“Covering up” the pause:
World’s top climate scientists told to ‘cover up’ the fact that the Earth’s temperature hasn’t risen for the last 15 years
Scientists working on the most authoritative study on climate change were urged to cover up the fact that the world’s temperature hasn’t risen for the last 15 years, it is claimed. Leaked documents seen by the Associated Press yesterday revealed deep concerns among politicians about a lack of global warming over the past few years.
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…leaked documents seen by the Associated Press, yesterday revealed deep concerns among politicians about a lack of global warming over the past few years.
Germany called for the references to the slowdown in warming to be deleted, saying looking at a time span of just 10 or 15 years was ‘misleading’ and they should focus on decades or centuries.
The UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change has changed its tune after issuing stern warnings about climate change for years
Hungary worried the report would provide ammunition for deniers of man-made climate change.
Belgium objected to using 1998 as a starting year for statistics, as it was exceptionally warm and makes the graph look flat – and suggested using 1999 or 2000 instead to give a more upward-pointing curve.
The United States delegation even weighed in, urging the authors of the report to explain away the lack of warming using the ‘leading hypothesis’ among scientists that the lower warming is down to more heat being absorbed by the ocean – which has got hotter.
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Finally, the IPCC has toned down its climate change alarm. Can rational discussion now begin?
Next week, those who made dire predictions of ruinous climate change face their own inconvenient truth. The summary of the fifth assessment report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) will be published, showing that global temperatures are refusing to follow the path which was predicted for them by almost all climatic models. Since its first report in 1990, the IPCC has been predicting that global temperatures would be rising at an average of 0.2° Celsius per decade. Now, the IPCC acknowledges that there has been no statistically significant rise at all over the past 16 years.
It is difficult to over-emphasise the significance of this report
More at The Spectator
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meanwhile… Gavin Schmidt dismisses the pause with a wave of the hand:
“This whole thing is just a blogstorm in a teacup”
“This whole thing is just a blogstorm in a teacup,” the British climatologist told CBSNews.com “The IPCC is there to assess the literature and tell people what the scientists are saying.” The report is meant to explain what scientists have reported, not conduct original science, he continued. “The idea that IPCC needs to be up to date on what was written last week is just ridiculous.”
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“It skews all of these diagnostics. Look at the long-term content, and ocean heat temperature is rising. We’re doing things to the planet that are geological in scope. I don’t use those words lightly.”
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He doesn’t expect the IPCC to devote much time to the issue of the apparent lull. “This whole thing has an element for ‘what can we find to try to undermine the IPCC’ before it’s even done, and there’s a lot of that going around this week,” he said.
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The deniers’ approach, says Schmidt is, “sling enough mud and hope something sticks. This seems to be a little sticky so this will be what they focus on.”
Controversy over U.N. report on climate change as warming appears to slow – CBS News
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Obama aims to ‘criminalize’ CO2 emissions — ‘If you’re pumping more than your legal limit of CO2 into the sky, well then, you sir, are a criminal’
Read the Full Article at Bloomberg News
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Eric Worrall writes:
Yet another climate fanatic has demanded the suspension of democratic processes:
This is because the implications of 3C, let alone 4C or 5C, are so horrible that we look to any possible scenario to head it off, including the canvassing of “emergency” responses such as the suspension of democratic processes.
This article was published in mainstream Australian media, on the eve of the Australian election.
Calls for green totalitarianism used to be comparatively rare, and therefore newsworthy – for example, Suzuki’s call to jail politicians who disagree with him, or Hansen’s promotion of Chinese style totalitarianism were widely seen as aberrations, as mistakes, as unrepresentative of the true feelings of people concerned about climate change.
However it is not difficult to predict that as voters increasingly reject greens at the ballot box, we shall see more of this nonsense in the future.
![Cartoon-Temperature-Rising-600[1]](http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2013/09/cartoon-temperature-rising-6001.jpg?quality=83)
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The Telegraph reports:
“We need a drastic policy shift,” said Christoph Schmidt, chairman of Germany’s Council of Economic Experts. “They haven’t paid any attention to costs. These are now huge.”
The government has vowed to break dependence on fossil fuels and source 50pc of all electricity from wind, solar and other renewables by 2030, and 80pc by mid-century. But cost estimates have reached €1 trillion (£840bn) over the next 25 years.
German Industry In Revolt Against Green Energy Policies
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You genuinely have to be an idiot to think that Arctic sea ice is recovering
There are serious debates to be had about climate change, and what we should do about it. Whether or not the Arctic ice is retreating is not one of them.
http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/tomchiversscience/100237031/you-genuinely-have-to-be-an-idiot-to-think-that-arctic-sea-ice-is-recovering/
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Meanwhile, over at Dr. Judith Curry’s place, Greg Goodman writes to tell me that he agrees with what I said in this video about Arctic Sea ice reaching a new equilibrium point. See the graph below.
Inter-decadal Variation in Northern Hemisphere sea ice
On the deceleration in the decline of the Arctic sea ice.
The variation in the magnitude of the annual cycle in arctic sea ice area has increased notably since the minimum of 2007. This means that using a unique annual cycle fitted to all the data leaves a strong residual (or “anomaly”) in post-2007 years. This makes it difficult or impossible to visualise how the data has evolved during that period. This leads to the need to develop an adaptive method to evaluate the typical annual cycle, in order to render the inter-annual variations more intelligible.
Figure 4. Showing Cryosphere Today anomaly derived with single seasonal cycle
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The rate of ice loss since 2007 is very close to that of the 1990s but is clearly less pronounced than it was from 1997 to 2007, a segment of the data which in itself shows a clear downward curvature, indicating accelerating ice loss.
Inter-decadal Variation in Northern Hemisphere sea ice
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I am surprised that none of the warmist alarmists have not taken the following approach:
“Hey, look at the effect all our efforts have done so far in reducing climate change – global warming has been suspended for 15 years. But let us be ever diligent in our efforts, not resting on our past achievements, but let us continue on with an even greater drive to limit CO2 emissions and reduce global warming even more.”
Do I hear an “Amen!”
“blogstorm in a teacup”
Well, that is an uncommon type of phrase; sounds to me like the type of comment that comes off around a bar stool with fellow alarmists. I wonder who really thought of it first? Gavin or the spinmeisters working over the weekend?
Totally agree. But, since we have only a VERY short record of “accurate” data, we can’t reasonably come to ANY conclusions about whether today’s climate is any “better” or “worse” than that of 1000, 2000, 3000, etc years ago. And even if it is, we don’t have sufficient evidence to say it’s due to human industrial activity.
You genuinely have to be an idiot to think that what is or isn’t happen to Arctic sea ice, Antarctic sea ice, glaciers, etc is unprecedented during this interglacial or any of the previous ones.
As I’ve said before, the entire CO2 scare is tantamount to waking up one morning, seeing that it’s raining, and becoming extremely alarmed when it’s still raining 5 minutes later. Obviously the trend, when extended out 10 years, means all life on the planet will be drowned before we know it.
“We need a drastic policy shift,” said Christoph Schmidt, chairman of Germany’s Council of Economic Experts. “They haven’t paid any attention to costs. These are now huge.”
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This sounds like a man-made energy crisis.
Ah. “Storm spotter” perhaps? Same here …
I’m thinking the contrast was enhanced, at the very least.
Also noticed the vapor (US spelling) seems to be emanating from the very ‘walls’ near the top of the left ‘steam stack’ rather than out the actual top. WUWT?
With what may be a source of illumination (the sun) off to the right judging from the illumination of the vapor, it SURE is strange the steam stacks DON’T show the same illumination on the side closest to the illumination. The steam stacks appear completely dark and un-illuminated. WUWT?
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More interesting media maltruths and having fun with pliable numbers (bold beyond title added):
http://www.express.co.uk/news/uk/430649/What-climate-change-Fewer-people-than-EVER-believe-the-world-is-really-warming-up
Amazing how scary they make it sound, when it is still below the “dingbat” percentage who accept fortune tellers and extraterrestrial corpses being stored at Area 51. When anyone who really knows anything knows they were moved to deep in Yucca Mountain to conceal the implanted distress beacon signals, and not all are corpses.
Will this be cross-posted on this also-influential blog?
Quoting Green Party leader Natalie Bennett (bold/italics added):
Faced with such huge forces of Nature, I’m reminded humanity is a flea on a dog’s tail that likes to convince itself it can wag the dog. Back to article:
Kenji Watts needs to file an immediate protest, as it is embarrassing for his organization to make up words for the purposes of slander and vile obscene insults.
IPCC math sure is strange. Since the rate of warming from 1998 to 2012 was statistically zero, doesn’t this mean the 1951 to 2012 rate was about two times nothing?
The CBS article calls Gavin Schmidt a British Climatologist. When did he become British? Or is this just something else that CBS got wrong?
“Belgium objected to using 1998 as a starting year for statistics, as it was exceptionally warm and makes the graph look flat . . .”
Interesting. Last decade it was okay to use 1979 as a starting year for statistics, as it was exceptionally cool and made the graph show astonishing rising temps.
WUWT says: “Meanwhile, over at Dr. Judith Curry’s place, Greg Goodman writes to tell me that he agrees with what I said in this video about Arctic Sea ice reaching a new equilibrium point. ”
Thanks for the link to the article.
In fact the result of my analysis was the following graph. The whole point being that it makes the post 2007 section much clearer.
http://climategrog.files.wordpress.com/2013/09/art_nh_ice_area_short_anom_2007_final.png
I also extract rates of change which shows the rate of area loss is now HALF what is was during 1997 to 2007.
Anthony says in the video at 19m44 “mean seem fairly flat”. That was my opinion too but it was unclear with all the noise. That’s why I rolled up my sleeves and had a closer look. Once we get rid of that residual it becomes a lot clearer. We see that 2007 and 2012 were parts of repetitive pattern in the data
We can also see that the reason it is flattening off because of the temperature plateau:
http://climategrog.wordpress.com/?attachment_id=521
It takes some time for the ice mass to respond to the temperature variations but the lesser rate of melting is as Anthony described it settling to a new equilibrium with the warmer conditions.
If we are to believe that the ice is melting due to global warming we should expect the melting to slow when the warming stops/pauses/plateaus or has a hiatus hernia.
Expect the IPCC to spend the next 17 years denying the “haitus” in arctic ice loss. Or expect the guardians of the data to start “correcting” some hitherto undetected ‘biases’ in the data. JAXA have opened the batting on the one this year already.
Sounds like a native of Louisiana:
/sarc
From the Telegraph comments section:
Gave me a chuckle, that did.
We have separation of church and state too. I read that in books about the constitution …
And we can’t own ‘guns’ unless we’re in the state militia. I read that in books about the constitution too.
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/sarc all
I guess he’s got a Green card.
In reply to:
The deniers’ approach, says Schmidt is, “sling enough mud and hope something sticks. This seems to be a little sticky so this will be what they focus on.”
William:
C’mon man! Schmidt is trying to change the subject, using a misapplied euphemism. The extreme AGW pushers’ use of the derogatory term ‘deniers’ and the term ‘mudslinging’ is an attempt to belittle the messenger rather than to address the scientific issues in a scientific manner which is obviously mudslinging. The so called ‘skeptics’ are using observations and logic to support their assertion that there is no extreme AGW problem to solve which is the standard methodology to resolve scientific issues, not mudslinging. i.e. What does theory predict? Do observations and analysis agree with theory predictions. Any observed warming does not support the assertion that there will be dangerous warming. Observations and analysis supports the assertion that the warming due to a doubling of atmospheric CO2 will be less than 1C. The fact that the planet has not warmed for 16 years while atmospheric CO2 increases is only one of many observations that disprove the extreme AGW hypothesis. The following are two other key logical points to support the assertion that the warming due to a doubling of atmospheric CO2 will be less than 1C.
1. Planet resists rather than amplifies forcing changes. Peer reviewed analysis supports the assertion that planetary cloud cover in the tropics increases or decreases to resist forcing changes which is negative feedback. The IPCC models which do not agree with observations, assume the tropical region amplifies the CO2 forcing (positive feedback) rather than resists CO2 forcing.
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/04/18/another-paper-finds-lower-climate-sensitivity/
http://www-eaps.mit.edu/faculty/lindzen/236-Lindzen-Choi-2011.pdf
On the Observational Determination of Climate Sensitivity and Its Implications, by Richard Lindzen and Yong-Sang Choi
….We again find that the outgoing radiation resulting from SST fluctuations exceeds the zerofeedback response thus implying negative feedback. In contrast to this, the calculated TOA outgoing radiation fluxes from 11 atmospheric models forced by the observed SST are less than the zerofeedback response, consistent with the positive feedbacks that characterize these models. The results imply that the models are exaggerating climate sensitivity. …. … However, warming from a doubling of CO2 would only be about 1C (based on simple calculations where the radiation altitude and the Planck temperature depend on wavelength in accordance with the attenuation coefficients of well mixed CO2 molecules; a doubling of any concentration in ppmv produces the same warming because of the logarithmic dependence of CO2’s absorption on the amount of CO2) (IPCC, 2007). This modest warming is much less than current climate models suggest for a doubling of CO2. Models predict warming of from 1.5C to 5C and even more for a doubling of CO2. Model predictions depend on the ‘feedback’ within models from the more important greenhouse substances, water vapor and clouds. Within all current climate models, water vapor increases with increasing temperature so as to further inhibit infrared cooling. Clouds also change so that their visible reflectivity decreases, causing increased solar absorption and warming of the earth. Cloud feedbacks are still considered to be highly uncertain (IPCC, 2007), but the fact that these feedbacks are strongly positive in most models is considered to be an indication that the result is basically correct.
2. There is no observed warming in the tropical troposphere at roughly 5km and there is almost no warming in the tropics in response to the increase in the atmospheric CO2. The climate models used by the IPCC amplify the forcing due to CO2 assuming an increase in water vapor in the tropics, in the tropical tropospheric (at roughly 5 km). If there was an increase in water vapor with no increase in cloud cover the upper troposphere in the tropics would warm. The general circulation models (GCM) assume there is either a reduction or no change in planetary cloud cover in response to an increase CO2 forcing. Twenty years of measurement of atmospheric temperature using weather balloons and satellites shows there is no tropic tropospheric warming supports the assertion that tropics does not amplify CO2 forcing.
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/07/16/about-that-missing-hot-spot/
http://www.drroyspencer.com/wp-content/uploads/CMIP5-73-models-vs-obs-20N-20S-MT-5-yr-means1.png
http://icecap.us/images/uploads/DOUGLASPAPER.pdf
A comparison of tropical temperature trends with model predictions
We examine tropospheric temperature trends of 67 runs from 22 ‘Climate of the 20th Century’ model simulations and try to reconcile them with the best available updated observations (in the tropics during the satellite era). Model results and observed temperature trends are in disagreement in most of the tropical troposphere, being separated by more than twice the uncertainty of the model mean. In layers near 5 km, the modelled trend is 100 to 300% higher than observed, and, above 8 km, modelled and observed trends have opposite signs. These conclusions contrast strongly with those of recent publications based on essentially the same data.
New paper that again finds the upper troposphere is not warming as predicted.
http://iopscience.iop.org/1748-9326/7/4/044018
For over forty-five years now, death-eating Luddite sociopaths have proved relentless Public Enemies of post-Enlightenment industrial/technological civilization. On the record, to name a few other than fuss-and-grumble AGW Catastrophists, truly manic exemplars of this genre include Paul Ehrlich, John Holdren, Keith Farnish, Kentti Linkola, Hans-Joachim Schellnhuber. Anyone unfamiliar with these unbelievably infantile-regressive Wreckers had best do their homework.
Crass and vulgar know-nothings as Green Gangsters are –for starters we include Keith Briffa, James Hansen, Paul Jones, Michael Mann, and Kevin Trenberth– their bleats-and-squeaks pale before the genocidal monomania of such as Farnish and Linkola. Propagandizing their communo-fascist New World Order, these vicious totalitarian ideologues care nothing for reality, and they want you dead.
“You genuinely have to be an idiot to think that Arctic sea ice is recovering”
At least, Tom Chivers has the courage of calling a growing percentage of his readers idiots.
Maybe he’s tired of his job.
@ur momisugly DirkH on September 20, 2013 at 9:40 am:
Hey, I ain’t going to say the Arctic sea ice is recovering either. The patient is out of bed and took a single step on their own. I’ll call it a recovery when they’re walking down the hall. For now we don’t know if they’ll fall over with the next step, or the one thereafter. This is way too soon to call it.
Now if you don’t want to say it’s a recovery because it will inevitably decline, then you’re a blooming idiot.
_Jim says:
September 20, 2013 at 8:17 am
> Also noticed the vapor (US spelling) seems to be emanating from the very ‘walls’ near the top of the left ‘steam stack’ rather than out the actual top. WUWT?
I think there are at least three stacks in the photo. The front left stack is the obvious steam source. There’s just a hint of a left rear stack, that’s what’s giving the appearance of steam coming from the wall of the left front stack. The right front stack appears to be emitting something faintly visible, I think that is combustion smoke, so yes, there is a CO2 source in the photo! I’m not sure if there’s a right rear stack.
JimS says:
September 20, 2013 at 7:48 am
I am surprised that none of the warmist alarmists have not taken the following approach:
“Hey, look at the effect all our efforts have done so far in reducing climate change – global warming has been suspended for 15 years. ….
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
That is a wee bit of a problem.
Countries Worldwide Propose to Build 1,200 New Coal Plants
…According to the World Coal Association, coal’s global share of primary energy consumption rose to 30.3 percent in 2011 from about 25 percent, where it had been for years, and generated about 42 percent of the world’s electricity. Coal’s global resurgence is due in part to the shale gas boom that lowered natural gas prices, making gas more competitive with coal, and pushing coal prices down on world markets.
Coal’s recent global renaissance, with the world’s highest consumption for the fuel since 1969, is not just due to Asian countries. In the United Kingdom, for example, coal consumption increased by nearly a quarter between the second quarter of 2011 and the second quarter of 2012. Germany is encouraging the construction of 10 gigawatts of coal-fired generation to replace its nuclear plants and provide back-up power for its wind and solar units, which require backup when the wind isn’t blowing or when the sun does not shine.
Europe overall burned more coal in the past year than any time since it pledged cuts to greenhouse gas emissions.
Graph “To put these new coal-fired capacity increases in perspective, the United States has 319 gigawatts of coal-fired electric generating capacity. Until recently, these plants have generated about 50 percent of America’s electricity. Now China and India are planning to build over 60 percent more coal-fired capacity than the coal-fired generating capacity that currently exists in the United States.”
Graph: Coal Consumption and Production
If this year wasn’t a recovery there was nothing notable happened last year either. Typical double standards for the propagandists. You can’t have it both ways.
That means that everyone who though last year’s OMG worse than we thought ice area is equally stupid.
When there’s a bad year, it’s a huge problem and we are told we must act NOW. When it comes back up a year later it’s irrelevant we need to take the long view.
Who’s calling who stupid in this game.
One things clear, starting you data collection at the top of the hill makes everything later “unprecedented”.
http://climategrog.wordpress.com/?attachment_id=521
From Greg Goodman on September 20, 2013 at 10:32 am:
So our side is allowed to be as wrong as theirs? Their jumping on UNPRECEDENTED events makes them look foolish. If we do the same, do you expect us to look learned and wise?
That’s often a non-verbal self-designation, evident from their actions. What are you saying with yours?
If it is the left front, steam looks to be exiting the ‘wall’ of the stack; a better candidate is the left rear stack (close examination of the image I observe three stacks: two foreground and one on the left in the back. No indication/signs of anything in the right-rear.)
Further examination of the ‘stack’ color shows better than 98% of the pixels possessing the same RGB value set; I’m thinking contrast was ‘enhanced’ on this photo until the desired darkness of the visible plume was achieved and any graytones on the stacks hit a lower limit (vis-a-vis a ‘cutoff’ in this case AKA ‘saturation’ into one color or tone, resulting in the same set of RGB values). Which means, with nearly the same RGB values for nearly all pixels in the steam stacks no ‘contrast enhancement’ is possible to reveal further individual stack details …
Summary: While this photo may not have been in a sense ‘doctored’, it has been manipulated …
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World’s top climate scientists told to ‘cover up’ the fact that the Earth’s temperature hasn’t risen for the last 15 years
Yet another case of ‘hiding the decline,’ in this case, hiding the decline in the rate of warming since 1980. We should come up with a nice, long list of inconvenient declines that AGW cultists would rather not discuss. I have a few to start with:
• The decline in the rate of sea-level rise
• The decline in concern over climate change
• The decline in deaths from extreme weather
• The decline in major hurricanes
• The decline in NH ACE
• The decline in hair count on Mann’s head