Judith Curry gets it right

She might also be describing bigots but she is certainly describing most Greenies

There are five attributes of ideologues:

1. Absence of doubt
2. Intolerance of debate
3. Appeal to authority
4. A desire to convince others of the ideological “truth”
5. A willingness to punish those that don’t concur

In the climate communication world, it has become very trendy to wear your political ideology on your sleeve. How many ‘climate science communicators’ can you name that have at least 4 of the above attributes of ideologues with regards to climate change?

SOURCE





Bill Nye is having a wet dream

He says Blue States Will ‘Impose Economic Sanctions’ Against Climate Change-Denying States.  I think he has finally lost his marbles

Friday on MSNBC, climate activist Bill Nye warned conservatives to “watch out,” saying progressive blue states will “address climate change” on their own.

Nye said, “Only 40 percent of people in the U.S. think that Congress should be addressing this and that’s because certain conservative groups, especially from the fossil fuel industry, have been very successful in introducing the idea that scientific uncertainty, plus or minus two percent, is the same as plus or minus 100 percent.”

He continued, “There’s a lot of emphasis from conservatives on what are writ-large states rights. Just watch out, conservatives, if states rights include California, Illinois, New York — these places that, where people voted in a progressive fashion — watch out if all those places start to address climate change and then impose economic sanctions, either overtly or by default, on places that have not embraced the work that needs to be done. Then you’ll end up with this states rights working the other way.”

He added, “We’ve got to remind people that we’re all in this together. The people I think about all the time are what are eloquently stated as the hillbillies. We want to engage everybody. Not working to address climate change is in no one’s best interest. It is not in the best interest, especially of your children and grandchildren. A couple of times you mentioned that I am against the president and so on. I’m not especially against the president. I just think he’s gotten himself surrounded by people who are willing to mortgage the future, to let the people who are coming into the workforce now pay for the future.

SOURCE





What needs to happen before electric cars take over the world

A lot

The electric-car future is still missing some pieces. Some crucial raw materials are scarce. There are not enough places to recharge. Battery-powered cars still cost thousands of dollars more than many petrol vehicles.

Here's a look at what needs to happen before electric cars take over the world.

The cost of building motors and components will have to continue to decrease

Electric cars will go mainstream when the cost of the motor and other components that make the car go forward - the powertrain - is the same or below as owning a car that burns petrol or diesel. How soon that day arrives is almost solely a function of the price of batteries.

The average price of a conventional powertrain is $US6000 ($7700), compared with $16,000 for an electric car powertrain.

Battery prices, measured by the power they produce, have fallen by more than half since 2011, according to analysts at Bank of America Merrill Lynch. The unexpectedly rapid drop in prices has sped up the timetable.

Merrill Lynch analysts now expect electric vehicles will be cheaper to own in the United States by 2024. Just a year ago, they estimated it would take until 2030.

One reason battery costs are falling is that manufacturers are ramping up production. The greater the supply, the lower the price.

There must be a steady, affordable supply of the resources required to make batteries

Carmakers are racing to secure the essential ingredients in batteries like cobalt, lithium and graphite. They need to avoid shortages that would drive prices too high, making electric vehicles unaffordable.

But manufacturers are also dealing with a geopolitical dimension. The world's reserves of lithium, a crucial ingredient in the most common kind of electric car battery, are in China, Bolivia and Chile. As demand surges, China could deploy its natural resources as a diplomatic cudgel the same way that Saudi Arabia uses oil.

More charging stations will need to be built, and they'll need to charge faster

Even when people can buy an electric car for the same price or less than a petrol model, they face another problem: where to plug it in. And they will not want to wait all day for the car to recharge.

Electric cars will become commonplace once there is a dense network of high-voltage charging stations where drivers can refill their batteries in the time it takes to use the restroom and drink a cup of coffee. At the moment, a cross-country drive in an electric car is an adventure. The average range of an electric vehicle on full charge is about 305 kilometres, compares with more than 600 for petrol.

But an array of startups and established companies like ABB are busy installing charging stations around the world, and they are on their way to becoming commonplace. There are already about 16,000 public charging stations in the United States alone, up from a few hundred in 2010. That compares with about 112,000 petrol stations.

Surprisingly, Volkswagen's emissions scandal has accelerated the rollout. As part of its settlement with diesel owners in the United States who bought cars with illegal software, Volkswagen agreed to spend $US2 billion to promote electric cars and build infrastructure. Electrify America, a company established to invest the settlement money, plans to install more than 2000 fast chargers in the US by mid-2019 in a first phase, with thousands more to follow.

Drivers will have to shed their attachment to the sound, smell and feel of petrol-powered engines

One of the biggest barriers for electric vehicles is psychological. People are used to internal combustion engines and the sensations that go with them - the odour of the fuel, the shifting of the transmission, the sound of the engine as the car accelerates.

Electric cars have a different personality that people need to get their heads around before they will buy one.

They may be pleasantly surprised. The physics of electric motors give them exceptional acceleration. A $US135,000 Tesla S clocked by Motor Trend magazine went from 0 to 97 kph faster than Ferraris, Lamborghinis or Porsches which cost hundreds of thousands of dollars more.

Electric cars are quiet, nearly vibration free and they do not smell like petrol or exhaust. They do not need oil changes. They cost less to operate. Electric cars hug the road because heavy battery packs, typically arrayed underneath the passenger compartment, provide low centres of gravity and high stability.

"There is no question that an electric car gives you significantly better performance," Stafford said. "I don't think the mainstream driver is going to understand that unless they experience it."

SOURCE





Global Cooling! But This Isn't a Schadenfreude Moment

By Rich Kozlovich

Andrew West published an article entitled, Deadly Temperatures Are Set To Invade America…Are You Safe? on December 28, 2017 saying:

"All good hoaxes must come to an end, and this week’s frigid and dangerous arctic blast may be another nail in the coffin for the “global warming” charlatans. The idea that the entire globe is somehow filling with greenhouse gasses, thusly heating the planet up to the point of no return, is patently absurd. Even the liberal science community believed 30 years ago that this process would likely cause a mini ice age, before dramatically shifting to their current hangup regarding an increase in temperature.  The reason for this abrupt change was not some scientific breakthrough, rather, the idea that the earth could become uninhabitable via heat is a much more profound problem."

Unfortunately, this isn't a schadenfreude moment.  You love to smugly say "I told you so", when arrogant, smarmy leftists look down their noses at everyone and declare any who disagree with them as enemies of humanity, flat Earthers, deniers, and more in their efforts to impose a totally destructive economic plan on the world based on the Kyoto Accords.  A scientifically fraudulent plan with the real goal of creating a scheme of worldwide governance under the United Nations.  Even a past president of France, Jacques Chirac acknowledged the Kyoto Accord was the first step in global governance.

However, this cooling trend is what many of us who've been on the right side of this issue from the beginning has been expecting for some time:  The potential for another solar minimum, and they're deadly!

The last minimum was during what's called the Dalton Minimum, which was another low sun spot period starting "about 1790 to 1830 or 1796 to 1820, corresponding to the period solar cycle 4 to solar cycle 7."  "Like the Maunder Minimum, 1645 - 1715, and Sporer Minimum 1460 -1550, the Dalton Minimum coincided with a period of lower-than-average global temperatures.  During that period, there was a variation of temperature of about 1 °C in Germany."

Some are claiming the cause for that cooling was a result of volcanism - and while that may have been a contributing factor - the fact of the matter is the cooling temperatures and solar minimum patterns are solid evidence, and that pattern is playing out right now.

But here's something to think about.  There's no consistent pattern as to how long these minimums go on.  The Maunder Minimum started in "about 1645 and continuing to about 1715", about 70 years, and if the Dalton minimum started in 1790 and lasted until 1830, that was 40 years, if it lasted, as some claim, from 1796 until 1820, that was a mere 24 years.  But no matter - there was only about a 75 to 85 year period where temperatures rose to level better suited to human and animal survival during that either 175 or 185 year period.

Let's understand this - over the last 1000 years it's been the cold that's been deadly, not the warming.  The warm periods were periods where agriculture, humans and animals flourished, including the Roman Warming Period from approximately 250 BC to AD 400.

A thousand years ago that age, now known as the Medieval Warming Period from 800 to 1400 AD, it was substantially warmer than it is today.  Although there are those who claim - through the use of Climate Proxy records this warming period wasn't universal.  Proxy records like tree ring counting, but is that reliable?

As a result of Biffa's offerings - tree ring counting that supplied evidence in support of what's now being called the "fraudulent" Hockey Stick Graph - we now know it isn't.

We now know that  not only can it be unreliable, it can be manipulated to get the results the researcher wants, all of which Anthony Watts covers quite well in his December 4, 2009 article, Jo Nova finds the Medieval Warm Period.  It's also interesting no one questioned the universality of that warming period until it interfered with the Warmist’s claims, especially since in Mann's Hockey Stick Graph the Medieval Warming Period and the Little Ice Age completely disappear.

The Medieval Warming period ended with what's called the Little Ice Age - 1300 to about 1850 - which forced the Vikings who lived there for about 300 years to abandon Greenland and return to Iceland. Greenland really was green over a large section of the Southern region.  It's also known from the historical records they're agricultural practises were the same as those practiced in Norway and Iceland.  They had to leave because they could no longer maintain those practises.  Because cold kills!  And every warming period humanity has experience has been beneficial.

In the paper, The `Hockey Stick': A New Low in Climate Science by John L. Daly he outlines the time lines in this way:

Medieval Warm Period (AD 700 - 1300)
Sporer Minimum' cool period (AD 1300 - 1500)
Brief climatic warming (AD 1500 - 1560)
Little Ice Age (`Maunder Minimum') (AD 1560 - 1830)

(Editor's note:  I think he must be melding the Maunder and Dalton Minimums in this time frame.  One thing we all have to acknowledge is the exact time frames for all of this is malleable, which can be a source for controversy, but the fact these eras existed isn't disputable. RK)

Brief warmer period (AD 1830 - 1870)
Brief cool period (AD 1870 - 1910)
20th century warm period (AD 1910 - 2000)

 He goes on to say:

"As to what caused these two major climatic events, the most probable candidate is the variable sun, particularly with respect to the Little Ice Age. This is because we have direct observations of sunspot counts going back to 1600 AD, which allows us to compare variations in the sun with variations to global climate. Fig.2 shows how the sun has changed over time, the radiation being greatest during a sunspot maximum and least during a sunspot minimum, both recurring on an 11-year cycle."

All the claims about Anthropogenic Climate Change are based on two foundations.  The Hockey Stick Graph, which is now being challenged by more and more scientists, including those who previously adhered to this tenet of green religion, and computer models, all of which are failing or have failed, which is why I call that Game Boy science. 

There are three things Warminsts leave out of these models that actually have something to do with climate: The decadal cycles of the oceans currents, the sun's cycles and the number one component of our atmosphere which actually does hold warmth - water vapor!  Why are they left out?  Because these are natural components of climate and mankind can't be blamed.

Computer models are an important part of science as it allows scientists to test new ideas quickly, then change the parameters to see what comes out, allowing for more speculation.  But speculation isn't science!  It’s a component of science which can allows for shortcuts in deciding what areas they need to pay attention to in order to do real science.  Science based on actual observation, not speculation.

We're hearing all these claims of Anthropogenic Climate Change and disaster, but we should be asking this:  Why did these hystarians opt out of  the phrase, Anthropogenic Global Warming and choose Anthropogenic Climate Change instead?  They knew their claims were unraveling!  It was also clear the "climate deniers" weren't walking away from the evidence of their fraud so they had to find a way to make whatever temperatures changes which might occur the fault of mankind, and most importantly - capitalism - and especially the capitalists of the United States.

But their efforts are failing so rapidly even Al Gore won't be able to further enrich himself with the scam.  The biggest reason is the Internet!  Finally, those who've opposed all the fraudulent claims put out by that neo-pagan secular religion known as Environmentalism, had a platform - an international platform - to challenge these people.  A platform the media would have never given them.  That's why the Kyoto Protocol never passed, and that piece of junk science known as the Montreal Protocol would have never been passed if the Internet existed then.

What I would like to know is when are these fraudsters going to be charged with a crime?  The Global Warming scam is a fraud paid for by the American taxpayer.  And the last time I looked: Fraud is a crime!

There are a five questions everyone has to ask.

1. Was it substantially warming during the Midieval Warming period than it is now? The answer is yes!

2. If the answer is yes, and it is, then we have to ask: What caused that warming period and what caused the Roman Warming Period?  Answer:  Those periods of warming must  have been naturally occurring.

3. If those warming periods were naturally occurring why shouldn't we believe any warming occurring now (which stopped over 20 years ago) isn't naturally occurring?  Answer: We shouldn't

4. If it was substantially warmer during both the Roman and Medeival Warming periods did any of the disasters they're predicting for today occur then?  Answer:  There's absolutely nothing in the historical record to show any of these disasters occurred then.

5. If these disasters didn't occur then, when it was substantially warmer, why should we believe any of these disasters will occur today.  The answer is - we shouldn't!

We're going through another period of little or no sun spot activity.  Does that mean another solar minimum?  No one knows for sure, but it seems historically and scientifically probable.  It's hard to feel schadenfreude when that happens - because cold kills!

SOURCE






Repairing the Damage to Children Caused by Climate Alarmists: a letter from Ken Haapala

Anyone on the look-out for materials, ideas, approaches that could help repair the emotional and intellectual damage caused to children (and vulnerable adults) by climate alarmists?  This letter from Ken Haapala of SEPP seems to me to be a good contribution in the right direction:

'Letter to Dr Singer from students in Denmark asking important questions:

We are starting a project next week and the topic is "change". We have chosen the subtopic "global warming"
Do you have the time to answer a few questions in writing?
1. What is behind global warming?
2. What can we do to prevent global warming?
3. If we don't do anything about it, how does it affect us and our descendants?
4. What will happen in the future, and what are the alternatives for us, if the Earth becomes unlivable?
5. How can we save Earth if it isn't too late?

RESPONSE

Dear Students:

Dr. Singer was not available to answer your questions. I have worked with him for the past seven years, and he approved this response to you.

You ask some very good questions, which require answers with some detail. Science advances by asking good questions, providing answers that may or may not be correct (guesses), then testing the guesses against all hard evidence, that may or may not support it. If the strongest evidence does not support the guess (the hypothesis), then the guess must be discarded or changed.

The climate has been warming and cooling for hundreds of millions of years. For over two million years, the globe has usually been cold, with long ice ages interrupted by short warm periods of 10 to 15 thousand years. We live in one such warm period of about 10,000 years. The longer periods of cooling (and shorter periods of warming) have been explained as resulting from a changing of the orbit and tilt of the globe in relation to the sun, known as the Milankovitch cycles.

Within the generally-warm past 10,000 years, there has been shorter periods of modest warming and cooling. During a warming period, agriculture began and with it, civilization. The most recent cooling period is known as the Little Ice Age. It occurred between about 1300 to 1850 and was very hard for those living in Northern Europe and China, where we have written records. In Europe, many died from starvation and associated diseases because crops did not ripen. The Nordic settlements in Greenland were wiped out. Great storms occurred in the North Sea, killing thousands of people living in the low countries. It is thought this cooling period was caused by a weaker intensity of the sun, which resulted in increasing cloudiness and corresponding cooling.

Understanding what is behind the current warming of the last century or so, requires a complete understanding of what created periods of warming and cooling over the past 10,000 years, which we do not have. The earth’s climate is extremely complex. It can be described as the result of two fluids in motion interacting with the land. The fluids move in response to the heat generated daily by the sun.

One of the fluids is the ocean, which transports heat on the surface from the tropics to the poles, where it escapes into the atmosphere and to space. A famous surface ocean flow is the Gulf Stream, which keeps Northern Europe much warmer than the corresponding latitudes of Canada. The other fluid is the atmosphere, which transports heat from the surface to the upper troposphere by convection, from which heat can escape to space by radiation. We simply do not understand the movements of fluids sufficiently well to explain exactly how these systems work.

Adding to the complexity is the rotation of the earth, which changes the intensity of solar energy hitting any specific location on the globe. That varies both daily and seasonally, which adds to the ever-changing motions of the atmosphere and the oceans. It may take hundreds of years before these complex motions are fully understood.

In answer to your question: What is behind global warming? We simply do not know in detail, but can guess, then look at the evidence.

Over 100 years ago, scientists wondered why the surface of the earth does not cool as rapidly at night, as many thought it should. An explanation, since then well tested, is that some gases in the atmosphere delay the transport of heat from the surface to space, keeping the earth warmer at night. These gases are called greenhouse gases, the most important of which is water vapor. Deserts, with low atmospheric water vapor, cool more rapidly at night than humid areas at comparable latitude.

A lesser greenhouse gas is carbon dioxide which humans emit by burning fossil fuels. But research by different laboratories have shown that adding carbon dioxide to today’s atmosphere will cause only a small warming, nothing to fear.

Prior to the time when satellite measurements began (1979), the surface thermometers that indicated warming were largely on land, mostly located in the US, Western Europe, and other Westernized areas. The coverage was not global. Surface temperatures may indicate what is occurring in the atmosphere, but are influenced by many other human activities such as building cities, land clearing, and farming. For over 38 years, we have had the benefit of accurate temperature measurements from satellites that cover nearly all the earth, including oceans.

Meanwhile, computer models, known as General Circulation Models, have been used with relatively little success. Built into them is the assumption that the slight warming caused by CO2 will be amplified into a much greater warming due to water vapor. The principles of the scientific method demand that real data from observations be used, and for a computer model to be valid, it must reproduce the observed data. Any warming caused by increased greenhouse gases will be stronger in the atmosphere than on the surface.

Satellite measurements of temperature trends in the atmosphere have been studied intensely, including even tiny corrections for drifting orbits. Furthermore, the temperature trends are double-checked by using four different sets of atmospheric temperature measurements, taken with different instruments, carried by weather balloons; and all closely agree. Now stretching over 38 years, these show a modest warming trend.

From this evidence, we can conclude that: unless compelling evidence indicates otherwise, the warming influence of greenhouse gases, especially carbon dioxide, has been greatly overestimated; efforts to reduce greenhouse gases will not prevent global warming; carbon dioxide-caused warming will be modest; and the Earth will not become unlivable from carbon dioxide warming. Life began on this planet when the atmosphere was far richer in carbon dioxide, and far poorer in oxygen, than it is today.

Starting in 1972, Landsat satellites have been taking images of the earth. They show that the earth is greening with increasing carbon dioxide, becoming richer for life. Thousands of experiments show food crops grow better in atmospheres richer in carbon dioxide than the atmosphere today. Indoor plant nurseries routinely increase the carbon dioxide concentration of their air to three to four times that of today’s atmosphere.

Through the wonder of photosynthesis, using energy from the sun, green plants convert carbon dioxide and water into oxygen and carbohydrates (food). All plants and complex animals depend on this food. We should praise carbon dioxide, not fear it.

To directly answer your questions:

What is behind global warming? We don’t know exactly, but based on evidence, greenhouse gases are not the main cause.

What can we do to prevent global warming? Nothing. The main cause is natural variation, which we cannot prevent.

If we don't do anything about it, how does it affect us and our descendants? You and your descendants will live in a world richer in carbon dioxide, which is a benefit to plants, the environment, and humanity.

What will happen in the future, and what are the alternatives for us, if the Earth becomes unlivable? Life began on earth with the atmosphere many times richer in carbon dioxide than today. The earth will not become unlivable from carbon dioxide-caused warming.

How can we save Earth if it isn't too late? The earth does not need saving, but it needs good stewards. You can help by not polluting with trash, not wasting energy, and living healthy lives.

SOURCE

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