Heavyweight attack on climate-change denial

Britain, currently chairing the G8 group of countries, has set an agenda for its term that highlights the problems of climate change as a result of emission of greenhouse gases. While there is still some scepticism about climate change, particularly in the US, the British prime minister, Tony Blair, is determined to flag up the issue and some senior scientists have also been outspoken about the problem. Blair initiated a meeting earlier this month to bring together scientists working on climate change further to bolster the seriousness of the situation. Meanwhile, Robert May, president of the Royal Society and a former chief scientific adviser to the British government has written warning of climate change scepticism. In the Guardian, he said: “The UK has become a target because the government has made climate change a focus of its G8 presidency this year. A key player in this decision is chief scientific adviser Sir David King, who became public enemy number one for the denial lobby when he described climate change as a bigger threat than terrorism.” In December, a UK-based group, the Scientific Alliance, teamed up with the George C. Marshall Institute, a body headed by the chairman emeritus of the Global Climate Coalition, described by May as a lobby of professional sceptics, to publish a document with the innocuous title Climate Issues & Questions. “It plays up the uncertainties surrounding climate change science, playing down the likely impact it will have,” writes May. But he has no doubt about the potential impact of greenhouse gases. “It contrasts sharply with the findings of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the world’s most reliable source of information on the effects of greenhouse gas emissions. In its last major report in 2001, the IPCC adopted an evidence-based approach to climate change and considered uncertainties on impact. It concluded that “overall, Feature