Posted on 2 February 2014 by John Hartz

SkS Highlights

Ocean heat was the primary focus of three of the five original SkS articles posted during the past week. The three are: 

• The Oceans Warmed up Sharply in 2013: We're Going to Need a Bigger Graph
• Corrections to Curry's Erroneous Comments on Ocean Heating
• Warming oceans consistent with rising sea level & global energy imbalance

These articles were either authored or co-authored by Rob Paining, SkS's resident expert on how manmade climate change is affecting the world's oceans. They also drew the most comments of the articles posted.    

Toon of the Week

h/t to I Heart Climate Scientists 

Quote of the Week

The Prince of Wales has launched an attack on climate change sceptics, describing them as the "headless chicken brigade" and accusing "powerful groups of deniers" of engaging in intimidation.

Charles, who has long campaigned to raise awareness of global warming and has hit out at sceptics in the past, unleashed his latest salvo during an awards ceremony at Buckingham Palace for green entrepreneurs.

"It is baffling, I must say, that in our modern world we have such blind trust in science and technology that we all accept what science tells us about everything - until, that is, it comes to climate science," the prince said in a speech on Thursday evening.

"All of a sudden, and with a barrage of sheer intimidation, we are told by powerful groups of deniers that the scientists are wrong and we must abandon all our faith in so much overwhelming scientific evidence.

"So, thank goodness for our young entrepreneurs here this evening, who have the far-sightedness and confidence in what they know is happening to ignore the headless chicken brigade and do something practical to help."

Climate change sceptics are 'headless chickens', says Prince Charles by Ben Quinn, The Guardian, Jan 31, 2014

SkS Week in Review

• 2014 SkS Weekly News Roundup #5 by John Hartz
• The Oceans Warmed up Sharply in 2013: We're Going to Need a Bigger Graph by Rob Painting
• Corrections to Curry's Erroneous Comments on Ocean Heating by Dana and Rob Painting
• Warming oceans consistent with rising sea level & global energy imbalance by Dana, Rob Painting, and Kevin Trenberth
• A Historical Perspective on Arctic Warming: Part One by Robert Way
• Cowtan and Way: Surface temperature data update by Kevin C

Coming Soon on SkS

• Why rainbows and oil slicks help to show the greenhouse effect (MarkR)
• Use Google Earth to see how much global warming has raised local temperatures, courtesy of UEA (Dana)
• How to debunk myths: two contrasting case studies (John Cook)
• 2013 was the 2nd-hottest non-El Niño year on record (Dana)
• New Video: Climate, Jetstream, Polar Vortex (Peter Sinclair)
• 2014 Sks Weekly News Roundup #6 (John Hartz) 

In the Works

• Dodgy Diagrams #1 - IPCC Residence Time Estimates (Dikran Marsupial)
• Deep Ocean Warming: The Coriolis Effect (Rob Painting)
• Rebuttal to the myth 'CO2 is saturated' (Glenn Tamblyn & jg)
• Honey, I mitigated climate change (Ari Jokimaki)
• Basic and Intermediate rebuttals of 'heatwaves have happened before' (John Cook, Dana, Rob Painting) 

SkS in the News

In his Climate Asylum blog post, What Precedent? Why National Review et al. Are Running Scared (a detailed analysis of the Mann v. National Review et al. case), Barry Bickmore writes:

But the main problem with the “defense of truth” is that the accusation of deliberate fraud is just stupid.  The basic conclusions of Mann’s Hockey Stick work have been confirmed over and over by other researchers using different kinds of data and statistical techniques, and the data-handling choices some question were openly discussed in the literature.  Mike Mann discusses all this in his book, The Hockey Stick and the Climate Wars, and Myron Ebell mentioned that he was aware of the contents of this book when he made the statement quoted above.

The first link embedded in the above is to the Advanced version of the SkS rebuttal article, Clearing up misconceptions regarding 'hide the decline'.

In his Real Climate blog post, Global Temperature 2013, Stefan Rhamstorf places great weight on the reuslts of Cowtan and Way (2013). Rhamstorf writes:

"New this year: for the first time there is a careful analysis of geographical data gaps – especially in the Arctic there’s a gaping hole – and their interpolation for the HadCRUT4 data. Thus there are now two surface temperature data sets with global coverage (the GISTEMP data from NASA have always filled gaps by interpolation). In these two data series 2007 is ranked 3rd. Their direct comparison looks like this"

Chris Mooney cites the findings of the TCP in his article, Donald Trump's Climate Conspiracy Theory posted on Blue Marble/Mother Jones. Mooney states:

"The incentives, therefore, are very much against maintaining a climate conspiracy. The incentives instead tilt towards exposing it. And that makes the 97-percent consensus on climate change among scientists publishing in the peer-reviewed literature that much more powerful."

SkS Spotlights

From the Home page of the website, Global Waming is Real: 

Global warming is the challenge of our times. It is important not as an isolated, ambiguous theory or political wedge issue but how the reality of global warming impacts nearly every aspect of humanity and life on Earth. Whether it be the economy, sustainable development, politics or realizing our place in the web of life that sustains us, understanding global warming is central in meeting the challenge and opportunities of the 21st century.

Global Warming is Real (GWIR) is designed for you, the concerned citizen, as the go-to resource for news, commentary and education on all aspects of global warming. From first-hand reporting and thoughtful commentary to the latest in climate science and solutions, GWIR touches on a range of issues including climate change, managing population growth, alternative energy, battling the politics of denial, and more. Awareness is the first step in facing the challenge of global warming. Within that challenge is an opportunity to build a better world for ourselves and for the generations that follow.