The Cato Institute, a Washington, D.C.-based libertarian think tank, is set to publish a document that poses as an “addendum” to a report released in 2009 by the U.S. Global Change Research Program. The new “report,” which apes the design of the original, denies the threat of global warming.

The addendum appears intended to deceive readers into linking it to the original, which sought to show how global warming would affect different regions in the United States. The layout and design, right down to the chapter heads, are almost identical.

— Posted by Alexander Reed Kelly.

The Daily Climate:

“It’s not an addendum. It’s a counterfeit,” said John Abraham, an associate professor at the University of Saint Thomas in Minnesota who studies clean power sources. “It’s a continued effort to kick the can down the road: A steady drip, drip, drip of fake reports by false scientists to create a false sense of debate.”

The 2009 assessment, titled Global Change Impacts in the United States, was presented to Congress as the federal government’s best assessment of the science and potential impacts. It is part of an ongoing effort by the National Climatic Data Center to assess the state of climate change science.

The Cato Institute bills its report as a “primary reference and a guidepost for those who want to bring science back into environmental protection.” In the introduction to a review copy obtained by DailyClimate.org, Cato president Ed Crane wrote that the effort “grew out of the recognition that the original document was lacking in scope and relevant scientific detail.”

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