Cars Cause Global Warming – is the myth about to be debunked?

Is the global warming myth about to be debunked?

Our views are well known on the whole climate change and ‘Cars kill the Planet’ ethos that has become received wisdom in the last decade. It isn’t a popular view and, in the eyes of many, is akin to being a holocaust denier. But we see no sense in the arguments that exist which claim we are ruining the planet by pumping CO2 in to the atmosphere.

The counter argument to the man-made global warming is that the recent increase in CO2 is as a result of solar activity. This is a theory that is solidly based on facts garnered from ice cores. The levels of CO2 have varied throughout the life of planet earth, all without the input of man. In fact, levels of CO2 in the atmosphere have been as much as seven times current levels. But the planet didn’t die. CO2 increases when solar activity increases as plant life needs extra CO2 to thrive in warmer conditions. But it doesn’t destroy the planet. And how naive are we if we think that the fraction of 1% that is man-made global warming gases are capable of skewing the earth’s atmosphere?

We wouldn’t go so far as to suggest that there is a conspiracy theory to be looked at with Governments making huge gains from taxation based on emissions taxes. Or that it’s a way for Western Governments to reduce the West’s reliance on oil without antagonising the oil producing countries. However, they certainly have a vested interest. But a report that the EPA (Environmental Protection Agency) in America has just published has been outed as a fake by a ‘Deep Throat’ at the EPA, who claims the report is a sham.

But this is no ‘Shrinking Violet’ Deep Throat. He’s stood up to be counted. Al Carlin – an EPA Director and author of the report – has come out and stated publicly that the report attributed to him and the agency is not the one he wrote. He says his findings were not politically expedient, so they were suppressed. So what were Al’s findings?

1. There is currently no reason to regulate CO2 emissions
2. Global temperatures are roughly where they were in the mid-20th century
3. Temperatures are not going up – if anything they are now going down
4. Atlantic Hurricanes are unaffected
5. There is little evidence that Greenland is shedding ice at the levels reported
6. Solar radiation has the single largest effect on the earth’s temperature

Now whether this report will stay buried, or whether we will all start to wake up to the reality remains to be seen. But instead of being fixated on the CO2 emissions of cars we should in fact be looking at the NOx emissions and other polluting problems with cars.

Whatever the CO2 debate we do need to get away from our reliance on oil. Some of the Hybrid technology that has come to be because of the CO2 fixation is a good step, but not in the form it takes in the Prius – which is just a superannuated milk float – but in the work companies like Porsche are doing with the Cayenne Hybrid, which gives V8 performance in an economical package that is still enjoyable to drive. Equally, the high efficiency diesel engines that are starting to be a big part of the market offer much less reliance on oil as they are so economical (but paradoxically their NOx emissions are much higher than petrol or Hybrid).

Long term, our reliance on oil can only be changed by investing in nuclear or solar energy to produce electricity, and utilise that electricity to power hydrogen fuel cell vehicles.

But that’s a completely different debate to CO2 emissions.