There's nothing more I can add to this. 'Nuff said.
(H/T GraniteGrok)
The turbines sit idly in Anoka, North St. Paul, Chaska, Shakopee, Buffalo and six other cities, all members of the Minnesota Municipal Power Agency (MMPA). The refurbished, 115-foot towers had operated on a California wind farm, where they didn't have to worry about cold hydraulic fluid turning to gel and oil lubricants getting too sluggish.Fluids and lubricants that worked well in California didn't work at all in below freezing temperatures, gumming up the works and bringing the turbines to a halt until spring. That turned them into expensive monuments to facts overlooked.
We don't dispute the fact that there has been some cyclical warming in recent decades -- most notably from 1979 to 1998 -- but cooling took place from the 1940s to the late 1970s, again after 1998, and especially after 2001, all while CO2 rose. This fact alone questions the primary role in climate change attributed to CO2 by the IPCC, environmental groups, and others.Many of the warmists say it doesn't matter if the data was cooked because they 'know' we're all doomed unless we impoverish the world and return to agrarian level energy usage. They believe no more debate or study is needed, only action.
However, the global surface station data is seriously compromised.
There was a major station dropout -- and an increase in missing data from remaining stations -- which occurred suddenly around 1990. Just about the time the global warming issue was being elevated to importance in political and environmental circles.
A clear bias was found towards removing higher elevation, higher latitude, and rural stations -- the cooler stations -- during this culling process, though that data was not also removed from the base periods from which "averages," and then anomalies, were computed.
The data also suffers contamination by urbanization and other local factors, such as land-use/land-cover changes and improper siting.
There are also uncertainties in ocean temperatures. This is no small issue, as oceans cover 71% of Earth's surface.
These factors all lead to significant uncertainty and a tendency for overestimation of century-scale temperature trends. A conclusion from all findings suggests that global databases are seriously flawed and can no longer be trusted to assess climate trends, or rankings, or to validate model forecasts. Consequently, such surface data should be ignored for political decision-making.
Using data downloaded from NASA GISS and picking rural sites near, but not too near, to urban sites, a comparison has been made of the temperature trend over time of the rural sites compared to those of the urban sites. 28 pairs of sites across the U.S. were compared. The paired rural site is from 31 to 91 km from the urban site in each pair. The result is that urban and rural sites were similar in 1900, with the urban sites slightly higher. The urban sites have shown an increase in temperatures since then. The rural sites show no such temperature increase and appear to be generally unchanging with only ups and downs localized in time. Over a 111 year time span, the urban sites temperatures have risen to be about 1.5C warmer than the rural sites. So, the much touted rising temperatures in the U.S. are due to the urban heat island effect and not due to a global warming such as has been proposed to be caused by human emissions of CO2 due to the combustion of fossil fuels.It's not just rural US stations seeing this non-trend. Canadian ground station in Ontario are seeing the same thing. If global warming were happening to the extent the warmists claim, wouldn't rural weather stations data show it as well? Or might we make the assumption that global warming is only an urban phenomenon? By positing such a hypothesis, might we also state the cure would be to do away with all urban areas (cities) and move everyone back into the countryside? (Yes, it is a ridiculous hypothesis and equally ridiculous 'cure', but both have as much validity as the present AGW theory and proposed cure.)
Late yesterday afternoon, the phone on my desk at work rang. Answering it I found my son on the line, seething in barely suppressed anger.
Apparently one of his teachers had assigned a paper dealing with global warming and its effects on coral reefs. In and of itself, that was not why he was angry. What pissed him off was the paper had to be written using only the information in a packet given to each student in his class.
It was as if Al Gore had handed him a copy of An Inconvenient Truth along with background materials and other propaganda pamphlets. The 'data' was that biased.
He wasn't sure about what to do. I pointed him to a number of information sources including NOAA, MIT, and NASA, and let him do the digging. In the end he decided he would do the assignment, but add a counterpoint to the original assignment.
Like me, he is a skeptic about AGW, but his skepticism comes from a source that is not me. While I am naturally a skeptic about anything grandiose that demands that we "do something NOW before we all DIE!!!", he comes into his AGW skepticism by way of his employer, Farmer Andy.
I haven't come across another profession that is more in tune to weather and its cycles and patterns than farmers and, of course, meteorologists. Weather can make or break a farmer, so they tend to be far more aware of it than the rest of us. Farmer Andy has weather records going back decades and those records make him skeptical about the dire claims about global warming.
Seeing BeezleBub's dismay at having to write about something he knew was bogus only confirmed my belief that our local school system is more interested in indoctrination - teaching kids what to think - rather than education - teaching them critical thinking. Fortunately BeezleBub has had plenty of examples and help from family to learn how to think critically, to take apart statements, claims, and "settled science" and look at it dispassionately and discover the truth or falsehoods behind them. That could be why some of his teachers see him as troublesome because he questions them and others see him as bright.
I told him this time, as I have many times in the past, that I would have his back should any of his less open-minded teachers decide he was "too disruptive" or "contrary" or "too much of a smart ass". Better that he speak out and contradict things he knows to be in error (or just outright wrong) than go along to get along and become nothing but another drone.
The appearance of [the websites that first made the ClimateGate data public] was probably the fruit of either a diligent hacker or the guilt easing effort of an honest, science dedicated, whistle blower who became disgusted with the dishonest actions of their employer at the East Anglia University's Climate Research Unit (CRU), in Britain, who supplies global temperature data to the UN. The material contained on the sites verified what many climatologists and meteorologists have been claiming for many years, i.e., there is no legitimate scientific data which indicates any unusual long term increase in the global temperature ('Global Warming'). Further, although carbon dioxide (CO2) 'greenhouse gas' in the atmosphere could have a small effect on global temperatures, it is kept in check by the massive amounts of CO2 loving vegetation on land and in the oceans (like kelp), which convert the CO2 into our life sustaining oxygen and food.To base policies, taxes, regulations, and laws on patently bogus data used to 'prove' a theory not much more than scientific quackery is madness...assuming the theory wasn't designed for just that purpose.
The e-mails revealed there has been an organized "cabal" of politicians and others calling themselves "Climate Scientists" who for years have been supplying falsified global temperature data to the UN to promote their efforts at worldwide wealth redistribution through CO2 emission rationing and taxing schemes, such as the US's upcoming 'Cap and Trade' (industrial CO2 generation allotments), with a tax on all CO2 releases. Following the first announcement that their scheme had been uncovered by the e-mails, the major players were on the Internet commanding file deletions, hard drive erasures, and demanding prosecution of those responsible for the releases. This whole episode was dubbed by some journalist as "Climategate". It has been an example of the radical environmentalists demanding the 'foot' must be made to fit the 'shoe'.
If this were only happening in North America, it might be an indicator. But it's happening in Europe and Asia, too.The few meteorologists I know do not believe global warming has anything to do with human activity. In fact a couple of them seem to think we're in for a prolonged period of cooling.
Fresh from the fiasco in Copenhagen and with a failure in the U.S. Senate looming this coming year, the climate-change lobby is already shifting to Plan B, or is it already Plan D? Meet the carbon tort.Never mind that there's not one bit of verifiable proof carbon emissions have any relation to any of these things. They'll still take up the battle cry of "I'll Sue Ya!" But then, that's the way the folks like this have always worked, forcing their minority view on the rest of us by bypassing the legislative route and going right to the courts. And they'll justify it by telling us they're doing it "for our own good." What's worse is that they actually believe it!!
Across the country, trial lawyers and green pressure groups--if that's not redundant--are teaming up to sue electric utilities for carbon emissions under "nuisance" laws.
A group of 12 Gulf Coast residents whose homes were damaged by Katrina are suing 33 energy companies for greenhouse gas emissions that allegedly contributed to the global warming that allegedly made the hurricane worse. Connecticut Attorney General Richard Blumenthal and seven state AG allies plus New York City are suing American Electric Power and other utilities for a host of supposed eco-maladies. A native village in Alaska is suing Exxon and 23 oil and energy companies for coastal erosion.
As a physicist with more than 20 years experience of modeling hydrodynamic systems, I can tell you that there are many, many things wrong with the computer-climate models.I believe Paul has hit the highlights in regards to the theory of AGW and where it fails.
Where to begin? Even the AGW people don't contend that CO2 is the dominant climate forcing agent. It is well known that water vapor is much, much stronger. However, in their models, the IPCC has hard-wired into their codes that water vapor responds with a positive feedback to small temperature changes due to CO2. But this is wrong. Actual measurements show that water vapor acts with negative feedback to small temperature changes and does not amplify CO2's effects.
It is insane to say, as Buzz claims, that the pre-human record is irrelevant. By studying the pre-human or early civilization record provides a mechanism for identifying natural behaviors. This is essential for distinguishing natural from alleged non-natural behaviors.
The widespread agreement on how our temperature compares with the last few millennia is that there have been periods of much warmer and much cooler temperatures - Unless one fudges the data as the CRU has unquestionably done. (See the CRU computer codes instead of the emails for incontrovertible documentation of this.)
And Buzz, you are completely wrong about "hide the decline". It has *everything* to do about historical temperature fluctuations. The tree-ring data was used as a temperature proxy (for determining the historical temperature before thermometer data was available.) The problem with the proxy data was that it diverged from thermometer data when thermometer data was available. That means that the proxy data was *not* reliable. The act of "hiding the decline" was an unethical ruse to cover-up the obvious failure of the tree-ring data as a reliable temperature proxy.
A few years ago, I accepted global warming theory with few doubts. I wrote several columns for this paper condemning what I thought were unfair attacks by skeptics and defending the climate scientists.When the self-blinded finally come to see the light, the transformation is amazing to behold. Even if this fellow at some point decides we are at fault for (the presently reversing) global warming, at least it's likely he will come to this conclusion based upon real science and not the political pandering that has been masquerading as science.
Boy, was I naive.
Since the Climategate emails and documents revealed active collusion to thwart skeptics and even outright fraud, I've been trying to correct the record of my earlier foolishness. In one of those columns, I even wrote: "And see Real Climate (www.realclimate.org) for global warming science without the political spin."
In fact, Real Climate was and is nothing more than the house organ of global warming activists, concerned more with politics than with science.
The IEA believes that Russian meteorological-station data did not substantiate the anthropogenic global-warming theory. Analysts say Russian meteorological stations cover most of the country's territory, and that the Hadley Center had used data submitted by only 25% of such stations in its reports. Over 40% of Russian territory was not included in global-temperature calculations for some other reasons, rather than the lack of meteorological stations and observations.Where were most of those stations located? In non-urban areas, particularly in northern regions of the nation (that means Siberia). If the data from those areas was excluded, then it would have given a false result, showing warming when none really existed. The IEA believes that of all the data were used then the so-called warming trend would disappear.
Climate Change Is Natural: 100 Reasons WhyI particularly like #'s 8, 10, 12, and 16.
1) There is "no real scientific proof" that the current warming is caused by the rise of greenhouse gases from man's activity.
2) Man-made carbon dioxide emissions throughout human history constitute less than 0.00022 percent of the total naturally emitted from the mantle of the earth during geological history.
3) Warmer periods of the Earth's history came around 800 years before rises in CO2 levels.
--snip--
10) A large body of scientific research suggests that the sun is responsible for the greater share of climate change during the past hundred years.
Despite appearing on CNN and MSNBC Wednesday, Nobel Laureate Al Gore was apparently too busy to discuss global warming on the premiere episode of John Stossel's new Fox Business Network program.He's made it clear on more than one occasion that the "debate is over and the science is settled", meaning there's no need to debate anything because it would be pointless. But anyone knowing anything about science, and specifically the scientific method, know one thing that all real scientists know - science is never settled. New knowledge can upset the science apple cart, turning everything that we believed to be true upside down. Goodness knows it's happened more than once during the whole of human history.
To kick off his new show Thursday, Stossel chose the controversial subject of climate change, and invited on a number of guests to address the issue in great detail.
According to an e-mail message sent to Stossel's producers on November 23, "the growing influence of the climate crisis message and the demand on Mr. Gore's time" made it impossible for the former Vice President to attend.
The general support for warming is based not so much on the quality of the data, but rather on the fact that there was a little ice age from about the 15th to the 19th century. Thus it is not surprising that temperatures should increase as we emerged from this episode. At the same time that we were emerging from the little ice age, the industrial era began, and this was accompanied by increasing emissions of greenhouse gases such as CO2, methane and nitrous oxide. CO2 is the most prominent of these, and it is again generally accepted that it has increased by about 30%.No argument there. But then Lindzen does the unforgivable, at least in the eyes of the AlGoristas: He questions the validity of the claims that GW is real and that we, human beings, are the sole cause.
At this point there is no basis for alarm regardless of whether any relation between the observed warming and the observed increase in minor greenhouse gases can be established. Nevertheless, the most publicized claims of the U.N.'s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) deal exactly with whether any relation can be discerned. The failure of the attempts to link the two over the past 20 years bespeaks the weakness of any case for concern.He goes on to make his case, showing the science is, at best, very weak and that the models are useless because they give too much weight to some factors and not enough (or none) to others. It is this that drove the comments of the faithful to go over the edge and cease being a debate. One comment in particular sticks out, trying to discredit Professor Lindzen despite his impeccable credentials and expertise in the science of climate.
At age 70, Professor Lindzen just isn't current on the research, it's that simple. He's done distinguished work in the past, but his current opinions [are] at best outliers. He's not involved in the current research.So the argument put forward is that he's too old, which means he is incapable of understanding the science (and the math) behind climate research? The commenter, one Arthur Kreitman, believes that just because Professor Lindzen is 'old' that he is out of touch, implying perhaps that he is senile. He also assumes that the professor's knowledge ossified and that he's learned nothing new since 1964! He is assuming based upon facts not in evidence. Kreitman's comments are a perfect example of an ad hominum attack. Don't argue the facts, argue instead the qualifications of the one you disagree with and make the allegation that he is incapable of understanding the science behind the fraud that is AGW.
His view is that the computer models are unreliable. Considering the capabilities of computer modeling at the time he received his Ph.D, which was 1964, that view is understandable. His expertise in the state of computer modeling is just outdated.
I too have a theory and a model. Through careful observation of the night sky, I have determined, within a few percentage points of perfection, the winning numbers for every lottery drawing over the last 20 years. But something always goes wrong, and the numbers drawn are not quite right. I've decided that this is clearly the work of extraterrestrials, who are screwing with the night sky to fudge my numbers and deny me my rightful winnings. I had all the data to prove this, but I threw it away when my computer's hard drive got overloaded. Nevertheless, my theory is a fact, because I say it is. And since no one has ever published data proving me wrong in a peer-reviewed journal, no one can say I'm wrong.The exact same thing happened to me, too!
Well
now, this brings up a whole new dimension of climate change.
Evidently, not only is your SUV killing the environment, your
food is too.
People will need to turn vegetarian if the world is to conquer climate change, according to a leading authority on global warming.
In an interview with The Times, Lord Stern of Brentford said: "Meat is a wasteful use of water and creates a lot of greenhouse gases. It puts enormous pressure on the world's resources."
Direct emissions of methane from cows and pigs is a significant source of greenhouse gases. Methane is 23 times more powerful than carbon dioxide as a global warming gas.
This idea is really nothing new. Sadly, so many actually fall for this. Regardless of not whether or not one believes global warming exists (though in recent times, the "stronghold" of global warming seems to have fallen a bit), one can not simply agree with this idea. This is not because methane may be twenty-five more times potent than carbon dioxide, but rather because this deals with the idea of putting the "global environment" above life (albeit animal life).
However, life isn't the only issue here. Take a second to imagine what would happen if this passes. Suppose there is a "methane cap" put in place. Each cow would most certainly be given an approximate methane value, and of course, the livestock population would be forced to dwindle. This would result in an incredible spike in the prices of beef and dairy, due to mass lowering of supply without proportionate lowering in demand. Combine this with a spike in production costs due to the new technologies one would have to implement to ensure that the methane caps are not exceeded (which, of course, the consumer will pick up the tab for). Just for fun, let's throw in a dollar at a 14 month low. What are they thinking? Our economy is struggling to recover enough as it is. There is a large portion of the American society sees beef and dairy products as necessities as opposed to luxuries. I firmly believe that should this cap take place, it won't effect demand (if anything, shortages - whether natural or manmade - have been known to increase demand), but rather, it will just cause vast rises in the prices.. This spike, coupled with an already recessed economy seems to me just to be turning a bad situation to worse. Again, I am a capitalist. If one feels so strongly about this, then by all means, turn to forums and debates and express your ideas out there. Allow supply and demand to take care of it's own. With only 21% of the US population approving of Congress, isn't it clear that the American population isn't looking to government for more (failed) resolutions and legislation?
Beyond that, however, is the fact that cows are only responsible for so much methane output. There is one (among others) major source of methane: humans. Now, it is true that on average, a cow "methane release" is generally less than that of a human (due to mass differences between the two). It has been estimated that there are 1.3 billion cows in the world. However, the world population (of people) is just shy of 6,800,000,000. How then, are they going to control the human methane producers? Are there going to be caps on the maximum allowable "gas passes" per day (with, of course, hefty fines for offenders)? Are we going to have to pay an "environmental clean-up" fee to get "methane-prone" foods? Are we going to have to go to a station once a year to receive a "methane rating" for tax purposes? Following this idea of "capping the methane producers" to it's logical extent would include restrictions on human population (as a whole, not just individual methane production) as well. This is clearly an unacceptable answer to the global warming question.
In short, I firmly believe in helping the environment where you can. Regardless of whether one believes that global warming exists (and is a problem) or not, one can not argue that newer, more energy efficient technologies are a "good" thing. Personally, I do use energy efficient light bulbs. My appliances are energy efficient as well. However, my car packs a V8 and heated leather interior (cows!), and I'm quite proud of it. Being good stewards of the environment is always a good thing, regardless of whether or not one believes that the environment needs to be saved. By all means, if one wishes to drive a hybrid, do so, and I shall respect you for it. But that is where I believe it should end. I do not believe that anyone (individual or entity) has the right to tell me that I can not use my hard-earned dollars to buy a large SUV if that is what I so desire. Environmentally friendly choices should be a personal decision, not a legislated one. Democracy was founded on personal choices. As history has so often shown us, once a government takes "responsibility" for the people, they are no longer responsible (free to decide) for themselves.
---TNJ
Recent Comments