From Politico via WUWT
Environmental Protection Agency chief Scott Pruitt has expressed doubts about carbon dioxide’s role as a major driver of climate change. | Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images
By EMILY HOLDEN Updated 08/12/2017 01:01 PM EDT
Environmental Protection Agency chief Scott Pruitt said his staff will gauge the “accuracy” of a major federal science report that blames human activity for climate change just days after researchers voiced their fears to The New York Times that the Trump administration would alter or suppress its findings.
“Frankly this report ought to be subjected to peer-reviewed, objective-reviewed methodology and evaluation,” Pruitt told a Texas radio show Thursday. “Science should not be politicized. Science is not something that should be just thrown about to try to dictate policy in Washington, D.C.”
Pruitt, who has expressed doubts about carbon dioxide’s role as a major driver of climate change, also dismissed the discussions in Washington about manmade carbon emissions, calling them “political.”
The report’s authors implemented the 132 pages of suggestions from the reviewers, and now the Trump administration has one last opportunity to review the document before publication. Agencies are supposed to sign off by Aug. 18 and send their comments to the authors.
“It’s a much more extensive process than a usual peer review, which does not typically come out as a paperback book,” said Bob Kopp, a lead report author and climate scientist at Rutgers University.
