by Judith Curry
“The current thinking and approaches guiding this conceptualization and description have been shown to lack scientific rigour, the consequence being that climate change risk and uncertainties are poorly presented. The climate change field needs to strengthen its risk science basis, to improve the current situation.” – Norwegian risk scientist Terje Aven
For decision-makers, climate change is a problem in risk assessment and management. Climate change is a risk because it may affect prosperity and security in a negative way, and because its consequences are uncertain.
Global climate change policy has been dominated by a specific strategy of risk management – the Precautionary Principle as a justification for setting specific targets for the elimination of manmade emissions of carbon dioxide. In the early 1980s, the United Nations Environmental Program (UNEP) became bullish on the idea that fossil fuels would produce dangerous climate change. The prospect of eliminating fossil fuels was congruent with UNEP’s broader interests in environmental quality and world governance. At Villach in 1985 at the beginning of the climate treaty movement, the policy movement to eliminate fossil fuels became detached from any moorings in the science – the rhetoric of precaution argued that we should act anyway to eliminate fossil fuels, just in case. This perspective became codified by the 1992 UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) Treaty in 1992, the Kyoto Protocol in 1997 and the 2015 Paris Climate Agreement.
Instead of framing the IPCC assessments around risk assessment, the IPCC reports narrowly framed its assessments to support the UNFCCC policies, focusing on dangerous climate change associated with fossil fuel emissions. The torquing of climate science and the manufacture of a consensus around dangerous human-caused climate change not only oversimplified the scientific and social challenges, but led to the adoption of a “predict then act” strategy to manage and control, supporting decisions about elimination of fossil fuel emissions that were begun in the 1980’s. The congruence of the IPCC assessments and UNFCCC policies enforces the belief that climate change is a simple or tame problem, with science trumping all practical questions and conflicting values and purposes.
This strategy of risk management implies that climate change is a simple, tame problem of “dose-response.” This characterization has led to the relative neglect of climate risk in formal assessment processes such as the IPCC. It is only in their most recent assessment report, AR6, that a consistent risk framing of climate change was attempted (it will be interesting to see what this looks like in the forthcoming WGII, III reports). As a result of the early adoption of a preferred risk management strategy, we are far from a complete assessment of full climate risk.
By characterizing climate change as a well-understood problem with a strong consensus, traditional risk management approaches assume that climate change can and ought to be rationally managed, or at the very least contained, and preferably eliminated. However, the diversity of climate-related impact drivers and their complex linkages, various inherent and irreducible uncertainties, ambiguities about the consequences of climate change, and the unequal distribution of exposure and effects across geography and time, confound any simple or uncontested application of traditional risk management approaches. As a result, the policy process that has evolved over the past several decades is not only inadequate to deal with the risks associated with climate change, but has fueled societal controversies around climate risk.
Risk has often been characterized as some type of statistical expected value – the product of the likelihood of occurrence and the impact. However, such a characterization is appropriate only for simple, or tame, problems. Broader definitions of risk integrate specified consequences of an event or actions, a measure of uncertainty associated with the consequences, and the strength of the knowledge base that supports the assessment.
Accepting the IPCC’s assessments as the “best available” knowledge base is not inconsistent with acknowledging significant weaknesses in the knowledge base in context of climate risk analysis. An important element of characterizing risk is evaluating the strength of the knowledge base. Concerns about strength of the knowledge base are raised by people questioning aspects of the IPCC’s assessment that are used to infer climate risk. The IPCC approach is based on judgement of the available evidence and agreement among experts. More sophisticated knowledge characterizations for risk management (Aven 2017b) include:
- the degree to which the assumptions made are reasonable/realistic – growing concern about the focus on implausible emissions scenarios RCP8.5/SSP5-8.5.
- the degree to which data/information exists and are reliable and relevant – the historical and paleo data base is inadequate for a full, global characterization of natural climate variability on multi-decadal to millennial time scales
- the degree to which there is disagreement among experts (including those from different environments) – attempts to suppress disagreement and alternative perspectives among experts
- the degree to which the phenomena involved are understood and accurate models exist – concerns about the fidelity and utility of climate models.
- the degree to which the knowledge has been thoroughly examined with respect to unknown knowns (i.e. others, but not the analysis group, have the knowledge) – neglect of the unknown knowns associated with natural climate variability.
The politics of international climate governance has produced systematic biases in the kinds of expertise and evidence that are deemed appropriate for consideration. (Lucas) The UNFCCC and IPCC have characterized climate change as an environmental and economic problem, and geoscientists and economists have dominated the assessment and policy making process.
However, the issues with the current CO2 increase and warming are social, not environmental. The Earth has undergone geological periods of higher temperatures and atmospheric CO2 concentrations, during which life thrived. Characterization of climate change as an environmental problem has downplayed the cultural and political dimensions of the issue. Many social scientists have argued that the disciplinary constrictions imposed by the IPCC and UNFCCC have neglected many important insights arising from a wide range of expert and unaccredited sources.
A risk assessment for a problem such as climate change – with high levels of complexity, uncertainty and ambiguity – must include the following elements (King et al. 2015):
- Clarify objectives of the risk analysis – the dangers or values at risk
- Take a holistic view of all relevant factors
- Identify the biggest risks – the plausible worst-case scenarios
- Be explicit about value judgements
Values and dangers
One of the biggest problems associated with climate change risk assessments is that there is no simple way to articulate danger associated with a warmer climate. However, in attempting to build political will for the international treaties, the adverse impacts of fossil-fuel driven warming have been exaggerated – severe weather/climate events, sea level rise and many adverse ecosystem, health, economic and geopolitical impacts, with all of their complex causes, were confounded with fossil-fuel driven warming. Further, the risks from fossil fuel emissions have not been placed in the appropriate context of other global and regional risks.
A key element of risk assessment is to judge whether activities are acceptable, tolerable, or intolerable. Activities are tolerable if they are considered as worth pursuing for the associated benefits. For tolerable risks, efforts for risk reduction or coping are welcomed provided that the benefits of the activities are not lost. Burning fossil fuels has historically been considered a tolerable risk. Genuinely intolerable risks include existential threats – such as portrayed by the earth-impacting comet in the move Don’t Look Up – or “ruin” problems. For less dire threats that are considered intolerable, notwithstanding the benefits, risk management should be focused on banning or phasing out the activity creating the risk or, if that is not possible, to mitigate or fight the risk in other ways or to increase societal resilience.
How to draw the lines between “acceptable”, “tolerable” and “intolerable’’ is one of the most controversial tasks in the risk governance process for complex risks. Ambiguity results from divergent and contested perspectives on the justification, severity or wider meanings associated with a perceived threat (Stirling 2003). Climate change risks have been characterized as acceptable, tolerable and intolerable by different individuals and constituencies – clearly an ambiguous situation. “Ambiguity” means that there are different legitimate viewpoints from which to evaluate whether there are, or could be, adverse effects and whether these risks are tolerable. Ambiguity results from divergent and contested perspectives on the justification, severity or wider meanings associated with a perceived threat (Stirling 2003).
Subjective value judgments are inherent both in identifying what constitutes a risk, and in deciding how much we care about it. All formal climate change risk assessments are structured by underlying values and normative goals that are sometimes explicit but often hidden. These values include societal attitudes to the intrinsic value of nature, misperceptions of risk, and implicit judgements on the acceptability or aversion to inequality in society.
Judgments of intolerable risks from climate change relate to mistakenly conflating the slow creep of global warming with consequences associated with extreme weather and climate events, concerns about inequitable risk exposure to poorer populations, and concerns about future generations.
Climate change risk includes elements of both incremental risk (e.g. the slow creep of sea level rise) and emergency risk. Emergency risks are associated with extreme weather events; technically these are weather risks and not climate risks, even if global warming could be shown to incrementally worsen the weather hazard. Weather risk can become climate risk if global warming causes the event to exceed a vulnerability threshold that otherwise wouldn’t have been exceeded by the weather event. Attempts are also made to assess incremental costs/damages associated with extreme weather events. Such assessments are very challenging to make against the background of natural weather and climate variability.
Removing the risk from most extreme weather and climate events from the consequences of global warming diminishes the perceived urgency for reducing fossil fuel emissions. Mischaracterizing incremental risks as urgent has led to policies that are not only costly and suboptimal, but also arguably reduce resilience. The poorest populations would benefit far more from access to grid electricity and help in reducing vulnerability from extreme weather events, than from reductions to the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere.
Moralizing surrounding the issue of climate change has regarded the climate change problem as a simple, righteous values choice: Are you for the planet or against it? This moralizing neglects to understand that people engage in activities which are of value to them that happen to emit carbon as a byproduct. Further, this narrow moralizing systematically excludes important ethical values, such as improving the lives of the billion people presently living in unacceptable poverty or protecting other aspects of the environment.
The question of intergenerational equity (concerns about the grandchildren) is of special importance as there is a lag between the emissions of greenhouse gases and the occurrence of the damage. There is no simple way to decide what duty of care we owe to future generations, but the IPCC’s socioeconomic pathways for the 21st century all have the world being better off by 2100, even under the most extreme emissions scenarios.
With this context, we need a broader ethical debate about what the consequences of climate change will be for what we humans have reason to value so that we can take credible actions to protect them. This requires an equally careful consideration of beneficial as well as adverse consequences.
Holistic view of plausible worst-case scenarios
The IPCC assessments have focused on the likely range of warming, sea level rise and other impact drivers. As I have discussed in many previous blog posts, the IPCC scenarios of 21st century climate do not provide a holistic perspective on 21st century climate change – they neglect a range of plausible scenarios of solar variability, volcanic eruptions, and multi-decadal to millennial natural internal variability. Their interpretation of extreme weather and climate events is drawn from data since 1950 – ignoring longer historical data sets and paleo climate data sets.
The bottom line is that the IPCC has not provided a complete set of plausible scenarios of 21st climate change outcomes. While models can be useful for understanding complex systems, factors that fall outside the consideration of a model should not be ignored. When a system is impossible to model in a meaningful way, scenarios may be developed to imagine its possible future states.
In addition to the risks associated with increased CO2 concentrations and the risks of rapidly transitioning away from fossil fuels, there is a need to recognized that natural climate variability and change along with extreme weather and climate events have equally important societal impacts. Further, human-caused climate change also includes emissions of non-CO2 greenhouse gases and aerosol particles plus land use changes.
For the first time in the AR6, attention is given to identifying worst case outcomes, beyond its misguided focus on the implausible RCP8.5/SSP5-8.5 emissions scenarios. The AR6 treatment of sea level rise is exemplary in this regard, clarifying the strength of the knowledge base associated with different extreme scenarios. The AR6 focus on regional climate change rightfully pulls away from the previous strategy of climate model generated scenarios as being adequate for this purpose, with a growing emphasis on physically-based storyline scenarios. The historical data record, especially when it extends back into the 19th century, is arguably the richest source of extreme weather and climate scenarios for the 21st century.
How to assess the plausibility of scenarios involving a high level risk is a topic that has received too little attention.
Transition risk
Social amplification of risk can occur via responses to perceived outcomes, either in anticipation or in reaction.
The UNFCCC in its urgent drive for NETZERO emissions ignores transition risk. Consequences of a rapid transition to renewable energy include the economic costs of the transition, adverse environmental impacts associated with wind and solar energy and biofuels, impacts of the intermittency of renewable energy on energy reliability and cost, more complex and extensive electricity transmission infrastructure with a larger number of failure nodes, decrease in energy security, the extensive need for rare earth minerals and the associated changes in geopolitics. These consequences of the transition are associated with a fairly solid knowledge base, leading many people to be more concerned about transition risks than they are about the more uncertain risks from climate change itself, with a far weaker knowledge base. The debate is then between tolerable but potentially unnecessary imposition of risks from the rapid transition away from fossil fuels, versus the highly uncertain impacts from climate change that are assessed as ranging from acceptable to intolerable by different individuals, countries and organizations.
The biggest risk from a rapid transition away from fossil fuels is arguably an opportunity cost – we are at risk of squandering our resources on effort that may not change the climate in a meaningful way, so that we do not have resources available for better solutions that improve human well-being in both the short and long terms. Further, we are ignoring other risks that are arguably more important to near-term human well being that could be more productively addressed with the same resources.
Conclusions
The UNFCCC is promoting a solution to an exceedingly complex, uncertain and ambiguous problem, without the context of an adequate risk assessment that references the wider ethical issues and political and practical feasibility. As a result, we have neglected to truly understand the the climate system and the broader causes of vulnerabilities of human and natural systems, and to systematically and broadly evaluate the feasible policy space.
The end result is that after 30 years of the UNFCCC/IPCC, we are fixated on the minutiae of greenhouse gas emissions levels and the abstract and impossible problem of constraining atmospheric CO2 concentration – while ignoring natural climate variability and drastically simplifying the human side. As long as the current situation prevails, the IPCC’s assessments of anthropogenic climate change and the UNFCCC recommendations for action will remain seriously inadequate.
It seems to me the main problem is that we can’t quantify how much of the increasing CO2 is due to natural sources and how much is due to mankind’s emissions. If it’s mostly due to natural sources trying to reduce mankind’s emissions would have very little effect on the global CO2 levels.
Peter Yates – I would suggest that the greater problems are that we don’t know how much of the late 20thC warming was natural and how much from CO2. The IPCC and modellers have assumed it’s all CO2.
No, the IPCC lists a number of forcings besides CO2. For example, methane is getting a lot of attention now. The focus on CO2 is itself an error.
Given that the IPCC is just presenting one side in the debate, it is at most half of the knowledge base, if that.
Mike Jonas. Can I refer you to the paper “The Impact of CO2 and Other Greenhouse Gases on Equilibrium Earth Temperatures”. By using the HITRAN data base of gaseous IR spectra it is possible to calculate with some precision the impact of the atmospheric greenhouse gases on the current earth temperatures. One result of this exercise is that the warming of the earth since the start of the industrial revolution due to the increase in atmospheric CO2 from 280ppm to the current 420ppm is shown to be just 0.24degC. Any further warming is due to other natural causes. http://www.ijaos.org/article/298/10.11648.j.ijaos.20210502.12 .
What is most telling in that regard is the information posted in the NOAA Research News from April 2021. In that report they boldly assert that:
“The global surface average for carbon dioxide (CO2), calculated from measurements collected at NOAA’s remote sampling locations, was 412.5 parts per million (ppm) in 2020, rising by 2.6 ppm during the year. The global rate of increase was the fifth-highest in NOAA’s 63-year record, following 1987, 1998, 2015 and 2016. The annual mean at NOAA’s Mauna Loa Observatory in Hawaii was 414.4 ppm during 2020.”
In the very next sentence, they declare:
“The economic recession was estimated to have reduced carbon emissions by about 7 percent during 2020.”
Here is the link to that site: https://research.noaa.gov/article/ArtMID/587/ArticleID/2742/Despite-pandemic-shutdowns-carbon-dioxide-and-methane-surged-in-2020
So, if the human CO2 load decreases, yet the total load increases (by near record levels, to boot), then that tells me that the natural loading processes dwarf the anthropogenic loading processes!
As a famous bard once said, “Something is rotten in the state of Denmark.”
I agree, current practice seems to under estimate natural sources, I’d recommend measuring Co2 concentration across plate boundaries and spreading centers like the mid Atlantic ridge. Check out the 2016 paper “Globally Significant CO2 Emissions from Katla” in Iceland. Perhaps the scientists should be measuring the ratio of Co2 to Helium or Co2 to Argon. If these ratios are the same then Co2 is coming mostly from the earth’s mantle, not from the burning of fossil fuel.
gekeyser – are you aware of how to distinguish natural from anthropogenic sources of CO2 based on their isotopes of carbon?
If not this would be a good time to learn..
Art Viterito
So, if the human CO2 load decreases, yet the total load increases (by near record levels, to boot), then that tells me that the natural loading processes dwarf the anthropogenic loading processes!
No it doesn’t. At all.
Think again.
Judith: If logging here with my Facebook ID is the only way to get comments emailed to me, but your site always says
“Error: your Facebook login has expired.”
even after I’ve logged into Facebook again with a new password, how am I ever supposed to get comments by email?
Requesting comments by email when I log in with WordPress or Twitter doesn’t work — I never get a email about confirmation.
Would you please help? Thanks.
A 7% reduction in carbon [dioxide] emissions is minor. Think of it this way: we still had 93% of the previous year’s emissions.
Peter Yates 3:56 pm :
“It seems to me the main problem is that we can’t quantify how much of the increasing CO2 is due to natural sources and how much is due to mankind’s emissions.”
What you mean we, Peter?
Perhaps you should enroll in Andy Dressler’s undergraduate climatology course at Texas A&M before pontificating further.
He did a splendid job of educating Joe Rogan’s audience last week:
“https://vvattsupwiththat.blogspot.com/2022/02/koonin-is-acting-as-defense-attorney.html
Here’s a link to Dressler’s response to Koonin on The Joe Rogan Experience
https://vvattsupwiththat.blogspot.com/2022/02/koonin-is-acting-as-defense-attorney.html
“The current thinking and approaches guiding this conceptualization and description have been shown to lack scientific rigour, the consequence being that climate change risk and uncertainties are poorly presented. The climate change field needs to strengthen its risk science basis, to improve the current situation.” – Norwegian risk scientist Terje Aven
Climate is an angry beast at which we are poking sticks. And there isn’t much scientific debate about that. I’d be surprised if Judith Curry, Steve Koonin or Andrew Dessler objected. It is behaviour exhibited by the broad class of complex dynamical systems as observed over a very long time. .
https://watertechbyrie.files.wordpress.com/2014/06/bifurcations.png
Anthropogenic changes to land systems and emissions of greenhouse gases to the atmosphere are changes in control variables that drive the climate system towards the next threshold. There is no devil in the detail – climate is bound to shift dramatically – although precisely when, how and by how much is not even theoretically calculable.
‘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 (see ref. 26).’ https://www.pnas.org/content/104/21/8709
Robert I Ellison: define “climate change risk.”
Risk is the dictionary definition – and climate happens as regimes and transitions.
Pingback: How we have mischaracterized climate risk – Climate- Science.press
Extreme weather has been mischaracterized, with the assumption that climate change leads to changes in the weather. The UK Met Office suggest that heatwaves like 2003 and 2018 will likely occur every other year by 2050. The discrete solar forcing of those heat events is precisely what is missing from their climate models.
Ulric Lyons wrote:
Extreme weather has been mischaracterized
How so?
Be specific. Be scientific. Cite peer reviewed science.
Comment from a grammar nazi: The plural of 1980 (used to indicate the decade) is 1980s, not 1980’s).
Alas, I have a proof-reader’s eye and pick up many errors in the media etc. Sadly, my proffered corrections are not always well-received. But we must struggle on.
Thank you again, Dr. Curry.
The selling of Climate Change policies has the same distortions as some of the selling of COVID19 mitigations (mitigations I mostly support, BTW).
But in the case of climate science, the field is also corrupted as best I can tell: want to get a good faculty position? Toe the line. Want to get your work in the journals? Toe the line. And there is a huge amount of money out there for those who go along with the consensus.
At least with COVID19, there is less corruption. Climatology, at least as applied to climate change, seems to be a cult, not a science. I know there is probably some very good science being done in the niches – model parameterizations, perhaps paleoclimatology. But the system is not set up to do science in the Hopper sense, it is to behave like bureaucrats with bureaucratic incentives, as best I can tell.
Mesoctye wrote:
But in the case of climate science, the field is also corrupted as best I can tell: want to get a good faculty position? Toe the line. Want to get your work in the journals? Toe the line.
I bet you can’t provide one iota of evidence to back up your claim.
Which is why your commented anonymously, like a cowar.d
“Activities are tolerable if they are considered as worth pursuing for the associated benefits.”
Chauncey Starr of EPRI made the point years ago that people are willing to accept risk if there is a perceived benefit. He provided a semi-log graph showing examples as a curvilinear relationship. If plotted as a log-log graph, the relationship falls along a straight line, demonstrating that the more the perceived subjective benefit, the more risk people tolerate.
A major problem is that the perceived benefit and risk from anthropogenic CO2 emissions are not objectively communicated to the public by the Media. Thus, most people are risk averse to something that they don’t think has benefits!
Whether the MSM is behaving out of ignorance, or have a political agenda, they are not properly serving society with their actions.
Perhaps someone could tell us just WHO is in current CO2-related danger from WHAT, WHERE, and show your math.
To assist you, here is a list of dangers that we are NOT currently facing …
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2021/04/25/wheres-the-emergency/
Virtually every one of the serial climate doomcasts of the last fifty years has crashed and burned … there are no drowned atolls, no sunken cities, no millions of climate refugees, no ice-free arctic, no “end of snow”.
Near as I can tell, the “perceived risk” is just that—perceived, not real.
Meanwhile, the benefits of a warmer world with more CO2 are obvious. A 10% greening, longer growing seasons, more ice-free ports, and since there are more deaths from excess cold than excess heat, fewer deaths.
Finally, as Dr. Judith points out, folks are using the “Precautionary Principle” to guide choices … but they are using it in a totally incorrect manner. See below.
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/12/31/climate-caution-and-precaution/
My best to all,
w.
> Near as I can tell, the “perceived risk” is just that—perceived, not real.
That’s pretty meaningless. Remember when you said there was no real risk of a higher than 0.085% population fatality?
What you mean to say is that you perceive the risk at a different level than others. One would think your previous overconfidence would have taught you that this idea you have that you’re the arbiter of what’s real and perceived risk was a misconception.
Ah, Joshua, the musician who knows only one tune—”Willis made an early preliminary estimate of COVID deaths and was wrong.” Yes, I was. My estimate was way low.
And?
What on earth does that have to do with what I just wrote? I said it seems to me the risk is more perceived than real … but your response doesn’t refer to a single one of the issues I raised or answer the questions I posed.
It’s just more of your eternal “I hate Willis and all his works” … perhaps you don’t realize just how petty and foolish that makes you look.
But heck, Joshua … you do you. The world goes on around you, and sadly, it’s passing you by while you’re stuck in hating on me. They say “haters gonna hate”, but I don’t think that’s true. I think you could free yourself of that albatross around your neck … but first you have to want to move on. Hating someone is like taking poison and thinking your enemy will die—it’s corrosive to your soul.
With sincere wishes that you can let go of your bitterness,
w.
PS—Regarding my incorrect prediction about COVID deaths, I do my best to live by the immortal words of Theodore Roosevelt:
“It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles or where the doer of deeds could have done them better.
The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows the great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.”
Willis –
You so frequently go there. Don’t be snowflake-y
Just because I criticize some of your comments doesn’t mean I “hate” you. I’ve never met you. I’m sure you’re a nice enough fella.
But you sometimes get out over your skis. That’s OK. Everyone does that sometimes.
And yes, you got waaaaaay out over your skis on the pandemic. You thought you expertly quantified the risk, the difference between “real” and “perceived” risk on an important topic – how many people would die. Topics don’t get a lot more important than that. But you were waaaaaay wrong. And then you tried to come up with lame excuses diminishing your error.
So once again, my point isn’t just that you were wrong. Everyone gets things wrong. My point is that in the past you were overconfident in your understanding of your own ability for risk assessment.
My recommendation is this: Just say that you assess the risks differently than others. There’s a lot of uncertainty here. There’s lots of room for disagreement without having to go to your happy place of overestimating your abilities. With all the uncertainty there’s a wide band of risk. Don’t try to argue that you have some gift for assessing the difference between “real” and “perceived” risk. That’s a very tricky thing to do in some objective or empirical fashion
That’s exactly what got you into an embarrassing spot with your waaaaaay wrong predictions about an important issue related to the pandemic. You thought you knew the difference between “real” and “perceived” risk then also. But you were wrong. You didn’t. You could have just said then also something as simple as you assessed the risks differently than others.
Respect the uncertainty.
Joshua – at least Willis has some skis. You are sliding down the mountain bare-footed. Your ad hom attacks are devoid of any relation to the subject matter. All you have is niggles, obfuscation, and lies. You drag down the quality of this blog.
Willis is correct. Joshie’s persona is to stalk people he doesnt like and try to discredit with past ‘errors.’ Doesn’t matter if like Willis they are usually right. It’s schoolyard stuff by someone who is often wrong and routinely lies about or misrepresents what his targets say. I second what jim2 said. In the recent past josh has been called out by at least half a dozen commenters for falsehoods, lies, and troll-like responses.
Joshua
James Joyce wrote ‘errors are the portals of discovery.’
We all make mistakes, it depends on whether you admit to them or not, and then, more importantly, use the information highlighted by the error to enter the portal.
Willis writes many articles. He likes the internet because things are peer reviewed quickly. Invariably, if he makes a mistake, he admits it and writes a new article incorporating what he has learnt.
The Royal Society on being founded in 1659 acknowledged the many grey areas with its motto, ‘Nullius in verba’ which, as you know, translates as ‘take nobody’s word as final’.
Good advice in many areas of life and one that sceptics adhere to.
Wills will continue to make mistakes, as will most of us when researching and writing about often complex matters.. He will also no doubt continue to correct them.
Hope you are keeping well
tonyb
Hi Tony –
Indeed, we all make mistakes and I am certainly not immune.
Making mistakes is an opportunity to learn. In this case Willis’ first reaction when his mistake was pointed out was to block me from Twitter. His second was a ridiculous and illogical diminishment of the mistake. Both bad ways to deal with error – but in the end he has openly acknowledged the error and stopped diminishing it, so in that sense maybe he has come around. Accountability is a critical step in dealing with error.
But there’s still a related problem reflected in his comment here: an imprudent overconfidence in his ability to determine what is “real” and what is “perceived” risk. Repeating that same overconfidence, as he did with his waaaay erroneous covid prediction, suggests actually he didn’t learn from his error.
All he needed to do was say he perceives the risks differently than others.
This idea that the risks he perceives are “real” whereas the risks others perceive are only “perceived” is silly. And it fundamentally ignores the full range of risks and the amount of uncertainty related to climate change. No doubt he sees some risks as lower than others do, and he sees other risks as higher than others do. That doesn’t grant him some gift of determining what risks are “real.”
And this philosophizing about the nature of errors in life does all seem like a smokescreen to me.
Willis also isn’t alone in treating subjective assessment of risk as if it’s an objective assessment. In fact, I’d say that tendency is a big problem on both sides of the climate change divide and may be the most problematic aspect of how we, as a society, collectively deal with climate change and other polarizing issues.
Your characterization of Willis is just more unrelenting niggling and innuendo on your part Joshua. The time taken to read your response is a waste. Willis made it clear that his classification of risks were in his OPINION! Maybe you should take a break for some reading comprehension courses.
jim –
> Willis made it clear that his classification of risks were in his OPINION!
Right. It’s his opinion that the risks he thinks are real are real, and the risks other people think are real are merely “perceived.”
I think it makes much more sense to just look at it as he assesses the risks differently than others, not that he has the ability to discern between “real” and “perceived” risks. In doing so, he’s ignoring the range of uncertainty and the range of risks. He’s ignoring that perception of risk always implies some subjectivity, some value judgements, some impact of perspective. He’s trying to impose some kind of false binary distinction onto a complicated matrix (which, just by coincidence?, happens to align with his opinions across a wide range of issues)?
Again, we have previous experience with this, where he confindently assessed a hard line of risk from COVID. That’s how he described it, as a universal and hard line of risk. But he was waaaaay wrong in that assessment.
So the question I’m asking is what did he learn from that experience? Did he merely learn that he, like eveyone else, makes errors? If so, that’s a pretty trivial lesson to learn. I think the more interesting question is to think about WHY he made such a stark error in risk assessment. Wouldn’t ‘that be a process that we should all apply? For example, when you thought the Seth Rich conspiracy stories might be valid, or the Sidney Powell “kraken” stories about election fraud might be credible – did you later assess WHY you thought such implausible theories might, in fact, be plausible?
> Willis made it clear that his classification of risks were in his OPINION!
Right. It’s his opinion that the risks he thinks are real are real, and the risks other people think are real are merely “perceived.”
I think it makes much more sense to just look at it as he assesses the risks differently than others, not that he has the ability to discern between “real” and “perceived” risks. In doing so, he’s ignoring the range of uncertainty and the range of risks. He’s ignoring that perception of risk always implies some subjectivity, some value judgements, some impact of perspective. He’s trying to impose some kind of false binary distinction onto a complicated matrix (which, just by coincidence?, happens to align with his opinions across a wide range of issues)?
Again, we have previous experience with this, where he confindently assessed a hard line of risk from COVID. That’s how he described it, as a universal and hard line of risk. But he was waaaaay wrong in that assessment.
So the question I’m asking is what did he learn from that experience? Did he merely learn that he, like everyone else, makes errors? If so, that’s a pretty trivial lesson to learn. I think the more interesting question is to think about WHY he made such a stark error in risk assessment. Wouldn’t ‘that be a process that we should all apply? For example, when you thought the S*th R*ch conspiracy stories might be valid, or the Sidney Powell “kr*ken” stories about election fraud might be credible – did you later assess WHY you thought such implausible theories might, in fact, be plausible?
Speaking of WRONG!
Claim- mask and vaccination mandates reduce spread and lower the risk of death.
Let’s compare New York and Florida, which had opposite approaches to mandates during the Omicron wave from Dec. 1 through Feb 7.
CDC data:
New York (mask and vaccine mandate + vaccine passports)
Cases: 2,100,000
Deaths: 8,238
Florida, a larger population and a higher percent of old people, (note that this based off cummulative and ends on the 7th, so the daily count method FL uses has no impact):
Cases: 1,980,000
Deaths: 6,310
climatereason wrote:
Willis writes many articles. He likes the internet because things are peer reviewed quickly.
LOL.
Clearly you have no idea what peer review is.
It’s not done by monkeys or sheep.
jeffnsails850 wrote:
Claim- mask and vaccination mandates reduce spread and lower the risk of death.
No one has had vaccine mandates so we can toss that out.
Here’s a comparison: Washington and Oregon have had hard mask mandates since early in the pandemic. And they have indeed fared much better than average compared to the other states. Here are the state-by-state data:
https://davidappell.blogspot.com/2022/01/latest-covid-19-case-and-death-rates-by.html
davidappell02 | February 24, 2022 at 2:23 pm |
jeffnsails850 wrote:
Claim- mask and vaccination mandates reduce spread and lower the risk of death.
No one has had vaccine mandates so we can toss that out.
Here’s a comparison: Washington and Oregon have had hard mask mandates since early in the pandemic. And they have indeed fared much better than average compared to the other states. Here are the state-by-state data:
https://davidappell.blogspot.com/2022/01/latest-covid-19-case-and-death-rates-by.html
Appell – I would think you would be capable of using a valid metric – or at least recognizing a valid metric.
Try covid deaths by age group, especially in the 65+ age group. You will find the delta between states quite small. But hey – lets cherrypick data and/metrics to promote an agenda driven conclusion
Willis & Jishua debate.
Joshua wrote “Everyone gets things wrong”.
Show us data, Joshua.
Wiiis admitted some things he got wrong.
What things did you get wrong, to enable your comment.
FWIW, I am hard pressed to find anything I got wrong in these blog comments. Geoff S
Willis Eschenbach wrote:
Perhaps someone could tell us just WHO is in current CO2-related danger from WHAT, WHERE, and show your math.
Seriously??
It’s called the IPCC 5AR WG2 – Impacts, Adaptation and Vulnerability.
And the danger is published in scientific papers ALL THE TIME. Literally ALL THE TIME.
But people like you Willis will always ignore all of that and always ask ludicrous questions like this as if that information has never been provided, because you have no interest in seeing it or reading it and, for some reason, every interest in ignoring it.
Why do you ignore all that information, Willis?
The event at the core of a climate risk analysis is abrupt and catastrophic change. An emergent state triggered by small changes in forcing. Reducing anthropogenic pressures is the goal of the 2 degree C target of the Paris accord – as the current diplomatic framework. The body of the accord is the country commitments. In these the developing world commits to building out clean, cheap, modern, efficient coal and gas generation until something better comes alone. A comforting social inertia.
I have been an ESG professional for decades. I’ve been seeing that term again. A lithium mine in Western Australia – Pilbara Minerals is sitting on a massive resource and a cheap and efficient processing chain – electrical transmission lines from Canada to New York, a new accounting standard for sustainability announced. In practice it means knowing what you are impacting on in cultural, economic, aesthetic, religious, environmental or scientific terms, avoiding the worst conflicts and conserving downstream environments. Accountants and investors love it and it saves money in the long run.
https://www.cfainstitute.org/en/research/esg-investing#:~:text=ESG%20stands%20for%20Environmental%2C%20Social,material%20risks%20and%20growth%20opportunities.&text=This%20guide%20takes%20fiduciary%20duty,important%20ESG%20issues%20into%20account.
A new focus on soil health for food security emerged in Paris. Increased agricultural productivity, increased downstream processing and access to markets build local economies and global wealth. Economic growth provides resources for solving problems – conserving and restoring ecosystems, better sanitation and safer water, better health and education, updating the diesel fleet and other productive assets to emit less black carbon and reduce the health and environmental impacts, developing better and cheaper ways of producing electricity, replacing cooking with wood and dung with better ways of preparing food thus avoiding respiratory disease and again reducing black carbon emissions. A global program of agricultural soils restoration is the foundation for balancing the human ecology. That and a global program of ecosystem conservation and restoration.
Sounds like Pascal’s wager, which is irrational. There is no known risk of the sort you describe. It is pure speculation, which is not a basis for action, certainly not the action you refer to.
Abrupt climate change is the dominant scientific paradigm and is the foundation of the 2 degree C Paris target. The evidence is far too strong to be dismissed without a much stronger case than David makes.
RIE, where can I find the math of this scientific paradigm?
Abrupt climate change is the dominant paradigm and will happen regardless. The CO2 effect is at least as likely to prevent it is it is to cause it. There’s no reason for aggressive action. In fact aggressive action is more likely to cause problems than climate change itself.
https://mobile.twitter.com/aaronshem/status/1126891475822891009
The evidence is all too apparent. Observation and experimentation are key.
e.g. https://history.aip.org/climate/rapid.htm#:~:text=The%20changes%20had%20been%20rapid,not%20a%20world%2Dwide%20phenomenon.
We are a long way from having a definitive mathematics of spatiotemporal chaos at the climate scale. I could discuss mathematical approaches to chaos – and these are not the math of nonlinear ODE – but it is clearly a bridge too far for George. But here’s an example involving ’empirical dynamic modeling’,
https://www.quantamagazine.org/chaos-theory-in-ecology-predicts-future-populations-20151013/#:~:text=Sugihara's%20technique%20predicted%20a%20run,deploy%20in%20the%20coming%20season.
‘The CO2 effect is at least as likely to prevent it is it is to cause it.’ Aaron
Let’s examine that. Greenhouse gas warming is at least as likely to increase thermohaline circulation as to reduce it? No – it doesn’t work that way in physical systems.
But there are many other systems. Increased ocean evaporation and land falling precip are key. Non agricultural fertilization. Subsistence and organic farming are probably dependent on rising CO2.
I am far more afraid that we cannot sustain adequate emissions than I am of climate change. Sinks are increasing faster than emissions. Previous interglacials were warmer, CO2 & CH4 did not increase despite much more thawing of permafrost & warmer oceans
https://mobile.twitter.com/aaronshem/status/1448594973994242055
Also, increased wildlife (this is likely much bigger than agricultural effects) Particularly sea life. CO2 and fertilizer run off (despite some areas sometimes being stressed too much at times) have probably kept fish populations up and help whales, walruses, polar bears, etc recover and reduces stress on fished species.
Increased CO2 has probably helped corals more than hurt them.
I suspect some portion of sea level rise will be mitigated by increased transfer to land by both increased evaporation from ocean and storage on land from fertilization. Much of it will be in plants, fats, and carbohydrates. There is an obesity epidemic in the natural world, far from man.
https://www.livescience.com/10277-obesity-rise-animals.html
https://phys.org/news/2018-01-discrepancies-satellite-global-storage.html
https://archive.news.iupui.edu/releases/2016/02/drylands-global-greening.shtml
https://www.sciencealert.com/the-spread-of-cities-is-causing-many-mammal-species-to-get-bigger
I may write something on tipping points. Starting with the chemistry of eutrophication.
“Big whirls have little whirls that feed on their velocity, and little whirls have lesser whirls and so on to viscosity.”—Lewis Fry Richardson
Quite literally as seen in the Navier-Stokes equation.
‘In the late 1950s, a group in Chicago carried out tabletop “dishpan” experiments using a rotating fluid to simulate the circulation of the atmosphere. They found that a circulation pattern could flip between distinct modes.’ Spencer Weart – AIP rapid climate change
I have just come across this early video from the University of Chicago. I have watched it twice already. What an exciting life I live.
Everyone gets tipping points.
They are not a good reason to stop CO2 aggressively.
Stopping CO2 too fast is more likely to cause a bad tipping point than rising temps.
‘Stopping CO2 too fast is more likely to cause a bad tipping point than rising temps.’ Aaron
Tendentious nonsense.
> Characterization of climate change as an environmental problem has downplayed the cultural and political dimensions of the issue.
Casting climate change solely as a problem excludes the possibility of it being a benefit.
> This requires an equally careful consideration of beneficial as well as adverse consequences.
This needs to be said earlier in any discussion of climate change, CO2 and/or fossil fuels. Otherwise the discussion becomes all about the ‘problems’ or degrees of problem. This plays into the hands of the IPCC which has already assumed that fossil fuel CO2 emissions are a problem.
> While models can be useful for understanding complex systems, factors that fall outside the consideration of a model should not be ignored.
We should apply that logic, factors that fall outside the consideration of a model, to the underlying argument itself that fossil fuel CO2 emissions are a problem.
Thanks, Judith
“This requires an equally careful consideration of beneficial as well as adverse consequences.”
The global political establishment is the thousand pound gorilla crushing the policy scale towards adversity—we need the elephant in the room to assert itself, to rebalance the scale.
Reasserting what was gained from the age of enlightenment requires the will to defeat the authoritarian gorilla sitting on the scale.
Agree with Willis Eschenbach entirely.
Trust we are correct!
“Multiple international bodies have specified that the absence of scientific evidence of potential damage is not sufficient justification for taking risks. As the jurist Cass Sunstein points out, the precautionary principle is costly, and when interpreted strictly it can be paralyzing.” — Daniel Kahneman
“Nothing ventured, nothing gained.”
Precautionary principle: “Nothing ventured, nothing lost.”
But there is loss – opportunity loss.
“The biggest risk from a rapid transition away from fossil fuels is arguably an opportunity cost…”
Opportunity lost costs include building intermittent energy sources along with the considerable infrastructure necessary to transfer such energy to consumer at a time when other social demands such as education and health care require considerable resources themselves. When considering allocation of funds, political decisions are more likely than not will go towards health and education as observed recently in San Francisco and Virginia. Then the process of weighing climate adaptation with all other competing worthy agendas should fall to honing down to impactful actions. Using scare media exhortations, policies which if enacted, require consumeing the whole pie will not only become tiresome, but ineffective, and risk getting an even smaller piece for activists to squabble over, wasting time and money.
Things in this I am struggling with. The two largest anthropogenic climate factors must be land use and fossil fuel burning. Both are increasing and policy makers need to know, given the only partial and arm’s length control they exert because of the general reliance on free markets and industrial capitalism, if it’s OK to let them carry on. Surely it makes sense to focus on these risks as they are man made and can be controlled?
The other risks, emanating from long-term climate fluctuations of course need to be framed too, but we have no levers to pull other than mitigation,
In terms of time frames, changes to anthropogenic systems would take years after they were found to be long-term deleterious to planetary systems. I know of at least one study that shows a 30 year window after realising a resource limit will be reached the point of rapid collapse of the society relying on it. The conclusion was to start as soon as the realisation was solid. There is a lost of freedom in the system and stopping the free-for all must be difficult if not impossible.
I am intrigued too, by your use of we and your assumption that IPCC is the sole go-to body on climate risk when their job is to assess all available research doing none themselves. Surely there are many institutions who can weigh in on climate risk assessment. Are these being ignored by IPCC and if so, what stops government policy makers from listening to them anyway?
The sections of IPCC reports for Policy Makers suggest that IPCC is taking a narrow scientific view and leaving the rest up to the various sovereign entities of nations to, well, work it out as best they can, They have a lot to choose from.
The Swedes gave Nordhaus the economics prize for suggesting 6 degrees of warming would be a Goldilocks “just right” from an economic point of view.
So the “we” in the title seems to be, well,,, it¨s unclear to me who “we” are or if “we” exist in any real sense. Nations, or the scientific community, or capital owners or world citizens…..? And where are the entities missing the point. The MSM, economists? scientists? businesses?
XXXX a confused fan.
I am still right. Simple High School Science.
http://www.drroyspencer.com/wp-content/uploads/UAH_LT_1979_thru_January_2022_v6.jpg
6 months of net warming this century, commencing November 2015. One net warming event.
All the global temperature data sets show the same.
Changes in cloud cover caused by ENSO increases absorbed sunlight (short wave radiation) and causes a net warming.
Exactly the same ENSO warming occurred late 1997.
Go through the detail of the global temperature record, all the global warming has been associated with ENSO. It is all natural.
The earth has a short warming event then a long temperature hiatus. The pattern repeats its self over and over. The planet is in another temperature hiatus now,
The planet will not warm again unless we see another very strong el nino and there is no guarantee that a very strong el nino will occur anytime soon. It was 17 years between the very strong el nino in 1997/ 98 and the very strong el nino in 2015/16. In fact there has only been 3 net warming events in 40 years.
Also the Atlantic Multi-decadal Oscillation (AMO) has leveled off and will cool soon.
Its all natural.
Look at the global temperature data sets for yourself.
My thoughts about this article:
– I think too many people have been propagandized into believing that any change of climate, whether warmer or cooler, is bad, i.e., implicitly they assume the present climate is ideal. There’s no evidence that is true.
– In general, the idea of change induces anxiety in most people. People who are made anxious about the possible negative effects of climate change are more susceptible to political manipulation to achieve unrelated political and ideological goals.
– I think the term ‘risk assessment’ is biased towards a negative view of inevitable climate change. There are benefits to a warmer climate that should be characterized and balanced against both the current climate or a cooler climate.
– Benefits and detriments of a warmer climate would not be uniformly distributed on a geographic basis nor felt uniformly by all social classes. Geography can’t be changed. Prosperous people and regions inherently have greater economic ability to adapt to climate change (warmer or cooler). Poorer peoples and regions have much less ability to adapt to climate change. Therefore, benefits and detriments to poorer people should be prioritized over those to prosperous peoples. In this regard, restricting the use of abundant, cheap, energy-dense fossil fuels is devastating to poor peoples. There are a lot more poor people than prosperous people in the world.
– Uncertainties associated with climate data and models clearly need much more work and clarification before committing to massive societal changes in what could be a vain attempt to mitigate what could be natural climate changes.
– Based on what know about the planet’s climate history as deduced from proxy measurements, the current climate trend, if any, is neither an existential threat to life in general nor to humans in particular. It should not be characterized as a crisis. Doing so is a huge exaggeration of reality and transparently political.
– As has been advocated repeatedly on this site, we should be doing more fundamental research to increase our understanding of climate and less predicting and speculating based on models. We should be focused primarily on practicable measures to mitigate the impacts of extreme weather on the economy and human loss of life in the present.
Spot on!
What do you tell the world when you know the peak in fossil fuel production is fast approaching? Do you tell them that? Well, Jimmy Carter tried and it didn’t work. People will worry the day they cannot fill their gas tank. And if people would believed it now, it would trigger a massive financial and economical crisis. You tell them instead that CO2 from fossil fuels is so bad that we have to stop using them. It is just a hypothesis, but most scientists will support it if enough money is thrown their way. And then you just hope that by the time peak fossil fuels takes place sufficient energy is being obtained from other sources to keep civilization going.
By the way, peak oil took place November 2018. COVID has been very useful to hide it so far. And if COVID lessens then we can manufacture a little war somewhere, like Ukraine, to justify that things aren’t going back to normal.
The climate crisis is just a red herring. That’s why they don’t bother too much with risk analyses, or solutions that are not “net zero” fossil fuels. Risk is near zero and other solutions don’t address the real problem behind.
Javier, I’ll buy that the powers that be want to hide the end of oil, but why are they so down on nuclear? Do they not want a technological world?
The left in Europe has been anti-nuclear since always. Now the EU is trying to say nuclear is green before the lights go off. The really believed an industrialized civilization could be sustained on wind, solar and hydro. By the time they awake we will be back to candles.
Peak oil has been predicted many times, and every time those predictions have failed. One thing right now that limits oil production is governments push to implement green extremist energy policy. Another is a push by some hedge funds, banks, and other investors to deny funding to oil and gas companies. Under Trump before COVID, oil prices got to about $40 to abouot $80 max, and this with a very healthy economy. The oilfield at that time was relatively unfettered. Now oil companies know governments and activist investors around the world are out to get them. None of this means we have actually hit “peak oil.” I’m sure it must happen some day, but not today.
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2022/02/20/power-grab-at-the-federal-energy-regulatory-commission/
Also, the media currently are blaming $90+ /bbl oil on resurgence of demand. They ignore the jackboot of government and green extremist’s impact on production.
“… and every time those predictions have failed.”
No, they have generally been accurate, given the assumptions about what was being predicted. That is, Peak Oil predictions have been predicated on ‘conventional’ oil, which generally meant oil pooled in structural traps, and accessed by current technology. That is, the predictions were an extrapolation of what was known at the time. While technology usually advances, one can’t depend on the rate of advance meeting the demands and it would be derelict to not point out the risks of technology not keeping pace. Peak conventional oil has already come and gone. We are now extracting something with the same characteristics and uses, but from a different environment.
Horizontal drilling and fracturing is a whole new ball game, accessing something with about the same composition as conventional oil, but being extracted from a different host in a new way. The technology breakthrough re-set the clock, as it were.
One can’t depend on what isn’t known. Until such time as new facts or technology are developed, it would be irresponsible to just continue with business as usual if it would appear there are problems in the future. One might argue that the Cassandras of the world serve an important function by making people aware that changes are necessary, and spurring research to advance technology.
Clyde – you can make any prediction look good with the appropriate assumptions. King made a prediction for oil production methods in vogue at the time. The problem is, as I said many years ago, technology continues to progress and that progress made shale oil viable while a whole host of people said it would never be. Technology will continue to advance in the oil field, but at some point, certainly not in the near term, we do have to run out of economical oil. What we can do in the meantime is work on small modular reactors including molten salt reactors.
Killing oil due to “green” extremist energy policies isn’t necessary and in fact is detrimental to the economy and society in general. The green extremists’ ideas sometimes sound good hypothetically, but when actually implemented, crash and burn. Look to Europe for a case in point. Of course, you can always come back with more hypothetical solutions, but once burned, we should all be twice shy.
I wasn’t clear. King Hubbert was pretty accurate for conventional oil. But that’s a small picture scenario. You have to make a prediction for crude oil generated by any technology, known or unknown. Therein lies the rub.
“Horizontal drilling and fracturing is a whole new ball game”
Horizontal drilling and fracking was trail blazed in the mid 20th century. Horizontal drilling came a bit later, but was in full swing by the 1980’s.
“Peak oil has been predicted many times, and every time those predictions have failed.”
I predicted it starting in 2014 when prices collapsed and until 2019. Since 2019 I am no longer predicting it because it has already happened. How do you call a prediction that has been successful? A successful prediction? Not that it makes me happy to have been right.
“None of this means we have actually hit “peak oil.” I’m sure it must happen some day, but not today.”
Not someday, November 2018. It will take a long time for most people to realize, because they will always find a new cause why the 2018 peak is not surpassed. But it won’t be surpassed. The sustained price required to produce more oil than in 2018 would cause a global recession before it does.
javier – I won’t pretend to know what production will be a few years out, but EIA, for one, expects 2018 production to be exceeded this year, if I’m reading their forecast chart correctly.
https://www.eia.gov/outlooks/steo/report/global_oil.php
“EIA, for one, expects 2018 production to be exceeded this year”
That’s all liquids, not oil, but I am surprised you don’t believe peak oil predictions because they have failed in the past, yet you seem to believe EIA projections despite a terrible record. They’ve never seen anything coming to oil production.
Why don’t you check their March 2020 projection?
https://www.eia.gov/outlooks/steo/archives/mar20.pdf
With the COVID pandemic already developing, I had written by then several articles about it, mentioning how the oil, travel, and tourism industries were going to be hard hit, yet they were projecting peak oil was going to be surpassed by Q3 2020. How did that come out?
And if you go back in time to EIA November 2018 projection:
https://www.eia.gov/outlooks/steo/archives/nov18.pdf
They projected the oil peak of Q3 2018 was going to be surpassed the next quarter and production was going to continue growing through 2019.
How did that come out?
They’ll keep projecting growth even if growth doesn’t come. That’s the beauty of projecting climate worsening or oil growth, very few people check how past projections fared, so most people keep believing in the ignorance of experts.
Javier,
Peak oil was in 2018?
No, that is not likely.
Years spent in very successful mineral exploration revealed the good working hypothesis that there good, new deposits to be found while ever parts of the globe remained unexplored. We gained from this adage several times. Big new mines were found where there was no evidence of them on the surface before we applied our cunning ways.
While ever ground is unavailable for exploration (at a fairly intense scale) there is scope for new discoveries, including for more good oil. Geoff S
https://www.facebook.com/aaron.chmielewski.3/posts/260553140734515
Whenever people start talking about OPEC, I like to point out this Paul Krugman paper from 2001, http://web.mit.edu/krugman/www/opec.html.
When people say that the US cannot affect the price of oil, I like to point out several things: 1.) That’s a good thing because every bit we produce goes to our GDP. 2.) That’s a good thing because every bit we don’t import adds to our GDP. 3.) That’s a good thing because every bit we don’t import reduces our trade deficit. 4.) That’s a good thing because it means lots of tax revenue (see 1 and 2). 5.) Don’t be so sure about that, a little competition could spur production in lots of other places.
Many producers produce inefficiently (and messily) because they believe price rises will keep them wealthy. E.g. Venezuela, Russia in the 1990s… They don’t keep their equipment maintained and they waste/spill a lot.
US hoarding sends a signal to oil producing nations with two implications: 1). Alternative Energy is nowhere near ready, otherwise the US would be extracting its oil before prices fall; the US likely doesn’t expect alternatives to ever be better than fossil fuels (I’d like to get into this, but I’ll save it for another time). 2). Current producers can make money by keeping production low.
If the US told the world it believes alternative energy R&D would pay off within the next 50 it would mean nothing, unless they back it up with extraction for the medium term. I believe that if the US said that there was no future in oil, and backed it up by pumping full-tilt to take advantage of the current high prices, we’d see both alternative research take off as well as exploration, extraction, and productivity throughout the world.
Reagan wasn’t the Great Communicator because of how he talked. Actions speak far louder than words.
Cheers,
If we were properly focused on energy security, greenhouse gas emissions would be a moot point.
The Northern Hemisphere climate was much more extreme in previous centuries. The past 150 years have been unusually kind. We are not prepared for reversion to the mean.
#AntiFragileEnergy
#GreenNUCLEARDeal
#HighlyFlexibleNaturalGas
#IncineratePlasticPollution
#WasteToEnergy
You mean Paul Krugman, the man that is always wrong but never in doubt? The man that predicted in 1998 that the impact of internet on the economy would not be higher than the fax machine? The man that predicted that Trump’s election would trigger a recession with no end in sight?
I would be ashamed to cite Krugman to support my views.
Paraphrasing Iñigo at “the Pricess Bride”, “I do not think the economy is what Paul Krugman thinks it is.”
Krugman piece is only about the relevance of multiple equalibria.
I’m quite confident he would disagree with the implications I cite.
“Current producers can make money by keeping production low.”
We had low energy prices not that long ago. We fought wars in the Middle East. Ally with Saudi Arabia. With energy, governments can interfere with the markets. They do.
We will know fairly soon about oil production numbers. I just posted what IEA wrote with no comment on if they are right or not. This is because they are forecasting. I know they aren’t gods, so it’s only a forecast. Nothing more.
I can already tell you. When 2023 arrives, Nov. 2018 will still be the peak. But then they will say 2018 production will be surpassed in 2023.
What will you do? Will you still believe that peak oil is in the future? How long until you accept it is in the past? 10 years? 25 years? Never?
I detected the change in Arctic sea ice trend in late 2015, only three years after the 2012 September low. Despite being a reality, most people have not accepted it yet, 15 years after it took place. People don’t see the most obvious things for years, because they are not looking at the right parameters and because it contradicts their belief systems.
I am an observer. I observe how things work. Then I predict to see if I understand them. If I fail, I learn. I predicted the 2019 El Niño, and the 2021 La Niña. I believe 2023 will have an El Niño, and 2024 & 2025 Neutral conditions. The date corresponds to the January winter.
Another climate shift is likely in about 10 years. The current regime is long in the tooth (25 years). More warming ahead, but less sea-ice melting. But I wonder if by then the world’s energy problems will allow many people to care about the climate. I guess we’ll see about that. The world is changing fast and it is going to change much faster.
I’m not overly concerned about it Javier. We’ll see what happens.
Peak oil has seemingly been declared every year for the half century that I have been alive. Predictions of peak oil may be the only predictions with a more embarrassing track record than those of an ice-free Arctic. I really wouldn’t hang your hat on this one.
Thank you, Judith, this is an excellent post. It has been a long time coming. I hope future posts will build on it and rigorously analyse the risks and benefits of global warming and increasing CO2 concentrations.
You say: The Earth has undergone geological periods of higher temperatures and atmospheric CO2 concentrations, during which life thrived.
This is true. The GMST of the planet has been warmer than now for 90% of the past 540 Ma. It was 17.5 °C warmer 250 Ma ago, 13.2 °C warmer 93 Ma ago and 10.5 C° warmer 51 Ma ago [1]. Life thrived when the planet was warmer and struggled when colder.
1. Scotese, C.R.; Song, H.; Mills, B.J.W.; van der Meer, D.G. Phanerozoic paleotemperatures: The earth’s changing climate during the last 540 million years. Earth-Science Reviews 2021, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.earscirev.2021.103503.
Many of you are feeding the alarmist by only studying the peer reviewed consensus alarmist claims and pushing back on them, reinforcing that nothing else is important.
Natural climate cycles from warmer to colder to warmer to colder, forever for fifty million years, gradually getting colder and cycles started oscillating with wider and wider bounds, especially over the last million years with 4 really major warm periods followed by 4 even longer cold periods. Almost no one has determined the cause of this, most say, “no one knows” why climate correlates with Milankovitch sometimes, solar cycles sometimes, CO2 sometimes.
Ice core records on Antarctica only go back 800 thousand years and Greenland data is real good for the last major cycle and not so good in the warmest time more than a hundred thousand years ago. That last warmest time removed much of the Greenland ice and there is not a good record for that time period.
In any system designed by man, energy is piped from the warmest places to the coldest places where it can be radiated out. Warm tropical ocean currents, IE. the gulf stream, are piped into the polar oceans where they promote removal of sea ice, promote evaporation and formation of clouds, promote snowfall and sequestering of ice. That IR out cools the climate system, but not until the ice is pushed into the gulf stream or other tropical currents in polar regions. That cools the oceans and the climate until the sequestered ice is depleted, then the warm cycle repeats to again rebuild the ice.
Peer Reviewed Consensus Climate Dogma, which most of you subscribe to, says that evaporation and snowfall occurs inside the atmosphere and can be ignored. It cannot because the IR out occurs in warmest times and the cooling by thawing ice occurs when that causes the coldest times.
Tropical climate gets warmed the most by the sun and Tropical hurricanes and typhoid’s and thunderstorms promote the strongest regulator of tropical and intermediate latitudes, but this other regulated polar ice cycle provides additional cooling that has alternating warm and cold cycles, currently, in the most recent ten thousand years, the bounds have been very tightly limited. The previous four major warm and cold periods, over the last 400 thousand years were the wildest in our records. The ice produces from 150 thousand years ago to 110 thousand years ago, piled up in and around the Arctic. That ice spread south onto the continents, causing more snowfall and also into the Arctic Ocean Basin, filling it with fresh water and ice that pushed the salt water out. There are studies that document that. The ice volume has been decreasing since about 100 thousand years ago, sea level kept dropping because melt-water flowed into the Arctic, depressed by the weight of the ice, and was trapped there mostly until 20 thousand years ago.
Clearly, a trace gas, one molecule added to ten thousand molecules of atmosphere could not have causes the past, huge climate shifts, yet most of you keep arguing with the alarmists in their home ball fields where they are the umpires.
The path you have been on has always failed and will always fail.
Study, understand and teach natural causes of past climate change and apply that to the future., or keep doing always failed in the past and expect a different outcome, that does not happen.
Most everything in this blog supports that CO2 is the only factor that needs to be considered for causing climate change.
The alarmists do not care what is causing warming, all they need is some change that they can blame on fossil fuels, while keeping the Nuclear alarmist alive so they can gain riches and power using the fear they provoke. They approve subsidies for all the expensive, evil, green energy, which they all get rich by investing in the schemes they created. Wind and Solar and Batteries promote more mining, more energy to accomplish the mining, transport, manufacturing, transportation and installation and maintenance and end of life dealings. When you consider the life and end of life of green energy, it produces much more emissions that it reduces.
They say the cost is coming down for green energy, that is only because of the subsidies and the tax credits and the crooked bookkeeping.
I have to wonder what’s different this interglacial? And although Judith Curry asserts that RCP 8.5 is implausible – high fossil fuel powered economic growth could see a CO2 concentration in the atmosphere of 1000 ppm by the end of the century. Last time concentrations were that high the world was a very different place. And there was a mass marine extinction.
https://assets.weforum.org/editor/large_EEYnarb17Mwon7wYfBZ_V6gUQ3hwp6_tpzpPzAMVLRw.png
The glacial/interglacial pattern involves a warming Arctic, reduced thermohaline circulation and ice sheet feedbacks.
One way or another abrupt climate change is inevitable and can be extreme. The dominant climate science paradigm is that human changes to the land and atmosphere add to pressures that can trigger state change in the spatiotemporal chaotic climate system.
Assessing risk requires an appreciation of how the system works.
‘Recent scientific evidence shows that major and widespread climate changes have occurred with startling speed. For example, roughly half the north Atlantic warming since the last ice age was achieved in only a decade, and it was accompanied by significant climatic changes across most of the globe. Similar events, including local warmings as large as 16°C, occurred repeatedly during the slide into and climb out of the last ice age. Human civilizations arose after those extreme, global ice-age climate jumps. Severe droughts and other regional climate events during the current warm period have shown similar tendencies of abrupt onset and great persistence, often with adverse effects on societies.
Abrupt climate changes were especially common when the climate system was being forced to change most rapidly. Thus, greenhouse warming and other human alterations of the earth system may increase the possibility of large, abrupt, and unwelcome regional or global climatic events. The abrupt changes of the past are not fully explained yet, and climate models typically underestimate the size, speed, and extent of those changes. Hence, future abrupt changes cannot be predicted with confidence, and climate surprises are to be expected.’
National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2002. Abrupt Climate Change: Inevitable Surprises. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. https://doi.org/10.17226/10136.
I doubt that we can claim more than a smidgeon of certainty about the future of climate – but whatever the risk – and there are many – the solution is to build prosperous and resilient communities in vibrant landscapes.
Economic, environmental, geopolitical, societal and technological risk.
https://watertechbyrie.files.wordpress.com/2022/02/global-risks.png
https://www.weforum.org/reports/global-risks-report-2022
“Severe droughts and other regional climate events during the current warm period have shown similar tendencies of abrupt onset and great persistence, often with adverse effects on societies.”
As with the 4.2 kyr and 3.2 kyr aridity events, grand solar minima certainly are inevitable, the next series starts from around 2095 AD. Any positive influence of rising CO2 forcing on the Northern Annular Mode should be welcomed.
“And although Judith Curry asserts that RCP 8.5 is implausible – high fossil fuel powered economic growth could see a CO2 concentration in the atmosphere of 1000 ppm by the end of the century.
Can you name a country that has an increasing fertility rate?
( hint: there are none ).
Can you name countries that have increasing per capita CO2 emissions?
( less than a third do, mostly the poorest still developing ones ).
Of course, falling population will have adverse consequences, which are already occurring with just the decrease or working age population.
And of course, the present does not determine the future, but it is a starting point one must include, and present trends clearly indicate limits.
“Last time concentrations were that high the world was a very different place. And there was a mass marine extinction.”
You are intimating a causal link here. CO2->Warming->extinctions.
Evidence is clearly the opposite.
NASA NEO oceanic chlorophyll ( a proxy for phytoplankton ) indicates a positive, though very noisy trend.
NDVI trends are positive and much less noisy.
Though biomass is not necessarily related to species diversity, there is a positive correlation of biomass with the increased CO2 and warming to date.
“The glacial/interglacial pattern involves a warming Arctic, reduced thermohaline circulation and ice sheet feedbacks.”
Except for Greenland, which at elevation is accumulating ice,
most Northern ice is gone.
Unless you’re imagining increased glaciation elsewhere, there is not a state change, because we’re in a stadial already.
Glacials are thought to be and correlate well with Milankovic.
Orbital analysis indicates increased summer sunshine over 65N for most of the next 100,000 years!
Imagine that CO2 warming actually had a big effect on Greenland ( even though surface mass balance and the Glacier Girl seem to indicate that it doesn’t ). Say that you preserved Greenland ice for a hundred years. In a few thousand years, nature is going to work on melting Greenland and will continue to do so for a hundred millenia.
“One way or another abrupt climate change is inevitable and can be extreme.”
Examine the proxy temperature records and one will indeed find dramatic changes. This is only one measure of climate, however, one will find the largest changes are clearly associated with glaciations and deglaciations.
There can be no significant deglaciation of most of North America because the ice sheets are gone. Though current Northern summers are less insolated than they were during the last glacial maximum, AGW theory indicates forcing toward deglaciation, not glaciation. It would appear that the most extreme variation is not likely because there is no likely state change from our current unglaciated state.
“The dominant climate science paradigm is that human changes to the land and atmosphere add to pressures that can trigger state change in the spatiotemporal chaotic climate system.”
I believe this is a misrepresentation of chaos. The non-linear equations of atmospheric motion have multiple valid solutions for any future state. This is true whether the atmosphere is perturbed or not. Keeping CO2 and its forcing perfectly constant doesn’t change this. There will be chaos no matter what.
…
“I doubt that we can claim more than a smidgeon of certainty about the future of climate”
This is a good idea to pursue.
What things are more or less accurately predictable and which are not?
My recollections of perturbation theory have faded from school, but while we can’t predict perturbations we can probably get closer to mean base states.
We can’t accurately predict the undulations of the jet stream at any future past a few days. However, we can predict that there will be a jet stream ( perhaps overlapping to appear as multiples ).
Why? Because the jet streams are the result of temperature gradients imposed by radiative gradients determined mostly by earth shape and orbit.
There is confirmation bias in thinking about climate change. Much of this is imposed by the IPCC defining climate change as only the anthropogenic portion, so that’s what people think about.
There are unpredictables and subtle changes.
But we can -probably- accurately predict:
* the shape of earth
* the size of earth
* the rotation speed of earth
* the orbital variations of earth
* the height and location of mountains
* the location of land and of the oceans
While they don’t preclude dynamic variation, these constants
do bound and limit climate change.
There will be broad climatic zones ( tropics, mid-lat, polar ).
These zones result from predictable mean insolation.
There will be extra-tropical seasons because insolation will impose them.
That means summers will be warmer than winters.
There will be jet streams because of resulting gradients of temperatures.
There will be an Inter-Tropical Convergence Zone, because cold air masses from each pole will converge against one another.
Because cold air masses accumulate short of the ITCZ, there will be subsidence zones which create sub-tropical deserts.
There will also be deserts in areas which are blocked from low level moisture advection by mountainous terrain. Conversely, mountainous areas which incur upstream flow will be forested.
The Namibian deserts are thought to have existed for tens of millions of years. It is somewhat paradoxical as they abut the South Atlantic, so access to moisture would not appear to explain this. The subtropical location is key compounded by the fact that Antarctic air masses approaching are forced toward anti-cyclonic circulation by the South African highlands.
Given its past reliability, one can probably predict that there will be a Namibian Desert.
Population, energy demand, food demand and GDP will all increase this century.
https://ars.els-cdn.com/content/image/1-s2.0-S0959378016300711-gr1.jpg
And quite clearly the big increases in CO2 emissions are coming from the developing nations.
https://ars.els-cdn.com/content/image/1-s2.0-S0959378016300711-gr1.jpg
The PETM was accompanied by a mass marine extinction.
Glacials are initiated when the Arctic warms and freshens, THC declines and ice sheets grow in low insolation northern summers. The next glacial is overdue.
The Navier-Stokes equation is insoluble for the planet as a whole. The physical evidence from ocean and atmospheric monitoring shows the Earth system behaving as a coupled, nonlinear system. Behaviours that include shifts in ocean and atmospheric states that are traditionally seen as oscillations. In the words of Michael Ghil (2013) the ‘global climate system is composed of a number of subsystems – atmosphere, biosphere, cryosphere, hydrosphere and lithosphere – each of which has distinct characteristic times, from days and weeks to centuries and millennia. Each subsystem, moreover, has its own internal variability, all other things being constant, over a fairly broad range of time scales. These ranges overlap between one subsystem and another. The interactions between the subsystems thus give rise to climate variability on all time scales.’
The theory suggests that the system is pushed by greenhouse gas changes and warming – as well as solar intensity and Earth orbital variability – past a threshold at which stage the components start to interact chaotically in multiple and changing negative and positive feedbacks – as tremendous energies cascade through powerful subsystems. Some of these changes have a regularity within broad limits and the planet responds with a broad regularity in changes of ice, cloud, Atlantic thermohaline circulation and ocean and atmospheric circulation.
State shifts emerge when the system is pushed by small changes in control variables past a threshold. Adding to changes in control variables pushes the system closer to the next tipping point. Modern climate science has this idea at its core. Avoiding tipping points is the rationale for the 2 degree C target. Unless you understand that and have some science you are whistlin’ Dixie.
“Population, [ and parameters dependent on it ] will all increase this century.”
Most countries of the world already have lower than replacement fertility rate. This includes Australia, the United States, China, Japan, Germany, UK, Italy, Spain, France, Sweden, Norway, Poland, Russia, Indonesia, Vietnam, and Taiwan. (https://www.cia.gov/the-world-factbook/field/total-fertility-rate/country-comparison) This also includes very religious states of Saudia Arabia, Iran, and Turkey.
Things could change, of course, but the current state is of low fertility and the trend is toward fertility falling further. Current trajectories put the world at less than replacement fertility within 30 years. Persistence of trend is not always a best forecast, but if one’s forecast differs from persistence, one should be prepared to explain why.
“And quite clearly the big increases in CO2 emissions are coming from the developing nations.”
Yes, 81% of current emissions are from countries with less than replacement fertility rates. But of the remaining 19% from growing countries, one may ask how their emissions are going to increase substantially. We wish them well in development and they should not be restrained in this regard. But they will not have very large exports to the rest of the world that has ageing and decreasing populations.
“The PETM was accompanied by a mass marine extinction.”
Due to what, exactly? There can be a lot of speculation, but no observations. The Holocene Optimum and the warmer still Eemian did not appear to create mass extinctions. These are more proxied and probably more relevant analogs.
“Glacials are initiated when the Arctic warms and freshens, THC declines and ice sheets grow in low insolation northern summers.”
You managed to put insolation last.
While stochastic resonance would seem to have modulated the timing, one does not need to invoke THC to explain the glacials.
Insolation alone describes the glacial cycles.
Weakly insolated Northern summers allowed annual snowfall persistence, and the increasing elevation of this snowfall was a positive feedback to further accumulation.
“The next glacial is overdue.”
The last glacial began about 115kya.
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Last_Glacial_Period)
At that time, summer insolation at 65N was less than 440W/m2.
At present , summer insolation at 65N is near 480W/m2.
Other things may vary, but by this measure, we’re not overdue for an ice age. And summer insolation at 65N will melt Arctic ice at a significantly greater rate than present for most of the next 100,000 years.
( https://biocycle.atmos.colostate.edu/shiny/Milankovitch/ )
“Adding to changes in control variables pushes the system closer to the next tipping point.”
I don’t understand – we are currently in an inter-glacial.
The only ‘tip’ from an inter-galcial is to a glacial.
Are you predicting that we’re tipping into an ice age?
If not, please be specific about precisely which phenomena ‘tipping point’ refers to.
More well-off older people may press for more medical advances so they can live longer!
Population peaks mid century in high economic growth scenarios.
Most energy growth – 350% increase in demand this century – will come from Asia, India and Africa.
The PETM was 10 degrees C warmer ffs. The evidence of a mass marine extinction is found in sediment.
You need ice sheet feedback to explain glacials. Interglacials in the late Pleistocene last about 10,000 years. Thermohaline circulation and a reduction in heat transport north is involved in glacial transitions.
e.g. https://journals.ametsoc.org/configurable/content/journals$002fclim$002f34$002f12$002fJCLI-D-20-0897.1.xml?t:ac=journals%24002fclim%24002f34%24002f12%24002fJCLI-D-20-0897.1.xml
Something different this time?
And of course you don’t understand tipping points. Arrayed against you is a immense body of science you don’t know exists. You may wave it away but without much credibility.
‘The ESS framework has since become a powerful tool for understanding how Earth operates as a single, complex adaptive system, driven by the diverse interactions among energy, matter and organisms. In particular, it connects traditional disciplines — which typically examine components in isolation — to build a unified understanding of the Earth. With human activities increasingly destabilising the system over the last two centuries, this perspective is necessary for studying global changes and their planetary-level impacts and risks, including phenomena such as climate change, biodiversity loss, and nutrient loading. Indeed, one of the most pressing challenges of ESS is to determine whether past warm
periods in Earth history are a possible outcome of current human pressures and, if so, how they best can be avoided.’ https://hal.archives-ouvertes.fr/hal-03087753/file/ESS%20REVIEW_FINAL_11%20NOV.pdf
Science is one thing – pragmatic policy is another.
I think we could use a post focused tipping points, the different types of events and to what extent they have any relation to various temperature thresholds. Lenton seems to be the primary source on this
Robert I Ellison: And of course you don’t understand tipping points. Arrayed against you is a immense body of science you don’t know exists. You may wave it away but without much credibility.
Actually, Turbulent Eddy asked for specifics, as have I on occasion. You respond with an insult and vagaries. Nothing in that vast literature you refer to specifies where, when, or in what measured variable a tipping point in response to CO2 accumulation, rainfall increase, or temperature is forecast to occur.
Specifics would be welcome, I am sure.
The details are in the literature. Matthew and Eddie are encouraged to Google it. Matthew’s habitually pettifogging quibbles I have no patience for. He will argue semantics until the cows come home without getting down to what it really means.
‘A study of Earth’s climate history suggests the inevitability of “tipping points”—thresholds beyond which major and rapid changes occur when crossed—that lead to abrupt changes in the climate system. The history of climate on the planet—as read in archives such as tree rings, ocean sediments, and ice cores—is punctuated with large changes that occurred rapidly, over the course of decades to as little as a few years. There are many potential tipping points in nature, as described in this report, and many more that we humans create in our own systems. The current rate of carbon emissions is changing the climate system at an accelerating pace, making the chances of crossing tipping points all the more likely.’
National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. 2013. Abrupt Impacts of Climate Change: Anticipating Surprises. Washington, DC: The National Academies Press. https://doi.org/10.17226/18373.
Perhaps someone could enlighten me on these dangerous “Tipping Points”
With all the talk of the danger of reaching the tipping points, why didnt the earth experience those dangerous “tipping points” during any of the prior warming periods?
The Arctic is warm, surface waters warm, thermohaline circulation slows, the north cools and there are runaway ice sheet feedbacks. That’s the Pleistocene pattern. And there are less extreme shifts.
https://history.aip.org/climate/rapid.htm#:~:text=The%20changes%20had%20been%20rapid,not%20a%20world%2Dwide%20phenomenon.
Chaos emerges from fluid flow dynamics in the Earth system. Spatiotemporal chaos involves shifting patterns in turbulent flow propagating around the planet in some sort of ‘stadium wave’. It can be seen in the chaotic oscillations of climate indices – which modulate ice, cloud, biology…
https://i0.wp.com/gmsciencein.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/11/Airplane_vortex.jpg
‘You can see spatio-temporal chaos if you look at a fast mountain river. There will be vortexes of different sizes at different places at different times. But if you observe patiently, you will notice that there are places where there almost always are vortexes and they almost always have similar sizes – these are the quasi standing waves of the spatio-temporal chaos governing the river.’ Tomas Milanovic
Perturb the flow and patterns shift. This goes over most people’s heads – but it is real. And it changes the climate risk equation.
In the current interglacial climate state, the AMO acts strongly against tipping. The North Atlantic and Arctic are colder when the solar wind is stronger, as in the mid 1970’s and mid 1980’s, and warmer when the solar wind is weaker, as from 1995.
There has been more global warming since 1975 from the warmer AMO and its reduction of low cloud cover than from rising CO2 forcing.
The AMO emerges from shifts in surface currents in the north Atlantic. It is a nonlinear oscillation that doesn’t modulate global energy dynamics at all. There is no evidence that it does – only narratives from Ulric. It is simply too small and at a high latitude. The Pacific Ocean in the tropics and subtropics is a different matter.
Robert I Ellison: The details are in the literature.
I find your claims of detailed application of dynamical systems to particular data series or projections of tipping points not to be supported.
But as I said, your insult of Turbulent Eddy is unwarranted: And of course you don’t understand tipping points. Arrayed against you is a immense body of science you don’t know exists. You may wave it away but without much credibility. .
He didn’t wave anything away, he asked you for specifics.
Robert I Ellison: There are many potential tipping points in nature, as described in this report, and many more that we humans create in our own systems. The current rate of carbon emissions is changing the climate system at an accelerating pace, making the chances of crossing tipping points all the more likely.’
That is what I meant by a vagary.
Is there any modeled or forecast (by a dynamical system) “tipping point” for any time span and for any measured variable with CO2 as a driver?
What Matthew finds is unsupported is not all that persuasive. It’s all off the top of his head. If you want detail – it’s in the links to science and authoritative sources. Calling a short extract describing a core concept as vague is just playing games.
“The AMO emerges from shifts in surface currents in the north Atlantic. It is a nonlinear oscillation that doesn’t modulate global energy dynamics at all”
Of course it does, it dominates Arctic warming and cooling, and varies low cloud cover levels. It is the main reason for global multi-decadal climate variability.
Excellent post Judith, but in addition to a proper risk assessent there is the broader issue if risk-benifit assessment. CO2 is plant food and there is ample evidence over the past several decades of increased plant production. Certainly this increase is not soley due to CO2 but the increase in CO2 is an important contributing factor.
Thanks for the insight Dr Curry.
This is the unbelievably poor reporting of the series of equinoctial storms having an impact on the UK.
“This comes days after one of the worst [sic] storms in the UK in decades in which three people died.”
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-60452334
Our national broadcaster cannot even do English language properly. In spite of being told the word they are searching for is ‘worse’ they carry on regardless … No wonder the climate change business, policy and reporting couldn’t get much worse.
If we were properly focused on energy security, greenhouse gas emissions would be a moot point.
#AntiFragileEnergy
#GreenNUCLEARDeal
#HighlyFlexibleNaturalGas
#IncineratePlasticPollution
#WasteToEnergy
The Northern Hemisphere climate was much more extreme in previous centuries. The past 150 years have been unusually kind. We are not prepared for reversion to the mean.
The degree to which high climate sensitivities are clung to despite ample evidence that anything over 3 is implausible.
In my consideration of this post, Judith has given her science view of the climate change matter by showing where the left-out parts from climate science can affect the assessment of climate risk and further where the methodology of risk assessment can be incorrectly applied. The post is polite and nonpartisan.
I, as a libertarian, would have to add to this assessment the basic political motivations that guide the climate risk assessments and that can be simply put as to ones view of government’s capability in dealing with the mitigations that might result from the risk assessments. In one camp we have the view that government must unquestionably be involved in the mitigation, and all aspects of mitigations, and that climate change mitigation gives governments an opportunity to gain a rightful hold over economic matters that are currently in their view too much in the hands of private parties. There are obviously shades of these motivations but the one described tends to be the default position whether articulated or not. On the other hand, we have the camp that sees government involvement in mitigation as being problematic and for some in this camp there is a tendency to minimize any potential detrimental affects of climate change. Again, there are here shades of motivations with the default being the one I have described.
There are those who are guided more by the science and less by political considerations, but they have much less influence on government policy by the very nature of their motivation than the camps I have described.
The current world intelligentsia is dominated by the strong-government-involvement camp view and thus there is much less requirement on their part for the science to show a more certain and strong need for mitigation, i.e., by the government. There is nothing significantly problematic about that part of any mitigation policy seen by this camp.
The minority camp without the support of the current intelligentsia must be more rigorous in analyzing and pointing to the uncertainties in the science and how the science product is reported and further in doing the same with the initial government attempts at mitigation and the economic consequences. This camp can suffer from those who might be considered members of the camp who tend to ignore the science and/or incorrectly interpret it or who engage in just plain exaggeration of results. The suffering comes by way of the entire group and their points of view being associated with the deniers and exaggerators and thus being more readily ignored.
I personally attempt to keep the science and political motivations separate. That might be easier for someone with my grave concerns with consequences of government mitigations and judgment that climate change is significantly less problematic at the present time than the consequence of government attempts at mitigation. My concern is that political motivations of the current dominant camp are winning in getting government mitigations going prematurely over uncertainties of climate change and detrimental consequences of government mitigation. In this matter I point to the recent fiasco of Germany’s current mitigations that included early decommissioning of nuclear plants. The German people are undeterred, and the ruling parties are using mitigation as never having to say sorry.
There remain the unwashed masses out there that will have to start dealing with the practical results of the government mitigation (favored by the intelligentsia) who might eventually question the reasoning behind these policies, but that in my view is far from being a certainty.
.
Good comment, Ken. Here is some relevant text that i left out of the post
The cultural theory of risk proposes that individual views on risk are filtered through cultural world views about how society should operate. (Douglas & Wildavsky 1982). Some individuals view human ingenuity as boundless and nature as robust. Conversely, others view nature as fragile and have more precautionary views of technology. Some people do not have strong attitudes regarding technology, but value authority, expertise, and the status quo. And finally, others have little faith in the predictability of nature or humanity or in our ability to learn from past mistakes, and often opt out of the policy-making process entirely.
Some see panics as opportunities to virtue signal and largely don’t care if the “mitigation” makes any sense or not.
“Mask Mandates Are Illogical. So What?”
https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2022/02/covid-mask-mandate-washington-dc/622860/
That article is better than the headline- it, at least, confesses that the most visible Covid “mitigation” was unscientific, inconsistent, illogical theater.
You can “mask up” for climate by slapping some solar panels on your roof
“Some see panics as opportunities to virtue signal and largely don’t care if the “mitigation” makes any sense or not.”
A wise comment that is frequently demonstrated. It does require some rational analysis to determine if the mitigation actually makes sense and from what perspective.
When you evaluate your comment-
“You can “mask up” for climate by slapping some solar panels on your roof”
Solar panels can make cost effective sense for individuals to install but the total number of solar panels installed probably won’t impact the CO2 curve enough to impact the climate
https://www.tabletmag.com/sections/science/articles/pandemic-science
Caution about ‘mitigation’ should be magnified by the failed, tyrannical, and deadly (according to a recent study from Johns Hopkins) covid response. The evidence is growing that science has suffered a big setback in its accuracy and credibility.
Ken -” In one camp we have the view that government must unquestionably be involved in the mitigation”
Ken likewise your post is a good comment
I will add what we saw with covid, a huge segment of the population believed that government imposed mitigation would be beneficial.
As we start to emerge from the 3 major wave of covid, we see that mitigation protocols had very little if any impact. The waves of Covid were remarkably similar to the waves that occurred during the 1918 spanish flu
In summary, with covid and with climate change, mother nature controls. The only question is to what extent is mother nature the driver of climate change.
Government will be involved in “mitigation” whether we like it or not. Power grids are highly regulated utilities.
The question is whether we will require government live up to the reason we give it this power- prioritize affordable, reliable energy.
Regulation, as the left has discovered, is a gold mine. Ultimately, utilities don’t care if you mandate heating Boston in February with Hamster wheels. They are guaranteed a profit in the regulatory framework, so you can make them do many silly and expensive things and allow your friends and family to cash in right up to the moment when the people paying for it go broke or vote you out.
It’s merely icing on the cake that this scam has a green veneer.
Kenneth Fritsch: “…the ruling parties are using mitigation as never having to say sorry”.
This is certainly one aspect of mitigation when pondering risk assessment, relative to ruling parties; another is exploiting circumstantial opportunity for power, the mantra: “never let a serious crises go to waste” is real, and tactically promoted (obviously climate qualifies here). Perhaps, ironically, centralized global power is the greatest anthropomorphic risk of all. Does the UN evaluate the risk from consolidation of power globally, or appreciate what separation of powers (nations in this capacity) protect against; or does the UN edifice grease the skids towards centralizing methods for control at every opportunity though utilization of the various standards bodies, and self promotion of method actors (China), those who increasingly direct UN influence? Part of the IPCC’s mission is world order. It’s impossible to assess risk if the myriad tentacles that feed risk intentionally are excluded. I see climate risk as merely a hub buttressed by focused spokes of cultural risk that are nearly impossible to untangle; climate is a superficial risk in this regard, yet the hub [climate] takes all the weight of introspection globally. Cultural stigmatization and propagandization on many cultural power fronts carve out climate as a stand alone risk, separate from all else, when actually the risks are an unrecognizable interwoven basket case of cultural influences, maybe it’s the wheels axil that should get the focus, the political class turning the wheel in one direction.
“The current world intelligentsia is dominated by the strong-government-involvement camp view”. No doubt about it; teasing out the tactical statists from the hysterically convinced can’t be known.
…the wheels “axle” should get the focus. Or better; the driver behind the wheel.
Kenneth,
Your comments,as usual, are excellent, pertinent and expressed well.
We older, more experienced scientists simply cannot fathom why good science is being so strongly suppressed by some present forces whose identity remains unclear. What real gain can there be to trash existing, high performance electricity generators? To damage or close pipelines? To spread wrong stories about sea level changes? To vilify the resources industries? To allow surgically mauled males to compete in womens’ games? And on and on?
I grizzle to my wife, too much, that there is much global madness that looks bleak for our children and theirs. I am a failure because this has happened despite my best efforts to combat it. Sadly, the solution seems to require warfare eventually.
Thanks to you and Judith for reasoned, neutral observation based on experience. Let us hope that more people start to realise that many evil matters are being foist upon us, for many seem not to know or care. Geoff S
” The poorest populations would benefit far more from access to grid electricity and help in reducing vulnerability from extreme weather events, than from reductions to the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere.”
I’m most surprised that there is so little attention on this. Lomborg and a few others mention the harms to the global poor occasionally, to the credit of those who do so. The alarmist community sometimes uses the phrase “climate justice,” but without a rigorous cost/benefit analysis (indeed, some “climate justice” sloganeers are anti-capitalist and anti-growth, and thus not serious).
A rigorous approach to these issues would include:
A. Various economic growth scenarios in low income nations and the rate at which vulnerability is reduced at different growth rates. In addition to vulnerability, most metrics of human well-being improve dramatically as nations develop from poor to middle class. How much human well-being is being lost at various decreased rates of economic growth?
B. The impact of limiting or halting fossil fuel production and use in such nations on economic growth and thus the rate at which metrics of human well-being and reduced vulnerability are accelerated through access to fossil fuels.
C. The impact of limiting or halting fossil fuel production and use in such nations on immediate well-being. For instance, with respect to immediate well-being, indoor air pollution (cooking with charcoal and biofuels indoors) kills 1-2 million each year. Access to either grid electricity or propane can reduce this to approximately zero.
We should have entire think tanks and academic journals devoted to developing models that help us evaluate when and where reducing access to fossil fuels is a net harm to the global poor (given various climate scenarios along with various growth scenarios).
Instead there is a nearly universal presumption in mainstream climate action advocacy that reducing fossil fuel use is a net benefit to the global poor when it surely is not. This blindness on the part of the climate action community is especially dangerous in the case in Africa, as China and India can stand up to Western elites, but most African nations are so dependent on Western aid that they are much more vulnerable to the delusional opinions of climate activists. Here is one push-back against that presumption following COP26 (by my wife),
https://www.wsj.com/articles/the-cop26-plan-to-keep-africa-poor-climate-change-clean-energy-11637964581
To take the most unambiguous case, there is no scenario in which eliminating access to propane cooking in Africa in order to reduce carbon emissions is a net gain for African women who are dying now from cooking with biofuels. One of my metrics for moral and intellectual seriousness when I encounter a climate activism group is whether or not they are aware of this issue.
It is surreal that most of the global “left” whose self-identity is that they support the least privileged are actively engaged in advocacy that, if successful, will be brutally harmful to the global poor. There are serious tradeoffs for the global poor in reducing rates of economic growth. An African continent with an average GDP per capita of $60K in 2100 will experience climate change very differently than would an African continent with an average GDP per capita of $10K. Insofar as the “climate emergency” is primarily about the impacts of climate change on the global poor, these tradeoffs absolutely need to be considered more consistently and in a much more rigorous manner.
Best comment on this thread yet.
This blindness on the part of the climate action community is especially dangerous in the case in Africa, as China and India can stand up to Western elites, but most African nations are so dependent on Western aid
Actually, Western Countries are rendering themselves unable to even aid themselves, soon, African nations will be dependent on China and India aid, maybe also Russia, they will soon be the only ones with enough resources to help anyone.
The only countries China and Russia are helping are China and Russia. Everybody else is a means to achieve Russian and Chinese global domination, thereby bringing immense riches to the ruling class. Common theme seen from the beginnings of mankind and the rise of tyranny.
The elitists in the West have the same goal, namely power bringing them wealth. However, at some “tipping” point, the elitists overplay their hand and an abrupt change occurs. (Borrowing from Ellison’s chaos theory views)
I suspect the Ukraine catastrophe is the event that causes an abrupt end to the green energy elitist’s reign in the West. The increasing economic misery being inflicted on the population will be too great to successfully hide.
When will the green energy Waterloo occur? In the US, the fall elections. Europe? Leave that to those more familiar with the European political scene.
Mike Keller commented:
I suspect the Ukraine catastrophe is the event that causes an abrupt end to the green energy elitist’s reign in the West. The increasing economic misery being inflicted on the population will be too great to successfully hide.
On the contrary, the Ukraine invasion shows exactly why more green energy is needed. It’s showing how Putin controls gas and oil prices in Europe and elsewhere and is able to manipulate the response to Ukraine. He’d be unable to do that if the US and Europe had ample sustainable energy sources.
Putin is showing that carbon-based energy is hardly a stable one at all.
Behold:
“European Renewables Stocks Surge as Ukraine War Fuels Energy Reckoning,” Michael Msika, Yahoo Finance, February 24, 2022.
https://finance.yahoo.com/news/european-renewables-stocks-surge-ukraine-163447499.html
“The poorest populations would benefit far more from access to grid electricity and help in reducing vulnerability from extreme weather events, than from reductions to the amount of CO2 in the atmosphere.”
One of the best sentences. I would like to add, we should also cut off benefits to unemployed parents with children and use that money to buy solar panels. Because as we know, climate change effects the poor the most.
Raggneer thanks for your comment regarding cutting off to the poor
As is well known by those with out an agenda – the most effective anti poverty program since the Great Depression was Clinton’s “Ending welfare as we know it”
Progressives are anti personal responsibility and pro government dependence
“Moralizing surrounding the issue of climate change has regarded the climate change problem as a simple, righteous values choice: Are you for the planet or against it?”
I would say, that’s the sale. Young people are recruited into the cause. With apparently not much understanding of how energy systems, systems that deliver things to consumers, operate. That fossil fuels can be killed to solved the problem. That corporations can be shamed. That technology like a Tesla is an answer. It is a fairy tale world sale. Where they will slay the dragon of the problem and be cheered for doing so. That they have the values that will of course win the day.
People make large changes to terrestrial systems and the atmosphere without any capacity to predict consequences. Not with models and certainly not with qualitative hand waving. Both sides have an objectively impossible uncertainty. The policy problem for the rest of us is what to do under scientific uncertainty. That’s a multi-factor optimization problem. There are ways to a bright future for the planet, its peoples and its wild places – but these need to be consciously designed in a broad context of economics and democracy, population, development, technical innovation, land use and the environment. The cost of not being innovative – the product of an entrepreneurial culture – is a backwater economy.
A million of these by 2050 transforms a continent – there are currently 1000. And sequesters carbon in soils and vegetation. Rattan Lal – doyen of soil scientists and 2021 World Food Prize winner – estimates that some 500 gigatonne carbon (GtC) has been lost from terrestrial systems since the advent of agriculture. ‘Soil is like a bank account – we must replace what we have removed.’
Ahhh… objectively impossible certainty…
‘For decision-makers, climate change is a problem in risk assessment and management. Climate change is a risk because it may affect prosperity and security in a negative way, and because its consequences are uncertain.
Global climate change policy has been dominated by a specific strategy of risk management – the Precautionary Principle as a justification for setting specific targets for the elimination of manmade emissions of carbon dioxide.’ JC
Uncertainty is a two edged sword – in a climate system exhibiting abrupt change especially. One way or another – risk reduction must involve restoring and conserving terrestrial systems and reducing greenhouse gas – CO2-e – emissions. A new cheap and abundant low carbon energy source is needed this decade. Thinking that coal and gas are solutions is as delusional as thinking that wind and solar are.
From a simple practical standpoint, rapid deployment of cheap, abundant and low-carbon new energy sources is not realistic. Technically, we could pull it off. However, the bureaucratic, political, and regulatory hurdles thwarting innovations are stupefying.
As a small example, the 1st US commercial nuclear reactor was conceived of, design ed, built, licensed, and operated in about 3 years. The US Nuclear Regulatory agency will take 5 or so years to simply alter regulations for new advanced reactors.
From a broader perspective, technology advancements are severely hindered by the massive growth in regulations promulgated by bureaucrats seeking more power. The greater good is not a consideration for unelected bureaucrats unwilling to focus on their fundamental duty to help protect citizens and the environment from undue danger.
In very simplest terms, the IPCC position is: Climate is God’s creation, and anything that interferes with it is a sin. Don’t even breathe.
Creationism as such. And models to support it.
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“[Climate change?]xxxxx Net Zero is a risk because it may affect prosperity and security in a negative way and because its consequences are [uncertain?]xxxxx certain- Freeze to death in the dark in North America and Europe. CO2 is life!
Would anyone be willing to consider the possibility this goes deeper still, notwithstanding the essential risk analysis which must be done correctly?
That is, the ideology driving the poor assessments is not just a simple material world one of say, planet saving Marxism, Malthusianism or whatever.
Could this latent demon be an archetype buried deep inside people, for survival. If there’s no danger to humanity any more, at least in terms of wealth and productivity as we have achieved so well today, then an apocalypse must be found to create a danger to fill that deep psychic void, even if imaginary.
Is this possible ‘DNA’ problem something science is ready yet to consider? Obviously it’s considered mumbo jumbo by corporate science because if true its acausal. That is, it’s hard to measure due to there being no material cause and effect to measure against. Nonetheless, is it there? There’s no shortage of funding for the quantum and who dares dispute it.
Thoughts?
Judith,
Thank you for this article. As usual, it provides many useful insights. As someone who undertook a number of risk management duties prior to retirement, I have several misgivings when I see how risk is handled with regard to the climate change problem. These are too numerous to list here. Anyone who is interested can find them in my most recent Cliscep article, written in response to Judith’s:
https://cliscep.com/2022/02/21/what-do-you-think-to-the-show-so-far/
John
I’m glad you chose to make your comment this way. It’s very well done and deserves our full attention as a separate piece. Lots of food for thought. Thanks.
John … Thanks. I was going to highlight a section and post, but I would have wound up highlighting the whole piece.
https://mobile.twitter.com/aaronshem/status/1126891475822891009
🧵
People assume tailes to get fatter, but it seems the opposite is happening. Extremes can increase while the harmful extremes decrease. Extreme is just a statistical bin. The shape (&change) of the distribution matters. Eg is flooding decreasing despite increase in extreme precip
Also, increased wildlife (this is likely much bigger than agricultural effects) Particularly sea life. CO2 and fertilizer run off (despite some areas sometimes being stressed too much at times) have probably kept fish populations up and help whales, walruses, polar bears, etc recover and reduces stress on fished species.
Increased CO2 has probably helped corals more than hurt them.
I suspect some portion of sea level rise will be mitigated by increased transfer to land by both increased evaporation from ocean and storage on land from fertilization. Much of it will be in plants, fats, and carbohydrates. There is an obesity epidemic in the natural world, far from man.
https://www.livescience.com/10277-obesity-rise-animals.html
https://phys.org/news/2018-01-discrepancies-satellite-global-storage.html
I love how governments almost kill an industry then blame the industry for the energy crisis (my bold):
Germany is planning to force energy firms to keep enough gas in storage to ensure security of supply in the winter as part of a package to be considered by parliament, according to people familiar with the matter.
The plan — to be presented in spring — would put the onus on companies including energy giants Uniper SE, RWE AG and Gazprom PJSC to safeguard stockpiles in Europe’s top natural gas consumer, said the people, who asked not to be identified because the information is private. Germany’s Economy Ministry has commissioned consultants at the Institute of Energy Economics at the University of Cologne to hash out details of the proposal, the people said.
Europe is looking for ways to avoid another energy crisis next winter after utilities failed to stash enough gas away before the start of the heating season. Prices surged to record last year as Russia limited supplies and demand rebounded at a time when inventories were at their lowest level in more than a decade. All of that forced energy-intensive industries from fertilizer producers to metals smelters to curb output or shutdown altogether.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-02-14/germany-plans-to-force-gas-firms-to-secure-reserves-for-winter
At the risk of pointing out the obvious, the Germans should not have shut down their nuclear power plants. Ditto for their coal plants. Their problems are self inflicted. I have zero sympathy for their plight, particularly because US citizens are being forced to bail-out European stupidity that is careening towards another world war. However, the Biden regime is also guilty of the same stupidity.
“…the Germans should not have shut down their nuclear power plants. Ditto for their coal plants.”
Self inflicted is correct. Yet the last few years sees the Germans adding coal power generation back to their grid; those who wonder why are hopelessly beyond rational help.
The US has been subsidizing soft socialism in the EU for decades; in particular a defense umbrella for the EU that the United States has provided at great cost to its own citizens, it’s no longer tenable.
During the ensuing decades, post WWII, the EU dismantled much of their respective military budgets for self defense in order to expand social programs; the US picked up the tab (excluding England). Essentially this has resulted in a decadal transference of US wealth to the EU, they learned there’s a benefit to laziness for self protection. Now the US Left wants to emulate the EU model (who needs defense after all), yet who then subsidizes the umbrella for the defense of global democracy while the US falls increasingly into debt? Someone must bear the costs, or at least share them equitably; the US can’t continue to hold the bag of being the protector of global democracy is essentially what it boils down to.
The US can no longer afford the onerous costs of defending western values against statist nations; namely China/Russia. It’s time for the EU to pay up for its own defense, stop its selfish backsliding. This is where we’re at. It’s hard to defend democracy and “mitigate climate” at the same time, while giving China and India a free pass. John Kerry can never understand these complexities.
Who actually believes that the Russian advance on Ukraine will be an isolated incident? Those who believe this are the same ones who admire China; they’re the ones who believe that China is a responsible, benevolent global actor.
Defense is expensive, ask China and Russia; all socialist/communist nations who snub the costs of climate mitigation.
“Germany is planning to force energy firms to keep enough gas in storage to ensure security of supply in the winter as part of a package to be considered by parliament”
Too bad for Germany; the before mentioned plan came before Germany “halted” Nord Stream 2, after Russia attacked the Ukraine.
But not so fast.
The elation post Trump within the EU, their erroneous sensibility that Trump “had little to no interest in the international order and trans-Atlantic partnership”, the latter demonstrably couldn’t have been proven more wrong; Russia literally saw no need for order with Biden’s flaccid grip on democracy, right? The Russian attack on Ukraine has their cash register ringing with promise; based on, among other things, the increasing pressure on German energy supply.
So how long before Germany cries uncle? Or maybe we in the US can quickly jerry-rig a gas pipeline to German from the US? Naw, Biden would nix that quicker than one can say Keystone. Sadly, Nor Stream 2 only lacks certification before it comes on-line. Germany is without question a pushover. It’s a win/win for Russia, certification will come faster than you can jerry-rig a fart from cabbage.
https://www.nationalreview.com/corner/nice-new-pipeline-youve-got-there-shame-if-something-happened-to-it/
Looks like the EU likes natural gas after all.
The European Union’s executive arm is looking at ways to build up strategic inventories of natural gas to better prepare for the next winter after limited supplies of the fuel pushed energy prices to records, sending shock waves through the bloc’s economy.
The European Commission plans to propose incentives and obligations to ensure sufficient stockpiles of gas in an action plan for “more affordable, secure and sustainable energy,” due to be presented next month. It will include a legal requirement for member states to have a minimum level of storage by Sept. 30 of every year, according to a draft seen by Bloomberg News.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-02-17/eu-plans-strategic-gas-storage-push-to-avoid-crisis-next-winter
If we were properly focused on energy security, greenhouse gas emissions would be a moot point. #AntiFragileEnergy #GreenNUCLEARDeal #HighlyFlexibleNaturalGas #IncineratePlasticPollution #WasteToEnergy
Very interesting article and comments as usual. My work involves mapping out and helping to change human organizations. Mapped energy industry and “new energy” systems on the ground worldwide for years. Helped create the emissions laws of the US.
So what?
I read the IPCC reports as a student of human networks.
Bottom line?
The IPCC networks are so inbred and self-congratulatory – that it is clear they will never be able to stimulate – or manage – the massive technology networks they imply are necessary.
So – it makes little difference what their ‘consensus’ reports are.
They are so abstract as to never be implemented by 7 billion highly diverse humans
Very interesting article and comments as usual.
My work involves mapping out and helping to change human organizations.
Mapped energy industry and “new energy” systems on the ground worldwide for years. Helped create the emissions laws of the US.
So what?
I read the IPCC reports as a student of human networks.
Bottom line?
The IPCC networks are so inbred and self-congratulatory – that it is clear they will never be able to stimulate – or manage – the massive technology networks they imply are necessary.
So – it makes little difference what their ‘consensus’ reports are.
They are so abstract as to never be implemented by 7 billion highly diverse humans
How do we get from here to there? What steps are necessary to view the problem and risks in a holistic manner? Changing is especially difficult because for decades the analysis of the problem and the solutions have been framed in an overly simplistic and binary manner. Humans inherently prefer that approach and the consensus narrative satisfies that desire. But given the history of the issue how can society be moved to reframe the issue? What is needed to get away from the overly simplistic and binary framing and have all parties embrace a more holistic view. Changing attitudes, given some are going to have to be talked down from the ledge first, is a huge problem. But it’s been done before.
FDR in 1940 saw what was required in the starkest terms. His country did not. Pearl Harbor changed that. An easy decision was forced onto the country. Today, what is being asked is to change what is an easy decision for many into a more complex decision making process. I’m not sure if it can be done voluntarily.
Before the world stops investing in traditional sources of energy it needs with absolute certainty to have other sources meeting the increased demand without any disruptions during that transition. The spike in some energy prices now might eventually become a global problem putting millions of households in a devastating position of not affording the basic necessities. Wouldn’t it be ironic if getting to a more complex decision making process was forced by a simple binary choice:heating or eating. That might be the December 7th moment.
As I was forming the above comment in my head I was also watching a program about Elizabeth Holmes, the founder of Theranos, a company that had been portrayed as revolutionizing the blood testing industry.
It’s an intriguing story of how a 19 year old had a vision and was able to convince some of the biggest names in politics and the financial community to share her vision. Over the years I’ve seen numerous interviews of her. Very impressive. She was found guilty on a number of counts of fraud, etc., just last month.
The question by some was did she really believe in her story and had she developed a belief system so strong that she had deluded herself in the righteousness of her cause and therefore couldn’t be rational about the theory. She was called a zealot, believing that she was doing the work of God which prevented her from being circumspect about her own company’s failures.
Of course, I saw the parallels in climate science. The question has to be asked whether some scientists have developed a blind spot in their own work given how important they view their job and whether their own risk analysis is skewed by their belief system.
As Richard Feynman said, the easiest person to fool in the entire world is oneself.
The list of cognitive biases runs in over 200.
https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Cognitive_bias_codex_en.svg
Most of them work so we can believe in what we have already decided we should believe. They affect everybody.
A water vapor molecule is more effective at warming than a CO2 molecule. Water vapor has been increasing about twice as fast as possible from just feedback. https://drive.google.com/file/d/14qc3dscY7YV0CeFmTkZLi2ygMNif7o4t/view?usp=sharing
Irrigation driven global warming? The proximate cause of much recent warming is reduced cloud cover in the eastern Pacific.
https://watertechbyrie.files.wordpress.com/2022/02/ceres-sw.png
Water vapor is a feedback. With increased surface water availability a greater proportion of surface energy flux is as latent energy. Water vapor condenses in the troposphere in accordance with thermodynamics. What is missing is a mechanism to retain moisture as vapor in the atmosphere.
‘Since the late 1800s, global average surface temperatures have increased by about 2 degrees Fahrenheit (1.1 degrees Celsius). Data from satellites, weather balloons, and ground measurements confirm the amount of atmospheric water vapor is increasing as the climate warms. (The United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Sixth Assessment Report states total atmospheric water vapor is increasing one to two percent per decade). For every degree Celsius that Earth’s atmospheric temperature rises, the amount of water vapor in the atmosphere can increase by about 7 percent, according to the laws of thermodynamics.’ https://climate.nasa.gov/ask-nasa-climate/3143/steamy-relationships-how-atmospheric-water-vapor-supercharges-earths-greenhouse-effect/#:~:text=Data%20from%20satellites%2C%20weather%20balloons,to%20two%20percent%20per%20decade).
What is missing is a mechanism for keeping extra moisture in the atmosphere…
There is a (are) mechanism(s) for keeping it on land.
https://archive.news.iupui.edu/releases/2016/02/drylands-global-greening.shtml
Reducing water loss and growing more leaf area?
https://phys.org/news/2018-01-discrepancies-satellite-global-storage.html
RIE,
Do you not think that over the last millions of years that Nature has evolved a mature, operational hydrologic system or two that makes puny attempts by mankind rather redundant?
Nature holds global temperatures very constant in terms of control mechanisms that are far more advanced than we can emulate. If they had not stood tests of time we would be viewing a rather different globe, but a steady one. Geoff SGeoff S
And this temperature limit might be +/- 10 degrees C?
That NASA article exhibits ignorance. NASAs own measurement data for WV show that water vapor has been increasing about twice as fast as possible from just planet warming.
Dan Pangburn commented:
NASAs own measurement data for WV show that water vapor has been increasing about twice as fast as possible from just planet warming.
When you make claims about data you’re supposed to cite it.
DA,
Apparently you missed the link above. It is also at Sect 7 of https://watervaporandwarming.blogspot.com
Dan, I don’t understand your page and I don’t know if I’m going to try. But on it you wrote this:
“Some people have asserted that WV content increases with air temperature. That would be true if the air was all continuously at saturation.”
This isn’t true. A gas doesn’t have to be at its saturation pressure for the Clausius-Claperyon equation to hold. Hence the current average 7%/degC increase in water vapor content of the atmosphere.
DA,
You need to refresh your understanding of the correct Clausius-Clapeyron equation. By definition it applies only at saturation and relates the enthalpy change (latent heat) to the volume change during phase change at saturation, i.e. hfg = vfg * T (∂P/∂T) where (∂P/∂T) is the slope of the pressure/temperature curve AT SATURATION.
There are approximate equations, also incorrectly called CC such as ln(P1/P2) = ΔHvap/R * (1/T1 – 1/T2) which allow estimating P-T relations by using an approximate value for the latent heat, ΔHvap. The approximation results because ΔHvap varies depending on saturation temperature. This equation was useful before the wide use of computers but is a hindrance to understanding how WV works.
Figure 4 in https://watervaporandwarming.blogspot.com is about as accurate as presently possible for the shape of the saturation vapor pressure vs T for water. The curve is obtained by accurate measurements for water and thermodynamic calculations for ice. The local slope of that curve divided by the T at that point is the feedback. It is determined by numerical methods using the numerical data for the saturation vapor pressure vs T as referenced. The lower graph shows this relation.
Over the temperature range of liquid water on the surface of the earth the temperature varies from about 0 °C to 30 °C for a feedback of about 7.3 to 5.7 %/C°. An area weighted assessment amounted to 6.33%/C° which with compounding (which is questionable) would increase to 6.7%/C°. The value of 7% per C deg is a bit high for the surface but low in the atmosphere where the temperature is below 0°C.
WV is forced into the atmosphere by the saturation vapor pressure resulting from the temperature at the surface. Unless already saturated, i.e. in a cloud, the atmosphere provides accommodation for the added WV.
Dan Pangburn commented
You need to refresh your understanding of the correct Clausius-Clapeyron equation. By definition it applies only at saturation….
But to a good approximation relative humidity is constant in the atmosphere (as Manabe first pointed out), and since
RH = (water vapor pressure)/(saturation vapor pressure)
WVP is proportional to SVP and so the results of the CC equation apply to it as well:
de/dT = Le/RT^2 = appx 7% per deg C
where e=WVP.
DA,
Sounds like you are going to cling to the 7% approximation instead of learning the actual values as shown in Figure 4 in https://watervaporandwarming.blogspot.com . Consequentially you might have difficulty understanding how RH can decline while specific humidity increases as shown here https://climate.metoffice.cloud/humidity.html .
Dan Pangburn commented:
Sounds like you are going to cling to the 7% approximation instead of learning the actual values as shown in Figure 4 in….
Yes. If you have calculated a %/degC for the trend in the water vapor concentration number, what is it? It’s very difficult to plow through your writing, sorry.
I haven’t found any peer reviewed papers giving the %/degC change — though I think they must be out there — but so far I did find this graph from RSS:
https://www.remss.com/research/climate/#vapor
Using their trend line from 1988 to 2014, I estimate a change of 3.6% in those 26 years. From their LT data I also calculate a trend of 0.20 C/decade over that time. So that gives a change in water vapor content of
(3.6/2.6)/0.20 = 6.9%/degC
FWIW.
DA,
You asked: “Yes. If you have calculated a %/degC for the trend in the water vapor concentration number, what is it?”
%/degC depends on the saturation vapor pressure vs temperature curve. It is the slope of the saturation vapor pressure vs temperature curve divided by the saturation vapor pressure at the point. The values are given by the lower graph at Fig 4 in https://watervaporandwarming.blogspot.com The values are given in 1/1 so multiply by 100 to get %.
Dan Pangburn commented:
The values are given by the lower graph at Fig 4 in https://watervaporandwarming.blogspot.com
So according to your Fig 4 at 15 C your number is about 6.5% per degC.
OK.
This is an exceptional, cogent and timely post from Dr. Curry that I wish had appeared years ago! We knew then what we know now. It should be required reading. Dr. Curry, or someone, could take it one step further – “climate change” as formulated for public consumption is only a risk assessment problem for decision-makers because political agendas have made it so. Those agendas have co-opted the incessant search for returns in capital markets in ways that make Big Short era ethics look amateurish. The real risk is public backlash – we’re only seeing the beginnings – made worse by continued deterioration of views toward science (not least because, eventually, people discern the weaknesses and uncertainties in claims) and institutions (already a worry on so many fronts). The potential for chaotic election results, ructions in financial markets given inflation pressures inherent in every one of the policy mandates and initiatives – there are no playbooks for managing the mess.
Art
I think it may be unrealistic to expect the Mauna Loa in the middle of the Pacific) CO2 value to respond that quickly with a 7% global reduction, for only a few months, a carbon cycle not well understood, a cooling phase, different circulation patterns. Also look at the timing of the lock downs and the peak Mauna Loa CO2 peak point. The atmospheric response may well have been in the down trend of the cycle. Mauna Loa measures circulation values, some of that volume would have been produced in the NH winter.
Also allow for the volume in the vertical column, displacement vertically which is not discussed, but measured. How did that change ?
We will never know.
http://saber.gats-inc.com/images/wn_0315_2.png
Ozone,
Symmetry suggests that if we cannot see a CO2 fall from a big emissions fall, we cannot see a CO2 rise from a similarly big emissions rise.
Where does this leave the CO2 police when they want to punish a selected emitter? Could a defence be that the law requires that actual harm is demonstrated, but no detectable change dictated no real harm.
Poor science used for policy can cause uncomfortable glitches like this. Sooner or later, enough people are convinced that the official story being pushed is fabricated on unsound principles and will fail.
Meanwhile, there is an astounding certainty among too many promoters of net zero that they are saving the Earth for humanity. Powerful, professional, paid propaganda needs to be questioned at every opportunity, including by good science. Geoff S
‘It was the best of times, it was the worst of times, it was the age of wisdom, it was the age of foolishness, it was the epoch of belief, it was the epoch of incredulity, it was the season of Light, it was the season of Darkness, it was the spring of hope, it was the winter of despair, we had everything before us, we had nothing before us, we were all going direct to Heaven, we were all going direct the other way – in short, the period was so far like the present period, that some of its noisiest authorities insisted on its being received, for good or for evil, in the superlative degree of comparison only.’ A tale of two cities…
As long as hyperinflation is prevented – there is no shock that would result in a market collapse. Raising interest rates aggressively, stopping quantitative easing (shudder) and cutting government spending is the countercyclical response. Long term only sustained economic growth in global markets will resolve the domestic deficit.
The world will muddle through. Modest amounts of wind and solar will be installed this decade. In Australia we will nurse our aging coal fleet and balance it all with expensive peaking gas and as much hydro as we can – much as we do now. Local gas is very limited. We have much more uranium and and most of the world’s thorium. Thorium can be burned in fast neutron modular nuclear engines. That’s a 60 year old technology being configured to factory fabrication. Cheaper, proliferation resistant, 3% of LW reactor waste that decays in 300 years and no meltdowns. They can supply heat, electricity and transport fuels. The technology is being ground out like sausages all over the world.
https://watertechbyrie.files.wordpress.com/2015/12/ga-em2.jpg
https://www.ga.com/nuclear-fission/advanced-reactors
Food security and biodiversity are more pressing problems for the world. Agricultural productivity can be doubled and tripled by improving soil health. Symbiotic organisms in soil are fed sugars by plants and in turn create microenvironments in which nutrients are released from parent rock. Organic matter holds water in soils and flood and drought proofs landscapes. The carbon content of 150 ppm of CO2 in the atmosphere is required to replace carbon lost from soils and ecosystems since the advent of agriculture. (Rattan Lal) We are getting better at it. Here’s a great film on soil health.
Excellent comment.
CO2 is also causing fertilization in the natural world. While crops have been engineered for carb production for food, in the natural world CO2 allows for more sharing of sugars and water with soil.
🧵 https://mobile.twitter.com/aaronshem/status/1126891477857198081
What are the implications for society if the average global temperature continues to rise at the same rate then it has since the Little Ice Age… recognizing that, temperature is an intensive variable and an average temperature has no meaning outside of the practice of sophistry.
Sophistry lamenting sophistry? Surface temperature is recorded consistently in time and space. After that – means and variance are just arithmetic. Each fractionally dimensioned state space attractor has its own.
Robert I. Ellison wrote:
Sophistry lamenting sophistry? Surface temperature is recorded consistently in time and space. After that – means and variance are just arithmetic. Each fractionally dimensioned state space attractor has its own.
What a amazingly ridiculous cowardly bullsh!t answer. Says nothing at all.
What are the implications to society if global temperatures continues to rise at NOAA’s 30-year rate, +0.21 C/dec, equals GISS over-land 0.30 C/decade?
It’s a vital question. Don’t duck it Robert.
Most of this:
https://watertechbyrie.files.wordpress.com/2022/02/temp-30-year.png
Is due to this:
https://watertechbyrie.files.wordpress.com/2022/02/ceres-sw.png
And the answer has been spoon fed to David too many times.
RIE, what do your watertech graphs mean? I have no idea. You’ll have to discuss and interpret them for us.
It’s a fairly recent CERES SW download. There was considerably less reflected SW at the end of the record – largely with lees eastern Pacific low level marine stratocumulus cloud cover.
Judith, please, isn’t there someway I can get comments by email?????????
Judith, what’s the point of having a WordPress login if it won’t give me comments by email?
Am I on some kind of censor list?
I am unfortunately clueless about the idiosyncracies of word press
Dave, it’s not you.
I cant log in.
Good to know, thanks Aaron.
Robert I. Ellison wrote:
It’s a fairly recent CERES SW download. There was considerably less reflected SW at the end of the record – largely with lees eastern Pacific low level marine stratocumulus cloud cover.
Do you have anything that doesn’t look like someone’s high school science project?
Oodles that seem well beyond David’s juvenile capacities.
Robert I. Ellison wrote:
Oodles that seem well beyond David’s juvenile capacities.
So you don’t.
Nothing peer reviewed?
Are these data the raw data from CERES? Have they undergone the necessary adjustments?
David Appell | February 24, 2022 at 2:37 pm |
Robert I. Ellison wrote:
Oodles that seem well beyond David’s juvenile capacities.
“So you don’t.
Nothing peer reviewed?
Are these data the raw data from CERES? Have they undergone the necessary adjustments?”
Appell – why would raw data need “necessary adjustments”?
To fit the narrative?
Joe – the non climate scientist commented:
Appell – why would raw data need “necessary adjustments”?
To correct for biases.
Just like the Christy’s UAH group does each and every month.
In the real and not digitized world of the global warming alarmists, the concept of a global ‘average’ temperature is nothing more than fallacious reductionist logic because temperature is an intensive variable: an average temperature has no more meaning than the average number of letters in all the names in a phone book.
Climate’s multiple equilibria is physical and presumably therefore ergodic.
Wagathon commented:
…has no more meaning than the average number of letters in all the names in a phone book.
Are you kidding???
L = total number of letters in all the names in the phone book.
N = total number of names.
average = L/N
Similarly, measure the temperature of the surface of the planet at k places, call them Tsubk
Then avg(T)=sum(Tsubk)/k
approximation gets better as k increases, though it really doesn’t have to be very large for it to be good enough.
Wagathon commented:
Unfortunately, the convinced model-makers of climatism who have been beating the drums are so dedicated to the concept of an average global temperature that they no longer even care if their models are tested and fail in every possible way: regionally, seasonally, temporally and historically.
Clearly you’ve never read IPCC 5AR WG1 Chapter 9, “Evaluation of Climate Models.” It’s the longest chapter in the book.
Why not?
Once you are on the reductionists’ dead-end road to nowhere it’s hard to get off the bandwagon. Unfortunately, the convinced model-makers of climatism who have been beating the drums are so dedicated to the concept of an average global temperature that they no longer even care if their models are tested and fail in every possible way: regionally, seasonally, temporally and historically.
An international team of scientists, led by the University of Cambridge, found that the effect of meltwater descending from the surface of the ice sheet to the bed—a kilometer or more below—is by far the largest heat source beneath the world’s second-largest ice sheet, leading to phenomenally high rates of melting at its base.
https://phys.org/news/2022-02-greenland-ice-sheet-world-largest.html
I’m not so sure those investigators got their physics straight. They suggest the melt water forms the energy head of a hydroelectric dam. That would require a restrained vertical column effect, whereby the water release at the column base starts to flow freely and the energy is turned into heat. The water probably enters in a distributed way through crevices and cracks, trickling and gushing. The crack pattern is unique to each glacier due to the underlying rock contouring. Further, they state the melt water at the base should be -0.4 degrees, and is actually +0.88 degrees. Given the pressure effect of the ice it should melt some amount above zero, not at -0.4, and depending on the height of the ice column. It is unclear if they performed an overall heating budget assessment at the base, which includes the measured geothermal component. In Greenland the geothermal heat is increased greatly above the natural constant. That is, from the underlying magma plume, which differs within geographical locale. This research effort may be trying too hard to prove a specific singular theory.
The green extremists’ energy policy hits the wall of reality.
The continued flow of natural gas is the key concern for Germany’s economy as tensions with Russia over Ukraine intensify.
The vulnerability “is clearly energy supply, but even there, the winter is almost over and other supply routes, other sources of supply have been discussed at least and have been prepared,” Ifo President Clemens Fuest said Tuesday in a Bloomberg Television interview with Tom Mackenzie.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-02-22/energy-supply-is-clearly-germany-s-top-risk-in-russia-conflict?srnd=premium
Robert I. Ellison | February 20, 2022
Climate is an angry beast at which we are poking sticks.
And there isn’t much scientific debate about that.
I’d be surprised if Judith Curry, Steve Koonin or Andrew Dessler objected.
–
Hmm.
Climate is like anaesthetics. 99% boring. 1% panic.
–
Opinions can differ markedly and yet both be true
Robert I. Ellison | February 19, 2022 at 6:45 pm | Reply
The event at the core of a climate risk analysis is abrupt and catastrophic change.
–
The most frightening risk in a climate risk analysis perhaps?
The event at the core of a risk analysis is not the risk but the event.
The Climate.
Why bother with rare and impossible to survive risks?
It is like worrying about the sun going nova or Yellowstone reerupting.
The risks that matter in a normal risk analysis are the more mundane examples given .
Sea level rise, more floods and droughts separated by shorter time intervals .
More intense but less frequent hurricanes, more frequent tornados everywhere and species extinction.
–
These are the issues pertinent to a risk analysis now.
angech
“Why bother with rare and impossible to survive risks?
It is like worrying about the sun going nova or Yellowstone reerupting.
The risks that matter in a normal risk analysis are the more mundane examples given .”
“The risks that matter in a normal risk analysis are the more mundane examples given .”
Exactly!
https://www.cristos-vournas.com
RE is quite right about possibilities and the fact that they can occur quite suddenly but the time scales of catastrophic events, frequent as they are , are in the one in million year category.
This does not preclude 2 happening in a week.
Black swan events do occur all the time.
The nature of a black swan event is that it is resistant to objective risk analysis but should not ever be dismissed as a logical outcome.
Right!
“Climate is an angry beast at which we are poking sticks.”
Wally Broecker was a great ocean chemist, but an awful climate researcher. Nearly everything he said about it was wrong, and Carl Wunsch put him to shame with that silly idea that the AMOC could shut down with a single phrase:
Gulf Stream safe if wind blows and Earth turns
https://www.nature.com/articles/428601c
Apparently Broecker was unable to understand how the ocean and the atmosphere interact in a rotating planet under a latitudinal insolation gradient established by the sun. He should have stuck to his trade to avoid making a fool of himself.
The transport of heat northward is not a steady state despite the underlying planetary rotation. It ebbs and flows with winds and currents. They call it a stadium wave – but it is tremendous energies cascading through powerful subsystems. Climate series show the chaotic heart of the beast pounding through woodland and savannah. It moves with immense power and speed across landscapes and oceans. It shifts suddenly and fiercely. We ain’t seen fierce in the 20th century – we ain’t seen nothin’ yet. But what shall we do now with this wild and angry beast?
Heat transport north is not a steady state – it changes with wind and currents – that can be tracked as indices of nonlinear ‘oscillations’.
‘The Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC), a major ocean current system transporting warm surface waters toward the northern Atlantic, has been suggested to exhibit two distinct modes of operation. A collapse from the currently attained strong to the weak mode would have severe impacts on the global climate system and further multi-stable Earth system components. Observations and recently suggested fingerprints of AMOC variability indicate a gradual weakening during the last decades, but estimates of the critical transition point remain uncertain. Here, a robust and general early-warning indicator for forthcoming critical transitions is introduced. Significant early-warning signals are found in eight independent AMOC indices, based on observational sea-surface temperature and salinity data from across the Atlantic Ocean basin. These results reveal spatially consistent empirical evidence that, in the course of the last century, the AMOC may have evolved from relatively stable conditions to a point close to a critical transition.’ Observation-based early-warning signals for a collapse of the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation
Javier’s invidious straw man mischaracterisation is just pointless rubbish.
Wally Broecker was a fool, but as Obi Wan Kenobi said:
“Who’s the more foolish, the fool or the fool that follows him?”
There isn’t a risk of a descent into a glacial. And interglacials tend to endure for 10,000. Time is not on our side in this. Unless you think things have changed? Then there are always megadroughts and megafloods. These tend to come as regimes of similar sized events. It’s a chaos thing.
‘By ‘Noah Effect’ we designate the observation that extreme precipitation can be very extreme indeed, and by ‘Joseph Effect’ the finding that a long period of unusual (high or low) precipitation can be extremely long. Current models of statistical hydrology cannot account for either effect and must be superseded.’ Mandelbrot and Wallis – 1968 – Noah, Joseph, and Operational Hydrology
Robert I. Ellison wrote:
The event at the core of a climate risk analysis is abrupt and catastrophic change.
No, that’s blinkered RIE. In fact, climate risk also comes as, for example, sea-level rise, cm by cm, until the world’s coastal cities are flooded.
This is happening right now.
You know that RIE. You can’t deny it. You can’t even try.
Judith, why can’t I login with my Facebook ID? It is, literally, the only way I can get comments by email. (And why is THAT, anyway????).
Please fix all this stuff, Judity.
Seems to be a wordpress problem, nothing I can do from here
Da02,
Why do you mention ocean level change in the context of man-made global warming, when the change of a couple of mm a year has been essentially constant for hundreds of years before people could have affected CO2 levels?
Parsimony would prefer the change seen on hundreds of tide gauges to be merely a continuation of natural variation. Geoff S
One of the obvious risks is rising global temperatures at Argo floats and the world wide network of airport sited observation sites which, despite their declining numbers and backward lowering temperature algorithms (Zeke).
Give a complete and accurate global temperature graph for the last 172 years even though the floats and many airports did not exist 40 years ago.
–
2021 highlighted a significant drop in temperature to 6 th place which can only be put down to a problem with the programs or a change in CO2 IR absorption and emittance.
Since the programs are infallible CO2 changes are most likely.
–
The other risk is Arctic ice melting away to less than a Wadham and failing to refreeze.
Currently there are 19 days left for it to reach the yearly maximum.
It is currently as of today in 6th lowest place.
Stumbling to the finish.
If by some mischance it gets past where it is predicted it would be a second validation of overconfidence in IPCC risk predictions.
It will obviously do some.last minute flop due to CO2 returning to normal emissivity, otherwise the DMI will have to do another graph recalculation to fix the errors
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Frigid Arctic air is now flowing into all of western North America. It will also reach all of California.
https://i.ibb.co/XX1nNhj/mimictpw-namer-latest.gif
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How is stating that he doesn’t think the risks are real not a statement of a different perception? I tend to agree with Willis about the reality of the risks of anthropogenic global warming but my position doesn’t need your verbiage to be adequately stated.
But don’t those who wish action to be taken in response to their beliefs about the risks have a responsibility to present a case for action that demonstrates how the actions they propose will eliminate the risks they see?
An increase in solar wind activity in January resulted in a strengthening of the stratospheric polar vortex and a decrease in temperatures in the lower stratosphere.
https://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/stratosphere/strat-trop/gif_files/time_pres_UGRD_ANOM_JFM_NH_2022.png
https://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/stratosphere/strat-trop/gif_files/time_pres_TEMP_ANOM_JFM_NH_2022.png
At the same time, the SOI index rose to more than 10.
https://www.longpaddock.qld.gov.au/soi/
Apart from being off topic – what on Earth can this possibly mean?
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My biggest issue with organizations such as the IPCC is knowing what their true agenda is. I would like to believe they truly have humanity’s best interests in mind. Featuring Michael Mann’s hockey stick while knowing of its many flaws, or continuing to use RCP8.5 as a bases for their troubling scenarios does not provide me with much confidence. If the ruling elite wanted to frighten us into accepting their version of governance, man made climate change would provide a perfect method.
Lloyd Corle wrote:
Featuring Michael Mann’s hockey stick while knowing of its many flaws…
Lloyd, Mann et al’s hockey stick has been replicated many times by many different methods. Maybe you don’t know this.
It’s also expected on theoretical grounds.
It’d be far more surprising if the hockey stick WASN’T true….
davidappell02 | February 22, 2022 at 9:10 pm | Reply
Lloyd Corle wrote:
Featuring Michael Mann’s hockey stick while knowing of its many flaws…
appell comment – “Lloyd, Mann et al’s hockey stick has been replicated many times by many different methods. Maybe you don’t know this.
It’s also expected on theoretical grounds.
It’d be far more surprising if the hockey stick WASN’T true….”
Appell – the reconstructions of the blade are fairly reasonable, especially since there are modern day instruments to correct for measurement errors and to keep the reconstructions honest.
The problem is the shaft – which the proxies used in the reconstruction dont line up with other historical records and the lack of modern day instruments to keep the climate scientists honest.
The errors in the shaft are well known, as has been pointed out to you multiple times.
The shaft is also heavily dependent on long proxies which few if any have a blade.
David, do you have a link to the latest hockey stick paper that is accessible to the public? I would be interested in reading a latter version.
davidappell02 | February 22, 2022
Lloyd Corle wrote:
Featuring Michael Mann’s hockey stick while knowing of its many flaws…
Lloyd, Mann et al’s hockey stick has been replicated many times by many different methods …….
……..by the same little group of Mann sycophants using variations of the same flawed data
Maybe you don’t know this.
But David Appell certainly does and is content not to spread that bit of information.
jim2 wrote:
David, do you have a link to the latest hockey stick paper that is accessible to the public? I would be interested in reading a latter version.
Lots of papers here:
http://www.davidappell.com/hockeysticks.html
Not sure which ones are open to the public, as I usually get free access. You can always write to an author and request a copy.
Joe – the non climate scientist wrote:
The errors in the shaft are well known, as has been pointed out to you multiple times.
Both shaft and blade have been replicated many times by many methods and published in the best peer reviewed journals in the world.
http://www.davidappell.com/hockeysticks.html
Those trump your noodling around on the subject.
angech wrote:
……..by the same little group of Mann sycophants using variations of the same flawed data
Same little group? Ha.
http://www.davidappell.com/hockeysticks.html
Replicated dozens of times by many different statistical methods. By experts around the globe. Your meatless opinion doesn’t stack up to their rigorous, detailed scientific work in any way.
jim2, if you can’t find a free copy of a paper, get my email address from my Web site, write me and I’ll send you a copy of PAGES 2k or this very recent paper:
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-021-03984-4
Or anything else in Science, Nature, or an AGU journal that you want.
http://www.davidappell.com
David Appell | February 24, 2022 at 11:33 pm |
Joe – the non climate scientist wrote:
The errors in the shaft are well known, as has been pointed out to you multiple times.
Both shaft and blade have been replicated many times by many methods and published in the best peer reviewed journals in the world.
http://www.davidappell.com/hockeysticks.html
Those trump your noodling around on the subject.
Appell – Just waiting for you to address the merits of the criticisms of the Hockey sticks
As previously stated the problems are in the shaft
1) The shaft is based on the long proxies which show no blade – How valid are the long proxies if they dont reconcile with recent past
2) The long proxies dont line up with well documented historical facts for example
a) large growth in human population during the mwp and death of the 1/4 -1/3 of the human population during the LIA
b) graves in greenland from the mwp located in permafrost today
c) reconstructions using yamal proxies showing cooling temps during the MWP even though the northward tree line was 200k further north during the mwp.
d) citrus crop in china growing 300k further north during the MWP than today.
e) high tree elevations throughout europe during the MWP than today, same in the andes
f) exposed forests dating from the MWP exposed by receding glaciers in the canadian columbia ice fields, the mendenhal glacier, etc
So what if the studies have been replicated many times by many different methods, and reviewed by the “best peer review journals”
As long as those studies continue to fail to reconcile to known historical facts, they will remain tainted along with tainting the integrity of the scientists and activists promoting the flaws.
Joe – the non climate scientist wrote:
Appell – Just waiting for you to address the merits of the criticisms of the Hockey sticks
It’s interesting how you insist that no one but a tax accountant can say anything meaningful about tax accounting, but you think your little list here invalidates the work of hundreds of climate scientists and dozens of peer reviewed studies that replicate the hockey stick.
David Appell | February 25, 2022 at 10:12 am |
Joe – the non climate scientist wrote:
Appell – Just waiting for you to address the merits of the criticisms of the Hockey sticks
“It’s interesting how you insist that no one but a tax accountant can say anything meaningful about tax accounting, but you think your little list here invalidates the work of hundreds of climate scientists and dozens of peer reviewed studies that replicate the hockey stick.”
1) Most commentators on this blog get the basics of taxation correct, you on the other hand dont even come close,
2) The deficiencies of the long proxies in the HS reconstructions are well known, the failure to address those deficiencies doesnt speak highly of the integrity of the climate scientists or those defending those works
Again – are you even aware of the issues that have been repetitively pointed out with regard to the long proxies and the failure to reconcile to other well known historical facts.
Joe – the non climate scientist commented:
1) Most commentators on this blog get the basics of taxation correct, you on the other hand dont even come close,
I don’t comment about tax accounting, except to cite what other documents say about fossil fuel subsidies. Other than that I find the whole subject incredibly boring.
2) The deficiencies of the long proxies in the HS reconstructions are well known, the failure to address those deficiencies doesnt speak highly of the integrity of the climate scientists or those defending those works
Here you go again, insisting you and your little list are right and all the experts and all the peer reviewed papers are wrong. How can the deficiencies be so well known but somehow never published as science? Or do you mean they’re well known to unscientific blog commenters like you who are sure you know everything despite having no training in climate science and no expertise in paleoclimatology whatsoever?
David Appell | February 25, 2022 at 10:42 am |
Joe – the non climate scientist commented:
1) Most commentators on this blog get the basics of taxation correct, you on the other hand dont even come close,
” I don’t comment about tax accounting, except to cite what other documents say about fossil fuel subsidies. Other than that I find the whole subject incredibly boring.”
let me comment on the your response regarding fossil fuel subsidies. Those claims are repeated ad nasuem by climate scientists and activists even though they they are well known to be false.
Similar to claims about renewables being cheaper than fossil fuels, those claims are made ad nausem even though they are well known to be false.
For some illogical reason climate scientists and activists belief those claims to be true
The climate science field is rife with those repetitive errors.
The same lack of rigor exists in the paleo reconstructions –
Now with regard to the non response from climate scientists to the proxies that dont line up with historical facts –
How often have you seen any climate scientists address any of the specific historical discrepancies
How often have you seen any of the climate scientists respond to the failure to reconcile proxies with known historical facts
The bottom line is you see that rigor from climate scientists where there are really omissions.
Spent some time exploring the specific discrepancies, get some education on the history of world civilizations, Look at the underlying proxies
I dont that you are even aware of how all the proxies fit into the reconstructions.
joe – the non climate scientist commented:
How often have you seen any climate scientists address any of the specific historical discrepancies
How often have you seen any of the climate scientists respond to the failure to reconcile proxies with known historical facts
You don’t understand science at all.
The science is about using proxies to determine temperatures and then reconstructing regional or hemispheric or global temperatures using various reconstruction techniques.
It’s about those data.
It’s not about populations or graves in Greenland or citrus crops in China. The former depends on very many factors, and the latter two are highly regional and say nothing about the globe as a whole.
If even you have those claims right. You provide no data or supporting evidence, so there’s no point in chasing down your ghosts until you do. See, that’s what scientists do in their published studies — provide data and evidence that’s verifiable and can be replicated. Not mere hearsay, which is all you ever have. You read something somewhere once who knows where and take it as proven fact and lack the expertise to interpret it or analyze it in terms of the big picture.
You don’t present any science, just hearsay and rumors and hand waving lacking data and specifics and evidence and citations and proof. So there’s no point in wasting time trying to debunk them.
David Appell | February 25, 2022 at 1:18 pm |
joe – the non climate scientist commented:
How often have you seen any climate scientists address any of the specific historical discrepancies
How often have you seen any of the climate scientists respond to the failure to reconcile proxies with known historical facts
Appell’s cmment –
“You don’t understand science at all.
The science is about using proxies to determine temperatures and then reconstructing regional or hemispheric or global temperatures using various reconstruction techniques.
It’s about those data.”
Appell its astonishing that you cant grasp the problem
It is absolutely about the data
It is absolutely about using the proxies to determine temperature and then using the those proxies to reconstruct regional, hemispheric and global temperatures using various reconstruction techniques.
The problem which you continually fail to grasp is if the initial measurement is faulty, then all subsequent measurements and reconstructions are faulty.
Far too many proxies DO NOT reconcile or line up with known historical facts. Yet those proxies continue to be used.
It doesnt matter if how many different methods are used, if the underlying proxies are not a good representation of historical temps, then the “reconstructions ” will remain faulty.
there is considerable information available on the bad proxies which continue to be used
Joe – the non climate scientist commented:
The problem which you continually fail to grasp is if the initial measurement is faulty….
In what way(s) is(are) the initial measurement(s) faulty?
Joe – the non climate scientist commented:
Far too many proxies DO NOT reconcile or line up with known historical facts
You haven’t shown this at all.
Which proxies? Where? When? Which historical facts, specifically?
Do you know what “hand waving” means in science??
You haven’t provided any data, evidence or information or “facts” whatsoever — and now you just keep repeating the same information vacuum over and over again. Do you have ANYTHING that’s specific?
Joe – the non climate scientist commented:
there is considerable information available on the bad proxies which continue to be used
This is what I mean — you just keep making the same vacuous claims over and over again.
joe – the non climate scientist commented:
Similar to claims about renewables being cheaper than fossil fuels, those claims are made ad nausem even though they are well known to be false.
“Renewable Energy Is Now The Cheapest Option – Even Without Subsidies,” Forbes 6/15/2019.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/jamesellsmoor/2019/06/15/renewable-energy-is-now-the-cheapest-option-even-without-subsidies/
“Building New Renewables Is Cheaper Than Burning Fossil Fuels,”
Bloomberg 6/23/2021.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-06-23/building-new-renewables-cheaper-than-running-fossil-fuel-plants
“Solar is now ‘cheapest electricity in history’, confirms IEA,”
CarbonBrief 10/13/2020.
https://www.carbonbrief.org/solar-is-now-cheapest-electricity-in-history-confirms-iea
davidappell02 | February 22, 2022 at 9:10 pm | Reply
Lloyd Corle wrote:
Featuring Michael Mann’s hockey stick while knowing of its many flaws…
David,
There are prominent papers that show tree ring temperature proxies in the last 50 years diverge from the instrumental data, seriouly badly so that it is plausible that one or the other is in error.
Hence “Hide the Decline”, “Mikes trick in Nature” and so on.
David, because of this divergence, what causes you confidence in earlier years of proxies, like the ones in the hockey stick graphs, are accurate?
Please pardon my use of jargon – it is meant for the occasional reader to help with context.
Geoff S
David Appell | February 25, 2022 at 10:53 pm |
Joe – the non climate scientist commented:
there is considerable information available on the bad proxies which continue to be used
This is what I mean — you just keep making the same vacuous claims over and over again.
I have given the links and citations multiple times – yet you refuse to follow up
climate audit dot org is a good start
David Appell | February 25, 2022 at 11:06 pm |
joe – the non climate scientist commented:
Similar to claims about renewables being cheaper than fossil fuels, those claims are made ad nausem even though they are well known to be false.
Appels responses – he cites three articles
“Renewable Energy Is Now The Cheapest Option – Even Without Subsidies,” Forbes 6/15/2019.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/jamesellsmoor/2019/06/15/renewable-energy-is-now-the-cheapest-option-even-without-subsidies/
“Building New Renewables Is Cheaper Than Burning Fossil Fuels,”
Bloomberg 6/23/2021.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2021-06-23/building-new-renewables-cheaper-than-running-fossil-fuel-plants
“Solar is now ‘cheapest electricity in history’, confirms IEA,”
CarbonBrief 10/13/2020.
https://www.carbonbrief.org/solar-is-now-cheapest-electricity-in-history-confirms-iea
Apple – thanks for the links
Did you flunk your high school algebra and geometry courses – where they teach “proof your work”
If renewables are actually cheaper – then why are energy / electricity costs higher in countries with higher renewable penetration?
Hint – its because total costs (not the marginal costs) are higher – significantly higher.
the error in the forbes , carbon brief and bloomberg articles would be obvious to you if you had a basic background in the subject matter and used some basic math skills
Joe wrote:
If renewables are actually cheaper – then why are energy / electricity costs higher in countries with higher renewable penetration?
Are they?
Where’s the proof of that?
David writes- “You don’t present any science, just hearsay and rumors and hand waving lacking data and specifics and evidence and citations and proof.”
What David writes describes describe exactly what he does when attributing bad weather to more CO2.
Rob Starkey | February 25, 2022 at 2:32 pm | Reply
David writes- “You don’t present any science, just hearsay and rumors and hand waving lacking data and specifics and evidence and citations and proof.”
Rob – What appell ignores – I gave him specifics.
The historical discrepancies are well known
david refuses to do basic google search to become educated on the paleo reconstructions and proxie deficiencies
Joe – the non climate scientist commented:
david refuses to do basic google search to become educated on the paleo reconstructions and proxie deficiencies
research by “Google searches” LOL. Reminds me of this:
t.ly/t1Py
It’s odd how you make the claims but I’m the one who’s supposed to do the research to support them. Ordinarily the one making the claims provides the evidence for them.
David Appell | February 25, 2022 at 10:45 pm |
Joe – the non climate scientist commented:
david refuses to do basic google search to become educated on the paleo reconstructions and proxie deficiencies
research by “Google searches” LOL. Reminds me of this:
t.ly/t1Py
It’s odd how you make the claims but I’m the one who’s supposed to do the research to support them. Ordinarily the one making the claims provides the evidence for them.”
Appell – I have give you multiple citations and links in the past – your respsonse has alway been that you were not going to look at any of those links or citations – your loss of becoming educated
Joe wrote:
Appell – I have give you multiple citations and links in the past – your respsonse has alway been that you were not going to look at any of those links or citations – your loss of becoming educated
Yet again you have *nothing* to support your claims.
It’s clear you don’t have the evidence to support them and are just stalling for time. You’re just repeating some little list you saw on the Web somewhere which didn’t give any supporting evidence either.
So there’s no point discussing this any further.
David Appell | February 27, 2022 at 11:08 am |
Joe wrote:
Appell – I have give you multiple citations and links in the past – your respsonse has alway been that you were not going to look at any of those links or citations – your loss of becoming educated
Yet again you have *nothing* to support your claims.
It’s clear you don’t have the evidence to support them and are just stalling for time. You’re just repeating some little list you saw on the Web somewhere which didn’t give any supporting evidence either.
Appell – you are correct that I have never given you a citation – a citation that you are willing to look at
https://climateaudit.org/2021/08/11/the-ipcc-ar6-hockeystick/
https://climateaudit.org/2021/08/15/pages19-asian-tree-ring-chronologies/
https://climateaudit.org/2021/08/26/pages2019-30-60s/
https://climateaudit.org/2021/09/02/pages19-0-30s/
https://climateaudit.org/2021/09/15/pages-2019-0-30n-proxies/
Appell – He is a prime example of the proxies not lining up with KNOWN Historical Facts
https://climateaudit.org/2021/03/02/milankovitch-forcing-and-tree-ring-proxies/
Note that Pages 2k is still using Yamal briffa series from 2008 and 2013 with the cooler MWP temps –
“Yamal Treeline
“The treeline series illustrated in Esper et al 2012 was derived from Hantemirov and Shiyatov Figure 2 (but excluding its Early Holocene portion). It showed mid-Holocene treelines extended approximately 30 km north of present treelines. However, this 30 km figure represented the northern limit of the survey, NOT the actual Holocene treeline. By the time of Hantemirov’s thesis in 2009, the survey – and the mid-Holocene treeline – had been extended nearly 120 km north of the current treeline (see middle panel). It appears that the Holocene treeline may have been even further north: in 1941, Tikhonov reportedly observed sub-fossil Holocene trees at 70N, approximately 275 km north of the present treeline. So, while Esper et al were right to note that Holocene treeline was further north, their diagram dramatically under-estimated the actual distance further north of the Holocene treeline, not just absolutely, but in respect to what was known in Russian literature at the date of their article.
Note that, in the 20th century, the Yamal treeline finally reversed its long march south, though still located far south of its Holocene location. This reversal corresponds to the 20th century reversal of the equilibrium line of Norwegian small glaciers – neither effect being apparent in the Esper et al figure.”
AS I said – The reconstructions are only as good as the underlying proxies
A basic concept you refuse to grasp
Joe wrote:
Appell – you are correct that I have never given you a citation – a citation that you are willing to look at
Please quote from these pages what specifically support your claims. I’m not going to hunt through all these links to try to pick that out.
joe wrote:
Appell – He is a prime example of the proxies not lining up with KNOWN Historical Facts
https://climateaudit.org/2021/03/02/milankovitch-forcing-and-tree-ring-proxies/
What “known historical facts” doesn’t this line up with?
Joe wrote:
“Yamal Treeline”
HOW does this support anything you’re claimed? Explain? I’m not an expert in moving treelines, and I’m not going to read through McIntyre’s pedantic and turgid writing to try to understand what YOU specifically claim.
David Allen 02 is playing his favorite game, what Ali called the Rope-a-Dope.
He has seen these citations and others about other issues, innumerable times. Probably in the hundreds over the years. There are some things beside this one that are common knowledge. For instance, there is a wealth of literature on the Global MVP and LIAs, little acceleration in SLR, US East Coast VLM, geothermal activity under the AIS and GIS, forest fires history, trendless hurricanes, failed predictions of catastrophic SLR, New Ice Age, and on and on and on. For anyone who has the reading comprehension of post 3rd grade, they know citations have been provided countless times.
Yet, he whines about no links. Why should the rest of us wet nurse the guy. He has fingers. He knows how to Google search. If he is physically unable to do so, he should take a cue from the NFL and declare himself on the injured reserve list.
David Appell | February 27, 2022 at 12:02 pm |
joe wrote:
Appell – He is a prime example of the proxies not lining up with KNOWN Historical Facts
https://climateaudit.org/2021/03/02/milankovitch-forcing-and-tree-ring-proxies/
What “known historical facts” doesn’t this line up with?
Appell – That should be obvious – Basic knowledge of science / botany would help – or at least not ignoring basic science/botany
If the tree line was 200k+ further north than the present day tree line – Botany science shows it was warmer during the MWP not colder than the present day. Yet the proxy shows it was colder during the MWP
Which are you going to believe ? The Rigorous peer reviewed climate scientists or basic botany science?
Simply put, It cant be colder during the MWP if the tree line was 200k + further north .
David Appell | February 27, 2022 at 12:01 pm |
Joe wrote:
Appell – you are correct that I have never given you a citation – a citation that you are willing to look at
Please quote from these pages what specifically support your claims. I’m not going to hunt through all these links to try to pick that out.
I provided the multitude of links to provide you with the opportunity to develop a basic background on the hockey stick deficiencies which have previously chosen to ignore.
Difficult to understand the full extent of the errors if you only listen to the echo chamber.
David Appell | February 27, 2022 at 12:09 pm |
Joe wrote:
“Yamal Treeline”
HOW does this support anything you’re claimed? Explain? I’m not an expert in moving treelines, and I’m not going to read through McIntyre’s pedantic and turgid writing to try to understand what YOU specifically claim.
Translation – Appell refuses to read the citations – too much work to become educated
Mr Appell is a climate zealot and only retains information that supports his notion that a slight rise in global temperature mandates that the climate will worsen exclusively.
Joe wrote:
Appell – you are correct that I have never given you a citation – a citation that you are willing to look at
https://climateaudit.org/2021/08/11/the-ipcc-ar6-hockeystick/
[more links]
So by “known historical facts” opposing the long proxies I assume(?) you mean the Milankovitch forcing of ~ -6 W/m2 over the last 2000 years?
Just acknowledging your reply. Have been busy with work but am studying this.
Joe wrote:
Botany science shows it was warmer during the MWP not colder than the present day.
It wasn’t warmer everywhere (the MWP wasn’t global) and it wasn’t always warmer.
You’ve been given this link many times:
“There were no globally synchronous multi-decadal warm or cold intervals that define a worldwide Medieval Warm Period or Little Ice Age….”
— “Continental-scale temperature variability during the past two millennia,” PAGES 2k Consortium, Nature Geosciences, April 21, 2013.
http://www.nature.com/ngeo/journal/v6/n5/abs/ngeo1797.html
See this timeline plot:
https://www.pastglobalchanges.org/sites/default/files/download/docs/magazine/2017-1/images/Neukon-Fig_1.png
Appel suppies us with this link
See this timeline plot:
https://www.pastglobalchanges.org/sites/default/files/download/docs/magazine/2017-1/images/Neukon-Fig_1.png
Appell – take a look at the Artic band in the Neukon reconstruction – compare and contrast that reconstruction with the facts detailed below –
Same issues with the norwegian glaciers, mendanhal glacier, colombia icefield.
Seriously – how comfortable are you with those Neukon’s reconstruction when you have those discrepancies?
Botany science shows the temp reconstructions from those proxies in the artic region to be iffy
Yamal Treeline
“The treeline series illustrated in Esper et al 2012 was derived from Hantemirov and Shiyatov Figure 2 (but excluding its Early Holocene portion). It showed mid-Holocene treelines extended approximately 30 km north of present treelines. However, this 30 km figure represented the northern limit of the survey, NOT the actual Holocene treeline. By the time of Hantemirov’s thesis in 2009, the survey – and the mid-Holocene treeline – had been extended nearly 120 km north of the current treeline (see middle panel). It appears that the Holocene treeline may have been even further north: in 1941, Tikhonov reportedly observed sub-fossil Holocene trees at 70N, approximately 275 km north of the present treeline. So, while Esper et al were right to note that Holocene treeline was further north, their diagram dramatically under-estimated the actual distance further north of the Holocene treeline, not just absolutely, but in respect to what was known in Russian literature at the date of their article.
Note that, in the 20th century, the Yamal treeline finally reversed its long march south, though still located far south of its Holocene location. This reversal corresponds to the 20th century reversal of the equilibrium line of Norwegian small glaciers – neither effect being apparent in the Esper et al figure.”
Appell’s citation — “Continental-scale temperature variability during the past two millennia,” PAGES 2k Consortium, Nature Geosciences, April 21, 2013.
http://www.nature.com/ngeo/journal/v6/n5/abs/ngeo1797.html
Appell – You look at the conclusions of the studies
I look at the underlying proxies used to support the conclusion
Appell – did you look at the sparseness of the proxies used in pages 2k 2013 or 2017.
did you look at the quality of the proxies used in pages 2k?
https://climateaudit.org/2021/08/11/the-ipcc-ar6-hockeystick/
https://climateaudit.org/2021/08/15/pages19-asian-tree-ring-chronologies/
https://climateaudit.org/2021/08/26/pages2019-30-60s/
https://climateaudit.org/2021/09/02/pages19-0-30s/
https://climateaudit.org/2021/09/15/pages-2019-0-30n-proxies/
Appell’s comment – “Continental-scale temperature variability during the past two millennia,” PAGES 2k Consortium, Nature Geosciences, April 21, 2013.
http://www.nature.com/ngeo/journal/v6/n5/abs/ngeo1797.html
Appell – you do realize the authors of the paper you cited (pages 2k 2013) have issued a correction that invalidates the conclusion in the paper you cited.
https://climateaudit.org/2015/03/17/another-upside-down-pages2k-non-corrigendum/
Appell
Temperatures are back to the level of nearly 40 years ago. Have you thought of how you will be able to handle this psychologically if the trend continues for, say, 30 or 40 years? I can see how it would be traumatic for the most sensitive in our population. Especially if they have their reputation on the line.
Joe wrote:
did you look at the quality of the proxies used in pages 2k?
What’s wrong with them? What’s wrong with them THAT’S BEEN PUBLISHED IN THE PEER REVIEWED LITERATURE, not on some blog.
Blogs aren’t science.
Joe wrote:
Appell – You look at the conclusions of the studies
I look at the underlying proxies used to support the conclusion
No, you cherry pick a few proxies and from those make global conclusions.
That’s not science.
An individual proxy responds to local influences as well as global influences. It doesn’t necessarily have to agree with Milankovitch forcings. If it did every proxy in the world would show identical results. They don’t.
Just as today every spot in the world isn’t responding the same way to greenhouse warming. The North Atlantic, in fact, is cooling.
Real scientists, which doesn’t include McIntyre, look at *all* the proxies and use them to statistically reconstruct hemispheric and global temperatures.
All of them get a hockey stick, again and again. As, again, is completely expected on theoretical grounds. It would be surprising if anyone DIDN’T find a hockey stick–that would be real news.
CKid commented:
Temperatures are back to the level of nearly 40 years ago
Not according to GISS or NOAA or JMA.
What you mean is that one or two months have fluctuated low, down to the very highest fluctuations around 1980, because now we’ve had back-to-back La Ninas and back then they had a monstrous El Nino.
But I don’t expect you to be that honest about the situation.
CKid commented:
Have you thought of how you will be able to handle this psychologically if the trend continues for, say, 30 or 40 years?
There you go again, assuming your ridiculous predictions of the future are right and then using them to attack people.
Of course your prediction is scientific hogwash. Worse, you know that.
Typical Appell comment – “Real scientists, which doesn’t include McIntyre, look at *all* the proxies and use them to statistically reconstruct hemispheric and global temperatures.”
Appell I guess you were unaware that pages 2k (2013) that you proudly linked & cited was corrected based on the errors pointed out by that non scientist mcintyre who runs some non peer reviewed blog
Typical Appell comment – “Real scientists, which doesn’t include McIntyre, look at *all* the proxies and use them to statistically reconstruct hemispheric and global temperatures.”
Appell seems you are unaware of the retraction of the gergis SH reconstruction based on errors pointed out by some non scientist named mcintyre who runs some non peer reviewed blog
Guess thats not the way sciences is done.
Appell any idea how many others problems exist
Appells comment – “All of them get a hockey stick, again and again. As, again, is completely expected on theoretical grounds. It would be surprising if anyone DIDN’T find a hockey stick–that would be real news.”
Appell – I will let you continue to believe “uncritically” that those hockey sticks using those long proxies with no blade are the “gold standard ” of science – oops the gold standard of “climate science ”
note – I have to distinquish between science and climate science.
The frost waves in the U.S. are due to a polar vortex pattern that formed in the fall when the solar wind was still weak.
https://i.ibb.co/n6b4xkK/gfs-t100-nh-f00-2.png
https://i.ibb.co/C6bBHmm/gfs-t100-nh-f24.png
A decrease in galactic radiation indicates an increase in the strength of the solar wind magnetic field (an increase in geomagnetic activity).
https://i.ibb.co/0VrwjNQ/onlinequery.gif
Snowfall mass for the current winter season, excluding the mountains, is well above the 1982-2012 average.
http://globalcryospherewatch.org/state_of_cryo/snow/fmi_swe_tracker.jpg
Pingback: What Do You Think to the Show So Far? – Climate- Science.press
Of course it can’t happen. So why energy innovation and environmental stewardship.
https://cdn.arstechnica.net/wp-content/uploads/2019/02/schenider_fig-1280×848.jpg
https://climate.fas.harvard.edu/files/climate/files/scheider_kaul_and_pressel_2019_-_possible_climate_transitions_from_breakup_of_stratocumulus_decks_under_greenhouse_warming.pdf
Judith:
Why can’t I subscribe to comments with my WordPress ID? I never get an email to confirm.
Why can’t I subscribe to comments with my Facebook ID (the only thing that has ever worked in the past)? I get the error message
“Error: your Facebook login has expired.”
How do I fix this?
PS: My Facebook login hasn’t expired. I can access Facebook just fine.
Severe frost in the central US. Snow in California.
https://i.ibb.co/qp5fK7Z/Screenshot-2.png
As the solar wind strength increased in January, the Walker Circulation to the south increased, allowing La Niña to last.
https://www.tropicaltidbits.com/analysis/ocean/nino12.png
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/68/LaNina.png
Is not Earth’s rotational warming based on its heat capacity and Holder’s inequality (the average of the fourth power of all global temperatures is greater than the fourth power of the average global temperature)?
–
Therefore, because extreme temperatures radiate more than a similar body with the same average temperature, a temperate body will be warmer than one with more extreme temperatures. In other words, the faster a body rotates, the warmer it will be.
https://www.cristos-vournas.com
Tipping points.
They are all around us, every day, at some scale or another. A dust devil forms over a sandy desert. lasts a few minutes then goes away. A rogue wave is felt by boats in the ocean. An earthquake happens. More, more.
What is of concern is the scale. It is only if they reach a scale of high energy, irrespective of their rate of happening, that they become a problem worthy of thought.
There is a log scale for earthquakes, so we can contemplate their force and know that bad earthquake events do happen.
What other tipping point events reach this problematic intensity? What can be done about them, apart from nothing? Geoff S
Tipping points involve positive feedbacks that are implicated in major climate shifts of the past. Although recognizing that requires some science.
Reducing anthropogenic pressures of a complex dynamical system involves energy innovation and better land management.
Rogue waves are the result of wave interference patterns. Sometimes wave wave reinforce and sometimes they cancel. And avalanches are a better example of a tipping point than earthquakes.
Of course avalanches are a better example. 😊
“ Saudis Warn Of Oil Shortage Shock, Blame “Net Zero” For Underinvestment”
Who needs another oil shortage shock?
https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/saudis-warn-oil-shortage-shock-blame-net-zero-underinvestment
“ USPS Shuns Biden’s EV Dreams With Massive Gasoline-Powered Mail Truck Purchase”
“ USPS wrote that given its financial condition, “the battery-electric option has a significantly higher total cost of ownership than its combustion-engine counterpart.”
https://www.zerohedge.com/markets/usps-shuns-bidens-ev-dreams-massive-gasoline-powered-mail-truck-purchase
No shyte, Sherlock!
The difference between talk and action. Talk is cheap. Action counts.
I rest my case. Show me the money.
https://www.ft.com/content/84196790-2030-44d7-988c-b6e3408f9b4b
Yep, it’s hard to believe the Post Office made such a rational decision. :)
Looks like the EU has gotten bored jumping over the bonfire. Now they want to dive headlong into the Volcano.
The sharp-toothed new E.U. strategy is expected to be unveiled March 2. It calls for a 40 percent reduction in fossil fuel use by 2030 and requires European energy companies to fill their storage tanks with natural gas this summer so that the continent is less dependent on Russian gas next winter than it has been in the past, according to an official involved in drafting the strategy, who spoke on the condition of anonymity to discuss the proposal before it is officially released. This season, Europe is poised to eke by with just enough gas after Russia cut exports roughly by half compared to a year ago. About 40 percent of the European Union’s natural gas currently comes from Russia. Elements of the plan were reported by Reuters last week.
The goal is “not being vulnerable to potential disruptions from one supplier,” the policymaker said.
“We are trying to wean ourselves off Russian gas,” the policymaker said. “When the time comes in 2028, 2029, 2030 and Russia decides to close us out, we can be like, ‘Fine.’”
The E.U. effort — which would still need to be approved by the 27 member states — would make it easier for individual governments to offer subsidies to consumers and companies that are struggling with high energy bills. And it would speed permitting for renewable energy projects, which in 2020 accounted for 22.1 percent of energy consumed in the European Union — around 2 percentage points above the 2020 target, according to the E.U. statistics office.
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/world/eu-will-unveil-a-strategy-to-break-free-from-russian-gas-after-decades-of-dependence/ar-AAUcDLi
Juan GarciaRe: 2022 Sea ice area and extent data
February 23rd, 2022: 14,393,951 km2, a two century break increase of 214,168 km2.
–
One thing that always amuses me is warmists pretending that they are really unbiased, with comments like wouldn’t it be good if the ice could increase this month when they actually mean wouldn’t it be good if it all melts away.
–
By some mischance the gods have allowed a double century break in the ice volume on the good side.
–
So now 10th lowest of 43 in one fell swoop.
–
Of course it is not right, someone will have entered the wrong figures or it will fall 200;000 tomorrow.
Nonetheless a good day for so many reasons as I have said before.
Arctic ice can rise and fall by dramatic amounts on a whim
( cue the chaos comments of RIE)
–
Still theoretically up to 2 weeks to go before a peak?
Will stop hoping.
It always goes the other way.
angech says:
2022 Sea ice area and extent data
“Sea Ice Around Antarctica Reaches a Record Low,” NY Times 2/23/22.
https://www.nytimes.com/2022/02/23/climate/antarctica-sea-ice-arctic.html
David Allen (formerly 02)
Yes, just a few years after it was a record high. It’s called natural variability. You ought to learn about it. The rest of us know all about it. You should try becoming familiar with the record yourself.
The current area is within the +/- 2 sigma. The drop below the previous minimum is very small. And the drop may be due to black carbon, not colorless carbon dioxide.
Dr Walt Meier, a senior research scientist with the NSIDC, said it coincided with strong winds over part of the Ross Sea that had pulled ice to the north, where it melted in warmer waters or was broken up by waves.
This pushed the sea ice extent – the area of the ocean covered by at least 15% floating ice – to below the previous record low set in 2017. But scientists expressed caution about attributing the retreat to the increase in global temperatures linked to greenhouse gas emissions.
Since satellites started measuring sea ice from 1979, the two poles have been behaving differently. Sea ice has been disappearing rapidly in the Arctic but satellites have been showing a slight rise in the Antarctic, contradicting expectations from some climate models.
The southern cover reached a record high in 2014 before crashing to record lows twice in the past eight years.
Meier said the changes in Antarctic sea ice were “still really a muddled signal at this stage”. “Whether this is the start of [a decline] it’s still too early to say, but it’s definitely worth watching”, Meier said.
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2022/feb/23/antarctic-sea-ice-falls-to-lowest-level-since-measurements-began-in-1979
You can play around with the stats for yourself:
https://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/charctic-interactive-sea-ice-graph/
CKid wrote:
Yes, just a few years after it was a record high. It’s called natural variability.
It counters those who ask why Antarctic sea ice increasing, huh.
For all the horrific things that have happened with nuclear weapons, I believe we would very well be in an all out war with Russia now if only conventional weapons were available. Putin has crossed the line and no one will stop him.
Just the start of Putin’s dream of reconstituting the Soviet Union. This is not about 1 country.
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/FMWD-bkWUAEW-HY?format=png&name=900×900
So climate change threatens food production, but we will have more pollen? It’s stuff like this that makes climate scientists and their minions look like id eee ot s.
Now here’s the worse news: rising carbon dioxide levels, mainly due to human-induced emissions, are increasing pollen production.
https://medialibrary.climatecentral.org/resources/pollen
The policy of NETZERO emissions has more risks than just Transition risks. The aim of NETZERO is ultimately to return the CO2 concentration of the atmosphere to the “pre-industrial” level, or that of 1850 (or thereabouts). If human activity does become net zero in terms of CO2 emissions, then the CO2 concentration will indeed fall and will probably fall fairly rapidly over a period of decades.
Is this a wise goal? Is the climate of 1850 somehow uniquely benign that makes it particularly desirable? I take the view that the climate of 1850 contains possibilities that make it highly undesirable from a human perspective and likely little better from the perspective of the other inhabitants of the globe. Namely: the potential for the onset of a new glacial period. Based on the history of Earth’s climate over the past couple of million years, we are currently towards the end of an interglacial period. Left to itself, there is a very high likelihood that a new glacial period will start in the near future. A new glacial period would certainly be a disaster for mankind – the loss of vast areas of productive cropland would condemn millions to death, to say nothing of the upheaval caused by major settlements becoming covered by ice.
The rise in global average temperature by about 1.2C since 1850 does not seem to have brought many downsides with it. It has a major upside of moving us away from the onset of a new glacial period. Whether the current CO2 concentration can actually prevent a new glacial, we don’t really know, since our understanding of glacial onset is not good enough. If we are very lucky, we may have stumbled on something to put off the next glacial onset – NETZERO would throw that away.
mikeedwards13 wrote:
Is this a wise goal? Is the climate of 1850 somehow uniquely benign that makes it particularly desirable?
Yes — it’s the climate we and all other species adapted to.
Science shows that having to adapt to another climate — especially a climate changing as fast as it is now, which is nearly unprecedented globally — stresses species and sometimes leads to their extinction.
Together with the other anthropogenic stresses already on the world’s nonhuman species, already in a sixth mass extinction event — climate change is a major added stress. It’s highly unlikely we can change global climate by 3 C in 150 years without ecosystems suffering a severe impact.
Appell’s comment – Science shows that having to adapt to another climate — especially a climate changing as fast as it is now, which is nearly unprecedented globally — ”
Appell – the resolution of the proxy data is not even closely high enough to make that determination.
Joe – the non climate scientist commented:
Appell – the resolution of the proxy data is not even closely high enough to make that determination.
Why not?
“Science shows that having to adapt to another climate — especially a climate changing as fast as it is now, which is nearly unprecedented globally — stresses species and sometimes leads to their extinction.”
We Brits have ancestors that occupied and abandoned our islands many times over the past 1m years and we get really stressed out by people like you who believe a small temperature rise is going to be avoided by fairy story net zero policies that may not come close to changing that temperature rise any time soon. There is no certainty the proposed policies will even reduce atmospheric CO2 quantity since we know the levels have been much higher before at times when the planet was much colder.
I would be all for nuclear energy on large, medium and small scale but we must stop destroying our legacy of reliable and affordable electricity which only serves to stress out those who have to choose between eating or heating. Stress is stress no matter the cause.
UK-Weather Lass commented:
We Brits have ancestors that occupied and abandoned our islands many times over the past 1m years and we get really stressed out by people like you who believe a small temperature rise is going to be avoided by fairy story net zero policies that may not come close to changing that temperature rise any time soon.
A small temperature rise? 3 C is half an ice age.
There is no certainty the proposed policies will even reduce atmospheric CO2 quantity since we know the levels have been much higher before at times when the planet was much colder.
No certainties, nope. In fact we need much, much larger cuts.
I would be all for nuclear energy on large, medium and small scale but we must stop destroying our legacy of reliable and affordable electricity which only serves to stress out those who have to choose between eating or heating.
If people in the UK are having to choose between heating and eating it’s because their government isn’t taking proper care of them. They should elect a new government. They could hardly do worse than who they have now.
Appell comment in response to UK – “If people in the UK are having to choose between heating and eating it’s because their government isn’t taking proper care of them. They should elect a new government. They could hardly do worse than who they have now.”
For once Appell is absolutely correct – give the man credit where credit is due
Brits should elect a new government that doesnt do stupid things such as impairing the ability to provide heat such as mandating less efficient costly energy schemes
David Appell | February 24, 2022 at 3:25 pm |
Joe – the non climate scientist commented:
Appell – the resolution of the proxy data is not even closely high enough to make that determination.
Why not?
appell – are you seriously asking a question that stupid
look at any of the long proxies
joe – the non climate scientist commented:
“Why not?”
appell – are you seriously asking a question that stupid
look at any of the long proxies
That’s not an answer.
That’s trying to look like you have an answer without actually providing one.
David Appell | February 25, 2022 at 11:55 am |
joe – the non climate scientist commented:
“Why not?”
appell – are you seriously asking a question that stupid
look at any of the long proxies
That’s not an answer.
That’s trying to look like you have an answer without actually providing one.”
Its an appropriate response to you question – you should be fully aware that the resolution of the proxies is not sufficient to reach that conclusion.
I would have thought that you needed to be educated on what is common knowledge
joe – the non climate scientist commented:
Its an appropriate response to you question – you should be fully aware that the resolution of the proxies is not sufficient to reach that conclusion.
Another meaningless answer devoid of evidence or data.
It’s the same as if you’re taking an arithmetic test and the question is “what’s 2+3?” and instead of writing “5” you answer “you should be fully aware what that sum is and it’s easy to do a google search”
“Yes — it’s the climate we and all other species adapted to.”
This statement demonstrates a profound ignorance.
Examining Earth’s climate over the Quaternary, the past 2.5 million years or so, shows an increasing dominance of “icehouse” conditions. Glaciations, with the temperature far below today’s, are the major feature of the climate, interspersed by short interglacials with conditions something like today’s. If the current fauna and flora are adapted to anything, it is these icehouse conditions. Indeed, the Quaternary contains the emergence of new cold-adapted species including the polar bear (climate change poster boy!) and the woolly mammoth. The climate of 1850 is (thankfully) nothing like these conditions.
Even if we restrict our gaze to the Holocene and the recent period since the end of the last glacial, the climate of 1850 is not even representative of that period. What we find is that Earth’s climate in 1850 is very likely the coldest since the start of our current interglacial, considerably cooler than that during the Holocene climatic optimum. It is very likely that even today’s climate, some 1.2C warmer than 1850, is still not as warm as that period 9000 – 5000 years ago.
I still vote for the warm interglacial conditions – even if ecosystems are in fact adapted to the icehouse.
For the speed of climatic change, it is doubtful whether the current warming comes anywhere close to the speed of the Younger Dryas event – major temperature changes over a decade or two. And yet here we all are – we got through that event. Ecosystems are likely much more resilient to such changes than you suppose.
As for your 3C warming – that is speculation, which multiple lines of evidence imply is unlikely. It is notable that the current 1.2C warming appears to have caused relatively little ecosystems impact. Humans are having far greater direct impacts on ecosystems – worrying about climate change is deflecting attention and effort away from the real problems.
DAA,
I am totally unaware of any sign of a mass extinction here in Australia.
If there have been changes of abundance of living creatures, almost all I have seen described are increases in numbers, possibly related to extra plant growth from CO2 and SO2 fertilisation, even the teeth of young people are larger than those of 2 generations ago. What is not to like?
Geoff S
Anyone who believes Russia’s war with Ukraine has nothing to do with climate mitigation is a foolish ideological sycophant. This war is one example of myopic mischaracterization of climate risk at the exclusion of all else. Both China and Russia see the West’s waning influence. Putin just warned the West of ‘consequences you have never seen’ if it interferes in the Ukraine. I wouldn’t be surprised to see China flex muscle in some capacity before too long.
Exactly right. Idealism just ups Putin’s leverage.
Yes, idealism; Putin wants to replace Ukraine’s “fascist” leadership—another example of how obfuscating definitions through the decades comes back to bite. Putin has no problem embracing the West’s propagandistic redefining of fascist ideology, and to apply it directly at his enemy. Putin is the fascist.
John Kerry: “I hope that President Putin will help us stay on track with respect to what we need to do for the climate.”
There are no words.
I see David Appell has finally got on. Its a letdown. What a shame. All that clamour for what?
Putin’s invasion of Ukraine is reprehensible and should be thoroughly condemned. I hope the Ukrainian people are able to somehow survive this as a nation. They’ll get no overt help from the USA or NATO.
Although I hate to say it, there may be a silver lining.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/clash-over-ukraine-drives-a-dagger-into-globalization-11645631285?st=fllahmxbs4tzp36&reflink=desktopwebshare_permalink
And not just the frenzy over globalism, but climate change, as well.
When Richard Somerville says, ‘We‘re talking here about managing risk for the future. It‘s a big risk to the planet to bet it on the contrarians,’ he is saying we can’t know the future with any certainty because we don’t believe in the scientific method.
Frost persists for several days in New Mexico and Texas.
https://i.ibb.co/bPqNbPz/Screenshot-3.png
Sorry.
https://i.ibb.co/n81Z7LW/gfs-T2ma-us-1.png
The New equation,
Tmean = [ Φ (1-a) S (β*N*cp)¹∕ ⁴ /4σ ]¹∕ ⁴
results from the discovered Rotating Planet Surface Solar irradiation Interaction-Emission New Equation:
Jemit = 4πr²σΤmean⁴ /(β*N*cp)¹∕ ⁴ (W)
And let’s compare with the blackbody planet emission equation:
J = 4πr²σΤe⁴ (W)
–
When comparing with the Stefan-Boltzmann blackbody emission – it is obvious when planet emission is considered – it is a different mechanism of emission.
Thus the equation describing IR emission from irradiated rotating planet surface is different.
–
–
When averaged over the entire planet surface, in order to compare with the Stefan-Boltzmann blackbody emission:
Jemit = σΤmean⁴ /(β*N*cp)¹∕ ⁴ (W/m²)
And compare with the Stefan-Boltzmann emission law equation:
J = σΤe⁴ (W/m²)
–
It is obvious these two IR emission mechanisms cannot be compared, because they are different.
Thus, the planet effective temperature Te formula:
Te = [ (1-a) S /4σ ]¹∕ ⁴
Which results for Earth Te =255K
cannot be compared with the planet measured average surface temperature Tmean =288K.
https://www.cristos-vournas.com
Φ – is the dimensionless Solar Irradiation accepting factor – very important.
It is a realizing that a sphere’s surface “absorbs” the incident solar irradiation not as a disk of the same diameter, but accordingly to its spherical shape.
For a smooth spherical surface
Φ = 0,47
Notice:
The term “Absorbed” is an outdated term. We have replaced the term “Absorbed” with the term “Not Reflected Portion“.
–
The term “Absorbed” was a WRONG concept about the entire Not Reflected Portion as SW EM energy accumulated in the inner layers.
–
What actually happens is the Not Reflected Portion INTERACTS with planet surface, and only a part of the Not Reflected Portion is, finally, accumulated in the inner layers.
https://www.cristos-vournas.com
Recent article by Matt Ridley (published 15 Feb 2022)
HOW GLOBAL WARMING CAN BE GOOD FOR US
https://www.rationaloptimist.com/blog/how-global-warming-can-be-good/
“Global warming is real. It is also – so far – mostly beneficial. This startling fact is kept from the public by a determined effort on the part of alarmists and their media allies who are determined to use the language of crisis and emergency. The goal of Net Zero emissions in the UK by 2050 is controversial enough as a policy because of the pain it is causing. But what if that pain is all to prevent something that is not doing net harm?
The biggest benefit of emissions is global greening, the increase year after year of green vegetation on the land surface of the planet. Forests grow more thickly, grasslands more richly and scrub more rapidly. This has been measured using satellites and on-the-ground recording of plant-growth rates. It is happening in all habitats, from tundra to rainforest. In the four decades since 1982, as Bjorn Lomborg points out, NASA data show that global greening has added 618,000 square kilometres of extra green leaves each year, equivalent to three Great Britains. You read that right: every year there’s more greenery on the planet to the extent of three Britains. I bet Greta Thunberg did not tell you that.
Cont …
Peter Lang commented:
The biggest benefit of emissions is global greening
Why is global greening a benefit?
If you believe increasing CO2 is a benefit, global greening reduces CO2, no?
… cont. https://www.rationaloptimist.com/blog/how-global-warming-can-be-good/
The cause of this greening? Although tree planting, natural reforestation, slightly longer growing seasons and a bit more rain all contribute, the big cause is something else. All studies agree that by far the largest contributor to global greening – responsible for roughly half the effect – is the extra carbon dioxide in the air. In 40 years, the proportion of the atmosphere that is CO2 has gone from 0.034 per cent to 0.041 per cent. That may seem a small change but, with more ‘food’ in the air, plants don’t need to lose as much water through their pores (‘stomata’) to acquire a given amount of carbon. So dry areas, like the Sahel region of Africa, are seeing some of the biggest improvements in greenery. Since this is one of the poorest places on the planet, it is good news that there is more food for people, goats and wildlife.
But because good news is no news, green pressure groups and environmental correspondents in the media prefer to ignore global greening. Astonishingly, it merited no mentions on the BBC’s recent Green Planet series, despite the name. Or, if it is mentioned, the media point to studies suggesting greening may soon cease. These studies are based on questionable models, not data (because data show the effect continuing at the same pace). On the very few occasions when the BBC has mentioned global greening it is always accompanied by a health warning in case any viewer might glimpse a silver lining to climate change – for example, ‘extra foliage helps slow climate change, but researchers warn this will be offset by rising temperatures’.
… cont.
Another bit of good news is on deaths. We’re against them, right? A recent study shows that rising temperatures have resulted in half a million fewer deaths in Britain over the past two decades. That is because cold weather kills about ’20 times as many people as hot weather’, according to the study, which analyses ‘over 74million deaths in 384 locations across 13 countries’. This is especially true in a temperate place like Britain, where summer days are rarely hot enough to kill. So global warming and the unrelated phenomenon of urban warming relative to rural areas, caused by the retention of heat by buildings plus energy use, are both preventing premature deaths on a huge scale.
Surely this will change in the future? Probably not. Britain would have to get much, much hotter for summer mortality to start exceeding winter deaths. Not even Greece manages that. And the statistics show that – as greenhouse-gas theory predicts – on the whole more warming is happening in cold places, in cold seasons and at cold times of day. So winter nighttime temperatures in the global north are rising much faster than summer daytime temperatures in the tropics.
… cont. :
Summer temperatures in the US are changing at half the rate of winter temperatures and daytimes are warming 20 per cent slower than nighttimes. A similar pattern is seen in most countries. Tropical nations are mostly experiencing very slow, almost undetectable daytime warming (outside cities), while Arctic nations are seeing quite rapid change, especially in winter and at night. Alarmists love to talk about polar amplification of average climate change, but they usually omit its inevitable flip side: that tropical temperatures (where most poor people live) are changing more slowly than the average.
But are we not told to expect more volatile weather as a result of climate change? It is certainly assumed that we should. Yet there’s no evidence to suggest weather volatility is increasing and no good theory to suggest it will. The decreasing temperature differential between the tropics and the Arctic may actually diminish the volatility of weather a little.
… cont:
Indeed, as the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) repeatedly confirms, there is no clear pattern of storms growing in either frequency or ferocity, droughts are decreasing slightly and floods are getting worse only where land-use changes (like deforestation or building houses on flood plains) create a problem. Globally, deaths from droughts, floods and storms are down by about 98 per cent over the past 100 years – not because weather is less dangerous but because shelter, transport and communication (which are mostly the products of the fossil-fuel economy) have dramatically improved people’s ability to survive such natural disasters.
The geological record shows greater climatic volatility in cold periods of the Earth’s history than in hot periods. At the peak of recent ice ages, the temperature fluctuated dramatically between years and decades, while decade-long mega-droughts ravaged Africa, drying up Lake Victoria at least twice. Those mega droughts happened 17,000 years ago and 15,000 years ago respectively, when the world was much colder than today and cooler oceans meant failed monsoons. One theory about the invention of farming argues that it was impossible until the climate settled down in the post-glacial warmth of around 10,000 years ago: ‘Recent data from ice- and ocean-core climate proxies show that the last glacial climates were extremely hostile to agriculture – dry, low in atmospheric CO2, and extremely variable on quite short time scales.’ It then became calmer as it became significantly warmer than today between 9,000 and 6,000 years ago, when human civilisation emerged.
… cont:
The effect of today’s warming (and greening) on farming is, on average, positive: crops can be grown farther north and for longer seasons and rainfall is slightly heavier in dry regions. We are feeding over seven billion people today much more easily than we fed three billion in the 1960s, and from a similar acreage of farmland. Global cereal production is on course to break its record this year, for the sixth time in 10 years.
Nature, too, will do generally better in a warming world. There are more species in warmer climates, so more new birds and insects are arriving to breed in southern England than are disappearing from northern Scotland. Warmer means wetter, too: 9,000 years ago, when the climate was warmer than today, the Sahara was green. Alarmists like to imply that concern about climate change goes hand in hand with concern about nature generally. But this is belied by the evidence. Climate policies often harm wildlife: biofuels compete for land with agriculture, eroding the benefits of improved agricultural productivity and increasing pressure on wild land; wind farms kill birds and bats; and the reckless planting of alien sitka spruce trees turns diverse moorland into dark monoculture.
… cont:
Meanwhile, real environmental issues are ignored or neglected because of the obsession with climate. With the help of local volunteers I have been fighting to protect the red squirrel in Northumberland for years. The government does literally nothing to help us, while it pours money into grants for studying the most far-fetched and minuscule possible climate-change impacts. Invasive alien species are the main cause of species extinction worldwide (like grey squirrels driving the red to the margins), whereas climate change has yet to be shown to have caused a single species to die out altogether anywhere.
Of course, climate change does and will bring problems as well as benefits. Rapid sea-level rise could be catastrophic. But whereas the sea level shot up between 10,000 and 8,000 years ago, rising by about 60 metres in two millennia, or roughly three metres per century, today the change is nine times slower: three millimetres a year, or a foot per century, and with not much sign of acceleration. Countries like the Netherlands and Vietnam show that it is possible to gain land from the sea even in a world where sea levels are rising. The land area of the planet is actually increasing, not shrinking, thanks to siltation and reclamation.
… cont.:
In January 2020, the UK’s chief scientific adviser organised for some slides to be shown to Boris Johnson to convert him to climate alarmism. Thanks to a freedom of information request, we now know that these slides showed the likely acceleration in sea-level rise under a scenario known as RCP 8.5. This is shocking because RCP 8.5 has long been discredited as a highly implausible future. It was created by piling unrealistic assumptions on to each other in models: coal use increasing tenfold by 2100, population growth accelerating to 12 billion people, innovation drying up and an implausibly high sensitivity of temperature to carbon dioxide. No serious scientist thinks RCP 8.5 represents a likely outcome from ‘business as usual’. Yet those who want to grab media attention by making alarming predictions use it all the time.
Environmentalists don’t get donations or invitations to appear on the telly if they say moderate things. To stand up and pronounce that ‘climate change is real and needs to be tackled, but it’s not happening very fast and other environmental issues are more urgent’ would be about as popular as an MP in Oliver Cromwell’s parliament declaring, ‘The evidence for God is looking a bit weak, and I’m not so very sure that fornication really is a sin’. And I speak as someone who has made several speeches on climate in parliament.
No wonder we don’t hear about the good news on climate change.
END of Matt Ridley’s article
…cont:
In January 2020, the UK’s chief scientific adviser organised for some slides to be shown to Boris Johnson to convert him to climate alarmism. Thanks to a freedom of information request, we now know that these slides showed the likely acceleration in sea-level rise under a scenario known as RCP 8.5. This is shocking because RCP 8.5 has long been discredited as a highly implausible future. It was created by piling unrealistic assumptions on to each other in models: coal use increasing tenfold by 2100, population growth accelerating to 12 billion people, innovation drying up and an implausibly high sensitivity of temperature to carbon dioxide. No serious scientist thinks RCP 8.5 represents a likely outcome from ‘business as usual’. Yet those who want to grab media attention by making alarming predictions use it all the time.
Environmentalists don’t get donations or invitations to appear on the telly if they say moderate things. To stand up and pronounce that ‘climate change is real and needs to be tackled, but it’s not happening very fast and other environmental issues are more urgent’ would be about as popular as an MP in Oliver Cromwell’s parliament declaring, ‘The evidence for God is looking a bit weak, and I’m not so very sure that fornication really is a sin’. And I speak as someone who has made several speeches on climate in parliament.
No wonder we don’t hear about the good news on climate change.
End of article
… cont.:
In January 2020, the UK’s chief scientific adviser organised for some slides to be shown to Boris Johnson to convert him to climate alarmism. Thanks to a freedom of information request, we now know that these slides showed the likely acceleration in sea-level rise under a scenario known as RCP 8.5. This is shocking because RCP 8.5 has long been discredited as a highly implausible future. It was created by piling unrealistic assumptions on to each other in models: coal use increasing tenfold by 2100, population growth accelerating to 12 billion people, innovation drying up and an implausibly high sensitivity of temperature to carbon dioxide. No serious scientist thinks RCP 8.5 represents a likely outcome from ‘business as usual’. Yet those who want to grab media attention by making alarming predictions use it all the time.
The last two paragraphs of the article are being rejected/blocked. You can read them (and the whole article, including links) here: https://www.rationaloptimist.com/blog/how-global-warming-can-be-good/
Peter, are you only able to cut-and-paste? And from a coal mine owner at that?
Why is greening a benefit?
David laughingly asks “Why is greening a benefit?”
Additional oxygen produced.
Peter Lang wrote, quoting Matt Ridley:
Yet there’s no evidence to suggest weather volatility is increasing….
This is wrong.
“Among its [IPCC AR6 WG1] key conclusions is that it is an “established fact” that human-caused greenhouse gas emissions have “led to an increased frequency and/or intensity of some weather and climate extremes since pre-industrial times”.
“Explainer: What the new IPCC report says about extreme weather and climate change,” CarbonBrief, 10.08.2021
https://www.carbonbrief.org/explainer-what-the-new-ipcc-report-says-about-extreme-weather-and-climate-change
Rob Starkey commented:
Additional oxygen produced.
We’re not in a shortage of oxygen, which anyway is declining, so this is a very poor reason to heat up the atmosphere and acidify the ocean. Got a better reason?
https://www.oxygenlevels.org/
https://www.sciencefocus.com/planet-earth/is-atmospheric-oxygen-declining-and-does-it-matter/
Matt Ridley wrote:
for example, ‘extra foliage helps slow climate change, but researchers warn this will be offset by rising temperatures’.
Greening lowers the Earth’s albedo, which adds to global warming.
Greening means plants and trees use more water, when water is already a precious commodity in many parts of the world. (“In some places over 70% of freshwater is used for agriculture.” https://blogs.worldbank.org/opendata/chart-globally-70-freshwater-used-agriculture)
Greening means more weeds that compete with crops. That means more work and more herbicides and insectides.
More CO2 reduces the nutritional quality of many crops:
“Higher CO2 tends to inhibit the ability of plants to make protein… And this explains why food quality seems to have been declining and will continue to decline as CO2 rises — because of this inhibition of nitrate conversion into protein…. “It’s going to be fairly universal that we’ll be struggling with trying to sustain food quality and it’s not just protein… it’s also micronutrients such as zinc and iron that suffer as well as protein.”
— University of California at Davis Professor Arnold J. Bloom, on Yale Climate Connections 10/7/14
http://www.yaleclimateconnections.org/2014/10/crop-nutrition/2014
“Crop Pests Spreading North with Global Warming: Fungi and insects migrate toward the poles at up to 7 kilometers per year,”
— Eliot Barford and Nature magazine, September 2, 2013
http://www.scientificamerican.com/article/crop-pests-spreading-north-climate-change/
“Ask the Experts: Does Rising CO2 Benefit Plants?” Annie Sneed, Scientific American 1/23/18
https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/ask-the-experts-does-rising-co2-benefit-plants1/
From this article:
“Even with the benefit of CO2 fertilization, when you start getting up to 1 to 2 degrees of warming, you see negative effects,” she [Frances Moore, an assistant professor of environmental science and policy at the University of California, Davis] says. “There are a lot of different pathways by which temperature can negatively affect crop yield: soil moisture deficit [or] heat directly damaging the plants and interfering with their reproductive process.” On top of all that, Moore points out increased CO2 also benefits weeds that compete with farm plants.
“We know unequivocally that when you grow food at elevated CO2 levels in fields, it becomes less nutritious,” notes Samuel Myers, principal research scientist in environmental health at Harvard University. “[Food crops] lose significant amounts of iron and zinc—and grains [also] lose protein.”
==
“Negative impacts of global warming on agriculture, health & environment far outweigh any supposed positives.” Smith et al. PNAS (2009)
http://www.pnas.org/content/106/11/4133.full.pdf
==
“Anthropogenic climate change has slowed global agricultural productivity growth,” Ariel Ortiz-Bobea et al, Nature Climate Change, vol 11 pp 306–312 (2021).
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41558-021-01000-1
Anyone who thinks they can model the earth’s climate accurately is fooling no one but themselves. After 40 years of doomsday predictions the climate is basically no hotter or colder than before but it is dynamic and ever-changing system. The Arctic was supposed to be ice free in 1920s, all the glaciers were to be gone… so explain how in this “hotter” world that a glacier has grown in Mt. St. Helens. I thought all the glaciers were dying. By 2100 all these predictions and models will be viewed as mindless piffle. Worry more about a mega volcano cooling the earth and mass famine coming in play.
Nature is taking water from the oceans, freezing it, and depositing it on the frozen areas of the poles. That heat is added to the atmosphere to replace that heat lost to the black sky.
Nature is breaking off ice from the ice blocks, glaciers to you, melting it with heat from the sun to replace the water removed above.
THE AVERAGE SURFACE TEMPERATURE OF THE SURFACE OF EARTH REMAINS RELATIVELY CONSTANT.
Robert D Clark wrote:
THE AVERAGE SURFACE TEMPERATURE OF THE SURFACE OF EARTH REMAINS RELATIVELY CONSTANT.
https://climatedataguide.ucar.edu/sites/default/files/styles/node_lightbox_display/public/key_figures/climate_data_set/F1_fromCarbonBrief.png?itok=sAs16Q74
Absolute zero is -273’C, -459″F. 459′ + 63′ = 522’F. A 1 to 2 degree F change to me is relatively constant.
Robert D Clark commented:
Absolute zero is -273’C, -459″F. 459′ + 63′ = 522’F. A 1 to 2 degree F change to me is relatively constant.
Utterly laughable. Can’t believe you’d even try to make such a ridiculous argument.
By that argument an infant who’s running a temperature 2 F above normal is nothing to worry about.
I cannot argue with that one
T L Shields wrote:
After 40 years of doomsday predictions the climate is basically no hotter or colder than before
https://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/graphs_v4/graph_data/Global_Mean_Estimates_based_on_Land_and_Ocean_Data/graph.html
DA,
From UAH, their satellite derived global temperature for the lower troposphere for the last 2 months has been the same as the average 1991-2020 (the baseline for anomaly numbers).
I am not inviting you to retort about UAH adjustments, how RSS is hotter, how UAH numbers are not the same as land-based temperatures. Have been all over that literature for years.
It is interesting that IPCC and followers are reluctant to study or discuss natural change. Yet some form of natural change might have depressed those temperatures, from an expected value (projecting the LLS fit line) of 0.2 deg C or so for early 2022.
What mechanism is causing this reversion to the norm type of behavior, in your studied opinion, David? Geoff S
Matt Ridley just published an interesting article: How global warming can be good for us
https://www.rationaloptimist.com/blog/how-global-warming-can-be-good/
Thank you, Peter. I think he sums it up well, in that good news doesn’t sell.
GLSEA (The Great Lakes Surface Environmental Analysis) is a digital map of the Great Lakes surface water temperature and ice cover which is produced daily at GLERL. The lake surface temperatures are derived from NOAA polar-orbiting satellite imagery.
https://i.ibb.co/b3Rz0Zj/gfs-T2ma-us-2.png
Sorry.
https://i.ibb.co/wpczxy1/glsea-cur.png
Looks like South Africa is making some rational moves.
South African Energy Minister Gwede Mantashe fired community representative Peter Becker from the board of the National Nuclear Regulator, citing a conflict of interest.
Mantashe said Becker was opposed to the development of new nuclear-power facilities or the extension of the life of South Africa’s existing one, Koeberg, and therefore couldn’t be objective, according to a letter sent to the activist on Friday that was seen by Bloomberg.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-02-25/s-africa-removes-anti-nuclear-activist-from-regulator-s-board
South Africa’s Limpopo province gave environmental authorization to a China-backed proposal to spend more than $10 billion building a 4,600 megawatt coal-fired power plant, a coking facility and ferroalloy and steel plants.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-02-25/s-african-province-clears-way-for-10-billion-coal-complex
Now the folly of green extremist energy policy is in full view, and the Emperor has no clothes. Cutting Russia off from the SWIFT system will leave Europe without means to pay Russia for hydrocarbons. The results will be almost as bad for Europe as for Russia.
But the move is risky. A total expulsion from SWIFT would mean that virtually all EU-Russia trade would come to a sudden halt, disrupting a significant part of the bloc’s economy.
Russia is the EU’s fifth-largest trade partner: in 2020, total trade in goods between the two amounted to €174.3 billion, of which €79 million were EU exports, according to the European Commission.
If this enormous amount of money were to disappear overnight, member states would feel the pain in an instantaneous and painful way. Gas prices would skyrocket, sending consumer bills to impossible highs and forcing many factories to stop production altogether.
https://www.euronews.com/my-europe/2022/02/25/eu-to-consider-russia-s-expulsion-from-swift-in-third-sanctions-package
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TotalEnergies has announced that it and APA Corporation have made a “significant” new oil and associated gas discovery at the Krabdagu-1 well in the central area of Block 58, offshore Suriname.
Krabdagu-1 was drilled at a water depth of 2,559 feet and encountered approximately 295 feet of net oil pay in good quality Maastrichtian and Campanian reservoirs, TotalEnergies revealed. Further operations will be carried out on Krabdagu-1 to appraise the resources and productivity, according to TotalEnergies, which noted that at least three further exploration and appraisal wells are planned to be drilled in 2022 on the block.
https://www.rigzone.com/news/totalenergies_makes_significant_new_oil_find-21-feb-2022-167998-article/
Saudi Arabia’s state oil company discovered five new natural gas fields across the kingdom that can produce over 100 million cubic feet per day in total, as the oil-rich kingdom looks to boost production of the fuel.
The fields, discovered by Saudi Aramco, are located in the country’s central region, the empty quarter desert, the northern border region and the Eastern province, Energy Minister Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman said in a statement.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-02-27/saudi-arabia-announces-discovery-of-five-natural-gas-fields
jim2,
Yet Javier tells us that we have passed peak oil? Geoff S
Geoff Sherrington | March 1, 2022 at 6:32 pm | Reply
jim2,
“Yet Javier tells us that we have passed peak oil? Geoff S”
How many times have we passed peak oil over the last 100 years ?
Jim2 –
“Krabdagu-1 was drilled at a water depth of 2,559 feet and encountered approximately 295 feet of net oil pay in good quality Maastrichtian and Campanian reservoirs,”
Interesting that no metion was made of total depth of the 295 ft producing zone
Cairn Oil & Gas, a subsidiary of the Vedanta group, has announced a new oil discovery in a key exploration block in Barmer, very close to its prolific Rajasthan block RJ-ON-90/1.
The operator, in a stock exchange filing this week, said it notified the Indian Directorate General of Hydrocarbons (DGH) and the country’s Ministry of Petroleum and Natural Gas on an oil Discovery —named ‘Durga’, in exploratory well WM-Basal DD Fan-1, that was spud in the RJ-ONHP-2017/1 onshore tract.
“During the drilling of the well, four hydrocarbon zones were encountered in the Dharvi Dungar (DD) formation of late Palaeocene to early Eocene age. Further evaluation is being carried out to assess potential commerciality of the discovery,” it said.
https://www.upstreamonline.com/exploration/cairn-uncovers-new-oil-discovery-near-prolific-rajasthan-block/2-1-1172866
Germany was very critical of President Trump. However, Trump encourages natural gas production and the expansion of LNG facilities. Those facilities are now helping Germany keep the lights on. Does Germany ever mention these facts? No.
Looks like they aren’t doing a moonshot effort to build more wind and solar. Oh, how quickly they forget! Instead, they are building out LNG terminals.
Germany pledged new support for liquefied natural gas terminals, the latest sign it’s willing to retool its energy policy in the wake of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.
Just days after shelving an $11 billion pipeline project to bring Russian gas to Europe, Chancellor Olaf Scholz said Germany would move “quickly” to build two LNG terminals. So far proposed projects have been left to the private sector alone, and are facing headwinds without government support.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-02-27/germany-backs-new-lng-plants-in-bid-to-cut-russian-dependence
It’s telling that the German energy strategy put Russia first, with their partnership to build the Nord Stream 2 pipeline to supplement German energy needs. LNG infrastructure should have been their first priority; diversification would have made them much less dependent on regional sources for energy, instead they saw a stronger relationship with Russia as more desirable.
The US is poised to be the leading exporter of LNG this year, this in spite of the Biden administrations strangling grip on the industry. Hard Left progressives want to use the Federal Reserve as a strongman to shut down the industry by eliminating all lending to the fossil fuel industry. The Fossil Free Finance Act is an authoritarian power grab, empowering the Federal Reserve with an authority it was not designed for; hopefully this act never sees the light of day.
European Industry Faces Shrink or Shut Decisions on Energy Pain
Chemical, metal producers warn gas prices will hurt profits
Uncertainty about sanctions, gas through Ukraine dims outlook
…
Europe’s biggest industrial firms have been banking on spring to bring down soaring energy costs. Those hopes faded this week as Russian tanks rolled into Ukraine.
Smelters and chemical factories across Europe were already struggling before the invasion sparked another jump in gas and electricity prices. Now, a growing list of companies including Europe’s biggest chemicals maker BASF SE are warning the energy crisis will keep hacking away at their bottom lines for the foreseeable future.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-02-27/european-industry-faces-shrink-or-shut-decisions-on-energy-pain
Bret and Heather 116th DarkHorse Podcast Livestream: Selling out the West
Here: 58:00. Climate changes and transgenic trees.
We don’t have time, the emergency is too great. I think he’s referring to the junk that CMIP6s are. We don’t really know what’s going to happen. But we know there’s an emergency and there’s no time to do normal science. The confirmation of this is the 97% meme. We will exile the 3%. The act of exiling I don’t think is science. Line up some people in lab coats and have them repeat these lines.
CMIP6s are junk. They’re good at soaking up money. Their reason for existence seems to be to say, spend money on Teslas, roof top solar and wind turbines. However, they are smart enough to be silent on nuclear power.
A table of sunrise and sunset times is not junk. That table is useful. I am questioning the usefulness of CMIP6s.
Exile. You only have to exile the 3% to get the 97% to step in line.
After an intoxicating binge on Catastrophic Climate Change Alarmism, Europe drove drunkenly over the Green Energy Extremist Policy cliff, eschewing fossil fuels in favor of unreliable wind and solar. This has placed them in the ironic position of funding Putin’s war against Ukraine. Europe, the EU, and especially Germany, the icon of “green” unreliable energy, cannot live without Russia’s natural gas and oil.
And that brings us to this:
Goldman Sachs: Enormous Amount of Oil Could Be Disrupted
February 28th, 2022, 4:30 AM EST
Goldman Sachs Head of Commodities Research Jeff Currie discusses the potential oil supply risk amid Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. “I just want to emphasize that at this point right now: unattended consequent risk — meaning a pipeline outage or something like that — is extraordinarily high,” Currie said on “Bloomberg Daybreak: European Open.” (Source: Bloomberg)
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/videos/2022-02-28/goldman-sachs-enormous-amount-of-oil-could-be-disrupted-video
The logical inference is that the Green Extremist Energy Policy has resulted in 3,000 – 4,000 deaths. Europe continues to fund the war through fossil fuel purchases from Putin.
To me it looks like anyone addicted to FF put themselves at a disadvantage. I went solar in 2012 and haven’t had an electric bill since. Electric prices in Texas have gone up over 30% since 2012 and I expect them to double in the next ten years. One way to look at buying solar panels (25yr lifespan) is you are locking in a tax free fixed price for all those future megawatts. My 28 panels have generated 97 Megawatts so far and I expect them to add another 90+MW before they fall to 80% of nameplate generation. I think they might outlive me! And since I bought my Volt (used) I cut my gasoline bill down to $50 a year.
Here is my production since 2013:
https://pvoutput.org/aggregate.jsp?id=12116&sid=10059&t=y
PS: I have a gas lease that keeps declining in production despite the fact they have re-fracked it 3 times in 12 years.
PPS: Did you know only certain refineries can process heavy crude? We built several of them on the Gulf coast back in the 90s to take advantage of cheap Venezuela oil. We now import high sulfur crude from Russia to replace the Venezuela oil Trump sanctioned in 2019 (oil is a weapon?). The Canadian tar sands oil (XL pipeline) is even dirtier and would not be very usable for fuel anyway.
What was the total system cost? Not just to you, but to everyone. Cost without counting subsidies from the tax/rate payer.
$23k for a 6.7KW system. You could buy the same 6.7KW system today for less but only need 18 panels due to higher efficiency (14% vs 21%).
Speaking of subsidies, I have another piece of property in town I didn’t sign a lease for because they never contacted me with an offer (BTW that was illegal but they went bankrupt later). When I contacted a oil/gas lawyer he said it would cost me thousands of dollars to sue the drillers and he suggested I try to start a class action suit. So who is screwing who?
You know what bugs me? The millions of tons of the 350,000 different man-made molecules humans have dispersed into the biosphere.
https://cen.acs.org/policy/chemical-regulation/Number-chemicals-commerce-vastly-underestimated/98/i7
So, if the 90 is megawatt-hours, you have paid 24 cents/kwh?
Texas 2021 rate was 11.36 cents/kwh. Maybe someday you will make back that investment if you live long enough.
Oh, I forgot to mention I won the Texas grand prize for “The Biggest Energy Saver Contest” back in 2013 and got $6,000 so my actual cost of amortizing the cost ($24k-$6k=$18k) would be a lot less than 24 cents KWh. But of course, that’s because I’m smarter than the average consumer :)
https://web.archive.org/web/20130922034202/http://biggestenergysaver.com/
You need use (LCOE), or levelized cost of electricity, which is a measure of the average net present cost of electricity generation for a generating plant over its lifetime. (25 years).
PS: Every Texas electric consumer is going to have to pay back nearly $38 Billion In excess energy costs from winter storm Uri over the next ten years which is not included in that 11.36 cents/kwh you quoted.
Sure, Jack, it may jump up to a whopping 14 cents/kwh. Right.
Jim2, You do know that Anthony Watts has solar panels as does our host Prof. Curry? Looks like they made the same choice I did. Freedom isn’t free.
Yes, I knew AW and JC had solar panels. JC lives in what appeared, back when she posted some pix of the hacienda, to be a remote region, so it might make sense for her. If people want to buy them, it’s their money. But I would rather pay cheaper rates if those are available and not have the maintenance and fire risk. Actually, I like nat gas best of all. It’s even a better deal than grid electricity.
IPCC releases 3,500 pages of bad weather:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/politics/2022/02/28/five-things-know-about-new-un-climate-report/
The suspicion in the air for purposes of perpetuating a belief in human-caused global warming and to create a sense of alarmism and imminent peril and to characterize the ppm of CO2 in the atmosphere as a calamity that results from bad behavior is nothing more than a flim-flam scenario of Western academia. However, according to William Harper, the atmosphere is actually, CO2 deficient.
‘Right now, at our current low levels of carbon dioxide, plants are paying a heavy price in water usage. Whether plants are C3 or C4, the way they get carbon dioxide from the air is the same: The plant leaves have little holes, or stomata, through which carbon dioxide molecules can diffuse into the moist interior for use in the plant’s photosynthetic cycles.
‘The density of water molecules within the leaf is typically 60 times greater than the density of carbon dioxide in the air, and the diffusion rate of the water molecule is greater than that of the carbon-dioxide molecule.
‘So depending on the relative humidity and temperature, 100 or more water molecules diffuse out of the leaf for every molecule of carbon dioxide that diffuses in. And not every carbon-dioxide molecule that diffuses into a leaf gets incorporated into a carbohydrate. As a result, plants require many hundreds of grams of water to produce one gram of plant biomass, largely carbohydrate.
‘Driven by the need to conserve water, plants produce fewer stomata openings in their leaves when there is more carbon dioxide in the air. This decreases the amount of water that the plant is forced to transpire and allows the plant to withstand dry conditions better.’ ~Harrison H. Schmitt and William Happer (In Defense of Carbon Dioxide)
From USA Today ……today
“ UN panel’s grim climate change report: ‘Parts of the planet will become uninhabitable’”
“ Hoesung Lee, chair of the IPCC, said Monday’s report is a “dire warning about the consequences of inaction. It shows that climate change is a grave and mounting threat to our well-being and a healthy planet.”
Given how many failed predictions have occurred over the last 40-50 years, don’t they become just a little bit embarrassed to associate their names with such tedious fear mongering?
Maybe they should get a new public relations firm.
A lot of people, including climate scientists believe them, so they have no reason to change.
For a long time I tried to be as charitable as I could about the consensus narrative. I have never called it or believed it to be a hoax. But as each year goes by and I gather more evidence, it’s becoming more difficult to be charitable.
Pielke did a nice analysis of the IPCC report on his recent tweet. Just another small piece of evidence, but it does pile up.
My point is demographic. Not sure what yours is. I do not see what charity has to do with the distribution of belief.
Meaning I didn’t want to ascribe anything but good intentions on their part, even though misguided.
I don’t see what demographics have to do with distribution of beliefs.
I am cut off again. Before I go I must say 2 things!!!!!
Ex POTUS Donald J. Trump has one large flaw. When he opens his mouth the truth as he believes it must come out. He is usually right.
Vladimer Putin is smarter than the combination of our Legislative and Executive Branches.
DATE POSITIVE TOTAL % DEATHS
2/1/2022 212,407 3,048,257 7 2,495
2/2/2022 204,456 4,510,220 5 1,854
2/3/2022 164,831 1,913,079 9 1,720
2/4/2022 215,814 2,533,005 9 2,154
2/5/2022 91,561 1,067,886 9 942
2/6/2022 50,561 1,049,563 5 369
2/7/2022 106,504 1,329,911 8 905
2/8/2022 142,933 4,110,437 3 2,261
2/9/2022 194,849 1,855,569 11 2,086
2/10/2022 133,576 1,858,836 7 1,800
2/11/2022 110,247 1,813,992 6 1,377
2/12/2022 59,579 871,677 7 873
2/13/2022 31,652 407,001 8 467
2/14/2022 52,402 1,764,672 3 595
2/15/2022 86,744 3,507,574 2 2,035
2/16/2022 82,903 2,523,337 3 1,926
2/17/2022 85,567 1,612,903 5 1,751
2/18/2022 82,800 1,888,873 4 1,631
2/19/2022 32,898 859,058 4 494
2/20/2022 12,940 301,450 4 221
2/21/2022 21,533 543,287 4 222
2/22/2022 45,787 2,582,320 2 1,076
2/23/2022 56,099 2,042,558 3 2,102
2/24/2022 57,256 1,330,304 4 1,421
2/25/2022 48,837 1,717,760 3 1,374
2/26/2022 25,842 547,957 5 635
2/27/2022 6,495 256,686 3 122
2/28/2022 19,754 1,101,220 2 348c
Positive 34,297
Total 2,690,847
% of total tests 1
Total deaths 1,240
% of total tests last 7 days 3
7 day % has been dropping 2/6/2022
Looks like all 50 are closing the border
Positive 41,157
Tests 1,612,731
% of total tests 3
Total deaths 1,052
Average % of total tests last 7days 3
Positive 12,230
Tests 565,942
% of total tests 2
Total deaths 230
% of total tests last 7 days 2
Positive 11,738
Tests 764,998
% of total tests 2
Total deaths 398
% of total tests last 7 days 2
Positive 19,754
Tests 1,101,220
% of total tests
Total deaths 347
Average % of total tests last 7 days 3
I could not stop. After 2 years you should see what is happening.
Positive 4,224
Tests 195,077
% of total tests 2
Total deaths 139
Average of total tests last 7 days 2
We will have to wait until Friday to see where the % actually is.
Keep the total tests as high as possible. In June of 2020 the total positive was down to 20,000 per day, with no 6-day rule.
Total deaths from COVID-19 in the USA since January 31,2021, 533,433
Positive 31,954
Tests 1,043,268
% of total tests 3
Total deaths 933
Average % of total tests last 7 days 3
I am watching the way the 535 elected MEMBERS OF CONGRESS are handling the WORLD CRISIS.
THEY ARE TALKING GARBAGE!!!!
PUTIN HAS WONIII
I was in the day Kennedy was shot. We were ready in minutes for what might be coming.
Positive 36,897
Tests 3,080,941
% of total tests 2
Total deaths 1,090
% of total test last 7 days 2
On 2/11/2022 the 7 day average was 6. Since then it was steadily dropping. Today it reached 2%.
KEEP UP THE EXCELENT WORK.
This is where we were at the end of January 2021 and the 6-day rule was gradually bringing the % down.
It appears the CDC COVID-19 chart (virusncov.com), which resets at 12:00 GMT has been disconinued
Positive 24,015
Tests 2,653,466
% of total tests 1
Total deaths 981
Average % of total tests last 7 days 2
I think I put it in the Right spot.
Positive 30,215
Tests 1,288,757
% of total tests 2
Total deaths 960
Average % of total tests last 7 days 2
Positive 29,251
Tests 1,245,871
% of total tests 2.3
Now rounded to nearest .1%
Total deaths 1,030
Average % of total tests last 7 days 1.5
Positive 26,078
Tests 1,166,499
% of total tests 2.2
Total deaths 851
Average % of total tests last 7 days
last 7 days 1.7
Positive 26,078
Tests 1,166,499
% of total tests 2.2
Total deaths 851
Average of total tests last 7 days 1.7
A.G of Texas was just on TV, He said “working hard on finishing wall and controlling border”.
We are back at April,May of 2020 so
!!!!!MORE TESTS!!!!
Joe wrote:
Now that I have given you those two hints – how likely is mexico’s reported case rate to be significantly lower than the US?
Not something you can answer, despite acting like you can.
Again, those who make the journey across the border are “likely” hardier and “likely” healthier than average. And certainly “likely” healthier than the average American and “likelier” than the average elderly American.
So, with these hints, what are the “likely” chances Mexicans entering the southern border illegally and “likely” to bring COVID-19 with them, or, “likely,” on an arduous journey through the desert or by sea or near a US checkpoint, or simply by climbing over one of Trump’s “impenetrable” walls?
I believe the trade winds in the northern hemisphere, where CHERNOBEL is, are from east to west. Putin has incentive to keep CHERNOBEL under control!!!
I meant west to east. Remember MT. St, Helen’s in Washington State.
Robert D Clark commented:
in response to Robert D Clark:
Positive 29,251 Tests 1,245,871 % of total tests 2.3 Now rounded to nearest .1% Total deaths 1,030 Average % of total tests last 7 days 1.5
last 7 days 1.7
These numbers don’t belong here.
Get rid of them.
Neither does DA. Get rid of him.
Positive 6,844
Tests 413,653
% of total tests 1.7
Total deaths 215
Average % of total tests last 7 days 1.7
Positive 3,914
Tests 323,753
% of total tests 1.2
Total deaths 81
% of total tests last 7 days 1.2
!!!!!MORE TESTS!!!!!
last 7 days above 1.7
Positive 13,822
Tests 1,164,727
% of total tests 1.2
Total deaths 295
Average % of total tests last 7 days 1.6
Positive 20,756
Tests 1,727,446
% of total tests 1.2
Total deaths 788
Average % of total tests last 7 days 1.7
!!!!!MORE TYESTS!!!!!
The AMERICAN PEOPLE, with the help of the States governments are overcoming the 535 elected members of Congress.
Positive 24,157
Tests 1,177,099
% of total tests 2.1
Tptal deaths 786
Average of total tests last 7 days 1.7
Positive 30,011
Tests 1,163,096
% of total tests 2.6
Total deaths 770
Average % of total tests last 7 days 1.8
Up a little. MORE TESTS.
On 2/9/2022 the 7 day % average of tests was 6. Since then it has gone down daily until today.
545,316 deaths from COVID-19 since 1/31/2021
Positive 26,601
Tests 1,174,470
% of total tests 2.3
Total deaths 604
Average % of total tests last 7 days 1.6
Positive 10,656
Tests 334,957
% of totl tests 3.2
Total deaths 269
Average % of total tests last 7 days 1.8
I will act like Biden.
It must be asymtomatic from Ukraine.
IT IS PUTIN’S FAULT.
Positive 9,057
Tests 939,588
% of total tests 1.0
Total deaths 87
Average % of total tests last 7 days 1.7
Down a little today
Positive 14,812
Tests 1,748,510
% of total tests 0.8
Total deaths 531
Average % of total tests last 7days 1.7
Can you keep the test number that high?
Positive 25,371
Tests 1,531,790
% of total tests 1.7
Total deaths 637
Average % of total tests last 7 days 1.66
The 7 day average is so small I will round it off to the nearest .01%
David Appell | March 31, 2022 at 2:15 pm |
Robert David Clark commented:
They are saying the government will eliminate Tital-42 at the end of May. That means the administration is over-riding all the work the AMERICAN PEOPLE have done to overcome the effect of the open border on the spread of COVID-19.
“Mexico has a lower COVID case rate than the US, currently by a factor of 3.4:
https://t.ly/H2rJ
(Our World in Data)”
Appell – gotta wonder if you have any comprehension of the stats.
see 91-divoc dot com
the cumulative covid deaths in the US are approx 297 per 100k while mexico is approx 255 per 100k.
the US has approx 13% of the population over the age of 65 while mexico’s percent of population over 65 is approx 7%. A reasonable estimate is that the US death rate by age group is that the US doing about 40% better than Mexico.
Joe wrote:
the US has approx 13% of the population over the age of 65 while mexico’s percent of population over 65 is approx 7%. A reasonable estimate is that the US death rate by age group is that the US doing about 40% better than Mexico.
That’s not a reasonable calculation at all, but in any case Mexico’s vax rate is 66% and the US’s is 77%
https://t.ly/bTjF
Yet their case rate is over three times smaller. A “reasonable estimate” is that they’re just a lot healthier than Americans.
David Appell | April 1, 2022 at 9:58 am |
Joe wrote:
the US has approx 13% of the population over the age of 65 while mexico’s percent of population over 65 is approx 7%. A reasonable estimate is that the US death rate by age group is that the US doing about 40% better than Mexico.
That’s not a reasonable calculation at all, but in any case Mexico’s vax rate is 66% and the US’s is 77%
https://t.ly/bTjF
“Yet their case rate is over three times smaller. A “reasonable estimate” is that they’re just a lot healthier than Americans.”
Appell — As I previously stated – and as demonstrated by your response – you have no fricking clue about the data, the stats, or basic math , in spite of your BA degree in mathematics — or was it a BS degree.
but a few hints to help you with basic math and data and basic analytical/critical thinking skills
A) case rates are heavily influenced by the level of testing
b) the best apples to apples comparison is death rates by age group. the US beats Mexico by approximately 40% .
c) case rates for all practical purposes are pretty meaningless, especially when there is such a disparity in age demographics for a disease in which the deaths are 90%+ in the age 65= group.
D) if you think the mexican population is healthier than the us population , then you probably think cuba has a better medical/health care system than the US.
Joe wrote:
D) if you think the mexican population is healthier than the us population , then you probably think cuba has a better medical/health care system than the US.
Robert’s comment was about those coming across the border bring COVID, not bringing death. Mexico has a much lower per capita COVID case rate. Those coming to the US tend to be healthier, and certainly healthier than American elders. They’re younger, fitter, and generally more ambitious and capable of making such a journey that most American probably couldn’t handle.
David Appell | April 1, 2022 at 11:40 am |
Joe wrote:
D) if you think the mexican population is healthier than the us population , then you probably think cuba has a better medical/health care system than the US.
Robert’s comment was about those coming across the border bring COVID, not bringing death. Mexico has a much lower per capita COVID case rate. Those coming to the US tend to be healthier, and certainly healthier than American elders. They’re younger, fitter, and generally more ambitious and capable of making such a journey that most American probably couldn’t handle.”
Appell – your ability to recognize bad data is seriously deficient. I gave you a few hints that you should have picked up on – but no – you still missed it.
As is well known – ie common knowldege – testing heavily influences the reported case rates – seems like you ignored what is common knowledge.
As I pointed out – mexico’s per capita death rate by age groups is 30%-40% higher than the US.
Now that I have given you those two hints – how likely is mexico’s reported case rate to be significantly lower than the US?
Positive 20,699
Tests 825,221
% of total tests 2.5
Total deaths 375
Average % of total tests last 7 days 1.61
Positive 20,545
Tests 1,974,736
% of total tests 1.0
Total death 524
Average % of total tests last 7 days 1.36
Looking verry good. Will have till next Friday to see.
On 2/7/2022 7 day average was 7. Going down since then.
Positive 7,900
Tests 282,579
% of total tests 2.8
Total deaths 154
Average % of total tests last 7 days 1.34
Positive 4,417
Tests 359,604
% of total tests 1.2
Total deaths 17
Average % of total tests last 7 days 1.34
WHERE WILL THE AMERICAN PEOPLE HAVE IT ON FRIDAY?
Positive 11,421
Tests 868,234
% of total tests 1.3
Total deaths 104
Average % of total tests last 7 days 1.6
Positive 20,930
Tests 990,463
% of total tests 2.11
Total deaths 363
Average % of total tests last 7 days 1.47
They are saying the government will eliminate Tital-42 at the end of May. That means the administration is over-riding all the work the AMERICAN PEOPLE have done to overcome the effect of the open border on the spread of COVID-19.
THE TRUE BIDEN BULD BACKBETTER PLAN IS COMMING BACK!!!!
It is up to the 535 elected members of Congress to stop this.
Robert David Clark commented:
They are saying the government will eliminate Tital-42 at the end of May. That means the administration is over-riding all the work the AMERICAN PEOPLE have done to overcome the effect of the open border on the spread of COVID-19.
Mexico has a lower COVID case rate than the US, currently by a factor of 3.4:
https://t.ly/H2rJ
(Our World in Data)
We still have the States trying to close the border and finish the wall.
MONTH TOTAL DEATHS
MARCH, 2020 26,061
APRIL, 2020 75,571
MAY, 2020 23,283
JUNE, 2020 23,362
JULY, 2020 29,717
AUGUST, 2020 28,607
SEPTEMBER, 2020 27,798
OCTOBER, 2020 24,271
NOVEMBER, 2020 38,500
DECEMBER, 2020 77,967
JANUARY, 2021 99,352
FEBRUARY, 2021 74,211
MARCH, 2021 39,672
APRIL, 2021 24,923
MAY, 2021 20,271
JUNE, 2021 10,436
JULY, 2021 9,090
AUGUST, 2021 27,410
SEPTEMBER, 2021 60,182
OCTOBER, 2021 52,027
NOVEMBER, 2021 35,449
DECEMBER, 2021 45,574
January, 2022 61,445
FEBRUARY, 2022 65,929
MARCH,2022 33,362
I do not know what happened to 31st so
% of totl tests 2.11
7 day % of total tests 1.46
Today is Friday. We will see how the closing of the border is going.
4/1/2022 results:
% of total positive 1.93
Average % of total positive last 7 days 1.66
I guess I was a bad boy, censored, the last 2 days!
Positive 9,896
Tests 1,154,288
% of total tests 0.86
Total deaths 119
Average % of total tests last 7 days 1.50
Positive 5,149
Tests 247,057
% of total tests 2.08
Total deaths 22
Average % of total tests last 7 days 1.53
Hopefully the wall is almost completed by the end of this month.
We will see where we are Friday again.
Positive 12,928
Tests 676,938
% of total tests 1.91
Total deaths 108
Average % of total tests last 7 days 1.06
We still have the stats trying to close the border!!!
What we need now is the 535 elected members of Congress to step up to the plate. KILL BIDEN’S REAL BUILD BACK BETTER PLAN # 2
Positive 20,613
Tests 1,473,375
% of total tests 1.40
Average % of total tests last 7 days 1.70
Positive 28,025
Tests 1,147,933
% of total tests 2.44
Total deaths 367
Average % of total tests last 7 days 1.82
6-day rule says President Biden should be tested on the 13th.
Positive 28515
Tests 507,547
% of total tests 5.62
Total deaths 266
Average % of total tests last 7 days 2.14
More tests. 7-day average is going up.
If Congress does nothing before 5/23/2022 the COVID-19 BUILD BACK BETTER Plan restarts.
4/9/2022
Positive 12,718
Tests 1,871,312
% 0f total tests 0.68
Total deaths 105
Average % of total tests last 7 days 1.94
Total deaths from COVID-19 in the USA since 1/31/2021 561,652.
That is an average of 40,118 per month.
If you look at the monthly death above, you will see it took from 2/1/2021 to 8/1/2021to overcome the excellent work of (MY HEROES) the testers and contact tracers.
Positive 8,917
Tests 156843
% of total tests 5.69
Total deaths 16
Average % of total tests last 7 days 1.58
Positive 15,550
Tests 551,867
% of total tests 2.82
Total deaths 160
Average % of total deaths last 7 days 2.11
Not going down last few days. MORE TESTS1
States, pick it up a little please.
CONGRESS GET BACK TO WORK. Over 550,000 Deaths since 1/31/2021!
Positive 24,184
Tests 1,212,847
% of total tests 2.00
Total deaths 393
Average % of total tests last 7 days 2.48
7 day average is rising, Congress is off for 2 weeks campaigning.
I am glad to see all is under control in the world!!!!
Today is the 13th. I guess President Biden’s 6-day test came back negative.
Positive 31,088
Tests 700,175
% of total tests 4.44
Total deaths 266
Average % of total tests last 7 days 2.42
Positive 41,855
Tests 1,656,423
% of total tests 2.53
Total deaths 355
Average % of total tests last 7 days 2.44
Last 7 days is holding and not dropping.
More Tests
Only 1 month until the COVID-19 bring back better plan resumes!!!!
4/15/2022
positive 36,421
tests 814,494
% of total tests 4.47
total deaths 325
average % of total tests last 7 days 2 45
4/16/2022
positive 12,890
Tests 187,940
% of total tests 6.86
total deaths 80
average of total tests last 7 days 324
Positive 7,235
Tests 112,363
% of total tests 6.44
Total deaths 10
Average % of total tests last 7 days 3.23
Positive 19,341
Tests 609,404
% of total tests 3.17
Total deaths 59
Average % of total tests last 7 days 3.37
Looking at the last 3 weeks, the daily positive has been going down and deaths also. The 7 day % has been going up.
The only explanation for this is there are less infected coming in to be tested voluntarily, thus less carriers let into the general public.
THE BORDER PATROL AND WALL BUILDERS ARE WINNING!!!!!
535 ELECTED MEMBERS OF CONGRESS MUST ACT BEFORE MAY 23rd!!!!!
Positive 18,375
Tests 437,873
% of total tests 3.70
Total deaths 190
Average % of tatol tests last 7 days 3.70
For the UK, when it comes to fracking as compared to wind turbines, it couldn’t get any more duplicitous when politicians talk about them. Fracking can provide us with clean gas for decades but it comes with serious objections from the green lobby and so our so called leaders appear prepared to pass up the opportunity for fear of upsetting Big Brother. The audible sound of a wind turbine turning is enough to drive some people mad but there is another much more sinister side to these monstrosities. Wind turbines are known to cause infrasound, something which has now been studied in some depth for nearly four decades. It is an inaudible killer.
http://www.icben.org/2017/ICBEN%202017%20Papers/SubjectArea10_Ecoti%C3%A8re_1005_2487.pdf
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZXCZ3OyklrE
Lately we have learned much more about the damage caused by infrasound not only to laboratory rats but to humans and other creatures which get too close to a turbine or happen to live not far enough away from one. Autopsies have shown what damage infrasound does to these people and it does not make pretty reading. Nuclear energy at least understands and respects the safety measures required to justify their continued existence. All of this makes me worry about the quality of our academics and scientists who should surely be on top of balancing health and safety risks against the potential benefits of the fuel concerned. Fracking has immense value as being a quality fuel which could power UK baseload generators for decades and give us independent energy; wind turbines have no such capability or reliability and come with considerably greater risks to humans which are unseen but deadly, harms and kills many other creatures, and may be altering weather and sea currents to our longer term cost.
I would imagine sea creatures are also suffering similar damage from infrasound as humans and rats and the other creatures researchers observed to be harmed by them. We are also discovering how offshore wind farms {sic] could be adversely influencing climate change by altering weather patterns. But, just like the killing of bats and birds, the awful consequences of wind turbines are ignored by the same green lobby that dislikes fracking, because there are now far too many of these monsters for the truth about them to do anything other than seriously damage the renewable energy lobby’s credibility.
Where is a quality IPCC paper when you need it?
The Green Extremists disregard the effects of their energy policy. From the stratospheric oil price to damage done by wind and solar farms. They are heartless zealots. Putin would get along great with them.
The recently initiated wind farm in the Atlantic waters some fifteen miles east of Martha’s Vineyard lies smack in the middle of the eastern seabird migration route. Chop chop.
Dietrich Hoecht commented:
The recently initiated wind farm in the Atlantic waters some fifteen miles east of Martha’s Vineyard lies smack in the middle of the eastern seabird migration route. Chop chop.
Offshore wind farms are proving to be a haven for sea life.
Another arctic front in the US Midwest.
https://i.ibb.co/9gDDw4Y/Screenshot-1.png
The planet mean surface temperature equation
Tmean = [ Φ (1-a) S (β*N*cp)¹∕ ⁴ /4σ ]¹∕ ⁴
produces remarkable results.
The calculated planets temperatures are almost identical with the measured by satellites.
Planet….Tmean…Tsat.mean
Mercury…325,83 K…340 K
Earth…..287,74 K…288 K
Moon……223,35 Κ…220 Κ
Mars……213,21 K…210 K
–
The 288 K – 255 K = 33 oC difference does not exist in the real world.
There are only traces of greenhouse gasses.
The Earth’s atmosphere is very thin. There is not any measurable Greenhouse Gasses Warming effect on the Earth’s surface.
–
There is NO +33°C greenhouse enhancement on the Earth’s mean surface temperature.
Both the calculated by equation and the satellite measured Earth’s mean surface temperatures are almost identical:
Tmean.earth = 287,74K = 288 K
https://www.cristos-vournas.com
Every old Atlas and Encyclopaedia that I have checked spells that Ukraine city “Kiev”
Now we see people being chastised for not spelling it “Kyiv”.
There is a lesson here.
You new-spellers are repeating material fed to you by others with an agenda. Their test of penetration is how often comments use “Kyiv”.
I just bypass comments with the trendy “Kyiv” because they are made (by inference and not always) by people who are easily led and who follow fads. I prefer original thinkers.
Yes, I do know about the origins of “Kyiv”.
It is similar to writes of climate papers inserting “Climate change is a global existential threat” without doing verification that it is so. Likewise, I now mostly bypass those papers.
Geoff S
Now those who stoop id ly listened to the Green Extremists and implemented their Unicorn energy policies have to pay the piper.
A large chunk of Russian crude and refined products exports are not finding buyers now and signs point to even more trouble by next week. Brent and West Texas Intermediate crude have surged above $105 a barrel for the first time since 2014. In late trading in London on Tuesday, WTI was up more than 10% in one of the biggest one-day spikes ever. More importantly, yardsticks that measure the short-term tightness of the market are surging. The price gap between a barrel of Brent delivered now and one in one year has widened to a record of more than $23.50 a barrel, surpassing the level after Saddam Hussein invaded Kuwait almost 32 years ago.
And something puddin’-head left out of his Dimowit-serving, pivot-to-the-middle-but-don’t-really-mean-it SOU speech is the US oil industry. He and everyone in the US has a stake in cheap oil and natural gas. We all do. Support this industry!
While President Joe Biden didn’t use its State of the Union speech to encourage American oil drillers to boost production, the U.S. shale patch needs to go into war footing. Many in the American oil industry would be tempted to snap back a “we told you so!” about forgetting about the domestic industry.
https://www.bloomberg.com/opinion/articles/2022-03-01/six-things-you-need-to-know-about-the-russian-oil-shock
It’s all about oil except maybe it’s not?
After the US shutout the Venezuela oil industry (the #1 country in terms of oil reserves, with over 304 billion barrels) Russia stepped in and took over their oil industry (and policy) at fire sale prices + military bases. That’s part of the problem too. Now I see Mexico has sided with Russia over sanctioning Ukraine. Maybe Russia will reboot the 1960s and move missiles into S. America to help those oppressed Latin American countries defend themselves against American corporate imperialism.
Elon Musk needs to step in and fix this.
We see what kinda shape Venezuela’s economy is like today
The kinda of social paradise our democrat leaders aspire
The US has plenty of oil. Just get the Fed out of the picture and, in this case, let the free market do its thing.
I agree jim2. Let’s get the Federal Reserve out of the market. Andrew Jackson was right.
The effort to push EVs (and ignore Elon Musk for some reason) is going to be fascinating for the climate action gang.
If you’re going to add millions of EVs, you’re going to need plentiful reliable electricity which is only going to come from nuclear if you want it emission-free. And it will take time to build that, so we’ll be burning lots of coal and gas to power EVs for some time.
Tell me again the “climate” reason to shift from today’s relatively clean ICE fleet of gasoline cars to EVs powered by coal.
But wait, there’s more! European EV exports just caught their delivery ship on fire and sank it. How all-in on EVs will Germany be if they can’t have nuclear power to support them at home and they can’t sell their high end electric vehicles to rich Americans? Or, to be more precise, they can sell them in the US, but only if they make them in the US, which has not much benefit to German workers.
The “green” political coalition is about to be tested in ways they never have been before:
Nukes or dams? Both of which they opposed.
Manufacturing policy (shift to EVs) that leave workers unemployed.
Subsidy of EVs that leave middle class and poor in the dark (they still can’t afford them) and scratching their heads about the reason (see: cars, powered by coal).
Or to put it another way: thanks to the stellar effort to vigorously alienate anyone to the right of Bernie Sanders, the “green” movement is about to get dumped by all the anti-nuke, environmental, and income equality factions of the left. And lose their base in the EU.
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Over some considerable time, I have observed David Appel wage debate (along with Joshua) against the hordes of CO2 deniers regarding many posts on this blog, and I thought that by and large he held his ground well and defended his positions with logic backed by credible references. However, I was very disappointed to see him argue for the hockey stick, which as I (among others) have shown at:
https://www.amazon.com/s?k=Donald+Rapp+climate+change&i=stripbooks&crid=1M43EI7RVC2TD&sprefix=donald+rapp+climate+change%2Cstripbooks%2C226&ref=nb_sb_noss
is throughly bad science, and indeed, essentially all the proxy work of the past 2,000 years is a house of cards built on poor and inadequate data. It was surprising to me that a person of his obvious knowledge and intelligence could heed to the party line, rather than look at it objectively.
Donald Rapp wrote:
https://www.amazon.com/s?k=Donald+Rapp+climate+change&i=stripbooks&crid=1M43EI7RVC2TD&sprefix=donald+rapp+climate+change%2Cstripbooks%2C226&ref=nb_sb_noss
Is this self-published?
Have you written anything that’s been published in a peer reviewed journal?
Appell’s comment -Donald Rapp wrote:
https://www.amazon.com/s?k=Donald+Rapp+climate+change&i=stripbooks&crid=1M43EI7RVC2TD&sprefix=donald+rapp+climate+change%2Cstripbooks%2C226&ref=nb_sb_noss
Is this self-published?
Have you written anything that’s been published in a peer reviewed journal?”
Appell regularly posts comments and links to crappy agenda based non peer reviewed articles covering such topics as “cheaper renewables” and bogus articles on fossil fuel tax subsidies because they fit the narrative.
But anything that highlights errors in the agenda driven climate science has to be “peer reviewed”.
Appell even goes as far as refusing to read some “non peer reviewed Unscientific” blog because it is not “peer reviewed” . Such blog being one which has pointed out numerous errors which have subsequently resulted in retractions and corrections of several previously published peer reviewed climate studies.
Joe
I believe that David (as a reasonably bright guy) knows the facts and data and is unable to accept the truth since it is contrary to his preconceived cultural views. Hence, I describe him as a zealot.
Look at how Judith’s views have changed on the issue since this blog started. The data and the actions of scientists with preconceived views made obvious resulted it the change.
joe wrote:
Such blog being one which has pointed out numerous errors which have subsequently resulted in retractions and corrections of several previously published peer reviewed climate studies.
On McIntyre’s blog this commenter wrote:
“You have not been able to get a retraction of any of the publications on hockeysticks because of improper dataset selection of improper statistics.”
[I assume that last “of” was meant to be “or.”]
https://climateaudit.org/2021/09/02/pages19-0-30s/#comment-805252
In McIntyre’s reply, the very next comment, he doesn’t disagree or take issue with that statement.
Appell – First I have to commend you for looking at site with specific criticisms of the the various hockey stick reconstructions, and the weakness of the underlying proxies. That is quite an improvement over your prior refusal to explore anything not “peer reviewed”
If you follow the whole thread with that BAS guy, you will notice that BAS was making numerous statements, McIntyre was responding to just one of those statements, so not addressing one of the several comments in the specific post doesnt raise any concerns,
There have been 3-4 retractions , notably the gergis and the pages 2k (2013) along with several climate scientists “circling the wagons” without a credible response to the proxy deficiencies.
You will also notice one of the Key observations regarding the long proxies and the short proxies. The reconstructions are made up of short proxies which have the blade (short proxies only going back to 1700-1800 time frame and the long proxies. virtually None of the long proxies have a blade or hills and valleys associated with the mwp or LIA which renders any conclusion about the quality calibration to be suspect.
the non climate scientist commented:
If you follow the whole thread with that BAS guy, you will notice that BAS was making numerous statements, McIntyre was responding to just one of those statements,
Yes, clearly he was responding to the comment about the hockey stick.
There have been 3-4 retractions , notably the gergis and the pages 2k (2013)
Then why didn’t McIntyre mention those, hmm?
Non scientist:
Here’s the PAGES 2k 2013 paper:
https://www.nature.com/articles/ngeo1797
No retraction. An update, two errata, and a corrigendum. No retraction.
Get your facts straight before making serious accusations.
non climate scientist commented:
None of the long proxies have a blade or hills and valleys associated with the mwp or LIA which renders any conclusion about the quality calibration to be suspect.
You seem to be assuming there was a global MWP and LIA.
Why?
David Appell | March 4, 2022 at 5:20 pm |
Non scientist:
Here’s the PAGES 2k 2013 paper:
https://www.nature.com/articles/ngeo1797
No retraction. An update, two errata, and a corrigendum. No retraction.
Get your facts straight before making serious accusations”
My bad – I called a corrigendum a correction – smae difference.
non climate scientist commented:
My bad – I called a corrigendum a correction – smae difference.
Nope, you said PAGES 2k (2013) was retracted:
“There have been 3-4 retractions , notably the gergis and the pages 2k (2013)….”
That’s flat-out incorrect.
David Appell | March 4, 2022 at 5:27 pm |
non climate scientist commented:
None of the long proxies have a blade or hills and valleys associated with the mwp or LIA which renders any conclusion about the quality calibration to be suspect.
You seem to be assuming there was a global MWP and LIA.
Why?”
Appell – enlighten us on why any proxie would reflect global temps
Explain how a proxie in yamal would should SH temps?
Note the Yamal proxy is used in the multitude of reconstructions using different statistical methods showing the hockey stick with no MWP even though the northern range of the tree line is some 100-160km further north than the present day.
Joe – the non climate scientist commented:
Appell – enlighten us on why any proxie would reflect global temps
Explain how a proxie in yamal would should SH temps?
No comment on your incorrect claim that PAGES 2k (2013) was retracted?
And you’re an expert on proxies when you can’t even get that right??
Joe – the non climate scientist commented:
Appell – enlighten us on why any proxie would reflect global temps
Explain how a proxie in yamal would should SH temps?
I never claimed such a thing.
Take a look at http://www.drdrapp.com
Donald Rapp commented:
Take a look at http://www.drdrapp.com
I don’t see any peer reviewed papers on the hockey stick.
You certainly know, or should know, that the scientific community won’t take you at all seriously without putting your work in a quality peer reviewed journal.
You say your book is widely used, but it doesn’t have a single customer review on Amazon.
David Appell: There are articles. And there are peer reviewed articles. And the peers tend to be members of the proxy cabal who revealed themselves through a series of leaked emails to be biased, in league with one another, active in manipulating the literature to their preconceived prejudices, preventing alternate views from being published, and persecuting those in opposition (e.g. Wegman). Yet, aside from that, the articles, as published, stand ready to be reviewed, analyzed, and criticized by anyone willing to take the trouble to do that, and one need not (indeed better not) be a member of the cabal. I offer myself as such a reviewer based on my scientific stature with all the accomplishments mentioned in my previous posting. See http://www.drdrapp.com. I am thoroughly competent to read the literature in this field and analyze it, which I did. In my book, I summarized ten years of research with over a thousand references to peer review articles in 811 pages. I would be happy to send a pdf of the the chapter on the hockey stick to you if I had your email address. Your characterization of my book (unseen) reveals the depth of your nasty personality, and your lack of respect for your betters.
Stephen McIntyre
Posted Sep 4, 2021 at 12:59 PM | Permalink
you say “you have not been able to convince a single climate scientist that the hockeysticks are poor science”.
Many scientists agreed with our criticism of Mann’s methodology and proxies. Even the current chair of IPCC WG1 told me in a conversation at AGU that she thought that our criticism of Mann’s methodology and proxies was convincing.
There are many non-political articles on the Holocene. Articles applying convoluted multivariate methods to multiple proxies play little to no role in virtually any of them. Accordingly, the Hockey Stick plays little to no role in majority of professional paleoclimate literature.
On the issue of availability of data and even code – an issue that was controversial at the time and hotly opposed by Mann and other climate scientists- I’m definitely on the right side of history, as all of the policies that I advocated are now acknowledged even by climate scientists.
https://climateaudit.org/2021/09/02/pages19-0-30s/#comment-805261
Interesting article Judith.
For me the root of the “risk” assessment problem is in the ill motivated attempts of generalisation.
Indeed considering that the climate’s variability depends on time and space, there is no such thing as a “global” impact.
The variability (of the climate) which is acceptable for one person on one place may be intolerable for another person on another place and both persons might have legitimate and rational reasons to draw contradictory conclusion.
It is like in special relativity where 2 observers in 2 different frames of reference will (legitimately) not agree on the fact whether 2 events they observed were simultaneous or not.
F.ex let’s take water availability.
In a warmer world the global evaporation increases and therefore necessarily the global precipitation increases.
However the global precipitation is irrelevant because there is a significant spatial variability.
For some regions and their inhabitants where water availability was low, an increase in precipitations is a benediction.
For some regions and their inhabitants where water availability was high, a further increase of precipitations might affect them negatively.
Finally for some regions there will be no or little change and the population will be indifferent to the change of some “global” parameter.
Then there is the temporal variability.
In some regions the precipitations will increase quasi homogeneously in time what will not create any significant problems or risks.
In other regions the precipitations will increase very heterogeneously in time what could lead to significant risks and problems due to flooding.
It seems then that any serious and scientifical risk assessment can only be local and people on different places will legitimately disagree on the sign of the risk that could really impact their lives.
So finally we are left with the subjective concept of “solidarity” but then it is politics and no more science.
‘If the dark side of concerns about Earth’s climate is fear, the bright side is data. The latter single-word label means to include the technological advances in monitoring atmosphere, hydrosphere, cryosphere and biosphere, the gathering and processing of huge amounts of ground- and space-based observations for the land and sea parts of the Earth, and the free availability of data. Hydrological processes on the global scale extend over all these spheres, and our knowledge of them benefits from these data.’ https://hess.copernicus.org/articles/24/3899/2020/
There is no evidence of an increase in evaporation or an intensification of precipitation. Increasing atmospheric humidity has something to do with that. What has always been the case is that changing patterns of ‘quasi standing waves’ in oceans change patterns of global precipitation with risk for agriculture, water resources and infrastructure.
Robert I. Ellison commented:
There is no evidence of an increase in evaporation or an intensification of precipitation.
False.
“Global warming already driving increases in rainfall extremes: Precipitation extremes are affecting even arid parts of the world, study shows,” Nature 3/7/16
http://www.nature.com/news/global-warming-already-driving-increases-in-rainfall-extremes-1.19508
“Increased record-breaking precipitation events under global warming,” J Lehmann et al, Clim. Change 132, 501–515 (2015).
http://link.springer.com/article/10.1007%2Fs10584-015-1434-y
Evidence for more extreme downpours:
Papalexiou, S. M., & Montanari, A.(2019). Global and regional increase of precipitation extremes under global warming. Water Resources Research, 55,4901–4914. https://doi.org/10.1029/2018WR024067
“Extreme Precipitation Events are on the Rise,” Climate Central, 5/6/14.
http://www.climatecentral.org/gallery/maps/extreme-precipitation-events-are-on-the-rise
‘Evidently, if we choose at random, say, 12 000 sites on Earth, then every month we will have, on the average, one catastrophic event of a 1000-year return period in one of the sites.’ Koutsoyiannis 2020
Global land and ocean data is needed to realistically assess rates of evaporation and precipitation. That the analysis is provided by a hydrologist of the stature of Koutsoyiannis is a bonus.
Robert I. Ellison wrote:
There is no evidence of an increase in evaporation….
False.
From the IPCC 6AR:
8.3.1.4 Evapotranspiration
AR5 assessed that there was medium confidence that pan evaporation declined in most regions over the last
50 years, yet medium confidence that evapotranspiration increased from the early 1980s to the late 1990s.
Since AR5, these conflicting observations have been attributed to internal variability and by the fact that
evapotranspiration is less sensitive to trends in wind speed and is partly controlled by vegetation greening
(Zhang et al., 2015a, 2016d; Zeng et al., 2018c). Observation-based estimates show a robust positive trend in
global terrestrial evapotranspiration between the early 1980s and the early 2010s (Miralles et al., 2014b;
Zeng et al., 2014, 2018c, Zhang et al., 2015a, 2016d). The rate of increase varies among datasets, with an
ensemble mean terrestrial average rate of 7.6 ± 1.3 mm year-1 decade-1 for 1882–2011 (Zeng et al., 2018b).
In addition, a decreasing trend in pan evaporation plateaued or reversed after the mid-1990s (Stephens et al.,
2018a) has been reported as due to a shift from a dominant influence of wind speed to a dominant effect of
water vapour pressure deficit, which has increased sharply since the 1990s (Yuan et al., 2019). The absence
of a trend in evapotranspiration in the decade following 1998 was shown to be at least partly an episodic
phenomenon associated with ENSO variability (Miralles et al., 2014b; Zhang et al., 2015a; Martens et al.,
2018). Thus, there is medium confidence that the apparent pause in the increase in global evapotranspiration
from 1998 to 2008 is mostly due to internal variability. In contrast to the AR5, there are now consistent
trends in pan evaporation and evapotranspiration at the global scale, given the recent increase in both
variables since the mid 1990s (medium confidence). Given the growing number of quantitative studies, there is high confidence that global terrestrial annual evapotranspiration has increased since the early 1980s.
https://hess.copernicus.org/articles/24/3899/2020/
RIE conveniently dismisses all the evidence without even looking at it. Unscientific and won’t wash.
His claim that “There is no evidence of an increase in evaporation or an intensification of precipitation” is stated as fact but unproven.
I am a hydrologist with decades of experience. I have seen it all before. David has not considered the more recent paper with the new data sources.
Robert I. Ellison wrote:
I am a hydrologist with decades of experience. I have seen it all before. David has not considered the more recent paper with the new data sources.
Trying to use your career to short circuit the debate? A cheap trick that doesn’t wash. Trying to cite a single paper that overthrows all the others? Also doesn’t wash. Compare to all the data in the much more comprehensive IPCC SREX report of 2018, written by climate science experts, and now the IPCC 6AR WG2.
More evaporation is based on fundamental laws of physics. Hence more precipitation too.
Notice there’s been unprecedented flooding on the east coast of Australia? I read some places received up to 900 mm (I think it was) of rain in just a few days.
There is no debate. There is David’s hidebound ideology and ignorance of the evaporation paradox and of the statistics of hydrological extremes.
“ Notice there’s been unprecedented flooding on the east coast of Australia? I read some places received up to 900 mm (I think it was) of rain in just a few days.”
Appell whiffs again. The record is 907mm in 1893. But nice try.
https://149366104.v2.pressablecdn.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/03/Table1-879×1536.png
But more importantly we will never know if higher numbers occurred during the GMWP (Global Medieval Warm Period).
Robert I. Ellison commented:
There is no debate. There is David’s hidebound ideology and ignorance of the evaporation paradox and of the statistics of hydrological extremes.
There’s your refusal to look at the 2018 IPCC SREX report and the 2022 IPCC 6AR WG1 and instead point to a single paper by a nonclimate scientist that gives the result you want.
I wrote:
“ Notice there’s been unprecedented flooding on the east coast of Australia? I read some places received up to 900 mm (I think it was) of rain in just a few days.”
Here’s the kind of thing I was thinking about:
“Record flooding in Australia driven by La Niña and climate change —
A slow-moving low-pressure system has dropped 790 millimetres of rain on Brisbane in one week, causing floods that have claimed eight lives,” New Scientist 2/28/22.
https://www.newscientist.com/article/2309783-record-flooding-in-australia-driven-by-la-nina-and-climate-change/#ixzz7N563SlIu
Appell once again without evidence claims that bad weather is a result of more CO2 caused climate change.
Rob Starkey commented:
Appell once again without evidence claims that bad weather is a result of more CO2 caused climate change.
I’ve given the evidence many times on this post. Pay attention.
The highest 1 day rainfall in Australia of 907mm was at Crohamhurst in 1893.
Robert I. Ellison commented:
‘Evidently, if we choose at random, say, 12 000 sites on Earth, then every month we will have, on the average, one catastrophic event of a 1000-year return period in one of the sites.’ Koutsoyiannis 2020
It depends on how you define “event.” If you’re talking about the 1-in-1000 year heat wave that occurred over three days in the US Pacific Northwest last summer over an area of roughly 1 M km2…. I’d like to see you point out the equivalent extreme events that have happened every month since.
But even that doesn’t matter because nothing about the theory behind AGW makes predictions about the regularity or frequency of “catastrophic” events, however you define them. Their definition is based on human values, anyway — they don’t have a scientific definition. The theory primarily pertains to trends in parameters such as temperature, precipitation, etc. More heat waves and extreme rainfalls are expected, but whether they’re “catastrophic” isn’t something the theory can speak to.
This is a good example of Koutsoyiannis not having a basic feel for what climate science is and how it works.
Rainfall extremes are based on daily, monthly and annual statistics. Rainfall can occur over a wide area but extremes are generated by relatively small cells within storms. Their occurrence is chaotic enough to seem random. They can dump huge amounts of rain on small areas. Then there are lows associated with ENSO. These have intense cells but the problem is more the time they hang around wetting catchment and the areal extent of the low.
https://psl.noaa.gov/enso/mei/img/meiv2.timeseries.png
ENSO has regimes and transitions – with a multidecadal influence on east coast Australian rainfall. Koutsotiannis found that what was evident in global precipitation data was variability without a trend increase. But it also evolves over millennia.
https://watertechbyrie.files.wordpress.com/2016/02/vance2012-antartica-law-dome-ice-core-salt-content.jpg
https://journals.ametsoc.org/view/journals/clim/26/3/jcli-d-12-00003.1.xml
In the centuries before 1900 there were megafloods in Australia and megadroughts in America. Derived statistics from far too short a record is sloppy work. To know what AGW does to rainfall one must first understand internal variability.
Appell
“ Demetris Koutsoyiannis is professor of Hydrology and Analysis of Hydrosystems in the National Technical University of Athens. He has served as Dean of the School of Civil Engineering, Head of the Department of Water Resources and Environmental Engineering, and Head of the Laboratory of Hydrology and Water Resources Development. He was Editor of Hydrological Sciences Journal for 12 years (2006-18), and member of the editorial boards of Hydrology and Earth System Sciences, Journal of Hydrology, Water Resources Research, Hydrology and Sci. He has been awarded the International Hydrology Prize– Dooge medal (2014) by the International Association of Hydrological Sciences (IAHS), UNESCO and World Meteorological Organization (WMO), and the Henry Darcy Medal (2009) by the European Geosciences Union (EGU). His distinctions include the Lorenz Lecture of the American Geophysical Union (AGU) (San Francisco, USA, 2014) and the Union Plenary Lecture of the International Union of Geodesy and Geophysics (IUGG) (Melbourne, Australia, 2011). He has served as professor of Hydraulics at the Hellenic Army’s Postgraduate School of Technical Education of Officers Engineers (Athens, 2007-10). He has been visiting academic/professor at the Imperial College (London, 1999-2000), Hydrologic Research Center (San Diego, 2005), Georgia Institute of Technology (Atlanta, 2005-06), University of Bologna (2006 & 2019) and Sapienza University of Rome (2008 & 2019).”
Appell, I’ve been looking everywhere for your distinctions and leadership positions and cv, and for some reason I’ve come up empty handed. Why do you think that is?
King of the cement block domain doesn’t count.
CKid commented:
“ Demetris Koutsoyiannis is professor of Hydrology and Analysis of Hydrosystems in the National Technical University of Athens.
Hydrology and civil engineering aren’t climate science.
PS: I’m sure my qualifications here are far greater than your’s. I know the units of acceleration, for example.
Typically tendentious nonsense.
Robert Ellison wrote:
To know what AGW does to rainfall one must first understand internal variability.
You’d think no one thought about internal variability before your hero.
“Precipitation trends at regional scales are dominated by internal variability across much of the world (Knutson and Zeng et al., 2018)”
— IPCC 6AR WG1 p8-34
“Global and regional changes in precipitation frequency and intensity have been observed over recent decades. An analysis of 1875 rain gauge records worldwide over the period 1961–2018 indicates that there has been a general increase in the probability of precipitation exceeding 50 mm/day, mostly due to an overall boost in rain intensity (Benestad et al., 2019). Such changes in precipitation intensity and frequency have not been formally attributed to human activities, but are consistent with the heating effect of increasing CO2 levels on the distribution of daily precipitation rates (Section 8.2.3.2) and with a distinct overall intensification of heavy precipitation events found in both observations and CMIP5 models, though with an underestimated magnitude (Fischer and Knutti, 2014). Beyond amplified precipitation extremes (Section
2 11.4.2), CMIP5 models also indicate that anthropogenic forcings have increased temporal variability of annual precipitation amount over land from 1950 to 2005, which is most pronounced in annual mean daily
4 precipitation intensity (Konapala et al., 2017).”
— ibid pp8-34 to 8-35
‘… records worldwide over the period 1961–2018…’
And that is the statistical crux of the matter.
Appell
“ I’m sure my qualifications here are far greater than your’s. ”
Can’t prove it by me. You might want to start with learning when not to use apostrophes. It is yours not your’s. Should we blame your 2nd grade teacher?
But then we should applaud your 3rd grade math teacher because you have those 3rd grade equations down pat.
On the other hand, when you need remedial assistance in deciphering short term variability in tide gauges, I have to wonder what you are able to grasp.
Don’t let it get you down. This charade of runaway global warming is about to hit a wall. And then those sleepless, angst filled nights will be in the rear view mirror.
Robert I. Ellison commented:
‘… records worldwide over the period 1961–2018…’
And that is the statistical crux of the matter.
Why?
Tomas Milanovic. Thank you for your comment.
“It seems then that any serious and scientifical risk assessment can only be local…”
The deer in my backyard this evening are pawing away the snow cover that fell the other night to get to the grass below for food.
I wonder: do General Circulation Models provide information that is impactful to me and the residents, including ecological inhabitants in my local? If so, what purpose do they serve? If not, is the best data one has to go on day-to-day..the local weather forecast?
A lack of hydrological intensification doesn’t prove or disprove AGW. It is the case that the methods used in 90% of the plethora of recent studies claiming that there is – are questionable and the precision claimed hugely optimistic.
https://hess.copernicus.org/articles/24/3899/2020/hess-24-3899-2020-g01.png
‘We clarify that here, to detect possible intensification in the hydrological cycle, we use past information on the global scale. This is similar to the common practice of detecting global warming, where the temporal evolution of an observed, globally averaged, tem