The U.S. Chamber of Commerce—the largest business lobby in the United States, and one of the most powerful—is pushing the Environmental Protection Agency to hold a public hearing intended to challenge the science of climate change in what Chamber officials are calling “the Scopes monkey trial of the 21st century.”
The Chamber’s stated purpose is to determine whether human activity is contributing significantly to global warming that is putting the planet and all its inhabitants at risk; its real purpose seems to be creating enough political controversy and political uncertainty to stall or derail any attempts by the EPA to impose federal greenhouse gas emission standards on U.S. businesses.
If the EPA refuses to hold the hearing—which seems likely given the agency’s response that the proposed hearing would be “a waste of time”—the Chamber plans to file suit in federal court.
"It would be evolution versus creationism," said William Kovacs, the chamber's senior vice president for environment, technology and regulatory affairs, told the Los Angeles Times in describing the proposed hearing that would include witnesses, cross-examinations and a judge’s ruling. "It would be the science of climate change on trial."
The Chamber may have made a tactical error in choosing the Scopes trial as its metaphor for putting the science of climate change on trial. In the Scopes trial, science won (even though the defendent was convicted).
In the 1925 Scopes trial, a high school science teacher named John Scopes from Dayton, Tennessee, was accused of teaching the theory of evolution to his students, which Tennessee law deemed an illegal act. Two famous attorneys—Clarence Darrow for the defense and former Secretary of State William Jennings Bryan for the prosecution—squared off to argue the case. The trial quickly became a debate over science versus religion, and the issue (if not the case) was won when Darrow called Bryan to the stand and questioned him about inconsistent and illogical Bible passages that Bryan said should be taken literally.
Some environmentalists and scientists are comparing the Chamber’s proposal to a different trial from history. Brenda Ekwurzel, a climate scientist for the Union of Concerned Scientists, said the proposed hearing "brings to mind for me the Salem witch trials, based on myth. In this case, it would be ignoring decades of publicly accessible evidence."
The potential for federal emissions controls moved a giant step closer in April, when the EPA issued a proposed “endangerment finding,” which concluded that greenhouse gas pollution poses a “danger to public health and welfare.” Since then, the EPA has collected more than 300,000 public comments about the proposed finding, and the agency is expected to issue a final ruling within the next few weeks.
Brad Peck, blogging for the Chamber, claims that the business group only wants to “ensure that regulations which reengineer our economy are needed and would ultimately be effective” by forcing the EPA to reveal the scientific sources the agency used as the basis for its finding and making sure all relevant science was considered.
“We need to drop the articles of faith and use the entirety of scientific study on the effects of climate change not a sub-set, chosen by the EPA not for its validity but rather on its ability to forward their policy goal—the regulation of greenhouse gas emissions,” Beck wrote.
And later, in the same post: “There are many questions to be asked of the EPA, and forgive the Chamber for not accepting "Trust Us" as an answer. To enact effective policy we need transparency and scientific data which is beyond question, not data deemed beyond questioning.”
Most scientists agree that greenhouse gases are contributing significantly to global warming and that the increased buildup of greenhouse gases over the past 150 years is largely due to factory and vehicle emissions and other human activities. Scientists also predict that continued warming could have catastrophic effects.
In May 2009, the heads of the top science organizations in 13 of the world’s largest countries (the G8+5 nations), published a letter to world leaders [pdf] that said: “The need for urgent action to address climate change is now indisputable.”
In the same letter, these leading scientists wrote: “The need to find solutions to climate change presents a huge but as yet unrealized opportunity for the creation of new jobs and for the stimulation of new and emerging markets. The role of innovation in delivering energy efficiency and a low carbon world should become a major part of the efforts to rebuild the global economy.”
That seems like a goal even the U.S. Chamber of Commerce could get behind.
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Comments
It is nice to know that government is moving forward and taking steps for saving the enivornment. There is one issue though.
There are NGOs and companies who claim to work for saving the environment but instead they do it for earning money. Such companies should be closed down immediately as they normally end up doing nothing for the environment.
This issue should be taken by non-profit orginaztions such as GreenFudge
This is my view, you might think otherwise.
I welcome this trial as there is no proof of man made global warming. It is a hypothesis only, not even a theory. Since the EPA does not do their own science this should be good. The EPA uses the IPCC summaries and the IPCC does not conduct their own science. It is time that the public hears that all this is based on computer models while real life data is proving the hupothesis wrong.
Eve, Who said anything about MAN MADE global warming? The Chamber’s petition doesn’t attemt to deny that there is global warming and that it is causing climate change. There is no discussion about the source. EPA says that, regardless of the source, emissions from new cars could reduce GHGs. The only argument is whether the science shows that the admitted increase in GHGs is causing harm to public health and welfare and that, therefore, we should reduce emissions from new cars. I’m curious, what do you think the electorate will say?
Go here and have your eyes opened. I don’t mind at all that our gov. wants us to protect our environment – it is the only planet we have and we should all be careful of how we use things. But the constant propaganda about “Global Warming” has to stop! The ice proved the models wrong, the climate is proving the models wrong, the lack of a “hot spot” that would be caused by GHG’s is not there, again proving it all wrong! Let’s be honest, we are in a normal earth cooling trend right now, and then we also have normal heating trends. The sun has fewer sunspots now, which they are studying to see if it is related to a climate cooling trend. Why not just get people to learn to take care of what we have? WHY – because by scaring people you FORCE them to do what you WANT. And then there is the other side – money! Do you know how many scientists/companies/etc. are getting grants and other money to study “Global Warming”. Go to the site below and read some real science facts:
http://joannenova.com.au/global-warming/
All the pollution, toxic emissions, etc., that we, as humans are producing, has to go into the earth’s atmosphere which is a finite closed system. What we create is in great excess to what “naturally” occurs within the natural balance of the earth’s activities and cycles so, it’s not “rocket science” that we have to be affecting the climate in some way…no ifs, ands, or buts about it! We all are experiencing more violent storms/weather, droughts, warmer oceans, pest infestions,disruptions of animal and bird migrations and reproduction, etc. These are things we can see and are experiencing with our own eyes, in our own neighborhoods. The home and business insurance companies can tell you they definitely know climate change is occuring and have been planning and are adjusting their rates based on the costs of devasting weather patterns now and into the near future. I guess it’s easier for some people to be in denial than to acknowledge a very real problem that needs to be addressed sooner rather than later. And as the article says, if the Chamber is truly interested in businesses, they would recognize that there are tremendous economic and business opportunities in trying to work to meet the need to reduce the effects of climate change. You can help the earth and the economy by implementing sustainable business practices. We just have to think about how businesses can make money in a different way than in the past.
I think the study should be beneficial. We don’t want to take extreme measures that could affect whole economies to fight man-made climate change if it doesn’t exist.
I disagree with GreenFudge though who says we should immediately shut down companies who don’t agree with him/her. That doesn’t sound like a free society.
At least now people might wake up and realize that they’ve been misled and fooled for years about so called global warming. Hopefully this will put a stop to the complete and totally unnecessary emissions bill (cap & trade). As for the comment that humans impact on the earth have been seen with the storms, drought, ocean temp, animal patterns etc. please do some more research on the topic. There are numerous professors that have already came out and showed evidence that it is not because of ghg’s or humans at all, its Natural Weather Cycles, it’s been going on since the earth was formed, the thing is that records only go back so far, so we really don’t know the exact weather patterns of say 1,000 or 2,000 years ago, we have limited computer models but those are only guesses based on the limited records we have, and the hypothesis of those who inputted data. The same can be said for the animal patterns, there are literally thousands of different reasons why an animal or group of animals would change territory, migration, reproduction, etc. To say its all global warming is a very closed minded one track response. Remember in the so called global warming battle, you originally had around 300 of the worlds leading scientist claiming that it was taking place, you now have over 700 of the worlds top scientist saying that the previous information and studies were biased and in some cases totally wrong and standing against global warming. Don’t believe everything you hear, the sky is not falling!!
We need to realise the inextricable link between environmental preservation and sustainable financial growth. If the environement does not become marketable and is able to financially compete, then environmental policy is doomed to fail.
Let me clarify, I agree with you that climate change is occurring but at a much faster rate than in recorded history, as Dan mentions. I can’t understand how anyone can believe that with the tremendous amounts of pollution and toxins that we humans are putting into the atmosphere, that we are not having any effect or an insignificant effect, on the earth’s natural systems and cycles. Can someone please explain how our activities are not possibly impacting our atmosphere? Where do you think it all goes and what happens to it??? Wouldn’t it be better for all of us if we put less pollution into our environment, regardless of what you think about what’s causing climate change?