Global Warming - Myth or Reality?: The Erring Ways of Climatology (Springer Praxis Books Environmental Sciences)

Features

• Cover Type: Hard Cover with 510 pages
• Published by: Springer
• Edition: 1st Edition August 22, 2005
• Written in: English
• ISBN 10 Number: 354023909X
• ISBN 13 Number: 978-3540239093
• Book Dimensions: 9.6 x 6.9 x 1.1 inches
• Weighs: 2.4 pounds

Product Description


In the global-warming debate, definitive answers to questions about ultimate causes and effects remain elusive. In Global Warming: Myth or Reality? Marcel Leroux seeks to separate fact from fiction in this critical debate from a climatological perspective. Beginning with a review of the dire hypotheses for climate trends, the author describes the history of the 1998 Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and many subsequent conferences. He discusses the main conclusions of the three IPCC reports and the predicted impact on global temperatures, rainfall, weather and climate, while highlighting the mounting confusion and sensationalism of reports in the media. After taking a hard look at the reality of the greenhouse effect, the ‘evidence’ from climate models, and the models’ limitations, Leroux postulates alternate causes of climate change and analyzes the trends for global temperatures, rainfall patterns, and sea level. He poses the ‘heretical’ question if warming may be considered a benefit in some regions. Finally Leroux suggests a number of priorities for climatologists to better understand processes of climate change, to integrate them into climate models, and to predict accurately future changes in climate. This timely and controversial book lays out the scientific case of the sizable skeptical scientific community who challenge the accepted wisdom.

Reader Reviews
Aside from the first four chapters (which provide an excellent, if strident, history of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change), this is a thorough text book on climate analysis for the layman. It develops a cogent theory of how the atmosphere works and explains each of the issues involved from the eccentricity of the earth's orbit, the tilt of the poles, the impact of the solar cycle, to a detailed look at the defects in climate modeling and how one might expect the atmosphere to react if, indeed, the earth were warming or cooling. Great care is taken to explain the impact of each of the green house gases (including the most significant, water vapor, and how its omission from IPCC studies impacts the conclusions). Not light reading, but well worth the effort.