It’s Hot But Don’t Blame Global Warming
By Cynthia Barnett – 2/1/2009
FloridaTrend Magazine
Morton D. Winsberg fell in love with Florida more than 50
years ago, but the Illinois-born geographer never quite got used to the dog days
of summer.
In recent years, the Florida State University professor emeritus and author
of a book called “Florida Weather” began wondering: Is global climate change
making Florida’s hot season longer and hotter? With help from geography students
and researchers at FSU’s Population Center and Florida Climate Center, Winsberg
and co-author Melanie Simmons gathered and analyzed temperature data from 57
Florida weather stations going back six decades.
Their research showed that the hot season in Florida has gotten a lot hotter
— and longer — in some places, but not at all in others. The change, however, is
unrelated to global warming, the increase in the average temperature of the
earth’s atmosphere. Rather, they found, it’s a function of the lesser-known
phenomenon of local warming. The analysis “shows that weather can be very
local,” says Winsberg, “and also that weather can be a function of population
growth.”
Winsberg found the most notable climate changes along the state’s
southeastern coast, where development and wetlands drainage have been heaviest.
In most areas he analyzed, the heat is getting more intense. Of the 57 weather
stations, 49 saw an increase in the number of days with an average temperature
of 80 degrees. When it came to the length of the hot season, the biggest
increase was in Hialeah, with a 72-day increase, followed by Miami, with a
45-day increase.
Neither the intensity of the heat nor the increasing number of hotter days
was related to water temperatures in the Atlantic and Gulf, a fact that
surprised Winsberg. The heat trends also weren’t consistent across the state. In
fact, some areas, notably in the northeast part of the state, saw a shorter hot
season and a decrease in the number of dog days.
That evidence leads Winsberg and FSU meteorologists to blame the hot spots on
local land-use changes that accentuate the urban “heat-island” effect — the
pools of heat that large, dense concentrations of people produce in their local
climates. Cutting down trees, draining wetlands and pouring concrete all make a
place hotter, as anyone who’s walked across an asphalt parking lot on a summer
day knows, Winsberg says.
|
Geographer Morton Winsberg’s research suggests that local land-use changes — urban development and draining wetlands — may be contributing more to local climate change than global warming. [Photo: Jeffrey Camp] Contagious Energy Geographer Morton Winsberg retired a decade ago, but you wouldn’t know if from his teaching load, his research output and the hours he spends on the Florida State University campus. At 78, Winsberg no longer worries about getting his work published or being recognized by fellow academics. He had even been teaching Latin American and Florida geography at FSU for free until last year, when FSU put him back on the payroll. Winsberg is happy taking advantage of office space, grad students and GIS equipment so he can keep digging into weather and other interests. “I don’t play golf,” he explains. “I prefer to play with aggregate data.” Winsberg spent his career traveling the globe and writing about 100 research papers on topics as diverse as Jewish agricultural colonization in Argentina and Irish suburbanization in Boston, Chicago and New York. His favorite trip: Backpacking across northern Spain, following a medieval pilgrimage route to Santiago de Compostela, reputed to be the burial site of St. James. Winsberg says he dreaded becoming the sort of retiree “who kept up with the world via “I wanted to keep feeling useful and to be useful,” Winsberg says. He passed up royalties from his “Florida Weather” book so it would be more affordable ($16.95 at upf.com). In addition to his work on weather, his post-retirement writings include the book “Atlas of Race, Ancestry, and Religion in 21st-Century Florida.” He is currently researching the locations of megachurches, particularly those within metropolitan areas. Colleagues say he’s the only “emeritus” professor they know who spends as much time on campus as he did before retiring. “I’ve never talked to Mort about weather when he was not extremely excited about it,” says Melissa Griffin, Florida’s assistant climatologist. “He has this energy that flows out of him, seeps out of him, and other people catch it.” |
On a regional level, state climatologist David Zierden says, historical
records show that southeastern Alabama, Georgia and north and central Florida
have not experienced steady warming, but rather relatively warm periods, such as
the 1930s through the 1950s, followed by relatively cool periods, such as the
1960s through the 1980s.
|
State climatologist David Zierden says Winsberg’s data bolsters his belief, backed up by other Florida studies, that climate changes driven by land use ‘are as important or more important in Florida than what has happened here to date due to greenhouse gases.’ [Photo: Ray Stanyard] |
Heavily drained or developed areas bucked those trends, however. The most
dramatic example in Winsberg’s study is the difference between Belle Glade, in a
part of the Everglades drained for sugar production, and undeveloped Everglades
City. Since 1950, Belle Glade has seen a 32% increase in its number of dog days,
while Everglades City has seen a 3% decrease. The transformation of swampland
around Belle Glade to farmland appears to have caused a significant rise in
temperatures. “The draining of the Everglades and the upturning of all that
black soil has really changed the local climate in that area,” says Zierden.
The idea of local climate change may seem contrarian at a time when
scientists and policy-makers focus on global warming and its causes, primarily
the release of carbon dioxide and other greenhouse gases into the atmosphere.
But Florida’s top global warming scientists, including Harold Wanless, chairman
of geological sciences at the University of Miami, agree that greenhouse gases
don’t seem to be impacting Florida’s temperatures. When it comes to global
warming, Wanless says, sea-level rise — caused by warming elsewhere,
particularly the Arctic — is the chief threat to Florida. Wanless predicts
Florida’s seas will rise three to five feet by century’s end.
As state and national policy-makers work to mitigate damages from the rising
seas, Winsberg says he hopes local officials and Floridians will use his data to
think more wisely about land-use changes and wetlands drainage.
“People just dread when the hot season begins, and they are so relieved when
it’s over,” says Winsberg. “We don’t want to extend the suffering.”
The transformation of swampland
around Belle Glade to farmland appears to have caused a significant rise in
temperatures. “The draining of the Everglades and the upturning of all that
black soil has really changed the local climate in that area,” says Zierden.
Reduced humidity will give you hotter days locally. Which is why deserts are much hotter in the daytime than humid tropical areas. This effect will be especially pronounced when a city is built over a swamp, like Miami.
Albedo changes are probably secondary. Although it sounds like an experiment for an enterprising highschooler.
(self snip snarky comment about high schooler needs to do it, because climate scientists aren’t interested in investigating the real causes of surface temperature changes)
Reply: Many thanks ~ charles the moderator
it appears to be quite hard to find any data, that supports AGW.
Should be in all text books. Perfect illustration of the urban heat island effect, smack bang centered on Miami …
If, like the author says that weather can be a function of population
growth then the weather changes are certainly a global phenomenon. If these changes becomes problematic (long dry hot-periods, heavy rain,…) then certainly we have a global problem. Actually this article says that there are maybe other courses of the weather / climate problem than the Goracle Religory tells us, but finally the problem remains a global one namely overpopulation in this approach.
So Roger Pielke Sr. was right after all. Who would’ve thought…
Question for everyone.
I saw a tv program on the BBC that was pro AGW Global Warming. On there, the presenter showed evidence from ice cores that in the past there has been sudden movements in global temperatures. He said that the temperature recorded in the ice cores showed a sudden 5 degrees C movement, and the change came within a year, perhaps it was even instantaneous. Also, that was it, the jump or decline in temperature happened, and there was no follow on movement in temperatures. (At least as far as I can remember).
This I thought, was perhaps the most interesting thing in the whole program. He offered no explanation for the cause, instead used it as a weapon to frighten the viewer, implying this would happen if we didnt cut our CO2 emissions.
The question is though, what theories are there out there that explain an event such as this? Assuming this evidence is true, I have only ever come across one theory that might explain it, and that is a bit far fetched.
From what I know of the AGW theory, temperatures will rise reasonably gradually in line with increasing levels of CO2. This theory cannot explain a sudden and discrete jump in temperature.
So, is there really evidence out there for sudden movements in temperature, and what are the competing theories to explain it?
> Willem de Rode (01:42:15) :
>If, like the author says that weather can be a function of population
growth then the weather changes are certainly a global phenomenon.
===============================
Why? It is easy to live in a populated area and travel to other populated areas and because most of our time is spent in highly populated areas to believe that the world is like that and population growth is reflected throughout the world globally. It is not. Look at google earth, spin the globe, stop at a random point and zoom in. Will you hit a populated area? Very unlikely. The vast majority of the earth is unspoilt empty wilderness. four fifths of it is water. Even on land we actually take up very little of the space available. If we are effecting the very local temperatures where civilisation is most concentrated, then the vast surface area of the planet is NOT effected by us.
Anthony,
OT – but I think the attached is a very clear analysis of what happened with the recent Sudden Stratospheric Warming and its impact on recent weather patterns in the NH which may be of interest
http://earthobservatory.nasa.gov/IOTD/view.php?id=36972
The majority of Florida’s thermometers are obviously in the pay of Big Oil ™…
At least it’s a “dry” heat!
So Anthropogenic Climate Change (ACC) is real – its just a local phenomena. Just as this humble Physics Graduate (hons) with a minor in meteorology and climatology thought all along since back when.
It’s a nice feeling to have your initial thoughts proved right yet again.
Perhaps I should have stated “shown to be correct yet again”.
Dave (02:10:10) :
I missed that program. But the jury appears to be out on the ice core evidence as to how the ice ages start and what triggers the following interglacial warmup. Seems to be a big anomaly in the CO2 level as temperature decreases and CO2 remains high. For thousands of years!!!! Doesn’t follow the GCMs at all. 🙂
Willem de Rode (01:42:15) :
If, like the author says that weather can be a function of population
growth then the weather changes are certainly a global phenomenon. If these changes becomes problematic (long dry hot-periods, heavy rain,…) then certainly we have a global problem. Actually this article says that there are maybe other courses of the weather / climate problem than the Goracle Religory tells us, but finally the problem remains a global one namely overpopulation in this approach.
Willem de Rode,
Would you please tell me how overpopulation ever could be a “Global Problem?”
Most of the planet is covered by Oceans, the North Pole, South Pole, the Antarctic, deserts like Gobi and Sahara, mountain area’s high planes and tundra’s like Siberia?
And even if the temperatures in California are up? What is the problem?
I hear you think…yes, NO PROBLEM.
This article is a good piece of work debunking the AGW scare.
Don’t replace one scare with another.
Whaddya know?? A major metropolitan area (Miami) shows significant warming trend.
No UHI there…..move along…
Ref. Dave above. Iam only a layman but I came across a reference to the follosing article in Science:
/ http://www.sciencexpress.org / 19 June 2008 / Page 1/ 10.1126/science.1157707 through reading about the research in a Danish newspaper Berlingske Tidende.
A Danish Team from Niels Bohr Institutet at University of Copenhagen observed this rapid heating effect from analysing ice cores taken from ice drillings in Greenland.
Project leader Dorthe Dahl-Jensen stated in Berlingske Tidende that the ice age ended so quickly that temperatures went up by two to four degrees celcius in a few years etc.
Those interested should really try and access the Science article.
I’ve lived in the Miami-Ft. Lauderdale area for 30 years, and the temperature can change by 5-6 degrees depending on where you are, especially during dry season (“winter” elsewhere). Closer to the beach its usually warmer than it is on the other side of town close to the everglades. Local meteorologists have a dozen ways to say “Upper 70s along the coast, cooler inland” (which I just heard on my morning news a few seconds ago) whenever they forecast the day’s temperatures.
I don’t know why they separate Miami and Hialeah in the chart in the article, you only know you’ve crossed from one into the other when the street numbers change to a different scheme. They’re adjacent to one another, and they’re both part of the same ~100 mile long city that stretches along the coast from Homestead in the south to above West Palm Beach in the north.
Having grown up in Texas, I can testify that 100+ degrees of dry heat in Waco is easier to handle than 90 degrees in 90% humidity down here, all these years and I still haven’t gotten used to it.
I will say that this past August was positively pleasant compared to what we’ve grown accustomed to in the past 10-15 years. So the global cooling of the past few years does have some effect down here. From my perspective I hope that continues.
Interesting article.
How long must we wait before “Independently Gav” claims that he came to this conclusion before Winsberg?
William de Rode—-what do you not get about “local warming”. Local warming does not equal global warming—–even if you have 10,000 locations on the Earth that are locally warming as a result of anthropogenic changes, you are not affecting anything other than the local climate.
Urban Heat Island has been proven by Anthony Watts in an article about his drive through Phoenix at night—–cool on the edge of town, hot in town, cool on the other edge of town—ALL AT NIGHT.
Buddy, do some reading, and get back to us.
The climate models build in large negative temperature impacts from “other forcings” to balance off the large increases they have built in for greenhouse gases. They wouldn’t be able to come close in a hindcast or a forecast without these offsets.
Land Use is no different. It has a negative temperature impact in the models.
Deforestation and agricultural land negative impacts outweigh the positives from urban heat island and urban development. This study would contradict that, at least for Florida.
Here is GISS’ Model E Land Use impact versus temperatures.
http://img127.imageshack.us/img127/7097/modelelandusexr5.png
A visit to Marjorie Kinnen Rawlings (sp?) house in Cross Creek (north of Ocala) describes her orange groves in the early 1900s. Now oranges aren’t grown much north of Orlando after the 1977, ’83 and ’89 freezes. Driving up the Florida Turnpike one can see pine trees where there used to be vast orange groves.
The world may be warmer, but north Florida isn’t.
I notice that this article finds that rural areas near major cities can also see major increases in temperature.
This study should put the kabosh to Hansen’s method of using “rural” stations to justify his urban adjustments. But it won’t.
Florida just bought up all the sugar cane land recently and plans on restoring all that property. It will be interesting to see what happens to the local climate over the next 50 years.
“People just dread when the hot season begins, and they are so relieved when it’s over,” says Winsberg. “We don’t want to extend the suffering.”
Most of those that I know who think like this are transplanted Northerners to whom I ask, “then why do you live here? “. Along the central/south Gulf Coast we rarely get above 94F. It’s hotter than that in lot’s of other places around the country. I believe the main reason those folks get so uncomfortable is not the heat or humidity but the intensity of direct sun on their skin due to the sun being almost overhead. Step into the shade and that goes away. Also, you will find that these transplants usually have their indoor A/C set at about 78F. Go from 78F to 94F for a few seconds before you get into your air conditioned car and yes, you feel like you walked through an oven. Give your body time to use adjust and once again it’s no problem.
Notice the central west coast along the Gulf of Mexico. Lot’s of development there over the last 20 years. Central hot spot is right about where Disney World and other resorts are. So let’s hear from the UHI deniers!
Good to see an article that land-use does indeed cause warming – not just isolated to urban environments. I’m inclined to believe direct human impacts on the environment have an immediate effect locally, but still doesn’t explain why other areas (not affected at all by human land use) also see warming.
Florida is warming w/the limiting temp for citrus fruits moving south?
Pielke Sr’s analysis of Florida suggests that urbanization, drainage enhancement & unirrigated crop conversion dries the land out w/less summer rainfall & greater extremes of high/low temps.
Was the longer hot season in Miami a bad thing? I have a feeling that it translates to billions of dollars extra over the years. Do the politicians really want to go back to cooler times? (less UHI?)
Anthony,
Are you familiar with the UHI study done in 1972 by T.R. Oke, “City Size and the Urban Heat Island”? You can find it by googling UHI and Oke. He compared night temperatures in rural areas with night temps in ten settlements with populations from 1000 to 2 million. His data was subjected to stepwise multiple regression analysis and yielded the formula:
Delta T (urban-rural) = 1.91 log P – 2.07 sqrt(u) – 1.73
where P is population and u is regional windspeed. (This assumes cloudless nights.)
What is surprising is the logarithmic relation between Delta T and P, and the amount of Delta T for even small settlements.
For example,
Delta T is over 2 degrees C for settlements of only 1000 people, over 5 degrees C for population of 10,000 and over 8 degrees for populations of 100,000 people.
If real, this changes the perception of “Rural” and “Urban” and shows how the GISS temperature records are meaningless without UHI adjustments.
It explains why the historical records from Great Britain show more of an increase in average daily minimum temperatures vs the avg. daily maximums, as the UHI is about an order of magnitude stronger in night than in the day.
It also might explain why other researchers found little UHI effect when comparing historical records of sites. The logarithment increase in UHI with population would mean that the stations they classified as “Rural” (with assumed zero UHI) actually had a large UHI effect.
We need more studies like this with data from cloudy nights, differing times of the day and different wind speeds.
Also unknown, as far as I can find, are studies on how these large numbers for local UHI (on calm and clear nights) affect the monthly temperature averages.
Dave (02:10:10) :
You might want to go over to Climate Audit and read the several threads on the accuracy and reliability of ice cores to report temperatures. If my fading memory is correct, there seems to be some question about whether the dissolved CO2, which is the indicator for temperature, actually remains unchanged in each strata while the ice is in place, and after the core is removed.
Well, as one who majored in geography for a couple of years, it is nice to see a study like this. (Actually, as I recall it, “climatology” was a part of the study of geography in those days. I remember one of my professors using having all the students in a class I was taking, somewhat like Winsberg, keep a record of rainfall where we all lived, so we could study and see how local topography influences microclimate. I suspect my “training” in climate studies — I went on to graduate in economics — is at least the equal of many of the so-called experts in the field.)
Willem de Rode (01:42:15) :
but finally the problem remains a global one namely overpopulation in this approach.
So what should we do about it? Anything? Why? Taking Florida as an example, if Miami-Dade is overpopulated, and this is causing the dog days of summer to last longer than their liking, they are free to move somewhere else, aren’t they?
Actually, is this really a “problem”? Calling something a “problem” implies that something needs “fixed.” And that raises the question of how, which will segue into who, will do the fixing. You didn’t say it, so I’m not attributing this to you, but my fear whenever I hear of a problem that needs fixing is that someone is going to decide that the .gov needs to be the one fixing it, which usually means a raid on my wallet or a restriction of my liberty, or both. Which is why the “climate change” issue is so contentious: it is being used to promote all kinds of expensive solutions and atrocious intrusions on individual liberty.
I’m not sure I see the “problem” here.
Prevailing winds from jet stream latitudinal/longitudinal relocation. The Jet stream (which can fly straight or wave and loop like a flag in the wind) allows sudden warm or cold air to flow into areas resulting in sudden temperature changes. If the jet stream shift stays around for a season or two, you can stay mighty cold or mighty warm in a hurry depending on whether it is blocking Arctic air, or bringing up warm tropical air. The temperature shift will be dramatic.
I meant, “…whether it is allowing Arctic air to drop into more southern locations, or bringing up warm tropical air.” My thought stream got interrupted by a need for coffee.
Forget the heat island, the interesting part is the blue areas in the mid and north of Florida.
The caption to the map says: “would have followed the general cooling trend seen elsewhere in the Southeast U.S.”
What cooling trend? Is not the Southeast U.S. part of the global globe?
Volcanic Activity, Massive solar flair, Tectonic Activity, Polarity shift in the polls (North and south have upended before), and pretty much anything else you can imagine. Most are not much more than ‘ideas’ since we really do not know what causes major changes over short times without other evidence.
You have to look at other data sources such as geologic to find a coloration if possible.
Wetland drainage is a critical component that is not modeled by the NASA team. he heat capacity of water overwhelms air temperatures. Over 50% of the wetlands have been lost this century and a large percentage (over 90% in California) have been channelized so that the cool waters are not stored and slowly released. Many of the threatened species are connected to wetlands.
People who don’t understand the science of the proposed Human Climate Warming, are believers who really just want to see the environment protected. We should spend our money fixing wetlands instead of throwing it away on dubious CO2 fixes. Fixing wetlands will help more species and is a good climate hedge whether it gets warmer or colder.
Dave, I woud be deeply suspicious of a claim that “the ice cores showed a sudden 5 degrees C movement, and the change came within a year, perhaps it was even instantaneous”. My understanding is that icecores have a much more limited resolution- look how long it took to work out that temperature changes preceded those of CO2 by some 800 years.
Mind you, it is the BBC that is saying this and we all know how unbiased they are when it comes to AGW and “tipping points”.
To Dave (02:10:10) :
Interesting that they highlighted the movement but didn’t indicate direction? I’d guess volcanic activity for a single year shift if downward? Just throwing something on the wall.
This is a fascinating study though in light of its impact on our understanding of UHI and controlling for it in data provided by weather stations.
Since I plan to retire in 3 years, 8 months and 14 days (not that I’m counting) in the Ocala/Leesburg area of Florida this is welcome news that the area is cooling over the last 50 years. 🙂 I don’t mind hot, humid weather having spent too much of my youth in SouthEast Asian areas that feature that type of weather, but having it not so hot as it used to be is a good thing.
Off topic but related. See this post by Dr Pielke, Sr on the observational evidence for global warming via the ‘Ocean Heat Content’ metric. http://climatesci.org/2009/02/09/update-on-a-comparison-of-upper-ocean-heat-content-changes-with-the-giss-model-predictions/.
Interesting that observation vs predicted model results for ocean heat content is SO far off (0 x 10^22 Joules observed vs ~6 x 10^22 joules predicted over the last five years). Is Dr. Hansen ever going to be asked to respond publicly as to why his predicted climate model results are not reflected in observational measurements?
The real irony about global warming and local warming is that if more land is drained to make room for sugar cane crops for alcohol production (as is done in Brazil but admitedly not here) then renewable fuels could increase the local temperature. Now at least sugar based ethanol can deliver a positive energy yield (compared with the corn based product) but will an increase in local temperatures cause increased used of electricity for air conditioning and will that net result be more energy used locally.
“with little or no land use change, areas showing a longer hot season would have followed the general cooling trend seen elsewhere in the Southeast U.S.”
so…it’s UHI masking cooling rather than cooling masking warming.
Does this not fly in the face of GISS land temperature measurements that do not agree with satellite measures?
Having spent much of my life in Florida. In fact in Kissimmee near the Disney growth area I am well familiar with the findings of Winsberg and Barnett. I lived there from 1960 – 1997. the amount of growth and wetlands drainage was terrible. Now they are worrying about where they are going to get potable water. Yes it is over population and the destruction of some of the best farmland in the United States also large amounts of drainage. The drainage started in the 1880’s and only increased as the climate there became more popular.
Florida history is full of reference to the changes made there. In this case I must agree it is localized warming but it is man made.
Bill Derryberry
Bill Marsh (07:54:05) :
Here’s the money quote from Dr. Pielke’s post:
“While the time period for this descrepancy with the GISS model is relatively short, the question should be asked as to the number of years required to reject this model as having global warming predictive skill, if this large difference between the observations and the GISS model persists.”
GIGO.
Thanks to those who answered my question.
The main response I seem to be getting is that the data was probably duff, and that there arent really events where you get a discrete movement in temperature.
Apart from the response which suggested that the last ice age ended very quickly.
I am sure though that I read somewhere evidence that the glaciers that created the Great Lake depressions apparently melted away in no time at all.
Would still like to keep the question open. Is there any evidence for large and discrete temperature changes on earth? And by that I mean a change of 4 – 5 degrees C, happening within a year.
If there is evidence for this, I would like to see a lot of money spent on it trying to find out why it happens.
Could they please do a similar study looking at the minimum temperatures in winter in Florida? We’ve had more nights below 20F here in north Florida this year than in the past few years. The cold this year has noticeably killed a lot of vegetation which has the potential to turn Florida into a bushfire tinderbox if there’s a dry spring/summer later in the year.
Dave (02:10:10) : asks about quick changes to global temperatures.
Chaotic systems like our atmosphere can experience movement from one stable state to another. This process can start slowly and reach a tipping point where it accelerates to the next stable state.
This may occur between ice ages and interglacials. Since ice melts at a specific temperature you could see a slow warming that was not sufficient to start melting. Then, as melting starts it quickly warms due to less albedo, etc., which causes more melting and you have a quick rise in temperatures.
Why are the SOHO sunspot and other pictures more than 2 days old ???????
http://sohowww.nascom.nasa.gov/data/realtime-images.html
No conspiracy just curious ???
It is so pleasurable to see stories of great people like this!
This caught my eye:
“Since 1950, Belle Glade has seen a 32% increase in its number of dog days,
while Everglades City has seen a 3% decrease. The transformation of swampland
around Belle Glade to farmland appears to have caused a significant rise in
temperatures. “The draining of the Everglades and the upturning of all that
black soil has really changed the local climate in that area,” says Zierden.”
More direct empirical evidence for the negative feedback exerted by water!
Long time reader, first time poster.
As a motorcycle rider, I can tell you that I unscientifically verify the local warming theory all the time. In Nashville, Tennessee the dense urban core quickly gives way to heavily wooded areas. There’s a huge park with dense forest just four miles away from downtown. The park has a narrow one-way road that meanders through it, but very few sections of it receive any direct sunlight. I took a ride once on a warm July evening that went through downtown. I was on the main drag, so I was going around 30 MPH on average. I was warm and toasty regardless of my speed in the urban area. As I got further out of downtown–even just a mile–it got noticeably cooler. When I was on the road going through the heavily forested park area, I was shivering, without going any faster than I went at any point in the urban roads. It really is common sense. The unshaded asphalt soaks up heat during the day and radiates it at night. The asphalt in the park is totally shaded all day, so there’s no extra heat from it at night.
Last Sunday, we had a beautiful 70-degree afternoon just a few days after a huge cold front had passed through. I took my motorcycle out for a 30 mile ride, and within one mile of road I could alternate between shivering and basking in gentle warmth.
It seems obvious, but for some reason it seems that a segment of the population wants to assume it’s a major disaster.
Some commenters ask me how it would be possible that population-growth induced weather changes can become a global problem. More than half of the global surface is water and so unpopulated. And even on the landpart the humans are concentrated on rather small areas ? Thus any problem associated with that can never be global ?
I think that is a very short-sighted vision. If any problems are associated with population growth they will be best sensible in these extreme dense populated zones. These area’s are spread over the whole globe, but that doesn’t matter. The consequenses of the weather changes will be felt by most of the humans because they live in these problem-areas.
Thus I think it is couting angels on a needlepoint to get involved in a discussion whether the article describes a global phenomenon of local wether changes or not.
The article describes very clearly a antropogenic induced warming that could influence weatherpatters all over the globe. And the consequences could be very negative for the humans, wherever they are on the world.
So stop chasing phantoms by insulting CO2 of this warming. Stop fooling ourselfes by trying to make ourselfs believe that it is not a global phenomenon. Just let minimize the impact of human presence on this earth. We all, the all globe, would benefit from it.
“At least it’s a “dry” heat!”
Dry and Florida are two words that have a hard time going together.
Dave (08:56:40) :
It is the answers you got that are duff. The temperature data from ice-cores are from oxygen isotopes, not CO2. The smearing problem is much smaller for the ice itself than for the contained gases. It is actually possible to measure and count the annual layers almost back to the last ice age. There is really no doubt that very rapid climatic changes occurred both at the beginning, during and at the end of the last ice-age. These changes were on the order of 5 degrees over time periods not longer than a few decades. They may have been even faster, but such short time intervals are difficult to measure. These sharp changes are confirmed by many other lines of evidence such as sea-bottom deposits, end moraines and changes in fauna and flora, though it was only through the ice-cores that it was realized just how fast these changes were (at least ten times faster than the warming during the 20th century). Fortunately for humanity the last time this happened was 8200 years ago. As for why it happens, no one knows for sure. Abrupt changes in air circulation arfe probably involved as are changes in the calving rates of glacier, but what is cause and what is effect is unclear. It is very unlikely to be due to GHG changes, unless there are natural mechanisms that can change GHG concentrations much faster than us humans, and the smearing of CO2 values in ice is much worse than we have thought.
Weather and climate – big difference of course.
Regarding rapid climate change and ice cores:
You are probably remembering reference to the 8,200 BP Event. The Greenland ice cores show a ~5C drop and about 3C in Antarctica. The temporal resolution of the cores is sufficient to indicate that this change was on the order of a decade. The subsequent warming, of the same magnitude as the fall, took about ten times as long.
There’s lots to read in “The Oceans and Rapid Climate: Past, present, and future” (D. Seidov, B.J. Haupt, and M. Maslin, Eds.), AGU, Washington, DC.
You’ll want to borrow it from a library as it’s a tad expensive to buy.
The cause of the 8.2kYBP Event was theorised to be due to the melting of the Laurentide ice sheet and the subsequenbt draining of Lake Agassiz into the Atlantic. Unfortunately, recent geological work shows the cooling preceded the draining. So it goes in real science.
Where has Winsberg published his findings? Just in his book “Florida Weather,” or also elsewhere?
I’m in the big blue area in the middle of Florida, just south of Ocala which lost 18 “dog days” per year since 1950 according to the research. During the recent cold snap my wife asked if we really moved to Florida! (But, Bill Marsh “come on down, the water was fine this morning” – In the heated pool.)
It should be clear to all that at least part of the measured 0.6 degree C “global” warming since 1950 is due to the encroachment of artificial heat islands on reporting stations. Does anyone know what percentage of that 0.6 degrees is explained by local development biases in the readings? Could “global” CO2 readings also be biased, in part, by local effects?
Does anybody know what part of the 0.6 degrees is real warming? Most of the real warming is due to sunspot cycle and Earth orbit variations as Anthony and others have proved.
But, some part is due to human burning of previously-sequestered CO2 (coal, oil, natural gas).
Let us hope the two-year pause in sunspot activity continues a while longer. A weak Cycle 24 could give us a decade or more of “breathing room” for rational development of alternative energy technology that does not further wreck the economy and depress living standards. In a decade or so, when it becomes clear even to the alarmists that warming has stabilized or reversed, they will claim it was Kyoto and government carbon cap and trade actions that cured global warming, and we will all celebrate together!
Can I draw someone’s attention to this? http://hadobs.metoffice.com/hadcet/graphs/stations2mean_2009.gif
It’s the Central England Temperature. I may be me seeing reds under the bed, but I’ve tried contacting the Met office to ask them to explain, and they didn’t reply. I constantly watch this page on their site, and up until today only the middle graph was showing data. Both of the other graphs were blank – so I assumed the January data for the CET was coming from only one station (Rothamsted Cambridge). The CET is currently showing a -0.5c anomaly for January (even though it felt cooler than that), and the February anomaly is a huge -3.5c down. However, today the bottom graph (Stonyhurst Squires Gate) suddenly started showing data – and entirely above 0 degrees c! How so, when the temperatures have been so low in the UK? Clearly something is wrong with the Stonyhurst data, but the Met Office have added the graph anyway. The Met Office have always answered my emails, but have remained strangely silent on this enquiry – it was sent on Feb 6th.
http://news.scotsman.com/latestnews/Global-warming-is-not-our.4966808.jp
Willem de Rode (09:46:30) :
The article describes very clearly a antropogenic induced warming that could influence weatherpatters all over the globe. And the consequences could be very negative for the humans, wherever they are on the world.
No, it doesn’t. We are talking about a warming which you yourself said is limited to rather small areas. Since the area is limited, it’s effect on global temperatures will also be limited, and in fact negligible. Yes, the people who live in those areas will of course feel the effects of the localised warming. No one says otherwise. What is the alternative? To not have cities? The livability of cities is an interesting discussion in its own right, but has little to do with global climate. As far as minimizing “the impact of human presence on this earth”, I assume you are talking about pollution, and things like clear-cutting forests, etc., which again, has nothing to do with climate, and which are things we should of course be trying to minimize. No one says otherwise.
It is you who is counting angels on a pinhead, Willem.
I have commented on this before, if you look at a trend map from the US, you will see warming in South Florida (check) Houston, Southern California, Boston-NY Megopolis, some around Albany NY (state capitol for a huge state) and Burlington, VT, and cooling trends in the upper mid west where the decades long trend has been “last person to leave please turn out the lights.”
The whole thing is a crock.
The IPCC and the rest of AGWers people have really put all their eggs in one basket.
Land use change is underrated as a factor in climate change. So is the UHI effect. Any natural causes of climate change are completely denied, of course. The problems of the world must be linked to carbon pollution or the whole house of cards will come tumbling down.
My question is, at what point do these local climate changes become regional or global? Is this a contributor to global warming, or is most of the observed warming an artifact of poor data collection and bad analysis?
Anthony,
You might want to check this one out. Gray has really cut loose on Hansen.
Claude Harvey
http://www.examiner.com/x-219-Denver-Weather-Examiner~y2009m2d10-Battle-of-the-climate-scientists–Gray-versus-Hansen-part-2?comments=true
Looks like this undeniable “Antropogenic Local Warming” could easily influence weather station/sattelite readings and skew the whole picture. Excellent post. thank you…
Dr Peilke, Sr, has pretty much stated that land use changes and their impact on local climate have been understated. Studies like this support this I believe.
Jim Steele (07:30:26) : Thank you Jim…from where I sit, you pretty much nailed it. As a field environmentalist here in south FL, I commonly come across clumps of cyprus trees that are high and dry…15 plus feet above the current water table, yet it is apparent that the area was once under 2-3 feet of water 4-6 months out of the year. We have drained far more wetlands than than is generally appreciated…thousands of square miles. Agreed..people have to live some where…but we need to be aware of the unintended consequences of our actions…
Thanks,
cdl
Dave (08:56:40) :
“Thanks to those who answered my question.
The main response I seem to be getting is that the data was probably duff, and that there arent really events where you get a discrete movement in temperature.
Apart from the response which suggested that the last ice age ended very quickly.
I am sure though that I read somewhere evidence that the glaciers that created the Great Lake depressions apparently melted away in no time at all.
Would still like to keep the question open. Is there any evidence for large and discrete temperature changes on earth? And by that I mean a change of 4 – 5 degrees C, happening within a year.
If there is evidence for this, I would like to see a lot of money spent on it trying to find out why it happens”.
Dave,
Aichim Brauer, Potsdam University Geological Science after studying lake sediments in the Eiffel region.
Take a look at the following link:
http://sci.tech-archive.net/Archive/sci.archaeology/2008-08/msg00020.html
They have found proof of fast shift in temperatures due to change in wind patterns
causing glaciation within a period of 1 – 2 years.
Regards,
Ron
I came across this extract from a book on slavery:
“At six o’clock in the morning the overseer forces the poor slave, still exhausted from the evening’s labors, to rise from his rude bed and proceed to his work. The first assignment of the season is the chopping down of the forests for the next year’s planting, using a scythe to hack down the smaller trees. This work normally goes on for two months, depending upon the type of jungle being cut and the stamina of the slaves.
The next step is the destruction of the large trees, and this, like the previous work, continues for twelve hours each day. At night the slaves return home, where evening work of two or more hours awaits them, depending upon the character of the master. They set fire to the devastated jungle, and then they cut and stack the branches and smaller tree trunks which have escaped the fire and which, occupying the surface of the earth, could hinder development of the crop.
These mounds of branches are again burned, and the result is a sad and devastating scene! Centuries-old tree trunks which two months before had produced a cool, crisp atmosphere over a broad stretch of land, lie on the surface of a field ravaged by fire and covered with ashes, where the slaves are compelled to spend twelve hours under the hot sun of the equator, without a single tree to give them shelter.
This destruction of the forests has exhausted the soil, which in many places now produces nothing but grasses suitable for grazing cattle. The temperature has intensified, and the seasons have become irregular. The rains at times damage the crops, and at other times there is not rain at all. The streams and certain shallow rivers, such as the Itapucuru, have dried up or have become almost unnavigable, and lumber for building has become very rare, or is only found at a great distance from the settlements.”
This was written in 1865.
You do not have to have urbanisation to bring about a warmer surface. Draining the land or tree clearing will do it. All glider pilots will tell you the best places to get lift and it’s not forest or lakes. Draining the land or lowering the water table is much the same as driving a car with a half empty radiator. All of the Mediteranean has been cleared of nearly all of the forests that grew there. What you won’t see on Google Earth is the lowered water tables on Continents like the US, India, Africa, China. There a lot of ‘locals’ here and a lot of ‘heat islands’. The number of these is only going to increase.
The problem with the comparison presented by the article is that Hansen isn’t a climate scientist, Gray is.
jp (09:25:28) :
Why are the SOHO sunspot and other pictures more than 2 days old ???????
From Soho:
The Solar and Heliospheric Observatory (SOHO) is passing through a telemetry
keyhole. This is causing a temporary delay in transmission of Daily Sun images. Updates will resume shortly.
“”” George M (06:27:18) :
Dave (02:10:10) :
You might want to go over to Climate Audit and read the several threads on the accuracy and reliability of ice cores to report temperatures. If my fading memory is correct, there seems to be some question about whether the dissolved CO2, which is the indicator for temperature, actually remains unchanged in each strata while the ice is in place, and after the core is removed. “””
Well your memory has certainly faded.
Dissolved CO2 is NOT a proxy for temperature. The ice core temperature proxy is the O18/O16 ratio in the entrapped atmosphere pockets; not the CO2.
This always bothered me, since I couldn’t see O16 and O18 transmuting into each other as a function of Temperature.
Evidently it is childishly simple; H2O18 and H2O16 have different evaporation rates at a given temperature. Likewise D2O whether D2O18 or D2O16 have different evaporation rates.
So presumably ice core O18/O16 ratios are proxies for ocean SURFACE temperature; but that begs the question “WHERE ??” I have no idea just where Vostok region or DOME-C ice is supposed to have originated ocean wise; but to me it is a highly iffy connection. I don’t dispute the evap differences; but I would be very suspicious of any claims for the origin of this water vapor, since we don’t know anything at all about ocean behavior 730,000 years ago.
If you have ever done any chemical process control in a manufacturing environment, you learn very quickly to monitor any variable parameter you want to control, right at the process point where you want that parameter to have a prescribed value.
You DO NOT measure SOMETHING ELSE in a location that is SOMEPLACE ELSE, and then try to infer some cause and effect relationship, between what you measure, and what you want to control; that leads to sometimes fatal errors.
George
Virginia has cooled according to the GISS records since the 1930s, the trend since the late 1800’s is up but I think some of that is due to uncertain temperature records and changes in the number of stations. The down trend since the 30s is probably due to the 30’s having been really warm in the US. All the current stations have been in use since 1931. When I was playing with my global temperature model I thought that sunspots play a role in temperature but I’m not sure how big of one. The problem with the sunspots is that so many other effects are larger, temperature correlations with just sunspots come out very very low, if you take out variations do to volcanoes and ocean temperatures the sunspots standout better. It does look to me that there has been some real warming based on the satellite records, and subtracting out effects from the oceans, volcanoes and sunspots, but I’m not really sure what is causing the warming.
Mort Winsberg once spent a sabbatical at Otago University in Dunedin, NZ, and he is still remembered here with great affection. Lovely to see he is still as active as ever and making important real science contributions.
latest sunspot graph updated for January….wow
http://www.solarcycle24.com/graphs/sunspotgraph.gif
“”” Bruce Cobb (11:53:38) :
Willem de Rode (09:46:30) :
The article describes very clearly a antropogenic induced warming that could influence weatherpatters all over the globe. And the consequences could be very negative for the humans, wherever they are on the world.
No, it doesn’t. We are talking about a warming which you yourself said is limited to rather small areas. Since the area is limited, it’s effect on global temperatures will also be limited, and in fact negligible. Yes, the people who live in those areas will of course feel the effects of the localised warming. No one says otherwise. What is the alternative? To not have cities? The livability of cities is an interesting discussion in its own right, but has little to do with global climate. As far as minimizing “the impact of human presence on this earth”, I assume you are talking about pollution, and things like clear-cutting forests, etc., which again, has nothing to do with climate, and which are things we should of course be trying to minimize. No one says otherwise.
It is you who is counting angels on a pinhead, Willem. “””
Actually Urban Heat Islands are a good thing; if properly accounted for.
Yes a blacktop parking lot in the middle of Miami, may get very hot during the noonday sun.
That is wonderful. That highly absorbing black surface is tied to the rest of the solid planet, through some layer of earth/rock/whatever, that has some thermal conductivity. The rate of thermal energy conduction (sometimes erroneously called “heat”) from the surface to the planet is a linear function of the temperature rise of that surface from the underlying ambient temperature. Also there is also a linear conduction effect between that heated surface and the bottom of the atmosphere, and the hotter the surface, the hotter the atmosphere bottom gets, and the greater is the upward convection of that heated air, which conveys thermal energy into the upper atmospher for removal to space by radiation. Convection trumps conduction.
In addition of course, that hot blacktop, is an excellent radiator of thermal energy roughly according to the blackbody radiation law, which is a 4th power of the surface temperature. So the conduction to the solid planet goes linear with temperature rise above equilibrium, while the radiation goes as 4th power of the surface temperature.
Actually, because of the Wien Displacement law, the hotter the surface, the shorter the wavelength at the peak of the thermal radiation spectrum, and the peak spectral radiant emittance of the surface actually increases as the fifth power of the surface temperature, which is even faster than the total radiation. Why the spectral peak radiant emittance is important, is because the CO2 Infra_red absorption spectrum lies at 13.5 to 16.5 microns, centered at 14.77 microns, so the hotter the emitting surface, the further down the emission spectrum the CO2 absorption line slides, and the less heating influence CO2 has. At +60 deg C surface temp, the spectral emittance peak is at about 8.7 microns, which is even below the 9.6 micron Ozone absorption line, let alone the 14.77 micron CO2 band.
The overall result is that the maximum cooling rate of the earth occcurs at these urban heat islands in the peak of the noonday sun; similarly in tropical deserts, where the surface temperature can exceed +60 deg C.
In contrast, at the Antarctic polar lows which can get down close to -90 deg C, the total radiant emittance can be only 1/12th of that at the tropical highs; so the polar regions are highly ineffective at cooling the planet, whereas UHIs are very effective.
The problem arises when you measure the temperature at a UHI, and then for some reason apply that temperature to some place that may be 1000 miles away, as if it is relevent to what is happening at that location.
All of which is a funtion of the fact that the global surface sampling regimen used by Hansen, and fed into his GISS AlGorythm violates the Nyquist Sampling Theorem by orders of magnitude, making any recovbery of meaningful data, including the global average of the data quite impossible.
No amount of statistical prestidigitation; and no central limit theorem, can rescue you from the aliassing noise that results from violation of the Nyquist criterion.
So even if the models were correct; which they are not; the data that goes into them is garbage.
And if you get lucky and get the right answer anyway; which you would never be able to confirm; the answer is quite meaningless, since temperature has no simple relationship to the total energy flux occurring at some arbitrary lcation with unknown terrain thermal characteristics.
So GISS and the like, has about as much scientific validity, as performing a statistical analysis, on the numbers in your local telephone directory; namely none at all.
George
Jane HM asked:
“Could they please do a similar study looking at the minimum temperatures in winter in Florida? We’ve had more nights below 20F here in north Florida this year than in the past few years. The cold this year has noticeably killed a lot of vegetation which has the potential to turn Florida into a bushfire tinderbox if there’s a dry spring/summer later in the year.”
Jane, lots of folks in my area are doing controlled burns now in anticipation of the wildfires that will develop later in the season if the La Nina pattern continues. Our dry season is extra dry this year. My pasture and yard is the epitome of dead, dried vegetation.
This year’s weather was, IMO, reminiscent of the late 70s/early 80s in NE FL when snow flurries in the winter were not uncommon. (No snow flurries observed so far this year that I have heard of. ) I know, because I was working construction then and it was so cold we would set a fire in a pile of scrap wood and stand in it to warm up!
latest sunspot is 23!
Thanks Anthony,
I really like this entry. I ate it up! I enjoyed seeing his work presented. I love to see ideas that have come from real data and not hypothesis.
I wish I had to money to finance a documentary about the Urban Heat Island effect. This man would be in it!!
Anthony, anyone,
Is there a publication out there that looked at temperature trends globally or over large areas using data captured only with rural sensors compared with data captured only with urban sensors ?
Would that not settle the issue of UHI effect ?
François
REPLY: I’m working on one, but I think Joe D’Aleo touched on it recently also at ICECAP – Anthony
I may be oversimplifying, so the other writers here may correct me, but two things occur to me when I look at the map.
Every hypothesis must be testable. If the earth has been consistently warming for the past 60 years, it would seem that none of Florida should have a shorter hot season. (except for perhaps a small outlier or two), but not on the scale on the map.
If the urban heating affect is true, I should be able to pick out the areas of greatest urbanization during the 60 years. So far that test seems to pass.
Willem de Rode (09:46:30) :
“Some commenters ask me how it would be possible that population-growth induced weather changes can become a global problem. More than half of the global surface is water and so unpopulated. And even on the landpart the humans are concentrated on rather small areas ? Thus any problem associated with that can never be global ?
I think that is a very short-sighted vision. If any problems are associated with population growth they will be best sensible in these extreme dense populated zones. These area’s are spread over the whole globe, but that doesn’t matter. The consequenses of the weather changes will be felt by most of the humans because they live in these problem-areas.
Thus I think it is couting angels on a needlepoint to get involved in a discussion whether the article describes a global phenomenon of local wether changes or not.
The article describes very clearly a antropogenic induced warming that could influence weatherpatters all over the globe. And the consequences could be very negative for the humans, wherever they are on the world.
So stop chasing phantoms by insulting CO2 of this warming. Stop fooling ourselfes by trying to make ourselfs believe that it is not a global phenomenon. Just let minimize the impact of human presence on this earth. We all, the all globe, would benefit from it”.
Willem de Rode,
You have some very confused ideas which you are now projecting on the people who have made a serious attempt to provide you with a reasonable response.
Willem de Rode (09:46:30) :
So stop chasing phantoms by insulting CO2 of this warming. Stop fooling ourselfes by trying to make ourselfs believe that it is not a global phenomenon. Just let minimize the impact of human presence on this earth. We all, the all globe, would benefit from it.
Are you not getting this? If CO2 is “the problem” then governments get to control every aspect of human life since access to cheap energy is the foundation of our prosperity. AGW proponents are too short on specifics and hide under the skirts of “concensus” for me to consider their arguments valid. This blog is a great place to see where AGW theories may not be perfectly aligned with reality. This particular posting shows that 1st order effects on temperature are decidedly not global in nature.
1. LOCAL does not equal GLOBAL. Even if the entire state of Florida showed cooling, it still would mean nothing wrt GLOBAL climate. Had he the same data for the globe, he might have something to say. Oh, wait, they DO! They DO check global temps! And, gosh, the Pacific was so cool this past year it brought down the otherwise high temps on land to show a GLOBAL average cooling.
2. Here’s my local climate: Very mild winters and relatively dry summers where it used to be very cold winters (Look up Chosun Reservoir, Korean War) and very wet summers (monsoon).
3. Here’s the most important local climate: Arctic anomalously warm this winter. http://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/
January 2009 average extent compared to past Januaries
While parts of North America have been in the icy grips of an unusually cold and snowy winter recently, the Arctic has been downright balmy compared to past winters.
These warmer-than-normal temperatures mean that the sea ice in the Arctic is looking pretty anemic, despite the winter season…
…”It’s warm everywhere in the Arctic. It’s anomalously warm,” said Julienne Stroeve, of the National Snow & Ice Data Center (NSIDC) in Boulder, Colo.
Both December and January have been abnormally warm months, which impacts the cyclical re-freezing of sea ice over the years, because these are “two crucial ice-growing months,” Stroeve told LiveScience.
Damn those heat islands to hell and back, i tell you!
3b. Ice extent in the Arctic and Antarctic below long-term trends, with the Arctic just slightly above record lows for this time if year.
Where the HELL are they hiding those HEAT ISLANDS????????
Gee… what happened to record ice equal to 1979??????
4. Pray tell, where is the study?
4b. Has it been published and peer reviewed? No?
5. Love that graphic!!! Way to lay it all out so it’s clear as mud!! Mixing lower by -8 with higher by +8? Now that’s honesty for you!
5b. Look at the ranges:
-9 to -infinity
-8 to + 8 = 16 days (shucks, minus 8 = + 8! Everyone knows that!)
+9 to +25 = 16
+16 to +24 = 8
26 to 34 = 8
34 to infinity
The mixing of -8 to plus 8 is really dishonest. (Of course. we expect nothing less from liars, do we? No, we don’t.) Virtually all of the purple area could show warming, so roughly a 1/4 more of the area of the state could be showing warming.
6. Cities are human creations. If they are heating the planet, it would STILL be anthropogenic.
7. How much of this cooling is due to the high number of hurricanes Florida and the Gulf Coast have experienced in recent years?
You people are ridiculous.
WHERE IS YOUR SCIENCE? WHERE IS YOUR PEER-REVIEWED, GLOBAL, SCIENCE?
REPLY: And where is your courage “ccpo”? This man has the courage to investigate and publish under his own name, you are like so many others who criticize from the shadows while doing nothing of value on your own. At least have the courage to put your name behind your words. -Anthony Watts
It appears that the length of the hot season may correlate to some extent with the bright lights as seen from space. (how’s that for un-scientific language…correlate to some extent!)
This referenceshows the Earth at night.
And per Sean’s suggestion on air conditioners, very true for warming any area with an A/C. Most electric power eventually turns to heat, whether from line loss, light bulbs, electric motors, or resistance heating such as electric stoves and ovens. The more inefficient the motor, the more heat is produced. Thus, urban heat islands also are heated by electric power usage and not only by solar thermal absorption.
Roger E. Sowell
Marina del Rey, California
(was in Sacramento today where there was pea-sized hail mixed with rain!)
JEFF aLBERTS, [snip] Gray is not a climate scientist.
William M. “Bill” Gray (born 1929) is a pioneer in the science of forecasting hurricanes.[1] In 1952 he received a B.S. degree in geography from George Washington University, and in 1959 a M.S. in meteorology from the University of Chicago, where he went on to earn a Ph.D. in geophysical sciences in 1964.
While Hansen is not degreed in climatology, his area of specialty is directly concerned with transfer of energy in atmospheres, which is what the greenhouse effect is: Hansen was elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 1996 for his “development of pioneering radiative transfer models and studies of planetary atmospheres;
Both cites via Wiki.
Reply: Second warning ~ charles the moderator
tone down the anger
[snip]
I would still be interested in your response.
If you’ve the fortitude.
Cheers
P.S. No anger or name calling.
Reply: Sure. You follow rules and instructions of the blog and moderators or your posts don’t see the light of day. This is a moderated site. Hiding behind a Korean proxy server may keep you anonymous, but it doesn’t help your posts get through. EOM ~ charles the moderator.
Hmmm….. I wonder if anyone has studied the effects of tree cover absorbing sunlight on atmospheric temperature. Seems interesting. Would the trees absorb the energy from the sunlight and prevent warming?
Ohioholic (21:38:46) :
In the 1974 Ice Age scare, people claimed “all” it would take was for the snow to not completely melt some year. Soon after hearing that I flew across the country and saw lots of dark evergreens sticking out above the snow and concluded it would be difficult for snow not to melt.
Similarly, trees are spreading into the tundra and may be a positive feedback, see
http://www.sciencenews.org/view/feature/id/33383/title/Forest_invades_tundra
The sea surface temperatures in the Gulf coast of Florida have been falling for the last 50 years. More details on Florida’s non-warming climate can be found at: http://www.appinsys.com/GlobalWarming/RS_FloridaUSA.htm
There are many dynamics in this ecosystem that we call the biosphere. Unfortunately, sometimes so many that it confuses even the best of researchers, writers and of course, their critics. I don’t see in Winsbergs work any attempt to discredit the theory of Global Warming as it applies to the planet, although I could see how people could construe or rather misconstrue what is being said in any number of ways. The title of the article states “but don’t blame global warming”. Its catchy and does a good job of invoking the critics and proponents, both of Global Warming theory and heat island theory, both of which are accepted scientific models which are as Winsberg correctly shows, independent of one another. The explanation of “heat island” effect is relatively simple for the layman to understand compared to global warming.
I would argue though that localized temperature affects global temperature. I have stated that the drivers behind increases in each act independently of one another but that is not to say that they don’t affect one another. Moderation of temperatures in marine localities are also localized phenomena. And as Alan Cheetham states above “Surface temperatures in the Gulf of Mexico have been falling” which would consequently cool coastal areas, once again indepently of, but affected by both the “heat island and global warming” that is happening concurrently.
Everything is related, even things acting independently do so in relation to the conditions and systems in which they operate. When you mix it all the climate models and theories together with solar flares and changing ocean currents you’ve got a synergistic soup that in which it is easy to stir in a dash of confusion. It can then be served up as fodder by those who would like to distract society from their pursuit of profit withuot regard for society or the health of the planet. My only argument with Cynthia Barnets article is that as an aside, it does little to clarify that Global Warming is a reality.
Much of the Global Warming debate has angered me over the past couple decades because the complexity of the issue is enough reason for many to argue for continuation of the “status quo”, in regards to curbing our cosumption and digestion of the earth. Hopefully their are enough enlightened individuals to lead society out of gluttony and into a happier, healthier future for the inhabitants of our home.
Dougsplace.wordpress.com
Related article: http://dougsplace.wordpress.com/2007/12/18/climate-change-and-global-wwwhats-that-now/
ccpo (20:03:29) :
It’s all natural cycles.
It will not take long before you will see the former weather patterns with cold winters returning to Korea.
Doug McColl (08:08:55) :
—
No.
The so-called “theories” of global warming you evidently admire are NOT correct, the proposed draconian “solutions” demanded by the AGW extremists only serve to advance the budgets and social agenda’s of those whose budgets and profits stem STRICTLY from their scare tactics and exaggerations to the general public through a thoroughly propagandized press.