‘Good enough’ on climate change
The Nation has a challenging story on the way John McCain is being framed as ‘good enough’ on the issue of climate change. In answer to the question will he be the climate champion America so desperately needs:
This is a classic case of what our president calls the soft bigotry of low expectations. Judged against his fellow Republicans, McCain is a paragon of atmospheric wisdom. Judged against the climate and energy legislation afoot in Congress, he falls short. Judged against the two leading Democratic presidential candidates, he is a pale shadow. Judged against the imperatives of climate science — that is to say, judged against brute physical reality — he isn’t even in the ballpark.
This is exactly the same problem we have in New Zealand with both Helen Clark and John Key. While they may want to frame themselves as climate champions, and committed to sustainability, no amount of awards is going to change this fact; New Zealand has had one of the fastest increase in greenhouse gases in the western world over the last decade. We have seen a decade of more intense and industrial dairy farms, more fertiliser and more oil in our food chain, more cars and more consumption.
As Jeanette noted yesterday:
Last year the Greens asked repeatedly how we could be the first sustainable nation while the Government’s own companies were ripping out forest to establish dairy farming, with massive effect on our greenhouse emissions and our water quality, and ramping up coal mining to sell to China and India while berating them for their increasing emissions.’
…NZ’s largest and most expensive transport project ever is to be a new motorway tunnel in Auckland. More than $2 billion, so that all the people who were starting to think about using public transport now that it is gradually improving are sent back to their cars. Just think what that money could do to improve public transport services in Auckland - a rail tunnel to link the western and southern lines and a link to the airport so we would see the start of a real electric rail network. Safe cycle routes with intersection priority. A new busway like the northern one, to the south east. That’s what Auckland is going to need to reduce carbon emissions and cope with rising oil prices. But no, the contradiction of this government is a vision of a world first in carbon neutrality and a reality of more coal, more dairy, and more motorways.
The test of sustainability and commitment to the environment is much more than ensuring you include it as a buzz word in every speech.
February 13th, 2008 at 11:05 am
why can’t it be a matter of ‘as well as’..?
instead of this ‘either/or’ mantra..?
the logic of actually finishing a 90% completed ‘ringroad’..
that would take pressure of the southern motorway..
does seem..to me..to be irrefutable..
(and i do note..that none..repeat..none of those green mps opposing the motorway completion are effected by the traffic-log-jam out west..
they/(he?) live ‘close to/in the city..and cycle in..(!)
i repeat..
why are the greens not clamouring for the ‘as well’..
rather than taking a(n illogical) stance that just pisses off almost every aucklander..
and hey..you do so well in auckland..!..eh..?
(i wonder why..?…eh..?
i guess we can’t blame ‘dick’ for everything..eh..?)
phil(whoar.co.nz)
February 13th, 2008 at 11:16 am
and to have jeanette bellowing this (nonsense) at us..from her coromandal farm..
when the nearest she comes to the woes we daily face..
is her brief runs up and down the southern reaches of the southern motorway..
to and from her coromandal farm..
..is particularly galling..for most aucklanders..
um..!..do you ever ask them..?
y’know..!
aucklanders..?
maybe in your many visits to the auckland greens between elections..
y’know..when you nurture/nourish the auckland green party organisation/troops..?
maybe on your next (of many..!..you ‘give’ so much..!..eh..?..) visit..?
you could ask them..?
and not just the auckland central one/’the’ mp..
eh..?
phil(whoar.co.nz)
February 13th, 2008 at 1:49 pm
I cannot believe that I am agreeing with Phil. While there is no proof that CO2 is causing global warming traffic causing polution and health problems.
Clogged motorways with vehicles idling and stopping and starting cause far more pollution that cars running at a constant speed in top gear.
February 13th, 2008 at 2:04 pm
you don’t mind if i keep you ‘at arms length’..?..
chucky..?
phil(whoar.co.nz)
February 13th, 2008 at 2:20 pm
Please yourself Phil but you will achieve anything politically till you grow up. But what else can one expect from a know all leftie who has sponged off the taxpayer for his education and cannot even write coherently.
February 13th, 2008 at 2:58 pm
Chuck
Its not just his education that you and I have paid for, we have also funded Phil’s lay about lifestyle for the past 15 years or so while he chose to stay at home.
February 13th, 2008 at 3:08 pm
shouldn’t you have had a few (sic)’s in there..chucky..?
‘write coherently’..
you say..
phil(whoar.co.nz)
February 13th, 2008 at 3:13 pm
and chuck..we may agree on the motorway..(for different reasons..)
but virtually every other political view i have heard you peddle..
has made my skin crawl..
(seeing as you’re asking..?..)
you seem to delight in ‘playing’ a caricature of all the worst rightwing cliches/mores..
phil(whoar.co.nz)
February 13th, 2008 at 5:34 pm
Phil
Gerrit came up with the idea of adding rail and power infrastructure to the tunneling project, and I tend to agree. I also regard the idea of not completing the loop as something less desirable than doing it and giving people a few more options for getting from hither to yon, If the price of petrol goes up to $100/liter it isn’t going to get used a lot by petrol powered motorcars, Heck $10/liter would pretty well empty it… of those. The fact is though, that however you organize a city, people travel, both within it and around it, and if horse drawn carriages become the common people’s transport option the tunnel will still be useful (if a little difficult to clean).
Obsessing about roads and routes is wrong. A new artery permits better circulation and the health of the body politic is improved. There are limits to this analogy, but NZ never been in danger of reaching those limits.
Worry instead about taxing petrol and reducing the desirability of introducing additional petrol automobiles. I saw a Humvee in Porirua.recently and it makes me wonder.
If we had more and better roads would we really need so many 4wd off-road utes of such limited efficiency?
respectfully
BJ
February 13th, 2008 at 7:37 pm
Jeanette has done well to express the blind hypocrisy that bedevils our government. It is truly a myth that NZ is ‘green’
Unfortunately the government is only reflecting the selfish greed and shortsightedness of the bulk of New Zealanders; and we can hardly expect that to change. Most people are either too busy just keeping their lives together to introduce a greener lifestyle, or else too shallow to even give a toss (eg: like most of Auckland’s North Shore)
To make any real progress it would probably require a very punitive government (which would likely never get elected again) or else a government that could dangle carrots that encouraged ordinary people, and ordinary businesses to make a difference.
Sadly, the low acceptance rate of governmental subsidies for solar water heating systems suggests that carrots may not work. Or maybe they just need to be bigger carrots.
How about huge tax incentives for any industry that can demonstrate a ‘green’ benefit from their activities or products?
How about HUGE tax reductions for families who have solar panels and composting toilets??
Becoming truly green requires us to identify and reward activities that really do help the planet. I don’t think they are really that hard to identify.
As for complaining about the building of roads…I think that is a complete non-issue.
I have a vision of well-built roads being full of bikes and lightweight commuter vehicles powered by any of the various forms of ‘green’ energy that are coming onstream.
Being ‘green’ does not mean staying at home and never wearing deodorant again.
February 13th, 2008 at 7:42 pm
“..Sadly, the low acceptance rate of governmental subsidies for solar water heating systems suggests that carrots may not work. Or maybe they just need to be bigger carrots…”
sshh!! greengeek..
that (touchy) subject isn’t mentioned in green party ciircles anymore..
eh..?
didn’t you get the memo..?
phil(whoar.co.nz)
February 13th, 2008 at 8:25 pm
>>How about HUGE tax reductions for families who have solar panels and composting toilets??
Which means someone else pays for your energy.
And what happens when the take-up is significant, as it would be if “huge” tax reductions were being “offered”? I imagine the take-up would come from the affluent, who would have the most to gain. Poor people paying more tax - it would be an interesting, if unelectable, turnaround.
How green is green? Strikes me we’re pretty green by virtue of the fact we have a lot of land and few people. If people disappeared tomorrow, there would be no trace of us in a few thousand years, except for some near-undetectable background radiation.
February 13th, 2008 at 9:15 pm
Well the Green approach is apparently to tax ‘bads’ to pay for something else, in the case of solar panels…?
February 13th, 2008 at 10:27 pm
Actually no; it doesn’t mean someone else pays for my energy… I said I want ‘tax reductions’. In other words, I want to pay less tax, on the basis that I don’t consume electricity off the grid, I generate my own power.
I am sick of paying tax for solo parents, dope smoking no-hopers on student allowances, and refugees in state houses.
Taxes should either be spent more wisely, or else reduced as an incentive for the taxpayesr to spend the money on green policies.
February 13th, 2008 at 11:21 pm
Dear Chucky Bird,
Unless you were totally educated outside New Zealand, then you too have “sponged off” the NZ tax payer for your education as well..or do you really think that “voluntary school fees” and university fees covered the entire cost of educating you?
I suggest that you think a little more before throwing stones. Gratuitous insults do not help convince anyone of your argument.
February 14th, 2008 at 12:18 am
Any comment on the lowest Jan temperture since the mid eighties. In fact 2007 was a year of cooling.
http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2008/02/giss-jan08.png
The facade of AGW is being shot down in flames. Maybe all of the controls needed on our freedom and wallets will not be needed after all!
February 14th, 2008 at 12:28 am
jingyang: I do not know where chuck bird received his/her education, but I do know that it didn’t include anything on climate research during the last decade or so (as the statement that “…there is no proof that CO2 is causing global warming …” demonstrates).
I get sick and tired of people writing things such as this, when they demonstably have very little knowledge on current state of climate science. No, that is putting it kindly, most people who make these statements are just plain ignorant when it comes to the subject of climate change.
Climate science isn’t set in concrete, and there is much debate about the details, but the main points such as the climate is currently changing as a result of anthropogenic CO2 emissions are not disputed by many climate experts at all.
February 14th, 2008 at 8:18 am
>>I am sick of paying tax for solo parents, dope smoking no-hopers on student allowances, and refugees in state houses.
Certainly something we agree on.
February 14th, 2008 at 9:46 am
yawn. Good thing GW’s graph doesn’t have an upward trend or anything
February 14th, 2008 at 11:09 am
Sustainability means different things to different people.
It could be argued that any human activity, apart from in its very basic form, is unsustainable. So any claim about sustainability is meaningless unless qualified by a definition.
HM Clark’s ambition for NZ to become the first carbon neutral state has been preempted by the Pope as I think the Vatican is now certified as carbon neutral, with trees in Hungary offsetting the incence vapours. It’s all hot air anyway, as Labour will be ousted from power later this year and replaced by a National Government.
Perhaps some reluctance by leaders to commit to a large reduction in greenhouse gases show an underlying private concern that the IPCC haven’t got it right. I for one don’t believe all the alarmist theory over greenhouse gases, especially as the last 7 or 8 years has seen no real increase in temperature, which is not really what was expected with the relentless increase in CO2.
February 14th, 2008 at 7:00 pm
Phil… excuse me if I misrepresent you at all, but I find it incredibly painful reading posts without some semblance of sentencing, paragraphing, or at least pacing, and your constant elipsis-abuse make you next to impossible to read. I believe your general point is that it wouldn’t hurt to have a good road network as well as public transport.
In principle I agree, but in practicality, our public transport system is so far behind that we could suspend all non-maintenance spending on roads without catching it up.
Also, I disagree that this tunnel is a good example of “as well as” without some drastic change, which is unlikely to be considered. Having new roading developments that work together with public transport means designing roads that cater to buses and cyclists much more than current roads do. It means designing roads that are intended to be travelled by people who need to use cars for travelling to remote places or carrying large loads. It means assuming people will use buses and rail for their usual, day-to-day transport needs.
Not the current system that worships the driver-only car ride as the height of individual freedom.
February 14th, 2008 at 9:48 pm
I feel that the only way for us to make progress in becoming a more ‘green’ society is to continue to accept the car as a form of individual freedom. People actually behave worse if they feel they are losing their freedoms. (Thats why we are seeing more SUVs and Hummers etc etc)
What would be wrong with us having a fleet of ‘green’ vehicles using the roads, still permitting a sense of individual freedom??
I have seen information of the VW diesel two-seater that does over 300mpg. Wouldn’t that be a suitable vehicle to take us toward a green future but still permit the utopia of individual freedom? I don’t want to have to use the bus!!@#$#@!
February 15th, 2008 at 1:38 am
Before getting too excited about using all roading revenue for public transport in the main centres just remember that half the money comes from rural roads. Rural travellers get no benefit from subsidising city commuters whereas city commuters do benefit from subsidising rural roads - most long weekends and most meal times and most pay days. Who of us has a job that doesn’t ultimately depend on the wealth generated by tourism or agriculture?
February 15th, 2008 at 9:54 am
I’d love the commute from my rural idyll to Christchurch to be on a train, but the railway tracks got pulled up in 1959.
Short sightedness is not a new quality…
February 15th, 2008 at 11:23 am
Agree, Kev and GG. The horseless carriage and its predecessor the horsy carriage have been with us for, oh, a few millenia. You could say we’ve co-evolved. The next evolution will of course be non-oily propulsion: the three leading bets are battery (see A123 systems), hydrogen (this way or perhaps that way, both biomass generated), and pure solar. So the horseless carriage will be with us for some time to come.
March 1st, 2008 at 4:26 am
I sincerely hope that all who are anti completion of SH20 will get behind Richard Simpson’s vision for Auckland. I love that elegant harbour bridge he is proposing. Please read his latest article in NBR.
http://www.nbr.co.nz/home/column_article.asp?id=20462&cid=39&cname=NBR +Comment
A refreshing change from the Business as Usual Brigade.
March 1st, 2008 at 7:46 am
buzz,
You are slightly disingenious as the article is more to do with freeing up foreshore land for recreational use then solving Auckland congestion problem.
Bridge looks nice but is a replacement for the exisiting harbour bridge at a point further west, without regard to the humongous relocating cost for the SH1 from its existing location.
Sure the householders living along the Northcote ridge and all the way back to Wairau Road will be most impressed with their relocation to other parts the North Shore just so that Auckland can have a few more kilometers of foreshore.
No it is absolutely vital for traffice (be it electric, horsedrawn, hygrogen or fred flinstone foot powered) that SH20 be completed from Manukau to Albany.
The congestion points along SH1 have sifted from spagetti junction (now that that section of most excellent motorway has been completed) to points north and south.
This is a reflection of where poeple are working as the congestion points align where most people now go (the industrial areas of Albany, Penrose, Wiri - Manukau and East Tamaki).
Opening up SH20 will decrease the industrial traffic currently coming from the western indutrial areas, (Rosebank Road and Henderson) from having to use the Southern Motorway.
And enable very quick access for western residents to the Airport.
Not to mention the growth stimulation that will occur for the Kumeu, Helenville areas by having better transport to and from the rest of the greater Auckland area (much like has happened with Pukekohe and points south with the completion of the Motorway to the top of the Bombay’s and the Waikato freeway from there on to Hamilton).
And most importantly give the North South traffic who do not have business in Auckland a quick route trhough this fantastic metropolitan conglomeration of ours.
March 1st, 2008 at 9:37 am
The Business as Usual Brigade may like to read Richard Simpson’s article right through. He is also talking about the opening up of waterfront land as an opportunity to provide light rail to Western suburbs plus other parts of Auckland. Much more sensible as petrolheads will eventually go the way of the dinosaurs.
March 1st, 2008 at 2:09 pm
Ari
The people who live near the rail line will be better off perhaps, but trying to force the country to give up personal transportation is doomed. We’ll all have horses and buggies first… as we did before we had motorcars. That means that roads and as I prefer to call them routes or arteries, will continue to develop and must continue to be developed.
Not like we’re doing… the SLIGHTEST bit of thought would show that Gerrit’s proposal is far far better than what the gummint has dropped on us… but fighting to take people’s personal freedom to travel away is a losing battle. It is a really good way to annoy the rest of the country and become un-electable too.
respectfully
BJ
March 1st, 2008 at 2:21 pm
the last 7 or 8 years has seen no real increase in temperature,
I await with bated breath your evidence that the temperature of the planet is showing no increase.
I expect something qualitatively better than this:
http://www.giss.nasa.gov/research/news/20070208/
http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/2007/
http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/
… which also has to indicate that in some manner the data collected and analysis done at Goddard is completely wrong.
Otherwise I will have to persist in the error of believing the actual data.
Sorry.
BJ
March 1st, 2008 at 4:53 pm
BJ, The other approach that needs to be vigorously followed is undoing the damage done by the post-WWII town planning rules on single use zoning. That process will be hastened as rising freight transport costs challenge the economics of large factories. We could see manufacturing economics shift in favour of many smaller factories instead of fewer bigger factories.
March 1st, 2008 at 5:56 pm
buzz,
If the “The Business as Usual Brigade” is a reference directed at my comment, then be manly (or womanly) enough to refer to my name.
Yes I did read the whole article and found it to be a very shallow viewpoint concentrating only on the central Auckland CBD district.
Now lets take a bigger picture view on transport problems from Orewa to Pukekohe and you realise that the bit of concern for the feature writer is but a drop in the bucket.
In fact Auckland CBD traffic problems are now minor compared with those at Manukau and Penrose (where the eastern arterial meets the Southern Motorway).
If you want more public access to the waterfront for the greater Auckland region you have the whole length of waterfront from Mechanics Bay to Doders Beach near Clevedon to play with. Not to mention the Bayswater to Long Bay stretch along the North Shore.
Looking at rail (heavy or light) then Westrern Springs is best serviced through the Waterview Tunnel.
With a bit of foresight we should extend this tunnel all the way back to Britomart (as an aside - can anyone tell me why there is no seating arrangement in britomart while waiting for a train? - no wonder people dont like to use public transport) with underground stations along the way.
And as I mentioned in an earlier post there should be a rail tunnel from britomart to the North Shore busway. Placing a tunnel on the seabed would be far easier then building a bigger bridge .
Mind you did the bridge design include rail traffic facilites? (like the Sydney harbour bridge)
Only then would I consider the proposal as a replacement for the existing bridge in the same location.
Agree with you that petrol powered vehicles will be dinosours but like BJ says we will have alternative private and individual vehicles powered by whatever will be cost effective. And these will need to be catered for as well.
If Kevyn is right and we will see a decentralisation of industry, there will be an even greater need for individual transport options (and roading) as public transport will not get all the people to all the work places.
March 1st, 2008 at 6:33 pm
bjchip,
The gisstemp figures you link to are not raw surface temperature data but the result of a very significant massaging which applies a false warming trend by means of various “adjustments” (massaging applied by arch alarmist and self-publicist, Jim Hansen, I should add).
It is what the police might call “fabricated evidence.”
Fortunately we now have satellite data which is much cleaner, so there is no pretext for adding a false warming trend. Sure enough, the satellite data proves that the temperature has been statistically flat for the best part of a decade (with some cooling, if anything):-
http://www.remss.com/msu/msu_data_description.html#msu_decadal_trends
But if you insist on using surface data, why not the hadCRUT data set:-
http://www.cru.uea.ac.uk/cru/data/temperature/nhshgl.gif
As you can see, like the satellite data, it shows cooling for the last few years.
So, if you really were waiting “with bated breath” for evidence “that the temperature of the planet is showing no increase,” you can now breath again.
March 1st, 2008 at 6:54 pm
I’m not sure why Mouldwarp thinks the satellite data shows a cooling of the earth. Three out of four of the channels involved show a warming trend. The forth shows a more significant cooling trend, but if you look at the key at the top of the document, you will see that this is for the channel that covers the Lower Stratosphere, i.e. the highest altitudes. Given that rising CO2 levels acts to keep heat in, this might be expected.
The surface data shows a small drop in the last few years that is only a fraction of the rise in temperature for the years before that, and that is not evidence “that the temperature of the planel is showing no increase”.
Trevor.
March 1st, 2008 at 7:32 pm
Trevor,
The claim being made is specifically that there has been no warming in the last 7 or 8 years.
As you say yourself, the satellite data supports this (the graphs are at the borrom of the page).
Sure there was warming before that, but that was entirely consistant with natural climate variation (the pattern of significant warming early in the century, followed by three decades of cooling and then more warming was decidedly not in accordance with the AGW theory: Alarmists have to ignore that inconvenient distribution and simply refer to the net warming over the entire century to try and get some propaganda value out of it).
But the point here is that the modern warming stopped around the year 2000, a fact which flatly contradicts the theory that CO2 is the predominant agent, inexorably driving up the temperature (remember Al Gore telling us how the warming was actually accelerating?)
March 1st, 2008 at 9:03 pm
Mouldwarp said:
“As you say yourself, the satellite data supports this (no warming)”
I said nothing of the sort. The satellite data that shows a cooling trend is for the upper atmosphere. That is the bit of sky above the CO2 layer that is keeping the heat in. The lower layers show a warming trend.
Trevor.
March 1st, 2008 at 11:20 pm
Trevor,
You agreed that “the surface data shows a small drop in the last few years.” That’s exactly what is being claimed.
The graphs are the Global Brightness Temperature Anomaly charts near the bottom of the page, charting back to 1980.
Remember, we are only talking about the last 7-8 years; so ignore the trend lines across the whole graph because they average the entire period. They are not what we’re interested in.
Look at the pattern at or shortly after the year 2000.
If it helps, imagine a trend line across just that period. You’ll see it is statistically flat or sloping down.
March 1st, 2008 at 11:26 pm
I think you are misinterpreting what you see in the MSU data Mouldwarp. The entire point to warming is that heat doesn’t escape to the Stratosphere channels, it is trapped near the surface and the Stratosphere actually is supposed to be getting colder. Per the models and the physics. This is atmospheric temperature taking in layers and the differences you see in the MSU data should WORRY you, not lead you to post here about how it isn’t getting warmer.
As for the CRU dataset you have two problems.
The first is that the CRU doesn’t cover the Arctic or Antarctic very well. Any examination of the temperature anomaly clearly points to the Polar regions warming faster.
http://www.cru.uea.ac.uk/cru/info/warming/
The second and WORSE problem however, is that this assertion that the earth is cooling, is based on comparisons AMONG the 12 highest temperatures since 1850. Any observer looking at that data would notice that 2006 and 2007 are only “cooling” with respect to 2005
“The 1990s were the warmest complete decade in the series. The warmest year of the entire series has been 1998, with a temperature of 0.546°C above the 1961-90 mean. Twelve of the thirteen warmest years in the series have now occurred in the past thirteen years (1995-2007). The only year in the last thirteen not among the warmest twelve is 1996 (replaced in the warm list by 1990). The period 2001-2007 is 0.21°C warmer than the 1991-2000 decade.”
In other words, the cooling - flattening claimed is evident only as regards the last 2 years, not the last 6… and the anomaly remains with temperatures well above those of the last decade. I don’t think you’ve shown me that the GISS data is wrong at all. This matches it well. It would seem that Hansen has massaged the data at the CRU and the MSU data as well. The man is a positive GENIUS at misleading us all…. or you may just be wrong about what is happening.
Understand. AGW is just a “theory” backed by a lot of science and scientists, but still just a theory so it could still be wrong.
When it comes down to it though, so can you.
The human species will decide what to do… “not to decide is to decide”, and it has taken the measure of the problem using the best instruments and the best science it can muster. They’ve reached an amazing degee of agreement (for science) about what the problem is.
You disagree. We can believe all those guys who have spent their lives studying the problem and all the research they’ve collected and recognize that we need to do something, OR we can believe you and do nothing. The fate of the world hangs in the balance.
I wonder what we should do?
( /sarcasm )
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mF_anaVcCXg#
(don’t forget the “appendices” to the right of the page)
BJ
March 1st, 2008 at 11:49 pm
Third problem - since I don’t get to answer in real time when the kids are awake -
If you draw those same lines with the last 2 years cut off the trendline will be UP. In other words, the dataset is too short to show trends of the nature we’re discussing, over 6 years with the variability that is inherent in the dataset.
FURTHERMORE… this
modern warming stopped around the year 2000, a fact which flatly contradicts the theory that CO2 is the predominant agent, inexorably driving up the temperature
First: You know damned well that there is no way from a series this short to come to the conclusion you’ve reached in a dataset that has this sort of variation. Can’t prove it. Not yet.
Second: The difference between “inexorable” and “monotonic” is pretty important. CO2 is the predominant agent driving up the temperature now… but it is not the ONLY agent affecting temperatures, just the one that is changing and the one we have changed and the one we theoretically can control. This assertion appears to be almost intentionally misleading on several dimensions.
respectfully
BJ
March 1st, 2008 at 11:53 pm
The good thing about having Mouldwarp post here is that he does force me to go back and look at the data over again. The bad thing is that I have to repeat things I’ve already done.
March 2nd, 2008 at 12:47 am
You, sir, have the patience of a saint.
March 2nd, 2008 at 11:37 am
Wow. Nicely detailed Bj, and it all looks pretty solid too. Well done.
March 2nd, 2008 at 6:35 pm
bjchip,
- “The entire point to warming is that heat doesn’t escape to the Stratosphere channels, it is trapped near the surface and the Stratosphere actually is supposed to be getting colder. Per the models and the physics. This is atmospheric temperature taking in layers and the differences you see in the MSU data should WORRY you, not lead you to post here about how it isn’t getting warmer.”
Wrong. The satellite data shows the *same* pattern - zero net warming for the past few years - for the troposhere, down near the surface. So my point remains.
- “As for the CRU dataset you have two problems. The first is that the CRU doesn’t cover the Arctic or Antarctic very well. Any examination of the temperature anomaly clearly points to the Polar regions warming faster.”
Wrong again. The arctic is warmer but the antarctic is cooler. In fact, the modern warming that you find so alarming is largely a northern hemisphere event; so we shouldn’t really call is “global” warming at all. How does your theory account for that? Does CO2 only work in the North?
As to your other (very lengthy) complaint, that any recent flattening or cooling is only in comparison to preceding increased temperatures, well, duh.
Nobody is saying this proves anything. What they *are* saying is that it inconsistent with the AGW scare.
- “If you draw those same lines with the last 2 years cut off the trendline will be UP”
Wrong again. Here’s a better graph of the satellite data, showing just the last few years (I’m referring to the bottom graph which, note, is of the lower atmosphere):-
http://www.worldclimatereport.com/index.php/2008/02/07/more-satellite- musings/#more-306
XYY,
- “You, sir, have the patience of a saint.”
Well, it is the man’s religion we’re talking about.
March 3rd, 2008 at 12:52 am
No Mouldwarp….
I can look at the Satellite data TLT channel OR your WorldClimateReport graph as close as I may and if I toss out the last 2 years I still see an up trend. Perhaps I need to actually graph 1999-2005 or 2000-2006 from the raw data and work up a proper linear fit to be certain but YOU know as well as anyone here that to claim that either of us know ANYTHING about the trends based on this short a series is complete bullsh!t and I would think better of you if you’d simply apply your ample reasoning powers to some better purpose. What it shows is that if you select a short data series from a set with large variations, you can choose your result by choosing your start and end points.
In other words, this is a real waste of time. Something you excel at.
You assert that a flattening of the curve for a few short years is “inconsistent with the AGW scare” when that is complete bullsh!t by your own lights and you know damned well that nobody in the climate science field asserts that AGW is the only thing influencing climate. We’re at a cyclical minimum for sunspot numbers and the temperature rise has “flattened”. Apparently mostly because of a la-nina over the past 6 months and a prior el-nino.. Why didn’t it actually go seriously down?
It is no longer clear to me that you even accept that there IS warming. Is the planet getting warmer? Not over the past few years, but over the past century. Tell me if there is any data you accept.
Wrong again. The arctic is warmer but the antarctic is cooler.
Yeah… I should have seen that coming. I simplified and you parsed. My point remains. that the CRU doesn’t measure EITHER of them worth a plug nickel (actually the measurements they manage to get are damned expensive and we appreciate the effort, but compared to the stats elsewhere, the data is sparse).
Model simulations have always shown much greater warming in Arctic than in the Antarctic, and it is “global” because the temperature of the entire planet is being taken… not because it is all getting warmer everywhere.
“Does CO2 only work in the north”
You know, that’s a sort of interesting question. Turned around a bit it is anyway… the Inter Tropical Convergence Zone could slow the process of CO2 diffusion through the entire atmosphere and I really do not think the models keep track of CO2 concentrations on a hemispheric basis. In addition the south has more water the north, with the buffering effect of the ocean making it possible that the concentration is even more skew. I am not aware of anyone doing this but I have at least started looking.
Things like this prove the value of listening with patience.
Thanks
BJ
March 3rd, 2008 at 1:17 am
Cool animation… watch the CO2 concentrations and which hemisphere they’re in…
http://www.esa.int/esaEO/SEM1DUQ08ZE_planet_1.html#subhead1
respectfully
BJ
March 3rd, 2008 at 1:18 am
Reading this thread is interesting, and it generated a couple of random thoughts:
1) I remember once thinking that I was glad I was not a biologist, because I wouldn’t have to defend my science from the attacks of creationists. If I was to start studying science today, what would be the most non-controversial “safe from creationists” field I could go into?
2) Is the climate change “debate” simply a sign that people don’t want to hear bad news, or is it a more fundamental attack on science in general?
March 3rd, 2008 at 8:54 am
>>people don’t want to hear bad news
I would say that’s part of it. I also wonder about those who buy into it so quickly. Perhaps these people tend towards asceticism….
As far as I’m concerned, there are a few issues:
-number of conflicting voices from qualified people (therefore confusing)
-there doesn’t seem to be much honesty in the debate
-the religious/political fervor and positioning (far-left, Al Gore)
-science is not at issue, but scientists can be wrong
March 3rd, 2008 at 9:08 am
What about the political fervour of the ‘far right’? (which would probably apply to the ‘honesty’ point too…It was pretty well documented (I WOULD say) by a Professor called Peter Jacques in a published paper called ‘The Rearguard of Modernity’ that the reason the US didn’t sign Kyoto was a lot of misleading information from Cato, Heritage, Hoover, Heartland and other free market think tanks in the US.
- Probably also past issues affect people’s thinking at the moment, such as ‘global cooling’ which was in a couple of magazine articles a few decades ago, so ‘if they got that wrong they’re probably wrong about this too’.
March 3rd, 2008 at 9:48 am
bjchip,
Perhaps you could explain what your animation is meant to be showing us?
March 3rd, 2008 at 11:40 am
Bluepeter- almost all the qualified people are telling us the same thing- what the data is telling us. Unfortunately, there are a few mavericks that are pushed along by people who really haven’t paid any attention to the data and studies that have been done that seem intent on confusing the issue.
The science is indeed about as uncontroversial as science gets. And Scientists can be wrong- however modern scientists are usually the first ones to admit when there’s a likelihood that they’ll be wrong. That the denial of climate change is not really gaining any traction within the scientific community should tell us something- that deniers aren’t properly providing data and analysis to support their claims.
I’d rather act on unsettling yet solid data than be comfortable ignoring it without good justification, personally speaking.
I also find it interesting that you mention that there’s left-wing fervor on this issue. Haven’t deniers been just as passionate in their dedication to shooting this down? All it really tells us is that this is a contentious issue with high stakes.
March 3rd, 2008 at 12:47 pm
There is climate change. There is always climate change.
At question is the role of C02 in causing so-called AGW. If it is, to what extent? Is it such a bad thing anyway? Is it a bad thing for New Zealand, necessarily? What should New Zealand’s response be?
How about some predictions that will demonstrate AGW is occurring. For example, if we see more hurricanes in the Pacific this year, does this indicate AGW? Or the opposite? If we don’t experience these hurricanes, does it indicate cooling? Should the global temperature be rising? If it isn’t, what does that mean? If the temperature doesn’t track with the models, what does that mean?
March 3rd, 2008 at 1:10 pm
I’m no expert, but there are many things which we would EXPECT to see from climate change/global warming e.g. increased hurricane intensity, but it is difficult to say CC/GW actually CAUSED it - observable correlations rather than cause-and-effect…I await correction though.
March 3rd, 2008 at 2:00 pm
The animation won’t make any sense until the post ahead of it comes out of moderation - sorry… It was related to a question about mixing across the equator and possibly different CO2 concentration. For which I ultimately found an answer at FLASK. - BJ
March 3rd, 2008 at 2:04 pm
Y’know, the number of times I have posted this link BP, I have to believe that you don’t bother to actually follow ANY information that might conflict with your particular worldview ….
Again…
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mF_anaVcCXg#
(don’t forget the “appendices� to the right of the page)
BJ
March 3rd, 2008 at 2:19 pm
The temperature is tracking the models fine thank you.
The hurricane count and intensity is of questionable value and is CERTAINLY not going to tell you much until you’ve gotten towards the middle of the century and are counting them in a consistent manner. “Named Storms” is not consistent until you define conditions for giving the silly things names.
Changes in rainfall patterns… predicted and present but not for long enough to “prove” anything and that is pretty much the case for every piece of the puzzle. The warming itself is pretty unequivocal… The growth in the CO2 concentrations is equally unequivocal… but PROOF of causation is always an issue. I don’t buy the size of the coincidence required for it to be something else.
You are looking for proof, which would be a really nice thing to have in our back pocket, but science isn’t a court of law. The evidence is never so unequivocal as that until after the fact and even then you can be quite wrong if you weren’t recording the data.
This problem won’t wait until after the fact. That’s why we have the IPCC and a process which is telling us about the problem.
respectfully
BJ
March 3rd, 2008 at 2:39 pm
Thanks BJChip. I have watched that video, but as I’ve said before, the argument is essentially Pascals Wager.
>>hurricane count and intensity is of questionable value
Right. So when believers announce every freak weather occurrence as being the direct result of global warming, you’ll forgive my skepticism.
March 3rd, 2008 at 2:51 pm
http://www.guardian.co.uk/theguardian/2008/mar/01/scienceofclimatechan ge.climatechange
March 3rd, 2008 at 3:05 pm
Interesting link, BJ.
I enjoyed it, but I’m not sure your fellow greenies will thank you for it…..
“Most of the things we have been told to do might make us feel better, but they won’t make any difference. Global warming has passed the tipping point, and catastrophe is unstoppable.
“It’s just too late for it,” he says. “Perhaps if we’d gone along routes like that in 1967, it might have helped. But we don’t have time. All these standard green things, like sustainable development, I think these are just words that mean nothing.”
“Carbon offsetting? I wouldn’t dream of it. It’s just a joke. To pay money to plant trees, to think you’re offsetting the carbon? You’re probably making matters worse.”
“while having a “green lifestyle” amounts to little more than “ostentatious grand gestures”
“To Lovelock, the logic is clear. The sustainability brigade are insane to think we can save ourselves by going back to nature; our only chance of survival will come not from less technology, but more.”
March 3rd, 2008 at 3:08 pm
Not entirely Pascal’s wager. In Pascal’s wager, the effect is quite personal. With warming EVERYONE lives or dies.
Personally I tend to side with Lovelock. That’s why I am here. So my kids have a shot at a seat in what may be one of the few places with enough of everything to make it through with some semblance of civilization intact.
I don’t however, count out the possibility of a stick-save of some sort, and I don’t reckon that I should JUST “enjoy life” cause I do have an obligation to keep trying for it.
Mouldwarp often chides me for “giving up” on whole continents full of people in favour of the people here. In medicine this is called Triage.
The thing that differs from Pascal’s wager here is that if I am right, the proof will come while I am still (God willing) alive. If I am right it will not be just me who suffers or profits.
The warming is there. The CO2 is there. The science is as clear as it ever gets, I could still be WRONG but the odds are powerfully against it and the consequences are powerfully weighted towards doing something right now.
Maybe Bush is a genius, engineering what may still become a the largest depression in World History. is probably the only way to stop the process now… if it can still be stopped at all
respectfully
BJ
March 3rd, 2008 at 3:14 pm
BP
As you may have figured out, I am not like everyone else. I gave up trying to be a long time ago. The Greens seem to put up with me and they seem to put up with Lovelock as well.
My view differs from his in terms of “what to do”… not what will happen. Like him I am generally pretty cheerful despite the double-barreled catastrophe that appears to be aimed at our children’s heads. Here in NZ the need for nukes is near zero and the power from renewables is more complete. That makes it easier.
respectfully
BJ
March 3rd, 2008 at 3:33 pm
There is a curious middle-ground. If Lovelock is correct, then it doesn’t matter if you’re a skeptic or a believer, because there’s nothing anyone can do about it, so we may as well focus on adaptation.
Hopefully we’ll exit Kyoto and the ludicrous trading schemes and use the money to build power generation instead.
March 3rd, 2008 at 7:56 pm
True.
Unfortunately many people feel that the severe climate changes that have happened throughout the millenia must be natural cycles, therefore we should not worry about changes occuring around us at present.
My view is that mankind is triggerring natural changes at an unnatural pace, and an unnatural time.
Why should we allow the rate of climatic change to increase rather than continuing to enjoy the period of relative stability we should theoretically be in at present??
There is no doubt that if we trigger an ice age, we will get uncomfortably cold.
There is also no doubt that triggering global warming is a step along the road to triggering an iceage.
It seems an irony that atmospheric warming would eventually lead to another iceage, but that is the reality we can see in the geological record.
The cycles will continue, just as they have for millions of years. It would just be stupid of us to drive the cycles sooner, and deeper, than they would otherwise be.
March 3rd, 2008 at 8:12 pm
What Lovelock does not consider is whether or not we can make the catastrophe worse. Can we? I think we can.. and simply ignoring what is happening is not the best way to mitigate much. If the power generation is wind and water and solar based I am happy with that, but I will not support building/buying new fossil fuel plants right now.
The other barrel is of course the empty oil barrel, and that one is going to kick the economies of the west just as they have been slammed to their knees by the greed of the banking fraternity.
BJ
March 3rd, 2008 at 8:17 pm
- “With warming EVERYONE lives or dies.”
A tad melodramatic.
More accurate to say “if the AGW theory is essentially correct there will be costs for adaptation; but in 100 years time people will be vastly richer than us and more technologically advanced in ways we perhaps can’t imagine, so they will be well prepared to deal with it.”
Read about the latest research on the supposed link between hurricanes and warming:-
http://www.worldclimatereport.com/index.php/2008/02/25/more-on-the-hur ricane-hysteria/
March 3rd, 2008 at 8:30 pm
People such as Bush have a lot to gain from global climate catastrophe.
As BluePeter points out, those who survive may well be those who rely on MORE technology, rather than less. (Ironically in the past the iceage survivors were those who had more bodyfat than technology).
However, if mankinds’ efforts do in fact drive us into a deeper climatic catastrophe than previous ‘normal’ iceages, it will probably be the masters of technology who survive the best.
It seems to me that the Bush’s of this world, who have nuclear power at their fingertips, are best placed to repopulate the planet after the likes of you and me kick the bucket through freezing to death.
I loathe nuclear power, but I gotta admit it would be kind nice to have one in the backyard when the next iceage hits. (Notice I said ‘when’ it hits. Because it certainly will. The only question is whether or not it will be preceeded by a period of hot, dry, life-damaging climatic warming)
March 3rd, 2008 at 8:32 pm
Mouldwarp
“if the AGW theory is essentially correct there will be costs for adaptation; but in 100 years time people will be vastly richer than us and more technologically advanced in ways we perhaps can’t imagine, so they will be well prepared to deal with it.
That’s so absurd as to be humorous.
http://www.paulchefurka.ca/WEAP2/WEAP2.html
respectfully
BJ
March 3rd, 2008 at 8:38 pm
I personally prefer Cheap Access To Space to solve the problems Greengeek… it provides MUCH cleaner answers… and as a side effect, gets our eggs out of the one basket. Nor is there enough nuclear fuel to supply our current consumption anywhere NEAR as long as we’d need to compensate for an Ice-Age.
respectfully
BJ
March 3rd, 2008 at 8:58 pm
‘Current consumption’: True. But lets assume that the world is already overpopulated. (I note that this week it is being reported that over 50% of humans live in cities now, for the first time in history)
If an iceage were to hit (preceeded by a long, hot, dry) we wouldn’t need the same energy consumption as now, because there would probably only be 2% of the population to support.
Keep an eye on the rich and powerful over the next 20 years and I’ll bet their efforts (and energy policies) have more to do with feathering their own nests, and ensuring their own biological survival, than worrying about overall survival of the human species.
March 3rd, 2008 at 9:15 pm
Mouldwarp, if AGW is correct and we take no action, we will most likely be a lot worse off than if we had taken action- the only time it’s not worth taking action is if we’ve already pushed the process so far that we’ve started an extinction-level disaster, which is what I find [i]really[/i] dramatic and uncalled for.
Saying that we’ll be richer despite all the disasters that would most likely ensure if the warnings we’re getting are correct is complete fantasy. Global floods/sea level rises, dieoffs of certain species, extreme storm systems, perhaps even the start of a new ice age… we’d be doing incredibly well if the worst comes to pass if we even manage to maintain the state of living we have right now.
That’s if the worst of the current predictions come to pass and we don’t take much more action than we are now, of course. It could be that we’re wrong. Or that Australia entering Kyoto will help make a difference and galvanise us and make things safe regardless of whether we’re wrong or not. There’s certainly still options open to us, even assuming the worst of the current science. Nobody wants to be right about this kind of thing, but if you’d insure your house… why not ensure your climate?
March 3rd, 2008 at 9:32 pm
Ari,
- ” Global floods/sea level rises, dieoffs of certain species, extreme storm systems, perhaps even the start of a new ice age…”
If we’ve learned anything from the movies it’s that such things certainly can occur when there’s a black president, and Obama is looking very strong…
The new ice age is probably the most likely (and certainly the most disastrous) of your scenarios, but that’s got nothing to do with rising CO2 levels. And note that not even Kyoto’s supporters believe it will make any measurable difference to the temperature in 50 years.
Perhaps you doom-mongers on this thread could agree either to panic about CO2 from fossil fuels, or to panic about the imminent depletion of said fossil fuels, BUT NOT BOTH. Thank you.
March 3rd, 2008 at 9:38 pm
But that’s the whole point… the result of both of those scenarios is that we need to transfer our energy demands to different sources. Toute suite.
March 3rd, 2008 at 10:17 pm
greengeek, it’s not the “whole” point, is it.
March 3rd, 2008 at 11:00 pm
If we’ve learned anything from the movies it’s that such things certainly can occur when there’s a black president, and Obama is looking very strong…
Oh yes !
Thanks
BJ
March 3rd, 2008 at 11:21 pm
Mouldwarp
I don’t that the result is wholly inevitable, though if we’ve pushed past a tipping point it may well be. It is quite clear that if we have not done that bit of nastiness to ourselves that we WILL have to change… either through voluntary reductions to avoid trouble with warming or peak-oil or through involuntary reductions as a result of them. We’ve been vociferous in demanding that the society change voluntarily., which tends to make it easier to control the process and the resulting problems.
Since people who have a lot MORE power than any of us, are unwilling to do the voluntary reductions, the reductions will be forced on us with far more coercion and pain than any the species has ever before endured.
Which will achieve change, whether we wish or not, we’ve said all along, change is necessary. It is.
We don’t actually care whether it is peak oil forcing changes in 5 years or a state initiative that forces changes now and defers the pain for a few more years, or sea level rise and drought that forces the changes in 25 years. The point is that something will be done. If we wait for the invisible hand to burn itself the reflexive withdrawal could be disastrous for a lot more people.
March 4th, 2008 at 2:19 am
When I read Moulwarps argument that future generations wont have to worry about climate change because they’ll be wealtheir than us I couldn’t help thinking that Ferrari drivers don’t have to worry about speeding because they are wealthy enough to pay for the best doctors.
March 4th, 2008 at 4:57 am
Mouldwarp, to the extent that the point is a fulcrum then, yes, that is the “whole� point or, at least, the pivotal point.
March 4th, 2008 at 10:55 am
The continued Green faith in the infallibility of the IPCC scenarios is revealing. The science around climate, and in particular, around the physics assumed in the General Circulation Models, is far from complete. The GCM’s used as a basis for IPCC scenarios have a number of inconsistencies and lacunae:
- no modelling of water vapour, precipitation, and the associated feedbacks (Courtney, 2006)
- no modelling of cloud formation, changes in albedo thereby (Shaviv, 2006)
- no modelling of the ocean’s deep water circulation patterns (Gray, 2006)
- reliance on land temperature measurements now discovered to be suspect (Watts, Pielke Sr, surfacestations.org)
- no cognisance of solar magnetic and galactic cosmic ray effects (Svensmark, 2006)
And climate science, far from being settled, has gaps: it is best compared to geology pre-Wegener or physics pre-Copenhagen interpretation.
- core physics involved in cloud formation (hence, water vapour, albedo) are uncertain: bacteria? aerosols? ionisation via GCR’s?
- solar and galactic involvment: the sun is a variable star, in all senses, and our galaxy moves through areas of greater and lesser deep-galactic ray intensity
- the part played by precipitation in altering climate sensitivity: Spencer likens this to a global air conditioner, with strong negative feedbacks
- the role of the oceans as heat sinks, and the effect of deep ocean water circulation patterns, is the ‘elephant in the room’ - the effects are large but unquantified
In short, we are very far from a Grand Unified Theory of Climate.
This argues for a certain humility, rather than the observed reliance on the Doctrine of Infallibility, and the continued recital of the IPCC catechism.
March 4th, 2008 at 1:04 pm
Oh dear WayMad… humility?
First: The IPCC is the most conservative research we have in terms of what is going to happen. If someone had disproved the CO2 having an effect it would certainly have quit being important pretty damned quick.
Egg on Face syndrome is common enough in science. We survive it.
Without going into detailed answers to everything in your list and there are answers (some better than others) to each of these in the science:
* We know as much as we know and not a single bit more.
* We have to decide what to do based on what we know (not deciding is deciding)
* Our ability to determine what will happen is imperfect.
* We have a very good idea of what CO2 in the atmosphere does.
* All the doubtful thoughts you have ARE examined. Not necessarily through the IPCC. We don’t have any evidence that any of them are significant to the outcome… yet.
The KEY facts here are:
The atmospheric CO2 is increasing some 50 times faster than it has ever increased in any paleoclimate we know of and we know that this has an effect on the ability of the planet to dump heat. Those things are known.
The planet is getting warmer.
Everything we can and have measured has indicated that the theory matches the reality. That’s what the IPCC is about.
To conclude that because we can’t legally prove the CO2 is a/the problem we can ignore it is a massive error in logic. It is theoretically a problem and the measurements of heat transfer we see all match the theoretical predictions relatively well. It has not been disproven. Moreover, the assumption that somehow some external driver such as cosmic radiation has somehow caused this at exactly the same time as the “irrelevant” CO2 is being released and is the actual driver… that tends to stretch my credulity.
To go further to say in essence
‘We should continue this massive experiment with the climate of the only planet that is able to support human life because it is better to make everyone as rich as possible now than to worry about the future”.
THAT is criminally irresponsible, palpably immoral and suicidally stupid.
Greens are telling everyone that the experiment is a BAD idea.
Science is telling everyone that the experiment is a BAD idea.
That means that we Greens are not the humans trying to play “god”, we are trying to conciliate Momma Nature before she and Poppa Physics whack us upside the head with a 4×2 for our misbehaviour.
Where is the humility in asserting that this is what we should do in the FACE of contrary data? SOMEBODY has an overblown idea of their own importance and their rights with respect to everyone else on the planet… but to lumber the Greens with this is risible.
I can imagine a half dozen scenarios where the changes we’ve been making in the climate could trigger anything from the next ice-age to a 95% extinction to a world so warm that only parts of Greenland and Antarctica and Invercargill are even habitable for humans. They’re ALL possible and they all come from this stupid experiment, and the IPCC doesn’t cover any of them, it just says what is almost certain to be a BEST case scenario of a destabilized climate.
I don’t think Hansen or Lovelock see the IPCC as infallible, nor I think, will you find many Greens who think it is the full story, but it IS the best tested science we have and the things it omits are, by and large, things that would make the picture look WORSE.
If there is any lack of humility here it is shown by the “antigreens” who reckon themselves infallible and the IPCC scientists ignorant of any of the truth.
respectfully
BJ
PS: If you want me to go through the explanations on these “not-includeds” say so. It may take a while though.
March 4th, 2008 at 2:02 pm
Mouldwarp said: if the AGW theory is essentially correct there will be costs for adaptation; but in 100 years time people will be vastly richer than us and more technologically advanced in ways we perhaps can’t imagine, so they will be well prepared to deal with it
The pebbles quickly turn into small cakes and Alice swallows one, suddenly causing her to shrink again to her earlier size. Back down to size Alice makes her way out of the house to find a small crowd of assorted animals, who in turn make a rush toward Alice when they see her. Quickly retreating into the nearby thick wood she finds herself confronted by an enormous puppy (note that Alice is merely a few inches tall at this time) and plays fetch with the puppy, tiring him into sleep. She rests for a moment herself, looking around and spotting a mushroom growing near her, she examines all angles of the mushroom and decides to have a peek at what might be on top of it. As she stands tiptoe and looks, her eyes meet with the ones of a blue Caterpillar, who is sitting arms folded quietly smoking a hookah.
March 4th, 2008 at 11:31 pm
bjchip said:
“If the power generation is wind and water and solar based I am happy with that, but I will not support building/buying new fossil fuel plants right now.”
I trust that you are also happy to see new geothermal power generation as well. I’d add a little bit of biomass to the mix as well, since that can provide extra generation to cover dry years or plant outages.
Trevor.