General AGW discussion thread

[Ari Jokimaki]

So, Stroller, why are you ignoring requests of references to your claims (here (http://www.bautforum.com/1636312-post2721.html) and here (http://www.bautforum.com/1635230-post2651.html))? Certainly you should have the references already because you wouldn't make the claims without them, wouldn't you? And in that case it wouldn't be much trouble to just give the references (which you should have given already when making the claims, anyway).


The major food sources at the bottom of the food chain are plants. These have been enjoying the warm weather and extra co2 and are more abundant everywhere. The relationship between smaller animals and their predators is such that a balance is maintained.
References for these claims also?

[Ari Jokimaki]

Now the problem for the science of agw is that it is these models which claim that a moderate increase in Co2 will cause a positive net feedback effect re: more warming.
Why is that a problem? Positive feedback for water vapor has already been observed (http://agwobserver.wordpress.com/2009/10/13/papers-on-water-vapor-feedback-observations/), and the low level cloud feedback which has been the major source of the uncertainty in feedbacks, seems to be getting there as well (Clement et al. (2009) (http://thingsbreak.files.wordpress.com/2009/07/observational-and-model-evidence-for-positive-low-level-cloud-feedback.pdf)). The science of AGW rests very heavily on the observations, not on model projections.

[Jetlack]

Why is that a problem? Positive feedback for water vapor has already been observed (http://agwobserver.wordpress.com/2009/10/13/papers-on-water-vapor-feedback-observations/), and the low level cloud feedback which has been the major source of the uncertainty in feedbacks, seems to be getting there as well (Clement et al. (2009) (http://thingsbreak.files.wordpress.com/2009/07/observational-and-model-evidence-for-positive-low-level-cloud-feedback.pdf)). The science of AGW rests very heavily on the observations, not on model projections.

You miss the point completely.

I am talking about the models which make the projections (predictions). Im not questioning the science of Co2 and positive or negative feedbacks. I will leave that for others.

You are not addressing my points re the failure of GCMs to correctly predict anything at all.

[Jetlack]

BBC report on errors in IPCC report on Glaciers dissapearing by 2035.

Himalayan glaciers melting deadline 'a mistake'

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/south_asia/8387737.stm

Oops :-) Of course no-one would accuse them of alarmism.

[Stroller]

But the periodic nature of ice ages is such that there is a cause. That cause may be external, or it may be an inherent oscillation in the climatological system.

To date, we haven't found it.

The switch in periodicity from 40k years to 100k years is interesting. In the really long view, these ice ages are minor oscillations from ~9C to ~13C. The big one is the oscillation from ~9C to the ~22C the earth has reached a lot of the time in the last 550M years according to Scotese.

The causes of these oscillations is most likely due to a combination of orbital elements and solar variation in my view. But that's a probability argument rather than a theory. There are problems with Milankovitch cycle theory and we just don't know much about the sun when truth be told.

[William]

The switch in periodicity from 40k years to 100k years is interesting. In the really long view, these ice ages are minor oscillations from ~9C to ~13C. The big one is the oscillation from ~9C to the ~22C the earth has reached a lot of the time in the last 550M years according to Scotese.

The causes of these oscillations is most likely due to a combination of orbital elements and solar variation in my view. But that's a probability argument rather than a theory. There are problems with Milankovitch cycle theory and we just don't know much about the sun when truth be told.


Hi Stroller,

Recent data and analysis has disproved Milankovitch's theory.

http://www.bautforum.com/science-technology/96560-cyclic-archeomagnetic-jerks-volcanic-eruptions-solar-cycle.html#post1636938

http://www.bautforum.com/science-technology/96560-cyclic-archeomagnetic-jerks-volcanic-eruptions-solar-cycle.html#post1636941


As Joe Bast ardi notes.

"Enjoy the weather, it's the only weather you've got."

[Stroller]

Hi Stroller,

Recent data and analysis has disproved Milankovitch's theory.


Hi William, I picked through the whole thread, which I have found very interesting. I agree that Milankovitch cycles can't account very well for ice ages, and that the discoveries you point up regarding geomagnetism and volcanism may well be important.

You seem to place stress on the possibility that the alignment of the Earth's magnetic dipole may be 'blown over' by a sudden burst of activity from the sun, and that this may then affect climate through the Svensmark effect due to greater cloud cover nearer the equator.

You may be interested to hear that during the cold part of the Dalton minimum, scientific observations made by naval officers on ships which visited the arctic in 1815 and 1820 noted a great melting of ice off the coast of Greenland. This would seem to be consistent with your idea that warmer conditions prevail in the arctic at the same time lower latitudes are gripped by cold and cloudy weather.

On a shorter timescale, a similar thing happened last winter with the sudden stratospheric warming event in January which caused the polar vortex to split in two and reverse direction. This also seemed to coincide with some sort of electromagnetic event which hit the Earth's magnetosphere, though reports on that seem to conflict.

[William]

Hi William, I picked through the whole thread, which I have found very interesting. I agree that Milankovitch cycles can't account very well for ice ages, and that the discoveries you point up regarding geomagnetism and volcanism may well be important.

You seem to place stress on the possibility that the alignment of the Earth's magnetic dipole may be 'blown over' by a sudden burst of activity from the sun, and that this may then affect climate through the Svensmark effect due to greater cloud cover nearer the equator.

You may be interested to hear that during the cold part of the Dalton minimum, scientific observations made by naval officers on ships which visited the arctic in 1815 and 1820 noted a great melting of ice off the coast of Greenland. This would seem to be consistent with your idea that warmer conditions prevail in the arctic at the same time lower latitudes are gripped by cold and cloudy weather.

On a shorter timescale, a similar thing happened last winter with the sudden stratospheric warming event in January which caused the polar vortex to split in two and reverse direction. This also seemed to coincide with some sort of electromagnetic event which hit the Earth's magnetosphere, though reports on that seem to conflict.

Hi Stroller,

That is interesting.

The geomagnetic inclination changes explains why there are, as Andre has noted, anomalous warm regions during the glacial cycle.

When there is a difference in the inclination of the geomagnetic field and the earth's axis of rotation, the earth cools as more GCR strikes the lower latitudes and which creates more clouds which has a greater affect as there is more solar energy received at lower latitudes.

Due to the inclination change (the geomagnetic field axis is no longer aligned with the earth's rotational axis) the geomagnetic field intensity as specific higher latitudes is stronger. At those higher latitudes due to the stronger geomagnetic field there is less GCR which causes there to be less clouds and hence that region will be warmer.

[Stroller]

William, I can't find the quote or book ref at the moment, but this post may interest you.

http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/06/20/historic-variation-in-arctic-ice/

[William]

William, I can't find the quote or book ref at the moment, but this post may interest you.

http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/06/20/historic-variation-in-arctic-ice/

Thanks Stoller. I had missed that article concerning past warm periods in the Arctic.

[mugaliens]

The switch in periodicity from 40k years to 100k years is interesting. In the really long view, these ice ages are minor oscillations from ~9C to ~13C. The big one is the oscillation from ~9C to the ~22C the earth has reached a lot of the time in the last 550M years according to Scotese.

The causes of these oscillations is most likely due to a combination of orbital elements and solar variation in my view. But that's a probability argument rather than a theory. There are problems with Milankovitch cycle theory and we just don't know much about the sun when truth be told.

I'm not so sure, due to the metronome consistance of orbits. The liklihood of any frequence change factor of 2.5 is slim. On the other hand, internal fluctuations in the Earths' outer core and mantel flows are complex enough to account for such a variation, as are cycles within the Sun's internal structure.

In contrast, our orbits are like clockwork, and this includes the solar system's cosmic year is 225-250 million years, where we pass through the plane of the Milky Way every 112.5 to 125 million years (duration due to unknowns, not cyclical variation).

The point is that nearly everything in nature is cyclical, and major systems have different periodicities. Furthermore, our climate may be bimodal, such that it's stable either in an ice age or an interglacial, but requires some period event to move it in the other direction. Given the Vostok graphs (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Vostok-ice-core-petit.png), however, I suspect it's stable in the ice age region, and is currently responding some even which occurs every 105,700 years, give or take a maximum deviation of 15.8%.

Some other interesting basic stats from Vostok ice core data:

The mean time from Start warming to Peak warming is 5.9 ky, with a variation of up to 47%. But the mean periods between global warming starts is 105.7 ky, with just 15.8% variation. Meanwhile, peak to peak times are 103.6 ky, with a 15.6% maximum variation.

Ideas: The fact that it deviates at all tells me it's probably not orbital in nature. I find it interesting that it takes around 6,000 years for an interglacial to establish itself, yet much longer for our planet's temperature to "return to normal." The fact that it takes so long (5.9 ky) tells me that it's not one event, but a change that takes 6,000 years to manifest it's full effect. This could be variation in the sun's output, our Earth's internal heat engine, something in the interstellar medium, or perhaps merely passing through our galaxy's spiral arms, of which there are four knowns, and perhaps as many as seven, total. Still, that would be a 40 my cycle, which doesn't gibe at all with the ice age cycle, so it's almost certainly not galactic in origen.

I think a lot of people have asked, "what causes ice ages?" when I think the data suggests the proper question is "what causes interglacial warming?"

[Stroller]

As usual, it's a confounding of many factors which presents the difficulty in analysis. We just don't know what causes ice ages. There are plenty of hypotheses though. My money is on solar variation rather than variations in Earth's orbit, though these might have some synchrony due both being caused by the same underlying factors.

I think the main underlying factor will turn out to be harmonic resonances in the solar system caused by the motions of the planets.

[Atraveller]

An interesting OP-Ed piece in the NY Times

Climate Change E-Mail (http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/06/opinion/06sun3.html)


No one should be misled by all the noise. The e-mail messages represent years’ worth of exchanges among prominent American and British climatologists. Some are mean-spirited, others intemperate. But they don’t change the underlying scientific facts about climate change.

And another interesting Piece about how big bussiness could save us...

Will Big Business save the Earth? (http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/06/opinion/06diamond.html?pagewanted=1&em)

it also contains this passage:


Even experts disagree about the reality of climate change. That was true 30 years ago, and some experts still disagreed a decade ago. Today, virtually every climatologist agrees that average global temperatures, warming rates and atmospheric carbon dioxide levels are higher than at any time in the earth’s recent past, and that the main cause is greenhouse gas emissions by humans. Instead, the questions still being debated concern whether average global temperatures will increase by 13 degrees or “only” by 4 degrees Fahrenheit by 2050, and whether humans account for 90 percent or “only” 85 percent of the global warming trend.

[Stroller]

An interesting OP-Ed piece in the NY Times

Climate Change E-Mail (http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/06/opinion/06sun3.html)


I notice the writer of the editorial piece prefers not to highlight the emails which demonstrate the perversion of the peer review process, the deliberate deleting of data requested under FOI, the stonewalling of data requests from other scientists, the bullying of journal editors or the deliberations on how to minimize or eliminate the existence of the medieval warm period in the graphs presented to policy makers.

Other editorial pieces concentrate on the release of the data itself and speculate about the identity and motive of the 'hackers'. Anything but face up to the reality of the revelations.

"Roaches blame light switch operator in warehouse food theft scandal"

In any case, the American public is not fooled:
http://www.rasmussenreports.com/public_content/politics/current_events/environment_energy/americans_skeptical_of_science_behind_global_warmi ng

Perhaps the moderators should move your post and my response to the CRU UEA data release thread.

[Stroller]

Pants round ankles again...

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/world/south_asia/8387737.stm

The UN panel on climate change warning that Himalayan glaciers could melt to a fifth of current levels by 2035 is wildly inaccurate, an academic says.

J Graham Cogley, a professor at Ontario Trent University, says he believes the UN authors got the date from an earlier report wrong by more than 300 years.

He is astonished they "misread 2350 as 2035". The authors deny the claims.

Leading glaciologists say the report has caused confusion and "a catalogue of errors in Himalayan glaciology".

[jlhredshift]

I realize that there is a tendency to segregate weather and climate, but in relation to the glaciation, the question I have is how does the climate change the weather pattern so as to transport water to the glacial centers? Without the water transport the glacier does not flow and flow they did, except in northern Siberia, so the models, in my opinion, need to account for this as well.

[Stroller]

Anyone who believes that the warming signal is an artifact of these changes is perfectly free to test their hypothesis by constructing a temperature record that only uses the geographic coverage characteristics of the current pool of stations.

It's getting annoying to see the way that AGW critics constantly throw out random ideas but never test their own hypotheses.

The preliminary result shows around half of the C20th warming is spurious signal from measurement and data manipulation problems.

The paper is in the works.

[Jetlack]

I realize that there is a tendency to segregate weather and climate, but in relation to the glaciation, the question I have is how does the climate change the weather pattern so as to transport water to the glacial centers? Without the water transport the glacier does not flow and flow they did, except in northern Siberia, so the models, in my opinion, need to account for this as well.

I think there is an overtly reductionist mindset in the agw scientific paradigm. I really cant see how one can treat the two as anything other than as the same self-organising system.

It's a bit like cutting a frog in half and calling it two different species.

[Strange]

I am following up this point from the CRU email thread...


Another point is that it was found that the ice cores show that rises in co2 lag ~800 years behind increases in temperature. It's been around 800 years since the peak of the medieval warm period...

I said in the other thread: "That is an interesting point about the lag that I haven't heard before. I would be interested to hear a 'pro AGW' response" (mainly thinking about the timing).

Ari Jokimaki pointed me at this: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hWJeqgG3Tl8 which gives an excellent explanation of the lag, itself.

However, it doesn't quite answer the question I was really asking, which is about the timing of the current rise in CO2. How do we distinguish between, or account for, two possible sources: the outgassing as a result of a warm period in the past versus human generated CO2?

I guess one factor is the timing: if, as Stroller suggested, rising CO2 levels are the lagging effect of the mediaeval warm period then levels should have started rising from around 1600 (and perhaps have peaked by now). Does the CO2 record support that view?

[lomiller1]

However, it doesn't quite answer the question I was really asking, which is about the timing of the current rise in CO2. How do we distinguish between, or account for, two possible sources: the outgassing as a result of a warm period in the past versus human generated CO2?

They have different isotope ratios for C12 and C13. This leaves a distinctive fingerprint for fossil Carbon in the atmosphere.

Also, the increase in atmospheric CO2 since the industrial revolution represents ~1/2 the CO2 emitted by burning fossil fuels in that time. This means that if you are going to speculate another source of CO2 you have to explain why all the human generated CO2 is being absorbed yet the CO2 from this mysterious other source is not.

[Stroller]

They have different isotope ratios for C12 and C13. This leaves a distinctive fingerprint for fossil Carbon in the atmosphere.

Also, the increase in atmospheric CO2 since the industrial revolution represents ~1/2 the CO2 emitted by burning fossil fuels in that time. This means that if you are going to speculate another source of CO2 you have to explain why all the human generated CO2 is being absorbed yet the CO2 from this mysterious other source is not.



I'd advise people not to take this statement at face value, but instead read this, and then weigh up the evidence put forward by both sides.

http://wattsupwiththat.com/2008/01/28/spencer-pt2-more-co2-peculiarities-the-c13c12-isotope-ratio/

[Stroller]

I guess one factor is the timing: if, as Stroller suggested, rising CO2 levels are the lagging effect of the mediaeval warm period then levels should have started rising from around 1600 (and perhaps have peaked by now). Does the CO2 record support that view?

Different ice core studies have resulted in different computed lags, from 600 - 2800 years. Some of this large difference may be due to the many difficulties in obtaining, transporting and analysing the cores. So you can't really draw firm conclusions about whether the current rise in co2 is related to the medieval warming or perhaps even the Roman warming, or any ideas about when it should peak.

In general with climate science, the high level of certainty the public is led to believe exists melts away once you examine the science more closely.

[Ari Jokimaki]

However, it doesn't quite answer the question I was really asking, which is about the timing of the current rise in CO2. How do we distinguish between, or account for, two possible sources: the outgassing as a result of a warm period in the past versus human generated CO2?

I guess one factor is the timing: if, as Stroller suggested, rising CO2 levels are the lagging effect of the mediaeval warm period then levels should have started rising from around 1600 (and perhaps have peaked by now). Does the CO2 record support that view?
No, it doesn't. The CO2 records quite conclusively show that it cannot be true. It is because the current levels of CO2 are far above anything in the (at least) last 800,000 years. Tripati et al. (2009) (http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/sci;1178296v1?maxtoshow=&HITS=10&hits=10&RESULTFORMAT=&fulltext=Tripati&searchid=1&FIRSTINDEX=0&resourcetype=HWCIT) say:


The CO2 content of the atmosphere has varied cyclically between ~180 and ~280 ppmv over the last 800,000 years, closely coupled with temperature and sea level.
Currently we are getting close to 400 ppmv. They also say this:


During the Middle Miocene, when temperatures were ~3 to 6°C warmer and sea level 25 to 40 meters higher than present, pCO2 was similar to modern levels.
See also Hansen et al. (2008) (http://pubs.giss.nasa.gov/docs/2008/2008_Hansen_etal.pdf) Figure 2 that shows in green the greenhouse gas forcing during the last 400,000 years. There you can see that in modern times, greenhouse gases have taken the lead. There are lot more papers about this listed in my blog, but under the new rules I cannot link to it anymore in this thread. Bottom line is that while we have had large global changes during the last few hundreds of years causing ice ages and warm periods, those changes have had atmospheric CO2 content far below current levels. Compared to changes related to ice ages, especially the massive warming periods that have brought us out of ice ages, recent periods of warming such as roman or medieval warm periods have been tiny events, so it doesn't make any sense to suggest that current exceptionally high CO2 levels could be due to them.

Another thing is the carbon dioxide isotopes, just like Iomiller1 said. Now, Stroller tried to "advice" you by giving a link to a blog (against the new rules here), where Roy Spencer creates a straw man argument making it look like as if only 12C is expected to change from fossil fuel burning. That is not true. Carbon dioxide released from fossil fuel burning is enriched by 12C which also means that it has less 13C. When it is released to the atmosphere, atmospheric content of 12C increases and 13C decreases. In his speculations, Roy Spencer doesn't seem to be aware that we are capable of measuring these isotopes separately, well at least 13C. See for example Böhm et al. (2002) (http://ecophys.biology.utah.edu/public/Isotope_course_readings/Spero%202.pdf) figure 3 which shows how 13C decreases starting from roughly at 1800. They say:


All δ13C records (appendix A) show the full extent of the industrial decline (Figure 3) caused by the anthropogenic addition of 12C-enriched CO2 to the atmosphere [Druffel and Benavides, 1986; Keeling et al., 1979; Friedli et al., 1986; Francey et al., 1999; Quay et al., 1992; Laube-Lenfant and Pierre, 1994; Bacastow et al., 1996].
So, both 13C and 12C content are changing due to fossil fuel burning. Also, as we noted above, 13C content has decreased during the industrial times so it can't possibly be the source of increasing atmospheric CO2 concentration. Note also that while all the real research on the subject (again more references are available in my blog) shows that 13C has decreased, Roy Spencer claims that 13C has increased. Spencer seems to have found the information on this by "digging around on the Internet", while the most relevant information is of course in the scientific literature, and Spencer is supposed to be a climate scientist?

[Stroller]

Spencer seems to have found the information on this by "digging around on the Internet", while the most relevant information is of course in the scientific literature, and Spencer is supposed to be a climate scientist?

Dr Roy Spencer is a climate scientist and he provides links to his data, unlike most of the hockey stick 'scientists'. Also unlike Peter Sinclair who you sent Henna Oji-san to, and his "Climate denialist crock of the week" which is very selective in it's data, and skewed in it's presentation, as you'd expect from someone who would use such a title containing a smear associating people who draw different conclusions form the data with holocaust denialists.

It's odious, and the fact you like to associate with it and use it at every opportunity speaks volumes. It stinks.

In this case, Dr Roy gave the link to the data to the very first poster in response to his article.


The monthly C13/C12 ratio data from Mauna Loa (1990-2005) are available here:
ftp://ftp.cmdl.noaa.gov/ccg/co2c13/flask/month/mlo_01D0_mm.co2c13

The monthly Mauna Loa CO2 data (1958-2007) are contained in the 5th file listed here:
ftp://ftp.cmdl.noaa.gov/ccg/co2/trends

So your attempted smear gets 0/10.

[Stroller]

More badly cooked surface temperature data coming to light.

Station data 'adjusted' to give a 6C/century warming trend. Wow.

http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/12/08/the-smoking-gun-at-darwin-zero/

[Ari Jokimaki]

Dr Roy Spencer is a climate scientist and he provides links to his data, unlike most of the hockey stick 'scientists'. Also unlike Peter Sinclair who you sent Henna Oji-san to, and his "Climate denialist crock of the week" which is very selective in it's data, and skewed in it's presentation, as you'd expect from someone who would use such a title containing a smear associating people who draw different conclusions form the data with holocaust denialists.

It's odious, and the fact you like to associate with it and use it at every opportunity speaks volumes. It stinks.

In this case, Dr Roy gave the link to the data to the very first poster in response to his article.


The monthly C13/C12 ratio data from Mauna Loa (1990-2005) are available here:
ftp://ftp.cmdl.noaa.gov/ccg/co2c13/f...01D0_mm.co2c13

The monthly Mauna Loa CO2 data (1958-2007) are contained in the 5th file listed here:
ftp://ftp.cmdl.noaa.gov/ccg/co2/trends

So your attempted smear gets 0/10.


More badly cooked surface temperature data coming to light.

Station data 'adjusted' to give a 6C/century warming trend. Wow.

http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/12/0...t-darwin-zero/

See this:



Going through the last few pages of the thread I see τhat the usual gang is at it again. Therefore, there will be some extra rules here, like, the following kind of posts/expressions I wish no longer to see (taken out in no particular order):


hysteria
deniers
elephants
agenda
emoticons unless really necessary
ridiculing, dishonesty accusations
whine
Pot, kettle, black
creationist
...


I could go on with a lot more.

If you have ANYTHING to say here in this thread you will do it in a scientific manner (and no I do not take pointing to the alleged fraud at CRU or at the Australian group as an excuse that you can do the same here). You will found your comments on a good basis, which is peer reviewed papers (that you can easily find through ADS (http://esoads.eso.org/ads_abstracts.html)) and not through re-interpretations from blogs or newspapers.

It is time this thread grows up, and leave the childish bickering behind.

[nauthiz]

How do we distinguish between, or account for, two possible sources: the outgassing as a result of a warm period in the past versus human generated CO2?

For one, we can use spectrometry to help determine what percentage of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere is anthropogenic. The relative mix of isotopes from the carbon found in fossil fuels is different from the one found in other sources.

[nauthiz]

More badly cooked surface temperature data coming to light.

Station data 'adjusted' to give a 6C/century warming trend. Wow.

http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/12/08/the-smoking-gun-at-darwin-zero/

What I see here is this:

1. Eisenbach graphs the unadjusted data, and shows that it doesn't match the adjusted data.

2. Eisenbach then asks why adjustments were made to this data, and then proceeds to completely fail to answer his own question by taking a sort of vague, vanilla explanation of why adjustments are made and stating that that one paragraph does not seem to apply to the record for this particular airport.

3. The train has already gone off the tracks at this point. . . a more meticulous person might have explored the possibility that the adjustments were possibly made to account for other things. Eisenbach seems to just jump to the conclusion that they must have been pulled out of a hat.

4. Eisenbach then makes a motion toward throwing them a bone by making one adjustment of his own. However, he does not give any clear explanation for this adjustment - anyone who was following his line of thought up to this point should have to conclude that he just pulled it out of a hat.

5. He follows that up with an explanation for why he wouldn't do any further adjustments that shouldn't have anything to do with the way climatologists normally decide to do adjustments. The decision on how to handle data like this should be made for consistent, quantitative reasons, never because someone's just eyeballing a graph and tweaking it until they think it looks right.

5a. In the process of doing the above, he does an interesting thing: He quoted a GHCN paragraph that indicated that adjustments are made for multiple factors, including but not limited to station location. He agreed that that made sense, so presumably he thought all of it made sense. However, he followed that up with a detailed analysis that is based on the presumption that station location is the only valid reason to make an adjustment.

So now we've hit the second place where Mr. Eisenbach can't even seem to agree with himself on how things should be done, and we're still only halfway through the post. . .

[Stroller]

I think one of the problems is that GHCN themselves only make vague vanilla explanations of their adjustments.

Anyway, no problem, I'll wait until you get to this graph near the end of the piece and then we can discuss the possible reasons why GHCN might have found it necessary to make 5.9C of positive adjustments indicated by the black line.

http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2009/12/darwin_zero8.png?w=510&h=371

[Webbo]

I think one of the problems is that GHCN themselves only make vague vanilla explanations of their adjustments.

Anyway, no problem, I'll wait until you get to this graph near the end of the piece and then we can discuss the possible reasons why GHCN might have found it necessary to make 5.9C of positive adjustments indicated by the black line.

http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2009/12/darwin_zero8.png?w=510&h=371

That is astonishingly similar to the valadj array (aka fudge factor) in the CRU briffa_sep98_e.pro file.

http://cubeantics.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/12/graph.jpg

No wonder they get the same answers.

[nauthiz]

How, beyond that all curves tend to look similar due to their essential curviness?

As I understand it the valadj array is working on completely unrelated data.

[nauthiz]

I think one of the problems is that GHCN themselves only make vague vanilla explanations of their adjustments.

I can understand why that information wouldn't be readily available, since including a log explaining all of the specific adjustments for a record compiled from thousands of land stations. However, I'm not sure that we have verified that the information is not available: Eisenbach didn't acquire the actual dataset, he grabbed the data from a readout on a webapp. And the article gives no indication that he made any attempt at acquiring an explanation of the adjustments and their justification, or a log of critical factors such as the time of day at which readings are made or changes to measurement procedure; instead he seems to just be guessing and making wild assumptions.

However, that still misses my essential problem with the article, which is that it is simply not sane. The author starts by accepting that it's reasonable to make adjustments for factors other than station location, and then proceeds to speak as if location changes are the only valid reason to make an adjustment, and follows it up by making an ad-hoc adjustment that the prose indicates seems to have been eyeballed rather than empirically-driven.

My criticism stands: Eisenbach seems to be making it up as he goes along, and I am not inclined to trust the analysis of an author who can't even manage to be consistent with himself.


Anyway, no problem, I'll wait until you get to this graph near the end of the piece and then we can discuss the possible reasons why GHCN might have found it necessary to make 5.9C of positive adjustments indicated by the black line.

http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2009/12/darwin_zero8.png?w=510&h=371

That graph only shows ~1.5C of positive adjustment.

[parejkoj]

I think one of the problems is that GHCN themselves only make vague vanilla explanations of their adjustments.


Stroller: you are such a liar.

First link on google for "ghcn temperature adjustment" is this page from the NCDC (http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/oa/climate/research/ushcn/ushcn.html). What's the second heading on that page? Why, it's Quality Control, Homogeneity Testing, and Adjustment Procedures (http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/oa/climate/research/ushcn/ushcn.html#QUAL), giving six quite specific descriptions of how the data is tested and aligned.

Perhaps instead of trying to discredit the entire field of climate science through insults, innuendo, suggestions of fraud and incompetence, and links to inflammatory political blog posts, you could try some actual research for a change?

[Webbo]

How, beyond that all curves tend to look similar due to their essential curviness?
So all curves show a 2.5 degree increase over 40-50 years do they.


As I understand it the valadj array is working on completely unrelated data.
Which makes it even more astonishing.

More to the point. What effect would you suggest requires an "homogonisation" adjustment like that?

[Stroller]

Stroller: you are such a liar.

First link on google for "ghcn temperature adjustment" is this page from the NCDC (http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/oa/climate/research/ushcn/ushcn.html). What's the second heading on that page? Why, it's Quality Control, Homogeneity Testing, and Adjustment Procedures (http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/oa/climate/research/ushcn/ushcn.html#QUAL), giving six quite specific descriptions of how the data is tested and aligned.


First of all I strongly object to you calling me a liar and I have reported your post.

Secondly, the point I was making is that we are not told how and why specific adjustments are applied to specific stations.

[Stroller]

That graph only shows ~1.5C of positive adjustment.

My mistake, I was looking at the wrong vertical scale. Thank you for pointing it out.

I wonder though why an airport, with all the issues of increased tarmac area, bigger jet engines nearby, increased passenger traffic etc is in need of a positive adjustment at all. A negative one to offset UHI would seem more appropriate. We need all of this information to be out in the open.

[Stroller]

Webbo, your graph data is used by Briffa to "correct the decline" in tree ring width post 1960 in order to get a curve which can be used to calibrate tree ring derived temperature variations.

A visit to http://climateaudit.org will give you plenty to chew on regarding Briffa and his paleodendroclimatology.

[Webbo]

My mistake, I was looking at the wrong vertical scale. Thank you for pointing it out.


Are you sure about that? The left axis is the anomaly and related to the temps; the right axis shows the actual difference. Both therefore show an adjustment of circa 2.5 degrees over 40-50 years, hence the 5.9 degrees over the century.

You are mistakenly measuring the temp data against the axis on the right.

[nauthiz]

So all curves show a 2.5 degree increase over 40-50 years do they.

:eh:

One graph shows a ~1.5 degree increase over ~50 years.

The other graph shows a ~2.5 unit increase over ~10 units.


And while we're on the subject of scrutinizing graphs, why does Esenbach plot the graphs through the mid-late 2000s throughout the article, and then suddenly chop it off at 1990 for that last one? He doesn't mention it in the paper, which makes me think that he came up with something that he doesn't want us to see. Judging from other data that's out there, it's that he couldn't draw quite such a spectacular trend line if he showed all the data since 1940 rather than just 3/4 of it.


More to the point. What effect would you suggest requires an "homogonisation" adjustment like that?

The explanation that I've heard from people who've looked at the code much more closely than I is that it's used to calibrate maximum latewood density tree ring data. MXD is a tricky proxy to work with because it is influenced by all sorts of factors, so used alone it's extremely imprecise as an absolute thermometer even if it is much better for showing relative temperatures. However, if you can correlate some thermometer readings to some tree ring readings, then you can calibrate the tree ring numbers to a known source and end up with much better precision and accuracy.

So in essence, what that code reveals is pretty much the same thing as what that "hide the decline" email reveals: There's a conspiracy by the scientists to treat well-engineered thermometers as a more reliable instrument than poorly-understood tree ring proxies.

[Webbo]

Webbo, your graph data is used by Briffa to "correct the decline" in tree ring width post 1960 in order to get a curve which can be used to calibrate tree ring derived temperature variations.

A visit to http://climateaudit.org will give you plenty to chew on regarding Briffa and his paleodendroclimatology.

Indeed, and it's interesting that both use virtually interchangable adjustment criteria.

[Webbo]

:eh:

One graph shows a ~1.5 degree increase over ~50 years.

The other graph shows a ~2.5 unit increase over ~10 units.

1) 1.5 degrees is wrong. It's closer to 2.5 degrees. Please read the graph corrrectly.

2) The 2.5 unit increases are degrees and the 10 units are 5 year intervals, so 2.5 degrees over 50 years.



And while we're on the subject of scrutinizing graphs, why does Esenbach plot the graphs through the mid-late 2000s throughout the article, and then suddenly chop it off at 1990 for that last one? He doesn't mention it in the paper, which makes me think that he came up with something that he doesn't want us to see. Judging from other data that's out there, it's that he couldn't draw quite such a spectacular trend line if he showed all the data since 1940 rather than just 3/4 of it.

It wouldn't affect the spectacular trend though would it. Have you thought of a justification for this "homogonisation" yet?


The explanation that I've heard from people who've looked at the code much more closely than I is that it's used to calibrate maximum latewood density tree ring data. MXD is a tricky proxy to work with because it is influenced by all sorts of factors, so used alone it's extremely imprecise as an absolute thermometer even if it is much better for showing relative temperatures. However, if you can correlate some thermometer readings to some tree ring readings, then you can calibrate the tree ring numbers to a known source and end up with much better precision and accuracy.

So in essence, what that code reveals is pretty much the same thing as what that "hide the decline" email reveals: There's a conspiracy by the scientists to treat well-engineered thermometers as a more reliable instrument than poorly-understood tree ring proxies.

So inputting a linear increasing adjustment fixes these issues does it? And obviously it's just a coincidence that the result is a warming trend over this period. Amazing.

[Swift]

Stroller: you are such a liar.


First of all I strongly object to you calling me a liar and I have reported your post.

I guess its time for the monthly "if you guys don't play nice I'm going to close this thread".

No name calling. And don't discuss the name calling or the fact that you reported it, just report it.

[nauthiz]

And obviously it's just a coincidence that the result is a warming trend over this period.

Not a coincidence at all. Like I said, it's proof of a conspiracy to treat thermometers as if they are more reliable than tree ring proxies.

[Stroller]

The reliability of the code used to manipulate those thermometer data is however another matter entirely.

[Stroller]

Are you sure about that? The left axis is the anomaly and related to the temps; the right axis shows the actual difference. Both therefore show an adjustment of circa 2.5 degrees over 40-50 years, hence the 5.9 degrees over the century.

You are mistakenly measuring the temp data against the axis on the right.
Good spot. The adjustment applied is 2.5C not 1.5C as Nauthiz stated.

How does USHCN justify that at a growing airport? It makes no sense.

[nauthiz]

The reliability of the code used to manipulate those thermometer data is however another matter entirely.
Do you have reason to suspect the code is not reliable?

[nauthiz]

How does USHCN justify that at a growing airport?

Changing the time of day at which measurements are taken seems like a pretty obvious guess. The average daily temperature spread in that area is ~10C according to Wikipedia, so shifting the schedule by an hour or two could easily necessitate such an adjustment.

Personally, I'm not interested in assuming undue adjustments were made until I've seen some indication that there's at least a little due process behind the suggestion that undue adjustments were made. Without that, it's just wild speculation.

[Stroller]

Changing the time of day at which measurements are taken seems like a pretty obvious guess. The average daily temperature spread in that area is ~10C according to Wikipedia, so shifting the schedule by an hour or two could easily necessitate such an adjustment.


I think the result from combining the raw data from over two hundred other local stations puts the nail in that one.

[Stroller]

Do you have reason to suspect the code is not reliable?

Yes. I suggest you take a look yourself, since nothing I say will convince you.

[Torsten]

I'd advise people not to take this statement at face value, but instead read this, and then weigh up the evidence put forward by both sides.

http://wattsupwiththat.com/2008/01/28/spencer-pt2-more-co2-peculiarities-the-c13c12-isotope-ratio/

Well, I read it. And I followed Spencer's logic and found where it falls apart.

The first clue that something is wrong ought to be that both the slope and the r2 values for his Figures 3 and 6 are identical. The intercept is the only value that differs, which suggests that what he has managed to achieve is two identical analyses that are separated only by some constant.

For his Figure 3, which he has labelled "TREND SIGNAL", he has made an estimate of the rate of change for both 13CO2 and 12CO2 for a sequence of dates, made a scatter plot of one against the other, and done a simple linear regression calculation. So the data he used include both the trends and the variation around those trends.

For his Figure 6, which he has labelled "INTERANNUAL SIGNAL", he has removed the trends from the data, plotted the results as before, and again performed a simple linear regression. By removing the trends that were present in each of the datasets he's done nothing more than remove a constant.

I had difficulty believing that his analysis was that flawed, so I decided to test it by comparing two other time series that have nothing to do with CO2 and are only somewhat related to each other in that they are measures of the price for two housebuilding materials. I downloaded the Producer Price Index Values of Softwood Lumber and of Hardwood Flooring from the US Dept of Labor, Bureau of Labor Statistics (http://www.bls.gov/ppi/#tables) and applied Spencer's steps (though I had to guess how he arrived at his d/dt values). Anyway, these two variables have very different trends over the 10 year period for which I found data. Yet using Spencer's approach I was able to produce the equivalent of his Figures 3 and 6 with the slopes and r2 values agreeing to all 15 decimal places that the software reported.

The result has nothing to do with the data and everything to do with the processing steps. It seems that Spencer is amazed by something that is a mathematical certainty.

[Stroller]

Lets take a look at what happened to global composites of measured temperature after the collapse of soviet Russia caused the loss of a couple of thousand siberian stations shall we.

http://www.uoguelph.ca/~rmckitri/research/nvst.jpg

Ohhhhh. Dear.

[nauthiz]

Yes. I suggest you take a look yourself, since nothing I say will convince you.

Care to suggest a particular thing I should look at?

[nauthiz]

I think the result from combining the raw data from over two hundred other local stations puts the nail in that one.

What on earth could could the temperature readings from other stations possibly tell us about the daily schedule of this station?

[Stroller]

Torsten. Thanks, I've emailed Dr Spencer for a comment.

Another thought that occurred to me about the ratio is that the amount attributable to human co2 output from fossil fuel would be dependent on the other variables such as the emission fom the total biomass. I looked at the paper Ari linked quite a while ago and found they assumed it was constant.

It isn't. It has increased quite a lot due to co2 fertilisation and of course, warmer temperatures.

[nauthiz]

Lets take a look at what happened to global composites of measured temperature after the collapse of soviet Russia caused the loss of a couple of thousand siberian stations shall we.

(IMG)

Ohhhhh. Dear.

Oh dear indeed. I found the page (http://www.uoguelph.ca/~rmckitri/research/nvst.html) on Mr. McKitrick's site where he explains this graph. He does a pretty good job of describing it himself: (just excerpts; emphasis mine)

- This page explains the origin of a graph comparing the number of weather stations around the world with the simple mean of the temperature data.

- The temperature average in the above graph is unprocessed. Graphs of the 'Global Temperature' from places like GISS and CRU reflect attempts to correct for, among other things, the loss of stations within grid cells, so they don't show the same jump at 1990.


Ross McKitrick raises a very interesting and valid point with this graph, but it is far, far more nuanced than what seems to be implied by Stroller's post. This graph is a simple arithmetic mean of raw data; it does not represent the contents of the global composites in any way whatsoever. I would further say that displaying this graph in the absence of any explanation of what it really shows is an incredibly misleading thing to do.

If anyone wants to know why I have a pet peeve about hotlinking graphs without providing links to provide explanatory information or context, this is an excellent illustration of the reason.

[Webbo]

Why not provide all the excerpts?

[nauthiz]

I hyperlinked the whole page.

[lomiller1]

Well, I read it. And I followed Spencer's logic and found where it falls apart.

The first clue that something is wrong ought to be that both the slope and the r2 values for his Figures 3 and 6 are identical. The intercept is the only value that differs, which suggests that what he has managed to achieve is two identical analyses that are separated only by some constant.

For his Figure 3, which he has labelled "TREND SIGNAL", he has made an estimate of the rate of change for both 13CO2 and 12CO2 for a sequence of dates, made a scatter plot of one against the other, and done a simple linear regression calculation. So the data he used include both the trends and the variation around those trends.

For his Figure 6, which he has labelled "INTERANNUAL SIGNAL", he has removed the trends from the data, plotted the results as before, and again performed a simple linear regression. By removing the trends that were present in each of the datasets he's done nothing more than remove a constant.

I had difficulty believing that his analysis was that flawed, so I decided to test it by comparing two other time series that have nothing to do with CO2 and are only somewhat related to each other in that they are measures of the price for two housebuilding materials. I downloaded the Producer Price Index Values of Softwood Lumber and of Hardwood Flooring from the US Dept of Labor, Bureau of Labor Statistics (http://www.bls.gov/ppi/#tables) and applied Spencer's steps (though I had to guess how he arrived at his d/dt values). Anyway, these two variables have very different trends over the 10 year period for which I found data. Yet using Spencer's approach I was able to produce the equivalent of his Figures 3 and 6 with the slopes and r2 values agreeing to all 15 decimal places that the software reported.

The result has nothing to do with the data and everything to do with the processing steps. It seems that Spencer is amazed by something that is a mathematical certainty.

Tamino came to the same conclusion when he looked at is in Jan

http://tamino.wordpress.com/2009/01/19/a-bag-of-hammers/



If we take any two time series and regress one against the other, we’ll get a slope. If we take the same two time series offset by constants and regress one against the other, we’ll get exactly the same slope. Necessarily. For Sure. Every time.

[Ari Jokimaki]

First link on google for "ghcn temperature adjustment" is this page from the NCDC (http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/oa/climate/research/ushcn/ushcn.html). What's the second heading on that page? Why, it's Quality Control, Homogeneity Testing, and Adjustment Procedures (http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/oa/climate/research/ushcn/ushcn.html#QUAL), giving six quite specific descriptions of how the data is tested and aligned.
Stroller was already shown this long ago (http://www.bautforum.com/1462489-post789.html), but as usual in this thread the claims just pop back to the surface.


Perhaps instead of trying to discredit the entire field of climate science through insults, innuendo, suggestions of fraud and incompetence, and links to inflammatory political blog posts, you could try some actual research for a change?
I think that's impossible as there's no real research that supports Stroller's views on the matter.

[mugaliens]

Ohhhhh. Dear.

Yes. The denial machine marches on, though.

Unfortunately.

[Stroller]

I think that's impossible as there's no real research that supports Stroller's views on the matter.


A Test of Corrections for Extraneous Signals
in Gridded Surface Temperature Data

Ross McKitrick, University of Guelph Department of Economics
and
Patrick J. Michaels, University of Virginia Department of Environmental Sciences

Climate Research 26(2):159-173 (2004)


ABSTRACT:
Monthly surface temperature records from 1979 to 2000 were obtained from 218 individual stations in 93 countries and a linear trend coefficient determined for each site. This vector of trends was regressed on measures of local climate, as well as indicators of local economic activity (income, GDP growth rates, coal use) and data quality. The spatial pattern of trends is shown to be significantly correlated with non-climatic factors, including economic activity and sociopolitical characteristics of the region. The analysis is then repeated on the corresponding IPCC gridded data, and very similar correlations appear, despite previous attempts to remove non-climatic effects. The socioeconomic effects in the data are shown to add up to a net warming bias, although more precise estimation of its magnitude will require further research.

Willmott, Robeson and Feddema ("Influence of Spatially Variable Instrument Networks on Climatic Averages, Geophysical Research Letters vol 18 No. 12, pp2249-2251, Dec 1991) calculated a +0.2C bias in the global average due to pre-1990 station closures.

So that's around 25% of the 1900-2009 warming gone, before we look at the other biases noted in Willis Eschenbach's non-political post.

[Jetlack]

Okay this is just a question/idea re raw temp data.

Would it not be better to just grapgh raw data because at least that way, any naturally occuring biases get carried year over year. So at least the temp differential from one year to the next would be accurate. If we are looking for temperature trends then its the differential figures that matter, not whether Temp Station 1a is making perfect readings.

And this way there could be no suspicion about the selection process.

[Stroller]

There is a country by country file which shows the graphs of the data which is homogenised but before it's been run through the CRU's wonky HADcrutV2 code. It makes interesting viewing. The warmist camp make much of the medieval warm period not all happening at the same time worldwide. See how many countries in this data don't show a strong warming signal in the 1900-2009 period.

http://strata-sphere.com/blog/wp-content/uploads/idl_cruts3_2005_vs_2008b.pdf

[Ivan Viehoff]

A Test of Corrections for Extraneous Signals
in Gridded Surface Temperature Data

Ross McKitrick, University of Guelph Department of Economics
and
Patrick J. Michaels, University of Virginia Department of Environmental Sciences

Climate Research 26(2):159-173 (2004)

Mainly I just point out rhetorical tricks, but I'm going to employ some of my knowledge as an economist on this occasion. McKitrick is also an economist, interestingly.

My immediate response to the above that was that if you regress an increasing series against another increasing series, you get some correlation, often quite high. There's a famous spoof paper illustrating this, showing a very high correlation between between the local consumer price index in an area of southern Africa and the incidence of a certain lesser-known tropical disease called kwashiorkor, both of which had tended to increase in secular fashion over an extended period. These correlations are frequently spurious, in the sense that there is no causal relationship, merely two things tending to increase over the same time period for entirely different reasons. There are many things we measure which show a tendency to increase.

Since this is an almost universal problem in macro-economic statistical analysis, economists have highly developed techniques for dealing with, or at least identifying and correcting for, the problem, though data fully to deal with the problem is not always available. So my first question was have they at least done the relevant things to test for spurious correlations. A first test would normally be to look for something called "autocorrelation". This is when the statistical "errors" don't go up and down at random, but are related to other errors in the locality.

Unfortunately I couldn't find a copy of this mentioned paper, but I could find a more recent paper in draft by McKitrick and Nierenberg (2009) in which he admits that they didn't do the tests. You can download it from here http://sites.google.com/site/rossmckitrick/ If that earlier paper had been submitted to an economics publication, without such tests, since such tests rae pretty routine, it would have been laughed at. But physicists can probably fall for it because they aren't used to it.

There is also an issue called simultaneous equation bias. This is when one variable you are interested in identifying in a multiple regression is correlated with another. So what happens is that one tends to act as an "instrument" for the other and pick up some of the effect the other is responsible for. Since CO2 growth is correlated with economic growth, you are likely to get this effect.

So, sorry Stroller, you were taken in, but you referred us to some crap statistics.

But in this later paper, having admitted they didn't do the tests, they have now done some tests, and comes up smelling of roses apparently. I shall have to leave it to the serious specialists to work out whether it is good enough. Unfortunately it is being published in an area where people are not very familiar with this kind of stuff, so I'm worried about the quality of peer review it might get. But I would remark that when have a reputation for attacking other people's data analysis, you really ought to get it right yourself if you want to be taken seriously. Also by writing "Taken by Storm" (with C Essex), he gave himself a reputation of one of the baying hounds, whether or not that was fair.

And as he carefully and correctly points out, even then, the correlations only "suggest" a causal relationship, which is just the sort of careful (honest not effective) comment that people attacking good work in the other direction take advantage of.

But it seems obvious to me that if temperatures are measured in developing urban heat islands, the measured temperatures will go up for that reason, and that will have a distorting effect over time. What is interesting is that when someone tries to measure what it accounts for, apparently it only accounts for around 25% of the reported growth in temperature. And if there is some unremoved simultaneous equation bias (it can be impossible to remove), the actual effect may be smaller. But that intuition is at the same level as the comment that "it seems equally obvious that if you increase the CO2 in the atmosphere, that causes warming too".

As a quote Stroller put out a day or two ago, it really is pretty much indisputable that CO2 causes warming: the argument is really over how much of the recent warming is attributable to it. That issue doesn't stand or fall on how warm the MWP was.

[lomiller1]

Okay this is just a question/idea re raw temp data.

Would it not be better to just grapgh raw data because at least that way, any naturally occuring biases get carried year over year. So at least the temp differential from one year to the next would be accurate. If we are looking for temperature trends then its the differential figures that matter, not whether Temp Station 1a is making perfect readings.

That doesn’t remove systematic biases like time of observation. Since most improvements to weather station siting involve remove sources of possible heat contamination there will always be a false negative trend in raw data from any weather station network that actively seeks to improve it’s processes.

[Stroller]

What on earth could could the temperature readings from other stations possibly tell us about the daily schedule of this station?

I passed on your earlier set of criticisms to Willis Eschenbach. Here is his reply:
Note to Mods. I have Willis' express permission (http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/12/08/the-smoking-gun-at-darwin-zero/#comment-254108) to reproduce this.

1. Eisenbach graphs the unadjusted data, and shows that it doesn’t match the adjusted data.

True

2. Eisenbach then asks why adjustments were made to this data, and then proceeds to completely fail to answer his own question by taking a sort of vague, vanilla explanation of why adjustments are made and stating that that one paragraph does not seem to apply to the record for this particular airport.

They describe a procedure for selecting stations that need adjustment, by comparing it to nearby stations. I show that their procedure won’t work in Darwin because there are no nearby stations.

3. The train has already gone off the tracks at this point. . . a more meticulous person might have explored the possibility that the adjustments were possibly made to account for other things. Eisenbach seems to just jump to the conclusion that they must have been pulled out of a hat.

Having looked at many, many temperature records, most scientifically based adjustments are small, on the order of a tenth of a degree. To alter a record by two and a half degrees is unheard of. I know of no legitimate reason for an adjustment of that size, particularly since we have five different temperature records that all agree very closely. If you know of such a reason, please bring it out. The only reason I have heard is a change to Stevenson Screens, but the link at the end of my post shows that is not the reason/

4. Eisenbach then makes a motion toward throwing them a bone by making one adjustment of his own. However, he does not give any clear explanation for this adjustment – anyone who was following his line of thought up to this point should have to conclude that he just pulled it out of a hat.

I have no reason for making a adjustment, I think the record is consistent. I adjusted it in 1941 because that was the year of the big decrease. I did it to show what kind of an adjustment might be done.

5. He follows that up with an explanation for why he wouldn’t do any further adjustments that shouldn’t have anything to do with the way climatologists normally decide to do adjustments. The decision on how to handle data like this should be made for consistent, quantitative reasons, never because someone’s just eyeballing a graph and tweaking it until they think it looks right.

I agree entirely. Adjustments should only be done for valid scientific reasons. However, adjustments should also not be done just because someone wants to increase the warming.

5a. In the process of doing the above, he does an interesting thing: He quoted a GHCN paragraph that indicated that adjustments are made for multiple factors, including but not limited to station location. He agreed that that made sense, so presumably he thought all of it made sense. However, he followed that up with a detailed analysis that is based on the presumption that station location is the only valid reason to make an adjustment.

Sorry for my lack of clarity. For a one-year adjustment of six tenths of a degree that occurs four times in fifty years, adjustments that total two and a half degrees, we need specific occurrences that happen suddenly. It’s not station moves. It’s not Stevenson Screens. Time of observation changes are typically small , on the order of a couple of tenths. Changing to a MMTS (automated temperature system) is small as well. The classic reference is Quayle, who puts the average change at 0.06 C. ± 0.02 C. Changes in the surroundings generally happen slowly

So you are right, I have no alternate explanation involving the normal adjustments. But it is not because I presume that “station location is the only valid reason to make an adjustment.” It is because I can’t think of any set of circumstances that would add up to two and a half degrees.

So now we’ve hit the second place where Mr. Eisenbach can’t even seem to agree with himself on how things should be done, and we’re still only halfway through the post. . .

Keep going, I’m sure you’ll find more. However, I have researched this, and thought long and hard about it, and I can’t come up with any remotely plausible explanation for adjusting up to five stations at once. Handwaving about “it must have been something” does not advance the discussion. The first big upwards adjustment was in 1930, six tenths of a degree. It wasn’t a station move, or a time-of-observation adjustment, or an MMTS adjustment, or an adjustment for trees growing up around the station … so if you think it was for a real reason, what was the reason?

Finally, before the adjustment, Darwin Zero, One and Two were all in extremely good agreement, within a few tenths. GHCN adjusted Darwin Zero a large amount, Darwin One by a smaller amount, and Darwin Two not at all … how is that explainable in any universe? They were agreeing perfectly before adjustment, so you adjust one a lot, one a little, and leave one untouched?

[nauthiz]

To alter a record by two and a half degrees is unheard of.

Simply untrue. Like I said before, an adjustment on that order would be necessary to reconcile a station's temperature record if that station introduces a discontinuity by changing the time of day at which they take their samples by a couple hours.

If that is done with all the locations at which the station takes measurements (a perfectly reasonable thing to do), then their measurements will stay in perfect alignment with each other through time, but there is still a discontinuity that requires adjustment. You won't see it by graphing the different sites' readings and seeing if they match up, though, because all of the sites will experience the same discontinuity at the same time. You can only discover it by looking into a log of the station's protocol.

Eschenbach chose not to do that, instead he just substituted his own speculation. While I believe that it's good to have an active imagination, I must protest that substituting imagination for data is a fundamentally invalid technique in science.

[Stroller]

Simply untrue. Like I said before, an adjustment on that order would be necessary to reconcile a station's temperature record if that station introduces a discontinuity by changing the time of day at which they take their samples by a couple hours.
From Willis' reply:
"Time of observation changes are typically small , on the order of a couple of tenths. "

If you think ajustments of 2.5C are not unheard of, can you provide some other examples?

[Webbo]

That doesn’t remove systematic biases like time of observation. Since most improvements to weather station siting involve remove sources of possible heat contamination there will always be a false negative trend in raw data from any weather station network that actively seeks to improve it’s processes.

If the USHCN network (supposedly the best in the world) is the result of decades of improvement I shudder to think what it was like in the past.

[nauthiz]

From Willis' reply:
"Time of observation changes are typically small , on the order of a couple of tenths. "

Translation: I didn't check my facts, but I'm not about to openly admit that.

[Stroller]

As a quote Stroller put out a day or two ago, it really is pretty much indisputable that CO2 causes warming: the argument is really over how much of the recent warming is attributable to it. That issue doesn't stand or fall on how warm the MWP was.

Whatever warming co2 produces, the current real world evidence is that it is easily overcome by natural variation. This should give some pause for thought about the relative strength of various other climate factors compared to co2.

Though the fact never made it into the IPCC reports, Keith Briffa, one of the main contributors acknowledges that the 11th century may have been as warm as the modern period. I'll put the link to the relevant email on the CRU UEA thread for you.

[Webbo]

Translation: I didn't check my facts, but I'm not about to openly admit that.

nauthiz,

I don't think you have a clue what TOB adjustments are for and what causes them. Just reading the thermometers at different times of the day does not necessarily even cause a bias.

To have a TOB that increases over time to a 2.5 degree adjustment steadily in one direction is just complete nonsense.

[Stroller]

Webbo, if Nauthiz didn't say that, I advise you to remove it.

[Trakar]

I passed on your earlier set of criticisms to Willis Eschenbach. Here is his reply:
Note to Mods. I have Willis' express permission (http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/12/08/the-smoking-gun-at-darwin-zero/#comment-254108) to reproduce this.


Are you referring to this Willis Eschenback?


http://scienceblogs.com/deltoid/2009/12/willis_eschenbach_caught_lying.php?utm_source=sbho mepage&utm_medium=link&utm_content=channellink

[Torsten]

From Willis' reply:
"Time of observation changes are typically small , on the order of a couple of tenths. "


I don't know if the nearest airport to me that records hourly observations is typical or not. I decided to download the hourly temperature observations for all of 2008. I then extracted the 10:00 through 14:00 values, determined the differences for each day for various times, and averaged the results over the entire year.

Average temperature difference in 2008 at Prince George Airport, British Columbia:

10:00 - 11:00 - 1.1C
10:00 - 12:00 - 2.0C
10:00 - 13:00 - 2.7C
10:00 - 14:00 - 3.2C
11:00 - 12:00 - 0.9C
11:00 - 13:00 - 1.6C
11:00 - 14:00 - 2.1C
12:00 - 13:00 - 0.7C
12:00 - 14:00 - 1.2C
13:00 - 14:00 - 0.5C

One station, one year. As I said, I don't know how typical this is, or whether it is even relevant to whatever you guys are discussing, but the smallest change in this selection is more than a "couple of tenths".

[Webbo]

I don't know if the nearest airport to me that records hourly observations is typical or not. I decided to download the hourly temperature observations for all of 2008. I then extracted the 10:00 through 14:00 values, determined the differences for each day for various times, and averaged the results over the entire year.

Average temperature difference in 2008 at Prince George Airport, British Columbia:

10:00 - 11:00 - 1.1C
10:00 - 12:00 - 2.0C
10:00 - 13:00 - 2.7C
10:00 - 14:00 - 3.2C
11:00 - 12:00 - 0.9C
11:00 - 13:00 - 1.6C
11:00 - 14:00 - 2.1C
12:00 - 13:00 - 0.7C
12:00 - 14:00 - 1.2C
13:00 - 14:00 - 0.5C

One station, one year. As I said, I don't know how typical this is, or whether it is even relevant to whatever you guys are discussing, but the smallest change in this selection is more than a "couple of tenths".

Unfortunately, the data selection you have provided is meaningless in relation to calculating TOB effects. It's nothing to do with comparing the difference between 2 temps at different times.

This is what happens when individuals just repeat what they have been told without checking for themselves.

[Atraveller]

I recognize the difference between weather and climate - but this has been one of the hottest Springs in recorded history in Australia.

I noticed this article in the Brisbane times today:

2010 hottest year ever (http://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/environment/scientists-tip-2010-as-hottest-yet-20091209-kk3k.html)


Every decade in Australia for the past 70 years had been getting warmer, and this decade has been the globe's warmest so far.

combine that with an op piece from Mikhail Gorbechev:

We have an Emergency (http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/10/opinion/10iht-edgorbachev.html?ref=global)

And another Op Ed:

Going Cheney with Climate (http://www.nytimes.com/2009/12/09/opinion/09friedman.html)


Mr. Cheney seemed to be endorsing the same “precautionary principle” that also animated environmentalists.

I find that a very interesting way of looking at this problem -

[Torsten]

Unfortunately, the data selection you have provided is meaningless in relation to calculating TOB effects. It's nothing to do with comparing the difference between 2 temps at different times.


Right, my example only has direct significance in systems that use a single daily temperature (not for climate purposes), for example as an input in the way we calculate drought codes and fuel moisture codes in this country, and I conflated this with the temperature calculations for monthly means. I also didn't realize how varied the different national schemes for calculating average daily temperatures are, and that some countries have changed their methods at various times, which potentially introduces inhomogeneities.

Anyway, I had time to read a little bit about the Time of Observation Bias, and it's fascinating. As I understand it, before November 1994 Australia was calculating its daily mean temperature as the average of the daily maximum and minimum, as USA presently does. I don't know what studies were done on TOB effects in Australia, but the study by Karl et al (1986) (http://ams.allenpress.com/perlserv/?request=get-abstract&doi=10.1175%2F1520-0450(1986)025%3C0145%3AAMTETT%3E2.0.CO%3B2&ct=1) for the USA showed that bias can be as high as 2C, and that the difference in bias, say between late afternoon and around sunrise, can be even greater. The average of 7 years of data showed significant areas of northern Texas, Oklahoma and southern Kansas have a change in TOB of 2.0C or more in March if time of observation changes from 1700 to 0700.

Before 1940 in the US, 75% of the cooperative network observers were making the observation in the evening, but by 1986 only 45% were doing this, and one of the most frequent observation times had become 0700. But apparently the need for adjustments of such magnitude in cases like this is "nonsense".

[Nereid]

I am totally new to this topic, and am not sure this thread is the right place for this post or not (please don't be shy in saying so, if it isn't).

Can anyone please point me to a post in this thread (or posts) - or, better, provide references - to a review paper (or papers, up to ~10, say) on the body of scientific material which concludes that all the relevant data is consistent with the conclusion that there has been no global warming, over a time period which includes at least all years of the 21st century (for which reliable data are available), and, preferably, over the period from ~1950 to today?

In short, where is the 'no GW' scientific case published?

That's my first question (and no, I don't need pointers to where the 'GW' scientific case is published ... that is extremely easy to find).

My second is related, but different: pointers please (to posts in this thread or references) to a review paper (or papers, up to ~10, say) on the body of scientific material which concludes that all the relevant data is consistent with the conclusion that whatever global warming there is (over a time period which includes at least all years of the 21st century (for which reliable data are available), and, preferably, over the period from ~1950 to today), it is consistent with a hypothesis (in one form or another) that the activities of Homo sapiens have not contributed significantly to it.

The scientific study of the Earth's climate is not a field I am familiar with, so I am hoping that some of the BAUTians who read this thread - and who are familiar with this field - will help to get up to speed.

Also: if anyone who has been paying a lot of attention to this topic is certain that the answer to either (or both) of my questions is "such a review paper does not exist" (or similar), please point that out.

Thanks.

[Jetlack]

That doesn’t remove systematic biases like time of observation. Since most improvements to weather station siting involve remove sources of possible heat contamination there will always be a false negative trend in raw data from any weather station network that actively seeks to improve it’s processes.

I realise it does not remove systematic biases. My point is that those biases can be averaged out if a large enough sample of raw data is used.

For instance we use the same statistical methods for calculating many more complex systems such as a gas dynamics etc...

I'm not saying we would get a perfect picture but i think the trends could be discerned even when individual temp stations are biased one way or another.

You say that we need to homogenise the data because if we dont there will likely be a false negative trend. But the current selection bias appears to ALWAYS give a positive trend. So thats okay then?

[jlhredshift]

I am totally new to this topic, and am not sure this thread is the right place for this post or not (please don't be shy in saying so, if it isn't).

Can anyone please point me to a post in this thread (or posts) - or, better, provide references - to a review paper (or papers, up to ~10, say) on the body of scientific material which concludes that all the relevant data is consistent with the conclusion that there has been no global warming, over a time period which includes at least all years of the 21st century (for which reliable data are available), and, preferably, over the period from ~1950 to today?

In short, where is the 'no GW' scientific case published?

That's my first question (and no, I don't need pointers to where the 'GW' scientific case is published ... that is extremely easy to find).

My second is related, but different: pointers please (to posts in this thread or references) to a review paper (or papers, up to ~10, say) on the body of scientific material which concludes that all the relevant data is consistent with the conclusion that whatever global warming there is (over a time period which includes at least all years of the 21st century (for which reliable data are available), and, preferably, over the period from ~1950 to today), it is consistent with a hypothesis (in one form or another) that the activities of Homo sapiens have not contributed significantly to it.

The scientific study of the Earth's climate is not a field I am familiar with, so I am hoping that some of the BAUTians who read this thread - and who are familiar with this field - will help to get up to speed.

Also: if anyone who has been paying a lot of attention to this topic is certain that the answer to either (or both) of my questions is "such a review paper does not exist" (or similar), please point that out.

Thanks.

The debate is not whether there is GW or not, the ice sheets have melted over a period of twenty thousand years. The debate is how much increase in the rate of Holocene warming is due to human activity, i. e. AGW.

[Ari Jokimaki]

In short, where is the 'no GW' scientific case published?

My second is related, but different: pointers please (to posts in this thread or references) to a review paper (or papers, up to ~10, say) on the body of scientific material which concludes that all the relevant data is consistent with the conclusion that whatever global warming there is (over a time period which includes at least all years of the 21st century (for which reliable data are available), and, preferably, over the period from ~1950 to today), it is consistent with a hypothesis (in one form or another) that the activities of Homo sapiens have not contributed significantly to it.

...

Also: if anyone who has been paying a lot of attention to this topic is certain that the answer to either (or both) of my questions is "such a review paper does not exist" (or similar), please point that out.
I think closest you get is the series of papers from Keller:
Global Warming: The Balance of Evidence and Its Policy Implications – Keller (2003) (http://www.thescientificworld.com/headeradmin/upload/2003.03.26.pdf)
Global Warming 2007 An Update to Global Warming: The Balance of Evidence and Its Policy Implications – Keller (2007) (http://www.thescientificworld.co.uk/headeradmin/upload/2007.03.91.pdf)
Global warming: a review of this mostly settled issue – Keller (2009) (http://www.springerlink.com/content/6801631u70ng0432/)

(I haven't read the last one myself - no access) Keller goes through the controversies related to the issue, but I think he really says that "such a review paper does not exist".

[Nereid]

The debate is not whether there is GW or not, the ice sheets have melted over a period of twenty thousand years. The debate is how much increase in the rate of Holocene warming is due to human activity, i. e. AGW.Thanks for the response.

I tried to distinguish the two, by asking two quite different questions.

Do you think my questions are insufficiently clear? If so, would you please make some suggestions on how I could improve them?

Also, it seems that - issues of clarification aside - you're saying the answer to the first question is "there is no such material" (or similar) ... but I don't know if you answered the second question (it seems that you didn't) ...

[jlhredshift]

Thanks for the response.

I tried to distinguish the two, by asking two quite different questions.

Do you think my questions are insufficiently clear? If so, would you please make some suggestions on how I could improve them?

Also, it seems that - issues of clarification aside - you're saying the answer to the first question is "there is no such material" (or similar) ... but I don't know if you answered the second question (it seems that you didn't) ...

That is correct.

[Saimell]

Hi all.

I have enjoyed the 95 pages of discssion so far, and say that so you know that I have taken the time to read through all the discussion posts and the links and the articles each of you have posted.

I do have a question in regards to heating or cooling caused by various GHG's when they are in the atmosphere. I hope I dont lose the flow of my question in this little window we have to type in.

I remember that SO2 was regulated very heavily, with the diesel fuel I can use in my plant limited to .2 ppm Sulfer by weight. I seem to remember a post on these boards that SO2 actually reflected solar radiation, which in effect caused a cooling effect. (I could not find the post to quote, sorry).

I also remember that CO2 is claimed to cause a warming effect. This warming effect is a result of absorbption of solar radiation. Again, I could not find the specific post.

Does it make sense then that all the CO2 we are pumping into the air is capturing more of the solar radiation, increasing the energy in atmosphere which is seen as higher temperature?

Again, a question from a neophyte.

[cope]

Saimell,

Welcome to the forum. We certainly have some lively and thought-provoking discussions here.

Yes, sulfur dioxide and other pollutants, especially particulates, "shade" the Earth and prevent some solar radiation from reaching the surface.

As for carbon dioxide, it warms the planet by absorbing heat energy the Earth radiates back into space.

There are some studies that suggest that global warming would be even more extreme without the cooling effect of sulfur dioxide and other pollutants.

[Ivan Viehoff]

Whatever warming co2 produces, the current real world evidence is that it is easily overcome by natural variation. This should give some pause for thought about the relative strength of various other climate factors compared to co2.

Though the fact never made it into the IPCC reports, Keith Briffa, one of the main contributors acknowledges that the 11th century may have been as warm as the modern period. I'll put the link to the relevant email on the CRU UEA thread for you.

As you say, the natural world can change climate by quite large amounts. But it just doesn't happen very often in the typical 100-200 year period. Since these things don't happen very often, it made economic sense, for example, for the Netherlands to have built its sea defences, rather than say "this is pointless, there is a risk that one day we will be under 10m of water". The point is that such risk is rather low over the economic life of the sea-defences.

The 11th century may well have been as warm as today. But that's nearly 1000 years ago. Economic time horizons are much shorter than 1000 years. And a key difference is that they didn't have a large amount of pent-up future warming built in as a result of a man-made increase in CO2 atmospheric concentration, which, even if it stabilises at present day levels, must surely continue to warm us for a long time yet, whatever exogenous natural effects are occurring at the same time. Over a timescale of 100 years, it would seem unlikely that natural changes will swamp such an effect. It's undeniable that it might happen, but it's big gamble.

[Coldcreation]

[...]
The scientific study of the Earth's climate is not a field I am familiar with, so I am hoping that some of the BAUTians who read this thread - and who are familiar with this field - will help to get up to speed. [...]

Hello Nereid,

Your questions actually prompted me to look into the problem further.

I did find an interesting paper with respect to your query, so it seems, though I haven't yet sifted through the whole pdf file. I think it may help understand certain aspects of the topic from a 'naturalist' point of view.



Nature, Not Human Activity, Rules the Climate (http://westinstenv.org/wp-content/NGIPCC_Singer.pdf)
(2008, Science and Environmental Policy Project / S. Fred Singer)



As NIPCC shows by offering an independent, non-governmental ‘second opinion’ on the ‘global warming’ issue, we do not currently have any convincing evidence or observations of significant climate change from other than natural causes. (See the Forward, by Frederick Seitz, 2008)


And from Conclusions, Policy Implications:




If, for whatever reason, a modest warming were to occur – even one that matches temperatures seen during the Medieval Warm Period of around 1100 AD or the much larger ones recorded during the Holocene Climate Optimum of some 6,000 years ago – the impact would not be damaging but would probably be, on the whole, beneficial. [...]

Even if a substantial part of global warming were due to greenhouse gases – and it is not – any control efforts currently contemplated would give only feeble results. For example, the Kyoto Protocol – even if punctiliously observed by all participating nations – would decrease calculated future temperatures by only 0.02 degrees C by 2050, an undetectable amount.

In conclusion, this NIPCC report falsifies the principal IPCC conclusion that the reported warming (since 1979) is very likely caused by the human emission of greenhouse gases. In other words, increasing carbon dioxide is not responsible for current warming. Policies adopted and called for in the name of ‘fighting global warming’ are unnecessary.

It is regrettable that the public debate over climate change, fueled by the errors and exaggerations contained in the reports of the IPCC, has strayed so far from scientific truth. It is an embarrassment to science that hype has replaced reason in the global debate over so important an issue.

Bold added.


About the author:

"S. Fred Singer, an atmospheric and space physicist, is founder and president of the Science and Environmental Policy Project, a nonprofit research and education organization based in Arlington, Virginia. He is also distinguished research professor at George Mason University and professor emeritus of environmental sciences at the University of Virginia.

Singer is the author or coauthor of many books and scholarly articles. Recently he coauthored, with Dennis Avery, Unstoppable Global Warming – Every 1,500 Years (Rowman & Littlefield, 2007), which was on the New York Times bestsellers list. Singer’s previous books include The Greenhouse Debate Continued: An Analysis and Critique of the IPCC Climate Assessment (ICS Press, 1992), Climate Policy – From Rio to Kyoto (Hoover Institution, 2000), and Hot Talk Cold Science – Global Warming’s Unfinished Debate (Independent Institute, 1997, 1999)."


Edit: I think this report may have already been mention somewhere in the thread.
CC

[Bright_Light]

I am totally new to this topic, and am not sure this thread is the right place for this post or not (please don't be shy in saying so, if it isn't).

Can anyone please point me to a post in this thread (or posts) - or, better, provide references - to a review paper (or papers, up to ~10, say) on the body of scientific material which concludes that all the relevant data is consistent with the conclusion that there has been no global warming, over a time period which includes at least all years of the 21st century (for which reliable data are available), and, preferably, over the period from ~1950 to today?

In short, where is the 'no GW' scientific case published?



AGW in of itself is a theory, by defination it MUST be proven. There is NO converse theory or claim thus there is NO theory to defend. What we on the "skeptics" side are doing is showing where the theory falls flat. That's sceince.
Expand your reading to other fourms and sceincetific sources. You'll have to decide which side to believe on your own.

[parejkoj]

Coldcreation (and Nereid): please note that the Heartland Institute's (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heartland_Institute) NIPCC (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nongovernmental_International_Panel_on_Climate_Cha nge) "report" was not peer reviewed, and SEPP (http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Science_and_Environmental_Policy_P roject) is very much a political, not a scientific, organization. On the other hand, Nereid, as flawed as it is (http://ourchangingclimate.wordpress.com/2009/06/13/the-nipcc-report/), it's probably as close as you'll get to a summary of the "skeptic" position.

[Webbo]

Right, my example only has direct significance in systems that use a single daily temperature (not for climate purposes), for example as an input in the way we calculate drought codes and fuel moisture codes in this country, and I conflated this with the temperature calculations for monthly means. I also didn't realize how varied the different national schemes for calculating average daily temperatures are, and that some countries have changed their methods at various times, which potentially introduces inhomogeneities.

Anyway, I had time to read a little bit about the Time of Observation Bias, and it's fascinating. As I understand it, before November 1994 Australia was calculating its daily mean temperature as the average of the daily maximum and minimum, as USA presently does. I don't know what studies were done on TOB effects in Australia, but the study by Karl et al (1986) (http://ams.allenpress.com/perlserv/?request=get-abstract&doi=10.1175%2F1520-0450(1986)025%3C0145%3AAMTETT%3E2.0.CO%3B2&ct=1) for the USA showed that bias can be as high as 2C, and that the difference in bias, say between late afternoon and around sunrise, can be even greater. The average of 7 years of data showed significant areas of northern Texas, Oklahoma and southern Kansas have a change in TOB of 2.0C or more in March if time of observation changes from 1700 to 0700.

Before 1940 in the US, 75% of the cooperative network observers were making the observation in the evening, but by 1986 only 45% were doing this, and one of the most frequent observation times had become 0700. But apparently the need for adjustments of such magnitude in cases like this is "nonsense".

It's possible to have high adjustments at specific times but it does not follow on that a bias adjustment of 0.5 is required consistently for 10 years, then 1.0 for 10 years, then 1.5 for 10 years, then 2.0 for 10 years then 2.5 for 10 years. That is the part that's complete nonsense.

There is only one explanation for those adjustments. They are manual and not explained in magnitude nor consistency by any known method of homogonisation. Individuals can make up there own minds as to why they were made.

[Saimell]

Saimell,

Welcome to the forum. We certainly have some lively and thought-provoking discussions here.

Yes, sulfur dioxide and other pollutants, especially particulates, "shade" the Earth and prevent some solar radiation from reaching the surface.

As for carbon dioxide, it warms the planet by absorbing heat energy the Earth radiates back into space.

There are some studies that suggest that global warming would be even more extreme without the cooling effect of sulfur dioxide and other pollutants.

Thanks for the response and the kind treatment of my first post.

Okay, so CO2 absorbs heat via radiation if I read your reply correctly. Does it matter which way the radiated heat is coming from, meaning earth or space?

[Stroller]

Thanks for the response and the kind treatment of my first post.

Okay, so CO2 absorbs heat via radiation if I read your reply correctly. Does it matter which way the radiated heat is coming from, meaning earth or space?
Welcome Saimell.
The atmosphere is comparatively transparent to incoming short wave solar radiation. So is the sea which it penetrates and yields it's energy as sensible heat in the near surface waters.

The oceans then radiate long wave energy into the atmosphere. Some of this is absorbed by water vapour and co2 and roughly half of that energy is reradiated back towards the surface.

The longwave radiation re-emitted by the atmosphere can't penetrate the ocean, it heats the surface, which evaporates, taking the heat upwards as it rises. Water vapour is a lot lighter than air unlike co2 which is heavier than air.

[Stroller]

Anyway, I had time to read a little bit about the Time of Observation Bias, and it's fascinating. As I understand it, before November 1994 Australia was calculating its daily mean temperature as the average of the daily maximum and minimum, as USA presently does. I don't know what studies were done on TOB effects in Australia, but the study by Karl et al (1986) (http://ams.allenpress.com/perlserv/?request=get-abstract&doi=10.1175%2F1520-0450(1986)025%3C0145%3AAMTETT%3E2.0.CO%3B2&ct=1) for the USA showed that bias can be as high as 2C, and that the difference in bias, say between late afternoon and around sunrise, can be even greater. The average of 7 years of data showed significant areas of northern Texas, Oklahoma and southern Kansas have a change in TOB of 2.0C or more in March if time of observation changes from 1700 to 0700.

Before 1940 in the US, 75% of the cooperative network observers were making the observation in the evening, but by 1986 only 45% were doing this, and one of the most frequent observation times had become 0700. But apparently the need for adjustments of such magnitude in cases like this is "nonsense".

There's seems to be a reasonably polite debate going between both sides on about all this stuff on the original thread.

http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/12/08/the-smoking-gun-at-darwin-zero/

In relation to your points, which I tookthe liberty of quoting there, there was this response:



have these people never ever heard of maximum and minimum thermometers (much less how to reset them)?

While most determinations of maximum and minimum daily temperatures are now done electronically, the Maximum Minimum Thermometer also known as Six’s thermometer, was invented by James Six in 1782.

[lomiller1]

Thanks for the response and the kind treatment of my first post.

Okay, so CO2 absorbs heat via radiation if I read your reply correctly. Does it matter which way the radiated heat is coming from, meaning earth or space?

Energy coming from the Sun is mostly visible light with some near visible infrared and ultraviolet. CO2 does not impede these in any way.

Energy that is absorbed (not reflected) goes back into space in the form of long wave infrared. CO2 is opaque in some of these wavelengths and will block some of this energy from getting out of the atmosphere until the earth heats sufficiently to overcome the effect.

[Nereid]

I think closest you get is the series of papers from Keller:
Global Warming: The Balance of Evidence and Its Policy Implications – Keller (2003) (http://www.thescientificworld.com/headeradmin/upload/2003.03.26.pdf)
Global Warming 2007 An Update to Global Warming: The Balance of Evidence and Its Policy Implications – Keller (2007) (http://www.thescientificworld.co.uk/headeradmin/upload/2007.03.91.pdf)
Global warming: a review of this mostly settled issue – Keller (2009) (http://www.springerlink.com/content/6801631u70ng0432/)

(I haven't read the last one myself - no access) Keller goes through the controversies related to the issue, but I think he really says that "such a review paper does not exist".
Thanks very much; this looks like a good place to start.

[Nereid]

Hello Nereid,

Your questions actually prompted me to look into the problem further.

I did find an interesting paper with respect to your query, so it seems, though I haven't yet sifted through the whole pdf file. I think it may help understand certain aspects of the topic from a 'naturalist' point of view.



Nature, Not Human Activity, Rules the Climate (http://westinstenv.org/wp-content/NGIPCC_Singer.pdf)
(2008, Science and Environmental Policy Project / S. Fred Singer)





And from Conclusions, Policy Implications:



Bold added.


About the author:

"S. Fred Singer, an atmospheric and space physicist, is founder and president of the Science and Environmental Policy Project, a nonprofit research and education organization based in Arlington, Virginia. He is also distinguished research professor at George Mason University and professor emeritus of environmental sciences at the University of Virginia.

Singer is the author or coauthor of many books and scholarly articles. Recently he coauthored, with Dennis Avery, Unstoppable Global Warming – Every 1,500 Years (Rowman & Littlefield, 2007), which was on the New York Times bestsellers list. Singer’s previous books include The Greenhouse Debate Continued: An Analysis and Critique of the IPCC Climate Assessment (ICS Press, 1992), Climate Policy – From Rio to Kyoto (Hoover Institution, 2000), and Hot Talk Cold Science – Global Warming’s Unfinished Debate (Independent Institute, 1997, 1999)."


Edit: I think this report may have already been mention somewhere in the thread.
CC
Thanks for this; two lots of good material to read.

I am unclear on the extent to which this has been peer-reviewed (it may become clear once I've had a chance to read through it, of course!); do you happen to know?

[Nereid]

AGW in of itself is a theory, by defination it MUST be proven. There is NO converse theory or claim thus there is NO theory to defend. What we on the "skeptics" side are doing is showing where the theory falls flat. That's sceince.
Expand your reading to other fourms and sceincetific sources. You'll have to decide which side to believe on your own.
Interesting comment, thanks.

So may I take it that the answer to my two questions - as far as you know anyway - is that there are no review papers of the kind I asked about?

[Nereid]

Coldcreation (and Nereid): please note that the Heartland Institute's (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Heartland_Institute) NIPCC (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nongovernmental_International_Panel_on_Climate_Cha nge) "report" was not peer reviewed, and SEPP (http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Science_and_Environmental_Policy_P roject) is very much a political, not a scientific, organization. On the other hand, Nereid, as flawed as it is (http://ourchangingclimate.wordpress.com/2009/06/13/the-nipcc-report/), it's probably as close as you'll get to a summary of the "skeptic" position.
Thanks for this input too.

So far no one has pointed to any review papers which answer my first question, and the only answer to the second may be the Singer document (though it may not be peer-reviewed)*.

* the Keller documents may also contain something that comes close to an answer (I won't know until I've read them)

[Stroller]

Thanks for this input too.

So far no one has pointed to any review papers which answer my first question, and the only answer to the second may be the Singer document (though it may not be peer-reviewed)*.

* the Keller documents may also contain something that comes close to an answer (I won't know until I've read them)

Although the Singer document is not peer reviewed by a Learned Journal, it does refer to a lot of peer reviewed literature, so in that sense, it has value as a 'review'.

You might want to acquaint yourself with the facts revealed in the leaked emails regarding the way the peer review process has been skewed by the actions of cliques within the climate science community, and the analysis of those social networks conducted by the Wegman report along with their findings regarding Prof Michael Mann's statistical methods and data splicing employed in the manufacturing of the 'hockey stick' graph.

Also, there is the evidence of the rejection of critical comments by IPCC reviewers published on Steve McKintyre's site http://climateaudit.org

This site also carries some of the conclusions and excerpts from the Wegman report.
http://climateaudit.org/2007/11/06/the-wegman-and-north-reports-for-newbies/

Steve McKintyre will be on CNN this morning. And Youtube later no doubt.

[Stroller]

Can anyone please point me to a post in this thread (or posts) - or, better, provide references - to a review paper (or papers, up to ~10, say) on the body of scientific material which concludes that all the relevant data is consistent with the conclusion that there has been no global warming, over a time period which includes at least all years of the 21st century (for which reliable data are available), and, preferably, over the period from ~1950 to today?

In short, where is the 'no GW' scientific case published?

That's my first question

I don't think anyone has tried to conclude that there has been no global warming.

The principle issues seem to be:

1) Has it warmed as much as the biased and secretive custodians of the HADcrut and GIStemp temperature reconstructions say it has?

2) What is the the cause or the relative contibutions of the causes of whatever warming there has been?

3) Does an equally warm period around a thousand years ago followed by 'the little ice age' and the subsequent recovery from it to today indicate that warming and cooling of the sort of magnitude we have seen is a natural phenomenon within the bounds of natural variability?

[Stroller]

Greenland ice core records from around 9000BC widen the context a bit I think.

http://www.foresight.org/nanodot/wp-content/uploads/2009/12/histo3.png

[Ivan Viehoff]

Greenland ice core records from around 9000BC widen the context a bit I think.
http://www.foresight.org/nanodot/wp-content/uploads/2009/12/histo3.png
Not without also telling us what the graph shows (what is the vertical axis for example) and providing references which allow us to check whether you read it the same way as the authors who present it.

[Jetlack]

Howabout this alarming chart:

pretty scary because it would imply that temperatures should be rising some 10 degrees if the normal correlation between Co2 and temp is maintained (at least according to this graph).

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Co2-temperature-plot.svg

[Saimell]

Lomiller1 and Stroller, thanks for your responses. It seems that, if I read it correctly, that CO2 absorbs long wave radiation and not the short wave or ultraviolet that you mention.

The term opaque to a certain form of radiation I will take to mean it is not relevant to CO2, or rather it just passes through and provides not heating effect.

One other question, is the earth the only source of long wave radiation or is it the major cause of CO2 trapping heat, so to speak?

Again, much to learn and read in this forum and it has been a rather interesting discussion so far.

[Bart]

Stroller,

Even though the NIPCC report may refer to a lot of peer reviewed articles, most of those do not support the conclusions reached in the report at all.

Otherwise interesting research is put in a context as if it somehow “falsifies the AGW theory”. In many cases, it hardly has any relevance to the attribution of current climate change, or to future projections, even though they try very hard to make it appear as if they do.

Besides that, it features the "usual" long debunked arguments and logical fallacies.

The NIPCC report is very misleading, and should not be confused with science.

See also http://ourchangingclimate.wordpress.com/2009/06/13/the-nipcc-report/

Bart

[William]

Surface Sea Temperature Anomaly, December 12, 2009


http://www.osdpd.noaa.gov/data/sst/anomaly/2009/anomnight.12.10.2009.gif

[Stroller]

Stroller,

Even though the NIPCC report may refer to a lot of peer reviewed articles, most of those do not support the conclusions reached in the report at all.

Otherwise interesting research is put in a context as if it somehow “falsifies the AGW theory”. In many cases, it hardly has any relevance to the attribution of current climate change, or to future projections, even though they try very hard to make it appear as if they do.

Besides that, it features the "usual" long debunked arguments and logical fallacies.

The NIPCC report is very misleading, and should not be confused with science.

See also http://ourchangingclimate.wordpress.com/2009/06/13/the-nipcc-report/

Bart

Quite a lot of the papers it refers to have carefully worded concluding paragraphs, which give the impression the authors believe their findings demonstrate AGW. However, some interesting contrary conclusions can be drawn from some of their data.

The IPCC reports are also very misleading, and perhaps the NIPCC report suffers because it has similar objectives though with opposite conclusions. It tries to fight propaganda with contrary propaganda. To find the relevant science, you need to read the peer reviewed papers referred to and use some critical judgment.

[Stroller]

Lomiller1 and Stroller, thanks for your responses. It seems that, if I read it correctly, that CO2 absorbs long wave radiation and not the short wave or ultraviolet that you mention.

The term opaque to a certain form of radiation I will take to mean it is not relevant to CO2, or rather it just passes through and provides not heating effect.

One other question, is the earth the only source of long wave radiation or is it the major cause of CO2 trapping heat, so to speak?

Again, much to learn and read in this forum and it has been a rather interesting discussion so far.

If you substitute the opposite word transparent for opaque, you have it. The atmosphere is largely transparent to incoming shortwave radiation from the sun, but partially opaque to long wave radiation leaving the surface.

The earth is not the only source of long wave radiation. Some of it also comes from the sun, and some comes from short wave radiation absorbed by water vapour in clouds and re-reradiated as long wave radiation, both upwards and downwards, as well as sideways. :)

[Stroller]

Not without also telling us what the graph shows (what is the vertical axis for example) and providing references which allow us to check whether you read it the same way as the authors who present it.

The data is was it is. How you interpret it is up to you. The vertical scale isn't really too important, it's a temperature reconstruction from isotope measurements in the ice, it's the relative size of the peaks which are of interest. We came out of the last ice age at the left hand side of the graph.

Temperature has been trending downwards for the last 8000 years. More steeply downwards since the Bronze age optimum, through the Minoan, Roman and Medieval warm periods to today's relatively small upward blip.

The data source is here:
http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/paleo/metadata/noaa-icecore-2475.html
"Confident paleothermometry is provided by site-specific calibrations
using ice-isotopic ratios, borehole temperatures, and gas-isotopic ratios.
Near-simultaneous changes in ice-core paleoclimatic indicators of local,
regional, and more-widespread climate conditions demonstrate that much
of the Earth experienced abrupt climate changes synchronous with
Greenland within thirty years or less."

[William]

This is interesting, in a El Nino year.

What is happening is there are very strong cold high pressure areas forming in the Arctic. The cold pressure highs break through the warm moist low pressure formations with the resultant being blizzards (high winds reducing visibility), high snow fall, and record cold temperatures.

What is being observed is consistent with a reduction in high level clouds. High level clouds warm the planet via a greenhouse mechanism that reduces the amount of heat that is lost to space.

The mechanism is high GCR reduces high level clouds and increase low level clouds. An increase in low level clouds causes an increase in the amount of radiation that is reflected into space.

The cloud reflected radiation is not affected by the greenhouse gases as it shorter wave lengths.

http://www.accuweather.com/video-on-demand.asp?video=45090637001&title=Long-Lasting%20Cold


Dec 11, 2009; 5:00 AM ET
While much of the eastern half of the United States will remain cold, Ken and Bernie discuss another area of the world that may be even colder!!

http://www.accuweather.com/news-story.asp?article=4


http://www.accuweather.com/video-on-demand.asp?video=1805489410&title=Strong%20Winds,%20No%20Power

[tusenfem]

The data is was it is. How you interpret it is up to you. The vertical scale isn't really too important, it's a temperature reconstruction from isotope measurements in the ice, it's the relative size of the peaks which are of interest. We came out of the last ice age at the left hand side of the graph.


Well, that is a bit weird, what you are writing here. If you really want to have a scientific discussion about this topic, than a claim like "the vertical scale isn't really important" is totally out of place, especially when you not even label the axes. The only comment is "core records from around 9000 BC" so the x-axis could be seconds since 9000 BC and the y-axis could be the log of concentration pollen.

That is NOT the way to discuss here, I thought I asked specifically to move this thread to a more SCIENTIFIC level.

[Stroller]

Tusenfem, my apologies.

I took it for granted that people would understand the x axis was Years. I should have been more explicit.

When I said the vertical scale doesn't matter too much, it's because I didn't want to discuss the issues around converting proxy data to temperature, but to concentrate on the relative size of the general trend of the peaks and troughs and the relative change in the overall amplitude with respect to time.

I would very much like to have a discussion on the historical perspective that the data presents.

The graph of the data extracted from the Greenland ice cores again.
http://www.foresight.org/nanodot/wp-content/uploads/2009/12/histo3.png

[William]

Well, that is a bit weird, what you are writing here. If you really want to have a scientific discussion about this topic, than a claim like "the vertical scale isn't really important" is totally out of place, especially when you not even label the axes. The only comment is "core records from around 9000 BC" so the x-axis could be seconds since 9000 BC and the y-axis could be the log of concentration pollen.

That is NOT the way to discuss here, I thought I asked specifically to move this thread to a more SCIENTIFIC level.

http://www.foresight.org/nanodot/wp-content/uploads/2009/12/histo3.png


http://www.foresight.org/nanodot/wp-content/uploads/2009/12/histo3.png

The Greenland ice sheet temperature is inferred from the ice core analysis. As the analysis is apples to apples for the entire period (i.e. We are looking at one proxy of planetary temperature) the relative changes is more important than the absolute temperature on the Greenland ice sheet (The planet cooled 2C during the 8200 year ago period so that event can be used as relative scale.) The shape of the graph shows that there are large climate changes over the last 9000 years.

What the graph shows is the planet has been steadily cooling for the last 2800 years. In addition it shows there are significant millennium length warming and cooling cycles in the paleo record. Hundreds of paleoclimatic papers support that conclusion.


The data referenced in this paper and this paper also supports the assertion that there are significant cycle changes in planetary temperature.

A 2000-Year Global Temperature Reconstruction Based on Non-Treering Proxies

http://www.ncasi.org/publications/Detail.aspx?id=3025


Comments:
The above graph shows clear evidence of cyclic warming and cooling which is the scientific issue behind the Climategate alleged data cherry picking and data manipulation.

The controversy around Climategate is that the author's tree ring analysis used a small cherry picked selection of tree ring data for analysis and then used a computer algorithm that smoothed out the cyclic changes in planetary temperature removing the Medieval warm period which is roughly 0.3C warmer than the 20th century warming and the Little Ice age.

The hockey stick tree ring data set showed an abrupt cooling in the 20th century which indicates that the tree ring data set used for the hockey stick analysis is not providing an accurate measure of planetary temperature. The "trick" used to hide this deficiency in the data was to add instrumentation measured temperatures to remove the dip in proxy data which would indicated that the tree ring data set did not reflect real planetary temperature.

Tree ring growth is strongly affected by the amount of moisture so if the rainfall varies in a region tree ring growth changes. It is therefore possible to cherry pick tree ring data to remove the medieval warm period and the little ice age.

Non tree ring proxy temperature data disagrees with the hockey stick temperature graph as well as written historic records which support the assertion that there was a Medieval warm period and a Little Ice age.

Logically if there are large cyclic changes in planetary temperature then the warming in the 20th century is not unusual. The question is what caused the warming and now what is causing the cooling.

It should be noted that the UK Met predicted an unusually warm winter for the winter 2009/2010 rather than the coldest winter in decades.

http://www.bautforum.com/science-technology/70431-general-agw-discussion-thread-96.html#post1640760

[Stroller]

Thanks William, good summary.

It looks like the past is getting colder though. Here's a blink comparison of GISS data from 2 years ago and the latest 'adjustments'

http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/12/11/giss-raw-station-data-before-and-after/

http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2009/12/orland_giss_blink2.gif

I do hope the dog hasn't eaten the original raw data like it did at CRU. :(

[parejkoj]

I have a single question for those of you in this thread who are continuing to suggest a massive fraud on the part of climate researchers:

Have you and actually looked at whether these differences between raw and processed data are caused by the documented changes to the data sets? My reading of this thread is that the first assumption by most of you (and your favorite blog posters) is that of fraud, without any attempt to even look at the documentation. Care to prove me wrong?

[SolusLupus]

I have another question:

Climategate? Really?

Someone 20 years ago suggested that a "-gate" suffix was done way too often. Now this is just getting ridiculous.

[Stroller]

We'd love to look at specific documentation for specific stations, and the original raw data, but all FOI requests have been stonewalled.

What documentation there is available is general in nature and no formula is derivable to explain the 'adjustments' to specific individual datasets.

It's science Jim, but not as we knew it.

[Stroller]

I have another question:

Climategate? Really?

Someone 20 years ago suggested that a "-gate" suffix was done way too often. Now this is just getting ridiculous.

The first suggestion was "The CRUtape letters". I guess someone in the media decided it was too obscure and literary for mass consumption.

I agree with you though. Watergate is way too small and petty to compare with this.

[SolusLupus]

The first suggestion was "The CRUtape letters". I guess someone in the media decided it was too obscure and literary for mass consumption.

Heh. Fair enough.

[parejkoj]

We'd love to look at specific documentation for specific stations, and the original raw data, but all FOI requests have been stonewalled.

What documentation there is available is general in nature and no formula is derivable to explain the 'adjustments' to specific individual datasets.

Again: have you looked at the literature to check?

In my work, I apply large corrections to massive data sets all the time. Picking one or two sources and staring at them a long time will result in precisely zero knowledge about how I did the overall corrections. Looking at my documentation for how the overall corrections were applied will.

Since you're still complaining about lacking raw data, perhaps you didn't bother to look at the USHCN link I gave you previously (http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/oa/climate/research/ushcn/ushcn.html). There is a "Data Package Description" header, which states


The data package contains the following four versions of the data set.

1. Raw: the data in this version have been through all quality control but have no data adjustments.
2. TOB: these data have also been subjected to the time-of-observation bias adjustment.
3. Adjusted: these data have been adjusted for the time-of-observation bias, MMTS bias, and station moves, etc.
4. Urban: these data have all adjustments including the urban heat adjustments.

Why don't you go and download that data, find your "questionable" sources, compare the raw and corrected data, and see whether the quality control and adjustment procedures described on that page and the linked papers let you get from one to the other?

I think there are two reasons why: 1. because it is a lot harder work than making a couple plots (or just borrowing them from a blog) and then screaming FRAUD at the top of your lungs, and 2. because if you did that, you might find that the adjustments are perfectly consistent with the documentation, and your claims of a massive fraud on the part of climate scientists would be shown to be even more ridiculous.


It's science Jim, but not as we knew it.

I agree: what you've been doing in this thread certainly isn't science.

[Stroller]

So now we have the trivia out of the way, how about discussing the Greenland ice cores and what they show about temperature decline over the last 8000 years?

[tusenfem]

What the graph shows is the planet has been steadily cooling for the last 2800 years. In addition it shows there are significant millennium length warming and cooling cycles in the paleo record. Hundreds of paleoclimatic papers support that conclusion.


The graph shows diddlysquad, zilch, zero, nothing, AS IT DOES NOT HAVE ANY LABELING OF THE AXIS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! ANY FIRST YEAR STUDENT WOULD GET A BIG FAILING GRADE IF (S)HE WOULD TURN IN A GRAPH LIKE TO ME.

This is stupidity at its highest.

[Stroller]

I hear you. I am labelling the axes now. Artistic huh?

http://tallbloke.wordpress.com/files/2009/12/greenland.jpg

[tusenfem]

So now we have the trivia out of the way, how about discussing the Greenland ice cores and what they show about temperature decline over the last 8000 years?

well as you said that:



When I said the vertical scale doesn't matter too much, it's because I didn't want to discuss the issues around converting proxy data to temperature, but to concentrate on the relative size of the general trend of the peaks and troughs and the relative change in the overall amplitude with respect to time.


I guess nothing will be done with that "graph".

If you want to discuss that, than start a real scientific discussion about it, with published (peer reviewed) sources. You claim to do some kind of "modeling" so apparently you know how to handle data, etc.

This thread is just choking with non-science from all sides, ie. pro and con.

But of course it is easier to talk platitudes instead of coming with some real analysis.

[Strange]

What the graph shows is the planet has been steadily cooling for the last 2800 years.

I think it is impossible to draw that sort of conclusion by "eyeballing" a graph like this. If I had to fit some sort of trend to this by eye, I guess I would say it was roughly flat from about -8,000 and started a downward trend in the last 1,000-ish years. I would also say that that statement has zero value.

Also, I could agree it looks like their are cyclical variations but they might just be random increases and decreases over arbitrary periods.

And what about error bars? How accurate is this data?

Without a proper statistical analysis of the data (which I am definitely not an expert in) I'm not sure you can say anything much about either the trends or any cyclical changes.

Then you would further context, such as how Greenland's temperatures relate to the rest of the world. And so on...

By itself this is just a pretty picture.

[nauthiz]

What data is being used for that graph? That kind of information is rather valuable when looking at a graph from an ice core record, since making inferences from them involves a lot of guesswork and therefore can produce extremely variable results.

For example, for a depth of 150 meters Ruddiman and Raymo (ftp://ftp.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/paleo/icecore/antarctica/vostok/vostok_methane_age.txt) list the age as 2.35 thousand years before present. Sowers et. al. (ftp://ftp.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/paleo/icecore/antarctica/vostok/vostok_time.txt), on the other hand, report it as being well over twice as old - 5.34 ky BP.

Granted, the Ruddiman and Raymo scale isn't meant to be used for CO2 timescales so hopefully we can assume it's not that. But even if we limit ourselves to the rest (you can compare them at the 2nd link), the portions of the graph that correspond to older ages could still vary by as much as ~1,000 years depending on which timescale is being used.

[William]

The graph shows diddlysquad, zilch, zero, nothing, AS IT DOES NOT HAVE ANY LABELING OF THE AXIS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! ANY FIRST YEAR STUDENT WOULD GET A BIG FAILING GRADE IF (S)HE WOULD TURN IN A GRAPH LIKE TO ME.

This is stupidity at its highest.

Tusenfern,

I have shown that the planet in the past has cooled cyclically. Based on current observational data the planet is cooling.

Concern about planetary temperature change, changes if the planet is abruptly cooling. The 1500 scientists that support the assertion that the planet is warming is surreal. It has nothing to do with current or past observations.

Scientific theories change based on observations. i.e. A trick does not change the physical truth.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Vostok-ice-core-petit.png

http://tallbloke.wordpress.com/files/2009/12/greenland.jpg


The data referenced in this paper and 100 similar papers supports the assertion that there are significant cycle changes in planetary temperature.

A 2000-Year Global Temperature Reconstruction Based on Non-Treering Proxies

http://www.ncasi.org/publications/Detail.aspx?id=3025


Comments:
The above graph shows clear evidence of cyclic warming and cooling which is the scientific issue behind the Climategate alleged data cherry picking and data manipulation.

The controversy around Climategate is that the author's tree ring analysis used a small cherry picked selection of tree ring data for analysis and then used a computer algorithm that smoothed out the cyclic changes in planetary temperature removing the Medieval warm period which is roughly 0.3C warmer than the 20th century warming and the Little Ice age.

The hockey stick tree ring data set showed an abrupt cooling in the 20th century which indicates that the tree ring data set used for the hockey stick analysis is not providing an accurate measure of planetary temperature. The "trick" used to hide this deficiency in the data was to add instrumentation measured temperatures to remove the dip in proxy data which would indicated that the tree ring data set did not reflect real planetary temperature.

Tree ring growth is strongly affected by the amount of moisture so if the rainfall varies in a region tree ring growth changes. It is therefore possible to cherry pick tree ring data to remove the medieval warm period and the little ice age.

Non tree ring proxy temperature data disagrees with the hockey stick temperature graph as well as written historic records which support the assertion that there was a Medieval warm period and a Little Ice age.

Logically if there are large cyclic changes in planetary temperature then the warming in the 20th century is not unusual. The question is what caused the warming and now what is causing the cooling.

It should be noted that the UK Met predicted an unusually warm winter for the winter 2009/2010 rather than the coldest winter in decades.

http://www.bautforum.com/science-technology/70431-general-agw-discussion-thread-96.html#post1640760

[William]

El Nino is over. The planet has started to abruptly cool.

http://www.accuweather.com/regional-news-story.asp?region=midwestusnews

http://www.bom.gov.au/climate/enso/#inbrief



In Brief
• The tropical Pacific Ocean sea surface remains significantly warmer than the long-term average in central and eastern areas.
• The sub-surface water of the tropical Pacific remains warmer than the long-term average. The eastern Pacific has cooled slightly in the last two weeks.
• The latest approximate 30-day SOI value is −9; the monthly value for November was −7. The SOI increased in value in the second half of November, but is currently falling once again.
• Trade winds are close to normal across the central and eastern tropical Pacific. A strong westerly wind burst has weakened the Trades significantly in the western Pacific.
• Cloudiness near the date-line has increased over the past fortnight.
• Most leading international computer models surveyed by the Bureau predict that El Niño conditions will persist through the southern hemisphere summer, but decline thereafter.

[William]

This is interesting.

Why are there suddenly record cold temperatures?

http://www.accuweather.com/news-story.asp?partner=accuweather&traveler=0&article=8

[Nereid]

Is there something similar, in fields of science relevant to this topic, to the SAO/NASA Astrophysics Data System (http://adswww.harvard.edu/)?

Do researchers in these fields have a preprint server, similar to arXiv (http://arxiv.org/)?

Is there a standard definition (or definitions) of global (surface) temperature? If so, what is it (or are they)?

[William]

I think it is impossible to draw that sort of conclusion by "eyeballing" a graph like this. If I had to fit some sort of trend to this by eye, I guess I would say it was roughly flat from about -8,000 and started a downward trend in the last 1,000-ish years. I would also say that that statement has zero value.

Also, I could agree it looks like their are cyclical variations but they might just be random increases and decreases over arbitrary periods.

And what about error bars? How accurate is this data?

Without a proper statistical analysis of the data (which I am definitely not an expert in) I'm not sure you can say anything much about either the trends or any cyclical changes.

Then you would further context, such as how Greenland's temperatures relate to the rest of the world. And so on...

By itself this is just a pretty picture.

Henna Oji-san,

This is what has happened before. What do you think will happen again?

As the planet cools is the climate stable or unstable?

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/60/Five_Myr_Climate_Change.png

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/60/Five_Myr_Climate_Change.png

Why is this abrupt climate change occurring?

Persistent Solar Influence on the North Atlantic Climate During the Holocene
http://ruby.fgcu.edu/courses/twimberley/EnviroPhilo/PersistentSolarInfluence.pdf

http://books.google.ca/books?hl=en&lr=&id=hrRPyK5OKfIC&oi=fnd&pg=PA35&dq=%22Bond%22+%22The+North+Atlantic%E2%80%99s+1%E2 %80%932kyr+climate+rhythm:+relation+...%22+&ots=Zdvnjf_YYB&sig=NT7gwLSmCcIqhL5HrVRf0W1vRz4#v=onepage&q=&f=false
The North Atlantic’s 1-2 kyr Climate Rhythm: Relation to Heinrich Events: Dansgaard/Osechger Cycles and the Little Ice Age

[nauthiz]

This is interesting.

Why are there suddenly record cold temperatures?

http://www.accuweather.com/news-story.asp?partner=accuweather&traveler=0&article=8

What's more interesting is that you seem to still be conflating weather and climate.

[nauthiz]

Also, another thing that I think should be articulated: All this trying to challenge the theory that human activity can influence the climate by conducting tasseography on wiggly lines is, when you get down to it, not really very convincing at all.

It's a bit like saying humans can't move rocks down hills by citing millions of years worth of evidence that rocks can move down hills without the aid of humans. . . at the end of the day, it doesn't amount to anything more than a nonsequitur.

If you'd like to argue that humans aren't responsible for the current change, that's certainly an option. . . but you won't find the answer to that question in the paleoclimate record any more than you can figure out what your spouse's favorite type of cookie is by reading a biography of Saladin.

[William]

What's more interesting is that you seem to still be conflating weather and climate.

nauthiz,

Check out figure 1. That is climate change. The planet's climate changed for a reason.

The sun is moving towards the deepest magnetic cycle minimum in 500 years.

The past warm and cold periods correlate with solar magnetic cycle changes.

http://www.ncasi.org/publications/Detail.aspx?id=3025


Figure 1. Mean of temperature data for 18 series.
Data archived at http://www.ncasi.org/programs/areas/climate/LoehleE&E2007.csv

[Ari Jokimaki]

Few things to note on that GISP2 ice core data from Greenland:

- Greenland temperature reconstruction does not tell global temperatures.

- As you can see from the data (ftp://ftp.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/paleo/icecore/greenland/summit/gisp2/isotopes/gisp2_temp_accum_alley2000.txt), newest value in that data set is from 95 years ago, so the whole 20th century warming is missing from the graph. This is quite a relevant piece of information about this, but somehow Stroller failed to mention it.

- Past temperatures do not make current warming event any less harmful.

- Past temperature from a single location does not say anything about how much warming carbon dioxide or other greenhouse gases cause globally. Scientific research on the matter shows that greenhouse gases are very important factors in determining climate (Hansen et al., 2008 (http://pubs.giss.nasa.gov/docs/2008/2008_Hansen_etal.pdf)).

So, as we are here discussing anthropogenic global warming, Stroller offers information that is irrelevant temporally, spatially, and in some other ways.

P.S. Alley (2000) (http://www.pnas.org/content/97/4/1331.full) is the source of this data.

[Ari Jokimaki]

Is there something similar, in fields of science relevant to this topic, to the SAO/NASA Astrophysics Data System?

Do researchers in these fields have a preprint server, similar to arXiv?
No, but both of those hold lot of papers relevant to the issue. However, I suggest that you use Google Scholar (http://scholar.google.com/).


Is there a standard definition (or definitions) of global (surface) temperature? If so, what is it (or are they)?
For this, GISS Surface Temperature Analysis (http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/) and references therein is a good place to start.

[Stroller]

For this, GISS Surface Temperature Analysis (http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/) and references therein is a good place to start.

Also for GISS, there is a great analysis of the code at http://chiefio.wordpress.com

[Ari Jokimaki]

With the track record of your blog references, I don't see any reason why people should waste their time on yet another one.

[Stroller]

I think Nereid will find E.M. Smith's work at http://chiefio.wordpress.com and Steve McKintyre's work at http://climateaudit.org a lot more scientifically rigorous than the last blog you pointed us to at http://greenfyre.wordpress.com/2009/11/21/climate-deniers-hoax-themselves-again/

In fact the BBC links to McKintyres site.

[Stroller]

Few things to note on that GISP2 ice core data from Greenland:

- Greenland temperature reconstruction does not tell global temperatures.

True, this is why they are Greenland temperatures. Lets take a look at whether it was a similar story at the other end of the Earth from the Vostok ice cores in Antarctica.
http://joannenova.com.au/globalwarming/graphs/vostok-ice-core-50000%20med.jpg
Yup, same general temperature decline over the last 10,000 years. The graph shows the lag of changes in co2 behind temperature too.


- As you can see from the data (ftp://ftp.ncdc.noaa.gov/pub/data/paleo/icecore/greenland/summit/gisp2/isotopes/gisp2_temp_accum_alley2000.txt), newest value in that data set is from 95 years ago, so the whole 20th century warming is missing from the graph. This is quite a relevant piece of information about this, but somehow Stroller failed to mention it.

In the post immediately above the one in which I introduced the Greenland ice core graph I said this:


3) Does an equally warm period around a thousand years ago followed by 'the little ice age' and the subsequent recovery from it to today indicate that warming and cooling of the sort of magnitude we have seen is a natural phenomenon within the bounds of natural variability?


- Past temperatures do not make current warming event any less harmful.

Harmful? Crop yields are up, life expectation is up, population is up, Rainfall is unaffected, hurricanes are at a 30 year low, sea level is currently rising very slowly compared to the past. What is your evidence of 'harmful'? And stick to the "current warming event" please, I'm not interested in computer aided 'scenarios' of the future.


Alley (2000) (http://www.pnas.org/content/97/4/1331.full) is the source of this data.
I linked to the data at NOAA already.

http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/paleo/metad...core-2475.html
"Confident paleothermometry is provided by site-specific calibrations
using ice-isotopic ratios, borehole temperatures, and gas-isotopic ratios.
Near-simultaneous changes in ice-core paleoclimatic indicators of local,
regional, and more-widespread climate conditions demonstrate that much
of the Earth experienced abrupt climate changes synchronous with
Greenland within thirty years or less."

[Strange]

This is what has happened before. What do you think will happen again?

Well, at the trivial level, the graph simply shows that temperatures in Greenland have varied a lot in the past. I guess it would make sense to assume they will change as much in the future. But I can't help saying, so what? Without more information on the context, looking at likely causes for each increase or decrease (which I wouldn't assume are the same in every case), extracting any cyclical information and other long term trends .... it is just a wiggly line.


As the planet cools is the climate stable or unstable?

I'm not sure what that means. I suppose it depends what you mean by "unstable". If "stable" means unchanging, then I suppose a cooling (or warming) climate is, by definition unstable. Or do you mean that as the climate cools it introduces some sort of chaotic change? Is that more true than warming periods? And why is that relevant? And what does it have to do with the graph?

[Coldcreation]

Steve McKintyre will be on CNN this morning. And Youtube later no doubt.

I missed this program, unfortunately. I was wondering if anything of interest to this discussion emerged from any of the statements.

I haven't checked Youtube yet. Does anyone have a link to that?

Edit: I just checked on Youtube. Here are the links:

Pt 1/2 CNN discusses CLIMATEGATE w/ Chris Horner, Stephen McIntyre & Michael Oppenheimer (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tsh7QUy4CvE)

Pt 2/2 CNN discusses CLIMATEGATE w/ Chris Horner, Stephen McIntyre & Michael Oppenheimer (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ucz_iCJCoZE)

I have yet to view the vids though.

I'll be back.

CC

[Stroller]

That was an earlier interview a few days ago.

The latest I haven't found on youtube, but the transcript is here
http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0912/11/ltm.02.html

[Coldcreation]

That was an earlier interview a few days ago.

The latest I haven't found on youtube, but the transcript is here
http://transcripts.cnn.com/TRANSCRIPTS/0912/11/ltm.02.html

One of those videos is dated Dec. 7 and the other Dec. 10, 2009.

This one's not bad, from FoxNews (Dec. 3):

Hannity - Chris Horner - ClimateGate (12.3.09) (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BwzlYEYeFok&feature=related)

"Sean Hannity talks to Chris Horner about the Global Warming fraud that is becoming more apparent every day."


CC

[Stroller]

The second one is the post commercial break continuation of the first.

McKintyres latest CNN interview was with McCracken

Chris Horner is more involved with the political side of the debate. McKintyre sticks to his own carefully researched facts.

[tusenfem]

This thread is just choking with non-science from all sides, ie. pro and con.

But of course it is easier to talk platitudes instead of coming with some real analysis.

I apologize to those who have produced scientific detail to this thread, I may have been to generalizing here.

[tusenfem]

This is interesting.

Why are there suddenly record cold temperatures?

http://www.accuweather.com/news-story.asp?partner=accuweather&traveler=0&article=8

maybe because it is winter?

[Ari Jokimaki]

I think Nereid will find E.M. Smith's work at http://chiefio.wordpress.com and Steve McKintyre's work at http://climateaudit.org a lot more scientifically rigorous than the last blog you pointed us to at http://greenfyre.wordpress.com/2009/...mselves-again/
That wasn't the last blog I linked to (and that one wasn't even in this thread), why would you make such an obviously false claim?

However, tusenfem said this in a post in this thread (http://www.bautforum.com/1634545-post2612.html):


You will found your comments on a good basis, which is peer reviewed papers (that you can easily find through ADS) and not through re-interpretations from blogs or newspapers.
I have stayed in peer-reviewed papers since that. You on the other hand keep on pushing blog interpretations, even after I reminded you about that, so it seems that you just don't care.


The graph shows the lag of changes in co2 behind temperature too.
Ahh, here we go with that straw-man once again. As usual, you give just a direct link to a graph with no reference. Link address tells me that it is indeed not from a scientific source. Little bit of detective work shows that this is yet another blog post graph (http://joannenova.com.au/global-warming/ice-core-graph/) you are showing. It says that the graph has been "scaled" so that the lag is visible to the naked eye. It says there that "What really matters here are the turning points, not the absolute levels". I have looked at the Vostok ice core turning points, and plenty of them show carbon dioxide leading, that happens especially in the turning points where a cooling starts. Most of those are being lead by carbon dioxide. The graph you offered shows carbon dioxide leading in the start of the warming 17-18000 years ago. Carbon dioxide starts increasing at about 18000 years ago, and temperature starts increasing about 17000 years ago. Also, at about 47000 years ago carbon dioxide starts increasing and temperature starts increasing at about 45000 years ago. Both these events have therefore carbon dioxide leading. Rather badly chosen example from you.

As I pointed out in my last post, current scientific research shows that greenhouse gases have been important factors in past climate changes(Hansen et al., 2008) (http://pubs.giss.nasa.gov/docs/2008/2008_Hansen_etal.pdf).


Harmful? Crop yields are up, life expectation is up, population is up, Rainfall is unaffected, hurricanes are at a 30 year low, sea level is currently rising very slowly compared to the past. What is your evidence of 'harmful'? And stick to the "current warming event" please, I'm not interested in computer aided 'scenarios' of the future.
I note that you don't give references to any of your claims here. After seeing what you did here (http://www.bautforum.com/1607419-post2208.html), I'm not willing to believe anything from you without references.

But let's just sample one of your claims here. You claim that "sea level is currently rising very slowly compared to the past". Here's Merrifield et al. (2009) (http://ams.allenpress.com/perlserv/?doi=10.1175%2F2009JCLI2985.1&request=get-abstract) paper titled "An Anomalous Recent Acceleration of Global Sea Level Rise".

Evidence of harmful: Kannan & James (2009) (http://www.tropecol.com/pdf/open/PDF_50_1/05Kannan.pdf), Parmesan (2006) (http://media.eurekalert.org/aaasnewsroom/2008/FIL_000000000114/AnnRev_CCimpacts2006.pdf). This of course has been shown to you here before.


I linked to the data at NOAA already.
And I gave a link to the paper where that data is described, what's your problem with that?

[tusenfem]

nauthiz,

Check out figure 1. That is climate change. The planet's climate changed for a reason.

William, you really do not know how to read data, I am sorry I have to say that. In that figure 1 there is indeed a "downturn" at year 2000, however, this variation in the upgoing trend is nothing unusual when you compare it with all the data that has gone before. You see a long increase in temperature over the years 300 to 1000 and the variations in that upward trend are the same as what you claim is a cooling of the Earth since 2000. However, the curve shows a gradual increase in temperature since 1600 up to today.

You might want to take some classes in data analysis.

[Stroller]

trying to challenge the theory that human activity can influence the climate by conducting tasseography on wiggly lines is, when you get down to it, not really very convincing at all.


Well, the authors of the papers which convinced policy makers AGW was a serious problem certainly thought it important enough to risk their scientific reputations on cooking up spliced data in wiggly lines on graphs and "hiding the decline" in tree ring growth width post 1960.

The worldwide reality of the Medieval Warm Period undermines the position of alarmists, because they rely on smoothing it out of their graphs to make a case for "unprecedented global warming" as opposed to perfectly natural and cyclical global warming and cooling.

[nauthiz]

Well, the authors of the papers which convinced policy makers AGW was a serious problem certainly thought it important enough to risk their scientific reputations on cooking up spliced data in wiggly lines on graphs and "hiding the decline" in tree ring growth width post 1960.

The worldwide reality of the Medieval Warm Period undermines the position of alarmists, because they rely on smoothing it out of their graphs to make a case for "unprecedented global warming" as opposed to perfectly natural and cyclical global warming and cooling.

All this post really indicates to me is:

1. You completely missed the point of the post you were replying to.

2. What you know is curated in such a way that it does not match up with reality. I don't know if it's because of deliberate deception or echo chamber effects, but it's there.

I think you might do well to step away from the blogosphere for a while to read up on the actual scientific case before you continue trying to argue against it, because right now you don't seem to have the minimum knowledge it takes to distinguish an argument that has legs from one that doesn't. Which is kind of amazing, considering much time you've clearly put into this - but if you're still harping on the medieval warm period in such a way then it's kind of for me to conclude otherwise. And it implies that having a conversation with you about the science is rather pointless as anything but a way to vent, because you have become so focused on only seeking out sources that confirm your distorted worldview, and you are so congenitally unwilling to read anything that might be derived from actual science unless you can get a blogger who shares opinions that you perceive to match your own* to predigest it for you that even this post I'm writing right now might as well be piped to /dev/null.

*Though, and this is key, they often don't seem to agree with each other. I've seen you quaver back and forth between citing folks who agree that the earth is warming but don't agree that it is due to anthropogenic sources, and citing folks who simply don't agree that the earth is warming, that I'm convinced you don't even know what you yourself believe. Or, I should say, it seems the only thing you believe is that everything that comes from AGW contrarians is correct, even the stuff that's fundamentally incompatible.

And you're so unquestioning about this belief that it doesn't even occur to you to stop and wonder, "Hey, these guys saw that the extremely poorly understood and barely-functional tree ring proxy data doesn't agree with nice well-engineered thermometers, and they decided that the thermometers are more reliable. I wonder why that is?" Instead you just jump straight to "Did someone I don't like make the decision? Then it must be the wrong decision and potentially has nefarious motivations!"

[Saimell]

Well all. I have read all 96 pages of this forum thread and have finally figured out two things:

1. The pro-AGW crowd is unwilling to listen to anything.

2. The anti-AGW crowd is unwilling to listen to anything.

This does not sound like science to me. While I dont have the title scientist, I do have the title Engineer.

All of you are so busy pontification your own view points that you fail to realize that there are other view points out there.

The single largest question I have read over and over is, "What is the long term effect of GHG's?" No one has a convincing argument for that one.

Another large question is, "Exactly how much forcing do individual GHG's provide to the average world temperature?"

You guys have so much ego wrapped up in your positions that you are fundamentally unable to see anything that would make you question your own thinking. You are no longer scientists, but rather advocates. At some point you must see the conflict of interest.

I will not be reading this again and will be deleting the bookmarks.

If a moderator could cancel my account I would appreciate it.

[Torsten]

William wrote:


What is being observed is consistent with a reduction in high level clouds. High level clouds warm the planet via a greenhouse mechanism that reduces the amount of heat that is lost to space.


This is interesting.

Why are there suddenly record cold temperatures? (TK comments: with obligatory cherry picked northern hemisphere weather story)

Okay, given the above, and your penchant for posting weather stories, what I would find far more interesting is your explanation for the temperatures in these charts:

http://i259.photobucket.com/albums/hh315/TKphotofolder/BAUT/th_Arctic_Temperatures_4_weeks_ending_.jpg (http://s259.photobucket.com/albums/hh315/TKphotofolder/BAUT/Arctic_Temperatures_4_weeks_ending_.jpg)Go ahead, click it.

Those are three stations in Canada's far north and high Arctic. A similar temperature pattern over the same period was seen at Kuujjuaq on Ungava Bay in northern Quebec. These stations encompass an area about the size of Greenland.

What's going on here William? Why the high temperatures? Why were some of them records? How do these observations fit your idea? Why don't you write about them? Why didn't you write about last month's warm temperatures across the prairies? Why did you write about the record cold temperatures in BC in early October, but ignore last month's above-average temperatures, or the record high set here on the 5th of November? And what about the record highs in Edmonton last month? Why don't you write about temperatures in Brisbane this spring? What's up?

[mugaliens]

Torsten, William, "suddenly record cold temperatures" and four weeks of data in "three stations in Canada" isn't climate science.

It's weather, which has little to do with long-term climatology. Weather even extends across years, occasionally decades.

[Strange]

Torsten, William, "suddenly record cold temperatures" and four weeks of data in "three stations in Canada" isn't climate science.

It's weather, which has little to do with long-term climatology. Weather even extends across years, occasionally decades.

Looks like up to 80 years of data from Canada (with detail from recent weeks).

[orionjim]

I am totally new to this topic, and am not sure this thread is the right place for this post or not (please don't be shy in saying so, if it isn't).

Can anyone please point me to a post in this thread (or posts) - or, better, provide references - to a review paper (or papers, up to ~10, say) on the body of scientific material which concludes that all the relevant data is consistent with the conclusion that there has been no global warming, over a time period which includes at least all years of the 21st century (for which reliable data are available), and, preferably, over the period from ~1950 to today?

In short, where is the 'no GW' scientific case published?

That's my first question (and no, I don't need pointers to where the 'GW' scientific case is published ... that is extremely easy to find).

My second is related, but different: pointers please (to posts in this thread or references) to a review paper (or papers, up to ~10, say) on the body of scientific material which concludes that all the relevant data is consistent with the conclusion that whatever global warming there is (over a time period which includes at least all years of the 21st century (for which reliable data are available), and, preferably, over the period from ~1950 to today), it is consistent with a hypothesis (in one form or another) that the activities of Homo sapiens have not contributed significantly to it.

The scientific study of the Earth's climate is not a field I am familiar with, so I am hoping that some of the BAUTians who read this thread - and who are familiar with this field - will help to get up to speed.

Also: if anyone who has been paying a lot of attention to this topic is certain that the answer to either (or both) of my questions is "such a review paper does not exist" (or similar), please point that out.

Thanks.
In your original post the answer to your question 1: is there isn't one.

Your second question was answered in 2004 by Naomi Oreskes in this Science Magazine article

http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/306/5702/1686

Note that in her study she dumped papers showing effects of solar, clouds, chance and others into the categories that weren’t the rejection category.

I am not aware of any papers since then that have challenged the AGW theory.


...

Is there a standard definition (or definitions) of global (surface) temperature? If so, what is it (or are they)?
From the IPCC Third Annual Report See:

http://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/glossary/tar-ipcc-terms-en.pdf


Global surface temperature
The global surface temperature is the area-weighted global average of (i) the sea-surface temperature over the oceans (i.e. the subsurface bulk temperature in the first few meters of the ocean), and (ii) the surface-air temperature over land at 1.5 m above the ground.

Note; most of the people that are labeled “deniers” are really skeptics. They are not skeptical of the science or even of most of the scientists, nor are they skeptical of the idea that man might be causing warming. Their skepticism is in the data, the handling of the underlying data and the methods used to present that data.

Finally, the best place I've found for general information on Climate Change is the IPCC reports.


Jim

[jlhredshift]

Well all. I have read all 96 pages of this forum thread and have finally figured out two things:

1. The pro-AGW crowd is unwilling to listen to anything.

2. The anti-AGW crowd is unwilling to listen to anything.

This does not sound like science to me. While I dont have the title scientist, I do have the title Engineer.

All of you are so busy pontification your own view points that you fail to realize that there are other view points out there.

The single largest question I have read over and over is, "What is the long term effect of GHG's?" No one has a convincing argument for that one.

Another large question is, "Exactly how much forcing do individual GHG's provide to the average world temperature?"

You guys have so much ego wrapped up in your positions that you are fundamentally unable to see anything that would make you question your own thinking. You are no longer scientists, but rather advocates. At some point you must see the conflict of interest.

I will not be reading this again and will be deleting the bookmarks.

If a moderator could cancel my account I would appreciate it.

My bold.

Yep!!!

Well, you make a positive contribution and then split.

OK, goodbye.

[SolusLupus]

All of you are so busy pontification your own view points that you fail to realize that there are other view points out there.

The single largest question I have read over and over is, "What is the long term effect of GHG's?" No one has a convincing argument for that one.

Another large question is, "Exactly how much forcing do individual GHG's provide to the average world temperature?"

You guys have so much ego wrapped up in your positions that you are fundamentally unable to see anything that would make you question your own thinking. You are no longer scientists, but rather advocates. At some point you must see the conflict of interest.

I will not be reading this again and will be deleting the bookmarks.

If a moderator could cancel my account I would appreciate it.
I'd make a translation for this post, but I'd just end up with another warning or infraction.

Anyways, bye.

[Torsten]

Looks like up to 80 years of data from Canada (with detail from recent weeks).

I was hoping people wouldn't interpret my previous post as a serious attempt to point out warming. My selected time frame is just recent weather that happened over a large area, though the 80 year period for the extremes is, to use William's word, "interesting". It's probably cold up there again, and likely to remain so for long periods this winter, like last winter. Maybe warmer on average, maybe colder.

Many of the regular participants in this thread have had a go at trying to help William appreciate the difference between weather and climate, and in particular about the absurdity of posting selected references to local stories of extreme weather events that he thinks support his notion of imminent, cataclysmic cold. Those same participants will understand that I am familiar with the difference as well, but they might wonder why I respond to his incessant posting of cold weather stories with charts illustrating the other extreme. Well, hope springs eternal, and maybe, just maybe, by pointing to easily verified concurrent weather information from his own backyard but contrary to his thesis, and challenging him to explain those in light of his ideas (or asking why he ignores them), William might conclude that it's not such a good idea to post weather stories in a climate thread.

I'd just like him to understand the fact that selected local weather stories are not the climate story of the planet, and that they fail to impress because they don't represent any sort of meaningful global average. When he fails to respond or change his methods, he just undermines his credibility.

[mugaliens]

Those same participants will understand that I am familiar with the difference as well, but they might wonder why I respond to his incessant posting of cold weather stories with charts illustrating the other extreme.

I would have responded with charts illustrating the norms, but that's me.


Well, hope springs eternal, and maybe, just maybe, by pointing to easily verified concurrent weather information from his own backyard but contrary to his thesis, and challenging him to explain those in light of his ideas (or asking why he ignores them), William might conclude that it's not such a good idea to post weather stories in a climate thread.

That's a good thought, but by posting similarly extreme charts in the other direction, the perception may simply be that you're both trying to prove your own points, rather than to see/show what the data itself is really saying.

And perhaps, instead of fighting fire with fire, that approach simply adds fuel to the fire.

[Stroller]

even this post I'm writing right now might as well be piped to /dev/null.
It would seem to be the best place for most of it I agree.


"Hey, these guys saw that the extremely poorly understood and barely-functional tree ring proxy data doesn't agree with nice well-engineered thermometers, and they decided that the thermometers are more reliable. I wonder why that is?" Instead you just jump straight to "Did someone I don't like make the decision? Then it must be the wrong decision and potentially has nefarious motivations!"

I know why they did it. They know why they did it. You probably know why they did it, although you seem to be pretending not to, for whatever rhetorical effect you think it has.

Phil Jones even made the spliced data all one colour on the graph and hid the full explanation of the caption in a separate publication.

It would be laughable if it wasn't so sad for science.

[parejkoj]

Stroller:

Have you tried downloading the data and comparing with the published adjustments, like I suggested in this post (http://www.bautforum.com/science-technology/70431-general-agw-discussion-thread-96.html#post1641025)?

Your bluster is wearing very thin...

[William]

William, you really do not know how to read data, I am sorry I have to say that. In that figure 1 there is indeed a "downturn" at year 2000, however, this variation in the upgoing trend is nothing unusual when you compare it with all the data that has gone before. You see a long increase in temperature over the years 300 to 1000 and the variations in that upward trend are the same as what you claim is a cooling of the Earth since 2000. However, the curve shows a gradual increase in temperature since 1600 up to today.

You might want to take some classes in data analysis.

http://www.ncasi.org/publications/Detail.aspx?id=3025

A 2000-year global temperature reconstruction based on non-treering proxies.


Tunenfem,

Perhaps you are looking at a different graph.

This graph shows the Medieval warm period and the Little Ice Age.

The fact that the Medieval warm period and the Little Ice Age occurred is the subject of Climategate.

The data in question is a 2000 year set of non tree ring proxy. It shows planetary temperature went up and then went down and then went up.

I am saying that planetary temperature is now about to go down.

I am interested in the mechanisms which caused planetary temperature to go up and then go down then go up. I did not state that the graph shows the planet is cooling post 2000. You stated that.

I am not sure if we agree or disagree as I am not sure what your point of view is.

[William]

Stroller:

Have you tried downloading the data and comparing with the published adjustments, like I suggested in this post (http://www.bautforum.com/science-technology/70431-general-agw-discussion-thread-96.html#post1641025)?

Your bluster is wearing very thin...


parejkoj,

Someone has already looked into the Climategate issue.

For those do not read scientific papers and listen to the media discussions only, Climategate is the name for a tree ring cherry picking data selection and an algorithm which made the Medieval Warm period and the Little Ice disappear. The reason the cyclic changes were made to disappear is cyclic planetary temperature changes are inconvenient for the AWG argument. Climategate is about the hockey stick graph. The stick is not a stick but rather a cycle of warming and cooling.

Check out figure 1 in this paper. The author provides the data set and explains mathematically how the graph, figure 1 was produced.

http://www.ncasi.org/publications/Detail.aspx?id=3025


A 2000-year global temperature reconstruction based on non-treering proxies.


Historical data provide a baseline for judging how anomalous recent temperature changes are and for assessing the degree to which organisms are likely to be adversely affected by current or future warming. Climate histories are commonly reconstructed from a variety of sources, including ice cores, tree rings, and sediment. Tree-ring data, being the most abundant for recent centuries, tend to dominate reconstructions. There are reasons to believe that tree ring data may not properly capture long-term climate changes. In this study, eighteen 2000-year-long series were obtained that were not based on tree ring data. Data in each series were smoothed with a 30-year running mean.


The overall mean series was then computed by simple averaging. The mean time series shows quite coherent structure. The mean series shows the Medieval Warm Period (MWP) and Little Ice Age (LIA) quite clearly, with the MWP (Medieval Warm Period) being approximately 0.3°C warmer than 20th century values at these eighteen sites.

[mugaliens]

This graph shows the Medieval warm period and the Little Ice Age.

The fact that the Medieval warm period and the Little Ice Age occurred is the subject of Climategate.

The data in question is a 2000 year set of non tree ring proxy. It shows planetary temperature went up and then went down and then went up.

From the link:


Historical data provide a baseline for judging how anomalous recent temperature changes are and for assessing the degree to which organisms are likely to be adversely affected by current or future warming. Climate histories are commonly reconstructed from a variety of sources, including ice cores, tree rings, and sediment. Tree-ring data, being the most abundant for recent centuries, tend to dominate reconstructions. There are reasons to believe that tree ring data may not properly capture long-term climate changes. In this study, eighteen 2000-year-long series were obtained that were not based on tree ring data. Data in each series were smoothed with a 30-year running mean. All data were then converted to anomalies by subtracting the mean of each series from that series. The overall mean series was then computed by simple averaging. The mean time series shows quite coherent structure. The mean series shows the Medieval Warm Period (MWP) and Little Ice Age (LIA) quite clearly, with the MWP being approximately 0.3°C warmer than 20th century values at these eighteen sites.

Unlike many AGW reports I've read, these folks know their statistics (pages 95 and 96 of the linked report, as well).

Their observation:


The corrected data continue to show the Medieval Warm Period (MWP) and Little
Ice Age (LIA) quite clearly. The confidence intervals in Figure 2 indicate that the
MWP was significantly warmer than the bimillennial average during most of
approximately 820 – 1040 AD, at the 5% level (2-tailed). Likewise, the LIA was
significantly cooler than the bimillennial average during most of approximately 1440-
1740 AD.

And their conclusion:


The main significance of the results here is not the details of every wiggle, which
are probably not reliable, but the overall picture of the 2000 year pattern showing the
MWP and LIA timing and curve shapes.

My observation: Since anthropogenic activity certainly didn't cause the MWP, what did? Moreover, why are we jumping on an AGW bandwagon where there exists prima facia evidence that a similar warming trend existed in recent history but long before we ever had the power to produce it?

:hand:


I am saying that planetary temperature is now about to go down.

I think it will sooner or later, with or without our help. Hopefully, we won't spend trillions of dollars on the AGW mirage before we (universally, I mean) figure out what's really going on.

All you AGW folks, enjoy your bandwagon while it lasts. As for me and my clan, we'll continue to fight the erosion of scarce tax dollars wasted on such parasitic endeavors. Don't forget - it's your tax dollars, too. If you're that hard over on throwing money out the window, I have a number of non-profit, non-religious charities in mind which are both very efficient and accomplish a great deal of good around the world.

[lomiller1]

http://www.ncasi.org/publications/Detail.aspx?id=3025

A 2000-year global temperature reconstruction based on non-treering proxies.



Published in a journal of pseudoscience...

[parejkoj]

Unlike many AGW reports I've read, these folks know their statistics (pages 95 and 96 of the linked report, as well).

Apparently they don't know their paleo-reconstructions (http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2007/12/past-reconstructions/)... (note: although I'm linking to realclimate.org, they link to all the original papers used in the Loehle "reconstruction").


Moreover, why are we jumping on an AGW bandwagon where there exists prima facia evidence that a similar warming trend existed in recent history but long before we ever had the power to produce it?

Perhaps you should review the references I gave you and Stroller in this post (http://www.bautforum.com/science-technology/70431-general-agw-discussion-thread-74.html#post1605887), about how we know that CO2 is a greenhouse gas, how we've estimated its radiative forcing, and how this impacts what the future global temperature will be.

[Ari Jokimaki]

Just couple of weeks ago, I explained why Loehle's reconstruction is nonsense (http://www.bautforum.com/1633704-post2556.html); main reasons are that the dataseries has been selected there from the areas where MWP is known to have been strongest, and Loehle then used a reconstruction method that amplifies the effect of areas that have most dataseries, i.e. the areas where MWP was strongest. Result is hugely exaggarated MWP temperatures.

So people accuse climate scientists of all kinds of bad things and then they offer this as something better? And even praise Loehle's methods?

[mugaliens]

Apparently they don't know...

Red herring. Different epoch.


Perhaps you should review the references I gave you..

Perhaps you should review the info Stroller (mostly) and I have given you.


...about how we know that CO2 is a greenhouse gas, how we've estimated its radiative forcing, and how this impacts what the future global temperature will be.

Please graduate, some day, from this over-freshmanic focus on CO2 and begin to realize it's not only not the only factor out there, it's by far not only the most predominant one, but that greehouse gases, all of them, don't even comprise a majority of the global warming effects to date.

Stroller and I are trying to explain dangling participles and all you and others do is keep repeating the ABC's. :doh:

[Trakar]

Please graduate, some day, from this over-freshmanic focus on CO2 and begin to realize it's not only not the only factor out there, it's by far not only the most predominant one, but that greehouse gases, all of them, don't even comprise a majority of the global warming effects to date.

Stroller and I are trying to explain dangling participles and all you and others do is keep repeating the ABC's. :doh:

Please cite the mainstream peer-reviewed science that supports this assertion, or alternatively pose it in the appropraite other than mainstream science section where it can be appropriately examined and discussed.

[mugaliens]

Please cite the mainstream peer-reviewed science that supports this assertion...

You continued, repeated, and unsubstantiated request for references in no way diminishes the fact they've been provided repeatedly throughout the several thousand posts of this thread.

Need glasses?

[tusenfem]

http://www.ncasi.org/publications/Detail.aspx?id=3025

A 2000-year global temperature reconstruction based on non-treering proxies.


Tunenfem,

Perhaps you are looking at a different graph.


tusenfem thank you.
I looked at Fig. 1 as you told nauthiz (http://www.bautforum.com/science-technology/70431-general-agw-discussion-thread-97.html#post1641261), so unless there is another figure 1 in that paper you linked to, then NO I am not looking at another graph.

To be sure, this is what the caption says: Figure 1. Mean of temperature data for 18 series. Data archived at link.



This graph shows the Medieval warm period and the Little Ice Age.


The graph shows temperature variations over the last 2000 years.

YOU are claiming that the Earth is cooling, by looking at the last drop in the curve at 2000.

I claim that that drop is statistically insignificant, when one looks at the whole 2000 year curve (reread it in my message).



The fact that the Medieval warm period and the Little Ice Age occurred is the subject of Climategate.

The data in question is a 2000 year set of non tree ring proxy. It shows planetary temperature went up and then went down and then went up.

I am saying that planetary temperature is now about to go down.


No need to link to the "climategate" how about looking at the "Williamgate," i.e. the drawing of conclusions that are totally unsubstantiated by the so-called "evidence" that is delivered.

YOU see the curve go down after 2000, however, unless you wait another decades, you cannot draw ANY conclusions of those few years, as the variation it shows is not uncommon, actually it is normal, over the whole 2000 year period. REREAD my post and try to understand it.

I am interested in the mechanisms which caused planetary temperature to go up and then go down then go up. I did not state that the graph shows the planet is cooling post 2000. You stated that.



I am not sure if we agree or disagree as I am not sure what your point of view is.

Then apparently you cannot read. YOU claim the Earth is cooling based on the last little part of the 2000 year curve. I claim that that variation is statistically insignificant in that 2000 year curve and there it shows clearly a warming trend.

I am not here to defend or attack global warming, beit A or non-A. I am here to attack pseudoscience like you are presenting here in this thread (and many other threads) and others who do that. This is supposed to be a sort of scientific board especially in the section called "Science and Technology" and thus I may expect from the peeps discussing here that they at least know how to do a little bit of basic science.

[Swift]

Please graduate, some day, from this over-freshmanic focus on CO2 and begin to realize it's not only not the only factor out there, it's by far not only the most predominant one, but that greehouse gases, all of them, don't even comprise a majority of the global warming effects to date.

Stroller and I are trying to explain dangling participles and all you and others do is keep repeating the ABC's. :doh:
This is inappropriate and borderline insulting. Stop it.

[William]

tusenfem thank you.
I looked at Fig. 1 as you told nauthiz (http://www.bautforum.com/science-technology/70431-general-agw-discussion-thread-97.html#post1641261), so unless there is another figure 1 in that paper you linked to, then NO I am not looking at another graph.

To be sure, this is what the caption says: Figure 1. Mean of temperature data for 18 series. Data archived at link.


The graph shows temperature variations over the last 2000 years.

I am interested in the mechanisms which caused planetary temperature to go up and then go down then go up. I did not state that the graph shows the planet is cooling post 2000. You stated that.


Then apparently you cannot read. YOU claim the Earth is cooling based on the last little part of the 2000 year curve. I claim that that variation is statistically insignificant in that 2000 year curve and there it shows clearly a warming trend.



A 2000-year global temperature reconstruction based on non-treering proxies.

http://www.ncasi.org/publications/Detail.aspx?id=3025

tusenfem,

I did not state the planet will cool based on a slight drop of the planetary temperature, post 2000 in the curve in the paper "A 2000-year global temperature reconstruction based on non-treering proxies". We are in agreement that the slight in planetary temperature post 2000 drop is not statically significant.

You are misquoting me. (You are in fact not quoting me at all. You are making a statement which is yours not mine.)

This is the second time you have made that statement and the second time I have responded with that is not my point. You appear to be misquoting me.

There is no logical reason to do so. Look at the logic of what I am saying which is separate from the person that is presenting the logic.

This is the logic.

The figure 1 graph in "A 2000-year global temperature reconstruction based on non-treering proxies" shows how planetary temperature changed over the last 2000 years.

The figure 1 graph when up (Medieval Warm Period), then when down (Little Ice Age), and then went up (20th century warming). Planetary temperature changed for a reason. The Medieval Warm period and the Little Ice Age occurred for a reason.

I did not say the slight dip in the proxies post 2000 is evidence the planet is cooling.

What I did say is there is past correlation of planetary temperature with variance in cosmogenic isotopes (less when the planet was warm and more when the planet was cool).

There are roughly 200 papers published concerning the mechanisms.

Now as the sun is currently in a deep solar magnetic minimum I am stating based on my understanding of the mechanisms and past correlation the planet will cool.

Has it? There is some evidence of cooling, we must however wait for more data to prove or disprove the set of competing mechanisms.

Comments
The figure 1 graph in the "A 2000-year global temperature reconstruction based on non-treering proxies." shows there was a Medieval Warm Period and a Little Ice Age which matches a famous graph William Connelly produced which was included in the IPCC issued AR3.

The Hockey stick graph replaced William Connelly's AR3 graph in AR4.

The Hockey stick analysis by selecting a small selection of tree data and a special algorithm which the authors would not make public, made the Medieval Warm Period and the little ice go disappear. The Hockey Stick authors refused to supply the data used for their paper or the algorithm which removes curves in data.

The Hockey Stick graph is shaped like a hockey stick.

In reality there was a Medieval warm period and there was a Little Ice age.

[nauthiz]

All you AGW folks, enjoy your bandwagon while it lasts. As for me and my clan, we'll continue to fight the erosion of scarce tax dollars wasted on such parasitic endeavors. Don't forget - it's your tax dollars, too. If you're that hard over on throwing money out the window, I have a number of non-profit, non-religious charities in mind which are both very efficient and accomplish a great deal of good around the world.

I, for one, vote we try to stay away from political soapboxing.

[Swift]

All you AGW folks, enjoy your bandwagon while it lasts. As for me and my clan, we'll continue to fight the erosion of scarce tax dollars wasted on such parasitic endeavors. Don't forget - it's your tax dollars, too. If you're that hard over on throwing money out the window, I have a number of non-profit, non-religious charities in mind which are both very efficient and accomplish a great deal of good around the world.
I'll make it official. Keep the politics out of this thread. I need little excuse to close this thread and/or give out some infractions.

And if people see questionable posts, please do not take moderation into your own hands. Report the post.

[Trakar]

http://www.ncasi.org/publications/Detail.aspx?id=3025

Perhaps you are looking at a different graph.

This graph shows the Medieval warm period and the Little Ice Age.

The fact that the Medieval warm period and the Little Ice Age occurred is the subject of Climategate.


Regardless, with respect to the MO and LIA:

http://www.nature.com/climate/2010/1001/full/climate.2010.128.html (http://www.nature.com/climate/2010/1001/full/climate.2010.128.html)

[nauthiz]

And if people see questionable posts, please do not take moderation into your own hands. Report the post.

Sorry. I wasn't even thinking of it in terms of rules, so much as intending to say "that's beside the point."

[Trakar]

You continued, repeated, and unsubstantiated request for references in no way diminishes the fact they've been provided repeatedly throughout the several thousand posts of this thread.

Need glasses?

Noting that peer-reviewed mainstream science articles have been cited, does not correlate with peer-reviewed mainstream science that specifically supports this particular assertion. Please point out the specific mainstream science publications which support:



Please graduate, some day, from this over-freshmanic focus on CO2 and begin to realize it's not only not the only factor out there, it's by far not only the most predominant one, but that greehouse gases, all of them, don't even comprise a majority of the global warming effects to date.

[nauthiz]

The Hockey stick graph replaced William Connelly's AR3 graph in AR4.

The Hockey stick analysis by selecting a small selection of tree data and a special algorithm which the authors would not make public, made the Medieval Warm Period and the little ice go disappear. The Hockey Stick authors refused to supply the data used for their paper or the algorithm which removes curves in data.

The Hockey Stick graph is shaped like a hockey stick.

In reality there was a Medieval warm period and there was a Little Ice age.

AR3 is the report that lended prominence to the hockey stick paper. AR4 also spends a lot of time of it, but it's a mea culpa. It spends most the time discussing the paper's shortcomings and discussing how our knowledge has improved.. In fact, I'd go so far as to say it did a much more cogent job of enumerating its failures than anything I've seen in this thread.

There's also quite a lot of time spent on discussing the Medieval warm period and the little ice age. These are well-known and often-studied events.

I don't think you're likely to overturn mainstream climatology by telling people things they already know.

I mean, Mann agreed that his paper was erroneous years ago. When a paper's lead author issues a retraction, you can normally assume the subject is pretty much dead. Continuing to harp on it as if the paper's errors and inadequacies are exciting new news after that point is a borderline farcical endeavor. And that point was years ago.

[nauthiz]

Noting that peer-reviewed mainstream science articles have been cited, does not correlate with peer-reviewed mainstream science that specifically supports this particular assertion. Please point out the specific mainstream science publications which support:

Well, it's pretty common knowledge that H2O, for example, produces a much stronger forcing.

I think the big thing that Mugaliens fails to understand is that the attention on CO2 isn't based on the belief that it's the only factor that influences climate, but because it's the greenhouse gas on which humans have the strongest direct influence.

[Trakar]

Well, it's pretty common knowledge that H2O, for example, produces a much stronger forcing.

Its really hard to qualify water (at least at the current baseline temperature range environment) as a true climate forcing factor. Its persistence is simply too short. If we were in an environment where the global temp averages were much closer to 100C then, yes, water becomes a much more important positive forcing factor of high importance. As we are currently hovering much closer to 0C, however, it is solid water's (snow and ice) rapidly diminishing negative forcing that is much more important to climate issues than its minor amplification of other issues due to the atmospheric vapor content.


I think the big thing that Mugaliens fails to understand is that the attention on CO2 isn't based on the belief that it's the only factor that influences climate, but because it's the greenhouse gas on which humans have the strongest direct influence.

I really am not qualified to judge what Mugaliens knows or doesn't know. I simply want him to support his assertions with mainstream science. There definitely is a range of consideration and understanding within the mainstream scientific perspective, but this assertion in particular seems to be well outside of that range and I was hoping to understand if this perception was the result of my misunderstanding what he had intended in his statement, or if perhaps he was reading items into his interpretation of the science.

[nauthiz]

Its really hard to qualify water (at least at the current baseline temperature range environment) as a true climate forcing factor.

Fair enough, but it still seems reasonable to call it the predominant greenhouse gas in that it seems to be the source of half (give or take something like 20%, right?) of the total greenhouse effect. Carbon dioxide might be in 2nd place, but it's producing less than 25% of the total effect.

[parejkoj]

Please graduate, some day, from this over-freshmanic focus on CO2 and begin to realize it's not only not the only factor out there, it's by far not only the most predominant one, but that greehouse gases, all of them, don't even comprise a majority of the global warming effects to date.

Stroller and I are trying to explain dangling participles and all you and others do is keep repeating the ABC's. :doh:

I focus on what you call the "ABC's" because it seems that many people in this thread do not know them. So, just to be clear, I'm going to ask you the same questions I asked Stroller earlier in the thread (http://www.bautforum.com/science-technology/70431-general-agw-discussion-thread-68.html#post1595065). Please note that I'm not interested in talking about solar forcing, water vapor (except as it relates to feedback), emissions reductions, political maneuvering or weather right now. I just want your answers to these very fundamental climate science questions. The "ABC's" as it were.

1. Do you consider CO2 to be a greenhouse gas? If not, what evidence do you have to disprove the past ~150 years of molecular physics? (For the record: from Stroller's non-answers to this question, it appears that he does not think that CO2 is a greenhouse gas, but has provided no evidence to back up this claim.)

2. If you think CO2 is a greenhouse gas, what do you think is the correct value of the climate forcing (in W/m2) for a doubling of atmospheric CO2, and why do you think that is the correct value? Citations to the peer reviewed literature would be helpful here.

3. Given your answer to question 2, what do you think the present global temperature anomaly should be, given the ~35% increase in atmospheric CO2 (from ~280 to ~380 ppmv) since the mid 1800s?

[HenrikOlsen]

You'll have to wait at least a week for any answer, since Mugaliens is taking an enforced break from the board.

[Swift]

I really am not qualified to judge what Mugaliens knows or doesn't know.
A very sound statement. Everyone - please stop making explicit or implied judgments of what other members know or don't know.

[lomiller1]

Well, it's pretty common knowledge that H2O, for example, produces a much stronger forcing.


Actually H2O provides almost no forcing due to it's short lifespan in the atmosphere

[Trakar]

Fair enough, but it still seems reasonable to call it the predominant greenhouse gas in that it seems to be the source of half (give or take something like 20%, right?) of the total greenhouse effect. Carbon dioxide might be in 2nd place, but it's producing less than 25% of the total effect.

Ah, put like this your statement is much clearer and more correct. There is a big difference, however, between talking about water being a factor in the greenhouse effects of our atmosphere, and talking about water being a climate "forcing" in the current climate change episode. The difference between "factor" and "forcing" may not seem significant, but they have very different meanings and connotations.

CO2 might be a lower level factor in the atmosphere's greenhouse effect, but it is the primary forcing in the current climate change providing from 50% of the forcing in the early part of the last century, to providing ~80% of the current forcing (IIRC).

When it comes to water, as both lomiller and I mentioned above, under the current environmental situation, water vapor simply doesn't stay in the atmosphere long enough to providing more than minor local and transient temperature forcing. If this isn't clear, I'm sure a more detailed explanation can be laid out (or undoubtably linked from somewhere earlier in this thread! <grin>).

With respect to climate, "forcings" are processes and factors which generate and drive a sustained change in the climate system when they are changed (ie., changes in solar input, changes in atmospheric composition, albedo changes, continental positioning differences, etc.,).

[Stroller]

Actually H2O provides almost no forcing due to it's short lifespan in the atmosphere

Can you think of any time in the last 3500M years when there was any shortage of water vapour in the atmosphere? The ability of a gas to 'force' the climate has nothing to do with it's residency period and everything to do with how much of it there is at any one time. Since the hydrological cycle never goes on holiday, you can take it as read that water vapour is doing it's stuff continuously.

[Trakar]

Can you think of any time in the last 3500M years when there was any shortage of water vapour in the atmosphere? The ability of a gas to 'force' the climate has nothing to do with it's residency period and everything to do with how much of it there is at any one time. Since the hydrological cycle never goes on holiday, you can take it as read that water vapour is doing it's stuff continuously.

This is an inappropriate use of the term "force" with respect to climate issues.

Water vapor is a greenhouse gas and a factor in the Earth atmosphere's greenhouse effect, but it is not a forcing factor in climate change in the current environment. Water vapor is a feedback effect, but it is related to the overall average temperature and cannot act as a forcing factor until that overall average temperature approaches much closer to the boiling point of water. Until much higher average temperatures are reached, any water vapor above the current Vp (which is determined mostly by temperature and pressure) will precipitate out of the atmosphere within a matter of days at the most, and cannot sustain a feedback loop of escalation which would be neccessary for it to act as a climate forcing factor.

[Stroller]

cannot sustain a feedback loop of escalation which would be neccessary for it to act as a climate forcing factor.

I think that in conjunction with a latitudinal shift of the jet streams, it can act as a negative or positive feedback on the climate in response to other changes in the atmosphere and the incoming radiation, solar windspeed, and other external variables.

Because there is always so much more water vapour than co2 in the atmosphere, it will swamp any effects the latter may have.

Are you aware of work done in the area of atmospheric water vapour, the hydrological cycle, and it's long term changes? It seems to me far too little attention has been paid to this major player in the climate system.

[William]

Edmonton, Alberta sets a record cold temperature of -51F today. That is the coldest temperature every recorded in Edmonton for the month of December and within 4F of the coldest temperature every recorded in Edmonton (The month of January is typically colder). Note the coldest temperature every record in Edmonton was set in January, 1972.

The weather which is occurring in both North America and Europe matches what occurred in the 1970s. As I said I am expecting 1880's cold however that may occur winter 2010/11 rather than 2009/10.

As I said high GCR reduces the formation of high altitude clouds and increase the formation of low level clouds. High altitude clouds warm the planet via a greenhouse mechanism particularly at night.

Record cold temperatures require a change in the mechanisms.

The temperatures in the below quote are in Fahrenheit. -40F is the same as -40C.

I see more extreme cold weather forecast for the US and Europe.

http://www.accuweather.com/world-index-news.asp?partner=forecastbar&traveler=0



Even by hardy Canadian standards, it is cold. The low temperature in Edmonton dropped to 51 degrees below zero. This is the coldest temperature ever measured during the month of December. The low at Edmonton Sunday morning was only a few degrees shy of the all-time record low temperature of 55 degrees below zero set Jan. 26, 1972. High temperatures were extremely cold Saturday. The afternoon high in Edmonton Saturday was only 22 degrees below zero. High temperatures across northern Alberta and in the northern Territories were 25 to 30 degrees below zero

[Trakar]

I think that in conjunction with a latitudinal shift of the jet streams, it can act as a negative or positive feedback on the climate in response to other changes in the atmosphere and the incoming radiation, solar windspeed, and other external variables.

Because there is always so much more water vapour than co2 in the atmosphere, it will swamp any effects the latter may have.

Are you aware of work done in the area of atmospheric water vapour, the hydrological cycle, and it's long term changes? It seems to me far too little attention has been paid to this major player in the climate system.

Please support any of these broad, sweeping, and generally incorrect to my understandings of the involved sciences, assertions with mainstream scientific citations.

[Trakar]

Edmonton, Alberta sets a record cold temperature of -51F today. That is the coldest temperature every recorded in Edmonton for the month of December and within 4F of the coldest temperature every recorded in Edmonton (The month of January is typically colder). Note the coldest temperature every record in Edmonton was set in January, 1972.

The weather which is occurring in both North America and Europe matches what occurred in the 1970s. As I said I am expecting 1880's cold however that may occur winter 2010/11 rather than 2009/10.

As I said high GCR reduces the formation of high altitude clouds and increase the formation of low level clouds. High altitude clouds warm the planet via a greenhouse mechanism particularly at night.

Record cold temperatures require a change in the mechanisms.

The temperatures in the below quote are in Fahrenheit. -40F is the same as -40C.

I see more extreme cold weather forecast for the US and Europe.

http://www.accuweather.com/world-index-news.asp?partner=forecastbar&traveler=0


And yet globally, we are facing a year that has been either the 5th or 2nd warmest on record ever, and all indications are that next year will sweep past 1998/2005 (which was the hottest on record, depending upon whether you adhere to Nasa or Hadley)

[William]

And yet globally, we are facing a year that has been either the 5th or 2nd warmest on record ever, and all indications are that next year will sweep past 1998/2005 (which was the hottest on record, depending upon whether you adhere to Nasa or Hadley)

No problem Trakar. October was the coldest October in the US in 113 years. The planet is cooling. The data over the next months will support that assertion.

This is of course a El Nino year.

There does seem to be some problem with GISS temperature measurement. I am sure they will solve that problem shortly.

[William]

August, 2009 Prediction

http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/20090804/el_nino_090804/20090804


El Nino, the precocious weather system with the cute name, is back, meteorologists say, which means that after a summer of record low temperatures, much of Canada may experience warmer days just in time for Christmas.
According to a report issued Monday by the Climate Prediction Center, an agency of the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, El Nino conditions "are present across the equatorial Pacific Ocean."

Sea surface temperatures are currently between 0.5 and 1.5 degrees Celsius warmer than usual across the equatorial Pacific Ocean, which can have a dramatic impact on air currents and affect weather worldwide.

"Current observations and dynamical model forecasts indicate El Nino conditions will continue to intensify and are expected to last through Northern Hemisphere winter 2009-10," the report says.

http://www.accuweather.com/world-index-news.asp?partner=forecastbar&traveler=0

Somewhat Colder than Predicted. Green Christmas?


Even by hardy Canadian standards, it is cold. The low temperature in Edmonton dropped to 51 degrees below zero. This is the coldest temperature ever measured during the month of December. The low at Edmonton Sunday morning was only a few degrees shy of the all-time record low temperature of 55 degrees below zero set Jan. 26, 1972. High temperatures were extremely cold Saturday. The afternoon high in Edmonton Saturday was only 22 degrees below zero.

[nauthiz]

No problem Trakar. October was the coldest October in the US in 113 years. The planet is cooling. The data over the next months will support that assertion.

October was indeed cold but it is not representative of the season: Overall the autumn came in at about the 25th percentile - i.e., one of the warmer ones the US has seen. In fact, that cold October was immediately followed by the 3rd warmest November on record.

source (http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/?report=national)

[Torsten]

October was the coldest October in the US in 113 years.

As for the rest of the planet: "The combined global land and ocean surface temperature for October 2009 was the sixth warmest on record (http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/?report=global&year=2009&month=10&submitted=Get+Report)."

Hmm, while I'm at it: "This was the second warmest September on record (http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/?report=global&year=2009&month=9&submitted=Get+Report), behind 2005, and the 33rd consecutive September with a global temperature above the 20th Century average. The last below-average September occurred in 1976."

A report for November was not yet available at the time of this post.

Regarding your linked August 4th CTV story, you of course failed to note that the "prediction" was not one made by meteorologists. The bit about Christmas seems to be speculation by the story's author, designed to get the reader's attention. The article quotes two meteorologists:



"According to L'Heureux, it is too early to predict the severity of this El Nino system.

"We do believe that it will continue to be weak-to-moderate strength through the fall," L'Heureux said. "Then at this point our forecast is anything is possible thereafter."

Phillips said he, too, cannot predict El Nino's exact impact on Canada's winter weather.

The system is still developing, and its severity will depend on both how warm the water gets and the surface area that warm water covers, he said.

Why did you leave that out?

This page (http://text.weatheroffice.gc.ca/saisons/charts_e.html?season=son&year=2009&type=t) shows what Environment Canada forecast for autumn temperatures, and what actually happened.

And yes William, about that -46C in Edmonton, it is just weather. Stations north of there (like the ones I recently charted) are warmer than Edmonton. That should make you think about the movements of large air masses.

So how about this for a novel idea William? Before posting these weather stories, check a weather map. Go to the Environment Canada website and snoop around to see what is happening elsewhere in this country, and what the history for those places has been.


The planet is cooling. The data over the next months will support that assertion.

And will your "data" once again consist of weather stories culled from the news services?

[Jetlack]

Funny how when temperatures hit record lows, blizzards, across North America its called "weather", but record highs, heatwaves or floods are "climate change".

[tusenfem]

No problem Trakar. October was the coldest October in the US in 113 years. The planet is cooling. The data over the next months will support that assertion.

This is of course a El Nino year.

There does seem to be some problem with GISS temperature measurement. I am sure they will solve that problem shortly.

Acutally, November was one of the warmest Novembers ever here in Austria, seems like the world is warming up. If you can read German look here (http://kurier.at/nachrichten/1956544.php). Only 1926 was warmer in November.

Stop confusing weather with climate!

[tusenfem]

Funny how when temperatures hit record lows, blizzards, across North America its called "weather", but record highs, heatwaves or floods are "climate change".

Nope, you are wrong here, climate change (or global warming if you don't like) can cause BOTH hot spells and cold spells in local areas due to changes in circulation etc. etc. Just one hot or cold summer does not mean a thing. However, it is William who continuously keeps on mistaking local weather phenomena for climate.

[Ari Jokimaki]

Because there is always so much more water vapour than co2 in the atmosphere, it will swamp any effects the latter may have.
As you have already been shown (one example here (http://www.bautforum.com/1625433-post2351.html)) the research that shows how CO2 indeed has measurable effects, it is now time that you give us the scientific body of evidence that shows how water vapour swamps CO2 effects. You have presented this as a fact so you should have no trouble to give us the peer-reviewed references that prove your claim to be true.


Are you aware of work done in the area of atmospheric water vapour, the hydrological cycle, and it's long term changes? It seems to me far too little attention has been paid to this major player in the climate system.
There is a huge amount of research on water vapor. Here is for example Dessler et al. (2008) (http://geotest.tamu.edu/userfiles/229/Dessler_et_al_2008b.pdf): "The water-vapor feedback implied by these observations is strongly positive, with an average magnitude of [lambda]q = 2.04 W/m2/K, similar to that simulated by climate models." These have been shown to you before, more than once (one example here (http://www.bautforum.com/1625433-post2351.html) and here's another (http://www.bautforum.com/1597029-post2076.html)).

If you still think that this issue has not been studied enough, here's Google Scholar search results for search words "water", "vapor", and "infrared" (http://scholar.google.fi/scholar?q=water+vapor+infrared&hl=fi) for you. As you see, there's more than 450,000 papers for you to study, well perhaps not all of them are exactly on the subject at hand, but there's plenty of relevant research out there. Already the first search result seems interesting, "Infrared continuum absorption by atmospheric water vapor in the 8-12 um window" - Roberts et al. (1976) (http://www.dtic.mil/cgi-bin/GetTRDoc?AD=ADA025377&Location=U2&doc=GetTRDoc.pdf).

[Strange]

This is an inappropriate use of the term "force" with respect to climate issues.

Water vapor is a greenhouse gas and a factor in the Earth atmosphere's greenhouse effect, but it is not a forcing factor in climate change in the current environment. Water vapor is a feedback effect, but it is related to the overall average temperature and cannot act as a forcing factor until that overall average temperature approaches much closer to the boiling point of water. Until much higher average temperatures are reached, any water vapor above the current Vp (which is determined mostly by temperature and pressure) will precipitate out of the atmosphere within a matter of days at the most, and cannot sustain a feedback loop of escalation which would be neccessary for it to act as a climate forcing factor.

I am not completely sure I understood this.

Is the point that, yes water is a greenhouse gas but its concentration is roughly constant (because of its short lifetime in the atmosphere)? In other words, if you pump extra CO2 into the atmosphere ever day, the concentration will gradually increase because it sticks around. But if you pump extra water vapour into the atmosphere every day, it will precipitate out roughly as fast as you pump it in? (all other things being equal)

The conclusion being that they both have an effect on climate (temperature of the planet) but you can only change climate with CO2, not with H2O?

[Trakar]

No problem Trakar. October was the coldest October in the US in 113 years. The planet is cooling. The data over the next months will support that assertion.

This is of course a El Nino year.

There does seem to be some problem with GISS temperature measurement. I am sure they will solve that problem shortly.

First, the US is not the World. Second, exactly how are you qualifying "the US". Third, got reference? There is no problem with the GISS temperature measurement that I am aware of, but please do feel free to present your evidence in support of that assertion.

Looking at this graph from NOAA,

http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/get-file.php?report=national&image=timeseries02&byear=2009&bmonth=10&year=2009&month=10&ext=gif&id=110-00

it looks like it was colder in October of 1975, Oct. of 1925, and Oct. of 1915. A one month or even one year cold snap in one relatively small section of the globe in a year where the averages set new record highs, does not indicate global cooling by any reasonable consideration of the issue.

NOAA: 2009 Global Temperatures Well Above Average; Slightly Above-Average for U.S. (http://www.noaanews.noaa.gov/stories2009/20091208_globalstats.html)


Global Temperature and Precipitation Highlights:

Global land and ocean annual surface temperatures through October are the fifth warmest on record, at 1.01 degrees F above the long-term average.

NOAA scientists project 2009 will be one of the 10 warmest years of the global surface temperature record, and likely finish as the fourth, fifth or sixth warmest year on record.

The 2000 – 2009 decade will be the warmest on record, with its average global surface temperature about 0.96 degree F above the 20th century average. This will easily surpass the 1990s value of 0.65 degree F.

Ocean surface temperatures (through October) were the sixth warmest on record, at 0.85 degree F above the 20th century average.

Land surface temperatures through October were the fifth warmest on record, at 1.44 degree F above the 20th century average.

Arctic sea ice extent reached its third smallest annual minimum on record behind 2007 and 2008. The past five years have produced the lowest sea ice extents on record.

[Jetlack]

Nope, you are wrong here, climate change (or global warming if you don't like) can cause BOTH hot spells and cold spells in local areas due to changes in circulation etc. etc. Just one hot or cold summer does not mean a thing. However, it is William who continuously keeps on mistaking local weather phenomena for climate.

Thats interesting because one doesnt hear the media blame global warming or climate change when there are record lows, and blizzards.

My point is that there is a double standard in the reporting of freak weather events. If its cold its just the way it is, but if its more hot than usual then it immediately gets blamed on agw.

[Trakar]

I am not completely sure I understood this.

Is the point that, yes water is a greenhouse gas but its concentration is roughly constant (because of its short lifetime in the atmosphere)? In other words, if you pump extra CO2 into the atmosphere ever day, the concentration will gradually increase because it sticks around. But if you pump extra water vapour into the atmosphere every day, it will precipitate out roughly as fast as you pump it in? (all other things being equal)

The conclusion being that they both have an effect on climate (temperature of the planet) but you can only change climate with CO2, not with H2O?

This is very roughly correct, not to say that there are no conditions where atmospheric water vapor can act as a climate forcing agent, but not under the present general environmental conditions.

[Trakar]

Thats interesting because one doesnt hear the media blame global warming or climate change when there are record lows, and blizzards.


You trying to claim that the media isn't very scientifically accurate, logical or factually correct in its presentation of climate issues?!?!?!

Say it isn't so!!!

:lol:

[Stroller]

This is very roughly correct, not to say that there are no conditions where atmospheric water vapor can act as a climate forcing agent, but not under the present general environmental conditions.

However, this is not to say that water vapour couldn't act as an amplifying mechanism for other climate forcing agents. AGW proponents believe raised co2 caused by higher temperatures could lead to a positive feedback from increased water vapour. Nir Shaviv has shown that there is a feedback mechanism amplifying solar variation's effect on global temperatures, and that the most likely candidate is another form of water vapour - clouds.

Clouds are notoriously difficult to measure both in terms of extent of cover and strength - even sign - of feedback, but indications are that they can change on multi-decadal scales and have a hand in climate variation. This is why climate model projections have large uncertainties, no-one can yet model clouds down to the resolution needed to account for their effect.

The IPCC cheerfully admits this in the small print of their report, but then goes on to say in the policy makers summary that they are 90% certain co2 has a ~1.7W/m^2 forcing on the climate...

[Ivan Viehoff]

No problem Trakar. October was the coldest October in the US in 113 years. The planet is cooling. The data over the next months will support that assertion.
So you haven't actually got the data to support your assertion, you are just guessing.

New local daily record low temperatures from time to time are a statistical inevitability, even with quite a bit more average warming. What we can see is that local daily record high temperatures are being set at twice the rate of record daily low temperatures in the USA over the last decade.

http://www.ucar.edu/news/releases/2009/maxmin.jsp

Meanwhile, scientists working on the earth's energy budget seem to think there is a 0.9 W/m2 excess of heat in over heat out, but they can't quite work out for sure where the earth is stashing all this heat. If it is going into the deep ocean, where we have little data, then what will be the consequences of that?

http://ams.allenpress.com/perlserv/?request=get-abstract&doi=10.1175%2F2008BAMS2634.1&ct=1

[Stroller]

Meanwhile, scientists working on the earth's energy budget seem to think there is a 0.9 W/m2 excess of heat in over heat out, but they can't quite work out for sure where the earth is stashing all this heat. If it is going into the deep ocean, where we have little data, then what will be the consequences of that?

http://ams.allenpress.com/perlserv/?request=get-abstract&doi=10.1175%2F2008BAMS2634.1&ct=1

Interesting. So this extra 'heat in' is coming from the sun presumably?

I did some calculations a while back which showed that to account for the 25mm of sea level rise between 1993-2003 attributable to thermal expansion, the Earth's oceans absorbed an extra 14x10^23J or so, roughly equivalent to a 4W/m^2 forcing. That would have to be due to reduced cloud mostly, since the sun doesn't vary that much and co2 ain't strong enough. This means that a lot of the increase in global temperature during that decade at least was due to natural climate change - not human emitted co2.

From the abstract:

A lack of closure in the energy balance at the surface is accommodated by making modest changes to surface fluxes, with the downward longwave radiation as the main residual to ensure a balance.

According to the Southampton Oceanography team, the 'lack of closure in the energy balance' amounts to around 30W/m^2

No wonder Kevin Trenberth laments the "travesty" of our "inability to account for current cooling".

And it should be noted that his choice of "downward longwave radiation as the main residual to ensure a balance" is entirely arbitrary.

I have another candidate. :)

[nauthiz]

Funny how when temperatures hit record lows, blizzards, across North America its called "weather", but record highs, heatwaves or floods are "climate change".

Generally only by people who don't really understand the topic. Personally, in real life I have a habit of correcting friends when they assume that unseasonably warm weather is because of global warming.

[SolusLupus]

Funny how when temperatures hit record lows, blizzards, across North America its called "weather", but record highs, heatwaves or floods are "climate change".

Strawmen: So much easier to fight.

Understanding is so much harder.

[Trakar]

However, this is not to say that water vapour couldn't act as an amplifying mechanism for other climate forcing agents.


Rather, quite the opposite, atmospheric water vapor, as a primary greenhouse gas, whose concentration (and persistence) in the terrestrial atmosphere is almost entirely dependent upon temperature and pressure (Jr. High Chemistry Combined Gas Law anyone?), is always an amplifier of any forcing agent that drives up atmospheric temperature.



AGW proponents believe raised co2 caused by higher temperatures could lead to a positive feedback from increased water vapour.


Cite or Reference?
Doesn't sound like anything I've ever heard any peer-reviewed topically relevent, mainstream science paper or knowledgable proponent say.



Nir Shaviv has shown that there is a feedback mechanism amplifying solar variation's effect on global temperatures, and that the most likely candidate is another form of water vapour - clouds.


Nir Shaviv has asserted, and yet failed to adequately support his against the mainstream scientific perspective in regards to climate and climate change.

Rahmstorf, S., D. Archer, D.S. Ebel, O. Eugster, J. Jouzel, D. Maraun, G.A. Schmidt, J. Severinghaus, A.J. Weaver, and J. Zachos, 2004: Cosmic rays, carbon dioxide, and climate. Eos Trans. Amer. Geophys. Union, 85, 38, 41.
http://pubs.giss.nasa.gov/docs/2004/2004_Rahmstorf_etal.pdf


Please stick to mainstream scientific perspectives and support your assertions with references to such works,...or propose your against the mainstream perspectives in the appropriate forum.

[JESMKS]

I was told many years ago that the temperature of groundwater in watertable aquifers generally approximates the mean annual air temperature of the overlying area. If this is true, wouldn't the annual or biannual monitoring of groundwater temperature provide a useful tool in monitoring changes in the earth's temperature?

[lomiller1]

Can you think of any time in the last 3500M years when there was any shortage of water vapour in the atmosphere? The ability of a gas to 'force' the climate has nothing to do with it's residency period and everything to do with how much of it there is at any one time. Since the hydrological cycle never goes on holiday, you can take it as read that water vapour is doing it's stuff continuously.

Forcing has a very specific meaning and you are not using it correctly. A forcing is an outside effect that forces a parameter within the system to some other value. The will, in turn, change the system’s attractor and therefore it’s behavior.

If you try and change the amount of water vapor in the atmosphere it will revert back to it’s original state in very short order. When the water vapor is gone any effect it had one the system is gone as well, therefore emitting water vapor cannot change the system output.

[lomiller1]

Somewhat Colder than Predicted. Green Christmas?

It was very close. The Canadian Prairies didn’t have any winter weather until December. I was still cycling to work in shorts in late November because temperatures were 5-10 deg above normal for most of the month. This current cold snap is the first sign of winter weather and it’s the latest freeze up on record.

[nauthiz]

Can you think of any time in the last 3500M years when there was any shortage of water vapour in the atmosphere? The ability of a gas to 'force' the climate has nothing to do with it's residency period and everything to do with how much of it there is at any one time. Since the hydrological cycle never goes on holiday, you can take it as read that water vapour is doing it's stuff continuously.

You're making the same mistake in terminology that I did and was recently corrected on in detail. lolmiller1 is right; water vapor does have the ability to act as a forcing, but under current conditions it's not much of one and primarily acts as a feedback mechanism.

[lomiller1]

You're making the same mistake in terminology that I did and was recently corrected on in detail. lolmiller1 is right; water vapor does have the ability to act as a forcing, but under current conditions it's not much of one and primarily acts as a feedback mechanism.

Any forcing effect would be indistinguishable from zero. Assuming a similar sensitivity as CO2, to get ~3 deg or warming you would need to create enough water vapor to permanently double the amount of H2O in the atmosphere across the whole globe. IOW the amount of water you had to evaporate would exceed the entire current rainfall on the entire planet. The heat used to evaporate the water in the first place would probably outweigh the greenhouse warming.

[Torsten]

It was very close. The Canadian Prairies didn’t have any winter weather until December. I was still cycling to work in shorts in late November because temperatures were 5-10 deg above normal for most of the month. This current cold snap is the first sign of winter weather and it’s the latest freeze up on record.

Yes, and I forgot to mention in my last reply to William that in his selective reporting of regional cold weather events he seems to have missed the fact that less than a month ago Edmonton broke two high temperature records going back to 1959, on November 16th and 17th.

The whole notion of averaging over the globe goes out the window when it comes to him promoting his idea. And if anyone dares mention that they are presently suffering under a heat wave, William calls that "selective reporting of extreme weather" (http://www.bautforum.com/science-technology/70431-general-agw-discussion-thread-9.html#post1422751).

'Nuff said.

[JESMKS]

Large irrigation projects constructed in desert basins throughout the world in the last 60 years have increased humidity (water vapor) over large areas that originally had very low humidity. The humidity increase persists throughout the entire irrigation season which may last from five to six month or more out of each year. If water vapor is a green house gas, irrigated agriculture should be considered culpable in contributiong to global warming.

[nauthiz]

Any forcing effect would be indistinguishable from zero. Assuming a similar sensitivity as CO2, to get ~3 deg or warming you would need to create enough water vapor to permanently double the amount of H2O in the atmosphere across the whole globe. IOW the amount of water you had to evaporate would exceed the entire current rainfall on the entire planet. The heat used to evaporate the water in the first place would probably outweigh the greenhouse warming.

Sure, I recognize that getting water vapor to act as a non-negligible forcing would generally involve some very extreme circumstances. . . but it is still technically possible.

[publiusr]

Large irrigation projects constructed in desert basins throughout the world in the last 60 years have increased humidity (water vapor) over large areas that originally had very low humidity. The humidity increase persists throughout the entire irrigation season which may last from five to six month or more out of each year. If water vapor is a green house gas, irrigated agriculture should be considered culpable in contributiong to global warming.

I would think the hydrologic cycle would remove the excess faster than the carbon cycle removes CO2--but it is something to consider when advocating millions of automobiles all on hydrogen.

Only a mandate to goo all nuclear with a mandate on cars being all (capacitor-based)electric--THAT would really drop all emissions in a big way.

[parejkoj]

I would think the hydrologic cycle would remove the excess faster than the carbon cycle removes CO2--but it is something to consider when advocating millions of automobiles all on hydrogen.

For more on the residence time of water vapor in the atmosphere, I rather like the experiment described in the middle of this discussion at realclimate.org (http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2005/04/water-vapour-feedback-or-forcing/) (the plot and surrounding paragraph). All of the atmospheric water vapor (think your skin dries out in the winter?) was removed from a general circulation model. After 14 days, the atmospheric content was back to ~90% of nominal (due to evaporation from the ocean), and within 50 days, it was completely restored to normal. That's pretty fast.

CO2 residence time is measured in centuries to millenia (http://geosci.uchicago.edu/~archer/reprints/archer.2005.fate_co2.pdf), with a very long tail. Quoting from Archer's Summary section: 'A [good] approximation of the lifetime of fossil fuel CO2 for public discussion might be "300 years, plus 25% that lasts forever."'


Only a mandate to goo all nuclear with a mandate on cars being all (capacitor-based)electric--THAT would really drop all emissions in a big way.

For an in depth look at the different steps that need to be taken to become carbon neutral, and eventually carbon negative, I am particularly fond of the "Wedge Approach" (http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/305/5686/968). Nuclear is one of many options, but it is not enough, by itself. Improvements in efficiency, such as outlined in The 2030 Challenge (http://www.architecture2030.org/2030_challenge/index.html), are probably more important, given the massive energy usage of the building sector (~50% of all U.S. energy consumption).

[Trakar]

I would think the hydrologic cycle would remove the excess faster than the carbon cycle removes CO2--but it is something to consider when advocating millions of automobiles all on hydrogen.

Only a mandate to goo all nuclear with a mandate on cars being all (capacitor-based)electric--THAT would really drop all emissions in a big way.

There are no truely stagnant areas of the planet, local concentrations quickly dissipate and are distributed to areas of cooler temp. and/or lower pressure, and the moisture preciptates out. Even substituting all opencycle combustion to H2 would not amount to a significant water vapor forcing factor. The average persistence of water vapor in the Earth's atmosphere is about one week, most comes out on very short order, a very little persists for weeks. You can't force air of a given temp and pressure to hold super-saturation amounts of water for any length of time, and for the most part, given the availablility of water over most of the Earth's surface, Our atmosphere maintains a constant state of maximum water saturation.

Isn't this all covered in basic Jr High Chemistry everywhere? Saturation, vapor pressure, combination gas law, Boyle, Charles, Dalton, Arrhenius,... doesn't any of this even sound familiar to anyone?

[William]

As for the rest of the planet: "The combined global land and ocean surface temperature for October 2009 was the sixth warmest on record (http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/?report=global&year=2009&month=10&submitted=Get+Report)."

Hmm, while I'm at it: "This was the second warmest September on record (http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/?report=global&year=2009&month=9&submitted=Get+Report), behind 2005, and the 33rd consecutive September with a global temperature above the 20th Century average. The last below-average September occurred in 1976."


Why did you leave that out?
My comment, because this is an El Nino years which should be warmer rather than having record cold temperatures. Oscillation from warm to extreme cold would indicate climate change to the cold not the warm.

This page (http://text.weatheroffice.gc.ca/saisons/charts_e.html?season=son&year=2009&type=t) shows what Environment Canada forecast for autumn temperatures, and what actually happened.



And will your "data" once again consist of weather stories culled from the news services?


Gentlemen,

This is an El Nino year. One would expect warmer weather not record cold temperatures.

Did you notice Saskatchewan had the second coldest summer in 100 years?

Freezing temperatures in Vancouver? Heavy snowfall Pacific Northwest?

Snowstorms in Europe?

http://www.ctv.ca/servlet/ArticleNews/story/CTVNews/20090804/el_nino_090804/20090804



El Nino, the precocious weather system with the cute name, is back, meteorologists say, which means that after a summer of record low temperatures, much of Canada may experience warmer days just in time for Christmas.
According to a report issued Monday by the Climate Prediction Center, an agency of the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, El Nino conditions "are present across the equatorial Pacific Ocean."

Sea surface temperatures are currently between 0.5 and 1.5 degrees Celsius warmer than usual across the equatorial Pacific Ocean, which can have a dramatic impact on air currents and affect weather worldwide.

"Current observations and dynamical model forecasts indicate El Nino conditions will continue to intensify and are expected to last through Northern Hemisphere winter 2009-10," the report says.



http://globalfreeze.wordpress.com/2009/08/21/saskatchewan-2009-coldest-year-on-record/



2009 could very well be the coldest year on record for Saskatchewan.
Environment Canada’s top weatherman Dave Phillips says we’ve had colder than normal temperatures since December. “I could only find one year where you had nine consecutive months of cooler than normal, so it really is historic in the wrong way so to speak.”

So far, it has been the second coldest summer in Saskatchewan in nearly 100 years. But, Phillips says a warm-up is on the way for the rest of August through to October.






http://www.canadaeast.com/front/article/529471

Residents of Saskatoon woke up to the coldest temperatures since 1966, with a wind chill of -45 C, leaving the city shrouded in ice fog.

The actual temperature in Saskatoon at mid-morning was -39 C and Environment Canada lists the record low temperature on Jan. 4 as -40 C in 1966. The Saskatchewan Encyclopedia says temperatures in the -50 C range are the lowest ever recorded in the province.

Regina and other areas of southern Saskatchewan were still digging out from up to 25 centimetres of snow that began Friday.

In Moose Jaw, 3,000 homeowners were without power for up to four hours Saturday as the result of a major house fire that left firefighters covered in ice.
Manitobans woke up Sunday shivering in wind chills of -45 C in Brandon and Dauphin, and flights were delayed out of Winnipeg as the city dug out from nearly 15 centimetres of snow.

A pregnant woman and her two toddlers were among seven people taken to hospital following a three-vehicle collision Saturday on Highway 6 north of Winnipeg that police blamed on poor road conditions.
Southeastern Manitoba was buried in up to 20 centimetres of snow Saturday.
Drivers across the region were being warned Sunday about blowing and drifting snow and travel was not recommended on Highway 44 west from the Ontario boundary.

http://www.cbc.ca/canada/edmonton/story/2009/10/12/mb-snowy-cold.html
Record cold, early snow grip Prairies on Thanksgiving


Monday, October 12, 2009
Temperatures dropped to –16.1 C in Calgary early Monday, breaking the day's previous record, from 1928, by about three degrees. Just three weeks ago Calgary broke a warm-weather record when the thermometer peaked at almost 33 C — the hottest day of 2009.

But after a balmy September, temperatures in early October have swung to the other extreme across the Prairies, especially in Alberta, where the mercury in at least seven locations broke records with overnight lows.

It was for many the coldest Thanksgiving weekend in 50 years. At Sandy Beach Lake, 65 kilometres northwest of Edmonton, snowmobiler Shane Verbeek, 30, of Calahoo fell through the ice Sunday and a search for the missing man continued into Monday.
Banff shattered its previous Oct. 12 record cold of –14 C by dropping eight degrees to –22, and Waterton dipped 7.7 degrees below its former record of –16.6.

[nauthiz]

This is an El Nino year. One would expect warmer weather not record cold temperatures.

And, as has been pointed out several times, warmer weather is what we got. No amount of being unable to see the forest for the trees will make that any less true.

[Stroller]

Sure, I recognize that getting water vapor to act as a non-negligible forcing would generally involve some very extreme circumstances. . . but it is still technically possible.

What do you mean by 'technically possible'? That such a thing could be engineered by man? Or that nature might decide to deluge the whole world with biblical floods simultaneously?

[Ivan Viehoff]

This is an El Nino year. One would expect warmer weather not record cold temperatures.
As I pointed out in my previous post, one would indeed expect some local daily record cold temperatures in an average warmer year, just fewer than normal. You went looking for them and, surprise, you found them.

[kzb]

Seen this? I now think we have crossed the line from incompetence into sheer insanity. With this, we in the UK and US can look forward to the last dregs of our industry being closed down and the multinationals being paid to do it:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1235200/Steel-firm-Corus-90m-pollution-payoff-closing-plant-axing-1-700-jobs.html

[Strange]

On the other hand, as it is the Daily Mail, they might have just made it up. Has the same story appeared in any [real] newspapers?

[cope]

Gentlemen,

This is an El Nino year. One would expect warmer weather not record cold temperatures.

The world-wide effects of El Nino include regional heating and cooling as can be seen on the maps at this site. (http://www.knmi.nl/research/global_climate/enso/effects/)

[kzb]

On the other hand, as it is the Daily Mail, they might have just made it up. Has the same story appeared in any [real] newspapers?

The fact is, Tata originally had £90 million carbon credit given to it for this plant. Having closed or mothballed it, they now effectivey have an extra £90 million in liquid assets, curtesy of the taxpayer. They are entitled to do what they want with this, including selling it for cash.

[lomiller1]

Record cold, early snow grip Prairies on Thanksgiving

One cold snap in what has otherwise been the warmest winter on record. In case you missed it in my previous post I live in the Canadian prairies, and this winter is remarkable for its warmth not it’s cold.

[JESMKS]

lomiller1 states "and this winter is remarkable for its warmth not it’s cold."

Our winter doesn't start till next week

[nauthiz]

lomiller1 states "and this winter is remarkable for its warmth not it’s cold."

Our winter doesn't start till next week

As far as the climate tracking is concerned, meteorological winter starts on December 1 and continues through the end of February. The idea is to have the coldest part of the year (which occurs a bit after the solstice) fall roughly in the middle of the season.

[lomiller1]

lomiller1 states "and this winter is remarkable for its warmth not it’s cold."

Our winter doesn't start till next week

We normally get snowstorms and sub-zero temperature starting at the end of October. Winter enough for anyone not trying to derail the discussion with semantics, I think.

[nimbus2506]

Michael Le Page, features editor of New Scientist, has debunked a list by UKs daily express which states 100 reasons why climate change is natural.

http://www.newscientist.com/blogs/shortsharpscience/2009/12/50-reasons-why-global-warming.html?DCMP=OTC-rss&nsref=online-news

Good read =]

[Jetlack]

Forget Co2! the next big shoe to fall: black soot!

http://www.nasa.gov/topics/earth/features/carbon-pole.html

Looks like there will be more conferences...

[Stroller]

Forget Co2! the next big shoe to fall: black soot!

http://www.nasa.gov/topics/earth/features/carbon-pole.html

Looks like there will be more conferences...

And according to realclimate's figures, this is on the back of a centennial rise in temperature of around 0.25C above the natural variation currently accounted for, but without including the factors for which there is according to the IPCC a "low level of scientific understanding".

[William]

City people understand weather based on what they hear on television. (i.e. They do not understand the fundamentals.)

Canadian crop yield and value is determined by how warm the spring is (no late frosts) and when the first early fall frost occurs.

Yield in 2009 in the Prairies was down roughly 20% because of the late cold spring. Early frost reduce the value of the crop.

A warmer planet increase the biosphere's productivity. There is sufficient sunlight in the Northern Latitudes to grow crops and trees. The summer temperatures and the periods of frost free days is however too short.


http://www1.agric.gov.ab.ca/$Department/deptdocs.nsf/all/webdoc12819


Alberta Province
Harvest is underway in all regions, principally on winter cereals and field peas. It is estimated that 10% of crops have been swathed with a further 3% harvested. For most crops, yield estimates have increased by 3-4 bushels/acre from July 30th report with the exception of field peas which is up 1 bu/acre. Yield estimates remain below 80% of the last 5 year average. Light frost was reported in the western portion of central Alberta and across the central portion of the Peace. The province needs another 2 weeks of frost free weather to get this crop passed the frost danger.


StatsCan released their July 31 crop yield estimates. In many cases, the estimates approach the 5 year average yield which was derived from relatively average year
Provincials. The StatsCan estimates do not appear to reflect the effects of the difficult growing conditions experienced this year throughout Alberta as shown by the differences between the two sets of yield estimates. For more information on StatsCan's production estimates for 2009 crops, plese visit the following website:

http://www.statcan.gc.ca/pub/22-002-x/22-002-x2009005-eng.pdf.

Sub soil moisture ratings have improved slightly to 53% poor/ 28% fair/ 17% good/ 2% excellent due to precipitation received in the north central areas principally.

66% of the 2nd cut irrigated hay and 19% of the 2nd cut dryland hay has been baled. Pasture ratings have improved slightly to 52% poor/ 38% fair/ 10% good but tame hay ratings have declined to 59% poor/ 31% fair/ 10% good.

Southern Alberta
Harvest this year is 7-14 days later than average due to the delayed maturity with only 15% swathed and 6% harvested. Since the July 30th report, estimated yields have increased 1-2 bu/acre with the exception of field peas which has declined by 2 bushels. Crop condition ratings are unchanged to slightly improved. Interestingly, early seeded crops are not performing as well this year, as the later seeded crops were able to take better advantage of the precipitation in late June/early July.


http://www.cwb.ca/en/newsroom/releases/2009/061109.jsp


Winnipeg – The CWB today released its preliminary crop forecasts, projecting a western Canadian wheat, durum and barley crop of 29.7 million tonnes in the 2009 crop year, down almost 20 per cent from last year’s 36.7 million tonnes and significantly below the five-year average of 33.9 million tonnes. The all-wheat yield estimate announced by the CWB today, at 33.4 bushels per acre, is the lowest initial projection in seven years.
“Cold weather across the Prairies this spring has had a detrimental effect on planting and early crop development in most growing regions,” said Bruce Burnett, CWB director of weather and market analysis, at the annual CWB grain industry briefing today. “In addition, soil moisture levels are dangerously low in parts of Alberta and western Saskatchewan, where dry conditions have persisted since last fall.”

[William]

As noted above crop yields were down roughly 20% in the Canadian Prairies due to cold weather. i.e. Crops are higher when it has been warmer.

http://globalfreeze.wordpress.com/2009/08/21/saskatchewan-2009-coldest-year-on-record/


2009 could very well be the coldest year on record for Saskatchewan.
Environment Canada’s top weatherman Dave Phillips says we’ve had colder than normal temperatures since December. “I could only find one year where you had nine consecutive months of cooler than normal, so it really is historic in the wrong way so to speak.”

So far, it has been the second coldest summer in Saskatchewan in nearly 100 years. But, Phillips says a warm-up is on the way for the rest of August through to October.

[William]

In Iowa the warm weather (and 12 feet of top soil thanks to the glaciers the stripped off the Canadian topsoil and moved it south) enables two crops of corn to be harvested a year.

This year due to a late planting and early snow the second crop suffered.

http://www.wallacesfarmer.com/story.aspx?s=33937&c=9


Nearly 1 billion bushels of unharvested corn nationwide

Last week's storm that dumped up to 15 to 16 inches of snow on a wide area of Iowa leaves nearly 1 billion bushels of unharvested corn in the fields nationwide. On the Chicago Board of Trade, December corn futures on December 14 rose to $3.92 per bushel, and March corn rose to $4.08. Soybean futures were up to the $10.55 level on the January contract.

[William]

When I look at the by year by region planetary temperature data I find it odd that Russia seems to consistently have the majority of the North Hemisphere warming.

The following comment by Russian scientists that the Hadley researchers are cherry picking warm Russian temperature data and not using cold Russian temperature data would explain the anomaly.


Analysts say Russian meteorological stations cover most of the country’s territory, and that the Hadley Center had used data submitted by only 25% of such stations in its reports.

Over 40% of Russian territory was not included in global-temperature calculations for some other reasons, rather than the lack of meteorological stations and observations.

The data of stations located in areas not listed in the Hadley Climate Research Unit Temperature UK (HadCRUT) survey often does not show any substantial warming in the late 20th century and the early 21st century.


http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/12/16/russian-iea-claims-cru-tampered-with-climate-data-cherrypicked-warmest-stations/


http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/get-file.php?report=national&image=timeseries02&byear=2009&bmonth=10&year=2009&month=10&ext=gif&id=110-00


http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/get-file.php?report=national&image=timeseries02&byear=2009&bmonth=10&year=2009&month=10&ext=gif&id=110-00

[jlhredshift]

In Iowa the warm weather (and 12 feet of top soil thanks to the glaciers the stripped off the Canadian topsoil and moved it south) enables two crops of corn to be harvested a year.

This year due to a late planting and early snow the second crop suffered.

http://www.wallacesfarmer.com/story.aspx?s=33937&c=9

Actually the Canadian stuff is under many feet of wind driven loess from the northwest.

[Stroller]

Roman M takes a preliminary look at the GHCN temperature data.

http://noconsensus.wordpress.com/2009/12/15/3649/

First question which springs to my mind is what the heck is going on with the number of stations with long records used since 2006? (red line)

http://docs.google.com/File?id=dcjxztvr_1366xs97693_b

Secondly: There hasn't been time to introduce a gridding and averaging system yet, but: 0.22C per century. Wow.

[tusenfem]

In Iowa the warm weather (and 12 feet of top soil thanks to the glaciers the stripped off the Canadian topsoil and moved it south) enables two crops of corn to be harvested a year.

This year due to a late planting and early snow the second crop suffered.

http://www.wallacesfarmer.com/story.aspx?s=33937&c=9


William, keep your crop stuff in your thread about plants please.
And again, you are talking about WEATHER and not about CLIMATE, how often does the difference has to be spelled out to you?

[tusenfem]

When I look at the by year by region planetary temperature data I find it odd that Russia seems to consistently have the majority of the North Hemisphere warming.

The following comment by Russian scientists that the Hadley researchers are cherry picking warm Russian temperature data and not using cold Russian temperature data would explain the anomaly.




http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/12/16/russian-iea-claims-cru-tampered-with-climate-data-cherrypicked-warmest-stations/


http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/get-file.php?report=national&image=timeseries02&byear=2009&bmonth=10&year=2009&month=10&ext=gif&id=110-00


http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/get-file.php?report=national&image=timeseries02&byear=2009&bmonth=10&year=2009&month=10&ext=gif&id=110-00

So you talk about Russian temperatures and you show for some reason or other US temperatures in a figure. Typical.

[nauthiz]

First question which springs to my mind is what the heck is going on with the number of stations with long records used since 2006? (red line)

Well, it looks like it drops down to zero after 2006. This red line represents what's left after the author applies some (apparently arbitrary) filters to throw out stations using a script. It seems the most obvious possibility is that the author made a "whoops" in the filtering - either choosing inappropriate filtering criteria, or a bug in the script.

Or maybe (and this does indeed make me go hmm) the author used inappropriate data to begin with. Contrary to what the blog post claims, the GHCN v2 data is not raw; it is quite heavily processed. The GHCN themselves recommend on their intro page (http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/oa/climate/research/ghcn/ghcngrid.html) for the dataset that if you're looking for the most complete information about individual stations, you need to look at the actual station data instead of a gridded digest like v2.

In short, the author needed data for purpose X, and the dataset he chose is one that is specifically contraindicated for purpose X. :doh:

[Ari Jokimaki]

As usual, we are being offered blogposts and news reports as evidence, instead of peer-reviewed references. Peer-reviewed references have not been offered even when separately requested.