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Let me state right up front that I am not a scientist. I am an ordinary guy who got interested in climate change because I worry about what kind of world I will be leaving to my grandchildren. What I know I have learned from a growing list of books and from a wide range of internet sources.
One of the more interesting things I didn't know before I got into this is how far back the science goes on the green house effect. I guess I just figured that the whole concept was something that arose on fairly recent times, but the core discovery was made in 1859 by a scientist named John Tyndall.
Something of a polymath, Tyndall got interested in the work of a fellow scientist named Joseph Fourier who discovered that the amount of heat energy coming into Earth from the Sun did not gibe with the actual temperature of the Earth. Earth was hotter than it should have been, and he couldn't figure out why.
Tyndall solved the problem in a series of classic experiments that proved conclusively that water vapor and trace amounts of other substances, including carbon dioxide and methane, were preventing the energy from the sun's light (infrared light) from leaving the earth's atmosphere. It was kind of like the Hotel California: Sunlight could enter but some of it could never leave.
Mind you, this is 1859 we are talking about. The effect of carbon dioxide on infrared light is settled science that has been known for 150 years. And we also know that carbon dioxide levels have risen steadily since the Industrial Revolution. Hmm, there might be a dot or two ripe for the connecting, don't you think?
Why, then, do we keep hearing CO2 is not a pollutant? Maybe it's because such statements serve the purpose of politicians who are looking for a reason not to vote on legislation to slow down global warming; legislation that is expensive, that causes pain to big money supporters, and that solves a problem that is still decades in the future.
This is unappealing to legislators anywhere in the world. They prefer issues that provide immediate benefits to their constituents, preferably right before the next election. And God forbid that a problem might entail such unpleasantness as increased expenditures that might raise taxes. If it is absolutely unavoidable, then they will structure the legislation to front-load the goodies and put all the pain at the back-end in the out-years, the further out the better.
Global warming deniers give politicians cover to do what they really like to do: nothing. And why not? Hey, it's not like global warming is going to bite them in the ass while they are in office. Of course, their grandchildren may not be too happy about it, but that's their problem.
This essay first appeared on http://www.PlanetRestart.org
