Happy New Year! Polar Ice Caps More Stable Than Predicted, New Observations Show
![global.daily.ice.area.withtrend[1]](https://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2015/01/global-daily-ice-area-withtrend1.jpg?resize=720%2C277)
Daily Express, 25 December 2014
Levi Winchester
THE North and South Poles are “not melting”, according to a leading global warming expert. In fact, the poles are “much more stable” than climate scientists once predicted and could even be much thicker than previously thought. For years, scientists have suggested that both poles are melting at an alarming rate because of warming temperatures – dangerously raising the Earth’s sea levels while threatening the homes of Arctic and Antarctic animals.
But the uncertainty surrounding climate change and the polar ice caps reached a new level this month when research suggested the ice in the Antarctic is actually growing.
And there could even be evidence to suggest the polar bear population is not under threat.
Ted Maksym, an oceanographer at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in Massachusetts, conducted a study in which he sent an underwater robot into the depths of the Antarctic sea to measure the ice.
His results contradicted previous assumptions made by scientists and showed that the ice is actually much thicker than has been predicted over the last 20 years.
Dr Benny Peiser, from the Global Warming Policy Forum (GWPF), said this latest research adds further proof to the unpredictability of the supposed effects of global warming.
He said:
“The Antarctic is actually growing and all the evidence in the last few months suggests many assumptions about the poles were wrong. “Global sea ice is at a record high, another key indicator that something is working in the opposite direction of what was predicted.”
He added:
“Most people think the poles are melting… they’re not. This is a huge inconvenience that reality is now catching up with climate alarmists, who were predicting that the poles would be melting fairly soon.”
Separate satellite data released this month showed evidence that at the other end of the globe, the ice in the Arctic sea is also holding up against climate change better than expected.The data from the European Space Agency CryoSat-2 satellite suggests that Arctic sea ice volumes in the autumn of 2014 were above the average set over the last five years, and sharply up on the lows recorded in 2011 and 2012.
According to this research, Arctic sea ice volumes in October and November this year averaged at 10,200 cubic kilometres.
This figure is only slightly down on the 2013 average of 10,900 cubic kilometres, yet massively up on the 2011 low of 4,275 cubic kilometres and the 6,000 cubic kilometres recorded in 2012.
Dr Peiser, who believes the threat of global warming has been overstated by climate scientists, described this occurrence as “some kind of rebound” adding that no-one knows what will continue to happen to the poles.
He added:
“This depends on whether or not we have further warming to come… and this is not certain.
“We do not know what the climate will be in 10, 20 years.”
The silence from the Doom and Gloom media in reference to this stunning plot is deafening.
So WHAT ABOUT THE DISAPPEARING ICE CAPS? Hello?
Let’s split that graph into two main components:
Arctic:
http://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/files/2014/04/Figure3.png
Antarctic:
http://i1054.photobucket.com/albums/s499/WeatherDem/Antarctic_monthly_sea_ice_extent_201409_zps735c9cd0.png
Saying that polar ice caps are more stable is wrong, when in fact the northern cap is decreasing and the southern cap increasing. Both in an anomalous way.
The northern cap has decreased, and the southern cap has increased.
Neither in an anomalous way.
Those graphs would look a lot less impressive if the y- axes actually went to zero.
Why are you looking at the months with maximum extents? What’s wrong with the other 11 months of the year?
Just seems like an odd choice of data to display.
The blog source for the images appears to be http://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/2014/04/ , titled “Arctic sea ice at fifth lowest annual maximum”
If you’re in the “Global temps peaked around 2005/2006 camp” like I am, the Arctic data since 2005 looks pretty flat to me.
What is the approved way for them to increase / decrease, so as to not be anomalous ??
If this IS the way they have increased / decreased, then it is a fact, and NOT an anomaly.
Ah now I see, by defining any change as “anomalous” regardless of the timeframe of the observations or historical context to compare it to then you get:
anomaly + ? = we’re all going to die meme
we’re all going to die meme = profit
underpants + ? = profit
The GUT of climate science.
our quantified oberservation is far too short to make such claims… in either direction.
However, that said, we are merely in an interglacial period. so stability of ice caps is a relevent term. They will grow again one day to a quite likely very large extent. The timing of that return to an ice age and the intervenings of minor ups and downs are all that we are arguing about.
Janne, there is a hypothesis called the bi-polar seesaw. I don’t know if it’s ‘robust’ yet but it’s food for thought.
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1029/2010GL042793/full
http://hockeyschtick.blogspot.com/2014/09/arctic-antarctic-sea-ice-extent.html
Some perspective might help—-
http://www.climate4you.com/images/AMO%20GlobalAnnualIndexSince1856%20With11yearRunningAverage.gif
You may not know what “anomalous” means.
At a pinch, I would say the predictions are in error if they don’t agree with the reality.
G
Look at the 2-Sigma curves, before writing of anomalies, Janne
Jane, Jimbo
The bipolar seesaw, nicely illustrated by Janne’s graphs, is not a hypothesis (unless ice ages and dinosaurs are also hypotheses). It is a well established process that happens at both the beginning and end of interglacials. Just google-scholar the term and you’ll see the big literature on the subject.
Lets also see the graphs going back further.
There is an obvious orbital component at work, maybe climoastrologers should take a few astronomy classes. The entire planet does not revolve around the composition of earth’s atmosphere.
If only satellites monitored Antarctic sea ice back in the 1960s, oh wait.
Dear Jane
Why only 1978 – 2014?
You imply you’re exposing us to a significant statement about “anomalous” polar ice cap behavior, but fail to present what you consider to be “normal” behavior.
If I presented a graph of July-to-February temperatures refuting global warming, you’d rightly accuse me of cherry picking.
Right back at you, kiddo.
To have an anomaly you have to have a baseline. Saying “Oh shit, we used to imagine they were static, but now that we measure them we find they are changing” is not an anomaly. It is just a byproduct of 20th century hubris.
Isn’t it splitting hairs to point out that the northern cap is decreasing in lock step with the southern cap if the conversation is about a “global” issue?
Janne, also read about the 1920s to 1940s Arctic Warm Period. There was also a sharp upturn in global temperature. Finally, are we still coming out of the Little Ice Age?
http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/media/image/j/l/warmingtrend.gif
Up the Down staircase.
Benny Peiser, of course, is an historian and sociologist, and not a climate scientist. Although Iagree with him that we don’t know exactly what future climate will look like. Similarly, I don’t know what might happen to my house in the future, but I look at the odds and buy insurance.
“Climate scientists” are not scientists since they don’t practice the scientific method.
Agreed.
Moreover, Dr. Peiser certainly has the credentials to talk about people who practice “false science”.
Heck, even I do.
/grin
But would you still be so willing to buy the same said insurance policy if the cost was tripple your current house payment
Most climate science is not based on experiment, but just like geology and evolutionary biology, climate scientists use data to test hypotheses. This is the essence of the scientific method.
Bill,
No, the ¨climate science¨Team do not practice science. They engage in anti-scientific method. When actual data don´t agree with their modeled predictions, they change the ´data¨instead of their models.
Bill
According to Galileo, Newton, Feynman, et al, the essence of the scientific method is IF DATA DOES NOT SUPPORT THE THEORY, THE THEORY (not the data) IS WRONG.
When I buy a toaster, I don’t buy the extended warranty. Why? Because good solid data says that the odds clearly and unequivocally do not match the chance that toaster will develop a problem. That is also true for my car, a much higher priced item. I do not buy the extended warranty though I get many phone calls saying I should. Again, data does not support the expense of such a measure and is only sold to enrich the purveyors of said insurance.
Sir, do you not see the similarities between extended warranties and the sham being promoted by those who tell us we can control global weather pattern variations by driving an electric car or canvasing our land with wind towers? Who is really being protected? Us? Or the insurance provider’s monthly payments on that brand new condo and boat?
If you don’t but the extended warranty for appliances you have not been paying attention lately.
RobW, insurance companies make their money by selling insurance to people who don’t need it.
If they sell to people who do end up using it, the insurance companies lose money.
Rob, like Mark says, insurance companies would not offer it if the product was likely to fail! The fact that someone is keen to sell you a policy should alert you to not having it. The best insurance policy to have is the one that you struggle to get out of them. Pamela is correct.
But that insurance will NOT guarantee that your house won’t burn down tomorrow.
Today, somebody else’s house burned down, instead of yours.
Your insurance premium is based on those facts.
Pamela, your old toaster, will be scrap heap toast, before it gets a chance to develop a problem.
You will replace it with a new Blue Tooth Toaster before that time.
G
RobW, I think she is paying attention:
http://www.consumerreports.org/cro/extended-warranties/buying-guide.htm
Pamela, when I buy a new car I always take the extended warranty and so far it has always paid off. Should perhaps emphasize that I bought the original one from the manufacturer, not from some third party.
Just a word of advice from someone on the inside – extended warranties are the largest money makers in the industry. Get a better car.
The question then becomes “how much insurance” and what is it that should be “insured” … if anything?
Is the administration driven Renewable energy market (Solyndra, wind farm subsidies, high tariff’s etc.)..”insurance”?
Is a Carbon Tax (as indicated by the UN IPCC as a source of revenue for that body) insurance or just a mechanism to reduce the use of conventional fuels, deflate developed nations economies and transfer wealth?
As reported WUWT a few weeks ago, Germany has dug a hole for itself going hell bent on renewables. The debate on where best to focus and buy insurance continues.
Unless the insurance is too expensive and the expenditure might bankrupt you?
Evidence suggests that moving to a low carbon world would be the most economically sound strategy even if AGW weren’t a factor. The alarmism seems to be coming from the supporters of the fossil fuel industry shouting “catastrophe” if we abandon the outdated dig-and-burn paradigm.
Some countries – notably Scotland, which already sources most of its electrical power from renewables, and of course the much misunderstood and misrepresented German Energiewende (the average German electric bill is about the same as the average American bill) – already well on their way.
Dear Sir, are you one and the same Sir, or are you two different Sirs?
—–
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2011/06/26/quote-of-the-week-still-wirthless-after-all-these-years-edition
According to The World Factbook, in the year 2012-2013, Germany used about half the power per capita than did the US. If the German electric bill is the same as the American bill, then they’re paying twice as much for their power as is the US. Hardly a good deal for the consumer.
Sir Harry Flashman – “Some countries – notably Scotland, which already sources most of its electrical power from renewables…”
Power generation in Scotland:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_power_stations_in_Scotland
“This list of power stations in Scotland includes current and former electricity-generating power stations in Scotland, sorted by type. Scotland is a net exporter of electricity and has a generating capacity of over 10GW. Much of this is generated by conventional fossil fuel-burning power stations, as well as two large nuclear power stations. Several hydro-electric schemes operate in the Highlands. Scotland also has an increasing number of wind farms, due to the large proportion of upland areas. As of July 2010, there were 100 operating wind farms in Scotland with a combined capacity of 2.1GW;”
Where is the evidence that moving to a low carbon world would be beneficial? Much less the “most economically sound strategy”?
From what I have seen, such a move is all cost with no gain whatsoever.
Well Hank,
You haven’t been paying attention to the “dig-and-burn” paradigm lately.
The arch villain of dig-and-burn is of course COAL, except maybe in India, where it perhaps “shovel-and-burn”; cow dung that is.
But back at the Coal dig, where the stuff grows in huge seams, where a tram load of “coal ore” is a tram load of coal to burn.
Meanwhile you wish to replace that with “renewables” that come from the sun for free. But nobody said the rounding up and herding of that free energy was free or even close to free.
And guess what; to efficiently collect that free clean green renewable energy, you have to dig and burn like you wouldn’t believe.
You should look into the technology of “Rare Earths”, to find out how much useful “stuff” you get in each tram load of Rare Earth ores.
So nyet on your goodbye to dig-and-burn.
And you can only weave so much thatch out of hemp and palm fronds. The vast majority of everything we use on earth besides food and energy, has to get dug out of the ground, and in effect, burned.
NO I didn’t exclude food and energy from the dig category. I just said, that most of everything besides those two has to get dug up from somewhere.
”Evidence suggests that moving to a low carbon world would be the most economically sound strategy even if AGW weren’t a factor.”
I assume you mean low Co2 and not all forms of Carbon. That would be just silly. I also notice you use the, even if we’re all wrong about this, thinking. No. I would rather you were sure, if the policies imposed upon us means economic suicide, I think we are entitled to something a lot more reliable than ”evidence suggests.”
Eamon.
SHF says:
Evidence suggests…
No good.
What does the evidence say? And is it solid, verifiable data, acceptable by most everyone?
Also, re: extended warranty insurance. I have had at least sixteen new cars, but I have never purchased an extended warranty, nor have I ever needed it.
Of course, there’s a secret…
Methinks that ‘FlashHarry’ is getting his information from WWF propaganda press releases.
WWF spivs are spinning
http://www.bishop-hill.net/blog/2015/1/5/wwf-spivs-are-spinning.html
Pay attention to the new WWF logo.
Dear Hank Flashman
I know squat about the average German and his/her use of electricity, but the cost of the average kWh in the USA is $0.12 and in Germany it’s $0.34 (http://shrinkthatfootprint.com/average-electricity-prices-kwh).
Here we go again “not a climate scientist”. Yes, but is he right or wrong? But if you insist then see the following who are NOT CLIMATE SCIENTISTS.
• James Hansen: astronomer / physicist
• Michael Mann: physicist / geologist
• John Cook: physicist & cartoonist
• Joe Romn: physicist
• John Holdren: plasma physicist
• Grant Foster (Tamino): theoretical physicist
• Dana Nuccitelli: physicist
• Gavin Schmidt: mathematician
• Eric Steig: geologist
• Bill McKibben: environmental studies
• Bill Nye: mechanical engineer
• Paul Nurse: geneticist
• Rajendra Pachauri: economist / industrial engineer
• David Suzuki: zoologist / geneticist
• Al Gore: divinity major
links to sources
Ouch!
(special thanks for ‘divinity major’ which does not mean ‘an XL sized god’)
Abt the blog — Ted Maksym is gonna be fried in ATTP and similar blogs. Antarctic melting is not going to end that easily. I’ll wait. We don’t know what happens in 10, or 20 years. We will get warming, or cooling. Eventually everything is sorted out.
Sir Harry Flashman
You claim
You have!? What is it? Where is it? The IPCC wants it!
Publish what you have seen immediately because 3 decades of research conducted world wide at a cost of over $5billion per year has failed to find any evidence for AGW; none, not any, zilch, nada. In the 1990s Ben Santer claimed to have found some evidence for AGW but that was soon seen to be a result of his having selected data from the middle of a time series.
Your publication will certainly result in you being awarded at least two Nobel Prizes unless – of course – your claim is as false as Santer’s was.
Richard
I also doubt that all of the New York Times’ theater/literary/music critics can act/write/play as well as those they critique, yet no one finds fault with that.
As Captain Jason Nesmith said to Sarris in “Galaxy Quest”, “It doesn’t take a great actor to recognize a bad one.”
True at all levels in life.
jimbo, once again I notice that there is not a single statistician in the bunch.
You left out Paul Elich-entomologist specializing in butterflies
I wouldn’t be so kind as to label Nutticelli as a ‘physicist’. No PhD, just BSc and MSc.
I don’t think that Bill Nye or Bill McKibben or Al Gore have every claimed to be climate scientists. A climate scientist is someone who publishes peer reviewed articles on climate change. Since climate science is is an interdisciplinary field, rather few researchers have degrees that say “climate science.” In fact, I don’t think that there are any university departments of “climate science.” In academia, you can develop expertise in what direction you wish to pursue. Take Robert May, the famous theoretical ecologist whose training is in nuclear physics. Certainly, a degree in physics is a good degree for studying physical forcing in climate. If you want to study how plants and animals are responding to the changing climate, a degree in biology/ecology would be a good choice.
If you don’t follow what I am responding to you will get lost. Here is what I was responding to.
Maybe you were not addressing me and I too got lost! Have a nice day.
BillD, I did not claim that “Bill Nye or Bill McKibben or Al Gore” have claimed to be climate scientists, yet they comment, make documentaries, and fly around the world in the name of
global warmingclimate change. Why can’t Dr Benny Peiser? [This is a serious question to YOU.]I can’t tell you the number of times warmists on comments sections of blogs / news articles have said words to the effect of “but he’s not a climate scientist”. Re-think your strategy.
Sir Harry Flashman, you are quite right and, unlike those who disparage your prudence, I endorse it fully.
Indeed I have another opportunity for you: I wish to sell you insurance against dragon attacks. Your name suggests that you have a personal responsibility for this problem after all.
The insurance is far cheaper than wind turbines. One 55kW wind turbine costs £320k – but my dragon attack insurance is only a tenth that. A mere £32,000, a one off payment up front for 20 years cover. Clearly a better deal.
Want more? I can prove effectiveness of my anti-draconis prophylactic. There have been NO DRAGON ATTACKS in my region since the introduction of the product. Not one! Not even a Common Welsh Green in the Marches.
Surely, a noble and prudent Knight such as yourself wishes to extend this security throughout our realm. Please contact this site for my contact details (Cash Only Please)
Show me a dragon and I’m in. I’ve seen the evidence for AGW.
Dir Harry Flashman
My reply to you is above. Sorry for the misplacement.
Richard
Every culture on the planet has tales of dragons. There is a clear consensus that dragons are dangerous.
Last year there was terrible flooding of the Somerset levels – dragons are known to cause flooding. This is consistent with the predictions of dragon effects that have been made fro years.
Now, some might say that other factors may be significant but in the face of such overwhelming circumstantial evidence – how can you be so careless?
How can you face your grandchildren when the will have to face such desolation?
Here is a computer model of the problem.
Sir Harry: “ I’ve seen the evidence for AGW.”
I think what Harry means is that he has consented to be trained to the notion that all recent “climate disruptions” are caused by man-made CO2.
Thus, whenever a “new” climate disruption occurs, he and countless others really believe they are seeing “evidence for AGW”.
Psssst, ever seen one of these? They will attack if hungry 😉
http://komodo-liveaboards.com/assets/images/komodo-dragon.jpg
For those who did not catch the literary allusion Sir Harry Flashman is the hero of George MacDonald Fraser’s ”Flashman” novels, he is an epic bully, coward, cheat and liar, but somehow always manages to get away with it since everybody else thinks he is a hero. That’s a pretty creative monicker for a CAGW troll, Sir Harry.
Sir
If you have seen the evidence for AGW then you subscribe to inductive reasoning. That is not science.
“Show me a dragon” … http://dragon-komodo.com/
Here you go.
Ossqss
Thanks for the Commodo dragon photo. The profile of the back of the dragon looks just like the curve of global temperature anomalies in the last century. This is proof that dragons cause global warming as well as floods, tornados, immigration and the loss of form of Manchester United.
The ball is in the court of skeptics to prove that climate change and all other disasters are NOT caused by republican-voting dragons.
@Sir Harry FlashMan. I am glad to see your contribution to this blog. I have long been an admirer of your distinguished Victorian Military career. I have read avidly each one of your memoires. I am very glad you are still alive and can tell the tale of how your excessive flatulance started teh charge of the Light Brigade first hand.
I can understand why some people believe you are a fictional character, a liar, a cad, a coward, a scoundrel etc, and do not take your memoires as truth, preferring other nefearious reasons for the great moments in Victorian history. Not I. Your memorires, like you commenst here, ring of truth and common sense and are not at all to be taken as scarcasm.
I too have looked at insurance and here is what I find.
One year doesn’t tell you much. How about:
“Climate change has affected Asia as well and has resulted in 183 million people who are threatened by rising sea levels, Mr. Baron said.
“This does have an impact on risk management and insurance,” and “while we still have a lot to do” to consider all the consequences, “it should be on our plate, it should be on our agenda,” he said”
http://www.businessinsurance.com/article/20141208/NEWS06/141209845?tags=|64|66|71|302|342
“Munich Re has been examining climate change since then, compiling the world’s most extensive database on natural disasters, covering some 33,000 events and drawing on research by its own staff and more than 200 other sources. “There hasn’t been any industry or company that has addressed climate change this early,” Höppe says.
How did Munich Re and the other reinsurers get it right so early? The answer, in a word, is fear—fear of losses that could destroy their business. No industry has more incentive to know the effects of climate change than the reinsurance and insurance industries.”
http://www.theglobeandmail.com/report-on-business/rob-magazine/an-industry-that-has-woken-up-to-climate-change-no-deniers-at-global-resinsurance-giant/article15635331/?page=all
Just speculation so people like YOU can buy THEIR climate policies. Don’t be a chump, keep your chump change in your pocket.
This Munich Re climate change ruse has been going on since the 1970s believe it or not. Disasters are good for insurance business not lack of.
By the way where are the still missing 50 million climate refugees?
What happened to the climate refugees? [FAIL]
Sir Harry Flashman,
Here is your Munich Re at work. Why push disaster policies when worsening weather / climate disasters will sell the polices all by themselves? I am outraged that Flashman cannot see through the ruse. Show me the peer reviewed evidence of worsening weather / climate disasters over at least 20 year (not yet climate – 30 years). Without that Flashman it’s just insurance salesmanship. No papers funded by the insurance industry please.
I buy Flood insurance on my house. The gummint in Washington DC says I have to buy it from them. Well my mortgage company does too.
Well my house is on a flood plain; a huge one; the central Valley of California, and on the shoreline of the largest lake west of the Mississippi River. (Tulare Lake).
My house is on top of a solid rock wall, four feet above the flood plain. The flood plain is all laser leveled. You can flood 100 acres of it, with just one inch of water. But you have to fill the whole valley four feet deep just to get up to the floor of my house.
There isn’t that much water ever lands on California in a whole year.
So yes I am getting ripped off for a non event. My house is more likely to get hit by an asteroid, than a flood. I don’t have asteroid insurance.
Oh by the way, there is a moat around my property, so any water that lands on my property, sloshes over into the moat which connects to a drainage canal, that ships it all to Southern California. So I don’t even have to worry about my car inside the ground level garage.
G
Tulare lake, hasn’t had any water in it for over 40 years.
Only a stupid moron would need a “climate scientist” to interpret the graphic at the top of the post for them. If such a moron took the word of such a “scientist” over what their own eyes can plainly see (that the ice caps aren’t disappearing), then they will have earned the “stupid moron” attribution. Such thick-headed morons “think” climate “scientists” are the only people qualified to assess the “facts”!? Would only a certified race-car driver or an auto mechanic be qualified to read a speedometer?
You need to cut down on your use of “scare quotes”, Bob. As noted elsewhere, the thickness of Antarctic ices tells us nothing about climate, since we had no idea how thick it was before or how it might have changed.
Just as we aren’t sure what the Arctic sea ice extent was before satellite imagery. Ditto Antarctica. Ozone ‘hole’? Are you sure you wanted to say that?
SHF, you need to re-read your own quote several hundred times. Maybe then you will understand that nothing we’re seeing can be shown as unprecedented or alarming regarding climate or weather.
“You need to….” -spoken like a true elitist, and coming from a “Sir” to boot.
Perhaps Harry you should turn your efforts at thought-policing to warmists like Al Gore, for example, and the other “climate scientists” who’ve claimed for years that Mann-made global warming was going to melt ALL the arctic ice by what date last year, and talk them down from their “scare quotes”.
Harry, the very fact that not ONE single such “scientist” or politician has come out to say they were wrong about the arctic ice disappearing by last year tells us all something very important about your precious climate “scientists” – either they don’t know they’re wrong, in which case they lack competence, or they fear attacks from those beholden to the long-standing groupthink, in which case they’re cowards.
The “thickness” of thin-skinned climate “scientists” is astounding.
Sir Harry Flashman says: January 5, 2015 at 7:11 am You need to cut down on your use of “scare quotes”, Bob. As noted elsewhere, the thickness of Antarctic ices tells us nothing about climate, since we had no idea how thick it was before or how it might have changed.
Nor do we know how thin the Arctic Icepack has been in the past warm epocs nor of any possible prior Ice Free summers. We only know what has happened to it over the period of the satellite era
but I look at the odds and buy insurance.
====================
when was the last time your car insurance company used your policy money to try and prevent you from getting into an accident? and, having spent all the policy money trying to prevent an accident, if an accident does occur, they would have nothing left to pay you for the accident. what you are calling insurance is nothing of the kind. it is insurance fraud, because there will be no payout in case of loss.
Thank you ferdberple for trying to knock insurance sense into the good Sir Flashman.
The good Sir replied to me “One year doesn’t tell you much. How about:…..” THANKS! Exactly what sceptics have been saying about weather events. You need to re-think for response tactics. You are digging a hole. You earlier said that we don’t know what the Antarctic sea ice thickness before the sub measurements so it can’t tell us much about climate! Flashman, the gift that keeps giving.
Sorry, Jimmy. I agree that a year doesn’t tell you much no matter who says it, so please don’t put words in my mouth.
“You earlier said that we don’t know what the Antarctic sea ice thickness before the sub measurements so it can’t tell us much about climate!”
Correct, I don’t understand the point you’re making.
“Flashman, the gift that keeps giving.”
Damn straight, my comments and all the responses must be driving some nice ad revenue for the site.
I have made the point clearer further down in comment HERE.
What really matters for sea level rise is land ice mass, not sea ice extent, and Cryosat has shown that land ice is melting in the Antarctic. Also, the study by Woods Hole did not address temporal change (comparing past to current measurements), but rather two different measurement techniques. Juxtaposing that study with quotes by Dr. Peiser is misleading. For a look at the current Arctic warming, see:
http://cci-reanalyzer.org/DailySummary/#
Buying insurance against risk is wise and thoughtful, but one has to perform a sane risk-benefit analysis and then further, compute the expectation values of the various alternative pathways to optimize one’s overall strategy. There is insurance against good and reasonable threats — and then there are the many forms of Pascal’s Wager as offered by the priests/insurance salesmen of the world. Finally, there is insurance as sold by the mob, also known as “protection”. The difficult thing about climate science is discerning what the actual risks are — and honestly, how well they are known (although using the term “honestly” in the context of climate science is pretty much an oxymoron these days).
When it comes to house insurance, things are pretty good. There is a risk that is easily estimated from statistical analysis of a broad population that my house will catch fire, and a computable loss value in the event that it does. The risk of loss (and expected value of the loss) due to theft is also computable. Ditto flood. Earthquake is trickier, as we move closer to Black Swan events, and nobody knows what a “good” estimate is for houses to be crushed by a falling asteroid or landed on by a plane flown by terrorists as these are too rare (and are pulled from a vast sea of very unlikely, but highly catastrophic possibilities). The insurance company sells me insurance at rates that effectively cover my amortized, averaged risks and make them a profit, but that are much CHEAPER than the house itself (else there is no point in buying the insurance). The insurance company than reinsures and sells off some if its risk against the truly broad scale catastrophic possibilities like a volcano erupting in central North Carolina and wiping out a million homes, and the government typically backs even the reinsurance for things like hurricanes and floods and tornadoes and earthquakes. In the end, we all spend maybe 10-20% more on mortgage, taxes, and insurance (where part of our tax money is insurance), with almost all of that money going not to rare black swan insurance, but to reliably computable mundane risk of fire, flood and theft.
Then there is Pascal’s Wager level insurance — Black Swan insurance. This often plays on the ignorance and belief system of the insured. For example, some people devoutly believe that we are mere days away from the Rapture, when they expect to be swept up into the sky — but leave their pets behind! So there are companies that sell “rapture insurance” (possibly tongue in cheek:-) to come and care for your pets in the event that you are taken up. Indeed, religions in general are selling insurance. While the evidence is overwhelming that when we die our brains cease the metabolic activity that is “us” and our conscious existence ends, there is of course SOME chance that we are mistaken about almost everything that we perceive and are (for example) the moral equivalent of power units in The Matrix so that our conscious existence continues after what completely consistently appears to be our total death. Further, given an incommensurable hypothesis, compounding it with further incommensurables surely does nothing but add a few zillion more zeros before the first nonzero digit in any estimate of the probability that is ALREADY basically zero, so it is also possible that when we die, we will be judged according to some criterion and then tortured for an eternity if we are found wanting (according to that criterion).
Since there is no evidence — or possibility of obtaining evidence — short of dying and hence finding out too late to communicate back to the living, this forms a fertile ground for the selling of “insurance” against a non-computable risk. The price is typically exorbitant — 10% of everything you earn on the material side, plus the additional “cost” of complying with the criteria given to you by the insurance agents. We have all sorts of examples of the purchase of this sort of insurance in human history, and the price can range as high as sacrificing your daughter up to the winds or giving up all of your possessions to the church (Acts 5: http://www.skepticsannotatedbible.com/acts/5.html). The insurance salesmen of this sort get away with this by being fundamentally, deeply dishonest. They never tell you what the actuarial basis — the computable, verifiable expectation value — is for the risk. They only tell you that they are certain of the risk and indeed, one of the most common characteristics of this approach is part of the cost of the insurance is to become an insurance salesman yourself in a vast pyramid scheme, you have to believe that the risk is real without reliable evidence and try to convince others that it is real or else you will experience the negative outcome. Imagine a preacher standing up in church on Sunday and stating “I, no more than you, have the slightest reason to believe all of the fantastic and improbable and mutually contradictory things that are stated in this book, but there is some chance, however small, that you will experience an eternity of horrific pain after you die if you don’t give me 1/10th of your net worth and do as I interpret this book as saying otherwise.” Honesty isn’t a good way to sell insurance for incommensurable risks
Finally, there is protection. This is like religion but without the tedious requirement of belief. A big, strong man accompanied by two other big, strong men armed with baseball bats comes to your door. He points out that the world is an uncertain place, and that people often suffer broken legs right there on their front porch. He observes that fortunately he is in the position of being able to offer you insurance against the event on the spot, and furthermore, that those who purchase the insurance appear to have somehow substantially ameliorated the risk (for at least this month). Here one is in a difficult position. On the one hand, it is pretty easy to believe in the risk as it is staring you in the face. One can even believe that the risk can be “insured” — substantially reduced — by buying the profferred insurance and complying with the codicil of not calling the cops. Still, most of us would much rather reach behind the door for the sawed off pump 12 gauge loaded with double-odd buckshot and blow the legs right off of the insurance salesman, even if it does substantially increase various risks on down the road.
So where, exactly, does the risk of (say) SLR fall in this spectrum? I ask, because this is something I’m very sensitive to as I live on the coast around 1/4 of the year. One part of SLR is easily computable. One takes e.g. tide gauge data back as long as tide gauge data exists. One dresses it with observations of sea level over much longer times where inferences can be made from observations or historical records. From this, one can conclude that SLR over the tide gauge era is describable with a linear trend plus noise with a mean rate of perhaps 2 mm/year (9 inches over 110 years). This corresponds well with the rate of global warming and is probably almost entirely due to isostatic thermal expansion of the surface waters of the ocean, and is not uniformly distributed because when surface waters expand, they float and can actually LOCALLY increase the height of the ocean without causing the ocean to actually “rise” anywhere else. There is no reason to think from the data, that SLR will ever be a major risk — the oceans are enormous and isostatic thermal expansion almost certainly lost in the commensurate changes due to land uplift or subsidence and hence ignorable almost everywhere.
But! There are models for global warming due to increasing CO_2. Some of the most extreme of those models predict extreme heating — over 5 C (say 10 F!) globally over the next 70 or 80 years! There are models for SLR based on the melting rates one expects for the major icepacks in Greenland and Antarctica (since melting sea ice doesn’t cause notable SLR because it is floating — it actually lowers the physical surface wherever it occurs). Some of those models (based on damn all data, remember — these models are basically “stuff people make up” that has no possible way of being tested before some ice pack somewhere decides to melt, and there are huge uncertainties to say the least) predict much faster melt than others, given the temperature changes. If one feeds the fastest melting models with the fastest heating models, one gets as much a 5 meters of sea level rise by 2100, truly a catastrophe in anybody’s book.
Now a sensible actuarial analyst would say, whoa, let’s calm down. Simply analyzing past data suggests that TCS is under 2 C, not over 5 C, and might be as low as 1 C. Then there is the extreme uncertainty of the future trajectory of CO_2 as the driver — sure, we are burning carbon for fuel now because it is cheap and comparatively plentiful and because 1/3 of the planet is locked in a state of energy poverty right out of the 17th and 18th century and it is the quick and easy way for them to enjoy the fruits of modern civilization and avoid the unpleasantness of dying of starvation or disease, ignorant, with no hope or prospects for their children. But in as little as a decade, we might have fusion energy, or we might get over our squeamishness regarding fission energy, or we might finish developing storage batteries that are both inexpensive and capacious enough to hold 100+ Kw-hr’s of energy in a volume of around 1 m^3 that costs around $1000 to make and sell at full retail and that will last at least 20 years with minimal maintenance (seriously). Then there are models that predict a lot less SLR as temperature rises, and spreads it out over a lot longer of a time frame. And then there is the uncertainty in any of these estimates. And finally, there is the past SLR data itself, which is (to be frank) about as unalarming as it is possible to be.
So the best (most honest) probability of catastrophic 5 m SLR is what? 0.01? 0.001? 0.0001? I suspect even the latter is high. True, the consequences are extreme if it happens, but that is also true if Yellowstone erupts, but you don’t see the government or society making plans to spend 10% of the global product to cope with that if it occurs, or to be able to act before or after an asteroid falls. That’s because however horrific the visualizable outcome, it is not very likely and because dealing with it if it happens is almost certainly the best way to optimize our expected benefit, rather than spending enormous amounts on things that probably wouldn’t work to reduce the risk anyway. But this is not communicated to the public. What is the risk of 1 m SLR? I think most actual climate scientists consider this to be on the order of 0.01, or 0.001, or less. It’s simple physics — it isn’t easy to melt vast amounts of ice, and the ice in question is all measurably well below freezing almost all of the time at this particular moment (averaged over the decade of your choice from as long as we have measurements) and is seriously below freezing most of the year. It isn’t even clear if such melt as is observed comes from geophysical heating from below or from soot lowering the albedo of the ice, not from CO_2 at all.
The most reliable/sane estimates come from people like Trenberth, who pegs probable SLR in the range of a foot or so — less than 1/2 of a meter. That’s almost twice the rate of the last century of SLR and is still utterly ignorable nearly everywhere! It is still low enough that there is little point in “insuring” against this risk by taking measures now any more than people took measures against the 9″ over the last century. They just adapted to it as it happened. If you live on a coast, you know that SLR at this rate is literally swamped by the noise of the tides and the storms, and that homes and property there are at far greater local risks of flooding or disaster.
So how is the insurance on this issue being sold? We have the former head of NASA, James Hansen, on public record as stating that it was his professional opinion speaking ex cathedra as one of the most eminent climate scientists in the world, the man who gave us the catastrophic anthropogenic global warming hypothesis itself that SLR would be 5 meters, right after misstating the position of the mainstream as being 1 meter of SLR, and without giving any indication whatsoever of the uncertainty or quantitative basis for his belief!
So you choose: Is SLR (which is be far and away the most consequential of the negative sequellae associated with hypothetical future warming, at least once it exceeds 1/2 a meter per century or thereabouts) an insurable risk? How much should we spend to insure against it, given that we’re talking about investing a huge fraction of our GDP for the indefinite future — carte blanche, an open ticket, no expenditure is apparently too great — to insure what in the end is a tiny fraction of the surface area of the Earth, and where there are enormous uncertainties in our ability to predict any future SLR rate at all, and where we have the certainty that after a full 165 years of largely anthropogenic global warming the associated observed SLR rate of the past has been distinctly non-catastrophic, easily and invisibly accommodated by people just making local decisions as it literally has crept up over decades? And is James Hansen an honest and reliable seller of actually computable insurance at fair rates, or is he of the religious/Pascal’s wager persuasion, or is he the mere tool of the energy companies and money launderers who are the ones that overwhelmingly have benefited from the absurd price increases and complex financial structure associated with carbon trading and measures taken to combat the hundred year threat of AGW at the expense of the perpetuation of misery and suffering of the poorest 1/3 of the world’s population, who are selling us protection?
Personally, I think it is mostly protection being sold by the unscrupulous politicians, reporters, banks, and energy companies with the unwitting religious support of scientists like Hansen who have long since lost any pretence of objectivity on the issue and who never, ever, give an honest appraisal of the uncertainty of our knowledge and just how shaky the tower of assumptions is that gives rise to any future estimate of global climate (as evidenced by just how badly our models either hindcast the past, describe the present, or described the future of when the models were run in the past).
There are still plenty of climate scientists who are objective, don’t get me wrong. I respect Trenberth, for example, as he often acknowledges his own uncertainty and can change his mind as the data demands it, even though he (like me, for that matter) do think that the evidence supports the hypothesis of CO_2 driven warming with TCS in the 1 to 3 C range. But until the Assessment Reports of the IPCC do an honest job of presenting uncertainties and stop using language in the SPM like “high confidence” or “low confidence” or “medium confidence” that is indefensible abuse of the language of statistics given that no such confidence interval can be computed or objectively defended, it is more a confidence game than a sober and reliable appraisal of the climate future of the planet suitable for doing the cost-benefit analysis that we need to make a rational decision about how much to spend on “insurance”, and how best to spend it.
rgb
Thanks Doc,
That’s a lot of food for thought on this cold windy day.
Joe
A lot to read, but enjoyed this comment.
Thanks for a thoughts provoking insight.
Betting is like insuring, in some sense. I wonder if coastal cities could collect money for flood protection by taking part in betting where very very sceptical minds bet against sea level rise. If they loose, city gets the money before it is flooded. If they win, they get their money back and some extra from the city that was saved. Of course the city needs to pay an interest rate, and the bets must have an after market so that you don’t need to put your money in for 200 years.
Err, I think I just reinvented reinsurances?
But rgb how much higher do we want the premium to grow? Trenberth is an author of the latest RS and NAS report about AGW. At point 20 they state that the entire planet could stop all human emissions of co2 today and there wouldn’t be a change in climate, temp or co2 levels for thousands of years.
So how many thousands of trillions $ premium should humans pay to get a desirable result? Can anyone please explain?
https://royalsociety.org/policy/projects/climate-evidence-causes/question-20/
Interesting book on how the Insurance industry( among many others) uses science to calculate their strategies etc. By Sharon Bertsch McGrayne titled “They theory that would not die (it is about the Bayes rule.”). Much debate, debunked etc over the last 200 years or so but it seems to work for even architects, ship building etc etc etc.
No lie: I read the description of Dr. Hansen as ‘one of the most emetic climate scientists in the world’.
You’ve seen the evidence for AGW, is that right? no warming for 18 years and 3 months and no warming distinguishable from zero for 26 years, last fact really important because that time line pre dates the inception of the IPCC.
Of course renewable generation works, that is not deniable unfortunately thought it only works when the wind blows or the sun shines but only rarely does the wind blow at the right speed for long enough and how exactly do you run A&E and vital services on an unreliable and inevitably interruptible source of electricity, premature baby incubators?
Germany has spent Euros 600 billion on trying to be green and just like the UK they have put in place a 400x’s markup on payments to conventional brown coal, black coal and gas generation to ensure that they stay in the game. These excessive payments are being made so that these plants are run 24/7 but not necessarily generating electricity as backup to cope with the severe intermittence of wind and solar. Contrary to popular belief German nuclear is having to close because it cannot be ramped like coal and gas and therefore cannot cope with the huge and indeterminate generation of wind and solar which can go from hero to zero within minutes.
As regards Scotland we are paying billions for high voltage links from Scotland to England so that we can pay for their expensive wind generated electricity whilst Scotland can take advantage of our cheap coal fired generation when their wind turbines lay dormant.
The once you have built 55,000 wind turbines which only last max 20 years you will have to fine ever more acreage that we don’t have to start building another 55,000, the truth is its take 25 years to build just 5,500 of the damn stupid monolithic monstrosities so it just wont happen, thank goodness.
Get your facts straight before pontificating about a subject which clearly you know very little.
Flashman is a bit of a troll
“a bit”?
Just trying to stimulate discussion, you’d miss me if I went away and left you all to endless rounds of snark and self-congratulation.
I wouldn’t miss you.
Sir Harry, I’m betting that the cost of your house insurance doesn’t exceed the cost of the likely damage to your house.
Is this really Sir Harry Paget Flashman who graces us with his presence?
Drink, puppy, drink…Yep, closing in on 200 years old and still a shite disturber :).
Yes, insurance companies make their money because you dread the consequences of a very improbable event.
If you live on a mountain top, do you buy flood insurance?
Strange choice of name SHF. George MacDonald Fraser’s magnificent creation, Flashman, is about the least likely fictional hero to think about taking out insurance. He’d never pay the premiums for a start. And he certainly would not give a tinker’s cuss about global warming.
Sorry to be picky, but the Flashman novels, brilliant though they are, carry on the story of the villain of “Tom Brown’s Schooldays” by, I think, Dr Arnold. The eponymous Tom is as nauseatingly virtuous as Flashman is vicious, but no-one would have dreamed of carrying forward his imagined life!
PS – George MacDonald Fraser’s masterpiece, IMO, is his war memoir, “Quartered Safe Out Here” – highly recommended!
I’ve said I won’t comment on climate matters further, but on another matter IMO George MacDonald Fraser is one of the greatest and most underrated writers of the 20th century. I’m no Flashman but have a sneaking admiration for him, cad and bounder though he is.
The original Flashman was an iconoclast. He would have made an excellent scientific skeptic. He certainly wouldn’t have followed the mouth-breathing, head-nodding climate alarmist crowd.
But you dont pay more for the insurance than the house is worth
Would you be willing to buy the Same Insurance though if the lowest prices policy cost you at least tripple your house payment?
In recent decades climate science as a profession has been attracting people whose main goal is to save the world from humanity. The individual scientists may or may not be doing good science, because that is only a secondary goal. Many of the older scientists in the field can be relied to put the science first, but they are aging out of the profession. For that reason, no one who advocates for the scientific evidence should fall for the idea that only climate scientists are qualified to report on it, and no one should believe that a poll result limited to the opinions of climate scientists accurately reflects the available evidence.
Nobody cares if you want to use your own money to buy your own insurance. The problem is everyone is being forced buy your insurance and most people don’t want it.
Amen Bryan. The decision to buy an insurance policy depends on TWO factors: cost versus benefit. The “insurance” policy being pushed on us by the Warmists would cost Trillions, and have little, or even negative, benefits.
Flashman, your house maybe struck my a meteorite, scientific models prove this, as we’re long overdue another major strike, thus I want you to pay an extra £1,000 a year, to be spent as I see fit.
Happy?
Sorry SHF training is not required for being a scientist. As long as you use the scientific method you are a scientist. It is the method that counts not what you call yourself.
You could have said : ‘is a sociologist and historian’ , and thus avoided all that cockney silliness.
For those who object to Benny Peiser, here is the BBC’s science correspondent Jonathan Amos. Maybe some people will object to his reporting because he’s not a climate scientist.
Shouldn’t the date be ‘Daily Express, 25 December 2014’ ?
[fixed -mod]
Unfortunately, you can’t trust anything written in the Daily Express, especially when it comes to the weather. Just look at some of the claims made http://themediablog.typepad.com/the-media-blog/2012/08/daily-express-weather-headlines.html
The fact that this article appeared in the Daily Express is likely to see it ridiculed by climate scientists, not an admission on their part their predictions were wrong…
The data are from WHOI & ESA observations, not a newspaper.
http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/IMAGES/global.daily.ice.area.withtrend.jpg
The graphic is from Global Sea Ice Area (University of Illinois),
at http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/IMAGES/global.daily.ice.area.withtrend.jpg
I use that graph all the time. It is updated daily.
The red line shows that global ice is now well above it’s 30-year average [click in the graph to embiggen].
Despite all the hand-wringing propaganda about disappearing Arctic ice, the fact is that there is nothing either unusual or unprecedented happening. Everything is completely normal, as this graph makes clear.
Lawrence: ….talking about trust: does the fact that the article was carried in the DE change the results of the robotic study?
“Ted Maksym, an oceanographer at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution in Massachusetts, conducted a study in which he sent an underwater robot into the depths of the Antarctic sea to measure the ice.”
Unfortunately not. The fact that it is in the Daily Express means it will be ignored – worse, those that see it would assume it was just a concocted story like their other weather stories. Its like climate sceptics using the National Enquirer as their main media outlet…
The Examiner, a website that reports daily on evidence for life on Mars, also carries stories on AGW. There are idiots on both sides, so what.
Not to sure: for example, it is now being carried in WUWT.. 🙂
It’s also reported in nature. Is your head firmly in the sand now?
http://www.nature.com/news/robot-reveals-surprisingly-thick-antarctic-sea-ice-1.16397
It never was in the sand, and you have totally missed the point I was making
Lawrence, the thicker Antarctic sea ice point has already been covered on WUWT.
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2014/11/24/surprise-robot-sub-finds-much-thicker-than-expected-antarctic-sea-ice/
Here it is from Woods Hole. Forget the Daily Express and look for what is reported on. It’s out there and not fabricated.
November 24, 2014
http://www.whoi.edu/news-release/SeabedAntarctic
http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/IMAGES/global.daily.ice.area.withtrend.jpg
I am not doubting the data. There is no need to convince me.
I am just pointing out that this post (not the data) is a link to a story in the Daily Express, which most people (i.e. the gullible public who believe global warming must be true because scientists say so) are going to treat as seriously as the celebrity headlines that this story is hidden amongst.
It will be ignored by Guardian readers but not by the far bigger readership of the Express
You know, last night I put a few cubes of ice in my bourbon and momentarily felt guilty knowing that the planet was losing ice and here I was using it for personal pleasure.
Thanks to this news, this heavy burden has been lifted from my bourbon soaked heart.
I enjoy doing my bit to help green the planet by releasing CO2 bubbles from beer & champagne.
and you weren’t wasting ice.
Clearly you are more attuned to the planet’s environmental needs than I.
*must try harder*
From one JW to another. Well done on the bourbon! Trust that it is ‘straight’. For even more fun, try drinking Irish without any ice ☺️ Sadly, I am on a dry January – bit of a fad here in the UK – but I least I have my daily fix of WUWT to get me through the month. Enjoy!
“I am on a dry January – bit of a fad here in the UK”
That’s just weather, it will pass.
If you’ve ever heard “it is Happy Hour somewhere”, maybe you could apply that in this case…
you know, while it may be January everywhere on this planet…
Seriously, isn’t this just one more case of where the data and observations do not support the predictions/projections of the Alarmists/Warmists?
The Polar Ice isn’t melting, the Sea Level isn’t rising at an increased rate, the atmospheric overall temperature isn’t rising at an increased rate,…
other than that atmospheric CO2 levels will continue to rise, and there is evidence that this is a good thing with nothing to be alarmed about,
do they get anything substantial right?
No, we are drowning in an ocean of liberal fantasy.
The date under the chart at the top of post (hyper linked) does not match the date of the article (should be 2014 vice 2015).
It should be December 25, 2014, the date of the article at http://www.express.co.uk/news/nature/548516/North-South-poles-not-melting-Dr-Benny-Peiser
Corrected earlier. Thank you. .mod]
I have heard nothing more repetitive in reply to ‘it isn’t warming’ than, ‘Look at the Arctic sea ice!’ which hasn’t done much since 2007.
Therefore I predict the facts will continue to be ignored, cherry-picked and misrepresented in support of a calamitous narrative. We have known since 1988 that it was never really about saving mankind from hot weather, it was about careerists collaborating on a (not very well thought out) career.
Maybe 26 years is enough and they will go away now. I am not betting on that. Until some heads start to roll it will continue, probably morphing into a ‘cooling catastrophe’ from which we must be ‘saved’ by valiant climate scientists’ Delphic predictions.
The chart does not seem to show “record high” in global sea ice as stated by Peiser, unless I’m reading it wrong somehow…
The maximum extent of Arctic sea ice was reached in 1979 and for the Antarctic in 2014.
He should have mabe said near record highs. The anomoly graph simply is no longer alarming. The thermageddon meltdown has stalled in the last few years. It may all melt away or start trending up – we don’t know – but certainly the Earth ‘ice’ death spiral has stuttered.
http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/iphone/images/iphone.anomaly.global.png
Sea ice variation is clearly a response that provides one of the many negative feedback loops that regulates Earth’s climate system on a scale of decades.
Some merely see sea ice as an albedo effect, but its high latitudes minimizes the solar energy absorption-reflection component. Its more significant impact is to limit heat loss to the cold sky during dark months. Sea ice blankets provide an insulation between the warmer polar water and a very cold night sky. So the Arctic low ice extent conditions of the previous 10 years allowed more heat to ventilate (convect) and escape (radiate) into the cold dark sky which corrected for the large heat release of the tropical pacific from the 98 El Nino.
Sounds like a natural emergent thermostatic phenomenon in the arctic waters. Cycles, cycles, and more cycles.
Not just Arctic. While the seasonal albedo effect of Arctic sea ice is minimal due to higher latitudes of the Arctic Ocean, sea ice on the Southern Ocean does have a more significant seasonal albedo component , a positive amplifying feedback. That the total global sea ice anomaly graph lumps Antarctic sea ice together with Arctic sea ice is misleadingly simplistic.
The negative feedback component of polar sea ice extent is one of limiting heat ventilation & re-radiation to space, which appears to operate on a time scales of a decade to years. The positive feedback albedo component opates faster, on a time scale of seasons. But the magnitude of the albedo component by north-south hemisphere (both sea ice and land ice-snow cover) varies also with Malinkovitch cycles, that is obliquity, eccentricity, and by precession of equinoxes.
It’s complicated. And the climate system is continually responding to forcings with feedbacks operating on many different time scales with changing magnitudes. Which is why any GHG related forcings get damped out and reduced into the background noise (to wit, a diminishing ECS) of global temp changes.
I believe in this negative feedback, but how it compares to the positive feedback related to spring/summer time insolation being absorbed in open sea water?
that is where ice thickness plays its vital role in the feedback. Thicker ice is of course far more resilent to seasonal meltings and short term forcings, such as short term warmer water influxes into polar waters.Sustained warm water influxes will keep ice thin and amplify albedo’s effect on further summer warming. But on the other side, winter, that open polar water rapidly ventilates heat to space. A winter or two of strongsurface winds can keep ice from accumulating through surface overturning, and thus flush a huge amount of ocean heat to space, that eventually result in a homeostatic reversion to mean.
Sounds right, though without numbers not so useful theory.
What I fear is though homeostacy is kept, the oscillation becomes larger when more energy stays in the system. It is just so tedious to watch climate change. Lets wait another 30 years….
I like that the Daily Express reporters are clairvoyant:
Seeing what people are going to say 12 months ahead could be very profitable in the stock markets.
(I know it is a typo… just in a playful mood today)
Indeed, since cooling appears to have already begun (much to Warmists’ dismay), they have dusted off the THC canard, and it is waiting in the wings, ready to be pushed onstage. The last refuge; the CO2 warming has caused cooling.
they will cling to “ocean acidification” until the next ice age cometh.
Thanks to Ted Maksym at the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution.
Another voice for reality!
Thanks also to Levi Winchester, Benny Peiser and WUWT for increasing his reach.
The post is misleading, the implication is that it is Maksym who is that ‘leading global warming expert’ who is being quoted ” the poles are “much more stable” than climate scientists once predicted and could even be much thicker than previously thought”
in fact that is Benny Peiser who is not a leading global warming expert but is a social anthropologist.
Maksym doesn’t say anything of the sort, I suggest you read the Woods Hole release to see what he actually says.
http://www.whoi.edu/news-release/SeabedAntarctic
Yep, and maybe the important thing is that it comes from Woods HOI, possibly a breakthrough of truth there? Brett
I haven’t gone through all the comments, but it seems like most folks (including the poster) are missing the point. The Antarctic ice is thicker than we thought, but that doesn’t mean it’s not thinning because we have no idea how thick it was before. So the measurements say nothing about a warming climate at all.
You’re advising the wrong side.
The alarmists have been asserting that every measurement of everything is part of a long line of empirical evidence supporting AGW. A sinking island is a victim of AGW sea rise.
Weather is climate every time they point to any weather related event.
This story contradicts their conjecture about what CO2 emissions & “climate sensitivity” is doing to the polar ice caps.
It is they who jumped to convenient yet false conclusions without your wisdom and guidance. Please assist them.
“You’re advising the wrong side.
The alarmists have been asserting that every measurement of everything is part of a long line of empirical evidence supporting AGW. A sinking island is a victim of AGW sea rise.
Weather is climate every time they point to any weather related event.
This story contradicts their conjecture about what CO2 emissions & “climate sensitivity” is doing to the polar ice caps.”
It is they who jumped to convenient yet false conclusions without your wisdom and guidance. Please assist them.”
There’s a wealth of snark on this site, backed up by a lot of proudly asserted but wrong assumptions – for example, that the newly discovered thickness of the Antarctic ice tells us anything at all about climate change. Sadly, I’m finding very little science.
SHF – that really is the pot calling the kettle black. The non CAGW majority on this site have been decrying virtually daily that short term events, especially in isolation, represent nothing at all unless they are part of a worsening /improving long term trend.
There are some here who will jump on the same band wagon when an event comes along that ‘proves’ a non warmist viewpoint – they are equally incorrect. For you to use the same argument of the few to denigrate the majority on this site, completely ridicules your stand point. If you want some credibility for what you believe in, this is not the way to go and lets down others who wish to debate this topic from a warmist viewpoint.
What it does say Sir Harry is that the polar ice is stable and folks like yourself are unstable.
“…The Antarctic ice is thicker than we thought, but that doesn’t mean it’s not thinning because we have no idea how thick it was before. So the measurements say nothing about a warming climate at all….”
Nice to hear that. So lets spend another 60 trillion dollars on CO2 emission reductions, to prevent global warming and catastrophic Arctic/Antarctic ice melting so our cities do not get inundated with rising seas.
Sir Harry,
Welcome back! I’m a fan of your memoirs,especially the one where you first found yourself a member of the crew of a slaver in Equatorial Africa which eventually led you to a Mississippi cotton plantation. If I remember correctly, the ower’s wife showed up in your room with a whip in one hand and wearing nothing but her riding boots. That encounter alone should have reduced Antarctica to a steaming jungle.
Instead, it reduced Sir Harry’s brain to a steaming jungle.
Conversely, there is no evidence that it is thinning. So you are just chasing your dragon. The article stated it is thicker than thought. it does not talk about what it was in the past since the evidence presented is not available before now (no one had a robot to send under the ice).
Hank
Wow! So this is what “settled science” looks like.
Good to know we can get to this point even before we have the basic data.
It also doesn’t mean it’s not thickening. We can all play with words. At least it was thicker than expected so it’s not worse than we thought!
Climate Solar Output EUV 1/4/2015
The increase in Antarctica Sea Ice is due to reduced output from the Sun. The area under the curve [integral] of total number of Sun spots [or Solar EVU] is 1/5 of Solar cycle 22, i.e., 1990. Since the Sun spots do not measure “energy”, they are an indication; but, the Solar EVU is energy! The Solar EVU directly produces more OZONE. More EVU, the Ozone layer becomes thicker. Ozone is a green house gas. When there is more Ozone the upper atmosphere gets “thicker” expanding due to the “heat [energy]”. NASA monitors this and produces reports for satellite operators, since the atmosphere can expand so much that it can affect the orbits.
The OZONE layer acts as a blanket of insulation keeping infrared radiation [heat] trapped near the surface of the planet. When OZONE holes open, the radiation [heat] escapes.
Simply, less Solar EUV more Antarctica and Arctic Sea Ice. Unless Solar EUV increases, expect the Polar Sea Ice Area, Extent, thickness to increase dramatically over the next 10 years. Expect Polar Vortex “breakouts” to drive temperatures down to -30 to -60 F in Canada and Minnesota regions during winter. During Summer expect reduced temperatures!
Solar EUV > 130 -> warming
Solar EUV > 100 holding constant
Wolar EUV cooling
Note: Solar EUV measured under the curve gives different values for warming, etc.
OZONE values graphical display web sites:
http://ozonewatch.gsfc.nasa.gov/monthly/NH.html
http://ozonewatch.gsfc.nasa.gov/
Correction:
Solar EUV > 130 -> warming
Solar EUV > 100 holding constant
Solar EUV cooling
Sir Harry Flashman
You say
Please explain why when “the measurements say nothing about a warming climate at all” the warmunists were shouting about polar ice loss when there were fewer measurements of the ice.
Richard
B I N G O! Larry misses this important observation. Or pretends to. 😊
SCENARIO.
“It’s thinning, it’s thinning! It’s a sign of our warming climate. It’s worse than we thought! ”
[Sub shoes thicker than previously thought].
“Thickness tells us nothing about climate.”
LOL. It should read:
[Sub shows thicker than previously thought].
Man, when you are right, you “shoe” are right.
/grin
Shoe ’nuff!
..not to mention a lot of these “warmest” were “coolists” back in the 1970’s.
2nd try: [trying to remove WordPress help]
Solar EUV greater than 130 ; warming
Solar EUV between 100 to 120 ; holding constant
Solar EUV less than 100 ; cooling
Sorry, but this would be better science if the writer was an actual scientist instead of a Dr. of Sociology.
True but only to those who subordinate the substance.
The significance of the substance would still be the same if it were written by Dr. Seuss.
True, and it would still tell us nothing about climate change.
Harry,
Even IF it’s not thickening we do have extra sea ice (caused by global warming) which adds to albedo – assists in cooling of the planet.
http://nsidc.org/data/seaice_index/images/daily_images/S_stddev_timeseries.png
Jimbo – yes, that is true, and a good thing.
The local mill is running a New Year sale, right now and have tremendous discounts on Troll Feed. The largest discounts come with boxcar loads.
I’ve seen, here on this site, many instances of people commenting to the fact that activists, politicians and all kinds of non climate scientists were publishing alarmist propaganda disguised as science and highjacking the entire subject.
This is now a case of NOT a climate scientist but a Dr of Sociology publishing climate science, and not a single word of skepticism is uttered purely because it supports the local opinion.
Not only that, but simply raising this fact immediately brings up some name calling… I would have expected better.
Dear Mr. Pot, let me introduce you to my good friend Mr. Kettle…
I wouldn’t go so far as to call it hypocrisy, but to me it’s dangerously close. Skepticism doesn’t mean blindly believing everything you read only if it supports your current opinion.
Pat, you wrote: “many instances of people commenting to the fact that activists, politicians and all kinds of non climate scientists were publishing alarmist propaganda disguised as science and highjacking the entire subject.”
In fact it is rare that skeptics try Appeal to Authority arguments. It is the Warmists who are primarily guilty of that.
Just about the only skeptic I know of who likes Appeal to Authority is you (“this would be better science if the writer was an actual scientist instead of a Dr. of Sociology”).
Jimbo, what the frakking, you just show us a graph showing significant increase in multi-year ice extent at Antarctica? Wasn’t the Truth that Antarctic sea ice melts every year and thus can’t replace Arctic multi-year ice?
I’m not saying warmists lie, it is more like they just don’t always manage to tell the truth.
A Dr of Sociology is a scientist
So is a Dr. in Communications or a Dr. in Linguistics… it still doesn’t make them qualified as climate experts.
Pat. Tell me what he has said that is false?
I maybe wrong here but I think Willis Eschenbach is a psychologist. Not many people tell him not to post here because of that reason. What about Christopher Monckton, 3rd Viscount Monckton of Brenchley (Classics / journalism studies)? What about Stephen Mosher?
See if you can SPOT THE CLIMATE SCIENTIST?
• James Hansen: astronomer / physicist
• Michael Mann: physicist / geologist
• John Cook: physicist & cartoonist
• Joe Romn: physicist
• John Holdren: plasma physicist
• Grant Foster (Tamino): theoretical physicist
• Dana Nuccitelli: physicist
• Gavin Schmidt: mathematician
• Eric Steig: geologist
• Bill McKibben: environmental studies
• Bill Nye: mechanical engineer
• Paul Nurse: geneticist
• Rajendra Pachauri: economist / industrial engineer
• David Suzuki: zoologist / geneticist
• Al Gore: divinity major
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2015/01/05/polar-ice-caps-more-stable-than-predicted-new-observations-show/#comment-1829038
jimbo, don’t you know by now? The only way to become an “expert in climate science” is to be anointed by those who already consider themselves to be “experts in climate science”.
mmm maybe not so much ( as traditional science). However a Dr. of Sociology is still probably quite good at interpreting the collected data. I will give it a pass.
No. a sociologist is an “observer” and (usually a poor) statistician, different than a scientist.
Pat
You make a daft assertion when you say
NO! ABSOLUTELY NOT!
The quality of this science is what it is, and it cannot be affected by who presents it.
The quality of science is NOT defined by who did it or their qualifications. The quality of any science is what it is.
The best science of the last century was provided by an inexpert patents clerk, and the seminal work in aeronautics was conducted by two brothers whose only ‘qualifications’ were experience as bicycle salesmen.
On the other hand, rubbish such as the ‘hockey stick’ of Mann, Bradley and Hughes (MBH) is supported by idiots because they think MBH are “actual scientists” and they think the quality of science depends on who “writes” it..
Richard
Amen. The China study was recently dismantled and debunked and found to be complete rubish by a very intelligent young lady named Denise Minger. It is funny watching people try to attack her and not her data.
Mr Flashman the Antarctic has been most inconvenient for proponents of AGW, Sea ice has grown in the Antarctic as the Arctic has shrank over the satellite era. As the PDO has flipped and the AO is on the verge, the Arctic appears to be recovering well in both volume and area but it is still early days. I suspect it will continue over coming decades to return 1979 starting point, but we will see. The thickness of the ice at the Antarctic has been measured by all Antarctic survey countries for over 50 years. Indeed in the 50’s the general consensus was that the Antarctic was melting and we were all going to drown. The empirical data does not conform to theory, which leads any sensible balanced person to question the theory. If there is clear empirical evidence of AGW, I would very much like to see it and I would be grateful if you could provide me with links to the data. All I generally get when I ask others is links to model output data so please enlighten me. As for Dr Peiser, he is highly respected academic who, whilst never purporting to be a climate scientist, has pointed out the folly of costly social and economic decisions on an unproven theory, something I understand he is qualified to do. I do not know how many contributors here are qualified in this area of discussion, but we are all publishing our opinion/questions/thoughts to world every time we contribute. So I believe Dr Peiser has as much right as any of us to make his opinion/observation also public no matter how qualified or unqualified he is, he will justify his position professionally.
I look forward to the data you have seen proving AGW
Skip down to the section “Statements by scientific organizations of national or international standing”. Hint: it’s pretty much all of them, and all of them endorse the theory of AGW. Click through for specifics. It’s only the folks here in the WUWT echo chamber that don’t get it.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scientific_opinion_on_climate_change#Statements_by_scientific_organizations_of_national_or_international_standing
He, he – Sir Harry appeals to the esteemed authority of Wikipedia.
I suspect we are wasting our time trying to discuss reality with one who is grounded in fairy tales.
However, as I contemplate this evening’s bourbon, I do see that we are getting some levity in the posts to Sir Harry and humor is a good thing.
Be fair, John -I’m not citing Wikipedia as a scientific source, but just as the easiest place to find the full list of scientific orgs that have jumped on board with AGW. But any of them can be easily verified by clicking through to the referenced site.
I also think humour is important, although the folks here don’t always get my jokes…
You seriously did NOT just post a Wikipedia page to support your argument on a science blog, did you?
Nothing quite like offering logical fallacies as proof…
SHF – we can all make generalised statements – I’m good at that too as I dont have time to do the research. However I try not to make statements without reading up on the subject first – even then I can be caught out and have to retract my stand point. But that is my present point you make an interesting argument to start with but when called out you go quiet and then insist that ‘WE’ are in an echo chamber and not once have you retracted – you cant always be right. As I said before ‘the pot calling the kettle black’. If you make a statement and then dont respond to comment at all, not even in support of your argument then you will have to consider yourself as in your own personal echo chamber – thats certainly how it looks
Wikipedia! You are sinking Sir Harry. Must try harder.
So nobody has anything to say what is wrong with the Wikipedia article other than it was obviously written by wrong people — though I don’t know who?
SHF, you are aware that all of these “scientific” organizations are run by politicians first and foremost.
It is the politicians who vote on these “statements of support”.
Out in the real world, real scientists have been quiting these organizations in droves because of the positions being taken by the politicians.
Seems like more and more people everyday are also ” not getting it ”
What’s not to like about warmer weather in the Northern Hemisphere
Hank
My bad.
When you said you had seen evidence of AGW, I foolishly thought you HAD REALLY SEEN/EXPERIENCED AGW.
Apparently, what you meant was you had read somebody’s claim about AGW. Good to know trolls read.
”
Sir Harry Flashman
January 5, 2015 at 7:37 am
True, and it would still tell us nothing about climate change.
“
But it did when it seemed to show thinning ice and was proclaimed by “non-climate science” activists.
Can you spell “h-y-p-o-c-r-i-s-y”?
You’re still missing the point. Noone said the Antarctic was thining, because noone knew what was going on. Now we do, and going forward we’ll be able to have more insight.
We do know giant ice sheets are collapsing because it’s highly visible.How do you account for that?
“Giant ice sheets collapsing”? Where?
“How do do you account for that?”
the end of the Pleistocene preordained the WAIS thinning & ultimate collapse, as it has for every interglacial.
Anthropogenic?…. hardly.
Geo thermal activity in the West Antarctica peninsula. This was covered by a study earlier this year.
news flash: “Scientists find evidence of a warming world in the collapse of the giant Larentide Ice Sheet. More at 10 pm on this breaking story.”
Not exactly a reply to your post just here, SHF, but I, and many others here and elsewhere, have been looking fror ANY evidence that CO2, produced by humans or just naturally occurring, has produced or might produce any catastrophically harmful effect on our planet.
If you have this evidence, I say again evidence not conjecture or guess, please share it with us.
And while you are at it, please tell everyone what YOU think the optimum temperature of the Earth should be. As it was 40 years ago? The same as the Minoan warm period? The same as when there were dinosaurs around?
Genuine enquiring minds want to know.
And I am not being sacastic here, I really want to know these things.
Fair enough. I don’t think there is an optimum temperature (although there are surely suboptimal temperatures). The key thing is that we have optimized our food production and living arrangements for 7 billion + people to the current climate which has been relatively stable for the last 10,000 years or so. Any dramatic, rapid change would be disruptive at best, catastrophic at worst. That is the source of my concern.
As far as evidence that CO2 heats the planet up, I can refer you to IPCC reports and the underlying science, but I’ve found that to be pointless as it’s generally dismissed as just wrong (normally without proof) or lies driven by some imaginary green conspiracy. So we must agree to disagree on this one.
SHF says:
I don’t think there is an optimum temperature (although there are surely suboptimal temperatures).
By that definition, everything is suboptimal.
That’s the problem with the alarmist crowd. Their glass is always half empty.
WRONG! Where did you pull that fact out of? Flashman, the gift that keeps on giving. I love you man.
Here is some more Sir Harry. You did say:
>>> “Noone said the Antarctic was thining, because noone knew what was going on.”
Sir Harry Flashman,
You are correct this article tells us nothing about climate change, nor do ANY of the failed predictions i.e. plummeting Polar Bear populations, disappearing Arctic Ice and Glaciers and on and on and on issued by the AGW/CC cabal.
From my perspective the science of climate change has been reduced to computer modeling that can forecast with extreme precision but zero accuracy, see Warren Buffets comments, referenced above, for the Global Insurance/Reinsurance Industries real world loss experience. It appears as though the insurers have also discounted climate modeling.
Sir you claim to have seen evidence of climate change, please present your evidence for discussion, or move along.
Ray Kuntz
You say to Sir Harry Flashman
He has not seen any such evidence because there is no such evidence, and his claim to have seen some is a blatant falsehood.
The fact that his claim is a falsehood is the reason he made no reply to my request for him to reveal the “evidence”.
I have asked him, and you have asked him. It would be good if everybody could each ask him. This may induce him to clear off and stop disrupting threads with such nonsensical falsehoods as he has “seen evidence for AGW”.
Richard
The only evidence that SHF has given for anything, is that his behavior exactly fits the profile of a Troll. He has shown no interest in truth, just the disruption of a thread.
Simple…http://www.economist.com/blogs/economist-explains/2014/11/economist-explains
Slightly less simple…http://www.skepticalscience.com/empirical-evidence-for-global-warming-intermediate.htm
http://www.livescience.com/40006-united-nations-report-calls-global-warming-unprecedented-infographic.html
Scientific consensus…http://climate.nasa.gov/scientific-consensus/
If you dismiss the underlying science produced over decades from highly reputable sources in multiple disciplines, I’m not sure what proof I can offer you.
SHF:
“Scientific consensus”?
That should tell you all you need to know about how low NASA’s climate credibility has sunk. Remember ‘Muslim Outreach’?
I also had to larf out loud at your Livescience link. Pure pop propaganda, that’s all that is. Every ‘infographic’ has been repeatedly debunked here. They are telling readers what to think. Is that what happened to you?
Next, linking to SkS is a non-starter. That is a 100% propaganda blog run by a neo-Nazi. Are you sure you want to be associated with them?
Finally, the Economist is a publication that I’ve subscribed to for more than 40 years, from when every ‘picture’ was a hand drawn depiction; no photos until about twenty years ago.
A while back the Economist was bought by a German entity, and they immediately began the ‘runaway global warming’ drumbeat. You can believe them when they print climate articles. Or, you can look out your window, and see that nothing out of the ordinary is happening.
People who think for themselves look out the window…
SHF,
OMG. Consensus is not a scientific term. Consensus in not a tenet of the scientific method. The evidence is that the “consensus” is wrong concerning AGW. The world COOLED from the late 30’s to 1980. Over 40 years of cooling while CO2 concentrations increased. The hypothesis said it was supposed to warm. It’s not warming now. It’s supposed to be warming. When the data does not support the hypothesis, the hypothesis is wrong. Scientific Method 101.
Unfortunately most of the reports published in the IPCC are written by scientists who are not conducting science.
@SHF:
you cited skeptical science website:
damn blockquote!
Sir Harry sez: I’ve seen the evidence of (GW/CAGW/CC . . . name of the day)’. You mu must possess special sight, I haven’t seen it – and I’ve been looking. The only thing I’ve seen is the prostitution of science for political and monetary gain on the one hand, and the deliberate censorship of sound skeptical science on the SAME hand.
Please share your info. and lower your flapping hands.
For Sir Harry – you made the frightening claim that the average US bill for electricity is roughly the same as it is for the unfortunate Germans. Please can you let us see your source? Because if this is true, given the relative price of domestic electricity in the two countries, Germany should be ashamed of it’s energy policy. Well, actually, it should be ashamed of it anyway.
October 2014 US average consumer cost $0.101 per kwhhttp://www.eia.gov/electricity/monthly/epm_table_grapher.cfm?t=epmt_5_6_a
German domestic electricity cost Jan-Jun 2014 $0.4038 . https://www.gov.uk/government/statistical-data-sets/international-domestic-energy-prices – you’ll have to open an xls file for that data.
That’s actually 4 times the price – so the only way that the Germans can have the same bill is if they are using 1/4 as much. With allegedly 600k homes being cut off every year in Germany, I’m going to take a wild stab that the reason for them using only 25% of the average US consumer is that the power is too expensive. This is not something to celebrate – it’s misanthropy and deliberate denial of energy to the poorest in society. In short, it disgusts me. Someone should tell that Pope fella.
You’re partially right, US prices are about half of German, not 25%, ( http://www.statista.com/statistics/263492/electricity-prices-in-selected-countries/) and German bills are relatively in line with US because the Germans are enormously more efficient. That said, their quality of life isn’t suffering for it (my father-in-law is German, so I hear about the superiority of the fatherland frequently.)
However, wholesale electricity prices (what businesses pay) are generally lower than in the US, principally because of the low cost of all the renewables that have come online. The higher prices at the retail level are a policy decision, and about 20% of overall cost goes to fund the move to those renewables. That said, when the buildout is done, it will be vastly cheaper per KwH to support and maintain than a fossil-fuel infrastructure requiring a constant input of variably priced fuel, and will avoid most of the socialized costs of pollution.
http://www.dw.de/german-electricity-price-is-half-taxes-and-fees/a-17849142
Sir Harry Flashman
I write to correct your typographical error for you. You wrote
Obviously, that is an error which even you must recognise, so I suppose you intended to write
However, wholesale electricity prices (what businesses pay) are generally lower than in the US, principally because of the high subsidies given to all of the renewables that have come online. The higher prices at the retail level result from a policy decision to adopt expensive renewables, and about 20% of overall cost goes to fund the move to those renewables.
I trust you are grateful for this correction to your off-topic comment and – now the correction has been made – there is no excuse to continue this off-topic matter.
Richard
Sir: You haven’t been correct about ANYTHING, other than your choice of a pen name. My suggestion is to read more and write less. Faith in the religion of AGW, is hardly virtuous and exposes you as a naive non scientist. Try not to live up to your fictional character’s profile. Reciting mantras will get you nowhere. GK
SHF,
Your argument makes no sense.
The comment concerned the relative cost of electricity. And Germany’s ‘quality of life’ certainly is suffering, due to the 4X higher cost for the same product. [And using only one person’s hearsay doesn’t make for a credible argument.]
Finally, I think you cherry-picked your stats. There is at least one more chart in that link that shows Germany’s cost at 14.25¢ per kwh. [Lots of their charts require a premium account, so I couldn’t view them.]
The fact remains that Germany’s electric power costs much more than Americans’. Since cheap power equates with national prosperity, Germany is shooting itself in the foot with their ‘green’ nonsense. Higher energy prices are not nearly as ‘sustainable’ as low prices are. National policy in every country should be to encourage the lowest energy costs. But the situation both here and in Germany is to encouraage the very most inefficient energy production. That is stupid.
Finally, ‘renewables’ [with the exception of hydro power, which isn’t usually counted anyway] are extremely inefficient. In many if not most cases, they require more fossil fuel to build and maintain than using straight fossil fuel energy requires.
The push for windmills and other ‘renewables’ is economic nonsense. It enriches a very few at the expense of everyone else — and the poor are affected the most, since they have the least to spend.
So try as you might, you can’t avoid the plain fact that your position and beliefs are directly hurting the country’s poorest people. What’s your answer to that? More government?
This thread is moving so fast (rolling in laughter) that this may have gotten lost: the average German kWh costs $0.34; the USA average is $0.12 (http://shrinkthatfootprint.com/average-electricity-prices-kwh).
It’s a 3-1 cost disadvantage for Germany.
that “Pope fella” is banking on the $100 Billion pledged by richer nations to poorer nations regardless of the dubious reason.
Does a local parish priest refuse offering plate donations from families engaged in Mafia activities? A 1000 years of anecdotal evidence from Sicily to Rome provides the clear implication he does not. This pope spent his adult life witnessing the poor streets of Argentina, with a rich upperclass tossing down offerings.
Sir Harry Flashman,
You are inventing assertions never made.
No one here is jumping to conclusions about what the new ice data means to the climate.
You can get over yourself and your correcting the straw man you fabricated.
The observation and significance is what’s happening in Antarctica certainly contradicts what alarmists have been lecturing us about. Acknowledging that contradiction is not the same as asserting the opposite.
It is the alarmists you need to be “advising”. They are gang of truth thieves jumping to every conclusion they can imagine.
Stop mangling and obfuscating the conversation here with your petulant hypocrisy.
So Antarctic ice was measured accurately enough to determine that it was melting. Now supposedly it was not measured accurately and yet we are capable of determining that it is melting? Let’s determine how to get the measurement accurate before we come to all kinds of conclusions. Right, SHF?
Wonderful news!
The next ice age is proceeding according to schedule.
Current Antarctic sea-ice is really remarkable. Sea-ice extent is at 138% of normal, and sea-ice area is more than four sigmas above normal. If sea-ice area is normally distributed, the probability of this happening is less than one in 15,000.
Now, the ice-area probably isn’t normally distributed (though NSIDC implies that it is, by including the SD in their chart), but even so the current situation is definitely unprecedented in the satellite era. Strangely enough, the MSM are very quiet, despite their usual enthusiasm for unprecedentedness.
Sometimes I am ashamed of some of the Geoscientists in our world. I was trained that the “Present is the key to the Past.” But Conversely I know that the “Past is also key to the Present.” I was also trained that data always, is the proof we need to back up any hypothesis. Without data a hypothesis is nothing but a model without proof. Any data which is contrary to the model, makes it invalid.
So how can any scientist ever say that any hypothesis is settled without the data to back it up. It is not scientists who are claiming the debate is settled, but politicians, and their lackeys who receive significant government funding, so much so, that they are prostituting themselves to the Global Warming Demi God.
The Global Warming Hypothesis requires several things for the warming to be a significant threat to the earth. Experiments at the turn of the 20th Century showed that a doubling of CO2 in the Atmosphere would cause between 1 to 1.3 degrees Celsius of warming, all things being equal. To get runaway warming this has to be reinforced by feedbacks such as adding significant water vapor to the atmosphere, and by a decrease in hear radiation into space.
Unfortunately for them neither is present in the data. NOAA data shows the atmosphere is declining in water vapor content. The Satellite data shows an increase in outgoing radiation of heat into space.
My training says that CAGW is wrong. Columbus proved the world was round in contrast to the consensus that the world was flat. Data trumped belief.
Columbus proved the world was round in contrast to the consensus that the world was flat.
Uh, the round Earth was already well-known when Columbus sailed. Let’s put that schoolbook myth to rest.
agree. A better analogy is the invention of the telescope. The early data on Jupiter’s moons put serious holes in solar geocentrism theory. The holes became gappingly bigger until it collapsed under the weight of data and a simplified mathematical explanation by Kepler.
My bet is OCO-2 will be the modern equivalent to the telescope with regards to human CO2 and global warming theory.
Not only that, Columbus had been to Denmark, knew the content of the Icelandic Sagas and knew perfectly well, along with lots of other folk, that Leif Erikson had found land to the SW of Greenland. He was a sea captain, after all.
Oh, come on now – It is well known that folks can walk to the edge of the flat Earth and stick their heads under the edge of the firmament and check this fact for themselves. Hope it is okay to use Wikipedia for this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flammarion_engraving#mediaviewer/File:Flammarion.jpg
I started to make this walk one time but forgot my lunch and had to go back home.
Seriously, there are late 1800s and early 1900s American school books that claim Columbus had to overcome the flat earth view prior to his voyage. Eratosthenes was so ancient history.
Early 1900s? I was taught this in elementary school in the early 1960s.
Sir Larry Flashman,
Here is a recap of what I find interesting in your rebuttal.
The linked word “before” refers to:
Surprise: Robot Sub Finds Much Thicker Than Expected Antarctic Sea Ice
WUWT – November 24, 2014
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2014/11/24/surprise-robot-sub-finds-much-thicker-than-expected-antarctic-sea-ice/
So it is now clear that you will no longer refer to any 1 year observation or weather event to back you up. I have copied you quotes with links for future reference.
I dunno, nothing in the story says anything about the ice being thicker than expected, that’s only in the WUWT headline. The story just says that they now have a better idea how thick it is. However I didn’t look at the original study so may be wrong.
However, if the original expectations were based on erroneous data, without a baseline we still have no idea whether the thickness has changed due to climate change or any other reason.
Yep you are wrong. Here it is again with some more. Click this link and read the words: “The data collected from the AUV allowed scientist to conclude that sea ice was much thicker than earlier believed.”
Let me remind you that you said:
I have shown this statement to be false – see HERE. You will read at that comment the following from NASA. This make your statement FALSE.
Hank
Two pieces of advice:
(1) change your screen name
(2) go back to troll land
Sir Harry, here is the abstract of the paper.
Thanks, I was wrong. Appreciate the correction.
I just hope that you have learned something from this disastrous episode of yours. When you make any claim on WUWT you can bet your bottom dollar it will be looked into. My advice is to be utterly sceptical of anything (warmist or sceptic) BEFORE commenting. I make mistakes all the time – I am human too.
The climate system has much noise in it due to the fact it is random, chaotic ,non linear and subject to thresholds. This is why when an item is said to influence the climate unless it achieves extreme values for a sufficient length of time it will be thought not to be influencing the climate, because it’s climate signal although present will be lost in the noise of the climatic system.
Added to this is the initial state the climate is in with respect to an item or items that may influence it ,such as land/ocean arrangements , or how far the climate is from glacial versus non glacial conditions.
This is why for instance the immense Antarctic Sea Ice deviation coverage does not correlate to a drop in S.H. temperatures which would be below the recent averages. It’s signal is being lost in the noise of the climate but I venture to guess there is a deviation value that if met would allow the Antarctic Sea Ice to overcome the noise in the climate and exert a more definitive influence .
The same can be said with the sun in that unless certain low value solar parameters are attained for a sufficient length of time will they to will often have their climate signal lost to the nature of the climatic system although solar is always influencing the climate as is Antarctic Sea Ice.
I do not know what values needed are needed for Antarctic Sea Ice to show a more direct correlation between it and the climate. Maybe it is a deviation sustained above 2.0 million sq. kilometers or maybe even a greater number. I do know however there is a threshold value out there just as there is for solar parameters which I have talked about many times in the past.
To all: Unfortunately, given the volume of responses to my posts, I don’t have time to research and respond in detail to all criticisms. Some of the things I read on here I agree with, but I don’t see the evidence that temperatures have been stable for the last 18 years (look north for tangible physical evidence), and I believe from other reading that the fingerprints of CO2 are all over the warming that we’re currently seeing. This information is available via IPCC reports and other sources for anyone who wants to swallow their bias and belief in far-fetched lefty conspiracies and take a look.
Anyway, honest disagreement should not be construed as trolling, nor should a failure to provide deeply researched and cited responses to throwaway comments from multiple commenters. This is not a full-time job.
Appreciate the tip-off on the dragons, though, I have contacted my insurance agent.
At least in the US, the 2nd Amendment to the US Constitution provides the homeowner some self-insurance from dragons and burly men with baseball bats (see RGB at Duke, above, for that reference to burly men with bats).
Sir Harry Flashman
You made the blatantly untrue assertion; viz.
Several people – including me – asked you to say what you claim to have “seen”.
You have ignored all those requests but now say
There is no evidence of a “fingerprint” for AGW; the ‘hot spot’ is missing.
There is no evidence of AGW in any IPCC Report and you cite none.
You have NOT “seen” them because they do not exist. Your claim to have “seen” them can only be a lie or a delusion.
But you say you “believe” such things exist. Do you also “believe” in fairies? Believing something is not seeing it.
You are right when you say
and that is why your trolling has caused such offence: your falsehoods inhibit honest disagreements.
Crawl back under your bridge.
Richard
I’ve answered your question above, but feel sure it will not be sufficient. Anyway, the collective you have convinced me, I will continue to read, but no longer comment. Happy New Year, chaps.
No, you haven’t answered “above”, but adios anyway and not a moment too soon. I’ve already gone through my new sack of Troll Feed.
Sir Harry Flashman says “I’ve seen the evidence for AGW”
The IPCC uses words such as “extremely likely” with plenty of caveats. Sir Harry MUST contact the IPCC and show them his certainty. He will be in line for a ‘certain’ Nobel prize. Do it Sir.
Sir
The reason there are so many skeptics on this site is exactly that they have read the IPCC and numerous other reports on AGW and the observational data do not confirm the assertions or projections in those reports. Most here have performed their due diligenceand they see the warmist orthodoxy is woefully lacking in true science. When the data confirm the projections and there is an absence of confirmation bias and there is pervasive evidence of the scientific method begin used by the establishment, then there will lots of these skeptics lining up to support what needs to done. To date that has not
occurred. Climate science is in a pathetic state.
@SHF:
Instead of doing more ‘research’, why not admit that there are plenty of highly educated people commenting here; that they have done their research, and that they are satisfied that the ‘disappearing Arctic ice’ scare is complete nonsense?
Or are you just looking for confirmation bias of your personal beliefs?
Hank
re “…but I don’t see the evidence that temperatures have been stable for the last 18 years …
The evidence is there; what you really mean is you don’t accept the evidence.
———————————————-
ps: assuming you live somewhere in the USA, I wish to sell you elephant insurance. I saw your astute response to the dragon insurance ruse, and I assure you there are plenty of North American mammoth skeletons lying around…if one of these babies wanders thru your uninsured teepee, it’ll ruin your entire day.
The second to last paragraph should be
The same can be said with the sun in that unless certain low value solar parameters are attained for a sufficient length of time they to will often have their climate signal lost to the nature of the climate system although solar is always influencing the climate as is Antarctic Sea Ice.
Steve Oregon
January 5, 2015 at 7:34 am
“True but only to those who subordinate the substance.
The significance of the substance would still be the same if it were written by Dr. Seuss.”
Reply
Sir Harry Flashman
January 5, 2015 at 7:37 am
>>>>>>> “True, and it would still tell us nothing about climate change.” <<<<<<
How can ANYTHING tell us anything about something that is nothing (i.e. doesn't exist or has always existed)?
"Climate Change" is an invention, a construct fallen for by the gullible who are never in short supply.
It never gets old watching an alarmist get completely dismantled in the comments section. Next!
It’s even more fun to watch the alarmist try to pretend that he hasn’t been refuted.
To Sir Harry Flashman past history shows no correlations between CO2 concentrations and climate. At best CO2 FOLLOWS the temperature trend and even worse many times in the past such as during the Ordovician Period of time CO2 concentrations were much higher while the earth was in an Ice Age.
Even if on compares the present temperatures to the more recent past such as the Medieval Warm Period, the Roman Warm Period or the Minoan Warm Period one will find temperatures as warm or warmer then today while CO2 concentrations were much lower then today.
There is no correlation or at best if their is. it is very weak and lost in the noise of the climatic system as well as being trumped by other items that exert a greater influence on the climate which is easy to believe since CO2 accounts for some 400 ppm of earth’s atmosphere with an increase of around 100 ppm over the last 100 years. That small amount and small increase is in no way going to head the climate into a new direction in my opinion.
adding that no-one knows what will continue to happen to the poles….
To be a climate scientist you have to hold to just two things….
“the climate is stable” and “if this trend continues”
The rest of us know what will continue to happen to the poles…
Mr Flashman
I haven’t had chance to respond to your comments, I will read avidly and check any references you provide but probably not until tomorrow. It seems on scanning though that you have had to suffer some very sharp criticism. That wasn’t my intent, I am all for calm professional debate and an exchange of ideas and opinions whatever the contributor’s expertise or qualifications. I will catch up and answer you tomorrow
Badger
Seems a decent sort of troll, more needed with Flashman sense of houmour.
Agreed thus far.
I’ve said it before that I do have a grudging respect for the chap. In fact, I feel some of the responses he’s had here today have been unduly “terse”. There, said it……
Then again, I might just be too sensitive.
Sir Harry , don’t forget , was at Rugby School where the junior boys were frequently “roasted” in front of the dorm fire. He no doubt had his share of that experience before rising to the stage where he could inflict the same on that dear poor boy Tom Brown. Any roasting here will be just a tickle in comparison.
Yup; you’re too sensitive.
Yes, and he did accept that he was wrong at least once when Jimbo had him over a barrel.
I thought humour might be a better way to refute the claim of AGW evidence because I guessed he would get the joke.
Here’s my question to rgb above. Can anyone answer my question?
January 5, 2015 at 1:36 pm
But rgb how much higher do we want the premium to grow? Trenberth is an author of the latest RS and NAS report about AGW. At point 20 they state that the entire planet could stop all human emissions of co2 today and there wouldn’t be a change in climate, temp or co2 levels for thousands of years.
So how many thousands of trillions $ premium should humans pay to get a desirable result? Can anyone please explain?
https://royalsociety.org/policy/projects/climate-evidence-causes/question-20/
Neville,
Big problems when you swallow the cAGW garbage. The trick is not to believe it. Just simply don’t believe it.
Can anyone please explain?
Yes, apparently you can’t read. The response to point 20 does not say what you assert.
Two men in a room. Both have their hands around the other chaps neck. One is yelling: “But you don’t understand the basic physics”. The other replies, turning blue, “It’s all cognitive bias and cherry picking, you hypocrite”. They tighten their grip. Outside, the sunset is delightful. An asteroid is about to smash into the house and destroy everything, but they have no clue this is about to happen. “Look at the data” screams the first, beginning to froth. “What’s your qualification?” bleats the second.
The planet is in good hands, people. Carry on. Fascinating discussion.
Where is the asteroid? Point your finger to the sky and show me that hotspot – the human ‘fingerprint’ of AGW. 28 million weather balloons cannot find it. The hypothesis is sh!t.
“Yet another paper shows the hot spot is missing”
http://joannenova.com.au/2013/02/yet-another-paper-shows-the-hot-spot-is-missing/
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/07/16/about-that-missing-hot-spot/
The obvious answer Neville is there is no price high enough that will achieve the stated result, rendering the attempt futile and useless from the get-go.
In other words, it’s really a get-rich quick scheme for all who wish to slurp at the public trough, including insurance companies.
Apologies to rgb if by any chance those two sentences were going to be his exact reply.
Good Morning Mr Flashman
I have read your data links carefully and cannot find the empirical evidence. There is a great deal of suggestion, modeling and poor scientific conclusion, but no empirical evidence of AGW. I think it is highly unfortunate to provide a link to the 97% consensus when that has been thoroughly discredited and is used as a propaganda tool by interested parties. Indeed, it devalues the argument immensely. No one is disputing that warming has taken place, the planet warms and cools in cycles and has always done so, very few dispute that mankind has an influence on the climate, especially at a local level by land use change, but CAGW is unproven and alarmist and the empirical evidence contradicts the theory. Normally, science would accept that the theory is unproven and thus seek to find alternate explanation for observation (indeed so many do but are ignored or denigrated by IPCC Al Gore, Mann etc) but the orthodox establishment continues to cling aggressively to that which maintains its income. So, to return to this post, Dr Peiser is a knowledgeable, calm and respected scientist who has great concern on how we are following a damaging, expensive and unnecessary path and its impact on global societies and economies and the confirmation of observation of the Antarctic ice should be welcomed by all if it is observed evidence that the proposed dangerous melt is not occurring. The question then should be: if the world is not warming as theorised, what is happening? Let us observe,look at the evidence and create a hypothesis and then test it. Let us not try to twist, create or alter evidence to fit a hypothesis that has failed.
Badger
September arctic sea ice volume has declined by more than 75% during the satellite record. If Peiser is going to cite woodshole et al for some modest recovery in the last year or so, he’s going to have to accept the rest of the record. Unless he thinks the record is only ‘robust’ when it tells an anti-warming story…
And, on that same mid-September day when the sun is shining on both Arctic and Antarctic sea ice, (when the Antarctic sea ice is setting record HIGH anomaly levels ALL YEAR long, when the Antarctic sea ice has been steadily increasing for 22 years, when just the “excess” Antarctic sea ice has been as large as the entire ice cap over Greenland, when for the last 4 years the Antarctic sea ice has been expanding fast enough to block sea traffic around Cape Horn within 8-12 years) the edge of that ever-increasing Antarctic sea ice is reflecting FIVE TIMES the solar energy than the Arctic sea ice is receiving.
But is even worse than that!
From today’s levels, for seven months of the year, the newly exposed Arctic Ocean LOSES more heat from the open ocean waters than it gains from the ever-lower sun rays. Less Arctic sea ice from today’s levels? More heat loss from evaporation, convection, conduction, and LW radiation.
barry, here is some good news.
Here are some surprises during this 1960s cooler time.
Here is the research.
Last year Antarctica sea ice reached 20 million square kilometers according to NASA.
Here is another lesson for the Warmists. Stop worrying about what you are told and understand that we are always learning. Now how can REDUCED sea ice extent threaten emperor penguins? They have less distance to walk.
Just like hurricanes it’s down to observations. Sir Harry this is an example of how your statement about no one saying Antarctic sea was thinning. They did say it and observations show your statement and alarmist claims to be sh!t.
Here it is in more focus.
If there is more ice does that mean the estimated heat content of the oceans is currently overstated?
Nik, as you can see global sea ice anomaly is virtually back to the 1979 level over the last few years. The Arctic sea ice spiral meltdown has stopped over the last few years and Antarctica is at near record levels the las few years. The next 5 years will be interesting, especially if global mean temps start heading south.
Here is a quick search regarding Thinning Antarctic Ice
https://www.google.com/search?q=thinning+of+ice+sheets+in+antarctica&hl=en&as_nlo=&as_nhi=&lr=&cr=&safe=active&gws_rd=ssl&oq=&gs_l=
The articles are regarding the thinning of Land Ice reather than Sea Ice though. Didn’t find anything on “Sea Ice”
Although a number of those returns are regarding “Thinning Sheet Ice”
You may have missed my comment earlier where I posted this.
george e. smith January 5, 2015 at 12:25 pm
I buy Flood insurance on my house. The gummint in Washington DC says I have to buy it from them. Well my mortgage company does too.
Well my house is on a flood plain; a huge one; the central Valley of California, and on the shoreline of the largest lake west of the Mississippi River. (Tulare Lake).
The reason it’s dry is that the rivers which once flowed into it have been dammed.
My house is on top of a solid rock wall, four feet above the flood plain. The flood plain is all laser leveled. You can flood 100 acres of it, with just one inch of water. But you have to fill the whole valley four feet deep just to get up to the floor of my house.
There isn’t that much water ever lands on California in a whole year.
But what if the dam breaks?
Tulare lake, hasn’t had any water in it for over 40 years.
Well not since 1997.
What about antarctic ice mass?
http://gpwayne.files.wordpress.com/2010/08/antarctica_ice_mass.gif
SimonPL,
Where’d ya get that graph? From a recognized research institute? Or from some alarmist blog?
I noticed on that blog, it says:
A notorious lobby group just launched another scurrilous attack on the 97% consensus on climate change. Why do they waste their time, when proving the lack of consensus should be so easy to do?
They are clearly nuts. Are blogs like that where you’re getting your misinformation? Because for sure, that is a bogus chart.
Here is the source…..hardly a “blog”
https://www.e-education.psu.edu/earth103/node/663
No, just a “Mann Cave”. Guess you missed Sandusky
Well, says you. The direct source of the graph is here:
https://gpwayne.wordpress.com
Dbstealey….
…
Of course you think that is the source. You don’t know how to use the Internet.
PS dbstealey
…
You of all people should know that a “blog” is not an original source for anything
Original source is as David writes: https://www.e-education.psu.edu/earth103/node/663. So, what about this? For me it looks credible. Or maybe you have another sources of real state of Antarctica?
If it is “for sure” valley girl, you can show us the proof. So far, all we have seen is hot air coming from you trying to melt it.
Socks says:
You don’t know how to use the Internet.
Whatever.
You are still a tiny part of a small minority of true believers. No one agrees with you, but it doesn’t matter, this is religion! It’s your religion.
I’ll go back to not knowing how to use the internet, and you can go back to your belief. But just to let you know, your belief is about as popular as a Jehovah’s Witnesses belief.