Here's an interesting assessment by someone at NASA, I'm not sure if he is speaking on behalf of NASA or just himself, probably just himself
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http://www.nytimes.com/2004/10/26/science/26climate.html?hp&ex=1098763200&en=605c36bc367a6ea9&ei=5094&partner=homepage
October 26, 2004
THE ENVIRONMENT
NASA Expert Criticizes Bush on Global Warming Policy
By ANDREW C. REVKIN
A top NASA climate expert who twice briefed Vice President Dick Cheney on global
warming plans to criticize the administration's approach to the issue in a
lecture at the University of Iowa tonight and say that a senior administration
official told him last year not to discuss dangerous consequences of rising
temperatures.
The expert, Dr. James E. Hansen, director of the NASA Goddard Institute for
Space Studies in Manhattan, expects to say that the Bush administration has
ignored growing evidence that sea levels could rise significantly unless prompt
action is taken to reduce heat-trapping emissions from smokestacks and tailpipes.
Many academic scientists, including dozens of Nobel laureates, have been
criticizing the administration over its handling of climate change and other
complex scientific issues. But Dr. Hansen, first in an interview with The New
York Times a week ago and again in his planned lecture today, is the only
leading scientist to speak out so publicly while still in the employ of the
government.
In the talk, Dr. Hansen, who describes himself as "moderately conservative,
middle-of-the-road" and registered in Pennsylvania as an independent, plans to
say that he will vote for Senator John Kerry, while also criticizing some of Mr.
Kerry's positions, particularly his pledge to keep nuclear waste out of Nevada.
He will acknowledge that one of the accolades he has received for his work on
climate change is a $250,000 Heinz Award, given in 2001 by a foundation run by
Teresa Heinz Kerry, Mr. Kerry's wife. The awards are given to people who advance
causes promoted by Senator John Heinz, the Pennsylvania Republican who was Mrs.
Heinz Kerry's first husband.
But in an interview yesterday, Dr. Hansen said he was confident that the award
had had "no impact on my evaluation of the climate problem or on my political
leanings."
In a draft of the talk, a copy of which Dr. Hansen provided to The Times
yesterday, he wrote that President Bush's climate policy, which puts off
consideration of binding cuts in such emissions until 2012, was likely to be too
little too late.
Actions to curtail greenhouse-gas emissions "are not only feasible but make
sense for other reasons, including our economic well-being and national security,"
Dr. Hansen wrote. "Delay of another decade, I argue, is a colossal risk."
In the speech, Dr. Hansen also says that last year, after he gave a presentation
on the dangers of human-caused, or anthropogenic, climate shifts to Sean O'Keefe,
the NASA administrator, "the administrator interrupted me; he told me that I
should not talk about dangerous anthropogenic interference, because we do not
know enough or have enough evidence for what would constitute dangerous
anthropogenic interference."
After conferring with Mr. O'Keefe, Glenn Mahone, the administrator's spokesman,
said Mr. O'Keefe had a completely different recollection of the meeting. "To say
the least, Sean is certain that he did not admonish or even suggest that there
be a throttling back of research efforts" by Dr. Hansen or his team, Mr. Mahone
said.
Dr. Franco Einaudi, director of the NASA Earth Sciences Directorate at the
Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md., and Dr. Hansen's supervisor, said
he was at the meeting between Dr. Hansen and Mr. O'Keefe. Dr. Einaudi confirmed
that Mr. O'Keefe had interrupted the presentation to say that these were "delicate
issues" and there was a lot of uncertainty about them. But, he added: "Whether
it is obvious to take that as an order or not is a question of judgment.
Personally, I did not take it as an order."
Dr. John H. Marburger III, the science adviser to the president, said he was not
privy to any exchanges between Dr. Hansen and the administrator of NASA. But he
denied that the White House was playing down the risks posed by climate change.
"President Bush has long recognized the serious implications of climate change,
the role of human activity, and our responsibility to reduce emissions,'' Dr.
Marburger said in an e-mailed statement. "He has put forward a series of policy
initiatives including a commitment to reduce the greenhouse gas intensity of our
economy.''
In the interview yesterday, Dr. Hansen stood by his assertions and said the
administration risked disaster by discouraging scientists from discussing
unwelcome findings.
Dr. Hansen, 63, acknowledged that he imperiled his credibility and perhaps his
job by criticizing Mr. Bush's policies in the final days of a tight presidential
campaign. He said he decided to speak out after months of deliberation because
he was convinced the country needed to change course on climate policy.
Dr. Hansen rose to prominence when, after testifying at a Senate hearing in the
record-warm summer of 1988, he said, "It is time to stop waffling so much and
say the evidence is pretty strong that the greenhouse effect is here."
Copyright 2004 The New York Times Company