From World Climate Report:
Another IPCC Error: Antarctic Sea Ice Increase Underestimated by 50%
Figure 1. Trend in Antarctic ice extent, November 1978 through December 2006 (source: Comiso and Nishio, 2008).
Several errors have been recently uncovered in the 4th Assessment Report (AR4) of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC). These include problems with Himalayan glaciers, African agriculture, Amazon rainforests, Dutch geography, and attribution of damages from extreme weather events. More seem to turn up daily. Most of these errors stem from the IPCC’s reliance on non-peer reviewed sources.
The defenders of the IPCC have contended that most of these errors are minor in significance and are confined to the Working Group II Report (the one on impacts, adaptation and vulnerability) of the IPCC which was put together by representatives from various regional interests and that there was not as much hard science available to call upon as there was in the Working Group I report (“The Physical Science Basis”). The IPCC defenders argue that there have been no (or practically no) problems identified in the Working Group I (WGI) report on the science.
We humbly disagree.
In fact, the WGI report is built upon a process which, as revealed by the Climategate emails, is, by its very nature, designed not to produce an accurate view of the state of climate science, but instead to be an “assessment” of the state of climate science—an assessment largely driven by preconceived ideas of the IPCC design team and promulgated by various elite chapter authors. The end result of this “assessment” is to elevate evidence which supports the preconceived ideas and denigrate (or ignore) ideas that run counter to it.
These practices are clearly laid bare in several recent Petitions to the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA)—petitions asking the EPA to reconsider its “Endangerment Finding” that anthropogenic greenhouse gases endanger our public health and welfare. The basis of the various petitions is that the process is so flawed that the IPCC cannot be considered a reliable provider of the true state of climate science, something that the EPA heavily relies on the IPCC to be. The most thorough of these petitions contains over 200 pages of descriptions of IPCC problems and it a true eye-opener into how bad things had become.
There is no doubt that the 200+ pages would continue to swell further had the submission deadline not been so tight. New material is being revealed daily.
Just last week, the IPCC’s (and thus EPA’s) primary assertion that “Most of the observed increase in global average temperatures since the mid-20th century is very likely due to the observed increase in anthropogenic GHG [greenhouse gas] concentrations” was shown to be wrong. This argument isn’t included in the Petition.
This adds yet another problem to the growing list of errors in the IPCC WGI report, this one concerns Antarctic sea ice trends.
While all the press is about the observed declines in Arctic sea ice extent in recent decades, little attention at all is paid to the fact that the sea ice extent in the Antarctic has been on the increase. No doubt the dearth of press coverage stems from the IPCC treatment of this topic.
In the IPCC AR4 the situation is described like this in Chapter 4, “Observations: Changes in Snow, Ice, and Frozen Ground” (p. 351):
As an example, an updated version of the analysis done by Comiso (2003), spanning the period from November 1978 through December 2005, is shown in Figure 4.8. The annual mean ice extent anomalies are shown. There is a significant decreasing trend in arctic sea ice extent of –33 ± 7.4 × 103 km2 yr–1 (equivalent to –2.7 ± 0.6% per decade), whereas the Antarctic results show a small positive trend of 5.6 ± 9.2 × 103 km2 yr–1 (0.47 ± 0.8% per decade), which is not statistically significant. The uncertainties represent the 90% confidence interval around the trend estimate and the percentages are based on the 1978 to 2005 mean.
Notice that the IPCC states that the Antarctic increase in sea ice extent from November 1979-December 2005 is “not statistically significant” which seems to give them good reason to play it down. For instance, in the Chapter 4, Executive Summary (p. 339), the sea ice bullet reads:
Satellite data indicate a continuation of the 2.7 ± 0.6% per decade decline in annual mean arctic sea ice extent since 1978. The decline for summer extent is larger than for winter, with the summer minimum declining at a rate of 7.4 ± 2.4% per decade since 1979. Other data indicate that the summer decline began around 1970. Similar observations in the Antarctic reveal larger interannual variability but no consistent trends.
Which in the AR4 Summary For Policymakers becomes two separate items:
Satellite data since 1978 show that annual average arctic sea ice extent has shrunk by 2.7 [2.1 to 3.3]% per decade, with larger decreases in summer of 7.4 [5.0 to 9.8]% per decade. These values are consistent with those reported in the TAR. {4.4}
and,
Antarctic sea ice extent continues to show interannual variability and localised changes but no statistically significant average trends, consistent with the lack of warming reflected in atmospheric temperatures averaged across the region. {3.2, 4.4}
“Continues to show…no statistically significant average trends”? Continues?
This is what the IPCC Third Assessment Report (TAR), released in 2001, had to say about Antarctic sea ice trends (Chapter 3, p. 125):
Over the period 1979 to 1996, the Antarctic (Cavalieri et al., 1997; Parkinson et al., 1999) shows a weak increase of 1.3 ± 0.2%/decade.
By anyone’s reckoning, that is a statistically significant increase.
In the IPCC TAR Chapter 3 Executive Summary is this bullet point:
…Satellite data indicate that after a possible initial decrease in the mid-1970s, Antarctic sea-ice extent has stayed almost stable or even increased since 1978.
So, the IPCC AR4’s contention that sea ice trends in Antarctica “continues” to show “no statistically significant average trends” contrasts with what it had concluded in the TAR.
Interestingly, the AR4 did not include references to any previous study that showed that Antarctic sea ice trends were increasing in a statistically significant way. The AR4 did not include the TAR references of either Cavalieri et al., 1997, or Parkinson et al., 1999. Nor did the IPCC AR4 include a reference to Zwally et al., 2002, which found that:
The derived 20 year trend in sea ice extent from the monthly deviations is 11.18 ± 4.19 x 103 km2yr-1 or 0.98 ± 0.37% (decade)-1 for the entire Antarctic sea ice cover, which is significantly positive. [emphasis added]
and (also from Zwally et al. 2002),
Also, a recent analysis of Antarctic sea ice trends for 1978–1996 by Watkins and Simmonds [2000] found significant increases in both Antarctic sea ice extent and ice area, similar to the results in this paper. [emphasis added]
Watkins and Simmonds (2000) was also not cited by the AR4.
So just what did the IPCC AR4 authors cite in support of their “assessment” that Antarctic sea ice extent was not increasing in a statistically significant manner? The answer is “an updated version of the analysis done by Comiso (2003).” And just what is “Comiso (2003)”? A book chapter!
Comiso, J.C., 2003: Large scale characteristics and variability of the global sea ice cover. In: Sea Ice – An Introduction to its Physics, Biology, Chemistry, and Geology [Thomas, D. and G.S. Dieckmann (eds.)]. Blackwell Science, Oxford, UK, pp. 112–142.
And the IPCC didn’t actually even use what was in the book chapter, but instead “an updated version” of the “analysis” that was in the book chapter.
And from this “updated” analysis, the IPCC reported that the increase in Antarctic sea ice extent was an insignificant 5.6 ± 9.2 × 103 km2 yr–1 (0.47 ± 0.8% per decade)—a value that was only about one-half of the increase reported in the peer-reviewed literature.
There are a few more things worth considering.
1) Josefino Comiso (the author of the above mentioned book chapter) was a contributing author of the IPCC AR4 Chapter 4, so the coordinating lead authors probably just turned directly to Comiso to provide an unpeer-reviewed update. (how convenient)
and 2) Comiso published a subsequent paper (along with Fumihiko Nishio) in 2008 that added only one additional year to the IPCC analysis (i.e. through 2006 instead of 2005), and once again found a statistically significant increase in Antarctic sea ice extent, with a value very similar to the value reported in the old TAR, that is:
When updated to 2006, the trends in ice extent and area …in the Antarctic remains slight but positive at 0.9 ± 0.2 and 1.7 ± 0.3% per decade.
These trends are, again, by anyone’s reckoning, statistically significant.
Figure 1. Trend in Antarctic ice extent, November 1978 through December 2006 (source: Comiso and Nishio, 2008).
And just in case further evidence is needed, and recent 2009 paper by Turner et al. (on which Comiso was a co-author), concluded that:
Based on a new analysis of passive microwave satellite data, we demonstrate that the annual mean extent of Antarctic sea ice has increased at a statistically significant rate of 0.97% dec-1 since the late 1970s.
This rate of increase is nearly twice as great as the value given in the AR4 (from its non-peer-reviewed source).
So, the peer reviewed literature, both extant at the time of the AR4 as well as published since the release of the AR4, shows that there has been a significant increase in the extent of sea ice around Antarctica since the time of the first satellite observations observed in the late 1970s. And yet the AR4 somehow “assessed” the evidence and determined not only that the increase was only half the rate established in the peer-reviewed literature, but also that it was statistically insignificant as well. And thus, the increase in sea ice in the Antarctic was downplayed in preference to highlighting the observed decline in sea ice in the Arctic.
It is little wonder why, considering that the AR4 found that “Sea ice is projected to shrink in both the Arctic and Antarctic under all SRES scenarios.”
References:
Cavalieri, D. J., P. Gloersen, C. L. Parkinson, J. C. Comiso, and H. J. Zwally, 1997. Observed hemispheric asymmetry in global sea ice changes. Science, 278, 1104–1106.
Cavalieri, D. J., C. L. Parkinson, P. Gloersen, J. C. Comiso, and H. J. Zwally, 1999. Deriving long-term time series of sea ice cover from satellite passivemicrowave multisensor data sets. Journal of Geophysical Research, 104, 15803–15814.
Comiso, J. C., and F. Nishio, 2008. Trends in the sea ice cover using enhanced and compatible AMSR-E, SSM/I, and SMMR data. Journal of Geophysical Research, 113, C02S07, doi:10.1029/2007JC004257.
Parkinson, C. L., D. J. Cavalieri, P. Gloersen, H. J. Zwally, and J. C. Comiso, 1999. Arctic sea ice extents, areas, and trends, 1978– 1996. Journal of Geophysical Research, 104, 20837–20856.
Turner, J., J. C. Comiso, G. J. Marshall, T. A. Lachlan-Cope, T. Bracegirdle, T. Maksym, M. P. Meredith, Z. Wang, and A. Orr, 2009. Non-annular atmospheric circulation change induced by stratospheric ozone depletion and its role in the recent increase of Antarctic sea ice extent. Geophysical Research Letters, 36, L08502, doi:10.1029/2009GL037524.
Watkins, A. B., and I. Simmonds, Current trends in Antarctic sea ice: The 1990s impact on a short climatology, 2000. Journal of Climate, 13, 4441–4451.
Zwally, H.J., J. C. Comiso, C. L. Parkinson, D. J. Cavalieri, and P. Gloersen, 2002. Variability of Antarctic sea ice 1979-1998. Journal of Geophysical Research, 107, C53041.
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It (The bogus reports from gubmint and the IPCC) is worse than we thought.
This is huge and shows a real bias on the part of the “scientists” who
put this together. They at least did better than the climate.gov website who simply “forgot” to mention the Antarctic at all.
Antarcticgate?
The sad thing is that you didn’t have to be a rocket scientist to spot these inconsistencies. I have pointed these things out to various sources (eg. the climate change advisor in my own company) and have either been ignored or had my view marginalised or been made to feel stupid.
I find it sad that has taken so so long for such observations to be made publically obvious. It is so obvious. If the sea ice around Antarctica is growing (on a decadal trend basis) – which any schoolboy analysis of freely available basic data shows …… what does this tell you about the certainty of global warming ?
In spite of all the new revelations of massaged data and biased evaluations that just keep on coming, the alarmists, like Peter Liss of CRU, continue to insist that the “overwhelming science still supports AGW”. What “science” are they basing this claim on? The pundits and politicians need to ask them. Is there any evidence for AGW that is not tarnished? It doesn’t seem like it to me.
Ouch.
Do not forget, that the “greenhouse” theory expects the strongest warming in polar regions, since dry air holds only a little of water vapor and increase of CO2 should intensify the “greenhouse” effect very vividly.
Antarctic – no warming
Arctic – cyclic oscillation related to AMO
Some coy phrases from Father Jack (Of the TV progran Fatther Ted) come to mind. You should all google “Fathre Ted” TV program. I can tell you from real and family experience, the theme is largely true.
Oi loik cake!
I think I finally understand why Obama is pushing so hard for carbon trading in the US. Obama was one of the persons responsible for the creation of the Chicago Climate Exchange, along with other people like Al Gore and Maurice Strong (involved in UN Oil-for-food scandal). Obama is pushing for a carbon trading bill in the United States because he stands to makes millions if not billions of dollars from this scam, trading in carbon credits (a made-up solution for a non-existent problem). Note how Obama is using the EPA to force through his carbon controlling agenda, even while the carbon trading bill has been stopped for now in the US congress.
[snip]
Meanwhile, Obama can also scare the masses and control them by blaming CO2 (a harmless gas that plants need for photosynthesis) for being the cause behind global warming. Obama: “CO2 bad, therefore government must take control of CO2 and regulate all CO2-related concerns” — meaning EVERYTHING. Meaning that Obama can control EVERYONE by being in charge of who can use energy and how much energy they can use. If this is not Big Brother, than I don’t know what is. 1984 was off by about 30 years. Let’s see how things turn out in 2014.
In a country like the UK (which no longer has natural resources or manufacturing capability), the only main way for them to make money and stay relevant to the world at large today is to be a player in the various world financial markets. Because the carbon market is expected to be worth trillions in the next 10-20 years, this why Gordon Brown is pushing hard for global carbon trading exchanges, as he wants the UK to get in early and be a player in this market.
As usual, the middle class will end up paying for all of this while a handful of politicians and bankers become megarich. Consider the subprime mess recently where all the greedy banks who caused the crisis were bailed out with taxpayer cash, and still the bank execs were given huge bonuses using the taxpayer’s money.
With the advent of The Internet, it will be harder than ever for the elitist in power to hoodwink the masses, but do not underestimate the influence that these corrupt elitists hold. Look at how they have managed to shut up the mainstream media in regards to the unraveling global warming scam. They may one day find a way to control The Internet, so we all need to be wary. Remember that Al Gore is on the board of advisors for Google. Once we lose The Internet, we will lose our freedom.
A special note on Al Gore: Al Gore is behaving like a jilted lover who wants revenge. Al Gore: “OK, you didn’t want me as your POTUS, so I’ll scam the whole world with my global warming scare. And I’ll make billions of dollars while I’m at it. You’ll see. I’ll have the last laugh. I’LL SHOW YOU.” The thing is, even the people in his own state didn’t vote for him because they know that he is a liar and hypocrite of the highest level. He keeps warning people that mega waves will engulf the coasts of the US; meanwhile he is happily buying and keeping beachfront property. He is such a liar to the extent that he even photoshopped non-existent hurricanes unto his latest book cover. His academy-award winning documentary has been legally declared in the UK to have nine glaring factual errors that mislead people about global warming. Companies that he is involved in regularly get huge million-dollar grants from the federal government, related to his global warming scare. He is a partner in the company behind the Chicago Climate Exchange, which stands to make trillions of dollars in carbon-trading commissions. How is it that some people still believe this charlatan and want to shake his hand?
Be wary of the ravenous wolves in sheeps clothing.
Why did they think that they could get away with it, and why have they actually achieved that for so long? 🙁
The link at the words “was shown to be wrong” doesn’t work.
This is one of the stronger “gates”. No “mere” citation error, no “mistake”. Clear evidence of biased assessment bookended by contrary peer-reviewed science.
Let’s see Gavin spin this away.
NASAgate.
Looks like another classic recipe from the IGCB (InterGovernmental Cookery Book):
Step 1: Take one part good science
Step 2: Stir in three parts of political expediency and an equal measure of pseudo-scientific interpretation
Step 3: Strain out any lumps that don’t look quite right
Step 4: repeat steps 2 and 3 as necessary, simmering gently until thoroughly cooked
Result: Exactly what the politicians need to nourish the hype.
“These trends are, again, by anyone’s reckoning, statistically significant.”
Reading their paper, it is obvious that the errors Cosimo and Nishio state in the trend are due to difficulties in an accurate determination of the edge of the ice. They are not the statistical errors calculated by looking at the variability in the data. The latter should be calculated and used in testing the significance of any trend.
It’s not correct to state, as this article does, that the increasing trend in Antarctic ice extent is significant based just on the measurement errors.
it is recorded that Adam and Eve had only two sons, one of whom killed the other. No daughters of any kind from anywhere achieved mention. Tell that to some Bible thumpers, ask how they think the human race was propagated post-Genesis, and note how that makes them rethink their beliefs.
Now, point out the errors, omissions, and palpable quackery in AGW science to warmies and note that they can dodge reality as easily as the Bible thumpers do.
I think jamesafalk hit it, “This is one of the stronger “gates”. No “mere” citation error, no “mistake”. Clear evidence of biased assessment bookended by contrary peer-reviewed science.”
I thought it would be tagged IPCC
Which brings up a point about collating all these “gate” posts into one post/article with it’s own link. Has such a post been done?
Cheers,
Anthony and Charles
On 29 December 2009 the site meter hit 30 million.
Today it is over 36 million!
Is there a hockey stick in the room?
Comiso. Comiso mucho. Kiss me and tell me that story of ice once again.
===============
It is absolutely incorrect to title this blog post as a “gate Du Jour” — thereby implying there’s some sort of scandal — or for the unnamed authors of the report to refer to an “IPCC Error.” The reason is very simple and straightforward: the article relies on information that was not published at the time of the IPCC’s 4AR. The report cites seven references — two of which are dated after 2007.
Will those who read this and manage these websites update their content and refer to this correctly as an update? I’d post this directly to Worldclimatereport.com, but their site is closed to comments.
Paul Z
I take your main point, but I would counsel you and all other fellow climate sceptics not to make the argument that CO2 is “a harmless gas that plants need for photosynthesis”.
All substances become toxic when they are in the wrong place in too high a concentration. Breathing pure CO2 would kill you. Water is essential for life but if you get too much into your lungs, you drown. Also, what is harmless to us may be harmful to other species.
I think that constant repetition of the point that CO2 is harmless tends to irritate pedantic life scientists like me and make the sceptical arguments look less scientific.
In the concentrations we are currently expereincing in the atmosphere, CO2 is harmless to animal life, and slight increases in concentration may be beneficial to plant growth.
“It’s not correct to state, as this article does, that the increasing trend in Antarctic ice extent is significant based just on the measurement errors.”
I second this.
Ref – Paul Z. (03:49:23) :
“I think I finally understand…”
______________________
Me too. Problem for EPA is that they’ve taken on a Kimakazee mission. The folks in charge there now are betting everything –their personal fortunes, their careers, their future livelihood, and their “names”– to convince the country that AGW is real. Problem is they’re out of gas and going down in an empty ocean. They will accomplish nothing but their own, and the EPA’s, destruction.
Ref – Peter (04:37:16) :
“I think jamesafalk hit it, “This is one of the stronger “gates”…”
_____________________
IPCC-gate is just a little “removed” from most people. They’re sitting on top of the mountain so to speak. But POTUS, Congress, the EPA, NASA, etc., these fools are square in the sights of a lot of angry voters. Angry voters taking aim at a bunch of “out of control” nutcases who need to be shown the real-gate.
No offense, but this is a pretty boring story- statistics, lack of peer-review.
If you want anyone to actually talk about the story, you have to find out who Comiso is, and affix devil horns to his head.
What are the evil motives that drive a scientist to fudge the facts?
Anthony, I mark this as Climategate #24. I am counting from AJ Strata’s three (2/16) and Mark Landsbaum’s summary of twenty (Orange County Register 2/10)
(Imran (03:31:35) : “The sad thing is that you didn’t have to be a rocket scientist to spot these inconsistencies. I have pointed these things out to various sources (eg. the climate change advisor in my own company) and have either been ignored or had my view marginalised or been made to feel stupid.
I find it sad that has taken so so long for such observations to be made publically obvious. ”
Yes, this nonsense truly is sad, given all the mischief it has caused and the billions it has sucked up. It (Climategate Conspiracy Crew — each group for their own reasons — greed, professional (scientific) godhood, or global power) continues to believe it can come back from the near-dead in vampiric fashion and take more blood from us.
The time for sadness is over. Anger, reasoned and swift, is necessary today to take down to the ground the crumbling edifice until not even one foundation stone is left.
What good can come from this “sadness”? Peoples’ education in the science of global warming and cooling — e.g., the more “gentle cycles” we have known for about 150 years; the more extreme cycles of the Holocene (last ~11,000 years), and the real thing, giant ice sheets. People might wake up to the necessity of (real) science, technology, and educating their kids to do their dangest for the future of “warm” living on Earth. How much time do we have? Looking at the charts, historically speaking, we “should” about be at the end of our “interglacial”.
People might come to love CO2 if our use of fossil fuels can delay what seems like the inevitable refrigerator Earth. (At the same time, on this issue I don’t think the science is settled.) People might come to love our corporations, too, (well regulated — no scams — only value added) for their ability to acrue knowledge, expertise, and the collective muscle to address these issues.
Everyone should read Paul Z. 3:49:23. He might not have all the players, but he knows the issues. I would add that everyone invested in cap-and-trade is a loser; they cannot make a profit from competing in the free (well regulated) market. Some examples: GE and the bangsters.
Anger, folks. We need lots of anger and reasoned actions therefrom.
So how long will the lie that the overwhelming science supports the fraudulent conclusions, persist.
Why is it that just about every error from the IPCC has been in their favor? Even the former IPCC head noticed this:
UN must investigate warming ‘bias’, says former climate chief
‘Every error exaggerated the impact of change’
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/news/environment/article7026932.ece
Correction: Corporations that cannot add value today (make a profit in the free market) and thus are depending on cap-n-trade: GE and the BANKSTERS
we wrote this email to the NobelPriceCommitee and world wide media:
In 2007 you awarded the Nobel Peace Prize to the IPPC and Albert Arnold Gore for their efforts about the climate protection. Demonstrably, data was manipulated or even falsified.
Don’t you think it is your duty to verify the award of this famous and most honorable prize again? Due to the knowledge that was obtained by the climate gate or by the glacier gate, your reputation would suffer enormously, if you covered it up in silence.
Let the public know, that this award is not arbitrary and therefore unimportant and that the Laureates are most honorable.
Here come the first reactions: NYPost
The other main organ of the climate “consensus” is the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change. It won the Nobel Peace Prize for its 2007 report — which turns out to have been so riddled with errors it could have been researched on Wikipedia.
Read more: http://www.nypost.com/p/news/opinion/opedcolumnists/warming_meltdown_iD1hypJAstOrvovafbIbGK#ixzz0fk4PeTwC [2]
FTD Financial Times Germany:
Nobel Price Judge going into distance to the IPCC
Cause of HimalayaGate the chief of the royalswedishacademy claims a strict inspection of the gremium and CONSEQUENCES!!!
http://www.infokriegernews.de/wordpress/2010/02/17/friedensnobelpreis-al-gore-und-ipcc-muessen-zittern/
😉
Person of Choler (04:34:40) :
it is recorded that Adam and Eve had only two sons, one of whom killed the other. No daughters of any kind from anywhere achieved mention. Tell that to some Bible thumpers, ask how they think the human race was propagated post-Genesis, and note how that makes them rethink their beliefs.
Now, point out the errors, omissions, and palpable quackery in AGW science to warmies and note that they can dodge reality as easily as the Bible thumpers do.
————–
Reply:
Please don’t rely much on what the “Bible” says (a rather incomplete record at best). Nowhere does it say that Adam and Eve had “only” two sons. I can show you additional scripture that says Adam and Eve had multiple sons and multiple daughters, and that they married and had children, grandchildren, and so forth.
That’s one of the reasons why the “Bible” isn’t allowed as a reference in any highschool debate.
But your point is well taken–the Warmers are now the deniers.
We’ve always been the realists.
At this point, not one single IPCC assertion has withstood the light of day. Nothing these rampant con-artists put out has any objective, rational validity whatever. Meantime, mass media in the U.S. have yet to mention these ongoing scandals, or even Climategate from last November. Surely there will a compensating tidal wave of long-outdated “news” when the dam of Statist censorship gives way. How long can such complicity in Green Gang and UN scams go on?
Don’t forget
Flooding = Global Warming
Drought = Global Waming
Less Snow = Global Warming
More Snow = Global Warming
So presumably
Less ice in the Arctic = Global Warming
More ice in the Antarctic = Global Warming
Simple really
Not forgetting of course that everywhere and in all circumstances warming is bad. Just because cooling causes people to starve and freeze in large numbers, fall over and die in more crashes, pay more for fuel and cause more animals and plants to die doesn’t mean we mustn’t do all we can to make the world colder and colder.
And as for spin. Well which continent emits the least amount of CO2? Antarctica! And its getting colder there. Nuff said I think. Now if we can only think of a way of making all the other continents more like Antarctica…
Let’s see if I’ve still got track of the growing gaggle of primary suspects under the Climate-Gate banner. (So far) we now have:
Glacier-Gate (Himalayan variant)
Amazon-Gate (forest fraud variant)
Pachauri-Gate (usual suspect variant)
TERI-Gate (corruption variant)
Hurricane-Gate (gone missing variant)
Disaster-Gate (hype variant)
PeerReview-Gate (bad science variant)
Boot-Gate (comedy variant)
China-Gate (obviously bad temps variant)
Geography-Gate (drowning Dutch variant)
Africa-Gate (ag variant)
SeaIce-Gate (won’t read or do math variant)
IPCC-Gate (pervasive fraud & incompetence variant)
And complex enough to need its own sub-directory:
NGO-Gate – including but not necessarily limited to:
WWF-Gate
NWF-Gate
Greenpeace-Gate
Magazine-Gate
Thesis-Gate
Newspaper-Gate
Anthony, it’s gotten so big and diverse and is growing so fast, that we almost need a Climate-Gate directory button on the WUWT top menu bar to keep track, categorize, and summarize them all.
If objective science still has any meaning in a politically-correct and agenda driven world:
Surely the above ”fraternity of gates” has progressed well beyond any usual and customary SNAFU, and has now metastasized into the full-blown FUBAR stage (for those few who don’t know and/or never worked for the military, polite translations are: Situation Normal, All ”Fouled” Up; and ”Fouled” Up Beyond All Repair).
Many in the parasitic & political classes and much of the LSM may still not have recognized it (and/or will continue to deliberately ignore the facts), but IMO we can now say that the tipping-point has been reached on the whole AGW scam:
Enough MSM outlets (especially the Fleet Street mob over in the U.K.) have gotten their teeth into the dysfunctional Climate-Gate family that Reverend Gore and friends will never get the AGW-as-religion genie back in the bottle.
And to those who called US ”deniers”:
Who’s your daddy now ??…
Thomas Friedman over at the NYT claims that Global Warming really should be called Global Weirding (I think he’s been reading the IPCC’s reports too literally–fantasies and all). Should that name stick, Warmists can be called Wierders based on that mindset.
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/02/17/opinion/17friedman.html
Can any of this get any more laughable? And really, what could be more appropriate?
I’d much rather be called a Climate Realist (or even a Climate Denialist) over being called a Climate Weirder anyday!
Interested article about IPCC in the Guardian
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/feb/10/ipcc-reform
A flat or slightly decreasing average earth temperature is considered by IPCC to be a statistically significant warming only depending on atmospheric CO2 level.
A real increase in Antarctic sea ice is considered by IPCC to be insignificant.
But this time are they wrong.
This is very significant.
Especially for IPCC.
Person of Choler,
Any Bible thumper worth his stuff knows that Genesis says Adam had other sons and daughters… throw in a little excusable early incest and it’s not too hard. Don’t argue with someone by misrepresenting their own data.
===========
As far as the ice goes, I’m waiting to see where this winter peaks and where this summer bottoms. The trouble with the ice stuff is that when it expands you have AGWers saying it’s less density and actually bad, and then when it shrinks you have skeptics saying it’s more dense as actually good. So I don’t know what to make of it. Snowfall amounts seem to be the only uncontroversial measurements these days…
So, if Arctic ice is MELTING, and Antarctic ice is INCREASING… Isn’t that going to make the planet off-balance and start us wobbling??? ZOMG WE’RE ALL GOING TO DIE!!!!
ILC @ 6:28:19
Thanks for Rich. Soon we’ll be appreciating the irony of the D word label as the world recognizes the economic holocaust we’ve dodged by not pursuing the chimera of CO2 demonization.
============================
Here ya go: CO2 is dangerous. If you ever find yourself hyperventilating, do NOT put a bag over your mouth and breathe in your own CO2! According to peer-reviewed science, it will KILL you! Instead, it is much healthier to continue to hyperventilate. While you are still gasping for CO2-less air and turning purple, try to say “ohmmmmmm” while sitting in the lotus position. And kiss a green WWF lapel pin for a blessing. You can rest in peace that this has been peer reviewed. One final step. What would you like your RIP sign to say?
Put this forth to the relevant chapter review editor and the response you’ll get is……
Richard S Courtney would understand…and chuckle behind gritted teeth. 🙂
More ‘evidence’ in support of a proposition that we should immediately abandon all preconceived ideas arising from past data and just start observing what happens in the real world with the benefit of modern satellite based observing systems.
And, please, let’s get away from the perspective of a 5 year old child for whom every daily observation is ‘unprecedented’.
We need a climatological ‘year zero’ starting today.
@I LOVE CO2 (06:28:19)
You may find this funny 😉
Carl Pope, Sierra Club Executive Director:Praise for Gore and IPCC For Nobel Peace Prize – World Leaders Must Follow their Example!:
http://tennessee.sierraclub.org/1107ts.pdf
I especially love how the AGW “proof” is always in far-away places like the arctic ocean or Antartica, or glaciers in the Himalayas. Places that 99.9% of people do not venture or have any prior knowledge. Al Gore can say “Ships are sailing right through the arctic and they should be trapped in ice…that’s proof of Global Warming”. How would anyone know for sure? Most people do not have first person exerience with this. But what people do experience every day does not support AGW. Most people are burning oil right now to stay warm, and shoveling feet of snow every other day. Al Gore and his ilk have to keep the focus on stuff beyond the reach of the average person (like glaciers and arctic sea ice).
I also like to tell folks that I wish for Global Warming so I can stop burning oil in the winter to stay warm.
Breathing pure CO2 causes no harm whtever.
What kills you is the lack of oxygen.
What proportion of the atmosphere as CO2 would deprive us of enough oxygen to be perceptible ?
[Studies on submarines said around 9000ppm. R.T. – mod]
The fact that all of these “innocent” mistakes (up about about 15+ by now ??) are always in favour of AGW is the ultimate proof that this is deliberate fraud.
If these mistakes were innocent, then you should have approx 50-50 for, and against AGW. At most 60%. But we see 100% of the “mistakes” favouring AGW – this is a statistical impossibility, even 70% would be statistically impossible.
I`m suprised more hasn’d been made of this fact.
This is another whopper in the collapse of the AGW movement.
Or shall we be kind and call it more infallability?
In total the picture could not be more clear. There’s been a deliberate effort at many levels and locations to doctor, embellish, fabricate and distort the scientific process to reflect an urgent need for policies and actions which benefit an agenda and the activists behind it.
Regarding Gavin Schmidt, I’ve read much of RC over the past few e years and there will be a GavinGate.
Throughout his participation are countless misrepresentations covering essentially every IPCC “error” which surfaces.
His and Romm’s CP effort to cover up and perpetrate even more malfeasence continues.
So it is entirely predictable that a GavinGate and RommGate will be occuring in the not too distant futere.
I am confident that millions of people want, demand, these people to face harsh consequences as ClimateGate fully unravels.
Another leading edge of that unraveling is here.
http://www.rechargenews.com/business_area/politics/article206621.ece
Texas, US Chamber legally challenge EPA on GHG ruling
http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/news/washington/stories/DN-epasuit_17tex.ART.State.Edition2.4bb1e87.html
Texas challenges EPA ruling on greenhouse gas threat
Thanks Smokey: Buy more Popcorn!
The Nasa Gate:
http://pajamasmedia.com/blog/climategate-2-0-—-the-nasa-files-u-s-climate-science-as-corrupt-as-cru-pjm-exclusive-—-part-one/?singlepage=true
Don’t worry, they will wheel out the ‘Its the Ozone Hole thats causing the Antarctic to be cold’ theory.
OT: Texas challenges EPA ruling on greenhouse gas threat
http://www.dallasnews.com/sharedcontent/dws/news/washington/stories/DN-epasuit_17tex.ART.State.Edition2.4bb1e87.html
It’s about fracking time.
The data is available here:
http://neptune.gsfc.nasa.gov/csb/index.php?section=59
A regression analysis for 11/1978 to 12/2004 gives a loss in antarctic ice extent of 1.20 +/- 0.25 % a decade. This is a statistically significant value and consistent with the subsequent published value of 0.94 +/-0.23 % a decade from Cosimo and Nishio (2008) cited in the article.
Hence, I agree the value of 5.6 +/- 9.2 x 10^3 km^2 a yr, equivalent to 0.49 +/- 0.81 % a decade given in AR4 does not appear correct, although I don’t know the actual data that was used for that calculation.
It might have been worth the author of this article contacting Dr Comiso. I’ve just emailed him this calculation and he is looking into this apparent discrepancy.
Any shift from a gain of 0.5 % to 1.2% a decade in the antarctic should be seen in the context of the arctic loss. This was given as 7.4 +/- 2.4% a decade in AR4 but has been updated by Cosimo and Nishio in 2008 to a loss of 8.4 +/- 1.4% a decade.
C02 is NOT, I repeat NOT, a toxic gas in any amount.
It is a simple asphyxiant in significant concentrations, and it does that by definition of asphyxiation.
There is no danger of asphyxiating the planet due to burning of fossil fuels.
To do that would require all the fossil fuels to be unearthed and lit on fire simultaneously. The accomplishment of gathering all remaining fossil fuels to a mass-ignition is nigh impossible. The stuff is too expensive to mine & pump for that purpose.
If anyone is naive enough or tired-of-living enough to burn fossil fuels in an enclosed space with no ventilation, the C0 will get you long before the C02 ever will.
If C02 were truly toxic, millions of citizens would be found dead from Soda Pop gas inhalation every year.
Lisa Jackson and the EPA’s sum knowledge on the subject rise no higher than high-school dropout status, and are better described as superstitious.
As a newbie, I’m still trying to catch up with the back stories. I don’t hear a lot about Svenmark’s theory here regarding cosmic rays and solar activity. It’s completely consistent with a colder Antarctic (and hence increasing ice) while the rest of the planet is warmer. Any comments? Is The Chilling Stars a quality book?
You know, I keep hearing these terms thrown around, “IPCC Reform” or “Restructure the IPCC” ..
Reform, restructure my ass. GET RID OF THEM PERIOD!!!
There is NOTHING to reform. There is NOTHING to restructure. It is all a total waste of time and money!!!
Paul Z
Where are you?
“In a country like the UK (which no longer has natural resources or manufacturing capability)”
They are still pumping oil out of the North Sea, I believe, and we do make a few things other than money.
Perosn of Choler
In the book of Genesis somewhere, Cain took a wife from the Land of Nod, I believe. Her parentage is not recorded, but she was apparently not a local girl.
Pamela Gray
Chisel the marble thus: “Believed all he read. Died from malicious sarcasm”
After extended digs through Laci’s responses (see the comments section of the Lacis post) I think there is a core unresolved question/disagreement in regards to the IPCC reports… and that is “[what is the purpose of the IPCC process]”?
Is the IPCC there to make the case for, and build a consensus around AGW… or is it to accurately portray the science in all its fuzzy/uncertain/sausage-making glory?
Take, for axample, this nugget from Lacis’ first reply:
The other aspect of the IPPC AR4 report is the political posturing component as exemplified by the Executive Summaries. Here, the need for group consensus appears to trump the need for factual correctness.
Notice that he said this issue is exemplified by, but does not say limited to, the Executive Summaries
@ MinB (08:23:49)
I think everyone’s waiting for the results of the CLOUD experiment, which I believe are due out sometime this year
Re CO2 as a “toxin”.
One might with all good reason state that CO2 is toxic because it is a waste product of human metabolism. We breathe it out because we have to eliminate it from our bodies, otherwise it would do us harm. The breathing into a paper bag thing – obviously the concentrations in the bag are not high enough to have ill effects.
It is a waste product of mammalian metabolism, which comes from the burning of food hydrocarbons. Not essentially different from the burning of fossil fuels, just more controlled as it is mediated by a series of biochemical reactions.
Trust me on this, I am a PhD biochemist.
Calling it harmless and beneficial and being a friend of CO2, just winds up the warmists. If that is what you are trying to do, well done, but it probably isn’t constructive.
Herman L (05:36:11)
As pointed out in the World Climate Report (WCR) article, there was plenty of extant literature that the IPCC had to go on in preparing the AR4 (e.g. Zwally et al., 2002; Watkins and Simmonds, 2000; Parkinson et al., 1999, Cavalieri et al. 1997). This literature generally found a significant increasing trend in Antarctic sea ice at a rate about twice the IPCC value. Yet somehow, the update of the Comiso (2003) book chapter found a smaller, insignificant trend. When Comiso got around to actually publishing an updated analysis in the peer-review literature, he found that the increasing trend was about twice the IPCC estimate. So, the IPCC estimate is the odd man out.
-Chip Knappenberger
75% of US below normal today, frost-freeze warnings in Fla, and Texas suing the US Govt. over EPA emissions ruling claiming economic damage and States Rights infringement. Go Texas.
EPA C02 Emissions Ruling: requires economic bleeding remedy to cure the fever. Calls into question from which Century the EPA’s thinking process originated in…21st AD or 21st BC?
rbateman
I am NOT saying that CO2 in the atmosphere will ever get to toxic levels! I’m just being pedantic about adjectives!
“not as much hard science to call upon” What right have these people to circulate such a hugely important document (possibly the most important document that the world has ever produced) that doesn’t have absolutely ‘hard science,’ peer reviewed, to back it up?. A document that is clearly intended to mislead governments across the world and which could have such a profound effect on the worlds economies. They should be severely punished and locked up for their intended misdemeanours
vboring (06:02:08) :
You asert and ask:
“No offense, but this is a pretty boring story- statistics, lack of peer-review.
If you want anyone to actually talk about the story, you have to find out who Comiso is, and affix devil horns to his head.
What are the evil motives that drive a scientist to fudge the facts?”
And Baa Humbug (07:28:26) responds:
“Put this forth to the relevant chapter review editor and the response you’ll get is……
“Rejected. The suggestion does not add to clarity or brevity.”
Richard S Courtney would understand…and chuckle behind gritted teeth. :)”
Yes I do “understand…and chuckle behind gritted teeth” so I suppose I had better explain.
The IPCC is NOT a scientific organisation. The IPCC never has been and never was intended to be a scientific organisation. Its purpose is indicated in its title and is stated in its Charter.
The InterGOVERNMENTal Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) exists to obtain scientific information that governments (i.e. politicians) can use to justify government (i.e. political) policies. Its entire purpose is to collate scientific information that supports those policies.
Importantly, scientific information that contradicts the IPCC’s political purpose is not considered then rejected by the IPCC. Instead, it is ignored or demeaned. All scientific information that disproves – or provides doubt – to the political policies is rejected or ignored for publication usually (as Baa Humbug says) without any real explanation.
Paul Reiter is the world’s foremost authority on vector borne diseases, Niils Axel-Morner is the world’s foremost authority on sea-level change, and Vincent Gray is the world’s foremost authority on hurricanes. But Reiter had to resort to law to get his name removed as an IPCC Author when he objected to the IPCC publishing falsehoods instead of facts concerning his specialism. Morner and Gray have each spoken out concerning the distortions of their specialisms in IPCC reports. (And the IPCC made no mention of one our 2005 papers that proves it cannot be known whether or not the recent rise in atmospheric CO2 concentration is anthropogenic or natural despite my citing that paper and its findings as part of my AR4 peer review).
So, the example in the above article is but one of many such distortions included in IPCC so-called scientific reports in attempt to fulfil the IPCC’s purpose.
Indeed, information that is complete rubbish is included in IPCC so-called scientific reports when the rubbish provides support for the IPCC’s political purpose (as glaciergate and Africagate demonstrate). Glaciergate occurred because India’s scientific authorities on Himalayan glaciers told their government that the IPCC assertion of complete loss of the glaciers by 2035 was impossible – a fact that all glaciologists knew – but the IPCC Chairman (Rajendra Pechauri) replied that this fact was “voodoo science”.
The Climategate emails prove that IPCC supporters used claims of ‘peer review’ as proof that information is correct (such claims are a denial of the scientific principle that information is assessed on its falsifiability). They then accepted for publication information of their own supply that had yet to be published in the peer reviewed literature (e.g. MBH 1998), and information from advocacy organisations (e.g. WWF) that had never been submitted for peer review.
But the flow of real scientific information continued and this was a problem to the agenda of the self-named ‘Team’ that collated information for inclusion in IPCC reports. So, as the Climategate emails prove, the Team suborned the peer review process and the Editorial Boards of journals that continued to publish untainted science. After that, also as the Climategate emails prove, when some journals continued to publish real science the Team attempted to redefine peer review so the Team could ignore anything published in those journals. Meanwhile, the Team continued to put completely unpublished nonsense (e.g. from WWF) in the IPCC reports.
“Evil motives”? No, the IPCC compilers were merely doing their job.
Richard
The most ironic d-word — and one that I therefore urge us to adopt as our own — is “deviationist,” a term from the 30s that subtly implies that the orthodoxy from which we are deviating is a fatheaded, unprincipled, tyrannical “party line.”
Tom P (08:13:09) :
Thanks for this information.
Comiso obviously knew, prior to now, of the discrepancy. He was a contributing author of the IPCC chapter, and co-author of both Comiso and Nishio (2008) and Turner et al. (2009). Turner et al. (2009) remarked on the IPCC’s low number–in fact, it was in reading that paper that this issue came to my attention.
-Chip
I understand what those who don’t like the word “gate” are saying. They want us to believe this stuff (all of the wrong statements in the IPCC ) are not done on purpose. I am not sure I believe that. I think some of them are done on propose, however, I think others aren’t. I think that many of the scientists on the IPCC are like mainstream journalist, and to some extent like everyone else, they have their own biases and therefore look for evidence that confirms their bias, and disregard evidence that doesn’t confirm their bias. They aren’t necessarily trying to mislead, but their bias prevents them from seeing another point of view.
It really does not matter, however, if they are doing it on purpose or not, If is wrong, it is wrong. It needs to be corrected.
If none of these issues matter to whether or not humans are causing global warming, why are the included in the first place? The answer to that is clear, the people who included them thought they mattered.
Type Svensmark (with two S’s) into the search box at the top right of the page and several WUWT articles will come up.
Tom P (08:13:09) :
The data is available here:
http://neptune.gsfc.nasa.gov/csb/index.php?section=59
A regression analysis for 11/1978 to 12/2004 gives a loss in antarctic ice extent of 1.20 +/- 0.25 % a decade.
Help me understand what you’ve done. Are you basically calculating a regression/trend line for the data shown in this chart:
http://neptune.gsfc.nasa.gov/uploads/sea_ice/antarctic_trend_plot.jpg
How do you get a “loss of … a decade” from this data? A loss of antarctic ice extent is inconsistent with the premise of this article, which is that the increase has been underestimated.
I’m in a bit of a fog right now, just having come back from the dentist, but I don’t think that explains what I’m missing here.
Its hard to believe that a rogue group of scientists conspired, on their own, to to create an AGW scare. Someone with lots of power was pushing them to do it. When the AGW scenario is finally laid to rest we need to find out who and why and then bring them to justice.
The carbon cycle before humans
No lack of hubris here.
This is a new one on me. Were there large-scale changes to the carbon cycle nearly 100 million years ago?
@ Imran (03:31:35) : I don’t think that is really quite that easy to see how wrong this is. But in general I share your frustration. For years I have try to point out inconsistencies with AGW and have been met with personal attacks, and have had my points dismissed and ignored. I have been called stupid by someone who did not know the difference between carbon-dioxide and carbon-monoxide.
When I point out that in the ice core data shows that temperature rises 800-1000 years before CO2, I am met with blank stares, or I am asked to prove it I can cite at least 6 peer reviewed study and cite the page number in the IPCC report where that is stated. None of that makes the slightest difference.
Slowly though I think we are finally being vindicated. I think a mistake was made in the beginning. That mistake was to believe the science would win out. We underestimated how powerfully the political view would control the debate.
@Tom T:
They seem very unlikely to be random errors, because every single error found so far – and there seem to be a lot – are all in the direction of alarmism.
So if they’re not random errors, they either represent (1) deliberate errors, or an (2) severe underlying bias in the methodology.
Neither looks particular good, both are scandalous.
Obviously deliberate errors are terrible, but even if they only an underlying bias, it tells the IPCC is nothing like what it was represented to be — an impartial body fairly reporting scientific evidence.
Actually rbateman,
CO2 and O2 are deadly to animal life in high concentrations – volcanic venting is a good example of CO2 in high concentrations and its effect when animals stumble into it.
Marine Modeling and Analysis Branch of the Environmental Modeling Center:
http://polar.ncep.noaa.gov/seaice/support/ssmi.advice.shtml
Advice on Interpreting the MMAB Ice concentrations
“Things other than ice can give an ice signature. This includes high seas and high precipitation rates. There is a filter which removes most of this contamination from the ice field, but it is not always effective. Most of the time, the false ice reports are for low concentration. This occurred on 8 January 1997, for example, at a time when Russ Page, in the Anchorage WSFO, tells me there were 60 knot winds in the Bering Sea. In the summer, the layers and puddles of water which can accumulate on the surface of the ice floes mislead the algorithm in to underestimating the total ice concentration.”
Its been interesting watching The Cryosphere Today reports; http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/
There’s approximately 3-4 more weeks of ice growth ahead and we’re currently -0.757 (million sq. km) of the 1979-2008 mean:
http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/IMAGES/seaice.recent.arctic.png
http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/IMAGES/seaice.area.arctic.png
The Sea of Okhotsk ice pack appears to be effected by currents in El Nino years.
I’m not wishing to get into a theological discussion here, but this has to be corrected.
Person of Choler (04:34:40) :
“it is recorded that Adam and Eve had only two sons, one of whom killed the other. No daughters of any kind from anywhere achieved mention. Tell that to some Bible thumpers, ask how they think the human race was propagated post-Genesis, and note how that makes them rethink their beliefs…………..”
Wrong. In the KJV Gen 5:3 Further, it doesn’t say they were exclusive.(Either more children of Adam and Eve or otherwise. Please note an earlier post referencing Cain’s wife.) Also, remember, in many cultures, it was common place not to place much significance on females. In the Bible, wives and concubines are often mentioned, but not always.
Sigh, I really don’t understand how otherwise intelligent people can remain so blissfully ignorant when it comes to religion(Christianity more specifically). TRY READING THE BOOK before attempting to butcher what it is saying. As many people do, you’ll find plenty of opportunity to butcher it’s meaning after reading, but any Bible thumper I know already understands the thoughts I’ve just expressed.
Kindest regards,
James Sexton
pcknappenberger (08:51:17) :
“Comiso obviously knew, prior to now, of the discrepancy.”
He sounded genuinely surprised when I talked to him and wanted to look in to this. If this is indeed an error, I wouldn’t assume any conspiracy.
RockyRoad (06:43:48)
I love how he says “they should add a summary of all the errors and wild exaggerations made by the climate skeptics — and where they get their funding”
Stuff like this really makes me want to start spouting various colorful words that should not be used in polite company… maybe even the Q-word.
What about all the errors and wild exaggerations made by AGW Believers – and where they get their funding. Then he quotes Romm… what a [snipping] [snip] of a [snip]
Hey Friedman and Romm, how about Congressional investigations (chaired by Al Gore?) where all these skeptics can be brought in under oath so allegiances to “Big Coal”, “Big Oil”, the Chamber of Commerce and, most frightening of all, “Conservatives” can be uncovered and the vastness of the conspiracy can be shown to the world.
“[I have here in my hand the names of 205 deniers who are still working at schools and major universities]”
Basil (09:03:11)
Apologies. Of course it should be gain. Hope you’re feeling better.
So quick to condemn.
If the IPCC had offered the figure from Zwally et al 2002 (of which Comiso is the second author), and the trend had become more positive since then, would you not now be equally scandalised? Of course they had an update of the trend calculated. Whether Comiso got the calculation right, I cannot tell without having the data as was available to him in 2005.
And what is so scandalous about Comiso 2003 being a book chaper?
Richard Telford (09:29:58) said:
Remind me again who were the ones calling us skeptics denialists and implying that we are morally equivalent to that other type of denialist?
Herman L (05:36:11) :
Didn’t you read this part then?
The AR4 did not include the TAR references of either Cavalieri et al., 1997, or Parkinson et al., 1999. Nor did the IPCC AR4 include a reference to Zwally et al., 2002.
Tom P (04:13:52) :
Neven (05:50:03) :
Didn’t you read this part then?
They Cherry Picked, don’t you get that?
The AR4 did not include the TAR references of either Cavalieri et al., 1997, or Parkinson et al., 1999. Nor did the IPCC AR4 include a reference to Zwally et al., 2002.
Basil (09:03:11) :
Thank you for the explanation on yesterday’s thread.
Tom P
Re “Comiso sounded genuinely surprised…”
of course, what we forget, is that nobody, not even “scientists” reads all the small print before signing. There aren’t enough hours in the day!
A visit to the impressive antarctic centre in Christchurch NZ in 2005 drew my attention to the increasing ice, the AGW scam and I have closely followed your web site since then. Because 80% of the worlds ice is on the continent a bit south of us and the sunspot thing looks dodgy I have enlarged my woodshed. Keep up he good work.
Rocky Road?
The Q Word…?
Quisling?
Quarantine?
Quicksand?
Quidditch?
give me a clue!
Chip Knappenberger,
You are missing my point entirely. I am not addressing the science. I have not read the science. As you say, the IPCC estimate may very well be “the odd man out.” But that is not my point.
I am only addressing the fact that no one can call this a “gate” (as Anthony does in his title), or call this an “IPCC error” (as Cato has done) if to do so requires referencing research that was not available to the IPCC authors and reviewers at the time they were writing the IPCC report. We all know the IPCC process very well: there was a cut-off date for material, and two of the items in the Cato study fall AFTER that date.
If Cato can rewrite its article to remove all references to what was not available to the IPCC for the 4AR material then, fine — call it what you will. But I have already read a number of post from people here who are jumping to the conclusion that this is evidence of another “IPCC scandal” and,as currently written, that is simply untrue in the case of this Cato article.
Re: Peter (Feb 17 04:37),
“Which brings up a point about collating all these “gate” posts into one post/article with it’s own link. Has such a post been done?”
I have a list at my website.
This includes the the IPCC’s false claim about Antarctic sea ice here.
My version has a couple of other papers, not mentioned in the World Climate Report story, that also confirm increasing ice extent.
Another amusing related IPCC trick is to hide the decline in Antarctic temperatures simply by omitting Antarctica from their world map!
Richard Telford (09:29:58) :
Zwally et al. (2002) for the period 1979-1998 found a rate of increase of Antarctic sea ice of 11.2 ± 4.2 x 10^3 km^2 yr^-1 or 0.98 ± 0.37% dec^-1. The IPCC, for the period 1978-2005 found 5.6 ± 9.2 x 10^3 km^2 yr^-1 or 0.47 ± 0.80% dec^-1. Comiso and Nishio (2008), for the period 1978-2006 found an increase of 10.8 ± 2.6 x 10^3 km^2 yr^-1 or 0.95 ± 0.23% dec^-1.
I appreciate that the IPCC wanted the most updated data as possible (that’s why they went to an updated analysis from a book chapter), but by moving outside the peer-reviewed literature they assumed a certain risk (and they got an answer that seemed to better fit their cause than the actual facts).
If you have been following the overall issue at all, you will see that we are not being overly quick to condemn. The IPCC has made its bed, now they are finding that laying in it is not so comfortable.
-Chip
“”” Veronica (08:42:12) :
Re CO2 as a “toxin”.
One might with all good reason state that CO2 is toxic because it is a waste product of human metabolism. We breathe it out because we have to eliminate it from our bodies, otherwise it would do us harm. The breathing into a paper bag thing – obviously the concentrations in the bag are not high enough to have ill effects.
It is a waste product of mammalian metabolism, which comes from the burning of food hydrocarbons. Not essentially different from the burning of fossil fuels, just more controlled as it is mediated by a series of biochemical reactions.
Trust me on this, I am a PhD biochemist.
Calling it harmless and beneficial and being a friend of CO2, just winds up the warmists. If that is what you are trying to do, well done, but it probably isn’t constructive. “””
Well one thing I am not, is a bio-chemist; nor a PhD. But I do have at least a smattering of ordinary non bio chemistry; and to me it would seem that CO2 is simply the effluent from one of the two most apparent stored chemical energy combustion reactions; the other one being H2O which is the effluent from combusting Hydrogen.
So that leads me (being naturally inquisitive) to enquire whether you are aware of; as a PhD Bio-Chemist, biological processes in (any) living organisms; which process Oxygen into some final waste product (effluent)that is not CO2.
It is my understanding (but I can’t cite any references) that in fact (at least in humans), an excess of CO2 in the lungs, triggers a natural (involuntary) gasping reaction; that would result in expulsion of the CO2 buildup, and taking a new breath. Apparently, deep free divers, have to train themselves to resist this gasping reaction, in order to hold their breath for much longer than is normal.
Folklore has it, that the old Maori treatment for a drowning or near drowning victim, was to hang him upside down over a fire damped with wet palm leaves, so his head was in the rising steam and smoke. The CO2 evidently would in many cases result in gasping which expelled the water from the lungs. The upside down helped in that.
So which incapacitates humans or mamals first; a lack of Oxygen, or an excess of CO2 ? My understanding is that Cyanide poisoning operates by saturating the Oxygen sites in Haemoglobin with CN; which prevents it from carrying Oxygen to the cells. That reaction would seem to be not connected with CO2.
But I certainly agree; we should not be worshipping CO2.
>>David Segesta (09:04:31) :
>>Its hard to believe that a rogue group of scientists conspired, on their own, to to create an AGW scare. Someone with lots of power was pushing them to do it. When the AGW scenario is finally laid to rest we need to find out who and why and then bring them to justice.
Get into the way back machine to the Stockholm conference and follow the trail of characters from there to Rio and finally to Copenhagen. Look who created the IPCC with this stated mission:
“the scientific, technical and socioeconomic information relevant for the understanding of the risk of human-induced climate change.”
Look at how NGO’s were given status of gov’t agencies at the UN (and look who did it). Look who is behind the carbon exchanges in the UK, in Chicago, in China. Look at the pr/communications group that coordinates all messaging for these seemingly independent groups (hint: starts with Fenton and ends with Communications and it’s science arm Environmental Media Services aka creator of RealClimate.org).
You will see the same list of lefty politicians, liberal advocacy groups and one world gov’t activists over and over since day 1. These people all share the same mindset, man is killing the planet and must be stopped. AGW is just the latest and most visible tactic they have used to try and control man and funnel enormous sums of money through the UN to their pet causes.
It’s about money and power. It’s always been about money and power. It’s not about science and it’s not about saving the planet, it’s about money and power. If there was a shred of truth to this scam do you really think it would be collapsing so fast and the science proving to be so fraudulent?
rbateman (08:20:04) :
C02 is NOT, I repeat NOT, a toxic gas in any amount.
——————–
Reply:
Well, true, Mr Bateman, to a point. But ask the astronauts on Apollo 13 what they feared near the end of their ill-fated trip and it was the CO2 level from their own respiration.
CO2 is toxic in higher concentrations: 1% (10,000 ppm) will make some people feel drowsy. Concentrations of 7% to 10% cause dizziness, headache, visual and hearing dysfunction, and unconsciousness within a few minutes to an hour. Death can then be the result.
However, CO2 at levels 3 to 6 times ambient are what greenhouses are elevated to, and at these levels there is no adverse physiological impact to humans. And plants really benefit from levels of CO2 in this range of from 1,000 to 2,000 ppm.
One estimate I saw of maximum atmospheric CO2 from burning all of the available fossil fuels was ~600 ppm. Such levels will never get high enough to where most plants would see the greatest benefit.
They are very large reports, so to some degree it is not surprising there would be a few errors. It would be much more comforting, however, if someone came up with some “underestimated” errors as well. Otherwise we’re left with something that was once pretty well described over 200 years ago:
“But when a long train of abuses and usurpations, pursuing invariably the same Object evinces a design. . . “
http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/technology/shanerichmond/100004663/iphone-app-aims-to-defeat-climate-change-deniers-with-science/comment-page-1/#comment-100003080
Ironically this appeared in today’s UK Telegraph – an iPhone app “to defeat climate change deniers with science”. Amusingly, the bottom “myth” on its list appears to be “But Antarctica is gaining ice”…
Even Hansen believes that a primary factor in Arctic ice trends is soot.
From my analysis of the gridded satellite data I caluclated an average trend of 14.5 x 10e3 Km^2. The post shows a significance value on the trend which should be ignored. The value for significance is smaller than indicated because the lag 1 value is nearly 1.
http://noconsensus.wordpress.com/2009/12/09/sea-ice-copenhagen-update/
I believe after the huge time I put into the sea ice calculations that my value is quite accurate.
Re: Richard Telford (Feb 17 09:29),
“And what is so scandalous about Comiso 2003 being a book chaper?”
Books are not peer reviewed.
The IPCC has relied on a single book chapter that gives a very low rate of increase of Antarctic sea ice, and they have completely ignored several peer-reviewed papers that give a larger rate of increase (see the WCR report and my page linked above).
Tom P (09:27:38) :
Basil (09:03:11)
Apologies. Of course it should be gain. Hope you’re feeling better.
Much better, especially knowing that I wasn’t seeing things upside down.
“So which incapacitates humans or mamals first; a lack of Oxygen, or an excess of CO2 ? ” – George E Smith
AIUI an excess of CO2 can cause asphyxiation even when there is still plenty of oxygen. Otherwise submariners would not be in nearly so much danger when things go wrong. Or indeed the astronauts in Apollo 13 who still had lots of oxygen in their tanks but had to fix the CO2 scrubbers to stay alive.
That said, the lethal concentration for CO2 (death in 30 minutes) is 10% (100,000 ppm). The “maximum safe level” is 3% (30,000 ppm). Our atmosphere is currently at about, what a bit under 400 ppm? So we have a fair amount of headroom on this one…
Superb post!
This is all far too complicated for the sleazy, conniving minds of our political masters to understand.
Their stance will remain: “Don’t confuse me with the facts, my mind is made up”.
Their stance will only change when they realise it is going to start costing a serious number of votes.
To paraphrase one of history’s greatest men at the turning point in the long fight against a rotten evil doctrine: “This is not yet the beginning of the end, but it may be the end of the beginning.”
And in closing, I am currently down in southern Spain where it is unseasonably cold and we are experiencing the heaviest and most prolonged rains in recorded history – doubtless further proof for IPCC Version 5 that AGW is a proven fact.
John R. Judge (03:33:07) : “In spite of all the new revelations of massaged data and biased evaluations that just keep on coming, the alarmists, like Peter Liss of CRU, continue to insist that the “overwhelming science still supports AGW”. What “science” are they basing this claim on?”
Obviously, the science that no skeptic has taken a look at yet.
Well I can’t comment on the accuracy of those straight line “fits” to the raw data; since I don’t know what algorithm was used to obtain those lines.
BUT, my eyeball says that both of those graphs have a definite rising tendency.
In fact my eyeball would say that a somewhat steeper straight line would be an even better fit to the data.
Now I suppose somebody is going to tell me that this given straight line was derived from a least squares error calculation; that being at least one of the more obvious things to do.
I would agree with that, if there was some a priori knowledge that in fact the plotted function was known to actually be a straight line buried in Gaussian random noise.
Well I have spent hours staring in real time at true random Gaussian noise; and that ain’t it. I would say that the noisy plot here; which I presume is actually somewhat less “noisy” real data; that is true measured data, looks more like a 1/f noise signature; rather than Gaussian.
In that case, I would tend to discount the less frequent, but larger amplitude deviations from the straight line; as being the result of actual transient events; rather than noise.
So I would pay more attention to the smaller deviations; aqnd when my eye does that, it sees a somewhat greater slope than the straight line plotted on this data.
But I’m not going to make any claims; since I don’t have the raw data; nor the history to try and unravel what is really going on here.
But I would caustion about applying least square error methods to raw data, for which that might not be a valid method.
PaulM (10:17:54)
“Books are not peer reviewed.”
This is not necessarily true. I have recently reviewed a manuscript destined to be a book chapter.
Nor is it relevant. There is nothing in the IPCC guidelines that state that only peer-reviewed material can be used. Even if this particular analysis from Comiso’s is not peer reviewed, the method used almost certainly was.
MinB (08:23:49) :
At the top of this page, run a search on Svensmark, and enjoy.
“Breathing pure CO2 causes no harm whtever.
What kills you is the lack of oxygen.
What proportion of the atmosphere as CO2 would deprive us of enough oxygen to be perceptible ?
[Studies on submarines said around 9000ppm. R.T. – mod]”
It’s mostly a theoretical concern, but if you had an oxygen-rich gas that was high in CO2, you would in the medium term get into trouble with your acid/base balance. We blow off CO2 in part to maintain our body’s pH in a tight window. Exhaled gas is about 5% CO2. If your inhaled gas is >5% CO2, you’re eventually going to develop hypercapnea and a respiratory acidosis. Of course, if the additional CO2 is coming out of your budget of 21% atmospheric O2, you’re going to notice that before you notice this.
David Segesta (09:04:31) : we need to find out who and why
Try this for starters:
http://icecap.us/images/uploads/EDBLICKRANT.pdf
——————————————
If Antarctic SEA ICE is growing it will at some point in the future fracture and parts will float around, re-attach, or float away. The pieces will be flat and broad and the size of small countries. Be prepared for shouts of doom.
“”” Phil A (10:21:04) :
“So which incapacitates humans or mamals first; a lack of Oxygen, or an excess of CO2 ? ” – George E Smith
AIUI an excess of CO2 can cause asphyxiation even when there is still plenty of oxygen. Otherwise submariners would not be in nearly so much danger when things go wrong. Or indeed the astronauts in Apollo 13 who still had lots of oxygen in their tanks but had to fix the CO2 scrubbers to stay alive.
That said, the lethal concentration for CO2 (death in 30 minutes) is 10% (100,000 ppm). The “maximum safe level” is 3% (30,000 ppm). Our atmosphere is currently at about, what a bit under 400 ppm? So we have a fair amount of headroom on this one… “””
Well I’ll take your scary explanation, just as you put it. No point trying to argue with numbers and situations as you succinctly put it.
Thanks for the education; that’s why I asked the question.
As I recall, the extreme cave divers who use rebreathers were more concerned about what the scrubbers left in the gas mixture, rather than the amount of added oxygen.
“Richard Telford (10:37:58) :
PaulM (10:17:54)
“Books are not peer reviewed.”
This is not necessarily true. I have recently reviewed a manuscript destined to be a book chapter.
Nor is it relevant. There is nothing in the IPCC guidelines that state that only peer-reviewed material can be used. Even if this particular analysis from Comiso’s is not peer reviewed, the method used almost certainly was.”
Note also that, using improved measurements, Comiso has now been corrected by — Comiso. In other words, science moves forward, in a “scandal” of continued observation and revised hypothesis.
jorgekafkazar (10:23:03) :
John R. Judge (03:33:07) : “In spite of all the new revelations of massaged data and biased evaluations that just keep on coming, the alarmists, like Peter Liss of CRU, continue to insist that the “overwhelming science still supports AGW”. What “science” are they basing this claim on?”
Obviously, the science that no skeptic has taken a look at yet.
———-
Reply:
Are you saying all those points about “science” from the latest IPCC? Like these:
ClimateGate – This scandal began the latest round of revelations when thousands of leaked documents from Britain’s East Anglia Climate Research Unit showed systematic suppression and discrediting of climate skeptics’ views and discarding of temperature data, suggesting a bias for making the case for warming. Why do such a thing if, as global warming defenders contend, the “science is settled?”
FOIGate – The British government has since determined someone at East Anglia committed a crime by refusing to release global warming documents sought in 95 Freedom of Information Act requests. The CRU is one of three international agencies compiling global temperature data. If their stuff’s so solid, why the secrecy?
ChinaGate – An investigation by the U.K.’s left-leaning Guardian newspaper found evidence that Chinese weather station measurements not only were seriously flawed, but couldn’t be located. “Where exactly are 42 weather monitoring stations in remote parts of rural China?” the paper asked. The paper’s investigation also couldn’t find corroboration of what Chinese scientists turned over to American scientists, leaving unanswered, “how much of the warming seen in recent decades is due to the local effects of spreading cities, rather than global warming?” The Guardian contends that researchers covered up the missing data for years.
HimalayaGate – An Indian climate official admitted in January that, as lead author of the IPCC’s Asian report, he intentionally exaggerated when claiming Himalayan glaciers would melt away by 2035 in order to prod governments into action. This fraudulent claim was not based on scientific research or peer-reviewed. Instead it was originally advanced by a researcher, since hired by a global warming research organization, who later admitted it was “speculation” lifted from a popular magazine. This political, not scientific, motivation at least got some researcher funded.
PachauriGate– Rajendra Pachauri, the IPCC chairman who accepted with Al Gore the Nobel Prize for scaring people witless, at first defended the Himalaya melting scenario. Critics, he said, practiced “voodoo science.” After the melting-scam perpetrator ‘fessed up, Pachauri admitted to making a mistake. But, he insisted, we still should trust him.
PachauriGate II – Pachauri also claimed he didn’t know before the 192-nation climate summit meeting in Copenhagen in December that the bogus Himalayan glacier claim was sheer speculation. But the London Times reported that a prominent science journalist said he had pointed out those errors in several e-mails and discussions to Pachauri, who “decided to overlook it.” Stonewalling? Cover up? Pachauri says he was “preoccupied.” Well, no sense spoiling the Copenhagen party, where countries like Pachauri’s India hoped to wrench billions from countries like the United States to combat global warming’s melting glaciers. Now there are calls for Pachauri’s resignation.
SternGate – One excuse for imposing worldwide climate crackdown has been the U.K.’s 2006 Stern Report, an economic doomsday prediction commissioned by the government. Now the U.K. Telegraph reports that quietly after publication “some of these predictions had been watered down because the scientific evidence on which they were based could not be verified.” Among original claims now deleted were that northwest Australia has had stronger typhoons in recent decades, and that southern Australia lost rainfall because of rising ocean temperatures. Exaggerated claims get headlines. Later, news reporters disclose the truth. Why is that?
SternGate II – A researcher now claims the Stern Report misquoted his work to suggest a firm link between global warming and more-frequent and severe floods and hurricanes. Robert Muir-Wood said his original research showed no such link. He accused Stern of “going far beyond what was an acceptable extrapolation of the evidence.” We’re shocked.
AmazonGate– The London Times exposed another shocker: the IPCC claim that global warming will wipe out rain forests was fraudulent, yet advanced as “peer-reveiwed” science. The Times said the assertion actually “was based on an unsubstantiated claim by green campaigners who had little scientific expertise,” “authored by two green activists” and lifted from a report from the World Wildlife Fund, an environmental pressure group. The “research” was based on a popular science magazine report that didn’t bother to assess rainfall. Instead, it looked at the impact of logging and burning. The original report suggested “up to 40 percent” of Brazilian rain forest was extremely sensitive to small reductions in the amount of rainfall, but the IPCC expanded that to cover the entire Amazon, the Times reported.
PeerReviewGate – The U.K. Sunday Telegraph has documented at least 16 nonpeer-reviewed reports (so far) from the advocacy group World Wildlife Fund that were used in the IPCC’s climate change bible, which calls for capping manmade greenhouse gases.
RussiaGate – Even when global warming alarmists base claims on scientific measurements, they’ve often had their finger on the scale. Russian think tank investigators evaluated thousands of documents and e-mails leaked from the East Anglia research center and concluded readings from the coldest regions of their nation had been omitted, driving average temperatures up about half a degree.
Russia-Gate II – Speaking of Russia, a presentation last October to the Geological Society of America showed how tree-ring data from Russia indicated cooling after 1961, but was deceptively truncated and only artfully discussed in IPCC publications. Well, at least the tree-ring data made it into the IPCC report, albeit disguised and misrepresented.
U.S.Gate – If Brits can’t be trusted, are Yanks more reliable? The U.S. National Climate Data Center has been manipulating weather data too, say computer expert E. Michael Smith and meteorologist Joesph D’Aleo. Forty years ago there were 6,000 surface-temperature measuring stations, but only 1,500 by 1990, which coincides with what global warming alarmists say was a record temperature increase. Most of the deleted stations were in colder regions, just as in the Russian case, resulting in misleading higher average temperatures.
IceGate – Hardly a continent has escaped global warming skewing. The IPCC based its findings of reductions in mountain ice in the Andes, Alps and in Africa on a feature story of climbers’ anecdotes in a popular mountaineering magazine, and a dissertation by a Switzerland university student, quoting mountain guides. Peer-reviewed? Hype? Worse?
ResearchGate– The global warming camp is reeling so much lately it must have seemed like a major victory when a Penn State University inquiry into climate scientist Michael Mann found no misconduct regarding three accusations of climate research impropriety. But the university did find “further investigation is warranted” to determine whether Mann engaged in actions that “seriously deviated from accepted practices for proposing, conducting or reporting research or other scholarly activities.” Being investigated for only one fraud is a global warming victory these days.
ReefGate– Let’s not forget the alleged link between climate change and coral reef degradation. The IPCC cited not peer-reviewed literature, but advocacy articles by Greenpeace, the publicity-hungry advocacy group, as its sole source for this claim.
AfricaGate – The IPCC claim that rising temperatures could cut in half agricultural yields in African countries turns out to have come from a 2003 paper published by a Canadian environmental think tank – not a peer-reviewed scientific journal.
DutchGate – The IPCC also claimed rising sea levels endanger the 55 percent of the Netherlands it says is below sea level. The portion of the Netherlands below sea level actually is 20 percent. The Dutch environment minister said she will no longer tolerate climate researchers’ errors.
AlaskaGate – Geologists for Space Studies in Geophysics and Oceanography and their U.S. and Canadian colleagues say previous studies largely overestimated by 40 percent Alaskan glacier loss for 40 years. This flawed data are fed into those computers to predict future warming.
And since the above was compiled by Mark Landsbaum (http://www.ocregister.com/articles/-234092–.html), There have been at least two more–Antacrctic-Sea-Ice-Gate and Hurricane-Gate.
It has just been flat difficult to keep up with all the errors the IPCC has been calling “science”.
RockyRoad (06:36:23) : “I can show you additional scripture that says Adam and Eve had multiple sons and multiple daughters, and that they married and had children, grandchildren, and so forth.”
Plus, this explanation of our origin is “consistent with” the current level of human intelligence. 🙂
Jeff Id (10:16:21) :
You said on your blog the lag r1 was 0.997 – 0.998.
A value so close to 1 makes the Quenouille (Santer) adjustment for autocorrelation, Q=(1-r1)/(1+r1) rather unstable. I’d be wary of using such an analysis for the confidence limits.
Indeed your plot of the trend looks peculiar, with a very constant value despite the large and strangely asymmetric bounds:
http://noconsensus.wordpress.com/2009/12/09/sea-ice-copenhagen-update/
One of the reasons for all of these repeated ‘Gates’ is that the science was so overhyped. So there is the near omnipresence of exaggeration in every story.
========================================
The data doesn’t jive with information from NASA, the National Snow and Ice Data Center and people living on low islands around the world. Ask the people in Venice Italy if the oceans are on the rise.
Check the data at http://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/
The climate is warming. The only two questions are, is it actually caused by man and could we really do anything to reverse the trend. Regardless of the cause I thing there is very reasonalbe doubt to think we can do anything to reverse the trend. Any money spent on climate change should be invested in protecting coastal areas.
Jorgkafkazar 10:23:03:
“Obviously, the science that no skeptic has taken a look at yet.”
Make that “unable to examine”.
The very term Climate Scientist is pretty vague. What constitutes a Climate Scientist? Back in the day there were oceanic, atmospheric, geological scientists.
Are we to understand that a “climate scientist” holds all these credentials? I believe if you are claiming or tasked as a climate scientist, you should hold all of them because of the factor of interplay. Someone asked “Why did they think they could get away with it? I beleive this to be fairly simple.
Firstly, we live in a pretty apathetical age. Few people in the “free world” vote compared to generations past. Secondly, special interest, as a result, is a huge influence on government. Thirdly, we live in an age of instant communication/news, camera phones etc. Everything newsworthy or spectacular can be uploaded, and broadcast worldwide. Even 25 years ago we wer’nt nearly this tuned in to events. A hurricane could desimate a small island, kill thousands, but without the visual element of it’s force, or immediate aftermath, it’s just another unfortunate event.
Put it this way; If this horrible earthquake in Haiti had happened in say, 1975…..How much outpouring do you think would have gone to this battered nation compared to what we have seen worldwide today? I would like to think alot, but the reality is people on mass, probably would’nt have donated out of their pocket like they did recently.
So back to the topic of GW……It’s these reasons the people behind GW are able to cause fear and gain support. The real evil above all is this tax on carbon. Obviously too much of anything is not good no matter what, but carbon taxation and villafication is utterly condemnable. The fact is every living thing, and most objects on this planet either are made of or utilize carbon. It’s an essential building block.
The profit margines for this scam are imeasurable. I heard one conservative estimate from a carbon trader, that it has the potential within the next five years of being a seventeen trillion dollar industry a year worldwide. That’s a lot of coin no matter how you slice it.
So governments stand to eliminate deficeits, beaurocrats stand to get wealthy, and corporations signed on to the program…..well, let’s just say expect to see more huge bonuses.
For the record, I’m not anti business, or right or left wing. I’m in the middle. I think you have to be, but I must say I am truly frightened by the sheeplike religious cult bent, such a hashed together, rather quick consencus based on human worst case scenario provided computer modelling, has taken people and made them converts, and those that question….deemed as “deniars”. Frightening indeed!
What CO2 levels does the US Navy allow in its submarines?
jorgekafkazar (10:23:03) :
John R. Judge (03:33:07) : “In spite of all the new revelations of massaged data and biased evaluations that just keep on coming, the alarmists, like Peter Liss of CRU, continue to insist that the “overwhelming science still supports AGW”. What “science” are they basing this claim on?”
Obviously, the science that no skeptic has taken a look at yet.
————
Reply:
Remember, alarmism isn’t science. There are few “skeptics” here (I prefer to call us “realists”) who ignore or refute the SCIENCE. It is the unadulterated brainless HYSTERIA we’re not too fond of.
Such an approach belittles science and logical thought. It also makes “Warmists” look like kooks–those that would cheat at any endeavor to gain an advantage.
Some are calling Global Warmers “Weirdologists” now (bing Thomas Friedman). That’s pretty appropriate, since even the vast majority of scientists don’t believe the science is settled. Even Phil Jones agrees.
Herman L (09:58:32) :
“I am only addressing the fact that no one can call this a “gate” (as Anthony does in his title), or call this an “IPCC error” (as Cato has done) if to do so requires referencing research that was not available to the IPCC authors and reviewers at the time they were writing the IPCC report. We all know the IPCC process very well: there was a cut-off date for material, and two of the items in the Cato study fall AFTER that date.”
Your point seems mostly specious. The two post AR4 references are clearly delineated as such in the article and are offered to support the point that the putative source for the AR4’s assertion of statistically insignificant growth in Antarctic sea ice extent, in his subsequent work which showed statistically significant growth, offered no indication that this was break from what he had done in the past. To me this reinforces the notion that the error was not innocent.
Tom P. indicates that Comiso seemed “genuinely surprised” when this was brought to his attention. Since I have seen comments from others involved in the IPCC process that indicated that what appeared in the final product was not what they assumed had been agreed to, I am willing to suspend judgement on Comiso until he has time to respond. But, given his rather prominent role in the authorship process, he has a rather high hurdle to clear to get off the hook for this.
In regard to ice conditions in the Antarctic….I made a trip to Antarctica in 2008/2009 on board a Russian icebreaker, as part of the trip the vessel entered the Bay of Whales located off the Ross Ice Shelf. This was the location at which Roald Amundsen departed for the South Pole. Amundsen reached the “ice” in the Bay Whales at 78 deg 38 mins on October 19, 1911. Due to ice conditions the icebreaker Kapitan Khlebnikov on which I was travelling on in December 2008 could only reach 78 deg 36 mins south, which is 2 minutes north of Amundsen’s location, approx 4 kms farther north. So, almost 100 years later (and according to AGW supposedly that much warmer) there now appears to be more ice in the Bay of Whales. The icebreaker then traversed along the Ross Ice Shelf to Ross Island. The plan was to visit Shackleton’s Hut at Cape Royds, to celebrate the centenary of Shackelton’s attempt on the pole. However here again, due to the ice conditions, the icebreaker was forced to anchor in the ice some 35kms north of Cape Royds. However in 1909 the Nimrod (a wooden boat, not a 25,000 ton icebreaker) was able to sail right up to Cape Royds and unload supplies. Also the Adelie penguin colony at Cape Royds is under threat and is slowly dying out due to the extreme distance from the colony to open water. This is because there is now so much ice in McMurdo sound.
John Galt (11:32:30) :
RockyRoad (10:13:20) :
rbateman (08:20:04) :
C02 is NOT, I repeat NOT, a toxic gas in any amount.
——————–
Reply:
…
What CO2 levels does the US Navy allow in its submarines?
———
Reply:
Good question. I have a son serving as a “nuke” on a “boomer” in the Pacific and they’re currently in port; I’ll ask him what their equipment lets the CO2 levels get up to. I don’t think that’s classified info.
Cracks are forming in the climate coalitions: http://online.wsj.com/article/SB10001424052748704804204575069440096420212.html
…And one must wonder, what profit incentive has evaporated to cause it?
This is surely because legitimate dissension flourished on the internet. If not for this, we would have had no voice – the media having long ago abandoned their watch.
Thanks to Anthony, Steve, Mods, Mcintyre, and all the great contributors here, and around the net, and particularly in my mind, Monckton, for their tremendous work.
Imagine, Al Gore….. done in by the very internet he invented. 🙂
“So which incapacitates humans or mamals first; a lack of Oxygen, or an excess of CO2 ? ” – George E Smith
lol, I think now is an appropriate time to throw this in, given how this little conversation parallels, in many ways, the global discussion of CAGW.
I believe it is the resultant acidosis(excessive CO2 infers lack of O2 so it doesn’t matter how you form the question) that kills humans. Of course, it is a superfluous discussion. It has been shown, that too much of just about everything is harmful to mammals. And, we all know breathing pure O2 is just as toxic.(Alkalosis?) You see we’re really fragile organisms and………OMG!!!!! The sky could be falling!!!!!! We need studies on this stuff!!!!
Just something to chew on.
Dave Wendt —
read my follow up. In summary, if Cato can rewrite its article and reach the same conclusions without reference to post-FAR literature, then call it what you want. But as long as scientific literature not available to the IPCC at the time of writing FAR is needed to reach its conclusion, then this “gate” is bogus.
Veronica (09:56:14) :
Rocky Road?
The Q Word…?
Quisling?
Quarantine?
Quicksand?
Quidditch?
give me a clue!
Sorry, it was me that referenced the Q-word in reply to RockyRoad.
For me it’s a farcical super-bad word that one should never, ever, ever use. In short it’s a running joke that I make with my older kid… especially after she came home from school one day (Kindergarten I think) telling me how another kid was using “the S-word”… which at the time was a reference to “Stupid” and not that other S-word
Ever since we’ve had the joke around our house, which I have heard in other places too, of more or less “OMG so-and-so said the Q-word!!!!1!!!!11!ONE!!!!ELEVEN”
Outside my house, the Q-word seems to commonly refer to the word Quiet – as in NEVER EVER SAY “Wow, it’s really Quiet right now” because as soon as you do all hell will break loose. It’s an unwritten rule in many work-settings that you should never use the Q-word for that reason.
darn it… mods I think I owe you guys another beer. Sorry for the all-bold! HALP!
[Fixed. ~dbs]
A C Osborn (09:54:18) :
Thank you.
It’s so good to see the IPCC cabal continue to squirm as more and more alarmist statements are proved to be false. I’m sure the people behind the scam have long left the sinking ship of CAGW, leaving behind the core of die-hard believers who will take the rap.
As the Earth continues to cool, the true extent of the damage they’ve been done will become apparent – may their god help them.
John Galt (11:32:30) :
…
What CO2 levels does the US Navy allow in its submarines?
———
Reply:
Good question. I have a son serving as a “nuke” on a “boomer” in the Pacific and they’re currently in port; I’ll ask him what their equipment lets the CO2 levels get up to. I don’t think that’s classified info.
——–
Reply:
My son says he doesn’t deal with the atmosphere on the boat. So I kept looking around on the Internet and found this:
“Donnelly points to a letter written to Congress in 2000 by Hugh Scott, a retired rear admiral and undersea medical officer.
The concentration of carbon dioxide on a submarine is 10 times greater than in the open atmosphere, Scott said.”
Reference: http://www.stripes.com/article.asp?section=104&article=65352
When it cools on land and warms in the oceans that’s averaged into warming. When it cools in mid latitudes but warms in the tropics that’s averaged into warming. When ice shrinks in the norths and grows in the south, the south doesn’t matter.
@David Segesta (09:04:31) :
“Its hard to believe that a rogue group of scientists conspired……. we need to find out who and why and then bring them to justice.”
How about these guys:
http://www.clubofrome.org/eng/cor_news_bank/20/
“Re-define the present concepts of growth, development and globalisation”
completely off-topic, but did you know that there’s a talking donkey in the bible (book of numbers).
History doesn’t record whether he was friends with an ogre.
I vote for a change of title to these from IPCC gate Du Jour to. ITS WORSE THAN WE THOUGHT!
NickB. (09:25:31) :
RockyRoad (06:43:48)
I love how he says “they should add a summary of all the errors and wild exaggerations made by the climate skeptics — and where they get their funding”
“Stuff like this really makes me want to start spouting various colorful words that should not be used in polite company… maybe even the Q-word.”
————–
Reply:
And then there is:
“Veronica (09:56:14) :
Rocky Road?
The Q Word…?
Quisling?
Quarantine?
Quicksand?
Quidditch?
give me a clue”
—————
Reply:
Sorry, folks. I’ve looked at my entry of (6:43:48) and all others and can’t see where the top recitation attributed to me (I love how he says…) came from. Must be from some other source, perchance? So sorry, Veronica, I have no clue what the “Q” word is either, not having contributed to that part of the conversation.
Regarding safe amounts of CO2, my dad was a miner and has been retired for 25y or so. In his day the safe level was 2%, which I think works out at 20,000ppm. Looks like our atmosphere will be safe to breath for a while yet.
Tom P (11:08:42) :
You said on your blog the lag r1 was 0.997 – 0.998. – I also said to ignore it because this exaggerates the confidence interval. I think we finally agree on something but I pointed it out in the link I left here. See my quote:
The post shows a significance value on the trend which should be ignored. The value for significance is smaller than indicated because the lag 1 value is nearly 1.
You said this:
Indeed your plot of the trend looks peculiar, with a very constant value despite the large and strangely asymmetric bounds:
My trend is almost exactly the same as the university of Illionois cryosphere page but the significance bound estimates are very conservative to say the least. I only plotted it because the code was right in front of me from work on temperature series to which lag1 was far better suited. The symmetry looks perfect to me so I’m unsure what you mean by that.
“James Sexton (12:11:17) :
I believe it is the resultant acidosis(excessive CO2 infers lack of O2 so it doesn’t matter how you form the question) that kills humans.”
Those are separate issues. Hypoxia is not the same thing as hypercapnea, and you can have plenty of oxygen and have too much CO2, and be fulminantly acidotic. Remember that 70% of the volume of air is nitrogen; adding CO2 does not decreases O2 on a 1-to-1 basis.
George E. Smith (10:06:20) :
Veronica (08:42:12) :
Veronica, your from biochemistry, myself from physiology. Everyone is overlooking actual numbers when discussing “carbon dioxide toxicity” so as to not to mislead the readers here on WUWT, here’s a little insight from a university physiology book.
Quoted portions are my own for clarity.
From Dynamic Anatomy and Physiology, ISBN 07-036272-6
RockyRoad (12:47:40) : ‘”The concentration of carbon dioxide on a submarine is 10 times greater than in the open atmosphere, Scott said.”’
According to this 2002 paper, typical CO2 levels in office buildings range as high as 2,500 ppm:
http://www.epa.gov/iaq/base/pdfs/base_3c2o2.pdf
The CO2 level is used as a simple proxy for indoor air pollutants, and indicates the rate of indoor/outdoor air exchange.
Erik (12:54:42) :
@David Segesta (09:04:31) :
“Its hard to believe that a rogue group of scientists conspired……. we need to find out who and why and then bring them to justice.”
How about these guys:
http://www.clubofrome.org/eng/cor_news_bank/20/
“Re-define the present concepts of growth, development and globalisation”
——–
Reply:
I visited the above-referenced site and found their first point to be rather revealing:
“Why have we failed so far?
We fail because our ideas have been overtaken by REALITY (emphasis mine): we insist on trying to solve connected, systemic problems through partial, incremental and short-term measures. ”
Wow. Sound like they’re a bunch of people that are peddling something besides “reality”. Since when are falsehoods preferable to reality?
RC’s response to all these Gates:
“Whatevergate”
http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2010/02/whatevergate/
There is also a rather glaring omission in AR4 Chapter 4’s discussion of the Arctic sea ice. Although I. Rigor is listed as a Contributing Author and Rigor and Wallace 2002 paper is referenced, this paper, one of my personal favorites is not cited
http://iabp.apl.washington.edu/research_seaiceageextent.html
here is the Abstract
Three of the past six summers have exhibited record low sea-ice extent on the Arctic Ocean. These minima may have been dynamically induced by changes in the surface winds. Based on results of a simple model that keeps track of the age of ice as it moves about on the Arctic Ocean, we argue that the areal coverage of thick multi-year ice decreased precipitously during 1989-1990 when the Arctic Oscillation was in an extreme “high index” state, and has remained low since that time. Under these conditions, younger, thinner ice anomalies recirculate back to the Alaskan coast more quickly, decreasing the time that new ice has to ridge and thicken before returning for another melt season. During the 2002 and 2003 summers this anomalously younger, thinner ice was advected into Alaskan coastal waters where extensive melting was observed, even though temperatures were locally colder than normal. The age of sea-ice explains more than half of the variance in summer sea-ice extent.
here are the comments for the animation that accompanies the paper
This animation of the age of sea ice shows:
1.) A large Beaufort Gyre which covers most of the Arctic Ocean during the 1980s, and a transpolar drift stream shifted towards the Eurasian Arctic. Older, thicker sea ice (white ice) covers about 80% of the Arctic Ocean up to 1988. The date is shown in the upper left corner.
2.) With the step to high-AO conditions in 1989, the Beaufort Gyre shrinks and is confined to the corner between Alaska and Canada. The Transpolar Drift Stream now sweeps across most of the Arctic Ocean, carrying most of the older, thicker sea ice out of the Arctic Ocean through Fram Strait (lower right). By 1990, only about 30% of the Arctic Ocean is covered by older thicker sea ice.
3.) During the high-AO years that follow (1991 and on), this younger thinner sea ice is shown to recirculated back to the Alaskan coast where extensive open water has been observed during summer.
The age of sea ice drifting towards the coast explains over 50% of the variance in summer sea ice extent (compared to less than 15% of the variance explained by the seasonal redistribution of sea ice, and advection of heat by summer winds).
What makes the omission of this paper from the AR4 interesting is that the language in the section on sea ice thickness indicates insufficient data for any conclusions on thickness trends and the section on pack ice motion indicates no trend in pack ice motion based on limited data. Both of these statements would seem to be contradicted by the paper. Since it was published in 2004 and one of its principal authors is listed as a contributing author, it is a bit hard to imagine that they were unaware of its contents.
RockyRoad (13:22:35) :
(I love how he says…)
Ouch!
Given the IPCC has been discredited so many times now, why isn’t it shut down immediately? If a corporate business behaved the same way, the directors of the company would be behind bars by now; and that’s a fact not just an opinion.
I forgot to include the link for the sea ice age and buoy drift animation I referred to above. I recommend watching it, as the precipitous decline in ice age in ’89 to’90 caused by the shift in state of the Beaufort Gyre and the Transpolar drift is quite apparent.
http://iabp.apl.washington.edu/animations/Rigor&Wallace2004_AgeOfIce1979to2007.mpg
George E. Smith
I’m pretty sure there are some bacteria that can process oxygen into… something different… I would have to do some desk research on that. Some sulphur compound maybe?
Of course in the peripheral tissues, oxygen detaches from the haemoglobin in the blood, and waste CO2 attaches, and the blood cells take it away to the lungs where it detaches again and is breathed out.
And whoever in this thread mentioned acid base balance – yes, that is the reason why you don’t want too much CO2 in your body fluids.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Carbon_dioxide#Toxicity
In regard to the Rigor and Wallace paper I cited above, I have been following the drift patterns of the Arctic sea ice for some time now here,
http://ocean.dmi.dk/arctic/icedrift/index.uk.php
It’s probably to early to tell, but to my eye at least, it appears that the BG may be returning to something like the pattern that prevailed in the early ’80s. If this pattern should be reestablished it would likely lead to a stronger reversal of the decline in arctic sea ice. It should make for interesting viewing over the future months.
I notice that the Scientific Committe on Anatartic Reasearch(SCAR) in their 2009 report “Antarctic Climate Change and the Environment” agrees that there has been a 1% per decade increase in sea ice extent. See Para 41 Sea Ice Extent in the Summary.
“The sea ice extent data derived from satellite measurements from 1979 – 2006
show a positive trend of around 1% per decade.”
Looks like the left hand doesnt know what the right hand is doing!
I’ve followed the links to the data, and just had a look at the Southern Sea Ice areas as recorded there. No doubt many of you have done the same, so are writing from personal numerical experience. However, I want to call your attention to the underlying structure of the the ice area data. If you have carried out a simple regression of raw recorded total areas on “Decimal Year” for the whole period you will have produced a non-significant positive coefficient. Now convert the monthly values to their differences from the overall monthly averages over the whole period. (In effect you are deseasonalising the data). The resulting overall difference will be exactly zero, of course. Now run the regression on these “monthly differences” and you will find that the coefficient becomes comfortably positive. Ergo, Southern sea ice area has a significant positive trend. Now go somewhat deeper, and consider the serial nature of the data. To do this I recommend forming the cumulative sum of the monthly differences. You can readily program this in a spreadsheet. Now plot this cumulative sum against “Decimal Year”, and you will see a remarkable display. It has two very distinct segments. The first ends at about late 1993 or early 1994 and the second last from then until the end of the data (end 2007). The two cusum segments are essentially straight, indicating that the data do indeed form two clearly different groups. Now regress each group on the time base (decimal year) and you will find that they both have totally non-significant coefficients (both marginally negative as it happens), but that the means of the two groups are separated by about 210000 square kilometers.
This is the very rapid change (almost a step change) that took place in about six months around late 1993 and early 1994. Before and after this change period Southern sea ice area has been essentially constant. The positive coefficient for monthly difference over the whole period 1979 to 2007 is due entirely to a change of regime in the 1993/4 period. I would like to have data up to the present to see whether a new period of change might have begun.
I’ve no time to look further tonight – it’s nearly midnight – but hope to find some time over the week-end.
Robin
Re Veronica (05:41:31)
CO2 is a very long way from being toxic so I have no idea what point you are trying to say. And this statement of yours, “CO2 may be beneficial to plant life”
Please remove the maybe and please study a little more.
Southern Hemisphere sea ice extent, 1979-2010. Trend 2.3% per decade.
http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/get-file.php?report=global&file=sh-seaice&year=2010&month=1&ext=gif
These are January anomalies, right in the middle of our summer. A pattern of higher highs and higher lows.
“Ask the people in Venice Italy if the oceans are on the rise” – Terry Edger
“Is Venice sinking? Or is the water level rising? The answer is complex but “yes” to both questions. The mean level of the land has lowered by 9 inches (23 centimeters) relative to sea level. Tapping the underground water supply has caused a reduction in pressure in the subsoil and, therefore, a contraction of the ground itself, with a subsequent lowering of structures above.
At the same time, the tidal level has increased by some 3 inches (8 centimeters) for several reasons, including organic structure growth on the barrier reef in the lagoon basin and changes in atmospheric pressure and wind action on the Adriatic Sea.
Eustasy, or the global variation in sea level, is tied to changes in the world’s climate. During the last century, the eustatic rise for the city of Venice, independent of its subsidence, was on the average 0.05 inches (1.27 milimeter) per year.”
So, 9″ from sinking, 3″ from local changes and 5″ from global sea level change. But that’s okay, you can blame all of it on global warming if it makes for a better headline…
Interestingly, the ice sheet appears to be losing mass:
“Measurements of Time-Variable Gravity Show Mass Loss in Antarctica”
http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/311/5768/1754
“Recent Antarctic ice mass loss from radar interferometry and regional climate modelling.”
http://www.nature.com/ngeo/journal/v1/n2/abs/ngeo102.html
“Changes in West Antarctic ice stream dynamics observed with ALOS PALSAR data”
http://dx.doi.org/10.1029%2F2008GL033365
If both sets of results are correct, It would imply a broader but thinner ice sheet. Interesting, but hardly reassuring.
Jeff Id (14:04:04) :
“….this exaggerates the confidence interval.”
“… the significance bound estimates are very conservative to say the least.”
So when you say:
“Global Sea ice trend by year only (barely) crosses 95% significance when the first two months of satellite data is included for the entire record.”
the data’s actually very clearly demonstrating a significant global ice loss above a bar that you admit you have set too high.
Somehow your words don’t quite convey this.
***************
Tenuc (13:41:39) :
Regarding safe amounts of CO2, my dad was a miner and has been retired for 25y or so. In his day the safe level was 2%, which I think works out at 20,000ppm. Looks like our atmosphere will be safe to breath for a while yet.
*****************
All this talk about toxicity is kind of pointless. Even oxygen is toxic.
“Central Nervous System Toxicity (CNS)
This is the serious kind and needs to be tracked on every dive if doing decompression or mixed gas dives. If you breathe oxygen at very high pO2s (0.9 ATA and up) for a short period of time then problems arrive much quicker. This results in visual disturbances, ringing in the ears, dizziness, mood swings, convulsions and finally coma. According to the NOAA (a US government research group) this times are: 1.6 ATA for 45 min, 1.5 ATA for 120 min, 1.4 ATA for 150 min, 1.3 ATA for 180 min and so on. Technical divers keep track of CNS toxicity by using a CNS clock. This shows your exposure as a percentage of the total allowable exposure.”
http://tjaartdb0.tripod.com/html/oxygen_toxicity.html
Dave Wendt (11:52:55) : “Since I have seen comments from others involved in the IPCC process that indicated that what appeared in the final product was not what they assumed had been agreed to, I am willing to suspend judgement on Comiso until he has time to respond.”
I heartily second this suggestion to see what Josefino Comiso says before passing judgement based upon just what is in AR4. I’ve only had some minor, somewhat indirect dealings with J. Comiso, but every indication was that he had the attitude of a good scientist looking for the truth.
Both the NASA and JAXA’s (Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency) snow and ice data depend upon algorithms and subroutines by Comiso. I certainly hope he is a man of good skill and intentions.
We have seen in a case involving Roger Pielke, Jr that what ends up in the IPCC report doesn’t always accurately reflect a persons work or statements.
Robert: your
Interestingly, the ice sheet appears to be losing mass:
the ice cap may be losing mass, but the ice pack is gaining in extent. These two are not the same thing.
The ice cap is losing a few mm per year, which translates to several hundred thousand years to its demise.
the ice cap loss mechanism is also not due warming. The average air temp is less than -30 deg C, and the water temp on the shelves is still near the freezing point, and is not believed to have warmed.
Tom P (17:01:23)
Sorry Tom, I can’t disagree with you this time. I didn’t convey it strongly enough in this post, of course if you were a regular reader at tAV you would know my opinion of this method of significance calculation. That’s why I said here that people should ignore it, tAV crowd already knows.
” Les Johnson (20:00:29) :
the ice cap may be losing mass, but the ice pack is gaining in extent. These two are not the same thing.”
Who said they were? I clearly said they were different.
“The ice cap is losing a few mm per year, which translates to several hundred thousand years to its demise.”
Your point is?
“the ice cap loss mechanism is also not due warming.”
Riiiiiiiiiight. It just happens to coincide with the warmest decade on record, much like the loss of Arctic sea ice, the melting permafrost, and the lengthening growing season. Ok.
REPLY: you really should get out more, maybe less health studies and more hard science? NASA for example shows that the loss has to do with wind pattern changes.
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2007/10/03/nh-sea-ice-loss-its-the-wind-says-nasa/
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2008/08/11/nasa-sees-arctic-ocean-circulation-do-an-about-face/
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/04/13/watching-the-2007-historic-low-sea-ice-flow-out-of-the-arctic-sea/
You can learn a lot by watching time lapse animation:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/05/31/arctic-sea-ice-time-lapse-from-1978-to-2009-using-nsidc-data/
I’m betting though you’ll ignore all this and come back to tell me that it can only be temperature that is the cause. We’ll see if you are open minded or not. – Anthony
So the test of open-mindedness is if I agree with you? C’mon. You’re a little better than that. I’ll take a look at the links and see what I think.
Starting with the original claim: “the ice cap loss mechanism is also not due warming.”
Note that this referring to Antarctic ice, not Arctic ice (which is what the links discuss). But I think the links are still worth discussing.
First link:
“Nghiem said the rapid decline in winter perennial ice the past two years [2006-2007] was caused by unusual winds.”
There can be more than one cause of decreasing ice in operation. The astonishing fall in the ice cover in 2006-2007, followed by the partial recovery in 2008 and 2009, may indeed be down to unusual winds. But sea ice has been declining for the last thirty years. The contribute of unusual wind conditions in 2006-2007 doesn’t say anything about the cause of the long-term trend.
If you look at 2005, the hottest year in the GISS record, you see a powerful El Nino effect. But of course there have always been El Ninos. Why is 2005 the record holder? Because you have a short-term warming and a long-term warming added together. Ice extent, same
There’s a question of common sense here, much like with your post about the disintegration of the Wilkins Ice Sheet: have these wind conditions never occurred before? If they have, why have we never seen ice minimums like those before? If they haven’t, why do we have this coincidental one-of-a-kind weather event coincidently occurring alongside warming unprecedented in modern times?
“The scientists observed less perennial ice cover in March 2007 than ever before, with the thick ice confined to the Arctic Ocean north of Canada. Consequently, the Arctic Ocean was dominated by thinner seasonal ice that melts faster. This ice is more easily compressed and responds more quickly to being pushed out of the Arctic by winds.”
Thinner ice is more responsive to wind. Why is the ice thinner?
Second link: ” The results suggest not all the large changes seen in Arctic climate in recent years are a result of long-term trends associated with global warming.”
OK. I have no problem with this. “Not all” the changes. How many things in the climate are caused by one thing? There’s a long way between “not all” and “none.”
Third link seems to rehash link #1; winds contributed in 2006-2007.
_______
Thank you for the links. I don’t think they prove the original assertion that “the ice cap loss mechanism is also not due [to] warming.” Your sources seem to feel that it is caused by a mix of factors, implicitly including warming. I agree with that.
“implicitly including warming.”
Correction: the second source doesn’t imply this, they say it: ” The results suggest not all the large changes seen in Arctic climate in recent years are a result of long-term trends associated with global warming.”
Not all are the changes are down to global warming, but some are.
Robert (21:56:25)
“Thinner ice is more responsive to wind. Why is the ice thinner?”
I’m starting to feel like Rodney Dangerfield around here. In response to your question I would refer you to my comment above Dave Wendt (14:39:39) : where I discuss the Rigor and Wallace paper of 2004 which demonstrated that the decline in sea ice age and thickness began with a shift in state in Beaufort Gyre and the TransPolar Drift in 1989 which resulted in multiyear ice declining from over 80% of the Arctic to 30% in about one year and that the persistence of that pattern has been responsible for the continuing decline. The shift coincided with a shift in the AO, but was unlikely to have been generated by any thing anthropogenic.
Robert (16:56:41) :
Interestingly, the ice sheet appears to be losing mass:
“Measurements of Time-Variable Gravity Show Mass Loss in Antarctica”
http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/311/5768/1754
“Recent Antarctic ice mass loss from radar interferometry and regional climate modelling.”
http://www.nature.com/ngeo/journal/v1/n2/abs/ngeo102.html
“Changes in West Antarctic ice stream dynamics observed with ALOS PALSAR data”
http://dx.doi.org/10.1029%2F2008GL033365
If both sets of results are correct, It would imply a broader but thinner ice sheet. Interesting, but hardly reassuring.
I could only got full access to the first of your links, but judging from the abstracts of the others, it provides the largest estimated decline so I’ll deal mostly with it. Although I only had time to give it a brief perusal, my eyeball judgement is that it represents about 10% measurement and 90% mathematics, which in my book means it rates a big “We don’t know that”. For the sake of argument I’ll stipulate that it might be correct. Given that let’s consider this passage
“Using measurements of time-variable gravity from the Gravity Recovery and Climate Experiment satellites, we determined mass variations of the Antarctic ice sheet during 2002–2005. We found that the mass of the ice sheet decreased significantly, at a rate of 152 ± 80 cubic kilometers of ice per year, which is equivalent to 0.4 ± 0.2 millimeters of global sea-level rise per year. Most of this mass loss came from the West Antarctic Ice Sheet.”
It’s been quite a few years since the nuns turned me loose on the world, but from what I remember of the arithmetic they tried to drum into my head 0.4+/- 0.2 mm corresponds to an estimate somewhere between 3/4″ and 2.25″ per century. Given the estimates I’ve seen for Greenland and glacial melting the total comes out somewhat below what seems to be the conventional number for sea level rise which has been occurring since the beginning of the interglacial period. Even if we discount any potential weaknesses in these works, why exactly are we supposed to find them disturbing.
You aren’t seriously suggesting that it’s melting at 30 below, surely. The supposed mass loss (which is questionable, as Dave Wendt argues) is due instead to increased glacial flow, which in turn is due to a prior mass buildup from precipitation, which caused increased pressure. Presumably this build-up and let-go of pressure occurs in internally generated fits and starts, and is unrelated to the temperature.
The air temperature there has been steady in recent decades, and the water temperature, which has been suspected of warming and allowing the jammed ice shelves along the shore to loosen, permitting increased glacial flow, doesn’t seem to be doing so:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/01/11/antarctic-sea-water-shows-no-sign-of-warming/
Jeff Id (20:05:36) :
“…if you were a regular reader at tAV you would know my opinion of this method of significance calculation. That’s why I said here that people should ignore it, tAV crowd already knows.”
When AR(1) fails (and the ice-extent time series really looks nothing like a random walk) ARMA might help. I’d guess you’ve already seen this, but other readers might like to have a look here for an excellent explanation of this analysis applied to temperature trends:
http://tamino.wordpress.com/2009/12/15/how-long
“…such estimates can be viewed as realistic, and they’re certainly more realistic than the AR(1) or white-noise estimates.”
[Snip. Fake email address. ~mod.]
To theconservativelie: your sarcastic comment fails on one point; the massive changes to our way of life do not come for free. Are we willing to pay the price and change the way we live for a false proposition? In fact, put your money where your mouth is and start living that cleaner, healthier, less fossil fuel dependent life… go live the Amish lifestyle. They do it just fine and so can you. You don’t need others to change in order for you to lead by example.
“I’m starting to feel like Rodney Dangerfield around here. In response to your question I would refer you to my comment above Dave Wendt (14:39:39) : where I discuss the Rigor and Wallace paper of 2004 which demonstrated that the decline in sea ice age and thickness began with a shift in state in Beaufort Gyre and the TransPolar Drift in 1989 which resulted in multiyear ice declining from over 80% of the Arctic to 30% in about one year and that the persistence of that pattern has been responsible for the continuing decline. The shift coincided with a shift in the AO, but was unlikely to have been generated by any thing anthropogenic.”
Let’s look at some of the papers that cited Rigor and Wallace (2004):
“Satellite data reveal unusually low Arctic sea ice coverage during the summer of 2007, caused in part by anomalously high temperatures and southerly winds. ”
– “Accelerated decline in the Arctic sea ice cover”
“The retreat of Arctic sea ice in recent decades is a pre-eminent signal of climate change. . . . The results indicate that concurrent atmospheric circulation trends contribute to forcing winter and summer sea ice concentration trends in many parts of the marginal ice zone during both periods. However, there is also an emerging signal of overall Arctic sea ice decline since 1979 in both winter and summer that is not directly attributable to a trend in the overlying atmospheric circulation.”
– “Evolution of Arctic sea ice concentration trends and the role of atmospheric circulation forcing, 1979–2007”
“The hemispheric-mean decline in winter ice extent is due in large part to increasing sea-surface temperatures in the Barents Sea and adjoining waters, which are consistent with increased concentrations of greenhouse gases.”
— “Drivers of declining sea ice in the Arctic winter: A tale of two seas”
Respect the peer-reviewed literature, and don’t just cherry-pick studies you like. By showing respect, you will, by the laws of karma, receive more respect in return!
Jim Clarke (09:43:07)
…says the king of the cherrypickers.
But I have to agree about the karma. The climate peer review system is totally corrupt, as can be seen throughout the Climategate emails.
Karma is now getting its revenge: Papers hand-waved through climate pal review by friendly referees are presumed to be sloppily researched, biased, and unreliable. They are written by rent-seekers primarily intended to generate grants, then used by true CAGW believers in their appeals to discredited authorities.
The climate peer review process is rotten with corruption. Anyone who doesn’t think so need only read the East Anglia emails.
“theconservativelie (07:46:39) :
wow. after reading all this, I’ve had a revelation… what if we do all this work and make a cleaner, better, healthier, less fossil fuel dependent world, and it all tuns out to be for NOTHING!!!! How stupid we will all feel then!! Thanks for the enlightenment.”
You don’t understand a thing. Companies develop very viable solutions all the time already. I happen to own shares in a company that makes Molten Carbonate Fuel Cells. These fuel cells are big, hot, and extremely efficient. They run on any kind of hydrocarbon fuel with an efficiency of 85 %, way better than combustion. You can buy one now if you want to run your freight ship on it.
If you ask me, storing energy in hydrocarbons is way smarter than storing it in H2 because the H2 fuel cell cycle has an efficiency of 10% and H2 makes steel tanks brittle so it’s all pretty complicated and expensive. If you have the energy and want it carbon neutral, you can synthesize the hydrocarbon if you don’t have oil, losing some efficiency.
So ordinary capitalism weeds out bad ideas all the time and favors good ideas. The last thing we need is a parasitic bueraucracy that takes trillions of dollars, redistributes it (taking half of it for themselves because it’s such a difficult job) and favors some ideas they – the bureaucrats – deem interesting. The free market is way better in driving innovation.
And don’t you tell me that it doesn’t matter whether we squander a few trillions on useless projects if only one of them succeeds. You might end up with a few thousand wind turbines that you have to supplement with a load of gas powered plants like Germany does only to keep your bloody grid stable, a completely wonky system. I should know, i’m german and yesterday evening i overtook a heavy truck convoy transporting the parts of a new wind turbine on the Autobahn. And i have to finance that wonkiness through my energy bill.
[Snip. Fake email address. ~mod.]
[Snip. Fake email address. ~mod.]
DirkH-I agree completely that capitalism will decide what energy sources we use, for better or for worse, and that govt mandates based on poor science should stay out of it. Theconservativelie- I also agree that it would be good to develop other energy sources and wean ourselves off of oil. Oil will be depleted at some point. But I disagree that we force it out because of some mythical AGW: the free market will move away from oil as it becomes too expensive and move to alternative sources. There’s no need to lose sleep that AGW is going to get us. The market will sort it out based on economics. But Al Gore can’t make money quickly if he waits for the free market to sort it out… He and others need to create the “demand” and sell goofy carbon offsets so they can profit NOW!
Come on guys. This is how the warmists undermined their position: by making claims they couldn’t substantiate. The first thing that caught my eye in this was where the author linked to something that was going to show us that a certain IPCC claim was “wrong”. I hit the link thinkin “real evidence” and this is what I get:
“The author has added an update at the end showing why it CAN BE REASONABLY ARGUED that anthropogenic greenhouse gases MAY BE RESPONSIBLE FOR less than half of the observed warming since the mid-20th century”
Not quite evidence that the claim was wrong. Not even close. It changes nothing. It’s just one more interpretation/hypothesis that’s very far from proven. Misrepresentation by the poster. Possibly unconsciously from desire to see what he wants to see – the greatest obstacle to the achievement of scientific truth.
But that was just an incidental. The poster’s main objectives were to show that there has been an ongoing increase in Antarctic ice extent since the late 70s, that the IPCC report hasn’t acknowledged this and that there is in fact a suspicious looking apparent contradiction in the IPCC reporting of Antarctic ice extent. But the two IPCC statements refer to different periods, and to my eye, when considered appropriately both statements appear reasonable. The 3rd report issued 2001 refers to the period 1979 to 1996 and admits a weak increase. The next report covering to 2005 claims no significant increase. Looking at the graph I’d have to go with that. The slight upward trend appears to have come to an end around 15 years ago. The trend since then looks less stable but doesn’t appear to show an increase that I can see. I think it’s fair to incorporate that reality into their assessment. If genuine sceptics think there’s merit in pointing out that the very recent trend reversal in Arctic ice extent is worth noting (and I do!) it’s surely only fair to take notice of what looks like more than ten years’ maintenance of the status quo in the southern ocean – a non-trend which when added to the weak preceding trend renders it effectively insignificant. There’s nothing in any of the above post that changes anything.that I can see.
The silver bullet that disposes of the AGW hypothesis might still be out there and on its way, but I suspect that the only really effective countering evidence will be provided by the passage of time. A few decades hence the picture should be a lot clearer. However, if it could be shown beyond doubt that the claimed temperature rise is a mistake or simply the result of natural variability then the party would be over.
As I’ve argued before, the temperature record as shown by stations that haven’t been moved and are still in environmentally uncontaminated locations may be the key to establishing an accurate temperature record from completely unprocessed data. If someone is working on that then all might be clear sooner rather than later, as it seems to me that there is some evidence of conscious and unconscious upward bias in the record for the last 100 years and more. If the warming trend is still present after such an investigation then the search for a full understanding by independent and objective scientists – though finding them might be the biggest obstacle of all – has to look at every other possible factor including CO2.
In the meantime the sceptic position gets weakened in exactly the same way as the warmist one by exaggerated and/or unfounded claims. Real evidence, very cautious analysis and meticulously supported interpretation of it has to be the way to go if credibility is to be maintained.
Apologies for any typos. I can never see them until after I press submit.
The_Conservative_Lie (12:24:46) :
As if the left hadn’t have lied about nuclear power? Please.
Mike Ramsey
For the record re the argument above regarding what the Bible says about Adam and Eve’s children, 3 children are actually named, including an unfortunately obscure son named Seth:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seth
Besides that, arguing that they only had three named kids when God is supposed to be able to make men from dirt is kinda…pointless.
The answer to most apparent inconsistencies in religions is that God is omnipotent and therefore immune to the normal rules of logic. Duh.
“As I’ve argued before, the temperature record as shown by stations that haven’t been moved and are still in environmentally uncontaminated locations may be the key to establishing an accurate temperature record from completely unprocessed data. If someone is working on that then all might be clear sooner rather than later”
There are a number of projects I’ve heard about that speak to this concern. For example, NOAA maintains a network of reference stations that are more closely followed than the volunteer stations:
http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/crn/
Dr. Christy has chimed in on behalf of the satellite data:
“In areas where you have high resolution, well-
maintained scientific collection of temperature data,
the satellites and the surface data show a high degree
of agreement,” said Christy. “Over North America,
Europe, Russia, China and Australia, the agreement
is basically one-to-one.”
You can see a comparison of four data sets (GISS, HadCRU, RSS, and UAH) here:
http://tamino.files.wordpress.com/2008/03/4way.jpg
I do not see any way movement or environment contamination would explain the tight correlation between the surface data as read by two independent centers and two sets of satellite data.
The_Conservative_Lie (12:24:46)
“As I understand nothing, it might have been a bit too complex for me.”
From the context of your comment I assume you saw that sentence as an attempt at irony. In a sense I’d have to say it was a successful attempt but perhaps not in the way you intended. To me the only irony present in it is that you seem to believe it was ironic.
jim hogg (12:52:34) :
The silver bullet that disposes of the AGW hypothesis might still be out there and on its way…
It’s apparently going to take a real silver bullet, jim. Because there isn’t any need to further dispose of an hypothesis which hasn’t been dealt with by its promoters in a truely Scientific way. And the CO2 AGW hypothesis has suffered from even more than that.
Robert (16:39:05) : except that the relationship between warming at the surface and the lower atmosphere as a whole is not supposed to be one to one. That the datasets show more warming than the satellites on average, and that the best satellite data shows significantly less warming, is at odds with expectations of how the atmosphere works. The best explanation is that warming is exaggerated by the surface data biases.
[Snip. Fake email address. ~mod.]
Robert (10:52:27) :
“Respect the peer-reviewed literature, and don’t just cherry-pick studies you like. By showing respect, you will, by the laws of karma, receive more respect in return!”
I’ve been away from the computer for most of the day, so I just caught up with your response. Since the references you provided all needed to be Googled and are all still behind the paywall, for which both my principles and level of resources rule against my providing support, I’ll have to limit my comments to what is available in the abstracts.
As to the first two cites you offer, I don’t really see anything that contradicts the R&W paper or my interpretation of it. A few nits worth picking do present themselves.
“Satellite data reveal unusually low Arctic sea ice coverage during the summer of 2007, caused in part by anomalously high temperatures and southerly winds. ”
Most discussions of this I’ve seen have emphasized the role of the winds rather than the temperature and as you said yourself “Thinner ice is more responsive to wind.” R&W present a quite reasonable cause for the thinning ice which is nonanthropogenic. Whether the anomalous winds are the result of human activity is arguable, but hardly provable.
You third cite
“The hemispheric-mean decline in winter ice extent is due in large part to increasing sea-surface temperatures in the Barents Sea and adjoining waters, which are consistent with increased concentrations of greenhouse gases.”
This is an interesting hypothesis. but at first glance a few questions do present themselves. The supposed increased SSTs are consistent with increased GHGs, are they perhaps also consistent with other possible factors? If GHGs are responsible, what is limiting their effect to the Barents Sea?
I’m truly outraged.
I want the perpetrators of this Global Warming hoax brought to justice.
“As to the first two cites you offer, I don’t really see anything that contradicts the R&W paper or my interpretation of it.”
When you offered that paper as relevant to the discussion I was having with Anthony, I thought you were introducing it to defend the thesis that the decline in Arctic sea ice is not related to warming temperatures. That was the original assertion. My point was that even the literature exploring things like the influence of wind and ocean currents also cite warming temperatures as part of the reason for the melting.
Your source points to one of the potential causes of melting, but in no way suggests that warming temperatures are not a cause of Arctic ice loss. Perhaps that was not what you meant to suggest at all, in which case, I apologize for having misunderstood.
Time to revisit something I said elsewhere a while ago.
The Arctic is a sea surrounded by land.
The Antarctic is land surrounded by sea.
A warming globe involves expansion of the Tropics and forcing of the air circulation systems poleward. Usually if not always a consequence of warming ocean surfaces.
In that situation both the poles become surrounded by faster moving jet streams and air flow in and out is restricted so both poles should tend to cool despite overall warming.
For the Arctic the flow of water between Greenland and Norway continues to inject warmer air from the warmer oceans into the Arctic Ocean to mitigate the cooling at the pole. The faster movement of the air circulation across the northern continents limits the cooling of those land areas during the northern winter.
In contrast the Antarctic just gets colder as long as the warming of the global troposphere continues because the faster jets around it prevent ingress of warmer air.
A cooling globe involves a contraction of the Tropics and allows the air circulation systems to drift back equatorward.
In that situation the Arctic continues to receive warmth from the flow of water between Greenland and Norway but the warming effect reduces over time because the cooling of the globe and contraction of the Tropics is itself caused by falling sea surface temperatures especially in the Pacific. However the continental regions around the Arctic cool a great deal and the Arctic as a whole cools along with the rest of the globe.
In contrast the Antarctic will then warm up because more warm air gets injected into the interior by virtue of the increased flows of air poleward and equatorward when the Tropical regions contract.
So the Arctic will always warm as the Antarctic cools and vice versa.
And additionally a warming globe will produce a warming Arctic but a cooling Antarctic and
a cooling globe will produce a cooling Arctic and a warming Antarctic.
However there is a refinement to that simple scenario which I should mention.
If the cooling globe is accompanied by a strong Arctic Oscillation then the north polar high pressure systems will drift equatorward over the northern continents and allow warmer air to enter the Arctic Circle as has happened this past winter. Although the region immediately around the north pole becomes warmer the continents around it become much cooler and the net effect is an acceleration of energy to space from the north pole with an enhancement of the global cooling process.
Now as far as I can see that fits what we have been observing of late.
I could link all that to observations of changes in the stratosphere but that can wait until another day.
To Veronica (England)
James Sexton
Robert
Wayne
et al. Well the toxicity of CO2 is hardly a climate issue. But my question was not to simply be argumentative.
It seems to me, on this forum (which is a science forum), whenever we have experts from other diciplines, we all should take advantage of that to learn what we can from each other.
So I for one certainly appreciate the Bio-chemistry input you all have given here; and specially to Veronica for not being afraid to toot her own horn.
Hey if you are an expert; we want to know that, so we can ask you sensible questions that can further educate all of us. There ain’t no such thing as extraneous education; we can all benefit by learning stuff outside our own comfort zone.
So thanks for the inputs you gave us here.
From this skeptical layman ‘down under’ I can only point out the bleeding obvious with all these global warming scientific experts-
http://flourish.org/upsidedownmap/
The blood’s been rushing to your heads chaps!
Reply: Oi! What a hangover! ~ ctm