Bruce Melton is a registered professional engineer, environmental researcher, author, trained outreach specialist, critical environmental issue filmmaker and front man for the band Climate Change. His work with climate started in the early 1990s when he was principal investigator for an EPA / Clean Water Act grant studying stormwater runoff treatment. Familiarity with the industry of science allowed him to begin following the growing body of ice research from Greenland and other new fundamental climate science that was redefining climate change.
About the Author
Counter intuitively, what Bruce found was that the media was under stating the science. In other words, the research said that climate change was worse than the media reported. Similarly convoluted, research was also reporting the solutions were less expensive than what the media was reporting. For a decade this fundamental disconnection only increased.
The growing disconnection was what pushed Bruce into his writing and filmmaking career in 2004. Within a few months he had a publisher for his first book. His reporting of leading-edge research revealed the IPCC was behind. Their consensus format created (and still creates) a time lag in the adoption of new science. The most current science was far ahead of the IPCC.
Melton reported in 2005 that the best interpretation of research showed that climate pollution should be evaluated based on atmospheric concentration, not annual emissions. In 2013, the IPCC changed their scenario concepts away from annual emissions to atmospheric concentration.
In 2009 Melton began writing about discoveries showing that methane’s global warming potential, in time frames that matter most, was four to five times greater than the IPCC’s 100-year global warming potential. Advocacy has now picked up on this and is actively working to increase regulations of methane (natural gas).
In 2009 Melton began reporting on research showing that global cooling aerosols were masking warming from global warming pollutants. In 2013, the IPCC reported that global cooling aerosols were masking 57 percent of warming that should have already occurred.
In 2010 Melton reported that research was showing that cars produced more warming in the most critical short-term time frames than coal (because of global cooling emissions from coal), and that air travel (because of the altitude that global cooling emissions were created), in the most critical short-term climate time frames), did not warm Earth at all but actually created cooling. This knowledge has yet to make it into advocacy or policy.
In 2013, the IPCC publicized statements of fact, one in their Summary for Policy Makers, that large net removal of CO2 from our atmosphere was required to prevent dangerous climate change. Advocacy (much less policy) has yet to pick up on this most important climate policy statement that complete annual elimination of CO2 emissions was not adequate, not even close.
In 2012, Melton began reporting on new technology research for air capture of CO2 showing costs to be significantly less than that of smokestack capture of CO2. This occurred as a major media blitz supported research (American Physical Society –APS) that said air capture of CO2 was economically infeasible. The “infeasible” research was quickly put to rest by the Nature, the 3rd most prestigious academic journal in the world, when it revealed that the APS research had only looked at atmospheric CO2 capture research technology that was basically developed during World War II. The media blitz was so successful that almost all popular reporting today and even the opinion of most environmental advocates and climate education resources continue to misstate the reality of the science.
In 2014, Melton reported on research that showed that swapping coal for natural gas would create more warming than doing nothing at all, in the most critical short-term climate change time frame. Related to global cooling aerosols, this fundamental knowledge has also failed to break free from academia.
Melton’s interpretations look at the big picture in a way that highly compartmentalized climate science specialists do not, and with the clarity to see through the fairness bias of the media. His writing, films and music focus on the latest fundamentals that are so slow to be adopted by the consensus, and his field investigations add presence that is so difficult to envision with simple reporting of journal findings.
Hard, long, worth every penny: Melton is 4,000 miles into a 7,000 mile, 24 day, 14 continental divide crossing, 27 national forest inspecting, 21 different camp, pine beetle chase.
Somewhere in the wilds of British Columbia chasing the pine beetle: Climate science is a dirty job.
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