by Judith Curry
The loss of glaciers from Glacier National Park is one of the most visible manifestations of climate change in the U.S. Signs were posted all around the park, proclaiming that the glaciers would be gone by 2020. In 2017, the Park started taking these signs down. What happened, beyond the obvious fact that the glaciers hadn’t disappeared by 2020?
Not only are Montana’s glaciers an important icon for global warming (e.g. Al Gore’s Inconvenient Truth), it also seems that the glaciers are an important political icon for progressive politicians in Montana. Earlier this week, Reilly Neill, a (sort of) politician in Montana, went after me on Twitter:
A number of progressive academic types are leaving twitter owing to Elon Musk’s takeover. What??? And miss all this fun???
Well, it just so happens that I have some analyses of Montana glaciers and climate in my archives; maybe I can help Reilly (and the “real scientists of Montana”) understand what is going on.
Variability of glaciers in Glacier National Park
The total area of Glacier National Park covered by glaciers shrank 70% from the1850s to 2015, according to US Geological Survey. Melting began at the end of the Little Ice Age (circa 1850) when scientists believe 146 glaciers covered the region, as opposed to 26 in 2019.
The first surveys of glaciers in Glacier National Park began in the 1880s, with most of the focus on the two largest glaciers – Grinnell and Sperry. A 2017 publication issued by the U.S. Geological Survey entitled Status of Glaciers in Glacier National Park [link] includes a table of the areal extent of named glaciers in the Glacier National Park since the Little Ice Age (LIA) with markers at LIA, 1966, 1998, 2005 and 2015. Analysis of these data show:
- A ~50% loss from LIA to 1966 (~115 years), averaging a loss of ~4.5% per decade.
- Additional ~12% loss from 1966-98 (32 years), averaging a loss of ~3.7% per decade.
- Additional ~4.75% loss from 1998-2015 (17 years), averaging a loss of ~2.8% per decade.
Much of the glacier loss occurred prior to 1966, when fossil-fueled warming was minimal. The percentage rate of glacier loss during this early period substantially exceeded the percentage rate of loss observed in the 21st century. I suspect that much of this melting occurred in the 1930’s (see next section).
Looking much further back, Glacier National Park was virtually ice free 11,000 years ago. Glaciers have been present within the boundaries of present-day Glacier National Park since about 6,500 years ago. [link] These glaciers have varied in size, tracking climatic variations, but did not grow to their recent maximum size until the end of the Little Ice Age, around 1850. An 80-year period (~1770-1840) of cool, wet summers and above-average winter snowfall led to a rapid growth of glaciers just prior to the end of the Little Ice Age. So, the recent loss of glacier mass must be understood in light of the fact the glaciers reached their largest mass for the past 11,000 years during the 19th century. [link]
The USGS hasn’t updated its glacial survey since 2015 (gotta wonder why, with the huge losses they were expecting). While the loss between 1998 and 2015 has decreased relative to prior decades, it appears that the ice loss has actually stalled or slightly reversed since 2008 [link] This stall caused the Glacier National Park in 2017 to start taking down the signs that expected the glaciers to disappear by 2020.
So, what is going on?
The areal extent and mass balance of glaciers depends in the interplay between snow accumulation during the cold season and the glacier melting during summer. There is no prima facie reason that slow warming of the average annual surface temperatures will cause net loss of glacier area/mass. There are strong interannual and multidecadal variations in the amount of snowfall, and in some situations warmer winter temperatures can be associated with more snowfall. The summer melt season is quite short. The timing of the quixotic, weather-driven seasonal transition from snow to rainfall is a key determinant of the onset of the melt season and hence its duration. During summer, the diurnal timing and overall amount of cloudiness can make a big difference in how much melting occurs. And finally, soot associated with air pollution can provide a substantial accelerant for glacier melting; this is a huge issue for the Hindu-Kush-Himalayan glaciers, but I don’t see any reference to soot in context of Glacier National Park.
You will not be surprised to learn that ENSO, the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO) and Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation (AMO) influence the atmospheric circulation patterns that influence both the cold season snow accumulation and summertime melt (For an overview see LINK )
Lets first look at snow. For the period of instrumental snow measurements in Montana since 1955, there has been an overall declining trend in April snowpack in Montana during the period 1955-2015. However, since 2016, most of the last 7 years have shown normal to above normal spring snowpack across Montana. [link] This behavior reflects the variable nature of climate on both seasonal and decadal scales.
To extend understanding of past snowpack behavior, paleoclimate records have been developed to supplement the modern data pool. These records include lake sediment and tree ring data. An important study focused on the American West was published in 2011, providing a data record over 500 years. [LINK] This length of record revealed climate variability on century scales including features like The Little Ice Age. The study also demonstrated more short-term climatic features that show different anomalies between the northern and southern Rockies. Of particular relevance, the study identified a snow drought during the 1930s in the Greater Yellowstone Region (Montana) that is similar to low values seen toward the end of the 20th century.
Now consider summertime temperatures. Shown here are Montana state averages from the NOAA State Climate Summary for Montana (2022).[link] While the two decades in the 21st century have overall been the warmest for Montana since 1900, there has been no trend in extreme summer temperatures. Montana’s warmest summer temperatures were in the 1930s.
The number of very hot days (≥95 oF) and warm nights (≥70 oF) was highest in the 1930s.
Any surprise here if glacial retreat was particularly strong in the 1930’s?
Montana’s cold winters
The “greed” part of Reilly Neill’s twitter rant seems to have something to do with fossil fuels. If there is ever a place you might want to be kept warm by fossil fuels (or nuclear), Montana during winter is it. Montana is one of the coldest states in the U.S. Of particular concern are wintertime “Arctic outbreaks,” which occur multiple times each winter with varying magnitudes and durations. “Arctic outbreaks” periodically bring exceptionally cold temperatures to large regions of the continental U.S., even in this era of global warming.
A little known JC biographical fact is that Arctic cold air outbreaks and the formation of cold-core anticyclones was the topic of my PhD thesis). [link] [link]
An exceptionally cold outbreak occurred in Montana during February and March 2019, with similar outbreaks in 2014 and 2017. In February 2019, average temperature departures from normal in Montana were as much as 27 to 28 oF below normal, with Great Falls at the heart of the cold. Temperatures did not rise above 0 oF on 11 days and dropped to 0 oF or below on 24 nights. While the cold in February was remarkable for its persistence, the subsequent Arctic blast in early March 2019 delivered the coldest temperatures. Almost two dozen official stations in Montana broke monthly records, with an all-time record state low temperature for March of -46F. [link]
I can’t even imagine what it would be like to be without electric power and household heating under such cold conditions. Apart from freezing and figuring out how to keep warm, water pipes would be frozen; not just a lack of potable water, but massive property damage once the pipes thaw.
Fortunately, Montana has a reliable power system with about 50% renewables (mostly hydro) with most of the rest produced by coal. There is a nontrivial contingent in Montana that is seeking 100% renewable power (hydro, wind, solar).
In addition to exceptional power demand for residential heating during such Arctic outbreaks, any power generation from renewables is at a minimum during such periods. Montana’s solar and hydropower capacity are at their lowest during winter. While winter winds are generally strong, the Arctic cold air outbreaks are accompanied by large regions of high pressure that are called cold-core anticyclones The nature of these circulations is that wind speeds are very low within the high pressure system, resulting in very low amounts of wind power production.
While Arctic outbreaks generally impact the northern Great Plains states the worst, the spatial extent of these outbreaks can be very large. The cold outbreak during February 2021 that impacted Montana also covered half of the U.S. and extended down to Texas, where massive power outages ensued that resulted in considerable loss of life. The large horizontal scale of these high pressure systems indicates that remote transmission of excess energy from someplace else is not going to be of much help if much of the continent is also suffering from cold temperatures and low winds. The long duration of these events makes battery storage hugely infeasible. The options are nuclear, gas and coal.
Conclusion
Nothing is simple when it comes to understanding the causes of climate change impacts. The key to understanding is to look at the longest data records available, and try to interpret the causes of the historical and paleo variability. Once you understand the natural variability, you aren’t so prone to attributing everything to fossil-fueled warming and making naïve predictions of the future. And once you understand weather variability and extremes, you won’t be so enthusiastic about renewable energy.
I hope that this little exposition helps Reilly Neill and the real scientists of Montana understand the causes of the recent variations in Montana’s glaciers.
Reilly Neill now has a chance to right or wrong and apologize.
Good place to start would be to admit free enterprise and American capitalism does not melt glaciers and raise seas.
LIA to 1966 loss ~4.5% per decade.
1966-98 loss ~3.7% per decade.
1998-2015 loss ~1.75% per decade.
Maybe Reilly Neill would like to check whether man-made CO2 causes less ice to be lost.
Mike, do you understand that temperature change ~ ln(CO2) in the absence of feedbacks?
Have you ever considered that temperature increases in line with the water vapour increase? We should never have entered into this debate if we fully understood the total of gases that surrounds the thermometer bulb or probe.
Wagathon wrote:
Good place to start would be to admit free enterprise and American capitalism does not melt glaciers and raise seas.
If capitalism emits CO2, then it melts glaciers and raises seas.
Still can’t understand why the “conservative” ideology — root word is “conserve” — is so fine with polluting the atmosphere and changing the climate.
How is changing the climate a “conservation?”
Increased atmospheric CO2 has been a positive, no?
https://evilincandescentbulb.wordpress.com/2022/11/09/modernity-making-the-world-green-again/
Ingvar Warnholtz wrote:
Have you ever considered that temperature increases in line with the water vapour increase?
Do you understand that water vapor concentration can’t increase until the temperature first increases?
See the Clausius-Claperyon equation.
Wagathon wrote:
Increased atmospheric CO2 has been a positive, no?
Why?
PS: Blogs aren’t science.
“Carbon dioxide levels have risen inexorably since the 1700s. Yet despite this, climate sensitive indicators of human and environmental wellbeing that carbon dioxide affects directly, such as crop yields, food production, prevalence of hunger, access to cleaner water and biological productivity, and those that it affects indirectly, such as living standards and life expectancies, have improved virtually everywhere. In most areas they have never been higher, nor do they show any sustained signs of reversing.” ~Freeman Dyson
davidappell02 wrote: “Do you understand that water vapor concentration can’t increase until the temperature first increases?”
Don’t you mean the saturation point cannot increase untill the temperature increases? Cannot there be a range of concentrations at any given temperature up to the saturation point?
A big actor in the Earthly drama we call weather and climate is vapor — water vapor: oceans of it! The energy of the sun falls on the oceans and lakes. This causes evaporation and the result of that is water vapor.
The water vapor mops up heat. As the vapor rises it leaves a cooler Earth behind. The water vapor rises and as it does the atmosphere becomes cooler and thinner and the water vapor eventually condenses. As it condenses the water vapor gives up its heat to the cold emptiness of space as the vapor returns to water and forms clouds or freezes and ultimately falls back to earth as rain, sleet, hail and snow.
The global warming alarmists cannot change this process. They can however program GCMs so as to depict runaway global warming by treating water vapor as a contributor to global warming—i.e., a positive feedback as if it collects heat like a greenhouse. In actuality, of course, water vapor is a part of a holistic process that results in a negative feedback because the amount of solar energy that is reflected away by clouds during the day more than offsets the suppression by clouds of cooling during the night.
Wagathon wrote:
“Carbon dioxide levels have risen inexorably since the 1700s. Yet despite this, climate sensitive indicators of human and environmental wellbeing that carbon dioxide affects directly, such as crop yields, food production, prevalence of hunger, access to cleaner water and biological productivity, and those that it affects indirectly, such as living standards and life expectancies, have improved virtually everywhere. In most areas they have never been higher, nor do they show any sustained signs of reversing.” ~Freeman Dyson
Freeman Dyson was never a climate expert, let alone in its ramifications, and you’re a fool — and a desperate one — for believing him.
Look at what the experts say.
Wagathon wrote:
As the vapor rises it leaves a cooler Earth behind.
Why? Explain your physics.
The water vapor rises and as it does the atmosphere becomes cooler and thinner and the water vapor eventually condenses.
Really?? Provide data that shows this. You can’t.
As it condenses the water vapor gives up its heat to the cold emptiness of space
You think water vapor condenses in space (LOLOLOL)
as the vapor returns to water and forms clouds or freezes and ultimately falls back to earth as rain, sleet, hail and snow.
Yet here you indicate water vapor isn’t condensing in space.
—
Your physics here is utterly fantastic and full of sh!t.
If you refuse to believe evaporation causes cooling perhaps you should bring that up with Pratt… I educated him on the matter back in the day of Amazon’s Science forum and, he admitted it.
David
At some point in the near future, the IPCC will be viewed as the Sam Bankman-Fried of the climate issue. It will be revealed that there was no there there.
Yup, faux economics…
https://evilincandescentbulb.wordpress.com/2021/11/07/tulip-mania-faux-economics-crypto-hot-world-alarmism-bizarre-anti-america-alternative-realities-and-fake-news/
Wagathon wrote:
If you refuse to believe evaporation causes cooling perhaps you should bring that up with Pratt…
I don’t know who “Pratt” is, but “cooling” of what?
Do you doubt that water vapor is a greenhouse gas?
obviously, people can believe in anything but, as far as Western academia, from what is now known and easily understood by any serious scientific skeptic of AGW, the only explanation is that fear of global warming has never been anything more than the product of willful ignorance, simple charlatanism or liberal fascist propaganda.
…or, closeted hatefulness!
David,
Enthalpy, it’s why you sweat.
https://www.khanacademy.org/science/ap-chemistry-beta/x2eef969c74e0d802:thermodynamics/x2eef969c74e0d802:energy-of-phase-changes/v/enthalpy-and-phase-changes
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/B9780123850409000013
Reilly Neill will apologise when hell freezes over!
That is a beautifully written article, Judith. There are so many interesting aspects to how you weaved the story that I think I’ll be reading it many times to absorb the insights. Congrats on that great piece of work!
Ken
I concur. As a non-scientist but a weather observer (part of my work) and never stopped to be amazed by what Nature would “dish up” irrespective of what the forecast may be.
THE ICE-FREE GLACIER NATIONAL PARK
As early as 1923, people were worried about the glacier melting in “Glacier National Park” and predicted that it would be ice-free by 1948. http://www.newspapers.com/image/103670563/?terms=glaciers+melting
When that prediction failed, the year was changed to 1961. https://www.newspapers.com/newspage/117079534/
This did not work either, and now the year 2002 was set https://www.newspapers.com/image/11924407/
but again the meltdown failed.. so it was set to 2020. https://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2009/03/090302-glaciers-melting.html
This failed and it has now been found that it will not happen before 2044.
https://www.nytimes.com/2014/11/23/us/climate-change-threatens-to-strip-the-identity-of-glacier-national-park.html?_r=2
And then it was the Ice free Arctic….. moved to 2054
https://www.nbcnews.com/sciencemain/ice-free-arctic-may-come-soon-2054-study-says-6c10641282
Should we start calling climate alarmists, “data deniers?’ Thanks, Judy, for walking us through the history of our National Park’s glaciers.
I find these Climate Etc. articles to be extremely helpful as a Managing Director at HamiltonClark working on technologies that reduce carbon. Both nuclear and natural gas are at the top of my list as they can both be scaled. There is a great deal of evidence and good reasons to believe that neither solar nor wind can be scaled to replace coal.
Robert, thanks for your participation here. If you every want to post an article here, send me an email.
China has a stranglehold on the minerals used in the construction of renewables and the actual construction of solar panels and wind turbines. We are much more exposed to foreign intervention with renewables than traditional sources of power generation.
Having a power source like PV and wind that can’t be embargoed or sanctioned has real value. Even better that they don’t need water to operate.
Don’t bet the farm on nuclear and gas.
8 November 2022
https://reneweconomy.com.au/france-electricity-prices-surge-past-e1000-mwh-as-more-nuclear-reactors-shut-down/
Wholesale electricity prices in France for the middle of winter surged above €1,000/MWh ($A1,540/MWh) after the operator of the world’s biggest nuclear fleet revealed more problems, and more outages at its reactors.
The surge in prices for January delivery came after the utility EdF reduced its forecast output for the fourth time this year, on this occasion due to extended outages at four reactors and maintenance delays at others caused by the waves of strikes that have affected the nation this autumn.
Energy analyst Gerard Reid noted in a LinkedIn post that half of France’s 56 reactors are out of action due to scheduled or emergency emergency maintenance measures.
“For months …. EdF has been saying that everything will be ok this winter yet on Friday the company announced that another four reactors that were due back online in the coming weeks will be delayed till early next year,” Reid wrote, noting it was the fourth output downgrade in 2022.
“The implications are enormous,” Reid noted. “For every 1 degree drop in temperature France needs one extra nuclear power station to provide the power needed to provide heat across the country.
“What this means is that on a cold January day France needs circa 45GW of nuclear energy. Yesterday there was only 25GW online.”
The news is significant because the French nuclear fleet is often hailed as the “backbone” of the European grid, particularly as the impact of the Russia gas embargo and soaring prices created fears of power shortages across Europe.”
At night the price of solar is infinite. Same with wind when it don’t blow.
David W: at night the cost of solar+storage isn’t infinite. Nor is the cost of solar energy transferred over smart grids. Or solar energy stored in homes that were recharged during the daytime. Or EVs that were charged at a place of employment.
You’re stuck in a box.
So, Appell.
When it’s night in France, where’s this smart grid going to transfer the energy from?
There are other specialised sites which go into it in more detail, but the problems with the French nuclear electricity generation are that many of their reactors are old and they have not done the capital re-investment.
Their grid philosophy is very good. Don’t go for cutting edge technology, Get a good design and build a half dozen on a cookie cutter approach pepperpotted throughout the country. It isn’t all the eggs in one basket as some have alluded because even type faults just take out 6 or 7 of the more than 50. With the numbers of reactors they have, there is the ability to have a good technology development workforce as well as the operations.
They can safely overbuild their reactor fleet. Then any power they don’t use can be sold at a premium to those countries around them that have put their trust in unreliablles and Russian gas.
Adam Gallon | November 11, 2022 at 9:35 am |
When it’s night in France, where’s this smart grid going to transfer the energy from?
1. nuclear
2. wind
3. storage of regional solar
4. storage of rooftop solar
4. geothermal
David A – you response to Adam shows you have no understanding of either the grid or the economics of it. Nukes don’t ramp up and down. They are baseload. Ramping up generation to follow the duck curve makes it unreliable. At present, South Australia is the crash test dummy showing basing it on the unreliables make the grid both expensive and failure prone. France uses about 1.5TWh a day. That storage you suggest, how much does that cost?
Morris: All power plants ramp up and down. All sometimes go offline for maintenance and repairs. That’s just a fact of life. So we need to build redundancies.
We shouldn’t be creating 0.20-0.25 C/decade of global warming no matter what.
David baseload and peak power trade independently in every power market. In Germany the spread amounts to roughly 100 EUR per Mwh. This vast gulf could never exist were there commercially feasible grid scale storage in the manner described above
From Chris Morris above “Ramping up generation to follow the duck curve makes it unreliable.”
Not if properly designed for purpose. Ie. ‘two cycling’ (if I recall the term correctly). There are instances when cycling plant is needed for a dual purpose. 1) to complement base load plant that cannot be cycled due to material design; and 2) because base load plant working off the design point is uneconomical since its efficiency drops off quite sharply with load reduction.
Design of ‘two shifting’ plant can keep its efficiency around near optimum for a longer range of output. However one needs to go into the details at procurement stage. Some of the critical parts material have to be studied for intended service life, and then monitored. But again that technology has been around for a couple of decades.
David Appell says “All power plants ramp up and down.” No they don’t. There are stringent material limits that preclude that. Of course, people not connected with that industrial sector would not know that; also many who are, including engineers. Many get to learn the expensive way.
Apple. Your comments on ramping verge on stupidity. Baseload is baseload, two shifting or ramping or load following are a different operating mode. One that nukes don’t do.
You can play cute with load changes for outages or partial deratings pretenting they are ramping, but anyone with any knowledge of the industry, which does not include you, just sees it as proof of your ignorance.
jacksmith4tx wrote, “Don’t bet the farm on nuclear and gas.”
The US Navy has already successfully bet the farm on nuclear and most of us (civilians) have bet our farms on gas, gasoline and other petrochemicals. Strangely enough the US is irrationally closing perfectly good nuclear power plants.
I would not necessarily go whole hog on nuclear. Cost remains a significant unknown for many of the advanced reactors while others are more akin to lab experiments for physicists disconnected from the real world.
The fundamental objectives of any power plants are to provide reasonably environmentally clean, reasonably cost effective, and reasonably reliable energy. Zero carbon emissions are not that important in the grand scheme, particularly if costs are off-scale-high.
Contrary to popular belief in many quarters, somebody actually has to eventually pay for electricity. Taxpayers and consumers do not have endless piles of other peoples money, unlike politicians.
Mike Keller,
We heard no arguments that cost was a problem when France built their nuclear electricity scheme.
Why should high costs suddenly appear in the equation of a country that now wants to do what France did? The French exercise did not demonstrate unforseen problems. It demonstrated a lovely return on investment and low accident rates. Take the scales from your eyes, see the French achievemnt as remarkably good and woth repeating.
Geoff S
That surely explains the Biofuel category.
Fantastic leadership once again, Judith. Thank you.
Dr. Curry I do very much enjoy your posts and papers on climate alarmists and alarmism. The sky has been falling for so long that it should be a basement by now. I’ll be the first to admit that I have no formal education in Climate science. I’m a retired GT engineering scientist and Industrial Designer (go Jackets). My question/comment would be that looking at the graph labeled “Observed Summer Temperature”, don’t the ’30’s appear as an anomaly, and if one were to graph the slope, wouldn’t the result be evidence of summer warming? I know you aren’t a denier, but I’m curious why you included the graph given that the relationship between snowfall and melt are well documented. Do warmer summer temperatures in the upper Midwest have any relationship to more or less snowfall? Thanks again for your insight.
It would be “leadership” if these analyses were published in a peer reviewed journal.
Instead they will be ignored by the scientific community and the scientific and nonscientific press.
David Appell | November 10, 2022 at 9:57 pm | Reply
It would be “leadership” if these analyses were published in a peer reviewed journal.
Instead they will be ignored by the scientific community and the scientific and nonscientific press.”
perhaps they should be published in peer reviewed journals so that the elite climate scientists would not overlook the obvious and quit making so many basic mistakes.
Yes, the scientific community has a habit of ignoring what doesn’t fit the narrative these days. Acknowledging any cracks in the #climatecrisis narrative could lead to scientific blackballing and dismissal from the tribe. Just ask Judy. She’s been through the vitriol. The older skeptical scientists have been pushed out or retired and new ones must play ball to get into university or academia. Not a proper situation for integrity of science.
“Instead they will be ignored by the scientific community and the scientific and nonscientific press.”
That doesn’t speak well for the individuals whose job description entails a search for understanding how things work in nature.
You harp on about peer reviewed publications David. It is touching to see you have such naive faith in the merits of such, when the rest of the literate world knows there are major issues (Retractions anyone?). The cutting edge of science and its real-world applications are done elsewhere. Much is never published. Academia (the ship of them being the best and brightest has long sailed) has been left as old men howling at the moon.
Chris – You make a good point on the issues associated with peer review.
One of the best examples is the multitude of peer reviewed studies on 100% renewable energy done by the experts renewable scientists.
none of the peer reviewers, and none of the authors have ever designed, operated or maintained an actual electrical grid.
Which raises the obvious question – How does someone become an expert with something they have never done?
Joe – the designation of expert nowadays just means someone (preferably from academia) who agrees with you when you want to appeal to authority. I mean, in what real world would Naomi Oreskes be considered as having climate expertise?
I have a professional interest in what is written about the grid and its operation, especially what will happen under high penetration of the unreliables. With regards costings, they are in fantasyland with orders of magnitude and timescales out. There are some absolute howlers written, like the 100% renewables you mention, that show the authors have no idea of what and why things happen. Yet they pass peer review and never get retracted. They are just zombie papers that one can never kill.
What makes it worse is politicians believe academics rather than electricity industry professionals – not consultants, but actual operators. The metoo pollies believe that legislation can over-ride the laws of physics. That is why the Western World is rapidly turning 3rd world. Unfortunately, it will take big power cuts or disasters to turn the Titanic around.
Joe – not a scientist wrote:
perhaps they should be published in peer reviewed journals so that the elite climate scientists would not overlook the obvious and quit making so many basic mistakes.
Yes, they should definitely be published in peer reviewed, where the level of scholarship is high, and because scientists have learned not to fall for amateurish claims.
Scientists are very smart and do not “overlook the obvious.” If they make “basic mistakes” the peer reviewed literature corrects them very, very quickly.
That’s the strength of the institution of science and why it has come to dominate the worldview in 400+ years.
If you can’t meet the level of rigor and scholarship necessary to publish in the scientific literature, your scientific ideas will be ignored. For very good, time worn reasons.
Appleman comment – “Scientists are very smart and do not “overlook the obvious.” If they make “basic mistakes” the peer reviewed literature corrects them very, very quickly.”
Thats BS and you know it
Look at the crap that gets through in the paleo reconstructions.
Look at the crap the gets published in the peer reviewed 100% renewable energy studies.
The rigor doesnt exist – at least not at the level you believe.
I have personally found math errors in 3 “peer reviewed ” studies that have rendered the conclusions meaningless ( one ground level ozone study , and 2 covid studies). The point being is peer review is often crap. Were those studies retracted – No, if fact, the CDC continues to promote the studies, oblivious to the math errors.
Another example – Few to none of the expert scientists publishing 100 % renewable arena have ever actually , operated, maintained, or designed an actual operating grid or even worked in the industry. Which begs the obvious question is how does someone become an expert in something they have never done.
“If you can’t meet the level of rigor and scholarship necessary to publish in the scientific literature, …”
A level that results in half of the medical articles not being reproducible. The articles on climatology are usually lacking uncertainty ranges for measurements, and are usually easily criticized by commenters here and at WUWT. You are naive.
By “peer reviewed journal” you mean Climate Doomer Pal Review tripe bucket.
Joe – the non climate scientist wrote:
perhaps they should be published in peer reviewed journals so that the elite climate scientists would not overlook the obvious and quit making so many basic mistakes.
They might be, but Judith knows better than to submit a mere blog post as a paper to a peer reviewed journal.
Wei Zhang (MN) wrote:
Yes, the scientific community has a habit of ignoring what doesn’t fit the narrative these days.
The professional scientific community ignores ALL blog posts, because they don’t meet the scholarly standards required for publication in real scientific journals.
Judith knows this very, very well.
Why don’t you?
Clyde Spencer wrote:
“Instead they will be ignored by the scientific community and the scientific and nonscientific press.”
That doesn’t speak well for the individuals whose job description entails a search for understanding how things work in nature.
Wrong, Clyde. Professional scientists don’t have time to mess around. They have learned that mere words published anywhere aren’t worthy of serious consideration. They don’t have time to waste.
If you have something serious to say about the science, then you have to meet the scholarly standards of science, because experience has shown that without that your claims are almost certainly crap.
“They don’t have time to waste.”
Therefore, from that, I can conclude that you aren’t a professional scientist. Otherwise you wouldn’t be here.
In what peer reviewed journal(s) did Einstein publish his papers on relativity?
“They have learned that mere words published anywhere aren’t worthy of serious consideration.”
Do you have a peer-reviewed study you can cite to support that claim? I should like to point out that many of the articles posted here and at WUWT have accompanying graphs and tabular data, not just “mere words.”
Clyde you ask: “In what peer reviewed journal(s) did Einstein publish his papers on relativity?”
google might help:
Einstein, A. (1905): “Zur Elektrodynamik bewegter Körper”
Annalen der Physik, Band 17, Seite 891-921.
These papers were not peer reviewed. They were published at the discretion of the journal editors (who published nearly every submitted paper.) Modern peer review is no older than 50 odd years.
https://mitcommlab.mit.edu/broad/commkit/peer-review-a-historical-perspective/
It’s hard to soar with Eagles when your peers are Turkeys.
Why would they need to be published in a peer reviewed journal? The analysis is in reply to a tweet by a non scientist. Nothing written here is groundbreaking or controversial.
Quote from Judith Curry:
“The USGS hasn’t updated its glacial survey since 2015 […]. While the loss between 1998 and 2015 has decreased relative to prior decades, it appears that the ice loss has actually stalled or slightly reversed since 2008.”
So many folks here took time to write comments, why did no one a short fact check?
1) USGS is measuring glacier mass balance at Sperry glacier in Glacier National Park since 2005.
JC should read the USGS Reports rather than Roger Roots when she wants to write about GNP glaciers.
2) Sperry glacier does not show any signs of “stalling”
3) Sperry glacier is still loosing mass especially after 2008
Here are the facts which shows that the GNP bench mark glacier is performing different to the statement cited above.
Mass balance data of Sperry glacier, the USGS benchmark glacier for GNP.
https://www.wgms.ch/data/min-data-graphs/218_MB_ann.png
The link to the graph is taken from WGMS glacier fluctuation browser
https://wgms.ch/fogbrowser/
WGMS and USGS web pages provide enough information on glacier fluctuation in GNP so you do not have to stick to the flawed reports of Roger Roots.
Looks like another Climate Doomer has a reading comprehension impediment. Dr. Curry actually supplied this link. She also supplied several other links.
https://www.usgs.gov/centers/norock/science/time-series-glacier-retreat#overview
which leads to this link …
https://www.sciencebase.gov/catalog/item/5ff72f2ad34ea5387df03a0e
from which you can see several glaciers in the park are tracked.
Try again, fearmonger.
@ jim2:
My Quote from Judith Curry was:
“The USGS hasn’t updated its glacial survey since 2015 […]. While the loss between 1998 and 2015 has decreased relative to prior decades, it appears that the ice loss has actually stalled or slightly reversed since 2008.”
Dr Curry supported this statement with a link to a Roger Roots post at WUWT. This report is flawed in respect to Roger Roots statement to glacier extend. Therefore I said:
– USGS is measuring glacier mass balance at Sperry glacier in Glacier National Park since 2005. JC should read the USGS Reports rather than Roger Roots when she wants to write about GNP glaciers.
– Sperry glacier does not show any signs of “stalling”
– Sperry glacier is considerably losing mass. Since 2008 this sums up to more than 5m water-equivalent, i.e. more than 18 ft of ice in average over the glacier area.
With these data available, how can someone come up with an educated guess: ‘ice loss has slightly reversed since 2008’?
At least for Sperry glacier (the GNP benchmark glacier) this statement is blatantly wrong. For the smaller cirque we have to wait until the next evaluation of satellite images is done.
Mass balance data of Sperry glacier, the USGS benchmark glacier for GNP.
https://www.wgms.ch/data/min-data-graphs/218_MB_ann.png
The link to the graph is taken from WGMS glacier fluctuation browser
https://wgms.ch/fogbrowser/
WGMS and USGS web pages provide enough information on glacier fluctuation in GNP so you do not have to stick to the flawed reports of Roger Roots.
@ jim2: which part of my post did you not understand?
mfk – I did miss the part about the WUWT article, so I read it. That article says nothing about the Sperry glacier, but instead discussed the Grinnell Glacier. Two different glaciers, mfk. I suppose it is you who misunderstood.
@jim2, i quote you:
“Two different glaciers, mfk. I suppose it is you who misunderstood.”
nope: not only two different glaciers rather two different levels of quality:
Sperry: glaiological research along the guidelines with reproducible results.
Roger Roots on Grinell: some layman take snapshots of a glacier and compare it to what?
To pictures taken before? Nope: they compare to a graffiti like picture on a trashcan.
My crude guess is: Roger Roots did not document the point where the picture was taken nor the properties of the camera in the mobile.
This kind of ‘research’ is not qualified for statements JC is bringing up here. To call R. Roots ‘research ‘flawed’ is the most polite term which came to my mind.
So you missunderstood, jim2.
Well, Dr. C. We all know what you said here can be right due to cognitive bias getting in front of your eyeteeth and thereby preventing you from perceiving that politically-motivated confirmation bias and an entire phalanx of counterfactuals which are very well known in the annals of the 96%!
“here can be” should have been “here CAN’T be” Oh well. I hate it when that happens.
Jim2, I think you will find that WordPress lets you edit your own posts.
Jim2, I think that you’ll find that WordPress lets you edit your own posts and comments.
Elsewhere glaciers were retreating 100+ years ago.
https://realclimatescience.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/AlpineGlaciersDisappearing_shadow.png
https://realclimatescience.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/2018-01-01044917_shadow.png
https://realclimatescience.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/01/2018-01-17082521_shadow.png
https://realclimatescience.com/wp-content/uploads/2017/06/PaintImage415.png
Judith –
Is the likelihood of glacier melt equal across all parts of the glacier? Are there some are areas more inclined to melt, thus more likely to melt first, leaving the more durable areas behind that would melt more slowly? For example, maybe the more southern areas or the areas towards the peripheries might be less deep and melt more quickly first – thus confounding a simple interpretation of the implications of your data showjng a decline in % of melt per decade over time.
IOW, do you have data on the volume of melt as opposed to the drop in area covered %?
Exactly! And what about the population variation of snow fleas over the decades?
Good point, Jim. Why bother comparing volume changes with extent changes of it might complicate the narrative?
After all, the simplistic narrative is the point, right?
Given that volume is a more difficult measurement, I’m guessing it wouldn’t be as accurate as the historical area measurements
Back to snow fleas, when we finally hit that infamous point in time when children don’t know what snow is, the snow flea population will no doubt be on the very edge of extinction. We should act now to ready a fleet of super-snow machines and deploy them at selected mountains around the world. Furthermore, I submit that the DNA from a few hundred individual sand fleas be frozen for that sad time when they have gone extinct, but after war on global warming has been valiantly won, then they can be re-established as happy populations.
jim –
> Given that volume is a more difficult measurement, I’m guessing it wouldn’t be as accurate as the historical area measurements
What does that have to do with anything? This isn’t some kind competition between metrics. The different metrics don’t have some kind of zero sum relationship to each other. They’re additive in value.
I guess I’m just used to the Arctic Sea Ice forum that DOES compare and discuss the various relevant metrics, so I’m surprised to see a scientific discussion that doesn’t even mention them as an issue, even if the measurement don’t exist or are hard to come buy.
But yeah, I guess that’s unreasonable. You’re right.
If you are citing volume measurements, it would be polite to post the link to said data.
Your volume measurement data should span from the LIA to 2015.
jim –
It’s not merely a question of volume data. It’s a total lack of any discussion at all that there might be factors that would confound interpreting the trends in the surface area data.
But I’m no scientist and maybe there’s no relevance to those issues. Maybe the melt is uniform across all the surface area over the entire period of time and it’s not even an issue.
I was just surprised to see no mention of that issue and so was wondering if maybe it should be addressed.
Sorry, Josh. I thought you might be on the verge of contributing some facts to the discussion. It’s so easy to criticize.
jim2 wrote:
If you are citing volume measurements, it would be polite to post the link to said data.
Yes. Thank you jim2
Joshua: “Why bother comparing volume changes with extent changes…” [said sarcastically]
While you are correct that mass volume is an acceptable measure of external conditions which are attacking the system on its skin (area) in 3 dimensions, it does not follow that area or extent is a bad way. And there is no physics telling one extent should decelerate under a constant rate of volume loss. Think about a popsicle melting in a dish. It’s length will diminish relatively linearly to volume and certainly not at a decelerating rate.
Back in the ’90s, the Glacier National Park website (I think; it may have been USGS.), there was a remark that the glacier on the north side of the mountains had been stable for 100 years. The statement has since disappeared. [Perhaps it sublimated.] Based on that, I suspect that decreased cloudiness and consequent increased insolation may be more important than ambient air temperature in driving the decline of the glaciers.
You are quite right, Ron.
One might also argue that when the researchers themselves say:
it does not mean that the glacier margins and area only reflect the footprint of the glacier. We certainly could act as if we knew better than the specialists and go ahead and infer a volume from an area.
Ice depth does not exist for the majority of the glaciers anyway.
Ron –
> , it does not follow that area or extent is a bad way.
Please don’t put words in my mouth.
Here’s what I said:
> This isn’t some kind competition between metrics. The different metrics don’t have some kind of zero sum relationship to each other. They’re additive in value.
And for saying that I was criticized even as a “skeptic” saying the same basic point is exempt from criticism.
And for some odd reason Judith would rather delete my comments than explain why we hear crickets rather than any explanation for why there’s not even ANY discussion of the value of different metrics in her thorough piece on this topic.
Joshua. It doesn’t really matter what you think Dr. Curry should include or not include in her posts. You are not her editor. I know that must come as a shock to you. Take a few days to process that and get back to us.
Why on Earth should she go down the rabbit hole of explaining different metrics in an article about Glacier National Park glaciers anyway. She’s not writing a text book. You have access to the internet, obviously, look it up if you really care, which I seriously doubt, or buy a book.
All you do is muck up the blog with FUD based on nothing but your Climate Doomer imagination.
The reason people focus on glacier area or length is that volume/mass is very difficult to measure, even with modern active satellite remote sensing.
Thanks Judith.
So is other metrics being difficult to assess the reason why you didn’t even mention in your thorough analysis, the potential limitations of area as a measure – such as that over time the ice that’s remaining might melt at a slower rate (in terms of area) due to higher elevation, or latitude or greater thickness, or factors other than those directly linked to climate change?
Anyone reading the post will realize that all data is uncertain and there are multiple ways to measure it. Why is this worth your valuable (I’m sure) time. A better use of time would be to read some of the literature and try to find more complete data.
> Anyone reading the post will realize that all data is uncertain
Yeah. I guess I tend to look for discussion of uncertainties and limitations when someone does a thorough analysis.
Especially when those uncertainties and limitations might have direct implications to the informativeness of the analysis presented.
Guess that makes me an oddball here at Climate Etc.
No one has mentioned it, but LIDAR might be a tool for measuring glacier volume. Bathymetric LIDAR penetrates water, so it may not be able to see ice. Just curious if a different part of the light spectrum might work?
Area calculation seems to be the only method. And, Judith’s post is about the GNP officials getting way out over their skis predicting glacier demise by set dates, a theme that climate activists seem to repeat often. The burden isn’t on Judith to produce volumetric data. Obviously, glaciers are still there. And her presented data showing they have slowed, via area over time, at this moment is the only game in town.
https://geodesy.noaa.gov/INFO/facts/lidar.shtml
BF –
Radioglaciology is the study of glaciers, ice sheets, ice caps and icy moons using ice penetrating radar. It employs a geophysical method similar to ground-penetrating radar and typically operates at frequencies in the MF, HF, VHF and UHF portions of the radio spectrum.[1][2][3][4] This technique is also commonly referred to as “Ice Penetrating Radar (IPR)” or “Radio Echo Sounding (RES)”.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Radioglaciology
Cool! Thanks, Jim!
Elsewhere glaciers were retreating 100+ years ago.
So?
Another lousy way to gauge climate change.
02
Let me help you clear out the fog. If the glaciers were shrinking before any significant effect from CO2, then that demonstrates natural variability. Of course that goes with the hundreds of papers that demonstrate existence of global MWP and LIA. The USGS finds GNP peaking with LIA and shrinking since. Not hard to understand.
It’s about the rate of change of glacier mass loss, not whether some glaciers were retreating 100 years ago.
HUGE difference.
David Appell | November 10, 2022 at 11:55 pm |
“It’s about the rate of change of glacier mass loss, not whether some glaciers were retreating 100 years ago.
HUGE difference.”
David Appell | November 10, 2022 at 9:56 pm | Reply
“Elsewhere glaciers were retreating 100+ years ago.
So?
Another lousy way to gauge climate change.”
David – As noted in the article – the rate of glacier melt was much faster in the 1st half of the 20th century ( at least in Glacier national Park) That delta in the rate of melt was reasonably consistent globally (after adjusting for observational deficiencies) . The rate of melt is also reasonably consistent with the changes in TSI over the last 200-300 years.
Rate of change eh?
Like Dr Curry has written above you mean?
A ~50% loss from LIA to 1966 (~115 years), averaging a loss of ~4.5% per decade.
Additional ~12% loss from 1966-98 (32 years), averaging a loss of ~3.7% per decade.
Additional ~4.75% loss from 1998-2015 (27 years), averaging a loss of ~1.75% per decade.
Now, that appears to be a declining rate of change, don’t you agree?
Rate of change in *what* again, Adam?
There was also amplified warming in the arctic at the time. Sans substantial GHG forcing.
https://rmets.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/joc.1973
https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.1615880114
https://wires.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1002/wcc.522
An efficient, well written piece. Thank you, Judith.
> I hope that this little exposition helps Reilly Neill and the real scientists of Montana understand the causes of the recent variations in Montana’s glaciers.
Sadly, I doubt it will with those deeply entrenched in their own view. That view has far too much of a political component to be changed by honest scientific debate. But it will with those who seek such debate and knowledge.
Comprehensive, high resolution aerial and satellite glacier data doesn’t start until the 60s, but the data we do have indicates the VAST majority of melting was before 1950 and was faster.
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/307805044_A_data_set_of_worldwide_glacier_length_fluctuations
A-A-ron: A disproportionate amount of forcing happened earlier than later.
It is the same situation everywhere. The first figure linked shows the shortening of the Jacobshavn Glacier in Greenland since 1850, and most of the melting took place before 1964, and then in the 2000-2007 period. Lately, Jocobshavn Glacier has grown some years to the puzzling of the “experts.”
https://i.imgur.com/WlHOigo.png
The second figure is photographic evidence that the Rhone Glacier massively decreased in size between 1856 and 1900.
https://i.imgur.com/fa9yhHJ.png
The cryosphere retreat is massive, but while it is reasonable to assign it to anthropogenic factors, there is no clear evidence that the increase in CO2 or the warming are solely responsible for it. The huge increase in population and associated activities (pollution, soot, black and brown carbon) reasonably may have played a huge part.
Nowadays, everything appears to be climate, but our footprint on the planet is multiple.
A disproportionate amount of forcing happens earlier than later, since dT ~ dF ~ ln(CO2).
We know the anthropogenic forcing thanks to the IPCC, and three quarters of its increase have taken place since 1950.
https://i.imgur.com/kI3WANh.png
It does not explain the deceleration in glacier melting between 1960-2000, or the lack of significant acceleration in sea level rise.
https://i.imgur.com/qOkIoE5.png
Twentieth-century contribution to sea-level rise from uncharted glaciers
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/329102538_Twentieth-century_contribution_to_sea-level_rise_from_uncharted_glaciers
a-a-ron: do you see the acceleration in glacier mass loss in your cited paper since the 1960s, Fig 2a?
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-018-0687-9
19th century glacier retreat in the Alps preceded the emergence of industrial black carbon deposition on high-alpine glaciers
19th century glacier retreat in the Alps preceded the emergence of industrial black carbon deposition on high-alpine glaciers
https://tc.copernicus.org/articles/12/3311/2018/tc-12-3311-2018-discussion.html
a-a-ron wrote:
19th century glacier retreat in the Alps preceded the emergence of industrial black carbon deposition on high-alpine glaciers 19th century glacier retreat in the Alps preceded the emergence of industrial black carbon deposition on high-alpine glaciers
That’s not the relevant question. The relevant question is, is modern warming causing land glacier mass loss?
The answer is clearly yes.
Apologies to Key and Peele.
Aaron
That is an interesting point. Scoresby, at the request of the Royal Society went on the first scientific expedition to the Arctic around 1818 to investigate substantial ice loss that had been observed by whalers in the first years of the 19th Century. He observed considerable amounts of black carbon on the snow and ice generally which he surmised might be causing melt and he attributed to growing US industrialisation.
It is very striking to view modern documentaries by such as Attenborough where the Arctic glaciers and snow generally are really dark with soot. They can also be observed in the snow chasms they investigate.
As a youngster, one of my jobs during a severe winter was to put the soot from our open fire on to our snowy paths where melting quickly followed.
I don’t know how significant overall this observable darkening of the snowpack is, but it’s an interesting topic.
tonyb
I feel it my duty to point out that snow fleas are also darkly colored. They will up the watts absorbed by the snow. I wonder if anyone has measure the W/m2 increase when the population of snow fleas is high vs absent?
https://www.farmersalmanac.com/snow-fleas-29846
Industrial black carbon is not the only human pollution. Check what the population of England did starting around 1800:
https://urbanrim.org.uk/population.htm
Not only the use of coal increased greatly, also the burning of biomass. The end of the Little Ice Age coincided with a big increase in global human population and their pollution.
Thinking that only climate change has had an effect on the cryosphere reduction is clearly a mistake. Most complex phenomena have a complex causality.
I agree. There are lots of interrelated matters going on. Black carbon is an interesting topic that doesn’t get aired enough, despite its potential effect on snow and ice.
tonyb
I wonder if such infrequent but long lasting activities such as the Miyake event have an effect on the weather as well as on humans?
https://www.sciencetimes.com/articles/40702/20221026/miyake-event-tree-rings-tell-next-solar-storm.htm
There was one around 1664 and it is striking at the number of weather events we can trace in England during the next 5 years or more . Might be a coincidence of course.
tonyb
Depending on its location, not only soot but various kinds of debris can accumulate on the surface of glaciers. These can be brought in by motions in the atmosphere and/or simply rolling onto the surface from adjacent bounding cliffs [freeze-thaw cycles are excellent rock breakers, for example]. These all make excellent ice melters.
If a given melt season results in the melting depth to reach a previous surface of the glacier, the concentration of the debris increases, and so increases the effectiveness of the debris-as-ice-melter. Several successive years of melting past previous surfaces make excellent ice-melter concentrators.
Not sure how relevant this is to GNP, but having been/camped on glaciers and seeing the hordes of people tromping all over the place with crampons and hiking poles, the impact is more significant than you might realize.
At the top of Kilimanjaro the glaciers have retreated so much that there are warning signs to stay off them. Of course people step on the edge to say they were ‘on the snows of Kilimanjaro’. I’m sure GNP has limitations on their access as do other parks, but there are definitely trails that go through glaciers, particularly when ascending peaks.
This piece below may give one a glimpse of the situation. Glacier tourism certainly wasn’t around prior to 1966. And guided mountaineering didn’t come into popularity till around the 90s.
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/14616688.2015.1084529
In reply to tonyb about Miyake events, how serious is a paper when its summary contains “Astronomers are widely thought to be nearly 12 times as intense, devastating, and powerful as the Carrington Event.”?
Geoff S
Politicians like, Reilly Neill don’t want a discussion, just your submissive obedience. This is why they have to insult you instead of simply pointing out why you might be wrong as an adult would do. I remember your interaction with another similar politician, Ed Markey. They just can’t be civil. Thanks, Judith for being the adult in the room.
Excellent post Judy!
Once again we have an uninformed politician mucking up the discussion with insults rather than engage in a serious discussion. I remember a similar encounter you had with Ed Markey on the senate floor. Is it no wonder why politicians are the most despised group of people in America if not the world.
Much of the glacier loss occurred prior to 1966, when fossil-fueled warming was minimal. The percentage rate of glacier loss during this early period substantially exceeded the percentage rate of loss observed in the 21st century.
So?
What science says volume(melting) is proportional to delta(CO2(t))?
It takes time for ice to melt, which is why it takes so much time for the sea to rise.
Yes, we keep waiting, and waiting, and waiting, and waiting. I’m sure significant acceleration will come along one of these centuries.
https://tidesandcurrents.noaa.gov/sltrends/plots/120-012_meantrend.png
The data show an acceleration in global glacier mass loss.
See Table 1 in
“Accelerated global glacier mass loss in the early twenty-first century,” Romain Hugonnet et al,
Nature volume 592, pages726–731 (28 April 2021)
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-021-03436-z
Yes, and it’s also about the data of on the ground observations of sea level rise. What happened to the missing acceleration in global glacier mass loss. Sea level rise is an excellent proxy for picking up the signal of such things. Maybe we can hire Miss Marple to find the missing signal. We have a real mystery here, Dave. You need to get right on it. Every tidal gauge I look at just doesn’t have it.
https://tidesandcurrents.noaa.gov/sltrends/plots/9410660_meantrend.png
https://tidesandcurrents.noaa.gov/sltrends/plots/1612340_meantrend.png
https://tidesandcurrents.noaa.gov/sltrends/plots/170-011_meantrend.png
https://tidesandcurrents.noaa.gov/sltrends/plots/130-051_meantrend.png
https://tidesandcurrents.noaa.gov/sltrends/plots/8418150_meantrend.png
“The data show an acceleration in global glacier mass loss.”
Even if individual glaciers are retreating more rapidly than formerly (not all are), the potential contribution to sea level rise is less than it was when high latitudes were covered with thousands of feet of ice.
CKid wrote;0
Yes, and it’s also about the data of on the ground observations of sea level rise.
False.
Table 1 is about glacier mass balance. It has nothing to do with sea level rise.
CKid wrote:
What happened to the missing acceleration in global glacier mass loss.
Table 1 shows an acceleration in global glacier mass loss. {eyeroll}
Let M be glacier mass.
Then mass loss is dM/dt (first derivative).
If dM/dt is decreasing, that’s a nonzero value for d2M/dt2, the acceleration (2nd derivative).
The data show an acceleration in glacier mass loss.
CKid wrote:
Sea level rise is an excellent proxy for picking up the signal of such things.
The glacier mass loss data I cited clearly show an acceleration in mass loss. That’s undeniable. That’s what we’re talking about here, not whatever you’re trying to change the subject to.
Actually, the post was intended to demonstrate that glacier loss predated the effects of CO2. But, since you brought up the non acceleration of SLR rise, TABLE 9.5 of IPCCAR6 page 1589 shows that the increase in SLR attributed to glaciers went from 0.58mm/yr for 1901-1990 to 0.62mm/yr for 2006-2018.
I get excited about that change of 0.04mm/yr about as much as I get excited by the contribution to SLR from Antarctica of 0.37mm/yr. Any way you cut it, it’s not much.
When the tidal gauge data show an acceleration then I might care. So far, it’s not showing up.
02
My point was where did the acceleration in glacier loss go? It should have shown up in the oceans. Is there an alternative location? Glaciers is one of the components of SLR budget. All the studies speak to this obvious fact. If you have an alternative theory as to where it went, I would like to hear it. I understand your frustration at not being able to answer the question.
Looks to me, in the second graph here, that SLR has significantly accelerated over the last 30 years, and that the curve is headed upward. But you may still ask, why is the increase not more dramatic to match glacial melt + thermal expansion? The answer is that artificial reservoirs, and their propagation behind dams, have contributed significantly to slowing the rate of SLR.
https://climate.nasa.gov/vital-signs/sea-level/
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/18339903/
Dan
There certainly is a disconnect between the actual measurements of the tidal gauges and the satellite data.
It’s interesting that the so called acceleration begins to show up precisely when satellite data is implemented. The list of adjustments and corrections and calibrations is long as documented by numerous studies. When there is significant acceleration showing up in the on the ground tidal gauges I will be convinced.
you asked, “if you have a theory about where it went, I would like to hear it.” I provided a link with a pretty persuasive theory. it went into sequestration of water behind dams. even IF you ignore the dataset that you don’t like and stick with the one that fits your assertion.
DanB
On the other hand, withdrawal of water from major aquifers is contributing water to the oceans. As land use changes expose more soil to erosion, the amount of sediment that goes into the oceans increases, displacing water and causing a potential increase of SLR. As the oceans get deeper, the weight will depress the oceanic crust, countering the SLR by isostatic adjustment. As the troposphere warms, it can hold more water vapor, withdrawing water from the oceans.
Untangling all the countering changes is difficult, if not impossible.
yes, the list of factors is long, but many of them have an impact that is de minimis. uplift and subsidence are of course significant at least locally if not globally.
but i found this re sedimentation and sea level rise: “The amount of sediment carried to the sea by the world’s rivers is about 14 billion tons a year, which works out to be about 1.2 cubic miles (five cubic kilometers) of rock, or 0.5 percent of the amount required to raise the sea level by the observed eighth of an inch (3.3 mm) per year.”
https://earthscience.stackexchange.com/questions/14200/how-much-does-sea-level-rise-due-to-sediment-deposition#:~:text=This%20means%20that%20the%20sediment,could%20be%20attributed%20to%20sediment.
DanB, you are missing another driver, the increase in photosynthesis. 9billion tons of CO2 are captured by land biosphere each year, corresponding to about 3.7 billion tons of water.
That’s almost 5% of the water accumulating on land each year.
More water is being stored on land. “Land water storage trends, summed over all basins, are positive for GRACE (71–82 km3/y) but negative for models (−450 to −12 km3/y), contributing opposing trends to global mean sea level change.”
https://www.pnas.org/doi/full/10.1073/pnas.1704665115
Judith Curry wrote:
A ~50% loss from LIA to 1966 (~115 years), averaging a loss of ~4.5% per decade.
Additional ~12% loss from 1966-98 (32 years), averaging a loss of ~3.7% per decade.
Additional ~4.75% loss from 1998-2015 (27 years), averaging a loss of ~1.75% per decade.
So? Forcing (hence temperature change, hence volume of melt) goes like the ln(CO2), sans feedbacks, which haven’t kicked in very much yet.
The percentages above look like a ln.
You should really have read the linked articles Judith posted before commenting. They explain this.
It also matches reasonably close to the TSI over the same period (matches/correlates to the changes in TSI) , including the fact that the TSI since circa 1960’s remains higher than the late 1800’s .
WordPress didn’t allow me to subscribe to comments so it’s unlikely I will see most of the replies to my posts.
No matter what login ID I use I get no ability to follow comments. I give up.
Yay!
I can tell that Matthew is afraid of my opinion here…..
Nice article Judith. A lot of research went into that.
Some years ago I collated glacier information from a variety of sources including the Met Office, The Scott Polar research Institute and from a variety of books that collated information from such as church records, I also visited 2 glaciers in the Alps to examine their data. Lastly I collected together information from Roman Sources, they had a lot of silver mines at high altitudes.
As a result of this I wrote an article of which this is a fragment. I was surprised by how often glaciers advanced and retreated and that this could occur for both short periods and over centuries. In that context the erosion of glaciers over the last 100 years can be seen as nothing out of the ordinary. A graphic of the results can be found in the link a few lines down
— —– —-
Section 4 Comparison of paleo to Glacier movements
In this final graph we have calculated historic glacier movements during the last 3000 years. (See note 1) Over it we have inserted the Mann et al 1998 data covering the past 1000 years together with the decadal record from CET back to 1538.
https://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2013/08/clip_image010.jpg
Fig 5-3000 year Glacier movements with CET decadal/50 year steps and Mann et al 1998
A closed blue horizontal line at the top of the graph equates to a period of glacial retreat (warmth) and a closed blue line at foot of graph demonstrates glacier advance (cold)
That glacial movements can be surprisingly short lived can be seen in the century long glacier advance around 1200 to 1300 AD, and to a lesser extent the 30 year retreat around 1730. Such short changes as noted in this latter period may be relatively common, but the records are unlikely to exist to be able to trace them in earlier times.
The small temperature deviations from the ‘norm’ shown in paleo proxy reconstructions- including that of Mann et al 1998-seem most unlikely to be of a scale that can precipitate glacier movements of any consequence. Several consecutive warm cold decades that can be noted in the instrumental records will however likely start such movements which will be accentuated if the prevailing characteristic of warmth or cold lasts for some time. In the case of the MWP this period of warmth lasted around 450 years . (Clearly however brief Warm periods can occur during a general glacial retreat and brief cold periods during glacial advance.)
That the paleo reconstructions somewhat accurately capture long term variability makes this feature useful. However, they appear to comprise of a very coarse sieve that allows the real world of constant noticeable climate change with considerable temperature swings that affects us all to slip through unnoticed. This makes the use of paleo reconstructions as the basis for far reaching policy changes somewhat problematic and counter intuitive as it is based on a belief that the past comprised of a relatively unchanging climate. A belief that is contradicted when the real world annual and decadal record is closely examined..
— —- —-
Tonyb
Nice to hear from you Tony. With all the uncertainties about energy, etc, on your side of the pond, I hope all goes well for you this winter.
CKid
We get very little of our oil or gas from Russia and still produce some of our own.
We always run close to our generating capacity in the winter and this year is no different, so the reports you hear are probably exaggerated, although not so with Germany.
The thing I most fear is a long cold winter as at any time over the last decade that would likely have caused shortages. At the moment we have just about enough back up if the wind stopped blowing for a few days and our off shore wind generators were to fail. Again, no problem for a short period but a mix of a calm winter with prolonged cold sells would be a bad scenario.
tonyb
climatereason: here are some more sources from a remoter past that I incidentally came across. Note the abruptness of change.
See https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KVE2PdY-qqk
At 42:14 the dates and the climatic effect/change, (plus the social upheaval/destruction) correlate with abrupt glacier ablation and lake sedimentation. See link at ” Arctic Holocene glacier fluctuations reconstructed from lake sediments at Mitrahalvøya, Spitsbergen” by W D’Andrea et al. uploaded 2021. See fig6. at about 2345bce.
From another source, the destruction of Jericho was bang on the 4k2 event (at Eddy root, possibly around 2345bce). The date appears in the video slide.
Both abruptness of change and its effect on climate and glaciers indicate that all are collateral to other main forces.
so, what are these other ‘main forces’ do you reckon?
tonyb
The main forces arise from planetary torques on the earth’s axial orientation; mainly obliquity ‘flickers’. That is now evident because the one that is evident in fig6 of the link at year 173ce was recorded by the Chinese. The earlier at 2345bce was what GF Dodwell hypothesized in 1936.
They occur mainly at the inflection points of the Eddy cycle (thanks to Javier for first pointing it out – afaik) in his ‘Nature Unbound’ series) at this site.
There comes a time when things change drastically near every half millennium. Meaning that looking back in time for more than 500 yrs one has to take account of these major changes. As far as glaciers are concerned this is one where remote times would have been so effected.
Worth noting that the LIA estimate was done on a different basis to the 1966 and subsequent data which which was based on satellite images. Here’s what has happened over the last 60 years at Glacier National Park based on Satellite images shown graphically.
https://www.instagram.com/p/CI76JnyHOGW/
Coincidentally Notalotofpeopleknowthat is also covering glaciers
https://notalotofpeopleknowthat.wordpress.com/2022/11/10/swiss-glacier-was-ice-free-2000-years-ago/
One is a study from 2005 that I think Steve Mcintyre covered under the heading “The Green Alps” and the other study is from this year.
tonyb
Being British I had never heard of Reilly Neill so did a search on her
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reilly_Neill
She seems a very minor character
tonyb
Tree ring data?
How fascinating.
> slow warming of the average annual surface temperatures
From your own source:
https://statesummaries.ncics.org/chapter/mt/
How is that slow?
If global average surface temperature has risen 1 degree C, then the tropics have warmed a lot less than that and the poles a lot more. Given Montana’s northerly lattitude, 1.4 C is not too surprising. I just love it when people use F instead of C. Why is that? Likewise, northern states should warm faster than the rest of the USA for the same reason.
> I just love it when people use F instead of C. Why is that?
Montana is in the United States of America, and Farenheit is lingua franca over there.
> it appears that the ice loss has actually stalled or slightly reversed since 2008 [link]
Here is the link:
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2017/09/20/are-the-glaciers-in-glacier-national-park-growing/
Here is the website of that author:
http://lysanderspooneruniversity.com/
Is this some kind of joke?
In that case you, Willard, might want to put up $5,000 in a bet with Dr. Roots. Easy money, Willard. Jump on it!
Roger Roots’ $5,000 bet that glaciers will still exist in Glacier National Park in 2030
http://lysanderspooneruniversity.com/roger-roots-5000-bet-regarding-melting-montana-glaciers/
Read the conditions properly, Jim.
Your good Doctor gave himself an escape clause.
Nope this is not a joke. This guy is serious about this topic.
More like a joke is the fact that Dr. J. Curry was referring to his ‘work’. I generally liked the stuff from JC, but not this time.
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Judith Curry wrote:
A ~50% loss from LIA to 1966 (~115 years), averaging a loss of ~4.5% per decade.
Additional ~12% loss from 1966-98 (32 years), averaging a loss of ~3.7% per decade.
Additional ~4.75% loss from 1998-2015 (27 years), averaging a loss of ~1.75% per decade.
FWIW – one possible explanation of the slowing of the melt rate in the glacier national park is that as the glaciers become smaller, the remaining portion of the glaciers are shielded from the sun for longer periods of the day to the shadows of the surrounding mountains.
https://judithcurry.com/2022/11/10/glacier-saga/#comment-982253
As Judith writes regarding the massive cold fronts during the winter :
“In addition to exceptional power demand for residential heating during such Arctic outbreaks, any power generation from renewables is at a minimum during such periods. Montana’s solar and hydropower capacity are at their lowest during winter. While winter winds are generally strong, the Arctic cold air outbreaks are accompanied by large regions of high pressure that are called cold-core anticyclones The nature of these circulations is that wind speeds are very low within the high pressure system, resulting in very low amounts of wind power production addition to exceptional power demand for residential heating during such Arctic outbreaks, any power generation from renewables is at a minimum during such periods. Montana’s solar and hydropower capacity are at their lowest during winter. While winter winds are generally strong, the Arctic cold air outbreaks are accompanied by large regions of high pressure that are called cold-core anticyclones The nature of these circulations is that wind speeds are very low within the high pressure system, resulting in very low amounts of wind power production.”
For those 100% renewable advocates – please provide a reality based solution for the above problem – which typically last 3-7 days at a time.
I’m not sure who is advocating 100% renewables. Clearly it is not realistic in the near and medium term. That does not mean that there is no value in a partial transition to renewables. In the long term, better energy storage solutions and/or better energy transmission (less leakage) **could** provide a solution. Nuclear also needs to be part of the answer. Note that while fossil fuels have lasted far longer than some forecast, the supply is still finite. so one day, i cannot say when, we will be forced to make this transition for reasons that have nothing to do with AGW. I personally do not believe, when that time comes, that the world economy will collapse.
Dan – 100% renewables are being pushed very heavily by those who believe AGW is a serious threat to life on earth. See commentary at skeptical science for examples. Leftist politicians are also a key bloc pushing the renewable solution.
I also agree that fossil fuels do have a finite life .
That being said, the movement to something less efficient is surprisingly naive. Further, the lack of comprehension of the shortcomings and limitations of renewables by those pushing renewables is disturbing.
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I hate to be picky, but did anyone notice that 1998 to 2015 is 17 not 27 years? Still under 3% but just saying
Dan, thanks for spotting this
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From the USGS report
https://d9-wret.s3.us-west-2.amazonaws.com/assets/palladium/production/s3fs-public/atoms/files/Table%20of%20Area%20of%20the%20Named%20Glaciers-II.pdf
Total area of Glacier National Park glaciers
20.8, 15.7, 14.9, and 13.6 km^2 in 1966, 1998, 2005, and 2015, respectively. An exponential decay at 0.86%/year fits these data well. That’s a half-life of 81 years.
Apparently Montana glaciers were retreating up to 100 meters a year between 1917 and 1941, i.e. the warming AMO.
Great video, Ulric. Thanks.
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jcurry
Really interesting article. What I find interesting, though, is the distinction between “Global” and in this case “Local” variation. Discussions and questions about “Local” climate seem more pertinent than the “Global” discussion of GMAT. Similarly, I would like to hear about the drought in the Southwest. It seems to me that there must be more to it than a few tenths of a degree Celsius of warming. I imagine all the people flocking to Arizona plus the increase in Almond farming can’t help. Not sure how I would tie all that together though. Nor do I have time to do all the research. The other issue I always find amazing is how people go on about a heat wave or an event like a wild-fire or hurricane and then people jump on the Global Warming podum but these are weather events and not climate. Yet the same people are pretty quick to wag the fingers at skeptics if they were to mention a record low temperature or something.
Every serious risk should have multiple layers of protection against it. Freezing to death is a great risk in Montana, and those fine folks probably have their own protection against gird failure in the form of propane generators, wood stoves, etc. However, the grid should also have multiple scalable options in addition to the hydro power base load they have, so that nobody is relying on their last personal layers of protection. No sensible knowledgeable person would advocate to rely only on solar or wind to handle peak cold, for the reasons Judith mentioned. A mix of scalable coal, gas, oil and nuclear provides the flexibility to keep the grid energized while minimizing cost. I would hope that cost continues to be the main deciding factor, not the amount of life-giving CO2 that is recycled to the plants of the world.
NOEngineer “No sensible knowledgeable person would advocate to rely only on solar or wind to handle peak cold, ”
You cant use sensible and renewable energy in the same sentence
People in Montanan should stock up on anthracite coal instead of wood. It has about 1.5 times more energy than wood.
https://world-nuclear.org/information-library/facts-and-figures/heat-values-of-various-fuels.aspx
FYI –
“Long-Duration Drought Variability and Impacts on Ecosystem Services: A Case Study from Glacier National Park, Montana
“These decadal-scale dry and wet events [1540 – 2000], in conjunction with periods of high and low snowpack, have served as a driver of ecosystem processes such as forest fires and glacial dynamics in the Glacier NP region.”
https://journals.ametsoc.org/view/journals/eint/10/4/ei153.1.xml
You are too intelligent to miss the obvious problem in your analysis of the data. I assume you are therefore ignoring it to make a partisan point rather than a scientific one: Alpine glaciers lose ice at their lower, warmer ends and the loss, in a warming climate, gradually moves upslope. In cases where the rate of loss has decreased, this demonstrates nothing, as the ice that was easiest to melt, at the lowest altitudes, is already gone, and the ice that is left, at the highest altitudes, will melt more slowly even in a warming climate (which, of course, is what we have). As i’m sure you know, some glaciers will simply equilibriate at a higher altitude and will not disappear. This does not mean there is no warming. Of course, snowfall rates do vary a lot, as you say, along with sunshine and other factors. But the fact that nearly all of the world’s glaciers are receding in concert suggests that these variables are being overwhelmed by the one pretty universal shift – warming temperatures.
Not all of the worlds glaciers are receding. A majority are as you would expect in a warming world. The question is whether or not that is unusual in the context of historic natural climate change. It is not unusual. Your point regarding ice melt was well covered both by Judiths article and the articles she linked to, so she was not just making a “partisan” point. She has never implied or stated directly there has been “no warming”, so your argument here constitutes a straw man.
She only spoke of a slowing rate reduction in area over time, to suggest that the rate reduction she described supports skepticism about the impact of climate change. She ignored the dynamics that Dan described, which complicates her simplistic implications.
She ignored the uncertainties and limitations related to the merric she pointed to. The ONLY metric she pointed to. She didn’t even discuss the limitations and uncertainty re that metric.
If that’s good enough for you, methinks “agnostic” may be a misnomer.
I have to disagree. What, exactly, is the point of showing the melt-rates over time, if not to give the impression that this the melt-rate, at a constant location and altitude, is decreasing, when it’s not? I did not see this covered in the post (if it’s there, it’s certainly nowhere near these statistics). To me this is every bit as misleading as people who naively point to the disappearance of GNP glaciers as proof of anthropogenic warming. As to glaciers melting around the world, nearly all are in decline. Yes, there are a few exceptions – especially where rising temperatures still do not get above freezing much, but lead to greater snowfall.it is true that the glaciers in the rockies were in decline for centuries. i was in banff in the 1970s and it was easy to see that some glaciers had already retreated substantially. but elsewhere retreating glaciers are a relatively new phenomenon, or has substantially accelerated. Does this alone prove warming is caused by humans? No. It’s merely suggestive of it. There is lots of proof elsewhere.
Most of this ice didn’t exist 1000yrs ago.
That large change, before much GHE, implies a massive forcing change.
No Joshua, she tried to correctly characterise glacier retreat, in the context of pronouncements of those glaciers disappearing altogether. It is you attributing “simplistic implications” to her.
Nor did she “ignore” the uncertainties and limitations. I strongly suggest you re-read her post and the articles she linked to, they make those uncertainties and limitations very plain.
What the main point of this article to me seems to be about, is a response to a specific claim that the glaciers will disappear as a result of manmade global warming. The reasoning is the assumption that recent warming is entirely caused by man and so they will vanish, whereas the truth is a more complicated picture where natural processes cause glaciers to advance and retreat, whether or not man influences climate or not. The fact that despite predictions, those glaciers are NOT are ice free and in fact may currently be advancing slightly suggest that expectations of the deleterious effects of manmade climate change are overstated.
Dr. Curry didn’t say there was “no warming.” She did make the case there was significant warming before CO2 began to take off. Climate Doomers seem to have reading comprehension issues.
She also made the point that Glacier National Park heralded the imminent demise of the glaciers in the park, presumably with advice from the keepers of “The Science.” And that this didn’t happen, so they quietly removed the signs. I guess this was really just an exercise in emotional manipulation of the populace. Oh noes – fossil fuels is killing the glaciers!
Thomas Fuller | November 12, 2022 at 8:29 am | Reply
DanB, it turned out that a vanishingly small number of glaciers were actually being studied in enough depth to actually provide evidence of global or even regional trends in glacier melt. Has that changed?
DanB | November 13, 2022
“I don’t have a number for you”
Yet.
“As to glaciers melting around the world, nearly all are in decline.”
So you have no idea as you cannot state how many have been measured?
Wonderful.
Could you perhaps go to Glacier Park and report back?
DanB, I’m curious–last time I explored this issue, it turned out that a vanishingly small number of glaciers were actually being studied in enough depth to actually provide evidence of global or even regional trends in glacier melt. Has that changed?
i don’t have a number for you, but first, as you may know, a small sample (on a percentage basis), when it produces a consistent pattern, can quickly become statistically significant. we don’t need to poll a million people to know who is leading in political race. if the race is close, you may need a few hundred. if it is a landslide, a mere fifty will almost always accurately reflect who is going to win. we have the equivalent of a landslide. https://www.climate.gov/news-features/understanding-climate/climate-change-mountain-glaciers
Thomas Fuller | November 12, 2022 at 8:29 am | Reply
DanB, it turned out that a vanishingly small number of glaciers were actually being studied in enough depth to actually provide evidence of global or even regional trends in glacier melt. Has that changed?
DanB | November 13, 2022
“I don’t have a number for you”
Yet.
“As to glaciers melting around the world, nearly all are in decline.”
So you have no idea as you cannot state how many have been measured?
Wonderful.
Could you perhaps go to Glacier Park and report back?
PDF) A data set of worldwide glacier length fluctuations
https://www.researchgate.net/publication/307805044_A_data_set_of_worldwide_glacier_length_fluctuations
Thanks, Aaron.
From the Summary … For the observed glaciers,
the 20th century retreat was strongest in the first half of the
20th century.
That supports Judith’s contention.
Agreed. However that dataset ends in 2000. but warming was not that far along then. This chart includes the next twenty years which show clear acceleration. https://www.cs.mcgill.ca/~rwest/wikispeedia/wpcd/images/58/5811.png.htm
a, The glacier estimates; data from this study and refs. 16,18,21. M&D, missing and disappeared glaciers (as determined by ref. 16). b, The Greenland Ice Sheet estimates; data from refs. 14,18,21,24,25. GP, contribution from Greenland peripheral glaciers. c, The Antarctic Ice Sheet estimates; data from refs. 23,24. d, The TWS estimates; data from refs. 17,26,27,28,53. All estimates are shown relative to the average height over 2003–2005. The inset in each panel shows all the estimates over 2002–2018. Shaded areas indicate 90% confidence intervals.
https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-020-2591-3/figures/9
I had never heard of Reilly until this evening. So, I went to Twitter and found she had blocked me even though, as far as I know, we have never communicated.
So much for being “scientific” (you know, open to new facts and ideas).
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I still can’t subscribe to comments here, so I’m done. Bye,
David
We need all sorts of points of view here so hope you don’t disappear. You seem able to read posts and make replies so don’t know what you mean by ‘subscribe.’
tonyb
Sorry to see you leave David…not. Judith, I just downloaded a book you provided the Foreword to.
https://wattsupwiththat.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/11/Vinos-CPPF2022.pdf
One historical event that wasn’t mentioned was Thermopylae. Everyone studies that event, and it is now 2 km inland and well above sea level. Also, COVID greatly decreased Fossil Fuels consumption and CO2’s trend remained unchanged and actually hit an all time high.
But Thermopylae is mentioned here:
https://tinyurl.com/But-historical-times
(Hat tip to Kennui at Roy’s.)
No mention of Svensmark and cosmic ray/solar cycle/global mean cloud cover analysis I could find in there.
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Dr Curry,
Ran into this paper a few years back: Glaciers of the Sierra Nevada: Past, Present, and Future by: Emily Schultz
“More than 100 alpine glaciers are found in the Sierra Nevada Range. [..] Scientists believe that the glaciers found in
California today were formed about 700 years ago during the Little Ice Age (1250-1900 A.D.).”
Certainly suggests that they did not exist by the end of the MWP . . or perhaps earlier. I suspect that they’ve come and gone during the Holocene era. Would be wonderful to have more knowledge here, for the next time the Los Angeles Times, others, puts out one of their, “these glaciers have never receded this far in history, and are at risk of disappearing completely if we don’t immediately do something about man-made climate change.
Interested?
https://web.archive.org/web/20190318105513/http://www.indiana.edu/~sierra/papers/2010/schultz.pdf
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Denizens (go team!) might also like:
https://ekk.scnat.ch/en/uuid/i/1b5ba07c-e55f-53bc-95b2-8e5f446ef40e-Glacier_volume_reduced_by_10_per_cent_in_only_five_years
In fairness, five years is pretty slow in political time.
So what is the negative impact?
Do you often sealion like that, Rob?
Check the video below. There are fours. The slide has four icons. You should be able to get them.
When you will provide something, you will get more.
Greenland also lost ice in 2019, because of months of negative NAO conditions, which is the reverse of what rising CO2 forcing should be doing to the NAO:
https://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/precip/CWlink/pna/month_nao_index.shtml
But Greenland is another square, Ulrich:
https://tinyurl.com/This-Odd-Place
In the acronym the O stands for Oscillation, which may not imply what you make it imply:
https://www.metoffice.gov.uk/research/climate/seasonal-to-decadal/gpc-outlooks/ens-mean/nao-description
I am not sure where to add your line. Let me think about it.
The very brief Saharan plumes in Summer 2019 were also dependent on negative NAO conditions, and the associated wavy jet stream. Think how bad the summer would have been without the chaos in the atmosphere working to alleviate the low solar and negative NAO pattern.
https://www.metoffice.gov.uk/hadobs/hadcet/graphs/2019/daily_maxtemp_cet_2019.png
But Chaos is another square, Ulric, and it may not cohere with the idea that we should expect a linear response over an oscillator. What we should expect is that in the long run Greenland shrinks, which it does. As predicted by theory.
Sorry for having misspelled your name earlier.
Judith … I assume you had an inkling of what Guterres was going to say in his opening address to COP 27? ‘… save our glaciers …’ If not, great timing.
From the horse’s mouth:
https://www.ipcc.ch/srocc/chapter/chapter-2/
This does not counterbalance anecdotes from Tony’s Man in Montana, but it might still deserve due diligence.
Willard
It is all about the rate of change and how easily, or not; that humans can adapt. Obviously, the rate of change is not what the IPCC and the UN led us to fear.
Rob,
Obviously you are just saying stuff. Never mind, allow me to help. Search for Wouters & al. and Zemp & al. Both studies are from 2019.
Best of luck.
Willard
You cite bologna. Does not show meaningful harms.
Your incredulity is duly noted, Rob.
A simple model of how the mountain glacier system works:
https://youtu.be/q9LDE4bPY1A
That should be enough to demonstrate that we should not assume linearity when it melts.
“There is a great deal of evidence and good reasons to believe that neither solar nor wind can be scaled to replace coal.”
Well one recent data point (Reuters I believe, but I could be mistaken) says the “world” spent 3.5 Trillion Dollars (that used to be a gigantic pile of money, WWII cost the Allies about 5 Trillion and took about 20 years to “pay off”) over the past decade on “Green Energy” and the result was a reduction of Fossil Fuels from 83% of total energy sources to 82% of total energy sources….
At that rate we need to spend 287 Trillion Dollars (~10x USA GDP) in the next Year, or 1x of the USA GDP for the next 82 years…
Wonder what ordering the whole output of the USA GDP from Amazon every year for the next 82 years will do to the supply chain ???
You All have got to start paying attention to those exponents… Billions/Trillions/Quadrillions… Those numbers have practical significance.
Liberals will spend any amount of other people’s money. No skin off their backs.
Kevin K,
This is a fascinating topic. Reports of big money items that used to be expressed in millions jumped to using billion, with not much pause for tens of millions and hundreds of millions.
Might there be a feedback working so that the value of money and acts to print more are partly caused by acceptance of reporting that jumps in steps of three orders of magnitude more often than one order? Just because it is easier to type “billion” than “hundreds of million”?
Some middle-east countries and China have long had intermediate levels of measurement expression, but I forget the details. Another project for another day. Geoff S
I lived for a short time in Billings MT in the mid-1970’s working environmental regulation issues for the coal industry, later moving to the Oregon/Washington region of the US Northwest working in nuclear.
Sometimes while driving along what’s called the ‘High Line’ along US Highway 2 in northern Montana, I would occasionally see a bumper sticker which read, Cool it in Cut Bank. These Montanans sure knew where it was they were living.
The big coal-fired plants which were built in the northern Rocky Mountain states in the late 1960’s and early 1970’s are now targeted for closure by the Biden administration, with strong support from the region’s climate activists, of whom there are many. Reilly Neill is fairly typical of these activists.
The legacy coal plants are forty to fifty years old. Some have already been retired and some are still attached to the Western Interconnect. Given the current hostile regulatory environment, no one in their right mind would spend serious money on maintaining and upgrading the remaining plants.
Between 2010 and 2020, it was public policy that all these northern plains coal plants would eventually be replaced by gas-fired generation. But in 2022, gas fired generation is now off the table as a public policy option for replacing coal.
What the great majority of those who live in the US Northwest and in the northern plains states don’t realize is that no combination of wind, solar, and nuclear can come close to replacing the coal plants now targeted for closure. Not within the next fifty years, anyway.
“no combination of [unreliables] and nuclear .. within the next fifty years”. A good prophecy. How many nuclear plants did the Biden administration approve so far?
I would like to know that too. The DoE has been pretty pro nuclear by generously extending plant certifications by decades. Cheaper to repair and upgrade the old plants plus it kicks the can down the road on dealing with all the spent fuel stored at those plants.
There is a lot of Negawatts money in the new IRA. Air and water heat pumps will offset Gigawatts of future demand.
Since the 2020 election, I myself haven’t seen any slowdown in the always slow and complicated process for NRC review and approval of a new reactor design.
What isn’t yet clear is what the NRC will be doing with review and approval of operating license extensions for legacy plants.
Biden’s NRC has already revoked its prior approval of a license extension for a Florida reactor on the coast, saying its prior approval had not adequately addressed issues concerning the effects of sea level rise.
It remains to be seen if opponents of nuclear power will be successful in preventing NRC approval of license extensions for other legacy reactors, for similar or for other reasons.
Part quote “The legacy coal plants are forty to fifty years old.”
It may be wise to check their design code (pressure vessel code) and the allowed lifetime in working hours.
That’s one reliability issue among several. The coal handling facilities in these legacy plants are old and are likewise deteriorating and in need of replacement. As are the emission control systems.
With coal now off the table in the US as a long term energy resource for the future, fixing all these problems with the legacy plants isn’t a profitable business decision.
Replacing those legacy plants with advanced coal technology isn’t possible either. In today’s regulatory environment, no corporate executive would dare risk making that kind of investment decision.
We are seeing the same situation in the US as is now being seen in Australia. Coal plants are being systematically shut down without replacement of the lost generation capacity.
I don’t see this trend being reversed anytime soon, if ever.
Beta,
Have you seen the latest green washing scam being run by the utility companies? Use solar panels to cover up toxic ash dumps without doing the land renovations they promised to do. I’m sure the EPA is in on this. All the big surface strip mines are doing the same thing.
https://www.power-eng.com/solar/tva-to-repurpose-closed-coal-ash-site-for-solar/
jacksmith4tx: “Have you seen the latest green washing scam being run by the utility companies? Use solar panels to cover up toxic ash dumps without doing the land renovations they promised to do.”
It doesn’t surprise me at all the utility companies are doing this sort of thing. Besides saving many millions of dollars in remediation costs, green washing has become a public relations art form.
The utilities also have a habit claiming that when they close a coal plant of ‘X’ megawatt nameplate rating, they are planning on replacing that generation with ‘X’ megawatts of wind and solar generation — not mentioning that wind and solar of the same total nameplate will have a much lower capacity factor.
Power Engineering magazine has become a propaganda rag for the utility industry in promoting its green energy image. But I do have to admit that their propaganda has been quite effective so far in convincing the public that a developing shortage of electricity isn’t imminently on the horizon.
I enjoyed reading Judy Curry’s post on Montana glaciers and the methodology used in her analysis. Bringing it home to the current conversation on climate policy was a bonus.
I would like to read through the comments to find the nuggets of information and insights, but with all the back and forth not directly relevant comments of the quipsters here that becomes a tiresome task.
Poor Kenneth:
https://www.flamewarriorsguide.com/warriorshtm/ennui.htm
Playing the ref since at least 2009.
Willard: This is your 15th comment on this thread .. “without, of course, ever contributing anything of interest himself.”
George,
Here is a short list of my contributions so far. First, I emphasized the reliance on tree rings, a sort of proxies that usually throw contrarians in a fit. Second, I asked how the current warming in Montana could be considered slow in the grand scheme of geological things. Third, I showed that the author behind the “seemings” expressed in a post did not look authoritative. Fourth, I met the factoid about Thermopylae with a link that already paid due diligence to it. Fifth, I quoted the authors from Cryospheric Commission of the Swiss Academy of Sciences. Sixth, I quoted the IPCC on High Mountain Areas. Seventh, I cited a short presentation on glacier dynamics, enough to indicate that we should not expect shrinking to be linear. Eight, I mentioned that one guest appearance was long in funding biofuel projects, which should be enough as a secret handshake for energy investors. Finally, I recalled that there was nothing new behind Kenneth’s whining, both as a matter of his own personal history as a matter of what is usually expected from online warriors.
Three of my comments were to respond ankle biters. You are my fourth. As you can see, it is not impossible to respond to an ankle biter and remain constructive.
Thank you for your concerns.
I can be equally constructive, here it comes ..
[Willard November 11, 2022 at 7:42 am] “Tree ring data?
How fascinating.”
That’s one comment, George. And even that comment had a point.
Now, you are supposed to be supporting the idea that I contributed nothing, not that I’m not always as constructive as you would like. In other words, please mind your quantifiers.
Off topic. My latest on the unfolding “loss and damage” fiasco.
COP27 — Will “loss and damage” extremism kill national alarmism?
By David Wojick
https://www.cfact.org/2022/11/12/cop27-will-loss-and-damage-extremism-kill-national-alarmism/
The beginning: “The extreme rhetoric of “loss and damage reparations” could backfire, causing developed countries to question the developing country claims of human caused damage. The best defense against a ruinous liability claim is innocence.
Until now the alarmist governments of America and the other developed countries have gleefully touted the emergency threat of human caused climate change, because it gave them immense power. They happily boasted of transforming our society and transitioning our energy system, all to save us from the ever increasing greenhouse gasses.
Central to this alarmist narrative is the theme that the world is already suffering heavily from human caused climate change. Every weather disaster is now called a “climate event” or some silly such.
Well as we say in the mountains: “What goes around, comes around”.
The climate damage narrative has now come to bite the developed countries, and bite them really hard. In principle ruinously hard.”
Lots more in the article. Please share it.
The Port of Theodosius has been discovered in Istambul. Curiosity Stream has a documentary on it. They have a Big Dig going on and they have a large train station being built. Why is this relevant to climate change? It is far inland and well above sea level, meaning that it was much warmer in the 3rd to 6th Century. The Big Dig
Istanbul’s city planners have a problem: too much history. https://www.newyorker.com/magazine/2015/08/31/the-big-dig
A month and a half without Robert I. Ellison’s comments is clearly noticeable.
Like Mosher it may be a “Cryptic” absence.
Hopefully he [Robert I. Ellison] is OK.
He adds vigor to the discussions.
Oddly enough, it is difficult to find current, dated pictures of the Grinnell glacier. I did find one from Jan 1, 2020. Had to view page source to find the date. So here is 2010, 2016, and 2020.
https://www.nps.gov/glac/learn/nature/glacier-repeat-photos.htm
https://enjoyyourparks.com/glacier-national-park/top-10-things-to-do-in-glacier/highline-trail/
It does appear Grinnell has “regrown.”
One of the issues I have seen with the advertisements for glacial melting (AGW advertisements ) is the pictures presented usually include late 1800’s or early 1900 pics, then skip to the 1980’s /1990’s era with the intention to leave the impression that most of the melting occurred since 1980ish, ie trying to hide that a significant portion of the melting occurred in the first half of the 20th century.
Unfortunately I cannot see a picture of 2020 via the second link you provided.
And so it does. I was looking at the HTML page source. Well, I tried to find some historical, as opposed to hysterical, pics of the Grinnell glacier and so far no luck. It would be nice to have year by year in the same month.
You have to scroll down … it’s this one …
https://enjoyyourparks.com/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/HIGHLINE-TRAIL-IMAGE-6.jpg
This picture Haas here
https://enjoyyourparks.com/glacier-national-park/hikes-and-places/grinnell-glacier-overlook/
A OP right mark of 2009 (at the second appearance of the picture)
The fact that the glacier, photographically, appears to have regrown is neither here nor there jim2.
Joshua has already admonished you on this very point.
An increase in area, or even in height is an artifact of measurement, a chimera.
Fake news.
You should not believe the evidence of your lying eyes. photographs and tape measures.
The true measurement of a glacier is its mass balance as done by means of a lever long enough, adding in glacial rebound,
[ISO ( φ, t) is the total isostatic effect of the glacial rebound process including the ice load (glacio-isostatic), water load (hydro-isostatic) and rotational contributions to the redistribution of ocean mass.]
Observer bias assumption and the laughable statement that volume can be difficult to measure from height and area measurements and often reduces when these other measurements increase!!
References
Out of the shadows [6 seasons] and
Correction, a British TV drama that everyone with an interest in computer fabulation should watch.
Just to be clear, we see a warming trend. Fossil fuel generated CO2 is likely responsible for a portion of the warming. Is is surprising that many if not most glaciers are shrinking? No.
But is the warming a bad thing? Probably not catastrophic. May even be a net benefit. That’s what isn’t established.
Should we spend trillions to mitigate fossil fuel CO2? No.
Reply to David Appell | November 11, 2022 at 11:07 pm
David, you frequently praise the supremacy of peer review. In the interests of injecting some reality it should be pointed out that in the last decade or so, it has been found that most peer reviewed work cannot be replicated.
I guess that you will challenge that statement. I was shocked by it too. If you delve into the detail the numbers vary by discipline, by type of study and various other parameters. It seems that more than half fail to be replicated in general.
There is absolutely no evidence that the introduction of the peer-review process has improved the quality of the published research. However, it has resulted in a huge amount of unpaid work, and it has introduced a great delay in publication from months to years, slowing the progress of science. It also introduces a bias that shouldn’t exist since if you try to publish against the consensus your publication will be repeatedly rejected.
In fact if you wanted to reduce the speed of scientific advance and tie up scientists into unproductive work, the peer review system would be a perfect way.
Javier … I’d be very interested in your comments to Jacksmith4tx post just below, if you have time. His link is interesting.
Javier,
Here in Australia I have occasionally sent our Bureau of Meteorology a report and/or spreadsheet of simple calculations on historic temperatures that can be shown to the public in various ways through cherry picking start and finish dates, by rejecting original measurements in favour of their adjusted ACORN-SAT series, by using doubtful ways to calculate measurement errors and so on. I have invited BOM to comment on articles I have published on WUWT.
The BOM has mostly ignored my suggestions, but when they did reply a couple of times they wrote that the BOM cannot consider informal communications like mine, writing that I need to present my case in a journal, after succeeding with the peer review process.
I have responded that scientific papers must go beyond simple algebra and should deal with major advances of knowledge that can affect the course of scientific understanding.
I have refrained from telling BOM accounts of experiences of colleagues here who have submitted significant papers on climate, papers that typically are critical of BOM. They have yet to pass peer review, perhaps because the reviewers are often chosen from the ranks of past and present BOM staff.
Yes, the peer review process is problematic. Geoff S
True, true, what we have seen is what the philosopher Habermas would say, ‘follows from the structure of speech itself.’ From the name they have given it, AGW, grows their belief in the object of their argument and in this way, ‘expressions of subjectivity are liberated from social restraints.’
“Despite the statements of numerous scientific societies, the scientific community cannot claim any special expertise in addressing issues related to humanity’s deepest goals and values… Any serious discussion of the changing climate must begin by acknowledging not only the scientific certainties but also the uncertainties, especially in projecting the future.” ~Dr. Steven Koonin
Wagathon: You know that Koonin’s recent book is full of errors, right, and that no real climate scientists take him at all seriously.
Don’t have a “week in review” handy, so putting it here. COVID reality in China.
https://www.itemfix.com/v?t=t5udtp
Looks like there will be another SSW (Sudden Stratospheric Warming) event late winter or early spring. Everyone should remember the SSW event in early 2021 preceded the historic US winter storm Uri. This early on it’s hard to predict what part of the norther hemisphere will be impacted by the extreme disruption of the polar vortex. Prepare accordingly.
“The January eruption of Hunga Tonga in the South Pacific has injected a large amount of water vapor into the stratosphere. That water vapor is now causing significant cooling of the southern stratosphere, continuing into late Fall and early Winter.
We looked at the historical data and found that there is a weak indication of the south stratospheric cooling, coinciding with later stratospheric warming events over the northern hemisphere. But much more research is needed, as other background signals can be at play.
Stratospheric warming during the northern hemisphere winter can mean a heavy disruption of circulation. This causes pressure changes and can unleash cold air from the Arctic into the United States and Europe.”
https://www.severe-weather.eu/global-weather/stratosphere-polar-vortex-cooling-event-update-cold-anomaly-winter-season-influence-fa/
Thanks for the link, Jack.
I hope Javier comments on this.
I don’t think we can say if there will be a SSW this winter in the NH, as they cannot be predicted. On average there’s 6 per decade in the NH, always during the cold season when there is a tropospheric vortex. Latest ones were in 2018 and 2021.
The Hunga Tonga eruption has made the stratosphere even more unpredictable, as there is no precedent for such a huge increase in stratospheric water vapor. It is bound to affect stratospheric circulation but we don’t know how. For sure we are going to learn a lot from it.
The article linked has to be taken with a grain of salt. Comparing this year’s cooling of the SH stratosphere to other years’ leads to weak conclusions as the cause of the cooling is clearly different.
Thanks, Javier.
SSW? Means what?
02
If you had read his book, you would know. It’s a terrific read and for you a great chance to learn the actual science and broaden your horizons.
Best cure to herpes which worked for me in 2 weeks, Doctors Email Robinson.buck ler ( ) yahoo com……………………
Another reason why blithely focusing EXCLUSIVELY on surface area prolly ain’t the best of ideas.
https://www.wired.com/story/scientists-are-uncovering-ominous-waters-under-antarctic-ice/
At least you could talk about the limitations of that metric. You know, uncertainty monster? Ever heard of that?
1. The National Park Service posts in the glacier Park signs warning that glaciers will be gone by 2020.
2. The glaciers refuse to go.
3. The NPS removes the signs, again at a taxpayer’s expense.
What limitations of the surface area metric interest you?
how much does it cost taxpayers to remove some signs?
Joshua | November 15, 2022
When surface area disagrees with your 3D world view goggles, shoot the messenger.
–
“Another reason why blithely focusing EXCLUSIVELY on surface area prolly ain’t the best of ideas”
–
Another way of saying when the facts do not agree with me I ignore the facts.
Get with it Joshua, facts can be science if you really really try hard.
Pingback: Everybody knows: the glaciers of Montana are disappearing - Climate Discussion Nexus
In this day of satellite imaging, there is no excuse not to have a display of glaciers around the world, broken down by year in, say, August in the NH and February in the SH. I wonder what with all the hand-wringing over glaciers why there isn’t one. Or is all the hubbub over glaciers solely for emotional effect courtesy of the Climate Doomers?
> I wonder what with all the hand-wringing over glaciers why there isn’t one.
C’mon you really don’t know? Obviously, it’s a conspiracy to hide the truth. Can’t have a great reset unless you hide the truth.
jim2: why can’t you download the data and do the specific calculations you desire?
Not competent? I think that’s the reason.
Some of us have work and a life. You seem to have time on your hands.
OK, here’s a useful glacier web site:
https://wgms.ch/fogbrowser/
You finally got it,
Could have been earlier: less writing, more reading.
And for Switzerland :
GLAMOS.ch
Nice site. Nice graphics.
Not about glaciers unless ice loss is “loss and damage” which it might be.
COP27 — Colombia claims an absurd $800 billion a year “loss and damage”
By David Wojick
https://www.cfact.org/2022/11/16/cop27-colombia-claims-an-absurd-800-billion-a-year-loss-and-damage/
The beginning: “This preposterous claim shows the dangerous absurdity of the “loss and damage” doctrine. At this rate of damage the global total would run around TWO HUNDRED TRILLION DOLLARS A YEAR. There is not that much money in the whole world.
The $800 billion a year is from a report presented by Colombia at COP27. The mainstream green press either did not notice or decided to ignore it, lest it raise issues best left alone until the proposed UN Loss and Damage Facility is created.
Look at it this way. Colombia is a relatively small country with a GDP of around $300 billion a year, about the 40th largest in the world and just 0.4% of the global total. Its “loss and damage” claim is roughly 2.5 times its GDP, so let’s assume that ratio globally.
World GDP is about $81 trillion, which multiplied by 2.5 equals just over $200 trillion a year. Here are some large developing country examples, using the 2.5 times GDP estimate, rounded off. (GDP is from 2017)”
Lots more in the article. Please share it.
“Loss and damage” is a preposterous plan.
No David, as a freelance I get paid to tell the truth. Somebody has to. I am proud of what I do, trying to save the world from people like you.
Oh and I do not deny climate change. Weather is chaotic so long term average weather constantly changes. Then there are the LIA, MWP, etc. and the big ice ages. At no time has climate not changed.
I “deny” (object to) the absurd alarmist claims about climate change. Including yours.
No matter what I try, Judith keeps blocking me from getting these comments & replies sent to me by email.
I give up. Bye.
David I have no idea what you are talking about. You are not blocked here in any way. If you don’t like how the site works, take up your issue with wordpress.com
Thanks, Judith.
–
David and Joshua seem to have a mission to complain about the site in any way that they can as part of their overall attack on comments on the site.
–
I hope the fact that you leave his complaints up shows that he actually can get through when he really wants to.
–
I do comment occasionally on a site that Willard and Joshua frequent, have not seen Appell there.
You see a different side to people when they stop self moderating believing they are invisible.
Bye. I hope.
It’s the Middle East against the Climate Doomers …
Saudi Arabia is opposed to that approach, Prince Abdulaziz bin Salman, the energy minister, said in an interview in the domes last week. The kingdom plans to keep producing hydrocarbons until the end of the 21st century because the world needs “all sorts of energy.”
“They are moving from a defensive policy to an offensive one,” said Laurence Tubiana, Chief Executive Officer at the European Climate Foundation and architect of the landmark 2015 Paris Agreement that saw world leaders commit to keeping global warming below 2C by the end of the century. “It signals that they are anxious.”
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-11-16/middle-east-oil-giants-assert-themselves-in-climate-politics
AGW-catastrophist Michael Mann is the Sam Bankman-Fried of science and his acolyte sycophants have corrupted Western academia.
Climate Doomers will love this …
Researchers just found that, at the base of Antarctica’s ice, an area the size of Germany and France combined is feeding meltwater into a super-pressurized, 290-mile-long river running to the sea. “Thirty years ago, we thought the whole of the ice pretty much was frozen to the bed,” says Imperial College London glaciologist Martin Siegert, coauthor of a new paper in Nature Geoscience describing the finding. “Now we’re in a position that we’ve just never been in before, to understand the whole of the Antarctic ice sheet.”
Antarctica’s ice is divided into two main components: the ice sheet that sits on land, and the ice shelf that extends off the coast, floating on seawater. Where the two meet—where the ice lifts off the bed and starts touching the ocean—is known as the grounding line.
https://www.wired.com/story/scientists-are-uncovering-ominous-waters-under-antarctic-ice/
I think this is an excellent analysis of glacier surface area and the complexity of what contributes to glacier loss. The data does not evidence a strong AGW signal if at all.
As far as energy sources I like natural gas, solar where it actually works, and a transitioning away from coal as it generally burns dirty; I am not a fan of great expanding of nuclear power plants as even with improvements they still pose unique risks.
The data to me seems to indicate warming for the last 30-50 years.
In this scenario one would expect some glacial surface area loss.
–
When doing one area only the data cannot be used for or against AGW.
The problem is that the area in question is much more easily accessed and visitable than most other glaciers around the world.
Any glacier that shows obvious signs of shrinking becomes a poster boy for an ideology when the rest are not easily measurable.
Putting up a poster boy is good until, [like tree rings, Willard] the facts start to vary from the story and need a trick [ claimed volume, Joshua] or to be disposed of like NBC news readers or taking down the erroneous signs.
C’mon, Doc.
Back in the days the poster boy was not tree rings. His name was Mike. Tree rings were used to get to him. Like in the current episode, but instead of saying they are crap, they are now being used to minimize current melting.
Either tree rings are crap or they can be used. Can’t be both.
All tree rings are crap, but some are useful.
Willard
“Three of my comments were to respond ankle biters. You are my fourth. As you can see, it is not impossible to respond to an ankle biter and remain constructive.”
–
I might be no 5.
Mike tree rings Whatshisname?
Mikes nature “trick”?
Michael Moore?
some Mann anyway.
Joshua
“tricks” – apparently ’cause feelings were hurt when things got personal.
No Joshua.
Spin it how you like.
Mann deliberately ignored tree rings when they went the other way or turned them upside down to ignore reality.
Should it hurt you to acknowledge that??
– I see no sign of contrition here [Grosse Point Blank]
angech –
You’re running around in circles with your focus on tree rings. The world is bigger than Michael Mann.
Running around in circles or running around in rings?
Joshua you have made some good comments recently at A…
Changing the subject from deliberately ignoring facts that are documented, proven and well understood.
Photos of Glaciers at the right time of year.
Actual visible measured extent.
If the problem existed the Park would be measuring and publishing loss every 6 months.
Crickets.
angech –
> Running around in circles or running around in rings?
The pun was intended.
> Changing the subject…
And there I thought the subject was how people address uncertainty or cherry pick evidence when they’re talking about climate change.
Guess I must have wandered into the wrong Climate Etc.
> Putting up a poster boy is good until, [like tree rings, Willard] the facts start to vary from the story and need a trick
Must be talking about this lame top level post at Climate Etc.
I remember the days when discussion of uncertainty and the limitations of data were considered important around here.
Instead we get “tricks” – apparently ’cause feelings were hurt when things got personal. What ever happened to big boy pants?
Yeah… tree rings and bristlecones et al. are all problematic as are many proxy data sources. I work with statistical analysis on various levels in my field(s) and what Climategate revealed was something I already found very disconcerting about the faith in p values, statistical significance, and assumptions with uncertainty in the models. There was a time I trusted Mann and Gavin’s work, but as I began to look closer, I became concerned about the claims.
Joshie, You are such an immature teenage persona. You wouldn’t know what a proper uncertainty analysis is because you are an ignorant non-scientist who can only throw spitballs at his betters. Grow up.
CyberStats,
“nuclear power plants … with improvements they still pose unique risks.”
So does driving an automobile.
Get with the modern era, please.
Geoff S
angech,
the ‘warming’ would be so small that the margin of error alone might make it problematic; true only using one area may not be a wide enough region to analyze, but with many contaminated thermometers, inconsistent thermometer calibration, UHI, and Mann’s Hockey Stick being dogma ignoring MWP (and thermodynamics), and the revelations of Climate Gate… well, there are legitimate reasons to say this is not only sloppy ‘science’ but there are significant portions of the IPCC report made up.
It does not help that some of the anti AGW websites are run by the far-right and other pro AGW websites the far-left… I do not take RC, Watts, or Tamino seriously; hence why I read here, and now post.
CyberStats
“I do not take RC, Watts, or Tamino seriously”.
“tree rings and bristlecones et al. are all problematic as are many proxy data sources. ”
–
RC will be a textbook in years to come for inanity.
A study in how some scientists completely loose their objectivity when pushing narratives.
Both it, WUWT and Tamino include the good with the bad.
JC at least gives the chance to discuss some subjects in depth.
When you see the usual suspects lining up to obstruct and confuse argument you always know a serious nerve has been touched.
Glaciers do melt and ramping up an event is good for the cause.
When the narrative fails, as with Glacier Park, there are no sorries, just excuses and absurdities like those scientists saying larger area/ extent is consistent with smaller volumes.
–
Enjoy posting.
https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/feart.2019.00096/full
Glaciers outside of the ice sheets are known to be important contributors to sea level rise. In this work, we provide an overview of changes in the mass of the world’s glaciers, excluding those in Greenland and Antarctica, between 2002 and 2016, based on satellite gravimetry observations of the Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment (GRACE). Glaciers lost mass at a rate of 199 ± 32 Gt yr−1 during this 14-yr period, equivalent to a cumulative sea level contribution of 8 mm. We present annual mass balances for 17 glacier regions, that show a qualitatively good agreement with published estimates from in situ observations. We find that annual mass balance varies considerably from year to year, which can in part be attributed to changes in the large-scale circulation of the atmosphere. These variations, combined with the relatively short observational record, hamper the detection of acceleration of glacier mass loss. Our study highlights the need for continued observations of the Earth’s glacierized regions.
Many people blame the natural gas shortage in the EU on the Ukraine war. The only reason the war had any effect on the quantity of gas available to the EU is because the EU chose to depend on Russia for a significant part of its supply. So really, the war isn’t the primary problem.
The primary problem is that the EU listened to the Climate Doomers and failed to encourage natural gas production locally, in the EU.
At one time, the EU produced over 5 times as much natural gas as in 2021.
They should at least now ignore the Climate Doomers and encourage local natural gas production.
(You can always say it won’t help right now, but don’t bother. Had they ramped up a year ago, they would be in better shape even now.)
https://www.statista.com/statistics/265383/european-union-natural-gas-production/
History of wind energy in the EU.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wind_power_in_the_European_Union#Installed_wind_power_capacity
Aside from the millions of gallons of valuable fresh water needed to frack each well you then have to find some place to get rid of the toxic waste.
Just be careful where you dispose of it.
11/17/2022
“West Texas Was Just Rocked By the Biggest Earthquake It Has Ever Seen
The 5.3-magnitude earthquake hit at 3:34 p.m. local time near Mentone, Texas, according to the US Geological Survey. The event topped a magnitude 5 quake that struck just north on March 26, 2020 and was considered the region’s largest.”
https://nz.finance.yahoo.com/news/west-texas-just-rocked-biggest-203708711.html
The reason that the EU is dependent on Russia for its’ energy supply is that the EU has refused to mine its’ own gas deposits, while simultaneously shutting down reliable coal-fired stations as well as nuclear powered generators. It seems that “global” mining pollution stops at the Russian borders, according to the greenies.
The water required for gas well mining is recycled. The “toxic” waste (this term so beloved by greenies depending on the ignorance of the general public) is found in most kitchens as well as beaches (we geologists call it sand).
A survey of over 100,000 gas mining wells in the US, done by the USGS and Duke University, found that less than 2% of the wells were leaking and those were due to drillers cutting corners – obviously this practice can be stopped by just applying current laws.
You could make a health shake out of the fracking fluids.
I love natural gas! I have a gas lease that pays me big $$! But I’m not blind to the downsides. Lucky for me any environmental damage is passed along to the public.
Do you guys have any proof how safe fracking wastewater is?
There are a few sites trying to reclaim fracking wastewater, but the costs are so high nobody does it.
https://www.watercalculator.org/news/news-briefs/oil-gas-wastewater/
“Drilling operations in the Permian produce an estimated 170 billion gallons per year, according to a recent study by the Produced Water Consortium, which was commissioned by Texas legislators to study recycling produced water. The actual amounts of produced water are unknown because the state doesn’t require operators to report how much water they actually produce.” <- Can't break a law if there isn't one.
—
The geologic formations that contain oil and gas deposits also contain naturally-occurring radionuclides, which are referred to as Naturally Occurring Radioactive Materials (NORM):
Uranium and its decay products.
Thorium and decay products.
Radium and decay products.
Potassium-40.
Lead-210/Polonium-210.
Source: EPA (2/27/2022)
EPA went bananas (Potassium-40).
The most toxic component in fracking fluid is the sand. Have people stopped going to the beach?
PITTSBURGH – The oil and gas industry is trying to ease environmental concerns by developing nontoxic fluids for the drilling process known as fracking, but it’s not clear whether the new product will be widely embraced by drilling companies.
Houston-based energy giant Halliburton Inc. has developed a product called CleanStim, which uses only food-industry ingredients. Other companies have developed nontoxic fluids as well.
“Halliburton is in the business to provide solutions to our customers,” said production manager Nicholas Gardiner. “Those solutions have to include ways to reduce the safety or environmental concerns that the public might have.”
https://www.thetimes-tribune.com/archive/energy-industry-develops-nontoxic-fracking-fluids/article_af5e541c-04e0-51ad-83fd-a62c511c48bf.html
jim2,
The only problem with fracking sand is that its unique properties make it rather expensive.
“The Cost of Sand Has Spiked 150% in Texas – Bloomberg
Jul 6, 2022”
Any sand that is recovered during drilling is probably recycled.
It’s the brine (produced water) that is saturated with minerals and radionuclides. Do you know anyone that is trying to recycle this stuff? The farmers don’t want it and their aquifers are running dry.
Jack, don’t go bananas, too. All those radionuclides are naturally occurring everywhere, including your house. Why didn’t you quote any numbers? But the dirty water is not easy to purify.
jacksmith4tx wrote
“The geologic formations that contain oil and gas deposits also contain naturally-occurring radionuclides”.
Correctly, ALL rocks contain redionuclides. So does your living body, this very instant.
You seem confused. The radionuclides you fear have to be concentrated enough to give the body an excess dose before harm arisaes.
What mechanism do you imagine could concentrate the radionuclides in ground water to a level of concern for human health?
Please avoid reprinting silly catchphrases from a bygone green era. Geoff S
A 5.3 magnitude quake is in the category “moderate” on the Richter scale”with some damage to weak structures” and there would normally be between 200 and 2000 a year. Remember the scale was originally developed for the situation in Southern California.
9 billion tons of CO2 absorbed by land biosphere each year, 2.5 is carbon. 3.7 water is consumed in photosynthesis yielding 6.23 dry mass. Generally dry organic mass is 30% of biomass, 70% being water. So land biomass is increasing roughly 20.8 billion tons a year. This retains 17.1 billion tons of water (14.5 water, 3.7 chemically transformed). The land biosphere is therefore retaining an additional 17.1km^3/y. This offset a substantial amount of sea level rise. It is 21% of the additional 80 km^3/y being retained by land. https://www.pnas.org/doi/full/10.1073/pnas.1704665115
Judith: Thanks for all the work that went into this post.
I’ve always found the Holocene Climate Optimum, when there were few glaciers outside polar regions, interesting. The northern tree line reached the edge of the Arctic Ocean due to summer warmth, but the Greenland Ice Cap and the Polar Bears survived for several millennia of this summer warmth.
Did the GIS survive because winter colder in the NH at the same time? It seems to me that when it’s dark during winter, the Arctic doesn’t care that the planet is further from the sun.
GIA is something mentioned at RC, but never fully factored in or are inaccurate in sea level rise and glacier ice loss
https://sealevel.colorado.edu/presentation/what-glacial-isostatic-adjustment-gia-and-why-do-you-correct-it
https://tc.copernicus.org/articles/16/2203/2022/
Judith, thank you for this essay. And thank you for the several immediately previous.
Judith … off topic, but thought you might like this.
A Conservative Magazine Returns to Harvard
The Salient’s new issue on motherhood and feminism is reflective, confident and affirmative.
https://www.wsj.com/articles/harvard-salient-student-publication-magazine-college-university-motherhood-feminism-family-matriarchy-editors-women-11668806585?st=7kavk3img2f3e10&reflink=desktopwebshare_permalink
Bill,
I hit reply to you, but I am also making a general statement here as those of us skeptical of AGW can still be a Democrat or considered slightly liberal.
It is interesting…and I do not want to get too far off topic or devolve to an endless political debate, but I want to share how my views vary in the political sphere. I am not going to bleed all over these threads and OPs with my political views, but usually it’s “liberals” who believe in AGW and “Conservatives” who do not–with a few exceptions like John McCain who is the only one I can think of at the top of my head.
I do not think AGW in general has any real credible evidence based upon a plethora of analyzing data sets and plugging in the statistics and following the IPCC report and Mann et al. Hockey Stick that never came true.
I vote Democrat, voted for Biden, Hilary, and Obama, abhor Trump and his followers, and 100% pro-choice on abortion within the standard 20-24 weeks of fetal development unless there are extenuating/emergency circumstances afterwards.
I support LBGTQ rights, and equal pay for equal work between both men and women. I would not personally call myself a feminist as a man, but I support equal rights; 4th wave feminism has me confused and while I am in academic circles where I know people publishing and teaching it, I am not a subscriber. This does not mean I do not support feminism at a more general level; I do support it, and I must admit I prefer how scientists were able to handle COVID under Democrats than Republicans.
I am only mentioned this once here as to show those of us skeptical of AGW and even both political parties are not a on size fits all. When Obama spoke of Anthropogenic Climate Change as indisputable fact, I cringed, but when Trump denied the dangers of COVID I feared for the country–my current dissertation work is COVID impacts on financial-economic variables and the epidemiological (Financial-Econometric Epidemiology) causes of such impacts; that combined with global travel I have seen COVID’s devastating effects first hand–in this area Conservatives were slow to acknowledge. That being said, the bivalent vaccines are not as effective overall as the original Moderna and Pfizer and vaccines, while necessary are waning in effectiveness; I am vaccinated as is my family and I abhor anti-vaccine rhetoric.
I realize I might invite debate with my post, but those of in science/academia who are not Conservative do not necessarily believe everything our party states as fact.
CyberStats abhors anti-vaccine rhetoric. Here is something to ponder:
https://www.theepochtimes.com/missouri-doctor-faces-500-billion-in-ftc-fines-for-promoting-vitamin-d3-during-pandemic_4865164.html
Besides, the pandemic was declared as gone by Biden. Now the administration extends the emergency authorization until well into 2023. Go figure.
And now there is active promotion for pregnant women to get the Covid vaccine, despite one in six women having menstrual problems as a result, and despite lack of research on follow-on fetus and early childhood development. That’s what I abhor about those vaccines and their mindless promotion.
Cyberstats … thank you for your reply.
When I read the WSJ opinion piece, by Wisse, this morning I immediately thought of Judith. I’m sure you’re aware she has been tireless in promoting a more open atmosphere in academia and the scientific community. Free speech and open debate has been constricted on campus, particularly in the social sciences. So, to see the Salient being published again at Harvard should be good news … for everyone. That the new issue’s topics are motherhood, the family and feminism from what is called a conservative feminist perspective is certainly stepping into fire of current, campus sociological narratives. I’m sure (hope?) there will be vigorous, healthy debate.
Obviously, you are welcome to your political views, as am I and everyone else. The issue today is that when those of us have views that are so ingrained in our psyche that not only can we not discuss rationally with those of a different persuasion, we have already condemned them to a status not fit to be physically tolerated, in the extreme. We become possessed of some knowledge that we ‘know’ they’re wrong, and ‘know’ that they’re dangerous. (I just wish my crystal ball could help me pick stocks.)
I’m sure you’ll agree that this is a situation that should be never accepted, particularly in an academic environment, as it is clearly anti-intellectual. In the end, we all need to look at ourselves and see how much of this boogeyman mentality, irrational fear and resultant bullying, has crept into our thinking and actions.
For myself, I view the political spectrum as not only wide but full of points/positions between the extremes. And, as some physicists have said, like photons many of us even occupy two (or more?) points at the same time. Particular positions/categorization/labels helps conversation but should never be considered a straitjacket.
The rise and continuation of publications like the Salient augurs the death of the boogeyman, not freedom of viewpoint.
Enjoy your day!
Bill Fabrizio
thanks for your thoughtful reply. I look forward to further dialogue with you.
Mistake … and freedom of viewpoint.
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I apologize for the typos, word omissions, and letter inversions; I should have proof-read better.
The long-term solution is nuclear power. Those that disagree should have a word or two with the US Navy.
The Naval Nuclear Propulsion Program provides militarily effective nuclear propulsion plants and ensures their safe, reliable and long-lived operation. This mission requires the combination of fully trained U.S. Navy men and women with ships that excel in endurance, stealth, speed, and independence from supply chains.
Powering the Navy
https://www.energy.gov/nnsa/missions/powering-navy
Our (US) national security depends on safe, clean and reliable nuclear power. Why shouldn’t our home heating and electric cars rely on it as well?
Going with nuclear is like going with wind and solar in that it is strictly a public policy decision. Left to its own devices, and in the absence of zero carbon mandates, the American power generation market would shift decisively towards natural gas.
Public policy decision makers will not consider nuclear as their go-to zero carbon energy solution unless the nuclear industry can demonstrate that a new-build reactor project can be brought in on cost and schedule.
After the VC Summer and Vogtle 3 & 4 cost & schedule overrun debacles, no one in their right mind would consider pursuing another AP1000 size reactor project in this country.
IMHO, the future of new-build nuclear in the US depends on successful roll out of the small modular reactors, the SMRs, in the late 2020’s and early 2030’s.
Beta blocker wrote
“Left to its own devices, and in the absence of zero carbon mandates, the American power generation market would shift decisively towards natural gas”
This type of sweeping assumption needs factual support. I have known many senior people who would decisively prefer nuclear. I think that you might be making deductions influenced by current costs (including social costs) rather than the unencumbered real costs of both. They are complicated economic equations that are seldom treated with reasonable weight given to all influential cost variables, much as we see with deficient economic analysis that says that renewables are 9 times less expensive than fossil fuels for national grid electricity. Just balderdash.
Geoff S
The short build time and comparatively low cost of gas plants would favor them in a free market. Or course if those “senior people” are of the government, we are no longer discussing a free market.
In the real world, of course, you can build out both gas and nuclear.
All we are saying is give free enterprise capitalism a chance…
Well on nuclear power plants and the Navy:
https://news.usni.org/2018/10/02/37045
https://issues.org/nuclear-power-needs-leadership-but-not-from-the-military/
Elsewhere:
https://www.scottishdailyexpress.co.uk/news/scottish-news/dounreay-nuclear-plant-radiation-scare-28358121
Dietrich Hoecht,
that chiropractor was making false claims about vitamin D3 and selling it as a way to significantly reduce COVID deaths by around 51%, so he lied, made a profit on the lie, and so he should be brought up on legal charges.
https://www.kmov.com/2022/03/07/feds-accuse-local-chiropractor-breaking-court-order-by-still-claiming-his-vitamin-products-cure-covid-19/
Highlight:
“Nepute and his company Quickwork claimed that people who get enough “Vitamin D are 52 percent less likely to die and that people who get enough Vitamin D are 77 percent less likely to get the disease,” authorities say. The products were sold under the brand name, “Wellness Warrior.”
https://www.medscape.com/viewarticle/949696 (free sign up).
https://www.thebureauinvestigates.com/stories/2021-02-28/factchecks-and-fake-news-but-facebook-still-let-them-post
Regarding alterations in menstrual cycles from COVID vaccines, there are anecdotal claims and findings from recent studies which show such alterations are ephemeral and not dangerous:
https://www.nih.gov/news-events/news-releases/study-confirms-link-between-covid-19-vaccination-temporary-increase-menstrual-cycle-length#:~:text=A%20large%20international%20study%20has,menses%20(days%20of%20bleeding). Tuesday, September 27, 2022
Highlights;
“A large international study has confirmed the findings of a previous U.S. study that linked COVID-19 vaccination with an average increase in menstrual cycle length of less than one day. The increase was not associated with any change in the number of days of menses (days of bleeding). Funded by the National Institutes of Health, the new study included data from nearly 20,000 people from Canada, the United Kingdom, the United States, Europe and other parts of the world who received any of nine different vaccines. For most study participants, the increase resolved in the cycle following vaccination.”
“On average, vaccinated people experienced an increase of less than one day in each cycle in which they were vaccinated: a .71 day increase after the first dose and a .56 day increase after the second dose. Participants who received both doses in a single cycle had a 3.91 day increase in cycle length. After vaccination, cycle length had increased by only .02 days for individuals who received one dose per cycle, and .85 days for individuals who received two doses in one cycle, compared to participants who were not vaccinated. Changes in cycle length did not differ according to the type of vaccine received.
Of the total, 1,342 participants experienced a change in cycle length of eight or more days, comprising 6.2% of vaccinated individuals and 5.0% of unvaccinated individuals. Women who were younger and who had longer cycle length before vaccination were more likely to experience the increase.”
Vaccines are safe for pregnant women:
https://www.webmd.com/vaccines/covid-19-vaccine/news/20220811/large-study-confirms-covid-vaccines-safe-for-pregnant-women
Highlights:
“Aug. 11, 2022 – Pregnant women should feel confident that Pfizer’s and Moderna’s vaccines against COVID-19 are safe, according to a large new study published today.
In fact, pregnant vaccinated women had lower odds of a significant health event, compared with nonpregnant vaccinated women, after both doses of either mRNA vaccination, the researchers reported in the journal The Lancet Infectious Diseases.”
Regarding how Biden worded things, yes, it could have been worded more carefully, but Fauci among others were downgrading COVID-19 to endemic state and in terms of R0 (R-naught), from full pandemic state; other scientists disagreed. My looking at the data told me to think more cautiously, but COVID is far less life threatening now–time will tell how the mutations play out.
Where are you getting 1/6 from? What data set or study and how serious do you think this is?
Dietrich Hoecht | November 20, 2022 at 10:
CyberStats abhors anti-vaccine rhetoric.
I abhor those vaccines and their mindless promotion.
–
Freedom of choice is a reason to not have a vaccine.
Wishing to prevent an infection with nasty consequences including death in oneself and others is a good reason to have a vaccine.
Whether accompanied by mindless rhetoric or not.
–
Your fixation on the rhetoric is reflective of your views on vaccination.
Reading between the lines you feel vaccines are evil and dangerous and made by people who want to hurt, not help people.
–
I would ask you to consider if there were no vaccines but you found you could make one which prevented mass death and suffering in most people, at a cost to a very few people, would this be a good thing and more importantly would you do it, Deitrich?
–
Or would you prefer to find an or any excuse not to do so?
Very well stated, with great questions.
I had read about the aggressive regimen of Vitamin D3 and Hydrochloroquine of the late Dr. Zelenko. He had great success in early Covid treatment of his enclave of Hassidic Jews. That was in early spring of 2020. I informed the CDC thereof and asked why such treatment recommendations are missing on their website. Of course – no answer.
Here are studies that show the efficacy of Vitamin D3 either as preventative for or treatment of Covid.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0188440922000455?via=ihub
https://www.grassrootshealth.net/blog/study-concludes-vitamin-d-treatment-reduces-covid-19-deaths/
https://www.grassrootshealth.net/blog/14-times-higher-risk-severe-critical-covid-19-disease-pre-infection-vitamin-d-20-ng-ml-50-nmol-l/
https://www.grassrootshealth.net/blog/vitamin-d-level-30-ng-ml-75-nmol-l-independent-risk-factor-covid-19/
https://www.grassrootshealth.net/blog/new-study-shows-53-lower-covid-19-positivity-rate-among-higher-vitamin-d-levels/
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0960076021001515
https://journals.plos.org/plosone/article?id=10.1371/journal.pone.0263069
Here is an intriguing study. Based on several clinical studies and a regression analysis one should achieve total Covid prevention with a 50 ng/ml Vitamin D3 level. Based on my personal experience this should only require a regimen of about 5000 IUs per day:
https://www.mdpi.com/2072-6643/13/10/3596
On menstruation irregularity:
https://www.science.org/content/article/thousands-report-unusual-menstruation-patterns-after-covid-19-vaccination
COVID-19 in pregnancy: implications for fetal brain development;
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC8841149/
Note – I haven’t found any studies that address fetal brain development as a result of Covid vaccination during pregnancy.
Further, my exasperation with Covid vaccination is the coerced and mandatory enforcement by Government entities, as well as the public and social media compliance with active suppression and cancellation of dissenting voices.
We have had deplatforming of advocates of sensible living and immune system strength, like health guru Dr. Mercola. The grotesque persecution of Dr. Nepute with the associated $500 Billion !!!?? fine is a glaring example of the vaccine industry and their government helpers’ clamp-down.
COP 27 wants to start a ‘damage fund’ … for the supposed effects of warming via CO2 to poorer countries. What about the damage from successful environmentalist efforts to poor countries via curbs/bans on mining in Western countries for minerals key to alternative energy?
https://www.wsj.com/articles/heaviest-fighting-in-years-breaks-out-in-congo-as-rivals-seek-control-of-minerals-11669034108?st=eu322rjmyrebjr8&reflink=desktopwebshare_permalink
The hypocrisy is astounding.
China is excluded from having to make contributions. Their emissions dwarf US emissions and are growing at an astronomical rate.
What is the reasonableness of that plan?
I believe India, as well. The plan is BS. They are BS. They’re ignoring their own culpability for the fact that Germany became ‘green’ by relying on Russian NG, the USA stops its own fossil fuel energy development by shipping increasing amounts of it overseas (and the USA does it cleaner), and also farming out mineral development overseas, where it’s done with absolutely no regard for the environment, child labor laws, labor laws in general … and foments wars, as this article shows. As I said … the hypocrisy of these folks is astounding.
Extreme cold records continue to tumble at the South Pole. Three recent days – November 16th, 17th and 18th – have recorded a daily record, with the 18th plunging to –45.2°C, compared with –44.7°C on the same day in 1987. The records follow the six-month winter of 2020-21, which was the coldest since records began in 1957. Inexplicably, all these facts and trends have escaped reporting in the mainstream media. The excuse might be that it is just weather, and temperatures have always moved up and down. But the excuse doesn’t seem to apply to the July 19th U.K. high of 40.3°C at RAF Coningsby, recorded at the side of the runway used by after-burning Typhoon jets. This record high has barely been out of the Net Zero headlines ever since.
https://dailysceptic.org/2022/11/20/south-pole-hits-record-cold-november-temperatures/
Gotta make “green” powered Cali look good.
The Biden administration awarded PG&E Corp. as much as $1.1 billion to help save California’s last two reactors, under a program designed to reinvigorate the US nuclear power industry.
The Energy Department funding for two units at the company’s Diablo Canyon nuclear power plant, which previously were scheduled to be shut down in 2024 and 2025, “creates a path” for the power station to stay open, the agency said Monday in a statement.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-11-21/us-gives-pg-e-up-to-1-1-billion-to-save-california-atomic-plant
Its way more expensive than $1.2B.
Did that article mention that California had just approved $1.4 Billion of state money for the Diablo Canyon plant? Added together that’s $2.5 billion just to extend its life by around 5 years.
“A recent amendment removed a rule that nuclear reactors applying for credits would not be eligible if they recovered more than 50% of their costs from cost-of-service regulation or regulated contracts.
The change came in response to a request from California Gov. Gavin Newsom, who has supported delaying the long-planned closure of Diablo Canyon, the state’s last operating nuclear plant. On September 1, California state legislators approved a $1.4 billion government loan to keep Diablo Canyon running for another five years.”
But Michigan missed out…
“The U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) rejected a request for funding to reopen the Palisades nuclear plant in Michigan, according to plant owner Holtec International…
ClearView Energy Partners, a nonpartisan research group, said in September that Palisades’ closure was “likely to be permanent.” Palisades was out of nuclear fuel, faced a control rod drive seal issue that needed to be fixed and likely needed a new company to operate it, as well as a buyer for the power it generates, ClearView told Reuters.”
https://www.power-eng.com/nuclear/doe-rejects-funding-to-reopen-palisades-nuclear-plant-in-michigan/
In a more promising development, it seems some Texans are moving forward with a commercial molten salt reactor:
“ACU’s NExT Lab estimates to finish molten salt nuclear reactor by 2025”
https://www.texasstandard.org/stories/acu-texas-next-lab-estimates-finish-molten-salt-nuclear-reactor-2025/
It will cost Cali billions more than that just for grid expansion alone for unreliable wind and solar farms. On top of that,
California’s blackouts, which forced millions of homes and businesses to go without electricity for days at a time, cost the state $10 billion, according to a rough estimate from Michael Wara of the Stanford Woods Institute for the Environment.
https://www.americanexperiment.org/californias-10-billion-blackouts/
So it looks like a few billion is small change.
That 10 billion is just a down payment. Wait till you see how much it will cost to bury all those high voltage power lines that cause the fires that cause the blackouts. Another reason to move to microgrids.
The reason for closing Diablo Canyon were corroding heat exchangers. They ordered new ones, but the new exchangers were even worse. Navier-Stokes equations can be a headache even on a small scale.
By Jo Nova
The would be King-Emperors of the world don’t just want to transform energy and change the weather, they also want to rebuild the entire financial system, no doubt to put the UN at the centre of the rivers of money.
Make no mistake, the lauded “loss and damages” fantasy plan was but a shiny bauble to distract you. The bigger ambit is to get the West to pay for the whole world to become a solar and windmill paradise and — “obviously” that means they have to rebuild the entire world’s financial system. (They actually say that).
Consider the numbers: The combined loss and damages claim for 55 countries over twenty years amounts to just $525 billion or a paltry $26 billion a year. But building all the useless renewable farms will supposedly require at least USD 4-6 trillion a year in investments.
Sensible investors will notice that it is 200 times as expensive to try to control the weather with windmills as it is to pay for all the current (theoretical) damage. Sadly, nobody is talking about sensible investments.
The UN announcement comes dressed up in a headline about the paltry Christmas fantasy payments to the third world. But a few paragraphs in are the “other details” about payments that are larger than most national GDP’s and the naked desire for the UN to be the conduit for the cash.
https://joannenova.com.au/2022/11/is-that-all-un-wants-4-6-or-10-trillion-a-year-and-a-transformation-of-the-worlds-financial-system/
Happy Thanksgiving, everyone! Yes, it is an American holiday, but it is an opportunity for us all to give thanks for our lives, those we love and what we have. Enjoy your day!
Biking the other day I ran into a Graduate Student in Physics studying lasers. I ask him if it seemed plausible that vibrating 1 out of every 2,500 molecules could materially impact the kinetic energy of the other 2,499. He of course said that is was unlikely. I then added that the vibration was caused by 15 micron LWIR, which as he knew was consistently with a black body of around -80C. Of course, it didn’t seem plausible. Putting everything into the context of CO2 being the molecule I was talking about, suddenly there must be an explanation that he couldn’t explain right now, but had to go, and he sped off. Only when people are told it has to do with Global Warming does the physics make sense, otherwise it is pure nonsense, not supported by the quantum mechanics of a CO2 molecule.
Yes, it is.
People always distinguish cults from science…
–
https://www.cristos-vournas.com
The Europeans now have to face their fossil fuels folly head on. There is no longer any route to denial. They have listened to the Climate Doomers and failed to produce locally sourced fossil fuels. Now, they pay the piper.
BRUSSELS (AP) — On winter’s doorstep, European Union nations again failed to bridge bitter disagreements over a natural gas price cap Thursday as they struggle to effectively shield 450 million citizens from massive increases in their utility bills.
An emergency meeting of energy ministers only showed how the energy crisis tied to Russia’s war in Ukraine has divided the 27-nation bloc into almost irreconcilable blocs.
“The discussion was quite heated, and you all know that there are very divergent views,” said Czech Industry Minister Jozef Síkela, who chaired the meeting where ministers could not agree on when and how a price cap on gas purchases should kick in.
A massive August spike in natural gas prices stunned all but the wealthiest in Europe, forcing the bloc to look for a cap to contain volatile prices that are fueling inflation.
But the EU is deadlocked between nations demanding cheaper gas to ease household bills — including Greece, Spain, Belgium, France and Poland — and those like Germany and the Netherlands insisting supplies are at risk if a cap stops EU countries from buying gas above a certain price.
A solution was nowhere near the horizon — to the frustration of many.
https://www.wishtv.com/news/international/eu-nations-fail-to-close-rift-on-gas-prices-as-cold-sets-in
Climate Doomers ruin energy in Europe:
Bloomberg) — Energy regulator Ofgem will raise its price cap for the average UK home by 21% to £4,279 ($5,173) from January, underscoring the growing gap the government has to plug to maintain its price freeze.
The UK has been subsidizing Ofgem’s price cap since October in an attempt to shield households from the worst energy crisis in decades. That means a total of around £16 billion in the first three months of 2023 to keep tariffs at £2,500, according to analysis from the Resolution Foundation think tank.
“The Energy Price Guarantee is protecting consumers from soaring energy costs, meaning people’s bills will not rise in line with today’s Ofgem energy price cap increase,” a spokesperson for the Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy said in a statement.
The government has been forced to cut back on its support for households amid rising wholesale costs. Chancellor of the Exchequer Jeremy Hunt increased the energy price guarantee to £3,000 from April. That’s roughly triple a typical annual energy bill before the crisis started last year. A £400 discount on bills for all households also expires at the end of March.
http://www.energyconnects.com/news/utilities/2022/november/uk-faces-16-billion-bill-for-three-months-of-energy-subsidy/
I am of the opinion that the earth’s climate is, indeed, warming, and that it is warming at a higher rate every year. However, I also believe that this is a natural ‘cycle’ if, indeed, we’ve had multiple ice ages. After all, if the earth weren’t warming the majority of the earth would still be covered in ice and humans would be killing mammoth with spears to survive.
I believe that the reason the earth is warming more quickly is because as more ice/snow (which reflect light and heat) melts, more darker, heat-absorbing ground is exposed which, in turn, melts more snow/ice, increasing the air temperature all the more, and the curcular cycle continues. But it is NOT man-caused except that we are part of life on earth.
Am I on the right track at all with this reasoning?
Yes, you are right, it is a natural cycle.
Thank you.
–
https://www.cristos-vournas.com
Western civilizations belief in human caused global warming (AGW) is political science based on hatred of Americanism. AGW is not natural science it’s hypocritical faux science – show me the global warming alarmist that is willing to admit the benefits of making the Earth green again, give up the benefits of modernity and return to the era of the horse and buggy.
You can have all the theory in the world, but sometimes you’ll come across a problem that defies all logic and any theory you have learned.
https://www.cristos-vournas.com
The UK, and the EU, are in trouble due to the Climate Doomers and their energy policies.
UK power prices surged as a sudden decline in wind output crimps supplies prompting network operator National Grid Plc to warn it may need to ask some homes to use less electricity on Tuesday.
Some hourly contracts for Tuesday climbed above £1,200 ($1,445.92) a megawatt-hour on Epex Spot SE as wind generation is set to fall away to almost nothing. The tight supply situation means National Grid may have to use for the first time a new tool that pays some homes to reduce consumption.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-11-28/french-power-prices-drop-as-edf-to-start-nuclear-ramp-up
Net Power LLC announced plans Monday to build the world’s first utility-scale gas power plant with carbon capture, which it said would generate electricity with close to zero emissions.
Construction on the roughly 300-megawatt project will start during the third quarter of 2024 near Odessa, Texas, according to the company. The North Carolina-based Net Power expects the facility to be online in 2026, putting it in a race to become one of only three full-sized power plants ever equipped to capture carbon dioxide emissions.
The announcement comes about a year after Net Power demonstrated its carbon capture technology in a 50-megawatt demonstration project, delivering emissions-free electricity to the grid (Energywire, Nov. 17, 2021). The company says its technology captures close to 100 percent of its carbon dioxide emissions — and does not release other pollution, like nitrogen oxides — by combusting natural gas with pure oxygen and using “supercritical” CO2 as a working fluid to drive a turbine and generate electricity (Energywire, Feb. 23).
https://www.eenews.net/articles/worlds-first-zero-emission-gas-plant-announced-in-texas/
China has completely mishandled COVID. So much for the Communist Utopia.
The protests that erupted against China’s Covid Zero strategy represent one of the most significant challenges to Communist Party rule since the Tiananmen crisis more than 30 years ago. How Xi Jinping responds to it may end up being just as pivotal for the country’s future.
From the capital Beijing to the far western outpost of Kashgar, Chinese residents frustrated by lockdowns and mass-testing campaigns have taken to the streets in recent days to urge change. In Shanghai — stricken by a grueling two-month Covid clampdown earlier this year — one crowd called for Xi to step down, defying the risk of a long prison term. Demonstrations ranged from a few people to street rallies of hundreds.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2022-11-28/xi-has-few-good-options-to-end-historic-china-covid-protests?srnd=premium
jim2 | November 28, 2022 at 10:02 am dropped into moderation.
After a woman is burned death, locked in her apartment by COVID police in China, mass riots ensue. Then, Chinese authorities blatantly lie about it. Isn’t democracy wonderful?
Chinese Communist Party (CCP) state propaganda outlet Xinhua News published a Nov. 27 article boasting about how China has a “thriving” economy because it is “opening up” and has an “optimized business” environment. Except that mass anti-regime protests against draconian lockdowns and inhumane working conditions are filling China’s streets, leading to multiple reports of CCP police violence. China’s economy is apparently more fragile than the CCP would like to admit.
The article, “Chinese economy thriving with wider opening-up over past decade,” claimed: “China’s stable economic performance, unwavering opening-up policy, optimized business environment and stronger protection of the legitimate rights and interests of foreign investors a[re] key factors behind its strong appeal.” Meanwhile workers from companies like Apple iPhone manufacturer Foxconn are rioting to protest what the Wall Street Journal previously described as “harsh conditions.”
https://pjmedia.com/news-and-politics/catherinesalgado/2022/11/27/china-boasts-about-thriving-economy-as-mass-protests-police-violence-fill-streets-n1648893
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I have known you a long time, Judith. You continue to impress. Beautiful article. But I suggest you may have paid Reilly Neill from you fossil fuel earnings to make the stupid post to set all of this up. You are that smart. Ron
The “evolution” of climate change denial: “The earth is cooling, not warming. OK, the earth is warming overall, but it’s just natural variation. OK, the overall warming of the earth is too steep to be natural variation, but it’s not caused by human activities. OK, it’s caused by human activities, but so what, it’ll make plants grow better, at least the plants that survive the droughts.”
Billy
Nobody I am aware of ever denied that the climate changes. It has always changed and always will as the land masses always be changing shape
The reasonable question is whether human released CO2 is causing warming at such a high rate so to result in an overall worsened climate. That is not an easy question to answer. Some places get a better climate as it changes, some get an adverse impact.
We do not have reliable models of the future climate as of yet so the topic is subject to debate. Hence this site. Comments seem to take a few minutes to get through now.
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Your link claimed by you ( https://www.usgs.gov/centers/norock/science/time-series-glacier-retreat#overview ) to have data for your claim of:
A ~50% loss from LIA to 1966 (~115 years), averaging a loss of ~4.5% per decade
Additional ~12% loss from 1966-98 (32 years), averaging a loss of ~3.7% per decade
Additional ~4.75% loss from 1998-2015 (17 years), averaging a loss of ~2.8% per decade
did not show me such data. I even followed links from this link. Did I miss something? I wanted to see what the percentage loss from is in each of these (whether from start of subset periods or from end of LIA), and I did not find data at all. If I missed something, would you please say where I can find it?
Meanwhile, I did find elsewhere: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:USGSglacierssince1850.jpg I see this as somewhat (a little) supporting a claim of slowing down of rate of loss in terms of square meters per year, but at least as much supporting a contention of glacier halflife decreasing after the early 1900s, especially towards that graph’s end year of 1993.
Although, I agree with your point about signs that got taken down for being excessively alamist. For one thing, I think one thing for a 1st order projection glacier retreat is increase of altitude for a specific average temperature in a region, from dividing amount of projected warming during a time period by the lapse rate. And, consider actual warming rate (such as indicated by UAH v6 TLT) as opposed to modeled by the medians of CMIP3, CMIP5 and (even worse) CMIP6 models.
Donald L. Klipstein wrote:
Meanwhile, I did find elsewhere: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:USGSglacierssince1850.jpg I see this as somewhat (a little) supporting a claim of slowing down of rate of loss in terms of square meters per year, but at least as much supporting a contention of glacier halflife decreasing after the early 1900s, especially towards that graph’s end year of 1993.
It may be the Glacier NP glacier area never gets to zero, for example because of glaciers on the north side of mountains.
It would be nice to see a graph updated to the most recent observation year, but this graph is hardly evidence for climate change denial. The glaciers in the NP have been melting significantly in a relatively short time. It does seem the NP admins overstated the degree of melting expected. It’s silly to crow about that (if you’re a denier) given the obvious trends and losses.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:USGSglacierssince1850.jpg
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JC says, with regard to home heating in Montana: “The options are nuclear, gas and coal.”
I’d add a fourth option: Death. And maybe that’s what it will take to wake up the alarmists and their believers.
http://www.earthsciencescanada.com/geovista/PDFs_en/vistas8_agci.pdf
Quote: “Will the Athabasca Glacier melt away altogether? It’s
possible. Some 5000 years ago, during a period not much
warmer than the present, the middle of the Columbia Icefield
was forest, not ice.”
Judith,
How about a brief, bullet-point summary in Plain English Reilly might read. No politician – or their staff – is going to read what is here.
kerry