Shattered Consensus: The True State of Global Warming [Paperback]

Patrick J. Michaels is the most famous global warming skeptic, but he is not alone. The book consists of ten chapters written by ten different scientists who focus on specific aspects of global warming including: temperature and precipitation forecasts, volatility of weather patterns, the impact of El Nino, impact of rising temperature on human health, impact of CO2 concentration on rising temperature.

The second chapter outlines how a scientist manipulated the underlying variables to create the "hockey stick" suggesting temperature levels are highest for the past millennium. The scientist who created this hockey stick pattern refused to share the data and explain his methodology when he was asked. This scientist purposely overweighed a variable to create the hockey stick effect. The author of the chapter uncovers how the scientific peer review process is bankrupt. A scientist is free to manipulate the data so as to create a fictitious hockey stick that is at the foundation of the global warming paradigm. In the business world, such behavior (manipulation of financial record) would get a CFO in jail. The author makes the case that due diligence requirements (audits) should apply to the scientific world as well.

The third chapter on the poor quality of global temperature record is also excellent. Global temperatures have risen by 0.7 degree Celsius over the past century. But, nearly half of this increase may be due to several upward biases that have caused temperatures to be underestimated during the first half of the 20th century. These biases include the change in thermometer technology and their physical casing that captured ambient heat differently and the urban heat island effect.

The fourth chapter explaining how the cooling of the stratosphere is totally inconsistent with the CO2 global warming hypothesis is fascinating. Chapter 10 expands on the inconsistency of the relationship between CO2 concentration and rise in temperature. In Earth's recent history, we have had periods with much warmer temperatures (6 degree Celsius higher than now) yet with CO2 concentration 20% below current levels. We also have had global cooling with rising CO2 levels. So, at this stage we have no scientific reason to believe there is a reliable relationship between CO2 levels and temperature.

Elsewhere in the book, the scientists explain how the climatic system is extremely sensitive so as to be impossible to model with current knowledge. An error in precipitation of only 0.1 inch equates to an error of 1.77 degree Fahrenheit. Yet, our models are all over the place on precipitation predictions. Similarly, just a 4% increase in stratus clouds formation would counteract any effect from a doubling in CO2 concentration. Yet, we can't model cloud formation so far. Thus, global circulation models (GCM) are incredibly unreliable.

Surprisingly, you don't read any of the above in the press. The science is nuanced and uncertain. The press conveys just the opposite. They suggest our fate is certain and sealed in a toaster unless we change our civilization as we know it. But, that's politics. You got to study the science to counter the daily media obfuscating noise. If you like this book, I also strongly recommend Patrick J. Michaels "Meltdown."

Shattered Consensus: The True State of Global Warming is edited by Prof. of Climate Science Patrick J. Michaels of University of Virginia, who was the State Climatologist of VA and has held other responsible postions in climatology, so he is no outsider to the field. The book has 10 chapters, 9 by authors other than Michaels. There is an adequate index and academic referencing, mostly to refereed journals.

The overal theme is to reveal the flaws in the 2001 Report of the Intergovermental Panel on Climate Change, which is accomplished many times over. This is especially valuable at this moment because we are between the release of the Summary for Policymakers of the 2007 Report and the delayed main body of the Report. Misleading and incomplete statements in the Summary abound, and are dealt with in whole chapters, which cover Michael E. Mann's deceptive temperature record of the past 1000 years, the tendency of warming predictions from modeling to exaggerate warming, the failure of the atmosphere to lead surface temperatures, the failure of hurricane frequency predictions, the lack of any basis for scares on moderate global warming, the correlation of what little warming there is with solar output and solar effect on cosmic rays, themselves affecting cloud formation, and the failure of climate models to allow for the effects of cloud formation.

To take one deception in detail, the Mann graph of temps from 1000-2000 AD was deliberately manufactured to eliminate the Little Ice Age (1450-1850) and the Medieval Warm Period (940-1450) that was warmer than now even though CO2 levels were much lower than now. This graph, without even its original error bars, has been presented by innumerable climate zealots as fact without admitting that two Canadians, Essex & McKitrick, worked out the flaws in it to the point where the Editor of Nature, in which the graph was first published, ordered a "correction of error" by Mann to be published, which was done incompletely.

If this book has a problem, it may be too technical for many readers, in which case A Politically Incorrect Guide to Global Warming and Environmentalism by Christopher C. Horner, 2007 and Unstoppable Global Warming: Every 1500 Years by S. Fred Singer and Dennis T. Avery, 2006, are strongly recommended.

I highly recommend this book. But I suspect that this book will not appeal to most readers. There's none of the intense hyperbole that infects both global warming fanatics and many of their deniers. There are no grand apocalyptic scenarios that garner such strong public appeal. No terrifying future, no living on the brink of disaster. Only quiet nuanced science from those who spend their life in research. One suspects that the politics of global warming has now superseded the science and sad to say, when politics enters the room, truth shuffles its way into the background. This is unfortunate since there are many things about the environment with which we should be concerned - not the least being our consumption of non renewable resources. My fervent hope is that we can move past the exaggerated apocalypse of global warming while addressing the necessary issues of the environment - i.e., the rest of the environment aside from climate change.
In this case of Shattered Consensus, all ten contributors are scientists and experts in their field. Each chapter, and scientific report, covers a separate and distinct aspect of climate. This is really a collection of reports, not a coherent "story". Each contributor has their own style, some being more accessible than others. They present the science as they understand it and in that regard the average reader may find the information dry, or indeed undecipherable. Most of the ten authors include a short conclusion which may be helpful for those unwilling to plow through the science. Nonetheless the reader is left in the end overwhelmed not by the certainty of any position, but by the staggering uncertainty in all aspects related to this Earth's climate. Our ability to measure past trends in climate are dependent on woefully scant data. Our ability to project future trends have no unambiguous models yet. In fact, the variability of the results of the different models are so big as to render them basically useless for anything other than further research. They certainly shouldn't be used to make definitive statements as to future trends. The effects of CO2 are still highly uncertain with some models suggesting no impact and some observations linking CO2 to an indicator of climate change not a driver - i.e., CO2 changes as a result of climate change, not the other way around. Much more research is needed to understand why these discrepancies are observed. Even if global warming is happening, and even if CO2 is at least partly to blame, the impact of global warming in some scenarios is actually beneficial to not only humans, but to some species. Indeed, in all of Earth's history through warming and cooling periods, some species benefit and other lose.
The reader is left with the question, since scientists tell us that the unknowns vastly outweigh the things that are known about climate, what should our policy decisions making framework be based on. Is seems to me that we need to base it on what is known. Air quality, water quality, land use, availability of non renewable resources, are all things we can measure and for which policies can be made. Having a single enemy (CO2, in this case) is certainly more appealing and simple for the average consumer to understand. But simple is not always best.
It should be noted that none of these scientists is involved in the petroleum industry (a favorite disclaimer by those wanting to discredit the validity of anyone critical of global warming science). Some have even been involved in the IPCC directly (the UN Intergovernmental protocol on climate change). Scientists are by nature a conservative lot. A hypothesis lasts as long as the next set of experiments that disprove it, or tenuously as long as further experiments continue to confirm it. Most scientists don't seek a public profile and most are uncomfortable playing the role of a nay-sayer, especially in the face of such publicly popular resources as Al Gore's an Inconvenient Truth. I will rely on the scientific truth to work its way to the surface. I just hope we don't waste too much in the way of public funds on chasing windmills when there are so many important issues in this world that need attention.