CO2 is not the main driver of climate change

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Incoming Energy Secretary Rick Perry (R) gives a double thumbs up during the Inaugural Parade for U.S. President Donald J. Trump January 20, 2017 in Washington, DC.

The EPA’s webpage on the causes of climate change used to state, “Carbon dioxide is the primary greenhouse gas that is contributing to recent climate change.” The EPA recently took down the web page containing that statement.

Perry and Pruitt’s views are also at odds with the conclusion of NASA and the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.

Despite those conclusions, Perry said, “This idea that science is just absolutely settled and if you don’t believe it’s settled then somehow you’re another neanderthal, that is so inappropriate from my perspective.”

Being a skeptic about climate change issues is “quite all right,” he said, suggesting that skepticism is a sign of a “wise, intellectually engaged person.”

President Donald Trump announced this month he would pull the United States out of the Paris climate agreement, an international effort to mitigate the effects of global warming. Since then, most of the president’s surrogates have declined to say whether he believes in climate change.