Arguments
Recent Comments
Prev 862 863 864 865 866 867 868 869 870 871 872 873 874 875 876 877 Next
Comments 43451 to 43500:
-
JasonB at 12:04 PM on 25 July 2013Skeptical Science Study Finds 97% Consensus on Human-Caused Global Warming in the Peer-Reviewed Literature
OneHappy,
I suggest reading through earlier comments, there was some discussion on the exact ratings applied to some papers and suggestions on how Cook et al might be meaningfully "audited". In particuar, any bias in how the papers are chosen (e.g. simply checking the papers of known sceptics) will invalidate attempts to extrapolate the error rate to the sample as a whole — if you don't want to recheck every rating then you need to choose a random sample of papers and see what error rate you get with those, taking into account both the papers that you didn't disagree with and those that you did. And don't forget the self-ratings of the authors!
The bottom line, however, is that nobody has come up with a huge hoard of papers that did not endorse the consensus yet somehow escaped that categorisation in Cook et al. You can always find errors in any human endeavour (and the paper itself specifically quantified disagreements between Cook et al raters, though remember that a disagreement in rating doesn't automatically translate into a disagreement in endorsement/non-endorsement) but the real question is, what impact does that error rate have on the result?
Given the overwhelming numbers involved, even gross errors would not sway the results very much. For example, as Tom Curtis pointed out previously regarding the author self-ratings, in order for the original authors' level of endorsement to drop to 94.5% — a figure I would still consider overwhelming — you would need to believe that half of the original authors mistakenly assessed their own papers as endorsing the consensus when they should have been rated as neutral.
Now, it's true that some (e.g. Richard Tol) managed to mis-rate their own papers (thereby incorrectly claiming Cook et al were wrong) but half? And that would still make the headline look much the same. Why? Because there really are bugger-all papers in the literature that actually dispute the consensus. What's even worse is that when you examine those papers, certain opinions about quality and rigour invariably form. In other words, not only are there very few papers disputing the consensus out there, but most of those are also rubbish with obvious errors that make you wonder how they got published in the first place. (Actually, not really — it's painfully obvious how they got published in most cases; it's just sad.)
There's no need to have doubts, the assessments are all online. Check for yourself!
-
OneHappy at 11:01 AM on 25 July 2013Skeptical Science Study Finds 97% Consensus on Human-Caused Global Warming in the Peer-Reviewed Literature
On reflection I think if there are 4 mistakes in over 4,000 abstracts rated then 0.1% is an acceptable rate of error, but still interested in other opinions on this.
-
chriskoz at 10:08 AM on 25 July 2013The Economist Screws Up on the Draft IPCC AR5 Report and Climate Sensitivity
Richard@19,
You're correct.
For example, simple Energy Budget models ignore the albedo change from sea ice/ice sheet melt, also the permafrost melt and methane clathrate release is ignored. That's because the machanics or the extents of those feedbacks are unknown. However, with more data about recent sea ice melt, I expect the sensitivity figures will be updated upwards in the near future.
-
Andy Skuce at 08:50 AM on 25 July 2013BC’s revenue-neutral carbon tax experiment, four years on: It’s working
usbuyer:
There's certainly some truth to what you say, whenever I drive across the border (about twice a year) I always fill-up. But I always have done that, even when I used to live in Alberta. And there has been in an increase in Canadians making cross-border shopping trips in the past few years, not only in BC, but in the other provinces also. It's unclear how much of this increase has been driven by the ~8cents per litre carbon tax, which might save an additional $5 per fill up. As you know, a lot of other goods are cheaper in the US.
I am working on crunching some numbers on this and will post a link here when I have finished. On a preliminary basis, I think that this might account for about an apparent 2% reduction in BC's per-capita fuel consumption. The latest figures, in a peer-reviewed study, show that BC fuel consumption has fallen by about19% relative to the rest of Canada since the carbon tax was introduced. So, perhaps 10% of the reduction might be attributable to cross-border shopping rather than other behaviour changes spurred by carbon taxes. But I need to check the calculations first.
-
usbuyer at 06:31 AM on 25 July 2013BC’s revenue-neutral carbon tax experiment, four years on: It’s working
Don't have an opinion on whether BC carbon tax is good or not. Do know that I used to spend about $2500 year buying gas in BC - now go across the border - fill up (and play a round of golf) - spent less than $200 on gas in BC last year. Many of my neighbors go to US on the weekend - shop - and gas up. Of 6 families around my place, I would estimate that gas buys in BC were around $15000 year, now not more than $1000 year. Don't know of any neighbors driving less - just going south for gas to save money. Need to look at all the impacts (lost sales, etc) when contemplating higher taxes.
-
KR at 05:42 AM on 25 July 2013Levitus et al. Find Global Warming Continues to Heat the Oceans
MA Rodger - Oh my, I missed that throwaway line the first time through. Eschenbach (somehow) dismisses CO2 in a sentence completely unrelated to anything else in the blog post, with no supporting evidence whatsoever.
So: a discussion that adds nothing to Levitus 2013, with unsupported aspertions on OHC data accuracy and a complete non sequitur regarding CO2 tacked on the end. I believe that sums up that Eschenbach post - in my opinion it's not worth the time to read.
-
MA Rodger at 04:49 AM on 25 July 2013Levitus et al. Find Global Warming Continues to Heat the Oceans
dvaytw @36.
Is there anything specific that bothers you. My main take-away from that Wattsupian post is that the author is a total idiot. 45+100+60. That's a lot smaller than 205. An' it ain't CO2 wot dun it, neever!! Then such arrant stupidity is quite a common on that planet.
-
KR at 04:40 AM on 25 July 2013Levitus et al. Find Global Warming Continues to Heat the Oceans
dvaytw - Aside from the (unsupported) aspersions on OHC data at the end, that post really doesn't say anything new. The oceans have a vertical temperature profile, they have accumulated huge amounts of energy over the last half-century of measurements, that translates into different amounts of warming over the vertical ocean profile.
While the temperature changes he plots are interesting, the raw temperature data is already available on the very same site he got the OHC information from - and by reversing to degrees C he's thrown away (cancelled out) the volume and total energy values of interest.
Overall, that post contains nothing much of interest. Far more informative to read the original Levitus 2012.
-
dvaytw at 02:07 AM on 25 July 2013Levitus et al. Find Global Warming Continues to Heat the Oceans
Wattsup has a blog post about this wherein he claims:
"The nice thing about the ocean is that the temperature and heat content are mathematically related by the fact that it takes about 4 megajoules to warm a tonne of water by 1°C. This lets us convert from heat content to temperature and back as needed.
Remember that the three layers have very different volumes. So a terajoule of energy added to the shallow 0-100 metre layer will warm it more than the same terajoule of energy added to the more voluminous 700-2000 metre layer. Fortunately, NOAA also provided the ocean depths on a 1° x 1° grid, so we can calculate the volume of each of the layers. Once we know the volumes, we can calculate the temperature changes. Figure 4 shows the same data as in Figure 3, except expressed as a temperature change rather than as a change in heat content."
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/05/10/the-layers-of-meaning-in-levitus/
Comments on that?
-
gws at 01:38 AM on 25 July 2013The climate change policy discussion I wish Andrew Neil would have on BBC
An important point not highlighted by Dana, but critical in the policy arena, is the trajectory towards the necessary approx. 80% reduction of emissions (more if related to today's emissions) by 2050. The longer humanity dithers, the steeper the reductions will need to be, the stronger the adverse impacts on "traditional" economics. This was recently reiterated (aka it is old news) by Kevin Anderson here. It can be comprehended even by non-economists. Those who accept the science while defending current economic practises should probably be the strongest supporters of early and sweeping decarbonization efforts. And indeed, it looks to me that some, like the Germans, are trying hard. Maybe not hard enough considering the challenge, but harder than most ...
-
Richard Lawson at 23:11 PM on 24 July 2013The Economist Screws Up on the Draft IPCC AR5 Report and Climate Sensitivity
Many thanks Tom Curtis @15. OK I have another question. I have been puzzled about the recent slew of papers giving low climate sensitivity. Then I read that the low CS papers are based on simple Energy Budget models, and that the more complex general circulation models which deal with more factors will deliver higher CS values.
Is that correct?
-
Glenn Tamblyn at 19:11 PM on 24 July 2013Why doesn’t the temperature rise at the same rate that CO2 increases?
David Sanger
I am no expert on this but the general sense I have is something like this:
A major part of the ocean circulation patterns in the upper half of the ocean is currents generated by the winds, particularly the major permanent wind patterns, the Easterly Trade Winds near the tropics, and the Westerly Roaring Forties. These winds generate large circular currents, the Gyres, one per ocean basin with smaller child gyres as well. These rotate clockwise in the Northern Hemisphere and counter-clockwise in the south.
This circular movement pushes water towards the center of the gyres which then creates a downwards water flow in the central region as this is the only place the inflow of water can get out. This is described in more detail in the theory of Ekman Pumping.
Additional factors come into play in the Southern Ocean with the interaction between the gyres and the circumpolar current that circles the Antarctic. Also the fact that the cold surface temperatures in the Southern Ocean mean that the temperature gradient between the surface and the deeper waters is less so Ekman pumping can more easily move water down since the buoyancy gradient is lower.
In recent years the speed of the Westerlies has increased. The speed of the Trade Winds may also have increased. And the latitiudes where the westerlies are blowing are shifting polewards as the Hadley Cells expand.
In principle, increases in the wind speeds should 'spin up' the gyres, increasing the Ekman transport, thus more water being moved from the surface to the mid depths - 1000 to 2000 meters - and thus able to carry more heat with it. But the details are apparently rather complex due to the interactions in the Southern Ocean. This is why the Southern Ocean is a region of intense research right now.
Things like the PDO and perhaps even the ENSO cycle may well be smaller scale consequences of a broader mechanism involving fluctuations in the winds and Ekman transport. With more research this area has the potential to really nail a lot of our uncertainties wrt natural climate variability.
-
Timothy Chase at 18:23 PM on 24 July 2013Why doesn’t the temperature rise at the same rate that CO2 increases?
Correction: last sentence should be "... I believe this is primarily due to the fact that la Ninas tend to dominate rather than el Ninos." During the negative phase of the PDO, la Ninas are more common, el Ninos less so, and during la Ninas the ocean tends to store heat that is released during an el Nino.
Regarding the relationship between el Ninos and the PDO, please see Comparing ENSO and PDO and The Pacific Decadal Oscillation (Climate Impacts Group, University of Washington)
However, there has also been talk of the character of ENSO changing as the result of global warming, where depending up the climate model, more "el Nino"-like or more "la Nina"-like conditions tend to dominate.
-
Cornelius Breadbasket at 18:05 PM on 24 July 2013The climate change policy discussion I wish Andrew Neil would have on BBC
Too many people will not have the time or depth of interest to follow the debunking of Andrew Neil's misrepresentation. In the spirit of the one-line responses here on Skeptical Science I suggest a link toi this excellent testimony by Dr Jennifer Francis.
-
chriskoz at 18:05 PM on 24 July 20132013 SkS Weekly News Roundup #29B
CBDunkerson@15,
You're absolutely correct. If you recall this fragment of the court decision:
“Having been investigated by almost one dozen bodies due to accusations of fraud, and none of those investigations having found Plaintiff’s work to be fraudulent, it must be concluded that the accusations are provably false. Reference to Plaintiff, as a fraud is a misstatement of fact.”
you can be confident that NRO and CEI defence as if their accusations of fraud were simply "opinions with rhetorical hyperbole" has already been rejected by the court. A "misstament of fact" simply means a "lie".
Whether this legaly proven lie is a perjury depends on its context (i.e. if accompanied by statement of oath) which is unknown to me. Like you, I hope MM's lawyers don't overlook this opportunity and add the possible perjury to their case if there is a good stance for it.
-
Timothy Chase at 17:55 PM on 24 July 2013Why doesn’t the temperature rise at the same rate that CO2 increases?
David, you might want to check out:
A Looming Climate Shift: Will Ocean Heat Come Back to Haunt us? by Rob Painting, 24 Jun 2013
Basically, the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (or more recently "Interdecadal Pacific Oscillation) is in its negative phase, and during this time the ocean tends to store heat. I may be wrong, but I believe this is primarily due to the fact that it la Ninas tend to dominate rather than el Ninos.
-
davidsanger at 16:02 PM on 24 July 2013Why doesn’t the temperature rise at the same rate that CO2 increases?
What is the current thinking as to why the oceans are now absorbing more heat than in previous decades? Is it some process which is occurring in response to the last centurys rise in air temperatures, or is it possibly related to other factors and cycles like ocean currents etc.?
What are there promising research projects trying to sort this out, and will they likely result in improved climate models which better understanding of the role of the oceans? -
OneHappy at 15:19 PM on 24 July 2013Skeptical Science Study Finds 97% Consensus on Human-Caused Global Warming in the Peer-Reviewed Literature
By the way I'm aware of two replies to this. 1) Its only four papers it does not change the overall result, and mistakes could equally have gone in the other direction as well. Moreover, denialists will have done their best to find or implicate every error they can, so these four might be the best they can come up with. 2) Since a sample of scientists were also contacted to rate their entire paper the fact that three scientists claim their paper argues somthing different to how SS classify it from the abstract does not matter because overall the findings from that method were 97.2% support from AGW.
But. The problem as I see it is that one mistake appears to have been found, and three more uncomfortable classifications seem to have occured. The presence of these fairly obvious looking doubts does cast a worrying shadow over the study as a whole because the implication is if you can find some mistakes, you can probably find more. And rhetorically that kind of doubt is exactly what denialists feed on.
-
Enginerd at 14:53 PM on 24 July 2013The climate change policy discussion I wish Andrew Neil would have on BBC
I'm with Dikran on his comment about the futility of trying to see signals among noisy data. Something interesting to do, however, is plot the monthly sattelite data...but do so using roughly 13-year rolling averages. Such an averaging time would roughly smooth out solar cycles. If you do this, you'll see a nearly linear, upward trend. And, this occurs whether or not 1998 is included in the data.
-
OneHappy at 14:36 PM on 24 July 2013Skeptical Science Study Finds 97% Consensus on Human-Caused Global Warming in the Peer-Reviewed Literature
This issue may have been addressed, but denialists have picked around the edges of this study by arguing some papers were wrongly classifed. While the total number of such incorrect classifications amounts to only four papers (as far as I am aware so far) what seems to be powerful about this objection is that by finding possible small errors it implicates the accuracy and credibility of the study and its overall findings. The links are:
http://www.webcitation.org/6Grmd4IOP
http://notalotofpeopleknowthat.wordpress.com/2013/06/30/getting-to-the-bottom-of-cooks-97-lie/
The latter reference involves only one paper but it does look like an incorrect classification, as far as I can tell. The former reference involves three papers where denialist scientists consider their entire paper and state it does not support AGW, when the SS study classified it as supporting AGW based upon the abstract. It just doesnt sound right that a denialist who rejects AGW would publish a paper with an abstract that supports AGW.
What is the reply to this?
-
KR at 12:48 PM on 24 July 20132013 SkS Weekly News Roundup #29B
Andy Skuce - I would consider price supports, tax incentives, and the like all as various kinds of subsidies: artificially manipulated prices representing a cost to the government or someone else, which change the economic landscape in one direction or another.
I would agree with you and with JvD that "industrialized" only is the wrong grouping, considering that the majority (not all) of these subsidies are in the exporting nations - although I would note that tax policies and import/export barriers are additions in both industrial and undeveloped countries, likely not accounted for in the figures above. I cannot, however, consider a refusal to consider artificial commodity pricing as a subsidy anything other than absurd. Every analysis I have ever seen describes these as subsidies. Accusations claiming that discussions of these subsidies are "lies" are unreasonable.
scaddenp - Yes, commodities is the correct word, which for some reason I spaced on in my previous post. Commodities have a value established by supply and demand, artificially lowering those values is a subsidy, a cost. At the very least, the Saudi Economy and Planning Minister thinks so... and I will have to say I consider his take on the situation more supportable than (re)definitions discussed in this thread.
-
JasonB at 11:58 AM on 24 July 20132013 SkS Weekly News Roundup #29B
When people discuss "subsidised public housing", does anybody stop to check whether the housing is being sold/rented below construction cost, or is it just a reflection of the fact that the cost is below market value and therefore represents a cost to the taxpayer?
BTW, I suspect that it's actually a lot harder to work out the "true cost" of Saudi oil than is being suggested here, even if all cards were on the table. Even within my own business it's hard to work out the "true cost" of some things.
-
Andy Skuce at 11:30 AM on 24 July 20132013 SkS Weekly News Roundup #29B
The Saudis certainly consider opportunity costs when they run the economics on solar versus oil-generated electricity. No doubt-oil-generated electricity is competitve with solar energy at marginal oil production costs, but solar probably wins if world prices for oil are used.
It is true that the Saudis sell domestic gasoline at greatly below market prices to their own consumers and that could reasonably be construed as a wasteful subsidy. On the other hand, the consumers are also the owners of the oil, since Saudi Aramco is a state company, and Saudi citizens might think it only fair that they pay just for the production and refining costs of oil that they already own as a birthright.
It's perhaps worth noting that N Americans are enjoying cheap natural gas at well below world gas prices. There's no direct cash subsidy here, but government reluctance to approve LNG export projects is certainly helping to shield consumers from paying world commodity prices.
I agree with JvD that the original article was misleading on the level of fossil fuel subsidies in industrialized nations. However, "lie" implies an intent to mislead and I'm not sure there is any evidence of that here, it was possibly just a mistake on the part of the journalist.
-
chriskoz at 11:21 AM on 24 July 2013The Economist Screws Up on the Draft IPCC AR5 Report and Climate Sensitivity
ianw01,
On rereading the posts and on closer look, it turns out I was wrong @8 (sorry) and you are right that the last plot is somewhat ambigous as to what those red points actually mean.
I very much like jdixon1980@7 suggestion in the last paragraph to animate the graph over three sensitivities. That would remove the issue and enhance & clarify the graph at the same time.
-
Timothy Chase at 10:43 AM on 24 July 2013Why doesn’t the temperature rise at the same rate that CO2 increases?
gpwayne, I think it would be a good idea to at least briefly mention the point that the warming due to carbon dioxide being put into the atmosphere at any given moment doesn't happen immediately, but involves a certain lag, that it is warming "in the pipeline" due to it resulting in an imbalance in the rate at which energy enters and leaves the system, and that we only gradually accumulate the energy that warms the Earth up enough that it radiates energy at the same rate that energy is entering the system. I believe this is at least as relevant as the point that the rise of temperature due to a rise in carbon dioxide is nonlinear. You wouldn't have to include much additional material, though. A brief mention and a link to where it is covered in more detail elsewhere at this site, such as:
What the science says... The argument that "Earth hasn't warmed as much as expected" generally relies on ignoring the factors which have a cooling effect on the Earth's temperatures, and the planet's thermal inertia, which delays the full amount of global warming.
in:
Has Earth warmed as much as expected?
http://www.skepticalscience.com/Earth-expected-global-warming.htm
... should be sufficient.
-
hank_ at 10:40 AM on 24 July 2013The climate change policy discussion I wish Andrew Neil would have on BBC
Just an FYI for Dana. You have been 'honored' with an original "Josh" cartoon over at Bishop Hill' blog.
http://bishophill.squarespace.com/blog/2013/7/23/you-get-what-you-pay-for-josh-230.html
Hank.
-
Nichol at 07:35 AM on 24 July 2013The climate change policy discussion I wish Andrew Neil would have on BBC
Neil: "As pointed out above some scientists (and Mr Nuccitelli) believe that global warming is causing the depths of the oceans to heat up and that one day this heat will be released."
It seems important to clearly explain that the ocean heat will not be 'released' as such. What will happen is that the ocean is expected to stop 'helping' us by absorbing as much heat as it does now, which means that more heat will go into the atmosphere.
.. and then I guess it wouldn't even be very 'helpful' if the oceans would (unlikely) continue absorbing heat at this rate, as that would increase the speed of sea level rise. So if we could worry less about atmospheric warming, we should probably need to worry more about sea level rise.
-
Bob Loblaw at 07:10 AM on 24 July 20132013 SkS Weekly News Roundup #29B
Not yet mentioned in this discussion of subsidies is the economic principle of opportunity cost.
Opportunity cost is a somewhat hidden cost, when a choice is made between alternatives. If the choice that is made provides less return than other choices, then the person/entity making the choice is further behind - i.e., the choice actually cost them money, compared to the more advantageous choice. The classic example is the cost of keeping your money in your sock drawer. In one sense it "costs nothing", since you pay nothing out to keep it there - but you do "pay" the (now lost) income you would get if you invested that money somewhere where it would grow.
In the case of the state-owned oil company that sells oil overseas for $100/barrel and sells it domestically for $30/b, there is an opportunity cost of $70/b for each domestic sale. The oil company's revenue is a source of income for the country, so each $70/b is lost, and to keep spending money at the same rate on other government functions, the money needs to come from somewhere else - perhaps taxes. If oil were sold at world rates locally, taxes could go down. This is a shift in the economics - the opportunity cost of selling domestically at lower rates is paid by other sources (perhaps taxes on alternative energy producers), who may or may not benefit from cheap gas.
Whether you call it a subsidy or not is irrelevant - it is part of the economics.
And it's "hidden" because you need to know where to look to see it. -
dorlomin at 06:37 AM on 24 July 2013The climate change policy discussion I wish Andrew Neil would have on BBC
Shuckman seems to have some 'interesting' sources as well
(hat tip Semyorka on the Guardian thread)
-
william5331 at 06:28 AM on 24 July 2013Why doesn’t the temperature rise at the same rate that CO2 increases?
For the sake of the example, suppose climate sensitivity is 30 for a doubling of CO2. So from 200ppm to 400ppm we would see a temperature rise of 30. We would then need to increase CO2 from 400ppm to 800ppm to see another 30. In other words each additional increase in Carbon dioxide has less effect than a similar previous increase. Of course this ignores an opposite effect, namely the inertia in the system. The El'gygytgyn results hint that we should already be seeing more effects than we do. It seems likely that we have set in motion a raft of interlocking feed back mechanisms that will have to work their way through before we are in equilibrium with 400ppm and hence be able to actually measure climate sensitivity. We won't be able to do this experiment since we are heading with gay abandon towards 500ppm and beyond.
-
scaddenp at 06:25 AM on 24 July 20132013 SkS Weekly News Roundup #29B
In your GM v Tesla analogy, I would argue that complaint would not be about price, but that GM's practices result in their employee buying more cars than they could otherwise afford. The complainent would not be Tesla but from makers of alternative forms of transport.
-
scaddenp at 06:20 AM on 24 July 20132013 SkS Weekly News Roundup #29B
JvD - you are somehow confusing the cost of production with the price of a commodity. If demand for a commodity exceeds supply, then price rises till demand matches supply. If Saudi government removed that price support, then consumer cost would be higher and Saudi's would use less (and probably make better use of abundant solar). Therefore what they are doing is a subsidy and there would be less consumption if it were removed.
You seem to be insisting a special definition of subsidy. Lets not get hung up on definition. How about the claim then that goverments are providing $600B of various kinds of price support that, if removed, would increase consumer cost of fossil fuel, making other sources more competitive. Are you contesting this statement?
-
jdixon1980 at 04:38 AM on 24 July 2013The Economist Screws Up on the Draft IPCC AR5 Report and Climate Sensitivity
Tom Curtis @12:
I second ianw01@16 - I think that aligning the three data points vertically would add clarity rather than remove it. Looking at the graph, I found myself second-guessing my understanding that the three data points were supposed to be all at the year 2100, because I could visually detect that they are not vertically aligned by noting the shrinking gap between the points and the right side of the graphic.
From the original article: "The figure below illustrates the amount of warming we can expect [my and ianw01's question is, by when? 2100?] if we continue on a business-as-usual path with continued reliance on fossil fuels and a slow transition to low-carbon energy sources (IPCC scenario RCP 6) for equilibrium climate sensitivities of 1.5°C (best case), 3°C (most likely), and 4.5°C (worst case), compared to the climate experienced during the history of human civilization."
If the RCP 6 scenario is supposed to be projected out to 2100 for each of the three climate sensitivities, how about showing three different curves, perhaps all red, but with a slightly lighter lineweight to avoid the "indistinguishable wedge" problem that Tom mentions? Or even with the heavy lineweight, I think the overlap between the lines would be less confusing than the three points not being vertically aligned.
As still a third option, which would avoid the line-overlap/"indistinguishable wedge" problem, you could animate the graphic, cycling through the projections for the respective climate sensitivities, only displaying one at a time. The legend itself could also cycle between "(RCP 6 scenario with 1.5 C sensitivity)," "(~ 3 C sensitivity)" and "(~ 4.5 C sensitivity)."
-
Dikran Marsupial at 03:30 AM on 24 July 2013The climate change policy discussion I wish Andrew Neil would have on BBC
@jonthed The human eye is really good at detecting patterns in noise that don't exist. In this case the perception of a plateau may be simply an artefact of the 1998 El-Nino spike. If you blank out the spike, there is no longer much evidence of a plateau, just a steady increase at a fairly constant rate, with a bit of variability superimposed on top.
-
Dikran Marsupial at 03:25 AM on 24 July 2013Empirical evidence that humans are causing global warming
Matthew L: Not all speculation is idle. Using your brain and having ideas is a good thing. It is idle speculation when you don't test your assumptions or find out what scientists who have looked into the question have found out, or tested the consequences of their ideas. I can assure you if you can produce a workable model that convincingly explains why mainstream science are mistaken about the causes of 20th century and current warming, academic journals would be keen to publish it and we would all be genuinely keen to read about it. However, that takes a lot of work (on which the climatologists have commanding head start).
-
jonthed at 03:19 AM on 24 July 2013The climate change policy discussion I wish Andrew Neil would have on BBC
Can't the whole 'plateau' and 'mysterious ocean mechanisms' just be simply explained and put to bed for good by the fact that the ENSO has been mostly neutral or la nina since 1998 and that the temperatures are still rising on the same gradient for neutral an dla nina years, as shown perfectly in your graphic here on this site?
This one: http://skepticalscience.com/graphics.php?g=67
surely this just shows that the whole 'plateau' is an illusion, that is fully explained and well understood? is it not?
-
Composer99 at 03:17 AM on 24 July 2013Empirical evidence that humans are causing global warming
MatthewL:
When I see an oscillation in temperatures from cooling (LIA) to warming (1850 - 1950) to cooling (1950 - 1980) to warming (1980 - 2000) to (possibly) cooling (2000 - ?) then it puts me in mind of a feedback effect. So, yes, I have used my own brain and had an idea. In your view is all speculation "idle"?
Since you:
(a) have asserted your speculation as fact ("For instance we have no way of telling whether the increase in temperature 1979 - 2000 is due [...]" - your words), and
(b) have taken into account neither the responses of others in this thread nor the quantified radiative forcings applied to the Earth climate over this time frame (see a globally- and annually-averaged radiative forcing history in Figure 1 of this post, or a comparison of global mean temperature versus solar forcing here, or the inability of natural radiative forcings only to match the 20th-century observational record),
I am comfortable in describing this specific speculation of yours as idle.
-
Dikran Marsupial at 02:54 AM on 24 July 2013Empirical evidence that humans are causing global warming
Matthew L, you obviously didn't see the point of my question. The exchange of heat between the atmosphere and oceans is very sensitive to relatively small changes in ocean circulation, in particular ENSO. This means that the oceans can equalise the the extra heat they have taken in really quite quickly. It also means that it is not particularly difficult for small changes in ocean circulation (e.g. ENSO) to give rise to an apparent hiatus in global mean surface temperatures. It is a pity that you can't see that uncertainties apply in both directions.
As to the attribution of previous periods of warming or cooling, try reading chapter 9 of the most recent IPCC WG1 report.
I agree with more funding for Prof. Trenberth though, science in general is rather underfunded.
I also notice that you have ignored my challenge to give details of "a statistical test that establishes that there actually has been a hiatus in GMSTs and what we are seeing is not just an artefact of the noise? ". You ought to ask yourself why it is that you are unable to answer this fairly basic question and yet seem quite confident of your own position on this.
-
MA Rodger at 02:26 AM on 24 July 2013The climate change policy discussion I wish Andrew Neil would have on BBC
Regarding the graph of temperature paraded by Neil during the interview. I have superimposed Neil's graphic onto the section of the original CRU graph here.
Given the tiny size of the original, Neil's copy would not be that bad, except that the 2012 'axis' is displaced about a year, to 2013. This is because Neil's graph uses a finer line than CRU, a line which he extends to the very end of roundy termination of the thicker CRU line. The 2012 'axis' is then drawn in further away again, the point which then becomes the terminus of the temperature trace.
The lack of the annual values shown by CRU but deleted by Neil does make the graph suspect given its method of end smooting, and that is so even without the extention to 2013. And of course, it in no way supports anything like the 15 year "plateau" that Neil insists is there and that is the source of all his argument.
-
KR at 02:23 AM on 24 July 20132013 SkS Weekly News Roundup #29B
JvD - "...raising taxes on Saudi domestic fuel sales will do nothing to improve the fundamental cost comparison between fossils and alternative energy. The one thing quite simply has nothing to do with the other, clearly!"
Nonsense. Costs of energy drive development and adoption, and artificially suppressed prices distort those economics. Those suppressed prices, those subsidies, change the equations.
The constant repetition of the lies about gargantuan 'fossil fuel subsidies' is certainly meant to deceive the public into thinking that alternative energies would be competitive 'if only those nasty subsidies for fossil fuels would be stopped'.
About $600+ B in subsidies - as defined by the countries in question, including members of the G20 - are indeed applied to fossil fuels. You seem to disagree with that, but your definition is not the one in use by world economies, and is hence not relevant. Wind energy is already on a par per unit of energy with new coal and gas generators - any change in fossil fuel costs would affect decisions as to generation capability. Your statement is therefore demonstrably wrong.
---
[ Side note; accusations of "lies" are quite over the top, as per the Comments Policy. ]
-
ianw01 at 02:07 AM on 24 July 2013The Economist Screws Up on the Draft IPCC AR5 Report and Climate Sensitivity
Tom Curtis @12: I respectfully disagree with your assertion that the differences are purely of style and therefore trivial. They are neither. Note that chriskoz@8 tells me that I'm wrong - that the red dots do not have the same x-value. You tell me they they "logically" should have the same x-value. It now seems you both support the graph, yet you interpret it differently.
I'm not so concerned with who is right or wrong. I just would like to be able to look at the graph and know what it is supposed to convey.
Here is its fundamental fault: any reader who first sees this plot needs to do some re-reading and deduction to realize that it represents 3 different scenarios. All they will see intially is a single path with 3 points along the way.
At a more detailed level, what a viewer of the plot (or I still) can't tell is whether, for each scenario, the climate models predict a different time to equilibrium that should be distinguishable on this plot. The plot makes me wonder whether the red dots were all put on one line for the sake of expediency (No offense, John & Dana!)
Given that the plot is intended to show time to equilibrium, then very short horizontal tails to the right would clarify the plot tremendously. They would immediately and graphically make clear that
- There are 3 scenarios in red
- The plot shows time to equilibrium
I'm grateful for the work that went into the artilcle and graphic, but I'm being picky because I believe a graphic like this (in the library) needs to be clear and not open to mis-interpretation or easy criticism. Confusion is the lifeblood of climate science deniers.
bvee @10: Thanks.
-
KR at 02:04 AM on 24 July 20132013 SkS Weekly News Roundup #29B
JvD - As of July 2013, the US cost per gallon of gasoline from international crude oil prices and refining was about $2.54 and $0.43 respectively, a total of $2.97 per gallon. Saudi Arabia prices domestic gasoline at $0.61 per gallon. That barely covers refining costs, let alone crude oil value, storage, distribution, etc.
That is the result of expensive subsidies, a huge cost to the Saudi government. Saudi Arabia prices its oil at ~$100/barrel, but uses it internally at much much lower (i.e. subsidized) prices. Oil, as with any limited natural resource, has a value dependent on supply and demand. Selling that resource far below value is a cost, a subsidy on the part of the resource owner.
Saudi Arabia’s Economy and Planning Minister Mohammed al-Jasser said regarding their internal fuel prices:
This has become an increasingly important issue as these subsidies have become increasingly distorting to our economy. This is something we are trying to address...
They certainly consider these to be subsidies - your definitions appear not to hold in terms of economic conversations. Enough said.
-
JvD at 01:55 AM on 24 July 20132013 SkS Weekly News Roundup #29B
KR, (-snip-)? Thanks.
Moderator Response:[DB] Inflammatory snipped.
-
JvD at 01:47 AM on 24 July 20132013 SkS Weekly News Roundup #29B
(-snip-)?
(-snip-)!
If Saudi Arabia does actually introduce such taxes (which would arguably be a good move, since it would mitigate the 'resource curse' that Saudi suffers from) then the proceeds are probably going to serve projects that benefit the Saudi's, and nobody else. Certainly, it would have to benifit poor Saudi's rather directly, or the whole country is liable to experience an 'arab spring' faster than you can say allah akbar. It is therefore complete nonsense to presume that such a move by Saudi Arabia has any international meaning for climate change mitigation and clean energy, as is being suggested in the article.
(-snip-)!
(-snip-)?
Moderator Response:[DB] Inflammatory snipped.
-
KR at 01:32 AM on 24 July 2013Empirical evidence that humans are causing global warming
Matthew L - Atmospheric temperatures have a much higher variability than the oceans; not surprising since there is far more thermal mass in water. Attempting (as you have) to draw significance from 10-12 year air temperature trends is just the Escalator fallacy all over again.
Compare and contrast ocean and atmospheric data - while air temperatures vary a lot, they cycle around the changes in ocean energy:
As to oscillations - beyond short term variability (5-20 years or so) the climate tracks forcings, as in:
The climate just doesn't change willy-nilly, and sheer energy constraints rule out 200 year oscillations such as you seem to advocate. Understood forcing changes (including anthropogenic greenhouse gases) appear more than sufficient explanation.
Quite frankly, your post appears to consist primarily of armwaving about possibilities while ignoring evidence. Oh, and claiming models are incomplete, which while unsupportable should be discussed here.
-
JvD at 01:27 AM on 24 July 20132013 SkS Weekly News Roundup #29B
KR: "That would be incorrect. Saudi Arabia, the example I gave before, sells gasoline to their citizens below cost (heavily subsidized at $43 billion a year for domestic fuels), and also provides below cost water and power."
You are wrong KR. Saudi oil costs about $5 to $15 to produce, and the Saudi people pay that price at the pump. They are not selling it below cost. This is the last time I will state this simple fact. I will not revisit it. Unless of course, you show actual proof that you are right, which you have not done.
-
Matthew L at 00:54 AM on 24 July 2013Empirical evidence that humans are causing global warming
Yes, almost entirely, as you can see from the first figure in this post. So what? The atmospheric temperature portion not buffered is sufficiently large to cause the atmospheric temperature rise from greenhouse gases that we have seen historically and continue to see. You seem to be implying that the amount of buffering will drastically increase starting now... well, now... well, tomorrow...
From Balmaseda, Trenberth and Kallen (GRL 10 May 2013)
“In the last decade, about 30% of the warming has occurred below 700 m, contributing significantly to an acceleration of the warming trend. The warming below 700 m remains even when the Argo observing system is withdrawn although the trends are reduced. Sensitivity experiments illustrate that surface wind variability is largely responsible for the changing ocean heat vertical distribution.”
The point of this paper, as stated here many times, is that the lack of a rise in the temperature of the atmosphere recently is at least partly due to an increase in the heat uptake of the deep oceans. So they clearly believe that the heat uptake of the deep oceans can change and in fact has changed in the last 10 years.No “drastic”extra buffering needs to occur. Because the heat capacity of the oceans is circa 280x greater than the heat capacity of the atmosphere, only a tiny change in deep ocean heat uptake has been enough to almost completely stall the previously seen rise in global atmospheric temperatures.
So what magnitude of deep ocean temperature change are we talking about that has contributed to this slowdown in the rate of global warming? An increase for the 700-2,000 metre layer of about 0.002 degrees Celsius.
This is natural variability and may well be a natural negative feedback to atmospheric and ocean surface warming (or it could be noise - research needed). This, to date, has not been included in the models and needs to be if we are to make meaningful projections of future climate change. More research needs to go into identifying and quantifying the magnitude and processes driving natural climate variability.
DM: This is nonsense. Please can you tell me what is thought to have caused the sudden rise in surface temperatures in 1998?
The warm waters below the surface of the western Pacific Ocean accumulated through solar gain because of high winds and low cloud cover in the deep La Nina in 1997 sloshed back east and came to the surface - as always happens in an El Nino. What do you think caused it?
The surface waters concerned were substantially warmer than the atmosphere over them. In the case of the deep oceans the water is somewhere around 5c, considerably colder than the surface temperatures.
As to the warming 1979 - 2000, do we know - to the nearest 0.001C - the change in the global temperature of the deep oceans (700 - 2000m) during that period?
Do we know how it changed in the period 1950 - 1979?
If a tiny change in deep ocean temperature can result in a reduction in warming 2000 - 2013, why is it not possible that variability in the rate of deep ocean heat uptake was at least partially responsible for the cooling 1950 - 1979? Or the warming 1910 - 1950?
Give Mr Trenberth more funding!
Composer99
Where is this idea coming from?
Do you have a cite or is this idle speculation?
When I see an oscillation in temperatures from cooling (LIA) to warming (1850 - 1950) to cooling (1950 - 1980) to warming (1980 - 2000) to (possibly) cooling (2000 - ?) then it puts me in mind of a feedback effect. So, yes, I have used my own brain and had an idea. In your view is all speculation "idle"?
-
KR at 00:46 AM on 24 July 20132013 SkS Weekly News Roundup #29B
It should be noted that even selling fossil fuel "at cost", or rather at production cost, is still a societal subsidy due to the lack of accounting for externalities from carbon emissions and pollution.
While setting a price, by example with a carbon tax, is difficult and a point of significant disagreement, these external costs do exist - and accounting for and charging for them (rather than leaving them buried and unacknowledged, paid for by society) would help the move towards non-carbon alternatives.
-
ptbrown31 at 00:29 AM on 24 July 2013Why doesn’t the temperature rise at the same rate that CO2 increases?
mandas @ 2: I like that analogy and I used it here:
http://www.skepticalscience.com/ptbrown31_gp_1.html
-
KR at 00:28 AM on 24 July 20132013 SkS Weekly News Roundup #29B
Countries like Saudi Arabia are merely selling one part of their oil on the international market, and another part of their oil to domestic consumers at cost. This is not a subsidy!
That would be incorrect. Saudi Arabia, the example I gave before, sells gasoline to their citizens below cost (heavily subsidized at $43 billion a year for domestic fuels), and also provides below cost water and power. And they are not alone. These are not cases of selling at cost, but rather of diverting monies to artificially reduce prices, in ways that encourage consumption.
I would suggest rather more careful fact-checking for your posts. Fuel subsidies are no myth.
Prev 862 863 864 865 866 867 868 869 870 871 872 873 874 875 876 877 Next
