AN INCONVENIENT TRUTH: Al is missing

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

And you say it isn't getting warmer?

It was 26 degrees this morning, you want zero?

 

[JackLuis]

SO it is 28 degrees warmer that in 1899.

Yep warmer, probably not so many Hurricanes back then though.

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

SO it is 28 degrees warmer that in 1899.

Yep warmer, probably not so many Hurricanes back then though.

There were several hurricanes around 1899, plus hard freezes.

 

[JackLuis]

There were several hurricanes around 1899, plus hard freezes.

I had a frozen Hurricane in New Orleans. You got those in Fla too?

 

[Huckleman2000]

It was 26 degrees this morning, you want zero?

So, when it's dark out, do you suppose it's dark out all over the world?

 

[penandpaper]

so tell me what is Al a perfessor of?

Never once has anyone ever heard me say I believe Al. And, never have I said I understand climate. But I know that Steinbeck's quote from Travels with Charley is true:
"I've lived in good climate and it bores the hell out of me. I like weather more than climate."

I think people in general are the same way. We like to see storms. When I lived in Florida, there was a certain sense of excitement I would get from watching Hurricanes. Lightning is scary is fascinating. Blizzards are crazy. Tornados stand the hair on the back of my neck up, but when the siren goes off, I'm like everyone else - we run outside to see it. (stupid is as stupid does.) But climate...

Boring. It's boring to track, to study, and to understand. This is why people focus on hurricane count, one record day temperature, etc... But, it does very little to equate to changing climate.

And for the record, I've never stated that global warming was a great threat. But, what I have stated is that it would behoove us to protect our natural resources, find alternative energies, not waste money on changing the environment, but rather work with it, and try to understand how to not change things on a grand scale.

 

[DesertPirate]

Of course the global warming alarmists fail to mention that their "proof" is found using suburbam temperature stations and not adding rural stations to the data. Do you think heat gain from pavement and concrete have anything to do with it?

 

[DeeZire]

Of course the global warming alarmists fail to mention that their "proof" is found using suburbam temperature stations and not adding rural stations to the data. Do you think heat gain from pavement and concrete have anything to do with it?

Go tell that to the glaciers that are melting as we speak.

 

[trysail]

This is one example of many. The surface temperature records for Rome ( Italy ) are recorded here. Do you see any possibility that the temperature record of recent years might be artificially elevated?

http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2009/03/rome_italy_airport_weather_station_large2.jpg?w=700&h=366&h=366

 

[Zeb_Carter]

Of course the global warming alarmists fail to mention that their "proof" is found using suburbam temperature stations and not adding rural stations to the data. Do you think heat gain from pavement and concrete have anything to do with it?

They also won't admit any credibility they thought they had went out the door with CRU scandal last month. And the Phil Jones interview this month.

 

[Boxlicker101]

Quote:
Originally Posted by penandpaper
Jesus Christ! Does anyone read read here (at leat those that dispute the facts)? Global warming is about, and has always been about global warming and global cooling. The two exist side-by-side.

Why does it take the jester of the group to explain to you and Ami about this?

What?

The two do not exist side-by-side. One follows the other.

Actually, they do exist side by side. Right now, the Northern Hemisphere is cooler and the Southern Hemisphere is warmer. In another five months, it will be the other way around.

 

[Zeb_Carter]

Quote:
Originally Posted by penandpaper
Jesus Christ! Does anyone read read here (at leat those that dispute the facts)? Global warming is about, and has always been about global warming and global cooling. The two exist side-by-side.

Why does it take the jester of the group to explain to you and Ami about this?




Actually, they do exist side by side. Right now, the Northern Hemisphere is cooler and the Southern Hemisphere is warmer. In another five months, it will be the other way around.

That's not climate, that's weather, the changing of the seasons over one year does not make a climate. But a thousand changing of the seasons does a climate make.

 

[TE999]

When the Grand High Pajandrum of Climate Change admits that his (and others) data has all the credulity of a 6th Graders book report on 'Moby Dick', the wheels are definitely off the wagon.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...-warming-email-row-admits-data-organised.html

I also read (sorry no link) that each climate variable in each of the much touted global warming computer models is but one of 26 possible variables from which to choose. Talk about fudging the data.

 

[Boxlicker101]

Quote:
Originally Posted by Boxlicker101
Quote:
Originally Posted by penandpaper
Jesus Christ! Does anyone read read here (at leat those that dispute the facts)? Global warming is about, and has always been about global warming and global cooling. The two exist side-by-side.

Why does it take the jester of the group to explain to you and Ami about this?

Actually, they do exist side by side. Right now, the Northern Hemisphere is cooler and the Southern Hemisphere is warmer. In another five months, it will be the other way around.

That's not climate, that's weather, the changing of the seasons over one year does not make a climate. But a thousand changing of the seasons does a climate make.

Well, for millions of years, the northern and southern hemispheres have changed back and forth, with one being warm and the other cold simultanneously.

 

[Handley_Page]

When the Grand High Pajandrum of Climate Change admits that his (and others) data has all the credulity of a 6th Graders book report on 'Moby Dick', the wheels are definitely off the wagon.

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/art...-warming-email-row-admits-data-organised.html

I also read (sorry no link) that each climate variable in each of the much touted global warming computer models is but one of 26 possible variables from which to choose. Talk about fudging the data.

Take a look at this report:-

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/02/15/hatton_on_hurricanes/

 

[JAMESBJOHNSON]

Several years ago I was involved in a case where a girl swore that her mom ran her over with a Cadillac. The girl had no marks or injuries yet the state social workers demanded she be removed from mom and put in foster care....because the girl said it happened and adults should believe kiddies.

The judge asked me what I thought, and I said MOM'S AN INCOMPETENT DRIVER IF SHE TRIED TO HIT THIS KID WITH A CADILLAC AND LEFT NO MARKS.

 

[trysail]

http://www.coaps.fsu.edu/~maue/tropical/may_june_july.jpg

 

[TE999]

Take a look at this report:-

http://www.theregister.co.uk/2010/02/15/hatton_on_hurricanes/

Thanks Handley...good info...there seemed to be a lot of hurricanes when I was a kid back in the 50's...I don't think the climate was changing back then although the summers were pretty hot...and I was living in Ft. Lauderdale, Florida.

 

[Boxlicker101]

To answer the question that was asked in the title of this thread, Al is probably flying around in his private jet or being driven around in one of his gas guzzler cars or holed up in one of his big houses.

 

[penandpaper]

Of course the global warming alarmists fail to mention that their "proof" is found using suburbam temperature stations and not adding rural stations to the data. Do you think heat gain from pavement and concrete have anything to do with it?

Mt Whitney is a suburb? Nome, AK is a suburb? Unakaleet, AK is a suburb? The middle of Patagonia is a suburb? Please make sure your info is correct. 72% of all climate recording stations are located over one mile from anything we would consider a suburb.

 

[trysail]

IPCC “Consensus”—Warning: Use at Your Own Risk
By: Chip Knappenberger

The findings of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) are often held up as representing “the consensus of scientists”—a pretty grandiose and presumptuous claim. And one that in recent days, weeks, and months, has been unraveling. So too, therefore, must all of the secondary assessments that are based on the IPCC findings—the most notable of which is the EPA’s Endangerment Finding—that “greenhouse gases taken in combination endanger both the public health and the public welfare of current and future generations.”

Recent events have shown, rather embarrassingly, that the IPCC is not “the” consensus of scientists, but rather the opinions of a few scientists (in some cases as few as one) in various subject areas whose consensus among themselves is then kludged together by the designers of the IPCC final product who a priori know what they want the ultimate outcome to be (that greenhouse gases are leading to dangerous climate change and need to be restricted). So clearly you can see why the EPA (who has a similar objective) would decide to rely on the IPCC findings rather than have to conduct an independent assessment of the science with the same predetermined outcome. Why go through the extra effort to arrive at the same conclusion?

The EPA’s official justification for its reliance on the IPCC’s findings is that it has reviewed the IPCC’s “procedures” and found them to be exemplary.

Below is a look at some things, recently revealed, that the IPCC “procedures” have produced. These recent revelations indicate that the “procedures” are not infallible and that highly publicized IPCC results are either wrong or unjustified—which has the knock-on effect of rendering the IPCC an unreliable source of information. Unreliable doesn’t mean wrong in all cases, mind you, just that it is hard to know where and when errors are present, and as such, the justification that “the IPCC says so” is no longer sufficient (or acceptable)...

*****​

...Many more examples of the IPCC “procedures” can be found courtesy of the Climategate emails.

For instance, in Chapter 6, the paleoclimate chapter of the IPCC’s most recent Fourth Assessment Report (AR4), it is the strong sentiment of one of the chapter’s coordinating lead author, Jonathan Overpeck, that he wants to dismiss the Medieval Warm Period (MWP)—a period of relatively high temperatures that occurred about a thousand years ago. If the MWP were found to be as warm as recent conditions, then the possibility that natural processes may play a larger role in recent warming is harder to ignore—thus the need to dismiss it. The task of doing so fell on Keith Briffa, who developed the contents of a special box in IPCC AR4 Chapter 6 that was apart from the main text and which focused on the WMP. Here’s the advice
( http://www.eastangliaemails.com/emails.php?eid=480&filename=1105670738.txt ) issued to Briffa by Overpeck:

I get the sense that I’m not the only one who would like to deal a mortal blow to the misuse of supposed warm period terms and myths in the literature. The sceptics and uninformed love to cite these periods as natural analogs for current warming too – pure rubbish.

So, pls DO try hard to follow up on my advice provided in previous email. No need to go into details on any but the MWP, but good to mention the others in the same dismissive effort.​

Briffa attempted to complete his task by presenting a well-chosen ( http://climateaudit.org/2008/09/26/manns-pc1-in-esper-and-frank-2008/ ) collection of data that showed that while some proxy temperature reconstructions did show a warm period about 1,000 years ago, others did not. He concluded that a more complete picture indicated that the higher temperatures during the MWP were “heterogeneous” (regionalized), while the warming of the late 20th century has been “homogeneous” (i.e. much broader in spatial extent)—confirming that current conditions were likely unprecedented during the past 1,300 years. Briffa received congratulations ( http://www.eastangliaemails.com/emails.php?eid=483&filename=1105978592.txt ) for a job well done by Overpeck:

[A]ttached is Keith’s MWP box w/ my edits. It reads just great – much like a big hammer. Nice job.”​

Thus, that conclusion driven by Overpeck’s desires, written by Briffa, perhaps reviewed by the chapter’s other authors (with varying degrees of knowledge about the subject), is now preserved as “the consensus of scientists.

But apparently, that consensus isn’t accepted by other leading paleoclimate researchers. In a peer-reviewed article published in 2009 in the journal Climatic Change, paleo-researchers Jan Esper and David Frank carefully re-examined the same proxy temperature reconstructions used by Briffa and came to conclude that the IPCC was unwarranted in declaring that the temperatures during the MWP were more heterogeneous than now. Here is the abstract from that paper ( http://www.wsl.ch/staff/jan.esper/publications/Esper_2009_CC_IPCC.pdf ):

In their 2007 report, IPCC working group 1 refers to an increased heterogeneity of climate during medieval times about 1000 years ago. This conclusion would be of relevance, as it implies a contrast in the spatial signature and forcing of current warmth to that during the Medieval Warm Period. Our analysis of the data displayed in the IPCC report, however, shows no indication of an increased spread between long-term proxy records. We emphasize the relevance of sample replication issues, and argue that an estimation of long-term spatial homogeneity changes is premature based on the smattering of data currently available.​

*****​

http://www.masterresource.org/2010/01/ipcc-consensus-warning-use-at-your-own-risk/#more-6981

 

[trysail]

Yanno, I'm not a conspiracy theory type but I do worry about data integrity and the exclusion of non-urban weather stations.

When one sees this kind of stuff ( http://www.rockyhigh66.org/stuff/USHCN_revisions_wisconsin.htm ), it does give one pause for thought.


See also:
http://www.surfacestations.org
http://www.rockyhigh66.org/stuff/USHCN_revisions.htm

 

[trysail]

Temperature records from NASA's
Goddard Institute for Space Studies:

Fort Smith, NWT, Canada
http://data.giss.nasa.gov/cgi-bin/g...py?id=403719340000&data_set=1&num_neighbors=1

Coppermine, NWT, Canada
http://data.giss.nasa.gov/cgi-bin/g...py?id=403719380005&data_set=1&num_neighbors=1

Anadyr, Siberia, Russia
http://data.giss.nasa.gov/cgi-bin/g...py?id=222255630007&data_set=1&num_neighbors=1

Markovo, Siberia, Russia
http://data.giss.nasa.gov/cgi-bin/g...py?id=222255510000&data_set=1&num_neighbors=1

Punta Arenas, Argentina
http://data.giss.nasa.gov/cgi-bin/g...py?id=304859340004&data_set=1&num_neighbors=1

San Antonio, Chile
http://data.giss.nasa.gov/cgi-bin/g...py?id=301877840003&data_set=1&num_neighbors=1

Amundsen-Scot, Antarctica
http://data.giss.nasa.gov/cgi-bin/g...py?id=700890090008&data_set=1&num_neighbors=1

Davis, Antarctica
http://data.giss.nasa.gov/cgi-bin/g...py?id=700895710008&data_set=1&num_neighbors=1

Christchurch, New Zealand
http://data.giss.nasa.gov/cgi-bin/g...py?id=507937800000&data_set=1&num_neighbors=1

Hokitika Aero, New Zealand
http://data.giss.nasa.gov/cgi-bin/g...py?id=507936150000&data_set=1&num_neighbors=1

 

[trysail]

They told us the polar bears were going to drown; they told us the Himalayan glaciers were going to melt by the year 2035. Now we learn both claims are untrue. They assured us they were engaged in unbiased science. And then we read their emails and found that they'd deliberately suppressed inconvenient facts. What are we to make of these disclosures? Are they just minor scratches on the solid structure of climate change theory, or are they emblematic of something far more troubling? Can we still trust the climate change experts or have they been guilty of exaggerating the threat in order to draw attention to their cause?

http://events.intelligencesquared.c..._Eaglman_Wellington2_16_2010&utm_medium=email

 

[trysail]

http://www.bloomberg.com/apps/news?pid=20601072&sid=aetYwnewp2eg

Nuclear Industry Gets Lift, No ‘Renaissance’ From U.S. Loan Aid
By Daniel Whitten

Feb. 17 (Bloomberg) -- Don’t call it a renaissance yet, says John Rowe, who oversees the biggest fleet of nuclear reactors in the U.S.

President Barack Obama’s announcement yesterday that the government will guarantee loans for the country’s first new nuclear plants in 30 years is a necessary move that won’t in itself spur a revival of the dormant industry, said Rowe, chief executive officer of Chicago-based Exelon Corp.

“We may see more and faster development of new plants now,” said Rowe, whose company operates 17 reactors. “We probably won’t see a full-blown nuclear renaissance in the next five to 10 years.”

In the first disbursement from a five-year-old program, Obama said Atlanta-based Southern Co. and partners will receive $8.33 billion in loan guarantees to build two reactors in Georgia, next to two existing ones. The plants would be the first licensed in the U.S. since a partial meltdown at Pennsylvania’s Three Mile Island in 1979.

“It’s gone thirty years in the desert, and it hasn’t even had a cup of water,” Reed Hundt, co-chairman of the Coalition for the Green Bank, a Washington-based group that pushes for federal financing of energy projects, said before yesterday’s announcement. “Nuclear is another one of those activities where if the government doesn’t step in, you’re not going to see anything going on.”

Falling Behind
While the U.S. operates more nuclear plants than any other country, with 104 reactors, it’s playing catch-up in construction. Worldwide, 56 reactors are being built, including 21 in China, nine in Russia, six in South Korea and five in India, according to the International Atomic Energy Agency in Vienna. Only one, the resurrection of a canceled project in Tennessee, is under way in the U.S.

“I think it’s a great step in the right direction,” Southern Co. CEO David Ratcliffe said at a news conference yesterday. “There is a tremendous amount of work that still has to be done in the licensing process and obviously in the construction phase.”

Assuming the licenses are approved, the two reactors would be completed in 2016 and 2017. “No, let’s be reasonable,” Ratcliffe said when asked if several dozen new plants can be built in the next three decades...

...In addition to lingering concerns about safety, the rising cost of reactors to more than $8 billion each and the absence of a plan for disposing of nuclear waste have short-circuited revival initiatives.

‘Essential Transition’
...The U.S. industry has filed applications to build 28 reactors since 2007, according to the Nuclear Regulatory Commission; none, including the Southern plants, has been approved by regulators. Until the government’s loan guarantee, none had a clear line on financing.

“At the moment the capital markets won’t be available simply because nuclear is too untested and too big,” said Aneesh Prabhu, an analyst at Standard and Poor’s in New York.

“You need some kind of seed capital, and in this case the size makes it impossible for a venture capitalist to be funding it -- and that’s where federal support is required,” Prabhu said in a telephone interview.

Market Rejection
Financial markets’ rejection of reactors “is an example of market success, markets properly assessing risk and acting accordingly by refusing to underwrite” new nuclear plants, Mark Cooper, research director at Consumer Federation of America wrote in December in a Vermont Law School report.

The San Antonio city council in October halted a vote on whether to proceed with financing for two reactors in Texas, part of a venture with Princeton, New Jersey-based NRG Energy Inc., after learning the costs could rise to $17 billion from $13 billion.

FPL Group Inc., owner of Florida Power & Light Co., the state’s largest utility, last month suspended $10 billion in investments in the state when regulators approved a $75.5 million rate increase for this year, 8 percent of the amount sought. Among the stalled projects are added nuclear reactors.

In the proposed budget for fiscal 2011, Obama wants to triple the Department of Energy’s loan-guarantee program to $54.5 billion from the $18.5 billion authorized during the George W. Bush administration and not acted on until yesterday.

‘Personal Priority’
“I am frustrated that DOE has still not issued a loan guarantee for nuclear power,” Senator Lisa Murkowski, an Alaska Republican, told Energy Secretary Steven Chu at a Feb. 5 hearing.

“It’s been a personal priority of mine to overhaul the loan-guarantee process,” Chu said on a conference call with reporters yesterday. “I’m determined to use this program to help restart America’s nuclear-power industry.”

Chu has said the $54.5 billion in loan guarantees could help fund seven to 10 reactors, laying the groundwork for further expansion.

The industry and its congressional supporters, such as Senator Lamar Alexander, a Tennessee Republican, and Senator Jim Webb, a Virginia Democrat, say the U.S. needs to provide as much as $100 billion.

The loan guarantee is “an important first step for creating large amounts of carbon-free electricity,” Alexander said in an interview in anticipation of yesterday’s announcement.

While the U.S. is “a long way from” a nuclear renaissance, ”I think it’s coming,” Alexander said.