A question about climate change/global warming.

The Guardian is liveblogging the run-up to the release of the Independent Climate Change Email Review.

It's, like, well exciting innit.

I'm not sure why this report is getting much attention since Phil Jones (of CRU) was exonerated in March, and the rest of the CRU scientists were exonerated way back in April, but for what it's worth, here's another exoneration.

Link to the report

On the allegation of withholding temperature data, we find that CRU was not in a position to withhold access to such data or tamper with it.

On the allegation of biased station selection and analysis, we find no evidence of bias.

The overall implication of the allegations was to cast doubt on the extent to which CRU’s work in this area could be trusted and should be relied upon and we find no evidence to support that implication.

On the allegations that there was subversion of the peer review or editorial process we find no evidence to substantiate this in the three instances examined in detail.

On the allegations that in two specific cases there had been a misuse by CRU scientists of the IPCC process, in presenting AR4 [the Fourth Assessment] to the public and policy makers, we find that the allegations cannot be upheld.

In particular, on the question of the composition of temperature reconstructions [in AR4], we found no evidence of exclusion of other published temperature reconstructions that would show a very different picture. The general discussion of sources of uncertainty in the text is extensive, including reference to divergence.

Of course, the infuriating part of being falsely accused is that few people ever hear about the exoneration. MAN ACCUSED OF BRUTAL RAPE/DOUBLE MURDER. (weeks later, on bottom of section H19: man is not guilty, sorry)

Your monthly "this is the hottest year on record so far but it's getting close to zero attention, again" update:

NASA's data shows that this is the hottest global January-June on record.

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more

Not going to link it but the most recent post on Joannenova.com.au about the EU and N1ck Gr1ff!n is fucking disgusting.

Haha, she took it down. Anthony Watts also posted about it this morning and deleted it after about 15 minutes. Still on the SPPI blog, though.

'Watts up with that?’ is ranked as the number one most read “science” blog in the world according to Wikio – and it has become the hub for the climate denial community online. Its lead blogger, Anthony Watts, is often quoted in mainstream media outlets such as The Times and his blog was winner of “best science blog” at the Weblog awards.

So you might be surprised (or not – if you already doubted the credibility of his sources) to learn that Anthony Watts’ latest source of information is none other than the Br1t1sh N4tion4l Party – yes, those known to the rest of us as the Br1t!sh N4z1 Party.

Anthony Watts blogged today at 15.30 GMT about how “climate scepticism could become a criminal offence in UK” – and his source? BNP leader, N1ck Gr1ff!n. Unsurprisingly, by 16.11, the page had disappeared. No doubt, after one of his friends in the UK pointed out it doesn’t look great when you post N4z1 propaganda on your blog and twitter feed.

This is pretty big news.

The dead sea: Global warming blamed for 40 per cent decline in the ocean's phytoplankton

The microscopic plants that support all life in the oceans are dying off at a dramatic rate, according to a study that has documented for the first time a disturbing and unprecedented change at the base of the marine food web.

Scientists have discovered that the phytoplankton of the oceans has declined by about 40 per cent over the past century, with much of the loss occurring since the 1950s. They believe the change is linked with rising sea temperatures and global warming.

If the findings are confirmed by further studies it will represent the single biggest change to the global biosphere in modern times, even bigger than the destruction of the tropical rainforests and coral reefs, the scientists said yesterday.

more here

for those interested in such things, this study would be a good thing to reference the next time you're talking to someone who doesn't give a shit about climate change and it's obvious that they think the effects of it won't take hold until decades from now. climate change is happening. IS happening.

Don't know if I've mentioned it on ILX before, but the 3 hour audio documentary Climate Wars by Gwynne Dyer for the CBC is one of the best discussions of consequences we'll see in our own lifetime, and it places the focus on things which might concern your right leaning family members: droughts at 20-40 degrees latitude and a flood of climate refugees to the North. The Pentagon and UK MoD are already wargaming scenarios like "Fortress Britain".

http://www.cbc.ca/technology/story/2010/07/29/climate-change-study-noaa.html

Jeff Id lets one of his readers 'expose' the 'global governance angles' of the leaked COP15 negotiating text and the draft document of the IPCC Emissions Scenarios report:

B1 SD is the path they are trying to shepherd us toward. It leads to the slaughterhouse. It is their first priority. There is nothing conspiratorial in nature about their plans because they put them right out there for all to read. Here are some of my favorite terms/phrases from the negotiating draft you should familiarize yourself with: historical climate debt; transparent system of governance; compensate for lost opportunities, resources, lives, land and dignity; environmental justice; green fund; levies on CO2 emissions; taxes on carbon-intensive products and services; levies on international and maritime transport; levies on international transactions; penalties or fines for non-compliance; ODA additional to ODA targets; adaptation debt; 2 per cent of gross national product; and uniform global levy.

What a wonderful world the AGW control freaks have in store for us. This movement in its current form is less concerned with environmental issues than it is with power and control. Not me. Not my son. Free will is a damned thing, isn’t it? Why is it so difficult for these folks to admit that this is far less a scientific endeavor than a political one? Why do they find it so hard to admit that this is more about control of humanity than it is about saving the world? It’s a simple equation: AGW = political movement. AGW fraud deniers can lobby for superficial groupthink and cry heretic and big oil and conspiracy all they want, but the evidence speaks for itself.

The first part of Roger Harrabin's Uncertain Climate documentary series was just on Radio 4. It's pretty even-handed.

http://i51.tinypic.com/in6czd.gif

Obviously the main takeaways from this new study (via CP are that women have a better understanding of climate science than men do, but still rate themselves as being less knowledgeable than men.

But for me, the interesting part of the data is the close correlation between the % of those who who "believe that most scientists believe global warming is happening" (66% of women, 60% of men) vs the % who "believe the effects of global warming have already begun to happen" (59% of women, 54% of men). Cause is not correlation, of course, but to me it seems that it demonstrates that most people that realize that there is an overwhelming consensus among climate scientists about global warming also believe that the effects of global warming are already happening.

This is significant to me because I don't believe that there is any way that someone could plausibly argue that there isn't a consensus among climate scientists on global warming. Study after study has shown this, with a recent relatively well-publicized study putting the % of climatologists who believe that global warming is "real" at 97% or so. So going back to the results at the top, the 34% of women and 40% of men who don't realize there's an overwhelming consensus among climate scientists on global warming, well...there may be hope for winning them over yet. "Debate" on the likely effects of climate change, physically, economically, etc..., I can just barely understand how someone would be susceptible to the disinformation campaign that was unleashed so long ago. But not realizing that there's a huge consensus? That's like "Earth is the third planet from the sun" level, and the media has to take the lion's share of the blame, but at least there's hope that the fact will be communicated better in the near future.

In Australia, the second-last election involved the winning party getting a strong mandate for doing something on climate change. They talked a lot, did fuck-all. Then, when it became apparent people might have to pay a little bit more for electricity, etc, the idiot population got cold feet and then, most recently, voted for the party led by a climate change denier.

We are all fucked.

But not realizing that there's a huge consensus?

I guess this is a function of certain parts of the media (all of them? Extreme points of view make better stories than confirmation of the consensus) giving a disproportionate amount of attention to deniers. For some outlets, this is just disinformation, but I suppose for some them this is a misguided attempt at 'balance' i.e. having one pro and one anti on the show, when this distorts where the debate is happening.

And if every discussion of climate change contains one fringe theorist alleging that dissenting voices are being silenced in service of a manufactured consent then this is going to shake people's confidence in the existence of a consensus.

I would be curious to read about media coverage of the risk of smoking back in the late 50s/early 60s.

The new 250 page study, Strange scholarship in the Wegman Report (exec summary, full report) by John Mashey (with considerable assistance from Canadian blogger Deep Climate) finds that:
* a third of the Wegman Report was plagiarised from other sources, without attribution
* half of the references in the bibliography are not cited in the main text, and one reference is to “a fringe technology publication by a writer of pseudoscience”
* a graph of central England temperatures from the first IPCC report was distorted and misrepresented
* the supposedly impartial Wegman team were fed papers and references by a member of Republican Congressman Joe Barton’s staff
* Wegman’s social network analysis of the authorship of “hockey team” papers was poor, and did not support the claims made of problems with peer-review in the field

Given the involvement in this "report" by a sitting congressman, this should be a Climate-gate-esque scandal that is covered breathlessly by newspapers across the world, right? Right?

Aaahahahahaha, shit.

(New Yorker) As the World Burns: How the Senate and the White House missed their best chance to deal with climate change

Loads of interesting new details (new to me, anyway) on the demise of the climate bill, and serves as a valuable epilogue to Eric Pooley's excellent The Climate War. Like a shortlist of the Republicans who might have voted for the bill:

Kerry, the de-facto leader of the triumvirate, assured him that there were five Republicans prepared to vote for the bill. One of them, Lindsey Graham, was sitting at the table. Kerry listed four more: Susan Collins, Olympia Snowe, Scott Brown, and George LeMieux. With five Republicans, getting sixty votes would be relatively easy. The Obama White House and the Three Amigos would be known for having passed a bill that would fundamentally change the American economy and slow the emission of gases that are causing the inexorable, and potentially catastrophic, warming of the planet.

McCain's final demise into the Realm of the Blowhard:

By late January, 2009, the details of the Lieberman-McCain bill had been almost entirely worked out, and Lieberman began showing it to other Senate offices in anticipation of a February press conference...

But the negotiations stalled as the bill moved forward. In Arizona, a right-wing radio host and former congressman, J. D. Hayworth, announced that he was considering challenging McCain in the primary. McCain had never faced a serious primary opponent for his Senate seat...

By the end of February, McCain was starting to back away from his commitment to Lieberman. At first, he insisted that he and Lieberman announce a set of climate-change “principles” instead of a bill. Then, three days before a scheduled press conference to announce those principles, the two senators had a heated conversation on the Senate floor. Lieberman turned and walked away. “That’s it,” he told an aide. “He can’t do it this year.”

Some people in the WH were a lil' worried about expanding offshore drilling, but Browner was there to ease the pain:

The strategy had risks, including the possibility that expanded drilling off America’s coast could lead to a dangerous spill. But Browner, the head of the E.P.A. for eight years under Clinton, seemed to think the odds of that were limited. “Carol Browner says the fact of the matter is that the technology is so good that after Katrina there was less spillage from those platforms than the amount you spill in a year filling up your car with gasoline,” the White House official said. “So, given that, she says realistically you could expand offshore drilling.”

Stabenow (D-MI) has no idea what is going on:

The top ask of Senator Debbie Stabenow, of Michigan, was to insure that incentives given to farmers for emissions-reducing projects—known as “offsets”—would be decided in part by the U.S.D.A., and not just the E.P.A. “Ultimately, farmers aren’t crazy about letting hippies tell them how to make money,” Rosengarten said.

God, if only Stabenow knew how unhippy-like the EPA is (unfortunately).

For those (on ILX and elsewhere) that like to pretend that Fox News doesn't have an outsized influence on politics:

But, back in Washington, Graham warned Lieberman and Kerry that they needed to get as far as they could in negotiating the bill “before Fox News got wind of the fact that this was a serious process,” one of the people involved in the negotiations said. “He would say, ‘The second they focus on us, it’s gonna be all cap-and-tax all the time, and it’s gonna become just a disaster for me on the airwaves. We have to move this along as quickly as possible.’ ”

After Obama's offshore drilling announcement, I was totally bewildered that they got NOTHING IN RETURN from the Republicans for a HUGE CONCESSION. Nice to see that others were bewildered too, and that in fact, the giveaways were a persistent, destructive pattern:

But there had been no communication with the senators actually writing the bill, and they felt betrayed. When Graham’s energy staffer learned of the announcement (ZS: Obama's expanded offshore drilling), the night before, he was “apoplectic,” according to a colleague. The group (ZS: Kerry, Lieberman and Graham) had dispensed with the idea of drilling in ANWR, but it was prepared to open up vast portions of the Gulf and the East Coast. Obama had now given away what the senators were planning to trade.

This was the third time that the White House had blundered. In February, the President’s budget proposal included $54.5 billion in new nuclear loan guarantees. Graham was also trying to use the promise of more loan guarantees to lure Republicans to the bill, but now the White House had simply handed the money over. Later that month, a group of eight moderate Democrats sent the E.P.A. a letter asking the agency to slow down its plans to regulate carbon, and the agency promised to delay any implementation until 2011. Again, that was a promise Kerry, Graham, and Lieberman wanted to negotiate with their colleagues. Obama had served the dessert before the children even promised to eat their spinach. Graham was the only Republican negotiating on the climate bill, and now he had virtually nothing left to take to his Republican colleagues.

also: Kerry striking a deal with the man who sabotaged his presidential campaign; David Axelrod blows;details surrounding Graham's exit from the bill;the impact of the oil spill on bill;etc

And an appropriate closing:

As the Senate debate expired this summer, a longtime environmental lobbyist told me that he believed the “real tragedy” surrounding the issue was that Obama understood it profoundly. “I believe Barack Obama understands that fifty years from now no one’s going to know about health care,” the lobbyist said. “Economic historians will know that we had a recession at this time. Everybody is going to be thinking about whether Barack Obama was the James Buchanan of climate change.”

I guess I went overboard on October 3rd, sry.

Thought I'd share this little gem here:

“Carbon regulation, cap and trade, it’s all just a money-control avenue,” Ms. Khuri added. “Some people say I’m extreme, but they said the John Birch Society was extreme, too.”

(from Climate Change Doubt Is Tea Party Article of Faith)

looooooooooooooooool

Can anyone help me find a map of areas that will get hit by glacial floods?

http://www.homepage.montana.edu/~geol445/hyperglac/space1/worldice.gif

http://i53.tinypic.com/34tbmlk.jpg

NYT

God, I'd love for the NYT's coverage to avoid unnecessary hedging, just for once

is it normal for it to be summer-snowing in australia?

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/worldnews/australiaandthepacific/australia/8213932/Wintry-weather-brings-snow-to-Australia-in-midsummer.html

i don't know, but nine of the hottest 10 years ever recorded all happened.. in the last 10 years.

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/ezra-klein/globaltempanom.jpg

Just deleted three(!!) more people from my Facebook list for variations of the "lol global warming is such a joke because there is snow" bullshit. I'm afraid I may become incoherent with rage and punch anyone that says that to me irl/

http://ifglobalwarmingisrealthenwhyisitcold.blogspot.com/

YES

http://4.bp.blogspot.com/_rpiegz3et3E/S2EP3FeEYzI/AAAAAAAAALI/yGktwwyuK0w/s1600-h/33o18ud.jpg

Unfortunately, the chances of persuading someone who thinks of the coldness of winter or a heavy snow as evidence against climate change to read this is about .000000001%, but at least you can be happy to know that a relatively easy to read quick guide exists!

Global Warming and Cold Winters

That harsh winter that we are experiencing, it is not proof that global warming is not happening, but rather serves as proof that it is indeed happening, and even a bit faster than we might like to think. It also shows why the phrase "Climate Change" is a better term to describe the effects of man on his environment.

That post mainly just covers the coldness itself (partly caused by increased heat in the arctic ocean combining with the polar air above it to create the Arctic Corridor), but then there's plenty of other stuff that "climate skeptics" (most charitable term I can force myself to use) apparently refuse to read that explain the increased precipitation, which of course in winter takes the form of snowfall in many places. Climate Progress has a quick overview with plenty of links.

http://static.guim.co.uk/sys-images/Environment/Pix/columnists/2011/1/21/1295623019230/Adam-Blog--James-Delingpo-007.jpg

lol

delingpole = nobber

well that wasn't too difficult

that was lovely to watch but i wanted more

ugh no more delingpole pls

if you've got the time, this series of videos is pretty great:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=52KLGqDSAjo

that's part 1, they're about 10 mins apiece, and there's 13 of them i think

The Delingpole segment referenced above:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=36Xu3SQcIE0

"I am an interpreter of interpretations"

THAT is the guy who broke the climategate e-mails?

how do people like this gain any authority or trust whatsoever?

I am forced to actually transcribe his closing statement just to stare at it:

'it is not my job to SIT DOWN and READ peer-reviewed papers because I simply haven't got the time, I haven't got the scientific expertise. What I rely upon is people who HAVE got the time and the expertise to DO IT and write about it and interpret it. I am an interpreter of interpretations.'

That is jaw dropping. What a prat.

That's a lot like the explanation some medical cranks give when someone asks them why they haven't done any scientific testing to see if their particular brand of snakeoil actually works: "I don't have the time to find out if I'm full of shit or not! I'm too busy saving lives!"

that quote needs to make the rounds. it needs to be his representative quote, that and perhaps the one about 'truly there just aren't enough bullets'. any paper of note that ever gave time to both sides of the debate in an attempt at objectivity needs to do a story on this and just publish that quote near the top of the page, to make it clear that one of the sides represents world scientific consensus and the other side is basically led by a twit in an angry clown mask who becomes incomprehensible under the slightest questioning.

Heads are going to roll for this, they’ll have to. But however many heads do roll it won’t be enough. Always remember this: the Warmist faith so fervently held and promulgated by the Met Office is exactly the same faith so passionately, unswervingly followed by David Cameron, Chris Huhne, Greg Barker, the Coalition’s energy spokesman in the Lords Lord Marland, and all but five members of the last parliament. And also by the BBC, the Prince of Wales, almost every national newspaper, the European Union, the Royal Society, the New York Times, CNBC, the Obama administration, the Australian and New Zealand governments, your children’s schools, our major universities, our minor universities, the University of East Anglia, your local council….

Truly there just aren’t enough bullets!

http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/jamesdelingpole/100069327/climate-change-there-just-arent-enough-bullets/

Almost all the responsible and/or intelligent people in the world disagree with my conclusions. Therefore, they should be shot.

Truly an example of conservative 'humor' at its 'finest'.

from tonight's SOTU:

"Now, clean energy breakthroughs will only translate into clean energy jobs if businesses know there will be a market for what they’re selling. So tonight, I challenge you to join me in setting a new goal: by 2035, 80% of America’s electricity will come from clean energy sources. Some folks want wind and solar. Others want nuclear, clean coal, and natural gas. To meet this goal, we will need them all – and I urge Democrats and Republicans to work together to make it happen….."

Wait a second...did "clean energy" just get redefined as including nuclear, clean coal and natural gas?

Obama's been pro-coal since his Illinois state house days. I can see a plausible case for creating incentives (carbon tax) for converting existing coal plants to natural gas over, say, 5 years as an inexpensive interim solution that would reduce electricity generation GHG emissions by 40-45% (while utility scale nuclear, wind, solar thermal, etc are built over a generation). We're not going to get that from an Illinois (or Wyoming, or Montana) politician.

We're not going to get that from an Illinois (or Wyoming, or Montana) politician.

― Pauper Management Improved (Sanpaku), Wednesday, January 26, 2011 5:47 AM (2 hours ago) Bookmark

Or Pennsylvania, or West Virginia or Kentucky etc. We're fucked.

If the only way to get a massive boost for solar, wind and small-head hydro projects is to feed the corporate pigs some subsidies for (*ahem*) "clean coal", then I am willing to hold my nose and go ahead with it. Something needs to happen that to change the present fossil fuel-centric equation in favor of cleaner energy. This is a case where half a loaf is still likely to be a long term disaster, but at least smaller, slower disaster than preserving the status quo.

The argument I often hear in favor of clean coal goes along these lines: It's in our own best interests to perfect & distribute Clean Coal technology to China & Russia since they're doing it anyway.

I can see a plausible case for creating incentives (carbon tax) for converting existing coal plants to natural gas over, say, 5 years as an inexpensive interim solution that would reduce electricity generation GHG emissions by 40-45% (while utility scale nuclear, wind, solar thermal, etc are built over a generation). We're not going to get that from an Illinois (or Wyoming, or Montana) politician.

― Pauper Management Improved (Sanpaku), Wednesday, 26 January 2011 00:47 (13 hours ago) Bookmark Suggest Ban Permalink

Converting coal to NG is not negligible thing to do. Since you are replacing baseload you want to be operating combined cycle which means new turbines and new or heavily modified boilers. There's not much saving or benefit over build new especially as you have to get that base load power from somewhere else. So essentially you are building new at ~ $750/kw. Cartbon tax would have to be huge to negate the effect of fully depreciated assets.

They need to change the rules on how thermal plants are costed. Fuel costs don't have to be factored in right now which means they look cheaper than they should compared to renewables.

The sad fact is that there is no way of passing an energy bill without votes from those bought and paid for by the fossil fuel industry. It means that way more than lipservice has to be paid to 'clean' coal and shale gas.

A gently effective demolition of Christopher Monckton just now on Storyville on BBC4.