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All IPCC definitions taken from Climate Change 2007: The Physical Science Basis. Working Group I Contribution to the Fourth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, Annex I, Glossary, pp. 941-954. Cambridge University Press.

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Comments 111301 to 111350:

  1. Arctic sea ice... take 2
    Argus dance around your words all you like but their meaning was fairly clear. You doubt what's reported, or perhaps more specifically you want to create an impression of doubt. "Dark water absorbs more of this energy than white ice." Sure, but how much energy are we talking about here? You go on to specify various parameters affecting absorption of solar energy in sea water at high latitudes. You "wonder" while projecting a rhetorical stance: Those who lament the absence of ice in the Arctic seem to forget (or pretend to forget) that the amount of solar energy per area unit that actually passes into the Arctic ocean through the surface, is at most a few percent (my guess) of what passes into tropic oceans. So how important is this effect? Duly answered. Nobody has forgotten the parameters you mention, but apparently you're not really interested in improved understanding, your mission or preferred perspective seems more about doubt. So in your next comment you focus on your earlier question about the difference in radiative properties of ice versus water: I have no answer, but I would like to see the subject discussed. Maybe the increased radiation during the darker hours, compensates for the absorption of energy when the sun is up? It sounds, to me, like an important negative feedback. You could have a stab at that question yourself, you could provide a constructive comment here with your result, but you appear to prefer leaving the question hanging in the air, conveying doubt. I'm done playing the game with you but here are clues to your answer: ice conducts heat about 4 times better than water, water and ice are similarly good radiators with water being a little better than ice with more emissivity particularly at longer wavelengths. Don't forget to extend your experiment into the atmosphere so as to get a net effect.
  2. The empirical evidence that humans are causing global warming
    doug_bostrom, what brazen omission are you talking about ?
  3. Arctic sea ice... take 2
    doug_bostrom, First, I think you ought to be more careful with how you quote people. Where did I say "I doubt it"? The answer is nowhere. You made it up, just as you invented the N+ iterations. And what is so "boringly repetitious"? I have never before raised these matters about arctic ice. Instead of answering at least one of my questions yourself, you claim that I am implying that "the people studying this" are naive. I have read through the report you recommended, and I cannot find that they adressed the function of heat radiation from a dark ocean anywhere at all. The only things they talked about were ice albedo and solar heat input. But where there is input there is also output, and it is obvious that a warm black body radiates a lot more than an icy white cold body. So most of my thoughts from #29 remain unanswered.
  4. citizenschallenge at 06:14 AM on 31 August 2010
    Sea level rise is exaggerated
    20 Andrew Hobbs at 21:06 PM on 13 June, 2010 Thank you for your post. Especially in light of no one else elaborating on the statement made in "The Skeptical Argument," and that I've been trying to find something on that charge for a little while: ~ ~ ~ "Scientists from Flinders University, Adelaide, certainly DID NOT abandon the project. " "In 2003 the University decided to cease the operations of the National Tidal Facility Australia (NTFA). ... The operation was transferred to the Commonwealth Government effective from 1 January 2004." "It is possible to access their latest results on the Australian Bureau of Meteorology website at the web page for the South Pacific Sea Level and Climate Monitoring Project. " "These results support the general rate of global sea level rise noted elsewhere." ~ ~ ~ Beyond that, earlier a comment was made: "... my comments have been deemed inappropriate by a rather draconian comments policy." Well, I for one, found this back and forth discussion another wonderful (and educational) example of how science should be discussed. Too bad such a sight can't be found in the AGW Hoax blogosphere. My point is that I'm sure it is the "draconian comments policy" that makes such discussion possible so thank you John for sticking to your guns.
  5. The empirical evidence that humans are causing global warming
    Wow, quote-miners going to work on the IPCC review w/pick and shovel. Amazingly brazen omission in pursuit of impressionism, mscavazz. How fortunate that the IPCC does not follow such degenerate techniques. Those looking for context might start w/the complete executive summary: Climate Change Assessments Review of the Processes and Procedures of the IPCC Meanwhile, notice that mscavazz' plucked cherry was from WGII. Notice from the topic heading here, this thread is about scientific evidence of climate change itself, not the subject of WGII. Find an appropriate thread mscavazz. Try plugging "IPCC" into the search box at upper left, pick an appropriate thread, go there w/further comments on the InterAcademy Review.
  6. Climate Models: Learning From History Rather Than Repeating It
    Pete Ridley - I'm not terribly surprised that your post got deleted; I believe John Cook and the moderators prefer links to giant quotes, rather than cut-n-paste. Sadly, your post (and your ongoing attitude regarding models as in your posts here, and here) reflects one of the major characteristics of denialism: #4, Impossible expectations and standards of proof. If you include your references to John O'Sullivan and others, as you did discussing satellite temperature records, you are also using tactic #2, Fake Experts. Demanding absolute accuracy, absolute proof, 100%+ certainty - these are all tactics that have repeatedly been used to deny evidence and scientific consensus. I clearly recall these very same tactics used to argue that second hand smoking was not proven harmful, and that CFC's weren't shown to damage the ozone layer. In fact, my brother used to be one of the public apologists/deniers for a major tobacco company, trying to argue against the 'second-hand smoke' issue on his companies behalf. He frequently used the "Not absolutely proven" certainty argument - and he knew quite well he was making s**t up. He referred me to the book "Thank You For Smoking", and stated "This is my job - I am this man." I just cannot take the absolutist argument seriously. We're well past the 95% certainty level for anthropogenic global warming, with a 3 deg. C +/- ~1 warming for a doubling of CO2. Insistence on absolute proof, on climate models that absolutely reproduce temps in the presence of noise - these are just calls to do nothing, and have no scientific basis. The models do a decent job, which has been statistically shown, and ignoring predictions from them is just foolish.
  7. The empirical evidence that humans are causing global warming
    breaking new InterAcademy Council - Review of the Processes and Procedures of the IPCC Quote: "authors reported high confidence in some statements for which there is little evidence. Furthermore, by making vague statements that were difficult to refute, authors were able to attach “high confidence” to the statements. The Working Group II Summary for Policy Makers contains many such statements that are not supported sufficiently in the literature, not put into perspective, or not expressed clearly."
  8. Why we can trust the surface temperature record
    Johnd, If people noticed that you had no winter that is a predicted sign of global warming. You claimed that the seasons were not shifting in post 12. Now we agree that the seasons have shifted so much that people are noticing it. Thats what scientists call "Climate Change". There is more water in the hydrological cycle because of increased temperature of the atmosphere and ocean. Increased temperature is caused by increased CO2. This was forcast decades ago. Water responds to temperature change. Water does not force temperature to change. Yes, it is complicated, but the base of the pyramid of climate change is CO2 forcing in the atmosphere.
  9. The empirical evidence that humans are causing global warming
    KR there is a place here suitable for cloud discussions but it does seem as though a specific "Clouds will save us" topic would be a good thing. Comes up time and again. The albedo effect. Related to this I'm interested in current efforts to reprocess old Nimbus tapes to extend ice trends farther back. Follow that link and you can see the stunning results available via reprocessing. The same methods ought to work w/longitudinal cloud cover as well, something that's not well quantified now.
  10. Climate Models: Learning From History Rather Than Repeating It
    I tried to post this yesterday but it has disappeared so I try again. You should be interested in the alternative opinion of “physicist, computer Programmer, environmental activist, financial expert” John Droz presented in his January article “Climategate: The Perils of Global Warming Models” (Note 1). This requires no embellishment from me as it reflects my own opinion perfectly. QUOTE:
    Moderator Response: Use your own words, please.
  11. The empirical evidence that humans are causing global warming
    johnd, as regards to the H2O spectra - What we need to do is pay attention to what the various GHG spectra are, not philosophize on the anthropogenic principle. The various spectra are what they are; discussing whether or not we would exist in alternate universes is a completely separate (although interesting, over sufficient high quality beer) discussion.
  12. The empirical evidence that humans are causing global warming
    johnd - Residence time for H2O is anything but a red herring. The short residence time makes H2O extremely responsive to temperature changes induced by other forcings - H2O level is a feedback, not a forcing. As to clouds - I'd have to say that CBDunkerson's comment is right on the money. We've had satellite observations of cloud cover and water vapor levels for decades, and the forcing from cloud cover is so small that there's no agreement on whether it's positive or negative. It certainly does not match or override the CO2 forcing in magnitude. At this point the science indicates that cloud feedbacks are essentially irrelevant. John Cook/moderators - I've been seeing the skeptic argument that 'the clouds are a huge negative feedback' for some time; from the Lindzen 'iris' effect to JoNova's web site, etc. This is essentially a "It won't happen" argument regarding AGW. Should we have a topic to discuss that here on SkepticalScience?
  13. Arctic sea ice... take 2
    For those keeping track; Arctic sea ice extent is now at about 5.25 million km^2... placing it below several of the ARCUS predictions for this year and on track to likely wind up somewhere in the middle of the pack. That said, the ARCUS predictions are for the September average rather than the absolute minimum and thus the rate of re-freeze in the latter part of September will be a significant factor. Still, it seems clear that this year will have a lower extent (both absolute and September average) than 2009. It probably won't beat the 2008 (or 2007) minimums and thus will likely be the third lowest extent on record. As noted above, Arctic ice volume is already at a new record low and still dropping.
  14. Why we can trust the surface temperature record
    michael sweet at 00:55 AM, whilst I'll concede that the timing of the seasons is constantly adjusted to accommodate slippage bought about by orbital cycles, as the chart above indicates the two seasons that are most subject to change due to changing orientation are spring and autumn, granted over a long period of time, but an ongoing process none the less. As we have discussed before, there are more factors that determine the timing of the seasons than just temperature or the calender. Seasons can begin and end early or close late for a variety of reasons. This year for instance in south eastern Australia people could be forgiven for think that spring came 6 months early and we went from spring to summer and then straight back to spring again such was the response of the plants and the animals that depend on them, all due to the amount of water vapour that cycled through the hydrological cycle.
  15. The empirical evidence that humans are causing global warming
    TOP #10, a hundred years ago actual skeptics argued that the IR absorption spectrum of H20 completely overlapped that of CO2 and thus CO2 caused no additional warming. However, this was proven incorrect both in that better instrumentation has allowed us to identify bands where the two do not overlap (as you note) but also because CO2 is found higher in the atmosphere than H20 and thus would continue to have a warming effect even if its absorption spectra WERE completely overlapped by H20. You are thus recycling an actual reasonable skeptic argument... from 1908. Unfortunately, as KR points out, you add an additional layer of error in the claim that IR emissions will shift to exclude the 'CO2 only' absorption bands... we'd all be dead LONG before that could happen, but as noted above the CO2 higher in the atmosphere would STILL induce warming even at the wavelengths where H20 overlaps.
  16. The empirical evidence that humans are causing global warming
    KR at 03:12 AM, the residence time of water vapour is a red herring, what is relevant of course is the volume of water vapour in the atmosphere at any one time and how this changes over time. The relating of CO2 to night time temperatures also applies to clouds which have the same effects both in the short term and over the longer term. It is no coincidence that when looking at periods of long term drought as against periods where above average rains occur in the drought flooding rain cycle, frosts tend to be more frequent, and more severe during the drought cycle because of the generally lower cloud cover. With regards to the absorption spectra, one needs to decide whether the H2O spectra is determined by the properties of H2O that enables it to change state at fixed points or not, and whether it is coincidence or not that the conditions that allow life on earth as we know it just happens to be within that H2O band of high emissivity.
  17. The empirical evidence that humans are causing global warming
    TOP, you apparently agree that water vapor is a positive feedback, increasing w/warming and multiplying the primary effect of additional C02 in the atmosphere, as predicted? Dai, HadCRUH, Barry & Kent specific humidity 1970-.
  18. The empirical evidence that humans are causing global warming
    TOP - You might want to look at the discussion on Water vapor is the most powerful greenhouse gas. Water vapor is more powerful as a greenhouse gas, but changes in water vapor have a lifespan in days or weeks, while CO2 has a lifespan on the order of centuries. Hence the changes in water vapor are feedbacks/reactions to the temperature changes from CO2, the current forcing driver. Secondly, the CO2 and H2O spectra (as seen here), while separable, are quite interlaced. If you remove some of the CO2 spectra by heating then you're removing H2O effects as well. And note that the thermal spectra of the Earth's surface would have to heat up a LOT to no longer involve CO2 and H2O - not quite to plasma levels, but well beyond anything predicted by any greenhouse effect. Paying attention to the reduced emissivity of the atmosphere due to CO2 is by no means cherry picking. It's a core detail of how our climate is changing.
  19. Arctic sea ice... take 2
    Do the numbers on reduced albedo Argus (repeating what researchers have not forgotten to do) and you'll be treated to some staggeringly large figures. Increasing solar heating of the Arctic Ocean and adjacent seas, 1979-2005: Attribution and role in the ice-albedo feedback Follow the references in the paper above and you can see why it's fallacy to believe the people studying this are as naive as you imply. "I doubt it" sure becomes boringly repetitious after N+... iterations.
  20. Arctic sea ice... take 2
    Whenever sea ice in the Arctic is discussed, I see only one aspect of the ice sheet mentioned: the property of reflecting incoming heat, from the sun, back out into space. The albedo of ice and snow is certainly much higher than that of open, dark, water. But another aspect is that even a relatively thin ice sheet serves to keep the heat of the water locked in. How much heat is radiated from an open ocean surface at, say, 274 degrees Kelvin at night, compared to that from an ocean surface covered by arctic ice? I have no answer, but I would like to see the subject discussed. Maybe the increased radiation during the darker hours, compensates for the absorption of energy when the sun is up? It sounds, to me, like an important negative feedback. "Dark water absorbs more of this energy than white ice." Sure, but how much energy are we talking about here? The same amount of sunlight that hits a square meter, or slightly more, in the tropics, is spread out over more than five square meters at a latitude of 80 degrees north (or south). In addition to this dilution, the same sunlight also has to pass through five times as much atmosphere on its way down to the surface. Even less energy is thus left to possibly pass into the water. But then we have one more factor: much of (most of?) the radiation that hits the water at an angle of 10 degrees, is reflected like from a mirror. Those who lament the absence of ice in the Arctic seem to forget (or pretend to forget) that the amount of solar energy per area unit that actually passes into the Arctic ocean through the surface, is at most a few percent (my guess) of what passes into tropic oceans. So how important is this effect? I do not know, but I would certainly like to learn more from somebody who does.
  21. The empirical evidence that humans are causing global warming
    Another two observations show that CO2 is trapping more heat: 1. Satellites measure less heat escaping to space at the precise wavelengths which CO2 absorbs. 2. Surface measurements find this heat is returning to Earth to warm the surface. A little cherry picking here. Water vapor is the biggest blocker of radiation to space. There is a notch in that block around the temperatures we need for life. CO2 is a very small block at the bottom of that notch. As temperatures rise the emitted IR wavelength becomes shorter and starts to miss the CO2 block. If temperatures rise enough the effect of CO2 becomes minimal. The whole focus on CO2 while disregarding H2O is cherry picking. While temperature is rising at one rate according to the measurements presented here, the global dew point is rising faster.
  22. The empirical evidence that humans are causing global warming
    factfinder, the greenhouse gas effect was first proposed by Joseph Fourier in 1824, proven to exist by John Tyndall in 1858, and quantified by Svante Arrhenius in 1896. Anyone who tells you that it doesn't exist is simply ignorant. It has been unquestioned science for well over a century.
  23. The empirical evidence that humans are causing global warming
    For all this "empirical -circumstantial evidence" there is still no experimental data and test that prove that the "greenhouse gas effect " exists. Much of the "empirical evidence " has been shown to be from other causes ,no relationship to CO2 period. The fantasy work of John Cook and the AGW fanatics.
    Response: The direct observational evidence of a CO2 greenhouse effect is outlined here, giving several independent lines of evidence. The direct observational evidence of an increasing greenhouse effect due to increasing CO2 levels is given above in points 5 and 6 but also fleshed out in more detail here.
  24. Long Term Certainty
    JMurphy, you're forgetting about the forced subsidy we'll be paying to the fossil fuels industry in upcoming years. Estimates on those future payments range from $890 trillion to $1240 trillion, depending on how much we want to comply with industry desire for us to pretend that paying for their products ends when fuel is delivered and money is handed over. Assessing the costs of adaptation to climate change Waffling about making decisions might be considered another gift. The top eight petroleum extraction, refining and marketing firms enjoy something like $2.2 trillion per year of revenue for each year we choose to help them continue thriving. That revenue could be dialed back even as we conserve petroleum products for better uses and simultaneously shrink the subsidy of adaptation we'll be making to those firms in future years. What's really annoying in the case of the petroleum industry is that the adaptation subsidy will continue long after they're unable to deliver useful quantities of their product. What a deal for them, eh?
  25. The empirical evidence that humans are causing global warming
    Re; Jaydee #3. Recently the 'average' daily temperatures in Houston have been so high that we will see the hottest August (for that matter the hottest month) ever recorded. This is due significantly to the extremely hotter nights. Yes the nights cool but they cool less and therefore the averages are higher. There, the nights are staying warmer, thus warming faster than the days. Our daily high temperatures are high but not much above the averages. Our nights are much higher than average. Hope this makes sense somewhat.
  26. Pakistan flood: many more will die unless more aid is delivered quickly
    Anything really to argue about here? As the WMO notes: "A series of recent publications indicate that main patterns of atmospheric variability exhibit noticeable changes and are predicted to be different in a warmer climate." Paraphrased, different things are expected to happen and different things are observed to be happening. What happened in Pakistan is novel in our records, could reasonably be attributed in part to what the WMO notes. Meanwhile expansion of human culture is expanding risks incurred when weather explodes old statistics. Monomania is not productive. For my part, I just noticed the point of John's post and will once again dig into the old wallet. If I have any serious reservations they come down to my unfulfilled wish I could get a signed statement about improved birth control when I send money into places like Pakistan. My qualms do not address the needs of the already-quick.
  27. Why we can trust the surface temperature record
    Johnd, The Milankovich cycles affect very long term climate, beyond one human life. It is known that these currently are a net cooling forcing, not a warming forcing. AGW has overwhelmed this effect and converted the trend into warming. This does not affect the timing of seasons and the response of animals and plants to those changes referred to by Steve in post 11. The timing of the seasons is a clear mark of AGW in the empirical evidence.
  28. The empirical evidence that humans are causing global warming
    Jaydee, greenhouse gases slow the rate at which heat escapes the atmosphere. As you say, nights tend to cool down... because heat is escaping and no more is coming in from sunlight to replace it. However, as the concentration of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere increases the rate at which heat escapes decreases... and nights cool down more slowly... which causes the average night time temperature to be higher... which is why "nights warm faster than days" under greenhouse warming.
  29. Hurricanes aren't linked to global warming
    I was playing around with some North Atlantic hurricane data and got a chart very similar to figure 1 above (except up through 2009 and without the 'major hurricanes' distinction) when something occurred to me. How can Landsea make the 'better detection' argument when there is no evidence of a change in values when the detection methods changed? If you look at the 'tropical storms' section from the end of the 'ships with radio' period through 'aircraft', 'radar', and the start of 'satellite' tracking there is very little change... just some minor up/down variation. If Landsea's claim that storms were systematically missed by the older methodologies were true there should be one or more significant jumps in there. Instead, we see storm levels holding fairly steady until ~20 years into the satellite tracking era... and then climbing steadily for the 20 years since then. Granted, the period of sharply increasing storm activity is fairly short and difficult to draw definitive conclusions from... but that doesn't change the fact that the data doesn't show any evidence of the measurement bias Landsea suggests is behind the increase. Also note that there was an earlier increase in frequency up until leveling off around 1950... that corresponds to the early 20th century warming period and the leveling off to a period of more level temperatures... all within the 'ships with radios' measuring period. Again, it is a short timeframe, but again there seems to be a correlation to temperatures rather than measurement methodology. All of these trends are present, but less distinct, on the 'hurricanes' and 'major hurricanes' subsets of the data as well. Obviously the temperature to storm/hurricane count correlation is not a perfect match... but there is NO correlation between the changing methodologies and increasing storm/hurricane count. Doesn't that invalidate Landsea's argument?
  30. The empirical evidence that humans are causing global warming
    Perhaps it would be better to say that increased CO2 hinders night-time cooling. Also: 4.Corals show that fossil carbon has recently risen sharply. Perhaps better to say, 'Corals show greater amounts/proportions of carbon/ carbonates/ calcium carbonates/ thought to/likely to originate in fossil fuel.' At the risk of pedantry, we don't actually know the specific origin of any individual carbon atom no matter what the isotope in any given coral. A brief statement explaining that corals are animals which produce an outer skeleton made out of calcium carbonate would prevent excessive dumbing down. Also, the presence of increased carbonates of fossil origin seems unreferenced in the original post (though this might be an oversight on my part). Perhaps this leads onto the question of oceanic sequestration of carbon though maybe this could be dealt with in another post.
  31. Sea level rise: the broader picture
    Peter Hogarth #15 There are a couple of problems with the consistency of CO2GHG warming with sea level rise. Firstly the chart shows that sea level rise from ARO 1925 to 1960 was similar to or steeper than the overall trend and similar to the recent trend despite the fact that theoretical CO2GHG forcing was around 0.4-0.6W/sq.m compared with 1.66W/sq.m in 2005 and higher since. Three times the theoretical forcing and lower or similar rate of sea level rise. Dr Trenberth finds that approx 2mm of recent sea level rise can be attributed to ice melt out of a total 'observed' of 2.5mm. You don't need very much heat; 2-3E20 Joules to melt this ice, but you need 20E20 Joules to produce 0.4mm of thermosteric rise. The 23E20 Joules required for 2.4mm of SLR is far short of the purported imbalance of 145E20 Joules to meet the postulated CO2GHG warming.
  32. Sea level rise: the broader picture
    Peter - Thanks for the update on the Wenzel paper. There definitely appears to be more data (and a much longer time period) in the 2010 paper than in their poster and web presentations from 2009, 2009. I had thought the 1.56mm/yr a bit low for the current rate, but that makes sense for the overall 20th century rate.
  33. The empirical evidence that humans are causing global warming
    I'm not sure under what circumstances "nights warm faster than days". Nights tend to cool down and days tend to warm up. Yes, but nights in the 2000s are warmer than nights in the 1990s, which were warmer than nights in the 1980s, which in turn were warmer than nights in the 1970s. That is nighttime warming. Predictions suggest that this process should happen faster than the similar warming of daytime temperatures, and observations confirm this.
  34. Pakistan flood: many more will die unless more aid is delivered quickly
    JMurphy, NASA and NOAA bulletins about strong La Nina, COMBINED to unusual position and stay of polar jet-stream, strongly suggest these two phenomenon are the main causes of this exceptional rainfall (and warm & dry climate over russia due to same jet-stream anomaly).
  35. The empirical evidence that humans are causing global warming
    I think this needs clarification "7. An increased greenhouse effect would make nights warm faster than days, and this is what has been observed." I'm not sure under what circumstances "nights warm faster than days". Nights tend to cool down and days tend to warm up.
  36. Anne-Marie Blackburn at 22:44 PM on 30 August 2010
    The empirical evidence that humans are causing global warming
    kampmannpeine, You might be interested in reading this post on cosmic rays. Current evidence strongly suggests that cosmic rays are unlikely to be responsible for warming in the past 30 years.
  37. Sea level rise: the broader picture
    HumanityRules at 14:03 PM on 30 August, 2010 (and comments 12 and 13) Thanks for this paper ( Wenzel 2010). Only 56 tide gauge sites were used in this study (which is justified in the methodology), and roughly half of these have data from before 1940, and roughly a third before 1930. These ratios are not really unusual, but there are obviously far more tidal stations in the full global network. This goes some way to explain differences in the pre-1950 period in this backpropagation technique compared with other methods, and the authors recognize this weakness as increased error before 1950 (pg 9) and note that their result is similar to that of Holgate 2007, which also used a small number of tide gauges. I believe the authors have factored in isostatic effects and back-estimating this is an inherent part of their method. In the presentation they arrive at an overall 20th century rise (ie for the entire period) of 1.56mm/yr which is in very good agreement with previous work. The confusion here (I think) is their reference to acceleration. In their paper they refer to 20th century acceleration (referring to the pre 1950 differences). It is the late 20th century acceleration to values of around 3.3 mm/yr (with GIA correction, as measured by both tide gauges and satellite altimeters, which has been the topic of discussion on this site and others. See free access Nerem 2010, and Leuliette 2010 for latest altimetry updates, and also see Wenzel 2010 figure 9a). This should clarify matters.
  38. Long Term Certainty
    thingadonta wrote : "Switching to renewable energies will 'create jobs', but at a higher cost to consumers and the taxpayer. Many such jobs are actually subsidised, by the taxpayer or otherwise. Many green groups have a hard time understanding this, becuase their jobs are also subsidised, they dont pay for themselves- they rely on society's good will to exist. This generally doesnt happen in oil and coal." Certainly not in America, judging by these reports : Energy Subsidies and Support by Type and Fuel (million 2007dollars) Coal/Refined Coal/Natural Gas/Petroleum Liquids - 5451 Nuclear - 1267 Renewables - 4875 Subsidy and Support per Unit of Production (dollars/megawatthour) Coal - 0.44 Refined Coal - 29.81 Natural Gas & Petroleum Liquids - 0.25 Nuclear - 1.59 Solar - 24.34 Wind - 23.37 "For example, even though coal receives more subsidies in absolute terms than wind power, the use of wind is likely to be more dependent on the availability of subsidies than the use of coal." Federal Financial Interventions and Subsidies in Energy Markets 2007 The largest U.S subsidies to fossil fuels are attributed to tax breaks that aid foreign oil production, according to research released by ELI. The study, which reviewed fossil fuel and energy subsidies for Fiscal Years 2002-2008, reveals that the lion’s share of energy subsidies supported energy sources that emit high levels of greenhouse gases. Fossil fuels benefited from approximately $72 billion over the seven-year period, while subsidies for renewable fuels totaled only $29 billion. Estimating U.S. Government Subsidies to Energy Sources: 2002-2008 Do you have actual figures and evidence that you can link to that goes against the above ?
  39. The empirical evidence that humans are causing global warming
    Thanks James, this was really helpful. I am trying to follow the peer reviewed literature on these issues which sometimes is difficult because not all these papers are publicly available without cost - althoug I have some kind of access to a library service... What I am missing is an open discussion on the effects which Svensmark discovered (Starry influence on cloud creation due to cosmic ray control thus increasing or decreasing the albedo). I recently read his book (published in 2007 - together with Calder) and it looks as if most of his arguments have strong weight ... So a combination of greenhouse effect which nobody negates and the cosmic ray effects might be a way to consider the causes of climate change ...
  40. Why we can trust the surface temperature record
    Peter Hogarth at 09:46 AM, whilst different cloud cover data sets may be differing in what they are measuring, as the graph shows there is quite a degree of variation, and depending on the type of clouds, any variation will either vary the incoming solar radiation, or the outgoing thermal radiation, or both. Given that clouds cover about 2/3 of the earths surface, a small change in coverage makes a significant difference, a change of about 5 percent roughly corresponds to a significant radiative net change of about 0.9 W/m2.
  41. Pakistan flood: many more will die unless more aid is delivered quickly
    mscavazz, although deforestation and bad land-cover decisions are, of course, important factors, how do you think these sort of tragedies can happen without an increase in precipitation (over a comparatively short space of time), and where do you think all that extra water is coming from ?
  42. Why we can trust the surface temperature record
    michael sweet at 23:10 PM, of course you are right, I was looking at it from the perspective of the precession rather than that of the calender. I had overlooked the leap years, and mans ability to change the calender and thus the climate, in a manner of speaking. However the precession continues it's cycle irrespective of mans adjusting the calender, but adjusting the calender so that defined seasons don't shift on the calender disguises the fact that oils ain't oils, in this case, the orientation of the planet is not the same each repeating solstice or equinox as perhaps more easily shown on this chart. Effects of axial precession on the seasons This figure illustrates the effects of axial precession on the seasons, relative to perihelion and aphelion. The precession of the equinoxes can cause periodic climate change because the hemisphere that experiences summer at perihelion and winter at aphelion (as the southern hemisphere does presently) is in principle prone to more severe seasons than the opposite hemisphere.
  43. Climate Models: Learning From History Rather Than Repeating It
    johnd, we've had weather satellites for decades now. They've been able to track the changes in atmospheric water vapor, regional temperatures, clouds, precipitation, et cetera. We can also measure various positive and negative feedback effects of these clouds and precipitation... NONE of those measurements comes anywhere CLOSE (i.e. within an order of magnitude) of the positive feedback from water vapor. Nor does the net effect (which may even be positive). Ergo, NO they just aren't that important. Show me a measurement which even suggests that there could be a net negative feedback from 'downstream' effects (e.g. clouds, precipitation) of increased water vapor capable of offsetting a significant portion (i.e. 10%) of the positive feedback from water vapor and we'll talk. Until then it's all just vague hand-waving... and directly contradicted by the both the paleoclimate record and all measurements of the current ongoing climate change.
  44. Arctic sea ice... take 2
    Actually, based on PIOMAS, volume is ALREADY the lowest ever and has been since some time in the first half of August. The previous record (from last September) was 5,800 km^3, but if I'm reading the graphs right this year may hit 4,000 km^3.
  45. Pakistan flood: many more will die unless more aid is delivered quickly
    sorry JMurphy 24% was the %change rate/year. Its also the overall deforested % between 1990-2005. Not exactly what I wrote above, I admit, but as a result the 2.5% left is correct. see here My opinion for short, is that even with no global warming such tragedies would occur anyway due to deforestation and bad land-cover decisions.
  46. Pakistan flood: many more will die unless more aid is delivered quickly
    mscavazz wrote : "Pakistan has only 2.5% forest coverage. It was destroyed at a rate of 24%/year in the last 10 years. That's the main reason for human losses and damages." 24%/year in the last 10 years ? How come they still have 2.5% of it left, then ? Perhaps you'd better provide a link. Also, since much of the country is arid or semi-arid, and since AGW is making the country even warmer, deforestation will have to take its place as another cause of future tragedies related to AGW.
  47. Pakistan flood: many more will die unless more aid is delivered quickly
    sorry, missed the link: Biofuel demand driving Africa "land grab" : report Article here this is the real cause of future tragedies
  48. Ocean acidification threatens entire marine food chains
    Agnostic at 11:44 AM on 30 August, 2010 I posted this elsewhere on the "acidification" thread, so sorry to repeat, but is pertinent here. The first deep basin observations of Aragonite undersaturation in surface waters have already been observed in 2008 Yamamoto-Kawai 2009, and in 2009 the extent of surface waters with undersaturated aragonite increased, although this is not yet region-wide. This means that these waters crossed the threshold where they are beginning to be corrosive to certain types of calcifying organisms. The trends in the Arctic regions have been a cause for concern for some time, Bates 2009 as the Arctic waters are subjected to the dual effects of decreasing alkalinity due to increasing pCO2 (directly due to uptake of the increasing atmospheric CO2 due to anthropogenic emissions), and increased sea ice meltwater due to increases in regional temperatures which are greater than the average global temperature rise. Models also predicted Aragonite undersaturation in these regions would occur in the near future, but the recent increased rate of ice melt has accelerated the process Steinacher 2009. As both atmospheric CO2 and Arctic sea ice melt rates are on accelerating trends this will have a negative effect on populations of both planktonic and benthic calcifying organisms in the Canada Basin, and potentially over wider areas within a relatively short time span.
  49. Pakistan flood: many more will die unless more aid is delivered quickly
    @Lou Grinzo post#2 "If we continue to pour 30 billion tons of CO2 into the air every year then tragedies like this will happen more and more often." More than CO2-cause, I would say "If we continue to deforest then tragedies like this will happen more and more often." Pakistan has only 2.5% forest coverage. It was destroyed at a rate of 24%/year in the last 10 years. That's the main reason for human losses and damages.
  50. Long Term Certainty
    Thingadonta points out that prices for fossil fuels-- particularly liquids-- will become uncompetitive w/newer and more modern energy capture and liberation systems as we're forced to use increasingly poor and economically defective deposits, moving from flowing crude through tar and finally to hydrocarbons finely dispersed and tightly locked in shale. The variety of "green" to end our brief and sadly temporary fling with virtually free energy will be of the folding kind, not the two-legged sort.

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