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Mattimus at 14:35 PM on 10 June 20152015 SkS News Bulletin #3: NOAA Updates Global Temperature Record
Am I allowed to bring quantum mechanics into this discussion or is that off-topic? I'm asking seriously.
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KR at 14:29 PM on 10 June 20152015 SkS News Bulletin #3: NOAA Updates Global Temperature Record
Mattimus - I must admit to a bit of difficulty in parsing what you are asking. That said, the evidence to date is sufficient to convince the vast majority of scientists studying the subject (the oft-mentioned 97%), and there really isn't any data sufficently strong to consider rejecting AGW. Let alone in favor of any particular theory of the contradictory multitude offered up sans support by the 3%.
Our understanding continually evolves with additional data and examination. But overturning the entire structure of climate science, rather than detailing particulars, would require both quite extraordinary evidence for a new cause of climate change, and an entire series of data that rejected all the elements of our current understanding - spectroscopy, radiative physics, satellite observations, GHG fingerprints, sums of forcings, etc.
No such evidence has been presented, and arguments against AGW simply haven't held up.
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scaddenp at 14:27 PM on 10 June 20152015 SkS News Bulletin #3: NOAA Updates Global Temperature Record
I think we all agree that the current methods used to estimate the change in the surface temperature metric are, just that, estimates, and that improvements will continue to be made.
However, I dont think you can find a scientist publishing in the field of surface temperature estimation that will argue that temperature is doing anything other than continuing to rise. What "argument" did you have in mind? What change in interpretation?
The global surface temperature metric is extremely important to us - the surface is where we live - but it is not necessarily the best metric for assessing AGW. The energy imbalance is potentially better estimated from ocean temperature change especially now that Argo is deployed. Furthermore ice loss (and thus sealevel) are better integrators of long term climate change. Any argument there?
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KR at 14:19 PM on 10 June 2015The Skeptical Science temperature trend calculator
Philip Shehan - Sorry to say, but I really don't have the spare time to read through four pages of comments mostly consisting of denial. Some points of interest based on what you've shared:
- There are no 'step changes', that's basic thermodynamics. Over the last 60 years we've seen perhaps 0.7C of warming, while the oceans (93% of the energy entering/leaving the environment) have gained 25*1022 Joules of energy. Meaning a 0.1C step change that actually affected the longer term Earth energy balance (as opposed to just internal variation between ocean and surface temps) would require something like 3*1022 Joules of energy. Since there have been no nearby supernova, that hasn't happened, and claiming step changes is absurd.
- Cherry-picking a particular point (such as 1998) for your trend start based upon its nature as an extrema increases the need for statistical confidence by something like an order of magnitude, to requiring 99.5% confidence (depending on the variance stats of the data). Unless Singer can exclude the longer term warming trend with the required confidence level, he's just making noise about noise.
Furthermore, in the statistical theme, here's something I've said before.
Examining any time-span starting in the instrumental record and ending in the present:
- Over no period is warming statistically excluded.
- Over no period is the hypothesis of "no warming" statistically supported WRT a null hypothesis of the longer term trends.
- And over any period with enough data to actually separate the two hypotheses – there is warming.
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Mattimus at 14:03 PM on 10 June 20152015 SkS News Bulletin #3: NOAA Updates Global Temperature Record
That being said, and no discredit to anyone's research on this forum, can we agree that there is still an argument in the data on both sides and continual change in the interpretation of the data in regard to the extent of our limited ability to capture all data?
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rocketeer at 13:59 PM on 10 June 2015Factcheck: Is climate change ‘helping Africa’?
"Climate Change is HELPING Africa because greenhouse gases are bringing rain to areas that have suffered drought for decades." - Daily Mail Headline
So greenhouse gases do cause climate change? Or only when that is "good" climate change?
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Mattimus at 13:49 PM on 10 June 20152015 SkS News Bulletin #3: NOAA Updates Global Temperature Record
I'm completely new to this site but have found it to have the most research-based data information/links I've come across so far on the internet. It's the only reason I took the time to sign up.
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scaddenp at 12:54 PM on 10 June 2015Spoiled ballots, spoiled views: an election snapshot from Powys, Wales, UK
I notice that UK still has issues with FF subsidies as well. eg here and here. Do people complaining about subsidies on renewables demand removal of these as well?
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Philip Shehan at 11:35 AM on 10 June 2015The Skeptical Science temperature trend calculator
Pardon the typos in my comments. dashing things off in beween dealing with more pressing matters.
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Philip Shehan at 11:26 AM on 10 June 2015The Skeptical Science temperature trend calculator
KR
Tree recent and rather lengthy analysies are on these pages. I post as
"Dr Brian" over there when discussing matters of science.I had to stop using my real name over there for a while for reasons which do them no credit and posted as Brian, my first given name - Philip is my middle name.
I started using the "Dr" for science matters when I became tired of responding to comments along the lines of "Clearly you know nothing about science/mathematics/statistics/ Popper/etc/etc/etc with "Well actually I do... This of course only annoys the “skeptics” more - "Oooooooh you're so arrogant." Which is another reason to keep using it.
But I digress.
I was challenged to refute an argument by David Whitehouse (sorry, not sure how to do links here):
The two items noted above are at
and
Any feedback on the validity or otherwise of my analysis appreciated.
Moderator Response:[PS] fixed links. Use the link button (looks like a chain) in the comment editor.
[RH] Shortened links that were breaking page formatting.
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scaddenp at 09:13 AM on 10 June 2015Spoiled ballots, spoiled views: an election snapshot from Powys, Wales, UK
Wind shapes up not too badly against all forms of generation (see levelized costs for all types here) including unsubsized coal and nuclear.
MacKay's analysis is based on looking at the amount of energy that is actually there, with virtually no regard to cost. A table on p107 shows, his estimates are far far higher than estimates from other 5 analysts. Far from unlimited potential, I would say MacKay's analysis sharply defines the limits. To say otherwise, then please produce the data.
While the electorate doesnt like subsidies, I am sure that electorate doesnt like the idea of paying of full cost for FF, including damages to those hurt by using it, either. Everyone wants energy as cheap as possible but sadly we have had 100 years or so of paying too little and you cant escape the change. To my mind, valuing visual impact so highly compared to other concerns (eg damage to great deltas from sea level rise) is morally suspect.
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Langham at 07:56 AM on 10 June 2015Spoiled ballots, spoiled views: an election snapshot from Powys, Wales, UK
^ If you reread my post you will see I was including all forms of renewable energy in my comment on "paltry returns". I was trying to convey the political reality which governs the situation - most of the electorate are opposed to subsidies.
I think KR may have gone to a different source, but my point was that I would be unwilling to rely on the MacKay estimates - however the figures are all rather meaningless in the final analysis, as energy production will be consistent with whatever any government is prepared to invest in harvesting wave and tidal power.
The opportunities offered by the British coastline, together with improvements in technology that can be reasonably anticipated, mean the potential is almost unlimited - but it will only be achieved with very considerable financial investment.
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Tom Curtis at 07:47 AM on 10 June 2015What you need to know about the NOAA global warming faux pause paper
dana, KR, for what it is worth, here is a comparison of UAH v6 to v5.6 and to RSS for the TLT pseudo channel:
As you can see, the major effective difference between v5.6 and v6 is that v6 much more closely matches RSS. That means it is not possible reject v6 as inadequate without also rejecting RSS as inadequate, ie, without effectively rejecting satellite temperature data altogether. While the appropriate caveates about satellite data are often ignored by deniers, I do not think rejecting it altogether is a tenable position.
The change in method of calculating the psueudo channel mentioned by KR changes the pseudo weighting profile, making it higher in altitude to that used in v 5.6 and by RSS:
This would have its greatest effect on measured temperatures in the tropics and least in polar regions due to differences in lapse rates between the two regions. Despite that, the largest difference in trends between UAH v5.6 and v6 is in the Arctic:
That combined with the greater sensitivity to ENSO displayed by v6 makes me suspect that primary difference is a reduced coverage of the Arctic to match that by RSS, but I have been unable to confirm that (gridded data being rather intractable on spreadsheets). It may be just a result of the change of diurnal drift corrections to effectively match those of RSS. Spencer's introduction of v6 takes no effort to explain the differences between measured temperatures between the two products which I consider very poor scientific practise. Hopefully the reviewers and editors of the paper introducing the changes will expect more of him.
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scaddenp at 07:38 AM on 10 June 2015Spoiled ballots, spoiled views: an election snapshot from Powys, Wales, UK
Given cost of marine energy (including offshore wind) subsidies on marine energy would have massively bigger than that on wind turbines. Given levelized cost of onshore wind, the "paltry return" comments seems a bit rich.
Rather than going for subsidies, paying full cost for carbon might help put costs for wind etc in perspective.
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scaddenp at 07:30 AM on 10 June 2015Spoiled ballots, spoiled views: an election snapshot from Powys, Wales, UK
Langham, I have looked through KR's links but for life of me, I cant see where your " the UK government's Dept of Energy and Climate Change estimates that wave and tidal stream energy can produce 20% of the UK's energy needs, with a further 8% coming from tidal lagoons" numbers are coming from. Is it really Energy or just electricity?
KR quotes onshore wind at 15% of 2020 target, but that target is only 15% of total energy needs (ie 2% of total energy). MacKay's estimate for tidal/wave comes to 242Twh and I cant see evidence that Energy ministry thinks it is bigger. Tidal power is predictable but it is most certainly not constant and absolutely must be backed up.
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Langham at 07:17 AM on 10 June 2015Spoiled ballots, spoiled views: an election snapshot from Powys, Wales, UK
KR - No need to spell out NIMBY, it's been in common use for some time. However, it is a cheap point to make and I find critics of perceived 'Nimbyism' are frequently all too willing to inflict contrivances and nuisance on others that they would not willingly endure in their own back yard.
People tend to be more willing to tolerate developments for which they can perceive a sustainable economic rationale, but I think wind turbines, and to some extent all renewable energy schemes, have become tainted by their reliance on subsidies, and people then feel they are being made monkeys of - their tax money is being spent for a paltry return, with noise, health and amenity nuisances thrown in for free. You or I might say climate change is being abated, so there is a return even if it cannot be measured financially, but the general public tend to be sceptical if not outright disbelieving of such reasoning.
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KR at 06:49 AM on 10 June 2015Spoiled ballots, spoiled views: an election snapshot from Powys, Wales, UK
Langham - We'll have to see how UK policies and projects develop based on costs, lead times, and public opinion, I suppose. In the meantime, though, dealing with NIMBY (Not In My Backyard) attitudes are part and parcel of every energy project, no matter where they are located.
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Langham at 06:41 AM on 10 June 2015Spoiled ballots, spoiled views: an election snapshot from Powys, Wales, UK
Wave, tidal and offshore wind capacity will simply be a corrolary of whatever investment is made in the infrastructure. Unlike inland windfarms which are subject to unpredictable, unreliable and fluctuating weather patterns, tidal power is completely predictable and reliable, so there is no need for the back-up or storage systems that must be in place to generate electricity on windless days.
The UK has almost limitless potential to develop offshore systems. The costs are extremely high, naturally, but I detect a greater willingness by the present government to invest in large-scale infrastructure projects - like the Cardiff Bay scheme, recently approved - than in piecemeal windfarm projects across the countryside which merely tend to irritate country-dwellers for reasons that have already been well ventilated.
While not underestimating their impact on, say, the fisheries, I would contend that the visual impact of marine power is much less than that of onshore schemes.
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KR at 06:05 AM on 10 June 2015What you need to know about the NOAA global warming faux pause paper
dana1981 - It's my understanding that V6 of the UAH data uses a completely new method for calculating lower tropospheric temperatures, resulting in lower LT trends. Dr. Spencer describes the differences as follows:
(1) a decrease in the global-average lower tropospheric (LT) temperature trend from +0.140 C/decade to +0.114 C/decade (Dec. ’78 through Mar. ’15); and (2) the geographic distribution of the LT trends, including higher spatial resolution.
There are also differences in how they calculate diurnal drift adjustments for the satellites, particularly NOAA-15.
The previous method for LT temperatures used multiple angles with individual weighting functions, the new method uses a combination of multiple channels at a single location to derive LT temperatures - with a pre-processing step of averaging all view angles.
As such, I believe that V6 LT temperature estimates cannot be directly compared to V5.6 or earlier, as they are not the same computation at all. The LT code previously released is now outdated, and it remains to be seen when/if the current code will be released.
Given past actions by the UAH team (including the Spencer/Braswell 2011 low sensitivity debacle leading to editor resignations) I find myself a bit suspicious of the reduced LT trend; we'll have to wait and see how it stands up to examination. In the meantime it would seem imprudent to be making policy decisions on a new and untested methodology.
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Paul D at 05:54 AM on 10 June 2015Factcheck: Is climate change ‘helping Africa’?
Haven't farmers also been planting trees in the Sahel?
The Great Green WallCould this also have an impact on rain? -
KR at 05:53 AM on 10 June 2015Spoiled ballots, spoiled views: an election snapshot from Powys, Wales, UK
Langham - It's certainly possible that there are better estimates than MacKays. However:
Looking at what appears to be your source, and the linked UK Renewable Energy Roadmap; onshore wind is rated at 15% of needed energy by 2020; offshore wind may be several times that. But by 2020 wave and tidal power is projected to be only 1 TWh (with only 1.2 MW of tidal power deployed in a single project so far), while wind energy is projected at 24-32 TWh. As to your cost concerns, onshore wind has by far the lowest levelized costs, marine power the highest (Fig. 5 here) - you seem to have that completely reversed. Marine power has a lot of future potential, but it has long lead times and high incremental costs (i.e. large projects).
I suspect you may be disappointed at how matters progress, given the costs involved. And I dare say that shore dwellers will have strong opinons about how wave/tidal power generators will affect their landscapes as well...
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dana1981 at 05:49 AM on 10 June 2015What you need to know about the NOAA global warming faux pause paper
Tom Curtis @16 - you're right, I'd forgotten that UAH are working on a new version of their data set, and that may be what Christy is referring to. Though it if does show no lower troposphere warming since 1998, I would seriously question its reliability.
As for Christy in general, as others have said, he's published some good (and some bad) research papers. The problem lies in his public comments, which often aren't supported by research, aren't accurate, and misinform a lot of peple. And in the media that amplifies that misinformation, and in the members of Congress who keep inviting him to testify despite (or because of) his repeatedly misleading testimony.
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Langham at 05:08 AM on 10 June 2015Spoiled ballots, spoiled views: an election snapshot from Powys, Wales, UK
KR, Mackay's analysis is way out. The UK government's Dept of Energy and Climate Change estimates that wave and tidal stream energy can produce 20% of the UK's energy needs, with a further 8% coming from tidal lagoons. So almost 30% of UK energy needs can be met without a single windmill. Nor is this just hypothesis - a tidal steam system has been in operation in Northern Ireland since 2008. There are schemes planned for Cardiff Bay and elsewhere - there is enormous potential around the UK to harness the very high tidal range. I don't think it is unrealistic to expect that, in the long run, land-based wind turbines will eventually come to be seen for what they are - inefficient, very expensive white elephants. My fear is that by then, the British landscape will have been badly clighted by their intrusion.
Attitudes to the countryside may be different in the USA, perhaps as there is an abundance of empty space, but on this densely populated island our beautiful countryside is in perilously short supply.
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ubrew12 at 04:57 AM on 10 June 2015Factcheck: Is climate change ‘helping Africa’?
So, if you live in the Sahel, you get to live in the American MidWest, and if you live in the MidWest, you get to live in the Sahel (ucar world map of future pdsi). My, my, that is good news indeed...
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jgnfld at 04:51 AM on 10 June 2015Factcheck: Is climate change ‘helping Africa’?
Even if true it's an ill wind that blows nobody any good.
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shoyemore at 04:06 AM on 10 June 2015What you need to know about the NOAA global warming faux pause paper
ryland, #22,
Professor Murray Salby was dismissed by MacQuarie University for "not fulfilling his contract obligations", and for repeated overseas travel when he had been asked to stay and teach. Salby would still be at the University, climate views and all, if he had played ball with the administration.
FWIW, it subsequently emerged that in 2005, the US National Science Foundation opened an investigation into Salby's federal funding arrangements and found that he had displayed "a pattern of deception [and] a lack of integrity" in his handling of federal grant money.
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Tom Dayton at 03:33 AM on 10 June 2015What you need to know about the NOAA global warming faux pause paper
ryland, the problems with Spencer's and Christy's aggressive public statements include very vocal, horribly biased, unjustified and even outright wacky claims about what their own peer-reviewed publications say.
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ryland at 03:29 AM on 10 June 2015What you need to know about the NOAA global warming faux pause paper
Thanks for your comments Tom Dayton and Simon Baines. I too was a tenured University professor at an Australian univesity where similar rules apply but not always as there have been professors notably Murray Salby who have been sacked for views not thought suitably concordant with mainstream climate science. Tom Dayton I was surprised at your statement "Both Christy and Spencer do some good work. In particular, what they write in their peer-reviewed publications tends to be reasonable" as most pieces commenting on these scientists rarely say any such thing. And Stephen Baines I thought your statement "For me, the problem is not Spencer and Christy per se, but rather the apparatus that exists to amplify their more contrarian views beyond their actual influence within the climate science community" showed far more insight than that shown bny many others who comment on Christy and Spencer.
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Stephen Baines at 02:57 AM on 10 June 2015What you need to know about the NOAA global warming faux pause paper
Ryland...Tenure is there to protect free speech from exactly this kind of threat. You want free speech so there is a battle of ideas that eventually leads to the truth. There will always be contrarians in any field — they serve a useful purpose by keeping ideas alive that may still be useful or injecting new ideas. To silence such voices would have a chilling effect on discourse over all.
For me, the problem is not Spencer and Christy per se, but rather the apparatus that exists to amplify their more contrarian views beyond their actual influence within the climate science community. That amplification brings in a lot of voices that do not have perspective and context to understand information, and who consequently interpret information to match their own fears, predipositions and narrow vested interests and political aims.
It ends up distorting the debate entirely. It ends up being about who has the power rather than who has the most rational argument. Look at attempts to cut Geosciences funding within NSF with the current House and Senate budgets, for example.
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Tom Dayton at 02:38 AM on 10 June 2015What you need to know about the NOAA global warming faux pause paper
ryland: Christy has tenure, so he can do and say nearly anything without any effects on his employment. Both Christy and Spencer do some good work. In particular, what they write in their peer-reviewed publications tends to be reasonable. It's what they write and say outside of those peer-reviewed publications that is the main problem. Contrast their behavior with that of RSS's Carl Mears.
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ryland at 02:15 AM on 10 June 2015What you need to know about the NOAA global warming faux pause paper
The general tenor of the comments about Dr Christy, UAH and RSS is hardly complimentary and in my opinion some, in particular that from Dana, come close to accusations of malpractice. Why therefore is Dr Christy and for that matter Dr Roy Spencer, still employed at UAH in a fairly high profile and senior position if he is as scietifically unsound as has been claimed? (http://www.skepticalscience.com/examining-christys-skepticism.html). Does UAH have particularly low standards for their climate scientists? It also seems surprising that Dr Christy is still able to publish in the peer reviewed literature if his reputation is as poor as is implied here.
Moderator Response:[PS] This site exists to debunk misinformation by fake skeptics. You have been pointed to the exactly what has been claimed and what the science actually says. What is your opinion?
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MA Rodger at 02:11 AM on 10 June 2015The Skeptical Science temperature trend calculator
KR @68.
It is here.
Of course the numpties there have yet to feed the period 1979-95 into the SkS trend calculator to demonstrate that even prior to the famous faux pause, the warming was also statistically insignificant, thus completing their myth-making.
I am myself employing the SkS trend calculator sparing with a numpty at CarbonBrief, one of may denialists that invaded the site to comment on their Karl et al. item. Mine insists most strongly that HadCRUT4 2003-2015.04 is almost statistically significant at 1%. There's always one!
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KR at 01:26 AM on 10 June 2015The Skeptical Science temperature trend calculator
Philip Shehan - "Have been getting all sorts of grief over at Bolt..."
Link?
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KR at 01:24 AM on 10 June 2015Spoiled ballots, spoiled views: an election snapshot from Powys, Wales, UK
Langham - By MacKays analysis, tidal and wave power can (with full utilization) at best supply perhaps 5-8% of the UKs energy needs. Offshore wind could supply another 25%. Tidal and sea-based supplies just aren't going to cover it alone.
Note that land-based wind power is estimated to have about a 10% potential, greater than that of tidal and wave. The biggest potentials are from solar, at perhaps 33%.
The best energy strategy is to use a lot of strategies - diversify the supply with wind, solar, tidal, biomass, onshore, offshore, etc. Not only does it greatly ameliorate intermittancy (wind blows stronger at night, solar not so much, for example), but it takes the best advantage of available energies.
As to siting issues - in the US, Western Pennsylvania where I grew up, there's a site where on one side of the highway are a bank of 1.4MW wind turbines. On the other side is a large coal strip mine, a vast pit which even with the best reclamation practices will still poison the water table for centuries. Personally, I prefer the turbines.
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Philip Shehan at 00:50 AM on 10 June 2015The Skeptical Science temperature trend calculator
Here is another (Sorry if I am a little robust in my comments here, but I get tired of the abuse over thereand unfortunately respond in kind):
I thought that the entirely inconsistent use of statistical significance by Michaels, Lindzen, and Knappenberger to suit their argument was bad enough, but Singer’s performance here is utterly amazing.
Singer objects to non satellite data “with its well-known problems”.
OK. Lets restrict ourselves to satellite data then:
Here are the graphs for UAH and RSS respectively. [Links to Wood for trees graphs in the original]
Since 1979
0.139 ±0.065 °C/decade
0.121 ±0.064 °C/decade
Statistically significant warming trends in agreement with the non satellite data.
Singer writes:
“the pause is still there, starting around 2003 [see Figure; it shows a sudden step increase around 2001, not caused by GH gases].”
2003
0.075 ±0.278 °C/decade
-0.031 ±0.274 °C/decade
So UAH shows a slight warming trend and RSS shows a slight cooling trend but unsurprisingly, for a 12 year time frame, you can drive a bus between the error margins.
As for the step claim. Nonsense, aided by selecting a colour coded graph that foster that impression. No more a step than plenty of other places on the non-colour coded graphs.
And note the excellent correlation between temperature and CO2 rise for the statistically significant section of the graphs. (And please, spare me the ‘correlation is not causation’ mantra. I know. Singer is talking about correlation.)
He then turns to this period:
1979-2000
0.103 ±0.163 °C/decade
0.145 ±0.158 °C/decade
Warming trends, though not statistically significant.
Now I just have to comment on the text here:
“Not only that, but the same satellite data show no warming trend from 1979 to 2000 – ignoring, of course, the exceptional super-El-Nino year of 1998.”
Gobsmacking.
“Skeptics” have been cherry picking the exceptional el nino of 1998 to base on which to base their “no warming for x years” claim for years.
But because it does not suit his argument, Singer wants to exclude it here.
Then Singer decides that non-satellite data is kosher after all because it suits his argument.
How can he pull this stuff without a hint of shame?
And this guy is supposed to be a leading “skeptic”.
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Langham at 00:42 AM on 10 June 2015Spoiled ballots, spoiled views: an election snapshot from Powys, Wales, UK
KR, I did look at the MacKay papers I was directed to by the previous poster, but they seem far from compelling in any respect - they struck me as methodologically freeform and improvised, and in any case not very relevant to the point I was making.
I was indeed objecting to the siting of wind turbines on land, when there are other (and better) alternatives.
At this stage, surely no serious person can expect all of the UK's energy needs to come from renewable sources, and given the quite poor efficiency of wind generation, even if the entire country was carpetted with wind turbines, the UK would still need to import energy in various forms.
My point is that we should be concentrating our research on tidal and sea-based renewable energy, which have various practical advantages over land-based alternatives, rather than polluting the countryside with inefficient, subsidy-dependent wind turbines.
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Philip Shehan at 00:38 AM on 10 June 2015The Skeptical Science temperature trend calculator
Have been getting all sorts of grief over at Bolt for pointing out a number of problems with "skeptics" use of temperature data, and using the trend calculator for this purpose.
I am told that I should contact directly the people whose interpretation I criticise and offer tham right of reply. Just like the "skeptics" do with scintistrs they bucket on blogs. (Yes, sarcasm.)
Actually I have on occasion have failed to do so in the case of Fred Singer, David Whitehouse and Patrick J. Michaels, Richard S. Lindzen, and Paul C. Knappenberge
I have told one critic, on numerous occasions that i have checked the trends with those produced by , among others, Monckton, McKitrick, and those who leapt on Jones' "admission" that a 15 year warming trend was not statistically significant, but nearly so, and the trend calculator results match theirs. I have also explained repeatedly the necessity for autocorrelation to be used with temperature data and referred him to this link.
Yet he wrote today.
The calculation that he [that is me] uses is a method written by a shill that just doesn’t make sense and comes out two to three times larger than you would get if you treated the noise as just random.
I will encourage him to represent his argument here.
But thank you for this valuable tool
Of interest this week are the following posts of mine;
On Anthony Watts blog, Patrick J. Michaels, Richard S. Lindzen, and Paul C. Knappenberger dispute a recent paper by Karl et al which questions whether there has been a “hiatus” in global warming.
This new paper, right or wrong, does not affect my primary argument on claims of a “hiatus”.
Which is that such claims do not meet (in fact do not come within a bulls roar of) the criterion of statistical significance.
What is of interest is that the criticisms of Michaels, Lindzen,and Knappenberger again demonstrate the way that skeptics apply totally different standards of statistical significance depending on how they want to spin the data.
The critique of the paper says:
“The significance level they report on their findings (0.10) is hardly normative, and the use of it should prompt members of the scientific community to question the reasoning behind the use of such a lax standard.”
True, the usual standard of statistical significance is the 0.05, 95% or 2 sigma level. The 0.10 level means that there is a 90% probability that the trend is significant
Yet further on Michaels, Lindzen,and Knappenberger claim:
“Additionally, there exist multiple measures of bulk lower atmosphere temperature independent from surface measurements which indicate the existence of a “hiatus"…Both the UAH and RSS satellite records are now in their 21st year without a significant trend, for example.”
Here are the trends for UAH, RSS and Berkeley data (the most comprehensive surface data set ) from 1995 at the 0.05 level
0.124 ±0.149 °C/decade
0.030 ±0.149 °C/decade
0.129 ±0.088 °C/decade
The Berkeley data shows statistically significant warming trend, as do 5 other surface data sets, with mean trend and error of
0.122 ± 0.093 °C/decade
So, Michaels, Lindzen, and Knappenberger object to statistical significance at the 90% level used by Karl et al.
Yet they base their claim of “multiple measures of bulk lower atmosphere temperature independent from surface measurements which indicate the existence of a “hiatus” on two data sets which have a probability of a “hiatus” or a cooling trend of 4.8% (UAH) and 34.5% (RSS).
I mean, these people have the chutzpah to write “the use of [a confidence level of 90%] should prompt members of the scientific community to question the reasoning behind the use of such a lax standard” yet pin their case for a “hiatus” on such a low statistical probability for two cherry picked data sets.
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KR at 00:23 AM on 10 June 2015Spoiled ballots, spoiled views: an election snapshot from Powys, Wales, UK
Langham - I would join in suggesting you read David MacKays work on sustainable energy. He specifically and in detail discusses renewable options for the UK, with numbers, and finds that offshore wind (deep and shallow waters), tide, and wave power could supply perhaps 30% of UK energy needs. Helpful, but not sufficient. The UK in particular is too small, too energy intensive, and with too few sources/sites to really be energy independent on renewables alone. UK options for energy supplies are a significantly increased nuclear fraction along with more renewables and/or remaining, as it is now, a net energy importer like so many other countries. It can only be hoped that those imports shift from the present coal basis to wind/solar/etc from North Africa or Europe over time...
I will point out that decrying "...an objectionable and rather totalitarian assumption that we have to sacrifice our views and rural amenities for the good of all..." does indeed appear to be an objection to siting, despite your disclaimers.
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BC at 23:41 PM on 9 June 2015What you need to know about the NOAA global warming faux pause paper
Thanks for the explanation (Scaddenp @12 and Tom Curtis @ 15) for outlining this difference between surface temps and satellite readings and why 2014 wasn't a record year according to satellites.
Also, because satellite readings are more sensitive to the El Nino and volcano contributions they'll show up more of a hiatus than the surface readings, which would be why Monckton is using them.
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MFreeman at 22:31 PM on 9 June 2015Antarctica is gaining ice
(Apologies, just realised with changing pages to create an account, I ended up posting on the Antarctic comment thread rather than the Arctic thread I was reading. However I can't see a delete comment button?)
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MFreeman at 20:54 PM on 9 June 2015Antarctica is gaining ice
There's an interesting time-series of models of ice thickness and other information here:
http://www7320.nrlssc.navy.mil/hycomARC/arctic.html
There's only the last 5 years of thickness represented, but it would be interesting to see a specific date animated as a gif (as opposed to the changes over a year), particularly at minimum and maximum days?
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Langham at 19:12 PM on 9 June 2015Spoiled ballots, spoiled views: an election snapshot from Powys, Wales, UK
Scaddenp, you have slightly missed my point, which is to do with the siting of turbines etc - I was not arguing for or against the contention that we must reduce our use of fossil fuels. My point is specific to maritime countries such as the UK, where there are many more, and better, ways of generating power in coastal areas and at sea than on land. For one thing, tides are more reliable than wind; and wind at sea is stronger and more reliable than on land. The costs are higher, of course, but advocates of land-based turbines can hardly point the finger of blame on that count, since the economics at present hardly stack up in any case. There seems to be an objectionable and rather totalitarian assumption that we have to sacrifice our views and rural amenities for the good of all, when that is not the case.
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Bernard J. at 17:20 PM on 9 June 2015What you need to know about the NOAA global warming faux pause paper
I'm curious to know if Karl's et al corrected data will be available as an option on the SkS trend calculator?
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Tom Curtis at 15:41 PM on 9 June 2015What you need to know about the NOAA global warming faux pause paper
dana @13, I believe the SkS tool still uses v5.6 of the UAH TLT pseudo channel. As you know Spencer and Christy are in the process of developing v6, which in beta release far more closely matches RSS. As presumably Spencer and Christy would claim that v6 is superior to v5.6, I don't think we should be using v5.6 to argue what "Christy's own UAH data" shows.
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Tom Curtis at 15:35 PM on 9 June 2015What you need to know about the NOAA global warming faux pause paper
BC @11, one of the features of satellite (and radiosonde) data is that it responds far more strongly to ENSO effects. It also responds more strongly to volcanic effects, and may also respond more strongly to other short term fluctuations but I have no data on that. The upshot is that satellite and radiosonde data is far more noisy, resulting in a greater standard deviation of the data. That in turn requires a larger underlying trend for it to be considered statistically significant over short periods, or (alternatively put), for given trend, it requires a longer period of data before it is statistically significant. Given that the denier test for "no warming" is "the trend is not statistically significant from zero" regardless of whether it is statistically significant from IPCC projected warming, it becomes almost a gimme for satelite data to show "no warming" in the deceitful terminology of deniers.
All that is basic. Less frequently commented on is something very interesting that has been happening with the Southern Oscillation Index (SOI). The SOI measures the pressure difference between Darwin and Tahitti. Because winds flow with pressure differences, that makes it a good proxy of the strength of the Walker Circulation, which drives the El Nino Southern Oscillation (ENSO). Essentially, if the pressure is greater in Tahitti than in Darwin, the Walker circulation blows surface Pacific waters towards the Pacific Warm Pool in waters near Indonesia. If they are only slightly stronger, the Walker Circulation is weak and you have normal conditions. If the pressure in Tahiti is much greater, you have an unusually strong Walker Circulation and a strongly positive SOI, and a La Nina results. In contrast, if the pressure falls in Tahiti relative to Darwin, the Walker circulation stops and you have strongly negative SOI values, along with an El Nino.
The interesting thing that is happening in the SOI is that it has been systematically increasing since the early 1990s. Because the SOI sign is the reverse of the global temperature effect, and because the peak temperature effect is felt about six months after the peak SOI effect, I have graphed the inverted, seven month lagged SOI below. (Seven month lagged rather than six as that allows me to include a full 2015 value.) The result should show the sign and relative magnitude of ENSO effects on global temperature over the years since 1950:
Another way of putting that is that if ENSO was the only factor affecting the Global Mean Surface Temperature (GMST), a scaled version of the above graph would show the actual fluctuations in GMST.
Obviously ENSO is not the only thing effecting GMST. For instance, in 1982 the El Chichon volcanoe erupted in Mexico, the effect of which reduced 1983 to an average year rather than the warmest on record (to that time). Likewise the Pinatubo eruption in 1992 cooled what was otherwise going to be a very warm year in 1992. Pinatubo's effect had largely dissipated by 1995, however, which had the 13th strongest ENSO warming effect since 1877, and the 4th warmest in the satellite era. Notably, every year in the 21st century has had a lower ENSO warming than 1995, and there is a consistent downward trend in that warming from 1998.
Absent global warming and volcanic effects, the various years in the satellite era would have ranked as follows for warmth:
Year SOI rank (inverted)
1979 21
1980 13
1981 15
1982 26
1983 1
1984 22
1985 24
1986 17
1987 7
1988 11
1989 35
1990 20
1991 12
1992 3
1993 8
1994 5
1995 4
1996 25
1997 23
1998 2
1999 34
2000 32
2001 29
2002 16
2003 9
2004 18
2005 6
2006 27
2007 10
2008 31
2009 33
2010 14
2011 36
2012 30
2013 19
2014 28You will notice that 2014 (a tied record year in GMST) would have only ranked 28th absent the effect of global warming and volcanoes. 2010 ranked 14th on ENSO warming, and just four years earlier, was also a statistical tie with 2014. Both years were warmer than the denier poster year, 1998 (ranked 2nd on ENSO effect, or first if we include volcanic effects as well).
Finally, the point of all this is that satellite record are (as stated at the beginning) far more effected by ENSO warming than are the surface records. Because of the radical difference between actual warmth as measured by GMST and ENSO only rankings, we therefore expect a significant disparity in ranking between surface and satellite records. In particular, early strong El Nino years will rank far higher relative to the later weak El Nino's that have been breaking records due to global warming.
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Glenn Tamblyn at 14:42 PM on 9 June 2015What you need to know about the NOAA global warming faux pause paper
To compare satellites, radiosondes and models you need an apples with apples comparison.
I believe he reversed applied the weighting functions used for the satellite channels to convert model output to 'what a satellite would have seen'. Hopefully he did the same with the radiosonde data. If he had tried to match to the lower troposphere channel (TLT) he would have also had to reverse apply the off-nadir readings and differencing algorithm used to synthesis TLT from the TMT channel - TLT isn't a direct measurement but one derived from extra processing of the TMT channel.
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dana1981 at 14:42 PM on 9 June 2015What you need to know about the NOAA global warming faux pause paper
SkS has a useful temperature trend tool for just this sort of thing. Using Christy's own UAH data, and cherry picking 1998 as the start date, there's still a postive trend (most likely 0.072°C/decade). If we instead choose 1999 as the start date, the trend is twice as big, at 0.145°C/decade.
So, all I can say is that Christy is spouting nonsense (that's about the nicest way to put it), and as one of the keepers of the UAH data set, he should know that it's nonsense.
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scaddenp at 14:14 PM on 9 June 2015What you need to know about the NOAA global warming faux pause paper
RSS and UAH attempt to measure lower troposphere temps (the lower 4km approx of atmosphere) rather than surface temperature. These temperature parameters shows a much stronger response to ENSO than surface temperature does (colder in La Nina, hotter in El Nino). 1998 and 2010 were El Nino years and 1998 was a monster. You would not expect a record in RSS or UAH unless El Nino is present (there is a few months of lag). El Nino is building. I would expect a new record at a smaller ONI value than 1998. 2015/2016 might be that year.
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BC at 13:19 PM on 9 June 2015What you need to know about the NOAA global warming faux pause paper
As part of the Denial 101 MOOC course I had to select a myth to write an article about. I picked a Christopher Monckton article on WUWT about the pause.
wattsupwiththat.com/2015/06/03/el-nino-strengthens-the-pause-lengthens/
It wasn't a problem debunking the myth - I mainly used info from the Kevin Cowtan video shown on SKS in Dana's post of 3 June. However I was surprised at one aspect of the RSS satellite data shown by Monckton. While 2014 is recognised as the warmest year so far an eyeball of the RSS data shows it quite low, much lower than 1998 and 2010 and probably down to about number 5 or 6. I looked on an RSS site but couldn't find much of use. Can anyone explain this please? Maybe he's using the TMT data too.
BTW the MOOC course was great!
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KR at 12:27 PM on 9 June 2015What you need to know about the NOAA global warming faux pause paper
Scaddenp - Yes, I found that a rather curious choice as well, given the _known_ mixing of cooling stratosphere signal in TMT. But consistent with all the other issues with those graphs that IMO add up to a misrepresentation of the data.
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