by Judith Curry
My analysis of EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt’s recent statements on climate change, and the response to his statements.
Last week, there was a controversial interview of Scott Pruitt on CNBC. A sampling of the headlines reporting on his interview:
New Yorker: Scott Pruitt rejects climate change reality. A relatively thorough summary of the interview with Scott Pruitt.
Washington Post: On climate change, Scott Pruitt causes an uproar — and contradicts the EPA’s own website.
CNBC: Scott Pruitt’s climate denial is dangerous and out of step.
Guardian: EPA head Scott Pruitt denies that carbon dioxide causes global warming. Subtitle: Trump adviser shocks scientists and environmental advocates with statement that negates EPA policy and ‘overwhelmingly clear’ evidence on climate change
David Robert at Vox: Scott Pruitt denies basic climate science. But most of the outrage is missing the point. Subtitle: It’s not about Pruitt and it’s not about facts. Excerpt: The right’s refusal to accept the authority of climate science is of a piece with its rejection of mainstream media, academia, and government, the shared institutions and norms that bind us together and contain our political disputes.
A number of scientists have responded in various venues regarding their opinion on Scott Pruitt’s statements. Here I include the ‘official’ statement from the AGU:
AGU Responds to Statements from EPA Administrator Scott Pruitt on Climate Change. Excerpt: The position statement of the American Geophysical Union regarding climate change leaves no doubt that increasing atmospheric concentrations of carbon dioxide resulting from human activity is the dominant source of climate change during the last several decades.
You may recall my concerns about the AGU policy statement on climate change [link]
What Scott Pruitt actually said
Listen to what Scott Pruitt actually said on CNBC and then compare it to the portrayal in the media. Here is the key text:
I think that measuring with precision human activity on the climate is something very challenging to do and there’s tremendous disagreement about the degree of impact, so no, I would not agree that it’s a primary contributor to the global warming that we see. But we don’t know that yet. We need to continue the debate and continue the review and the analysis.
Can you square what Pruitt actually said with the distorted quotes and headlines about this? I can’t.
I think that these two statements made by Pruitt are absolutely correct:
I think that measuring with precision human activity on the climate is something very challenging to do and there’s tremendous disagreement about the degree of impact
We need to continue the debate and continue the review and the analysis.
The other two statements give slightly conflicting messages:
I would not agree that it’s a primary contributor to the global warming that we see. But we don’t know that yet.
The main statement of controversy is:
I would not agree that it’s a primary contributor to the global warming that we see.
You can interpret this in two ways:
1.Pruitt is denying that CO2 is a primary contributor to recent global warming
OR
2.Pruitt is saying that he does not accept as a ‘fact’ that CO2 is a primary contributor because we simply don’t know.
Since his subsequent statement is “But we don’t know that yet”, #2 is obviously the correct interpretation.
I think he is saying that he is not convinced that we know with certainty that humans have caused 100% of the recent warming (which is what some climate modelers are saying, see recent tweets from Gavin Schmidt), or that humans have caused ‘more than half’ of the recent warming (which was the conclusion from the IPCC AR5.
JC reflections
If I am interpreting Pruitt’s statements correctly, I do not find anything to disagree with in what he said: we don’t know how much of recent warming can be attributed to humans. In my opinion, this is correct and is a healthy position for both the science and policy debates.
Exactly what the Trump administration intends to do regarding funding climate science, energy policy and the Paris climate agreement presumably remain as subjects of debate within the administration. Looking at every little leak and quote out of context as a rationale for hysteria simply isn’t rational or useful.
The most interest reaction to all this is David Robert’s vox article:
The right’s refusal to accept the authority of climate science is of a piece with its rejection of mainstream media, academia, and government, the shared institutions and norms that bind us together and contain our political disputes.
The ‘problem’: a change of administration and party after 8 years, mainstream media no longer has a lock on the media’s message (given all of the new news sources on the internet), academia’s profoundly liberal bias is being challenged, and the consensus that has been negotiated and enforced by certain elite scientists is being challenged.
Three cheers for democracy, the internet and the scientific process.
Three cheers for democracy, the internet and the scientific process.
I’m with you. Well said.
Second that sentiment.
+10 from me
Three cheers for democracy, the internet and the scientific process. Totally agree.
The politicization of science, has led many democrats to argue if anyone disagrees with their favored hypotheses that CO2 accounts for most or all climate change, then we must be “anti-science” . They have tried to portray themselves as the party of science, and anyone who disagrees as anti-science
But before we can attribute anything to CO2, we must understand the bounds of natural climate variability. Hopefully Pruitt can redirect funds that had been used to support research obsessed with catastrophic climate change in the distant future, and re-direct it to research on understanding natural oscillations. The PDO was not even named until 1996, but now there is a consensus that it is a major driver of global climate change, second to ENSO.
Hi Jim,
What’s the story on having 2 large bleaching event on the GBR back to back.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-03-10/great-barrier-reef-mass-bleaching-event-2017-confirmed/8342174
Your my #1 guy for alternative facts on coral bleaching.
I would look at the number of scientists studying the Great Barrier Reef while coating their bodies in sunscreen containing oxybenzone, which is fatal to coral in parts per trillion quantities.
Hi George,
It was just the other day I noticed a bunch of mad scientists had made a brand new hockey stick showing the growth of man made compounds introduced into the biosphere since the beginning of the industrial age. I bet oxybenzone was on their list.
https://judithcurry.com/2017/03/04/week-in-review-science-edition-63/#comment-840636
Jim Steele, do you still believe that corals can instantaneously adapt to bleaching and miraculously recover? Why did 2/3 of the northern section of the Great Barrier Reef die last year? Now, it is bleaching again due to too much heat? You downplayed heat as a cause for bleaching as claimed by marine biologists and NOAA: “In contrast to researchers like Hoegh-Guldberg who emphasizes coral bleaching as a deadly product of global warming, bleaching is a visible stage in a complex set of acclimation mechanisms during which coral expel, shift and shuffle their symbionts, seeking the most beneficial partnership possible.”
Since 2/3 of the north Great Barrier Reef died due to heat-induced bleaching last year, and the GBR is bleaching again this year, do you want to modify your claims?
You also wrote this, “There is a perception that bleaching suddenly became more common only since the 1980s, leading some to speculate bleaching is due to rising CO2 and global warming.” Bleaching did become more common and is happening more frequently. That is why there is a perception that it is true, because it is true.
I think you (and Judith Curry for printing and “editing” the guest essay) owe an apology for your blatant attempt to downplay the obvious damaging impacts of climate change and global warming on coral reef ecosystems. The massive bleaching and death on the Great Barrier Reef make your efforts to diminish coral bleaching as evidence of climate change seem extremely misguided and wrong.
Jacksmith, I am sorry, I dont know who you are. But I am delighted to know I am your favorite source of knowledge. Still I am not sure what specific facts you are now looking for
In my essay The Coral Bleaching Debate: Is Bleaching the Legacy of a Marvelous Adaptation Mechanism or A Prelude to Extirpation? I never argued that bleaching could not happen 2 years in a row. I reported new advances in the adaptive bleaching hypothesis that many coral researchers now vouch for. Improved genetic techniques are constantly confirming the alternantive fact that different symbionts can be shuffled and shifted and provide different degrees of protection and rapid adaptation to various stresses. This contradicts the old “alternative facts” from researchers like Houegh-Guldberg who argued coral can only adapt very slowly via classical Darwinian evolution.
In addition there is continuing research supporting the Mirobe Bleaching Hypothesis. These researchers argue, not only must the photosynthesizing symbionts be taken into consderation, but all the microbes that compose a coral ecospecies. They argue that bleaching can be induced by bacteria such as in the genus VIbrio. These bacteria can exude toxins and molecules that disrupt the mechanisms that make coral resilient. Increases in seaweeds like Lobophora spp harbor Vibrio spp and more seaweed can cause more bleaching as a means of helping the seaweeds in their battle for space against coral.
Overfishing and other disruptions have caused an increase these seaweeds and thus tilted the balance against coral making them more susceptible to summer temperatures. I dont know the trends of these increasing seaweeds in all segments of the GBR but if these facts are something you want to pursue further, I will gladly contribute to your investagation.
Hi Trip, Unfortunately I do remember you because you were aggressively insulting and obsessed with only a CO2 interpretation of coral bleaching. That you now demand an apology from me as well as from Judith for simply allowing me to report an alternative explanation that is debated in the peer reviewed literature, suggests you lean towards promoting intellectual tyranny when you disagree. You appear to be against the scientific process where alternative explanations must be considered.
Just to remind you, what I downplayed is the hype that bleaching now means coral are on the verge of extirpation by 2050 as Hoegh-Guldberg fear mongers. If you remember I provided several examples of reefs that were bleached, and “believed” dead, only to revive and thrive within 0ne to 15 years.
https://goo.gl/7mEJ2y
It seems reports of bleaching in the Far Northern Great Barrier Reef has you upset. And presently I do not have adequate information, nor have you provided any, to ascertain how that bleaching supports or refutes the adaptive bleaching hypothesis. Can you tell me if the same colonies, species, or reefs underwent bleaching again? Often what is observed is different colonies, species and reefs undergo bleaching, while those that bleached previously are now more resilient. Has there been any trends in seaweed cover? Can you explain why one reef was bleached but a neighboring reef was not???
Trip do you believe coral are suddenly so fragile they will be extirpated by 2050 despite thriving during the Holocene Optimum when temperatures were much higher?
Trip Here is a report from the GBRMPA confirming my suspicions that different places are experience bleaching than the year before.
“On 9 March 2017 experts from the Marine Park Authority spent six hours flying over the Reef between Townsville and Cairns, alongside researchers from the Australian Institute of Marine Science. The first aerial survey of the Reef for 2017 found severe bleaching in offshore reefs from north of Ingham to the northern extent of the survey near Cairns. This year more bleaching is being observed in this central part of the Reef, which last year escaped widespread severe bleaching.”
So you see Trip, to simply hype “2 years of bleaching” tell us very little. The coral that are now bleaching wdid not bleach last year and there for did not adapt with new symbionts. Finally you really must wait 10 to 15 years before you can call a reef dead. Coral have proven the rumors of their demise have been greatly exaggerated. If a fire destroyed a forest, I hope you would not argue the trees would soon go extinct, would you? Trees as well as coral have similarly adapted to rapid rejuvenation after extreme disruptions.
Jim,
Everything you say could be true.
But the reefs are dying. I saw it in Belize from my first trip in 1971 to my last visit in 2006. If human nature is any guide I predict you will win this argument. Maybe we can name one of the dead reefs in your honor.
This was oral, right? Who parsed it as two sentences (which is grammatically incorrect):
“I would not agree that it’s a primary contributor to the global warming that we see. But we don’t know that yet.”
instead of as a single sentence which is grammatically correct
“I would not agree that it’s a primary contributor to the global warming that we see but we don’t know that yet.”
The first parsing allows him to be taken out of context. The second (correct) parsing makes clear that he is not agreeing because the facts are not clear.
You need to see/hear the actual question he was asked before judging it even parsing his answer. It turns out he wasn’t asked about global,warming or climate change. He was asked “Do you believe that it’s been proven that carbon dioxide is THE primary control knob for climate?”
There is absolutely nothing grammatically incorrect about the two-sentence form.
David Ramsay Steel:
You never reflected my Climate Etc. response to your essay, explaining your many errors and false assumptions, at the la-blog, which you had undertaken so to do. Please can you make good on your offer. As I said at the time, repeated below, your blog is a private forum and I am not able to do this myself. Thank you. Prior comment:
—————-
andywest2012 | May 20, 2015 at 9:35 am |
David Ramsay Steele | May 12, 2015 at 2:35 am
But to get a user name and password, don’t I have to ‘join’? It says in the general info that the forum is private and joining is subject to approval. Nor even if approval is granted do I particularly want to ‘join’ (no dislike of your blog implied at all, but I don’t want to join any politically orientated forum at this time). In essence, there appears to be no true public access therefore, as there is here for instance, unless simply a WordPress or Facebook or similar ID works (there’s no indication of that). If this is not the case, can you simply reflect my reply below your article or enact one of the other fixes please? Thanks.
—————-
The other fixes being: correct the essay, or considering that it is a complete misfire, take it down. Comment explaining the issues here:
https://judithcurry.com/2015/04/24/contradiction-on-emotional-bias-in-the-climate-domain/#comment-697908
At the moment your essay still stands, with no indication that you have acknowledged issues with it.
Well put Judith.
Pruitt statement as one sentence makes sense.
Bad News Sells.
An example of main stream media desperate to recover paying customers – despite the facts!
David Steele – most schools teach the maxim “Never begin a sentence with ‘and’ or ‘but’. http://blog.oxforddictionaries.com/2012/01/can-i-start-a-sentence-with-a-conjunction/
But you may choose to argue the point. And that’s okay. But it looks kind of silly. And people taught otherwise will continually wag a finger. And you may not care. And that’s okay too.
But be that as it may we should ask whether the chosen transcriptive choice changes the meaning of the sentence. And we should also ask whether the transcription choice allows a whole sentence to be quoted that is clearly out of context given there is an immediate conjunctive connecting word at the beginning of the next sentence.
But I don’t care. And I don’t think Pruitt cares either. Because regardless of this the EPA is getting disassembled. And it will return to its core mission of protecting the environment. But it will not continue on a pointless futile exercise to regulate the earth’s temperature. And it will not demonize fertilization of the atmosphere with CO2 which in any reasonable view is a net benefit to living things.
if 50% of the EPA budget is grants, and the rumors of Trumps budget calling for a 25% reduction in the EPA budget are true, things are going to get interesting there.
Imagine the gall of the President actually planning to REDUCE the size of the executive branch workforce, you may even think he is serious about draining the swamp :-)
David,
You put a lot of faith in the NASA satellites showing all this greening of the planet but can you explain why the atmospheric and ocean oxygen levels keep dropping. I thought plants were the primary source of oxygen in the biosphere? Sum Ting Wong?
Oh one other thing. You do realize that measuring atmosphere temperatures with satellites uses a sensor that measures the reflective qualities or oxygen atoms. If there there is a steady decrease in the ratio of oxygen atoms to the levels of GHG then the satellites are biased cool. I have asked Dr. Spencer (UAH) to explain how he adjusts the satellite data for this forcing but he’s ignoring my question for some reason. Just being a good skeptic.
Amen sister.
I fully agree. Well said.
“The right’s refusal to accept the authority of climate science is of a piece with its rejection of mainstream media, academia, and government, the shared institutions and norms that bind us together and contain our political disputes.”
An interesting statement – an appeal to authority and consensus, but not to factual science. The commenter is basically expecting intelligent voters and policy makers not to think for themselves but to simply parrot what the mainstream media, academia, government and left wing political bodies state as true. Voters seem to be smarter or have perhaps learned from past experience that this is a recipe for disaster. It would take far to much time and text to list the many times that a consensus of thought on one end of a political/social spectrum was ultimately found to be foolishly and dangerously wrong. For CAGW/Climate Change, I believe we are coming close to a general realization of the same once more, as all the prophesies have and continue to fail the test of reality.
There seems to be a third possibility. That he was referring to the overall process of recent global warming – in which CO2 is the ‘primary trigger’, but water vapour is the “primary contributor”. As far as I am aware, the latter statement is just basic consensus science. For instance, in 2010 a paper by the current NASA lead climate researcher put water vapour in the high troposphere at ~20% of the overall global warming effect (Schmidt et al, ‘Attribution of the present-day total greenhouse effect’).
Very sorry, that should have read: “put CO2 at ~20% of the overall global warming effect”.
Right but there’s even more to it. CO2 is a catch-all for all non-condensing greenhouse gases including methane and nitrous oxide.
Where is water in this diagram?
PeteBonk,
“… all non-condensing greenhouse gases…”
I’d guess non-condensing under ambient conditions on Earth.
In the condensing greenhouse gas list. It’s a very short list.
I don’t think I captured the true relationship, but if I did, I think the non-condensing greenhouse gasses would be reduced to a single pixel…
He was asked “Do you believe that it’s been proven that carbon dioxide is THE primary control knob for climate?” This is the actual question to which he quite correctly responded “No”.
I wish he had the Trump balls to actually respond “No”. That headline might have focused the debate.
His first word was “NO!”
i do not know what is wrong with the Bill Gray link, it works for me but when I post it it gets changed. I will post it differently, copy and paste it it this works.
“https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ivVUBfqWsEc&feature=youtu.be&list=PLgnnPnL9OL7Gbzw8wdzgZs8SA9HdUfQn6”
You have touched on one of my favorite topics, and I appreciate the link you provided. I am providing one in response – the late Dr. William Gray’s 2010 (same year) paper where he directly confronts positive water vapor feedback.
I draw your attention to the references to Charney in both papers. Dr. Gray asserts that his study of 60 years of reanalysis data plus 21 years of satellite data and local rainfall data show that the atmosphere doesn’t behave in the manner assumed for a doubling of CO2 by Charney in 1979, and still used by Schmidt in 2010 (GISS Model E).
Dr. Gray asserts that temperature response to a doubling of CO2 will only be one-sixth that projected by Schmidt. I have yet to find a refutation of Gray’s work. By this post, I am continuing my search for one. Comments are welcome.
Link to Dr. Gray’s paper:
http://climaterealists.com/attachments/ftp/AMS-Final5-10.pdf
Link to the Schmidt paper: https://pubs.giss.nasa.gov/docs/2010/2010_Schmidt_sc05400j.pdf
On my initial reading, the paper does contain some serious problems with quantification of what he is describing. At one stage Dr Gray argues that the TOA CO2 forcing associated with his atmospheric concentration of 380ppm is (100/280)*3.7. He assumes a linear rather than a logarithmic effect. Secondly, even if this were corrected, it would still be wrong, since the forcing he should be applying in the context of explaining temperature-dependent observations is the total change in all forcings from pre-industral – not just the CO2 forcing. He also seems somewhat confused by the no-feedback calculation of temperature rise from CO2. He is correct to suggest that this calculation does not account for increased evaporation, but that is only because it does not account for any change in sensible heat at all, nor does it account for change in lapse rate – both of these things are treated as feedbacks. The no-feedback temperature change for a doubling of CO2 is the answer to the question: what temperature do I have to raise the Earth’s surface by to balance an additional forcing of 3.7 W/m2 at TOA if I hold everything else constant.
He may well be right when he asserts that GCM’s C-C calculations (which more or less correspond to a constant rel humidity) do not correspond well to observations. In fact, I recall that Garth Partridge argued something similar from the reanalysis data. However, I do not understand how any of this affects Dr Gray’s final quantified conclusions because his calculation of CO2 sensitivity with WV feedback is somewhat arcane, to me at least, and appears to have changed by the time he presented a paper on this subject at a Heartland conference in 2012. In summary, he might well be saying something important, but the paper is not stellar in quality IMO.
Here’s the Heartland presentation you referred to. It includes an intro to his THC hypothesis. It is more user-friendly in readability overall. http://tropical.atmos.colostate.edu/Includes/Documents/Publications/gray2012.pdf
Thanks for the Web link. I am certainly no expert on this matter, and have only a growing but-outline journalistic knowledge of the apparent fundamentals of the warming process, with the help of various explanatory podcasts and process diagrams. e.g.: the very clear explanations given by a lead scientist on the NASA TC4 mission in a long audio interview at: http://omegataupodcast.net/46-the-nasa-tc4-project/ As such I am not really qualified to assess the details of the extended conference abstract you link to. But as a ‘go straight to meta’ kind of historian I would have initial worries about it on two broad points. As I understand the high troposphere process, ice-fall velocity rates from the area of high ‘superfine’ cirrus in the upper troposphere are the second most important climate sensitivity factor in the broad warming model(s) under discussion. Yet my initial keyword search of the 2010 Gray & Schwartz paper for “ice” suggests that it does not mention this apparently important factor, which I would have expected it to mention. My second initial concern is that the 2010-11 results of the NASA TC4 mission to the upper troposphere are not mentioned by the paper, specifically the discovery of much larger and much sparser ice crystals than had been previously assumed by then-existing models. I wonder to what extent the TC4 mission results – and similar later findings – may have modified the understanding and functioning of the current IR energy transfer element of the climate models – which I take it is what the Gray & Schwartz abstract was addressing?
Thanks. The Heartland paper adds to my confusion rather than dispels it, since it changes the sensitivity estimate and introduces an unsupported assertion that temperature changes are mostly due to multi-decadal and centenary changes in ocean salinity.
If Dr Gray’s presentation has any importance then it rests with the observational data (OK, a mix of reanalysis data) which he claims are at odds with GCM simulations. He promises in his paper “A long observational paper is presently being prepared to more fully document our many observations of the association of changes of rainfall with albedo and IR.” Do you happen to know if such a documentation was made? If so, it may indeed be important in explaining the absence of the tropical hotspot and demonstrating that the total WV plus cloud feedback is negative. However, as it stands, we are left with a number of declared “findings” with no data shown to support them, and then a total disconnect between his conclusions about the observational data and his estimation of a revised climate sensitivity. The basis for the latter calculation is not well explained at all.
For a clear and simple exposition of what GCMs actually DO in terms of surface balance in response to a change in CO2, I would strongly recommend the Andrews et al 2009 paper which you can find here:-
http://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/pdf/10.1175/2008JCLI2759.1
You can compare and contrast the actual movements in latent heat, sensible heat, SW and LW in the GCMs with the assertions made by Dr Gray. For an excellent theoretical analysis of surface balance, I would recommend Ramanathan 1981, but you need a wet towel on your head to untangle the maths.
Here is the follow-up paper, done about a year after the first one, and probably released prior to the Heartland presentation.
http://hurricane.atmos.colostate.edu/Includes/Documents/Publications/grayschwartz2012.pdf
Thanks for these comments; very much appreciated.
finnpii,
Thanks for the last link. It allows me at least to confirm that his climate sensitivity calculation is plain wrong. He seems to have assumed a certain symmetry of positive and negative feedbacks when talking about “temperature feedback”. It just doesn’t work that way. If you believe the feedback values he posted on his graph, they add up to ca -1.2 W/m2/degK. Added to Planck, this gives a total feedback of -4.5 W/m2/degK and the predicted ECS is then given by 3.7/4.5 = 0.82 deg C not his reported 0.3 degC or his earlier 0.5 degC.
For the rest, he also makes some annoyingly counterfactual statements, such as references to a “faulty assumption of constant relative humidity” in the GCMs. There is no such assumption. The early analytic models assumed constant RH as a working hypothesis. The GCMs calculate WV using C-C as a limiting constraint. It just happpens that the results are not far off an assumption of constant RH.
This brings me to the meat of the issue. His findings support Paltridge et al (see here: https://climateaudit.org/2009/03/04/a-peek-behind-the-curtain/ ) , but this is not very surprising since he is using the same reanalysis dataset for the observations of RH and total precipitatable water in the upper and mid troposphere. What he has added to that is an explanation for why specific humidity can decrease counterintuitively even when there is a rise in surface temperature and the hydrological cycle is accelerated. He has also added an observation (which I cannot confirm) that there is a decrease in net positive downward TOA flux and a drying of the upper atmosphere at times of high rainfall relative to low rainfall. He is right to suggest that this is contraindicated in the GCMs. They all predict an increase in rainfall AND an increase in specific humidity as temperature increases. It is worth noting that this does go a long way towards explaining the observation of Richard Lindzen that the observed OLR response in the tropics is of opposite sign to that predicted in GCM’s. It would also explain why GCM climate sensitivity is biased high against observational data.
So overall:- It is a badly written paper with several errors, but the observations might prove to be very important. The humidity data will be challenged for the same reason that Paltridge was challenged.
I was thinking of dropping a note to Professor Gray to seek clarification on a couple of points, but, sadly, it seems that he died last year. To judge from his entry in Wikipedia, I think I would have liked him.
“Gray had many students and he offered them advise including his commandments. One of them was Remember Up-Moist, Down-Dry and Keep it Holy which was the reference to his conviction that one has to include moisture processes such as evaporation and rainfall to understand atmospheric energy balance. Thou Shalt Not Concern Thyself Unduly With Commandments and Regulations expressed his disdain for bureaucracy. Being observational atmospheric scientist, he detested numerical models of the atmosphere – Thou Shalt Not Bow Before Computer Terminals Nor Involve Thyself With Numerical Models. He hold very lively group meetings with his students and encouraged them to question everything – Remember Thy Project Meeting and Keep it Holy, Thou Shalt Not Wait’til the End of a Talk to Ask a Question When Thou Can Interrupt in the Middle.”
kribaez: Being only what I call a “climate hobbyist”, it will take some serious study on my part to understand your comments. Mine is a cursory understanding. I appreciate your engaging my blog post with such energy.
I’m sure it wouldn’t equate to communicating with Dr. Gray, but he did have a co-author named Barry Schwartz who is probably still at it at Colorado State University, if you think he could address your questions.
> I have yet to find a refutation of Gray’s work
You might like this comment, vintage ct 12, 2006-10-12:
https://climateaudit.org/2006/10/11/bill-gray-presentation/#comment-66515
@Willard: That is from 2006, and after clicking through, I found a broken link to whatever that Gray study was. I am specifically talking about his studies from ~2010 to 2012.
Even Dr. Curry has modified her positions on many issues since ’06.
Since you’re the amateur here, dear Finn, I suggest you scratch your own itch and search for G10’s citations yourself. Otherwise Denizens will have to conclude you did not do your homework before issuing your negative existential.
Please beware your wishes.
Yes, the quote is ca 2006. Some things change. Some do not. Not knowing much about the so-called “hurricanes war” indicates you may be new here.
There isn’t any positive water feedback, but there is a lot of temperature regulation from water vapor. About 35W/m^ at this location.
The regulation, the changing of the rate of outgoing radiation, which results in a change in the rate of cooling, is temperature dependent on dew point temp, slowing cooling late at night to limit how much it cools.
Forcing from co2 is just radiated to space (this is under clear sky conditions) before the required temp is reached to slow cooling. This is why they have to lie and cheat to make it look like temps are correlated to rising CO2. Fake science, or they’re just stupid.
Here is how it works: This is a simplified exaggerated example. Cooling rates once they start to slow, is likely an exponential curve so my 2 step example does not represent how much is left accurately.
Let’s say it’s 85F with a dew point of 60F. Lets set the cooling rates as 5F per hour below a rel humidity of about 85% (this will actually start to drop at about 70 or 75%, and the rate quickly drops until in the upper 90’s where it slows down to under 0.5F/hour), so lets set this switch point as 70F
But let’s say we add 5F of temp due to co2 radiation during the day, way over exaggerated. so at 7:00 pm one temp is 85F, the other 90F
7:00 85F/90F
8:00 80F/85F
9:00 75F/80F
10:00 70F/75F
11:00 68F/70F
12:00 66F/68F
5F was reduced to 2F, now the reality is the higher rate always cools at a higher rate because it isn’t a real switch(as well as it has the higher 4th power relationship to cooling), you can see this all in the graph above.
Start off with a sensitivity to solar at less than 0.02F/W/m^2 x 3.7w so less than 0.1F, and by morning there is little left if any left.
And it’s also why min temps follow dew point temps, not co2.
> Forcing from co2 is just radiated to space (this is under clear sky conditions) before the required temp is reached to slow cooling. This is why they have to lie and cheat to make it look like temps are correlated to rising CO2. Fake science, or they’re just stupid.
One problem with verbal abuses, Micro, is that they may indicate where to look for logical skyhooks. In your case, your watery regulator bites more than it can chew. How does it beat El Ninos over and over again?
Something’s amiss.
El Nino’s are self-emergent systems that builds a large pool of warm water, which creates a lot of warm water vapor, which is then blown is some cases poleward to cool. That cooling, that warm water vapor shows up as higher dew points over land, and surface min temp, as I’ve shown, is strongly regulated to dew point. Then if it’s sunny it warms up, and than that night it cools back to dew point.
> That cooling, that warm water vapor shows up as higher dew points over land, and surface min temp, as I’ve shown, is strongly regulated to dew point.
What you’ve shown is a correlation, micro. The regulation part requires a bit more.
But that’s unresponsive to what I’m asking. So perhaps I should be clearer. Are you suggesting that dew points are causing the warming we observe? That’d be an interesting hypothesis, and would fit nicely in my Contrarian Matrix:
https://contrarianmatrix.wordpress.com/lots-of-theories/
If I get you right, then I’d need a citation for your hypothesis so I could link to it.
I’ll even add your name in the colophon.
Waddaya say?
Well if I say yes, it’s fails to capture that’s it the oceans cycles that are the source of the increased dew point.
> [I]t the oceans cycles that are the source of the increased dew point.
Great! Now, what would be the most serious citation expressing that idea, Micro?
The measurements shown here.
https://micro6500blog.wordpress.com/2016/05/18/measuring-surface-climate-sensitivity/
I want a mechanism, Micro. Not CS crap.
What’s the mechanism that moves and self organizes warm pools of water in the Ocean? What is the mechanism that causes an El Nino?
And I don’t really care what you want Willard.
> What’s the mechanism that moves and self organizes warm pools of water in the Ocean?
Moving and self-organizing doesn’t warming create, Micro. Because, physics.
To replace AGW, you need something that explains GW better than the A.
Ah, an El Nino is a reorganization of existing warm water into a large pool upwind of a major continent, effectively most of the Northern Hemisphere because the itc zones blow it around the world, but it blows all that water vapor inland, and daily temps ride on top of dew points.
Is it all just existing latent energy regulating temps, or does it just allow max temps to go up higher and when you look at the land distribution between hemispheres it adds up to more over thermometers.
Not sure.
And my stupid CS stuff was showing the distribution of heat, by latitude bands. Sort of pertinent to this conversation.
well you have to admit that the surface of the 2 hemispheres is asymmetrical
> And my stupid CS stuff was showing the distribution of heat, by latitude bands. Sort of pertinent to this conversation.
The conversation being about how GW can be explained by a reorganizing ocean from which emerges some dew processes. Or something like that.
Explain first, then calculate.
I did meet and talk to Bill Gray at two climate conferences. at the last one in Washington DC
Bill Grey, who was one of the greatest weather and climate scientists, said, after some talks by our TRCS people at the Washington DC Climate Conference, whatever warming CO2 can cause, the earth will respond and counter most of it. Bill Grey said, everyone’s published CO2 sensitivity is too high, the atmosphere responds to any increase CO2 and makes corrections. He said .2 to .4 at the most.
I met and talked to Bill Grey in Las Vegas and again in Washington DC. He made comments after the NASA TRCS group spoke in DC on Panel 13.
Ten minutes into this recording, Bill Grey does make his statements that there clearly are natural responses to changes that bound climate extremes,
He was telling us about natural responses, or feedbacks, if you prefer.
Listen to William Grey!
Everyone’s climate sensitivity lower bound is higher than Bill Grey’s highest estimate.
copy and paste this link and listen starting at ten minutes.
And this is exactly what my stupid little graph shows in action.
That appears to be the wrong link, but it is a good link, try this one
Ten minutes in for Bill Gray, I spell Gray as Grey in many of my postings and I have seen others commit this error.
Listen to William Grey!
Wrong again, I try again. look at ten minutes in.
Yes the phrase “non-condensing” is on the context of the planet earth. Indeed ‘global warming’ and ‘climate change’ are both given in the context of our home planet. Does that point really need to be belabored?
P.S. In case you need clarification I’m writing this from the planet earth. Is that where you are located?
The real problem is that journalists are incapable of engaging in critical thinking and nuanced statements. They go after the eyeballs. Printing statements that are uncontroversial don’t sell newspapers. The media, in the final analysis are in the businessto make money.
I ignore headlines about global warming. They seldom have anything to do with reality.
This issue with Pruitt is just the latest example. As shown by the headlines and some comments here , people spend more time putting words inthe mouths of others than in reading or listening with precision.
And for some warmists the issue needs to be reduced to a binary question. Why insist on engaging the cognitive functions.
My reaction upon reading NYT, WashPo and New Yorker articles on Pruitt’s statements was the same. I commented as well on NYT and WashPo articles. NYT piece was written by Coral Davenport who for the past year + is full time on pushing the lefty climate agenda along with Justin Gillis, always incomplete partial story presenting supporting climate without voicing the real issues of e.g., uncertainties, climate sensitivity, and esp. natural causes/forcing. I noted on the WashPo article there were many many comments that objected to the one sided story and misinterpretation of what Pruitt has said – that is an encouraging sign. I scolded Davenport writer of the NYT piece for how she misrepresented what Pruitt actually said. I do believe that Pruitt needs to stay on message and not lower himself to getting into the debate and there are real challenges in overturning Scotus ruling in Massuchusetts v. EPA which is the precedent setting case essentially law of the land…on CO2 being defined as a pollutant therefore something the government can control as it likes at will. This presents limits as it stands on executive orders to reverse the abuse / damage done during the Obama presidency. So Pruitt is correct that a Congressional Act is needed to make the needed correction – Massachusetts v. EPA then means that any law passed will surely be challenged all the way to the Supreme Court.
I also notice that every NYT article on Climate Change runs a side bar with a link to a propaganda presentation prepared by Justin Gillis with all the answers you need to understand Climate Change. Check it out. Totally one sided propaganda … I believe it is basically correct to use the term “crooked mainstream media” esp. in the case of the NYT and WashPo but don’t forget the cable fake news shows. Of course to the other side all of this is perfectly ok / not corrupt.
I also responded to the article by Coral Davenport and tweeted her to which she responded. She and others misstated what Mr. Pruitt was asked in addition to distorting his response. Here is the actual question posed:
“Do you believe that it’s been proven that carbon dioxide is THE primary control knob for climate?”
When you understand the question, his answer makes perfect sense. All the criticisms are based on an assumption of a different question. He wasn’t asked if carbon dioxide was a primary contributor to global warming. He wasn’t even asked about climate change or global warming. He was asked about climate. It was a dumb question, for sure. But he answered it in a manner consistent with scientific understanding.
It is true that only Congress can overturn the SCOTUS ruling that CO2 is a pollutant under the CAA, because the CAA clearly includes causing climate change in the definition of “pollutant” (added in 1990).
However, EPA can by itself reverse its endangerment finding, based on a new and improved assessment of the science, which is sufficient to stop all regulatory action against CO2 emissions. “We do not know” is sufficient to reverse the endangerment finding.
BTW, this issue will be addressed in some detail at the Heartland Institute’s upcoming “Conference on Climate Change” in DC on March 23-24, see https://www.heartland.org/events/events/12th-international-conference-on-climate-change. The theme is “Resetting U.S. Climate Policy.” All are invited (for a modest entry fee.)
DW, SCOTUS did NOT rule that CO2 was a pollutant. In Mass v. EPA, it ruled that under the CAA in 2007, the EPA had the congressional authority to do so. Then with the 2008 endangement finding, it did. The endangerment finding can be redone. Or the CAA circular definition of a pollutant as that which pollutes can be amended by congress. Both routes can be traveled. Meanwhile the CPP is almost certainly unconstitutional so that goes away all by itself.
“However, EPA can by itself reverse its endangerment finding, based on a new and improved assessment of the science, which is sufficient to stop all regulatory action against CO2 emissions. “We do not know” is sufficient to reverse the endangerment finding.”
And the next guy just reverses Pruitt’s.
Turn EPA responsibilities back to the states.
I believe recent failures have shown those at the fed EPA are replaceable by state EPAs.
We have the internet and everybody owns a decent camera.
The bad guys can’t hide like in the ’70s.
I’m in agreement that we just don’t know yet. The dogma enforcers always fight independent thought. It’s always sad when scitntists, politicians, and their various supporters engaged in the massive AGW group deception seek to marginalize and denigrate those that express uncertainty about climate change attribution.
Suppression of independent thought that is outside the mainstream is very unhealthy in science and many other matters as well.
The right’s refusal to accept the authority of climate science…the shared institutions and norms that bind us together
If 49% of the population(or 51%) reject something…then it is not a ‘shared institution that binds us’…it an an institution that divides us.
What is it about people talking about science when they can no even see the logical fallacy in their own attempts to make a logical argument?
It’s as ludicrous as saying ‘Left handed peoples refusal to be right handed’ rejects the shares value of right handedness that bind us together.
The “climate science” lost all authority when it declared itself settled and silenced any opposition. In fact, it ceased to be science, and became a club.
It was politicians who declared it settled enough that there is a real risk, which then leads to mitigation actions. This is where we are now – mitigating.
“The right’s refusal to accept the authority of …”
I thought the Lew crew said that us skeptics were ‘authoritarians’.
Authoritarians refusing to accept authority.
Dang.
We need new Pythons.
Exactly Harry.
I love how corporate owned media seems to think it is essential to freedom of speech and freedom of the press, when the truth is probably closer to it being one of the greatest threats.
Fortunately, due to TDS they appear to be digging their own graves.
Here we have the perennial problem of the “science politics intersection”.
In science people are interested in the logical content of a statement while in politics people are interested in distorting propositions as much as possible to please your audience without your interpretation being rejected by your audience because of cognitive dissonance.
Since Pruitt knew he was seen as a politician he would have been well advised to make it more difficult to distort his statements. Given his statements this was to be expected.
Replacing “the shared institutions and norms that bind us together” with ‘the shared institutions and norms that bind the left together’ makes the Vox article somehow spot an again.
The message I hear, there is an attack upon the EPA and NASA’s earth climate budgets and these headlines and slant of commenters is an effort to mitigate the budget losses. There is no climate science to preserve, only the funding stream. Carefully parsed words have no meaning now, only the media maintaining the spin. And, may I say, Gavin is right in the middle of the spinning fray, he has a lot to lose; ie, his job.
Extricating the USA from the UN’s climate control efforts plus leaving behind the Paris agreements would remove a large gaggle of government employees and academic hanger-on-ers with little resources to fight over, which, would be a good thing for the present.
I do hope Ivanna Trump and Secretary of State Tollison (sp?) advise to remain within the UN’s position, whispering in Donald’s ear does not impede our withdrawal as was promised on the Campaign trail. Pulling out of UN and Paris now would necessitate the next administration to re-write EPA’s enabling legislation which would likely take a long time. Meanwhile, the world would continue spinning on and the cacophony of climate lobbyists would have also moved onto some other worldly issue needing profound governmental intervention.
The press seems intent of justifying the public’s opinion and the President Trump’s belief that they are more about agenda’s, fake news and propaganda than an honest reporting the news. The good news is the more nonsense they publish, the more traffic gets driven to the conservative news sources.
I will repost what I put on the other thread.
It may be too soon to tell for him, but every major scientific society, government and industry have recognized that emissions need to slow down, and that is why we have Paris. Even Exxon has statements on emissions that are far ahead of Pruitt. When a person even trails the fossil fuel industry on climate change, that is something.
http://corporate.exxonmobil.com/en/current-issues/climate-policy/climate-perspectives/our-position
“The risk of climate change is clear and the risk warrants action. Increasing carbon emissions in the atmosphere are having a warming effect. There is a broad scientific and policy consensus that action must be taken to further quantify and assess the risks.”
Would Pruitt, and Judith for that matter, at least agree with Exxon’s climate statement? He wasn’t asked anything about risk, which allowed him to dodge the issue. Risk is how much your uncertainty overlaps with truly large climate impacts of emissions.
Jim D, the difficulty with your statement is the meaning of the word recognized.
Exxon’s statement is an example of what I call recognition.
Or the spelling of the word recognised…
Tonyb
Oh dear Jimbo, it looks like you’ll have to find some other fantasy apocalypse to justify sleeping on your rubber sheet.
AGW = It’s All Gone Wrong!
Seems that one has gone the way of numerous others and has run its course.
I believe Mosher has switched to pollution, pm2.5 and NOx which the ‘Usual Suspects’ have now started peddling as the greatest current threat to ‘Civilisation as we know it’, perhaps you can get a handle on that?
You still have Pruitt on your side, I guess, but some Florida Republicans have seen enough of this. They have to care about real things instead of Pruitt’s self-conflicted musings.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/gop-florida-epa_us_58c30374e4b0ed71826c9aa3?q5aa5x5cnyfa8aor&ncid=inblnkushpmg00000009
JD, you have two problems. 1. I am a Florida voter. 2. Broward county just asked me to reregister some party. Cause I registered none. The last request has pissed me off.
Jim D, Florida Republicans have seen enough of what? Misrepresentation by reporters as to what somebody actually said?
“Scientists, environmentalists and Democratic lawmakers pounced Thursday after Environmental Protection Agency chief Scott Pruitt refuted his own agency by insisting carbon dioxide emissions don’t cause global warming.”
This bears no relation to what the guy actually said, right?
If Fla. Repubs knew what the guy really said, they would have reacted differently.
As I mentioned somewhere else on this thread, most people would interpret his answer to that question as ‘no’ because he included that word in his answer. If he meant ‘maybe’ he worded his answer very poorly which led people to think he meant ‘no’ when he said ‘no’. He’s a lawyer, so who knows what he really thinks because he has had to take that side for his cases for so many years.
It may be too soon to tell for him, but every major scientific society, government and industry have recognized that emissions need to slow down, and that is why we have Paris.
Emissions have already slowed down, without Paris:
The same forces that have led to decreasing rates of emissions are continuing – emissions will continue to decrease already.
Good news if you care about emissions.
Not good news if you care more about dictatorial government control.
Some people want to bring back the coal industry from the dead, exploit tar sands and shale oil to the max, and drill in the Arctic while also not caring about energy and fuel efficiency and trying to stop renewable programs. That battle is not over even if you think it is because there is industry money behind them.
Some people want to bring back the coal industry from the dead, exploit tar sands and shale oil to the max, and drill in the Arctic while also not caring about energy and fuel efficiency and trying to stop renewable programs. That battle is not over even if you think it is because there is industry money behind them.
Regulation didn’t kill coal, natural gas did – that will continue.
Yes it did, but try telling that to Pruitt and the President who likely see coal as a jobs program even though it doesn’t profit anyone.
Jimd
But do you practice what you preach and live a low carbon lifestyle thereby obviating the need for new coal mines or using tar sands etc?
Tonyb
I am not promoting regulating what individual people do, but what governments and industries do which is especially important in regards to planning and effects on the global climate. The people can react to their choices, and I am for freedom of choice. If the government imposed fuel efficiency standards or incentivized low-energy use, I would be for that.
Jim D,
.”..I am for freedom of choice. If the government imposed …, I would be for that.”
At least you didn’t contradict yourself within the same sentence.
Good point. There are possibly some things the government could impose that I may object to, but not these types of measures, and nothing comes to mind in the US at least, so they have been sensible so far, at least for me. Now if we get to some recent things like immigration bans or dictating restrooms, there may be some difference of opinion. They also want to stop monitoring methane leaks and allow coal mines to pollute rivers. Not good.
Jimd
So you are one of the participants of the tragedy of the commons? Bearing in mind your extreme concern over ‘business as usual’ regarding our fossil fuel use I would have thought you would be an enthusiastic proponent of an alternative way of doing things and show your concern by substantially reducing your carbon footprint.
Tonyb
It turns out that just a 2% reduction in global CO2 emissions per year solves the problem. It’s a long term problem with a long-term solution. Nothing I do tomorrow matters a whit, and I am realistic enough to realize that. What matters is global agreements and I support those.
“Nothing I do tomorrow matters a whit, and I am realistic enough to realize that. What matters is global agreements……..”
Ah yes, the Al Gore/Leo Decaprio philosophy. Advocate strict loss of freedoms while living large and showing the world they have no intention of practicing what they preach.
You would prefer the advocates to live like monks because they would be less effective that way. As for the “strict loss of freedoms” give me a break. How is a 50-year technological advancement plan a strict loss of freedoms?This is theater critic Steyn’s “collapsing the global economy” fearmongering meme.
A 2% reduction in emissions is a worthy goal but we’re going to need some help from China and India. Our (U.S.) emissions are decreasing without our really trying that hard.
“You would prefer the advocates to live like monks…”
Cutting down air travel and living in ONE energy efficient home is now equivalent to living in a monastery?
Give me a break indeed.
I live in CA and there is talk in Sacramento of installing tracking devices in all cars to regulate movement of citizens (politicians of course exempt) and taxing them accordingly. All in the name of fighting climate change.
If you don’t recognize this as just one more potential loss of freedom, that’s on you.
harkin1, that tracking idea sounds like it comes straight from a fake news right-wing conspiracy site. The simplest way to tax carbon is just by adding it to the fuel price rather than having a GPS on everyone.
Jim D,
Spot on. Fake news site indeed.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/local/trafficandcommuting/east-coast-states-want-to-tax-drivers-travel-not-their-gas/2016/06/25/9d4d1488-395c-11e6-8f7c-d4c723a2becb_story.html?utm_term=.559bca1e96ac
This brings up an interesting question. If people don’t want a gas tax to pay for their roads, but they would like those who use them to pay more, I wonder how this can be done. This may become more of an issue as more people move to electric cars. I doubt GPS would be a popular or even practical choice, so that may leave the only option as an added tax at registration. Food for thought there.
I agree. The swamp is deep and wide.
Actually the Exxon statement is very carefully crafted. It acknowledges there is a risk; agrees that action is required, but only to the extent of the need for further quantification and assessment; and draws attention to competing priorities that need to be in the mix.
There is no doubt there is a risk from GHG emissions, but the question for the politics is how much of a risk and how to manage it. The risk is the uncertainty times the consequences, and in this case it is slowly evolving and with the passage of time we are reducing the uncertainty and better understanding the consequences. This is why the uncertainty is the critical part to understand for policy purposes.
When it comes to management the line being taken by the various treaties is second rate. It assumes certainty about the likelihood of change (and does dodgy calculations on the consequences) and prescribes certain costs today in response. This is done on the basis of being precautionary rather than trying to manage the risk.
Given the actual level of uncertainty (particularly the link between GHG emissions and the way the climate is changing), but the way the passage of time is constraining climate sensitivity on the downside, it makes sense to do the low cost things today (particularly those with material payoffs) and to take the option of investing in understanding what’s happening rather than rushing in and imposing high costs today.
That’s pretty much what Exxon suggest.
I’ll conclude by adding that Exxon is no doubt quite properly managing another risk, namely that their customers perceive them as being unconcerned about the issue. They (along with many politicians) need to lay this risk off.
There is a realization that mitigating emissions more also mitigates risk more. You don’t need precision to make that equation. The days of ignorant recklessness are past.
You misunderstand. Managing a risk comes at a cost and here you are trading off an uncertain future benefit against a certain cost today. The sums have to be done, the option of waiting and doing more to understand the uncertainty needs to be in the mix. I should hasten to add that other low cost actions that could have an impact or potentially provide a base for future action should also be in the mix.
As you say the days of ignorant recklessness are past, but I somehow don’t think you were applying it to your own position.
There is a cost whether you manage the emissions or not. Mitigating emissions more reduces the risk of future damage more. The cost argument is bogus because alternative energy can only take over as its costs compete sufficiently and those costs are coming down all the time. There are advances in renewables especially energy storage, and 2050 is a long way away. I also think nuclear energy has a role with the newer safer technology that has been developed. With motivation, this can be solved. Here’s an example of things happening today.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com.au/2017/03/09/elon-musk-just-personally-promised-to-fix-south-australias-ener/?utm_hp_ref=au-homepage
“There is a cost whether you manage the emissions or not. ”
Yes, but the point of risk management is that we don’t identify an uncertain cost in the future, ignore the benefits, and move to mitigate it today willy-nilly. We ask what the risk is (and the uncertainty in that) and weigh that against the cost. The answer may well be to wait and see (or to continue poking around and/or getting on with the obvious while one waits).
Just think of all the cost that has been incurred on the basis of high projections of GHG emissions costs based on what are increasingly being seen as over estimated climate sensitivities. That’s the kind of practical risk that we need to be managing.
If, as you say, alternative energy is going to become competitive then well and good, it will naturally be an obvious risk reduction development and should pretty much look after itself. The wise investment now would be low cost activities that remove roadblocks etc.
Unfortunately it isn’t all going to be that simple. Clean fuels for the heavy duty cycle fleet are likely to require very high carbon charges to make them competitive with existing fossil fuels (particularly as their GHG footprint reduces).
Given the uncertainty in all that and the uncertainty in climate sensitivity and the potential costs of climate change, but the certainty around the costs that accepting high carbon charges will impose, how do you best manage the risks?
Simply moving to mitigate emissions may well increase the risks. It isn’t straightforward.
Well, whether you like it or not, we have Paris, and mitigation is going ahead largely because it is the common-sense no-regrets approach to handling risk and uncertainty while also moving away from a limited energy source. Under the Paris agreement, this is a very gradual process that unfolds over many decades. It also involves continual regular assessments of progress and what works best with the target kept in mind. People fearmonger about costs and pay no attention to the time-scales involved in the plans that factor into that. They have this mismatch between a proposed climate change policy that they should know is slow, but their assumptions about its cost being immediate.
Unfortunately Paris isn’t no-regrets or common sense. It’s a political deal.
You haven’t answered, but how much do you regret investments that have been made on the basis of IPCC AR5 estimates of climate sensitivity and the top end of their projections versus where the current semi-empirical estimates are at and the risk properly assessed on the full PDF of future temps given by the IPCC?
For example, how many coastal communities are facing the cost today of planning rules that have been introduced on the basis of an (ironically unlikely) 1m plus sea level rise at the end of the century.
This is just demonstrates in microcosm the risk that Paris creates for the global community (or the developed countries at least).
To mitigate the risk of climate change we need to move away from fossil fuels by clear cutting all the world’s rain forests and US hardwood forests so we can ship the wood chips to Europe where they will directly count as renewable green energy. Oh wait. We’re already doing that to meet EU climate targets.
It should be repeated that U.S. emissions are decreasing, mainly due to market forces. And I don’t really know but I would bet that EPA’s Endangerment Finding has had little or nothing to do with it. And this has taken very little, if any, sacrifice.
Personally, I don’t mind some mild sacrifices to bring down our emissions further – sort of a lite application of the precautionary principal. Large sacrifices are politically impossible in a democracy, especially if they allow the Chinese to eat our lunch while their own emissions are increasing. That dog will not hunt.
Should we continue to subsidize renewal energy development? Probably, especially since we subsidize fossil fuels to the extent of tax policy. The issue is the magnitude of the subsidy.
HAS, the estimates of sea-level rise near a meter by 2100 would be a median value. Also sensitivity still puts it at a 4 C rise from 700 ppm which can be reached under BAU using projected global per capita CO2 growth and population growth. Most planning is still aimed at avoiding such high levels and preferably keeping it nearer 450 ppm. Skeptics perhaps disagree that CO2 should be limited below 700 ppm and equivalently that global per capita emissions should be reduced, but that is an argument that they don’t make very explicitly stating what CO2 level and sea-level and temperature rise they would be happy with by 2100.
What scientific study supports ~one meter being “ironically unlikely”?
At this point I’m in favor of a 5 or 6 meter rise, but unfortunately coastal elites are quite mobile and would probably escape it by flying to Switzerland. Perhaps I can come up with something that would be more effective.
Unfortunately, IPCC AR5 predictions (guesses) for 2100 CE are from 0.15 meters (RCP 2.6) to 0.30 meters (RCP 8.5), and that’s not enough to catch anyone who isn’t already buried up to their neck in sand.
And of course guys in hard hats could just lower the sea level by using the energy from about a year’s worth of new Chinese power plant construction to pump sea water back into high polar areas where it will freeze.
By 2150, you might get your wish.
Perhaps, but that still gives coastal families six generations to decide to sell their house and move to Nashville. I just don’t foresee that very many of them would be caught unawares and trapped by the rising waters that great-great grandpa warned them about.
Jim D, JCH and George perhaps have a look at Table 13.5 Chpt 13 AR5 IPCC that gives their view. Their likely range is 0.28 to 0.98m by 2100. 1m is therefore unlikely. Since then we have climate sensitivity constrained at much lower levels than these projections assume.
Jim D, I can see you having difficulty grasping the concept of managing risk under uncertainty. You seem to want the future to be more certain than science can deliver at this stage, and you are seeking simple rules to impose. It isn’t like that. In this case the science can only say that by the end of the century there is a very large range that pretty much includes BAU at the lower end.
The problem is that there are both costs and benefits from acting. Over-react and you’ve cost coastal communities needlessly (along with the population at large if constraining fossil fuel use). You are ignoring those possible outcomes.
Well, if they wanted a solution instead of a problem to milk, lowering sea level is a simple exercise in moving fluids. Convert the sea level rise to a volume and the rate of rise to a flow rate, then pick a height and distance to pump the water, which sets the amount of power required (with 85% pump efficiency). Problem solved until the onset of the next glaciation period.
If my duck pond is about to overflow, I’d remove a few buckets of water, or take a shovel and dig the basin a tiny bit deeper, or add a small pond pump. “The duck pond is about to overflow! We must rethink all of human society!” is not a rational response to a simple fluid problem – unless of course the goal isn’t to solve the simple problem but to gain money and status, if not control of human society, through fear mongering.
HAS, sea level is where there is the least certainty. IPCC tried not to factor in any major ice sheet collapses. NOAA gets 0.2-2 m in some scenarios and advise planning for the high end in high-risk cases. New York refers to this document for their planning.
http://woodfortrees.org/plot/gistemp/from:1950/mean:12/plot/esrl-co2/scale:0.01/offset:-3.2
Rise rates in the past have been 3-4 meters per century in certain faster phases after the last Ice Age. These rates can happen with rapid forcing changes.
Jim D if you read the literature on catastrophic collapse of sea ice in the IPCC you will see that the modeling used relies on triggering temperatures at the top of their projected range. And even then this is uncertain. Uncertainty is cumulative so if the IPCC triggering temperature has a 5% chance of occurring by 2100 and there is a 20% chance of that leading to collapse beginning we are down at the level of 1% chance. Something to keep an eye on, but the important thing is we will know much better in 10 years time.
NOAA discusses this in “Global and Regional Sea Level Rise Scenarios for the United States” (2017). They also show the probabilities of their scenarios being exceeded under a range of RCP scenarios in 2100 (Table 4) and these pretty much confirm 1m is unlikely on the unlikely RCP8.5 and very unlikely on the much more likely RCP4.5.
Since you find NOAA’s work useful perhaps read section 6.1 of the report dealing with scenario selection. It will help you think about how to manage risk under uncertainty, particularly where the risks are gradually evolving rather than being stochastic (eg seismic).
The document I meant to link to was this one. New York refers to it in its planning.
http://cpo.noaa.gov/Home/AllNews/TabId/315/ArtMID/668/ArticleID/80/Global-Sea-Level-Rise-Scenarios-for-the-United-States-National-Climate-Assessment.aspx
author explanation, and they continue to publish
Just to be thorough, here’s my math on the cost of lowering sea level by pumping water upward 100 meters vertically onto arctic surfaces where it will freeze.
Given the Earth’s ocean area of 360 million square kilometers (3.6e14 sq meters), and a rate of rise of 1 mm/year (0.1 meters per century), the flow rate is 11,407 cubic meters per second, or 11.407e6 kg/sec. Since P.E. is mass*gravity*height, the power required to pump that mass at 85% pump efficiency is 11,186 megawatts, or 11,186,000 kW. At $0.10 per kWhr, the cost is $1,316,047/hour, or $11.54 billion per year.
In table form the variables in the calculation are
rate of rise: 1 mm/year or 0.1 m/century
pumping height: 100 meters
electricity cost: $0.10/kWhr
cost per year: $11.54 billion
If you want to abate a 0.3 meter rise by 2117, the cost would thus be $34.6 billion a year.
If it costs far more to try and avoid the problem than it costs to fix the problem, we should just fix the problem.
“….. action must be taken to further quantify the risk.” is consistent with Mr. Elliott’s statement. It is a far cry from “We must fundamentally change our societies, economies and energy systems.”
Pruitt … Darned AUTO complete!
JimD,
Again it comes down to credible separation of natural and anthropogenic climate effects. Whatever is asserted by anyone, no matter how authoritative, is useless unless and until the attribution can be made. Words of belief are not enough. Science has to be satisfied first.
JimD, you have consistently jumped over this critical attribution step.
If you can make a clear statement that attribution has been achieved and how, then that is what needs confirmation and restatement by your several listed authorities.
Has any one of them stated the mechanism of this attribution, together with confirmation that they agree with it being correct and applicable?
If we the public do not know the detail, the science, the logic of this claimed support, we have a duty to ask about the ongoing reluctance of said authorities to describe the precise mechanism of the solution of the attribution problem.
Until then can we separate natural from anthropogenic?
NO, WE CANNOT.
Geoff
You need to pay attention to the imbalance. A positive imbalance (the sign agreed even by skeptics who look at OHC) means that all the warming we have had has not been enough to keep up with the forcing that itself is anthropogenically dominated. It is a simple piece of evidence that the skeptics just don’t do their homework on. Follow where the observational evidence leads and be objective and then the 100% conclusion is not so surprising.
JimD,
Sorry, I do not “need” to do anything you suggest. The proponents of a hypothesis affecting me are those who need to do things such as defending the hypothesis.
Whereas I sought a clear explanation of the mechanisms on which you rely to differentiate natural from anthro, you have come back with a few vague buzz words and an insinuation that I am one of a 1% (dumb) minority.
JimD, that is not how hypotheses are defended.
You reference ocean heat content. Now, a lot of my career involved measurement of earth science variables and its quality control, so I am on fairly experienced ground when I state that those who rely on current OHC figures are imprudent, for at least the two reasons that the estimation of error has not been done with adequate depth and formalism; and that the enormity of the task of sampling ocean temperatures seems not well appreciated. The deeper half of the oceans is scarcely sampled at all, though that is not a killer observation, just a measure of the immaturity of the challenge.
One is left with an impression that everyone in the club knows that natural has not been separated from anthro, but a wink and nod acquiescence lets all move on the the next stages of the hypothesis of global warming.
Given the enormous stakes, wink and nod is no basis for masking policy.
Can you at least nominate a few references that purport to finally explain the attribution mechanisms? I have looked fairly thouroughly over the last decade and found none, including much reading of IPCC reports.
Geoff
I’m not sure where this is all going, but it will be an interesting ride. Will it be a smash-up at the end, or a smooth highway? One problem I see is that the administration and the party are now not the same entity. It’s now politicians versus managers, and they have different mind-sets. The MSM is resisting the electorate. The electorate has realized that it wants managers, not politicians. The MSM will take time to change as funds move from the old media to the new. Academia’s bias will take the longest to change. Academia will support the “consensus” until it is abundantly clear that a consensus never existed. Trump will have an eight-year knock-down, drag-out, fight, and it will take an equally managerial successor to continue it. What will support this fight is success. If the stock markets continue to rise and government finances improve, the Democrats will whither away. If not, ……..??
The problem with ‘managers’ is that their interests often conflict with the people’s. The politicians are supposed to represent the people, but actually through money in politics mostly represent the big industries that fill the swamp. The problem is that no one is truly representing the people, and environmental protection is fast becoming a perfect example of that. The role of the EPA is to protect the environment against the polluters. Pruitt comes at it from the other direction being a big supporter of the polluters. It’s another example of the Trumpism craziness where people were deceived into voting against their own interests.
I object to your cultural/political/tribal appropriation of the word swamp.
The epitome of swamp creatures squealing as they dehydrate is that head of the EPA’s “Environmental Justice” department that made a big public showing of resigning before he was tossed out. He is emblematic of the pond scum of the administrative state.
I feel triggered by your matriarchal nonintersectional microaggressions against all my current gender identities..
I will retreat to one of my safe spaces filled with baby wolves, hot women, and beer, lots of beer.
(So no, we don’t consider productive industries the swamp).
The swamp are the industries with their lobbyists that affect every election and policy to the detriment of what the regular people actually need and want from their government.
Regarding our form of democracy, it is true that industry lobbies have huge influence, but 1) industry lobbies exist because they represent products that the electorate uses. Fossil fuels has a big lobby because fossil fuel companies are huge and rich, and that’s because huge amounts of fossil fuels are used, and that’s because of their tremendous utility. In that sense, what’s good for Exxon is good for the U.S.A.
2) The President and the Congress are truly responsible to and for the people who have the opportunity to periodically vote them in or out. Granted, the influence of industry money is undeniable, but the smart politician ignores the “people” at his/her peril.
Managers hold their position so long as politicians allow them to, and that’s the way it should be. And I don’t agree that the people want managers and not politicians. Donald Trump won the election as a politician, certainly not as a manager, and his managers like Scott Pruitt will do what Trump tells them to do.
The politicians are chosen locally to represent their party by their financial support and promises. The people only get to choose which party, but can’t choose someone who is not encumbered by financiers for their election because that part has already happened at the candidate selection stage. A candidate will not be selected that can’t provide good funding for their campaign. It’s a fundamental problem with pay-to-play elections. Your view on what’s good for Exxon is good for the US is completely opposite to what anyone who cares about the environment would say. Big companies don’t advocate for policies that help the environment, worker pay, worker safety, public health and product safety and often oppose them in the name of profit. Electing people who support big companies is completely ignoring this other side of the equation that helps the people.
I’d be fine with cutting off corporate contributions if we are also willing to cut off union contributions as well.
Maybe you should read a little more carefully what I said, rather than allowing any mention of Exxon to propel you into an anti-corporate sound-off.
My point is that Exxon is a big, powerful company because it sells a product that everybody wants and needs. Companies can’t just declare themselves influential lobbyists. Is it a pay-to-play system? I’d say that’s one way to put it. Big companies that are important to the economy have thousands of employees and big payrolls, and they deserve to be heard. Contributions to candidates are a good way to get their attention.
To write off Exxon because “they don’t care about the environment” is naive. Environmentalists who want to fight and demonize them are effectively fighting tens of millions of ordinary citizens – which means those environmentalists will lose.
Fossil fuel companies were universally admired until climate alarmists made them the fall guy for a warming climate. Now some politicians consider them criminals because they expressed skepticism about climate change. This is the kind of foolishness that gets somebody like Trump elected.
Fossil fuel companies are not universally admired. Look at coal – regularly called out for various forms of pollution and miner safety violations. Fossil industries would not clean up their act without a fight. You may be a fan, but I am not when they do these things. When they lobby it is to protect their right to pollute and have their pipelines built regardless of who does not want them, and they have the money to get these things through. It is no coincidence that the most denialist congressmen are in oil and coal states and have influence on committees important to shove their industrial interests through. Trump hires these people into his cabinet, so now they are even more ingrained in the system, and that is before even talking about the banker crowd and the ignoramus they put in charge of energy.
=={ One problem I see is that the administration and the party are now not the same entity. It’s now politicians versus managers, and they have different mind-sets.}==
Scott Pruitt isn’t a politician?
This is a good start by Pruitt. Watermelon heads exploding all over the MSM was to be expected. Misrepresenting what he actually said is a standard progressive tactic.
The WaPo concern is easily fixed by taking down the EPA website and then revising it to something more closely representing current knowledge. Except for the now cooled 2015-16 El Nino blip, no warming this century. Yet this century comprises ~1/3 of the rise in atmospheric CO2 since 1958 (onset of Keeling Curve). Observational ECS ~1.65 not 3+. SLR not accelerating. Planet greening per NASA. Polar bears thriving. California drowning. Arctic ice recovering. CMIP5 models failing- running 3.5x hot innthe tropical troposphere. Even Santers new paper with the illegitimate tropical stratosphere correction found them running 1.7x hot.
Hi Rud,
1) Didn’t you mean no warming caused by human development? I’m pretty sure Curry’s main theory is it’s all just natural variability and nothing humans are doing will affect the long term climate trends.
2) Why should we care what happens to bears or most large carnivores? They serve no useful purpose to Americans as far as I can tell. We generally don’t eat them and they are dangerous.
2) At the current rate of recovery at what point can we declare that the polar regions have fully recovered? If it doesn’t matter now why should it matter in the future?
I literally meant no statistically meaningul warming this century (since 2000) whatever the cause. The pause is almost certainly returning. The months since July 2016 show the fastest cooling in the satellite record. And the unusual persistent low in the Arctic drawing in warmer air (all the MSM headlines) is actually a massive further cooling event.
Polar bears are an Al Gore meme and have been used to sell CAGW. Their thriving refutes the meme.
Akasofu published on a roughly 60-65 year Arctic full ice cycle. This ismsupported by DMI August ice extent record to 1939, and by Russian ice records. IMO the true ice nadir was 2007 and we are 1/3 of the way to the next maximum. This can already be seen in multiyear ice recovery. Falling Arctic ice has been used to sell CAGW. Ice recovery refutes the meme.
Do you agree with the latest data from Dr. Roy Spencer?
http://www.drroyspencer.com/2017/03/uah-global-temperature-update-for-february-2017-0-35-deg-c/
Looking at his graph the drop in the temperature was faster and almost straight down in the 97-98 El Nino event. In his Feb. measurement there was a +0.35 deg C increase which is a lot slower than the rate of the previous decline for a comparable time period (so far).
From what I know about satellite sensors they don’t measure temperature but actually the reflective property of oxygen atoms. He just published the Version 6 dataset paper so I hope he has factored in the measurable decrease in oxygen in the atmosphere since we began measurements.
scrippso2.ucsd.edu/ .
I’m still in “robot” mode Rud! At the risk of repeating myself:
Do you classify Scott Pruitt’s claim as a “fact”, a “factoid”, an “alternative fact” or “fake news”?
Depends on which specific statement sentence. Some are facts: measuring human impact with precision is challenging. When two comments mysteriously in moderation emerge, you will have a logical proof.
Some are factoids in the Kip Hansen sense: humans not primarily responsible. Again when the moderated comments emerge, you will understand why. Depending on perspective, that statement could also be an alt fact in the Kip Hansen sense. Lots of fake news was provided by MSM, none by Pruitt.
Thank you Rud.
So it seems you did understand my question all along! Now, up above you state “Arctic ice recovering.”
Do you classify that claim as a “fact”, a “factoid”, an “alternative fact” or “fake news”?
As a fact verifible by DMI, NSIDC, and Russia. Do you not know that there are two Russian ice breakers accompnying three supply ships all frozen in place off Chukoya (sp?) Siberia.
Rud – Those “icebound icebreakers” are “fake news” with very high confidence. I have been covering that “story” since before the cryodenialosphere picked it up:
http://GreatWhiteCon.info/2017/02/alternative-facts-about-the-arctic-in-2017/
Here’s the very latest “Shock News!” from Chaunskaya Bay:
The Northern Sea Route seems to be opening up extremely early this year!
The Siberian Times has a more recent story about the ice breakers:
“Global warming? Icebreaker marooned by thick ice connects to shore power supply”
http://siberiantimes.com/other/others/news/n0872-global-warming-icebreaker-marooned-by-thick-ice-connects-to-shore-power-supply/
They apparently are close to shore.
Jim2 – February 10th is more recent than March 11th? Surely not?
And surely the Siberian Times headline writer was over the top with their “marooned”?
Just as surely as Rud was “alternative” with his “a fact verifible by DMI, NSIDC, and Russia”!
The ships are stuck off Pevek, not the part you show in the satellite picture.
Fake news indeed! I think it’s bloody obvious who’s peddling the fake news.
Northern sea route transits:
Year Total
2011 41
2012 46
2013 71
2014 53
2015 18
2016 18
Jim2 – I think “it’s bloody obvious who’s peddling the fake news” too. You and Rud, amongst others. Let’s start with the churnalistic source you quote shall we?
The fourth vessel in the convoy – the Admiral Makarov – has been dispatched to undertake other icebreaking duties in the region.
The failure of the return voyage is not surprising given the time of year.
Are those two sentences “facts”, “factoids”, “alternative facts” or “fake news”? What do they tell us about Rud’s “two Russian ice breakers accompanying three supply ships all frozen in place”?
Scott Pruitt’s alternative facts.
Alternative fact # 1:
Alternative fact #2:
Interesting how his personal opinion is irrelevant one minute and then another minute forms his basis for determining (as the head of the EPA) what is a primary contributor to climate change, eh?
“Why is the climate changing?”
This question alone indicates confirmation bias ( implicit is that one is talking about global mean temperature ).
One of my favorite charts from the IPCC is this one:
It’s a latitude band chart of precipitation anomalies for the globe.
For the moment, leaving aside the veracity, you can’t go back to any decade without one latitude band being anomalous. Probably no one knows why. But the climate is always changing in ways more significant than global mean temperature.
Turbulent Eddie,
Favourite chart?
Do tell us why there is pattern in the 1961-1990 time period?
How can you subtract 1961-1990 data from itself and retain a residual?
(Yes I have intense dislike for the climate work device used herre, the so-called anomaly method. Nick Stokes berates me for this dislike, but his main arguments fail to convince. Raw data any time for me).
Geoff
Geoff. Wrt to the anomaly method. You get the same answer whether you use it or don’t use it.
As for only using raw data. ..you get more warming with raw data.
Steven,
You might get more warming using your methods of analysis with raw v. anomaly, but I get less using my methods. One of us suffers terminological and/or methodological inexactitude.
I dislike the anomaly method partly because one has to append extra information each time it is used, like the choice of reference period, which was the point of my comment to TE.
Geoff
Numbnuts, learn the difference between opinion and assessment.
Pruitt is offering his assessment of the degree of precision currently available and the degree of disagreement over impact.
Here is an opinion – your use of “alternative fact” is indicative of what a putz you are, not a sign of cuteness.
Jim D: “It may be too soon to tell for him, but every major scientific society, government and industry have recognized that emissions need to slow down, and that is why we have Paris.”
When the Democrats were in power in Congress and in the White House, they didn’t do nearly as much as current environmental law would have allowed them to do in pushing strong anti-carbon regulations. The Democrats had the power, but not the commitment or the will.
In direct contradiction to their professed beliefs concerning the dangers of climate change, they chose not to use the full authority of the Clean Air Act to regulate all of America’s carbon emission sources, not just those from coal-fired power plants.
Sooner or later, the Democrats will be back in the driver’s seat in Washington, possibly as soon as 2021. Here is what a newly-elected Democratic president could do starting in January of 2021 to put us on track towards achieving Barack Obama’s publicly-stated goal of an 80% reduction in America’s carbon emissions by 2050:
1: On his or her first day in office, issue an Executive Order declaring a carbon pollution emergency and directing all departments and agencies of the Federal Government to cooperate with the EPA in developing a fully comprehensive anti-carbon regulatory program.
2: Publish a Clean Air Act (CAA) Section 108 Endangerment Finding for carbon to complement and greatly expand upon 2009’s Section 202 Endangerment Finding.
3: Using the CAA Section 108 Endangerment Finding as the basis, set a National Ambient Air Quality Standard (NAAQS) for carbon at 450 parts per million. Use the NAAQS of 450 ppm as the basis for legally enabling America’s commitment to the Paris climate accords.
4: Publish an aggressive framework of anti-carbon regulations which target all sources of America’s carbon pollution, not just those of coal-fired power power plants. Develop a corresponding framework of stiff carbon pollution fines which is the functional equivalent of a legislated tax on carbon.
5: Use a series of cooperative agreements with the state governments to enforce these anti-carbon regulations and to collect the carbon pollution fines, assigning all revenues thus collected to the individual state governments.
Under existing environmental law, the Executive Branch could in theory do everything which needs to be done in forcing steep reductions in America’s carbon emissions, and to enforce those reductions legally and constitutionally without another word of new legislation being needed from the US Congress.
Once they are back in control, if the Democrats don’t move aggressively forward in pressing strong anti-carbon regulations, ones which target all sectors of the American economy, then they can be rightly accused of being completely cynical and deceitful in claiming to be concerned about the dangers of climate change.
Yes, if they knew they only had 2 years with control in Congress, that would have been one the big things right along with healthcare, and possibly also immigration they could have tackled. Another two years and they may well have done that. As it was the CPP and fuel efficiency plans, that they could do without congress, were in line with other countries in the Paris agreement, and the US would not be seen as laggards if those plans were allowed to continue. A carbon tax makes sense, either the revenue neutral kind that rewards efficiency and helps the poor to buy fuel or rebates them in some way, or one that uses revenue to develop new energy technologies and infrastructure for it.
Jim D: “Yes, if they knew they only had 2 years with control in Congress, that would have been one the big things right along with healthcare, and possibly also immigration they could have tackled. Another two years and they may well have done that. As it was the CPP and fuel efficiency plans, that they could do without congress, were in line with other countries in the Paris agreement, and the US would not be seen as laggards if those plans were allowed to continue. A carbon tax makes sense, either the revenue neutral kind that rewards efficiency and helps the poor to buy fuel or rebates them in some way, or one that uses revenue to develop new energy technologies and infrastructure for it.”
Jim D, once again, you evade the fundamental issue in an attempt to absolve the Democrats from not acting in accordance with their professed beliefs concerning the dangers of climate change.
If an excessive concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere does indeed make it an atmospheric pollutant — it has been identified as such according to the EPA’s 2009 Section 202 Endangerment Finding — then regulatory actions published, coordinated, and enforced by the EPA must be the nation’s preferred approach to dealing with CO2 as a pollutant.
This is what the Clean Air Act demands; but more important than that, strict carbon regulation is the only means we have for guaranteeing that America’s carbon emissions can be reduced 80% by 2050.
As for the Clean Power Plan (CPP), remember that CO2 is a well-mixed gas. The earth’s atmosphere doesn’t know where a CO2 molecule comes from, and carbon emissions are ubiquitous throughout the American economy. The Clean Power Plan would have been struck down in the courts because it is not written according to the EPA’s own historical practices in that it unfairly targets the coal industry for the better part of our emission reductions while leaving other segments of America’s economy largely untouched.
As for the supposed miracles of renewable energy technology, it is impossible for advancing technology by itself to reduce America’s carbon emissions to the extent which is necessary to meet the 2050 reduction target. Advanced technology can play an important role, but strictly-enforced energy conservation measures will also be necessary if we are to go as far and as fast as needed to achieve the 2050 goal. For Democrats to claim otherwise is in itself a cynical and deceitful act on their part.
It’s all very well for the EPA to treat CO2 as a pollutant and even perhaps dictate a safe level for it (say 450 ppm). Then what? It requires international agreements to put this into effect, and the EPA does not have that jurisdiction. This is not the normal kind of EPA problem. A better parallel is the Montreal Protocol for CFCs. The EPA can help with national targets consistent with the required global mitigation, and can probably even impose penalties for excesses in emission rates in this case to protect the global environment, much as it was to protect the ozone layer with CFC mitigation.
Jim D, what you are doing here is looking for excuses not to follow the only policy pathway that can possibly reduce America’s carbon emissions 80% by 2050. This has the effect of making the sincerity of your professed commitment to fighting climate change open to question.
Jim D: “It’s all very well for the EPA to treat CO2 as a pollutant and even perhaps dictate a safe level for it (say 450 ppm). Then what? It requires international agreements to put this into effect, and the EPA does not have that jurisdiction. This is not the normal kind of EPA problem.”
When the US Supreme Court ruled in 2010 that 2009’s Section 202 Endangerment Finding had been properly developed and published according to the Clean Air Act’s provisions, the precedent was established for regulating carbon emissions using the EPA as our primary coordinating agency. That decision made CO2 a ‘normal kind of EPA problem’ to the extent it needed to be to allow for aggressive regulation of all of America’s carbon emissions.
What the Obama Administration should have done next — if they had been truly serious about reducing all of America’s carbon emissions — was to publish a CAA Section 108 Endangerment Finding using the Section 202 finding as a template. They could then have used that Section 108 finding as a basis for pushing a series of powerful and effective anti-carbon regulations that touched every sector of the American economy.
But the Obamamanians didn’t do that. They published the Clean Power Plan, which was a fatally flawed regulation from get-go and which was then, and still is, likely to be rejected in the courts. Combined with their refusal to enact a carbon tax in 2009, the failure to move forward with a Section 108 finding had the effect of making the sincerity of President Obama’s and the Democrat’s commitment to fighting climate change very much open to question.
Jim D: “A better parallel is the Montreal Protocol for CFCs. The EPA can help with national targets consistent with the required global mitigation, and can probably even impose penalties for excesses in emission rates in this case to protect the global environment, much as it was to protect the ozone layer with CFC mitigation.”
It’s often been said that America’s leadership is vitally necessary to enable the world-wide effort needed to win the fight against climate change.
The Democrats didn’t need to sign a treaty to demonstrate America’s commitment to fighting climate change. They could have demonstrated that commitment through aggressive action in controlling the carbon emissions America itself is generating, using the EPA as their policy enforcement tool.
President Obama himself could have personally demonstrated his commitment to fighting climate change by accepting the political risks of pushing for comprehensive anti-carbon regulation and of asking for genuine sacrifice on the part of the American people.
But neither President Obama nor the Democrats in Congress were willing to take those political risks. Would the Democrats and a newly elected Democratic president and Congress make the same decision again if the voters return them to power in 2021?
Beta Blocker, you are saying that there was a faster way to reduce emissions despite the fact that there wasn’t. Technologically we are not there where we can just replace emissions wholesale unless you have an idea that no one else has thought of. The pace of reduction proposed is that of the western world, and is enough to meet the Paris targets. There is no way for the US to go faster than anyone else, and also no need. What the Obama administration did was just right. Get China involved and push for a pragmatic reduction from all the other major emitters. Perhaps with another two years of Congress after 2010, he could have done some budget-related changes like a carbon tax, but I am pretty sure he can’t do that without them. Anyway states are free to enact those and some have.
Jim D: “Beta Blocker, you are saying that there was a faster way to reduce emissions despite the fact that there wasn’t.”
Jim D, I am questioning the sincerity of the Democrat’s professed commitment to the goal President Obama set for a 28% reduction in America’s GHG emissions by 2025, a 32% reduction by 2030, and an 80% reduction by 2050.
What is your opinion concerning these targets? Are they too ambitious, or are they not ambitious enough?
Do you believe these targets are achievable in the time frames President Obama set out without imposing mandatory energy conservation measures which have the effect of rationing all forms of fossil fuel energy?
If you believe Obama’s GHG reduction targets and his schedule dates are the right ones, how do you propose we go about achieving them?
So far in 2015 US emissions were more than 10% below 2005 levels, so it remains on track despite not even trying hard for most of this time, as I think coal is dying a natural death, and renewables are expanding anyway just as a matter of practicality and economy helped by general public support for clean energy. Sticking to planned CAFE standards will also be important and technology is helping there too. Don’t underestimate technology advances, and industrial, commercial and public motivations to fix the emission problem. They know that the future is not fossil fuels.
jimd
Surely the US co2 levels are dropping because of (highly unpopular in some quarters) fracking and that the US has exported much of their heavy industry and manufacturing to other countries?
If the environmental lobby has their way and reduce fracking AND Trump succeeds in bringing back heavy industry to America, surely the co2 levels could start to rise again?
tonyb
The US oil industry has stayed put, and that is a major contributor. The US per capita CO2 emission level is still on the high end globally because of that. Even if (somehow) heavy industry comes back, it will be more efficient and employ less people. That was one of his rhetorical promises but it relies on him, as the government, forcing the CEOs not to look at the efficiencies they may have gained by manufacturing and selling overseas, and trying to punish them for that instead. It’s big government meddling with the marketplace, just like the conservatives wanted (?).
Tony, you are correct concerning the drop in CO2 emissions in the US. But natural gas is great! We won’t be getting rid of fracking anytime soon, it didn’t even happen under obummer, it sure as hell won’t happen under Trump. Natural gas is a great feedstock as well as an energy source.
Of course, it wasn’t US citizens who moved manufacturing over seas, it was business. I can only hope some of it comes back to the US – CO2 emissions be damned!!!
jimd
We all appreciate that there is some low hanging fruit that can be picked that could reduce co2 or even dangerous pollutants.
In Britain the Govt encouraged people a decade ago to switch to diesel cars in order to reduce co2 despite everyone telling them that the emissions from diesel were much more dangerous pollutants.
After encouraging people very vigorously they are now back pedalling and diesel vehicles are now seen as the spawn of the de%il.
One related thing that came up in todays newspapers is that ‘white van man’ has proliferated as people want their internet purchase delivered immediately. Their vans are apparently causing ten times more pollution than their emissions tests originally claimed (thank you tax dodging in the UK Google)
Has America seen the same upsurge in smaller diesel vehicles used for rapid deliveries?
tonyb
I am not aware of diesel being promoted in the US. Fuel is cheap anyway and the US has strict car emission standards.
jimd
bearing in mind you say the oil industry is the biggest problem and that fuel is cheap, presumably you would like to see the tax on it increased to European levels in order to sharply curtail fuel use?
tonyb
A $40/tonne carbon tax would raise it by 40 cents per gallon. If this is phased in over a few years, people would not notice. It fluctuates by a $1 per gallon year to year anyway. The revenue-neutral version of a carbon tax would more than offset this with rebates for those who use less energy than average.
@ jim D?
If people won’t notice the carbon tax, how will it curtail emissions?
the only way it would reduce emissions is if people use less because it’s more expensive, and they will only do that if they notice the expense
Its purpose is to add the true social cost. If it was saved it would pay for adaptation and damage.
now you are just being silly.
according to you, the ‘true social cost’ is that the rising CO2 levels will cause the sea levels to rise by meters and flood the coats (among many other problems), a 0.50/gal tax on gas isn’t going to pay for that.
They came up with $40 per tonne and account for investment at 3%, and then before you know it you are talking about real money, so yes that is the amount needed. You get a big fuss about the SCC, but that is the size of it when you start talking about the numbers.
jimd
surely there is a flaw in your logic? If people would not notice a 40 cent tax increase on fuel they will continue to consume it at the same rate as now.
if you want to reduce the harm that you believe the oil industries do, surely taxes need to be raised enough to significantly reduce demand? That is to say, to European levels.
tonyb
I don’t think of a carbon tax as a deterrent, just as a much needed revenue source that skims off the top. If it is revenue-neutral it can be rebated to subsidize energy bills. The low-carbon users would net gain from such a tax. Or it can be partly rebated and partly subsidize infrastructure needed for energy generation.
They were scared that if they used that Power, they would be seen as Dictators and Kicked out. As it stands, the American People chose to avoid that possibility anyway and Believe Trumps better way with regard to Jobs and less taxes and so on. Bad luck Lefties. See if you can beat him in 4 years time.
CrabbyOne: “They were scared that if they used that Power, they would be seen as Dictators and Kicked out. As it stands, the American People chose to avoid that possibility anyway and believe Trumps better way with regard to Jobs and less taxes and so on. Bad luck Lefties. See if you can beat him in 4 years time.”
Donald Trump is now president because Hillary Clinton didn’t do the work needed to ensure she won the Electoral College in addition to winning the popular vote. She ignored warnings that the swing states were vulnerable; she didn’t do what she needed to do to get out the vote in those states, and that’s why Trump sits in the Oval Office.
That said, there is no question but that if serious economic and personal sacrifice was ever to be demanded of the American people in the name of fighting climate change, the public debate over the validity of today’s climate science would quickly reach a critical mass.
The Democrats claim the dangers of climate change are real and that the science is powerfully on their side.
If their concern is genuine and not merely a political ploy to attract environmentally conscious voters, they should be willing to defend that position in the court of public opinion and to demonstrate the leadership needed to convince America’s voters that strict anti-carbon regulation is necessary.
For Democrats to do otherwise once they return to power would be a cynical and deceitful act on their part.
I disagree.
Donald Trump is now President Trump because we needed an outsider that spoke the truth.
He offered to fix the underlying problems of Washington DC BAU and the bad deals taxpayers are given.
He was the one that knew the solutions did not include CO2, carbon credits, a tax revenue stream, CAGW and fixing the earth’s fever.
afaik There is zero evidence of unprecedented climate catastrophe.
But, there’s tons of evidence some people do us harm.
He said that it’s time to end the bad deals.
And we agreed.
He’s conned people before, and this is the biggest one of them all. His plans usually lead to the little guy suffering and/or him losing big money, not just his own but other people’s. Trump has a deluded reality that we can only glimpse with his twitterings. His handlers have their work cut out, and they need to watch him 24/7 to restrain him. When they fail, there are others that have to follow behind and clean up the messes he leaves. Sad.
Beta,
Maybe this is your real point:
“For Democrats to do otherwise once they return to power would be a cynical and deceitful act on their part.”
Has this meme grown old?
Now we have to wait at least 4 years to get a Democrat back in the White House for your storyline to get enacted? The Democrats who you have repeatedly stated failed to act on the problem in the first place?
timg56, the real point here is that those who are pushing technology innovation as The Solution to climate change — if only we would spend enough money to buy it — can’t get the job done with technology alone in the thirty-five years before the 80% target is due in 2050.
Just spending money on technology isn’t going to work, Serious energy conservation measures, including what amounts to government rationing of fossil fuel energy resources, is necessary to meet the 2050 reduction target.
These conservation measures will impose some level of sacrifice on some large number of people who now enjoy the benefits of fossil fuel energy.
To claim otherwise is to play a game of politics with the climate change issue, a game which has no clear outcome except to guarantee that America will eventually be covered from coast to coast to with an unholy combination of wind mills and gas fracking wells.
I’m still not sure what your point is.
If you think Americans are going to make the significant reductions in fossil fuel use you say is necessary, then I’d say you are living in a fantasy world.
As for wind mills and fracking wells – the first is going to be limited. Even the wind industry’s proponents acknowledge 20% of US generation is the maximum wind can contribute. The second has a rather small footprint.
timg56: “I’m still not sure what your point is. If you think Americans are going to make the significant reductions in fossil fuel use you say is necessary, then I’d say you are living in a fantasy world. As for wind mills and fracking wells – the first is going to be limited. Even the wind industry’s proponents acknowledge 20% of US generation is the maximum wind can contribute. The second has a rather small footprint.”
First, as someone who makes his living in the nuclear industry, I don’t want to see this country covered from coast to coast with an unholy combination of wind mills and gas fracking wells when we can do much of the job of carbon emission reduction using nuclear power.
Second, I want the public debate over the validity of today’s climate science to go critical mass, so that doubters — I will not call them deniers — can come face to face with their accusers in the court of US public opinion.
Third, I want those of the progressive left who are using the issue of climate change as a political stick to acknowledge that they can’t reduce our carbon emissions to the extent they claim is necessary without imposing considerable personal and economic sacrifice on the American people.
Fourth, I want the Democrats who are using the issue of climate change as a political weapon against the Republicans to explain why they didn’t pass a carbon tax while they controlled the US Congress and why they didn’t use the full authority of the Clean Air Act against carbon emissions while they controlled the Executive Branch.
Fifth, I want a grand experiment in the fast-track adoption of renewable energy technologies to be performed, an experiment in which a representative region of the country is assigned the task of demonstrating what kinds of technologies and what kinds of implementation strategies either do, or do not, actually work in moving towards a low-carbon economy.
For that last item, a grand experiment in the fast-track adoption of renewable energy technologies, the Californians have already embarked upon an ambitious plan to this very thing.
They have committed to a 50% reduction in their power sector carbon emissions by 2030, and a 100% reduction by 2050. And they believe they can do it without nuclear power.
My position concerning the Californians and their grand experiment is that no one should stand in their way, but that we must also be vigilant in keeping an eye on the Californians lest they get cold feet and renege on their commitment.
Judith quotes Pruitt:
“I think that measuring with precision human activity on the climate is something very challenging to do and there’s tremendous disagreement about the degree of impact”
If we are just talking about impacts that currently affect humans I agree. Technology will shield most of us from most of the first order effects like extreme weather, pollution and rising sea levels. If I had to guess I bet genetic engineering will pretty much eliminate our need to worry about the health of the rest of the biosphere. The human brain is the most powerful thing on the planet, until AI becomes self aware :)
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Has anyone consulted the Basic Instructions Before Leaving Earth (the BIBLE) for it’s spin on this situation? The best Book says there will be a “Millennium” After the Lord’s return for the People of the Earth to live under. So obviously, there will not be the Doom and Gloom the Lefties expect to see. The Earth will go on it’s merry way till the Lord says otherwise. Just my 20 cents worth.
It’s an interesting interlude.
Q: Do you believe, that it’s been proven, that CO2 is the primary control knob for climate? Do you believe that?
A: “I think that measuring with precision human activity on the climate is something very challenging to do and there’s tremendous disagreement about the degree of impact, so no, I would not agree that it’s a primary contributor to the global warming that we see. But we don’t know that yet. We need to continue the debate, continue the review and analysis.
Many facets within.
First, there is a mismatch between the question and the answer.
The question is about proof and control knob for climate.
The answer is about global warming, then a caveat of what we do and don’t know and then a call for continued analysis.
My response (after more reflection than an interview might offer ) might have been:
“There likely will never be complete, unequivocal proof of attribution of any trends in the atmosphere. However, it is likely that increased CO2 causes increased global temperature. But global temperature is not climate. The questions then become about: extent, marginal changes to climate ( storms, precipitation, extremes – and change is from a base, not zero ), risk-benefit ratio from such assessments and perhaps most importantly, the secular changes in global CO2 emissions.
The extent of warming has been lower than the low end of past modeled projections. Changes to climate have been correspondingly small. Many of these changes would appear to convey benefit to humanity ( reduced storm intensity from reduced kinetic energy, reduced variability, etc. ) beyond the direct benefit of the energy and fertilization of crops. And some 75% of global CO2 emissions are from countries with fertility rates lower than replacement rate, which will perpetuate the already falling global CO2 emissions rate, perhaps making dictates unnecessary.”
That’s how I might have answered.
Excellent points about future human generated CO2.
‘The extent of warming has been lower than the low end
of past modeled projections.’ This at a cost of trillions of
$$$ to the global economy in carbon taxes and subsidies.
Broken window fallacy anyone?
Climate Control Knobs:
Solar Radiance ( the largest knob )
Orbital Parameters ( very large knob )
Orography ( Oceans/Mountains/Continents ) ( very large knob ),
Chaotic Fluid Flow
Atmospheric Constiuency ( including CO2 ).
Solar,Orbit, and Orography are probably most significant.
But, nobody’s twiddling those knobs, while we are twiddling the CO2 knob.
That should give on solace. The biggest knobs are relatively constant.
Climate may change but not by much because most of the important knobs aren’t changing.
We only have control of one of them, and it is as large as you want to make it. Current forcing stands at about ten times what the sun alone can do on century time scales. Climate only changes with these control knobs because all changes can be explained through these. There are some tipping points too where a small twiddle of a knob leads to a large change, like the Ice Ages.
You’re distorting the meaning of the word climate.
The poles will still have an energy deficit, seasons will exist about the same, jet streams will still occur. Deserts and jungles will still exist at about the same locations.
And you’re conceiving of everything as a problem. Too the extent that change occurs, models have indicated decreased kinetic energy ( less intense storms? ) and decreased temperature variability ( less frequent extremes? ). To be sure, these changes would be small, but mind the exaggerations when applied to negatives as well.
There are some tipping points too where a small twiddle of a knob leads to a large change, like the Ice Ages.
Ice Ages clearly arise from not twiddles of the small knobs but big changes in the big knob of orbits. I’m pretty sure no one is predicting an ice age from ‘global warming’.
Ice Ages occur through a subtle albedo forcing change from small orbital changes. These albedo changes have big positive feedbacks, hence the Ice Ages. I find no skeptics who want to defend a 4 C global temperature increase that would come with 700 ppm that would itself come from continued growth in emissions per capita and global population. Skeptics would rather deny that 4 C is possible than defend allowing unmitigated climate change at the central sensitivity estimate. These are two different arguments, but we never get to the second one with the skeptics, which is essentially the no-harm at 4 C argument.
“And you’re conceiving of everything as a problem. Too the extent that change occurs, models have indicated decreased kinetic energy ( less intense storms? ) and decreased temperature variability ( less frequent extremes? ). To be sure, these changes would be small, but mind the exaggerations when applied to negatives as well.”
Kinetic energy is not just driven by equ to pole deltaT. Release of LH from increased absolute humidity is another (drives vertical motion). Convective storms (incl Tropical storms) is the obvious mechanism in which that occurs but it is a very sig process in baroclinic generated storms (mid-lat depressions) too. Given the reduction in PJS strength the propensity of JS disruption and “stuck” regimes means precipitable water and slow system motion bring an increased flooding threat.
Decreased temp variability (I assume you mean deltaT equ to pole) does not come into it in regards continental temp extremes (high summer temps) – because of the reduced mobility afforded by a weaker PJS the persistence of Rossby waves.
Working with precipitation measurements made at nearly 1,000 weather stations located in 114 different countries — each of which had at least 100 years of observations that resulted in a macro-dataset comprising over 1.5 million monthly precipitation amounts — Wijngaarden and Syed (2015) developed a precipitation history for Earth’s entire land mass (minus Antarctica), which they ultimately used to calculate global changes in precipitation for a set of different time intervals relative to the 1961-90 time interval. And what did these results reveal?
The two Canadian researchers report that “most trends exhibited no clear precipitation change,” noting that “global changes in precipitation over the Earth’s land mass excluding Antarctica relative to 1961-90 were estimated to be: -1.2±1.7, 2.6±2.5 and -5.4±8.1 percent per century for the periods 1850-2000, 1900-2000 and 1950-2000, respectively.” In addition, they state that “stations experiencing low, moderate and heavy annual precipitation did not show very different precipitation trends,” which would imply, as they describe it, that “deserts/jungles are neither expanding nor shrinking due to changes in precipitation patterns.”
And they therefore also state, in the terminal sentence of their paper, that it is “reasonable to conclude that some caution is warranted about claiming that large changes to global precipitation have occurred during the last 150 years.”
Van Wijngaarden, W.A. and Syed, A. 2015. Changes in annual precipitation over the Earth’s land mass excluding Antarctica from the 18th century to 2013. Journal of Hydrology 531: 1020-1027.
RIE, can you find a paper where someone has claimed large changes of precipitation over the last 150 years?
“Our reconstruction reveals that prominent seesaw patterns of alternating moisture regimes observed in instrumental data12, 13, 14 across the Mediterranean, western USA, and China have operated consistently over the past twelve centuries. Using an updated compilation of 128 temperature proxy records15, we assess the relationship between the reconstructed centennial-scale Northern Hemisphere hydroclimate and temperature variability. Even though dry and wet conditions occurred over extensive areas under both warm and cold climate regimes, a statistically significant co-variability of hydroclimate and temperature is evident for particular regions. We compare the reconstructed hydroclimate anomalies with coupled atmosphere–ocean general circulation model simulations and find reasonable agreement during pre-industrial times. However, the intensification of the twentieth-century-mean hydroclimate anomalies in the simulations, as compared to previous centuries, is not supported by our new multi-proxy reconstruction. This finding suggests that much work remains before we can model hydroclimate variability accurately, and highlights the importance of using palaeoclimate data to place recent and predicted hydroclimate changes in a millennium-long context16, 17.”
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v532/n7597/full/nature17418.html
So the models are wrong – not much surprise there. Much less convincing are blog comment narratives about how a hyper-complex system works. The millennium long context in a highly variable system is an obvious necessity.
We have only had a small fraction of the projected climate change, so you can’t discount possible changes in precipitation going forwards which it appears you have. In a warmer climate precipitation is heavier, but droughts could also be more severe.
I can guarantee that we have seen a fraction of the variability the system is capable of.
Not just random variability too – forced change all in one direction and fast.
The planet is busily moving to sequester carbon – for reasons other than global warming – and moving to 21st century energy within decades. Jim is a dinosaur.
What other reasons are there?
Food security, economic development, soil water holding capacity, less downstream flooding, less erosion, drought and flood resilience, more efficient use of agricultural inputs, reversing desertification, higher levels of nutrients and minerals in soils. biodiversity, ecological restoration…
Carbon dioxide emissions from fossil fuels and cement production – from 1750 to 2011 – was about 365 billion metric tonnes as carbon (GtC), with another 180 GtC from deforestation and agriculture. A critical metric is the losses from soils and forests.
Putting carbon back where it belongs – and where it does the most good – is the goal of many countries and many millions of people.
> Can you square what Pruitt actually said with the […] quotes and headlines about this?
Of course
Next post, please.
***
> I can’t.
Why, of course.
Essentially, with Scott Pruitt we’re stepping off the — where we should have stepped off back in 2009.
stepping into something, more like.
…hockey pucks?
Maybe Judith can clarify something. Is the suggestion that we should be able to (or need to) precisely determine how much is anthropogenic?
Climate predictions are based on quantities which have never been measured with any precision, like the Effective Radiation Level or a Climate Sensitivity. I have exactly zero confidence in these predictions. I agree that an action is urgently needed: make better predictions. Call them predictions, not projections. Stop using weasel words.
Curious,
The problem is that some of these probably cannot be measured with better precision (or, at least, not easily). That’s why these are presented with confidence/uncertainty intervals. That way you see the likelihood/probability of it falling within a certain range. That’s largely how science works.
That’s exactly how a pseudo-science works. It knows it can’t do any better, so please trust it. What happened to Physics?
It’s not precise, but you can take it for what it looks like which is 1 C per 100 ppm. This gives 2.3 C per doubling as an effective transient rate just based on observations.
http://woodfortrees.org/plot/gistemp/from:1950/mean:12/plot/esrl-co2/scale:0.01/offset:-3.2
The point is that it is deliberately constructed to be obscure and imprecise. Not what I would expect of a science.
No, it’s not. That it isn’t necessarily as precise as maybe we would like, does not mean that it is constructed to be obscure and imprecise. Presenting uncertainties (or confidence intervals) is a perfectly normally part of science. Expecting absolute precision is not.
Science should build on measurable quantities. Astronomy, for example. If you start with an assumption that celestial cycles as signs of divine communications, you get astrology.
Curious,
Indeed, but this does not mean that science requires measuring things with absolute precision. If anything, this is almost never possible. Science requires presenting results with uncertainties/confidence intervals.
I’m well aware of what happens in Astronomy.
Judith is more than capable of speaking for herself, but my short answer is yes.
My longer answer is that at the very least the climate models at the centre of debate need to either be improved so that they do not need arbitrary tuning to hindcast history or be abandoned.
Firstly, absolute precision is almost never possible. We’ll always be working with a range of possible outcomes. How do you define when the range is too large?
As for the models, even if they are at the centre of the debate (which I’m not convinced they are) they aren’t the only – or even the key – evidence.
aTTP, the problem with the models is the number of pseudo scientific studies which are premised on the models. There are even some which feed various input scenarios into the models and then claim the output is data.
Oh, and absolute precision is not the problem. It’s worst than that.
> the climate models at the centre of debate need to either be improved so that they do not need arbitrary tuning to hindcast history or be abandoned.
and I would say that one good test of any model is that after it has been tuned, if you change the starting conditions by an amount smaller than the claimed precision of the measurements, the model must produce essentially the same results.
If it doesn’t, then the model results are the result of choosing the tuning parameters, not based on data.
side note, starting conditions should not be defined as something like and accuracy of 0.1 degree, but instead as +- X degrees, which isn’t going to be 0.05 degrees if anyone competent in statistical analysis is honestly doing the work.
I won’t believe in gravity until they get it right to 100 significant digits.
Steven, as my first reply has been censored I’ll try again.
Believe what you will, but the uncertainty over the output of the climate models is significantly greater than the uncertainty over the universal gravitational constant or the uncertainty over the laws of gravity.
The fundamental fact of models is that they have at their core nonlinear equations of fluid transport. They are chaotic. They are sensitively dependent on initial conditions. Beyond a certain time there is no longer a single deterministic solution. All of the above.
Within the unavoidable limits of measurement precision of inputs – and of the characterization of processes and couplings – there are thousands of starting points and thousands of solutions that diverge exponentially. Try to understand that this is true not just scientifically but mathematically.
“In sum, a strategy must recognise what is possible. In climate research and modelling, we should recognise that we are dealing with a coupled non-linear chaotic system, and therefore that the long-term prediction of future climate states is not possible. The most we can expect to achieve is the prediction of the probability distribution of the system’s future possible states by the generation of ensembles of model solutions.” IPCC TAR 14.2.2.2
What they mean by the generation of ensembles is what is called perturbed physics ensembles – many solutions are generated from small changes in initial conditions. It is shown schematically below. The solutions diverge through the state space of the model and converge on a range of values that may or may not correspond to the future climate state. Each of these solutions are equally plausible. There is no way to determine beforehand which is the ‘correct’ solution. Theoretically a solution could be assigned a probability – but not yet. The key idea is that there are thousands of solutions – as a result of the nonlinear equations at the core of the mathematical engine – and no way of rationally determining which is right.
http://rsta.royalsocietypublishing.org/content/369/1956/4751
This is not what the IPCC does. The IPCC takes one solution from each model and graphs them together as an ‘opportunistic ensemble’. Each individual solution is arbitrarily chosen from amongst all other plausible solutions on the basis of the qualitative expectation of solution behaviour. Literally – this looks about right. It is the antithesis of precision. The IPCC takes their opportunistic ensemble and fabricates a statistics over it. The results are literally incredible and need to be simply thrown away as complete rubbish.
Models are fine – I have spent 30 years as a hydrodynamic modeler – and they all need calibration. But this is not how to use them. It strongly suggests to me a serious scientific fraud intended to scam the unsuspecting public – because all this is known without a doubt.
Steven Mosher: I won’t believe in gravity until they get it right to 100 significant digits.
That may be a true statement about your belief, but I suspect it is an irony.
Would you rely upon calculations that depend on the existence of gravity and a reasonable estimate of its strength, such as the position of your car on a map display, calculated from GPS signals? Those are amazing, and in real time.
Quantitative theories based on gravitation have produced reasonably dependable results. To date, the quantitative theories of the effects of CO2 have produced undependable results, dramatically overpredicting warming (hence the drama). Off-the-cuff warnings, such as perpetual drought, the end of snow, the disastrous increase in the rate of Hurricane Katrinas, were even worse.
Gravity is easy to prove, stand under a falling hammer.
The simple test of a model is its fitness for purpose. Stability in the face of perturbation of inputs etc etc are all secondary to that, and in fact may be irrelevant to the purpose.
Thus we use different models for the motion of physical objects depending on the scale etc.
The question then becomes are GCMs useful for making decisions about managing risks that arise from GHGs. The answer is like the curate’s egg they are good in parts.
They are probably not very good at providing evidence of the risks since they do fail to model critical elements of the atmosphere. Here we should turn to empirical techniques. They are definitely useful for short-term (days and weeks) estimation of the weather – we use them all the time. They are similarly useful for understanding how the climate interacts within tight boundary conditions.
However for decadal projections of how things might develop to support decision makers they are probably less useful than macroeconomic models in their equivalent domain, and for multi-decadal forecasts or projection of future climates one suspects simpler models would be more useful, although the effort really hasn’t gone into developing them.
As might be expected the controversy over their use occurs where they are probably the least fit-for-purpose.
“The position statement of the American Geophysical Union regarding climate change leaves no doubt that increasing atmospheric concentrations of carbon dioxide resulting from human activity is the dominant source of climate change during the last several decades.”
Have they looked at Humlum 2013 or Harde 2017? Both of these papers find that human emissions hardly effect atmospheric concentration. The natural sources and sinks are so large and variable the human source is lost in the noise. Humlum shows that annual CO2 concentration follows temperature not the other way around. It seems that if we can’t find a correlation of human emissions to atmospheric concentration we shouldn’t be talking about our emissions being the dominant source of climate change. There are also dozens of new papers in the last year or so that demonstrate that the recent warming is not global or unusual so why the hurry to fix it?
I will be watching Pruitt to see if these things will finally get to the mainstream media.
Yours is a misunderstanding of the Ole Humlum paper. While humans contribute about 2ppm of CO2 to the atmosphere annually – there is a variation of some 0.5ppm about the mean that lags sea surface temperature.
Thank you Robert.
The conclusions in the Humlum paper state:
“(5) Changes in ocean temperatures appear to explain a substantial
part of the observed changes in atmospheric CO2 since January
1980.
(6) CO2 released from anthropogene sources apparently has little influence
on the observed changes in atmospheric CO2, and
changes in atmospheric CO2 are not tracking changes in human emissions.”
When I read the paper I thought these results were literately supported by the body of the work. I will have to revisit it.
Yes – that’s what he did say. Not sure I understand why – but my apologies to you anyway.
https://pielkeclimatesci.wordpress.com/2012/09/20/review-of-humlum-et-al-2012-the-phase-relation-between-atmospheric-carbon-dioxide-and-global-temperature-by-donald-rapp/
Robert there seems to be some uncertainty about how long CO2 is resident in the atmosphere. Is that 2ppm gross or nett?
Supposedly net – but there are very large stores and a very large turnover. Supposedly it doesn’t matter which molecule is in the atmosphere and the assumption is that all stores increase with added carbon from long sequestered sources at constant rates. But quite a lot of the carbon lost – some 180 billion tonnes – from soils and ecosystems can be restored. A cooler world will as well make inroads in atmospheric concentration.
> Harde 2017
Not again:
https://andthentheresphysics.wordpress.com/2017/02/26/oh-no-not-again/
Willard
If we went into an ice age starting tomorrow, and the human CO2 emissions remained constant, the atmospheric quantity would not decline. The annual rate of residual increase measutef at Mauna Loa would reduce as atmospheric temperatures decreased. The unseasonal atmospheric upwelling in January would increase as a vent.
The residence time you suggest of four years is unsupported with real data
Currently the residence rate of CO2 at 200km altitude for the months December and January, and August to November is zero as it passes straight through.
> The residence time you suggest of four years is unsupported with real data
It’s Harde’s suggestion, Ozzie. Look its summary.
Correction
100 km
The upwelling in the Guam region.
I believe 40 scientists travelled to the area to find the reason for the unseasonal upwelling in January 18 month’s ago, still no word yet.
Doesn’t fit the current model of belief.
Thanks. The data is not supported
Welcome, Ozzie. I suppose that answers half of your question:
> Have they looked at Humlum 2013 or Harde 2017?
Pingback: Scott Pruitt’s statement on climate change – Enjeux énergies et environnement
“I think that measuring with precision human activity on the climate is something very challenging to do and there’s tremendous disagreement about the degree of impact”
That is something United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change seems to completely agree with:
“The equilibrium climate sensitivity quantifies the response of the climate system to constant radiative forcing on multi-century time scales. It is defined as the change in global mean surface temperature at equilibrium that is caused by a doubling of the atmospheric CO2 concentration. Equilibrium climate sensitivity is likely in the range 1.5°C to 4.5°C (high confidence), extremely unlikely less than 1°C (high confidence), and very unlikely greater than 6°C (medium confidence)( Note 16 ).”
Note 16 “No best estimate for equilibrium climate sensitivity can now be given because of a lack of agreement on values across assessed lines of evidence and studies.”
– ref.: IPCC; WGI ; AR5; Summary for policymakers; Page 16
Here are a couple of citations that everyone should read. Admittedly, these are social science related articles, but everyone can learn from them. Also, these articles may seem a little old, but the concepts expressed within them are still relevant today.
Demeritt, David. “The construction of global warming and the politics of science.” Annals of the association of American geographers 91, no. 2 (2001): 307-337.
Lahsen, Myanna. “Seductive simulations? Uncertainty distribution around climate models.” Social Studies of Science 35, no. 6 (2005): 895-922.
Alan, Thanks for the references. The second one is quite instructive I think. It discusses the way modelers “sell” their models in contrast to how they think about it when they do science.
Thank you.
Unfortunately, most people think this discussion is a science issue. It’s not about science, it’s about politics, social interactions, and policy. This would not be as contentious a problem if this was relegated to pure science. The problem is that people are striving to control the narrative and achieve political objectives, and that thrusts the entire situation into the social arena, not just pure science. It’s not just about the data, the error in the data, the methods for modelling and acquiring data, or the overall uncertainty associated with the present conclusions asserted by the dominant climate scientists. That makes it about the social sciences, and therefore social science studies like Science and Technology Policy (STP) comes into play.
STP is the social study of science and people that make science happen, along with policies, institutions, and policymakers. Think about the social interactions in this blog. Even though data may be presented, it’s essentially a social interaction and social argument that is occurring.
Once you see and understand the social construction of science and the climate change debate, you will be enlightened, and begin to understand what is actually going on in the news, with politicians, and scientists in general.
I understand that the climate change debate is a social construction that is designed to achieve particular political objectives. It’s no longer just about the science.
Yes Allan, That’s the key fact that activist scientists fail to grasp. Its not the skeptics that are causing the lack of “action.” It’s the politics and basic human nature. I have bookmarked your references and will use them in the future.
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Well said. It should also be noted that many of the responses to Pruitt’s statement have included unsupportable (and overly-emotional) comments that have gone unchallenged. It’s an excellent demonstration of how this debate has left the world of science.
It will be interesting when Scott Pruitt actually does something instead of just saying something.
I look forward to reading Judith Curry’s future columns on whether microorganisms cause disease, evolution is real, or the Earth is more than a few thousand years old.
Hey, uncertainty, right?
¯\_(ツ)_/¯
You must be a good astrologist.
Nope, he’s just a troll.
Magma, the warming from ~1920-1945 is essentially indistinguishable from the warming~1975-2000. AR4 WG1 SPM figure 8.2 says the first was not AGW; it could not do otherwise since there not sufficient change in atmospheic CO2. The problem is natural variation did not magically stop in 1975.
That is very different than the well established germ theory of infectious disease, evolution (which we see working in the evolution of antibiotic resistant disease causing bacteria), or Earths age.
I would hope that we could find areas of common agreement to facilitate discussion. My limited research led me to this link: https://climate.nasa.gov/scientific-consensus/. It appears to me that the scientific consensus is that climate change is real and largely caused by us. I see this as our best common ground.
That it is real is a tautology. That it is largely caused by us is much less certain. Solve the problems of prediction in a chaotic system and we can talk. You would probably win a Nobel Prize also.
That is what NASA says. That is what the IPCC says. But it isn’t factually correct in many respects. The attribution uncertainty causes the whole CAGW edifice relected by that NASA site to fail There is no common ground about it to be found.
The warming from ~1920-1945 is essentially indistinguishable from the warming ~1975-2000. IPCC AR4 WG1 SPM figure 8.2 said the first warming was mostly not AGW; they could not do otherwise since there was not enough change in atmospheric CO2. The problem is that natural variation did not magically cease in 1975. Ergo, the NASA propaganda that the later warming is AGW is just wrong.
And, except for the now cooled 2015-16 El Nino blip, there has been no warming this century except by Karlization. This century comprises ~1/3 of the total atmospheric CO2 increase since 1958 (Keeling curve start). Proves three things: 1. CO2 is not the master control knob. 2. Natural variation still exists. 3. The climate models are wrong since they predicted rising temperatures with rising CO2.
Current science supports his position.
“A Hiatus of the Greenhouse Effect”
“the downward tendency of clouds is the dominant contributor to the greenhouse effect hiatus.”
http://www.nature.com/articles/srep33315
So, Willis is correct with his cloud – thermostat research?
I thought it sounded about right, too.
I think you could add Miskolczi into the mix also. He found that the optical depth of the atmosphere isn’t showing an enhanced GHG effect.
Uncertainty is a two edged sword. Uncertainty goes to undermining the imagined certainties of global warming – not terribly well I have to say – and usually with impossible certainties of their own. But it goes no way to resolving uncertainty in a context of real action in the real world.
‘The report does not focus on large, abrupt causes—nuclear wars or giant meteorite impacts—but rather on the surprising new findings that abrupt climate change can occur when gradual causes push the earth system across a threshold. Just as the slowly increasing pressure of a finger eventually flips a switch and turns on a light, the slow effects of drifting continents or wobbling orbits or changing atmospheric composition may “switch” the climate to a new state. And, just as a moving hand is more likely than a stationary one to encounter and flip a switch, faster earth-system changes—whether natural or human-caused—are likely to increase the probability of encountering a threshold that triggers a still faster climate shift.’ https://www.nap.edu/read/10136/chapter/1#v
Uncertainty is absolute. Opportunistic ensembles of models are theoretically complete nonsense – to the extent that scientific fraud is indicated. Warming is occurring modestly at some 0.087 degrees C/decade. But the future is unknowable and may hold surprises on either the hot or cold end of the spectrum that are well outside a steady rise in global temperatures. The consideration extends to changing terrestrial hydrology through through plant stomatal responses to CO2 or changing ocean chemistry. Ecologies are chaotic – and nothing can be known of the outcomes of any of this. Little can be known but that we are changing Earth systems with carbon dioxide emissions.
I find it difficult to imagine that doing nothing is the optimal response to a problem of an unknown but but potentially high severity. On the other hand – the distance between the rhetoric and reality of COP21 is predictably delusional. The world has committed – by IEA projections – to increase energy emissions by 3.7 billion tonnes of CO2 in 2030 – at a cost of $13.7 trillion dollars.
I agree with the growth of fossil fueled energy sources. Climate change – such as it is – can’t be solved on the backs of the world’s poor. Not liking it is immaterial – we are along for the ride. Most of the energy growth will be in non-OECD countries.
The answer to energy is technological. I think that cost-competitive modern versions of decades old technology – being commercialised around the world now – is a very likely contender. One advantage is that they can burn conventional nuclear waste to produce much less waste that is much shorter lived.
Some 180 billion tonnes of carbon has been lost from soils and forests over the last few hundred years. Returning even half that for reasons of food security, development, flood and drought resilience and biodiversity would take 330 billion tonnes of carbon dioxide from the atmosphere. It is not an idea but a global objective.
…and, there likely are equally plausible counteranalogies that would lead to an opposite conclusion–e.g., begin rowing west from Spain may decrease the probability of finding land as opposed to simply drifting with the tide.
The analogy was from the introduction to the NAS report – by a group of very eminent scientists.
You may believe it is not – but your story is not equally plausible.
But beyond that there are nuclear engines, farm productivity and environmental conservation. These are proper aims for policy in this area – and being reflexively reactive is not.
Yes – I have a catastrophe theory.
My favorite example of a catastrophe: You miss your train.
Just think if Einstein had missed hiss train.
What if a catastrophe happened in the woods and no one was around to witness it? Still a catastrophe?
I was going to say – well yes – the bear would still …. in the woods.
“My favorite example of a catastrophe: You miss your train.”
Ah! The difference between comedy and tragedy: comedy is when YOU cut your arm off; tragedy is when I nick myself shaving.
It’s all perspective, innit?
“doing nothing is [not] the optimal response to a problem of an unknown but but potentially high severity”. We are throwing trillions of dollars on projects with questionable results, like biofuels. Let’s better spend millions on researching the problem. We are in a theater where IPCC yelled “fire” and everybody is rushing to the nearest door, without knowing which one is the exit.
I agree – especially if Audi and General Atomics fund it.
From memory – Audi was claiming $3/litre. I suppose that’s about $12/gallon. A ways to go then.
When it comes to global warming Lord Christopher Monckton got it right: The correct policy response to the non-problem of global warming is not to cap or tax carbon dioxide emissions. It is to have the courage to do nothing.
Caps and taxes are nonsense – but the alternative is far from doing nothing. It is to answer imaginatively what can be done to manage uncertainty while benefiting the world. It is happening whether you approve or not.
That earth will be attacked by extra terrestrials is “a problem of an unknown but potentially high severity”, is it not? What should we be doing about that? How many $ trillions should we be spending?
I suppose you believe that we have been attacked by aliens many times in the past?
Abrupt climate change is very real and abrupt changes in global ecologies are certain. The solution you are missing is that only rich people can afford environments.
And if you really don’t want to advance US agriculture through science and technology – or move to 21st century technology – well I guess the world will just pass you by.
so you are saying that we need to spend trillions to try and prevent natural changes?
First off, you are now no longer claiming “it’s all man’s fault”
Second, you still need to explain why the changed conditions are worse for humanity than the current conditions.
ACtually, since the things that would be developed to defend against ETs would be the same things that we need to get off this rock, we should be spending a lot on the topic :-)
Like getting hit by an asteroid – abrupt climate change will happen but with greater frequency. We can avoid shortening the odds by minimising change to the system.
Carbon dioxide emissions from fossil fuels and cement production – from 1750 to 2011 – was about 365 billion metric tonnes as carbon (GtC), with another 180 GtC from deforestation and agriculture. A critical metric is the losses from soils and forests.
Putting carbon back where it belongs – and where it does the most good – is the goal of many countries and many millions of people. For the purpose of food security, economic development, soil water holding capacity, less downstream flooding, less erosion, drought and flood resilience, more efficient use of agricultural inputs, reversing desertification, higher levels of nutrients and minerals in soils. biodiversity, ecological restoration…
It is the new standard in farm practice in the US – http://onpasture.com/
The other side was about advanced nuclear designs.
Uncertainty cuts both ways – but even if it is a problem it isn’t. Well as much as anything is certain.
“The right’s refusal to accept the authority of climate science is of a piece with its rejection of mainstream media, academia, and government, the shared institutions and norms that bind us together and contain our political disputes.” David Robert at Vox
This statement says it all . . . if you don’t agree with “us,” you’re not worth listening to or reading. This attitude dominates climate science, government (liberal), most “shared” institutions, academia and the mainstream media.
I’m an old guy who received an engineering degree (thankfully) in the apolitical 1950s. I’ve watched my alma mater, Time magazine, PBS, “science,” the “culture,” and the Democrat party make a hard left turn over the years. Except for the internet and social media, there’s no ability to state an alternative opinion to that offered by the Left. Whether politics, climate or social science, culture, or mores only one opinion is allowed. To state or show support for an alternative position means you get ejected, shouted down or physically attacked. Or in Pruitt’s case, you are misquoted or misrepresented and made to look like a looney ignoramous.
Thank you, Dr. Curry, for continuing with this website, and for correctly interpreting Mr. Pruitt’s statements.
Why did you let this happen?!
You were part of the “Greatest Generation” remember? Just look what we have done; The space program, computers, 500 TV channels, most powerful military in world not to mention the greatest wealth inequality in modern American history. Where did we go wrong?
We haven’t gone wrong jack. Just allowed a small group of apologists who believe they are smarter, better educated and of better stock and therefore should be the ones making all of the “important” decisions, control the narrative. They lost control of that narrative last fall, allowing citizens who still believe the US is the greatest nation on earth to assert that narrative.
And boy, is the whining off the charts.
Who allowed them Tim? Not me, not you, not my parents not my friends. Give me a name so I focus my anger on someone who deserves it.
“Give me a name so I focus my anger on someone who deserves it.”
How about Obama and all the PeeCee pseudo-intellectual self-elected-elite metropolitan hipster class that supported him?
Fortunately, under the new management, it looks like things have a chance of being put back on the right track.
Give me a name.
Seriously?
How about jacksmith, seeing as how you expect others to do your thinking for you.
I don’t have a name but I’m going to point at the 45%+ of the eligible voters who have failed their country by withdrawing from the political discourse by not voting. The alternative to that narrative is they have just given up realizing the game was rigged all along.
Voter turnout for the 2016 election was the lowest in 20 years. If they don’t care enough to exercise their right to vote then maybe they don’t deserve it and they certainty don’t have a right to criticize what happens to their health care, taxes or foreign policy now.
Unfortunately, I have to take this into the social domain. You all are operating within it anyway, even if you aren’t aware of it.
It’s kind of scary to me that socially dogmatic principals such as mandated conformity are being used to suppress independent thought in the climate change debate. It is inherently political to do this sort of activity.
Socialism thrives where uniformity and conformity are mandated and enforced. Independence of thought is strongly discouraged in socialist environments. Group think is encouraged, and propaganda is used to reinforce the group think (the massive group deception). This is how Communism and Socialism have dominated the thoughts and lives of billions of people. If you are a nonconformist, you are purged, publicly disgraced, derided, and threatened (in a variety of manners ranging from verbal abuse to imprisonment or even with death, as in the Communist countries, Imperial Japan, and Nazi Germany). Even the most recent example of thought conformity enforcement can be seen in Sweden, through the denial of the consideration that their immigration policies could be generating massive social problems within their borders.
Be aware of socialist dogma that is designed to force bad political objectives on the populace as a whole. The social policies that are derived through this sort of mechanism are likely to be fraught with error and end in disaster.
Sorry, but it’s true.
According to surveys going back decades the most respected organization in America is the military. What type of social organization would you classify the military as?
Key features:
Authoritarian to the extreme.
Rigid hierarchical structure.
Merit based promotions only, no voting for your leaders.
Total social conformity enforced by Uniform Code of Military Justice.
Lifetime social benefits including healthcare.
Perhaps we should just draft the entire population into the military and all our problems would be solved. Fun fact, For some reason there has never been a billionaire serving in the military.
There is no reply button for jacksmith4tx, therefore I will make my reply to that person here.
Unfortunately, jacksmith4tx confuses a required military structure with political structures. Your argument is not a comparative argument. This is because of the required organizational structure that are mandated by all military institutions (regardless of incorporating political structures) in order to be effective fighting forces. Most of the prevailing political and social structures of the past and present require the existence of military organizations to be able to survive.
So, the moral to this story is to not confuse military organization, discipline, and conformity with the political and social structures that use them. All military organizations have the same basic structure regardless of the incorporating political structures that form them.
jack,
Ever serve? Doesn’t sound like it from your characterization of the US military. One of the strengths of our armed forces has been the ability to think and act independently. The Marines have a saying, Improvise, Adapt, Overcome. Not exactly something a rigid, authoritarian, hierarchical organization would encourage. And what does merit based promotion have to with socially dogmatic principals and mandated conformity?
Tim,
“The Marines have a saying, Improvise, Adapt, Overcome. Not exactly something a rigid, authoritarian, hierarchical organization would encourage.”
Sounds like what trained, obedient soldiers are told to do in combat situations. Islamic jihadist say the same thing. Note the purpose of saying this is so you use what ever means necessary to complete the objective the authoritarian, hierarchical organization wants.
Try that technique with your wife or a 2yr old baby.
I spent 20yrs working for a defense contractor building as supporting the toys you guys play with and was born on a AF Base.
Oh gee, another tiff over what caused “the climate change of the last several decades”.
WHAT fracking climate change?
Minor changes in global average temp ain’t climate change.
‘The last several decades’ have been one of the more stable in human history.
The reason we’re going on about ‘climate change’ is we don’t enough to worry about.
Agreed Ronin. I’d be particularly interested in a statement of what the climate is now in my home town of Cairns in Australia and a statement of what it was 30 years ago.
The emphasis on the manufactured single figure to represent the temperature of the entire earth has created much heat but very little light.
‘It is not light that we need, but fire; it is not the gentle shower, but thunder. We need the storm, the whirlwind, and the earthquake.’ Frederick Douglass
Forest ‘manufactured single figure to represent’
Science forgets that it creates.
Then often obscures the source of these creations and presents them as other than manufactured.
They often choose language poorly and pretend that they are not about language.
But the one thing that torques my keister the most about this climate thing is the teaching of kids to hate their own existence.
Teaching kids that Gaia erred in them.
To doubt the gift of their future.
This is the most sinister and dim propaganda crime of my lifetime.
Forrest, please excuse the misspelling of your name;
Hello to the SH.
I’m in the NH, USA.
Trapped among the feckless coastal elite.
Required to listen and nod.
Pruitt gives a fair assessment of the problem and said precise and well.\. Judith, you are absolutely right on this one.
Both of us are now emeritus professors and we both learned long ago that academe overreacts with righteous indignation, particularly on their realm of expertise. Henry Kissinger pt it well when he said, “The reason there is so much politics in academe is that there is so little at stake.” (This is also known in some circles as “Sayre’s Law).
George Devries Klein, PhD, PG, FGSA &
Professor Emeritus, Geology, University of Illinois @ Urbana-Chamaign
Bravo, Dr. Klein. Once more with the sanity!
Thanks, Mike.
Home from Kurdistan?
Reblogged this on ClimateTheTruth.com.
I agree with Judith’s analysis completely.
IMHO Scott Pruitt was an inspired choice to head EPA.
Until we understand why amount of annual total absorbed shortwave radiation is next to the same for the two hemispheres in spite of the huge difference in their clear sky albedos, climate science is missing its basic paradigm, therefore no consensus makes any sense whatsoever.
Climate funds should clearly be redirected to basic research from those who can only fabricate politically loaded scare stories instead of doing actual scientific research.
Clearly, there is little difference in the “clear sky” of the world’s financial albedo with regard to scientific research – whether absorbed or reflected – it is redistributed by consensus.
Reblogged this on Quaerere Propter Vērum.
My favourite Scott Pruitt quote – assuming the NYT actually quoted him correctly, a somewhat dubious prospect perhaps, considering their “journalist-wannabes'” performances of late …
But that aside, as I have noted elsewhere … Even the upper echelons of the UN/EU seem to be adapting (finally!) to the reality that the wheels have been falling off the CO2-is-deadly climate-whatevers bandwagon.
Reading between the lines of the proceedings of copious carefully crafted UN word-salads … The arms, elbows, hands and fingers of the UN had to stick to their CO2-causes-all-evils money-grubbing guns until the new, improved sibling (rival?!) bandwagon, aka IPBES (Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services), had sufficiently matured to bring the dedicated missionaries on board.
As I’ve noted elsewhere, a rather significant tidbit from the recently concluded IPBES proceedings appears to signal that CO2 as primary cause is rapidly falling from favour:
YMMV, but I fully expect all the “transformative” and “innovative” send-money-now solutions will emanate from the UN’s far foggier “Sustainable Development” front. Whether their predictable alarms will yield anything more than inane slogans, tweets and word-salads of obeisance remains to be seen. My best guess: no they won’t, because, well, because – thanks to the Interwebs – too many people have seen this 5th-rate flick before;-)
Consider also the following arrogant tweet from one of the UNEP’s sisters-in-authoritative-arms, the BSR:
Thanks to the UNEP’s ubiquitous arms, elbows, hands and fingers – of which BSR is merely one – and recycled IPCC-nik Bob Watson’s baby, FutureEarth – the new, improved bandwagon is ready and waiting for the snowflakes, their hashtags and placards.
Well done – but you forgot the photo op’s.
“The UN’s flagship energy access program, for example, claims that “basic human needs” can be met with enough electricity to power a fan, a couple of light bulbs, and a radio for five hours a day.”
They will be so grateful.
“The presidents and prime ministers agreed to replace the eight goals and 18 targets of the Millennium Development Goals with an impossibly long list of 17 goals and 169 targets. The chief problem with this new laundry list of targets is that trying to prioritize 169 things looks very similar to prioritizing nothing.
Researchers for Copenhagen Consensus—the think tank that I am president of—explored how much social benefit the targets would achieve, and found that some targets could achieve a huge deal, others very little. Spreading money and energy thinly among them reduces the overall good that we do.
Consider this target: “By 2030 ensure all learners acquire knowledge and skills needed to promote sustainable development, including among others through education for sustainable development and sustainable lifestyles, human rights, gender equality, promotion of a culture of peace and non-violence, global citizenship, and appreciation of cultural diversity and of culture’s contribution to sustainable development.” It’s hard to know what is promised, let alone how it will be implemented, monitored or evaluated….
Yet some targets are worth pursuing. Copenhagen Consensus analysis by a panel including several Nobel laureate economists found that there are 19 specific targets within the 169 that would do more than $15 of good for every dollar spent.” http://time.com/4052109/un-sustainable-development-goals/
Yes let’s let the UN fritter away $2.5 trillion.
I think Scott Pruit did a good summary of the climate science.
“It is very likely that more than half the warming is caused by CO2”
What percentage would it take to say we are sure? Would it be 20% or 30% of the warming.
After 30 years of recearch they can only come up with these weasel words.
How would it sound if they said we are 50% sure that most of the warming is caused by man made CO2?
It would in fact be the same statement.
My glass is half empty or half full.
I should change “climate science” to the officiially promoted sort of climate science. There are researchers and others that realise that climate is a lot more that CO2 and temperature, and how little we know about it.
It also says that the best estimate of human-induced warming is similar to the observed warming over this period. This means 100% is the best estimate: a crucial part that is rarely quoted by skeptics for some reason.
That’s because they predicted much more warming than we had (which was zero for about two decades now), so whatever warming there was must have been all caused by us. That’s unsound reasoning.
It’s the positive imbalance, but I shouldn’t need to explain that.
“This means 100% is the best estimate: a crucial part that is rarely quoted by skeptics for some reason.”
The reason being it’s sh1te, like most of your prognostications.
Skeptics are happy the quote the very likely more than half part of this, but then leave out the part I just quoted which comes straight after. If they quoted this part too every time, it might make them look more honest, but I am not expecting that to change.
Mosher, The simple answer to the Alarmist position is that no one knows what the future will hold in 80 to 100 years. It is possible that there may be unknown cooling processes that are on the verge of occurring that may be ameliorated by CO2. (I admit not likely, but if Alarmists will occur that warming may be worse than currently imagined, this counter-argument is also valid)
The one thing we do know is that science is advancing very rapidly and that that human society will be very different 80-100 years from now. If there is substantial and harmful warming, it will be a trivial exercise to reduce it with the increased scientific tools that will be available in the future.
JD
With what precision do we know what the global temperature was in 1950?
With what precision do we know what the global temperature is now?
With what precision do we know how much of the change is anthro?
With what precision do we know how much of the anthro-change is due to burning fossils?
With what precision do we know whether said change in global temperature is good or bad?
With what precision do we know how much various political policies would reduce our consumption of fossil fuels?
With what precision do we know the beneficial impacts of such policies?
With what precision do we know the detrimental impacts of such policies?
To sum up: With what precision do we know how much money it is wise to spend to achieve Climate Goals?
I hate it how the media just reduces the question to “Do you believe in Climate Change?”.
+100
and if they claim that they know the global temps to 0.1 degree, and the models produce wildly different results if you shift the starting conditions by 0.001 degree, the models are worthless
With what precision do we know what the global temperature was in 1950?
#################
Wrong question. Pruitt stated that getting a precise answer was a challenge. It his responsibility as a consumer of science and policymaker to define what precision is required for policy. The same goes for all your other questions. Policy making may only require precision to +- 10%. Or even less precise. For example..
I’m sure that a travel ban will reduce the risk of new terror attacks.. I can’t tell you with any precision, but the lack of precision in the estimate doesn’t mean the policy isn’t rational.
Once You play the precision card it is up to you, not me, to set a precision requirement and justify it.
It’s the users of information, policymakers, to set and defend precision requirements. Not you. Not me.. but Pruitt now owns the decision making process and he has appealed to the previous criteria so the ball is in his court, not mine, to answer the question. .How precise is REQUIRED? Until that question is answered it’s stupid to even calculate the present uncertainity.
If he says we have to know it to 3 significant digits he will have prove that is a reasonable requirement
As I’ve said before we know everything we need to know to make policy without any reference to temperatures or human attribution.
“As I’ve said before we know everything we need to know to make policy without any reference to temperatures or human attribution.”
Absolute, total, complete nonsense.
We know nothing of the sort.
“Policy making may only require precision to +- 10%.”
10% would be, what? 3 orders of magnitude better than now? Or maybe just 2 orders of magnitude? A lot better at any rate.
Work on that. Let me know when you get to 20%….
“As I’ve said before we know everything we need to know to make policy without any reference to temperatures or human attribution.”
So much wiggle room in that. I know that there will be a baseball game in May. I know that one of those teams will win that game. I know that ability and professionalism is controlling factor in winning baseball games. Therefore I know everything I need to know to place a winning bet, today, on a game in May.
Policy – decision making – is always done with a significant hedge in mind- how precise your understanding of the determines how much you’re willing to risk. I’m willing to risk a lot more on a game between the Yankees and the little sisters of the poor than I am between Yankees-Orioles right now.
The warm assert not merely that we know enough to set policy, but that what we know is precise enough to warrant policies with significant risk (economic impact).
You of all people should know that it is entirely rational to doubt that.
“As I’ve said before we know everything we need to know to make policy without any reference to temperatures or human attribution.”
With pollution from Asia causing western states to have ozone levels exceeding current limits, how will reducing US ozone emissions standards improve US or “global” air quality?
Approximately 50% of the “global” reduction in life expectancy interpreted as 7 million potential deaths per year due to particulate matter are related to indoor use of coal, charcoal, and bio-mass, not central energy systems with standard scrubbers and particle arresters as required in the US. How is the elimination of coal us in the US going to reduce this “global” problem? Wouldn’t recommending emissions standards “globally” that meet or exceed US standards encourage more responsible use of limited resources?
“Global” mercury emissions are primarily due to artisan mining practices and unregulated emissions in Asian, African and South American industries. Wouldn’t it be more practical to encourage these regions to use better practice than to over regulate locally?
With China willing to finance infrastructure in developing nations without “green” strings attached, aren’t current policy initiatives devaluing US foreign interests?
Almost forgot, bio-fuel initiatives and damming wild tropical rivers appears to be causing more problems than solutions. Who do we need to terminate for that jewel of a policy recommendation?
Steven Mosher: Policy making may only require precision to +- 10%.
Maybe. For CO2 policy, it might be nice to have the sign of the water vapor effect better known than it is now. Also, why the model predicted tropical hot spot isn’t there.
There’s about 18F of warming early morning recorded here. Greatly exceeds co2.
Look at the temp would be if the high cooling rate didn’t change till the sun comes up.
Do we know the Climate Sensitivity with a sufficient precision to guide a responsible policy?
Yes we knew enough in 1896.
And in 1938
And 1988.
I am curious, Stephen – what would your responsible policy be?
I will start with mine. No mitigation with current technology because nothing works well enough to replicate itself and it is too expensive today. Research alternatives to fossil fuels because cheap sources could run out and if you need to mitigate in the future Pielke’s Iron Law cheaper must be confronted. Plan for the past and make society resilient to extreme weather, because, you said it well, we don’t even plan for the past. Finally, throw some money at research to natural drivers of climate change because you never know.
Please share with me the value and error bounds.
Steven Mosher: This contains two statements.
1.) that measuring with PRECISION is challenging
2) There is TREMENDOUS disagreement about the degree of impact.
It’s a shame that there was little attempt to clarify language and thinking before the IPCC was formed, and before there were calls to invest vast and seldom calculated resources to reducing human CO2.
1. Has it ever been shown that “precision” and “accuracy” of the mathematical models were sufficient to support policy? Not as of the time that Hansen gave his Senate testimony, and not in the most recent report of the IPCC. Anywhere?
2. “Tremendous” disagreement is a good descriptor for the anguish and ad hominems that greeted Bjorn Lomborg’s calculations of the costs of modest “improvements”. Since then, the evidence on the effects of CO2, rainfall and temperature changes over the past 135 or so years has tended to undermine the claim that there is any harm from anthropogenic CO2. (As far as I can tell, you have been impervious to evidence from the last 10 years of research.) Research on cyclonic storms shows little effect.
All weather events come about because of atmospheric “here today gone tomorrow” pressure systems interacting with the various jet streams and semi-permanent pressure systems (which are huge extremely powerful entities) interacting with oceanic/trade winds teleconnections. It takes a tremendous amount of energy to drive these systems into a new regime and to sustain the shift. There is no way the anthropogenic portion of global well mixed CO2 can be the cause. Not enough energy. Period. End of discussion. Whatever change in weather systems the anthropogenic portion is responsible for is buried in the natural oscillating noise of the past 800,000 years of weather pattern stadial and interstadial regimes.
That this easily discernible via calculated energy needed is ignored astounds me.
Once again, Judith comes off as the adult in the room. Others, for unknown reasons, didn’t take the time to determine precisely what Pruitt said. Perhaps this is a habit just going off half cocked. Or they have innate reading comprehension problems. What ever the reason they all messed up the assignment completely. They did not know what he said. They only believed that he had said something they didn’t like and off they went.
In comes Judith. No, she said in her usual objective and analytical way, let’s step back and see what Pruitt actually said. Once that was done and once the facts were learned, the transgressor didn’t seem to be quite the lunatic that they thought. It was a well reasoned statement that could be defended given the state of the science today.
They were the usual crowd that was involved getting it completely wrong. The equation addicts and ankle biting wannabees. It makes one wonder if they have ever had a real job. Clearly they want simple answers and only view the world through a binary lens. Either you are with us or you’re a denier. No nuance. No admission that other possibilities exist. Just dogma.
And these are the same people who want to be taken seriously. They are the cadre that has the only correct answer. Follow them, they say, for they are the chosen ones. They see where others, with inferior intellect, are clearly blind.
Sorry boys, but you just mucked up another attempt at gaining some legitimacy. No cigars for you.
His response was in the negative surrounded by some weasel words for plausible deniability, being a lawyer. There is no doubt which way he leans regarding the control knob unless he has worded himself very badly. Take ‘no’ as his answer. He didn’t say ‘maybe’.
Jim D: Take ‘no’ as his answer. He didn’t say ‘maybe’.
He said “Not yet”.
The question was whether he believed CO2 was the control knob. ‘not yet’ is not an answer to that kind of question. Perhaps it is ‘no’ in another guise, but he actually said ‘no’ he doesn’t agree which sounds like ‘no’ to that question. He could have stayed on safe ground and said “I don’t know” or “I am not a scientist” which is the preferred answer of politicians, but he drifted off and showed his cards. Next time his answer will be more careful.
Jim D,
Are you suggesting that CO2 is the primary knob for climate? Because that was the question that was asked. “Do you believe that it’s been proven that carbon dioxide is the primary control knob for climate?”
The only acceptable answer to that question is No.
Or a thoughtful person could explain that the question doesn’t make sense without defining what is meant by primary control knob or climate. And any reasonable definition of those terms would result in an answer of no.
The scientists say it is the primary control knob. The other factors don’t really compete.
“The scientists say it is the primary control knob.”
More BS…
SOME of the rapidly losing credibility “climate scientists” who will be looking for employment in the very near future – if they aren’t already – say that.
The vast majority of real scientists don’t say anything of the kind.
You are just repeating what Pruitt says which is that you don’t know why it is warming so fast, and you are still scratching your heads on that one. It is very understandable that you and Pruitt still don’t know what’s going on with these mysterious record warm years every year. I think you managed to convince yourself it can’t no way, no how, be the record CO2 levels, but that puts you in a box of your own making.
“you don’t know why it is warming so fast”
Jimbo, it isn’t warming fast, for the last couple of decades – despite the best efforts of the alarmist data Mannipulators – it’s hardly been warming at all!
You need to check that graph again sometime. As of now we have this.
http://woodfortrees.org/plot/gistemp/from:1950/mean:12/plot/esrl-co2/scale:0.01/offset:-3.2
Sorry Jimbo, that’s a totally rubbish graph, as I’m sure you are well aware.
I prefer this one.
http://woodfortrees.org/plot/rss/from:1998/trend/plot/rss/from:19 98
Looks like 0.04 deg C per decade to me, not worth getting excited about.
Messed up the link – try again!
http://woodfortrees.org/plot/rss/from:1998/trend/plot/rss/from:1998
Do you think a 20-year trend is worth anything? UAH5.6 has several times that rate, supposedly from the same data even with that cherry-picked start date. It has structural uncertainty is the way the RSS scientists excuse their data variants. Just not enough independent points to verify against.
http://woodfortrees.org/plot/uah5/from:1998/trend/plot/uah5/from:1998
a 20 year trend is nothing, you need centry level trends, and we don’t have records that far back.
And even then, where is the proof that a warmer earth is so horrible? We know that the earth has been much warmer in historical times (We are finding farms under retreating glaciers in Greenland for example)
75% of the CO2 had been added in the last 60 years, 75% of the warming has been in the same period, and the 60-year trend is clearly above anything in history. This should be enough, but some still wonder about 60-year trends while also believing in 15-year pauses meaning anything. Highly inconsistent.
bedeverthewise: The only acceptable answer to that question is No.
I think “not yet” is also a good answer, maybe because it’s mine. Perhaps some day that will be established beyond reasonable doubt, but not yet.
He was asked about the consensus view and it certainly looked like he said he didn’t agree that CO2 was the primary driver. There was a ‘no’ in his answer.
In the history of our planet, the level of CO2 in the atmosphere has ranged from less than 200 ppm to thousands of ppm. During that time, the earth’s climate has been widely variable and it would appear that factors other than CO2 have overwhelmed CO2 as the “control knob”.
I would also say that it appears that there have been times where the global temps have been decreasing while CO2 levels have been increasing and vise versa. There have been times when the CO2 levels have been much higher than present while the climate has been much colder.
That doesn’t mean that CO2 levels are not an important factor, or that our current situation isn’t dangerous. But it makes it very hard to make the case that CO2 is “THE primary control knob”. Now perhaps you have some unusual definitions for the word primary. Or you are imagining that there are some unspoken qualifiers such as, the only factor that humans have any control over. But I choose to simply use the words that were spoken even if they are inane.
Take Milankovitch cycles. According to those, we should be about as cool as the LIA still because its forcing gives a cooling trend. However, it has been increasingly overwhelmed by GHG forcing in the last couple of centuries which is why the trend is not only opposite to the millennial-scale Milankovitch one but an order of magnitude larger. Primary is the correct term for the current state of things. You can add in the sun and volcanoes too, and it doesn’t change anything.
Beyond a reasonable doubt? Since when did that become the standard of proof for policy making.?
We make all manner of policy. .Like travel bans.. on standards like probable cause..
It’s more likely than not that human influence will cause damage. .that’s the right standard for policy.
Yes, there are always uncertainties in decision-making. Sea level is rising and we don’t have to know exactly how fast before saying we have to do something about it. Ditto temperatures rising.
Steven Mosher: It’s more likely than not that human influence will cause damage. .that’s the right standard for policy.
I agree that’s a reasonable standard. I do not think that standard has been met yet with regard to anthropogenic CO2. It’s more likely than not, given some recent reviews, that the combination of warming, increased rainfall, and increased CO2 over the past 135 years or so has been beneficial.
If you like the climate as it is now, you should strive to keep it that way. This climate, at a mere 1 C warmer than pre-industrial, is typical of 350 ppm and 350.org name themselves that way because they see it as optimal, even beneficial. As it is, we are blowing through that on the way to 700 ppm by 2100. Keeping it closer to 350 ppm than 700 ppm is what the IPCC targets aim at doing, so that is why we have the Paris agreement.
Jim D “and we don’t have to know exactly how fast before saying we have to do something about it.”
You should go and read up about Real Options.
Jim D,
If the question had been “Do you believe that it’s been proven that Milankovitch Cycles are the primary control knob for climate? ” I would expect some sort of positive response. But that wasn’t the question.
It’s more equivalent to him denying the Milankovitch cycles too. They have just as much evidence.
Jim D: If you like the climate as it is now, you should strive to keep it that way.
Is that your backward way of admitting that, on the evidence, the combination of increased CO2, increased rainfall, and increased global mean temp over the past 135 or so years has been largely beneficial to life?
As I mentioned, 350.org makes that case because otherwise we would still have an LIA climate. It is not me. If you want to make a case for 700 ppm, go for it. No one has gone there yet, possibly worried they might look crazy. 700.org would be a good name for it. Choose your optimal level and advocate for it.
Jim D: As I mentioned, 350.org makes that case because otherwise we would still have an LIA climate
You stay away from agreeing that the evidence supports the notion that the warming since about 1985 has been beneficial.
As to an optimum combination of CO2, temp, and rainfall, no one knows how to calculate an optimum.
Reblogged this on Patti Kellar and commented:
God bless Dr. Judith Curry….the voice of reason amidst the insanity of politicized climate change.
We can debate climate sensitivity, kinetic energy, solar forcing, etc. until the chickens come home. The reality is that every science-based federal budget will be cut a MINIMUM of 15% EVERY year for the next 4 years.
People in science will lose their jobs. The future is now bleak and the tunnel we are entering is exceptionally dark with no light at the end.
Time spent on this BB might be better used to polish resumes for those who depend on federal funding.
The ride has begun and it will be extremely bumpy and uncertain for many.
https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/through-his-budget-a-bottom-line-look-at-trumps-new-washington/2017/03/12/29739206-05be-11e7-b9fa-ed727b644a0b_story.html?utm_term=.6381e878397d#comments
All republicans MUST vote for these changes or they will be un-elected by president bannon in 2018 and 2020. FEAR is powerful motivation.
“Preliminary budget documents have also shown that Trump advisers have also looked at cutting the Environmental Protection Agency’s staff by about 20 percent and tightening the Commerce Department’s budget by about 18 percent, which would impact climate change research and weather satellite programs, among other things.”
Reblogged this on I Didn't Ask To Be a Blog.
50-year HadCET4 trend is .177 ℃ per decade… shortly after the end of the negative phase of stadium wave
We’re now in the positive phase of the stadium wave… 38 straight months of positive PDO, and not a sign anywhere in observations of the earth’s system that it going to anything except stay strongly positive for at least another year.
David Rose’s La Nina-inspired cooling nonsense has rapidly disintegrated. For a negative ONI, the February anomaly is through the roof.
Heatwave… all due to anthropogenic carbon dioxide.
“Heatwave… all due to anthropogenic carbon dioxide.” JCH- science at work!
Accidentally used Gistemp for the linear trend.
50-year trend for HADCET4 is .165 ℃ per decade
It’s rather obvious the Eastern Pacific is driving the wiggles in the GMST trend. The PDO is a decent proxy for it. For the first 47 of those 50 years, the PDO has a negative trend.
pretty black and white: accelerated warming 1974 to 1980s (including volcano); PDO goes negative and begins its slow mask of AGW, ending with the complete dead PAWS
The media are a business, not an information resource. Their product is not news but your eyeballs. They sell them to advertisers.
There’s no market for hard news (think city council meetings). So except for one-offs like Princess Di or JFK Jr or the originator of it all Jessica-in-the-well, hard news can’t pay the daily bills.
There’s one market that will tune in every day, news or no news, and that’s the soap opera audience. They’re 20% of the population but that’s big enough to pay the daily bills, so soap opera narratives is what you’ll always get. If something isn’t soap opera, it will be rewritten so that it is, lest the soap opera audience tune away.
That’s a business constant. It can’t change without the media going out of business.
Politicians free-ride on that business necessity, by supplying soap opera narratives for the media to run.
The tastes of soap opera people edit every public debate, as a result. An entertainment choice determines public policy.
The solution is ridicule, so that at least the media don’t any longer have the aura of seriousness that they’ve been trading under.
Trump got elected by demonstrating he could throw sand in the media narrative gearbox, as he continues to do. Perhaps once again actual problems that could not be talked about can show up in public debate.
I can understand arguing over trend lines, where to start them, here to end them, even the processing preformed to create an individual dataset.
But to say “all due to anthropogenic carbon dioxide”. Where does that come from?
How?
Why?
Proof?
Without anthropogenic CO2, the GMST today would be around the 1910-1920 level.
“Scientific interest in the climate effects of black carbon (BC) intensified with the publication of Crutzen and Birks’ (1) report dealing with the ejection of large amounts of smoke into the atmosphere after a major nuclear war. A key component of smoke is BC, which is the strongest absorber of visible solar radiation. BC solar absorption became a central issue in climate change research when a synthesis of satellite, in situ, and ground observations concluded (2) that the global solar absorption (i.e., direct radiative forcing, DRF) by atmospheric BC is as much as 0.9 W⋅m−2, second only to the CO2 DRF. BC is also an important component of air pollution, which is plaguing large parts of the world. BC results from poor combustion of fossil fuel, household burning of coal briquettes, wood, and dung as fuel for home heating and cooking practiced by 3 billion people, as well as from agricultural and natural vegetation fires. These fine BC particles thus touch on personal and cultural basics, such as how we cook our food, how we move about, and the quality of the air that we breathe. This air pollution, consisting of BC and other particles, causes worldwide an estimated 7 million premature deaths annually, with most in East and South Asia (3). BC particles are also implicated in large-scale environmental effects, such as melting of the Himalaya and other glaciers (e.g., refs. 4 and 5). BC, along with the coemitted organic aerosols, is a major source of global dimming (2), which has been linked with reduction in precipitation (6). ”
Add in land use/ abuse and old school EPA policy to reduce pollution that adversely impact health starts dealing once again with a large portion of “climate change” as well as quality of life. Of course, if all you have is a CO2 hammer, every problem is just another nail ain’t it?
And was the world a better place in 1910? I don’t think so.
And civilization since then, of course, was built by fossil fuels.
Climate events of that time:
Paris: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/7a/Paris_1910_Inondation_gare_Saint-Lazare.jpg
Dayton Ohio: https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/1/13/OHdayton-flood1913-4thst.jpg
Central US:https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f9/Tri-State_Tornado.JPG
and many others.
Global temperature doesn’t have much to do with these things and reducing CO2 is not going to change adverse climate.
Dr. Curry
Here I go again, back in moderation again. What is the sin I’m in? On this cold wintery day.
TE – hilarious. Just hilarious.
The IPCC has this for 1951-2010. You can draw the conclusion from this. Note where natural forcing variations and internal variability are.
The realclimate page this comes from is here.
http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2013/10/the-ipcc-ar5-attribution-statement/
2010? You still buying 2010 cutting edge technology?
AR5. It’s the latest report they have. If you know of a newer one go for it. That was during the so-called pause.
NAT and IV are wildly undervalued, plus the so-called observed warming is bogus. The satellites did not see this warming. In fact they have yet to see any GHG warming. None.
You do understand that the IPCC is a political front for the UNEP, right? Why do you present their stuff as factual?
That’s just denial, not an argument. Find someone who says those are undervalued in a publication or even on WUWT and say why you believe them. They don’t use that argument and for good reason – no evidence.
Jim D there has been a lot written recently about estimates of climate sensitivity using semi-empirical approaches, and these are lowering the estimates significantly. You should dig this stuff out (perhaps starting with the ‘Sensitivity and feedback’ category here). It simply reinforces the point that being too certain about all this can lead to costly mistakes.
If you are talking about Lewis and those types of studies, they all assume 100% attribution to begin with because they have a positive remaining imbalance built in which means there is warming in the pipeline even if we stop emitting. I prefer the effective transient sensitivity which is warming per CO2 rise that stands at 1 C per 100 ppm from the last 60 years of observations (2.3 C per doubling). This uses CO2 as a proxy for the total forcing, and the fit is good as I have shown many times and will spare you from that data again. I would take the last 60 years of data as typical for planning purposes because it averages out various natural cycles and leaves just the forced change. It is also very sharp at 2.3 C rather than 2.0 or 2.6. By the time we add something on for equilibrium, we may be in the 2.8-3.0 C per doubling range. Observation based, no models.
HAS
There is one method that gives lower numbers
No reason able analyst focuses on one set of numbers
Observation based
Since 1979, observations indicate ~1.7 C per effective CO2 doubling.
Water vapor and Arctic sea ice are thought to be the largest positive feedbacks and certainly both have contributed to this 1.7C rate.
The Hot Spot is thought to be the largest negative feedback and it has been a no show for this period.
It’s difficult to make a case for anything beyond what is observed.
The trend since 1979 is consistent with the trend since 1950, if you look at it, 1 C per 100 ppm.
http://woodfortrees.org/plot/gistemp/from:1950/mean:12/plot/esrl-co2/scale:0.01/offset:-3.2
“The trend since 1979 is consistent with the trend since 1950, if you look at it, 1 C per 100 ppm.”
Yet more of your scientifically illiterate utter drivel.
You haven’t even grasped the concept of a logarithmic relationship yet, and you consider yourself qualified to comment on climate science.
Unbelievable!
catweasel’s graph of falling ECS and TCR estimates vs. time is pure gold.
You can do that if you cherry pick your studies. Now we’ll see an opposite trend as studies start to take 2016 into account. End-date sensitivity is not good to have but that is a large part f what you are looking at.
Steven Mosher: No reason able analyst focuses on one set of numbers
It depends on context: when the most recent estimate is clearly the best, that’s what reasonable people go with. Michelson’s estimate of the speed of light, for example, and the Michelson and Morely estimate of the effect of the ether drag had large impacts.
The earlier estimates of the TCS and ECS were based in part on climate experts’ opinion, stated as prior probability distributions. Those prior distributions have been shown to have been terribly inaccurate. Yet they are still included in tables as being reasonable. That’s as foolish as using pre-Michelson estimates of the speed of light.
Based on catweasel’s graph, TCR will be zero by about 2020!!
Not after people start figuring 2016 in.
“One could be badly misled by taking observed trends and extrapolating into the future, because we do not expect this particular warming pattern to persist.” … – Chen Zhou
Latest research is pointing toward higher, not lower, climate sensitivity.
There are some strangely linear adherents of chaos theory here at CargoCult Etc.
Steven Mosher, we were discussing the contribution of a new set of numbers/method (as you please) to uncertainty.
JCH what were the particular new works you had in mind?
JCH please feel free to demonstrate how you can cherry pick studies by making your own cherry picks and put them in a graph like Catweazel did. In the meantime he’s the only game in town, so to speak.
Empirical ECS estimates are based on decades of records. One year (2016) won’t have much influence. Anyone with even modestly informed on these studies with above average aptitude in math would not need me to explain this. So you’re either dummies or dishonest or both.
And show warming is a regional issue, which can only be due to moving water. There is no other mechanism capable of altering regional climate.
https://micro6500blog.wordpress.com/2016/05/18/measuring-surface-climate-sensitivity/
> we were discussing the contribution of a new set of numbers/method (as you please) to uncertainty.
Actually, it is you who went on that tengent, HAS. Attribution ain’t the lukewarm studies’ thing. As Jim D mentions, it’d be circular.
Hence Mr. T.
Willard, Jim D’s circularity comes because he “take[s] the last 60 years of data … because it averages out various natural cycles and leaves just the forced change” to quote.
You can use Google Scholar better than me. Heading for a hot year, maybe even a record 4th warmest in a row. That low climate sensitivity is really kickbutt.
Here, HAS:
There’s not much other choice, since injecting too much variability in their so-called “observational” modulz doesn’t help lower the limits of justified lukewarm disingenuousness.
Bjorn Stevens, who wears a white hat, and is one of the good pre-approved, CargoCult Etc. good guys:
Correcting the simple model interpretations of the instrumental record by allowing for a 33 % pattern effect would imply that the studies cited in Table S1 can, with some (here the eighty-third percentile) confidence, rule out values of ECS greater than about 2.4 K to 3.7 K, depending on the study. We adopt a more conservative statement, and assert that an ECS greater than 4 K becomes difficult to reconcile with the instrumental temperature record. Some recent work suggests that even such a large correction to the upper bound (from 2.8 K to 4.0 K) may still insufficiently account for pattern effects [Gregory and Andrews, 2016], thereby further undermining the ability of the instrumental record to refute the story line for a very high ECS.
JCH perhaps read the Sevens et al paper itself rather than quote the SI (out of context). Available here http://pubman.mpdl.mpg.de/pubman/faces/viewItemOverviewPage.jsp?itemId=escidoc:2270489:11#files
Willard perhaps you might find it useful to read this too.
“Mandy Gunasekara, who supplied the snowball U.S. Sen. Jim Inhofe famously tossed on the Senate floor two years ago, has been named new EPA chief Scott Pruitt’s top adviser on air and climate issues.”
Gunasekara, a former lobbyist and congressional aide, has a BA in Communication and Media Studies and a law degree.
But, uncertainty, right?
Presumably a top advisor on the communication and law aspects of air and climate issues, of which there is great stock thanks to the alarmists.
Even more good news re apointing Inhofe staffers:
I helped Inhofe’s staff get up to speed on skepticism, back in the day. He and I (and CEI) sued NSF to block the first National Assessment (National Scare is better) from becoming policy back around 2001. Pruitt is picking the right people.
Was that back in the day you consulted for coal companies?
How are they all doing these days, by the way?
Indeed it was, although my main client was nonprofit rural electric power cooperatives who depended on economical coal fired power. But as you and Mr. Trump know, we lost the left’s war on coal, so far anyway. Time will tell.
By the 1999 AEC estimate there were between 1,000 and 100,000 years of fissionables. They get more expensive, but plant dominates costs due to the high energy density, so the fuel costs can actually rise by 10x or more before they start to matter to the end user. We still can’t do fusion despite many, many computer models that failed to predict reality (there used to be a joke that theory always experiment, but for some reason they both changed every year) and it’s still an open question whether that transition will be very painful or even technically possible. There’s no more low-hanging fruit in 2017.
As long as coal can be extracted cheaply someone will always be burning it, and benefiting economically from their choice.
To: Turbulent Eddie and Capt’nDallas regarding your comments up thread about what was life like in 1910 and issues of black carbon.
I am reposting this as I have been in moderation and speculate that my reply to TE and CD resulted in a WordPress default ding.
And further to your point, in the USA urban dwellers where household coal burning plus industrial sources black carbon (which Capt’nDallas was addressing) lodged in the lungs of residents. Autopsy of cops on the beat, trolley drivers and others who lived and worked in the cities demonstrated black carbon accumulation in these people’s lungs; visible on plain inspection as a speckled pattern on the outside, coating of the mucus on the inside of airways and enlarged lymph nodes loaded with black carbon. A prosector’s knife had a gritty feel to it as it sliced through the tissues.
One of my contentions regarding the dramatic improvement in the incidence and prevalence of Pulmonary Tuberculosis in the US centers around the abrupt change in the use of natural gas for heating homes instead of coal. Gas pipes were already in many urban homes because of lighting. When electricity became generally available, the gas pipes were used as conduits for electric wires and the gas was diverted to the converted coal furnace in the basement, sometimes leaving the coal bin still containing coal from the last shipment. The change occurred around the 1920’s, and, over the next 10 years, the city skies could see blue again, and, remarkably, the number of people with new cases of tuberculosis plummeted. There was no breakthrough in medical cares for Tbc, that would not come until Streptomycin and INH were developed in the late 1940’s and used extensively in the 1950’s.
My speculation is that the respiratory burden of black carbon was profoundly reduced in the 1920’s, the respiratory defense systems were no longer overwhelmed, hence, could subdue, sequester and kill the Tbc organisms.
What is relevant for todays 2+ billion people exposed to black carbon and other products of combustion like the aldehydes, that just by introducing electric cooking would save millions of lives from death by tuberculosis. To me it is almost criminal that there is a solution to billions of people’s struggles that won’t become available because of ideology.
It is nothing less than a crime against humanity. Can we jail them and throw away the key?
It is pretty amazing how CO2 developed into a primary issue when direct action on the “low hanging fruit” would have accomplished more for less and still would have reduced CO2 emissions in the ROW.
http://www.copenhagenconsensus.com/post-2015-consensus/nobel-laureates-guide-smarter-global-targets-2030
Many of these have population implications, one requires increased organic content in soils, development allows updating of fuel sources and equipment. There is a mention of a tax but it disaoppears in the detail. It is mostly concerned with health – and should there be a problem with encouraging minimal emissions of black carbon and sulfate. And yes low bc and sulfate emission technology is already widely adopted.
Chief
If, and this is a big IF people in power of the UN believed in the Millennium goals: ie, reduce Tuberculosis deaths by 90%, reduce infant mortality by 70% and reduced indoor air pollution by 20%, all could be accomplished by installing electric cooking. Imagine that, millions of deaths averted annually by a stroke of an International Monetary Fund pen, allow electric power generation and distribute that power to billions of people. The numbers are there. The observational data is there. The science is there. Only the Gavin Schmidt’s and Michael Mann’s and Kevin Trenberth’s impeded this humanitarian activity. What would the people say if they knew?
The UN has 169 goals that are basically photo opportunities in poor countries. For God’s sake don’t send them money.
Alternatively – these are the 19 goals where you could spend your philanthropic dollar if you wanted to have the best effect.
“The UN’s flagship energy access program, for example, claims that “basic human needs” can be met with enough electricity to power a fan, a couple of light bulbs, and a radio for five hours a day.”
I recall it to be some 100kW/year.
Weather weirding
My lake near Lake Minnetonka of about 140 acres in size and with 8 feet of average depth went ice out on March 7th. Wind speeds were at least 30 mph for a sustained time. My lake is now ice in. I do not recall this happening in the past 2 decades. I typically see 2 regime changes per year. Looks like will have double that amount for 2017. I’d say the high winds forced a regime swap removing lake insulation. The lake wanted its ice back and got it.
I’ve also seen another rare occurrence. Typically the creek/ditch outletting to Lake Minnetonka stops doing that before and during Winter. The creek is dry. It will flow all Winter this year as it did a year ago. Back to back occurrences means what? There has not been unusually high levels of precipitation. Call our recent Winters milder. Cold decreases water flow. With global warming, farmland may drain more in Winter. The farmers can get into the fields earlier. They may need less tile. There may be less Spring Flooding in Fargo. Perhaps it’s the case that a sped up hydrological cycle is better.
Ragnaar
Given that your name elicits in my mind of a Norse Viking landscape, I too have observed a double icing this winter. Pond hockey earlier and now, a scant covering of ice, just enough to insulate the waters, not enough to lace up the skates.
Everything in the alternate reality of global warming is up for review. Models, internal variability, the amount of warming, the energy imbalance, the source of carbon in the atmosphere, drought and flooding, climate extremes – literally everything.
Energy imbalance is one of those odd urban myths. The idea depends on thermal inertia. Add greenhouse gases and it takes a while for the oceans to warm. Turn that idea on its head – greenhouse gases stop some cooling. The instantaneous increase in greenhouse gas forcing is 1E-10 W/m2. Even warming from the interior of the Earth is in the order of a billion times more. The argument there is that interior energy is lost – but put the two ideas together and less of that energy from the Earth’s interior is lost – and no energy imbalance evolves at top of atmosphere. There is simply a warmer planet in a new quasi-equilibrium. Energy imbalance is a sacred shibboleth in the alternate reality of global warming. What else could could be causing warming and cooling now? To find out you need both ocean and satellite data – I’ll attach the latest at the bottom.
I have not quite been following the Forde 2017 controversy – and certainly have not read the blog science that purports to be refutations of published science. I am inclined – just on that frenzied, pissant response to a disturbance of the mindset – to report that peer reviewed science says that only 17% of the increase in CO2 is caused by people.
We are certainly used to simple minded zealots feeling entitled to harass respected scientists – encouraged by self-appointed gatekeepers of the truth. None of that will stand any more.
“You claim to be a scientist, yet feel free to present an incomplete story intent on making gullible people believe it’s OK to ignore all this information – in favor of juvenile cherry-picked arguments.
But, the evidence does exist… and what we ignore will hurt us and our children!”
Not much evidence exists at all. Models are fair enough as far as they go. Models are incomplete and coarse grained. They all need tuning – as all models do. The input data is not precise to any relevant degree and processes are less than well known or even unknown. The central problem is not even the nonlinear equations of fluid motions at the core of climate models. From slightly different starting points these nonlinear equations have 1000’s of equally plausible solutions. The central problem is the opportunistic ensembles manufactured by the IPCC. There is no theoretical justification for opportunistic models that survives the reality of nonlinear math. It is known widely by modelers – so how did dissimulation arise and how it persist?
“Sensitive dependence and structural instability are humbling twin properties for chaotic dynamical systems, indicating limits about which kinds of questions are theoretically answerable. They echo other famous limitations on scientist’s expectations, namely the undecidability of some propositions within axiomatic mathematical systems (Gödel’s theorem) and the uncomputability of some algorithms due to excessive size of the calculation.” James McWilliams
Have you ever wondered why they start the count on temperature from 1951?
The spike at the end of the record is another annoying little feature of the surface record. Drought changes the balance of latent and sensible heat at the surface with less soil moisture. Surface temperature (a measurement of sensible heat) increases with declining soil moisture. El Nino and drought caused the spike at the end of the record. The drought artifact does not happen with satellite records.
We know that 20-30 years Pacific regimes added to warming between 1911 and 1944, cooled the atmosphere to 1976 and warmed it to 1998. We have since been in a neutral regime – and I suspect it will stay that way until the next shift due in a 2018-2028 window. Ask Anastasios Tsonis – who was the object of the ignorant rant referred to above.
“It is no coincidence that shifts in ocean and atmospheric indices occur at the same time as changes in the trajectory of global surface temperature. Our ‘interest is to understand – first the natural variability of climate – and then take it from there. So we were very excited when we realized a lot of changes in the past century from warmer to cooler and then back to warmer were all natural,” Tsonis said.
Most of the pre-1944 warming was quite natural. Anthrpogenic forcing in this period was negligible. Natural cooling during the 1944 to 1976 period offset a net increase in forcing – a net that includes sulfates. Warming to 1998 – according to the satellite evidence – is mostly cloud feedbacks to Pacific sea surface temperature. Models in a more appropriate use show that the cloud variability in that period cannot be a global warming feedback – just in case you’re wondering.
“In summary, although there is independent evidence for decadal changes in TOA radiative fluxes over the last two decades, the evidence is equivocal. Changes in the planetary and tropical TOA radiative fluxes are consistent with independent global ocean heat-storage data, and are expected to be dominated by changes in cloud radiative forcing. To the extent that they are real, they may simply reflect natural low-frequency variability of the climate system.” IPCC, AR4, 3.4.4.1
So why start at a low point in the cooling regime? The residual warming between 1944 and 1998 is 0.087 degrees C/decade. With no credible computer projections it is the starting point for scenarios for the next few decades at least.
The regimes start with upwelling in the north-eastern and central Pacific and set up feedbacks in wind, curents, hydrology and biology across the planet – a great resonant system. It is very much the elephant in the room.
http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/IOTD/view.php?id=8703
Upwelling is a function of offshore winds on the eastern margin driving currents in the Pacific ocean gyres.
The gyres are set up by Ekman transport and Coriolis forces and are modulated by the internal resonance of the system. The beat is supplied by polar annular modes transmitting a solar signal via UV/ozone chemistry.
You see – it is a different world entirely.
Don’t fool yourself. Some guy named Feynman said that is easy to do. Apparently especially easy for alternate reality libertarians. Hey, but even Feynman wasted a day to go and meet Uri Geller the spoon bender.
Drought… that’s a good one.
The dynamics of the warming hiatus over the Northern Hemisphere
The results conclude that the DMO (decadal modulated oscillation) can not only be used to interpret the current warming hiatus, it also suggests that global warming will accelerate again when it swings upward.
it also suggests that global warming will accelerate again when it swings upward.
Gee, what would a DMO accelerated warming look like? How about three warmest years in a row? Nah, it wouldn’t look like that. No way. Don’t fool yourselves.
It is very simple physics of latent and sensible heat. Drought increases the sensible heat component at the surface.
‘The term “global warming” has been used to describe the observed surface air temperature increase in the 20th century. However, this concept of “global warming” requires assessments of units of heat (that is, Joules). Temperature, by itself, is an incomplete characterization of surface air heat content.’ http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1029/2004EO210004/abstract
And ENSO activity is correlated with solar irradiance over a very long time.
“Using Markov chain method, this study explored a strong relation between Sunspots and ENSO according to the resemblance on the formation of the values of the transition matrices, tracks of transition diagram, and found the same formation of the return period values. Moreover, these relations are more confirming with the evaluation of 2-dimensional correlation of 0.5897 and 0.9518 between Sunspots and the ENSO transition matrices of 1996–2009
and 1950–2014 data sets respectively. The above results infer that Sunspots influence the ENSO data.” https://friendsofscience.org/assets/documents/CliSci/Hassan-SSPT&ENSO-relationship.pdf
The mid-Holocene transition from La Nina to El Nino dominated, the Medieval climate optimum high in El Nino activity – and the modern 1000 year high.
The 20 to 30 year regimes add up to variability on millennial timescales. The next shift in a 2018 to 2028 window is – with a less active Sun – likely to be to more Pacific upwelling . That’s the experiment under way.
The assumption that the next shift will be to warmer again is really just that. Millennial evidence shows it just ain’t necessarily so.
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This is exactly what Feynman and Hayek warned about and Tetlock proved experimentally: experts are competent neither to define scientific truth nor to run the world.
A climate skeptic is one who believes in the ignorance of experts as to how little they really know about what they imagine they can design.
You got Feynman backwards. He was warning you not to fool yourself, and you’ve gone and done it anyway. You’re not alone. The warming PAWS made fools of a lot of very smart people.
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Judith Curry:
”If I am interpreting Pruitt’s statements correctly, I do not find anything to disagree with in what he said: we don’t know how much of recent warming can be attributed to humans. In my opinion, this is correct and is a healthy position for both the science and policy debates.”
As I see the present climate problem is too complicated to be clearly understood only by reading institutional reports – like published by IPCC. Topics and comments of threads – like Climate etc – help your understanding as an open-minded person. Anyhow, that demands even scrutinizing by yourself. This kind of multi-disciplinary problems I am used to solve my own way. As a starting point of my own I usually have tried to make myself know real circumtances of the problem, well enough. Simultaneously you can get qualifications to learn accurately to know the problem, which helps the scrutiny of your own on that.
UN politicians focus on the mere belief according to which the recent global warming is dominated by CO2 emissions from fossile fuels, whereas my first priority in order to solve the role of those anthropogenic CO2 emissions on warming, compared to total warming, is to base it per se on the expreriences of my own.
In the Rio conference 1992 UN politicians acknowledged, that there was not awailable any true evidence in reality which could duely prove that the emissions from fossile fuels dominate the climate warming. In spite of that, according to precausionary principle, the politicians regarded cost-effective cuttings of man-made CO2 emissions as necessary. As the cuttings in accordance with the Kyoto protocol prove, until now, cuttings of CO2 emissions caused by fossile fuels have caused only disarsters, which makes even the Paris agreement be obviously questionable. Any working solution demands a result that is excact enough – and that is what I am here striving for, too.
At first I have been interested in the question why on the dry savannas in Africa any climate temperature during day time can be even about 70 C, but during night time that can drop below zero Celsius degrees. The frost in clear, dry atmophere of savanna during night time can be explained by the lack of water vapor as green house gas in atmosphere. At the same time, according to pragmatic logic, it proves that influence of present CO2 content in atmosphere as greenhouse gas is unnoticeable.
At second I have thought, why a smoke streak of jet plane in the sky sometimes can be seen, sometimes it can not be seen. On basis of what I have experienced it means that the clear sky without the kind of smoke streaks, in spite of presence on flying jet planes, is a consequence of low relative humidity in the air. The lack of water vapor as green house gas makes even climate get colder during night times. Correspondingly higher relative humidities in air lessen the cooling of climate during night times, and that can make even water drops of smoke streaks be possible. Even though foehn winds are regarded as dry, the relative humidity in air seems to be still high enough to make smoke streaks of jet planes be possible.
At third in earlier comments of mine I have already argued: a) geological and recent observations prove that during last 100 million years change trends of CO2 content in atmospher follow change trends of climate temperature and not vice versa; and b) the share CO2 content from fossile fuels in the recent increase of CO2 content in atmosphere has been only about 4 % at the most; https://judithcurry.com/2017/02/10/the-new-climate-denial/#comment-838229 .
As my summary I can ascertain: a) even any total increase of CO2 content in atmosphere has not been proved to cause any distinguishable climate warming; b) as the share of CO2 from fossile fuels in the recent total increase of CO2 content in atmophere has been only about 4 % at the most, the influence of it on climate sensitivity can not be distinguished from zero; c) the Paris agreement will be disastrous; and d) cutting CO2 emissions from fossile fuel mus be replaced by adaptation to natural climate changes and extreme weather events.
It is the job of scientists to question everything, and seek answers. It is the job of politicians to distort everything, and provide answers based upon their distortions.
It is the job of the media to report on everything. But they seem to have lost their job and think they are politicians.
Excellent analysis. Thanks for providing it.
“Get your facts first, then you can distort them as much as you please.” – Mark Twain
So much global warming debate now involves pitting of 2 camps, one being “Parse the Process” and the other “Show the Science” if you will pardon the shorthand.
Preserve some time andbenergy for the second one, the one that matters.
Geoff
And still, the Earth has cooled for four and a half billion years.
Sad?
Cheers.
The Twitter link “What Happens When an Archaeologist Challenges Mainstream Scientific Thinking?” is very interesting.. as John P. A. Ioannidis has pointed out “Claimed research findings may often be simply accurate measures of the prevailing bias” — in this and many other cases, the current consensus in many a scientific field is “simply accurate measure of the prevailing bias.” (ref: “Why Most Published Research Findings Are False” (.pdf here).
For those still agog at the idea of “alternative facts”, this is a fine example of true alternative facts being presented and rejected as they appeared contrary to the currently accepted interpretation of other true facts. As is often the case, those alternative facts, when taken seriously, led to a huge advance in human archaeology of the Americas.
Your shoes are on the wrong feet. You just turned left when you should have turned right. Oh well. It’ not like you matter. The AMO cargo plane is never coming.
One observation of that current consensus was that they seemed “almost brainwashed.”
Sounds eerily familiar with another consensus position that is near and dear to our hearts.
It took decades for some to be enlightened in that case. Even if we had an impending ice age, there would still be some holdouts deep
into this century, just like some Japanese soldiers who hid out in the South Pacific
islands for many years after WWII.
As the Iwo Jima battlefield shrank down to the last pocket of armed resistance, my father’s platoon was ordered to assist translators who were there to talk bypassed Japanese soldiers and sailors/marines into coming out of their caves and bunkers and surrendering. Iwo is a volcanic island, so the caves and bunkers were unbearably hot. The conditions inside were about as bad as it gets. Waiting outside for them was life, water, food, and medical treatment. In total, around 100 out of a garrison of around 20,000 surrendered to the three USMC divisions in 36 days of combat. They were told if they did not come out, engineers would blast the entrances shut, and they would experience slow, agonizing deaths in total darkness. A large number went that way. Often they heard grenades and gunshots as they ended their lives. I have a bayonet that my father removed from a dead soldier’s belly. He was in a small cave at the base Mt. Suribachi. After the USMC turned the captured island over to US Army units, they eventually got around 1,000 to surrender, but also had kill many dead enders.
Like so many here, you’re completely wrong and it’s getting worse.
The highest ranking officer to successfully surrender emerged from a cave opening and ran straight to my father. He spoke English. In Japan he lived the rest of his life in shame… seldom came out of his house.
JCH
I’ve noticed you have a lot of problems but I didn’t know reading comprehension was one of them.
Did I say Iwo Jima? Did you realize there were battles all across the
Pacific? In the 1950s , I saw film of Japanese soldiers surrendering on isolated islands. In the 1960s I saw film of Japanese soldiers surrendering on isolated islands. In the 1970s I saw film of Japanese soldiers turning themselves up. I believe even in the 1980s they found one on one the tiny islands.
Don’t tell me I’m wrong about what I said when you didn’t even know what I said.
You make it easy to dismiss your blather when you can’t even read simple sentences.
Yes, my father was in 6 Pacific War campaigns… from Guadalcanal to training for the invasion of Japan. What you don’t get is you’re them… a dead ender.
JCH:
お早うございます
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/USS_Indianapolis_(CA-35)
This man in a cave thinks the oceans will moderate changes in the GMST.
> this is a fine example of true alternative facts
Hence the title’s *scientific thinking*, and the piece’s mention of *story* and *model*.
Here’s the single mention of the word “alternative” in the piece:
http://www.smithsonianmag.com/science-nature/jacques-cinq-mars-bluefish-caves-scientific-progress-180962410
Notice how “skeptics” and “critics” built up impossible demands, just as Denizens do daily. There’s even a One Single Proof, Sir Rud’s favorite.
It’s as is Cinq-Mars got a taste of the auditing sciences.
Furthermore, the community’s skepticism seems to have died down as evidence from other sites piled up. Another model now seems to be preferred: the Beringian standstill hypothesis.
HERE IS MY CLIMATE FORECAST BASED ON TWO FACTORS
FACTOR NUMBER ONE – ALL of the solar conditions must meet my criteria. Thus far all have with the exception of the solar wind /ap index but that should come in line soon ,as sunspots vanish. The coronal holes will dry up which is temporary keeping up the solar wind speed and ap index .
FACTOR TWO – The upcoming probable El Nino, but this is very temporary and will last worst case scenario 9 months.
So let’s say a moderate El NINO develops and last around 9 months that would take us to the end of 2017 /early 2018.
At that time that is when the global temperatures will fall below the 30 year running normal.
It will be fast not slow when it happens.
Look at the period 1275-1325 the climate changed quickly.
Now if El Nino should fizzle and major volcanic activity picks up this dramatic cooling below the 30 year avg. will come before the end of year 2017.
So my climate outlook is, this is the end of the warm period. It has one year or less to go and when it ends the global temperatures will fall fast and be below the 30 year running normal and stay there.
If my two factors take place and the global temperatures do not fall I will be wrong.
I know two things for sure which are this period of time in the climate is in no way unique and AGW does not exist. at part.
y
And here we have a prediction that’s measurable in a reasonable timeframe
Can I see your 2014 forecast that predicted the 2015-16 global mean temperature?
…in the next few years we will know, who is right and who is wrong.
I will be proven correct along with many in my camp that predict this will be the decade of global cooling…Mark my words.
So said Salvatore Del Prete in 2010.
Pat Cassen: So said Salvatore Del Prete in 2010.
Thank you for the link, and the reminder. Time is running out, but has not expired yet, on that prediction.
AGW is the biggest hoax every to be put upon the public.
The data does not support it and yet the scam whatever one wants to call it lives on but as I have said many times before this decade is out AGW theory will be obsolete.
Patience climate skeptics ,everything is falling into place.
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Remember my prediction was based on the sun having very low solar parameters which did not take place until just recently therefore the verdict is out.
The solar parameters were way above my criteria for having a climate impact from 2011- 2016. This is now changing.
Salvatore del Prete: The solar parameters were way above my criteria for having a climate impact from 2011- 2016.
Every failed prediction has explanations. Those explanations are tested, not always confirmed, by new predictions.
Good Luck.
I have never changed my prediction based on the solar parameters. The low solar parameters did not materialize until now.
Back in 2010 I thought the low solar parameters(2008-2010) were going to continue . The maximum of solar cycle 24 although weak was much stronger then I thought .
My prediction is all based on very low solar parameters.
The Sun will cool in the Schwabe cycle. But the effect is some 0.12W/ms at the surface.
https://wordpress.com/post/watertechbyrie.com
A return to “Maunder Minimum” conditions is now put at 20% by some people. But again it is only 0.4W/m2 at the surface.
A prediction of solar decline is no great stretch – but the direct insolation effects are minimal. What else you got?
It’s because they are wrong about their key points.
And even this was only grudgingly, and only after a famous Climate Scientist was plastered with flack when she suggested such a thing.
Galileo’s refusal to accept the Church’s authority on matters astronomical.
And there you go with the lashings of irony, coöpting Galileo in support of an ideologically-informed position of ignorance.
The Church didn’t have any authority on matters Astronomical – that’s kind of the point – Galileo was advancing science and his opposition was entirely based on political ideology, not science and observations.
just curious – who has authority on matters climatic?
The allusion was to climate science as a religion.
Amen! It’s usually those who know least about something that ascribe “ignorance” to any dissent.
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Curry agrees with:
” there’s tremendous disagreement about the degree of impact”
…and yet here in the real world, more than two dozen studies of sensitivity have all produced results that agree with each other.
It’s almost as if “tremendous disagreement” was completely made-up….
No they haven’t. The IPCC’s estimate of sensitivity ranges from 1.5 to 4.5, and hasn’t been narrowed for decades. Sensitivity is in fact a good example of the disagreement.
The IPCC would like to ignore these 60 low sensitivity papers. http://notrickszone.com/50-papers-low-sensitivity/#sthash.gwG4UMaq.NQfwyyY6.dpbs
Measured CS to changes to solar in the extratropics.
http://wp.me/p5VgHU-1t
Delete your account, Craig. ECS estimates go from a mild and beneficial 1.5C to a civilization-threatening 4.5C. This estimate hasn’t been improved by moribund climate “science” in 50 years.
Not sure where you got your “mild and beneficial 1.5C,” Big Dave.
Citation needed.
There you go again, asking Big Dave to do your homework for ya :)
Big Dave’s the one who claims something about 1.5C, Cap’n. Why would it be my homework to substantiate that claim? Talking about ECS as if it was a single number is a bit silly, and TCR, more constrained than 30 yeara ago, is what matters most in the end.
Wait until Denizens will finally get to Shindell 2014.
Or it could be that none of the models based on those studies have any track record for accuracy.
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Robert it is not the reduction in solar irradiance although that contributes
but rather all of the secondary effects.
As far as the climate of the earth this period of time is in no way unique.
The climate in the big picture is controlled by Milankovitch Cycles, Land Ocean arrangements, with Solar Activity and the Geo Magnetic Field Strength of the earth superimposed upon this.
These factors then exert influences on the terrestrial items on the earth that determine the climate.
Terrestrial Items which are effected due to very low solar activity. These are the secondary effects which will have a big impact on the climate in my opinion.
Atmospheric Circulation
Sea Surface Temperatures
Global Cloud Coverage
Global Snow Coverage
Global Sea Ice Coverage
Enso
Volcanic Activity
All of this gives an x climate over x time. The historical climatic record supports this.
That is WHAT likely makes the climate change, NOT the scam they promote which is AGW.
The historical climatic record showing this period of time in the climate is in no way unique while changes in CO2 concentrations having no correlation in leading to resultant climate changes.
Now how the cooling evolves will have to be monitored. Of course going from an El Nino condition to an La Nina condition is going to cause an initial cooling.
For clues that if solar is involved the depth of the cooling will have to be monitored and if the cooling is accompanied by the terrestrial items I have mentioned above.
Each one of those terrestrial items having been shown to be linked to Milankovitch Cycles Land Ocean Arrangements in the big slow moving picture while solar and geo magnetic variability being factors that can change these terrestrial items on a much smaller time scale.
The solar parameters needed are
Solar Wind sub 350 km/sec.
AP index 5 or lower
EUV LIGHT 100 units or less
COSMIC RAY COUNTS – 6500 or greater
SOLAR IRRADIANCE – off by .15% or greater.
All very attainable going forward and being compounded by a weakening geo magnetic which if attained with sufficient duration of time will translate into bringing the terrestrial items that control our climate to values which will cause the climate to cool gradually if not in a sharp drop off if certain thresholds should be meant.
“Since irradiance variations are apparently minimal, changes in the Earth’s climate that seem to be associated with changes in the level of solar activity—the Maunder Minimum and the Little Ice age for example—would then seem to be due to terrestrial responses to more subtle changes in the Sun’s spectrum of radiative output. This leads naturally to a linkage with terrestrial reflectance, the second component of the net sunlight, as the carrier of the terrestrial amplification of the Sun’s varying output. Much progress has also been made in determining this difficult to measure, and not-so-well-known quantity.” http://bbso.njit.edu/Research/EarthShine/literature/Goode_Palle_2007_JASTP.pdf
The question of solar irradiance has been asked and answered – only the global energy budget matters when it comes to warming or cooling. So what you are looking for – at scales less than 100,000 years – are cloud changes from a subtle solar effect.
Cloud cover is anti-correlated with sea surface temperature in the Pacific.
There are 20 to 30 year abrupt shifts in the Pacific state. Abrupt shifts occur in chaotic systems – which brings a new dimension of complexity to the problem.
A warm (cool) PDO is associated with intense and frequent El Nino (La Nina). The 20-30 years shifts in means and variance of the system add up to millennial variability.
Salt content in a Law Dome ice core varies with the intensity of circum-polar winds. High intensity winds drive ocean/atmospheric circulation in the southern ocean. High intensity winds and wind driven currents result in upwelling in the eastern Pacific. High intensity winds create the conditions for La Nina and rainfall in Australia.
The cause of changes in the polar annular modes is changes in surface pressure between polar and sub polar regions. The solar connection to surface pressure appears to be solar UV/ozone chemistry in the stratosphere – at both poles. So the circuit is complete.
So I think that conditions in the Pacific will persist until the next Pacific climate shift – due in a 2018-2028 window. Then – with a cooling Sun – I’d suggest that a shift to a yet cooler Pacific is on the cards. But I suggest there are no hard and fast rules. When the conditions are right in the resonant, chaotic Pacific system – a small change in solar UV will push it into a new state.
AMS Executive Director Keith Seitter misrepresents Pruitt, and chastises him for what he didn’t say, in a letter on AMS letterhead, presuming to speak for the Society, when in fact he didn’t poll members. I take Seitter to task at http://cornwallalliance.org/2017/03/how-ideologues-abuse-power-in-professional-associations-exhibit-a-ams-letter-to-pruitt.
CalvinB, who runs the Cornwall Alliance all by himself, criticizes the AMS’ “cadre of ideological activists who run the organizations.” By quoting Senior who handwaves to two of his usual citations, NRC 2005 and an obscure textbook. If AGW is so easy to refute, why would Senior provide the refutation once and for all? Fame and glory await him.
Oh, and Pruitt clearly denied that CO2 is “a primary contributor to the global warming that we see.”
Next post, please.
>Oh, and Pruitt clearly denied that CO2 is “a primary contributor to the global warming that we see.”
Black Carbon forcing ~0.9 W/m2, Non-CO2 greenhouse gas forcing ~1.1 Wm-2, Cloud Radiative forcing neutral to likely negative, In direct land use effect not well understood, aerosol indirect effects not well understood, pre-industrial reference temperature uncertainty ~ +/-0.5 C and CO2 all by itself is estimated at ~1.9 Wm-2 of forcing. Looks like a toss up to me.
All of that is really trivial. There’s ~35Wm-2 of regulation at this sample site in the mid latitudes.
There could be 10Wm-2, and it’s still not cause any warming, if it doesn’t cause have a source where it can cause amplification. That’s one of their fails with water vapor enhancement to warming, over land there just isn’t a lot of available water to suck up, and in most places, about the time it’s sucked up, it rains again. There just isn’t a lot of water to find inland.
Unless you are confident that the odds that land use is more than 1.9 W/m^2 is 50% or up, I would not bet on that coin toss if I were you, Cap’n.
Knowing that the numbers are around 0.2 W/m^2 (eg Betts’) I’d ask you how much you can afford to lose.
Since land-use is a surface albedo effect, I’m not sure we want a very big number, otherwise JimH’s modulz would become more relevant than lukewarmingly portrayed by Denizens.
0.9 + 1.1 = 2.0 > 1.9 or CO2 only may contribute nearly 50% of the forcing. Land use indirect effects like impacts on local hydrology, wind erosion etc. would be gravy for not just CO2 done it crowd. Since all the other than CO2 contributors have adverse health impacts, pollute the air, and waters of the world they would fall in the original wheel house of the EPA.
Now you could go with the flow and inspire immediate action or whine some more.
0.9 + 1.1 = 2.0 > 1.9
Yet 0.9 < 1.9 and 1.1 < 1.9, Cap'n.
AMS statement is about "our emissions of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases" (i.e. your 1.1 goes on the right side) and teh Scott is denying CO2 as "a primary contributor" (i.e. your equation is irrelevant).
But you're right: we should talk about black carbon a bit more. It is after all an anthropogenic aerosol, and if we're serious about AGW, then we should consider all should be subsumed under A. For instance, you should say that your 1.1 is "through all forcing mechanisms, including clouds and cryosphere forcing," as we can read in Bond & al 2013's abstract. With 90% uncertainty bounds, it goes without saying. Also note:
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/jgrd.50171/abstract
This quote should suffice to show the extent of teh Scott’s denial.
***
And then Ron Broberg wondered why I asked that we clarify our quantifiers a while ago.
The 0.9 for BC is a rough average of several papers as did the 1.1 for non-CO2 ghgs. Together they equal to 2.0, CO2 comes in second to the pair. The Scott addressing the pair can accomplish much in a short time frame since BC tends to rapidly age reducing forcing. I know, it is low hanging fruit, but it would have a big bang for the buck within our lifetime.
> The Scott addressing the pair can accomplish much in a short time frame since BC tends to rapidly age reducing forcing. I know, it is low hanging fruit, but it would have a big bang for the buck within our lifetime.
Teh Scott doesn’t need to deny that carbon dioxide has the greatest forcing among all known forcings to deflect Sanders’ question toward that low hanging fruit, Cap’n.
lol
Micro, EPA and Pruitt are the topic, classical pollutants should be the primary focus of the EPA.
Yes, and I’m addressing the fundamental truth of his answer. I thought that was applicable.
As it should have always been.
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Who is Wayne Tracker?
It has been revealed that former EXXON CEO Rex Tillerson and more than 30 other EXXON upper management personnel used secret email accounts to talk about climate change with external sources. Of course he lied about it to deflect attention from their criminal activities. They knew they were screwing the environment all along.
Rex sadly only got $180 million in exchange for giving up his restricted stock units. This comes on top of the $54 million that Tillerson already had coming to him in Exxon stock he already owned. Recognizing the sacrifice Rex has made to become a Trump goon the Trump’s transition team structured his separation package to avoid over $71 million in taxes.
Adding insult to injury Rex also lost his lifetime free gas Exxon credit card.
The bottom line is this period in the climate is not unique not even close ,it has been much warmer then it is now over the last 8000 ears. Holocene Optimum in particular.
This is yet another reason / more evidence why AGW is just plain old BS.
Reblogged this on WeatherAction News.