#BTColumn – Is climate change a hoax?

Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed by the author(s) do not represent the official position of Barbados TODAY.

By Dick Stoute

The globe is not warming as fast as the models predict. Yes, Co2 is contributing to warming, and the climate is changing, as we have all witnessed, but over the last few years, the average temperature in the world has more or less stabilised while Co2 has continued to increase. This is not what the models predicted. According to climate scientist William Happer, the models do not, accurately enough, estimate the amount and type of cloud being created by the change. 

The surface temperature of our globe depends on the balance between warming radiation from the sun and cooling radiation from our planet back into space. Clouds block solar radiation from reaching the earth’s surface and also block the radiation from the earth carrying heat into space. Increasing cloud cover can block enough sunlight to cool our planet even though greenhouse gases are blocking more of the heat leaving us. It seems as if the increased cloud is offsetting the heating trapped by Co2 in our atmosphere.  

What should we do? Step one is to recognise the human propensity to be hysterical. We must pay attention to the way our emotions influence our decisions. When we were told, back in 1987, that our CFC based refrigerants were creating holes in the ozone layer, we panicked and agreed on the Montreal Protocol, blocking the use of CFCs. This happened to coincide with the expiry of the patents a large US company had for these refrigerants and allowed them to make billions selling new refrigerants. Was it a conspiracy?

Conspiracies are fascinating. The trumped up “stolen election” has drawn millions into its thrall, but so have pandemic and vaccination conspiracies. Global warming, rebranded as Climate Change, has spurred several conspiracy theories as well. Big, threatening issues, spawn them by making us scared. When someone shouts “danger” we all pay attention. The bigger the danger, the more scared we get, and the more urgently, and violently, we respond.

 Our first response is to fight. Believers and non-believers have been fighting over their theories for millennia, but we are getting smarter and social media is taking us to the point where we just raise an eyebrow at the next conspiracy theory. I expect some Climate Change deniers will use these recent trends to argue Climate Change is just a hoax. Should we believe them?  

Be sensitive to your own fear as you consider your options. It still makes sense to produce our own energy, even as we prepare for nuclear energy. It is the cleanest energy source available to us, but it has been blocked by (oil fuelled?) conspiracy theories touting its danger. The fact that it has the safest operational record in the energy industry does not stand up against the hysterical fears generated by the conspiracy theories.

It is time for us to look to the future with confidence, rather than torment ourselves with imagined fears.

This column was submitted as a letter to the editor.