An Inconvenient Alternative Explanation For Global Climate Change

In a peer-reviewed paper in a prestigious physic journal, physicist Qing Bin-Lu finds a inconvenient alternative explanation for recently observed climatic fluctuations. And he doesn't have to fudge numbers or "hide the decline."

In a peer-reviewed paper published in the prestigious online journal Physics Reports, Lu, who holds a Ph.D. in physics from the University of Newcastle, reports that CFCs, the compounds once widely used as refrigerants, and cosmic rays, which are energy particles originating in outer space, are mostly to blame for climate change, rather than carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions.

Lu puts the start of the cooling trend at 2002 and writes that "the observed data show that CFCs conspiring with cosmic rays most likely caused both the Antarctic ozone hole and global warming. These findings are totally unexpected and striking, as I was focused on studying the mechanism for the formation of the ozone hole, rather than global warming."

From 1850 to 1950, Lu notes, the recorded CO2 level increased significantly because of the Industrial Revolution; the global temperature stayed constant or rose only 0.1 degree Celsius.

"Most remarkably, the total amount of CFCs, ozone-depleting molecules that are well-known greenhouse gases ... decreased around 2000," Lu said. "Correspondingly, the global surface temperature has also dropped. In striking contrast, the CO2 level has kept rising since 1850 and now is at its largest growth rate."