Devonian

How efficient is a coal or oil fired powerstation? The figure I have in my mind is a whopping 30% or so.......

Brickfielder, Why do you use a satellite record graph that end in 2002 when a better graph is available? You, perhaps, don't know that the data has been looked at and revised? Have you checked this critique of Zbigniew Jaworowski? It's difficult to ignore it's conclusions - Dr Z is plain wrong.

Do you know how many thousands of miles of hedges have been grubbed out since WW2? I don't think that is 'organic moulding' - it was destruction, plain and simple. Elm trees vanished inside a decade - did anyone protest? De we do sweet fa about it? You think if something similar happened to the mighty oak we'd, as a people, get off our butts? NOT A CHANCE! Yet, a few thousand windmills that, as a small start, begin to reduce our dependence on fossil fuels, a small change in a direction of living off the planets excess energy not treat it's atmosphere as a dustbin for products of combustion, and it's 'stupid' (not just you, or mainly you) and many people offer voiciferous criticsm, protests. Honestly... It makes me dispare for my species :huh:

Visually stunning, once set up the energy is free, renewable and non polluting. I've not noticed any noise from the wind farms I've visited, and I'd rather have winds farms in my back yards than some foul coal power station, or depend on voilatile countries for energy supplies more than we have to. Will I justify myself with some figures? Nope, it opinion like your post. I will say we have a wind powered water pump. It's pumped god knows how many thousands gallon of water at a cost, once set up (in the £100/s) of practically nowt. I will, however, refrain from using the word 'stupid' as glibly as others have in this thread....

For global CO2 this is good http://www.cmdl.noaa.gov/gallery/ccgg_figu...2_surface_color from http://www.cmdl.noaa.gov/gallery/ccgg_figures . CO2 show a greater annual cycle in the NH (more land, seasonal vegitation) but overall the trend is clearly up and up everywhere. CO2 is undoubtedly a well mixed atmospheric gas. Oh, and it's as clear as anything is wrt recent atmospheric changes that the extra CO2 is anthropogenic - I'll add a link explaining why later. This is the best explaination for why the extra CO2 has to be our doing that I've found on the net - http://www.dailykos.com/storyonly/2006/7/7/104649/4911

For global CO2 this is good http://www.cmdl.noaa.gov/gallery/ccgg_figu...2_surface_color from http://www.cmdl.noaa.gov/gallery/ccgg_figures . CO2 show a greater annual cycle in the NH (more land, seasonal vegitation) but overall the trend is clearly up and up everywhere. CO2 is undoubtedly a well mixed atmospheric gas. Oh, and it's as clear as anything is wrt recent atmospheric changes that the extra CO2 is anthropogenic - I'll add a link explaining why later.

AGW you mean? For the climate forcing due to 'A'ghg's to 'go away' then basic physics involved will have to be shown to be wrong. I don't think that will happen, it's well tested and studied. Otoh, something might come along that masks the effect of anthro ghg's - a large negative forcing. It might happen, but, as with all 'mights', might doesn't mean will. So, it might NOT happen. Fact is we can't rely on 'mights' to get us out of this pickle. People should go around saying that as well.

Humm, well, firstly we're comparing a yet to be published report with one from 2001. Secondly, not sure 'twice as good' are the words. You could say, since the celcius scale goes from -270 odd to infinity, that a range of 4.4C was pretty impressive allready

Eh? Look again , the range has decreased from 4.4 to 2.5 2007: (a yet to be confimed since it's not been officially published) 2-4.5C = 2.5C. 2001: 1.4-5.8C = 4.4C

P3 "Best estimates of solar flux suggest a cooling effect of about 1 - 1.2C over the 11 year cycle.". Sounds like an awful lot to me. I can't think of any 11 year solar cycle showing any obvious temperature change (over 11 years I mean, or 22 or....). 1C plus is an awful lot imo. It's enough to come out of a LIA and end up where we are now - and that's taken hundreds of years. So, who's credibly claiming 1C plus?

I think this is pure speculation - unless someone has evidence from sound scientific sources? I've seen no evidence of a coming spectacular cooling of the sun except on dodgy website (the kind of stuff the astrologer T. Landshiedt came up with...). LIA 2C colder? I think you'll find that is not so, perhaps a degree colder than now at most (in long term averges that is). Again, though, I'm open to evidence - like the CET for 1690-1720 perhaps?).

I think we've both misunderstood each other. Apologies for that. I'm afraid I've seen to many people branded 'religious' (in an ''ad homming' way) in these dabates in various places for me not to react to the word. But, I may have missed your point :lol: I (so this is my view) think the 'scientifically prudent' approach is this: CO2 is a potent ghg. It's concentration is rising rapidly to levels not seen for at least 600,000 year atm and millions of years if it rises as much as is likely. This rise in CO2 conc is (nb) due to our activities. Simple models of the Earth's atmosphere first used over 100 years ago and more sophisticate models that become better over time indicate pretty much the same thing - warming, of about 1C directly due to CO2 and probably (nb) several more degrees warming on top of that due to feedback effects. Additional, other changes we have made may well have climate changing effects (deforestation, cfc's, methane...). Does that sound right

Is it me whos supposed to have done something wrong? All I think is that the use of the word religion in debates about agw often causes trouble. I posted that opinion, and asked questions, to clarify things. I still can't understand what Wilson is saying.

I'm not being defensive - I'm reacting. I don't like to think I'm being religious (irrational) rather than rational or scientific (would you?). I've not called you religious . It's you who needs to put up the evidence. As I said, i've not seen evidence such irrationality is widespread on either side. I'd like to know what the 'scientifically prudent' view of AGW is? I also asked a question about the views of Daniel and the Hadley Centre. "With climate change we can make predictions, such as major cold by 2030s, and we, if we are honest with ourselves, have no idea " We know we can can calculate what Earth's temperature should be, note it's seems to be too high and see ghg's are having an effect. I really think it's not a question of we having 'no idea' what effect doubling CO2 will, in of itself, have. I do though think Daniels prediction is without similar strong foundations.

Lets leave out calling people 'religious'. My impression is that very few on either side would, if push came to shove, have a belief system that overode compelling (or more compelling) evidence. That said, you seem to be equating the kind of predictions in Daniel's posts with what might come out of the Hadley Centre? Right?

Sorry, I'm guilty of not reading everything I remember that. I also remember thinking that chaos seems to be a problem with not knowing the initial conditions when running models - so small errors build up. But, the Earths climate isn't a model? It 'knows' what it's intial conditons are? How could it's initial conditons change so that chaos would come into effect? It's like one model run, and it goes along, new inputs changing it? It's models of it that go 'wrong/chaotic' not the actual climate? Right? Wrong? Way off? I think the arguement (see the RC post?) is whether the peterbation builds or fades away. Tbh I think the effect of butterfly wings fades away. After all, look at all the cars whizzing around, much bigger efect than a butterfly, have they cause a change to depression tracks? It's not in any way obvious they have...

We don't know everything 'tis true. Why does that mean that if something unexpected comes along it's not as likely to be something that enhances any anthro warming? Nope, not studied 'chaos' to any high level, I've just read a bit and I know what I agree with. Imo, climate isn't utterly chaotic. I think can quite accurately predict next year's CET - I predict it will be between 8 and 11C. I guess I've better than a, what, 90% chance of being right? Yup, I agree

Chaos, it's the bane of climatology forums :unsure: . I don't fully understand it, but I do know that to say our climate is chaotic and therefore anything can happen is wrong. Climate obeys the laws of physics. So do ghg's. Unless something comes along to 'force' the climate in another direction it will warm (by an ammount not fully known) because of anthro ghgs. That something wont arise becuase of chaos in the climate system. It will be either a huge volcanic eruption, a massive meteorite, or a cooling of the sun, or some a yet missed but nevertheless a vast climate forcing (err, how do you miss something vast?). None of those things are 'chaotic'.

Wolf!

Not if you want to compare like with like. You don't have to go far back in time, say to when the Isthmus of Panama closed, to find times when climate then is simply not comparible to now becuase the basic set up wasn't the same. You'd need to compare like cars using different fuels, if you wanted to say anything about what effect different fuels have.

See post #85 of this RealClimate thread for an interesting comment by Judith Curry on this hurricane season in the NH. It's nowhere near over yet.

Good, the above is pretty much the post I don't now have to write.

Sure, we've had predominately NW winds until recently, N. Devon faces the north . Try this site for a view of how warm South Devon has been. Devon's south, or south east, really hasn't had a bad August so far.

But the consequences of what we do or don't do this century will....

But, the 'hockey stick' doesn't compare aginst running 30 year means, indeed I can't think of any graph anywhere that does? Not against running means? I just think comparing aginst running mean adds confusion (I'm certainly getting confused ), because you're not comparing years to the same base line. So to me it's rather (though I take GW's point about inflation) rather like comparing present petrol prices with the mean of the present and past petrol proces with the mean of the past. To get at real petrol prices excluding inflation you exclued infalation and measure against a base. Likewise with temperature if you want to get a warming due to one factor you exclude uhi, and the rest and measure against a baseline. So, I still don't really get what this graph shows that's helpful?