FOR more than a decade public opinion on human-caused global warming has been moulded by pronouncements from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change and its army of acolytes.
Arguably the zenith of acceptance was the IPCC's fourth assessment in early 2007 followed soon after by the release of the Al Gore movie An Inconvenient Truth.
The accompanying recognition by way of an Academy Award for the movie and awarding of the Nobel Peace Prize jointly to Gore and the IPCC only heightened awareness of the message.
During more recent months it is not overstating the case to say that there has been a perceptible shift in public opinion.
Rejection of some of the claims made in the movie by a British court in itself has had little effect.
It is the soothing promises that decarbonising the economies of the developed world can be achieved without pain, and even with gain of green jobs, that are being seen more widely as hollow.
There is rising recognition that introduction of a carbon tax under the guise of "cap and trade" will be personally costly, economically disruptive to society and tend to shift classes of jobs offshore. Moreover, despite rising carbon dioxide concentrations, global warming seems to have taken a holiday.
The science of global warming is claimed to be too complex for the public to comprehend and judge. We are continually being told to take and act on the advice of the consensus of IPCC experts; the dissenters are no more than paid mouthpieces of industry or worse. Read more.