Patrick Michaels: The Dog Ate Global Warming

The title of Patrick J. Michaels' article is so good, I had to mention it here, even though I have already written on this subject on 19 August 2009 in an entry called Global Surface Temperature Data Lost.  The Dog Ate Global Warming is a very interesting account of the efforts of many scientists to get the original surface temperature data from the Climate Research Unit at East Anglia, which was originally funded by the U.S. Dept. of Energy and has received funds from the EPA as well.  Michaels also has knowledge of the foolishness of the CRU claim that they could not keep the data because they did not have enough data storage capacity in the 1980s.  His account is quite entertaining.  He concludes that this episode of shoddy science casts even more doubt on the claims of the global warming alarmists who are pushing the EPA to claim CO2 is a pollutant, with the consequence that the government will be forcing huge increases in energy costs, a reduction in power reliability, and massive increases in unemployment.

Yes, the Dog ate the primary data basis for the claim of catastrophic man-made global warming!  So, what are the consequences?  Our intrepid friend at the Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI) has come up with a great response.  CEI's general counsel, Sam Kazman, has had CEI file a petition to force the EPA to reopen a major global warming proceeding.  This account finishes with:

CEI’s petition, filed late Monday with EPA, argues that CRU’s disclosure casts a new cloud of doubt on the science behind EPA’s proposal to regulate carbon dioxide.  EPA stopped accepting public comments in late June but has not yet issued its final decision.  As CEI’s petition argues, court rulings make it clear that agencies must consider new facts when those facts change the underlying issues.

CEI general counsel Sam Kazman stated, “EPA is resting its case on international studies that in turn relied on CRU data.  But CRU’s suspicious destruction of its original data, disclosed at this late date, makes that information totally unreliable.  If EPA doesn’t reexamine the implications of this, it’s stumbling blindly into the most important regulatory issue we face.”

You may recall that Sam Kazman filed the Freedom of Information Act request for the Alan Carlin and John Davidson report from within the EPA which questioned the EPA's evidence that CO2 was a pollutant.  This report was suppressed by the EPA management.  I discussed this in an entry called EPA Suppression of Endangerment Analysis of Greenhouse Gas Emissions on 1 July 2009.