Open thread weekend

For your entertainment, here is an excerpt from a letter I wrote to my son’s geography teacher, answering some of the questions she put in a pamphlet to encourage students to continue with geography studies to age 16.
1. Does it matter that 1998 was the warmest year on record, since 1861?
Yes, but not for the reasons you think. You think that this means that global warming is an increasing danger to the world, and that with some fluctuations global temperatures are still rising. But it does matter that 1998, now 14 years ago, was the warmest rather than a more recent year, because the failure of these following years is rapidly falsifying the models and projections on which the IPCC relies for its alarming view of climate around 2100AD. In fact, a noisy function in the vicinity of its peak will tend to show fairly flat behaviour, just like that seen in the years 2001-2011 (and almost certainly 2012 too). After a peak comes a fall – global cooling, a term which may surprise you, except that even mainstream media such as The Daily Mail are now reporting on the possibility that a grand solar minimum, possibly to rival Maunder’s, will imply a cooling climate.
Why did the question specify “since 1861”? The pre-eminent UK global temperature series is HadCRUT3, which starts in 1850. So 1998 was the warmest since at least 1850, and quite probably since about 1300, when the Mediaeval Warm Period started to give way to the Little Ice Age; but we really don’t know when the last warmer year was. In my spare time I have been writing a paper (to submit to peer-reviewed journals) which fits a curve to carbon dioxide concentrations and the length of solar cycles. It predicts a very modest global cooling of about 0.06K during 2010-2030, so it is quite possible that 1998’s mark may not be exceeded until the 2030s (though the odd “super El Nino” year could do it). There are some global cooling alarmists who predict far more serious cooling, but for now I am going to trust my more balanced view.
2. What is happening to the world’s ice? Will ski-ing holidays still be available in 2060?
It depends on which bits of the world’s ice are being considered. The Antarctic sea ice has shown a very modest upward trend over the last 30 years. In contrast, the Arctic sea ice as measured at minimum (September) has declined significantly. When measured at maximum extent the decline is smaller but still noticeable. Right now there is more ice than usual in the Bering Sea, but less in the Greenland and Barents seas. This is probably related to the fact that the Pacific Decadal Oscillation has gone negative whereas the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation is still positive. Global warming theorists might argue that oceans will never return to the cooler conditions of yesteryear, but the PDO contradicts that, so how confident are you that the AMO will not reverse phase?
So yes, while the AMO is positive we can expect polar sea ice on the Atlantic side to be low, and more melting could occur even if global air temperatures do fall slightly. But 2007’s record low Arctic ice extent has not yet been broken. It will of course be fascinating to see when (and if) it does get broken. Will 2007 be to Arctic sea ice what 1998 is to global temperatures (i.e. a hard record to break)? Or is the Arctic in a so-called “death spiral”, and most years from now will be lower than 2007’s?
Now ski-ing holidays are taken on mountains rather than on sea ice, so there shouldn’t be much connection between the two. Except, bizarrely, only today I read a report suggesting that a warmer Arctic would, for a while, lead to colder northern winters. But I have to say I have very little faith in that research – it just seems to be a knee-jerk reaction to the fact that we have had some cold winters recently.
Regarding ski-ing in 2060, my model puts the global temperature at about 0.93K above the 1971-2000 mean, or 0.55K above the 1996-2006 mean. That’s a bit of global warming, but I don’t think it’s enough to prevent ski-ing in the Alps. The saturated adiabatic lapse rate is about 5K/km, and global warming of 0.5K might translate, through “polar amplification” and a large stretch of the imagination, to 1.0K at the Alps’ latitude, so that corresponds to a freezing level difference of 200m. Alpine ski resorts typically offer a vertical range of 1200-1500m, so they won’t lose all their snow, but the season will on average be a little shorter, and in late season taking lifts back down to the resort will become more common. It’ll still be great fun though.
As a case in point, at the end of November there were concerns that no snow had fallen at village levels; now they have oodles, and in Les Deux Alpes the maximum temperature this week is set to be -14degC. You can add 1 degree of global warming to that and not make much impact on a cold February’s ski-ing.
3. Will rising sea levels affect me?
No. That is a categorical “no”, not just for me in my fifties, but for James in his teens too. The rate of sea level rise in the last 30 years has been about 3mm per year, and there has been no sign of acceleration. In fact the latest La Nina (cold and contracting Pacific Ocean) has put a big dent into the figures and sea levels have fallen the odd millimetre, probably temporarily. Even the IPCC AR4 only puts sea level rise at 40cm per century.
The only risk is the pusillanimity of the British government. “Sea levels are inching up, shall we build bigger walls and dykes like the Dutch do, to protect our land? Nah, I never much liked East Anglia anyway…”
4. Is Toowoomba a victim of climate change?
Where? Oh, that town near Brisbane which was deluged in January 2011. Now this is actually quite an interesting question. But these are not the climate changes you are looking for. The onset of global cooling is in fact a plausible mechanism for flooding, and I was attributing the one to the other even at 1p.m. on July 20th 2007 while I was trying to persuade the stream in our garden not to invade our house. Why is it plausible? Well, why is August typically wetter than July? It is because the atmosphere has warmed and saturated with moisture, and the onset of any hint of autumnal cooling causes heavy rain.
Globally we can have the same effect occurring. The Pakistan floods were caused by cold air coming down through central Asia and meeting the monsoon air. In Queensland the Pacific condition was La Nina, a massive cooling current, not the warming El Nino.
There are two aspects to Toowoomba which are really striking as regards the fickleness of Mother Nature and our stupid belief that we understand Her. The first is that before 2011 the Australians were blaming global warming for the severe drought they were suffering in the Murray-Darling basin – as if they had never suffered droughts before. Well they are not in drought since that La Nina kicked in. Last year they had to give up filming the latest film in the Mad Max series at their favoured location – because the desert was too green!
The second aspect is an awful human culpability bordering on the criminal, because it probably cost lives. At the time of the heavy rains some hydrologists knew that a bad river surge would surely occur if they let the reservoir fill up, so they wanted to release plenty of water well before it filled up. But the head honcho, knowing of the drought, could not bear to let one drop go out until it was absolutely necessary. And by then, with the continuing rains, it was too late! So that belief in the continuing drought-making effects of global warming killed people.
Finally, here are a couple of questions which didn’t make it into your list.
5. Does it matter that solar Cycle 23 was the longest since 1850?
Yes, because it was 2 years longer than the average of the previous 8 cycles, and my model shows that those 2 years convert to global cooling of 0.16K. This is counteracted by about 0.10K of warming from increased CO2, leaving a net cooling. Because the previous cycles were shorter, part of the global warming of the 20th century was attributable to that, leaving the sensitivity to CO2 at 1.8K per doubling, well below central IPCC estimates.
6. Does it matter that thunderstorms have become a rarity in England since 2006?
Not really – it’s the sort of “climate change” which is benign, and not that noticeable (had you noticed it – the Met Office don’t report on this type of thing). But it contradicts the “climate change meme” of the Earth’s climate becoming more violent (as does the lowest Accumulated Cyclone Energy levels for 40 years). And it’s another sign of the quiet sun, which is proving to be in the driving seat of climate. Solar maximum is due in 2013, so I am hoping to see a few more thunderstorms this summer.
I hope that you have found these answers interesting, and that you will be encouraged to think about teaching a balanced view of global warming in Geography. Because the only thing that is certain about it all is that the science isn’t settled.

The Cliff Mass Weather Blog is the best weather blog I have seen. His topic is mainly Seattle weather. Why can’t other weather sites give the excellent graphics and explanations he does?
http://cliffmass.blogspot.com/
Today’s entry is “Will we do anything about global warming? Should we?”
http://cliffmass.blogspot.com/2012/02/will-we-do-anything-about-global.html
Cliff is convinced that CAGW is real, although there is still hope for him.

Although warming is certain, the AMOUNT of warming is not–there is a substantial range of possibilities, and significantly the uncertainties have not been reduced during the past several decades. (As we have learned more, additional uncertainties appear!)
Unfortunately, this global warming business has become politicized. Sometimes I think Al Gore did far more harm than good; if he had never injected the issue into the political arena, might we be in a better place now? Hard to know. And too many people have confused what HAS happened to what WILL happen. Global warming up to now has been relatively subtle and roughly of the same magnitude as natural climate variations. The big action is YET to come, particularly in the later half of this century. Politicians and a few activist scientists that exaggerated the effects of greenhouse-induced warming on recent climate/weather events have often done far more harm than good by reducing the credibility of the real threat later in this century.

I propose that we compromise: we will allow global warming in the winter and put a cap on it in the summer. Just ask any snowbird in AZ escaping the winters in the northern states and Canada.