Government Scientists Spread Ice Melt Myths

A good example of why an independent, non-governmental climate science organization is needed as an alternative to government controlled research was provided this week by researchers working for the U.S. and British governments.

Researchers with the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) and the British Antarctic Survey reported this week that global warming is causing Antarctic ice shelves to disappear. 

"The loss of ice shelves is evidence of the effects of global warming," USGS scientist and lead author Jane Ferrigno is quoted in USA Today.

While it is true that some ice shelves in Antarctica are fracturing and falling into the sea, such events are natural occurrences whether the ice sheet is expanding or contracting. And, as objective data report, Antarctic temperatures are cooling and the Antarctic ice sheet as a whole is expanding.

Satellite instruments measuring atmospheric temperatures between latitudes 60 degrees and 90 degrees south show temperatures have been steadily declining since the satellites were first launched in 1979. During the past 30 years, Antarctic temperatures have fallen by 0.3 degrees Celsius, the satellite instruments report.

Similarly, satellite instruments measuring the extent of the Antarctic ice sheet report the sheet has been at record extent for much of the past three years, and has been growing steadily since 1979.

University of Arizona atmospheric science professor William Sprigg, who chaired the International Technical Review Panel for the IPCC’s first report, told an environmental conference in Phoenix earlier this month that a new research body independent of government funding and government control should be created to serve as an alternative voice to the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and other national climate research programs. The misleading claims regarding Antarctic ice sheets by U.S. and British government scientists perfectly illustrate this point.

Finding isolated instances of ice sheets calving and falling into the sea may help federal agencies justify their enormous and ever-growing climate budgets, but it does not prove that global warming is causing the Antarctic ice sheet to disappear. In the real world the very opposite is happening, and all too often it takes an independent voice to point this out.