Global Warming Science: www.appinsys.com/GlobalWarming
Human Impact of Global Warming Grossly Exaggerated by the Shadow U.N.
[last update: 2009/06/04]
The Global Humanitarian Forum (GHF) released (29 May 2009) a report on the “Human Impact of Climate Change”
(called “The Anatomy of a Silent Crisis”). They don’t let science get in the way of their agenda.
This document examines the claims made in the GHF report as well as taking a brief look at the GHF itself.
Within this document “text in this format“ is quoted from the Human Impact report.
- The Human Impact Report – their propaganda compared to facts
- The Global Humanitarian Forum – UN and former UN people - their goal is to impose a global carbon tax
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This section examines some of the specific statements made in the report and compares them with the actual scientific data.
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Kofi Annan, the president of the GHF, wrote the report introduction – “Message from the President” in which he makes the following statement: “Ninety-nine percent of all casualties occur in developing countries. A stark contrast to the one percent of global emissions attributable to some 50 of the least developed nations. If all countries were to pollute so little, there would be no climate change.”
This is in contradiction to the United Nations Food and Agriculture statement in a 2006 release: “Most people assume that global warming is caused by burning oil and gas. But in fact between 25 and 30 percent of the greenhouse gases released into the atmosphere each year – 1.6 billion tonnes – is caused by deforestation. … ” [http://www.fao.org/newsroom/en/news/2006/1000385/index.html]. The same U.N. FAO release states: “Delegates of the 46 developing countries present at the Rome workshop signalled their readiness to act on deforestation, 80 percent of which is due to increased farmland to feed growing populations. … But they also stressed that they needed financial help from the developed world to do the job.”
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The Executive Summary states: “Already today, hundreds of thousands of lives are lost every year due to climate change. This will rise to roughly half a million in 20 years. Over nine in ten deaths are related to gradual environmental degradation due to climate change – principally malnutrition, diarrhoea, malaria…It is a grave global justice concern that those who suffer most from climate change have done the least to cause it. … Climate change threatens sustainable development and all eight Millennium Development Goals. … climate change is already responsible for forcing some fifty million additional people to go hungry and driving over ten million additional people into extreme poverty.”
What the report reiterates many times is: African countries and other poor nations need more money and they are all dying due to CO2. But this doesn’t match reality. The following figure shows the global temperature change from 1978 to 2006 from satellite data [http://climate.uah.edu/25yearbig.jpg].
The following figure is from the UN IPCC Fourth Assessment Report (AR4) Figure 9.6 (2007). It shows the change in temperature (C per decade) by latitude. The black line shows the observed temperature, the blue band shows the output of the computer models including only natural factors, whereas the pink band shows the output of computer models including anthropogenic CO2. Notice that the models without CO2 (blue shaded area) can explain all of the warming for most of the world up to 30 degrees north latitude, including Africa. In addition, the warming in the tropics is minimal.
There has been no warming in Africa for more than 10 years. The following figure shows the average temperature anomalies for three regions of Africa from the Hadley CRUTEM3 database (used by the IPCC) and plotted at the Royal Netherlands Meteorological Institute [http://climexp.knmi.nl/selectfield_obs.cgi?someone@somewhere] for 1998 to 2008.
The following figure is from the United Nations UNEP [http://maps.grida.no/go/graphic/losses-in-land-productivity-due-to-land-degradation] showing a substantial increase in global productivity from 1981 – 2003. This shows substantially more increase in productivity than decrease, especially in north-central and west Africa.
As described at rainforest site Mongabay [http://rainforests.mongabay.com/20afrotropical.htm]: “Sub-Saharan Africa has long been considered one of the poorest regions on earth despite its rich biological diversity and mineral wealth. The poor turn to the forests for subsistence agriculture, the collection of fuelwood, and the poaching of forest animals for food. The rapid population growth of the region—among the highest in the world—combined with high rates of urbanization have promoted these unsustainable activities by creating demand for bushmeat, fuelwood, and other forest products. Fuelwood makes up more than 8o percent of the total roundwood produced in the region.”
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Africa - Reduced Agricultural Yields: “Climate change is projected to be at the root of hunger and malnutrition for about 45 million people, as a result of reduced agricultural yields of cereals, fruits, vegetables, livestock and dairy, as well as the cash crops like cotton and fish which generate income. For example, drought hurts crops in Africa where over 90 percent of farmers are small scale and about 65 percent of people’s primary source of income is agriculture. … In some parts of Africa climate change is expected to reduce yield up to 50 percent by 2020.”
A United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) report in 2006 (“Climate Change and Variability in the Sahel Region: Impacts and Adaptation Strategies in the Agricultural Sector”) [http://www.unep.org/Themes/Freshwater/Documents/pdf/ClimateChangeSahelCombine.pdf] states: “The increase in aggregate food production (per capita food production has been declining due to rapid population growth), which has been observed in the Sahel and many other parts of sub-Saharan Africa since the early 1980s, has primarily been driven by the continued expansion of the cultivated areas“. The following figures are from that report:
Since the 1980s, the vegetation has been increasing in the Sahel. The following figure shows the Normalized Difference Vegetation Index (NDVI), showing substantial increases throughout most of the region. [http://www.eoearth.org/article/Greening_of_the_Sahel]. Temperatures in the Sahel are similar to the 1930s.
NDVI (Normalized Difference Vegetation Index) 1982 - 1999
The Sahel region had a long period of declining rainfall from the early 1950s to the 1980s, with increasing rainfall since 1985, as shown in the following figure showing deviation from mean precipitation for 1900 to 2000 [http://www.eoearth.org/article/Greening_of_the_Sahel].
Sahel Rainfall and number of stations providing data
The following figure is from a study (“Impact of Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillations on India/Sahel Rainfall and Atlantic Hurricanes” - Zhang and Delwoth, Geophysical Research Letters, Vol. 33, 2006 [http://www.gfdl.noaa.gov/reference/bibliography/2006/roz0603.pdf]) showing the correspondence between the AMO (top) and the Sahel rainfall (bottom).
See also: http://www.appinsys.com/GlobalWarming/RS_Kenya.htm http://www.appinsys.com/GlobalWarming/RS_Sahel.htm http://www.appinsys.com/GlobalWarming/RS_EastAfrica.htm http://www.appinsys.com/GlobalWarming/RS_Malawi.htm http://www.appinsys.com/GlobalWarming/ReutersAfrica.htm
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Ghana: Case study: “In a survey of 203 internal migrants from north-west Ghana, the vast majority mentioned environmental reasons for leaving their homes. The respondents – settler farmers living in rural areas of Brong Ahafo Region in Central Ghana – said they decided to migrate because of scarcity of fertile land, unreliable rainfall, low crop yields and/or food security problems.“
According to Poverty Environment Net [http://www.povertyenvironment.net/?q=ghana_in_the_fight_against_desertification_and_drought]: “In Ghana, about 35% of the land surface experiences severe erosion and loss of productivity through deforestation and land degradation, amounting to a 4% loss of Gross Domestic Product (GDP). It has also been estimated that the original 8.2 million hectares of the closed forest in Ghana have been destroyed, leaving about 1.962 million hectares. Desertification in Ghana has come about as a result of population growth, deforestation, high incidence of bushfires and inappropriate land use practices, such as the slash and burn system of agriculture, which has caused the expansion of the savannah zone across the deciduous forest zone to the high rain forest ecozone.”
Mongabay, which monitors rainforests [http://rainforests.mongabay.com/deforestation/2000/Ghana.htm] states: “Between 1990 and 2000, Ghana lost an average of 135,400 hectares of forest per year. The amounts to an average annual deforestation rate of 1.82%. Between 2000 and 2005, the rate of forest change increased by 4.2% to 1.89% per annum. In total, between 1990 and 2005, Ghana lost 25.9% of its forest cover, or around 1,931,000 hectares. Measuring the total rate of habitat conversion (defined as change in forest area plus change in woodland area minus net plantation expansion) for the 1990-2005 interval, Ghana lost 27.6% of its forest and woodland habitat.”
According to National Geographic: [http://www.nationalgeographic.com/eye/deforestation/effect.html]: “Rain forests help generate rainfall in drought-prone countries elsewhere. Studies have shown that destruction of rain forests in such West African countries as Nigeria, Ghana, and Côte d’Ivoire may have caused two decades of droughts in the interior of Africa, with attendant hardship and famine.”
“The rate of deforestation in Ghana is alarming and urgent steps need to be taken to reverse the trend, Robert D. Mann, a British tropical agriculturist, has warned. He says, "There will be further disintegration of the local climate, deterioration of soil fertility and reduced food-crop production, if the present trend of denudation by felling trees and uncontrolled bush fires is not halted and reversed."” [http://db.jhuccp.org/ics-wpd/exec/icswppro.dll?BU=http://db.jhuccp.org/ics-wpd/exec/icswppro.dll&QF0=DocNo&QI0=075326&TN=Popline&AC=QBE_QUERY&MR=30%25DL=1&&RL=1&&RF=LongRecordDisplay&DF=LongRecordDisplay]
The following figures show annual temperature and precipitation anomalies for Ghana. Recent warming is similar to the 1930s, except that now the deforestation and increased population are making the effects worse. Developed country CO2? – Not a factor here.
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Uganda: Case study: “Perpetual droughts have plagued Uganda since the 1960s, usually occurring every 5 to 10 years. However, drought frequency and intensity is rapidly worsening as the country experienced drought seven times between 1991 and 2000 … Over 80 percent of Uganda’s 31 million people rely on rain-fed subsistence farming“
According to the CIA factbook [https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/geos/ug.html]: Uganda is slightly smaller than Oregon (USA), with 32 million people, 50% of whom are 14 years old or younger, and a birth rate of 6.8 children per woman, 87% rural population.
Global Envision: “Ugandan Forests In Danger” [http://www.globalenvision.org/library/1/1537] states: “The country's forests are disappearing at an alarming rate of 2% per year, the highest in the world. Six thousand hectares of trees are being cut down every month, 72,000 hectares in 2006. At this pace, Uganda's forests will have gone in 50 years. … With 7.1 births per woman, Uganda has the second highest fertility rate in the world. Only Niger, with 7.9 births per woman, scores higher. By 2050, according to the UN, Uganda's population will have soared to 130 million. Presently, 97% of the population uses charcoal and firewood for cooking. … Deforestation leads to climate change and drought.”
Deforestation: The hidden cause of global warming (Daniel Howden, 2007/05/14: [http://environment.independent.co.uk/climate_change/article2539349.ece]: “In the next 24 hours, deforestation will release as much CO2 into the atmosphere as 8 million people flying from London to New York. Stopping the loggers is the fastest and cheapest solution to climate change. So why are global leaders turning a blind eye to this crisis? …The accelerating destruction of the rainforests that form a precious cooling band around the Earth's equator, is now being recognised as one of the main causes of climate change. Carbon emissions from deforestation far outstrip damage caused by planes and automobiles and factories ...deforestation accounts for up to 25 per cent of global emissions of heat-trapping gases, while transport and industry account for 14 per cent each; and aviation makes up only 3 per cent of the total”
A UNEP spokesman: “Contrary to conventional wisdom, an estimated 62 percent of precipitation occurs over land as a result of evapotranspiration from lakes and wetlands and dense vegetation, particularly forests, which pump ground water into the sky.” [http://www.irinnews.org/report.aspx?reportid=61528]
The following figures show annual temperature and precipitation anomalies for Uganda. One problem with this area is the lack of data – maintaining climate observation stations in Uganda is a problem unto itself. A degree of warming? With the degree of population growth and deforestation occurring here, the environmental problems are clearly produced locally.
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Peru: One person’s anecdote: “Pablo Huerta Mandez, Peru is a farmer on the Andean slopes. “But it barely rains, now. Year by year it’s less and less. I’ve farmed here for 10 years and there is more heat, which affects the plants and causes plagues. If the weather continues like this, maybe people will only be able to cultivate half their land. The flow might decrease, and water might dry out because of the heat. We’re very worried about climate change.”“
The following figures show temperature anomalies (top from the Hadley CRUTEM3) and precipitation anomalies (bottom from the Hadley CRU TS3 precipitation) plotted at KNMI [http://climexp.knmi.nl/selectfield_obs.cgi?someone@somewhere]. While the GHF prefers anecdotes to science, Peru has neither warming nor reduced rainfall.
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Himalaya Glaciers: “As temperature rises globally, glaciers around the world are melting at an alarming and ever accelerating rate. … For example, the Himalaya glaciers may completely disappear as early as 2030 as about 7 percent of its ice is melting away each year … The Ganges River flows through Northern India and Bangladesh and alone supplies a population of over 407 million people with water.“
The following figure shows a composite image showing retreat of the Gangotri Glacier terminus in the Garhwal Himalaya since 1780 [http://nsidc.org/glims/glaciermelt/index.html] It shows how the Himalayan glaciers have been shrinking since the Little Ice Age in the 1700s.
The Times of India reported the following (Mar 2008): “Contrary to what prophets of doom contend, that Gangotri will disappear in the next 30 to 40 years, some of India’s leading scientists believe there's no immediate or even medium-term threat to the glacier that feeds one of India's greatest rivers, Ganga. Gangotri's drawdown - 20 metres per annum in the '70s - is now mere six metres a year. Bhagirath Khadak in the Himalayas was retreating at 12 m annually but last year it didn't recede at all. Machoi in Jammu & Kashmir has showed no change since 1957. Same is true of Siachen and Kagriz in Ladakh, according to the Geological Survey of India. Even if Gangotri retreats at 20 m per annum, it will last for 1,500 years, according to V K Raina, chairman, Monitoring Committee on Himalayan Glaciology. "The discharge in Ganga had increased in 2001 when there was heavy snowfall. Raina, also a former deputy director general of GSI, said doomsayers have based their claims of a much shorter life of Gangotri on the basis of reduction in discharge of water from the glacier into the Ganga. But, he said, the glacier contributes only 25% to river discharge - the remaining 75% depends on snowfall and rainwater. This year, too, the snowfall's been heavy, hence the discharge will increase," he said. Not only the rate of retreat of Gangotri has decreased, in Leh, 123 years of temperature data shows a cooling of .04 degree per decade." [http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/No_threat_to_Gangotri/articleshow/2892632.cms]
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Hurricanes Re: Katrina: “Whereas an individual hurricane event cannot be attributed solely to climate change, it can serve to illustrate the consequences of weakening ecosystems as the intensity and frequency of such events increase in the future.”
According to researchers at the Department of Atmospheric Science at the Colorado State University (Extended Range Forecast of Atlantic Seasonal Hurricane Activity and U.S. Landfall Strike Probability for 2007, Klotzbach and Gray, Colorado State University, Dec. 2006) [http://typhoon.atmos.colostate.edu/Forecasts/2006/dec2006/]: “Between 1966 and 2003, US major hurricane landfall numbers were below the long-term average”. “Although global surface temperatures have increased over the last century and over the last 30 years, there is no reliable data available to indicate increased hurricane frequency or intensity in any of the globe’s seven tropical cyclone basins. Meteorologists who study tropical cyclones have no valid physical theory as to why hurricane frequency or intensity would necessarily be altered significantly by small amounts (< ±1oC) of global mean temperature change.”
The following figure shows US landfalling hurricanes in terms of Power Dissipation Index (PDI) for 1900-2006 [http://www.waveworkshop.org/10thWaves/Presentations/L1.Knutson_Hawaii_waves_nov07.pdf], along with the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation (magenta line). See http://www.appinsys.com/GlobalWarming/GW_4CE_Hurricanes.htm for more information on this.
Magenta line – Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation
In their 2008 hurricane summary (“Summary of 2008 Atlantic Tropical Cyclone Activity and Verification of Author’s Seasonal and Monthly Forecasts”, Philip J. Klotzbach and William M. Gray, Department of Atmospheric Science Colorado State University, Nov. 2008) [http://tropical.atmos.colostate.edu/Forecasts/2008/nov2008/nov2008.pdf] the authors state: “Despite the global warming of the sea surface that has taken place over the last 3 decades, the global numbers of hurricanes and their intensity have not shown increases in recent years except for the Atlantic. This large increase in Atlantic major hurricanes is primarily a result of the multi-decadal increase in the Atlantic Ocean thermohaline circulation (THC) that is not directly related to global sea surface temperatures or CO2 gas increases. Changes in ocean salinity are believed to be the driving mechanism. These multi-decadal changes have also been termed the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation (AMO).” The following figure is from this report. (See www.appinsys.com/GlobalWarming/PDO_AMO.htm for more info on the AMO).
Although they state “an individual hurricane event cannot be attributed solely to climate change” they refer to hurricane Katrina several times in the report, implying that it was caused by global warming.
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Australia: “Australia is perhaps the developed nation most vulnerable to the direct impacts of climate change and also to the indirect impact from neighbouring countries that are stressed by climate change. Temperature has increased by three-quarters of a degree Celsius in the past 15 years in Australia and rainfall has decreased – leading to water scarcity and drought.”
The GHF is typical of alarmists looking only at short terms like 15 years. According to research reported in New Scientist: “Deforestation by European settlers may be to blame for making Australia's drought longer, hotter and dryer than it would be otherwise. Over much of south-east Australia, where the drought has hit hardest, less that 10 per cent of the original vegetation remains. The team's model showed that this land clearance has increased the length of droughts in the area by one to two weeks per year. In years of extreme drought, the loss of vegetation caused the number of days above 35 °C to increase by six to 18 days, and the number of dry days to increase by five to 15 days” [http://www.newscientist.com/article/mg20227084.700-land-clearances-turned-up-the-heat-on-australian-climate.html?DCMP=OTC-rss&nsref=online-news]
Another study, (Deo et al, “Impact of historical land cover change on daily indices of climate extremes including droughts in eastern Australia”, Geophysical Research Letters, 2009) states: “There is growing scientific evidence that anthropogenic land cover change (LCC) can produce a significant impact on regional climate. … The results showed: an increase in the number of dry and hot days, a decrease in daily rainfall intensity and wet day rainfall, and an increase in the decile‐based drought duration index for modified land cover conditions. These changes were statistically significant for all years, and especially pronounced during strong El Niño events. Therefore it appears that LCC has exacerbated climate extremes in eastern Australia, thus resulting in longer‐lasting and more severe droughts.” [http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/2009/2009GL037666.shtml]
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CO2: “Carbon dioxide resides over hundreds if not thousands of years in the atmosphere.”
There are many scientific studies on the atmospheric residence of CO2, with many disagreements (i.e. the science is not settled). Many studies show a residence of 5 to 15 years – none make the claim of “thousands”.
An example:“Atmospheric CO2 residence time and the carbon cycle : Global warming” [http://cat.inist.fr/?aModele=afficheN&cpsidt=4048904]: “An atmospheric CO2 residence time is determined from a carbon cycle which assumes that anthropogenic emissions only marginally disturb the preindustrial equilibrium dynamics of source/atmosphere/sink fluxes. This study explores the plausibility of this concept, which results in much shorter atmospheric residence times, 4-5 years, than the magnitude larger outcomes of the usual global carbon cycle models which are adjusted to fit the assumption that anthropogenic emissions are primarily the cause of the observed rise in atmospheric CO2. The continuum concept is consistent with the record of the seasonal photosynthesis swing of atmospheric CO2 which supports a residence time of about 5 years, as also does the bomb C14 decay history.”
This link: http://folk.uio.no/tomvs/esef/ESEF3VO2.htm provides a list of published studies showing CO2 residence times as listed below. See that reference for details on this.
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They even try to turn a self-contradiction into a promotion for the United Nations: “As climate change intensifies, it can generate new resource conflicts over water and food, and increase resource issues as a driver of conflict. … For example, the potential for armed conflict over water resources is often seen as an imminent threat to security as 263 river basins are shared by two or more countries and water supply is fast depleting in many of these water reservoirs in areas like Middle East and Central Africa … However, past predictions of large scale water wars have not come to pass and increased cooperation has instead prevailed. … In fact, many processes associated with global warming, have occurred during a time when the world has witnessed a dramatic reduction in the frequency and severity of armed conflict. … The main reasons for this include the end of the Cold War; increased international cooperation to prevent and stem conflict; rapid economic growth in parts of the world once rife with conflict, such as areas of Eastern Europe; and United Nations peacekeeping operation reforms.“ (UN peacekeeping – like in Sudan, Rwanda, etc.? The joke is on us).
They haven’t even noticed that “climate change” has not intensified. The following figure shows global average temperature anomalies for the last decade from the Hadley CRUTEM3 data plotted at KNMI [http://climexp.knmi.nl/selectfield_obs.cgi?someone@somewhere]. Oops – warming stopped a decade ago.
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The Global Humanitarian Forum (GHF) was founded in 2007 by Kofi Annan (former Secretary General of the United Nations). At the launch of the forum in October 2007, the GHF’s press release states: “The Forum will engage in a variety of activities and events including expert workshops to establish stronger links across sectors, and will also commission targeted research. In its first phase the Forum will focus on the humanitarian impact of climate change on the poor and most vulnerable, which Mr Annan called “one of the most significant emerging humanitarian concerns we now face.”
The GHF press release also states: “The Board comprises high profile public figures from government, civil society, the military, humanitarian organizations, the business community and academia.“ (No mention of the United Nations). The GHF Secretariat is Walter Fust – Chairman of UNESCO’s International Program for Development and Communication.
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Some of the board members:
Additional U.N.-related members of the Human Impact report advisory panel:
This group appears to be a shadow U.N. with a focus on using global warming as a means of transferring wealth to Africa, instead of addressing the real problem of deforestation.
Above from http://www.rippleafrica.org/ripple_funding_trees_update2007.htm
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United Nations Millennium Development Goals: “Climate change threatens sustainable development, especially the Millennium Development Goals (MDGs). Unless adaptation to climate change is funded through additional channels, the growing impact of climate change is expected to consume an increasing share of development aid. Official development assistance alone amounted to $120 billion in 2008. This amount is already insufficient to reach international development goals“
This is what it’s all about.
“Copenhagen is likely to generate some sort of global pricing system on emissions. It must go for mechanisms and sanctions, including a globally accepted solution on taxing CO2. ”
A tax on CO2 – they don’t really care about reducing CO2 – just taxing it. Industrial nation CO2 is a smoke-screen – deforestation is the real issue – caused locally in these “poorest countries”.
They admit that a tax on CO2 is a regressive tax that will also hurt the poor, therefore: “Any climate policy must also compensate for these effects through financial redistribution“
Where have I heard this before? Oh yes – the United Nations University World Institute for Development Economics Research (UNU-WIDER). In 2004 they published a study into possible scenarios for implementing a global tax. It states: “How can we find an extra US$50 billion for development funding? Our focus is on flows of resources from high-income to developing countries… Any foreseeable global tax will be introduced, not by a unitary world government, but as the result of concerted action by nation states… The taxation of environmental externalities is an obvious potential source of revenue. ... Does this mean that the global tax should be levied at the same rate on all countries? To the extent that emissions impose environmental damage wherever they occur, the corrective tax should be the same. However, this needs to be moderated to take account of the unequal distribution of world income. Considerations of global justice point to poor countries bearing less of the cost burden, and may justify the tax being levied only on high-income or middle-income countries.” They are not actually concerned about the CO2 – just the money: “We are presupposing that the tax is indeed levied on individuals and firms in the form of a carbon levy… Suppose, however, that we have subsidiarity, where the burden on national governments is determined by their carbon emissions, but the national governments are free to decide how to raise the revenue. As noted above, they may for political or other reasons choose another taxbase.” (This document used to be available at: http://www.wider.unu.edu/publications/policy-briefs/wider-policy-briefs/en_GB/pb10/ but they have since removed it. A summary of part of it is available at: http://update.unu.edu/archive/issue34_9.htm. It stems from earlier work which states: “reversing the widening and "shameful" gap between rich and poor countries "is the pre-eminent moral and humanitarian challenge of our age." And sub-Saharan Africa, they noted, should be a priority.” [http://www.un.org/ecosocdev/geninfo/afrec/vol15no4/154finan.htm])
“The revenue potential appears large – a fuel-consumption tax on CO2 emissions could by itself finance the MDGs. … It would require that the United States opt for it, however; 20 per cent of the tax yield would originate there alone. … US legislation makes it illegal for the United States to participate in any global taxes.” From “Financing Development, Aid and Beyond”, OECD Development Centre [http://books.google.com/books?id=_XvLvuRd4-8C]
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Deforestation Is Ignored in the UN / GHF Push To Get The US / Europe to Pay Africa More For CO2
AFRICA: Tackling deforestation is critical [http://www.irinnews.org/Report.aspx?ReportId=75868]
"People often do not take into account the main driver of deforestation, which is very different in Africa, where it is the need for fuel wood," said Kevin Conrad, director of the Coalition for Rainforest Nations at the Earth Institute of Columbia University. … Deforestation is responsible for 1.6 billion tonnes of carbon emissions every year, amounting to one-fifth of the global total, and to more than the combined total contributed by the world's energy-intensive transport sectors, according to the Indonesia-based Centre for International Forestry Research (CIFOR). "Deforestation contributes almost as much to climate change as does US fossil fuel use," said Conrad. "Yet deforestation was specifically excluded from the Kyoto Protocol in 1997, which failed to address this significant source of carbon emissions."
See: www.appinsys.com/GlobalWarming/Deforestation.htm
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The GHF Blame Game For Desired Money Flow
The GHF’s blame game completely ignores Africa’s CO2 emissions from deforestation and biomass burning, and blames all African malnutrition and disease on U.S CO2 instead of on their deforestation and overpopulation.
Deforestation: The hidden cause of global warming (Daniel Howden, 2007/05/14): “In the next 24 hours, deforestation will release as much CO2 into the atmosphere as 8 million people flying from London to New York. Stopping the loggers is the fastest and cheapest solution to climate change. So why are global leaders turning a blind eye to this crisis?” … “The accelerating destruction of the rainforests that form a precious cooling band around the Earth's equator, is now being recognised as one of the main causes of climate change. Carbon emissions from deforestation far outstrip damage caused by planes and automobiles and factories ...deforestation accounts for up to 25 per cent of global emissions of heat-trapping gases, while transport and industry account for 14 per cent each; and aviation makes up only 3 per cent of the total” [http://environment.independent.co.uk/climate_change/article2539349.ece]
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See also: “Why Foreign Aid is Hurting Africa” http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123758895999200083.html
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