Author Archives: curryja

Emergent constraints on climate sensitivity: Part I

Posted on March 19, 2018 | 119 comments

by Nic Lewis

Emergent constraints on climate sensitivity:  their nature and assessment of validity.

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119 Comments

Posted in Sensitivity & feedbacks

Recent research on aerosol forcing of the CMIP5 models

Posted on March 11, 2018 | 169 comments

by Frank Bosse

A few days ago a paper (Sato et al) dealing with some aspects of the “Aerosol Cloud Interactions”, (ACI, also called “aerosol indirect effects”) was released. It bolsters the conclusions of earlier papers: the effective radiative forcing from ACI (ERFaci) is smaller than thought, perhaps near zero .

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169 Comments

Posted in Sensitivity & feedbacks

What are the main sources of heat that account for the incremental rise in temperature on Earth?

Posted on March 9, 2018 | 227 comments

by Judith Curry

Suggestions for the climate ‘red team’ response.

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227 Comments

Posted in Attribution

Will advances in groundwater science force a paradigm shift in sea level rise attribution?

Posted on March 4, 2018 | 117 comments

by Jim Steele

 A better accounting of natural groundwater discharge is needed to constrain the range of contributions to sea level rise. The greater the contribution from groundwater discharge, the smaller the adjustments used to amplify contributions from meltwater and thermal expansion.

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117 Comments

Posted in Attribution, Oceans

The Rise and Fall of Central England Temperatures: Part II

Posted on March 3, 2018 | 140 comments

by Tony Brown

This article examines the continued cooling of CET this century

  • Looks at a similar scenario of regional cooling in America
  • Examines CET related urbanisation issues, and the current Met office allowances for this
  • Notes the centuries long general warming of our climate.
  • Notes considerable English seasonal variability over the centuries
  • Examines the key component parts of the weather that affect the British Isles
  • Queries whether wind direction, strength and longevity are major factors in shaping our climate over the centuries.

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140 Comments

Posted in Attribution, Data and observations, History

Nature Unbound VIII – Modern global warming

Posted on February 26, 2018 | 871 comments

by Javier

Summary: Modern Global Warming has been taking place for the past 300 years. It is the last of several multi-century warming periods that have happened during the Neoglacial cooling of the past 3000 years. Analysis of Holocene climate cycles shows that the period 1600-2100 AD should be a period of warming. The evidence suggests that Modern Global Warming is within Holocene variability, but the cryosphere displays a non-cyclical retreat that appears to have undone thousands of years of Neoglacial ice advance. The last 70 out of 300 years of Modern Global Warming are characterized by human-caused, extremely unusual, rapidly increasing CO2 levels. In stark contrast with this rapidly accelerating anthropogenic forcing, global temperature and sea level appear to have continued their rising trend with no perceptible evidence of added acceleration. The evidence supports a higher sensitivity to CO2 in the cryosphere, suggesting a negative feedback by H2O, that prevents CO2 from having the same effect elsewhere.

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871 Comments

Posted in Attribution, Sensitivity & feedbacks

Sea level rise acceleration (or not): Part IV – Satellite era record

Posted on February 17, 2018 | 207 comments

by Judith Curry

Part IV of the Climate Etc. series on sea level rise focuses on the satellite era (since 1993), including the recent causes of sea level variations and arguments regarding the acceleration (or not) of recent sea level rise.

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207 Comments

Posted in Data and observations, Oceans

Update: libel cases and the ‘climate wars’

Posted on February 14, 2018 | 139 comments

by Judith Curry

Big news in the world of ‘climate wars’ – the libel case of Andrew Weaver versus Tim Ball has been dismissed by the judge —  for a rather surprising reason.

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139 Comments

Posted in Sociology of science

Sea level rise acceleration (or not): Part III – 19th & 20th century observations

Posted on February 10, 2018 | 95 comments

By Judith Curry

“We are in the uncomfortable position of extrapolating into the next century without understanding the last.” – Walter Munk 

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95 Comments

Posted in Data and observations, Oceans

Marvel et al.’s new paper on estimating climate sensitivity from observations

Posted on February 5, 2018 | 784 comments

by Nic Lewis

Recently a new model-based paper on climate sensitivity was published by Kate Marvel, Gavin Schmidt and others, titled ‘Internal variability and disequilibrium confound estimates of climate sensitivity from observations’.[1]

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784 Comments

Posted in Sensitivity & feedbacks

The Top 50 Women in STEM

Posted on February 1, 2018 | 78 comments

by Judith Curry

Inspiring biosketches of some amazing female scientists, which rather astonishingly includes moi.

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78 Comments

Posted in Sociology of science

Impact of Climate Change on Human Evolution: The Odyssey from Africa

Posted on January 25, 2018 | 77 comments

by Phil Salmon

How a small group of people from Africa changed the world. Continue reading →

77 Comments

Posted in Climate change impacts

Sea level rise acceleration (or not): Part II – The geological record

Posted on January 24, 2018 | 107 comments

By Judith Curry

Part II of the Climate Etc. series on sea level rise –the geological record provides context for the recent sea level rise.

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107 Comments

Posted in Oceans

Nature Unbound VII – Climate change mechanisms

Posted on January 21, 2018 | 68 comments

by Javier

Climate variations that alter the angular momentum of the atmosphere modify the speed of the Earth’s rotation, which affects the length of day (LOD). Alterations in LOD integrate different climate-affecting phenomena, and can anticipate turning points in climate.

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68 Comments

Posted in Attribution, Solar

Sea level rise acceleration (or not): Part I – Introduction

Posted on January 16, 2018 | 349 comments

by Judith Curry

Introduction and context for a new Climate Etc. series on sea level rise.

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349 Comments

Posted in Attribution, Climate change impacts, Oceans

Manufacturing consensus: the early history of the IPCC

Posted on January 3, 2018 | 385 comments

by Judith Curry

Short summary: scientists sought political relevance and allowed policy makers to put a big thumb on the scale of the scientific assessment of the attribution of climate change.

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385 Comments

Posted in Attribution, Consensus, IPCC, Sociology of science

Looking forward to 2018

Posted on January 1, 2018 | 102 comments

by Judith Curry

Happy New Year everyone!  My ‘prognostications’, hopes and goals for 2018.

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102 Comments

Posted in Welcome

JC’s (un)motivated reasoning

Posted on December 28, 2017 | 315 comments

by Judith Curry

“I think open explorations of the ideological assumptions scientists bring into policy debates are not only welcome but often necessary for having productive conversations.” – Aaron Huertas

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315 Comments

Posted in Sociology of science

Reply to Patrick Brown’s response to comments on his Nature article

Posted on December 24, 2017 | 286 comments

by Nic Lewis

My reply to Patrick Brown’s response to my my comments on his Nature article.

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286 Comments

Posted in Sensitivity & feedbacks

Forgone benefits of disruption to nuclear power since late-1960’s

Posted on December 21, 2017 | 352 comments

by Peter Lang

Could the costs of nuclear power have been 10% of what they are if not for the disruption?

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352 Comments

Posted in Energy

Greater future global warming (still) predicted from Earth’s recent energy budget

Posted on December 21, 2017 | 69 comments

by Patrick Brown

A response to Nic Lewis’ post A closer look shows global warming will not be greater than we thought.

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69 Comments

Posted in Sensitivity & feedbacks

Long-range predictability of seasonal Atlantic hurricane activity

Posted on December 20, 2017 | 14 comments

by Jim Johnstone and Judith Curry

Climate Forecast Applications Network (CFAN) has identified new early precursors for seasonal Atlantic hurricane activity that involve systematic, repeating interactions among ENSO, stratospheric circulations and regional North Atlantic processes.

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14 Comments

Posted in Hurricanes

Brown and Caldeira: A closer look shows global warming will not be greater than we thought

Posted on December 15, 2017 | 245 comments

by Nic Lewis

A critique of a recent paper by Brown and Caldeira published in Nature that predicted greater than expected global warming.

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245 Comments

Posted in climate models, Sensitivity & feedbacks

The cost of displacing fossil fuels: some evidence from Texas

Posted on December 14, 2017 | 100 comments

by Peter Hartley

Although technological progress can alter the relative costs of different energy sources, depletion inevitably must raise the costs of fossil fuels leading to their displacement by alternative energy sources. What energy technology will likely be used when fossil fuels are no longer dominant? More importantly, what will be the cost of that alternative “backstop” energy supply?

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100 Comments

Posted in Energy

Is climate change the culprit causing California’s wildfires?

Posted on December 13, 2017 | 107 comments

by Larry Kummer

We’re told that climate change caused or intensified California’s wildfires — and that such fires are getting worse. As usual for such scary stories, these claims are only weakly supported by science — except for the ones that are outright fabrications.

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107 Comments

Posted in Causation, Climate change impacts