Open Letter to the Bishop of Chester (29 May)

Dear Bishop Peter,

My name is Mark Dowd I am currently employed with Operation Noah, the faith based campaign on climate change.

I am also a daily subscriber to the Ekklesia news bulletin and this morning my attention was drawn to the remarks attributed to you during the second reading of the Energy Bill and your views on whether human emissions of carbon dioxide are the principal driving force in the global heating that has been recorded in recent decades. The communication I have read has you as saying that there was no consensus among climate scientists that “carbon dioxide levels are the key determinant”.

This is not the time, nor the place to embark on complex discussions about your other comments about nuclear power stations. Your attributed comments on anthropogenic climate change are what concern me in your capacity as an individual charged with the leadership of his flock and their care.

You are right to stress that this area can be “notoriously imprecise.” This is why the United Nations’ IPCC has such widely varying predictions on expected global temperature rises, sea level rises etc over the next century and also explains why there is still healthy debate about such uncertainties as to the future pattern of clouds formations and their effects on the climate. But many elements in this domain are now accepted beyond doubt:

FACT: the Earth is heating up - 0.8 degrees on average since 1900 with further rises of up to two degrees likely as a result of the greenhouse gas emissions of the last thirty to forty years.

FACT: CO2 is a major element in the warming process. The greenhouse gas theory is not new, but has its origins in the nineteenth century among scientists such as Fourier and Arrhenius. Some have tried to dismiss the present warming to other “natural factors” such as solar activity or volcanic eruptions. However, greenhouse gases from volcanoes equal around two per cent of human global emissions, and solar sunspot activity hit a plateau and has been in gentle decline since the late 1970s.

FACT: There is a scientific consensus on this issue. Not unanimity, I grant you. I quote the words of the renowned US climate scientist, James Hansen:

“If ninety five of the world’s best, most experienced experts in child well-being, were to tell you that your child was under lethal attack – and with dramatic signs already visible if you would only look – would you say, “I think I’ll wait until the other five experts are convinced before I do anything about it?”

The IPCC Fourth assessment report last Spring said that there was “90 per cent certainty” that human activity was the major factor in driving the warming of the planet. This body claims the working allegiance of 800 of the world’s top climate scientists and a further 1700 others who peer review their work to arrive at a consensus. The case for anthropogenic motivated heating has also been backed up incontrovertibly by the Academies of Science of all G8 countries, plus India, China and Brazil. What more would constitute “a consensus” in your view?

The reason that I am taking the time to point all this out is because, as a Bishop, you have a great potential to influence and guide public opinion. The emerging narrative about our role in global warming is not a pleasant one to ponder on and I can understand why many would want to avert their gaze. But the fact is that we are putting God’s Creation at risk and reneging on our vocational duty to be stewards. Behaviour which results in the background elimination of thousands of species at now record rates amounts to nothing less than blasphemy against what God has put in place.

I am no “eco-freak.” I have come to this issue against all my prejudices. My fear is that your remarks will simply encourage denial and give succour to those who seek to hide behind “a senior voice of the Church.”

You are familiar, no doubt, with the utterances of Pope Benedict, the Archbishop of Canterbury and the Ecumenical Patriarch, Bartholomew I on this issue. I suggest you take time to read them and reflect accordingly.

Yours sincerely,

Mark Dowd

A letter from Mark Dowd to the Rt Rev Dr Peter Forster in response to his remarks on climate change as reported by Ekklesia on 29th May. (See http://www.ekklesia.co.uk/node/7198)