Nice website for showing your point of view. Clearly laid out. However, I must respectfully must disagree with some of the conclusions based on things I have read and seen on this hotly contested and exhaustively debated issue.

I saw this last week in the news:

news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/scien...8008473.stm

As a microbiologist friend who was the one who pointed this out to me said, “Last time this sort of thing led to a little ice age, but the scientists say don't worry, the reduction of solar activity won't affect the rising temperature of the Earth. The IPCC says so, and they've got all those computer models to prove it dontcherknow. Ignore the last ten years of stable temperature measurements. If data conflicts with the theory the proper thing to do is invent new data.”

Let me say at the outset that I am a not an atmospheric scientist (I am organic chemist with a graduate research degree), but I am also very skeptical of most claims out there concerning global warming. The climate has been changing (warming slightly) since the ‘Little Ice Age’. It also got much colder during the 'Little Ice Age' over the previous centuries, maybe because those Romans were not driving SUC's (Sport Utility Chariots) any more. That is something that has been measured. But since we still haven't reached the mean average temperatures prior to the 'Little Ice Age' of the later Middle Ages, I don't get too excited. The weather has never remained static throughout the history of our planet. So it is usually getting warmer or getting colder. No one has convinced me that global warming is worse than global cooling for humanity. On the other hand, the ‘Little Ice Age’ did show global cooling was very bad for crops and resulted human populations dropping from starvation. Here’s some stuff on that fun time of human history and current (last 5 years or so) trends:

www2.sunysuffolk.edu/mandias...age.html

www.grisda.org/origins/10051.htm

www.lavoisier.com.au/article...2007.pdf

www.lavoisier.com.au/article...bald.pdf

english.pravda.ru/science/e..._ice_age-0

www.theaustralian.news.com.au/sto...html

www.dailytech.com/SunMakesH...e12823.htm

So from everything I have seen to date, I suspect that yes the temperatures have been getting warmer at times (1980’s through late 1990’s) and cooler at times (1970’s, and to some extent the last 5-10 years). From the data and research I have seen, the hoax is the probably the idea that it is solely man's fault rather than natural cycle. We puny humans may have contributed a small amount, but probably not to the extent currently claimed. The number one greenhouse gas is still water vapor, by orders of magnitude. Good luck controlling that. Quite a large number (over 31 thousand) American scientists are also skeptical of the extent, reality, and causes of global warming. There is no 'consensus' since there has been a remarkable lack of reproducible, peer reviewed results:

www.petitionproject.org/

The Climate will fluctuate: it always has, it always will. Sometimes widely. 20,000 years ago, Chicago was buried under an ice sheet. Thank God for global warming long before SUV’s! I believe that there are other problems facing this beat up old world of ours that need greater concern from all of us. One book on the subject of global warming that everyone looking into this debate ought to get and read is Bjorn Lomborg’s “Cool It!” Lomborg started out as an ardent environmentalist and is also a statistics professor. I read that when he got tired of skeptics knocking him for his views he decided to prove them wrong. To his surprise much of the environmental data doesn’t support the claims it purports when rigorously tested. His website is good for a quick look around and even has links to some interesting stuff:

www.lomborg.com/

As well as some of the late Michael Crichton’s speeches:

www.crichton-official.com/speec...e.html

www.crichton-official.com/speec...g.html

www.crichton-official.com/speec...n.html

As I said I am skeptical on the claimed causes of warming and the dangers claimed if it continues. As one example, remember we were told right after Hurricane Katrina that because of global warming we could expect several Katrina's each year now? We have not seen that prediction come true for the past 4 years and hopefully we don't to the extent predicted 4 years ago:

www.skepticalscience.com/Did-g...a.html

I also feel that if the climate is going to change and not remain static over long time frames, warming is preferred to global cooling based on the adverse effects of historical cooling in the past. The current climate models that I have seen cited are really good at predicting the past, but very poor at predicting the future. I tend to distrust weather predictions made a week in advance, much less a century.

From an energy and pollution perspective, I tend to favor future use and expansion of nuclear, wind where applicable, solar energy where applicable. Of biofuels, corn ethanol has major problems in scale-up and efficiencies. As shown in this past week’s article on California’s study of the effects of ethanol addition to fuel in relation to global warming shows:

www.worldnetdaily.com/index.php

In my opinion after some research in the area, I think biodiesel (over ethanol) looks more promising for a long term liquid fuel possibility, and some of the algal based biodiesel research looks VERY promising if it can be scaled up.