Dear Editor:

The Dec. 26 editorial page had a rebuttal, or more accurately, an ad hominem attack on my letter “Record High Temperatures” published Dec. 12. My point was that the hysterical claims of record global warming are not supported by readings from properly installed temperature stations in the U.S. and around the world. Links were provided for review of the data.

I have decades of experience using the scientific method. At Maine Maritime Academy I studied nuclear physics, thermodynamics, heat transfer by convection, conduction, and radiation, fluid and gas flow, and the properties of water vapor, including specific heat and density. In my nuclear career I received thousands of hours of training on nuclear physics, electromagnetic radiation, quantum physics, and chemistry. I held the title of lead scientist at my last job on a Department of Energy project related to the Fukushima nuclear event.

Weather on earth is a wonderful and complex process. Most of the heat from the sun falls in the tropics. Ocean currents, prevailing winds, and evaporation and condensation transport that heat towards the poles. The earth rejects heat by radiating it into space. Presently we have scores of computer programs trying to prove CO2 drives global warming. None of the programs properly model the most important and complex process - water vapor. Not surprisingly, none of the programs work, and the solution has been to average the wrongs to make a right.

We have periodic glaciers. The weather cools and glaciers grow, at some point, warming starts and they melt. Earth’s historical record indicates CO2 has little effect in the process. To understand what drives climate cycles is to know the past. Our climate history is literally written in stone (and mud and ice). The output of the sun felt at earth’s “edge of space” is the other part of the puzzle.

I will end with a quote from Dr. Kiminori Itoh, an award-winning environmental physical chemist, “Warming fears are the worst scientific scandal in history. When people come to know what the truth is they will feel deceived by science and scientists.”

Joe Grant

Wiscasset