By Dr. Roger Pielke Sr.
There is an article
Global warming lull down to China’s coal growth by Richard Black of the BBC which perpetuate an inappropriately narrow view of climate science. The article headlines with the text
“The lull in global warming from 1998 to 2008 was mainly caused by a sharp rise in China’s coal use, a study suggests.”
This article makes the common major erroneous statement that global warming from CO2 and a few other greenhouse gases is climate change. This is NOT true. As we document in our article
Pielke Sr., R., K. Beven, G. Brasseur, J. Calvert, M. Chahine, R. Dickerson, D. Entekhabi, E. Foufoula-Georgiou, H. Gupta, V. Gupta, W. Krajewski, E. Philip Krider, W. K.M. Lau, J. McDonnell, W. Rossow, J. Schaake, J. Smith, S. Sorooshian, and E. Wood, 2009: Climate change: The need to consider human forcings besides greenhouse gases. Eos, Vol. 90, No. 45, 10 November 2009, 413. Copyright (2009) American Geophysical Union
“Although the natural causes of climate variations and changes are undoubtedly important, the human influences are significant and involve a diverse range of first-order climate forcings, including, but not limited to, the human input of carbon dioxide (CO2). Most, if not all, of these human influences on regional and global climate will continue to be of concern during the coming decades.”
The claim that CO2 dominates climate change in the multi-decadal time period has been clearly FALSIFIED.
The end of the Richard Black article reads
“The last two years’ data suggest temperatures are once more beginning to rise; but how fast this happens depends on a number of factors.
One is how quickly the rapidly industrialising countries mandate the fitting of equipment that removes sulphate particles.
Another is solar activity. Recently, it showed signs of picking up as the Sun enters a new cycle of activity, although recent research raises the possibility of a new lull.
Other research groups, meanwhile, have produced evidence showing that natural cycles of ocean temperature, such as the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation, may restrain temperatures for another decade or so.
Uncertainties over aspects of the Earth’s immensely complex climate system, such as melting ice and the behaviour of clouds, could also skew the overall picture.
But Robert Kaufmann is in no doubt that temperatures will pick up if greenhouse gas emissions continue to rise.
“People can choose not to believe in [man-made] climate change – but the correct term here is ‘belief’ – believing is an act of faith, whereas science is a testing of hypotheses and seeing whether they hold up against real world data.
‘Even before this paper there wasn’t much scientific evidence for denying climate change, and now I don’t see any credible scientific contradiction – if people don’t believe it, it’ll be because they choose not to believe it.’”
Robert Kaufmann is correct that
“….science is a testing of hypotheses and seeing whether they hold up against real world data.”
We have performed such a test on the hypothesis that CO2 and a few other greenhouse dominates climate change and have clearly shown this to be a falsified hypothesis. The human role in climate change is much more than the positive radiative effect from added CO2 and a few other greenhouse gases.
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Whatever the human influences on climate are, they are primarily regional and/or second order forcings. In other words, they, including C02, merely add noise to the climate system, not direction. The entire concern over man’s supposed “influence” on climate is simply a ruse, and mis-directs away from real environmental concerns.
@ur momisugly Mike Bromley the Kurd July 15, 2011 at 12:23 am
If the odds that CO2 will cause climate change are 50% as you claim, then we should begin reducing emissions. If a sign said there is a 50% chance the bridge is out, what would you do?
@ur momisuglyho hum:
SO2 shielding is temporary. SO2 does not build up in the atmosphere the way CO2 does. With the increase in Asian SO2 emissions how to you explain the lack of cooling?
@ur momisugly rpielke, July 15, 2011 at 7:11 am
I have no idea which slide of the 57 you are referring to, and a presentation by you saying you are right does not carry a lot of weight. Sorry. The NRC study discusses the need to improve our understanding of various regional issues but does not back up your claim that the build up of CO2 is not the dominant factor in global climate change. Yes there are lots issues we need to look at beside GHG emissions, but since CO2 sticks around this is the dominate issue.
Dr. Pielke – Thank you for your response.
Reading your links, there are some very interesting issues that you have raised, in particular (for me) effects of land use changes upon cloud formation. I would, however, consider cloud formation a feedback, not a forcing, and in fact would consider the majority of changes in the water cycle to also be feedbacks. There is also the issue that land only represents a fraction of Earth surface – radiative imbalances over the oceans represent the majority of climate energy changes.
To the extent that CO2 influence on current climate are reduced (by better estimates of other forcings and secondary effects), it’s quite clear to me that we are in greater risk from climate change, not less, as we know the physical radiative imbalance due from expected CO2 (and other GHG component) changes, and those changes in radiative forcing will still occur – along with all of those feedbacks.
Most importantly, however, is your emphasis on regional and local climate changes rather than global, like your decrying of global temperature anomalies. I have seen such emphasis used to claim that global climate change is not occurring, a Fallacy Of Composition (http://www.don-lindsay-archive.org/skeptic/arguments.html#composition), looking at the trees while ignoring the forest. Hence I am very wary of focusing on the part rather than the whole – such a local focus can distract from the changes of the whole, which will in time affect all regions and localities in some fashion.
—
Incidentally, I would strongly disagree with your statement that “Global and regional climate models have not demonstrated skill at predicting climate change and variability on multi-decadal time scales. (Pielke, R.A. Sr., 2006). Global models in particular have performed quite well within the bounds of internal variability. But that’s another discussion entirely…
RE: Pamela Gray says:
July 15, 2011 at 6:13 am
============================
I strongly suspect that so called “climate change” in the Eastern US and the Old World is largely a result of albedo mods and other surface / near surface effects. Because most surface stations happen to be in such locales, it creates the false impression of “global warming.” Per another poster’s comment I doubt it has resulted in much net ocean warming other than continental shelf areas of the Atlantic Basin. I also suspect that the net near surface “warming” in that densely populated portion of the world even impacts the satellite record. I also suspect that here out West we have not had nearly the impacts from albedo mods etc hence your observations in the stepped, high desert and high country in OR.
hum @ur momisugly July 15, 2011 at 6:36 am
CO2 is one of a number of forcings (albeit the once changing fastest right now, and therefore dominant in climate change), but there’s also lots of variability in both internal state (ENSO, for example) and forcings (solar minimum, the recent aerosol changes in Asia).
Of course, if you account for those variations, such as volcanic activity, ENSO, solar activity, etc., there’s a blatantly evident linear trend (http://tamino.wordpress.com/2011/01/20/how-fast-is-earth-warming/) in global temperature evident from examining all five major temperature measurements (GISS, NCDC, HadCRU, RSS, UAH). The climate is still warming.
@KR:
The climate is supposed to change, isn’t it? What would be the rate of climate change without anthropogenic greenhouse gases in the atmosphere? Would we be entering another ice age, as it was believed just a few decades ago? Would we be in climate nirvana?
Fat fingers … stepped -> steppes.
KR – Thank you for your further feedback.
Regarding your text
“Incidentally, I would strongly disagree with your statement that “Global and regional climate models have not demonstrated skill at predicting climate change and variability on multi-decadal time scales. (Pielke, R.A. Sr., 2006). Global models in particular have performed quite well within the bounds of internal variability. But that’s another discussion entirely”
please document examples in the literature where the models have sucessfully predicted changes in the statistics of the climate system in response to human and natual climate forcings and feedbacks. This includes the statistics of such weather dominating features as ENSO, the PDO, NAO, etc. It is these regional atmospheric/ocean climate features and their changes over time that the models need to skillfully predict, and, unfortunately, they have not.
Mike says:
July 15, 2011 at 9:00 am
If a sign said there is a 50% chance the bridge is out, what would you do?
See if there was a “bridge for sale” further ahead?
Dr. Pielke
As I stated before, climate modeling is a side topic; and ENSO, PDO, etc. are internal variability. Examples include GISS (http://data.giss.nasa.gov/modelE/, http://www-pcmdi.llnl.gov/ipcc/about_ipcc.php), NOAA (http://nomads.gfdl.noaa.gov/CM2.X/CM2.0/data/cm2.0_data.html), etc.
Some of the deviation from modeled runs, particularly from the IPCC data (http://www.copenhagendiagnosis.com/), are in higher temperatures and faster ice loss (at or above the fastest estimates presented), as the IPCC was quite conservative with those items and estimates at the time of the Third Assessment report.
Regional variations such as ENSO are just that – variations. “It is these regional atmospheric/ocean climate features and their changes over time that the models need to skillfully predict, and, unfortunately, they have not.” I cannot disagree more. Climate is the long term behavior, not short term, and <5-15 years is far more 'weather' than 'climate'. That's not the question climate models are constructed to answer. I don't ask for a truck to weave in and out the HOV lanes for high speed commuting, and I don't ask a motorcycle to carry a tonne of cargo – it would be frankly disingenuous to demand either.
—
My major concern, though, is that here in a post on "Climate Science Myopia", you point me to several presentations of yours indicating that the only relevant issues are the local/regional variations, not global climate change. Global climate drives those local/regional issues, and (in my opinion) ignoring global indicators and trends while emphasizing local effects is itself myopic.
AGW alarmism turns out to be a great vehicle for expressing ones favourite predjudices. Are we left wing anti-capitalists? Jolly good – CAGW is a perfect policy vehicle to give industry and big business a good kicking – as well as people who fly in airplanes. O yes – we’re racists too and dont like the Chinese? No problem – we can pin either warming or cooling on the new yellow peril, from their dark Maoist mills.
Useful thing, CAGW – hmmm – I wonder what effect sexual orientation has on climate?
Gary Hladik says:
July 14, 2011 at 5:03 pm
“So what “first-order climate forcings” other than CO2 are we talking about here?”
I can think of 3 others. They are;
-Water vapour
-Water vapour, and
-Water vapour.
But you can’t tax it. It would be too ridiculous. Therefore, CO2 is the tax-substitute.
@ur momisugly KR
Global climate drives those local/regional issues, and (in my opinion) ignoring global indicators and trends while emphasizing local effects is itself myopic.
Well then, please enlighten us as to just how global climate “drove” the snows of kilamanjaro away. Or, how about how they “drive” UHI?
Go ahead, deny that those are/were manmade, locally-driven effects. As far as global indicators, there’s nothing at all unprecedented about the some .7 °C (probably exaggerated by half, due to issues with thermometer placement, dropout, etc.) rise in temps since the LIA. Climate is cyclical in nature. We’re just along for the ride.
Alan the Brit says (July 15, 2011 at 3:13 am): “Are you seriously suggesting that on a planet 71% covered with water, that our mega offerings of irrigation make a significant contribution to the atmosphere through evaporation?”
Globally, no. On local/regional scales, yes. IIRC, Anthony found at least one well-sited surface station with an unexpected jump in temp that correlated with an increase in local irrigated farming. What was the effect of converting California’s Central Valley from a semi-desert into an irrigated breadbasket? Could the increased humidity have raised the average night temperatures through the famous “greenhouse” effect?
Others may experience climate globally, but personally I only feel local effects. 🙂
rpielke says (July 14, 2011 at 6:00 pm): “Gary Hladik – Please see
http://pielkeclimatesci.files.wordpress.com/2010/01/testimony-written.pdf”
Thanks, Dr. Pielke, that’s just what I was looking for.
tallbloke (July 14, 2011 at 11:41 pm), Drl Pielke’s testimony includes references on forest cover, soot on ice, plant cover albedo, and evaporation. The situation is, as I suspected, a lot more complex than the simple suggestions I made.
KR – Regarding
“Global climate drives those local/regional issues, and (in my opinion) ignoring global indicators and trends while emphasizing local effects is itself myopic.”
see http://www.nap.edu/openbook.php?record_id=11175&page=5
where it is written
“Regional variations in radiative forcing may have important regional and global climatic implications that are not resolved by the concept of global mean radiative forcing. Tropospheric aerosols and landscape changes have particularly heterogeneous forcings. To date, there have been only limited studies of regional radiative forcing and response. Indeed, it is not clear how best to diagnose a regional forcing and response in the observational record; regional forcings can lead to global climate responses, while global forcings can be associated with regional climate responses. Regional diabatic heating can also cause atmospheric teleconnections that influence regional climate thousands of kilometers away from the point of forcing. Improving societally relevant projections of regional climate impacts will require a better understanding of the magnitudes of regional forcings and the associated climate responses.”
Dr. Pielke
while global forcings can be associated with regional climate responses – Obvious, and quite sincerely agreed.
regional forcings can lead to global climate responses – References? This sounds interesting, I would like to look at the evidence. Aside from polar amplification (and similar global feedbacks), I don’t know of regional elements that can bend the boundary conditions that drive climate averages – rather than just inducing local energy distributions (aka ENSO and the like). I won’t say ‘simply’, as the math is not, but local is the key there.
Regional variations (which I consider ‘weather’) are indeed of critical importance to our immediate plans and responses – along the lines of better weather prediction. However, as initial value problems in a chaotic or near chaotic state, they are by no means equivalent to the long term boundary value problems such as climate averages. Again, focusing on the local, the regional, the immediate (as you advocate), while deprecating the global trends, the larger point of view – that’s (in, again, my opinion) truly myopic.
A particular tree may be doing very well – but if the forest as a whole is burning, that small sub-sample isn’t going to look good for very long…
KR – Regarding “regional forcings can lead to global climate responses – References?” see the references in the body of the text of NRC (2005).
With respect to climate being a boundary value problem, see the discussion in
Pielke Sr., R.A., 2010: Comment on ” A Unified Modeling Approach to Climate System Prediction”, Bull. Amer. Meteor. Soc., 91, 1699–1701, DOI:10.1175/2010BAMS2975.
http://pielkeclimatesci.files.wordpress.com/2011/03/r-360.pdf
and
Publication Of “Comments on ‘A Unified Modeling Approach to Climate System” By R. A. Pielke Sr And “Reply” By Hurrell Et Al 2010
http://pielkeclimatesci.wordpress.com/2011/01/25/publication-of-comments-on-a-unified-modeling-approach-to-climate-system-by-r-a-pielke-sr-and-reply-by-hurrell-et-al-2010/
Finally, except for a few metrics such as sea level rise due to ocean heating, the climate effects of human and natural climate forcings have their most important impacts on regional scales. A global average smears out our ability to describe these effects. This does not mean that an increase in global average atmospheric CO2 and its radiative and biogeochemical effects are not important, but the climate system is much more complex than that. We overviewed this complexity in the NRC (2005) report and, more recently, in the EOS article.
Dr. Pielke
Thank you for the very interesting references, in particular the indirect reference to Hurrell 2009 (http://www.gfdl.noaa.gov/bibliography/related_files/Hurrell_2009BAMS2752.pdf). The border between weather prediction (initial value) and climate projections (boundary value) problems does indeed blur at midscale time/spatial resolutions.
I would disagree on long term climate being an initial value problem, however (a question you note was posed in 1998), – conservation of energy alone requires that that the boundary values of radiative balance will have an increasing influence over longer time scales. Initial values of weather cannot over the long term maintain the climate in an imbalanced state, as the restoring forcings will simply increase until a response occurs.
I would agree that mid-scale predictions at high spatial/temporal resolution beyond the ~10 day weather forecasts would be exceedingly useful. But this certainly doesn’t invalidate long term climate projections. As to long term effects on regional scales, I would argue that even the simplest global temperature anomaly or precipitation prediction is of use – understanding growth zones moving poleward (isotherms are fairly large scale), predicting seasonal start/end times, long term water forcasts, etc.. For example, the projection that by the end of the 21st century the California Central Valley (8% of US food production) will lose ~50% productivity due to temperature shifts and reduced precipitation is a low resolution projection worth paying attention to.
More detail is better. But even low resolution forecasts are of use.
Reference for my previous post:
Luedeling et al 2009, http://www.plosone.org/article/info%3Adoi%2F10.1371%2Fjournal.pone.0006166
KR – All climate time scales are strongly forced as a boundary value problem; for instance, daily solar heating or on intraannual and longer time scales solar forcing. However, initial conditions matter on all time scales also. For multi-decadal time scales, this includes the need to specifiy the ocean temperatures and salinty, continental and sea ice coverage, vegetation, ect.
If you prefer, the term “initial-boundary value problem” accurately captures this perspective, but the termimology “boundatry value problem” does not in my view. It is incomplete.
To illustrate why climate even on long time scales is an initial value problem, please see the example in our paper
Pielke, R.A. and X. Zeng, 1994: Long-term variability of climate. J. Atmos. Sci., 51, 155-159.
http://pielkeclimatesci.wordpress.com/files/2009/09/r-120.pdf
and also our discussion in
Rial, J., R.A. Pielke Sr., M. Beniston, M. Claussen, J. Canadell, P. Cox, H. Held, N. de Noblet-Ducoudre, R. Prinn, J. Reynolds, and J.D. Salas, 2004: Nonlinearities, feedbacks and critical thresholds within the Earth’s climate system. Climatic Change, 65, 11-38.
http://pielkeclimatesci.wordpress.com/files/2009/10/r-260.pdf
With respect to your comment “low resolution forecasts are of use”, I agree with you.
However, I would use “simulations” rather than “forecasts”. Nevertheless, what will they tell us beyond what we already know; i.e. that added CO2 is a positive radiative forcing and in the absence of large enough negative feedbacks and negative radaitive forcings will warm the climate system. Hence, it prudent to develop constructive policies that minimize how much more added CO2 we place in the atmosphere. The regional projections you present have not been shown, however, to be accurate, in that the climate models have not shown skill at predicting changes in climate statistics even in hindcast. Low resolution models do not even have the spatial scales to tell us anything about regional climate change, such as in the California Central Valley.
Dr. Pielke
I will have to continue to disagree, although you have argued your points well – Winograd 1992 (arguing ice ages from natural variability rather than Milankovich cycles) and similar articles are not well supported, or for that matter convincing, to the majority in the field. Back-projections of climate forcings match climate behavior reasonably well, even in the (rather spotty) warming of the MWP, and natural ‘cycles’ have not been demonstrated to statistical significance by anyone to my knowledge. Boundary conditions seem more than sufficient to predict >30 year variations in climate conditions, and arguments otherwise have not been convincing (in my opinion, granted).
Even the low resolution projections we have now (simple global temperature anomaly projections) indicate that regions like the California Central Valley will indeed lose precipitation and warm enough to significantly impact fruit and nut crops – unless you have evidence indicating that regional variations will outweigh the global shifts sufficiently to ensure continuing agricultural production? Because otherwise the global projections indicate severe issues in the future. The state of the science at present is more than sufficient to cause CA to put a lot of effort into considering how they will manage the agriculture going forward.
In other words, the global changes forthcoming are going to be severe – are you arguing that regional variations and influences will override the global changes, making them less severe where it’s important to us? Because otherwise, we have to prepare for the projections we have…
However – I am in total agreement that more accurate regional and temporal modelling and predictions are hugely desirable. I look forward to continuing progress in bridging the temporal/spatial scale space between initial value and (more or less) boundary condition projections.
Thank you again for the discussion – it’s been very interesting.
KR – In terms of your question
“…are you arguing that regional variations and influences will override the global changes, making them less severe where it’s important to us?’
please see our paper
Pielke Sr., R.A., R. Wilby, D. Niyogi, F. Hossain, K. Dairuku, J. Adegoke, G. Kallos, T. Seastedt, and K. Suding, 2011: Dealing with complexity and extreme events using a bottom-up, resource-based vulnerability perspective. AGU Monograph on Complexity and Extreme Events in Geosciences, in press. http://pielkeclimatesci.files.wordpress.com/2011/05/r-365.pdf
Our abtract reads
“We discuss the adoption of a bottom-up, resource–based vulnerability approach in evaluating the effect of climate and other environmental and societal threats to societally critical resources. This vulnerability concept requires the determination of the major threats to local and regional water, food, energy, human health, and ecosystem function resources from extreme events including climate, but also from other social and environmental issues. After these threats are identified for each resource, then the relative risks can be compared with other risks in order to adopt optimal preferred mitigation/adaptation strategies.
This is a more inclusive way of assessing risks, including from climate variability and climate change than using the outcome vulnerability approach adopted by the IPCC. A contextual vulnerability assessment, using the bottom-up, resource-based framework is a more inclusive approach for policymakers to adopt effective mitigation and adaptation methodologies to deal with the complexity of the spectrum of social and environmental extreme events that will occur in the coming decades, as the range of threats are assessed, beyond just the focus on CO2 and a few other greenhouse gases as emphasized in the IPCC assessments.”
This is a framework which would, in our view, develop more effective adaptation and mitigation policies in the coming decades. See also my son’s book
The Climate Fix – http://rogerpielkejr.blogspot.com/2010/04/climate-fix.html
Finally, thank you for the constructive exchange of viewpoints. I wish there was more such dialog in our science community.
Mike:
“The essay ignores the obvious fact that CO2 builds up in the atmosphere and thus will likely dominate other human activities in causing climate change.”
+++++++
Your objection is to him providing a reference to a previous article which you have termed, ‘opinion’ which you then counter with you own ‘opinion’ to which you neither append nor reference anything in support, even from your own previous publications (if they exist).
The article above is in support of a long stream of other evidence that CO2 does not dominate other human activities ‘causing climate change’. Further, there is no detectable signal that humans cause any climate change at all, because even if it is there, it is completely dominated by natural variation. Trying to assign a dominant role to AG CO2’s contribution to an undetectable signal is literally pointless and equal to arguing about how many fairies can dance on the head of a pin.
Eschew that which starts and ends in words.