The world’s largest scientific society, the American Association for the Advancement of Science, joined the public debate on global climate change Sunday at its annual meeting, issuing a statement of consensus that said, in part, “The evidence is clear: global climate change caused by human activities is occurring now and is a growing threat to society.”

The society issued the statement just weeks after the International Panel on Climate Change issued its most recent report on human-induced global warming due to the burning of fossil fuels.

“Scientists are observing the rapid melting of glaciers, destabilization of major ice sheets, rising sea levels, shifts in species ranges and increased frequency of weather extremes,” said John P. Holdren, director of the Woods Hole Research Center and AAAS president, according to the Associated Press, other news sources and the press release.

Concern focuses on carbon dioxide and other gases produced by burning fossil fuels and other processes, which accumulate in the atmosphere and trap heat from the sun, much like a greenhouse, warming the climate.

“The longer we wait to tackle climate change, the harder and more expensive the task will be,” the group said.

Holdren noted that some of the most dramatic changes are occurring in the far North where warming has occurred more rapidly than in other areas. Retreating sea ice and rising sea level are driving some natives from their villages, the group said.

On Feb. 2 the Intergovernmental Panel in Climate Change reported that global warming is so severe that it will “continue for centuries,” leading to a far different planet in 100 years.

The panel, established by the United Nations, concluded that global warming is “very likely” caused by man, meaning more than 90 percent certain.

If nothing is done to change current emissions patterns of greenhouse gases, global temperature could increase as much as 11 degrees Fahrenheit by 2100, the report said.

AAAS was founded in 1848. It reports that it serves 262 affiliated societies and academies of science, reaching 10 million individuals.

Find out more at the group’s Website: American Association for the Advancement of Science.

Scientists and economists have been offered $10,000 each by a lobby group funded by one of the world’s largest oil companies to undermine a major climate change report published today, according to the UK Guardian newspaper.

Scientists Offered Cash to Dispute Climate Study

Letters sent by the American Enterprise Institute (AEI), an ExxonMobil-funded thinktank with close links to the Bush administration, offered the payments for articles that emphasise the shortcomings of a report from the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). Travel expenses and additional payments were also offered.

The AEI has received more than $1.6 million from ExxonMobil and more than 20 of its staff have worked as consultants to the Bush administration. Lee Raymond, a former head of ExxonMobil, is the vice-chairman of AEI’s board of trustees.

The UN report was written by international experts and is widely regarded as the most comprehensive review yet of climate change science … (more below) and even more …

So much for Alabama weatherman James Spann’s rant about scientists making money to say there IS “man-made” global warming…

ExxonMobil announced Thursday it made $39.5 billion in profits last year, breaking its own world record for 2005 of $36.1 billion - the most profits ever made by a company in a single year.

Exxon Mobil Posts Record Annual Profit

Unfortunately, according to the Exxpose Exxon Coalition, CEO Rex Tillerson is poised to pump most of that money right back into polluting oil and gas projects, lobbying against solutions to global warming, and funding front groups and junk science.

If ExxonMobil invested less than one month of its 2006 profits in renewable energy like wind, solar, or biomass, it would have more than doubled all federal spending last year on renewable energy, fuel efficiency and alternative fuels combined ($1.8 billion).

Unlike its competitors, ExxonMobil is avidly opposed to renewable energy. In Davos last week, CEO Rex Tillerson told the business crowd that “even if renewable energy production grows at double digit rates, it will remain less than 2 percent of world energy supplies.” But current calculations by the Renewable Energy Policy Network calculate that renewable energy already supplies roughly 4 percent of world power.

DAVOS Exxon Mobil CEO sees 2030 world energy consumption up 50 pct

That ExxonMobil’s predictions on renewable energy are notoriously off-base is not surprising given that up until just recently ExxonMobil has denied that global warming is even a serious problem. Now, after being battered for a year and a half by hundreds of thousands of Exxpose Exxon activists and coalition members, ExxonMobil has begun to shift its rhetoric - not its policies, but its rhetoric.

The good news is that Exxon finally admitted recently that somebody should do something about global warming. The bad news is they refuse to recognize that they are that somebody…
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Global Warming Report to be Released on Friday

The most authoritative report on climate change is using the strongest wording ever on the source of global warming, saying it is “very likely” caused by humans and already is leading to killer heat waves and stronger hurricanes, delegates who have seen the report said Thursday according to the AP.

Dozens of scientists and bureaucrats from 113 countries are editing the new report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change in closed-door meetings in Paris. Their report, which must be unanimously approved, is to be released Friday and is considered an authoritative document that could influence government and industrial policy worldwide.

As the delegates hold their evening session, the Eiffel Tower, other Paris monuments and concerned citizens in several European countries were expected to switch off their lights for five minutes to call attention to energy conservation, heeding a call by French environmental campaigners.

Also, Global warming has made stronger hurricanes, including those in the Atlantic such as Katrina, the authoritative panel on climate change has concluded for the first time.

Global Warming Linked to Stronger Hurricanes

Eiffel Tower photo

Eiffel Tower Web Cam