Peddling a "Cure" Worse than the Disease
The 2004 election is over and defeated liberals are urging President Bush to pander to them, not the conservative majority that re-elected him. One issue liberal activists have pushed since Election Day is global warming, and network reporters are again ringing alarm bells about the climate catastrophe that supposedly awaits. "Severe climate change is accelerating," ABC's Bill Blakemore warned on Monday's World News Tonight as he quoted a pair of alarmist reports. "Polar bears are starving as the ice they hunt on vanishes, along with the seals they eat. Millions of birds are affected as spring comes too early and the fish they eat [have] gone to seek cooler waters."
ABC directly attributed global warming to "the increase in man-made gases since the Industrial Revolution," and passed along advice that "cutting back emissions from burning fossil fuels should eventually stop the warming, but will still take many decades." But ABC was silent on the high costs associated with such a severe cutback, and ignored the fact that many scientists doubt liberals' alarmist predictions. ABC's one-sided approach is all too typical, according to a new study by the MRC's Free Market Project. Researchers looked at coverage of global warming on ABC, CBS, CNN, NBC, and the Fox News Channel on each network's evening newscast from January 20, 2001 through September 30, 2004. They found the coverage reinforced liberal theories about a dangerous man-made global warming, while all but ignoring the dangers of enacting liberals' solution:
* No Debate Over the Science. Of the 107 stories that discussed the causes of global warming, the vast majority (83 percent) failed to mention scientific doubts about the truth of environmental activists' claims of an impending global warming catastrophe. No story was biased against the liberal view, and only one out of six (17 percent) offered a glimpse of the conservative position alongside liberal theories. But doubts abound: One flaw in liberal arguments: Satellite and weather balloon data show none of the warming found by land-based thermometers.
* Hyping the Harm. TV reporters tried to link specific weather events to global climate change. On August 6, 2003, NBC's Patricia Sabga blamed a European heat wave on global warming. "Learning to live with blistering heat may prove a long-term strategy," she counseled. But that same week, the eastern United States was experiencing much cooler than normal temperatures.
* Little Coverage of Kyoto's Costs. Environmentalists got their wish in 1998 when the Clinton administration signed the Kyoto treaty, agreeing to a sharp reduction in carbon emissions. The U.S. got the worst of that deal - other countries were assigned lower reductions or completely exempted. The Senate voted 95-0 to reject those terms, but liberals still insist Kyoto is the model for "solving" the global warming problem.
But while network coverage stressed the need to reduce emissions, only ABC and Fox - just once each - gave viewers statistics summarizing the conservative point that Kyoto would cost millions of jobs and punish families to the tune of $2,700 a year. In 1998, the Clinton administration also estimated the high costs of complying with Kyoto, but those numbers never made it on the airwaves. During Bush's first term, the networks aligned themselves with activists hoping that America would punish itself by accepting something like the onerous Kyoto treaty. Coverage since November 2 indicates more of the same awaits.
Source
GLOBAL WARMING ON MARS TOO
It's all those factories and power stations they've got up there
"Mars' distinctive personality is finally emerging. After five successful Mars missions launched in the past seven years, planetary scientists no longer describe the fourth planet from the sun in terms of its better-known relatives - Mars as the moon with an atmosphere, as Earth with craters. Today, scientists know far more about the salty sea that once washed across Mars' face and the volcanoes that erupted billions of years ago, experts said Tuesday night at a free public Mars forum.
A few billion years ago, Mars sported liquid water and temperatures balmy enough that life could have been possible, the scientists concluded. "It had habitable environments," said Steven Squyres, a Cornell University planetary scientist. "Now the question becomes, 'Were they actually inhabited?"'
Michael Malin, president of Malin Space Science Systems, talked about gullies that may have been sculpted recently by liquid water; evidence of ancient seas; and the discovery that the planet's south polar cap of dry ice is losing weight. "Mars is experiencing global warming," Malin said. "And we don't know why.""
There seems to be general agreement that there has been a slight global warming on earth in recent years but it is only theory to say that the warming has been caused by human activity. One of several alternative explanations is that the output of the sun has gone up fractionally in that time. Solar variability has, of course, been known since Galileo. Since there are no people on Mars and Mars is also undergoing recent global warming, variability in solar output becomes the obvious explanation for what is happening to both planets. Were the Greenies not involved, the "anthropogenic" theory of terrestrial global warming would be universally dismissed as bunk.
More here
IS ENGLAND GETTING WARMER?
This past week has seen significant media coverage of UK Prime Minister Tony Blair's 'global warming' fears.... We might wonder what makes him so fearful.... The most impressive warming evident occurred from the 1690s through 1730s with the running mean climbing almost 2øC! We imagine that was a significant relief in the depths of the Little Ice Age although 1740 was obviously a bummer. Abrupt warmings also occurred in the 1770s; 1810s/20s; 1890s and 1990s. Abrupt coolings are evident and a relatively sustained warming in the first half of the Twentieth Century. With our 10-year running mean showing warmer than the series mean for almost the entire Twentieth Century it is fair to say there has been a net warming over the record period. Some argue that warming is a problem and we will not dwell on our contention that warming is distinctly preferable to cooling.
Having established that there has been a warming and avoided the question of whether this constitutes a problem, the next and obvious question is: "why has this occurred?" Tony Blair appears convinced by the enhanced greenhouse hypothesis but atmospheric CO2 levels do not fit changes in the CET at all well. For example, from 1695 to 1733, the annual mean temperature rose from 7.25øC to 10.47øC at a time when there was negligible change in atmospheric CO2 - the running mean did not return to such readings until the 1990s. On the other hand, annual mean temperatures fell from 10.62øC in 1949 to 8.47øC by 1963, a period when atmospheric CO2 levels were measurably rising. Greenhouse does not appear to be exerting a strong influence on the CET.
If not greenhouse then what? Certainly there has been significant urbanization - with the English population rising from about 9 million in 1800 to almost 50 million now that is inevitable. Urbanization or at least population growth, however, has been continuously positive since the mid-17th century and that does not really suit our mean temperature track either. Or does it? Consider the effect of so many more urbanites and their fuel sources of the day - see how Roehampton University writes it up:
What is the urban effect on sunshine? This is one aspect of the region's climate that has dramatically changed over the late 19th and 20th centuries. At the height of the Industrial Revolution in the latter half of the 19th century, vast amounts of smoke and soot were emitted into the atmosphere in London. This led to the absorption or blocking of a remarkable proportion of the incoming radiation from the sunshine and hence sunshine amounts were curtailed.
It is difficult to believe today how profound this effect was and how quickly it has changed. In the 1880s, it was estimated that London was 'losing' up to 80% of its winter sunshine. In December 1890 no sunshine was recorded at Westminster. As recently as 1921-50, central London averaged only 50% of the winter sunshine as surrounding rural areas. The effect was concentrated in winter because of the increased emission of smoke and soot associated with the greater use of coal burning to heat houses and offices and also because of the low angle of the sun.
The situation is quite different today - emissions of pollutants that cause a shading effect have dropped dramatically with the switch away from coal as the prime source of energy in industry and in the home, a change well under way before the passing of the Clean Air Acts in the 1950s and 1960s. Not only has this led to a reduction in the frequency of winter smogs and fog (possibly assisted by more mobile, changeable winters in recent decades) but on occasions, central London is now sunnier than the outlying areas because of the urban heating effect evaporating low cloud or fog.
Seems plausible, a lot more people, all using what would currently be abhorred as "dirty" fuels, could conceivably generate enough smoke to interfere with solar warming, at least regionally. We are not aware that anyone seriously disputes the dramatic improvement in urban air quality over the Twentieth Century so increased solar radiation penetration to surface must at least be entertained as a probable result. Here is a mechanism by which increasing populations could influence both increase and decrease of regional temperatures and specifically where near-surface temperature readings are recorded. Importantly, it is not merely current urban heat island effect, which datasets try to address (with varying and, we think, limited success) that is affected by urbanization but, through earlier regional sunshine suppression, prior cooling (not addressed in any dataset to our knowledge) that gives the impression of current warming within the dataset. While merely an assertion rather than any form of cause and effect explanation for recorded temperature trends, the differing effect of urbanization over time highlights some of the problems with simplistic associations like enhanced greenhouse - it is not as simple as: atmospheric greenhouse gas levels have risen; recorded temperatures have risen - therefore greenhouse gases drive temperature......
Tony Blair seems to have fallen into the old post hoc, ergo propter hoc (it happened after, so it was caused by) trap. Do global temperatures react to recent increases in atmospheric greenhouse gasses? Quite possibly but temperatures obviously respond to other influences, possibly much more so than atmospheric CO2. From what we can see, GHGs are a poor fit with measured global near-surface temperatures, so, too, are simple urbanization and sunspot numbers, although length of solar cycle appears to have promise as a primary driver.
Whatever is finally discovered to be the case, simplistic notions about greenhouse gasses appear to fit the post hoc fallacy far better than they do global temperature. Some of the things so briefly discussed here might be drivers of global temperature but hardly in isolation. As the source of global warmth, the sun, and its various phases, looks a likely culprit as a primary driver of global climate, as do the Earth's orbital eccentricities.
On reflection, having the CET show the 1990s just barely eclipse annual mean temperature recorded in 1733 (a 266 year-old record following a temperature climb of ~3.25øC in under 4 decades, a rise which would cause pandemonium today), suggests negligible warming over two and one-half centuries, despite massive population increase, urbanization and clearer skies allowing greater solar radiation penetration to ground. We freely admit cherry picking some of the dates used for comparison here - and why not, the greenhouse industry is shameless in their selective use of data - our purpose is to demonstrate that there's really nothing new under the sun.
A favorite comparison is the temperature increase since 1880 (roughly the end of the Little Ice Age) and that's fine. The CET above certainly indicates an annual mean increase of ~1.6øC 1880-1999 - half that observed 1695-1733. Twice the warming occurred over one-third the time and this was before humanity could possibly have significantly influenced the greenhouse gas balance in the atmosphere, so why the current panic over possible warming and specifically over atmospheric CO2?
To return to our original point, Tony Blair has made much of enhanced greenhouse and global warming - the Central England Temperature record suggests his fears are groundless. You can either believe a 340-year temperature record or a politician - suit yourself.
More (much more) here
***************************************
Many people would like to be kind to others so Leftists exploit that with their nonsense about equality. Most people want a clean, green environment so Greenies exploit that by inventing all sorts of far-fetched threats to the environment. But for both, the real motive is to promote themselves as wiser and better than everyone else, truth regardless.
Comments? Email me here. My Home Page is here or here. For times when blogger.com is playing up, there is a mirror of this site (viewable even in China!) here
*****************************************
Jim Hansen and his twin
No comments:
Post a Comment