Paul Biggs from the University of Birmingham, UK, sent me the following summary of a presentation by Roger Pielke Sr. There is so much interesting information on the potential human impact on climate beyond a focus on carbon dioxide:
“Roger Pielke Sr, a respected climatologist of some 30 years, gave an interesting presentation of his perspective on climate science entitled ‘Regional and Global Climate Forcings – The Need to Move Beyond a Focus of the Radiative Forcing of the Well-Mixed Greenhouse Gases’ at the The 2006 Earth’s Radiative Energy Budget Related to SORCE Meeting in Washington.
The general conclusions that I draw from Pielke’s work are as follows:
Humans are significantly altering the global climate, but in a variety of diverse ways beyond the radiative effect of carbon dioxide.
In terms of climate change and variability on the regional and local scale, the IPCC Reports, the CCSP Report on surface and tropospheric temperature trends, and the U.S. National Assessment, have all overstated the role of the radiative effect of the anthropogenic increase of CO2 relative to the role of the diversity of other human climate climate forcing on global warming, and more generally, on climate variability and change.
Pielke calculates the fraction of global warming due to the radiative forcing of increased atmospheric CO2, using the current IPCC framework on climate forcings:
http://www.grida.no/climate/ipcc_tar/slides/large/06.01.jpg.This includes new findings on artic ozone, methane, albedo, and aerosols/black carbon with forcing calculated to be about 26.5%. This contrasts with the IPCC view of 48%.
He suggests new or under-recognized human climate forcings including:
biogeochemical effect of CO2, nitrogen deposition, land-use/land-cover change, glaciation effect of aerosols, thermodynamic effect of aerosols, surface energy budget effect.Global and regional climate models have not demonstrated skill at predicting climate change and variability on multi-decadal time scales.
A postitive feedback is required in order to significantly amplify the radiative forcing of added carbon dioxide.
There is, as of yet, no evidence that atmospheric water vapor concentrations have increased (see http://climatesci.atmos.colostate.edu/2006/04/03/new-global-precip-papers-trend-is-zero-or-positive/).
Moreover, water vapor also changes phase (into liquid and ice clouds and precipitation) which greater complicates the actual climate response to added CO2 and other well-mixed greenhouse gases.
Attempts to significantly influence regional and local-scale climate based on controlling CO2 emissions alone is an inadequate policy for this purpose.
The needed focus for the study of climate change and variability is on the regional and local scales. Global and zonally averaged surface temperature trend assessments, besides having major difficulties in terms of how this metric is diagnosed and analyzed, do not provide significant information on climate change and variability on the regional and local scales.
It is this instrumental data that gives the plot of a hockey stick shape, grafted onto proxy data. Furthermore, if, for example, the temperature of an area of the desert were to increase from plus 40 degrees celsius to 41 degrees, while at the same time an equal area of the Antarctic decreased from minus 40 to minus 41, the average temperature of the earth would stay constant.
However, under the Stephan-Boltzman equation, more radiation would be emitted by increasing the temperature of the desert, than the radiation loss from Antarctica. Pielke will shortly have a paper published in JGR, which introduces this problem.
Global warming is not equivalent to climate change. Significant, societally important climate change, due to both natural and human climate forcings, can occur without any global warming or cooling.
The spatial pattern of ocean heat content change is the appropriate metric to assess climate system heat changes including global warming. Pielke examines the significant upper ocean cooling from 2003 reported by Lyman et al, 2006 (http://www.noaanews.noaa.gov/stories2006/s2704.htm) to a depth of at least 750m, which was not predicted by climate models.
He cites 2 papers which support the diagnosis: A 2004 Science article by E. Pallé, P. R. Goode, P. Montañés-Rodríguez, and S. E. Kooninentitled ‘Changes in Earth’s Reflectance Over the Past Two Decades’ and a follow-on 2005 Geophysical Research Letters paper by Pallé E., P. Montañés-Rodriguez, P. R. Goode, S. E. Koonin, M. Wild, and S. Casadio entitled ‘A multi-data comparison of shortwave climate forcing changes’ (http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/2005…/2005GL023847.shtml ).
Finally, I must point out that Pielke says all of this is not a reason not to seek to reduce CO2 emissions.”
Thanks Paul for the summary and also to Luke, for emphasising to me the importance of getting this information up as a new post/thread.
Jennifer Marohasy BSc PhD is a critical thinker with expertise in the scientific method.
Jennifer, I almost drove off the road today when on the local ABC radio this Prof of Climatology dismembered climate change alarmists arguments, the interviewer appeared to be shocked as she had just finished reading Tim Flannerys latest.
http://www.newcastle.edu.au/school/engineering/our_staff/profiles/franks_stewart.html
Hello all, and nice blog here Jen; I am a newby here. I am an American, and a Texan from Austin. It looks like a well educated and somewhat diverse crowd at this website from what I can tell of posts I’ve read here. I have studied this topic of global warming and have recently seen Al Gore’s “An Inconvenient Truth”, Jim Hansen on PBS Nova’s “Global Dimming”, and PBS Nova’s “Magnetic Storm”. I find this topic very intering and it is hard for me to determine where I stand on global warming, and I thought maybe you guys could help me out. I have a good basic understanding of this topic, but what I am looking for is more specific, scientific details. Any input is welcome and answer what you can or wish to. Thanks in advance and I apoligise if my questions/views seem odd.
A bit about what I think:
I. I strongly dislike and don’t trust oil companies and big corporations
II. I strongly dislike George W. Bush
III. I strongly dislike Al Gore
IV. I don’t trust the mainstream media.
V. I am a naturalist, and try my best to have a holistic observation and application of things.
VI. I fear extreme environmentalists much, much more than terrorists, especially the environmentalists who wish to depopulate everyone else excluding themselves, of course.
VII. I KNOW that the temperature is rising on Earth, but I am skeptical as to the cause of the rising temperature and the effects predicted for the future from global warming alarmists.
VIII. I find that typically scientists who have built their name up and get a big head and mass funding, tend to let their big head and/or funding get in the way of good science, as the masses continue to worship them.
IX. I think pollution should virtually end as soon as possible, but how it is done is of major concern to me (Gore’s global tax proposition, a pretext to globalisation, will NOT end pollution, and neither will depopulation, communism, fascism, or globalisation)
X. I think that enough alternatives exist currently to engineer our way out of oil usage, and is easily pheasable to do economically when produced on a mass scale.
Elaboration needed:
a. CO2 effects and exactly how it traps solar radiation on a molecular level…
b. Global Dimming (interior climate data)…
c. Solar Radiation satellite detection (exterior climate data)…
d. How the Earth cools via hurricanes, etc.(interior climate data)…
e. How the Earth’s atmosphere releases heat/energy (exterior climate data)…
f. The effect and/or corrrelation to climate and the earth’s core and magnetism…
g. The effect of astral bodies (noteably the Sun, the large planets, the Moon, and other possible radiation or magnetic astral sources) in correlation to gravitational effects to the Earth and it’s climate…
h. Any possible correlating effects on other astral bodies similar to Earth…
i. The correlation of temperature change to Earth and the ocean currents and ecology to include glaciers/icecaps…
Questions (data, charts, etc. please):
1. Exactly what effect does industrialisation have on Earth’s ecology via pollution, from water to earth to air, holistically speaking as it pertains to global warming?
2. What are the exact processes in data collection which intends to chart past climate trends, including dating methods?
3. Is there any correlation to temperature rise on Earth and the flipping of the magnetic poles and/or Earth’s spin-wobble, and what exactly would that be?
4. Never forgetting that which is absorbed by Earth, what precisely does escape Earth’s atmosphere into space and how, and what are the effects of that which leaves the atmosphere?
5. What are the effects of man-made radiation or even electricty emissions on global warming and earth’s magnetism?
I apoligize for my long wishlist and my brass-tax approach, but any help in understanding is appreciated…
Thanks Paul, and apologies for misspelling your name in the comments .It seems to me that this presentation and your fine summary covers many of my misgiving own about IPCC and then adds much more. I’d also add that Roger P’s Policy proposals previously made are of such a high quality that this presentation and its messages must be given serious attention. It’s the kind of summary many voices in these threads have been crying for, so thanks again.
Raven, Thanks for your questions. You might want to start by looking through the slides here: http://blue.atmos.colostate.edu/presentations/PPT-69.pdf . Pielke breaks contributions to warming and cooling down into the various natural processes (volcanoes, sun, orbit) versus human activity (including industrial practices) and then goes into some detail on what IPCC estimates relative contribution to be and what new findings suggest.
Detribe, would you, or Paul B, be so kind as to explain the following in further detail?:
“Global warming is not equivalent to climate change. Significant, societally important climate change, due to both natural and human climate forcings, can occur without any global warming or cooling.”
And as outcome, what’s the recommendation? If this still leaves open the possibility of consequences for humanity and the cause of uncertainty is the lack in our ability to model, then do you want to see more investment in better data and better science?
Take note, Luke,
“Moreover, water vapor also changes phase (into liquid and ice clouds and precipitation) which greater complicates the actual climate response to added CO2 and other well-mixed greenhouse gases.”
And we know perfectly well that most of this water vapour/precipitation cycling is taking place within the band between the Tropic of Cancer and the Tropic of Capricorn. And we also know that 78% of this area is ocean where we have very limited rainfall data.
The best we can do is use data sets like the one from Nauru as a surrogate for the rainfall over the surrounding 5.3 million square km of ocean, an area 2/3rds the size of Australia.
So we don’t have the faintest idea how the volumes and frequencies of those water vapor cycles have changed over the past century.
And you want us to put the world economy on a Prozac holiday on the strength of what you think you know.
Amazing – Ian didn’t use the word paedophile, scum or spiv in a post. I’ll be discounting anything you say as uninformed drivel from here on. Check your own medication – you need something other than Prozac.
Try http://trmm.gsfc.nasa.gov/
Pinxi,
Very clever at cherry-picking detribe quotes. Why don’t you answer the questions yourself? After all, you have the Greenpeace think-tank behind you and they will supply all the data you would wish to have. Surely an annual budget of US$178 million can buy you all the smart ideas you might possibly want, as all the money goes into Public Relations and advertising.
“Global warming is not equivalent to climate change. Significant, societally important climate change, due to both natural and human climate forcings, can occur without any global warming or cooling.”
Please explain.
Ill briefly give my immediate reaction as to what it is referring to. They are not my words and Paul Biggs is probably better suited to do justice to it.
After looking at the slides and recalling other papers I have met, I take this to refer to local changes that are occuring in paricular regions ( eg central Austalian drying, Florida rainfall/climate, rain on the middle of the Pacific, sea water cooling) that involve events, mechanisms, feedbacks and outcomes that are essentially local and divorced from averaged global trends.
For instance IPCC may predict more rain and locally there may be less rain.
Succinctly, thinking globally doesnt necessarily help you locally, and trying to change global parameters may be useless and even counter productive, as it may be damaging to the desired local outcomes. eg We may be better of getting rid of some trees here in Oz in some catchments.
What did you make of it?
As far as explaining there is a lot more that could be said, as we live in a complex, large, diverse changing world. That’s part of the point He’s getting at, I suspect.
Given that it’s complex, what’s the recommendation? Well first think before you act and be careful what you wish for. Think a lot. Three weeks reading all the papers related to the presentation would be just a start.
Second, local well developed and particular actions,actions that are worthwhile whatever is going on locally/globally ( eg poverty elimination, womens right in the third world, infrastucture in developing countries, agricultural research relevant to rural prosperity etc, its a long list) and adaptation to dynamic may be more productive reponses that trying to revent global change. Make sure money is not drained away from actions that are certain to help welfare and environmental management and wasted on risky dubious policies.
I can go on further, but the perverse outcomes of Kyoto based policicies as far as NSW woodly weeds are a specific example of how global policies applied innapropriately at a local level come, but still implemented because of ernestly held moral convictions that carbon credits are always right come immediately to mind.
“If this still leaves open the possibility of consequences for humanity and the cause of uncertainty is the lack in our ability to model, then do you want to see more investment in better data and better science?” Well yes indeed this is very perceptive of you, and yes I think that one good outcome of the so-called “alarmism” is it creates avenues for this to happen.
The danger is that the effort can be misdirected and counterproductive. I’m emotional about how so much is misdirected, and blocks to GM golden rice is one.Its killing people for symbilic and ideogical reasons. The now completely reversed effort to absolutely ban DDT is another. The ludicrous prediction in the 1960s-70s of an epidemic of cancer from pesticides is a third.That epidemic never occured but most people never realise it.
Part of this suggested science investment is fearless, honest and open debate as a process to get better scientific foundations for policy.
It would be good to encourage such fearless debate here rather that try and enforce a “consensus” or even worse, act like the Spanish Inquisition as the UK Rotyal Society just has. It’s called democratic freedom of expression and tolerance of dissent. The reason we do this is to get better outcome, as empirically free societies provide better lives for their citizens and can afford to take actions to protect the environment and research policy.
Schiller, Please provide evidence that Pinxi is Greenpeace supported… and explain the relevance.
Pinxi, Please read the link in post and repeated in my answer to Raven as it outlines the case … the words are from Pielke not Detribe.
Everyone, Lets start focusing on issues and cease picking on individuals.
Re: “A positive feedback is required in order to significantly amplify the radiative forcing of added carbon dioxide. There is, as of yet, no evidence that atmospheric water vapor concentrations have increased .. ..”
Interestingly we do have some evidence of a positive amplification feedback of CO2 driving water vapour albeit a surface effect.
Philipona, R., B. Dürr, A. Ohmura, and C. Ruckstuhl (2005), Anthropogenic greenhouse forcing and strong water vapor feedback increase temperature in Europe, Geophys. Res. Lett., 32, L19809, doi:10.1029/2005GL023624.
Europe’s temperature increases considerably faster than the northern hemisphere average. Detailed month-by-month analyses show temperature and humidity changes for individual months that are similar for all Europe, indicating large-scale weather patterns uniformly influencing temperature. However, superimposed to these changes a strong west-east gradient is observed for all months. The gradual temperature and humidity increases from west to east are not related to circulation but must be due to non-uniform water vapour feedback. Surface radiation measurements in central Europe manifest anthropogenic greenhouse forcing and strong water vapor feedback, enhancing the forcing and temperature rise by about a factor of three. Solar radiation decreases and changing cloud amounts show small net radiative effects. However, high correlation of increasing cloud-free longwave downward radiation with temperature (r = 0.99) and absolute humidity (r = 0.89), and high correlation between ERA-40 integrated water vapor and CRU surface temperature changes (r = 0.84), demonstrates greenhouse forcing with strong water vapor feedback.
And some interesting upper atmosphere work
Science 4 November 2005:
Vol. 310. no. 5749, pp. 841 – 844
The Radiative Signature of Upper Tropospheric Moistening
Brian J. Soden,1* Darren L. Jackson,2 V. Ramaswamy,3 M. D. Schwarzkopf,3 Xianglei Huang4
Climate models predict that the concentration of water vapor in the upper troposphere could double by the end of the century as a result of increases in greenhouse gases. Such moistening plays a key role in amplifying the rate at which the climate warms in response to anthropogenic activities, but has been difficult to detect because of deficiencies in conventional observing systems. We use satellite measurements to highlight a distinct radiative signature of upper tropospheric moistening over the period 1982 to 2004. The observed moistening is accurately captured by climate model simulations and lends further credence to model projections of future global warming.
And some more interesting work on the challenges
http://geosci.uchicago.edu/%7ertp1/papers/CaltechWater.pdf
Schiller I don’t work for GP & I think most commenters here realise that. To be honest I think that GP would treat me with the same hostility as some of you guys do. It was actually a genuine question because I didn’t understand the point that was being made.
Jennifer yr right, unfort I was being interrupted so didn’t read more deeply via the link.
thanks detribe – I wasn’t sure if it was a real scientific distinction or a turn of phrase to get a point across. If it’s merely distinguishing ‘localised’ climate experiences from ‘global’ climate trends then there doesn’t seem to be anything new there that isn’t already covered in the science. (But perhaps it needs more explanation in the public debate, is the point). If I’m wrong in saying so, I’m sure the other commenters might will out the truth.
I have a new bee in my bonnet over the nature of scepticism because I think you can be very sceptical of the AGW science but still support investment in the science, ongoing public discussion and even preparedness – mitigation &/or adaptation, particularly for the poorest dry countries who are experiencing the ill-effects of localised climate/weather variations. But most of the AGW contrarians here seem to want to sweep the entire issue under the carpet & do SFA.
I’ve just added a note to the above post: thanking Luke for requesting through me that Paul provide this brief summary.
Also Luke provided the lead for the recent new Scientist solar post.
“I have a new bee in my bonnet over the nature of scepticism because I think you can be very sceptical of the AGW science but still support investment in the science, ongoing public discussion and even preparedness – mitigation &/or adaptation, particularly for the poorest dry countries who are experiencing the ill-effects of localised climate/weather variations.”
It seems once more we find close agreement. Great.
“But most of the AGW contrarians here seem to want to sweep the entire issue under the carpet & do SFA.”
This is where you go off the rails. How can you reach such a far reaching assertion. It’s irrellevant to the ideas, but the fact that you believe it makes some of your thinking and likely reponses counterproductive.
I can’t speak for the AGW contrarians, but use of group labels like that is unhelpful comment. In fact this blog would be greatly improved if we stopped group labelling people and kept to arguing about ideas.
Why not stick to the rule of assuming good will by contributors untill there is tangible evidence of obstructionism?
One possiblity which you should consider is whether SFA is at least less bad than some of the misguided proposals for action, (not that I think SFA is the best response).
At the AEF conference I heard the expression least worst response. Sometimes SFA is less worse that what we currently get.
“This is where you go off the rails…”
detribe I see repeated acts of one-sided scepticism and obstructionist tactics here. Are you really blind to that? Are the sceptics on this blog consistent in their scepticism across all aspects and across comparable situations eg acid rain & ozone thinning?
I won’t object to a game theory mini-max approach to AGW if thats what you recommend. But most commenters here just rail against the science and clam up when you invite them to consider the other part of the debate or the broader picture, eg ok we’re unsure of the science, but so what, then? What do we do, considering the potential ramifications? Who of the sceptics has displayed any scepticism about the economic analysis of the costs of actions to address climate change? I have several times written that the ABARE case excluded the economic gains that would be incurred in meeting GHG reductions (they acknolwedged this themslves and I think I originally gave links for this) but no-one responds. Steve recently linked to a piece that claimed that business estimates of costs to abate environmental pollutants etc are consistently over-estimated and under-estimate the innovations that proliferate (which can positively impact the money money effect on GDP growth) but which of the sceptics considered this? The sceptics often state that innovative man will come up with technological solutions to AGW if it happens but why do they refuse to consider that that same technological innovativeness could be used today to reduce GHG emissions in a cost-effective way? One-eyed?
What pushed me off the rails detribe? It’s that lack of clarification or reflection upon their own position by the AGW contrarians/sceptics. Perhaps Jennifer would make a separate post of it – to invite all of those who comment on the AGW science clarify their position on the aspects I mentioned in a couple of posts the sceptics thread. Cos people seem reluctant to oblige and the general AGW sceptical position looks mighty biased to me. To be honest, most of the screaming on this blog comes across as downright selfish, entrenched conservative resistance. The people on this blog are highly unlikely to experience any direct consequences of climate change during their lifetime or in their backyard. They do’nt want to ask themselves, if as people with high living stds & high per capita emissions they should accept any responsibility for potential impacts on those poor suckers who are likely to be on the receiving end of localised climate effects. I’ve asked this question a couple of times before. Like with all the curly ones, the contrarians are remarkedly silent. It’s like the common partyline of the seagulls in the movie “Finding Nemo”?
Conservative deniers are citing this blog as having denier-centric leanings. Is this true? Because one new poster here I know first hand denies smoking causes lung cancer. And that’s as a nurse! That’s the level of denial I’m talking about. GW cannot be disputed. The solutions can be debated but not denied.
Mark, Pinxi & Luke, I have not noticed anyone denying, or disputing GW.
I have seen many disputing the extent, & the cause of the GW.
It appears to be the inability of you to countenance any doubt, or discussion on the theory that CO2 is totally to blame, & that CO2 mitigation should start now, & damn the other consequences which appears to be the main sticking point.
“detribe I see repeated acts of one-sided scepticism and obstructionist tactics here. Are you really blind to that? Are the sceptics on this blog consistent in their scepticism across all aspects and across comparable situations eg acid rain & ozone thinning?”
No I’m not blind to that, but I ignore the nonsense as much as I can when I form my own conclusions. Yes there are ratbag remarks. Yes some people lose their cool, some are unnecessarly sarcastic, or seemingly arrogant and a few are obstructionist (or seem to be), but I try and filter them out in reaching my own position.
Yes, the screaming on this blog really annoys me like hall. Its a waste of time. A lot of it comes from entrenched differences of opinion. You know, conservatives are heartless bs, lefties are disconnected with reality, city folk dont care about the farmers, ordinary people cannot follow advanced science and so on. And you seem like one of Group X so I know you must think like Y. Thats how much of normal human behaviour is. What I cant stand is this routine effort to but me in box X so they can claim I think Y and thus should be shunned ignored or mocked. Lamnus nasus tried that one on.
One problem with your treatment of scepticsm is that you may be seeing dissent as obstructionism, but if your own position is actually badly thought through (and wrong), you will be unfairly judging the dissent.
The only solution I know to that is talking more with people outside your own closed circle which is at least possible here in theory. In my experience of this world there’s lots of people going around resolutely on piously believing all sorts of lies which they think are perfectly true, and this is particularly true in the environmental area. But as far as climate is concerned, I’m only an amateur so don’t take me too seriously on those types of issues – on climate I’m only here to learn and can’t pick the real porky pies easily.
Your set of comments suggests an interesting complicated set of social concerns, and I do understand the direction your coming from.
I don’t think you are necessarly right but we’d only sort it out from some long telephone conversations (you are from Tassie right) which because of the miracles of VOIP I can now afford so perhaps thats where we should take this. My typing is awfully inefficient.
So to try and finish (but only touching the surface), many of the concerns you raise come from organisations whose credibility for reliable economic advice may be very low or biased.
Let me give you a specific illustration. (I know its a bit off topic) In recent weeks a prominent anti-GM activist has been offering free financial advice to farmers. His background is a serious commitment to bringing down capitalism, and his business and financial expertise are minimal. So the issue is do you take his advice at face value? . I’d discount it heavily, and thats maybe the kind of reason your concerns may not have got a response. People have different views of whats going on, and nether ABARE, or Unions, or Social Workers, or farmers have the whole story.
Yes the total result at this blog, if you accept it all, is biased noisy rubbish. But out of it come a few gems like Paul Biggs post which I was glad to learn was triggered by Luke. And also reading my email at Luke suggestion unearthed a collection of good relevant reading, but some of which I was familiar with and surprised that Luke assumed I was unaware of it. The best news was some confirmation that Luke really is a practicising professional climate scientist. Why he doesnt come out of the anonymous closet beats me.
yes I do have “a complicated set of social concerns” but simply asking curly questions attracts unfounded labels and incorrect assumptions and accusations. I get the same suspicion from ‘dumb urban greenies’.
“The best news was some confirmation that Luke really is a practicising professional climate scientist. Why he doesnt come out of the anonymous closet beats me.”
interesting one that! An enviro consultant I thought. I reckon he puts more effort in than he gets credit for. Perhaps he should write a people piece for Jen, anonymous or not?
Thats old news, we always knew that Phluke put the mental into the environment.
well someone has to use their brain rog & we know it won’t be u
Guys – I’m not claiming to be a practising climate scientist. I am not a member of any NGO (e.g. Greenpeace) or political party or union. I am not representing a govt view. It’s my personal opinion as a citizen. I have 3 children and an interest in the future of the economy, the environment and society. I don’t think you would categorise me as a greenie.
And I have no friends apart from Ian and Rog. I’d like to be Detribe’s friend but he’s mean. Pinxi dropped me.
‘Global warming’ is a function of the number of temperature staions, and where they are placed. Pielke cites papers that suggest a warm bias in the near surface temperature data. ‘Global average temperature’ is the sum of both positive and negative anomolies from around the globe. No-one lives in a ‘global average’ region. Pielke believes that changes in ‘Ocean Heat Storage’ is the best climate change metric.
I admire Pielke because he is an objective scientist. Of course, we have much, much more to learn about our non-linear chaotic climate system so continuing effort and money has to go into research.
Just look at the levels of scientific understanding at the bottom, here:
http://www.grida.no/climate/ipcc_tar/slides/large/06.01.jpg
Meanwhile, if we can use new technology and develop genuine alternatives to fossil fuels, which results in a reduction in anthropogenic CO2 released into the atmosphere, then of course we should. This would give us ‘business as usual.’ Pielke calls this ‘win,win.’
Unfortunately, there are people out there who want ‘lose, lose.’
Pielke’s calculation for the effect of the radiative forcing of increased atmospheric CO2 on temperature is about 0.16C out of the 0.6C rise in ‘global average temperature.’ This partly depends on the 2001 IPCC framework being the last word on climate forcings, which I’m sure it isn’t.
Remember CO2 stays in the atmosphere for 50-200 years.
Regarding water vapour feedback and models – there’s another paper here:
http://ams.allenpress.com/perlserv/?request=get-abstract&doi=10.1175%2FJCLI3611.1
“There is preliminary evidence of a neutral or even negative longwave feedback in the observations, suggesting that current climate models may not be representing some processes correctly if they give a net positive longwave feedback.”
The above is in addition to this:
http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/2006/2005GL025393.shtml
which confirms the work of one Pielke’s students. I understand Pielke has completed and submitted a paper on this subject.
I think that the work of Pielke, and others, shows that policy makers who would have us believe that attempting to manipulate a single climatic factor, CO2, will allow them to control the weather or climate, are seriously deluded or just plain dishonest.
well if yr not a practising climate scientist, are you an accomplished climate scientist? or other scientist? consultant? geologist, heh? retired?
Hasby – may I respond
“I have not noticed anyone denying, or disputing GW. ”
ummm Bob Carter – it’s cooling since 1998, Warwick Hughes and heat island and record contamination/corruption, Fosbob – start of a cooling cycle, Louis 5/10 times
If you look this blog has denied eveyrthing at some point.
“It appears to be the inability of you to countenance any doubt, or discussion on the theory that CO2 is totally to blame”
Well I have listed quite some material on the CO2 issue of late – papers that confirm the magntitude of the flux, spectral windows closing in the atmosphere, and we have the IPCC reports – the considered view of serious professionals in the area. They have found no change in solar luminosity to explain the warming. There was a new paper tended here a post of two ago from Nature saying as much. The true solar advocates are saying – it’s not solar radiation output so much as eruptivity, magnetic anomalies or even other planetary influences. The consensus of the mainstream climatologists is that there is nothing in it – although people continue to look and a new CERN experiment is commencing. The problem with cycles is false statistics – episodic behaviour like El Nino and multi-decadal ocean oscillations can masquerade as cyclical behaviour. You can dredge out all manner of patterns with stats packages. But many have been found to be artefacts – just false statistics. This is why sunspot climate forecasts aren’t that good under strict analysis. But of course many would argue !
If a solar mechanism yet unknown is found – how important is it – and that doesn’t make the CO2 warming go away either. You have to argue why CO2 does not work. Absolute proof of anything climatic is probably near impossible – but one can accumulate supporting evidence. I am much swayed by evidence I have listed above. Also to note the IPCC scientists do not replicate the 20th century temperature curve without including solar, CO2 and aerosol forcings. Individually solar and CO2 don’t match the temperature record.
Just an aside – does Pielke above suggest a solar mechanism?
Anyway – I’m curious and having a read and interested in what Fosbob has to say.
“that CO2 mitigation should start now, & damn the other consequences which appears to be the main sticking point.”
Am I saying exactly that? What to do about CO2 is complex and a very difficult problem. Stuffing the economy is not a good option. Doing nothing is not a good option. I genuinely find this difficult and you should not think that I wish to send everyone back to the caves. But having worked on drought as an issue for some time one tends to become morose over the issue and I genuinely worry about the future. Current climate is injurious to many people already.
So instead of solar I’d be somewhat concerned about changes in the southern hemsiphere circulation and what may be changes in the eastern Australian current. But I can indulge here and speculate as I’m not a professional climatologist – but I take umbrage at the slurs here on those people who work on these issues. We need to know and be informed. It’s critical for planning.
planning… => enviro consultant!
That’s what my money says. prob on the take from taxpayers too.
Pinx if I return your grandad’s war medals can we patch it up.
Luke, your link to the Nasa site shows monthly totals and anomalies. How would this sort of data pick up changes in vapor cycling frequency?
And I must repectfully point out a potential comprehension deficit exhibited by some readers of this blog. My use of the term paedophile was clearly in relation to people exhibiting the smarm and deceit that is often displayed by such people. Most year 5 kids could comprehend that this is not a statement that accuses anyone of actually being such a person.
I had mistakenly assumed that people were functioning at a level well above that of a word search.
Wait a moment…
I’ve normally got a lot of time for Roger Pielke Snr but check out page 31 (of 57) in the first link mentioned (“Regional and global climate forcing …”). It seems to be saying that in the centre of Western Australia the annual rainfall has now increased by more than 2190 mm in most of the region and by more than 2920 mm in a couple of patches (in red). The rest of the state, apart from the south west appears to have had an increase of about 750mm (ie. 2 mm/day)
I doubt this very much because average rainfall across all of Western Australia over the last few years is around 350mm. (see http://www.bom.gov.au/cgi-bin/silo/reg/cli_chg/timeseries.cgi) For the 4 or 5 years before that the average was closer to 500mm but that’s still a long way short of what Pielke shows.
If I can spot a error like this in just one country in how many other places is it also wrong? If the data is wrong then the conclusions could easily be wrong too. Take away this fictitious increase in Australian rainfall and the map on page 31 doesn’t really say a lot.
“If you look this blog has denied eveyrthing (sic) at some point.”
And so it should, would you deny that?
Extrapolating apocalyptic scenarios from random circumstantial observations is on par with astrology and Phluke, you done plenty of that.
Rog – no that’s fine. I’m responding to Hasby who’s suggesting there’s a sort of “consensus” or “general opinion” on some issues. May I ask what apocalyptic scenarios am I making from what random observations.
Yes, you may ask.
Wait a moment………John.
As I said in another thread to Pinxi; I’m still driving round with the red dust stuck to my red kingswood from Sunday morning when it rained mud. Where did it come from?
At least as far as the red dirt areas in western NSW, if not way beyond! I bet the satellites missed all that upper atmosphere dust.
The reality check for everyone in all of this is simple; look out your window while reading any statements from groups of scientists and skeptics on here.
I was not happy reading Pielke’s stuff the first time either (from ref in an earlier thread). His conclusions are too sweeping given all that went before.
In general considering my feelings about our part of the world and this latest science, we had a lot of premature bushfires up and down the country last week. The whole continent is so dry the outback farmers through their federation are telling the media and the government we all have to do something about drought driven by climate change.
It seems to me any confusion remaining over finding difference in averages here comes from another personal observation regarding our daily extremes. We are getting more cold nights and frosts in this dry weather as well as more hot days.
Note the sudden loss of fruit crops this week along the Goulburn Valley in Victoria. What’s the bet Vic stone fruit will outstrip QLD bananas in the end?
All good science particularly from 3d atmosphere models must be tempered with some practical observations at ground level.
Rog, Rog, Rog, mate [now an awkward silence of least 10 seconds, and sigh as I take breath] you started off this thread listing a local chappie at your nearby educational institution with some pride it seemed. Well you Googled his creds and we know how stingy the Scottish genes are with bandwidth. Quite a tidy little story on drought, ENSO and things multi-decadal. I thought – jeez – could be a bit of hope on the thread – even Rog has gone up market and getting a bit intellectual here. He might come back with “well what about model representation of ENSO then .. boy.. could get tough!” I overlooked the almost obligatory gratuitous swipe at Flannery – did you see Two Men in a Tinnie which I thought the blog would have liked, pretty balanced, bit of day out, everyone blamed everyone up river, one buggerised around in boats, had some lamingtons and Australian values, I mused Motty could have pointed out relevant ecological facts about dead or alive trees, Jen could have measured the water depth, Gavin would have grooved on the blacksmiths shop, and Louis would have found a diamond not a jaw bone. Pop – dream sequence over .. .. and You say, you actually say, you say “Yes, you may ask”
[mate .. .. .. ..]
Ian, the TRMM site says:
A new series of quasi-global, near-real-time, TRMM-based precipitation estimates is now available to the research community via anonymous ftp. The estimates are provided on a global 0.25 ° x0.25 ° grid over the latitude band 50 ° N-S within about seven hours of observation time. Three products are being provided: A TRMM-calibrated merger of all available TMI, AMSR-E, SSM/I, and AMSU-B precipitation estimates (three-hourly accumulations); a geosynchronous infrared estimate which is calibrated by the merged-microwave data (hourly estimates); and a combination of the first two fields (three-hourly accumulations).
So if you hacked in their FTP server you might get all manner of finer data.
Does it help with the science?
Sensitivity tests using assimilation of latent heating estimates in GCMs has revealed the potential for improving the prediction of rainfall events. For example, GCM 24-h rainfall predictions using initial conditions adjusted from simulated profiles of TRMM latent heating may be improved by as much as 30% over NMC and ECMWF models.
There is more techo stuff on GCM validation to be found, viz:
VALIDATION AND IMPROVEMENT OF MOIST PHYSICAL PROCESSES IN A GCM
Jui-Lin F. Li* (STG/GMAO), L. Takacs (SAIC/GMAO), A. Hou (GMAO) and W.S. Olsen (JCET/UMBC)
GSFC, NASA, Greenbelt, Maryland
The space-time variations of the vertical structure of the latent heating from precipitating clouds and a proper interaction between the cloud and planetary boundary layer (PBL) have a significant impact on tropical atmospheric general circulations. It is important for general circulation models (GCMs) to properly simulate the moist physical processes associated with precipitation. The global tropical precipitation fields and latent heating profiles (-30o N ~ 30o N) from the GEOS3 GCM of the NASA Global Modeling and Assimilation Office (GMAO) are compared to TRMM estimates for Feb 1998. The effort is to evaluate and improve the model’s moist physical parameterizations.
The results emphasize that the heating/moistening profiles and the large-scale rain rates are very sensitive to the amount of cloud-top detrainment of cloud liquid, and that a proper coupling between the convection, PBL and large-scale condensation schemes in GCMs is crucial.
Having said that I don’t know whether it would address “vapor cycling frequency” to your satisfaction. You should also put the boot in and say it’s only 6 years or so of data.
A professional practicing meteorologist might inform us better on rainfall issues over oceans.
Hiya all,
I saw a recommendation (from what i would call, an AGW sceptic), for this site, on a another blog. I am not that impressed.
I’m surprised to find people using terms like paedophilia in a blog on politics and the environment, are we moderated here, I guess not?
Anyway, funny to see some Aussies are standing shoulder to shoulder with GWB (ie making noises about technology, but doing SFA). A word of advice though, look what that did for us in the UK! Our soldiers are taking a hammering in Afghanistan. Our citizens got smeared all over the tube (londons underground railway). Many thanks to Tony Blair for that, at least he has the decency to fall on his political sword.
So Australia, step away from the Bush, Chavez is right, he has the smell of sulphur on him!
Most of the folks on here can discount my opinions though. They would probably call me an alarmist. But I’m not. I’m just alarmed.
You lot stick with ExxonMobil, i’m with the Royal Society and the joint statement of the Academies of Science(made in 2005).
If you have not read that statement, well…
Good luck in the future, I suggest we think lucky thoughts, because we need to be lucky!
yours, Mark S
Thanks for the info Jen and Luke. I am not done looking through it all, but I think there’s enough here to keep me busy for a few days. I already have questions, but I’ll reserve that until after I’m done going through all the documents and references. Just wanted to say thanks for pointing me the way.
Mark S.,
Maybe you could add some actual useful information and input, instead of touting how pompous you are. Not a good sign of intelligence…
I love this latest lot from Luke on collecting and analysing data at the edge of an event as big as our weather systems. Sorry but I can’t help laughing.
Elsewhere Luke reminds me of how we are handicapped by our models. It’s like collecting the hot flakes of iron hammered off on the anvil by a blacksmith as he forges a piece of metal then analysing each of them for a prediction about its final form, long after it left the cooling sand.
Every Saturday arvo I go to BOM on the www then load the Kingswood with either wet day or dry day items according to their predictions. Although market people are resilient I reloaded and returned home quite dissatisfied twice this month. BOM weather predictions day to day are never better than our experience of watching the drops on the car connect into streams. These weather models are at best about 30% bets each way on everything.
I have an old borrowed CSIRO max min thermometer with a significant zero error hanging outside home on the protective screen. It serves us well in that we know our daily differences with the official records from several local monitoring stations; one is up in the high country. None of us get readings from the cloud tops if we have any.
Another funny thing, it seems every day I look out the window there is a cloudless sky in all directions.
I hope Luke understands.
I have a simple agenda to get these scientific arguments over atmospheric and sea level changes back into an engineering framework. If we have AGW in any form then it probably started with our engineering. I expect its changes in our engineering not science that delivers safety in the long run.
On another point; although I have decades of experience with instruments and measurements for industry the term “forgings” is completely new for me in these discussions.
I have learned much in coming to this blog through people like Luke who I believe have the job of informing us and our governments allowing some better understanding of their science about our future problems in living as we do on this planet.
We have just had more rain and several cloudy days, must be an aberration.
The human impact on climate Jennifer is directly related to the overall human impact on the planet. When I say changes to our engineering is the answer it must involve everybody.
This morning as I wiped the hot frypan with a handful of kitchen tissue paper from a handy supermarket brand name roll in the pot drawer I had to decide on its most appropriate disposal. It was including the fat mostly organic.
Was it my garden compost, the green wheely bin and big plastic bags destined for our government operated land fill or the sewage system?
I had the similar thoughts today about the empty plastic shampoo bottle in the shower.
Energy of one sort or another is tied up in both handfuls ready for disposal.
Recycling was another part of my industrial experience. I say engineering for a better future must start at home.
Warning: Hasbeen said it all in a few choice words, so ignore this if you like.
“I’d like to be Detribe’s friend but he’s mean. Pinxi dropped me.”
ROTFLOL.
Hysterical laughter.
Thanks for the dog whistle Luke I finally heard.
Now I understand Luke’s sense of humour. Sorry Luke, I don’t usually come across people whose sense of irony is possibly more exteme that my owm. Actually, I only trust people who say that I’ve done something stupid or I’am really making an error directly and blatently to my face. You simply can’t trust those who offer compliments too easily.
Thats why I always tell Jen privately when I think she’s wrong and she never makes a face or shouts back and generally has an intelligent response, so she does have some redeeming feature ( as all regulars here know).
I actually had a side email exchange with Luke. I revealed I had a soft spot for some scribblers here and was irritated by others, but the crew here would probably be surprised who’s who. Ethics prevent me from divulging further.
It took me a while to realise though that Luke was not speaking about Ian Castles. Duh.
No , Luke may not be a practising climate scientist (I thought it rude to ask him directly ) but his command of the meterological literature is at least that of an extremly gifted and well educated amateur, and he fooled me with Exhibit A and Paul Biggs contributions. Those are clearly the paper He was calling the so-called “skeptics” to write or show. If it was only so he can next bring up the stunning counter evidence, it’s a brilliant breathtaking double play, but perfectly kosher.
Finally I want to try and be clear about Mark’s use of denialist like labels. As in Shoa Denial.
Drop it Mark, its just another version of ad hominem attack.
Scepticism is not denial. Jen had a whole thread coming from my attempts to make progress on this distinction by gently making a semantic distiction between scepticism and skeptick.
Let me put it this way:
Dont throw the baby out with the bathwater.
It’s bad practice to ignore well established science unless you have really good reasons, and outrageous claims require outstanding data.
But scepticism allows you to find the dirty water. Skeptics usually throw out the baby.
There is indeed a C02 forcing effect. Exactly what percentage of global change it constributes to is anyone’s guess. But it is the baby. Exactly how much bath water there is is still an open question. My guess is 30% of the bath. But I admitted to Luke the bath water my even be pure asses milk which Cleopatra would give her kingdom for. It’s this quandry that makes this discussion interesting. Luke himself think there may be a second small baby there somewhere, so do I.
I said to Luke I think there may be a bit of baby still in the bathwater. Luke said it looks brown and sticky to me. We don’t yet know whose eyesight is better. If Luke is indeed a gifted climate amateur, I can match him with a lot of heavy lifting, but my back is bad and I have to save it mostly for where I know I can put runs on the board which is in biology. I’m bright enough to realise he’s at least a semi-pro, but he’s clearly not Greenpeace as they have a different utterly pathetic modus operandi, similar to Lamnus nasus or whoever.
The diagnostic feature of GP is complete absence of honesty about the counter case to their spin. Why they operate like this is still a deep mystery to me.
Thanks for that stuff. Luke. Nice to know it is there and being used. But I must agree that only six years of data doesn’t tell us much at all.
But correct me if I’m wrong but, surely, an increase in atmospheric moisture is generally limited by an increase in the frequency of rain?
I’m reluctant to use the “P” word again as it might clash with the beige of this blog. But it would seem that Mark S is some sort of Pommie Bathplug. Could I get any more defamatory?
These coded messages between combatants are intriguing. Although they could be only drifting’s from a peace pipe being passed around I suspect they involve more forms of elitism behind the scene about this new science.
Up the workers!
Now Ian – don’t get too polite. The vernacular is a trade mark.
Interesting comment re increase in frequency of rain – this may help or be irrelevant if I misunderstood.
Stoat says:
Water vapour is a “reactive” GHG with a short atmospheric lifetime of about 1 week. If you pump out a whole load of extra water vapour it won’t stay in the atmosphere; it would condense as rain/snow and we’d be back to where we started. If you sucked the atmosphere dry of moisture, more would evaporate from the oceans. The balance is dynamic of course: humidity of the air varies by place and time, but its a stable balance.
In contrast, CO2 has a long lifetime (actually calculating a single “lifetime” for it doesn’t work; but a given CO2 pulse such as we’re supplying now will hang around for.. ohh… a century or more). It doesn’t rain out (amusing factoid: the surface temperature of the deep interior Antarctica in winter can be colder than the freezing point of CO2; but this doesn’t lead to CO2 snow (sadly, it would be fun) because the freezing point is lower because of the lower pressure because its higher up). So if you put in extra CO2 the climate warms a bit; because of this move WV evaporates (it doesn’t have to, but just about all models show that the relative humidity tends to be about constant; so if you heat the atmos that means that the absolute humidity will increase). This in turn warms the atmosphere warms up a bit more; so more water gets evaporates. This is a positive feedback but a limited one: the increments (if you think of it that way) get smaller not larger so there is no runaway GH effect.
So: adding CO2 to the atmosphere warms it a bit and ends up with more WV. Adding WV does nothing much and the atmos returns to equilibrium. This is why WV is not the *dominant* GHG; its more like a submissive GHG 🙂
From the longer post: http://mustelid.blogspot.com/2005/01/water-vapour-is-not-dominant.html
Also discussed at: http://www.realclimate.org/index.php?p=142
Average ocean water temperatures cooled slightly between 2003 and 2005 after a decade-long warming trend, according to a study released by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) September 21.
“This research suggests global warming isn’t always steady, but happens with occasional ‘speed bumps’,” said study co-author Josh Willis of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory.
Researchers estimated the heat content of Earth’s ocean waters to a depth of about 760 meters, finding that this volume of water warmed by approximately 0.089 degree Celsius between 1993 and 2003. But from 2003 to 2005, the average temperatures fell by approximately 0.03 degree Celsius.
“This cooling is probably natural climate variability,” said Willis. “The oceans today are still warmer than they were during the 1980s, and most scientists expect the oceans will eventually continue to warm in response to human-induced climate changes.”
The heat content of the oceans reveals a great deal to scientists about the balance of energy for the planet as a whole.
“The capacity of Earth’s oceans to store the sun’s energy is more than 1,000 times that of Earth’s atmosphere,” said John Lyman of NOAA’s Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory in Seattle, Washington. “It’s important to measure upper ocean temperature, since 84 percent of the heat absorbed by Earth since the mid-1950s has gone toward warming the ocean. Measuring ocean temperature is really measuring the progress of global warming.”
Understanding this temperature fluctuation will allow scientists to develop better estimates of overall ocean temperatures — a capability that will help design computer models to predict Earth’s climate.
The findings present the researchers with another puzzle about the relationship between ocean temperatures and sea-level changes. Cooler waters should suggest less melting of glaciers and ice sheets, melting that causes sea levels to inch up. But the data show the sea levels rose during the two-year period in which the cooler ocean temperatures were recorded.
This research is part of a far-reaching U.S. science and technology program to understand climate change and reduce emissions of greenhouse gases that are linked to this phenomenon. In 2006, the United States invested nearly $3 billion in technologies such as cold fusion, hydrogen fuel, and coal-powered, zero-emissions power generation.
The findings http://oceans.pmel.noaa.gov/Pdf/heat_2006.pdf (PDF, 15 pages) and the full text http://www.noaanews.noaa.gov/stories2006/s2704.htm of the press release are available on the NOAA web site.
Luke: In the RC argument (WV feedback versus forcing) we see the concept of constant relative humidity. Now I reckon we need a bit of thought on how it applies at a local level. Dehumidifying in a closed engineering system at atmospheric pressure provides some insights; for one due point is varied with temperature.
Let’s also have another look at Pielke’s models and flow charts above.
If we think for a mo on our quarries etc that’s a lot of carbon or CO2 to account for out there somewhere. Recall I said we got a good handle here and there on such emissions for the first time around the mid 70’s to 80’s, except for that damn pesky CO2. In fact; since then there is much more from our increased burning regardless of this more recent efficiency.
Something is damping all feedback in the models and it must be the sea.
oops Luke got in first on oceans!
Gavin some interesting thoughts on the local level:
http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/2005…/2005GL023624.shtml
Realclimate interprets:
They (Philipona et al.) understand fully well that water vapor acts as a feedback to amplify forcing due to CO2 increase, and make this clear in their paper. This paper does not, however, deal directly with the problem of whether European warming can be attributed to CO2 increase. It only shows that, whatever mechanism is causing the warming of the atmosphere in this region, the surface warming is being amplified by low level water vapor feedbacks. {Wow !}
Press reports failed to note that the water vapor feedback discussed in Philipona et al. is not the same water vapor feedback usually discussed in connection with global warming. It is instead a surface water vapor feedback which adds additional surface warming on top of the usual things we talk about. The effect is already incorporated in the climate models used in IPCC forecasts, but the new observational study will be useful as a reality-check.
The fact is, that even if the diligent Swiss authors of this paper had found that increasing CO2 contributed nothing to the changes in the surface budget, this would have in no way contradicted our understanding of the way anthropogenic greenhouse gases influence climate. For the most part, surface temperature changes are determined by perturbations to the top-of-atmosphere budget, and the surface budget is just dragged along, accommodating itself to whatever changes in surface temperature are demanded in order to be able to satisfy the top of atmosphere budget. It is impossible to understand the greenhouse effect without thoroughly understanding this point
They estimate this to be about one third of a Watt per square meter. This is not in bad agreement with estimates from detailed radiation models run by the authors, which say that the change in surface radiation due to the 12ppm CO2 increase between 1995 and 2002 should be about one fourth of a Watt per square meter. It is striking that the changes in the Earth’s surface radiation budget due to anthropogenic greenhouse gases are so profound that they can be directly observed on a regional scale, over such a short time period.
careful Gavin, you’re recommending personal responsibility. Who knows where that might lead us.
“Perturbations” to the top-of-atmosphere budget, and the surface budget is just dragged along, accommodating itself to whatever changes in surface temperature are demanded in order to be able to satisfy the top of atmosphere budget” – hmm I could make some wise crack about folk caught up the in the PD, or difference between budgets top and bottom re the turmoil as we go on but……..
while hunting a definition for “perturbations” re above this popped out front-
Quote – “Roger raises a good question: “What temperature is actually important to them?” What I try to do in my stories is figure that out and answer it in as many useful ways as possible. So we had a drought. How dry was it really compared to the longest record we’ve got? Growing season, for example, is of relevance, meaning first freeze of fall, which is then linked to overnight temperatures, so I’ll tell ’em that, in Albuquerque, 2005 is likely to be one of the warmest by that measure in history. And then what about the days – which haven’t been so hot? But then I expect them to wonder whether this is part of anything larger, at which point I think the globally averaged” surface temperature is a useful data point to help them understand where their local experience fits into the bigger picture”
Did I mention frost first?
Everything we wanna know is on the www and there is nothing new under the jolly old sun except AGW!
Pielke Sr isn’t a ‘solar man’ his main interests are mainly in land use change and ocean heat storage.
Interesting post from Pielke on his blog:
My answer as to whether we should seek to reduce the amount of CO2 that we exhaust into the atmosphere, is certainly yes. Indeed, I have concluded that the biogeochemical effect of added CO2 may actually have a greater effect on the climate system than the radiative effect of CO2.
However, it has not been recognized in the climate assessments. nor by policymakers, that added CO2, by itself, can explain only a fraction (at most about 28% according to the estimate I posted on the Climate Science weblog) of the reported climate system heat increases (global warming) over the last several decades.
Even more importantly, global warming is but one of many climate responses, and CO2 is but one of a number of first order climate forcings. Climate forcings, such as land use/land cover change and the thermodynamic effect of anthropogenic aerosols, for example, can very significantly change the climate system, but yet they may not produce global warming or cooling.
We need to consider these diverse climate forcings in terms of how they could alter the lives of future generations. Focusing primarily on CO2 as a solution to the human alteration of climate is oversimplistic and misleading to policymakers.
To move society and policymakers forward on this discussion, I recommend that energy policy be seperated from climate policy. The 2005 National Research Council is a way forward with respect to the climate issue, but, unfortunately, has not been widely read.
National Research Council, 2005: Radiative forcing of climate change: Expanding the concept and addressing uncertainties. Committee on Radiative Forcing Effects on Climate Change, Climate Research Committee, Board on Atmospheric Sciences and Climate, Division on Earth and Life Studies, The National Academies Press, Washington, D.C., 208 pp.
http://www.nap.edu/openbook/0309095069/html/
If only every comment on this site were as measured and useful as Paul’s quotes and paraphrase’s of Pielke Sr . thanks PB. (and Luke)
Thanks for the info Paul. I am currently reading this book at the link you have, and so far, it seems full of useful information.
Paul’s comment – Pielke Sr isn’t a ‘solar man’ is curious
However “his main interests are mainly in land use change and ocean heat storage” is good enough for me particularly the ocean heat storage bit.
What is the ocean’s capacity for delay in sea level and climate change?
Gavin -it was my comment I think you’ll find.
See previous post in recent weeks on Tuvalu for up to date links on sea level issues. Pielke’s issues may potentially complicate some of the projections.
Among all these comments I find very little to reassure me that the Earth’s thermostat can be adjusted, what the ideal temperature is, how we will deal with people who are disadvantaged by others’ notions of ideal temperature, and so forth, especially since the notion of “climate control” has yet to emerge as something more than merely a plot element in science fiction novels.
Schills – we obviously cannot do much about solar or orbital influences but adapt or not !
We can do something about CO2 emissions at some cost. I would not be so concerned about average temperature – but changes in extremes – e.g. droughts, floods, heatwaves, hurricanes. If by changes we end up with the Pacific in a “mean El Nino like warm state” and we end up with more drought all the time over here – we might well have to take you yanks to court.
Quoting “I admire Pielke because he is an objective scientist. Of course, we have much, much more to learn about our non-linear chaotic climate system so continuing effort and money has to go into research.”
In geophysical exploration where we have had far more success in scientific prediction than any climate scientists, verified by physically testing our predictions from computer modelling of geophysical data, (of which earth temperature is one of many variables we use) by drilling, we have one axiom – when the data become non-linear all bets are off.
If the data are non-linear AND chaotic, then we simply ignore that data and try a new model.
Put simply – you cannot model non-linear chaotic systems – it’s an oxymoron!
Can somebody please explain to me why it is that a mark made in the rocks nearly 200 years ago at Port Arthur in Tassie indicates that the mean tide level is the same today as it was when it was first placed their by scientists, and yet we are consistently being told that the sea level has risen?
A further question please. Why is it that the ice caps on Mars are melting more rapidly than has been seen in the past.
my apologies for not posting links to these ‘facts’, I found them a while ago whilst trying to reach a conclusion on the ‘climate change’. It may be these facts are just ‘misinformation spread by oil companies’but in my research as a non scientist I must admit that I have come across enormous amounts of information that supposedly supports AGW that are misleading or just downright lies….if there really is such strong evidence why muddy the waters?
lacadarouac