To the editor:

The U.N.’s fifth major Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change came out in late September. Top scientists from 200 nations reported four takeaways: The past three decades are the hottest since the start of the Industrial Revolution in 1850; in the past two decades the ice sheets in Greenland and Antarctic have steadily lost mass while glaciers are rapidly shrinking across the world; and the concentration of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere has increased to levels unprecedented in the last 800,000 years and sea levels are likely to rise three feet by the end of the century.

These peer-reviewed findings are what distinguishes science from opinion. The Nobel Prize-winning IPCC panel reported with 95 percent certainty that human activity is causing global warming, and 1,400 climate scientists have come out in support of the need to take action.

Powerful carbon producers promote deniers like pseudo-scientist Fred Singer of the Heartland Institute. He was also the expert scientific witness who denied the connection of smoking and cancer. Citizens Climate Lobby has a clear solution: increase the price of carbon. We work for one goal: revenue neutral carbon fee and dividend legislation. This means, tax carbon at the well, the mine and the port and return those revenues as a dividend payment equally distributed to all citizens.  Heavy users will not receive any more than moderate or miserly carbon users. The goal is miserly carbon use and more renewables.