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Rob Honeycutt at 07:51 AM on 22 January 2015Renewables can't provide baseload power
Tracy @112... This one doesn't look like it's even out of the concept phase yet. You're probably talking something that might come online in 40 years.
We needs big solutions on deck in the next 15 years.
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T. Cossins at 06:36 AM on 22 January 2015Renewables can't provide baseload power
A better option for baseload power is the aneutronic fusion, because it is clean and dense, no large land area, no intermittence due to climate conditions, no neutron emissions, virtually no radioactive waste, the most environmentally friendly energy source than ever. http://youtu.be/u8n7j5k-_G8
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ubrew12 at 05:57 AM on 22 January 2015Matt Ridley wants to gamble the Earth’s future because he won’t learn from the past
billthefrog@3: Yes, I get it. But once again, in what alternate reality is someone who has written extensively on Genetics the 'go to guy' for a Climate prediction? Renaissance Man? Or guy with waaay too much time on his hands? We report, you decide.
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billthefrog at 04:34 AM on 22 January 2015Matt Ridley wants to gamble the Earth’s future because he won’t learn from the past
@ubrew12
The Times (of London) is wholly owned by News Corp: in other words, it is part of the Rupert Murdoch fiefdom. Matt Ridley is an attractive proposition to them as a commentator on climate change for a variety of reasons...
a) He is part of the titled aristocracy and therefore, in the minds of some, his views carry more weight
b) He is an advisor to the Global Warming Policy Foundation
c) He is a lot more than a mere Fourth Estate hack. He has written extensively on science matters and his scientific credentials are vastly more impressive than mine. See either his wiki entry, or his entry on deSmogBlog. (NB The letters FRSL do not stand for Fellow of the Royal Society (of London), the most prestigious science body in the UK. That would just be FRS. The letter "L" at the end turns it into Fellow of the Royal Society of Literature.)
I hope that helps explain why the Times is eager and willing to provide a platform for Ridley's views. (Which I am sure are not in any way influenced by the fortuitous location of any coal fields - see the link provided by Lionel in #1)
Cheers Bill F
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ubrew12 at 03:51 AM on 22 January 2015Matt Ridley wants to gamble the Earth’s future because he won’t learn from the past
Ridley: "I no longer think [Global Warming]... is likely to be dangerous and I think its slow and erratic progress so far is what we should expect in the future." This is a prediction of future climate. If this guy doesn't have a PhD in Climatology why is the London Times broadcasting his prediction as if he did? The problem isn't Ridley. The problem is the London Times. The media are complicit in public complacency toward this topic. The Times today has to bypass hundreds of perfectly qualified Scientists to find one science journalist to give it the prediction it wants to hear. Who would buy it if it disserved its readership similarly in the area of economic or business prediction? But we are now well within the 'Age of Consequences' on this topic: Climate predictions are, in fact, now economic predictions. The Times is already disserving its readership about tomorrows economy.
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Lionel A at 02:37 AM on 22 January 2015Matt Ridley wants to gamble the Earth’s future because he won’t learn from the past
Matt Ridley opposes immediate aggressive efforts to cut global carbon pollution.
Of course he does, he will see a drop in income:
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Jim Hunt at 01:55 AM on 22 January 2015Global warming made 2014 a record hot year – in animated graphics
I'm somewhat surprised to see it hasn't appeared here as yet, in what seems like the obvious place. However I've now added my two cents to the two cents Rob Honeycutt added to Tamino's two cents in my deconstruction of David Rose's report on recent global temperature news:
http://GreatWhiteCon.info/2015/01/was-2014-really-the-warmest-year-in-modern-record/#BullChannel
Here's Rob's animation of Tamino's charts.
Bull markets in global surface temperature certainly look to be far more predictable than they are in stocks and shares. -
One Planet Only Forever at 01:13 AM on 22 January 20152015 SkS Weekly Digest #3
wili,
As a further clarification, I was a little sloppy when I referred to significant negative SOI values as 'low'.
The SOI is the pressure diffence between Darwin and Tahiti. So a significant negative value is a 'large pressure difference' between the locations.
The categories of SOI are presented here and are more correctly:
- near neutral (positive or negative values less than 8) likely to result in neutral Nina 3.4 conditions.
- Positive (stronger than 8) likely to develop trade winds supportive of La Nina conditions
- Negative (stronger than 8) likely to develop trade winds supportive of El Nino conditions
Thanks for the reference indicating that a TS as the reason for the current SOI value. It is possble that a storm system could create temporary SOI values that only apper as if they would support El Nino. A steadier set of negative daily values resulting in a 30 day average SOI of -10 is probably more supportive of El Nino than short spurts of very significant negative values with long periods between them that produce a 30 day average of -10.
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MA Rodger at 21:15 PM on 21 January 2015It's not us
One number I forgot to tap in @86; AR5 A.II gives an average solar forcing over solar cycle 23 (1996-2007) of 0.045W/m2.
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MA Rodger at 21:02 PM on 21 January 2015It's not us
dvaytw @85.
Regarding Trenberth's ERB from CERES, it does suffer massively from calibration issues. Its decadal value is more an inference relying on OHC data than a result in itself. IPCC AR5 Chapter 2 Section 2.3.1 is saying the net satellite measurements are 'calibrated' +/-2 W/m2, which is rather a lot. There is also quite big trend calibration issue (tenths of W/m2 per decade) for which a reference doesn't immediately spring into hand.
What we importantly do have with ERB measurements is sight of the general wobbles which are valuable checks on GCM results. This also allows gaps to be filled in that allow demonstration that some of the crackpot wobblology theories (Staduim Waves etc) are nonsense and cannot be happening due to what we know of ERB. That sort of answers some of your second question @82 and is a bit of background to a graphic of mine that shows ERB less smoothed than normal (here - usually two clicks to 'download your attachment'). Unsmoothed it can be seen how any trend in ERB has yet to emerge from the wobbles.
Your TSI graph comes from Lean(2000) (Data here @ NCDC). More recent assessments of historical of TSI (see graph from CU here) do not yield such a large rise since the seventeenth century. And also, ΔTSI has to be divided by 4 to be equivilant to climate forcing as TSI is measured over the disc and forcing over the sphere. Perhaps one thing to remember with this TSI calibration here is that TSI is a component of the ERB measurement and its 'calibration' has been revised by quite a bit recently, usually downwards, much to the annoyance of denialists.
Positive forcing is now above 3W/M2 (AR5 table A.II 1.2 gives positive forcing of +3.4 W/m2 for 1750-2011and it is rising at about 0.04 W/m2 pa). But there are also less-well defined negative forcings yielding a net anthropogenic forcing of ~+2.3W/m2 for 1750-2011 according to AR5 A.II.
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dvaytw at 17:54 PM on 21 January 2015It's not us
@82, 83 and 84
I think I understand the importance of Trenberth's satellite data now; it lies not in the amount of increase since the satellites went up (as this was very recent), but in that it matches predictions made with OHC data. Have I got that right?
I also have a question about Evans 2006: he states there that Greenhouse radiation has increased by about 3 W/m2 since pre-industrial times, and a denier pointed out that this matches pretty much exactly the increase in TSI since that time:
I realize there are plenty of reasons we know it's not the sun and have pointed them out to him, but am wondering if there is any comment to be made about this correlation.
PS the discussion is happening in the comments here, if anyone's interested: -
chriskoz at 17:54 PM on 21 January 20152015 SkS Weekly Digest #3
The toon is a repeat from 5 Oct 2014 and rightly so, because it's a very good one, as testified buy comments therein.
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Rob Honeycutt at 14:40 PM on 21 January 20152015 SkS Weekly Digest #3
Michael Whittemore @3... Hm. I'd be more inclined to say that there are a number of studies that have proposed solutions to Trenberth's questions about "missing heat." But I'm not sure I'd say that it's been found, per se.
The amount of heat being trapped by the atmosphere is a function of both models and measurements of outgoing radiation. The "missing heat" is more of an accounting question of exactly where the heat is moving around within the climate system.
Nothing (to my knowledge) has changed relative to expectations of warming trends, since those calculations are just a function of the physics involved.
As the Talking Heads said, it's...
Same as it ever was...
Same as it ever was...
Same as it ever was...
Same as it ever was...
Same as it ever was...
Same as it ever was...
Same as it ever was...
Same as it ever was... -
wili at 14:12 PM on 21 January 20152015 SkS Weekly Digest #3
Here are 'Lord M Vader's' views, from Arcti Sea Ice blog:
TS 7 have now formed north of Tahiti and should quickly intensify to a cat 2 hurricane in a day or so, perhaps even reaching major hurricane satus before weakening occurs. should be able to push down the daily SOI index really low.. But of course it depends on how low the SLP will be when the cyclone is at its closest by tomorrow or by thursday.. Given this situation we should see some really low SOI values the next 2-3 days, perhaps it could bottom out at -50, -60 or even as low as -70...http://www.usno.navy.mil/JTWC/
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wili at 14:07 PM on 21 January 20152015 SkS Weekly Digest #3
Thanks for that broader perspective, OPOF.
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One Planet Only Forever at 12:01 PM on 21 January 20152015 SkS Weekly Digest #3
wili,
The preliminary SOI values (here) do indeed show that as of January 20 the 30 day average SOI is just at -8. However, the value may only be momentarily that low. The current 30 day averages include a few very low values in late December (that is when a set of 6 days below -8 occurred). The values for these dates and earlier are in the table I linked in my earlier post. As soon as the 30 day average moves past that set of lows (by January 24), the daily SOI values will need to be significantly below -8 to keep the 30 day average below -8.
The very long lull between the end of December set of low SOI values and this very recent set of very low values is probably why the Nina 3.4 has noticeably dropped even though the 30 day SOI averages have remained negative (the lowest 30 day value being about -5.3 even though most of the daily values were much higher).
As always the near term is more 'wait and see' than 'sure to be'.
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Michael Whittemore at 10:54 AM on 21 January 20152015 SkS Weekly Digest #3
I have a question if that’s ok. In light of all the resent studies that have found missing heat, has there been a gathering of the data to show how much heat is actually building up on the Earth and how this compares to the expected warming from anthropogenic climate change. Thanks.
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wili at 05:54 AM on 21 January 20152015 SkS Weekly Digest #3
Thanks for your continual attention to the on-again-off-again El Nino situation. SOI 30-day average now below -8 so no longer neutral, iirc, but pointing toward El Nino. Daily value about -40.
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MA Rodger at 03:54 AM on 21 January 2015It's not us
scaddenp @83.
The papers under discussion are Trenberth et al 2013 & Hansen et al 2003, both of which calculate the ERB from back in the 19th century having modelled the climate to fit temperature records. T(2013) figure 1 and H(2003) figure 1c are graphs of this, the latter being figure 9 of the 'advanced' post here but which is mis-referenced.
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kmoyd at 02:59 AM on 21 January 2015Call to climate scientists: submit your quote for 97 Hours of Consensus 2015
Many of the deniers are changing their position to: yes the globe is warming and humans are contributing to the warming, but the consequences are not so great that extreme action has to be taken now. Some also claim that taking action will destroy the economy.
is there any possibility of asking the submitters to focus on the effects already happening, but with specifics; e.g., the increased wandering of the jet stream being caused by a decreased temperature difference between the Artic and more southern water.
Also, could it be opened to others, such as economists, who can deal with the impacts of not taking action and of mitigations/adaptation.
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wili at 02:49 AM on 21 January 2015Global warming made 2014 a record hot year – in animated graphics
Tamino just added his two cents to the hottest-year discussion: https://tamino.wordpress.com/2015/01/20/its-the-trend-stupid-3/
“It’s the Trend, Stupid”
” The reaction of the “pausemaniacs” to the record hottest year has mostly been protest. Breakin’ some temperature record just don’t mean a gosh-darn thing worth payin’ no attention to. It only broke the record by a little bit. And besides, it ain’t the individual years, record hot or not, that count, it’s the pause that counts — a record hottest year don’t end the pause!
Methinks they do protest too much. Perhaps they fear that a record year really does threaten their beloved “pause.” But that’s not the real threat at all, it’s the fact that the data have followed the global-warming-continues-without-slowing-down pattern just about as closely as one could have expected, because all the while they’ve been bellowing about the pause that never was.
But the record year does do this: it makes it harder to sell the whole “pause” idea…”
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billthefrog at 20:48 PM on 20 January 2015Global warming made 2014 a record hot year – in animated graphics
Oops! Typo alert - never work with very big (or very small) numbers when tired.
In #28, the overall concentration of CFCs + HCFCs should have read "2 parts per billion" not per trillion. These numbers were taken from the Trace Gas section of the Carbon Dioxide Information and Analysis Centre (CDIAC) at Oak Ridge National Laboratory.
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billthefrog at 19:44 PM on 20 January 2015Global warming made 2014 a record hot year – in animated graphics
@ Moderator(s)
Apologies for my Post #28
Whilst I was writing the above response to the appropriately named Madkatz, you obviously were doing much the same thing. When I had finished - at around half past midnight - I hit the Submit button and then went to bed. Had I waited until this morning, I would have seen the action you had taken and would not have bothered writing #28.
Cheers Bill F
Moderator Response:[DB] Madkatz has opted out of participating further at SkS.
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One Planet Only Forever at 15:56 PM on 20 January 20152015 SkS Weekly Digest #3
The dip in the Nino 3.4 value over the past month may be connected to the lack of a strong SOI (-8 or lower) over the past month.
The daily SOI values (here) show that since day 358 of 2014 the SOI has been above the -8 value considered a threshhold to help push the Tropical Pacific surface waters into an El Nino conditions. So it is no surprise that the Nino 3.4 average has been declining.
However, since January 16, the SOI daily values show another strong negative surge. Mind you, there was also a strong negative surge of the SOI daily values at the end of December.
Accurately predicting region specific near-term changes is definitely more challenging than understanding the likely long term global changes. That seems to be easily twisted into claims that the understanding of what is going on must be wrong about the future if it can't predict the near-term.
As important as near-term regional predictions are for many things like agriculture planning, emergency planning, and ocean transporation planning it may be prudent to try to avoid discussion of near-term predictions when discussing climate change. Explaining the importance of actual measured occurances like 2014 being the new Hottest Year even though it was not boosted by El Nino is helpful. Speculating too much about 2015 may not be helpful.
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John Cook at 10:32 AM on 20 January 2015Call to climate scientists: submit your quote for 97 Hours of Consensus 2015
Greg, that is actually what we found in our 2013 study - there has been an overwhelming consensus in peer-reviewed climate papers since the early 1990s, and it's getting stronger. So by 2013, it has grown to about 98%. The 97.1% figure we quote is the average over the 21 year period.
Naomi Oreskes might accuse me of erring on the side of least drama by emphasising 97.1% rather than 98%. But then, it's hard to imagine the reaction to our consensus study containing any more drama! :-)
Jack, the communication of the 97% consensus is to address the fact that the public think there is a 50:50 debate (although there's some evidence that public perception is now higher than that). So just the mere communication of that single number - 97% agreement - is a significant and powerful statement. That single number implicitly communicates what you're talking about - there is no longer a debate about human-caused global warming. There is a great deal of social science evidence demonstrating just how powerful consensus is as a simple, effective means of communicating the realities of climate change.
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billthefrog at 10:29 AM on 20 January 2015Global warming made 2014 a record hot year – in animated graphics
@Madkatz,
"Manmade CO2 is just 4% of the total CO2, in the atmosphere which is only .04% of the total gas in the atmosphere..."
On the tentative assumption that you merely have an unfortunate communication style, rather than simply being a troll, shall we try one or two little thought experiments?
1) Instead of jumping straight into atmospheric physics, why don't we kick off with some simple plumbing? Imagine that one has a 200 litre open-topped reservoir that starts off approximately half full. If there is a daily inflow of 100 litres, and that is matched by an equivalent extraction rate, the reservoir would remain about half full. Agreed?
Now, if some unrelated pipework develops a leak and drips an additional 4 litres per day (i.e. an additional 4%) into said reservoir, what happens after about 25 days? It should be obvious that about 4 litres per day will end up overflowing. Agreed?
Now, since the leak only accounts for (approximately) 4% of the new input rate of 104 litres/day, it is indeed true that only about 0.16 litre/day comes from the leak. But here's the $64,000 question: ask yourself "what mysterious agency prompted the other 3.84 litres to start overflowing at the same time"? It had been extracted quite naturally in the past without any problem, so what has changed?
2) It is probably a reasonable assumption that you would not care to be afflicted by severe sunburn or melanoma. The agency in the atmosphere which quietly goes about protecting you is stratospheric ozone (O3). The mean concentration of ozone across the globe is in the order of 600 parts per billion - as compared to our current CO2 levels of around 400 ppm and counting.
You may be aware of the 1987 Montreal Protocol on Substances that Deplete the Ozone Layer. Chemicals such as chlorofluorocarbons (CFCs) and hydrochlorofluorocarbons (HCFCs) were finger printed as being responsible for the infamous Ozone Hole, and have been (and are still being) progressively phased out. (You could look at the 1995 Nobel Chemistry Prize citation.)
The total atmospheric concentration of CFCs and HCFCs is currently somewhere in the region of 2 parts per trillion, but that was enough to wreak havoc come spring time in the Antarctic. To put this in some perspective, approximately every 8 hours, the amount of extra CO2 added to the atmosphere is roughly equal to the total concentration of CFCs and HCFCs that has built up since their introduction about 85 years ago.
Getting really cheerful, the botulinum toxin has a median lethal dose (LD-50) at a concentration of somewhere just over 1 nanogram per kilogram of body weight. That's just over one part in a trillion! Were you to ingest such a dosage, you'd have a 50-50 chance of shuffling off this mortal coil.
Just because you appear to have trouble comprehending the fact that a small concentration does NOT perforce correspond to a small effect, doesn't make it any less real.
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Jim Eager at 10:22 AM on 20 January 2015Global warming made 2014 a record hot year – in animated graphics
Sorry I didn't see madkatz' reply, but judging from the in-line moderator response from RH and TD and DSL's reply, it sounds like he pretty much proved my point. Repeating long-debunked assertions and selective half-truths based on a poor understanding of the science is not making a scientific argument.
Moderator Response:[RH] Yup. You got it.
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DSL at 09:07 AM on 20 January 2015Global warming made 2014 a record hot year – in animated graphics
By the way, "faith" is the distance between evidence and reality. Everyone has faith. There's no other option, unless you can show me absolute truth. A fool is someone whose faith outdistances their evidence. I'll take science over your common sense. The two aren't mutually exclusive, but trusting to common sense alone without continually challenging it is a sure bet for looking like a fool from time to time.
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DSL at 09:02 AM on 20 January 2015Global warming made 2014 a record hot year – in animated graphics
madkatz, if you want to be taken seriously, you should probably come to an understanding of the physics involved. Roughly 98% of the atmosphere is transparent to thermal infrared radiation. What's left--H2O, CO2, CH4, etc.--manages to keep the planet about 33C warmer than it would be without those "trace" gases.
You might also want to look at the PETM event to understand what can happen when the surface temperature of the planet increases .00417C per decade over 12,000 years. Keep in mind we're warming at about 30x-40x the rate of PETM warming.
Also, human-sourced CO2 comprises about 40% of the current 400ppm in the atmosphere. Using the total C cycling through the system each year is misleading, since the system was near long-term equilibrium before human emissions and land use changes began in earnest. What matters is how much change is occurring in the atmosphere as a result of disturbing that equilibrium.
Moderator Response:[RH] If madkatz returns for more please move individual discussions to relevant threads. Thx.
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madkatz at 08:27 AM on 20 January 2015Global warming made 2014 a record hot year – in animated graphics
Jim Eager:
Manmade CO2 is just 4% of the total CO2, in the atmosphere which is only .04% of the total gas in the atmosphere. This little amount is going to bring on a climate catastrophe?!
Common sense should tell you otherwise
Yes, you have to have faith to believe this.
Any global warming is probably coming from sunspot activity.
Also don't forget we have been coming out af an ice age for the past
5000+ years. (Snip)
Moderator Response:[RH] Gish gallop deleted. You need to go back and read all the relevant sections of this site and place your comments in the proper sections. We have no tolerance for these sorts of baseless assumptions. Everyone here is open to honest discussion on any climate related issue, but you're going to have to up your game (significantly) in order to retain your posting privileges.
[TD] There are several posts that directly address your assertions. On each of the following, after you read the "Basic" tabbed pane, read the "Intermediate" and "Advanced" tabbed panes, when those exist.
Human activity has caused 100% of the rise of the atmospheric level of CO2 in the past many decades. Please read the rebuttal to the myth "Human CO2 Is a Tiny % of CO2 Emissions." For more about the mass balance evidence see "The Independence of Global Warming on Residence Time of CO2." See also "New Study by Skeptical Science Author Finds 100% of Atmospheric CO2 Rise Is Man-Made."
The CO2 (totaled across all sources) level as a percent of all the gases in the atmosphere is no more relevant than is computing the CO2 mass as a percent of the mass of all the sandwiches ever made. That's because the vast majority of gases in the atmosphere do not absorb the infrared radiation that the Earth radiates. The gases that do absorb that IR are called greenhouse gases. What matters is the percentage by which greenhouse gases have increased, and how fast. See "How Do We Know More CO2 Is Causing Warming?"
Regarding sunspots: See the counterargument to the myth "It's the Sun."
As RH told you, any comments on those topics must be put on those threads, not here where they are off topic.
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scaddenp at 06:09 AM on 20 January 2015It's not us
dvaytw - I am struggling a little to follow you. Can you please be more precise about which paper you mean where you find Trenberth and Hansen discussing TOA energy balance at times prior to the satellite era? In Trenberth et al 2013, there is discussion of how difficult this is given the uncertainity in OHC measurements prior to Argo.
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jack chirnside at 05:31 AM on 20 January 2015Call to climate scientists: submit your quote for 97 Hours of Consensus 2015
The concept of a "Climate Change Debate" allows the doubters too much wriggle room. The reality is that there is no longer a debate about anthropogenic climate change. We should become more aggressive in our stance. We should insist on discussing the "fact" of CC. The small element of doubt has been exploited by those in denial of CC. The result is that the public are genuinely confused.
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greg_laden at 03:56 AM on 20 January 2015Call to climate scientists: submit your quote for 97 Hours of Consensus 2015
The consensus study is getting old. The consensus is growing. Seems like you should be doig at least 98, not 97, scientist quotes.
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dvaytw at 22:28 PM on 19 January 2015It's not us
MA Rodger I think some of what you're responding to here is brought up in a question I asked in Trenberth on Tracking Earth’s Energy . In any case, thank you.
A follow-up question: so am I correct in understanding that Trenberth and Hansen are using temperature data to calculate the energy balance at the TOA prior to satellite data?And is there a way to explain the verified energy imbalance, other than the GHE?
Finally, I recall reading the criticism that the margin of error for Trenberth's TOA data is very large. Is this a legitimate criticism?
(Note to moderator: this comment and the one above it may fit more appropriately in the discussion under the "Trenberth on Tracking Earth's Energy" article. ) -
michael sweet at 22:24 PM on 19 January 20152015 SkS Weekly News Roundup #3B
Wiliam,
This topic has already been discussed here at SkS. In short, the satelite record does not measure the surface teperature. It estimates the temperature about 3,000 meters up in the atmosphere (satelites cannot directly measure the temperature of the surface). This is approximate as it is actually an average of the temperature at many levels of the atmosphere.
Since we actually live on the surface of the Earth, most people care more about the surface temperature. 2014 is the hottest year on the surface.
Arguing about statistics while the temperature continues to go up will not win any arguments here. Watch the escalator graph for a while and see how you feel.
Moderator Response:[DB] William has recused himself from further participation here, finding the strictures of the Comments Policy too onerous.
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MA Rodger at 19:43 PM on 19 January 2015Global warming made 2014 a record hot year – in animated graphics
madkatz @19.
The increase above the previous record year (2010) was 0.017ºC (GISS) or 0.035ºC (NCDC) if monthly averages are used for the calculation. And unlike 2010, that is without an El Nino.
I for one don't consider this 'exciting'. It is hardily unexpected just as the next record breaker can be expected in coming years.
As the Moderator Response suggests, perhaps you should take a little time to get some understanding of where humanity is pushing our planet's climate system and the implications of that change for our kids & grand kids. Displaying your gross ignorance is quaint but actually unhelpful to man nor beast.
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Glenn Tamblyn at 12:42 PM on 19 January 2015Global warming made 2014 a record hot year – in animated graphics
madkatz
"The actual measuring points on the earth's surface cover much less than 1% of the planets surface". Actually, no they don't. 70% of the earth's surface is oceans, and sea surface temperatures (which is the ocean component of the temperature record) are measured by satellites now so actually most of the earth's surface is sampled.
" What is the temperature of the area that is not recorded?? "
Think about it madkatz. These are average temperature anomalies. So the land stations are supplying the average of many readings for each station for periods of a month or longer. And the weather patterns that pass over each of those stations also pass over all those other nearby regions that don't have a station. So the average for those other locations is much the same. And the records deal in anomalies; how much the local average has changed from a past, longer term average. And these long term averages are very stable over long time periods - that's what climate is.
"How the hell can you measure tree rings and claim to know the temperature they represent? ". By understanding how the growth patterns of trees are affected by temperature and other factors. Basic botany really.
Just as understanding how the physics of why water that contains the heavier isotope of oxygen (Oxygen 18) doesn't evaporate as easily and condenses more easily than Oxygen 16 water which leads to changes in the proportions of Oxygen 18 in snow in the polar regions depending on the temperature when the water first evaporated. So we can measure the Oxygen isotope ratios in ice from ice cores (old snow) and infer from that what past temperatures were like.
madkatz. Your comments suggest you don't know much about these subjects. Yet your tone is of incredulousness and anger. Surely if you are incredulous of things you don't know very well, then that incredulousness is misplaced. If one does't understand a subject surely the best course of action is to defer to those who do, or gain an understanding of the topic oneself. Incredulousness of something one is ignorant of just makes one look foolish.
So, '...these scientists...'. They are the experts who understand this stuff far far better than you or I. To doubt them we first need to be as knowledgeable as them.
Moderator Response:[PS] Please keep discussion of paleotemperature records off this thread.
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Tom Dayton at 11:30 AM on 19 January 2015Global warming made 2014 a record hot year – in animated graphics
davidsanger, records sometimes arrive late from some stations that are remote, or from which communication has been disrupted. I imagine some stations deliver records chronically late, such as ones that accumulate records for months before a courier takes them. That doesn't happen in the U.S. very often, of course, but in many other parts of the world I bet it does.
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davidsanger at 11:15 AM on 19 January 2015Global warming made 2014 a record hot year – in animated graphics
tom@15 kevin@18 thanks. that's what I was looking for, along with finding out a bit more about the updated versions of GHCN.
It looks like ther next version (Version 4 due in 2015) will have a big jump to 30,000 stations. Sounds like an improvement. I wonder if that will cause much to change -
madkatz at 10:41 AM on 19 January 2015Global warming made 2014 a record hot year – in animated graphics
Regarding Hottest Year since 1880!
Why don't you say how much warmer 2014 actually is?
It's .01C warmer, and you all are getting excited by this!
The actual measuring points on the earth's surface cover much less than 1% of the planets surface. What is the temperature of the area that is not recorded?? And these scientists act like they are measuring the temperature of a cup of coffee.
They process and "cook" the data so that it agrees with what they promoting. These number crunchers that call themselves scientists should go out and look at the world a little.
How the hell can you measure tree rings and claim to know the temperature they represent? Then they cobble this data onto actual readings and make a "prediction" that looks like a hockey stick.
Moderator Response:[PS]
Please note that posting comments here at SkS is a privilege, not a right. This privilege can be rescinded if the posting individual treats adherence to the Comments Policy as optional, rather than the mandatory condition of participating in this online forum.
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.
Your comment suggest you have multiple levels of misunderstanding which hopefully this site can help you with. Please see in particular the Temp Record is unreliable myth. Any comment on the paleo-climate record (determined from tree ring and many other proxies) should go on an appropriate thread. (eg here ). Off topic comments will be removed. Just because you dont understand something does not make it wrong. Please take the time to read and understand the science before attempting to criticize it.
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Kevin C at 05:27 AM on 19 January 2015Global warming made 2014 a record hot year – in animated graphics
David, KR, Tom:
It's possible for past temperature estimates to change even without any change in the methodology, so looking for such changes won't necessarily anwer your question.
Suppose that last 6 months of a station record shows unexpectedly high temperatures. The most likely explanation at this point is that the data are faulty, or at least require an unknown correction, and those records are rejected.
Then two years later, the station has reported 30 months of temperatures which look sensible compared to neighbouring stations, but are systematically warmer than the previous period. Now, with the same data for the year of interest, it look as though there was an undocumented station move. The station data get adjusted to remove the discontinuity rather than being removed, and you get a different final answer.
So NOAA temperatures for recent years can vary just from adding extra months of data after the year concerned. The trailing end of the temperature record tends to wag for a few years.
GISTEMP and Berkeley show the same behaviour, but slightly more so, because isolated stations can be upweighted to cover larger regions - Berkeley in particular.
Are the adjustments more likely to be one way that the other? I've not done a systematic survey, but in the cases I've looked at NOAA seem to be more likely to reject change (which is a good conservative approach), and so in a warming world are likely to have to adjust upward as more evidence comes in. However that conclusion is based on a handful of stations - it's little better than guesswork.
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One Planet Only Forever at 02:38 AM on 19 January 2015Global warming made 2014 a record hot year – in animated graphics
dana@6,
Got it. It may be clearer to say:
"As this graphic shows (click here for the source of this animated graphic), the last five times that record hottest years occurred (2010, 2005, 1998, 1997, and 1995), they were assisted by El Niño conditions."
It may help to add horizontal lines for each record hottest year.
p.s. I also changed the wording for the graphic since it is now animated
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Mal Adapted at 01:30 AM on 19 January 2015Global warming made 2014 a record hot year – in animated graphics
Everyone is waiting for everyone else, if you guys won't cut emissions, who will ?
No doubt you've studied Environmental Economics. Individual voluntary sacrifices (that is, choosing to enjoy less benefit, or expend extra time and/or money, in order to reduce one's own emissions) shouldn't be discouraged, but they won't drive effective abatement of AGW. Economics will. There's a reason it's called "the dismal science" 8^(.
The key economic concept is "externality". As long as the climate-change cost of using fossil fuels is kept out of the prices we pay for them, rational economic actors will use fossil fuels. Hitherto, Americans have been able to hold climate change external to our individual energy-consumption choices. When climate change costs start showing up whenever we fill our gas tanks or pay our utility bills, we will switch to alternative energy sources with alacrity.
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Tom Curtis at 17:44 PM on 18 January 2015Global warming made 2014 a record hot year – in animated graphics
davidsanger @12 & 14, GISS keeps a running log of updates to their temperature series, which is, I suspect, what you are looking for. NOAA may do the same, or may simply relly on the technical reports from the GHCN to provide the relevant information. I doubt either is very usefull to the layman. That is, unless you run your own software to generate temperature series as per the reported methodologies (as done by Nick Stokes and others), the updates will not inform you as to why the alteration is as it is because you will be missing too much context.
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davidsanger at 16:31 PM on 18 January 2015Global warming made 2014 a record hot year – in animated graphics
Actually KR those are not much help. I am aware of the general processing of temperature data. My question is about reprocessing of data already reported. It seems that each year (at least in the past 5 years reports) the global average for some of the previous years has changed.
I did some more searching and found documentation of an update to GHCN Monthly to version 3 and then up to version 3.2.0, and some reference to a planned version 4.
Is there some timeline, then, of the updates? Are there others?
They do seem minor but every year the top 10 shift around a little bit as one or more years' average is updated. -
Global warming made 2014 a record hot year – in animated graphics
davidsanger - A quick Google search on "NOAA temperature data adjustments" finds this NOAA FAQ, linking details such as the NOAA pairwise homogenization methods. Menne et al 2009 may also be of interest in this regard.
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davidsanger at 12:47 PM on 18 January 2015Global warming made 2014 a record hot year – in animated graphics
Could someone point out if there is online documentation of what seem to be adjustments to previously reported annual temperatures? Presumably there are good reasons for the adjustments but it would be helfpul to know the basis of them.
For example the NOAA 2010 Global Analysis reported the 2010 global land and ocean anomaly as +0.62 ± 0.07ºC (above the 20th century average of 13.9°C)
the NOAA 2011 Global Analysis reports the 2010 global land and ocean anomaly as +0.64ºC
the NOAA 2012 Global Analysis reports the 2010 global land and ocean anomaly as +0.66ºC
the NOAA 2013 Global Analysis reports the same.
the NOAA 2014 Global Analysis reports the 2010 global land and ocean anomaly as +0.65ºC
Thanks.. david -
Trevor_S at 08:46 AM on 18 January 2015Global warming made 2014 a record hot year – in animated graphics
Thanks for all the replies but I think you suffer from the misguided thinking that data and science is what interests them :) It doesn't matter what Science is presented to them, they will keep denying.
As I have pointed out several times, it's not these people I am concerned about, they will deny in their grave. I was just answering the rhetroical question as to what deniers would use now. Just as an aside, none of them take this site seriously... sigh. If you want a reasonable synopsis of the nonsense they use, go to reddit
What concerns me is those that understand and accept the Science aren't doing anything. A recent example, the AGU conference, the LIMA comference, Dr Abrahams doing Aid work in Africa. All massive emitters. I know you think this is important work, which is the exact same reason everyone else gives and nothing is done. Everyone is waiting for everyone else, if you guys won't cut emissions, who will ? Causal Inefficeacy isn't a good reason. Yes, we have personally cut back enormously.
As to Dr Abrhams Aid work. I used to fly to Cambodia to do Aid work but now I rely on the support network in country and transfer funds electronically from here to fund the projects I support. So I can empathise with how hard it is not to be involved but the emissions are not justified. Once we've chewed away that emissions budget, there's no realistic way of going back.
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Tom Curtis at 06:47 AM on 18 January 2015Global warming made 2014 a record hot year – in animated graphics
Trevor_S @7, a few things you may want to point out to your friends:
1) "Skeptics" are often dubios about surface temperature records because adjustments need to be made for time of observations (which has not been constant), change of site conditions, and change of instruments. Satellite temperature data, however, have come from a succession of 12 different satellites, requiring a site adjustment for the entire Earth at once for each transition. Further, the orbits of satellites decay over time, requiring a continous "site move" adjustments for the entire data set. Finally, satellites do not pass over a given point on the Earth at the same time each day (let alone punctually at the time of minimum and maximum temperatures), thereby requiring a continuous Time of Observation adjustment every day. (I have used the names for the equivalent surface adjustments rather than those used for the satellite adjustments.)
The fact that these adjustments need to be made for the entire record at the same time, rather than for individual instruments as with the surface record, means there are no nearby stations without the adjustments which allow comparisons to check for biases introduced by the adjustment. Consequently the story of the satellite record is a history of major errors corrected after some time in successive versions:
There is currently a peer reviewed paper pointing out a purported additional error that has not been publicly accepted by the authors of the UAH temperature set. They have, however, given notice that a new version is forthcoming which will make a significant difference.
2) The TLT record is not based on a single set of instruments but on the differences between two sets of instruments, meaning it compounds the errors of each seperate set of instruments. As Carl Mears (of RSS) says:
"TLT is constructed by calculating a weighted difference between MSU2 (or AMSU 5) measurements from near limb views and measurements from the same channels taken closer to nadir, as can be seen in Figure 1 for the case of MSU. This has the effect of extrapolating the MSU2 (or AMSU5) measurements lower in the troposphere, and removing most of the stratospheric influence. Because of the differences involves measurements made at different locations, and because of the large absolute values of the weights used, additional noise is added by this process, increasing the uncertainty in the final results."
(My emphasis)
UAH uses a different method, but the same problem applies.
3) As noted by Jim Eager, satellites do not measure surface temperature. In fact, they do not even measure the same portion of the atmosphere over different locations of the globe. RSS has provided the weighting functions for the TLT channel over land and water:
Thus, the altitude from 0 - 300 meters of the atmosphere provides around 4.5% of the signal over ocean, but only 4% over land. Of course, the amount provided over land depends on the altitude of the surface, so that the weightings over Denver, for example, would be different to the weightings over the qattara depression. The reason satellite records do not show temperatures over the Himalayas is not because the satellites won't clear the mountains, but because the difference in weighting is so great that it would make inclusion of the data nonsensical. Changes in surface pressure (the presence of highs or lows) will also change the weightings slightly.
The actual surface also contributes some of the signal (about 5% over land, and 3.8% over ocean), but that contribution also varies depending or surface type.
For what it is worth, about 50% of the signal comes from the first 3000 meters of the atmosphere (including the surface), and 50% from above. Because each altitude band above (approx) 2400 meters contributes less an less, that means the mean altitude of the temperature measurement in the TLT channel is close to, but above 3000 meters.
4) Actual attempts to measure the actual surface temperature using satellites have been made, with the current benchmark for accuraccy being +/- 1 K. For comparison, surface instruments read by eye have an accuracy of +/- 0.25 K for mercury thermometers, and 0.05 K for electronic thermometers. UAH can report greater accuraccy than that, but only by not actually reporting surface temperatures and not specifying too closely what part of the Earth/atmosphere system they are reporting the temperature of (as it varies by time, season, and geographical location).
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Enginerd at 04:47 AM on 18 January 2015Global warming made 2014 a record hot year – in animated graphics
Trevor: In addition to what Jim pointed out, I recommend reminding your peers that UAH satellite data shows a long-term trend of +0.14 degrees per decade, which aligns pretty closely with the rate of temperature increase for the surface data sets.
I personally don't see the point of obsessing over which year has the highest temperature in which data set, because the ranking of specific years varies across them. We have known this for some time now. Much more important to me is that *all* reliable data sets show a steady temperature increase (behind a noisy year-to-year signal) and the rate of increase is indeed comparable across all of them.
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