Curry and Lomborg in house committee today – webcast live

Obama’s problem is that he surrounded himself with useless advisers like Holdren and Hansen. Obama’s science knowledge is minimal to non existent. The UK has the same problem with 95% of our politicians.

“Skeptics outnumber alarmists at House of Representatives session today”
Neither Curry of Lomborg is really a skeptic. Nor are they alarmists.
I think Curry will say that, while elevated CO2 levels cause a bit of warming, it is nothing to worry about and will almost certainly not be catastrophic. In an interview she recently repeated what she said last year: “Based upon the background knowledge that we have, the threat does not seem to be an existential one on the time scale of the 21st century, even in its most alarming incarnation.”
link
I expect that Lomborg will take a similar tack. He recently said: “Yes, global warming is real and mostly man-made, … The solution is not to make fossil fuels so expensive that nobody wants them because that will never work but to make green energy so cheap that eventually everybody wants it.” link
Both Curry and Lomborg will present a nuanced message and my biggest concern is that they will confuse the committee members.

Politicians hear what they want to hear: Blah, blah, blah, blah, climate change, blah, blah, blah, warming, blah, blah, blah…
If Judith says any of those words, the rest will be ignored. More to the point, questions will be asked for the sole purpose of eliciting those words from her mouth. She will be a puppet on a string and won’t even realize it.

Global warming has paused now for some 16 years and the pattern of the last 10 years has been actually one of slight cooling. The best forecasts [UK Met Office] call for the same for the next 5 years, bringing the total pause to 20 years by 2017. Some climate scientists have been predicting typical long term cooling phase which may last well into the 2030/2040 era like the pauses between 1880-1910 and 1940-1970. These pauses typically last for 30-40 years and not just 10-15 years as IPCC has been suggesting. What is behind this pause? It would appear that the current cooler cycle may be due to the following key climate factors:
DECLINING SOLAR CYCLE
Solar sunspot activity is at the lowest level since 1900. During the decades of 1880, 1890 and 1900 the average sunspot numbers [NSO] were 45.2, 55.1 and 42.6. During 2000 decade they were 49.6. During the last 10 years the average sunspot number was 29.3. Low solar sunspot numbers seem to correlate with low global surface temperatures especially when ocean and solar cycles are both in sync and declining. Low solar cycles typically come in threes, so it is possible that low sunspot number may exist for several decades into the future
DECLINING SST
Sea Surface Temperatures in both the Northern and Southern Hemispheres have been flat for 16 years as measured by HADSST2 and have actually been declining slightly during the last 10 year. Land temperatures typically follow ocean surface temperatures which follow solar heating cycles. The oceans release this heat to the atmosphere in lagged timing from the sun cycle.
WINTER AO GOING MOSTLY NEGATIVE
The JFM Seasonal standardized AO Index has been declining since 1989 and is more frequently now negative allowing more cold Arctic air to drift further south
DECLINE IN STRONG EL NINOS
During previous global cool cycles like1880-1910 and 1940-1980 there was typically only one climate altering El Nino per decade. During the warm phases, there were 2
MORE FREQUENT SUDDEN STRATOAPHERIC WARMING. [SSW]
SSW used to happen every other year, but recently these are stronger, are happening more frequently and are earlier in the winter. These events are caused by sudden warming of the stratosphere air which is compressed and sinks down causing a mound of air at higher pressure to develop around the pole which in turn forces the cold Arctic air outward from the poles. This cold air can split the polar vortex and these vortices can send cold Arctic air over Europe and North America and change the direction of winter winds to come from the north east as was the case in Europe.
ROSSBY WAVES AND JET STREAM CHANGES
More recently low amplitude zonal waves [jet streams] are being replaced by larger amplitude meridonal waves. These jet streams swing further south pushing more cold Arctic air toward the equator. These waves used to move from west to east in relatively short periods [6weeeks] but recently they have stayed longer and are more often blocked by adjacent Hi’s
MORE SEVERE WEATHER
When there is more global cooling taking place, there will be a greater incidence of warm and cold fronts clashing at the jet stream inter face regions bringing a higher probability of bigger and more frequent storms. There will be more severe and sometime extreme weather with the cooling globe. The best example of this is the increase in tornadoes during the spring and fall in United States where cold and warm fronts clash more often due to the existence of still cold fronts from the west. It has nothing to do with global warming.
CLIMATE MODELS
Climate models based on rising co2 levels seem to be somewhat flawed and a comparison of 44 climate model predictions and observed satellite readings of global lower troposphere temperatures illustrates the problem. Not a single model seemed to match observed global temperature trends. It would be quite wrong in my opinion to base any public energy and environmental policy on this doubtful science.
Climate models based on CO2 levels seem to be seriously flawed and headed in the wrong direction as compared to UAH and RSS satellite observable global temperature trend. Why any government would spend tax payer’s money during these difficult financial times with serious budget deficits to fight non existing global warming which is based on this flawed science is hard to comprehend.

Her testimony looked pretty good to me; thumbs up JC! Lots of good stuff in there although nothing earth shattering. My particular favorite from the conclusion reads:

‘The role of scientists should not be to develop political will to act by hiding or simplifying the uncertainties, either explicitly or implicitly, behind a negotiated consensus.’

Take that, followers of the late Dr. Stephen Schneider!
It must be neat to be able to stand up in a House subcommittee and talk about ‘messy wickedness’. 🙂

For: Leif Svalgaard
Hey, Leif, here is a good partial list of exogenous variables that can explain why EVERY low solar activity period is not neccesarily a low surface temperature period. Multicolinearity of inter-correlated variables will do that, particularly when lag times may be invovled. It does not mean that low solar activity does not generally result in lower temperatures. See: herkimer says: April 25, 2013 at 7:10 am . Many more variables can be added to this list, some inter-correlated, some not, like volcanism.

I thought Chameides was a shifty and untrustworthy sort of cove…..he could barely conceal his conviction that the elected reps. were halfwits.
And that will have gone down very badly with them.

It seems to me that a label such as “lukewarmer” is irrelevant in the case of Dr. Curry. She is an excellent critic of IPCC attribution studies. She created the “Uncertainty Monster” and presented addresses on it at mainstream climate science venues. She sticks to the science.
Questioners might have elicited a policy response from her this morning but she prefers to address the uncertainty in the science rather than policy options. She was at a disadvantage in this panel. She would like to discuss the science but she was the only person in the room who can discuss science at her level.