The Truth About Global Warming

Too many bodies and not enough resources to sustain us -- that's what many scientists are saying in terms of global warming and how we must curb the fallout. Human vs. animal populations are now on the chopping block. Which one do you think should be pushed aside so we can save the planet? [Editor's Note: Plants absorb CO2 and emit oxygen as a waste product; humans and animals breathe oxygen and emit CO2 as a waste product -- the global warming alarmists believe that in order to save the trees ('Mother Earth'), we must reduce human and animal populations. In other words, only a select few should be allowed to live.] - Humans vs Animals -- To Reduce Global Warming, Which One Needs to Go, Bob Kurz, December 22, 2009

The Earth is now entering a phase with unstoppable and dramatic global cooling, which will initiate a new Little Ice Age within the next decade. The cause of this cooling is the predicted, and now real, reduction in solar activity that we now can see. These conditions will persist during the next solar cycles. This will have a devastating effect on agriculture, lowering food production and increasing the risk of widespread famine. This will also increase the demand for fuel. - Global Cooling Is Now Imminent, Is Unstoppable and Will Be Severe!, Per Strandberg, March 18, 2008

My suspicions have been deepened over the years by the climate movement’s totalitarian approach to opposing views, their demonizing of successful opponents and their opposition to the publication of opposing views even in scientific journals. The rewards for proper environmental behaviour are uncertain, unlike the grim scenarios for the future as a result of human irresponsibility, which have a dash of the apocalyptic about them. The immense financial costs true believers would impose on economies can be compared with the sacrifices offered traditionally in religion, and the sale of carbon credits with the pre-Reformation practice of selling indulgences. Some of those campaigning to save the planet are not merely zealous but zealots. - Cardinal Pell, 2011 Annual GWPF Lecture, Westminister Cathedral Hall, October 26, 2011

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The overwhelming greenhouse gas is water vapor, 30 to 50 times more important than CO2.

CO2 attributed to man is minuscule.

Yet government-paid scientists claim HUMAN CO2 is the primary climate driver and must be eliminated to save the earth.

Cabon dioxide represents a little over 3% of the total atmosphere and methane is much less than that. Of that 3% mankind contributes about 3%. 95% of the carbon dioxide that enters the atmosphere every year is due to natural sources not mankind. Temperatures have gone up and down since the industrial revolution about 150 years ago. In fact, it was hotter in the 1930s than it is now.

Mankind did not contribute significant amount of CO2 to the atmosphere until after WWII. Immediately after WWII there was a cooling period through the early '70s, Scientists thought an ice age may have been beginning. Then temperatures rose from the late 70s to the late 90s. Scientists and politicians then thought this must me global warming.

Finally there has been a plateau in temperatures of the last 19 years. If there is no correlation between temperatures and increasing CO2, this is evidence that there is no correlation. It is known that there is correlation between sun cycles and temperatures for thousands, if not millions of years, however IPCC scientists do not understand why this is, so they ignore it. I think if there is a correlation for millennia with sun cycle and there is no correlation with increased CO2. These "scientists" should maybe try to figure out why. It is clear carbon dioxide is not a problem and will be beneficial because increased plant growth will be essential to feed a growing population.

The largest emitters of carbon dioxide are volcanic eruptions, forest and wild fires, and natural decomposition of plants and animals. Thankfully, ocean water has a great propensity for absorbing this gas, and, as ice melts, it means that the oceans can take in a great deal more CO2.

1. The biggest source of CO2 emissions is volcanic eruptions. At any given time, according to agencies such as the USGS, there are about 13-17 volcanoes erupting somewhere on Earth.

2. Next in line for emissions is the natural decomposition of plant life. CO2 that goes into the atmosphere does not stay there but is continually recycled by terrestrial plant life and earth's oceans.

3. The next biggest emitter of carbon dioxide is probably the ocean. CO2 that goes into the atmosphere does not stay there but is continually recycled by terrestrial plant life and earth's oceans-- the great retirement home for most terrestrial carbon dioxide.

4. Other large emitters of carbon dioxide are forest and wild fires.

If it weren’t for carbon dioxide (CO2), the earth could well be a frozen ball in space, and life, as we know it, would probably not be able to survive.

The greatest amount of CO2 is locked up in plants, rocks and the oceans. It should not be surprising that these each contribute more CO2 emissions than any other sources. This is a good thing, since there is a relatively stable and finite amount of both oxygen and carbon on this planet.

Water vapor is the overwhelming greenhouse gas [it is 30 to 50 times more important than carbon dioxide (CO2)], and CO2 attributed to man is minuscule. Yet government-paid scientists claim HUMAN-INDUCED CO2 is the primary climate driver and must be eliminated to save the earth. Of course man is prideful enough to think he is a major player when in actuality man is an insignificant producer of CO2.

Animals and mankind breathe in oxygen and breath out CO2, and their bodies also contain CO2 and carbon, which is released when they die and decompose. Man burns fossil fuels, which release CO2 as a byproduct. Animals and mankind don’t produce nearly as much carbon dioxide as the major producers, with the possible exception of the death and decomposition of animals.

The instrument temperature records since 1850 or so (until satellite measures started in the 1970s) which are used to prove human-induced global warming (AGW) have been shown to be inaccurate, unreliable, and tainted by numerous errors. Dr. Don Easterbrook, Professor of Geology at Western Washington University, suggests that since the IPCC climate models are now so far off from what is actually happening, that their projections for both this decade and century must be considered highly unreliable.

In a Geological Society of America abstract by Dr. Easterbrook, data showed we were in a global warming cycle from 1977 to 1998, at which time we entered into a new global cooling period that should last for the next three decades. The Pacific Ocean has a warm temperature mode and a cool temperature mode, and in the past century has switched back and forth between these two modes every 25-30 years. This is known as the Pacific Decadal Oscillation or PDO. In 1977 the Pacific abruptly shifted from its cool mode (where it had been since about 1945) into its warm mode, and this initiated global warming from 1977 to 1998. The PDO typically lasts 25-30 years and assures North America of cool, wetter climates during its cool phases and warmer, drier climates during its warm phases. The establishment of the cool PDO in 1998, together with similar cooling of the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO), virtually assures several decades of global cooling and the end of the past 30-year warm phase.

PDO typically lasts 25-30 years:

1. 1945 - 1977: PDO cool phase (27 years)
2. 1977 - 1998: PDO warm phase (21 years)
3. 1998 - 2028: PDO cool phase (30 years) 

Man is actually an insignificant producer of CO2, though he is prideful enough to think he is a major player.

A person may wonder where man and other animals fit into all of this. After all, animals breathe in oxygen and breath out carbon dioxide. Their bodies also contain CO2 and carbon, which is released when they die and decompose. Man also burns fossil fuels, which do release CO2 as a byproduct. However, animals including man, don’t produce nearly as much carbon dioxide as the major producers, with the possible exception of the death and decomposition of animals.

"We need to get some broad based support,
to capture the public's imagination...
So we have to offer up scary scenarios,
make simplified, dramatic statements
and make little mention of any doubts...
Each of us has to decide what the right balance
is between being effective and being honest."
- Prof. Stephen Schneider,
Stanford Professor of Climatology,
lead author of many IPCC reports

"We've got to ride this global warming issue.
Even if the theory of global warming is wrong,
we will be doing the right thing in terms of
economic and environmental policy."
- Timothy Wirth,
President of the UN Foundation

Global Warming Fraud Creates Third World Food Crisis

How saving the planet causes famine: the climate crisis melts away but global food shortage is legacy of the foolish rush to biofuels.

Climate Change Dispatch
May 12, 2011

Evidence for dangerous, human-caused global warming was always slim, now it lies cruelly exposed both by a cruel blowback and it’s not just coming from within the science.
 
A far more devastating catastrophe is unfolding and it is entirely the product of the mad rush to biofuels: third world famine. Today a whopping 6.5 percent of the world’s grain has been stripped from the global food supply. That’s the kind of catastrophic cut in food supply that triggers a tipping point so that Third World hunger explodes into mass starvation.

Why did it happen?

Kyoto Protocol: The Trigger to Mass Starvation

What mechanism prompted mankind to instigate this genocide of the world’s poor? The Kyoto Protocol. International governments signed up to the idea that biofuels were going to be the better, cleaner, greener source for mankind’s energy needs in a new utopia predicted for us by ‘expert’s inside the United Nations.

Canadian Geophysicist Norm Kalmanovitch is as concerned as many independent scientists at the alarming rate at which this international food crisis is now escalating.

Kalmanovitch is semi-retired now and not in fear of having his scientific career tarnished by blowback from speaking out. He argues that the facts easily demonstrate that the Kyoto Protocol is based entirely on fraudulent science.

Misguided Climate Scientist Primed the Politicians

Honest scientific inquiry serves the single purpose of advancing human knowledge and understanding free of any bias or ulterior motivation and it is clear that promoting “human caused global warming” a full nine years after the world had already started cooling serves no such lofty purpose.

Kalmanovitch accuses a small clique of self-serving climate researchers for violating the fundamental ethics of science protocol and propagating the false science that made the Kyoto Accord the international vehicle for crimes against humanity. Listening to his arguments you cannot help but see he has a point.

So what was the root catalyst for this cataclysm? Astonishingly, you can pin a lot of it on one well-intentioned but misguided do-gooder. His name: Professor James Hansen. Hansen was NASA’s bright-eyed scientist back in 1988. The eager climate modeler appeared before a Congressional Committee and prophesized that mankind would kill the planet if it continued to burn coal and gasoline at modern industrial rates.

Kalmanovich explains,

“When you look closely at the climate change issue it is remarkable that the only actual evidence ever cited for a relationship between CO₂ emissions and global warming is climate models.”

Hansen made unfounded and highly alarmist claims based on his computer forecasts. He predicted doomsday scenarios that panicked Congress and that wave of fear stampeded the world into believing in a non-existent crisis. Global temperatures have never rocketed as Hansen forecast. In fact all five global temperature datasets show zero net global warming over the past decade in spite of record increases in CO₂ emissions from fossil fuels (climate scientists have now grudgingly conceded no statistically significant rise in temperatures has occurred since 1998 from their doomsaying). But once the stampede was launched it caused a rush to biofuels that stripped millions of crop acreage from the world’s food basket.

But more sickening is that many have made sizeable fortunes from trumpeting a short period of warming that lasted from (1975-1998); a vast international array of speculators in wind, solar, wave and biofuels alternatives are onboard the great global warming gravy train.

Hansen’s friends in the infant science of climatology have also fed well off government grants where the ‘climate change’ industry generates tens of billions annually in this self-perpetuating Ponzi scheme that symbiotically melded the interests of speculators with climate researchers.

In effect, those great riches and shining scientific careers were together built upon exploiting a 0.6 C rise in temperatures that all but vanished in the first decade of the 21^st Century.

Alternative Scientific Views Now Come to the Fore

But since Hansen’s watershed moment in 1988 the science has moved on and many independent scientists, not on the government grant gravy train, have cast their eyes over the numbers for carbon dioxide (CO2), the prime bogeyman of climate alarmism. 

From physical measurement of the Earth’s radiative spectrum impartial eyes saw that the 14.77 micron band of the Earth’s thermal radiation accessed by CO2, is so close to saturation that it is a physical impossibility for any increase in that trace gas to have anywhere near the effect claimed.

Analysts then looked back at the natural warming since the 1830’s that ushered in the end of the Little Ice Age, a time 100 years before any scientist claims humans had impact on the climate.  They say natural warming in the order of 0.5°Centigrade per century. We can calculate this to show that the maximum possible effect from CO₂ increases is just 0.1°C per century of the claimed 0.6°C per century of the observed temperature increase.

Hansen and his self-serving followers in climatology conveniently chose to ignore such inconvenient truths. Kalmanovich seethes,

“They falsely attributed the effect of CO₂ to the full 0.6°C and incorporated a range of wavelengths from 7 to 14 microns when CO₂ only has an effect over a range from 13.5 to 17microns and the wavelength band is at least 80 percent saturated. Though never stated explicitly this formed the basis for the CO₂ forcing parameter which Hansen used in his earlier climate models and is still used by the IPCC today with the basic formula of 5.35ln(2) = 3.71watts/m² for a doubling of CO₂.”

Like other independent scientists Kalmanovich saw that the fuss all stems from a 1981 paper by Hansen that was peer reviewed and published in SCIENCE magazine. Here’s where Hansen’s alarmist and skewed climate models captivated scientific literature on the matter. It is by repeated reference to Hansen’s original paper and his 1988 modification of it that the current climate change issue was premised.

In REAL Science Correlation Does not prove Causation

All the other evidence is either of warming or misrepresentations of the greenhouse effect but never of an actual relationship between the two other than a stated correlation stating that CO₂ increased and global temperature increased and therefore CO₂ caused the global temperature increase.

Kalmanovich’s findings have been corroborated by a group of independent scientists calling themselves the ‘Slayers’ who claim to have refuted the greenhouse gas effect.

They agree that correlation between temperatures and CO2 is easily refuted and they cite the same numbers used by the IPCC in the 2001 report.

That report shows cyclic warming and cooling trends that are completely out of step with CO₂ emissions as explained by Kalmanovich,

“It shows rapid warming from 1910 to 1942 with only a trivial 14 per cent increase in CO₂ emissions. That is followed by 33 years of a global cooling trend with a 500 percent increase in CO₂ emissions from 1942 to 1975.”

Greenhouse Gas Theory Falls ApartKalmanovich argues that is more than enough physical evidence to completely destroy the greenhouse gas theory. But that requires the doomsayers to accept numbers and scientific arguments that they have not yet been prepared to do.

The irony of this travesty is that Hansen himself never claims in absolute terms that CO₂ emissions cause global warming. Kalmanovich notes,

“Hansen instead uses the output from his climate models to make this claim absolving him of having his statements challenged.”

This technique was masterfully employed by Al Gore in his Inconvenient Truth in which he makes no claims directly but shows out of context snippets of evidence to make the claims for him.

Here is Kalmanovich in depth reasoning:

The satellite measurements of outgoing longwave radiation (OLR) demonstrate that OLR is responding strictly to the fourth power of the Earth’s absolute temperature in perfect accordance to basic physics theory, but is in no way responding to the 57.1% increase in CO₂ emissions from fossil fuels since 1979. This completely refutes the Kyoto Protocol on Climate Change, which is based on an assumed “enhanced greenhouse effect” from increased greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, but these satellite measurements demonstrate conclusively that this enhanced greenhouse effect from GHG emissions never actually existed!

This single physical observation makes the Kyoto Protocol completely fraudulent, and anyone promoting the concept of CO2 emissions from fossil fuels enhancing the greenhouse effect in support of this fraudulent Kyoto Accord, must be seen as complicit in this fraud.

Kalmanovich then reaches a devastating conclusion:

“This is not a trivial scientific error because over 6.5% of the world’s grain has been removed from the global food supply to serve as feedstock for the 85 billion litres of ethanol produced annually as fuel in accordance with the dictates of this fraudulent UN Kyoto Protocol on Climate Change.”

It is basic food staples that are being removed from the global food supply; the wealthier portion of the world’s 6.6 billion people end up paying substantially more for their food but the poor simply starve, making this Kyoto Accord a true “crime against humanity” and those who have fabricated the false science on which this crime is based are therefore guilty of being complicit in this “crime against humanity”.

Green Energy Promise Just a Pipe Dream
 
Americans are fast waking up to the harsh reality that this is all pain for no gain. There is stagnation in constructing conventional power generating sources in the wake of large government subsidies to wind and solar power generating facilities. That has dramatically increased power bills but has provided virtually zero additional peak power to consumers.

There is also a huge moral issue in the US. It removes more food from the global food supply than any other country in the manufacture of ethanol for fuel, making Americans key culprit in this crime against humanity. In the United States a staggering 39.7 percent of the world’s ethanol is created from crops that should be used as food.

The new moral question now to be posed is: if the US government was truly looking after the interests of the people then shouldn’t better investment ought to be made in natural gas and coal conversions to liquid fuels? That would bring the price of gas to under $2.50/gal. President Obama could then do away with subsidizing biofuels production, which only serves to raise the price of gas at the pumps and add to world hunger.

(The 85 billion litres of ethanol production comes from a compelling Marketwire article.

Why is 2011 the Critical Year?

Europe views 2011 as a critical year as member countries ramp up their production and use of ethanol to meet the European Union's Renewable Energy Directive. In this year alone, Europe is expected to produce 5.4 billion liters of ethanol that is a 15 per cent increase over 2010 (see table).

The Global Renewable Fuels Alliance promotes “biofuels friendly policies internationally and represent over 65 per cent of the global biofuels production from 44 countries.” They predict only growth in this voracious business and if their numbers are correct, a death sentence is being issued on millions more in the future.

(Note that these are imperial gallons and not U.S. gallons. This is why the 2010 value of 18,934 million gallons is 85,763 million liters and not 73,653 million liters as would be calculated for US gallons).

In this mad, bad crazy world western good intentions spawned a crime against humanity; the law of unintended consequences turned the Kyoto Accord into a perverse death sentence to millions. Now we must put an end to this genocide.

Climate Change is the Totalitarian’s Dream Come True

CNSNews
April 22, 2010

For E. Calvin Beisner and his colleagues with the Cornwall Alliance for the Stewardship of Creation (CASC) every day is Earth Day because Christians are called by God to be good stewards of the planet and its inhabitants.

Beisner also believes that it is not carbon emissions but global warming activism and international climate treaties that are a threat to the nation’s future and the world’s poorest populations.

“Climate change is the totalitarian’s dream come true,” Beisner, founder of the CASC, said at a conference on Thursday at the Family Research Council in Washington, D.C. “It offers a rationale for government intrusion into every aspect of life for every person on Earth.”

Beisner, who is also the national spokesman for the CASC, enjoys a distinguished career as teacher, author and speaker on the connection between religion and environmentalism.

Beisner painted a chilling picture of the consequences of the United States signing on to the kind of international climate change treaty proposed at a United Nations conference last year in Copenhagen.

“Global warming alarmists see each new human being in terms of his or her ‘carbon footprint,’ and already many are saying that the best way to fight global warming is for everyone to have just one child so that the population will shrink,” Beisner said.

The enforcement of a U.N.-style treaty would mean a global government’s intrusion into how people live their private lives – “everything from the temperature at which you keep your house to whether to drive a large, crash-worthy vehicle or a small car that conserves fuel but is a death trap in an accident,” Beisner said.

In his speech, Beisner said that Christians should be concerned about global warming policies because they affect myriad issues, such as the sanctity of human life, individual liberty, the survival of free enterprise and free markets in the United States, compassion for the poor around the world, and a sovereign America with the kind of limited government envisioned by the Founding Fathers.

Christians are commanded by God to care for the poor, which Beisner said would suffer the most from the kind of environmental controls and alternative energy plans proposed by both the United Nations and the U.S. Congress.

“The Bible requires us to care for the poor,” he said, detailing how the policies focused on cutting the use of fossil fuels, for example, will hurt the poorest people by increasing the cost of energy and limiting its availability in the world’s poorest places where access to abundant energy supplies can prevent disease and premature death.

“Global warming legislation is part of a concerted effort to push environmentalism to the fore in American politics and culture,” Beisner said. “And environmentalism is hardly limited to good stewardship of God-given natural resources.

“Secular environmentalism, in contrast to creation stewardship, is at heart a false religion,” Beisner said.

“It degrades human beings, the crown of God’s creation, deifies nature in its untouched state as the ideal – contrary to God’s mandate for man to fill, subdue, and rule the Earth – and disregards the poor, who often are harmed by environmental policies like banning DDT, a cheap and safe insecticide that could largely eliminate the malaria-bearing mosquitoes that cost millions of lives every year in the Third World,” he added.

Beisner also said the cap-and-trade legislation proposed by Democrats in Congress to limit carbon emissions and allow the trading of “carbon credits” will harm an already struggling economy by killing jobs and slowing or even reversing economic growth.

Beisner said his organization late last year released a comprehensive research project, “A Renewed Call to Truth, Prudence, and Protection of the Poor: An Evangelical Examination of the Theology, Science, and Economics of Global Warming.”

This project, he said, “provides solid Biblical, scientific, and economic basis for not only rejecting belief in dangerous manmade global warming, but also for rejecting policies meant to fight it.”

Beisner ended his remarks by citing one of the founding principles of the CASC, which states that the Earth is not a fragile entity made randomly by chance but the creation of an almighty God, who sustains it.

“Raising the atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration from 27 thousandths of one percent to 39 thousandths of one percent, or even to 108 thousandths of one percent, is not going to cause catastrophic global warming that will, as Al Gore puts it, threaten to destroy human civilization and wipe out 90 percent or more of all species,” Beisner said.

“Our God is a more intelligent designer than to make a system so fragile, and a better judge to call such a system ‘very good’ after he made it,” Beisner said.

The Global Warming Truth

Science is not the search for consensus; science is the search for truth
 
Facts about Carbon Dioxide (CO2)

CO2 is odorless, colorless, and tasteless. Plants absorb CO2 and emit oxygen as a waste product. Humans and animals breathe oxygen and emit CO2 as a waste product. Carbon dioxide is a nutrient, not a pollutant, and all life-- plants and animals alike-- benefit from more of it. All life on earth is carbon-based and CO2 is an essential ingredient. When plant-growers want to stimulate plant growth, they introduce more carbon dioxide.

CO2 that goes into the atmosphere does not stay there but is continually recycled by terrestrial plant life and earth's oceans-- the great retirement home for most terrestrial carbon dioxide.

If we are in a global warming crisis today, even the most aggressive and costly proposals for limiting industrial carbon dioxide emissions would have a negligible effect on global climate!

Of the 186 billion tons of CO2 that enter earth's atmosphere each year from all sources, only 6 billion tons are from human activity. Approximately 90 billion tons come from biologic activity in earth's oceans and another 90 billion tons from such sources as volcanoes and decaying land plants.

At 368 parts per million CO2 is a minor constituent of earth's atmosphere-- less than 4/100ths of 1% of all gases present. Compared to former geologic times, earth's current atmosphere is CO2- impoverished.

ANOTHER TAKE ON CO2

1. The overwhelming greenhouse gas is water vapor, 30 to 50 times more important than CO2. Yet this component is not modeled with any accuracy in the GCMs.


2. CO2 attributed to man is minuscule, about 6 to 7 Gigatons/yr, into an atmospheric GHG reservoir estimated between 720 and 760 Gigatons. Yet we are told it is the major driver of climate and must be eliminated to save the earth.


3. The uptake of CO2 by the ocean is from 92 to 107 Gigatons/yr. There is uncertainty or an error of about ±7 Gigatons/yr, equal to the anthropogenic total. While the out gassing of CO2 from the oceans are from 90 to 103 Gigatons/yr, or an uncertainty error of about ±7 Gigatons/yr, again as large as the anthropogenic input. Yet we are told human CO2 is the major driver of climate and must be eliminated to save the earth, while the oceanic and even the soil components of sink vs. source of CO2 are so uncertain as to swamp the human inputs.


4. The net difference between oceanic uptake and out gassing estimates is about 3 Gigatons/yr, but ±14 Gigatons/yr error. However, climatologists use a figure of 2 Gigatons/yr as their estimate of the oceanic uptake of the manmade CO2 of 7 Gigatons/yr., and thus claim human CO2 stays in the atmosphere many decades. Yet they claim human CO2 is the primary climate driver and must be eliminated to save the earth. How can this be as the error estimates again swamps the tiny human inputs?


5. The instrument temperature records since 1850 or so (until satellite measures started in the 1970s) that are used to prove AGW have been shown to be inaccurate, unreliable, and tainted by numerous errors [anthropogenic global warming (AGW) is the myth of human-induced climate change]. Yet, we are told they show man's immediate impact on climate as CO2 rises (all .6 degrees C of it), thus it must be eliminated to save the earth.

The Major Sources for Carbon Dioxide Emissions

The largest emitters of carbon dioxide are:

1. volcanic eruptions, 
2. forest and wild fires, and 
3. natural decomposition of plants and animals. 

This is a good thing, since there is a relatively stable and finite amount of both oxygen and carbon on this planet.

If it weren’t for carbon dioxide, the earth could well be a frozen ball in space, and life, as we know it, would probably not be able to survive.

By Rex Trulove, Helium.com

Carbon dioxide is a common gas that comes from primarily natural sources, when a carbon atom combines with an oxygen molecule. It makes up a small, but important part of our atmosphere, which is primarily nitrogen and oxygen. Though only a small amount of the atmosphere is made of CO2, this is still a huge amount in weight and volume. It is reasonable to wonder what the major sources are.

The greatest amount of carbon dioxide is locked up in plants, rocks, and the oceans. It should not be surprising that these each contribute more CO2 emissions than any other sources.

The people who firmly believe that man is the biggest culprit may not take it happily, but the biggest source of CO2 emissions is volcanic eruptions. There is a huge amount of carbon dioxide locked up in rocks. As the rocks melt, they give up the gas, and this is expelled during the eruption. Often, the larger the eruption, the more carbon dioxide is released along with other gases, such as hydrogen sulfide.

1. At any given time, according to agencies such as the USGS, there are about 13-17 volcanoes erupting somewhere on Earth. This means that yearly, volcanoes spew out hundreds or even thousands of times more carbon dioxide than man is capable of producing, even if he tried. Man is actually an insignificant producer of CO2, though he is prideful enough to think he is a major player.

Thankfully, ocean water has a great propensity for absorbing this gas, and as ice melts, as it has done for the past 11,000 years, it means that the oceans can take in a great deal more CO2. Many of the volcanoes occur in the ocean, so it has a good chance to absorb a lot of this gas. Above the surface, though, the gas is vented into the atmosphere.

2. Next in line for emissions is the decomposition of plant life. This can be in the form of natural death and decay, forest fire, or even use and consumption. Plants contain a great deal of carbon dioxide and carbon. These are released as the plant dies and decomposes. (Oregon State agricultural extension service, Albany, Oregon)

According to Steve (last name withheld on request), retired thermal imaging specialist, the amount of CO2 released is staggering. One major forest fire can release nearly as much carbon dioxide as a moderate volcanic eruption. That is enormous compared to other sources of emissions, excluding volcanic eruption. (US Forest Service; western fire suppression center, Boise, ID)

3. The next biggest emitter of carbon dioxide is probably the ocean. It absorbs a great deal of the gas, however, the colder it is, the more it can hold. The bottom of the ocean contains water that is below the freezing point, but salinity and pressure prevent it from freezing. Contained CO2 tends to stay there for a long time.

However, in some places, like the Gulf of Mexico and in the Caribbean, surface waters get relatively hot, releasing carbon dioxide in the process. Colder polar waters offset this, because the gas is absorbed again, however this is still a major source of emissions.

4. A person may wonder where man and other animals fit into all of this. After all, animals breathe in oxygen and breath out carbon dioxide. Their bodies also contain CO2 and carbon, which is released when they die and decompose. Man also burns fossil fuels, which does release CO2 as a byproduct. However, animals including man don’t produce nearly as much carbon dioxide as the major producers with the possible exception of the death and decomposition of animals.

5. Note that exact figures for the amount of CO2 released through the use of fossil fuels, is hard to come by. The figures tend to range from high to low, depending on sources, though not approaching that produced by volcanic eruption, by comparing the numbers to those given by the USGS and volcano researchers. The latter figures are available from the USGS website, and through the US national park system.

Sources:
US Geological Survey
Oregon State University, Oceanography department
National Geographic Explorer
Volcanoes National Park

How Do We "Come Out of Confusion?"

In a Geological Society of America abstract, Dr. Don Easterbrook, Professor of Geology at Western Washington University, presents data showing that the global warming cycle from 1977 to 1998 is now over and we have entered into a new global cooling period that should last for the next three decades. He also suggests that since the IPCC climate models are now so far off from what is actually happening, that their projections for both this decade and century must be considered highly unreliable. - Implications of PDO, NAO, Glacial Fluctuations, and Sun Spot Cycles for Global Climate in the Coming Decades (PDF)

World Temperatures according to the Hadley Center for Climate Prediction. Note the steep drop since 2007.

Source: hadCRUT

Brandon T. Ward
January 4, 2010

Why do so many people find it difficult to come to the realization that there truly is a plan for global government? The Bible talks about a world government materializing before the end of this age, yet many remain oblivious to this fact. Why do so many people find it difficult to see through the lies we are fed concerning “climate change?”

I think there are some people who just refuse to believe any of the documentation on these subjects because they can’t handle it. They don’t want their boat to be rocked if you will. Then there are those who don’t even know it’s going on. They are too wrapped up in TV shows and the like. But there has to be another element to this.

And with all deceivableness of unrighteousness in them that perish; because they received not the love of the truth, that they might be saved. - II Thesselonians 2:10

And for this cause God shall send them strong delusion, that they should believe a lie. - II Thesselonians 2:11

That they all might be damned who believed not the truth, but had pleasure in unrighteousness. - II Thesselonians 2:12

Do you have pleasure in unrighteousness? Or do you love God and His truth? If you love the Lord and His Word, He will keep you from believing a lie. Ask Him for knowledge; ask Him for wisdom.

In July, the Pope called for world government by stating that we needed a “true world political authority.” In December, the Pope made the following statement:

"It is important to acknowledge that among the causes of the present ecological crisis is the historical responsibility of the industrialized countries."

The Pope should understand that “climate change” is a lie, it’s not something man has caused; rather, it’s the natural cycles of the sun and its effect on our planet. The Pope continued by saying:

"This means that technologically advanced societies must be prepared to encourage more sober lifestyles, while reducing their energy consumption and improving its efficiency."

This is all being done under the guise of “climate change;” let the world unite as one to stop this disaster, we are told.

Meanwhile, the past few years have brought us stories with titles like these: Beijing, coldest in 40 years, Iowa temps 'a solid 30 degrees below normal, Vermont sets 'all-time record for one snowstorm,' and World copes with Arctic weather. This is nothing man caused, but is the natural cycle of things.

While world leaders were meeting in Copenhagen to discuss “climate change,” a blizzard came down on their heads. It seems every time there is some “climate change” meeting there is always snow. I have noticed this in the United States, where the government has discussed this same topic. Divine joke? Pretty coincidental if you ask me.

While man-made “climate change” has been discovered to be officially a scam with the recent release of emails by climate scientists, people are still clinging to the idea, as we see with the Pope, among others (No the Pope is not the antichrist; we will be covering this topic very soon). Obama’s science officials have defended the false notion of man-made “climate change” even after the release of these emails.

If you are old enough to remember, in 1975 the government pushed the idea of a new “ice age!” That didn't happen either, did it?

With all of the information readily available about the falsification of climate change, the world's governments still band together to try and change something they have no effect on, nor can change. Don't you find that intriguing? The real agenda is for a global government or new world order, if you will. With that said, we should take steps to help reduce pollution, which does affect all of us. That doesn't mean we need world government!

So what did United States Secretary of State Hillary Clinton do? Donate 100 billion of your tax dollars to the scam known as “global warming.” Did you get a say in it? Of course not, neither did you when it came to the trillions of dollars corporations and banks received in the recent bailouts. Folks, this is all by design.

So with all of this information so readily available, why is it so difficult for some to see the truth? That not only “climate change” is a lie, but it’s part of the big push for a new world order, global government, or whatever you wish to call it. If you can’t see through these lies, man’s lies, how will you ever stand against Satan and his lies? As we are told, the antichrist (Satan) will do great wonders when he arrives on earth.

And he doeth great wonders, so that he maketh fire come down from heaven on the earth in the sight of men. - Revelation 13:13

And deceiveth them that dwell on the earth by the means of those miracles which he had power to do in the sight of the beast. - Revelation 13:14

Therefore, how can we come out of confusion? By asking the Lord for wisdom and understanding, as Proverbs 2:6 declares:

"For the LORD giveth wisdom: out of his mouth cometh knowledge and understanding.”

Food and Energy Price Inflation

Inflation Up 2.3% from Last Year, Gasoline Prices Have Soared 41.1%

USInflationCalculator.com
April 14, 2010

Inflation remained tame in March, as U.S. consumer prices edged only slightly higher due mostly to higher fresh fruits and vegetables costs, the Labor Department reported Wednesday.

The Consumer Price Index, the government’s most closely watched reading for inflation at the consumer level, rose 0.1% in March. February’s CPI was flat and marked the first time prices had not advanced since March 2009.

"Inflation as a concern is relegated to the distant future," Guy Lebas, chief fixed income strategist at Janney Montgomery Scott LLC in Philadelphia, said on Bloomberg. "It gives the Fed the flexibility to keep rates low for a while."

Helping to keep prices contained in March were flat energy prices, as increased electricity costs were offset by lower gasoline and natural gas bills. For the past year, however, energy prices have soared 18.3%, with gasoline leading at 41.1%.

Those costs drove inflation up 2.3% over the past 12 months compared to a 2.1% increase the Labor Department reported during the 12 months ending in February.

Core consumer prices, which strip out volatile food and energy prices, were unchanged during the month of March. While core inflation was still up 1.1% from a year earlier, it was the smallest gain since 2004. Month prior respective increases were 0.1% and 1.3%.

"The rate of inflation was very low this month and still somewhat below the historical average," Andres Carbacho-Burgos, an economist for Moody’s Economy.com, was cited on CNNMoney.com. Adding that the annual rate has historically been between 2.4% to 2.5% and core inflation rate between 1.7% to 1.8%.

The 12-month core inflation rate is right within the Federal Reserve’s comfort range of 1%-2%.

Inflation Adjusted Gasoline Prices

InflationData.com
December 11, 2009

Back in 1980 - 81 we were shocked as gas prices rose above $1.00 for the first time. This was especially shocking because just four years earlier in 1976 gas was $0.60 per gallon and in 1969 it was only $0.35 a gallon. But by 1981 only 12 years later it was a full dollar higher at $1.35. That is an increase of 286% in 12 years!

In 1981 that $1.35 would be the equivalent of $3.21 in inflation adjusted terms for 2009 dollars.

Compare that to the price increase from 1998 where the average price was $1.02 and by July 2008 it had increased to $4.02 and you have a 294% increase in 10 years. But that is to the monthly peak price. Amazingly the average price for all of 2008 was $3.23. Almost identical to the price in 1981 when adjusted for inflation.

Interestingly, the average price of a gallon of gas from 1918 to the present is $2.37 in inflation adjusted dollars.

If we look at the average annual Inflation adjusted gasoline prices for each of the following years (1958, 1968, 1978, 1988, 1998, and 2008) we see the following:

Inflation Adjusted Gasoline Prices:

Year & Price

1958

$2.24

1968

$2.11

1978

$2.16

1988

$1.75

1998

$1.35

2008

$3.23

2009

$2.28

So if the long term average price is $2.37, then in 1988 gas was very cheap and in 1978 it was only slightly below average; but in 1981 and in 2008 it was extremely expensive on a historical basis.

In 1998 gas had gotten really cheap by historical standards allowing people to buy gas guzzlers like SUV's and Hummers. But that reversed in 2008 as prices rose above the long term average.

As of this writing, the monthly average price of gasoline in November of 2009 was $2.61 just slightly above the long term average price of $2.37, with the Annual Average for 2009 at $2.28 being extremely close to the long term average.

Remember that these are average annual prices and individual months had much higher averages and on a weekly or daily basis prices could (and did) spike much higher.

According to the US Energy Information Administration, the average price of a gallon of gasoline in March 2008 cost $3.21 ... although I know in many places like California people would have been glad to find gasoline for $3.21 a gallon so in addition to averaging over time it is also averaging over the whole country.

I spent several weeks driving around California in March 2008 and often saw gas closer to $4.00 a gallon and then actually saw $5.00 a gallon in May in Alaska. Granted that was more of a supply/demand issue (it was the only station for a hundred miles and all the gas actually came from a refinery thousands of miles away). The irony of the matter was across the highway within site of the pump, was the Trans-Alaska pipeline, transporting crude on the beginning of its thousands of miles trip.


The chart above right shows the Average annual Gas prices in nominal terms (what you actually pay) and in inflation adjusted terms (red line) ...

U.S. Inflation to Appear Next in Food and Agriculture

The National Inflation Association
October 30, 2009

While most mainstream economists such as Nouriel Roubini are warning of deflationary threats to the U.S. economy, it is our belief that massive price inflation has already begun. The Federal Reserve's policy of massive monetary inflation in 2009 has caused the Dow Jones to bounce over 50% from its low, oil to rise 100% from its low, and gold to surge to a new all time nominal high. One NIA co-founder just saw his health insurance premium rise 16% over a year ago; and the average tuition for a four-year public college increased this year by 6.5%.

Prices are rising all around us, yet agricultural commodities have for the most part been left behind and remain at historically depressed levels. Fundamentals for agriculture are improving on a daily basis. A worldwide shortage of farmers combined with food inventories falling to record lows is setting up the perfect storm for an explosion in agriculture prices. There is a huge opportunity today to invest at the ground-floor into what will likely be one of the biggest boom industries of the next several decades.

Advanced Economic Solutions estimates that food inflation will rise to by an average of 9 percent annually between 2008 and 2012, as the rising costs are passed on to consumers. As was experienced during the 1970s, food price inflation rates are moving higher during the next five years as a result of sharply higher commodity input prices. While the precise yearly levels of food inflation are difficult to predict, the rising commodity prices clearly suggest that food prices will rise more dramatically during the next five years. - Rising Commodity Prices and their Impact upon US Food Infation, Advanced Economic Solutions, June 2008

Wheat is currently down 60% from its all time nominal high set in 2008 and 80% from its inflation adjusted high set in the 1970s. Corn is currently down 50% from its all time nominal high set in 2008 and 75% from its inflation adjusted high set in the 1970s. Wheat and corn have only bounced 13% and 26% from their 52-week lows this year respectively. While sugar has faired much better and is now at a 28-year nominal high, sugar is still down 70% from its inflation adjusted high set in the 1970s.

With crude oil back above $80 per barrel, we will soon see a renewed interest in alternative energy. This will create increased demand for wheat, corn and sugar which are used to make ethanol and other biofuels. A massive rise in agriculture prices is just around the corner.

We receive countless emails on a weekly basis asking about if Real Estate is now a good investment and if rents will likely climb during hyperinflation. While rents will increase nominally during hyperinflation, they will plummet compared to agriculture. No longer will Americans eat more than most other countries, yet spend less of their income on food. When Americans are forced to pay more for food, it will take away from what they can spend on rent.

The average American consumer today spends approximately 30% of their income on housing and only 10% of their income on food. We expect these numbers to reverse in the years ahead as the U.S. dollar loses its purchasing power. In Germany during hyperinflation, rents fell from 30% to less than 1% of the average households' expenditures while food rose from 30% to a high of over 91%.

The U.S. is currently the world's largest exporter of wheat and corn and the fifth largest exporter of sugar. When American consumers purchase food at their local supermarket, they are competing against consumers from all around the globe. As the Federal Reserve prints trillions of dollars out of thin air and causes our currency to lose its purchasing power, Americans won't be able to afford to eat as much and farmers will be forced to increase their exports to countries with stronger currencies.

When it comes to an apartment in the U.S. that a landlord is trying to rent to a tenant, there is no global market to drive rent prices up. The rents landlords receive depend on the strength of the local U.S. economy. With unemployment continuing to surge and a huge glut of homes on the market, it is only a matter of time before real rent prices decline and become a smaller monthly expense than food.

While Americans will eat less in the years ahead, Chinese citizens will be able to afford to eat more. Despite China's rapidly growing economy, there are major food shortages in China. Chinese agriculture companies have a chance of becoming the market's biggest gainers of the next decade. Our last China agriculture stock suggestion gained over 83% after our profile in a little more than six months. We will be announcing our new China agriculture stock suggestion on Tuesday.

Income Falls 3.2% During Obama's Term

The Washington Times
April 13, 2010

Real personal income for Americans -- excluding government payouts such as Social Security -- has fallen by 3.2 percent since President Obama took office in January 2009, according to the Commerce Department's Bureau of Economic Analysis.

For comparison, real personal income during the first 15 months in office for President George W. Bush, who inherited a milder recession from his predecessor, dropped 0.4 percent. Income excluding government payouts increased 12.7 percent during Mr. Bush's eight years in office.

"This is hardly surprising," said Douglas Holtz-Eakin, an economist and former director of the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office. "Under President Obama, only federal spending is going up; jobs, business startups, and incomes are all down. It is proof that the government can't spend its way to prosperity."

According to the bureau's statistics, per capita income dropped during 2009 in 47 states, with only modest gains in the other states, West Virginia, Maine and Maryland. But most of those increases were attributed to rising income from the government, such as Medicare and unemployment benefits.

Two of the most populous states in the country reported dramatic declines: Per capita income in California dropped 3.5 percent to $42,325; in New York, the drop was 3.8 percent to $46,957.

"The evidence from New York and California reinforces a basic lesson: Where government gets too large, prosperity suffers. Let's hope that the Congress learns this lesson before it is too late for the country as a whole," said Mr. Holtz-Eakin, who also served as chief economic policy adviser to Sen. John McCain's 2008 presidential campaign.

On the campaign trail, Mr. Obama often derided Mr. Bush for what he said were dramatically falling incomes for workers.

"American families, since George Bush has been in office, have seen average family incomes go down $2,000," Mr. Obama said in a September 2008 speech on the economy in Green Bay, Wis.

The bureau, which doesn't compile statistics on "family" income, reported that per capita income rose during Mr. Bush's two terms, from $29,159 to $32,632 (using 2005 dollar values as a base). During Mr. Obama's 15 months in office, per capita income has dropped nearly 1 percent to $32,343.

Economists agree that Mr. Obama inherited a severe recession, although some dispute that it is the "worst since the Great Depression," as Mr. Obama often asserts. Still, the dropping numbers show that the $862 billion stimulus package has not turned the tide on dropping incomes.

"All in all I think the [bureau's] data are just another confirmation of what we all know -- the recession has been just brutal, and while we may in the past couple of months have stopped the downward slide in jobs and incomes, we'll be digging out of a big hole for a long time," said Josh Bivens of the Economic Policy Institute.

Carol Moylan, chief of national income and wealth division at the Bureau of Economic Analysis, said comparing real personal incomes while excluding government payments is a good barometer.

"A lot of people like that number," she said.

The White House did not respond to requests for comments on the numbers.

Personal income with government "transfers" -- which include such federal money as Social Security, unemployment insurance, Medicare and food stamps -- has grown during Mr. Obama's time in office, up 1.2 percent from January 2009 to February 2010. During that period, government unemployment insurance benefits rose from $88 billion to $143 billion.

Despite a near doubling in unemployment payouts, Mr. Obama in February announced a multitrillion-dollar spending plan that boosted the federal deficit to a record-breaking $1.56 trillion.

"While the market income of Americans has fallen since early 2008, government assistance has offset this somewhat through greater transfer spending such as unemployment benefits and new tax credits such as the 'making work pay credit,' albeit at the expense of higher deficits," said Gerald Prante, a senior economist at the Tax Foundation organization.

Mr. Obama, who just finished pushing a $1 trillion health care reform bill through Congress, is falling behind on his predictions.

In a September speech, he said: "All in all, many middle-class families will see their incomes go up by about $3,000 because of the Recovery Act."

Other numbers show dramatic differences between the state of the economy in the opening months of Mr. Bush's first term versus that of Mr. Obama. While disposal income during Mr. Obama's term has risen $2.5 billion, extra cash for Americans rose $113 billion over Mr. Bush's first 15 months in office.

Meanwhile, the findings of a new survey of leading economists by the Associated Press found widespread pessimism over a quick recovery. The finding included ominous news:

The unemployment rate will stay high for the next two years and still be at 8.4 percent by the end of 2011.

Home prices will remain almost flat for the next two years, even after dropping an average 32 percent nationwide since peaking in 2006.

The economy will grow about 3 percent this year, less than usual during the early phase of a recovery, but few jobs will be added.

Even with Low Inflation, Households Still Squeezed

The Associated Press
April 14, 2010

The deep recession has caused inflation to all but melt away. The problem is that the same severe downturn has also translated into weak income growth.

Economists say it is no wonder that consumer confidence is at such low levels. Americans' pocketbooks are being squeezed, even though inflation remains a no-show in many ways.

For that reason, the prices that have been rising lately — in such areas as energy and food — seem to be having more of an impact than normal.

"At a time when wages have not risen, people are obviously more sensitive to any kind of price increases," said Nariman Behravesh, chief economist at IHS Global Insight.

Economists surveyed by Thomson Reuters are looking for overall prices to have risen by a modest 0.1 percent in March and to be up 2.4 percent over the past 12 months. That 12-month gain primarily reflects that the volatile sectors of energy and food have been showing gains recently.

However, excluding food and energy, the core rate of inflation is likely to show a small 0.1 percent increase in March and be up just 1.2 percent over the past 12 months. That gain would be well within the Federal Reserve's comfort zone, meaning the central bank can continue to keep a key interest rate at a record low where it has been for more than a year in order to jump-start growth and put the country on a sustained recovery from the Great Recession.

For all of 2009, inflation rose by 2.7 percent for the 12 months ending in December. That followed an even smaller 0.1 percent rise in 2008, which had been the smallest gain since prices fell by 0.7 percent in 1954.

Excluding food and energy, so-called core inflation was up 1.8 percent last year, the second smallest rise in four decades. The inflation figures were kept in check by the severe recession, which has depressed wages, the biggest component in the cost of production.

Workers saw their inflation-adjusted weekly wages fall by 1.6 percent last year, the sharpest setback since 1990.

Inflation-adjusted pay has sunk in five of the past seven years, underscoring the pressures households were feeling even before the recession began in late 2007.

In fact, the last period of strong wage gains occurred in the 1970s, when the country suffered double-digit inflation triggered by oil shocks. Many unions negotiated cost-of-living wage increases that only added fuel to the inflation fire.

Inflation was not successfully constrained until the Fed under then-Chairman Paul Volcker drove interest rates to levels not seen since the Civil War. It ended a debilitating decade in which successive oil shocks pushed the country into stagflation, a period when economic growth is stagnant and inflation is high.

Even with inflation at extremely low levels now, some economists are worried that the current period of exceptionally low inflation could be followed by inflation troubles down the road.

The worry is that the Fed will repeat a mistake many economists believe the central bank made following the 2001 recession when it left interest rates too low for too long, fueling an asset bubble in housing that pushed home prices to record levels only to end with a disastrous crash that pulled the entire economy into a recession.

These economists worry that the threat this time could be even more severe because not only has the Fed pushed its target for overnight bank lending to an all-time low but has nearly tripled the assets on its balance sheet in what has turned out to be a successful campaign to stabilize the financial system.

If the Fed makes a mistake in not draining those excess reserves from the system or in raising rates in a timely fashion, these economists worry that it could sow the seeds for a new bout of inflation.

To be able to safely guide policy, the Fed will need to depend on accurate readings of inflation and on that score some critics have charged that the government's most prominent inflation gauge, the Consumer Price Index, is flawed because it is not properly tracking housing costs.

But most economists discount that criticism, saying that the low inflation readings in the CPI are showing up in other inflation readings as well.

"There are problems with the CPI like any economic statistic, but overall it is doing a good job of measuring inflation," said Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody's Economy.com. "It is pretty clear that inflation is low and slowing."

The Coming Global Food Shortage
Get Ready: Experts Project 2010 Will Be A Year When Food Prices Dramatically Increase
U.S. Food Prices ‘Spiraling Out of Control’
NIA: U.S. Food Inflation Spiraling Out of Control

Updated 5/6/10 (Newest Additions at End of List)

Frankenfoods for the 'Useless Eaters'

"The Illuminati uses a variety of tools [one being 'physical']... The objective, as stated by one of their main spokesmen, Henry Kissinger, is to take control of food and oil. By controlling oil, they control the militaries of the nations of the world. By controlling food, they can control individuals ... The 'Global 2000 Report,' written by former Secretary of State Cyrus Vance, declares that the world needs to be depopulated"... by means of limited wars in the advanced countries and by means of starvation and disease in the Third World Countries, the death of three billion people (described as 'useless eaters') by the year 2000." - Liberty Lost, F. Gregory Anderson, Circa 1993

What do the elite eat? This is an interesting question. I bet they don't eat GM foods, processed supermarket foods, meat soaked in steroids and hormones, or drink fluoridated water... It's clear that the elite are doing something 'weird' (unnatural / supernatural??) and not consuming the processed (poisoned) crap that 'the cattle' are duped into eating and drinking, when one considers the actual 'longevity' of many of the members of the elite families. Take for instance the British Royal Family; the Queen Mother; Prince Philip and Queenie looking fit and well into their 80's/90's. Strange that the Rothschilds guys etc. all seem to live well into their 90's. You would think with their fatcat, overindulgent lifestyles they would hit the wooden box mid fifties or so, but they all seem to go on and on? Ok, so what are 'they' doing in secret that Mr Joe average isn't aware of? Well, perhaps creating wars, bloodshed and complete chaos on earth; fucking your fellow man over for a goddamn percentage, cannibalism, blood drinking, ritual human sacrifice, and selling one's soul to Lucifer all comes with an added bonus... the reward of longevity. This is definitely a subject worth discussion and further investigation. - What do the elite eat?, David Icke Forum, December 20, 2007

Are Regulators Dropping the Ball on Biocrops?

Reuters
April 13, 2010

Robert Kremer, a U.S. government microbiologist who studies Midwestern farm soil, has spent two decades analyzing the rich dirt that yields billions of bushels of food each year and helps the United States retain its title as breadbasket of the world.

Kremer's lab is housed at the University of Missouri and is literally in the shadow of Monsanto Auditorium, named after the $11.8 billion-a-year agricultural giant Monsanto Co.. Based in Creve Coeur, Missouri, the company has accumulated vast wealth and power creating chemicals and genetically altered seeds for farmers worldwide.

But recent findings by Kremer and other agricultural scientists are raising fresh concerns about Monsanto's products and the Washington agencies that oversee them. The same seeds and chemicals spread across millions of acres of U.S. farmland could be creating unforeseen problems in the plants and soil, this body of research shows.

Kremer, who works for the U.S. Department of Agriculture's Agricultural Research Service (ARS), is among a group of scientists who are turning up potential problems with glyphosate, the key ingredient in Monsanto's Roundup and the most widely used weed-killer in the world.

"This could be something quite big. We might be setting up a huge problem," said Kremer, who expressed alarm that regulators were not paying enough attention to the potential risks from biotechnology on the farm, including his own research.

Concerns range from worries about how nontraditional genetic traits in crops could affect human and animal health to the spread of herbicide-resistant weeds.

Biotech crop supporters say there is a wealth of evidence that the crops on the market are safe, but critics argue that after only 14 years of commercialized GMOs, it is still unclear whether or not the technology has long-term adverse effects.

Whatever the point of view on the crops themselves, there are many people on both sides of the debate who say that the current U.S. regulatory apparatus is ill-equipped to adequately address the concerns. Indeed, many experts say the U.S. government does more to promote global acceptance of biotech crops than to protect the public from possible harmful consequences.

"We don't have a robust enough regulatory system to be able to give us a definitive answer about whether these crops are safe or not. We simply aren't doing the kinds of tests we need to do to have confidence in the safety of these crops," said Doug Gurian-Sherman, a scientist who served on a FDA biotech advisory subcommittee from 2002 to 2005.

"The U.S. response (to questions about biotech crop safety) has been an extremely patronizing one. They say 'We know best, trust us,'" added Gurian-Sherman, now a senior scientist at the Union of Concerned Scientists, a nonprofit environmental group.

CALL FOR CHANGE

The World Health Organization has not taken a stand on biotech crops generally, simply stating "individual GM foods and their safety should be assessed on a case-by-case basis."

And while many scientists around the world cite research they say shows health and environmental risks tied to GMOs, many other scientists say research proves the crops are no different than conventional types.

With a growing world population and a need to increase food production in poor nations, confidence in the regulatory system in the leading biotech crop country is considered critical.

"One of the things that we think is important to do is to have regular reviews and updates of our strategies for regulating products of biotechnology," said Roger Beachy, a biotech crop supporter who was appointed last year as director of the National Institute of Food and Agriculture.

"We want to look carefully to see that they are logical and science-based but still maintain the confidence of the consumer to ensure that the projects that are developed and released have the highest level of oversight," added Beachy.

So far, that confidence has been lacking. Courts have cited regulators for failing to do their jobs properly and advisers and auditors have sought sweeping changes.

Even Wall Street has taken note. In January, shares in Monsanto fell more than 3 percent amid a rush of hedging activity during a morning trading session after a report by European scientists in the International Journal of Biological Sciences found signs of toxicity in the livers and kidneys of rats fed the company's biotech corn.

Monsanto has said the European study had "unsubstantiated conclusions," and says it is confident its products are well tested and safe.

Indeed, farmers around the world seem to be embracing biotech crops that have been altered to resist bugs and tolerate weed-killing treatments while yielding more. According to an industry report issued in February, 14 million farmers in 25 countries planted biotech crops on 330 million acres in 2009, with the United States alone accounting for 158 million acres.

REGULATORY ODDITIES

A common complaint is that the U.S. government conducts no independent testing of these biotech crops before they are approved, and does little to track their consequences after.

The developers of these crop technologies, including Monsanto and its chief rival DuPont, tightly curtail independent scientists from conducting their own studies. Because the companies patent their genetic alterations, outsiders are barred from testing the biotech seeds without company approvals.

Unlike several other countries, including France, Japan and Germany, the United States has never passed a law for regulating genetically modified crop technologies. Rather, the government has tried to incorporate regulation into laws already in existence before biotech crops were developed.

The result is a system that treats a genetically modified fish as a drug subject to Federal Drug Administration oversight, and a herbicide-tolerant corn seed as a potential "pest" that needs to be regulated by USDA's Animal Plant Health Inspection Service (APHIS) before its sale to farmers.

The process is also costly and time-consuming for biotech crop developers, which might need to go through three different regulators before commercializing a new product.

Nina Fedoroff, a special adviser on science and technology to the U.S. State Department, which promotes GMO adoption overseas, said even though she is confident that biotech crops are ultimately safe and highly beneficial for agriculture and food production, an improved regulatory framework could help boost confidence in the products.

"We preach to the world about science-based regulations but really our regulations on crop biotechnology are not yet science-based," said Fedoroff in an interview. "They are way, way out of date. In many countries scientists are much better represented at the government ranks than they are here."

Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack, a former governor of top U.S. corn producing state Iowa, also said he recognizes change is needed. The USDA is in fact developing new rules for regulating genetically modified crops but the process has dragged out now for more than six years amid heavy lobbying from corporate interests and consumer and environmental groups.

"There is no question that our rules and regulations have to be modernized," Vilsack told Reuters. "The more information you find out, the more you have to look at your regulations to make sure they are doing what they have to do. There are some issues we are still grappling with."

UNDER ATTACK

Fourteen years after commercialization of the world's first biotech crop, the trio of U.S. regulatory agencies charged with overseeing biotech crops -- USDA, the Environmental Protection Agency, and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration -- are under attack on several fronts.

The USDA is most directly in the line of fire after a string of federal court decisions found its officials acted illegally or carelessly in approving some biotech crops.

In one recent case, a federal court banned the sale of a herbicide-tolerant alfalfa engineered by Monsanto until the government more thoroughly evaluates its safety.

U.S. District Court Judge Charles Breyer of the Northern District of California ruled that the USDA violated federal law in allowing unrestricted commercial planting of "Roundup Ready" alfalfa -- a key livestock fodder -- without a solid review.

Breyer ordered the USDA to prepare an environmental impact statement that explores potential negative consequences that critics say could include contamination of non-GMO alfalfa fields. The spread of herbicide-tolerant weeds is also a concern and is a mounting problem that has been reported across the United States in many key farming areas.

Monsanto has appealed the ruling and the U.S. Supreme Court will hear the case on April 27, marking the first time the high court has taken up biotech crop concerns.

Meanwhile, the USDA recently completed its Environmental Impact Statement and took public comments on the report through early March. The department has yet to issue a final report.

In a similar case, a federal court found that sugarbeets altered to be "Roundup Ready" were approved without adequate USDA evaluation.

U.S. District Court Judge Jeffrey White said the government's decision to deregulate Roundup Ready sugar beets "may significantly affect the environment" and he encouraged growers to "take all efforts, going forward, to use conventional seed."

Judge White declined to immediately ban all GMO sugarbeet plantings, but said he would consider a permanent injunction at a hearing on July 9.

Andrew Kimbrell, executive director of the Center for Food Safety, which filed the sugarbeet lawsuit, said the court actions should be a "wakeup call" for the U.S. government.

"They will not be allowed to ignore the biological pollution and economic impacts of gene-altered crops. The courts have made it clear that USDA's job is to protect America's farmers and consumers, not the interests of Monsanto," he said.

The USDA, EPA and FDA say they work hard to ensure that crops produced through genetic engineering (GE) for commercial use are properly tested and studied to make sure they pose no significant risk to consumers or the environment.

But a November 2008 report by the Government Accountability Office, the investigative arm of the U.S. Congress, cited several problems. Among the shortcomings mentioned in the report is a lack of a coordinated program to determine whether the "spread of genetic traits is causing undesirable effects on the environment, non-GE segments of agriculture, or food safety."

The GAO took the FDA to task for not requiring companies like Monsanto and other GMO developers to notify the agency before selling new products, relying on only voluntary notice. It recommended the FDA publicize the results of food safety assessments of genetically engineered crops and advised the three agencies to develop a risk-based strategy to monitor use of GE crops.

But more than a year later, most of the recommendations remain unimplemented, according to Lisa Shames, director of the natural resources and environment arm of the GAO ...

Concerns about genetically altered crops and the lack of broad testing hit a boiling point last year. In February 2009, 26 leading academic entomologists -- scientists specializing in insects -- issued a public statement to the Environmental Protection Agency complaining that they were restricted from doing independent research by technology agreements Monsanto and other companies attach to every bag of biotech seed they sell. The agreements disallow any research that is not first approved by the companies.

"No truly independent research can be legally conducted on many critical questions regarding the technology," the scientists said in their statement.

University of Minnesota entomologist Ken Ostlie, who co-authored the statement, said some of the concerns involve corn engineered to resist corn rootworm pests. Biotech corn crops in Minnesota, Iowa, and parts of Wisconsin and South Dakota harvested last fall showed damage and disease, and some fear the biotech corn could sicken livestock.

"We don't know if something is going on with the plant and the technology or with the insect. We just know things didn't work the way they were supposed to," said Ostlie. "It would be nice to have independently verifiable information going into EPA's decision-making beyond just what the company provides."

Christian Krupke, an entomologist at Purdue University, said the technology engineered into the plants has many benefits, but more research is needed on effects.

"We are all fans of this technology. The problem is we are not getting access to ask the questions that need to be asked that maybe the companies don't want to ask," Krupke said.

BACKLASH ABROAD

A backlash against biotech crops has swept many countries. India became one of the latest hot spots in February when biotech opponents created such an uprising that the Environment Minister, Jairam Ramesh, blocked the release of a genetically modified eggplant made by Monsanto.

India already allows planting of altered cotton, but Ramesh said there was not enough public trust to support the introduction of a GM food crop until more research was done.

Among the critics of the engineered eggplant was Tiruvadi Jagadisan, a former managing director of Monsanto's India operations.

In an interview with Reuters, Jagadisan, who worked with Monsanto for 18 years, said he believed there were "very many legitimate concerns about the safety of GM food crops for humans, animals and the environment." He said Monsanto did not give "accurate information to the public" about its eggplant.

"No extensive tests have been done to assess the effect of consuming GM crops on future generations," Jagadisan said, an assertion common among critics, but one Monsanto has repeatedly denied.

Monsanto called Jagadisan's assertions "baseless" and said India's regulatory regime requires "extensive and rigid crop safety assessments, following strict scientific protocols."

The state department's Fedoroff, a supporter of Monsanto's technology, called the incident "one little setback" to gaining worldwide acceptance of biotech crops.

She said with rising food prices and population growth, biotech crop technology will become increasingly important, and criticisms of Monsanto and its technology were unfair.

"They've certainly made mistakes but they've done a whole lot more good than harm. They are investing more in crop improvements than our government is," she said.

SEEKING ANSWERS

Back in his USDA laboratory, Kremer's assigned government work is focused on general soil quality. As a side project in support of that research, he has spent the last several years studying soil and plant growth tests that appear to show ravaged root systems in biotech "Roundup Ready" plants.

The crops have been subjected to glyphosate applications and on the surface appear to be impervious to the weed-killing treatments as the genetic alteration allows. But the roots seem to tell a different story.

"This is supposed to be a wonderful tool for the farmer ... but in many situations it may actually be a detriment," Kremer said. "We have glyphosate released into the soil which appears to be affecting root growth and root-associated microbes. We need to understand what is the long-term trend here," he said.

The development of crops engineered to tolerate glyphosate spurred a surge in use of the chemical -- an extra 383 million pounds were sold from 1996 to 2008, according to a report released by The Organic Center (TOC), the Union for Concerned Scientists (UCS) and the Center for Food Safety (CFS).

Monsanto says the chemical binds tightly to most types of soil, is not harmful and does not harm the crops.

But some scientists say there are indications of increased root fungal disease as well as nutrient deficiencies in Roundup Ready crops. They say manganese deficiency in soybeans in particular appears to be an issue in key farming areas that include Indiana, Michigan, Kansas and Wisconsin.

Outside researchers have also raised concerns over the years that glyphosate use may be linked to cancer, miscarriages and other health problems in people.

Monsanto says extensive research shows glyphosate is safe for humans and the environment, and has an entire section on its website devoted to refuting the reports. Monsanto says extensive investigation of questions about changes in soil micro-organisms has found no long-term ill effects.

Peering into his petri dishes, Kremer isn't so sure.

"Science is not being considered in policy setting and deregulation," said Kremer. "This research is important. We need to be vigilant."

The Value of Climate Change Sceptics and Why Copenhagen Was Doomed

James Lovelock's Interview with Leo Hickman

By Leo Hickman, The Guardian
March 29, 2010

When I recently interviewed James Lovelock for the G2 section of the Guardian, we spoke for nearly two hours about the various events of the past few months — a period in which he'd remained silent because he'd been over-wintering with his wife Sandy in her native Missouri. There was a lot to talk about: the stolen emails from the University of East Anglia, the UN climate summit in Copenhagen, the intense scrutiny placed on the IPCC, and the rather nippy winter experienced across much of the Northern Hemisphere.

As is inevitable with an interview appearing in the newspaper, space was at a premium so the quotes used were tightly edited. But, just as I did with my interview with Al Gore last year, I have decided to publish a transcript of his key points here online for anyone interested in hearing in much more detail what Lovelock had to say on some of these controversial and much-discussed topics.

Lovelock's reaction to first reading about the stolen CRU emails [he later clarified that he hadn't read the originals, saying: "Oddly, I felt reluctant to pry"]:

I was utterly disgusted. My second thought was that it was inevitable. It was bound to happen.

Science, not so very long ago, pre-1960s, was largely vocational. Back when I was young, I didn't want to do anything else other than be a scientist. They're not like that nowadays. They don't give a damn. They go to these massive, mass-produced universities and churn them out. They say: "Science is a good career. You can get a job for life doing government work." That's no way to do science.

I have seen this happen before, of course. We should have been warned by the CFC/ozone affair because the corruption of science in that was so bad that something like 80% of the measurements being made during that time were either faked, or incompetently done.

Fudging the data in any way whatsoever is quite literally a sin against the holy ghost of science. I'm not religious, but I put it that way because I feel so strongly. It's the one thing you do not ever do. You've got to have standards.

You can make mistakes; they're helpful. In the old days, it was perfectly OK to make a mistake and say so. You often learned from it. Nowadays if you're dependent on a grant — and 99% of them are — you can't make mistakes as you won't get another one if you do.

It's an awful moral climate, and it was all set up for the best of reasons. I think it was felt there was far too much inequality in science and there was an enormous redress. Looking around the country [at the wider society], this was good on the whole, but in some special professions you want the best, the elite. Elitism is important in science. It is vital.

On what the Climate Research Unit at the University of East Anglia — and climate scientists in general — should do to help restore public trust in their work:

Careers have been ended by this affair and the reputation of the institution [CRU] will go down for a while. It's sad because there are some good people there. They have to clean their house if they know people are behaving badly. They have got a rotten job ahead, but it will blow over in a few years. I think if they can produce a coup and produce some really good climate research they will undo all the harm that's been done. And they've now got an incentive to do that.

I would only have been too pleased if someone had asked me for my data. If you really believed in your data, you wouldn't mind someone looking at it. You should be able to respond that if you don't believe me go out and do the measurements yourself.

You don't hide data. But there are some natural limitations to making data public. For example, if you have just received a fresh batch of data you want to make sure that the instruments are properly calibrated and that something else hasn't happened in that region that might explain why a sudden change might have occurred. You've got to be honest about it and explain why you've done what you have done. I think to release the raw data as it comes up, you could see silly sceptics misusing it quite badly.

On the over-reliance on computer modelling:

I remember when the Americans sent up a satellite to measure ozone and it started saying that a hole was developing over the South Pole. But the damn fool scientists were so mad on the models that they said the satellite must have a fault. We tend to now get carried away by our giant computer models. But they're not complete models. They're based more or less entirely on geophysics. They don't take into account the climate of the oceans to any great extent, or the responses of the living stuff on the planet. So I don't see how they can accurately predict the climate.

It's not the computational power that we lack today, but the ability to take what we know and convert it into a form the computers will understand. I think we've got too high an opinion of ourselves. We're not that bright an animal. We stumble along very nicely and it's amazing what we do do sometimes, but we tend to be too hubristic to notice the limitations. If you make a model, after a while you get suckered into it. You begin to forget that it's a model and think of it as the real world. You really start to believe it.

On climate sceptics:

We're very tribal. You're either a goodie or a baddie. I've got quite a few friends among the sceptics, as well as among the "angels" of climate science. I've got more angels as friends than sceptics, I have to say, but there are some sceptics that I fully respect. Nigel Lawson is one. He writes sensibly and well. He raises questions. I find him an interesting sceptic.

What I like about sceptics is that in good science you need critics that make you think: "Crumbs, have I made a mistake here?" If you don't have that continuously, you really are up the creek.

The good sceptics have done a good service, but some of the mad ones I think have not done anyone any favours. Some of them, of course, are corrupted and employed by oil companies and things like that. Some even work for governments. For example, I wouldn't put it past the Russians to be behind some of the disinformation to help further their energy interests. But you need sceptics especially when the science gets very big and monolithic.

I respect their right to be sceptics. Nigel Lawson is an easy person to talk to. He's more like a defence counsel for the sceptics than a right-winger banging the drum. His book is not a diatribe or polemic. He tries to reason his case.

There is one sceptic that everyone should read and that is Garth Paltridge. He's written a book called the "Climate Caper." It is a devastating, critical book. It is so good. This impresses me a lot. Like me, he's convinced that if you put a trillion tonnes of carbon dioxide into the atmosphere, which we will have done in 20 years' time, it's going to have some nasty effects, but what we don't know if how nasty and when.

If you look back on climate history, it sometimes took anything up to 1,000 years before a change in one of the variables kicked in and had an effect. And during those 1,000 years the temperature could have gone in the other direction to what you thought it should have done.

What right have the scientists with their models to say that in 2100 the temperature will have risen by 5C? There are plenty of incidences where something turns on the heat, but temperatures actually go down perversely, before eventually going up. A cold winter may mean nothing, as could 10 cold winters in a row.

The great climate science centres around the world are more than well aware how weak their science is. If you talk to them privately, they're scared stiff of the fact that they don't really know what the clouds and the aerosols are doing. They could be absolutely running the show. We haven't got the physics worked out yet.

One of the chiefs once said to me that he agreed that they should include the biology in their models, but he said they hadn't got the physics right yet and it would be five years before they do. So why on earth are the politicians spending a fortune of our money when we can least afford it on doing things to prevent events 50 years from now? They've employed scientists to tell them what they want to hear. The Germans and the Danes are making a fortune out of renewable energy. I'm puzzled why politicians are not a bit more pragmatic about all this.

We do need scepticism about the predictions about what will happen to the climate in 50 years, or whatever. It's almost naive, scientifically speaking, to think we can give relatively accurate predictions for future climate. There are so many unknowns that it's wrong to do it.

On the blogosphere's reaction to the various revelations over the past few months:

I think the sceptic bloggers should worry. It's almost certain that you can't put a trillion tonnes of CO2 into the atmosphere without something nasty happening. This is going to resolve itself and global heating is going to come back on stream, and it's these bloggers who are going to be made to look weird when it does. When something like this happens again, they'll say we had all this before with 'Climategate'. But there's a danger that you can go off too strong, like they have. They are not sufficiently aware of the longer-term consequences. I think the sceptics have done us a good service because they've made us look at all this a lot more closely, and hopefully the science will improve as a result. But everything has a price and an unexpected price may hit these bloggers. It's the cry-wolf phenomenon. When the real one comes along, they'll be laughed at.

On the Copenhagen summit:

Copenhagen was doomed to fail. But I think it was worth their while trying. A lot of people put their hearts into it. But I've never felt entirely happy with that sort of environmental wing-ding. It's obscene to have 10,000 people flying to Bali or whatever to talk about the environment. It just shows how hopeless humans are. The UN was a lovely idea, but its primary objective was to make sure the British Empire was got rid of. You just can't get all those people to agree.

On the IPCC:

I was all for the IPPC when it was set up. I greatly respect Sir John Houghton [IPCC's co-chairman from 1988-2002]. It wasn't just a bunch of gung-ho scientists wanting to save the world. But then in 2007 there was a paper published in Science with the observational measurements saying the predictions [for sea-level rises] were underestimated. It was a serious underestimating of sea-level rises. The thing people should know about the sea is that surface temperatures can fluctuate all over the place, but we're not measuring the temperatures far down below. There's very little funding, or interest, in direct observational data.

On the influence of vested interests:

We shouldn't let the lobbies influence science. Whatever criticism might befall the IPCC and the UEA, they're nothing as bad as lobbyists who are politically motivated and who will manipulate data or select data to make their political point.

For example, it's deplorable for the BBC whenever one of these issues comes up to go and ask what one of the green lobbyists thinks of it. Sometimes their view might be quite right, but it might also be pure propaganda. This is wrong. They should ask the scientists, but the problem is scientists won't speak. If we had some really good scientists it wouldn't be a problem, but we've got so many dumbos who just can't say anything, or who are afraid to say anything. They're not free agents.

On how humans will ever manage to tackle climate change:

We need a more authoritative world. We've become a sort of cheeky, egalitarian world where everyone can have their say. It's all very well, but there are certain circumstances — a war is a typical example — where you can't do that. You've got to have a few people with authority who you trust who are running it. And they should be very accountable too, of course.

But it can't happen in a modern democracy. This is one of the problems. What's the alternative to democracy? There isn't one. But even the best democracies agree that when a major war approaches, democracy must be put on hold for the time being. I have a feeling that climate change may be an issue as severe as a war. It may be necessary to put democracy on hold for a while.

On what it will take to convince the public that meaningful action is required to tackle climate change:

There has been a lot of speculation that a very large glacier [Pine Island glacier] in Antarctica is unstable. If there's much more melting, it may break off and slip into the ocean. It would be enough to produce an immediate sea-level rise of two metres, something huge, and tsunamis. I would say the scientists are not worried about it, but they are keeping a close watch on it. That would be the sort of event that would change public opinion. Or a return of the Dust Bowl in the mid-west. Another IPCC report won't be enough. We'll just argue over it like now.

On what we should be doing to tackle the predicted threats of climate change?

I've always said that adaptation is the most serious thing we can do. Are our sea defences adequate? Can we prevent London from flooding? This is where we should be spending our billions. If wind turbines really worked, I wouldn't object to them. To hell with the aesthetics, we might need them to save ourselves. But they don't work — the Germans have admitted it.

It's like the [EU] Common Agricultural Policy which led to corruption and inefficiencies. A common energy policy across Europe is not a good idea. I'm in favour of nuclear for crowded places like Britain for the simple reason that it's cheap, effective and exceedingly safe when you look at the record. We've had it for 50 years, but I can understand the left hating it because it was Thatcher's greatest weapon against the miners because we were then getting 30% of our electricity from nuclear. We could build a nuclear power station in five years, but it's the legal and planning stuff that makes it take 15 years. If governments were serious they would undo this legislation that holds it back.

I don't know enough abut carbon trading, but I suspect that it is basically a scam. The whole thing is not very sensible. We have this crazy idea that we are setting an example to the world. What we're doing is trying to make money out of the world by selling them renewable gadgetry and green ideas. It might be worthy from the national interest, but it is moonshine if you think what the Chinese and Indians are doing [in terms of emissions]. The inertia of humans is so huge that you can't really do anything meaningful.

On the surveys showing that public trust with climate science is eroding:

I think the public are right. That's why I'm soft on the sceptics. Science has got overblown. From the moment Harold Wilson brought in that stuff about the "white heat of technology," science, in Britain at least, has gone down the drain. Science was always elitist and has to be elitist. The very idea of diluting it down [to be more egalitarian] is crazy. We're paying the price for it now.

On whether we are capable as a species of tackling climate change:

I don't think we're yet evolved to the point where we're clever enough to handle a complex a situation as climate change. We're very active animals. We like to think: "Ah yes, this will be a good policy," but it's almost never that simple. Wars show this to be true.

People are very certain they are fighting a just cause, but it doesn't always work out like that. Climate change is kind of a repetition of a war-time situation. It could quite easily lead to a physical war. That's why I always come back to the safest thing to do being adaptation. For example, we've got to have good supplies of food. I would be very pleased to see this country and Europe seriously thinking about synthesising food.