A Place to Stand

  My letter in reply to Mr Turnball's letter here (stuff edited underlined).

Roy Turnball'a response to my letter (Friday) saying that the recent claimed figure of Greenland melt is completely false agrees on that fact. He depends on the "imprecise nature of previous records" to deny certainty on this lack of melting but that cuts both ways. If the records aren't that good alarmists can't rely on them to claim any warming let alone catastrophism.
Moreover he doesn't dispute the fact that Antarctic ice is growing.
I note that, despite repeated requests, neither he nor any alarmist is able to name a single independent scientist anywhere in the world promoting the governmental catastrophic warming scare story. This, on its own, proves it is not part of science and that all those claiming a "scientific consensus", without any of these scientists in it is unworthy of trust on any other subject either.

Mr Turnball's defence of Gore's claim of 20 ft sea level rise is disingenuous because Gore's "Inconvenient Truth" film was not about the last ice age but about current alleged warming. The sea level claims were merely 2 among many convenient untruths in the film,

Indeed, apart from the fact that he ran for President it is difficult to find anything that is unequivocally truthful. Mr Gore may be a Nobel winner enriched by the methods Sarah Palin recently denounced as "crony capitalism" but he seems not seriously restricted by knowledge as his claims that smoking is a serious cause of global warming and that 2,000m down is "millions of degrees" hot shows.
And on the subject of another attendee at the forthcoming "renewables" shindig in Edinburgh, Chris Huhne but a different letter from Scottish Renewables (Friday) an organisation funded by government to lobby for ever more windmill subsidies, denouncing Tavish Scott, former Scottish LibDem leader who as party leader supported billions in windmill subsidies for not quite matching Huhne's enthusiasm for windmills.

It us true that Mr Huhne given as a reason for massive subsidy of windmills that they will be cheaper and "in the long run, protect us from future hikes in gas prices". However he has also said that development of the new shale gas field in Preston, with potential profits comparable to North Sea oil, will be halted purely to stop cheaper gas undercutting subsidised windmill power. It is unreasonable of Scottish Renewables to demand that Nicol know which of 2 expensive and destructive statements by his LibDem colleague, that windmills need subsidised because they are cheaper than gas or that gas needs banning because it is cheaper than windmills, should be taken as the party line for the day.

I am sure Gore, Huhne and Salmond will get on well

  The last couple of paragraphs deleted refer to another letter yesterday and the Scotsman were fully entitled not to let me take on 2 at once. The nothing "unequivocally truthful" remark, while true may have been considered overly contentious.

  The repetition of my call for the naming of any scientist supporting catastrophic warming is courteous since an apparent answer to that is published alongside my letter.

Bravo to Roy Turnbull (Letters, 23 September) for trouncing Neil Craig's misrepresentation (Letters, 22 September) of research on Greenland ice melting.


Mr Craig has repeatedly demanded examples of scientists who accept warming, but are not paid by the state.
Well, now he has one. Me. As I am an industrial chemist, he may object that my work is not in climate science. Likewise for the scientists working on low-carbon technologies for Shell, BP and Chevron, whose websites support the global warming consensus.
For non-state-funded climate scientists, who accept warming, he need only look at private universities like Harvard, MIT, Princeton, Stanford and Yale.
Of course he will not do this as it contradicts the deniers' conspiracy theory of climate scientists promoting warming to keep the grants coming in. Or the related conspiracy theory in which it is all an excuse to raise taxes.
Never mind that even state-funded climate scientists continued to warn of warming during the Bush administration, even though it was the last thing the science-denying, tax-averse Republicans wanted to hear.

  I have sent an answer which I think answers this unexpected reply well., though it may lead to Dr Moreton advancing into an untenable position. I hope it will be in on Monday. This correspondence seems to be developing legs.