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One Planet Only Forever at 08:03 AM on 5 December 20222022 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #48
Developing improvements for humanity is almost certain to be harmed by Twitter allowing and excusing, and as a result promoting with relative impunity, harmful misunderstandings and harmfully misleading comments (note: Some misunderstanding and misleading can be neutral or even be helpful. It is less important to correct or limit the influence of neutral or helpful misunderstanding).
It is important to differentiate between Knowledge and Beliefs. Belief can be anything. Knowledge is limited to reasoned or evidence-based understanding. Beliefs can be entrenched dogma. Knowledge is constantly improving. Belief and Knowledge have a history of conflict.
There is now ample evidence, and robust reasoning related to the evidence, that ‘people being freer to believe, comment, and act however they wish without effective governing of harm done’ will lead to a failure of humanity developing sustainable improvements. The climate science case is one of the most significant examples. Thirty years after the development of a robust evidence-based and well-reasoned understanding that fossil fuel use is unsustainable and very harmful there continue to be people trying to resist that learning becoming the ‘significantly more’ common sense. (Note that climate science is not the only case of harmful results due to people being freer to believe and do as they please in competition for personal benefits and status).
Constantly improving consensus understanding of what is harmful and how to effectively limit harm done is essential to the development of sustainable improvements for humanity (refer to the SkS Explainer regarding Scientific Consensus but extend it to other reasoned or evidence-based understanding). Constantly improving the ‘common sense about harm and the need to limit harm done’ is especially important for correcting harmful unsustainable human development and developing sustainable improvements.
Free speech is important. But, like most things, Free Speech can be helpful or harmful. To limit its harmfulness, Free Speech needs to be governed by the pursuit of increased awareness and improved understanding of what is harmful. Helpful learning and education about harm to effectively limit harm done is critical. The most important application of critical thinking is learning to limit harm done (that involves learning that may reduce developed perceptions of status or opportunities for benefit).
It would be great if everyone diligently learned and self-governed their Free Speech to be as harmless as possible and strive to be helpful. But that is unlikely to ever be the reality for humanity. Some people will probably always try to benefit from harmful Free Speech (or other Freedoms). There will probably always be a need for prompt effective correction of harmful misunderstanding or misleading claims. And, in the worst cases, it will be necessary to ‘cancel’ the ‘sharing of very harmful misunderstanding’ and effectively block the influence of the most harmful repeat offenders (the ones who resist learning to be less harmful and more helpful).
Repeatedly harmful people, people resisting helpful harm reducing correction, are traditionally penalized or kept from harmfully influencing things. That tradition needs to govern the ‘sharing of beliefs’.
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Doug Bostrom at 05:58 AM on 4 December 2022New paper: A toolkit for understanding and addressing climate scepticism
[Update: Unfortunately this paper will not be open access until 6 months after publication, apparently a glitch in reportage from the journal. We apologize for the error.]
Sorry about that, wstephen.
It's our practice to only center publications suggested for our readers' attention that are open access.
At the time this item surfaced for New Research, Unpaywall identified it as open access and indeed it was (we always check, for highlights). Now it's not.
Working on it and hope to remedy.
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wstephen at 05:28 AM on 4 December 2022New paper: A toolkit for understanding and addressing climate scepticism
I suspect this is an excellent article in its entirety, as this summary is an attention grabber. It's a shame the entire article is behind a paywall and inaccessible to those of us who have long ago retired from an institution with a subscription. This is much too important a topic to require $32 to read it.
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EddieEvans at 03:31 AM on 4 December 20222022 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #46
The subcribers number on climate deception is inaccurate by far. I do not have any sexy-like content, and much of it is not strictly climate deception; had I kept my voice I would have done more original, less robot reading.
I am eclectic and pick and choose; so I have gone far afield from strictly climate deception material. I cannot produce enough to remain a ranking channel without highjacking kinda related content. For example, today, I will upload a fifteen-minute podcast highlighting the plutocrat control of information, which means more climate deception, denial, and delay.
I choose all four of your questions and then some. There is no silver bullet. Besides, more people must notice that the Mississippi River is a stream, Lake Powel is a fish bowl, and California burns from time to time.
For the record, I am looking for others to contribute and/or take over anyone or all of my channels: climate deception, climate damage, and global warming simplified. Note that NASA's climate effects page and NASA Climate Kids need more attention than any Youtube channel.
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wilddouglascounty at 02:39 AM on 4 December 20222022 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #46
2 Eddie,
Apologies for the delay; I just checked back today to see what you have done here. Thanks so much for this--I see that there are 137 folks as part of your channel, so I'll check out the other posts you've made there. I think small circles are really a good way to spread the conversation and discussions to elevate the discussion toward taking on the many tasks that will be required to create real change.
And 3/One Planet, I agree that acknowledging that climate change is a problem is the starting point for sustainable improvements. Different circles are at different points in this process, so fortunately we don't have to have all of humanity to agree to anything all at the same time in order to proceed.
I think also that the participants in the COP process are well past this point and that the real questions that have emerged in my mind and many others are: since fossil fuel interests have positioned themselves to be able to neutralize and even stop needed reforms called on by the scientific community in the COP meetings, how to proceed?
-Do we showcase their fossil fuel interests as sacrificing the ability to mitigate an increasingly hostile environment for short-term, selfish gain?
-Do we show that delays and resistance only increase the severity of large scale suffering, mass migrations, warfare and authoritarian regimes?
-Do we spend our time really showcasing successful transitions of large economies to drastically reducing emissions as well as showcasing economic development of the South in ways that are empowering and sustainable?
It's my sense that we need to be doing a mix of all of these and probably other initiatives if we are to have a chance. The important realization for me is that we cannot expect those changes to come through the COP process. There must be pressure applied in ways that the fossil fuels interests cannot so easily insert themselves into to stop.
I'm really interested in hearing more about these types of things and hope that this website will showcase these types of things more and more.
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EddieEvans at 22:26 PM on 3 December 2022Publishing a long overdue explainer about a scientific consensus
This a really helpful reader for a non-specialist like myself. I suggest a tone-down, common language version and placing it on Wikipedia. At least on Wikipedia, its subject becomes documented for posterity. Besides, it's ready to go as is.
Moderator Response:[BW] embedded link
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EddieEvans at 20:01 PM on 3 December 2022Publishing a long overdue explainer about a scientific consensus
I have only one recommendation for this important subject, use a heavier font style for webpage publication. Even with the typeface enlarged with the browser tool, it's still less than easily read by the visually impaired and older folks like myself.
myself. Link to the Credible Hulk article
Moderator Response:[BW] Embedded link
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One Planet Only Forever at 10:19 AM on 3 December 2022Publishing a long overdue explainer about a scientific consensus
This is indeed a helpful presentation.
A related thought would be that science is about education/learning, which is the pursuit of increased awareness and improved understanding. The consensus understanding is always being improved. However, the following quote from the “explainer” exposes how some scientific pursuits may impede the development and improvement of a consensus:
“Given the combative nature of science it’s highly unlikely that any scientist sets out to become part of a consensus.”
The “competition” between scientists can be helpful or harmful. Open collaboration is clearly the better way to pursue learning. Combative competition for wealth or status can produce negative results in many ways including:
- reducing openness (selective sharing of information, hiding disliked results)
- influencing what is chosen to be investigated, especially ‘not choosing’ to investigate the potential harm done by potentially beneficial activities.
- misleading presentations on an issue, especially using selected evidence (knowing better, but not sharing the better understanding)
A related understanding is that a very important sub-set of learning is "learning about what is harmful and the ways to limit harm done". Learning (science) aligned with the pursuit of limiting harm done is more sustainable. That is essentially the basis for the developed consensus understanding, open to continued improvement, of the Sustainable Development Goals.
That understanding leads to awareness that not everybody cares to govern their learning by the sub-set objective of limiting harm done. Other objectives can lead people to argue against a 'developing consensus understanding' in their pursuit ways to prolong or increase their ability to benefit from understandably harmful beliefs and actions.
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One Planet Only Forever at 08:03 AM on 3 December 2022New paper: A toolkit for understanding and addressing climate scepticism
nigelj,
I agree with your assessment and recommendations.
A minor supplement: Check out Al Gore's 2007 book "The Assault on Reason". It is about the 'unjustified and unreasonable' tactics abused by some political players. But it is not focused on misleading messaging regarding climate change.
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nigelj at 06:38 AM on 3 December 2022New paper: A toolkit for understanding and addressing climate scepticism
Thanks. Sounds like good, credible analysis and good advice to me.
Here's a story which is hopefully relevant. John Key was the leader of the New Zealand National Party when it was in government a few years back. Both Key and his party lean conservative, and Key used to be a climate sceptic. He said in an interview on television he became convinced humans were responsible for climate change when he was presented with a graph showing the warming trend and solar irradiance together, and clearly there was no correlation over the last 50 years.
For me a picture with some accompanying commentary like this is simple and paints a thousand words, and cuts through a lot of complicated maths and physics. Not once have I ever seen that graph in our media - and they do many articles on climate change. The point Im making is the media and climate community sometimes overcomplicate the issues, and leave out the simple clear things, and so have to take responsibility for some of the scepticism.
You wont actually convince the hard core of sceptics anyway. They are a mixture of stubborn cranks and people strongly driven by libertarian ideologies and people who are excessively worried that climate mitigation might affect their status in life. We know those people are very fixed in their views right through their lives. So any strategy to convince sceptics has to focus on the "reasonable sceptic" and what might change their minds! While its trendy to say facts don't convince people, I don't think thats entirely true with reasonable people. But facts need to be kept simple and focus in simple ways on core issues, like what might be causing climate change and what the evidence says on those things. This is done very well on this website, but not so well in the general media.
Al Gores book An Inconvenient Truth did a nice job on the science in my view, but had nothing on the sceptics and their climate myths and why they were false. Presumbaly he felt he didn't want to give them oxygen but I think it was a misake not to address such issues. Because they will inevitably get into the media and anyway. And by then we are on the back foot.
Excuse me for being a bit ranty, but hopefully you get what I'm saying.
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One Planet Only Forever at 04:16 AM on 3 December 2022SkS Analogy 10 - Bathtubs and Budgets
This is another effective presentation by Analogy.
However, I think it may be better to discuss everything in terms of CO2 (and CO2 equivalent ghgs) rather than mixing in the briefer, and admittedly commonly used, term Carbon (as in Carbon Budget which is defined as the amount of CO2, not Carbon).
It may also be very helpful to include the understanding that creating a peak CO2 impact above 1.5 C needs to be corrected by drawing CO2 levels back down from that peak. That adds the understanding that in addition to it being more harmful to have a peak impact exceeding 1.5 C it also requires more corrective effort to bring CO2 levels back down.
That understanding of the problem of exceeding 1.5 C could be presented by having the tub leaking out of a pipe at 1.5 C level. Keeping impacts inside the tub by staying below 1.5 C impacts would represent staying within Safe Planetary Boundaries.
The leak out of the overflow when CO2 levels exceed 1.5 C would represent the more damaging results of exceeding the 1.5 C level of impact (the higher the level and the longer it is elevated the more significant the damage will be). The related understanding would be that as the level in the tub continues to rise above 1.5 C more damage gets done by the more rapid release out of the overflow pipe. That relates to the more significant and more likely to be irreparable damage caused by exceeding 1.5 C impact levels. It would also relate to the understanding of the need to draw CO2 levels back down to be below 1.5 C as rapidly as possible.
The key understanding needs to be that exceeding 1.5 C impacts is not the end of the world. But more damage is done as the level higher. And a peak level exceeding 1.5 C needs to be rapidly brought back down to be below the 1.5 C to minimize the long term harm done.
The best result would be to not exceed 1.5 C. The next best result is to only exceed 1.5 C by a small amount for a very short period of time. And it just gets worse if the peak is higher, or if the level exceeds 1.5 C for a longer time.
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MA Rodger at 20:41 PM on 2 December 2022Models are unreliable
sailingfree @1322,
The four 'corrections' to Christy's senate presentation presented in the gif in the OP above are originally set out within this RealClimate post. While that post makes no mention of problems with the averages presented by Christy (eg apples being compared with oranges), I am a bit sceptical of Christy's Global graphics given the graphed 'correction' in that RealClimate post.
The RSS TMTv4 plotted in the 'correction' would not have been available in Feb 2016 (it was a month later) so Christy's 'Ave 3 satellite datasets' plotted as 'squares' would presumably be UAH TMTv5.4, RSS TMTv3.3 & NOAA STAR. While the divergence between model & satellite data in Christy's Tropical graphic appear to match, the Global divergence seems 'stretched' in the Christy version relative to the 'corrected' version. Thus scaling the graphics gives Christy showing +0.47ºC divergence while the 'corrected' version shows just +0.39ºC for just RSSv3/UAH, a value which presumably would be even smaller (+0.36ºC) if NOAA STAR as plotted in the 'correction' is the third 'satellite dataset'.
I think this is probably Christy plotting his averages with more carelessness than would be expected from a genuine researcher rather than it being an 'apples-&-oranges' thing.
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Bob Loblaw at 07:37 AM on 2 December 2022Models are unreliable
sailingfree:
The models are three-dimensional, so they give temperature in a three-dimensional grid of latitude/longitude/altitude. To get a "global" average from 0 to 50,000 feet, you'd need to average in all three dimensions.
To compare to the satellites, the vertical averaging of model data would need to be a weighted average, using the same weighting function as the satellites.
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sailingfree at 02:14 AM on 2 December 2022Models are unreliable
Bob Loblaw @ 1321.
Thank you so much for info on Christy's "Bulk Atmosphere". Are the 102 CHIMP-5 models for a similar altitude, or are they for near the surface? i.e, apples or oranges compared to his oranges?
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Leonard Bachman at 20:34 PM on 1 December 2022Publishing a long overdue explainer about a scientific consensus
Notions of "converging lines of evidence [sic]" could include "triangulation" as a concept.
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Bob Loblaw at 09:18 AM on 1 December 2022Models are unreliable
sailingfree:
I presume you are asking about the Christie graph in the blog post? The image is actually an animated graphic, but on the intermediate tab you can see additional static images from the animation.
You can also click on the graphic to load this page, with more explanation:
https://skepticalscience.com/graphics.php?g=243
On that page you can get a higher-resolution copy of the first annotated image:
https://skepticalscience.com/pics/Slide12.jpg
...but to address your question, the Christie graphic talks about surface to 50,000 feet. That is a pressure of about 115 mb.
On this blog post, there is a chart of weighting functions for satellite measurements:
As you can see, the satellite temperatures represent a non-uniform weighted response at different altitude, so proper weighting of other sources is required for a valid comparison. In addition, the processing of satellite radiation data into temperatures is complex, and explains much of the differences between different satellite sets (which is not shown by Christie, as mentioned in the annotations for the figure).
Without knowing details, Christie may or may not have done a proper weighting - but the other problems with his graph (as noted in the annotations in the blog post image) are not a good indication that he can be relied on.
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sailingfree at 02:14 AM on 1 December 2022Models are unreliable
Thanks for responding to my page comment.
A question, and forgive my for not reading all 1.3 k comments: Re: Christy's chart for the Senate hearings: Is he doing apples to apples or not? i.e, What is "Global Bulk Atmospheric Temperature", and is that at the altitude of the 102 CMIP-5 models that he shows? Thanks in advance.
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gerontocrat at 07:22 AM on 30 November 2022How 2022 has substantially, and favorably, changed global climate outlook
Note the minuscule drop in fossil fuel demand and CO2 emissions by 2030 under "Steps" and "APS", and still at around 30GT under "NZE".
I was under the impression that this decade needed substantial drops in CO2 emissions to reduce the risk of climate passing tipping points and avoid +1.5 with the expected violent changes in climate and weather that exceeding +1.5 will bring.
Also not considered in this document is the push by the Fossil Fuel industry to use Africa as a major growth engine as was made abundantly clear at COP27.
And lastly, one welcomes the proposed new "Loss and Damage" fund for countries affected most severely and with limited resources to cope. However, it seems that "the polluter pays" principle has been overlooked. Governments and multi-lateral institutions are expected to find the money - I have not seen one suggestion that the Fossil Fuel industry should be surcharged as they are directly responsible for CO2 emissions in the future and are working hard to maintain and enhance their production levels.
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Bob Loblaw at 07:31 AM on 29 November 2022Models are unreliable
Eddie et al (comments 1314-1417) on Spencer's video and blog post.
Thanks, MAR, for the link to Spencer's blog post. I followed his link to the NOAA data source, and looked at the numbers. If I grab the June, July, and August monthly values (the standard climatological "summer"), I get the same results: about 0.26C/decade. That checks out. A few things that Spencer does not mention:
- The overall trend is not particularly linear.
- The r2 value is rather low.
- The standard error on the slope esitmate is 0.04 C/decade.
Here is a graph of the data:
The uncertainty on the trend covers some of the model range he provides in the blog post. Two sigma range places the observed trend between 0.17 and 0.35 C/decade.
The model trends also include a level of internal variability. The observations follow a specific pattern of "unforced variations" related to cycles such as El Nino, etc., while individual model runs and models will have different patterns within a specific model run. Over shorter periods, and smaller areas, you need to consider this in making any comparisons. For models, they often get an "ensemble mean" of many runs with different variability - but the observations are still a "single roll of the dice" that can fall anywhere in the range of the collection of model runs and still be consistent with the models.
I see that you have already found the Great Global Warming Blunder post at RealClimate. They also have a couple of other relevant posts:
This one talks about how unforced variability affects model runs.
This one talks about things to consider in comparing models and observations.
Tamino's blog is also a useful place to look whenever statistical stuff comes up. In this post, he points out several aspects of the use of the continental US for data. He covers the non-linearity of trends, the variations in trends in different parts of the US, and points out that the continental US represents 1.6% of the global area (ripe for cherry picking).
In general, Spencer tends to get more wrong than he gets right.
P.S. The preferred abbreviation for SkepticalScience is SkS (for obvious reasons).
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One Planet Only Forever at 05:59 AM on 29 November 2022Models are unreliable
EddieEvans is justified to question Roy Spencer's work. And I agree with MA Rogers that Spencer's claim that 'what he claims to have discovered about climate models should alter (govern) US Energy Planning Policy development and action' is bizarre.
I do not believe it is necessary to get into the details of what Spencer did. The real question is: How is the 'summer trend in average surface warming of the contiguous USA' relevant to US Energy Planning? The likely answer is "It Isn't relevant".
The rate and total ultimate magnitude of human global warming impacts is the concern. And US Energy Planning needs to be aligned with the USA responsibly leading the rapid ending of harmful impacts (because the USA undeniably led the creation of the problem and is still a per capita leader of the increase of the problem).
Also, it is unlikely that the sea level rise impacts on the USA, or many of the other climate change impacts on the USA, are altered by what the models indicate as the 'trend of Summer surface average temperature in the contiguous USA from 1973 to 2022' vs NOAA data. And "What about the Fall or Winter or Spring values?"
This apperas to just be Spencer 'doing his thing' - creative development of attempts to be misleading about climate science to delay the development of the understanding of, and delay the development of popular support for, the need to rapidly end the harm done by fossil fuel use and other harmful human pursuits of benefit.
Actually, this recent bit about how the models appear to overstate the rate of warming of the 'Summer values' of the contiguous USA is rather weak compared to many of Spencer's 'more subtle distortions and misleading claim-making'.
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EddieEvans at 22:16 PM on 27 November 2022Models are unreliable
MA Rodger - - Thanks for the information. For the record, I'm still learning to navigate SS.
FYI: My chief goal, however useful, aims to make more information available on Youtube; I'd like to add your post to a growing project on climate deniers on one of my Youtube channels, "Climate Deception." Interestingly, my hobby with climate deception dovetails with climate damage, and global warming simplified. Although the global warming simplified project lags because it's hard to simplify beyond NASA's Climate Kids. So, I think I'm going to post the difficult reading on it too. I'm old and this is my most useful activity as it turns out. Regards.
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MA Rodger at 20:38 PM on 27 November 2022Models are unreliable
EddieEvans @1314,
The 3-minute video clip linked @1312 in turn referrs to this blogpost by Spencer. The agrument put forward by Spencer is that the summer trend in AGW over the contiguous USA 1973-2022 as measured by NOAA is +0.26ºC/decade, a value he confirms with his own analysis of temperature records (although Spencer also suggests this result may be impacted by the presence of that fantastical archipelago 'The Urban Heat Islands' even though his analysis fails to note their location within the contiguous USA).
Spencer then compares this US summer trend with that of 36 modelled trends** and finds a bit of a mismatch. The models are all showing far more warming for this particular measure according to Spencer. If correct (and that is a big 'if' because Spencer is involved), these modelled trends are sitting in the range +0.28ºC/decade to +0.72ºC/decade and averaging perhaps +0.45ºC/decade.
And so Spencer concludes:-Given that U.S. energy policy depends upon the predictions from these models, their tendency to produce too much warming (and likely also warming-associated climate change) should be factored into energy policy planning. I doubt that it is, given the climate change exaggerations routinely promoted by environment groups, anti-oil advocates, the media, politicians, and most government agencies.
This all seems a bit of a leap into the realms of purile nonsense rather than the sort of stuff a grown-up climatologist should be doing. I note in Spencer's comment thread somebody says they "checked NOAAs summer temperature for Europe 1975-2022 and got 0.53 deg.C/decade." So if there is "far more warming" showing in these models, for Europe that modelled warming must show a steep trend indeed.
** Spencer doesn't explain his analysis of these models but points to this web engine which might have done it for him, or confused him enough to make his blunderful grand finding. A quick go on the web engine for Tas & SSP2-4.5 (as per Spencer) yields a summer global land model average of +0.33ºC/decade which is pretty close to the NOAA NH summer land average trend (1973-2020) of +0.31ºC/decade. -
EddieEvans at 19:57 PM on 27 November 2022Models are unreliable
Bob Ludlow, I'm concluding my Spencer search via Real ClimateReview of Spencer’s ‘Great Global Warming Blunder’ to "cdesign proponentsists-the case against "Intelligent Design" and it's not even five in the morning. I mentioned Potholder54 because I believe that I first heard Spencer's name in one of his videos. Now I know, and the redirection to "cdesign proponentsists" and climate change deniers, deceivers sheds more light. I hope I have not transgressed boundaries on SS with this post. I also wonder if RealScience's copyright applies to copying text and posting it on Youtube. I better ask first. Regards
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EddieEvans at 19:14 PM on 27 November 2022Models are unreliable
Thanks for the reply.
I believe that Spencer's contrarian views go back a long way in the denial business. Potholder54 on Youtube (https://youtu.be/PoSVoxwYrKI) does a lot of work on climate evidence and deniers. He's a geologist and creates helpful videos.
What disturbs me, and the motivation for my post is his following. I'm just nosing about it; it's mental health, reality check thing.
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Bob Loblaw at 04:47 AM on 27 November 2022Models are unreliable
Eddie:
I have not watched the video you linked to, but this SkS repost of a RealClimate blog post discusses how Spencer has gotten things wrong in the past:
Comparing models to the satellite datasets
Moderator Response:[Note that the proper link to the correct page for this comment on its proper thread is as follows:]
https://skepticalscience.com/argument.php?a=15&p=53#comments
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EddieEvans at 21:06 PM on 26 November 2022Models are unreliable
I'm interested in comments about this Youtube channel's climate deception and denial, especially this video and Roy Spencer's comment about models being wrong. 1:34
Moderator Response:[BL] Link activated. Remember: you need to turn the text into a link using the little "link" icon on the "Insert" tab. Select the text you want to display (which can be different from the URL), click on the link icon, then add the URL in the dialog box.
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EddieEvans at 20:01 PM on 26 November 2022New reports spell out climate urgency, shortfalls, needed actions
unicef - for every child
The Coldest Year of the Rest of Their Lives
The title tells all. And as for predicting the future, common sense will dictate worldwide Manhattan-like climate programs worldwide. And I don’t see “common sense” arising soon in wealthy nations. It’s a matter of intergenerational moral corruption. So it’s not the science, but ethics that will finally usher in common sense, if at all.
Mitigation will look like the Meer Project, with roves painted white where mirrors or solar panels do not cover shingles; parking lots painted white will match other surfaces. Such approaches and others should have been underway long ago. https://www.unicef.org/reports/coldest-year-rest-of-their-lives-children-heatwaves
Moderator Response:[BL] Link activated
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One Planet Only Forever at 04:22 AM on 26 November 20222022 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #46
wilddouglascounty,
What next?
That depends on what admissions about the reality of what has been going on become the 'common sense'.
My comments on the SkS reposting of the Yale Climate Connections item "New reports spell out climate urgency, shortfalls, needed actions" provide an indication of the type of 'common sense understanding' that would be helpful.
As you have identified, essentially the problem is the power and influence of the most harmful portion of the global population allowing the most harmful to evade losing undeserved developed perceptions of prosperity and superiority.
That is historically a tough problem that has rarely, perhaps never, been sustainably solved in any region, and it has certainly never been globally solved.
How does 'leadership by the wealthy and powerful' get corrected to bring a sustainable end to all of the harmful systemic developments of activity and beliefs that the undeserving among the wealthy and powerful have benefited from being able to develop, increase and 'conserve' popular support for?
An increased common sense that that is the problem is a required starting point for pursuit of sustainable improvements, corrections and other solutions to the developed problem.
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EddieEvans at 20:36 PM on 25 November 20222022 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #46
I could not agree more; we should have started a planetwide GHG reduction program similar to the US Manhatten program around 1980.
Your comment is too accurate to see lost to one website, so, I shared the only way I know. Thanks!
Moderator Response:[BL] Link activated
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One Planet Only Forever at 04:16 AM on 25 November 2022New reports spell out climate urgency, shortfalls, needed actions
Regarding my comment @3,
The following new News item provides a detailed presentation that is consistent with the point I make regarding the misleading marketing history of Alberta's new Premier Smith. Admittedly it clarifies for me that 'what someone believes' can not be certain no matter what they say ... it could all be an act with the Actor knowing better.
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One Planet Only Forever at 06:12 AM on 24 November 2022New reports spell out climate urgency, shortfalls, needed actions
I am still reading through the set of reports. But I have come across the following specific points that reinforce the point I make in my comment @1.
The "Emissions Gap Report 2022: The Closing Window – Climate Crisis Calls for Rapid Transformation of Societies by Juliane Berger et al." starts and ends part 2.3.2 "Consumption-based emissions are highly unequal between and within countries" with the following quotes (Bold is my emphasis):
"When national fossil CO2 emissions are estimated on a consumption-basis (i.e. where the supply-chain emissions are allocated to consumers) rather than on the territorial-basis considered so far, emissions tend to be higher in high-income countries such as the United States of America and European Union (by 6 per cent and 14 per cent respectively; Friedlingstein et al. [2020]). Conversely, they are lower in countries such as India and China (by 9 per cent and 10 per cent respectively), which are net exporters of goods ..."
"Consumption-based emissions also diverge starkly at a household level, in large part due to income and wealth disparities between and within countries (Capstick, Khosla and Wang 2020). When the emissions associated with both household consumption and public and private investments are allocated to households (see appendix A), and households are ranked by GHG emissions (excluding LULUCF), the bottom 50 per cent emit on average 1.6 tCO2e/capita and contribute 12 per cent of the global total, whereas the top 1 per cent emit on average 110 tCO2e/capita and contribute 17 per cent of the total (Chancel 2022; Chancel et al. 2022). Super-emitters in the top 0.1 per cent (average 467 tCO2e/capita) and the top 0.01 per cent (2,531 tCO2e/capita) have seen the fastest growth in personal carbon footprints since 1990. High-emitting households are present across all major economies, and large inequalities now exist both within and between countries (figure 2.3) (Chancel et al. 2022)."
The problem is bigger today than it had to be mainly because of the successful resistance to responsible leadership by the greatest unnecessary beneficiaries from harmful-impacting actions over the past 30 years (they would be doing OK with far less benefit but they pursue increased status and benefit from being as harmful as they can get away with) ... and they are in almost every nation ... and sometimes they become national leaders.
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scaddenp at 05:29 AM on 24 November 2022Are clean technologies and renewable energies better for the environment than fossil fuels?
Almost all of turbine parts can be recycled and the base installation simply reused. Expect lifetime to increase and recycling costs to drop. The first turbine installed in my country did 22 years and then just replaced the turbine component. I would note that FF-powered turbines also have a finite lifespan.
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Bob Loblaw at 01:26 AM on 24 November 2022Don’t get fooled: Electric vehicles really are better for the climate
PSBaker:
Your first link does not make any references at all to "carbon pollution" (e.g. CO2 emissions to the atmosphere). It discusses only particulate emissions. And it does not say that EVs are worse - it says that heavier vehicles (of any type) are worse. And it points out that one of the reasons tires are now more important is because particulate emissions from the tailpipe are now much less than they used to be. And it points out that much of the tire wear particulate matter does not become airborne (where it would affect air quality).
It makes mention of the extra weight of Battery Electric Vehicles (BEVs), but driving style is far more of an impact. Quoting the article:
Nevertheless, it is important to say that a gentle BEV driver, with the benefit of regenerative braking, can more than cancel out the tire wear emissions from the additional weight of their vehicle, to achieve lower tire wear than an internal combustion engine vehicle driven badly.
So, your article looks at only one small component of EV use.
As for your second article: what is your point? Quoting from the article:
The results show that the scenario with a high concentration of electric vehicles (‘EV-high’), which bets on wide-scale electrification but does not change our current mobility patterns only manages to reduce by 15 percent the greenhouse gas emissions from transport by 2050.
So, EVs do reduce greenhouse gas emissions - but many other actions are needed to meet our goals.
Neither of your sources seem to provide any sort of "EVs are a waste of effort" that your extremely brief comment seems to want to imply. And the certainly do not refute the main point of the blog post.
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wilddouglascounty at 01:00 AM on 24 November 20222022 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #46
I am sad to say that the observation that the COP system for addressing climate change is broken is incorrect simply because it is an understatement.
To break, it has to be working, which it has NEVER managed to do in terms of rising to the levels of action required. Seeing the oil producers end COP 27 by nixing even considering cutting back on fossil fuel production should make that clear to even the most hopeful.
The current war in the Ukraine only reinforces how destructive a force our dependence on fossil fuels has become, and to what extent the controllers of energy will go in order to retain their power. I'm not saying this as a political statement at all, as the countries who control the fossil fuel production cut across the entire political spectrum. We don't have much of a track record for successfully breaking up such a stranglehold, but I believe that despite such sobering evidence, we must continue to try, ever more clear-eyed about calling a spade a spade. COP was probably co-opted in its inception: what next?
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PSBaker at 23:42 PM on 23 November 2022Don’t get fooled: Electric vehicles really are better for the climate
Not sure about that … tire pollution is significantly worse with EVs & gains are modest.
EVs will never deliver the sort of transport reductions needed.https://www.emissionsanalytics.com/news/gaining-traction-losing-tread
https://theecologist.org/2020/oct/05/unsustainability-electric-carModerator Response:[BL] Links activated.
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Evan at 23:37 PM on 23 November 2022SkS Analogy 9 - The greenhouse effect is a stack of blankets
Charlie Brown, thanks for your thoughts and comments for other analogies. I dealt with your suggestion 2) in a separate analogy (read here), which I agree is an excellent example of the greenhouse effect.
We try to keep these analogies as simple as possible to reach the broadest analogy. Hence, we do not deal with all of the detailed radiative effects to which you refer. But we keep modifying and hopefully improving these analogies, so perphaps more of your suggestions will show up in future renditions.
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Bob Loblaw at 23:32 PM on 23 November 2022Over half a dozen handy handbook translations published!
Eddie:
I agree on "redirecting". It should match the syntax of "by affirming the value". To use "redirect", you'd need to introduce a subject in the sentence - e.g., "but then you should redirect..."
Toward vs. towards is not an issue. From Wiktionary:
https://en.wiktionary.org/wiki/towards
Usage notes
Although some have tried to discern a semantic distinction between the words toward and towards, the only difference in practice is dialectal. Toward is more common in American English and towards is more common in British English, though each form may be found in both varieties.
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EddieEvans at 22:15 PM on 23 November 2022Over half a dozen handy handbook translations published!
Maybe it's me — I don't know.
Under "How to talk to a conspiracy theorist," I wonder if there's a better way to write the "Affirm critical thinking:
Conspiracy theorists perceive themselves as
critical thinkers who are not fooled by an official
account. This perception can be capitalized on
by affirming the value of critical thinking but then
redirect this approach towards a more critical
analysis of the conspiracy theory.56"It sounds convoluted to me, not simple enough. Then there's a possibility for a grammar check, "redirect" to "redirecting," and "toward" instead of "towards"more critical analysis . . . .
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lalith at 12:14 PM on 23 November 2022Are clean technologies and renewable energies better for the environment than fossil fuels?
This articler assumes that once a wind turbine is installed it will be there forever. However, it has a finite life of around 20years after which a new unit will be required so mining will need to increase. And perhaps to fossil fuel levels.
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Bob Loblaw at 07:50 AM on 21 November 2022CO2 effect is saturated
Yes, the U Chicago link to MODTRAN I gave above does not allow you to enter in an arbitrary temperature profile. You can choose "Locality" from a pre-set list, and a variety of pre-set values for cloud and precipitation conditions. This will alter the temperature profile displayed on the right - but the online interface has its limitations as far as user preferences go.
The stratospheric cooling in response to increased CO2, illustrated in figure 16 of Manabe and Wetherald 1967 (linked in previous comments, but included here again for convenience) is largely due to more CO2 in the stratosphere emitting more IR at the same temperature, so the same outward IR flux to space can be accomplished at lower temperatures.
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BaerbelW at 05:16 AM on 21 November 2022The Debunking Handbook 2020: Downloads and Translations
Since mid-November, three more translations of the Debunking Handbook 2020 have been published: Slovak, Albanian and Macedonian.
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Charlie_Brown at 05:02 AM on 21 November 2022CO2 effect is saturated
Bob Loblaw
Good clarifications, thank you. I should have said “Emitted radiant energy intensity as a function of wavelength depends only upon the composition and temperature of the emitting source.”
Also, thank you for the references to Manabe’s work and to the BAMS paper. Manabe’s approach demonstrated the effect of stratospheric cooling and tropospheric warming from CO2 doubling. Since MODTRAN uses a specified atmospheric temperature profile, this version of the model can’t be changed to show this effect. One always needs to be mindful of the purpose and limitations of any model that is used.
Those who deny that “CO2 is a strong emitter as well as a strong absorber” should be reminded of Kirchhoff’s Law that absorptance equals emittance, although precisely only when there is thermodynamic equilibrium. This is a very good approximation in the atmosphere, but it means that any slight imbalance between photon absorptance and emittance will be manifested as a temperature change. Conservation of energy is rigorous, but not conservation of photons. This is one reason why tracking the path of photons emitted from the surface is problematic. The simple fact is that CO2 in the tropopause absorbs and emits radiant energy based on the cold temperature at that altitude. -
Bob Loblaw at 01:22 AM on 21 November 2022CO2 effect is saturated
Further minor note:
The radiative-convective model work of Manabe et al does include both IR radiative transfer and solar radiation. This is necessary for a proper energy balance model. The stratospheric heating seen in the above figures is largely due to ozone absorption of UV radiation.
MODTRAN, as linked to earlier in comments, focusses on IR radiation.
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Bob Loblaw at 00:58 AM on 21 November 2022CO2 effect is saturated
Charlie_Brown:
One minor clarification. You say "Radiant energy intensity as a function of wavelength depends only upon the composition and temperature of the emitting source."
Yes, this is correct for radiant energy emitted locally, but when it comes to measuring radiant energy at a point, you get both the locally-emitted energy plus any energy at that wavelength that was emitted elsewhere and has been transmitted through the atmosphere to that point - i.e., it has not been absorbed by the intervening atmosphere. At some wavelengths, where atmospheric absorption is large, it will be mostly locally-emitted. At wavelengths where atmospheric absorption is small, it will be mostly transmitted from elsewhere.
The complication that you refer to in terms of what is seen at any particular height in the atmosphere is that it includes both components (local emission plus transmission). From measurements of radiant energy alone you cannot know how much is from each. For that, you need models that incorporate temperature, all gases and their emission spectra, etc.
And, as you state, models such as MODTRAN will do that for you - but they are not energy balance models. You need to specify the temperature profile (and cloud profile, and gases) and then you can get the profile of radiative energy (upward and downward fluxes, absorption and emission rates).
If that radiative energy transfer does not balance (local absorption and emission are not equal), then locally you will have either heating or cooling. At that point, you can iteratively warm or cool that layer (and all other layers), recalculate the temperature profile, recalculate the radiative transfer, etc until you find a temperature profile that is at equilibrium.
And people have done this. Classic early references are from roughly 60 years ago (and have been linked to earlier in this long comments thread).
If you only consider radiatve transfer, the atmosphere would stabilize at a much steeper temperature gradient than exists. If you adjust for this (Manabe et al's "convective adjustment") you get a very good fit to actual global mean temperature. Figure 1 from Manabe and Strickler shows these two scenarios clearly, as well as the iterative process of radiative calculations, determining heating/cooling, radiative calculations, etc:
An interesting paper appeared in BAMS earlier this month, looking at the historical importance of this early work by Manabe.
Certain stubbornly-ignorant self-proclaimed experts that have repeatedly invaded this thread seem to lose sight of the fact that the atmosphere also emits radiation in the wavelengths that are strongly-absorbed. It's easy to deny that the Greenhouse Effect exists if you deny that CO2 is a strong emitter as well as a strong absorber.
Moderator Response:[BL] Due to a recently-noted bug in the SkS code, the link to this comment, as it appears in "Recent Comments" will take you to the wrong page. For the convenience of anyone trying to follow the thread, here is the correct link (note the p=27 part):
https://skepticalscience.com/argument.php?a=82&p=27#139813
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Charlie_Brown at 07:27 AM on 20 November 2022SkS Analogy 9 - The greenhouse effect is a stack of blankets
The blanket analogy is fine for those who are not familiar with radiant energy transfer. For those who do know a little about it (think night vision goggles), there are other analogies that could be used that are not based on thermal conduction heat transfer. 1) Smudge pots used in fruit orchards on cold, clear nights. Increasing CO2 would be akin to thickening the smoke layer. 2) The effect of cloud cover on cold, but otherwise clear, nights. Similarly, increasing CO2 would be akin to thin clouds vs. thicker clouds. 3) Mylar space blankets instead of fabric blankets. Increasing CO2 would be akin to filling in holes changing the material to reduce the emissivity. There are weaknesses in the analogies, but they can help to convey the message about global warming. Resolving the weaknesses can be educational. A technical description necessarily involves emissivity as a function of wavelength. The Advanced description in “Is The CO2 Effect Saturated” is excellent. The Basic description also is very good because it includes the critical effect of cold temperature at high altitude with a very nice graphic image. The 27 pages of 668 comments are tedious to work through because they contain a lot of misinformation mixed in with some very good information, and it takes quite a bit of critical thinking to sort through what is accurate and important. I will post my additional comment there, at risk of making repetitive points and being lost in the mix.
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Charlie_Brown at 07:25 AM on 20 November 2022CO2 effect is saturated
It is easier to interpret radiant energy leaving the top of the atmosphere (TOA) toward space than to track it after being emitted from the surface. Radiant energy intensity as a function of wavelength depends only upon the composition and temperature of the emitting source. In other words, the emitted energy in the 14-16 micron band that is emitted to space comes from CO2 in the tropopause near the lower stratosphere. There are sufficient CO2 molecules in this layer to bring the emissivity to 1.0 and the temperature is about 220K. The TOA is the system boundary for the global energy balance. At most other wavelengths, CO2 has an emissivity of 0, so IR emissions are due to another substance which may or may not be emitting at a different temperature. That is why it is easier to explain IR loss to space by looking at the downward from the TOA instead of trying to track IR leaving the surface, which gets absorbed and re-emitted and re-absorbed and re-emitted again.
I see several previous references to MODTRAN in this thread. Great. It is an easy-to-use free, public access online program for modeling radiant energy in the atmosphere. The hardest part to grasp is that it is not an energy balance model that calculates the surface temperature, but a radiation model that calculates the radiant energy flow for a specified surface temperature and atmospheric temperature profile. Much can be learned from using it, including the saturation effect for CO2 and CH4, effect of water vapor and water vapor feedback, and radiant energy flow upward and downward through the atmospheric, and the importance of the atmospheric temperature profile for the greenhouse effect. Note that the saturation effect can be observed as widening the 14-16 micron trough with increasing CO2, while the depth of the trough is set by the emission temperature. While the saturation effect tends to be logarithmic, it has not plateaued for CO2. For CH4 at 18. ppm, any saturation effect has barely started. That is what makes CH4 such a powerful greenhouse gas.
The short answer to the question about downward IR is that it comes from radiated energy from GHG in the lower atmosphere. To fully understand the upward and downward flow of IR, try exercising MODTRAN at different altitudes and switch between looking at the spectrum upward and downward. -
EddieEvans at 00:39 AM on 19 November 2022A brief history of fossil-fuelled climate denial
Yep, that's it! It's been so long that I could not remember; now, how do I find someone to appreciate this vast store of fossil fuel deception documents? [Shortened link]
Moderator Response:[BL] Link activated.
The web software here does not automatically create links. You can do this when posting a comment by selecting the "insert" tab, selecting the text you want to use for the link, and clicking on the icon that looks like a chain link. Add the URL in the dialog box. -
Bob Loblaw at 00:18 AM on 19 November 2022A brief history of fossil-fuelled climate denial
Eddie:
Is there anything useful at https://www.climatefiles.com/?
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EddieEvans at 21:13 PM on 18 November 2022A brief history of fossil-fuelled climate denial
I can no longer find the "Fossil Fuel Files" website. I used to find it with a simple google search, but no more. Was it taken off for copyright violations? It was a great resource; I wanted to place its content on Youtube.
I have one June 6, 1978 document written by J.F. Black, Scientific Advisor, Products Research Division, Exxon. "The Greenhouse Effect."
Does anyone here know what became of the website?
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Doug Bostrom at 10:21 AM on 18 November 2022Don’t get fooled: Electric vehicles really are better for the climate
Per Eddie's remarks, we have an EV that does the vast bulk of our mileage. It can handle dimensional items up to 118" (~3m) with the hatch closed and can comfortably do a 190 mile (305km) roundtrip I routinely need to cover, in winter, mostly at 70mph (112kph) and without the driver freezing, w/~40 miles (64km) reserve range on returning to driveway. And it's a delight to drive, makes me feel a little bit too much like I'm 16 years of age again. So lots of bullet points covered there.
For other needs we have a 1997 Ford Ranger. It goes through about 40 gallons of gas per year, at about 25MPG (10km/l) for above trip case. I've not done the math, but I suspect the current embodied carbon in replacing it with the most plausible EPU candidate (Ford F150 Lightning) may be problematic; the choice would not necessarily be a win over the geriatric Ranger.
There are two other problems.
For us, $40k is not a dealbreaker. But as a practical matter and in the context where a lot of PUs are used (think solo operators running a yard care concern, etc.) that's a huge lift, essentially impossible.
But here's another dealbreaker: none of the current EPUs will hold a 6' (1.8m) dimensional item in the bed with the gate closed, the lowest bar of legitimate PU cargo specs*. All of them are centered as designer accessories first, tool second. This is like having to use a tack hammer where one needs a framing hammer, or (given the toy-like nature of such an implementation) a kid's plastic hammer instead of the real deal. And that's a shame, because for the legitimate use case of many PUs, EPUs otherwise offer distinct advantages, and have range more than ample for a typical day's work.
Eventually this will get sorted and we'll probably even see -proper- EPU models with what used to be the correct treatment: an 8' (2.4m) bed. But right now, conflicted objectives, still catering to urban cowboys having PUs with no scratches or dirt in the bed. A lot of cost and a lot of dead weight are concentrated on useless appurtenances, things that are completely irrelevant to the original use case of PUs, hardware as psychological reassurance, ending up with the worst possible analogy to designer handbag.
All that said, the more EVs, the better for the planet, with the stipulation that fewer vehicle miles of all kinds are also going to be necessary. We're habituated to automobiles, but in truth if we can't feed or house ourselves with jumping into a car, our "convenience" item is substantially a prosthetic device, a very large and inefficient wheel chair.
*"just leave the gate open" isn't responsive to how that actually unpacks in practice. As usual, "just" is way too economical.
