By Congressman Mo Brooks, a Republican representing District 5

AL.com's John Archibald's vilifying Op-Ed about my comments and questions in a recent Science, Space and Technology ("SST") hearing cry for a response.

By way of background, the climate scare of the 1970s was global COOLING! When that didn't turn out, the climate scare morphed into global warming. When over 90 percent of global warming projections made in the 1990s turned out to be wrong, alarmists shifted to "climate change", a much safer bet because the Earth's climate has always changed and likely always will.

Too often climate scare enthusiasts resort to vilification of the messenger rather than thoughtful analysis of scientific fact and theory. Locally, they've done it repeatedly to the Tennessee Valley's own well-respected Dr. John Christy and Dr. Roy Spencer (world leaders in satellite temperature data).

To be clear, what I said in the SST hearing is backed up by science. Period. There is no logical, science-based argument to the contrary that can be advanced by anyone familiar with geology, meteorology, and climatology.

Mr. Archibald wrongly ridiculed the observation that erosion impacts sea levels.

Over the history of planet Earth, far and away the #1 cause of sea level rise has been erosion and its resulting deposits of sediment and rocks into the world's seas and oceans. There is no close second cause of sea level rise. At a minimum, over many millions of years, thousands of cubic miles of eroded material have been deposited into the Earth's seas, forcing rising sea levels.

Anyone can research this statement of fact. In the alternative, simply look at Google Earth maps that reveal vast alluvial plains and deltas of the Earth's major river systems and how far they protrude into the seas. These protrusions (sedimentary deposits) have displaced vast quantities of sea water which, in turn, forced sea levels to rise.

In contrast to erosion, ice has had little to no permanent effect on sea levels because ice quantity has varied significantly throughout Earth's history as the planet cooled or warmed. Erosion and sedimentary deposits have been the constant.

Mr. Archibald next ridiculed statements about Antarctica (because he failed to grasp the difference between surface ice area and total ice quantity). In my hearing remarks, I referred to Antarctic ice QUANTITY (the thing that actually affects sea levels). I never limited my comments to fluctuating Antarctic ice surface areas because it has little to no effect on sea levels except to the extent of the QUANTITY of ice below that surface.

Why did I focus my comments and questions on Antarctic ice quantity and its impact on sea levels? Because Antarctic ice constitutes the vast majority (roughly 85 percent) of all ice on Earth, roughly six times the ice in the Arctic Ocean, on Greenland, and everywhere else, combined.

For emphasis, I have actually been to Antarctica and South Pole. At the South Pole, the ice is over 8,000 feet thick! Similarly, the Antarctica continent ice sheet averages over a mile thick! While there I inspected America's science facilities, evaluated the National Science Foundation's capital improvement requests, and talked with field scientists. They consistently said two things: first, the Earth is warming. Second, and surprising to me, that projected global warming will LOWER sea levels because warmer Antarctic air will carry more moisture above the Antarctic land mass, and deposit that moisture in the interior of Antarctica, where it will take hundreds of years to glacially make its way to the sea. These scientists opined that the increase in Antarctic continental ice will more than offset the loss of ice elsewhere on planet Earth.

A major part of this reasoning is that not all ice is the same. Different ice affects sea levels in different ways. For example, roughly 87 percent of icebergs are below the water line, which means only about 13 percent of floating sea ice affects sea levels. In contrast, 100 percent of Antarctic continent ice affects sea levels. Stated differently, land ice impacts sea levels roughly 8 times more than does floating sea ice. That is why the Antarctic continent ice sheet is so important to the sea level debate.

In summary, the news media could do so much better for Alabama and America. I pray and hope they will. The public needs good information in order to make wise decisions about our future.