According to Greenwire reporters Brian Stempeck and Andrew Freedman (March 4, 2005) ...

A top climate official announced plans to resign his federal post next week, blasting the Bush administration's global warming research plan and
raising concern about the potential for politics to influence federal findings.

Rick Piltz, senior associate with the Climate Change Science Program, said he would resign at the end of next week after 10 years at CCSP and the U.S. Global Change Research Program, the agencies responsible for federal climate research.

Piltz expressed frustration with what he sees as the intrusion of politics into the scientific arena and a questionable scientific review process overseen by top White House officials.

"I resigned because of a number of differences with the Bush administration's approach to climate change and climate science over the past four years," Piltz wrote in an e-mail to Greenwire this morning.

"There is a problem with the process that has been established for final review and revision of these reports and clearance for publication," he
continued, noting that lead scientists on climate studies are not given the power to approve their final reports. "The final review and clearance would be done inside the administration, through a process that was seen as potentially subject to political influence on how the scientific conclusions were expressed.

"There is a governmental process, and potential political influence, in the way these reports are approved," Piltz said. "It's not clear yet how
big a problem this will become in practice. But it occurs in the context of a widespread distrust of the Bush administration in the scientific community -- for exactly the reason that the administration has come to be perceived as not
keeping politics out of science, on climate and other issues."

Piltz described oversight of CCSP research at part of a larger pattern. "The administration chose to have the CCSP Synthesis Reports be government
documents rather than asking the independent scientists to write them and let the chips fall where they may -- and this leads to a number of potential problems," he concluded. To view Piltz's full statement, click here.

"He felt some differences in his view about the way the work is being done," said James Mahoney, director of CCSP and deputy administrator of the
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. "I certainly have commended him for his diligent work over 10 years on the program," Mahoney
added, noting that Piltz is only one of the 300 officials working on CCSP reports.

But other climate researchers say Piltz's resignation should send a message to the Bush administration.

"I think it's a clear indication of a growing frustration," said Michael MacCracken, a scientist at the Climate Institute who previously worked
at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory for 34 years and also spent nine years with the U.S. Global Change Research Program. "A number of other people are quite frustrated by the administration's attempt to control the scientific
findings, the presentation of the scientific findings."

Just two weeks ago, the lead author of a forthcoming CCSP climate report asked to have his name removed from the study, questioning whether White House officials are looking to put their own spin on climate research.

Eric Sundquist -- formerly a lead author of the U.S. State of the Carbon Cycle Report -- announced he was removing his name from the study in a Feb. 22 letter circulated to his colleagues."
(snip)
www.eenews.net/Greenwire/include/print.php

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