Hammer Lane Blog

All those who remain skeptical that global warming– brought on by greenhouse gas emissions– is causing climate change should give a read to the news story that came out yesterday reporting that a British panel has cleared scientists accused of ginning up their research in the so-called Climategate scandal.

According to New York Times reporter Justin Gillis, the investigating panel “exonerated the scientists caught up in the controversy known as Climategate of charges that they had manipulated their research to support preconceived ideas about global warming.”

On the other hand, the scientists were “rebuked” for “several aspects of their behavior, especially their reluctance to release computer files supporting their scientific work.”



Bottom line is it’s the only home planet we got.

The British report is the last in a series of five investigations of leading British and American climate researchers, which was brought on by by the release of a “cache of e-mail messages that cast doubt on their conduct and raised fresh public controversy over the science of global warming,” reported Gillis.

But when all is said and done, all the investigations have essentially cleared the climatologists of wrongdoing. Nevertheless, the scandal has hurt the cause of gaining acceptance for the idea that the global warming now being experienced is caused largely by burning carbon-based fuels.

“The e-mails don’t at all change the fundamental tenets of the science,” the artcile quoted Roger Pielke Jr., a professor of environmental studies at the University of Colorado, saying. “But they changed the notion that people could blindly trust one authoritative group, when it turns out they’re just like everybody else.”

This latest development may not clear the air entirely around climate change, but it should be reassuring to all of us that if the problem is man-made, then mankind can solve it…. eventually.