Let's Call It 'Climate Disruption,' White House Science Adviser Suggests (Again)

First there was “global warming.”  Then many researchers suggested “climate change” was a better term.  Now, White House science adviser John Holdren is renewing his call for a new nomenclature to describe the end result of dumping vast quantities of carbon dioxide and other heat-trapping gases into Earth’s atmosphere:  “global climate disruption.”

“I’ve always thought that the phrase ‘global warming’ was something of a misnomer because it suggests that the phenomenon is something that is uniform around the world, that it’s all about temperature, and that it’s gradual,” Holdren said Thursday at the annual AAAS Forum on Science and Technology Policy in Washington, D.C.  “What could be wrong with that?”

Instead, he said, “we should call it ‘global climate disruption.’  Although the rising average global surface temperature is an indicator of the degree of disruption that we have imposed on the global climate system, what’s actually happening involves changes in circulation patterns, changes in precipitation patterns, and changes in extremes.  And those are very different in different places.”

“My own suspicion is that we will end up over the long run leaving quite a lot of fossil fuels in the ground,” he continued, “because the alternatives to fossil fuels, even those that capture and store the emissions, are improving at a very rapid rate.  And I think their share will increase in a way that will enable us not to be pushed to exploit the vast quantities of fossil fuels still in the ground, including oil shale and tar sands and much more.”

Let's Call It 'Climate Disruption,' White House Science Adviser Suggests (Again)