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Comments 19201 to 19250:

19201. Eclectic at 22:47 PM on 26 June 2017
       Surface Temperature or Satellite Brightness?
       

       Qwertie @38, the peaking "near ground level" is a relative term. Relative to the even higher altitude measurements of the other channels.

       It is misleading to make any real equivalence of T1 channel to actual surface temperatures.  Humans plants & animals live down at ground-level/sea-level.  Not thousands of feet up in the air (where T1 applies).   Sadly, the satellite-measured temperatures have little or no relevance to real surface temperatures.

19202. Eclectic at 22:35 PM on 26 June 2017
       Satellites show no warming in the troposphere
       

       Qwertie @66 , his "peaking near ground level" description is simply false.

       The satellite data (usually quoted by Spencer as the so-called The Lower Troposphere) averages out over much of the height of the troposphere — and with a small amount of stratosphere added to the mixture as well !! [a bias which they attempt to remove]

       It could be taken as equivalent to the temperature on top of a very tall mountain.  But is he seriously suggesting that way-up-high mountain-peak temperatures are in any way a reasonable representation of the world's ground-level & sea-level temperature?  He is pulling your leg (or his own).

       Perhaps his next comment will be that we should only look at the warming trend measured at Mt Everest Base Camp ;-) 

19203. DPiepgrass at 22:17 PM on 26 June 2017
       Surface Temperature or Satellite Brightness?
       

       "Microwaves do not measure the temperature of the surface, where we live. They measure the warm glow from different layers of the atmosphere."

       Another article on SkS says that "T1, MSU Channel 1" peaks "near ground level." Is there some reason it could not be used to measure surface temperatures?

19204. Eclectic at 22:06 PM on 26 June 2017
       Temp record is unreliable
       

       Serial Sockpuppet (of #416) seems to take very personally the criticism of Mr Heller.

       The graphs he alludes to, both demonstrate a skyrocketing of global temperature during the past 2 decades.

       — So what on Earth is the point he is trying to make, other than a pointless persistent peevishness?

       The world is heating up rapidly: regardless of deniers.

       (Moderator, please abridge or delete my post, at need.)

19205. DPiepgrass at 21:51 PM on 26 June 2017
       Satellites show no warming in the troposphere
       

       Why is "T1, MSU Channel 1" which is "peaking near ground level" seldom used?

       I'm talking to a guy who seems to be claiming the satellites show half or less as much warming as the "land" temperature record. So I would be interested to see a land temperature reconstruction from the satellites to find out if there's any truth to that. Do clouds prevent an accurate reconstruction of ground temperatures by satellites?

19206. Tom Curtis at 21:36 PM on 26 June 2017
       Temp record is unreliable
       

       RobJones @416, if you are going to accuse me of lying, it behoves you to use my actual words.  I did not talk about a change in scale, but a change in the range of the y-axis.  Specifically, I said:

       "Heller's giff does not demonstrate any significant change in values. Rather, it exhibits a change in the range of the y-axis from -0.6 to 0.8 for "NASA 2001" to approximately -0.85 to 1 for "NASA 2015". That represents a 32% increase and accounts for nearly all of the apparent change in trend - particlularly post 1980."

       Nearly all of the apparent change in trend post 1980 is a result of the warming trend continuing for another 14 years, a fact obscured by Heller's method of presentation.  This is evident when you simply overlay the data as in the graph I showed.  By changing the range of the y-axis between graphs, Heller creates an optical illusion, without which his case falls to pieces.

       As it happens, Heller's scales are also not identical, as is shown by your graph, and as I have independently confirmed.  This can be seen by noting that the decimal points of the two graphs are aligned at 0.2 on the y-axis, but not aligned at 0.8.  Thus, you have conveniently demonstrated that Heller also changed the scale.  The effect, however, is minor and works against his preferred indoctrination, and so can be ignored. 

       Continuing on, you write:

       "I compared these plots with those used by Tony Heller in his .gif animation, and except for scale, they were identical. BTW, these are the datasets I am referring to when I talk about the doubling of warming trends with the "corrections" of 2015. The statement bu Tom Curtis

       "It is very clear that use of the new data sets make almost no difference to the trend."

       obviously does not apply here as substantial data re-writing was done for the entire 20th century, most of which should not have been touched."

       First, thank you for confirming that your current account is a sock puppet by referring to your prior talk about doubling.  I note that you talked about a doubling of the trend in the last decades of the 20th century, and clearly there is no doubling of between the lowest and the highest trends among different GISS versions as shown in the graph I show.

       Second, the specific changes in methodology detailed @413 are applied across the entire century.  More importantly, when additional stations are added, they can have data across any period of the record.  Consequently, on both accounts we would expect revisions going as far back as 1880.  Once again, if you have a problem with the methods, criticize them.

       Finally, I note your hypocrissy in being shocked that I should accuse Heller of lying (even though I didn't); while hapilly defending Heller whose whole career in climate science has been based on claims that climate scientists are lying; a claim you appear to make in your following post ("field of study isn't already riddled with corruption").

19207. nigelj at 19:55 PM on 26 June 2017
       Exxon, Stephen Hawking, greens, and Reagan’s advisors agree on a carbon tax
       

       Bvangerven @14, thank's for clarifying that. I totally agree, particularly your comments on some countries relying on encouraging renewable energy as the only real strategy, and hoping this would drive emissions down, and your coffee / tea analogy. This wont really work well enough. I really just meant it's absurd that they are going down that road, as nobody with any sense should be promoting that.

       The obvious example is America. I think it has had only very modest results looking at the numbers, and has mainly lead to emissions reductions for electricity generation, but not much uptake of electric cars or things like that. 

       But go one stage further to Germany. They have mostly relied on cap and trade combined with subsidising wind power etc. This has again reduced emissions from coal fired power (sadly somewhat reversed due to the nuclear issue), but this combination has not been enough to cause much uptake of electric cars. It becomes clear they need specific subsidies for electrtic cars, or maybe it requires a state funded recharging network.

       In other words it is fairly clear that subsidies alone are helpful but insufficient, but also that carbon taxes (or cap and trade) alone are useful but insufficient as well. Further even both together only go so far and development of electric transportation needs  some form of initial support as well (and it may not require much, this is the important thing). So you need a combinational approach that deals with discouraging fossil fuel use and all elements of renewable energy.

       Yes an emissions trading scheme is complex, but a carbon tax will have some complexity, although not quite as much. The biggest problems with emissions trading are that they are opaque schemes where its very hard to get to the bottom of whats going on (and I have tried), perhaps so called commercial sensitivity is part of this. They also rely on globally traded agreements and forestry units, that come form all sorts of countries, and many of these countries dont have terribly reliable or trustworthy commercial practices. By the time we figure outs whats going on the damage is done, and my country has had a specific problem of this kind with imported credits that turned out to be worthless, admitted by our government.

       Emissions trading schemes have a form of accounting that also looks to me to be very open to all sorts of abuses. In addition Europe has allowed all sorts of exemptions under their scheme to keep industry competitive against imorted products, but the end result has been a weak scheme. But you probably know all this anyway and, I have only scratched the surface.

       In comparison carbon taxes are a pretty visible sort of cost and any exemptions would appear tobe more visible or harder to hide, a benefit of such a scheme. You have less commercial sensitivity problems, or difficult to access contracts with dubious conditions attached. 

       Emissions tarding schemes do have the virtue of encouraging innovation, but I think more in theory than in practice. And any form of tax or regulation can encourage innovation to at least some extent.

       Encouraging energy efficiency is just so obviously desirable. A "no brainer". 

       The problem is some people want a singular magic answer. People who promote cap and trade see this as the only thing needed. This just isn't convincing.

       We need a strategy that combines a number of tools. As I stated above, the most viable and politically plausible is a revenue neutral carbon tax combined with lightly subsidising some aspects of renewable energy and electric cars ( and transport in general), and rules around energy efficiency. This brings all elements close together, and closes the gap. The whole package could be revenue neutral or close to it, if required.

       Ultimately a carbon tax may reach its own limits of effectiveness, but that is far off and  can be dealt with if it happens.

19208. bvangerven at 17:47 PM on 26 June 2017
       Exxon, Stephen Hawking, greens, and Reagan’s advisors agree on a carbon tax
       

       @nigelj,

       I don’t think we disagree. I just want to make the point that we should be skeptical about climate policies. In my opinion a climate policy should be engineered, it should be modelled like a climate model to identify all expected and unexpected consequences.

       We don’t have much time left, and we only have one opportunity to get it right. If after a couple of decades it turns out we implemented the wrong policy (also the EU ETS comes to mind) we won’t have a second chance.

       Regarding my statement that renewable energy may well cause an increase in demand for fossil fuels, you say: "That would only happen if renewable energy was developed and spread widely and was very affordable, and there was no carbon tax or other control on fossil fuels. Nobody is suggesting that scenario."

       But … that scenario is the reality is many countries. There are many countries – that signed the Paris agreement ! - that don’t have any policy to discourage the use of fossil fuels, they are just focussing on improving energy efficiency and the deployment of renewable energy.

       I just don’t believe you can drive the consumption of fossil fuels to zero that way. It’s the same as trying to stop people drinking coffee by putting tea on the market. People won’t stop drinking coffee. In the best case they’ll drink a little less coffee.

       Or to put it another way: there are policies that shift the system’s stable equilibrium point to a low-carbon state. A carbon tax that is high enough does this. An emission trading scheme may perhaps achieve the same results – if it is well designed, and the cap is really a cap, and measures are taken to avoid carbon leakage. But an emission trading scheme is much more complex and hence it’s effect is much more difficult to assess.

       And there are other policies that don’t shift the system’s equilibrium point, but these measures will help us to reach the equilibrium point faster and with less disruptions (f.i. improving energy efficiency and rolling out renewable energy).

       These two kinds of policies should not be confused. And the second kind cannot replace the first kind.

19209. RobJones at 17:44 PM on 26 June 2017
       Temp record is unreliable
       

       (-snip-)

       Moderator Response:

       [DB] Serial sock puppet of serial spammer cosmoswarrior snipped.  Please ignore this user.

19210. bozzza at 15:43 PM on 26 June 2017
       Factcheck: Grenfell Tower fire and the Daily Mail’s ‘green targets’ claim
       

       Hear, Hear: I can't believe there was no sprinkler system but will expect this to be made publicly/(globally) known as the most glaring mistake in highrise buildings aka dog-boxes.... how did that journalist miss so many elephants?

       The people in these apartments are being treated with contempt but such has our society become. It is all of our responsibility to make sure this is never forgotten for the calculated murder it is!!

19211. Art Vandelay at 14:23 PM on 26 June 2017
       Explainer: Dealing with the ‘loss and damage’ caused by climate change
       

       Nijelj@1, just to offer the comment in reply, that the west's total contribution to GHG's will soon be overtaken by developing countries in Asia. Yes, per-capita emisisons are higher in the west but a large population naturally incurrs higher emissions. Ultimately, it's emisisons per square foot or meter of land that a country will be paying for.   

19212. Art Vandelay at 14:06 PM on 26 June 2017
       Explainer: Dealing with the ‘loss and damage’ caused by climate change
       

       bvangerven@3, you ask, "who is going to pay".

       Well, let's hope that each country is made responbsible to pay for its emissions over a 200 year time-frame, and let's also hope that emissions also include those associated with land use changes, including deforestation.  But there still remains the question of where that money goes and how that money is used to mitigate or adapt to climate change. Also, depending on the rate and severity of the change, geo engineering might actually be the cheapest and best solution over the short to medium term. Sure, there may well be very undesirable side effects, but those would be weighed against the even more severe consequences of 3 or 4 degrees of planetary warming. 

19213. nigelj at 07:35 AM on 26 June 2017
       Exxon, Stephen Hawking, greens, and Reagan’s advisors agree on a carbon tax
       

       bvangerven @12, I agree the economy is complex, and there can be unintended consequences in various emissions reduction strategies, or negative side effects.

       Of course as you would appear to agree this is not a reason to do nothing or try nothing, and we have to simply try to think the issues through as much as we can, and minimise problems through classic harm minimisation strategies, and also accept some "experiments" may not work. That is the price we may for making any form of progress. Given the way renewable energy is plumetting in price, many of these "experiments" have been a spectacular success.

       However I agree biofuels have had unintended consequences. I thought they were a dubious idea this from day one, instinctively. I also understand the use of corn or maize for biofuels was driven more from political and farm lobby motives than to reduce climate change, so if the motives are dubious then it's likely the results will be of dubious value as well. However it was possibly still an experiment worth trying, and something viable may come from other forms of biofuels.

       However I'm going to disagree in part about your comments on carbon taxes and renewable energy. Even carbon taxes could have unintended consequences or some problems. For example a revenue neutral tax will give money back to people one way or the other, and there's nothing to stop some being spent on fossil fuel products, negating some of the effect of the tax. However both the theoretical modelling and real world evidence suggests much is not spent on petrol, as use of petrol has declined in countries trying these taxes.  So the bottom line is a carbon tax is not going to be perfect, but is a very good idea that still ticks all the boxes.

       Regarding renewable energy you say "When renewable energy is deployed on a massive scale, this may give a boost to the worldwide economy … resulting in a higher demand for fossil fuels."

       That  would only happen if renewable energy was developed and spread widely and was very affordable,  and there was no carbon tax or other control on fossil fuels. Nobody is suggesting that scenario. If renewable energy becomes cheap, and a huge general boost for the economy, and fossil fules are taxed, demand for fossil fuels will be pretty low.  

       And it is absolutely senseless having a carbon tax on fossil fuels, if there is no viable alternative, like renewable energy, so this fuel source must be encouraged. A carbon tax will partly do this by making it more attractive to purchase, however I don't think a carbon tax would go far enough to do this,  and you also need to subsidise renewable energy to some extent (which happens right now anyway). Or it may be a case of just needing to subsidise things like recharging stations.

       I agree the bottom line is the best solution is a carbon tax combined with indirect measures.

19214. nigelj at 06:41 AM on 26 June 2017
       2017 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming Digest #25
       

       Some great articles, however the main reason the aral sea has receded  is rivers feeding the sea were diverted for agriculture, starting right back in the 1960s (notably before the modern global warming era). If climate change is a factor, it should be stated as a "contributory factor" . 

19215. bvangerven at 06:41 AM on 26 June 2017
       Exxon, Stephen Hawking, greens, and Reagan’s advisors agree on a carbon tax
       

       The economy is a complex system with multiple interdependencies and feedbacks (in this respect it is much like the climate system).

       
       It often happens that scientists look at a system in a far too reductionistic way – I think it stems from the laboratorium conditions, where it is actually possible to vary one parameter in function of one other parameter and keep all the other parameters constant. In the real world, this isn’t possible. A influences B influences C influences A again … etc.

       
       And this reductionistic vision has resulted in big mistakes before. Take biofuel. Biofuel was supposedly better than fossil fuels because it is carbon-neutral. Except that biofuels go in competition with food crops, lead to deforestation, and several studies have even indicated that biofuels might actually be worse for the climate than fossil fuels.

       
       Another example is the idea that natural gas can be a transition technology towards a low carbon future. It turns out the amount of methane escaping from fracking sites makes natural gas as bad as coal.

       
       In a complex system, you have got to choose carefully WHERE to interact with the system. If you don’t take all interdependencies and feedbacks into account the result of your action may be different from what you anticipated, it may even be the opposite of what you anticipated.

       
       This is the major reason why I am in favor of a carbon tax. It interacts with the system where it matters: at the point where CO2 (or other greenhouse gases) is released into the atmosphere.

       
       All other measures, for instance improving energy efficiency, or encouraging the deployment of renewable energy are indirect attempts at reducing greenhouse gas emissions. They may have the hoped result. Or they may have the opposite result.

       
       When energy efficiency is improved, households will spend less money on energy, and hence will have more money in the bank … which they may decide to spend on a holiday by plane …

       
       When renewable energy is deployed on a massive scale, this may give a boost to the worldwide economy … resulting in a higher demand for fossil fuels.

       
       I am not against these indirect measures, but they should be combined with a carbon tax. The carbon tax forces the consumption of fossil fuels down. Other measures make it possible to maintain our living standard while transferring to the low carbon economy.

19216. Joel_Huberman at 23:58 PM on 25 June 2017
       Exxon, Stephen Hawking, greens, and Reagan’s advisors agree on a carbon tax
       

       As Dana says in his article, "The proposed policy is similar to that of Citizens’ Climate Lobby, calling for a rising price on carbon pollution with 100% of the revenue being returned to taxpayers via regular rebate checks." I recommend that all readers go to the Citizens' Climate Lobby (CCL) web site and read the information about their "carbon fee and dividend" plan. Nearly every one of the concerns raised in the above discussion is clearly and constructively addressed by CCL. I further recommend that those of you who have not yet done so click on the big red "Join CCL" button at the top right of their main web pages.

19217. ubrew12 at 18:51 PM on 25 June 2017
       2017 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #25
       

       For Sat June 24, the link for 'The World is Burning' by IPS News Desk goes to an article 'The 1C milestone' by '...and then there's Physics'.

       The National Geographic article 'Antarctica Is Melting, and Giant Ice Cracks Are Just the Start' is really well-written and informative.  Highly recommend.

       Moderator Response:

       [JH] Link fixed. Thanks.

19218. nigelj at 09:22 AM on 25 June 2017
       2017 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #25
       

       Regarding John Vidals very good article he says "Whether it’s faster than average warming, more vulnerable than average populations, or more severe than average drought, floods and storms, it’s clear that some places are being hit harder than others ... But the bottom line is that climate hotspots intersect, and nowhere will we escape the changes taking place. What happens in the Amazon affects West Africa....."

       This physical process is of course already happening, and will continute to happen, and is predicted to accelerate. At precisedly the same time, the world is globalising and becoming ever more inter linked and inter dependent, by free trade, tourism, immigration and international agreements and alliances. It is process is sometimes criticised, but appears inevitable and largely desirable. Therefore severe economic problems and social problems in certain countries caused by climate change, will become eveyones problems.

       As some countries are hit harder by climate change, this inevitably affects their economies and internal political stability, etc. This then effects other countries, on trade and economic levels, and all these things are now in a delicate balance. We saw how the financial crash in america rapidly spread globally. Of course global political and economic systems develop some resilency, but there are limits and problems in such systems adapting to fast rates of change generated for whatever reason.

       Climate change will also create a refugee problem and this will also become an ethical and moral concern and hard to ignore because in a globalising, inter linked world there are all sorts of consequences if you ignore problems.

       In a globalising world it will herefore becomes much harder for individual nation states to insultate themselves. Climate problems are going to become everyones problems, not just on the physical affects, but through economic and political and humanitarian levels as well. It's utterly inevitable, and retreat into isolationism is not a viable option.

       Quantifying and predicting this is all but impossible, but it looks like a distinctly damaging problem, and  I'm reminded of an old saying "prevention is better than cure".

19219. nigelj at 06:40 AM on 25 June 2017
       Exxon, Stephen Hawking, greens, and Reagan’s advisors agree on a carbon tax
       

       Tom Curtis @5, yes true enough a carbon tax may only work up to a certain limit, but then we have other alternatives. I believe its better to do something than nothing, and to start with the most workable and politically plausible solution, even though its not what I personally ideally prefer. I prefer the best technical or theoretical solution, which is sometimes the simplest as well, and zooming straight to that, but sadly politics gets in the way.

       I'm also reminded of tobacco taxes. In my country have seen these contribute strongly to a drop in smoking rates from 40% to 15%, which shows the powerful effect of taxes. However getting rates to fall from 20% to 15% required quite significant taxes and things seem to have reached a plateu. A sort of law of diminishing returns has been generated, I assume this is because of we are left with  people very highly addicted and / or financially well off.

       But "e cigarettes" have been legalised, and may make a difference. There are always alternatives and if smoking gets down to under 10% that may be sufficient anyway as the taxes pay for health costs.

       However the tobacco issue isonly a rough anaology to fossil fuels, and even a moderate tax may have larger effects than we think provided renewable energy is attractive. Plus its important to get fossil fuel use as close to zero as possible.

19220. nigelj at 06:33 AM on 25 June 2017
       Exxon, Stephen Hawking, greens, and Reagan’s advisors agree on a carbon tax
       

       Driving By @7, yes you are probably right. A telephone tax going back to the Vietnam war. Thats astounding!

       I accept only a revenue neutral style of carbon tax is likely to gain traction in America, where there is a strong suspicion of taxes, and a lot of ideological and partisan contoversy on the issue. I was thinking about the issue more from the perpective of what might work in my country. It's all about the art of what is politically possible, sadly to say, and thats how democracy works.

       However a revenue neutral carbon tax is without doubt a tremendously good concept on several levels and a viable way forwards out of this mess. You could still deal with other issues in other ways. You could subsidise renewable energy and electric cars, and this has justification in orthodox economic theory, and it could be done out of the existing tax base / government revenue by some small re-prioritising spending, so it could also be revenue neutral if required.

       A carbon tax is a good base to build on. Project specific taxes and subsidies can also have time limit clauses in legislation so that they dont get cemented in forever, and need to be renewed by a vote in government of some sort.

19221. ubrew12 at 06:08 AM on 25 June 2017
       2017 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #25
       

       The link to "Deadly heatwaves could endanger 74% of mankind by 2100, study says" isn't working for me.  It leads to a 'forbidden' page.  I got the article separately through a google search.

       Moderator Response:

       [JH] Link fixed. Thanks for bringing this glitch to our attention.

19222. John Hartz at 04:25 AM on 25 June 2017
       2017 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #24
       

       SteveW: Who is making the claim that melting sea ice contributes to sea level rise?

19223. One Planet Only Forever at 03:59 AM on 25 June 2017
       Exxon, Stephen Hawking, greens, and Reagan’s advisors agree on a carbon tax
       

       A revenue-neutral carbon tax will "help" make marketplace competition more helpful at achieving the 2015 Sustainable Development Goals. But as Tom Curtis points out, the need is to end the human activities that are causing increased GHGs will require other measures.

       Additional measures will be needed to compensate people who did not benefit from contributing to the problem (the 'loss and damage' compensation owed by the current generations in nations that had previously 'benefited from activity that increased the current problem').

       It needs to be understood that since the 1972 Stockholm Conference no business or government leader/winner (including investors) can claim to not be aware of the unacceptability of trying to expand or prolong their ability to benefit from activity that increased the GHGs. As John Hartz points out, the cheaters are now trying to get 'legal immunity from penalty' by claiming to support carbon-taxes 'if and only if they will be free from potential penalty for the understandably unacceptable things they got away with benefiting from'.

19224. SteveW at 02:43 AM on 25 June 2017
       2017 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming News Roundup #24
       

       As this is your first post, Skeptical Science respectfully reminds you to please follow our comments policy. Thank You!

       It doesn't make sense to attribute the, alleged, melting of floating sea ice as contributing to sea level rise. Melting ice does not change sea level if it is already floating.

       Moderator Response:

       [DB] "Melting ice does not change sea level if it is already floating"

       The melting ice referenced in the article refers to land-based ice sheets and the loss of the floating ice shelves that buttress them.  The loss of those ice shelves mean that the rates of land-based ice sheet mass losses via calving will increase dramatically, raising sea levels around the globe.

19225. One Planet Only Forever at 01:09 AM on 25 June 2017
       Exxon, Stephen Hawking, greens, and Reagan’s advisors agree on a carbon tax
       

       There are a number of concerns to be aware of. There are the many ways of behaving that people who have previously Won by getting away with behaving understandably less acceptably than others (to get the competitive advantage that doing so provides to those who get away with it) are likely to try to get away with regarding this measure:

       • It needs to be a truly transparent revenue-neutral tax on all activities that have an accumulating impact increasing GHG. The cheaters would try to hide what they are doing (claim proprietary business rights protect them from having to disclose information or be monitored). But it practically needs to be limited to the significant activities that are contributing to the problem (like any legal regulatory measure it is not possible to have the rules and monitoring address "everything" - the cheaters will try to limit what gets addressed).
       • To block attempts by pursuers of profit to by-pass a national tax system, it needs to be a consistent internationally set value collected and distributed in each nation. That way products exported from high impact nations would "Cost More as a traded commodity" and the extra cost would provide more financial benefit for the least fortunate in the high impacting nation.
       • The tax level should start high and rapidly go very high. Since it is revenue-neutral a high tax would only negatively impacts those who live higher-than-average lifestyles (and positively impact those who live lower impact lifestyles. Cheaters will try to argue that the tax needs to start very low. Then they will fight against it being increased.

       An internationally applied revenue neutral tax-rebate program could indeed be a good measure to help change the attitudes of people who have not willingly decided to best understand how they can help advance humanity to a sustainable better future as a robust diversity of humanity that fits into a robust regional diversity of other life on this, or any other, amazing planet. But rigorous effort is required to keep those who care less about helping improve the future for all of humanity from being able to believe and do as they wish.

19226. John Hartz at 00:06 AM on 25 June 2017
       Exxon, Stephen Hawking, greens, and Reagan’s advisors agree on a carbon tax
       

       Always read the fine print...

       "Buried in pages of supposedly 'free market' solutions is new regulation exempting polluters from facing legal consequences for their role in fueling climate change."

       Climate Groups: Don't Be Fooled, Industry-Backed Carbon Tax Just Latest Scam by John Queally, Common Dreams, June 20, 2017

19227. Tom Curtis at 15:19 PM on 24 June 2017
       Exxon, Stephen Hawking, greens, and Reagan’s advisors agree on a carbon tax
       

       Ogemaniac @1, first, carbon taxes are normally designed to tax CO2eq emissions, and consequently do not ignore emissions other than CO2.  Further, given a sufficiently large carbon tax, industry will itself pay for the necessary infrastructure, etc.  At least it will if given sufficient time to adapt.  The major problem with a carbon tax, other coordination between separate economies, is that as the time span to convert to a carbon free economy contracts, carbon taxes become more and more inefficient.  At some point they become less efficient than regulations, but it is certainly not clear that we are at that point yet.

19228. DrivingBy at 10:29 AM on 24 June 2017
       Exxon, Stephen Hawking, greens, and Reagan’s advisors agree on a carbon tax
       

       "Secondly I would question whether a carbon tax should be completely revenue neutral...."

       In my humble opinion, having a scrupulously, exactly and demonstrably revenue neutral carbon tax is the one way it might suceed. Otherwise, the voter's already slim trust in Lucy...mm, goverment fixes... will go 'poof' and any future proposals from the same quarter will be met with rage. It's already at this point with many taxes; in the USA we have a "temporary" tax on telephone services which was to pay for the Vietnam war. That was about 50 years ago, the tax is still collected.  Same for 'temporary' state tax hikes, they are all but permanent.  

       As for renewables, when the public's income tax is lower they have more to spend, sales of goods increases so business has more ability to invest. At least some will use that for electric delivery trucks, solar hot water, perhaps solar electric, etc. After low-carbon replacements demonstrate success - IF they succeed - then they'll be adopted in bulk. Something's better than nothing. 

       Personally, I think that as long as the world has 7 billion people, nearly all of whom want refrigeration, TV, cars and meat, we're going to have a degraded environment.  You're not going to change the fact that 99% of humanity wants more, not less. If we got to 3 billion instead of 7, this and other issues could be tackled with ease.   This is politically a non-starter, of course.    

19229. nigelj at 09:10 AM on 24 June 2017
       Exxon, Stephen Hawking, greens, and Reagan’s advisors agree on a carbon tax
       

       Ogemaniac @ 1, yes a revenue neutral carbon tax is clearly insufficient as a stand alone scheme to fight climate change. But it doesn't have to be a stand alone scheme.

       Firstly a similar tax scheme could be applied to methane emissions in theory, as a tax on animal products, or  you could deal with methane emissions in other ways.

       Secondly I would question whether a carbon tax should be completely revenue neutral. Part of the money could be given back to the public directly, or with income tax cuts, part could go into things like electric cars, and part could go into the administration costs of a carbon tax scheme anyway.

       Thirdly and alternatively have a revenue neutral carbon tax, and the government could just subsidise renewable energy. This is not ideologically incompatible. There are also cases where subsidies make economic sense, because of recognised market failures.

       I think we are faced with trying to develop the best possible overall package of measures that is ideologically acceptable but also practical, and we won't ever address all of these perfectly, but can do a reasonable job overall. We probably need a combination of taxes, some mild regulation and subsidies. There are no perfect ideologically pure and  pain free options, but a carbon tax of some sort combined with measures to address methane etc and rebewable energy seems the best overall.

19230. One Planet Only Forever at 09:06 AM on 24 June 2017
       Claiming that Listerine alleviates cold symptoms is false: To repeat or not to repeat the myth during debunking?
       

       nigelj@8,

       I am not convinced that media have to state a climate science myth. The reports should simply present a clear and fairly complete understanding of the science and leave it to the recipient to understand how misleading the myth messages are.

       What should happen is the media that fails to present Good Reasons for their reporting will be more clearly understood to be providing Poor Excuses.

       That does not mean that the Poor Excuses will not be popular. I have mentioned many times that behaving less acceptably affords the Bad Behavers a competitive advantage as long as they can get away with it.

       The failure of leaders in business and government to effectively block the pursuits of Winning by the less acceptable behavers, thwarting their attempts until they learn to change their minds, is a failure of the society they are members of no matter what perceptions of prosperity get away with being temporarily created or prolonged. In fact the larger the development in the wrong direction (away from Good Objectives like the sustainable development goals), the bigger the inevitable correction will be. That applies to individuals, businesses, and nations.

       Trump told no lie when he said that doing responsible changes to correct for past incorrect development regarding climate impacts will be harder on the callous greedy in the USA and many other nations. But they have no one to blame but themselves and those among their predecessors who were just like them.

19231. nigelj at 08:11 AM on 24 June 2017
       New Video: John Cook and the 97 Percent
       

       TC @7, yes I realise all that about the movie! I'm sure most people would understand things can't happen that fast or involving super storms taking up half the plant. I was just trying to say rapid change of some sort is possible. I should have been clearer.

       Abrupt climate change on wikipedia is an easy to read account of past periods for lay people, and documents periods of several degrees of cooling or warming in a matter of just a few years, and changes in weather systems although not at the speed or scale of the movie. That would still be bad enough for humanity to adapt to on global or even regional scales.

       However no doubt the teflon coated president would somehow escape a cooling event, tucked away down in mar a lago.

19232. nigelj at 07:53 AM on 24 June 2017
       Claiming that Listerine alleviates cold symptoms is false: To repeat or not to repeat the myth during debunking?
       

       OPOF @7, what you say makes total sense if you are talking to a friend, or responding on a  website. No need to restate the myth, so you just respond on whats really happening with temperatures (and this can also be a valid response to numerous myths)

       I think the issue being described above is more relating to the media. It's hard for the media to respond to the latest myth doing the rounds in society, without actually stating what it is, and the logical place is to put the myth as the top of discussion. Avoiding being specific about the myth or burying it in the text is confusing for me.

       However I agree about satellite data. A couple of additional things occur to me. If you are just a typical person and not a science expert and look at the UAH satellite data on Roy Spencers website, or over at RSS, the graph looks kind of flat compared to the surface data. This is partly because the vertical scale is simply a bit different I think. When you see the satellite data together with surface data on the same graph, there is much less difference. Of course the satellite data doesnt show as much warming since about 2005, but when seen together with the surface data even that difference is not as huge as it seems.

       And the satellite data doesn't measure temperature directly. It extracts temperatures by measuring changes in the molecules that make up the atmosphere, and this is not as reliable as simple surface thermometer readings.

       As you undoubtably know satellites also do not actually measure surface temperatures where we live, only the middle of the troposphere. But how many other people realise this? 

19233. nigelj at 07:12 AM on 24 June 2017
       Exxon, Stephen Hawking, greens, and Reagan’s advisors agree on a carbon tax
       

       Carbon taxes have worked quite well in British Columbia as below. They have reduced emissions and fossil fuel use, and ironically because it was set up as revenue neutral, people now have low income tax rates. I wouldn't claim its all perfect, but it is proof of basic viability and potential, and shows the predicted negative problems haven't happened.

       www.theglobeandmail.com/opinion/the-insidious-truth-about-bcs-carbon-tax-it-works/article19512237/

       www.sightline.org/2014/03/11/all-you-need-to-know-about-bcs-carbon-tax-shift-in-five-charts/?gclid=CKOV7JPm1NQCFYYIKgodX84Fzg

       Not only do carbon taxes incentivise people to reduce carbon use, they provide an income stream that can be given back to the public, or used to subsidise electric cars, or subsidise renewable energy or some combination of these. This seems to make total sense to me in a practical sense.

       In my opinion, carbon taxes are transparent and upfront costs with a clear price on carbon underpinning the concept, where cap and trade schemes are harder to comprehend and appear less upfront. A revenue neutral tax overcomes most of the ideological criticisms directed at taxation. We know from history and economic analysis that taxes can influence rates of consumption of products.

       Carbon taxes are flexible, and can be combined with government regulation regarding large emitters.

       But to be effective carbon taxes do need to set quite a high price on carbon that will raise petrol prices very significantly, so its important that renewable energy alternatives and electric cars and hybrids are made attractive options. The two things must be combined.

       Alternatively you can force companies to keep fossil fuels in the ground by simple government regulation. This is simple and almost ideal, but it's unlikely to win industry, political, or public approval and may be perceived as harsh and excessive use of state power. It would be hard on consumers as well.

       The other alternative is an emissions trading scheme, sometimes called cap and trade. This is one of those mechanisms that makes total sense confined to a textbook, but I think it has problems when implemented in the real world. For example the scheme in Europe has been only minimally effective, and the whole scheme looks easy for governments and participants to manipulate and rort to me, because of its inherent nature. The public in my country are suspicious of the scheme as it looks like crony capitalism. This may be unfair, but the perception is there.

       Cap and trade also looks suspiciously like a neoliberal free market dream, artfully structured to look good, but designed to achieve precisely nothing, but so complex that all this becomes well hidden. Poor results in Europe seem to bear this out.

       Carbon taxes seem  the best alternative overall.

19234. Ogemaniac at 06:16 AM on 24 June 2017
       Exxon, Stephen Hawking, greens, and Reagan’s advisors agree on a carbon tax
       

       There are two major problems with a revenue-neutral carbon tax

       1: It only addresses about half the problem, as other climate-related pollutants are ignored and substantial amounts of carbon emissions come from non-point-sources such as land use, animal husbandry, or forestry practices that cannot be addressed easily by a carbon tax.

       2: The government will need tens of billions of dollars a year if not more to pay for the related infrastructure, R&D, enforcement, and regulations that will be necessary to tackle this problem. Where would this come from, if not the carbon tax?

       Such a plan could be a devil's bargain, where by tackling one half the problem, we make the other half unsolvable.

19235. One Planet Only Forever at 01:36 AM on 24 June 2017
       Claiming that Listerine alleviates cold symptoms is false: To repeat or not to repeat the myth during debunking?
       

       When dealing with temperature 'misclaims', I do not have to restate any of the myths. I start with the values for CO2 in the atmosphere continuing to rise rapidly. The NOAA movie is a presentation of data I refer people to because the site includes lots of related information (and some people seem to "Switch Off" if I refer to SkS information).

       I state that when you look at the full set of temperature data from any source you can clearly see how much the values bounce in the short term but you can clearly see that the temperature has been increasing. I add that the satellite data starts in the late 1970s, not the late 1990s.

       The SkS Temperature Trends tool is handy for seeing the full set of data from several sources (however, some people seem to instantly distrust anything directly from SkS - a testament to the value of this website, but also backfire trigger).

       For those willing to use the SkS Temparture Trend tool to compare surface and satellite data I encourage them to set the years from 1978 to 2018. They can see for themselves how the satellite data for the Lower Troposphere (TLT) shows a temperature trend similar to the surface data.

       I also try to add that the satellite data is not the temperature at the bottom of the accumulated impact of all the CO2 in the atmosphere (sometimes that leads to an opportunity to present more details).

       However, it is unfortunate that there are different baselines for each data set. The difference between the approximate 12 month averages of the non-Satellite data at the start of the 1978 to 2018 plots is from +0.7C for GISTEMP to -1.4C for NOAA. And the satellite values start with 12 month averages of -1C for RSS to -2.1C for UAHv6.0. Those ranges are more than the total increase of the average surface temperature since the late 1800s.

       I try to explain that the trend is what is important. But some people focus on the different temperature values, even claiming that the UAH satellite data being so much lower than the surface temperature data proves that the surface temperature data has been Fudged. When I try to explain the different baselines I quickly find out if the person I am dealing with is genuinely interested in better understanding the issue.

       Those complexities of properly understanding this issue make it prone to easy abuse by very smart people who deliberately want it to be misunderstood. Those smart deliberate trouble-makers can easily become popular by helping to create effective Poor Excuses for undeserving pursuers of more perssonal benefit any way they can get away with.

       The real problem is not the way that climate science is legitimately  communicated.  The real problem is the failure of leaders (winners) in business and government to deal with those type of undeserving people before they can achieve signficant success. Once enough of those type of people get away with becoming a significant portion of the Winners it can be very difficult to Correct the situation because Those undeserving Winners can and do Band Together to Defend and Excuse each other's different unacceptability.

19236. jef12506 at 01:16 AM on 24 June 2017
       New Video: John Cook and the 97 Percent
       

       I would like to propose another consensus. Let us all agree to stop using the term "believe" in and around Climate Change.

       Nobody gets to decide if they believe or don't believe in CC. By using the term "believe" people think they need to choose a side like all other belief systems.

       You either "understand" or don't understand" Climate Change.

19237. ubrew12 at 22:33 PM on 23 June 2017
       Claiming that Listerine alleviates cold symptoms is false: To repeat or not to repeat the myth during debunking?
       

       This is useful information.  There's an almost overwhelming human desire to correct someone who says "There's been no global warming in 20 years".  You want to show the many ways this person has been fooled (cherry-picking start dates, cherry-picking temperature surveys, missing the ocean-forest for the atmosphere-trees, etc).  Instead you end up reinforcing the myth.  The problem is the brazen statement of the myth in the first place immediately places you on the defensive.  The fossil fuel companies know that the best defense is a strong offense.

       A better response: "Global warming is indicated in the vast majority of surface temperature records, for all time scales, 15, 20, 25, 100 years, and for both ocean and atmosphere."

19238. Tom Curtis at 20:44 PM on 23 June 2017
       New Video: John Cook and the 97 Percent
       

       nigelj @6, the day after tomorrow gets the science almost completely wrong in every way.  You might get rapid cooling with an AMOC shutdown, but not a turn around in days.  Nor would you get supercells so large and so intence that they are effective vacuums in the eye.  Nor, with rapid cooling, would you get snowfall sufficient to bury multistory buildings within a matter of weeks (cold water equals low precipitation), nor a sudden seal level rise (in a matter of days) from current to sufficient to float a ship through NY streets.

       And last, and worst of all, what happened to that wall between the US and Mexico ;)

19239. nigelj at 19:12 PM on 23 June 2017
       New Video: John Cook and the 97 Percent
       

       TC @5, that's interesting.  There have certainly been some short and quite intense cooling and warming periods, so the day after tomorrow is not quite as out theres as it seems. The current rapid arctic warming seems to fit the definitions of abrupt regional climate change.

       An analogy for abrupt climate change might be an earthquake.

19240. nigelj at 19:00 PM on 23 June 2017
       Claiming that Listerine alleviates cold symptoms is false: To repeat or not to repeat the myth during debunking?
       

       Simple messages are indeed powerful. I mean short sentences, and short, clear, concise explanations.

       Of course this is not appropriate for dedictated enthusiasts, but it works for certain target audiences. This website gets it, by having different levels of explanation, but sometimes the beginners explanation is still quite complex.

       Remember most people are busy people,and dont have the time to read masses of stuff, and others have short attention spans.

       Trump is most definitely not to my preference in presidents, but he undertands certain aspects of communication like simplicity, although he probably takes it a bit far at times to the level of a child. But you know what I mean, he does have certain communication skills of a sort, and knows his target audience (say no more).

       Most science issues revolve around causation and correlation. Most climate science myths can probably be condensed to a brief couple of sentences on both these elements. It's important to cover both, and get the point across on these elements, and not lost in endless detail, unless you are writing or discussing with someone educated, and with the time and interest to take in detail.

19241. Tom Curtis at 15:33 PM on 23 June 2017
       New Video: John Cook and the 97 Percent
       

       nigelj @4, from Alley et al (2003)

       "“Technically, an abrupt climate change occurs when the climate system is forced to cross some threshold, triggering a transition to a new state at a rate determined by the climate system itself and faster than the cause” (2, p. 14). Even a slow forcing can trigger an abrupt change, and the forcing may be chaotic and thus undetectably small. For human concerns, attention is especially focused on persistent changes that affect sub-continental or larger regions, and for which ecosystems and economies are unprepared or are incapable of adapting."

       Reference 2, from which the first sentence appears to be quoted, is the NAS report on abrupt climate change.

       The classic case of abrupt climate change is the Younger Dryas, which in Greenland saw a change in precipitation patterns over 3 years, and in temperature over 50 years, although the change was much slower in the tropics.

       Based on that definition, the end of glacials, which takes thousands of years, counts as abrupt, whereas a similar warming from AGW over a century or two may not count as abrupt if it follows change of forcing smoothly.  There is, of course, a considerable risk that it will not.

19242. chriskoz at 15:01 PM on 23 June 2017
       Claiming that Listerine alleviates cold symptoms is false: To repeat or not to repeat the myth during debunking?
       

       The range of effects of the myth (from being debunked to 100% backfire) depends on the way the myth is presented. So, the issue herein boils down to the accurate, and easy to understand by the intended audience, presentation by the communicator. Note, that the intended audience must also be considered. A person with phD in the rellevant or related field is interested in different details than a newbe person.

       But above all, the myth should be clearly labeled as a falsehood, with simple and unambiguous words, the simpler the better, especially if expressed not the target person's main language. Complex words as well as colloquial jokes will create confusion. So jokes and satire is IMO unacceptable.

       As an example: a badly frased poster confused even myself, because it used some complex words and some thinly veiled satire. If I was a climate science conspiracy theorist, this poster would only reinforce my opinion. Much better wording of the poster would be simply:

       "A plucky band of bilionaires [...] created a plot: '...'; but the plot is an absurd falsehood"

       which states unambiguously what the myth is and does not allow it to stand but debunks the myth in the same sentence.

19243. Digby Scorgie at 11:43 AM on 23 June 2017
       Claiming that Listerine alleviates cold symptoms is false: To repeat or not to repeat the myth during debunking?
       

       A lot of energy is being expended on persuading doubters about the reality of climate change.  (I'm excluding those who are ideologically wedded to their denialism.)  The doubters, however, are actually victims of the "propaganda war" (Stefan Rahmstorf's term) on climate science.  Would it not therefore be more effective first to sketch the nature of this "war" and then follow with details of how they've been deceived?

19244. bjchip at 09:16 AM on 23 June 2017
       Claiming that Listerine alleviates cold symptoms is false: To repeat or not to repeat the myth during debunking?
       

       Random people or educated people?  I think that something like this is going to be an important variable.  People who are familiar with and used to logical and analytical thinking may be more competent in accepting the debunking and having it override false information than people who are not.  People who rely on their gut and their belief system rather than analytical thought would be more vulnerable to the repetition than the debunking.  Effect will depend on audience. 

       One other thing.  Reading this I tripped over this phrase... 

       "our studies remain moot on whether familiarity backfire effects will occur in other circumstances."

       In most cases we see mute used incorrectly.  In this case however, mute (silent) would be (I think) more appropriate than moot (hypothetical - open for debate).  YMMV. I simply know that it caused my reading process to stumble to a halt for a wee while.  

       I think that this is important.  To debunk effectively one has to explain at least once what the error is that is being debunked.  OTOH, and this is important, in many forums the subject is set by the original post.  Often it is worth debunking by starting a new post because when looking at the subject lines there is an obvious propaganda value to those, and no matter how well you debunk in your response, you just repeated the error in the subject... which may well be all that most people ever see.. 

       Be careful out there

       respectfully 

       BJ

19245. jenna at 08:20 AM on 23 June 2017
       To lead on climate, leave the ivy tower
       

       All these institutions and governement members and others that have signed on will mean nothing unless they find a way to keep funding the $100 billion Climate Fund for disadvantaged countries.

       Words will not help here real funding is needed.

19246. nigelj at 07:50 AM on 23 June 2017
       New Video: John Cook and the 97 Percent
       

       What is actually meant by the term "abrupt change" ? And what is a possible scenario, even if it's unlikely to actually happen?

       The IPCC report related to this overturing circulation is very long and technical to read right through.

       We all know "The Day After Tomorrow" scenario can't happen that fast (rather good move though) but what is a more likely scenario and timing?

       Or do I just have an unhealthy  fascination with disasters and horror stories?

19247. stephen baines14492 at 07:37 AM on 23 June 2017
       To lead on climate, leave the ivy tower
       

       They want to stand apart from the other universities as they feel they are elite.  OK if they feel superior, but this is not the way or the time to emphasize that sentiment over a broad commitment to Paris.

       Frankly, I'm ashamed of my alma mater.  Not the first time, I admit.

19248. nigelj at 07:27 AM on 23 June 2017
       Claiming that Listerine alleviates cold symptoms is false: To repeat or not to repeat the myth during debunking?
       

       Very illuminating. It's good to hear this familairity bakfire effect is not always as strong as feared, because it's very difficult addressing science based myths or issues (or anything serious) without putting the key points up front at the top of discussion. It becomes confused and looks like something is being hidden or dodged to do otherwise. Your research is preliminary, but I thought the experiments discussed in the links were reasonably convincing.

       The familiarity backfire effect has also been studied and discussed as related to economic, social, and poltical debate as well, with some views that its better to avoid attracting attention to negative problems, and instead simply either go on the offensive, change the subject, or accentuate the positive or bury the problem text in the middle somewhere. Some say "explaining is losing". However I dont think you can apply this strategy to science. We expect manipulative spin from politicians, but people will be less forgiving when academics indulge in it.

       The research appears to show the familiarity backfire effect doesn't have much effect on people already familiar with a myth, or who are prepared to study it in detail and listen. I think the real problem is that when myths or problem issues are put at the start of discussion, theres a risk some people wont read more than the myth, so see what the counter arguments are, or just skim the counter arguments only briefly, so the myth might spread. It's similar to the use of "click bait" headlines in the media, that are exaggerations, spin, or simply false, but many people dont read past them so are left with false beliefs.

19249. HK at 01:04 AM on 23 June 2017
       2017 SkS Weekly Climate Change & Global Warming Digest #24
       

       Art Vandelay @5:
       The period 1921-1980 was 0.06°C and 0.05°C colder in the Berkeley Earth and NASA record respectively than their reference period 1951-80, so including those 30 years would make the temp anomalies that much larger, not smaller.
       Note: Berkeley Earth presents two versions of their temperature record, but they recommend using the one with air temperature above sea ice, not water temperature below it.

19250. Seymour at 00:20 AM on 23 June 2017
       SkS Analogy 3 - The Greenhouse Effect is Like a Cloudy Night
       

       Isn't this example a little more than an just an analogy? A cloudy sky implies higher relative humidity. Water is a greenhouse gas, which will absorb infrared radiation and return some of it to the ground. I think most people would expect a more gradual temperature drop at sundown in humid climates than in dry climates, even without cloud cover. The only difference seems to be that clouds are visible but greenhouse gasses are not. Isn't the same effect noticeable during a total solar eclipse? In other words, isn't there a more gradual temperature drop during a solar eclipse in humid areas as compared to dry areas? How measurable is the effect of 45% more CO2 and 124% more CH4 in the atmosphere on the rate of temperature drop? If we compare the rates of temperature drop we measure now during a solar eclipse with the rates measured before the Industrial Revolution would we notice a difference? I guess I'm asking for a quantitative estimate of the difference. Given that an eclipse moves so quickly over the earth's surface, I would expect that the radiative effects would dominate convective effects. A total solar eclipse will cross the United States in August. Could this present a teaching moment on the greenhouse effect or is the effect too small? 

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