Analyzing the DOE’s ‘A Critical Review of Impacts of Greenhouse Gas Emissions on the U.S. Climate’ – Watts Up With That?

Honestly, I never thought I’d see the day. To quote Mr. FOIA from ClimateGate, “A miracle has occurred.”

Yesterday’s release of the DOE’s A Critical Review of Impacts of Greenhouse Gas Emissions on the U.S. Climate is a watershed moment in the ongoing debate over climate policy in America. Why? Because for the first time, a major U.S. government agency—on official letterhead and with a blue-ribbon cast of authors (John Christy, Judith Curry, Steven Koonin, Ross McKitrick, and Roy Spencer)—has published an open challenge to the central claims, data handling, and even the motivations behind mainstream climate science and policy.

This isn’t just another technical report. It is a systematic rebuke of accepted climate “wisdom,” and it does so with unusual clarity, scientific rigor, and (at times) a sense of humor often absent in climate documents. Most importantly, it directly confronts the exaggerated and politicized rhetoric that has dominated headlines for decades.

The Executive Summary from the DOE web page:

This report: 

• Reviews scientific certainties and uncertainties in how anthropogenic emissions of CO₂ and other GHGs have affected, or will affect, the Nation’s climate, extreme weather events, and metrics of societal well-being.
• Assesses the near-term impacts of elevated concentrations of CO₂, including enhanced plant growth and reduced ocean alkalinity.
• Evaluates data and projections regarding long-term impacts of elevated concentrations of CO₂, including estimates of future warming.
• Finds that claims of increased frequency or intensity of hurricanes, tornadoes, floods, and droughts are not supported by U.S. historical data.
• Asserts that CO₂-induced warming appears to be less damaging economically than commonly believed, and that aggressive mitigation policies could prove more detrimental than beneficial.
• Finds that U.S. policy actions are expected to have undetectably small direct impacts on the global climate and any effects will emerge only with long delays.

What Makes This Report Unique?

1. Official Status and Author Independence
   Unlike think tank white papers or “dissenting” journal articles, this report comes from within the federal government, under the Trump administration’s DOE. Yet the authors assert full independence—no editorial oversight, no political vetting. It’s rare to see scientists of this caliber (with backgrounds at NASA, IPCC, and major universities) allowed to directly challenge prevailing policy narratives with government resources behind them.
2. Comprehensive Critique, Not Just a Narrow Rebuttal
   Rather than focusing on a single point of controversy, the report systematically evaluates everything from CO2’s physiological role in plant growth, to climate sensitivity estimates, to the track record of climate models, to the real-world impacts (or lack thereof) on extreme weather and U.S. agriculture. Each chapter is loaded with extended quotes from peer-reviewed literature and clear explanations of scientific uncertainty and model error.
3. Explicit Address of Policy Missteps and Economic Risks
   Most uniquely, the report doesn’t stop at “science.” It details the economic costs of climate policy—especially the social cost of carbon modeling games and the virtually undetectable impact U.S. mitigation will have on the global climate. This is a rarely admitted fact, buried in most government assessments but here discussed openly and at length.
4. Direct Critique of Media, IPCC, and U.S. National Climate Assessments
   In one chapter after another, the report highlights the misuse of worst-case scenarios (RCP8.5), the prevalence of “publication bias” in alarming ocean acidification studies, and the outright neglect of positive CO2 impacts like global greening. The report does not hesitate to call out “systemic misuse of scenarios in climate research” and points to specific agencies and news outlets responsible for propagating misleading claims.

My List of the Eight Most Important Findings in the Report

1. CO2 Is Not a Conventional Pollutant and Has Direct Environmental Benefits
   Unlike actual pollutants, CO2 has no toxic effect at ambient levels, is essential for plant life, and has caused global greening—a fact barely acknowledged in IPCC summaries.
2. “Ocean Acidification” Fears Are Overblown
   Oceans are still alkaline, and changes in pH are within natural variability; most ocean life evolved under much lower pH. The report exposes publication bias and lack of reproducibility in many alarming acidification studies. The Great Barrier Reef is currently thriving.
3. Climate Models Consistently Overestimate Warming
   Most climate models run “hot,” overstating recent warming at the surface and in the troposphere. Data-driven climate sensitivity estimates are lower and more constrained than model-based ones, challenging the high ECS values used to justify drastic policy measures.
4. No Evidence for Increases in Most U.S. Extreme Weather
   U.S. historical data shows no long-term upward trend in hurricanes, tornadoes, floods, or droughts. Claims of worsening disasters are unsupported by observations; fire trends are largely due to land management, not climate change.
5. Sea Level Rise Is Not Accelerating Dangerously
   Global sea level has risen about 8 inches since 1900, but regional U.S. sea level trends are dominated by local land movements, not acceleration from climate change. Tide gauges do not show alarming acceleration.
6. Attribution of Warming to CO2 Is Far Less Certain Than Claimed
   Natural variability, incomplete data, and significant model uncertainties make attribution of observed warming and extremes to human CO2 emissions tenuous. Solar variability may be underestimated in mainstream assessments.
7. The Social Cost of Carbon (SCC) Is Largely Arbitrary
   SCC estimates, which drive regulatory costs, are shown to be highly sensitive to model assumptions, with no robust economic basis. The report demonstrates that realistic ECS values and updated economic inputs lead to much lower SCC estimates.
8. U.S. Emission Reductions Will Have Negligible Impact on Global Climate
   Even extreme U.S. policy actions will produce climate changes too small to detect for generations—an inconvenient truth almost never discussed in mainstream policy or media reports.

Here is a Breakdown of How the Report Challenges Mainstream Climate Science

CO2: Pollutant or Plant Food?

The DOE report begins by demolishing the notion that CO2 should be treated as a conventional pollutant, as regulated under the Clean Air Act. It cites OSHA exposure limits (5,000 ppm—orders of magnitude above outdoor levels) and presents robust evidence from plant physiology showing that rising CO2 enhances growth, improves water use efficiency, and has led to the global greening phenomenon observed by satellites.

Notably, the report details how IPCC assessments downplay or omit this global greening effect, despite its direct connection to rising CO2. Even the IPCC’s own Special Report on Land concluded “with high confidence” that greening has occurred, yet this is absent from summary reports intended for policymakers and the public.

Ocean “Acidification”: A Manufactured Crisis?

The report’s treatment of ocean acidification is a case study in scientific skepticism. It points out that “acidification” is a misnomer—oceans remain alkaline, and pH fluctuations are within historic norms. Life in the ocean evolved under a much broader range of pH conditions. More importantly, the DOE authors highlight the growing recognition of “publication bias”: studies with null or minimal impacts from declining pH are difficult to publish, leading to a skewed scientific record.

A meta-analysis cited in the report finds a strong “decline effect” in ocean acidification impacts on fish behavior: early alarming results are rarely replicated by later, larger studies, which usually show negligible impacts. In short, the “crisis” has been grossly exaggerated in the literature and the media.

Model Failure: The Emperor Has No Clothes

The centerpiece of the DOE critique is the performance of global climate models. The report notes that despite decades of effort and billions spent, model projections have failed to narrow the uncertainty in equilibrium climate sensitivity (ECS). In fact, the spread of ECS in the latest (CMIP6) models has grown wider, not narrower, and the majority of models produce too much warming compared to observations—both at the surface and throughout the troposphere.

Crucially, the report provides detailed side-by-side comparisons of model projections versus observed data (see page 33–37). It notes that only models with the lowest ECS values match the actual temperature record since 1979. The majority of models overestimate warming, in some cases by more than a factor of two.

The report also skewers the widespread misuse of “worst-case” emissions scenarios (RCP8.5) in research and media. It cites analysis showing that the vast majority of climate impact papers used RCP8.5 as a business-as-usual baseline, despite the scenario being grossly implausible and far above observed emissions trends.

Attribution and Natural Variability

The report spends several chapters dissecting the uncertainties around attribution—the attempt to link observed warming and extreme events specifically to human GHG emissions. The authors document the wide range of natural variability (including the still-uncertain role of solar variation), and show that statistical “fingerprinting” methods are often inconclusive or circular. In some key cases, model simulations of vertical temperature profiles and the geographic distribution of warming simply fail to match real-world data—a fact not honestly conveyed in mainstream summaries.

The Social Cost of Carbon: An Economic Mirage

One of the most policy-relevant chapters debunks the “social cost of carbon” (SCC) calculations used by regulatory agencies to justify massive economic interventions. The DOE report shows that SCC values are essentially “made up,” highly sensitive to a few subjective assumptions about climate sensitivity, discount rates, and economic damages. When updated with realistic parameters and best-estimate ECS values, the SCC drops dramatically, sometimes to near zero or even negative (i.e., net benefits from CO2 emissions due to agricultural gains).

U.S. Policy: All Pain, No Gain

Perhaps the most striking section (and one likely to cause heartburn in certain policy circles) comes at the end: the scale of the U.S. impact on the global climate. The report quantifies just how little effect even the most aggressive U.S. mitigation policies will have—using the very models and assumptions of mainstream climate science. The answer: “undetectably small” impacts, appearing only after centuries, if at all. This fact is never honestly presented in the typical policy debate.

Of course, the Media is Panning It

Predictably, the release of the DOE report has drawn fire from mainstream outlets and climate advocacy groups. For example, the ever angry and alarmed, The Guardian wrote:

“Climate scientists have condemned the DOE’s new report as ‘dangerous disinformation,’ claiming it was designed to mislead the public about the risks of greenhouse gas emissions and to justify a rollback of U.S. climate policy. Several experts criticized the report for cherry-picking studies and downplaying the consensus on climate risks.”

LOL. Let’s address these lightweight claims, point by point:

Claim: The report is “disinformation” and “cherry-picks” studies.
Pushback: The DOE report is authored by respected scientists with deep experience in climate modeling, attribution, and atmospheric science—many of whom have published widely in peer-reviewed journals. The report is overwhelmingly referenced, including citations from the very IPCC reports it critiques, and in fact spends entire chapters reviewing both sides of contested issues. The presence of extended quotations from mainstream literature, including detailed reviews of opposing arguments, refutes the idea that it is simply “cherry-picking.”

Claim: The report “downplays the consensus” on climate risks.
Pushback: The DOE report does not deny climate change or human influence. It argues, with substantial evidence, that the level of risk is greatly overstated, that models exaggerate sensitivity, and that the costs of mitigation policies are vastly underestimated. It is not “disinformation” to present documented, peer-reviewed evidence that calls into question apocalyptic scenarios—especially when such scenarios are contradicted by the data.

Claim: The report is designed to justify policy rollbacks.
Pushback: The report’s authors explicitly state their independence and reject any suggestion of political vetting or pressure. They also include dissent and debate within the team. The report’s focus is on evidence, not policy prescription. The fact that it challenges established policy is a sign of its intellectual independence, not its bias.

Gavin Schmidt’s “RealClimate” website barely managed a whimper, starting an open thread, saying:

The EPA, along with the “Climate Working Group” of usual suspects (plus Judith Curry and Ross McKitrick) at DOE, have just put out a document for public comment their attempt to rescind the 2009 Endangerment Finding for greenhouse gas emissions.

I got a real laugh out of one of the four comments so far:

Secular Animist says

29 Jul 2025 at 4:35 PM

The proposed rule to rescind the 2009 Endangerment Finding is an ACT OF WAR against the human species by the fossil fuel industry.

LOL, bring it, you anonymous dork.

My Cold Hard Facts Conclusion

The DOE’s A Critical Review of Impacts of Greenhouse Gas Emissions on the U.S. Climate stands out as a landmark challenge to the status quo in climate science and policy. It is a detailed, referenced, and balanced review—one that will make uncomfortable reading for those invested in climate alarmism or rigid consensus. It doesn’t offer certainty; it offers scientific humility, transparency, and an honest assessment of the uncertainties and limitations in current climate science.

The real “dangerous disinformation” isn’t in this report—it’s in the repeated failure of the mainstream media and science to confront inconvenient evidence, model errors, and the economic reality of climate policy. It’s long past time for the climate debate to embrace the kind of open, skeptical, and evidence-based assessment represented in this DOE report.

REFERENCES:

DOE Report (Main Document)

Key Peer-Reviewed and Official References Used in the DOE Report

1. IPCC Assessment Reports

2. Climate Model Performance and Sensitivity

• Hausfather, Z., et al. (2019). Evaluating the Performance of Past Climate Model Projections. Geophysical Research Letters 47(1).
  https://doi.org/10.1029/2019GL085378
• Scafetta, N. (2021). Testing the CMIP6 GCM simulations versus surface temperature records… Climate 9(11):161.
  https://doi.org/10.3390/cli9110161
• Sherwood, S. C., et al. (2020). An assessment of Earth’s climate sensitivity using multiple lines of evidence. Reviews of Geophysics, 58(4).
  https://doi.org/10.1029/2019rg000678
• Lewis, N. (2023). Objectively combining climate sensitivity evidence. Climate Dynamics 61, 3155–3163.
  https://doi.org/10.1007/s00382-022-06398-8
• Pielke Jr., R., & Ritchie, J. (2020). Systemic Misuse of Scenarios in Climate Research and Assessment. SSRN.
  https://ssrn.com/abstract=3581777
• Hausfather, Z. & Peters, G. P. (2020). Emissions – the ‘business as usual’ story is misleading. Nature.
  https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-020-00177-3

3. CO₂, Global Greening, and Fertilization

• Zhu, Z., et al. (2016). Greening of the Earth and its drivers. Nature Climate Change, 6, 791–795.
  https://www.nature.com/articles/nclimate3004
• Chen, C., et al. (2019). China and India lead in greening of the world through land-use management. Nature Sustainability 2, 122–129.
  https://www.nature.com/articles/s41893-019-0220-7
• Keenan, T. F., et al. (2023). A constraint on historic growth in global photosynthesis due to rising CO₂. Nature Climate Change 13, 1376-1381.
  https://doi.org/10.1038/s41558-023-01867-2
• Haverd, V., et al. (2020). Higher than expected CO₂ fertilization inferred from leaf to global observations. Global Change Biology 26, 2390–2402.
  https://doi.org/10.1111/gcb.14950

4. Ocean “Acidification” and Coral Reefs

5. Extreme Weather Data

6. Solar Influence and Natural Variability

7. Social Cost of Carbon and Economic Analyses

8. Emissions Scenarios Critiques

Official & U.S. Government Data

Additional Useful Reports for Context

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