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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 14451 to 14500:

RedBaron at 21:23 PM on 3 June 2018

Animal agriculture and eating meat are the biggest causes of global warming

No nigelj, you are wrong there. The current factory farming style of animal husbandry is labor efficient but not land efficient or energy efficient or even cost efficient. Overall it is mostly inefficient.

Converting to regenerative ag in this case increases food output on less land at a lower cost and higher profit and improves that land rather than degrades it.

We could easily support far more population, not less.

nigelj at 14:34 PM on 3 June 2018

Animal agriculture and eating meat are the biggest causes of global warming

Red Baron, this is a difficult thing. On one side of this issue, prairie style beef grazing creates a good long term carbon sink. Meat is an excellent source of protein.

On the other side of the issue, meat is an inefficient form of calories compared to crops and has a significant carbon footprint ( but as you say it depends how its farmed). Whats more, a growing population will put pressure on available land, and this will particularly include converting areas of beef grazing to crops.

The way out of the dilemma is this: If you want your cows, you better be promoting smaller human population size!

nigelj at 07:18 AM on 3 June 2018

2018 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #22

New Zealand has just implemented a ban on issuing any new permits for offshore oil and gas exploration. This supply side policy has had the predictable push back form business interests and their apologists in the media, but not hugely so, and it has not reduced the governments standing in public opinion polls. (I admit this is all a shameless promotion of my country).

A combination of supply and demand side measures does seem the best approach to me. This is often used to resolve housing market inflation by increasing the supply of housing while dampening demand until things meet in the middle at stable prices. It also seems better strategically to use several tools, in case one tool doesn't work as well as predicted.

Turning off the supply side of fossil fuels would intuitively seem the the simplest and best solution, but do it too fast and it would be too hard for the economy to adjust, and do it at a more managed pace and it will lead to more fuel efficient and smaller cars, and ditto more efficient electricity generation, thus prolonging emissions. Therefore you have to have demand side measures that make electric cars and renewable energy attractive, such as subsidies or tax exemptions. The UK have subsidised renewable energy with good results.

To fund the subsidies a carbon tax makes sense, whether this is on oil companies, or more at the petrol pump as a demand side measure. I personally favour a carbon tax that gives some dividends back to the public, but also pays for renewable energy subsidies.

I suppose its also about the art of the possible, and very heavy supply side measures would get huge push back from industry, but this is so frustrating and shows the grip fossil fuel lobbies have over politicians.

Emissions trading is pure demand side management, and it doesn't really impress me much. It does have the virtue of simply setting a price and letting industy innovate the best solutions and in theory could be a stand alone climate solution, but it inevitably seems to lead to closed door bargaining with industry interests, and multiple industry exemptions, and is a very opaque process. I have a gut feeling that even with a high carbon price, it is just a very slow mechanism for the various price signals to trickle down into actual results, and time is a factor in the climate problem. But it could be part of a range of measures.

I also don't like the idea of relying on just one mechanism, and emissions trading is a very complex mechanism. Commonsense tends to suggest its best to have a range of supply and demand side measures.

RedBaron at 01:43 AM on 3 June 2018

Animal agriculture and eating meat are the biggest causes of global warming

The issue is clearly what type of animal husbandry we are talking about. Managed properly Beef production can be the most effect sink, or improperly managed a very significant emissions source.

All depends if the CAFO feedlot model is used or not.

“The number one public enemy is the cow. But the number one tool that can save mankind is the cow. We need every cow we can get back out on the range. It is almost criminal to have them in feedlots which are inhumane, antisocial, and environmentally and economically unsound.” Allan Savory

RedBaron at 01:28 AM on 3 June 2018

New research, May 21-27, 2018

2 jef + mod,

I think it is fair to at least comment on the junk science found on this list here: Impact of cutting meat intake on hidden greenhouse gas emissions in an import-reliant city

The paper tries to make a case for consumption based accounting where production based accounting is far more appropriate. Primarily because management changes alone can change animal husbandry from a net emissions source to a net sink. It is the production that matters in this case for mitigation potential. You have posted this under the heading of Emission savings and the is no greater emissions savings than changing production from a net source to a net sink.

Ironically another paper on this same list Carbon footprints of grain-, forage-, and energy-based cropping systems in the North China plain

Shows the smallest footprint for grass!

Clearly both papers are at least partly in conflict with each other.

I agree though that further discussion besides mentioning those papers are on the weeks list and are at least partly in conflict would be better done on the animal husbandry threads because more solid science has been posted there already.

jef12506 at 23:52 PM on 2 June 2018

New research, May 21-27, 2018

I am so tired of the simple minded thinking on meat consumption. It is not meat/dairy consumption that is the problem it is the CAFO standard that has been fourced on the industry so a small number of corporations can rake in massive profits.

We need to go back to grazing livestock. Instead of growing millions of acres of grain, with all the connected FFs involved in that, then cramming it into animals we need to put the animals directly on the land. This has the effect of healthy animals and healthy meat/dairy, it also means healthy pasture lands from natural spread of manure so better CO2 up take. It could also provide millions of jobs.

Moderator Response:

[DB] Your comment is off-topic on this thread. Please place a version on this thread, if you wish to continue this line of discussion. Same to respondents. Thanks!

nigelj at 19:57 PM on 2 June 2018

Trump administration refuses to consider that 97% of climate scientists could be right

In America about half of scientists believe in some form of god or higher power. And they are telling you we are altering the climate.

motorsports at 18:43 PM on 2 June 2018

Trump administration refuses to consider that 97% of climate scientists could be right

I read you say president Donald Trumps gvt does not acknowledge 97% of what scientists say

have you also considered that secular people are spiritually dead and do not aknowledge the glaring facts of a created hand that brought this world you see into existence

Moderator Response:

[DB] Please comport your comments to the topic of the thread you place them on and in compliance with the Comments Policy here. Comments addressing religion fall under the category of ideology. This venue deals with matters surrounding the scientific evidence for climate change. Thanks!

nigelj at 07:33 AM on 2 June 2018

New research, May 21-27, 2018

"Climate change as a polarizing cue: Framing effects on public support for low-carbon energy policies"

This appears to suggest that Republicans don't accept anthropogenic climate change and regard it almost like a swear word not be said in polite company, and prefer nuclear energy over wind and solar for some mysterious reason. (I confess, I have just scanned the abstract). The common factor might be a desire to understand the world by over simplifying the issues. For example regarding the science the most common myth is "climate has changed before so we arent responsible" which has the virtue of both being simple but wrong.

Nuclear energy has the one advantage of being continuous baseload power, and the magical appeal of being something wonderful that creates energy out of a few tonnes of uranium. What could be a simpler solution? We were all impressed with nuclear when we were children.

And wind and solar might be perceived as associated with Greenies and greenies are allegedly "watermelons" and bad, communist people, so therefore we don't have to listen to anything they say no matter how constructive it is. This is another simplification, and I guess we are all susceptible to such mental biases on various issues.

But these are all massive simplifications and hide multiple problems with nuclear power and climate denialist myths. It's literally an inability to deal with complexity and nuance, and hard realities about problems. There is a basic lack of intellectual rigour in the Republicans response to the issues at times. You see it with their economic policies as well, all based on massive simplifications that are so far detached from reality as to cause massive problems.

"This nuclear expansion should be accompanied by effective international safety assurances, including a mandate to stop construction of unsafe nuclear power plants"

Good luck with that. Another piece of wishful thinking. I don't see this as likely to happen, given countries self interest and cost pressures, especially when you have America attacking international agreements, if not indeed the entire international order. Wind and solar seems the best idea until genuinely safe nuclear power becomes a reality which I would welcome (but dont hold your breath, its been promised for a considerable time now).

billev at 05:02 AM on 2 June 2018

Global warming made Hurricane Harvey more destructive

Areas of high and low air pressure will continue to be the major determinant of hurricane direction and speed.

SirCharles at 04:01 AM on 2 June 2018

Restricting global warming to 1.5C could ‘halve’ risk of biodiversity loss

Scratching the 1.5°C Jazz
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9a6JeqX1BHI

John Hartz at 23:58 PM on 1 June 2018

Global warming made Hurricane Harvey more destructive

Recommended supplemental reading:

Stronger, Wetter, Slower: How Hurricanes Will Change by Mark Fischetti, Scientific American, May 30, 2018

Does global warming make tropical cyclones stronger? by Stefan Rahmstorf, Kerry Emanuel, Mike Mann & Jim Kossin, Real Climate, May 30, 2018

MA Rodger at 22:43 PM on 1 June 2018

It hasn't warmed since 1998

Correction to #402.

Para 3 should read "... instead of 1998-2012."

MA Rodger at 22:38 PM on 1 June 2018

It hasn't warmed since 1998

guym @400,

I have long pondered the "hiatus" nonsense from contrarians. My take on it is perhaps more clinical than Eclectic @401, and a smidgen shorter.

One of the difficulties we face addessing the "hiatus" is that contrarians define the "hiatus" to mean vastly different things, from silly nonsense from Rose of the Daily Rail (Temp(Jan1996)=Temp(Aug2012) => global warming stopped 16 years ago) to more allegedly-grown-up versions comparing modeled & measured temperatures. Which ever version is used, their take-away is "Global Warming has stopped" or "Models are badly wrong". And any attempt to sensibly address the issue like in the AR5 Box 9.2 or for instance Hansen et al discussing the 'Global Warming Standstill' in 2012 results in a contrarian 'we told you so!!' response which is then grafted onto nonsense by even the more respected of contrarians to beat the "Global Warming Has Stopped!!!" drum (eg ex-clomatologist Judith Curry).

So you really do have to be careful when addressing the issue of the "hiatus" and that means more than using a title that calls it the "Hiatus in Global Mean Surface Warming of the Past 15 Years" as per AR5 Box9.2.

I think the AR5 Box9.2 use of OLS analysis over the period 1998-2012 was poorly contrived. (For the record, the resulting SAT trend roughly doubles if you use 1999-2012, to +0.09ºC/decade, instead of 1975-1996.) What was poor was firstly comparison of 1998-2012 with 1951-2012. The start period should have been roughly 1975, the start of the recent strong AGW. Contrarians who exaggerate the significance of the "hiatus" would be surprised to hear that if you compare 1975-1996 with 1975-2012 you get almost identical trends. The reason for 1998-2012 being so different from the longer-term SAT trend is because the 1998-2012 SAT trend relies on one of those reality-busting steps as in the SKS Escalator. So a second criticism of AR5 Box9.2 is giving credance to the 1998-2012 reality-busting OLS analysis.

SKS Escalator

Simply-put, anybody who (a) supports a "hiatus" 16-years long or (b) uses the "flatness" in surface temperature record to create a 16-year long "hiatus" by for instance saying "I predict we will see continuation of the ‘standstill’ in global average temperature for the next decade" (and good old Judy Curry manages both a & b) show they have departed from truthful analysis of AGW.

I myself feel the way to take command of the "hiatus" is by setting its true length. This analysis of HadCRUT data (usually 2 clicks to 'download your attachment') finds it was just 32 months long. And a message that must always be included in "hiatus" talk - thoroughout these years, AGW did not show any signs of faltering as the Ocean Heat Content data surely demonstrates.

Eclectic at 21:01 PM on 1 June 2018

It hasn't warmed since 1998

Guym @400 , [and my apologies for the long post]

the "hiatus" still lives on — at least in the minds of the climate denialists. (The less-educated denialists often refer to it as "the Pause" . . . and seem to wish to genuflect at its mention.) Although the hiatus disappeared 4 years ago, many denialists feel that the recent record-hot years [2014/2015/2016/2017] are a transient aberration; and that within a very few years, planet Earth will return to another prolonged halt in warming (and thus all the scientists will conclusively be proven wrong). And moreover, the Earth will probably cool down, back to its rightful & divinely ordained un-warmed condition. That is their faith. But they have zero mechanism to point to, which could produce such a change (they sometimes point to the future possibility of a Grand Solar Minimum . . . but they refuse to acknowledge that such an event, if it would occur at all, could only produce a feeble/ineffectual counter to the ongoing rapid warming caused by the Greenhouse Effect — an Effect which many denialists still refuse to believe CO2 has any place in).

I am fairly sure I am not telling anything you aren't already aware of.

Denialists will only look at planetary surface temperatures: and even there, they have an extreme preference for the satellite record of temperatures limited to to the upper troposphere, rather than the actual planetary surface temperatures down here at ground level. They have a blind spot for other surface changes such as ice melting and sea levels rising — or at least, they will consider such changes only in isolation (and will quibble about those changes individually, rather than putting it all together in the big picture).

Where denialists do pay attention to real surface conditions, they usually restrict their mental focus to the region around Latitude 40 North and Longitude 80 West. Other regions receive attenuated or non-existent concern.

Denialists mentally refuse to look at the ongoing continuous warming of the ocean, and they have a massive blind spot for the 90+% of global warming energy which goes into the ocean. For them to acknowledge that fact, would mean acknowledging it is impossible for a genuine hiatus to exist (short of the Earth reaching thermal equilibrium as a new higher plateau of GH Effect).

Consequently, they still agonize over the so-called Hiatus/Pause; they discuss it as though it never terminated, and they still put enormous effort into statistical analysis "proving" that the Hiatus was/is real. They denounce the scientific view that there never was a real post-1998 hiatus . . . and they are still buoyed by the way that some real scientists were embarrassed (and insecure) enough to name a "hiatus" (as well devoting some discussion & research time to it. Surely there can be no smoke without fire !! Nor can there be any ocean warming, or even Greenhouse Effect !! The existence of an unpredicted Hiatus must mean that the scientists' models from the 80's and 90's . . . are false & invalid. Likewise all the rest of the Warmist/Alarmist blather & propaganda).

Guym, for my sins (and for my entertainment) I sometimes look at the WhatsUpWithThat website. The actual articles are a complete waste of time — being either crazy stuff, or semi-real stuff which has received ferocious "spin". But in the comments column under each article, you find a 100 or so "comments". 95% of them, you should slide straight past — they are the usual deluded/toxic/extremist nonsense spouted by angry denialists who are using the WUWT site as an echo-chamber to bolster their strange/bizarre beliefs. But there are a few gems.

Keep your eye alert for (A) posts by Nick Stokes — a real scientist, with saintly patience, who infuriates the denialists by his cool corrections of their nonsense (they just can't win a trick against him)

. . . and (B) a couple of denialists [I won't name them] who have enough science & math to produce umpteen paragraphs of equations & analyses — all of it ultimately fruitless in reality; yet they lack the insight to see that they are willing victims of severe Motivated Reasoning. If they were sane, then they could achieve a considerable amount if they turned their talents to actual real science, I'm sure. Ah, what a waste. One of them asserts that the CO2 / Greenhouse Effect does not exist, and that "AGW" is truly just a result of long-cycle ocean oscillations. Quite crazy.

The other [and here I finally address the main point of your post] goes in for lengthy statistical analyses to demonstrate that the recent "hiatus" must have been genuine because he can find "no statistically significant" upward trend in (surface) temperature. He does sometimes admit that there seems to be a very slight positive trend during the hiatus — but since it is statistically not significant in its difference from zero trend, then he concludes that there was no actual warming during that period (and therefore the scientific climate consensus is wrong in its entirety).

Not only does he ignore the ongoing melting and sea level rise, but he seemingly cannot conceive that the real purpose of statistical analysis is to reflect reality, rather than conceal it. He prefers to look at his figuring, rather than look at the reality of the physical processes affecting climate.

nigelj at 18:48 PM on 1 June 2018

Melting Arctic sends a message: Climate change is here in a big way

Billev #6, Greenland has been farmed for centuries and still is now.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Economy_of_Greenland#Agriculture_and_forestry

"We appear to be experiencing the same sort of climate change that humans have previously experienced;"

Climate change is quite different now. Reconstructions show temperatures over the last decade are higher than during the medieval warm period and in fact higher than the last 10,000 years. The recent warming is driven primarily by greenhouse gases, solar activity has been falling slightly for the last 50 years, and the specific way the earth is heating can only be explained by the greenhouse effect.

I think you know this, and this is why your comments are so lame. You obviously have no real enthusiasm for your own beliefs, and certainly have no evidence to back them up.

billev at 16:50 PM on 1 June 2018

Global warming made Hurricane Harvey more destructive

One or more areas of high pressure caused Hurricane Harvey to stall then track the way it did along the Texas coast. High pressure areas are not a recent occurrence caused by global warming.

billev at 16:39 PM on 1 June 2018

Global warming made Hurricane Harvey more destructive

Hurricane Harvey's forward progress stalled as it made landfall in Texas and it meandered along the coast toward Houston. Thus its rainfall was concentrated in a relatively small area for an extended period and thus caused more severe flooding.

billev at 16:16 PM on 1 June 2018

Melting Arctic sends a message: Climate change is here in a big way

Scientists have unearthed remnants that indicate that the Vikings farmed on the Southern tip of Greenland for a few hundred years beginning in the latter part of the 1200's. This is evidence that the Earth has warmed previously as claimed in current climate theory. We appear to be experiencing the same sort of climate change that humans have previously experienced; repeatedly experienced if the climatologists are correct in their theory.

guym at 13:38 PM on 1 June 2018

It hasn't warmed since 1998

I often find myself in discussions with contrarians about the supposed "hiatus" of AGW from 1998. I'm happy to have these discussions as it appears to me to be a dishonest statistical trick to claim the hiatus i.e. the random picking of 1998 as the starting point. If they pick any other year it doesn't seem like they can get the desired result, from their perspective.

One of the claims that is made is that the IPCC acknowledge that the hiatus occurred and they point to things like box 9.2 in the AR5 report that is titled "Climate Models and the Hiatus in Global Mean Surface Warming of the Past 15 Years". Although, again, I don't have an issue in what is written there, my question is, why do the IPCC reports refer to this period at all and why use the term hiatus when this doesn't really fit with what is said? It just seems strange that they should talk about a period starting with such an anomolous year. Is it just to address the hiatus claims?

Johnboy at 08:29 AM on 1 June 2018

Melting Arctic sends a message: Climate change is here in a big way

A program I wish every American would watch was a 2-hour presentation on NOVA this spring, titled "Decoding the Weather Machine". From the origins of climate science 200 years ago through to today's science modeling and issues, potential future outcomes and very interesting information on adapting, mitigating and even prospering to avoid the suffering that will come with inaction.

Found it encouraging that one of the Koch brothers, being a principle sponsor of NOVA, would not block this sort of programming. It's available now on Amazon video, for 3 bucks.

nigelj at 06:36 AM on 1 June 2018

Melting Arctic sends a message: Climate change is here in a big way

The stories about climate change in Siberia are important, and there are important stories in other countries as well. Our local media don't report them, perhaps because they are unaware, or see them as local issues, but when they are put together they become very important.

It's the sort of thing large media organisations like the Wall Street Journal could investigate as a totality, but the Wall Street journal is biased and writes poor quality articles on climate issues. Here are a collection of reviews of the Wall Street climate change articles, and they are not flattering reviews.

SirCharles at 06:17 AM on 1 June 2018

Melting Arctic sends a message: Climate change is here in a big way

Study Finds 5,000 May Have Died From Hurricane Maria, Yet Cable News Covered Roseanne Instead

Johnboy at 01:10 AM on 1 June 2018

Melting Arctic sends a message: Climate change is here in a big way

How do we get these kind of stories (and so many others) to the general public? Just read a Discover magazine article on the subject, including reports on hundreds of cracking and destableizing buildings in Siberia, crumbling roads, surfacing of Mammoth bones (people sell the tusks as substitutes for elephant ivory), reemergence of virus spores, etc., etc.

This information needs to be seen on the evening news and in national publications. The Wall Street Journal gave Dr. Singer a megaphone with his easily refutable science on sea level rise. More on the realities of climate change need that kind of coverage.

Riduna at 15:35 PM on 31 May 2018

Melting Arctic sends a message: Climate change is here in a big way
‘Melting Arctic send a message’ is the title – but the message is barely explored. Only in the penultimate paragraph do the threats posed by CH4/CO2 emissions and sea level rise get a cursory mention. Nowhere is there an attempt to quantify and state their effects or those of ever thinning sea ice and coastal erosion on the future of the Arctic and global warming. Well illustrated but otherwise not very informative.

nigelj at 08:25 AM on 31 May 2018

Trump administration refuses to consider that 97% of climate scientists could be right

Regarding the supposed 99.94% consensus study. The related article makes the claim that the public realise that sometimes eccentric dissenting voices in science turn out to be correct, so its important to have a "complete consensus" and they believe the climate change consensus is actually very close to complete at 99.94% (something it appears may or may not be the case)

I suppose this is all true "in an ideal world". However with complex science its unlikely to me that absolutely all scientists would agree, and you also get a few cranks. With contentious science you would get a few people with hidden agendas and funding. The public probably realise this, and would if anything be suspicious if the consensus was actually 100%. It would look too much like a stitch up job.

I think anything above 90% would be generally seen as a powerful consensus by the public, although nothing will persuade the hard core denialists. The important thing is to publicise the consensus studies to raise public awareness, regardless of the precise figure. We know its over 90% and the Cook study finding 97% is a rigorous and wide sort of study.

Of course if it really is 99.4% great. Right now many people I know think scientific opinion on the climate issue is about equally divided 50 / 50, and that is the problem because it suggests considerable disagreement.

BaerbelW at 06:51 AM on 31 May 2018

Trump administration refuses to consider that 97% of climate scientists could be right

Sir Charles @10

The paper you link to is "just" a response to our teams's response to Powell's comment on Cook et al. 2013. As outlined in our paper (Skuce et al. 2017) - which Andy Skuce wrote about here - we don't agree with Powell's approach to determine the consensus. His final rejoinder doesn't change that.

SirCharles at 06:00 AM on 31 May 2018

Trump administration refuses to consider that 97% of climate scientists could be right

Jim Powel's new peer-reviewed study puts the scientific consensus on human made global warming at 99.94%

=> The Consensus on Anthropogenic Global Warming Matters

knaugle at 02:18 AM on 31 May 2018

Trump administration refuses to consider that 97% of climate scientists could be right

I might point out that the 97% seems to include several once active scientists on the 3% side who are now retired, or no longer with us. It's not a case where any new information has emerged that would sway the majority to reconsider the minority argument.

lucike at 22:34 PM on 30 May 2018

Trump administration refuses to consider that 97% of climate scientists could be right

The sad truth is that climate change is not about the science anymore. It is about politics.
And this is how it should also be adressed by the people advocating to do things to stop it.

Just pointing out the numbers or coming up with scientists is not enough, one needs to play the game that the "anti- camp" is playing.

They do not care about the data or the 97% scientists that agree with the global warming issues. They see and take care of it as a political point.

(and sadly this is the case with many other things as well)

Postkey at 18:40 PM on 30 May 2018

Trump administration refuses to consider that 97% of climate scientists could be right

“ Moreover, as I show, the consensus among publishing scientists is demonstrably not 97%. Instead, five surveys of the peer-reviewed literature from 1991 to 2015 combine to 54,195 articles with an average consensus of 99.94%. “
http://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0270467617707079

DrivingBy at 15:34 PM on 30 May 2018

Yes, EVs are green and global warming is raising sea levels

@nigelj

I wouldn't call Singer a conservative; he is not advocating for any traditional viepoint or program. In my humble opinion, he's just a) shilling for dollars and b) is an old crank.

nigelj at 13:31 PM on 30 May 2018

Trump administration refuses to consider that 97% of climate scientists could be right

The EPA has now become the environmental destruction agency. It's like something out of George Orwells novel '1984', for example The Ministry of Truth is really the ministry of propoganda. List of the ministries in 1984 here.

John Hartz at 10:49 AM on 30 May 2018

Trump administration refuses to consider that 97% of climate scientists could be right

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