NWF Scientist Responds to Climate Email Theft

Global warming deniers have been feverishly pushing emails stolen by hackers from the accounts of climate scientists. Their argument? If any climate scientist ever discussed the best way to sort through mountains of climate data, then global warming isn’t happening. If that sounds like a bizarre conspiracy theory with no connection to fact or reality … well, welcome to the world of global warming denial.

There’s only one group of people more upset about the hacked emails than the deniers: The climate science community.

The National Wildlife Federation’s Dr. Amanda Staudt just responded to the ginned-up controversy and didn’t mince words:

The latest attack on climate science is simply another attempt to distract from the reality that the world is warming more than ever and the buildup of heat-trapping pollution in our atmosphere is higher than it’s been in 15 million years.

While opponents want to draw attention to decade-old emails, here is what is happening right now to the planet:

• Temperatures this decade have been higher than any other decade on record, and one degree (F) higher than average temperatures in the 20th century.
• Ocean temperatures worldwide this summer were hotter than ever previously recorded.
• Stable sea ice in the Arctic melted to its lowest recorded levels this summer, declining more than 60% since the 1980s and 1990s.
• Carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere for 2009 (387 parts per million) are the highest they have been in about 15 million years.
• Globally, 8.7 billion tons of carbon were emitted in 2008 from burning coal, oil and natural gas, a 41% increase from 1990.

Please take a moment to tell your senator that we need clean energy & climate legislation now more than ever.