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Aug 18, 2008 10:47 pm US/Central

Project Energy: Silenced NASA Scientist Talks

Reporting
Don Shelby
(WCCO) The NASA scientist who was silenced by the government for talking about global warming was in town recently at the Science Museum.
As part of Project Energy, Don Shelby talked with Jim Hansen, the long-time head of NASA's Goddard Institute for Space Studies who first warned people of climate change more than 25 years ago. They talked about politics versus science.

 Shelby : Do you feel free to speak? Do you feel free to talk these days?

 Hanson: Yeah, I certainly feel free just because it's received so much attention in my case that I can say what I want now.

 But you should realize that in some agencies like EPA, National Institutes of Health, there's still are very strong constraints on.... There are several agencies, most agencies where unfortunately our administration -- and this has been true in Democratic administrations as well as Republican -- they feel that scientists are working for the President rather than working for the public.

 Our salaries are paid by the public so we should give the best information that we have and we should be free to give that information without checking some political, whether it's consistent with political party views that are in power.

 Shelby : I'd like to ask you a candid question about the effect of 'An Inconvenient Truth'. He (Al Gore) attaches a Democrat's name, a presidential candidate's name, to a science that we're supposed to look at objectively, which is causing difficulty certainly among conservatives who won't buy the idea of the global warming science because it seems that the only thing they've heard about is that Al Gore thinks it's true.

 Hansen: Yeah, I think that's very unfortunate. It seems to me that conservatives should be at the front of the line in protecting the planet and protecting creation and the planet that we received from our elders.

 But it has become politicized. I'm an Independent. I'm not a Democrat or a Republican. And I think that is the reason now that it is difficult to get the actions because it has become politicized.

 We have to somehow reduce that politicization because that is a serious problem and I'm not sure I know exactly how to do that except just continue to make the science as clear as possible and what the implications of it are.

 Shelby : There are people who believe that they're trying to reach a political solution to something that they are not convinced exists. And the solution may be worse than the problem because the problem can't be demonstrated to them in real time.

 Hansen: That simply doesn't make sense because the solution consists of clean energy. You know, energy efficiency, solar power, wind power and I think we should be looking at next generation nuclear power also. But things that would end up with a cleaner atmosphere is going to produce a lot of jobs.

 Shelby : How long will it be before there is a true consensus?

 Hansen: I think the evidence now has become overwhelming. That's why I hope that the next President will ask the National Academy of Sciences to summarize what the status is because the evidence has become so powerful that we have to begin to do something. And we can't wait for the changes to be so large that they become very obvious because by then it will be too late. There will be processes underway -- melting of the ice in the arctic, the ice sheets will begin to disintegrate, and it will be out of our control.

 Hansen said NASA has been taking very precise measurements of greenhouse gasses due to humans burning coal and oil and comparing that with the natural effects of the sun. He said the human effects are about 10 times larger.

 

(© MMVIII, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.)

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© MMVIII, CBS Broadcasting Inc. All Rights Reserved.