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EOttawa at 10:30 AM on 8 March 2010Does record snowfall disprove global warming?
libertarianromanticideal, The article from the Independent that I was responding to focused primarily on Britain. Several paragraphs in that article (from 2000) did indeed cite anecdotal evidence of less wintery conditions, including snowfalls. -
captain_heroic44 at 10:19 AM on 8 March 2010CO2 lags temperature
Why does CO2 drop off when temperature goes back down? -
GFW at 10:05 AM on 8 March 2010Does record snowfall disprove global warming?
Sordnay, I don't know about globally (I'm sure someone has done it) but for the continental US, Tamino at OpenMind showed quite conclusively that the annual snow cover is decreasing, but that that decrease is entirely attributable to earlier spring melting and "higher" (up mountains) melting through spring and summer. Winter snow cover isn't changing to any statistically significant degree. -
GFW at 10:01 AM on 8 March 2010Does record snowfall disprove global warming?
This (northern hemisphere) winter had some unusual weather patterns. It was warmer than average overall, but colder than average over the major population centers known as Europe and the eastern US. So the warmth was mostly over the oceans. It's pretty easy to see what had to happen - the warm air over the Atlantic would get loaded up with moisture, and then, following whatever regional circulation was present, would get swept over colder land and air masses - voila, surprising amounts of snow in the UK and the eastern US. -
shargash at 09:54 AM on 8 March 2010Does record snowfall disprove global warming?
ptbrown31, it isn't just the air temperature; the water temperature plays a big role too. You are right to emphasize that snowstorms are weather events, not climate. But it is also true that storms will tend to be more intense, the warmer the atmosphere and the warmer the oceans. -
johnd at 09:49 AM on 8 March 2010Does record snowfall disprove global warming?
Is there any chance of posting a chart comparing the historic % atmospheric water vapour against CO2 levels from the last ice age to present? If the water vapour content of the atmosphere is a direct function of temperature, and CO2 is the primary forcing agent of temperature, such a chart should illustrate how well the CO2/water vapour relationship has been maintained as the planet has warmed. -
Sordnay at 09:43 AM on 8 March 2010Does record snowfall disprove global warming?
John #10 The case with -15 to -5 is clear, and I do agree. You also say "Until it becomes so warm that snow is not possible" so it seems obvious to me that where temperature where (at preindustrial times) just close to minimum in order to snow, now after the experienced warming, that it should be harder to see snow, then the more warming the less area covered, right? Is that what it's happening? There is a statistical correlation between global warming anomaly and snow cover anomaly? If there is not, should anyone make any statement at all? -
ptbrown31 at 09:41 AM on 8 March 2010Does record snowfall disprove global warming?
The point you make in this post, while it is true in general, does not apply to the so called "snowmageddon" events. Both of those major east coast snow storms were associated with COLDER than average temperatures in those regions. Because of this you can not imply that they were caused by warmer air and hence more water vapor. I think a better way to address snowstorms and global warming is to emphasize that weather is not climate. The 2000's decade set 2X more record high temperatures than record low temperatures (in the United States) but that does not mean that record low temperatures are no longer seen - that is simply weather. http://www.ucar.edu/news/releases/2009/maxmin.jsp In general, great website. Keep up the good work!Response: Thanks for the comment. I wasn't trying to make the point that "global warming caused snowmageddon" but that "record snowfall does not contradict global warming". Perhaps I could have communicated that more clearly. When I was writing the post, I had a whole bit about weather vs climate with the weighted dice metaphor but cut it for brevity's sake. Maybe I should have left it in but fortunately I can always include it in the Record snowfall disproves global warming skeptic argument. -
johnd at 09:40 AM on 8 March 2010Does record snowfall disprove global warming?
These recent events are merely indicators that the natural climate cycle is about to, or has, entered another cooling cycle which will last several decades. Just as the predictions back in the 70's of a coming ice age were made by projecting from the then ending downward cooling cycle, the more recent doom and gloom global warming scenarios were being made by projecting from a soon to end upward warming cycle. More realistic projections can be made from the trend established by a number of these multi-decadal natural cycles rather than data obtained from the ridiculously short part cycle time frames that have been used merely because new technology has only allowed more accurate data to be collected over such a short period. I often wonder what would have been the case if the current technology for data collection had been available immediately post WW2 and used to make long term predictions. Perhaps it would have given the global cooling predictions the same credibility as the current global warming predictions have. There is no doubt that there is a long term warming trend, but at times the natural cycles may enhance it, and other times overwhelm it, and perhaps we are presently in the transition of moving from a period of the former to the latter.Response: The best type of climate projection comes from a physical understanding of what's happening in our climate. The 1970s is a good example. Some looked at the cooling trend and projected continued cooling into the future. However, others looked at the rising carbon dioxide in the atmosphere and aware of the greenhouse effect it causes, predicted that temperatures would start to warm. For this reason, the majority of papers in the 1970s that looked at future climate predicted warming due to rising CO2 levels. -
Riccardo at 09:28 AM on 8 March 2010Does record snowfall disprove global warming?
garythompson, the 18 W/m^2 is where we are now, i.e. the sum of short and long wavelength effects. What matters for the future is how this number might change with warming. On the cloud feedback there's still a lot to learn, but generally it is considered to be positive. -
Peter Hogarth at 09:14 AM on 8 March 2010Does record snowfall disprove global warming?
16.RSVP at 07:03 AM on 8 March, 2010 I'm sure there will be an albedo effect, but it's going to be relatively small in Winter. May be oversimplifying, but extra snow cover in places that normally don't see much is not exactly long lived once the clouds get out of the way and a relatively small extra percentage of the Earths surface is affected. If it got deep enough (or cold enough) to stay until summer in NH, then we'd have an issue, eg Greenland throws back a lot of incoming sunlight in early summer. I'll have a look for papers on this though. -
garythompson at 08:53 AM on 8 March 2010Does record snowfall disprove global warming?
good article here john, thanks. in my opinion this just shows how compicated weather is and how little we know (or at least I know). in my opinion, and in the opinion of others who have posted here, this increased evaporation which will lead to increased precipitation (and clouds). Correct me if i'm wrong but won't that be a negative feedback (not only from the sun reflection from the clouds but also the snow albedo)? in reading the peer reviewed papers, there seems to be great uncertainty in the models with how to handle clouds. in Ramanathan's paper (http://www-ramanathan.ucsd.edu/RamAmbio.pdf), he outlines very well that a good estimate based on ERBE observations show clouds have a net cooling of around 18 W/m^2 which dwarfs the positive feedback from CO2 which is 2.5 W/m^2 but we don't know how clouds will respond to increased SST. But if the increase in SST causes more evaporation and more clouds wouldn't this cancel out any CO2 effect?Response: If clouds were imposing a cooling forcing of 18 W/m2, the Earth would be experiencing a dramatic, negative energy imbalance and global temperatures would be plummeting precipitiously. That is not what is happening - the planet has a positive energy imbalance of around 0.8 W/m2.
However, the change in cloud cover has had a cooling effect - it's estimated the radiative forcing from 1850 to 2000 was a cooling of -0.7 W/m2. I couldn't tell you off the top of my head how much of that is estimated from increased water vapor - my understanding is the main contributor to increased cloud cover is increased aerosols in the atmosphere which enhances cloud formation.
Since 2000, several different satellite datasets show very little trend in cloud cover (Loeb 2007a):
There's a more detailed discussion on albedo at The albedo effect and global warming. -
joseph449008 at 08:14 AM on 8 March 2010Does record snowfall disprove global warming?
The earlier article talks about positive feedback due to methane, but here nothing about negative feedback due to higher albedo produced by snow cover.
No one said all-year-round global snow cover will increase with global warming. It's clear that during glacial periods, there was more ice globally. It's also clear that during very warm historical periods (e.g. the Eocene-Paleocene Thermal Maximum), there was little ice, and hence the Earth's albedo was lower. It's a positive feedback overall. -
Andy Skuce at 07:20 AM on 8 March 2010New observations find underwater Arctic Shelf is perforated and venting methane
CBDunkerson wrote: "the reason that surface concentrations (and thus atmospheric release) of methane are highest in shallower waters is BECAUSE they are shallow... there is less water for the methane to disperse through. {snip] As to geological processes producing methane... look at the ocean floor map. What could possibly produce that much methane that consistently over that large an area? We're not seeing isolated spots of methane release, but rather an entire region producing methane. That clearly points to release from the permafrost due to warming." CBD: The maps of methane concentrations are actually not that consistent over the area, whether measured near the sea bed, in surface waters or in the atmosphere. The maps show elongated N-S stripes*, whereas the main trend of the bathymetry is roughly at right angles to this. However, I do think that melting permafrost is the most likely and, perhaps, the only explanation for the observed methane; I would just like to better understand the influence, if any, of the deep geology. I note that the authors report using a chromatograph to analyse the gas but they don't mention observing any ethane or other alkanes. They do say that they intend to do some isotopic work in future. *The N-S trends in their maps actually look a little suspicious to me and I wonder to what extent they have been influenced by the orientation of some of the sampling stations along N-S transects (Fig 1A) and the authors' use of a Kriging gridding process. The coastline on Fig 1A is different to those shown on 1B,C and D, particularly for the islands, but this is just drafting error. None of this is likely material to their main point but I wouldn't be surprised to see it picked up and blown out of proportion by a certain mining engineer. -
RSVP at 07:03 AM on 8 March 2010Does record snowfall disprove global warming?
The earlier article talks about positive feedback due to methane, but here nothing about negative feedback due to higher albedo produced by snow cover.Response: This is a good question. While there has been an increase in extreme snowstorm events in some colder regions, this doesn't mean snow cover is showing a long-term increase. In fact, the long-term trend for Northern Hemisphere is a decreasing trend (see Tamino's Cherry Snow for a detailed analysis of snow cover trends). In fact, one paper does examine the question of feedback from changing snow cover: Assessing Snow Albedo Feedback in Simulated Climate Change (Qu 2004). So if there is any feedback from changing snow cover, it's a positive feedback. -
shargash at 06:52 AM on 8 March 2010Does record snowfall disprove global warming?
Come on, guys. This isn't that hard to understand. If there's more moisture in the air, there's going to be more precipitation. If it is cold enough to snow, that precipitation will be in the form of snow. There hasn't been enough warming to banish winter yet. It may snow less often, but when it snows, it will snow more (on average). That's just the laws of physics. Learn them. -
John Mason at 06:28 AM on 8 March 2010Does record snowfall disprove global warming?
Nickle, # 6: This is entirely likely to occur. The most basic laws of physics expect it to: 1) warmer SSTs = more evaporation 2) warmer air (even if it's -5 instead of -15) carries more moisture Add in a nor-easter, where the air is warmed as it circulates across the Gulf Stream then piles back into the Eastern Seaboard and meets cool arctic Northerlies, and Hey Presto! One big dumping of snow! Until it becomes so warm that snow is not possible, expect bigger & bigger dumpings! Cheers - John -
libertarianromanticideal at 06:01 AM on 8 March 2010Does record snowfall disprove global warming?
Hi EOttawa you say: "Dr. Viner was not that far off. The article you referenced (from 2000), quotes Dr. Viner as saying that heavy snow will return occasionally and that "Snow will probably cause chaos in 20 years time"." Are you saying that heavy snow fall did disappear for awhile and now just returned? Rutgers University Global Snow Lab numbers (http://climate.rutgers.edu/snowcover/files/moncov.nhland.txt) doesn't support that. The Snow lab numbers (1967-2010) show that the just completed decade (2001-2010) had the snowiest Northern Hemisphere winters on record. The just completed winter was also the second snowiest on record, exceeded only by 1978. Average winter snow extent during the past decade was greater than 45,500,000 km2, beating out the 1960s by about 70,000 km2, and beating out the 1990s by nearly 1,000,000 km2. - Cheers, Christopher Skyi http://libertarianromanticideal.com/ -
jimalakirti at 05:59 AM on 8 March 2010Does record snowfall disprove global warming?
I recommend the earlier post on this site about glaciers. Some glaciers in the Himalaya region are growing because above about 15,000 feet or so all precipitation is in the form of snow, and the monsoons are being redirected to parts of the mountains so that they will get a lot more precipitation. What happens to the glaciers from which the monsoon is being removed? Well they will shrink. Some may even disappear within 20 years or so. By the way, that posting has about 80 or so of the most absurd trash one can imagine. Don't go there if you aren't prepared to have your head buzz and your ears ring. -
Riccardo at 05:53 AM on 8 March 2010CO2 effect is saturated
mazibuko, the problems with those guys is that their reasoning looks straightforward and anyone can understand it. The mistake he makes becomes apparent only if you know the physics. So common people tend to trust those bogus falsifications. The problem with that "falsification" is not just related to the single band he considers, he arbitrarly put a limit to the amount of radiation CO2 can absorb. This is not true both experimentally (as shown in this post) and theoretically even for the 15 micron band alone; and it would not matter anyway. -
mazibuko at 05:19 AM on 8 March 2010CO2 effect is saturated
What do you make of this claim? http://jimpeden.blogspot.com/2009/11/norm-kalmanovich-on-global-warming-hoax.html I haven't read it thoroughly, but it seems like they are missing the fact that CO2 is absorbed at several different wavelengths. The post devolves into the usual questioning of motives, but I was curious to hear thoughts on the main claim about the 14.77 micron band being used up. Thanks, M -
Peter Hogarth at 05:17 AM on 8 March 2010Does record snowfall disprove global warming?
Nice chart! It was also unusually cold, and we had higher than recent average levels of snow here in the UK this winter. I have bodged together a quick regional temperature chart sequence on UK (CET) variations and trend. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kqIQfD2UKAs I haven't tried to correlate with regional precipitation yet to make it more relevent to this post, but the UK Meteorological Office have excellent records, and may have some graphics somewhere. -
Jeff Freymueller at 04:16 AM on 8 March 2010New observations find underwater Arctic Shelf is perforated and venting methane
#46 chriscanaris, my understanding of the term "Socratic dialogue" matches what the short wikipedia entry says: discussion of moral or philosophical problems, answering and asking questions. As a method of rational thinking, it's great. But scientific questions are not answered by dialogue. They are answered by data. Socrates was not an experimentalist. The Socratic Method was not the Scientific Method. It seems to me that you have redefined Socratic dialogue, although we seem to agree that the scientific method is the way forward to answering many questions. -
jimalakirti at 03:53 AM on 8 March 2010Does record snowfall disprove global warming?
For nearly 60 years I have been seriously involved in some way with snow. I was a skier and a mountain climber when my body allowed it. By the time I was 20 I was interested in avalanches and winter travel and survival and rescue. I kept daily high and low temperature and precipitation records so I would understand the history of the snowpacks in the back country I hoped to visit over the winter. So I understood better than most people the temperatures and other conditions under which snow fell, arranged itself on the ground, and metamorphosed through a series of magical transformations — many of them dangerous to winter travelers. For about ten years I taught snow and avalanche courses for the National Ski Patrol. And I taught that the heaviest snows, those that piled up snow most rapidly, fell at temperatures somewhere between 25 and 35 degrees F. I explained why snow that falls when it is much colder is too fine and powdery to amount to much until redistributed by wind. And on and on. And yet. And yet I have had students who had been skiers for many years who seem never to have noticed this effect, and who would want to argue with me in class that the colder the climate the more snow it got. They would point out that there are glaciers hundreds of feet deep at the poles, and perpetual snows on a lot of mountain tops where it was noticeably and measurably colder than down here in the balmy valley. Explaining that in these special locations any precipitation they get is snow, the small amounts of snow that fall annually can stay (or used to be able to stay) there for centuries upon centuries. I had some students who just never bought it. And there will be a lot of deniers who will simply refuse to buy this. There are a lot of cable TV talk show hosts who will argue that the scientists just made this excuse up after the fact to cover their butts. Wait and see. A harder sell is why have all my tomatoes and strawberries from Florida frozen? -
Sordnay at 03:37 AM on 8 March 2010Does record snowfall disprove global warming?
EOttawa, right, he is saying both, it won't snow and it will, he is betting both on black and red at the same time. The problem is that snow area covered and volume aren't being affected too much, if anything they are both increasing, so telling that snow will become a rare event one year that snows relatively less than normal, and the oposite when is greater than normal, that seems biased. -
libertarianromanticideal at 03:31 AM on 8 March 2010Does record snowfall disprove global warming?
Hi MikeTheInfidel "Can you provide an example from the peer-reviewed literature where anyone was saying that (i.e., Lack of snow was billed in the past as proof for global warming)?" 1. A 2005 Columbia University study titled “WILL CLIMATE CHANGE AFFECT SNOW COVER OVER NORTH AMERICA?” ran nine climate models used by the IPCC, and all nine predicted that North American winter snow cover would decline significantly, starting in about 1990. See: http://www.eee.columbia.edu/research-projects/water_resources/climate-change-snow-cover/index.html 2. Global warming, the heating of the atmosphere by increased amounts of industrial gases, is now accepted as a reality by the international community. Average temperatures in Britain were nearly 0.6°C higher in the Nineties than in 1960-90, and it is estimated that they will increase by 0.2C every decade over the coming century. Eight of the 10 hottest years on record occurred in the Nineties. However, the warming is so far manifesting itself more in winters which are less cold than in much hotter summers. According to Dr David Viner, a senior research scientist at the climatic research unit (CRU) of the University of East Anglia,within a few years winter snowfall will become "a very rare and exciting event". "Children just aren't going to know what snow is," he said. (see: http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/snowfalls-are-now-just-a-thing-of-the-past-724017.html) Yes, the world is warming, but it appears that AGW claims of the demise of snowfall have been exaggerated. And things are not looking very good for the climate model predictions of declining snowfall in the 21st century. - Cheers, Christopher Skyi http://libertarianromanticideal.com/ -
EOttawa at 03:08 AM on 8 March 2010Does record snowfall disprove global warming?
Sordnay - It seems Dr. Viner was not that far off. The article you referenced (from 2000), quotes Dr. Viner as saying that heavy snow will return occasionally and that "Snow will probably cause chaos in 20 years time". Coincidentally, a line from a BBC item in January 2010 was: "Heavy snow and icy roads are causing chaos across most of the UK" -
Tom Dayton at 02:56 AM on 8 March 2010Senator Inhofe's attempt to distract us from the scientific realities of global warming
gallopingcamel, you did write one thing that at least prompts my following response that is on the topic of this thread: I had pointed you to a detailed, factual, technical, peer-reviewed rebuttal of Lindzen and Choi's claims that you were touting. You could have responded that you are unconvinced by the content of that rebuttal and will post your technical objections either on that RealClimate thread or on the Skeptical Science thread Climate Sensitivity is Low, and invited me to follow you to those threads to continue discussion. Instead you responded only by writing that you are more impressed by Lindzen's than Trenberth's demeanors in TV appearances. You did not even say that Lindzen's factual arguments in those TV appearances were more complete--just that you liked his demeanor better. Your response is a good illustration of the topic of this thread: attempts to distract us from the scientific realities. -
Sordnay at 02:38 AM on 8 March 2010Does record snowfall disprove global warming?
I agree, someone who claims that, might have either low understanding of climate, or a biased view. According to Dr David Viner, a senior research scientist at the climatic research unit (CRU) of the University of East Anglia,within a few years winter snowfall will become "a very rare and exciting event". "Children just aren't going to know what snow is," he said. http://www.independent.co.uk/environment/snowfalls-are-now-just-a-thing-of-the-past-724017.html -
RSVP at 02:26 AM on 8 March 2010Does record snowfall disprove global warming?
Any relation to Baltic Sea incident? -
Tom Dayton at 01:37 AM on 8 March 2010Senator Inhofe's attempt to distract us from the scientific realities of global warming
gallopingcamel, you insisted that the GCMs have failed. I don't understand why you insist on that. Instead of me repeating the evidence for GCM success here, I'll just point you to the Skeptical Science argument Models Are Unreliable. If you want to argue or discuss that topic, that thread is the appropriate place. -
Mal Adapted at 01:16 AM on 8 March 2010New observations find underwater Arctic Shelf is perforated and venting methane
Chriscanaris says: "Furthermore, treating the whole patient (planet) calls for consideration of people's wants and aspirations including the aspirations of the third world. Our failure to do so no doubt contributed to the failure of Copenhagen." It seems clear (to me, at least) that global warming will cause disproportionate harm to third world people. First-world people, on average, have a greater cushion of resources to help them adapt to rising sea-level, regional changes in rainfall, summer heatwaves, etc. Much of the population of the third world, however, lives close to the edge of survival, such that any change in conditions means disaster for them. This is the crux of the ethical problem presented by AGW, in my view.Response: "It seems clear (to me, at least) that global warming will cause disproportionate harm to third world people"
This view is borne out in the peer-reviewed literature although not just for the reasons you suppose. See The distributional impact of climate change on rich and poor countries (Mendelsohn 2006):"We predict that poor countries will suffer the bulk of the damages from climate change. Although adaptation, wealth, and technology may influence distributional consequences across countries, we argue that the primary reason that poor countries are so vulnerable is their location. Countries in the low latitudes start with very high temperatures. Further warming pushes these countries ever further away from optimal temperatures for climate sensitive economic sectors."
In addition, developing countries happen to be those most vulnerable to sea level rise, as examined in The impact of sea level rise on developing countries: a comparative analysis (Dasgupta 2008). -
thingadonta at 22:54 PM on 7 March 2010Climate is chaotic and cannot be predicted
I suspect you have largely ignored variations in solar cycles on the earth's climate, whilst focussing on internal effects/variations of the earth's climate (El Nino, volcanoes etc). Increase radiation from the sun and you get non-linear chaotic effects on earth (references needed). The earth does not respond in a linear fashion to changes in the sun's output (references needed). You have assumed the sun/solar variations have a more or less peripheral/minor effect. They don't; any solar variation is hugely amplified on earth, and also, importantly, chaotically amplified (non linear response). Isn't it a bit like droppping a pebble into an already turbulent stream; the external influence is not only amplified, it creates even more chaos?. -
chris1204 at 20:53 PM on 7 March 2010New observations find underwater Arctic Shelf is perforated and venting methane
I can see this is all going to get bigger than Ben Hur so I'll say no more on the topic after this (collective sigh of relief from all and sundry). I'll leave off biting the bait on large scale family planning beyond noting that family size tends to decrease following increased prosperity and not vice versa. However, when it comes to education and health, our foreign aid budgets are laughably miniscule. I do think we have to ask ourselves about the resilience of natural systems - in my own discipline, medicine, and specifically psychiatry, treating the the illness without treating the whole patient and taking into account their strengths (ie, resilience) is poor medicine indeed. Furthermore, treating the whole patient (planet) calls for consideration of people's wants and aspirations including the aspirations of the third world. Our failure to do so no doubt contributed to the failure of Copenhagen. At this point, of course, the argument enters the realm of philosophy (which is not the same as faith). However, we can't escape philosophy. The only reason we are putting so much energy into this discussion is because we would like a good life for ourselves and our children's children (a philosophical notion) for which a well functioning planet is a sine qua non. If we were not looking to the self-interest of humanity, future climatological outcomes are no more than a scientific curiosity on par with past climatic events. -
mikeh1 at 20:40 PM on 7 March 2010Models are unreliable
I have been meaning to post here for a while after reading the post from Poptech who claims that "Only Computer Illiterates believe in "Man-Made" Global Warming". I am a computer scientist with 30 years experience who has no doubt that the theory of AGW is correct. I want to deal specifically with Poptech's claims about computer science as he claims to be an "expert". As most of his post consists of unintelligible rant it is difficult to nail precisely what "straw man" the hapless Poptech is railing against but he does appear to have an issue with physicists or in particular climate scientists who program in FORTRAN. Computers have been used for solving problems in Physics since the beginning of the computer age. In fact most universities run degree courses which allow you to major in Physics and Computing. I did a variation of that degree in the mid 1970s majoring in Applied Maths, Physics and Computer Science. There is a whole range of computer algorithms designed for solving complex mathematical problems using computers and as any physicist will tell you mathematics is the language of physics. He also claims that because some climate scientists use the computer language FORTRAN, their code must be full of bugs. Why? Because Poptech cannot understand FORTRAN code? Because FORTRAN has been around for a while? He does not say. I no longer use FORTRAN but in my experience ability and training is a much better guide to good programming than choice of language. The principals of Computer Science are universal and not tied to any specific computer language. In fact computers are language agnostic as they execute machine code. Many of the changes to programming methodology over the years have addressed the issue of software bugs by promoting the use of tested library components or frameworks, structured coding techniques, the use of design patterns and object oriented programming techniques. That is we break our complex code down into smaller testable units and ensure that they work correctly by testing them rigorously before combining them into the whole. This does not guarantee bug free code but these approaches have been proven to reduce bugs substantially. All these approaches are available to the FORTRAN programmer with the added advantage of having access to a well proven library of scientific and statistical routines. Does our "expert" check every time he flies as to what programming language the aircraft's control system is written in? Most are written in a specialist programming language called ADA which is of the same vintage as FORTRAN. His rant against climate models is really a rant against science of any form. But there is a built in uncertainty in nature so there will always be questions that cannot be answered with absolute precision whether those questions are answered using computer models or with pen and paper. It is the reason why every scientist needs a good handle on statistics because many questions can only be answered within a range of certainty. Sometimes a general question can be answered with more certainty than a more specific question. Actuaries working for health insurance companies use statistical computer models to work out the average health costs of a range of population groups so their employers can set insurance premiums. But they cannot tell you precisely how many people will get sick next week or more specifically if you are likely to need medical care. So it is with climate and weather. Contrary to Poptech's assertion, weather forecasts have actually become much more accurate over the last few years. With better computer climate models, use of satellite measurements and faster computers, weather bureaus now offer five day forecasts which were not reliable enough in past decades. Ironically some forecasters complain that climate change is affecting their forecasts as the changing climate is altering many of the assumptions based on the historical experience that is built into the models. Computer models which deal with climate change have not been designed to forecast the weather over the next century. They cannot tell you the summer temperature in 2050. They are tools for examining climate science the physics of which, contrary to Poptech's opinion, is well understood. They are able to give a range of projections which examine the effects of C02 as well as other factors on the long term climate. In that they have been remarkably successful. -
Riccardo at 20:02 PM on 7 March 2010New observations find underwater Arctic Shelf is perforated and venting methane
chriscanaris, the question you continue to ask ("how much is too much") is more philosophical than scientific. Whatever answer one may give is always questionable, as i said before. Science may tell you that beyond a certain temperature you'll get this or that effect; if you further increase temperature those other effects will come into play; and so on. So, how much is too much? Here you go into philosophiical and/or political and/or ethical ground. If i got it right, you do not question AGW theory. You agree that temperature is rising due to human activities and that it will have a negative impact on human welfare. If this is true, you questions appears to be more on resilience and "affordable damage" the on the science of climate. Why you should you find an answer in climatology? Science already told us what we can confidently say about the evolution of climate, it's time to make a choice an to take up the responsibility (and the costs). Remember, doing nothing or postponing the choice is a choice as well, with the same burden of responsibility and costs. -
Doug Bostrom at 20:02 PM on 7 March 2010New observations find underwater Arctic Shelf is perforated and venting methane
chriscanaris at 13:47 PM on 7 March, 2010 Chris, this is going way off topic, but if we're truly concerned about grinding poverty in the third world we'll gift those places with universal education, equal rights for women, and encouragement and means to practice birth control. None of those things are particularly energy intensive, or expensive for that matter. Short of fully exploiting those proven methods for lifting people from the mud, we'll have to employ and continue forever employing brute force energy, in ever increasing amounts. Fixing the problems of the third world really has not much to do with energy supplies; one could argue that supplying the third world with ample food, consumer goods and energy without supplying the three basics of education, equality and population control would be a fool's errand. -
chris1204 at 19:32 PM on 7 March 2010New observations find underwater Arctic Shelf is perforated and venting methane
Jeff: Socratic dialogue is precisely a process of posing hypotheses and testing them against data. I confess that the more I look at the whole AGW question, the more I am overwhelmed by its complexities. We must be wary of our natural human tendency to reductionist thinking and thus avoid confronting the multiple contradictory strands of evidence (no, I'm not denying temperature rises to date or increases in anthropogenic CO2 - that part of the science looks very convincingly settled). However, as this site so richly illustrates, there's so much more to climate change than CO2. You're perfectly right in highlighting the irony in my giving examples of rearranging geography. The irony was intended. As a species, we have enormous difficulties dealing even with 'simple' issues like running an equitable national health system in a prosperous economy let alone dealing with climate change. However, we have to do the best we can with what data we have and take a careful punt. Consequently, we need to be honest about what we do and don't understand - otherwise, our reductionism does devolve into faith based thinking. We also need to be honest about the ad hoc nature of our responses to the challenges we have faced over successive generations. These are not always as coherent as we would like to pretend. Human history has never been 'business as usual' unless we accept that lurching from crisis to crisis is what we do most often. The trick lies in finding the balance between overhasty responses and paralysis. -
jibal at 18:50 PM on 7 March 2010Did Phil Jones really say global warming ended in 1995?
@JonMoseley "Thus, scientifically, a trend that is not statistically significant DOES NOT EXIST, and must be treated as ZERO for the purposes of valid science." This is quite wrong. First, where did you get your 95% confidence level that the value is zero? Second, you can always find a sample size small enough that there's no statistically significant trend. If those counted as zero, we could discount any trend. The fact is, there's a statistically significant trend going back further than 1995, and the data since 1995 is consistent with it, and everything else we know indicates that it will continue. "the observed results are in conflict with the predictions of the computer models" What makes you think so? It certainly isn't true. "Since we have no experimental (i.e., scientific) data whatsoever to support the idea of man-made global warming" This is quite wrong. First, evidence doesn't cease to exist simply because it doesn't reach a 95% confidence level -- you're using a very odd and erroneous equivalence chain: "statistically significant" = "scientific" = "experimental". Second, not only are you ignoring the evidence mentioned in this very article of statistically significant warming of the oceans, you are ignoring large amounts of other data, such as NASA's examination of 29,000 indicators such as insect migrations, 90% of which support global warming, and the greenhouse physics, which counts as evidence in a proper epistemology. @TruthSeeker "First, the significance of Jones statement is that you cannot, scientificly, make the conclusion that there has been heating from 95-2009. That is scientific fact. This is in direct conflict with the fact that CO2 rates have continued to rise in that same time frame." This is a conceptual confusion that is similar to Jon's. First, you can reach that conclusion, just not by restricting yourself to the 95-2009 temperature data. Second, the inability to reach a conclusion does not in any way conflict with a prediction from a model -- for there to be a conflict, you would have to be able to conclude that the prediction is false. -
Jeff Freymueller at 18:15 PM on 7 March 2010New observations find underwater Arctic Shelf is perforated and venting methane
#40 chriscanaris, I think what Riccardo was getting at with his statement about truth is that no scientist can claim knowledge of absolute truth, in contrast to faith-based thinking. Of course we are seeking the truth, but EVERY scientific theory is subject to revision or to even being discarded if data don't support it. You have to change your mind when the data demand it. All of science is just our best approximation to the truth. Socratic dialogue is fine, but scientific questions are not answered by dialogue -- they are answered by data. You talk about posing hypotheses, but that is only a small part of science. Testing hypotheses by experiment, observation is the critical part. Any new theoretical development also must be put to the test. Sometimes, breakthroughs come from new theory or models that allow us to test new things we couldn't test before. Later, you said: "I think we need to be very wary of assuming that our level of knowledge and understanding suffices to ensure our interventions will evade the 'law of unintended consequences.'" I find this a bit ironic given that you go on to cite examples of rearranging geography, and thus recognize that we are intervening already. We have been intervening in the climate system for at least 250 years, with dramatically increasing global effect from the geometric growth of our energy consumption. What are the unintended consequences, now and in the future, of our experiments in changing atmospheric composition? It is wise to be wary of overestimating our knowledge, but the same wariness must be applied equally to our understanding of what our business as usual is doing. -
Doug Bostrom at 15:00 PM on 7 March 2010New observations find underwater Arctic Shelf is perforated and venting methane
HumanityRules at 13:51 PM on 7 March, 2010 "Also the strongest hotspot is a a river delta. Is there another process going on here?" Relatively warm water from the river, it's mentioned in the article. -
Doug Bostrom at 14:59 PM on 7 March 2010New observations find underwater Arctic Shelf is perforated and venting methane
ubrew12 at 12:18 PM on 7 March, 2010 I just spent some time w/Google scholar rummaging around using the search term "methane stability zone." There's a term we use, "cold comfort"; maybe now we need to add an ironic "warm comfort" to our parlance. This methane seems to exist in a state of equilibrium balanced by opposing forces. Reduction of sea level due to glaciation destabilizes methane due to reduced pressure, but so does rising temperature. Methane takes a long time to get locked up but can break out of jail in very little time given half a chance. On the other hand it seems to be "metabolized" fairly rapidly. It looks as though how rapidly methane is liberated and whether it can contribute significantly to a warming pulse depends on how quickly currently stable methane is engulfed by conditions that don't support stability. This of course makes me think of the rapidly changing Arctic ice scene. Over and over again it seems we're reminded of how various dynamic features of Earth such as ice sheets are tuned for the instant they inhabit. It's too easy to forget that none of these features are engineered, none of them are purposely built with reserve strength. -
Ian Forrester at 14:51 PM on 7 March 2010New observations find underwater Arctic Shelf is perforated and venting methane
HR, I'm afraid that is not right. Flux should be given in "amount" per area per time. It should be able to give actual numbers and amounts and not "ratios". Check out Fick's first law of diffusion -
HumanityRules at 13:51 PM on 7 March 2010New observations find underwater Arctic Shelf is perforated and venting methane
34.Ian Forrester at 05:13 AM on 7 March, 2010 Flux is the movement from one fluid to another so I guess it's a ratio sort of thing, no actual units. I found that scale puzzling. Particularly the use of colour. Goes up to pink then back to green and upto pink/red. Leads to a confusion of where the hotspots are. Also the strongest hotspot is a a river delta. Is there another process going on here? -
chris1204 at 13:47 PM on 7 March 2010New observations find underwater Arctic Shelf is perforated and venting methane
Thanks ubrew12 - no hard feelings. I seem to have provoked a few responses :-) Riccardo: you say, 'This is the best approximation we can give, the truth does not exists in science.' You then say,'We can be quite confident that current warming is anthropogenic.' For the record, I would very likely agree with the latter but not the former statement. I think it bodes us ill to forget that science is a search for truth via a process of positing hypotheses (IE, asking questions). I'm not a climate scientist but I like this site and the opportunity to ask questions. Socratic dialogue is a means of ensuring that we are asking the right questions and edging closer to the truth. Of course, what countries do with the scientific data comes down to political decisions. You then say, 'What we do know, again, is that too much warming isn't good for anyone.' This however begs the question. How much warming is too much? I think it's important to work out as best as we can whether the processes in evidence today have passed a tipping point or whether they are reversible. Otherwise, we risk huge investment in low yield strategies (emission lowering only) as opposed to, for example, strategies aimed at both lowering emissions and mitigation/adaptation. Doug, you may well be right that we have come to the end of our fossil fuel driven boom. Interestingly, countries such as India seem to recognise this - they seem to be moving towards nuclear energy. This has given rise to some interesting responses from Australia which doesn't want to sell India its uranium because the Indians have not signed the non-proliferation treaty. However, short of massive subsidies from the first world, I can't see countries such as Bangladesh or Burkina Faso moving towards either nuclear energy or renewables - they're just not in that league. However, they deserve a leg up to prosperity. As for 'rearranging geography by accident,' I think we need to be very wary of assuming that our level of knowledge and understanding suffices to ensure our interventions will evade the 'law of unintended consequences.' I'm not arguing for doing nothing or 'business as usual' - just hoping that in asking questions, I (and others) might learn something of value. I loved the methane maps. I was fascinated to see that one of the major 'hot spots' was in West Africa on the Gulf of Guinea. I was born childhood in Ghana where I spent my childhood - the West African coastline comprises coastal wetlands giving way to stretches of savanna and tropical rain forest. The other major hot spot is the Amazon basin. Unfortunately, these are precisely the conditions that give rise to endemic malaria and a host of other tropical nasties that kill lots of people and undermine quality of life of many more. Interestingly, malaria was also endemic in southern Europe, eg, in Italy, until Mussolini drained the Pontine Marshes outside Rome. Today, this would be considered ecological vandalism - however, the Italians seem perfectly happy to be free of malaria at the expense of biodiversity. The Wikipedia article on the Pontine Marshes ends with the following: 'The Battle of Anzio [WWII] left the marsh in state of devastation; nearly everything Mussolini had accomplished was reversed. The cities were in ruins, the houses blown up, the marshes full of brackish water, the channels filled in, the plain depopulated, the mosquitoes flourishing and malaria on the rise. The major structures for water control survived and in a few short years the Agro Pontino was restored. In 1947, the province of Littoria, created by Mussolini, was renamed to Latina. The last of the malaria was conquered in the 1950s, with the aid of DDT. Today a duct system runs through the dried-out area. Wheat, fruit and wine are cultivated in the Pontine region. The "Agro Pontino" is a flowering landscape with modern cities with both pre-war and post-war architecture. By the year 2000, about 520,000 inhabitants lived in this formerly deserted region. The Battle of the Swamps, however, is never quite over; without constant vigilance: dredging the channels, repairing and updating the pumps, and so on, the enemy would soon return. The spectre of distant problems remains: the prospect of chemical pollution of the environment, DDT-resistant mosquitoes, and medicine-resistant strains of malaria.' In other words, humans are always rearranging geography whether by accident or design in accordance with prevailing values. I sometimes feel that we in the First World operate on a double standard. Allowing the Third World to remain in grinding poverty is unjust. Moreover, prosperity helps create a milieu in which people value and care for the environment - witness the ecological disasters of the former Soviet Bloc Rustbelt. I doubt very much you or I would want to live in 18th Century London (just before anthropogenic CO2 began to rise) with its narrow streets piled high with horse manure, human excrement, and refuse with cholera epidemics, polluted air, and a host of other nasties to boot. -
ubrew12 at 12:18 PM on 7 March 2010New observations find underwater Arctic Shelf is perforated and venting methane
I want to apologize to chriscanaris for the abruptness of my earlier response. I'm not a frequent commenter on SkepticalScience, and perhaps now you know why. However, particularly on the subject of methane release, I find it increasingly hard to distance my scientific self from my selfish humanness. No other consequence of AGW has, in my mind, the potential to exert itself so completely and utterly onto my physical person, and, more urgently, onto those of my children. The estimated costs of AGW remediation are 1-2% of global GDP for the next 50 years. To save us this cost, we are debating the future magnitude of polar methane release. A release that, RealClimate notwithstanding, could still in its worst manifestation lead to human extinction. I would remind our readers what a 'standup job' scientists have made of Polar Warming predictions in the past: as few as two years ago they predicted NO polar ice field contributions to sea level rise this century. Now they are saying 'no big deal' to polar methane release. Sorry, but there's something in there about 'fool me once, fool me twice'. This is the topic, the only topic, about which people like me lose sleep. Methane clasts in deep ocean deposts exist in an unstable configuration of high pressure and low temperature. Assure me they won't bubble up and extinguish life on earth, as many earth scientists posit they have done in the past. Failing that, sign up, post-haste for a 1-2% hit on global GDP. You can laugh at me later if its all a false alarm. -
CBDunkerson at 10:17 AM on 7 March 2010New observations find underwater Arctic Shelf is perforated and venting methane
Steve L, thus far it is more the other way around... ocean heating through the summer is the reason that frozen methane is melting and being released at that time. Yes, this methane would then contribute to MORE ocean heating, but thus far the amounts being released aren't sufficient for any significant impact. -
Steve L at 09:52 AM on 7 March 2010New observations find underwater Arctic Shelf is perforated and venting methane
Peter Hogarth @26 -- thank you. I read somewhere that Arctic sea ice melts on nearly the same schedule as it did 20 years ago, but that the regrowth is delayed to a greater extent. The explanation was that the reduced ice extent allowed the Arctic Ocean to accumulate more heat, so it took longer to freeze. Looking at how methane seems highest only in July-October in the northern hemisphere, I wonder if that's an additional factor. I'd be curious to know if the late release of methane also contributes significantly to this trend. -
From Peru at 08:30 AM on 7 March 2010New observations find underwater Arctic Shelf is perforated and venting methane
Great video, Peter Hogarth ! This kind of videos should be released by NOAA, NASA and ESA every month so we can all follow the plumes of methane in the atmosphere! -
Doug Bostrom at 05:32 AM on 7 March 2010What do the hacked CRU emails tell us?
Tom Dayton at 04:47 AM on 7 March, 2010 Turns out there are some problems with that evidence, including irony: 'Evan Harris, a member of the science and technology select committee, said: "Members of the Institute of Physics … may be concerned that the IOP is not as transparent as those it wishes to criticise."' More: Climate emails inquiry: Energy consultant linked to physics body's submission
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