Andrew Bolt of the Herald Sun digs up another issue with non peer reviewed World Wildlife Fund reports in the IPCC AR4. It turns out a new paper in GRL handily disputes the cause of the drought.
He writes:
Melbourne University alarmist David Karoly once claimed a rise in the Murray Darling Basin’s temperatures was “likely due to the increase in greenhouse gases in the atmosphere from human acitivity” and:
Prime Minister Kevin Rudd grabbed the scare and exploited it:
BRENDAN Nelson was yesterday accused of being “blissfully immune” to the effects of climate change after he said the crisis in the Murray-Darling Basin was not linked to global warming…
In parliament yesterday, Kevin Rudd attacked Dr Nelson, accusing him of ignoring scientific facts.
“You need to get with the science on this,” the Prime Minister said. “Look at the technical report put together by the CSIRO and the Bureau of Meteorology.”
But the latest evidence shows that Rudd and Karoly were wrong. In fact, there’s no evidence in the Murray Darling drought of man-made warming, says a new study in Geophysical Research Letters, this new study:
Previous studies of the recent drought in the Murray-Darling Basin (MDB) have noted that low rainfall totals have been accompanied by anomalously high air temperatures. Subsequent studies have interpreted an identified trend in the residual timeseries of non-rainfall related temperature variability as a signal of anthropogenic change, further speculating that increased air temperature has exacerbated the drought through increasing evapotranspiration rates. In this study, we explore an alternative explanation of the recent increases in air temperature. This study demonstrates that significant misunderstanding of known processes of land surface – atmosphere interactions has led to the incorrect attribution of the causes of the anomalous temperatures, as well as significant misunderstanding of their impact on evaporation within the Murray-Darling Basin…
However, to accept the correlation [between temperature and rainfall] as the sole basis for the attribution of cause to human emissions is to implicitly assume that the correlation represents an entirely correct model of the sole driver of maximum air temperature. This is clearly not the case.
What’s causing the evaporation and temperatures is not (man-made) warming. It’s kind of the other way around: more sunshine, through lack of cloud cover, and lack of rain and therefore evaporation is causing higher temperatures.
And guess which scandal-ridden and alarmist IPCC report relied on Karoly’s claims? Reader Baa Humbug:
Karoly was cited very extensively in the AR4 WG1 paper.e.g. Chapter 9 9.4.2.3 Studies Based on Indices of Temperature Change and Temperature-Precipitation Relationships.”Studies based on indices of temperature change support the robust detection of human influence on continental-scale land areas. Observed trends in indices of North American continental scale temperature change, (including the regional mean, the mean land-ocean temperature contrast and the annual cycle) were found by Karoly et al. (2003) to be generally consistent with simulated trends under historical forcing from greenhouse gases and sulphate aerosols during the second half of the 20th century. In contrast, they find only a small likelihood of agreement with trends driven by natural forcing only during this period.
joshua corning (09:33:50)
Just being picky, but I remember being taught that it was an oblate spheroid.
So that would be “kind of” round then, I guess.
Dave
@ur momisugly JonesII (13:03:13) :
Curiousgeorge (12:54:07) Doomed! This new agency will issue “robust” reports to back “climate change” remediation.
I notice she hit all the talking points:
wind power industry – Coal is bad
coastal community planning – Sea level rise
fishermen and fishery managers- Ocean Acidification, etc.
farmers – Drought (or flood, take your pick)
and public health officials – Tropical diseases
yep, nothing gets by her. 😉
R. Gates (11:18:38) :
Jones II said: “A hacker will tell us your real name..that will be the “Gates’ Gate”☺
Is this suppose to scare me? Not quite sure what your point here is? How is this related climate issues?
I believe it is intended as humor. Might get yours checked , seems to be a bit out of alignment.
Sheez…of course!…I’ll get that checked and ask for a stronger prescription of anti-paranoia pills…thx
And the science just keeps chugging along…
Those pills work fast! 😉
If the Earth was the size of a squash ball, it would be smoother than a squash ball, as well as more spherical.
So, to all intents and purposes, it’s round.
RE: the new Climate Service: Here’s another jewel:
The NOAA announcement brought quick praise from Sierra Club President Carl Pope: “As polluters and their allies continue to try and muddy the waters around climate science, the Climate Service will provide easy, direct access to the valuable scientific research undertaken by government scientists and others.”
Rastus (00:35:10) :
http://www.bom.gov.au/cgi-bin/climate/change/timeseries.cgi?graph=rain&area=mdb&season=0112&ave_yr=T
In truth the trend of rainfall in the Murray Draling Basin over 110 years up…according to the BOM that is.
I have a problem with the linear trend going up on this landform. Australian inland rivers are really river channels that ,at any point in time may or may not contain water. Fly from Sydney to Singapore and hundreds of square kilometres of these dry river channels will reveal themselves. So the Murray and Darling as main collection rivers will flow only when the peak,/b> flow is large enough to overcome soil absorption and evaporation. The histogram shows a peak in the late 1940’s at 700mm decreasing to 400mm in 1970’s. I consider that the annual peak rainfall event is more important to river flow in the MD basin than the linear trend. To complicate matters, cyclonic and monsoonal rain in western Queensland can feed into the MD basin and this feed is slowly filling the Darling right now.
Antonia San (07:32:46) There is an anthropogenic factor in bushfire causation, most of then them are deliberately lit !, others are caused by lightning strikes. The Australian flora and forest floor is dry and oily (Eucalypt) and prone to ignition. Any AGW factor is spurious.
TerrySkinner (08:52:38) :
“I think it’s jealousy. Glaciergate, Africagate, Australiagate, NZgate etc. We were there first in the UK: Climategate. Accept no substitutes.
Our crooks are bigger than your crooks. Our crooks lied about the whole planet, continually.”
Yeah jealous right that your crooks are bigger. But our crooks (NIWAgate et al) learnt alot about crookery from your crooks, and your crooks could soon be in jail.
But he added: “I stand 100 per cent behind the science. I did not manipulate or fabricate any data.”
Well of course not! That is what grad students are for!
😉
Apologies for all the bold,it was only ‘peak’ that I wanted to highlight.
Lord Monckton’s 1.5 hour Brisbane talk is on audio and video http://www.abc.net.au/tv/fora/stories/2010/02/08/2811681.htm
The ABC presented 5minutes of his talk on their Big Ideas programme this morning, and what a difference it is to hear his presentation so clearly expressed instead of filtered by MSM. This talk was professionally recorded with excellent audio and video quality. You can choose the low bandwidth video version to save motorbikes 🙂
Re: Curious George (12.54.07)
Now that Hussein has made that announcement, our Krudd downunder will do something similar.
It will be as useless as his usual talkfests but he will use it as an out for “deferring” his ETS scam after it gets the arse from the senate. He is desperate to find a way out and probably ringing the former insipid Opposition leader begging him not cross the floor for the vote.
Maenwhile, nice to see Luke continue the “denialist” meme.
Both history and science seem to be beyond the grasp of politicians and others who want to control the world. The Australian contingent has counterparts in other places. Consider:
Just a couple of years ago the SE USA was considered to be in a drought situation. Today, not so much. And it all is blamed on global warming.
http://www.pewclimate.org/blog/gulledgej/georgia’s-climate-rollercoaster-illustrates-consequences-global-warming
What then are the explanations for droughts in Georgia in 1903-05, 1924-27, 1930-35, . . .
http://pubs.usgs.gov/of/2000/0380/pdf/ofr00-380.pdf
A very interesting thread, especially the philosophical/psychological posts…
I’ve jsut been re-reading some Milan Kundera, who knew a thing or two about totalitariansim, group-think, and the search for ‘paradise’.
His conversation with Philip Roth printed as an afterword to ‘The Book of Laughter and Forgetting’ is worth reading in the context of our struggle against the hydra-headed AGW bandwagon. Here are a couple of gems, with a special nod to our earnest friends at RealClimate (and R Gates):
PR: “When your characters come to grief it is always because they bump against a world that is losing its sense of humour”
MK: “I learned the value of humour during the time of Stalinist terror. I was twenty then. I could always recognize a person who was not a Stalinist, a person whom I needn’t fear, by the way he smiled. A sense of humour was a trustworthy sign of recognition. Ever since I have been terrified by a world that is losing its sense of humour.
… Human life is bounded by two chasms: fanaticism on one side, absolute skepticism on the other”
As I’ve remarked before, we Brits stood up to Hitler in our darkest day, mainly by laughing at him. Thank God for this blog to keep us sane
PS Can anyone tell us how much sense Luke (13.22.01) is or isn’t talking?
Chris in Tropical Australia (00:36:30) :
twawki
“Can anyone find anything, just something that may be even close to the truth in the IPCC reports !”
IF the reports have a date of issue, the date could be OK ???
I also believe that they have got the “Titles” correct, but I haven’t actually seen the evidence…
I wonderrif this Luke is the same one who infests the Marohasy blog with the same nit wit arguments
” P.S. Usual ruses here – (1) present rainfall stats for the whole Murray Darling Basin (MDB) – issue is lower MDB – i.e. Murray itself. Better still present rainfall stats for the whole of Australia. (NW has become wetter – while east, SE, and SW drier – average that and learn nothing !!)”
The MDB is a defined area for which the BOM has collected records for over 110 years.They didnt see any problems in using this as specific area ..given its common useage as an agricultural producing region. The absence of water in the lower reaches has nothing to do with the absence of rain, and any marginal differences with the lesser MDB regions are nothing compared to the incompetent way the water in the whole has been managed
Ruse 2 – “there have been droughts before” – duh !
There certainly have been and every Aussie and bar fly with half a brain knows thi,s except the dillberry academics chasing more grant money
Get a life Luke whoever you are
Gets even worse for denialists. Lockart et al will be comprehensively rebutted in an upcoming GRL.
The trend in SSH over the MDB as reported in LKF is not real, and is an artefact of their analysis. As they say in Oz – “come in spinner”.
I wish this was a bit clearer as to who was claiming what and who was claiming it isn’t so and why.
“I stand 100 per cent behind the science. I did not manipulate or fabricate any data.”
sounds a bit like
“I did not have sexual relations with that woman”
and we all know how that turned out:)
Scientist for Truth
I know this is off-topic here but I hope the admin will treat us with a little indulgence. I saw a link before to the International Investors Group on Climate Change and their connection to the BBC Pension Fund via the Director of both being Peter Dunscombe. When I saw your message above re the connection between IIGCC and the The Climate Group (the biggest Green Lobby group in the world ?) I followed that up too.
I posted a long post on it earlier this evening on the BBC radio4 Science Board but it was removed immediately. Never mind, I also posted it on my climate blog here http://thesequal.proboards.com/index.cgi?board=climate&action=display&thread=262&page=1
Do you remember back in November 2009, just after Climategate (19 Nov) when the BBC and ALL other UK mainstream media were studiously ignoring the fascinating email leak, from CRU? Susan Watts, supposedly the BBC’s “science” correspondent on BBC2 Newsnight 29 Nov, presented a smokescreen piece that purported to demonstrate the growing incidence of extreme weather by the growth in insurance claims for weather damage.
I debunked it at the time, on the previous WHs Proboard, sadly no longer extant. The programme was a load of tosh. Anyone can see that population growth and the growth or more and valuable real estate on vulnerable coasts etc would, other things being equal, lead to an increase in claims over time. Nothing at all to do with global warming/climate change – spurious correlation. The audience at the Royal Institution debate on the same subject last week came to the same conclusion. They threw out the motion. I listened to the debate. http://www.rigb.org/contentControl?action=displayEvent&id=1000
Anyway I didn’t notice it at the time but the company whose research Susan Watts drew on was the Munich Re Group. This is a large German insurance company which specialises in the re-insurance of mega weather hazards, acts of God etc. http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/newsnight/susanwatts/2009/11/insuring_against_climate_chang.html
Surprise surprise, what did I find when reading up about The Climate Group and Institutional Investors Group on Climate Change, just now? Munich Re is there on the list of members! (Munich Re was also quoted in the Royal Institution debate – so obviously a player!)
http://www.theclimategroup.org/our-members/munich-re
Now call me suspicious but The Climate Group funds the IIGCC. IIGCC’s Director is also director of the BBC’s Pension Fund, Peter Dunscombe. Susan Watts is a BBC so-called BBC “scientist”, she consults Munich Re Group in order to promote a story about extreme weather at a time when the IPCC’s proxies at CRU UEA are under fire.
Is it just a coincidence?
What about the cross connections between The Climate Group, WWF and The Meteorological Office? Why are there two former top brass of ther WWF now heading the UK Meteorological Office? Why is the former Director of The Climate Group, Robin Napier now Chairman of the Board at the UK Met Office?
It’s depressing. The swines are entrenched in public life. How will we ever dislodge them and their pernicious ideology of “climatechangeism”? I feel a bit depressed, I must admit. Cheer me up, someone!
I have twice tried to post a message here replying to ScientistforTruth and they just disappears into the ether. Why, please? Am I persona non grata?
REPLY: No, but you did have more than three links in it, which automatically trips the spam filter. Restored. – Anthony
Maybe it was too long. Is their a word limit?
And as can be seen fro the graphic, the MDB is a rather large area, probably as large if not larger than Texas.
R. Gates (11:02:48) :
“Tenuc, if you believe the world could see 6 degrees C of warming without losing all arctic sea ice and probably melting most of the permafrost as well, then we have very little scientific basis for agreement. No point in answering or responding to you. Good day…
Oh dear, sorry your feeling a bit sulky – though it must me hard for you having to live your life in terror of what the future climate could bring. Don’t let your sense of humour fail, the only thing certain about climate is change.
Regarding ice at the North Pole…
At the current level of global mean temperature (in the unlikely event the numbers of right, of course) there are approx 90 days above the freezing point of sea water (271 Kelvin), based on the period 1958 to 2002.
In the very unlikely event that global mean temperature went up by 6 Kelvin, then the number of days above freezing would be 125 days, again based on the above period.
So, simplistically, the effect of the change would be a reduction in sea ice as there would be an increase of around 12% in the number of days above freezing point of sea water. So your premise of “losing all arctic sea ice” is clearly wrong.
In addition, less Arctic ice could have many benefits to shipping, fishing, underwater oil and natural gas production, the lumber industry, tourism etc.
In the words of the famous Dire Straits song – Why Worry
“Baby I see this world has made you sad
Some people can be bad
The things they do, the things they say
But baby I’ll wipe away those bitter tears
I’ll chase away those restless fears
That turn your blue skies into grey. :-))
I was at a conference where this paper was presented. It seemed to be that Karoly (et al) correlated higher temperatures & higher evapotranspiration with drought and concluded that it was the higher temperatures & evaportranspiration CAUSED the drought. The authors of the more recent paper actually tested which way the correlation worked and established that the drought (and higher Sunshine hours due to lack of rain) caused the higher evapotranspiration and drought. They made the point that you can’t claim every severe event is due to “climate change”
Also on the MDB “no rainfall deficit issue” – the north area (above the sub tropical ridge which runs EW from about Sydney to Perth) has had increased rainfall. (that area is in a summer dominated rainfall area), while the southern area (which has autumn winter dominated rainfall) has had decreased rainfall – particularly in autumn. During that time there has been v. few large rainfall events in this region. This has affected water supply (Perth, Adelaide, Melbourne, Canberra etc) as the overall rainfall reduction has been magnified in the run-off reduction. This is the case even in areas with no farm/agricultural extraction.
There is still some speculation as to why this has occurred – it is a different pattern to the other droughts in the “good record”. One theory is that it is due to a flipping of the Southern Annular Mode (SAM) which affects the passage of cold fronts in South Eastern Australia. There is not enough long-term data to tell if this is due to natural variability or otherwise.