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Showing posts from September, 2013

Skeptics Winning Americans are less worried about climate change than almost anyone else

The climate scientists at the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change have released a sweeping new report on global climate change, and the implications are pretty scary. My colleague  Brad Plumer looks at the report in detail , but the big takeaway seems to be we're on a path toward temperatures, and thus sea levels, rising. The report is a reminder that the world's leading greenhouse gas emitters, the United States and China, are doing little to combat it. Which is, in turn, a reminder that people in both countries can sometimes view climate change reports such as this one with greater skepticism than do people in other countries. It's worth putting that skepticism into context. Just how seriously do Americans and other nationalities take the threat of climate change? Pew actually sought to answer that question earlier this year, with a  big study on attitudes around the world  toward various global threats. Here's a chart showing attitudes toward climate chan

Models of misinformation -- climate reports melt under scrutiny

A last-ditch effort to refute climate “skeptics”—people unconvinced that we need to spend trillions to reshape our economies to halt or slow  “climate change”-- has failed. Last week, the National Academy of Sciences (NAS) published a study by 13 prestigious atmospheric scientists that supposedly provides “clear evidence for a discernible human influence on the thermal structure of the atmosphere.” The NAS researchers pointedly echo the famous declaration by the United Nation-sponsored Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, or IPCC, that the “balance of evidence suggests a discernible human influence on global climate.” With this new study, the authors claim to clinch the case. The IPCC, we’re supposed to believe, has been right all along. With the IPCC now issuing the first segment of its latest mammoth study on the same topic, readers should take the NAS pronouncement with a large grain of salt—and the IPCC report too. This is an attempt to change the subject and ignore th

NOAA admits: Global warming ‘really wasn’t a factor’ in Colorado floods Harry Reid debunk!

Harry Reid Blames Global Warming for the Colorado Floods http://www.nationalreview.com/planet-gore/358710/harry-reid-blames-global-warming-colorado-floods-greg-pollowitz The Christian Science Monitor reports: The answer, of course, is impossible to know for sure. But according to a panel of climate scientists from Colorado, the storm likely had little to do with climate change and more to do with an unusual confluence of atmospheric events. It’s possible that some shifts due to climate change, such as increased water vapor in the air, may have exacerbated the effects of the storm slightly. But a storm in September 1938 was very similar in its footprint, its timing, and the type of rainfall (which was not the brief, intense thunderstorms typical here). RECOMMENDED:  Think you know the odd effects of global climate change? Take our quiz. “Having seen the September 1938 analog should somewhat humble us, and remind us that nature has a way of delivering without human

Arctic Ocean Predicted To Be Ice Free By 2013 — Oops!

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Al Gore's 2007 prediction that all arctic ice would be gone by 2014 now proven to be alarming fear mongering Learn more:  http://www.naturalnews.com/042074_al_gore_global_warming_predictions.html#ixzz2g1L0UoyL Arctic Ocean Predicted To Be Ice Free By 2013 — Oops! Junk Science:  Earth has gained 19,000 Manhattans of sea ice since this date last year, the largest increase on record. There is more sea ice now than there was in mid-September 1990. Al Gore, call your office. A 2007 prediction that summer in the North Pole could be "ice-free by 2013" that was cited by former Vice President Al Gore in his Nobel Peace Prize acceptance speech has proven to be off . .. by 920,000 square miles. But then Democrats have never been good at math — or climate science. In his Dec. 10, 2007, "Earth has a fever" speech, Gore referred to a prediction by U.S. climate scientist Wieslaw Maslowski that the Arctic's summer ice could "completely di

Reuters: Skeptics have turned Al Gore, IPCC chief Pachauri into has-beens

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Compared to the heady days in 2007 when U.S. climate campaigner Al Gore and the U.N.’s panel of climate scientists shared the Nobel Peace Prize, the risks of global warming may be greater but the stars preaching the message have faded… Both Gore, the IPCC and Pachauri, now 73, won a series of international awards for their work in 2007. Gore’s movie, An Inconvenient Truth, won an Oscar and standing applause at U.N. negotiating sessions when it was shown… “We need new voices,” said Jennifer Morgan, of the World Resources Institute think tank in Washington. “Hopefully the IPCC will inspire leadership, from the Mom to the business leader, to the mayor to the head of state”… But Gore has also been worn down by criticisms, especially by U.S. Republicans who say his climate campaigns are alarmist and question the science behind them… Compared to the heady days in 2007 when U.S. climate campaigner Al Gore and the U.N.’s panel of climate scientists shared the Nobel Peace Prize,

IPCC Reviewer: “But to be honest, there’s not a clear consensus among the scientific community”

CBC reports: Climate change researchers and activists say the debate is over on the science of global warming but deniers of the evidence think a 15-year pause in temperature rise is reason enough to keep questioning conclusions. On Friday, the Inter-governmental Panel on Climate Change will release its summary for policy makers of the physical science basis study. This study is the first part of the IPCC’s fifth Assessment Report. And the contributors admit there isn’t much of a change from their last one, which they released in 2007, beyond the fact that they are even more certain about their science. “It further affirms: a), that we have seen a changing climate, b), that a lot of that is because of us [humans] and, c), if we don’t do something about it we’re going to be in serious trouble,” explained John Stone, one of the authors of the IPCC’s fourth report in 2007 that won the group the Nobel Peace Prize. He peer reviewed the IPCC’s latest report… Stone is disappointed

Skeptics scare IPCC sh*tless — Frantic last minute negotiations in Stockholm ahead of report release

The Guardian reports: Fraught negotiations over a landmark review of the world’s knowledge of climate change were making slow progress on Thursday with just hours to go before early Friday’s deadline . The negotiations are likely to go on through the night, as countries and scientists wrangle over how to assess the global threat from greenhouse gas emissions. At stake are projections – such as those of future temperature increases, sea level rises and the frequency of extreme weather – that will inform and guide government policies around the world for years to come. But people involved with the talks told the Guardian that progress had been patchy and slow as delegates debate the precise wording of the 50-plus page summary. Read more… http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2013/sep/26/ipcc-climate-report-slow-progress

IPCC to have ‘low confidence’ in more hurricanes, longer droughts by 2050

The Financial Times reports: In keeping with the cautious language used in these IPCC assessments, only four of which have ever been done in the panel’s 25-year history, the table says there is “low confidence” that there will be more tropical cyclones or longer droughts between now and 2050. Read more (registration required). http://junkscience.com/2013/09/26/ipcc-to-have-low-confidence-in-more-hurricanes-longer-droughts-by-2050/

IPCC to blame warming stop on" volcanoes, solar cycle" — has ‘low confidence’ in attribution

The Financial Times reports: The final draft of the summary for policy makers (which is still officially confidential) has a stab at explaining why this has happened, but it is not exactly an easy read – especially for a document that is supposed to be a simple and accessible explanation of climate change. It says: “The observed reduction in warming trend over the period 1998–2012 as compared to the period 1951–2012, is due in roughly equal measure to a cooling contribution from internal variability and a reduced trend in radiative forcing (medium confidence). The reduced trend in radiative forcing is primarily due to volcanic eruptions and the downward phase of the current solar cycle. However, there is low confidence in quantifying the role of changes in radiative forcing in causing this reduced warming trend.” Other parts of the summary are clearer, and its overwhelming message is that even though temperature rises may have stalled, there is plenty of other evidence of clima

New excuse for stop in warming — ‘black holes’ in the ocean: "mathematically" the same as the warped regions of space-time around cosmic singularities.

New Scientist reports: Earth has its own black holes. Swirling masses of water in the ocean are mathematically the same as the warped regions of space-time around cosmic singularities. The finding is more than a mere curiosity: these eddies could be helping to slow climate change. Oceanic maelstroms can trap and carry billions of tonnes of water over long distances, along with debris and marine life. But because the oceans are constantly churning, it was difficult to pick these cyclones out of the chaos. To know how much water they transport and what their impact on climate could be, we needed a way to locate their edges. To find them, George Haller of the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich and Francisco Beron-Vera at the University of Miami, Florida, created a mathematical model that revealed the similarities between the eddies’ conveyor belt-like edges and a particular region around a black hole. In this so-called photon sphere, light is trapped in loops that spi

Warmists say they won’t disbelieve models unless ‘pause’ lasts another 20 years!

AFP reports: Over the past 50 years, the mean global temperature rise was 0.12 degrees Celsius (0.2 degrees Fahrenheit) per decade, slowing to an average 0.05 C (0.09 F) per decade over the past 15 years. Half of the slowdown could be attributed to volcanic eruptions, whose particles reflect sunlight, and a bigger-than expected drop in heat from the Sun’s changing activity cycle, said a summary of the report. The other half is attributed to a “cooling contribution from internal variability”. Laurent Terray with the French computer modelling agency Cerfacs said the term is used to explain a shift in the way heat is distributed between land, sea and air. Still unclear is what causes the variation or determines its duration. “We know that this kind of episode, of a decadal length or thereabouts, can occur once or twice a century,” said Terray. “If it (the present one) continues for two more decades, we may start to think that the computer models are underestimating internal va

Ocean-ate-my-warming notion supported by warmists — but not necessarily the data

Deutsche Welle reports: The output of heat-trapping gases like carbon dioxide (CO2) continues to surge, forcing up global temperatures. Sea levels are also rising, said Mojib Latif of the Geomar Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research in Kiel. “This reprieve only refers to the ocean’s surface temperature. We can’t conclude that climate change has come to a halt.” Mojib Latif predicted a temporary hiatus in global warming Latif is a calm, self-controlled man, but he is easily angered by having to explain again and again why climate change isn’t just a scam. Back in 2008, Latif shocked many of his colleagues by saying the rise of temperature could indeed stagnate. Oceans covering two thirds of the earth’s surface are able to absorb heat and store it – especially in deep sea levels below 800 meters (875 yards). This theory is supported by many other scientists, but there is limited data available about the deepest regions of the sea.  That’s why Latif continues to stress how important

Coal regains market share in 2013 as natgas prices rise — Obama dream of no coal would put us at the mercy of gas volatility

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Natural gas generation lower than last year because of differences in relative fuel prices Source:  U.S. Energy Information Administration, Electric Power Monthly Note:  The rolling 4-year range for each fuel source represents the maximum and minimum amount of each fuel source that is consumed for electricity generation for the same month during the previous four years. Total natural gas use for power generation in the United States was down 14% during the first seven months of 2013 compared to the same period in 2012 (see chart), mostly because of  higher natural gas prices  relative to coal prices. High natural gas-fired generation in 2012 occurred as a result of the lowest spot natural gas prices in a decade—in fact, the two fuels contributed  approximately equal shares of total generation in April 2012 . Despite  lower gas use for generation  thus far in 2013, natural gas generation remains consistently higher than levels before 2012, as shown in the graphs below. Trends i

IPCC claims climate won’t cool without massive geoengineering — So what is the politically correct temperature?

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Geoengineering aims to cool the Earth by methods including spraying sulphate aerosols into the stratosphere to reflect sunlight, or fertilising the oceans with iron to create carbon-capturing algal blooms. Stratospheric Aerosol Geoengineering (aka Chemtrails) Facts Scientists and governments refer to, what is commonly known around the world as Chemtrails (not to be confused with normal jet contrails), as Stratospheric Aerosol Geoengineering (S.A.G.).  It has been documented, as far back as the late 1980’s, that the United States (U.S.) Government has been conducting covert S.A.G. programs. These covert operations are now being conducted worldwide throughout the U.S. and NATO countries on an on-going daily bases. This program is a global covert operation. Famed scientist, Edward Teller, who at the time worked at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory in Livermore, California and took part in the development of the Atomic Bomb and was the co-inventor of the Hydrogen Bomb, was