by Roy W. Spencer, Ph. D.
LiveScience.com posted an article yesterday where the usual IPCC suspects (Gavin Schmidt, Kevin Trenberth, and Andy Dessler) dissed our recent paper in in the journal Remote Sensing.
Given their comments, I doubt any of them could actually state what the major conclusion of our paper was.
For example, Andy Dessler told LiveScience:
“He’s taken an incorrect model, he’s tweaked it to match observations, but the conclusions you get from that are not correct…”
Well, apparently Andy did not notice that those were OBSERVATIONS that disagreed with the IPCC climate models. And our model can quantitatively explain the disagreement.
Besides, is Andy implying the IPCC models he is so fond of DON’T have THEIR results tweaked to match the observations? Yeah, right.
Kevin Trenberth’s response to our paper, rather predictably, was:
“I cannot believe it got published”
Which when translated from IPCC-speak actually means, “Why didn’t I get the chance to deep-six Spencer’s paper, just like I’ve done with his other papers?”
Finally Gavin Schmidt claims that it’s the paleoclimate record that tells us how sensitive the climate system is, not the current satellite data. Oh, really? Then why have so many papers been published over the years trying to figure out how sensitive today’s climate system is? When scientists appeal to unfalsifiable theories of ancient events which we have virtually no data on, and ignore many years of detailed global satellite observations of today’s climate system, *I* think they are giving science a bad name.
COMMENTS ON THE FORBES ARTICLE BY JAMES TAYLOR
I have received literally dozens of phone calls and e-mails asking basically the same question: did James Taylor’s Forbes article really represent what we published in our Remote Sensing journal article this week?
Several of those people, including AP science reporter Seth Borenstein, actually read our article and said that there seemed to be a disconnect.
The short answer is that, while the title of the Forbes article (New NASA Data Blow Gaping Hole In Global Warming Alarmism) is a little over the top (as are most mainstream media articles about global warming science), the body of his article is — upon my re-reading of it — actually pretty good.
About the only disconnect I can see is we state in our paper that, while the discrepancy between the satellite observations were in the direction of the models producing too much global warming, it is really not possible to say by how much. Taylor’s article makes it sound much more certain that we have shown that the models produce too much warming in the long term. (Which I think is true…we just did not actually ‘prove’ it.)
But how is this any different than the reporting we see on the other side of the issue? Heck, how different is it than the misrepresentation of the certainty of the science in the IPCC’s own summaries for policymakers, versus what the scientists write in the body of those IPCC reports?
I am quite frankly getting tired of the climate ‘alarmists’ demanding that we ’skeptics’ be held a higher standard than they are held to. They claim our results don’t prove their models are wrong in their predictions of strong future warming, yet fail to mention they have no good, independent evidence their models are right.
For example….
…while our detractors correctly point out that the feedbacks we see in short term (year-to-year) climate variability might not indicate what the long-term feedbacks are in response to increasing CO2, the IPCC still uses short-term variability in their models to compare to satellite observations to then support the claimed realism of the long-term behavior of those models.
Well, they can’t have it both ways.
If they are going to validate their models with short term variability as some sort of indication that their models can be believed for long-term global warming, then they are going to HAVE to explain why there is such a huge discrepancy (see Fig. 3 in our paper) between the models and the satellite observations in what is the most fundamental issue: How fast do the models lose excess radiant energy in response to warming?
That is essentially the definition of “feedback”, and feedbacks determine climate sensitivity.
I’m sorry, but if this is the best they can do in the way of rebuttal to our study, they are going to have to become a little more creative.
I have a post up at Climate Etc. on the Spencer and Braswell paper
http://judithcurry.com/2011/07/30/spencer-braswells-new-paper/
Trenberth, Gates and many others are wrong about the cloudiness response to ENSO.
The late 20th century was characterised by a run of strong El Ninos yet cloud cover DECREASED.
They have it exactly wrong in global terms even if they are right in regional terms. Now despite the beginning of a negative PDO cloud cover is INCREASING.
El Nino increases surface air temperature to enhance convection above. That enhanced convection then descends in the sub tropics to strengthen and widen the sub tropical high pressure cells for LESS clouds and MORE energy into the oceans.
In the process the mid latitude jets get pushed poleward and/or become more zonal for reduced total cloud cover globally.
However that is only half the story because at the same time the level of solar activity is affecting the vertical temperature profile of the atmosphere too but from the poles and can either supplement or offset the effect of ENSO on the size of the sub tropical high pressure cells and the latitudinal position of the jets.
In view of the data how can they keep asserting that El Nino produces more clouds and La Nina produces less clouds?
Mine is the only hypothesis that accommodates all that plus a cooling stratosphere when the sun is active and a warming stratosphere when the sun is inactive.
During the late 20th century warming trend the stratosphere was observed to cool and that was also supposed to be in accordance with AGW. However since the 90s that cooling has ceased and the stratospheric temperature trend is now one of slight warming:
http://www.jstage.jst.go.jp/article/sola/5/0/53/_pdf
“The evidence for the cooling trend in the stratosphere may need to be revisited. This study presents evidence that the stratosphere has been slightly warming since 1996.”
Nice hijack attempt R Gates. The results of Spencer’s study are about how much energy is being released to space versus how much energy the computer models calculate is being released to space. It has nothing to do with what drives what, and the study isn’t a model, it is just measurements compared to models. The models are wrong, or the measurements are.
Sad is it not that the world is inhabited by legions of those (like you) who would rather believe that the sky is falling than to admit that the bump on Chicken Little’s head is from an acorn. Confronted with the fact that there are no cracks in the sky, nor pieces missing from it, they point to the bump on Chicken Little’s head and come up with the most convoluted of theories as to why it could not possibly have been an acorn, or any of a thousand other causes, it must have been a piece of the sky. They even have computer models showing exactly how the sky is falling apart.
Sadder still is what their obvious belief system dictates to them. They rejoice in every bit of evidence showing that the world is coming to an end, and with grim determination, discredit every shred of evidence that it is not. It is bad enough that they believe their models to the point that they ignore actual measurements showing the models to be wrong. But the worst part is that they WANT the sky to be falling. Not because it would prove their models right, but because they can’t believe in a world where humanity has a bright future and doesn’t bring disaster down on themselves.
“Travesty” Trenberth’s ironically ambiguous comment is particularly precious: “I cannot believe it got published” And Schmidt’s “Climate sensitivity is not constrained by the last two decades of imperfect satellite data, but rather the paleoclimate record” is a close second. Warmists have loudly proclaimed that contrarian arguments derived from paleoclimate data don’t apply to the modern, “unprecedented” CO2 levels. This is starting to actually get funny.
Brian says:
“James Taylor can’t be taken seriously because of his over the top article and ties to Heartland Institute. The guy is obviously a flim-flammer and probably a god fearing Republican also.”
That’s what passes for an attempted refutation when an alarmist posts at the internet’s “Best Science” site. Really, ad-homs and projection are all they’ve got.
La Nina reduces air temperature thus clouds. Without clouds the fairly constant Sun is allowed more access to the ocean. We don’t readily see the heat build up because equatorial winds that blow towards the west are stronger during La Nina’s thus mixing colder layers beneath with the warmer layers above. Without a warmer sea surface temperature, clouds are not formed as thickly, as evaporation is reduced.
During El Nino, air temps build up thus clouds build up. The winds that were blowing towards the west die down or change direction and blow towards the east. The waters not only layer themselves, but start evaporating off the top layer of warmth into the atmosphere, creating clouds that prevent the Sun’s full strength from getting to the ocean surface.
Correct me if I am wrong, but that is why La Nina absorbs heat and El Nino evaporates heat from the oceans.
Steve Garcia asked
“I’ve searched high and low and can’t find out where the scientists say the heat energy for El Niño comes from. I know, Trenberth has much better access to sources than I do. I would have this question: What paper explains the mechanisms of HOW the La Niña “uptakes” and “stores” the heat? I’d like to see exactly what assumptions are behind this assertion. I have a hypothesis in the back of my head that I’d like to falsify and get rid of, if it is worthless.”
In my opinion the heat energy for El Nino accumulates because the ITCZ is always north of the equator (due to the current global landmass distribution) which creates an imbalance of solar shortwave inout either side of the equator.
Periodically the imbalance becomes large enough to provoke an El Nino event as the system tries to move back towards thermal equilibrium either side of the equator.
In theory the release of ocean energy during an El nino should reduce ocean heat content for a net cooling of the entire system. However during the late 20th century ocean heat content rose despite the run of powerful El Ninos. Now, with more La Ninas the ocean heat content should in theory be recharging but it is not.
The reason is that El Nino actually increases the width of the subtropical high pressure cells pushing the jets poleward and allowing MORE sunlight into the oceans.
However that is not always enough to offset the energy release. Another factor is required to achieve that.
That other factor is the level of solar activity. When the sun is active the polar vortex becomes more positive pulling the jets poleward which supplements the effect of the EL NIno allowing even more sunlight into the oceans. So it was during the late 20th century. Strong El Ninos combined with an active sun allowed the surface pressure distribution to change enough to allow sufficient shortwave into the oceans such that ocean heat content rose despite the strong El Ninos.
That is the only scenario whereby all the observations can be made to work in a coherent fashion.
Responding to R. Gates:
Feel free to look at a .pdf of the original paper (I am holding a hardcopy of it in my formerly nicotine-stained fingers [riffle-riffle-riffle]) where it says on the first page, directly underneath the authorship data:
“Received: 24 May 2011; in revised form: 13 July 2011/ Accepted 15 July 2011/ Published: 25 July 2011”
Then on page 1612 (the next-to-the-last page):
[boldface] “Acknowledgements” [boldface off]
“We acknowledge the modeling groups, the Program for Climate Model Diagnosis and Intercomparison (PCMDI) and WCRP’s Working Group on Coupled Modeling (WGCM) for their roles in making available the WCRP CMIP3multi-model dataset. Support for this dataset is provided by the Office of Science, US Department of Energy. This research was sponsored by DOE contract DE-SC0005330 and NOAA contract NA09NES4400017.”
As far as peer-review goes, in the thousands of scientific papers I have read, I usually see something to the effect of, ” … … and the comments of [2] [3] anonymous reviewers … …”, so the absence of such a statement here is of some concern. I would expect that Dr. Spencer could shed some light upon this, but I do note that there was a gap of some two months duration from May to July, when the original was revised.
Possibly in response to some reviewer(s) comments?
Mark H.
The presumption that a lack of clouds mean that the ocean is heating is deeply flawed. For any given radiative heating there will be a wind speed that evaporates the heat away as it arrives. So the tropical cu-nim seen from space is a much smaller area than the area of ocean it cools.
Strong trade winds will cool the ocean even under a cloudless noon.
“Well, they can’t have it both ways.”
The warmista cult believes COLD is HOT and all newly minted sunshine heat is “unprecidented.”
On top of that, everything is heating up “faster than previously thought.”
So of course the warmista cult must have it both ways…the “theory” cannot withstand the logical truth.
If there is no warming, man cannot be responsible for non-warming.
So even though the planet is not warming, it in fact, is according to the lying bastards who have been caught lying from the start.
Having it both ways is easy for the warministas…their rent seeking hoax and scam depends on it.
Yippee Ky AAAY Dr Spencer!!!
“Finally Gavin Schmidt claims that it’s the paleoclimate record that tells us how sensitive the climate system is, not the current satellite data…..”
I would ask him, in a Jack Nicholson voice: “Now, are these the questions I was really called here to answer? Tree rings and sediments? Please tell me that you have something more, Gavin. The whole CAGW world is on trial for their life. Please tell me their scientist hasn’t pinned their hopes to a tree ring.” 🙂
Best,
J.
Smokey,
Even George Bush, Romney and John McCain are in agreement that Climate Change is an issue that must be addressed.
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2008/04/15/george-bush-global-warmin_n_96871.html
http://articles.boston.com/2011-06-04/news/29685848_1_global-warming-climate-change-greenhouse-gases
http://www.boston.com/news/politics/politicalintelligence/2008/01/mccain_vows_to.html
It’s time to accept reality Smokey. Even those that you think would deny the issue are now accepting it.
Doug in Seattle says:
July 30, 2011 at 10:38 am
The ball is back on Dr. Spencer’s side of the net after Trenberth, et al give a weak return. Now its time for the spike. Perhaps Kirby or Svensmark will take the honors.
Dr. Spencer may be preparing to deliver the spike. His July 15 blog entry announcing that his paper had been accepted for publication closes with this statement: “And this is not over…I am now writing up what I consider to be our most convincing evidence yet that the climate system is relatively insensitive.”
http://www.drroyspencer.com/2011/07/our-refutation-of-dessler-2010-is-accepted-for-publication/
Dr Spencer
At what wavelength(s) is the outgoing radiation measured? My guess is it would be around the 10 micron atmospheric window. Are there any measurements around the 15 micron CO2 absorbtion band. It would seem to me that the ratio of outgoing radiation at 10 micron and 15 micron would be conclusive one way or the other. As the amount of CO2 increases the radiation at 10 micron should go up and the radiation at 15 micron should go down. Therefore the ratio of the two should increase dramatically. Have these measurement been made?
I have also made the point before that a decrease in 15 micron radiation requires the layer radiating into space to be at a lower temperature. This is the basis of the AGW theory since the greater CO2 density means the layer moves to a higher altitude. For low CO2 densities (less than about 400 ppm) this makes sense. However the satelite data I have seems to show that at current densities the radiation layer is already at the tropopause. Thus a higher altitude no longer means a lower temperature. From now on increasing densities needs a drop in tropopause temperature. There may be a mechanism to cause this but it is not obvious. However if it is happening it should be measureable. Has such measurement been made?
Sandy Rham says:
July 30, 2011 at 11:51 am
“The presumption that a lack of clouds mean that the ocean is heating is deeply flawed. For any given radiative heating there will be a wind speed that evaporates the heat away as it arrives. So the tropical cu-nim seen from space is a much smaller area than the area of ocean it cools.
Strong trade winds will cool the ocean even under a cloudless noon.”
Locally and/or regionally yes but globally no.
The extra uplift in the tropics enhances the downward flow in the subtropics for an overall expansion of the tropics as a whole with more sunshine and more energy into the global oceans.
A similar reply for Pamela. Due to a La Nina reducing the energy supply to the air the air cools and can hold less water in vapour form so whatever happens regionally or locally the global effect is more clouds and the tropics contract.
This is what the cloudiness data says:
http://bbso.njit.edu/Research/EarthShine/literature/Palle_etal_2006_EOS.pdf
See fig 1 . Until 2000 positive PDO with lots of strong El Ninos) cloudiness was decreasing. Since then (negative PDO just getting under way) it has been increasing.
Brian,
Politicians, left- or right-wing, always sing along with the crowd.
Their “opinion” isn’t worth the paper it’s printed on.
Maybe it’s time you should accept reality, Brian: climate has been always changing, long before we featherless bipeds were introduced by evolution.
Dr Spencer, heard you on Coast to Coast. Sounded Good!!
Brian sez:
“Even George Bush, Romney and John McCain are in agreement that Climate Change is an issue…”
And their qualifications are …?
Brian, you are trying to make this issue one of partisan politics. IANAR, and plenty of liberal/left folks who post here know the catastrophic AGW scare is being hyped for grant money.
And climate alarmist Michael Mann became infamous for his debunked hockey stick chart, which purported to show there was no climate change until the start of the industrial revolution. But the IPCC can no longer use Mann’s original hockey stick chart, because it was so thoroughly deconstructed by McIntyre & McKitrick.
In other words, it is actually the believers in the CAGW conjecture who refused to accept the fact that the climate has always changed. Skeptics have always known that the climate constantly changes — and that prior to the industrial revolution there were much more drastic changes than the current, very benign climate.
Mike says:
July 30, 2011 at 9:49 am
**How many journals did Spencer submit the paper to before he found one that would take it?**
Too bad. The team does not control all the publications. You wish.
Brian says:
July 30, 2011 at 12:05 pm
Smokey,
**Even George Bush, Romney and John McCain are in agreement that Climate Change is an issue that must be addressed.**
And where did they get their “science” from?
You are right. Address it to the round file.
Brian says:
July 30, 2011 at 12:05 pm
Even George Bush, Romney and John McCain are in agreement that Climate Change is an issue that must be addressed.
Idiots and scalliwags of all stripes have joined the CAGW bandwagon for various and sundry reasons – money, power, fame, desire to be “part of something”, etc. What’s your excuse?
@Gates
What do you know about how the peer review was performed for Spencer’s paper? What we do know is several journals are predisposed to reject papers that put the so-called “consensus” view. It took McIntyre & McKitrick 18 months to get their paper published after several months alone battling the stall tactics by Santer et al.
How much “peer review” scrutiny went into this load of dung by Dessler in his?
[my bold]
Virtually guaranteed? That is a scientific statement?
Roy Spencer has offered to hold a public debate with Andrew Dessler or anyone else on these matters.
Brian says (July 30, 2011 at 12:05 pm): “Even George Bush, Romney and John McCain are in agreement that Climate Change is an issue that must be addressed…It’s time to accept reality Smokey. Even those that you think would deny the issue are now accepting it.”
BWAHAHAHAHA!
OMG, I can’t believe he actually cited politicians as experts on “reality”!
Wait, wait, I can do even better: “Ahem, I believe in CAGW because…
(wait for it)
I saw it on ‘JERSEY SHORE’!!!” HAHAHA!
Stop, stop, you’re killing me! 🙂
From Brian on July 30, 2011 at 11:08 am:
As opposed to being a god-fearing Democrat, which isn’t a problem. Or is it? Do they exist in your tiny closed-off world? Is your issue merely with someone being a god-fearing (fill in political affiliation)? You really need some good trolling skills, that’s way too blatant.
From Brian on July 30, 2011 at 12:05 pm:
So after implicitly denigrating Taylor as less trustworthy for probably being a god-fearing Republican, you cite THREE god-fearing Republicans for your attempted appeal to authority. And do so with two pre-Climategate articles so for all we know Bush’s and McCain’s positions have changed, and Romney was a Massachusetts governor where you basically can’t win a state election without moderate/liberal leanings. To note it though, Romney was opposed to Cap and Trade.
BTW, even Wikipedia has noted an apparent change to McCain’s position:
Ref 243: http://thinkprogress.org/2010/02/17/mccain-never-favored-cap/
Ref 246: “On Climate, Partners on Hill Drift Apart”, Juliet Eilperin Washington Post September 13, 2009
Go back to your (C)AGW-pushing masters. Your Troll-Fu is weak.
R. Gates: “The Spencer and Braswell paper is now getting the review is should have had before being published.”
Do you think that Mann’s upside down Tiljander data had the review it should have had before being published?