GOVERNMENT ministers have accepted the theory that catastrophic climate change will be unavoidable unless there is a switch to renewable energy systems rather than burning coal, oil and gas, all of which produce carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions.

They believe that because the CO2 content of the atmosphere has increased, and the air temperature has increased, the rise in CO2 has therefore produced the temperature increase.

But there is nothing new about climate change. It has been happening for millions of years.

There was the Medieval warming period, when the Vikings were farming in Greenland, while the Romans were growing grapes and making wine in Cumbria. That period lasted from 1000AD to 1400AD and was not caused by coalfired power stations and motor cars.

It was followed by the Little Ice Age which ended in 1900. Then, from 1900 to 1940, there was a rapid global temperature increase while CO2 emissions were increasing slightly.

Then there was a small drop in temperature from 1940 to 1970.

From 1970 to 1999 both CO2 and temperature increased, but over the past 12 years there has been no temperature increase at all, even though global CO2 emissions have been increasing at a record rate.

There is much more to climate change than CO2 emissions. There are complex interactions between the Earth’s atmosphere, oceans and terrestrial systems and there are variations in the Earth’s orbit round the sun, fluctuations in the rotation of the Earth on its axis and changes in solar activity such as sunspots. All of these factors affect the climate to varying extents.

Many climate scientists have made these points, but the politicians have made their minds up and don’t want to be confused by the facts.

Jim Allan, Hartlepool.