Update: Michael and Ted are not the only ones who have argued that there are many reasons to catalyze an energy transformation regardless of the certainty of climate science. In 2002, Oxford Professor Steve Rayner made a similar point in the Guardian that " further research is not a prerequisite for sound policy action."

Michael Shellenberger and Ted Nordhaus have an essay up at Yale e360 arguing that in the wake of Climategate, energy policy should be made independent of climate science. The piece is already beginning to set the climate blogosphere aflutter, with coverage from the National Journal, E&E News (subs. req'd), The Hill, and the North County Times.

While Michael and Ted's argument has particular resonance in the wake of Climategate, in truth, they have been making this argument for a long time.

In their 2004, "The Death of Environmentalism" [pdf] they argued that energy policy should be motivated by concern for national security and the economy:

Literal-sclerosis can be seen in the assumption that to win action on global warming one must talk about global warming instead of, say, the economy, industrial policy, or health care. "If you want people to act on global warming" stressed [then-Sierra Club staffer Dan] Becker, "you need to convince them that action is needed on global warming and not on some ulterior goal."

In a 2006 New York Times op-ed, they argued that skeptics and greens did not need to agree about the causes of global warming to support global warming preparedness:

ENVIRONMENTALISTS and their opponents have spent far too much time debating whether global warming is caused by humans, and whether the transition to cleaner energy sources will be good or bad for the economy. Whatever the causes, warming is a genuine risk. If the earth's temperatures continue to rise, we can expect to face melting glaciers and rising sea levels, warmer ocean temperatures and more intense hurricanes, more frequent droughts and other extreme weather. Is the government ready?

In Break Through, Michael and Ted argued that climate science should not be the guide for what we do:

"The questions before us are centrally about how we will survive, who will survive, and how we will live. These are questions that climatologists and other scientists can inform but not decide. For their important work, scientists deserve our gratitude, not special political authority.

What's needed today is a politics that seeks authority not from Nature or Science but from a compelling vision of the future that is appropriate for the world we live in and the crises we face." (Nordhaus and Shellenberger, 142)

Unsurprisingly, some commentators are accusing Michael and Ted of being skeptics -- a reaction is to be expected given what we know about the Hyperpartisan Mind.