Global Warming

A team of UC Berkeley physicists and statisticians that set out to challenge the scientific consensus on global warming is finding that its data-crunching effort is producing results nearly identical to those underlying the prevailing view. The Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature project was launched by physics professor Richard Muller, a longtime critic of government-led climate studies, to address what he called "the legitimate concerns" of skeptics who believe that global warming is exaggerated.

Dinosaurs' gassy guts may have contributed to global warming tens of millions of years ago, according to a new study that finds a group of plant-eating dinosaurs could have produced about as much methane as all of today's natural and man-made sources of the greenhouse gas. British researchers reported in Tuesday's edition of the journal Current Biology that the methane emissions from sauropods far outstripped those of today's cattle, goats and...

You're likely to hear a chorus of dire warnings as we approach Earth Day, but there's a serious shortage few pundits are talking about: air pollution. That's right, the world is running short on air pollution, and if we continue to cut back on smoke pouring forth from industrial smokestacks, the increase in global warming could be profound. Cleaner air, one of the signature achievements of the U.S. environmental movement, is certainly worth celebrating. Scientists estimate that the U.S. Clean Air Act has cut a major air pollutant called sulfate aerosols, for example, by 30% to 50% since the 1980s, helping greatly reduce cases of asthma and other respiratory problems.

It wasn't long ago that Marco Rubio and Tim Pawlenty -- two rising Republican stars -- supported legislation to limit greenhouse gas emissions. But in recent weeks, both have begun to express doubts about whether cars, factories and power plants have anything to do with global warming. The shift by Rubio and Pawlenty -- as well as other prominent Republicans -- reflects the rising power of climate change skeptics in the GOP, where global warming is becoming a litmus test for conservatives.

Fundraising for a ballot initiative to suspend California's global warming law has flagged, but oil companies and other business interests are pouring millions of dollars into a separate ballot measure that could dry up funds to implement the law. Proposition 26 would require a two-thirds vote of the Legislature, rather than the current simple majority, to enact any regulatory fees such as those imposed on tobacco companies to fund health-related programs,...

"What the heck went wrong?" That, apparently, is the question roiling the environmental community as it realizes that the fight against climate change has fizzled. As Brad Plumer writes in the New Republic, everything was looking great in 2008 for a sweeping effort to make good on candidate Barack Obama's pledge to start turning back the rising oceans. The Democrats held Congress. Both John McCain and Obama had promised to push for capping carbon emissions. Corporations had gotten on board.

Megadroughts lasting centuries are part of the normal weather pattern in sub-Saharan Africa, researchers reported Friday, a finding they say bodes ill for what could happen if the effects of global warming are added in.

More than a third of native California bird species could vanish from a wide swath of their current range by the end of the 21st century because of global warming, according to a new study by Audubon California.

Texas Gov. Rick Perry on Wednesday reaffirmed his view that global warming is an unproven scientific theory that has been advanced, at least in part, by scientists who have "manipulated data," and he argued that programs intended to limit climate change are costing the nation "billions if not trillions" of dollars that he believes could be better spent elsewhere. "We are seeing almost weekly, or even daily, scientists are coming forward and questioning the original idea that man-made global warming is what is causing the climate to change," Perry told an audience of several hundred voters, business leaders and local officials who gathered for a breakfast in Bedford.

Paramount's specialty division has acquired the distribution rights to former Vice President Al Gore's documentary about the dangers of global warming, a producer of the film said Monday. The film, "An Inconvenient Truth," will be shown in theaters starting at the end of May, Lawrence Bender said. He would not disclose how much the studio paid for the rights. The film, directed by Davis Guggenheim, premiered at the Sundance Film Festival last month. -- Tina Daunt