Page images
PDF
EPUB

Additional Information from Mr. Lashof responding to question from Mr. Ballenger at pp. 64-65.

The average person exhales about 2 pounds of carbon dioxide per day. So 1000 people breathing for an hour would produce about 90 pounds of carbon dioxide. This is about the same amount of carbon dioxide that is produced by one person driving an average car (with a fuel economy of 20 miles per gallon) for 80 miles, say one round-trip between Washington and Baltimore. In fact, the average American produces 56 times as much carbon dioxide from fossil fuel consumption as from food consumption (which is released through breathing). Also, the carbon in food is recycled when plants remove carbon dioxide from the atmosphere as food is grown.

STATEMENT OF DANA ROHRABACHER, MEMBER OF CONGRESS

BEFORE THE

SUBCOMMITTEE ON ECONOMIC POLICY, TRADE AND ENVIRONMENT

OF THE

BOUSE COMMITTEE ON FOREIGN AFFAIRS

March 1, 1993

Mr. Chairman and Fellow Members of the Subcommittas:

It has come to my attention that some people are suggesting that, when the Bush Administration promulgated the U.S. National Action Plan concerning the issue of potential global climate change, commonly called the "USNAP," it did so in the dark of night in a last-minute effort to preempt the Clinton Administration on that important policy matter. That is a completa mischaracterisation of what happened, and I want this subcommittee's record to reflect the facts accurately.

-

[ocr errors]

By its terms, the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate change does not enter into forue that is, become legally binding until 90 days following its ratification by 50 nations. Only about 12 nations have ratified the Convention so far, and the United States was the first industrialized nation to do so. So, although, more than 150 nations have signed the Convention, the further requirement of ratification means that the Convention likely will not enter into force until sometime in the spring of 1994.

The

Article 4, Paragraph 2 of the Convention, among other things, requires industrialized nations to adopt policies and measures to limit greanhouse gas emissions and to report thereon and on the projected results of such policies and measures. report is to be furnished to the Conference of the Parties, the supreme body of the Convention, consisting of all parties to the Convention. However, the Conference of the Parties does not come into being until after the Convention enters into forca.

The Convention was negotiated by an international body, established by the UN. General Assembly, the Intergovernmental Negotiating Committee for a Framework Convention on Climate Change -- the INC. The INC recognized that, because of the ratification requirement, there necessarily would be delay in the industrialized nations' submitting their reports on climate change policies and measures pursuant to the mechanism established by the Convention. So, on May 9, 1992, the very day that it approved the text of the Convention, the INC adopted what was called a "prompt start resolution."

That resolution "invited" nations eligible to sign the Convention "to communicate as soon as fossible to the head of the secretariat information regarding measures consistent with the provisions of the Convention pending its entry into force." (emphasis added) .

In my view, the prior Administration's publication of the USNAP in December 1992, at a meeting of the INC, was nothing other than our nation's honoring thể INC's prompt start resolution.

But, there is more. During the course of negotiation of the Convention, the U.S. publicly comitted to early publication of its national action plan concerning climate change. Indeed, at the "Earth Summit" in Rio, in June 1992, which was long before the slection and even before Mr. Clinton was nominated, President Bush -- reportedly, the urging of EPA Administrator sill Reilly called upon industrialized nations to come forth with their respective national action plans by the first of 1993.

[ocr errors]

This was an effective challenge to the European Community, which, although it had engaged in substantial political rhetoric about "stabilizing" its co2 emissions at 1990 levels by the year 2000, actually had no agreed plan for achieving its objective. And, I might add, it still does not.

Having publicly challenged other nations to put their national action plans on the table by the first of 1993, the Administration hardly could have avoided doing so itself. The last international occasion to do so, by that deadline, was the INC meeting in Geneva in December.

So, when we look at the facts, the prior Administration's publication of the USHAP not only was pursuant to the INC's prompt start resolution, but also made good on the public commitment of the President of the United States, made long before the election.

We also should recognise that the USNAP was developed as a result of an interagency deliberative process participated in by all relevant Executive Branch departments and agencies, including EPA and the Council on Environmental Quality.

Moreover, publication of the USNAP was accompanied by a December 8 Federal Register notice, which invited the publle to comment on the USNAP. The comment period expires next week.

I shall look forward to being enlightened on these important issues not only by testimony of the witnesses selected for today's hearing, but by the public's comments that were invited by the prior Administration.

Testimony to the Foreign Affairs Committee, U.S. House of Representatives

March 9, 1993

Patrick J. Michaels

Associate Professor of Environmental Sciences

University of Virginia

Virginia State Climatologist'

This testimony does not represent any official view of the University of Virginia or the Commonwealth of Virginia, but rather is the personal testimony of Patrick J. Michaels, tendered under the traditional protection of academic freedom.

[ocr errors]

Thank you for inviting my testimony on the problem of global warming and the enhanced greenhouse effect.

While this hearing is primarily concerned with policy, one must ask an important question before proceeding with that policy: do the facts warrant any considerable expenditure to remediate global warming? I believe that they do not; rather, the facts indicate that projections of the amount and effects of global warming that have been presented to the Congress of the United States have been based upon a forecast that is already failing.

Consequently, my testimony centers around disparities that have arisen between forecasts of global warming and actual observations. The implication is that the political process has intervened in a scientific issue before that science had matured.

Four years ago I testified to the Subcommitee on Energy and Power that the politically popular vision of global warming caused by an enhanced greenhouse effect--ecological and agricultural chaos caused by dramatic daytime heating, and meters of sea level rise--was flawed. I emphasized that the observed data on climatic change had, even then, indicated that projected warming had not occurred in the regions in which it was forecast to be most pronounced. Further, I pointed out that one very reliable set of data (though limited to the coterminous United States) indicated that almost all warming had taken place at night. which is a benign climatic change.

Since my original testimony, I have on several occasions been asked to speak before House and Senate Committees on this subject. In each succeeding testimonial, additional evidence has been presented that bolsters my original view. I believe it is reasonable to state that my original view, once thought of as heretical by some in the Congress, is now becoming a mainstream scientific synthesis of the global warming problem.

Science proceeds by entertaining hypotheses that can be supported by observed data. In the case of global warming, the most refined hypotheses we have are known collectively as General Circulation Climate Models (GCMs). A typical example of this type of calculation, taken from Schlesinger and Mitchell (1986) is shown in Figure 1. The salient features are the projection of overall average warming and the concentration of that warming in the highest latitudes (the polar regions) of the Northern Hemisphere.

[merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][ocr errors][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small][merged small]

Figure 1. Change in mean temperature calculated for doubling atmospheric carbon dioxide, December-February (Northern Hemisphere Winter). These projections are typical of those of the mid-1980s GCMs.

Together, the mean equilibrium warming predicted by the mid-1980's generation of these models for an effective doubling of atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2) was 4.2°C. According to data presented on page 246 of the 1990 report of the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the earth's mean temperature has never been on target for that projection in the last half-century.

The observed data on global warming therefore have consistently argued that the mean projections of warming were overestimated, both in magnitude, and in societal and ecological effect.

Following are some examples of the differences between forecasts and reality that have arisen:

« PreviousContinue »