But…there’s that word again, “robust” used in the context of error admission. Now all we need is an apology from Chairman Dr. Rajenda Pachauri for statements that claims that this error existed were “arrogant” and “voodoo science“. Will he give one? His track record suggests it is doubtful.
UPDATE: It seems Dr. Pachauri is getting a bit miffed over all the attention he’s getting over his ties to TERI and questions raised by Richard North and Christopher Booker in the UK telegraph. He’s threatening a lawsuit:
Angry Pachauri threatens to sue UK daily
This is the best thing that could happen, as it will mean independent discovery.
IPCC statement on the melting of Himalayan glaciers1
The Synthesis Report, the concluding document of the Fourth Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (page 49) stated: “Climate change is expected to exacerbate current stresses on water resources from population growth and economic and land-use change, including urbanisation. On a regional scale, mountain snow pack, glaciers and small ice caps play a crucial role in freshwater availability. Widespread mass losses from glaciers and reductions in snow cover over recent decades are projected to accelerate throughout the 21st century, reducing water availability, hydropower potential, and changing seasonality of flows in regions supplied by meltwater from major mountain ranges (e.g. Hindu-Kush, Himalaya, Andes), where more than one-sixth of the world population currently lives.”
This conclusion is robust, appropriate, and entirely consistent with the underlying science and the broader IPCC assessment.
It has, however, recently come to our attention that a paragraph in the 938-page Working Group II contribution to the underlying assessment2 refers to poorly substantiated estimates of rate of recession and date for the disappearance of Himalayan glaciers. In drafting the paragraph in question, the clear and well-established standards of evidence, required by the IPCC procedures, were not applied properly.
The Chair, Vice-Chairs, and Co-chairs of the IPCC regret the poor application of well-established IPCC procedures in this instance. This episode demonstrates that the quality of the assessment depends on absolute adherence to the IPCC standards, including thorough review of “the quality and validity of each source before incorporating results from the source into an IPCC Report” 3. We reaffirm our strong commitment to ensuring this level of performance.
===============================================
1 This statement is from the Chair and Vice-Chairs of the IPCC, and the Co-Chairs of the IPCC Working Groups.
2 The text in question is the second paragraph in section 10.6.2 of the Working Group II contribution and a repeat of part of the paragraph in Box TS.6. of the Working Group II Technical Summary of the IPCC Fourth Assessment Report.
3 This is verbatim text from Annex 2 of Appendix A to the Principles Governing IPCC Work.
PDF of the announcement is here
h/t to WUWT reader Nigel Brereton
Yvo de Boer, head of the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change:
“But that does not alter the inevitable consequences, unless rigorous action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions is taken.”
without a doubt? inevitable?
Roger Pielke’s, Jr.’s blog for today points out flaws in that defense. An IPCC insider, Georg Kaser, revealed that:
1. He had alerted the IPCC staff about the error prior to publication, but they refused to correct it.
2. None of the other reviewers pointed out this glaring error.
3. The people in charge of the Asia section of the report lacked relevant expertise. (“They were without any knowledge of glaciology.”)
4. Everyone in the IPCC is now aware of the fault and intends to correct it in the next report. This means that Pachauri’s vigorous defense of the flawed report against criticism by a non-alarmist recent Indian government report implies that either he was unaware (out of touch) or aware (deceitful).
Here’s the link to Pielke’s article: http://rogerpielkejr.blogspot.com/2010/01/stranger-and-stranger.html
“The Chair, Vice-Chairs, and Co-chairs of the IPCC regret the poor application of……”
So may I respectfully request through, The Chair, The Vice Chairs, and The Co-Chairs, who, within the IPCC, might be responsible for the “absolute adherence to the IPCC standards, including thorough review of the quality and validity of each source before incorporating results from the source into an IPCC Report”?
Responsibility, interesting word, means the ability to respond. So who was in the only position to respond to this document before publication? Who reviewed it? Who put their names to it? Could it not possibly be, The Chair, The Vice Chairs and The Co-Chairs?
A truly great man, uttered something along the lines of “A camel is horse designed by a committee”
The Chair, The Vice Chairs, The Co-Chairs…. Better than going by Thomas Cook?
Mr. Herman L.,
it has, however, recently come to our attention that the leg of yours we incidently amputated refers to poorly substantiated estimates of rate of inspection. In performing the surgical procedure in question, the clear and well-established standards of evidence, required by the clinic’s procedures, were not applied properly.
The Chair, Vice-Chairs, and Co-chairs of the clinic regret the poor application of well-established clinic procedures in this instance. This episode demonstrates that the quality of the assessment depends on absolute adherence to the clinic’s standards, including thorough review of “the quality and validity of each source before incorporating results from the source into a surgical procedure” 3. We reaffirm our strong commitment to ensuring this level of performance.
———————————————————————
This, Mr. Pachauri, is worth some trillions of damage – excluding the $500,000 TERI got.
“Secondly, and more importantly, there are plenty of skeptics in the IPCC. They may not be skeptical of everything in every instance. They may be only skeptical at the level of how accurately a particular number wa calculated……” None of these sceptics had ever recalculated Mr. Hansen’s data or looked into his computercode. None had the idea of asking Mr. Jones for the raw data and adjustment procedures! Quality controll in even the worst GM factory is better than in the IPCC. Scientists? No, Mr. Herman L., never. Amateurs! They can devote whatever they want to whom they want. Have a look at Surfacestations Gallery (link on the right) and then you can see the quality of these scientists.
There are trillions and trillions of dollars at stake, which are blown in the wind. And this clown Pachauri and his staff kept it secret for two years! Money that could feed the poor, make children happy or pay for health insurance or even petrol. But it is other peoples money which is blown in the wind or somebody’s pocket.
So this makes three strikes … Next batter?
If this wasn’t so serious the UN IPCC would be laughed off the science stage.
What was their charter anyway?
There are hidden contradictions in the minds of people who “love Nature” while deploring the “artificialities” with which “Man has spoiled ‘Nature.'” The obvious contradiction lies in their choice of words, which imply that Man and his artifacts are not part of “Nature” — but beavers and their dams are.
But the contradictions go deeper than this prima facie absurdity. In declaring his love for a beaver dam (erected by beavers for beavers’ purposes) and his hatred for dams erected by men (for the purposes of men) the “Naturist” reveals his hatred for his own race — i. e., his own self-hatred.
— Robert A. Heinlein
Look at the faces of Mann, Hansen, Briffa, Al Gore, Sommerville, Pachauri et. al. These people got where they are now, and received all their inflated titles for being conformists, for telling their bosses and sponsors (politicians) whatever they wanted to hear. These people know it, and they hate themselves for it. The main reason for eco-fanaticism is internal guilt.
rabidfox (12:16:38) :
I don’t think that ‘robust’ means what they think it means.
Or as Inigo Montoya says ” You keep saying that word. I think it does not mean what you think it means”
Keep trying. I’ve been much happier with the appearance of my posts since I started using it about two weeks ago. Incidentally, here’s a little tip: after you’ve typed in <blockquote> at the start and pasted in your quoted material, hold down the up-arrow key until you get back in front of the tag, copy it, hold down the down-arrow key to get down to the end of the quote, paste it, then back up and insert the backslash to terminate the “block.”
Now maybe I am a simple man, but doesn’t melting glaciers and snowpacks mean more water delivered downstream? What water stress are they talking about? Flooding?
Or maybe there will be some sort of sublime intervention?
(Yes that was intentional)
Peter of Sydney (13:49:44) :
Not good enough. There’s ample evidence that the chairman of the IPCC was warned about the falsehoods. He should be charged with fraud.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
I thought I had read somewhere that Lord Monckton was lodging fraud charges against Pachauri, but I can’t seem to put a finger on a reference. Maybe it was just a pleasant dream 🙂
Harry (12:19:54) : said
“Until the clowns at IPCC start viewing ’skeptics’ as essential to quality control, they will continue to make outrageous mistakes.”
All drafts of AR4 were publicly posted. Christopher Monckton apparently got to review it. What more do you want? Editorial approval by Exxon?
“… poorly substantiated …”???
I think they mean UNsubstantiated.
UPDATE: It seems Dr. Pachauri is getting a bit miffed over all the attention he’s getting over his ties to TERI and questions raised by Richard North and Christopher Booker in the UK telegraph. He’s threatening a lawsuit.
In the UK, loser pays all. So sue away.
I’m really starting to mourn the buzzwordification of “robust”. It was a fine, useful term 10 years ago. Now you can’t turn around without bumping into it. When everything is “robust”, nothing is. . .
UN climate report riddled with errors on glaciers Seattle Times January 20, 2010 at 3:03 PM
Herman,
“First, I don’t know where you come off calling the scientists who participate in the IPCC effort “clowns.” On what basis do you make that assessment? It seems a rather rude interpretation of people who devote their life’s work to the pursuit of scientific knowledge.”
So exactly how does a claim that the Himalaya’s will melt by 2035 get thru a quality control check if it was reviewed by a skeptic? There wasn’t even one scientific paper that concluded that. Nothing, nada..an off the cuff remark in a magazine interview.
It fit the reviewers ‘belief system’.
We all ‘see what we expect to see’…
The most common example is how many of us fail to notice our wifes new hairdo…while others readily notice it.
NASA had on it’s web site until today a claim based that the “Himalaya’s would melt by 2030”. So NASA reviewed the IPCC as well…and they didn’t catch that there was ‘no scientific evidence to support the claim’ either.
Herman L mentions that “You see that throughout the IPCC report where specific items are rated regarding the level of scientific knowledge, or or where a probability range is assigned to a value.”
But from the original newspaper article: When finally published, the IPCC report did give its source as the WWF study but went further, suggesting the likelihood of the glaciers melting was “very high”. The IPCC defines this as having a probability of greater than 90%.
What is so disturbing is reading their reports full of probability ranges that have no basis in science or even simple reality. The glacial melt and Greenland ice melt are among the worst examples and they are the main basis for the predictions of catastrophe. The glaciers in Greenland lose about 100 km2 per year and the ice sheet is about 1.7m km2. At linear rates that’s 100,000 years, but the rates will likely be less since the present loss from outlet glaciers is orders of magnitude higher than interior glaciers.
The Himalayas have a similar issue with the volume of ice versus the current rates, it will simply take centuries for it to disappear. To claim that a probability range of 90% was somehow calculated scientifically is laughable. How are we supposed to take any of their other alarmist probabilistic claims seriously?
“On a regional scale, mountain snow pack, glaciers and small ice caps play a crucial role in freshwater availability. “
This is an absolute lie.
The glaciers could disappear tomorrow and the rivers would still flow. Think about it a little bit.
If the glaciers stopped melting they would contribute NO water to rivers on a yearly basis. Then were does all the water in the rivers come from? Snow and rain. Most of the water flowing off glaciers is the melting of snow that was deposited the prior winter.
In winter same snowfall is also falling everywhere else on the entire mountain, valleys, hills, and planes surrounding the mountain. Far more snow falls on those areas than the comparatively small areas occupied by glaciers.
This study of the Himalayas in Nepal states that “The most salient finding of this study is that the glaciers of the Nepal Himalaya do not appear to make a
significant contribution to the total streamflow of the rivers of Nepal.”
What the study found was that 4% of the studied area was covered by glacier and only ~4% of the runoff came from the glacier. But that is right around what would be expected just from annual percipitation that would fall on the glacier.
will any of the following appear on TV News, which is the only way most of the public will know about it?
except for Fox, do no real reporting, eagerly tell us this doesn’t change AGW an iota, don’t represent hasnain correctly or ignore him altogether, etc.
CNN: Matthew Knight: U.N. climate chiefs apologize for glacier error
Despite the admission, the IPCC reiterated its concern about the dangers melting glaciers present in a region that is home to more than one-sixth of the world’s population.
“Widespread mass losses from glaciers and reductions in snow cover over recent decades are projected to accelerate throughout the 21st century, reducing water availability, hydropower potential, and changing seasonality of flows in regions supplied by meltwater from major mountain ranges (e.g. Hindu-Kush, Himalaya, Andes)…”..
In the article, “Flooded Out,” Indian glaciologist Syed Hasnain speculates that the Himalayan glaciers could vanish within 40 years as a result of global warming. ..
Zemp also believes that the errors shouldn’t shake people’s belief in climate science.
“Glaciers are the best proof that climate change is happening. This is happening on a global scale. They can translate very small changes in the climate into a visible signal,” he said.
http://www.cnn.com/2010/WORLD/asiapcf/01/20/glacier.himalayas.ipcc.error/?hpt=Sbin
ABC: U.N.: Himalayan Glaciers Warning Not Backed Up
By ELIANE ENGELER Associated Press
The U.N. panel did not give a new estimate of when Himalayan glaciers might melt away, but said “widespread mass losses from glaciers and reductions in snow cover over recent decades are projected to accelerate throughout the 21st century.”..
http://abcnews.go.com/Technology/wireStory?id=9609395
CBS: Seth Borenstein, AP: Nobel Prize-Winning Panel Apologizes
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2010/01/20/tech/main6121986.shtml?tag=cbsnewsSectionContent.13
Fox: U.N. Panel’s Glacier-Disaster Claims Melting Away
By Gene J. Koprowski
Contacted by FoxNews.com at TERI, officials would not respond to a request for additional comment…
“The data, all the data, needs to come to light,” says Dr. Jane M. Orient, president of Doctors for Disaster Preparedness and an outspoken skeptic on climate change.
“Thousands of scientists are capable of assessing it. The only reason to keep it hidden, locked in the clutches of the elite few, is that it decisively disproves their computer models and shows that their draconian emission controls are based on nothing except a lust for power, control and profit.”
The IPCC “made a clear and obvious error when it stated that Himalayan glaciers would be gone by 2035,” added Patrick J. Michaels, a senior fellow in environmental policy at the libertarian Cato Institute, in an interview.
“The absurdity was obvious to anyone who had studied the scientific literature. This was not an honest mistake. IPCC had been warned about it for a year by many scientists.”
A letter just released to the Science Web site underscores the mistake. Written by J. Graham Cogley of the department of geography at Canada’s Trent University, it points out that “the claim that Himalayan glaciers may disappear by 2035 … conflicts with knowledge of glacier-climate relationships, and is wrong.”
The dustup is the latest scandal in global warming science, coming after the disclosure of attempts to shade climate-science research findings at the U.K.’s East Anglia University and the failed talks in Copenhagen by environmental policymakers last month. ..
“Most Himalayan glaciers are hundreds of feet thick and could not melt fast enough to vanish by 2035. The maximum rate of decline in thickness seen in glaciers at the moment is two to three feet per year, and most are far lower,” Don Easterbrook, a professor emeritus of the department of geology at Western Washington University, told FoxNews.com.
Pachauri, the IPCC chief, is under attack on another front, as well, as newspaper reports in India have commented repeatedly on his reportedly lavish lifestyle. TERI receives funding from the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency and the U.S. Department of Energy, both of which did not respond to requests for comment from FoxNews.com. Reports indicate that there also are concerns in the United Kingdom surrounding 10 million British pounds in funding for TERI, and questions about TERI’s objectivity.
“It’s about time that somebody started following the money trail to the big interests that want to prosper from the green regime, while the rest of the economy is crushed,” Orient told FoxNews.com. “It’s not as though the amount were a trickle.”
http://www.foxnews.com/scitech/2010/01/20/panels-glacier-disaster-claims-melting-away/?test=latestnews
fantastic!
UK Financial Times: UN abandons climate change deadline
By Fiona Harvey in London and Anna Fifield in Washington
The timetable to reach a global deal to tackle climate change lay in tatters on Wednesday after the UN waived the first deadline of the process laid out at last month’s fractious Copenhagen summit.
Nations agreed then to declare their emissions reduction targets by the end of this month…
But Yvo de Boer, the UN’s senior climate change official, admitted that the deadline had in effect been shelved.
“By [the end of] January, countries will have the opportunity to . . . indicate if they want to be associated with the accord,” he said. “[Governments could] indicate by the deadline, or they can also indicate later.”
“You could describe it as a soft deadline,” Mr de Boer said. “There is nothing deadly about it. If [countries] fail to meet it, they can still associate with the Copenhagen accord after.”
Countries pushing for a new legally binding treaty on climate change will be disappointed, as The waiving of the deadline sets a bad precedent for efforts to finalise a deal this year. The next scheduled meeting is not until late May, in Germany, with another in late November, in Mexico but many officials say more will be needed…
The result of Tuesday’s Massachusetts senatorial election, which took away Barack Obama’s super-majority in the Senate, is likely to push climate change further down the US agenda. It was the latest in a series of setbacks that have caused efforts to push a cap-and-trade bill through the Senate to grind to a halt, making it harder for the White House to participate meaningfully in global climate negotiations.
Instead, the administration has been pressing ahead with steps to limit the US’s carbon emissions through regulation..
http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/87479ee2-0600-11df-8c97-00144feabdc0.html
reminds me of a piece a few days ago:
State of the World Forum: 2020 Climate Leadership Campaign
Dear Friends,
I want to inform you that we have decided to postpone indefinitely the
Washington conference Feb. 28 – Mar. 3. I apologize for any inconvenience
this might cause you. There is simply not a critical mass of receptivity at
this time for the kind of “Climate Summit” we have designed, which has
emphasized an integral approach to climate change and the need for an
“urgency coalition” to come together to take immediate and decisive action
to resolve the climate crisis..
As disappointed as we are that the conference will not take place, the
considered opinion of all our conference partners has been that this is
simply not the right time to convene a major conference of this kind in the
nation’s capitol. It would have virtually no impact on either the thinking
or the agenda with which the U.S. Congress and the president are now
engaged, such is the paralysis to which Washington has succumbed with regard
to any action on global warming. In due course, this situation will no doubt
change, probably induced by a sufficiently strong climate related
catastrophe, but this is the stark reality we face at the moment. As a
result, raising funds and registering sufficient numbers have been extremely
challenging.
State of the World Forum will in time convene a Climate Summit in Washington
but that time is not now. ..
http://www.worldforum.org/2009WashingtonDC.htm
Wow. AP’s report on this is incredibly slanted.
AP makes it sound as if all’s that happened is 2035 was transposed from 2350. Only a cursory implication that they pulled the number from non-peer reviewed literature. They also state that no scientists argue that the glaciers are disappearing, when it is my understanding that there are some scientists, particularly Indian ones, who are doing just that.
Roger Pielke Jr. gets quoted, but the bulk of the article makes the errors in the IPCC assessment seem like simple editing errors, and not the systemic bias errors they really are.
http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2010/01/20/tech/main6121986.shtml
[snip – we don’t need to stoop to this level, the IPCC is doing fine on its own -A]
Sorry!
brc
this is just another example of how the warmistas think. Do you remeber the Polar bears stranded on the ice flow? This one picture was snapped up by people wanting to put their angle on it, passed on to willing promoters around the world as evidence of the evil of modern man without one ounce of sweat being raised to check the source and background to the photo. Assumption is the mother of all stuff-ups. I am being a bit generous in saying ‘assumption,’ because we are talking about ‘believers’ here.
When it finally came out that a visiting Australian scientist took these innocent photos of Polar Bears doing their normal thing it was too late, the damage had been done. Once again there was no actual admission of error, no apology to right the wrong. There can be no wrong when your cause is sooo right! These people are preaching to other people who want to be heros that either save a species that isn’t endangered, or a planet that is in verygood health thank-you verymuch! Give the folks what they want. Don’t be a spoil-sport and put reality, truth or anything else in the way.
“Rivers fed by melting snow and glaciers supply water to over one-sixth of the world’s population–well over a billion people. But these sources of water are quickly disappearing: the Himalayan glaciers that feed rivers in India, China, and other Asian countries could be gone in 25 years. ”
This is the opening passage from MIT Technology Review’s piece on “The Geoengineering Gambit”
http://www.technologyreview.com/energy/24157/
Most of the remaining piece is dedicated to goofy ‘geo-engineering’ schemes like SO2 spraying and artificial trees, and of course the mandatory fawning and begging of funds from Obama adviser Daniel Schrag and ‘White House Scientist’ Joe Holdren.
All because the IPCC said the glaciers were melting and the United Kingdom’s Royal Society declared that geoengineering ideas are not kooky anymore.
And these people are not clowns?