Another reason for skepticism about ice-core proxies for CO2 levels etc. The lower part of an Antarctic drill core may NOT be older than the upper parts -- completely overturning all existing ice-core assumptions. As of now, caution indicates that the lower part of any existing drill core must be taken as uninformative about the past
Science 25 March 2011: Vol. 331 no. 6024 pp. 1592-1595
Widespread Persistent Thickening of the East Antarctic Ice Sheet by Freezing from the Base
Robin E. Bell et al.
ABSTRACT
An International Polar Year aerogeophysical investigation of the high interior of East Antarctica reveals widespread freeze-on that drives substantial mass redistribution at the bottom of the ice sheet. Although the surface accumulation of snow remains the primary mechanism for ice sheet growth, beneath Dome A, 24% of the base by area is frozen-on ice. In some places, up to half of the ice thickness has been added from below. These ice packages result from the conductive cooling of water ponded near the Gamburtsev Subglacial Mountain ridges and the supercooling of water forced up steep valley walls. Persistent freeze-on thickens the ice column, alters basal ice rheology and fabric, and upwarps the overlying ice sheet, including the oldest atmospheric climate archive, and drives flow behavior not captured in present models.
SOURCE
Prominent Warmist "scientist" ignores the facts about tornadoes
Romm is blaming the high tornado count the last two weeks on global warming. There are so many things wrong with his analysis, it is difficult to tell where to start.
* Global temperatures have been below the 30 year mean this year
* Most of the increase in tornadoes is due to better detection of small tornadoes. It is well know that severe tornadoes (F3 and above) have declined, and that “significant” tornadoes (F2 and above) have also declined.
* It is also well understood that the tornadoes this year are the result of very cold water and air to the northwest, colliding with warm humid air in the southeast. Last spring was much warmer and had below normal tornadoes.
Similarly, Romm blames the flooding on the Mississippi on global warming, despite the fact that there is no trend in precipitation.
Is the problem that Romm is not very bright, or is he just wildly dishonest?
SOURCE (See the original for links)
Now that we’ve killed Osama bin Laden, oil should be the next target
Drill, baby, drill? The article below makes a good case for unleashing oil exploration in the USA but that is not the intention. The article comes from the deep Green "Grist". What they are promoting is nostrums like Priuses and bicycles
The U.S. military's killing of Osama bin Laden is a huge victory in the war against terror and on behalf of a safer, freer world.
But if this is to be the beginning of the end for al Qaeda and repressive governments everywhere, we have to make it our national mission not just to hunt down terrorist leaders, but also to wipe out the single greatest source of their money and power: oil.
From the beginning, Osama bin Laden's rise was made possible by oil money. He acquired the millions of dollars that allowed him to start and finance al Qaeda from his huge family construction business, which literally paved the way for Saudi Arabia's massive oil boom. Al Qaeda continues to receive tens of millions of dollars from oil-rich sympathizers in the Gulf. But they're hardly alone in feeding their brutality with oil.
Libya's Muammar Gadaffi is able to hang on against an intense NATO campaign largely because of the billions of dollars in oil money he's stockpiled to pay African mercenaries and buy off potential opponents. Iran's Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has financed Hezbollah and Hamas and poured billions into a nuclear weapons program with profits from Iran's huge oil deposits. Further down on the repression scale, Bahrain's royal family has imported Saudi troops to crush the country's democratic reform movement, while Vladimir Putin is able to resist calls for openness and economic innovation because of the flood of oil dollars entering his country.
In contrast, Tunisia and Egypt's relative lack of oil meant that their governments didn't have the same level of resources to maintain the support of loyalists or try to temporarily buy off their people.
Indeed, not only does oil finance terror and repression, it enables it. According to an extraordinary statistical analysis by UCLA political scientist Michael Ross, a country's "reliance on either oil or mineral exports tends to make it less democratic," and "this effect is not caused by other types of primary exports; ... it is not limited to the Arabian Peninsula, to the Middle East, or sub-Saharan Africa; and ... it is not limited to small states."
When demand surges and the price of oil rises, terrorist groups are better financed and repressive governments have more resources with which to repress their people and more ability to resist pressure to respect human rights and democratize
More HERE
The Green gravy train rolls on
A satisfied comment from CA below
Tackling climate change just got a little bit easier, with some help from federal funding.
The Environmental Protection Agency recently awarded grants to five local and tribal governments in California for projects that include reducing waste, improving energy efficiency and planting drought-resistant gardens. Nationwide, 50 communities will receive funds for localized efforts to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, totaling $20 million in two years.
While there isn't a national target for reducing greenhouse gas emissions, the state's Global Warming Solutions Act (known as AB 32) mandates a reduction to 1990 levels by 2020, about 15 percent less than current emissions.*
In the Bay Area, Alameda County's Stop Waste program received $498,720 to reduce industrial packaging waste, swapping cardboard boxes and wooden pallets with more durable and reusable totes. The project began as a pilot program in 2007 and is expanding thanks to the federal dollars. But working with local businesses that use national suppliers can be a challenge, said Justin Lehrer, the project manager.
"It involves making a change to transport packaging, so it's more than just putting recycling bins in place," he said. "It creates ripples throughout the (supply chain) system."
One example is Oakland-based Peerless Coffee & Tea. The company had to retrofit its truck fleet to accommodate the reusable totes that replaced boxes and pallets. And though there is often an up-front cost for reusables, Lehrer said their program works with companies to identify long-term savings. The program is estimated to reduce greenhouse gas emissions by the equivalent of 16,000 metric tons of carbon dioxide annually.
For Humboldt County's Waste Management Authority, the program's goal is to turn commercial food waste into fuel through the use of an anaerobic food digester. Collecting organic waste from Humboldt State University, St. Joseph's Hospital, Costco and a number of breweries and cheese makers, the digester will break down the food waste, collect the by-product – methane gas – and use it to generate electricity.
Beginning this year, the pilot project will help identify benefits for its customers, reduce overall waste and identify the most efficient route for the collection trucks using GIS mapping technology. Juliette Bohn, the project manager, said the program creates local jobs, produces renewable electricity and helps meet a number of statewide goals for climate change and renewable energy.
"If we are going to reach our AB 32 goals, then we should get reductions in every way we can," Bohn said.
Sacramento County is using its $486,668 grant to expand a river-friendly landscaping program, part of a sustainable landscaping initiative. Encouraging homeowners and businesses to plant "rain gardens," the county provides a handy guide to selecting native and drought-resistant vegetation.
The native plants not only reduce storm water runoff, they attract bees and butterflies, and reduce the "heat island" effect that occurs in urban areas in the summer. Individuals can receive up to a $500 rebate to offset the costs of supplies and labor, said media representative Diane Margetts. The county estimates the project will reduce emissions by the equivalent of 10,350 metric tons of carbon dioxide annually.
Other winners in California include the Santa Ynez Band of Chumash Indians in Santa Barbara County, and the Small Cities Climate Action Partnership, which includes Albany, El Cerrito, Piedmont and San Pablo. The tribal program aims to educate the community about energy efficiency, which includes retrofitting and weatherizing homes. It will also include job training to teach solar panel installation. The Small Cities partnership also promotes energy efficiency, the EPA's website states.
According to the agency, nearly 20 percent of the applications for the Climate Showcase Communities program in the two-year grant cycle came from California. All 50 programs are estimated to reduce emissions by the equivalent of 350,000 metric tons of carbon dioxide annually, by 2014.
An EPA representative emphasized that those are estimates, and each program is required to monitor and report actual reductions. The "showcase" programs are intended to serve as replicable models for other communities.
"We're pleased to see the federal government supporting efforts at the local level and among tribal lands to promote climate change programs," Stanley Young, a representative for the state's Air Resources Board, said in an e-mail message. "This helps ensure that the effort to reach a clean energy future is a commitment at every level of government, and it's an example of the kind of cooperation that supports plans and projects that touch people's everyday lives and supports the specific, on-the-ground solutions."
SOURCE
Why the public won’t buy greenhouse limits
In the April 21st issue of the far-left New Republic, associate editor Bradford Plumer asked his readers whether the Greens’ climate strategy had been a “total flop.” He said the Greens had helped elect Barack Obama and a filibuster-proof majority in both Houses of Congress, and approved Obama’s Cabinet and “czars.” The President was expected to roll over the climate deniers.
“Instead,” says Plumer, “the climate push was . . . a total flop. By late 2010, the main cap-and-trade bill had fizzled out in the Senate; not a single Republican would agree to vote for it. Greens ended up winning zilch from Congress, not even minor legislation to boost renewable electricity or energy efficiency. Worse, after the 2010 midterms, the House GOP became overrun with climate deniers, while voters turned apathetic about global warming.”
Plumer wants to know who or what to blame. Was it strategy? Money? A failure of Presidential will? None of the above. The Greens and Obama are failing on emission controls for the simplest of reasons. The earth stopped warming.
James Hansen told the Senate in 1988 that the earth would thenceforth do nothing but get rapidly warmer, dictated by rising concentrations of CO2 in the atmosphere. For a time, Hansen’s predictions seemed to be accurate—but then after 1998 the warming trend stopped. CO2 concentrations continued to rise, but the temperatures didn’t. The public began to wonder if the previous warming-with-CO2 had been a coincidence.
Then came 2007, and a sharp drop in global temperatures! The computer models’ predictions had failed. The mainstream media kept mostly silent about this unnerving development, but the blogs and talk radio didn’t. This was itself a key change in the public persuasion machinery, which had previously been unanimous in its promotion of man-made warming.
The lack of public panic on temperatures has been supported by the satellites, arguably the best source of global temperature information ever devised. The alarmists kept shouting “record high averages” but the satellites have revealed only a modest increase since 1979, and no recent upward temperature trend.
The skeptics also note that the thermometer record has recently trended both upward and downward—in 30-year spurts. Those spurts now appear linked to a 60-year cycle in the Pacific. In 2008, NASA said its satellites confirmed the Pacific moving into a cool phase, which is likely to last 25 years. The sunspot index has just been through an ultra-long minimum, which also suggests colder temperatures. Is this another climate step-change?
Climate legislation now hinges on the temperatures over the next three years or so. A cooling trend will endorse the solar cause of warming. A resumption of warming will re-endorse the greenhouse theory.
But the public isn’t waiting. They’ve already “gone apathetic,” to quote Plumer. Concern about global warming has dropped 12 percent in America since 2001, according to a March Gallup poll. We’ve had a series of obviously colder, snow-filled winters. Several of the IPCC scare stories have been proven wrong. The fear of man-made warming has dropped below critical levels.
Prediction: Global warming is a dead issue unless the planet can be persuaded to start warming again, quickly. Don’t blame the President or the eco-ad campaign. Blame the thermometers.
SOURCE
Australia's official climate experts: Clueless
Climate commissioner Will Steffen said the following at a meeting of the commission chaired by the ABC's Tony Eastley at Port Macquarie April 28. (Video available HERE)
At 16:09 WILL STEFFEN: "Great Barrier Reef: about 15 years ago there were no bleaching events. The sea surface temperatures is risen, we've had 7 or 8 severe bleaching events in the last 15 years in the Great Barrier Reef"
The Facts
15 years from 2011 that would be 1996. Let's see what the record says:
According to the IPCC AR4 WGII (p.512) "Eight mass bleaching events on the Great Barrier Reef since 1979"
According to wikipedia "The Great Barrier Reef along the coast of Australia experienced bleaching events in 1980, 1982, 1992, 1994, 1998, 2002, and 2006.[24
A question from the audience about 0:27:05:
At the time of the dinosaurs what would you imagine the temperature would have been?
WILL STEFFEN: Good question. That would have been about 65 million years ago. Much Much warmer than today, probably on the order of 5 or 6 degrees warmer. CO2 was much much higher than today as well, probably 900 to 1000ppm.
The Facts
1. Dinosaurs actually extinct 65 million years ago. They dominated life on earth for 160 million years between the Triassic and Cretaceous, living through a wide range of climates. FAIL
2. For the Cretaceous temperatures about 4 degrees warmer, CO2 about 1700ppm. For the Jurassic temperatures about 3 degrees warmer, CO2 about 1950ppm. For the Triassic temperatures about 3 degrees warmer, CO2 about 1750ppm. FAIL
Clearly Will Steffen is getting his facts mixed up and is misinforming and misleading the audience. Will ABC's embedded reporter cover the lies, or let it slip? (or are they just mistakes-what from an expert, surely not).
We expect experts paid good money out of our taxes to get things right. It is news when they get things wrong.
(Note that the the main reason for an absence in bleaching being noted prior to 1980 has more to do with a lack of observers than events-but more on that later)
SOURCE
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Jim Hansen and his twin
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