So like all epic sagas, the politics surrounding climate change seem to just go on and on and on and on. And so, like all epic sagas, this whinge-a-thon returns for a very much delayed, over-hyped third instalment on this subject matter. I honestly didn’t intend to bang on about politics for so long, but seriously, they are dragging all this out a bit, aren’t they?
Not only have things got a tad epic in the political arena, but they’ve also got a tad sceptical. You may have heard about the “Climategate” scandal that erupted shortly before the Copenhagen summit on climate change (convenient timing, no?). The University of East Anglia’s Climate Research Unit had its email server hacked, resulting in said hackers stealing emails that were sent between some of the world’s leading Climate change scientists. Question 1 for your consideration: what were run-of-the-mill hackers, who are usually more interested in stealing your credit card details in order to go on shopping sprees on Amazon or buy flights from New York to Kathmandu, doing hacking into one of the world’s most renowned climate research institutions to steal emails to cast doubts on the science behind climate change? Why would they bother? It’s not as if they could make money out of publishing these emails on the internet. Their main motivation seems to be to cast a sceptical shadow over the science behind climate change, just before one of the most important and pivotal UN conferences on the subject in recent years. But why? Who were the hackers? This point aside, it is also worth noting the extreme polarity the media has shown in reporting this story. Whilst trying to do some actual research for once, I realised that various media outlets treated this story from either a pro- or con- position. I don’t think I’ve read one article which actually attempts to look at the issue objectively. I certainly haven’t read anything which actually tells me what the emails said. Fair enough, there were over 1,000 of them nicked and published, but you’d think the Guardian could do a bit better than quoting just two of them in this article: http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/nov/20/climate-sceptics-hackers-leaked-emails. All this article tells me about these emails is that a) someone was having trouble with their statistics and b) someone slightly unpleasant works at the Climate Research Unit. Neither of these are earth-shattering revelations about the science behind climate change. But what about that one about fiddling with statistics?! I hear you cry. Yeah, ok, it looks pretty bad, I’ll admit.
At the risk of being a hypocrite and throwing objectivity to the wind for a moment, I’d say two things need to be considered. Firstly, scientists are absolutely terrible at using the English language. It’s the reason why they’re scientists, and not writers or poets. In fact, in my humble experience, it seems that the cleverer and more genius-like the scientist, the worse their language skills are. Secondly, this particular email is quite clearly informal and taken out of context. Informal by use of “Mike”, and not Sir or Madam or Professor or Doctor etc etc, and taken out of context because, what was Mike’s trick that he used in the highly respected, peer-reviewed academic journal Nature? He might well just have drawn up all his graphs in multicolours or put smiley faces on them. I honestly wouldn’t put it past your average, bonkers, I’ve-spent-a-bit-too-much-time-in-the-lab scientist. Anyway. Climategate is currently being investigated by an independent inquiry, the government’s universal response to uncomfortable, unanswered questions that originate in these sceptred isles.
One reason why Climategate has erupted into such an almighty mud fight is because the CRU at the University of East Anglia is one of the most important climate research institutions in the entire world. The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, whose reports are based on peer-reviewed academic papers, have used a lot of research carried out by the CRU in their own work. The IPCC was established by the United Nations Environment Programme and the World Meteorological Organisation, and its close ties to the United Nations are the reason why they are given such a prominent platform at conferences such as that shindig that went down in Copenhagen. It is meant to be the world’s leading, most authoritative body on the science behind climate change, and its potential impact on people and the environment. All of a sudden, post-Copenhagen, its authority is being called into question.
I’m not just talking about Climategate here. Recently, the IPCC had to own up to the fact that it had made a mistake in its calculations over the rate of retreat of some Himalayan Glaciers. They probably couldn’t have picked a worse time to embarrass themselves publicly if they’d tried. The mistake itself concerns a statistical error, nothing more, i.e. someone moved a decimal point a bit too far to the right, something along those lines. This mistake does not change the fact that “Most of the observed increase in global average temperatures since the mid-20th century is very likely due to the observed increase in anthropogenic greenhouse gas concentrations.” (IPCC, 2007). This being a quote from a sciencey report, “very likely” here means a probability of greater than 90%. Lost? Sorry....a few errors in statistics concerning a few glaciers and a couple of dodgy sounding emails is not enough to prove that Climate Change isn’t happening. Considering the monumental amount of research and analysis concerning Climate change that has gone on in the last 60 years or so, really, if this is all the dirt the sceptics can come up with they really aren’t backing a winner. Sorry China, read this and weep.
So what’s with all the scandal and slander in the world of Climate change science at the minute, then? Do not be fooled. The media seem all too keen to reflect a highly sceptical public mood at the minute. The errors the IPCC and the CRU have made are pretty bad, I’ll give you that. However, they are not that damaging because they do not overturn the simple hard truth that Climate change is still occurring. It’s not as if the hackers found an email saying “HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA we’ve got them all fooled eh!!!” What has happened is that Climate change is no longer some wishy washy theory that hippies in multicoloured Tye dye shirts bang tambourines and sing protest songs about. It. Is. Real. Political leaders all over the world have finally realised it is not an issue they can ignore. One way or the other, they have to have an opinion on the matter. Climate change has graduated from the league of airy fairy lefty-fringe nonsense to a major political issue. And this is why people are suddenly bothering to dig up dirt on it. The potential consequences of doing something about Climate change are great, especially for newly wealthy countries such as China, whose whole booming beast of an economy is propped up on the relentless consumption of fossil fuels. However, the potential consequences of not doing anything about Climate change are far greater.
I read an article about what happened in Copenhagen recently that asked whether the Copenhagen Accord is this generation’s Munich Agreement. I really, really hope not.
xx
http://www.ipcc.ch/publications_and_data/publications_and_data_reports.htm
http://unfccc.int/2860.php
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