Should The BBC Do This?

[SnowBear]

I see the BBC are running this article this morning. 

UK's 40C heatwave 'basically impossible' without climate change

WWW.BBC.CO.UK

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Human-caused climate change made the high temperatures last week much more likely, say scientists.

No, it wasn't impossible, the UK has seen those types of temperatures before in Roman times when grapes were grown in even northern parts of England. 

I also find the article somewhat contradicting, in one part it says we will see similar "in coming years" (which to me is the next decade or so) yet another part says "even in today's climate its a once in 500 to 1,500 year event. 

It also laments on our buildings and infrastructure not being resilient to those types of temperatures, no, even if we see 40c for two or three days once every decade now it would not outweigh the need to insulate and build for winter temperatures. 

What can be done is to plant more trees to give shade over houses etc. This is something they do in Australia, and where trees won't grow they use artificial shading such as sun sail shades. I have one for the patio and it makes a huge difference to temperatures in the kitchen in hot weather in shading the house and also stopping the slabs heating up and radiating heat in any open windows. 

When I was a child we had far more trees in urban areas, many streets which once had avenues of trees either side, are now just grass verge where cars are parked. Admittedly Dutch Elm took many of those trees, I remember in Ipswich loads of them having to be cut down, but they were never replaced. The street I live in now in Colchester had trees either side, only 1 or 2 remain. 

Often now, and this has happened in two neighbours gardens recently, when it was sold all greenery was stripped, hedges, trees, shrubs, and left with just a patch of grass, no shade. I've been told it's because it makes it easier to sell. 

Trees, oh, and if you think the Jubilee carbon footprint has been offset by planting loads of trees all over the place, a small park near me had about 200 saplings planted as part of the Jubilee tree planting exercise, none have been looked after since and I doubt 5% have survived. 

Plant trees, they give shade, prevent the ground beneath taking in heat and acting as a radiator, gives somewhere for animals and birds to find refuge from extremes of weather, and if you plant the right trees may even give you nuts, apples etc at harvest time.

Edited July 29, 2022 by SnowBear
Spelling

[kold weather]

12 minutes ago, SnowBear said:

I see the BBC are running this article this morning. 

UK's 40C heatwave 'basically impossible' without climate change

WWW.BBC.CO.UK

---

Human-caused climate change made the high temperatures last week much more likely, say scientists.

No, it wasn't impossible, the UK has seen those types of temperatures before in Roman times when grapes were grown in even northern parts of England. 

 

Frankly we just don't know for certain either way with regards to previous times. I guess they've run enough simulations of background conditions to know how high above the normal temperature a theoretical heatwave can get. This one we just had is pretty anomalous even when taking background warming into consideration. (the fact both the Monday and Tuesday stand head and shoulders above all else in terms of UK mean temps is telling.

What I think is fair to say though is that even in the modern conditions 40c days are basically unheard of, and probably inconceivable from a period from 1700-2000. The fact we've not even come within 3c of that before 1990 speaks volumes really.

[Derecho]

UK heatwave: Weather forecasters report unprecedented trolling

WWW.BBC.CO.UK

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Meteorologists from the BBC and elsewhere faced abuse as they reported on the UK's record heat.

 

Doesn't surprise me, humans eh?

[Methuselah]

I'm guessing that, during Roman times, temperature recorders were somewhat less accurate than those we have today. BTW, are grapes growing in northern England now?

If the famous hockey stick graph gets called into question (by dint of its being based on proxy data) the writings of ancient scribes and historians must also be treated with scepticism?

You can't have it both ways!

[Derecho]

1 minute ago, Ed Stone said:

I'm guessing that, during Roman times, temperature recorders were somewhat less accurate than those we have today. BTW, are grapes growing in northern England now?

If the famous hockey stick graph gets called into question (by dint of its being based on proxy data) the writings of ancient scribes and historians must also be treated with scepticism?

You can't have it both ways!

There's also the question as to whether any such warmth was due to extremes in atmospheric circulation... We can trace an AGW influence by taking away the influence of atmospheric circulation. Studies have shown that there is a residual warming trend when taking this away from the observed temperature.

How extreme can atmospheric circulation get? This can influence things regionally. Proxies for the MWP indicate there was regionally varying extremes rather then the global increase in temperatures now. Proxies indicate the MWP was dominated by very strong La Nina conditions. You can still have a notably cold year globally and regions of notable warmth, look at summer 1976 in the UK for example.

I do think there is uncertainty about the impacts of extreme events and their economic impacts. This however is down to how resilient and how good defenses are to deal with them. In the recent UK heatwave for example a lot of people decided to stay at home but what if all the trains had been running as normal at full speed on buckled lines? Or got stuck in huge traffic jams going to the beach? Could well have been a different story. Another day and the fire brigade would have been struggling. Last Tuesday, was already the busiest day since WW2 for them.

It essentially boils down to the question of do we want to continue playing Russian roulette with a warming climate? Rising sea levels, increased occurrences of extreme rainfall and drought means we will constantly have to invest money in measures to keep up and protect lives. At what point does the trade off with doing something about it occur?

By the time we realise it will probably be too late.

[Methuselah]

3 minutes ago, Quicksilver1989 said:

There's also the question as to whether any such warmth was due to extremes in atmospheric circulation... We can trace an AGW influence by taking away the influence of atmospheric circulation. Studies have shown that there is a residual warming trend when taking this away from the observed temperature.

How extreme can atmospheric circulation get? This can influence things regionally. Proxies for the MWP indicate there was regionally varying extremes rather then the global increase in temperatures now. Proxies indicate the MWP was dominated by very strong La Nina conditions. You can still have a notably cold year globally and regions of notable warmth, look at summer 1976 in the UK for example.

I do think there is uncertainty about the impacts of extreme events and their economic impacts. This however is down to how resilient and how good defenses are to deal with them. In the recent UK heatwave for example a lot of people decided to stay at home but what if all the trains had been running as normal at full speed on buckled lines? Or got stuck in huge traffic jams going to the beach? Could well have been a different story. Another day and the fire brigade would have been struggling. Last Tuesday, was already the busiest day since WW2 for them.

It essentially boils down to the question of do we want to continue playing Russian roulette with a warming climate? Rising sea levels, increased occurrences of extreme rainfall and drought means we will constantly have to invest money in measures to keep up and protect lives. At what point does the trade off with doing something about it occur?

By the time we realise it will probably be too late.

And don't forget that we are in a novel situation: Earth's tectonic plates being arranged slightly differently from how they were 2,000 years ago? I'm thinking along the lines of fractal coastlines, chaos and complexity here -- no two situations will ever be the same.

[Gray-Wolf]

They always go back to Romans and their bloody viniculture.....there is a letter from an officer describing his time at 'Blackstone edge' (up the road from here?) and his moans of the cloud, mist/drizzle/rain/cold ring as true today as it was back then!

England is a record sparkling white producer....has been for years

I can find no Roman reports on the quality of English wines.....

[SnowBear]

26 minutes ago, Gray-Wolf said:

England is a record sparkling white producer....has been for years

Much of that is down to cultivation of modern vines which are able to withstand colder climates. Old world vines species were alot different. 

[Methuselah]

1 hour ago, SnowBear said:

Much of that is down to cultivation of modern vines which are able to withstand colder climates. Old world vines species were alot different. 

Some of it, certainly; 'much' of it, doubtful? There were good reasons why Lysenko couldn't 'educate' maize to grow in Siberia.

[SnowBear]

7 minutes ago, Ed Stone said:

Some of it, certainly; 'much' of it, doubtful? There were good reasons why Lysenko couldn't 'educate' maize to grow in Siberia.

Sorry, but most grape vines cultivated in the UK although most have Mediterranean origins, are cultivars for cooler climates. You still won't get much success with old world cultivars as you will get a crop, but the length of season isn't long enough to ripen it. 

[Methuselah]

22 minutes ago, SnowBear said:

Sorry, but most grape vines cultivated in the UK although most have Mediterranean origins, are cultivars for cooler climates. You still won't get much success with old world cultivars as you will get a crop, but the length of season isn't long enough to ripen it. 

Which is precisely why claims of widespread Britsh vineyards, during Roman times, are almost certainly exaggerated hearsay? What was it the Romans called Britain . . . Hibernia?

[SnowBear]

30 minutes ago, Ed Stone said:

Which is precisely why claims of widespread Britsh vineyards, during Roman times, are almost certainly exaggerated hearsay? What was it the Romans called Britain . . . Hibernia?

Ireland was Hibernia, the Romans called England Britannia, before that it was Albion.

[Methuselah]

11 minutes ago, SnowBear said:

Ireland was Hibernia, the Romans called England Britannia, before that it was Albion.

Well, be that as it may, any evidence that Britannia was a famed wine-growing country is scant. Rather like Greenland being green: Propaganda for the folks back home?

Edited July 29, 2022 by Ed Stone

[Gray-Wolf]

Do I recall a lot of moaning, back in the day, when advice was given about the S.E. needing to look at planting more 'Mediterranean type plants' that could cope better with heat/drought?

I suppose folk were wrong about that too eh?

[SnowBear]

It really narks me when the BBC peddle headlines like "Field fire destroys large area of farmland in Boxted". 

Like eh? Destroyed? Never to be able to be used again? Poisoned or something? 

Do they not realise we used to fire fields every year so the ash could be ploughed in as fertiliser and next year it could actually give a better crop? 

Destroyed.... Oh the drama

[Wold Topper]

14 minutes ago, SnowBear said:

It really narks me when the BBC peddle headlines like "Field fire destroys large area of farmland in Boxted". 

Like eh? Destroyed? Never to be able to be used again? Poisoned or something? 

Do they not realise we used to fire fields every year so the ash could be ploughed in as fertiliser and next year it could actually give a better crop? 

Destroyed.... Oh the drama

Indeed, when i was younger a lot of 'stubble' fields were set on fire on the Wolds, common practise, plough the 'headland' to stop any potential fire spread and set fire to the stubble!

[GSP]

On 02/08/2022 at 22:55, SnowBear said:

It really narks me when the BBC peddle headlines like "Field fire destroys large area of farmland in Boxted". 

Like eh? Destroyed? Never to be able to be used again? Poisoned or something? 

Do they not realise we used to fire fields every year so the ash could be ploughed in as fertiliser and next year it could actually give a better crop? 

Destroyed.... Oh the drama

Would you consider this ‘disinformation’ from them then, as they employ people with job titles such as “Climate Disinformation Reporters”?

[Methuselah]

All I can say is that, seeing as the Beeb gets routinely accused of bias (from both far-right and far-left true believers) it must be getting something correct!

[SnowBear]

56 minutes ago, GSP said:

Would you consider this ‘disinformation’ from them then, as they employ people with job titles such as “Climate Disinformation Reporters”?

It is pretty much disinformation and shows signs of a reporter who has no clue what he or she is reporting on. 

Burning stubble was a practice widely used some years ago, it cleared the ground of stubble, weeds and pests, the ash was turned in as a fertiliser (potash). 

Obviously to prevent air pollution that practice had to stop. But in no way does it "destroy" a field, that's modern sensationalist reporting with an agenda/bias... wording which brings to the mind of many I suspect of complete destruction, unusable from then on, bringing a loss, etc. Completely the opposite is true and I suspect the farmer was quite happy to see it burn, next year once ploughed and we have rain I reckon a good crop from that field! 

[Methuselah]

26 minutes ago, SnowBear said:

It is pretty much disinformation and shows signs of a reporter who has no clue what he or she is reporting on. 

Burning stubble was a practice widely used some years ago, it cleared the ground of stubble, weeds and pests, the ash was turned in as a fertiliser (potash). 

Obviously to prevent air pollution that practice had to stop. But in no way does it "destroy" a field, that's modern sensationalist reporting with an agenda/bias... wording which brings to the mind of many I suspect of complete destruction, unusable from then on, bringing a loss, etc. Completely the opposite is true and I suspect the farmer was quite happy to see it burn, next year once ploughed and we have rain I reckon a good crop from that field! 

But ignorance (of what went on 40-years ago) is not really disinformation, is it, SB? IMO, it's tits like this guy who we should be worried about: 

Alex Jones ordered to pay another $45m to parents of Sandy Hook massacre victim

NEWS.SKY.COM

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Twenty children and six adults were killed at Sandy Hook in Connecticut in 2012 in what remains the deadliest school shooting in US history.

 

[Gray-Wolf]

So If I had 2 sealed containers, one mimicking the atmosphere as it was at 280ppm CO2 & another with our current 420ppm CO2 & applied the same amount of solar forcing to both which would become the hottest & by how much?

 

 

[Don]

20 hours ago, Gray-Wolf said:

So If I had 2 sealed containers, one mimicking the atmosphere as it was at 280ppm CO2 & another with our current 420ppm CO2 & applied the same amount of solar forcing to both which would become the hottest & by how much?

 

 

The later by 1C. 

[Methuselah]

4 minutes ago, Don said:

The later by 1C. 

And that 1C can, especially for places lying NNE of NW Africa, shove temperatures many degrees above average?

[Don]

3 minutes ago, Ed Stone said:

And that 1C can, especially for places lying NNE of NW Africa, shove temperatures many degrees above average?

What, like on a couple of islands in the north Atlantic, just off mainland Europe?! 

[Methuselah]

10 minutes ago, Don said:

What, like on a couple of islands in the north Atlantic, just off mainland Europe?! 

Exactly that, Don: What used to almost guarantee us a nondescript summer maybe no longer does? Maybe yes; maybe no; I really wouldn't know. But the last five summers have been anything but nondescript?