UPDATE: Dr. Roger Pielke Sr. has a comment on the paper here: Comments On The Dessler 2011 GRL Paper “Cloud Variations And The Earth’s Energy Budget also, physicist Lubos Motl has an analysis here. The press release from TAMU/Dessler has been pushed to media outlets on Eurekalert, see update below.
UPDATE2: Dessler has made a video on the paper see it here And Steve McIntyre has his take on it with The stone in Trenberth’s shoe
I’ve been given an advance copy, for which I’ve posted excerpts below. This paper appears to have been made ready in record time, with a turnaround from submission to acceptance and publication of about six weeks based on the July 26th publication date of the original Spencer and Braswell paper. We should all be so lucky to have expedited peer review service. PeerEx maybe, something like FedEx? Compare that to the two years it took to get Lindzen and Choi out the door. Or how about the WUWT story: “Science has been sitting on his [Spencer’s] critique of Dessler’s paper for months”.
If anyone needs a clear, concise, and irrefutable example of how peer review in climate science is biased for the consensus and against skeptics, this is it.
I’m sure some thorough examination will determine if the maxim “haste makes waste” applies here for Dessler’s turbo treatise.
Cloud variations and the Earth’s energy budget
A.E. Dessler
Dept. of Atmospheric Sciences
Texas A&M University
College Station, TX
Abstract: The question of whether clouds are the cause of surface temperature changes, rather than acting as a feedback in response to those temperature changes, is explored using data obtained between 2000 and 2010. An energy budget calculation shows that the energy trapped by clouds accounts for little of the observed climate variations. And observations of the lagged response of top-of-atmosphere (TOA) energy fluxes to surface temperature variations are not evidence that clouds are causing climate change.
Introduction
The usual way to think about clouds in the climate system is that they are a feedback — as the climate warms, clouds change in response and either amplify (positive cloud feedback) or ameliorate (negative cloud feedback) the initial change [e.g., Stephens, 2005]. In recent papers, Lindzen and Choi [2011, hereafter LC11] and Spencer and Braswell [2011, hereafter SB11] have argued that reality is reversed: clouds are the cause of, and not a feedback on, changes in surface temperature. If this claim is correct, then significant revisions to climate science may be required.
…
Conclusions
These calculations show that clouds did not cause significant climate change over the last decade (over the decades or centuries relevant for long-term climate change, on the other hand, clouds can indeed cause significant warming). Rather, the evolution of the surface and atmosphere during ENSO variations are dominated by oceanic heat transport. This means in turn that regressions of TOA fluxes vs. ΔTs can be used to accurately estimate climate sensitivity or the magnitude of climate feedbacks. In addition, observations presented by LC11 and SB11 are not in fundamental disagreement with mainstream climate models, nor do they provide evidence that clouds are causing climate change. Suggestions that significant revisions to mainstream climate science are required are therefore not supported.
Acknowledgments: This work was supported by NSF grant AGS-1012665 to Texas A&M University. I thank A. Evan, J. Fasullo, D. Murphy, K. Trenberth, M. Zelinka, and A.J. Dessler for useful comments.
h/t to Marc Hendrickx
=============================================================
UPDATE: Here is the press release from Texas A&M via Eurekalert:
Texas A&M prof says study shows that clouds don’t cause climate change
COLLEGE STATION, Sept. 6, 2011 — Clouds only amplify climate change, says a Texas A&M University professor in a study that rebuts recent claims that clouds are actually the root cause of climate change.
Andrew Dessler, a Texas A&M atmospheric sciences professor considered one of the nation’s experts on climate variations, says decades of data support the mainstream and long-held view that clouds are primarily acting as a so-called “feedback” that amplifies warming from human activity. His work is published today in the American Geophysical Union’s peer-reviewed journal Geophysical Research Letters.
Dessler studied El Niño and La Niña cycles over the past 10 years and calculated the Earth’s “energy budget” over this time. El Nino and La Nina are cyclical events, roughly every five years, when waters in the central Pacific Ocean tend to get warmer or colder. These changes have a huge impact on much of the world’s weather systems for months or even years.
Dessler found that clouds played a very small role in initiating these climate variations — in agreement, he says, with mainstream climate science and in direct opposition to some previous claims.
“The bottom line is that clouds have not replaced humans as the cause of the recent warming the Earth is experiencing,” Dessler says.
Texas is currently in one of the worst droughts in the state’s history, and most scientists believe it is a direct result of La Niña conditions that have lingered in the Pacific Ocean for many months.
Dessler adds, “Over a century, however, clouds can indeed play an important role amplifying climate change.”
“I hope my analysis puts an end to this claim that clouds are causing climate change,” he adds.
For more information about Dessler’s research, go to http://goo.gl/zFJmt
About Research at Texas A&M University:
As one of the world’s leading research institutions, Texas A&M is in the vanguard in making significant contributions to the storehouse of knowledge, including that of science and technology. Research conducted at Texas A&M represents an annual investment of more than $630 million, which ranks third nationally for universities without a medical school, and underwrites approximately 3,500 sponsored projects. That research creates new knowledge that provides basic, fundamental and applied contributions resulting in many cases in economic benefits to the state, nation and world.
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Warm biased climate scientists are the only people in the world who know all the unknown unknowns! So they tell us.
“Suggestions that significant revisions to mainstream climate science are required are therefore not supported.”
I suspect that this was actully the starting point of the paper and everything else was build around it.
It`s simply a trick to ensure SB11 doesn`t make it into AR5 for consideration.
” Spencer and Braswell [2011, hereafter SB11] have argued that reality is reversed: clouds are the cause of, and not a feedback on, changes in surface temperature. If this claim is correct, then significant revisions to climate science may be required.”
30 sec passing scan. I believe S&B suggest the cloud feedback is bidirectional.
How about we examine the paper rather than the process? It may not say much, but I don’t think SB11 did either. I think this is still an area for further investigation though.
Question …where did Lindzen, Choi, Spencer and Braswell write that “significant revisions to mainstream climate science are required”?
Dave Wendt: “I believe S&B suggest the cloud feedback is bidirectional.”
Exactly. So this paper by Dessler doesn’t properly address the points that S&B made.
Crikey, I’m an idiot an even I understood their paper suggest cloud feedback is bidirectional. Wonder if the MSM such as Richard Black will notice it when they write their balanced pieces…..
“If anyone needs a clear, concise, and irrefutable example of how peer review in climate science is biased for the consensus and against skeptics, this is it.”
The system is biased against bad science. So-called “skeptics” produce a lot of bad science, and it’s a good thing that they have difficulty publishing it.
Hmmm … thats funny … I don’t see any refererence to the EXISTING work on clouds as a forcing shown in the recently released CERN CLOUD study …
http://press.web.cern.ch/press/PressReleases/Releases2011/PR15.11E.html
Wasn’t that the major complaint with Spencer and Braswell – that they did not address the existing science on the issue?
Even Gavin Schmidt speaks positively (at least to the extent that’s possible for his group) about the CERN CLOUD study’s findings … this study would seem to be directly relevant to the S&B paper yet Dessler seemingly ignores it
JGR is normally fast. They gives the stats in this editorial:
“Publication is indeed rapid. For the past 3 years we have maintained an effi cient review process, with a median time to first decision of 36 days and, for 50% of accepted papers, an average time from submission to publication of 13.5 weeks.”
Mr D is right you know, as it clearly states…
“These calculations show that clouds did not cause significant climate change over the last decade”
Is it not rather difficult to show how anything can change a system if the system as measured (climate change) has not changed over the last decade.
or to put it into easyspeak .. all that heat energy I put into my house last year can now be clearly seen not to affect my house, as it has not warmed up over the year. proof !!!
‘Clouds cause climate change.’
‘They do not!’
‘Oh yes they do!”
“Oh no they dont…..”
Even if the turnaround time for the paper is a record it is still obviously far too long. If it could have been published before Spencer and Braswell’s paper then there would have been absolutely no need for anyone to take any notice of their sceptical arguments, would there?
The peer review process needs to be redefined so that in cases where it is not possible for the referees to reject sceptical papers the rebuttal comes out first!
Good grief.
Indecent haste indeed, and does appear to be flawed. I think the team will live to regret this.
The part I liked was:
“These calculations show that clouds did not cause significant climate change over the last decade (over the decades or centuries relevant for long term climate change, on the other hand clouds can cause significant warming)”.
I suppose this sort of logic sums up alarmist ‘science’ – something like: “The factual evidence for man made global warming cannot be found, but as the models show that climate change is caused by man, it means the science is settled.”
Climate change is the norm, it is simply not possible to fix climate – which is why goofy politicians have created Ministers for Climate Change in an attempt to regulate something, which simply cannot be regulated.
THe paper says;
“These calculations show that clouds did not cause significant climate change over the last decade (over the decades or centuries relevant for long-term climate change, on the other hand, clouds can indeed cause significant warming)”
A decade is a very short period and difficult to measure, especially when the temperature was mostly flatlining. But surely the author is saying that over a longer period clouds can have an effect? I will see what else is in the pdf before commenting further so jst an initial response to the abstract.
tonyb .
Entirely from physical experience of the world around me. It’s very simplistic and empirical, but I believe it’s relevant to these papers being discussed, so here goes…
It’s the morning, the skies are clear of cloud. Temperatures are cool to begin with, but it’s humid. Later on, some cumulus cloud begins to form. A pleasant sight….
It’s now late afternoon. It’s hot and it’s muggy. The initially small cumulus clouds have been growing bigger and taller. Central pillars inside the cumulus cloud are now shooting up – actually visibly, if you keep your eye on one of the pillars – it’s a majestic sight as you realise this upwards movement of the growing towers represents immense energies being expended in order for this to happen.
Where I am standing, the sun is blazing down on me and I feel very hot, but, one of the cumulus clouds has moved in front of the sun and I am now in shadow. I instantly feel that the heat from the sun has decreased by a large order of magnitude.
A little while later, the cumulus clouds have reached some kind of pinnacle, some certain boundary high up in the atmosphere. At this height, they begin to spread out, like the top of some gigantic fountain, only this water isn’t falling (yet) – it’s forming an anvil-shaped head at the top of the cloud. The cumulo-nimbus is born.
Shortly after that, I hear the first rumblings of thunder. Those little cumulus clouds have grown into monstrous thunderclouds and the storms begin.
There is gusty wind, heavy rain, even hail. There is numerous lightning and clamorous thunder with that. There is high drama all around me as I observe the weather.
A while later and the storms begin to wane, and eventually die out. It is much, much cooler! I’m going to get a decent sleep tonight after all.
And so now to the point;
The above is a very short and basic description of the birth and death of a thundery day. It describes the phenomenon below, namely;
1) The sun obviously heats up the ground and anything the sunlight hits – roofs of houses, etc.
2) If a cloud gets in between the sun and the ground, the ground – or a person standing on the ground – stops heating up because they’re in the cloud’s shadow – this to me means a negative forcing – i.e. sunlight is being prevented from hitting me or the ground by the cloud – the cloud is reflecting the energy of the sun that would have heated me/ground up. The cloud is not being heated up by the energy from the sun, seeing as cloud is not a solid object. At the very most, only the top “layer” (e.g. perhaps the water molecules forming the cloud down to a certain depth from the top of the cloud are absorbing any energy from the sun.)
3) Finally, the thunderstorm is transporting energy from the ground, upwards, to high altitudes, and cooler air is being transported down towards the ground. This, to me, also represents a negative feedback.
Now, how is it that this paper (and others) can claim that clouds can only produce a positive feedback, when from imperial, physical evidence and observation, I can deduce that clouds appear to produce more negative feedback than they do positive?
Silly me. I had thought the pdf link would lead to more information but it seems to be a paywall. Its very difficult to comment any further on such a brief abstract.
tonyb
Stevo says
“So-called “skeptics” produce a lot of bad science, and it’s a good thing that they have difficulty publishing it.”
Stevo, why are they “So called”? What does that statement mean?
Kind Regards
Michael
Accepted aug 29.
GRL says that the median time to a first response after submission is 36 days
GRL says they can turn a review in as quick as 14 days
GRL says the average paper takes 13.5 week from submission to publication.
July 26th to august 29.
heck this paper got written, submitted, reviewed and accepted faster than 50% of papers
wait to get their first response.
So, is this a defense soley against Spencer or does represent an opening against CERNs work as well? It is beginning to sound like the gambit has changed from: “the Sun doesn’t matter”, to add ” and neither do clouds”.
What a pile of…….
With an as yet undetermined appendage Dessler writes:
“These calculations show that clouds did not cause significant climate change over the last decade”
I wasn’t aware there was any significant climate change due to any cause during that period of time. Global average temperature hasn’t significantly changed in the past 10 years.
Seems like a rather glaring flaw. Am I missing something?
There has not been “significant climate change over the last decade”.
I fail to see the point, or the point of reading further????