Countering Climate Change Sceptics and Handling Tricky Questions

Climate change is the single biggest challenge that humankind has ever had to face. For the past 200 years we have been burning fossil fuels at a growing rate, releasing increasing quantities of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases into the atmosphere. The planet's natural systems have only been able to absorb a proportion of these emissions, so the stock of greenhouse gases remaining in the atmosphere has been building up over time. As the concentration of these gases builds up, it is causing the climate system and global temperature to change. We are now at a stage where the concentration in the atmosphere is believed to be at a crucial tipping point for runaway climate change.

Some people still deny that climate change is a reality. Others feel a sense of inertia or are fearful of taking action. This factsheet is intended to help you counter some of the arguments you may hear in a debate on climate change. We hope it will equip you with swift rebuttals to the deniers and sceptics!

1. "I don't believe in climate change, it's scaremongering"
2. "Even if the climate is changing, it's not down to human activity"
3. "Scientists don't agree on climate change, and some deny it's a problem, so who should we believe?"
4. "Climate Change may be happening, but it's not as bad as people say. This summer wasn't hot and a drought was predicted"
5. "Climate Change is a good thing, we can grow grapes in Yorkshire"
6. "There are too many uncertainties about the effects of climate change to justify taking action"
7. "Technology will provide the answer"
8. "Climate Change is a problem, but it would cost more to do anything about it than to live with it"
9. "We shouldn't worry about emissions, we can offset them"
10. "The UK only produces a tiny amount of carbon dioxide emissions compared with China so we aren't the problem and anything we do is a drop in the ocean"
11. "Climate change is a huge problem, it is too difficult to tackle and probably too late to stop it"

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1. "I don't believe in climate change, it's scaremongering"

Few scientists contest that the Earth's average temperature has been rising over the past 100 years.

According to the Royal Society, Britain's pre-eminent scientific institution, the Inter-Governmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), www.ipcc.ch/ is the most authoritative source of information about the current understanding of climate change. The IPCC involves thousands of experts, some nominated by governments, in the process of producing and reviewing its assessment reports, which periodically review current scientific understanding of climate change, its impacts, and remaining uncertainties.

In 2007, the IPCC produced its fourth assessment report. This found that:

• Warming of the climate system is now unequivocal.
• Numerous long-term changes in climate have been observed: changes in Artic temperatures and ice, changes in rainfall amounts, ocean salinity, wind patterns and extreme weather conditions.

Measurements show that the average global temperature has risen by some 0.8°C in the last 150 years since the industrial revolution. Most of the change has occurred over the past 30 years.
This means we are now committed to an average temperature rise since the industrial revolution of 1.8°C, but, depending on the actions we take, we could be facing a rise of between 4 and 6.4°C.

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2. "Even if the climate is changing, it's not down to human activity"

In its 2007 assessment report the IPCC stated that:

There is very high confidence, meaning a 9 in 10 chance, that human activities since 1750 have led to global warming. It is very unlikely that the observed warming is due to natural forces alone.

• The concentrations of carbon dioxide (CO2) & methane in the atmosphere, measured in 2005, exceed by far the natural range over the last 650,000 years.
• The primary source of increased atmospheric CO2 is fossil fuel use, while the primary source of increased atmospheric methane is agriculture.

One myth is that solar activity is the main driver of climate change. The Met Office's Hadley Centre for Climate Prediction and Research notes that: "changes in solar activity do affect global temperatures. However, what research also shows is that increased greenhouse gas concentrations have a much greater effect than changes in the Sun's energy over the last 50 years." http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/corporate/pressoffice/myths/index.html

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3. "Scientists don't agree on climate change, and some deny it's a problem, so who should we believe?"

Among the sceptics on climate change, there are a few genuine scientists, but most are not climate change specialists. Many of these sceptics have or do receive money from oil companies and others with vested interests. They receive this money to try and prove that climate change is not related to emissions from human activity.

Of course, not all of the contrarians have been corrupted by oil companies. Some are genuinely convinced (but then some people are also convinced that the events of 11th September 2001 were a hoax). Some have presented themselves as "victims", arguing that throughout history scientists whose views were considered implausible were subsequently proved right. But this is not always quite the case: Galileo, for example, was not condemned by scientists, but by theologians.

Climate change scientists and contrarians do agree on two facts:

• There has been a rise in global temperatures. The IPPC states that: "Warming of the climate system is unequivocal" (IPPC, 2007).
• There has been a rise in CO2 concentrations in the atmosphere.

What the climate change scientists and contrarians disagree on is the link between the two and whether global warming is the result of human activities.

Respected bodies including the IPCC, the Royal Society and the Met Office agree that the global average temperature increase is due to rising concentrations of CO2, and that the primary source for this is burning of fossil fuels - oil, gas, coal. The Royal Society explains that even when all the natural factors which influence climate, such as solar activity and volcanic eruptions, are taken into account, they cannot account for the temperature increases over the past century. It is only when greenhouse gas emissions from human activity are included that they can achieve a correlation with the observed temperature change. By looking at the particles of gas trapped in polar ice cores, scientists can see that the concentration of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere has increased in the past 100 years and the composition of the trapped particles reveals that they are mainly the result of burning fossil fuels, the production of cement and the widespread burning of forests. http://www.royalsoc.ac.uk/page.asp?tip=1&id=6230

Contrarians challenge the correlation between the temperature increase and the concentrations of CO2. One of the main arguments is that during the last ice age, the temperature started to rise before the concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere increased (this is an argument used in the Channel 4 programme, The Great Global Warming Swindle). It is true that initially the temperature started to rise sometime before the increase in CO2 concentrations, but as CO2 concentrations rose they triggered a vicious circle (a "positive feedback") which in turn increased temperatures further.

People are often ready to listen to contrarians and be convinced that science is not clear because this allows them to continue business as usual. We are used to living with cheap, readily available energy, in a society which encourages us to consume ever more. The evidence of climate change and what its mitigation means for our lifestyles is therefore deeply unsettling.

The arguments of contrarians bring to mind biblical stories of prophets trying to awaken the people of Israel to danger, while the people would not listen. We need to consider this: what interests have scientists in raising the alarm? What interest have governments in discussing very unpopular measures like carbon rationing, increase in taxes and duties on petrol and gas, road pricing etc.. And if there were still serious doubts, why would almost all governments agree that climate change is a pressing issue?

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4. "Climate Change may be happening, but it's not as bad as people say. This summer wasn't hot and a drought was predicted"

Climate change does involve an overall increase in the average global temperature. However, it does not mean that every part of the world will be consistently hotter. Climate change means that the whole climate system is being disrupted, involving amongst other things a greater number and severity of extreme weather events and less predictability.

In Britain this summer, we may not have seen a very hot, dry season, but parts of the country were inundated with the worst floods for sixty years. These floods join a pattern of more extreme weather events being experienced across the world.

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5. "Climate Change is a good thing, we can grow grapes in Yorkshire"

The following quote comes from the Royal Society, http://www.royalsoc.ac.uk/page.asp?tip=1&id=6235

"In the short term, some parts of the world could initially benefit from climate change. For example, more northerly regions of the world may experience longer growing seasons for crops and crop yields may increase because increased levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere would have a fertilizing effect on plants.

However the IPCC has pointed out that as climate change progresses it is likely that negative effects would begin to dominate almost everywhere. Increasing temperatures are likely, for example, to increase the frequency and severity of weather events such as heat waves, storms and flooding".

For us in Britain, we might indeed get some short-term benefits from a warmer climate and an extended growing season. But we could also expect more severe storms, floods and droughts as part of the growing pattern of more extreme weather events. We would also see a loss of some of our native species of plants and animals as habitats change.

We also cannot ignore the impacts of climate change on other parts of the world. Africa and Asia in particular are expected to suffer the most extreme effects. The IPCC predicts that by 2020, between 75 million and 250 million people in Africa will be subject to water stress, and that in some countries rain-fed agricultural production will fall by 50% by 2020. For Asia, the IPCC predicts that the loss of freshwater across central, south and east Asia will affect more than one billion people by 2050. If the potential human tragedy of this is not enough to convince us that the disadvantages of climate change far outweigh any short-term benefits, then we must consider the impact of potentially huge numbers of environmental refugees on the world's remaining capacity, and the capacity of nations including Britain.

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6. "There are too many uncertainties about the effects of climate change to justify taking action"

The IPCC's report this year concluded that we are already committed to 1.8°C of warming. Even if we stopped emitting greenhouse gases now, the IPCC makes it clear that warming and sea level rise would continue for centuries owing to the timescales associated with climate processes.

Meanwhile, the international community - governments and NGOs - have rallied round a target for limiting the increase in the global average temperature to 2°C. There are strong scientific reasons for this. First, there is a consensus that once the average temperature rises by more than 2°C the effects will be catastrophic. Even a 2°C rise is enough to make every summer in Europe as hot as in 2003, when 30,000 people died from heatstroke. But don't forget that in a world 2°C hotter, the extreme summers would be even hotter than in 2003. 2°C is also enough to ensure the complete melting of the Greenland ice cap, causing sea levels to rise by 7 metres over the next 2 centuries. And 2°C of warming carries with it a likelihood that one-third of all species on Earth would be driven to extinction as habitats change.

And we must not forget that the IPCC considered a range of outcomes, depending on the action we take, from which 1.8°C of warming was the minimum, but warming of between 4 and 6.4°C possible in the worst case.

In his book Six Degrees, Our future on a hotter planet, Mark Lynas reviewed the predicted consequences of higher temperatures:

• A 3°C rise may be the tipping point where we no longer have the capacity to make any changes to what is happening. It is predicted that drought and heat would render large parts of the planet uninhabitable.
• A 4°C rise introduces the possibility of a further tipping point, where the Siberian permafrost melts releasing methane and CO2 in vast quantities. Melting of the West Antartic ice-shelf would add a further 5 metres to sea levels. An estimated 50% of species on Earth would become extinct.
• A 6.4°C rise implies that warming seas lead to the possible release of methane hydrates trapped in sub-oceanic sediments. The oceans lose their oxygen and turn stagnant. Deserts extend almost to the Arctic. Humanity reduces to a few survivors eking out a living in polar refuges. Most of life on Earth has been snuffed out, as temperatures rise higher than for hundreds of millions of years.

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7. "Technology will provide the answer"

A number of technological fixes have been proposed, such as capturing carbon in the atmosphere and pumping it underground; building hundreds of nuclear power stations; even putting silver foil into space. Some of these options could help as part of a more comprehensive response, but it is wishful thinking to suggest that untested technology will solve the problem.

The real issue here is our cheery reliance on 'progress' and our refusal to acknowledge its dark side. Since the industrial revolution we have believed that our ingenuity alone will make the human condition better and better. However technologies can bring great benefits, some carry intolerable or unknown risks. The environmental crisis shows that technology must be used responsibly, with caution, and with respect for other people and the planet.

In fact no technology will yield adequate reductions in greenhouse gases without changes to lifestyles and the economy. Certainly technological development is important, but with as few as ten years to go before we reach dangerous concentrations of greenhouse gases, we cannot afford to run the risk of technology failing to deliver.

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8. "Climate Change is a problem, but it would cost more to do anything about it than to live with it"

This kind of argument implies that we can live with unchecked climate change and that there is, therefore, a valid choice about whether to take action or not. This is evidently not the case for the vast majority of the human population. Unchecked climate change will lead to:

• increases in temperature which will, through melting of ice caps, flood major cities at or near coasts, including London and New York,
• food and water insecurity for billions of people, especially in Africa and Asia, with concomitant migrations of people and pressure on a reduced amount of productive land worldwide,
• more prevalent extremes in weather events with associated costs and dangers, and mass extinction of plant and animal species. Mass extinction is a problem because entire ecosystems will collapse. Even if some people do not put a high value on the intrinsic worth of ecosystems, this will further limit food supplies (eg: as fish stocks collapse and land becomes unproductive as diversity falls) and medicinal capability.

The UK government commissioned a Review on the Economics of Climate Change, which was produced by Sir Nicholas Stern in October 2006. This highly regarded document found that "the evidence gathered by the Review leads to a simple conclusion: the benefits of strong, early action considerably outweigh the costs." The Review also notes that "Uncertainty is an argument for a more not less demanding goal because of the size of the adverse climate change impacts in the worse case scenarios."

Some, such as Lord Lawson of Blaby, former Chancellor of the Exchequer, claim that as future generations will be richer as a result of economic growth, they, not us, should shoulder any costs from tackling climate change. But of course, if we wait, we are at ever greater risk of passing climatic tipping points which will mean that our children and grandchildren will not have the luxury of choosing to avoid catastrophic climate change however much they are willing to pay.

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9. "We shouldn't worry about emissions, we can offset them"

In recent years, carbon offsetting has become big business. But planting trees does not tackle the root cause of climate change - the release of carbon dioxide through burning fossil fuels, nor could it ever hope to take place on a scale commensurate with the scale of emissions. And there is evidence that apart from areas near to the equator, forestry actually increases warming because canopies trap more heat than the trees prevent from absorbing carbon dioxide. In higher latitudes, planting trees reduces the important 'albedo' effect, which is responsible for reflecting heat from the Earth's surface.
Dr Kevin Anderson of the well respected Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research has described offsetting schemes as a dangerous delaying technique, diverting attention from the meaningful action required to cut emissions radically.

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10. "The UK only produces a tiny amount of carbon dioxide emissions compared with China so we aren't the problem and anything we do is a drop in the ocean"

We often hear it said that the UK only emits around 2% of the world's carbon dioxide every year. In the words of the previous Prime Minister:

"[If] we shut down all of Britain's emissions tomorrow, the growth in China will make up the difference within two years. So we've got to be realistic about how much obligation we've got to put on ourselves."
Tony Blair, Christmas 2006 (cited in Christian Aid, Coming Clean: Revealing the UK's true carbon footprint)

Christian Aid's report Coming Clean: Revealing the UK's true carbon footprint, describes how the figure of 2% is a gross underestimate because it takes no account of UK business activities abroad. So, for example, it takes no account of the emissions from the production and transportation of green beans grown in Kenya purely for UK consumption. Nor does it take account of the activities of British businesses abroad, the profits from which are repatriated to the UK. One estimate cited by Christian Aid suggests that the real figure for the UK is closer to 12-15% of the world's total CO2 emissions.

Quite apart from UK's emissions as a country, the truth is that the average UK citizen emits far far more every year than a Chinese, Indian or African person. On average, a Briton emits 9.5 tonnes of CO2 every year, an American emits 20 tonnes, a Chinese emits around 3.5 tonnes, an Indian emits 1 tonne, and a Kenyan emits one-third of a tonne.

What we have been talking about above are the flows of emissions every year. However, the impact we are seeing on the climate now largely comes from the stock of emissions parked in the atmosphere over the past 150-200 years of industrial activity. The Earth's natural systems have not been able to absorb all that we have been emitting over that time, so a good proportion of the greenhouse gases have been left building up in concentration in the atmosphere. This build up of gases is the stock.

The UK was the leader of the industrial revolution. Figures from the World Resources Institute show that the UK ranks as the 6th biggest contributor to cumulative emissions between 1850 and 2002. High income countries together account for 76% of the world's emissions between 1850 and 2002. And even though the share of emissions from high income countries has been falling in recent decades, between 1990 and 2002, they still accounted for 61% of the world's total. This gives rich nations such as Britain the moral duty to stand up to their responsibility and take the lead on implementing change to combat climate change.

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11. "Climate change is a huge problem, it is too difficult to tackle and probably too late to stop it"

Operation Noah firmly believes that while it is too late to prevent some impacts from global warming, it is certainly not too late to prevent the potential catastrophic effects. There can be no doubt that the action required to cut emissions deeply will mean radical changes in economies and lifestyles in wealthy countries like Britain. However, we see this as an exciting opportunity as well as a challenge. It is an opportunity to regain a stronger sense of community and well-being, where we can move away from pressure to achieve high levels of consumption, and live healthier more sustainable lives, in greater harmony with the environment we depend on and with a greater level of social, economic and political justice for all people.

Our consumerist lifestyles can very often make us feel guilty, and disempowered. Taking refuge in guilt makes us feel miserable generally. But more seriously, we can use it as an anaesthetic from the effects of what is going on around us.

A far healthier approach is accept our responsibility to ourselves, to our children and our grandchildren without a sense of guilt, change the way we see the world, and ourselves as part of it, and to welcome the opportunities that this new vision brings for ourselves and others.

As Christians, we come together in the spirit of hope we are enjoined with the moral imperative to protect God's creation and ensure equity and fairness for the people of the world today and for future generations.

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