Are we going to cook or are we going to freeze?
Not everybody thinks that global warming is the immediate threat that it’s made out to be. There are scientists who think we have a more immediate climate problem, namely a new ice age.
The basis of their assessment is based on the correlation between Earth cooling events and the number of Sun spots. Sun spot activity seems to be based on 11-year cycles. We’ve just reached the end point of a an 11-year low in activity and we should be seeing more Sun spot activity on the Sun, but there is none. And there are those that claim that such inactivity will produce lower temperatures on Earth and could lead to a mini or full blown Ice age.
Not everybody agrees with this assessment. The US National Centre for Atmospheric Research concluded that the Sun’s brightness varied by only 0.07 percent over the 11-year cycle which was far to little to account for changes in Earth temperature.
It’s also hard to credit a theory for an new ice age when a recent report from New Zealand that the Tasman Glacier near Mount Cook is retreating (melting) at a rate of almost 200 metres a year and this rate is accelerating not slowing.