Figure 7.TOP: Winter minus Summer, satellite temperature trends (°C/decade) for the period 1979 through 1995. BOTTOM: Winter minus Summer, IPCC surface temperature trends (°C/decade) concurrent with satellite.

Figure 8. Winter minus summer surface temperature trends (°C/decade) since 1946 indicate that most of the observed warming has been occurring in some of the coldest airmasses on earth-over Siberia during the winter.

become too cold and the tropics too warm.

A very few of the most recent models do not contain this type of adjustment, including the one detailed in Figure 3. Not surprisingly, it predicts considerably less warming than its adjusted counterparts.

Table 1 gives the equivalent carbon dioxide concentration of the atmosphere, in parts per million (ppm), given a continuation of the current exponential increase in emissions, and under the program proposed by the Administration. Under the Administration's plan, we assume that emissions reductions begin around 2004 and that they reach 1990 levels by 2010 and remain constant after that. We assume that the entire world does the same. We also assume that the time-behavior of the NCAR model is roughly linear through these increments of greenhouse gas. This is a characteristic common to almost all climate models.

Table 1. The effect that the Clinton "plan" will have on atmospheric carbon dioxide levels and the resulting temperature savings (based on NCAR model results and the IPCC "best guess" emission scenario).

Figure 9 compares the NCAR results for the next 50 years with and without the Administration program. The amount of "saved" warming is infinitesimal: 0.13°C. It is doubtful that this change could even be extracted from ground based temperature measurements, owing to problems with increasing urbanization and land-use alterations. However, it should be apparent in satellite measurements, which are accurate to within ±0.01°C.

What Should be Done?

Emissions trading proposed by the Administration is simply a "hidden" tax that ultimately falls on the consumer and discourages spending. Each consumer is impoverished a small amount while emissions are forcibly reduced.

Is this what we really want? I think not. Rather, it might be wiser to allow people to keep their money. Many will invest their funds in technologies that will produce substantial energy at reduced cost. Some of these will produce few if any greenhouse emissions.

The lessons of technological history are clear. Each century brings about changes that are simply unanticipated but revolutionary. 100 years ago, senior scientists and public officials worried that America would be deforested by the 1920s and that disease would be rampant in urban areas because of the alarming increase in horse traffic. Amidst all this concern, the automobile and the fossil fuel-powered economy were soon to appear. Its development was driven less by concern for the environment than it was by the profit motive. Those who saw this opportunity did well. If there was a substantial horse tax, there would have been less to invest.

A similar argument could be made for nearly 200 years ago. In the early years of the 19th century, the U.S. government fretted over nascent Manifest Destiny. If it had gathered a team of "top scientists" to recommend how to move goods and people across this vast nation, they would doubtless have recommended a substantial and very expensive network of barge canals. Fortunately, there was no massive tax levied to make this happen. But if there were, it would have taken place just as the steam engine and fixed rail transit were being invented.

As we debate this issue and what to do, there are probably 10,000 people tinkering and thinking about fuel cells, hydrogen power, and undreamt-of exotica that will displace our current energy system. Let's save our citizens' money. Let's allow them to invest in the future, take the risks and reap the rewards. Better to do that than tax them to solve a problem that is not all that emergent, and one that will nonetheless resolve itself faster if only we would get out of the way.

References

(1) Houghton, J.T., G.J. Jenkins, and J.J. Ephraums (Eds.) (1990). Climate Change: The IPCC Scientific Assessment. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

(2) Houghton, J.T., L.G. Meira Filho, B.A. Callander, N. Harris, A. Kattenberg, and K. Maskell (Eds.) (1996). Climate Change 1995: The Science of Climate Change. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

(3) Santer, B.D. et al. (1996). A Search for Human Influences on the Thermal Structure of the Atmosphere. Nature, 382, 39-45.

(4) Michaels, P.J. and P.C. Knappenberger, 1996. Human Effect on Global Climate? Nature, 384, 522-523.

(5) Pearce, F., 1997. Greenhouse Wars. New Scientist, 139, 38-43.

(6) Kerr, R.A. (1997). Model Gets It Right-Without Fudge Factors, Science, 276, 1041.

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