Guest essay by Eric Worrall
Former NASA Chief Scientist Ellen Stofan is worried some media outlets do not provide sufficiently apocalyptic climate views.
Americans ‘under siege’ from climate disinformation – former Nasa chief scientist
Fake news spread by those with a profit motive is leaving many people oblivious to the threat of climate change, says former head of US space agency.
Hannah Devlin Science correspondent
Friday 9 June 2017 00.15 AEST
Americans are “under siege” from disinformation designed to confuse the public about the threat of climate change, Nasa’s former chief scientist has said.
Speaking to the Guardian, Ellen Stofan, who left the US space agency in December, said that a constant barrage of half-truths had left many Americans oblivious to the potentially dire consequences of continued carbon emissions, despite the science being unequivocal.
“We are under siege by fake information that’s being put forward by people who have a profit motive,” she said, citing oil and coal companies as culprits. “Fake news is so harmful because once people take on a concept it’s very hard to dislodge it.”
During the past six months, the US science community has woken up to this threat, according to Stofan, and responded by ratcheting up efforts to communicate with the public at the grassroots level as well as in the mainstream press.
“The harder part is this active disinformation campaign,” she said before her appearance at Cheltenham Science Festival this week. “I’m always wondering if these people honestly believe the nonsense they put forward. When they say ‘It could be volcanoes’ or ‘the climate always changes’… to obfuscate and to confuse people, it frankly makes me angry.”
Stofan added that while “fake news” is frequently characterised as a problem in the right-leaning media, she saw evidence of an “erosion of people’s ability to scrutinise information” across the political spectrum. “All of us have a responsibility,” she said. “There’s this attitude of ‘I read it on the internet therefore it must be true’.”
…
Even using IPCC estimates, there is a real possibility we do not face a climate emergency. From IPCC AR5 Chapter 10 page 871;
… Estimates of the Equilibrium Climate Sensitivity (ECS) based on multiple and partly independent lines of evidence from observed climate change indicate that there is high con dence that ECS is extremely unlikely to be less than 1°C and medium con dence that the ECS is likely to be between 1.5°C and 4.5°C and very unlikely greater than 6°C. These assessments are consistent with the overall assessment in Chapter 12, where the inclusion of additional lines of evidence increases con dence in the assessed likely range for ECS. …
Read more: http://www.climatechange2013.org/images/report/WG1AR5_Chapter10_FINAL.pdf
The lower IPCC estimate for a plausible equilibrium climate sensitivity is an unexciting 1.5C per doubling of CO2. Even 1C per doubling is considered possible.
CO2 is currently growing at around 3ppm / year, according to observations from Mauna Loa.
Starting from 2016 / 404ppm, project the CO2 level by 2100;
404ppm + 3ppm * (2100 – 2016) = 656ppm
Calibrating for 1.5C / doubling (CO2 forcing is logarithmic) – determine the value of k;
1.5C = k log10(2)
k = 1.5C / log10(2) = 4.98
Determine the equilibrium temperature anomaly for 656ppm;
T = k log10(656ppm / 280ppm) = 1.8C temperature rise above pre-industrial temperatures.
Note this is the equilibrium sensitivity calculation – the transient climate sensitivity is likely to be even less.
Since we have already experienced around 1C of temperature rise without any noticeable ill effects, an additional 0.8C by the year 2100 is a big nothing burger.
Obviously everyone can debate the likelihood of various climate sensitivity estimates, or the possibility that the rise in atmospheric CO2 level will accelerate as China complies with their Paris agreement commitments, by building hundreds of new coal plants, but my point stands;
The science is NOT unequivocal that we face a climate emergency. Using the IPCC’s own climate figures, there is a real possibility anthropogenic CO2 is not a big deal.
Calling people who point this out purveyors of “fake news” is pure climate alarmism.
As for what happens after the year 2100, frankly that is their problem. By the year 2100 humanity will know whether CO2 is causing climate problems – and will have the energy supply options and advanced engineering capabilities to deal with any eventuality.
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I wonder if she really believes her own barrage of nonsense, misinformation and half-truths. It frankly makes me angry.
BC,
I don’t doubt that she believes what she is saying. That is one of the problems. She and those like her are so convinced that they are right that the only thing that explains (to her) the actions of those of us here is that we are being paid big bucks to confuse the public. She has made a mental model of the world where she is in possession of the Ultimate Truth and those working against her do so out of simple greed. The bottom line is that she is ‘reality challenged,’ and isn’t even aware of it. These are people who have closed minds and don’t really understand how the Scientific Method works.
I agree. I think this is the problem. As far as I can tell, this is the result of developments over the past 40-50 years.
As I like to say, only the completely insane are completely convinced of their own sanity.
Hear, hear! I have never claimed to be sane, just stable.
It just fries me how many of these useless “Dr. Bureaucrat” types are employed by the US federal gov’t either as full-time employees or as highly paid “consultants”. You could cut the budgets of many federal agencies such as the EPA and NOAA by 75% and you wouldn’t see any change in their deliverable. It’s that bad: literal armies of people that don’t do anything of value unless of course you count their virtue signalling.
Dr. Bureaucrat
Good one
Piled high .
She didn’t mention a single item of fake news that she says is being used to to mislead the public.
This sounds like fake news.
And Ellen Stofan will be publicly debating …?
Yeah, exactly, Tim. She won’t be publicly debating her quack, fake, utterly ridiculous clams of CO2 warming air because she knows there’s no defending it except through using hordes of ignoratti class diptards who are sure that ”if the laws of physics wanted their side stated, they should have had a lawyer of their own.”
“Runaway greenhouse effect”
This is a copy and paste from Tips and Notes:
https://wattsupwiththat.com/tips-and-notes/#comment-2523700
I was wondering about this also. Stofan says Venus is hot (500C) because the atmosphere has a high content of CO2. But there’s no mention of Mars, where the mean surface temperature is -63C.
Venus atmosphere 96.5% CO2.
Mars atmosphere 95.8% CO2.
What conclusion can one draw from these observations?
You can’t conclude anything because you’ve neglected orbital distance from the Sun.
Also atmopsheric pressure. On Venus, atmospheric pressure is about 90 times that of earth. Since surface gravity on Venus is about 0.9 times that of earh, Venus’s atmosphere is 100 times as thick as ours,
Venus also has sulfur dioxide clouds, which also have some effect on surface temperature.
Mars’ atmosphere is only 0.6% that of earth, and its gravity is about 35% that of earth. Mars has about 0.006/0.35 0r 1.7% as thick an atmosphere as earth.
Earth mean surface temperature is 15C
Earth atmosphere 0.04% CO2
BINGO!
Climate Nazis don’t want to talk about that.
It’s more complex than that. Mars atmosphere is a fraction of Earth’s in density. Partial pressure of CO2 is much lower. You can’t really draw anything from the comparison because of that difference.
Usually I agree with you Anthony…. but here I disagree. From those % numbers you CAN conclude that it is NOT the percentage of CO2 in the atmosphere that is important. There is NO correlation at all with percentage and even you agree with that. It is other differences that account for the temperature differences between the worlds. On earth, one always hears from the CAGW types… that we MUST keep earth atmosphere below “X” percentage or the earth will become uninhabitable by any intelligent life forms.
” below “X” percentage or the earth will become uninhabitable by any intelligent life forms”
Heck we are only just managing to keep the atmospheric CO2 level ABOVE “X = .02%” when MOST sorts of life on Earth becomes unsustainable because most plant life stops growing.
Well, Ellen Stofan has been paraphased to say something like this
Her misanthropogenic accusations and fears are absurd in astonishingly many ways. For Earth to turn into Venus, mankind would need to multiply Earth’s atmospheric pressure. How exactly would mankind cause it here? No need to even mention the Venusian atmosphere is dry according to NASA. And what other planets is she talking about?
As far as I know the worst storms rage in one of the coldest planets in the solar system, Neptune, with an atmosphere made of the worst greenhouse gas there is, methane. WUWT?
Let me correct the message above myself. Haven’t worked in NASA unlike Stofan: Neptune’s atmosphere is mostly hydrogen and helium. It contains only traces of methane.
https://nssdc.gsfc.nasa.gov/planetary/factsheet/neptunefact.html
I can’t help myself. What we need here are some “dumb blonde” jokes.
Eugene WR Gallun
My daughter made her German Master in Medical Technology with the highest possible score. She is blonde. According to her opinion dumb blondes are fake blondes….
As in “peroxide blondes?” Perhaps some of the peroxide is absorbed and does some brain damage.
The whole CO2 climate sensitivity is fake; the real sensitivity is 0 (no effect).
I like, PV = nRT. So, n(moles CO2) = PV/RT. Constant PV would force a decrease in T to maintain balance.
Jajajajajajaja 😉
I tried playing with that equation and could come to no conclusion one way or the other. Add additional gas and you get additional Pressure. Does Volume also go up, does atmosphere expand? Who knows?
The n should exactly balance the P increae, R stays constant, if V also goes up, T goes up, If Volume goes down with extra pressure, T also goes down.
You’re making a mistake to assume that P or V are constant. Expansion is a cooling process. Assuming that the temperature is rising, then the upper boundary of the atmosphere should expand. This will reduce the temperature increase to a new (higher) equilibrium.
Of course, melting and evaporation are also both cooling processes. There does not need to be a temperature change to absorb increased energy.
Remember Skylab? It crashed from orbital decay before NASA could rescue it due to (as NASA claimed at the time) drag from an expanded atmosphere from unusually hot weather in the early 70’s. Seems to me that by now both NASA and the Air Force (and the Russians) should have reams of data on the density of the ionosphere at LEO altitudes going back to at least the late 60’s and that might be a reasonable proxy for global atmospheric T. Don’t see how it could be worse than the current infilled, adjusted, UHI contaminated mess we have now.
She stated– “There’s this attitude of ‘I read it on the internet therefore it must be true’.” Could it be true that despite the efforts of many instructors, educators gave into the internet as education too long ago? It did start before this, however.
The True Face of Science Denialism: NASA Geologist “Scientist” Denies 600 Million Years of Geologic History
https://co2islife.wordpress.com/2017/06/11/nasa-geologist-scientist-denies-600-million-years-of-geologic-history/
600 million years of geologic history? The graphic in your blog display’s Berner’s GEOCARB model output. When did the output of a model become geologic history?
Model output is all that supports the field of climate “science.” What evidence do they have of temperatures 100 years in the future to support the 95% certainty claimed in this field.
1) We’re talking about geologic history, not climate
2) We’re talking about the past, not the future.
3) Thank you for acknowledging your blog post is no better than climate science, due to using models.
If you have better estimates of the geological CO2 record, please post it.
“Estimates” are not geologic history. Besides, there’s no point in playing the game of “my estimates are better than your estimates.”
The “best” that can be done today is going back to the limit of ice core trapped bubbles.
Every historical reconstruction is an “estimate,” just what do you think the global temperature graphs are. The fact that you don’t like the Geological Record for CO2, and are silent about the “Hockeystick” pretty much proves your selective moral outrage is nothing more that phony politics. Climate “science” is totally based on models, reconstructions, and forecasts. These is no science at all supporting it if you can’t use models.
1) The output of the GEOCARB model is not the “Geological Record for CO2.”
2) Measuring the amount of CO2 in a trapped bubble in ice is not an “estimate”
3) “moral outrage” has nothing to do with geologic history
4) You divert to “climate science,” which is not the subject of our discussion.
5) There is a lot of science at all supporting it. Take for instance the physics of radiative heat transfer.
5.5) The physics of radiative transfer is not a theory of climate. No one knows how the climate responds to that extra kinetic energy.
Pat Frank, you are correct, “The physics of radiative transfer is not a theory of climate.” However I suggest your re-read the comment posted by “co2islife” where he/she says: ” is totally based on models.” Do you understand the meaning of the English word “BASED?” Or do you not understand the word “SUPPORTING?”
…
PS, I also suggest you consult a physicist and see if they would agree that all kinetic energy on our planet eventually ends up as heat.
Luis Anastasia, the claim of AGW *is* totally based on models; a claim-base that includes your implicit assertion that radiation physics is a model of the climate.
The climate has a number of fast response modes, other than to just heat up. I suggest you follow your own advice and ask a physicist whether it’s clever to insist in ignorance on only one of a number of possible modes.
I long ago gave up expecting educated people to be any more rational than the rest. Decades ago, there was an ongoing exchange in the Letters to the Editor in Geotimes where a micropaleontologist, who earned his living identifying micro-fossils in well cuttings, thereby dating the rock being drilled, denied evolution. Similarly, the only difference between an average person and a Mensan is that the Mensan is better at articulating their rationalizations for their irrational behavior.
No blonde joke. Limerick?
There once was a lady fair
Whose job was to promote a scare
But the electorate changed the boss
And everything she had was loss
Except for the seventies hair.
She’s an a-hole.
I am from California and went to college in California in the 70’s. I learned many years ago in a college physical geography course that was taught by a former Oil Company scientist about the oil off California coasts, the ocean movements, and man’s affects on the environment. What I found is that in many cases the environmentalists were causing issues that impeded corporations for having work that would save areas from environmental damage, An example is most the the coast of California has much oil naturally leaking from sea bed and the environmentalist by stopping the oil drilling has caused this to continue and stopped the oil companies from harvesting the oil without damage to the coast, and this is never reported. This is the same way with Climate Change (as it was originally Climate Warming until it did not warm), these different groups want control and money.
The “former” in the header is the give-away.
With any luck, she will be part of the climate brain trust heading to France.
“constant barrage of half-truths”
This is the bread and butter of the alarmist camp and inferring that this applies to the skeptical side of climate science is yet another example of psychological projection. For example, the relevance of natural variability and the many benefits of warming to man and the benefits of increased CO2 to agriculture are completely absent from the alarmist narrative. Another example is cherry picking starting and ending point to establish a ‘perpetual’ trend. Many more of these half truths can easily be identified in nearly article written by the MSM addressing climate change and in nearly every paper written about the topic.
It’s unfathomably absurd how ostensibly intelligent scientists can be so absolutely wrong about something with trillion dollar negative implications while the physics is pretty clear that they’re undeniably wrong about their unjustifiably high sensitivity. Climate science and even the scientific method has been irreparably harmed by a far left political ideology designed to support a massive redistribution of wealth under the guise of climate reparations. Even more absurd is that so many on the alarmist side are blind to the underlying motivation and succumb to the fear, especially considering that the motivation driving the UNFCCC and the IPCC is very transparent, even as it’s obfuscated with fake science.
When the history books are written centuries from now, people will look back at the foolishness and wonder how their ancestors allowed such insanity to persist for so long. Will we learn? Probably not since we didn’t learn from the political/religious interference that drove science to accept an Earth Centric Universe which draws many parallels to the flawed concepts of man centric climate change.
I don’t know why anyone would question her or the science when they trot out the “venus” scenario. Or that every hurricane will be as strong or stronger than Katrina and happen once a month. Or that the Westside Hiway in NYC should be on its way to being submerged by now. Or that there will be 10’s millions of climate refugees. Or there’s a tropospheric hotspot. Or polar bears are going extinct. etc…………
From the Guardian article”
“…….Throughout her career, Stofan has highlighted the role of planetary science in understanding the Earth’s environment and said it provided some of the most inarguable proof that atmospheric carbon dioxide leads to a warmer climate. She draws parallels between carbon emissions on Earth and the runaway greenhouse effect on Venus, a planet which once had oceans but is now a toxic inferno with surface temperatures approaching 500C.
The Earth is not destined for such an extreme scenario – even if all the CO2 were burned its oceans would not boil off completely – but Venus demonstrates the dramatic changes that can unfold when the fine balance of planet’s atmosphere is tipped…….”.
I’m not a scientist, but I thought that Venus’ atmospheric pressure was some 90 times greater than Earth’s. Doesn’t that atmospheric pressure play an important role in the intense heat of Venus? Higher atmospheric pressure = higher temps, correct?
http://hypertextbook.com/facts/2000/NangMiu.shtml.
Isn’t blaming Venus’ intense heat on CO2 engaging in misdirection to some degree?
Higher pressure yields broader absorption lines. Pauli exclusion principal and all you know. If the line is twice as wide, it will absorb twice as much energy and reradiate it all things being equal. So yes, the CO2 in the atmosphere of Venus is not the “same” CO2 in our atmosphere as to its absorption effects. Of course, there is the small matter of the distance from the sun and all. At 67MM miles from the sun, Venus gets about 1.9 times the energy from the sun that the earth does. Granted that the T^4 aspect of the blackbody equation means that the temperature only increases by about 18% when you measure in Kelvin, but outside of a sauna for a short period I have not found 60 degrees C very comfortable either.
It’s temperature is solved identically to any other gas. There’s no difference, it’s why Hansen and everyone else associated with the scam don’t want to talk about Venus except in passing, because if you check, all their lies about Venus being anything but COOLER watt for watt and molecule for molecule.
Venus’ temperature is a few degrees cooler than the earth’s atmosphere would be at that pressure and light level.
There’s no proof whatsoever that Venus ever had an ocean, unless the ocean you’re talking about is the supercritical fluid CO2 ocean that’s still present. The solid surface of Venus is hot because it’s not the surface of the planet that’s in direct equilibrium with the Sun. This surface is the top of its clouds at the top of its atmosphere. Once the temperature of this surface is established, the PVT profile of the atmosphere below dictates the required surface temperature. For both Venus and Earth, the lapse rate starts at the surface in equilibrium with the Sun. On Earth this is negative from the bottom of the atmosphere up while on Venus it’s positive from the top of the atmosphere down.
Note that the mass of the Venusian atmosphere is the same order of magnitude as the mass of Earth’s oceans and the Venusian atmosphere acts more like an Earth ocean, than like the Earth’s atmosphere.
Note too that the solid surface of Earth is also not in direct equilibrium with the Sun. This surface is the top of the oceans and the bits of land that poke through. Like the solid surface of Venus, the solid surface of Earth beneath the oceans has no diurnal or seasonal variability and its temperature is dictated by the density/temperature profile of the ocean above.
What should we expect from a political appointee who just lost her job?
Another attempt to grab media outlet attention, and spew falsehood about it being possible for Carbon Dioxide to warm atmospheric air, after she and her politics orientated friends installed a generational dark-age regarding atmospheric physics for years?
She’s angry and she’s filled with the kind of venom that comes from an exposed, debunked, cancer on scientific credibility. The people of N.A.S.A. who knew the original men responsible for all this, said repeatedly that their work would become just that, and destroy peoples’ faith in science.
Unfortunately her “mandatory” blame oil and other rhetoric leaves on to believe she was not a working scientist but another political appointee that does not practice science but the agenda of the far left. This was a political comment without any substance to judge her blame game.
Meanwhile the International Energy Agency has just admitted that Obama’s program for clean renewable fuels to replace Fossil Fuels has been a total failure:
” Nearly every country in the world has committed to take action under the Paris Agreement to slow global warming. But only 3 out of 26 technology categories tracked by the IEA are on pace to help do that, the agency concluded in this year’s Energy Technology Perspectives report.”
Although the CNBC reports is blaming Trump for reducing the funding for this effort. and still pretends that throwing more money at the problem will work, but Science does not work that way and there are uncomfortable laws of Thermodynamics, Physics, and Chemistry that prove otherwise.
Any honest individual knowledgeable of energy knows that the Obama program had no clue on funding viable projects, just push the $$$ out the door and fund “friends” .
In reality there is currently no promising energy source to replace fossil fuels in the horizon that can come on in decades, especially if we rule out Nuclear. Replacement of transportation fuels has been particularly elusive.
Green energy plans like those planned for California cannot be implemented without major disruption to the economy and the good life we currently enjoy. Unfortunately many politicians and the MSM is ignorant of these facts and I am disappointed that the Engineering and Science communities fail to speak up..National Academies are a joke.
http://www.cnbc.com/2017/06/09/energy-technology-is-not-advancing-fast-enough-to-meet-climate-goals.html
I will never understand articles like this. Just about every day, you can find newspaper articles which include quotes by “climate scientists” that are obvious distortions of the science. This is why they lack credibility.
You can agree all day long that Carbon Dioxide increases the temperature, but that doesn’t make the increase harmful. Every time I read the phrase “as much as … ” or “some scientists believe…”, it activates my BS meter. The scientists are their own worst enemy when it comes to exaggerated quotes in the press.
Nobody but people profiting politically or monetarily claim carbon dioxide causes warming, a warming in violation of thermodynamic law from several directions.
Its suspension in air causes cooling. That’s why whenever you speak with someone claiming it does cause warming, they act insane and declare they are above debating it. They are cowards to the core.
Site admin: While reading the above article I recurved a pop-up ad that appeared to be from Google. It looks really suspicious, and your site is possibly compromised.
Here’s the URL (don’t open or download anything if prompted): http://www.kudesa20.website/lp/lp3?trkdat=YGpnPjIwOjolcHZhamc-NjowZzs7MDY1Zjo2NjEzOjIwNzI2NjNmJXNid2tqZz4wMTo0JXB0YnNqZz42NzUJCQ==
“Fake news is so harmful.” Easy. Stop reading the Washington Post, the New York Times, and the San Francisco Chronicle.
And the Seattle Times
Based on the paleoclimate record and modeling results one can only conclude that the climate change we are experiencing today is caused by the sun and the oceans over which mankind has no control..It is all a matter of science.
There is no real evidence that CO2 has any effect on climate. There is no such evidence in the paleoclimate record. There is plenty of scientific rational to support the idea that the climate sensivity of CO2 is zero. If CO2 really affected climate then the increase in CO2 over the past 30 years should have cuased at least a measureable increase in the dry lapse rate in the troposphere but such has not happened. It is all a matter of science.
The AGW conjecture cannot be defended because the conjecture is just too full of holes. The largest is that the radiant greenhouse effect upon which the AGW conjecture depends, has not been observed anywhere in the solar system including the Earth. The radiant greenhouse effect is scidnce fiction as must be the AGW conjecture. It is all a matter of science. What the former chief scientists really needs to do is to study the associated science and not just the partial science upon which the AGW conjecture is based.
“There’s this attitude of ‘I read it on the internet therefore it must be true’.”
OK, NASA, here’s some things I read on the internet, from your website. I think they are true, not because they were accessed so easily by clicking, but that they are readily confirmed by honest observation and sound reasoning. These quotations are taken from the web article “Climate and Earth’s Energy Budget” by Rebecca Lindsey, January 14, 2009.
“The climate’s heat engine must not only redistribute solar heat from the equator toward the poles, but also from the Earth’s surface and lower atmosphere back to space.”
Right. A good example of a localized heat engine is a thunderstorm. It turns heat energy into motion, at impressive power per unit area.
“At an altitude of roughly 5-6 kilometers, the concentration of greenhouse gases in the overlying atmosphere is so small that heat can radiate freely to space.”
Right. The absorption of outgoing longwave radiation by the overlying atmosphere diminishes with altitude. Pretty obvious when you think about it.
“The atmosphere radiates heat equivalent to 59 percent of incoming sunlight; the surface radiates only 12 percent. In other words, most solar heating happens at the surface, while most radiative cooling happens in the atmosphere.”
Right. Therefore the working fluid of the heat engine absorbs heat more readily down low with the help of CO2. The heat engine works just fine to deliver heat upward, perhaps to a slightly higher altitude, or perhaps by an increased number rather than increased severity of strong convective events.
I keep going back to this article in my comments from time to time here at WUWT, because it is so clear to me that the basic operation of the atmosphere is described much more accurately as a heat engine than as a radiative insulating blanket. When one grasps that concept, and pulls on the loose threads of the catastrophic global warming talking points, the entire narrative unravels. I realize that the full article mentions the warming trend, “greenhouse gases” and all that, but I find it interesting that in the 8 years of the administration that took office a week after this article was posted, no one took this article down. It is still there on the internet. I don’t think they understood that these gems of accurate science were so available to anyone who wished to know.
NASA, as an institution, knows (or knew) perfectly well how the atmosphere works. I expect it is on a better track politically now.
It’s the same old lame excuses and allegations from someone on the losing side of a debate. They had everything on their side: the money, support and encouragement of government, the media, the scientific establishment, the advantage of striking their blows first… everything….and still couldn’t make their case stick, because their alarmist argument is not actually supported by the less than alarming facts.
So the fall-back is the same old vague allegations about persons unnamed using money unnamed influencing other persons unnamed with vague plots and devices. Not even any detailed allegations to be rebutted, just the same old ‘big oil’ type argument.
I am never sure whether to be as angry as she claims to be, or just bored by political activism that cannot even be bothered to invent new excuses as to why the world isn’t buying their tired story any more.