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Promoting integrity in the use of climate science in government |
Climate Science Watch is a nonprofit public interest education and advocacy project dedicated to holding public officials accountable for the integrity and effectiveness with which they use climate science and related research in government policymaking, toward the goal of enabling society to respond effectively to the challenges posed by global warming and climate change. See Details |
Documents in Supreme Court case on greenhouse emissions regulation
Posted on Thursday, November 30, 2006
On November 29 the U.S. Supreme Court heard arguments in the case of Commonwealth of Massachusetts et al. v. Environmental Protection Agency, on the issue of EPA’s refusal to regulate greenhouse gas emissions from new vehicles. The case presented the questions of (1) whether EPA has authority to regulate air pollutants associated with climate change under the Clean Air Act, and (2) whether EPA may decline to issue emission standards for motor vehicles based on policy considerations. Much of the case revolves around “standing” and other legal issues, but as documents in the case, the hearing transcript, and media coverage make clear, the case raises questions about how to translate climate science into decisionmaking.
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“California’s Changing Climate: The Politics of Climate Change”
Posted on Thursday, November 30, 2006
KPCC-FM (89.3), Southern California Public Radio, is airing a 9-day series on California’s Changing Climate. A Webcast of today’s program (November 30, 2006), on The Politics of Climate Change, is posted on the KPCC Web site. Climate Science Watch director Rick Piltz was among those interviewed.
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Four noteworthy articles on climate change in the Washington Post
Posted on Sunday, November 26, 2006
Climate in the Court (November 26, Editorial). “On Wednesday, the Supreme Court will hear oral arguments in...a challenge by states and environmental groups to the Bush administration’s refusal to regulate greenhouse gases as pollution.”
Science a la Joe Camel (November 26, Sunday Outlook section). “It’s bad enough when a company tries to sell junk science to a bunch of grown-ups. But, like a tobacco company using cartoons to peddle cigarettes, Exxon Mobil is going after our kids, too.”
On the Move to Outrun Climate Change: Self-Preservation Forcing Wild Species, Businesses, Planning Officials to Act (November 26, National News, p. A3)
Energy Firms Come to Terms With Climate Change (November 25, front page). “While the political debate over global warming continues, top executives at many of the nations largest energy companies have accepted the scientific consensus about climate change and see federal regulation to cut greenhouse gas emissions as inevitable.”
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For researchers: White House CEQ “Online Reading Room” for FOIA response documents
Posted on Friday, November 24, 2006
The White House Council on Environment Quality has posted documents that CEQ has released pursuant to various requests made under the Freedom of information Act in an “Online Reading Room” on the CEQ Web site. These include documents relating to CEQ communications with the Competitive Enterprise Institute; the 2002 U.S. Climate Action Report; EPA’s Clean Air Act authority and Draft Report on the Environment; the U.S. Climate Change Science Program; and other topics.
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Michael MacCracken’s 2002 letter to the ExxonMobil board of directors
Posted on Thursday, November 23, 2006
ExxonMobil had attacked the National Assessment of Climate Change Impacts and had called on the incoming Bush administration to purge four specific individuals involved in climate change activities. In September 2002, in his final week in the U.S. Global Change Research Program Office, National Assessment coordinator Michael MacCracken, one of the “ExxonMobil Four,” sent a letter to each member of the ExxonMobil board of directors. With ExxonMobil’s global warming denial campaign behavior and the Bush administration’s suppression of the National Assessment process coming under greater critical scrutiny, Dr. MacCracken has authorized us to post his letter as part of the record.
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“Send in the Subpoenas”
Posted on Sunday, November 19, 2006
In the Sunday Outlook section of the November 19 Washington Post, Ron Suskind, author of The One Percent Doctrine: Deep Inside America’s Pursuit of its Enemies Since 9/11, contends that oversight investigation hearings in the next Congress should include a focus on government corruption, starting with the relationship between administration officials and energy companies such as ExxonMobil, as well as holding the administration accountable for its “repeated practice of strong-arming experts who stray off message,” including global warming science and the deceptive cost estimates on the Medicare prescription drug program. Suskind: “Suggested witnesses: Tom Scully, [HHS accountant Richard] Foster’s boss; James Hansen of NASA; Rick Piltz, formerly of the U.S. Global Change Research Program; and former Environmental Protection Agency director Christine Todd Whitman.”
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“Bush administration censorship key issue in next Congress”
Posted on Saturday, November 18, 2006
Nearly a year after NASA climatologist James Hansen accused federal officials of censoring his views on global warming, scientific freedom is shaping up as a key issue for the next Congress, Environment & Energy Daily reported in its #1 story on November 17. We said to E&E Daily: “Mr. Waxman and Mr. Gordon [incoming chairs of the House Government Reform and Science committees] have both been on the case, even as ranking members in the current Congress. I don’t think they’re going to be stonewalled without some kind of response.” We also expect legislation that would offer federal scientists improved whistleblower protections.
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“Undermining Science: Suppression and Distortion in the Bush Administration” published
Posted on Saturday, November 18, 2006
Yesterday we picked up a copy of the just-published book, Undermining Science: Suppression and Distortion in the Bush Administration, by Seth Shulman. Shulman, an investigative journalist, authored the Union of Concerned Scientists report, “Restoring Scientific Integrity in Policy Making,” which served as the basis for a highly publicized scientists’ statement accusing the Bush administration of misuse of science. Check it out, as a companion to Chris Mooney’s outstanding The Republican War on Science.
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“The Denial Machine” airs on CBC-TV
Posted on Friday, November 17, 2006
On November 15 “the fifth estate,” Canada’s leading investigative public affairs program, aired “The Denial Machine” (Webcast here). CBC says: “The documentary shows how fossil fuel corporations have kept the global warming debate alive long after most scientists believed that global warming was real and had potentially catastrophic consequences.” In an interview on the program, Climate Science Watch director Rick Piltz says: “This is a political operation to deny the seriousness of the problem in order to control the direction of policy. So I call it ‘the denial machine’ because I think it’s a more accurate description of what’s going on in this town right now.”
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IPCC Chair Pachauri on the forthcoming Fourth Assessment Report
Posted on Thursday, November 16, 2006
At the annual conference of the parties to the Framework Convention on Climate Change and Kyoto Protocol, being held in Nairobi the past two weeks, Rajendra K. Pachauri, chair of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, gave an interview on the forthcoming IPCC Fourth Assessment Report, the comprehensive and most authoritative scientific assessment of the currrent state of knowledge. Dr. Pachauri said the IPCC report “might provide just the right impetus to get the negotiations going in a more purposeful way....There’s much stronger evidence now of human actions on the change in climate that’s taken place,” Pachauri told The Associated Press. In our November 7 post we wrote on “Anticipating the denialist attack on authors of the IPCC climate change assessment.” Watch out, Dr. Pachauri.
Press coverage and comment on the National Assessment lawsuit
Posted on Thursday, November 16, 2006
The suit filed in federal court on November 14 by the Center for Biological Diversity et al. to require the production of a second National Assessment of Climate Change Impacts (see our November 14 post) was reported by the Associated Press ("White House Sued Over Global Warming"), the San Francisco Chronicle ("White House sued for not doing report on warming"), and others. “The Bush administration has failed to comply with the law,’’ said attorney Julie Teel of the Center for Biological Diversity, which is a plaintiff in the lawsuit. “I think the administration’s afraid to release this information because it makes climate change real for people.’’ The NOAA press office responded on behalf of the government, with the official party line that offers 21 topical reports as an alternative to an integrative, independent assessment.
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Sen. Kerry statement in support of lawsuit on National Assessment of Climate Change Impacts
Posted on Tuesday, November 14, 2006
Senator Kerry issued a statement on November 14 supporting a lawsuit filed by conservation advocates—the Center for Biological Diversity, Greenpeace, and Friends of the Earth—calling for the administration to issue an overdue National Assessment on the impacts of climate change on the United States. Climate Science Watch encourages Congressional interest and oversight on this issue, to undo almost six years of allowing the administration to suppress the National Assessment process, and almost six years of allowing the first National Assessment to be slandered by the global warming denial machine without a principled defense by the leadership of the U.S. Climate Change Science Program.
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Conservation groups file suit against Bush administration to compel second National Assessment
Posted on Tuesday, November 14, 2006
The Center for Biological Diversity, along with other conservation groups, filed suit November 14 in federal district court for the Northern District of California against the Bush administration for refusing to conduct a second U.S. National Climate Change Impacts Assessment. The suit contends that such an integrated scientific assessment, due in November of 2004, is required by the Global Change Research Act of 1990. The suit names Dr. William Brennan, acting director of the U.S. Climate Change Science Program, and Dr. John Marburger, director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, as defendants. We have repeatedly and strongly criticized the Bush administration for officially suppressing the National Assessment process, and the leadership of the Climate Change Science Program for their silence on this central climate science scandal of the administration.
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“Science Fiction”—PBS “America’s Investigative Reports” program on science reporter Paul Thacker
Posted on Thursday, November 09, 2006
The next episode of the PBS “America’s Investigative Reports” program, titled “Science Fiction,” will feature investigative science reporter Paul Thacker, who has published significant stories on global warming deniers and censorship of climate science. Paul published a good interview with CSW director Rick Piltz in June 2005 in Environmental Science & Technology, a publication for which he worked as Associate Editor until recently forced out of his position. The program airs in the Washington, DC, area on Friday, November 10 and Monday, November 13.
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Anticipating the denialist attack on authors of the IPCC climate change assessment
Posted on Monday, November 06, 2006
We are witnessing the development of an unmistakable effort by the global warming denial machine and some of the contrarian scientists to create controversy in order to discredit the authors and findings of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), in advance of publication starting in early 2007 of the IPCC Fourth Assessment Report. New Scientist news service reports on scientists’ concerns in a November 4 article, “Climate change special: State of denial.” Climate Science Watch calls on policymakers and journalists to maintain critical perspective and not be diverted by spun-up controversy from focusing on this comprehensive and authoritative mainstream scientific assessment of climate change.
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