EPA Rejects Claims of Flawed Climate Science

The Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has released a document titled "EPA Rejects Claims of Flawed Climate Science." The document rejects the allegations (see below on the EPA document) incited by unknown "Climategate" hacker/provocateurs who claim that climate change is a hoax perpetrated by Western climate scientists.

Some "denialists"---people who deny the scientific evidence of man-made climate change---even accuse the scientists of communist sympathies and of using this so-called "hoax" to increase government powers. Well, if climate change is real---and all major American and international scientific organizations believe climate change is happening---shouldn't we use the powers of government to combat this threat? Isn't that what government is for? Did we leave the NAZI, Communist, and Islamist terrorist threats to the private enterprise system?

Ironically, the allegation that climate change is a hoax perpetrated by Western scientists was also spread by the Russian tabloid Pravda, by the Kremlin-financed English-language satellite channel Russia Today, and by other Russian media in the days before the Copenhagen Climate Summit.

The Russians often spread propaganda about the "plots" of Western scientists. The KGB's AIDS conspiracy theory was still being repeated by President Obama’s minister Rev. Wright, even though KGB chief Primakov admitted in Izvestia in 1992 that the KGB made up those stories about the plots of crafty US scientists.

As Izvestiya (3-19-92) famously reported:

[KGB chief Yevgeni Primakov] mentioned the well known articles printed a few years ago in our central newspapers about AIDS supposedly originating from secret Pentagon laboratories. According to Yevgeni Primakov, the articles exposing US scientists' 'crafty' plots were fabricated in KGB offices.

Like Rev. Wright, Virginia's denialist Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli continues to repeat the Russian propaganda's discredited canards about the "plots" of our most famous climate scientists. Attorney General Cuccinelli complained to the EPA about the alleged corruption of climate scientists (see below) and is persecuting the climate scientist Michael Mann on trumped-up allegations of fraud based on the "Climategate" emails.

There are so many other conspiracies that Cuccinelli could unmask instead of the climate change "hoax." For example, where are the aliens at Area 51?

Virginians are wondering why Attorney General Cuccinelli doesn't investigate the criminal who gave him 55,000 dollars and who stole the name "Bobby Thompson" from another person and who is being sought on a "John Doe" warrant issued by Attorney General Richard Cordray of Ohio.

Instead of persecuting climate scientists, why doesn't Attorney General Cuccinelli apprehend this "John Doe," who also operated his bogus charity, the U.S. Navy Veterans' Association, in Virginia? Why doesn't Virginia's Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli issue an arrest warrant for this criminal who ripped-off Virginians and whose "national headquarters" is a UPS mailbox in Washington D.C.? I wonder about who is collecting the mail from "Suite 275" a lot more than I wonder about Dr. Michael Mann's so-called "fraud."

Here is the full-text of the EPA document (7-29-10):

EPA Rejects Claims of Flawed Climate Science

Release date: 07/29/2010

Contact Information: Cathy Milbourn (News MediaOnly) Milbourn.cathy@epa.gov 202-564-4355

WASHINGTON – The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) today denied 10 petitions challenging its 2009 determination that climate change is real, is occurring due to emissions of greenhouse gases from human activities, and threatens human health and the environment.

The petitions to reconsider EPA’s Endangerment Finding claim that climate science cannot be trusted, and assert a conspiracy that invalidates the findings of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the U.S. National Academy of Sciences, and the U.S. Global Change Research Program. After months of serious consideration of the petitions and of the state of climate change science, EPA finds no evidence to support these claims. In contrast, EPA’s review shows that climate science is credible, compelling, and growing stronger.

“The endangerment finding is based on years of science from the U.S. and around the world. These petitions -- based as they are on selectively edited, out-of-context data and a manufactured controversy -- provide no evidence to undermine our determination. Excess greenhouse gases are a threat to our health and welfare,” said EPA Administrator Lisa P. Jackson. “Defenders of the status quo will try to slow our efforts to get America running on clean energy. A better solution would be to join the vast majority of the American people who want to see more green jobs, more clean energy innovation and an end to the oil addiction that pollutes our planet and jeopardizes our national security.”

The basic assertions by the petitioners and EPA responses follow.

Claim: Petitioners say that emails disclosed from the University of East Anglia’s Climatic Research Unit provide evidence of a conspiracy to manipulate global temperature data.

Response: EPA reviewed every e-mail and found this was simply a candid discussion of scientists working through issues that arise in compiling and presenting large complex data sets. Four other independent reviews came to similar conclusions.

Claim: Petitioners say that errors in the IPCC Fourth Assessment Report call the entire body of work into question.

Response: Of the alleged errors, EPA confirmed only two in a 3,000 page report. The first pertains to the rate of Himalayan glacier melt and second to the percentage of the Netherlands below sea level. IPCC issued correction statements for both of these errors. The errors have no bearing on Administrator Jackson’s decision. None of the errors undermines the basic facts that the climate is changing in ways that threaten our health and welfare.

Claim: Petitioners say that because certain studies were not included in the IPCC Fourth Assessment Report, the IPCC itself is biased and cannot be trusted as a source of reliable information.

Response: These claims are incorrect. In fact, the studies in question were included in the IPCC report, which provided a comprehensive and balanced discussion of climate science.

Claim: Petitioners say that new scientific studies refute evidence supporting the Endangerment Finding.

Response: Petitioners misinterpreted the results of these studies. Contrary to their claims, many of the papers they submit as evidence are consistent with EPA’s Finding. Other studies submitted by the petitioners were based on unsound methodologies. Detailed discussion of these issues may be found in volume one of the response to petition documents, on EPA’s website.

Climate change is already happening, and human activity is a contributor. The global warming trend over the past 100 years is confirmed by three separate records of surface temperature, all of which are confirmed by satellite data. Beyond this, evidence of climate change is seen in melting ice in the Arctic, melting glaciers around the world, increasing ocean temperatures, rising sea levels, shifting precipitation patterns, and changing ecosystems and wildlife habitats.

“America’s Climate Choices,” a report from the National Academy of Sciences and the most recent assessment of the full body of scientific literature on climate change, along with the recently released “State of the Climate” report from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration both fully support the conclusion that climate change is real and poses significant risk to human and natural systems. The consistency among these and previously issued assessments only serves to strengthen EPA’s conclusion.

Information on EPA’s findings and the petitions

More information on climate change

Review America’s Climate Choices report

Review State of the Climate report

Review information on Indicators of Climate Change