Dear Editor:
I read with interest and slight disappointment the letter to the editor by Len Burkitt regarding climate change (August 24th). Mr Burkitt is correct in saying that natural changes of global climate have occurred, and continue to take place. But these have taken place over tens of thousands of years, and are quite different from the current changes which have been extensively researched over the past decades. I would refer Mr. Burkitt and others who are sceptical to the research done by members of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), a coordinating body set up in 1989 by the UN. Research by IPCC members refutes Mr. Burkitt’s statement that “there has been nothing appreciable in the last 18 to 20 years according to the sensors around the globe”. The debate as to the human causation and reality of global climate change should have been settled long ago. The gradual warming of the earth’s atmosphere and oceans presents a very serious problem which could evolve into a global crisis in a few decades. If Mr. Burkitt is willing to do a bit more reading, I would refer him to the educational website www.explainingclimatchange.ca.
Greg Scott
Invermere
