Professor
Guus Berkhout
The Hague
guus.berkhout@clintel.org
23 September 2019
Sr. António Guterres, Secretary-General, United Nations,
United Nations Headquarters,
New York, NY 10017, United States of America.
Ms. Patricia Espinosa Cantellano, Executive Secretary,
United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change,
UNFCCC Secretariat, UN Campus, Platz der Vereinten Nationen 1,
53113 Bonn, Germany
Your Excellencies,
There is no climate emergency...
A global network of more than
500 knowledgeable and experienced
scientists and professionals in climate and related fields have
the honor to address to Your Excellencies the attached
European Climate Declaration,
for which the signatories to this letter are the national
ambassadors.
The general-circulation models of climate on which international
policy is at present founded are unfit for their purpose.
Therefore, it is
cruel as well as imprudent to advocate the squandering of
trillions on the basis of results from such immature models.
Current climate
policies pointlessly, grievously undermine the economic system,
putting lives at risk in countries denied access to affordable,
continuous electrical power.
We urge you to follow a climate policy based on sound
science, realistic economics and genuine concern for those
harmed by costly but unnecessary attempts at mitigation.
We ask you to place the Declaration on the agenda of your
imminent New York session.
We also invite you to organize with us a constructive high-level
meeting between world-class scientists on both sides of the
climate debate early in 2020.
The meeting will give
effect to the sound and ancient principle no less of sound
science than of natural justice that both sides should be fully
and fairly heard.
Audiatur et altera pars...!
Please let us know your thoughts about such a joint meeting.
Yours sincerely, ambassadors of the European Climate
Declaration,
-
Professor
Guus Berkhout - The Netherlands
-
Professor
Richard Lindzen - USA
-
Professor
Reynald Du Berger French - Canada
-
Professor
Ingemar Nordin - Sweden
-
Terry
Dunleavy - New Zealand
-
Jim O'Brien -
Rep. of Ireland
-
Viv Forbes -
Australia
-
Professor
Alberto Prestininzi - Italy
-
Professor
Jeffrey Foss - English Canada
-
Professor
Benoît Rittaud - France
-
Morten Jødal
- Norway
-
Professor
Fritz Vahrenholt - Germany
-
Rob Lemeire -
Belgium
-
The Viscount
Monckton of Brenchley - UK
There is no climate emergency
A global network of 500 scientists and
professionals has prepared this urgent message.
Scientists should
openly address the uncertainties and exaggerations in their
predictions of
global warming, while
politicians should dispassionately count the real benefits as
well as the imagined costs of adaptation to global warming, and
the real costs as well as the imagined benefits of
mitigation.
Natural as
well as anthropogenic factors cause warming
The geological archive reveals that Earth's climate has varied
as long as the planet has existed, with natural cold and warm
phases.
The
Little Ice Age ended as
recently as 1850. Therefore, it is no surprise
that we now are experiencing a period of warming.
Warming is
far slower than predicted
The world has warmed at less than half the originally-predicted
rate, and at less than half the rate to be expected on the basis
of net anthropogenic forcing and radiative imbalance.
It tells us that we
are far from understanding climate change...
Climate
policy relies on inadequate models
Climate models have many shortcomings and are not remotely
plausible as policy tools.
Moreover, they most
likely exaggerate the effect of greenhouse gases such as CO2.
In addition, they ignore the fact that enriching the atmosphere
with CO2
is
beneficial...
CO2
is plant food, the basis of all life on Earth
CO2 is not a pollutant. It is essential to all life
on Earth. Photosynthesis is a blessing.
More CO2
is beneficial for nature, greening the Earth:
additional CO2
in the air has promoted growth in global plant biomass.
It is also good for
agriculture, increasing the yields of crop worldwide.
Global
warming has not increased natural disasters
There is no statistical evidence that
global warming is
intensifying hurricanes, floods, droughts and suchlike natural
disasters, or making them more frequent.
However, CO2-mitigation
measures are as damaging as they are costly. For instance, wind
turbines kill birds and bats, and palm-oil plantations destroy
the biodiversity of the rainforests.
Policy must
respect scientific and economic realities
There is no 'climate emergency.' Therefore, there is no cause
for panic and alarm.
We strongly oppose
the harmful and unrealistic net-zero CO2 policy
proposed for 2050. If better approaches emerge, and they
certainly will, we have ample time to reflect and adapt.
The aim of
international policy should be to provide reliable and
affordable energy at all times, and throughout the world.