General Climate Change Discussion.......

[Guest diessoli]

So the sinks are healthier than we've been led to believe.

Who has led you to believe that?

AR4 says:

... the terrestrial biosphere and the oceans together have consistently removed 45% of fossil CO₂ for the last 45 years ...

Some recent studies say less anthropogenic CO2 is taken up by sinks, Knorr says there is no change. Over time people will confirm one or the other study, may find issues with the methods employed, will have more data, ...

This is just science in progress.

It's only in the highly politicised atmosphere around climate science that you see all this excitement about each new study that comes out.

This also indicates that warming in recent decades is far more likely to have been of natural origin, with at the most, a tiny percentage of extra warming being due to CO2.

That's an interesting conclusion. It would be interesting to know why that might be.

D.

[VillagePlank]

It's only in the highly politicised atmosphere around climate science that you see all this excitement about each new study that comes out.

Yep - it would be nice to shut the lid on the box for, say, 3 years (safe enough?) so that the scientists can get on with their work without being paraded about, or spied on, or any of a whole host of nasties.

We know they have lied through what came out in the recent scandal.

Sorry, Paul, I missed the bit where 'they' 'lied' I didn't realise that. What did they lie about?

[Turnedoutniceagain]

3rd day in a row with not a breathe of wind. How much have they spent on those hideous windmills ??

[laserguy]

3rd day in a row with not a breathe of wind. How much have they spent on those hideous windmills ??

Probably almost as much as my energy bill's gonna come to this quarter. Hope there's some overtime in the offing or I'm stuffed as much as the turbines are.

[rob48]

A nasty and horrid man writes:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/comment/columnists/christopherbooker/6924898/The-Met-Office-gives-us-the-warmist-weather.html

I particularly like Daniel's comment @08.22pm 02/01/2010!

[laserguy]

A nasty and horrid man writes:

http://www.telegraph...st-weather.html

I particularly like Daniel's comment @08.22pm 02/01/2010!

Ouch! Plenty more juicy morsels in there,too. Just look at some of the organisations which fund CRU - never again let it be said that sceptics/deniers (I'm proudly in the latter camp!) are in the pockets of 'Big Oil'.

[Gray-Wolf]

With the poor performance/warming of the PDO-ve phase over the last 3 major cycles and the view that El-Nino will become a permanent feature as the planet warms I'd been looking for other 'alterations/modifications' to recognised climate fluctuations.

Today S.D. posted this;

http://www.scienceda...91230183104.htm

which appears a little bit drastic.

With that huge, growing, warm pool (east of NZ) now filling most of the southern Pacific (and totally dwarfing the Nino output) I was wondering if it was about time for our 'new' climate to show it's hand in dramatic fashion.

If we expand the IOD into the southern Pacific and meld it with a fat Nino signature (remember how surprised some folk were at the amount of warmth that was surfacing in the Nino Regions?) , seal it in the temperate/tropical southern hemisphere (with the human influenced Antarctic circumpolar current/winds) then we could create a heat absorbing/shedding cycle that would, indeed does, dwarf anything a typical 'super Nino could produce.

The other thing I had to consider were the teleconnections with the other oscillations that some folk seem to feel they extend their influence as far as the polar stratosphere ( and warmings etc).

I cannot help but feel that 2010 will be a busy old year for all in the climate/meteorology world as I find it hard to imagine the amount of energy currently peculating into the atmosphere from the equator south.

EDIT; On CO2 sinks working better;

http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/news/2009/co2_emissions_outpace_absorption.html

Thry're not. In fact;

http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/webdata/ccgg/trends/co2_trend_mlo.pdf

Edited January 3, 2010 by Gray-Wolf

[noggin]

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1240082/It-gigantic-supercomputer-1-500-staff-170m-year-budget-So-does-Met-Office-wrong.html

I know it's the Mail. I also know it is, by and large, an opinion piece, although there are also facts in there that I didn't know....such as environmentalists seeping into the MetO. But, it is good, I think, that this sort of questioning and information is coming out in the MSM more and more.

[Thundery wintry showers]

Those who 'advocate' global warming seem to be the ones who can't bear the thought that things might actually be getting back to normal (huh?) and that there is in fact no grounds whatsoever for concern,let alone that we could 'tackle' the situation if it existed. I find that worrying. Anyways,signing off for a while - A HAPPY NEW YEAR TO EVERY ONE OF YOU. I'm off to vent some CO2 from me homebrew !

One aspect of your arguments constantly fails to add up. If you feel that we should take action to be more sustainable and clean up our act, then why the extreme defensiveness of the "AGW is a myth" position, backed up by arguments that, by and large, amount to saying "I'm right because I'm right"? Tackling AGW should mandate many of the same policies that would be needed to curb the sustainability/pollution problem.

I understand that you have misgivings about the way AGW is abused to help grind political axes. So do I. But that says everything about politics and nothing about the science. Terrorism is used to grind political axes and get the public to accept increased surveillance, does that make terrorism a myth? I don't think so.

I have to say something here.

For a couple of years now this "argument" has been used by the "AGWarmers".

How long will it take for it to sink in that the "couple of weeks" have actually become a couple (or more) of YEARS?

2009 was one of the top five warmest years on record averaged globally, and in the UK still managed to come in above 10.0C CET, in excess of both 1961-90 and 1971-2000 averages.

Hypothetically speaking, if we were having two record warm years, both globally and in the UK, would this prove AGW? If not, then why would the reverse disprove AGW? "Confirmation bias" springs to mind.

[Devonian]

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1240082/It-gigantic-supercomputer-1-500-staff-170m-year-budget-So-does-Met-Office-wrong.html

I know it's the Mail. I also know it is, by and large, an opinion piece, although there are also facts in there that I didn't know....such as environmentalists seeping into the MetO. But, it is good, I think, that this sort of questioning and information is coming out in the MSM more and more.

Aren't we all environmentalists? Don't we all agree we should take care of the planet? So, what's so terribly wrong with the Chariman of the Met O being so???

Anyway, the article is a good rant, and presses all the right buttons about religion, conspiracies and theft (yes, the author approves of theft). Heck, it even blesses Joe B. who (because it's cold this year and he allways forecasts a cold winter) has got his winter forecast right so far...

As to substance, some new science for example - well not a jot...

Edited January 4, 2010 by Devonian

[Methuselah]

I tend to think that peeps who repeatedly make 'All Praise to the Great One!' comments regarding Joe B's first (and only, as far as I can recall?) success, as if it somehow disproves AGW theory, are suffering from a trully monumental case of confirmation bias!

[stewfox]

We went from Global warming (not happening) to Climate change, whats next global cooling ??

Record cold across the Northern Hemisphere

Beijing China

http://news.bbc.co.u...fic/8438871.stm

India

http://news.bbc.co.u...sia/8438879.stm

Scotland

http://news.bbc.co.u...and/8439259.stm

South Korea

http://www.usatoday....uth-korea_N.htm

USA

http://www.usatoday....-coldsnap_N.htm

Edited January 4, 2010 by stewfox

[VillagePlank]

Record cold across the Northern Hemisphere

The question is, is it cold enough? For instance we'd need to see, say, a 0.5C cooling just to get to the long-term average, which, as I am sure you will agree, is well within the bounds of natural variability.

Exactly the same computer models that are used to forecast that we will fry by the year 2030, 2050 or even 2080, are also those used to produce the shorter-range forecasts. It was these models, back in September, that told us we were going to have a mild winter.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1240082/It-gigantic-supercomputer-1-500-staff-170m-year-budget-So-does-Met-Office-wrong.html#ixzz0beFpWpKE

That might well be true, but the software can be configured to act differently according to different scales of time and space, here

[Devonian]

We went from Global warming (not happening) to Climate change, whats next global cooling ??

Record cold across the Northern Hemisphere

Beijing China

http://news.bbc.co.u...fic/8438871.stm

India

http://news.bbc.co.u...sia/8438879.stm

Scotland

http://news.bbc.co.u...and/8439259.stm

South Korea

http://www.usatoday....uth-korea_N.htm

USA

http://www.usatoday....-coldsnap_N.htm

I'm guessing but I'm pretty sure that's <10% of the globe and probably <5%. Ok, lets, so there is no argument, call it 20% in total. So, the other ~80% doesn't count?

Edited January 4, 2010 by Devonian

[Thundery wintry showers]

Anyway, the article is a good rant, and presses all the right buttons about religion, conspiracies and theft (yes, the author approves of theft).

No he doesn't. When the data is taken and leaked to the general public, a copy of the data is taken, and the creators are not deprived of the original copy. For it to be theft, the original would have to be removed as well.

It does concern me that the antipiracy campaigns are succeeding in misleading people into believing that copyright infringement is the same as theft, meaning that they will be more tolerant of ever-tightening copyright laws in the future. It's not just the entertainment industries, science is at risk from this as well- what happens when companies, both inside and outside of academia, decide they want tighter intellectual property restrictions as a means of creating new potential revenue streams, and emphasise policies of only supporting people's work if said people like to be very protective of their IP? In that scenario there would be a real danger of science becoming more hidden and less reproducible, leading to more Climategate type incidents, among other problems.

I certainly agree that the hacking/leaking was unethical, but not for the same reasons as for theft.

As for global temperatures, I expect December and January to come out with low positive anomalies over the Northern Hemisphere simply because the pattern of cold over Eurasia because landmasses cool and warm more readily than the oceans. Positive NAO has contributed to some of the warming over the Northern Hemisphere. But as long as the global temperature is still high over a period of time, it doesn't disprove global warming.

[stewfox]

I'm guessing but I'm pretty sure that's <10% of the globe and probably <5%. Ok, lets, so there is no argument, call it 20% in total. So, the other ~80% doesn't count?

I dont have time to post another '10 stories' from around the globe

The point being we are not talking about one country or even one continent but around the globe

If many more people freeze to death from all this global warming we're having, somebody is going to start to notice

As for global temperatures, I expect December and January to come out with low positive anomalies over the Northern Hemisphere simply because the pattern of cold over Eurasia because landmasses cool and warm more readily than the oceans. Positive NAO has contributed to some of the warming over the Northern Hemisphere. But as long as the global temperature is still high over a period of time, it doesn't disprove global warming.

+ North America + Europe +

Edited January 4, 2010 by stewfox

[Thundery wintry showers]

What about North America and Europe?

The northeast of the North America continent is experiencing exceptional warmth for the time of year with temperatures 15-20C above average in some parts. These will be more than offsetting the cold in the west of North America. However, Eurasia as a whole looks cooler than average.

[Devonian]

No he doesn't. When the data is taken and leaked to the general public, a copy of the data is taken, and the creators are not deprived of the original copy. For it to be theft, the original would have to be removed as well.

TWS, I'm thinking about the stealing of the CRU emails which the auther doesn't condemn? Or, do I misunderstand you and you don't think that was theft? In which case I'm sorry but I think it was. If someone took my private correspondences and plastered them across the interent without my permission I'd certainly call it theft.

I dont have time to post another '10 stories' from around the globe

The point being we are not talking about one country or even one continent but around the globe

If many more people freeze to death from all this global warming we're having, somebody is going to start to notice

+ North America + Europe +

I'm sorry but anecdote does not make good data.

[Admiral_Bobski]

TWS, I'm thinking about the stealing of the CRU emails which the auther doesn't condemn? Or, do I misunderstand you and you don't think that was theft? In which case I'm sorry but I think it was. If someone took my private correspondences and plastered them across the interent without my permission I'd certainly call it theft.

I'm sorry but anecdote does not make good data.

So should we prefix every single comment on the CRU emails with a condemnation of the hack? Why?

I think you're missing the point of what actually constitutes "theft", a definition which TWS was attempting (very well, I thought) to clarify. The definition of theft is an entirely separate discussion (perhaps one more suited to the Grammarians' Corner thread?!). Discussion of the content of the the leaked emails is not related to the source of the leak - the emails were copied and distributed, thousands of people then read them: those who read and discuss those emails are not guilty of theft, so why the constant griping about the origin of their availability?

CB

[jethro]

I personally see no benefit to anyone to continue to discuss the rights and wrongs of how those emails were obtained - that matter is for the legal system to decide whether or not charges are to be brought and answered.

As for global temps and a cold winter, it doesn't disprove AGW in the same way that a warm summer doesn't prove AGW. Sadly (IMO) a lot of the problem here has actually been created by the pro-side of the debate by continually holding up warm seasons/years as demonstrable of AGW. Neither cold nor warm years/seasons, in isolation demonstrate anything other than weather.

All that said, we have been given the expectation that sustained and substantial cold in the UK in particular, is a thing of the past, not expected to happen again. We've had many papers and articles which have strongly suggested that weather generating Hadley cells/pressure patterns etc have been displaced ever further North as a result of AGW and as such, deep, prolonged cold will not happen. If nothing else, winter thus far is showing this to be a questionable assumption, as has been suggested for some time, by some of us sceptics.

[Devonian]

So should we prefix every single comment on the CRU emails with a condemnation of the hack? Why?

I think you're missing the point of what actually constitutes "theft", a definition which TWS was attempting (very well, I thought) to clarify. The definition of theft is an entirely separate discussion (perhaps one more suited to the Grammarians' Corner thread?!). Discussion of the content of the the leaked emails is not related to the source of the leak - the emails were copied and distributed, thousands of people then read them: those who read and discuss those emails are not guilty of theft, so why the constant griping about the origin of their availability?

CB

Because it's important to remember that the emails were stolen. Just like some sceptics think it's important to keep banging on about the hockey stick - they think that is important as well.

I have thus learnt a tactics from the sceptics

I personally see no benefit to anyone to continue to discuss the rights and wrongs of how those emails were obtained - that matter is for the legal system to decide whether or not charges are to be brought and answered.

Likewise with the 'Hockey Stick'? Deal?

As for global temps and a cold winter, it doesn't disprove AGW in the same way that a warm summer doesn't prove AGW. Sadly (IMO) a lot of the problem here has actually been created by the pro-side of the debate by continually holding up warm seasons/years as demonstrable of AGW. Neither cold nor warm years/seasons, in isolation demonstrate anything other than weather.

All that said, we have been given the expectation that sustained and substantial cold in the UK in particular, is a thing of the past, not expected to happen again. We've had many papers and articles which have strongly suggested that weather generating Hadley cells/pressure patterns etc have been displaced ever further North as a result of AGW and as such, deep, prolonged cold will not happen. If nothing else, winter thus far is showing this to be a questionable assumption, as has been suggested for some time, by some of us sceptics.

Can you show me such a paper Jethro? I can't recall one. Oh, yes, plenty of talk about less cold winters, but no of their complete absence.

Fwiw, I don't for a second deny it's been cold for some time (very cold, even exceptionallt so in Scotland), dispute the temperature readings, put the general cold down to local effects, claim the temperatures are skewed by urban cold islands, claim it all a plot by 'coldistas', or due to the vast increase in use of fridges etc etc etc

[jethro]

With the greatest of respect Dev that post just reads like looking for an argument along the lines of yes it is/no it isn't; frankly I have neither time nor inclination. No one learns anything from such discussions and is usually results in a "can't be bothered with that" response as folk switch off and go to another part of the forum instead. I'd like to encourage more people into this area, not put them off.

[stewfox]

What about North America and Europe?

The northeast of the North America continent is experiencing exceptional warmth for the time of year with temperatures 15-20C above average in some parts. These will be more than offsetting the cold in the west of North America. However, Eurasia as a whole looks cooler than average.

USA

A few warm and a few cold records are normal. They always happen.

But here again is a large number of cold records. And more record Snow. This is a third week of record snow and a second week of numerous cold records since before winter began.

http://wattsupwithth...-the-last-week/

Canada

Parts of the far west are above average, the rest at or below par

http://www.theweathe...her_weathermaps

Europe

http://www.guardian....-weather-europe

Edited January 4, 2010 by stewfox

[paul tall]

19 consecutive lying days snow here, mmmm nice. How long before somebody claims it is "climate change"?

[laserguy]

19 consecutive lying days snow here, mmmm nice. How long before somebody claims it is "climate change"?

http://www.dailymail...ic-weather.html

Oh it's a-changing alright,but not in the direction *everyone* has been led to believe. Bored of saying it now,but it'll take a full-on ice-age before some realise/accept that the game is up.