This week in New York City close to five hundred global warming skeptics gathered for the 2008 International Conference on Climate Change sponsored by the Heartland Institute to separate fact from fiction on this topic.

 

The conference was also co-sponsored by some 52 other organizations ranging from  the International Climate Science Coalition  to Sovereignty International and offered  28 sessions on subjects dealing with Climatology, Economics and the Politics of climate change to name a few with over 90 presenters.

 

Dr. Donald Hertzmark who is an adjunct professor at Johns Hopkins University spoke about the Kyoto Protocol and how CO2 emissions reductions figures are manipulated and misinterpreted.  He cited the figures used by the EU on how they have been able to reduce emissions at a faster clip than the U.S.  but that is the “new” EU which includes several Eastern European countries that were heavy polluters and  just by shutting down the worst polluters had a dramatic effect on the emissions figures.  If using the “old” EU the figures show a very different picture.  For example Austria’s emissions were actually up 23% between 1997-2005, Ireland was up 28%, Portugal 25% and so on.  The U.S. by comparison was up just 7%.  Also economic  growth in the U.S. was 50% greater than the old EU  per CO2.  Hertzmark concluded that “talk is cheap” and  one of the best ways to reduce CO2 emissions would be to use more nuclear power, but Kyoto-2 excludes this clean form of energy.

 

The president of the Cascade Policy Institute John Charles spoke about the efforts that Portland , OR has made to reduce CO2 emissions.  In 2005  Portland announced that they were the first city in the world to reduce emissions in below their  1990 levels therefore making the Kyoto Protocol compliant.  The only problem was there was a math error of some 74,000 tons that put the emission level just below the 1990 level which means they were not Kyoto compliant after all.  Then add in more fuzzy math from the Office of Sustainable Development.  They claimed a decrease in transportation related CO2 emissions since 1990 and based their claim on gas sales in Multnomah County (MC) which comprises Portland because sales increased less than 1%.  However, gas sales in neighboring Washington County rose 37% in the same time period and roughly 12% of workers in MC live in Washington County so they do drive into the Portland area contributing to emissions.  Add to that a 50% increase on the bridges from Vancouver to MC and it adds up to a 21% increase in commuter traffic to MC.  How the OSD can claim a reduction in the face of these facts is a real stretch to say the least. 

 

Czech Republic president Vaclav Klaus told the audience that the United Nation’s IPCC is political and not scientific and that to reduce CO2 emissions means that you have to stop economic growth or produce a miracle since reduced emissions results in slower economic growth.

The conference also included screenings of various movies debunking global warming from “An Inconvenient Truth…or Convenient Fiction?” to “Apocalypse? No!” which features Lord Monckton and is undoubtedly the most polished response to Al Gore’s “An Inconvenient Truth.”

 

While the audience was largely in agreement that global warming or climate change isn’t a threat the conference couldn’t overcome a skeptical press. 

 

CNN’s Miles O’Brien was heard asking one attendee if the meeting wasn’t like that of The Flat Earth Society and a BBC reporter referred to Marc Morano who works for Sen. Jim Inhofe (R-OK) as polished when he couldn’t rattle Morano.

 

Yet rather than be demoralized by the media’s response the attendees seemed to be energized by the gathering and left hopeful that their facts would trump the fiction spewed by global warming alarmists.

 

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