From Dr. Judith Curry’s Climate Etc.
by Judith Curry
Politics versus the data versus communicating science.
On December 10 and 11, a catastrophic tornado outbreak slammed the Mississippi Valley, with catastrophic impacts particularly in Kentucky. One tornadic storm traveled more than 200 miles, and more than 100 people may have died. An excellent overview of the storm was written by Bob Henson [link]. Preliminary analysis indicates that the maximum tornado strength was EF4, with winds estimated as high as 190 mph.
Tornadoes and global warming
<begin quote from Henson’s article>
The links between tornadoes and climate change are more nuanced than for phenomena such as heat waves or extreme rainfall.
Fortunately, there is no sign that the number or intensity of the most violent tornadoes (EF3+) is increasing. However, tornadoes are becoming more tightly packed within outbreaks, and there are longer stretches in between, leading to more variability from quiet to violent periods and vice versa. Prior to Friday, the U.S. tornado death toll for 2021 was only 14, the third lowest in data going back to 1875. (The lowest on record was 10, set in 2018.)
There’s also been a distinct multi-decadal trend for recent outbreaks to shift into and east of the Mississippi Valley, particularly over the Mid-South, as opposed to the more traditional territory of the southern and central Great Plains.
As for seasonal timing, it’s never been impossible to get a violent tornado in December, even as far north as Illinois. At least two F5/EF5 tornadoes are on the record books for December: one in Vicksburg, Mississippi on Dec. 5, 1953, that killed 38 (the deadliest December tornado on record up to this year), and one on Dec. 18, 1957, that struck Sunfield, Illinois, as part of the state’s most severe outbreak on record so late in the year.
This December has been strikingly mild across most of the United States, and warm, moist surface air streamed into Friday’s tornadic storms, fueling their power. It’s not hard to imagine the springtime peak and the autumn second-season peak of tornado season edging closer to winter as greenhouse gases continue to warm our climate globally, nationally, and regionally. Such a shift in tornado timing has been difficult to confirm thus far, though.
<end quote>
What does the IPCC AR6 have to say about tornadoes and global warming?
“trends in tornadoes… associated w/ severe convective storms are not robustly detected”
“attribution of certain classes of extreme weather (eg, tornadoes) is beyond current modelling & theoretical capabilities”
“how tornadoes… will change is an open question”
Politics
President Joe Biden made these statements in an interview:
Q Mr. President, does this say anything to you about climate change? Is this — or do you conclude that these storms and the intensity has to do with climate change?
THE PRESIDENT: Well, all that I know is that the intensity of the weather across the board has some impact as a consequence of the warming of the planet and the climate change.
The specific impact on these specific storms, I can’t say at this point. I’m going to be asking the EPA and others to take a look at that. But the fact is that we all know everything is more intense when the climate is warming — everything. And, obviously, it has some impact here, but I can’t give you a — a quantitative read on that.
Here is what Michael Mann has to say [link]:
Meteorologist Michael Mann of Penn State told USA Today: “The latest science indicates that we can expect more of these huge (tornado) outbreaks because of human-caused climate change.”
In another interview [link]:
We speak to climate scientist Michael Mann about the role of climate change in the storms and climate denialism among Republican leaders. “Make no mistake, we have been seeing an increase in these massive tornado outbreaks that can be attributed to the warming of the planet,” says Mann, director of the Earth System Science Center at Penn State University.
And then to top it off, there is this tweet – data ‘denial’ at its ‘finest’:
The ‘deceptive’ graph comes from a plot that is on the NOAA website [link] through 2014, which was updated by AEI thought 2018. NOAA’s explainer of the data can be found [here].
The data
Chris Martz, an undergraduate meteorology student at Millersville University, provides the following plots of NOAA’s tornado record
Here are the plots of December tornadoes from NOAA data:
The US FEMA administrator says December tornadoes are the ‘new normal’ [link]. It seems that 1963 is the only year on record with no US tornadoes during December.
With regards to normalized U.S. damage from tornadoes, Roger Pielke Jr provides this graph [link]:
Greg Goodman’s analysis
Historical data of tornado events in USA is often dismissed as unreliable because of changes in observational techniques affecting reliability and consistency of reporting. IPCC SREX claims: “There is low confidence in observed trends in small spatial-scale phenomena such as tornadoes and hail because of data inhomogeneities and inadequacies in monitoring systems.”
One of the main factors in such inhomogeneity was the development and deployment of Doppler RADAR starting in the mid 1980s, though deployment is an ongoing process in the decades since. Other factors are the spread of urbanised areas into rural areas and facility of reporting by non technical persons due to hand held devices and ready access to global communications. RADAR observations record many smaller events which would not have been seen or recorded previously. Historically, many events were recorded by insurance claims when they affected property or crops and this meant many minor events would go unreported unless they caused injury or significant damage. However large, powerful events are unlikely to be missed.
Tornadoes are classed according to the Enhanced Fujita Scale (EF Scale). Examination of the available data from 1950 to end 2019 shows more powerful events ( classified EF2 or greater ) display consistent progression over time and it is just the lower magnitude EF0 and EF1 which are boosted in recent years by better, more comprehensive reporting.
Method
The archive of individual tornado events lists each event by date and provides several data such as location, force rating and fatalities. The number of events of each force rating in each calendar year were calculated, then each time series was standardised (subtracting the mean and dividing by the standard deviation ) to see the relative progression of each category over time.
Analysis
After the strongest year in the record, 1975, there was a marked reduction in tornado activity in all categories. With the exception of a few lesser peaks, activity remained below average ever since. EF2, EF3 and EF4 categories all show very similar progression over time in both individual years of activity and long term trends. It is very unlikely that massive tornadoes would go unnoticed and unreported, so the similarity in the temporal evolution of each category indicates that reporting, down to EF2 is consistent over time. The data are coherent and self consistent between categories, which gives confidence that there are no major reporting induced biases present.
The period from 1950 – 1975 shows a steadily rising level of activity reaching a climax in 1975. After that there was a sudden and marked decline with no sign of a reversing increase since. All three categories are strikingly similar, which indicates there is no tendency towards a greater proportion of more power or less powerful storms over this period.
The post 1975 period marks the beginning of the late 20th century warming which IPCC has attributed mainly to anthropogenic effects ( AGW ). If there is a need to hypothesise a link between “global warming” and the frequency or intensity of tornadoes in USA, it would be that there have been less events in all major categories during this warming period. There has been no significant change in the distribution in storm severity as temperatures rise and recent warmer decades have seen notably less activity than the earlier post-WWII cooling period.
The ‘messaging’
Marshall Shepherd wrote a good article in Forbes entitled How Climate Messaging Spun Out Of Control During the Tornado Outbreaks.
<begin quote>
The good news is that climate change is being discussed with greater vigor. The bad news is that some of that discussion is cringe-worthy. Recent tornado outbreaks sparked a frenzy of coverage about connections to climate change. In my view, some of the messaging spun out of control.
I reached out to Professor Allen for his thoughts on messaging in the aftermath of the December tornadoes. The Central Michigan University scholar told me, “There is a philosophical point where I think we have to be careful to know the limits of our expertise and capability when agreeing to interviews.” I am a scientist who receives media requests frequently. There are so many media outlets these days that content is at a premium and so are “talking heads.” Relative to the audience, I probably can speak to a range of weather, climate, and Earth science topics. Though my degrees are in meteorology, I get asked about wildfires, tsunamis, meteors, and other basic topics, and it is usually ok.
However, we all have limits. Allen goes on to say, “While we might be able to talk about other fields at a basic level, for most of the science (particularly regarding climate change), it is often the nuance which defines what we are able to say – and familiarity with the latest developments in the field tends to be where this is exposed most.” Such nuances can be even more challenging for an “expert” speaking without firm meteorological or climate science grounding.
Expert saturation is another problem. In the midst of events like the December tornado outbreak, journalists are seeking input from experts. Many of the experts become overwhelmed by the requests. It is a double-edged sword. Scholars like Trapp, Brooks, Gensini, and Allen have achieved a certain level of credibility and become “go to” sources. However, when the expert pool “saturates,” there can be a tendency to move to other options. Often, those options are mostly just fine. However, some choices end up being cringe-inducing. Professor Victor Gensini, an expert at Northern Illinois, told me the saturation thing is real. He has done over 50 interviews in the past week and referred 30 others. He wrote, “Honestly, I share a very similar sentiment to you….I think the real issues arise when ‘fringe field’ experts come in and try to apply their perspective and research to the question of the day.”
At the end of the day, there are multiple messages and messengers out there. This is not going to change. How can we deal with conflicting narratives in real-time, poor science grounding by some talking heads, or the saturation problem. I am not sure.
<end quote>
Mann is shameless.
Don’t you listen to what the Mann Says
He says Blah Blah Blah
Blah Blah Blah Blah
The wonder of it all baby!
Needs another “blah” at the end, as in Blah-Blah Blah-Blah, Blahhhh.
https://youtu.be/TJNHfZ2CvBw
In 1821 William Tudor, the editor of the important U.S. literary publication “The North American Review” credited the remark to the statesman Fisher Ames long before it was attributed to Mark Twain.
Mann made global warming
A compulsory liar. He clearly is mentally ill. Food for psychiatrists.
https://www.healthline.com/health/pathological-liar
Why do the recent tornado articles never go to the records before 1950?
This is one important statistic from March of 1925 – the Tri-State tornado outbreak with almost 700 fatalities:
https://www.google.com/search?q=tri-state+tornado+of+1925&sxsrf=AOaemvJC4rZSKxCFacmrnQKZl7VwThJy1g:1640035587650&source=lnms&tbm=isch&sa=X&sqi=2&ved=2ahUKEwjX7PrUqPP0AhVpJaYKHfSMDhoQ_AUoAXoECAIQAw&biw=1366&bih=657&dpr=1
The above is a similar situation as the recent 6-7 state tornado breakout!
= JPP
“.I think the real issues arise when ‘fringe field’ experts come in and try to apply their perspective and research to the question of the day” – Mann a fringe on the fringe of scientists.
M. Mann’s beclowning alarmist comments about every weather event are more predictable than the weather events themselves.
Mann found out he could make a lot of money through climate alarmism. Science is now the furthest thing from his mind. And he is not alone.
Yes he has his own well funded Institute at Penn State. Uncertainty does not pay.
If you accept the adjustments that correct for biases in reporting standards then there isn’t much change in either the number of tornadoes or the damage they cause. If you don’t accept the adjustments then the number of tornadoes has increased but the damage they cause has declined.
Who checks the bias of the people who correct the biases?
Facebook?
Every study I’ve seen shows that unadjusted damage data is going up. It’s only when you factor for increased populations and wealth that damage goes down.
When I say “damage” I’m talking about the Fujita or Enhanced-Fujita scale which is a damage indicator scale. Note that very intense tornadoes can sometimes get low EF ratings if they don’t hit specific damage indicators. This was the case for the 2013 El Reno tornado which was 2.5 miles wide and had doppler radar observed winds in excess of 300 mph (100 mph more than the threshold for EF5) yet it was only rated EF3.
Rather an ignorant comment, bdgwx. First, there are damage indicators across most types of terrain. Second, doppler radar produces estimates of wind speeds which isn’t necessarily the wind at ground level (winds aloft are also sampled) and third, if you want to compare intensity to historical tornadoes you have to use a consistent methodology that existed before the advent of doppler radar. DUH.
meab said: “First, there are damage indicators across most types of terrain.”
Patently False. For example, the highest rating a tornado can achieve when moving over open farmland with only barns or outbuildings is EF2. This is true even if its winds are observed to be over 200 mph. That’s because the SBO (small barn and outbuilding) DOD (degree of damage) maxes out at 8 with a UB (upper bound wind) of 131 mph.
meab said: “Second, doppler radar produces estimates of wind speeds which isn’t necessarily the wind at ground level (winds aloft are also sampled)”
That is true for WSR-88D, but for RSDOW and DOW mobile deployments they do observe at near surface (as low as 5 meters AGL). Though it turns out for many tornadoes the vertical profile of the winds remains relatively constant (0.9 to 1.1 multiplier with height) up to 200 meters though it depends on the cellular mode and whether the tornado is multi-vortex.
meab said: “third, if you want to compare intensity to historical tornadoes you have to use a consistent methodology that existed before the advent of doppler radar.”
Exactly. Rating tornadoes prior to 1974 primarily by newspaper reports turned out to cause an overrating bias while the 2003 policy change of requiring special assessment teams for significant tornadoes caused an underrating bias. Note that doppler radar data is not considered a damage indicator and thus cannot be used for either fujita or enhanced fujita ratings.
Now you’re just lying. A snapped hardwood tree is EF-4. A debarked tree is EF-5. There are 28 indicators, many found on open farmland such as posts (fence posts) and objects that become large projectiles. The rest of what you wrote is either intentionally misleading (the highest windspeeds are often measured in multi-vortex tornados) or simply bunk – like your newspaper report false claim – you do know that photographs were not just invented, don’t you?
So what is your (dishonest) agenda?
meab said: “Now you’re just lying.”
DI #1 labeled as Small Barns or Farm Outbuildings (SBO) has 8 degrees of damage (DOD) with number 8 maxing out at 131 mph. [1: A-2]
meab said: “A snapped hardwood tree is EF-4.”
A snapped hardwood occurs at EF1 on the low end and EF2 on the high end. [1: A-66].
meab said: “A debarked tree is EF-5”
For hardwoods a debarked tree occurs at EF2 on the low end and EF4 on the high end. For softwoods this occurs at EF1 and EF3 respectively. [1: A-66 and A-69]
meab said: “There are 28 indicators, many found on open farmland such as posts (fence posts) and objects that become large projectiles.”
I think we can only reasonably say DI #1, #27, and #28 are common on farm land. Many likely have 2 of the 3, but not always. In cases where #1 is the only DI then EF2 is the maximum rating. [1: A-1].
meab said: “The rest of what you wrote is either intentionally misleading (the highest windspeeds are often measured in multi-vortex tornados)”
The highest windspeeds are usually measured in multi-vortex tornadoes by RSDOW and DOW mobile deployments. I never said otherwise so I don’t know what you think is misleading.
meab said: “simply bunk – like your newspaper report false claim”
Oh that’s definitely true. The Fujita scale went into effect in the mid 1970’s. Tornadoes were retroactively rated not by first hand assessments but in large part or in most cases solely from newspaper descriptions of damage with no assessment as the quality of construction of the structure damaged and done by untrained students. [2: pg 555]
meab said: “you do know that photographs were not just invented, don’t you?”
Yes. I’m aware of that. I’m also aware that newspapers were not just invented.
https://www.weather.gov/oun/efscale
The important thing is that the EF uses damages as an estimate of strength rather than its just a measure of damage, and equated to wind speed of 3 second gusts.
Shallow rooted trees are uprooted at EF0. Most trees uprooted at EF3 or snapped. Some trees uprooted and snapped at EF2.
Trees partially debarked at EF4, Mostly debarked at EF5.
To Bed B: “The important thing is that the EF uses damages as an estimate of strength rather than its just a measure of damage, and equated to wind speed of 3 second gusts.”
That’s what I’m trying to explain to the contrarians here. And I’ve already provided the same information you just linked. Maybe you could have them go through Doswell et al. 2008 as well for a brief history of the F and EF scales, the pros and cons, and why there are inconsistencies in reporting methodology.
To Bed B: “Trees partially debarked at EF4, Mostly debarked at EF5.”
DI #28 Trees Softwood (TS): DOD 5 Trees debarked with only stubs of largest branches remaining. LB 112 mph or EF1.
No. Your whole argument is that it’s just a measure of damage, ie. if it doesn’t destroy a man-made object then it’s weak. Not true. The damage is like a proxy for wind speed.
To Bed B: “No. Your whole argument is that it’s just a measure of damage, ie. if it doesn’t destroy a man-made object then it’s weak.”
I never said that. In fact, I said exactly the opposite. I said and I quote “Note that very intense tornadoes can sometimes get low EF ratings if they don’t hit specific damage indicators.”
This is the problem with the EF scale. If a 200 mph tornado doesn’t hit a DI with a high enough DOD then it doesn’t get the EF5 rating.
And this is partly why there is a bias in the tornado ratings similar to the bias in the tornado counts. For example, the Plainfield 1990 tornado was given an F5 rating in large part due to the ground scouring. The problem is that ground scouring is not a DI for the EF scale so had it occurred after 2007 instead of 1990 it may not been given an EF5 rating even though it was assigned an F5 rating at the time. Note that the El Reno 2013 tornado exhibited ground scouring as well and it was only rated EF3. The bar for an EF5 is so high now that there has only been 4 severe weather outbreak days since its inception that have been able to muster up an EF5. And one of those, the Joplin 2011 tornado, was questioned because an independent engineering team could find no EF5 damage even though the hospital (which is a qualifying EF5 DI) was a total loss.
“Patently False. For example, the highest rating a tornado can achieve when moving over open farmland with only barns or outbuildings is EF2. “
As below, there was an EF5 given to a tornado purely from crop damage. A tornado in an Australian due to tree damage was estimated to be F4 to F5.
If you are saying that there is a problem with using damage as a proxy for tornado intensity, you would have had no argument.
“When I say “damage” I’m talking about the Fujita or Enhanced-Fujita scale which is a damage indicator scale. “
Except its not. NOAA in the link states it clearly
“IMPORTANT NOTE ABOUT EF SCALE WINDS: The EF scale still is a set of wind estimates (not measurements) based on damage.” so they try to avoid bias of the terrain that is hit. Whether they do a good job or if its even possible is what you should be arguing.
The Plainfield tornado of 1990 was categorised as F4 when it did the most damage to buildings and killed 29 people. Its considered to have been an F5 solely from the damage to cropland prior to weakening (and throwing a 20 ton trailer half a mile).
Inflation and devaluation of the $Dollar affect the nominal value of structures, amount of damage claims, and model estimates of corporate insurance losses in the time series of these adjusted numbers going back to the 19th C. Wealth consumption or QOL plays a big part too as gauged by the changes in average number of sq ft of the American home, cost/sq ft, utility connections, HVAC systems, number of bathrooms etc. The building of $multimillion mansions on beach front property at risk for storm surges and hurricane damage seems reckless especially if by owners that accept the doctrine of rising sea levels due to GW/CC.
Take a look at Pillage Idiot’s comment down-thread.
“If you don’t accept the adjustments then the number of tornadoes has increased but the damage they cause has declined”
The number of EF0 being reported has increased, not the actual number. There is very little damage and many are only known about because of Doppler Radar picking them up.
“The number of tornadoes increased dramatically in the 1990s as the modernized National Weather Service installed the Doppler Radar network. The National Weather Service modernization also began the Warning Coordination Meteorologist program increasing partnerships with media and Emergency Management across the United States. This program also initiated the training of storm spotters across the County Warning Area of each Weather Forecast Office. With more people trained to relay information on storm activity to the Weather Forecast Office and improved communication and digital technology, more tornadoes could be reported.”
From the NOAA themselves https://www.spc.noaa.gov/efscale/
There is nothing to accept. Without any correction, the trend is meaningless, and any corrected trend needs to be judge along with the method.
Looking at data post 2000 or stronger tornadoes, where better reporting isn’t a significant factor of the trends, there is a negative trend. Therefore, any claim that the recent tornado is due to climate change is spurious and Mann is being dishonest.
It is that simple.
The graph provided by Pielke above, shows declining levels of tornado damage when normalized.
Opposite to your propaganda.
Tornadoes have only increased because modern systems are able to spot and identify lesser tornadoes that were unreported.
ATheoK said: “The graph provided by Pielke above, shows declining levels of tornado damage when normalized.”
The graph provided Pielke above shows damages in terms of cost. That is not the same thing as the EF rating given to a tornado.
ATheoK said: “Tornadoes have only increased because modern systems are able to spot and identify lesser tornadoes that were unreported.”
Tornadoes have NOT increased because modern systems are able to spot them. Only the reports have increased. When we adjust the report data to correct for biases caused changes in reporting methodology and efficacy we conclude that there is no statistically significant trend in the number of actual tornadoes.
Mann – supposedly a scientist – complained of “Carbon pollution” after the Build Back bill was lost
“Michael Mann on MSNBC: “Well, you know, we need to pass Build Back Better, because that –that bill has climate provisions that will address this problem at its, you know, at its core, which is the warming of the planet due to carbon pollution, fossil fuel burning, so that’s most important. “
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2021/12/19/cheers-bidens-climate-agenda-collapses-dem-sen-manchin-kills-build-back-bankrupt-bill/
And then I stumbled on this
“All schools to receive carbon dioxide monitors
Education settings will be provided with carbon dioxide monitors from September, backed by £25 million in government funding”
https://www.gov.uk/government/news/all-schools-to-receive-carbon-dioxide-monitors
Carbon MONOXIDE monitors would make some sense, but CO2 monitors?
Laughable.
You wouldn’t find any CO in a school. Asbestos etc, perhaps.
It is absurd when you consider a submarine submerged for a lengthy period of time.
Depends on how they were heated.
I have a CO monitor / alarm in my camper.
Propane cooktops and furnace.
It wouldn’t hurt to make schoolkids aware of the hazards of enclosed spaces with any sort of exposure to combustion activities.
Just this morning, a family of 7 was found dead in their house in Minneapolis, most likely CO asphyxiation.
I saw one in a play area of a Burger Kind once. Took me awhile to figure out what it was. The play area was completely walled off from the rest of the dining area, but had ducts leading to a common A/C system.
My only guess was that someone was concerned that if the play area was completely full, and the weather outside was mild (so that the blowers weren’t running much), then CO2 levels could climb to dangerous levels.
Most likely poor reporting. Most people if they know anything about the topic will find errors in what the media reports. So reporters that are told “Carbon Monoxide” will hear “Carbon Dioxide” because the vast majority of them are brainwashed with climate change propaganda.
HVAC systems often use CO2 monitors. Ironically they are usually of the NDIR type which exploits the same mechanism which causes the GHE that a lot of posters on here deny even exists.
Wouldn’t it be more efficacious to test for reduction of Oxygen and increase of Nitrogen in people’s air supply?
CO2 is, after all, just 0.03% of what we breathe in.
I don’t know. I’m not an HVAC engineer so I don’t know what the pros/cons are of using different air quality strategies.
“same mechanism which causes the GHE that a lot of posters on here deny even exists.”
Its on par with arguing that if you accept that birds need feathers to fly, then you must accept that putting feathers on something will make it fly.
It’s more like scientists saying feathers play a role in birds ability to fly and contrarians saying that birds don’t even have feathers to begin with so their ability to fly must be derived from some other unidentified cause.
Name of application where an IR absorbing gas is used for that purpose as a blanket.
I’m not sure where “blanket” comes into play. I didn’t mention anything about that. What I said is that NDIR exploit the same mechanism which causes the GHE. The application of this mechanism is the NDIR sensor itself.
So you really think that the oceans warm just because IR is absorbed in the atmosphere? No other reasoning needed?
It is certainly one causative mechanism for ocean warming.
“causative”? How does it cause ocean warming is the answer required. Labelling it “causative” is not an argument.
Did I say you that you referred to a blanket or am I asking how does it make the earth warmer (unless you’re claiming that it is a source of extra thermal energy, then its a blanket in effect).
Just in case you are not from a troll farm, take an actual black body with a transparent atmosphere that stops suddenly, say 10 km up. Add gasses that absorb (also emit) IR until its opaque to IR, then the top of the atmosphere is the temperature of the original surface (emissivity 1). If there is no temperature gradient, what is the surface temperature? Same as before? I’m assuming that mentioning a lapse rate is blasphemy.
NO – I’m not claiming that this disproves anything. I’m just pointing out how stupid it is to insist that simply an atmosphere absorbing IR creates a warmer ocean. No knuckle dragging contrarian/denier is actually arguing that CO2 doesn’t absorb IR.
It causes ocean warming by impeding the transfer of energy that otherwise would have escaped to space.
CO2 absorbs IR. It does not impede flow of heat from the ocean, and in the above example, it doesn’t lead to warming of the surface even if there is no loss of heat straight to outerspace. There is more to the GHE than absorbing IR, like there is more to flying than gluing feathers to something.
To bed B: said: “It does not impede flow of heat from the ocean”
Yes it does. Refer to Wong and Minnet 2018 for details. But even if it didn’t it would still be a causative mechanism for ocean warming indirectly by causing everything else to warm which would eventually cause the ocean to warm.
To bed B said: “it doesn’t lead to warming of the surface even if there is no loss of heat straight to outerspace.”
Yes it does. Refer to the 1st law of thermodynamics ΔU = Q – W or in conservation form ΔE = Ein – Eout and the formula for the change in temperature ΔT = ΔE/m.c where m is the mass and c is the specific heat capacity.
To bed B said: “There is more to the GHE than absorbing IR”
I’m not saying there isn’t. There are numerous details that could be discussed. My point isn’t concerning the details. It is concerning the fundamental mechanism (impeding the transmission of energy) that allow a NDIR sensor to work and is the cause of the GHE. CO2 blocks energy from proceeding down the cuvett chamber in a NDIR sensor just like it blocks energy from proceeding to space. If CO2 did not impede the transmission of energy in certain bands then neither NDIR sensors nor the GHE would work.
“But even if it didn’t it would still be a causative mechanism for ocean warming indirectly by causing everything else to warm which would eventually cause the ocean to warm.”
How?
Just in case you are a bit slow, I’m not arguing that there is no GHE. If anything, transfer of heat from oceans to the land would increase the global mean. There is a temperature gradient so the lower atmosphere must warm in the above example.
But how the oceans and surface warm is the important bit. Even esteemed climate scientists like Rasool and Schnieder once calculated an 8 fold increase in CO2 for a 2 degree of warming. You seem to think it’s a simple linear relation between surface temperature and concentration of CO2 because it absorbs IR. Denying this is denying an IR spectrophotometer works, according to yourself. You have yet to justify this belief.
I don’t think that you have had much of an education in science. You can’t look up something fancy in Wikipedia and pretend. That first equation just states that putting heat and work into the system increases internal energy by that amount, not necessarily increases the temperature. In my example, the upper atmosphere warms and energy is lost to space so there is still conservation of energy.
It is much more complicated than you seem to able to cope with.
I am sure that either the monitor manufacturer or the coalition/contractor installing them that got the legislation passed is laughing all the way to the bank. As well as the MPs that invested in the company.
CO2 is monitored in buildings as a proxy for the buildup of human bioeffluents in an enclosed space. When CO2 levels are high, that is an indication that there is not enough fresh outside air being brought into the building. Bringing in more fresh air can also reduce the concentration of aerosols containing infectious diseases, so fewer people get sick. It’s not the accumulation of CO2 that is the concern. It’s just that humans exhale CO2 so it is a good measurement to use to control exhaust fans—when there are more people in the building, more air is exhausted, when there are fewer people less air is exhausted. This saves energy because outside air that is brought into the building has to be treated (heated or cooled) to maintain comfortable conditions in the building, and the exhaust fans themselves use more energy when more air is moved.
no real scientist would ever use the term “carbon pollution”- even if they think CO2 emissions are a bad thing
It is a common political buzzword now, used by canadian politicians of the bubblehead type across the country
Oh, how do you solve a problem like the Mikey Mann?
How do you catch a liar and pin him down?
How do you find a word that means the Mikey Mann?
A flibbertijibbet! A will-o’-the wisp! A clown!
From “The Sound of Moaning”.
“A clown!”
Shouldn’t that be “Carnival Barker”?
No, because it doesn’t rhyme, but it would go nicely in place of “flibbertijibbet”.
Note that to my knowledge no EF4 or 5 tornadoes were found. It was a relatively low intensity, but widespread, event. Not unusual.
As of this posting and for the December 10-11 severe weather outbreak there were 63 confirmed tornadoes. EF0 = 16, EF1 = 23, EF2 = 15, EF3 = 6, EF4 = 2. The first EF4 was on the ground for 81 miles. The second EF4 was on the ground for 165 miles. For the December 15 severe weather outbreak there were 62 tornadoes. EF0 = 12, EF1 = 23, EF2 = 23. So in total for December 2021 there were 46 strong/significant tornadoes (EF2+) and 2 violent tornadoes (EF4+).
bdgwx:
This paper was posted up on the thread at CE.
Interesting …..
https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1029/2018GL080819
“Tornado power is metered by the energy dissipated near the ground (Fricker et al., 2017). On average, the longest lasting tornadoes generate the most extreme wind speeds (Brooks, 2004; Elsner, Jagger, & Elsner, 2014; Fricker & Elsner, 2015). And indeed, damage paths are getting longer. Multiplying path area, air density, and wind speed gives an estimate of the total energy dissipated by a tornado (Fricker et al., 2017; see section 4). For the set of 27,950 tornadoes during the period 1994–2016, the median power is 2.22 gigawatts (GW) with an interquartile range between 0.27 and 17 GW. Tornado power is highly correlated (r > 0.9) with the destructive potential index developed at the U.S. Storm Prediction Center (Fricker & Elsner, 2015) and with the number of casualties when people are present (Fricker et al., 2017). The Tallulah-Yazoo City-Durant tornado (Louisiana and Mississippi) of 24 April 2010 that killed 10 and injured 146 had an estimated power of 66,200 GW. Annual statistics of tornado power show clear upward trends with the median, quartiles, and 90th percentile all on the rise over the period 1994–2016 (Figure 1).”
“Annual energy dissipation (power) by year. The black dot is the median and the red dot is the 90th percentile value each year. The vertical bar extends from the lower to upper quartile numbers.”
“Upward trends in energy dissipation (power) by month. The black dot is the median and the red dot is the 90th percentile value each year. The vertical bar extends from the lower to upper quartile numbers. The black line is the modeled trend with a 95% CI band shown in red shading.”
That is consistent with conclusions reached by other researchers regarding how tornado ratings are biased high early in the period and low in the later period.
I believe I read about one of the tornadoes being rated an EF4.
What damage a tornado does is pretty much random. If it hits a forest, a few trees get knocked down. If it goes through the heart of a small town, many buildings are knocked down and people get hurt or killed.
The recent outbreak was bad because of where a few of the tornadoes hit, not because the outbreak was unusually usually large.
And yet it was the worst storm in Kentucky history, at a time of year when tornadoes are uncommon, left a record track, there were multiple tornadoes…
and then there’s an epic rainstorm around Vancouver, truly record NW heatwave, NY city flooded basements, multiple US heatwaves and a devastating fire season.
and around the world, multiple, record, 1 in 1,000 year events.
but apparently this is all (a very big) coincidence
Griff, The world-leading exerts at the UN IPCC disagree with you. Since weather is so variable in space and time, it’s easy to be fooled into thinking that normal is abnormal. Even average weather isn’t “normal.” In other words, average weather happens infrequently. Weather records are set somewhere every second. This second is the hottest, or coldest, twenty-seventh second after 15:49 GMT on record for a December 20th, somewhere in the world.
Yep, that’s the thing about life, Griff –
nobody is coming out of this alive.
Scary, huh?
Yet more of griff’s low IQ posts.
Give it a rest griff. No sale.
Let’s say even that there was something to your claims (which I won’t actually grant). What’s your plan for getting China and India to cooperate in your suicide pact? You don’t have one. The only answer is adaptation.
Uncommon, but hardly rare.
The extreme lack of hurricanes in the Gulf this past year has left the Gulf a lot warmer than usual for this time of year. It was warm Gulf air that created this outbreak.
Having multiple tornadoes in a single outbreak is pretty much standard. Not surprised that you didn’t know that.
As to everything else in your list, still nothing unusual. It’s all happened before, the only difference was before nobody cared, so they didn’t make a big deal about it.
Snake oil seller griff, no chance, as you woudn’t learn what weather and climate is.
And tornadoes in this time of the year are not unusual, if the weather pattern alow forming tornadoes.
What about the great Kansas tornado of 1939?
It was so bad even whole houses were picked up, people and cattle spun around
Surely you’ve seen the documentary or perhaps read the story before making your wild claims?
I believe griff starred in a tornado documentary:
It really was no miracle, what happened was just this.
The wind began to switch, the house to pitch, and suddenly the hinges started
to unhitch.
Just then the witch, to satisfy an itch went flying on her broomstick thumbing
for a hitch.
And oh what happen’d then was rich.
The house began to pitch, the kitchen took a slitch, it landed on the wicked
witch in the middle of a ditch.
Which was not a healthy situation for a wicked witch.
The house began to pitch, the kitchen took a slitch, it landed on the wicked
witch in the middle of a ditch.
Which was not a healthy situation for a wicked witch who began to twitch
And was reduced to just a stitch of what was once the wicked witch.
Well at least 2 people got the reference 😉
As per the data, december tornados aren’t unusual, and are more common in cooling periods.
Can you respond to the data that shows these late season tornados were more common during the cooling period in mid-20th century?
Doesn’t that jive with various items pointing out we are in a cooling period, as you very well know?
Yes, the globe has actually cooled 0.6C since the highpoint of 2016, the warmest year in the 21st century.
These alarmists keep saying warming is driving the tornadoes, but the globe is cooling now. How does that figure into the equation? At what cooling point do we hit “normal tornado”?
And yet the corona virus had another variant clearly an indication of climate change according to Griff because anything out of the ordinary is caused by it.
Weren’t we supposed to have even bigger bushfires in Australia this year Griff? I mean, climate change was the cause last year, right? C02 has done nothing but increase. This year should be worse than last, no?
“Prof Michail E Mann … This graph falsely purporting to depict a decrease in the strongest tornadoes is making the denialist rounds again. Those tweeting it are either deeply ignorant or intentionally seeking to deceive. Here’s what actual tornado experts have to say about it…”
______________________________________________________________________
Wow! the Graphic in Dr. Mann’s Tweet is exactly the same as the NOAA link that Dr. Curry put up except that it’s more up to date by four years. Is there an internal link at NOAA that isn’t public? Anyway download both graphs and use your favorite image software to see that with the exception of the last four years it’s an exact match.
Regarding the NOAA graph, it’s been saved at the Internet Archives WayBack Machine since 2012. The current 2021 iteration only goes to 2014 so it looks like NOAA decided to keep the continuing decline out of the public eye.* So thank you Dr. Mann for providing the update.
*Opinion, the rest is fact.
Alarmists are all about hiding the truth.
You can’t take anything an alarmists says at face value. You must dig deeper for the truth.
If Mickey Mann carries on like this spewing forth such utter nonsense that is so easily verified as such, at some point even the climate media are going to call him out on it. Unless Mark Steyn gets him on the witness stand first.
Mann is heading for a big fall. Its been a long time coming but I think he will go down in the history of science as a charlatan.
The important question is what recently motivated the change from those previous NOAA graphs and explanation to the all-in-one current tornado graph with increasing frequency (and no explanation)? And who was responsible for that change and resulting misdirection?
In the “Hall of Shame” listed just after Lysenko.
Piltdown Mann?
The perfidy of NOAA’s deception in “disappearing” their historical violent tornado data to match the narrative goes even deeper than what is discussed in the post!
Basically, the charts that Chris Martz reconstructed match the old NOAA data (for which I had saved a link). My saved link no longer goes to the old page. It now goes to the “new narrative approved” data that they have substituted to the same web address.
However, even looking over their new data, I could not reconcile it with the data shown in Chris Martz’s reconstructions.
I finally found the discrepancy. The Martz data for total U.S. Tornadoes is for EF-1 and higher. It mirrors the old NOAA reporting standard. For the new agency reporting, NOAA has switched their historical data page to EF-0 and higher!
There is no mention of this change in data reporting anywhere on their page.
There is also no discussion about “inflation-adjusted” tornado counts (to correct for the huge difference in observation bias over that last 65 years.)
NOAA gets their tornado data from the SPC (Storm Prediction Center). The SPC is very careful to note that current tornado counts cannot be compared to historical data without major adjustments. NOAA somehow fails to note the SPC’s important data caveat when NOAA presents the tornado data.
IMHO, the NOAA tornado page is now being run by someone with an advanced degree in “Lying With Statistics”.
IMHO, the NOAA tornado page is now being run by someone with an advanced degree in “Lying With Statistics”.
IMHO, the NOAA tornado page is now being run by someone with an advanced degree in “Lying
With Statistics”.Fixed it.
Another example of why we have to dig deeper for the truth. We won’t get it out of the alarmists voluntarily.
Mother Nature gonna do what Mother Nature wanna do…irregardless of what the wacko sciencey types want to make of it. Still they can’t seem to predict much of anything when it comes to weather, but “climate” they can handle…not.
Humble opinion here…in the tornado belt.
So now, Michael Mann claims that the NOAA data is bogus.
He must therefore, have his own data source that he neglected to provide. Seems to be an ongoing pattern with Mann.
For the life of me, I cannot understand why anyone would pay big dollars to Penn State to claim they were educated by charlatans.
Michael Mann has more than one trick up his sleeve.
From the article: “The post 1975 period marks the beginning of the late 20th century warming which IPCC has attributed mainly to anthropogenic effects ( AGW ). If there is a need to hypothesise a link between “global warming” and the frequency or intensity of tornadoes in USA, it would be that there have been less events in all major categories during this warming period. There has been no significant change in the distribution in storm severity as temperatures rise and recent warmer decades have seen notably less activity than the earlier post-WWII cooling period.”
This is just the opposite of what the alarmists claim. They claim the warmer it gets, the more violent and powerful the tornadoes are.
The actual data shows the warmer we get, the tornado activity tails off. Michael Mann and President Biden are saying just the opposite.
They obviously don’t know what they are talking about.
From the article: “At the end of the day, there are multiple messages and messengers out there. This is not going to change. How can we deal with conflicting narratives in real-time, poor science grounding by some talking heads, or the saturation problem. I am not sure.”
Answer: Read WUWT if you want all this sorted out.
“It’s not hard to imagine [..] as greenhouse gases continue to warm our climate globally, nationally, and regionally.”
Well there you go. We have indeed seen the fruits of their imagination for several decades now.
“Such a shift in tornado timing has been difficult to confirm thus far, though.”
Well, there you go.
From the article: :There’s also been a distinct multi-decadal trend for recent outbreaks to shift into and east of the Mississippi Valley, particularly over the Mid-South, as opposed to the more traditional territory of the southern and central Great Plains.”
Here’s another unsubstantiated assertion.
We’ll keep a close eye on how the jet stream shapes up this coming spring and summer. The subtropical jet stream is what determines the storm track. Sometimes it sets up in the central U.S., and sometimes it moves to the east.
The jet stream establishes the storm track, not CO2. When you can show how CO2 controls the jet stream configuration, come back and see us.
What continues to blow my mind is that everybody continues to miss the biggest reason for the tornado outbreak……..the powerful jet stream.
When was the last time we had an outbreak of severe storms that featured violent tornadoes without a powerful jet stream.
How about NEVER!
What causes powerful jet streams?
A strong temperature gradient with cold to the north and warm humid air to the south.
Global warming has warmed the highest latitudes the most and weakened the meridional temperature gradient, which has resulted in LESS violent tornadoes.
Violent tornadoes will always be on the warm/humid side of the temperature gradient and often associated with a jet max or jet streak embedded in the powerful jet steam.that maximizes the lift to air in the lowest levels.
The lift to the air below from a strong jet stream can be sort of like a vacuum cleaner sucking up the air and spreading it out up higher. This also causes the weight/pressure of the air underneath to drop and what we know as a mid latitude cyclone/low pressure system with winds that spin counterclockwise because air from higher pressure at the surface, moving towards the lowering pressure get deflected to the right by the earths spin……….instead of just going straight and filling up the low pressure area to equalize the pressure gradient.
Nobody seems to realize or at least to explain that it was the unusually frigid air in Canada, that caused the powerful jet stream, that led to most of this.
Take that frigid air away and replace it with seasonally average temperatures in Canada during that period and none of this would have happened.
It would have reduced the jet stream by 50% and along with it, the key factor that led to the most violent severe storms/tornadoes.
Look at the huge pool of frigid air in Canada last week.
https://www.marketforum.com/forum/topic/78838/#79130
Additionally, the La Nina conditions increase odds of tornado outbreaks like this. Usually this happens in Spring, during the normal severe weather season.
Did warming the atmosphere slightly contribute to this happening in the Winter?
Probably just a small bit but not nearly as much as the decrease in the violent tornadoes from the same affect during the main severe weather season.