Being Unpopular about Global Warming - a guest editorial by Mason P. Wilson

One can hardly pick up a paper or magazine or listen to the nightly news without hearing some more about Global Warming, but Global Warming cannot explain the recent increase in the number and intensity of hurricanes since water vapor, the fuel for hurricanes, increases only a few percent for every degree of temperature rise. The experts at Colorado State University who most accurately predict the number of hurricanes each year also find no evidence of global warming in their predictions.

Recently an editorial in the Wall Street Journal written by Dr. Richard Lindzen, Sloan Professor of Atmospheric Science at MIT, also debunks this popular theory. I have been following all of these articles and even studied in detail the treatise written by the IPCC (The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change), the bible of proponents of Global Warming. Surprisingly they start out with the premise that Global Warming is caused by man and consider no other source¦ no wonder they have come to the conclusion that Global Warming is caused by man. Woefully lacking is consideration of any other cause such as Plate Tectonics which causes volcanoes and emits the same greenhouse gases they claim are causing Global Warming. There are a number of articles concerning plate tectonics and climate change in the geology journals.

I suppose most of you remember the recent headlines that the glaciers in Iceland are retreating at a much faster rate than can be explained by global warming. Yes, they are calving at a higher rate, but nobody states that glaciers move more quickly and calve at a higher rate when the snow and ice accumulate in the higher elevations, just like when it rains in the uplands, more water flows to the ocean, and we get floods. There have been some reports that the snow on top of Greenland glaciers has increased over the most recent years. Nearby in Russia, they had to abandon their Ice Station at Vostok for the first time ever on March 4, 2003 because of the unusual amount of pack ice.

Glaciers in Antarctica are also growing at an alarming rate; that is, except one on the peninsula just above the Antarctic Circle, that appears to be decreasing. Glaciers in New Zealand are growing and calving at an alarming rate also; so much so that they have issued warnings to tourists visiting this area to be extra cautious. The Nisqually glacier on top of Mt. Rainier grew by 17 meters (51 feet) between 1994 and 1997. At the same time, one cannot ignore the melting of the permafrost in some parts of the Arctic, but one has to be careful not to blame this on global warming.

The climate steering currents of El Nino affect the steering currents for weather throughout a major portion of the world. The temperature of El Nino can warm portions of the Pacific as much as 14 degrees. Some believe the heat source for El Nino is from underwater volcanoes. Certainly, there are some major climatic changes happening in the world. There is fear and some evidence that the Gulf Stream is weakening and might eventually be unable to keep the British Isles warm¦ is this the beginning of another Ice Age?? Surprisingly some say this also is the result of Global warming. The theory supposedly states that the less saline water caused by melting of the glaciers prevents the cold water from flowing south blocking the warmer Gulf currents to flow more freely to the north. All that is reported are the measurements of the currents, but if this hypothesis is true they must also measure salinity to prove their case. So far I have not found an article on salinity that supports this theory.

Recently there was an article stating that the magnetic north pole is also rapidly moving westward at an alarming rate and could end up in the middle of Siberia within the next half century. Don’t be too alarmed; it has done this in the past, in fact, the poles have completely shifted from north to south. It is generally thought that the shift of the magnetic pole is due to a shift of the magma currents far below the surface of the earth. Remember that the mid-Atlantic ridge is where much of the magma comes to the ocean floor as the tectonic plates in the Atlantic pull apart. This ridge runs from north to south in the mid-Atlantic and runs parallel to the Greenland ice fields. It comes to the surface as lava some two hundred miles away in the volcanoes in Iceland. Are we barking up the wrong tree?; you decide.

Mason P. Wilson, Jr., Ph.D.
Former Director of the Energy Center and
Professor Emeritus
University of Rhode Island