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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.

Recent Comments

Comments 16851 to 16900:

nigelj at 05:54 AM on 27 November 2017

2017 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming Digest #47

Regarding negative emissions technology, the economist.com has a good article here. This covers sucking CO2 from the atmosphere with chemical processes, beccs, enhanced soil sinks, and forestry sinks.

william5331 at 04:40 AM on 27 November 2017

2017 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #47

We should congratulate Trump for uniting the world against myopic American policies. They weren't much better before Trump but he has united us.

One Planet Only Forever at 03:19 AM on 27 November 2017

Analysis: WRI data suggests emissions have already ‘peaked’ in 49 countries

nigelj,

An organization calling itself the GHG Management Institute has published an article about International Travel and Climate Change. The article explains why international air travel is excluded from a nation's GHG accounting. It explains that it was agreed that the International Civil Aviation Organization (ICAO) would be responsible for GHG abatement actions on international travel (International cargo GHG is also not accounted for by nations, and neither is the GHG emissions of a nation's military activity outside of their nation).

An interesting point is how difficult it has been for the ICAO to make meaningful progress. My suspicion is that they lack the authority to direct what will be done by aircraft manufacturer's because those are 'National and Business Organization Interests'. And they lack the authority to direct what will be done by International Carriers because they are also 'National and Business Organization Interests'. And as an association of Private Interest organizations, part of their mandate is maximizing the success of their members, protecting their Private Interests.

Asking the ICAO to impose profitability challenges on their members (the actions required to responsibly address the climate change challenge), appears to be similar to asking the International Energy Agency (IEA) to effectively manage the rapid termination of global burning of fossil fuels.

The real problem continues to be the power of inappropriately developed Private Interests to interfere with efforts to curtail understandably harmful and ultimately unsustainable activity. And the real problem related to that problem is the ability of powerful people to abuse the understanding of marketing message creation and delivery to improperly influence the education of the population.

Which leads to John Stuart Mill's warning in "On Liberty" that I share so often (because it keeps coming up as the best fundamental explanation of so many problems/challenges relating to developing lasting improvements for all of humanity).

“If society lets a considerable number of its members grow up mere children, incapable of being acted on by rational consideration of distant motives, society has itself to blame for the consequences.”

And a related quote that keeps coming up as the best explanation of what is going on is from the UN Commissioned Report "Our Common Future" published in 1987.

"25. Many present efforts to guard and maintain human progress, to meet human needs, and to realize human ambitions are simply unsustainable - in both the rich and poor nations. They draw too heavily, too quickly, on already overdrawn environmental resource accounts to be affordable far into the future without bankrupting those accounts. They may show profit on the balance sheets of our generation, but our children will inherit the losses. We borrow environmental capital from future generations with no intention or prospect of repaying. They may damn us for our spendthrift ways, but they can never collect on our debt to them. We act as we do because we can get away with it: future generations do not vote; they have no political or financial power; they cannot challenge our decisions.
26. But the results of the present profligacy are rapidly closing the options for future generations. Most of today's decision makers will be dead before the planet feels; the heavier effects of acid precipitation, global warming, ozone depletion, or widespread desertification and species loss. Most of the young voters of today will still be alive. In the Commission's hearings it was the young, those who have the most to lose, who were the harshest critics of the planet's present management."

And those identified fundamental problems have led to the development of a Global set of Sustainable Development Goals that can be used to measure the worthiness of any leader of humanity (in Business and Politics). Those goals include climate action. And it is clear that all of the SDGs need to be achieved for humanity to have a decent future.

The missing link is the global ability to effectively limit the influence of undeserving Winners of Pursuit of Private Interest and keep other undeserving people from becoming temporary damaging Winners. And that missing link will not be easily developed as long as there remains a powerful belief/dogma that Good Results will develop if people, groups or nations are freer to believe and do whatever they can get away with that suits Their Interest.

Better education of the entire global population will be best developed when Private Interests that want to compromise the Global Public Interest have no significant influence on the leadership or education of any sub-set of the population. As long as sub-sets are freer to believe whatever they want and try to get away with doing what suits their Private Interest there will be damaging developments and conflict.

The continued development of climate science awareness and understanding has unintentionally, but very powerfully, exposed the unacceptability of what has been developed by competitions of Private Interests for popularity and profit, and the social and economic leadership changes that are needed for the Global Public Interest of humanity to have a lasting constantly improving future, not being compromised by Private Interests pursuing better personal presents at the expense of others.

XRAY1961 at 03:10 AM on 27 November 2017

Humans are greening the planet, but the implications are complicated

Being rather visual in my interpretations, one thing I notice from the image above is that a lot of the greening appears to be in the sub polar regions. These are areas that for the most part have been either tundra or ice covered.

We are already observing changes in these areas due to warming. In addition, there has been concern voiced about increased emmissions of GHG's as these areas melt. Finally, there are the obvious albedo changes. As the title mentions, it's "complicated".

Paul D at 21:00 PM on 26 November 2017

New rebuttal to the myth 'climate scientists are in it for the money' courtesy of Katharine Hayhoe

Accusing someone of doing something purely for the money reveals more about the person saying it than it does of the person it is aimed at.

I get paid for the work I do, but I stay with the job because the work I do ticks all the boxes regarding my interests and skills. I work for a large commercial engineering and services company.

I don't own property and I use public transport.

If I wanted more money I wouldn't stay where I am.

Lloyd Flack at 16:37 PM on 26 November 2017

New rebuttal to the myth 'climate scientists are in it for the money' courtesy of Katharine Hayhoe

My salary gets paid out of research grants. I know what researchers do to try to stretch out a grant. The suggestion that anyone is getting rich off them is plain silly. I am working in public health rather than climate but I see no reason at all to believe that how grants are spent is any different.

nigelj at 08:18 AM on 26 November 2017

Analysis: WRI data suggests emissions have already ‘peaked’ in 49 countries

Peter Wilde@16

The impression of how many countries have reached emissions peak might indeed be over optimistic in some cases, but not all cases, or that widely. In Russia it was driven by politics of the breakup of the Soviet Union and later economic recessions, and with no real sign of a genuine commitment to reduce emissions.

However offshoring of manufacturing in Britain to China is only part of the reason for emissions reductions. It's well known Britain have a well developed renewable electricity sector which would be a big contributor to lower emissions.

Surely emissions from planes are accounted for in country of origin? I dont see why it would be ambiguous or otherwise.

China's share of manufacturing has increased over the last 30 years, but this process is nearing saturation according to the economist.com. China has some manufacturing migrating back to America and very low cost centres like Vietnam and Bangaldesh. This is because of wage rises in China. Theres's also a government push to expand the services sector rather than just manufacturing. Manufacturing debt servicing is also right at the upper limits. Chinas building boom of high rise apartments is also nearing saturation level, so its use of cement may decrease to some extent. So if you consider all that, it is feasible that China can reduce emissions.

nigelj at 06:37 AM on 26 November 2017

What do Jellyfish teach us about climate change?

Aleks, Michael Sweet, this published research appears to be what is very relevant.

"Impact of anthropogenic atmospheric nitrogen and sulfur deposition on ocean acidification and the inorganic carbon system"

Scott C. Doney,*† Natalie Mahowald,‡ Ivan Lima,* Richard A. Feely,§ Fred T. Mackenzie,¶ Jean-Francois Lamarque,‖ and Phil J. Rasch‡

Proc Natl Acad Sci U S A. 2007 Sep 11; 104(37): 14580–14585.
Published online 2007 Sep 5. doi: 10.1073/pnas.0702218104
PMCID: PMC1965482
Environmental Sciences, Sustainability Science, Environmental Sciences

www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC1965482/

Summary:

On a global scale, the alterations in surface water chemistry from anthropogenic nitrogen and sulfur deposition are only a few percent of the ocean acidification and Δ[DIC] increases expected from the oceanic uptake of anthropogenic CO2. However, impacts on seawater chemistry can be much more substantial in coastal waters, on the order of 10–50% or more of the anthropogenic CO2-driven changes near the major source regions and in marginal seas.

Peter Wilde at 05:16 AM on 26 November 2017

Analysis: WRI data suggests emissions have already ‘peaked’ in 49 countries

Looking at the dates when national emissions peak, as in this article, could give an over-optimistic impression of how far and fast the world is advancing in tackling climate change.

Surely it's also necessary to consider the reasons why certain countries' emissions have peaked relatively early. For a number of developed countries like the UK, the relatively early peak to some extent reflects a decline in home-grown manufacturing industry; replaced by a greater reliance on imports of manufactured goods from countries like China.

The rise of the globalised economy and goods being transported for long distances also raises other questions. Where are emissions from planes and ships being accounted for when considering whether or not a particular country's emissions have peaked? And what about emissions connected to rapidly increasing internet activity, for maintaining server farms, and call centres, etc?

A few major players like China and India are responsible for an increasing share of global manufacturing (and arguably too of data processing and the internet-based service economy). How much reliance can be placed on their good intentions to reduce emissions by xx date - while simultaneously increasing their share of global business activity - ?

nigelj at 05:13 AM on 26 November 2017

Analysis: WRI data suggests emissions have already ‘peaked’ in 49 countries

Voting systems are actually extremely relevant to the climate issue. FPP makes it very challenging for small parties, like Green Parties and other environemtally driven parties to become part of any government. Proportional representation is more inclusive of Green parties, and wider minority parties generally. I have seen this in my country first hand where small parties have been in government, or had confidence and supply agreements. Just the possibility they could be in government might influence policy of other parties.

The problem with MMP is it can give minority parties a disproportionate influence, where the tail wags the dog. This can lead to instability. STV (single transferable vote) proportional representation overcomes this problem and may be the best system overall.

Approx 80 countries have some form of proportional representation as below. Many have proportional party list.

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Proportional_representation

I dont think you can lightly dismiss the decision of 80 countries, especially wealthy european countries, some with good climate policies. FPP might have the virtue of it being easier and more clear cut in forming a government, but the results in terms of quality of government often aren't compelling.

michael sweet at 04:41 AM on 26 November 2017

What do Jellyfish teach us about climate change?

Aleks:

The solubility of CO2 in water dependant on both the temperature and the pressure of the CO2. According to the engineering toolbox, at 15C and 1 atm pressure, approximately 2 gm of CO2 dissolve per kg of water. Your figure of 1.5 g/kg is probably from 25C.

You make two basic mistakes with using this temperature:

The average temperature of the ocean is closer to 15C and not 25C.
The pressure of CO2 above the ocean is not 1 atm, it is 4x10-4 atm.

Since you do not know how to figure out the solubility of CO2 from a graph, why should I believe your claim that:

" Calculation from the data in the right column of the table leads to a much larger difference.
It seems that these data do not confirm the theory of determining role of atmospheric CO2 in the change of ocean acidity."

You have made so many basic calculation errors that your calculations canot be trusted.

Scientists have found that the tabulated data is completely consistant with theory that CO2 determines the pH of the ocean. Keep in mind that other buffers exist in the ocean (especially boric acid) and you must consider these when you calcuate the pH change caused by adding more CO2.

michael sweet at 04:15 AM on 26 November 2017

Analysis: WRI data suggests emissions have already ‘peaked’ in 49 countries

Norrism:

Your comment was deleted for being off topic on this thread (I am not a moderator).

I suggest you repost your question on the Weekly news roundup where it will be more on topic. I imagine that John Hartz did not see the post in the Economist, it is difficult to read everything.

Moderator Response:

[JH] See my Moderator's comment on NorrisM's post.]

NorrisM at 03:21 AM on 26 November 2017

Analysis: WRI data suggests emissions have already ‘peaked’ in 49 countries

Moderator

As Eclectic has noted, my question relating to the recent lead article in the November 18, 2017 of the Economist has been "disappeared" but without any explanation for why this was done. I thought perhaps it should be posted on the "Models are Unreliable" thread but it did seem relevant to this thread as well in that the levelling of emissions is not enough according to the Economist. We have to pull massive amounts of carbon out of the air to meet most of the model's projections.

Moderator Response:

[JH] Another Moderator deleted your comment because it was "off topic."

Andy Skuce produced a three-part series on the issues of your concen in the Fall/Winter of 2015.

The Road to Two Degrees, Part One: Feasible Emissions Pathways

The Road to Two Degrees, Part Two: Are the experts being candid about our chances?

The Road to Two Degrees, Part Three: Equity, inertia and fairly sharing the remaining carbon budget

Please read this set of articles and post your comment on one of them.

For more recents article on this topic, see:

Who will deliver the negative emissions needed to avoid 2C warming?, Guest Post by Glen Peters & Oliver Geden, Carbon Brief, Oct 30, 2017

Can Carbon-Dioxide Removal Save the World? by Elizabeth Kolbert, Annals of Science, The New Yorker, Nov 20, 2017 Print Edition

One Planet Only Forever at 02:42 AM on 26 November 2017

Analysis: WRI data suggests emissions have already ‘peaked’ in 49 countries

NorrisM@10,

To begin, I did not say the Conservatives 'will choose to fade away'. What I said, and meant, was that unless the Conservatives become a less significant factor in Global Leadership there is no real hope of make lasting improvements for the future of humanity.

And I should have said the 'Collective of current day Unite the Right groups who claim to be Conservative' (rather than using the term Conservative), need to become irrelevant.

The Global Public Interest is advancing humanity through the development of 'lasting' improvements for a robust diversity of humanity, the future of humanity. And all sub-sets of humanity need to govern their regional or tribal behaviour in line with achieving that Public Interest, ensuring their regional or tribal Private Interests do not compromise the Global Pubic Interest.

Unite the Right groups can clearly be seen to be collections of a diversity of Private Interests that are contrary to the Public Interest. As that awarenss and understanding grows fewer people will be willing to stay in that United group that votes to support each other's understandably unaccepable interests.

It is inevitable that the Unite the Right groups will see reduced popularity. The extremists among that group like ISIS and Team Trump are making it more difficult for people to excuse what is understandably the pursuit of unacceptable and ultimately unsustainable regional or tribal Private Interests that compromise the Public Interest of the future of humanity.

As I mentioned in my earlier comment, Alberta is likely one of the last places on the planet where the Unite the Right will fade away. But the United Right in Alberta have less than 50% popularity. That shows that even in a very Religious part of Canada with so much easy money to be made if they can get away with behaving less acceptably, the collective of Religious Fundamentalists, Callous Greedy and those who Tribally just vote 'Conservative' because that is what they always did are less than 50% of the population.

As for voting, I think that Ranked Transferable votes are the Right way to vote in multi-party systems to ensure the First Past 50% support is the Winner. The United Right who call themselves Conservative are unlikely to be anyones 2nd choice. When they won Minority Power at the Federal level in Canada in 2006 they could not Lead because they were so different form all te other parties, except the Quebec Seperatist Party. They called for new elections several times until the flawed FPP system gave them the narrow win of Majority rule. They lost in the next election.

As for the realities of public opinions created by massive misleading marketing campaigns favoring the compromise of Public Interests for Private Interests in Alberta, I understand that changing the public understanding is the political challenge faced by any responsible Government in Alberta (maximizing the misunderstanding in the population is the objective of Unite the Right types especially when they Win Government Leadrship. The Unite the Right Leadership in Saskatchewan that has walked away from the job because the unsustainable delusions they created were recently shattered is proof of that.

A ranked ballot vote would reduce the chances of the United Right winning unfettered power in Alberta (or anywhere else). What are your thoughts regarding a Ranked Transferable Ballot?

aleks at 02:19 AM on 26 November 2017

What do Jellyfish teach us about climate change?

Some remarks to the main problem of our discussion: effect of CO2 on ocean acidity. Let's analyze data that can be considered as a result of experimental verification of this effect. Doug Mackie [1] gives a graph (Fig. 13) of pH dependence on depth in Pacific and Atlantic ocean
https://skepticalscience.com/Mackie_OA_not_OK_post_14.html
Similar (but not the same) data are given by Z.Ernest a.o. [2], this article also gives the values of CO2 concentration (T CO2, micromole/kg):
https://socratic.org/questions/how-does-ph-change-with-depth
Some of the data taken from these graphs for convenience are tabulated.
Atlantic Pacific Depth, m pH TCO2 [2] pH TCO2 [2]
0 8.1[1], ~8[2] ~ 2000 7.8[1], 7.82[2] ~2000
500 7.9[1], 7.7[2] 2150 7.75[1], 7.3[2] 2350
From these data it is clear that: a) Difference between the results of measurements of surface pH values in Atlantic and Pacific at approximately the same CO2 concentration is greater than the accepted decrease in pH of the World Ocean due to Industrial Revolution (0.1 – 0.15). b) CO2 concentration in the surface layer of both oceans is much less than value corresponding to maximum solubility (1.5 g/kg = 34 mmole/kg), tabulated values of TCO2 are in the range of 2 – 2.35 mmole/kg. c) An increase in the CO2 concentration by 7.5% (2000 -> 2150) leads to the decrease in the pH by 0.2, or increase in [H+] from 8 nmole/kg (pH 8.1) to 13 nmole/kg (pH 7.9): by 63%. Calculation from the data in the right column of the table leads to a much larger difference.
It seems that these data do not confirm the theory of determining role of atmospheric CO2 in the change of ocean acidity.

Eclectic at 00:06 AM on 26 November 2017

Analysis: WRI data suggests emissions have already ‘peaked’ in 49 countries

My apologies, Moderators. My post above was a reply to a post of NorrisM's which has been "disappeared". Please delete, too.

Eclectic at 00:00 AM on 26 November 2017

Analysis: WRI data suggests emissions have already ‘peaked’ in 49 countries

NorrisM @10 , certainly 810 billion tonnes of CO2 is a formidable amount to "remove".

All the more reason, to minimize the problem in the first place, by rapid conversion of the world energy economy to "renewable" energy.

It may well be that future citizens [of late 21st Century] will stridently demand that their politicians take action to get the carbon back in the ground. Will the technology exist in 60 years' time, to do so? As well as the renewable-sourced electricity to reduce the 810 bn tonnes you mentioned, into black sooty carbon [ = 220 bn tonnes of soot ] ??

On my back-of-envelope arithmetic, 220 bn tonnes of carbon would equate to about a 10mm thick layer of (granular) soot covering the world's 1700 million hectares of arable farmland. Maybe not all that difficult to churn that underground during routine seasonal ploughing. Good for the soil, too. Though I don't know what the carbon degradation rate would be.

On another thread, contributor Red Baron discussed the alternative approach of biological [fungal] fixation of carbon into pasture/ range-land.

Then again, some 200 custom-built supertankers could carry that 220 bn tonnes of granular carbon and, during 25 years . . . dump it somewhere off the continental shelf, where no voters exist!

Still, NorrisM — an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.

John Hartz at 23:58 PM on 25 November 2017

Climate scientists are in it for the money

The denier myth begins with...

In truth, the overwhelming majority of climate-research funding comes from the federal government and left-wing foundations.

In truth, climate-research is conducted by scientists throughout the world who are not being paid by either the US government or US foundations.

NorrisM at 16:50 PM on 25 November 2017

Analysis: WRI data suggests emissions have already ‘peaked’ in 49 countries

OPOF @ 7

"And the Conservatives should not be expected to change their minds. They will likely continue trying to Win any unacceptable way they can get away with. The future of humanity clearly needs that group to globally become nothing more than an irrelevant annoyance."

Don't hold your breath. I think that anyone thinking that the Conservatives of Alberta or the Republicans in the US will just "fade away" have to examine their powers of analysis to be polite. I think that the NDP government in Alberta (referred to your in your blog as the "non-Conservative" party) when it unexpectedly found itself in power had to face political reality and come up with some rational proposals. For those who are not familiar with Canadian politics, the NDP is the most left wind party in Canada. I personally think they have done a good job of balancing political realities with a climate policy. It is amazing what happens when you are suddenly faced with political power rather than arguing from the opposition.

I personally think that FPP is the best system compared to proportional representation. Look what is happening in Germany at the present time. Or consider Italy or Israel or ...... I have always thought that the US system was a disaster because of its "checks and balances". I would much prefer 4 or 5 year "dictatorships" who have to know they will be booted out if they do not behave. But we really should not be discussing political systems on this website.

nigelj at 10:30 AM on 25 November 2017

Analysis: WRI data suggests emissions have already ‘peaked’ in 49 countries

OPOF,

We used to have a FPP voting system, and frustratingly this system twice lead to a party with less popular vote than the other main party being elected on the basis of electorate results. This is just so unacceptable to me personally.

One of these governments turned out to be a genuine disaster, and this motivated a change to mixed member proportional representation about 1994, and we still have this. It has been good on the whole, imho, and has delivered coalitions of both centre left leaning governments and centre right governments, both of which have been reasonably decent governments on the whole, no huge disasters of policy, although some issues not adressed well enough. (I want to avoid polarising political evaluation of which I personally prefer etc). Two of these governments had stability issues due to one of the smaller parties, but FPP also had stability issues of its own kind.

But the point is if we can change our voting system anyone can, and the majority don’t want to go back to FPP. This speaks volumes. Although I would suggest STV proportional representation system may be best, (if hard to get ones head around,) as it avoids some of the issues of mmp.

People are addicted to oil in various ways on various levels. Take the drug away, and you get anger, tantrums, and an endless stream of excuses and sceptical nonsense just like any drug.

Coming back to MMP it seems to have lead to a consensus on having climate policy and this appears to be an inevitable result of MMP style of system. Nobody would dare dump policy completely because they would be punished electorally where with FPP winner take all system it appeared easier to get away with this sort of thing.

What is more troublesome is manipulation of ETS by the last centre right government and weakening of it, but this may be partly because an ETS is susceptible to this manipulation, as Europe has found if you read about their system.

Anyway people who ruthlessly abuse or exploit the "commons" or business activities to their own benefit to cause damage to the community well being, and planetary resources and systems, have to be subjected to boundaries, that is for sure.

One Planet Only Forever at 09:44 AM on 25 November 2017

Analysis: WRI data suggests emissions have already ‘peaked’ in 49 countries

nigelj,

Just to clarify. In Canada the provinces of Alberta and Saskatchewan are 'outliers' when it comes to political leaning and attitude towards reduction of burning of fossil fuels. Both of those provinces are heavily dependent on continuing to get away with benefiting from the burning of fossil fuels for electricity and export of fossil fuels for burning ... because they have large deposits of those non-renewable resources (Alberta more than Saskatchewan).

Excluding the GHG generated by the burning of fossil fuels exported from Alberta, activity in the province of Alberta is the largest contribution to Canada's total emissions. This can be seen in the lastest Government of Canada report of GHG emissions (2015).

And Alberta will have increased emissions since major expansions of Oil Sands extraction will be completed and start operations in the near future. These facilities can take nearly a decade to design and build. So they got started when the price of oil was alluringly high. Now that they are built their investors have 'sunk their costs in the facilities'. Those investors are desperate to maximize their revenue, and so is the Government of Alberta. They push for new pipelines to reduce the cost, increase the speed of exporting the stuff, and also in the hopes of attracting new investment to further expand the extraction for export.

The popularity of getting away with getting wealthy from the global burning of fossil fuels is regionally massive. So massive that just about any Alberta Government has to be seen to be a Cheerleader for the unacceptable activity if they want to stand a chance to win power in the flawed multi-party First-Past-the-Post game. The current government leaders have implemented Carbon Legislation for Alberta that includes a modest Carbon Price. And they set a limit on the GHG emissions, but at a level that allows significant expansion of Oil Sands extraction (Alberta plan for Oil Sands GHG). And the United Conservatives have declared the 'Need' to eliminate all of the Carbon Plan without offering any Carbon Reduction action of their own.

Thankfully, the Federal Government has legislated a minimum required action by any province. So the Conservatives winning power in Alberta will only be able to cut back the actions in Alberta to the Federal minimums. The United Conservatives in Alberta (and Conservatives in the rest of Canada), have already declared their dislike of the Federal Government that implemented such a diabolical restriction of 'Their Freedom to Believe and do as they please'.

If the likes of the United Conservatives win Federal power it may be necessary for the global community to impose targeted penalties on Canadian activities (or specific Canadians) to motivate 'better behaviour' from the anti-Leaders. Since the power winners in multi-party First-Past-the-Post elections usually do not have true majority support, the majority of Canadians would likely support such external influence, just as the majority of Albertans would support Federal restrictions on a Conservative Provincial leadership.

And the Conservatives should not be expected to change their minds. They will likely continue trying to Win any unacceptable way they can get away with. The future of humanity clearly needs that group to globally become nothing more than an irrelevant annoyance.

Things are headed in that direction. And the rising anger of the United Right/Conservatives is probable proof that even they know their Winning is not sustainable. But since they only care about the benefit they can get away with in their lifetime there will always need external restrictions on what they can get away with - restrictions and penalties that they will always be angry about, never acknowledge their understanding of the importance of the restrictions because the importance is the Public Interest. And their Private Interest is to compromise the Public Interest as much as they can get away with.

michael sweet at 09:07 AM on 25 November 2017

Video: Climate, Sea Level, and Superstorms

Nigelj,

I would look more carefully at the Gulf Stream system.

This RealClimate post reviews two reasons that current models are biased toward a more stable Gulf Stream. It describes collapse of the Gulf Stream over 100-300 years. It has several additional links at the end.

This Real Climate post #2 describes slowing of the Gulf Stream since 1930.

Gulf Stream

Fig. 3 Index of the strength of the overturning circulation in the Atlantic (AMOC), calculated from the temperature in the subpolar Atlantic minus the mean temperature of the Northern Hemisphere (red and blue curves). The green curve shows the coral data of Sherwood and colleagues. Source: Rahmstorf et al, Nature Climate Change 2015.

The Gulf Stream flow is a little higher than its lowest point around 1980. It is not catastrophic but not a "low probability" that it could get worse. The currently measured slow down is greater than predicted by models.

The cold patch just below Greenland on many global temperature graphs is caused by the slowing of the Gulf Stream. This patch set a record for the coldest measured (over the entire record) during 2015, a record hot year worldwide.

cold patch

Fig. 1 Linear temperature trends from 1901 to 2013 according to NASA data. Source: Rahmstorf et al, Nature Climate Change 2015.

nigelj at 06:22 AM on 25 November 2017

Video: Climate, Sea Level, and Superstorms

HK @7 yes fair comments. The movie the day after tomorrow was obviously fantasy, and things like a change in the gulf stream and cooling Northern ocean cannot cause such a deep ice age and certainly not that fast, or generate superstorms of that ferocity and also covering the entire northern hemisphere. That is Hollywood hype and dramatic licence, like numerous other disaster movies. Virtually everyone realises this is fantasy. However I quite enjoy these movies, and it's interesting to contemplate why we enjoy disaster movies.

However its interesting that the day after tomorrow got a little bit partly right that changes to gulf stream and thus cooler northern oceans leads to more intense storms as you pointed out. I wonder if that was accident or a little bit of science input.

The more accurate scenario is a warming climate could cause a change in gulf stream, but low probability at this stage. It would potentially cause a semi ice age in Europe and parts of N America with significant drop in temperatures over decades to centuries, that would be very damaging, although not kilometre thick ice sheets. Although the probability is low, the consequences are still serious enough so we should pay strong attention.

nigelj at 05:52 AM on 25 November 2017

Analysis: WRI data suggests emissions have already ‘peaked’ in 49 countries

OPOF @5

Your account of Canada's climate policy is interesting.

I live in New Zealand, and our history of emissions reductions has actually been very weak, but our new government elected this year is taking a stronger stand on emissions reduction, and I will get to that.

Firstly, our history of attempts to reduce emissions and deal with global warming has been of limited success so far. Here is a brief summary of the sorry story, a comedy of errors and denial:

The Labour (liberal / left leaning party) started things about 15 years ago by proposing a sensible carbon tax, but was beaten in that election and the incoming National Party (conservative party) adopted an emissions trading scheme. This ETS has been an appalling joke of a scheme with limited strength, no actual cap, and huge reliance on imported carbon credits that turned out to be worthless, but still form part of the system in terms of value, despite this being acknowledged by the government. This ETS is still in force today.

The ETS scheme is so complicated nobody understands it, and the media don't go near the thing, apart from Brian Fallow, but his comments are so technical only enthusiasts would bother. This ETS has proven useless, because our emissions have continued to grow, and the scheme excludes farming, our main source of emissions, because we are a big dairy producer. The ETS settings are not strong enough, and too much reliance is put on forestry sinks particularly buying credits in these from other countries that are proven to be of dubious value.

But the ETS "sound impressive" like we are doing something, and the National Government has sold it with appropriate spin and exaggerated hype, and never been properly challenged by the media. I don't think its media political bias, more possibly just laziness and not enough news in a gray complex issue like this, but that is no excuse. We are a small country with just a few main media outlets, and no huge media bias, although the main newspaper did arguably start to favour National a little recently.

Renewable energy has been more successful, but only by accident. We had good hydro and geothermal power making up over 50% of our electricity, going way back to the 1940's. We have added more geothermal power recently but this would have happened regardless of climate policies. We have added wind power which gets a small subsidy and is about 5% or so of our generation. More wind power is planned, but the global financial crash caused a drop in electricity demand, so we have surplus of generation at the moment.

Currently approx. 80% of our electricity is hydro, geothermal and wind with the remainder gas and one coal station I think. DS will correct me if I'm wrong.

Believe it or not we actually export oil, shamelessly as far as the climate issue goes. We are a very open free market economy and both export and import oil (weird I know, but this is an open market economy). We also export coal, although less recently I think. So there are no limits on this in terms of climate policies, and the National government also allows deep sea oil exploration, again regardless of climate issue. They make a bizarre point of principle that the ETS should be only control on emitters, in a nonsensical application of ideological free market purity. Everyone else can work out you don't have to rely just on an ETS, and need a range of policies and the public have questioned the wisdom of drilling for more oil.

Now we come to the year of 2017, when a Labour government has been elected (with a very pleasant and smart leader). More precisely we have a proportional representation system of MMP the same as Germany. The National Party got the highest popular vote, but had no real coalition partners this time, so the other three main parties Labour, NZ First and The Greens with less of the vote, formed a governing coalition. As you can imagine this complicates climate policies.

The new Labour coalition elected this year has taken a stronger stand overall on climate issues, but precise policy is not clear yet and time will tell.

Unfortunately they have decided one thing, to keep the ETS, but have proposed a rethink and may modify it, but who knows. More significantly they have proposed a carbon tax of some sort on agriculture in an attempt to reduce methane emissions. Time will tell if they implement this.

The leader Adern has expressed a strong and genuine commitement to reducing emissions, however it appears the party has backtraked partly on some other strong economic policies out of fear of causing negative economic side effects so who knows what will happen over climate issues. I'm not yet decided whether Adern is sensible and prepared to listen and do sensible modifications, or easily lead and weak. Again its too early to say.

We have no idea what Labour will do in terms of coal and oil exports. and given their commitment to free market this may not change. I think its likely they would stop offsore exploration as this is easy "low hanging fruit" and offshore potential appears limited anyway. I have no doubt they would support renewable electricity generation, as this is an easy thing to agree on.

So in summary the new Labour government talks tough on climate change, but time will tell if it amounts to much and what real policies are. However it cant be worse than the outgoing National government.

As you can see I'm not all that enthused about ETS schemes, and think a carbon fee and dividend is probably better. However both can be made to work if theres a will.

Our political parties and lobby groups have also made some shameless claims about how various climate policies and so on will hurt the poor etc, usually in a very misleading way, but not quite as brazenly as Canada by the sound of it. The various schemes only get back page coverage in the media, and hardly even figured in the election campaign. The media seldom ask the hard questions of National ministers on their terrible ETS, apart from Brian Fallow alone. I suppose the media find it complicated, and frankly anyone would, but it still seems like laziness and poor journalism to me as its clearly an important issue.

In general we have all the same media issues as you do in Canada, but possibly not quite as severely!

HK at 01:39 AM on 25 November 2017

Video: Climate, Sea Level, and Superstorms

#5:
In his book Storms of my Grandchildren James Hansen described that movie as "highly unscientific" as it greatly exaggerates the global cooling caused by the shutdown of the Gulfstream. The lead climate scientist in the movie – portrayed by Dennis Quaid – claimed that the storms would continue until the balance was restored, but I doubt that the movie makers really understood the global energy imbalance the way climate scientists define it.

One Planet Only Forever at 01:32 AM on 25 November 2017

Analysis: WRI data suggests emissions have already ‘peaked’ in 49 countries

Digby Scorgie@4,

At least you appear to be in a region with Leadership that gets popular support for claiming to support actions to reduce carbon emissions and could win re-election if they meaningfully act to reduce fossil fuel burning.

I live in Alberta, Canada. I would bet Alberta (along with similarly addicted to benefiting from the export of fossil fuels for burning - Saskatchewan) will be among the last places on the planet to get a combined significant popular support for action to reduce Carbon emissions and Leadership that wants that.

Alberta's current Leaders claim to want action to reduce Carbon Emissions. But they have been careful to not say they want to wind-down the Oil Sands extraction and export quicker than the market-place would wrap it up (the provincial budget is massively dependent on revenue from fossil fuel export for burning).

But they are only the current Leaders due to a freak event where 2 Conservative Parties were in the 5 Party chase for power. That allowed the strongest of the non-Conservative Parties to win many seats with less than majority support. (Unlike Australia, Canada still uses First-Past-the-Post Voting even though we have almost always had at least 3 major political parties).

The current government in Alberta has implemented a Carbon Fee and partial Rebate program. A portion of the Carbon Fee is returned to people with moderate or lower income with the rebate likely exceeding the Carbon Fee those people would pay (Full rebate at $60,000 income reduced to Zero rebate at $90,000). And the rest of the Carbon Fee is used to try to diversify the Alberta economy away from actions related to the burning of fossil fuels.

The Conservative Parties in Alberta recently United. And polls clearly show the popularity in Alberta of that United Party being higher than any other party, though still lower than 50%. In Alberta that level of support (less than 50%) has produced clear majority authority for a party. That is how the current non-Conservative Party won majority power in the last election.

The leader of the United Conservatives has already made misleading marketing pitches criticizing the Carbon Fee program because the increase in the fees happens at the start of next year. They claim the Carbon Fee hurts the less fortunate (they never mention the rebate). And they claim the Fee is a 75% Tax on Natural Gas (they do not mention that natural gas only costs $2 per GJ and the Carbon Fee after the increase will be a fixed $1.50 per GJ meaning the 'tax rate' goes down as the price goes up).

A few of the media in Alberta have tried to better inform Albertans when they report the claims made by the United Conservatives. But not all of the media are that responsible (many of the media are also misleading marketers - eager to lock in the more popular audience support that many advertisers look for).

I am heartened by the fact that some media in Alberta are trying to better inform the population. But I doubt that enough proper efforts to better and more fully inform the population in Alberta will occur before the next election. I also doubt that even all of the major media trying to better inform the population in Alberta would make enough of a difference before the next election. Such action, pointing out the Fake Claims being made by the United Conservatives, would probably lead to massive amounts of loud popular support for claims of Fake News being produced.

Evan at 01:25 AM on 25 November 2017

New rebuttal to the myth 'climate scientists are in it for the money' courtesy of Katharine Hayhoe

According to Kevin Anderson, one of the insidious things is that many climate scientists are apparently down playing the severity of climate change so that they get government support, quite the opposite of the effect to which Katharine Hayhoe is referring. "He points to hypocrisy in IPCC working groups, the UK Committee on Climate Change, and university research councils writing their strategy documents. Bodies which he suggests are concealing the gravity of the situation, in the interests of their own funding."

Digby Scorgie at 17:05 PM on 24 November 2017

Analysis: WRI data suggests emissions have already ‘peaked’ in 49 countries

New Zealand has pledged that its emissions will peak by 2020? Really? Living in the country, I see business continuing as usual and no real sign of actions to limit our emissions. We have a new government now that has pledged to take action on climate change. Nevertheless, I'll believe it when I see it.

michael sweet at 10:35 AM on 24 November 2017

What do Jellyfish teach us about climate change?

Aleks:

I have responded to you here. Please respond there where the discussion is on topic.

michael sweet at 10:27 AM on 24 November 2017

OA not OK part 20: SUMMARY 2/2

Responding to Aleks from here: (his previous post is just above the linked post)

You said:

"That's why "dry wall plant" you saw is built not from CaSO4, but from CaCO3 with impurities of CaSO3, Ca SO4, Ca(NO2)2, and Ca(NO3)2. It's not a good building material."

The Wikipedia article on drywall states:

"Drywall (also known as plasterboard, wallboard, gypsum panel, sheet rock, or gypsum board) is a panel made of calcium sulfate dihydrate (gypsum)" (my emphasis)

Your claim that dry wall is made from calcium carbonate is incorrect. You make yourself look stupid when you make false claims that can be easily Googled. Calcium carbonate is what is added to convert the SO2 into calcium sulfate. SInce I am a chemistry teacher I know that the Calcium Sulfate from coal power plant scrubbers is especially high in purity and makes the best drywall.

As for your suggestion that:

""The actual value of the mmol of H+ ions formed from 34 mmol of CO2 is about 37 mmol". This is possible only if H2CO3 dissociates completely (??) as a monopritic acid and partly as a diprotic acid. It contradicts the facts established in chemistry."

I will remind youu that I have provided a reference from an expert and I have taught students how to do this calculation for the past ten years. I reviewed the experts calculation and I got the same values he did.

By contrast you are an anonymous guy on the internet who claims to have a degree in Chemistry. You have provided no citations to support your wild claims, only an incorrect calculation.

When a weak acid is dissolved in distilled water most of the acid does not ionize. When the weak acid is dissolved in a buffer, the pH of the buffer determines how much of the acid ionizes. If the pH of the buffer is greater than the pKa of the acid most of the acid ionizes. If the pH is less than the pKa than most of the acid does not ionize.

Since the apparent Ka of carbon dioxide is 4.5 x 10-7, the pKa is about 6.3. Since ocean surface water is about pH 8.2, about 99.5% of the CO2 has ionized. The actual values of % ionization are:

"At typical surface seawater pH of 8.2, the speciation between [CO2], [HCO3−], and [CO3 2−] is 0.5%, 89%, and 10.5%,"

as I previously posted. These are the "facts established in Chemistry" and calculated from the Ka's of Carbonic acid listed previously. Your "calculation" was incorrect because you do not know how to incorporate the pH into the calculation. You must use the pH.

You do not know how to do calculate the % ionization of an acid in a buffer. Why are you bothering to call out scientists who do calculations you do not know how to do?

scaddenp at 08:59 AM on 24 November 2017

New rebuttal to the myth 'climate scientists are in it for the money' courtesy of Katharine Hayhoe

Actually, I think the bulk of the money spent on climate change research goes to satellites - by a very large margin. Shouldn't there be a conspiracy theory that AGW is the invention of corporations that build and launch satellites?

nigelj at 07:30 AM on 24 November 2017

New rebuttal to the myth 'climate scientists are in it for the money' courtesy of Katharine Hayhoe

Climate scientists salary looks very ordinary, given the high level of education and solid contribution, more so than the so called contribution of some of the characters in the financial sector.( Refer to the book "Other Peoples Money' by John Kay). Not everyone is in things for the money, many people value job satisfaction, and choose lower paying jobs accordingly.

But I think the other issue not confronted in the video is an (erroneous) public perception with some nasty minded people scientists exaggerate warming to get governments worried so they get more research grants. This is just so ridiculous. Exaggerated or mistaken claims about warming come up against criticism form other scientists and future data trends and don't survive long. Recent temperatures have actually vindicated predictions made by climate modelling, so it's hard to find these so called exaggerated claims. It's also interesting that data adjustments to the global warming trend have actually adjusted temperatures down overall.

This all makes the attacks of denialists look increasingly unfounded, irrational, nasty, and desperate. They are reduced to making inane claims for example that climate scientists are communists! Its like medieval accusations of "you are a witch". Next there will be Spanish Inquisition of climate science, and a ritual burning of text books, and I'm not entirely kidding just looking at America right now. This is how stupid the whole thing is becoming. Humanity should be ashamed of its conduct, and stick to science and carefully prepared, reports like IPCC report.

nigelj at 06:05 AM on 24 November 2017

What do Jellyfish teach us about climate change?

Aleks, one final important point just for you to think about in terms of quantifying this issue as a whole.

First to summarise, your basic proposition is SO2 and NO2 are dominant causes of ocean acidity more so than CO2. Internet and mainstream science all says CO2 is main cause, so you are on the back foot and need compelling argument. Given combustion products are mostly C02 this also means you have to precisely prove your case because at face value it looks like CO2 even although I take your point other gases are more acidic.

So far I dont think you have proven your case.

I think to prove your case you need by analogy a sort of bookeeping ledger approach. This is why I said before its more complex than you think, or just a case of molar concentrations. Let me explain.

First calculate effects of burning coal, oil and gas regarding how much CO2 is produced by each, and calculate how much acidity this produces in oceans ( or strictly speaking change in ph). Your calculation on this 9 above seems in dispute.

Then on other side of ledger you have to consider how much of combustion of coal, oil and gas is SO2 and NO2 and how much acidity this produces. So far you have only considered coal which has most sulphur compounds. you have to consider propertions of each fossil fuel humanity uses and quantities of SO2 and NO2 each produce and what it adds up to.

Most SO2 and NO2 is washed out over land, with some blown offshore into harbours and some released from ships. So you have to find quantities / proportions and factor this in to work out what proportion gets into oceans as a whole. The smaller quantity getting into the oceans is obviously smaller and so offsets the strong acidity of these gases. Some of these compounds rained out over land will get into oceans through groundwater and rivers, but you have to quantify how much, and how much is neutralised along the way. The rate of groundwater flow is also extremely slow and is not going to be a significant factor.

You also have to also factor in complex processes of effects of organic life interacting with these compounds as others have raised that reduce their effects.

So far you havent done a lot of this and its hugely significant.

This will give two final quantities to compare, acidity from CO2 compared to acidity from the combination of other gases (or rather effect on ph). Until you do this you have proven absolutely nothing to me.

I dont know that its of great significance to humanity what the proportions are. They all come from burning fossil fuels anyway so it becomes pedantic.

Regarding Michael Sweets comments on diffrent concentrations of C02 in different oceans being due to older water. I read this myself somewhere so he is right. So its a complex issue, more than just looking at chemistry of specific molecules.

aleks at 03:57 AM on 24 November 2017

What do Jellyfish teach us about climate change?

I apologize to the other opponents, but so far I'll only reply michael sweet (@15 and @24).

@15. "Scientific consensus is that CO2 is causes ocean acidification". The correctness of the scientific theory is determined not by voting, but by how it corresponds to the facts. Your assertion that SO2 from coal burning power plants absorbs in scrubbers refers to particular cases and is refuted by the data given in @23 (thanks MA Rodger for interesting information). I'll only add that not only SO2 and NO2 are absorbed in scrubbers, but first of all CO2 (absorbent Ca(OH)2). That's why "dry wall plant" you saw is built not from CaSO4, but from CaCO3 with impurities of CaSO3, Ca SO4, Ca(NO2)2, and Ca(NO3)2. It's not a good building material.

@24. "The actual value of the mmol of H+ ions formed from 34 mmol of CO2 is about 37 mmol". This is possible only if H2CO3 dissociates completely (??) as a monopritic acid and partly as a diprotic acid. It contradicts the facts established in chemistry.

One Planet Only Forever at 02:38 AM on 24 November 2017

Analysis: WRI data suggests emissions have already ‘peaked’ in 49 countries

Minor rephrasing in the 7th para. of my post @2

'encourage better behaviour from individuals in nations trying to get away with behaving irresponsibly in the hopes of temporarily benefiting more by getting away with behaving less acceptably'

One Planet Only Forever at 02:32 AM on 24 November 2017

Analysis: WRI data suggests emissions have already ‘peaked’ in 49 countries

takver@1,

The Australian Carbon Tax was implemented in 2012. Its ending in 2014 may have created a temporary surge of irresponsible behaviour. But something other than a "Carbon Tax Policy" was reducing emissions prior to 2012. Perhaps the possibility of a carbon tax being imposing was an influence. Things were also affected significantly by the 2008 global set-back due to irresponsible pursuers of Private Interest temporarily Winning until the inevitable collapse of their unsustainable and damaging pursuits.

One of the factors regarding the bump up after 2014 may have been an expansion of activity in Autralia related to the development and operation of factlities for exporting fossil fuels for burning elsewhere. In addition to increasing coal exports (the same irresponsible behaviour the Trump Administration is trying to temporarily impress people with in the USA), Australia has been increasing natural gas exports.

The Australian DoE document that Figure 9 was taken from for the Guardian Article (and that it incorrectly sub-labelled as 1990-2025) states the following related to Figure 9.

"Projected 2029–30 emissions provide an indication of long-term emissions trends. Projected emissions growth to 2029–30 is dominated by electricity generation emissions, as electricity demand increases with growth in economic activity and coal-fired electricity generation retains a high share of total electricity generation. Emissions from direct combustion and fugitives also increase significantly, primarily as a consequence of the extraction of coal and natural gas in increasing volumes for export (Figure 9)."

How coal exports will be doing in the future is an important consideration for the future emissions in Australia (note there are added emissions of that coal being burned elsewhere). China is clearly cutting back on coal burning. And the latest COP meeting included a significant group of nations becoming activists for the more rapid termination of the global burning of coal.

And the infrastructure building for fossil fuel export may not continue far into the future since facilities can operate for 30 to 50 years. Facilities related to fossil fuel burning are likely to have a shorter future than that in developed nations (the nations that will be globally expected to lead the reduction of global fossil fuel burning). That shorter future makes the Return on Investment less encouraging for new infrastructure related to fossil fuel burning in the more fortunate nations.

The global community may be a significant factor regarding what happens in Australia if Australia does not responsibly restrain its pursuits. It is highly likely that global trade tariffs will be introduced to 'encourage better behaviour from individuals in irresponsible nations that hope to win advantages by behaving less acceptably'. There is also the possibility of global limits or embargoes on the export of fossil fuels for burning, a more extreme step to deal with the worst offenders.

That type of future global action is often ignored because it seldom happens to an activity that the most fortunate benefit from. But that type of global action is the history regarding dealing with individuals, and groups they gather around themselves, who try to get away with unacceptable behaviour (Private Interest behaviour that is clearly compromising the Global Public Interest in developing lasting improvements for all of humanity - The 2015 Sustainable Development Goals set out the actions that will make lasting impovements for the future of humanity as long as all the goals are achieved).

So what happens in the future in Australia, and any other nation, can either be responsibly determined by Australian's or be externally 'corrected' by global interests in the future of humanity. That is where the future has been headed since the 1960s with a few unfortunate Dips temporarily Winning Influence along the way. Responsible Global Leadership Winning is actually the only way for humanity to have a future that is not dystopian.

John Hartz at 00:19 AM on 24 November 2017

The Debunking Handbook: now freely available for download

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