Administration Comments on Climate Email Controversy

President Obama’s Chief Science Geeks, John Holdren  and Jane Lubchenco, tried to alleviate concerns about the disclosure of more than 1,000 controversial e-mails and several thousand documents stored on the computers of climate scientists at the University of East Anglia’s Climate Research Unit.

“There is, and there will remain after the dust settles in this current controversy, a very strong scientific consensus on the key characteristics of the problem [of climate change],” Holdren said, while noting that not all of the disclosed documents have been adequately reviewed.  Lubchenco added:  “The e-mails do nothing to undermine the strong scientific consensus and independent scientific analysis of thousands of scientists around the world that tell us the Earth is warming, and the warming is largely a result of human activities.”

In seperate testimony before the Senate Committee on Environment and Public Works, EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson argued that the emails do not affect the scientific consensus on anthropogenic climate change.