Warming

Miami Debate Institute
Climate
CLIMATE FILE
***AFF STUFF***
1ac warming....................................................................................................................................................3
1ac warming....................................................................................................................................................4
1ac warming....................................................................................................................................................5
warming now...................................................................................................................................................6
must act now...................................................................................................................................................7
positive feedbacks...........................................................................................................................................8
positive feedbacks.........................................................................................................................................10
models show warming..................................................................................................................................13
satellites show warming...............................................................................................................................14
Warming is caused by humans....................................................................................................................15
warming causes extinction...........................................................................................................................18
warming hurts the economy........................................................................................................................19
warming hurts ecosystems...........................................................................................................................20
Warming causes monoculture ....................................................................................................................21
warming causes diseases..............................................................................................................................22
warming hurts species..................................................................................................................................26
warming causes war.....................................................................................................................................27
warming causes genocide.............................................................................................................................28
warming causes bad weather [general]......................................................................................................30
warming causes super storms......................................................................................................................31
warming causes hurricanes.........................................................................................................................33
warming causes illegal immigration...........................................................................................................34
warming outweighs neg impacts.................................................................................................................35
quals/consensus.............................................................................................................................................36
warming hurts the ozone..............................................................................................................................37
warming is a threat.......................................................................................................................................38
at: co2 ag........................................................................................................................................................39
at: co2 ag........................................................................................................................................................41
at: co2 ag........................................................................................................................................................42
at: carbon sinks.............................................................................................................................................44
at: carbon sinks.............................................................................................................................................45
at: ice age.......................................................................................................................................................46
at: ice age.......................................................................................................................................................47
at: ice age.......................................................................................................................................................48
at: ice age.......................................................................................................................................................49
at: ice age.......................................................................................................................................................50
at: s02.............................................................................................................................................................51
at: s02.............................................................................................................................................................52
at: s02.............................................................................................................................................................53
at: s02.............................................................................................................................................................54
at: s02.............................................................................................................................................................55
at: s02.............................................................................................................................................................56
at: s02.............................................................................................................................................................57
at: s02.............................................................................................................................................................59
at: s02.............................................................................................................................................................60
at: s02.............................................................................................................................................................61
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1nc can’t solve warming...............................................................................................................................62

1nc can’t solve warming...............................................................................................................................63
1nc no warming.............................................................................................................................................64
ext #1 – el nino ..............................................................................................................................................65
ext #2 – not human induced.........................................................................................................................66
ext #2 – not human induced.........................................................................................................................67
1nc earth is cooling.......................................................................................................................................68
ext – earth is cooling.....................................................................................................................................69
1nc models bad..............................................................................................................................................70
ext – models bad............................................................................................................................................71
AT: warming hurts the economy................................................................................................................72
AT: warming causes storms........................................................................................................................73
warming is not a threat................................................................................................................................74
quals/consensus.............................................................................................................................................75
1nc ice age......................................................................................................................................................76
warming stops the ice age............................................................................................................................77
ice age coming...............................................................................................................................................78
ice age worse than warming.........................................................................................................................79
1nc c02 ag......................................................................................................................................................80
1nc c02 AG....................................................................................................................................................81
1nc c02 AG....................................................................................................................................................82
food shortages cause war ............................................................................................................................83
ext – carbon sinks.........................................................................................................................................84
cO2 good for plants......................................................................................................................................86
AT: insects.....................................................................................................................................................91
AT: warming hurts crops............................................................................................................................92
1nc so2............................................................................................................................................................93
so2 cools/solves warming..............................................................................................................................94
satellites prove so2........................................................................................................................................98
models prove so2...........................................................................................................................................99
sO2 changes cloud property......................................................................................................................100
AT: hurts rain forests.................................................................................................................................101
so2 caused by humans................................................................................................................................102
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1AC WARMING
Warming Now – The 3 biggest feedbacks are all positive and guarantee rapid warming greater than
ever anticipated – research proves
New Scientist 7-24-04
The real warming could be as high as 10 degreesC. Surely some mistake? Too much wine at lunch? But no. This was for real. Till
now, climate modellers' forecasts of future warming have resembled the famous bell curve, with the most
likely result of doubling CO2 being a temperature increase of about 3 degreesC, and with declining
probabilities on either side for a narrow range of higher and lower temperature rises . But not in this case.
The graph, shown by James Murphy of the Met Office's Hadley Centre for Climate Prediction, had a long
"tail" at the higher end, reaching up to 6, 8 and even 10 degreesC. Temperature rises of this much would
have serious implications. CO2 is expected to reach double its pre-industrial levels within a century if we carry on burning coal and oil in what economists call a "business-as-usual" scenario. Nobody has seriously tried to work
out what this extra warming would mean for the planet or human society. But it would certainly not mean business as usual. First, a health warning. Murphy was not making a firm prediction of climatic Armageddon. But nor was this a Hollywood movie full of
Nor was Murphy alone with his tail. He showed a

impossible science. The high temperatures on the display, he said, "may not be the most likely, but cannot be discounted".
projection by David Stainforth from the University of Oxford that suggested a possible warming of 12
degreesC or more. This new generation of scarily skewed distributions will start turning up in the journals
soon. They arise because modellers have for the first time systematically checked their models for
uncertainties and discovered that they have an Achilles' heel: clouds. While clouds have always been regarded as one of the
biggest uncertainties in calculations of global warming, they are turning out to be far more of a wild card than anyone imagined. The fear is that global
warming will either reduce how cloudy the planet is, or significantly change the type of clouds in the sky,
and their influence of the planet's radiation budget. This could amplify global warming more than so far
anticipated. Being mostly of an age to remember 1970s Joni Mitchell songs, the climate scientists say they have "looked at clouds from both sides now", and they don't like what they see. Later this month, many of the researchers at the Exeter
workshop will sit down again in Paris to begin work on the UN's fourth global assessment of climate change, which will be published by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) in 2007. The sessions will discuss how sensitive the climate system is to
If the evidence presented at the Exeter meeting holds true, the UN will have to ratchet
infusions of CO2 and other greenhouse gases.
up its predictions of global warming, and in particular warn that their worst-case scenarios have just not
been worst-case enough. The climate's sensitivity to warming depends critically on feedbacks that may
amplify or damp down the initial warming. If you double the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere, the direct greenhouse effect is only about 1 degreesC.
Not much to worry about. But climate scientists expect the warming to trigger a series of feedbacks, of which the
three biggest, at least in the next few decades, will be from ice, water vapour and clouds. Take ice. As
the world warms, snow and ice from polar caps and mountain glaciers melts and is replaced by open water,
bare rock, tundra and forests. As this happens, the surface of the Earth becomes darker and absorbs more
radiation from the sun. This positive feedback is already evident in much of the Arctic, where warming
in recent decades has happened faster than elsewhere. But it will also warm up the global atmosphere.
Water vapor, like CO2, is a potent greenhouse gas. Without it our planet would freeze. But what will
happen to water vapour as the world warms is not as clear-cut as with ice. A warmer surface will certainly
cause more water to evaporate. And, though some sceptics disagree, this will probably increase the amount
of water vapour in the atmosphere. That again will amplify warming. In the standard climate models
extra water vapour in the air will at least double the direct warming effect of CO2. Add the impacts of water vapour and ice
together and we are close to climate scientists' central prediction -- a warming of about 3 degreesC for a doubling of CO2. But it's when we come to the third feedback
mechanism that things get really sticky. Clouds are clearly linked to water vapour. A lot of water vapour in the air eventually forms clouds.
During their short lives, clouds produce both positive and negative feedbacks. We all know that during the day, they can keep us cool by reflecting the sun's harsh rays. And at night they keep us warm, acting like a blanket that traps heat rising from the ground. But
which of these effects wins out depends a lot on the height at which the clouds form, their depth, colour and density. Researchers still know surprisingly little about how many and what sort of clouds are up there. Last year, for instance, it emerged that there may be
vastly more heat-trapping cirrus clouds in the upper atmosphere than anyone had thought. Some studies suggest that, taken globally, the cooling and warming effects of clouds may largely cancel each other out. But nobody is sure. And small changes in either the area
of cloud cover or the types of clouds that form could change things radically. So for modellers of our future climate there are two issues. Will global warming change clouds? And will the changes produce positive or negative feedback on the climate? A first guess
Higher evaporation rates in the heat of a greenhouse day

would suggest that extra evaporation and water vapour in the atmosphere will make more clouds. But it may not be so simple.
may "burn off" clouds without them ever producing rain. Equally, clouds may "rain out" more quickly,
leaving clearer skies rather than cloudier ones. The fear is that clearer skies will amplify, rather than damp
down global warming. And there is growing evidence that this clear-skies effect could already be under way. One of the foremost experts on clouds and climate, Bruce Wielicki of NASA's Langley Research Center, has found that
there are fewer clouds these days in the tropics. Since the mid-1980s, he says, the rising and descending motions of air that cover the entire tropics, for example in the Hadley circulation cells , appeared to increase in strength. The result was faster formation of storm
New research showing a

clouds in areas where the air rises -- what meteorologists call the inter-tropical convergence zone -- but with the clouds raining out more quickly, which left the rest of the tropics drier and less cloudy.
decrease in "earthshine", the sunlight reflected from the Earth onto the moon, is still controversial , but
seems to confirm both that the Earth's cloud cover is falling and that the reflectivity of clouds plays a vital
role in controlling the planet's radiation budget, says Peter Cox, head of climate chemistry at the Met Office. Wielicki is still cautious about what
is behind the clearer tropical skies, but many others see them as strong evidence of global warming. And this matters a
great deal because an estimated two-thirds of global water-vapour feedback, and probably an equal
proportion of the cloud feedback, take place in the tropics. So, clearer tropical skies could bring a major
positive feedback to global warming. Even if global warming is not the cause of clearer tropical skies, Wielicki says his findings show that we are being complacent if we think clouds are an unchanging
The extent to which clouds control the planetary thermostat

feature of the world. Not only are they highly variable but their potential effects on climate are poorly understood.
may be between two and four times greater than previously thought, he says.
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Climate
1AC WARMING
Humans are directly responsible for warming

Schneider, Tapio, 2008, “How We Know Global Warming Is Real” Skeptic, Vol. 14 Issue 1, p31-37
There are several lines of evidence. We know approximately how much carbon dioxide is emitted as a
result of human activities. Adding up the human sources of carbon dioxide—primarily from fossil fuel
burning, cement production, and land use changes (e.g.. deforestation)—one finds that only about half the
carbon dioxide emitted as a result of human activities has led to an increase in atmospheric concentrations.
The other half of the emitted carbon dioxide has been take up by oceans and the biosphere—where and how exactly is not completely understood: there is a “missing carbon sink”.
Human activities thus can account for the increase in carbon dioxide concentrations. Changes in the
isotopic composition of carbon dioxide show that the carbon dioxide derives largely from plant materials,
that is, from processes such as burning of biomass or fossil fuels, which are derived from fossil plant
materials. Minute changes in the atmospheric concentration of oxygen show that the added carbon dioxide
derives from burning of the plant materials. And concentrations of carbon dioxide in the ocean have
increased along with the atmospheric concentrations, showing that the increase in atmospheric carbon
dioxide concentrations cannot be a result of release from the oceans. All lines of evidence taken together
make it unambiguous that the increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations is human induced and
is primarily a result of fossil fuel burning. (Similar reasoning can be evoked for other greenhouse gases, but
for some of those, such as methane and nitrous oxide, their resources are not as clear as those of carbon
dioxide.)
Runaway warming kills billions and the economy

Lester W. Milbrath is director of the Research Program in Environment and Society at the State University
of New York at Buffalo and a professor emeritus of political science and sociologyThe Futurist.
Washington: May/Jun 1994. Vol. 28, Iss. 3; pg. 26
As this scenario plays out, it is improbable that the climate system will not change at all or that it will
gradually change to a new pattern and settle down, as is assumed in most current economic thinking. The
most-probable climate scenario is for even more chaos. Many meteorologists and climatologists already perceive the climate system as chaotic. If humans increasingly perturb that
system, we could expect it to become even more chaotic. But how chaotic will it become, what kinds of chaos might we expect, and how long will it last? No one knows the answers to those questions. From chaos theory, we do suspect that systems which become
extremely chaotic may collapse or shift to a new pattern--one that may or may not be stable. The climatic catastrophes of recent years do suggest one possible scenario of climate behavior. Frequent, unexpected climatic disasters may be interspersed into "normal"
climate patterns. The resulting loss of life and property could reduce the human propensity to multiply and to increase economic throughput. Experiencing these losses may lead people to lose faith in the premise of continuity. This will retard economic growth despite
Another scenario suggests that there could be an extended period, perhaps a decade or
the desperate efforts of governments to promote it.
two, when there is oscillation-type chaos in the climate system. Plants will be especially vulnerable to
oscillating chaos, since they are injured or die when climate is too hot or too cold, too dry or too wet. And
since plants make food for all other creatures, plant dieback would lead to severe declines in agricultural
production. Farm animals and wildlife would die in large numbers. Many humans also would starve.
Several years of climatic oscillation could kill billions of people. The loss of the premise of continuity would also precipitate collapse
of world financial markets. That collapse would lead to sharp declines in commodity markets, world trade, factory output, retail sales, research and development, tax income for
Billions of
governments, and education. Such nonessential activities as tourism, travel, hotel occupancy, restaurants, entertainment, and fashion would be severely affected.
unemployed people would drastically reduce their consumption, and modern society's vaunted economic
system would collapse like a house of cards.
US Economic collapse causes war

Walter Russel Mead, 8/29/98 [The Record, “Markets are biggest threat to World Peace”]
Stock markets are tottering around the world. The United States and the world are facing what could grow
into the greatest threat to world peace in 60 years. Forget suicide car bombers and Afghan fanatics. It's the
financial markets, not the terrorist training camps that pose the biggest immediate threat to world peace. How
can this be? Think about the mother of all global meltdowns: the Great Depression that started in 1929. U.S. stocks began to collapse in October, staged a rally, then the market
headed south big time. At the bottom, the Dow Jones industrial average had lost 90 per cent of its value. Wages plummeted, thousands of banks and brokerages went bankrupt,
But the biggest impact of the Depression on the United
millions of people lost their jobs. There were similar horror stories worldwide.
States -- and on world history -- wasn't money. It was blood: the Second World War, to be exact. The
Depression brought Adolf Hitler to power in Germany, undermined the ability of moderates to oppose
Joseph Stalin's power in Russia, and convinced the Japanese military that the country had no choice but to
build an Asian empire, even if that meant war with the United States and Britain. That's the thing about
depressions. They aren't just bad for your pensions. Let the world economy crash far enough and the rules
change. We stop playing The Price Is Right and start up a new round of Saving Private Ryan.
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1AC WARMING
Warming crushes agriculture – 2 billion will die

Chen, Consortium for International Earth Science Information Network, CLIMATE CHANGE AND
WORLD FOOD SECURITY, Thomas Downing, ed., 1996, p. 44-5.
In all cases, climate change leads to net declines in cereal production and agricultural GDP in the
developing world. Modest increases in production in the developed world in most instances do not fully
counterbalance the developing world declines, except at high levels of adaptation in the less dramatic GCM
scenarios. World market price increases at the same time the developing counties are forced to import more
cereals. As a result, the estimated number of undernourished people is projected to increase in 11 of the 12
climate change scenarios examined. Tables 4 and 5 summarize the results of the BLS scenario experiments in comparison with our scenario of a food-
secure world. These illustrate that there is a large gap between a “desirable” food-secure scenario and the BLS scenarios with respect to the prevalence of undernutrition and future
growth in food availability and income. About 500 million more people, or an additional 5 percent of the world population in 2060, suffer from severe under-nutrition in the BLS
Under the most adverse climate changes considered the number of
Reference Scenario compared with the food-secure scenario.
undernourished could increase drastically to more than 2 billion, or 20 percent of the 2060 population.
Warming devastates every ecosystem on the planet

J.C. Ryan, Worldwatch Institute, WORLDWATCH PAPER 108, September/October 1992, p. 10-11
Now evolution is again being thrown off its usual course – but not by a gradual change in global
temperature or an explosive collision between the Earth and a giant asteroid, both of which are primary
suspects in the demise of the dinosaurs. This time, the collision is between the insatiable demands of one
species and the finite capacity of its global habitat. The result is rates of extinction several thousand times
normal levels. Biological diversity – the variety not just of species, but of genes and ecosystem – is
diminishing at precipitous rates throughout the world. Species are vanishing most rapidly – and most
notably – from dwindling tropical forests. But mass extinction is everywhere; amphibians are declining
worldwide; three-quarters of the world’s species of birds are declining in population or threatened with
extinction; and genetic varieties of crops, fish, and livestock are all rapidly disappearing, near and far from
the equator. Yet the worst may still lie ahead. If human-generated global warming comes to pass as rapidly
as most climatologists predict, another wave of extinction – even more massive than the one already in
progress – is in store. While the problems of declining biodiversity and global warming have each attracted
extensive attention, the relationship between them has not. Unfortunately, this unholy alliance will
probably make the world’s current biological collapse pale in comparison. With a rapidly changing climate,
it is not an overstatement to say that practically every habitat on the planet will be put at risk. Most species
will face the choice of either adapting or relocating; many will fail to make the transition.
Species loss risks extinction

Paul Warner, American University, Dept of International Politics and Foreign Policy, August, Politics and
Life Sciences, 1994, p 177
Massive extinction of species is dangerous, then, because one cannot predict which species are expendable
to the system as a whole. As Philip Hoose remarks, "Plants and animals cannot tell us what they mean to
each other." One can never be sure which species holds up fundamental biological relationships in the
planetary ecosystem. And, because removing species is an irreversible act, it may be too late to save the
system after the extinction of key plants or animals. According to the U.S. National Research Council, "The
ramifications of an ecological change of this magnitude [vast extinction of species] are so far reaching that
no one on earth will escape them." Trifling with the "lives" of species is like playing Russian roulette, with
our collective future as the stakes.
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WARMING NOW
Global warming is happening now and fast
Jeffrey Kluger; Sunday, March 26, 2006; Posted: 11:27 a.m. EST (16:27 GMT); Time
Magazine, http://www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1176081,00.html?cnn=yes
Never mind what you've heard about global warming as a slow-motion emergency that
would take decades to play out. Suddenly and unexpectedly, the crisis is upon us. From
heat waves to storms to floods to fires to massive glacial melts, the global climate seems
to be crashing around us. The problem -- as scientists suspected but few others
appreciated -- is that global climate systems are booby-trapped with tipping points and
feedback loops, thresholds past which the slow creep of environmental decay gives way
to sudden and self-perpetuating collapse. That's just what's happening now. It's at the
north and south poles -- where ice cover is crumbling to slush -- that the crisis is being
felt the most acutely. Late last year, for example, researchers analyzed data from
Canadian and European satellites and found that the Greenland ice sheet is not only
melting, but doing so faster and faster, with 53 cubic miles draining away into the sea last
year alone, compared to 23 cubic miles in 1996.One of the reasons the loss of the planet's
ice cover is accelerating is that as the poles' bright white surface disappears it changes the
relationship of the Earth and the sun. Polar ice is so reflective that 90 percent of the
sunlight that strikes it simply bounces back into space, taking its energy with it. Ocean
water does just the opposite, absorbing 90 percent of the light and heat it receives,
meaning that each mile of ice that melts vanishes faster than the mile that preceded it.
This is what scientists call a feedback loop, and a similar one is also melting the frozen
land called permafrost, much of which has been frozen -- since the end of last ice age in
fact, or at least 8,000 years ago. Sealed inside that cryonic time capsule are layers of
decaying organic matter, thick with carbon, which itself can transform into CO2. In
places like the southern boundary of Alaska the soil is now melting and softening.
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MUST ACT NOW
Federal Government Needs To Address Climate Change Now
Betty Parker • News Journal capital bureau • June 26, 2008
The federal government may be slow-acting when it comes to addressing climate change, but
Miami-Dade Mayor Many Diaz said the nation’s mayors are leading the way to fight global warm
“Climate change will not wait and that’s why we must act now,” Diaz told the audience at Gov.
Charlie Crist’s conference on climate change.
More than 800 mayors have signed a pledge to fight climate change by implementing the Kyoto
protocols, said Diaz, who is also president of the U.S. Conference of Mayors.
He singled out almost a dozen cities around the county, large and small, for their progressive
action, especially in implementing green building codes and efficient transportation for mass
transit and for government fleets. But he mentioned no other Florida city except for
Miami, which he said is preparing to pass new codes requiring all buildings to be green. Green
buildings already get expedited permitting. “The message is simple in Miami, he said, “Build
green, or you don’t build at all.”
He also said cities demand an end to sprawl that forces more people to use individual vehicles.
“We need government policies that make it less easy to use automobiles,” he said.
Diaz said his own city vehicle is a hybrid, which has brought significantly lower fuel bills and less
air pollution. Soon, he said, all city cars will be hybrids.
While there may be some start-up costs, he said, the cost of inaction is much greater; Florida is
especially vulnerable to the effects of global warming.
Diaz also praised Crist, saying the governor “had the courage to go against so many in his own
party, to go for what he believes in and what is right” in fighting global warming.
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Climate
POSITIVE FEEDBACKS
Global warming threatens to escalate temperatures further once carbon, long assumed to be ‘locked
away’ beneath earth’s crust, ‘spews forth.’
Pearce, Fred, environment and development consultant and author of 14 books, Why it's time to
pay attention to the long-ignored "deep" carbon cycle, 5/24/2008, Database: Academic Search Complete
The escape of carbon from deep within the Earth could have profound implications for
climate CARBON buried in the Earth could ultimately determine the fate of our planet's atmosphere. So concluded a pioneering
meeting last week about the Earth's long-neglected "deep" carbon cycle. Carbon is locked away down in the
Earth's crust: in magma and old carbonate rocks buried by plate tectonics, in fossil fuels like coal and oil, and in ice lattices
beneath the ocean bed. It has long been assumed that this carbon was largely cut off from the
surface, and could safely be ignored when analysing the effect of greenhouse gases on
climate. Now it seems there may be much more "deep carbon" ready to spew out than we
thought. This realisation could have profound implications for our climate, argues Robert Hazen of the Carnegie Institution, who
organised the meeting at the institution's Geophysical Laboratory in Washington DC. "We may be on the verge of a transformational
moment… a glimpse of new, unexplored scientific territory," he says. Perhaps the
greatest threat of an unexpected
release of carbon from the deep comes from an indirect effect of human-made CO2.
Global warming could destabilise some deep carbon reserves, notably in clathrates - ice
lattices which are found beneath the ocean floor and continental permafrost, and even under freshwater lakes like Lake Baikal in
Siberia (pictured). These ice structures may hold trillions of tonnes of methane. "We are extremely
concerned that clathrates are the largest single source of greenhouse gases that could be added
to the atmosphere," says Hazen. "If you raise temperatures even slightly, they could be
released." According to Ronald Cohen, a geophysicist at the Carnegie Institution, natural warming caused large releases of
methane around 55 million years ago. Though the deep carbon cycle could theoretically absorb
human-made emissions, Hazen points out that this would take millions of years. Catastrophic
methane emissions could happen over just a few decades.
Global warming is melting permafrost releasing trapped greenhouse gases that further escalade the
rate of warming
Zimov, Sergey, Director of Northeast Science Station, 2006, “Permafrost and the Global
Carbon Budget”, Science, Vol. 312 Issue 5780 p1612-1613
Our laboratory incubations and field experiments show that theorganic matter in yedoma decomposes
quickly when thawed, resulting in respiration rates of initially 10 to 40 g of carbon per m3
per day, and then 0.5 to 5 g of carbon per m3 per day over several years. These rates are similar to those of
productive northern grassland soils. If these rates are sustained in the long term, as field observations suggest, then
most carbon in recently thawed yedoma will be released within a century--a striking contrast to the preservation of
carbon for tens of thousands of years when frozen in permafrost. Some local thawing of yedoma occurs independently
of climate change. When permafrost ice wedges thaw, the ground subsides (thermokarst), forming lakes. The abundant
thermokarst lakes on yedoma territory migrate across the plains as thawing and subsidence occur along their margins.
During the Holocene (the past 10,000 years), about half of the yedoma thawed beneath these migratory lakes and then
refroze when the lakes had moved on. The yedoma carbon beneath the thermokarst lakes is decomposed by microbes
under anaerobic conditions, producing methane that is released to the atmosphere primarily by bubbling (5). Near
eroding lake shores, methane bubbling is so high that channels through the lake ice remain open all winter. During a
thaw/freeze cycle associated with lake migration, ~30% of yedoma carbon is decomposed
by microbes and converted to methane. As a potent greenhouse gas, this methane
contributes to climate warming. In response to climate warming, permafrost sediments
have already begun to thaw (6), with extreme projections that almost all yedoma will
8
Climate
thaw by the end of the 21st century (7). What would happen to the carbon derived from permafrost if
high-latitude warming continues?
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Climate
POSITIVE FEEDBACKS
Carbon dioxide absorbs radiation and intensifies the global warming crisis
Hansen, James, Director of NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies, 2006, “Earth’s
Climate Is Near Tipping Point”, NPQ: New Perspectives Quarterly; Vol. 23 Issue 1, p63-
65
The great interest in CO2 is due to the realization that increasing CO2, other things being equal, will cause
global warming. CO2 is a greenhouse gas. It absorbs the Earth’s infrared radiation,
reducing the emission of heat to space. This causes a temporary imbalance between the
amount of solar energy absorbed by the Earth and the energy emitted to space. So the
Earth will warm up until it restores energy balance. Global warming in just the past 30 years is more
than one-half degree Celsius, about 1 degree Fahrenheit in 30 years. The good news about CO2 is that about 40 percent
of annual fossil fuel emissions continue to be soaked up. And if we decreased CO2 emissions and improved
reforestation and agricultural practices, we could probably increase the percentage uptake. The bad news is that
stabilization of atmospheric CO2 amount may require reducing emissions by as much as 60 percent to 80 percent. But,
on the contrary, emissions are still increasing—2 percent per year in the past decade.
Thawing of permafrost releases carbon dioxide and methane, hastening global warming
Patel, Samir, 2007, “Melting Permafrost May Rev Up Global Warming”, Discover; Vol.
28, Issue 1, p45
By 2100 Siberia as we know it may not exist--all that frozen ground may have thawed. The
defrosting could release nearly 1,000 gigatons of carbon stored in the permafrost and
hasten global warming, according to a report in June. The unnerving new estimate puts
permafrost up there with soils (1,500gigatons) and vegetation (650 gigatons), Earth's second
and third largest repositories of carbon after the oceans. In a separate study, Katey Walter, an
aquatic ecologist at the University of Alaska at Fairbanks, showed that much of this buried
carbon may emerge as methane, a greenhouse gas some 20 times more powerful than
carbon dioxide. One type of permafrost called yedoma is full of grass roots, bones, and
other biological material. For tens of thousands of years, this organic matter has been in cold
storage; when permafrost melts, it gives rise to thaw lakes, where the organics decompose
and release bubbles of methane. While monitoring two Arctic thaw lakes for 13 months,
Walter's team found that they gave off five times as much methane as previously
estimated. She also showed that the lakes are growing, potentially starting a feedback loop
that could lead to more rapid warming.
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Climate
POSITIVE FEEDBACKS
Vegetation in the arctic adds to global warming; warming in the region creates feedback effects
which will further warm the arctic.
Sturm, M., T. Douglas, C. Racine, and G. E. Liston (2005), Changing snow and shrub
conditions affect albedo with global implications, Vegetation growth in Arctic could add
to warming,
http://news.mongabay.com/2005/0908-agu.htmlSeptember 8, 2005
Warming in the Arctic is stimulating the growth of vegetation and could affect the
delicate energy balance there, causing an additional climate warming of several degrees
over the next few decades. A new study indicates that as the number of dark-colored
shrubs in the otherwise stark Arctic tundra rises, the amount of solar energy absorbed
could increase winter heating by up to 70 percent. The research will be published 7 September in the first
issue of the Journal of Geophysical Research-Biogeosciences, published by the American Geophysical Union. The study in
western Alaska during the winters in 2000-2002 shows how the increasing abundance of high-latitude
vegetation, particularly shrubs, interacts with the snow and affects Earth's albedo, or the
reflection of the Sun's rays from the surface. The paper, which also analyzes the ramifications of continued
plant growth in the tundra regions, written by researchers at the U.S. Army Cold Regions Research and Engineering Laboratory and at
Colorado State University. It
presents the first evidence that shrub growth could alter the winter
energy balance of the Arctic and subarctic tundra in a substantial way.
The authors measured five adjacent sites in subarctic Alaska. They included areas covered by continuous forest canopy, others dotted
with shrubs, and some of barren tundra. They found that mid-winter albedo was greatly reduced where shrubs were exposed and that
melting began several weeks earlier in the spring at these locations, as compared to snow-covered terrain. The researchers note,
however, that the shrubs' branches produced shade that slowed the rate of melting, so that the snowmelt finished at approximately the
same time for all the sites they examined.
Matthew Sturm, lead author of the study, notes that warming
in the region seems to have stimulated shrub
growth, which further warms the area and creates a feedback effect that can promote
higher temperatures and even more growth. This feedback could, in turn, accelerate
increases in the shrubs' range and size over the four million square kilometer [1.5 million square
mile] tundra and effect significant changes over the region.
11
Climate
POSITIVE FEEDBACKS
LARGE RELEASE OF METHANE COULD CAUSE ABRUPT AND CATASTROPHIC CLIMATE

CHANGE AS HAPPENED 635 MILLION YEARS AGO, UCR-LED STUDY WARNS.
States News Service, Broadcast Industry, May 28, 2008, Large Release of Methane
Could Cause Abrupt And Catastrophic Climate Change as Happened 635 Million
Years Ago, UCR-LED Study Warns, NexisLexis Database.
An abrupt release of methane, a powerful greenhouse gas, about 635 million years ago from ice
sheets that then extended to Earth's low latitudes caused a dramatic shift in climate, triggering a series of events that
resulted in global warming and effectively ended the last "snowball" ice age, a UC
Riverside-led study reports. The researchers posit that the methane was released gradually at first and then
in abundance from clathrates - methane ice that forms and stabilizes beneath ice sheets
under specific temperatures and pressures. When the ice sheets became unstable, they collapsed, releasing
pressure on the clathrates which began to degas. "Our findings document an abrupt and catastrophic
means of global warming that abruptly led from a very cold, seemingly stable climate
state to a very warm also stable climate state with no pause in between," said Martin
Kennedy, a professor of geology in the Department of Earth Sciences, who led the research team.
"This tells us about the mechanism, which exists, but is dormant today, as well as the rate of change," he added. "What we now
need to know is the sensitivity of the trigger: how much forcing does it take to move from one stable state to the other, and are
we approaching something like that today with current carbon dioxide warming."
Study results appear in the May 29 issue of Nature.
According to the study, methane clathrate destabilization acted as a runaway feedback to increased warming, and was the
tipping point that ended the last snowball Earth. (The snowball Earth hypothesis posits that the Earth was covered from pole to
pole in a thick sheet of ice for mil lions of years at a time.)
"Once methane was released at low latitudes from destabilization in front of ice sheets, warming caused other clathrates to
destabilize because clathrates are held in a temperature-pressure balance of a few degrees," Kennedy said. "But not all the
methane clathrates are present today in the
Earth's methane has been released as yet. These same
Arctic permafrost as well as below sea level at the continental margins of the ocean,
and remain dormant until triggered by warming.
it's possible that only a little warming can unleash this trapped
"This is a major concern because
methane. Unzippering the methane reservoir could potentially warm the Earth tens
of degrees, and the mechanism could be geologically very rapid. Such a violent, zipper-like opening of the clathrates
could have triggered a catastrophic climate and biogeochemical reorganization of the ocean and atmosphere around 635 million
years ago."
12
Climate
MODELS SHOW WARMING
Models presented by scientists must be accepted because they are based on reliable principles such as
the laws of thermodynamics and radiative transfer, combined with properties of gases.
Schneider, Tapio, 2008, “How We Know Global Warming Is Real” Skeptic, Vol. 14 Issue 1, p31-37
While there are uncertainties in climate projections, it is important to realize that the climate projections are
based on sound scientific principles, such as the laws of thermodynamics and radiative transfer, with
measurements of optical properties of gases. The record of past climate changes that can be inferred, for
example, with geochemical methods from ice cores and ocean sediment cores, provides tantalizing hints of
large climate changes that occurred over Earth’s history, and it poses challenges to our understanding of
climate (for example, there is no complete and commonly accepted explanation for the cycle of ice ages
and warm periods). However, climate models are not empirical, based on correlations in such records, but
incorporate our best understanding of the physical, chemical, and biological processes of being modeled.
Hence, evidence that temperature changes precede changes in carbon dioxide concentrations in some
climate changes on the timescales of ice ages, for example, only shows that temperature changes can affect
the atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations, which in turn feed back on temperature changes. Such
evidence does not invalidate the laws of thermodynamics and radiative transfer, or the conclusion that the
increase in greenhouse gas concentrations in the past decades is
human induced.
13
Climate
SATELLITES SHOW WARMING
Satellites show thinning in upper atmosphere proving global warming is actually occurring
Perkins, Sid, 2006, “Irony on High”, Science News; Vol. 170 Issue 26/27 p405-406
Using their new model, which includes variations of the solar cycle, the researchers calculated that future increases in
greenhouse gases could reduce the density of the air at that altitude-which is approximately one-billionth as dense as it is at sea level-
by about another 3 percent by 2017.
"It's a paradox that there are different effects [of global warming] at high and low altitudes, but both are real," Solomon
says. The dissimilar effects result from the disparity in atmospheric density at different altitudes, he notes.
Greenhouse gases are particularly efficient at absorbing infrared radiation, thereby trapping heat. Regardless of altitude,
gas molecules increase their speed when they absorb radiation. The speeding molecules typically lose their extra kinetic energy in one
of two ways: They transfer it as heat to another molecule via a collision, or they radiate a photon. If doesn't strike another molecule,
the photon can carry the energy into space.
At altitudes below 15 km, gas molecules are closely packed and each molecule
travels only a few dozen nanometers before it collides with another. Thus, the extra
energy that a molecule gains via the greenhouse effect is usually passed on via a collision
rather than radiated into space, says Solomon. So, warmth remains trapped in the lower
atmosphere.
In contrast, at high altitudes, where the atmosphere is less dense, collisions
between gas molecules are infrequent. There, energized molecules of gas are much more
likely to radiate a photon, contributing to atmospheric cooling, Solomon explains. The
cooling air contracts, leaving the atmosphere less dense at any given altitude.
The high-altitude atmospheric thinning that Solomon has documented indicates
that global warming is really happening, Dickinson says.
14
Climate
WARMING IS CAUSED BY HUMANS
Humans create 25 gigatons of carbon dioxide annually, causing global warming, despite what
skeptics say.
Jeff Short, supervisory research chemist at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric
Administration's Auke Bay Laboratory near Juneau, April 22, 2008, Global warming
demands action, not ill-informed bickering, LexisNexis Database.
Despite overwhelming evidence that humans are causing global warming, the
arguments of ill-informed skeptics continue to promote the illusion of scientific
uncertainty. Because policy makers routinely cite these arguments to justify inaction, they require rebuttal. One recent letter
to the Daily News implies that humans have nothing to do with the current warming because we played no role in previous ice age
terminations, and that the inaccuracy of climate models may be due to their failure to incorporate effects of galactic cosmic rays on
cloud formation. Another criticized the authors of the Alaska Greenhouse Emission Inventory for their failure to account for water
vapor, volcanoes and forest fires as natural greenhouse gas sources. These arguments are dismissed by nearly all climate scientists
not because of some self-serving conspiracy but because these arguments are seriously flawed. Such distractions court disaster.
All six ice ages within the last 450,000 years were terminated by rapid temperature rises,
triggered by small, regular variations in the Earth's orbit that increased the amount of sunlight hitting
the Northern Hemisphere. These small increases melted ice-sheet fringes and stimulated releases of
carbon dioxide and water vapor from the ocean to the atmosphere, which then amplified the
temperature increases in mutually reinforcing, positive feedback loops. These feedback loops can be triggered by a small initial
Today these triggers are being provided by
temperature increase or by a small greenhouse gas increase.
humans on a much larger scale. About 25 gigatons of carbon dioxide is released to the
atmosphere annually from combustion of fossil fuels; that far exceeds the 0.1 gigatons
from volcanoes and forest fires during years of peak activity. As for water vapor, it is indeed a more
powerful greenhouse gas than carbon dioxide, but it is already incorporated into climate models as one of several feedback
mechanisms. These models now account for the Earth's temperature record reasonably well and are not markedly improved when
galactic cosmic rays are included. There is, however, no dismissing the impacts of human-caused
carbon dioxide emissions.
Humans have sped up the process of global warming; if nothing is done soon, humanity will face
death, global war, famine, and drought.
Jeff Short, supervisory research chemist at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric
Administration's Auke Bay Laboratory near Juneau, April 22, 2008, Global warming
demands action, not ill-informed bickering, LexisNexis Database.
Once thawed, vast stores of methane are available for release from bacterial
decomposition of organic matter. Methane is 24 times more potent a greenhouse gas
than carbon dioxide, so these releases may trigger a runaway greenhouse scenario
beyond our ability to stop. Climate models cannot account for the rapid ice cap loss without including effects from
black carbon particles produced by forest fires and industrial emissions. Black carbon absorbs sunlight efficiently, increasing
atmospheric warming and accelerating ice melt when they settle. These processes are happening so fast that we have perhaps 10
years before we become committed to an ice-free Arctic Ocean during summer and subsequently face high risk of rapid,
irreversible warming. According to some projections, the ice may be essentially gone within five years for the first time in the last
700,000 and probably several million -- far longer than our species has been on the planet. Once global warming
escapes our control, we will bitterly regret it. Whatever the short-term economic costs of reversing global
warming, at least to restore the Arctic ice cap, they are preferable to the nightmare that would unfold if we fail. As emphasized in
the recent Alaska Climate Impact Assessment report,
we can and will adapt. But the report fails to acknowledge that
doing so will almost certainly be extremely repugnant. Humanity has "adapted" to the
black plague, which killed one-third of the European population, to global warfare, and
to widespread famine and drought. Runaway global warming may lead to such
outcomes on almost inconceivably large scales, in duration as well as scope, within
most of our lifetimes.
15
Climate
Global warming is due to human activities, which have risen .74 Celsius in the past 100 years and
threaten plant and animal life on earth.
Dr Neville Nicholls, School of Geography and Environmental Science at Monash

University. January 7, 2007, We're all to blame for the curse of global warming –
Environment, LexisNexis Database.
* What is global warming? Global warming is the heating of the atmosphere near the surface of
the Earth by increases in greenhouse gases due to human activities, such as burning
fossil fuels (oil, coal, gas). The Earth's temperature has risen about 0.74C in the past
100 years, due mainly to these gas increases. * Is global warming a man-made phenomenon or simply the
natural evolution of our planet? Warming in the past 100 years is mainly due to increases in greenhouse gases from human
activity, especially the use of fossil fuels. * How has global warming caused a hole
in the ozone layer? The hole is
caused by chemical processes linked to human activities and the release of gases used
for refrigeration and in aerosol cans. * If all the world's gas-generating power stations were turned off
tomorrow, how long would it take before it affected global warming? Carbon dioxide remains in the
atmosphere for a long time, so warming would continue for several decades, even if we
stopped all activities creating greenhouse gases. But the rate of warming would
definitely slow down. * Has global warming increased temperatures on Earth in the past 50 years. If so, by how much?
The Earth has warmed about 0.65C in the past 50 years. Most, perhaps all, of this
warming is due to increases in greenhouse gases from human activity. * How much do
temperatures have to increase before it becomes a significant issue? Some scientists believe a warming of
about 2C would cause substantial damage to the planet. There is a great deal of
evidence that warming has already affected the flowering of plants and animal
breeding times. * What effect will global warming have on plant and animal life? If warming is not too fast,
much plant and animal life would adapt to the changes in the climate. But some species would be vulnerable,
even to small temperature increases, including animals used to cold mountain
temperatures. Large increases in sea levels would have a devastating effect on coastal
life.
Not only have humans caused global warming but it is too late to stop rising temperatures
Walsh, Bryan, 2007, “Raising the Climate Stakes”, Time, Vol. 169 Issue 8, p18
Consider the case closed on global warming. The assessment released this month by the
U.N.'s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) concluded for the first time
that evidence of the earth's rising temperatures was "unequivocal" and that this warming
was more than 90% likely to be the result of human activity. The report's authors--some
600 scientists from 40 countries--also noted that we are locked into more climate change.
Even if all greenhouse-gas emissions miraculously ended today, the earth would continue
to warm through the rest of the century because of the amount of carbon we have already
added to the atmosphere. Now that the IPCC has fingered the culprits behind global warming, the
question becomes how will world leaders respond. And the policy debates are shaping up to be even more
contentious than the scientific ones. China, which could become the world's largest carbon emitter by 2010,
reiterated on Feb. 6 that it wants First World polluters to take primary responsibility for cutting emissions--
a stance that doesn't sit well with the U.S., which refuses to give large developing countries like China a
pass. But as the IPCC report shows, the price of inaction will be enormous for all of us.
16
Climate
CO2 is the cause of global warming
Adam Rink, (Libertarian); Thursday, June 12, 2008, Nolan Chart;

http://www.nolanchart.com/article4029.html
Carbon dioxide is the gas that is responsible for global warming under the man made
global warming theory. CO2 is also a part of everyday life. Therefore, this gas should not
be confused with smog, which creates a low level ozone layer that can be harmful to
humans. CO2 is less than 2% of the world’s atmosphere. Meanwhile 93% of all CO2 is
stored in the world’s oceans; the rest is stored the biosphere in things like plants. Oceans
move CO2 into the atmosphere and then remove it as continual cycle. Warmer waters,
like tropical waters, store less CO2 than colder arctic or deep waters. As CO2 increases in
the Earth’s atmosphere, the oceans work harder to remove it. CO2 concentrations in the
atmosphere have increased 30% since the pre-industrial era. The ocean has also increased
its absorption of CO2 from roughly 2.0 Pg of CO2 in the 1980s to 2.4 Pg in the 1990s.
17
Climate
WARMING CAUSES EXTINCTION
Too many greenhouse gases are present in the atmosphere, there are only a couple decades left
before mass extinction, ecosystem collapse and dramatic sea level rising sets in.
SETH BORENSTEIN, AP Science Writer for Washington DateLine, June 24, 2008,
NASA warming scientist: 'This is the last chance,' LexisNexis Database.
James Hansen told Congress on Monday that the world has long passed the "dangerous
level" for greenhouse gases in the atmosphere and needs to get back to 1988 levels. He said Earth's
atmosphere can only stay this loaded with man-made carbon dioxide for a couple
more decades without changes such as mass extinction, ecosystem collapse and
dramatic sea level rises.
"We're toast if we don't get on a very different path," Hansen, director of the Goddard Institute of Space Sciences who is
sometimes called the godfather of global warming science, told The Associated Press.
"This is the last chance."
18
Climate
WARMING HURTS THE ECONOMY
Global Warming will cause a complete collapse of the economy if no action is taken
Washington Post, 2006, “Warming Called Threat to Global Economy” 10/31/2006,
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wpdyn/content/article/2006/10/30/AR2006103000269.html)
Failing to curb the impact of climate change could damage the global economy on the
scale of the Great Depression or the world wars by spawning environmental devastation
that could cost 5 to 20 percent of the world's annual gross domestic product, according to a
report issued yesterday by the British government. The report by Nicholas Stern, who heads Britain's
Government Economic Service and formerly served as the World Bank's chief economist, calls for a new
round of international collaboration to cut greenhouse gas emissions linked to global warming. "There's
still time to avoid the worst impacts of climate change, if we act now and act internationally,"
Stern said in a statement. "But the task is urgent. Delaying action, even by a decade or two, will take us into
dangerous territory. We must not let this window of opportunity close."
19
Climate
WARMING HURTS ECOSYSTEMS
1Climate Change Disrupting Eco Systems- End in species Extinction

CBC News, Thursday, June 26, 2008 | 2:38 PM ET
Temperatures aren't the only thing rising as a result of climate change;
researchers say plants are creeping to higher elevations in order to survive
global warming.
More than two thirds of the plants in six western European mountain ranges
have climbed an average of 29 metres in altitude each decade since 1905,
according to a study published in the Friday issue of the journal Science.
Researchers from AgroParisTech in France said the shift to higher altitudes
is even larger for those plant species restricted to mountain habitats.
"If all of these species moved in the same way, this is interesting to see and
to analyze and it was significant enough to be considered a movement in
relation to climate warming," said lead researcher Jonathan Lenoir in an
interview podcast by Science.
Plants move by dispersing their seeds in the wind, blowing them to different
locations. The study findings suggest the altitude where those seeds might
thrive has changed as temperatures in those regions have changed.
Previous studies have found evidence of plant species migration along
latitudinal and longitudinal lines as a result of climate change. A study
published this week in the journal Public Library of Science-ONE found
some of California's native plants could lose more than 80 per cent of their
range by the end of the century.
20
Climate
WARMING CAUSES MONOCULTURE
Independent of Warming CO2 will collapse the biosphere and causes monoculture
Paul Raeburn, Science Writer and Agricultural Expert, THE LAST HARVEST: THE GENETIC
GAMBLE THAT THREATENS TO DESTROY AMERICAN AGRICULTURE, December, 1995 p. 217
Increasing carbon dioxide levels would have on beneficial effect on plants. Experiments have shown that
plants grown in air enriched with carbon dioxide grow bigger and faster. EPA studies have shown that the
effects of this carbon dioxide “fertilizer” are not likely to compensate for changes in climate. Again,
predictions suggest that there would be winners and losers. Fakhri A. Bazzaz of Harvard University
maintains a small cluster of greenhouses on the Harvard campus. Each is isolated from the others, and the
air inside them contains differing amounts of carbon dioxide. After years of growing plants inside those
greenhouses and comparing the results, he has shown that different species of plants respond differently to
increasing levels of carbon dioxide. Rising levels of carbon dioxide—even if they do not produce
substantial temperature increases—could have a profound effect on agriculture, Bazzaz has found. Certain
crops, such as soybeans, might be able to compete better against weeds in a carbon dioxide-rich
environment. But other crops, such as corn and sugarcane, would fare poorly in the competition with weeds
as carbon dioxide levels rise. The increased competition from weeds could cause yields to drop, Bazzaz
said. He also concluded that rising carbon-dioxide levels are likely to wipe out many endangered plant
species, further eroding the world’s genetic diversity and further limiting plant breeders’ options. “It is
clear that high carbon dioxide levels will have wide-ranging consequences for the natural world,” Bazzaz
said. “And it is clear that the carbon dioxide fertilization effect does not guarantee a lush, green future of
agricultural abundance….Such an atmosphere will not help lessen the planet’s environmental and
demographic woes. This atmosphere may induce climatic modification that could undermine the integrity
of the biological systems on which all Homo sapiens depend.” The critical point is that rising levels of
carbon dioxide—which are a measurable fact, not a prediction—can affect plants dramatically even without
any rise in global temperatures. If the dire predictions of global warming are wrong, climate may not
change dramatically. But agriculture is certain to change.
Extinction results without sustained genetic diversity

Cary Fowler and Pat Mooney, Rural Advancement Fund International, Shattering: Food, Politics, and the
Loss of Genetic Diversity, 1990, p. ix
While many may ponder the consequences of global warming, perhaps the biggest single environmental
catastrophe in human history is unfolding in the garden. While all are rightly concerned about the
possibility of nuclear war, an equally devastating time bomb is ticking away in the fields of farmers all
over the world. Loss of genetic diversity in agriculture—silent, rapid, inexorable—is leading us to a
rendezvous with extinction—to the doorstep of hunger on a scale we refuse to imagine. To simplify the
environment as we have done with agriculture is to destroy the complex interrelationships that hold the
natural world together. Reducing the diversity of life, we narrow our options for the future and render
our own survival more precarious. It is life at the end of the limb. That is the subject of this book.
Agronomists in the Philippines warned of what became known as southern corn leaf blight in 1061.'
The disease was reported in Mexico not long after. In the summer of 1968, the first faint hint that the
blight was in the United States came from seed growers in the Midwest. The danger was ignored. By
the spring of 19701 the disease had taken hold in the Florida corn crop. But it was not until corn prices
leapt thirty cents a bushel on the Chicago Board of Trade that the world took notice; by then it was
August—and too late. By the close of the year, Americans had lost fifteen percent of their most
important crop—more than a billion bushels. Some southern states lost half their harvest and many of
their farmers. While consumers suffered in the grocery stores, producers were out a billion dollars in
lost yield. And the disaster was not solely domestic. U.S. seed exports may have spread the blight to
Africa, Latin America and Asia.
21
Climate
WARMING CAUSES DISEASES
Global warming’s effect on rising temperatures will also cause tropical and subtropical diseases to
enter areas that are temperate.
Geoffery Hunt, social anthropologist with more than twenty years experience in
planning, conducting, and managing research in community studies, health, substance
abuse, and social policy, 2006, Climate change and Health, LexisNexis Database.
As temperatures rise in the temperate areas of the globe, so tropical and
subtropical diseases will follow. Malaria, cholera, dengue fever and
Lyme disease are all gradually moving northward. However, one has to be careful
not to adopt an ethnocentric attitude coupled with a narrow vision of what global warming will bring.
Temperature rises are already triggering, and will continue to set off, a
cascade of other environmental changes that will have a dramatic
impact on health and morbidity. So far-reaching will the changes be by the time our
grandchildren are themselves grandparents that one can hardly begin to comprehend them.
Global warming hurts the earth in more than just environmental ways – diseases will be highly
prevalent as will human migration, refugees, conflicts, and war. Furthermore, the health care
system will lose its ability to deal with basic afflictions.
Geoffery Hunt, social anthropologist with more than twenty years experience in
planning, conducting, and managing research in community studies, health, substance
abuse, and social policy, 2006, Climate change and Health, LexisNexis Database.
The cascading consequences of global warming include a rise in extreme
weather events such as heat waves, hurricanes, storms, river-flooding,
sea-flooding, droughts, soil erosion and desertification, landslides,
mudslides, photochemical smog, mini-ice ages, increased air pollution,
disruption of ecological systems with an impact on food chains, the
spread of pests and blights (rats, mice, ticks, flies, weevils, locusts,
moulds, bacteria, etc.) and the interruption or dwindling of human food
supplies. All of this, needless to say, has major health consequences. The worst-case
scenario is barely thinkable. As well as the spread of pathogen-related
disease we can expect big increases in malnutrition, trauma, cardiac
and respiratory illness, allergies and the like. As if this is not enough,
economic, financial, industrial, transport, social and political systems
(compounded by a coming oil demand crisis) will be put under severe strain.
Migrations, refugees, conflicts and wars will almost certainly increase
too. The health care system as we know it in the ‘developed countries’
will be put under increasing pressure, and what is more, it will become
awkwardly dislocated and irrelevant for the basic life problems with
which it will have to deal.
22
Climate
Global warming will increase malaria and dengue fever, killing up to 400 million people while
exhausting our health services
Gale, Jason and Varner, Bill, Nov. 2007, “Global Warming Increases Malaria, Dengue Fever
Threat, U.N Says”, Rachel’s Democracy and Health News, Issue 935, p6
Global warming will put millions more people at risk of malaria and dengue fever, according to a United
Nations report that calls for an urgent review of the health dangers posed by climate change. Increases in rainfall,
temperature and humidity will favor the spread of malaria-transmitting mosquitoes over a wider range and to
higher altitudes, according to the 2007-2008 Human Development Report, released today. That could put 220
million to 400 million additional people at greater risk of the disease that kills about 1 million a year,
mostly in Africa. "Ill health is one of the most powerful forces holding back the human development potential of poor
households," the report said. "Climate change will intensify the problem." The 384-page report commissioned by the
UN Development Program was released a week before delegates to a UN-sponsored conference on Bali, Indonesia, will
try to convince the U.S. to join a new emissions- limiting treaty that will pick up after 2012, when the Kyoto Protocol
ends. Droughts, floods and storms will worsen unless measures are taken to cut emissions in half by 2050 relative to
1990 levels, the report said. About 262 million people were affected by climate disasters from 2000 to 2004, most of
them in developing countries. Changes in weather patterns may also increase the number of people exposed to
dengue fever to 3.5 billion from 1.5 billion by 2080. The potentially lethal viral disease, which is also
transmitted by mosquitoes, is found at higher elevations in previously dengue-free areas of Latin America,
the report said. "A major public health threat is coming from the vector- borne diseases that depend on
temperature and on humidity," said Martin Krause, UNDP's Bangkok-based technical adviser on climate change for
the Asia-Pacific region. "Occurrences of malaria and dengue fever in communities" traditionally unaffected by these
diseases would place an additional strain on public health services, he said.
Global warming increases zoonotic diseases
Lovinger, Sarah, Medical doctor, 2007, “Climate Change Culprit in
Emerging Infections” Internal Medicine World Report, Vol. 22 Issue 11 p1-6
Increased outbreaks of such viral illnesses as Dengue fever, West Nile virus,
the tick-borne encephalitis, and Nipah virus have all been linked to climate
change. Warmer weather may also increase outbreaks of bacterial illness,
including Lyme disease, cholera, and Salmonella. Although it is difficult to predict
the disease burden that might result from climate change, the World Health Organization is
trying to determine the impact that projected temperature increases could have on
communicable diseases worldwide. Climate change has already opened up new avenues
of disease transmission from animals to humans, according to Dr McMichael. Nipah virus,
first recognized in 1999 in Malaysia, apparently spread from fruit bats to pigs, after pig
ranchers cleared forests that would normally have provided nourishment to the bats. Dry
conditions that experts believe resulted from climate change then led to forest fires, and the
bats, deprived of their normal food source, started to eat fruit from orchards near pig
farms. Pigs fed on the bat droppings and became infected with Nipah virus, which
they then passed on to humans. Now Nipah virus is found not only in Malaysia, but also in
Australia, the Philippines, and Indonesia.
23
Climate
The future holds a floodgate of infectious diseases and viruses; Global warming is already killing up
to 5 million people per year
Rachel’s Democracy & Health News, 2007, “Global Warming to Increase Infectious Disease:
Study”, Issue 925, p5
Global warming likely will lead to an increase in infectious disease around the world, as
viruses, microbes and the agents that spread them flourish, experts at a medical conference warned
Tuesday. The problem is already evident and has become particularly acute in just the past
decade, according to researchers at a meeting of the American Society for Microbiology. "Years ago we probably would not be
talking about this topic," said Anthony McMichael, lead scientist on a study entitled "The Impact of Climate Change on Human
Health." "Human-induced climate change… is proceeding a little bit faster than we would have expected," said McMichael, an
epidemiologist at the University of Canberra in Australia. Experts cite West Nile virus as a disease whose
spread has been facilitated by global warming. Native to Africa, West Nile can be found today throughout
Canada and the United States, according to McMichael, who explained that a rise in North American temperatures
since 1999 has allowed non-native mosquitoes that transmit the virus to thrive. Jim Sliwa,
spokesman for the American Society for Microbiology, underscored the potential health crisis posed by a rise in world temperatures.
"We know that climate change is going to change the pattern of infectious diseases," said Sliwa at the conference, which, with some
"the malaria
12,000 physicians and scientists, is billed as the world's biggest on disease-causing microbes. For example, he said,
line in mountainous regions will continue to rise," as global average temperature increases. McMichael
also predicted a rise in the incidence of "year-round influenza" in the tropics. Near the equator, he said
"there is no influenza season, so as the temperature rises the tropical areas expand and we'll get more year- round influenza." Climate
change experts believe that the earth's temperature is likely to rise by 1.8-4.0 degrees Celsius by the year 2100. Experts
believe
diseases worsened by global warming already have contributed to the deaths of between
150,000 and five million people per year. In addition to an increase in diseases like
malaria and dengue fever, global warming is likely heighten the incidence of diarrhea,
heat waves, drought, floods and malnutrition.
Global warming provides a perfect environment for diseases such as malaria that now kills 2 million
people each year
Serafini, Marilyn, 2007, “Rapidly Spreading Threats”, National Journal, Vol. 39 Issue 27, p22-26
According to the U.N. report, the health effects of climate change will increase gradually over the next few decades -- and by midcentury have a noticeably stronger impact than
they have now. causes of worry are the diseases that mosquitoes, ticks, and tsetse
Perhaps the chief
flies carry, such as dengue, malaria, Lyme disease, West Nile virus, tick-borne
encephalitis, and sleeping sickness. Already, as temperatures have risen over the past 20 years, dengue and
malaria have followed mosquitoes into new geographic areas and higher elevations.
Malaria is one of the most climate-sensitive diseases, according to Patz. It kills more than 2 million people
every year, most of them African children. Although treatment for malaria exists, drug-resistant strains continue
to emerge, so new medications are needed. Parts of South America, meanwhile, are reporting widespread
outbreaks of dengue, which the U.N. panel called "the world's most important viral vector-borne disease." According to the
panel, "While high rainfall or high temperatures can lead to an increase in transmission, studies have shown that drought also
can be a cause if household water storage increases the number of suitable mosquito-
breeding sites." Already, one-third of the world's population lives in places where dengue is a danger because of the climate.
The U.N. report forecasts that waterborne diarrheal diseases could rise 5 percent in poor regions by
2020. That's because warmer temperatures could mean more floods and droughts, and more runoff of contaminated water into
clean water. A recent study found that as the average daily temperature rose in Peru in 1997-98 because of an El Nino, so did the
number of children hospitalized because of serious diarrhea.
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Climate
An increase in global temperature causes more spread and incubation of malaria and disastrous
diseases
Warming Climate Spawns Disease Epidemics By Cat Lazaroff the Washington bureau chief of
Environment News Service
http://ens-newswire.com/ens/jun2002/2002-06-25-06.asp
WASHINGTON, DC, June 25, 2002 (ENS) –
The changing, warming climate around the globe is triggering unprecedented numbers of disease outbreaks
in both land and ocean based wildlife populations in habitats ranging from coral reefs to rainforests. Ecologists
and epidemiologists express concern over this rising trend in a new report in the June 21 issue of the journal "Science." As mosquito populations move into previously cooler
climes, the diseases they carry - such as malaria and West Nile Virus - spread with them. (Photo courtesy Centers for Disease Control and Prevention)Their comprehensive two
year study, developed by the National Center for Ecological Analysis and Synthesis (NCEAS) is the first to analyze disease epidemics across entire plant and animal systems, both
on land and in the oceans. The study investigates these recent disease outbreaks and examines the mechanisms related to temperature or seasonality changes that could influence
What is most surprising is the fact that climate sensitive outbreaks are happening with so many
them. "
different types of pathogens - viruses, bacteria, fungi and parasites - as well as in such a wide range of hosts
including corals, oysters, terrestrial plants, birds and humans," said lead author Drew Harvell of Cornell
University. "This isn't just a question of coral bleaching for a few marine ecologists, nor just a question of
malaria for a few health officials - the number of similar increases in disease incidence is astonishing,"
added coauthor Richard Ostfeld from the Institute of Ecosystem Studies in Millbrook New York. "We
don¹t want to be alarmist, but we are alarmed." The team of experts has concluded that there are common
themes likely linked to global warming. "Climate change is disrupting natural ecosystems in a way that is
making life better for infectious diseases," said epidemiologist Andrew Dobson of Princeton University.
"The accumulation of evidence has us extremely worried. We share diseases with some of these species.
The risk for humans is going up." The team documented examples of viruses, bacteria and fungi associated
with diseases that develop more rapidly with slight rises in temperature. Many vectors of disease such as
mosquitoes, ticks and rodents, as well as the viral, fungal, and bacterial pathogens are sensitive to changes
in temperature and moisture. As temperatures increase, these carriers are likely to spread into new areas
and may have potentially devastating effects on wildlife populations that have not been previously exposed.
Reproduction, growth, and biting rates of insects all go up with increases of temperature. This child's right hand and wrist display the characteristic spotted rash of Rocky
Mountain spotted fever - a disease spread by ticks. (Photo courtesy Centers for Disease Control and Prevention)Winter is the limiting time for many pathogens, killing back
populations each year. With milder winters, this population bottleneck may be removed for many species. Warmer, longer summers also mean that the period of time of disease
transmission is longer. Warmer summers may increase the susceptibility of host species to diseases due to the stress of excessive heat, particularly in the oceans. "We have to get
serious about global change," Dobson warned. "It's not only going to be a warmer world, it¹s going to be a sicker world." Marine
bacteria and fungal growth rates are both linked to increasing temperatures, for example. During the unusually warm 1998 El Niño year, corals suffered massive die offs worldwide. A new large bleaching event has just occurred in Australia. Harvell and other scientists
have shown that once bleached or stressed by heat, some corals become susceptible to disease. "The disease may be what actually kills them," said Harvell, but she and her colleagues attribute a dieback of soft, Caribbean corals called sea fans to a fungal epidemic.
Aspergillis - a fungus that occurs everywhere - tends to be a problem for immune compromised hosts. Coral bleaching is a product of warmer temperatures and disease, the researchers argue. (Photo courtesy Florida National Marine Sanctuary)"Once stressed, corals
become susceptible to diseases," said Harvell, whose group has isolated the fungus and found that it grows fastest at 30-32 degrees Celsius - exactly the temperature at which many of the corals in the Florida Keys start to bleach. Warming winter temperatures can be as
much of a problem as summer temperatures in affecting the geographic distribution of pathogens and parasites. The edible eastern oyster is plagued by a protozoan parasite called Perkinsus. A winter warming trend in the mid-1990¹s lifted a barrier to the parasite's
northward movement and allowed it to spread into previously unexposed Maine oysters. In the Hawaiian Islands, mosquitoes are now spreading malaria into the last populations of honeycreepers ¬ boldly colored songbirds that evolved only in Hawaii. In the 1960s,
mosquitoes were restricted by temperature to elevations below 2,500 feet, but warmer temperatures have allowed them to move higher up the mountainsides. The honeycreepers are now restricted to the highest forested slopes of the Big Island of Hawaii and Maui at
elevations cool enough to stop the mosquitoes. "Today there are no native birds below 4,500 feet," said Dobson. Many Hawaiian birds, like this Àkiapöläàu, are declining due to the spread of malaria and other threats. (Photo courtesy Earthjustice Legal Defense
Fund)Humans are affected by spreading diseases as well. Rift Valley fever, a devastating viral illness spread by mosquitoes, occurs mostly in parts of East Africa and is linked to heavy rains. The last Rift Valley fever outbreak in 1998 killed thousands in East Africa.
"There is clear evidence that Rift Valley Fever outbreaks are linked to El Niño years and we expect an increase in the frequency of El Niños with climate change," warned coauthor Richard Ostfeld. In the wetter conditions, mosquito populations explode, more
With warmer conditions, the researchers expect both faster replication

mosquitoes acquire the disease, and more transmit the disease to humans and livestock.
of the virus within mosquitoes and an increase in the rate that they bite and infect other animals. "The
diseases we should be most worried about are the vector transmitted diseases," said Dobson. As
temperature warms, insects carrying disease from the tropics are spreading towards the poles. In tropical
areas, there is a greater diversity of species, but smaller numbers of individuals of each species. This dilutes the
spread of pathogens between species. In temperate areas, disease can hit harder. There are fewer numbers of species but many more individuals, making them more vulnerable to
epidemics. Dozens of lions died in Tanzania in 2001 after flies carrying distemper spread to eastern Africa. (Photo courtesy U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service)With higher levels of
biodiversity, there is a greater chance that a mosquito will bite a species in which the disease does not develop. In temperate areas, vectors have fewer choices about what to bite.
"Thus any pathogen which manages to spread from the tropics to the
As biodiversity decreases there is less and less buffering.
temperate zone in a warmer world is likely to have a bigger impact as it can focus on a few common and
abundant susceptible species - maybe even us!" Dobson said. Pathogens have also contributed to declines of threatened species such as lions,
cranes, vultures and black-footed ferrets, among others. "Human destruction of biodiversity makes this a double whammy ¬ it means we are exacerbating the problem," said
Dobson. The authors acknowledge that response to their findings will be controversial and politicized. "There are still people resistant to the idea of climate change at all, others
will say it is hard to predict what type of outbreaks will occur or where they will happen," said Dobson. "This is true. Very little monitoring and few long term studies exist. What
is apparent is the end result - when the epidemic strikes." When diseases do break out, little is known about how to respond ¬ and that needs to change, say the authors. A parasite
that attacks monarch butterflies is spreading into the insect's previously safe northern habitats due to warming temperatures. (Photo courtesy World Wildlife Fund)Baseline disease
data are critical. And while forecasting epidemics in crop diseases has received much attention, and the National Ocean and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) has a sea surface
temperature monitoring system for coral bleaching, there are no disease forecasting models for threatened wildlife populations or management protocols for infectious diseases.
"Now that we know these epidemics are arising, what can we do about it?
"We need to develop lines of defense," said Harvell.
It"s highly likely to get worse with increasing temperature." Not including funding for HIV, there is very
little research money going towards infectious disease work and training, anywhere in the world. "The
scary thing about the recent anthrax threat [in the United States] was not just that it happened but how few
people know anything about infectious diseases, and how little even these people know about their
dynamics," said Dobson. "We need to pay better attention to this issue in an increasingly unnatural world."
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WARMING HURTS SPECIES
Changing temperatures of global warming mean the extinction of many species.
Rachel Ehrenberg, Journalist for Science New, 5/24/2008, Hotter weather threatens
cold-blooded creatures too, LexisNexis Database.
Insects, turtles, and other creatures

that use their environments to regulate their body temperatures
may find themselves in hot water as global temperatures increase, a new study finds. In the tropics,
many of these animals are already living at the temperatures their bodies like best, with
little wiggle room for dealing with a warming world. Even though temperatures in the
tropics are predicted to increase less than at higher latitudes, animals living in already
warm places may be especially vulnerable, the study suggests. It isn't just the rate of warming
that matters, but also the physiologies of insects and "cold-blooded" animals in those
climates, says Curtis Deutsch of the University of California, Los Angeles. Deutsch and collaborators integrated
physiology data for 38 species of insects and some frogs, toads, lizards and turtles with climate models simulating global temperatures
for the years 2070 to 2100. The results, in the May 6 Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, suggest
that small
temperature changes in the tropics may push some animals over the edge. At higher
latitudes, the inverse maybe true. Since northern temperatures are now less than ideal for
many insects, they may thrive in warmer weather. "There will be some winners and
losers—it's hard to predict who those are," says Deutsch
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Climate
WARMING CAUSES WAR
History and studies show an increase in temperature will result in devastating war, revolts, famines,
and invasions
Futurist, Mar/Apr 2008, Climate Changes and Global Conflicts, Vol. 42 Issue 2, p 6-7
Traumatic climate cooling may have launched wars in the past, like the Little Ice Age of the mid-sixteenth
through mid-nineteenth centuries. Cold-induced stresses on agriculture led to wars, famines, and population
declines, an international team of researchers believes. Now, they warn that future climate change that turns
up the heat could also increase conflicts. Sudden changes in temperature don’t directly cause conflict, but
they do disrupt water and food supplies. Shortages of such critical resources can lead people to rise against
their governments or invade neighboring countries, according to studies led by University of Hong Kong
geographer David Zhang and published by the Proceedings of the National Academy of Science. To study the
relationship between climate and conflict, the researchers collected data on temperature change and wars from A.D. 1400 to 1900.
They discovered that cycles of turbulence followed historic low temperatures, with tranquility restored during more-temperate times.
Sources for the study included a database of 4,500 wars, assembled by co-author Peter Brecke of Georgia Tech, and climate records
reconstructed by paleontologists from historical documents. The researchers found that there were nearly twice as many wars per year
worldwide during cold centuries as there were during the milder eighteenth century. More than 80% of countries around the world
experienced more wars in a cold climate, according to Zhang. The researchers reason that the link between climate shock and conflict
is the supply of food: Decreases in agricultural production trigger increases in food prices, and when grain prices reach a certain level,
wars erupt. Population growth and decline are also affected by these climate change driven conflicts, the researchers believe. After
peak periods of war in Europe and Asia, such as during the frigid seventeenth century, populations declined. In China, population
dropped by 43% between 1620 and 1650, then rose dramatically between 1650 and 1800, when the next cooling period began,
bringing another global demographic shock. “Climate change may have played a more important role on human
civilization than has so far been suggested,” says Zhang. The depletion of resources on which livelihoods
are based is the most critical effect of such change and is “the root cause of human miseries—e.g., wars,
famines, and epidemics.” Abrupt global warming is upon us now, they warn, and may pose just as dire
threats to resource supply and demand as did global cooling in centuries past. “The speed of global
warming is totally beyond our imagination,” says Zhang. “Such abnormal climate will certainly break the
balance of human ecosystem. At the moment, scientists cannot accurately predict the chain of ecological
effects induced by climate change. If global warming continues, we are afraid that the associated shortages
of livelihood resources such as freshwater, arable land, and food may trigger more armed conflicts (e.g.,
Darfur in Africa) or even general crises in the world.” As Brecke of Georgia Tech points out, global
warming may have some beneficial effects in the short term, but “with more droughts and a rapidly
growing population, it is going to get harder and harder to provide food for everyone and thus we should
not be surprised to see more instances of starvation and probably more cases of hungry people clashing
over scarce food and water.
Global Warming Leads To Interstate Conflict

SEATTLE POST-INTELLIGENCER EDITORIAL BOARD, June 26, 2008
Hell hath no fury like Nature scorned. According to a new assessment by U.S.
intelligence agencies, while global warming alone probably won't cause states
to fail, it likely will bring about the sort of strife that would constitute a
national security threat to the U.S.: Food and water shortages elsewhere will
trigger migration patterns, leading to ethnic conflict and a spike in illegal
immigration. U.S. military forces will be required to bring stability to affected
regions -- if only for the sake of protecting U.S. interests.
Too bad the White House couldn't even be bothered to open the e-mails sent
by the Environmental Protection Agency on the health and environmental
dangers of greenhouse gases.
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WARMING CAUSES GENOCIDE
Global warming will cause genocide of religious and ethnic minorities

Jenkins, Philip, December 2007, New Republic, Vol. 237 Issue 11, p14-15
In a climate of death and horror, people cast about for scapegoats, even before the
Black Death struck. The Church formally declared witchcraft a heresy in 1320, and people were soon
being executed for devil-worship and black magic. And governments, desperate to find a safe outlet for
their subjects' rage, condoned mob attacks on religious minorities. Bigots of whatever faith rarely referred
explicitly to the climatic catastrophe in progress around them, but the very close correlation between the
cooling and a region-wide heightening of violent intolerance makes such a linkage likely. Jews were among
the favorite targets of the Little Ice Age's hate criminals: England expelled its Jews in the 1290s, and
pogroms were common in the 1320s and '30s and accelerated during the Black Death, forcing an eastward
migration that ended up concentrating most of Europe's Jews in modern-day Poland, Lithuania, and Russia
by the end of the fourteenth century. But Christians suffered as well, at the hands of Muslims in Asia and
the Middle East strained by some of the same circumstances that were affecting Europe. In 1250,
Christians were still substantial minorities in many African and Asian countries. But, during the Little Ice
Age, old-established Christian communities began to get the same treatment their coreligionists were
dishing out to Jews in Europe. Egyptian Muslims accused Christians of arson and plotting terrorist attacks
against mosques, using the newly popular weapon of gunpowder. Elsewhere, in Mesopotamia and
modern-day Turkey, churches were destroyed and Christians were massacred. When
modern jihadis look for intellectual role models, they turn back to precisely this era,
to hard-line scholars like Ibn Taymiyya, who loathed infidels and condemned
moderate Muslim regimes for not being tough enough on them. It is not outlandish to
say that we are heading toward a future very much like our fourteenth-century past,
particularly in the areas of the global South where Christian populations are rising
drastically. As the Little Ice Age did in the fourteenth century, global warming will
redraw the world's religious maps, making it more and more difficult for religious or
ethnic minorities to survive under a majority-led government and forcing splinter
groups to concentrate in nations with sympathetic governments. The resource-driven
genocide in Darfur, for example, although it involves competing Muslim communities
and not Muslim-Christian warfare, is a foretaste of conflicts that could soon be
sweeping the whole area, as nations implode in sectarian violence, pulling
neighboring countries down with them.
Empirically proven with Darfur: Global warming causes genocide
Johnson, Mac, 2007, “If It’s Bad and Recent, It’s Global Warming”, Vol. 63 Issue 22,
p20
Last week, UN Secretary General Ban Ki Moon, anxious to show the world that a UN head can be wacky
instead of just corrupt, wrote an editorial for the Washington Post in which he revealed that the genocide in
Darfur is "in fact" actually a consequence of global warming.
In Darfur, radical Muslim militias have taken to slaughtering Christian and pagan farmers
for fun and profit. Since radical Muslims elsewhere in the world are generally a peaceful lot, Ban Ki Moon has
wisely seen that it must be the weather setting them off. Allah Akbar, it's hot! Let's kill the infidels.
before global warming caused a long-term drought

No really, the man basically said this. He also said that
in Sudan, the black Christian farmers and the Arab Muslim herders lived in a sort of
multicultural slumber party of mutual understanding and admiration. Then global warming
happened and the farmers put up fences and triggered their own genocide at the hands of the
once neighborly camel herders (and you thought good fences made good neighbors). So now I understand that the
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Climate
trouble in Darfur is really something of a cross between Lawrence of Arabia, Open Range and "The Weather Channel."
Ban Ki Moon is one slick explicator.
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WARMING CAUSES BAD WEATHER [GENERAL]
Globing warming will cause potential snow storms, unmanageable flooding, and devastating
droughts
Miller, Kathleen A., Working for Institute for the Study of Society and Environment, Spring/Summer
2008, Journal of International Affairs, Vol. 61 Issue 2, pgs 35-50
Warming will also tend to increase the intensity of rainfall and snowfall events because storms
will be carrying heavier moisture loads. Cartoons sometimes portray global warming as leading to balmy
tropical climates in currently cold locations. In reality, winter will still happen and, if it is cold enough to
snow, the chances for a big snowfall will likely increase. When temperatures are above freezing, we can
expect to see increases in the likelihood of deluges that may overwhelm storm sewers and cause localized
flooding. In areas not on the receiving end of the storm track, dry spells are expected to lengthen and
intensify as the warmer atmosphere accelerates the evaporation of any surface moisture. In other words, in
different regions and seasons, global warming will increase the potential for both droughts and downpours
Global warming will cause unpredictable side-effects, such as reversing the Gulf Stream or causing
El Nino to occur more frequently or permanently.
The Canaberra Times, September 13, 2006, Climate change as big a threat to our
wellbeing as terrorism, LexisNexis Database.
Putting aside all the partisan hyperbole and speculation on global warming, one thing we do know from the hard science and
dispassionate analysis that has been done to date is that no
matter how regular and predictable the global
warming trend that is being produced by human activities turns out to be, the resulting
environmental developments from it will be anything but predictable. The Gulf Stream,
which sends warm currents into the Atlantic Ocean (which explains why Western Europe has a climate far milder than, say, central
Finland or Siberia) could
at some point slow, or even go into reverse. The El Nino
phenomenon in the Pacific Ocean, which periodically wreaks drought havoc in Eastern Australia, could
occur more frequently, or even be turned "on" permanently. But we do not yet know the
"trigger points" for either of these specific events, nor for many others that are
potentially a hazard from global warming: they could happen quickly, unpredictably,
and very destructively for many people - possibly including us.
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WARMING CAUSES SUPER STORMS
Global warming causes more devastating super-storms and hurricanes

Anup Shah January 01, 2008 Master of Science in Environmental Engineering from Georgia Institute of
Technology, Atlanta, USA “What are the impacts of Global Warming?”
http://www.globalissues.org/EnvIssues/GlobalWarming/Intro.asp#WhataretheimpactsofGlobalWarming
Most scientists believe that the warming of the climate will lead to more extreme weather patterns such as:
• More hurricanes and drought;
• Longer spells of dry heat or intense rain (depending on where you are in the world);
• Scientists have pointed out that Northern Europe could be severely affected with colder weather if climate change continues, as the arctic begins to melt and send
fresher waters further south. It would effectively cut off the Gulf Stream that brings warmth from the Gulf of Mexico, keeping countries such as Britain warmer than expected;
• In South Asia, the Himalayan glaciers could retreat causing water scarcity in the long run.
While many environmental groups have been warning about extreme weather conditions for a few years, the World Meteorological Organization announced in July 2003 that
“Recent scientific assessments indicate that, as the global temperatures continue to warm due to climate change, the number and intensity of extreme events might increase.”
The WMO also notes that “New record extreme events occur every year somewhere in the globe, but in
recent years the number of such extremes have been increasing.” (The WMO limits the definition of extreme events to high
temperatures, low temperatures and high rainfall amounts and droughts.) The U.K’s Independent newspaper described the WMO’s announcement as “unprecedented” and
“astonishing” because it came from a respected United Nations organization not an environmental group! Super-storms Mentioned further above was the concern that more
hurricanes could result. The link used was from the environmental organization WWF, written back in 1999. In August/September 2004 a wave of severe hurricanes left many
Caribbean islands and parts of South Eastern United States devastated. In the Caribbean many lives were lost and there was immense damage to entire cities. In the U.S. many
In its wake, scientists have reiterated that such
lives were lost as well, some of the most expensive damage resulted from the successive hurricanes.
super-storms may be a sign of things to come. “Global warming may spawn more super-storms”, Inter
Press Service (IPS) notes.
Interviewing a biological oceanography professor at Harvard University, IPS notes that the world’s oceans
are approaching 27 degrees C or warmer during the summer. This increases the odds of major storms.
• When water reaches such temperatures, more of it evaporates, priming hurricane or cyclone
formation.
• Once born, a hurricane needs only warm water to build and maintain its strength and intensity.
Furthermore, “as emissions of greenhouse gases continue to trap more and more of the sun’s energy, that
energy has to be dissipated, resulting in stronger storms, more intense precipitation and higher winds.”
The super-storms from global warming cause deaths all around the world
SCIENCE: Global Warming May Spawn More Super-StormsBy Stephen Leahy –Environmental journalist
for 12 years- dozens of publications around the world including New Scientist, The London Sunday Times,
Maclean’s Magazine, The Toronto Star, Wired News, Audubon, BBC Wildlife, and Canadian Geographic.
Sept 20 2004 http://www.ipsnews.net/interna.asp?idnews=25534
BROOKLIN, Canada, Sep 20 (IPS) - Hurricane Ivan, the incredibly powerful storm that killed at least 120
people in the Caribbean and southern United States, may be a harbinger of the Earth's hotter future, say
experts. "As the world warms, we expect more and more intense tropical hurricanes and cyclones," said James
McCarthy, a professor of biological oceanography at Harvard University. Large parts of the world's oceans are approaching 27 degrees C or warmer during the summer, greatly
Once born,
increasing the odds of major storms, McCarthy told IPS. When water reaches such temperatures, more of it evaporates, priming hurricane or cyclone formation.
a hurricane needs only warm water to build and maintain its strength and intensity. Over the last 100 years,
the Earth has warmed by about .6 degrees C, according to the 2001 report by the Intergovernmental Panel
on Climate Change (IPCC), an international scientific body that studies the relationship between human
activity and global warming. The IPCC report was based on research by more than 2,500 scientists from
about 100 countries who determined that emissions of gases such as carbon dioxide act as a blanket that
prevents much of the sun's energy from dissipating into space. Much of the extra energy from this
"greenhouse effect" is being absorbed by the oceans. The "proof" that the oceans are warming is the fact
that global sea levels have risen 3.1 cm in the past 10 years, said Kevin Trenberth, head of the Climate
Analysis Section at the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colorado. Sea levels are expected to continue rising by as much as 50 cm by 2100. While the
warming of the oceans is not uniform -- the North Pacific and North Atlantic are a bit cooler -- the hurricane-producing mid-Atlantic and Caribbean oceans have warmed
"Global warming is creating conditions that are more favourable for hurricanes to develop and be
significantly.
more severe," said Trenberth. Will that result in more Category 4 or 5 storms like Ivan? "That's the logical conclusion, although it may be somewhat
controversial," he said. Before it struck Cuba a glancing blow, Ivan was a Category 5 on the Saffir-Simpson scale, which rates hurricanes from 1 to 5 according to wind speeds and
destructive potential. Category 5 hurricanes have winds that blow continuously above 250 kilometers an hour. Ivan's gusts topped 320 kilometers an hour at times, making it the
sixth most powerful hurricane on record for the Atlantic Basin. Hurricane Ivan's 12-day rampage killed 70 people in the Caribbean and 50 in the United States. It will be some time
before the full extent of the damage is known, but some estimates put it at 10 billion dollars for the United States alone. As emissions of greenhouse gases continue to trap more
and more of the sun's energy, that energy has to be dissipated, resulting in stronger storms, more intense precipitation and higher winds, says McMcarthy. However, the statistical
record of hurricanes hitting the U.S. shows a decrease in the past 50 years. Most hurricanes do not strike land, McCarthy points out, and up until the past 25 years, with the advent
of satellite tracking, there was scant data on the storms. But there is abundant evidence of an unprecedented number of severe
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weather events in the past decade, McCarthy says. In 1998, Hurricane Mitch killed nearly 20,000 people in
Central America, and more than 4,000 people died during disastrous flooding in China.
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WARMING CAUSES HURRICANES
We can expect frequent “Hurricane Katrinas” in the future because of the intense storms resulting
from global warming
Hillman, Mayer and Fawcett, Tina, 2007, The Suicidal Planet: How To Prevent Global Climate
Catastrophe, pg. 29
The climate in the United States is predicted to be very different toward the end of the century.
There is general agreement that more intense storms are likely to be generated as the global
climate continues to warm: Events such as Hurricane Katrina can be expected to increase in the
future. Further global temperature and sea level rises, combined with ongoing regional postglacial
subsidence, are predicted to continue to erode the coastlines. This inevitably will cause enormous
problems for the many cities in highly urbanized coastal areas.
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WARMING CAUSES ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION
Climate Change Likely To Increase Illegal Immigration And Violence

Deborah Bonello on June 26, 2008
Illegal immigration, ethnic violence, humanitarian crises and national security issues will worsen
during the next two decades because of global warming, according to U.S. intelligence agencies.
"Global warming is likely to have a series of destabilizing effects around the world, causing
humanitarian crises as well as surges in ethnic violence and illegal immigration, according to an
assessment released Wednesday by U.S. intelligence agencies", writes The Times' Greg Miller.
But Rep. Peter Hoekstra (R-Mich.), the ranking Republican on the House Intelligence Committee,
called the report "a pathetic use of intelligence resources".
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Climate
WARMING OUTWEIGHS NEG IMPACTS
Whatever positive aspect of global warming are present, they are vastly outwieghed by the negative
impacts: heatwaves, crop shortages, decreased water availability, and an increased rate of
warming.
Dr Evan Lau, Department of Organismic and. Evolutionary Biology. Harvard University,

April 20, 2007, Humans the major cause of global warming the widely accepted
view, Lexis Nexis Database.
While it is true that global warming may increase arable land, the negative impacts
from global warming vastly outweigh their positive ones. Aside from the threat of rising sea
levels, other dramatic negative impacts of global warming include: (i) in vast areas of
boreal Canada and Russia, previously frozen peatlands are warming up and releasing
carbon dioxide and methane, both greenhouse gases, thus increasing the warming
trend, (ii) increasing frequency of heatwaves (leading to heat-related mortalities) in
summer in central Europe, (3) warmer and drier conditions in Sahelian Africa
decreasing the length of growing season and hence crop yield, (4) disappearances of
alpine glaciers and their projected effects on water availability for human
consumption, agriculture and energy generation. It is virtually certain that humans are at
least, in major part, if not entirely, the cause of global warming.
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Climate
QUALS/CONSENSUS
Regardless of minority views, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change are top authority on
global warming.
Dr Evan Lau, Department of Organismic and. Evolutionary Biology. Harvard University,

April 20, 2007, Humans the major cause of global warming the widely accepted view,
Lexis Nexis Database.
While minority views contrary to the conventional have always existed, in the case of
anthropogenic cause of global warming, the views of IPCC are strong and irrefutable.
The numerous panel members on the IPCC committee are renowned scientists in both government agencies and academia and
their opinions have been consistently supported by vast collection of data worldwide over several decades.
While it is not known if all the warming is human-caused,

the IPCC has been unanimous in associating
the vast majority (but not all) of global warming to human-related activities.
In recent years, the accumulation of data has led to increasing confidence in associating the warming trend to human activity.
While it is important not to ignore those minority publications presenting data contrary to the IPCC's, it
would be
foolhardy not to accept the IPCC report as the prevailing view of the scientific
community.
Global warming is real, the International Global Warming Conference has 29,000 sets of data to
back it up
MSNBC, 2007, “Experts Issue New Climate Warning”, MSNBC News, 04/06/2007,
http://www.heatisonline.org/contentserver/objecthandlers/index.cfm?id=6342&method=full)
An international global warming conference approved a report Friday warning of dire threats to
the Earth and to mankind from increased hunger in Africa and Asia to the extinction of species
unless the world adapts to climate change and halts its progress. Africa will be hardest hit, the
report concluded. By 2020, up to 250 million people are likely to exposed to water shortages. In
some countries, food production could fall by half, it said. Agreement came after an all-night session during
which key sections were deleted from the draft and scientists angrily confronted government negotiators who they
feared were watering down their findings. It has been a complex exercise, said Rajendra Pachauri, chairman of the
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Several scientists objected to the editing of the final draft by government
negotiators but in the end agreed to compromises. However, some scientists vowed never to take part in the process
again. The climax of five days of negotiations was reached when the delegates removed parts of a key chart
highlighting devastating effects of climate change that kick in with every rise of 1.8 degrees Fahrenheit, and in a tussle
over the level of scientific reliability attached to key statements. There was little doubt about the science,
which was based on 29,000 sets of data, much of it collected in the last five years. For the first
time we are not just arm-waving with models, Martin Perry, who conducted the grueling
negotiations, told reporters
36
Climate
WARMING HURTS THE OZONE
Greenhouse gas emissions are causing the depletion of the ozone layer which will very soon be
completely destroyed
Pearce, Fred, 2007, The Last Generation: How Nature Will Take Her Revenge for Climate
Change, p.274-275
The problem is this. In the lower atmosphere greenhouse gases trap heat, but in the stratosphere they have the opposite
effect, causing an increase in the amount of heat escaping to space from that zone of the atmosphere. This is happening
worldwide, but some of the most intense cooling is over areas with the greatest warming at the surface. Like the Arctic,
which increasingly resembles the air high above Antarctica. As the stratosphere cools the risk of formation of
stratospheric clouds, and massive ozone loss, increases.
There is another risk factor, too. The warmer the troposphere, with stronger convection currents taking
thunderstorms clouds right up to the boundary with the stratosphere, may be injecting more water vapour into the
stratosphere. So far as we know, the stratosphere has always been very dry in the past. So extra water vapour is
potentially a big change. And more water vapour will also make more likely the formation of the polar stratospheric
clouds. ‘If it gets a lot wetter that will make ozone depletion much worse,’ says Shindell. There is some evidence that
this is happening, though data are scarce. ‘Water vapour levels in parts of the lower stratosphere have doubled in the
past 60 years,’ he says.
No hole formed in the Arctic ozone layer in 2005, because the sun did not rise when the air was at its coldest.
But the spring of 2005 nonetheless saw the largest Arctic ozone loss in forty years of records. More than a third of the
ozone disappeared, and losses reached 70 per cent in places. Air masses containing the reduced ozone levels spread
south across Scandinavia and Britain and even as far south as Italy for a few days. One year soon, the sun will rise
when temperatures are still cold enough for major runaway ozone destruction. And when it does, there could be
millions of people living beneath. It will be another unexpected consequence of global warming.
37
Climate
WARMING IS A THREAT
Global Warming Possess a Serious Threat- Immediate Action Must be Taken

Ross Gelbspan, 2002, Opposing View Points
Ross Gelbspan argues in the following viewpoint that human consumption of coal and oil and the
subsequent rise of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere have brought about unprecedented and life threatening
global warming. He believes that the earth is already experiencing extreme weather events as a result of the
warming, such as droughts, heat waves, and wind storms. According to Gelbspan, immediate action must
be taken to curb further buildup of heat-trapping gases in the atmosphere through the promotion of
alternative energy sources. In 1995 more than 2,000 scientists from 100 countries reported to the UN that
our burning of oil, coal, and natural gas is changing the earth’s climate. Five years later, many of the same
researchers ware very troubled by two things; the climate is changing much more quickly than they
projected even a few years ago; and the systems of the planet are far more sensitive to even a very small
degree of warming than they had realized.
Global Warming Alarm

Ross Gelbspan, 2002, Opposing View Points
The long anticipated federal report the “Climate Change in America”, was first leaked to the press in June
2000, and it forecast a dire future of disappearing alpine meadows, loss of coastal wetlands and barrier
islands, and a dangerous upsurge in insect-borne diseases such as malaria. Forecasts will be replaced with
grasslands, said the government study, and the water quality problems will mount. Average US
temperatures, the report said, will rise by 5 to 10 degrees (F) by the end of the 21st century. In March 2000,
researchers at the National Climate Data Center also published alarming findings: Until the mid- 1970’s,
the planet had been warming up by one degree F per century- a rate at which most eco systems can adapt.
But for the last twenty years, Earth has instead been warming by 4 degrees (F) per century. That same
month, researchers announced that absorption of heat in the deep oceans over the last 40 years has
temporarily masked the rapidly rising temperature of the planet. The findings promoted a number of
scientists to revise upward their projections of future warming.
38
Climate
AT: CO2 AG
Plants need carbon dioxide – but only to an extent. Excess CO2 is toxic and threatens the wellbeing of
ecosystems.
Roberta C. Barbalace, college professor, writer, editor and environmental consultant, providing self-
assessment, audit services, DOT and HM and OSHA training and expert witness service to offices across
the United States and Puerto Rico, Nov. 7, 2006, http://environmentalchemistry.com.
In August of 2006 EPA General Counsel Robert Fabricant concluded that since the
Clean Air Act does not specifically authorize regulation to address climate change,
CO2 is not a pollutant. The reason given for not classifying CO2 as a pollutant is based
upon the fact that it is a natural component of the atmosphere and needed by plants
in order to carry out photosynthesis. No one would argue the fact that carbon dioxide
is a necessary component of the atmosphere any more than one would argue the
fact that Vitamin D is necessary in the human diet. However, excess Vitamin D in the
diet can be extremely toxic (6). Living systems, be they an ecosystem or an organism,
require that a delicate balance be maintained between certain elements and/or
compounds in order for the system to function normally. When one substance is
present in excess and as a result threatens the wellbeing of an ecosystem, it
becomes toxic, and could be considered to be a pollutant, despite the fact that it is
required in small quantities.
FACE scientists from Duke University find that tree growth declines over the years at high CO2
levels.
ScienceDaily, (Feb. 16, 2004), Duke Open-air Experiment Results Could Deflate Hopes That Forests
Can Alleviate Global Warming, http://www.sciencedaily.com
Scientists at FACE had an unanticipated opportunity to assess how
drought affects trees growing in a CO2 enriched atmosphere when
2002 proved to be one of the driest years on record in North Carolina,
Schlesinger said. By comparison, 2003 was one of the area's wettest
years. "As the experiment has continued, we realized just how hard it is to see
what ultimately controls tree growth -- whether CO2, water or soil
nutrients," he added. Apart from the impact of nitrogen deficiency and
drought, the scientists have found some indication that pine tree
growth declined over the years at the high CO2 levels, he said. The trees
bathed in high CO2 also added more fine roots, which Schlesinger suggests is
just another indicator of low nitrogen. "If trees don't have a lot of
nutrients they grow a lot of roots looking for them," he said. Meanwhile,
some other species in Duke's CO2-bathed forest plots have grown at
faster rates than the loblolly pines, scientists report. Still-unpublished data shows
70 percent growth increases for poison ivy, according to Schlesinger. There is also
evidence that the extra carbon dioxide has induced more underlying
rock to weather into soil through dissolution by CO2-produced carbonic
acid. While that action would also remove carbon dioxide from the
atmosphere and "store" the remnants in the added soil, the impact
would be "trivial" compared to expectations from boosted tree growth,
Schlesinger said.
Based on available evidence from the Duke experiment, "I'd be surprised if the
forests of the world will take up more than one-third of the carbon
39
Climate
dioxide from fossil fuel emissions in the year 2050, which is what our
experiment simulates," he predicted.
40
Climate
AT: CO2 AG
Plants won’t be able to store excess carbon dioxide; they won’t be able to offset any increases.
ScienceDaily (Apr. 13, 2006), Higher Carbon Dioxide, Lack Of
Nitrogen Limit Plant Growth, http://www.sciencedaily.com-
Earth's plant life will not be able to "store" excess carbon from rising
atmospheric carbon dioxide levels as well as scientists once thought
because plants likely cannot get enough nutrients, such as nitrogen,
when there are higher levels of carbon dioxide, according to scientists publishing
in this week's issue of the journal Nature.
That, in turn, is likely to dampen the ability of plants to offset increases in

atmospheric carbon dioxide.
"We found that atmospheric carbon dioxide levels may rise even faster than
anticipated, because ecosystems likely will not store as much carbon
as had been predicted," said Peter Reich of the University of Minnesota, lead author of the
study, which was conducted at the National Science Foundation (NSF)'s Cedar Creek Long-Term Ecological
Research (LTER) site in Minn.
"As a result, soils will be unable to sustain plant growth over time [as
atmospheric carbon dioxide continues to increase]," said plant ecologist David
Ellsworth of the University of Michigan.
Ozone pollution effects plants ability to absorb carbon dioxide, reducing their ability to counter
greenhouse gases.
Amber Dance, July 26, 2007, The Nation - Ozone is found to curb
plants’ powers - Pollution seems to limit the ability of flora to offset
greenhouse gases., http://articles.latimes.com/2007/jul/26/science/sci-
ozone26
Rising levels of ozone pollution near the ground are damaging the
ability of plants to take up carbon dioxide, reducing their potential to
act as a counterbalance to greenhouse gas accumulation, scientists
said Wednesday.
When affected by projected high levels of ozone, plants can absorb up

to one-third less carbon dioxide than healthy plants, the researchers found.
The finding adds a new component that will have to be factored into climate models used to assess the
future effects of global warming, they said.
The study, published online by the journal Nature, was the first to consider the
indirect effect of ozone on vegetation.
41
Climate
AT: CO2 AG
Ozone prevents plants from absorbing carbon dioxide, placing the world in further danger of global
warming.
Andrea Thompson, 25 July 2007, LiveScience Staff Writer, Rising
Ozone Levels Could Stunt Plant Growth,
http://www.livescience.com/environment/.
the amount of
While ozone forms naturally in the atmosphere from other chemical compounds,
ground-level ozone has been increasing because these compounds are
emitted by the burning of fossil fuels. And though stratospheric ozone is beneficial
because it acts like a planet-wide layer of sunscreen, ground-level ozone can be harmful
to humans who breathe it and toxic to plants that absorb it. Plants
normally take in ozone and other gases through their stomata, or
pores, but when ozone levels surpass a certain amount, the gas causes
cellular damage inside the plant's leaves, and they become visibly
damaged with brown splotches. The ozone also reduces the rate of
photosynthesis in the plant and cripples its ability to grow. "In effect the cells
have been disrupted," Sitch told LiveScience. "Essentially the photosynthetic apparatus has been
damage could cause large economic losses through
damaged." Such
reduced crop yields.
Excess carbon dioxide will only prove beneficial in the short term; other factors of warming render
plants useless to combat excess.
ScienceDaily, (Dec. 6, 2002), Climate Change Surprise: High Carbon Dioxide Levels
Can Retard Plant Growth, Study Reveals, ScienceDaily.com.
global climate change may prove
The prevailing view among scientists is that
beneficial to many farmers and foresters – at least in the short term.
The logic is straightforward: Plants need atmospheric carbon dioxide to produce
food, and by emitting more CO2 into the air, our cars and factories
create new sources of plant nutrition that will cause some crops and
trees to grow bigger and faster. But an unprecedented three-year
experiment conducted at Stanford University is raising questions about
that long-held assumption. Writing in the journal Science, researchers concluded
that elevated atmospheric CO2 actually reduces plant growth when
combined with other likely consequences of climate change – namely,
higher temperatures, increased precipitation or increased nitrogen
deposits in the soil.
The results of the study may prompt researchers and policymakers to
re-think one of the standard arguments against taking action to
prevent global warming: that natural ecosystems will minimize the
problem of fossil fuel emissions by transferring large amounts of
carbon in the atmosphere to plants and soils.
42
Climate
we won't get as much help with the carbon problem as we

"Perhaps
thought we could, and we will need to put more emphasis on both
managing vegetation and reducing emissions,"
43
Climate
AT: CARBON SINKS
Forests are losing the ability to absorb carbon dioxide; this will only accelerate global warming.
James RAnderson, science correspondent for the Gaurdian, January 3, 2008, trees absorbing less co2 as
world warms, study finds,
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2008/jan/03/climatechange.carbonemissions.
The ability of forests to soak up man-made carbon dioxide is
weakening, according to an analysis of two decades of data from more than 30 sites in the frozen
north.
The finding published today is crucial, because it means that more

of the CO2 we release
will end up affecting the climate in the atmosphere rather than being
safely locked away in trees or soil.
the amount of CO2 in the
The results may partly explain recent studies suggesting that
atmosphere is increasing faster than expected. If higher temperatures
mean less carbon is soaked up by plants and microbes, global warming
will accelerate.
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, which shared the Nobel
peace prize with Al Gore, has concluded that humanity has eight years left to
prevent the worst effects of global warming.
Carbon uptake by land and sea is crucial to predictions about future
warming. "We are currently getting a 50% discount on the climatic impact of our fossil fuel
emissions," the climate scientist John Miller of the University of Colorado wrote in a commentary on the
research in the journal Nature - meaning that half of what we put out is sucked up by the oceans and
ecosystems on land.
"Unfortunately, we have no guarantee that the 50% discount will continue, and if it disappears we will feel
the full climatic brunt of our unrelenting emission of CO2 from fossil fuels."
44
Climate
AT: CARBON SINKS
Temperatures have increased, meaning that despite forests being carbon sinks, global warming will
have a bigger effect.
James RAnderson, science correspondent for the Gaurdian, January 3, 2008, trees absorbing less co2 as
world warms, study finds,
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2008/jan/03/climatechange.carbonemissions.
In northern latitudes, spring and autumn temperatures have risen by
1.1C and 0.8C respectively in the past two decades. That means a longer growing
season for plants, which scientists thought should be a good thing for
slowing warming. This increased growth is even visible from space, with satellite measurements
indicating a greening of the land. As plants take up more CO2, that should put a
break on CO2 increases. However, the new data suggests that is too
simplistic. The team analysed data from more than 30 monitoring stations spread across northern
regions including Siberia, Alaska, Canada and Europe. The data, which goes back to 1980, charts
the levels of CO2 in the local atmosphere. This is a product of both
uptake by plants during photosynthesis and release of CO2 by plants
and microbes during respiration. The team focused particularly on the date in
autumn at which the forests switched from being a net sink for carbon
into a net source. Instead of moving later in the year as they had expected, this date actually got
earlier - in some places by a few days, but in others by a few weeks.
"The information that we had from satellite data, that the greening was
increasing, looked like a positive sign. There was hope that this would
help us to mitigate emissions," said Anders Lindroth at Lund University in Sweden, who was part of
the research team. "But even if we have a greening, it doesn't mean that we
have a positive effect on the carbon balance ... it's bad news." "This
means potentially a bigger warming effect," said Timo Vesala at the University of
Helsinki, who led the study.
Believing that forest sinks will save the human race is foolish; it makes the world doubt the US on the
issue of global warming.
James Randerson, science correspondent for the Gaurdian 13th April 2002, Trees
aren't going to solve global warming, http://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2002-04/ns-tag041002.php.
FORESTS will be less effective at slowing climate change than scientists thought, because they'll mop up
less carbon dioxide than expected. That verdict follows a four-year experiment to see how much CO2 trees will absorb from
the atmosphere when pollution has raised levels of the gas. The results should hammer home the message that the world can't rely on
trees to solve the problem of CO2 emissions, according to William Schlesinger at Duke University in North Carolina, whose team
carried out the work. "It throws doubt on nations such as the US who have carbon sequestration as their only
strategy for dealing with the problem," he says. Global CO2 emissions from sources such as car exhausts
and industry are predicted to double between now and 2050. More CO2 means that trees will grow faster
and lock up more carbon. This led some to hope that plants might mop up all the extra gas, says Schlesinger.
But earlier experiments to find out how much CO2 plants can absorb have been inconclusive because they
took place in sealed environments such as greenhouses. These can't maintain realistic outdoor climate
conditions of temperature, humidity and rain.
45
Climate
AT: ICE AGE
Europe can breathe and so can we; IPCC studies prove an ice age impossible
Weaver, Andrew [at the School of Earth and Ocean Sciences] and Hillaire-Marcel, Claude,
2004, “Global Warming and the Next Ice Age”, Science, 4/16/2004: Vol. 304, no. 5669, p400-
402
It is certainly true that if the AMO were to become inactive, substantial short-term cooling would result in western
Europe, especially during the winter. However, it is important to emphasize that not a single coupled
model assessed by the 2001 IPCC Working Group I on Climate Change Science (4) predicted a
collapse in the AMO during the 21st century. Even in those models where the AMO was found to
weaken during the 21st century, there would still be warming over Europe due to the radiative
forcing associated with increased levels of greenhouse gases.
Models that eventually lead to a collapse of the AMO under global warming conditions typically
fall into two categories: (i) flux-adjusted coupled general circulation models, and (ii)
intermediate-complexity models with zonally averaged ocean components. Both suites of
models are known to be more sensitive to freshwater perturbations. In the first class of
models, a small perturbation away from the present climate leads to large systematic errors in
the salinity fields (as large flux adjustments are applied) that then build up to cause dramatic
AMO transitions. In the second class of models, the convection and sinking of water masses
are coupled (there is no horizontal structure). In contrast, newer non-flux-adjusted models find
a more stable AMO under future conditions of climate change.
Even the recent observations of freshening in the North Atlantic (15) (a reduction of salinity
due to the addition of freshwater) appear to be consistent with the projections of perhaps the
most sophisticated non-flux-adjusted model (11). Ironically, this model suggests that such
freshening is associated with an increased AMO (16). This same model proposes that it
is only Labrador Sea Water formation that is susceptible to collapse in
response to global warming.
In light of the paleoclimate record and our understanding of the
contemporary climate system, it is safe to say that global warming will not
lead to the onset of a new ice age. These same records suggest that it is
highly unlikely that global warming will lead to a widespread collapse of the
AMO--despite the appealing possibility raised in two recent studies (18, 19)--
although it is possible that deep convection in the Labrador Sea will cease.
Such an event would have much more minor consequences on the climate
downstream over Europe.
The next “Ice Age” won’t cause extinction because of compensating mechanisms. Glacial cycles in the
future are too remote for any legitimate predictions to be made
Snook, Jim, 2007, Ice Age Extinction: Cause and Human Consequences, p 172
The next glacial breakup phase will be very had on living things because of a major decrease in atmospheric carbon dioxide and lower
precipitation. However, I suspect that the next breakup phase will not cause the extinction of many animal
genera like the last one did, for several reasons. With all of the fossil fuels burned, there will be
an increase of carbon dioxide in the ocean-atmosphere system. Many compensating mechanism
that will affect the carbon dioxide in the system include deposition of carbonates in shallow seas
and utilization by ocean plants. In addition, we do not know how much carbon dioxide will be
added to the system by volcanism.
Glacial cycles after the next one are too remote for us to make any viable predictions. We do not
know if there will be another great extinction with the same cause as the one that occurred near the end of the last ice age, but it is a
possibility.
46
Climate
AT: ICE AGE
Carbon dioxide has adverse effects that go beyond extinction and future sea level rise; these include
rapidly changing climate zones, forest fires, shrinking lakes, reduction of fresh water sources,
and ocean acidification.
James HANSEN, heads the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies[1] in New York
City, a part of the Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, Earth Sciences
Division.[ 2008, Twenty Years later, LexisNexis Database.
The disturbing conclusion, documented in a paper I have written with several of the world’s leading climate experts, is that the
safe level of atmospheric carbon dioxide is no more than 350 ppm (parts per million) and
it may be less. Carbon dioxide mount is already 385 ppm and rising about 2 ppm per
year. Stunning corollary: the oft-stated goal to keep global warming less than two degrees
Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit) is a recipe for global disaster, not salvation. These
conclusions are based on paleoclimate data showing how the Earth responded to past
levels of greenhouse gases and on observations showing how the world is responding to
today’s carbon dioxide amount. The consequences of continued increase of greenhouse
gases extend far beyond extermination of species and future sea level rise. Arid
subtropical climate zones are expanding poleward. Already an average expansion of
about 250 miles has occurred, affecting the southern United States, the Mediterranean region,
Australia and southern Africa. Forest fires and drying-up of lakes will increase further
unless carbon dioxide growth is halted and reversed. Mountain glaciers are the source of
fresh water for hundreds of millions of people. These glaciers are receding world-wide, in
the Himalayas, Andes and Rocky Mountains. They will disappear, leaving their rivers as trickles in late summer and fall, unless the
growth of carbon dioxide is reversed. Coral reefs, the rainforest of the ocean, are home for one-third of the
species in the sea. Coral reefs are under stress for several reasons, including warming of the ocean,
but especially because of ocean acidification, a direct effect of added carbon dioxide.
Ocean life dependent on carbonate shells and skeletons is threatened by dissolution as the
ocean becomes more acid. Such phenomena, including the instability of Arctic sea ice and the great ice sheets at
today’s carbon dioxide amount, show that we have already gone too far. We must draw down atmospheric carbon
dioxide to preserve the planet we know. A level of no more than 350 ppm is still feasible, with the help of
reforestation and improved agricultural practices, but just barely – time is running out.
Global warming is melting ice now, the North Pole is now all water and sea ice has decreased the size
of Texas
Catastrophe, pg. 22-23
Climate change is now ride-ranging in its impacts. Higher temperatures have already had a
measurable effect on land glaciers and sea ice. Mountain glaciers have been shrinking in almost
all areas of the world. For example, the glacier from which mountaineers began the first ascent of
Everest in 1953 have retreated by about three miles over the past fifty years. There has been a
substantial thinning of Arctic sea ice in late summer: In August 2000, for example, there was no
ice at the North Pole; there was only a stretch of open water. More generally, sea ice in the
Northern Hemisphere has decreased over the last three decades by an area equivalent to that of
the state of Texas.
47
Climate
AT: ICE AGE
Empirically proven: Melting ice caps will alter the Gulf Stream, burying all of Europe under glaciers
while flooding the rest of the world
Readicker-Henderson, Edward, 2007, “The End of the World”, Sierra, Vol. 92 Issue 2, p34-41
the Greenlandic ice cap is melting not only on top but underneath as
Recent studies show that
well, hurrying glaciers to the sea. Last year alone, Greenland lost as much as 52 cubic
miles of ice, and the speed of the melt is increasing, in part because so much has already melted. Ice
is an extremely efficient reflector, bouncing solar heat back into the atmosphere. The loss
of ice exposes more and more rock, which holds more heat, which melts yet more ice.
Should the ice cap melt completely, the world's oceans will rise six to seven meters. "You've
seen the disaster in New Orleans?" asks Dornsiepen. "The same thing can happen to all big
coastal cities."
Before Greenland melts entirely, however, an even bigger problem could arise.All that freshwater means a
less-salty — and therefore lighter and warmer — ocean. Changing the temperature and
salinity of the North Atlantic could alter the Gulf Stream, which functions as a giant
conveyor belt: Cold heavy water from around Greenland sinks and cycles south, pushing water from the tropics
north to warm Europe. With each drop of lightweight ice melt pouring off Greenland, that belt frays a little more. The
last time it was disrupted, much of Europe was buried under glaciers a mile thick. An ice
bright brought the first people to Greenland as far back as 2500 B.C., crossing by foot from Canada. There were a
couple of false starts before the Thule culture, which appeared around 1100 A.D., got Arctic life right: whale and
walrus hunting, snow houses, dogsleds. It lasted until Western contact in the 1500s. That contact — whalers and
glorydrunk explorers, mostly — explains why traditional Greenlandic dances now tend to look like variations on the
hornpipe and the jig.
Global warming is causing U.S cities to be flooded by increasingly rising sea levels
Current Events, 2006, “Meltdown”, Vol. 105 Issue 24 p1-3
Take a look at your thumb. Imagine it's the Florida peninsula today. Now take a look at
your pinkie. Imagine it extends only as far as the top knuckle. That's what the Florida
peninsula could look like in the future. That's how climate expert Michael Oppenheimer explained what
might happen if the ice sheets at Earth's poles keep melting at the present rate. He and other climatologists warn that
global warming could cause sea levels to rise between 13 and 20 feet in the next century.
That means that about two-thirds of Florida would be under the sea. In addition, the U.S. Gulf
Coast would move up to Houston, and the coast of Louisiana would move up about 100 miles. "We're talking
about a monumental reconfiguration," Oppenheimer told National Public Radio.
Satellite measurements have revealed that Earth's two largest ice sheets — the ones that cover Antarctica and
Greenland — have been shrinking rapidly. Greenland's ice sheet has been melting slowly for
thousands of years. But the rate at which it has been shrinking doubled between 1996 and
2005 as glaciers slid more quickly into the ocean, according to Eric Rignot of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory.
One glacier Rignot studied had moved very little in 60 years but is now sliding at a rate of 9 miles a year. Meltwater
appears to be seeping under the glacier, making it move faster.
48
Climate
AT: ICE AGE
Global warming will melt the Greenland ice sheet and shut down the ocean conveyer
Change, p.182-183
But the crux of the public debate on Broecker’s ocean conveyer remains the very simple question:
could global warming shut down the conveyor? Broecker seems rarely to have doubted it. And the
claim has in recent years seemed almost to have a life of its own. This struck me most strongly at a conference on
‘dangerous’ climate change held at Britain’s Hadley Centre for Climate Prediction in Exeter in 2005. There I met
Michael Schlesinger of the University of Illinois at Urbana- Champaign. He is a sharp-suited guy sporting a pastiche of
1950s Teddy-boy clothes and hair style. But if there were serious doubts in Exeter about where his style sense would
ever come back into fashion, there was no doubt that his ideas about climate change had found their moment.
For more than a decade, Schlesinger has been making Broecker’s case that a shutdown of
the ocean conveyer could be closer than the mainstream climate modelers think. Some critics felt
that he just did not know when to give up and move on. But he stuck with it, criticizing the IPCC
and its models for systematically eliminating a range of quite possible ‘doomsday scenarios’ from
consideration. ‘The trouble with trying to reach a consensus is that all the interesting ideas get
eliminated,’ he said. Science by committee ends up throwing away the good stuff—like the idea
of the shutting down of the conveyor. But in Exeter, Schlesinger was back in vogue. He had been
invited to present his model findings that a global warming of just 2 degrees C would melt the
Greenland ice sheet fast enough to swamp the ocean with fresh water and shut down the
conveyor. The risk, he said, was ‘unacceptably large’.
Empirically proven: Shutting down the ocean conveyer will result in an Ice Age
Change, p.184
Early on, Broecker was often ambivalent about the potential for truly disastrous events. But by
1995, he felt confident enough to title a lecture on the conveyor to a big science conference
‘Abrupt Climate Change: Is One Hiding in the Greenhouse?’ In it he outlined how evidence from
sea floor and lake sediments, ice cores, coral and glacier records, ‘demonstrates unequivocally’
that an on-off switch on the global conveyor operated at the beginning and end of the last ice age.
The suggestion was that the conveyor had shut down and single-handedly started the ice ages,
lowering temperatures by ‘4 degrees C or more…often within the lifespan of a generation’—a
claim he inflated soon afterwards, in the pages of Scientific American, to ’10 degrees C over the
course of as little as a decade’.
49
Climate
AT: ICE AGE
Global warming is causing Arctic ice to melt that will lead to sea level rises, destruction of low-lying
areas and coastline, making people refugees, and causing mass extinction that won’t recover
for hundreds of thousands of years.
James HANSEN, heads the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies[1] in New York
City, a part of the Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Maryland, Earth Sciences
Division.[ 2008, Twenty Years later, LexisNexis Database.
And climate is nearing dangerous tipping points. Elements of a “perfect storm”, a global
cataclysm, are assembled. Climate can reach points such that amplifying feedbacks spur large rapid changes. Arctic sea
ice is a current example. Global warming initiated sea ice melt, exposing darker ocean that
absorbs more sunlight, melting more ice. As a result, without any additional greenhouse gases, the
Arctic soon will be ice-free in the summer. More ominous tipping points loom. West Antarctic and
Greenland ice sheets are vulnerable to even small additional warming. These two-mile-thick
behemoths respond slowly at first, but if disintegration gets well underway it will become unstoppable. Debate among scientists is
only about how much sea level would rise by a given date. In my opinion,
if emissions follow a business-as-usual
scenario, sea level rise of at least two meters is likely this century. Hundreds of millions
of people would become refugees. No stable shoreline would be reestablished in any time
frame that humanity can conceive. Animal and plant species are already stressed by
climate change. Polar and alpine species will be pushed off the planet, if warming
continues. Other species attempt to migrate, but as some are extinguished their interdependencies can cause ecosystem collapse.
Mass extinctions, of more than half the species on the planet, have occurred several times when the
Earth warmed as much as expected if greenhouse gases continue to increase. Biodiversity
recovered, but it required hundreds of thousands of years.
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AT: S02
Sulphur dioxide increases the amount of water vapor and kills the ozone to make the earth warmer
World Climate Report April 22, 2005 “Change of Direction: Do SO2 Emissions
Lead to Warming?”
http://www.worldclimatereport.com/index.php/2005/04/22/change-of-direction-do-
so2-emissions-lead-to-warming/
Many scientists believe that sulfur dioxide emissions, either from un-scrubbed power
plants or from large-scale agricultural burning, serve to cool the planet’s surface
temperature.The cooling mechanism is fairly straightforward. Sulfur dioxide is
transformed in the atmosphere into sulfate aerosol, a fine particle that reflects away
the sun’s radiation. The particles also serve as the condensation nuclei for cloud
droplets which also reflect away the sun’s energy.On the other hand, no one really
knows the magnitude of these cooling effects (if any). So we have argued that sulfate
cooling is simply a fudge factor put into climate models in order to chill the overly-hot
projections they make if left to their own devices.Now comes evidence that sulfur
dioxide actually can enhance global warming.While this doesn’t mean that sulfates
aren’t also cooling things by reflecting away radiation, the parent, sulfur dioxide, can
do some other things that make the surface warmer. According to research just
published in Geophysical Research Letters by J. Notholt and his co-authors, sulfur
dioxide is converted to sulfuric acid (remember “acid rain”?), which leads to more ice
crystals in the upper atmosphere. Some of these are eventually lifted upwards into
the stable stratosphere where they increase the amount of water vapor found
there.Water vapor in the stratosphere serves as a greenhouse gas and is involved in
the destruction of ozone, resulting in a stratospheric cooling and a warming of the
lower atmosphere and surface.And, for once, it’s not from the USA. We’re usually
blamed for the lion’s share of warming as a result of our carbon dioxide emissions.
But the sulfur dioxide is largely from elsewhere. The authors write: While
anthropogenic SO2 emissions in Europe and North America have been decreasing
since around 1980, the anthropogenic SO2 emissions from China, Asia and the
tropics have been increasing…For example, van Aardenne et al (2001) report a factor
of 12 increase for China and 8 for East Asia, respectively between 1950 and 1990.The
authors propose that their mechanism has been responsible for about one-quarter of
the increases in stratospheric water vapor during the period 1950 to 2000. According
to a NASA model published by Drew Shindell in 2001, this would account for about
5% of the observed warming.While that seems small, it is a sign about how little we
really know (or have known) about the climatic disposition of sulfur dioxide. Every
increment of warming that it causes takes away from its putative cooling. Which
means, ironically, that it can serve less and less as an explanation as to why we have
only witnessed a very modest global warming to date.Obviously, this points to
something being very wrong. We have been mentioning this for years, and we’re
going to mention it again:With so many non-carbon dioxide factors apparently
causing warming (soot, methane, sulfur dioxide…), why isn’t it warmer than heck?
There are two options: Either warming is being countered by a tremendous sulfate
cooling (which should be obvious in, say, China (which is warming by the way)) or the
warming effect of carbon dioxide itself is overstated. We’ll bet on the latter, but it is
going to take decades for science to admit to this error after all the fear and bad
policies that is has caused.
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AT: S02
Sulfur dioxide acts like other radiative green house gases and increases the climate temperature
Steven J. Smith, Hugh Pitcher and T. M. L. Wigley June 2001 “Global and regional
anthropogenic sulfur dioxide emissions”
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science?_ob=ArticleURL&_udi=B6VF0-43B2JRM-
5&_user=2518055&_rdoc=1&_fmt=&_orig=search&_sort=d&view=c&_acct=C00005
7738&_version=1&_urlVersion=0&_userid=2518055&md5=68a7bb9a034fcb378c945
7f1cb2fed55#aff1
A knowledge of the time-evolving spatial details of sulfur dioxide emissions is vital for
a number of reasons: understanding the processes leading to acid deposition;
estimating the atmospheric sulfur dioxide and sulfate aerosol loadings for pollution
studies; and estimating sulfate aerosol loadings as a climate forcing agent. In all such
studies, it is almost essential to have emissions data on a regular latitude–longitude
grid and desirable to have data that resolve the seasonal cycle.Here, we have used a
variety of methods and data sources to derive, first, a detailed regional and gridded
data set for 1990. This was then extended to give corresponding regional data for
1980, 1985, 1995 and 2000. The results were then compared with other emissions
estimates.Our results show that global-total emissions have varied little over 1980–
2000 (±3 TgS/year). Regionally, however, there have been major changes,
summarized in Table 4. The percentage contribution to global emissions from
countries around the North Atlantic basin (United States, Canada and Europe) has
declined substantially over recent decades while the contribution from Asia has
increased. The net effect is a shift from an emissions pattern centered around the
North Atlantic to one dominated by Asia. This shift is expected to continue over
coming decades (Smith et al., 2000 and Nakicenovic).These results, and their
extension into the future, have important consequences for acid precipitation and
pollution, as demonstrated by regional analyses (Alcamo; Foell and National). The
main application of the global data set produced here, however, lies in coupled
sulfur-chemistry/climate modeling. In the climate context, sulfur dioxide emissions
are important both in understanding the past and in predicting the future. The
emissions estimates produced here form the base data for globally gridded scenarios
of future sulfur dioxide emissions (Smith et al., 2000). These scenarios have been
used to produce projections for the present and future climate including self-
consistent atmospheric sulfur chemistry (Dai et al., 2000).To 1990, the net radiative
forcing due to sulfur dioxide-derived sulfate aerosols has been around −1.1 W/m2
(Shine et al., 1996) due to the sum of direct (clear sky) and indirect (cloud albedo)
effects. While sulfate aerosol forcing is subject to large uncertainties, a value of −1.1
W/m2 implies that sulfate aerosols have offset almost half of the radiative effect of
increasing greenhouse gas concentrations. Regionally, the offsetting effect has been
much greater (e.g., Taylor; Mitchell and Kiehl). Sulfate aerosols have, therefore,
substantially modified the pattern of climate response to increasing greenhouse gas
concentrations.
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AT: S02
Sulphur dioxide reacts with water vapor to poison plants and take away nutrients from the ground
Atmosphere, Climate & Environment Information Programme 2004 “Impacts of Air Pollution
& Acid Rain on Vegetation”
http://www.ace.mmu.ac.uk/Resources/Fact_Sheets/Key_Stage_4/Air_Pollution/15.html
"Acid rain" is a general name for many phenomena including acid fog, acid sleet, and
acid snow. Although we associate the acid threat with rainy days, acid deposition
occurs all the time, even on sunny days.Sulphur dioxide and nitrogen oxides both
combine with water in the atmosphere to create acid rain. Acid rain acidifies the soils
and waters where it falls, killing off plants. Many industrial processes produce large
quantities of pollutants including sulphur dioxide and nitrous oxide. These are also
produced by car engines and are emitted in the exhaust. When sulphur dioxide and
nitrous oxide react with water vapour in the atmosphere, acids are produced. The
result is what is termed acid rain, which causes serious damage to plants.In addition,
other gaseous pollutants, such as ozone, can also harm vegetation directly.Acid rain
does not usually kill trees directly. Instead, it is more likely to weaken the trees by
damaging their leaves, limiting the nutrients available to them, or poisoning them
with toxic substances slowly released from the soil. The main atmospheric pollutants
that affect trees are nitrates and sulphates. Forest decline is often the first sign that
trees are in trouble due to air pollution.Scientists believe that acidic water dissolves
the nutrients and helpful minerals in the soil and then washes them away before the
trees and other plants can use them to grow. At the same time, the acid rain causes
the release of toxic substances such as aluminium into the soil. These are very
harmful to trees and plants, even if contact is limited. Toxic substances also wash
away in the runoff that carries the substances into streams, rivers, and lakes. Fewer
of these toxic substances are released when the rainfall is cleaner.Even if the soil is
well buffered, there can be damage from acid rain. Forests in high mountain regions
receive additional acid from the acidic clouds and fog that often surround them.
These clouds and fog are often more acidic than rainfall. When leaves are frequently
bathed in this acid fog, their protective waxy coating can wear away. The loss of the
coating damages the leaves and creates brown spots. Leaves turn the energy in
sunlight into food for growth. This process is called photosynthesis. When leaves are
damaged, they cannot produce enough food energy for the tree to remain
healthy.Once trees are weak, diseases or insects that ultimately kill them can more
easily attack them. Weakened trees may also become injured more easily by cold
weather.
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AT: S02
Sulphur dioxide kills the leaves of plants and even damages the plant’s cell membranes
Atmosphere, Climate & Environment Information Programme 2004 “Impacts of Air Pollution
& Acid Rain on Vegetation”
http://www.ace.mmu.ac.uk/Resources/Fact_Sheets/Key_Stage_4/Air_Pollution/15.html
Sulphur dioxide, one of the main components of acid rain, has direct effects on
vegetation. Changes in the physical appearance of vegetation are an indication that
the plants' metabolism is impaired by the concentration of sulphur dioxide. Harm
caused by sulphur dioxide is first noticeable on the leaves of the plants. For some
plants injury can occur within hours or days of being exposed to high levels of
sulphur dioxide. It is the leaves in mid-growth that are the most vulnerable, while the
older and younger leaves are more resistant. You can see the damage to coniferous
needles by observing the extreme colour difference between the green base and the
bright orange-red tips.
The effects of sulphur dioxide are influenced by other biological and environmental
factors such as plant type, age, sunlight levels, temperature, humidity and the
presence of other pollutants (ozone and nitrogen oxides). Thus, even though sulphur
dioxide levels may be extremely high, the levels may not affect vegetation because
of the surrounding environmental conditions. It is also possible that the plants and
soils may temporarily store pollutants. By storing the pollutants they are preventing
the pollutants from reacting with other substances in the plants or soil.
The effects of ozone on plants have been investigated intensively for almost two
decades. Studies made in controlled environment (CE) chambers, glasshouses and in
the field, using open-topped chambers, have all contributed to the understanding of
the mechanisms underlying ozone effects and their ultimate impact on vegetation.
The biochemical mechanisms by which ozone interacts with plants have been
intensively studied and, although the relative significance of different initial reactions
remains unclear, there is a consensus that the key event in plant responses is
oxidative damage to cell membranes. This primary oxidative damage results in the
loss of membrane integrity and function, and in turn to inhibition of essential
biochemical and physiological processes. A key target is photosynthesis, although
ozone may also affect stomatal function and so modify plant responses to other
factors, such as drought and elevated carbon dioxide. These changes result in
reduced growth and yield in many plants. However, it is clear that such responses
vary in magnitude between species and also between different cultivars within
species. The mechanisms by which some species and genotypes are protected from
ozone injury are not clear, but may include differences in uptake into the leaf or in
the various components of antioxidant metabolism. Ozone may also increase the
severity of many fungal diseases, while virus infections reduce the effects of ozone in
some plants.
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AT: S02
Sulfuric acid leads to acidification of lakes, forests and damages human health and visibility
Dallas Burtraw, et al, David A. Evans, Alan Krupnick, Karen Palmer,
and Russell Toth March 2005 “Economics of Pollution Trading for SO2 and NOx”
Burtraw- Ph.D. in economics, University of Michigan
http://www.rff.org/rff/documents/rff-dp-05-05.pdf
SO2 and its derivative pollutants are ubiquitous threats to public health and the
environment. Given its potentially direct effect on human health, gaseous SO2
emissions are regulated as a criteria air pollutant.5 Today, the largest threat of SO2
to public health is its role as a precursor to secondary particulates, a constituent of
particulate matter, which is another criteria air pollutant. SO2 and particulate matter
are associated with human morbidity and mortality. To help alleviate the contribution
of SO2 emissions to local air quality problems in the 1970s, utility companies
constructed 429 tall stacks, many over 500 feet, on coal-fired boilers (Regens and
Rycroft 1988). As a consequence, the vast majority of urban areas in the 1980s
attained the national ambient air quality standards for SO2. However, the
smokestack remedy to local problems contributed to the deterioration of air quality
at a regional level. Released high in the atmosphere, SO2 emissions from coal plants
travel hundreds of miles and convert to sulfates that, as particulates, degrade air
quality and damage human health and visibility.Furthermore, the elevated emissions
have led to deposition of sulfuric compounds in soils and waterways in regions
distant from the source of emissions. More commonly known as acid rain, deposition
of sulfur compounds contributes to acidification of forests and lakes. NOx emissions
behave similarly and also contribute to acid rain.6 Although secondary particulates
and acid rain are national problems, they are most severe in the eastern United
States. Most of the nation’s high-sulfur coal is from the Appalachians and burned
primarily east of the Mississippi River. Weather patterns move emissions farther to
the east.
Sulfur dioxide becomes a large part of acid rain and attracts water vapor
Langerman, Paul T. September 15, 1982 “Autos and Clean Air: Time for
Reassessment”
http://www.heritage.org/Research/Regulation/bg210.cfm
Pollution control devices, especially the catalytic converter are a source of sulfur
dioxide which, among other elements becomes a factor in acid rain. Because of this,
and other reasons it is becoming increasingly apparent that the liabilities outweigh
the assets in any accounting of the value of the catalytic conver ter and air pump. An
independent scientific study by the National Academy of Sciences or the Office of
Technolgy Assessment should review the relationship of the catalytic converter, the
air pump and acid rain composition, for there is considerable evidence that the
catalytic converter, etc contribute substantially to acid rain.According to a July 1980
report of the Environmental Protec tion Agency's Office of Research and
Development, sulfuric acid constitutes 65-70 percent of the atmospheric rain's
acidity--the rest being nitric acid. The majority of the sulfuric acid is formed when
sulfur, a component of gasoline, interacts with oxygen creating sulfur dioxide or
sulfur trioxide is a gas at ordinary temperature and pressure and oxidizes into sulfur
trioxide, which is a liquid. This liquid has an affinity for water vapor in the
atmosphere, with which it reacts to form sulfuric acid.
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Climate
AT: S02
Sulfur dioxide has warmed up a planet before and created more carbon dioxide
Anne Minard- Master of Science, Biology
Northern Arizona University December 20, 2007 “Sulfur Dioxide Kept Ancient Mars
Ocean Flowing”
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2007/12/071220-mars-ocean.html
Sulfur dioxide—not carbon dioxide as previously thought—may have helped heat up
ancient Mars and sustained its liquid ocean, a new study has found.Scientists have
often proposed that the planet was enveloped in a carbon dioxide-rich atmosphere
during its early days, which would have allowed for warm temperatures similar to
those on Earth.But the expected limestones and other carbonate rocks formed from
carbon dioxide are apparently missing from Mars's surface, according to new
research led by Itay Halevy, a Harvard planetary geochemist.The contradiction
makes sense if volcanoes on long-ago Mars released sulfur dioxide and hydrogen
sulfide, Halevy and colleagues say.Sulfur dioxide is a powerful greenhouse gas that
could have also acidified the oceans enough to prevent the formation of carbonate
minerals.And if that was the major driver of Mars's climate, it could have yielded life
that didn't depend on a carbon-based chemistry."These questions are especially
relevant in the context of the search for habitable environments in the solar system
[and] also for extrasolar planets," Halevy said.
Sulfur dioxide creates a warmer, more carbonated planet

Anne Minard- Master of Science, Biology Northern Arizona University December 20,
2007 “Sulfur Dioxide Kept Ancient Mars Ocean Flowing”
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2007/12/071220-mars-ocean.html
Sulfur dioxide "provides a potential explanation of early Martian warmth," Halevy
said.It also explains "... the absence of carbonates, the existence of clays on ancient
Martian surfaces, [and] the abundance of sulfates and the acidic conditions later in
Martian history."On Earth sulfur dioxide rapidly oxidizes and then leaves the
atmosphere—often as acid rain.But on an early, oxygen-free Mars, the gas would
remain longer, the authors say.Volcanically produced sulfur dioxide could have even
played the same role on Earth about to 2.5 to 4 billion years ago, when no carbonate
rocks were deposited.
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AT: S02
Sulfur dioxide leads to warming over the Artic and increase global climate temperatures
Alok Jha, Science correspondent March 6, 2007 “Asia smog fuelling Pacific storms
'will melt Arctic ice': Scientists highlight threat from big rise in emissions: 'Severe
pollution' blamed on rapid industrialization”
http://www.lexisnexis.com/us/lnacademic/results/docview/docview.do?
docLinkInd=true&risb=21_T4048729765&format=GNBFI&sort=RELEVANCE&startDoc
No=1&resultsUrlKey=29_T4048729768&cisb=22_T4048729767&treeMax=true&tree
Width=0&csi=138620&docNo=17
Smog and air pollution from Asian cities have intensified storms over the Pacific
Ocean, which will result in increased warming of the Arctic, scientists have warned.
They report that the number of storm clouds in the region has increased by up to a
half over the last 20 years as rapidly industrialised cities in countries such as India
and China burn more coal as they grow.The Pacific's storm system plays an
important role in the circulation of the Earth's atmosphere, transporting heat and
moisture to the northern latitudes. Renyi Zhang, an atmospheric scientist at Texas
A&M University, said this weather system had been affected by aerosols - tiny
particles of pollution such as soot produced when burning coal."Rapid
industrialisation and urbanisation in Asia have caused severe air pollution over many
countries, including China and India. Long-term satellite measurements have
revealed a dramatic increase in aerosol concentrations over Asia," wrote Dr Zhang
yesterday in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. "The increasing
aerosol trend has been explained by sulphur dioxide and soot emissions, with an
increase in sulphur dioxide emissions of 35% per decade over the same
region."Damian Wilson, an atmospheric scientist at the Met Office in Exeter, said the
Pacific storms formed in the central part of the ocean and headed west, hitting
Canada and the northern US. "It's caused by the temperature difference between the
northerly latitudes and the more southerly, tropical latitudes - the storms mix the
heat around." The weather system is active all year long, reaching its peak every
winter in December and a minimum around July. Aerosols can affect weather by
influencing the formation and duration of clouds, but to what extent this happens is
not well understood."Aerosols affect the size of water droplets," said Dr Wilson. "The
more pollution particles there are in the air, the smaller the water droplets will
be."Smaller droplets are less likely to run into each other and coalesce into drops of
rain, meaning clouds stay in the air longer. To work out how pollution was changing
the Pacific weather system Dr Zhang led a team of researchers in analysing the
information recorded on clouds over the Pacific from 1984 to 2005. They found that
the clouds which make up many of the Pacific storms, called deep convective clouds
(DCC), seemed to arise in connection with pollution emission from Asia.His data
showed that the number of these clouds from 1994 to 2005 had increased by 20% to
50% compared with the previous 10-year period. "Our results suggest that the winter
Pacific is highly vulnerable to the aerosol effect. The intensified storms over the
Pacific in winter are climatically significant and represent a detected climate signal of
the aerosol-cloud interaction associated with anthropogenic pollution." The
intensified storms highlighted by Dr Zhang would also transfer more of the aerosols
further north. "In particular, efficient northward transfers of sensible heat and
anthropogenic aerosols can exacerbate warming at higher latitudes," he wrote.This
could have devastating implications for the Arctic. The recent assessment of global
warming by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change said that some of the
largest warming occurs over the polar regions. This is partly due to the reduction in
ice cover (which means that less sunlight is reflected away) but also because of the
increasing presence of aerosols from pollution in the region."Warming in the polar
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Climate
regions has catastrophic climate consequences, such as polar ice caps shrinking and
sea level rising," wrote Dr Zhang. "The change in the Pacific storm track and its
associated climate impacts require further studies from a large scientific community,
including investigation with global climate models."
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AT: S02
Acid rain and loss of ozone are caused by sulphurous compounds

David King- Director of the Smith School of Enterprise and the Environment at the
University of Oxford June 1, 2008 “ Now is not the time to abandon our ambition to
be green”
http://www.guardian.co.uk/commentisfree/2008/jun/01/carbonemissions.greenpolitics
Nationally, other market mechanisms are required to encourage individuals to
change their behaviour. We have recently dealt with other environmental market
failures with remarkable success. Acid rain resulting from burning high sulphur
content coal has virtually been eliminated; the loss of ozone from the stratosphere
due to CFCs has been halted; pollution in our cities due to car exhaust fumes has
been massively reduced. And with each of these measures, our economy and the
well-being of our citizens have been improved.The solutions lie with those businesses
that recognise the opportunities these changes produce and with individuals pressing
for reforms and overcoming short-sighted objections from government. It is in the
time of economic austerity that finding ways to increase efficiency of energy usage
becomes most important.The current rising price of oil can be met by increasing
supply, but the rising long-term trend in oil prices is likely to continue. This is driven
by increased demand due to rising global prosperity and to the growing global
population, the latter set to reach nine billion by mid-century. This could be offset by
large-scale petrol production through alternative technologies. One of these is
already in the marketplace. The conversion of coal to petrol was successfully
developed commercially in South Africa during the oil embargo of the apartheid era
and is still happening today. This Sasol process is no longer subsidised. It became
commercially viable when oil reached $50 a barrel; at $130, it is a highly profitable
venture. If the market perceives that high oil prices are here to stay, this technology
will become a dominant source of petrol, but it fails on the need to decarbonise the
economy.
Sulphur dioxide destroys ozone and creates a hotter planet

Robin McKie- Observer science and technology editor. and Juliette Jowit -
environment editor of The Observer.
October 7, 2007 “Can science really save the world?”
http://observer.guardian.co.uk/focus/story/0,,2185343,00.html
The idea alarms other scientists, who fear such a massive input of sulphur into the
upper atmosphere could increase acid rain or damage the ozone layer. Crutzen
believes his idea may still be necessary if Earth continues to warm up at its current
rate. 'I am prepared to lose some bit of ozone if we can prevent major increases of
temperature, say beyond two degrees or three degrees,' he says.
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AT: S02
Sulfur injections lead to the destruction of the ozone above the Antarctic zone
By Randolph E. Schmid, AP Science Writer 4/24/2008 “Greenhouse plan could
damage ozone”
http://www.usatoday.com/tech/science/environment/2008-04-24-greenhouse-
ozone_n.htm
WASHINGTON — The rule of unintended consequences threatens to strike
again.Some researchers have suggested that injecting sulfur compounds into the
atmosphere might help ease global warming by increasing clouds and haze that
would reflect sunlight.After all, they reason, when volcanoes spew lots of sulfur,
months or more of cooling often follows.But a new study warns that injecting enough
sulfur to reduce warming would wipe out the Arctic ozone layer and delay recovery of
the Antarctic ozone hole by as much as 70 years."Our research indicates that trying
to artificially cool off the planet could have perilous side effects," said Simone Tilmes
of the National Center for Atmospheric Research in Boulder, Colo."While climate
change is a major threat, more research is required before society attempts global
geoengineering solutions," said Tilmes, lead author of a paper appearing in
Thursday's online edition of the journal Science.And while one study worries that
fixing climate will destroy ozone, another raises the possibility that recovery of the
ozone hole over Antarctica will worsen warming in that region.A full recovery of the
ozone hole could modify climate in the Southern Hemisphere and even amplify
Antarctic warming, scientists from the University of Colorado at Boulder, the National
Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration and NASA report in a paper scheduled for
Geophysical Research Letters.Although temperatures have been rising worldwide,
there has been cooling in the interior of Antarctica in summer, which researchers
attribute to the depletion of ozone overhead."If the successful control of ozone-
depleting substances allows for a full recovery of the ozone hole over Antarctica, we
may finally see the interior of Antarctica begin to warm with the rest of the world,"
said Judith Perlwitz of the Cooperative Institute for Research in Environmental
Sciences, a joint institute of CU-Boulder and NOAA.The authors used a NASA
supercomputer to model interactions between the climate and stratospheric ozone
chemistry. A return to pre-1969 ozone levels would mean atmospheric circulation
patterns now shielding the Antarctic interior from warmer air to the north will begin
to break down during the summer, they concluded.The idea of reversing global
warming by injecting sulfates into the air was suggested by eruptions such as the
1991 blast by Mount Pinatubo in the Philippines, which produced a brief cooling.The
massive 1815 eruption of Tambora in what is now Indonesia produced such a strong
cooling that 1816 became known as the "year without a summer" in New England,
where snow fell in every month of the year.But Tilmes knew that volcanic eruptions
also temporarily thin the ozone layer, which protects people, plants and animals from
the most dangerous ultraviolet rays from the sun.So she and colleagues calculated
the effect of suggested sulfate injections and concluded that the result, over the next
few decades, would be to destroy between one-fourth to three-fourths of the ozone
layer above the Arctic. This would affect a large part of the Northern Hemisphere
because of atmospheric circulation patterns.The sulfates would also delay the
expected recovery of the ozone hole over the Antarctic by about 30 to 70 years, or
until at least the last decade of this century, they said.
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AT: S02
Global dimming can kill billions of people

By David Sington- successful producer, screenwriter, director, author and journalist 13 January 2005 Why
the Sun seems to be 'dimming' http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/4171591.stm
It was only recently, when his conclusions were confirmed by Australian scientists using a completely
different method to estimate solar radiation, that climate scientists at last woke up to the reality of global
dimming. Dimming appears to be caused by air pollution. Burning coal, oil and wood, whether in cars,
power stations or cooking fires, produces not only invisible carbon dioxide - the principal greenhouse gas
responsible for global warming - but also tiny airborne particles of soot, ash, sulphur compounds and other
pollutants.This visible air pollution reflects sunlight back into space, preventing it reaching the surface. But
the pollution also changes the optical properties of clouds.Because the particles seed the formation of water
droplets, polluted clouds contain a larger number of droplets than unpolluted clouds.Recent research shows
that this makes them more reflective than they would otherwise be, again reflecting the Sun's rays back into
space.Scientists are now worried that dimming, by shielding the oceans from the full power of the Sun,
may be disrupting the pattern of the world's rainfall.There are suggestions that dimming was behind the
droughts in sub-Saharan Africa which claimed hundreds of thousands of lives in the 1970s and 80s.There
are disturbing hints the same thing may be happening today in Asia, home to half the world's
population."My main concern is global dimming is also having a detrimental impact on the Asian
monsoon," says Professor Veerhabhadran Ramanathan, professor of climate and atmospheric sciences at
the University of California, San Diego. "We are talking about billions of people."
Sulfur dioxide causes a wide array of harms including damage to aquatic systems, vegetation
Environment Protection Authority of Western Australia 2007 “Atmosphere”
http://www.soe.wa.gov.au/report/atmosphere/sulfur-dioxide.html
Sulfur dioxide (SO2) is a colourless gas with a pungent, suffocating odour. It can be a significant air
pollutant in WA, particularly around industrial areas such as Kalgoorlie, Kwinana and Collie. It is produced
by the combustion of fuels like coal, oil and diesel fuel, and in smelting of metallic sulfide ores. The sulfur
content of a fuel can be reduced by refining, so that less sulfur dioxide is emitted when the fuel is burned .
Sulfur dioxide oxidises in air to sulfite (SO3) which, when dissolved in atmospheric water droplets, forms
sulfuric acid and potentially acid rain. Acid rain issues have not been researched in WA as the problem has
not been recorded as it has in parts of America and Europe. This process is accelerated in the presence of
particulates, assisting with the condensation of water droplets (see 'Particulates'). Industry uses a similar
chemical process to generate sulfuric acid. Sulfur dioxide is a dangerous air pollutant because of its toxicity
and corrosive properties. Sulfur dioxide is a strong irritant to the respiratory tract, causing breathing
problems in people with sensitive airways. In addition, sulfur dioxide can corrode buildings and other
infrastructure, and damage aquatic systems and vegetation, including agricultural crops.
Sulfur dioxide disrupts the balance of rivers, lakes, soil and vegetation
The Environment Agency 2008 “Pollution Inventory”
http://www.environment-
agency.gov.uk/business/444255/446867/255244/substances/433/?&lang=_e
Sulphur dioxide is toxic to a variety of plant life and may produce visible signs of injury and/or reduce
yields of certain crops. Paradoxically, beneficial effects may also be seen on some plants where sulphur
dioxide can reduce the incidence of some fungal diseases - for example -the incidence of 'black spot' on
roses is low in areas of high sulphur dioxide. Sulphur dioxide emitted in sufficient quantities at low or
ground level can combine with air moisture to cause gradual damage to some building materials (such as
limestone) by forming an acid solution that gradually dissolves the stonework if it is constantly exposed.
Sulphur dioxide gas dissolves in the water droplets in clouds causing the rain to be more acidic that usual.
Pollutants can be transported thousands of kilometres due to the introduction of tall chimneys dispersing
pollutants high in the atmosphere. Acid rain affects the natural balance of rivers, lakes and soils, resulting
in damage to wildlife and vegetation like that seen in Scandinavia in the 1970s and 1980s.
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1NC CAN’T SOLVE WARMING
China is a horrible leader in alternative energy, they adulterate our air and pollute in astonishing
numbers
Cliff, Steven, atmospheric scientist at the University of California, 2006, “We are
Breathing Chinese Polution”, NPQ: New Perspectives Quarterly, Vol. 23 Issue 4, p78-79
Expanding deserts, coal-fired growth and auto emissions in China are not only threats to the health and well-being of
the Chinese, but also to that of Americans. At least one-third of the background aerosol pollution (soot,
smoke and dust particles, collectively called aerosols) in California today has floated across
the Pacific from Asia, and this fraction is increasing. I collect and analyze air samples from four sites in the
Sierra Nevada and Cascade mountains, and the filters in my samplers are tracking this trend. Of California’s annual
average limit for particulate matter—12 micrograms per cubic meter of air—Asian pollution already accounts for 4–6
micrograms at these mountain sites. China’s economic boom, combined with population growth in
the western United States, is bound to push pollution levels beyond all California and US air
quality standards. Oceans, we now understand, do not insulate land masses from atmospheric conditions
elsewhere. Any pollution that does not dissipate quickly will, with some variation, be transported by the prevailing
westerly winds across the Pacific Ocean in less than a week. In the springtime, which is the dry season, a dust storm in
the Gobi Desert of China and Mongolia can send a huge cloud over the US within three to five days, which then moves
on to Greenland and Europe mixed with North American pollution. One of the largest documented events of this kind
happened in the spring of 2001 and was tracked by satellite. People throughout the West noted the hazy skies and asked
about the location of the “fire.” In early April of this year, satellites tracked a large carbon cloud
from Chinese coal-burning smokestacks crossing the Pacific.
Carbon emissions are out of control, even a 70% decrease would not stop rising temperatures
Shermer, Michael, 2006, “The Flipping Point” Scientific American, Vol. 294 Issue 6,
p28
It is a matter of the Goldilocks phenomenon. In the last ice age, CO2 levels were 180 parts
per million (ppm)—too cold. Between the agricultural revolution and the industrial revolution,
levels rose to 280 ppm—just right. Today levels are at 380 ppm and are projected to reach
450 to 550 by the end of the century—too warm. Like a kettle of water that transforms
from liquid to steam when it changes from 99 to 100 degrees Celsius, the environment
itself is about to make a CO2-driven flip. According to Flannery, even if we reduce our
carbon dioxide emissions by 70 percent by 2050, average global
temperatures will increase between two and nine degrees by 2100. This rise
could lead to the melting of the Greenland Ice Sheet, which the March. 24 issue of Science
reports is already shrinking at a rate of 224 ±41 cubic kilometers a year, double the rate measured
in 1996 (Los Angeles uses one cubic kilometer of water a year). If it and the West Antarctic Ice
Sheet melt, sea levels will rise five to 10 meters, displacing half a billion inhabitants.
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1NC CAN’T SOLVE WARMING
No solvency: If we stopped all emissions of greenhouse gases today it would taken centuries for them
to decline
Catastrophe, pg. 25-26
The effects of climate change cannot quickly be reversed by reducing or even eliminating future
emissions of greenhouse gases. There are two reasons for this. First, greenhouse gases released
into the atmosphere linger for decades (in the case of relatively short-lived gases like methane),
or hundreds of years (for carbon dioxide), or even thousands of years (for the long-lived gases
like per-fluorocarbons). Carbon dioxide and methane concentrations in the atmosphere are
respectively one-third and more than twice as high as those at any time over the last 650,000
years. Even if no additional carbon dioxide were emitted from now on, atmospheric
concentrations would take centuries to decline to pre-Industrial Revolution levels. While elevated
levels of greenhouse gases remain in the atmosphere, additional warming will occur.
Less than 5 percent of global warming stems from the combustion of fossil fuels; water effects
global warming more.
ROBERT H. ESSENHIGH, professor of mechanical engineering whose main focus is in

the area of combustion. June 23, 2008, Small Parts of Greenhouse Man-Made, Lexis
Nexis Database.
Reading the June 7 letter "Fight against warming can't wait," from David A. Scott of
the Sierra Club, I was astonished that his organization believes global warming is due
to carbon-dioxide emissions from combustion of fossil fuels, since the numbers just
don't support it.
Of all the greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, water and carbon dioxide are about
99 percent of the total, at relative proportions of roughly 80 percent water and 20
percent carbon dioxide. So, if we want to "control" global warming by reducing the
greenhouse gases, shouldn't we start with water? And, since its source is natural --
evaporation from rivers, lakes and seas, with return as rain -- how do we do that?
Carbon dioxide's primary source also is nature: vegetation and the sea. Using data
from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (and can the IPCC be
wrong?), the annual in/out carbon tonnage (carried as carbon dioxide) is about 60
gigatons per year from vegetation and 90 gigatons per year from the sea, for a total
of 150 gigatons per year.
And from combustion? Currently, it measures about 6 or 7 gigatons per year, which
is less than 5 percent of the total. Combine the carbon dioxide with the water
emissions, and 5 percent of 20 percent is 1 percent. So this is a problem? Exactly why and how?
But the real kicker is that it's

not the rising carbon dioxide that is driving up the temperature;
it's the rising temperature that is driving up the carbon dioxide, and this has been
going on since the bottom of the last Ice Age.
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Climate
1NC NO WARMING
There is no global warming; evidence backing claims of rising temperature were based on El Nino’s
effects.
Patrick J. Michaels, December 31, 1998, professor of environmental science at the University of Virginia,
is a senior fellow in environmental studies at the Cato Institute., Long Hot Year: Latest Science Debunks
Global Warming Hysteria, http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=1188.
The national media have given tremendous play to the claims of Vice
President Al Gore, some federal scientists, and environmental activists
that the unseasonably warm temperatures of this past summer were
proof positive of the arrival of dramatic and devastating global
warming. In fact, the record temperatures were largely the result of a
strong El Niño superimposed on a decade in which temperatures
continue to reflect a warming that largely took place in the first half of
this century.
Global warming isn’t something to worry about - the earth goes through cycles of cooling and
warming due to oceanic influence on global temperatures.
Patrick J. Michaels, senior fellow in environmental studies at the Cato Institute, May
16, 2008, Global-warming myth; Politics trumps science, Database: NexisLexis.
The Keenlyside team found that natural

variability in the Earth's oceans will "temporarily offset"
global warming from carbon dioxide. Seventy percent of the Earth's surface is
oceanic; hence, what happens there greatly influences global temperature. It is now
known that both Atlantic and Pacific temperatures can get "stuck," for a decade or
longer, in relatively warm or cool patterns. The North Atlantic is now forecast to be
in a cold stage for a decade, which will help put the damper on global warming.
Another Pacific temperature pattern is forecast not to push warming, either.
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EXT #1 – EL NINO
Global warming is a myth.

Patrick J. Michaels, May 16, 2008, senior fellow in environmental
studies and author of Meltdown: The Predictable Distortion of Global
Warming by Scientists, Politicians, and the Media, Global warming –
myth, cato.org
Al Gore and his minions continue to chant that "the science is settled"
on global warming, but the only thing settled is that there has not been
any since 1998. Critics of this view (rightfully) argue that 1998 was the
warmest year in modern record, due to a huge El Nino event in the
Pacific Ocean, and that it is unfair to start any analysis at a high (or a
low) point in a longer history. But starting in 2001 or 1998 yields the same result: no
warming.
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EXT #2 – NOT HUMAN INDUCED
Global warming is not caused by humans or even animals, geologic deposits show.
States News Service, Broadcast Industry, May 28, 2008, Large Release of Methane
Could Cause Abrupt And Catastrophic Climate Change as Happened 635 Million
Years Ago, UCR-LED Study Warns, NexisLexis Database.
"The geologic deposits of this period are quite different from what we find in
subsequent deglaciation," he said. "Moreover, they immediately precede the first
appearance of animals on earth, suggesting some kind of environmental link. Our
methane hypothesis is capable also of accounting for this odd geological,
geochemical and paleooceanographic record."
The real cause of global warming is livestock; they are responsible for more greenhouse gas
emissions than cars
Jacobson, Micheal, Ph.D, Executive Director of Center for Science in the Public Interest, 2007,
“Diet for a Cooler Planet” Vol. 34 Issue 4, p2
Our planet just experienced the warmest winter in the 105 years during which records have been
kept. According to James Hansen, who heads NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies, "if further global
warming reaches 2 or 3 degrees Celsius [4 or 5 degrees Fahrenheit], we will likely see
changes that make Earth a different planet than the one we know. The last time it was that warm
was…about three million years ago, when sea level was estimated to have been about 80 feet higher than today." Fossil
fuels--used in coal-burning power plants and gasoline-and-diesel-burning cars and trucks--top the list of problems. But
other factors also contribute:
* Population growth: 6.5 billion people--double the population of 1965--now draw down our world's finite resources. *
Higher standards of living: air conditioners, cars, air travel, and other conveniences require fossil fuels. * Diet: as
incomes rise, people replace wheat and rice with meat and dairy foods.
What do more burgers and cheese have to do with climate change? Between global warming and a lack of land, water,
and other resources, the Earth simply can't cope with a worldwide jump in meat and dairy
consumption. In 2006, a report by the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization
(FAO) warned: "Livestock's contribution to environmental problems is on a massive
scale and its potential contribution to their solution is equally large. The impact is so
significant that it needs to be addressed with urgency." Livestock not only pollutes our
water, air, and soil, said the FAO, it's also "responsible for 18 percent of greenhouse gas
emissions… a higher share than transport."
Cattle belch out huge volumes of methane, a gas that's 23 times more potent at trapping
heat than carbon dioxide. Livestock manure is the source of two-thirds of man-made
nitrous oxide, a greenhouse gas that's 300 times more potent than carbon dioxide.
Growing corn, soybeans, and hay for live stock feed uses up about half of all U.S.
fertilizer, generating large amounts of nitrous oxide. In Brazil, an astounding 70 percent of onetime
forest land is being used as pasture and to grow animal feed. Worldwide, the 34 million acres of trees that are cut and
burned each year account for 25 to 30 percent of all the carbon that enters our atmosphere. Eating less meat and dairy
foods is a small step that each of us could take to help slow global warming.
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EXT #2 – NOT HUMAN INDUCED
Over 500 scientists refute the idea of a man-made global warming

World net daily
500 scientists refute global warming dangers'Centuries of human history say warm periods are good for
people September 12, 2007http://www.worldnetdaily.com/news/article.asp?ARTICLE_ID=57605
More than 500 scientists have published evidence refuting the current man-made global warming scare,
according to a new analysis of peer-reviewed literature by the Hudson Institute. The assessment supports another study on
which WND reported recently, one that revealed carbon dioxide levels were largely irrelevant to global warming. Those results prompted Reid Bryson, founding chairman of the
The newest
Department of Meteorology at the University of Wisconsin, to quip, "You can go outside and spit and have the same effect as doubling carbon dioxide."
analysis was released by Hudson Institute Senior Fellow Dennis Avery, who said of the 500 scientists who
have refuted at least one element of the global warming scare, more than 300 have found evidence that a
natural moderate 1,500-year climate cycle has produced more than a dozen global warmings similar to the
current circumstances since the last Ice Age and that such warmings are linked to variations in the sun's
irradiance. "This data and the list of scientists make a mockery of recent claims that a scientific consensus blames humans as the primary cause of global temperature
increases since 1850," he said. "Two thousand years of published human histories say that the warm periods were good for people. It was the harsh, unstable Dark Ages and Little
Ice Age that brought bigger storms, untimely frost, widespread famine and plagues of disease," he said. Other researchers have found evidence that sea levels are failing to rise
importantly, storms and droughts are becoming fewer and milder and human deaths will be reduced with warming because cold kills twice the number of people as heat. Another
result was that corals, trees, birds, mammals and butterflies are "adapting well" to the routine reality of changing climate, the analysis said. The issue of global warming, of course,
erupted with the release of the film that former Vice President Al Gore made – and stars in – called "An Inconvenient Truth," which won an Oscar. It now has become mandatory
for students in many high schools and colleges. Despite the publication of such global warming debunking conclusions in journals including Nature, Geophysical Review Letters
and Science, there's been little media attention, he said. "Not all of these researchers would describe themselves as global warming skeptics," noted Avery, "but the evidence in
their studies is there for all to see." The scientists were compiled by Avery and climate physicist S. Fred Singer, who previously has reported there has been little or no warming
since about 1940. The two also co-authored the new book "Unstoppable Global Warming: Every 1,500 Years," from peer-reviewed studies in specialties including tree rings, sea
"We have had a greenhouse theory with no
levels, stalagmites, lichens, pollen, plankton, insects, public health, Chinese history and astrophysics.
evidence to support it – except a moderate warning turned into a scare by computer models whose results
have never been verified with real-world events," added Singer. "On the other hand, we have compelling
evidence of a real-world climate cycle averaging 1470 years (plus or minus 500) running through the last
million years of history. The climate cycle has above all been moderate, and the trees, bears, birds, and humans have quietly adapted." Singer said climate model-
builders probably have developed a consensus of guesses. "However, the models only reflect the warming, not its cause," he said. He said about 70 percent of the Earth's post-1850
warming came before 1940, and thus was probably not caused by human-emitted greenhouse gases. The net post-1940 warming totals only a tiny 0.2 degrees Celsius, he said. The
analysis said the historic evidence of the temperature fluctuations includes the 5,000-year record of Nile floods, 1st Century Roman wine production in Britain, and thousands of
museum paintings that portray sunnier skies during the Medieval Warming and cloudiness during the Little Ice Age. Physical evidence includes oxygen isotopes, beryllium ions,
sea and pollen fossils and ancient tree rings. For example, Constance Millar of the U.S. Forest Service studied seven species of relict trees that grew above today's treeline and
concluded temperatures during the Medieval Warming Period on Whitewing Mountain in California were about 3.2 degrees warmer than today's temperatures. Singer said
experiments also have shown more or fewer cosmic rays hitting the Earth create more or fewer low, cooling clouds that deflect solar heat back into space – which amplifies small
variations in the intensity of the sun. The earlier study "Heat Capacity, Time Constant, and Sensitivity of Earth's Climate System," was authored by Brookhaven National lab
scientist Stephen Schwartz. "Anthropogenic (man-made) global warming bites the dust," declared astronomer Ian Wilson after reviewing the study, which was accepted for
publication in the peer-reviewed Journal of Geophysical Research. Bryson's and Wilson's comments were among those from a long list of doubters of catastrophic, man-made
global warming, assembled by Sen. James Inhofe, R-Okla., and posted on a blog site for the U.S. Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works. Meteorologist Joseph
Conklin, of the website Climate Police said "global warming" is disintegrating. "A few months ago, a study came out that demonstrated global temperatures have leveled off. But
instead of possibly admitting that this whole global warming thing is a farce, a group of British scientists concluded that the real global warming won't start until 2009," Conklin
Last September, a leading U.S. climate researcher claimed
wrote. WND has previously reported on significant doubts about global warming.
there's a decade at most left to address global warming before environmental disaster takes place, but the
federal government issued a report showing the year 1936 had a hotter summer than 2006. "The average
June-August 2006 temperature for the contiguous United States (based on preliminary data) was 2.4
degrees F (1.3 degrees C) above the 20th century average of 72.1 degrees F (22.3 degrees C)," said the
NOAA report. "This was the second warmest summer on record, slightly cooler than the record of 74.7
degrees F set in 1936 during the Dust Bowl era. This summer's average was 74.5 degrees F. Eight of the
past ten summers have been warmer than the U.S. average for the same period." WND also reported on
NASA-funded study that noted some climate forecasts might be exaggerating estimations of global
warming.
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Climate
1NC EARTH IS COOLING
Earth is cooling – carbon dioxide levels were five to 10 times higher in the past.
Lawrence Solomon, Financial Post staff writer and - Lawrence Solomon is executive
director of Energy Probe and author of The Deniers., June 07, 2008, In praise of CO2,
http://www.financialpost.com/story.html?id=569586
Lush as the planet may now be, it is as nothing compared to earlier times, when levels of
CO2 and Earth temperatures were far higher. In the age of the dinosaur, for example, CO2
levels may have been five to 10 times higher than today, spurring a luxuriantly fertile
planet whose plant life sated the immense animals of that era. Planet Earth is also much
cooler today than during the hothouse era of the dinosaur, and cooler than it was 1,000
years ago during the Medieval Warming Period.
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Climate
EXT – EARTH IS COOLING
The earth is cooling – oceans are absorbing carbon dioxide, threatening life on the planet.
Lawrence Solomon, Financial Post staff writer and - Lawrence Solomon is executive
director of Energy Probe and author of The Deniers., June 07, 2008, In praise of CO2,
This blossoming Earth

could now be in jeopardy, for reasons both natural and man-made.
According to a growing number of scientists, the period of global warming that we have
experienced over the past few centuries as Earth climbed out of the Little Ice Age is
about to end. The oceans, which have been releasing their vast store of carbon dioxide as
the planet has warmed -- CO2 is released from oceans as they warm and dissolves in
them when they cool -- will start to take the carbon dioxide back. With less heat and less
carbon dioxide, the planet could become less hospitable and less green, especially in areas such as
Canada's Boreal forests, which have been major beneficiaries of the increase in GPP and NPP.
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Climate
1NC MODELS BAD
Global warming predictions are inaccurate; they rely on computer models using only ‘positive
feedback.’
Patrick J. Michaels, senior fellow in environmental studies at the Cato Institute, May
16, 2008, Global-warming myth; Politics trumps science, Database: NexisLexis.
If you think about it, all we possess to project the future of complex systems are computer
models. Therefore, if the models that serve as the basis for policy do not work - and that
must be the conclusion if indeed we are at the midpoint of a two-decade hiatus in global warming - then there is no
verifiable science behind the current legislative hysteria.
What does this mean for the future? If warming is "temporarily offset" for two decades, does all the "offset" warming suddenly
appear with a vengeance, or is it delayed?
Computer models, like the one used by Keenlyside, et al., rely on "positive feedbacks" to
generate much of their warming. First, atmospheric carbon dioxide warms things up a bit. Then the ocean
follows, raising the amount of atmospheric water vapor, which is a greater source of global warming than carbon dioxide.
When the ocean does not warm up, it seems that the additional warming is also delayed.
All of this may mean that we have simply overestimated the amount of warming that
results from increases in atmospheric carbon dioxide.
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EXT – MODELS BAD
There is no evidence that shows detrimental consequences of global warming; predictions are based
on inaccurate computer climate modeling simulations. Empirical evidence shows
temperatures are actually decreasing.
ARTHUR B. ROBINSON, NOAH E. ROBINSON, ANDWILLIE SOON, Oregon Institute of Science and
Medicine, 2007, http://www.oism.org/pproject/s33p36.htm
Does a catastrophic amplification of these trends with damaging
clima tological consequences lie ahead? There are no exper imental
data that sug gest this. There is also no ex perimentally val idated the oretical
evidence of such an am plification.
Predictions of catastrophic global warming are based on computer
climate modeling, a branch of sci ence still in its in fancy. The em pirical
ev idence – ac tual measurements of Earth’s temperature and cli -
mate – shows no man-made warming trend. In deed, during four of
the seven decades since 1940 when av erage CO2 lev els steadily
increased, U.S. av er age tem per a tures were ac tu ally decreasing.
Computer models are inaccurate; their global warming predictions haven’t come true.
Patrick J. Michaels, December 31, 1998, professor of environmental science at the University of Virginia,
is a senior fellow in environmental studies at the Cato Institute., Long Hot Year: Latest Science Debunks
Global Warming Hysteria, http://www.cato.org/pub_display.php?pub_id=1188.
Observed global warming remains far below the amount predicted by
computer models that served as the basis for the United Nations Framework Convention on
Climate Change. Whatever record is used, the largest portion of the warming of the second half of this
century has mainly been confined to winter in the very coldest continental air masses of Siberia and
The
northwestern North America, as predicted by basic greenhouse effect physics.
unpredictability of seasonal and annual temperatures has declined
significantly. There has been no change in precipitation variability. In
the United States, drought has decreased while flooding has not
increased.
Moreover, carbon dioxide is increasing in the atmosphere at a rate below
that of most climate-change scenarios because it is being increasingly
captured by growing vegetation. The second most important human
greenhouse enhancer -- methane -- is not likely to increase appreciably
in the next 100 years. And perhaps most important, the direct warming
effect of carbon dioxide was overestimated. Even global warming alarmists in the
scientific establishment now say that the Kyoto Protocol will have no discernible impact on global climate.
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AT: WARMING HURTS THE ECONOMY
Global warming breeds financial markets designed to assume the worst; insurance companies are
factoring these into their backstop policies.
JENNIFER LIBERTO, Times Staff Writer, March 24, 2007, Global warming may
get a price tag, LexisNexis Database.
While the debate among politicians continues over whether temperature increases
represent a long term trend, the financial markets that are designed to assume the
worst are pretty much settled on the matter. For years, international reinsurance
companies, unburdened by regulation or the American political landscape, have factored the ill effects of
climate change into the rates they charge retail insurance companies for backstop
policies. Now, some of those same dire assumptions about warmer oceans spawning more frequent and stronger hurricanes
could soon be used directly by the retail insurance companies that sell policies in Florida. State regulators have
been asked to approve a new forecasting model on insurance risk in Florida that
would, for the first time, look into the future and consider that the oceans are heating up
and making hurricanes worse.
Global warming is good for the economy; betting on emissions is highly profitable and accessible to
everyone
Campell, Colin, 2008, “How To Profit From Global Warming”, Maclean’s; Vol. 121
Issue 3, pg39
For those people who have been busy planting trees and buying carbon offsets to help save the world from
greenhouse gases, you might consider hedging your bets on the future of global warming. One recent
international study found that carbon dioxide emissions went up by 35 per cent between 1990 and 2006.
And looking ahead, the evidence suggests that emissions will keep rising for the foreseeable future. As the
saying goes, hope for the best, but prepare for the worst.
That's where the UBS Greenhouse Index might come in handy. Last week, the investment bank
UBS said it will launch the first index that will allow investors to bet on greenhouse gas emissions and their
effect on the weather. The index will track existing markets where emissions futures contracts and weather
derivatives are traded. The aim is to make it easier for not only institutional investors, but for individuals to
gain some exposure to these growing markets, and to gain some measure of protection against the
economic costs of a warming planet. As emissions rise, so too will the value of the index.
The index will be made up largely of futures contracts on the Chicago Mercantile Exchange,
where weather contracts are traded, and the European Climate Exchange, where carbon dioxide emissions
are traded. It builds on the UBS Global Warming Index launched last year, which has already drawn about
$100 million from investors. "If clients feel like they want to get into this, they can at least track what's
going on in the market," says Graeme Harris, a spokesman with UBS. It will also help smaller investors
follow these markets without having to deal with all the complexities and regulations that go with them, he
adds.
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AT: WARMING CAUSES STORMS
Global warming decreases the amount of hurricanes and super-storms

By SETH BORENSTEIN, AP Science Writer May 18, 2008Study says global warming not worsening
hurricanes http://web.lexisnexis.com/envuniv/document?
_m=984fedb47a45e067a58b602ebce6fdbb&_docnum=23&wchp=dGLzVzz-
zSkVB&_md5=4e8f554da81dbeb75e24822d2658ee6d lexis
Global warming isn't to blame for the recent jump in hurricanes in the Atlantic, concludes a study by a
prominent federal scientist whose position has shifted on the subject. Not only that, warmer temperatures
will actually reduce the number of hurricanes in the Atlantic and those making landfall, research
meteorologist Tom Knutson reported in a study released Sunday. In the past, Knutson has raised concerns
about the effects of climate change on storms. His new paper has the potential to heat up a simmering
debate among meteorologists about current and future effects of global warming in the Atlantic. Ever since
Hurricane Katrina in 2005, hurricanes have often been seen as a symbol of global warming's wrath. Many
climate change experts have tied the rise of hurricanes in recent years to global warming and hotter waters
that fuel them. Another group of experts, those who study hurricanes and who are more often skeptical
about global warming, say there is no link. They attribute the recent increase to a natural multi-decade
cycle. What makes this study different is Knutson, a meteorologist with the National Oceanic and
Atmospheric Administration's fluid dynamics lab in Princeton, N.J. He has warned about the harmful
effects of climate change and has even complained in the past about being censored by the Bush
administration on past studies on the dangers of global warming. He said his new study, based on a
computer model, argues "against the notion that we've already seen a really dramatic increase in Atlantic
hurricane activity resulting from greenhouse warming." The study, published online Sunday in the journal
Nature Geoscience, predicts that by the end of the century the number of hurricanes in the Atlantic will fall
by 18 percent. The number of hurricanes making landfall in the United States and its neighbors anywhere
west of Puerto Rico will drop by 30 percent because of wind factors. The biggest storms those with winds
of more than 110 mph would only decrease in frequency by 8 percent. Tropical storms, those with winds
between 39 and 73 mph, would decrease by 27 percent. It's not all good news from Knutson's study,
however. His computer model also forecasts that hurricanes and tropical storms will be wetter and fiercer.
Rainfall within 30 miles of a hurricane should jump by 37 percent and wind strength should increase by
about 2 percent, Knutson's study says. And Knutson said this study significantly underestimates the
increase in wind strength. Some other scientists criticized his computer model. MIT hurricane
meteorologist Kerry Emanuel, while praising Knutson as a scientist, called his conclusion "demonstrably
wrong" based on a computer model that doesn't look properly at storms. Kevin Trenberth, a climate
scientist, said Knutson's computer model is poor at assessing tropical weather and "fail to replicate storms
with any kind of fidelity." Trenberth, climate analysis chief at the National Center for Atmospheric
Research in Boulder, Colo., said it is not just the number of hurricanes "that matter, it is also the intensity,
duration and size, and this study falls short on these issues." Knutson acknowledges weaknesses in his
computer model and said it primarily gives a coarse overview, not an accurate picture on individual storms
and storm strength. He said the latest model doesn't produce storms surpassing 112 mph. But NOAA
hurricane meteorologist Chris Landsea, who wasn't part of this study, praised Knutson's work as "very
consistent with what's being said all along." "I think global warming is a big concern, but when it comes to
hurricanes the evidence for changes is pretty darn tiny," Landsea said. Hurricane season starts June 1 in the
Atlantic and a Colorado State University forecast predicts about a 50 percent more active than normal
storm season this year. NOAA puts out its own seasonal forecast on May 22. In a normal year about 10
named storms form. Six become hurricanes and two become major hurricanes. On average, about five
hurricanes hit the United States every three years.
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WARMING IS NOT A THREAT
Global Warming Does Not Pose A Serious Threat

S. Fred Singer, 2002, Opposing View Points
In the following viewpoint, Fred Singer argues that contrary to the dire scenarios of floods and famine,
global warming remains scientifically unproven and does not pose a threat to the environment and human
welfare. Singer maintains that politicians, the media, environmentalists, and bad science have joined forces
to foist a global warming scare on the American public. According to Singer, these factions promote a fear
of global warming in order to secure research grant money, and justify the expansion of government control
over personal behavior.
Global Warming Should Not Be Taken Seriously

Tens of thousands of global warming promoters jet around the world to preach the gospel of renewable
energy, based on solar and wind power, both of which are currently impracticable and unlikely to be usable
for many years. But after logging thousands of miles and burning millions of gallons of fuel, these
promoters have yet to present convincing evidence that global warming poses any environmental threat.
Though doomsday scenarios generated by proponents of this theory have not been verified by
climatologists, the political community of Washington DC has made the alleged phenomenon a natural
priority; and the UN has made it a global one.
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QUALS/CONSENSUS
IPCC studies are a major deception activity full of fraudulent “findings” not to be mistaken as real
science
Fox, Micheal, energy analyst at Grassroot Institute of Hawaii, “Flaws in the Global Warming Debate”,
Hawaii Reporter, 7/16/2007, http://snipurl.com/2pmjy
There are many scientific problems involved with global warming issues which are routinely downplayed.
Some are related to numerous uncertainties being airbrushed away and replaced by statements of
unsupportable certitude. These include errors in the early CO2 measurements, phenomenally poor and
biased temperature readings, poor and nonuniform data bases, poor temperature data quality, unvalidated
temperature data and computer programs. Also many are ignoring the roles of aerosols, particulates, and the
physics of cloud formation, and place undue reliance upon Global Climate Models (GCMs), which don't even agree
with each other, etc. Downplaying these uncertainties has been a major deception activity of the International
Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). This seems to be an effort to deceive the policy makers. For example, the
Summaries for Policy Makers (SPM) issued by the (IPCC) are flawed. Hundreds of comments from the
authors themselves of the Scientific Assessment Report (SAR) have only recently surfaced .These authors
have expressed serious concerns for the IPCC claimed certainties in the SPMs. The legitimization of the
"Hockeystick" by the IPCC now shown to be fraudulent is but another example of the scientific corruption
within the IPCC, its editors, its reviewers, and it supporters. For example, the computer algorithm used to reproduce the
Hockeystick chart, according to McIntyre and McKitrick could produce such a chart from a table of random numbers.
This is appalling, and is deception, not science. Nations of the world were expected to make energy policy using the
IPCC chart. The IPCC quietly dropped the chart from the 4th Assessment Report, without apology to the nations of the
world. The unscientific weaknesses at the IPCC have been known for years. In the June 12, 1996 Wall Street Journal,
Dr. Fred Seitz stated, “In my more than 60 years as a member of the American scientific community, including
service as president of both the National Academy of Sciences and the American Physical Society, I have
never witnessed a more disturbing corruption of the peer-review process than the events that led to this
IPCC report”. Yet in the eyes of the media, Hollywood, and the alarmists, the IPCC gets an unexamined
free pass.
Scientists are not in consensus on global warming

Although the mass media have come to a consensus on global warming, the scientific community has not.
Surface temperature data do show a warming since about 1850, the end of the “Little Ice Age,” but most of
it occurred before 1940, after which the climate cooled for more than three decades. Weather satellite data,
the only true global measurements, show no current warming, in direct disagreement with the best
computer-created climate model predictions. Critics can say “garbage in, garbage out’ regarding the
computer predictions, but climate models are the only tools available for predicting future climate
conditions.
Scientists are not in consensus on global warming

The lack of scientific consensus on the causes possible effects the global warming is easily demonstrated.
Many scientists show “concern” in public but voice doubts in private. Government funding agencies, which
support much scientific research, are unlikely to support a proposal unless it expresses deep concern about
global warming and explains how the study will save the world.
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1NC ICE AGE
Warming is holding off an ice age that will cause extinction
Business Wire, 2-14-1991, "Study: global warming may be beneficial," pl/n
Global warming may be needed in order to prevent the next ice age, which is long overdue on nature's
timetable, according to a study produced by the National Center for Policy Analysis. ''The costs of global
warming are being exaggerated and the benefits are being ignored,'' said the study's author, Kent Jeffreys,
who is director of environmental studies at the Competitive Enterprise Institute in Washington. Drawing on
scientific evidence which Jeffreys says has been overlooked in the global warming policy debate, the study
says that: -- In the past two to three million years, the earth's temperature has gone through at least 17
climate cycles, with ice ages lasting about 100,000 years interrupted by warm periods lasting about 10,000
years. -- Since the current warm period is about 13,000 years old, the next ice age is long overdue. --
During the coldest period of the last ice age, about 25,000 years ago, most of North America was
completely covered by ice. ''The natural temperature of the earth is cold, not warm,'' said Jeffreys. ''The
warm temperature we now enjoy has existed only 10 percent of the time over the last three million years
and only 2 percent of the time over the last 15 million years.'' Jeffreys said there is no hard evidence that we
are experiencing a global warming. But it may be just what is needed. ''Enhancing the greenhouse effect
may be necessary for our survival,'' he said. The study said that human emissions of carbon dioxide (CO2)
from the use of carbon-based fuels may have other benefits for the planet. According to Jeffreys: --
Humans contribute only 5 percent of the CO2 in the atmosphere, while nature contributes 95 percent. --
Throughout the earth's 4.5 billion year history there have been wide swings in the amount of CO2 in the
atmosphere, but the long-term trend is toward less CO2. -- If the long-term trend continues, and there is no
scientific reason why it should not, the earth will eventually become a lifeless planet. ''The Darwinian
ancestors of today's plant life evolved at a time when there was far more CO2 in the atmosphere than there
is today,'' said Jeffreys. ''Some scientists think today's plants are starved for CO2, and that may explain why
plants respond so well to CO2 enhancement in green houses.'' The study said that although most of the CO2
in the atmosphere comes from natural sources, over time nature has become less generous. As a result,
''human emissions of CO2 may be necessary as a replacement for nature's stinginess.'' ''Adjusting to
temperature changes can be costly,'' said Jeffreys. ''But the history of the earth's climate brings us one clear
message: Warmth and CO2 are life-sustaining and life-enhancing. Jeffreys said that when dinosaurs walked
the earth the temperature was from five degrees C to ten degrees warmer than it now is and there was from
five to ten times as much CO2 in the atmosphere. ''Those conditions must have been extremely life-
enhancing,'' said Jeffreys. ''If dinosaurs were alive today, they would die of starvation because of lack of
food.''
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WARMING STOPS THE ICE AGE
Global Warming necessary: carbon dioxide releases are vital to prevent the coming Ice Age
Pearce, Fred, 2007, New Scientist, Vol. 195 Issue 2618 p16
The fossil fuels we burn today may leave an atmospheric "hangover" lasting
hundreds of thousands of years, which may cause enough residual warming
to prevent the onset of the next ice age. This is the most far-reaching
disruption of long-term planetary processes yet suggested for human activity.
The UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change describes carbon dioxide as having a lifetime in the
atmosphere of between five and 200 years before it is ultimately absorbed by the oceans. In fact, as much
as one-tenth of the CO2 we are emitting now will linger in the air for at least 100,000 years, and perhaps
much longer, says Toby Tyrrell of the UK's National Oceanography Centre in Southampton. "It is often
assumed that the Earth will always recover from perturbations. But our research shows that it doesn't
necessarily behave like this," says Tyrrell. "It isn't always inherently self-rectifying." Tyrrell and his
colleagues used mathematical models to study what would happen to marine chemistry in a greenhouse
world. As the ocean absorbs ever more CO2 from the atmosphere, it becomes more acid and so dissolves
more calcium carbonate from the shells of marine organisms. This in turn reduces the oceans' ability to
absorb more CO2, leaving more greenhouse gas in the atmosphere. This complication has been suggested
before, notably by David Archer of the University of Chicago. Tyrrell's analysis substantiates Archer's
suspicions, providing a firm estimate of just how big, and how long-lasting, the fossil-fuel hangover is likely
to be (Tellus B, vol 59, p 664). The effect may be great enough to prevent the next ice
age, Tyrrell found. Ice ages occur roughly every 100,000 years. The chill
begins when wobbles in the planet's orbit marginally change where solar
radiation hits the Earth. This is enough to trigger the growth of ice caps. But
for reasons that are not yet clear, this initial cooling also causes the oceans
to draw CO2 out of the air. Starved of this greenhouse gas, the atmosphere's
temperature nosedives until much of the planet is covered in ice.
Atmospheric CO2 is now at 380 parts per million, up from a pre-industrial
level of 280 ppm. An analysis by Archer two years ago, using models linking
climate and ice sheets, suggested that atmospheric CO2 levels above 560
ppm would almost certainly be enough to prevent the global cooling that now
triggers an ice age every 100,000 years or so. Even levels of 400 ppm would
make such cooling less likely.
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ICE AGE COMING
Ice Age is coming: Satellites show glaciers are forming faster than ever
Booker, Christopher, 2008, “So It Appears The Arctic Isn’t Vanishing
After All”, Telegraph, 04/18/2008,
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/1577399/Christopher-Booker
%27s-Notebook.html
Sea ice cover had shrunk to the lowest level ever recorded. But for some
reason the warmists are less keen on the latest satellite findings, reported by
the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) on the
website Cryosphere Today by the University of Illinois.
This body is committed to warmist orthodoxy and contributes to the work of
the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. Yet its graph of northern
hemisphere sea ice area, which shows the ice shrinking from 13,000 million
sq km to just 4 million from the start of 2007 to October, also shows it now
almost back to 13 million sq km.
A second graph, "Global Ice Area", shows a similar pattern repeated every
year since satellite records began in 1979; while a third, "Southern
Hemisphere Ice", shows that sea ice has actually expanded in recent years,
well above its 30-year mean.
Growing glaciers in Mount St. Helens prove the world is heading toward an Ice Age
Barker, Brian, 2008, “All Odds, Glacier Grows in Cauldron of Mt. St. Helens”, Katu News, 05/14/2008,
http://www.katu.com/news/outdoors/18948279.html
Almost three decades later, the effects of the eruption are readily apparent to the thousands of visitors to the
observation points in the sprawling Mount St. Helens volcanic monument. But time has also muted the effects to some
degree. Trees are growing back in some areas, plants have poked up through the ash, animals move through the
devastated plains once again.
And inside the volcano, which was once a soft dome of snow but is now a gaping, steaming
menace with an unpredictable streak, an unexpected phenomenon is taking place: a glacier is
growing.
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ICE AGE WORSE THAN WARMING
We should be celebrating our optimum climate now, slightly warmer weather is highly preferred to
an Ice Age
D’Aleo, Joseph, Meteorologist at Weather Services International Corporation, 2007, “Global
Warming—Is Carbon Dioxide Getting a Bad Rap?” Energy Tribune, 7/09/2007,
http://www.energytribune.com/articles.cfm?aid=544#)
Lost in all of this is the fact that we have had an optimum climate the last 30 years – with warmer
temperatures, more rainfall, and increased CO2 – that has enabled us to grow more food in more
places, and consume less energy than had the cold weather of the 60s and 70s persisted.
Descending back into a little Ice Age has far greater negative consequences than a slow and
relative minor warming. Crop failures and famines are more common due to dryness and cold,
and the world would consume more energy for heating. We may look back at the late 20th and
early 21st centuries as the golden years.
Future generations will shake their heads over how we failed to recognize a good thing when we
had it and how science was hijacked by politics, environmentalism, and greed. We would be
better off spending all our dollars and efforts on maximizing energy sources, new and old, than
trying to eliminate a gas that does far more good than harm.
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1NC C02 AG
Billions will starve without more food

Jerusalem Post 11/15/01
Klaus Toepfer, Executive Director of UNEP, said: "Billions of people across the tropics depend on
crops such as rice, maize and wheat for their very survival. These new findings indicate that large
numbers are facing acute hunger and malnutrition unless the world acts to reduce emissions of carbon
dioxide and other greenhouse gases." "The population of Asia is expected to increase by 44 percent in
the next 50 years and yields must at least match that growth rate if famine is to be avoided. Currently
more than half the people in South East Asia have a calorie intake that is inadequate for an active life,
and ten million children die annually from diseases related to malnutrition.
And, C02 is the lifeblood of plants – it increases their water use efficiency, enhances stomatas, allows
for plants and animals to live in uninhabitable places, prevents soil erosion, solves all sorts of
environmental stress, and solves worldwide starvation
All the Idsos [Sherwood Idso, Keith Idso, and Craig Idso] [C02 science magazine Volume 6, Number 37]
9/10/03
In a broad review of the scientific literature, Idso (2001) describes a number of biological consequences of
elevated atmospheric CO2 concentrations. The best known of these important impacts is probably CO2's
aerial fertilization effect, which works its wonders on plants that utilize all three of the major biochemical
pathways of photosynthesis (C3, C4 and CAM). In the case of herbaceous plants, this phenomenon
typically boosts their productivities by about a third in response to a 300 ppm increase in the air's CO2
content, while it enhances the growth of woody plants by 50% or more (see our website's Plant Growth
Data section). Next comes plant water use efficiency, which may be defined as the amount of organic
matter produced per unit of water transpired to the atmosphere. This parameter is directly enhanced by
the aerial fertilization effect of atmospheric CO2 enrichment, as well as by its anti-transpirant effect, which
is produced by CO2-induced decreases in the number density and degree of openness of leaf stomatal
apertures that occur at higher atmospheric CO2 concentrations. Here, too, CO2-induced percentage
increases as large as, or even larger than, those exhibited by plant productivity are commonplace. One of
the important ramifications of this CO2-induced increase in plant water use efficiency is the fact that it
enables plants to grow and reproduce in areas that were previously too dry for them. With consequent
increases in ground cover in these regions, the adverse effects of wind- and water-induced soil erosion are
also reduced. Hence, there is a tendency for desertification to be reversed and for vast tracts of previously
unproductive land to become supportive of more abundant animal life, both above- and below-ground, in
what could appropriately be called a "greening of the earth." In addition to helping vegetation overcome the
stress of limited water supplies, elevated levels of atmospheric CO2 help plants to better cope with other
environmental stresses, such as low soil fertility, low light intensity, high soil and water salinity, high air
temperature, various oxidative stresses and the stress of herbivory. When confronted with the specter of
global warming, for example, many experiments have revealed that concomitant enrichment of the air with
CO2 tends to increase the temperature at which plants function at their optimum, often making them even
better suited to the warmer environment than they were to the cooler environment to which they were
originally adapted. Under the most stressful of such conditions, in fact, extra CO2 sometimes is the
deciding factor in determining whether a plant lives or dies. These benefits of atmospheric CO2
enrichment apply to both agricultural and natural ecosystems; and as Wittwer (1995) has noted, "the rising
level of atmospheric CO2 could be the one global natural resource that is progressively increasing food
production and total biological output in a world of otherwise diminishing natural resources of land, water,
energy, minerals, and fertilizer." This phenomenon is thus a means, he says, "of inadvertently increasing
the productivity of farming systems and other photosynthetically active ecosystems," and that "the effects
know no boundaries and both developing and developed countries are, and will be, sharing equally."
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1NC C02 AG
Plus, C02 is the business – It allows plants to grow in infertile soil and during droughts and helps
plants fight weeds, insects, and diseases, and is critical to solve future food shortages
3/19/03
In the case of soil infertility, many experiments have demonstrated that even when important nutrients are
present in the soil in less than optimal amounts, enriching the air with CO2 still boosts crop yields. With
respect to the soil of an African farm where their "genetic and agro-ecological technologies" have been
applied, for example, Conway and Toenniessen speak of "a severe lack of phosphorus and shortages of
nitrogen." Even in such situations, materials archived in our Subject Index provide several examples of
how atmospheric CO2 enrichment enhances plant growth under these adverse conditions [see Growth
Response to CO2 With Other Variables (Nitrogen -- Agricultural Crops) and Growth Response to CO2
With Other Variables (Phosphorus)]. Furthermore, if supplemental fertilization is provided as described by
Conway and Toenniessen, these same Subject Index sections provide examples of even larger CO2-
induced benefits above and beyond those provided by the extra nitrogen and phosphorus applied to the
soil. In the case of weeds, Conway and Toenniessen speak of one of Africa's staple crops, maize, being "attacked by the parasitic weed Striga (Striga hermonthica), which sucks
nutrients from roots." This weed also infects many other C4 crops of the semi-arid tropics, such as sorghum, sugar cane and millet, as well as the C3 crop rice, particularly
Here, too, materials archived on our
throughout much of Africa, where it is currently one of the region's most economically important parasitic weeds.
website describe how atmospheric CO2 enrichment greatly reduces the damage done by this devastating
weed [see our Journal Reviews of Watling and Press (1997) and Watling and Press (2000)]. In the case of
insects and plant diseases, atmospheric CO2 enrichment also helps prevent crop losses. In a study of
diseased tomato plants infected with the fungal pathogen Phytophthora parasitica, which attacks plant
roots inducing water stress that decreases yields, for example, the growth-promoting effect of a doubling of
the air's CO2 content completely counterbalanced the yield-reducing effect of the pathogen (Jwa and
Walling, 2001). Likewise, in a review of impacts and responses of herbivorous insects maintained for
relatively long periods of time in CO2-enriched environments as described in some 30-plus different
studies, Whittaker (1999) noted that insect populations, on average, have been unaffected by the extra
CO2. Since plant growth is nearly universally stimulated in air of elevated CO2 concentration, however, a
smaller proportion of it would thus be likely to be consumed by herbivorous insects in a high-CO2 world.
Lastly, in the case of drought, we again have the nearly universal bettering of plant water use efficiency
that is induced by atmospheric CO2 enrichment [see Water Use Efficiency (Agricultural Species) in our
Subject Index, as well as the Grassland Species and Woody Species subheadings]. In conclusion, in
essentially every major way in which human ingenuity can increase crop productivity to help feed the poor
of Africa -- or anywhere else, for that matter -- the ongoing rise in the air's CO2 content can greatly add to
whatever man can do, thereby producing a truly "Doubly" Green Revolution that is absolutely essential to
preventing future food shortages. Will we be intelligent enough and caring enough to channel our efforts in
the directions needed to rise to this challenge? Or will we do all in our power to fight against the very
phenomenon that can prove our salvation? These are questions that are too important to be left to others to
decide. Each of us has a responsibility to act in accordance with what he or she knows to be scientifically
factual. To acquiesce to what is merely politically fashionable is to abdicate that which sets us apart from
all creation and makes us moral.
And, C02 increases the ability of plants to act as sinks which solves warming
10/15/03
In light of these observations, plus the fact that Saxe et al. (1998) have determined that a doubling of the
air's CO2 content leads to more than a doubling of the biomass production of coniferous species, it
logically follows that the ongoing rise in the atmosphere's CO2 concentration is increasing carbon
sequestration rates in the soils upon which conifers grow and, hence, is producing a significant negative
feedback phenomenon that slows the rate of rise of the air's CO2 content, which would be assumed by
many to be reducing the rate of global warming.
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1NC C02 AG
Famine is inevitable even if all warming is stopped. It’s a significantly bigger threat than warming
Center for the Study of Carbon Dioxide and Global Change, “Two Crises of Unbelievable Magnitude:
Can We Prevent One Without Exacerbating the Other?” Volume 4, Number 24, 6/13/01
w.co2science.org/edit/v4_edit/v4n24edit.htm
Two potentially devastating environmental crises loom ominously on the horizon. One is catastrophic global warming, which many people claim will occur by the end of the
next century. The other is the need to divert essentially all usable non-saline water on the face of the earth to the agricultural enterprises that will be required to meet the food
and fiber needs of humanity’s growing numbers in but half a century (Wallace, 2000; Tilman et al., 2001). This necessary expansion of agriculture will also require the land
that currently supports a full third of all tropical and temperate forests, savannas and grasslands, according to Tilman, et al., who also correctly state that the destruction of
that important natural habitat will lead to the extinction of untold numbers of plant and animal species. How do the magnitudes of the two crises compare? Tilman et al.
suggest that the coming agriculturally-driven crisis is likely to rival that of predicted climate change, placing the two disasters on pretty much an equal footing.
Wallace, however, is unequivocal in his contention that the agricultural crisis dwarfs the climate crisis.
"There can be," he says, "no greater global challenge today on which physical and social scientists can
work together than the goal of producing the food required for future generations." It is our judgment
that the conclusion of Wallace is the more robust of the two, based on the simple fact that the
agriculturally-driven crisis is almost certain to occur, whereas there is still doubt about the climate
crisis. We also believe that Tilman et al. would probably not dispute this contention; for it is their own
conclusion that "even the best available technologies, fully deployed, cannot prevent many of the
forecasted problems," meaning the future scarcity of food, fiber, land and water described above. This
conclusion as to the unavoidability of the agricultural crisis is further buttressed by the fact that Tilman
et al.’s analysis even assumed a reasonable rate of advancement in technological expertise, as we also
assumed in an earlier analysis of the identical problem that arrived at essentially the same conclusion
(Idso and Idso, 2000).
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FOOD SHORTAGES CAUSE WAR
Food shortages lead to World War III

William Calvin, theoretical neurophysiologist at the University of Washington, Atlantic Monthly, January,
The Great Climate Flip-Flop, Vol 281, No. 1, 1998, p. 47-64
The population-crash scenario is surely the most appalling. Plummeting crop yields would cause some
powerful countries to try to take over their neighbors or distant lands -- if only because their armies, unpaid
and lacking food, would go marauding, both at home and across the borders. The better-organized countries
would attempt to use their armies, before they fell apart entirely, to take over countries with significant
remaining resources, driving out or starving their inhabitants if not using modern weapons to accomplish
the same end: eliminating competitors for the remaining food. This would be a worldwide problem -- and
could lead to a Third World War -- but Europe's vulnerability is particularly easy to analyze. The last
abrupt cooling, the Younger Dryas, drastically altered Europe's climate as far east as Ukraine. Present-day
Europe has more than 650 million people. It has excellent soils, and largely grows its own food. It could no
longer do so if it lost the extra warming from the North Atlantic.
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EXT – CARBON SINKS
Grasslands can Act As "Carbon Sinks" and aid in the absorption of global warming.
ScienceDaily, (Jan. 15, 2001), Scientists Find That Grasslands Can Act As "Carbon Sinks",
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2001/01/010111073831.htm .
forests sometimes act as "carbon sinks,"
Scientists have long known that
absorbing more of the greenhouse gas carbon dioxide than they
release. Now, a team of researchers has identified a mechanism through which grasslands
appear to demonstrate the same property.
The research findings, published in the Jan. 11 issue of the journal Nature, may have important
implications as scientists and policy-makers around the world debate ways to lower levels of atmospheric
carbon dioxide, believed to be a major contributor to the greenhouse effect and global climate change.
The lead author of the paper is Dr. Shuijin Hu, assistant professor of plant pathology at North Carolina
State University. The project leaders are Dr. F. Stuart Chapin III, formerly at the University of California,
Berkeley, and now at the University of Alaska; Dr. Christopher B. Field of the Carnegie Institution of
Washington; and Dr. Harold A. Mooney of Stanford University.
grasslands can act as carbon sinks

Hu explains that other scientists have proposed that
when atmospheric carbon dioxide is elevated. The research described in the
Nature paper, however, identified a mechanism through which grassland soils
can sequester carbon, and, in fact, found a trend toward increased soil
carbon under elevated carbon dioxide conditions.
"Our data indicate that soil microbes quickly respond to changes in carbon and
nitrogen availability and may play critical roles in determining the
potential of grasslands -- and other terrestrial ecosystems, too -- to act
as a carbon sink," Hu said.
Carbon sequestration occurs in an ecosystem when the amount of carbon dioxide absorbed by growing
plants is greater than the amount of the gas released by decomposing plant material.
The results are from a five-year study conducted at an annual grassland on Stanford University’s Jasper
Ridge Biological Preserve in central California. Between 1992 and 1997, the researchers maintained two
sets of open-top chambers at the grassland, one in which carbon dioxide levels were maintained
at their normal level -- 360 parts per million (ppm) -- and one in which they were doubled to 720 ppm In
scientists analyzed soil core samples from each of the plots. They found
1996 and 1997, the
a trend toward higher carbon content in the soil from plots given
elevated carbon dioxide levels. Hu says the implications are that
grasslands can be carbon sinks -- at least for the short term. The
magnitude of carbon sequestration in such a grassland is yet to be
determined, he notes.
Soil microbes appear to play a critical role in the process, Hu explains. The increased atmospheric carbon dioxide
stimulates the grassland plants to grow more quickly, drawing nitrogen from the soil in the process. That results in less
nitrogen available for use by the microbes in the soil, reducing the microbes’ ability to decompose dead plant material.
With less plant material decomposed, less carbon is released into the air as carbon dioxide. Additionally, the research
indicated that under elevated carbon dioxide levels, fungi become a more dominant part of the microbial community,
which is also conducive to protecting soil carbon from decomposition.
research indicates that the extent of carbon buildup in the grassland soil may be limited, because
At the same time, the
the lower rate of plant decomposition reduces the supply of nitrogen for additional plant growth.
forests are probably able to store more carbon than

Hu notes that
grasslands. "Forests may be of greater potential as a long-term carbon
sink than annual grasslands because trees can sequester carbon in
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Climate
above-ground biomass and their roots can exploit nutrients in deeper

soils," he said.
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Climate
CO2 GOOD FOR PLANTS
Carbon dioxide is beneficial for plants – it increases growth and robustness; this provides more food
for animals, adds to the extent and diversity of plant and animal life.
The increasein atmospheric carbon dioxide has, however, had a
substantial environmental effect. Atmospheric CO2 fertilizes plants.
Higher CO2 enables plants to grow faster and larger and to live in
drier climates. Plants provide food for animals, which are thereby
also enhanced. The extent and diversity of plant and animal life have
both increased sub stantially during the past half-century. Increased
temperature has also mildly stimulated plant growth.
Carbon dioxide increases plant growth, and benefits animal life.

As atmospheric CO2 increases, plant growth rates increase. Also,
leaves transpire less and lose less water as CO2 increases, so that
plants are able to grow under drier conditions. Animal life, which de -
pends upon plant life for food, increases proportionally.
Figures 21 to 24 show examples of experimentally measured increases
in the growth of plants. These examples are representative of
a very large research literature on this subject (103-109). As Figure
21 shows, long-lived 1,000- to 2,000-year-old pine trees have shown
a sharp increase in growth during the past half-century. Figure 22
shows the 40% increase in the forests of the United States that has taken place since 1950. Much of this increase is due to the increase
in atmospheric CO2 that has already occurred. In
addition, it has been reported that Amazonian rain
forests are increasing their vegetation by about 900 pounds of carbon per acre per year
(113), or
approximately 2 tons of biomass per acre per year. Trees respond to
CO2 fertilization more strongly than do most other plants, but all
plants respond to some extent.
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CO2 GOOD FOR PLANTS
Studies show that plants grow in carbon dioxide rich environments, especially in ‘less than ideal
conditions.’
Wheat growth is accelerated by increased atmospheric CO2, especially
under dry conditions. Figure 24 shows the response of wheat grown under wet conditions
versus that of wheat stressed by lack of water. The underlying data is from open-field experiments. Wheat
was grown in the usual way, but the atmospheric CO2 concentrations of circular sections of the fields were
increased by arrays of computer-controlled equipment that released CO2 into the air to hold the levels as
specified (115,116). Orange and young pine tree growth enhancement (117-119) with two atmospheric
CO2 increases – that which has already occurred since 1885 and that projected for the next two centuries –
is also shown. The relative growth enhancement of trees by CO2 diminishes with age. Figure 24 shows
young trees. Figure 23 summarizes 279 experiments in which plants of various types were raised under
CO2-enhanced conditions.
Plants under stress from less-than-ideal conditions –
a common occurrence in nature – respond more to CO2 fertilization. The
selections of species in Figure 23 were biased toward plants that respond less to CO2 fertilization than
does the mixture actually covering the Earth, so Figure 23 underestimates the effects of global CO2
enhancement. Clearly, the green revolution in agriculture has already
benefitted from CO2 fertilization, and benefits in the future will be even
greater. Animal life is increasing proportionally, as shown by studies of 51
terrestrial (120) and 22 aquatic ecosystems (121). Moreover, as shown by a study of 94 terrestrial
ecosystems on all continents except Antarctica (122), species richness – biodiversity – is more
positively correlated with productivity – the total quantity of plant life
per acre – than with anything else.
Carbon dioxide is key to life; it is not an environmental pollutant.

Atmospheric CO2 is required for life by both plants and animals. It is
the sole source of carbon in all of the protein, carbohydrate, fat, and
other organic molecules of which living things are constructed. Plants
extract carbon from atmospheric CO2 and are thereby fertilized.
Animals obtain their carbon from plants. Without atmospheric CO2,
none of the life we see on Earth would exist. Water, oxygen, and
carbon dioxide are the three most important substances that make life
possible. They are surely not environmental pollutants.
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CO2 GOOD FOR PLANTS
Physicists have found that plants grow faster and live longer due to carbon dioxide.
ScienceDaily, June 1 2008, Can Carbon Dioxide Be A Good Thing?
Physicist Explains Benefits Of Carbon Dioxide, ScienceDaily.com.
Through the processes of photosynthesis and respiration, scientists
have been able to elucidate why plants are growing more rapidly than
they are dying. The NACP is employing methods, such as the use of cell phone and aircraft towers
to monitor and retrieve carbon data for their continuing study. Too much carbon dioxide can be a
bad thing, but sometimes it can have a positive effect on plants and trees. The
more carbon emissions we dump into the air, the faster forests and
plants grow. This new revelation is the result of research done by the North American carbon
program. Scott Denning, Ph.D., a physicist from Colorado State University in Fort Collins, Colorado,
explains the North American Carbon Program, "We are measuring CO2 in the atmosphere at dozens of
places every hour around the United States and Canada." About 100 cell phone and aircraft
towers dotting the North American landscape are providing a network
to measure CO2 in the atmosphere. Physicists tracking the data have
found an unexpected benefit of rising carbon dioxide levels. Dr. Denning says
it's unusual. "Stuff is growing faster than it's dying, which is weird," he says.
The answer may have more to do with how plants use CO . During photosynthesis, plants take
2
in carbon dioxide from the air to make food, but as a plant decays, CO is released 2
back it into the air. Plans are underway to use cell phone towers worldwide for measuring CO2, expanding
the carbon program globally. The bad part is plants can't clean the air as fast as
we are polluting it.
Larger amounts of carbon dioxide increase plant growth and sustainability, provide food
for animals, and diversify life.
Lawrence Solomon, Financial Post staff writer, June 07, 2008, In praise of CO2,
CO2 is nature's fertilizer, bathing the biota with its life-giving nutrients. Plants take the
carbon from CO2 to bulk themselves up -- carbon is the building block of life -- and
release the oxygen, which along with the plants, then sustain animal life. As summarized in a
report last month, released along with a petition signed by 32,000 U. S. scientists who vouched for the benefits of CO2: "Higher
CO2 enables plants to grow faster and larger and to live in drier climates. Plants provide
food for animals, which are thereby also enhanced. The extent and diversity of plant and
animal life have both increased substantially during the past half-century."
88
Climate
CO2 GOOD FOR PLANTS
Carbon dioxide is necessary for plants, the vital source humans rely on for survival
Snook, Jim, 2007, Ice Age Extinction: Cause and Human Consequences, p 173
All life is dependent upon the survival viability of plants. Plants on land need sufficient
atmospheric carbon dioxide to survive. Carbon dioxide is very soluble in water, and is about twice as
soluble in cold water as it is in warm water. The carbon dioxide in the atmosphere varies with the temperature of the surface of the
oceans. When the oceans’ surfaces were cold near the end of the last ice age, the atmospheric carbon dioxide dropped dramatically.
Plants could not survive in the higher altitudes, middle and high latitudes, and some plants could not survive in the low latitudes. The
animals and humans that ate these plants did not survive.
In this book, we have looked at net effects of these phenomena. The percentage of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere has
declined throughout most of geological time. The atmosphere is deformed by centrifugal force. Most of the energy reaching
the earth is utilized in changing the temperature or phase of water. Plants cannot grow when they
do not have sufficient carbon dioxide, water, nutrients, and sunlight. Animals cannot survive
without sufficient plants for food. All of these mechanisms are much more complex than we can
identify, but we can see the net effects.
The process of “greening” has and continues to take place; carbon dioxide stimulates plant growth.
Patrick J. Michaels, September 13, 2001, Patrick J. Michaels is senior
fellow in environmental studies at the Cato Institute, author of "The
Satanic Gases", and an advisor to the Greening Earth Society in
Washington, DC.
For over a decade,

many industry groups have maintained that putting carbon dioxide in the air
would produce a general "greening" of the planet. In fact, that's the thesis of a famous 1992 video, "The
Greening of Planet Earth," which riled the environmental community more than just about anything else that business has done in its
own defense on this issue.
"Greening" was put out by energy-industry activists (you can get your own copy by contacting
http://www.greeningearthsociety.org), who discovered that several big-name scientists
were willing to appear and argue that carbon dioxide will enhance
global plant growth by directly stimulating plants and by warming the
coldest air of winter. These scientists were confident because the
growth stimulation had been observed in literally thousands of
controlled lab experiments and reported in the scientific literature. At the
same time, the climate data were pouring in showing that "global"
warming was much more "winter" warming, and in the coldest air,
which was sure to lengthen the growing season for plants.
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Climate
CO2 GOOD FOR PLANTS
Global warming would be conductive for food production, alleviating fear of food shortages.
Patrick J. Michaels, September 13, 2001, Patrick J. Michaels is senior
fellow in environmental studies at the Cato Institute, author of "The
Satanic Gases", and an advisor to the Greening Earth Society in
Washington, DC.
What really ticked off the greens about "The Greening of Planet Earth" were the many sound bites from
the future atmosphere would be much more
prominent agricultural scientists about how
conducive for food production. look at what NASA, which funded this study, now
But
says about Zhou's work: "The pattern of high growth is especially noteworthy
in boreal [northern] Eurasia...This includes the grasslands and
croplands of south central Russia....[emphases added]."
In other words, dreaded global warming will produce more food for
Russia.
Russians rightfully fear the cold.
In 1972, near the bottom of the mid-century cooling (and around the
height of global cooling fear)
they were so short of food that they purchased just
about every kernel of American grain. This sent grocery store prices
here to alarming levels. By the end of the crop year 1972, world grain
reserves stood at a stunningly low 19 days. Since we warmed up, those
fears have become a thing of the past. Now food shortages are largely
local and political, and commodity prices have been in the tank for
years, reflecting vast supply compared to demand.
So is this what global warming has wrought? It appears to have
created a more comfortable planet with more food. The video was right. The
greens were wrong. The world is greener.
90
Climate
AT: INSECTS
Global warming kills off unwanted and dangerous insects without effecting harmless ones.
Robert C. Balling Jr., ., Ph.D. is director of the Laboratory of Climatology at Arizona

State University and coauthor of The Satanic Gases., July 1 2000, Don’t let global
warming bug you!, http://www.heartland.org/
The effects of global warming on insects are also failing to make headlines. If plants put down
their defenses, won’t other herbivores come along and gobble up all the increased plant biomass? Well, a second recent paper
shows us that not all insects will emerge as lucky as the common blue butterfly; consider the future
of the bird cherry-oat aphid.
Newman and colleagues grew tall fescue plants for two weeks in open-top chambers with atmospheric CO2 levels maintained at 350 ppm and 700 ppm.
At that time in the experiment, the tall fescue was inoculated with 20 aphids per plant and grown for an additional nine weeks with the differential CO2
levels.
The team found that the doubling of CO2 increased plant dry matter production by 37
percent, but the total number of aphids decreased substantially. Unlike the butterflies, the aphids
seemed to lose out.
Hmmm. . . . Be good to butterflies and emit CO2—or be good to aphids and adopt the Kyoto Protocol?
From these two studies, we learn that increased

atmospheric CO2 concentrations will cause a)
wildflowers and fescue to grow bigger and healthier, b) beneficial butterflies to grow
bigger, more quickly, with lower mortality rates, and c) the number of rose-ruining
aphids to decrease. These hard facts come from reproducible studies that have survived
the peer-review process.
—increased CO2 will strengthen the biosphere and make the Earth
It’s as simple as the birds and the bees
a better place.
When I see a picture of the Earth from space, I do not see a fragile world with its climate
system hanging on a thread. I see a global ecosystem crying out for higher levels of CO2.
91
Climate
AT: WARMING HURTS CROPS
The impact of warming on agriculture is highly exaggerated; warm-weather crops are silver-linings
in climate change
Mendelsohn, Robert, 1994, The American Economic Review, Vol. 83, No. 4, p. 764
The striking difference between the crop-revenue and cropland approaches is a useful reminder of
how we can be misled by our mental images. The specter of global warming calls up the vista of
corn blistering on the stalk or desiccated wheat fields. Yet the major grains so vulnerable to
drought—wheat and corn—represented only $22.5 billion of the $143 billion of farm marketings
in 1982. Our results suggest that the vulnerability of American agriculture to climate change may
be exaggerated if the analysis is limited to the major grains. A broader vision should also include
the warm-weather crops such as cotton, fruits, vegetables, rice, hay, and grapes in addition to
other sectors such as livestock and poultry. Whereas past production-function studies focus
ominously on the vulnerable cool-weather grains, the comprehensive crop-revenue Ricardian
model reminds us that the irrigated warm-weather crops be a silver lining behind the climate-
change cloud.
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Climate
1NC SO2
Sulfur has a absorbing effect on CO2 molecules and decreases global temperatures
William Cotton– Professor of Atmospheric Science at Colorado State University
“Human Impacts on Weather And Climate, 2nd Edition, Cambridge Press” April 9, 2007
http://icecap.us/docs/change/aerosols.pdf
Clouds, we have seen, are good reflectors of solar radiation and therefore contribute significantly to the net
albedo of the Earth system. We thus ask, how might aerosol particles originating through anthropogenic
activity influence the radiative properties ofclouds and thereby affect climate? First of all, there are
indications that in urban areas aerosols make clouds `dirty' andthereby decrease the albedo of the cloud
aerosol layer and increase the absorptance of the clouds Kondrat'yev et al., 1981. This effect appears to be
quite localized; being restricted to over and immediately downwind of major urban areas, particularly cities
emitting large quantities of black soot particles. Kondrat'yev et al.\ noted that the water samples collected
from the clouds they sampled were actually dark in color. A potentially more important impact of aerosol
on clouds and climate is that they can serve as a source of cloud condensation nuclei CCN and thereby alter
the concentration of cloud droplets. Twomey 1974 first pointed out that increasing pollution results in
greater CCN concentrations and greater numbers of cloud droplets, which, in turn, increase the reflectance
of clouds. Subsequently, Twomey 1977 showed that this effectwas most influential for optically thin
clouds; clouds having shallow depths or littlecolumn integrated liquid water content. Optically thicker
clouds, he argued, are already very bright, and are therefore susceptible to increased absorption by the
presence of dirty aerosol. In Twomey's words: `ìt an increase in global pollution could, at the same time,
make thin clouds brighter and thick clouds darker, the crossover in behavioroccurring at a cloud thickness
which depends on the ratio of absorption to the cube root of drop nucleus concentration. The sign of the net
global effect, warming or cooling,therefore involves both the distribution of cloud thickness and the
relative magnitude ofthe rate of increase of cloud-nucleating particles vis-a-vis particulate
absorption.}"Subsequently, Twomey et al. 1984 presented observational and theoretical evidence indicating
that the absorption effect of aerosols is small and the enhanced albedo effect plays a dominate role on
global climate. They argued that the enhanced cloud albedo has a magnitude comparable to that of
greenhouse warming see Chapter 11 and acts to coolthe atmosphere. Kaufman et al.1991 concluded that
although coal and oil emit 120 times as many CO2 molecules as SO2 molecules, each SO2 molecule is 50-
1100 times as effective in cooling the atmosphere than each CO2 molecule is in warming it. This is by
virtue of the SO2 molecules' contribution to CCN production and enhanced cloud albedo.Twomey suggests
that if the CCN concentration in the cleaner parts of the atmosphere, such as the oceanic regions, were
raised to continental atmospheric values, about 10%more energy would be reflected to space by relatively
thin cloud layers. He also points out that an increase in cloud reflectivity by 10% is of greater consequence
than a similar increase in global cloudiness. This is because while an increase in cloudiness reduces the
incoming solar radiation, it also reduces the outgoing infrared radiation. Thus both cooling and heating
effects occur when global cloudiness increases. In contrast, an increase in cloud reflectance due to
enhanced CCN concentration does not appreciably affect infrared radiation but does reflect more incoming
solar radiation which results in a net cooling effect.
93
Climate
SO2 COOLS/SOLVES WARMING
Sulphate aerosols from sulphur dioxide go into the air and reduce temperatures at the earth’s
surface
Department for Environmental Food and Rural affairs 02/04/2007 “Air quality
and climate change: The UK perspective”
http://64.233.167.104/search?
q=cache:wMBzd8RlISgJ:www.defra.gov.uk/environment/airquality/publications/airqual
-
climatechange/pdf/chapter06.pdf+sulphur+dioxide+leads+to+more+global+warmin
g&hl=en&ct=clnk&cd=14&gl=us&client=firefox-a
There are often important and sometimes complex interlinkages of pollutant
emissions arising from interventions which are designed to improve local air quality
or intended to reduce greenhouse gas emissions. Some are more complex than those
outlined above. For example, emissions of sulphur dioxide lead to the formation of
sulphate aerosol particles in the atmosphere, which reflect incoming solar radiation
thereby reducing air temperatures. Aerosol particles also influence the reflectivity
(albedo) of clouds so as to reduce temperatures at the earth’s surface. The cooling
effects of sulphate aerosol are believed to have masked some of the warming effects
of increased greenhouse gas concentrations, and further abatement of sulphur
dioxide emissions is likely to lead to an enhancement of global warming. Ozone plays
an important role as a greenhouse gas and hence altering the emissions of ozone
precursors such as nitrogen oxides and volatile organic compounds has implications
for climate. In the case of aviation emissions, the climatic effects of ozone generated
from precursor emissions are significant in magnitude, although different in
timescale, to those associated with carbon dioxide emissions.
Tons of sulphur dioxide would be sufficient to create a “cooling” blanket

Robin McKie- Observer science and technology editor. and Juliette Jowit -
environment editor of The Observer.
October 7, 2007 “Can science really save the world?”
http://observer.guardian.co.uk/focus/story/0,,2185343,00.html
During major volcanic eruptions, the Earth often undergoes significant cooling. For
example, when Mount Pinatubo in the Philippines erupted in 1991 the average
temperature across the Earth decreased by 0.6C. Scientists pointed the finger of
blame at the 10 million tonnes of sulphur that the volcano ejected into the
stratosphere. So why not copy Pinatubo? That is the suggestion of Professor Paul
Crutzen who won a Nobel prize in 1995 for his work on the ozone layer. He has
proposed creating a 'blanket' of sulphur that would block the Sun's rays from
reaching Earth; to do this, he envisages hundreds of rockets filled with sulphur being
blasted into the stratosphere. About one million tonnes of sulphur would be enough
to create his cooling blanket, he says.
94
Climate
Sulfur dioxide and aerosols tend to reflect incoming sunlight to compensate for global warming
NASA 16 Oct 2006 Products – “AIRS Sulfur Dioxide & Aerosols”
http://airs.jpl.nasa.gov/Products/SulferDioxide_Aerosols/
Sulfur dioxide (SO2), and aerosols also play a part in global climate. Rather than absorbing sunlight they
reflect it, which tends to cool the earth, compensating the effects of global warming. For years scientists
have observed an increase in both aerosols and SO2 and the deleterious effects they have on weather,
including acid rain. Scientists have speculated that the global warming effect of the greenhouse gases,
carbon dioxide and methane have been compensated by the increased aerosols. It is only recently that CO2
levels have risen above the compensating effects of aerosols.AIRS sensitivity to SO2 is low and is
primarily visible in volcanic activity. However the AIRS instrument is very sensitive to atmospheric
aerosols, such as dust and ash. AIRS SO2 and aerosols are not produced in geophysical units (e.g.
concentration or optical thickness), but due to absorption the SO2 is expressed in terms of a temperature
difference. Dust, on the other hand, is expressed as a flag indicating an identifiable amount of material
present in the atmosphere.
Sulfate aerosols act to suppress warm temperatures and rain

Another facet of aerosol direct or semi-direct affects is on the nucleation of clouddroplets and thus the
concentration of droplets in clouds. Conant et al. 2002 computedthe effects of carbon black aerosols on
cloud droplet nucleationHeating parameters of 0.1 and 0.2 are chosen for the two droplet sizes,
respectively. Thesolid curve represents the no-heating case, the dashed curve represents the heating
case.Particles are assumed to have the hygroscopic properties of sulfate.illustrates theequilibrium
supersaturation over solution drops containing carbon black aerosols. Thepeak in the curves, called Kohler
curves, represents the supersaturation that must beattained in a cloud in order to form growing cloud
droplets. If the cooling rate in cloudswhich is normally proportional to updraft velocity is not large enough
to exceed the peakvalues in the curves, then the aerosol particles of the size indicated cannot form a
clouddroplet.Their calculations showed that since carbonaceous particles are strongly absorbing ofsolar
radiation, the warming of those aerosol particles elevates the peak supersaturation.Thus, for example, if
many of aerosols are 0.1 micrometers in diameter, and peaksupersaturations are less 0.01%, those particles
will not be activated to form clouddroplets owing to absorption of solar radiation. This effect is most
pronounced in lowsupersaturation clouds such as fogs. Moreover, this effect is greatest for larger
aerosolparticles since the absorption cross section is proportional to the area of the particle. Itsmain impact
is on giant CCN see Nenes et al., 2002 which we have seen in Chapter 4 caninitiate or speed up the warm-
rain collision and coalescence process. Thus if thecarboneous particles absorb solar radiation they may not
become big enough to initiatecollision and coalescence which, in turn, can act to suppress warm rain
processes.
95
Climate
Sulfate aerosol directly counteracts the effects of global warming

We have seen that greenhouse warming as a result of enhanced CO2 concentrations is only significant
when the global hydrological cycle is enhanced and greater amounts of water vapor are evaporated into the
air principally over the oceans but also over land,since water vapor is the dominant greenhouse gas as
discussed in Chapter 8. The increased amounts of water vapor in the air, in turn, results in a strong positive
feedback to CO2 warming. Recent GCM simulations of both greenhouse warming, and direct and indirect
aerosol affects, Liepert etal., 2004 suggest that aerosol indirect and direct cooling reduces surface latent and
sensible heat transfer and as a consequence acts to spin-down the hydrological cycle and thereby
substantially weaken greenhouse gas warming. This is important since most investigators compare top of
the atmosphere radiative differences for greenhouse gas warming and aerosol direct and indirect effects
separately. But since greenhouse warming depends on a spin-up of the hydrological cycleand aerosol direct
and indirect cooling counters that, the potential influence of aerosols on climate could be far more
significant than previously thought
Aerosol pollution would reflect more than convect to cool down the earth
Spencer Weart Director of the Center for History of Physics of the American Institute of Physics June
2007 The Discovery of Global Warming
http://www.aip.org/history/climate/aerosol.htm
In 1977 some light was cast into the shadows by Sean Twomey at the University of Arizona's Institute of
Atmospheric Physics. (The name of the institute hints how scientists were regrouping to attack complex
questions involving the environment.) Twomey showed that reflection of sunlight from clouds depends on
the number of nuclei in a curiously intricate way. Adding particles would normally create more water
droplets, and thus thicker light-reflecting clouds. Past some point, however, the drops might fall as rain and
the clouds would disappear altogether. On the other hand, if there were a great many nuclei the water could
end up not as raindrops but as myriads of tiny droplets — a long-lasting mist. And as Twomey also
showed, the amount of reflection and absorption depended strongly on the average size of the droplets
(with smaller mist droplets there is more surface area for a given amount of water). In short, adding more
aerosol particles might either raise or lower cloud reflectivity, depending on quite a variety of factors.
Overall, for thin clouds Twomey calculated that added pollution would increase the reflectivity (and thus
cool the climate), whereas for thick clouds absorption would dominate (hence warming). He concluded that
since thin clouds are most common, the net effect of human pollution should be to cool the Earth.
96
Climate
Aerosols intercept sunlight and form cloud condensation nuclei to decrease global temperatures
Aerosols not only intercepted sunlight, but might also affect climate by helping to create clouds. Research
early in the century had shown that clouds can only form where there are enough "cloud condensation
nuclei," tiny particles that give a surface for the water droplets to condense around. In the 1950s, scientists
began to consider whether people might be able to deliberately change their local weather by injecting
materials into the atmosphere to help clouds form. "Seeding" clouds with silver iodide smoke, in hopes of
making rain, became a widespread commercial enterprise. Less visible to the public were government
studies of the use of aerosols as a weapon of climatological warfare, to inflict droughts or blizzards on an
enemy. For good or ill, it was becoming plausible that aerosols emitted on an industrial scale could alter the
climate of an entire region. Perhaps we were already doing something like that inadvertently. In the early
1960s, Walter Orr Roberts, a prominent astrophysicist at the University of Colorado, noticed that
something was changing in the broad and sparkling skies above Boulder. Roberts had a long-standing
interest in climate. One of the things that had driven his career in astrophysics was a hope of connecting
climate with sunspot cycles. He had been especially impressed by the terrible drought of the 1930s, which
he had seen firsthand when he drove through the Dust Bowl on his way to Colorado. Aerosols stayed on his
mind. One morning as he was talking with a reporter from the New York Times, Roberts pointed out the jet
airplane contrails overhead. He predicted that by mid afternoon they would spread and thin, until you
couldn't tell the contrails from cirrus clouds. They did, and you couldn't. The Times made it a front-page
story (Sept. 23, 1963). "Until recently, Dr. Roberts explained, cirrus clouds were thought to be more of an
effect than a cause of weather conditions. But data from balloon and satellite experiments now suggest...
[clouds] may trap enough heat beneath them to affect the weather." Since jets evidently made cirrus clouds,
they "might be altering the climate subtly along major air routes." The idea was controversial, like
anything that sounded like "cloud seeding." Many scientists believed that seeding with particles could
cause rain only under unusual conditions — or never. The "cloud chamber" studies around the start of the
20th century, which had shown that clouds could not condense in very pure air, did not seem significant.
Most scientists believed that there were always plenty of nuclei in the air, from sources like soil dust stirred
up by the wind and salt crystals from ocean foam. Therefore clouds would form wherever the temperature
and humidity were right. Nobody had carefully tested this assumption. The theory of how particles affected
clouds was complex beyond reckoning, and field tests were too costly to pursue far, especially since their
results turned out to be contradictory and confusing. Scientists avoided the intractable study of cloud
formation. As one of them later recalled, they viewed tiny particles mainly "as air-quality indicators."
97
Climate
SATELLITES PROVE SO2
Empirically proven- Satellites have proven a decrease in temperature from aerosols

The cooling effect of sulfates was confirmed by computer studies that took advantage of a colossal
explosion of the Mexican volcano El Chichón in 1982. From this event scientists learned more about the
effects of volcanic aerosols, one of them declared, "than from all previous eruptions combined." Satellite
observations of clouds that were affected by the eight million tons of sulfur aerosols blown into the upper
air could be matched with a noticeable cooling of regions beneath the clouds.(63) Alongside the progress in
dealing with volcanoes came increasing evidence that the natural background of aerosols always present in
the atmosphere also tended to cause mild cooling. The first calculation that many experts accepted as
reasonably accurate gave a year-in, year-out global cooling effect of 2-3°C (roughly 4-5°F).(64)
98
Climate
MODELS PROVE SO2
Computer models prove sulfate aerosols provide a cooling effect

Computer modelers returned to their simulations of global temperature, and found they could get curves
that matched the observations since the 1860s quite closely provided they included increases in sulfate
aerosols as well as CO2.(87) Because aerosol pollution was greater in some regions than others, whereas
CO2 levels were about the same everywhere, modelers could even try to disentangle the two influences.
(88) To be sure, there was a risk that with aerosol effects poorly understood, the modelers might merely be
adjusting their numbers until they reproduced the climate data, overlooking other possible factors. But the
new results incorporating aerosols did give, for the first time ever, a plausible and consistent accounting of
the main features of 20th-century climate. In particular, it seemed likely that industrial pollution had
temporarily depressed Northern Hemisphere temperatures in mid century. As Bryson had speculated back
in the 1970s, the effects of aerosol emissions from human industry were comparable to the effects of a large
volcanic eruption. These results led directly to the announcement by a 1995 international report that human
influence on climate had probably become discernible. Global warming might have become evident
decades earlier, but for the overlooked cooling effect of aerosols.
99
Climate
SO2 CHANGES CLOUD PROPERTY
Sulphur dioxide changes the properties of clouds to reflect more heat and energy from the sun
Anup Shah Master of Science in Environmental Engineering from Georgia Institute of
Technology, Atlanta, USA “Global Dimming” January 15 2005
http://www.globalissues.org/EnvIssues/GlobalWarming/globaldimming.asp
Fossil fuel use, as well as producing greenhouse gases, creates other
by-products. These by-products are also pollutants, such as sulphur
dioxide, soot, and ash. These pollutants however, also change the
properties of clouds. Clouds are formed when water droplets are
seeded by air-borne particles, such as pollen. Polluted air results in
clouds with larger number of droplets than unpolluted clouds. This then
makes those clouds more reflective. More of the sun’s heat and energy
is therefore reflected back into space.
Sulphur and sulphate compounds change the optical properties of water and clouds to be more
reflective
By David Sington- successful producer, screenwriter, director, author and journalist 13 January 2005 Why
the Sun seems to be 'dimming' http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/4171591.stm
It was only recently, when his conclusions were confirmed by Australian scientists using a completely
different method to estimate solar radiation, that climate scientists at last woke up to the reality of global
dimming. Dimming appears to be caused by air pollution. Burning coal, oil and wood, whether in cars,
power stations or cooking fires, produces not only invisible carbon dioxide - the principal greenhouse gas
responsible for global warming - but also tiny airborne particles of soot, ash, sulphur compounds and other
pollutants.This visible air pollution reflects sunlight back into space, preventing it reaching the surface. But
the pollution also changes the optical properties of clouds.Because the particles seed the formation of water
droplets, polluted clouds contain a larger number of droplets than unpolluted clouds.Recent research shows
that this makes them more reflective than they would otherwise be, again reflecting the Sun's rays back into
space.Scientists are now worried that dimming, by shielding the oceans from the full power of the Sun,
may be disrupting the pattern of the world's rainfall.There are suggestions that dimming was behind the
droughts in sub-Saharan Africa which claimed hundreds of thousands of lives in the 1970s and 80s.There
are disturbing hints the same thing may be happening today in Asia, home to half the world's
population."My main concern is global dimming is also having a detrimental impact on the Asian
monsoon," says Professor Veerhabhadran Ramanathan, professor of climate and atmospheric sciences at
the University of California, San Diego. "We are talking about billions of people."
Sulfur dioxide allows for bigger, longer lasting clouds that reflect the sunlight more
David Adam,- PhD in chemical engineering The Guardian, Decemeber 18,2003 “Goodbye Sunshine”
http://www.guardian.co.uk/science/2003/dec/18/science.research1
So what causes global dimming? The first thing to say is that it's nothing to do with changes in the amount
of radiation arriving from the sun. Although that varies as the sun's activity rises and falls and the Earth
moves closer or further away, the global dimming effect is much, much larger and the opposite of what
would be expected given there has been a general increase in overall solar radiation over the past 150
years.That means something must have happened to the Earth's atmosphere to stop the arriving sunlight
penetrating. The few experts who have studied the effect believe it's down to air pollution. Tiny particles of
soot or chemical compounds like sulphates reflect sunlight and they also promote the formation of bigger,
longer lasting clouds. "The cloudy times are getting darker," says Cohen, at the Volcani Centre. "If it's
cloudy then it's darker, but when it's sunny things haven't changed much."More importantly, what impact
could global dimming have? If the effect continues then it's certainly bad news for solar power, as darker,
cloudier skies will reduce its meagre efficiency still further.
100
Climate
AT: HURTS RAIN FORESTS
Less amounts of sulphur dioxide hurts rain forests especially the amazon
Washington Post May 7, 2008 “Cleaner Air May Threaten Amazon
Rainforest”
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-
dyn/content/article/2008/05/07/AR2008050702238.html
WEDNESDAY, May 7 (HealthDay News) -- Cleaner air may actually threaten the
Amazon rainforest, according to Brazilian and British climate scientists.They claim
that a reduction in coal burning and the resultant sulphur dioxide emissions is linked
to increasing sea surface temperatures in the tropical north Atlantic, which increases
the risk of drought in the Amazon rainforest.The researchers said sulphate aerosol
particles released by coal-burning power stations in the 1970s and 1980s partially
reduced global warming by reflecting sunlight and making clouds brighter. This
pollution has been mainly in the northern hemisphere and has acted to limit warming
in the tropical north Atlantic, which has kept the Amazon wetter then it would
otherwise be, the scientists explained."Reduced sulphur emissions in North America
and Europe will see tropical rain-bands move northwards as the north Atlantic warms,
resulting in a sharp increase in the risk of Amazonian drought," study co-author Chris
Huntingford, of the Centre for Ecology and Hydrology at the University of Exeter in
the United Kingdom, said in a prepared statement."These findings are another
reminder of the complex nature of environmental change. To improve air quality and
safeguard public health, we must continue to reduce aerosol pollution, but our study
suggests that this needs to be accompanied by urgent reductions in carbon dioxide
emissions to minimize the risk of Amazon forest dieback," study author Professor
Peter Cox, of the University of Exeter, said in a prepared statement.
101
Climate
SO2 CAUSED BY HUMANS
Sulfur dioxide is ultimately caused by humans

William Cotton – Professor of Atmospheric Science at Colorado State University
These particles form from sulphur dioxide emitted naturally largely by decay of plant and animal matter, by
wild land fires, by volcanos, and by anthropogenic activity. The particles form primarily from the in situ
oxidation of sulphur dioxide either as a primary gas or as an intermediate stage of oxidation. Two
mechanisms for aerosol formation from sulphur dioxide are: 1 dissolving in cloud droplets to create
sulfurous acid, which oxidesfurther to form sulphuric acid aerosol particles, and 2 photochemical oxidation
to form sulphate particles. Although sulphate particles are not the only human-caused aerosol, they are
certainly prolific, so identification of their distribution is important to understanding the role of human-
caused aerosol on climate. Anthropogenic sulphur dioxide emissions have increased to their present level
almost entirely within the last 100 years Cullis and Hirschler, 1980 and, furthermore, as summarized by
Schwartz 1989, the bulk of those emissions are in the northern hemisphere. Aerosol sulphate is quite
common at remote sites in both the northern and southern hemispheres, with northern hemispheric
concentrations substantially exceeding those in the southern hemisphere.
102

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Miami Debate Institute

1nc can’t solve warming...............................................................................................................................62

Nor was Murphy alone with his tail. He showed a

Higher evaporation rates in the heat of a greenhouse day

New research showing a

The extent to which clouds control the planetary thermostat

Humans are directly responsible for warming

Runaway warming kills billions and the economy

US Economic collapse causes war

Warming crushes agriculture – 2 billion will die

Warming devastates every ecosystem on the planet

Species loss risks extinction

Global warming is happening now and fast

MUST ACT NOW

Federal Government Needs To Address Climate Change Now

Betty Parker • News Journal capital bureau • June 26, 2008

LARGE RELEASE OF METHANE COULD CAUSE ABRUPT AND CATASTROPHIC CLIMATE

Study results appear in the May 29 issue of Nature.

MODELS SHOW WARMING

SATELLITES SHOW WARMING

WARMING IS CAUSED BY HUMANS

WARMING IS CAUSED BY HUMANS

Dr Neville Nicholls, School of Geography and Environmental Science at Monash

WARMING IS CAUSED BY HUMANS

CO2 is the cause of global warming

Adam Rink, (Libertarian); Thursday, June 12, 2008, Nolan Chart;

WARMING CAUSES EXTINCTION

WARMING HURTS THE ECONOMY

WARMING HURTS ECOSYSTEMS

1Climate Change Disrupting Eco Systems- End in species Extinction

WARMING CAUSES MONOCULTURE

Extinction results without sustained genetic diversity

WARMING CAUSES DISEASES

WARMING CAUSES DISEASES

WARMING CAUSES DISEASES

WARMING CAUSES DISEASES

With warmer conditions, the researchers expect both faster replication

WARMING HURTS SPECIES

Changing temperatures of global warming mean the extinction of many species.

Insects, turtles, and other creatures

WARMING CAUSES WAR

Global Warming Leads To Interstate Conflict

WARMING CAUSES GENOCIDE

Global warming will cause genocide of religious and ethnic minorities

Empirically proven with Darfur: Global warming causes genocide

before global warming caused a long-term drought

WARMING CAUSES BAD WEATHER [GENERAL]

WARMING CAUSES SUPER STORMS

Global warming causes more devastating super-storms and hurricanes

WARMING CAUSES HURRICANES

WARMING CAUSES ILLEGAL IMMIGRATION

Climate Change Likely To Increase Illegal Immigration And Violence

WARMING OUTWEIGHS NEG IMPACTS

Dr Evan Lau, Department of Organismic and. Evolutionary Biology. Harvard University,

Dr Evan Lau, Department of Organismic and. Evolutionary Biology. Harvard University,

While it is not known if all the warming is human-caused,

WARMING HURTS THE OZONE

Global Warming Possess a Serious Threat- Immediate Action Must be Taken

Global Warming Alarm

That, in turn, is likely to dampen the ability of plants to offset increases in

When affected by projected high levels of ozone, plants can absorb up

we won't get as much help with the carbon problem as we

AT: CARBON SINKS

The finding published today is crucial, because it means that more