And tonight we're going to look at a major climate change breakthrough. Last Wednesday on Sydney radio station 2GB, Breakfast host Alan Jones did his first interview this year with a climate scientist who doesn't reckon that the whole thing is nonsense.

Mind you, it's stretching the term to call Alan's half-hour chat with Professor David Karoly of the University of Melbourne an interview. It was part interrogation, part harangue. Here's a sample:

Alan Jones: You were intimately involved in the writing and reviewing of these United Nations intergovernmental reports on climate change? David Karoly: As were many, many thousands of other scientists. Alan Jones: Yeah, but no I'm just talking about you now, but you were intimately involved? David Karoly: That's correct. Alan Jones: Is there any empirical evidence proving human production of carbon dioxide as distinct from nature's production caused global warming? Is there? David Karoly: Yes. Alan Jones: ... in these reports? Yes or no? David Karoly: Yes. Alan Jones: Yes. Now where would I find that in chapter 9? That's your chapter. David Karoly: Sure, you would find that evidence in the peer reviewed scientific studies and in the data that's in chapter 9... Alan Jones: But where in chapter 9? David Karoly: So... Alan Jones: Where in chapter 9? Where can I open chapter 9, 'cause I looked? Where in open chapter 9 is that evidence? Where is it? David Karoly: It's... I can't tell you the page number because I don't have the page in front of me... Alan Jones: No, no, no, no, no it's not there. It's not there. David Karoly: Well no Alan... Alan Jones: It's not there. You're the chapter review editor. It's not there. That's why you can't tell me the page number. The evidence is not there. David Karoly: That's not true, Alan. — 2GB, The Alan Jones Breakfast Show, 25th May, 2011

Of course that's not the way Alan treats scientists whose conclusions he agrees with.

Professor Richard Lindzen of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, for example, is a respected meteorologist who argues that if man-made global warming is happening at all, it's likely effects are being grossly exaggerated.

On May 17th Dr Lindzen received the Jones soft-soap treatment...

Prof Richard Lindzen: No, I mean Australia, Australia could sink into the sea without affecting the CO2 balance significantly. Alan Jones: That's it. Australia could sink into the sea without affecting the CO2 balance significantly. — 2GB, The Alan Jones Breakfast Show, 17th May, 2011

Awed repetition is a classic sign of Jones approbation. Here's another one...

Richard Lindzen: ... there is no way current models can predict anything for a region as localised as Australia. Where your politicians come off with these statements sort of borders on the unbelievable. Alan Jones: Good on you... Alan Jones: "Borders on the unbelievable." — 2GB, the Alan Jones Breakfast Show, 17th May, 2011

Professor Karoly is just as distinguished a scientist as Professor Lindzen. A lead author of the IPCC reports, a scientific adviser to the Climate Change Commission. But Alan Jones doesn't agree with him, so he cops this:

David Karoly: ... carbon dioxide on average is going from the atmosphere into the ocean... ... and not the other way around. Alan Jones: No but hang on, hang on, you've agreed with me. You've agreed with me... David Karoly: Sure. Alan Jones: ... that 97% of CO2 comes from nature and if the oceans represent over 70% of the planet and the bulk of the oceans are in the southern hemisphere, they may be causing that that's the natural phenomenon of CO2 production. David Karoly: Alan, you're not listening to me, but that's fine. Alan Jones: Yeah I am. David Karoly: You're welcome to your opinion. Alan Jones: I'm listening to everything. David Karoly: ...would you like me to . . . Alan Jones: I'm listening attentively. David Karoly: Good, excellent. Alan Jones: Yeah no I am, I'm here. I'm sweating as well. David Karoly: Well, I'm sure you are. Alan Jones: You've got me nervous. — 2GB, the Alan Jones Breakfast Show, 25th May, 2011

But Alan wasn't nervous, and he wasn't listening. Instead, he was subjecting the Professor to a blizzard of figures.

Alan Jones: So, .04 of a per cent of the air is carbon dioxide, 3% of that .04 of a per cent is human activity, and Australia produce 1?% of the 3%, so we are producing... .000018 of carbon dioxide. — 2GB, the Alan Jones Breakfast Show, 25th May, 2011

No Alan. Even if your reasoning was correct, and many would argue it isn't, that would be the figure for the percentage of the entire atmosphere, not just of carbon dioxide, represented by man-made CO2 emissions from Australia. Yet you made the same mistake over and over again...

Alan Jones: ... of all the carbon dioxide Australians are producing .000018 of a per cent. Give me a break, Doc! WHITE NOISE Alan Jones: I'm simply saying that Australians - you've agreed with me - are producing .000018% of carbon dioxide — 2GB, the Alan Jones Breakfast Show, 25th May, 2011

Understandably bamboozled, it's true that Professor Karoly didn't pick Alan up on the error during the interview.

However afterwards he sent an email to 2GB setting out why he reckons Alan's figures are completely wrong.

Check it out on our website - you won't find it on 2GB's - but here's the bottom line...

...0.45% of the total CO2 in the atmosphere is due to Australians — Professor David Karoly, 26th May, 2011

Read Professor Karoly's email to 2GB

Professor Karoly's estimate - almost half a percent - is twenty-five thousand times bigger than the figure with all those zeroes that Alan kept repeating.

But according to 2GB, it doesn't matter. Last time we visited this issue, I pointed out that Alan had made a similar mistake with his maths...

Alan Jones: Nature produces nearly all of the carbon dioxide in the air. Human beings produce point 001 percent of the carbon dioxide in the air... — ABC, Media Watch, 21st March, 2011

That figure was nonsense too.

Following our program, a number of people complained to 2GB.

We've seen the response to two of those complaints. The station didn't deny that Alan's figure was fantasy. Instead, it made this remarkable claim...

...this particular statement made by the presenter is more a hyperbolic gesture to elucidate this opinion, rather than as a statement of scientific fact. — 2GB, 23rd May, 2011

Ah! A hyperbolic gesture! Presumably that applies just as much to Alan's new figure...

Alan Jones: .000018 of a per cent. — 2GB, The Alan Jones Breakfast Show, 25th May, 2011

Six decimal places of hyperbolic gesture. Well here are some figures which we are prepared to stand by.

In his interview with Professor Lindzen, Alan spoke for 30% of the time, and Professor Lindzen spoke for 70%.

In his 'interview' with Professor Karoly, Alan Jones spoke for 60% of the time, and Professor Karoly for 40%.

And amongst all Jones's blather and bulldust was this:

Alan Jones: Are you being paid for being on the Government's Climate Commission Science Advisory Panel?... David Karoly: No, my salary is not being paid by that. Alan Jones: Are you in any, and in receipt of any, benefits or funds or anything at all from the... David Karoly: I am receiving a travel allowance to cover the costs of going to meetings of the Science Advisory Panel and I am receiving a small retainer which is substantially less than your daily salary. Alan Jones: So you're paid by the Government and then you give an opinion on the science of climate change. Have you ever heard about he who pays the piper calls the tune? — 2GB, The Alan Jones Breakfast Show, 25th May, 2011

This is the man who, according to an inquiry by the Australian Broadcasting Authority, was found in the 1990's to have signed contracts worth millions of dollars, which he didn't disclose to his listeners, to spruik the virtues of Optus, and Qantas, and the State Bank of New South Wales, and the Walsh Bay development, and the Walker Corporation...

And Alan Jones is accusing one of Australia's most respected scientists of being corrupted by the payment of a small retainer? The hypocrisy, and the gall, are breathtaking.

The current regulator, ACMA, tells Media Watch that today it's begun an investigation into 2GB's coverage of the climate change debate.