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By Hamish Johnston
The UK’s premier scientific organization, the Royal Society, has released a “new short guide to the science of climate change”.
Entitled Climate Change: a Summary of the Science, the 19-page document can be downloaded here.
The guide was produced in part because of pressure from 43 members of the society, who had complained that a 2007 report from the organization did not acknowledge fully areas of uncertainty in climate science.
As a result, the report has a more measured tone, but still asserts “There is strong evidence that the warming of the Earth over the last half-century has been caused largely by human activity.”
The document says: “A number of mechanisms have been proposed that could reduce or amplify the effect of solar variations; these remain areas of active research.” This is important. There have been periods during the past 2000 years when the Earth has been significantly warmer (Medieval Warm Period) and also much cooler (Little Ice Age) than at present. Since human activity resulting in CO2 emissions was negligible then, it would seem reasonable to give some priority to research into the causes of these cases of past climate change.
I am sure all will agree with the policy conclusion: “However, the potential impacts of climate change are sufficiently serious that important decisions will need to be made.” I am glad to see that the authors have avoided giving the impression that cutting back on CO2 emissions will solve the problem.