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John Russell at 01:22 AM on 31 October 2012Climate of Doubt Strategy #1: Deny the Consensus
Alexandre -- I'm with you all the way. While it's important to anchor all statements in scientific fact, and to be wary of exaggeration, the public expects to be persuaded by advertising and PR. If there's a consensus of scientific bodies -- and there surely is -- then one would expect them to make their views on important issues heard in the popular media. To some degree the well-known NGOs such as Greenpeace and WWF are already using these methods, however I'd like to see such organisations teaming-up with -- and closely supervised by, in order to rein in any tendency towards alarmism -- scientific bodies, so as to publicise exactly what climate change could so easily mean. The aftermath of hurricane Sandy is the perfect timing for some billboards that say to New Yorkers something like: "Scientists tell us that 12 inches of sea-level rise in New York has been caused directly by global warming. Hurricane Sandy has been a foretaste of what is likely to become more frequent in future." Now is the time to act. If it could add in the small print that the message is endorsed by NASA, NOAA or whoever, it wouldn't take long to have the desired effect. A link in the small print to a scientific paper or two would provide the necessary rigour, even though the person in the street wouldn't take it any further. This approach would put the denial lobby on the defensive, instead of the situation at the moment where they constantly take the initiative and leave the scientific community almost always fighting a rearguard action. -
vrooomie at 01:13 AM on 31 October 2012Climate of Doubt Strategy #1: Deny the Consensus
Agreed, DSL. The list is then--what's the word?--unimpressive. Now, perhaps, to further answer the question, a list of the remaining scientists' paper on teh subject: I'm sure it's in all the debunking buttons, though. It might make a good blog post....woops, I think I just stepped in it...;) -
Eric (skeptic) at 00:30 AM on 31 October 2012Hurricane Sandy: Neither weather nor tide nor sea level can be legislated
Sandy moved onshore near Atlantic City NJ with a sub 28 inch pressure (I don't know exactly but the two hourly readings were 28.01) The previous non-tropical cyclone record for the US was 28.21 in 2010 in a storm in the upper midwest. Sandy was sucked inland more rapidly than expected which saved NYC and NJ to some extent. But record surges were recorded on Long Island, Sandy Hook NJ (old 10 feet 1 inch, new 12.58 feet) and well up the Hudson River in Poughkeepsie NY (old 8 feet a year ago in Irene, new 9.5 feet). It's not over but the worst is over. The result in my area of Northern Virginia and elsewhere was sporadic wind damage, not severe but over a very wide area somewhat typical flooding. -
Bernard J. at 00:25 AM on 31 October 2012Climate of Doubt and Escalator Updates
Vrooomie. Thanks for a very intriguing response. Given the results that you report it follows that the costs of purifying, storing and delivering the O2, and the costs of collecting, storing and safely and permanently disposing of the CO2 would all have to be effectively zero to warrant even the few percent benefit that you observed with using oxygen enrichment. And in the real world the laws of thermodynamics will not permit those (very large) costs to be avoided. It would seem that sincam shot all of his tappets. -
DSL at 00:12 AM on 31 October 2012Climate of Doubt Strategy #1: Deny the Consensus
vrooomie- We have to exclude non-scientists, so Watts' list drops down to Lindzen, McKitrick (I'm generous), Christy (who used Watts' non-paper in Congressional testimony), Maue (WeatherBell ACE-pusher), Luning (albeit working in the private sector for a petro company), and Michaels. Others may have been published, but the publications were probably pay-for-play or Energy & Environment. -
Bernard J. at 00:12 AM on 31 October 2012Hurricane Sandy: Neither weather nor tide nor sea level can be legislated
Brian at #18.I don’t know if you are aware or not but the real estate developer pictured in the SMH article you linked to is now the Lord Mayor of Newcastle – developer becomes politician.
No, I wasn't aware of that! Brings to mind foxes and hen houses. It's obviously a very different Hunter Valley now than when I knew it. It hints at the background for the state government's recinding of the sea level rise policy... Seems that cronyism is alive and well in NSW. Joy Cummings will be turning in her grave. -
Alexandre at 23:29 PM on 30 October 2012Climate of Doubt Strategy #1: Deny the Consensus
YubeDude at 22:35 PM on 30 October, 2012 No offense taken, but thanks for being polite anyway. I understand this is no longer a scientific issue: it's a PR one, and only one side is really skillful at that. The public is not aware of the present scientific consensus. To many people, it's still largely a "debate". My aim with my suggestion above is just to make the consensus known to the general public. For that purpose, those "public" statements from National Academies of Science, for, example, are simply not effective enough. They will hardly reach a handful of people. I'm not a PR person, so I will not particularly defend the billboard idea too fiercely. Whatever means used, it must be one that reaches the general public, not just the very interested people. And whatever content the message has, it must be direct and simple. One cannot treat a public communication effort as a classroom lecture, expecting from people the attention span a student would (ideally) have. It's always good to promote scientific litteracy but to count on a broad understanding of the underlying physics by the gerneral public to enable change is unrealistic. The general public does not understand in depth how a human heart works, or a lung, or blood vessels. They just trust their doctors when they say cigarettes or too much sugar is bad for you. When it comes to climate science, they were caught in a lying campaign that told them the doctors are still arguing about it. And that's what I think needs proper addressing. -
vrooomie at 23:13 PM on 30 October 2012Climate of Doubt Strategy #1: Deny the Consensus
danielbacon@13, Anthony watts has kindly compiled a list, which should go a ways towards adressing your requests. Andrew Montford (Author of The Hockey Stick Illusion) Richard Lindzen (Alfred P. Sloan professor of Meteorology, MIT) Marc Morano (Climate Depot) John Coleman (Founder of the Weather Channel, now at KUSI-TV) Chris Horner (Senior Fellow, Center for Energy and Environment, CEI) Steve McIntyre (editor of ClimateAudit.org) Dr. Ross McKitrick (University of Guelph) John Christy (Alabama State climatologist, co author of UAH dataset) Joe D’Aleo (WeatherBell) Joe Bastardi (Weatherbell) Senator Jim Inhofe Bob Tisdale (author of Who Turned on The Heat?) Dr. Ryan Maue (Weatherbell) Dr. Sebastian Lüning (co-author of Die Kalt Sonne) Harold Ambler (Author of Don’t Sell Your Coat) Donna LaFramboise (Author of The Delinquent Teenager) Pat Michaels (former State climatologist of Virgina, fellow of the Cato institute) Pete Garcia (Producer of the movie The Boy Who Cried Warming) Christopher Monckton (SPPI) *All* have been debunked/addressed here on SkS in the helpful links on the home page. -
vrooomie at 23:10 PM on 30 October 2012Climate of Doubt and Escalator Updates
Bernard J, let me take a shot at answering your questions... Re: "pure" O2 in an engine, I'll stand by my statement: There is *NO* internal combustion engine that will run on pure O2, nor benefit appreciably by the use of O2. Yes, adding pure O2 will indeed make combustion hotter..and decrease fuel mileage, due to the fact of the engine needing more fuel to maintain stochiometry. I happened to have done this professionally, i.e, built, run, and test automotive engines; in 1980, a local physicist sought my dad an I out to run these EXACT tests, that is, running an auxiliary O2 enrichment system on standard automobiles and trucks. One of the test "mules" was a 1981 Chevy Suburban, which I ran ~2000 miles to establich baseline fuel usage data. I then replaced all the lubricants with high-tech (for then) synthetic lubricanbts, then ran *another* 2000 miles to determine their efficacy. Standard, as delivered: 10 mpg, city; 13 mpg highway. Standard, with modified lubricants: almost identical numbers, with ~ less than 1% improvement. I then modified the engine to attain higher volumentric and thermodynamic efficiency (different cam timing, improved induction system, precision balancing, better fuel and timing mapping. Modded engine, standard lubricants: 11 mpg, city, 14 mpg, highway. Modded engine, synthlubes: a repeated ~1% improvement. We then developed the O2 injection system and ran it for ~5000 miles...the *astounding* results? 11.6 mpg, city, 14.1 mpg, highway. In a word, it was essentially useless to inject pure O2 into the engine. On top of that the exhaust emissions were not substantially decreased (given the coarse and low standards of the time) and I can almost assuredly say that any improvements today would be subsumed by the high cost of O2 refinement/storage and distribution. I repeat: O2 injection does NOT make an appreciable difference and is costly to do. Modern engines in cars are just about as efficient as a *reciprocating* engine can be made.I also We cannot do a lot better, using IC engines: what we can do is to continue using modern, lower-weight composite structures (ala F1/CART/IndyCar technology), increasing CAFE standards, and *conserving,* i. e. move ~away~ from so much individual car use. Sorry car guys, but the day of the internal combustion-powered car is, thankfully, numbered. I must say that this was a painful admission for me, who lived, ate, and breathed the car game all my life, and will, so long as I can afford the fuel, continue to play with my one toy car. I will, however, ASAP, be buying a hi-mileage European turbodiesel hybrid, as soon as CARB pulls its regulatory thumb out of its administrative ....behind. -
danielbacon at 22:55 PM on 30 October 2012Climate of Doubt Strategy #1: Deny the Consensus
There is must to-do about the 97-98% but who are the 2%’ers really. If they are publishing in field, what are they saying (links to their abstracts). I realize the surveys will not list the participants, but I really cannot come up with 2% If we exclude the non-scientists nuts who is left? I know of: John Christy Roy Spencer I would exclude “Patrick Michaels” he only has one published work in Nature or am I wrong not to include him. Anyway it would be nice to have a post of these 2%’ers and their works. -
DSL at 22:44 PM on 30 October 2012Climate of Doubt Strategy #1: Deny the Consensus
Yes, Tom. The longer it takes you to answer questions about the science, the more I'm inclined to think you're simply a tool in others' hands. You were once a teacher, weren't you? You now appear as a professional rhetorician, which is as kind as I can put it without violating the comments policy (which I've probably already done). -
YubeDude at 22:35 PM on 30 October 2012Climate of Doubt Strategy #1: Deny the Consensus
Alexandre@10 First let me state that my comments are not personal or intended to insult your position. I disagree with your suggest and mostly because your billboard idea has an emotional tone that plays into the hands of groups like Heartland and people like Mr Harris. They want to make this an emotional issue because they can not argue the facts or the empirical metrics that have been developed. The want to suggest that life styles will be compromised, wallets lightened and that your children will end up walking in the bitter cold searching for a job. We need to concentrate on the facts, the details, the studies, the peer reviewed publications first and foremost. Once the issue is established as a reality that threatens our way of life and life itself, then and only then, will we have any traction with the lay-public; and once they see the reality, the future will be abundantly clear. We won't have to put up billboards as everyone will already know what is in store for us. Skeptics are the ones who came up with the acronym CAGW because they wanted to paint the picture that the issue is one of scare mongering. We don't need to help them out. I feel your passion and I am equally frustrated over the resistance toward the obvious but the public needs to be handled carefully or we will lose them to their own fears; fears which are being actively manipulated by an army of "deskepticons" hell bent on obfuscation and re-working the issue away from science and moving it to an issue of politically motivated social engineering. -
Alexandre at 22:07 PM on 30 October 2012Climate of Doubt Strategy #1: Deny the Consensus
I'm for a campaign publicly endorsed by the most respected scientific institutions in the field, in each country. It should convey simple and direct messages - as simple as tobacco hazard warnings we have in some countries. Billboards or full-page ads saying thins like “We thought Arctic sea ice would be as low only in fifty years. It’s going now.” “Remember last summer’s heatwave? That will be our mild summer in 2060. Protect our children’s future. Stop global warming.” “40% of our freshwater comes from that glacier. Protect our water. Stop warming.” All this, I repeat, endorsed by institutions like NOAA, NASA, and the like. The general public is NOT currently aware of the position of these institutions, and that helps only the denier campaign. Elaborate public statements buried in the middle of a very technical website (such as NOAA’s) have a very limited effect when it comes to informing the general public. -
Kevin C at 22:06 PM on 30 October 2012Climate of Doubt Strategy #1: Deny the Consensus
Dr Harris: Welcome back. I note that you still haven't provided a response to the scientific questions concerning your previous lecture course, as identified in this article, instead choosing to try and deflect the discussion to other topics. I'm still interested in your answers to those questions. My particular area of interest is the relationship between forcing and temperature, and so your statement that "there isn’t a good correlation between temperatures and CO2 over the record." is particularly peculiar: Firstly it ignores the fact that CO2 is not and has never been claimed to be the only forcing, and secondly the relationship between forcing and temperature once taking into account lags is very strong indeed. I will be happy to take you through my analysis if you are interested. I suggest however that the other thread would be a more appropriate venue. No doubt other contributors will want to understand your curious statements on other issues. -
Philippe Chantreau at 21:50 PM on 30 October 2012Climate of Doubt Strategy #1: Deny the Consensus
And Tom Harris gives us a perfect example of another topic, namely the coping strategy number one of those who can't face reality: deny it. And be sincere about it. -
John Brookes at 21:23 PM on 30 October 2012Hurricane Sandy: Neither weather nor tide nor sea level can be legislated
US summer heat wave. Record low arctic sea ice minimum. NY hit by two hurricanes in one year. But its just bad luck... -
Brian Purdue at 20:09 PM on 30 October 2012Hurricane Sandy: Neither weather nor tide nor sea level can be legislated
Bernard J @17 I don’t know if you are aware or not but the real estate developer pictured in the SMH article you linked to is now the Lord Mayor of Newcastle – developer becomes politician. Now that’s no way to solve the problem! -
YubeDude at 19:54 PM on 30 October 2012Climate of Doubt Strategy #1: Deny the Consensus
TomHarris@6 "consensus argument is nonsense" Vague and unsupported, but congrats for putting it out there. Maybe next time you can substantiate such a bold and meaningless claim. "poll you cite was so biased as to not be a meaningful indicator of American public opinion on global warming" What makes the poll biased, and not to put to fine a point on things, who gives a "rats ass" what the public OPINION is on a matter of science? When it comes to opinion I thought it was the job of manipulative "deskepticons", like those who run sham think tanks, to create the public opinion. "I'll have a review...It is a pretty ridiculous survey." Maybe it would be best to wait for some objective analysis before posting your conclusion on the surveys merit. -
TomHarrisICSC at 19:04 PM on 30 October 2012Climate of Doubt Strategy #1: Deny the Consensus
Thanks for mentioning the International Climate Science Coalition in your article. Yes, the consensus argument is nonsense. Also, the Yale/George Mason poll you cite was so biased as to not be a meaningful indicator of American public opinion on global warming, etc. See my article on this here: http://www.canadafreepress.com/index.php/article/u.s.-main-stream-media-duped-on-global-warming-polls I'll have a review of the Anderegg et al. (2010) 97% paper shortly. It is a pretty ridiculous survey. Sincerely, Tom Harris ICSC - Ottawa -
Arctic Haze at 18:02 PM on 30 October 2012Hansen predicted the West Side Highway would be underwater
Here is another one: https://twitter.com/bakyelli/status/263065660890951681/photo/1 And I will remind here that Hansen was talking not only about ocean surge but also hight winds. He apparently meant a tropical hurricane in NY. "“The West Side Highway will be under water. And there will be tape across the windows across the street because of high winds". His prediction came true after 24, not 40 years! -
Miriam O'Brien (Sou) at 17:03 PM on 30 October 2012Examining Hansen's prediction about the West Side Highway
Here is another photo - chest deep on the West Side Highway - during the Sandy superstorm. -
Miriam O'Brien (Sou) at 16:47 PM on 30 October 2012Examining Hansen's prediction about the West Side Highway
This isn't permanent (yet), but likely to happen more often this century. Click here to see a photo of New York's West Side Highway under water. Another report from Wall St Journal Metropolis blog here: "Water is “flowing at great speed” from the West Side Highway into the Brooklyn-Battery Tunnel, he said, but it’s too early to say how much had entered the subway system." -
Doug Bostrom at 16:34 PM on 30 October 2012Climate of Doubt Strategy #1: Deny the Consensus
Sensenbrenner's remarks about "scientists and their supporters" make me wonder if he'd need to be persuaded to use a ladder to climb down from a roof rather than simply jump. On the one hand "physicists and their supporters" say Sensenbrenner would risk being hurt by jumping 20' to the ground but on the other hand who can really say? It's controversial; after all, gravitation is only a theory and doubtless some crazy people can be found who think our confinement to Earth is just mass hysteria. Why not leap off the roof and let events prove the truth? Not likely Sensenbrenner would jump from a roof but he's prepared to impose bigger risks on himself and many others. Odd. -
Bernard J. at 16:02 PM on 30 October 2012Hurricane Sandy: Neither weather nor tide nor sea level can be legislated
Indeed Uncle Pete. And not to forget the real estate industry's liaisons with the likes of David Archibald, Ian Plimer, and Bob Carter. -
mikeh1 at 15:36 PM on 30 October 2012Hansen predicted the West Side Highway would be underwater
Photo of flooding along the Westside Highway during Hurricane Sandy. -
Uncle Pete at 14:27 PM on 30 October 2012Hurricane Sandy: Neither weather nor tide nor sea level can be legislated
@Bernard J . Never underestimate the power of the real estate industry and their close liaisons with politicians. -
Uncle Pete at 14:18 PM on 30 October 2012Climate of Doubt Strategy #1: Deny the Consensus
Thanks for another great post. I sometimes wonder how these people can sleep with a clear conscience. Then again, the laws of physics even apply to the universe these thinktankers inhabit. I suppose Sandy is a just an appetiser of what is in store for the biosphere. -
DSL at 14:16 PM on 30 October 2012Postma disproved the greenhouse effect
Yes, Doug: I've seen your "new science" before. Isn't that Sonja Boehmer-Christiansen I hear calling your name? -
Bernard J. at 12:51 PM on 30 October 2012Climate of Doubt Strategy #1: Deny the Consensus
We Need to Communicate the Consensus to the Public
I've said it before and I'll say it again: professional scientific organisations need to be deliberately and conspicuously standing squarely in the limelight to strenuously inform the public that the issue of human-caused planetary warming is Real, that it is Serious, and that it is Now. If politics won't stay out of science, then science needs to wedge a foot in the door of the political strategy rooms and straighten the record. And kudos for the Skeptical Science team, for their invaluable and world-leading efforts in this regard. -
adelady at 12:50 PM on 30 October 2012Postma disproved the greenhouse effect
Postma's new paper. There's nothing new about it. Some of it is downright tedious. 3.4. The back-radiation/glass greenhouse justification for the GHE Please see Appendix H for a sample list of quotation references adhering to the backradiation mechanism of the GHE. All the references and quotations therein conform to the “backradiation model” of the GHE, which is based on a comparison with actual greenhouses made of glass. The problem is that this well-known comparison is incorrect. Go and have a look if you're interested, but don't expect anything new, or even interesting. -
Bernard J. at 12:20 PM on 30 October 2012Climate of Doubt and Escalator Updates
You go to a gas station to fill up on hydrocarbon fuel which powers an engine designed to eficiently burn the hydrocarbon fuel with pure oxygen. The hydrogen combines with oxygen to produce heat and H2O. The carbon combines with oxygen to produce heat and CO2. The temperatures attainable are higher than using air, which contains 79% Nitrogen. The efficiency of a heat to work engine is proportional to the difference between the highest and lowest cycle temperatures (Carnot). The products are work, CO2 and water. The CO2 can be temporarily captued in a recyclable media, which is recycled at the gas station while you fill up. Zero emissions, much better gas mileage, higher efficiency, unbelievable power.
I'd like to see the energy budget that accounts for: 1) the costs of purifying, storing and delivering the O2, 2) the costs of collecting, storing and safely and permanently disposing of the CO2 and, as others have pointed out, 3) for the vehicle retooling that would be necessary. How do these thermodynamically-unavoidable costs compare with the increased combustion efficiently returned from using pure oxygen? -
YubeDude at 11:52 AM on 30 October 2012Climate of Doubt Strategy #1: Deny the Consensus
Another solid effort addressing the communication front in this battle over reality. A spin that is often used and one that serves as an anchor for the "deskepticons" to turn the tables on consensus is this "97% consensus" statement. I respectfully disagree with your suggestion that we drive this number home and as an alternitive suggest a more detailed set of numbers while completely avoiding this simple percentage...allow me to explain. The issue of consensus is done a disservice by any mention of this oft repeated percentage as its use quickly opens the door to the statistically insignificant sample size that was used to gives us the "97%"; discount the sample size and you discount the percentage in the finding, discount the finding and you discount the consensus. Discount the consensus and you call into to question a variety of empirical metrics with any outlier that offers a contrarian conclusion. The baby steps of denial. Rather than make any mention of the 97% I suggest the following mash up of Dana's statement: -A 2004 survey of 928 peer-reviewed climate science abstracts, found 75% either explicitly or implicitly endorsed the consensus view, while finding no papers rejecting and later in 2009, a review of 1,372 climate researchers and their publication and citation data showed a 97–98% of the researchers most actively publishing in the field support the tenets of human induced climate change.- The "97% consensus" statement is so overloaded with caveat that it really only serves as a softball to be driven deep into the denial-a-sphere by "deskepticons" and his Lordship. Break away from the simple reference and add the structure of significance that the details present. "the climate denial movement knows they don't need to win the scientific argument as long as they can convince the public that there is an ongoing scientific debate regarding climate change." It's never about the truth, just the perception. I would't doubt it if someone told me there is a plaque hanging in the Heartland conference room that says: "It's their perception stupid" -
stonepig at 11:08 AM on 30 October 2012Hurricane Sandy: Neither weather nor tide nor sea level can be legislated
DMCarey, I think you misinterpreted YubeDude. I thought he made a point that we get frustrated with the icers. Granted, he might be a Republican but does that really matter here? I have heard reports that people right in the path are not even doing the basics to survive a power outage for a few days. Lack of personal responsibility in a modest planning mode could save a lot of lives, but most people really do expect the government services to 'save' them. -
kar at 10:56 AM on 30 October 2012Climate of Doubt Strategy #1: Deny the Consensus
Did you mean denyers - or delayers? :-) However, the formula for climate delayers is a simple one Great article by the way... -
scaddenp at 10:18 AM on 30 October 2012Climate of Doubt and Escalator Updates
"Exactly". Something that takes a complete redesign of the car is not a stopgap measure - it would take 25years to replace vehicle fleet with new technology. We would be better off doing that transition to electric rather than a pure O2 fossil fuel burner. For a pure O2 burner to get more kms per litre of fossil fuel, it needs to be a lot better at converting chemical energy to kinetic and as a result must exhaust much less heat. At first glance, it is hard to see how pure O2 makes that difference. You have either carry heavy O2 tank on car as well as fuel, or carry an O2-stripping apparatus in the car as well. Pure o2 should result in more power so perhaps a smaller engine but an internal combustion engine is going to have major fun with the temperature. I'm skeptical - electric seems better to me - but I'm open to be convinced by actual designs. -
Doug Bostrom at 08:45 AM on 30 October 2012Climate of Doubt and Escalator Updates
I seem to remember a (apocryphal?) story about a car or truck accidentally being run through a wall into an area at Cape Kennedy where the air was enriched w/oxygen for some reason. If I remember rightly the main the outcome was lots of flame in the wrong places; impromptu external combustion engine, so to speak. Can't find the story on Google so presumably it does not even rise to the level of Internet rubbish... -
sincam at 07:50 AM on 30 October 2012Climate of Doubt and Escalator Updates
scaddenp, EXACTLY!! -
scaddenp at 07:42 AM on 30 October 2012Climate of Doubt and Escalator Updates
sincam - i think if pushed pure oxygen in the engine, you would loose the engine very quickly and very messily. You would need a complete redesign to use pure O2. -
scaddenp at 07:22 AM on 30 October 2012Climate of Doubt Shines a Light on the Climate Denial Movement
Also Bill. If you are only looking at surface temperature stations, then note that models (in which the heating is continuous) can show quite long periods of flat surface temperatures. For a rather infamous example look at Keenlyside et al 2008 - fig 3 for instance. -
scaddenp at 07:14 AM on 30 October 2012Climate of Doubt Shines a Light on the Climate Denial Movement
See here for article on measuring the earth's energy imbalance. It has links to many of the relevant papers. -
funglestrumpet at 06:22 AM on 30 October 20122012 SkS Weekly Digest #43
On a lighter note, imagine debating climate change with the woman in this video -
DMCarey at 05:21 AM on 30 October 2012Hurricane Sandy: Neither weather nor tide nor sea level can be legislated
YubeDude, that really is the kind of reply that makes you want to scream. I've seen several attempts at dismissing or manipulating Sandy, but that is the first where the cooling spin was attempted to be put on it. Earlier today I had the... luxury... of listening through a taxing explination that the fuss over Sandy has been hyped up by the "leftist media" in order to swing voters for Obama. The really frustrating part is I'm in Canada, and still in the path of the hurricane at that. To see the potential damage the US might undergo as a result of Sandy brushed off as a political ploy is just infuriating -
sincam at 04:46 AM on 30 October 2012Climate of Doubt and Escalator Updates
vroomie. You go to a gas station to fill up on hydrocarbon fuel which powers an engine designed to eficiently burn the hydrocarbon fuel with pure oxygen. The hydrogen combines with oxygen to produce heat and H2O. The carbon combines with oxygen to produce heat and CO2. The temperatures attainable are higher than using air, which contains 79% Nitrogen. The efficiency of a heat to work engine is proportional to the difference between the highest and lowest cycle temperatures (Carnot). The products are work, CO2 and water. The CO2 can be temporarily captued in a recyclable media, which is recycled at the gas station while you fill up. Zero emissions, much better gas mileage, higher efficiency, unbelievable power. -
funglestrumpet at 03:30 AM on 30 October 20122012 SkS Weekly Digest #43
"When and how did you first become concerned about manmade climate change and its consequences?" I have yet to become concerned about manmade climate change. What I am concerned about, and extremely so, is climate change regardless of what the heck is causing it. I think anyone who watched the recent video 'Climate of Doubt' can't help but to have noticed how much the debate got hung up on the 'manmade' bit and just how effective it is in deflecting the debate from reducing the fossil fuel industry's profits – sorry – deflecting action to combat climate change. A scenario that I use (repeatedly) concerns the actions of the captain of a liner with an iceberg dead ahead. It would be an act of supreme folly to refuse to change course and reduce speed simply because the damn thing was not manmade. We know that CO2 is a greenhouse gas. We know that we are pumping CO2 into the atmosphere and therefore, even if it were the sun or some other natural phenomenon that is causing the warming, it would still make sense to cut CO2 production in order to offset the heating effect, whatever its cause, if only by a little. Indeed, if climate change were being caused by the sun, or some other natural phenomenon, I suppose we should all be praying, chanting and doing all that sort of thing because the warming would be destined to continue at or near the current rate until Old Mother Nature, and only Old Mother Nature, decided enough is enough, whenever that might be. In those circumstances all we could do is delay it a little by reducing CO2 (and pray and chant etc., of course). I reckon that that would give us as a species around 200 to 300 years at most and possibly a lot fewer. It is perhaps proof that the denialati don't really believe that we are not to blame for climate change because there is a marked absence of wailing and gnashing of teeth on their part. But we should not let such absence of concern by them deflect us from taking the action that becomes ever more urgent with each passing moment. -
Doug Bostrom at 03:25 AM on 30 October 2012Hurricane Sandy: Neither weather nor tide nor sea level can be legislated
Re Malloy it's a terrific thing to hear from a public servant who's able to look to the future and understand an object lesson even while dealing with immediate contingencies. -
Don9000 at 03:08 AM on 30 October 2012Hurricane Sandy: Neither weather nor tide nor sea level can be legislated
Thank you, Doug. Technically, I see that the 11 am update is now showing the inlets southwest of Manhattan are potentially looking at higher storm surges than western Long Island Sound. Down along our shoreline, however, we have a lot of residential neighborhoods. Our governor here in Connecticut, Dannel Malloy, just held a noon press conference in which he made a few subtle yet telling remarks. He pointed out that the storm is unprecedented, yet noted that it was a wake-up call for all of us. The two specific points he made were that our state would need in the future to plan for similar events that have the potential to knock out our electrical grids and sewer systems in low-lying areas. It turned out that an electrical substation in Bridgeport, Connecticut, almost needed to be shut down. Malloy said the storm surge was a matter of 8 to 10 inches shy of causing a shutdown at the point of high tide. The prediction is safety shutdowns will be required this evening going into the next high tide. Of course, we are already seeing wind-caused power outages all over the state, even though the wind is still barely gusting to tropical storm strength. I think one of the interesting facts about this storm and last October's snow storm is that we are seeing a convergence of traditionally winter and summer weather events here in the northeast. All that extra energy in the climate system is finding new ways to act. -
Doug Bostrom at 01:17 AM on 30 October 2012Hurricane Sandy: Neither weather nor tide nor sea level can be legislated
Grinsted, that's a very interesting and timely paper. Thank you. -
Doug Bostrom at 01:16 AM on 30 October 2012Hurricane Sandy: Neither weather nor tide nor sea level can be legislated
That's an excellent point about time correction for tides, Don. The more complicated the coast line, the more arrival of tides varies from location-location. Here's a pretty nice tool for deducing tide timing in specific locations in the NE: Nor'East Saltwater Tide Charts -
DSL at 23:53 PM on 29 October 2012Rose and Curry Double Down on Global Warming Denial
We can add this recent one to Doug's list: Sedláček & Knutti (2012). Abstract: “Of the additional energy absorbed by the Earth over the past decades, by far the largest fraction is taken up by the oceans. Yet most attribution studies focus on the surface warming, and only few have used patterns of ocean warming to attribute changes to external forcing or internal variability. Here we use the combined observed evidence from warming of the atmosphere and ocean with the latest climate model simulations to demonstrate that both the depth profiles and spatial warming patterns near the surface are very heterogeneous when resulting from internal unforced variability. In the 20th-century simulations on the other hand, the observed spatial pattern is smooth, and the warming decreases almost gradually with depth in the ocean, consistent with observations and a penetration of the surface warming to intermediate depth by diffusion and advection. We argue that such physically motivated arguments combining different lines of evidence and types of observations offer insight that is complementary to optimal fingerprint attribution methods. We conclude that the simultaneous global warming of the atmosphere and mixed layer alone is uninformative for attribution, but the magnitude of ocean heat uptake, the homogeneity of the spatial pattern as well as the distribution of warming below the mixed layer strongly argue for the 20th-century warming being largely externally forced.” The bibliography for that paper should of tremendous help to you, Bill, and I would expect you to use some of the works referenced if you continue, here, your public thought on the subject. You may also want to check out the Knutti & Plattner (2011) response to Schwarz et al. (2010) -- and the works referenced. Ocean warming is an extremely complex process, with dozens of distinct circulation/mixing mechanisms both large and small. Check out Ari's research blog (usually reprinted at SkS) on the subject here. If you don't have access to the journals, let the blog know, and someone may be able to finagle a copy of the article you need. -
gws at 22:47 PM on 29 October 2012Rose and Curry Double Down on Global Warming Denial
BillHunter Let's assume for a moment that there were indeed no direct measurements of an energy imbalance (note: even the decreasing amount of outgoing infrared (aka heat-) radiation from Earth into space has been measured). Then we would still know that greenhouse gases (GHGs) have increased in Earth's atmosphere (not disputed by anyone). Our knowledge of the physical properties of those GHGs says that they will "trap" heat radiation, a well-known mechanism, also not disputed. This then is roughly equivalent to putting a pot of water (Earth) on the stove and turning the heat on (GHG). Self-named "skeptics" still allege that the water in that pot will not get warmer despite the "energy imbalance" the stove is creating. (-snip-)Moderator Response: [DB] Text snipped per request.
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