Letter: Concern over climate change is premature (April 6)

CORVALLIS GAZETTE-TIMES, LETTERS, 4/6/2009 by Jean Nelson - The extreme environmental movement appears to be producing a following akin to a religion. Doting on exaggerated claims of catastrophe if we don’t do something NOW, these alarmists blame people for the 0.6 degree Celsius increase in the Earth’s temperature over the past 100 years. Never mind that much of the warming occurred prior to the time that the combustion engine could have affected the Earth’s climate. Don’t pay attention to the fact that today we’re in a period of cooling.

Computer-generated models that predict radical results from global warming have not been able accurately to predict past events. Though now discredited by many scientists, the faithful still cling to predictions of future catastrophe. Oregon’s Legislature is under pressure to declare “emergency” and attempt to reduce greenhouse gases. No scheme seems to be too great. Even eliminating our access to affordable sources of energy is being considered.

Carbon tax, cap-and-trade — they, too, are negative, damaging, premature solutions that are being proposed before adequate alternative fuels are available.

Cap-and-trade is meant to discourage use of fossil fuels by increasing their cost and availability. Some scientists think controlling CO2 emissions will reduce variations in the Earth’s temperature. Others, like prolific writer Prof. Delgado Domingos of Portugal, who founded the Numerical Weather Forecast group, says, “Creating an ideology pegged to carbon dioxide is a dangerous nonsense. The present alarm on climate change is an instrument of social control ….”

Jean Nelson, Corvallis
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