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Science and climate sceptics should come clean
By Andrew Wade	 30th October 2015 1:11 pm 11th April 2017 12:28 pm
A prominent media voice has over the past two weeks extolled the virtues of global warming, and denied the benefits of government funded scientific research. He also happens to own the land on which England's biggest open-cast coal mine is situated.
A couple of weeks ago a friend of mine pointed me in the direction of an interesting Times article (paywall) on the economic benefits of global warming. It argued that increased CO2 in the atmosphere enhances plant growth, leading to greater crop yields, reducing world hunger etc. I had come across similar arguments before, but this was particularly cogent, and appeared to have plenty of evidence to back up its points.
What I didn't realise at the time was that the author of the piece was one Matt Ridley, otherwise known as Tory peer Viscount Ridley, owner of the land on which England's largest open-cast coal mine operates, and former chairman of Northern Rock. It wasn't until the Viscount's Northumberland family estate was hijacked this week by a group of protesters calling themselves Matt Ridley's Conscience that I put two and two together.
Ridley is an eloquent writer and speaker, a potent combination when paired with his climate scepticism. And he has a genuine point about CO2 levels and the benefits to the plant world. In the short-term, humans may in fact attain some marginal gains from increased CO2 in the atmosphere. What he denies, however, is the catastrophic long-term effects that the vast majority of scientists agree will result from the Earth warming above two degrees.
It is widely accepted, by everyone from Bank of England Governor Mark Carney to Barack Obama, that the majority of fossil fuel reserves known today need to be left untapped if we are to stay within the two degree limit. I suppose when your family is benefiting financially from coal extraction, this presents something of a conflict of interest, and one that should certainly have been made explicit in The Times.
Just as nine members of Matt Ridley's Conscience were being arrested on the Viscount's estate, the grassroots organisation Science is Vital was gearing up for a rally in central London to "celebrate science, and demand that the government set out a positive plan to invest in it." The UK's public science spend has declined to 0.44 per cent of GDP. This is about half of the G8 average, and actually less than any G8 country has spent in the last 20 years.
While the UK goes cap in hand to China to develop the nuclear infrastructure that will keep the lights on for the next 50 years, George Osborne and the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills are at the same time telling the research councils to model cuts of 25 to 40 per cent. Rather than preparing to reverse the decline in the R&D budget that has occurred over the past number of years, the government is planning on slashing innovation investment even further.
The UK's public science spend has declined to 0.44 per cent of GDP.
Interestingly, Osborne's Westminster colleague Viscount Ridley has an opinion on this as well. In an article last week for The Wall Street Journal – another Murdoch title incidentally – Ridley argues that the evolution of technology and innovation happens independently of investment. According to him, the inevitable march of technology means that government funding for science is irrelevant. Private capital and industry will do any heavy lifting, and the government can take a back seat and let nature run its course.
While private capital is an absolutely vital driver of innovation, it is very often governments that lay the foundations for progress, with industry taking the reins once the path is clear. With nuclear energy, or space exploration for example, there is no way humanity could have achieved what we have to date without massive initial public investment. Private companies like SpaceX would not exist today without the huge public spend on the Apollo programme. Conversely, imagine if all medical research was left to pharmaceutical companies? Or if climate policy was left to the energy sector? It's for these reasons that Ridley is wrong, and that government needs to lead the way on both climate change and science in general.
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Latest ArticlesComments (110)
JamesG 30th October 2015 at 2:21 pm
And you came up with 5.
Ridley would make far more money from windmills than coal if he were as mercenary as the other landowners transferring money from the poor to the rich like David Cameron's father-in-law.
That coal by the way is keeping the lights on. 40% of our electricity still comes from coal power and nothing is set to replace that any time soon.
And the reason we don't have the money for investment is quite simply that the country is broke and can't afford it. Spending 8 billion a year on useless windmills doesn't help. And we'll be a lot more broke with only windmills left thanks to ideology winning over common sense.
clive gardner 30th October 2015 at 2:34 pm
Mark Carney and Barack Obama are both experts in climate change.
It seems to me nobody really knows which way the climate will change and we'll only know for sure when it happens. I think future generations
will look back and laugh at our windmills.
Mike Haseler 30th October 2015 at 2:43 pm
As you don't mention NOAA I assume this was written before the news that they have refused to defend their adjustments creating warming in the Global Temperature. They clearly have something to hide and are acting illegally as the congressional committee requesting this information is charged with oversight of this area.
In other words, they are now law breakers, more than likely hiding fabrication of the climate data. So, bangs goes their credibility … and hallo the Satellites showing 18 years without warming.
Anonymous 30th October 2015 at 2:49 pm
Matt Ridley declares his interest every time he writes on the subject. It is no secret>
Bill Church 30th October 2015 at 2:54 pm
"What he denies, however, is the catastrophic long-term effects that the vast majority of scientists agree will result from the Earth warming above two degrees."
More sloppy journalism from The Engineer. He is probably referring to the infamous and entirely discredited 97% paper and to suggest that Barak Obama and Mark Carney are somehow qualified with papal infallibility concerning climate science is clearly nonsense.
Please check the facts.
mike blamey 30th October 2015 at 3:46 pm
And the reason we don't have the money for investment is quite simply that the country is broke and can't afford it. Spending 8 billion a year on useless windmills doesn't help.
So, finally the convincing argument NOT to spend £50,000,000,000 on HS2 and £100,000,000,000 on another fleet of missile launching subs. I know, have enough seats on trains and subs to put all those who vote for this farce in such: so that they can move quickly to cloud-cuckoo land. Mike B
Dave Smart 30th October 2015 at 4:29 pm
"The decline in the R&D budget" is the only important issue here. The rest is utterly irrelevant.
George Osbourne, Viscount Ridley, Mark Carney and Barack Obama have no expertise in climate science – so what? The facts are as plain as the nose on your face. i.e. The first two will construct a fallacious argument to support their ideology and denial, whereas the other two have the intellect (and absence of vested interest) to judge the value of real scientific evidence and use it to inform essential changes in policy that the first two can't stomach.
"The evolution of technology and innovation happens independently of investment." That is the right wing/free market lie used to justify every cut in public spending on R&D. The shortfall is never made up by the private sector, since R&D cuts into profit margins.
Private capital only ever drives innovation if the ROI promises to be good and quick. There is no likelihood of any renewables or nuclear technology falling into that category. The government's abdication of responsibility is the product of an immoral ideological stance.
John K 30th October 2015 at 5:08 pm
By all means reference scientific studies into global warming. However, to refer to 'everyone from Mark Carney and Barack Obama' is a bit like saying you heard it on Eastenders, or read it in the Daily Mail.
stewart boyle 30th October 2015 at 5:56 pm
Good work by Andrew Wade. No one will convince the haggle of folks who just repeat here ad finitum and elsewhere scientifically illiterate comments about Cl Change as tho' they are fact. 97% of peer reviewed scientific papers confirm existence of man-made cl change. I think I'd rather rely on this than a very poor economist who lost billions thro' financial incompetence.
Silvia Leahu-Aluas 30th October 2015 at 5:59 pm
Coal is dead and no Viscount can revive it:
http://www.bloombergview.com/articles/2015-07-06/why-you-should-short-coal
Poor Viscount, he is so concerned about widows and orphans and world hunger, this is why he pushes the "benefits" of global warming! Not to try and sell his coal.
Well, if we have to take the advice of somebody with a title (although Viscount in the XXIst century sounds as contemporary as coal), then here is a much better source:
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/oct/27/prince-charles-warns-financial-sector-charities-fossil-fuel-risk?CMP=share_btn_gp
Paul Reeves 30th October 2015 at 7:11 pm
I think that 'The scientific consensus has been proved beyond doubt' is indeed beyond doubt – but science is all about 'doubt' ie is provisional etc (especially when what we are talking about are predictions often based on the 'consensus' between computer models). Unfortunately the whole climate change issue has become so politicised (small p) (and any skeptics cannot be referred to without using the term 'Deni/yer' (ie probably mad or bad) somewhere in any article referring to them) that any doubt expressed is jumped upon.
The decisions that Obama, Cameron etc. makes are Political (big P) indeed – and go beyond 'The Science' – involving moral and ethical decisions ( taking into account scientific input) which are open to what people need or just plain want (that's democracy). That may in the short term require putting the 'Planet' second. For example getting billions out of poverty is to me more urgent & may require a non 'low carbon future' for now with the option of clearing up after (and that is possible- if the term Engineer is to mean anything).
Carney may have been appointed by politicians – but he is after all just a Financial 'expert' and ironically another example of the fact that Politicians have lost the will to lead but prefer to hide behind experts and their unquestionable 'facts' financial or scientific.
Ridley is good and interesting on some things, less so on others, but if the Engineer wants to start getting 'radical' why not start at pointing out that he was appointed to the totally undemocratic 'Lords' (who again in some circles are seems as progressive 'experts') when in reality they again short circuit democracy.
For global warming to occur we need a mechanism and feedback.
I've read two separate articles by different researchers demonstrating the heating effect of CO2 to be significantly less than previously anticipated and I haven't actually seen any evidence for the feedback loop, beyond conjecture based on models.
To my eye, it appears that climate researchers simply assume these based not on proven evidence but accepted wisdom.
I suppose for me, the fact that we, in our geological history have had periods of higher CO2 and lower temperatures and conversely higher temperatures and lower CO2 concentrations undermines the theory of AGW driven climate change. Then when I read the research I noted above my suspicions are strengthened.
That's not to say I don't agree with pursuing a more sustainable technological future, this just seems sensible.
What I dislike is green dogmatism based not on provable hypotheses but 'scientific opinion' and consensus.
The catholic church is often condemned by secular commentators for its treatment of Galileo by dogmatising one scientific opinion over another only for them to be proved wrong. The green debate seems to have taken on a similar religious quality as those who are 'convinced' gradually marginalse and label dissenters, even proposing the criminalisation of the voicing of their opinions.
This doesn't feel like open, rational enquiry but religious dogmatism from centuries past.
Bryan Leyland 30th October 2015 at 11:17 pm
Editor, you choose to "shoot the messenger" and mount a personal attack on Ridley. That is not the way science – or engineering – is done.
All that matters is the evidence. And the evidence is, beyond doubt, (climate4you.com) that all five of the leading temperature records (and the IPCC " [SPM, page 3, section B.1, bullet point 3, ) agree that the world has not warmed as the computer models predicted it would over the last 18 years or so. This proves that the computer models are worthless and should not be used for temperature prediction.
Consensus belongs to the world of politics, evidence belongs to the world of science and engineering. As Einstein pointed out, "one single fact can prove me wrong". The consensus was against Galileo, continental drift, and the real reason for stomach ulcers. It was wrong every time.
I would expect that the editor of an engineering Journal could tell the difference between consensus and evidence. As my father used to say to me "believe nothing of what you hear and half what you see". And if you look, you will see that the world has not warmed.
Anyway, the scientific consensus has not been proved beyond doubt. Since 1998, more than 31,000 American scientists from diverse climate-related disciplines, including more than 9,000 with Ph.D.s, have signed a public petition announcing their belief that "…there is no convincing scientific evidence that human release of carbon dioxide, methane, or other greenhouse gases is causing or will, in the foreseeable future, cause catastrophic heating of the Earth's atmosphere and disruption of the Earth's climate." Included are atmospheric physicists, botanists, geologists, oceanographers, and meteorologists. (Forbes.)
mike blamey 31st October 2015 at 12:26 pm
" Governments need to lead the way…"
Regular readers may recall my somewhat tenuous link to Nevil Shute Norway [A Town like Alice, On the Beach, No Highway..and a succession of other very popular books and films in the 40s and 50s with the theme of Engineering and ordinary persons doing extra-ordinary things.] My father worked, until his death in 1943 as a colleague of Shute, and, so my mother advised, he did come to our home one evening and 'bless' me!I was six months old.
Shute's auto-biography (It's called Slide Rule) describes the competition 'organised' in the late 20s/30s by HMG between the State owned-airship company (based in Cardington, Beds) and Vickers (based in Howden, Yorks) to build two air-ships R100 and R101-to demonstrate which method of management of complex projects and situations was the best. Public or privately funded. The R100 (whose chief designer was Barnes Wallis, Shute then was chief mathematician) was absolutely successful fulfilling all its design and acceptance parameters: the R101 crashed on its maiden flight, killing many of its design team, the Minister for Air etc. UK based Airship potential, to all intents and purposes, ceased! Shute opines that in his later work attached to the Royal Navy, only senior technical staff with a private income (ie unafraid of the consequences of any decision that might be influenced by/conflict with those of their seniors) could be relied upon to give totally impartial decisions. Has anything changed?
Bill Church 31st October 2015 at 7:53 pm
"The scientific consensus has been proved beyond doubt."
Typical of a lightweight journalist! Consensus does not equal proof. The consensus once held that the Earth was the centre of the universe.
Yes, CO2 is a greenhouse gas and will have some warming effect but nobody knows what the degree of warming will be. The records suggest much less than the alarmists try to frighten us with.
When CO2 was above 4,000ppm the climate did not "tip" and remember that CO2 is a vital plant food.
Please do some research before you opine.
Jack Broughton 31st October 2015 at 10:16 pm
That there is a "Scientific consensus" about the "proven science" is well proven, consensus is exactly that it is not fact.
The Engineer is almost alone in even allowing those of us who fine the "proven science" to be very unproven and broken, so please keep this up.
The article is one of the most one-sided that I have seen in these pages: hope that COP 21 is not being enforced by the Ministry of Truth!
Rosco T 1st November 2015 at 8:21 pm
Good article. You make a simple point well. He clearly should have declared his vested interests. Suburb put downs to the hecklers.
There is no way innovation should be left solely to private capital as there can be little ROI in certain areas that are of big benefit to public.
Bryan Leyland 1st November 2015 at 9:14 pm
It is sad to see someone choose to "shoot the messenger" and mount a personal attack on Ridley. That is not the way science – or engineering – is done.
The editor of an engineering Journal should be able to tell the difference between consensus and evidence. As my father used to say to me "believe nothing of what you hear and half what you see". The simple fact is that the world has not warmed as predicted by the climate models.
Also the scientific consensus has not been proved beyond doubt. Since 1998, more than 31,000 American scientists from diverse climate-related disciplines, including more than 9,000 with Ph.D.s, have signed a public petition announcing their belief that "…there is no convincing scientific evidence that human release of carbon dioxide, methane, or other greenhouse gases is causing or will, in the foreseeable future, cause catastrophic heating of the Earth's atmosphere and disruption of the Earth's climate." Included are atmospheric physicists, botanists, geologists, oceanographers, and meteorologists. (Forbes.)
I am reminded of this quote by Galileo: "In questions of science, the authority of a thousand is not worth the humble reasoning of a single individual."
What we need is open debate and objective examination of all the evidence.
Jack Broughton 1st November 2015 at 9:43 pm
The Demise of COP 21: Part 1.
The NOAA have refused to provide info to Congress on their recent data fiddling that claimed that global warming was continuing. Hope that Congress can now extend this to the humangenisation of measured temperatures that nave seen the past being cooled more each year. Orwell's Ministry of Truth would have struggled to outdo the NOAA.
Amusing that the US Government will question their scientists while EU governments swallow their second-rate science hook, line and sinker.
The French TV station has fired a Meteorologist who had the temerity to claim that the "proven science" was far from proven.
In the UK the BBC continues to act as judge and jury regarding the "proven science".
Only the EU and tragically primarily UK have made any real commitment to the IDCs. The rest of the world is either ambivalent, increasing fossil fuel usage or laying claims for large monetary transfers.
JamesG 1st November 2015 at 10:09 pm
Consider this line: "What he denies, however, is the catastrophic long-term effects that the vast majority of scientists agree will result from the Earth warming above two degrees."
The link is to Christine Figueres, a diplomat not a scientist. Now read where the 2 degree limit came from here by the person who invented it and said it was 100% political and designed purely to force German policy.
http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/interview-hans-von-storch-on-problems-with-climate-change-models-a-906721.html
In fact there is no consensus on 2 degrees being other than beneficial; and certainly not in the IPCC reports. So Ridley cannot deny anything that is not true. Above 3 degrees, the IPCC only says that it might be bad. The distinction is important because estimated climate sensitivities in the literature have been continuously falling to lower than 2 degrees, never mind 3.
And the biggest single issue in climate science is why the models missed the 'hiatus' that cannot occur if manmade CO2 truly dominates the climate. Almost all climate science is focused now on this conundrum.
As for 'has been proved beyond doubt'. Read what von Storch said in the link above:
"A 20-year pause in global warming does not occur in a single modeled scenario….There are two conceivable explanations — The first..is that less global warming is occurring than expected because greenhouse gases, especially CO2, have less of an effect than we have assumed. This wouldn't mean that there is no man-made greenhouse effect, but simply that our effect on climate events is not as great as we have believed. The other possibility is that, in our simulations, we have underestimated how much the climate fluctuates owing to natural causes.
Hence the skeptics have every right to be skeptical… whether they produce coal currently vital to our energy supply or not! Ridley btw is actually a recent convert to skepticism….because he keeps up to date with the actual science – not the slogans. You guys could try doing the same!
And as a nuclear engineer I declare not one whit of interest in fossil fuels except that I've gotten used to heat and power being there when I need it. And yes I'd agree with the above sentiments that nuclear power needs public investment in the UK…not so much in the USA, which seems to be the model that Ridley is touting.
Alternative energies should stand or fall on their own merits – not on a manufactured climate hysteria about to pop in Paris. Meantime we'll only have gas power left in the UK by 2023 and blackouts could start this winter.
Dave Smart 2nd November 2015 at 7:40 am
If Viscount Ridley read The Telegraph he would learn that manufacturers in the real world depend on public R&D funding. "Without it Britain risks losing its place as a leading technology base." But they miss the point too. We lost that place, due to cuts in years past. Now Osbourne goes begging abroad for the expertise + investment and we pay the price. How incompetent can you be?
"Many countries, including Germany, China, Singapore and South Korea have clear strategies for promoting innovation across priority areas." Britain has no strategy – it has dumb ideology.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/finance/newsbysector/industry/engineering/11967085/Engineering-giants-warn-over-changes-to-research-funding.html
It's applied research that needs more money. Basic science gets enough, but it's spent unwisely.
http://www.wsj.com/articles/the-myth-of-basic-science-1445613954
"In 2003, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development published a paper on the 'sources of economic growth in OECD countries' between 1971 and 1998 and found, to its surprise, that whereas privately funded research and development stimulated economic growth, publicly funded research had no economic impact whatsoever. None. This earthshaking result has never been challenged. It is so inconvenient to the argument that science needs public funding that it is ignored." On the contrary, the truth is so inconvenient for Matt Ridley, he has to construct a bogus argument in a vain attempt to justify his selfish hubris.
Does it honestly surprise anyone? There's nothing 'earthshaking' about that result. It's inevitable, since private investment is ONLY put into research which is expected to reap commercial rewards! Furthermore, inventions that can outcompete an established, incumbent industry (and put it out of business) are always vigorously opposed (understandably) by the vested interests that advise the government on what R&D needs to be done!
Government should fund the research that the private sector won't do for itself. The strategy must be to focus on those disruptive technologies that'll displace the obsolete junk we currently import. Then we can manufacture the better designs for ourselves, using British steel etc. and export them to China. That's a trade partnership that makes sense. When did Osbourne ever make sense? The only rational explanation for neoliberalism is that it's a selfish policy, aiming to manipulate the economy so that wealth continues to flow from low and middle earners to the wealthy 'elite'. (as they see themselves) The victims are conned into voting for this (New Labour, Tory) lunacy. Very sad, but they get what they deserve. Do they like being slaves to debt?
David Waring 2nd November 2015 at 7:58 am
There is much concern over global warming yet we appear to still be led by sheep.
Consider the tale proposed by the author of ISBN-10: 1444779672 and set it against
http://www.pnas.org/content/104/41/16016.full especially in the light of the recent Chelyabinsk event.
Anonymous 2nd November 2015 at 9:49 am
This piece is an attack on the messenger, not the message, and without a single variable fact to back it up its 'consensual' assertions.
This is not engineering, or science. It is politics.
I am now compelled to ask Mr Wade, do you have any interests to declare involving AGW
Roger B 2nd November 2015 at 12:21 pm
"Editor's comments | 30 Oct 2015 5:08 pm
What has been proven beyond doubt? Please can you enlighten us (and the IPCC).
There are various probabilities that man's actions are having some effect on the climate. There are various models that predict various possibilities for future temperature increases (most of which are currently deviating from reality). None of this is beyond doubt in a scientific or legal way.
Please can you justify or remove this statement.
Bill Church 2nd November 2015 at 1:46 pm
I'd like to know just what Andrew's qualifications are and to what degree has he studied climate and the multitude of scientific papers on the subject.
It is not science or engineering simply to parrot the press releases of NGOs and lunatic UN activists.
Roger B 2nd November 2015 at 2:50 pm
When the Cook et al study was posted on the Skeptical Science website it was headlined with "12 000 papers relating to climate changer were studied and there was a 97% consensus that man's actions were responsible for global warming.
They also showed the actual data broken down into categories as follows:
1. 65 explicit endorse, >50% warming caused by man
2. 934 explicit endorse
3. 2933 implicit endorse
4. 8261 no position
5. 53 implicit reject
6. 15 explicit reject
7. 10 explicit reject, <50% warming caused by man
Out of 12271 papers 999 or 8% explicitly endorse warming caused by man.
Out of 12271 papers 3923 or 32% apparently endorse warming caused by man.
Not quite 97%!
As I said, please justify your statement.
Silvia Leahu-Aluas 2nd November 2015 at 2:58 pm
Andrew, just keep your cool.
Not only coal is dead, no matter how much flustering its demise and the reality of anthropogenic climate change generate, but the age if carbon is over. And that is a good thing, happening not a moment too soon:
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/jul/10/fossil-fuel-industry-must-implode-to-avoid-climate-disaster-says-top-scientist
"The journalist's qualifications are irrelevant. He is not claiming to be a scientific expert on the subject of climate change, but is rather highlighting the opinions of those that are."
I'm sorry, that's nonsense. If you report a story in a magazine or on radio or TV, you should have sufficient scientific basic knowledge to make a judgement or, if you do not have the knowledge, be prepared to dig for it.
Too much reporting today in the media simply takes the easy way out and parrots the sensationalist output of pressure groups, charities and other NGOs.
What are your qualifications Andrew?
David Redfern 2nd November 2015 at 3:38 pm
As neither a scientist nor an engineer I have only one question about AGW which may help me make more sense of the article in question.
Is the funding for AGW supporters research equal to the funding for the AGW sceptics research?
If one receives substantially more funding, from whatever source, then the argument is hardly balanced and the 97% Roger B rather neatly categorised surely can't be taken seriously.
But then I don't know much of these things other than I believe the world has been considerably hotter, which I believe it dealt with rather better than if the temperature drops and we suffer another ice age (not that either is particularly likely in our lifetimes).
I also question the validity of any science on the subject as evidence from fossils etc. can only surely be a snapshot of a small area of the planet at a particular moment in time. Joining up the sketchy dots available would seem little more than guesswork.
I might seem rude to suggest that everyone is actually making it up as they go along. As we have never been on earth before (to my knowledge) we can't possibly predict the future by gazing into a badly cracked, scientific crystal ball.
65 explicit endorse, >50% warming caused by man
10 explicit reject, <50% warming caused by man
87% taking 75 papers out of 12271.
For less than 50% warming caused by man we should, as I have said many times before, be looking at mitigation and adaptation as well as a general reduction in our consumption of resources and generation of pollution.
The ridiculous focus on CO2 does not help. Just look at diesel cars and the installation of solar PV in northern latitudes.
And whilst it's absolutely right that research is done into the subject of AGW, surely it shouldn't be used to scare the living bejeezus out of the global population by feeding the media with information that is little more than conjecture but presented as scientific fact.
I don't believe my descendants are going to boil in their beds. I'm far more concerned with global population growth, much of it because of ignorance, economic need and denial of birth control to billions of third world (and many first world) inhabitants because of religious dogma.
If the global climate is at risk from AGW surely it makes more sense to deal with the problem rather than the symptoms?
Bryan Leyland 2nd November 2015 at 8:46 pm
"Are you trying to say that every time there is consensus, that consensus is wrong? The examples you cite from history have no bearing on the overwhelming scientific consensus that exists today on climate change. "
No. What I'm saying is that consensus has no part in science. It belongs to the world of politics. Whether it is right or wrong is irrelevant. In science all that matters is the evidence.
The evidence says the world had not warmed for the last 18 years in spite of a steady increase in carbon dioxide levels. This proves – and I use the word carefully – that man-made carbon dioxide does not cause dangerous global warming. (It probably causes some, but not enough to be measured beyond dispute.
Anyway, the 97% figure you quote is nonsense. The people concerned – less than 200 I believe – agreed that mankind effects the climate. I would agree with that.
http://richardtol.blogspot.nl/2015/03/now-almost-two-years-old-john-cooks-97.html "In their paper, Cook and colleagues argue that 97% of the relevant academic literature endorses that humans have contributed to observed climate change."
From the IPCC:
1. "… the rate of warming over the past 15 years (1998–2012; 0.05 [–0.05 to 0.15] °C per decade) … is smaller than the rate calculated since 1951 (1951–2012; 0.12 [0.08 to 0.14] °C per decade)." [SPM, page 3, section B.1, bullet point 3, and in full Synthesis Report on page SYR-6]
>>The world has not warmed as fast as we predicted and we don't know why.
2. "… an analysis of the full suite of CMIP5 historical simulations (…) reveals that 111 out of 114 realisations show a GMST trend over 1998–2012 that is higher than the entire HadCRUT4 trend ensemble …." [WGI contribution, chapter 9, text box 9.2, page 769, and in full Synthesis Report on page SYR-8]
>> 97% of the model runs over estimated the actual temperature rise.
3. "There may also be a contribution from forcing inadequacies and, in some models, an overestimate of the response to increasing greenhouse gas and other anthropogenic forcing (dominated by the effects of aerosols)." [SPM, section D.1, page 13, bullet point 2, and full Synthesis Report on page SYR-8]
>> It is possible that we have overestimated the climate forcing factor and other key factors – the numbers that drive our predictions of dangerous global warming.
4. "This difference between simulated [i.e. model output] and observed trends could be caused by some combination of (a) internal climate variability, (b) missing or incorrect radiative forcing and (c) model response error". [WGI contribution, chapter 9, text box 9.2, page 769]
>> We really don't know why the climate models got it so wrong.
If the IPCC demonstrates grounds for serious doubts, how can anyone be certain?
JohnK 3rd November 2015 at 7:46 am
Would the commenter using the nom-de-plume 'John K' please refrain as it may confuse some readers with myself. The comment above was not mine!
Ed. Do you have some filter to prevent such identity theft.
As for the subject matter of the article, I believe the facts and theories surrounding 'Global Warming' have become so intertwined and muddled that to extract pure fact from what is merely conjecture is now impossible. It has thus become an ideological rather than a scientific argument.
David Redfern 3rd November 2015 at 12:53 pm
@Bryan Leyland
From my earliest attempts to understand climate change many years ago, the IPCC were accused of using erroneous and blatantly false data to ensure their conclusions agreed with their theory. It now appears even dodgy data can't cook us.
John Douglas 3rd November 2015 at 1:10 pm
This very diverse discussion touches at a number of points in the one, Big Picture.
1. It may be "an ideological rather than a scientific argument" but I contend it would be better to heed the warnings about CC and avoid the possibility of 70% of the world's population being displaced by rising sea levels. Losing cities like London would be wounding, and the Maldives a catastrophe for its tiny population, but reduction of whole landmasses like Bangladesh to a tow path would be make the 2015 refugee crisis look like a works outing.
2. We are all agreed about the need for R&D but we have got to stop faffing about and get on with the "D" in particular. Constructing HS2,3 and the rest will put mass transport on the grid, literally. Completing the right projects will obviate the need for short haul air travel and thereby release slots in existing airport capacity for long haul traffic, saving the need for construction of additional runways, and even whole airports.
3. Powering the grid with nuclear stations (and shouldn't these be Thorium until we have fusion?) will preserve concentrated fossil carbon deposits (not "fuel") for non-energy applications over the coming thousands of years, rather than blowing it all away up a chimney over a few decades or, at best, another century or two.
4. A substantially nuclear driven grid will always need quickly deployed boost for peak periods, and coal is not ideal for that, though perhaps better than nothing. Certainly windmill generation is not a solution but I disagree with the earlier comment that future generations (if there are any) will laugh at the concept. They will be too angry about the waste of vital resources to have anything left for hilarity. No, they will ask why we didn't research and develop storage systems so that benign nuclear will meet all needs without recourse to these absurd windmills, though storage will help even that fiasco.
5. We are in transition and, as the Ed pointed out, that does include some coal. But not for long (Sunday Times, Business Focus 25.10.2015: "Power Failure").
Anonymous 3rd November 2015 at 2:19 pm
I am surprised by the number of supposedly technically literate people posting here who, in the face of almost complete scientific agreement on this issue, seem to have been taking in by the self interested chatter of a handful of Samuel Rowbotham characters. Monckton, Lawson et al…
I am left to conclude that either this comments page has been hijacked by climate denial trolls or maybe it is an illustration of the disappointing state of British Engineering.
Randy Dutton 4th November 2015 at 1:30 am
Forget Ridley. Go to http://www.co2science.org for the hundreds of studies on how increased CO2 levels increase plant growth and health.
A little geohistory. Up until the industrial revolution our biosphere had lost 96% of its atmospheric CO2 since animals first roamed land. At a straight line projection, in another 10-20 million years the CO2 levels would have dropped below the levels plants need to survive. Burning fossil fuels actually recycled the sequestered carbon so that plants could benefit.
Dave Smart 4th November 2015 at 9:59 am
@ Anonymous | 3 Nov 2015 2:19 pm
It's the way our brains work, or don't work appropriately, depending on how you see it. . .
i.e. The Two Systems of Cognitive Processes. System 1 produces the fast, intuitive reactions and instantaneous decisions that govern most of our lives. System 2 is the deliberate type of thinking involved in focus, deliberation, reasoning or analysis.
http://bigthink.com/delancey-place/the-two-systems-of-cognitive-processes
"System 2 tires easily (a process called 'ego depletion'), so it usually accepts what System 1 tells it."
http://www.theguardian.com/books/2011/dec/13/thinking-fast-slow-daniel-kahneman
Then, having made a bad decision (being taken in by a plausible but fallacious argument.) with System 1, people don't like admitting they got it wrong.
J. K. Galbraith summed up nicely the usual outcome of this hubris:-
"Faced with the choice between changing one's mind and proving that there is no need to do so, almost everyone gets busy on the proof."
Roger B 4th November 2015 at 2:05 pm
Especially when large international bodies and governments have been taken in by this fallacious argument.
It will be hard for the IPCC and most western Governments to admit they have grossly overstated the problem and spent trillions on the wrong solutions.
Or in the case of NASA massaging the numbers to match the argument.
Bill Church 4th November 2015 at 5:01 pm
From"anonymous".
People who make ad hominem attacks are often too scared to admit their identity!
I have been studying climate in some detail for many years and am confident that the science is most definitely not agreed.
JamesG 5th November 2015 at 1:50 pm
This winter could see blackouts thanks to the overhyped demonization of fossil fuels by earth scientists with a track record of failure predicting food shortages from overpopulation in the 60s, a new ice age from fossil fuels in the 70's, Euro deforestation from acid rain from coal in the 80s, worldwide deforestation in the 90's (the planet has been greening for 40 years according to the MODIS satellite), a mythical gulf stream shift in 2000s that can only happen if the world stops spinning and many more… Funnily enough these were consensus positions too.
Now if they had been able to predict the current hiatus in temperature or that Antarctica would cool and grow in extent, or that stratospheric warming would cease in 1995 all of which run contrary to the hypothesis that mankind now dominates the climate then the current pessimistic consensus might have meant something. Alas it just continues an inglorious tradition of earth scientists unique expertise in being wrong all the time.
Some of us are actually big fans of alternative energy research but only a fool would try to replace reliable, cheap energy with expensive unreliable energy. We through the baby out with the bathwater and all to reduce CO2 by the miniscule amount that the UK produces. If we removes all our CO2 by ending industry, riding horses to work and using peat fires again then the worlds CO2 output drops by 2%
Well the power shortages predicted by sceptics are now here. Let's see how much everyone enjoys this new age of carbon freedom.
Does that 'come clean' enough for you? This is not the first time where scientific common sense has lost out to a fashionable paradigm and it won't be the last. But the lumpen public always suffer when it happens.
Dave Smart 5th November 2015 at 1:54 pm
As I was saying – the ONLY issue we should be discussing on this thread is the abdication by successive UK governments of their responsibility to fund, from taxation, (of wealthy people and corporations) the R&D of the new technologies we need, which the private sector refuses to deal with. The rest is a waste of breath.
"Plutonium is extracted from reprocessed nuclear waste and was originally stockpiled as a source of fuel for a new breed of experimental nuclear reactors. But in the 1990s, the government-backed programme of research to develop these new reactors was cancelled, on both cost and safety grounds."
140 tons of plutonium is potentially how many TW/h of electricity? It represents "thousands of years" of energy in the bank, according to a leading nuclear scientist, professor Tim Abram.
"A decision is expected to be made by ministers on how to proceed during 2015/16," the NDA said in a statement." Don't hold your breath!
david Brook 5th November 2015 at 3:00 pm
Bill, we often hear the 97% figure used by the scientists when they describe the consensus surrounding climate science. I am not an expert on the subject, however as a Civil Engineer working in the water industry it does have a direct impact on my day to day work. As someone who has been studying climate for many years and is confident that the science isn't agreed, I am interested to hear your best guess at an alternative consensus figure.
Bill Church 6th November 2015 at 9:24 am
Consensus has no place in science. Consensus is about who shouts loudest or who offers the the biggest dollops of dosh.
For the truth, you will have to dig for yourself (as I have done).
david brook 6th November 2015 at 12:35 pm
Blimey, I thought that the environmental monitoring behind the science was all leading to similar conclusions. That we might be altering the climate of the planet by increasing the concentrations of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere.
And far from this being a one off, these changes were being witnessed in a wide variety of different disciplines, more erratic weather patterns, retreating glaciers, sea level rise, ocean acidification etc..
And that the conclusions of these numerous studies had then been peer reviewed by the numerous relevant learned institutions, such as NASA, IPCC, The Royal Society, Universities, Meteorological offices etc.
And that their conclusion was a broad but common message that climate change was a serious threat, that we need to act with some urgency and that there is a risk we could have missed our chance.
And then we see other bellwethers, commercial institutions limiting their risks / exposure, from insurance companies not covering flood / storm risks, utilities hardening their assets and investment companies dis investing in fossil fuels.
But I now realise having read yours and some of the other posts here, that I have been a fool and that climate change simply isn't a problem worth worrying about. In fact, it seems that it is just an attempt to advance the careers of the key scientists involved and to make loads of money.
That is a turn up for the books, I always thought that the money was on the side of the fossil fuels, I used to watch Dallas and aren't the Koch brothers worth a few bob.
I must get out their and spread the message that this is a big conspiracy, better still where can I get a piece of the action, there must be loads of money supporting all the people and institutions involved.
Wait till the wife hears about this.
Silvia Leahu-Aluas 6th November 2015 at 12:58 pm
Just relax and have fun, since there is no debate about anthropogenic climate change. There are a lot of cut-and-paste, repeated for ever, non-fact based comments, but they do not matter. Disputing NASA's work? That is enough to dismiss any debate.
For fun and advancing solutions, watch and sign the petition:
https://youtu.be/yKLWW_j4a_E
Anonymous 6th November 2015 at 1:31 pm
For sure David Brook, when the science does not suppot your position undermine the other's.
If you are making the claim that man drives the climate it falls to you to prove the case.
The worlds 'green cllimate econnomy' has just been valued at $1.5 T (not that far behind the UK), so lets not pretend that only one side is monied, especially as subsidees make up a lot of the other.
Prompted by a point an a graph labeled Hansen 1984 I thought that I would delve a little into the history of CO2 and AGW. I searched back to a report by the Carbon Dioxide Assessment Committee from 1983. This is available as a download online:
http://www.nap.edu/catalog/18714/changing-climate-report-of-the-carbon-dioxide-assessment-committee
The first point I noted in the executive summary was,
"8. Results of most numerical model experiments suggest that a doubling of CO2 , if maintained indefinitely , would cause a global surface air warming of between 1 . 5 °C and 4 . 5 °C. The climate record of the past hundred years and our estimates of CO2 changes over that period suggest that values in the lower half of this range are more probable. (Chapters 4 , 5)"
30 years later after vast amounts of expensive research the IPCC AR5 came up with the same figures! Can anything change, or is it the case as with fundamental physics and string theory that groupthink has taken over and original thought is no longer possible?
The CO2 level estimates were also interesting,
"The median estimate for passing 600 ppm is 2065. For the year 2000, the most likely concentration is 370 ppm , with an upper limit of about 400 ppm."
The Mauna Loa annual average for 2000 was 369.52 ppm! I would be proud to make a 25 year plus prediction that close.
Figure 1.12 is a pre Hockey stick temperature chart from 1880 to 1980 showing a steady temperature drop from 1940 to 1980.
The ECS validation is also interesting,
"The available data on trends in globally or hemi spherically averaged temperatures over the last century, together with estimates of C02 changes over the period , do not preclude the possibility that slow climatic changes due to increasing atmospheric CO2 projections might already be under way. If the climate has warmed about 0.5°C and the preindustrial CO2 concentration was near 300 ppm , the sensitivity of climate to CO2 (expressed as projected increase of equilibrium global temperature for a doubling of CO2 concentration) might be as large as suggested by the upper half of the range indicated earlier , i.e. , up to perhaps 4.5°C , if the preindustrial C02 concentration was well below 300 ppm and if other forcing factors did not intervene , however , the sensitivity must be below 3°C if we are to avoid inconsistency with the available record (see Figure 1.13)."
From the Law Dome ice core the preindustrial CO2 levels were around 275-280ppm so figure 1.13 gives an ECS of around 2.
There is a lot more interesting reading about the predicted effects of climate change on agriculture, sea levels, etc. along with a lot of uncertainties that still have not been resolved/improved.
Climate science along with fundamental physics does not appear to have moved along in the last 30 plus years. In both cases I think that we must be missing something fundamental!
Having read through a tranche of opinions either based on fact or supposition, suddenly a massive figure $1.5 T appears on the scene. What is this – a "green climate economy" just been valued at – valued by whom, based on what? Isn't this just another statistic which helps no one?
https://www.uschamber.com/above-the-fold/asia-will-build-500-coal-fired-power-plants-year-no-matter-what-the-us-does
I am not sure I am undermining anyone's position. I have be won over by the well reasoned arguments presented here and elsewhere.
Even the suggestion that human activity could alter the climate is tantamount to madness.
Then to embark on a drive to improve our society's sustainability based on such flimsy evidence, further compounds this lunacy.
No, I am with you, Bill and the others here. We need get out there and spread the news that we have been taken in by the wicked scientists and politicians. Even the Pope is in on it.
The report referenced here is the source of the 1.5 Trillion
http://joannenova.com.au/2015/07/spot-the-vested-interest-the-1-5-trillion-climate-change-industry/
Silvia Leahu-Aluas 6th November 2015 at 7:02 pm
More good news from the climate change solutions camp (the only one that matters) as more junk oil (bitumen) left in the ground:
https://nextgenclimate.org/reject/?utm_source=textlink2&utm_medium=email&utm_content=Keystone-Rejection-Email&utm_campaign=Keystone-XL
David Redfern 8th November 2015 at 11:22 pm
Proposing that a single element, CO2, is entirely responsible for climate change is like attributing a catastrophic bridge collapse to an apprentice hitting it with a hammer.
Almost all climate scientists maintain Climate Change is inevitable, most will also maintain there simply isn't enough data on the multiple factors involved to blame it on CO2 alone.
Nor can the apparent speed of it be considered unusual as paleo data simply isn't nearly detailed enough to determine whether an event like this has, or hasn't happened in the past.
Accurate, reliable and, more importantly, non-conflicting temperature records from multiple sources isn't yet available despite satellite data and anything approaching reliable data collection has been over a very short time period relative to the predicted problem.
The real problem, however is the policy decisions being influenced by the IPCC. If they are proven to be 100% right, then we'll all applaud them. However, if they aren't entirely correct in their predictions then their narrow policy perspective has no plan B.
And that's the scary thing. Almost by 'scientific consensus' the world isn't going to be flooded next year, in the next decade, nor perhaps by the next century. So if we pursue policies of strangling human behaviour with the focus on a single element, what do we do if the world starts cooling, and there are some 'experts' now predicting it will. In any event humans will adapt to rising sea levels, we have done it for thousands of years, what's changed?
It's a bit like 50 years ago someone said meat was bad for us. But the human race has thrived on it for thousands of years, so what the hell happened to evolution 50 years ago, did it suddenly stop?
I would also like to point out that sea level rises are quite regional, with some falling, and some rising. If you are genuinely interested in listening to a moderate climate scientist on the subject, then look up Professor Judith Curry of the Georgia Institute of Technology http://judithcurry.com/ who seems to have a comprehensive grasp on both the science and the policy, without the hysterics.
@ Roger B
I got as far as the first paragraph of the Preface to the Board on Atmospheric Sciences and Climate report you highlighted.
It brilliantly predicts Judith Curry's proposition on the whole concept of climate change policy. Well, by my judgement.
"There is a broad class of problems that have no solution in the sense of an agreed course of action that would be expected to make the problem go away. These problems can also be so important that they should not be avoided or ignored until the fog lifts. We simply must learn to deal more effectively with their twists and turns as they unfold. We require sensible regular progress to anticipate what these developments might be with a balanced diversity of approaches. The payoff is that we will have had the chance to consider alternative courses of action with some degree of calm before we may be forced to choose among them in urgency or have them forced on us when other–perhaps better–options have been lost. Increasing atmospheric C02 and its climatic consequences constitute such a problem."
Cliff Pattrick 9th November 2015 at 10:10 am
I have a few questions to ask on the subject of AGW. Firstly has anyone considered the possibility of a correlation between an increase in atmospheric CO2 and the systematic de-forestation all over the globe? Secondly during the polar winter the temperature can be as low as -50°C while at the equatorial regions (such as the Namibian desert) the temperature is a high as +50°C. The difference there is an incredible 100°C at any one time on the earths surface. With that 'fact' in mind where does the '+2°C equals disaster theory' come from? Finally over both polar regions it has been observed that the sea ice is increasing year by year (the antarctic ice has been increasing by 120 billions tons per year and recently slowing to 90 billion tons per year).
I ask these questions not to be smart but being genuinely intrigued. AGW advocates, who are generally well informed, any answers?
Marcus Gibson 9th November 2015 at 2:08 pm
Your very young reporter needs to get out a bit. No rise in temps for 17 years; dodgy, self-written software by low-grade academics; NOAA/UEA offering third-grade outputs;
Ridley's assets have nothing to do with his global warming doubts – any more than left-wing darling George Monbiot's large rental income denies him an opinion on the property capitalism and rent profiteering.
Weather history disproves global warming. Your very young reporter won't remember the winters of 1940, 1941, 1961, 1962. Is this the 'pre-human influence', pre-warming weather he thinks is the 'norm'??
Demolition of 'consensus'..
Top physicist Freeman Dyson, No.1 aerospace engineer Burt Rutan, Profs Mike Kelly, many German university professors, especially in oceanography, and many former heads of UK research councils, and even (having spoken at some length to both of them in person in private) – David Attenborough and John Prescott(!) – are sceptics..
Even James Lovelock – once convinced, stated he was in error.. NERC scientists and officials have privately retracted papers, eg on 'disappearing Antarctic penguins'..
In the past any scientist or BBC broadcaster who aired sceptical/realist views.. ended their career then and there..
Believe me – pick up the phone – there is no consensus whatsoever!
Obvious examples of incidents where warmists are very obviously wrong are too many to list.. though my book on all this will be out next year.
I wouldn't bother quoting NASA on a science subject. NASA has great engineering, but its science track record is very third rate – everyone knows that much.
The Engineer is a great magazine, but it needs to sharpen up on its contacts book, methinks..
Editor (Andrew?)
"Firstly, sea ice over both polar regions is not increasing. Arctic sea ice extent for October 2015 averaged 7.72 million square km (2.98 million square miles), the sixth lowest October in the satellite record. This is 1.19 million square km (460,000 square miles) below the 1981 to 2010 average extent. "
The current low point for Arctic sea ice was 2012. Since then the area has been increasing and is back within the 1981 to 2010 range.
https://nsidc.org/arcticseaicenews/
"The picture is less clear in Antarctica, where warming does not appear to be happening anywhere near as fast. Sea ice there is more difficult to measure due to being covered by much larger volumes of snow, and there is not the same clarity regarding its volume. Some studies say it is increasing, while others dispute this. Where there is general consensus is that the Antarctic ice sheet is diminishing. "
NASA says that the Antarctic ice cover is increasing and according to Silvia we have to believe NASA.
https://www.nasa.gov/feature/goddard/nasa-study-mass-gains-of-antarctic-ice-sheet-greater-than-losses
"The 2 degree threshold is based on global average mean temperature. Of course the poles will be colder than the tropics. What matters is the average temperature across the planet. 2 degrees is based roughly on limits scientists believe the planet has experienced in the past, and which we can predict behaviour for with some degree of accuracy. Beyond 2 degrees, current modelling becomes less accurate, but we know that the effects will not progress linearly. A 4 degree increase will not be twice as bad as 2 degrees, it will be orders of magnitude worse. 2 degrees is also believed to be achievable – a target that we can realistically attain if we take appropriate action in time."
Some very sweeping statements. Why is 2°C global temperature increase bad? 1°C in the medieval warm period was not a problem, 2°C in biblical times was not a problem (according to ice core measurements). Why will 4°C be orders of magnitude worse? Do you understand what orders of magnitude means?
Please drop the propaganda and stick to engineering matters.
Floody hell! Let's have an end to this pointless conjecture on whether the models are wrong, or the rise in CO2 is only partly due to human activity. That is all irrelevant. The effects of the rise in CO2 to date are a matter of proven record. We know that if we add even more, at the current rate, 2°C warming is inevitable. In 1858 The Great Stink forced Parliament to act, and spend money! Do we have to wait 50 years or more for thick politicians to get wisdom, when the water's up to their ankles?
http://www.londonlovesbusiness.com/lifestyle/london-culture/floody-hell-images-show-devastating-impact-of-4-degree-temperature-rise/11328.article?utm_source=Sign-Up.to&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=17719-312391-09%2F11%2F2015+London+newsletter
Aside from that; oil is a precious resource, too precious to burn. We should have a selfless attitude about all of Earth's finite resources and leave them for the benefit of generations to come.
At Dave Smart,
I quite agree. I simply don't believe that CO2 emissions are driving climate change, my hunch is in yearsvyo come we will recognise it as a function of Earths declining magnetic field, which also started its precipitous drop during the industrial revolution.
But as you put it: oil is frankly too important a resource to burn, particulates from coal quite literally kill hundreds of thousands and gas, although significantly better, tends to be owned by people we should not be dependent on.
We need nuclear, passive solar, some off shore wind, gas, biomass and clean coal. I'd like to see tidal and wave make a big contribution also.
More importantly I'd like to see government funding for renewal of the housing stock and a step change in insulation. Presently subsidies benefit the wealthy and foreign business but these would immediately benefit the average Brit and the poor in particular who are most likely to live in old, breezy and expensive housing.
I think the argument should be moved away from climate change to energy security, sustainability, quality of life and poverty alleviation. We can all agree on these, moreover domestic construction and engineering can benefit from it, rather than Euro wind turbine manufacturers.
Bill Church 10th November 2015 at 9:43 am
There is not the space here to fully explain all the counter arguments to AGW alarmists positions and in any case, Senior Reporter Andrew Wade seems fully signed up to the alarmist dogma so nothing is going to change there!
If he had studied the many papers or, at least the abstracts, he would, like me, understand that the science is absolutely not understood – not even nearly.
And I'm still hoping to learn of his doubtless numerous and impressive academic achievements – they are relevant as they are (or are not) indicative of the ability to analyse and question the various assertions made.
Roger B 10th November 2015 at 12:30 pm
I agree totally with your last point: "oil is a precious resource, too precious to burn"
Your first points, however are very dubious:
"The effects of the rise in CO2 to date are a matter of proven record." What does the proven record say? What is the proven ECS? Where is the proof? Are we back to the Hockey Stick?
"We know that if we add even more, at the current rate, 2°C warming is inevitable" How do we know? There are some models which don't match reality which might suggest this. 2°C warming, and more, is inevitable based on the information from historical proxy measurements.
Is this due to man's emissions of CO2, probably not. Can we change anything by spending Trillions, probably not. Should we try to reduce our consumption of finite resources, yes. Should we try to reduce our footprint/impact on the planet, yes.
Please note that installing solar PV in northern latitudes increases our consumption of resources and pollution of the planet. The push for diesel engines to reduce CO2 at the expense of everything else has increased our pollution of the planet. It's time for some joined up thinking.
Moving the pollution to China from the West and then complaining about the pollution in China is not joined up thinking.
Bill Church 10th November 2015 at 2:22 pm
Some very good points on energy conservation etc. and there is huge scope for reducing demand.
The news media have been parroting the Met Office recent line about reaching a tipping point – CERTAIN DOOM!!!! Can't help wondering why the climate did not tip (whatever that means) when CO2 was around 4,000ppm (compared with the current 400 ish) in the Cretaceous Period I think.
Dave Smart 10th November 2015 at 3:34 pm
"Is this due to man's CO2, probably not. Can we change anything by spending Trillions, probably not."
Roger, you exaggerate the uncertainties and fall into circular reasoning.
Is this due to man's emissions of CO2? Almost certainly, yes – proven.
Can we change anything by spending billions? Yes, of course we can. It's only the losers who tell you we'll be eating into their profits and wasting their money, (and the taxpayers' money they consider to be theirs!). You've fallen, hook, line and sinker for propaganda – end of story.
The lunatics have taken over the asylum of government (to fulfil the elite's dreams of staying in charge). See my post on the Innovate 2015 article. . . .
Michael Brooks 10th November 2015 at 11:03 pm
James Hansen' book "Storms of my Grandchildren" and Prof David Mackay's " Sustainable Energy – Without the Hot Air" are well worth a place on the bookshelves of open-minded people. It is a pity their well developed arguments and thoughtful analysis get lost in the fog
Silvia Leahu-Aluas 11th November 2015 at 3:55 am
There is no debate about anthropogenic climate change, no matter how long, how many caps are included or how personal (the most pathetic) some of the comments are. The science is settled by real scientists, an absolute majority of them, doing real science, in other words if they had any hunches they took the time and effort to prove them right or wrong.
Even Ben & Jerry understand climate science and they are not engineers or technical people, as one would assume the readers of The Engineer are. So have fun, take action and do something positive to stop human-induced global warming:
http://www.benjerry.com/values/issues-we-care-about/climate-justice/twenty-four-reality
Roger B 11th November 2015 at 11:32 am
Some quotes form this thread:
"There is no debate about anthropogenic climate change, no matter how long, how many caps are included or how personal (the most pathetic) some of the comments are. The science is settled by real scientists, an absolute majority of them, doing real science"
"The effects of the rise in CO2 to date are a matter of proven record."
Editor Andrew,
"The scientific consensus has been proved beyond doubt"
In spite of all these bold statements not one of the alamists on here has been able to state what this science that has been proved beyond doubt is. As with similar discussions on the IET website they are all magnificently avoidant. This supports the view that AGW has become such a religious belief for some that they are no longer capable of looking at reality. As with most religions they cannot comprehend anyone challenging their core belief. It must be true so it cannot be challenged.
We are heading into COP 21 with a few not very well supported assumptions on which world policy will be based.
1) CO2 is the major driver of climate change.
The current pause suggests that there is at least one other driver of equivalent strength to CO2. In a dynamic system if your input variable has a consistent behavior, in this case a rise in atmospheric concentration of CO2 of around 1.6 ppm per year (Mauna Loa figures), but your output variable makes a step change of more than 50%, in this case a global temperature rise of around 0.12°C/decade from 1951 to 1998 dropping to around 0.05°C/decade after 1998 (IPCC AR5 WG1 figures) something else is happening.
2) The current rise in atmospheric CO2 concentration is entirely manmade.
Isotopic measurements suggest that a portion is manmade, which is reasonable considering we burn fossil fuels. We also know from historic proxy records that CO2 levels vary without man burning fossil fuels.
3) The sensitivity of the climate to CO2 levels, Equilibrium Climate Sensitivity (ECS).
This number is generally considered to be a in a range from 1.5°C to 4.5°C for a doubling of atmospheric CO2. This range was quoted in the 1983 CDAC report. It tended to rise for a while and has now dropping again. If the ECS is 2°C, taking 350 ppm as a starting point it will take more than 200 years at the current rate of CO2 increase to achieve a global temperature increase of 2°C.
4) 2°C above pre industrial level (whatever that actually is) is the safe limit for global temperature rise.
I suggest that those who still have open minds do some research and see what this number is based on. Maybe one of our believers will actually justify the science (carried out by real scientists) that is behind this.
How about some of the purveyors of certainty above actually coming up with some science and evidence (currently in very short supply from them).
Jack Broughton 11th November 2015 at 2:14 pm
As the Paris COP 21 is getting close, the number of totally dishonest claims about climate change in the press is increasing exponentially: extreme weather claims, sea level and polar bears wiped out have all been regurgitated by the Ministry of Truth.
It is essential that the balance is restored despite the author's apparent view that it is climate skeptics who are wrong. The cost to UK plc of the COP agreements could be a true disaster.
At least let the facts be debated openly.
Anonymous 11th November 2015 at 2:15 pm
Why argue about climate change and that UK is cut back on polution of the atmosphere and borrowing money from China.
Why not go to China and see that all our polution has simply moved location on the planet, to China.
In UK we had tried to introduce means to cut back on polution at a cost that ment we where not competitive with countries that continued with polution. Now most of UK business is in China, we dont see the polution.
But the worlds atmoshphere still has the same problems or worse, since very little is done to limit that polution for many years past, only now does China think about polution, when they have all the industries and we have none to talk about. they obviusly will increase the costs to the rest of the world and all that has really happened is a delay in claning up the atmoshpere.
Only a fool would deny that CO2 is a greenhouse gas.
Only a fool would state that they know what the climate sensitivity is (the temperature rise as the result of a doubling of CO2) unless, of course, they are on the grant gravy train.
The science is not settled. Shame that a magazine like The Engineer should seem so keen to embrace orthodoxy.
cheerful middle aged engineer 11th November 2015 at 7:59 pm
mike b. If they all get tickets to cloud cuckoo land, you'll have company. Getting lonely, perhaps?
@ Roger B:
You are acting in exactly the manner described in my 4 Nov. 9:59 am post. In Galbraith's words – "almost everyone gets busy on the proof."
You cherry pick any points that suggest there may be greater uncertainty in the evidence for the 'consensus view' than is in fact the case and you dismiss the mass of evidence supporting it. Then you insult thousands of capable people, whose integrity cannot be doubted, by saying they must be guilty of 'groupthink', because they disagree with your partial analysis.
Change your mind; It's the only logical way out of the hole you've dug yourself into. Your alternative reality makes no sense whatever.
A set of typical responses:
From Editor Andrew
We have linked to numerous scientific sources throughout this thread. The reality is that those who choose to ignore the overwhelming weight of scientific analysis are in fact the ones whose position is akin to religious belief, still proclaiming the earth to be flat when all around can see that it is round.
It's not orthodoxy, it's the widespread international consensus backed up by a mountain of scientific evidence. Since 2007, no official body of scientists rejects the findings of human-induced effects on climate change. Are you suggesting that the entire scientific community is part of a giant global conspiracy? Every scientific body in the world has abandoned its principles to ride the 'grant gravy train'?
From David
Neither of these posters have actually come up with what the facts and consensus are, is it because there is no consensus of fact, just consensus of belief.
I am actually quite open minded and willing to change my mind, but what to?
I find the 'Hockey Stick' difficult, there may have been all sorts of mathematical proofs but it doesn't match reality.
There is sufficient documentary evidence of climate change in the last thousands years being much larger than shown on Mann's graph. If grape vines were grown in northern England (Romans, Doomsday book) why aren't they growing now, when according to Mann the temperatures are sufficiently higher? Alpine glaciers were also advancing in the little ice age and threatening the existence of alpine villages (Saas Fee, Grindlewald), where is this cold period. Why do the ice core proxies show much greater variation than the hockey stick graph?
Is this cherry picking, or is it an apparent large problem with the evidence?
I was reading an interesting piece on 'And Then There's Physics' on taking an objective view of "global warming" and the problems that the warmist extremists are causing.
Imagine you are reasonably well versed in science, probably an applied science like dentistry or mechanical engineering. You are professional and proud of your skills. And you look into this "global warming" business, and most of the writing on it seems like polarized nonsense. But though you see dubious arguments everywhere the allegedly consensus claims seem extreme to you, and you start to fall into the "skeptic" camp and gravitating to some theory of what is going on that casts significant blame on the key scientists in the field. And you start to enjoy mocking them.
A lot of climate scientists find falling into this position unimaginable. But I don't. There but for the Grace of God go I.
And a lot of political types, especially journalists and people focused on elections, find this group irrelevant, unimportant. They make a lot of noise, they give cover to recalcitrant politicians, but they haven't enough influence to matter.
I disagree. I think having a core of intelligent people not getting it is fundamentally a problem in a democracy We have to find a way to reach, if not the core group of celebrated malcontents and their sleazy professional eggers-on, the many intelligent people they are constantly recruiting.
So let's for the sake of argument adopt the point of view of a skeptical recruit. Your position in the Disaster Tango is that claims are made linking every weather disaster without exception and even the occasional tsunami to climate change, that it is ridiculous, and that RPJr and Marty Hoerling among others have convincingly shown that there is little evidence of any trends to increased disasters, and that any concerns are at most ones for a distant future that can gradually adapt in any case.
https://andthentheresphysics.wordpress.com/2015/10/10/thinking-about-what-a-friend-had-said-i-was-hoping-it-was-a-lie/
onnasinkinship 17th November 2015 at 8:16 pm
thinkers on their mountains of evidence are mistaken on the true correlation and cause, and even if we back off there still could be a warming.
The big question is whether governments would go to war against countries who decide to stay with carbon fuels without sacrificing their economies.
john davies 18th November 2015 at 12:45 am
Ref Editor's comments | 17 Nov 2015 11:48 am
THE HOCKEY STICK GRAPH,
is Michael Mann's debunked fraudulent piece of junk science that used false data, which fueled the Catastrophic Anthropologic Global Warming (CAGW) juggernaut. !! After it was fully investigated, it was dropped from both the IPCC 2007 IPCC Fourth Assessment Report (AR4) & (AR5) in 2013.
The full sorry story here – http://tinyurl.com/q6jtnqo
Michael Mann also falsely claimed he is a Nobel laureate. http://tinyurl.com/oywpvjo & produced his own authentic-looking diploma.
The Nobel Committee doesn't agree with him !! http://tinyurl.com/pckh6je
Michael Mann is a proven cheat & fraudster, a disgrace to science.
Even with the increase in CO2 & all the dire predictions of British summers being like southern Spain, according to the Central England temperatures 1659 – 2014 data,
we are only +0.1°C warmer than 1659 (356yrs); We are still 2°C colder than when the Romans were here; and sadly there has been NO global warming for the last 18 yrs. See – http://tinyurl.com/p538a54
Temperature history from the Central Greenland Ice Core record- https://www.pressdispensary.co.uk/q991593/images/20k.jpg
You mention the Domesday Book observations.
As an engineer I was taught to always double check the mathematical proofs, but trust the observations.
Computer models are great tools for helping you think,… just never rely on them to do the thinking for you.
You also mention a "vocal community of deniers that continue to maintain an extremist ideology in the face of the science." Here's an example – sea level rise
1985 Al Gore predicted 2.2m (7ft ) rise by 2100 (18mm/yr)
By 2006 Al Gore had upped it to 4 to 6 meters (13 to 20 ft) for his film. (that's 64mm/year !!!)
2007 James Hansen (NASA), assumed a sea-level rise of 5 m this century (53mm/yr)
The IPCC (2013) nearly 1m by 2100 (11mm/yr)
A 2015 study by sea level rise 'experts' concluded a range between 0.2 – 2 m (8 inch – 6.6 feet) (2.5 – 23mm/yr)
Quite a choice, 2.5 to 64mm/yr …so who do you believe ?? …
…try NOAA (National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration).
Absolute measured global sea level rise is just 1.7-1.8 millimeters/year. ~ 180mm (7inch)/ century.
( http://tidesandcurrents.noaa.gov/sltrends/globalregional.htm
David Redfern 18th November 2015 at 1:21 am
The Earth was once flat and it was only heretics that dared contradict that theory.
Whilst 'Climate Change' is undoubtedly happening (it seems governments and the IPCC have moved on from GW and AGW) Scientists and engineers are not Precognotist's (did I just make that up?) and can't foretell the future; which is possibly where the incredulity of people like me, with no scientific background springs from.
The 'acceptors' (I don't appreciate being scornfully branded a 'denier' by scientific journalists who should know better) lurch from one extreme disaster prediction to another so it's entirely unsurprising there are heretics and deniers. If the acceptors could stick to the science instead of predicting the future, there may be a lot less confusion around the whole subject.
My belief in science in general is that, whilst participants necessarily explore the boundaries of credibility, they have a duty to explain their theories and findings to us dumb schmuck's who invariably pay the bills. Unfortunately, that has to be delivered in a digestible form or it is invariably dismissed.
And whilst science is frequently the predictor of the future, we understand so little of our earth's climate system that the Met. Office has abandoned publishing long range weather forecasts. And whilst I perfectly understand those are short term anticipations of weather as opposed to climate trends, how about extrapolating their predictions and margins of error, and then examining what margins of error are built into each and every climate prediction? All fed into the laptop of an IPCC office junior for publication of this week's prophecy of doom. And whilst the accusation of money grubbing can be levelled at oil companies, the IPCC have no less interest in securing a lucrative revenue stream for as long as they can. Not to mention those grubbing for clean energy grants.
If from nothing more than a business perspective, were someone to approach me with the proposition that the earth was facing climate catastrophe and they asked me to back them with a modest amount of money I would turn them down flat. Not because they don't know what they were talking about but because there are far too many unknowns, solar activity, magnetic fields, aerosol effects, not to mention (again) the wide ranging paleo scientific data we are basing enormous assumptions on. As a business model it seriously sucks, other than averaged intermittent fossil, geological and tree ring data we have no experience of what's going on here. That alone is enough to put me off as nothing on God's earth conforms to an average, certainly not the future.
Perhaps it's hopeless hope, perhaps it's intuition, but I'm inclined to come down on the side of the deniers for no other reason than determined scientific predictions are invariably wrong in my experience. Scientific endeavour is littered with more failure than successes, so what makes climate prediction so different from any other scientific prediction?
Bill Church 18th November 2015 at 12:11 pm
Take a look at the RSS satellite temperature series as it's probably the most accurate unlike the terrestrial records that have been affected by all sorts of extraneous factors including siting, UHI and adjustments (a.k.a. homogenisation).
http://images.remss.com/msu/msu_time_series.html
Some warming in the lower troposphere but nothing since 1998. Some cooling at higher altitudes where the models suggest there should be warming.
Is the trend (if it is a trend) scary enough to bankrupt our companies, put people on the dole and make energy unaffordable for the poor? I think not.
David Redfern 18th November 2015 at 11:41 pm
@Bill Church
I had a wander round the remss site you refer to and found this statement:
The troposphere has not warmed as fast as almost all climate models predict." (http://www.remss.com/research/climate)
Followed by three graphs showing global, tropics and north polar temperature changes 1979 – 2008.
CC supporters have explained away the 15 year 'pause' with recent, after the fact, research, and dismissed it as insignificant stating 30 years as the minimum measurement period. Yet there is accurate data here that seems to be mashed up with other less reliable data.
It also occurs to me that whilst unpredictable weather patterns are attributed to CC, why then is the climate as predictable as they maintain?
Furthermore, my understanding is, the hockey stick graph the worlds destiny is predicated on measures climate change in the Northern Hemisphere, completely ignoring anything south of the equator where it seems CC is not the problem it is at the top of the world (I am, however, happy to be corrected on that.)
Indeed, there is a statement in the link which discusses the lack of data in the south pacific and refers to the unreliability of balloon harvested data, amongst other unreliable data sources.
Again, I'm not a scientist but there seems so many variables and margins for error across a range of single point measurement tools like buoys, ships and land based sites, which all make allowances for geographical locations and local conditions. They in turn must be aligned to present the data in a common format, which I suspect itself is more black art than science, before the climate model is produced.
Add to that data garnered from fossilised remains that, even with carbon dating, must have variables of at best decades, most of which are incredibly localised.
I'm not sceptical of climate change, I'm sceptical of the shaman's rattling bones and stones predicting Armageddon based on voodoo science.
Almost forgot.
I have wondered for a long time how much effect on global warming the Earth's molten core must surely have? Apart from the obvious volcanic eruptions we see, how much CO2 is being expelled from a molten core into the sea's?
Is it measured? Can it be measured? How many mini volcanic eruptions are going on undersea we don't know about? How much CO2 is simply leaking from billions of seabed holes?
Assuming of course, that CO2 is the environmental demon it's presented as.
In my simplistic way I believe hot and cold will eventually balance, so a molten earth cooles to a crust insulated blob of lava in the freezing expanse of space. And whilst we toast our toes on the gas fire of our solar system, the earth is still leaking heat, somehow, from its core. So where does it go, and how?
Contributions gratefully recieved.
Dave Smart 19th November 2015 at 9:31 am
The comments here, from those who doubt the science, simply construct any argument to support their 'denial' – for that is what it is. True sceptics would doubt the false memes that they repeat over and over (such as "no further warming"). They ask for 'evidence' that the scientific consensus is correct, when the evidence is staring them in the face, but they choose to dismiss it.
There is very little room for doubt, that this represents the reality:-
http://www.ted.com/talks/alice_bows_larkin_we_re_too_late_to_prevent_climate_change_here_s_how_we_adapt
If anybody doubts it, THEY are the ones who must take responsibility to provide real evidence to refute the case. Every person and every country will have to get off this addiction to fossil fuels at some point in the future, so anyone with half a brain says "let's do it now".
David Redfern 19th November 2015 at 5:58 pm
@Dave Smart
Thanks for the link to the Alice Bows-Larkin presentation but she delivers no evidence. Her predictions are conjecture, she has no idea what will happen in a warmer climate, none of us do. It's little more than a scary story.
According to the RSS satellite data (site posted earlier by Bill Church) the actual temperature since, I think, 1980 or so has been significantly less than predicted which suggests there is something fundamentally wrong with the recognised science employed to anticipate future temperatures. And if the science is flawed, we are in an even worse position than if the science is right because we then have absolutely no idea what's going on.
On the other hand, the RSS satellite data could be wrong, which I'm perfectly willing to accept, in the face of more accurate means of measurement. Perhaps someone could direct me to them.
Dave Smart 20th November 2015 at 10:44 am
@ David Redfern
The doubters are the ones who get their conjecture wrong, because they pick up on any errors they think they can see in the 'consensus' and extrapolate that if scientists have got a few things wrong, their whole case must be suspect!!! Nonsense – that's a non sequitur.
Bows-Larkin's presentation on the graphs to the present day are factual, not conjecture, and the correlation between the rise in GHG and rising global temperature is proven, beyond any doubt. The point is that accumulated emissions won't diminish, we're stuck with them and adding even more, which in turn will be around for a long time. "There's no time like the present, to act."
". . which suggests there is something fundamentally wrong with the recognised science employed to anticipate future temperatures." No, it doesn't. Atmospheric temperatures are the most variable, short and long term. The oceans are a huge heat-sink and it takes an enormous amount of energy to melt a massive quantity of ice. The latter is the canary in the coal mine. It's obviously getting sick, but you prefer to wait until it's dead, so an autopsy can prove what it died from!!!
Open your eyes – open your mind – anyone can see "what's going on".
Together with decarbonising electricity and electrifying transport, we need to get off our addiction to bad diet. Feeding good food to animals to make a different food, that wealthy people prefer to eat in excess, makes no sense whatsoever. Do you know what the GHG emissions are from that process? Check it out.
I understand that one Douglas Keenan is offering a substantial award – he writes as follows:
"There have been many claims of observational evidence for global-warming alarmism. I have argued that all such claims rely on invalid statistical analyses. Some people, though, have asserted that the analyses are valid. Those people assert, in particular, that they can determine, via statistical analysis, whether global temperatures are increasing more that would be reasonably expected by random natural variation. Those people do not present any counter to my argument, but they make their assertions anyway.
In response to that, I am sponsoring a contest: the prize is $100 000. In essence, the prize will be awarded to anyone who can demonstrate, via statistical analysis, that the increase in global temperatures is probably not due to random natural variation".
Must be some statisticians among readers of The Engineer who would like some easy money. Andrew, you might like to have a go!
So if there are errors in the conventional science graphs it's OK to extrapolate them, but it's not OK to extrapolate factual recording of satellite data?
Nor did I "pick up on any errors they think they can see". REMSS clearly states:
"The troposphere has not warmed as fast as almost all climate models predict." (http://www.remss.com/research/climate). But of course mention that and its "Atmospheric temperatures are the most variable, short and long term.". Make up your mind, had I mentioned the oceans you would have countered it with something else.
When a respected organisation, whose data the IPCC uses (I believe) makes a clear statement like that, it's pretty unambiguous. Or do we ignore it because it doesn't correlate with tree rings, ice cores, corals, ocean and lake sediment data which are indicators, they can't pin anything down to less than decades, if not centuries and certainly not to within a few degrees C. We are comparing actual measurements with guesstimates. "there are very few weather balloons launched in the Eastern Tropical Pacific Ocean, even though this region is where the changes in Sea Surface Temperature due to the El Nino – Southern Oscillation cycle are largest." (see previous link). There's one massive hole in conventional data collection.
And why, if mistakes are made in underlying calculations predicting future temperatures, are they "non sequitur". If I believe 1+1 = 3 and continue for the rest of my life on that basis whilst everything else is unerringly accurate, I'm still going to be wildly out in my expectations when I'm buried.
What is it about believers? You insist you can't possibly be wrong in anything? It's fanaticism, all science should be questioned, constantly, surely.
Nor did I question the data Bows-Larkin presented, my objection is the predictions she extrapolates from them. She, nor you, nor I, nor anyone else alive to my knowledge, can determine with any certainty what's going to happen tomorrow never mind in 50 years' time. She's just scaring the children.
Using "The oceans are a huge heat-sink" as a weapon of mass persuasion is simplistic and manipulative. There are billions of acres of deep sea floor we know nothing about. Believers have an awfully high opinion of themselves if they maintain they know nearly enough about our planet to second guess what it's going to do.
Either an extraordinarily arrogant, or extraordinarily silly statement. My eyes are open which is precisely why I'm asking questions about the subject. However, my mind is closing, in the face of a barrage from fatalists refusing to concede there could possibly be alternative theories. I find the 'deniers' entirely more accepting of possibilities, whilst most disagree with certain climate change contentions, they rarely maintain they are 100% correct, indeed most are humble enough to concede that we simply don't know enough to make the biblical predictions wholly accepted by believers.
It's akin to the unwavering belief in deity's, based on contradictory ancient beliefs, collectively supporting the certainty of an afterlife.
Dave Smart 23rd November 2015 at 9:50 am
Is it not the misinterpretation of the data which is the mistake, as much as the data itself?
"The troposphere has not warmed as fast as almost all climate models predict." So, that particular premise in the models may be wrong, don't you think? Consider also that perhaps satellites aren't in the best place to measure these temperatures anyway? Add to that the natural variability.
That is exactly what I've been saying. It makes no sense to deny the reality of global warming, because of some mistakes in the MODELS. That denial is grasping at straws and sowing the seeds of doubt just to sustain itself. The science isn't a product of fanatical belief. It is the adamant deniers who are arrogant.
The psychological inertia, ignorance and selfishness of politicians, powerful vested interests and deniers is what the kids should be scared of. Give them a good education in science. Let them decide for themselves.
Jack Broughton 23rd November 2015 at 8:34 pm
This has been a first class debate about the most important issue that we have. If climate change were as predicted, we would have cause for concern and taking action. The problem is that a hypothetical model of the climate that can never be validated or even questioned now dominates the topic. The NOAA data behind the claimed actual rise of temperature have been fully discredited- even NOAA refuse to explain their fiddles to Congress.
This is not science but religion, and much of the debate reflects that rather than factual proof.
If I may correct your wholly erroneous assertions Jack. . . .
Anthropogenic global warming is proceeding just as the fundamental science predicted it would over half a century ago!! You've been taken in by the disinformation put about by powerful vested interests. These selfish people have the arrogance to believe that they can fool all the people all the time, but they won't succeed:-
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/nov/23/over-2000-academics-world-heads-do-more-limit-global-warming-noam-chomsky
"This coalition … believes the private sector has a responsibility to actively engage in global efforts to reduce greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions, and to help lead the global transition to a low-carbon, climate-resilient economy."
There's no hypothetical models or religion involved here Jack – it's the economic rationale of sensible people, informed by indisputable facts.
"It's good to see outstanding international companies like these speaking out on this matter."
Half a century ago climate science was still concerned that we were about to enter the next ice age. It's funny how the consensus changes. The science is still as uncertain.
Phew. Saved from my incorrect and foolishly held opinions again by Dave!
There you go again Roger – condemning a whole branch of science by cherry-picking the mistakes of SOME 'scientists'. The consensus view has developed and been confirmed during the past half century precisely because science learns from the errors of the few. The consensus hasn't changed. The science is certain. You can deny it till you're blue in the face, but you can't rewrite history, or change scientific facts – it's time you changed your mind. What do you find so appealing in the lies, disinformation and empty assertions you keep repeating?
Myth No. 11
http://www.skepticalscience.com/argument.php
Roger B 25th November 2015 at 8:20 am
Oh dear Dave, a link to skeptical skience the last bastion of the deniers of reality.
What science is certain? Science is never certain, it is always (and must be) flexible. Certainty only exists as part of a belief system.
Maybe I can't rewrite history, but NASA appears to be trying to:
http://notrickszone.com/2015/11/20/german-professor-examines-nasa-giss-temperature-datasets-finds-they-have-been-massively-altered/#sthash.srne9gXN.dpbs
Dave Smart 25th November 2015 at 12:22 pm
@ RogerB: There's no doubt about who's departed from reality.
"Half a century ago climate science was still concerned that we were about to enter the next ice age." That's a lie, and you know it's a lie, but you still repeat it. Why?
Either admit that you are mistaken, or provide a rebuttal to the historical evidence that 62% of climate scientists predicted global warming in the 70s and 10% said it may cool:-
http://www.skepticalscience.com/ice-age-predictions-in-1970s.htm
Skeptical Science shows that your myths don't stand up to scrutiny, so you have to resort to talking nonsense – "the last bastion of the deniers of reality" YOUR certainty "only exists as part of a belief system" which seems to have its roots in 'cognitive dissonance'. It takes some mighty hubris, to set yourself up as judge and jury over the science. As for your next false conjecture:-
http://www.skepticalscience.com/study-drives-sixth-nail-into-pause-myth.html
Silvia Leahu-Aluas 25th November 2015 at 1:45 pm
Trust Exxon on climate science, not their executives, but their scientists:
http://www.theguardian.com/environment/climate-consensus-97-per-cent/2015/nov/25/two-faced-exxon-the-misinformation-campaign-against-its-own-scientists
The real fun part comes as Exxon is investigated, most ironically, for deceiving shareholders, the very ones they were dedicated to serve by funding climate change denial in order to maximize their earnings. Fun, fun, fun!
Some people cannot be reached by rational argument, so no point in wasting our time and beautiful minds on them. Plus, they do not understand that we live in a stochastic not deterministic world, where 90% probability of anything happening is certainty. Insurers have a better grasp of that notion, than some of you here, which is a pity for an engineer. And between NASA and nobodyblogger.com, guess who I, like millions others,, will base my scientific literacy and culture on?
Let's focus our efforts on what to do, as global warming is a runaway train: 2015 will likely be the warmest on record and the last 5 years have been the warmest on record. Who says so? Another reliable organization, that even the denialists use in their daily lives, as there will be no advanced living without its work:
https://www.wmo.int/media/content/wmo-2015-likely-be-warmest-record-2011-2015-warmest-five-year-period
I've looked at the WMO information that Silvia cited. It is based on the totally discredited NOAA humangenised temperatures and ignores the satellite values that are much more consistent.
It is a publicity document for the meja hype related to COP 21: but even as that it fails. The graph of world temperature anomaly since 1860 shows a rise of about 0.5 deg K between 1910 and 1940 and the same rise between 1960 and 2000: where was the increasing CO2 in the earlier period???
A rise of 1 degK from the cold period in the mid 19th Century is something to be glad about not a cause for alarm, unless you are an "anthropogenic doom-believer".
Dave, let's have a look at this. We are now in 2015 so half a century ago (=50 years) takes us back to 1965. As your statement refers to the 70's we will have a look there:
Here is a 1974 CIA report on the state of climate science and the effect of global cooling on food supplies:
"The world is returning to the type of climate which has existed over the last 400 years. That is, the abnormal climate of agricultural-optimum is being replaced by a normal climate of the neo-boreal era.
The climate change began in 1960, but no one including the climatologists recognized it. Crop failures in the Soviet Union and India during the first part of the sixties were attributed to the natural fluctuations of the weather. India was supported by massive U.S. grain shipments that fed over 100 million people. To eat, the Soviets slaughtered their livestock and Premier Nikita Khrushchev was quietly deposed."
The report goes on to note the state of climate science at the time and that there were no clear explanations or accurate predictions possible. The science could not explain the cooling taking place nor could it say if it was going to continue or not.
http://www.climatemonitor.it/wp-content/uploads/2009/12/1974.pdf
This is from the IAEA also from 1974:
" A New World Climate Norm?
In February of 1972 earth-orbiting artificial satellites revealed the existence of a greatly increased area of the snow and ice cover of the north polar cap as compared to all previous years of space age observations."
"There are strong signs that these recent climate disasters were not random deviations from the usual weather, but instead signals of the emergence of a new normal for world climates. If so, it is a normal that will be far less favorable to global agriculture, and thus to world food supplies. Not all climate experts agree, however, that this is so. Because of this difference of view there is a clear and pressing need for a major new thrust of basic and applied research on climate change."
https://www.iaea.org/sites/default/files/16505796265.pdf
And from Newsweek from 1975:
"Climatologists are pessimistic that political leaders will take any positive action to compensate for the climatic change, or even to allay its effects. They conclude that some of the more spectacular solutions proposed, such as melting the arctic ice cap by covering it with black soot or diverting arctic rivers might create problems far greater than those they solve."
http://denisdutton.com/newsweek_coolingworld.pdf
So three prime source examples from the 70s of the focus on falling global temperatures. Lies, I think not, a reasonable summary of the state of climate science half a century ago, probably.
Why do I post what I do?
I am concerned that the current religious fixation on CO2 is not addressing the real problems, in fact it is not addressing any problems but creating them.
I believe that fossil fuels are a valuable raw material and should not just be burnt for energy. We should also be preserving the Earth's finite resources and reducing our pollution and impact. If we focused on real pollutants, NOx, SOx, PM10, etc. the consumption of the resources that emit these would also be reduced.
The CO2 focus fails completely. Let's look at some recent examples:
–	Increased harmful pollution, NOx, due to the push for Diesel cars in a misguided attempt to reduce CO2 emissions.
–	Subsidised installation of solar PV on roofs in northern latitudes which are unlikely to return the energy used in their manufacture and installation and will certainly not compensate for the pollution generated by their manufacture (but the pollution is in China so the western Greens can feel smug).
http://www.bbc.com/future/story/20150402-the-worst-place-on-earth
–	Bringing biomass from America to the UK to fuel our power stations without considering the rest of the environmental impact, just CO2.
–	CCS. This requires around 40% of the generated/used energy to store the removed carbon. Simply a waste of resources.
I also consider attempting to recover oil from tar sands where half the oil is used to provide energy for the process to be a complete waste.
So what do I consider good/sensible:
Solar appears to work reasonably in southern latitudes. PV may not be the best, but thermal with some form of storage is probably the way to go. I am surprised not to have seen any mention of this plant in Morocco in 'The Engineer' (or have I missed it 🙁 )
http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-34883224
Tidal/wave is interesting, but is limited in application to locations with a long coastline in proportion to its area. It would not be of benefit in Switzerland. The combination of tidal with storage lagoons to supply dispatchable electricity will work but I am not sure on the actual return on resources used. This is a general problem of the intermittent supplies including wind. Everything has to be sized for the maximum output but delivers less than a third of this which is not a good use of raw materials.
Hydro/pumped storage is generally good but is again geographically limited. It will work in Switzerland, but the opportunities in the Netherlands are limited.
New generation nuclear also looks good. This needs some materials development as well as alternative fuel cycles for Pu and Th as well as breeding up the non fissile U and Th isotopes. As nuclear power is concentrated it is also much better at utilising resources. Significantly less construction materials are required for 1GWe of nuclear than for 1GWe of wind. The operational life of a nuclear plant is also longer, 60 instead of 20 years.
I certainly accept that there are significant hazards and risks with nuclear power but so are there with burning fossil fuels. The risks of nuclear are certainly overstated by the green lobby and the media and I challenge these views as well when I come across them.
It would be best for some of you to use your computers (linked to servers that increase human-induced GHG emissions) to run climate models in support of climate science and the common good. This is what I run with thousands others:
http://www.climateprediction.net/
If I have to read a long text, it will not be opinions, although I respect everybody's freedom to offer them, but scientists' analysis and statements of facts:
http://www.realclimate.org/index.php?p=18914
One more thing, the solar power plants in Sweden disprove any assertion that solar needs a certain latitude to work. Intermittence problem? Storage solution. Problem solved.
https://www.engie.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/10/pr-engie-inauguration-alata.pdf
Nuclear? We already have no-risk and for ever nuclear: the sun, plus the price is right (~zero). The risks are overstated for clumsily built human nuclear, compared to the sun's simplicity and elegance? Whoever still wants human-built nuclear should put it in his/her backyard and also pay for total costs: building, operating, decommissioning, catastrophic failures.
First let me say that I am not a denier, nor barely a sceptic until I looked at the evidence for and against GW. As a layman, I object to the dogmatic conviction that GW, AGW or CC science is settled. Even I know that science is never settled and unless one turns up on my doorstep and can prove he's God, I will never believe any scientist predicting a certain future. Indeed, I have heard utterly convincing arguments from Jehovah's witnesses that sound more credible than the arguments for the future dictated by man's feeble efforts to influence mother nature.
Again, even as a layman, I know the climate has changed over millions of years, and will continue into the distant future (thankfully). Furthermore, paleoclimatology has demonstrated that CO2 levels have often been extremely low during the hottest periods which strongly suggests there is no relationship between CO2 and temperature.
I also understand the most prevalent greenhouse gas in the atmosphere is water vapour at 97%. Of the remaining 3% of mixed gasses, man's contribution is around 3% of CO2, so as a simplistic calculation we are not contributing huge amounts. But we continue to blame CO2 for climate change before we even understand what water vapour does.
I also understand that CERN have discovered that cloud-forming aerosols, mankind recognised as a widely held scientific certainty, are now in considerable doubt. The science of feedback itself is barely understood but if CERN do dispel conventional aerosol 'certainties' then, frankly, it's back to the drawing board for every climatologist, for or against.
In terms of credibility, I know that the Michael Mann has been roundly condemned for omitting data in his Hockey stick graph to the extent that the IPCC has removed it from their website. I also understand a retired German professor has discovered the GISS temperature datasets have been altered as far back (I believe) as the 60's. Even I know that's very naughty. Assuming that data has been used in IPCC predictions then no wonder the climate isn't responding as they expect it. Regardless of the 'cherry picking' so often quoted by believers, if this is true, it's a fundamental change in the assessment of CC, nor might it support the deniers, it might demonstrate CC as worse than anyone expected, I am happy to accept either outcome.
I also know from RSS satellite data (I believe that's about as accurate and consistent as we have) that there has been considerably less global warming than predicted over the last 15 years or so, indeed if it continues as it is, in a few short years it will drop completely outwith the 95% standard error (I think I quoted that correctly) margin. If that doesn't convince someone their rune stones are wrong, I really don't know what will. As it is the IPCC have said they don't know why it's happening. Therefore, to present this 'slowdown' or 'pause' in global warming as "2015 will likely be the warmest on record and the last 5 years have been the warmest on record." without qualification that it's below the predictions is manipulative, unprofessional and alarmist. You guys are supposed to be informing we uneducated muppets as to the science of the situation, not controlling it to present your personal beliefs.
I think we are also aware that far from being bad for the planet, increased CO2 is extremely good even if it was responsible for climate change, not that I believe a gas as rare as CO2 (see my third paragraph) could be responsible for it in the first place. Plants thrive on increased CO2, they grow better, are more disease resistant, require less water and smother weeds which don't respond as well to CO2. Why is there no debate over water vapour, I mean it forms 97% of all GHG's, global warming is far more likely to be caused by that than manmade CO2 which forms 0.09(?) of all GHG's.
Nor can I be convinced the paleo science I mentioned earlier is accurate enough to demonstrate whether there have been as sharp rises in global temperatures as our current one, it could have happened thousands of times, we just can't tell. I also understand that Carbon dating is notoriously unreliable with only 40% of specimens judged as suitable for consideration as evidence. But it seems that even the seemingly most reliable specimens can still be millions of years awry. So scientists roll up millions of years of climate change from what? A million tree ring specimens? 2 million, 100 million? Demonstrating even 1 million years with 100 million specimens represents barely a pin prick on the earth's surface, always assuming 40% of them aren't discarded. Please tell me we have more than 100 samples of paleo evidence for each of the last million years.
But, and I'll refer back to my first paragraph, what I find really unconvincing is the slanderous nature of the believers who routinely call into question the professional qualifications, personal integrity, reputations and earnings sources of any scientist who dares contradict them. The sneering and personal insults are quite extraordinary and desperately unprofessional. It doesn't matter if a climatologist is employed by Exxon or any other oil, gas, or coal company, everyone has to make a living and it's their professional future that's at stake so the vast majority are not going to simply make the science up regardless of who asks. On the other hand, if the GISS data is found to have been adjusted the implications are huge. But I'll also say the same of critics of the IPCC, if it turns out their research was false then at some time in the future they'll be driving busses. So how about both sides back down from sneering at one another's scientist's, web sites, blogs and publications, it serves no purpose.
What I do find truly astonishing is the representation made to Obama to criminalise 'deniers'. I sincerely hope this is just a daft rumour, if not, I would, as I hope any scientist would, condemn anyone involved and hand them the keys to a bus. Science exists to be questioned, indeed its future relies on it, without open inquisition it descends into religious dogma.
I wasn't particularly sceptical of climate change and mans impact on it until I started looking into it recently. What I have observed is little to do with the science of the subject, it's the politics that matter and the income that can be derived from the estimated $1.5T business that has mushroomed almost overnight. I also see an unbelievably aggressive group of people who countenance no criticism, scientific or otherwise, who routinely brandish a 95% consensus when it is patently untrue, but, on that basis, demands everyone falls into line. It's the very reason to rebel.
And whilst I'm routinely told that we can't rely on weather events to determine climate change as it's long-term trends that matter, on the eve of the Paris conference there has been a determined PR campaign to highlight 2015 as the hottest year since records began. Elevating a single year, in the minds of the public, to a significant global indicator utterly ignoring the fact that the earth has been considerably warmer in the past.
As a layman I have read everything I can on climate change, ranging from Climatology to quantum mechanics, anti-gravitational theory to the case for the existence of God. As far as I can see, the IPCC are a fledgling political entity, recruiting scientists, politicians and evangelists, predicated on tenuous scientific history, to surf the barely understood, hugely profitable wave of Climatology. Hitherto scientific caution is manipulated into documented media fact, historical uncertainty perverted to future certainty. We have yet to see the flying car, moon communities or routine space travel, but they were all confidently predicted for the 21st Century, as recently as the 20th Century, by the media, at least. Thankfully, most scientific predictions are wrong, every scientist knows there are more failed experiments than successful ones, so why promote the absolute belief that humankind has a roadmap to the future based on scientific certainty, there is no such thing. The concept is deluded, if not, criminally irresponsible.
David Redfern tells us scientists can't be certain of anything but tells us what he "knows". Quite how this makes a logical argument is a mystery to us all.
Silvia's right of course. The contrarians on this thread are incorrigible, and never offer a rational explanation for their views. They can't admit, even to themselves that they're the ones ignoring the 'scientific' evidence. Expressions such as "alarmist dogma" – "It's fanaticism" – "the last bastion of the deniers of reality." – "anthropogenic doom-believer" have no place in rational debate.
Even – "Spending 8 billion a year on useless windmills." fails as an argument, but "I simply don't believe that CO2 emissions are driving climate change, my hunch is. . ." takes the biscuit.
The Editors have been tolerant, patient and objective. Isn't 100 comments enough to serve the right to free speech? We'll have to leave the final verdict to history, I fear.
As I said a month ago – "The decline in the R&D budget" is the only important issue here. The rest is utterly irrelevant. Get the engineering design right and the sustainable generation of low-cost, zero emissions electricity is a piece of cake. (for millennia to come)
Even as an atheist I concede that – "Pope Francis blames 'human selfishness' for global warming." nails the issue better than most. The very same greed and abuse of power is also to blame for the suppression of innovation that's beneficial to human society (but not immediately profitable!).
It's a no-brainer – the economic case (CBA) would settle it, but for human selfishness.
David Redfern 1st December 2015 at 12:17 am
"I know that most men, including those at ease with problems of the greatest complexity, can seldom accept even the simplest and most obvious truth if it be such as would oblige them to admit the falsity of conclusions which they have delighted in explaining to colleagues, which they have proudly taught to others, and which they have woven, thread by thread, into the fabric of their lives." – Leo Tolstoy.
Dave Smart 1st December 2015 at 9:44 am
"I also see an unbelievably aggressive group of people who countenance no criticism, scientific or otherwise, who routinely brandish a 95% consensus when it is patently untrue"
You have to see what isn't there – a single, organised conspiratorial "group", otherwise your denial of the science must be seen for what it is, a delusion.
"why promote the absolute belief that humankind has a roadmap to the future based on scientific certainty, there is no such thing? The concept is deluded" Are you certain about that, David?
"the simplest and most obvious truth" is that GHG emissions are effecting the Earth's climate in exactly the way that the logically applied science has predicted for decades.
You can't see that Tolstoy's words apply to you and your unshakeable belief?!!
I make my decisions on the balance of probabilities. If better evidence emerges, I change my mind.
N Brook 1st December 2015 at 2:37 pm
I note the 'debate' has gone exactly as every other similar climate debate does.
There are those who are strongly in favour of the existance of climate change and even to the point of evangelical like devotion.
There are the 'athiests' who believe the exact opposite and just as deeply. Some explain implausible non-C02 related reasons explaining climate change.
The rest of us are agnostics and I believe they are the silent majority. Many keep their heads down so that they do not get shot in the crossfire as the debate tend to descend into ever more personal attacks. I know few (if any) professional engineers who actually believe in the doomsday predictions.
Agnostics believe in nothing until proved despite being told over and over.
The evidence is packaged and re-packaged until it is presented to show fact. A TED talk does not constitute evidence and neither do the models.
Climate change has been far less than expected and this is a fact. Hastly concocted theories to explain this are not fact either.
There are those on both side of the argument whose professional reputations and livelihoods depend on either the status quo or a transition away from fossil fuels. To this end I would trust a spokeperson from the renewables lobby as much as I would one that from an oil company.
I have done research on temperature increases using actual data from hundreds of monitoring station. The annual increases were at the very lowest of the IPCC predictions. However the data sets from monitoring stations that are available to scientists are incomplete and satellite derived measurements prone to error. Also the effects of climate change vary drastically depending whether you are in the upper northern or southern hemispheres or near the equator.
Those on both end of the spectrum of the argument need to concede there is a possibility that they are wrong.
I'll defer to someone with a hell of a lot more intelligence and insight than anyone I have ever discussed climate change with.
"No amount of experimentation can ever prove me right; a single experiment can prove me wrong" – Albert Einstein
mike blamey 1st December 2015 at 5:59 pm
"…Obama to criminalise 'deniers'. I sincerely hope this is just a daft rumour, if not, I would, as I hope any scientist would, condemn anyone involved and hand them the keys to a bus. Science exists to be questioned, indeed its future relies on it, without open inquisition it descends into religious dogma."
Come on: in the 30s in one of the Southern States of the USA there was a trial and conviction of a teacher who had the temerity to suggest that 'Natural Selection' had a superior likelyhood of explaining the Origin of Species than Noah and his Ark! Fairy Tales?Father Christmas? great for the nursery (and to put my grand-children to sleep) but hardly rational analysis.
David Redfern 1st December 2015 at 9:49 pm
That'll be Voodoo science then, Dave.
David Redfern 1st December 2015 at 11:31 pm
@N Brook
I would be delighted to concede I'm wrong, but when I ask questions, they are rarely answered. Instead, I'm targeted by believers and treated like an idiot (which I'm also willing to accept is true) sneered at and ridiculed simply because I dare find evidence to question a scientific theory, which future climate events is, a theory.
As a layman I must believe scientific fact, but the fact is, I really do see an evangelical campaign by believers, with most sceptical scientists being approachable and reasonable. The most reasonable of all seems to be Judith Curry who, whilst she doubts the apocalyptic claims, concedes herself that we simply don't know enough yet to make definitive statements one way or another. On the other hand, communicate with almost any believer and their aggression is defensive and unsettling.
I also see a determined IPCC forging ahead with political change based on science that, whilst perhaps largely correct, ignores serious questions, lots of them. And you are not alone in the 'after the fact' hastily concocted theories observation. I think I have commented before on the miraculous emergence of new science when an issue with existing science is pointed out.
From what I can gather the current political proposals will threaten the incomes, wellbeing and safety of billions of people in a more certain and immediate fashion than adaptation to a changing climate. But the fact global temperature observations are drifting significantly away from IPCC predictions seems irrelevant to the believers, so just when do they become relevant? It seems more important to hang onto, what appears to be, a gradually eroding theory than it is to question what has gone wrong with the science.
I'm neither an evangelist nor an atheist, I'm a guy doing his best to understand what the science tells us. But the science no longer seems to matter, it's politics and money that once again have driven another ill conceived, ill understood and ill-considered charge into the unknown. Another World War fought without considering the misery, the exit or the outcomes. Another knee jerk reaction.
I daresay there will be innumerable scientific climate change supporters at COP21, but I'll be interested to see how many scientific sceptics are invited. If there's not an equitable balance then the conference represents neither science nor politics, not to mention the individual.
And what if they're wrong? What if the 'pause' in rising temperatures, which undoubtedly exists, is the start of a decline into a colder future, are we going to increase burning fossil fuels in an attempt to raise global temperatures? That is undoubtedly the basis on which the IPCC's argument rests, too much CO2? Stop burning it. Too little CO2? Start making it again, quick. Are we to believe that imaginative tinkering with CO2, or any other gas for that matter, will level out climate change altogether? How utterly preposterous. I'm an uneducated layman, not a mug.
If humanity is to take climate seriously and not as a profitable opportunity then someone has to start asking 'what if?' questions…..well they are, but they're branded deniers and heretics.
However, there is hope. I, like you, find more evidence of scepticism than of support for runaway climate change and these are the guys who will be left to pick up the pieces, assuming we don't all boil in our beds.
Dave Smart 3rd December 2015 at 8:30 am
"I'm a guy doing his best to understand what the science tells us." You must try harder David, and ignore the propaganda. I'm an uneducated layman, but I can read and understand the science, with a little help from better educated (MA Theoretical Physics) and more intelligent friends.
"Are we to believe that imaginative tinkering with CO2, or any other gas for that matter, will level out climate change altogether?" Er . . YES! Because it's not preposterous, it's true:-
http://www.fossilmall.com/Science/About_Stromatolite.htm
Stromatolites: "the predominant form of life on early earth for more than 2 Billion years, and were likely responsible for the creation of earth's atmospheric oxygen, consuming CO2 and releasing O2 through their photosynthetic metabolism. Creation of the modern atmosphere is perhaps the most critical event in geological history, that powered the Cambrian explosion and subsequent evolution of the aerobic forms of life, including all animals."
Ralf 3rd December 2015 at 1:03 pm
Don't hold your breath.
What EVERYBODY else could do: increase energy efficiency and reduce wastage.
What I find funny and disturbing: some energy companies and switching companies encourage me to switch my energy supplier. The new one would cost far less, so that "on average" I would only need to pay £875 for energy per year.
The problem is: right now I pay far less than that. Even with staying with one of the more expensive companies. (change is on the way, just switched gas, going to switch electricity too).
And with having no car there is no fuel consumption there either. Yes, too bad for Land Rover. But I tried. I wanted to get a Defender, but couldn't get in behind the wheel. Not enough space.
Randy Dutton 3rd February 2016 at 7:47 pm
Just because someone benefits financially from a position, their argument isn't necessarily invalidated. I have 114 acres of timber on Washington's western coast. My trees benefit significantly from increased CO2. What fails is the government mandated biofuel ethanol in the fuel supply that is corrosive, destroys fuel systems of open-cycle engines, and burns hotter thus increases the RPM of chainsaw governors and causing clutch engagement during idling.