UPDATE: Annan now suggests the IPCC “is in a bit of a pickle”, see below.
UPDATE2: Title has been changed to reflect Annan’s new essay, suggesting lying for political purposes inside the IPCC. Also added some updates about Aldrin et al and other notes for accuracy. See below.
Readers may recall there has been a bit of a hullabaloo at Andrew Revkin’s Dot Earth of the New York Times over the press release I first carried at WUWT, saying that I had “seized on it”.
Purveyors of climate doubt have seized on a news release from the Research Council of Norway with this provocative title: “Global warming less extreme than feared?”
I beg to differ with Andy’s characterization, as I simply repeated the press release verbatim without any embellishments. My only contribution was the title: Yet another study shows lower climate sensitivity. It turns out to the surprise of many that the subject of the press release was not peer reviewed, but based on previous cumulative work by the Norwegian Research Council. That revelation set Andy off again, in a good way with this: When Publicity Precedes Peer Review in Climate Science (Part One), and I followed up with this story demonstrating a lack of and a need for standards in climate science press releases by the worlds largest purveyor of Science PR, Eurekalert: Eurekalert’s lack of press release standards – a systemic problem with science and the media
It turns out that all of this discussion was tremendously fortuitous.
Surprisingly, although the press release was not about a new peer reviewed paper (Update: it appears to be a rehash and translation of a release about Aldrin et al from October), it has caused at least one scientist to consider it. Last night I was cc’d an exceptional email from Andrew Revkin forwarding an email (Update: Andy says of a comment from Dot Earth) quoting climate scientist James Annan, who one could call a member of the “hockey team” based on his strong past opinions related to AGW and paleoclimatology.
Andrew Revkin published the email today at the NYT Dot Earth blog as a comment in that thread, so now I am free to reproduce it here where I was not last night.
Below is the comment left by Andy, quoting Annan’s email, bolding added:
The climate scientist James Annan sent these thoughts by email:
‘Well, the press release is a bit strange, because it sounds like it is talking about the Aldrin et al paper which was published some time ago, to no great fanfare. I don’t know if they have a further update to that.
Anyway, there have now been several recent papers showing much the same – numerous factors including: the increase in positive forcing (CO2 and the recent work on black carbon), decrease in estimated negative forcing (aerosols), combined with the stubborn refusal of the planet to warm as had been predicted over the last decade, all makes a high climate sensitivity increasingly untenable. A value (slightly) under 2 is certainly looking a whole lot more plausible than anything above 4.5.’
And this is what many have been saying now and for some time, that the climate sensitivity has been overestimated. Kudos to Annan for realizing the likelihood of a lower climate sensitivity.
The leader of the “hockey team”, Dr. Michael Mann will likely pan it, but that’s “Mikey, he hates everything”. I do wonder though, if he’ll start calling James Annan a “denier” as he has done in other instances where some scientist suggests a lower climate sensitivity?
UPDATE: over at Annans’ blog, now there is this new essay expounding on the issue titled: A sensitive matter, and this paragraph in it caught my eye because it speaks to a recent “leak” done here at WUWT:
But the point stands, that the IPCC’s sensitivity estimate cannot readily be reconciled with forcing estimates and observational data. All the recent literature that approaches the question from this angle comes up with similar answers, including the papers I mentioned above. By failing to meet this problem head-on, the IPCC authors now find themselves in a bit of a pickle. I expect them to brazen it out, on the grounds that they are the experts and are quite capable of squaring the circle before breakfast if need be. But in doing so, they risk being seen as not so much summarising scientific progress, but obstructing it.
Readers may recall this now famous graph from the IPCC leak, animated and annotated by Dr. Ira Glickstein in this essay here:
Yes, the IPCC is “in a bit of a pickle” to say the least, since as Annan said in his comment/email to Revkin:
…combined with the stubborn refusal of the planet to warm as had been predicted over the last decade, all makes a high climate sensitivity increasingly untenable.
UPDATE 2: Annan also speaks about lying as a political motivator within the IPCC, I’ve repeated this extraordinary paragraph in full. Bold mine.
Note for the avoidance of any doubt I am not quoting directly from the unquotable IPCC draft, but only repeating my own comment on it. However, those who have read the second draft of Chapter 12 will realise why I previously said I thought the report was improved 🙂 Of course there is no guarantee as to what will remain in the final report, which for all the talk of extensive reviews, is not even seen by the proletariat, let alone opened to their comments, prior to its final publication. The paper I refer to as a “small private opinion poll” is of course the Zickfeld et al PNAS paper. The list of pollees in the Zickfeld paper are largely the self-same people responsible for the largely bogus analyses that I’ve criticised over recent years, and which even if they were valid then, are certainly outdated now. Interestingly, one of them stated quite openly in a meeting I attended a few years ago that he deliberately lied in these sort of elicitation exercises (i.e. exaggerating the probability of high sensitivity) in order to help motivate political action. Of course, there may be others who lie in the other direction, which is why it seems bizarre that the IPCC appeared to rely so heavily on this paper to justify their choice, rather than relying on published quantitative analyses of observational data. Since the IPCC can no longer defend their old analyses in any meaningful manner, it seems they have to resort to an unsupported “this is what we think, because we asked our pals”. It’s essentially the Lindzen strategy in reverse: having firmly wedded themselves to their politically convenient long tail of high values, their response to new evidence is little more than sticking their fingers in their ears and singing “la la la I can’t hear you”.
Oh dear oh dear oh dear…
I have no hostility towards English majors like Mosher. I do have a problem with those who take what he says seriously without knowing his background; Mosher’s educational background consists of BA’s in English Literature and Philosophy. His “scientific” background involves bringing MP3 players to market for Creative Labs as a marketing director.
It is no coincidence that an English major would be the one to deduce Gleick’s involvement in the Heartland scandal since it involved recognition of nuance in written language. How that translates into caring what he has to say on scientific issues I have no idea.
Mosher frequently posts nonsensical “riddle” like comments here and rarely responds to criticism. When pressed he usually disengages and runs away. His comment tone reflects a superiority complex, believing himself to be the true “rational thinker”. He also frequently throws Anthony and other skeptics under the bus at other websites.
I also suspect he was the one behind the fabricated Muller as a recovering skeptic meme in the NYT op-ed. Which was easily crushed. His commenting is largely manipulative and or trolling. Manipulation of skeptics is the goal of those associated with BEST and people like Judith Curry. They want to siphon off the huge number of people who became skeptical after climategate to their brand of “luke warmerism” just with no change in policy proposals. Unfortunately too many people are naturally inclined to “moderate” type arguments but only so long as you can stereo-type those who disagree with you as “fringe”, peer-pressure does the rest.
PS: As for making society more resilient, I agree with that idea too. I think that multi-storey buildings in flood-prone areas should have emergency supplies stockpiled in a locked shed on the roof, that emergency generators should be required there, that barriers against water intrusion, and backup water pumps should be required of big office buildings in such areas, that a local-area communications infrastructure and procedure should be in place, within and between buildings, etc. I’ve described these in much more detail elsewhere, on a few Bloomberg threads.
Poptech
Before Mosh worked in Marketing, he was writing code for aerospace simulators. I don’t know if it’s on his resume or not. He has written his own temperature index code before he joined the BEST team. Attempting to disparage his qualifications based on his college major is just ignorant. Argue with his points, his style, his sloppy extra line breaks, but there is nothing wrong with being self-taught in science or computer programming and to attempt to belittle him this way is less than petty, it is simply juvenile.
Government is the reason behind the increase in population in flood prone regions. Without government subsidized flood insurance only those that could afford to have their homes flooded would take the risk as market based flood insurance premiums would do the rest. So long as government is in the flood insurance business you will see an increase in population in flood prone areas.
With that being said I do not feel it is justified to punish those who have been misled by government boondoggles and prefer an attrition strategy to reverse the trend. Most home owners pay enough in income taxes over their lifetime to cover a one time flood insurance payment for their house by the government anyway, after which time the property owner should be left with a choice or selling or obtaining private sector insurance.
Steven Mosher says:
February 1, 2013 at 5:05 pm
“I dont think most skeptics are lukewarmers. I don’t think they have thought about the science in a way that allows them to agree with any aspect of it. Its mostly knee jerk contrarianism.”
———————————————————————————————————
Mr. Mosher please.
I wish I could take you seriously. It does not matter whether the instrumental record has or has not been mucked about with. I submit that you and every one else had better hope and pray that CO2 is the heathen devil gas it is made out to be. Because radical warmist to lukewarmer has one, and only one, thing going for them. The Holocene had better turn out to be another interglacial anomaly, like MIS-11 (the Holsteinian) was, lasting somewhere between 1.5 to 2.0 precession cycles. Because if it turns out to be like 5 of the last 6 interglacials, it will last on the order of half a precession cycle, which at present would be 23,000/2=11,500. And this year, the Holocene turns 11,716 years old……
Either the Holocene “goes long”, like MIS-11 did, or this is all just a silly buggers game.
Go ahead, play your one shot in six hand, strip the late Holocene climate security blanket to whatever concentration you wish.
But just before you do, take a moment to ponder the awesome anthropogenic signal to natural noise ratio that seems to be incumbent at most end interglacials. And this might bring us closer to what actually constitutes “knee jerk contrarianism”.
If we stipulate to the IPCC’s 2007 AR4 worst case estimate for sea level rise by 2100 of +0.59M amsl, then stipulate an order of magnitude more, to say Gore’s aging +20ft (~+6.0M), that only brings us to parity with the low end of the estimates which accompany the second thermal pulse which attended the end of the last extreme interglacial, MIS-5e http://www.uow.edu.au/business/content/groups/public/@web/@sci/@eesc/documents/doc/uow045009.pdf we end up with a range which might be anywhere from +6.0M to +45M amsl. And that does not include the +52M amsl estimate here http://lin.irk.ru/pdf/6696.pdf
And, well, you know, there is this other problem….. What if the Holocene does go long, like MIS-11 did? Well………….. It might have peaked, right at its very end, at some +21.3M amsl. http://si-pddr.si.edu/jspui/bitstream/10088/7516/1/vz_Olson_and_hearty_a_sustained_21m_sea-level_highstand_during_mis_1.pdf
The truly fascinating thing here is that it really does not matter what you believe. End extreme interglacials seem to have BESTed the very BEST anthropogenic signals anyone has yet contrived. Just how, precisely, do you attribute anthropogenic signal 1 to perhaps almost 2 orders of magnitude below the normal natural end extreme interglacial noise?
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/03/16/the-end-holocene-or-how-to-make-out-like-a-madoff-climate-change-insurer/
Viewed from the perspective that even on things which actually have happened the science is not that particularly well-settled, what would be the things you would convince me with such that I could hear your wailings against such stunning end-extreme-interglacial normal climate noise?
“Knee jerk contrarianism”, in such a situation, might well be perceived as getting all worked-up about something catastrophic, which at best, might come in at 10% if what has happened at least twice in post-MPT time. At worst, maybe one hundredth.
Which, in the end analysis, means that I fret a lot more about bad bug bites than I do about orders of magnitude worse things that might happen anyway, with or without your BEST efforts.
“It’s like two fleas arguing about who owns the dog they are riding on….” Crocodile Dundee
After reading Mosher’s comments, you simply come off as an arogant, condescending, egotistical, “How dare you question me…I’m smarter than you” individual. Very unbecoming of an individual who may be in fact be very intelligent and has some idea of what he’s talking about (although stuck on radiative physics). To get respect you must offer it too. The childlike tone of your sometimes venomous comments belong on Twitter, not WUWT. Please, tone it down a bit.
Jeez, I am very familiar with computer programming resumes and Mosher does not even list a language he is proficient in. He has no formal training in anything computer science related. “Written code” can mean anything, including writing scripts or customizing pre-made files.
His resume specifically says, “Developed computer simulation models for aircraft systems and war games.” and “Created and coded data collection and analysis systems.” That can mean anything and looks like resume padding. Why did he not list the language he “coded” in? Programmers who actually write software are much more clear and detailed about what they actually did. People who give ideas about what should be in a simulation can claim to be part of the “development team” that does not mean they programmed anything. You can claim to “create and code data collection and analysis systems.” by writing a script to extract data from a DB. None of which is a scientific credential let alone the backbone of a computer programming resume.
Only non computer science academics would fall for it. Conveniently this makes up the entire BEST team.
He explicitly sells himself as a “Marketing Consultant”. Marketing and Sales are the two most frequently used words on his resume.
Those who think they are programmers is one of the things wrong with climate science,
http://www.nature.com/news/2010/101013/full/467775a.html
Yes there is a lot of things wrong with selling yourself as something you are not and I do not consider an English major to have any relevant scientific credentials no matter how much he pads his resume.
A 2008 review of sensitivity by Knutti and Hegerl says:
“Various observations favour a climate sensitivity value of about 3 °C, with a likely range of about 2–4.5 °C.”
http://www.nature.com/ngeo/journal/v1/n11/abs/ngeo337.html
Annan offers his opinion that if outside this range, it is likely to be on the lower rather than higher end::
A value (slightly) under 2 is certainly looking a whole lot more plausible than anything above 4.5.’
The words ‘climate’ and ‘sensitivity’ form an oxymoron.
DaveA says: February 1, 2013 at 7:35 pm
“Small additions of mass to the atmosphere in the form of CO2 will enhance it’s effect. It’s presently about 391 ppm (parts per million). Go work out how much atmospheric pressure increases if we add the additional mass to make it 800 ppm, then comment on evaporation.”
– – –
Take into consideration what is physically happening. A carbon atom is attaching to two pre-existing oxygen atoms already present in the atmosphere. So we are not adding CO2 to the atmosphere so much as adding carbon atoms to the atmosphere.
davidmhoffer says@ur momisugly: Steven Mosher; We know from first principles, verified by testing, that doubling will get us to 1.2C.
Yes we do. In an atmospheric air column with constant water vapour
concentration from top to bottom and no feedbacks. No such thing exists.
Thank you David–I was going to ask what “testing” could verify that? It’s certainly not being verified out in the atmosphere! But I thought, and rightfully so, that I am not qualified to ask even that. So you did it for me!
What I am going to ask, and still not qualified, is about the adjusted surface temperature being pretty correct within .2C. Mosher says, : Well, its pretty easy to test. I take a random sample of around 300 stations. I construct an estimate for the temperature at other locations. i used my sample of 500 to predict the other locations.
Guess what? damn, those estimates of out of sample cases are always bang on.
How come when the JMA doesn’t use the value added temps, they deviate so much from the climatological party line–or is their purple line within that .2C correct margin? It’s a .25 degree difference–so if that is “probably correct,” as Mr. Mosher says, then move along, nothing to see in the CLIMAT report data without adjustments. Means nothing. Is that what he is saying?
“Want to build a radar for the F-22? how far can it see? well, you have to pull out your radiative physics …”
“But monday morning when you show up to build shit that works, you pull out your radiative transfer codes.”
Or you could do something called prototyping and testing, (as in NAZI’s Horten Ho 229). Which may just show you that knowledge of radiative physics and assumptions of real world interactions isn’t perfect, and computer models that were coded are as buggy as most other programming. Later, perhaps being why computer Climate models have been failing to agree with mother nature. Of course starting with the faulty assumption that CO2 was ‘the’ cause, likely didn’t help said Climate models… 😉
Steven Mosher says:
February 1, 2013 at 5:11 pm
Well, its pretty easy to test [i.e. the claimed accuracy of surface station records].I take a random sample of around 300 stations. I construct an estimate for the temperature at other locations. i used my sample of 500 to predict the other locations.
Guess what? damn, those estimates of out of sample cases are always bang on.
Wanna know something even better. So, you might think you’re right. I used to think that too. But, I pulled out my feynman, tested your idea and had to give your idea up.
go figure.
I think you will find that what you are testing here is the consistency of the temperatures, not the accuracy. If you added 1 degree to all of the temperatures, you would get the same result. I suggest you might do better to take into account Anthony Watts’ findings aboiut station siting and perhaps also compare surface station records against satellite measurements.
“Mr. Mosher please.”
Mosher is a lukewarm lapdog. Meaning there is a lap he appeases. The least influential of that genre, he reblathers the party line of climate hysteria using unsound and refuted by observed science to the great delight of the super powers of that underworld he humors. His personal meme is that of a nice guy, reasonable, but incapable of refutation because he propounds incomplete arguments that lacking foundation, could easily apply to a knitting circle as to climate. Generalities abound and his posts posit a mystery left to the reader to solve. To date he has convinced only himself which seems quite enough to encourage him onward. Of importance, anything he says that you don’t understand become evidence to him that you are a dunce and don’t belong in the conversation. Perish be he should come to grips with his non-participative side of the conversation where the typical response of his part of the conversation is “huh?” He hides behind his novel “catch me if you can” debate style which heaps responsibility onto the reader for understanding his cloaked blovia. If you really seek answers, avoid him. He is where thinking goes to die. I’m working hard here to avoid saying anything negative about him, but surely, there must be something along those lines I could add were I to give it some thought, so don’t take all of this as the heaping praise it appears to be.
I’ve met Steven Mosher a few times, and I must say he is not like he comes across in his comments. He’s a nice guy, and he’s not not arrogant or condescending like he appears here. One of his really good points is that he was the first to out Peter Gleick as the Heartland scamster.
Everyone is entitled to be wrong about CAGW, and if Mosh abuses that privilege, well, maybe we should give him a break.☺
Bravo Crosspatch!
This is the non-scientific issue that needs to be dealt with. We have to find a way for them to save face, an escape route if you like. All this after calling us of: anti-science, global warming deniers, climate change deniers, spreading disinformation, big oil shills, when in fact the opposite was true. One example is one lady called me a “denier” in the Guardian; I responded by pointing to the science from the IPCC and peer review to put her right. I never heard from her again.
Many people who did not look closely at the science simply used their high school knowledge about co2 being a greenhouse gas, combined with what climate scientist were projecting for this century and became convinced and alarmed. Most have NEVER looked into climate sensitivity or the IPCC projections compared to observations.
2011
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2011/11/25/new-study-in-science-shows-climate-sensitivity-is-overhyped/
Mosher, you said
“…you can change the consensus from inside the tent rather than attacking everything and everyone. Focus on sensitivity, work to refine that. You see there is a debate in climate science, its a debate about sensitivity.
When folks start putting their effort into that ( instead of frittering away time on tangents)
then you will see changes.”
OK, but a month ago you said that debate was over and the topic had shifted to mitigation/adaptation. Those are the answers wanted by POWER. Not other natterings.
Not any more.
.
“an encouraging admission of lower climate sensitivity by a ‘hockey team’ scientist…”
May I suggest that, in memory of the late, great John Daly, all such admissions in the future (and I suspect there will be many of them) are labeled “Oddly Cheering”…
ferd berple says:
February 1, 2013 at 6:17 pm
“Partial pressure dictates that adding CO2 will drive H2O out of the atmosphere. Since H2O is a stronger GHG than CO2, the CO2 sensitivity is at best 0.”
That is a very good argument, easy to be forgotten in the heat of the argument. ( haha )
But Ferd, it is a long time since I had Gas Law stuff at school, ( 30 years ! ) so certain details are forgotten…. How do we know that it is H2O that is driven out, and not N2 ? Or a combination?
Steven Mosher:
I am replying to your posts at February 1, 2013 at 5:20 pm and February 1, 2013 at 6:01 pm.
As this answer explains, both your posts are silly, and they display a deluded view of the world.
In the former post you ask
Firstly, that is NOT “the real question”: it is a trivial consideration. I will address “the real question” after answering your ‘straw men’ questions.
Secondly, there is no “geoengineering project of adding more c02” except in your imagination.
There is an emission of CO2 to the atmosphere as a by-product of industrialised civilisation. This is no more a “geoenineering project” than mining and making iron.
I answer your questions as follows.
A1.
Nothing is “safe”: crossing the road has risks.
Life consists of obtaining benefits which are worth the risks of getting them. Industrial civilisation has many “risks” and several of the “risks” (e.g. global thermo-nuclear war) pose greater threat than the by-product of CO2 emissions.
A2.
Nobody knows how “safe” is industrial civilisation.
But its benefits have been immense providing bulk populations with longer lives and riches beyond the wealth of Emperors in previous ages. The benefits have outweighed the “risks” of industrial civilisation although some of those “risks” have been realised (e.g. two mechanised world wars).
A3.
Nobody can know how to determine the safety of industrial civilisation.
This is because such knowledge requires a time-machine to view the future. However, there is no known reason to fear that future.
A more reasonable questions than yours would be
Is it rational to inhibit industrial civilisation and its benefits because some people claim a by-product of industrial civilisation may cause problems but they have failed to find any evidence to support their claim?
And that brings us to your post at February 1, 2013 at 6:01 pm which concludes saying this
That is so wrong it is gob-smacking!
There cannot be “6 billion of them” if they lack sufficient energy: people die without adequate energy for food, shelter, clothing and transport.
You make a ridiculous assertion when you write, “you cannot scale big system down in size, balance of systems prevents that”. It did not “prevent that” for the already industrialised world.
A century ago, “coal gas and nuclear and big grids” were built in a few decades in the industrialised world (well, nuclear came later). China has done it (including nuclear) recently.
The reason “coal gas and nuclear and big grids don’t work for the billions who live in poverty” is because people cease to be living in poverty when they have “coal gas and nuclear and big grids”. Their greater available energy supply frees them from needing to use all their time and effort to provide power so they can do additional productive activities.
Until people are provided with “coal gas and nuclear and big grids” then your suggestion of a smaller “individual” solution may benefit them. But you make an offensive assertion when you say the poor must cope with that instead of the benefits of industrialised society.
In summation:
Your arguments which I here quote are a misrepresentation of reality, and they assert that the poor must be kept poor. I reject all your arguments because they are untrue and they are offensive on practical, ethical and moral grounds.
Richard
Steven Mosher says:
February 1, 2013 at 5:15 pm
“DirkH.
You have the process all wrong. The effect works by raising the ERL. Dont believe me, it was DOD research prior to AGW that settled that issue. Take it up with Christy or Spenser or Lindzen and explain to them why they are wrong about radiative physics. or write a paper an collect your nobel prize.”
First of all, nothing of what I said was wrong – or maybe something was but you didn’t show what.
Second, why are you trotting out an argumentum ad verecundiam, the reputation or appeal-to-authority fallacy. There’s no need for that.
Third, Spencer has written about the speed of radiative cooling with his box experiments.
Roy Spencer, The Box, measuring back radiation
http://www.drroyspencer.com/2010/08/help-back-radiation-has-invaded-my-backyard/
Fourth, about the raising of the ERL, that’s a good point and it might increase the number of absorptions and re-emissions for an IR photon in the CO2 absorption bands slightly. But that opens up the interesting question, what happens with the postulated never-observed water vapor feedback? Will water vapor concentrations in the stratosphere rise as well as a consequence of rising CO2?
Why has the lower stratosphere dried out? Article from 2010:
http://www.economist.com/node/15443791
Is there a constructal law at work; shifting the distribution of water vapor as a consequence of the very slight shift in energy distribution through the antropogenically modified CO2 GHG?
Has any GCM ever predicted the observed drying out of the lower stratosphere? Not to my knowledge. Shouldn’t this be top on the list of failures that the climate modelers should be looking into? Shouldn’t they have admitted complete and utter defeat the moment this unsimulated drying out was observed, and begged for another 30 years of comparison between model runs and real temperatures before one draws any conclusion?
There’s so much more to say but I’m running out of time…
joeldshore says:
February 1, 2013 at 6:20 pm
…is plenty high enough to mean that we are going to have to leave a lot of the fossil fuels in the ground (or sequester the emissions) if we don’t want to significantly alter the global climate and sea levels.
the geologists are yawning
haven’t you got anything else to offer – phreatomagmatic eruption, large meteorite impact, some glaciation or perhaps a little cordillera here or there…
Steven Mosher says:
“1. We are not prepared for the storms and weather of our grandparents. Regardless of the cause of Sandy, we should see that such storms are to be expected given the past. Perhaps things will get worse, but remember the evidence shows we are not prepared for the storms of the past much less the storms of the future.”
Steven is spot on.
Tokyo is well prepared for the storms of the present and is likely prepared for the storms of the future regardless of what they might be. My home is located in a section of the city that would, without an elaborate system of locks and barriers, be underwater at high tide for many, if not most, days. While major typhoons cause local flooding (typically at points in the local area below sea level) even the strongest of storms pass through here with little or no significant impact. In addition, all electrical poles are constructed either out of reinforced concrete or steel (mostly the former). Such structures hold up to the strongest winds and are designed to hold up to major earthquakes. As a result, there are few, if any, power outages here from even the strongest of storms.
The Tokyo subway system is also designed to be secure even in the face of the strongest of storms. Subway entrances, especially in areas at or below sea level, are usually raised above the street level. This helps keep rain water from penetrating into the subway system. In addition, subway entrances can be completely sealed off in the event of a flood, further protecting the system from flooding. It is also important to note that the Tokyo subway system tunnels, especially in the part of the city I live in, travel under large rivers and underneath an intricate system of canals.
In contrast, New York’s protection against major storms is a complete joke. There are no significant seawalls protecting any part of the city potentially exposed (except, perhaps, for the east side along the FDR Drive in the Midtown area). Forget about the Queens and Brooklyn shore completely exposed to the Atlantic. And lower Manhattan had nothing to protect New York’s (and America’s) second most important office area from the storm surge that has wrecked so much havoc and which has caused so much economic damage. Tunnels such as the Brooklyn-Battery, were also completely flooded.
The city’s subway system was similarly unprotected as water poured into tunnel and subway entrances. The resulting subterranean flooding shut down the subway system for days. But remember that NYC’s subway system was shut down a few years ago by a summer downpour over about two hours of about 2 inches (5 cm). Water poured down unprotected subway entrances completely innundating the system for a number of hours. New York can’t even protect itself against heavy downpours, forget major storms.
Then there is New Orleans which was devastated in 1965 by Betsy and which learned nothing from that storm. In spite of warnings, the city was essentially unprotected when Katrina came in 2005. Pre-Katrina, officials in Louisiana actually boasted that the levees protecting the city were world-class.
Babbling about climate change is, in the end, an excuse to not build adequate infrastructure to protect against existing storms. Rather, it is an excuse to tax and spend the money on something else because the tax itself is its own defense against “climate change”.
Off topic but what’s happened to Climate Audit? Some company called “Aplusnet” is now using the URL “http://climateaudit.org/”
There is nothing extraordinary about Annan’s comments.
A 2008 review of sensitivity by Knutti and Hegerl says:
“Various observations favour a climate sensitivity value of about 3 °C, with a likely range of about 2–4.5 °C.”
http://www.nature.com/ngeo/journal/v1/n11/abs/ngeo337.html
Annan offers his opinion that if outside this range, it is likely to be on the lower rather than higher end::
A value (slightly) under 2 is certainly looking a whole lot more plausible than anything above 4.5.’