IPCC's "Africagate" blunder as told by Dr. Richard North

Dr. Richard North, who does investigative journalism at the EU referendum blog, has a comprehensive analysis and backgrounder on the latest in a series of blunders by the IPCC that have been uncovered. It complements the just released story by Jonathan Leake of The Sunday Times that highlights a leading British scientist calling for IPPC to “tackle the blunders or lose all credibility

Here is Dr. North’s introduction to the issue:

And now for Africagate

Following an investigation by this blog (and with the story also told in The Sunday Times), another major “mistake” in the IPCC’s benchmark Fourth Assessment Report has emerged.

Similar in effect to the erroneous “2035” claim ā€“ the year the IPCC claimed that Himalayan glaciers were going to melt ā€“ in this instance we find that the IPCC has wrongly claimed that in some African countries, yields from rain-fed agriculture could be reduced by up to 50 percent by 2020.

At best, this is a wild exaggeration, unsupported by any scientific research, referenced only to a report produced by a Canadian advocacy group, written by an obscure Moroccan academic who specialises in carbon trading, citing references which do not support his claims.

Unlike the glacier claim, which was confined to a section of the technical Working Group II report, this “50 percent by 2020” claim forms part of the key Synthesis Report, the production of which was the personal responsibility of the chair of the IPCC, Dr R K Pachauri. It has been repeated by him in many public fora. He, therefore, bears a personal responsibility for the error.

In this lengthy post, we examine the nature and background of this latest debacle, which is now under investigation by IPCC scientists and officials.

===============================

What follows is a detailed investigation by Dr. North, I highly recommend reading it here:

EU Referendum: And now for Africagate

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February 6, 2010 2:39 pm

Dr North has done us a great service. The cumulative drip-drip effect of distortions being revealed build a clear picture of a detailed and deliberate attempt to mislead people and misrepresent the facts to suit the agenda of vested interests.
If the science is sound, as various talking heads in the media and from organs such as the Met Office would have us believe, then why is there a need to include so many bogus claims?
Pachauri’s time at the IPCC is coming to an end because he will take the fall. But this goes far wider than Pachauri. Who knows, such is the level of his arrogance, he could be minded to speak out and reveal even more about the goings on behind the scenes, from research labs to Ministerial offices.

DoctorJJ
February 6, 2010 2:40 pm

At this point, nothing, in regards to the shadiness of the IPCC, surprises me anymore.

E.M.Smith
Editor
February 6, 2010 2:40 pm

IPCC – The gift that keeps on giving!

Michael
February 6, 2010 2:43 pm

During a global cooling onset like the one we have today due to the deep solar minimum, all areas deprived of rain in the buildup to solar max and after its drop off, are once again replenished as has happened in the past year. Most US reservoirs and aquifers are all full up again. Africa will also enjoy the benefits of global cooling and solar minimum.

Gerard
February 6, 2010 2:43 pm

Is there no end to the extent that the IPCC will go. With such systemic falsehoods throughout the document it looks more and more like the lies were designed to purposely to (use the Brit’s words) to sex up the document to suck in the media and shallow politicians looking for votes.

February 6, 2010 2:45 pm

Once again, every region of the world had to have its own horror fairy-tale. Asia-Andia, Latin America, Africa, and so on. It’s pretty hard to remember all the gates.
ClimateGate, GlacierGate, TeriGate, AmazonGate, DisasterGate, HollandGate, AfricaGate, …
And they haven’t started to approve the cap-and-trade bills yet, because if they had, there would surely be lots of BillGates. šŸ™‚

DCC
February 6, 2010 2:50 pm

Darn, E.M.Smith beat me to it! But I confess that I, too, have typed IPPC more often than I should.

Tenuc
February 6, 2010 2:58 pm

Strange that the IPCC AR4 report will be the document responsible for the end of the CAGW scam. This is better than any spy novel!

lex
February 6, 2010 2:59 pm

Well, actually not the latest blunder of the IPCC, but this is what would happen according to the IPCC with the Netherlands, 55% would be submerged by the sea. Luckily it turns out to be 20%.
http://www.rtl.nl/(/actueel/rtlnieuws/binnenland/)/components/actueel/rtlnieuws/2010/02_februari/04/binnenland/blunders-van-klimaatpanel.xml
What do you mean with research?

Leon Brozyna
February 6, 2010 2:59 pm

Climategate
Pachaurigate
TERIgate
Hurricanegate
Disastergate
Glaciergate
Amazongate
NGOgate ā€“ including
ā€¦WWFgate
ā€¦NWFgate
ā€¦Greenpeacegate
ā€¦Magazinegate
ā€¦Thesisgate
ā€¦Newspapergate
Bootgate
Chinagate
Africagate
Hmmmm … about the only gate not yet uncovered is Western Europe and North America. Perhaps that will come when the temperature data is uncovered and the manipulations done to that data are shown to underpin the whole AGW belief system. That is the real offense to science.

Lance
February 6, 2010 3:02 pm

Wow!
After Himalaya-gate our minister of environment, mrs. Cramer, told the Dutch that she will not accept another mistake by the IPCC…I wonder what she will do now.
Anthony and the others, thanks for everything!
Lance

Leon Brozyna
February 6, 2010 3:02 pm

Whoops … forgot Hollandgate.

KimW
February 6, 2010 3:02 pm

Words like ‘Sloppy’ and “fraudulent’ might be replaced by the simple phrase “Climate Science’. This stuff is supposed to be the cutting edge of modern knowledge and instead it is coming across as less than the greasy campaign promises of of a socialist politician.
There is an agenda here.

February 6, 2010 3:03 pm

“By 2020, in some countries, yields from rain-fed agriculture could be reduced by up to 50%.”
This is not science – this is spin. There are so many woolly words in that, that it can be said to be true practically whatever happens.
By 2020, in SOME countries, yields from rain-fed agriculture COULD be reduced by UP TO 50%.
So a 1% reduction in rain-fed agricultural yield in any single country before 2020 for any reason under the sun (for example natural weather variation) will satisfy that statement. I’m afraid the people who write this stuff and propagate it have been taking lessons in political spin from advocacy groups: how to deceive and get people to believe lies without actually lying.
I wonder how Pachauri is going to extricate himself from this one, since he can’t bleat that he wasn’t responsible.
It’s time to abandon the IPCC: it is a laughing-stock. Get off folks before you get caught in the train wreck.

February 6, 2010 3:03 pm

Dear Leon Brozyna,
you’re surely wrong that there hasn’t been any gate in Western Europe yet.
What about HollandGate, with the IPCC tripling the area of Holland under the sea level?
http://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/world/europe/55-of-Holland-below-sea-IPCC-got-this-wrong-too/articleshow/5540792.cms
Cheers
LM

February 6, 2010 3:04 pm

It is rather appropriate that Golf Links, New Delhi, home of Rajendra Pachauri, is a gated community.

Tenuc
February 6, 2010 3:05 pm

Ironic that the UK climate change TV ad features a young girl being told a Dr R K Pachauri fairytale by her dad. Perhaps Hans Anderson would have done a better job.

DirkH
February 6, 2010 3:09 pm

http://beta.thehindu.com/news/national/article102273.ece
“The European Union (EU) has offered to help the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) strengthen its quality control system, after the climate science panel was revealed to have made a mistake about the timeline melting of Himalayan glaciers.”

DCC
February 6, 2010 3:11 pm

The USA doesn’t need any IPCC “gates.” We have data massaged by NOAA which, in turn, is the basis for many of the claims in IPCC reports !

Michael
February 6, 2010 3:11 pm

Perhaps it would be a more efficient use of our time if we focus on what is not fiction in the IPCC AR4. That way we could spend more time on sharpening our pitch forks and gathering our torches.

CarlNC
February 6, 2010 3:11 pm

This must be very embarrassing to all scientists. Glad I’m only an engineer.
It has been said before that this fiasco is damaging the image of science, and as time goes on and the IPCC keeps repeating the line that these errors and omissions don’t change the science, people will become ever more skeptical. The IPCC, sans RKP, should retract AR4 immediately and begin a rewrite, supervised by a scientist and not a politician. If that or similar drastic action is not taken soon, AR5 will have no credibility at all, in my opinion.

rbateman
February 6, 2010 3:20 pm

At this rate, the IPCC will leaning on a walking stick. The table they had laid out doesn’t seem to have a leg left under it.
Leon Brozyna (14:59:46) :
Hmmmm ā€¦ about the only gate not yet uncovered is Western Europe and North America. Perhaps that will come when the temperature data is uncovered and the manipulations done to that data are shown to underpin the whole AGW belief system. That is the real offense to science.

That would be the raw data as opposed to the rubberized version they now hold in high esteem.

Dave Worley
February 6, 2010 3:22 pm

RobustGate is real.

leftymartin
February 6, 2010 3:22 pm

Richard North (15:04:18).
Touche! And on behalf of all who value integrity in science, thank you for your work in exposing the IPCC’s bankruptcy in same.
Let’s all keep in mind that Pachauri is not the problem, he is merely the titular head of the problem – the IPCC had evangelism and corruption ingrained within its origins and its charter. Pachauri walking the plank will change none of that. Again, the longer we are able to keep Pachauri around, the better.

lex
February 6, 2010 3:25 pm

@Leon & Lubos
Dutch people are accustomed to live below sea level. In fact this the Dutch do this for about 4 to 6 centuries and they have the knowledge to handle this.
The problem is, that a government institute, which was eagerly and willingly to rapport the IPCC, the Dutch Institute on Habitat Environment, gave the wrong figures.
Mrs Jacqueline Cramer, now secretary of state of environment and who studied on the University of Arkansas during the late 60’s early 70’s, is a direct responsible for this.
Mrs Jacqueline Cramer considers sceptics as believers of a flat earth!!!

WitteringsfromWitney
February 6, 2010 3:28 pm

Were there more ‘investigative journalists’, of the calibre of Richard North and Christopher Booker, in the MSM!

Baike
February 6, 2010 3:30 pm

This Pachauri guy must have more than a few chips in the big game to still be upright at this point. These grifters always surround themselves with folks on whom they have enough dirt to ensure loyalty.

DirkH
February 6, 2010 3:31 pm

http://www.redorbit.com/news/science/1819675/netherlands_enters_the_climate_fray/
“The IPCCā€™s calculation that 55 percent of the Netherlands was below sea level came from adding the actual estimates that 26 percent of the area was below sea level and 29 percent of the area was threatened from river flooding, Vallaart said. […] The error has been brought up to the IPCC several times, but nothing has happened as of yet. He was disappointed that proper procedure could not be followed and added that it should not be left to politicians to review IPCC figures”

Pamela Gray
February 6, 2010 3:35 pm

It wouldn’t surprise me to find the next piece of climate change results reported by IPCC’s 4th report comes from Mad Magazine. Wait. Pachauri wrote a D grade sleaze story, so I should be looking for that reference in Hustler.

Jim F
February 6, 2010 3:38 pm

Wow! We need to keep Pachy at the head of the IPCC. Do not join with GreenPeace and the long line forming at the left side of this argument. The guy just keeps on giving, like a pinata that instantly heals and refills itself, ready for another belting.
GP et al. just want the hurt to go away. Pachy for President! Rally behind him?
Mann!

jorge c
February 6, 2010 3:42 pm

it is worst than we thought…
what i don’t understand it is that IPCC “report” has been presented 2 years ago… only now are they founding mistakes??? has it not been studied before???
sorry for my awful english…

Jim F
February 6, 2010 3:43 pm

@ LuboÅ” Motl (15:03:45) :
“…Dear Leon Brozyna,
youā€™re surely wrong that there hasnā€™t been any gate in Western Europe yet….”
I think there is one clearly set out in the ClimateGate emails: The case of Scandinavia, that Professor W? pointed out to Jones. The good prof. seemed to make a case, over a bigger area, that sounds like “Darwin” all over again. Willis, are you working on this?

February 6, 2010 3:44 pm

Just to note that Fiona Harvey at the FT had tried to retreat to the SPM as the one part of the IPCC reports to be treated as “the gold standard”

In drawing the conclusions for the SPM, the scientists apply more robust methodologies than are applied to the inclusion of data into the wider report. The predictions that make it into the summary for policymakers are only those that are most widely supported by different data sources – that is, where many pieces of research point in the same direction.

As I pointed out at the time, all one needed was then to find a flaw in the SPM for the whole pretence of the IPCC as a “scientific” body to collapse. Thanks to Richard North, that’s exactly what has now happened..

debreuil
February 6, 2010 3:47 pm

“The sun is a variable star” – great article on the upcoming Solar Dynamics Observatory and how the sun affects things like, um, climate…
http://science.nasa.gov/headlines/y2010/05feb_sdo.htm
Nasa has some great projects, but has got to stop letting the cheerleaders call the plays.

John F. Hultquist
February 6, 2010 3:48 pm

What an interesting tale. It reminds me of the party game of passing a story down a line of people and seeing, in the end, how much it has changed. See here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chinese_whispers
In the game variously known as Chinese whispers,[1] Telephone, Broken Telephone, Whisper Down the Lane, ā€¦
The game is often played by children

Stephen Brown
February 6, 2010 3:48 pm

I have read Dr. Richard North’s “Africagate” article and I had to laugh.
I grew up on a farm which was on the banks of the Kafue River in Zambia. Each year we would watch anxiously where in the reeds along the river the weaver birds were building their nests. If they built low down on the reeds then the rains were going to be scant. If they built high up, then there was going to be heavy rain.
One year we couldn’t find any nesting activity in the reeds. Our African employees told us that this meant that the river was going to flood. My parents abandoned our house, moving everything they could into shipping containers well above the river, including all of us in the family.
Four weeks later our house had four feet of water flowing through it and when we went in our boat to examine the property we were amazed to find a five-foot long crocodile in the lounge, seeking refuge from the fast-flowing water outside!
The weaver birds had got it right again, as they did every year. They were and still are better than any weather predictors as far as the amount of rain which is going to fall.

kadaka
February 6, 2010 3:51 pm

“AgriculturalGate” is too wordy. Could this IPCC blunder (link found at Climate Depot) be called “GrowGate”?

Lazarus Long
February 6, 2010 3:53 pm

Can we finally and for all time start calling this guy Dr R K Patchouli?

February 6, 2010 4:00 pm

Autonomous Mind (14:39:47) said:
“If the science is sound, as various talking heads in the media and from organs such as the Met Office would have us believe, then why is there a need to include so many bogus claims?”
Hasn’t that always been one of the main questions?
Al Gore’s movie, The IPCC reports, Mann’s “hidings”, CRU’s “manipulations”, GISS’s “selectivity”, etc. all should be totally unnecessary, if the science is sound.

February 6, 2010 4:03 pm

KimW (15:02:29)
I agree totally that there is an agenda. The agenda is to control the worldā€™s wealth by buying, trading, and selling carbon credits as a new monetary unit and to control people by enforcing regulation on energy sources that affect carbon dioxide in the atmosphere. In this effort capitalism and free enterprise will be disappear.
The world leaders at Copenhagen could afford private jets and limos because their sponsors expect a payoff in carbon dollars or they are themselves carbon entrepreneurs. Iā€™ll bet they wish that they had spent more money to improve the quality of the IPCC report. This article presents just one of many flaws the IPCC report given as evidence that CO2 is the only cause of global warming, and therefore must be stopped by controlling the release of CO2 from carbon energy sources. If they have their way we will end up poor, hungry, and freezing in the dark.

Methow Ken
February 6, 2010 4:06 pm

Given the statements by former IPCC Chair Robert Watson reported in last prior thread; the inclusion of AfricaGate in the key Synthesis Report (good grief, Charlie Brown); and a list of ”gates” that is now long enough I need a spreadsheet to properly track them all:
I have to ask: HOW MUCH violation of any semblence of the scientific method, intellectual fraud, financial irregularity, blatant self-interest, shameless pandering, and pervasive gross incompetence IS ENOUGH; before Pachauri and the whole corrupt IPCC structure finally and formally get the boot ?? . . .
The world wonders. . . .

RockyRoad
February 6, 2010 4:12 pm

Whenever I see “IPCC” anymore, it reminds me of ipecac.

John F. Hultquist
February 6, 2010 4:15 pm

Others and Michael @(14:43:29) :
During a global cooling onset like the one we have today due to the deep solar minimum,
There are intriguing correlations and relevant hypotheses as regards the science of our Sun and the climate of Earth. To accept these correlations and hypotheses as proven is to adopt the fuzzy belief system of the CAGW group. Personally I think the claim that CO2 output by humans is going to cause catastrophic destabilization of Earthā€™s climate is not true. There are still too many interesting hypotheses about the Sun and Earth to investigate for me to plant both feet on any one of them and proclaim ā€œThis is it.ā€
When several have been falsified and others strengthened Iā€™ll re-evaluate my position. Until one or more have great support Iā€™m comfortable being a skeptic. Meanwhile let the warmest defend their belief, if they can.

Don Shaw
February 6, 2010 4:16 pm

I previously stated that the IPCC AR 4 report should be audited and completely redone.
I changed my mind given all the problems. India has the right approach, withdraw from the IPCC. The organization is not capable of correcting the numerous errors and exaggerations.
I should have remembered that the UN, while originally started with a worthwhile objective, has been so corrupted that it is beyond repair. Remember the oil for food scandal? The head of the UN was deeply involved as well as his son and various politicians, all of which got rich. Did anyone pay the price for the corruption and stealing from the Iraqui people who were starving? Also picture Castro, Chavez, Gadaffi, the Iranian leader, etc spewing hate and lies before the UN assembly with huge approval from the left wing members. Look at their inability to help Africa. Remember the rape and pillage comitted by UN troops. What has the UN done to stop nuclear proliferation by Iran or North Korea?
The UN is incapable of doing anything effectively without being tainted with politics and greed.
Dump the UN and divert the money we spend to positive use.

DirkH
February 6, 2010 4:20 pm

“kadaka (15:51:04) :
ā€œAgriculturalGateā€ is too wordy. Could this IPCC blunder (link found at Climate Depot) be called ā€œGrowGateā€?”
agrogate.

Kendra
February 6, 2010 4:25 pm

In the last few weeks, so many discoveries have either been made or finally gotten airtime about the IPCC reports.
I’m just curious – is it that there were already enough uphill battles that no one really studied the references the IPCC used? Or had they already been noticed but no one paid attention when they were pointed out?
I got the impression after the CRU emails, that no one realized how egregious that data was – the surface stations project was going on, and we knew that many sites were not up to standard – but it’s only after that that people decided to look at specific stations – usually near to them, which they had more or less presumed to be more or less OK – e.g. Darwin Zero, and others shortly afterward including the SƤntis here in Switzerland (where you see some great old photos as well as find out that the weather station monitors were murdered in 1922 (unsolved)!
To go back to my question, did everyone, skeptics included, take most of this on faith (because they already had enough problems – and enough evidence)? I am an amateur so excuse me for asking a naive question – it just seems to me someone somewhere must have read this report back in 2007 and pointed out at least some of this – or not? Or did no one listen?
I haven’t read all the comments yet so sorry if this has been addressed already.

Dr A Burns
February 6, 2010 4:29 pm

Data seems a bit sparce but from what I can see, there’s been a slight increase in rain around Morocco, for example:
http://www.appinsys.com/GlobalWarming/climgraph.aspx?pltparms=GHCNP100AJanDecI188020080900110AR20140990000x

Snufflegruff
February 6, 2010 4:29 pm

Leon Brozyna (14:59:46) :
Climategate
Pachaurigate
TERIgate
Hurricanegate
Disastergate
Glaciergate
Amazongate
NGOgate ā€“ including
ā€¦WWFgate
ā€¦NWFgate
ā€¦Greenpeacegate
ā€¦Magazinegate
ā€¦Thesisgate
ā€¦Newspapergate
Bootgate
Chinagate
Africagate
Can’t we just revert to the apt and witty ‘Warmergate’?

View from the Solent
February 6, 2010 4:41 pm

An attempt at invoking sympathy Sunday Times(UK) . Who’s been talking to a PR agency? Or in other words, mea culpa.

joe
February 6, 2010 4:41 pm

This is nothing, its just show that science is ugly, and some experts have gone rogue. But the science behind climate change is concrete. There are thousands of peer reviewed studies that support it. And I base that on nothing.
Thats the typical media spin such scandals get.

Michael Larkin
February 6, 2010 4:43 pm

Stephen Brown (15:48:34) :
What an absolutely fascinating observation from your personal experience. One wonders whether this kind of thing is generalisable and if so whether it would have any role to play in weather, if not climate, prediction.

Indiana Bones
February 6, 2010 4:45 pm

Well done. However, is it not odd that none of these errors was discovered before now?? And if the IPCC peer review process worked at all, and these errors were flagged – what happened to the flags? Are there peer reviewers out there that would like to tell us what happened when they critiqued IPCC work?? Were they ignored??
Or what.

Bob Highland
February 6, 2010 4:46 pm

What next? There’s no “Australiagate” yet, and we’re feeling a bit left out. Note to self: Get onto it – there’s bound to be one in there somewhere. Something about droughts perhaps, as many citizens of NSW and Qld mop up after between 3 and 8 inches of rain in the last 24 hours.
ā€œBut the underlying science is robust!ā€ they cry.
ā€œOh yeah? Prove it,ā€ we shout back.
ā€œThe models canā€™t be wrong,ā€ they retort, stamping their feet.
ā€œGarbage in, garbage out,ā€ we bellow, those millions of us who have ever worked with computers or used a spreadsheet to conclusively prove that black is white, simply by beginning with the conclusion and fiddling the variables to arrive at it.
I have genuine sympathy for all of those scientists who have done their jobs skilfully and honestly (i.e. without an agenda) to derive new knowledge about the most complex system we (almost) know of, barring life itself. That their work should be misused by agents of doom with a monophonic agenda is a travesty in itself.
But then, ’twere ever so. Money talks, hucksterism squawks, and bulls**t walks.
The entire IPCC process, not to mention the once noble concept of peer review, is surely now compromised beyond salvation, and the devious clowns that run it must soon be feeling the rapier’s cruel point on their collective ar**s as they walk the plank.

February 6, 2010 4:46 pm

CarlNC (15:11:56) :
“It has been said before that this fiasco is damaging the image of science, and as time goes on and the IPCC keeps repeating the line that these errors and omissions donā€™t change the science …”
In a way I agree with the IPCC on this. The core science is the man-made global warming hypothesis. That is unaffected by wild predictions of how man-made global warming would affect life on the planet. The problem for the IPCC is that a prophesy of doom is necessary, otherwise global warming is nothing to worry about.
I wonder what predictions of doom now remain. I suppose sea level rises are still threatened, although we know the IPCC has scaled back its predictions to such an extent that beach-front properties in California have been given an official safety certificate by Saint Al of Gore.

Gary Hladik
February 6, 2010 4:54 pm

Leon Brozyna (14:59:46) : Thanks for the (growing) -gate list. I picture Pachauri as Cardinal Fang of the Spanish Inquisition, protesting in a high-pitched voice:
“TWO paltry mistakes do NOT discredit my IPCC! Glaciers and the Amazon, Amazon and glaciers…and weather disasters–THREE mistakes! Glaciers, Amazon, and disasters do not…and Holland–FOUR mistakes!
.
.
.
SEVENTY-SIX mistakes, uh, the nature of which I have divulged in my previous utterances, do not discredit…and African rainfall–SEVENTY-SEVEN mistakes!”

February 6, 2010 4:54 pm

We need a special link that briefly summarizes all of the gates in clear, easy for even a warmist to understand, language…preferably with links to supporting articles.
This is from another poster (forgot who) and does a great job. However, it was done after Amazongate and darn if this IPCC corruption-gate thing just keeps getting more interesting. It’s hard to keep up!
__________________________
“Would it be correct and sequentially correct to summarise the revelations of the last few months as consisting of:
1. Hockey-stickgate ā€“ wherein is described the distortion, hiding and manipulation of temperature data as evidence of a hypothesis.
2. Climategate ā€“ wherein is described the corruption of the peer-review process by an AGW ā€œmafiaā€
3. Pachaurigate ā€“ consisting of actions (or omissions) which have converted the supposedly scientific and peer-reviewed credentials of the IPCC AR4 report into an advocacy document, and in turn encompassing:
3.1 Glaciergate wherein is described the exaggeration of non-peer reviewed press articles (with no scientific backing) to further a particular political agenda, and
3.2 TERIgate wherein the exaggerated claims of Glaciergate are used in support of obtaining funding for research projects, and
3.3 Disastergate wherein it is implied that there is a clear statistical link between natural disasters and global warming where there is none, and
3.4 Amazongate wherein a postulation that there is a linkage between the Brazilian forest and rainfall is morphed to become a linkage between the Amazon forests and global warming.”

rbateman
February 6, 2010 4:58 pm

Pamela Gray (15:35:56) :
Yes. You have struck gold. Don Martin could easily head the IPCC.
It would make a great Magazine. 50 cents cheap.
Humor in a Carbon Vein.
Green vs Green
Scenes we’d like to Forget.

February 6, 2010 4:58 pm

Maybe we should call this C3-Gate or Climate Change Corruption-gate.

DirkH
February 6, 2010 4:59 pm

“Kendra (16:25:53) :
[…]
To go back to my question, did everyone, skeptics included, take most of this on faith (because they already had enough problems ā€“ and enough evidence)?”
I can only speak for myself. Since buying Lomborg’s “The skeptical environmentalist” about 5 years ago i knew that the IPCC was an organization primarily focussed on exaggerating its claims. I never bothered to read the IPCC reports myself, why read all that stuff when i consider it biased anyway? So there was the opposite of faith on my part. Let’s just say i’d be surprised if they have one fact right.

February 6, 2010 5:00 pm

I thought of killing myself, says climate scandal professor Phil Jones
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article7017922.ece
THE scientist at the centre of the ā€œclimategateā€ email scandal has revealed that he was so traumatised by the global backlash against him that he contemplated suicide. Professor Phil Jones said in an exclusive interview with The Sunday Times that he had thought about killing himself ā€œseveral timesā€. He acknowledged similarities to Dr David Kelly, the scientist who committed suicide after being exposed as the source for a BBC report that alleged the government had ā€œsexed upā€ evidence to justify the invasion of Iraq.

Gary Hladik
February 6, 2010 5:05 pm

Gary Hladik (16:54:13), correction: Cardinal Ximinez.
Does this error make me eligible to join the IPCC?

Rob
February 6, 2010 5:07 pm

These errors were all known and in there for effect.

Harry
February 6, 2010 5:11 pm

“I suppose sea level rises are still threatened”
Even Greenpeace only claims sea levels rises of between 3 inches and 3 feet over the next 100 years.

TinyCo2
February 6, 2010 5:11 pm

When are the IPCC going to wave the white flag and do what they should have done right back when Steve McIntyre broke Mannā€™s hockey stick?
Start from scratch guys! Ditch the exaggerations and the fakery. Make all the data and software available to the public. Put a gag in your most obnoxious allies (Al Gore, Prince Charles and Greenpeace). Set up independent auditing of all areas and start listening to the sceptics.
The longer you leave it, the harder it will be to regain ground.

Greg Cavanagh
February 6, 2010 5:12 pm

But the report was written by 2600 of the worlds best scientists. All the scientists agree, sic.
I am glad that people are finaly beginning to look under the hood at the science. Now to just get the politicians to understand that all this climate sciance has been hyped to a degree which is not a reliable reflection of the state of understanding.
A costly exersize so far, hopefuly some pragmatism will be instilled in the media, politicians and public.

Richard M
February 6, 2010 5:15 pm

I think the USA has plenty of problems, not the least of which was Mann’s Hockey Stick. Now, you might have PennStateGate to add to the list. And, don’t forget the march of the thermometers … NoaaGate? And, with Hansen/Schmidt around there’s probably a NasaGate lurking somewhere.

February 6, 2010 5:16 pm

This “gate” appears to me to be the biggest because Pachauri cannot possibly wiggle out by saying he “did not know” or that it is a minor error.
It is so big that it isn’t a gate, it is as big as a barn door, or better yet, huge as a mountain pass leading to his valley of despair and loathing.
John

Richard M
February 6, 2010 5:20 pm

Bob Highland (16:46:22) :
What next? Thereā€™s no ā€œAustraliagateā€ yet, and weā€™re feeling a bit left out.
Well, there’s always Darwin. Not to mention all the hysteria of increased wildfires. In fact, is this mentioned anywhere in the IPCC report? Could another gate in the making.

February 6, 2010 5:28 pm

As View from the Solent points out, Phil Jones is invoking the sympathy card claiming things have made him feel suicidal. But of a resignation there is no sign. He’s a bit extreme in that sense.
Old news for some… but, in that parallel dimension occupied by the Met Office, we have Professor John Mitchell’s tooth and nail fight to withhold his 2007 AR4 working papers and correspondence with IPCC chums splashed across the Mail. So worried is the Met Office, they’ve got the Defence Secretary to justify the refusal.
http://autonomousmind.wordpress.com/2010/02/06/met-office-and-mod-collude-in-climate-data-cover-up/
Met Office credibility is about the same as the temperature in Celsius in Washington DC right now…

February 6, 2010 5:31 pm

OT I thought of killing myself, says climate scandal professor Phil Jones
THE scientist at the centre of the ā€œclimategateā€ email scandal has revealed that he was so traumatised by the global backlash against him that he contemplated suicide.
Professor Phil Jones said in an exclusive interview with The Sunday Times that he had thought about killing himself ā€œseveral timesā€. He acknowledged similarities to Dr David Kelly, the scientist who committed suicide after being exposed as the source for a BBC report that alleged the government had ā€œsexed upā€ evidence to justify the invasion of Iraq.
In emails that were hacked into and seized upon by global-warming sceptics before the Copenhagen climate summit in December, Jones appeared to call upon his colleagues to destroy scientific data rather than release it to people intent on discrediting their work monitoring climate change.
Jones, 57, said he was unprepared for the scandal: ā€œI am just a scientist. I have no training in PR or dealing with crises.ā€
Story continues… http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article7017922.ece

DirkH
February 6, 2010 5:35 pm

“joe (16:41:11) :
This is nothing, its just show that science is ugly, and some experts have gone rogue. But the science behind climate change is concrete. ”
You mean like GCM’s that can’t model cloud formation?

AndyB
February 6, 2010 5:37 pm

OT – I’m annoyed. Not with you guys on this board but the whole way this is going. I’m insulted: I’m being called a “flat Earther”, a “denier”, and I’m not a “climate scientist”. There’s thousands of homeopathists telling me I don’t know how water works as well! Sounds the same with climate “science” – if the methodolody is flawed every result after is suspect, this is the way my science works and has done for hundreds of years. I’m the arch skeptic: I try and catch myself when I’m going with my emotions and play devils’s advocate with myself…. but, speaking for myself, I’m all with cutting back on pollution, wasting resources etc. but absolutely none of this political charade is helping anybody… I’ll rephrase that, it isn’t helping us, the majority.

February 6, 2010 5:51 pm

”””Dave Worley (15:22:11) : RobustGate is real.””’
The IPCC AR4 report IS robust!
Robustly incorrect and misleading.
John

February 6, 2010 6:01 pm

””’Pamela Gray (15:35:56) : It wouldnā€™t surprise me to find the next piece of climate change results reported by IPCCā€™s 4th report . . . . .should be looking for that reference in Hustler.”””’
Pamela, good . . . . really good.
But we all should get our rabies shots. The rodent (nest of rodents) that we all keep chewing on looks to me to be infected.
To health & happiness,
John

February 6, 2010 6:05 pm

I like the term…
“Robustly Wrong”
for The Team’s new motto..

February 6, 2010 6:06 pm

I like the Term…
“Robustly Wrong”
to summarize the IPCC and Team Stick

tokyoboy
February 6, 2010 6:08 pm

I’m now quite sure that these revelations of GATES will make at least three people read IPCC’s AR5 cautiously, if ever it comes into being some day ……..

DirkH
February 6, 2010 6:09 pm

O/T
These days i’m constantly trawling the english and german versions of google news to see how the media bias shifts. While most hits on the first page for global warming in the english version are circling around the IPCC’s failings, germany is still in a deep slumber. Articles for “ErderwƤrmung” (Global warming) still center around how we can all do our bit to reduce our carbon footprint.
Funnily, a section of the german Greens are firm believers in chemtrails:
http://www.gruene-glashuetten.de/index.php?dom=1?=22&p=74
Sigh. This party was part of the government coalition til 5 years ago. Even the UK has no match for these morons.

Richard M
February 6, 2010 6:11 pm

Autonomous Mind (17:28:24),
Great, add MetGate to the list.

February 6, 2010 6:17 pm

””’jorge c (15:42:48) : it is worst than we thoughtā€¦
what i donā€™t understand it is that IPCC ā€œreportā€ has been presented 2 years agoā€¦ only now are they founding mistakes??? has it not been studied before???
sorry for my awful englishā€¦””’
Jorge,
My view of why the two (plus) years that apparently nobody read the AR4 is:
1. It was those blogs who allowed skeptical analysis of AGW that continously chewed on the the kinds of non-science that was presented in the AR4 report. These blogs were chewing on AGW non-science for many more than 2 (plus) years.
2. MSM was on the AGW agenda train, so for 2 (plus) years it would not critically review AR4 nor would MSM report on the knowledge in blogs that allowed skeptical analysis.
3. the precipitating event that lead to MSM eventually allowing reporting critical to AGW was the release of the UEA CRU emails/files. It tremendously strengthen the position of the blogs that allowed sekptical ananlysis of AGW.
4. MSM stories critical of AGW then “get legs”. So here we all are MSM and those great blogs together, picking apart the bible of AGW, the AR4 as written by its many apostles.
John

pat
February 6, 2010 6:20 pm

here comes MET-Gate:
UK Daily Mail: How Met Office blocked questions on its own manā€™s role in ā€˜hockey stickā€™ climate row
Professor John Mitchell, the Met Officeā€™s Director of Climate Science, shared responsibility for the most worrying headline in the 2007 Nobel Prize-winning IPCC report ā€“ that the Earth is now hotter than at any time in the past 1,300 years.
And he approved the inclusion in the report of the famous ā€˜hockey stickā€™ graph, showing centuries of level or declining temperatures until a steep 20th Century rise.
By the time the 2007 report was being written, the graph had been heavily criticised by climate sceptics who had shown it minimised the ā€˜medieval warm periodā€™ around 1000AD, when the Vikings established farming settlements in Greenland.
In fact, according to some scientists, the planet was then as warm, or even warmer, than it is today.
Early drafts of the report were fiercely contested by official IPCC reviewers, who cited other scientific papers stating that the 1,300-year claim and the graph were inaccurate.
But the final version, approved by Prof Mitchell, the relevant chapterā€™s review editor, swept aside these concerns.
Now, the Met Office is refusing to disclose Prof Mitchellā€™s working papers and correspondence with his IPCC colleagues in response to requests filed under the Freedom of Information Act.
The block has been endorsed in writing by Defence Secretary Bob Ainsworth ā€“ whose department has responsibility for the Met Office.
Documents obtained by The Mail on Sunday reveal that the Met Officeā€™s stonewalling was part of a co-ordinated, legally questionable strategy by climate change academics linked with the IPCC to block access to outsiders. …
The email, dated July 17, 2008 ā€“ when Mr Holland was also trying to get material from the Met Office and the CRU ā€“ provides clear evidence of a co-ordinated effort to hide data. Sir Brian wrote:
ā€˜I have made enquiries and found that both the Met Office/MOD and UEA are resisting the FOI requests made by Holland. The latter are very relevant to us, as UK universities should speak with the same voice on this. I gather that they are using academic freedom as their reason.ā€™..ETC
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1249035/How-Met-Office-blocked-questions-mans-role-hockey-stick-climate-row.html
let’s add MoD-Gate, one of the elephants in the rooms all along.

Stephan
February 6, 2010 6:23 pm

Strongly recommend leaving Prof Jones alone. We all make mistakes… I am sure he could still have a great career in Climate Science, especially now that they are having another look at the situation in a realistic light ie: probably wise to throw the C02 connection away…

latitude
February 6, 2010 6:27 pm

I like robustgate…..
……and hope to never hear that word again

Andrew30
February 6, 2010 6:35 pm

This may make it even more likely that China, India, Brazil and South Africa may split from the IPCC and from their own ‘non-Aligned’ climate science group.
They have ALL now been officially slandered by the IPCC as irresponsible custodians and poor defenders of their parts of the planet.

February 6, 2010 6:43 pm

”””Stephan (18:23:36) : Strongly recommend leaving Prof Jones alone. We all make mistakesā€¦ I am sure he could still have a great career in Climate Science, especially now that they are having another look at the situation in a realistic light ie: probably wise to throw the C02 connection awayā€¦””’
Stephan,
Yes, I agree with your recommendation. Being professionally critical of him as a professional scientist is one thing. But, I think, we all should refrain from personal attacks him in his current state of mind.
John

Jan
February 6, 2010 6:45 pm

Because I’m doing research for an article about the CRU manipulation of data for the sparse Czech airports stations they use (where some years even decades of data just nobody in Czech Met Office doesn’t know where they come from, because teh Czech Met Office doesn’t have any such data from the stations for 50ties) I was also looking what the GHCN is doing with the data from this same stations. It looks like they adjust them to make the beginning cooler some 0.2-1Ā°C (to get steeper warming trends?):
http://www.appinsys.com/GlobalWarming/climgraph.aspx?pltparms=GHCNT100AJanDecI195020080900111AR61111518000x
http://www.appinsys.com/GlobalWarming/climgraph.aspx?pltparms=GHCNT100AJanDecI195020080900111AR61111782000x
http://www.appinsys.com/GlobalWarming/climgraph.aspx?pltparms=GHCNT100AJanDecI195120080900111AR61111723000x
All the three stations are on the recently substantially enlarged main Czech international airports, so one would expect, they would adjust the UHI in recent years, but instead, they consistently adjust the past values since 50ties to mid 80es – you guessed it – DOWN…

starzmom
February 6, 2010 6:48 pm

I thought Anthony’s surface stations study/survey exposed the North America-gate, the very first one that hit the fan. No one realize what it started at the time. Congratulations everybody–Anthony–you all—we all were at the forefront!!

Andrew30
February 6, 2010 6:50 pm

Stephan (18:23:36) :
“Strongly recommend leaving Prof Jones alone.”
Unlike many he is not exactly a pawn in the play, but he is also not quite a bishop. Either way as long as he continues to defend the king, he remains a part of the game.
It does however look like the king (whom ever that may be) is contemplating sacrificing the queen (Pachauri).
So who or what is the king?

starzmom
February 6, 2010 6:51 pm

P.S. I hope Phil Jones gets the help he needs.

RStein
February 6, 2010 6:52 pm

“I’m no crook!” First it was Richard Nixon, and now it is Phil Jones.

Baa Humbug
February 6, 2010 6:54 pm

Remember folks, most of this junk science was also in the TAR and SAR. So just sacrificing Pachauru the Love Guru is not enough. Others must be held accountable, starting with the UNFCCC head (and Pachauris boss) Yves De Boer

Steve Goddard
February 6, 2010 7:14 pm

The IPCC has already lost all credibility. They are fraudulent at worst, and grossly incompetent at best. The should be replaced by a “Climate Study” group, not a “Climate Change” group. By being chartered to study “Climate Change” their conclusions were predetermined.
There is nothing they can do to restore credibility, because anything and everything they say is now suspect.

February 6, 2010 7:17 pm

Another blunder on animals;
Quote “ACCUSATIONS that ā€œless meat means less heatā€, inferring that cutting back on livestock production is a panacea for global warming, are wide of the mark according to the Australian Farm Institute (AFI).
The Insituteā€™s executive director, Mick Keogh, points to some flaws in the way livestock emissions are accounted for in several life-cycle analyses (LCAs) that have been used to make cases against red meat production”.
More here;
http://theland.farmonline.com.au/news/nationalrural/livestock/news/less-meat-less-heat-climate-argument-flawed-afi/1741506.aspx

Dr A Burns
February 6, 2010 7:22 pm

“Estimates of carbon-dioxide emissions from nuclear power stations and claims that suggested they were cheaper than coal or gas power stations were also taken from the website of the World Nuclear Association, rather than using independent scientific calculations. ”
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/environment/climatechange/7177230/New-errors-in-IPCC-climate-change-report.html
I wonder if this could be the source of really big money behind the IPCC, from companies pushing for Cap and Trade like GE ?
Not coincidentally, GE is one of the world’s leading manuafacturers of nuclear power stations and wind turbines. GE owns CNBC, MSNBC, Bravo, Mun2TV, Sci-Fi channel, Trio, and USA network.

Editor
February 6, 2010 7:22 pm

http://www.medindia.net/news/Climate-Changes-And-Increased-Rainfall-Greening-the-Sahara-Desert-Becoming-Green-Due-to-Climate-Change-55735-1.htm
Sahara rainfall increasing from climate warming…. global warming is therefore good for African countries and will boost crop yields, contrary to Patchy’s claims.

D. King
February 6, 2010 7:24 pm

“…yields from rain-fed agriculture could be reduced by up to 50 percent by 2020.”
What a bunch of hacks.

Curiousgeorge
February 6, 2010 7:29 pm

Has anyone done a study on how high BS can be piled before it collapses? Seems to me there would be a “tipping point” for that, which apparently the IPCC and Pachauri has encountered.

tokyoboy
February 6, 2010 7:31 pm

I think there have been additional two, more prominent and pernicious Gates, namely the suspected concoction of temperature data for the two regions:
NAUgate (for northern Australia)
NEUgate (for northern Europe)
Am I wrong?

Marlene Anderson
February 6, 2010 7:32 pm

I thought the IPCC would go down one brick at a time but this is an avalanche of self-destruction that continues to pick up momentum and it still hasn’t completed it’s full slide down the mountain.
Remember the Wizard of Oz when Dorothy finds there’s only a timid little man pulling levers behind a curtain? I see a 2010 sequel called the Wizard of the IPCC with Pachauri as the Chief of Humbug.

Richard M
February 6, 2010 7:36 pm

There’s one more big gate to go. When will the fact that big oil has been in support of AGW for the last several years get highlighted?
1) Oil is a limited commodity and it won’t last forever. Whatever is not used today will be more valuable in the future.
2) By environmentalists calling for no drilling the supply part of supply/demand will start dropping. The oil companies are not fighting this because they know that once the economy gets going again the demand will return. Everyone knows what happens to prices when that occurs. Look for more gigantic profits for the oil companies in the near future.
3) Big oil has been investing in several green technologies. One of the biggies is ExxonMobil’s investment in genetically modified algae. From what I’ve read this will be competitive with oil in around 5 years and get better with time. That reduces the big costs of drilling and dealing with unstable foreign gov’ts. Not to mention that the algae eats CO2 like crazy and would also give them gov’t backing and, most likely, subsidies. It’s still oil and they would still be in position to make gigantic profits.
It’s win-win for big oil. Once the anti-capitalists understand they are doing exactly what the big oil companies want, I think that part of the AGW movement could collapse.

Phil's Dad
February 6, 2010 7:37 pm

DirkH (15:09:31) :
ā€œThe European Union (EU) has offered to help the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) strengthen its quality control system”
This would be the EU that has failed to produce audited accounts for the last ten years. That’s like letting a Vampire help you run a blood bank.

Richard Sharpe
February 6, 2010 7:51 pm

mikelorrey (19:22:52) said:

http://www.medindia.net/news/Climate-Changes-And-Increased-Rainfall-Greening-the-Sahara-Desert-Becoming-Green-Due-to-Climate-Change-55735-1.htm
Sahara rainfall increasing from climate warmingā€¦. global warming is therefore good for African countries and will boost crop yields, contrary to Patchyā€™s claims.

Well obviously. The whole AGW scam was supported by governments and fellow travellers because it promised to provide an easy way to foist higher taxes on the populace. If a majority believed in such palpable nonsense, then it would be hard for the sceptics to argue that the taxes were unnecessary.
It’s all unravelling now.

February 6, 2010 7:52 pm

Outwardly Awkward
Broken, Fragmented, Shattered, Hungry, Constipated and Disgusted all at the same time. The followers of blind and obscene revelations. The trees never lie, its just the air which is filling up wrong words in your ears. The latest composition of air as suggested by the scientists at the Biggest University(I Pee you See) of the Far Far town is 90% awkardness , 9.09% CO2 and the rest they are yet to figure out. These words settle in your ear with the awkwardness flying in the air. Ear buds are acting as drilling agents for your ears when you try to remove awkardness. So the next thing cool is being Deaf. Deaf to whats happening around you. No one else is responsible for it but You. The air got polluted () by your outw(o)ardly awkardness and now youā€™ve got to rectify it. Easier to ask others to do rather than doing yourself and publishing reports Greek to a normal human is the next level of easy. No debates, just disgust , disgust packed in plastic bags, disgust wrapped with sh*t in your car silencer. Who is gonna clean up the mess? The biggest fart of the centuries coming straight from your constipated self. Global Warming ?

ML
February 6, 2010 7:58 pm

So, IPCC is losing credibility?
At this point in time they have nothing to lose. All the credibility is already gone

Jaye
February 6, 2010 8:01 pm

So I just scanned RC’s take on “Glaciergate”. Came across many posts that talk about the lunatics at WUWT and ClimateAudit, then I came across this little jewel that made it through moderation…
“Iā€™ve said it before and Iā€™ll say it again, all this fixation on get-it-right, got-it-wrong is obscuring the real issue: the truth is what we define it to be, and the truth is that mankind is a scourge on the planet. The sooner we can limit the right to breed, the sooner the planet will recover. If glacier data is a little incorrect but helps that effort, then the data is true in all but a very narrow and clinical scientific sense.
Common people donā€™t really understand science. But they understand not having enough to eat and not being able to sit down on a too-crowded subway. if we can educate people not to reproduce there will be many seats and the fewer people will be happier. Indeed, as the capitalist economies of scale are reduced, the atisfaction from making your own clothes and embracing a low-carbon vegan diet will be so intense, reproduction will come to be seen in the same category as child abuse.
I yearn for the day when i might not have been born!”

Roger Knights
February 6, 2010 8:02 pm

KimW (15:02:29) :
Words like ā€˜Sloppyā€™ and ā€œfraudulentā€™ might be replaced by the simple phrase ā€œClimate Scienceā€™.

Or crimatology.

Richard North (15:04:18) :
It is rather appropriate that Golf Links, New Delhi, home of Rajendra Pachauri, is a gated community.

Next up: Gate-gate?

DirkH (15:31:30) :
http://www.redorbit.com/news/science/1819675/netherlands_enters_the_climate_fray/
ā€œThe IPCCā€™s calculation that 55 percent of the Netherlands was below sea level came from adding the actual estimates that 26 percent of the area was below sea level and 29 percent of the area was threatened from river flooding, Vallaart said. […] The error has been brought up to the IPCC several times, but nothing has happened as of yet. He was disappointed that proper procedure could not be followed and added that it should not be left to politicians to review IPCC figuresā€

This turning of a blind eye (i.e., deliberate obliviousness to attempts to correct alarmist errors) supports my suspicion that Lal and his Asia group deliberately ignored the attempts by Kaser (and others, as I hope will emerge) to get the 2035 error corrected or retracted. A cover-up is far more damning than an error, because it is deliberate and contemplated, so investigative journalists should look for informants within the IPCC for the really explosive material. Errors can be explained away; not so, coverups. (That’s why Lal would have had to deny receiving Kaser’s letter, had he actually got it.) A dozen more arrows are still needed to slay this elephant.

RockyRoad (16:12:24) :
Whenever I see ā€œIPCCā€ anymore, it reminds me of ipecac.

A marketing guy could have told them to avoid a name with such a vulnerable-to-ridicule acronym.

joe (16:41:11) :
This is nothing, its just show that science is ugly, and some experts have gone rogue. But the science behind climate change is concrete. There are thousands of peer reviewed studies that support it. And I base that on nothing.

Correct. Most of these “thousand” studies just take AGW as a given, or accept GW as occurring (which it is, but which says nothing about the “A” component). Thus, they don’t “support” AGW any more than a drunk supports a lamppost.

Al Gore's Holy Hologram
February 6, 2010 8:06 pm

But who cares for Africans or Indians and what they think? This IPCC is about crocodile tears and forcing brown skinned, apart from the likes of Pachauri, to live under a carbon caste system in which the lower down the chain you are the less carbon emissions you are allowed to have.
Recently I found an interesting tract about the leftwing view of third world people’s. I found it in no less than an essay on Rudyard Kipling by George Orwell. Here’s the passage:
“All left-wing parties in the highly industrialized countries are at bottom a sham, because they make it their business to fight against something which they do not really wish to destroy. They have internationalist aims, and at the same time they struggle to keep up a standard of life with which those aims are incompatible. We all live by robbing Asiatic coolies, and those of us who are ‘enlightened’ all maintain that those coolies ought to be set free; but our standard of living, and hence our ‘enlightenment’, demands that the robbery shall continue. A humanitarian is always a hypocrite, and Kipling’s understanding of this is perhaps the central secret of his power to create telling phrases. It would be difficult to hit off the one-eyed pacifism of the English in fewer words than in the phrase, ‘making mock of uniforms that guard you while you sleep’. It is true that Kipling does not understand the economic aspect of the relationship between the highbrow and the blimp. He does not see that the map is painted red chiefly in order that the coolie may be exploited.”
Nothing has changed since 1942 when Orwell wrote that.

February 6, 2010 8:12 pm

”””Marlene Anderson (19:32:40) : I thought the IPCC would go down one brick at a time but this is an avalanche of self-destruction . . . . Remember the Wizard of Oz when Dorothy finds thereā€™s only a timid little man pulling levers behind a curtain? I see a 2010 sequel called the Wizard of the IPCC with Pachauri as the Chief of Humbug.”””
Marlene,
Maybe Pachauri is just the fierce face of the Wizard of OZ, but many think the person(s)/group(s) behind the curtain are . . . . . well . . . ahhh
John

Anand Rajan KD
February 6, 2010 8:21 pm

Nobody should kill themselves over global warming!
I think the skeptical world should extend its fullest support to Phil Jones – if his admissions are to be believed. Jones never expressed himself through the media or any outlets. All the stuff that was written about him, and not a peep from the man.
The man should vent his rage (or whatever he is feeling). Present his side of the story.
Imagine contemplating suicide over global warming!

John F. Hultquist
February 6, 2010 8:23 pm

Kendra (16:25:53) : ā€œasking a naĆÆve questionā€
No. Your question was a very good one and I donā€™t think it got the sorts of answers it deserved. Unfortunately this is a long story and it takes a lot of reading and searching to begin to pull it together. I will suggest two papers for you to read that I found added a lot to my understanding of what was going on with the AWG agenda. Perhaps 5 or 6 others could also suggest 2 of their favorite reads and we could save you a lot of time. Here are my two suggestions:
1: http://www.climateaudit.org/pdf/ohio.pdf
This is a conference presentation by Stephen McIntyre given on May 16, 2008. In it he explains who he is and how he became involved. He maintains the site called Climate Audit (CA) on which this paper is found.
2: UN Infects Science with Cancer of Global Warming
http://icecap.us/images/uploads/EDBLICKRANT.pdf
Also go to Jo Novaā€™s site and read her story and the 2 handbooks she has written. http://joannenova.com.au/
The Skepticā€™s Hanbook is on the left side of her main page near the top.
Who else will help out with this list?

yonason
February 6, 2010 8:29 pm

Just think of all the food that’s been wasted on producing ethanol, a less efficient and more costly fuel than gas. And, further, all the billions of dollars wasted on phony “science” which could have gone to helping poor people around the world.
The IPCC, and the entity that spawned it, the UN, are worse than worthless, they are highly toxic.

Roger Knights
February 6, 2010 8:39 pm

A minor improvement: I should have written, “A cover-up is far more damning than an error, because it is deliberate and contemplated deliberated …”

Indiana Bones (16:45:32) :
Well done. However, is it not odd that none of these errors was discovered before now?? And if the IPCC peer review process worked at all, and these errors were flagged ā€“ what happened to the flags? Are there peer reviewers out there that would like to tell us what happened when they critiqued IPCC work?? Were they ignored?? Or what.

Or what indeed.

John Whitman (17:16:50) :
This ā€œgateā€ appears to me to be the biggest because Pachauri cannot possibly wiggle out by saying he ā€œdid not knowā€ or that it is a minor error.

Unfortunately, unlike the 2035 error, it’s not a “howler,” or glaring error that should have raised a red flag.

Bob Highland (16:46:22) :
What next? Thereā€™s no ā€œAustraliagateā€ yet, and weā€™re feeling a bit left out.

Coralgate? (I think this exaggeration of the threat to the world’s reefs should be added to the list of gates that others are compiling.)

Jones, 57, said he was unprepared for the scandal: ā€œI am just a scientist. I have no training in PR or dealing with crises.ā€

Not “just.” He was a bigshot administrator, head of the CRU, wasn’t he?

yonason
February 6, 2010 8:39 pm

Kate (19:52:52) :
New website for me. Looks good. Thanks.

February 6, 2010 8:46 pm

Let’s just call this one “FarmGate’ šŸ˜‰

Clive
February 6, 2010 8:55 pm

Great lists of “gates.”
After Pachauri’s new book, we might add Tail-gate ā˜ŗ

Roger Knights
February 6, 2010 8:57 pm

ML (19:58:27) :
So, IPCC is losing credibility?
At this point in time they have nothing to lose. All the credibility is already gone

Not yet, not in the public eye. A dozen more arrows are needed, one of them a hit to a vital organ, or the thick-skinned pachyderm will survive this onslaught. Its claim about the rate of glacial melt in the Himalayas was an important element in alarmism, but not in “the underlying science.”
A really solid, incontrovertible “hit” to a vital organ of the science, such as the hockey stick, would do lasting damage. If the e-mails of the Met Office’s lobbying of the IPCC to include the hockey stick in AR4 can be obtained via an FOI (or by a Chinese hacker team), as described by at above as Met-gate, and it can be shown that the other side had the better argument, that would do the trick.

February 6, 2010 8:58 pm

Despite all the faults being found in their data our governments are still going crazy trying to implement as many UN based policies as possible in the quickest time as possible. Until this stops and these policies are made null and void the pain will not only continue but get worse!

Roger Knights
February 6, 2010 8:58 pm

Oops — change “at above” to “pat above”.

Sharon
February 6, 2010 8:59 pm

Revealing the IPCC’s Synthesis Report to be less than a “gold standard”:
Golden-gate

John F. Hultquist
February 6, 2010 9:00 pm

Roger Knights (20:39:03), Indiana Bones (16:45:32) :
Yes, ā€œerrorsā€ were flagged by reviewers and some of those have reported what happened next. Frequently they were ignored. I think Iā€™ve read statements by McIntyre, Christy, and Pielke about their concerns. I havenā€™t kept a list. Sorry.

Gerard
February 6, 2010 9:06 pm

How come we haven’t heard anything from Al Baby or Flim Flam Flannery

Larry
February 6, 2010 9:18 pm

The acronym “IPCC” should probably now stand for the “International Propagandists for Climate Change.”

J.Hansford
February 6, 2010 9:23 pm

Good grief!!! The IPCC and AGW is all Gate and no fence!

February 6, 2010 9:26 pm

”””Roger Knights (20:39:03) : Unfortunately, unlike the 2035 error, itā€™s not a ā€œhowler,ā€ or glaring error that should have raised a red flag.”””
Roger,
Thanks. I agree that it is not be the glaring stuff of Media reports that fundamentally condemns the AR4 scientifically, it is the unscientific process and lack of professionalism used by the IPCC and the contributors it chose to use.
Your comment does remind me of how, until ~ summer of 2009, I always thought that the mills of science ground the facts exceedingly fine. That is I thought that science finely sifts through all observations/data in infinite detail and objectivity. Given the climate science state since then, I am looking much more critically at all science, even the so-called hard sciences.
John

Not Amused
February 6, 2010 9:32 pm

… so many gates… so little time.

Peredur
February 6, 2010 9:51 pm

As we have only had a fraction of a degree observed warming since the end of the Little Ice Age, and none at all in the Southern Hemisphere, surely every alarmist statement the IPCC has made is suspect and worthy of examination?
Surely it is time for the vagaries and mischief embedded in the IPCC GCMs to be highlighted and exposed for all to see?

Roger Carr
February 6, 2010 10:00 pm

Listen to the Australians and SHUT THE BLOODY GATE

Marlene Anderson
February 6, 2010 10:10 pm

John Whitman:
Maybe Pachauri is just the fierce face of the Wizard of OZ, but many think the person(s)/group(s) behind the curtain are . . . . . well . . . ahhh. . . .
Pachauri is an ego walking on its hind legs – you are correct there are puppeteers behind the curtain and we have to go through the people like Pachauri to get to them.
The truth of who’s involved with the AGW scam is far uglier than anyone will ever anticipate – this is going to rock environmentalism to it’s foundation before it’s all done.

February 6, 2010 10:13 pm


Michael (14:43:29) :
During a global cooling onset like the one we have today due to the deep solar minimum, all areas deprived of rain in the buildup to solar max and after its drop off, are once again replenished as has happened in the past year. Most US reservoirs and aquifers are all full up again.

Can this claim actually bear much scrutiny?
How about the Ogallala Aquifer – is it back to pre-1940 levels?
.
.

GeneDoc
February 6, 2010 10:15 pm

It seems that there are many fewer examples of the use of the term “settled science” coming from the believers these days. And I’ve even seen some say that they would never dare use that term and deny that they ever had. Good work WUWT team.
Now to move on to the equally pernicious “overwhelming scientific evidence” phrase. I, for one, can’t seem to find this evidence. Correlation between warming based on possibly suspect temperature data and relatively solid CO2 measurement, sure. I don’t see what’s overwhelming about that.
I propose “overwhelmingly poor scientific evidence” to counter the phrase. Of course you may substitute you own adjective for poor. Scant? bad? lousy? unimpressive? flawed?

February 6, 2010 10:18 pm

Good News for IPCC – There are so many people finally reading the IPCC’s AR4 that there cannot be any doubt that right now it is just as popular as any NYT Bestseller in recent memory.
Bad News for IPC – see above
John

It's always Marcia, Marcia
February 6, 2010 10:24 pm

referenced only to a report produced by a Canadian advocacy group, written by an obscure Moroccan academic who specialises in carbon trading, citing references which do not support his claims.
=================================================
What a rickety contraption the IPCC is!
This would be par for the course for them.
Taking this from a carbon trader would be a conflict of interest. Funny that a Wall Street type who stands to make a mint from carbon credits finds disaster in co2.
Where are the 2500 scientists????

February 6, 2010 10:43 pm

”””’It’s always Marcia, Marcia (22:24:32) : What a rickety contraption the IPCC is! . . . . Where are the 2500 scientists????”””’
Q – Can ~2500 scientists be wrong?? Which is supposedly the number that the IPCC claims where involved in their AR4 consensus
Answer 1 – mostly
Answer 2 – Latest New Report : The INTERPOL has an all-points-bulletin looking worldwide for the missing 2500 scientists. It fails to find any leads
John

David
February 6, 2010 10:51 pm

Once again, like always with our IPCC friends, peer reviewed or not, it is projected, possible, maybe if, horror stories, and a complete refusal to acknowldge the known, tested and proved in hundreds of observation studies, the benefits of increased CO2 on biomass, which includes crops, irrigated or rain fed.
By the way, where did all our US droughts go?

J.Peden
February 6, 2010 11:08 pm

Jaye (20:01:45)
Too funny! But right on.

sdcougar
February 6, 2010 11:15 pm

Tenuc (14:58:54) :
Strange that the IPCC AR4 report will be the document responsible for the end of the CAGW scam. This is better than any spy novel!”
]Yes, but right in tune with MIchael Crichton’s State of Fear.]
Michael (15:11:55) :
Perhaps it would be a more efficient use of our time if we focus on what is not fiction in the IPCC AR4. That way we could spend more time on sharpening our pitch forks and gathering our torches.
[Party pooper!]

February 6, 2010 11:16 pm

Once the anti-capitalists understand they are doing exactly what the big oil companies want, I think that part of the AGW movement could collapse.
That is tough. The anti-capitalists don’t believe in supply and demand. Except when it come to the dope market. The capitalists (for the most part) believe in supply and demand every where except the dope market.
It drives me nuts.

February 6, 2010 11:23 pm

It seems that there are many fewer examples of the use of the term ā€œsettled scienceā€ coming from the believers these days. And Iā€™ve even seen some say that they would never dare use that term and deny that they ever had.
I have had a warmist tell me that only deniers used the “settled science” term as a slur on warmists. He even pointed to a Wm. Connolley wiki page “debunking” “settled science”. I gave him 10 or 20 links to the use of the term. By our President. By his spokes person Gibbs. And lots of others.
Well that ended that particular discussion.

David
February 6, 2010 11:36 pm

Re Jan (18:45:33) :
Thank you for your effort. Good luck, and any detailed breakdown of a small area like this helps the overall effort to understand exactly what is going on in this arena. If it was malajusted here, then it is a fair bet the same procedures were done elsewhere.

It's always Marcia, Marcia
February 6, 2010 11:48 pm

I don’t know the rules:
how many gates can they go through before they have to give the Nobel back?

It's always Marcia, Marcia
February 6, 2010 11:54 pm

M. Simon (23:23:37) :
That warmist had never heard Al Gore say the science is settled? Was he talking about the same Al Gore global warming thingy that everyone else has heard of? Maybe there’s two global warmings?

February 7, 2010 1:38 am

Considering Rodin and the burning crater in Turkmenistan, “The Gates of Hell” may not be appropriate.
There is some poetry to “The Gates of Mordor” with Pachauri as Saruman and Jones, Mann & Co as the Nazgul. But there would need to be auditions to cast Frodo and Aragorn and Gandalf.
My current preference is for “The Myriad Gates of Anthropogenic Perfidy” in the style of a good, old fashioned, Viking Saga. It would certainly be long enough and intricate enough, but it would need to be translated into Runic.

KPO
February 7, 2010 1:41 am

Surely it is now beyond doubt that the IPCC AR4 report is a deeply flawed document prepared with the sole purpose of creating a doomsday scenario intended to deceive and/or influence a trusting global community. It is further self-evident that is purely political in motive and dishonest in content. The exposed untruths (read lies) are not simply the result of ā€œminor errorsā€ of the ā€œtypoā€ variety, but deliberate distortions with immense consequences concerning the well-being of billions of souls. The oft cited reference to ā€œthousands of scientistsā€ should not bring them comfort but rather dread as these ā€œthousandsā€ are now tainted (through association) with the same corruption. The honest scientists (most) owe it to themselves, to their beloved science and to humanity to speak out and forever end the rape.

Ken Harvey
February 7, 2010 2:13 am

Gate? It’s not a gate, it’s a motorised revolving door!

Atheist Ranter
February 7, 2010 2:26 am

It’s not that they make errors, they just lie to suit their agenda.

A C Osborn
February 7, 2010 4:11 am

I honestly think that there are so many Gates we are losing track, we also have Coral, especially the recent barrier reef report and the Cold killing mre coral the heat does.

A C Osborn
February 7, 2010 4:11 am

more coral not mre coral.

Bill Pounder
February 7, 2010 4:15 am

Kevin Rudd, on detailed programmatic specificity ,that’s Gobbledegookgate, says man-made climate change is “indisputable”.
http://blogs.news.com.au/heraldsun/andrewbolt/index.php/heraldsun/comments/rudds_latest_scientific_advisor_a_six_year_old_girl/
And that is Graciegate.
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/would-you-mind-saying-that-again-in-english/story-0-1225748372488
And now from Kevin Rudd we have ” Reefergate “.
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/nation/report-undercuts-kevin-rudds-great-barrier-reef-wipeout/story-e6frg6nf-1225826128644
J. Hansford (21.23.52 ) is right. All gate , no fence

kadaka
February 7, 2010 4:20 am

DirkH (16:20:07) :
ā€œkadaka (15:51:04) :
ā€œAgriculturalGateā€ is too wordy. Could this IPCC blunder (link found at Climate Depot) be called ā€œGrowGateā€?ā€
agrogate.

Time for the grand consolidation of all of this.
Aggregate-gate.

A C Osborn
February 7, 2010 4:21 am

Re
Richard Lawson (16:33:49) :
Surprise surprise there is even more:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/earth/environment/climatechange/7177230/New-errors-in-IPCC-climate-change-report.html
So we have the Nile Delta as well
“One unpublished dissertation was used to support the claim that sea-level rise could impact on people living in the Nile delta and other African coastal areas, although the main focus of the thesis, by a student at the Al-Azhar University in Cairo, appears to have been the impact of computer software on environmental development. ”
and Nuclear Power CO2
“Estimates of carbon-dioxide emissions from nuclear power stations and claims that suggested they were cheaper than coal or gas power stations were also taken from the website of the World Nuclear Association, rather than using independent scientific calculations. “

Vieras
February 7, 2010 4:26 am

This becomes even more interesting, when one looks at the Annual Food Production Statistics for these three countries. The stats are available at: http://faostat.fao.org/site/567/default.aspx
Select Algeria, Tunisia and Morocco and get production quantities for wheat from 1960 to 2008 and start analyzing.
The report mentioned was from 2001. If you compare what production from 1994-2000 to 2001-2008, you notice that:
Algeria is producing 56% more during 2001-2008 than 1994-2000.
Morocco is producing 26% more during 2001-2008 than 1994-2000.
Tunisia is producing 24% more during 2001-2008 than 1994-2000.
I’d appreciate if someone more qualified could make a proper analysis.

KeithGuy
February 7, 2010 4:29 am

From the IPCC Sythesis Report.
ā€œBy 2020, in some countries, yields from rain-fed agriculture COULD be reduced by up to 50%.ā€
How do the IPCC define the probability attached to the word could.
After all ā€œpigs could flyā€.

February 7, 2010 5:00 am

It’s always Marcia, Marcia (23:48:10) :
I donā€™t know the rules:
how many gates can they go through before they have to give the Nobel back?

That has never happened (at least I think so), and I don’t think there are any ways for the Nobel committee to demand the return of the Nobel peace prize once it has been awarded. And that is assuming they actually think it should be returned.
You could always try to contact them and ask their position on the new information, but I would be surprised if you received any reply at all
http://nobelpeaceprize.org/en_GB/institute/contact/

ditmar
February 7, 2010 5:02 am

“I have done the numbers and we are all doomed”
“Why’s that phil”
“I’ve spoken to mike and he agrees too”
“Show me”
“There you go”
“Er, phil this is just a piece of paper saying we are all doomed”
“Trust me, its true”
“But phil, you cannot expect the world to ruin their economies on your word alone, where is the evidence?
“Its not just me as I said mike agrees”
“Show us the data phil, we need proof that we are all going to die”
“Oh I can’t do that,you will have to take my word for it”
“I will use an foi request then”
“You could do that but there is always ipr and I will hide behind that”
“Show us the evidence phil”
“I already did”
“No phil you showed me a piece of paper that said we are all doomed, give me the raw data and I will crunch the numbers myself”
“Fu@k off do you think I am stupidan I shredded that, I have my career to think of you know”

Mike Bryant
February 7, 2010 5:21 am

Everyone here is jumping to the conclusion that something nefarious is happening simply because studies, magazines and theme papers are being completely misrepresented to further the catastrophic AGW scenario.
Don’t worry Joel will soon post a response to show how absolutely innocent all of this is.

A C Osborn
February 7, 2010 5:25 am

Vieras (04:26:47) :
You don’t need to be any more qualified, the number speak for themselves LOL

DirkH
February 7, 2010 5:42 am

“Jaye (20:01:45) :
So I just scanned RCā€™s take on ā€œGlaciergateā€. Came across many posts that
[…]
“If glacier data is a little incorrect but helps that effort, then the data is true in all but a very narrow and clinical scientific sense.””
A typical leftist/sociologist/freudian take on the truth. Soviet DiaMat, Pol Pot and Hugo Chavez come to mind. Reminds me of this hoax:
http://libcom.org/library/sokal-hoax-transgressing-boundaries-towards-transformative-hermeneutics-quantum-gravity-

DirkH
February 7, 2010 6:18 am

“A C Osborn (04:09:50) :
[…]
See this article
http://www.openthemagazine.com/article/international/the-hottest-hoax-in-the-world

Good point about Bangladesh there. Which reminds me of this piece of propaganda by the BBC. Terrible erosion in Monrovia, Liberia, caused by sea level rise. Except for Monrovia is at a river delta and actually begs to be flooded/eroded.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/8375301.stm
The wikipedia has an old map from the founding date of Monrovia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Monrovia_Plan_Map_1830.jpg
This striking evidence should really make it into IPCC AR5.

Peter Plail
February 7, 2010 6:43 am

M. Simon (23:23:37) :
“The science is settled” is also part of the British Government’s mantra along with the use of flat-earthers to refer to anyone who dissents..

Ron de Haan
February 7, 2010 7:32 am

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change was specifically designed by Maurice Strong as a political vehicle to further his objective of crippling the industrial nations
IPCC Science Designed For Propaganda
By Dr. Tim Ball Friday, February 5, 2010
http://canadafreepress.com/index.php/article/19702

Leon Brozyna
February 7, 2010 7:37 am

From EUReferendum come this bit on The beauties of blogging:
http://eureferendum.blogspot.com/2010/02/beauties-of-blogging.html

No sooner is the Africagate piece up then Bishop Hill comments on it. That brings up further comments which identify this article from the National Geographic News.

For those interested, here’s the piece at Bishop Hill:
http://bishophill.squarespace.com/blog/2010/2/7/climate-cuttings-34.html
It, in turn, links to National Geographic News:
http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2009/07/090731-green-sahara.html
In reading that piece on the greening of the Sahara, there’s this little gem about a study done in 2005, two years before the IPCC Africagate-tainted AR4:

… in 2005 a team led by Reindert Haarsma of the Royal Netherlands Meteorological Institute in De Bilt, the Netherlands, forecast significantly more future rainfall in the Sahel.
The study in Geophysical Research Letters predicted that rainfall in the July to September wet season would rise by up to two millimeters a day by 2080.
Satellite data shows “that indeed during the last decade, the Sahel is becoming more green,” Haarsma said.

So, the IPCC got it part right, they just had the wrong continent ā€” it’s not the Amazon rain forest that will turn into savannah, rather it’s the Sahara desert that’ll turn into savannah. Sounds like a good deal to me.

Henry Galt
February 7, 2010 7:42 am

jorge c (15:42:48) :
“it is worst than we thoughtā€¦”
I now believe that if we topple this weird edifice the world’s economy will suffer.
When you look into the IIGCC http://www.iigcc.org/membership.aspx you see several things. The vast (estimated at 4 trillion Euros) power of the pension funds invested. The involvement of, for example, the BBC (to the point where the steering committee has Peter Dunscombe, of BBC Pension Trust, as a member) who have always slated sceptics. The amount of churches on board. Fear creates strange bedfellows and conflicts of interest.
When you see the amount of verdigris growing on the world’s engines.
When you remember who created this bubble – JP Morgan, Goldman Sachs, Citigroup, etc.
I remain pessimistic about our hopes of enlightenment.

It's always Marcia, Marcia
February 7, 2010 7:43 am

ditmar (05:02:47) :
I thought of killing myself, says climate scandal professor Phil Jones
Phil Jones contemplated suicideā€¦ā€¦has lost weightā€¦..canā€™t sleepā€¦..paints himself as victim
I guess the truth is not setting Phil Jones free.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article7017922.ece

Richard M
February 7, 2010 7:51 am

Anand Rajan KD (04:30:42) :,
I love the picture. It should be on the cover of AR4.

Robertol
February 7, 2010 7:53 am

El problema NO ES PACHAURI
El problema NO ES el IPCC
El problema son los que impulsaron la creaciĆ³n del IPCC, pusieron a Pachauri como su presidente, y pagaron mucho dinero a los investigadores que justificaran todo eso.
El problema es POLITICO. ĀæNos atreveremos a mirar tan arriba?

Richard M
February 7, 2010 7:59 am

Richard M (19:36:44) :
I forgot to add another reason big oil supports the cap and trade.
4) When the algae industry gets going it will become carbon neutral if not negative. They can use these offsets to eliminate paying much if not all of the carbon fees for the crude side of the industry. That would give them a big edge over coal and natural gas. It would also mean they would have a big advantage of other “green” technologies.
I often wonder if the Bush administration’s support of Patchy wasn’t pushed by some of his oil buddies. Hmmmm … another conspiracy in the making?

P Gosselin
February 7, 2010 8:04 am
RichieP
February 7, 2010 8:20 am

Knights (20:02:01) :
‘KimW (15:02:29) :
Words like ā€˜Sloppyā€™ and ā€œfraudulentā€™ might be replaced by the simple phrase ā€œClimate Scienceā€™.
Or crimatology.’
Bravo! What a brilliant neologism.

Rob
February 7, 2010 8:50 am

It’s always Marcia, Marcia (07:43:46) :
ditmar (05:02:47) :
I thought of killing myself, says climate scandal professor Phil Jones
Phil Jones contemplated suicideā€¦ā€¦has lost weightā€¦..canā€™t sleepā€¦..paints himself as victim
I guess the truth is not setting Phil Jones free.
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article7017922.ece
Read the comments, they say it all, I would suggest MP`s take note.

Clive
February 7, 2010 9:17 am

Vieras
I am not sure what the context of your post was about Algeria etc food productivity, so I may be out of line here. Sorry if so.
Food productivity may or may not be “climate” related. Right now, I am working on an export-development project and just last week rec’d a report on Algeria. Here is a direct quote from that report.
In 2008, Algerian Ministry of Agriculture implemented the agricultural and rural revitalization policy. This strategy is aimed at ensuring food self-sufficiency by promoting domestic production and building local capacities in the following fields: cereals, dairy, pulses, potatoes, oilseeds, irrigation and human resources capacity building. Moreover, the government has allocated US$ 18 billion to boost the agriculture sector and provided financing to more than 3,970 local development projects.
Okay this is said to have started in 2008 (the end date of your quoted figures), but governments are quite often merely updating “five-year” plans for political PR. Point is, political support (or lack or wars and conflicts) is often a major contributor to food production.
Low food productivity in many countries is not so much a function of climate and weather (obviously a HUGE factor) but usually more a function of:
1) Technical and infrastructure support, training and availability of inputs and
2) Wars, politics, corruption, greed. No surprise there. Often climate gets blamed for hunger when politics, greed and corruption are usually overriding factors.
How does politics affect food production? Here is a current example:
Crackdown on terrorists hits Algeria’s potato crop
Algeria, April 20, 2009
http://www.potatopro.com/Lists/News/DispForm.aspx?ID=2546
Again I want to reiterate that my comments my be out of context.
Best wishes,
Clive

G.L.Lalique
February 7, 2010 9:42 am

Now that the IGCC report and the global warming science is being successfully challenged in so many quarters, I wonder whether it is time for the Prime Minister to discontinue those ludicrous T.V. and press global warming ads that we have all been bombarded with recently, all at great cost to the tax payer. And when are we going to hear from him that he has withdrawn his proposals to introduce draconian ‘green’ taxes, – at least until the science is settled one way or the other?

Gary Hladik
February 7, 2010 10:26 am

Advocatus Diaboli (17:00:44) : “I thought of killing myself, says climate scandal professor Phil Jones.”
So let me get this straight. Dr. Jones is receiving death threats…from himself?

J.Peden
February 7, 2010 10:47 am

how many gates can they go through before they have to give the Nobel back?
I wouldn’t trust any “prize” the Nobel process gives. For example, consider what the Scientific Community itself has allowed to occur/brought about in the case of AGW. Overall, everyone has to understand the depths and extent to which the Controllism of Ideological Narcissism – we’re only trying to “help” you or the downtrodden, etc., save the World, etc. – Political Correctness, Progressivism, Postmodernism, and the various forms of Totalitarianism have infiltrated institutions including Government, the Press, the Educational system, the Medical system etc.. It’s real. But not that I’m pessimistic about it: it’s “see a problem, fix a problem”, if nothing else – but it is something else, too.

Robert M. Marshall
February 7, 2010 11:32 am

From:
Jaye (20:01:45) :
So I just scanned RCā€™s take on ā€œGlaciergateā€. Came across many posts that talk about the lunatics at WUWT and ClimateAudit, then I came across this little jewel that made it through moderationā€¦
“Indeed, as the capitalist economies of scale are reduced, the atisfaction from making your own clothes and embracing a low-carbon vegan diet will be so intense, reproduction will come to be seen in the same category as child abuse.
I yearn for the day when i might not have been born!ā€
I don’t know about the rest of you, but I found this little tidbit to be encouraging. Each year “Darwin Awards” recogonizes those who take chlorinating the gene pool seriously. I presume that this poster will take his own advice seriously as will the like minded, “wish I wasn’t here”, guilt ridden, geniouses at RC and not reproduce. If only we could convince them not to proselytize.
The way the recent history of the No-Bell Awards has gone, they might need to merge with the Darwin Awards to regain their credibility.

J.Peden
February 7, 2010 12:13 pm

Kendra (16:25:53), I agree with John Hultquist:
John F. Hultquist (20:23:42) :
Kendra (16:25:53) : ā€œasking a naĆÆve questionā€
No. Your question was a very good one and I donā€™t think it got the sorts of answers it deserved.

I agree and tried to give an answer to your question below last night, but it vaporized along the way or something- I should have copied it:
Kendra (16:25:53):
Iā€™m just curious ā€“ is it that there were already enough uphill battles that no one really studied the references the IPCC used? Or had they already been noticed but no one paid attention when they were pointed out?
Actually many of the ipcc “references” were really studied, ones which involved the basic hypotheses of AGW and the ipcc’s way of doing Climate Science, which was thereby revealed to be not Scientific. One of the most basic sets of questions was, “Is ‘it’ warming, how much, and how much is ‘it’ really ‘unprecedented’?” This led to Anthony’s examination of the U.S. surface stations – basically some of the primary thermometers which the ipcc Climate Scientists never checked! – and to “sceptics” trying to get the source of the data used by GISS and HADCRU to make their temperature reconstructions, and find out what they did to the data in order to make their graphs – which actually constituted what GISS and HadCru’s “science” was.
It led to Steve McIntyre’s dedicated attempt to analyze the tree ring, etc., proxy data and methods which claimed by Climate Scientists to show long term temperatures prior to instrumental data.
Which all led to the fact that the ipcc and its elite Climate Science were not doing real Science, because their “science” involving data, code, materials and methods was not accessable for “audit”, review, or replication – except allegedly for a few annointed “peer reviewers” and Team or “tribal” members.
McIntyre also found by looking and asking for references that no one could back up the ipcc’s alleged basic CO2 “doubling” effect on atmospheric temperatures.
Other ipcc direct statements of fact and predictions could be checked, shown to be dubious, or disproven on their own merits.
So what is being revealed now about the ipcc references is not surprising at all, though it is also scandalous, and ironically has torched off what was already obviously the whole problem to begin with, that the ipcc and its elite Climate Scientists were simply not doing real Science, merely based upon the way they tried to handle their “references”.
In an ideal world “Climate Science ” would have been stopped in its tracks years ago. The CRU leaks would never have occurred because there would have been nothing needing leaking. And the bogus ipcc “references” would have never been included in anyone’s truely scientific analysis.
But the people and process which caused this whole mess are not simply going to go away. They’re going to keep on doing what “got them there” probably because they actually don’t know how to do anything else or at least can’t be trusted to do anything else, as already proven. They’re going to do go down swinging as per usual to the bitter end. So they are going to keep on propagandizind, diverting, making bizarre arguments and “references”, conspiring with their enablers and buddies, etc., until they’re nearly or actually physically subdued.

Dugetit
February 7, 2010 3:24 pm

May I UNGate the FloodGate with some more associated ClimateGate Gates? Iā€™ve been finding everywhere a GateGate!
SeaLevelGate, GoogleGate, RainForestGate, EmailGate, IceGate, CRUGate, SternGate, TempGate, KiwiGate, WikiGate, TreeGate, MediaGate, TemperatureGate, World WildlifeGate, CarbonGate,
WarmingGate, RainGate, WikipediaGate, GlobalWarmingGate, StormGate, NatureGate, GISSGate, WeatherGate, GIECGate, StudentDissertationAndMagazineArticleGate, OceanGate, GreenGate, PolarBearGate, MountainGate, YamalGate, Co2Gate, IndiaGate, GoreGate, StationGate, RussiaGate, HansenGate, StudentDissertationGate, CopenhagenGate, NetherlandGate, HadleyGate, JonesGate, ClimateChangeGate, WeatherStationGate, SaharaGate, PeerGate, ClimbingGate, ThermometerGate, NaturalDisasterGate, ForestGate, DarwinGate, ArcticGate, WarmGate, AntarticaGate, PhilJonesGate, DroughtGate, FireGate, PeerReviewGate, EarthquakeGate, BriffaGate, WhistleBlowerGate, ArticleGate, MSMGate, HadCRUGate, HadCRUTGate, ArticleGate, AntarticGate, FOIGate, GHCNGate, HarryReadMeGate, SiberiaGate, TornadoGate, UNESCOGate, UHIEffectGate, KilimanjaroGate, and canā€™t forget the classic,
WaterGate II Gate.
Do we have a ConsensusGate?

tokyoboy
February 7, 2010 6:02 pm

Dugetit (15:24:16) :
Yeah, the chicanery on the water shortage issue should very adequately called “Watergate.”

rogerthesurf
February 7, 2010 7:03 pm

With reference to global warming, which unfortunately so long as governments are considering Cap and Trade and CO2 taxes, is still with us.
There might be global warming or cooling but the important issue is whether we, as a human race, can do anything about it.
There are a host of porkies and not very much truth barraging us everyday so its difficult to know what to believe.
I think I have simplified the issue in an entertaining way on my blog which includes some issues connected with climategate and ā€œembarrassingā€ evidence.
In the pipeline is an analysis of the economic effects of the proposed emission reductions. Watch this space or should I say Blog
http://www.rogerfromnewzealand.wordpress.com
Please feel welcome to visit and leave a comment.
Cheers
Roger

Another Qlder
February 7, 2010 7:06 pm

Hey – don’t forget the Kiwi-Gate! It may be a small country but boy – it has the same capacity of fudging temp data as some other countries!

RockyRoad
February 8, 2010 10:33 am

Fox News is now carrying this about Africa-Gate and how the IPCC is losing all credibility:
http://www.foxnews.com/scitech/2010/02/08/british-scientist-says-panel-losing-credibility/

February 8, 2010 5:55 pm

The politics of global warming died at Copenhagen – now it looks like the “science” won’t survive this snowy winter.
In any case, global warming was about science in the same sense that the Spanish Inquisition was about God: both appealed to an unimpeachable authority to implement measures most people considered unpleasant and unnecessary.
All this is big news: where’s the US news media? At least the Brit press has caught up to the subject… See “Climategate and the ideology of news”:
http://vulgarmorality.wordpress.com/2010/02/08/climategate-and-the-ideology-of-news/

David Gay
February 8, 2010 10:49 pm

The climate isn’t the only thing that could reduce food production by 50%. We have seen that happen in Rhodesia over the last decade. In the Unites States and an aggressive E.P.A. could have a similar effect by enforcing the strictest regulations available to them.

Roger Knights
February 9, 2010 12:05 am

I heartily endorse vulgarmorality’s piece, recommended a couple of posts above. He’s got his finger on the real motives of the warmists: Not politics, not money, not their vegetarian overlords, but arrogant, pushy elitist rationalism. (I.e., IMO, Pareto’s “circulation of the elites,” supplemented by “the will to power.”)
http://vulgarmorality.wordpress.com/2010/02/08/climategate-and-the-ideology-of-news/

Roger Knights
February 9, 2010 12:20 am

PS: I should concede that there was one very powerful political motive for CAWG alarmism: It provided a huge stick for Bush-bashers to pummel the Republicans with, to harvest lots of Independent votes, and to rope in greenie campaign foot-soldiers. These fantastic payoffs ensured that the unscrupulous, and the conscientious but willfully deluded — i.e., everyone — would take full advantage of this wedge issue.

Roger Knights
February 9, 2010 1:06 am

PPS: Come to think of it, Global Warming provided a terrific campaign issue for left-wing parties worldwide, so long as the costs could be fudged or it could be pretended that renewable energy sources would become practical in a reasonable time and not be too expensive.
A UK professor named Runciman (sp?) wrote a book in the 60s titled (I think), The Liberal Mind. One sentence stuck with me (I paraphrase): “The soul of socialism is sensitivity to wrongs crying out for redress.”
Global warming fits the script as a crying wrong. And the villains of the piece are “the usual suspects”: big money, polluting industries, blinkered, unfeeling, compromised, apologist-scientists and greedy, short-sighted, money-nexus market-fiend political parties and pressure groups. Plus the short-sighted, uncaring, unthinking, unscientific, polluting, convenience-focused, populist-or-worse, Joe-sixpack public.
What a narrative! The facts must surely fit it! Any that don’t they must be lies! My knee is jerking at warp speed! Get me my warhorse! On with the show!

Roger Knights
February 9, 2010 7:50 am

PPPS: Or maybe Runciman wrote, “The soul of socialism is a search for wrongs crying out for redress.ā€

Alex Beere
February 9, 2010 12:57 pm

IPCC: I protect carbon crooks