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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.

Suggested reading for Sam:

Extraordinary Heat Wave Sweeps Southeast Asia and Points Beyond by Christopher C. Burt , Wunderblog, Weahter Underground, April 19, 2016

sam13501 at 09:07 AM on 20 May 2016

It's cooling

oh i see, those are not temps they are 'temp. ranks' this is exactly what im talking about.. they will always manage to slice the data in a way that shows it's 'warm' again they are saying that April was the warmest april on record.. that's obvious bullshit when it was freezing the whole month with snow and asia and europe were also cold.. I was just watching the Rome masters with djok and murray last week, been watching it for years, this year everyone in the stands were wearing jackets and scarves, i checked the weather it was 11*c there in May.. it has been a very cold april and may..something is being seriously fudged here.

Moderator Response:

[DB] Inflammatory and sloganeering snipped.

Please see the Moderation advice given you in your previous comment.

sam13501 at 08:57 AM on 20 May 2016

It's cooling

and i think what people like tony hellar are saying is that these charts include adjusted and fabricated data. In April I checked the weather for various cities in the US everyday, Boston, Wichita Falls, WDC,NY, everyday it was freezing, like i said there was a white easter and 16 FEET of snow in PA, everyday in the entire region it was freezing or near freezing..if it was 60* in PA then why was there 16 feet of snow, if it was so warm then why was only 5% of the crop planted? Today is May 20 Chicago-low7*c, high 18, NY 12,21 WDC 12,21 wis 6,22 etc. according to your chart it was warmer in april than it is now.. obviously the charts that the noaa put out are faked.. i put up photos that showed much more ice in greenland now than just a few years ago, but im sure you have charts that show opposite..

also tonys charts that shows there are less days now that break 100*f, 95*F than in the 30's and 60's .. real or fake?

Moderator Response:

[DB] Inflammatory and sloganeering snipped.

Please note that posting comments here at SkS is a privilege, not a right. This privilege can and will be rescinded if the posting individual continues to treat adherence to the Comments Policy as optional, rather than the mandatory condition of participating in this online forum.

Moderating this site is a tiresome chore, particularly when commentators repeatedly submit offensive, off-topic posts or intentionally misleading comments and graphics or simply make things up. We really appreciate people's cooperation in abiding by the Comments Policy, which is largely responsible for the quality of this site.

Finally, please understand that moderation policies are not open for discussion. If you find yourself incapable of abiding by these common set of rules that everyone else observes, then a change of venues is in the offing.

Please take the time to review the policy and ensure future comments are in full compliance with it. Thanks for your understanding and compliance in this matter, as no further warnings shall be given.

MA Rodger at 04:20 AM on 20 May 2016

It's cooling

sam @278,

If you are to get anything from your visits here, it would be best if you show your data sources. I get the impression you are rather too wedded to Tony Heller & his RealClimateScience.com website, a place that is certainly packed full of WMD or Wordage of Mass Deception, so you may be reluctant to do this.

However, data sources are always useful. For instance, if you track down the Heller post you talk of with its "(3)charts, using US HCN stations" you can also find the source of the drought chart Heller uses, which is an update of Fig 2.3a of U.S. Climate Change Science Program Synthesis and Assessment Product 3.3, June 2008. (PDF here) Note that it was likely sight of Fig 2.3b that gave Heller the inspiration for his post. But tellingly for us here, what else is there in that document of June 2008? I think there is some (for instance, see Fig 2.4) that makes a bit of a nonsense of this talk of yours of cooling US winters.

sauerj at 02:41 AM on 20 May 2016

What Sir David King gets wrong about carbon pricing

One Planet Only Forever@6: I agree w/ your comment, but the reality of today's US Republicans (who have pledged not to enact any new taxes; Grover Norquist pledge) causes an impasse. CCL's approach: 'OK, that won't stop us, we can get around this'. And, they are! They are getting some GOP members' attention & real support (which opens the door to building relationships for really getting things moving).

SkS members would all agree that CFD at $100 US/ton CO2 (CCL proposal) would be a very effective start to motivating toward a FF-free economy. Dr. Shi-Ling Hsu (Case for Carbon Tax) argues that CFD is the most effective way (compared to Command&CaptureControl (Regs), Cap&Trade, and Subsidies). CCL's approach is to figure out a way to effectively and respectfully work within the political constraints that we have. And, the 100% revenue neutral CFD proposal (no new net tax burden) removes any political foothold from the GOP to thwart this policy (on the grounds of tax burden). And, this is working; GOP members are signing-on in support (see citizensclimatelobby.org/climate-solutions-caucus/). In fact, CCL places such a high priority on bipartison cooperation that they purposely do NOT invite any new Democrats until a new GOP member joins (currently there are 6 democrats and 6 republicans). I find that kind of "vision" very refreshly (another example of the positive spirit behind CCL).

But, in the end, though CFD by itself will be very effective. A combination of 1) 100% revenue neutral CFD, and 2) subsidies to R&D, and 3) Command&Capture (regs) would be extremely powerful. My personal analogy is that CFD is a "pulling" economic force (it pulls the economy & markets toward the best solutions); while Command&Capture (regs) are a "pushing" economic force (they push the economy & markets away from an undesire state). I compare the effectiveness of these to that of front-wheel drive cars (pulling) vs rear-wheel drive cars (pushing). If you had to pick between the two, you would pick the former. But, the ultimate would be BOTH (an all-wheel drive car), especially to move somewhere as expedieting as possible. R&D subsidies would be like hiring a mechanic that works 24/7 on your car to continuously optimize its technology.

Moderator Response:

[JH] Edited per request.

howardlee at 01:25 AM on 20 May 2016

Ocean Oxygen – another climate shoe dropping

Ranyl - I'll answer in sequence:

Remineralization depth CO2 feedback starting in ernest?
I don't know, but it's a plausible factor among many including fires that you mention. The Global Carbon Budget shows that the ocean carbon sink continues to increase at about 10 GtCO2/yr but there is large yearly variation in those data. Kwon et al said: "...considerable fractions (more than 30%) of the full response occur on timescales of decades..." and: "... changes in remineralization depth could feed back on twenty-first century climate change." And "... our work suggests that the impact on the global carbon cycle could be substantial."

Iron fertilization:
Iron fertilization is nutrient supply, so it would tend to increase anoxia, provided other essential nutrients like phosphorus, nitrogen, etc are present in the Redfield Ratio.

Inundation of nutrient-rich land:
Yes this should increase nutrient supply at least in coastal areas.

Industrial farming:
Yes this is one of the major factors behind the exponential increase in coastal dead zones since the 1960s.

Carbon sequestration: Yes. See Andy Skuce's excellent 3-part article on "The Road to 2 degrees"

The bottom line is that the climate system is complex machinary that we've stuck multiple fingers into. All the knock-ons and feedbacks - positive and negative - are highly tangled. But evidence from Earth's past show that the positive feedbacks exceed the negative ones on a human timeframe, before he negative ones win out on a geolgical timeframe of many millennia.

One Planet Only Forever at 01:12 AM on 20 May 2016

What Sir David King gets wrong about carbon pricing

I agree with Carbon Fee & Dividend, with the carbon fee being significant enough that the dividends are noticably improve the life circumstances of the least fortunate who actually live in ways that result in very little CO2 impact.

In addition to that action, I agree with Sir David King's push for more tax money to be collected and spent on reserch and development of truly suistainable energy technologies. But that tax should be a special surcharge on individual gross income (before reducing the inome by tax allowed deductions like loss of value of stocks), for anyone whose gross income is significant (a tax only on the top 10%).

The bottom line is that many of the currently developed perceptions of prosperity and wealth are clearly unsustainable and undeserved. Pushing for those perceptions to be excused and be maintained until (or unless) a cheaper more popular or more profitable way of living is developed is simply shameful. History clearly shows that less acceptable actions that can actually be temporarily gotten away with will be cheaper, popular and most profitable (for a few for a little while). That Invisible Slapping Hand of the marketplace needs to be acknowedged in order for humanity to more rapidly advance to a lasting better future for all.

Tom Curtis at 00:51 AM on 20 May 2016

It's cooling

sam @278:

"I do not consider charts such as that,to be reliable."

Of course you don't. I never imagined for a second that you are one to let a "beautiful theory" be spoilt be ugly facts. So you just cherry pick some more.

First, when discussing the record global warmth, you cherry pick data from the USA (which had only its 18th warmest April). And not the USA as a whole, but only two particular zones within the US. You can guess which zones be looking at the temperature rankings by state for April 2016:

You make a point of mentioning the North East (which was near average, or below average for the 20th century, and hence very cool relative to 21st century to date) and central US (which is a bit of a stretch, given that most states in the central region were above average, and hence below average for the 21st century todate) - but you very carefully do not mention the North West where three states had their second warmest April on record. I'm sure that was entirely accidental, and not in any way an attempt to cherry pick /sarc.

You also manage to mention Europe (where parts were near average relative to the 20th century record) - but no mention of Australia, or the central Meditarainian, or the Indian Ocean, or the Amazon, in all of which large tracks were the warmest on record. Now either you genuinely believe the Globe consists of just the US and Europe, or you are cherry picking. Outrageiously so.

I like statistical evidence where you can see at a glance that you are not getting a biased picture. If you say April 2016 wasn't that warm, but have to restrict your discusion to less than 5% of the globe to make your case (as you have), then you have not case. You ought to either be honest with yourself about that fact, or leave discussion here to the grownups who are happy to look at the whole of the data, and don't start invoking conspiracy theories every time the data doesn't tell them what they want to hear.

howardlee at 00:20 AM on 20 May 2016

Ocean Oxygen – another climate shoe dropping

Chriskoz - I believe that remineralization effects were accounted for in carbon pump calculations which explain some but not all of the 80-100ppm CO2 drawdown in glacial times. As Prof Archer noted in his book The Global Carbon Cycle (2010) "There is no single satisfactory explanation for the positive ocean carbon cycle feedback responsible for the glacial and interglacial atmospeheric CO2 cycles."

I brought this up in my interview with Prof Andy Ridgwell last December, and he said:

"I suspect it’s more likely we have all the mechanisms known but it’s how we piece the whole thing together consistent with all the different bits of proxy information we have. Now that the CO2 record of the glaciation is getting better and better resolved in time, they are looking like 100-year steps of 20 - 25 ppm CO2 and there’s some radiocarbon evidence that this carbon must have been mostly radiocarbon-dead. So people have been thinking: could it have been rapid sea rises? Could it have been destabilizing permafrost or marine hydrates? In terms of really trying to interrogate the highest resolution ice core record of the glaciation and actually see within a general change in the carbon cycle between glacial and interglacial, are there particular mechanisms that might be giving a huge kick of CO2 at certain times? If you just flood permafrost with ocean that’s not at freezing temperature, then you suddenly melt the permafrost so you can have a lot of carbon release just because the sea level rise is massive."

sam13501 at 00:18 AM on 20 May 2016

It's cooling

I do not consider charts such as that,to be reliable.. I saw something on one of the news, "April 2016 was the hottest on record, and it wasn't even close" This was the same April that was freezing all over the NE and central US with heavy snow..and it wasn't just the USA, east asia and europe were also cold, not as cold but it wasn't very spring like.. There have been April's in my life where Spring actually existed, this wasn't one of them, even May is cold.. How could that possibly be the coldest on record. Climate Central's chart says one thing, but tony hellar puts up (3)charts, using US HCN stations that there were more days in the 30s, and 60's that were over 90,95,100* That there were more hot days back then, then there are now.. Charts contradicting each other, ice studies contradicting each other, the charts in the 70,s and 80's showing one thing, the currentcharts showing another.. at this point I only look at weather patterns not charts.. what comes to mind ofcource is all the reliable data we had that showed Iraq had a WMD program..

Moderator Response:

[RH] You don't get to merely dismiss data you don't like and accept data you like. You need to show why the data is wrong if you don't accept it. If you're incapable of doing this, then perhaps you should consider the possibility that you don't know what you're talking about and should keep your mind open to the potential that reality may be something other than what you prefer to believe.

ranyl at 00:06 AM on 20 May 2016

Ocean Oxygen – another climate shoe dropping

Thanks Howardlee,
Sobering indeed, also interesting how recent CO2ppm 12 month apart month on month rises are increasing whilst emissions are apparently falling, is there evidence that this natural positive feedback or others (forest fires) are possibly already starting in earnest?
What do think iron fertilization will do to the fine balance of things?
Do you think sea level rises invading nutrient rich lands and soils will have any significant affect?
And lastly sorry for so many questions, what are your thoughts on how the increase in runoff nutrients caused by the expansion of industrial farming may affect things?
Does seem more and more that a huge carbon sequestration effort is going to be needed and keeping the oceans healthy and carbon sequestering through the warming coming is going to be a vital challenge.
Mind you if over activates like over fishing, waste, pollutants, etc, somehow just stopped occurring then maybe the surface oceans might actually get healthier for while despite the accelerating warming period being experienced.

howardlee at 23:53 PM on 19 May 2016

Ocean Oxygen – another climate shoe dropping

Mitch - in talking to people who know way more about this than I do, they tell me that the thermal stratification is indeed transient exactly as you describe, but anoxic conditions in Ocean Anoxic Events sometimes lasted hundreds of millennia, well beyond the shelf-life of stratification, suggesting a prolonged enhanced nutrient supply, which seems to be linked to enhanced weathering rates in a warmer, wetter climate.

Tom Curtis at 23:23 PM on 19 May 2016

It's cooling

sam @275:

"I also appreciate that there can be this cherry-picking on both sides of an argument and in different ways, when something 'appears' to show something basic, like Ice-accumulation on antarctica, it can be 'viewed' in a different light."

The way to avoid cherry picking is not to look at yet more anecdotal evidence as you are doing. It is to look at the summary statistics. Thus, while you quote incidents from some states in the US, in fact in 2016 to date, there have been 640 warm daily records compared to just 121 cold daily records, a ratio of 5.29 to 1 in favour of the warm records. Globally, to date, there have been 46,542 warm daily records compared to 8,275 cold daily records, a ratio of 5.64 to 1 in favour of the warm records.

In contrast to those record, your listing of incidents is 100% cold incidents. When the data shows >5 to 1 in favour, but all your samples come from the 1 rather than the >5, we know very clearly who is cherry picking.

Further, this tendency towards of warm records is something which is well known, and increasing in magnitude:

(Data for contiguous USA, source)

While this is in fact what you would expect from global warming, the idea that we could have global cooling while warm records outnumber cold records by >5 to 1 is an absurdity.

billev at 22:02 PM on 19 May 2016

The things people ask about the scientific consensus on climate change

I still have seen no proof that the current level of atmospheric CO2 has any measureable effect on temperature readings. The fact that an entity has the quality of causing something does not guarantee that it will cause that something if there is not enough of the entity. For example, steel has the quality of being able to stop the flight of a bullet. A thickness of one inch of steel will stop a bullet fired from a pistol but 1/2500th of an inch of steel won't. The recorded temperature change the Earth has been experiencing since 1880 conforms to the statements by climatologists that a 500 year period of warming began about 1850 with the end of the of a 500 year period of cooling that had begun around 1350. This would not appear to have anything to do with atmospheric CO2 levels, Also, I think that continuous recording of the pattern of heat loss that occurs between the Earth's surface and the temperature recording devices would be key to determining whether changes in the atmosphere were acting upon that heat loss and to what extent.

Moderator Response:

[PS] I am quite sure that if you do not want to accept GHG theory, then nothing will change you mind. However, if you can show an example of increased irradiation of a surface not increasing its temperature, then line up for a Nobel prize. Furthermore you seem to postualating that the earth can warm or cool without a cause (ie a violation of 1st law). Please cite the "the statements by climatologists" - otherwise this is sloganneering and prohibited. Since most of the earth is covered by ocean, most of heat goes there. How to explain this energy build up with your "natural cycles"?

chriskoz at 20:17 PM on 19 May 2016

Ocean Oxygen – another climate shoe dropping

Interesting summary Howard.

Do you think the remineralization depth changes during ice ages may explin the phenomenon of strong CO2 feedback of the initial orbital forcings?

Oceanographers have been saying that the CO2 feedback responsible for the magnification of orbital forcings comes from the ocean degassing. But they don't know or are unsure of the mechanism responsible for such degassing and regassing cycles that dominated climate cycles of the last 1My.

Rob Painting at 17:43 PM on 19 May 2016

It's cooling

Sam your comment reminds me of this:

It is extraordinarily unlikely that ten of thousands of scientists are wrong about global warming. Especially when the Earth continues to accumulate heat, ice continues to melt, and sea level continues to rise as expected.

sam13501 at 16:40 PM on 19 May 2016

It's cooling

well ok i appreciate you replies.. I also appreciate that there can be this cherry-picking on both sides of an argument and in different ways, when something 'appears' to show something basic, like Ice-accumulation on antarctica, it can be 'viewed' in a different light. But things like snow in the tropics, first time ever snow in tropical area's-it is what it is.. and what snow in the tropics is-is typical 'mini-ice age' conditions. Do an image search 'gtemps' and you will see a diagram that shows the 'roman warm period' etc. You can see that the roman empire existed during a warm period between 400AD & 500AD the solar minimums came along with their volcanic activity and there was the natural shift to a cold period..It was also about that time that their civilization collapsed. In fact every chinese dynasty collapsed during solar minimums, these things come, agricultural production suffers-next thing you know, famine- death, the emperor's head is on a platter.

After the 70s,early 80's ice age scare-where scientists like George Kukla and Leona Woods Libby mapped out the natural cycles, and then onto the global warming greenhouse gas movement.. what facinates me about the global warming movement is on the one hand they claim to fear the environmental destruction that (man-made) global warming can create, but in talking to the followers of this movement, they also claim that this man-made warming will 'protect' us from mini-ice ages-which have repeatedly ravaged civilizations throught the previous 10,000 year inter-glacial. There can be this sort of 'mitigation' of a MIA. So far the weather patterns are showing this is not the case-notice the cold related crop failures have already started. no one can deny from a historical standpoint: global warming=good times, global cooling=bad times (despite all the wars and conquest that these good times go along with). I believe that history will later see the GW movement as a 'collective psycosis'. It starts with a realistic fear-fear of ice ages; from this fear a group creates a defense mechanism, a 'wrong' ideology that they think will save them, they then collectivly re-inforce it, when one doubts, the others set him strait, when others tell them that their logic is flawed-they insist that these people are evil; in this case a derogotory word is used; "deniers" Deniers are people who secretly work for fossil fuel energy polluters and all they care about is corporate profits-that's their motive so everything they say is evil. But all that aside, this thing (MIA) is coming, it can't be stopped, it can't be mitigated, and there is no escape. Perhaps it could have been mitigated if these western countries had put their resources into protecting their agricultural sectors instead of middle eastern wars; but with 2019 only a few years away, i guess it's too late.

Moderator Response:

[RH] You're becoming completely nonsensical and that's far from the intent on this website. If you wish to continue posting here you're going to have to come up with substantive scientific research to support your position. Continued speculation and supposition will not suffice.

Moderating this site is a tiresome chore, particularly when commentators repeatedly submit offensive or off-topic posts. We really appreciate people's cooperation in abiding by the Comments Policy, which is largely responsible for the quality of this site.

Finally, please understand that moderation policies are not open for discussion. If you find yourself incapable of abiding by these common set of rules that everyone else observes, then a change of venues is in the offing.

Please take the time to review the policy and ensure future comments are in full compliance with it. Thanks for your understanding and compliance in this matter.

scaddenp at 13:51 PM on 19 May 2016

It's cooling

Someone believing what they read on Tony "CO2 could fall as snow in Antarctica" Heller's blog has their critical faculties turned off completely.

JIm Steele at 10:58 AM on 19 May 2016

Corals are resilient to bleaching

Coral Bleaching is the Legacy of a Marvelous Adaptation Mechanism

http://landscapesandcycles.net/coral-bleaching-debate.html

Observations of increased bleaching have happened for both warm and cold events

Moderator Response:

[Rob P] - Note the text on the post you have commented on:

"Because reef-coral have adapted tolerance to a narrow band of environmental conditions, bleaching can occur for a number of reasons, such as ocean acidification, pollution, excess nutrients from run-off, high UV radiation levels, exposure at extremely low tides and cooling or warming of the waters in which the coral reside. Typically these events are very localized in scale and if bleaching is mild, the coral can survive long enough to re-acquire new algal partners. So bleaching in itself is not something new, but mass coral bleaching on the huge scale being observed certainly appears to be, and represents a whole new level of coral reef decline."

Coral reefs globally are in dramatic decline and the worldwide bleaching event currently underway is likely to kill quite a few more coral reefs. When one steps back to look at the 'big picture' it's pretty clear why coral reefs in the ancient ocean suffered crises and extinctions - a too-warm and acidified ocean was just too inhospitable for them to survive.

Bob Loblaw at 10:51 AM on 19 May 2016

The things people ask about the scientific consensus on climate change

billev:

Your "fact" that temperature rise has not been continuous even though CO2 rise has been "constant" would only be a reasonable conclusion if CO2 was the only thing that affected global temperatures. It is not, and there are lots of posts on this site that will educate you if you bother to look. Although many factors affect short-term trends (and some longer-term), the current rise in temperatures cannot be explained by those other factors and it is entirely consistent with the known physics of CO2 and radiation transfer.

Your logic is like saying that your long-term increase in your bank balance is not caused by your regular paycheck because the bank balance drops sometimes (when you pay bills) - even though you have no other source of income.

pattimer at 03:03 AM on 19 May 2016

What Sir David King gets wrong about carbon pricing

I am 100% in favour of a carbon tax to take into account, as far as possible, external costs but when David King says "“It needs to go hand in hand with other regulatory systems.” I cannot find fault with that opinion either. We neeed surely to use every tool at our disposal, carbon tax, government planning and regulation. If on the other hand he argues that regulation should be used instead of carbon tax I would say he was in error for excluding an important strategy.

billev at 02:31 AM on 19 May 2016

The things people ask about the scientific consensus on climate change

The referenced papers, in my opinion, do not prove that the increase in radiative forcing has been sufficient to have any measureable effect on temperature change as recorded since 1880. The fact that atmospheric CO2 rise has been constant but temperature rise has not been continuous does not support a finding that CO2 levels are influencing temperature.

Moderator Response:

[PS] These papers show that energy radiating to earth surface increase precisely in line with predictions. Unless you want to revoke Plancks Law and conservation of energy, this must increase temperature. To discuss correlation with temperature, please see the myth "There is correlation with temperature". Please note that nowhere does science claim a linear correlation with temperature - CO2 is not the only factor in surface temperature, especially on scales less than a couple of decade. This site is not the place for rhetorical tricks like strawman arguments.

You might find the "Arguments" item on the top menu bar helpful for finding resources about your apparent beliefs. Please read the article carefully before commenting and if you want to dispute the science, please ensure that you have understood what the science claims first, not taking some misinformation site's word for it.

mitch at 01:29 AM on 19 May 2016

Ocean Oxygen – another climate shoe dropping

Very nice presentation.One of the best summaries I have seen.

Important point to make is that the expanded anoxic zone is a transient, because the ocean is heated from the top but mixed by winds and tides. The density gradient across the thermocline strengthens as global temperatures go up, making it more difficult to mix water and oxygen down.

Eventually as the ocean warms and the gradient drops, there will be more exchange. However, warm temperatures still cause organic matter degradation shallow and maintain higher atmospheric CO2.

Tom Dayton at 01:04 AM on 19 May 2016

Models are unreliable

dvaytw, more details on how the Bates paper is ridiculous are at ATTP.

Joel_Huberman at 00:19 AM on 19 May 2016

What Sir David King gets wrong about carbon pricing

Nick @ 3. I'm a member of a Citizen's Climate Lobby chapter in New Hampshire. Our chapter is just a year old, but already it's lobbying effectively at the Federal legislative level (Senate and House). Citizen's Climate Lobby has posted a great deal of information about its proposed "carbon fee & dividend" policy here: http://citizensclimatelobby.org/carbon-fee-and-dividend/

In addition, the Carbon Tax Center posts lots of information about carbon taxes in general, with and without dividends, on its website.

Finally, I fully agree with sauerj@1 that Dr. Shi-Ling Hsu's book, "The Case for a Carbon Tax," is an excellent source of information. In addition, it's brief, well written, and occasionally humorous. Look it up on Amazon.

MA Rodger at 23:50 PM on 18 May 2016

It's cooling

sam @268,

If you wish to set out an argument that "you can't say there is global warming when the ice is increasing," it would be advisable not to link to a NASA press release which demonstrates that you actually can say it -

“At the end of the last Ice Age, the air became warmer and carried more moisture across the continent, doubling the amount of snow dropped on the ice sheet,” Zwally said. The extra snowfall that began 10,000 years ago has been slowly accumulating on the ice sheet... (My bold)

Of course, some may question the authority of Jay Zwally to make such a statement, but he is the lead author of the work in question and was also clever enough to predict even before its publication that silly denialists will distort his work for their own ends.

“I know some of the climate deniers will jump on this, and say this means we don’t have to worry as much as some people have been making out,” he says. “It should not take away from the concern about climate warming.”

Eclectic at 23:41 PM on 18 May 2016

It's cooling

Sam, I am happy to give you a detailed reply to your latest posting, which has been "half struck out".

In collecting anecdotal evidence and a scattering of selected events, it is all too easy for the human brain to be influenced by unintended bias and subconscious prejudices. That is why a careful and thorough scientific evaluation is the only way we can come to realistic conclusions on a complex and worldwide phenomenon such as climate measured over time.

The most straightforward approach here, is to look for an aggregator which compiles all the net effect of the cold & hot events you are interested in. Such an aggregator is the "global mean sea level" over time. ( You can find recent graphs of Global MSL via the University of Colorado website. )

3 or 4 mm per year may not seem very much when you are standing on the beach on a particular day - but think about what it means over the oceans of the whole planet. Each 1 mm of rise represents the melting of approx. 360 Giga-tons of ice, coming from the ice-sheets of Antarctica, Greenland, and so on (and even from the sadly-depleted Glacier National Park ! ).

360 cubic Km of ice is a colossal amount - try a mental picture of 360 blocks of ice measuring each 3,300 feet tall and wide and long. And don't forget that part of each year's rise in MSL on top of that , is caused by thermal expansion of water in the oceans (thermal expansion because the oceans have been warming up more every year).

Allowing for some minor fluctuations from retention/release of surface water on land (and similar changes in ground-water) , we find that MSL shows a strong upward trend during the 20th Century - as measured by tidal gauges and in recent decades, by the more accurate satellite measurements. And the rising sea level rate has been even stronger during the past 20 years. Look at the Global MSL, and you will see an even more impressive rise during 2015.

These findings all point in one direction - and they are entirely inconsistent with the idea of a preponderance of cold events and more build-up of snow & ice-sheets.

It may seem cold where you are : but the planet itself is telling us a different story. The totality of evidence shows that the Earth is continuing to warm up. Nor can the scientists find any reason for it not to continue warming - and that's because there's more solar radiation entering Earth than radiation leaving Earth (the planet hasn't yet reached equilibrium from the effects of current Greenhouse Gasses - and worse, the GHG's are continuing to rise: e.g. CO2 is now above 400 ppm, and climbing) .

Overall, it is clear that AGW hasn't paused or reversed.

Nick Palmer at 23:21 PM on 18 May 2016

What Sir David King gets wrong about carbon pricing

Hi Baerbel! Could you send me any good stuff you might have on how to start implementing a carbon tax with full or partial dividend? I'm on our local government's advisory panel to their Energy Policy Executive and they've asked me to submit some carbon tax stuff. I have my own information but I'd like to see a different perspective to keep me as up to date as possible. I'm still on the usual email

sam13501 at 21:49 PM on 18 May 2016

It's cooling

Eclectic @270 No I didn't list 'warm events' because they seem to be in decline, for example off the top of my head from what I have seen on the tony hellar blog: There are less days over 90,95,and 100*F now than there were in the 30s and in the 60's.. the 1930's were very hot..117F in melbourne australia at 8am, 1 year in the 30's (i forgot which one) 45 days over 100*F in Indiana.. so 'hot events' are days that are over 100F, there are less of those now than there were in the past using US HCN weather stations.. and this purported 'sea level rise' is measured in milimeters; I feel that such a thing is easily fudged.. how much could it possibly be if even nasa.goddard is forced to admit (in that link i copied) that ice in antarctica is increasing over time, and you can see from those 2 photos of greenland, also from nasa, those photos there is clearly much more ice in 2015, than there was a few years ago..just another 'rebound'? I think the real culprit are the solar minimums that seed clouds, increase volcanic activity. bend the jet-stream, and radiate less heat toward earth.. that's alot for the greenhouse effect to overcome.. so as of right now, we got more ice and less hot days, intense winters with superblizzartds and winters that drag on..you can only imagine what its going to be like in 2019-24 when the current solar cycle finally reaches it's minimum

Moderator Response:

[RH] This is running very thin here with cherry picked materials. I'd highly suggest you spend some time looking at actual scientific research over climate denier blogs.

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BaerbelW at 21:19 PM on 18 May 2016

What Sir David King gets wrong about carbon pricing

I'll 2nd what sauerj mentions at #1 - but then I'm obviously (also) biased, being a member of CCL in Germany where we recently came together in Berlin for our 2nd annual meeting. Thanks to weekly European calls, I'm also in regular contact with Judy and Brian from the UK who wrote the article. CCL is a great way to get something done climate-wise with like-minded people in an ever growing global network.

Eclectic at 20:19 PM on 18 May 2016

It's cooling

Sam @268 and @269 , you've gone to some trouble to list an impressive number of "cold events". But have you been genuinely skeptical enough to draw up a comparable list of "hot events" occurring during the same 2014-2016 timespan ?

Since sea-levels are rising, and rising at an accelerating rate . . . the obvious conclusion is that your "cold events" are very much smaller in effect than the hot events.

Cherrypicking only what you want to look at, is a tempting occupation, but you should keep the overall picture in mind. And the overall picture is that the Earth is warming. In other words, the NASA and NOAA scientists are correct in their assessment of global warming. You have misunderstood the data and science.

SirCharles at 18:57 PM on 18 May 2016

Explainer: 10 ways ‘negative emissions’ could slow climate change

Survivable IPCC projections are based on science fiction - the reality is much worse

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8akSfOIsU2Y

sam13501 at 18:39 PM on 18 May 2016

It's cooling

way more ice in 2015 than there was a few years ago..oh i know, it's just 'rebounding' yea rebounding from the solar minimum:

2112: LINK

2015: LINK

Moderator Response:

[RH] Shortened links that were breaking page formatting.

sam13501 at 18:36 PM on 18 May 2016

It's cooling

In April in the NE,USA there was a 'white easter', during the month there was 16 feet of snow in PA, even more in colorado..and it's STILL cold even as of middle of May.. it has snowed for the first time in many tropical area's.. as these agencies claim 'this is the hottest ever' .. they actually said this april was the hottest ever..and april in which it was freezing everyday..makes no sence! There were more hot days in the 30's than there is today here even your friends at nasa-goddard admit there is global cooling:

http://www.nasa.gov/feature/goddard/nasa-study-mass-gains-of-antarctic-ice-sheet-greater-than-losses

you can't say there is global warming when the ice is increasing! Ice is increasing in greenland.. and i been tallying the mini-ice age as it progresses..lets take a look..isn't it about time you briliant scientists admit that the greehouse effect has been greatly exagerated:

Partial List of extreme cold weather anomalies since 2014

2014 ALL US states below freezing RARE
* 92% ice cover on the great lakes US
* cold records broken in NZ

SNOW RECORDS BROKEN AND HEAVY SNOWS:

* 2014,15 heavy snow in Atlanta and Houston RARE
* 2015 Cappricotta Italy one day snow record
* 300 year snow record in Hokkaido, Japan
* 2015 snow fall record broke in Nova Scota
* Hallifax snow 18X higher than normal
* 2015 Boston 270 snow record broke
* Buffalo New York ALLTIME snow record
* Snow in Huntington Beach ca RARE
* 2015 great lake USA ice cover lasting until June, months longer than normal
* 2015 Heavy Snows in Syria & Libya + many other ME countries, very RARE especially so widespread
* Snow last 2 years in Vietnam RARE
* Snow in July in Hawaii at 10,000 feet RARE
* Snow in August in Calgary Canada RARE
* Snow in August in SOUTHERN China RARE
* 2015 August Snow is Montana, and Wyoming
* 2015 August cold records for Billings MT, Denver CO, Mitchell SD, Watertown SD, Shrevepost LA, Monroe LA, Texarkana AR, El Dorado AR, Tyler TX, Longview TX + many others, Broke.

* 2016 January snow for the first time in central Vietnam, heavy snow all over vietnam unbeleivable picts: http://english.vietnamnet.vn/fms/vietnam-in-photos/150560/in-pictures--snowfall-in-central-vietnam-for-the-first-time.html Okinawa-first snow ever. Hiroshima-55 inches of snow, Hong Kong records 3rd coldest day on record.
* 2016 March: cold records broke all over US and more snow in tropics, NY and Boston have coldest March in 100 years. Vietnam had 1 foot of snow 300km south of hanoi.. Heavy snow again in central mexico. New York's Whiteface Mountains reached an insanely cold minus-78.88C ; Taiwan and Kuwait receive first snow on record.
* CROP FAILURE wheat crop fail from intense lanina late colds: http://www.agweb.com/article/concerns-mount-over-freeze-damage-to-winter-wheat-crops-naa-associated-press/
* 2016 Pakistans meteorological dept. issues a report predicting global cooling as a result of solar activity. Pakistan is 2nd government so far to issue global cooling warning after Russia did earlier.

* 2016 March 22 wheat crop damage in US due to freeze. http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2016-03-22/freeze-across-great-plains-has-farmers-watching-winter-wheat

* 2016 Russian wheat crop damaged by ice.

* 2016 April snow in PA,USA in april, media refers to phenomenon as 'snow-showers'. The forcast is then upgraded to 3-12" of snow blanketing PA & MW, and NE region. NY and other states record their coldest April day on record. Heavy snow in Colorado-between 15"-32" snow in April. Snow records for April broken in CO & WY.

* 2016 April 1st snow reported in the Carribian. Guadelupe snow in April described by Dominica News as "extrodinary weather phenomenon"

* 2016 April, less than 5% of wheat and oat crop planted as of mid-April; cold and wind preventing fieldwork http://www.agweb.com/article/cold-wind-hamper-fieldwork-in-north-dakota-naa-associated-press/

denisaf at 16:49 PM on 18 May 2016

Explainer: 10 ways ‘negative emissions’ could slow climate change

The operation of the exisitng vast infrastructure is using fossil fuels at an unsustainable rate. The best that can be done is to reduce that rate of fossil fuels as quickly as economically and physically possible. All these measures can possibly do is slow climate disruption and ocean acidification warming very slightly where they are practical and do not have unintended consequences. They certainly cannot ease the future situation significantly. They just convey a false sense of possible amelioration when most attention should be on sound mreasures to cope with such issues as sea level rise.

dvaytw at 13:46 PM on 18 May 2016

Models are unreliable

Ps- never mind. Comment withdrawn:

Bates’ Embarrassment: Sad and Sloppy Climate Sensitivity Study

Prism at 13:22 PM on 18 May 2016

Past 150,000 Years of Sea Level History Suggests High Rates of Future Sea Level Rise

For perspective, 7 billion people standing in close formation would fit within the boundries of Los Angeles. A very, very small space compared with the occupiable land area on the earth.

Tom Curtis at 13:11 PM on 18 May 2016

Breathing contributes to CO2 buildup

DailySledge @60, the industrial revolution started in 1750, not 1850. As a result, from 1750 to 1849, industrial emissions of CO2 from the burning of coal amounted to 1.25 billion metric tonnes of Carbon. While only, approximately, a sixth of current annual industrial emissions, it still represents a substantive contribution to global warming. The contribution from Land Use Change was approximately the same as that from fossil fuel consumption in 1850 (spreadsheet), and is likely to have exceeded it beforehand. Together, these contribute to an annual increase of 1.3 ppmv in CO2 concentration over the period 1750-1849. However, probably more significant was the significant reduction in volcanic activity over the period, combined with an increase in solar activity. So your quadratic fits retrodiction of a positive temperature trend prior to 1850 is accurate as far as that goes, but misleading in that there have been substantial changes in the importance of different forcings over various intervals within the quadratic fit.

billev at 12:50 PM on 18 May 2016

The things people ask about the scientific consensus on climate change

What I'm asking is what method has been used to measure CO2's contribution to global temperature rise?

Moderator Response:

[PS] See here for direct measurement. See "There is no empirical evidence" for other papers measuring the effect. (Harries, Wang, Evans, Philipona, Grigg, Chen all on that page). The IPCC chapter on "Attribution" covers methods for working out contribution in excruciating detail.

Bob Loblaw at 12:06 PM on 18 May 2016

Breathing contributes to CO2 buildup

It doesn't look like DailySledge has read all the comments to this article. The comment that "An increasing population does by breathing incrementaly contribute more CO2 gas to the atmosphere" has already been addressed (e.g. here).

Long story short, as scaddenp points out: more people store more carbon, so an increasing population has to be a carbon sink, not a source.

dvaytw at 11:54 AM on 18 May 2016

Models are unreliable

Should we all be jumping for joy?

Climate Sensitivity Paper Hints Models Overestimate Warming

scaddenp at 11:38 AM on 18 May 2016

Breathing contributes to CO2 buildup

I dont see how we can "breath out more than we take in". We take C in via our food, and emit in breathing. While we live, we are carbon sink.

The contribution of changes in biomass since 1750 is detailed in the AR5 WG1, p486, table 6.1. The total land to atmosphere change is estimated at 30 PgC +/- 45. Compare that fossil fuel contribution of 375 PgC +/- 30.

sauerj at 09:58 AM on 18 May 2016

What Sir David King gets wrong about carbon pricing

I recently joined Citizen's Climate Lobby (CCL). This group is wonderful! They advocate for Fee & Dividend using a relationship-building, respectful, kind approach. They have great resources. There are CCL chapters all around the world and in about every congressional district in the US. If you are looking for an way to plug-into effective action, please take a serious look at CCL! Their cause (CFD) is the most effective way to really start reducing carbon emissions. Email the local chapter leader and they will quickly get you involved. You will be glad you did. PS: They don't hound you for money; but they will hound you for your time and talent.

Also, read 'The Case for a Carbon Tax' Dr. Shi-Ling Hsu. Great book!

DailySledge at 09:21 AM on 18 May 2016

Breathing contributes to CO2 buildup

'By breathing out, we are simply returning to the air the same CO2 that was there to begin with.'

As biological engines we consume energy and produce waste, given we live on a planet that has finite mass of elements with the only addition to the total mass coming from stellar objects the I think it's safe to say in it's simplest terms the statement is correct.

CO2 measurements have been taken for many years and have been rising in concert with rising global temps with records extend back to 1850 showing a dramatic increase. Taking those temp records and using quadratic equation to extrapilate the curve of incidence, it shows that temp increases began before 1850, although incremently slower the trend was upward and this is before fossil fuels became popular, increasing trend can be attributed to increasing carbon based energy usage, which is directly related to and attributed to the increase in population.

Dramatic increases in modern CO2 levels are directly or indirectly linked to man and his actions in most cases.

A reducing biomass that converts CO2 to stored carbon coupled with mankind's increased CO2 producing enviroment and life suggest's the balances that we assumed as constants no longer apply.

If we are producing more CO2 than the global environment can absorb then the outcome is obvious, if the environments that can absorb CO2 keeps reducing or slow's down uptake due to excess CO2 then problem further compounds global impact.

If we were to compare increasing CO2 levels with global population increases we see much the same trend and increases as we see with fossil fuel usage if looked at solely.

An increasing population does by breathing incrementaly contribute more CO2 gas to the atmosphere, which does contribute to global warming and rising temps, by the time CO2 is converted and stored as carbon it will added it's own impact which add's to rising temps.

CO2 is as a gas, a pollutant, we breath out more than we take in so we add to the combined total of CO2 increase, it is posionous or hazardous depending on it's concentrations to most living organism.......

billev at 07:12 AM on 18 May 2016

The things people ask about the scientific consensus on climate change

The current level of CO2 is 400 parts per million which means there is one cubic foot of CO2 for every 2500 cubic feet of air. What is the measure of how much temperature rise is caused by this amount of CO2?

Moderator Response:

[PS] You might like to look at the myths "CO2 is just a trace gas" and "CO2 only causes 35% of warming". You might like to clarify your question. I assume you mean how much of the temperature rise since pre-Industrial is caused by increase of CO2 since then. With 0% CO2 in atmosphere, earth would be frigid ice ball. Do you mean how much temperature rise by direct radiative effect, or how much by radiative plus feedbacks? (decreased albedo, increased water vapour etc).

villabolo at 04:14 AM on 18 May 2016

Mars is warming

GPWayne, your link to Fred Thompson in the green box no longer works.

Moderator Response:

[GT] Thanks, we will update the link.

denisaf at 11:35 AM on 17 May 2016

The things people ask about the scientific consensus on climate change

It is ironical that this discussion is misleading as it is the operation of technical systems that have contibuted to climate disruption and ocean acidification and warming. Human have only made the decisions that led to these unintended consequences of the technical systems using fossil fuels.

JWRebel at 04:01 AM on 17 May 2016

Explainer: 10 ways ‘negative emissions’ could slow climate change

Very interesting summary and links. I fear that many of us are rather to sanguine about the clock we are on. The carbon budget can easily be optimistic:

Current temperature anomalies, even if outliers, bring us within striking distance of the 1.5° C.
Equilibrium temperature would be for current CO² levels is also uncertain, but we are not there yet.
If positive feedbacks (permafrost, methane) or other discontinuities appear, there will be less scope for further human manipulation of climate.

The modelling and especially the costs for NETs does not seem very far along yet. (e.g., between £15 and £361 per tonne: that would make quite a difference if you were buying steaks!) Personally I feel CCS and BECCS seem to be sexiest and getting the most attention, but confidence in costs and scale seems unwarranted. Accelerated olivine weathering is often skipped altogether, but it is a natural process, extremely scalable, and according to Schuiling possible at $10/ton of CO².

MA Rodger at 20:41 PM on 16 May 2016

CO2 is not the only driver of climate

Ken Kimura @24.

I find your comments curious, extending as they do initially beyond this thread. Note here @24 you say you intend a couteous enquiry and see nothing to suggest you are not doing so. This is followed by a set of questions that imply you consider the person you address to be, if not sincere, not to be trusted. "...this claim of yours." "How can you be sure..."

The science being discussed here is not anybody's personal property. Scientific knowledge is open access thus owned by all. That is what makes it so powerful. (Having written this, I am conscious that I now embark on addressing questions that do have ownership and with answers that have a single author and so could be wholly disowned elsewhere.)

Picking up a word in your questioning @24, "How did they measure the stratospheric aerosol density during the period?", you might find Sato et al 1993 a worthwhile read (PDF here). This paper predates the appearance of the ice core data which has allowed the record to be extended back before 1883 with far greater confidence and accuracy.

Further, I am mindful that there may be a not-uncommon misconception buried within your various questions. You perhaps are of the view that early indstrialistaion was entirely driven by fossil fuel use, initially exclusively coal, and if this were so would we not have had from its earlierst times CO2 emissions & SO2 emissions in a constant proportion (until SO2 pollution was reduced in the 1970s). However, the contribution of mankind's rising CO2 emissions from burgeoning coal use only overtook the mounting emissions from low SO2-emitting wood burning in the 1910s, apparently. (CDIAC FF data & CDIAC LOC data.)

Perhaps for completeness, I should add that the forcing from GHGs in those early decades is often dismissed as too small to have significantly affected global temperatures pre-1940. Yet, if you examine the rise of atmospheric CO2 since pre-industrial times (IPCC AR5 data to 2011here), 27% of today's atmospheric CO2 rise causing 31% of today's CO2 forcings were present by 1940. And with their slower increase, the temperature response would likely be closer to 40% of today's total. But saying that we should be sure not to forget "CO2 is not the only driver of climate."

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