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JARWillis at 20:38 PM on 27 February 2021Teaming up with Facebook to fight misinformation
Useful. Nothing gets you reading better than 'you're going to be surprised by this'. Link shared with our climate action network.
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Doug Bostrom at 16:12 PM on 26 February 2021Teaming up with Facebook to fight misinformation
"Drink responsibly!"
— Joe Camel
[Maybe I have that a little bit mixed up. :-) ]
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iskepticaluser at 08:13 AM on 24 February 2021Hurricanes, wildfires, and heat dominated U.S. weather in 2020
Jamesh ~
The ocean heat content (OHC) measure of heat build-up is particularly relevant (since over 90% of excess heat trapped by our thickened greenhouse blanket is stored in the oceans), and millions of readings from ARGO ocean-profiling floats plus advances in statistical analysis of those and other observations are giving us a clearer picture its evolution (though there are still discrepancies between estimates of different analyses, quite common in a relatively-new observational science). A recent paper by Cheng et al. ("Upper Ocean Temperatures Hit Record High in 2020") exposes full-depth OHC since 1960 of 380 ± 81 ZJ (that's Zettajoules = 10^21 or a billion trillion joules; a 100W light-bulb consumes 100 joules of energy per second).
Most worrying, the RATE of increase in OHC since 1986 equals almost eight times that of 1958-1985, at 9.1 ZJ per year, or roughly 10 ZJ for the entire Earth system (OHC plus heat to warm the land and atmosphere and melt ice world-wide).
This excess energy STAYS IN THE SYSTEM, cycling between ocean and atmosphere to drive everything from deeper droughts and deluges to incresingly-severe fire seasons to changing ocean and atmospheric circulation patterns, novel disease distributions, rising sea levels and attendant economic, social and, increasingly, political turmoil.
As to the SCALE of the problem, consider this. Average 1986-2019 global energy consumption - backed by everything from hydro to wind to nuclear, oil, coal and cow dung - is 0.48 ZJ per year. That means that minute by minute, hour by hour and year by year, since 1986 the planet has trapped an amount of excess heat equal to TWENTY-ONE TIMES the energy consumed by the global economy.
Given the early climate-change impacts we are already suffering, WE HAVE TO REVERSE COURSE. If atmospheric GHG (and cooling aerosol) concentrations were somehow stabilized at current levels, the planet would continue heating up (though at declining rates) until atmospheric temperatures were high enough to re-establish incoming/outgoing radiative balance at the edge of space.
But if we want to forestall worsening impacts, let alone eventually bring global temperature levels back down to those for which human civilization and biological diversity are designed, we have to somehow DRAW DOWN those GHG levels from the current 415 to around 350 ppm CO2.
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nigelj at 07:14 AM on 24 February 2021Hurricanes, wildfires, and heat dominated U.S. weather in 2020
jamesh @1
The approx 1.5 deg c warming since the industrial revolution probably isn't enough to take buildings out of their design limits and so produce obvious observable strain and certanly not failure. I used to work in the building industry. This is because buildings are designed for certain maximum temperatures plus a tolerance or margin of safety over that. However something like 3 degrees global warming will probably take buildings beyond their current design limits and produce observable / measurable problems.
Regarding asphalt in roads there is already signs of problems due to global warming as here.
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scaddenp at 06:10 AM on 24 February 2021Hurricanes, wildfires, and heat dominated U.S. weather in 2020
Jamesh, it is very unclear to me why you are posting here.
Let's get one thing very clear. If you wish to convince readers that the science is wrong, then you cannot do so by displays of ignorance. You certainly cannot disprove science by insisting it make predictions that it manifestly does not.
A "build up of heat in the environment" manifests itself as a temperature increase. A temperature increase of the observed size will definitely have effects such as we are seeing, but not more.
Here is how the game is played. If you want to dispute the science, then you point to what the science consensus says. The IPCC reports are the best way to do this, or quote from peer-reviewed research. (If you have learnt your climate science from denier sites, then chances are everything you think you know is wrong or distorted. ) Then you point to observations or papers which you think clearly show that the stated science is wrong. Beware of cherry-picked observations from denier sites. Deniers largely rely on strawmen statements about science and cherry-picking as the main rhetorical devices.
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jamesh at 01:59 AM on 24 February 2021Hurricanes, wildfires, and heat dominated U.S. weather in 2020
Mr. Henson's post on climate connections does not connect observed temperatures increases to any build up heat in the environment. If there were such a buildup we would expect to observe bridge failures, pavement failures and other structures such as hi-rise bldgs.
Moderator Response:[DB] And yet heat continues to build up in the environment, both in the atmosphere:
And in the ocean:
Presumptuous red herrings snipped.
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One Planet Only Forever at 16:07 PM on 23 February 20212021 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming Digest #8
swampfoxh,
In spite of Rob Honeycutt's response, the Reich Opinion piece you refer to (and that I read all the way through then sarcastically - but not effectively - questioned the basis for your comment) is a reasonably robust explanation of the observable history on the matter. Not being a "peer reviewed presentation of repeatable controlled experiments" does not mean it is not a robustly reasoned and defensible presentation of what has been observed to have happened.
I repeat that I see no parts of the Opinion piece being what you claim (no part is a misrepresentation). In addition, there are other evidence-based reports being presented in many other news sources that substantiate the basis and evaluation presented in the Opinion piece. And the observations of what happened in Texas are consistent with what has been observed to happen in many other places in recent history. Also, there are many books that cover the general topic with detailed observations as their basis that support the Opinion presented (it is not just this power problem in Texas).
And the problem of pursuers of wealth not considering or caring about the harm that could be caused by their maximization of personal benefit (or maximization of profit) is a major part of the climate change problem, a major reason less correction of behaviour to reduce the harm being done has occurred.
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Rob Honeycutt at 06:55 AM on 23 February 20212021 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming Digest #8
I would note to swampfoxh that the Reich article is presented as an opinion piece in the Guardian. It's not scientific research subject to peer review nor would any reasonable person confuse it for such.
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One Planet Only Forever at 06:32 AM on 23 February 20212021 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming Digest #8
Dear swampfoxh,
I read the entire article you refer to and I am confused about what article you meant to refer to.
I see little basis in the article for what you claim regarding the article.
Maybe you are just making stuff up?
Moderator Response:[JH] Swampfoxh is reacting to the "Editorial of the Week" posted on the second page of this Weekly Digest.
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Hans Petter Jacobsen at 06:10 AM on 23 February 2021Solar Cycle Length proves its the sun
Jan-Erik Solheim, Kjell Stordahl and Ole Humlum (SSH) published their papers 'Solar Activity and Svalbard Temperatures' and 'The long sunspot cycle 23 predicts a significant temperature decrease in cycle 24' early in 2012. According to SSH, their Solar Cycle Model can, based on the length of a solar cycle, predict the mean temperature in the next solar cycle for some northern regions. Later the same year I programmed their Solar Cycle Model. I got the same results as they did with their implementation of the model. When the model was run with temperature series for the northern region up to and including solar cycle 23, the results satisfied the statistical test used by SSH. A closer examination with hindcasting (backtesting) revealed that the model predicted the temperatures well until the mid-1970s, but not thereafter. I wrote about this in December 2012 here at Skeptical Science in the blog post 'Solar Cycle Model fails to predict the recent warming'.
In their papers, SSH made some specific predictions for temperatures in solar cycle 24, which had just started in 2012. In 2014 I discussed the Solar Cycle Model with the lead author Solheim on a Norwegian discussion forum. He stressed that we have to wait till solar cycle 24 has ended before we can evaluate the model's predictions for that cycle. Now it has ended. The temperatures in solar cycle 24 were higher than in the previous cycle, not colder as predicted by SSH. See more details in comment 22 in the blog post I wrote here at SkS.
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swampfoxh at 01:54 AM on 23 February 20212021 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming Digest #8
The above article by Robert Reich is awfully political. Since when did SkepSci post stuff that goes after the Rich? Is it scientific to defecate on the oil company owners while lamenting the plight of "ordinary" Texans? Is Reich's rant subject to any peer review? I'm pretty sure most of those Texans, in trouble, are climate deniers and are just "getting what's coming to them" for their ignorance of the problems in the climate. Texas is a heavy Red State, they could use some climate education, but less climate politics.
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prove we are smart at 22:25 PM on 22 February 2021Coming attraction: IPCC's upcoming major climate assessment
Firstly, if most people like me would only read the easily understood science of how global warming works-that would be a great help for our planet. Your site here is my goto for anyone interested. Some like me, then really wade in and can give concise retorts to the fake news believers..
And that is still a major hurdle. Here is a depressing story #ClimateChange #GlobalWarming
World leaders fail to curb climate change in 2020 | DW Newshttps://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GGGTUSXeahk
And why they didn't act? , because we elected the wrong leaders. Enough Australians believed the bs and thats history now. You might say we got the govt we deserve but we need a govt the planet deserves. Perhaps those appocalyptic fires will not become just another short term memory loss and I wondered about that after reading this https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-02-05/australia-attitudes-climate-change-action-morrison-government/11878510
So the crux of my thoughts were formed after reading that the latest IPCC assesment for 2021-22 will be released soon. Will our politicians of most persuasions be allowed by their donors to do what we want? Will the media be helpful? Will the lure of an election cycle be enough to procrastinate another 4yrs and see what happens? I wish I could see my fellow citizens being thoughtful and people in power who can navigate a path through the many crises everyone is facing..
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Rob Honeycutt at 07:38 AM on 22 February 2021Veganism is the best way to reduce carbon emissions
Klemet... Suffice to say, I don't think we're far apart in our thinking. My major concern is with more radical, aggressive elements of the vegan community because I believe they have an effect that is inverse to what they ostensibly wish to accomplish.
Given dietary choices, diet will always be a personal decision for the mere fact that people are different. All creatures have impacts on their environment. The elemental state of existence on this planet is that life steals energy from other life for survival. The larger picture is humanity's outsized impacts due to our success as a species, and the detrimental environmental effects that come with FF energy production.
Ultimately, I think we need to better capture the economic costs of the damages in the marketplace through carbon taxation systems. With that, more carbon intense calories are going to cost more and promote positive changes. The cost benefits of reducing meat consumption would come with additional health benefits. Then those personal dietary decisions also become economic and health related decisions. Then no one needs to lecture anyone else on what kind of food they should be consuming.
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Klemet at 04:35 AM on 22 February 2021Veganism is the best way to reduce carbon emissions
@Rob : Thank you for your story, Rob ! That was really interesting and touching to read : ).
I think that I can relate with some of the choices that you mentionned in your story, which can be quite difficult, especially socialy. I'd be curious to know, though, how we can (according to you) say that diet is a personal decision when the interests of others (e.g. the animals, or the environment) are directly impacted by our diet ?As for your view on the supply chain, I don't see why our views are incompatible; I think that changing the emissions linked to the different processes necessary to produce a certain amount of a certain food would change the resulting GHGs emissions associated to this food. However, that doesn't change the fact that those GHGs emissions are related to the production of this food, in the way that they would not be emitted if it were not produced.
In my mind, it's the same as comparing the ecological impacts of a smartphone; how could be it exact to not take into account every part of the process that are needed to create it ? Like mining operations for rare metals, infrastructure for the factories specialized in creating the parts, etc.
@michael sweet : I understand your view, and I do not doubt that for many people today, going vegan is not even an option : it's a fear. However, the idea I wanted to add related to the present article was that even if people dislike the idea of being vegan, it could still represent our #1 individual option to reduce our emissions (it's not, but it could be even if people don't like it).
In that way, we can easily say that many people in western countries dislike the idea of restricting the number of children they have, or to avoid taking the plane to go explore the world; yet, those seems to be two of our best individual choices to reduce our GHGs emissions, if I'm not mistaken.
Concerning the "Savoy method", I think that you might be related to Allan Savory (whose name is similar) ? But if that's so, everything I read on it in the scientific litterature makes it look like pseudosience, with many saying that it's quite dangerous. An account of that is present in the report of the Food Climate Research Network, but a more summarized account is written on Savory's wikipedia page. In addition - and I don't want to make sound like an ad hominem against Savory -, he is also responsible for the culling of more than 40 000 elephants in the 70's, as he advocated that those very elephants were destroying their natural habitat. To give him credit, he says that it's the "biggest blunder of his life" today; but I think this explains why he might have gotten a bit obsessed with his "holistic grazing" approach. So, maybe we don't "need" to become vegan as other things can be done; but it still seems like it is very useful.
Concerning your note about that vegetarian couple and their children, I don't think that it's a very sane approach to talk about individual cases when talking about the effects of a diet; especially a diet about which we have a huge risk of social bias. Meanwhile, studies seem to show that vegan children end up having the same height as non-vegetarian children. But maybe you just wanted to point out the bias, and how it would make things difficult for people to go vegan; and on that, I completly agree !
In the end, I think that I completly agree with you two, @Rob and @michael. Humanity going vegan is something that goes against a very, very strong social inertia. Yet, in the age of internet, an age where slavery is mostly illegal, where women occupy positions of power more than ever before, where we fly in the air and go into space, where our lifestyle is almost completly different from the one of any of our ancestors, who can say what will happen ?
Still, advocating for veganism "or else climate change will never be fixed" is not the right hill to die on to me too. But I think that it's OK, as many vegan activists seem to understand that it's the ethical argument (i.e. why is it okay to eat an animal for reasons other than survival ?) that needs to be focused on, and that the rest is just secondary.
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One Planet Only Forever at 02:21 AM on 22 February 2021Guest post: Why avoiding climate change ‘maladaptation’ is vital
Great presentation of the importance and difficulty of considering the full set of "Sustainable Development Goals", and any new related awareness, in any effort to "assist the development of the less fortunate". Pursuing that fuller understanding is required to ensure that the "Pursuit of Improvement" is sustainable and does not cause "Harm to Others".
In many cases help for the less fortunate requires ending harm done to the less fortunate by the pursuits of, and protection of, superiority by the more fortunate.
The excusing of harm done in pursuit of benefits is a serious problem. It is the reason there has been an abject failure of the richest to "Adapt" to having to live and profit in ways that are "Not Harmful".
It is hard for the more fortunate, who developed immersed in a culture of competition for superiority in games of profit and popularity, to "Figure out what is really going on and figure out how to help others and limit harm done".
In summary, the most important adaptation is for the supposedly more advanced to figure out what changes and corrections have to be made regarding "Their Development" to limit harm done to Others, and how much they owe Others for harm that has already been done by the incorrect harmful over-development of the supposedly more advanced (including owing for the harm done by their predecessors).
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Bob Loblaw at 03:43 AM on 21 February 2021Skeptical Science New Research for Week #7, 2021
Jamesh @ 8:
As you seem to be struggling to find appropriate places to discuss stuff, let me try to help you.
First, The the most recent ice sheet to cover New York State would have been the Laurentide Ice Sheet, which covered pretty much all of Canada and the northern US states. It had several distinct and somewhat independent areas of motion, though. "Polar" is probably not a good descriptor for it.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Laurentide_Ice_Sheet
If you want to argue that it represents evidence that climate has changed before and therefore humans can't be the cause now, then the reasons why that argument are wrong is #1 on the Most Used Climate Myths page "Climate's changed before":
https://skepticalscience.com/climate-change-little-ice-age-medieval-warm-period.htm
If you want to use it to argue that climate scientists were predicting a return to ice age conditions in the 1970s, then the reasons why that argument are wrong is #11 on the Most Used Climate Myths page "Ice Age predicted in the 1970s":
https://skepticalscience.com/ice-age-predictions-in-1970s.htm
If you want to use it to argue that we are now heading into another glacial period, then the reasons why that argument are wrong is #14 on the Most Used Climate Myths page "We're heading into another ice age":
https://skepticalscience.com/heading-into-new-little-ice-age.htm
If you want to use it to argue that the current warming is just a continued pattern from a previous cold period, then the reasons why that argument are wrong is #48 on the Most Used Climate Myths page "We're coming out of the Little Ice Age":
https://skepticalscience.com/coming-out-of-little-ice-age.htm
If you want to use it to argue that climate follows natural cycles and the current warming is no different, then the reasons why that argument are wrong is #56 on the Most Used Climate Myths page "It's a Natural Cycle":
https://skepticalscience.com/global-warming-natural-cycle.htm
If you want to use it to argue that you know of some special factor affecting climate that climate science has ignored, and you are the only one that knows this, then you might want to go to Climate Myth #130 "Climate Skeptics are like Galileo":
https://skepticalscience.com/climate-skeptics-are-like-galileo.htm
If you want to use it to argue that humans can survive large shift in climate, then Climate Myth #197 "Humans survived past climate changes" is your destination:
https://skepticalscience.com/humans-survived-past-climate-changes.htm
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Bob Loblaw at 03:07 AM on 21 February 2021Solar Cycle Model fails to predict the recent warming
Yes, Hans. Thanks very much for that update.
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Philippe Chantreau at 00:31 AM on 21 February 2021Solar Cycle Model fails to predict the recent warming
Thank you HPJ for this update. It is interesting that cycle 24 was one of the weakest in recent history yet we saw global temperatures in 2020 tied with the all time record set in the large El-Nino year of 2016.
I think people in Norway ought to challenge Solheim and Humlum to a bet like the Real Climate folks discussed recently.
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Hans Petter Jacobsen at 23:53 PM on 20 February 2021Solar Cycle Model fails to predict the recent warming
When I wrote this blog post in December 2012, the temperatures measured so far in solar cycle 24 were much higher than SSH (Jan-Erik Solheim, Kjell Stordahl and Ole Humlum) predicted with their solar cycle model in [1] and [2]. In 2014, I wrote about the failure of their model on a Norwegian discussion forum. Solheim, the lead author of the two articles, participated in the discussion afterwards. He defended his model. He stressed that we have to wait till solar cycle 24 has ended before we can evaluate the model's predictions for that cycle. It ended in November 2019, so now we have the answer. The average temperatures in solar cycle 24 became much higher than SSH predicted with their model.
In [1], SSH predicted that the average temperature on Svalbard in solar cycle 24 would be between 1.5 and 5.5°C colder than it was in solar cycle 23. According to the Norwegian Meteorological Institute, the average temperature at Svalbard Airport Longyearbyen increased by 1.7°C from solar cycle 23 to 24. According to Berkeley Earth, it increased by 1.0°C at a location inland, not far from Longyearbyen.
In [2], SSH predicted that the average temperature in a northern region including Iceland and Norway would drop by at least 1°C from solar cycle 23 to 24. According to Berkeley Earth it rose by 0.3°C on Iceland and by 0.7°C in Norway including Svalbard.
Figure 1 in the blog post shows how the HadCRUT3 temperatures in the Northern Hemisphere fit with the predictions of the solar cycle model. Then solar cycle 24 had just started, and the blue star for solar cycle 24 showed the temperatures measured so far in that cycle. Now the blue star can be replaced with a blue circle showing the average temperature in solar cycle 24. That is done in the Updated Figure 1.
Updated Figure 1: The observed and the predicted mean temperatures in solar cycles up to and including cycle 24.
The original Figure 1 used the HadCRUT3 temperatures in the Northern Hemisphere, just as SSH did in [2]. Met Office has replaced the HadCRUT3 temperatures with the HadCRUT4 temperatures. The Updated Figure 1 therefore uses the the HadCRUT4 temperatures in the Northern Hemisphere.
The Updated Figure 1 shows the same for the northern hemisphere as the examples do for Svalbard, Iceland and Norway. The temperatures in Solar Cycle 24 became much higher than they were in the previous cycle. Not colder as predicted by SSH.
See the blog post Solar Cycle Model failed totally when predicting colder temperatures for more information and more plots.
The lead author Jan-Erik Solheim and his two co-authors are members of the Scientific Advisory Board in an organization run by climate deniers in Norway. Some months ago Solheim wrote on their web site (in Norwegian) that solar cycle 25 has started. He did not mention his failed predictions for solar cycle 24. On the contrary, he wrote about the connection between solar activity and the climate, about the little ice age caused by low solar activity, and that it will be exciting to see if low solar activity in this century will cause a colder climate. He has obviously not learned from his failed predictions for solar cycle 24.
References
1. Solar Activity and Svalbard Temperatures
Jan-Erik Solheim, Kjell Stordahl and Ole Humlum.2. The long sunspot cycle 23 predicts a significant temperature decrease in cycle 24
Jan-Erik Solheim, Kjell Stordahl and Ole Humlum. -
Rob Honeycutt at 09:46 AM on 20 February 2021Skeptical Science New Research for Week #7, 2021
James @8... Would you like someone to suggest a thread where you can take up a discussion on the last glacial maximum? I tried to suggest a thread for a previous topic you wanted to discuss and you didn't begin a discussion.
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Doug Bostrom at 07:19 AM on 20 February 2021Skeptical Science New Research for Week #7, 2021
Jamesh, ignoring the actual potential technical discussion on hand and rather swerving into rhetorical artifice and acting a role was a choice you made. You're making your own rules and writing your own script; don't pretend to be surprised when others follow your rules and critique your drama.
You are duly being accorded the respect you've earned.
It may help to remember that some of us have been reading and abiding the same stale rhetorical stylings for over a decade. What seems original to you is in fact extremely tiresome, boring. Patience has limits.
Noted: while dancing about with words, you've not yet managed to plant your feet on topic. A "discussion" was never started. If/when you choose to honestly discuss something germane to a topic included in this week's NR, you might actually be able to process a conversation to a conclusion here.
For my part I find myself wasting too much time on you and time is valuable. I'm getting nothing in the way of novelty or entertainment from spending time replying to your effort, which is substandard compared to the "state of the art" in science denial. That waste of minutes is now concluded. So on that point we're in full agreement even when we've arrived at the same juncture from poles apart.
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jamesh at 06:55 AM on 20 February 2021Skeptical Science New Research for Week #7, 2021
Doug; You have me at a disadcantage. I was informed by the site manager that I had to show respect to other contributors; I am determined to abide by that rule; Also, I was told to keep my comments non political, and I intend to abdide by that rule. That leaves scientific facts, which I am prepared to discuss with interested parties. If you have no interest in a strictly technical discussion then I respect that. In which case I have nothing further to say to you; end of discussion.
ptical Science asks that you review the comments policy. Thank you.
Moderator Response:[JH] You are not a Moderator on this site.
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Doug Bostrom at 03:55 AM on 20 February 2021Skeptical Science New Research for Week #7, 2021
"I did read the the complete posting on geoengineering and did not perceve that strataspheric aerosol injection had anything to do with engineering. Engineering always deals with known scientific principals."
Thank you for echoing and reinforcing the point made in our bloviation section of NR, even as you're humiliating yourself by adopting a conspicuously awkward and visibly uncomfortable rhetorical posture.
James Watt was an engineer who produced engineering artifacts in the absence of full knowledge of the materials and their behavior available to him. At best his work was "semi-empirical" but nonetheless, he was an engineer. He would have been happier and more productive if he'd been able to engineer with a full deck of information, of course.
To geoengineer to our best modern ability as opposed to 18th century practice Watt was forced to adopt requires material property and behavior information. Foreclosing research on these matters will make optimal geoengineering employing reliable numeric models impossible.
Smith & Henly are encouraging us not to pretend to be in the predicament of James Watt, when it comes to geoengineering. Their topic is entirely about geoengineering.
But you already knew this, Jamesh. You're pretending to be ignorant. It's not a good look and more in the practical sense it has a very detrimental effect on your credibility and capacity to influence other peoples' thinking, that being your obvious objective here. You should try to do better.
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Daniel Bailey at 03:39 AM on 20 February 2021Skeptical Science New Research for Week #7, 2021
Basically, jamesh's point he wishes to contest (the existence of land-based ice sheets that have since disappeared, like the Laurentide Ice Sheet) is a variant of the skeptic argument, "The Climate Has Changed Before" (so therefore this iteration of climate change is normal).
He needs to take his argument to that link, where I'm sure it will be prompted and thoroughly refuted.
After all, that the climate changed naturally before the impacts of humans became the dominant forcing of climate is uncontentious.
That the impacts of human activities are now the dominant forcing of climate is equally uncontentious, from a scientific basis.
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jamesh at 01:08 AM on 20 February 2021Skeptical Science New Research for Week #7, 2021
Rob @ Bob Thank you for your comments re ice sheets..Actually the ice sheet that I wanted to talk about is the one that covered New York State, which at max was about 9000ft thick. I joined the Hudson-Mohawk Society of Professional Geologists in 2017 and learned a lot about ice sheets. I think they are all alike, but if you all are interested, I will share what I have learned.
Moderator Response:[TD] Share that only in the thread of a relevant post, not here. If there are no relevant posts then you are looking at the wrong site.
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Bob Loblaw at 00:27 AM on 20 February 2021Skeptical Science New Research for Week #7, 2021
James: also note that two of the three that Rob mentions are ice on land, while the third is floating sea ice.
...and there is also floating sea ice around Antarctica. Item 10 on the Most Used Climate Myths ("Antarctica is gaining ice") starts off by talking about the differences between sea ice and land ice.
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Rob Honeycutt at 12:12 PM on 19 February 2021Skeptical Science New Research for Week #7, 2021
James... There's the Antarctic ice sheet, the Greenland ice sheet and Arctic sea ice. Did you have one in mind?
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Bob Loblaw at 11:16 AM on 19 February 2021Skeptical Science New Research for Week #7, 2021
jamesh:
Look to the top of any page here. Under the "Skeptical Science" banner, you will see a row of menu items, saying :Home Arguments Software..."
Below that is a box. It says "Search". You can type in that box, and then click on "Go" below it.
You can also read further down below that, where it says "Most Used Climate Myths". If you don't find what you want there, at the bottom of the thermometer you can click on "View All Arguments...".
..and as to your comment about "stratospheric aerosol injection", since we know the effects of adding aerosols to the stratosphere - because, well, scientists have studied it and understand it, and know the principles involved - then yes, it is geo-engineering.
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jamesh at 11:02 AM on 19 February 2021Skeptical Science New Research for Week #7, 2021
I did read the the complete posting on geoengineering and did not perceve that strataspheric aerosol injection had anything to do with engineering. Engineering always deals with known scientific principals. In any case I wish to move on to the issue of the melting of polar ice sheets. How do I access postings on that subject?
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Philippe Chantreau at 09:02 AM on 19 February 2021Skeptical Science New Research for Week #7, 2021
Even as it is, James statement is only partially true, since enhanced geothermal can work in a much larger variety of situations, as in Soultz Sous Foret.
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michael sweet at 08:52 AM on 19 February 2021Skeptical Science New Research for Week #3, 2021
Jamesh,
The "scientific consensus" argument was popular about 10-15 years ago. That horse was flogged untill there was nothing left. Read the articles the moderator has highighted. There is a scientific consensus when a great majority of scientists agree that the problem has been solved. Scientists agree that CO2 causes global warming. The question is exactly how much it will warm and what the consequences of that warming will be.
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Bob Loblaw at 07:00 AM on 19 February 2021Gillett et al. (2021) global warming attribution study
jamesh@5:
You are not expressing yourself sufficeintly clearly. For example, you first say
"Dr. Mann in his publication dated 01 April 19 Titled Global-scale temperature patterns and climate forcing"
[emphasis mine], and then you say:
"the atmosphere could not have forced the sequesteration of carbon in the earths sedimentary rocks."
The two uses of the term "force" have entirely different meanings in these contexts.
Mann's statement - and any statement that has to do with CO2 forcing climate changes - is due to the radiative properties of greenhouse gases. They absorb and emit IR radaition, which alters the flows of energy, and do this in such a fashion that the global balance between absorbed solar radiation and emitted IR (to space) is affected. As a result, the earth warms in response to increased atmospheric CO2.
In your second use of the term forced, you seem to be talking about changes in the global carbon cycle. How the carbon cycle responds to the burning of fossil fuels is a different question from how increased atmospheric CO2 alters the radiation transfer.
To claim that CO2 cannot force climate because the atmosphere cannot force geological carbon sequestration is a non sequitur.
There are threads her that discuss the carbon cycle and how we know that the burning of fossil fuels is leading to increased atmospheric CO2. There are other threads where the role of CO2 as a greenhouse gas is discussed, including how the greenhouse gases lead to a warmer surface.
Such confusion in what you write needs to be clarified. We can only know your thoughts by how you express them. If your writing is confusing, we have no way of knowing if you are just expressing yourself poorly, or whether you are failing to understand some aspect of the science. Right now, it looks like there is a lot you do not understand.
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Doug Bostrom at 04:09 AM on 19 February 2021Skeptical Science New Research for Week #7, 2021
Geothermal energy will be practical in some areas of the US and impractical in others, the same way a "traditional" thermal generation plant will be more or less practical, dependent on such matters as fairly ample water supply.
Jamesh, I'm wondering: why are you reviewing/remarking on geothermal energy here? There are no articles on geothermal energy in this batch of papers and the "editorial content" ahead of this week's list has no relevance to geothermal energy systems.
It looks as though you've found your way to the wrong page and hence accidentally created a non sequitur. What thread did you have in mnd?
Moderator Response:[TD] I think Jamesh read only the "Geoengineering" title of this post, and assumed that meant geothermal. I let Jamesh's comment stand, because we sorta let the New Research posts act as entry points for commenters who have not yet found their way to more appropriate posts' threads. But if Jamesh continues to comment without actually reading anything first, we will start deleting the comments.
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jamesh at 03:33 AM on 19 February 2021Skeptical Science New Research for Week #7, 2021
With respect geothermal, it is not new technology, and it does work but there are technical limitations. One is efficiency, which varies dependent on temp. difference source and discharge. And this brings up another problem. When you have ground water, the source of heat has to be well below ground water in order to have an efficient system. I know from personal experience what difference ground water can have. Early in my career I worked in mine in Arizona where their wes no ground water, at least above 2000ft. At 2000ft rock in the work area was over 90dF. I later worked in a mine in Virginia where the ground water extended below 1000ft. Workers needed extra cloths to keep warm. My experience tells me that geothermal would not be practical in many areas of the US.
Moderator Response:[TD] I removed the extra blank space at the bottom of your comment, and changed your double spacing to single spacing. Do those things yourself next time please.
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jamesh at 02:58 AM on 19 February 2021Skeptical Science New Research for Week #3, 2021
My guess is that your moderator will call the following comment political, but I think my opinion counts for something so I ask your honest comment on the following; I do recall a time when Scientists did not band together to support a view of scientific facts. Scientists were on their own, (this was true even in The old USSR. Yosenko was Stalins favorite scientist, other scientists kept their mouthes shout) so when they came up with a theaory they knew they had to have facts and present a reasoned analysis. As a good example of how the system did work I suggest you google Steven J. Gould and you will see the old system at work.
Moderator Response:[TD] Read the post The 97% Consensus on Global Warming. Actually read it. The whole thing, not just the title. Basic, Intermediate, and Advanced tabbed panes. Then if you still want to comment on that topic, do so there, not here.
[TD] I changed your double spacing to single spacing. Do that yourself next time please.
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MA Rodger at 23:54 PM on 18 February 2021Gillett et al. (2021) global warming attribution study
michael sweet @7,
In calling N2 "a GHG and that it is 300 times more effective than CO2," the commenter @5 is probably in this particular confusing N2 and N2O, the latter of course being a GHG and with current atmospheric concentrations, providing 10% of the forcing level of CO2 from 2000-times less increase in oncentration. The "300 times more potent than carbon dioxide" can often be found on-line, this being a rounded-up value for the 100 year GWP.
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michael sweet at 22:56 PM on 18 February 2021Gillett et al. (2021) global warming attribution study
Hi Jamesh,
If you want to engage successfully it helps if you do some background reading first. For example, diatomic molecules like N2 (78% of atmosphere) and O2 (21%) do not absorb IR radiation and are not greenhouse gasses. (Monoatomic atoms like argon (0.9%) also are not greenhouse gasses). This is a pretty basic mistake and makes everything else you say look questionable. Triatomic molecules like H2O and CO2 and higher order molecules like SF6 absorb IR radiation and are greenhouse gasses (< 0.1%). This was figured out by scientists in about 1850.
Good luck in your effort. I suggest you read some of the basics first like the Interactive History of Climate Science at the upper left of this page.
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jamesh at 08:17 AM on 18 February 2021Gillett et al. (2021) global warming attribution study
Rob
I think you missed my point. My purpose was to address the scientific
basis for Climate forcing. I think this is a valid issue, inasmuch as DR.
Mann raised the issue in his paper titled Global-scale temperature
patterns and climate forcing etc. published 01 April 1998. I do'not
want to address my concerns to anyone in particular, I just want to
talk about applicable science.
Moderator Response:[PS] Take this to an appropriate thread. No more offtopic comments here please. You have already been pointed to more appropriate thread. Take the time to read the science before commenting.
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jamesh at 08:02 AM on 18 February 2021Gillett et al. (2021) global warming attribution study
Bob
My intent was to engage our audience in a discution of scientific facts.
The central issue is climate forcing by atmospheric CO2. The term was
used by Dr. Mann in his publication dated 01 April 19 Titled Global-scale
temperature patterns and climate forcing. I think it is fair to look at the
science behind climate forcing. My purpose in citing geologic history
was to illustrate a long period when CO2 in the atmosphere could not
have forced the sequesteration of carbon in the earths sedimentary
rocks. Inasmuch as the physical laws of nature haven't change I figured
scientists might agree that CO2 in the atmosphere could not possibly
force climate change. To confirm the foregoing alledge fact, anyone
can go online and with the aid of google, find that N2 is also a GHG
and that it is 300 times more effective than CO2. All of this does make
if one keeps in mind that at 400ppm CO2 is present in the atmosphere
that it weights in at o.o4 percent. N2 comes in at 80percent. If we go
to the driest place on earth, probably the Sahara, we are told that night
temps. are known to drop as much as 36deg F. The moderating effects
of H2 and CO2 are nowhere to be found. Also there was an opportunity
to run a GHG test on effecity of CO2 by running a series of tests, starting
with sundown and running to sunup. A series could have been run, but
it was not done. Again, I am not looking to engage any one person
specificately, I only want to discuss the scientific facts (as I see them)
Moderator Response:[TD] Your comment is off topic, as was your previous one. Find appropriate posts for your comments, with separate comments on separate posts.
For your claim that N2 is a greenhouse gas, you should read the American Chemical Society's post "Which Gases are Greenhouse Gases?", and if for some reason you disagree with the absence of N2's listing there, maybe post your objection in the SkepticalScience thread off the post "CO2 is main driver of climate change."
You must also back up your claims with evidence. For example, your claim that CO2 and H2O do not affect temperatures of deserts plainly is false, but if you want to claim otherwise you need to provide evidence, along with whatever rationale you can muster for squaring that claim of yours with your note that deserts are dry. I for one cannot figure out how the cooling of a desert with a dearth of water vapor demonstrates that the presence of water vapor fails to prevent cooling. -
Rob Honeycutt at 06:09 AM on 18 February 2021Gillett et al. (2021) global warming attribution study
James... If I understand your question correctly, this might be a better thread to comment on. John Mason does a good explanation of carbonate-silicate rock weathering thermostat processes here:
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Bob Loblaw at 05:55 AM on 18 February 2021Gillett et al. (2021) global warming attribution study
Jasmesh:
Your statement " I cannot imagine..." is an argument from incredulity. It carries no weight. I don't even know what "the process" is that you are talking about.
If you have specific things to state related to specific aspects of climate science, please use the Search function to find a topic, and place comments on that topic.
Your comments should deal with something raised by the blog post - if not, it's probably off topic there and you need to find another topic. This topic does not discuss distant geological time - only the recent past.
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jamesh at 05:11 AM on 18 February 2021Gillett et al. (2021) global warming attribution study
I appologe for the snarky remark. Will abide with the rules next time.
Moderator Response:[PS] Offtopic. Maybe start with "Co2 levels were higher in the past" but more detail on past CO2 and past climate on many other threads. Use the Search button on top left or review the "Arguments" page.
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jamesh at 05:05 AM on 18 February 2021Gillett et al. (2021) global warming attribution study
I am an engineer by training and experience, so I do have a scientific
background. At this time, I want to point out a few scientific facts. The first
is from a text on historical geology. They list all of the geologic divisions
from the permian going back about 350my to the cambrian. We know
that most of the carbon that is sequestered in geologic formations was
deposited as coal, limestone and shale during that period. Also the
atmosphere benefited by O2. I think it is obvious that the process would
have required a lot of CO2, which everone knows is the product of
volcanic action. I cannot imagine that any scientist would alledge that
CO2 has the power to drive the process, but be my guest.
James h. shanley, environmental safety engineer
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Wol at 09:21 AM on 17 February 2021Tips on countering conspiracy theories and misinformation
Sorry - retraction: I see that clicking downloads the .pdf! Didn't notice the little green arrow.....
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Wol at 09:19 AM on 17 February 2021Tips on countering conspiracy theories and misinformation
The links to the English versions merely point to the same page, and viewing the image has such a low resolution that it's unreadable
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Bob Loblaw at 08:31 AM on 16 February 2021It's waste heat
Yes. Another give-away is the use of the term "equivalent climate change..." in front of each "boundary layer" term in the text I quoted.
Equivalent to what?
Equivalent to Finnegan's Finnagling Factor, or Cook's Constant, or less formally, the Fudge Factor - the ratio between what he really got and what he wanted to get.
"If I put these totally unrealstic coefficients into my model and label them like something real, I can fit global temperatures."
Tamino's blog is full of take-downs of this sort of curve-fitting.
Of course, we true curve fitters know that the real explanation is Pirates.
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MA Rodger at 07:12 AM on 16 February 2021It's waste heat
Bob Loblaw @202,
There is, of course, the old SkS favourite when debunking nonsense like this - the identification of curve fitting. The grand modelling exercise carried out by Bian runs 1965-2018 and shows a pretty constant increase in FF+nuclear Primary Energy and also in surface temperature.
Look more closely and, of course are we are familiar with this, the surface temperature was flat for the first few years of this period and indeed was effectively flat 1940-1970. But FF+Nuclear Primary Energy was rising at a costant rate from 1950 with a far slower rise prior to that. So pre-1965 Bian's curve-fitting would be looking a lot less than a good fit.
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Bob Loblaw at 01:17 AM on 16 February 2021It's waste heat
MA Rodger:
You dug further than I had the time to do. I did look at the web page for the 2019 article, and I saw that is has information on the review. I did not take the time to examine the article or the reviews, but it may be entertaining to do so.
I did look at the editorial board for Environmental Systems Research and did not see a single name I recognized, so it's hard to know what their background is.
The International Journal of Environment and Climate Change is also an unkown entity. Searching Beall's List of Predatory Journals there are 690 hits for "International Journal of" and 4 hits for "International Journal of Environment", but "International Journal of Environment and Climate Change" is not on it. BIan's article from 2019 is listed as being in volume 9, and the journal seems to go back to 2011. The publisher (Science Domain International) is on Beall's list, though.
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MA Rodger at 23:43 PM on 15 February 2021It's waste heat
Bob Loblaw @200,
The craziness engendered in this thesis set out in both Bian (2019) 'The Nature of Climate Change-equivalent Climate Change Model’s Application in Decoding the Root Cause of Global Warming' and Bian (2020) 'Waste heat: the dominating root cause of current global warming' is profound. Other than having access to more recent data, the second account sets out nothing new that I can see, and there is little point in spending much time examining such madness.
I note the citations made by the second account (which are quite sparce) include two to SkS webpages, this one and 'What does past climate change tell us about global warming?'.
So from this SkS webpage the author does appreciate that the global primary energy use amounts to just 1% of the positive forcings from AGW. Indeed, this disparity he considered too small as, in the universe inhabited by Qinghan Bian the energy employed in "useful work" is somehow swept from the planetary climate system and will not contribute to a planetary energy imbalance. Given the "perspective of thermodynamics" invoked at this point in the narrative, the blundersome efforts of Qinghan Bian seem to know no bounds.You point to the climate being modelled as having a pond-depth of ocean and a similar height of atmosphere. Adopting such nonsense allows temperature increases to be equated to global Primary Energy Use (bar the 20% that magically disappears in "useful work").
The earlier account gives annual values for the energy employed heating the various components of the planet. Thus in 2017 there is 1,500Kj x 10^14 warming the ocean surface layer. The OHC measurements give the 0-2,000m warming for 2017 as a little low relative to earlier years, averaging out at 7.8Zj annual. So in Bian-money, that is 78,000Kj x 10^14.
Some may consider this comparison a little unfair given ΔOHC is usually seen as being perhaps 80% of the heating resulting from AGW. This would put the total planetary on-going warming at some 100,000Kj x 10^14 which would compate with the 4,000Kj x 10^14 of Bian but only if the global temperature rise so far is ignored. The +1ºC extra planetary temperature which requires maintaining. If this AGW-delivered-so-far is also factored in, the extra energy flux out into space would be balancing 3.7Wm^-2 of forcing/feedback (and presumably with a ration of perhaps 1:2) giving a figure for the global forcing (20Zj balanced forcing+ 10Zj imbalanced forcing still heating) at 300,000Kj x 10^14. So very roughly the 1% value of [Primary Energy Use]/[AGW] appears again. -
Bob Loblaw at 12:27 PM on 15 February 2021It's waste heat
I have only taken a quick read of the paper, and I know nothing specific about the journal, but the paragraph on "Past Simulations" says the following (emphasis added):
It is revealed that (Bian 2019) an equivalent climate change surface air boundary layer with a depth between 50 and 100 m (also referred to as the depth’s lower and upper layer limits), an equivalent climate change waters surface boundary layer with a depth between 0.1 and 0.2 m, and an equivalent climate change land surface boundary layer with a depth between 0.05 and 0.1 m can well characterize their respective temperature changes due to the heat entered air (Fig. 2), oceans and land from human activities. The simulations at these depths are well consistent with the observed temperature anomalies in these three components (Bian 2019). These depths are referred to as equivalent climate change boundary layers’ depths.
The values for "boundary layer" depths are absurdly small for use in determining global temperature changes.
- 50-100m of atmosphere is about 1% of the total atmosphere.
- Average ocean depth is about 3700m, so 0.2m is about 0.005% of the total ocean volume. (If we only think in terms of the ocean mixed layer, which is roughly 60-100m deep,the 0.2m figure is less that 0.3% of the total.)
- On an annual basis, land surface temperature changes extend to about 10 depth, so 0.1m is about 1% of that volume. (Over decades, the temperature changes would extend to greater depths, making 0.1m a smaller %.)
The paper appears to model global temperature changes assuming that the waste heat is confined to those small portions of the earth-atmosphere system, and concludes that waster heat therefore "explains" global temperatures. As those very small proportions of the system are only a very small proportion of the amount that actually is heating up, the conclusion is absurd.
It is the equiivalent of saying that the heat from a candle is capable of warming the air in a shoebox by X degrees, so when my house warms by X degrees the candle is the explanation (and the furnace is irrelevant).
If someone can find some redeeming portion fo the paper that does any better, feel free to post it. The sole reference to the model used seems to be to another paper by the same author. It did not seem worth the effort to obtain it.
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