So after breakfast, I settled into the room where the climatology track took place. A good bit of the climatology track was devoted to critiquing the general circulation climate models (GCMs) For example, University of Rochester physicist David Douglass presented the results of his recent study that compared the outputs of 22 different climate models with observational temperature data in the tropical troposphere. According to Douglass, the models show that tropical troposphere should warm as much as 3 times faster than surface. However, when this result is checked against observational temperature data from satellites and weather balloons, it turns out the surface and troposphere warm at about the same rate. Thus, Douglass concludes, greenhouse gases must be having only a minor impact on global temperature trends. Naturally, this study is controversial.

One of the more remarkable performances was by Australian entrepreneur David C. Archibald during one of the afternoon panels. Archibald is described in the conference materials as "a scientist operating in the fields of cancer research, climate science, and oil exploration." He also appears to have business interests in some oil fields in Australia. In any case, Archibald made it very clear that he is a big believer in the idea that climate change is primarily driven by the sun. Archibald's basic theory is that when the sun's magnetic field strength drops there are fewer sunspots which reduce the amount of particles ejected as the solar wind. Less solar wind allows more galactic cosmic rays to enter the Earth's atmosphere. Archibald is here relying on studies by Danish physicist Henrik Svensmark which find that cosmic rays do produce cloud condensation nuclei which then might create low level clouds that reflect more sunlight back into space thus making the Earth colder.

Archibald predicts that the next solar cycle, Cycle 24, will produce a weak magnetic field which means that more cosmic rays will enter the atmosphere to create clouds and thus cool the earth. Actually, a 2007 NASA scientific panel was evenly split on the strong/weak prediction for Cycle 24. However, many researchers expect that Cycle 25 may be one the weakest in centuries. Archibald ended by boldly predicting that the world will see average temperatures drop by -2.2 degrees centigrade in the coming decade. That's more than three times the amount of warming the world has experienced over the last century. He also predicted as a consequence that the growing seasons in the United States would be shortened by a total of four weeks, dramatically reducing food production.