By David Wojick |June 1st, 2020|Climate
If Greta Thunberg is an alarmist princess then Katherine Hayhoe is the queen of climate alarmism, at least in the U.S. and Canada. She was the de facto spokesperson for the atrocious third National Climate Assessment. After that she started doing bogus “Here’s what is going to happen to you” climate studies for various states and cities. Making big bucks scaring people.
Last year Hayhoe delivered a doomsday forecast to the Province of Alberta, Canada, and here our story begins. Alberta is home to the Friends of Science Society (FOSS), one of Canada’s top skeptical organizations. FOSS has now produced a 77 page takedown report, shredding Hayhoe’s so-called study in detail. It is an elegant critical work, with implications far beyond Canada.
The topic is technical but it is written for policy makers. The plain English table of contents gives the flavor and shows the scope, with 37 succinct chapters. There are even chapters titled “What is“Climate Change”?” and “What is a Climate Model?” In the same vein Hayhoe’s report is arrogantly titled “Alberta’s Climate Future” so the FOSS takedown is “Facts versus Fortune Telling”.
There are lots of data issues, especially since the Hayhoe report uses truncated trends. The FOSS rebuttal does a lot of longer term analysis.
Another big issue is that the Hayhoe report is based on so-called “downscaling” of hot climate models. This means taking huge crude regional results and interpolating questionable local details. Hayhoe bills herself as an “atmospheric scientist” but her Ph.D. work was on downscaling, which is just computer science. It is fitting that she is now in a university Political Science department, as her work is certainly political.
What Hayhoe ignores is the fact that different global climate models give wildly different regional projections. I recall when the first U.S. National Climate Assessment came out; it used two major models, the Canadian and the British Hadley. For the North Central region one projected a 160% increase in rainfall, while the other gave a 60% decrease. Swamp or desert! Obviously this junk is no good for policy making.
Here is the Friends of Science condensed summary:
“This review shows how Hayhoe & Stoner misinform, how they did not use all available information, how they cultivate alarm regarding Black Swan events, while ignoring counter trends and evidence of cycles. Their report style demonstrates a false, absolute certainty, of knowledge, where due qualification of assumptions and other influences can alter results as reported. Facts and evidence, not fortune-telling, should guide public policy on climate and energy.”
Here are some more specific and telling FOSS findings:
“Hayhoe & Stoner’s “Alberta’s Climate Future” report fails in a number of ways. The report ignores climate cycles and instead forecasts continuing linear temperature increases based on global climate models, even when local trends may be quite different. The report only addresses trends from 1950, ignoring much warmer conditions in the past in the Province.”
“More concerning, “Alberta’s Climate Future” is based on the use of unreasonably unlikely scenarios, such as Representative Concentration Pathway (RCP) 8.5. This computer simulation is a very extreme projection of the future where the world goes back to using more than five times the coal than is used today. Most mainstream scientists believe the RCP8.5 scenario to be a critically flawed benchmark for forecasting future climate.”
“Hayhoe & Stoner make bold and unverified statements such as: “extreme high and low temperatures are projected to increase exponentially” without justification. The report creates alarm with discredited references to natural “Black Swan” events, ascribing human caused climate change as the driver of floods and fires.”
There is a great deal more criticism, which is worth looking at. FOSS really does a job on Queen Hayhoe’s so-called research.
The Friends of Science takedown is a model for critical analysis of alarmist pseudoscientific hype. The deeply flawed Hayhoe report is not unusual. On the contrary it is typical of climate alarmism — computer based, on selected data, presenting speculative scary conclusions as facts.
Author
David Wojick David Wojick, Ph.D. is an independent analyst working at the intersection of science, technology and policy. For origins see http://www.stemed.info/engineer_tackles_confusion.html For over 100 prior articles for CFACT see http://www.cfact.org/author/david-wojick-ph-d/ Available for confidential research and consulting.
Here is astrophysicist katharyn hayhoe being interviewed by astrophysicist neil degrasse tyson. The topic is climate change in the age of covid.
https://tambonthongchai.com/2020/04/19/corona-sells-climate/
Ah, yes. The false intersection of climate change and coronavirus. What else can climate change intersect with? That’s a rhetorical question, because the answer is… everything! Your retirement fund? Let’s look at climate change. The blackhole at the center of the galaxy? Let’s look at climate change. Why 2 + 2 = 5 and you’re wrong to think otherwise? Let’s look at climate change. Your toenail fungus problem? Let’s look at climate change.
There is a true intersection of covid and climate change: in both realms, bad computer have produced failed predictions and bad policies that are harming our societies.
….bad computer models….
On May 4, 2020, NBC nightly news reported that a new covid-19 model projected cases in the US would rise to 200,000 per day along with 3,000 deaths per day by June 1. What happened? On June 2 there were 1,134 deaths—two-thirds short of the model prediction. The number of new cases was 21,882 approximately 90% short of the model prediction. The model projecting out only 27 days was a stunning failure. Now we are asked to take seriously models predicting climate events 80 years out.
“Gavin Schmidt: Because we’ve stopped driving around so much, the amount of transportation that’s going on, the amount of internal combustion engines that are being turned on has gone way way down. And those are producers of things like nitrous oxide, NOx, NO2 which are components of smog that leads to high ozone levels which are very unhealthy ….
ND Tyson: Quick question, what does NOx refer to?
Gavin Schmidt: NOx is a whole range of nitrous oxides that are NO2, NO4, NO6, N2O5, and more complex”
Surely there’s only one Nitrous Oxide (N20), try using those listed above as an anaesthetic, even Wikipedia warns about getting them mixed up.
They are Nitric Oxides. How do they expect to be taken seriously if they cannot use the right nomenclature? Credibility goes out the window with that sort of fundamental error.
As you note, John, there’s only one nitrous oxide, N2O.
Among Gavin’s set, NO4 and NO6 do not exist.
His NO2 should really be N2O4.
Yeah, Gavin really is not that sharp. NO (nitric oxide) is a major component of NOx.
Scissor-
Yes, NO is a product (along with NO2) of high temperature combustion, but NO is rapidly oxidized to NO2 in sunlight, so there is very little NO in the ambient air. I believe the term NOx originated with automotive emission studies, because the instrumentation measured both NO and NO2 and could not distinguish between them.
The chemiluminescent analyzers for NOx actually are based on the reaction of NO and O3. NO2 is not detected unless it is passed through a heated converter, typically made of Mo.
GOSH!
There’s no “C” in those molecules!
Is he implying there’s no such thing as “Carbon Pollution”?
To be pedantic, NO2 and N2O4 are in equilibrium at room temperature, with the proportion of NO2 increasing with temperature.
It’s perfectly clear Gavin Schmidt knows diddly-squat about Chemistry. Why should anyone take him seriously?
To Pat and John
Correct:
>As you note, John, there’s only one nitrous oxide, N2O.
Good for drag racing and illegal on the stock car circuit.
>Among Gavin’s set, NO4 and NO6 do not exist.
Funny!
>His NO2 should really be N2O4.
NO and NO2 are functionally identical in that NO quickly converts to NO2 in sunlight and converts back to NO at night. For combustion emissions (to which Gavin refers) there is in a combustion analyser an NO cell which often has a fixed add-on % for NO2 (like 10%) and is reported together as NOx on the screen.
Compression + fire leads to the formation of some NO3 and it can come from the air (N2 converted to NO3). Engines are the main source. It is possible for regular fires to make N2 into NO2 and NO3 but the temperature required is really high. Power stations can do it.
So, not running vehicles has the predictable consequence of lowering NO3 concentrations and if the VOC’s are down as well (cars don’t many much at all) the ozone at ground level will drop. That’s good. But if the pollution was below statutory (safe) levels to begin with, it makes no difference.
For those interested, burning young green wood produces a lot of NO/NO2 usually in conditions that are “against” the destruction of it to N2 and O2. It is hard being green.
By “NO3” Crispin, do you mean nitrate – NO3(-) – or the neutral radical, NO3(dot)?
The illusion of knowledge is a far bigger downfall than the admission of ignorance. All these self-described “climate scientists” like Schmidt disregard of uncertainty.
The only thing they’ve learned over the past 30 years of climate dowsing is to now push their projections/prediction dates out to a point where no adult alive today will be around then to call them out on their failed divinations.
Is Schmidt a climate scientist? Thought his educational ‘prowess’ was in the functioning of the humble abacus and it’s later derivatives. As for climate science, demonstrably, not his cup of tea.
As an master ASE auto tech for over 35 years and dealing with the excrement coming from tailpipes, NOx is exactly correct, oxides of nitrogen. Altho he got the numbers wrong there are 5 different copounds,NO,NO2,N2O, NO3 and N2O5 and if you want to get picky N2O is dinitrogen monoxide but commnly know as just nitrous.
It’s news to me that NO3 exists as a stable species.
N2O3 and N2O5 decompose well below room temperature, so cannot be present in auto exhaust.
Neutral NO3 is a very reactive radical, Graeme. It’s a very strong oxidant and has got to be very short-lived.
Reference source is IUPAC, International Union of Pure and Applied Chemistry. We chemists formed such authoritative bodies to set standards for nomenclature, so chemists could speak the same language and be done with nick names like NOx and nitrous. It is part of education in the sciences and a good part at that.
Do not laugh at dumb Gavin in his ignorance, pity him. Geoff S
How soon will FOSS be charged with hate crimes against Hayhoe?
I stopped when Gavin Schmidt said that air travel is about 3% of global emissions of CO2.
A lay person hearing this might believe this is 3% of ALL emissions whereas he meant (I hope) 3% of HUMAN emissions which are 3-4% of GLOBAL emissions including natural sources.
Doesn’t sound so much if you use 0.09% of total emissions attributable to air travel so the farce continues.
As a ‘scientist’ he should be using precise language.
If he used precise statements he would be, rightly, in argument. That is not his purpose. So bullshit baffles brains is the narrative.
John
You mean “precise” as in Ocean Acidification? /sarc
I think you meant 0.09 and not 0.09%.
Comment was for Aussie John
I think you meant 0.09 and not 0.09%.
Told you so – 18 years ago. That includes you, Michael Moore.
The ability to predict is the best objective measure of scientific and technical competence. Every very-scary prediction of runaway global warming and climate chaos made by the global warming alarmists has failed to materialize. Nobody should believe them – about anything.*
Following are our two major statements we published in 2002 – these statements are correct-to-date, for anyone who understands climate and energy. The climate alarmists and their slave leftist media, with their “100% wrong predictive track record”, will dispute them. *See note above. 🙂
Regards, Allan MacRae
_________________
OUR TWO MAJOR STATEMENTS PUBLISHED IN 2002
In 2002 co-authors Dr Sallie Baliunas, Astrophysicist, Harvard-Smithsonian, Dr Tim Patterson, Paleoclimatologist, Carleton U, Ottawa and Allan MacRae wrote:
1. “Climate science does not support the theory of catastrophic human-made global warming – the alleged warming crisis does not exist.”
2. “The ultimate agenda of pro-Kyoto advocates is to eliminate fossil fuels, but this would result in a catastrophic shortfall in global energy supply – the wasteful, inefficient energy solutions proposed by Kyoto advocates simply cannot replace fossil fuels.”
Allan, your efforts again showcase Calgary, Alberta, Canada as a center of professionals, both from the science and engineering side. I remember visiting with Archie Nesbitt in Calgary, and, over dinner, he recommended AAA Alaska Outfitters for a guided caribou hunting my twin brother and me were contemplating. Archie shot the world record brown bear with these guys. Several years later my twin brother and I were in Alaska with AAA, and they remembered guiding Archie. Half of the guides thought he was unusually brave, and the other half of the guides thought he was totally crazy. Good on Alberta/Calgary for standing up to the Hayhoe et al CAGW nonsense, and thanks to David Wojick for the story. Stay sane and safe (doesn’t appear to apply to Archie).
Hi Ron,
Don’t know much about Hayhoe – always thought that was a salutation.
Alberta also has great hunting and trout fishing, and some world-class hunting and fishing guides.
“Must Be Nice” Drift Company of Calgary is owned and operated by Tom Cutmore, good friend of my late friend Ron Clark – I think Tom is still in business – has a great reputation.
I’d recommend hunting guide Dewey Browning, but he went and died when I wasn’t looking, at age 86 – father of world champion figure skater Kurt Browning.
Best, Allan 🙂
Allan, This crazy person was contracted to provide this study by the former NDP (nee communist) government of Alberta that was accidentally elected through a combination of errors, whih has now been corrected. This report will now correct the garbage climate report.
It’s such a farce….so glad people seem to be waking up to that.
Exponential predictions. Where have we seen that?
I have been a member of FOSS for several years. C$10-15/year. Cheap and well worth the money. Do join.
Actually worth way more! To everyone – please donate to FSS beyond the simple annual membership. They do excellent work on a shoestring budget and need funds to keep fighting the good fight.
Bob,
You’re right and I do donate from time to time.
Big bucks is the key ingredient.
While I appreciate the great work FOSS does, I think (with great certainty) that this type of discussion is a smokescreen that frauds like Ms Hayhoe are constantly throwing up.
All we really need to do is to read back to the origins of the people and ideals who framed CO2 as a fake culprit and visualized using the UN to achieve their goals of having a non-elected, unaccountable political body control humanity through an imaginary culprit.
I have to admit I was a true blue believer for several years and though not a scientist by any stretch I was able very easily to research the origins of this massive fraud. My favorite of these evil doers was Maurice Strong, but of course he had many accomplices not the least of which was a willing UN body of power hungry bureaucrats. When the wonderful philanthropist and coal rich (like Maurice Strong strangely enough) Al Gore got involved I really knew there was a sham in place. ANYONE who believes Al Gore is in it for anything but the money he can make is a gullible fool.
Next you have a huge procession of useful idiots. Here in Canada it starts with Justin Trudeau, Gerald Butts and their liar in chief Catherine McKenna, but the list goes on and on right down to city councils declaring a phony “climate emergency” in the hopes of gaining power and wealth over the working people they are supposed to represent and protect.
Imagine that! CO2 is a climate emergency. The very molecule we all exhale each breath. The very molecule trees take and use to return oxygen to the air. The molecule without which we would all be dead. But these nincompoops now label it pollution!
Truly we have lost our collective minds listening to these prophets of fake doom.
Keep it up FOSS but I frankly tire of the entire fraudulent discussion.
Catherine McKenna is no longer the Minister of Climate Change. She now has a much lower profile job. That probably means we can’t call her Climate Barbie any more.
I take note that McKenna’s successor in the Climate portfolio is almost unknown and, as far as I can tell, has attracted zero flack. Maybe Trudeau (Dances with Unicorns) has wisely decided that climate activism isn’t going to win any elections.
commieBob,
Catherine McKenna will always be Climate Barbie to me. It is a mantle she never will be able to shed. Just as Justin Trudeau always will be Climate Ken. And Gerald Butts always will be Canada’s Climate Machiavelli.
It couldn’t have happened, Al, without the cowardly silence of the scientific societies. Blame them.
I have had that thought Pat and I dared not say it. I have made it clear on this site that I’ve had no higher education and I was reluctant risk offending those with academic accolades under their belts.
Is it too late Pat? Is it too late for the scientific societies and those many scientists with integrity that I know still exist to speak out. I know that you have and that Allan Macrea does too, I really applaud you for that. And this site in itself definitely keeps the discussion going. Are there not scientific societies who would be willing to put papers such as yours and others on this site out there on a broader scale? I would have thought that there would be enough doubt in the minds of those societies at this stage that a debate would be perceived as necessary. Wouldn’t it be a good thing for the general public to know that you all exist, that the 97% figure really is a load of twaddle. My own adult son said those words to me. “How can you agrue the facts of 97% of scientists?” He treats me like an idiot! Another son said that he is deeply saddened by the fact that his daughter’s will not be able to enjoy the world that he grew up in. The education system has done this! And now they want to indoctrinate them from infancy. Have you seen the children’s book put out by Michael Mann and his wife?
Are we simply allowing this to happen, or am I missing something out of ignorance? We talk strongly about our stance on here on this site but is it enough?
Stand up and be counted I say, let the world know the figure being quoted is rubbish and that the science is in no way settled.
Megs
‘My…. son….said ‘How can you argue the facts of 97% of scientists?’ Einstein, responding to a book entitled ‘100 Authors Against Einstein’ said ‘If I were wrong, it would only take one to prove me wrong’ (S. Hawking).
The book has been described as the work of ‘those who do not understand a scientific theory (publishing) a joint presentation of their misunderstanding of their joint misunderstandings’
Enter the sad roll call of names who are ‘not even wrong’ (Schrodinger) about the climate.
You know more than your son about real science which is based on discussion and debate and testing and is never complete. The word ‘denier’ smells of sulphur and stinks in the nostrils of truth seekers everywhere. Yet, as you say we are allowing this to happen.
‘
Oriel Kolnai You exactly pointed out their force. They control the education system the press and the social media. If you’re not in at least 1 of these platforms YOU DON’T EXIST. They have had 20 years to create the Climate Jugend and Green Shirts and now have started the Great Leap Forward. The current riots form part of the same organisation. They don’t care shit about the climate or black lives or any other life they just want total control.
Follow the yellow brick road. He who prints the money rules.
Climate Jugend indeed. Together with NOAA, the IPCC and climate spruiker professors at most universities and politicians of the left make them the Neo-Socialists, and the rebirth of communism under a different guise.
Megs, the silence of the scientific societies has been the biggest conundrum for me. I don’t understand it. I’ve queried some scientists in charge about it, and gotten silence in return.
Moral cowardice? I don’t know. Maybe. Or maybe some scientists put politics ahead of professional integrity; deliberate betrayal.
I hope to find out which alternative is true, if either, someday. Especially of the APS. I used to think of physicists as the hard–minded defenders of science. No more
RE societies – it’s called “The Long March of the Institutions” – started in the 1930’s and going strong.
The novel “Nineteen Eighty-Four”, written by George Orwell in 1949, foresaw a time “when much of the world has fallen victim to perpetual war, omnipresent government surveillance, historical negationism and propaganda”.
Orwell had remarkable foresight. Here is the real “Nineteen Eighty-Four”, an interview that year with ex-KGB officer and Soviet defector Yuri Bezmenov, who described their long-term program to ideologically undermine the western democracies. Note especially Bezmenov’s discussion of “ideological subversion”. It is all about manipulating the “useful idiots” – the pro-Soviet leftists within the democracies.
https://youtu.be/bX3EZCVj2XA
Read the following papers to understand what is happening and why:
SCIENCE’S UNTOLD SCANDAL: THE LOCKSTEP MARCH OF PROFESSIONAL SOCIETIES TO PROMOTE CLIMATE CHANGE
By Tom Harris and Dr. Jay Lehr, May 24, 2019
wattsupwiththat.com/2019/05/25/sciences-untold-scandal-the-lockstep-march-of-professional-societies-to-promote-the-climate-change-scare/
HYPOTHESIS: RADICAL GREENS ARE THE GREAT KILLERS OF OUR AGE
By Allan M.R. MacRae, B.A.Sc., M.Eng., April 14, 2019
wattsupwiththat.com/2019/04/14/hypothesis-radical-greens-are-the-great-killers-of-our-age/
THE COST TO SOCIETY OF RADICAL ENVIRONMENTALISM
By Allan M.R. MacRae, B.A.Sc., M.Eng., July 4, 2019
wattsupwiththat.com/2019/07/04/the-cost-to-society-of-radical-environmentalism/
“the silence of the scientific societies has been the biggest conundrum for me.”
What they do, I suspect, is call for volunteers to form a committee to study the subject, as they traditionally have done (I suspect). But that means that the committee is stacked with ardent greenies. The disgraceful cases of the APS and the G** (I forgot the acronym) are illustrative.
Black Swan events are, by definition, unpredictable except in hindsight. Invoking them takes advantage of the popularity of Nassim Nicholas Taleb. They are really the same as James Hansen’s tipping points.
The problem for the alarmists is that it has been warmer than now earlier in the Holocene. Did tipping points or black swans cause runaway global warming back then? Nope.
“You’ve got to believe us because something unexpected might happen.” Yeah, right. If you believe that, could I interest you in the Flying Spaghetti Monster?
Thanks Bob, I kinda forgot about this – keeping things in perspective.
“unpredictable except in hindsight”
-Yogi Berra
“Repent, sinners or spend eternity in He11”
-Katharine Hayhoe
Hey hey, Hayhoe
Your climate crap has got to go!
Can’t we just use ‘no image available’ for some of these scare/outrage stories? We can only take so much wreckage in one week.
Dolores Umbridge is apparently Ms Hayhoe’s role model. The likeness is uncanny.
I can imagine Professor Hayhoe emulates Umbrdge at Texas Tech quite well. (pun intended)
If you simply replace “Dark Arts” in the above with “Climate Change”, and replace “Hogwarts” with “Climate Center at TexasTech”, then everything would make sense of what she is about. Using witchcraft and magic in the Defense against Climate Change pretty much sums up the whole situation.
They both have that sickly sweet quality of nicety, while having no problem of inflicting pain on others.
You never see Katherine Hayhoe and Ozzy Osbourne at the same time.
You owe me a new keyboard!
You win the internet today. LOL.
I don’t claim to know for certain what is going on in the heads of Katherine Hayhoe and the other high priests and priestesses of the climate alarmist orthodoxy. If I were to hazard a guess however, I would say it is a matter of confusing arrogance for some kind of presumed moral authority and superiority. They have decided to embrace the save-the-planet narrative and have awarded themselves a license and the authority to act on the narrative’s behalf.
The problem with this however is that science becomes enslaved and subordinated to this higher calling (saving the planet) in the minds of Hayhoe, Mann and their ilk. The arrogance that goes with the belief in this higher calling opens the door to what I can only describe as the corruption of science in service to it. No amount of corruption or bad science is unjustified in the name of it.
Whether or not wind and solar energy are indeed capable of displacing fossil fuels is probably of secondary importance to them, if it matters to them at all. The degree of economic suffering which would take place in the absence of fossil fuels is the price we must pay if solar and wind can’t do the job. Society is just going to have to transform itself to adjust.
Any scientist who is unable or unwilling to choose between sound science on one hand and ideologies and orthodoxies on the other has no business being in science. When we get to the point where it is seen as legitimate to subordinate and enslave science to ideologies and orthodoxies, then science is in deep trouble. The arrogance of believing one have the authority to do this leaves us with little reason to trust what scientists tell us–at least in the climate field.
Of course science has been subordinating itself to money for quite some time now, and the climate alarmist and save-the-planet orthodoxies are making matters worse. Whether the politicians in Washington and other capitals around the world actually know this and care is probably a subject for another day. I haven’t seen much evidence that they do.
With respect to Ms. Hayhoe’s statement that: “extreme high and low temperatures are projected to increase exponentially” and “human caused climate change as the driver of floods and fires,” what do Canada’s government scientists say ? (https://albertawater.com/history-of-drought-in-alberta):
““Drought is no stranger to the Canadian Prairies. In fact, some may say that drought is a defining characteristic of Alberta, Saskatchewan and Manitoba. Drought is something that has occurred regularly over the centuries in this region (for example, at least 40 droughts have affected western Canada over the last two centuries), and is something that will continue to occur well into the future. Over their history, the Prairie Provinces have experienced several decadal droughts, several multi-decadal droughts and large floods…”
It seems like creationists have infiltrated NOAA. The way Hayhoe read from the teleprompter one could imagine that she is part of a group of scientists at NOAA who seek to turn climate science upside down with crazy ideas and faking global warming by incrementing the global mean temperatures as a function of rising CO2 at Mauna Loa due to the reducing obliquity of Earth’s spin axis. They are in control of the data and make whatever changes they see fit before supplying it to others. Check out the link below if you want to know more about that.
https://www.quora.com/Isnt-global-warming-good-for-Earth-I-mean-we-can-use-all-the-solar-energy-to-produce-energy-and-reduce-our-dependency-on-fossil-fuels/answer/John-Bruyn
Protest chant:
“Hayhoe, Hayhoe
these Psuedo
Scientists have got to go!”
It couldn’t have happened if the mainstream media had done their homework.
I have three degrees from Texas Tech. It burdens my soul to have someone of her ilk disparaging the name of my University with her pseudo science. She offices in Holden
Hall-which is the Political Science building. That should tell you all you need to know about her scientific credentials.
Her Ph. D. Thesis at the U of I, Urbana-Champaign 1997: A modeling study of the role of methane in global climate change.