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Comments 86651 to 86700:

86651. scaddenp at 12:09 PM on 6 May 2011
       Lindzen Illusion #3 and Christy Crock #5: Opposing Climate Solutions
       KL - "I will be the first to buy your PV Solar panel when it can re-produce itself without the help of relatively cheap fossil fuels." Yeah! Good to know we have a customer for a project under consideration...
86652. scaddenp at 12:07 PM on 6 May 2011
       Lindzen Illusion #3 and Christy Crock #5: Opposing Climate Solutions
       I cant find anything more recent published on commitments that really adds to Hare and Meinshausen, though results from AR5 full carbon cycle will be interesting. However, I think a zero emissions is interesting only from a theoretical point of view. Best we can hope is to see what commitment we have with a cap though progress towards that isnt really happening either. If getting reductions is tough now as a policy sell, imagine how difficult it could be for our grandchildren selling really tough emission control and seeing NO results (in terms of slower climate change) from those efforts for decades. I dont think humans work well on those time scales.
86653. Tom Curtis at 11:38 AM on 6 May 2011
       Lindzen Illusion #3 and Christy Crock #5: Opposing Climate Solutions
       scaddenp @79, thanks for the link. From it I find the following graph by Hare and Meinshausen whose zero emissions trajectory is much more like what I would expect. Most of the initial rise in temperatures is, of course, due to the loss of aerosols, but some rise would still be expected with out that. However, given the example of the Eemian, it is plausible that both of these constant forcing scenario's are wildly optimistic and that constant forcing would result in a two plus degrees C increase.
86654. Tom Curtis at 11:21 AM on 6 May 2011
       Frauenfeld, Knappenberger, and Michaels 2011: Obsolescence by Design?
       FK&M 2011 base their reconstruction on a multiple regression on the Greenland summer temperatures taken from four stations, and the Winter North Atlantic Oscillation. Base on this, they show melt extents in the 1930's to be significantly more extensive than those in the 1990s. However, as shown below, Greenland summer temperatures (red line, first graph)in the 1990's where equivalent to those in the 1930s, while the winter NAO index (second graph) was only a little stronger (more positive) in the 1930s. Given that, we would expect only a slightly stronger Ice Melt Extent Index for the 1930's than for the 1990's. This is particularly the case given that the Summer Temperature has 2.6 times the effect of the Winter NAO on Ice Melt Extent (FK&M 2011, 4th page of 7). This suggests at a minimum that the FK&M reconstruction is sensitive to the choice of surface stations in constructing their index. Given that, there is a significant probability that the choice of a larger number of surface stations would show a significantly stronger end 20th century melt relative to the 30's.
86655. muoncounter at 11:12 AM on 6 May 2011
       Hurricanes aren't linked to global warming
       Interesting new blog post by Michael Tobis: Is there a trend in Atlantic hurricanes? Some people are still stuck in hypothesis testing mode, which I think is starting to get a little bit crazy. We can only test hypotheses that way. We cannot use that approach to establish that changing the radiative properties of the atmosphere is safe. My claim is that we need to get our thinking out of nudge-world. This is not a nudge. ... I don't understand why people don't anticipate some ringing in a system that gets kicked this hard.
86656. Tom Curtis at 10:47 AM on 6 May 2011
       Frauenfeld, Knappenberger, and Michaels 2011: Obsolescence by Design?
       Lucia @140 and Mosher @147 suggest that using 2010 data would simply require substituting 2010 for 2007 in the sentence,

       "We find that the recent period of high-melt extent is similar in magnitude but, thus far, shorter in duration, than a period of high melt lasting from the early 1920s through the early 1960s. The greatest melt extent over the last 2 1/4 centuries occurred in 2007; however, this value is not statistically significantly different from the reconstructed melt extent during 20 other melt seasons, primarily during 1923–1961.

       Close scrutiny of the graph of the Tedesco figures (Figure 2 above) shows that the difference between 2007 and 2010 mass loss is only 1/6th of the difference between 2005 and 2007. Assuming a similar magnitude difference in the Ice Melt Extent Index, one difference the inclusion of 2010 would make is that the number of years prior to satellite observations in which 2010 lies within the 95% confidence intervals reduces to approximately eleven. The number of reconstructed temperatures lying within one RMSEv of the 2010 value would probably also fall from two to either one or zero. The trailing 10 year moving average for 2010 would also rise by about 0.3 points to almost match that in the 1930's. Given these changes: 1) Ice melt extent in the 2000's would be statistically indistinguishable from that for the highest period in the reconstruction. (This is true as it stands, but apparently was not worthy of comment in the paper.) 2) The two years with the greatest ice melt extent would have occurred in the last ten years, and five of the most extensive melts would have occurred in the last ten years. In no other ten year period would more than two of the ten most extensive melts have occured. 3) The year with the highest melt extent would be the most recent year, with just eleven reconstructed values having 95% confidence intervals encompassing that value. 4) The relatively low ice melt extents in the early satellite period are due in large part to major tropical volcanic eruptions, eruptions which were absent in the 1930s. In the absence of these erruptions, the longest and period of extensive melting would be that straddling the end of the 20th century, not that in the middle. Clearly natural forcings have favoured extensive ice melt in the mid 20th century, while acting against it towards the end. (True also in 2009, and surely worth a mention in the paper.) A paper drawing these conclusions, IMO, would be substantially different from the paper actually produced. Certainly it would have been very hard for Michaels to place the spin on it that he as been doing. Of course, there are certain caveattes to this analysis. Firstly (and most importantly), Tedesco shows mass loss, while FK&M show melt extent. The two are not equivalent and it is possible to have (as in 2005) very extensive melt areas with restricted mass loss due to greater precipitation. Given comments by Box, it is quite possible that that has indeed happened in 2010. If that where the case it would require an even more extensive revision of FK&M 2011 to bring it up to 2010, datawise. Second, this analysis has been done graphically, and has all the consequent uncertainties (ie, the numbers might be out by one or two in either direction). This is particularly the case in that FKM's graph reproduce by Lucia has an uneven scale.
86657. scaddenp at 10:44 AM on 6 May 2011
       Lindzen Illusion #3 and Christy Crock #5: Opposing Climate Solutions
       Its a letter to editor, but discussed (along with Hare and Meinshausen) at RC. Go here. Includes pointer to discussion of Matthews and Weaver.
86658. grypo at 10:30 AM on 6 May 2011
       Frauenfeld, Knappenberger, and Michaels 2011: Obsolescence by Design?
       Chris, (the "dense" remark was not about you, it was everyone's ability to ignore the CATO article elephant in the room) "However an incisive review, paarticularly in late Dec/Jan, could easily have addressed the several problmatic sentences in the paper, and ensured that the data was properly interpreted in relation to independent data. " Well, he certainly could have, but Box's initial review tried to make the paper better by suggesting the FKM consider the warming and cooling causal factors that Box himself used to predict the 09-10 melt, accurately. But as a shortcut, he suggested they include the 2010 data. Now, we are all worked up because the data wasn't available, or timed right, even though, somehow, every other expert knew the implications, but whatever, who cares? Box's point is that publishing "as is" was insignificant and not up to JGR's usual standard. So his suggestion was ignored. This paper was too important wait apparently. Not my call or Box's. This coupled with that way the paper has been used, post-publication, is the real story here. Unless these are addressed, getting on to Box's handling of the review process seems like a misdirected priority. Although, it is certainly something to discuss in improving the review process in climate papers.
86659. Tom Curtis at 09:52 AM on 6 May 2011
       Lindzen Illusion #3 and Christy Crock #5: Opposing Climate Solutions
       scaddenp @78, I would be very dubious of Matthews'and Weaver's result. It is widely believed, and with good reason, that thermal inertia alone would result in an additional 0.5 degrees C warming if CO2 levels where held constant. M&W show only half of that, and show no additional warming for zero emissions. Even allowing that CO2 levels would decline with zero emissions, they would do so on a decadal time scale which would ensure a significant early warming with zero emissions. M&W is behind a pay wall, so I cannot discuss their methods, and they may be correct. However, their paper does require close scrutiny before accepting its results.
86660. Bern at 09:51 AM on 6 May 2011
       The Climate Show Episode 12: twisters, ozone and Google in the sun
       Hey, it's 15 minutes shorter than last episode! :-) I like to watch the videos myself - the figures, charts, and images that are interspersed add a lot to the story being told. And it's easy enough to have it open in a browser window, while doing something else on the PC (as much as my wife might be amused by me watching a vidcast and playing a game or working on a presentation for work at the same time...) Either way, I guess I know what I'm doing with my Friday night, now (yes, I am that boring! ;-)
86661. Albatross at 09:42 AM on 6 May 2011
       Lindzen Illusion #3 and Christy Crock #5: Opposing Climate Solutions
       BP, Seriously, please do email and tell Lindzen and Christy and Spencer to stick to the science, and to stop talking through their hats about economics, politics and socioeconomics--then there will be no need for others to make the observation I did above. Until then, it is not political to call them on their politicization of science.....
86662. Don9000 at 09:22 AM on 6 May 2011
       Arctic Ice March 2011
       Oops! I see I said it would take the water longer to freeze in the autumn! That is a relic of a revision! Sorry!
86663. Don9000 at 09:20 AM on 6 May 2011
       Arctic Ice March 2011
       Interesting comments! My understanding is rather incomplete, but since the Arctic basin and surrounding seas are adding more meltwater to the surface waters each melt season, I suppose this means that the intensity (is that the correct word?) of the halocline during the autumn and winter is increased. In other words, the increased summer melting and reduction in the overall ice volume must be making the surface waters of the Arctic fresher which may well cause the surface waters to take just a bit longer to freeze in the autumn. It seems to me that this is a variable that is potentially in flux for a number of different reasons, and this must have consequences if it is so. For example, I understand that the fresher water being added to the Arctic waters during the melt season results in more surface ice forming earlier in the fall/winter for the simple reason that it freezes at a higher temperature than saltier water. And I gather that the Arctic still has a well-established halocline despite the significant and continuing reduction in overall ice volume, but I also suppose that eventually the halocline will begin to break down, if the trend continues. Right now, my best guess is that the Arctic still has plenty of relatively fresh water at the surface. Also, given that the sea ice that forms is fresher if it forms at higher temperatures because it is then able to exclude more salt, I suspect that the ice that exists in the Arctic is fresher than it used to be. Has anyone studied this? If the ice is fresher than it was a few decades ago, it makes sense that it melts more rapidly once the temperatures warm in the spring. This is part of the reason I made my comment about the potential for a record melt, since not only are the air temperatures higher than they were a few decades ago, but the ice that is present may have a higher melting point. That said, it seems to me that eventually, as the Arctic is open to wave and wind action for longer periods of time, it will lose a significant portion of its fresher surface waters to the Atlantic in particular. Is this happening? Or is it predicted to happen? If it does, given the rising temperature trend, I would think that future sea ice formation in the Arctic will delayed and reduced since the surface water will be saltier and the air temperature will be warmer.
86664. Albatross at 09:14 AM on 6 May 2011
       Frauenfeld, Knappenberger, and Michaels 2011: Obsolescence by Design?
       Well done Daniel Bailey, you have drawn the "lukewarmers" (but I think that excludes poster Chris) out of the woodwork to defend their champion Michaels. Yes, please KFM release the code and perhaps CA will do a thorough audit of KFM too, and then perhaps, just perhaps, pigs might fly.
86665. steven mosher at 08:37 AM on 6 May 2011
       Frauenfeld, Knappenberger, and Michaels 2011: Obsolescence by Design?
       Oddly Dan thinks: "No, the data would not have been in the proper format the authors were accustomed to dealing with. But that is merely a technical limitation and could have been dealt with. After all, the Muir Russell Commission was able to replicate the entire "hockey stick" from original data in a mere two days (something the auditors still have not yet completed themselves), pronouncing it something easily accomplished (cf page 48 of the report) by a competent researcher." Muir Russell did no such thing. They constructed their own 'replication' of the land temperature series (chapter 6) and not the hockey stick. Strange the simple mistakes people make when grasping at straws. On the issue of failing to use "up to the data" I'm fairly confident that no one here will throw out all papers that are published with truncated data series. if that were the case some of Box's own work would qualify as bad science. And of course we have the famous example of Santer's paper. I would hope that KFM would publish their code so that an update could be made. That seems a simple matter and I suppose someone can go hound them for the code. The issue seems to be this: "Had the authors considered all available data, their conclusion that ‘Greenland climate has not changed significantly’ would have been simply insupportable." That is a TESTABLE claim. but no one has taken the time to test it. It seems rather brazen to claim that their conclusions would have been unsupportable. Well, test the claim of this post. if they had considered all the data would their conclusions be unsupportable? dont wave your skeptical arms. Ask them for their code and do the work. And what specifically do you think was wrong. you wrote "They write: “We find that the recent period of high-melt extent is similar in magnitude but, thus far, shorter in duration, than a period of high melt lasting from the early 1920s through the early 1960s. The greatest melt extent over the last 2 1/4 centuries occurred in 2007; however, this value is not statistically significantly different from the reconstructed melt extent during 20 other melt seasons, primarily during 1923–1961.”" if you add 2010 data which sentence is wrong A "We find that the recent period of high-melt extent is similar in magnitude but, thus far, shorter in duration, than a period of high melt lasting from the early 1920s through the early 1960s." adding 2010 data wont change a word of that claim. B "The greatest melt extent over the last 2 1/4 centuries occurred in 2007; however, this value is not statistically significantly different from the reconstructed melt extent during 20 other melt seasons, primarily during 1923–1961.”" adding 2010 data will change one word here. So.. The greatest melt extent over the last 2 1/4 centuries occurred in 2010; however, this value is not statistically significantly different from the reconstructed melt extent during 20 other melt seasons, primarily during 1923–1961. better?
86666. scaddenp at 08:29 AM on 6 May 2011
       Lindzen Illusion #3 and Christy Crock #5: Opposing Climate Solutions
       A worldwide zero emissions isnt required. The Matthews and Weaver 2010 diagram was this . Holding emissions at current level doesnt look too dangerous from this diagram. Of course, this doesnt address the equity issue which would propose that west reduced emissions heavily so developing countries can increase their's but that is a different issue.
       Moderator Response: [muoncounter] Please restrict image width to 500.
86667. David Horton at 07:43 AM on 6 May 2011
       Lindzen Illusion #4: Climate Sensitivity
       So, just pure Milankovitch with no CO2 contribution?
86668. Chip Knappenberger at 07:25 AM on 6 May 2011
       Frauenfeld, Knappenberger, and Michaels 2011: Obsolescence by Design?
       And for a comparison to the Wake et al. conclusions provided by chris@144... Here is the first paragraph of conclusions from our paper:

       We have created a record of total annual ice melt extent across Greenland extending back approximately 226 years by combining satellite‐derived observations with melt extent values reconstructed with historical observations of summer temperatures and winter circulation patterns. This record of ice melt indicates that the melt extent observed since the late 1990s is among the highest likely to have occurred since the late 18th century, although recent values are not statistically different from those common during the period 1923–1961, a period when summer temperatures along the southern coast of Greenland were similarly high as those experienced in recent years. Our reconstruction indicates that if the current trend toward increasing melt extent continues, total melt across the Greenland ice sheet will exceed historic values of the past two and a quarter centuries.

       Not really very different from Wake et al. This conclusion follows directly from our work and will be little impacted by what occurred in 2010. In the last two paragraphs of our Conclusions, we go beyond our direct results, and speculate on sea level rise. In writing a paper, it is not particularly unusual to try to put the results in the bigger picture. -Chip
86669. chris at 07:06 AM on 6 May 2011
       Frauenfeld, Knappenberger, and Michaels 2011: Obsolescence by Design?
       Albatross, I'm not being naive (or I should say I don't consider that I am). In this particular instance I consider many of the individuals complaining about this mess, to be naive: There are two elements that ensure decent quality papers. The first is the inherent scientific integrity in the vast majority of publishing scientists (the most important part of peer-review; i.e. "self-peer-review"). The second is the peer-review process itself (reviewers giving robust and unambiguous guidance to editors). It's very rare indeed that each of these fail at the same time. Of course KFM are "playing games". We all know that. So in this particular case, we lose a main element of peer review, and are left with the other to hold the fort. Unfortunately the reviewer most qualified to do this seems to have deserted his post. He wrote a dismal review (have you read it?), classified the paper as "good", and declined to re-review the paper at a time when he could have made some very strong recommendations indeed. Why complain now? My comments about Wake et al don't constitute a strawman, and I recommend tha people try to look at this from an objective viewpoint. Wake et al demonstrate that so long as one is clear about the period of analysis, it's acceptable to publish a paper in 2009 that only includes data through 2005. It doesn't matter whether or not a reviewer suggested that they should have included more up to date data. The editor can overrule that if he considers the suggestion is unreasonable. The obvious point that several people seem preternaturally unable to absorb is that one cannot include data in a paper that doesn't yet exist. The editor seems to have cottoned on to that reality. Of course that doesn't absolve KFM from interpreting their data properly in the light of the 2010 data as it stood especially in December 2010. Unfortunately the expert reviewer declined to take part in the process that would have ensured they did. (not sure what the second reviewer was doing - I wonder whether he might be hiding under his bed until this blows over, and hoping that no one decides to identify him/her!). Sadly, we can't conjure up good outcomes by a combination of indignation and anger. It really helps if the systems of peer review work well enough at source.
86670. Bob Lacatena at 06:48 AM on 6 May 2011
       Why 450 ppm is not a safe target
       30, Jesús,

       ...their suggestion that 450 ppm will result in 5 meters sea level rise at the end of this century.

       Citation (direct link), please.
86671. chris at 06:25 AM on 6 May 2011
       Frauenfeld, Knappenberger, and Michaels 2011: Obsolescence by Design?
       Not really grypo. However an incisive review, paarticularly in late Dec/Jan, could easily have addressed the several problmatic sentences in the paper, and ensured that the data was properly interpreted in relation to independent data. (Not sure what you mean by O'Donnel and Steig) Yes, I've seen a little of what the authors have done with it. What do you expect - that's how a couple of the authors earn a living I believe. Not sure about Box's "ideas" - however he has considerable expertise in the subject of the paper, and it would have been nice if he'd chosen to review the paper robustly in Jan. At the very least some incorrect statements in the abstract should have been removed/corrected. Not sure what you mean by "acting dense to this issue to appear "nice""? I hope I'm not acting dense, and I certainly don't think I'm being nice, although I am trying to be scientific, objective and accurate! Here's the conclusions of Wake et al 2009 that you suggest should be a model for how KFM should have written theirs. They don't actually seem so different in general outline from FKM's. I would conclude from the conclusions of Wake et al that things are not very different now in Greenland than then, just like FKM (my bold in the conclusions below). I don't actually think that's going to be true going forward into the future, but a dispassionate read of Wake et al's (2009) conclusions wouldn't give you that idea, apart perhaps from the sentence about disappearance of some ice sheet points... CONCLUSION We have presented a modelling study tracking SMB changes of the Greenland ice sheet since 1866, reflecting how the ice sheet has behaved under the climatic conditions of the 19th– 21st centuries. Over the time window of our study, we find that the Greenland ice sheet has reacted to, and endured, a temperature increase similar to that experienced at present. Higher surface runoff rates similar to those of the last decade were also present in an earlier warm period in the 1920s and 1930s and apparently did not lead to a strong feedback cycle through surface lowering and increased ice discharge. Judging by the volume loss in these periods, we can interpret that the current climate of Greenland is not causing any exceptional changes in the ice sheet. Mass loss through glacier discharge is currently believed to dominate mass loss through SMB, and both processes are likely to be correlated. Forman and others (2007) report that the ice sheet retreated 1–2km inland at Kangerlussuaq, West Greenland, over the past 100 years. Although our model resolution is 55 km, we predict complete disappearance of some ice-sheet points in this area, in line with these observations. We are not able to shed light on the relative contributions of ice dynamics vs SMB to the current mass loss, but our study puts the modernday changes into the context of longer-term century timescale changes."
86672. Albatross at 06:08 AM on 6 May 2011
       Frauenfeld, Knappenberger, and Michaels 2011: Obsolescence by Design?
       Chris @139 and @141, I agree with some of your comments, in particular I agree that Dr. Box could have handled the review better, and so could the editor. I do, however, take issue with other claims and arguments that you made. Unfortunately, I do not have time to properly address them all today. At the end of the day, and despite all the attention, KFM have to this day still not bothered to include the 2010 data-- surely data format issues have not held them back for eight months! Note what the Sir Muir Russell inquiry accomplished in a matter of days. Instead, it is unfortunate that we now have "lukewarmer" bloggers now trying to defend KFM, as of course they would. It would be much better for all concerned if KFM did the analysis themselves. While KFM and Wake et al. are in broad agreement, there are striking differences in how the results are interpreted, and how the findings are being used (or is that abuse din the case of Pat Michaels?). Your comment about Wake et al.'s "void" is a strawman and very much avoids the issue at here and now, unless of course you can demonstrate that reviewer's of the Wake et al. paper specifically requested that they include the 2006-2008 data. What is (intentionally) lost in all this is that the current warming is in all likelihood not transient whereas the 1925-1955 event was, and its causes are in all likelihood very different than those driving the warming now and into the future-- I'll post some more on this tomorrow when I have more time. Citing the KFM paper as evidence that what is happening now (and where we are heading) is not exceptional, and possibly even natural or within the realm of natural variability is thus misleading, disingenuous and wrong. The duplicity being shown by Knappenburger and Michaels is also deeply disturbing. I could be more direct and forthright, but that might violate the comments policy. Chris, let us not be naive about the game that is being played by KFM-- 'skeptics' have quite a long history of "playing" peer-reviewed journals.
86673. grypo at 05:49 AM on 6 May 2011
       Frauenfeld, Knappenberger, and Michaels 2011: Obsolescence by Design?
       Chris, seriously? Are you blaming a bad review for this paper? Is this Odonnel/Steig all over again? You have seen what the author's have done with it since, right? Do you really think Box's ideas could have saved it from the publishing afterglow? Do we really need to act dense to this issue to appear *nice*? I'd look at Wake 09 to see how this paper's conclusions should have been written, as stated earlier. This way we can congratulate the author's on the statistical methods and then turn back to analyzing reality.
86674. chris at 05:11 AM on 6 May 2011
       Frauenfeld, Knappenberger, and Michaels 2011: Obsolescence by Design?
       Eli, I certainly agree with your first statement. You reproduce something Martin Vermeer stated, viz:

       ""This is clearly what Box means by "causal factors"... an analysis of ice melt as relating to temperature is what he would have liked to see, to provide the "depth" that he is missing. ......"

       Two things about that: 1. First, that may very well be what Box meant, but if he did mean it why didn't he say so? Several commentators have suggest interpretations of what Dr. Box meant in his review. In my opinion it's farcical. If it's not possible to give clear and unambiguous guidance to an editor then I don't see how one can subsequently complain when a deficient paper results. 2. Secondly if Martin thinks that "an analysis of ice melt as relating to temperature is what he would have liked to see...", then he could look at page 3 of FKM2011 and read the section that begins: "Our Greenland melt reconstruction therefore focuses on the relationship between summer average temperatures from the available four coastal locations in southern Greenland and our standardized melt index." where an analysis of ice melt as relating to temperature is described; i.e. it uses the empirical temperature and melt data for the period 1979-2009 in order to optimize a model for the relationship between temperature and melt that can be used to determine historical melt. Dr. Box classified the paper methodologically as "good". I'm not playing Devil's Advocate here. In my opinion a truly dismal review has caused a huge amount of confusion over this paper. We (and the editor!) shouldn't be having to guess what the reviewer meant, and if he felt so strongly about defects in the paper he should have taken the opportunity to re-review it in early Jan and do somethibg about it, rather than get mad.
86675. Alexandre at 04:57 AM on 6 May 2011
       Why 450 ppm is not a safe target
       Jesús Rosino at 02:02 AM on 6 May, 2011 IPCC physical models exclude glacier and ice sheet mechanics - I'm sure you are aware of this. So they're not directly comparable with Rahmstorf & Vermeer. Although I agree that these semi-empirical quantifications are not a consensus yet (too new, too few), I'd say that it is already a consensus that those IPCC AR4 figures are an underestimate. I'm just trying to understand your point.
86676. lucia at 04:51 AM on 6 May 2011
       Frauenfeld, Knappenberger, and Michaels 2011: Obsolescence by Design?
       barry

       I realize there are issues with the methodology amongst some, but getting a fix on inclusion of 2010 data with the methods used in the paper would be a good next step, no? Can this be done by the good people here questioning the paper? Quantitative analysis beats speculation every time

       I asked Chip the same thing by private email explaining that I'd like to do this myself. The satellite index melt data KFM2011 used to compute the average in their figure 2 come from index from Abdalati and Steffen, 1997; Fettweis et al., 2007; Mote, 2007. His answer is as far as he is aware, those data aren't available yet. When reading here, I saw the link to the Tedesco paper which contains melt index data for 2010. (This paper was published after the final version of KFM2011 was submitted to JGR but before KFM2011 was published. But as readers are aware, one isn't permitted to completely recompute ones results after a paper has been accepted.) The Tedesco paper would seem to have data that we might use to make a decent guess as to whether the results of KFM2011 would be obsolete when 2010 melt data were published. Specifically, had Tedesco been used as the melt-index, the relevant 2010 melt data would be the value for 2010 in figure 1C in Tedesco. I examined figure 1C and drew a trace to see how the melt index for 2010 compares to melt data for 2007: It seems according to Tedesco melt index for 2010 was exceeded that for 2007 by a tiny amount. In corporating this value into KFM would involve adding a blue dot for 2010 to figure 2 in KFM. Here's my marked up version with lines illustrating various features of the graph: Assuming the relative values of the melt indices from 2007 and 2010 from the two other groups exceeds 2007 by a similar tiny amount, the final blue dot representing 2010 melt data : * would likely still fall inside the ±2σ uncertainty intervals for roughly 20 years of the reconstructed melt data. That is: given what we know, we would not state that 2010 had a record melt index. (I think this is the relevance of explaining the measured melt index for 2007 falls inside the uncertainty of the reconstruction. Based on what we know, we can't call 2007 since 1840 or even earlier start years. ) * the 10 year lagging average would likely still fall below the levels achieved during the previous rapid melt period. * the duration of the recent rapid melt period would remain shorter than the previous one. I suspect that the first two of these things may change during the next El Nino. But as far as I can see, incorporation of the 2010 melt data would require KFM to slightly tweak their text. Adding the data did not make the paper "obsolete". What mystifies me is why Jason Box, who is a co-author and who claims the 2010 data would and does make the paper obsolete didn't just slap the 2010 data point from Tedesco onto KFM2010. I'd do it myself, but I don't know if re-baselining would be required. But it seems to me that if we added the Tedesco data to the KFM2010's figure, the appropriate tweak the KFM2010's abstract is to strike out "2007" and replace it with "2010". This may change when the melt data from the other groups is available. I'll try to remember this issue and comment when it does become available. My fuller discussion is here
86677. chris at 04:44 AM on 6 May 2011
       Frauenfeld, Knappenberger, and Michaels 2011: Obsolescence by Design?
       I’m going to be a party-pooper again, and state why I consider your narrative to be deficient Daniel. You state that you’re planning a future comment on: ”The editorial and decision making process at the heart of the publication of an obsolete paper.” I hope that when you do so, you can be a little more objective in your analysis than here. Your aim should be to make convincing arguments to reasonable people who might be confused about some of the issues related to the science and politics of climate studies. So far it doesn’t seem like it. Here’s some of what I consider to be problematic: 1. Your paragraph (it helps with long posts to number your paragraphs) starting and ending with:

       ”This lack of context……. Because to them, FKM 2011 adds nothing to the science and is thus obsolete.”

       ... isn't really correct. FKM2011 does add something to the science, and its benefits might have outweighed the negatives if it had been properly reviewed. One of the important elements of science is that interpretations are broadly independent of methodological approaches (in other words the essential features of the study object – the stark and uninterpreted historical and contemporary Greenland melt in this case- are revealed by independent analyses using different methods). FKM2011 is surely a useful confirmation of the conclusions of Dr. Box who addressed this subject in a paper in 2009: [L.M. Wake et al (2009) Surface mass-balance of the Greenland ice sheet since 1866, Annals of Glaciology 50, 178]. The abstract concludes: (concerning Surface Mass Balance = “SMB”):

       ”All SMB estimates are made relative to the 1961–90 average SMB and we compare annual SMB estimates from the period 1995–2005 to a similar period in the past (1923–33) where SMB was comparable, and conclude that the present-day changes are not exceptional within the last 140 years.”

       FKM2011 can't be too far wrong if the conclusion from the perspective of 2010 is similar to the perspective of an expert in 2009. I hope we're not go down the route of insisting that the essential elements of a particular local climate state is defined by 1 year’s data! That sounds like "cherry-picking" to me. 2. You suggest (in a somewhat Mills and Boon style if I may say so!) that: ”a 2010-shaped void left its mark by its absence.” But Dr. Box’s 2009 paper included data through only 2005. Are we going to complain that in Dr. Box’s study ”a 2009-shaped void left its mark by its absence.”? …not to mention the 2008-shaped void, and the 2007-shaped void, and the 2006-shaped void? Or are we a little bit reasonable and recognise that one can only include data in a paper that actually exists? And how do we decide when to cause a fuss about where to extend a study? 2008 and 2009 melt years were the lowest for some time (Tedesco and Fettweis data in Fig 2 of your top article). If FKM2011 was actually FKM2010, would this kerfuffle have arisen? Nope. 3. You state omnisciently:

       ”No, the data would not have been in the proper format the authors were accustomed to dealing with. But that is merely a technical limitation and could have been dealt with. After all, the Muir Russell Commission was able to replicate the entire "hockey stick" from original data in a mere two days (something the auditors still have not yet completed themselves), pronouncing it something easily accomplished by a competent researcher.”

       That is entirely unreasonable. It’s not that the data weren’t “in the proper format”. The data from independent groups used by FKM for their model simply weren’t available! That’s not “merely a technical limitation”. It means the analysis for the model simply couldn’t be done. Your analogy of the Muir Russell Commission (MRC) is completely inappropriate, and I fear it makes you appear as if you don’t consider this a subject that should be addressed objectively. The data for that reproduction existed, and in fact had been already “reproduced” several times (e.g. by Wahl and Amman). The independent data used by FKM for their reconstruction didn’t exist. This seems astonishingly easy to understand…. 4. One of the things that stands out from the comments on this thread is that the real problem with FKM2011 is easy to glean and would have been straightforward to address if a reviewer had chosen to do so. Right through the thread (e.g. see my comments, those of Dikran Marsupial, Tom Curtis and Dr. Pelto) we have highlighted statements, sentences or sub-paragraphs that were inappropriate interpretations given the scope of the data and independent knowledge. A reviewer should have ensured that these statements were removed from the paper and the data properly described in relation to the marked 2010 temperatures and melt, and especially in terms of the sort of information that Dr. Pelto has described about the nature of glacier recession in the early 20th century melt period and now. That was what was required of this paper - a thorough and if necessary suitably blunt review in late Dec/early Jan. At least one reviewer was offered the opportunity to do this on Dec 27th last. Unfortunately he declined. 5. We would have been left with a rather dull but confirmatory study of Greenland melt, that would have added a little (a few more years) to Dr. Box’s own paper published in 2009 (see [1.] above). That would be fine. You’re allowed to publish dull and confirmatory studies. The “house journals” of particular scientific fields are full of them. At least one journal I know of even has categories for the reviewer’s general assessment of a paper that includes the category “dull but sound”. That’s an indication to the editor that the manuscript is pretty borderline. In this particular case at least one reviewer thought FKM2011 was better than that. He categorised it as “good”.
86678. Jesús Rosino at 04:42 AM on 6 May 2011
       Why 450 ppm is not a safe target
       Sphaerica, I was thinking of their suggestion that 450 ppm will result in 5 meters sea level rise at the end of this century.
86679. Pete Dunkelberg at 04:32 AM on 6 May 2011
       Medieval project gone wrong
       Mangini et al. 2007:Persistent influence of the North Atlantic hydrography on central European winter temperature during the last 9000 years (more through than their 2005 paper) finds solar variation to be the cause of European winter warm periods. More interestingly, they say that their isotope methods record mainly winter variation, while tree rings record mostly spring and summer when warming is less. Thus the best comparison with their results is with recent northern hemisphere winter temperature trends (where is the graph of that?). Arrhenius already predicted that winters would warm faster than summers, and this has generally been the case in the recent warm-up. However, NH winters are also sensitive to everything from the Madden-Julian Oscillation to tropical volcanoes, and we have seen in the last two years that some NH areas can have cold winters while Arctic amplification is concentrated farther north.
86680. Bob Lacatena at 04:26 AM on 6 May 2011
       Why 450 ppm is not a safe target
       27, Jesús, RC silence about what, exactly?
86681. bibasir at 03:15 AM on 6 May 2011
       Why 450 ppm is not a safe target
       Here is the link to Hansens paper concerning sea level rise. http://www.columbia.edu/~jeh1/mailings/2011/20110118_MilankovicPaper.pdf Scroll down to page 15 to see the graph where he argues that a 10 year doubling of the melt rate for Arctic and Antarctic ice is possible. It can be argued that a 7 year doubling is possible. Time will tell.
86682. dana1981 at 03:08 AM on 6 May 2011
       Lindzen Illusion #3 and Christy Crock #5: Opposing Climate Solutions
       Good point, Albatross. At the congrssional hearing, Emanuel was referred to as an "advocate" (I've never heard Emanuel advocate anything other than good science). Meanwhile Christy and Lindzen are going on conservative talk shows and advocating inaction, talking about economics, etc. Major double standard.
86683. Bob Lacatena at 03:00 AM on 6 May 2011
       Arctic Ice March 2011
       Albatross:

       IMHO, ice state in the boreal spring doe snot seem to be a terribly good indicator of minimum sea-ice extent area in September.

       [img src="http://www7320.nrlssc.navy.mil/pips2/archive/pips2_thick/2007/pips2_thick.2007050400.gif" height="220" width="200" /][img src="http://www7320.nrlssc.navy.mil/pips2/archive/pips2_thick/2010/pips2_thick.2010050400.gif" height="220" width="200" /] As emphasized by the comparison of BP's images to the same date on the record low 2007 year (from these, one would have projected that 2010 would have produced the lowest extent on record): [img src="http://www7320.nrlssc.navy.mil/pips2/archive/pips2_thick/2011/pips2_thick.2011050400.gif" height="220" width="200" /] Again, predicting any one year at any point is difficult to do. The only prediction one can realistically make is that the long term trend is going to continue to be downward, and new records will continue to be set (but not necessarily every year).
       Moderator Response: [Sph] Bad images removed.
86684. EliRabett at 02:45 AM on 6 May 2011
       Frauenfeld, Knappenberger, and Michaels 2011: Obsolescence by Design?
       Chip Knappenberger and Pat Michaels are masters at playing good cop, bad cop, but it is an act. They are both responsible, and being nice to Chip merely advances their misconduct, in this case for hiding the incline. Anyone looking at the FKM paper could see that they were comparing a short period of rapidly rising melt, with a longer more gradual period in the 1930s. As Martin Vermeer put it, what Box offered was a low cost way of making the paper somewhat less dishonest. "This is clearly what Box means by "causal factors"... an analysis of ice melt as relating to temperature is what he would have liked to see, to provide the "depth" that he is missing. But it would have undermined the simple story line of "yet another thing that contradicts warmism"... and it would have been extra work, quite a bit of it. So, Box offers an easy way out, which would also puncture the less-than-100%-honest story line. "
86685. Albatross at 02:40 AM on 6 May 2011
       Frauenfeld, Knappenberger, and Michaels 2011: Obsolescence by Design?
       Daniel, Nice summary. It also boils down to this, when the authors speak to the nature of the melting and attempt to place that melting in context, it is unacceptable to exclude extreme events such as 2010. Ignorance is perhaps one thing, but we know that was definitely not the case here. Additionally, they were aware of those 2010 data in September 2010, it is now eight months later, and by one of the authors admission, they have not yet incorporated those 2010 data. That appears to me to be the very antithesis of genuine scientific curiosity, but rather perhaps a situation where the authors had arrived at an answer that they liked, and did not wish to include data that might upset/challenge that. So what happens now? Dr. Box and others have to fill the void and do the job properly and clean up after a paper written by "skeptics". Déjà vu. Of course the failings of the journal and editor on this subject cannot go unchallenged.
86686. Albatross at 02:16 AM on 6 May 2011
       Arctic Ice March 2011
       Riccardo @244, Agreed Also, it appears that the relatively thick ice that PIPS model is 'seeing" over the central Arctic Ocean may in reality not be so. Look at the image form Cryosphere today: Source] One last comment. IMHO, ice state in the boreal spring does not seem to be a terribly good indicator of minimum sea-ice extent area in September.
       Response:

       [DB] Ice extent and area histories are no longer reliable comps to go by.  As the Barber video showed, even the MY ice no longer presents much obstacle to navigation in the Arctic.

       Just as temperatures and CO2 levels are changing in greater-than-linear-fashion, so too the demise of the Arctic sea ice; the losses overall are increasing in greater-than-linear-fashion.  The condition of the ice is a continuum; each season preconditions the ice for the next.  The recent winter was abnormally warm in the Arctic with greater warm oceanic water penetration from the Bering Straits and the North Atlantic.  This has set the stage for the 2011 summer melt season drama to be played out before us.

       We are in "uncharted waters", wherin past indicators (pre-2005) of melt performance and winter regrowth are no longer the reliable indicators of things to come that once they were.  Each year sees more MY ice loss through top-and-bottom melt and advection out the Fram Strait; additionally, less FY ice survives to MY ice status.

       Death Spiral.

86687. Jesús Rosino at 02:02 AM on 6 May 2011
       Why 450 ppm is not a safe target
       Pete Dunkelberg, My undestanding is that "over 1 meter" projectons come from semi-empirical approaches (pioneered by Rahmstorf), but physical models (those used by the IPCC) don't project such high rises. Semi-empiricals may perfectly be right, but I woudln't call it a consensus yet. In any case, Hansen & Sato are way off the numbers published in the peer reviewed literature. They count on Cenozoic big ice sheets such as Laurentide that aren't here any more. And I don't really see any scientist supporting their high estimates ever (the same when suggesting that sensitivity is 6ºC). In my view, RealClimate silence about this (as previously with Hansen's Venus syndrome) si somewhat telling.
86688. Bob Lacatena at 01:56 AM on 6 May 2011
       A Flanner in the Works for Snow and Ice
       153, Ken, 154, Tom, We all need to avoid the tactic of declaring victory rather than achieving it, and that of simply broadcasting a perception of the errors of others, rather than actually proving them. That said... it is utterly reprehensible to simply lie about what others have said, or to pretend that the previous thread of the conversation says something entirely different from the truth of the matter. It will also be reprehensible to jump on this comment and righteously accuse the other party of such guilt. Anyone who looks at this stream of comments is well advised to go back and judge that aspect of this particular debate for themselves. The evidence is mostly there (except for the utterly outrageous posts which were deleted by the moderators), and the behavior in question will be easy enough to identify. Just look for the comments that keep declaring victory, or claiming to have previously found and proven mistakes by others (without actually doing so, or by quietly ignoring any substantive rebuttals).
86689. Riccardo at 01:53 AM on 6 May 2011
       Arctic Ice March 2011
       "The reality is that the proposition above is not true if ..." One region, one kind of ice, one day. The trick is to choose the criterion untill it matches your will. Kind of extreme cherry picking.
86690. Albatross at 01:37 AM on 6 May 2011
       Lindzen Illusion #3 and Christy Crock #5: Opposing Climate Solutions
       All, And the thread has now been hi-jacked and derailed. Convenient, b/c now Lindzen's and Christy's failings are not being highlighted/underscored while we are debating a steady stream of red herrings and strawmen. What I find totally hypocritical of people like Lindzen, Christy, Michaels and Spencer is that they have the gall to accuse their fellow scientists who (are rightly concerned about AGW) of engaging in politics, when it fact it is the contrarian crowd who is politicizing this issue more than anyone. For goodness' sakes we have Christy and Lindzen speaking on right-wing talk radio shows, and speaking to the economics and politics of AGW, something that they are not qualified to do, yet something that they accuse others of doing as if it were a crime. What is worse, Christy and Lindzen are misrepresenting the facts and the science, and engaging in rhetoric and hyperbole. Finally, "skeptics" here are suggesting that they want to move away from FFs and towards sustainable energy-- great, but that does not appear to be what Lindzen is advocating. So on that issue you are apparently in disagreement.
86691. Chris G at 01:21 AM on 6 May 2011
       Lindzen Illusion #4: Climate Sensitivity
       Dankd, Thanks, my own searches were narrowing down to a debate that took place in Nature between Lindzen and Covey, circa 1993. I found this reference, but I haven't been able to find a link to the article. Lindzen, R. S.: 1993, 'Paleoclimate Sensitivity', Nature 363, 25-26. referenced in PALEOCLIMATE DATA CONSTRAINTS ON CLIMATE SENSITIVITY: THE PALEOCALIBRATION METHOD I'm thinking that Lindzen's argument that there will be meridional gradient pattern differences between orbital forcings and CO2 forcings has some merit. But, I get the impression that he obfuscates between the meridional gradient and the forcings which would cause it to change. Hadley cells are predicted to expand under CO2 forcing; so, that would also cause changes where Lindzen predicted none. But that is a cursory read of your discussion link, and I haven't found the actual Lindzen article yet. Another thought I have is that Lindzen's part of the discussion appears to be an argument of uncertainty. Again, it may have been valid at the time.
86692. dana1981 at 01:15 AM on 6 May 2011
       Lindzen Illusion #3 and Christy Crock #5: Opposing Climate Solutions
       TTTM # 56 -

       "Emissions haven't stopped by 2050 under your ideal global scenario. We wont be stabilised at 450ppm we'll still be increasing at 50% the rate in 1990."

       As noted in the article,

       "Approximately 55% of human CO2 emissions currently remain airborne"

       Thus reducing global emissions by ~50% will be sufficient to stop the increase in atmospheric CO2 concentration, unless natural carbon sinks become saturated in the meantime. I also think that throwing money at a technology (fusion) which is perpetually 50 years away from a breakthrough is a major waste.
86693. KR at 00:52 AM on 6 May 2011
       Lindzen Illusion #4: Climate Sensitivity
       dankd - Thanks for the link to the correspondence. Given that one of the major criticisms of Lindzen and Choi's various papers has been the lack of consideration of energy exchanges with the subtropics, his appeal to such "dynamic heat exchanges" to critique CO2 sensitivity is rather appalling - a severe case of the pot calling the kettle black. In particular, he states (quite correctly) "...given that the Earth's major greenhouse gas, water vapor, varies greatly with latitude and altitude, it is impossible to calculate the net greenhouse effect without knowing where heat is deposited by the dynamic heat transports." This sounds like a repeat of many of the L&C criticisms. And yet his 2010 revision (17 years after this correspondence) of the L&C paper completely ignores this issue! Very sad - personally, I can no longer take his work seriously.
86694. Berényi Péter at 00:50 AM on 6 May 2011
       Lindzen Illusion #3 and Christy Crock #5: Opposing Climate Solutions
       Black carbon is pretty inert stuff. It does not get oxidized easily at ambient temperature.
86695. CBDunkerson at 00:47 AM on 6 May 2011
       Lindzen Illusion #3 and Christy Crock #5: Opposing Climate Solutions
       KL #69: "Marcus, I will be the first to buy your PV Solar panel when it can re-produce itself without the help of relatively cheap fossil fuels." Solar PV power is now cheaper than fossil fuel power in Hawaii and parts of Italy and California. Ergo, any solar panels produced there (and lots are made in California) can do so without the help of relatively expensive fossil fuels. Most estimates put global average 'grid parity' for solar PV some time before 2020... though now that the IEA says we passed 'peak oil' back in 2006 we're likely to see sustained large increases in oil prices and consequently in coal transport costs/final prices.
86696. Tom Curtis at 00:41 AM on 6 May 2011
       A Flanner in the Works for Snow and Ice
       Ken Lambert @153: 1) Why be charitable? You have already taken the opportunity of my mother's ill health and my being preoccupied with helping family members shift house to declare victory. Why should this time be any different? 2) It is not your attention to the "errors of others" which makes your character questionable - it is your inability to acknowledge any error you yourself make. 3) Apposite of which, your "assumptions" have been irrelevant to every error of yours I have pointed to. That is because I calculated a particular value, ie, the net incoming energy absorbed by the arctic the summer season of 2010 - the net incoming energy absorbed by the arctic in the summer season of 1979. I know when I calculate that value and get a figure in Watts per square meter, and then I multiply by the area by 60 by 60 by 24 by 90 that I have calculated a value for a 90 day period. Your assuming that the value is actually that of a thirty day period is therefore just an error. It is, what's more an error that you repeated several times after correction, and have never admitted to. It is not an error of calculation simply because you do not bother doing the sums. In like manner, when I actually look up the monthly data for sea ice area for the respective periods, and determine the difference in sea ice area between 1979 and 2010, your assumption that the actual loss of area over that thirty year period is just the loss of sea ice calculated by Trenberth for a single year is again simply an error. It is just as much an error as if you used the diameter of the moon to calculate the surface area of the Earth, and no matter how exact your equations are, the error in the initial values means your equations are useless. 4) With regard to the decimal places, sometimes it is just easier to cut and paste. The number of decimals means nothing more, nor less than that. Typically, you however try to make so simple a matter the basis of an ad hominen. 5) Finally, your argument style of making a false statement, ignoring the correction, making it again, and ignoring the correction, and making it again, and so on until you hold the field by exhaustion of the opposition shows an absolute lack of intellectual integrity. It reminds me of nothing so much as the debating style of some creationists I have known.
86697. Berényi Péter at 00:38 AM on 6 May 2011
       Arctic Ice March 2011
       
       Response: [DB] The reality is that spring 2011 conditions as measured by PIPS 2.0 are worse than those of spring 2010

       The reality is that the proposition above is not true if by "worse" you mean extension of thick ice is smaller in the central arctic this spring than it was a year ago. Of course if you mean something else, it can be made true. Clarify your position please.

       Response:

       [DB] See Riccardo's point below about cherry-picking.

86698. dankd at 00:32 AM on 6 May 2011
       Lindzen Illusion #4: Climate Sensitivity
       David, Chris, Lindzen's explanation for the ice age climate changes is that they were forced by changes in the distribution of solar forcing (orbital changes) to which he believes the climate system is much more sensitive that it is to changes in mean solar forcing (or mean CO2 forcing). Here's a representative piece (including a reply by Hoffert and Covey): http://eaps.mit.edu/faculty/lindzen/165pal~1.pdf That note (from 1993) has no actual calculations in it, and in this day and age it ought to have been trivial for someone to have built a simplified GCM with low climate sensitivity, and to see whether it is capable of producing an ice age. That no one has done so suggests that it's not possible to come up with a consistent model that reproduces the earth's observed behavior, and has climate sensitivity as low as Lindzen proposes.
86699. Chris G at 00:18 AM on 6 May 2011
       Lindzen Illusion #4: Climate Sensitivity
       "In the current models, for reasons that puzzle almost everyone, the cloud feedbacks are positive rather than negative." This is a gem. Yes, back in 1989, it was a puzzlement. Yet, most recently, measurements have born out the results of whatever early models Lindzen was referring to. I'm referring to the post on this site, "What is the net feedback from clouds?", and in particular Dessler (2010), "A Determination of the Cloud Feedback from Climate Variations over the Past Decade". Lindzen's concern was valid in 1989, but it no longer carries the weight it once did. David H, indeed, the disagreement between the paleologic record and Lindzen's model has been raised before, but likewise, I haven't heard of a Lindzen explanation.
86700. Dikran Marsupial at 00:16 AM on 6 May 2011
       Lindzen Illusion #3 and Christy Crock #5: Opposing Climate Solutions
       BP@68 I meant that terra preta rapidly looses its fertility if you carry on using it without maintenance. However, thanks for the reference (although your manner left a bit to be desired), it is both interesting and surprising that carbon in that form should be so long lasting.

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