Two very different Warmists meet  -- and we see which is rational

Kevin Trenberth is allegedly a scientist but is certainly a global warming evangelist.  His second most famous quote is:  "The planet is warming", but "the warmth just isn’t being manifested at the surface".   Pielke Jr. says he believes in global warming but doesn't think anyone can do anything about it.  Pielke enrages other Warmists.  He reports via Twitter:

Roger Pielke Jr. @RogerPielkeJr

I debated Trenberth last week. From Kevin there was yelling, spittle & an apology. I stuck to IPCC AR5 which he called totally wrong. Weird.

IPCC AR5 is the latest U.N. climate report





Claim: 'State-of-the-art modeling techniques' reveal that 'Humans Are to Blame for Earth's Rapidly Melting Glaciers'

The paper is Attribution of global glacier mass loss to anthropogenic and natural causes and it is a glaringly obvious piece of propaganda that starts out with a lie. "The ongoing global glacier retreat" doesn't exist. Overall glacier retreat stopped in about 1950. See here. And their failure to include solar factors in their models is also revelatory -- since sunspots have been known for many years as correlated with climate change. And models will give you any result you want of course

The steady melt of glacial ice around the world is largely due to man-made factors, such as greenhouse-gas emissions and aerosols, a new study finds.

Humans have caused roughly a quarter of the globe's glacial loss between 1851 and 2010, and about 69 percent of glacial melting between 1991 and 2010, the study suggests.

"In a sense, we got a confirmation that by now, it is really mostly humans that are responsible for the melting glaciers," said lead researcher Ben Marzeion, an associate professor of meteorology and geophysics at the University of Innsbruck in Austria.

Vanishing glaciers are often associated with global warming, and other studies have estimated past ice loss and made projections of future melt. But until now, researchers were unsure how much glacial loss was tied to human factors.

"So far, it has been unclear how much of the observed mass losses are caused by humans rather than natural climate variations," Regine Hock, a professor of geophysics at the University of Alaska Fairbanks who was not involved in the study, wrote an in email to Live Science.

The researchers used "state-of-the art modeling techniques," in their work, Hock said.

The research team relied on 12 climate models, most of them from the latest reports from theIntergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, an international group of climate-change experts convened by the United Nations. By combining the models, along with data from the Randolph Glacier Inventory (a catalog of nearly 200,000 glaciers), the researchers created a computer model that included only natural contributions to glacier melt, such as volcanic eruptions and solar variability, and another model with both human and natural factors.

Using data from 1851 to 2010, the researchers compared the two models with real measurements of glaciers to determine which one better represented reality. The study did not include glaciers in Antarctica, because not enough data on the region was available during the 159 years covered by the study.

The model with the man-made influences was a better fit, they found.

"Glaciers thin and retreat around the world as a result of rising air temperature, but the glaciers don't care whether or not the increase in temperature is due to natural or human causes," Hock said. "Over the last 150 years, most of the mass loss was due to natural climate variability, caused, for example, by volcanic eruptions or changes in solar activity.

"However, during the last 20 years, almost 70 percent of the glacier mass changes were caused by climate change due to humans," she wrote.

Interestingly, the study found that glaciers, which are slow to react to climate change, are still recovering from the end of the Little Ice Age that lasted from the 14th to the 19th centuries.  During the Little Ice Age, temperatures were about 1.8 degrees Fahrenheit (1 degree Celsius) colder than they are today.
Warmer temperatures after the Little Ice Age affected the glaciers. "Essentially, what we find is that glaciers would be melting without any human influence," Marzeion told Live Science.

The melt, however, would not be happening as quickly as it is today if it weren't for man-made contributions, such as aerosols from wood or coal fires, he said. Aerosols are particles suspended in the atmosphere that absorb and scatter the sun's radiation.

Even if climate change from both man-made and natural causes stopped today, the glaciers would continue to melt and are projected to raise ocean levels by 2.7 inches (7 centimeters) during this century, Marzeion said.

As global temperatures continue to rise, the glaciers will continue to disappear. The melt may provide more water for irrigation and other needs, but it won't be sustainable because the glaciers may eventually vanish, Marzeion said. In the meantime, people can try to reduce man-made contributions to global warming and adapt to the changing planet, he said.

The study was published online today (Aug. 14) in the journal Science.

SOURCE





The glaciers have stopped retreating

A paper published today in The Cryosphere studies glacier length data available worldwide since 1800 and finds that glaciers retreated faster during the first half of the 20th century than the second half from 1950-2000.

This is the opposite pattern that would be expected if man-made greenhouse gases were the cause, and suggests a natural origin. Most warmists and the IPCC claim man-made greenhouse gases did not begin to affect climate until after 1950, and thus can't be blamed for the fastest rate of glacier retreat from ~1850-1950 and subsequent deceleration.

The authors find glaciers showed little change in length during the latter part of the Little Ice Age 1800-1850, but following the end of the Little Ice Age in ~1850 most began a relatively rapid retreat that began to decelerate after ~1950. The data shows that calving glaciers reversed to a net advancing trend after ~2001, and that the number of calving glaciers  has sharply decreased from ~99% to 50% since the year 2000.

The paper:

A data set of worldwide glacier length fluctuations

P. W. Leclercq et al.

Abstract.

Glacier fluctuations contribute to variations in sea level and historical glacier length fluctuations are natural indicators of past climate change. To study these subjects, long-term information of glacier change is needed. In this paper we present a data set of global long-term glacier length fluctuations. The data set is a compilation of available information on changes in glacier length worldwide, including both measured and reconstructed glacier length fluctuations. All 471 length series start before 1950 and cover at least four decades. The longest record starts in 1535, but the majority of time series start after 1850. The number of available records decreases again after 1962. The data set has global coverage including records from all continents. However, the Canadian Arctic is not represented in the data set. The available glacier length series show relatively small fluctuations until the mid-19th century, followed by a global retreat. The retreat was strongest in the first half of the 20th century, although large variability in the length change of the different glaciers is observed. During the 20th century, calving glaciers retreated more than land-terminating glaciers, but their relative length change was approximately equal. Besides calving, the glacier slope is the most important glacier property determining length change: steep glaciers have retreated less than glaciers with a gentle slope.

SOURCE





Warmists are the climate deniers

An interesting comment by Major Combs on the article above.  Warmists really are pathetic.  Their inability to handle reality shows that they desperately need their mental simplifications

I had the pleasure of discussing glacier retreat with James Balog of "Chasing Ice" fame, and Dr. Robert Bindschadler, retired NASA, on a recent Lindblad/National Geographic Antarctic voyage. Both seemed unknowledgeable about the history of glacier advances and retreats, perhaps because such information did not serve their anthropogenic global warming/climate change agendas. Dr; Bindschadler ridiculed my mention of warmer periods this interglacial, like the Medieval warm period, and denied knowledge of previous sea level high stands, such as during the Holocene Climate Optimum 8,000 to 4,000 years ago. Sadly, it appears that anything that predates Al Gore's alarmism is something that neither gentlemen cared to discuss. I consider both of them to be natural climate change deniers.




Bill Nye, Al Gore Get The Physics Of Global Warming Wrong

Critics are saying Bill Nye “the science guy” and former Vice President Al Gore got their global warming science wrong, citing previously published research.

Back in 2011, Nye and Gore teamed up to show that global warming was real using “a simple lab experiment.” The problem is that such experiments have been discredited by scientists who the say these demonstrations show heat transport, not global warming.

“Although not an accurate demonstration of the physics of climate change, the experiment we have considered and related ones are valuable examples of the dangers of unintentional bias in science, the value of at least a rough quantitative prediction of the expected effect, the importance of considering alternative explanations, and the need for carefully designed experimental controls,” according to a paper by scientists from Tufts and the Technical Education Research Centers.

During a 2011 “24 hours of climate reality” by the Climate Reality Project, a group founded by Gore to sound the alarm on global warming, Nye put together a “Climate Change 101” video which used “a simple lab experiment” to demonstrate how increasing levels of carbon dioxide emissions heat the planet.

Nye’s “simple” experiment involved sealing thermometers inside two identical bottles, which were sealed. To illustrate the effects of increased carbon dioxide on temperature, Nye fits a hose from a CO2 canister into one of the bottles. Both bottles are then placed placed under heat lamps.

“Within minutes you will see the temperature of the bottle with carbon dioxide in it rising faster and higher,” Nye said in his video experiment. “The bottles are like our atmosphere, the lamps are like our sun.”

A paper published in a 2010 edition of the American Journal of Physics found that experiments like Nye’s are “not an accurate demonstration of the physics of climate change.”

These experiments have not just been reproduced by Nye, but by scientists and teachers around the country to illustrate the cause of global warming in a simple, easy to understand way. But they all suffer a fatal flaw: they illustrate “processes related to convective heat transport that plays no role in climate change.”

“All involve comparing the temperature rise in a container filled with air with that of the same or a similar container filled with carbon dioxide when exposed to radiation from the Sun or a heat lamp,” the scientists wrote. “Typically, a larger temperature rise is observed with carbon dioxide and the difference is attributed, explicitly or implicitly, to the physical phenomena responsible for the climate change.”

“We argue here that great care is required in interpreting these demonstrations. … The results arise primarily from processes related to convective heat transport that plays no role in climate change,” the paper continues.

“The greater density of carbon dioxide compared to air reduces heat transfer by suppressing convective mixing with the ambient air,” the scientists continued. “Other related experiments are subject to similar concerns. Argon, which has a density close to that of carbon dioxide but no infrared absorption, provides a valuable experimental control for separating radiative from convective effects.”

Nye’s “Climate Change 101″ video is still featured prominently on the Climate Reality Project’s website, along with content that sounds the alarm on global warming and bashes those skeptical that man-made carbon dioxide is warming the planet.

“Take Climate 101 with Bill Nye (the Science Guy) and you’ll be schooled in the scientific fundamentals of climate change in under 5 minutes,” Climate Reality Project’s website reads.

“Separate fact from fiction, and we can end the debate and denial and move on to solutions, together,” the site adds.

SOURCE





Wind farm 'needs 700 times more land' than fracking site to produce same energy

A wind farm requires 700 times more land to produce the same amount of energy as a fracking site, according to analysis by the energy department’s recently-departed chief scientific advisor.

Prof David MacKay, who stood down from the Government role at the end of July, published analysis putting shale gas extraction “in perspective”, showing it was far less intrusive on the landscape than wind or solar energy.

His intervention was welcomed by fracking groups, who are battling to win public support amid claims from green groups and other critics that shale gas extraction will require the “industrialisation” of the countryside.

Hundreds of anti-fracking protesters on Thursday occupied a field near Blackpool neighbouring a proposed fracking site for energy firm Cuadrilla.

Prof MacKay said that a shale gas site uses less land and “creates the least visual intrusion”, compared with a wind farm or solar farm capable of producing the equivalent amount of energy over 25 years.

He rated each technology’s “footprint” against six criteria covering aspects of land use, height, visual impact and truck movements to and from the site.

The shale gas site or “pad” was the “winning” technology on three measures, solar farms won on two, while wind farms did not win any. None was deemed to have “won” on truck movements as all types generated “lots” of traffic.

Prof MacKay, who is Regius Professor of Engineering at the University of Cambridge, said that a shale gas pad of 10 wells would require just 2 hectares of land and would be visible - due to an 85-foot-high drilling rig - from 77 hectares of surrounding area. However, the drilling rig would be in place for "only the first few years of operations".

By contrast, a wind farm capable of producing the same energy would span an area of 1,450 hectares, requiring 87 turbines each 328-foot tall.

Prof MacKay noted that the actual turbines, access roads and other installations for the wind farm would have a smaller footprint, of 36 hectares, as “the wind farm has lots of empty land between the turbines, which can be used for other purposes”.

But the large area covered by the farm as a whole would mean it would be visible from a surrounding area of between 5,200 and 17,000 hectares.

A solar farm generating equivalent energy would span a 924 hectare area, directly building on 208 hectares of it.

An estimated 7,800 lorry movements would be required for the wind farm and between 3,800 and 7,600 for the solar farm.

The fracking site could require the fewest lorry movements, at 2,900, if water is piped to and from the site. However, it could require significantly more than the other technologies - 20,000 trips - if water was transported by truck.

Prof MacKay said the analysis showed that “perhaps unsurprisingly, there is no silver bullet – no energy source with all-round small environmental impact”. He said that all sources “have their costs and risks” and said the public should “look at all the options”.

A spokesman for Cuadrilla said: "This comparison by David MacKay clearly demonstrates that, contrary to what some people may assume, exploration for and production of shale gas would actually have less far less impact on the countryside than wind or solar energy.

"To supply an equivalent amount of energy a shale gas site would occupy just a small fraction of the land required for either wind or solar sites, would have less visual intrusion and significantly less transport impact, given that in the UK we do not anticipate having to truck water to our proposed sites."

Ken Cronin, chief executive of the UK Onshore Operators Group, which represents fracking firms, said: "David MacKay’s review is a useful addition to the debate. We are going to need all these energy sources to be part of a balanced energy mix.

"We mustn’t ignore the fact that over 80 per cent of homes and businesses are heated by gas. As an industry we are committed to informing and consulting fully with the communities in which we operate."

Dr Jimmy Aldridge, energy analyst for Greenpeace UK, said: “The visual impact of fracking isn’t really the main issue – everyone knows that wind turbines are taller than drilling rigs, so you can see them from further away, but government figures show three times as many people support wind power than shale gas, and that difference just gets more pronounced when it’s in their local area.

"That’s partly because of the risk of localised air and water pollution, partly noise and inconvenience, but most importantly, because shale gas is a high-carbon energy source, which is exactly what we need a lot less of.”

The Department of Energy and Climate Change caused controversy last autumn when it published and then deleted from its website a graphic showing that onshore wind farms covering 250,000 acres would be required to generate as much power as the proposed Hinkley Point C nuclear power station in Somerset, which would cover 430 acres.

SOURCE

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