by Judith Curry
It’s your turn to introduce topics for discussion
I am beyond swamped with stuff I need to do (some of it is actually exciting). Fortunately, I have no travel for 3 weeks, so there is some chance of catching up.
I will try to get a brief post up on the new satellite temperature data set and February pause ‘bust’. I also have a few potential guest posts to go through. I will do my best to keep a few posts per week coming to the blog.
To kick off the discussion, here are a few things I’ve spotted:
Galileo on critical thinking and the folly of believing your preconceptions http://buff.ly/1UG1j44
Marc Morano’s new movie will be released May 2. Climate Hustle, new trailer https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nXBzjBE9l5Q … co-starring JC.
Feds refer Exxon climate claims to FBI http://www.climatedepot.com/2016/03/03/feds-refer-exxon-climate-claims-to-fbi/ …
Shukla (RICO20): House Probe Reveals Audit Detailing Climate Change Researcher’s ‘Double Dipping’ http://dailysign.al/1WUXXsJ
Yale to shut down Climate and Energy Institute http://yaledailynews.com/blog/2016/03/01/climate-change-institute-shut-down/ …
Opinion: Climate change has dropped off the political radar http://sumo.ly/fKPq
Clean Power without the Clean Power Plan http://j.mp/1SErBE9
Global Warming Fund a Slush Fund for World’s Dictators http://reason.com/archives/2016/02/16/global-warming-fund-a-slush-fund-for-wor …
Of all the candidates Sanders and Clinton seem to be clearly on the side of AGW and continuing Western governments’ pogrom against CO2, even at the cost of economic wellbeing. Cruz and Trump have been the most vocal in opposing the Left’s blind belief in AGW.
Lose with Cruz
Sanders too
Nevertheless, the debate over CO2 is among the most contentious in the field of climate, and other scientists, including the leadership of Western academia and Western governments continue to support the decades-old warning about too much CO2 in the air. The result is that as the federal government prepares its influential EPA Guidelines and crafts new energy policies for the rest of us to live by, bureaucrats confront a quandary: They must either retract one of their oldest climate change commandments or overlook prominent new doubts about the global warming hypothesis.
Snip
Belongs on U.S. Presidential Politics page!
Snip
I’ll take overlook prominent new doubts about the global warming hypothesis.
By the way, have you seen how they have their thumbs on the RSS scale these days?
I agree with the Tea Party President analysis: We love and work to preserve the Constitution of the United States of America. So does Senator Ted Cruz. Donald Trump loves Donald Trump.
I want to walk back something I implied about Trump a week or two ago.
I implied that Trump was a neocon. That apparently was wrong.
Here’s an email I received from an acquaintance of mine who is way out on the left:
Apparently Trump has become the target of the neocon’s Two Minutes Hate:
The bankers also appear to not like Trump:
From my point of view, anybody the neocons, bankers, and green commissariat don’t like can’t be all bad.
Fabius Maximus did a post in which he claims Trump is operating in a long tradition of US populism. It seems plausible enough to me.
Perhaps trump is a neoconservationist.
It looks like the EPA, NOAA, and IPCC mathematicians have rallied to the cause of keeping Trump from getting the nomination.
If the mathematicians and their models predict Trump can’t win the nomination, then it must be true!
As an outsider, it seems apparent to me that people support Trump not because they agree with what he says, but rather because they actually want to talk about a lot of the subjects he has controversial views on and no other candidate (or politician for that matter) is prepared to comment on them – they all seem to be either concerned about being seen as politically incorrect, or are too gutless to take a stand before they get some clear polling data about the voters views. This means Trump is seen as leading, not slavishly following the spin doctors advice, even when he qualifies with things like “We should temporarily … until we can figure out…”. By raising the concerns of ordinary Americans, by talking about them, by being a political outsider attacked by all sides, it’s hard to imagine he won’t win – regardless of whether he’s a good president or not, I get the feeling a lot of voters would put him in anyway just to rattle a few cages and get their idea of what democracy is supposed to be back on track.
More is being revealed: http://hillarysamericathemovie.com/?utm_source=aweber&utm_medium=email&utm_content=3-5-2016&utm_campaign=newsletter
I agree with Trump on Iraq and inmigración policy. He is a bit goofy but he may be the better alternative.
Kneel said:
Frank Rich came to similar conclusions:
There’s a great video included in the article with some clips from Donald Trump’s speeches.
Trump the apostate utters unspeakable truths which our bought and paid for political class considers to be heresies.
Trump is like a modern-day Machiavelli. No wonder the paid liars and bumsuckers have excommunicated him.
I tried to read Suzanne Goldenberg’s article on supposed breakthroughs with grid level battery storage by ARPA sponsored initiatives. While such breakthroughs would be very welcome, I don’t see anything in the article that remotely suggests that such breakthroughs actually exist – beyond the saying that they do. Musk’s wall is certainly no breakthrough at the grid level as far as I can tell.
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2016/mar/03/us-agency-says-has-beaten-elon-musk-gates-to-holy-grail-battery-storage
The article doesn’t say much of anything.
max10k: My thoughts exactly. But it has triggered a lot hype about the benefits of government sponsored research.
In all its years of existance and startup spinoffs, NREL has produced exactly nothing of use. In all the years of ARPA-E funding, exactly nothing of use has been deceloped. In fact, with enough knowledge of energy storage, it was possible to predict in advance that most (but not all) of what ARPA-E backed would fail to be commercially useful from first principles. There are a number of examples in essay California Dreaming, and others in my guest post last year on grid storage. Indiana Jones had more success finding the Holy Grail than ARPA–E.
… but … GRAPHENE!!!
ristvan complains about ARPA-E
“In all the years of ARPA-E funding, exactly nothing of use has been deceloped.”
“Indiana Jones had more success finding the Holy Grail than ARPA–E.”
__________
ristvan, you may have unrealistic expectations and a lack patience.
Musk “Wall” Model 6.4 kWh $3,000.The wall is Warrantied for 10 years. Has about 92% round-trip DC efficiency, power capacity 3.3 kW. The capacity factor should be 70% when new so the implied 52% capacity factor from the stated capacity implies a derating of some sort. Perhaps they believe they lose 30% of capacity after 10 years. Anyway, I going to work with their numbers.
It stores and returns (if used at stated 3.3 kWh capacity once a day) 11081.4 kWh over its lifetime. It wastes 963.6 kWh or $48.18 at 5 ¢/kWh.
That’s 27.5 ¢ per kWh. Or 32.5 ¢ including 5 ¢.charging power.
This is not to my mind a breakthrough.
The problems with batteries are: short life time, use of toxic or rare material, more polluting to make than other elements of the grid, and relatively expensive for a buffer (pumped storage is cheaper).
Battery cost per kWh should be less than difference between peak and off peak power cost per kWh. That isn’t 27.5 ¢.
The magic advances in the paper haven’t hit Firestone Lane yet.
Max10k, nope. I just hate wasting taxpayer money stupidly. Good tries that come up short, all in favor of. Thats reality in translational R&D. But when from first principles it can be shown that even if a technical success, something makes no practical sense, then fire the grant awarder for incompetence.
Three examples. $25 million to Skymine for CCS that makes NO sense from an energy/carbon perspective. Example explained in The Arts of Truth. Closer to my own energy storage expertise, $5 million of Arpa-E to Rocardo Signorelli’s FastCap Systems for vertically aligned mwcnt supercaps. MIT spinout. Just two problems known at time of grants. 1. Japanese had already spent more $ on a different process for vacnt, showing experimentally after two years that the desired result was not there because of coulombic blockade, something I had presented at several international supercap conferences to which Arpa-E never came. 2. Ricardo’s process presented at those same conferences pre PhD was batched partial vacuum CVD. Fine for an MIT PhD thesis when the electrode area is 4cm2. NOT fine when commercial supercaps require 10s of square meters each. Process in no imaginable way scalable. Might as well have just burnt the Arpa-e money as a biofuel. 3. Arpa-E plus DOE combined to provide EnerG2 with $19 million for ‘tuned nanopore carbons’. Except I had already proven in those same topical energy atorage conferences that nanopores have little to do with double layer capacitance, and on the basis of those experimental proofs had already obtained $2 million in ONR funds for materials development for a Marine Corps application. Arpa-E should have known that before making its grant. But they never came to those conferences to know the state of play. Again, just gross incompetence/stupidity/lazy ignorance wasting $19 million. BTW, both companies have since essentially failed.
You didn’t mention ViZn (used to be Zinc Air). A bit of research suggests that they haven’t gotten any help from NREL or ARPA-E, although they recently won a Contract for Flow Battery System From Idaho National Laboratory.
Looks to me as though the government agencies are jumping in to take credit for what appears to have been a completely private development initiative.
Because of my nanocarbons business for supercaps, I keep current on energy storage technologies. The lady is talking through her hat. The ‘big deal’s funded by Arpa-E since 2012 include:
Envia Systems LiIon. Collapsed ye 2013 when could not deliver a demo to GM. Turned out the lab data was faked and the IP stolen. Black eye for Arpa-E.
TVN Systems hydrogen bromide flow battery. Demo units exist. As of ye 2015, problems include low cycle life (corrosion and bromine poisoning of anode Pt catalyst) and 80% round trip efficiency per their paper at ECS.
Energy Storage Systems iron flow battery. As of 2/2016, ESS is still all hype and no demo per their website.
risttvan, thank you for your response. I haven’t kept up with developments in batteries and caps. Some you have mentioned look like good places for me to start.
Thank
You are welcome. As much as we all hope for an electricity storage breakthrough, it is just very, very tough. Been there, done that. Pray for a miracle. Cause no Physics/chemistry science I am aware of comes even close. Even if all the other problems in those speculations were solved.
Scientists engineer non-toxic flow batteries using common plant nutrients rather than toxic metals and acids
[…]
AK, you refer to Harvard’s rhubarb flow battery. Go read the papers on it. Check out RT efficiency and cycle life thus far achieved in the lab. Then hope for a Harvard miracle.
From the Science report I linked above:
[…]
In a blow to those in favor of coal plants spewing mercury and arsenic, the Supreme Court has this week decided against them delaying measures.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/supreme-court-epa-rule-mercury-pollutants_us_56d89748e4b0000de403bca9?utm_hp_ref=climate-change
The SCOTUS did not rule on the (nonexistent) science. The CPP stay was a rarity, so not staying this rule was no surprise. But note that the Supreme Court has remanded the rule. Glad to hear that.
I think the spewing is yours. There is no known causal link between mercury emissions and mercury in fish, nor any correlation by location.
We are now seeing twenty-some states contesting multiple EPA rules. EPA’s extremism threatens the Federal-State partnership which is the foundation of US environmental regulation. Hopefully the Court sees that.
I do think some people are in favor of mercury and arsenic being put in the environment, but the EPA is there to stop them. Most coal plants already comply because they know it is not good, so this only gets to the deadbeat delayers who put their own wealth over public health.
mercury and arsenic being put in the environment
http://www.knowledgedoor.com/2/elements_handbook/element_abundances_in_the_earth_s_crust.html
More nonsense. Mercury is 85 parts per billion in the environment – naturally. Arsenic is 1.8 ppm of the earth’s crust – naturally.
There is so much Arsenic it is hard to believe we are having an impact. There is roughly 1,999,117,967 tons (US) in the top foot of soil in the US alone. 2 Billion tons of arsenic in just one foot.
Just how much are you claiming we release?
Jim D | March 5, 2016 at 11:45 am |
“I do think some people are in favor of mercury and arsenic being put in the environment”
Really…
Seek professional psychiatric assistance.
Urgently.
These people exist. They were making their case at the Supreme Court.
Slander — it’s page one of the lefty playbook. See also, racist, sexist, homophobe, denier ….
Michael Crichton: A second-hand cigarette smoke danger has not been scientifically proven.
J D: M Crichton advocates blowing cigarette smoke on babies.
Jim D | March 5, 2016 at 1:03 pm |
These people exist. They were making their case at the Supreme Court.
2 billion tons of Arsenic in the top 1 foot of US soil. “All Natural” like the yogurt.
I ask again, just how much are we “spewing” according to you?
> coal plants spewing mercury and arsenic …
These are trace contaminants in the woody material, absorbed by living plants from the soil prior to the long process of coalification
They are in the same concentrations in the wood chips currently supplied from the US to the Drax UK power plant in lieu of coal
Burning wood releases these traces too
Quo vadis now ?
That will also be a blow against those fossil fuel powered economic enterprises who are the providers of the money to fund ARPA as well as being the providers of the money that the energy department and others pay out as subsidies for so-called “renewables.” No fossil fuels, no financial subsidies for renewables.
I have a post that has so far failed to gain any traction on LinkedIn or Facebook. It regards a 1950’s hypothesis by Maurice Ewing and William Donn. It is timely today, because the receding Arctic ice is an important component of their model. See it at:
http://kennethpiper.com/global-warming-next-glacial-stage/
Ewing and Donn Climate theory is the basis for Pope’s Climate Theory.
I will post my latest to help give you traction. Ewing and Donn deserve to be honored for their amazing understanding of what regulates climate, even before ice core data was available. My post to follow. I was going to have some people review it first, but I just changed my mind.
My post is below at this link.
https://judithcurry.com/2016/03/05/open-thread-weekend-42/#comment-769382
Ken, I read your post about Ewing and Donn theory.
Tom Wysmuller taught me about Ewing and Donn theory. He has several related presentations.
http://www.colderside.com/Colderside/Home.html
I have studied climate, almost every day, for eight years, since April 2008
Juda Cohen has written papers on how the open Arctic contributes to snowfall for his long range Weather, (not climate) forecasts. But, if an open arctic causes more snowfall and increases the ice on land, that will add up to a climate forecast. I have a link to his papers, but when I checked today, access was Forbidden. http://web.mit.edu/jlcohen/www/papers/
I do have copies of some Ewing and Donn papers.
Interesting article Ken. The paleo evidence certainly suggests IMO that CO2 levels move in response to changes in temperature levels with an approximate lag of 800 years. The ocean currents seem to be responsible for much of climatic change and as yet data is too scarce and unreliable for hypothesis testing. Changes in the Earth’s mantle and in the current elevation of intercontinental straits would seem to be an important underlying reason for changes in the direction and strength of the major currents.
Re: the CPP article by Pat Michaels. The first thing he said is plain wrong. “Worse, the CPP actually discouraged the use of natural gas”. Replacement of coal with gas through 2035 is a key part of the plan. So with his premise wrong, the rest is not worth reading. Who is he fooling?

Pat is correct. The revised CPP basically precludes construction of new natgas fired power plants. You on the other hand are not worth reading, except it is fun to flag you ignorance.
I posted the graph that shows an increase in natural gas. How do you deny that? It came from here.
http://www.eia.gov/analysis/requests/powerplants/cleanplan/
Jim D, http://www.eia.gov/analysis/requests/powerplants/cleanplan/
thank you for the link. The four “building blocks” listed are:
Building block 1: Improving the thermal efficiency of individual affected sources (heat rate improvement)10
Building Block 2: Dispatching the generating fleet to substitute less-carbon-intensive affected sources for more-carbon-intensive affected sources (re-dispatch for reduced emissions)
Building Block 3: Expanding the use of low- or zero-carbon generation in order to displace affected sources (low- and zero-carbon capacity expansion)
Building Block 4: Employing the use of demand-side energy efficiency to reduce overall generation required from affected sources (demand-side energy efficiency)11
From the Cato Institute we read:
By Ned Mamula and Patrick J. Michaels
This article appeared on Real Clear Policy on February 19, 2016.
A month ago we stated in these pages that, despite what is being spun by the EPA regarding the Clean Power Plan, renewables are years away from their solo debut. Worse, the CPP actually discouraged the use of natural gas — which is far cleaner than coal — as a bridge to a renewable future.
Mamula and Michaels need more support that what they provided for their opinion. It looks to me like they are just wrong.
Points for you this go-round.
David Wojick: The revised CPP basically precludes construction of new natgas fired power plants.
Did you make that up, or do you have a reliable source? The CPP leaves many decisions to states, and does not “preclude” construction of new natgas fired plants.
What Mamula and Michaels wrote is not supported in their essay.: Worse, the CPP actually discouraged the use of natural gas — which is far cleaner than coal — as a bridge to a renewable future. The EIA report linked by Jim D discusses many of the options available to states.
The reason we have more gas plants, is the Senate wisely gave Waxman-Markey, a deranged 1428 pages of eco-liberal insanity, the back of it’s hand.
Waxman-Markey are apparently quite dim and thought they were writing a long form Russian Novel and not a bill. They missed writing War and Peace by 12 pages.
The companion Senate bill, sponsored by John Kerry in 2009, got written, got reported out of committee (which amazes me, I thought they were smarter), and is probably still wandering around the halls of the Senate looking for the calendar. (Boxer as a co-sponsor? Really?
http://the-american-catholic.com/2013/08/09/is-dick-durbin-the-dumbest-us-senator-not-named-barbara-boxer/
http://www.sandiegouniontribune.com/news/2013/aug/21/dick-durbin-challenge-boxer-dumbest-senator/
Washingtonian magazine Senate staff surveys that listed her as a finalist for dumbest Senator don’t google so we will have to take other peoples’ word for it.).
Even with Democrats controlling the House, Senate, Presidency, and with Harry Reid as majority leader, they still couldn’t get Waxman-Markey or Kerry-Boxer to a vote in the Senate.
I have to admit sometimes the Democrats surprise me and do the right thing.
PA said:
The first time I watched Markey in action was at the senate hearings in the wake of the BP blowout in the Gulf of Mexico in 2010.
Watching Markey in action cannot help but remind one of the movie Idiocracy:
It’s not that what BP did wasn’t criminally negligent, but with friends like Markey, who needs enemies?
There are two distinct parts to CPP. Originally it was two separate rulemakings, one for new (or modified) plants and one for overall State emissions limits. The new plant emission standard basically fit natgas plants (although EPA claimed (falsely) that CCS was an available technology that would make coal plants okay).
Then at the last minute EPA combined the two into one rulemaking, revising both. My understanding from Ned Mamula is that the revised standard for new plants was tightened to the point that natgas plants no longer comply. All the flexibility, scenarios, modeling and such that people are talking about falls under the State emissions limit rule. If the new plant standard precludes new gas fired plants then they presumably cannot be part of the State plans. People seem to have missed this.
Jim D, the increase in gas fired generation must be from increased use (dispatch) of existing plants, which has a limit. But as demand increases we will also need new plants
Once again, Building Block 2 of the final version reads “Building Block 2 -substituting increased electricity generation from lower-emitting existing natural gas plants for reduced generation from higher-emitting coal-fired power plants.” This is about as explicitly different from the statement that natural gas is “discouraged” as it is possible to be. It is even more explicit in mentioning natural gas than the originally proposed building blocks. It is true that they say “existing”, so are not planning on building new gas plants, because they only see this as a transition phase, not long-term.
Having said that, natural gas capacity has been increasing at a steady rate and will through 2016.
http://www.eia.gov/todayinenergy/detail.cfm?id=25172
David Wojick: My understanding from Ned Mamula is that the revised standard for new plants was tightened to the point that natgas plants no longer comply. All the flexibility, scenarios, modeling and such that people are talking about falls under the State emissions limit rule
Nevertheless, there is no support for the claim that The revised CPP basically precludes construction of new natgas fired power plants.
If the rules say that someplace, then quote the rules, not your understanding of an inference that seems baseless. I read through the rules, and did not find anything supporting Mamula’s inference. If I missed something (there are precedents!), then quote what I missed.
Actually the lead author is Ned Mamula, an adjunct scholar in Pat’s Center, who is an expert on this stuff. His take on fracking is especially interesting. Nor is the article in any way premised on the first thing said, as many things are said.
Apparently it is indeed not worth your time to read, because you clearly did not understand it. By the way, is your EIA graph for the original CPP or the last minute revised version that combined new and existing power plants?
I posted the link. It is just one of several scenarios, but they call it the reference case. When I read the Cato piece, it looked like it was just plain wrong. I thought that everyone by now knows that natural gas for coal is a key piece of the CPP that makes short-term emissions reductions even possible. They go counter to what everyone knows with that sentence.
IIRC when the final version was released, it was widely stated that it (final version) was far worse for natural gas (than earlier versions). Whether that actually means discouraging it, or just not incenting it as much as the earlier version, I never bothered to track down.
The paper was written in May 2015 and the four building blocks were all part of the original version of the rule. In my opinion, AK’s comment “just not incenting it as much as the earlier version” sums it up. Basically you can build new natural gas but you don’t get credit for it.
Check out articles on the arguments against this rule to see just how different this rule is than other pollution control rules: http://www.eesi.org/articles/view/diving-into-the-legal-action-against-the-clean-power-plan
OK, people want to see if the final plan was any different. Not significantly. Natural gas still encouraged as building block 2.
http://www.epa.gov/cleanpowerplan/fact-sheet-clean-power-plan-key-changes-and-improvements
Overview of final plan.
http://www.epa.gov/cleanpowerplan/fact-sheet-overview-clean-power-plan
As I see it, the major issue isn’t the regulations themselves, but rather that the EPA, under Presidential direction, is arrogating itself authority not granted by the Constitution. This is a revolutionary change to the practical balance of power.
IMO such changes are historically inevitable (consider the histories of Rome and Athens), but dangerous and, in this case, in an undesirable direction.
It represents a shift of power from the Congressional/Presidential interaction, both at least somewhat answerable to the voters, to the imperial Presidency/bureaucracy interaction, essentially insulated from the voters except for the quadrennial election. Basically voter disapproval is far more bundled, which means specific issues are much harder to get resolved in elections.
The Pacific ocean–atmosphere system exerts an important influence on the climate of Asia and North America, but the limited length of the observational record prevents a complete understanding of its bidecadal and multidecadal time scales. Paleoclimate reconstructions provide one source of information on longer time scales, although they differ in their estimation of the behavior of the Pacific decadal oscillation (PDO) prior to the instrumental period. Forced general circulation model simulations offer complementary long-term perspectives on both the history and dynamics of this important mode of variability. Here, we analyze the PDO in the ensemble of CMIP5/PMIP3 last millennium (past1000 + historical) simulations. We evaluate the modeled spatial, temporal, and spectral characteristics of this mode, as well as teleconnections between North Pacific variability and global climate. All models produce a mode of North Pacific variability over the last millennium with spatial patterns and spectral power density similar to observations. CCSM, FGOALS, and IPSL best reproduce observed spatial patterns, spectral characteristics, and teleconnections to terrestrial regions used in paleoclimate proxy reconstructions. In these simulations, the PDO shows no consistent response to solar or volcanic forcing. …
NOAA’s PDO index
NOV – .13
DEC – .52
2016
JAN – .80
FEB – 1.18
Looks like the PDO index could stay positive for awhile more.
I of course am a simple layman on climate science and come here to try and learn. Dr. Curry (I believe) often talks about a warming trend in the 1940’s.
Could Dr. Curry or other scientists give their reaction to this NOAA article (Deke Arndt) on warming trends? Thanks.
https://www.climate.gov/news-features/blogs/beyond-data/no-your-2nd-grader-can%E2%80%99t-dunk-tim-duncan
Both occurred during the upward ramp of the PDO. The one ending during ww2 is cold and long ago out of the mold. The current upward ramp could be just getting started. It could be several years before it’s a pie. If so, get ready for some new papers on observation-based subjects.
Since the upward ramp of the PDO started, the decadalized rate is 1.6 ℃ per decade, or 8 times the IPCC prediction. The pause is not only paws up, it’s being cremated. However, it can still fog a mirror, so in the General Franco sense, it ain’t completely dead.
It’s a lost pause.
Please forgive me, I couldn’t resist the impulse.
It is a lost pause.
That is why Michael Mann switched sides? I don’t think the pause is lost.
But, that is a good way to say it, if it were true.
Are you sure Mann said there was a pause? My recollection is his name was on an article that said there was a slowing.
Dear Congressman Lamar Smith,
Please don’t misrepresent (http://dailysignal.com/…/the-inconvenient-facts-the-media-…/) our recent Nature Climate Change commentary (http://www.nature.com/…/journal/v6/n3/full/nclimate2938.html).
Our study does NOT support the notion of a “pause” in global warming, only a *temporary slowdown*, which was due to natural factors, and has now ended.
Our recent work (http://www.nature.com/articles/srep19831), which you fail to cite, indicates that the record warmth we are now experiencing can only be explained by human-caused global warming.
Michael E. Mann
Distinguished Professor of Atmospheric Science
The Pennsylvania State University
University Park, PA
16827
the warming trend was from 1905 to ~1945.
Graphs in the latest IPCC report show that climate models fail to reproduce the 1900-1940 warming.
Here’s a look at temperature changes by Russian scientists at AARI
https://rclutz.wordpress.com/2016/03/05/legal-test-of-global-warming/
Stephen, it appears to me the NOAA climate blogger is comparing the ENSO events, not the multi-decadal warming.
The warming rate from the early 1900s to about 1945 is in the same ball park as the warming from 1975 or so to present. The absolute temperatures are probably higher today than any time in the period of record ( say 1880 ).
But the ENSO event is a trap for those global warming enthusiast who want to conflate the natural variability with GHG forcing.
It’s also a trap for those who would begin a trend in 1998.
Longer term trends are more representative.
ENSOs are a good example of climate changing temperature.
The converse, temperature changing climate, may not be valid, at least not global average temperature.
ENSO is incapable of warming/cooling the earth system. It averages to near zero. Energy is moved around. The energy is in the system because of how sunlight interacts with the earth system, of which, anthropogenic CO2 is now a major factor. There is no trap, but there is grasping at straws.
ENSO is incapable of warming/cooling the earth system. It averages to near zero.
Perhaps in the long run, though that fact is not enough to keep you from hyperventilating about the present. And you don’t really know, because no one knows albedo well enough to say.
Even so, if there’s averaging out to be done, we’re past due for more La Ninas than El Ninos:

Turbulent, see this from Gavin :
https://tamino.files.wordpress.com/2016/01/correcting-gistemp-for-enso.png?w=500&h=300
The PDO phases are said to be characterized by El Nino dominance and La Nina dominance. Since 1900, it slightly negative. That’s to be expected as it was trending downward since the mid 1980s, and has just recently turned positive. So, anthropogenic = 100% plus.
The big difference between 1905-to-1945 warming and 1974-to-present warming is simple. Natural variation tried to take the warming to 1945 away: down… or at least natural variation made a valiant attempt to do that. NV actually experienced some success, though very limited.
Mid-Century cooling… that was NV’s last feeble, pale-blue attempt at being an actual cycle.
It will never happen again.
JCH,
Why would you suggest ‘natural variation’ was the culprit to ‘take away’ the warming pre 1945? Readings indicate that that was man caused aerosols.
Aerosols may have played a role, but the PDO went negative around WW2… and it is a beast… but its negative phase is no longer match for mankind.
correcting-gistemp-for-enso
ENSOs aren’t real and have to be corrected for?
Wrong – that’s chasing the postulate of global warming that Gavin doesn’t recognize in himself.
ENSOs are real and will continue to occur.
But the average ENSO was La Nina from 1950 through 1975 and mostly El Nino from 1975 through the present.
If averaging out ( reversion to the mean ) applies, and I’m not sure when or if that applies, there will be more La Ninas than El Ninos in the future.
Shukla (RICO20): House Probe Reveals Audit Detailing Climate Change Researcher’s ‘Double Dipping’ http://dailysign.al/1WUXXsJ
______
Smith is pretty sneaky. He doesn’t say the researcher did anything illegal. Smith doesn’t even say the researcher did anything wrong, just that evidence suggests he may have done something wrong.
Wait! I retract my “Smith is pretty sneaky.”
What I should have said: Evidence appears to suggest Smith may know how to be sneaky.
He referred his findings to the NSF IG. In fact, there are three criminal acts.
1. Double dipping. Worse than just violating the 9 + 2 NSF salary rule.
2. Misappropriation (the gifts to his family charity in India from NSF grant money).
3. False conflict/outside interest disclosures to Virginia (state crime).
The most recent similar case concerning 1 and 2 was a Penn State professor comcerning an NIH grant (similar strictures to NSF). Convicted of wire fraud and ‘theft’ of grant money, sentenced to 41 months in federal prison plus $640k restitution.
Smith isn’t sneaky. He investigated, got the goods on Shukla (confirming what McIntyre, Pielke Sr, and others including myself found) and has formally asked the NSF IG to proceed with legal action.
max10k: He doesn’t say the researcher did anything illegal.
More details are needed, hence Smith’s cautious language and the need for more investigation. If Shukla intentionally failed to disclose other sources of income on a federal grant application where it was required, then he broke the law. Without such a (still hypothetical) deception, he would not likely have been awarded such large grants.
NSF funded both dips, my understanding even the same Program Officer. He too may be in serious trouble. Shukla certainly is.
He may or may not be in serious trouble.
I may get a rope or I may not.
Ice cycles put ice on land. It is a natural cycle that mankind did not cause.
More ice on land reflects more energy with more albedo and more ice on land cools the land and oceans by melting. Earth temperature gets lower when there is more ice on land and gets higher when there is less ice on land. Ice shelves melt at the edges, they melt underneath, and they melt on top. When an ice shelf is larger, the area of ice at the edges and underneath and on top that is exposed for melting is much larger. When a Glacier advances down a mountain, the ice is exposed to a warmer climate and it melts much faster and causes much more cooling, all this in addition to the increased albedo.
The plot is in this link. http://popesclimatetheory.com/page81.html
Every warm peak on this chart is a time of higher ice accumulation rate than the adjacent valleys on both sides of the peaks. Every peak is a time when ice on land is increasing. Every valley is a time when ice on land is depleting. When a peak and valley is followed by a peak and valley that is lower, that means that some of the ice that was placed on land did not melt and return to the oceans. When a peak and valley is followed by a peak and valley that is higher, that means that more ice melted and returned to the oceans. When a peak and valley is about the same as the peak and valley that occurred before, that means the ice volume max and minimums were about the same as the ones before. This is close to what has happened for the most recent ten thousand years. Earth got colder, over the most recent fifty million years because continents moved and forced more warm tropical waters into colder latitudes. This cooling stopped, around thirty million years ago. It resumed around fifteen million years ago when oceans were blocked, between North and South America and between Eurasia and Africa and forced more and more warm tropical water to flow closer to the really cold poles. Warm, thawed, water in cold places is necessary to support snowfall needed to put ice on land. During the recent million years, before twenty thousand years ago, these ice cycles started having larger and larger swings to warmer and colder. The warm times put huge amounts of ice on land each time. The cold times did not have enough snowfall to maintain the ice and much of it melted. Some of the ice fell on Antarctica and Greenland and on high mountains. Much ice ended up in middle latitudes. The ice in middle latitudes and low mountain elevations, melted every time. The ice on Antarctica and Greenland and the high Mountains did not melt every time. Every cycle left more ice on land than the cycle before, especially on Antarctic. Every warm period returned less melt water into the oceans. During the last major warming, from twenty thousand years ago, to ten thousand years ago, the oceans hit the sweet spot, the Paradise that Leighton Steward wrote about in his book, “Fire, Ice and Paradise”. It hit that spot that Willis Eschenbach wrote about the amazing stability, the cycle that Ewing and Donn wrote about in some of their later papers. There is enough ice on land, in each Hemisphere to prevent the oceans from ever getting high enough to provide enough moisture for another major ice age or warm enough for another major warm period. The ice on land in each hemisphere is the right amount to regulate that hemisphere within the bounds of the most recent ten thousand years. There is more ocean in the Southern Hemisphere, so more ice is needed, and the Southern Hemisphere has more ice.
The changes between a Roman and Medieval and Modern warm period and a Little Ice Age, is not much change in temperature or ice on land, but it don’t take much. Very few watts per meter square are needed to operate this cycle. There is not an equilibrium temperature. There is an equilibrium cycle.
The changes between fifty million years ago and the coldest periods during the recent million years, requires a huge difference in ice on land and there was a huge difference. The difference in Albedo, fifty million years ago and the coldest part of the major ice ages is in excess of 60 watts per meter squared. Ice on land is not a result of temperature changes. You cannot get that much change from anything, other than ice on land.
The temperature that Polar Oceans freeze and thaw provides the set point for the thermostats to turn snowfall on and off and ice on land is the means that is used to regulate temperatures.
All the other factors that influence temperature, can, and do, push temperature around and achieve some correlations, but none of them can, or ever did, push temperature out of bounds.
Look at earth with Google Earth. Look from North and South. The South has more oceans, with more warming, and needs more ice on land to provide cooling and it has much more ice on land. The North has less oceans, much more land in warm latitudes and needs less cooling than the South, and it has less ice on land than the South. The North and the South, both have the right amount of ice on land to regulate temperature in both hemispheres to the same bounds.
The CO2 level dropped from 2000 to less than 1000 during the Mesozoic to early Cenozoic with no evident influence in temperature. The cooling didn’t start until Antarctica moved to the south pole, let alone the other many tectonic shifts that influenced atmospheric and ocean currents.
Much of the Andes and all of the Himalayas started emerging 30 million years ago. It is challenging to argue that the drop in CO2 since then had more than a commentatorial impact by comparison. They reject about 10 times the energy (obvious on CERES) than was released by the CO2 drop in the last 30 million years. The Himalayas should be semi-tropical jungle. The Himalayan peaks were part of a limestone sea bed and are still growing (together with their insolation rejecting ice sheath) at 5 mm per year.
There’s been much comment on the alarmist scaremongeting from the Oxford Martin School, published in the Lancet, on alleged future deaths from food shortages due to climate change.
See for example Geoff Chmbers here
http://cliscep.com/2016/03/04/turning-out-nice-in-syria/
and links therein.
AnthroCO2 is already feeding an extra billion people. Mild warming will extend the range of arable land.
These people are so intent on preserving alarm that they’ve lost their minds.
===============
Well, no that isn’t quite right.
Since 1900 the CO2 level has increased 105 PPM and increased plant growth 60%. 37.5% of our food comes from anthropogenic CO2.
The census bureau says there are 7,309,701,173 people on the globe as I am writing this. 2,741,137,960 owe their lives to anthropogenic CO2.
I’ve seen little discussion about what the global warmers are going to do with 2,741,137,960 (and counting) people when they drop the CO2 level to 280 PPM. Letting them eat cake hasn’t worked well in the past.
I’m going to assume the global warmers are honorable men and won’t require 2,741,137,960 members of the third world to do the lemming plunge or fight for food. But the silence on their plans to close the food gap is deafening.
Perhaps they are planning to raze all the natural vegetation and grow food everywhere? Perhaps they are going to farm the entire ocean and extinct pesky species like whales that feed on the bottom of the food chain – or start eating whale again. Perhaps they are going to terraform Mars and move almost 3 billion people there.
The alternatives to more CO2 seem pretty expensive and disruptive. The “social cost” of less CO2 is inhumanly high. The plan needs to be in place before the global warmers start dropping the CO2 level. What is the plan???
Inquiring minds want to know.
It would seem the clear benefits of more CO2 vastly outweigh the virtual problems. Perhaps doing nothing and “letting the chips ride” is the safest course.
I’ve seen little discussion about what the global warmers are going to do with 2,741,137,960 (and counting) people when they drop the CO2 level to 280 PPM.
The greens preach that there are too many people on earth, this is their solution, genocide by CO2 starvation for green things that grow.
They discuss the too many people a lot and they discuss reducing CO2 a lot, they just don’t talk a lot about how they will reduce the population with starvation by CO2. This is what they do intend.
They discuss the too many people a lot and they discuss reducing CO2 a lot, they just don’t talk a lot about how they will reduce the population with starvation by CO2. This is what they do intend.
I’m not sure what they are planning and thought I’d ask.
But offering people the choice between genocide and starvation isn’t a plan, or at least not a good one.
PA said
“Since 1900 the CO2 level has increased 105 PPM and increased plant growth 60%. 37.5% of our food comes from anthropogenic CO2.”
_________________
I’m skeptical. Do you have 115 year-old pictures of watermelons to support your claim ?
_______
Joel are you saying that technological changes and improved agricultural practices have nothing to do with increased grain and other plants production? Maybe I am not understanding what you are trying to say.
Joseph,
takes CO2 to grow stuff and warm temperatures. My guess is that new technologies and farming practices are able to use this “fertilizer”. I’d be realy worried if the correlation was parabolic such a short CO2 range. Thankfully, it is not. Lab results indicate that even higher levels of CO2 are even better for growing crops. Then this plot could be fortuitous, just like catastrophic global warming, that some are trying to scare the hell out of us with. I find this one more credible. Massive amounts of global grain require massive amounts of readily available CO2 fertilizer.
I’m skeptical of relying on articles that try to make an Oxford Martin School study look as silly as possible.
You are skeptical that CO2 provides benefits, but seem to fully accept “potential harms” as very likely.
You got that wrong. I’m skeptical that a lot more CO2 provides a net benefit, so why experiment? Climate contrarians want to gamble on the future, but if there are consequences, they won’t be around.
max1ok | March 5, 2016 at 12:55 pm | Reply
I’m skeptical of relying on articles that try to make an Oxford Martin School study look as silly as possible.
I agree. Ridiculing satire articles is unnecessary or at least redundant.
But the study might be correct (or at least not grossly wrong). If zero Syrians die from global warming and the Italians and Greeks over expose themselves on the beach due to nice weather, technically one or two heats strokes would mean more Greeks and Italians in 2050 died of global warming. They actually would die of a deficit of common sense, but “a deficit of common sense” and claims of “manmade global warming” have a lot common.
max1ok | March 5, 2016 at 3:29 pm |
You got that wrong. I’m skeptical that a lot more CO2 provides a net benefit, so why experiment? Climate contrarians want to gamble on the future, but if there are consequences, they won’t be around.
Repeating successful experiments (like a 100 PPM CO2 rise) is wise.
Repeating failed experiments (like global warmer predictions) is pretty much something only global warmers do.
Why experiment? We are beyond experiments now. CO2 is used in commercial greenhouses to boost production. While CO2 is a greenhouse gas, this is not the greenhouse effect Al Gore refers to.
max1ok | March 5, 2016 at 3:29 pm |
You got that wrong. I’m skeptical that a lot more CO2 provides a net benefit, so why experiment?…
Not an experiment. Greenhouses enrich the air to 1200-1500 PPM. They know from practical experience what scientists keep guessing at.
The claims that more CO2 is bad or not beneficial are frankly absurd
It is impossible to raise the CO2 level to the point of harm using commercially extractable fossil fuel. The high fertilization effect might make it extremely difficult to even hit 460 PPM..
What a load of crap ! Why has it not occurred to CO2 lovers that greenhouses use air-conditioning, and If warmer and warmer were better, greenhouses would not need air-conditioning? It may because they have never given much thought to how controlled the climate in a greenhouse must be to take advantage of added C02.
Doomsday consen-suss-ites ain’t sceptics,
they’re ‘waitin-fer greenhouse’ apocalypse
-ians, though, i’ faith, they lack feed-back evidence,
still lookin’ fer missin’ heat in deepest oceans,
leadin’ ter no-good outcomes like no-snow, -no
-niver-agin,’n mass-famines-like-we-used-ter-git,
(pre-industrial revolution.) Polar bears? OMG, let’s
not go inter that! Millenarian-ist – perennial-ists all.*
* h/t kim.
List of Credits:
H/t Club of Rome, Ehrlich et Al. (Gore.)
H/t Globully thrTaiping Rebellion etctera .
H/T Shakers
H/T Malthus
H/t Nostradamus
…and of course
lpts of other climactic-
apoplectic-apocolypsians *
,,, if that’s how yer spell it.
bts.
Tsk! Typin’ by the lite of one flickerin’ candle ain’t good.
“Apoplectic apocalyptics” Good one Beth +10
So happy that yrt liks it and gave me plus ten.,
Peter MD from WA. Serf’s are inter feed-back.
Max1, Greenhouses use air conditioning. Yes and most of the greenhouses in cold places condition the air by making it warmer and more humid in addition to the wonderful more CO2.
Long before growers used CO2 enrichment in greenhouses, growers used greenhouses with great success. In the Dakotas they had these things called steam pipes. They raised flowers in ambient air.
A question: Since there are recognized ~60 year ocean SST cycles (AMO & PDO), does this suggest that ocean heat transport follows these same patterns? For example, when the sun warms tropical oceans, can this heat reside in the water and be transported to higher latitudes, warming colder ocean waters and colder atmosphere ~60 years later?
Wexford, PA – Noon EST
Of course, the nascent World Government wants to tackle “climate change.” But the change would end up in its pocket you can bet. What the hell does IMF have to do with “climate change” in the first place??? From the article:
…
CAMBRIDGE, Mass., March 4 (Reuters) – Turning the tide on global warming should be tackled by big and small steps that range from cutting subsidies to riding bicycles, International Monetary Fund managing director Christine Lagarde said on Friday.
“Removing fossil fuel subsidies would go a long way to cutting consumption,” Lagarde said in answer to a question at Massachusetts Institute of Technology about how climate change can be addressed.
She had delivered a speech on how to promote growth in the face of an aging population and said that “game changers” including competition among insurers and raising the retirement age could go a long way to helping.
Speaking months after the end of the hottest year on record, Lagarde said “If subsidies were removed and carbon prices set properly now and taxed that would go a long way in addressing the climate change issues the world is facing.”
…
http://www.cnbc.com/2016/03/04/reuters-america-imfs-lagarde-eyes-subsidies-simple-things-to-tackle-climate-change.html
From the article:
…
BRUSSELS, March 4 (Reuters) – Germany, France and Britain pressed the European Union for more ambitious greenhouse gas targets at a meeting of environment ministers on Friday, clashing with the EU executive and several eastern and central European states.
The big states led criticism of a draft text that said the bloc does not need to revise up its targets until the next decade as it tries to decide how to share out the burden of meeting those among its 28 member countries.
So far, the EU has agreed to cut emissions by at least 40 percent by 2030 from 1990 levels and to a first global stock-take in 2023.
Germany’s Jochen Flasbarth called the European Commission text “weak on the 2030 objectives.”
…
http://www.cnbc.com/2016/03/04/reuters-america-germany-france-uk-press-for-tougher-emission-targets-after-paris-deal.html
From the article:
…
ANCOUVER, March 3 (Reuters) – Strains over stalled Canadian oil pipeline projects and Ottawa’s push to impose a national carbon price hung over talks on Thursday between Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and the country’s 10 provinces on how to tackle global warming.
Trudeau’s Liberal Party won an election last October on a pledge to do much more than the previous administration to curb emissions of greenhouse gases, which are climbing as firms exploit Canada’s vast crude-rich oil sands.
Behind the scenes, Trudeau officials have been pointing out to the premiers that introducing a national price on carbon was also a key element of the Liberal platform as they swept to power, knocking Conservative Prime Minister Stephen Harper from office after almost a decade in power.
But the provinces, which enjoy significant jurisdiction over the environment, are wary of Ottawa’s intentions and say they should be allowed to cut carbon emissions their own way.
…
http://www.cnbc.com/2016/03/03/reuters-america-update-1-carbon-tax-wrangling-center-stage-at-canada-climate-change-talks.html
From the article:
…
Saskatchewan Premier Brad Wall is upset that the eastern province of Quebec has filed an injunction against TransCanada Corp’s proposed Energy East pipeline, designed to carry up to 1.1 million barrels of western oil per day to eastern ports.
“It does look like a political barrier put up against the project because there’s oil involved,” Wall told reporters on Wednesday, noting that Quebec has benefited in the past from transfer payments from energy-rich Western provinces.
Trudeau, pressed on the matter, said he did not feel “highlighting points of disagreement or differing views in this country is a threat to national unity”.
…
http://www.cnbc.com/2016/03/03/reuters-america-pipeline-strains-set-to-cloud-canada-climate-change-talks.html
Canadian Provinces to the East and to the West don’t want the pipeline. Why should we want the pipeline?
Why should you NOT want the pipeline?
I detest competition. More oil is BAD. Higher priced oil is GOOD.
This article was posted to the FEE (Foundation for Economic Education) web site:
A Scientific Consensus on What Now?
by Robert P. Murphy
Time and again, references to “the consensus” are greatly exaggerated, while people pointing out enormous problems with the case for policy action are dismissed as “deniers.”
Will this be a major Pacific cooling event? From the article:
…
Every once in awhile California gets a “Pineapple Express” this is more like an El Niño express as the source of this moisture river extends all the way across the Pacific to the Phillipines, near the “warm pool” area that gets created by an El Niño event.
…
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2016/03/04/california-to-get-clobbered-with-wet-atmospheric-river-this-weekend/
Another interesting development concerning EPA CPP. Using FOIA, yhe Energy and Environment Legal Institue determined that Michael Goo, deputy administrator for the Office of Policy (where CPP was finalized) set up a private email server and used it to consult ‘off system’ with at least WWF, Sierra Club, and NRDC about CPP specifics. Seems to be a bad EPA habit, shades of ‘Richard Windsor’ scandal in 2013. EELI is filing an amicus brief to the 27 state’s ‘unconstitutional’ CPP suit saying the EPA process itself was unlawful.
> … a private email server and used it to consult ‘off system’ with at least WWF, Sierra Club, and NRDC about CPP specifics
The EPA may consult with whom they wish, of course, but a private email server to avoid FOI ?
Golly gee … no one else would do such a thing, would they ?
We need to abolish the EPA that is controlled by the Federal Government in Washington, D.C. and create a new EPA that is controlled by representatives from all the states.
Good morning. Here is an updated look at the visible solar disk on Saturday. No major solar flares to report as all visible sunspot regions are currently stable. Only isolated C-Flares are to be expected during the next 24 hours. Geomagnetic activity is also at quiet levels, although an increase is predicted during the next 24-48 hours as a coronal hole stream is expected to become geoeffective. Sky watchers at very high latitudes should be alert for visual aurora displays.
For All info go to:
http://www.solarham.net/
To get NOAA solar spot and solar flux click on Averages (in yellow) second line from the top
ordvic, thank you.
“The Energy & Environment Legal Institute” is working to eliminate illegal barriers to public information of public concern:
http://m.azdailysun.com/news/state-and-regional/profs-emails-on-climate-change-ruled-public/article_3654cbcf-f6a1-5187-af02-e94e57be904f.html?mobile_touch=true
How Chesapeake CEO Aubrey McClendon Helped Push Coal to the Brink
Aubrey McClendon, the former Chesapeake Energy CEO, died March 2 in a car wreck the day after being indicted for conspiracy to rig bids on oil and natural gas leases. He will likely be remembered for two things: being a pioneer of the shale gas boom and a possible criminal who, in death, may have eluded a prison sentence.
But McClendon may have had one other lasting legacy: he helped hasten the collapse of the coal industry in the United States.
Between 2007 and 2012, McClendon and his associates contributed around $26 million to the Sierra Club to oppose the building of new coal-fired power plants.
McClendon’s motivations were hardly pure; he knew that preventing new coal plants meant more demand for his company’s product, natural gas. And the contributions led to a scandal for the environmental group, whose well-funded “Beyond Coal” campaign has been instrumental in not only preventing new plants, but also shutting down aging ones.
https://www.technologyreview.com/s/600940/how-chesapeake-ceo-aubrey-mcclendon-helped-push-coal-to-the-brink/#/set/id/600944/
It is a nice plan. Build no coal plants. Shut down old plants. Prevent export of coal. Coal is a dangerous substance, it should not be transported by rail. The Port of Oakland, CA is about to abandon a plan for a coal export terminal.
Some people never grow beyond fairy-tales, and some are good at spinning them.
Seems some industry insiders think that the DOJ complaint made no sense. https://www.thelayoff.com/t/Gf2gs1q
CMS.
That the DOJ was “conducting this political witch hunt that was handed down to you by your superiors,” as the letter you link alleges, seems to be a universally held position in the oil patch.
This from Rigzone:
And what the letter you linked says about when McClendon became interested in a play and started buying leases — how the King of Shale’s entry made the prices paid for leases go through the roof — is also true.
In June 2014 McClendon’s American Energy Partners paid $2.5 billion for a 63,000 acre leasehold in the Permian Basin — a whopping $39,700 per acre.
http://www.americanenergypartners.com/news/american-energy-permian-basin-llc-agrees-to-acquire-63000-net-acres-of-southern-permian-basin-leasehold-and-16000-boe-per-day-of-net-production-from-enduring-resources-llc-for-25-billion
Compare that to Concho Resources purchase of Henry Petroleum in 2007 (330,000 acres for $584 million) for $1770 per acre.
http://pbog.zacpubs.com/opportunity-knocked/
Or to Apache’s more recent purchase of BP’s Permian Basin assets in 2010 (763,000 acres for $1.5 billion) for $1965 per acre.
http://info.drillinginfo.com/apache-to-acquire-bp-permian-basin-assets/
McClendon, probably more than any other person in the United States, was responsible for bringing about the US shale revolution.
Who knows what got him on the wrong side of the Obama administration, and why the administration made him the target of such a vicious witch hunt.
As the Rigzone article notes, however, the implications of the witch hunt go way beyond just McClendon, and the Obama admistration now has the entire industry looking over its shoulder:
Could it be that Obama has such a visceral hatred for the fossil fuel industry that he will use any method at his disposal to destroy it?
Here’s another article on McClendon, which may help explain why the Obama administration had it in for him.
“McClendon’s motivations were hardly pure.”
—————
He was a capitalist. His motive was to eliminate competition. As long as it’s done legally, eliminating competition is OK. I would have done the same. I wouldn’t lose sleep over thinking about the “purity” of my motive.
I recently started looking at monthly CFSR temperature anomaly trends for the Arctic, Northern Hemisphere middle latitudes, Tropics, Southern Hemisphere middle latitudes, and Antarctic based on estimates provided by the University of Maine Climate Change Institute (UM CCI). I plan to update the graphs monthly:
https://oz4caster.wordpress.com/monthly-trends/
One of the more interesting findings is very little trend for the Southern Hemisphere middle latitudes and a significant downward trend for the Antarctic. If the CFSR indicated downward trend in the Antarctic were to continue for 100 years, the average temperature south of 60S would drop 2.5C. The graph below shows the downward Antarctic trend:

Since CO2 levels are relatively uniform across the globe over scales of years, the downward trend in the Antarctic zone is quite contradictory to hypothesized warming from man-made CO2 and methane emissions. The implication to me is that other factors are more dominant. Do the global warming climate models predict decreasing temperatures in the Antarctic? I think not. To me this is a major failure of the man-made CO2 global warming hypothesis.
If you have not read this, you need to.
Try it again
Yes, in areas not dominated by surface heating, like Antarctica and the stratosphere, added CO2 leads to cooling, so this backs up the consensus view and is not explainable without changing CO2. Maybe this will lead to converts to AGW finally.
JCH, I find that hard to believe. If cold temperatures cause a reverse of supposed “GHG” gas effects then why don’t we see that every winter in the Arctic as well? It is certainly not happening this winter in the Arctic.
JCH, I find that hard to believe. If cold temperatures cause a reverse of supposed “GHG” gas effects then why don’t we see that every winter in the Arctic as well?
Cold temperatures don’t exactly reverse GHG effects, but what increasing the infrared opacity of the atmosphere amounts to is that more of the emissions to space will be from higher up in the troposphere than near the surface. In the Antarctic, especially in the high terrain around the South Pole( 2700 m above sea level ), the atmosphere near the surface is very cold and the air above is relatively warmer than the surface. Thus, with more CO2, more emissions take place from the relatively warmer levels above, meaning more energy to space than before.
In the Arctic, by contrast, the North Pole ( 0m above sea level ) is not as cold at the surface, and depending on the circulation, colder aloft than near the surface, so more CO2 means emissions from colder layers aloft, meaning less energy emitted to space.
The high terrain of Greenland and of the Himalayas may have similar profiles to Antarctica, but there aren’t regular RAOB measurments from these locations to know for sure, while they’ve been faithfully launching at the South Pole for some time.
OZ – you’ve made a mountainous challenge to the paper’s finding.
Ignoring Antartica as such, there has been a sudden and increasing break between the temperatures in the Northern and Souther hemispheres. This brings into question the assumption of well mixed gases or that the warming effect is not as dominant across the globe as portrayed. http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/hadcrut4nh/from:1990/plot/hadcrut4sh/from:1990
This seems to be a relatively new phenomena and as such is not a consistent differential. http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/hadcrut4nh/plot/hadcrut4sh
there has been a sudden and increasing break between the temperatures in the Northern and Southern hemispheres.
SH mostly ocean, NH mostly land.
-> NH has a lower heat capacity.
-> NH incurs more rapid response to heating.
“Do the global warming climate models predict decreasing temperatures in the Antarctic? I think not. ”
Your theory is busted.
Now.. you had a theory about what Your data showed.
That theory is wrong.
Calling Karl Popper…..
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/2015GL066749/full
That’s an interesting paper, but what it represents is things that are missing, not present in the climate models, meaning the GCMs.
The GCMs don’t indicate declining temperatures in Antarctica,

neither for the satellite era:
Nor for the longer term:

Steven, it is not my “theory”, but simply my current understanding of how warming from CO2 is suppose to work … which may not be correct, I am still learning. My understanding is that according to the man-made CO2 global warming hypothesis, most of the warming is supposed to take place at higher latitudes, and that would include both poles. Maybe the hypothesis has been revised lately?
The temperature trend for the Southern Hemisphere middle latitudes is relatively flat since 1979 and especially since 2001. This is another inconsistency with the CO2 hypothesis. And as I replied to JCH, I find it difficult to believe that we would not also see the same negative temperature trend CO2-induced phenomenon in the winter Arctic as what is hypothesized for the Antarctic and especially in the highland areas of Greenland.
ozcaster:
My understanding is that according to the man-made CO2 global warming hypothesis, most of the warming is supposed to take place at higher latitudes, and that would include both poles.
Manabe puzzled over this from the time of some of the very first GCMs. This paper covers a lot of it. The text and graphics are worth reading, even if atrophied math skills preclude ingest the formulas.
What Manabe found ( and this was for 4x CO2, not 2x ) was greater temperature rise in the Arctic because of: 1.) summer time albedo feedback from sea ice loss 2.) autumn increased release of latent heat of freezing ( thinner ice paradoxically means greater freezing when it does get cold ), and 3.) greater winter heat from the underlying ocean, because even though there was autumnal freezing, the average thickness is less.
These factors all involve sea ice. The Arcitc is mostly ocean. But the Antarctic is mostly land. That is why there is modeled to be greater temperature increase in the Arctic. The GCMs ( see above ) do indicate temperature increase for the Antarctic, more or less in line with the global average. The Anarctic remains very poorly sampled and there is a fair amount of variability, so a cooling trend there may be real but not a huge contradiction to the overall theory.
Turbulent, “The Anarctic remains very poorly sampled and there is a fair amount of variability, so a cooling trend there may be real but not a huge contradiction to the overall theory.”
It is more of a contradiction of some of the “facts” spouted out by believers. Steig et al were searching diligently for Antarctic warming when there should have been none which I found extremely entertaining. Then the “gang” jumped on Steig’s bandwagon :)
Oh, also:
1. The cooling effect from CO2 over the Antarctic would appear real, but not for the whole continent, nor for all months:

2. The Manabe paper is very worthwhile but obviously many estimates have changed since 1980. One of those estimates may well have effected the albedo response. The 1980 model was for 4xCO2, but even so, it appears to have greatly overestimated the albedo response. Here is a comparison of the 1980 SW and that of the GISS model e, also for a 4x CO2:
So global warming may not create quite as much Arctic Amplification certainly as was modeled in earlier times.
It is also a trap to assume that the observed Arctic Sea Ice loss is all due to ‘global warming’. In some ways, sea ice can vary naturally, and by the same mechanisms, sea ice loss can cause warming, without being caused by it. And should this reverse, sea ice gain can cause cooling.
That doesn’t preclude at all the fact that GHGs cause radiative forcing.
First published: 14 December 2015
He counts back on his fingers 1, 2, 3. Oh, that article only came out 3 months ago.
Well, yes they claim that for 35 years CO2 has been cooling Antarctica, after Antarctica has cooled for 35 years.
I thought Antarctica was melting until a few months ago when NASA said “Oh, noes it isn’t”.
Global warming theory doesn’t seem to predict a lot until after it happens. Then we get a flurry of articles that adjust this and change that and tweak the theory a bit with magical explanations and presto-chango it all fits again.
Prediction from theory is when you make a statement about something before it happens, and it happens as predicted (IE you and the theory are correct) . This needs to be explained to global warmers. They are either wrong in their predictions or predict things nearly 100% accurately after they happen.
Further, if the core of Antarctica is cooling and will cool as long as CO2 rises, why all the silly predictions that Antarctica is going to go melty-melty?
I’ve seen the theory of AGW take some major hits on blog threads before, but these hits today on this thread are just colossal.
As the political campaign heats up, the AGW claims cool down.
I’ve asked a few times about the Schmithüsen CO2-cools-Antarctica paper. I’ve actually read it and the thesis it’s based but of course cannot say if they’re right.
That said, I see no way that both Schmithüsen and the sea-level-catastrophe papers, of which there are a few, can be right. Any sea level rise beyond 10 meters would require melting in East Antarctica – which according to Schmithüsen cannot happen from CO2. One side has to be wrong, but I have seen basically no comments from atmospheric experts on Schmithüsen.
PS: of course, even if the CO2-cools-Antarctica paper is wrong, there are a lot of other problems with the sea-level-catastrophe papers. Starting with the fact that the last we’ve heard of Antarctica is that it’s barely warming, and it’s actually gaining ice.
http://geographical.co.uk/places/mapping/item/1545-mapping-greenland-s-ice-sheet
Current snow in Greenland is 3 times “harder” than the previous interglacial and the ice sheets are hardening and stiffening with time anyway. Presumably the Antarctic snow is 3 times harder as well.
The thickening of the Antarctic on top of it’s cooling is the crack of doom for the runaway melting theories. Further melting at the edges is going to increase snow fall on the core.
You just can’t get long term runaway melting with stiffening and thickening and slowing Antarctic and Greenland core ice sheets.
Latest from Dr. Lee: http://www.governancenow.com/news/regular-story/we-must-enhance-involvement-scientists-developing-countries
Pat Michael’s did an evaluation of what Waxman-Markey cap-n-trade would have done to temperature in 2050:
He came up with these resulting increases:
1.) Business-as-Usual: 1.584 C
2.) Waxman-Markey (US only): 1.540 C
3.) Waxman-Markey (Kyoto Countries): 1.500 C
He comes up with a range of only 0.084 C. He only goes out to 2050, so perhaps there’s a much larger divergence to 2100 and beyond. But for the lifespans of most people living now, this spread looks pretty valid, unless someone can show that he’s off by an order of magnitude or two (if you can please do). So if the equivalent of Waxman-Markey can be accomplished by:
1.) A nuclear build out (perhaps).
2.) The two Marks (Jacobson and Ruffalo) bringing us 100% wind, water and solar (WWS — I think not).
3.) Turning the world into some combination of Maoist China or North Korea. (I think this actually appeals to a lot of greenies).
4.) Some heretofore unknown breakthrough.
5.) Some combination of the above.
It may not solve the CO2 problem if it is indeed a problem.
I don’t know how bad of a problem increasing CO2 is. It certainly looks like it will cause warming, but there is also a lot about its effect on the climate that is not understood. Maybe someday natural variability and other forcings will be better understood and a compelling case can be made. But maybe a Waxman-Markey level of CO2 reduction won’t solve it! I think there should be more discussion of direct human control over the climate. This means control of Earth’s albedo and huge CO2 mega-projects like this:
http://www.cquestrate.com/the-idea/detailed-description-of-the-idea
This would require a lot of energy and I think the only practical source would be nuclear. Of all the things that are proposed for the climate, the only sure thing I see is nuclear power. The only other thing about the climate I’m sure of is that there is nothing urgent about it. “Climate emergency” is an oxymoron.
Pat Michael should have said, “Waxman-Markey shows you can’t get sensible energy policy from people who are mentally deficient or badly misinformed”.
The 1.5°C increase in the BAU and Waxman-Markey discussion looks suspicious.
Going from 1998 the last major El Nino to 2015 the current major El Nino there is a 0.23 °C difference. 0.63 to 0.86 (and I’m using GISS the most biased temperature scale I could find).
0.23°C/1.7 (17 years) is 0.135°C/decade. In 35 years (assuming continued exponential emissions growth – which isn’t happening) it will be 0.47 °C warmer.
But wait, Michaels was discussing from 1990 … so let’s dig that out from the data table (I’m going from the data not eyeballing the chart). Ah 0.43, ooohhh the 2000 value is 0.42 so the decadal trend is – 0.01 but we’ll ignore that being the kind and generous people that we are.. So 0.2 colder in 1990 than 1998. So the likely 2050 temperature increase from 1990 assuming global warmer facts not in evidence, exponential emissions growth (global warmer “facts” don’t ever seem to be in evidence), will be 0.67°C warmer.
And I am using 2015 the new global warmer favorite year as my trend endpoint. And a brand fancy new 17 year trend.
1.5°C in 2050 fails the smell test.
Michaels is basing his 1.5 C on model results and not actual temperature trends and it does not look far off to me. His main point is that the Waxman-Markey 80% reduction of CO2 will only result in about a tenth of a degree less warming by 2050. I think he should have also projected it out to 2100. It’s not clear how much this spread would have widened.
His main point is that the 80% reduction of CO2 will only result in about a tenth of a degree less warming by 2050.
Correcting model errors and assumptions will cause at least a 8.7 times greater change in 2050 temperatures than Waxman-Markey.
Why don’t we just correct the model errors and assumptions? That is much cheaper and less damaging to the economy than Waxman-Markey..
Or we could require by law that only the Russian INM-CM4 model be used as a basis for climate policy and projections since it is the only one that is even close to accurate.
How about this fer ‘ Open Thread ‘ climate craziness
of the week? ‘Glaciers, gender and science: A feminist
glaciology framework foe global environmental change
research.’
There yer go Judith. )
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2016/03/05/climate-craziness-of-the-week-feminist-glaciology-in-the-climate-change-context/
Just on the ever popular subject of gendered epistemologies in dynamic social-ecological systems…
I’m outraged by the omission of trans-gendered epistemologies from the study in Progress in Human Geography. All we hear is patriarchal this and feminist that. Ever hear mention of a queer glaciology network, let alone a trans-gender glaciology framework? I thought not.
In fact, I’m not gonna read a page of Progress in Human Geography until they correct this glaring injustice. I want a published apology to Conchita and all those who have suffered disadvantage for so long within the dominant patriarchal/feminist paradigm.
“Just on the ever popular subject of gendered epistemologies
in dynamic social-ecological systems…”
I’m awardin’ yer a + 9
bts..
Giving points is sooooo patriarcho-feminist. I’m going to have to find a safe space to sob a while. (And since the taking of offence is the main qualification for Australian of the Year, who knows how far my tears will take me?)
Mebbe not far, you bein’ a white anglo-saxon male.
Not all equal in two legs- four legs-affirmative action
shape-shiftin’ decision makin’.
Well you be Australian of the Year then. You’re a bloody sheila + a medieval serf. Centuries of disadvantage right there. Just tell ’em how you believe passionately in climate justice and banning apple stickers etc. Committees love all that. And do try to find an indigene or Irish bandit in the family tree.
Very erudite Moso. Most impressive use of language and even I had to check some of your words for meaning and context, like I do for some of our warmist friends on this blog. While recognising that you have somewhat less experience in this area and that the practictioners from the warmist side have been carrying on like this for at least 17 years I hereby award you a +7.5.
First don’t fool yourself.
Thanks for the great link to Galileo on Critical Thinking His protagonist said:
That sounds remarkably prescient to many of today’s “climate scientists”.
Richard Feynmann summarized:
So different ter the tricky
methodology of ye
union of concerned scientists,
‘concerned’ here synonymous
with ‘consensus.’ Cli-sci’
by angsty angry activists
engaged in hockey-stick
up-lift-statist-ticks ‘n fake
‘”d” word -conspiracist-
surveys because the ends
justify it, don’t they?
What ever became of the Steyn versus Mann rumble?
Still rumbling in DC appelate court in re SLAPP. Opinion awaited from a notorious in arears judge. Nothing to so with Steyn’s suit or counter suit, per se.
I’m not sure, but I think it’s somewhere in the bowels of the DC court system. There’s a lesson here. If you want resolve a dispute, consider the advantages of reaching an agreement out of court.
Is Climate Alarmism Stalling?
I thought a review of this article may be interesting. It references the recently published study [http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00704-015-1597-5] “Learning From Mistakes in Climate Research”. I would like to hear JC’s insight as well as others.
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/climate-consensus-97-per-cent/2015/aug/25/heres-what-happens-when-you-try-to-replicate-climate-contrarian-papers
Thanks,
Stephen
Feds refer Exxon climate claims to FBI:
“As a courtesy, we have forwarded your correspondence to the Federal Bureau of Investigation,” Department Of Justice wrote to Representatives. Ted Lieu (D-Calif.) and Mark DeSaulnier (D-Calif.), who asked for the probe.”
– Climate Depot
Just like reporting a crime that didn´t happen!
In other words:
As a courtesy – we are wasting tax-payers money while we eventually throw your correspondence into the bin.
Spot on:
“Thankfully for the Zimbabwean dictator, there are plenty of gullible Westerners willing to believe that the frighteningly vile and comically incompetent government isn’t at the root of Zimbabwe’s food shortages, but that global warming is to blame. Of course, this is pure nonsense. Botswana and Zimbabwe share a border and their climate and natural resources are exceptionally similar. Yet, since 2004, food production has increased by 29 percent in Botswana, while declining by 9 percent in Zimbabwe. It is not drought but government policies that make nations starve!”
Global Warming Fund a Slush Fund for World’s Dictators
I’m not sure about the economic comparison. According to the CIA fact book, agriculture accounts for only 1.8 % of GDP in Botswana but about 20% of GDP in Zimbabwe, making the latter more vulnerable to drought.
I doubt the “plenty of gullible Westerners” accusation. None are identified.
Speakin’ of food , never far from a serf’s mind,
do not feed the kleptocrats, fer like Octopussy,
it’ll do you or others no good… The EU Octopussy
likewise.
TRUMP: I was joking when I said the Chinese ‘created’ the concept of climate change
http://www.businessinsider.com/donald-trump-china-created-climate-change-2016-1
I found the word “hoax” used five times. Maybe he was joking about the Chinese, but still believes it is a hoax. He has flipflopped a few times so maybe he will tone it down for a general election. I don’t know..
The nice thing about being a billionaire is that you don’t care at all about those pesky Josephs or Georges. General election? That’s the best show business. The best return on investment.
It looks to me like it’s the Georges and Josephs of the world who don’t care about what the people think.
A million more people have now voted for Trump than had voted for Romney at this time during the 2012 primaries.
Why is it that the environmentalists hate democracy so much?
Nobody knows what Trump believes..including the Donald himself. But if I was convinced he actually did believe that CAGW was a hoax my whole opinion of him would change….I would support him.and disregard all the other nonsense that comes with him.
Judith: As a scientist, I don’t think I want a clip of me in Morano’s trailer to appear 15 seconds before a sound-bite saying “it’s just propaganda”. Have you been spending too much time away from science these days? Do the tactics of your opponents change your responsibilities as a scientist? Schneider and other alarmists thought so and they created this mess.
Hey look! Your hair’s on fire!
That happens every time the people tune the scientist kings out as thoroughly as they’ve tuned out the climatariat.
franktoo,
And by the way, you and your fellow “scientists” have done this to yourselves, so enough of the search for scapegoats.
For those who’ve been following the ‘reproducibility’ issue in psychology, you might find this follow up of interest (especially the reactions). http://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2016/03/psychologys-replication-crisis-cant-be-wished-away/472272/
I would be interested in hearing what people think of Erl Happ’s interesting Blog https://reality348.wordpress.com/
If it’s UV and ozone, he’ll be the first to know.
============
A couple of (new to me) discussions on nuclear for those so interested: http://www.citylab.com/tech/2016/02/cost-to-built-nuclear-power-plants-around-the-world/470226/
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0301421516300106
Danny, those were interesting discussions about the cost of nuclear power. I am more concerned about safety than costs, and I had always thought the public’s concern about safety was the main reason more nuclear power plants were not being built.
Perhaps costs is more of an obstacle to new construction than I thought.
Max1OK,
Reasonable concerns and shared by pretty much all including the regulatory agencies. Now, with those concerns in mind I can think of 3 ‘substantial’ events which merit consideration w/r/t nuclear. Then, offsetting that vs. the level of concern over CO2 may I ask for your insights in to how to maintain lifestyle with energy demand?
A secondary thought your comment brings to mind is what safety losses have occurred using other fuel sources. This is a comparison I’ve not seen.
I have a pretty long, 8000 words actually, dissection of climate policies. Published on a Spanish website, I’m guessing Medium or a few other places if I get the time.
http://www.desdeelexilio.com/2016/03/01/no-greenhouse-effect-not-justify-pet-idea/
TL; DR: even if you want to reduce CO2 emissions, the policies most countries are following are nonsense. Just because some far-away goal sounds good, doesn’t justify whatever pet policy you have in mind.
When looking at the ozonewatch website for the Arctic region for Jan and Feb 2016, all of the ozone is displaced to the Canadian side and you can clearly see the two locations in Russia that had the highest temperature rises for those months. These great big ozone holes and no scientific comment.
They scammed us with natural ozone holes when they took the freon R12 away because the patent had run out and they needed to force their new, inferior, product on the market. Then after the scientific fraud with CO2, maybe they are learning that not all of us get fooled.
Bruns and Ioannidis on p-hacking:
http://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0149144
The Oil Bite. It ain’t just the US oil patch what’s hurting. From the article:
…
Moody’s Investors Service has cut its outlook for the debt ratings of Saudi Arabia and three other Gulf states while lowering Bahrain’s rating to junk, citing concern over the impact of low oil prices on their finances.
Saudi Arabia’s Aa3 rating was placed on review for a possible downgrade, Moody’s said late on Friday, adding that it would study whether Riyadh’s efforts to expand its non-oil revenues and diversify its economy were likely to work.
…
http://www.cnbc.com/2016/03/05/moodys-reviews-saudi-arabia-cuts-bahrain-to-junk.html
Low oil prices might put a kink in the terrorist’s budget. I hope so.
Why are most people ignoring this strong evidence that the Sun influences the Earth’s climate on time scales from 50 to 9400 years.
Evidence that the Sun has always had an important influence upon climate change
http://astroclimateconnection.blogspot.com.au/2016/03/evidence-that-sun-has-always-had.html
Something related to climate (e.g. soil moisture, air temperature, precipitation, rate of evaporation, frequency of frosts etc.) affects the tree ring widths of Bristle Cone pines. It really doesn’t matter which of these is the dominant factor or even if it is a combination of these parameters.
Your question is how does something related to the long-term variations of the climate of the Southern Colorado Plateau know about the long-term variations of the strength of the Sun’s magnetic field.
From the article:
…
Reason.com’s Robby Soave criticizes an article published in the journal Progress in Human Geography, for being “utterly incomprehensible,” and “the least essential paper ever written.” Entitled Glaciers, Gender, and Science–A feminist glaciology framework for global environmental climate change, the article is authored by researchers at the University of Oregon and funded by a grant from the National Science Foundation.
…
http://science.slashdot.org/story/16/03/08/2018245/reason-excoriates-paper-on-glaciers-gender-and-science
As Always – ATLANTIC warming though representing only 23% of the planets sea water embodies nearly 50% of the planets additional heat. The issue is and always will be the reduction in the equatorial Easterly Wave cloud mass allowing more solar energy to effect this additional heating – END OF SERMON
To what do you attribute the reduction in cloud mass as you contend?
Rain.
THIS IS HUGE! FORMER AUSTRALIAN PRIME MINISTER JOHN HOWARD SAYS ON TV HE IS A “CLIMATE CHANGE AGNOSTIC.”
Former Australian Prime Minister for 11 years, John Howard has just been interviewed in a nationwide TV program marking the 20th anniversary of his taking office. Yes, he declared himself a “Climate Change Agnostic” and pointed out that there is growing skepticism in Australia and elsewhere. In particular he remarked on the adverse effects of making electricity more expensive in developing countries, and also on the very significant cost included in the budget.
This is huge! I have met and spoken with John Howard in my twenties when he lived nearby and sometimes spoke with my parents, and also at a function in the 1980’s. His opinion is widely respected and he still plays a role supporting Liberal Party candidates in election campaigns and occasionally offers advice to the current government. He was responsible for gun control following the Port Arthur massacre and thus made Australia one of the safest countries in the world. Many respect him for that.
The false “science” aired by climatologists (with little understanding of physics) can be demolished with a small gadget called a vortex tube which you can read about on Wikipedia. Air flowing in a helical motion down this tube develops a temperature gradient along each radius, being much colder in the center and hotter at the outside circumference. The temperature differential is caused at the molecular level by centrifugal force, and exactly the same process happens in the lower layer of the Earth’s atmosphere called the troposphere, due to the effect of gravity. This raises the surface temperature – a fact apparently forgotten or never learned by James Hansen who was the ring-leader in promulgating since the 1980’s what has become the greatest error in the history of science in terms of wasted money and even human lives. Basically, for lack of anything else that he could think of, Hansen thought the elevated surface temperature must be caused by radiation from the colder atmosphere somehow heating the warmer surface – and the conjecture stuck despite there being absolutely no established physics supporting it. So they manipulated standard physics to “explain” it and started teaching such to generations of gullible climatology students who were shielded from the real world of physics, thermodynamics in particular. The whole radiation paradigm is just simply wrong.
http://climate-change-theory.com