IN May 2007 I saw the Al Gore film An inconvenient Truth. I was so appalled by the totally unscientific content and distortion of previous climate data that I sent the first global warming letter to the Bucks Free Press. After over seven years the debate continues.

The distinguishing feature of all those who believe that the CO2 created by the burning of fossil fuels is the sole cause of climate change, is their failure to accept scientific records dating back millions of years that show conclusively the climate has always been changing and a blind faith in the predictions made by a political organisation, the Intergovernmental Panel for Climate Change.

The CO2 content of the atmosphere has changed dramatically from highs of over 3,000 ppm during the Jurassic period to lows of 280 ppm since the end of the last ice age 8,000 years ago. Currently it is close to 400 ppm (0.04 per cent).

Ice cores taken from deep in the Greenland ice sheet reveal a succession of ice ages each lasting about 90,000 years. Each ice age is separated by an interglacial period of about 10,000 years. Our planet is now in an interglacial period which is likely to end within the next 2,000 years when the planet will revert to its natural state of stable equilibrium, i.e. the next ice age. The highest temperatures occurred during the Holocene period some 8,000 years ago and since then the planet has been cooling and warming at variable rates but the long-term trend has been for the planet to cool.

The global climate can be defined as a “non-linear, close coupled, chaotic system”. The prediction of future global temperatures by mathematical modelling is of no use because you cannot accurately model a chaotic system. Global temperature forecasts made in the latter part of the last century predicted rapid temperature increases. In fact since 1998 the global climate has shown a cooling trend. Fifteen years ago, the UK Meteorological Office using its climate model, forecast that between 2004 and 2014 the global mean temperature would rise by at least 0.3C and that four of the five years after 2009 would exceed the 1998 record. The reality is the global mean temperature has declined and no year since 2004 has exceeded 1998.

Roderick Taylor, in his letter of June 27, rightly points out the folly of relying on wind- mills and solar energy in replacing conventional thermal power stations. It is likely when the history of the opening years of the 21st century are studied in the future, readers will be intrigued to see how the quasi- religious faith shown in the power of computer models to replicate the complex workings of the global climate, led to one of the most expensive, destructive and foolish mistakes the human race has ever made. — Anthony Weeden, Bockmer End, Nr Marlow