Bush Administration Ordered to Prepare Global Warming Documents

The Bush administration has violated federal law by failing to prepare plans and studies required for dealing with the impacts of global warming, according to a ruling by a U.S. District Court judge in a case brought by environmental groups.

Federal District Court Judge Saundra Armstrong this week ordered the administration to prepare the required documents by early next year.

Attorneys with the organizations that brought the lawsuit -- the Center for Biological Diversity, Greenpeace and Friends of the Earth -- praised Armstrong's decision.

"This administration has denied and suppressed the science of global warming at every turn," said Brendan Cummings, an attorney with the Center for Biological Diversity. "Today's ruling is a stern rebuke of the administration's head-in-the-sand approach to global warming."

The environmental groups sued the Bush administration last year to get it to comply with the U.S. Global Change Research Act of 1990. The act requires the U.S. Climate Change Science Program to prepare a National Assessment every four years to take into account all the latest federal climate change research. The act also requires regular updates of a Research Plan that guides all federal climate research.

The last National Assessment was prepared by the Clinton administration in late 2000, and was not updated in 2004 as required by law. An updated Research Plan was required in 2006, but also has not been produced.

Judge Armstrong ordered the Bush administration to prepare a draft of a new Research Plan b.y March 1, 2008, a final plan 90 days later, and an updated National Assessment by May 31, 2008.

"Knowledge is the key to effective action," said Danielle Fugere, global warming program director for Friends of the Earth. "Congress knew this when it required the best minds in our government to conduct a National Assessment documenting the impacts of global warming on the U.S. Today's ruling will help make that information available."

Both U.S. Sen. John Kerry and U.S. Rep Jay Inslee filed friend-of-the-court briefs in support of the environmental groups when the lawsuit was filed last year.

"For too many years, action on global climate change has been stopped dead in its tracks by government foot-dragging, hiding information, and smothering science," Kerry said last November in expressing his support for the lawsuit. "It's the right time to push Washington to grapple with this issue. We can't respond to climate change if we can't make the government comply with the laws already on the books. This lawsuit sends an important message not just to follow the Global Change Research Act, but also to pass legislation imposing mandatory and substantial cuts in our greenhouse gas emissions."

A growing body of scientific research indicates that global warming, if not addressed immediately, could threaten everything from public health and biological diversity to public health and the global economy. James Hansen, NASA's leading climate scientist, warned earlier this year that the Earth was approaching a "tipping point" beyond which serious climatic impacts become unavoidable. Hansen has also repeatedly criticized the Bush administration for attempting to muzzle or censor climate change research.

Center for Biological Diversity, "Court Rules Against Bush Administration in Global Warming Case." URL: (http://www.biologicaldiversity.org/swcbd/press/global-warming-08-21-2007.html)