REAL cause for climate alarm developing

Norm Kalmanovitch [kalhnd@shaw.ca] points out the problems that more global cooling will bring -- with starvation looming for the poorest

The next IPCC Report will be the first report that actually has scientific justification for being "alarmist" because by 2014 we will be well into solar cycle 24 and severe global cooling. This will confirm that the global cooling which started in 2002 is related to solar activity and the likelihood that the current solar activity pattern is mimicking the Dalton Minimum that brought about an extension of the Little Ice Age.

The first IPCC Report in 1990 depicted a temperature reconstruction showing the Medieval Warm Period and the Little Ice Age. While there is well over half a degree C left to go before the world actually reaches the pleasant temperature of the Medieval Warm Period, this will not be reached for several decades because, in spite of continuously increasing CO2 emissions, the world is cooling in response to solar cycles, and we are very likely headed for at least two decades of rather unpleasant cool temperatures.

Close inspection of the graph in the 1990 IPCC Report shows the Little Ice Age corresponding exactly to the Maunder Minimum, and the recovery from the depths of the Little Ice Age is terminated by the return to cold temperatures consistent with the Dalton Minimum.

The justifiable alarmism in the 2014 IPCC Report will not be about sea level rise. This is because the rate of sea level rise has actually decreased over the past decade, negating any possible claims of increased sea level rise related to the 29.3% increase in global CO2 emissions in the past ten years.

The justifiable alarmism will be about shortages in both global food supplies and global energy supply. The food supply will be reduced because of the shortened growing seasons in the "temperate food supplying regions" of the world resulting from this global cooling. This reduction in food supply will only exacerbate the current global food crisis caused by Kyoto "carbon credit initiatives" that have turned "food crops" into "biofuel crops" with the resultant widespread starvation of the poorest people in the poorest nations.

The potential energy shortages will result from the increased energy demand dictated by the cooler temperatures. This shortage will be far more severe than it should be because of the costly, inefficient, and limited solar and wind power initiatives and the virtual stagnation in expansion of efficient and high volume energy producing facilities for the past decade that have resulted from The Kyoto Protocol initiatives and exorbitant "Carbon Capture and Sequestration" (CCS) requirements that have made expansion of fossil fuel power production facilities economically unfeasible.

The global data demonstrates that there was only 23 years, from 1975 to 1998, during which there was actual global warming concurrent with rapid increases in CO2 emissions from fossil fuels. Prior to that, the world cooled from 1942 to 1795 with increasing CO2 emissions that went from 4gt/year in 1942 to over 20gt/year by 1975. During the rapid global warming that preceded this cooling period, there was only a minor increase from 3.5gt/year at the start of the warming in 1910, to 4gt/year by 1942 when the warming ended.

By the time of the next report in 2014, CO2 emissions will have increased by at least another 2gt/year but not producing any global warming for 16 years (and over a decade of actual global cooling in spite of increasing CO2 emissions).

If the IPCC claims any possible link between CO2 emissions and global warming in this 2014 Report; it will be a clear indication that this agency is completely devoid of any integrity; neither scientific nor moral.

Received by email




The Muir Russell whitewash of "Climategate"

The "old boy network" defends its own

The University of East Anglia's enquiry into the conduct of its own staff at its Climatic Research Unit has highlighted criticisms of the department and staff conduct - but clears the path for the individuals concerned to carry on.

The CRU played an important role in writing the UN's IPCC summaries on climate science, so the issue is far from a parochial one. The most serious charge is poor communication; Sir Muir Russell even calls for "a concerted and sustained campaign to win hearts and minds" to restore confidence in the team's work.

Russell was appointed by the institution to investigate an archive of source code and emails that leaked onto the internet last November. The source code is not addressed at all. His report suggests that the problems were of the academics' own making, stating that they were "united in defence against criticism". Yet the enquiry found that despite emails promising to "redefine" the peer review publication process, and put pressure on journal editors, staff were not guilty of subverting the IPCC process, and their "rigour" and "honesty" were beyond question.

Leading academics were called for written and oral evidence before the Russell enquiry, and in many cases the report accepts their account of events. The subjects of their criticism were not invited, not were climate scientists critical of their behaviour. For example, in their capacity as IPCC gatekeepers, the academics are cleared of excluding critical evidence, and yet bending the rules to include supporting studies.

To reach this particular conclusion, for example, the report finds a criterion: a "consistence of view" with earlier work. The earlier work here was in fact produced the academics under scrutiny. So, having compared the CRU academics' work against their previous work, and found it to be consistent, they are cleared of malpractice [!!]

Despite the gentlemanly and clubbable tone, the report nevertheless has deep systemic criticism of the institution and the team's processes. UEA "fell badly short of its scientific and public obligations", according to one review panel member, Lancet editor Richard Horton.

It criticises the team's decision to curtail a temperature reconstruction at 1960, and splice on an instrumental temperature record, without explanation, noting: "The figure supplied for the WMO Report was misleading in not describing that one of the series was truncated post 1960 for the figure, and in not being clear on the fact that proxy and instrumental data were spliced together. We do not find that it is misleading to curtail reconstructions at some point per se, or to splice data."

There's a selective approach to criticism of scientific techniques - officially, Muir Russell says it doesn't examine the validity of scientific arguments. But as you can see, in places, it does. On the issue of the Yamal reconstruction, CRU is cleared but the related issues of basing the reconstruction on a limited sample of proxies, and using techniques which exaggerate and validate outliers (basically, one tree) is not addressed.

On compliance with Freedom of Information requests, the inquiry found the CRU team evasive, and "found a tendency to answer the wrong question or to give a partial answer". They also found "a clear incitement to delete e-mails, although we have seen no evidence of any attempt to delete information in respect of a request already made". (Jones had told a US academic that "I think I'll delete the file rather than send to anyone” and requesting deletions from other staff.)

The defensiveness "set the stage", says Russell, for the barrage of FOIA requests last year, but "clear and early action would likely have prevented much subsequent grief". It adds that "CRU helped create the conditions for this campaign by being unhelpful in its earlier responses".

The institution itself had failed to anticipate the new FOIA regime, and let the academics run amok. Strangely it calls for "a concerted and sustained campaign to win hearts and minds" to restore confidence.

On information handling, the report "highlighted significant problems in the areas of: imbalance of authority; lack of effective challenge at appeal; over dependence on single individuals; inadequate escalation processes and limited strategic oversight."

The panel avoided examining the scientific work of the CRU Team - as have the two other reviews of the leaked archive by Lord Oxburgh, and the Commons Select Committee on science. If the academics had used bats' wings or tea leaves to create temperature reconstructions, that wasn't a matter for any of the panels to judge. And this is undoubtedly a shortcoming. The voter is entitled to see the evidence and understand the arguments that may answer the question: "Is this climate thing anything to worry about?"

More HERE

Something to think about: A succinct summary of Muir Russell logic below

Sir Muir Russell summarizes his CRU inquiry as follows:

* This was not about forming a view on the content or quality of the scientific work and the conclusions drawn by CRU.

* We did not find any evidence of behaviour that might undermine the conclusions of the IPCC assessments.

Let's subject these statements to a logical mathematical analysis:

* (1) The scientific work was not an issue.

* (2) The conclusions of the IPCC assessments were not undermined.

Combining (1) and (2) we conclude that what Muir Russell effectively says is: "IPCC conclusions are not based on scientific work". Seems correct.

SOURCE





"Adiabatic" effects and the temperature of Venus

Adiabatic effects -- in this case the effect of pressure on the temperature of gases -- have been known for centuries, but they have only recently been remembered in explaining earth's temperature. But they explain the temperature of Venus best of all -- unlike the quite fraudulent "runaway greenhouse effect" that is usually invoked to explain why Venus is superheated.

Note that even on Earth in places like like the Dead Sea, or Death Valley, or the deep gold mines in South Africa, which are all below sea level, temperatures are significantly higher than in comparable regions at sea level, and that has nothing to do with the CO2 content of the atmosphere but rather due to adiabatic compression.

The first problem is that the surface of Venus receives no direct sunshine. The Venusian atmosphere is full of dense, high clouds “30–40 km thick with bases at 30–35 km altitude.“ The way a greenhouse effect works is by shortwave radiation warming the ground, and greenhouse gases impeding the return of long wave radiation to space. Since there is very little sunshine reaching below 30km on Venus, it does not warm the surface much. This is further evidenced by the fact that there is almost no difference in temperature on Venus between day and night. It is just as hot during their very long (1400 hours) nights, so the 485C temperatures can not be due to solar heating and a resultant greenhouse effect. The days on Venus are dim and the nights are pitch black.

The next problem is that the albedo of Venus is very high, due to the 100% cloud cover. At least 65% of the sunshine received by Venus is immediately reflected back into space. Even the upper atmosphere doesn’t receive a lot of sunshine. The top of Venus’ atmosphere receives 1.9 times as much solar radiation as earth, but the albedo is more than double earth’s – so the net effect is that Venus’ upper atmosphere receives a lower TSI than earth.

The third problem is that Venus has almost no water vapor in the atmosphere. The concentration of water vapor is about one thousand times greater on earth.

Water vapor is a much more important greenhouse gas than CO2, because it absorbs a wider spectrum of infrared light

The effects of increasing CO2 decay logarithmically. Each doubling of CO2 increases temperatures by 2-3C. So if earth went from .04% CO2 to 100% CO2, it would raise temperatures by less than 25-36C.

Even worse, if earth’s atmosphere had almost no water (like Venus) temperatures would be much colder – like the Arctic. The excess CO2 does not begin to compensate for the lack of H2O. Water vapour accounts for 70-95% of the greenhouse effect on earth. The whole basis of the CAGW argument is that H2O feedback will overwhelm the system, yet Venus has essentially no H2O to feed back. CAGW proponents are talking out of both sides of their mouth.

So why is Venus hot? Because it has an extremely high atmospheric pressure. The atmospheric pressure on Venus is 92X greater than earth. Temperatures in Earth’s atmosphere warm over 80C going from 20 kPa (altitude 15km) to 100 kPa (sea level.) That is why mountains are much colder than the deserts which lie at their base.

The atmospheric pressure on Venus is greater than 9,000 kPa. At those pressures, we would expect Venus to be very hot. Much, much hotter than Death Valley.

This is very close to what we see on Venus. The high temperatures there can be almost completely explained by atmospheric pressure – not composition. If 90% of the CO2 in Venus atmosphere was replaced by Nitrogen, it would change temperatures there by only a few tens of degrees.

More HERE (See the original for links, graphics etc.)

Update here

German physicists Gerlich and Tscheuschner are also very scathing on the matter. Excerpt:

In the speculative discussion around the existence of an atmospheric natural greenhouse effect or the existence of an atmospheric CO2 greenhouse effect it is sometimes stated that the greenhouse effect could modify the temperature profile of the Earth’s atmosphere.

This conjecture is related to another popular but incorrect idea communicated by some proponents of the global warming hypothesis, namely the hypothesis that the temperatures of the Venus are due to a greenhouse effect. For instance, in their book “Der Klimawandel. Diagnose, Prognose, Therapie” (Climate Change. Diagnosis, Prognosis, Therapy) “two leading international experts”, Hans-Joachim Schellnhuber and Stefan Rahmstorf, present a “compact and understandable review” of “climate change” to the general public.

On page 32 they explicitly refer to the “power” of the “greenhouse effect” on the Venus. The claim of Rahmstorf and Schellhuber is that the high venusian surface temperatures somewhere between 400 and 500 Celsius degrees are due to an atmospheric CO2 greenhouse effect.

Of course, they are not. On the one hand, since the venusian atmosphere is opaque to visible light, the central assumption of the greenhouse hypotheses is not obeyed. On the other hand, if one compares the temperature and pressure profiles of Venus and Earth, one immediately will see that they are both very similar.

An important difference is the atmospheric pressure on the ground, which is approximately two orders higher than on the Earth. At 50 km altitude the venusian atmospheric pressure corresponds to the normal pressure on the Earth with temperatures at approximately 37 Celsius degrees. [i.e. a temperature fairly common in tropical regions on earth --JR]




Scientists as propagandists: "developing stories"

The facts obviously don't speak for themselves. An excerpt below from the reliably Warmist "Nature" magazine. I always thought that research was what scientists did, not "developing stories". I guess that shows what an old fogey I am

At Climate Central, a non-profit organization based in Princeton, New Jersey, scientists work with journalists and writers to develop climate stories in partnership with media outlets. The idea came together in 2008, backed by high-profile scientists such as Jane Lubchenco, who oversees much of the nation's climate science as head the US National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. Climate Central has published work in major magazines and newspapers as well as on broadcast television; one story in Time magazine (see http://go.nature.com/BgyVSP) covered a Nature paper documenting increasing ocean temperatures (J. M. Lyman et al. Nature 465, 334-337; 2009).

Researchers at George Mason University have teamed up with Climate Central on a project to see whether meteorologists on television can change the way people think about climate issues by making global warming into a local phenomenon. Beginning this summer on the television network WLTX in Columbia, South Carolina, weather forecaster Jim Gandy will integrate global warming into his coverage. Topics might include projections for increasing weather extremes over the next century, and how local gardeners are adapting to climate change. The George Mason team will use surveys at the start and end of the project to see whether it has any effect on public opinion.

It is no coincidence that the team is starting with weather forecasters: a recent poll found that, after scientists, they are the most trusted source of information on global warming, despite their lack of formal training in climate science. "The nation's weather forecasters are basically standing by, ready to teach their local populations," says Edward Maibach, director of George Mason University's Center for Climate Change Communication. "We feel that we know them and trust them, and that means that they actually have greater potential to engage the public and teach them about climate change than do climate scientists, as a profession."

Similar discussions have unfolded in the United Kingdom. In March, the Science Media Centre in London brought together a number of climate researchers in an effort to expand the roster of scientists talking to the media, which has tended to consult only a few high-profile researchers.

Sheila Jasanoff, a science-policy expert at Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts, says that more communication is good, particularly if scientists can help people to understand the local effects of a global phenomenon. But she warns against the assumption that public doubts and the lack of political action on climate change reflect a problem that can be solved simply by transferring knowledge.

As a model for how to move forward, Jasanoff points to the US government's health and environmental regulatory process, which seeks public input through [easily manipulated] comments on proposed actions and includes non-scientists on advisory boards. She says that researchers should look for ways to build trust by taking on board the concerns of the public.

Leiserowitz agrees that scientists should engage with the public, but he also urges researchers to be realistic about their influence. "Even if climate-change scientists suddenly had the abilities of Carl Sagan to bring complex ideas to the public, there's only so much they can do," says Leiserowitz. "It's hubristic to think that if we could just communicate better, suddenly we would change the world."

SOURCE






The EPA is no Friend to America

The mission statement of the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is to “protect human health and to safeguard the natural environment — air, water and land — upon which life depends.”

Today the EPA does indeed have its opinions on protecting Americans and the environment. More recently it seems the EPA is more concerned with regulations, rules and power than it is about safeguarding our natural resources.

President Richard Nixon formed the EPA in 1970 with the intent that the organization would battle pollutants and research clean and effective ways to protect all components of the environment. President Nixon felt having a separate agency handle these tasks independently, while still seeking the expertise of other government organizations, would provide a safer, more efficient America.

The EPA of today was never the intent of President Nixon.

Taking a glance at the oil-laden Gulf of Mexico proves the point that the EPA is more concerned about enforcing regulations than it is about cleaning up the oil. If it cared anything about the Gulf and those states affected by the spill, it would encourage the Administration to lift the Jones Act and allow the world’s skimmer ships to enter and help clean up the Gulf. President Bush lifted the Act after Hurricane Katrina. Facing a disaster of this magnitude should warrant a similar reaction by Obama. The State Department did finally accept 22 offers from 12 countries and international organization to help with the efforts in the Gulf, without lifting the Act.

However, regulations still persist as the EPA is not allowing these skimmer ships to do their job because they don’t filter out the required 15 parts per million of contaminants.

For not wavering on its regulations, restricting the full potential of skimmer ships, the EPA is in no way protecting our environment. Instead of having a mostly oil-free Gulf, we have an ocean drenched in oil. After 77 days, the oil leak is still spewing about 250,000 barrels per day. Contrary to its initial claims of being able to skim 491,721 barrels of oil per day, BP has only been able to skim an average of less than 900 barrels per day.

An agency established to protect the environment is hurting the economies of the affected states and killing wildlife in the area, all by prolonging the necessary cleanup from this devastating crisis.

The EPA’s stonewalling of cleanup efforts doesn’t stop at skimmer ships. In May, the EPA gave BP 24 hours to find a different chemical dispersant than the one it had already used on 600,000 gallons on the surface and 55,000 underwater to help clean up the oil spill. The dispersants being used, Corexit 9500A and Corexit 9527A, were on the EPA-approved list. As previously reported by Americans for Limited Government (ALG), apparently, these “green” regulators didn’t like BP using a dispersant, approved by their own agency, and demanded they cease and desist and submit an alternative plan.

The list could go on of ridiculous judgment calls by the EPA. Earlier this year EPA officials met with film director James Cameron along with scientists and other experts to discuss the oil spill. James Cameron was invited because of his expertise on underwater filming and remote vehicle technologies after his filming of “Titanic.” The EPA described the meeting as “part of the federal government’s ongoing efforts to hear from stakeholders, scientists and experts from academia, government and the private sector as we continue to respond to the BP oil spill.”

Unless the EPA plans to make a movie of the oil spill, Hollywood should not be consulted. There are many legitimate experts who could have and should have been called upon to assist in the handling of this disaster.

The incompetence and radical environmentalism by the EPA continues outside the Gulf oil spill. The EPA wants to use its endangerment findings, obtained earlier this year, to regulate carbon dioxide — its own version of cap-and-trade. This is a complete breach of power by the EPA according to the language in the Clean Air Act.

As reported by the American Spectator, the EPA changed the way the Clean Air Act applies to carbon dioxide. “The plain language of the Clean Air Act would apply the regulations to anyone who emits more than 250 tons of CO2 in a year. That means fast food franchises, apartment buildings, and hospitals would be subject to regulations aimed at clamping down on pollution from large industrial facilities. Even the EPA recognized the absurdity of this result. It took it upon itself to rewrite the law, saying that what the Clean Air Act meant in this case was 25,000 tons, not 250, and issued what it called a ‘tailoring rule’ to this effect. This represents a significant assault on the principle of separation of powers.”

ALG President Bill Wilson couldn’t agree more. “This is not necessarily an environmental, energy or even a tax issue — it’s a constitutional separation of powers issue,” he says. “Even if a senator believes in the highly controversial dogma that carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases are harmful, he or she should be gravely concerned at the blatant power grab the EPA has engaged in to declare that those gases are covered under the Clean Air Act.”

With the Senate voting 53 to 47, approving of the EPA’s findings, the agency will continue to work with the Administration to build the framework for cap-and-trade regulation, which will surely implement new and harmful taxes on American businesses.

While the EPA continues to feed its insatiable appetite for power and new regulations, it is killing American jobs in the process. From its neglect in the cleanup efforts of the oil spill devastating the fishing industry in New Orleans, to its fight for a six-month moratorium to be placed on drilling in the Gulf, people are now without jobs and can no longer provide for their families.

Don’t be fooled by EPA Administrator Lisa Jackson’s comments this past Earth Day when she stated, “Despite the overheated rhetoric we often hear today about runaway environmental regulations killing jobs, our history is one of healthier families, cleaner communities — and, yes, job-creating innovation and a stronger America.”

Based on EPA’s actions and inactions of recent time, Jackson is certainly not talking about the America of today.

SOURCE





The truth behind energy, green or otherwise

This is a blatant plug for a wonderfully frank book by Robert Bryce, “Power Hungry: The myths of ‘green’ energy and the real fuels of the future.” It won’t be well-received by greenies and global warmists. Bryce, incidentally, has 3,200 watts of solar photovoltaic panels on his house’s roof, though after breakdowns, monthly roof-top mopping to keep them clean and substantial cost (despite subsidies) to put them there, he wonders aloud “if they were really worth it.”

That aside, Bryce sums up his energy policy as simply (and a lot like everyone else’s on earth when you scrape away the faux ideology): “I’m in favor of air conditioning and cold beer.”

Here are a few of the inconvenient truths Bryce reports:

“American voters have been bombarded with nonsense about energy, and much of that nonsense has been embraced.”

“We use hydrocarbons – coal, oil and natural gas – not because we like them, but because they produce lots of heat energy from small spaces at prices we can afford, and in the quantities that we demand. And that’s the absolutely critical point.”

“…the United States has built a $14-trillion-per-year economy that’s based almost entirely on cheap hydrocarbons. No matter how much the United States and the rest of the world may desire a move away from those fossil fuels, the transition to renewable sources of energy – and to no-carbon sources such as nuclear power – will take most of the twent first century and require trillions of dollars in new investment.”

Bryce spends a good bit of the book refuting the claims and assumptions about green technologies that “simply won’t work.”

“These claims ignore the hard realities… It may be fashionable to promote wind, solar and biofuels, but those sources fail when it comes to power density. We want energy sources that produce lots of power … from small amounts of real estate. And that’s the key problem with wind, solar and biofuels: They require huge amounts of land to generate meaningful amounts of power.”

Bryce points to futile and even counterproductive efforts like congressional mandates for motorists to buy ethanol-based gasoline, supposedly to reduce dependence on foreign oil.

“Instead, these measures only worsened air quality, increased food costs, damaged untold numbers of engines and slashed the amount of grain available in the global marketplace.”

We recommend you break through the media “happy talk,” as Bryce describes it, and the ideologically green Utopian thinking and pick up a copy of “Power Hungry…” Until you’re persuaded he’s right, you can read it by candlelight. But by Chapter 1, you’ll have flipped the light switch on and maybe settled into air-conditioned comfort with a cold beer.

SOURCE

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