The National Academy of Sciences released a study that strongly reinforces the growing scientific consensus that climate change is real and serious. In its new report entitled "Reconciling Observations of Global Temperature Change," the NAS convincingly clarifies apparent discrepancies between surface and satellite records of global temperature. In the past, skeptics frequently used the discordant conclusions from the different data sets to dismiss the veracity of global warming. The NAS report puts this particular controversy to rest. Several large newspapers have reported this story, but most downplay the human influence on this warming trend and say nothing about the need for mitigation of greenhouse gas emissions.The NAS study confirms that observed global warming is "undoubtedly real" and is substantially greater than the average rate of warming during the twentieth century. The report adds further weight to the call for policymakers to act now to reduce greenhouse gas emissions from fossil fuel consumption. The NAS report can be found on the web here.

Unfortunately, disregarding this effect is probably not prudent. Officials with the National Weather Service and Britain's Meteorological Office, in an open letter published December 23, 1999, concluded that "Ignoring climate change will surely be the most costly of all possible choices, for us and our children." These costs will be in increased risk to human health, the expansion of deserts, the disruption of agriculture, a rise in sea level of anywhere from 6 to 37.5 inches above the current level, with persistent coastal flooding, and a series of secondary impacts on human welfare and the economy among others. All of us must accept some of the responsibility for creating this environmental effect, and for mitigating it. The manner in which we have allowed residential and commercial development to sprawl ever further from the city centers and the reliance we have developed on fuel-guzzling vehicles are but two areas which pointedly cry out for popular action. In a time of increasing indifference to what we perceive to be bad news on many fronts, complacency in this case carries a high price.