Under Court Orders, White House Releases Report Backing Climate Change Warnings. By Margot Roosevelt and Kenneth R. Weiss, LATimes, May 30, 2008. "President Bush's top science advisors issued a comprehensive reprot [Summary and Findings, PDF 4 pp] Thursday that for the first time endorses what most scientific experts have long asserted: that greenhouse gases from fossil fuel combustion 'are very likely the single largest cause' of Earth's warming. The 271-page report [Scientific Assessment of the Effects of Global Change on the United States, PDF] could undercut opposition to the more aggressive provisions of climate legislation, which is to be debated in the Senate next week. The Bush administration had long resisted a congressional mandate, the 1990 Global Change Research Act, requiring the White House to report every four years on the science and impact of global warming and other environmental forces. A U.S. District Court in August ordered Bush to comply with a 2004 deadline for an updated report, after the Tucson-based Center for Biological Diversity and other environmental groups filed suit... The report by the National Science and Technology Council and the U.S. Climate Change Science Program asserts that natural causes alone cannot explain recent extremes of heat and cold, warming seas and an increase in the frequency and intensity of hurricanes... The warming climate also will accelerate the spread of diseases carried by water, food and insects. Among the most vulnerable people are the young, elderly, frail and poor, the administration's scientists concluded.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment