Comments on Yesterday’s paean to Global Warming
Guest post by Dr. Richard Keen,
Meteorologist Emeritus, University of Colorado, Boulder
It’s like playing whac-a-mole. After every major storm or unusual (or even slightly interesting) weather event, some non-investigative reporter gets hold of the usual suspects to write an article about how it’s all due to global warming. Then it’s up to knowledgeable folk like Joe D’Aleo, Anthony Watts, Bill Gray, James Taylor, Steve Goddard, and many, many others to write a data-based rebuttal to “whac” the nonsense back down into its hole. But then, as in the game, it always pops up again. Today I’ll draw the short straw and try to whac the mole back down once more.
The article in question is a piece by Seth Borenstein (again) of AP (again) titled “Climate contradiction: Less snow, more blizzards” (again). Borenstein talked to Michael Oppenheimer, Mark Serreze, and other “leading federal and university climate scientists” (again). If you really want to read it, it’s at
http://hosted.ap.org/dynamic/stories/U/US_SCI_SNOW_GLOBAL_WARMING?SITE=AP&SECTION=HOME&TEMPLATE=DEFAULT&CTIME=2013-02-18-11-33-15
But you might find the annotated version more rewarding:
http://icecap.us/index.php/go/joes-blog/no_surprise_psuedo_scientists_now_blame_blizzards_on_warming/
Borenstein’s story starts off with a valid point:
“With scant snowfall and barren ski slopes in parts of the Midwest and Northeast the past couple of years, some scientists have pointed to global warming as the culprit.
“Then when a whopper of a blizzard smacked the Northeast with more than 2 feet of snow in some places earlier this month, some of the same people again blamed global warming.
“How can that be? It’s been a joke among skeptics, pointing to what seems to be a brazen contradiction.”
So far, so good. It IS a brazen contradiction. So what do the global warming apologists say?
Borenstein continues,
“But the answer lies in atmospheric physics. A warmer atmosphere can hold, and dump, more moisture, snow experts say.”
So they’re saying that since a warmer atmosphere can “hold” more moisture (technically quite incorrect in itself), there’s more moisture to produce more snow. How much moisture is there?
At -10C, aka 14F, each kilogram of air can “hold” (as they say) a maximum of 1.8 grams of water vapor. If all that condenses out as snow, you’ll get 1.8 grams of snow from that kilogram of air rising in a Low or along a front. That would likely be a cold, fluffy snow. Warm the air up to 0C (32F), and the water content of the air doubles to 3.8 grams. Then the same storm will produce twice as much snow, or at least twice as heavy a snow (since the warmer snow won’t be as fluffy). Most big snow storms occur with temperatures close to the freezing point.
Source: http://web.gccaz.edu/~lnewman/gph111/topic_units/Labs_all/Water%20Vapor%20Capacity%20of%20Air.pdf
Now let’s kick in some global warming and raise the temperature to +10C (50F). The water content doubles again to 7.6 grams, so the snow storms will again produce twice as much snow.
What? You say it can’t snow at 50 degrees F???? Well, then you know more physics than these “snow experts”!
The biggest snow storms occur at temperatures near freezing, and warming CANNOT make them any bigger because of two corollaries of a well-known physical law:
1. The freezing point of water is 0C (32F), and ice or snow cannot form above this temperature.
2. Short of a presidential executive order, the freezing point cannot be raised to allow for more moisture to be available.
Like the speed of light, it’s not just a good idea, it’s the law, and it clearly states that warmer cannot equal more extreme snow.
Now, the AGW apologists will gin and jerry their models to violate these physical laws, but one can also make pigs fly on a computer. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=49wJAkz8X1M
Onwards….
“The United States has been walloped by twice as many of the most extreme snowstorms in the past 50 years than in the previous 60 years, according to an upcoming study…”
Well, you can look at the same data and draw different conclusions. May I refer you to a piece I wrote for the Science & Public Policy Institute, “ARE HUGE NORTHEAST SNOW STORMS DUE TO GLOBAL WARMING?”, at http://scienceandpublicpolicy.org/images/stories/papers/reprint/ne_storms.pdf
Simple plots of winter temperature and snowfall data for Philadelphia show two obvious things:
1. Colder winters have more snow and more big snow storms, in contradiction to the warming hypothesis. This would be obvious to most folk, but the warmers have a way for denying the obvious with clever theories.
2. Over the past 125 years there has been little or no trend in either winter temperatures or snowfall.
Less obvious, but apparent in closer scrutiny of the charts, is a small 60-year cycle in snow and temperature. These correspond well with the “Atlantic Multi-Decadal Oscillation” (AMO), a huge oceanic cycle enveloping the entire Atlantic Ocean from the equator to Iceland. Joe D’Aleo has written extensively on this; just go to ICECAP.us, Wattsupwiththat.com, or other honest climate websites and do a search for combinations of “snow”, “AMO”, and the AMO’s Pacific cousin, “PDO”.
You can check this article, “Reliving the 1950s (and 1890s): the 60 year cycle” at
http://icecap.us/index.php/go/joes-blog/reliving_the_1950s_and_1890s_the_60_year_cycle/
Although I was raised in Philadelphia, and was present for the regional climate shift from hurricanes in the 1950s to the cold snowy winters of the 60s (due to the AMO, of course), I realize not everybody considers the city the center of the universe. Expanding to the entire Northeast, NOAA’s “Northeast Snowfall Impact Scale (NESIS)” also shows no overall change in the snow climate of the northeastern U.S. Read all about it at “Big Snows: Northeast U.S. and Colorado”
http://icecap.us/index.php/go/joes-blog/big_snows_northeast_us_and_colorado/
The Colorado part of that article has the same end point: giant storms in Colorado are not increasing or decreasing; out in the Rockies it’s all el Niño. More at:
“Thirty years in the Bull’s-eye: a climatology of meter-class snow storms in the Front Range foothills”
http://hydrosciences.colorado.edu/symposium/abstract_details_archive.php?abstract_id=155
Now movin’ on up to the South Side, Borenstein asks us to “take Chicago” (please!), which, along with the Northeast, has “been hit with historic storms in recent years”. The 2011 Blizzard was certainly impressive, with 21.2 inches of snow containing 1.57 inches of water equivalent. Not bad, but officially, it was a bit shy of 1967’s “Big Snow” (they didn’t use excessive superlatives like “superstorm”, “megastorm”, or “storm of the century” back then; “Big” was sufficient) which dumped 23.0 inches. More importantly, the water content of the storm was 2.40 inches, 53 percent greater than the recent blizzard. It would take 6C, or 11F, of global warming to produce that much more moisture, according to the warmers. Indeed, the Big Snow was warmer than the 2011 version, with temperatures close to freezing during the snow. Two days earlier Chicago enjoyed a record maximum of 65 degrees and the Midwest suffered its largest January tornado outbreak on record. One of the 32 tornadoes was a F3 monster in Wisconsin, the northernmost wintertime tornado in US history. I had moved to Chicago by then (follow the snow, I say), and although the ’67 storm fit perfectly the warming scenario now espoused by Serreze, Oppenheimer, and the like, I don’t recall anyone linking it to Global Warming 46 years ago. Not even Mayor Daley. Extreme weather is not new. Read more about these wild storms at:
http://www.crh.noaa.gov/lot/?n=2011blizzard
http://www.crh.noaa.gov/lot/?n=67blizzard
http://www.crh.noaa.gov/dvn/?n=01241967_tornadooutbreak
http://www.crh.noaa.gov/lsx/?n=jan241967tornado
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1967_St._Louis_Tornado_Outbreak
There’s more nonsense in Borenstein’s article, but frankly, neither the taxpayer, the canola oil companies, or the Rockefellers pay me enough to spend all night refuting it all. Actually, they pay me nothing.
[Added/] And one more thing, about that “ragged edge”….
“Strong snowstorms thrive on the ragged edge of temperature – warm enough for the air to hold lots of moisture, meaning lots of precipitation, but just cold enough for it to fall as snow,” said Mark Serreze, director of the National Snow and Ice Data Center. “Increasingly, it seems that we’re on that ragged edge.”
Let’s look at some data to see if that’s the case. Here’s climatological means, 1971-2000, for three substantial cities supposedly on the “ragged edge”:
Taking the usual 10:1 snow to precipitation ratio, 31% of the precipitation falls as snow. That means most of the precipitation already falls as rain, and always has (at least since weather records began). That would place Boston, New York, and Philadelphia on the
warm side of Serreze’s “ragged edge”, a fact supported by the above freezing mean temperatures for these places. Any warming – should it occur – would push that “ragged edge” even farther north and away from the cities. That would mean more rain, less snow, and fewer big snow storms.
Since the winters aren’t getting warmer, it’s all a moot point. [/end addition]
The AGW gang summarize their apologetics by claiming they knew it all along.
“when Serreze, Oppenheimer and others look at the last few years of less snow overall, punctuated by big storms, they say this is what they are expecting in the future.
“It fits the pattern that we expect to unfold,” Oppenheimer said.
“Ten [unnamed] climate scientists say the idea of less snow and more blizzards makes sense: A warmer world is likely to decrease the overall amount of snow falling each year and shrink snow season.”
They’d have a point if they had said this five or ten years ago, before the recent round of big eastern storms. But they said no such thing. The last IPCC report claimed snowfall would decrease, and made no mention of larger snow storms in the northeastern US. In 2000, Oppenheimer himself lamented his daughter’s unused sled and that “the pleasures of sledding and snowball fights are as out-of-date as hoop-rolling”.
New York Times 2000: “sledding and snowball fights are as out-of-date as hoop-rolling”
Now Oppenheimer & Co. are trying to explain their way out of their dead wrong assessment without admitting the sad truth – that Global Warming, like Barney, is a dinosaur from their imaginations. And we – you – the taxpayer – are paying the AGW gang to cover their errors.
As for the changing climate,
“What has been will be again, what has been done will be done again; there is nothing new under the sun” — Ecclesiastes 1:9 NIV
And the climatologists,
“It is error alone which needs the support of government. Truth can stand by itself.” –Thomas Jefferson: Notes on Virginia, 1782
=============================================================
UPDATE 1PM PST: I’ve contacted AP by both email and telephone per this page here:
http://www.ap.org/company/contact-us
So far the email has been ignored. Perhaps others will have better luck at getting a correction. An upcoming story on WUWT will further illustrate why Seth Borenstein has made a grievous error.
I spoke with a person named Corelaee, and her response was to simply ask me to talk to Seth directly, which we know will be a waste of time. So I’ve asked to speak to someone who can intervene. Keeps your fingers crossed.
UPDATE2: 4PM PST I’ve added some new content per Dr. Keen’s request between the [Added/] [/end addition] tags. See also the related story below. – Anthony
Related articles
- Round Up: Meteorologists Slaps Down latest warmist claim of ‘Less snow = more blizzards’ — AP’s Seth Borenstein rebutted (climatedepot.com)
- New paper from NOAA demonstrates that El Niño has more impacts than climate on winter weather in the USA
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I was taught that larger snowflakes were a result of warmer temperatures, the crystals had more time to create the flake and it fell fluffy. In cold temperatures you get smaller flakes. I’m confused now….
I see the phrase “some models project”, but that is not a prediction, is it? I mean, do you really want to assert that a projection is a prediction?
Steven Mosher says:
February 19, 2013 at 8:17 am
You are a disappointing piece of work, Steven. The quote you rail against talked about “larger storms” (emphasis mine), but in none of the examples you used did they specifically mention “larger storms” even once. They did discuss larger amounts of precipitation, but that doesn’t automatically mean larger storms–they could just as easily come as more frequent storms of the same magnitude. Epic fail on your part, Mr. Mosher. Models aren’t based on “larger storms”, are they?
Throughout this diatribe you attack people for their lack of reading comprehension, but then you display a perfect example of just that. Then at the end you get nasty and profer a list of deviations, some of which you have repeatedly used youself when asked to show (as I have done many times) definitive proof that CO2 (for that’s really your argument here) causes global warming or weather weirding or whatever your Catastrophic Anthropogenic Genocidal Warmista buddies and you want to call it.
You never answer the most critical of questions–the only one that really matters.
Not once.
And I’m not holding my breath for a response this time, either, although I find your egregious approach less than scientific and always of the driveby hit-and-run variety.
Surprise me and show me some proof. And in the meantime, work on your own reading comprehension, which is sorely lacking–especially the last reference in your list, which appears to be nothing but verbal dunnage in support of your argument.
Thanks.
From the OP: Simple plots of winter temperature and snowfall data for Philadelphia show two obvious things:
1. Colder winters have more snow and more big snow storms, in contradiction to the warming hypothesis.
Actually the simple plots show no such thing about ‘big snow storms’, they just show the averages.
The biggest snow storms occur at temperatures near freezing, and warming CANNOT make them any bigger because of two corollaries of a well-known physical law:
Since the OP is a Meteorologist Emeritus he knows better than this so I can only assume he’s trying to mislead! In most of the big storms we’re talking about warm moist air being transported to somewhere cold (over a mountain range or over cold air in a frontal system) where it is forced to release its moisture content because of the drop in temperature. Warmer incoming air, more precip., whether it falls as snow depends on the temperature of the colder air. In the NJ/Phila area we usually get frontal snow usually preceded by rain as the colder underlying air pushes up the warm air it turns to snow, the amount that falls depends on the initial temperature of the humid air and the form of precip. on the temperature of the underlying air. In the big snowstorm in the NE recently, around Phila it was mostly rain, in NYC more snow, in Connecticut mostly snow. The amount of precip depended on the warm air that flowed in. note the nonlinearity in Table 1.
To Steve Mosher,
Nothing you have quoted says that we will get less overall snow but more severe snow storms which is what is now being claimed by the climate scientists refered to in the above article. And by the way – we have not gotten less overall snow fall and the storms are not worse than the past (obviously the only reason they are saying it is becauce it would be the worst possible of all worlds – as warmists always claim).
If your quotes are correct and from the latest IPCC report it just means that the author got what Openheimer famously claimed (snow is a thing of the past…) and the IPCC report mixed up – it was one sentence in the article.
If it’s too warm it falls as rain and not snow. So what kind of snow should be expect in 2100? Real snow or rainy snow?
When I lived over in the UK I noticed that in winteer whenever it snowed it felt bloody cold. Sometimes it felt bloody cold with no snow. But, funnily when it rained it did not feel so cold. Why is this? Am I going mad?
Too bad someone couldn’t come up with a smartphone ap game to whack such moles… caricatures by Josh of course. It would be fun to whack the likes of Borenstein (and his partners in crime) over the head with a mallet.
First comment seems stuck in moderation. Another comment speaking straight to Richard’s main argument: if temperature, and its direct link to the maximum possible specific humidity for a particular air mass, has no connection to precipitation intensity, then why do we observe some of the most intense precipitation in the warmest and most humid parts of the world?
The TRMM climatology:
http://cimss.ssec.wisc.edu/sage/ess/lesson1/images/TRMM_all_years..gif
MIke (UK) commented
Having spent most of my life in the midwest, shoveling a lot of snow, this is generally true. No need to be confused.
I would say to Steven Mosher that in all that text he’s presented, I do not see the word “storms,” much less “larger storms.” (The title of the article by Borentstein is “Less Snow, More Blizzards.”) Nor do I see any language that approximates it, although granted, that is a matter of interpretation. If I read it correctly, they are predicting more winter precipitation in some regions.
But then, most people who make their living issuing predictions are deliberately vague–and for good reason.
Mosher quotes the following from the last IPCC report:
‘However, this reduction is close to the inter-model spread so it contains large uncertainty, an assessment that is reinforced by the fact that some AOGCMs project an increase in precipitation.”’
You should learn from the modesty of the person that you quoted. He/she emphasized the large uncertainty of these results. Your writing suggests that you offer an airtight case.
In any case, Mosher, all of the evidence that you provide in support of your position consists of model runs. Have you not learned that results of model runs are not evidence, at least not scientific evidence.
If we take model runs as a substitute for empirical evidence in science then science will die and be replaced by digital bone reading. Is that what you want?
A quick look at “Meteorologist Dominik Jung Turns Skeptical After Germany Sets Record 5 Consecutive Colder-Than-Normal Winters!” (google it) reveals a contrary view from Germany that is based on observed fact:
‘Just a few years ago climate experts prophesied that Germany would no longer experience winters with ice and snow in the future. In the 1990s there had been an entire series of milder and stormier winters. […] However, this trend has not been observed over the last years. To the contrary: winters have again gotten considerably colder and the huge storms like those in the 1990s have more or less disappeared. […]. Climate experts prophesied in the year 2000 that winters with snow and ice in Germany would cease to exist.”’
I would think if there were any warming going on it would simply move weather behavior northward a few dozen miles. Why newly severe weather if the same thing didn’t happen southward in the past? –AGF
Philly, huh!?
Genuine:
—Cheesesteaks with thin sliced ribeye and Italian rolls,
—Soft pretzels baked that day with mustard if desired,
—Italian hoagies! A true Italian hoagie is one that everyone in the room knows you brought one to work for lunch.
—Pizza trucks on the street that sell good pizza
—Hotdog stands where you get your order within 30-45 seconds
—Hurricanes frequent enough in the fifties that people knew they were deadly,
—Huge snowstorms in the sities that occurred near winters end/ springs beginning… Like the April Easter storm…
I’ve a standing order for any friends or family visiting me from the Philly area;
Fresh soft pretzels even if they’re bought at the philly airport stand,
Hoagie, cheesteaks if they’re willing to bring them. Yes, the real ones are that good even a day old,
And if possible, real bacon; the truly smoked dry bacon that does not have water added. The package substitutes at the big grocery stores are insipid damp greasy ham slices in comparison.
The topic above. On SB’s (ever wonder if his middle name might be Oliver?) news that isn’t news; big surprise. Might be cool if someone has the time and aptitude to do a graph on his predictions across time; drought, flood, rain, dry, hot, cold, snow, big snow, no snow…
Nice try Steve; baffle us with BS… Not a lot of real specificity;
Does this mean up or down, more or less?
Uh, when? and does this mean up or down, more or less?
Increased precip due to circulation pattern changes?
increased snowfall in those regions that remain below freezing?
You may insist on mandatory reading; comprehending the doubletalk and attempts to baffle definite projections is darn near impossible. Instead of naming a region explicitly and making defined statements of future assesments, by year or at least decade, all of the predictions are spread across multiple paragraphs with abundant contradictions. Is it or isn’t it?
If I’d summarized the list of ‘less snow bigger storms’ IPCC predictions you claim to document I’d end up with:
More snow,
Less snow,
More extreme snow,
Greater precitipitation,
Less precipitation,
Snow where it is cold,
More precipitation on westward slopes of North American mountains,
Less precipitation in summer on westward slopes of North American mountains,
More precipitation in winter on westward slopes of North American mountains,
No change in annual precipitation on westward slopes of North American mountains,
And this is before the claims about precipitation by the end of the 21st centuary in the Artic and unknown determination in Antarctica…
Now about the supposed predictions regarding immediate change to less snow, more extreme storms for this decade?
Got any firm IPCC statements that declare via their models and pal reviewed studies what the weather will be, where and when this year?! Surely given IPCC’s omniscient powers of accurate prediction they published specific storm warnings for the year 2013? Oh yeah, climate is not weather; but weather is climate any time the CAGWers decide it suits their purpose.
Steven Mosher says:
At this point you have these choices.
1. Argue that the text does not mean what it says
2. Apologize for misleading folks
3. Attack me
4. Change the topic.
5. Attack some other part of the science and gish gallop away.
6. Admit you didnt read the document you criticized
7. Ignore the findings
8. Attack models that predicted the very thing you deny they predicted.
9. Post a you tube video of kittens
>>> Or….
10. Point out that nothing you posted from the IPCC mentioned Northeast US snow storms.
From Borenstein’s article…
“With scant snowfall and barren ski slopes in parts of the Midwest and Northeast the past couple of years, some scientists have pointed to global warming as the culprit.”
I could change my sentence,
“The last IPCC report claimed snowfall would decrease, and made no mention of larger storms.”
to ..
“…no mention of larger storms in the Northeastern US”
lest some people think Borenstein or I are talking about Siberia or Antarctica.
agfosterjr commented
I’ve been thinking that all that would really need to happen is the Polar and Subtropical jets were to move, altering the area between jets, that could explain most of the measured warming.
Where I live we experience weather on both side of the polar jet. The difference between a warm wet winter and a cold snowy winter is a slight difference in jet stream path.
I bet if I run enough models of the 2012 baseball season I can get the Houston Astros to win the WS at least 0.1% of the time. Doesn’t mean it happened. Models are utterly and totally useless unless the entire mechanism is 100% transparent.
About 13years ago, Dr David Viner, a senior research scientist at the climatic research unit (CRU) of the University of East Anglia had the following to say about future snowfall:
within a few years winter snowfall will become “a very rare and exciting event”.
“Children just aren’t going to know what snow is”
“Heavy snow will return occasionally, but when it does we will be unprepared.”
“We’re really going to get caught out. Snow will probably cause chaos in 20 years time,” he said.
“The chances are certainly now stacked against the sort of heavy snowfall in cities that inspired Impressionist painters, such as Sisley, and the 19th century poet laureate Robert Bridges, who wrote in “London Snow” of it, “stealthily and perpetually settling and loosely lying”.”
I guess that hasn’t worked out very well for them, so, just change the rules, and heck, might as well move those goalposts while we’re at it.
trafamadore says:
February 19, 2013 at 9:16 am
If air over the ocean comes landward, the amt of water it contains is limited by its temp, warmer air, more H2O. … AGW could change that by allowing more moisture in.
>>>The amount of H20 available to make snow is limited to the maximum amount available at the maximum temperature at which SNOW can form. Snow and Ice crystals cannot form above zero C, at which point the 3.8 grams/kg saturation mixing ratio is the maximum available H20. Supersaturation can push that up a few percent, but there’s still a limit that won’t change (unless global warming changes the freezing point of water).
Beyond that limit, it’s all rain.
Alright then, I won’t attack the models. I’ll let the modelers attack the models themselves.
You see when a model says to expect warmer northern latitude winters and another says to expect colder, what is there to deny? What was predicted? I can only point out the conflict.
Warmer winters
http://www.nature.com/nature/journal/v399/n6735/full/399452a0.html
Colder winters
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1029/2009JD013568/abstract
A man with 3 watches (1 running fast, 1 running slow & 1 accurate) is never sure of the time.
atheok says:
Philly, huh!?
Genuine:
—Soft pretzels baked that day with mustard if desired,
>>> Mustard is mandatory, and enough that it drips on the sidewalk.
And scrapple, if you’re allowed to eat that stuff.
—Hurricanes frequent enough in the fifties that people knew they were deadly,
>>> Do Carol and Hazel ring a bell? Did the former in Wildwood Crest, which was completely flooded (but not evacuated), and the latter back in Philadelphia where I watch giant oaks criss-crossing our street.
Matthew W says:
I don’t even bother reading “articles” from Seth anymore.
>>> Me neither, but I saw it on Drudge and thought it might be OK. Then I couldn’t go back to sleep, and stayed up all night writing my thesis.
Box of Rocks says:
February 19, 2013 at 9:39 am
Chart 1 is wrong.
The 1990′s and 2000s are clearly warmer than the 1930s.
Need to edit the data to reflect that…
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
No they are not.
Hansen messing with the data: 3 graphs
An alternate method of looking at climate is the Köppen climate classification. The movement of the climate boundary in the 20th century graphs The top graph shows the last quarter of a century is not the warmest the first quarter of the century is.
“The Köppen climate classification is a widely used, vegetation-based empirical
climate classification system developed by German botanist-climatologist Wladimir Köppen.”
At this point I believe a bunch of plants over Hansen and his buddies.
Steven Mosher says:
I suppose it would be too much trouble to actually read the science. Much easier to pick cherries. At this point you have these choices.
1. Argue that the text does not mean what it says
2. Apologize for misleading folks
3. Attack me
4. Change the topic.
5. Attack some other part of the science and gish gallop away.
6. Admit you didnt read the document you criticized
7. Ignore the findings
8. Attack models that predicted the very thing you deny they predicted.
9. Post a you tube video of kittens
========================================================================
Steven,
When you quote the IPCC report, liberally dosed as it is with non-science science, how can you turn back on yourself and attack folks for not reading ‘the science’. If you would be specific about the science you would like us to read it would be helpful. Quoting block after block about non-scientific models is not helpful. As you well know, models do not produce findings. Why else would you continue to work to produce real temperature data?
PS: I like cherries. Should be a good crop in the Central Valley of California this year since the unusually cool temps have kept the cherry trees from blooming yet. Daffodils are up and rolling though.
pbh
Matt says:
With sufficient thrust one can make pigs fly in real life. Please note that I am not suggesting that flying pigs would be a good idea. 🙂
>>> Right. And the Pink Floyd pig I linked to was a balloon, not computer generated, but still a good metaphor for a climate model.