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Comments 102451 to 102500:

  1. Miriam O'Brien (Sou) at 17:09 PM on 3 December 2010
    The human fingerprint in the seasons
    Not at all, Albatross :) BTW, with regard to water vapour. Some of what goes up must come down. Water comes down more quickly than CO2. And where I live we've been getting a whole heap of it coming down - unseasonally so and in unusual torrents and record breaking amounts. This follows a record long and hot drought. All this weird weather signals a changing climate.
  2. Stratospheric Cooling and Tropospheric Warming
    where can i find a long term graph of the troposphere temperatures and data showing that its temperature increase is correlated with increased CO2 in the atmosphere? the following link doesn't show it so there must be some other data that is validating this thesis. and by the way, i enjoyed this post, well done.
  3. The human fingerprint in the seasons
    Sout @9, You are quite right. Hope you don’t mind if I elaborate a bit on what you said. We are increasing CO2 (a GHG), as a result the planet is experiencing a net energy imbalance (e.g., Murphy et al.2009) which is causing warming of the oceans and atmosphere. Warming of oceans is increasing WV in the atmosphere (e.g., Dessler et al. 2010), and the air can hold more WV as it warms, one result is an acceleration of the hydrological cycle (e.g., Syed et al. 2010). Another result is that higher WV (a powerful GHG) is causing a positive feedback which is further enhancing the warming that we humans have kicked off. To summarize: From Braganza et al. (2004): “ Observed linear trends over 1950–1999 in all the indices except the hemispheric temperature contrast are significantly larger than simulated changes due to internal variability or natural (solar and volcanic aerosol) forcings and are consistent with simulated changes due to anthropogenic (greenhouse gas and sulfate aerosol) forcing.” And “It is found that anthropogenic forcing accounts for almost all of the observed changes in surface temperature during 1946–1995”. From Dessler et al. (2010): “All of the other reanalyses show that decadal warming is accompanied by increases in mid and upper tropospheric specific humidity.” Anyway, sadly the point of this post has clearly been lost on some readers. Did they even read the post and references therein? John Cook and Braganza et al. 2003, 2004 have laid out their reasoning very clearly and this final sentence of John’s post sums things up: “All these pieces of evidence paint a consistent picture - greenhouse gases, not the sun, are driving global warming” Now do any of the resident “skeptics” take issue with that statement? I think not, they would rather argue this WV strawman that they have created.
  4. The human fingerprint in the seasons
    I'm Glad to hear that both John and HR acknowledge that water vapor is a positive feedback though. It is good to see when individuals who are skeptical join the scientific consensus.
  5. The human fingerprint in the seasons
    Couple Questions for John and HR, Is the theory that a solar (For example) perturbation is what is causing the initial temperature increase which then results in a positive feedback from water vapor causing the GHG signature to be present in the post 1975 warming? I don't buy it. I think this graph is very good because it shows that initially summers were warming quicker than winters and that as the effect of CO2 increased so did the rate of winter warming when compared to summer. That makes sense based upon what we already know which is that the early warming of the 20th century was solar induced mostly (I say oceans too but I digress) but that the late century warmth has a large anthropogenic component. What we have is a theory, early warming natural, late warming anthropogenic which we can then compare to the data, summers warm more than winters early, winters warm more than summers late. We also know that with increasing CO2 it was predicted that winters warm more than summers. For me its a pretty strong case. There's not really a need to always choose the 2nd or 3rd best theory when the evidence suggests theory #1 is well substantiated. Secondly I ask, wouldn't the initial solar warming being most prominent in summer counteract much of the winter warming caused by your GHG feedback?
  6. Renewable Baseload Energy
    muoncounter, I would have to say that retail electric cost isnt entirely correlated to generation cost, especially with the layers of subsidies that apply in US.
  7. The human fingerprint in the seasons
    TIS - if climate models work the way you seem to believe they do, then can you find me an example from ANY of the 15 or so models where the Antarctic is behaving like the Arctic? On the other hand, SH is most definitely warming. Why do think 0.25SW/m2/100year (max) has more effect than 3.7W/m2/100 year? Do you believe that energy received at the surface is an inconsequential factor in global climate?
    Moderator Response: Use italic or bold instead of all-caps, please.
  8. The human fingerprint in the seasons
    Re: HumanityRules (14) We know CO2 is rising; all other forcings have been flat or declining (source here). We know the increasing CO2 comes from us. Because increasing levels of atmospheric CO2 drives temperatures up, and the increased CO2 is shown isotopically to be of human origin, ergo: human fingerprint. Off road, stuck-in-sand, spinning-wheels. The Yooper
  9. Renewable Baseload Energy
    Peter: You said: "Moore's Law does not apply. These are very high cost systems with long life times and so turn over and learning takes decades." Moore's Law may not apply, but the laws of scaling do. In developing technologies, the rough rule of thumb is that a doubling of production lowers costs by 15%. Solar has been tracking right along this path the last several years, and prices are lower than ever. If we were to scale solar to about one hundred times what it is now, prices would likely fall more than half from where they are now. This would also be enough production capacity to replace every every fossil fuel plant within a generation. The scale of this industry would be similar to that of the auto industry...certainly not impossible.
  10. The human fingerprint in the seasons
    Re: The Inconvenient Skeptic (12)
    "Why isn't the Antarctic warming in its winter in the same manner as the Arctic if the cause is CO2"
     You present a logical fallacy. Comparing the Arctic, an ice-covered ocean surrounded by landmasses, with the Antarctic, a glaciated continent over 2 miles high: apples and oranges. A question to you: Why, exactly, would anyone expect the Antarctic to warm similarly to the Arctic? The Yooper
  11. The human fingerprint in the seasons
    11 Daniel Bailey We could argue about solar variation but that would be going OT and is for another thread. The contention in John's argument is GHG fingerprint = human fingerprint That seems wrong. The suggestion that the solar fingerprint will not contain a GHG component is wrong. The question is whether identifying a GHG fingerprint means you've identified a human fingerprint. The problem I have is to call this a fingerprint of human warming it should stand alone, that would be the nature of a fingerprint in this context. As you demonstrate it's only through bring in other arguments that you can make this stand up. This isn't a pedantic arguement. Part of the strength of the AGW arguement is the heaps of independant arguements that point to CO2. I think this and the previous human fingerprint point to a warming trend not a human warming trend. Back on the road, DB.
  12. Philippe Chantreau at 15:21 PM on 3 December 2010
    The human fingerprint in the seasons
    Both poles should be showing the same behavior" Why? I don't believe that at all. The poles are very different, so are the oceanic circulations around them. I think that they actually should not be showing the same behavior.
  13. It's a 1500 year cycle
    cjshaker - please see comments to you on this at We're heading into an ice age where this comments belong (the ice cycle is not a 1500 year cycle).
  14. The Inconvenient Skeptic at 15:10 PM on 3 December 2010
    The human fingerprint in the seasons
    There are a couple of problems with this article. There is no time when the Earth is in winter or in summer. By showing only part of the Earth it is certainly possible to miss what is happening as a whole. I do agree that the NH is the main driver of the Earth's climate. I have shown that here. The basis is a Jones paper in 1999 that shows that the NH winter and summer drives the global average as shown here. The global temperature shows that the anomaly in the Dec-Feb time frame has gone up more than in the June-August time frame. This isn't a surprise as Antarctica has not shown the winter warming that the Arctic region has in its winter. But that is a problem. Why isn't the Antarctic warming in its winter in the same manner as the Arctic if the cause is CO2. Both poles should be showing the same behavior, but they are not. So while I agree that Dec-Feb are showing more warming than Jun-Aug, the answer is not as simple as CO2. The current orbital obliquity trend should also be favoring warming Dec-Feb as the NH receives slightly more insolation during those months. That would also correlate to cooling Antarctic trend is also observed. John Kehr The Inconvenient Skeptic
  15. The human fingerprint in the seasons
    Re: HumanityRules (10)
    "My suggestion is that solar warming will contain a sizable GHG component because of the role of water vapour."
     Per this link, there has been no increase in TSI in the past 32 years and thus, no solar-driven warming over that period. It's not the sun, yet temps still rising. Water vapor would be a feedback, so it can't drive itself up via driving up temps. Ran outta road, HR. The Yooper
  16. Renewable Baseload Energy
    #297: The claim that the consumer pays much more for renewable electricity suggests that there should be a strong correlation between retail electric costs and renewable generation. Here is a graph for the US retail electric cost vs renewable generation from EIA data: There is no such correlation.
  17. The human fingerprint in the seasons
    9 sout What is hard to follow is John's suggestion that any GHG warming signal is a fingerprint of warming. I think it's summed up in the over-simplification of the solar-fingerprint. My suggestion is that solar warming will contain a sizable GHG component because of the role of water vapour. Any process that warms the world presumably increases water vapour. This is a GHG. It's not quite the simple all or nothing situation that John sets out. Let's use the example you vividly describe i.e. warming from CO2. A) The direct effect from the CO2 molecule of doubling CO2 is a temp increase of 1.2oC. B) The IPCC estimate for a doubling of CO2 in the earth’s complex system is 2-4.5oC. The increase from A is due to feedback’s (primarily albedo and water vapour) C) In simple climate models when clouds, aerosol and ice are held constant (albedo is fixed) then doubling CO2 gives 2-3oC warming. The difference between A and C is essentially the water vapour feedback. That means 40-60% of the warming trend from a doubling of CO2 comes from the water vapour feedback. 40-60% of the GHG fingerprint comes from water vapour. The water vapour effect is not specific to CO2 but is a consequence of a warming world. All things being equal, any process that warms the world is going to have this 40-60% water vapour feedback. As water vapour is a GHG then any process human or natural that warms the world will have a sizable GHG component to its fingerprint. I don’t think this is sceptical science, it seems mainstream. A study that reports a GHG fingerprint is not reporting a human fingerprint. I understand the significance of that, maybe you don't. Finally you really should stick to criticising the points I put forward rather than speculating on my mental processes, it does nothing for your argument.
  18. We're heading into an ice age
    Also "AGW believers don't seem to want to admit that the glacial cycle is happening, as it has been happening for millions of years. We're supposed to believe that the glacial cycle has magically stopped working just because the CO2 level is elevated." This from over in 1500 year cycle borders on the offensive. You will find no science published that asserts milankovich cycles arent continuing. Only that what causes the ice age is just one of the forcings affecting climate and its being trumped by high CO2 - just as it was when world had more CO2. Do think the milankovich cycles werent operating "magically" to use your word, at times before we had ice caps?
  19. It's a 1500 year cycle
    Re: cjshaker (13)
    "We reached temperatures 4.5C warmer than today during the previous glacial warming phase, without mankind's CO2 influence. "
     Were you aware that the study cited in that article used 1950 for its "today"? Have a look-see for the warming since 1950: The climate during that interglacial was warmer than today, sure. For known, natural reasons. Said known, natural reasons are not the same today. But...if CO2 were as high then as now: Then conditions then would have been dramatically higher still. As muoncounter (14) ably says,
    "We've blown our way out the top of the 'natural cycle'."
     You would do well to ponder the comment made by adelady (15). If you had any idea of the radiative physics of CO2 and the temperature anomaly already in the pipeline (and it's very obvious you don't), you wouldn't be making the comments you do. The Yooper
  20. It's a 1500 year cycle
    #16: "graph of CO2 going sky high only means something" Actually, such a graph means quite a lot, if you understand such measurements. "We're supposed to believe that the glacial cycle has magically stopped" Who told you that? Open eyes, look at graph. The right-hand edge of the red curve suggests that we might turn colder due to 'natural cycles' sometime in the next 10-20000 years, but if that's what you're planning on, good luck with it. "you did not catch my remarks about needing to emit more CO2 " Yeah, I caught it. Pop fly to short. Next batter?
  21. Miriam O'Brien (Sou) at 14:25 PM on 3 December 2010
    The human fingerprint in the seasons
    HR, greenhouse gases are increasing. Humans are adding greenhouse gases to the atmosphere which is causing them to increase. The greenhouse gases are causing global warming. Humans are causing global warming. What is so hard to follow about that? (Like I say, probably a mental block to the logic of it all. Some people don't want to accept the obvious so they don't :))
  22. We're heading into an ice age
    cjshaker - the deeper down (further back in time) you go with ice core, the more resolution you lose due to compaction and consequent changes in the ice - so yes, the data going back is effectively smoothed. Its the nature of the record. As to worrying about the next ice age... The milankovitch forcing that drives ice age is due to change in forcing that is about 0.25W/m2 per hundred years at 65N. Globally, its maybe a tenth of that. By comparison, anthropogenic GHG is about 3.7W/m2 over last 100 years on a GLOBAL scale. Ie the +ve anthropogenic forcings far exceeds the negative milankovich forcing. Estimate are that we arent going to see an ice age for 50,000 years.
    Moderator Response: No all-caps, please.
  23. We're heading into an ice age
    cjshaker, I suspect the line on the left side of the figure is skinnier than on the right side, because the line on the left side is smoother, because there are fewer samples of times longer ago. The author of the graph could have created a best-fit smoothed line through the entire graph, but probably refrained in order to present as much useful information, including uncertainty, as possible.
  24. It's a 1500 year cycle
    Obviously, you did not catch my remarks about needing to emit MORE CO2 and hope that the AGW believers are right. You must not have caught the AGW believer's claims that we're supposed to be starting the cooling phase of the glacial cycle. If that is true, and if the AGW theory is true, CUTTING CO2 emissions would be a really dumb idea. Unless you''re actually interested in bringing about the collapse of agriculture and the failure of mankind's civilization, as occured during the dark ages. Chris Shaker
    Moderator Response: Please do not use all caps. Use italic, or if you must, bold.
  25. actually thoughtful at 14:11 PM on 3 December 2010
    Renewable Baseload Energy
    Scaddenp - if we price fuel accurately (drop all incentives and price in the carbon externalities) - Renewables win by a mile. But our collective governments have all proved themselves incapable of doing that. So what do we do given our broken governments, and a relentless threat to our civilization?
  26. Stratospheric Cooling and Tropospheric Warming
    Humanity Rules 75 Why?
  27. It's a 1500 year cycle
    Another hockey stick graph of CO2 going sky high only means something to AGW believers. The graphs I was talking about show temperature and ice extent, derived from the ice core. The temperature graph is what I care about. AGW believers don't seem to want to admit that the glacial cycle is happening, as it has been happening for millions of years. We're supposed to believe that the glacial cycle has magically stopped working just because the CO2 level is elevated. Chris Shaker Chris Shaker
    Moderator Response: This thread is inappropriate for the specific topic of impending glaciation that you have focused on. Read the post "We’re heading into an ice age," which answers some of your questions and contentions. If you still have comments, make them on that thread, not this one.
  28. Renewable Baseload Energy
    Peter, that is interesting. I didnt know that. I'm from NZ. Clearly the wholesale market does not work in those places in the same way as it works here. So even in France, you have to buy wind before you buy nuclear? I'm for dump all subsidies, including any form on fossil fuel. Then you have something to work with. On the other hand, I'd be open to punitive pricing of fossil fuel going climate change adaption and let markets decide what is the best alternative.
  29. actually thoughtful at 13:59 PM on 3 December 2010
    Renewable Baseload Energy
    SNRatio, I think your scenario is a little bit to rosy. But perhaps you are thinking of an urban setting, and I am thinking of stand-alone buildings. In particular - I have found that it takes 8 200 watt PV panels to recharge the Nissan Leaf if you drive the full 100 miles of it's range (this may not be disagreeing with you - but that is so cool it is worth saying, and then saying again - YOU and I can wink out of the carbon economy completely - all I can tell you, Yogi Berra style, is: the more people who check out of the carbon economy, the more people will check out of the carbon economy. Once YOU (and I) demonstrate how easy it is - others will follow. It is how humanity works. Government is in the middle of failing us on this most crucial of all issues - individual action is required at this time in history. That is just the truth. We cannot count on our institutions to solve this one - they were designed to handle a completely different threat, and our hamstrung by an invisible, slow and pervasive threat to our existence. OK - actual areas of disagreement - I haven't seen any of the combined PV and solar thermal panels that are as efficient as the two separated (well it is obviously good for PV - but I don't think the economics work out; you are better off to buy solar thermal as solar thermal, and buy an extra PV panel to overcome the losses-due-to-heat). But you are 100% correct that virtually all residential heat needs can be solved by solar hot water. Smart people (who can afford it) are investing now, in this period of incentives. Once fuel prices go up and it pencils without the incentives - they will dis-appear. Much better to buy it now than wait until it is obvious at face value.
  30. actually thoughtful at 13:51 PM on 3 December 2010
    Renewable Baseload Energy
    Peter Lang, If you want to follow the STRICT definition "power all the time, every day" - then sure, solar or any renewable is always going to be challenged (some of the ideas will mitigate that). However, if you look at the big picture it doesn't follow that solar can therefore supply no baseload. Because: 1) Regional diversification 2) Pricing structures and smart meters that save people money if they use electricity when it IS sunny (so you charge your car on a sunny day for X and on a cloudy day for 2X). 3) Grid-scale storage 4) Source diversification (wind/solar/geothermal/tidal) - the last two are directly dispatchable. As many posters has pointed out - this translates to needing less backup than it first appears. Rather than, as you claim, needing 100% backup - you need some decimal backup. Exactly how much depends on how well 1-4 are implemented. Note that the backup will more likely be natural gas rather than nuclear as you can quickly spin up NG. Right now we are in a sweet spot where EVERY bit of renewables is easily usable by grid operators (in the US - I can't speak for Australia). Thus the concept of "grid storage" - here meaning pump energy into the grid to meet peak load, and pull it back out during non-demand periods, when those poor nuke operators have all this electrical production and no where to use it. So for the first 20% (per the original article) - we don't have any real issues with renewables. At the current rate of growth we will hit 20% between 2020 and 2030. So we know we have at least 10 years to scale up grid-scale storage and maybe 20. If you could admit that much, it might be easier to have a real conversation, instead of just talking across one another. If you continue to insist renewables have exactly zero role in our energy future - sorry, but I invoke reality - real people have already proved this false by installing and selling renewable energy, that real, for-profit companies have purchased - resulting in fewer fossil or nuke plants being built (see Excel in Colorado for a plant-not-built - plus others).
  31. What should we do about climate change?
    #379: "while nuclear works out its problems. " Some problems just keep hanging around. Jinxed Plant Slows A Nuclear Rebirth Originally slated to cost around $4 billion (€3 billion), its price tag has nearly doubled to $7.2 billion (€5.3 billion). And it is four years behind schedule. ... "If it were any other product, it would have been binned by now," says Steve Thomas, professor of energy policy at London's University of Greenwich.
  32. Renewable Baseload Energy
    scaddenp, I don't know where you are from. However, in USA, UK, Europe and Australia the electricity distributers are required by regulation to take the power generated by renewables before they take any other power. There are various types of regulations but it all amounts to the same thing. The consumer pays about twice to three times as much for wind and about 5 to 20 times as much for solar as they would pay for the same energy from a baseload generator.
  33. The human fingerprint in the seasons
    Robert Way I agree. My point is water vapour is a feedback to whatever is causing warming. Earth is a wet place. The theory goes when it gets warm evapouration increases. 5 muoncounter Again I'm not claiming water vapour is the driver here, I'm cliaming water vapour is a feedback in any scenario that warms the earth. Whether the driver is human or natural. The point I'm making is GHG fingerprint does not equal human fingerprint. That's the assumption in John's article again.
  34. Miriam O'Brien (Sou) at 13:32 PM on 3 December 2010
    The human fingerprint in the seasons
    Thanks for this post. It's interesting to see the relationships from this perspective. Regarding water vapour and 'sceptics' - some people have a mental block and can't latch onto the fact that something has to drive the temperature up before more water will evaporate to the atmosphere. Over the past few decades, that's obviously been carbon emissions adding to the greenhouse effect, which is raising the global temperature, which means more water evaporates, which can make the temperature rise even more. Some so-called 'sceptics' keep bringing up water vapour to try to confuse the less well-informed.
  35. It's a 1500 year cycle
    #13 "We reached temperatures 4.5C warmer than today during the previous glacial warming phase, without mankind's CO2 influence." And the sea level then was ..... ? And the agricultural productivity then was ...... ? And the human population then was ...... ? I'm very interested in what the planet can do long before and long after human society was around. I'm much more interested in us doing our best to maintain the best of what we've got. Has it ever occurred to you that if the climate was warming or cooling for reasons beyond our control, say the sun or global tilt or whatever, that we could then still use our intelligence and our activities to extract or introduce CO2 into the atmosphere to counteract, ameliorate or delay the worst effects? CO2 is the one thing we *can* control.
  36. Renewable Baseload Energy
    Rob Honeycutt @ #294, True. However, if you take a look at the unconstructive criticisms dished out by nearly all the contributors that I've seen posting on SkepticalScience, then you would understand why I respond as I do. From my perspective the type of contributions here demonstrate an inability to be objective. The contributions have convinced me I shouldn't take much notice of anything these people advocate. It is all ideologically based; not objective, not impartial. I suspect that applies to all they advocate. The contributer here have discredited all they stand for in my opinion.
  37. The human fingerprint in the seasons
    #3: "GHG fingerprints can be natural because of the existence of water vapour. " I'm fascinated by the play the water vapor argument gets in the skeptic world. If the climate is stable, water vapor should be in a long-term equilibrium. If the climate warms, increased evaporation obviously results in increased atmospheric water vapor content. That acts as a feedback, potentially increasing the warming (due to GHE) or not (due to increased cloud cover. Whatever the feedback, increased water vapor is necessarily a response to a changing climate. So how the skeptics claim that water vapor causes the warming in the first place? There must be an external factor to first drive (force) the climate change -- and atmospheric CO2 comes to my mind.
  38. The human fingerprint in the seasons
    Humanity Rules, Water Vapor is a feedback to CO2 warming. See Lacis et al. 2010
  39. Renewable Baseload Energy
    When needed most the UK wind farms stopped producing. Typical! The following is of interest for its comment on recent UK wind turbine performance http://www.ctv.ca/generic/generated/static/business/article1818067.html The relevant paragraph is Britain has built 2,400 megawatts of wind-turbine generation capacity, but on an cold Monday the windmill fleet was generating less than 450 megawatts, about 0.8 per cent of total electricity demand. Notwithstanding their erratic performance, Britain is committed to increasing windmill capacity to 32 gigawatts by 2020, from the current 2.4 GW.
  40. It's a 1500 year cycle
    #13: "how can you claim that today's global warming is NOT caused by the glacial cycle?" Easy. Open your eyes and look: We've blown our way out the top of the 'natural cycle'.
  41. The human fingerprint in the seasons
    Again I've got the same problem as with the last "human fingerprint" article. Whatever is causing the the recent multi-century warming trend there is going to be a GHG component to that trend in the form of water vapour. So identifying a 'GHG fingerprint' in any metric does not mean you have specifically identified a 'human fingerprint'. GHG fingerprints can be natural because of the existence of water vapour.
  42. It's a 1500 year cycle
    We reached temperatures 4.5C warmer than today during the previous glacial warming phase, without mankind's CO2 influence. We know that from ice core derived temperature proxy data. So how can you claim that today's global warming is NOT caused by the glacial cycle? http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2007/07/070705-antarctica-ice.html If the current glacial cycle trend is really toward cooling, we ought to be emitting more CO2, and hoping that the AGW believers are right. None of you seems to realize how rare these warming phases are, nor the devastating effect that the cooling phases of the glacial cycle have had on land based life. Will human civilization survive the next cooling cycle? Advancing ice will reduce arable land. The cooling climate will result in reduced plant productivity and massive crop failures. It seems that starvation and reduced populations will result. Probably war over surviving arable land. Probably another dark ages. Consider the dramatic impact of the little ice age on human civilization. It was quite devastating. For an example of what the cooling cycle can do to animal populations, consider the Cheetah. It's genetic inbreeding problems are believed to result from greatly reduced populations during a cooling cycle: http://www.mitochondrial.net/showabstract.php?pmid=8475057 http://animals.howstuffworks.com/endangered-species/endangered-cheetah-info.htm/printable I'm pretty sure that rising sea levels from global warming will not wipe out civilization. The cooling cycle may. Chris Shaker
    Moderator Response: See "We’re heading into an ice age"
  43. It's a 1500 year cycle
    The current Milankovitch cycle direction is cooling, yet the world is warming. Besides, how does a steady millenial cycle explain a decadal trend? That is why the soundbite response is "it's irrelevent."
  44. We're heading into an ice age
    Looking at the graph of temperature over the past 420,000 years of the the glacial cycle, in Figure 1. Why is the left side of the graph so much 'skinnier' than the right side? The line representing temperature on the left side of the graph is quite thin and looks maybe 'smoothed'? Compare it to the much fatter and fuzzier looking temperature signal line on the right side of the graph. Why is the difference so striking? Thank you, Chris Shaker
  45. It's a 1500 year cycle
    I am having a hard time buying claims that ancient climate cycles do not matter. The glacial cycle has been rolling along for millions of years, like clockwork, without any CO2 input from mankind. For the past 800,000 years, the glacial cycle has been on a 100,000 year period. We appear to be about 14,000 years into this glacial warming phase. Looking at the graphs of the previous seven warming phases makes this one look pretty similar. It looks to me like most of the global warming we've been seeing is a natural result of the glacial cycle. A picture of the ice age cycles over the past 800,000 years may make it more obvious that a graph of the ice extent is a repetitive waveform http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Milankovitch_Variations.png http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Quaternary_glaciation These graphs of the ice age cycle sure look like repetitive waveforms to me http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/77/Vostok_420ky_4curves_insolation.jpg http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Milankovitc Given the glacial cycle's documented longevity, and huge influence over our climate and geology, I'm more inclined to believe that it continues on. Chris Shaker
  46. The human fingerprint in the seasons
    What illustrates the point even better, is to adjust the anomalies to a baseline of 1850-1890. That really highlights the difference between summer and winter warming over that period - by the 2000s, the difference is about a quarter of a degree C, if I've done the sums correctly. Thanks for including the link to the Excel file, too!
  47. The human fingerprint in the seasons
    Whenever I see an article like this, where the signals you are comparing are visually very little different, I wonder about significant figures and signal to noise ratios. Chris Shaker
  48. Renewable Baseload Energy
    Peter... Constructive criticism: You might get a lot further with people if you carried on an actual nuanced conversation rather than just claiming that everyone is wrong and should simply understand that you know better than everyone else. It's just not a very effective rhetorical technique.
  49. Stratospheric Cooling and Tropospheric Warming
    "*It is recognized that a fictitious planet as described herein is a physical impossiblity. The simplicity of this planet serves to explain a concept that would not be easily explained using a more complex and realistic model." That in a nutshell seems to be the problem.
  50. Renewable Baseload Energy
    michael sweet, If you would care to read the links I provide you will find that all the claims are supported.

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