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John Hartz at 04:21 AM on 29 June 2012Simply Wrong: Jan-Erik Solheim on Hansen 1988
Angusmac: A quick scan of the term Scientific Method posted in Wikepedia suggests that your definition of "scientific methodology" falls way short of the commonly accepted understanding of the term by the scientific community. -
KR at 03:38 AM on 29 June 2012Simply Wrong: Jan-Erik Solheim on Hansen 1988
angusmac - I believe Dikran was asking what methodology you used in establishing a +/-30% range. What statistics, data, and period? Or did you use the "eyecrometer"? I will note that the tone of your post, while technically within the comments policy, is quite insulting overall. -
angusmac at 02:53 AM on 29 June 2012Simply Wrong: Jan-Erik Solheim on Hansen 1988
Dikran Marsupial @65 The scientific methodology is statistics and reliability. (-Snip-)Moderator Response: Inflammatory comments snipped. Please try and keep the discussion civil. -
michael sweet at 02:41 AM on 29 June 2012Mercury rising: Greater L.A. to heat up an average 4 to 5 degrees by mid-century
Pierre; I re-read the abstract of the paper that I linked above. You seem to have misinterpreted their conclusion. Your quote above is incomplete and gives an incorrect summary of the abstract. It should read: "Contrary to generally accepted wisdom, no statistically significant impact of urbanization could be found in annual temperatures. It is postulated that this is due to micro- and local-scale impacts dominating over the mesoscale urban heat island. Industrial sections of towns may well be significantly warmer than rural sites, but urban meteorological observations are more likely to be made within park cool islands than industrial regions." My emphasis. I have provided data that shows UHI is not important to the OP. Please provide data to support your claim that UHI is important. As I said above "In general, UHI is a non effect that deniers cite to confuse people. AGW fake skeptics often raise tone questions of this type to suggest data issues that do not exist. What is your point?" -
michael sweet at 02:31 AM on 29 June 2012Mercury rising: Greater L.A. to heat up an average 4 to 5 degrees by mid-century
Pierre: Please provide a reference that shows the models are finely enough gridded to discern between industrial and residential areas. It seems to me that if I misinterpreted Daisym's question it is up to her to clarify the misunderstanding. You might be the one misinterpreting her question. While UHI is a real effect, it is very small. Numerous studies, including BEST, showed that it makes no difference to temperature trends whether you correct for UHI or not. Since the authors and reviewers of the paper are professionals it should be presumed that they considered any important effects unless data is provided to show that they did not. No data has been provided to show anything important was left out. Asking a question does not show that the authors made a mistake. If you think it is a good question, read the paper and see what they say. -
chuckbot at 01:59 AM on 29 June 2012Madness over sea level rise in North Carolina
sigh. First NC legislated straight marriage as the only acceptable relationship. Now they're legislating straight lines as the only acceptable graph. We're not all loonies here, I promise :/ -
Bob Lacatena at 23:57 PM on 28 June 2012Madness over sea level rise in North Carolina
Steve, You may find this helpful in correcting your misunderstanding. -
Bob Lacatena at 23:54 PM on 28 June 2012Madness over sea level rise in North Carolina
Steve Case, 8, When you say "not according to the satellite record" do you mean "not if you ignore the data that doesn't show what you'd like it to show, while further putting undue weight on short-term trends that are heavily influenced by short-term factors?" -
vrooomie at 23:39 PM on 28 June 2012North Carolina Lawmakers Turning a Blind Eye to Sea Level Reality?
TC@1: I apologize for the all-caps; I simply forgot to revert to another method of emphasis. As for the 'imputations of dishonesty,' I'll let stand the original wording and actions of the legislators in question. -
Steve Case at 23:38 PM on 28 June 2012Madness over sea level rise in North Carolina
"Globally, sea level rise is known to be accelerating..." Not according to the satellite record. -
vrooomie at 23:35 PM on 28 June 2012Madness over sea level rise in North Carolina
Just as an aside: The King Canute story is so ofttimes mistold, it's now risen to a level of mythical urban...myth! Canute was not trying to control the sea: he was trying to show the limits of kingly power. His sitting by the sea (perhaps apocryphal) was to show his minions that a king's powers had limits. Back to our regularly-scheduled science...;) -
Jim Eager at 23:17 PM on 28 June 2012Madness over sea level rise in North Carolina
heijdensejan, no that should be 20th century. The increase to 3.2mm/yr took place in the 1990s. -
Pierre-Normand at 22:36 PM on 28 June 2012Madness over sea level rise in North Carolina
The argument is flawed but makes some kind of sense. If surface water only warmed away from the coasts, then, indeed, the immediate effect would be the same as if that water expanded through freezing. It wouldn't tend to displace water underneath. But the flaw in the reasoning, of course, is that this water wouldn't remain there. Unlike floating ice, some of the raised volume of warmer water would tend to flow towards the coasts. If one delicately poured warm water on top of cold water in in the middle of a container, it wouldn't remain in the middle to form a stable reversed-bowl-shaped liquid surface. -
chriskoz at 21:44 PM on 28 June 2012North Carolina Lawmakers Turning a Blind Eye to Sea Level Reality?
I cannot help but remind these images of Irene in NC. Each mm of SLR increases the probability of destructions on the pictures. Just wait and see the insurance/reinsurance rates. If the legislators keep denying the obvious the crash (when re won't be able to cover it and Obama won't be able to dig in fed coffer) will be even bigger and more spectacular. NC coast infrastructure in a bubble waiting to burst. You don't need to understand climate science to put big money on it if you're a panter.Moderator Response: [Riccardo - link fixed] -
Paul D at 21:26 PM on 28 June 2012Madness over sea level rise in North Carolina
ahhh. Just noticed Rob Paintings reference to Canute in a similar post. Plagarism wasn't intended :-) -
Paul D at 21:23 PM on 28 June 2012Madness over sea level rise in North Carolina
The stories of King Cnut trying to control nature and the sea are probably a myth. He probably wasn't mad. Yet now we have an American state government trying stop the sea by doing a 'big brother' and re-writing history. Yep, in comparison Cnut had all his marbles. -
Glenn Tamblyn at 20:15 PM on 28 June 2012Madness over sea level rise in North Carolina
"Moreover, although thermal expansion does cause satellite-measured mid-ocean sea level to rise, it does not necessarily cause coastal sea level to rise. If deep-ocean water were to expand, it would, indeed, affect coastal sea levels. But when surface water warms, it rises in place, like ice, and its displacement is unaffected, so it does not affect coastal sea levels." WTF! I want some of their Kool-Aid! -
heijdensejan at 18:41 PM on 28 June 2012Madness over sea level rise in North Carolina
29th century? -
scaddenp at 14:19 PM on 28 June 2012Hansen and Sato Estimate Climate Sensitivity from Earth's History
Just one other note - a global average temperature isnt really that complex a thing. For any planet rotating fast enough to equilibrate temperatures, then surface temp is function of incoming solar radiation, planetary albedo, geothermal heatflux (insignificant on earth) and atmospheric composition (GHG). eg a calculator or here for some of the equations. The tricky bit is predicting how atmosphere composition and albedo will change if alter something. -
scaddenp at 13:52 PM on 28 June 2012Hansen and Sato Estimate Climate Sensitivity from Earth's History
curiousd - my understanding of the calculated temperature in Fig 3, is that depends on only 3 inputs - CH4, CO2 and sealevel. However, they are are not directly "fitted" to a curve. N2O is also important but not preserved, but because it strongly correlated with CO2 and CH4, its contribution is added in as a 1.12 multiplier on the forcing strength of CO2 + CH4. This no. being consistent with radiative codes. Albedo is sum of a great many changes - ice shelves, ice sheets, changing land/ocean ratios, changing vegetation, but the earlier work (2007 from CLIMAP 1981) showed that it could estimated by sealevel alone as a "good enough" approximation. Clouds are problematic but clouds have both positive and negative effects and net forcing for current time is thought to be close to zero. There is no proxy for clouds but this data is at least consistent with assumption that net contribution has been very small compared to GHG and albedo. Note the cause of the ice-age cycle is solar variation but solar forcing isnt included. The global solar forcing is very small but the regional distribution means that it is expressed an albedo forcing. Note also, that the climate sensitivity that produces the good fit is dependent on 4.5C temp difference between LGM and Holocene. Use a different temp diff and you get a different sensitivity as discussed in detail in the paper. -
Pierre-Normand at 12:37 PM on 28 June 2012Mercury rising: Greater L.A. to heat up an average 4 to 5 degrees by mid-century
Michael, I only pointed out that your reference 'denies that...' in the sense of 'affirming the falsity of...' in its conclusion. That was an innocent use of the word "denies". The paper concludes that the UHI doesn't introduces significant bias in temperatures reconstructions. But that conclusion doesn't speak at all to Daisym's question. Daisym only seemed to be inquiring if the UHI effect (that your reference acknowledges to be real and significant albeit not a source of measurement bias) is accounted for in the models predictions. This is a good question, it seems to me, since the models are so finely gridded so as to geographically discriminate some industrial from residential or rural areas. -
curiousd at 11:20 AM on 28 June 2012Hansen and Sato Estimate Climate Sensitivity from Earth's History
To someone who needs to explain/impress both smart but non technical students, and to physics phds who are nearly ignorant of climate change, that figure 3 above could be a "game changer". The agreement between experiment and theory is rather like one sees in many areas of condensed matter physics. For instance it is like one obtains in fitting extended x-ray fine structure (EXAFS)data to a structural model. But one needs to know the number of adjustable parameters. When I first read the article, I thought that since they were able to figure out the albedos, CO2 concentrations, and temperatures that that figure represents only one adjustable parameter, the short term (transient) CO2 climate sensitivity. Now I am not so sure because of the mention of the N2O and CH4. In EXAFS theory a big deal is made about the number of independent data points and the number of adjustable parameters. If it is only one (or two ) (or three) parameters that are being fitted here the result is spectacular. (Nobel Prize Hanson?) Any help on what you think the number of adjustable parameters is? BTW...he gets rid of the "clouds" uncertainty by this empiricle method, right? Another "Lindzen ism" dealt with? -
Chemware at 10:32 AM on 28 June 2012North Carolina Lawmakers Turning a Blind Eye to Sea Level Reality?
@ newcrusader To quote Bohr's retort to Einstein ... Stop telling God what to do. -
Chris G at 08:47 AM on 28 June 2012North Carolina Lawmakers Turning a Blind Eye to Sea Level Reality?
John (#3), It would be nice if they read it and acknowledged the reality of what scientific studies indicate, but it is not as though there were not plenty of other evidence that they have chosen to pretend doesn't exist. I don't think a little more would make any difference to them. -
newcrusader at 08:21 AM on 28 June 2012North Carolina Lawmakers Turning a Blind Eye to Sea Level Reality?
The legislature in NC denies global warming because God will not permit it. -
John Hartz at 05:53 AM on 28 June 2012North Carolina Lawmakers Turning a Blind Eye to Sea Level Reality?
Every member of the North Carolina State Legislature should be required to read: Hot spot of accelerated sea-level rise on the Atlantic coast of North America This peer-reviewed paper by Asbury H. Sallenger Jr, Kara S. Doran & Peter A. Howd published online June 24 by the journal Nature Climate Change. -
shoyemore at 04:09 AM on 28 June 2012North Carolina Lawmakers Turning a Blind Eye to Sea Level Reality?
The legislators of North Carolina should remember that the original King Canute (or Knut) lived during the Medieval Warm Period, no doubt enjoying wine from the many English vineyards which flourished back then. But even he had to show humility in the face of sea level rise, which respects neither King nor commoner. -
vrooomie at 02:32 AM on 28 June 2012North Carolina Lawmakers Turning a Blind Eye to Sea Level Reality?
I remember thinking, while first reading about this mind-numbingly stupid story, that I thought (imputation of dishonesty snipped) I take some solace in that, eventually, the sheer stupidity of this will become apparent to all but the dimmest of lights, and that science, once again, shall become valued and heeded. That they NC lege "torpedoed" the amendment may be a sign of rational thought triumping over those who would deny science, at any and all costs. With the help of all here, and all who endeavor to hold out against the forces of dark, and by"common' scientists like me speaking to those we can, we might just win the day. *Maybe*. "No matter how cynical you get, it's impossible to keep up." -Lily Tomlin, "The Search for Signs Of Intelligent Life In The Universe."Moderator Response: TC: Please refrain from suggestions of dishonesty and all caps, both of which violate the comments policy. -
shoyemore at 02:18 AM on 28 June 2012Adding wind power saves CO2
Paul D :)) -
dana1981 at 01:59 AM on 28 June 2012Simply Wrong: Jan-Erik Solheim on Hansen 1988
angusmac @66:Dana, you seem to be focused on "Hansen would have been right"
No, you're still not understanding. It's not about whether or not Hansen was right (no model is ever "right"), it's about what we can learn from comparing his projections to real world observations.Your 2.7°C sensitivity Scenario D is running ≈ 12% above LOTI (1984-2012), which has a sensitivity ≈ 2.4°C.
LOTI is the land-ocean temperature index (observational data, not a model) so I have no idea where you get this 2.4°C sensitivity figure from.Furthermore, Hansen's temperature projections were used by policy makers
What does that even mean? First of all, the USA has not implemented any climate policy. Second, if they had implemented policy, it would not be dependent on the precise sensitivity of Hansen's 1988 model.Additionally, the errors in Hansen's scenarios are higher than the 40% stated by you.
First we're not talking about errors, we're talking about the amount by which the model sensitivity was too high. And my figure is correct. You're probably using the wrong baseline in addition to not accounting for the Scenario B forcing being 16% too high. -
dana1981 at 01:51 AM on 28 June 2012Gleckler et al Confirm the Human Fingerprint in Global Ocean Warming
Thanks Albatross. I think this is a very useful paper in responding to the misconception of a large model-data OHC discrepancy that we've previously discussed. As the authors note, most other studies have only used one or two models, whereas their study uses several from the CMIP3 ensemble for a much more thorough survey. The difference between the models incorporating volcanic effects and those excluding them is also very interesting and useful to know. And Domingues' feedback was very helpful. There's another post in the pipeline for which I got feedback from Trenberth and Dessler. It's nice that these prominent climate scientists are willing to take the time to help us make sure we get the science right in our blog posts. -
Albatross at 01:12 AM on 28 June 2012Gleckler et al Confirm the Human Fingerprint in Global Ocean Warming
Excellent summary Dana. It was very kind of Dr. Domingues to provide SkS with valuable feedback, especially given how busy scientists are preparing papers for the deadline for the fifth IPCC assessment report. This is a devastating paper for the fake skeptics and those who deny the theory of AGW. [So expect push back and obfuscation from the usual suspects] For example, "Gleckler et al. on the other hand examine several different CMIP3 models, and do not identify a notable model-data discrepancy" So much for the much touted claim on blogs by fake skeptics that the models grossly overestimate the warming in the climate system Also, Domingues et al. show that "...when we continue to consider longer and longer trends, the human-induced signal becomes more and more evident (stronger relative to the noise)." This is of course the very reason why fake skeptics and those who enable advocates of delaying taking meaningful action to reduce GHG emissions (e.g., Dr. Pielke Snr.) insist on focussing on unrealistically short periods when examining the climate system, even when strongly advised to the contrary. The paper also indicates why the same fake skeptics can continually cherry-pick their start and end points to try and disappear the warming and accumulation of heat in the climate system. All this compelling evidence right before people's eyes, yet some continue to deny the reality and deny the science at everyone's peril. -
angusmac at 00:13 AM on 28 June 2012Simply Wrong: Jan-Erik Solheim on Hansen 1988
Dana@53, I read all of your post, including the final section, and I comment as follows. "What this tells us is that real-world climate sensitivity is right around 3°C." Dana, you seem to be focused on "Hansen would have been right" - if only he had used 3°C. Nevertheless, this sensitivity value appears to be a little high. Your 2.7°C sensitivity Scenario D is running ≈ 12% above LOTI (1984-2012), which has a sensitivity ≈ 2.4°C. Furthermore, Hansen's temperature projections were used by policy makers. He gave them temperature estimates that were significantly too high. Consequently, he was wrong. Additionally, the errors in Hansen's scenarios are higher than the 40% stated by you. When compared with LOTI (0.52°C in May 2012), the errors are as follows: Scenario A 1.18°C (126%) Scenario B 1.07°C (105%) Scenario D 0.67°C (28%) -
michael sweet at 22:57 PM on 27 June 2012Mercury rising: Greater L.A. to heat up an average 4 to 5 degrees by mid-century
Pierre: It appears to me that Daisym is challenging the OP, claiming that UHI has not been properly taken into effect. Perhaps I am incorrect, Daisym could tell me if that is the case. The link I provided was the first of many that show UHI has a small effect on these types of measurement. My reference "denies" nothing. They provide data that show the UHI effect is small. I could have cited Watts paper where they show "improperly" located weather stations have no effect on temperature trends. In general, UHI is a non effect that deniers cite to confuse people. AGW fake skeptics often raise tone questions of this type to suggest data issues that do not exist. What is your point? -
Paul D at 21:05 PM on 27 June 2012Adding wind power saves CO2
Cheers Shoyemore nice gentle ski slope there! -
Dikran Marsupial at 20:26 PM on 27 June 2012Simply Wrong: Jan-Erik Solheim on Hansen 1988
angusmac on what basis would you arrive at plus minus 20% or 30% range? Is this subjective, or is there a scientific methodology that you have used to arive at these figures? -
Pierre-Normand at 19:48 PM on 27 June 2012Mercury rising: Greater L.A. to heat up an average 4 to 5 degrees by mid-century
Michael, you seem to have misread both Daisym's comment and your own reference. Daisym didn't suggest that the UHI has the effect to bias temperature anomaly reconstructions. And your reference only denies that the UHI causes any significant such bias. That's in part because "urban meteorological observations are more likely to be made within park cool islands than industrial regions" -
angusmac at 19:26 PM on 27 June 2012Simply Wrong: Jan-Erik Solheim on Hansen 1988
Dikran Marsupial@49 When modelling semi-random systems, I would expect results in the ± 20% range to be good. However, for results that were significantly larger than the ± 30% range, I would suspect that there was something wrong with my physics. -
Fred Staples at 18:38 PM on 27 June 2012Simply Wrong: Jan-Erik Solheim on Hansen 1988
(-SNIP-)Moderator Response:[DB] Long, specious "What if...?" strawman rhetorical argument snipped.
You have been counseled against this line of posting, which constitutes sloganeering, previously. Continuance in this line of comment construction will necessitate a revocation of posting privileges. You will receive no further warnings in this matter.
-
shoyemore at 17:31 PM on 27 June 2012Adding wind power saves CO2
You can get real time wind power data and CO2 emissions (calculated by a formula) from the Eirgrid website. Anyone who is in the business of refuting Udo & Co may find it useful. Eirgrid data The following shows CO2 emissions on the y-axis, and fraction of demand taken up by wind generation on the x-axis. I had to split the data because Excel gets huffy with more than 32,000 data points. Further calculations showed ~0.45tCO2/MWh, which I think is in line with industry expectations. -
scaddenp at 14:05 PM on 27 June 2012Hansen and Sato Estimate Climate Sensitivity from Earth's History
By the way, the albedo estimates and modelling used go back to Hansen et al 2007, which for input relies heavily on the accumulated data from multiple sources in CLIMAP 1981. -
scaddenp at 13:46 PM on 27 June 2012Hansen and Sato Estimate Climate Sensitivity from Earth's History
Past sealevel is important for determine land/sea boundaries in albedo estimates. In a glacial period, the ice-sheets on Eurasia and North America are major contributors to albedo. Antarctica and Greenland were frozen then as now so dont contribute much to change in albedo. Ice extent is from geomorphology etc. Sea ice extent is inferred from plankton in sediment core. Some species only occur in open water, others under ice. This leads to chemical biomarkers too. I dont have the papers but putting "sea ice biomarker" into scholar.google.com will give quite a few papers. There are a number of techniques used to infer paleo sealevel. Try here for coral reef work. Have you had a look at Chpter 6 of the AR4 IPCC? This links to many papers on this topic. -
curiousd at 13:17 PM on 27 June 2012Hansen and Sato Estimate Climate Sensitivity from Earth's History
Questions on great Hanson and Sato paper: 1. They estimate Albedo from sea level since the sea level is determined by the major ice sheets. Clever!! Sea level is unaffected by floating ice packs, of course, such as ice now floating in the Arctic (but not for long, unfortunately). So does this mean that the contribution of the Arctic sea ice pack to the albedo is negligible compared to Greenland and Antarctica? 2. How does one determine sea levels going back 800,000 years? -
scaddenp at 10:18 AM on 27 June 2012Glimmer of hope? A conservative tackles climate change.
Patrick, I believe what is meant by revenue neutral is that tax is collected on carbon emission and all of it distribute back on per capita basis. That way is it is not adding to government or redistributing wealth to the unworthy - concerns for the right wing. -
Patrick 027 at 09:37 AM on 27 June 2012Glimmer of hope? A conservative tackles climate change.
'inequities' probably a better word choice for last word of 2nd-to-last paragraph of my first of 2 prior comments; sorry for being nit-picky. -
Patrick 027 at 09:35 AM on 27 June 2012Glimmer of hope? A conservative tackles climate change.
... on national boundaries - the tax itself could come along with some tariff (somehow proportional to emissions (if all countries did this, then I think it would only be the emissions only in what was done to a product/service in the last country, not the entire upstream chain)/export subsidy (not proportional to emissions on a per product/service basis - why reward our own polluters just because another country would?) proportional to the tax and to differences among national policies. -
Patrick 027 at 09:29 AM on 27 June 2012Glimmer of hope? A conservative tackles climate change.
I'm curious about the logic of 'revenue neutral' here. Setting aside general justifications for government R&D for new technology, and some other things, following the concepts of an efficient market and externalities, the tax rate is justified by the public cost, so it would make sense to spend the revenue on those costs. Of course, the way in which the costs are realized is somewhat up to us even given a particular forcing scenario - relocation verses adapation in place, paying for injuries as the happen verses proactive actions. We could concievably spend the money now on adaptive water supply infrastructure - or those bits which we can design now given our climate knowledge (some additions might concievably have to wait until we know more details about where and when the rains will go, etc.). There could also be agricultural R&D. And some costs will be incurred by the government itself, of course. One caveat is that you would generally want to avoid spending money to subsidize innefficient adaptation means. One might want to pay compensation once for a reduction in property value suffered or for upgrades (but maybe only up to a point, since people (setting aside more caveats) already have had opportunity to retreat from coasts and drying and heating-up regions, for example), but wouldn't want to mask the price signals when insurance costs rise at some location, as that may encourage people to relocate to a less risky place. Maybe some mix between tax and dividend (equal per capita) and tax and cut other taxes could be seen as an economic investment, so that there will be more wealth in the future that can be taxed when public spending on the costs of climate change will be necessary, and also as a general compensation to people now for what they or their heirs may deal with later or for there proactive measures taken now, but there will be inequalities. And compensation, in some form, will eventually have to cross national boundaries... -
Tom Smerling at 23:51 PM on 26 June 2012Glimmer of hope? A conservative tackles climate change.
More conservative advocates of a revenue-neutral carbon tax: A short list of quotes from other conservative supporters of a revenue-neutral carbon tax can be found at CarbonTax.org. The Frum Forum hosts a Kenneth Silber post titled, "How the GOP Should Explain Climate Change," with a sample speech for a Republican candidate that includes a ringing call for a carbon tax: "My plan is straightforward and honest. We will raise taxes on carbon emissions across the board, while cutting taxes on payrolls and incomes. That means more money in people’s pockets, and more incentives for industry to develop cleaner and safer energy supplies." [links to the above can be found at the bottom of the original post at ClimateBites.) -
Cornelius Breadbasket at 23:38 PM on 26 June 2012Review of new iBook: Going to Extremes
99p here in the UK. And it is a brilliant piece of work and extremely good value! It is, however, rather depressing, particularly in the light of the failure of Rio. -
michael sweet at 22:52 PM on 26 June 2012Mercury rising: Greater L.A. to heat up an average 4 to 5 degrees by mid-century
Daisym This peer reviewed paper shows little effect from UHI on urban temperatures in the USA. Fake skeptics claim UHI causes everything. Can you provide a peer reviewed study that suggests UHI affects the result of the opening post or are you just hand waving? Hand waving arguments can be dismissed with a hand wave. In any case, UHI changes are well known to have little effect on decade level temperature changes.
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