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eschwarzbach at 19:05 PM on 13 August 2019Skeptical Science New Research for Week #32, 2019
Unfortunately in the New Research for Week #32, 2019 all the articles in Nature Climate Change are erroneously not open access, but behind a paywall.
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scaddenp at 13:29 PM on 13 August 2019The History of Climate Science
keithwlarson - you will like this blog post then.
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rt.arnold at 12:17 PM on 13 August 2019Can Land cause Climate Change? (new IPCC report)
Along the line of other commentors, there are many issues that don't seem to be addressed in the IPCC report.
My main concern is that agricultural practices and impacts can vary massively for the same commodity (beef) or even production system (e.g. grazing). Scientists published about "grazing impacts" or even about "impacts from extensive grazing with low stocking density". As a trained Earth Scientist and farmer, I see that farm management is far more complex than "these academics" can imagine. I know very good grazing managers who likely have a net negative emissions from beef production, and many lazy grazers who degrade pasture and soil. Management is all that matters.
So any parts of this study which generically talk about specific land use practices (e.g. "grazing", "cropping", "forestry") can only be over simplistic. Remember: On average, every human has one female breast and one male ball. This statement is both true and nonsense - and is here as a reminder of aggregation errors. One must look at what actually happens microbiologically in the soil, not at what type of product is sold.
As for farming, there is no good or bad product - just good or bad production management. Cows can be good for the climate (though few are), or destructive (as most production is). Same as soybeans. This makes it darn hard to define a "regenerative diet"... unless we start measuring soil carbon impacts, as the Savory Institute is spear-heading.
For me, the IPCC report fails to highlight this management dimension in agricultural land management. This only reflects academic difficulties to quantify soil management efficiency (its easier to look at yields!), especially in the short duration of most projects. -
Philippe Chantreau at 09:31 AM on 13 August 2019Temp record is unreliable
rkcannon,
The abundance of the data is what makes it possible to narrow down the error range. Look it up. As indicated by mods higher the error range for NOAA is +/- 0.15. They have publications that detail their statistical methods and show where these numbers come from.
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Philippe Chantreau at 09:26 AM on 13 August 2019Nuclear testing is causing global warming
Arnout,
The existence of a "pause" is entirely dependent on choosing 1998 as a start year, so there is in fact no pause, never was. CERN has demonstrated that cosmic rays were not a significant source of cloud seeding. Water vapor is greenhouse gas, there is no such thing as clouds that are gas, clouds are made of liquid or solid water and do not have any greenhouse effect, thay act in other ways. This has been extensively studied, check the litterature before arguing that the science forgot to take something in consideration.
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rkcannon at 07:00 AM on 13 August 2019Temp record is unreliable
Weslsh I to wonder how such precision of 0.01C has any meaning. Tolerance is probably over 1 degree.
Also I wonder in post 516, the averages of the trend shown between 1900 and 2000 etc and compared with other averages, what do the other graphs look like? Seems there are better ways to compare trends, such as slope. Somewhat of a moving target taking an average of a trend.
Moderator Response:[DB] This is a moderated forum wherein all parties must use credible sources to support claims made. This claim of yours is unsupported and, frankly, wrong:
"I to wonder how such precision of 0.01C has any meaning. Tolerance is probably over 1 degree"Note the error bars in the following image clearly do not support your claims:
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Arnout at 05:38 AM on 13 August 2019Nuclear testing is causing global warming
Ionic radiation forms clouds, a cloud chamber is a good example to show this. H2O Clouds are by far the most important greenhousegas.
People are debating about the influence of cosmic radiation from the sun, mainly to explain for the global warming pauze.
But what would be the influence of human made ionic radiation? It could explain the increased heating after wwII and the warming pauze at the beginning of the century
Moderator Response:[PS] Welcome to Skeptical Science and please read our commenting policy. In particular, note the ban on sloganeering. If you make a claim about science or what is said, then provide links to back your assertions.
Your comment is also offtopic. Please type "cosmic rays" into the search box on top left to find many articles testing the idea radiation might affect climate (no evidence at all compared to the overwhelming direct evidence that GHG affect climate).
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keithwlarson at 18:12 PM on 12 August 2019The History of Climate Science
As I am relatively new to this site, I was wondering if you could make it more transparent about the contribution of Eunice Foote, note comments 31 and 32. Sadly as someone interested in the history of climate science I have come across here contribution very late. How about mentioning her specifically in the above story?
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Eclectic at 13:23 PM on 12 August 2019Models are unreliable
Scaddenp @1148 ,
The Finn language is somewhat of an outlier from the mainstream European languages, so it may well be that an automated translation falls short of clarity. Still, the technical word "asymptotic" is hardly likely to be mis-translated.
Could it be that these two authors are holding on to the Climate Myth of CO2 "saturation" ?
It might explain some of their failure to understand the basic physics of GreenHouse Effect.
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scaddenp at 12:28 PM on 12 August 2019Models are unreliable
Looks to me like they made no serious attempt to understand the greenhouse effect or even radiative transfer and so in the familiar territory for deniers of attacking a strawman. They are either unaware or have ignored direct measurements of the radiative properties in the atmosphere.
"4) "[The] influence of increase of linear emission coefficient on radiation isn’t progressive but asymptotic." This is gibberish to me. "
Translation is tricky but I am guessing this some acknowledgement of logarithmic relation to CO2 concentration rather linear. In assuming that this is news to physicists, they are demonstating they dont understand it all.
I cant imagine any real physicist spending more than a few minutes looking at this before binning it. If you really want to disprove GHE theory, then your replacement theory has to reproduce the spectra of radiation measured both at top of atmosphere looking down and at the surface looking up as GHG concentrations in the atmoshere change. Current theory matches the observations with exquisite accuracy. (see papers in article here.) Or recent very direct measurement here.
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Rob Honeycutt at 08:45 AM on 12 August 2019Models are unreliable
Or, here with the following passage...
"Claim 1.5: Carbon dioxide in the atmosphere may increase the thermodynamic mean temperature of the ground by 2.1-4.1°C
According to the claim 1.5 increase of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere causes progressive increase of the global mean temperature of the lower atmosphere (the hockey stick theory). The hockey stick theory proves unfathomable ignorance on radiative heat transfer because influence of increase of linear emission coefficient on radiation isn’t progressive but asymptotic."
Again, maybe it's just the translation but this comes off as word salad.
1) What's the point of continually repeating the phrase "thermodynamic temperature"? Ironically, they state on page 8, "It is undisputable that increase of the thermodynamic mean temperature of the ground (hence forward the Temperature)..." but then continue to use the full phrasing another 30 times over the following 85 pages. In fact, their only use of the term "thermodynamic" comes when they use the full phrase "thermodynamic mean temperature." It's just weird.
2) 2.1-4.1°C isn't "ground temperature" it's surface temperature. Yes, there's a difference because surface includes sea and land, but "ground" would only refer to land. But maybe that's a translation issue.
3) The hockey stick isn't the same as greenhouse gas theory. The hockey stick is merely a graph of the past 1000+ years of global temperature.
4) "[The] influence of increase of linear emission coefficient on radiation isn’t progressive but asymptotic." This is gibberish to me.
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Rob Honeycutt at 08:25 AM on 12 August 2019Models are unreliable
onhannoita... I'm sure climate scientists everywhere get submissions from all sorts of cranks claiming almost everything under the sun. Most are going to straight to the cylindrical filing cabinet (aka, trash can).
Here's one that should be fairly straight-forward: water vapor.
"Claim 1.4: Water vapor is not a greenhouse gas
The claim 1.4 proves unfathomable ignorance on radiative heat transfer of the thousands of authors of IPCC’s assessment reports. Even though water vapor differs from all other gases of the atmosphere by its thermostatic properties it is by far the “strongest greenhouse gas” of the atmosphere. In the lower atmosphere, mean linear emission coefficient of water vapor is about 27 times the linear emission coefficient of carbon dioxide.
Water is not only by far the “strongest greenhouse gas” but also by far the strongest “greenhouse liquid” and “greenhouse solid”. In the lower atmosphere, sum of the linear emission coefficients of water droplets and particles is at least as large as the linear emission coefficient of water vapor. Everybody knows that during cool nights, when linear emission coefficient of water vapor is small, air temperature may vary up to 10 oC, depending on cloudiness. Because the existing data is deficient, in the calculations of Appendix 4, the Authors have applied minimum realistic estimate of 1 m2/mole for the mean molar emission area of liquid and solid water. Even with this minimum value, water in its three entities dominates fully thermal and solar radiation to the ground and thus the thermodynamic mean temperature of the ground."
As far as I can tell, this is borderline word salad. I mean, "greenhouse liquid" and "greenhouse solid"? It's not even clear to me what they're claiming. Are the claiming the IPCC doesn't consider WV a greenhouse gas? (Which would clearly be wrong.)
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nigelj at 08:04 AM on 12 August 20192019 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #32
Regarding the conversion of grasslands to forests, and how much area of grasslands could be converted to forests.
Grasslands are already being converted to forests in places like Brazil here. ironically perhaps. Forests are also naturally replacing grasslands in some places here.Research paper on the conversion of grassland to acacia forest as an effective option for net reduction in greenhouse gas emissions here.
It's difficult to get an idea of how many grasslands could be converted to forests, but its clearly significant in area. But does it make sense? It's a form of natural geoengineering, that will probably have unintended consequences (as in the Brazil example). However taking land originally in forests and converted to grasslands back to forestry looks sustainable.
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nigelj at 07:28 AM on 12 August 2019The consensus on consensus messaging
I think we all need to push hard to try to get the consensus studies mentioned more in the daily newspaper media and the like. The media might resist this, because it suggests the scientific debate is really largely over, and the media prefer to keep controversies going because it gets people buying their product, but try anyway.
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nigelj at 07:14 AM on 12 August 20192019 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #32
RedBaron @4
"Both views ignore the system most efficient at both feeding people, feeding wildlife and sequestering carbon.....Cows, Carbon and Climate"
I don't think I ignored the issue. I mentioned that grasslands cattle farming has some potential to sequester more soil carbon. I sincerely believe it does, just that I don't expect miracles.
The problem is cattle farming is not efficient in terms of resource use and food production, because it requires a huge voume of plants to produce a small volume of meat. However as others point out, a lot of land is only really suitable for cattle grazing. I dont have time to research exactly how much so I'm taking them at their word.
I therefore think my numbers of reducing grasslands cattle farming (including dairy farming) by 25% are probably ball park feasible. It looks plausible that people would reduce meat consumption about 25%, particularly red meat, based on trends were are already seeing especially in younger people, and noting OPOF's numbers on the issue. At a guess, or first appromimation, it looks like about 25% of grasslands might be potentially convertible to forests; clearly there are limits as others have pointed out.
This creates a large continent sized area of land for forests or other land uses, and still leaves vast grasslands that could sequester more carbon. We can have things both ways.
Grasslands might also suit fast growing grasses for a BECCS type of application, however there are many valid criticisms of BECCS.
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MA Rodger at 06:38 AM on 12 August 2019Models are unreliable
The article linked @1143 runs to ninety-three pages and is the work of a couple of rather old Mechanical Engineering Professors, Pertti Sarkomaa & Seppo Ruotu (whose surname translates as 'Swedish'). Their work in thermodynamics explains their easy use of maths.
At first glance, their modelling does not appear to address the mechanisms of AGW so if they conclude that increased CO2 is not an agent of warming, that would be no surprise. The article is not well presented with presumably some of the problem resulting from language difficulties.
An account of their work more easily understood is presented in a blog on the site that holds the up-load of the article linked @1143. (Its comment thread may be worth examining.) Of course, the blog-page is in Finnish but that is no great barrier in this day & age. The blog runs to 700 words, not an impossible length for an SkS thread. A translation of it runs:-
Professors: The IPCC Climate Hysteria is a religion without logic
Professors Pertti Sarkomaa (Professor of Heat and Flow Technology and Combustion Engineering) and Seppo Ruottu (Professor Emeritus of Technical Thermodynamics) approached the Rural Media and sent their thoughts on the IPCC report, the IPCC Climate Hysteria. In their view, the IPCC's climate change projections are based on completely erroneous calculations.
IPCC calculations are based on climate models
The calculations in the IPCC monitoring reports are based on climate models that use heuristic parameters such as radiation constraint, cloud feedback, and climate sensitivity that have no physical equivalent or objectively correct value and are not known, required, or permitted by the exact laws of flow and thermal dynamics. The use of said heuristic quantities in climate models is in itself a fatal mistake and indicates that their users do not understand flow and thermal dynamics.
The meteorological scientific community recognizes that, despite decades of research, there is no certainty about the hallmark of cloud feedback. Every common sense person understands that even if the sign of a key parameter of a mathematical model is unknown, the results produced by the model are incorrect. Because cloud feedback is a heuristic that has no physical equivalent, there is no objectively correct value that can be determined. The decades-long study of Cloud Feedback is the most incomprehensible blunder in modern science.
Positive cloud feedback values have been used in the calculations accepted by the IPCC so that a staggering increase in carbon dioxide concentration from 300 ppm to 600 ppm, which would not actually occur, would increase the global mean global equilibrium temperature generated by the calculations by 2-5 ℃. Meteorologists call this change in temperature sensitive to climate sensitivity.
With positive cloud returns from calculations approved by the IPCC, the sensitivity of the climate is two to five times the warming of the lower atmosphere caused by the actual increase in atmospheric carbon dioxide from 280 ppm to the present 410 ppm. So climate sensitivity depends entirely on the cloud response you choose.
It follows from Planck's Law and the equation for spectral radiance that the effect of increasing atmospheric carbon dioxide on global temperatures is asymptotic, not progressive. If the atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration were to increase by the next 130 ppm, the effect of the increase on global average temperatures would be smaller than the increase that had already occurred. The climate sensitivity of the IPCC calculations is completely unrealistic.
Clouds are known to reduce the average solar energy flux on the Earth's surface by about 100 W / m2, so negative calculations should have been used instead of positives in calculations approved by the IPCC. Thus, the IPCC's climate change projections are based on completely erroneous calculations. When the effect of carbon dioxide on global average temperatures is calculated in accordance with the laws of flow and thermal dynamics, the effect is found to be insignificant.
We have provided our calculations to leading Finnish meteorological experts and asked them to prove their potential errors. No errors have been addressed. Nonetheless, the meteorologists who have committed themselves to the IPCC claim are categorically dogmatic, ”say Finnish professors Pertti Sarkomaa and Seppo Ruottu.
Carbon dioxide has no effect on global warming
The climate has changed during the Earth's existence and in the future. It is affected by a plurality of randomly variable quantities with their mutual random interconnections.
According to our research, the effect of atmospheric carbon dioxide on surface and ground-level temperature is insignificant, even if the atmospheric carbon dioxide content doubles compared to the present one. The change would be only a few hundredths of a degree Celsius.
According to our understanding, e.g. The IPCC climate models that underlie the Paris Climate Convention and the climate projections and key measures to "save the world" derived from them are both erroneous and illogical.
The efforts of the IPCC to minimize carbon in the natural cycle and the atmosphere and to switch from fossil fuels to electricity and mechanical energy generation to biofuels will lead to a reduction in energy and food production and biodiversity. Long-term adherence to the IPCC's aspirations and recommendations will lead to mankind's disaster as fossil fuels run out over the next 100 years.
Therefore, the remaining fossil fuels should be used in such a way that, when depleted, the Earth's carbon cycle, which sustains life in the world, produces the greatest amount of biodiversity-compatible biomass.
In Lappeenranta 03.08.2019, Best regards. Pertti Sarkomaa Seppo Ruottu - Professori, TKT.
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Gingerbaker at 06:06 AM on 12 August 20192019 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #32
The vast majority of American grasslands which are used to graze beef cattle can not be used for anything else, they are too arid, and indeed face desertification by next century. You can not put new forests on them or grow crops there. But you raise beef to 2/3rds to 3/4's of their final weight there, on nothing but grass and rainfall. That is as efficient as agriculture gets.
Meanwhile, in the US, crop ag generates more GHG emissions than the entire livestock industry (which produces a ton of products besides milk and meat). 90% of crop ag is wastage, and a lot of that 'waste' becomes livestock feed. Globally, 86% of what a cow eats in unsuitable for human consumption, and that figure is almost certainly higher in the US.
So, depending on where you live, not eating meat may actually increase your carbon footprint. And the fact remains that meat is likely NOT the issue - the 80%+ of US GHG emissions and ~80% of global emissions are from fossil fuel burning, not livestock.
In any case, livestock ain't going away. But ICE engines and furnaces sure can.
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onhannoita at 05:30 AM on 12 August 2019Models are unreliable
^ Yep, I know the normal approach in scientific research, peer reviews etc. According to the authors the article has been sent to some well-known climate scientists in Finland but authors have not yet received any response. Will wait and see what happens. The reason to post article here was just to get some comments from readers who understand physical theories presented in article when debunking IPCC claims better than me :-)
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Rob Honeycutt at 04:45 AM on 12 August 2019Models are unreliable
onhannoita... Wow. Two people with no published research in any climate area have disproven 150 years of scientific research?
I guess that's possible but certainly not very likely. It might be worth a few chuckles to go through their "analysis," if you can call it that.
Just an FYI: a real scientist who thought they'd found an error on any climate topic would write up their research and get it published in a prestigious journal, and then let the broader scientific community hack away at it.
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onhannoita at 04:05 AM on 12 August 2019Models are unreliable
The following article debunks IPCC claims and their climate models by using physics and math. Interesting but very scientific article. I'm not expert in physics and I would like to hear your comments about the subject.
Climate change and use of fossil fuels
www.maaseutumedia.fi/wp-content/uploads/2019/08/climate_change_and_use_of_fossil_fuels.pdf
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One Planet Only Forever at 01:36 AM on 12 August 20192019 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #32
Improving the sustainability of how meat is produced (and how feed for meat is produced) is possible and would be helpful to the future of humanity. And it would be helpful to correct the diets of the 'supposedly most advanced humans setting the example that others aspire to' would also be helpful (like those supposedly more advanced humans setting the example of lower energy consumption, with all their consumed energy being sustainably sourced renewable energy, as the example for all others to aspire to)
There is already a robust, but still improving, understanding of protein needs of humans and the impacts of that human activity (like there is regarding human activity related to climate science).
There are many references for that understanding, but my internet search engine fairly responsibly put this Harvard School of Public Health item near the top of my search "The Nutrition Source -> What Should I Eat -> Protein"
The item states the following summary of research into health related to different sources of protein (about what you are eating along with the protein in the food item you consume) "...eating healthy protein sources like beans, nuts, fish, or poultry in place of red meat and processed meat can lower the risk of several diseases and premature death."
However a major point in the article is that 2 - 4 oz servings of meat provide more than the daily protein for most people (and that is excluding protein obtained from other consumed foods). And other research indicates that eating more than 4 oz of meat in a meal is a waste since a body will only process the protein from 4 oz in a meal. So a significant reduction of meat consumption can be achieved by people limiting their per-meal and total-daily meat consumption to amounts that their body will actually use, further reduced by accounting for the protein they get from other foods they eat like the beans in a chili mix.
Also note that Nuts grow on Trees - leads to thoughts of forests. However, being able to sustain tree growth of food is a function of climate. The current amount of tree based food production in California required an unsustainable over-consumption of water during the recent string of years with low rainfall in summer and low recharge of aquifers. Unlike annual crops that can be allowed to suffer in a severe drought and replanted the next year, trees must be kept alive. And a large amount of aquifer water has been needed to keep the California trees alive through the past several years.
The understanding of the required corrections is well established. The main thing keeping the corrections from being implemented is the power of correction resistant people, people who have developed unsustainable perceptions of success and status in the status quo system and can promote them, and fight against their correction, through the mechanisms explained by Edward S. Herman's Propaganda Model. The type of leadership that recently won power in Brazil, and how they did it, and the termination of the director of the National Institute for Space Research in Brazil for exposing that the New Government policies had resulted in increased Rain Forest cutting (mainly cut to expand beef production), is an example of that damaging power of harmfully correction resistant people.
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RedBaron at 22:10 PM on 11 August 20192019 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #32
Both views ignore the system most efficient at both feeding people, feeding wildlife and sequestering carbon.
“Land can’t, at the same time, feed people, and grow trees to be burned for bioenergy, and store carbon,” Stabinsky said.
This quote is true, but it is because fundamentally they are attempting it with the wrong biome. There is clearly no concept of ecosystem services are supply by which.
While you can't do what Stabinsky said, you could use a far more efficient and productive biome (grasslands) to do all that and even more.
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BaerbelW at 17:25 PM on 11 August 2019The consensus on consensus messaging
Loz73 @10
In Germany, Austria and Switzerland we have Scientists for Future (S4F) who do exactly what you'd like to see in Australia: it started as an organised effort to collect signatures for a statement in support of the Fridays for Future (FfF) movement, corroborating their demands. They managed to get 26,800 signatures within a couple of weeks from a wide variety of scientists and have been visible and vocal in the regular strikes and other activities organised by FfF. They also held a big press conference (in German) to publish their statement which in turn got a lot of press. Currently, S4F helps FfF - if asked - with material for presentations or provides speakers at strikes and other events - it's an impressive if still fledgling effort. Please feel free to touch base via our contact form if you'd like to know more (I'm involved with S4F in Germany).
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nigelj at 11:57 AM on 11 August 20192019 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #32
Michael Sweet @2
Good point about cattle feed. I didn't think of that, because we dont rely as much on cattle feed as much some countries. Therefore reducing cattle grazed lands would indeed create a lot of space for forests, in theory.
I'm not so pessimistic about lower meat consumption. Granted most people do prefer a high meat diet, yet in fact several countries have declining meat consumption as below:
worldpreservationfoundation.org/business/meat-in-decline/
theconversation.com/meat-consumption-is-changing-but-its-not-because-of-vegans-112332
Of course there are likely to be limits as to how much people would reduce meat consumption. Lets assume meat consumption could be cut 25% globally, (more in rich countries less in poorer countries), which seems like a plausible number, then according to data on land use that would free up approx 12 million kms2 for forests, all other things being equal. That is approximately the area of Canada which is huge, and would make something like BECCS at large scale feasible and capable of sequestering a big chunk of carbon emissions. Of course it's all idealistic, but far from impossible.
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Loz73 at 10:45 AM on 11 August 2019The consensus on consensus messaging
In Australia the reason that, “Voters believe that there is no consensus about global warming with the scientific community” (Nigelj) is that no Australian scientist has ever persisted in telling them otherwise. As a retired biological scientist with 10 years of activism in BREAZE (Ballarat Renewable Energy & Zero Emissions) I am in a state of despair. Parts of Australia are in the worst drought in history; the Barrier Reef and the Murray Darling basin are in terminal decline; our Prime Minister fondled a lump of coal in parliament and told us not to be afraid; and neither of the main political parties opposed the giant Adani mine. Virulent attacks on young Swedish activist Greta Thunberg and school strikers here confirm how terrified those on the hard right of politics and media are of the youthful threat but they’re nowhere near terrified enough yet. As the life support systems of all creatures face extinction, though, comment by Australia’s climate scientists continues to be so subdued as to be ineffectual.
Scientists have one last chance of redemption. It doesn't involve the safe pathway of publishing ever more articles in prestigious journals to fine-tune what we already know. Instead, we are suggesting that climate scientist show leadership and join students to form an alliance that cannot be silenced. If we are to avoid the catastrophe of a 2 degree temperature rise we need activism on the scale of the Vietnam era protests, with kids in every school screaming for action and screaming for their parents to support it, and we need to have kids supported by loud and hard evidence from fearless scientists. Now is the time for action and hope. -
michael sweet at 10:22 AM on 11 August 20192019 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #32
Nigelj,
My understanding is that if people eat less meat that much less land needs to be in cultivation, not more as you suggest. Since less land is in cultivation and less is needed for grazing livestock more can be used for forrests or biofuels.
Currently much of agricultural production of plant type foods like corn and soybeans is fed to animals. If we eat the corn and soybeans instead much less food needs to be produced. You have to feed an animal about 10 pounds of food to get one pound of meat. If you eat the feed you need less farm production because you directly eat the plants the farm grows.
Unfortunately, most people prefer a high meat diet.
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One Planet Only Forever at 08:42 AM on 11 August 2019Can Land cause Climate Change? (new IPCC report)
The following 'Buisiness-Minded' way of thinking is a general problem that relates to the 'farming practices point' that william raises.
Return On Investment is desired. But discounting the future and having the ability to easily move wealth to other investment opportunities around the world leads to thinking that a good business opportunity is one where:
- the initial investment will be paid back within 3 years
- and the business will continue for about 10 years.
- Anything beyond 10 years is a bonus.
- And the business collapsing at 10 years is OK as long as there are ot end costs that cannot be minimized by things like bankrupcy protection that limit the loses. The money made can be invested in a new 'Best Investment Opportunity'.
The quest for those opportunities leads to the challenges that result in the industrial take-over of farmland that has no real future, but looks great on the balance sheet of today.
DIscounting the future combined with desires for maximum quickest personal gain is unsustainable and disaster creating.
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nigelj at 07:33 AM on 11 August 20192019 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #32
“Land can’t, at the same time, feed people, and grow trees to be burned for bioenergy, and store carbon,” Stabinsky said.
Yes, this is the essence of the problem, although there is one possibility for feeding people and growing more trees if we sacrifice livestock grazing lands. The area of the world in grasslands livestock farming is huge. The IPCC is encouraging a low meat diet because of the methane problem and that meat is an inefficient use of resources. Grasslands freed up could be used for a mixture of crops, forests and biofuels. A lot of this land would need to be in crops to replace reduced meat consumption, and for a growing population, and not all cattle farming is likely to be replaced, so use for forests still looks limited in potential.
This is a conundrum as well, because there is some evidence properly managed livestock grazing has the potential to store more soil carbon than presently. However things look to be heading towards lower meat consumption so less livestock grazing lands. What's left could still be better managed to conserve more soil carbon.
It's a complicated problem. It makes sense to stop deforestation and grow more trees, but the potential looks ultimately limited to using little bits of spare land, not continent sized BECCS plantations. One thing seems to be a given: Large areas of the planet will remain in crop lands, so we should look carefully at the potential of these to store more carbon using regenerative agriculture. It's there so use it.
Maybe there are other possibilities, or I'm not seeing it right?
Table of global land use data:
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william5331 at 06:21 AM on 11 August 2019Can Land cause Climate Change? (new IPCC report)
ps. When correct farming is practiced, carbon is sequestered in the soil and would you believe, the bottom line of the farmer improves.
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william5331 at 06:17 AM on 11 August 2019Can Land cause Climate Change? (new IPCC report)
Our effect on the climate due to our use of the land is apparently not new. If you read the book Plows, Plagues and Petroleum by Ruddiman he makes a very convincing case that we were delaying our slide into the next glacial period by our use of the land, including, significantly, the use of the plow as we vented sequestered carbon into the atmosphere.
Come forward and read the three books by David R Montgomety, Dirt, Growing a revolution and The Hidden Half of Nature.
The first describes what happens when a civilization treats her soil like dirt and how many hundreds of years it takes the soil to rebuild from the underlying bed rock when that civilization disappears.
The second describes his globe trotting trip to see the very few farmers in widely different soils, climates, political regimes and widely diffent sizes from small holdings to huge ranches, that have come up with a better way of farming. He describes how you can restore your soil in an amazing short three years by correct farming methods.
The third describes the inner working of a rich organic soil including the knowlege from recent research.
I have heard he is working on a fouth book in the series describing the food value of crops grown in rich organic soils vs sterile soils using chemical nutrients.
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Rob Honeycutt at 03:43 AM on 11 August 2019There is no consensus
"Well now we're getting back on topic. Is that your opinion, or do you have studies to back it? This thread refers to several studies that document a strong consensus that AGW EXISTS."
That's been the subject matter of all the studies listed in the OP here. But perhaps you different expectations of what defines a consensus.
Here's the way I think of it. Much of the human population doesn't have much of a grasp of what is going on with climate change. In the press this issue gets presented as a 50/50 possibility. Two sides arguing whether this is real or not. The point of all these research papers is merely to say, "Hello! Look here! Nearly all scientists agree this is real and that it presents a significant problem for our planet." I believe all of the 97% of working climate scientists out there would agree with that statement.
The Cook 2013 paper (noted in the OP) specifically tested the notion that AGW exists but would have minimal effects. That position was very low, inclusive of the 3% of studies.
If you're looking for something that specifically states how damaging AGW will be, I don't think you're going to find that. This is a question that (as Schneider states in that video) this is a systems problem with a wide range of potential outcomes based on both what we do and how the climate system responds.
As Yogi Berra said, "Predictions are hard, especially about the future."
I don't think there are many scientists who would disagree with the idea that this might not be as bad as we expect. They'd also tell you that a very low probability. There's an equally low probability that this will turn out much, much worse that expected, and that's a very scary possibility on par with nuclear armageddon. The mid-range higher probability outcomes are already very bad if we don't get emissions down quickly.
Scientists, as I understand it, are not concerned much about the consensus. They're out there grappling with issues like quantifying the pace of ice sheet melt in Antarctica.
It's real. It's bad. It's us. These are all accepted. The questions are: how bad? How fast is it happening? How quickly can we get to zero emissions?
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Rob Honeycutt at 03:09 AM on 11 August 2019There is no consensus
cstrouss...
"Now who is engaging in hyperbole? Are we digging everything we can out of the earth? And if so, who is proposing that we continue doing that? Is the collapse of civilization with continued CO2 emissions also part of the consensus? Documentation?"
In truth, no, I don't think this is hyperbole since it's firmly based in the realm of possibilities. Human's have an enormous capacity for accomplishments on massive scales. As a species, we have the collective nuclear weapony sufficient to end all life on this planet, possibly permanently (or at least for coming many millions of years). Likewise, oil companies have identified reserves sufficient, were it all burned, to raise the surface temp of this planet to levels that would collapse civilization. And they're continuing to locate more.
Will we nuke the planet? I hope not but it's not outside the realm of possibilities. In that, it's extremely important that nations of the world work together to manage this possibility.
Will we burn all those reserves? I also hope we won't do that, but it's even more likely than nuclear armageddon, specifically because there is a massive financial incentive for those oil companies to put their sources of energy on the market.
I'm a firm believer that the problem we face is a market failure: the failure to price the social costs of carbon emissions. If there were a price on carbon emissions then carbon-free sources of energy would be abundantly cheaper than carbon-based energy. There are a lot of very large companies and very wealthy, powerful people who prefer not to seen their sources of wealth conform to a levelized market. ...because they know they'll lose.
If you want documentation on the impacts of high CO2 levels, I'll have to do some additional reasearch. It seems pretty clear that nearly all the expected effects of high CO2 will negatively affect agriculture. Increased rain intensity. Increased droughts. Desertification. Increase in pest species. There's a lot of research on this and I've even read a bunch of it. It would just take some time to pull together relevant research. I'm sure there are a number of good articles written here on SkS on the topic.
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MA Rodger at 21:09 PM on 10 August 2019There is no consensus
cstrouss @813,
While off-topic, this question to you may prove a route to bringing this on-topic.
I note you mention repeatedly the "logaricmic nature of the greenhouse effect" which you see as a factor poorly considered in tackling AGW. "And I see no recognition of the logarithmic nature of the greenhouse effect, which makes the political problems almost insurmountable."
The logarithmic relationship between CO2 concentrations and the resulting climate forcing isn't usually seen as causing an "almost insurmountable" problem for AGW mitigation so perhaps you could explain.
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MA Rodger at 20:45 PM on 10 August 2019Models are unreliable
rupisnark @1138,
I'm not sure how helpful Christy's responses are other than to demonstrate again how error-prone Christy is.Up-thread I branded Christy's talk as error-filled and we do get Christy admitting to one error. In so doing he demonstrates a few more errors.
He admits the "atmosphere" units needed correcting. I assume this "atmosphere" concern the 750 million figure. (Note, this issue can now be retrieved from your long grass @1117 as I see Christy quotes the figure in GWPF Note 17 linked @1130.)
The "atmosphere" units are obviously in need of correction but the corrected units are not "joules" as Christy says. The units are 1 unit≈3.4 j/m2 globally. This is something understood back @1113 so this should come as no great revelation. And of course this 750 million units is a measure of the total thermal heat content of the atmosphere down to absolute zero, as assumed @1113. It is a rather silly comparison. Perhaps a better comparison would be a value of the atmosphere's changed heat content that would entirely stuff the climate for us, say an ice age of -6ºC globally (or AGW of +6ºC) which would require losing (or gaining) 20 million of Christy's units in the atmosphere.The 6 trillion figure appears solely within the talk transcript. "About £47 comes into this bank account (down at the surface). By the way, that account has about £6 trillion in it right now. So we’re talking about small numbers compared to the vast reservoir of these energies." The "£47 com(ing) in" is 47 x 3.4 = 160Wm^-2.
Up-thread @1119, I put this 6 trillion figure as being 80-times too big for the total ocean heat content (down to absolute zero). That 80-times estimate was in error. Totting it up again, perhaps it could be 0.6 trillion. But it is an absurd quantity to be wielding. The oceans, as oceans, have a lot less heat content before they freeze down to the sea bed and cease being oceans. Indeed almost half my estimated 0.6 trillion is the melt energy. And in a sensible comparison (ie the +/-6ºC one) the ice melt/freeze becomes even more the dominant factor, 0.002 trillion warming/cooling water & 0.004 or 0.008 trillion melting or freezing ice.What is more interesting than Christy's silly use of big big big numbers is Christy's description of 'the missed point'. Actually it has not been 'missed'. As set out up-thread, I am well aware of the point he is trying to make. His 0.5 units is small in comparison to the other numbers he chooses to wield as he wishes to diminish the importance of the 0.5 units..
But in this 'correction' his reply to you is riven with error. (He can't even get a correction correct!!)"The 0.5 is still very small compared to the fluctuations of the 100 units or so in the other flows of energy."
This is poorly written but does imply the "fluctuations" are "100 units or so" which is again absurd. And it is not what he says in either his talk or GWPF Note 17.
"...we have hundreds of units going back and forth, and varying by much more than half a unit over time. In other words, evaporation might be 24 one month, but it might be 26 the next. Radiation from the surface might be 105, or it could be 102. So now you see that 0.5 of a unit is almost in the noise level of what happens."
The constant 0.5 imbalance is "almost" (Christy also says "much more" which is a poor description - "more" yes, "much more" no.) the same size as the occasional fluctuations, his examples being monthly wobbles of +/-1.0 & +/-1.5. Christy is wrong with his comparison of the 0.5 with 100. He is also wrong to compare a constant effect with occasional wobbly ones.
And he is also wrong in stating "The 54 million joules is not being retained in the system each year as the critic implies."
I assume I am the critic and that the "54 million" originates @1113 which says:-"But 0.5 'units' would amount to 0.5 x 3.4 x 8766 x 3600 = 54 million j/sq m in a single year. It would take a bit of a fool to dismiss this as "small numbers", but then we are talking about John Christy."
Christy is wrong to say I "imply" the retention of the 0.5 units flux. It is Christy's diagrams that imply it. Yet in both his talk and GWPF Note 17 Christy even manages to deny that any of this 0.5 unit is retained. "Note that the surface is in balance too, with the number of incoming units equal to the number outgoing." Of this 0.5 units (1.7Wm^-2) of climate forcing, the imbalance is 0.2 units (0.7Wm^-2 = 22Mjm^-2/yr) and this flux is "retained" energy. The source Christy uses to get his numbers ("Values per AR5 Fig. 2.11") makes the existence of that 0.2 units (0.7Wm^-2 = 22Mjm^-2/yr) quite plain, at least plain to the whole world but not to John Christy who appears to inhabit a different planet.
So a sensible comparison of that 0.2 units of global imbalance (or 22 million jm^-2/year) would be a comparison with the climate-busting AGW of +6ºC. That would require perhaps 68 million jm^-2 (3 years' worth) to warm the atmosphere and perhaps 20,000 million jm^-2 (a thousand years' worth) to warm the oceans and melt the global ice.
Taking the current rate of AGW (0.019ºC/yr) as being the product of the 0.2 units of global energy imbalance and we are 300 years away from +6ºC of climate-busting AGW, or should that be 250 years as we have managed +1ºC already. -
Eclectic at 20:08 PM on 10 August 2019There is no consensus
Cstrouss ,
I also have a 20-year-old car. That's not a rare state of affairs.
But I do not have the anger issues which you are displaying. If you wish to go further in discussing the range of topics you are raising, then please [in accordance with SkS site posting rules] take each separate aspect to its own appropriate thread.
The posting rules exist precisely for this purpose — to prevent every thread becoming a chaos of churning unresolving random shoot-em-ups by those without the mental discipline to clearly think through the individual aspects (which make up the "whole").
But you may find that the Moderators give short shrift to those whose "shotgun pellets" land in a handful of threads simultaneously. So please draw up your own mental list of matters which trouble or anger you — and select the most important one, and post that. Once that one has had a reasonable airing [resolved to general satisfaction; or put aside as "agreeing to differ"] then move on to your "second priority" aspect . . . and so on.
Clear thinking, without the obfuscations & rhetorical deceits & uninsightful semantic confusions . . . is more likely to bring you the satisfaction you are requiring. Yes, there is the risk that you might find you have to change your current "beliefs" — but I would like to imagine you have the courage to put your intellect ahead of your ego.
"Motivated Reasoning" is a danger to all of us . . . don't you think?
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cstrouss at 17:23 PM on 10 August 2019There is no consensus
Eclectic wrote:
>>> the scientific consensus is about the science, not the political response required. <<<
Yes, and I'm trying to keep that distinction clear. The consensus is that there is a problem. And given the inherently geo-political nature of the problem, I have not yet seen a workable solution proposed, let alone any wide consensus on it. In fact I very rarely see mention of the logarithmic nature of the problem, which is what makes it so intractable.
Is there another forum where those issues are discussed?
>>> ... the facts indicate that it would be foolish to delay the conversion to a renewables-based economy. Is there any other conclusion to be drawn from the consensus? <<<
Well again we have to be clear on what the consensus is. This thread is about documenting and quanitfying the consensus that AGW exists, not about its scope or the urgency of solutions. Some have asserted in the last few comments that the consensus is that the latest IPCC report is correct, which is a step in that direction, but there is no evidence presented for that or how wide the consensus may be.
>>> Cstrouss, if you have a point to make then please make it clearly and simply (and on another, more appropriate thread). <<<
I agree, my question has been answered... the consensus is that AGW exists, as indicated in the formal proposition in the header, and consistent with my other reading. I'm not the one continuing the discussion into separate issues, like the severity, urgency, and strategies.
I wrote:
"...That the AGW hypothesis is true... Or that there it is a catastrophic situation and humans must immediately... <<<
Rob Honeycutt responded:
>>> Why is this an either/or question? Can they not both be true? <<<
They can both be true, but are they both the consensus? If the consensus includes the latter, could you present evidence of that?
>>> What you're doing, though, is running off into hyperbole... <<<
Yes, guilty, that one thing was a bit overboard. My point is that what is being proposed are some very radical solutions with no real return, unless you go with the idea that if the USA spends a great deal of money, the rest of the world, including much poorer and rapidly developing regions will follow. (I heard Sanders say something along those lines the other day.)
But of course that gets far outside the domain of climate science. It is a matter for political science and psychology, and necessarily involves a tremendous amount of speculation.
>>> Therein lay the problem. Yes, if we continue to burn everything we can get dig out of the earth, most scientists will likely agree that would probably mean a total collapse of modern civilization. Lots of death, destruction and suffering. <<<
Now who is engaging in hyperbole? Are we digging everything we can out of the earth? And if so, who is proposing that we continue doing that? Is the collapse of civilization with continued CO2 emissions also part of the consensus? Documentation?
>>> Can we avoid that? Yes, of course. We are going to see significant challenges and costs due to our emissions so far. We are already seeing very good signs of progress with the cost of wind and solar continuing to fall. But there are so many more challenges we're going to see. <<<
Again, we agree on that. I think it is great for wealthy people in wealthy nations to voluntarily adopt more expensive alternative forms of energy. In fact all of my super affluent friends are already making great strides, except for their regular jet travel.
And no doubt progress is being made on the technology, and the small-scale interim deployments have been helping to refine the tech. I have two good friends who have been working as engineers on photovoltaic systems for at least 25 years. They tell me we can expect a lot of changes in the next 20 years.The issue is what to do with the less affluent population. Will I be left behind? And even though I'm in the lower end of income in the USA, I'm still in the upper end in the world. I can barely afford one tank of gas per month in my 20 year old compact car now.
I know that places where large numbers of people are rising out of dire poverty for the first time, like areas in Asia and Africa, are on the ragged edge of affording energy in the first place. Even when alternatives are CLOSE to fossil fuel costs, that is a luxury they will not be able to afford. I'm sure you're aware of studies that show people will only sacrifice to improve their natural environment after a certain level of affluence is attained.
I'm sure you'll agree that it will not address the problem if the richest 20% reduce their emissions by 50%, when a billion or two people are increasing their consumption a great deal from virtually zero. So any attempts to force those nations and people to reduce (instead of increase) their use of fossil fuels will only happen if those rich nations are willing to foot the bill for alternative electrification. Certainly it is technically feasible, and would make a lot of sense, since distributed solar is a more efficient way of building rural electrical systems than power plants and long wired grids, but I have not heard this level of financial assistance being proposed.
>>> Nothing I'm saying here is controversial, and I believe this would all fall within the definition of the "scientific consensus on AGW." <<<
Well now we're getting back on topic. Is that your opinion, or do you have studies to back it? This thread refers to several studies that document a strong consensus that AGW EXISTS. I have not scoured the whole thing, but I have not seen any evidence to quantify the consensus for stronger propositions. Certainly that would have to be considerably less than the approximately 97% which apparently accept the minimalist proposition.
>>> Here's what should give you the most concern about all this: thermal inertia.... Best case scenario says we'll be able to bring emissions to zero by ~2050. That means continued warming through 2080 at a minimum. <<<
Yes yes, I understand that. But I have not heard any suggestions on how global emissions could realistically go to zero by 2050.
michael sweet wrote:
>> It is too bad that you canot afford future electric cars. According to this white paper put out by BNP Paribas (the eighth largest bank in the world) between 2020 and 2022 electric cars using renewable energy (wind and solar) will be by far the cheapest cars. You will be spending more to pollute the air for the rest of us. <<<
Wow, I'm really sorry I'm so poor I have to inconvenience rich people who can afford new cars. Thank you for the compassion and understanding for those less fortunate than yourself. And by the way, any solutions that do not address the issues of the less affluent masses will never happen.
By the time a 2020 electric car is affordable for people like me who need simple, reliable 20 year old cars, I'll be dead. Also, given battery life issues, it isn't clear whether any 2020 models will still be serviceable when they are 20 years old.
>>>... You show your true colors when you call Greta Thunberg an actor. <<<
I tried to research her. Certainly her parents and grandfather are in show biz. I couldn't find much else about her, but I'm going to assume she is not a published climate scientist who did original research. She seems to be repeating what others have told her... in other words, a celebrity spokesperson, and not a source.
Rob Honeycutt wrote:
>>> This is a genuinely bizarre statement: "Most of the IPCC signatories don't even agree with the entire report. So the IPCC report is not the consensus."... I'm very curious where you picked that up. <<<
Yeah, me too... I can't find it again now. I have seen interviews with signatories who were critical of how the process was segmented, and who very displeased with how the politicians tacked on a "summary for policymakers" that did not follow from the scientific parts of the report.
And I've read letters from other sigantories who have clarified that they do not agree with all of the conclusions, which of course is inevitable, as you won't ever get 2500 people to agree with everything in a long document, or even 97% of them.
But since I can't find my references at the moment, I'll retract it unless and until I can document it. Meanwhile, I think the burden of proof is on those who assert that the IPCC report does represent a community-wide consensus.
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Rob Honeycutt at 14:56 PM on 10 August 2019There is no consensus
This is a genuinely bizarre statement: "Most of the IPCC signatories don't even agree with the entire report. So the IPCC report is not the consensus."
I'm very curious where you picked that up.
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michael sweet at 10:59 AM on 10 August 2019There is no consensus
Cstrouss,
It is too bad that you canot afford future electric cars. According to this white paper put out by BNP Paribas (the eighth largest bank in the world) between 2020 and 2022 electric cars using renewable energy (wind and solar) will be by far the cheapest cars. You will be spending more to pollute the air for the rest of us.
You show your true colors when you call Greta Thunberg an actor.
I can see where you are going. Unfortunately, I do not have time for you today. Good luck.
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Rob Honeycutt at 09:42 AM on 10 August 2019There is no consensus
You know, I bet you might find this short video compelling.
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Rob Honeycutt at 09:21 AM on 10 August 2019There is no consensus
cstrouss...
"That the AGW hypothesis is true and it will have increasing implications on global weather patterns? Or that there it is a catastrophic situation and human must immediately and completely restructure our social and economic systems if the species is to survive?
Why is this an either/or question? Can they not both be true?
Think of climate change impacts as a sliding scale that vary based on our total emissions. Within a reasonable range of uncertainty, probably the best understood elements of AGW are the basics of radiative forcing and the response in global mean temperature. The concensus is that we'll likely see about 2.8°C of warming for each doubling of CO2 over preindustrial levels. I think almost every scientist working in the field would agree with that statement.
We also know for certain, the more we push the system, the more damage we're ultimately going to see. Again, that's not a controversial statement for scientists.
What you're doing, though, is running off into hyperbole. I don't think many scientists would agree that we must "...immediately and completely restructure our social and economic systems if the species is to survive." Our species is likely to survive whatever happens. We're extraordinarily adaptable. But, most of the natural world that we rely on to sustain 7+ billion people on the planet is not nearly as adaptable as we are.
Therein lay the problem. Yes, if we continue to burn everything we can get dig out of the earth, most scientists will likely agree that would probably mean a total collapse of modern civilization. Lots of death, destruction and suffering.
Can we avoid that? Yes, of course. We are going to see significant challenges and costs due to our emissions so far. We are already seeing very good signs of progress with the cost of wind and solar continuing to fall. But there are so many more challenges we're going to see.
Nothing I'm saying here is controversial, and I believe this would all fall within the definition of the "scientific consensus on AGW."
Here's what should give you the most concern about all this: thermal inertia.
I hope you agree that we are now seeing many of the impacts of climate change starting to emerge. Melting ice sheets, extreme weather events, heat waves, etc. Now, consider that there is a 30 year lag in the climate system since most of the heat goes into the world's oceans. That heat takes time to come into equilibrium with the land, ice and atmosphere. Thus the impacts we're seeing today are the result of where CO2 levels were some 30 years ago.
If we were to stop all carbon emissions tomorrow the planet would continue to warm through the middle of this century. If we're seeing impacts already you can bet your bottom dollar they're going to start getting a lot worse over the coming three decades. Best case scenario says we'll be able to bring emissions to zero by ~2050. That means continued warming through 2080 at a minimum.
Also consider that, in the past at 450ppmv CO2 levels, there were no ice sheets on this planet. The planet was too warm to sustain them. It'll take another 1000 years to melt them entirely, but we're talking about sea levels rising to up to 70m over the coming centuries. That's a completely different planet than we currently live on. No Florida at all. It's gone. LA, SF, NYC, Tokyo, and 100's of other cities. All under water.
It's not the end of our species but replacing entire cities ain't gonna be cheap. The better investment is to reduce our carbon emissions as quickly as we can and keep CO2 levels as low as we possibly can. That's an enormous task. It's one that needs to happen fast.
Again, none of this is controversial. Gore, DiCaprio and Thunberg are not scientists but they are doing their level best to help convey to the world what is overwhelmingly agreed in the scientific community.
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Eclectic at 09:18 AM on 10 August 2019There is no consensus
Cstrouss ,
the scientific consensus is about the science, not the political response required.
The so-called Green New Deal which might "radically transform" the U.S. economy (in less than 12 years?!?! ) . . . is mere fanciful hyperbole. Nor would it directly involve the other 95% of the world's population.
Cstrouss, you are using the GND as a strawman (straw-woman??). Please take a sensible look at the scientific facts — and the facts indicate that it would be foolish to delay the conversion to a renewables-based economy. Is there any other conclusion to be drawn from the consensus?
Cstrouss, if you have a point to make then please make it clearly and simply (and on another, more appropriate thread).
No need for straw.
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Eclectic at 09:02 AM on 10 August 2019Models are unreliable
Rupisnark , the presence (or absence) of a "gnat", does not somehow abolish the herd of rampaging elephants [melting ice, rising sea-levels, rising temperatures, ocean acidification].
To continue the metaphor — a policy of ignoring the elephants is exactly the policy which will result in the unnecessary death of millions (mainly the poor) and in unnecessary damage to our world economy.
Your rhetoric is seriously misplaced.
And the good Dr Christy is being disingenuous with his audience. His comments are akin to saying: "Oh, we humans have only changed the atmospheric composition by one part in 10,000 . . . such a tiny figure could surely, surely, surely never alter the climate, eh?"
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rupisnark at 05:21 AM on 10 August 2019Models are unreliable
Eclectic @ 1134
Given the way the climate models are constructed, if they are make incorrect predictions, then they are not necessarily reliable.When an editor of this blog pointed me to several sources and the first says:-
“That is to say, is the troposphere actually warming as expected? Unfortunately, the answer to this is much less cut and dry” and the third (the paper by Steven C Sherwood and Nidhi Nishant) says “...as shown in previous studies, tropospheric warming does not reach quite as high in the tropics and subtropics as predicted in typical models” then it is clear that this is more than a gnat.“ the gnat is simply a gnat…While all around you is a stampede of elephants “. If the climate change hypothesis is wrong and policies are followed that reduce global growth by >1% pa as is being proposed, it will cost millions of lives, so perhaps your analogy suggests that it is climate scientists stampeding people to cause (indirectly) millions of deaths?
Moderator Response:[DB] Sloganeering snipped.
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rupisnark at 05:16 AM on 10 August 2019Models are unreliable
MA Rodger @ 1129 and @1119
I asked Dr. Christy by email about the figures and he said: “ The units in the “atmosphere” are joules, not w/m^2. I had sent a correction … but it didn’t make the publication. “
”The 6 trillion is the number of joules in the ocean column below the surface.”
“However, the 0.5 is still very small compared to the fluctuations of the 100 units or so in the other flows of energy - the critic …misses the point. Indeed the response of the atmosphere (from measurements) indicates the atmosphere loses heat readily to space with … extra forcing. The 54 million joules is not being retained in the system each year as the critic implies.” -
cstrouss at 03:42 AM on 10 August 2019There is no consensus
Eclectic, I'm 100% in favor of conservation and a change-over to renewables as they become more economically feasible... more importantly I advocate serious investment in research to hasten that process. That is not an issue.
The issue is radical transformations that have been proposed like "the Green New Deal," which would have a devastating effect on low income people like myself, who will not be able to afford used electric vehicles for another decade or two. And it would have ZERO direct affect on AGW, given the logarithmic nature of the greenhouse affect and the number of people receiving electrification for the first time.
So I think it is important to view it as a long-term issue, that will necessarily involve innovation and mitigation of climate changes that cannot be avoided.
But as I said, that is all off-topic for this thread. This is about the consensus that AGW exists, not about the magnitude or solutions.
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Eclectic at 01:50 AM on 10 August 2019There is no consensus
Cstrouss , you give the strong impression you are not really interested in the climate science or the scientific consensus.
Are you interested in the consensus of the world's leading economists — which is that the cost of not taking action against AGW is far, far higher than the cost of phasing-in "renewables" to replace fossil-fuels.
It is grossly alarmist to represent that "renewables" change-over as the immediate and complete restructure of our social and economic systems . . . don't you think ?
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cstrouss at 01:20 AM on 10 August 2019There is no consensus
Michael: Seriously, you're pointing to a 16 year old Swedish actress as a source of information? Why not that kid from Titanic? He made a movie about climate, too.
I've actually answered my own question now, as I'm learning to use this site, and you got the consensus very wrong. The "advanced" tab gives the actual proposition: "Surveys of the peer-reviewed scientific literature and the opinions of experts consistently show a 97–98% consensus that humans are causing global warming."
Most of the IPCC signatories don't even agree with the entire report. So the IPCC report is not the consensus.Also, it's wrong to suggest that everyone who isn't a full bore alarmist is an oil industry shill. If it's all about bias, let's not forget that Gore became extremely wealthy with his "post-carbon" portfolio, but his profit motive does not invalidate his arguments.
As far as an indisputable expert who I think is reasonably unbiased and presents a non-alarmist position, my first thought would be to point to Cliff Mass at University of Washington.
So then there are deeper questions... What can realistically be done to slow or mitigate AGW, given the global political implications, the millions of people rising out of poverty, and the logarithmic nature of the greenhouse effect.. but that is not the topic for this thread.
The consensus being discussed in this thread is clear... AGW exists, which is a rather trivial conclusion... so I will search elsewhere on the site to see if anyone is diving into the more complicated and practical issues.
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One Planet Only Forever at 01:20 AM on 10 August 2019Can Land cause Climate Change? (new IPCC report)
"...we have to learn to protect our land from ourselves."
Humanity has to figure out how to correct the developed harmful aspects of systems and cultures to protect its future from the harmful results that can be expected to be produced by pursuits of status in competitions for popularity and profit.
It is cheaper and easier to act more harmfully and less sustainably for as long as it can be gotten away with.
All of the Sustainable Development Goals have been identified for Good Reason. They all need to be achieved and improved on, not just the corrections of land use and climate impacts.
And the 1987 UN report "Our Common Future" (a report that was the result of the continuation of global efforts to improve awareness and understanding of the requirements for the future of humanity that had produced the 1972 Stockholm Conference Report and continues with the IPCC and similar efforts to improve global understanding) accurately identified the reason Global Leadership (the winners of competitions for popularity and profit) fail to act in ways that would raise awareness of those goals and prioritize the achievement and improvement of those goals:
"25. Many present efforts to guard and maintain human progress, to meet human needs, and to realize human ambitions are simply unsustainable - in both the rich and poor nations. They draw too heavily, too quickly, on already overdrawn environmental resource accounts to be affordable far into the future without bankrupting those accounts. They may show profit on the balance sheets of our generation, but our children will inherit the losses. We borrow environmental capital from future generations with no intention or prospect of repaying. They may damn us for our spendthrift ways, but they can never collect on our debt to them. We act as we do because we can get away with it: future generations do not vote; they have no political or financial power; they cannot challenge our decisions.
26. But the results of the present profligacy are rapidly closing the options for future generations. Most of today's decision makers will be dead before the planet feels; the heavier effects of acid precipitation, global warming, ozone depletion, or widespread desertification and species loss. Most of the young voters of today will still be alive. In the Commission's hearings it was the young, those who have the most to lose, who were the harshest critics of the planet's present management."And the Propaganda Model presented by Edward S. Herman and Noam Chomsky in 1988 in the book "Manufacturing Consent" explains how harmful resistance to correction can be expected to fight to Defend undeserved Winning of Status.
The real problem is the undeserving among the wealthy and powerful and the way that Good people among the wealthy and powerful have been struggling to get support to correct their harmful Peers. Those helpful ones among the Winners struggle to win popularity contests because of the mechanisms identified by the Propaganda Model. They also struggle because as Jonathan Haidt has identified in "The Righteous Mind", many people will allow Interests Other than the fundamental ethical/moral value of 'Helping Others / Not Harming Others' to compromise how they evaluate the merit or value of actions. Many people will say they like actions to reduce climate impact but will still allow Other Interests to lead them to choose to vote for leaders who have a history of resisting such corrective actions.
The aspects of the story-telling systems that are influenced by, or harmfully governed by, interests that are contrary to achieving and improving on the SDGs are the reason so many people have inadequate and incorrect awareness and understanding of what is actually going on, and why many people who do understand what is going on become supporting players in the status quo systems contrary to the understood corrections required for the benefit of the future of humanity.
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michael sweet at 22:16 PM on 9 August 2019There is no consensus
Cstrouss;
There are different measures of the consensus but Cook et al used the IPCC reports. Since these are scientific reports that have been accepted line by line by all nations in the world they are a god pace to start. Many people feel that they are too conservative but deniers say scientists are all alarmists.
The most recent IPCC report says that we have only 12 years from January 1, 2018 to reduce emissions to zero if we want to limit waring to 1.5C. For that we have a 66% chance of keeping warming less than 1.5C. Already we have severe heat waves: over 75,000 hospitalized in Japan alone. Half of the Great Barrior reef is dead. Unprecedented floods in the US this year have seriously lowered food production. If we succeed, little action has been taken as yet, we still have a 33% chance of greater than 1.5C.
10 years ago I wondered if I would see the effects of climate change in my lifetime (I am currently 60). Now we see terrible floods and heatwaves. Houses and towns are flooded by record rainfall and affected by sea level rise. Many migrants coming to the US are fleeing AGW caused drought. Gore underestimated the problems in his movie. The changes currently at 1C are dramatic. How bad do they have to get before you become concerned?
Watch some of Greta Thunbergs talks on line. She speaks clearly about the science and does not pull punches. As she says, this is an emergency and shoud be treated as such.
Your suggestion that there are two sides is inaccurate. One side is what people who have studied climate for 100 years have learned and the other is what fossil fuel executives tell you. One side only cares about what will happen to their chilldren and the other only cares about their bonus this quarter. Who do you trust?
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cstrouss at 21:44 PM on 9 August 2019There is no consensus
Please forgive me if this sub-issue has been covered already... I read the first few pages where it was being discussed without resolution, and in the last few pages it is not mentioned.
But what exactly is "the consensus"? That the AGW hypothesis is true and it will have increasing implications on global weather patterns? Or that there it is a catastrophic situation and human must immediately and completely restructure our social and economic systems if the species is to survive?
In some of the arguments I've read so far, the believers seemed to be defending the former, and the skeptics were challenging the latter.
In the previous post (sorry, I don't know how to do that thing that references it yet) Eclectic seemed to criticize anti-AGW propaganda films masquerading as information, yet the same critiques could be made of the propaganda films from the other side, like Gore and DiCapprio's popular films, full of dramatic music and hyperbole.
I find it surprising that any intelligent and well meaning people still take the position that AGW is a complete hoax, but there is certainly a huge space for reasonable debate on the costs and risks of various strategies to reduce it or mitigate the damage.
Furthermore, I suggest it is the fact that so many people are taking a rather extreme alarmist position (if we don't do something radical in the next xyz years, we're doomed!) that make many other people rebel, and say obviously that's ridiculous, I think you're making the whole thing up.
It really is a thorny problem, considering the vast number of people now coming out of poverty, and having access to electricity and other technologies for the first time. And I see no recognition of the logarithmic nature of the greenhouse effect, which makes the political problems almost insurmountable.
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