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Comments 35601 to 35650:

35601. wili at 03:43 AM on 14 July 2014
       Deep Decarbonization Pathways Project (DDPP) Presents Interim Report to UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon
       

       "And already, for long distance travel, aviation has a low carbon footprint compared to other forms of suface transportation. (You have to remember, there is no surface infrastructure required; e.g. roads, rail lines, etc.)"

       
       But Rob, how many of those trips just wouldn't have been taken if there was not a fast, cheap way to do it. We have to make flying, driving and most other forms of carbon-based travel _less_ convenient, so people think twice about doing them and think instead of alternatives...skipe for meetings, local bike tours for tourism...

       Relatively few long distance trips, flying or otherwise, are absolutely essential. We're talking about an existential threat here, people. Shouldn't all non-essential use of CO2 producint activities be getting very close scrutiny and huge doses of skepticism, rather than rationalizing a way of continuing such mostly frivolous activity?

35602. Rob Honeycutt at 02:50 AM on 14 July 2014
       Deep Decarbonization Pathways Project (DDPP) Presents Interim Report to UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon
       

       On the aviation issue...  The nice thing about this one is, the aviation industry doesn't deny the problem. They are embracing the problem and are working on solutions. They know fuel prices are going up and the major cost driver is fuel costs. The industry has every incentive to work really hard to try to use fuel as efficiently as possible. And already, for long distance travel, aviation has a low carbon footprint compared to other forms of suface transportation. (You have to remember, there is no surface infrastructure required; e.g. roads, rail lines, etc.)

       Aviation moves very slowly but their engineers do freakishly amazing stuff. There's some wild stuff on the drawing boards right now that look to address fuel source issues, like superconducting ducted fan designs. It's just not stuff that's going to flying by 2050. 

35603. MThompson at 22:18 PM on 13 July 2014
       The power of pie-charts to communicate consensus
       

       Thanks for the other parries, but it is chrisd3 that exhibits integrity that builds solid science. We must not allow inaccurate renditions of key propositions to go unchallenged. Are we not rebutting global warming misinformation herein?

       I hold the work of Cook et al. in higher esteem than published surveys of related propositions precisely because it is an analysis of data (i.e. published abstracts) rather than the shifting sands of surveys. Yes, such overwhelming consensus is notable, and whether it is 97 percent or 99.9 percent is unimportant. It is elimination of the all-important qualifiers on the proposition that justifiably incites our critics. A survey of scientists would likely provide a very high consensus that “Gravity is an attractive force between massive bodies.” Restrict that survey to physicists and there should be found strong disagreement.

35604. WRyan at 20:06 PM on 13 July 2014
       Deep Decarbonization Pathways Project (DDPP) Presents Interim Report to UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon
       

       @Paul W

       The BREE modelling you quoted is for hypothetical nuclear power in Australia. I find it difficult to believe that the construction and operating costs of a nuclear reactor in Australia is half of that of a real reactor in the UK, which is what that model implies.

       The OECD modelling that article quoted is based on there being close to zero storage. This scenario is based on basically maintaing an entire separate electricity generating system to replace power lost if close to all renewable systems in a network closed down because of lack of sunlight, wind, etc at the same time and for an extended period (days). I question how realistic this view is. Storage technologies are likely to became considerably cheaper as a market is established and the technlogies go into mass production. As they become cheaper, they will greatly reduce the costs of renewables stated in your linked articles.

       The nuclear batteries you quoted are currently extremely expensive (and of course impossible to obtain outside of strictly regulated government environments.) This may change in the future, but then again it might not.

35605. Paul W at 18:23 PM on 13 July 2014
       Deep Decarbonization Pathways Project (DDPP) Presents Interim Report to UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon
       

       @WRyan 5.

       A study that includes all the hiden costs tells a different story.

       http://bravenewclimate.com/2013/03/22/counting-hidden-costs-of-energy/#more-6088

       There is a very big difference between cost of production and the delivered costs. The referenced study showed nuclear as lower at delivered costs in an Australian context.

       I did discuss nuclear batteries which is a small scale low cost nuclear technology that runs for 15 tp 20 years between refueling un attended.

       It is designed to replace the coal burning part of a coal power station while leaving the rest of the station. It's to fast track shut down of coal to use existing infrastructure.

       It can also be mass produced which is quite unlike the large one off nukes you refer to.

       All large power generation uses government subsidies.

35606. WRyan at 16:02 PM on 13 July 2014
       El Niño in 2014: Still On the Way?
       

       With regard to my previous post, I've thought of a 5th possible mechanism for warming.

       5. A decrease in cloud cover over land results in more sunlight being absorbed by land surfaces. This results in an increased amount of IR radiation entering the atmosphere, which causes the temporary warming.

35607. WRyan at 15:54 PM on 13 July 2014
       El Niño in 2014: Still On the Way?
       

       I've never been able to find a good explanation of why El Nino events cause temporary atmospheric warming. There are 4 factors I can think of:

       1. Increased volume of warm surface water increases the amount of IR radiation entering the atmaosphere, and so causes increase warming.

       2. Increased evaporation causes a higher humidity and therefore increased absorption of IR radiation ( a temporary enhanced greenhouse effect).

       3. Incresed eveaportaion of warm water carries energy into the atmosphere which is transferred to the rest of the lower troposphere by conduction and convection.

       4. Increased evaporation causes an increase in humidity which results in more cloud formation. As the vapour condenses, the production of latent heat involved in the phase transition is transferred to the surrounding air by conduction.

       Are any of these mechanisms responsible for the increased temperature? If so, which ones and to what degree does each contribute to the warming?

       I think this would be a good topic for  short article.

35608. WRyan at 15:08 PM on 13 July 2014
       Deep Decarbonization Pathways Project (DDPP) Presents Interim Report to UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon
       

       @Paul W

       New nuclear power is generally very expensive. The new reactor being built in England is priced to generate electricty at around 17c/kWh. The reactor is only being built through a  very large government subsidy. New wind power costs less than half that amount and new utility scale PV can be much cheaper than the price of nuclear, depending on the proposed site. (Proposals for new PV farms in Texas and California are pricing generation at around 6-7 c/kWh.)

       As for air travel, it isn't necessary to completely stop the burning of fossil fuels to stabilise the climate. It is only necessary to substantially reduce it (maybe by 80-90%). So it is possible that the  highest priority uses of fossil fuels could continue. For this reason, the aim of the decarbonising studies tends to focus on reducing CO2 sources from the easiest targets first - switching electricity generation to renewables, and then switching land transport to electrical vehicles, trains, cars and, eventually, trucks.

       The real challenge of reducing fossil fuel use is to make it happen quickly. The faster the reductions occur from sources like electricity generation, the more time people will have to work on the hard targets like airline travel.

35609. Paul W at 13:51 PM on 13 July 2014
       Deep Decarbonization Pathways Project (DDPP) Presents Interim Report to UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon
       

       @Larry E 3.

       It's seems that they have chosen a global approach. It has some limitiations but the one that you mention I dont see as being absolute.

       If very cheap power were available then the route from sea water for jet fuel costs 90 cents USD on land and 1.20 USD on the ocean capital costs) according to the US navy. They have very cheap power on their nuclear powered ships.

       We could have that on land during storms with losts of wind power when power costs go negative or with advanced nuclear. The ARC nuclear battery technology puts fuel at a fixed price for 15 to 20 years.

       That means that we could keep on with air travel growth and not blow out CO2 emmisions. We just need non fossil jet fuel.

       Could we get the anti nukes to relent? I'm more skeptical about that issue.

       Could we get onging support for wind with out attacks from fossil fuel intersets under cutting their supports?

       I see those as more difficult than non fossil fueled air travel.

       Progesss forwards is a lot easier technically than getting the extrems in politics to agree and work together. I think that is the rate limiting step to limiting global temperature.

35610. Ken in Oz at 11:36 AM on 13 July 2014
       Today’s Solar Power ‘Revolution’: Powerful Insights from Energy Experts
       

       I actually find it a postive that a relatively small amount of solar PV is making fossil fuels more expensive - by shaving the lucrative peak off daytime demand. A relatively small amount of storage will shave the lucrative peak off evening demand. (Isentropic's PHES is aiming for an initial, most lucrative, 3 hours worth of storage) Ultimately a 'free' - or at least an open - energy market will see fossil fuels forced into intermittency and, already bearing a burden of costs from having overcapitalised for demand that never eventuated, they will cost more again from the losses of their most profitable demand periods - enough to become the carbon price signal that Cap and Trade, Carbon Tax or other pricing mechanisms have been resisted so strongly, have so far failed to be. The value and cost of that shrinking, intermittent output will rise to compensate, but the value of energy storage options will become increasingly apparent, especially if the climate consequences of emissions are no longer ignored on an 'out of sight, out of mind' basis.

       A broad acceptance that emissions from fossil fuels represent an unacceptable burden of consequences and costs has to underpin energy policy and energy research and energy investment. Using lowest cost fossil fuels as the benchmark and constraining limit on energy prices, when those costs do not include that externalised burden of consequences means those constraints are false and deceptive. Yet, regionally, periodically and with a large measure of predictability, they are no longer the lowest cost option; something that should have been foreseen, had  low cost enewables not been dismissed out of hand as an impossibility.  

       The least emissions - rather than simply the least cost - options for dealing with intermittency will still require preferential policy assistance but there may be, ironically, some requirement to assit power companies to retain some interim fossil fueled backup capacity whilst staving off untimely bankruptcy.

35611. Larry E at 09:10 AM on 13 July 2014
       Deep Decarbonization Pathways Project (DDPP) Presents Interim Report to UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon
       

       The report does not give any consideration to long-distance travel, and without limitations on that we cannot succeed — even with the inadequate 2oC guardrail that the study relied on.

35612. chrisd3 at 22:08 PM on 12 July 2014
       The power of pie-charts to communicate consensus
       

       @MThompson: The literature supports both claims. Doran & Zimmerman find, by direct poll, that 97% of the scientists who are most expert in climate science support the theory.

       Now, bloggers and others (including both Obama and John Kerry) do go wrong when they say "97% of scientists agree." That is not true. The percentage is very high (e.g., 82% of Earth scientists, according to the D&Z survey), but it's not 97%.

       The most accurate phrase is probably something like "97% of climate science experts."

35613. scaddenp at 15:14 PM on 12 July 2014
       El Niño in 2014: Still On the Way?
       

       wwysim - for what fairly spare information I can find, the volume of ejecta from the recent Indonesian eruptions is far below Pinatuba and unlikely to affect weather.

       While volcanoes undoubtedly cool the climate, I am unaware of evidence that they can affect the ENSO cycle. Do you have a reference?

35614. PluviAL at 14:55 PM on 12 July 2014
       Today’s Solar Power ‘Revolution’: Powerful Insights from Energy Experts
       

       Tom Curtis and From Peru, well made points; however, you fail to grasp the fact that civilizations actual use energy load is miniscule. 15 TW vs 174,000 of incoming radiation. Climate change is orders of magnitude greater, because it takes place at the planetary scale. Albedo from PV is insignificant as Tom argues well. The big thrust should be to come up with solutions that allow for economic growth without damaging the environment. One way is for our energy regime to improve the environment. The most successful life forms improve the environment with their life processes. We can do the same. Pluvinergy is my prior argument for that, but only a few hundred copies sold. Now I take great hope in article such as this, or the really excellent news about hydrogen storage in Ammonia, ianw01 provides.

       There are technical solutions, and going to zero growth sounds good, but it is not. Environmental improvement can be defined as and result in economic growth. Putting insulation in my house and adding solar lighting and heating have huge energy and comfort returns. If we design from that starting point, the world can be really lovely. We must design from that point of view.

       Now I am working on controlling sea level. It is not as impossible as it seems. It is a modification of Pluvinergy, but it makes the task quite doable, to the point that one realizes, that is the real challenge; there is no way to turn back the clock on the 40 year lag in climate change that is already in the atmosphere. The cryosphere will melt, we either do something about it or suffer the consequences.

       This kind of article is just what the doctor ordered to give us curage to confront the problems head on instead of with denial or other forms of burying our heads in the sand.

35615. One Planet Only Forever at 13:04 PM on 12 July 2014
       Deep Decarbonization Pathways Project (DDPP) Presents Interim Report to UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon
       

       Another action the global coimmunity must take is the evaluation of all known fossil fuel resources and agree which ones must be left in the ground unburned. The rational approach would be to use the ones that will produce the least amount of unacceptable consequences per unit of useable enegry obtained.

       The current approach is bound to fail. It is based on expecting self-serving national leadership to willfully stop promoting the maximum benefit they can get away with from unacceptable economic activity that they see as benefiting their national interests.

       It is clear that such self-serving nations are the reason we face the bigger challenge today. What needs to be accomplished would have been far easier to accomplish starting 20 years ago.

35616. Composer99 at 11:56 AM on 12 July 2014
       The power of pie-charts to communicate consensus
       

       MThompson: Other surveys producing 97% (± 1-2%) levels of agreement are surveys of scientists' opinions themselves. Indeed, Cook et al 2013 mentions Zimmerman & Doran 2009 and Anderegg et al 2010 as just such surveys.

       And those surveys conclude, as Anderegg et al put it in their abstract:

       97–98% of the climate researchers most actively publishing in the field surveyed here support the tenets of [anthropogenic climate change] outlined by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change

       In other words, your assertion that the infographics shown are "troubling" is shown to be incorrect: they both relate substantiated conclusions from the published literature.

35617. KR at 06:10 AM on 12 July 2014
       The power of pie-charts to communicate consensus
       

       MThompson - Do you think there is any evidence supporting a drastically different opinion distribution for those scientists whose paper abstracts didn't mention the causes of recent climate change? Note that about the same percentages apply to the self-ratings by authors for their papers, including many whose abstracts were rated by Cook et al as neutral, indicating that the ~97% consensus carries through to all. Barring evidence to the contrary, such an objection is rather irrelevant. 

       Cook et al 2013 states their methods and the first assertion you quote; anyone interested in the topic can read the (open) paper themselves. Conversational shorthand descriptions (i.e., in common English) of the conclusions are just that - details get dropped, particularly when there is shared knowledge. I have seen 'skeptic' arguments along those lines, and they are just semantic quibbling. 

35618. MThompson at 04:35 AM on 12 July 2014
       The power of pie-charts to communicate consensus
       

       Embedded in this post is an example of one of the troubling tendencies in popular climate science blogs. The graphic first indicates:

       “97% of climate papers stating a position … agree ...”

       Then just below that image:

       “97% of climate scientists agree …”

       Are these logically the same proposition? I think not. What scientist would defend such bastardization?

35619. wili at 04:34 AM on 12 July 2014
       Deep Decarbonization Pathways Project (DDPP) Presents Interim Report to UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-Moon
       

       Well, at least they admit that many consider two degrees to be too high. But then they go ahead and set that as the guardrail--go figure. At one point in the main article, they give the following equation:

       CO2 emissions = Population x (GDP/Pop.) x (Energy/GDP) x (CO2/Energy)

       
       Unfortunately, they only concentration on the last two, assuming the first must go up by about 2 billion before starting to decline by around 2050. And of course, since the whole thing is lead by an economist, they see an net increase (presumably for eternity) in the second as not only necessary but highly desirable, their central goal, in fact. But percapita GDP has not been shown to be a good indicator of human happiness beyond a certain minimal point. Why should this be left off the table of things we have to decrease dramatically and quickly? And this is the only element that can be reduced very quickly. And quickly versus slowly, in this case, makes all the difference, well, in the world.

       Continued rise in CO2 emissions spell global ecocide. Why should the best and fastest way to avert it be taken off the table just because of the blind and misguided ideology of a few economist.

       (Note Herman Daly's definition of economics: "An ideology parading as a discipline.")

35620. Roger D at 03:29 AM on 12 July 2014
       The power of pie-charts to communicate consensus
       

       As explained in this piece, the graphics of the pie charts showing actual expert consensus or expert vs public consensus are great at showing these things. It seems to me though that the climate change-denier slide would be useful for its intended purpose too. To facilitate the chronic "skeptic's" avoidance of the reality of the seriousness of global warming. Although very busy, and probably needing a walkthrough by the “skeptic” presenter to get full benefit, the denier slide makes the valid point that "ghosts of doubt" will always be "in the game". And just speaking from my personal experience, I think many of the "skeptics" I know and love would place great weight on that fact. Their thinking process apparently approximates this: Ghosts of doubt = those scientists don't know everything = there could be factors they are completely unaware of = why, maybe there are huge unknowns = no need to act yet, what with the huge unknowns. In other words, they smoothly think themselves from a premise that is true (but oversimplified and without context – like most skeptic arguments themselves), to what they want to keep believing. It's a tough nut to crack but it seems a shift is hopefully underway. I appreciate SKS for their part.

        

35621. KR at 02:13 AM on 12 July 2014
       Global warming conspiracy theorist zombies devour Telegraph and Fox News brains
       

       DB - I would suggest reading Surface Temperature Measurements: Time of observation bias and its correction. This issue is primarily seen in the US, as volunteer temperature measurements have shifted to a different time of day over the years, station by station, hence an increasing TOBS correction. Other countries don't rely as much on volunteers. Other items in the correction list include the progressive station change from mercury to electronic thermometers, which read a bit cooler. 

       The TOBS correction is discussed in detail by Karl et al 1986, referenced on the very USHCN page you linked to. See the proceeding graph of the effect of individual adjustments - the sum of these is an increasing adjustment over time, quite justified by demonstrable bias changes over the US historical record. 

       Note that these adjustments are fairly small compared to overall temperature changes in the last century, affect only the US, and are lost in the noise for the global temperature record. Pseudo-skeptics harp on the shape of the adjustments, but fail to point out that they really make no significant difference in our understanding of global climate change. 

35622. DB at 01:21 AM on 12 July 2014
       Global warming conspiracy theorist zombies devour Telegraph and Fox News brains
       

       Part of what is causing confusion is, I think, this graph from the NCDC discussion on USHCN adjustments. Can someone please explain why the adjustment is increasing over time and why the increase looks so much like the overall temperature increase? I can't understand the reasons based on the discussion on that page or elsewhere. Thanks.

35623. Composer99 at 23:35 PM on 11 July 2014
       The power of pie-charts to communicate consensus
       

       CBDunkerson:

       Yes, apparently only 3 centuries (the original Star Trek TV series, is, canonically, set in the 2260s) need to pass for humans of the mid-20th century to be "Early Earthmen": Paleolithic humans and previous members of genus Homo need not apply.

35624. Mark Andrews at 22:38 PM on 11 July 2014
       El Niño in 2014: Still On the Way?
       

       I like your piece, Rob, but you say "the substantial reduction of the warm water volume anomaly (thankfully) diminishes the odds of a powerful event rivaling that of 1997-1998 from taking hold." We will be thankful in one way — from potentially less drought and other extreme weather conditions than otherwise — but in another way it would be good to have an El Nino as strong or stronger than the one in 1997-1998 because then many more people may wake up to the reality of global overheating, like many did when 1998 became the hottest year in the instrumental record at that time, and be inspired to take climate action.

       Moderator Response:

       (Rob P) - I understand the sentiment, but there are no guarantees that another record-breaking warm year will sufficiently shift public opinion. The last one came only 4 years ago (2010), and yet here we still are.

       The level of greenhouse gases - predominantly carbon dioxide - in the atmosphere is what counts and so far that just continues to climb. You will note (below) what happened to CO₂ levels after 1998 - they kept increasing. As long as that continues, the oceans and atmosphere will only grow warmer and the oceans will continue to acidify. 

       

        

35625. CBDunkerson at 21:21 PM on 11 July 2014
       The power of pie-charts to communicate consensus
       

       Pac-man was popular with "Early Earthmen"?

       Yikes! Have they dropped the 'age of the Earth' from 6000 years to just 60?

35626. wwsyim at 18:57 PM on 11 July 2014
       El Niño in 2014: Still On the Way?
       

       The Indonesian eruptions of the Kelut volcano and Sangeang Api volcano on February 13 and May 30 respectively may already have switched the Pacific Ocean back into a more La Nina mode. The eruption clouds of both eruptions penetrated well into the stratosphere.

35627. rocketman at 14:01 PM on 11 July 2014
       The power of pie-charts to communicate consensus
       

       Amusing that the Republicans were most influenced by the pie chart.  Apparently they were fuzzy on the meaning of 97% until it was shown graphically.

35628. ubrew12 at 13:18 PM on 11 July 2014
       The power of pie-charts to communicate consensus
       

       When looking at more than two options, a bar chart is better than a pie chart.  But if you only have two options, a pie chart makes it quite plain who is 'winning' (the 'pac man' metaphor is apt here).  A line chart is most useful if the x-axis represents the quantity of a single presumed causal factor (boundary condition).  But if, in a line chart, the x-axis does NOT represent such, but instead represents several competing causal factors, then a line chart is the worst way to present that information (a bar chart is much better).  Hence, the only 'crime' in this article is your first chart.

35629. Composer99 at 12:08 PM on 11 July 2014
       The power of pie-charts to communicate consensus
       

       You can see the difference between professional and amateur communication in the graphics created for the Consensus Project website/sharing (clean, uncluttered, easy to read, simple language and message) compared to the hash of a slide created by the climate denier group (cluttered, sizing and backgrounds make it difficult to read, white text on black background!, complex language and message).

       And that's before we get to the scurillous attempt to equate The Consensus Project with Pac-Man (my reaction, if you'll pardon the Internet slang, was definitely "lolwut") and the questionable vocabulary (I mean, "Early Earthmen"? What is this, Invasion of the Saucer-Men?).

       

       I suppose that it really does show up the difference between attempting to properly communicate the science to the public, and attempting to obfuscate the science.

35630. Timothy Chase at 09:33 AM on 11 July 2014
       El Niño in 2014: Still On the Way?
       

       Joe T

       The monthly Pacific Decadal Oscillation inde is available here.  I would also strongly recommend the Australian Government's Bureau of Meteorology's ENSO Wrap-Up which gets updated roughly once every two weeks.  The latter includes multiple tabs: Overview / Sea surface / Sea sub-surface / SOI / Trade winds / Cloudiness / Outlooks / Indian Ocean / Effects. Indian Ocean focuses on the Indian Ocean Dipole (IOD) also known as the Indian Ocean Dipole Mode Index (DMI) with recent data and basic explanations.

35631. shoyemore at 07:33 AM on 11 July 2014
       The power of pie-charts to communicate consensus
       

       I forget to add: Good post, and thanks for the reminder about simple, direct visuals.

35632. shoyemore at 07:31 AM on 11 July 2014
       The power of pie-charts to communicate consensus
       

       Edward Tufte in The Visual Display of Quantitative Information (p.178):

       A table is nearly always better than a dumb pie chart; the only thing worse than a pie chart is several of them ....

       The effectiveness of these pie charts comes their big, red (or blue) in-your-face, single number or statement, almost like shouting it out loud.

       The two side-by-side pass muster because they are of equal size. Whoever created the denier slide never read Tufte, who warns against asking a viewer to compare pies of different sizes. And who stuck the sun in there, and what does it mean?

       The moral is when you use pie charts, use 'em mostly one at a time and Keep It Simple Stupid (KISS).

35633. scaddenp at 07:17 AM on 11 July 2014
       Volcanoes emit more CO2 than humans
       

       Logan, the article has been noted as needing update but it will sit in the queue with many others. As Tom points out, a good literature review of both volcanic and anthropogenic estimate papers is needed for such an update. Note though that while it is good to put emissions in a context, it is worth noting that no revision of estimates is going get humans off the hook. As Rob points out, FF and volcanoes have different isotopic signitures. Almost all of the increase in CO2 since pre-industrial is of human origin.

35634. scaddenp at 06:10 AM on 11 July 2014
       It's cooling
       

       Jetfuel.

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35635. Rob Honeycutt at 02:20 AM on 11 July 2014
       Volcanoes emit more CO2 than humans
       

       That's also confirmed by carbon isotope measurements as well. So, we have two methods that converge on the same answer. 

       The Robin Wylie article is bizarrely over-the-top with regards to rhetoric, with the title stating that volcanic CO2 levels are "staggering." And, of course, when you google the article title you see that it's been reposted numerous times throughout the denial blogosphere.

35636. JoeT at 01:56 AM on 11 July 2014
       El Niño in 2014: Still On the Way?
       

       Thanks again Rob for another very interesting article. The one thing that I hadn't read anywhere else is that the PDO has shifted to a positive state. How robust do you think this change is? Is it possible that it could shift back to a negative state? Perhaps you could elaborate more on what you think the broader implications might be. Should we expect surface temperature to increase again at rates last seen in the 80s and 90s?

       Moderator Response:

       (Rob P) - Is the weakening Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO) a sign of the climate moving toward a positive Interdecadal Pacific Oscillation (IPO), or 'accelerated warming decades' as Meehl et al (2013) put it? That's a very interesting question.

       I'll have a future blog post about that, but not only is the PDO positive, but the North Atlantic subpolar gyre is cooling - consistent with the spin-down of the North Atlantic subtropical gyre, and the subsequent reduction in the northward transport of warm subtropical surface water.

       This image from Meehl (2013) - based on the NCAR climate model runs - differentiates the hiatus vs accelerated warming decades. The approximate area of the North Atlantic subpolar gyre is south of the southern tip of Greenland.

       

        

       Note that the subpolar gyres spin in the opposite direction to the subtropical ones creating surface divergence. Therefore upwelling (Ekman suction) occurs in the subpolar gyres - as opposed to surface convergence and downwelling (Ekman pumping) in the subtropical gyres.

35637. KR at 00:04 AM on 11 July 2014
       Rose-colored glasses: Antarctic sea ice is the Mail on Sunday's latest global warming distraction
       

       PluviAL - Potential sea level rise for _total_ icecap melt would be ~80.32m, not 200: 

       

       [Source]. 

35638. Tom Curtis at 00:01 AM on 11 July 2014
       Volcanoes emit more CO2 than humans
       

       Logan, I agree that the article should be updated to include the recent figures.  Those figures indicate 637 Mt per year of CO2 from volcanic sources (including volcanic lakes), and 300 Mt per year from non-volcanic sources (ie, metamorphism), the later derived from Morner and Etiope (2002).  In Burton et al (2013), the 937 Mt CO2 per annum from geophysical sources is compared to 35,000 Mt CO2 per annum as calculated by Friedlingstein et al (2010).  That estimate was for 2010.  A more recent estimate (for 2012), by Le Quere et al (2013), indicates total anthropogenic emissions of CO2 of 38,867 +/- 2,600 Mt CO2 per annum (10.6 +/- 0.71 PgC).  Consequently CO2 from geophysical sources represents 2.4% of anthropogenic CO2.

       The Burton et al estimate is likely to be too high rather than too low, in that it is significantly greater than recent estimates of in gassing of CO2.

       While important to update the figures in the interests of accuracy, it remains clear that geophysically sourced CO2 is emitted far to slow to have been responsible for the recent rapid rise in CO2, which is entirely of anthropogenic origin.

35639. MA Rodger at 23:56 PM on 10 July 2014
       Volcanoes emit more CO2 than humans
       

       PhilippeChantreau @254.

       It was linked @250.  Burton et al (2013) Deep Carbon Emissions from Volcanoes.

35640. PhilippeChantreau at 23:32 PM on 10 July 2014
       Volcanoes emit more CO2 than humans
       

       Logan, the link to the Italian study mentioned in the Op-ed you cite does not lead anywhere, can you reference it otherwise?

35641. CBDunkerson at 23:05 PM on 10 July 2014
       New Jersey science education standards may be blocked by climate contrarians
       

       I think this was one of those situations where few enough wingnuts were paying attention that the BOE could get away with making a rational decision. It is entirely true that NJ has plenty of crazy climate deniers who could have demanded the new standards be blocked, and the BOE (all appointed by the GOP governor) would then likely have done so. I suspect that even Christie knows global warming is a real problem, he just can't admit that without alienating his supporters.

35642. Logan at 21:06 PM on 10 July 2014
       Volcanoes emit more CO2 than humans
       

       Here's a recent article by a volcanologist, summarizing latest developments in volcanic CO2 emission research, and the significant uncertainties in the field:

       Long Invisible, Research Shows Volcanic CO2 Levels Are Staggering

35643. Logan at 20:31 PM on 10 July 2014
       Volcanoes emit more CO2 than humans
       

       The article could be updated because "Humans emit 100 times more CO2 than volcanoes" no longer reflects current best estimates. Human emission is about 50 times more than volcanic.

35644. MA Rodger at 17:46 PM on 10 July 2014
       Models are unreliable
       

       There is a further fundamental difference between financial models and models of physical systems.

       Financial models are far more tightly coupled to the system they model. Indeed, the financial model is itself part of the system it models. That is, a model of some form (and probably many models of many forms) will have been developed and adopted as a guide to decision-making by those involved in the financial trading that is being modelled. Likewise any learning from the modelling about the workings of the financial system will also feed back into the workings of the system. Such coupling between model and system is probably seen as a problem by the financial modellers.

       There is potential feedback from climate models into the climate system but here it is the difficulty in achieving that feedback which is seen as a problem (eg CO2 emissions have bad consequences => stop CO2 emissions).

35645. ubrew12 at 14:49 PM on 10 July 2014
       Rose-colored glasses: Antarctic sea ice is the Mail on Sunday's latest global warming distraction
       

       PluviAL@6: it seems to me we're having trouble maintaining our freshwater reservoirs as they are, and indeed, are quickly draining underwater aquifers (like the Ogallala) as quickly as we can.  I'm not hopeful, especially in a globally warmed world of drought, etc, that we could long keep our hands off the irrigation cornucopia that is a freshwater reservoir designed to counter sea level rise.  But its an original idea you have, so don't want to discourage you.  Perhaps elevated seawater reservoirs over marginal lands is possible.

35646. grindupBaker at 13:37 PM on 10 July 2014
       Rose-colored glasses: Antarctic sea ice is the Mail on Sunday's latest global warming distraction
       

       28,000,000 km**3 ice on Antarctica so it's 78m of sea level rise for the whole lot. End of last glaciation was ~130m SLR from Laurentide ice sheet, the smaller one to its West & Scandanavian ~2x as much as Antarctica. I read that Antarctica ice = ~10x Greenland ice so that sounds right. I also read Antarctica ice = ~7x Greenland ice some place that seemed knowledgeable (maybe a lecture) but I'm staying with 10x for now. I still got my daughter's bucket & spade from 40 years ago if you need a hand moving the ocean up onto the land a bit.

35647. PluviAL at 13:13 PM on 10 July 2014
       Rose-colored glasses: Antarctic sea ice is the Mail on Sunday's latest global warming distraction
       

       Chris, sorry to give thums down, the amount of sea level rise from Antarctica is a lot more than 60 meters, its closer to 200m. But perhaps I am wrong about that. What I calculate is 217 meters from all ice, and only 8 meters from Greenland ice. What I also understand is that Antarctica contributes more water to see level than Greenland. I think we will discover that the one meter or even the 4 meters forecasted by the most well accepted models are too optimistic. We need to plan for much more sea level change. That's the big deal. Antarctic sea ice, is probably an anomoly from our understanding of the mechanics of A-ice propagation, probably a little bit from additional fresh water, a little bit from additional energy in the Antarctic Ocean from higher energy content in the globe overall, and a little bit of something else. But it does not matter at all since it all melts, and has no effect on sea level.

       Currently I am writing a paper on how to control sea level rise by moving equal or larger amounts of fresh water from the sea onto the land. To control it we need to move about 8000 km3 per year for 180 years. Its a big order, but duable. 1km3 is 18 days of the historic average Colorado.  Any brave souls out there who might want to colaborate?

35648. scaddenp at 12:05 PM on 10 July 2014
       Volcanoes emit more CO2 than humans
       

       Thanks for that Logan. I see that this study includes outgassing from volcanic lakes which were missing from earlier estimates. However, as the paper notes, the emissions are still insignificant compared to anthropogenic sources.

35649. DSL at 12:02 PM on 10 July 2014
       It's cooling
       

       Jetfuel, I believe you've failed to respond to a wide range of criticisms of your posts.  Now you use 1.6% of the Earth's surface to represent the whole.  Brilliant, I must say.  Such analytical saavy will get you far in major journals such as Energy & Environment.  Snort.  Bye bye, jetfuel.  This was likely the straw--or cherry--that broke the dromedary.

35650. jetfuel at 11:54 AM on 10 July 2014
       It's cooling
       

       <Snip>

       Moderator Response:

       [PS] You have already been warned on sloganeering and cherry-picking (2% area of earth, short time intervals). If you can explain why such cherry-picking has any significance then your post will stand. The issue has been explained to you in earlier responses which it appears you did not bother to read.

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