Posted on 31 March 2013 by John Hartz

SkS Highlights

Climate sensiivity is one of the most hotly debated topics in climate science. The lively discussion engendered by Dana's  Making Sense of Sensitivity … and Keeping It in Perspective brears witness to this fact. Dana's New Research Confirms Global Warming Has Accelerated was the most viewed post of the week and drew the second highest number of comments of articles posted this past week. JosHag's The two epochs of Marcott and the Wheelchair garnered the thrid highest number of comments.

Toon of the Week

h/t to Climate Progress

Quote of the Week

Increased short-term masking of greenhouse gas warming by fossil fuel particulate and nitrogen pollution represents a 'doubling down' of the Faustian bargain, an increase in the stakes. The more we allow the Faustian debt to build, the more unmanageable the eventual consequences will be. Yet globally there are plans to build more than 1000 coal-fired power plants (Yang and Cui 2012) and plans to develop some of the dirtiest oil sources on the planet (EIA 2011). These plans should be vigorously resisted. We are already in a deep hole—it is time to stop digging.

Climate forcing growth rates: doubling down on our Faustian bargain, James Hansen et al 2013 Environ. Res. Lett. 8 011006 doi:10.1088/1748-9326/8/1/011006 

The Week in Review 

• The Scientific Method by rockytom
• 2013 SkS Weekly News Roundup #13 by John Hartz
• Earth Encounters Giant Speed Bump on the Road to Higher Sea Level by Rob Painting
• Making Sense of Sensitivity … and Keeping It in Perspective by Dana
• 2013 SkS News Bulletin #5: Alberta Tar Sands and Keystone XL Pipeline by John Hartz
• To frack or not to frack? by gws
• The two epochs of Marcott and the Wheelchair by JosHag
• New Research Confirms Global Warming Has Accelerated by Dana

Rebuttal Article Updated 

The new findings contained in Dana's New Research Confirms Global Warming Has Accelerated have also been incorporated into the new rebuttal to the myth No long tail means climate sensitivity is low, as well as Global warming stopped in [insert date] and Trenberth can't account for the lack of warming. 

Coming Soon

• Book review: Cold Cash, Cool Climate by Jonathan Koomey (John Cook)
• Trillions of Dollars are Pumped into our Fossil Fuel Addiction Every Year (Dana)
  
• 2013 SkS News Bulletin #6: Alberta Tar Sands and Keystone XL Pipeline (John Hartz)
• The Fool's Gold of Current Climate (Dana)
• Klotzbach Revisited and John Christy's response, part 1 (JosHag)
• Klotzbach Revisited and John Christy's response, part 2 (JosHag)
• Food Security - What Security? (Agnostic)
• 2013 SkS News Roundup (John Hartz) 

In the Works 

• Forks in the road (Sarah)
• Antarctic Octopus Living Testament To Global Warming (Daniel Bailey)
• New Research Shows Humans Causing More Strong Hurricanes (Dana)
• The radiative role of clouds – which ones warm and which ones cool the Earth (jenikhollan)
• A tale told in maps and charts: Texas in the National Climate Assessment (Dana)
• New satellite confirms dramatic thinning of Arctic ice (MarkR)
• The History of Climate Science (John Mason)
• Irreversible Does Not Mean Unstoppable(Andy Skuce)

SkS in the News

Dana's New Research Confirms Global Warming Has Accelerated was re-posted by Ciimate Progress, Climate Crocks, TreeHugger, Carbon Brief, Climate Citizen, Common Dreams, Earth & Industry, Carbonated.tv, Compatible Creatures, and The Legend of Pine Ridge,

Jeff Masters on Wunderground used several SkS graphics to debunk the myth that global warming has stopped.  This effort was also re-posted on Climate Progress, Climate Crocks,

Stephen Mulkey at Unity College Sustainability Monitor put together a similar post to Jeff Masters'.

350.org re-posted the SkS 'where is global warming going' graphic on their Facebook page.

John Cook's Recursive Fury: Facts and misrepresentations was re-posted on Climate Progress.  Recursive Fury was also discussed at io9.

Rob Painting's Earth Encounters Giant Speed Bump on the Road to Higher Sea Level was re-posted on Climate Crocks.

Techno Magazine featured the SkS smartphone apps.

Jos Hagelaars on Bart Verheggen's blog referenced Dana's Record Arctic Sea Ice Melt to Levels Unseen in Millennia.

Media Matters made use of The Escalator.

Dana's Watts Interview – Denial and Reality Mix like Oil and Water and Watts' New Paper - Analysis and Critique were referenced at HotWhopper.

What Do I Know referenced the SkS Empirical evidence that humans are causing global warming.

Mongbay Italian made use of the SkS CO2 emissions vs. IPCC scenarios graphic.

Cape Gazette recommended SkS.

SkS Spotlights

The International Geosphere-Biosphere Programme (IGBP) was launched in 1987 to coordinate international research on global-scale and regional-scale interactions between Earth's biological, chemical and physical processes and their interactions with human systems.  IGBP views the Earth system as the Earth's natural physical, chemical and biological cycles and processes AND the social and economic dimensions.

IGBP's vision is to provide essential scientific leadership and knowledge of the Earth system to help guide society onto a sustainable pathway during rapid global change.

• the planet
• the planet under pressure
• transformation in an era of rapid global change.

Click here to access the complete vision statment.