The National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine issued a sobering climate report Wednesday that stands as a sharp rebuttal to efforts by the Trump administration to downplay the risks and severity of global warming.
The findings are in direct response to EPA’s proposed rollback of the 2009 endangerment finding, which determined that six greenhouse gases pose a danger to human health. That landmark decision has served as the legal and scientific backbone of federal climate regulations.
In making its case to repeal the endangerment finding, the Trump administration is relying on a recent Department of Energy report that uses cherry-picked data and misleading claims to assert that humanity’s burning of fossil fuels is not driving the planet toward dangerous tipping points.
The DOE report was compiled by five climate change contrarians handpicked by Energy Secretary Chris Wright, who has long criticized climate policy.
The National Academies report stands in stark contrast to the DOE document. Not only does the endangerment finding still stand, it concludes, but its determination is “reinforced by even stronger evidence” today.
The National Academies, created under a congressional charter signed into law by President Abraham Lincoln in 1863, are independent, nonpartisan institutions that provide objective analysis of public policy decisions.
The 16-member review committee that produced the climate report consists of experts in climate, health, oceans and more. It also includes multiple members who previously worked in the fossil fuel industry and the findings were reviewed by a group of experts that includes Tim Gallaudet, the acting NOAA administrator in Trump’s first term.
More than 200 individuals and organizations responded to a public request for information from the National Academies, providing the authors with more than 600 peer-reviewed articles to inform their research.
The National Academies authors presented five lines of evidence to support their findings.
Greenhouse gases are increasing in the atmosphere. These emissions are changing the Earth’s climate. They’re harming human health. They’re affecting human welfare through damages to energy systems, infrastructure and agriculture. And continued carbon emissions will only make these effects worse.
Many of the report’s conclusions are at odds with the DOE report, which has been widely criticized by scientists for presenting false or misleading information.
The new National Academies report acknowledges the existence of the DOE report but notes that since it is still in draft form — and could change with the input of public comments — the authors did not directly cite it.
The new report’s authors came to their conclusions using an array of scientific studies and observations focused on both the global and U.S. climate. These include trends in temperature, precipitation, extreme weather events and sea levels.
The report notes that climate science has advanced since 2009, and many uncertainties about the impacts of global warming have become more clear.
Over the last 16 years, for instance, scientists have developed a much firmer grasp of the links between climate change and wildfires, harmful algal blooms, agricultural changes and human health outcomes.
The evidence supporting global warming’s harms to human health and well-being is “beyond scientific dispute,” the report concludes. “The United States faces a future in which climate-induced harm continues to worsen and today’s extremes become tomorrow’s norms.”
