Climate change policies questioned

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Published: July 10, 2008

If you need an example of how global warming policies are foolhardy and hazardous to the planet, look no further than biofuel subsidies, says National Post columnist Lawrence Solomon.

“We’re getting food riots because of our attempts to convert our food lands into fuel lands,” said Solomon, noting that he’s not against biofuel, but the subsidies. “Without subsidizing biofuel, we’d find the right balance between food and fuel uses.”

Solomon presented his arguments against global warming policies during a June 26 speech in Winnipeg to promote his new book The Deniers. The book and its wordy subtitle, The world-renowned scientists who stood up against global warming hysteria, political persecution, and fraud, is a compilation of Solomon’s articles on global warming.

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For his columns and the subsequent book, Solomon interviewed dozens of prominent scientists who are critical of conventional scientific wisdom.

At a luncheon hosted by the Frontier Centre for Public Policy, a conservative think-tank, Solomon told an audience of 75 that world governments are pushing ahead with Kyoto and other policies to curb global warming, in the face of the reality that the science on global warming is not settled.

“Our governments are prepared to spend hundreds of billions of dollars on the assumption that we know what will happen,” said Solomon, who also shared his ideas in Calgary and Regina. “We think we’re doing good, but we’re actually doing a lot of harm.”

Solomon doesn’t deny that the planet is warming. His grievance is with scientists and international agencies that constantly sing the same tune; that man-made greenhouse gases are solely behind climate change.

Following his speech, 15 members of the audience lined up for signed copies of Solomon’s book, praising him for telling the real story behind climate change.

One of Solomon’s critics, however, is not convinced that the author is presenting the real or full story.

“None of his deniers actually deny global warming…. And on page 64 of his book he says… that none of them deny that the climate is changing and humans are responsible,” said Richard Littlemore, editor of DeSmogBlog, a blog he says attempts to clarify the climate change debate.

Solomon’s scientists quibble over narrow details of climate change research, which is legitimate, Littlemore said. But to present their arguments as questioning the validity of all global warming research is irresponsible journalism, he said.

Solomon has been executive director of Energy Probe for the last few decades, an Ontario based environmental group that opposes nuclear energy and massive hydro dams.

About the author

Robert Arnason

Robert Arnason

Reporter

Robert Arnason is a reporter with The Western Producer and Glacier Farm Media. Since 2008, he has authored nearly 5,000 articles on anything and everything related to Canadian agriculture. He didn’t grow up on a farm, but Robert spent hundreds of days on his uncle’s cattle and grain farm in Manitoba. Robert started his journalism career in Winnipeg as a freelancer, then worked as a reporter and editor at newspapers in Nipawin, Saskatchewan and Fernie, BC. Robert has a degree in civil engineering from the University of Manitoba and a diploma in LSJF – Long Suffering Jets’ Fan.

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