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Malaria vaccine trial disappoints WASHINGTON - The numbers were so bad that Dr. Stephen Hoffman did not even want to say them out loud.
If you averaged the highs and lows of a rollercoaster, it wouldn’t be much of a thrill ride; same with the threat of flu.
Hmm... National study finds strong link between diabetes and air pollution Findings unchanged after adjustment for obesity and other diabetes risk factors
Phony Cancers and Self-Inflicted Acid Attacks: A National Outbreak of Munchausen's? The stories boggle the mind: in August, a 28-year-old Washington woman claimed to be the victim of a mindless acid attack, and almost won the ultimate prize
in attention-seeking — an appearance on Oprah — before admitting she had actually disfigured herself. Another woman, a 23-year-old Canadian, faked terminal
cancer. She shaved her head, starved herself, tattooed "won't quit" on her fingers and solicited thousands of dollars in donations for a fake charity,
before turning herself over to police this summer.
Study finds big risk of cancer in the family CLOSE relatives of women diagnosed with breast cancer before the age of 35 have a much higher risk of developing other cancers, including brain and lung
cancers, research has found.
Is The EPA About To Shut Down Urban Renewal Across The U.S.? At the beginning of August, Mayor Michael Bloomberg signed an agreement that could revivify thousands of acres of wasteland contaminated by industrial
pollution in New York City. Speaking at the first so-called “brownfield” site to be reclaimed under the plan, and soon to be graced with an affordable
housing complex, Bloomberg declared a victory for everyone.
Hmm... Research Examines Vicious Cycle of Overeating and Obesity Newswise — New research provides evidence of the vicious cycle created when an obese individual overeats to compensate for reduced pleasure from food.
We Deserve a Break Today (from the Food Fascists)
It’s enough to make Ronald McDonald join the Tea Party. San Francisco’s Board of Supervisors is seriously mulling a ban on the Happy Meal and other toy giveaways associated with foods containing more sugar, sodium, and fat than the proponents of the ban regard as appropriate. The proposed “Healthy Food Incentives Ordinance” also conditions a free trinket on half-cup servings of both a fruit and vegetable. Obnoxious as this is—although not by California standards, perhaps—the proposal is the latest attempt by government officials at every level to do something about the “obesity epidemic.” Unable (just yet) to dictate what we eat at every meal, they are instead limiting consumers’ choices by cracking down on restaurants and food manufacturers. Continue reading... (The Foundry)
?!! Bottle-feeding babies can lead to adult obesity, says study Research shows using formula can cause health problems in later life, as children can develop unnaturally large appetites
Green Firms Face Prolonged Funding Drought: Bank Green firms seeking bank financing will have a tough time for at least five years as banks shy away from taking on risk due to the economic downturn and new
regulation, a senior banking executive said Wednesday.
Green Money: The Perpetual Motion Machine Part III of the Washington Examiner/PJM special report on the environmental movement looks at how Big Green funds itself through a never-ending parade of lawsuits aimed at the productive sector of the economy. (Charlie Martin, PJM)
Like orphanages and Irish families, always room for one more -- crisis of the moment: World's Rivers In Crisis, Study Says The world's rivers are in crisis including in North America and Europe where governments have invested trillions of dollars to clean up freshwater supplies,
a study showed Wednesday.
Leave the extinctions to Mother Nature, not the Red List We should abandon our crazy obsession with counting species, says Christopher Lloyd. (Christopher Lloyd, TDT)
President Klaus Highlights UN’s Limits
The United Nations General Debate (the traditional opening of the annual General Assembly session featuring speeches by heads of state) is very predictable. World leaders use their speeches to laud themselves, their countries, and praise the United Nations with assurances that the world body is indispensable amid calls for it to assume even more projects, initiatives and responsibilities. The predictability of the speeches by most world leaders serves to highlight the speeches that are bizarre and, sometimes, appalling. However, even these bizarre speeches have become troublesomely regular and sadly tolerated. However, we saw a truly unusual speech before the United Nations on Saturday. Czech President Vaclav Klaus interrupted the rote calls for increased global governance – centered, of course on an expanded role for the United Nations – and instead called for the United Nations to be pared back and refocused on its founding principles and divested of the extravagant smorgasbord of its current agenda and budget: Continue reading... (The Foundry)
by Daren Bakst Since cap and trade legislation looks like it is dead, many in Congress are still adamant about imposing an energy tax on Americans. Senator Bingaman (D-NM), along with a bipartisan group of Senators, is pushing a renewable energy standard (RES). This particular RES mandates that utility companies generate 11 percent of their electricity from high-cost and unreliable renewable sources such as solar and wind power. Consumers, of course, pay for these higher energy costs on their electricity bills. Since the massive subsidies for solar and wind power haven’t been enough to generate demand for renewable energy, Congress wants to mandate that Americans buy renewable electricity, not unlike individual health care mandates. It is a bit troubling that Republicans, who for the most part, have been opposed to cap and… Read the full story (Cooler Heads)
Don't let this tax die, be proactive! Kill the damned thing! Renewable Electricity Standard Bill Stands Alone or Dies, Senate Sponsors Vow A Senate bill to implement a national renewable electricity standard should be brought to the floor this session as a stand-alone measure or not at all, a
leading co-sponsor of the legislation said today.
Sen. Graham's Plan for Clean-Energy Bill Could Drain RES Support Backers of bipartisan Senate legislation establishing a renewable electricity standard hit a stumbling block today as Sen. Lindsey Graham made plans to
introduce an alternative energy measure that could draw Republican supporters.
Hopes dim for energy bill in Senate Senate Democratic leaders are backing away from plans to tackle any type of energy legislation during the upcoming lame duck session, including a renewable
electricity standard and a response to the BP oil spill.
Senators agree with Obama call to break up climate bill Key Senate Democrats and Republicans indicated Wednesday that they agree with President Barack Obama's call to tackle energy and climate legislation "in
chunks" come 2011.
China says climate talks to focus on differences China's top climate change official said Wednesday that countries have little expectation of reaching a binding climate treaty this year but instead will focus on narrowing their differences ahead of the year-end summit in Cancun. (AP)
China Says Emissions Goal Already Tough, No Cap For Now China's goals to slow greenhouse gas growth will be tough and costly, the nation's top climate change official said on Wednesday, presenting an absolute cap
and major carbon market in the world's top emitter as distant plans.
Abbott attacks PM over changing carbon tax policy JULIA Gillard has again declined to commit to a timetable for introducing a carbon price.
We Are Not Thinking The Wrong Thoughts; We Just Don't Know How To Think The Right Thoughts Written by Dennis Ambler In a just published paper for SPPI, We Are Thinking The Wrong Thoughts, I highlighted the intensive efforts by government funded research groups, to categorise and explain away the non-acceptance by ever-increasing numbers of the general public, of the IPCC and UN creed on global warming. It is obviously very galling to some of the Lead Authors at IPCC that not everyone, including very many scientists more qualified than they, accepts their modelling claims. Read more... (SPPI)
White House science advisor Holdren’s climate slide show at Kavli While Obama seems to be a non-starter on climate, John Holdren is out stumping for climate change issues. For those who wonder what we are up against, watching this slideshow is enlightening. Comments on specific slides welcome. – Anthony Via Eurekalert -Public Release: 28-Sep-2010 TRANSCRIPT AND SLIDES (CLICK IMAGE BELOW FOR POWERPOINT PRESENTATION) Ministers, Ambassador White, Mr. Kavli, distinguished colleagues, ladies and gentlemen. My topic today, as is obvious from the screen, is climate change science and policy: what do we know, what should we do. And the secret bottom line is what is the Obama administration doing. [SLIDE 1] I will get to that, but I want to make a few general observations first to put these remarks in context. I’ve given the broad focus of this symposium on international cooperation in science. President Obama was clear from the very outset — clear in his campaign, clear in his inaugural speech, clear on many, many occasions since – that he places a very high priority on science and technology, on the federal government’s stewardship of an investment in science and technology, of international cooperation in science and technology, and the reason he places such a high priority on these activities — and indeed on science, technology, engineering and mathematics education – is that he recognizes with crystal clarity the relevance of science and technology to the full array of great challenges that we face in the United States and indeed that most societies around the world face in common. Of the challenges of maintaining viable and growing economies; the challenge of delivering better health care outcomes to all citizens at affordable cost; the challenge of addressing the great problems at the intersection of energy and environment; above all, the challenge of climate change; the problems of maintaining peace and security in the world. Continue reading (WUWT)
Royal Society Bows To Climate Change Sceptics Britain’s leading scientific institution has been forced to rewrite its guide to climate change and admit that there is greater uncertainty about future temperature increases than it had previously suggested. The Royal Society is publishing a new document today after a rebellion by more than 40 of its fellows who questioned mankind’s contribution to rising temperatures. Climate change: a summary of the science states that “some uncertainties are unlikely ever to be significantly reduced”. Unlike Climate change controversies, a simple guide — the document it replaces — it avoids making predictions about the impact of climate change and refrains from advising governments about how they should respond. The new guide says: “The size of future temperature increases and other aspects of climate change, especially at the regional scale, are still subject to uncertainty.” The Royal Society even appears to criticise scientists who have made predictions about heatwaves and rising sea levels. It now says: “There is little confidence in specific projections of future regional climate change, except at continental scales.” It adds: “It is not possible to determine exactly how much the Earth will warm or exactly how the climate will change in the future. “There remains the possibility that hitherto unknown aspects of the climate and climate change could emerge and lead to significant modifications in our understanding.” The working group that produced the new guide took advice from two Royal Society fellows who have links to the climate-sceptic think-tank founded by Lord Lawson of Blaby. Professor Anthony Kelly and Sir Alan Rudge are members of the academic advisory council of the Global Warming Policy Foundation. They were among 43 fellows who signed a petition sent to Lord Rees, the society’s president, asking for its statement on climate change to be rewritten to take more account of questions raised by sceptics. Professor John Pethica, the society’s vice-president and chairman of the working group that wrote the document, said the guide stated clearly that there was “strong evidence” that the warming of the Earth over the past half-century had been caused largely by human activity. Meanwhile, the Government is planning an exercise to test how England and Wales would cope with severe flooding caused by climate change. Exercise Watermark will take place in March and test emergency services and communities on a range of scenarios that could occur. The Times, 30 September 2010 (Via GWPF)
You just knew Nude Socialist would have to screw it up: Emission control: Turning carbon trash into treasure Carbon dioxide may be bad for the climate, but it's good for the roses. Perhaps it's time we rehabilitated this gaseous villain
Eye-roller: Coral reefs 'could disappear by 2100' Copenhagen targets too weak to combat climate change, new report by Institute of Physics (IOP) suggests
The Great Climate Crunch Of 2010 Haven’t posted much of late. For two reason: one, a super-secrete Earth-shattering project (or rather, a smaller version of it), and two, because with the whole catastrophic climate change narrative imploding around me, I do not really find much in pleasure in flogging a comatose horse… We have the BBC’s Richard Black severely reprimanded by the illiberals at Climate Progress. The UK Government might get rid of its Climate Department and doesn’t want to keep foraging the solar power industry no more. The New Statesman, no less, forces itself into recognising the importance of Stephen McIntyre. There’s Scientific American stating that “the leaked “Climategate” e-mails painted researchers as censorious”, whilst Lord Turnbull is allowed to write in the pages of the Financial Times that “a climate overhaul is needed to win back public trust” Of course Obama wants no solar panels for the White House, and Revkin gives up on the climate fight. Keith Kloor finds out some people want to censor what they don’t perfectly like. If another bunch of hidden, dodgy emails shows up now, the “catastrophic climate” discourse will go the way of the Dodo. UPDATE: Climategate keeps popping up with what a few weeks ago were unlikely comments. For example at the UN University: (Maurizio Morabito, OmniClimate)
Ameren, feds sign agreement on FutureGen WASHINGTON – Ameren has officially signed an agreement with the federal Department of Energy that could lead to the reuse of an old western Illinois power
plant in the revamped FutureGen project, the St. Louis-based energy company announced Tuesday.
Give us lots of money to trade in useless crap: UK firms demand at least $7 billion for green bank The UK government must ensure its Green Investment Bank has at least 4 billion to 6 billion pounds ($7 billion-$9 billion) over the next four years for
low-carbon investment, a group of businesses said on Wednesday.
U.S. Government To Unveil New Drilling Rules By Thursday The Obama administration was set to release its latest set of requirements for offshore oil drillers by Thursday as the government moves toward lifting its
contested ban on deepwater drilling in the Gulf of Mexico.
Energy efficiency increases energy consumption
Why Energy Efficiency Does not Decrease Energy Consumption (Breakthrough Institute)I would classify the Breakthrough Institute as a relatively sensible and technologically loaded organization that nevertheless promotes left-wing values and utopias. The essential effect is that if some gadgets that consume energy become more efficient, the people also have to pay less for the energy, and they can afford more of it. Alternatively, they may also afford other activities that consume energy. Clearly, if the "average" or "aggregate" efficiency increases N times, the total amount of consumed energy will be greater than 1/N of the current energy consumption - because of the stimulated extra consumption. » Don't Stop Reading » (TRF)
Wind will power fossil fuel-free Denmark in 2050, report predicts Danish climate commission report predicts the country could switch to renewables by the middle of the century* (BusinessGreen, part of the Guardian Environment Network)
Is Windpower the Ethanol of Electricity? (Part II: Environmental Issues) by Ben Lieberman Part I examined the true costs of ethanol and windpower to find that both were highly uneconomic compared to their alternatives. Both government-dependent fuels are also inferior products, making a straight comparative cost comparison misleading. The environmental characteristics of both ethanol and windpower are also problematic compared to their more energy-dense, consumer-preferred alternatives. Is Ethanol Green? Given the high cost of the ethanol mandate, the putative benefits – energy independence, green jobs creation, environmental improvement – come at a steep price. But costs aside, there are other reasons to doubt whether these benefits are real. The gulf between hype and reality is perhaps greatest when it comes to environmental performance. The negative environmental externalities associated with petroleum-derived fuels – particularly oil spills, air pollution, and greenhouse gas emissions – have long been a major focus of the environmental movement and federal regulators. Thus, many simply assumed that ethanol, by supplanting some of the gasoline supply, would be an improvement. Unfortunately, the mandate is teaching us, the hard way, that ethanol has plenty of its own environmental negatives. Environmental organizations have raised concerns about the increased inputs of energy, pesticides, and fertilizer to grow the additional corn now needed to meet fuel as well as food demand. The same is true for the stress on water supplies, especially now that corn production has been expanded into locales where rainfall is insufficient and irrigation is needed. Land previously in its natural state has been converted to cropland. The facilities that distill the corn into ethanol also require significant energy and water inputs and produce industrial emissions. The use of ethanol in motor fuel has had a mixed impact on air quality. It lowers some types of pollutants, such as carbon monoxide, but increases others, such as the evaporative emissions that contribute to smog. In fact, certain high-volatility components of gasoline must be removed before adding ethanol in order to prevent the overall blend from violating Clean Air Act requirements in high smog areas. [Read more →] (MasterResource)
Windfall: Documenting the Backlash Against Wind Energy
On January 25, I got an email from Charlie Porter, a Missouri-based horse trainer. The issue: noise from wind turbines. His emails said that in 2007, a phalanx of wind turbines had been around his family’s farm near King City and that “The overwhelming noise, sleep deprivation, constant headaches, anxiety, etc., etc., etc., forced us to abandon our home/horse farm of 15 years. [Read More] (Robert Bryce, ET)
Frivolous Lawsuit Aimed at Silencing Critics of Eminent Domain Abuse Posted by In Kelo v. City of New London, the Supreme Court ruled that a locality could use its eminent domain authority to seize private property to sell to private developers. Cato’s amicus brief opposing this abuse of the Takings Clause is available here, and an article on Kelo and other property law rulings of the 2004-2005 term by law professor James W. Ely, Jr. is available here. One positive outcome of Kelo was the legislative restriction of eminent domain usage in state houses across the country. On the other hand, developers and localities have attempted to muzzle their critics with frivolous lawsuits. The Institute for Justice is currently litigating one of these actions in Texas:
A Dallas trial court ruled last year that the lawsuit was not barred by the First Amendment, even though Royall could not point to any statement in Main’s book that came close to the legal standard for defamation. The Institute for Justice is appealing the trial court’s decision. As Bill McGurn writes in today’s Wall Street Journal, this suit is one of the “high costs of Mr. Kennedy’s concurrence” in Kelo. Here’s hoping that rights protected by both the First and Fifth Amendments can prevail. Susette Kelo, the owner of the Little Pink House at the center of the Kelo case, spoke at the Cato Institute about her ordeal, and her story is the subject of this Cato Institute video. (Cato at liberty)
Hmm... WHO chief defends her agency's pandemic response GENEVA - The World Health Organization did not hype the risks of H1N1 flu, and made the best decisions possible with the information available about the new
virus, WHO Director-General Margaret Chan said on Tuesday.
Parents' drinking may be risk factor for SIDS NEW YORK - Parents and caretakers who drink alcohol may put infants at a higher risk for sudden infant death syndrome (SIDS), new research suggests.
The glycemic index, and why you don't need to worry about it The glycemic index (GI) is a ranking of carbohydrates on a scale from 0 to 100 according to the extent to which they raise blood sugar levels after eating. Foods with a high GI are those which are rapidly digested and absorbed and result in marked fluctuations in blood sugar levels. The GI has been promoted as a method to construct a healthy diet, and has been touted to diabetics as a way to control their blood glucose levels. The definite implication is that low GI equals healthy. The only problem is that the concept is a grotesque oversimplification that has no applicability to the real world. My latest HND article discusses the GI and its limitations. To calculate the GI, testing of an individual food item is performed on ten healthy subjects, who consume a measured amount of the food. Their blood glucose levels are monitored at frequent intervals over a two hour period. The data is then averaged and the GI for this food is established. However, GI data for a particular food can vary widely from lab to lab. Those familiar with blood glucose levels will tell you that they can be affected by a host of things, including stress, and any inflammatory processes going on in the body. It is remarkable that even the most basic physiological controls are not done on the subjects, to eliminate confounding factors. Besides, foods, being biologic, are not identical from sample to sample. The random errors alone could be substantial, and let's not even bother with the systematic errors inherent in the blood glucose measurement itself. Moreover, even if consistent data on the pure food could be obtained, there are few real life instances whereby a single food item is actually consumed. White bread could have a particular GI, which would be drastically lowered if butter were applied. Depending on the vinegar content and amount of time it has been refrigerated, the GI for potato salad can be affected—and not by a small amount, either. Finally, low GI does not equate with healthy. There are many decidedly unhealthy foods with a low GI. It is appalling that so-called scientists are promoting this nonsense. It is long past time that someone exposed the GI for what it is: Just one more diet scam. Read the complete article. (Shaw's Eco-Logic)
Fighting obesity: Revisiting schoolyard games A study in the Journal of Pediatrics systematically measured both energy expenditure and enjoyment in 30 different schoolyard games. Its findings offer a menu of effective games that could be played during gym and recess to address the growing child obesity problem. (PhysOrg.com)
Heightened suicide risk after weight-loss surgery NEW YORK - Severely obese people who undergo weight-loss surgery may have a higher-than-average risk of suicide in the years following the procedure, a new
study finds.
Ultrafine air particles may increase firefighters' risk for heart disease CINCINNATI—Firefighters are exposed to potentially dangerous levels of ultrafine particulates at the time they are least likely to wear protective
breathing equipment. Because of this, researchers believe firefighters may face an increased risk for heart disease from exposures during the fire suppression
process.
End Drug War, Save Billions in Wealth Posted by A new Cato Institute report examines the budgetary impact of ending the drug war and concludes that $88 billion could be saved each year (about $41 billion from canceled spending and about $47 billion in new tax revenue). Here’s the executive summary:
Saving money that is otherwise wasted is just one of a dozen good reasons to end the drug war. But since policymakers have placed all of us into a financial jam, this report shows one way to improve our position. Voting against the drug war remains a risky vote but more politicians are concluding that it is a less painful vote than voting against other things the government spends money on. Harvard economist Jeff Miron and his co-author Katherine Waldock have data on the federal budget and all the states. Check out how much money your state is wasting and spread the word to others.
(Cato at liberty)
Global Acidification: The Next EU Bought-And-Paid-For Science Hoax 28. September 2010 Now that man-made catastrophic global warming has been exposed as a hyper-inflated problem, proponents are now scrambling to save their movement. Here comes global acidification (sounds much more menacing than climate disruption, doesn’t it?). Expect a flood of sewage media reports on this in the days ahead.  Now that global warming is
exposed as a hoax, the EU wants you to believe in global acidification.
The Alfred Wegener Institute (AWI) for Polar and Marine Research in the German Hemholtz Association is hosting a 4-day conference with more than 200 scientists from all over Europe expected to attend at Conference Center Bremerhaven. See details here. The AWI press release is titled:
This conference undoubtedly is designed to produce new, future horror scenarios of oceanic death and destruction. These scenarios will then be avidly spread as science by Europe’s established publicly-funded media. The idea of course is to keep the public in a state of elevated fear, while governments move to regulate every aspect of human life.
So says the AWI press release, and:
Wait a second. There’s a huge difference between ocean surface and ocean, i.e. the complete ocean. But whatever.
Emphasis added. Don’t you just love how they appear to be so sure about everything, yet admit they actually know almost nothing? But hey, they have begun to study this closely.
The Arctic is again the canary in the coal mine. One partner in research they happen not to mention is the scientifically balanced and objective Greenpeace organisation, read here Research Assisted By Greenpeace. Much of the research funding comes from global regulator wannabe: The European Union and its European Commission. The conference sponsors are BIOACID (Biological Impacts of Ocean ACIDification) funded by the German Ministry for Education and Research (BMBF). The Leibniz Institute for Marine Sciences (IFM-GEOMAR) in Kiel is responsible for project coordination and management. Another sponsor is UKOARP (UK Ocean Acidification Research Program) UK’s first research programme, launched in 2010. And the third sponsor is EPOCA (European Project on OCean Acidification) launched in May 2008. It’s a four-year long project and is partly funded by the European Commission. The European Commission is precisely the body that has been making it clearer than ever that it wants to run the rest of the planet, together with the UN. And what better place to start than with the global airline industry. Right now it is threatening the rest of the world with a flight ban. Read here: EU Threatens World With Flight Ban/. However, banning flights, along with regulating people’s lives, is bound to be quite unpopular with the masses, unless of course you can produce compelling arguments to do so. Global warming is no longer compelling, and so in comes global acidification – due to carbon emissions. Vaclav Klaus needs to add a couple more chapters to his recent book, and rename it to: “Blue Planet In Green Chains, Forged By White Euro-Elitists”. Let’s not kid ourselves. This whole environmental movement is a bid by a certain class of elitists in Europe, and America’s east and west coasts, who want to tell the rest of the world what to do. Wasn’t that tried last century? This elitist enviro-establishment needs to get toppled from the bottom up. (No Tricks Zone)
PJTV Special Report: The Big Money & The Global Governance Agenda That Fuels Environmentalism The environmental movement is not just a well funded special interest, it is a big bully gaining increased control over the U.S. economy. (PJM)
How the ‘Long Green’ Becomes Green Power The second in a series on "Big Green": the alliance of the Democratic Party, environmental groups, and activists in the progressive movement. Today, where the money goes, and how it's spent. (The Washington Examiner is publishing a five-part special report this week in association with PJM on "Big Green.") (PJM)
This seal was declared extinct in 1892. So what is it doing alive and well today?
Guadalupe fur seal: feared extinct in 1890s. Photograph: Visuals Unlimited/Corbis The Guadalupe fur seal was feared extinct, gone the way of the dodo after being slaughtered by Russian and American hunters for their skins. None could be
found at breeding grounds and as sightings elsewhere tailed off the species was consigned to history.
Looking beyond the glamour of conservation Mammal ecologists call for greater focus on non-charismatic species.
It's alright though, you can still worry about weeds: One in five plant species face extinction First ever comprehensive study of plants, from giant rainforests to common snowdrops, finds 22% of all species at-risk (Juliette Jowit, Guardian)
Peter Foster: Ecuador’s eco blackmail
Almost 40 years ago, satirical magazine National Lampoon had a famous cover featuring somebody holding a pistol to the head of a cute canine. The caption was: “If You Don’t Buy This Magazine, We’ll Kill This Dog.” The “21st-century socialist” government of Ecuador has come up with a non-joke variant: “Pay us US$3.6-billion or we’ll drill for oil in the Amazon.” That this blatant attempted eco shakedown comes the week posturing Avatar director James Cameron is touring the Alberta oilsands should be embarrassing for the Hollywood carbon spewer. It’s as if the natives of Pandora had sent a message to Earth saying: “Send money or we’ll trash our own planet.” Details of the Ecuadoran scheme — which is “strongly backed” by the United Nations — were laid out before the UN General Assembly on Monday by Ecuador’s Vice-President, the appropriately named Lenin Moreno Garces. Mr. Moreno stressed what a big favour Ecuador was doing the world by not drilling in the Yasuni National Park , a tropical rain forest that contains primitive tribes and a fount of biodiversity. “ Ecuador,” he said, “has decided not to receive 50% of the potential income that oil will generate, just as long as the international community makes a similar effort to our own.”
EU-Poor Rift Could Derail Conservation Talks: Group Tension between the European Union and poor countries could undermine U.N. talks on agreeing 2020 targets to preserve nature's riches that provide clean air,
water and medicine, a top conservation official said.
Trade in mammoth ivory 'is fuelling slaughter of African elephants' Conservationists fear that legal trade is being used as a front for laundering of poached tusks
The Watery Future of East Germany's Coal Mines Swathes of land in eastern Germany are undergoing an ambitious facelift: Derelict open-cast mines dating from communist East Germany are being flooded,
transforming the area into Europe's biggest artificial lake district. Developers hope it will become a tourist magnet as well.
NYC To Curb Water Runoff With Blue And Green Roofs New York City wants to catch and store rainwater temporarily in new roof systems to stop heavy storms sending sewage spilling into city waterways.
Digging deep for ways to curb ammonia emissions Dairy farmers can greatly reduce ammonia emissions from their production facilities by injecting liquid manure into crop fields below the soil surface,
according to research by the U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA).
Obama Says Energy Policy A Top Priority Next Year President Barack Obama said revamping U.S. energy policy would be a top priority next year and may have to be done "in chunks" rather than through
one piece of legislation, according to Rolling Stone magazine.
Senators See Renewable Energy Bill as Christmas Tree for Pet Projects With a renewable energy bill gaining legs in the Senate, lawmakers are increasingly eyeing the measure for their own pet projects.
CHESSER: Another government mandate First they force you to buy health insurance, then wind power, too
New EPA Rules Will Cost More than 800,000 Jobs by Hans Bader New EPA rules will cost more than 800,000 jobs, probably far more, according to a newly released congressional report. That includes the EPA’s first set of rules “for Greenhouse Gas Emissions,” and “new standards for commercial and industrial boilers.” Indeed, the boiler rules alone could cost close to 800,000 jobs. This shouldn’t be a surprise. In 2008, President Obama admitted that under his greenhouse gas regulations, people’s utility bills would “skyrocket,” and coal-fired power plants would go “bankrupt.” The EPA’s own internal documents show that the administration’s global warming regulations will result in a massive “loss of steel, paper, aluminum, chemical, and cement manufacturing jobs.” It’s not just the administration’s global warming regulations that will wipe out jobs. The stimulus package contained so-called “green jobs”… Read the full story (Cooler Heads)
Global warming critic plots revenge By: Darren Samuelsohn
Durbin says energy legislation in lame-duck a 'long shot' Senate Majority Whip Richard Durbin (D-Ill.) Tuesday threw cold water on suggestions that the Senate would respond legislatively to the Gulf of Mexico oil
spill or take up a renewable power mandate during a post-election lame-duck session.
The Economics of Napoleon Obamaparte: Spread the Wealth Around by Christopher C. Horner
Alan Carlin | September 28, 2010
UN not getting enough of your money: UN sees funds threat to climate campaign International agreements to fight the threat of climate change will not make any further progress unless rich countries deliver on their promises of almost
$30bn in short-term funding for developing economies, the UN’s senior climate official has warned.
Administration Inflates Green Jobs Numbers Are you a financial adviser? You may not know it, but you've got a green job. Are you a wholesale buyer? You've got a green job, too. Or maybe you're a
newspaper reporter. You, too, have a green job -- at least according to the Obama administration.
EU Clampdown On Gas-Guzzling Vans Suffers Setback Europe's efforts to wean itself off costly oil imports suffered a setback on Tuesday when a European Parliament panel threw out plans for speed-limiters on
vans and light trucks.
Leo Hickman wants to pound his head on a brick wall... there's a lot of that going around: Middle East's largest theme park makes a gimmick of global warming The ice-themed water park is based on the story of a clan of penguins who lose their 'Arctic' home and settle in the waters of the Arabian Gulf (Guardian)
Tom Harris of the International Climate Science
Coalition reviews the latest book of eco-alarmist and crank David Suzuki:
(Andrew Bolt)
Treehugger buys a clue, or two Hippies at Treehugger have realized that once-favored green talking points are old and busted by comparison with the harsh reality of actual events.
Telling porkies: Munich Re: 2010 Cats Cause $18B In Insured Losses, Likely Linked To Climate Change A total of 725 weather events between January and September this year have caused insured losses of $18 billion and indicate a probable link between the
increasing weather extremes and climate change, Munich Re said.
2010 Pakistan Floods: Climate Change or Natural Variability? By Dr. Madhav Khandekar Among the extreme weather events of summer 2010, the extensive floods in Pakistan and their widespread impacts garnered maximum attention in the media as well as in the scientific community. Several climate scientists expressed concern about such weather extremes becoming more common with future climate change, while the WMO (World Meteorological Organization) issued a statement that the weather related cataclysms of July and August (2010) fit patterns predicted by climate scientists. The extensive damage due to floods and plight of thousands of people marooned over waterlogged areas were graphically covered in heart-wrenching details by most newspapers and TV news stories in Canada. Per latest estimates, the floods have claimed over 1500 human fatalities so far and over two million more have been rendered homeless. From a personal perspective, the TV footage of women & children in knee-deep water brought back poignant memories of a similar situation I witnessed in Pune, my former home-town (a city 200 km southeast of Mumbai, the largest Indian city on the west coast) in July 1961 when incessant monsoon rains in the first week of July 1961 led to the breaking of a dam resulting in massive flooding of the city, destroying hundreds of homes and drowning dozens of people living along the riverside. Several other cities and regions suffered from similar flooding during the 1961 summer monsoon. As it turned out, the 1961 summer monsoon over India and vicinity was the rainiest monsoon season in the 150-year instrument data which caused extensive flooding and loss of life and property in many regions of the country (India Meteorological Department 1962). This year’s monsoon has been quite vigorous since the third week of July 2010 and heavy rains have caused flooding in the peninsular regions of India and also in the northwest regions bordering with Pakistan. Has the vigorous Indian monsoon of 2010 led to the historic floods in Pakistan? Let us briefly consider the monsoon climatology. (Icecap)
This Just In -- Upcoming Debate with Benny Peiser 
vs.
Comments On NOAA’s Report Of Deep Ocean Warming I was alerted by Leonard Ornstein to a NOAA news article titled Scientists Find 20 Years of Deep Water Warming Leading to Sea Level Rise The article includes the text
I wrote in the paper Pielke Sr., R.A., 2003: Heat storage within the Earth system. Bull. Amer. Meteor. Soc., 84, 331-335.
Since I wrote that statement, I have become convinced that since deep ocean heating is diffused through relatively large volumes of the ocean (as indicated in the NOAA study), it cannot suddenly reappear in the atmosphere. Indeed, we can now monitor with the Argo network in order to assess if there are large amounts of heat (in Joules) migrating towards the surface of the ocean. There are several comments and questions that result from this study:
Since the data density of this study was relatively coarse, however, further study is needed to confirm their values. Nonetheless, this is the type of diagnosis we need, along with the Argo network, to obtain a more accurate diagnosis of global warming and cooling. (Roger Pielke Sr., Climate Science)
F.C. Ljungqvist has published a new climate reconstruction from the birth of Jesus Christ to the present: Ljungqvist, F.C. 2010.On Anthony Watts' blog, Craig Loehle argues that the paper is a vindication of his 2007 tree-less reconstruction in E&E. You don't need a 20-20 vision to see that the two (or three) are strikingly similar: 
» Don't Stop Reading » (TRF)
Report On Sea Level Rise And Ground Water Extraction There is a news article from the University of Utrecht [thanks to Erik Waeijen for alerting us to this!] titled Rising sea levels attributed to global groundwater extraction The article starts with the text
The article is based on the paper Y. Wada, L.P.H. van Beek, C.M. van Kempen, J.W.T.M. Reckman, S. Vasak, and M.F.P. Bierkens (2010), Global depletion of groundwater resources, Geophysical Research Letters, doi:10.1029/2010GL044571, in press. This is yet another paper that shows the interconnection among the components of the climate system. The attribution of a climate effect (in this case sea level rise) to just one cause (e.g. ocean warming and glacial melt due to positive radiative forcing from anthropogenic greenhouse gases) is too narrow of a perspective. (Roger Pielke Sr., climate Science)
From CO2 Science Volume 13 Number 39: 29 September 2010 Editorial: Subject Index Summary: Journal Reviews: The Changing Climate of Canada: Implications for Agriculture: What are the changes? ... and what do they imply? Human Mortality in Castile-Leon, Spain: How is it related to temperature? Global Warming and Malaria: Does the former promote the latter? The Peatlands of China's Changbai Mountains: Have they been giving up their carbon in the face of what climate alarmists claim is unprecedented global warming? Plant Growth Database:
US energy companies rush into shale oil projects A band of entrepreneurial oilmen have found an economic way to extract oil from shale rock, fuelling a frenzy for prospects that has pushed up lease prices
and lifted hopes of the first rise in onshore US oil production in decades.
Gas producers consider cutting production Natural gas producers are teetering on the fourth consecutive winter of low demand and prices, but relief could be at hand, analysts said Monday.
The Light Bulb Switchover: In the Dark So, are you ready to comply with the federal government’s ban on incandescent light bulbs? Me neither.
It's should be called the law of unintended consequences, and Congress should learn to abide by it, taking enough time to discover whether the road they choose to follow is smooth or filled with ruts. (Michael Reagan, Townhall)
The Bright and Dark Sides of the Smart Grid
As I was catching up on email that accumulated during my travels last week, I ran across two items highlighting the contrast between the shining potential of the emerging "smart grid" for energy and its darker, more dangerous side. In his keynote address at the first annual GridWise Global Forum, IBM''s CEO Samuel J. Palmisano described the vision and opportunity of a closely interconnected, highly efficient global energy system, while the unfolding story of the Stuxnet computer worm infecting the control system of Iran''s Bushehr nuclear reactor and other facilities serves as a chilling reminder of the vulnerabilities that will likely accompany this revolution. [Read More] (Geoffrey Styles, ET)
Norway Concerned By Power Supply Ahead Of Winter Norway's oil and energy minister said he was concerned about electricity supply this winter due to lingering troubles at Swedish nuclear reactors and low
reservoir levels at hydro power plants.
Is Windpower the Ethanol of Electricity? (Part I: Economics) by Ben Lieberman Repeating past mistakes is an unfortunate but common part of federal policy, and perhaps no more so than with energy. Indeed, much of the Obama administration’s “clean energy economy” and “energy independence” agenda is a virtual repeat of the follies from the 1970s – failed attempts by Washington to pick winners and losers amongst alternative energy sources and energy-using technologies, as well as taxes and regulations that exacerbated the very concerns they were supposed to address. One of the Reagan Administration’s lesser-remembered successes was the repeal of much of this government meddling beginning soon after taking office in 1981. Reagan’s turn away from energy central planning and towards free markets brought down energy costs and helped launch a long period of economic growth. Of course, this decades-old lesson may be lost on younger politicians, bureaucrats, and activists who seem unaware that their energy policy ideas are proven failures from the age of disco. But the same cannot be said of efforts to enact a federal renewable electricity standard (RES), as this would be a near-exact repeat of a blunder that was launched just a few short years ago – the renewable fuels mandate. Part I of this two-part post will review the lessons of the RFM, or ethanol. Part II tomorrow will turn to windpower, the central energy of the RES. Indeed, the requirement that ethanol be added to the gasoline supply has quickly proven to be an economic and environmental failure. Congressional proposals mandating wind and other renewable sources of electricity show all the signs of becoming a similar flop, but with far more serious implications. The True Cost of Ethanol It should come as no surprise that the renewable fuels mandate has raised the cost of driving. After all, if ethanol was cost competitive with petroleum-derived gasoline, it would have caught on without substantial government intervention. Nonetheless, despite repeated promises during the 2005 energy bill debate to help provide relief for high pump prices, Congress mandated that a specified amount of renewable fuels –mostly ethanol derived from corn – be added to the gasoline supply. The 2007 energy bill increased the mandate substantially. The law raised the targets to 13 billion gallons of renewable fuels in 2010 -12 from corn, and the rest from non-corn renewables like cellulosic ethanol and biodiesel. This is a near-tripling of ethanol use over the last five years. The mandate increases each year and will reach 36 billion gallons by 2022, with 15 billion gallons coming from corn and 21 billion from non-corn renewables. [Read more →] (MasterResource)
Rent seekers not getting enough of your money: UK biogas company folds after green subsidy delay UK-based biogas company Renewable Zukunft folded in the summer, administrators Leonard Curtis confirmed on Tuesday, a collapse key investors Climate Change Capital blamed on confusion over green incentives. (Reuters)
How Much More Can They Get Wrong? The New Obamacare Impact Calculator Answers
There's been a lot of misinformation when it comes to the new health care law-but not in the way Obamacare supporters have been claiming. We heard early on in the health reform debate that a massive overhaul of the private health care sector would bend the health care cost downward. But when that looked unlikely under the best scenarios, Obamacare proponents pivoted and said the American public would embrace this law. Even former President Bill Clinton recently admitted he was wrong in saying that Democrats would pick up additional support with Obamacare's passage. So how much more could the new health law impact Americans and the health sector if other forecasts, such as those from the Congressional Budget Office, turn out to be false? Heritage's brand-new Obamacare Impact Calculator shows the real-time results of what these changes could mean to you, the federal budget and the US economy if the CBO is wrong. Continue reading... (The Foundry)
Wealthy live three years longer: report A new report shows that the poorest Australians are dying on average three years earlier than the wealthiest.
Obviously true, just a shame they spoiled it with "climate change" nonsense: Slum Dwellers Most Vulnerable To Disasters: Red Cross About one billion slum dwellers in developing countries are vulnerable to disasters because they live in congested and poorly built houses without emergency
services, the Red Cross said in a report released Tuesday.
The great inequality debate, part 1: Linda McQuaig and Neil Brooks
 Extreme inequality is on the rise. Is Alex Rodriguez
really 30 times better than Hank Aaron?
By Linda McQuaig and Neil Brooks Billionaires are on the rise. While workers' wages have stagnated over the past 30 years, the rich have gotten richer, and the very rich have gotten wildly richer. We're no longer amazed to hear that Tiger Woods is making US$100-million a year, or that Oprah Winfrey ranks among the billionaires. Thirty years ago, CEOs of large corporations were content to make 20 or 30 times the average income; now they feel hard done by if they only make 200 to 300 times as much. Things are even more out of whack in the financial world. In 2009, the 25 highest-paid hedge fund managers earned an average over US$1-billion each - about 24,000 times the average income. These anecdotal reports of rising inequality have been confirmed in countless empirical studies. Perhaps the most widely cited have been a series of studies led by University of California economist Emmanuel Saez and Thomas Piketty of the Paris School of Economics. Using income tax data, the Saez-Piketty studies show that the share of market income captured by the top 1% in the United States rose dramatically from 8.9% in 1978 to a staggering 23.5% in 2007. But even that understates the windfall at the very top. Those in the top 0.01%, for instance, increased their share more than sevenfold, from 0.86% in 1978 to 6.04% in 2007. This is the largest share of national income this very top group has received since the introduction of the U.S. income tax in 1913.
The great inequality debate, part 2: Alan Reynolds
The real income of the rich has been steady, while U.S. taxation is heavily progressive By Alan Reynolds If only tax policy could be so simple: Tax the rich and everybody else gets richer and incomes get equalized. Even more complicated is the underlying assumption of the equality seekers, including Linda McQuaig and Neil Brooks, whose premise is that there is some optimum level of inequality. They seem to like the 1947-73 period when, they claim, the top 10% in the U.S. allegedly earned a relatively steady share of close to 35% the total. The graph supporting this assertion looks impressive. But as Terence Corcoran pointed out in his original article in this series, it's full of holes. For one thing, it masks the fact that almost all of the increase in income shares of the top 10% can be attributed to the top 1%. Even that doesn't accurately tell a credible story, because the data behind it are faulty. There is no dispute about the increase in inequality since 1979 - only about whether that increase ended in 1988 or 1993. Nobody doubts the obvious benefits to high-income investors (and to the low-income unemployed) from the rebound in stocks, bonds and the U.S. economy in 1983-89. But what happened since then? Read More (Financial Post)
Two promising developments in the fight against malaria: 1: Protein critical in malaria parasite development identified Research led by The University of Nottingham has opened up a new area of malaria parasite biology which could lead to new methods of controlling the transmission of this deadly disease. (PhysOrg)
2: Major breakthrough in war against malaria Australian researchers discover new pathway through which malaria infects the body
MILLOY: Republicans green with Democrat envy GOP activists pursue a liberal eco-agenda
How the Environmental Movement Became Just Another Washington Power Bloc It's not just a band of flannel-shirted environmentalists any longer; it's become a big-money, major player in Washington power politics and American elections. (Starting today, the Washington Examiner is publishing a five-part special report in association with Pajamas Media on "Big Green.") (Charlie Martin, PJM)
Environmentalists may seek President Obama challenger Call them crazy, but a handful of environmentalists are so peeved with President Barack Obama that they are talking openly about the need for a Democratic
primary challenger in 2012.
Do this, don't do that, sit up straight, be quiet, that lawn won't mow itself €¦ younger readers may detect a parental note in modern science. Older readers may be reminded of the reasons
for that first divorce: (Tim Blair)
Tile drainage directly related to nitrate loss URBANA - Tile drainage in the Mississippi Basin is one of the great advances of the 19th and 20th centuries, allowing highly productive agriculture in what
was once land too wet to farm. In fact, installation of new tile systems continues every year, because it leads to increased crop yields. But a recent study
shows that the most heavily tile-drained areas of North America are also the largest contributing source of nitrate to the Gulf of Mexico, leading to seasonal
hypoxia. In the summer of 2010 this dead zone in the Gulf spanned over 7,000 square miles.
Europe Seeks To Protect Mid-Atlantic High Seas European nations agreed on Friday to set up fishing-free zones in remote parts of the Atlantic Ocean in the world's first high seas network of protected
areas beyond the control of national governments.
Yes, let's reduce efficiency... Consumer backlash again 'super dairies' could create new label for 'free range milk' A backlash against the increasing prevalence of superdairies comprising herds of thousands of animals will lead consumers to demand more 'free range' milk, farmers predict.
Back on the "functional food" hype trail: Nestle to invest $500M in medicinal foods business LAUSANNE, Switzerland - Nestle will plow some $500 million into expanding its medical nutrition business over the next decade, in a bid to capture a slice of
the growing market for foods to treat chronic conditions such as diabetes and obesity, the Swiss consumer company said Monday.
Scientists arrive in Senegal to give African hunger a black eye At the World Cowpea Research Conference, crop experts embrace one of agriculture's oldest legumes -- prized for protein and resilience to hot, dry
climates -- as food for people, livestock and astronauts
Hilarious :D GM maize 'has polluted rivers across the United States' An insecticide used in genetically modified (GM) crops grown extensively in the United States and other parts of the world has leached into the water of the
surrounding environment.
U.S. Set To Propose New Auto Fuel, Emissions Rules The Obama administration this week will propose new fuel efficiency and emissions requirements for cars and light trucks for model years 2017 and beyond.
Raese to Bank on Cap and Trade Against Manchin MORGANTOWN, W.Va. -- Republican Senate nominee John Raese is hoping that concerns over Democratic cap and trade proposals will help propel him to a
surprising victory in the special election to fill the late West Virginia Sen. Robert Byrd's seat.
Arnold SANTA CLARA, Calif. -- Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger is blasting oil companies that are trying to undermine California's global warming law with a ballot
measure, saying they are motivated purely by greed.
Not silly: Businesses urged to grow ... trees City wants to offset concrete heat. St. Laurent borough targeted as part of effort to raise island's green cover from 20 to 25 per cent
Gillard ups the ante on carbon charge The Prime Minister has wiped the slate clean on climate change policy and launched a new approach in which business, unions, green groups and other
interested parties will have a stake.
PM invites Greens to join closed-door cabinet committee on climate GREENS leader Bob Brown will sit at the cabinet table with Prime Minister Julia Gillard under a deal to design the minority Labor Government's climate change
policy.
Gillard's rigs her warming "consensus" The fix is in, and shame on any commentator who falls for this childish spin:
Note already that the committee skips what should be the start of any discussion. As in: is a carbon price actually worth the pain? Will cutting our emissions actually achieve anything? Is a rise in global temperatures actually good for us? Isn't it suicidal to slash our tiny emissions before the rest of the world - and especially the biggest emitters - agree to do likewise? So right away this committee is fundamentally rigged to dodge debate and produce the "right" result. What's sold by Gillard as an exercise to achieve "community consensus" is a con - this is the consensus you reach simply by excluding everyone who doesn't agree with you. In fact, Gillard today made that explicit:
This is why the Coalition will not be taking up of the offer of two seats on the committee, which will be stacked instead by ideologues, including Greens leader Bob Brown:
Another con. On the committee's agenda will be the carbon "levy" - actually tax - that Gillard repeatedly ruled out before the election, when there were nervous voters to fool:
Contrast that to this solemn promise of just six weeks ago: A carbon tax is actually a demand of the Greens, which now seems in charge of Labor's global warming agenda. After all, Ross Garnaut had already done an extensive report for the then Rudd Government on exactly these questions, among others, and settled on an emissions trading scheme. Holding yet another inquiry just buys Labor more time for further delay, but also offers the Greens a prize - the hope of getting something even tougher and more damaging to our economy. Note that this committee aims to produce a "consensus" among its members (two of them Greens) that will actually form the Government policy. But let's get to the remaining deceit here. The four "independent experts" appointed by Gillard to advise the committee include people who are either not expert (in global warming policies, at least) or not independent. Take Patricia Faulkner, who has no expertise in global warming policies at all and seems to have been chosen instead for her Leftism, social activism and bureaucratic skills - all the hallmarks of a classic apparatchik:
Then there's the alarmist Will Steffen, who is indeed a climate scientist, but not one independent of this Government;
Add Treasurer Wayne Swan to the committee, and the Government's global warming policy is being decided (so far) by three Labor ministers, two Greens and an independent who knows little about global warming but is sure we must Do Something. And the six of them will be guided by four experts who turn out to be an alarmist scientist, a welfare activist, a big business representative and an alarmist economist. Be scared. This committee is little better than a propaganda outfit, designed to sell a "solution" already agreed upon in the broad - and which in detail may break one of Gilllard's most solemn election promises. The "community consensus" it pretends to be developing is no more than a fix and a fraud. UPDATE Need more evidence of deceit and broken promises? (Andrew Bolt)
Carbon committee 'Marxist': Mirabella Prime Minister Julia Gillard's climate change committee has been labelled as Marxist for its refusal to include opponents of a carbon price.
1st wobbly wheel: Food cost risk with climate action: Tony Windsor KEY independent Tony Windsor has expressed concern about the impact of a carbon price on the cost of food.
Why is Gillard now pushing what she told Rudd was poison? Andrew Bolt - Tuesday, September 28, 10 (10:48 am) Terry McCrann is mystified by Prime Minister Julia Gillard's decision to consider imposing the carbon tax she ruled out just six weeks ago, when there was an election to win:
UPDATE No kidding, Sherlock:
Wait until it dawns on Windsor that a carbon dioxide tax will also send power bills through the roof. UPDATE 2
Reader Stephen wonders just how high an Australian carbon tax would have to be to actually force people to slash their emissions, when the overseas data is so discouraging:
Dates obtained for carbon tax implementation here. Data set for emissions here. UPDATE 3 The Greens MP for Melbourne, Adam Bandt, boasts on Twitter that the Greens forced Julia Gillard yesterday to set up her rigged committee to work out how to tax emissions:
The Government really is a Greens-Labor coalition. UPDATE 4 Meanwhile, the rest of the world keeps refusing to do what Gillard says we must - and that includes even Barack Obama's US:
(Thanks to readers Deb and Alan RM Jones.) (Andrew Bolt)
And Reuters gets to the meat: No Carbon Price In Sight For Australia Before 2012 Australia will not put a price on carbon emissions until at least 2012, after Prime Minister Julia Gillard announced that a committee examining the issue
would not finish its deliberations until end-2011.
Scientists debate root causes of Earth's warming Hundreds of people packed Purdue University's Loeb Playhouse Monday night for a discussion on global warming.
For U.S. Wildlife, a Climate Change Blueprint New efforts to measure what warming temperatures are doing to forests, streams and animals at a regional level are at the core of a strategic plan by the
Fish and Wildlife Service to respond to the effects of climate change.
UN MILLENNIUM GOALS FLUNK REALITY CHECK, BY: DENNIS T. AVERY CHURCHVILLE, VA-On the10th birthday of the UN's Millennium Development Goals, officials are lamenting that the world has made little progress in meeting
them. No one should be surprised.
Global Cooling and the New World Order Bilderberg. Whether you believe it's part of a sinister conspiracy which will lead inexorably to one world government or whether you think it's just an
innocent high-level talking shop, there's one thing that can't be denied: it knows which way the wind is blowing. (Hat tips: Will/NoIdea/Ozboy)
Yep, that's right. Global Cooling.
Recognition, kind of... 50 People Who Matter 2010 | 32. Stephen McIntyre Published 27 September 2010
Stephen McIntyre. Credit: Getty Images
A climate overhaul is needed to win back public trust When in November 2009 an archive of some 1,000 e-mails sent and received by scientists at the Climatic Research Unit at the University of East Anglia was
leaked to the blogosphere alarm bells started to ring. Was this evidence of serious malpractice by scientists on both sides of the Atlantic? Had scientists
sought to prevent views critical of their work from appearing in scientific literature? Had scientists deleted e-mails to avoid disclosure under the UK's
Freedom of Information legislation? In passing information to the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change had they omitted inconvenient evidence?
Munich Re, the global resinurance company, has always had a complicated relationship with the science of disasters and climate change due to the emission of
greenhouse gases. On the one hand, its technical staff have published solid
work in the peer reviewed literature. On the other hand, its marketing statements often go beyond what the science can support. Two months prior to Cancun Summit/Large number of weather extremes as strong indication of climate changeThe text of the press release would seem to suggest that Munich Re can't back up this claim, other than with empty speculation (emphasis added): The rise in natural catastrophe losses is primarily due to socio-economic factors. In many countries, populations are rising, and more and more people moving into exposed areas. At the same time, greater prosperity is leading to higher property values. Nevertheless, it would seem that the only plausible explanation for the rise in weather-related catastrophes is climate change. The view that weather extremes are more frequent and intense due to global warming coincides with the current state of scientific knowledge as set out in the Fourth IPCC Assessment Report.The press release then goes on to list a number of phenomena that it asserts are being driven by climate change: [T]here is evidence that, as a result of warming, events associated with severe windstorms, such as thunderstorms, hail and cloudbursts, have become more frequent in parts of the USA, southwest Germany and other regions. The number of very severe tropical cyclones is also increasing. One direct result of warming is an increase in heatwaves such as that experienced in Russia this summer. There are also indications of a higher incidence of atmospheric conditions causing air mass formation on the north side of the Alps and low-lying mountain ranges, a phenomenon which can result in floods. Heavy rain and flash floods are affecting not only people living close to rivers but also those who live well away from traditionally flood-prone areas.The actual state of the science is that no connection has been shown between greenhouse gas emissions and thunderstorms, tropical cyclones, Russian heatwaves or European floods. Regrettably, Munich Re has made a jump from making a tenuous assertion to propagating incorrect information. The press release concludes with this statement: In the two months preceding the World Climate Summit, Munich Re will be drawing attention to the climate change issue with a series of communications and publications. The ERGO Insurance Group and MEAG, the asset manager of ERGO and Munich Re, are also planning to issue press releases in the next few weeks on insurance products related to natural catastrophes and renewable energy as well as business activities designed to reduce carbon emissions.Enough said. (Roger Pielke Jr.)
Invited Letter Now Rejected By Nature Magazine UPDATE: September 27 2010 - see the post "You Are Invited To Waste Your Time" I was invited by Nature magazine to write a Letter in response to the September Exeter meeting http://www.surfacetemperatures.org/home, and have been working with a member of their staff on edits over the past two weeks. This morning, I received the startling e-mail below from Nature's Chief Commissioning Editor. Quite frankly, the only way I can interpret this behavior is as an example of the continued bias in Nature's reporting of climate issues. Their statement that "We have now reflected on the matter, and on some information from attendees at the meeting in question" is a remarkable admission.
Temperature dataset effort vulnerable to problems by Roger A. Pielke Sr. Klotzbach, P.J., R.A. Pielke Sr., R.A. Pielke Jr., J.R. Christy, and R.T. McNider, 2009: An alternative explanation for differential temperature trends at
the surface and in the lower troposphere. J. Geophys. Res., 114, D21102, doi:10.1029/2009JD011841. (Roger Pielke Sr., Climate Science)
Weather And Climate - Well Summarized By Tomas Milanovic On Climate Etc. Tomas Milanovic has a accurate succinct summary of the relationship between weather and climate on the weblog post The Uncertainty Monster at Climate Etc. The comment reads
The issue of what is climate is discussed further in the article Pielke, R.A., 1998: Climate prediction as an initial value problem. Bull. Amer. Meteor. Soc., 79, 2743-2746 where I wrote
Indeed, climate models must not only be able to simulate weather features such as high and low pressure systems including tropical cyclones are well as operational numerical weather prediction models, but must be able to accurately simulate a diverse variety of physical, chemical and biological processes. Even then, nonlinear interactions between the many components of the climate system (e.g. as illustrated in Figure 1 in Rial et al 2004) can result in limiting skillful prediction decades into the future. The Milanovic comment on Climate Etc. effectively summarizes this issue. A subject that is not properly assessed in the 2007 IPCC report. (Roger Pielke Sr., Climate Science)
AMO Impacts Temperatures Globally - CO2 Gets No Respect 27. September 2010 In my last post I summarized the results of Ed Caryl's analyses of stations far up in the Arctic, where temperature trends appear to follow the 60-year AMO cycle, and do not correlate at all with CO2. Now I've been made aware that temperatures following the AMO are not exclusive to the Arctic. Blogsite digging in the clay has plotted temperatures from other cities located about the globe and came up with the same AMO sine wave trend, see below: 
Source: http://diggingintheclay.wordpress.com/2010/09/01/in-search-of-cooling-trends/ And what follows are more plots from Iceland, Norway and Russia on the left, and from USA on the right (Sorry about the poor quality. Better quality graphics can be seen at diggingintheclay here). Again the AMO wave appears there as well. Moreover, the 1930s and 40s in USA even look a bit warmer than today's temps.
So poor little trace-gas CO2 just doesn't get no respect, no matter where it goes. Every corner of the globe is ignoring this pip-squeak, climate-driver wannabe. CO2 is fading from the picture. If the temperature has followed the AMO sine trend over the last 150 years, then why do we keep seeing hockey blades (nowadays without the stick-part) showing temperatures straight-lining up over the last 100 years or so? Probably because GISS and others have changed historical data to make them fit their ideologized models - as unbelievable as it may sound. Steve Goddard's site here explains how GISS has precisely done this with US temperatures by going back and flattening the graph. 
The above comparator is from: Steve Goddard's site. His post is short, but a very worthwhile read. Before 2000, GISS showed a warmer 1930s and cooler current period. The AMO wave is clear to see. But today, after having fiddled with the data, GISS now shows a cooler 1930s, a warmer present day and a somewhat straighter line that tries to cloak the AMO effect. Now you really know why they call it "man-made global warming". (No Tricks Zone)
Examining Trenberth's 'The heat will come back to haunt us sooner or later' statement Inspired by a WUWT comment from Bill Illis in the Maybe they've found Trenberth's missing heat thread, I've elevated this to full post status and provided the relevant graphics from the links Bill provided. From a National Science Foundation article on April 15th, 2010:
Ocean heat content estimates show that energy in the form of heat is building up on Earth.Credit: NCAR/courtesy Science =============================== Bill Illis writes: Trenberth is looking for about 0.8 watts/m2 of the projected increase in energy held in the Earth system that is not going into heating the surface. Either this energy is not being held in the Earth system (and is just escaping to space and hence climate theory is not correct) or it is hiding and the most likely place for that would be the deep oceans (or continental ice sheets warming up and melting that we have not observed). Continue reading (WUWT)
Melting of Arctic Ice Opening up New Routes to Asia The decline in the amount of ice floating on the Arctic Ocean is clearing the way for new shipping routes to Asia. Traffic was already brisk this summer. New
ships are being designed to cope with icebergs during the voyage.
German States To Oppose CO2 Storage Law Workers at a carbon capture and storage test facility operated by Swedish energy giant Vattenfall in the state of Brandenburg in eastern Germany near Berlin.
Third-Party Panel To Study Canada Oil Sands Impact Alberta is forming an independent panel of scientists to study data on water pollution near the Canadian province's oil sands after a report by a noted
ecologist concluded the industry's operations were contaminating a northern river system.
The Arctic bilateral border agreement signed by Norway and Russia earlier this month rekindled media hype over the so-called race for the region's energy treasures, which could amount to as much as 30 percent of the world's undiscovered gas and 13 percent of its undiscovered oil. [Read More] (Andres Cala, ET)
Scare over rare-earth minerals underlines fear of a rising China For a panicked moment last week, it seemed China had decided to cut off exports to Japan of a little-known, yet vital, ingredient in everything from iPhones
to cruise missiles and wind turbines.
Study: Electric cars hold greater promise for reducing emissions and lowering US oil imports Electric cars hold greater promise for reducing emissions and lowering U.S. oil imports than a national renewable portfolio standard, according to research conducted by Rice University's Baker Institute for Public Policy. (Rice University)
Subsidy farmers want more: Business leaders call for more incentives to invest in renewables Before the renewables financing conference, major players say government guarantees are vital to meet ambitious climate change targets (Guardian)
Windpower: Not as Free As You Think by Lisa Linowes We've all heard the pitch about how wind is free and that once a windpower facility is constructed, the cost of generation is appropriately set low thanks to no fuel expense. We're also often reminded that no fuel cost means wind will help insulate consumers from wildly fluctuating energy prices. The concept is easy to grasp, and rural communities considering whether to host a wind facility are likely to conclude that the project will produce local and regional benefits in the form of lower electricity bills. Think again The fact is, the price of electricity within a grid region is set at a single price known as the market-clearing price (MCP). In most organized electricity markets, electricity generators are encouraged to participate in a daily or day-ahead auction process whereby a uniform market price-the MCP-is established. The MCP is the offer price of the highest-priced generation accepted within the market. Ross Baldick states in his paper, Single Clearing Price in Electricity Markets: Consider a simple electricity system with baseload coal generators having low production costs of approximately $25/MWh, and gas-fired peakers having higher production costs of approximately $100/MWh. Off-peak, when demand is lower, only the coal generators may be necessary to meet demand. The market-clearing price for energy is set by the coal offer price, which can be expected to be around $25/MWh. However, on-peak, when demand is higher, both the coal and the gas-fired generation may be required to meet demand and the market-clearing price will be set by the offer of the gas-fired generation, which can be expected to be around $100/MWh. On-peak, both the coal and the gas-fired generation receive the market-clearing price. How It Works The New England ISO (ISO-NE) and New York ISO (NYISO)[i] typically operate using a day-ahead auction where generators are required to offer firm levels of production for each hour of the next power day. The energy price, in turn, is determined based on those bidding into the system; all generators receive the same price per megawatt hour of generation. Significant penalties are applied if a generator is unable to meet his commitment. [Read more †’] (MasterResource)
Britain's offshore windpower costs twice as much as coal and gas generated electricity Off shore wind farms cost twice as much to produce electricity as gas and coal powered stations and will need subsidies for at least 20 years, a major report warns. (TDT)
From the rubber room: Scotland To Get 100 Pct Green Energy by 2025 Scotland should produce enough renewable electricity to meet all its power demand by 2025, First Minister Alex Salmond said Tuesday.
Time to Topple Keynesian Economics Peter Smith
Lawrence Solomon: Radiation's benefits
By Lawrence Solomon "There is no safe level of radiation." For the last 30 years, my colleagues and I at the Energy Probe Research Foundation have held that view, and espoused it through books, media appearances and presentations to regulatory bodies, helping in no small measure to tighten Canada's radiation standards. The science on radiation as published by official bodies, we knew, made clear that any dose of radiation, no matter how small, carries with it an additional risk of contracting cancer. The upshot was a better-safe-than-sorry stance: Don't frivolously accept X-rays; take special care in disposing of smoke detectors, worry about routine releases of radiation from nuclear facilities. This stance is now reeling. Low levels of radiation, science is increasingly telling us, are not only safe, they are actually healthful. It may be more prudent to worry about getting too little radiation than too much.
Cancer treatment found among junk DNA Australian scientists have found a new and potent way to fight cancer among what was once thought of as junk DNA.
There's nothing unhealthy about being bottle fed Alexandra Carlton
Told to Eat Its Vegetables, America Orders Fries The baby-carrot industry tried to reposition its product as junk food, starting a $25 million advertising campaign whose defining characteristics include
heavy metal music, a phone app and a young man in a grocery cart dodging baby-carrot bullets fired by a woman in tight jeans.
Nanny rules simply take retail profits from schools: Bodegas put school kids at obesity-risk NEW YORK, Sept. 24 -- No matter how healthy the food may be in school New York City school children have easy access to junk food close to their school,
researchers say.
Fashionable nonsense: Calorie counts on menus to fight obesity Minister launches voluntary scheme urging food industry to highlight healthy options for diners
Should journalists second guess the scientific truth? My agreement with Sean Carroll couldn't have lasted. Today, he
wrote something pretty incredible. Second, reporters are messengers -- their job is to tell, as accurately as they can, what has been said, with the benefit of such insight as their experience allows them to bring, not to second guess whether what is said is right.Sean Carroll hysterically disagrees. The job for the journalists is not to be messengers but to authoritatively separate the scientific truthiness from the falsity, and promote the truthiness, we learn. I kid you not. (Carroll uses the word "truth" instead of "truthiness" but it is an obvious mistake because the carefully described method how he found the T-word shows that the T-word is truthiness rather than the truth.) How could a scientific journalist possibly determine what is the scientific truth? The scientific truth is gradually being approached by the scientific method (you know, the exercises that include experiments, calculations, logical reasoning, and possible exchanges with others who work on similar problems) - and journalists, pretty much by definition, are not too skillful when it comes to the scientific method. To say the least, they haven't dedicated enough time to the actual scientific research. » Don't Stop Reading » (TRF)
Where the particulates are (and aren't) This press release from NASA has the usual FUD in it, particularly with the "health-sapping" title. But what I find most interesting is the lack of 2.5 μm particulates in the USA and Australia. Yet another USA map further down (link) in the article shows an entirely different view for the same period. It shows a lot of particulates in the San Joaquin valley of California where there is little industry, and a lot of farming, suggesting dust from ag operations. Likewise, the Sahara is full of dust, and dust laden winds coming off the Sahara and towards Cape Verde islands may have a role in hurricane formation. Dust is important in the scheme of things meteorological, as another NASA press release says it's important enough to launch a broad study of.  Global satellite-derived map of PM2.5
averaged over 2001-2006. Credit: Dalhousie University, Aaron van Donkelaar - click to enlarge
New Map Offers a Global View of Health-Sapping Air Pollution In many developing countries, the absence of surface-based air pollution sensors makes it difficult, and in some cases impossible, to get even a rough estimate of the abundance of a subcategory of airborne particles that epidemiologists suspect contributes to millions of premature deaths each year. The problematic particles, called fine particulate matter (PM2.5), are 2.5 micrometers or less in diameter, about a tenth the fraction of human hair. These small particles can get past the body's normal defenses and penetrate deep into the lungs. Continue reading
Right... UN to appoint Earth contact for aliens THE United Nations was set today to appoint an obscure Malaysian astrophysicist to act as Earths first contact for any aliens that may come visiting.
I wonder what planet Melchett is on? Public opinion stopped GM, says campaigner Global resistance has halted the biotech giants, reports Environment Editor Michael McCarthy from the IoS co-sponsored Sustainable Planet Forum
GM food battle moves to fish as super-salmon nears US approval Consumer groups fear green light for engineered species will bring environmental disaster to the oceans (Observer)
In The Rational Optimist, Matt Ridley offers example after spectacular example of a phenomenon that has baffled me ever since I began covering environmental
issues in my first job in journalism thirty years ago: to wit, that while the entire presumable goal, purpose, and raison d'être of applied environmental
science is to solve environmental problems, any environmental scientist who dares to suggest that problems are being solved is asking for trouble. As Ridley
observes, we have arrived at a state where even the most wildly irrational pessimism is treated with reverence, while the most cautiously sober optimism is
ridiculed.
Working to Keep a Heritage Relevant HAMBURG, Pa. -- To millions of Americans, autumn means not just N.F.L. games and the World Series but also the start of hunting season -- a few months packed
with chances to stalk deer, bear, ducks and doves with rifles, shotguns, bows and even black-powder muskets.
Federal Register Notice: Call For Public Comment Public comment is sought on the development of the next USGCRP National Climate Assessment. JunkScience.com visitors are encouraged to submit comments as requested by the FR notice.
Senators Aim To Keep Renewable Power Bill "Clean" Senators backing a bi-partisan bill that would make big utilities begin embracing renewable electricity believe they can get enough votes to pass it without
having to add oil or nuclear incentives to the measure, a Congressional aide said on Friday.
Renewable Electricity Standard: Same as a National Energy Tax
The probability of cap and trade becoming law rapidly diminished as more and more people saw it for what it truly is: a national energy tax. Since 85 percent of our energy comes from carbon-emitting fossil fuels, and the goal of cap and trade is to reduce carbon dioxide, a cap-and-trade system would raise the price of energy to discourage its use. Politicians knew very well that Americans wouldn't stand for a national energy tax--especially during an election year--so despite several murmurs, the Senate failed to move legislation forward. Now, Congress is working on another plan that would mandate higher electricity prices. What makes it more threatening than a cap-and-trade program is that it's garnering bipartisan support. Senators Jeff Bingaman (D--NM) and Sam Brownback (R--KS) introduced legislation that would require utilities to provide 15 percent of their electricity from government-selected renewable energy sources (primarily wind and solar) by 2021. Known as a renewable electricity standard (RES), it may sound less intimidating, but it's nothing more than a plan that would cause electricity prices to skyrocket, leading to unnecessary hardship for American families. Why? Continue reading... (The Foundry)
Trying to prop up the scam: The future of carbon reporting Carbon reporting by U.S.-based companies today has broad similarities to financial reporting before the enactment of the Securities and Exchange Act of 1934.
Just as market forces and regulation evolved then, so too now are we seeing a similar trend.
Carbon scammers say carbon important: Climate Change Climbs the Boardroom Agenda Carbon management is becoming a strategic business priority and competitive driver for the largest global companies, despite the lack of global agreement on climate change. These are among the findings of the 2010 Global 500 report and leadership index released today by the Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP), produced by PwC. (SustainableBusiness at Matter Network)
EU Climate Policy after the Crash of 09 It is now plain that something has gone badly awry with the European Union's policies and views on the issue of climate change. Plain to any observer, it seems, other than the EU Commissioner for Climate Action Connie Hedegaard, and her colleagues inside the shiny towers of the Brussels quartier européen. They continue to assert in a triumph of hope over experience that it will all come good with more of the same polices that have just failed. The EU Emissions Trading Scheme and associated promotion of so-called "cap and trade" carbon trading has crashed and is burning. The carbon price had already crashed twice before the present time. That isn't to say that nothing is happening: much is. A false market in the non-emission of carbon has been created by fiat and is having a dampening effect on already fragile EU economic recovery. But it is fertilising a luxuriant undergrowth of consultants and "carbon traders', rather in the way that speculators in other classic "bubble' markets have been enriched in the past. "Bubble' markets are quite familiar and the motives driving them never change. In 1841 Charles Mackay observed in one of the first works of modern sociology, entitled Extraordinary Popular Delusions and the Madness of Crowds, that greed, ingenuity, credulity and the capacity for self delusion are pretty constant in human nature. Famous examples of bubble markets were for tulip bulbs in the Netherlands in 1636, or the Mississippi Scheme of John Law in France in 1719-20 or the best known -- the South Sea Bubble a couple of years earlier in England. By the way, the promoting motive of the South Sea Company has a cautionary contemporary ring in post-Brownian Britain today as we are told of ever-promised and never materialising "green growth': it was supposed to pay off the government's debt painlessly, by privatised venture. (European Business Review)
Cancun climate talks hopeless: Goldstein It's time for Canada to emerge from the Kyoto stupor and take control of its own energy future George Monbiot is the world's most famous global warming journalist.
China Seeks Binding Climate Treaty Late 2011: Report China wants the world to seal a binding climate change treaty by late 2011, a Chinese negotiator said in a newspaper on Friday, blaming U.S. politics for
impeding talks and making a deal on global warming impossible this year.
Smoke and mirrors: PM seeking 'certainty' on carbon JULIA Gillard and Wayne Swan have appealed to the new parliament to let them put a price on carbon in this term to deliver certainty for business.
Scammers seek legislated profits: Green firms in limbo over carbon credits inaction THE Minister for Climate Change, Greg Combet, is under pressure from green firms to quickly resolve a policy bungle that is forcing businesses in search of
carbon credits to head overseas.
Wishful thinking form the scammers: Combet set to join carbon price push CLIMATE Change Minister Greg Combet is expected to be part of a high-level federal government committee to pursue consensus on a carbon price.
As if they could: PM to move quickly on climate change Julia Gillard will move fast to try to reassert the government's credentials on climate change when Parliament sits for the first time since the election
tomorrow.
What a surprise: Greens senator to be co-deputy of multi-party climate change committee unveiled by PM THE Australian Greens have secured a deputy chair position on a new multi-party climate change committee.
No: Super funds at the mercy of climate change Just one week after the world's biggest miner belled the cat saying Australia's economic competitiveness was at risk by delaying action on pricing pollution,
Australia's first climate change shareholder resolutions have been launched by the innovative Climate Advocacy Fund.
Enviro and Media Agenda on Extreme Weather - State Climatologist Invited, then Uninvited to Rally David R. Legates, Ph.D., C.C.M
Blog Warfare -- Warmist attacks their own Then today Richard Black of the BBC finds out how ugly it can be when you make the mistake (the travesty!) of missing a chance to tell everyone that the Earth's falling apart due to Man-made Global Warming. It's the first time Richard Black has been on the receiving end. He's a bit put out.
Joe Romm took him to task for doing a story on the hottest year without "mentioning the primary cause of global warming" (according to climate models which are known to be wrong). Romm set lots of emailers onto Black. The original "dreadful" story is just reporting how arctic ice melted fast, but didn't shrink as much as 2007. Then you can see the cogs turning in Black's mind with the implications:
Hello, Richard, yes, exactly, and you are catching up fast on the world in 1990. Around then, an intolerant culture was established that scorned anyone who so much as asked difficult questions. Some eminent scientists were sacked. Al Gores staffers attacked Fred Singer so viperously, that he took them to court and won. But what message did that send to the world's scientists? You can speak your doubts on the hypothesis of man-made-catastrophe, but be prepared to spend thousands on lawyers, risk your job, and lose your friends. Singer won the battle, but Al won that war. If Richard Black would like the debate to be less polarized and more scientific he could start by getting over his own noxious use of the derogatory term "denier". More » (Jo Nova)
More on that propaganda: Red Redemption: Fate of the world In 2006, Red Redemption, openly supported by Oxford, BBC, and the Environmental Change Institute, released a Flash game called Climate Challenge. Fate Of The World (game website, trailer)In the new game, you are no longer just a European dictator which was way too modest a job. Now you are chosen the global dictator - the head of the G.E.O. junta - who is hired immediately when the 2010 climate talks fail (see the trailer) and whose task is do everything to reduce the emissions of CO2 in the world. Here are some of your basic options; they became much more "juicy" relatively to the bureaucratic elimination of power plants etc. in the 2006 game:  Click to zoom in. On each continent, you can introduce "mandatory euthanasia" for $100 billion - a policy to kill all the old and ill people. Or you can pay the same money to develop special bio-weapons to predictably exterminate whole nations. For the same payment, you may also induce a regime change just to overthrow politicians who are climate skeptics or who are otherwise hostile to your world government and replace them with "biddable", corrupt politicians of your choice. So this is what they plan if the 2010 climate talks will fail, and be sure that they will? Even if the creators of the game don't intend it, it's clear that some groups will worship the game as a computer model whose lessons justify "action". After all, the likes of the IPCC are already taking much less realistic computer games seriously today. » Don't Stop Reading » (TRF)
No, 99 per cent of climate scientists do not agree A newly released survey done in 2008 of 375 climate scientists - mostly mainstream ones - reveals not quite the certainty and unanimity we're so often sold by the Leftist media:
A third also agree or strongly agree that "external politics" has influenced the direction of climate research this past decade. (Andrew Bolt)
IPCC on Extreme Events: Getting Better but Still Not Great 
Oppenheimer states: So-called "joint attribution" the assignment of cause for the damaging outcomes of such extremes, such as wildfires or human mortality occurring during hot and dry spells, is a relatively new field, and it remains difficult to associate recent increases in most such impacts directly with greenhouse gas emissions, but indirect evidence is strongly suggestive of such a link in many cases.This is a convoluted way of simply saying that the present state of the science does not support claims of attribution. In suggesting that this is a "new" field he notably avoids discussing a large body of literature such as on tropical cyclones (in the US, Australia, China, India, Latin America, etc.), floods, European storms, Australian bushfires, etc. where peer reviewed work has explained damage trends solely in terms of increasing societal vulnerability. Why is it so hard for IPCC authors to acknowledge any of this literature? But, even so, I give Opeenheimer some credit for moving in the right direction. Oppenheimer's conclusion acknowledges the importance of societal factors in driving disasters, but then completely ignores adaptation (which he does mention elsewhere in the presentation), which indicates to me that the desire to advocate among IPCC leaders will be a habit hard to control: Finally, while extreme events are generally a physical phenomenon, circumstances where such events translate into disasters, like Hurricane Katrina or the great European heat wave of 2003, depend in large measure on individual and societal anticipation, planning, and response capacity and implementation. In other words, disaster is partly a social phenomenon. In both of these episodes, the toll was much higher than was imagined possible before the events. Unfortunately, if history is a guide, such situations may become ever more common. Even as we learn to cope better with certain extreme events, the climate may change faster than we learn about it, and faster than our ability to implement what we have learned. The only remedy for such a situation is to act to slow the climate change by slowing greenhouse gas emissions.Oppenheimer's statement is a move in the right direction, but it is highly selective, slanted and gives some misleading policy advice. The reality is that actions today to reduce emissions will not have an discernible effects for many decades. By not mentioning the time scale of the effects of mitigation and the relative role of mitigation and adaptation for addressing future losses (another literature not mentioned), Oppenheimer is arguably misleading. If I had to give a grade to the presentation -- if the IPCC 2007 was an "F," then Oppenheimer gets a "C-." The IPCC leadership still has a ways to go on the issue of extreme events. Its extremes report is not due out for another year (remarkably), so they have lots of time to up their game. (Roger Pielke Jr.)
Ongoing BoM utter incompetence September 25th, 2010 by Warwick Hughes Every month the Australian BoM published a three month "Outlook" (prediction based on models) for rainfall and temperatures. The Outlook press releases are often picked up by the media who
quote them with reverence as though "written on tablets of stone". I am only aware of one journalist who has had the temerity to draw attention to
Outlook shortcomings -- that is Andrew Bolt.
For a start -- the entire Outlook map areas are predicted to be far too hot. This has been a common fault in BoM temperature Oulooks for a long time -- look
for yourself. What are these people smoking ? My main gripes about the mostly failing BoM Outlooks are:
(Warwick Hughes)
Pacific Warming, Atlantic Hurricanes & Global Climate Non-Disruption
In July 2009, Kim et al. suggested that the influence of sea surface warming events in the Central Pacific Ocean contributed to more frequent landfall of North Atlantic tropical cyclones in the Gulf of Mexico and Central America. Their Science report, "Impact of Shifting Patterns of Pacific Ocean Warming on North Atlantic Tropical Cyclones," concluded that the location of the Pacific warming affects the location of cyclone (hurricane) formation and the tracks of tropical cyclones. "Two distinctly different forms of tropical Pacific Ocean warming are shown to have substantially different impacts on the frequency and tracks of North Atlantic tropical cyclones," the report stated. "The eastern Pacific warming (EPW) is identical to that of the conventional El Niño, whereas the central Pacific warming (CPW) has maximum temperature anomalies located near the dateline." If that were true, the predictability of Atlantic hurricane behavior could be improved by taking into account the state of the Pacific.  Composites of SST anomalies during August to October. Shown in the figure above are composites of sea surface temperature (SST) anomalies during the August to October period for (A) EPW, (B) CPW, and (C) EPC. (D) The average number of North Atlantic tropical cyclones per month from June to November for climatology (gray bar), EPW (red), CPW (green), and EPC (blue). The time series has been detrended to eliminate the effects of decadal variability or climate trends. The claim is that this correlation represents a causal relationship and, because the IPCC reports had predicted such a link to climate change, some hailed this as proof that global warming was increasing hurricane activity. To be fair, Kim et al. do not make the direct assertion that anthropogenic climate change is responsible for the warming events. Their report cites uncertainty caused by inadequate models and a lack of data:
But Kim et al.'s apologetics may be moot. A new analysis in Geophysical Research Letters, entitled "On the impact of central Pacific warming events on Atlantic tropical storm activity," researchers from NOAA's Atlantic Oceanographic and Meteorological Laboratory in Miami, Florida, assert that temperature fluctuation in Atlantic waters is sufficient to explain the variation in hurricane frequency and landfall patterns. Sang-Ki Lee, Chunzai Wang and David B. Enfield directly refute Kim et al.'s conclusions:
Scientific disagreements are seldom stated more clearly than that. Lee et al. note that an earlier paper by Yeh et al. argued that, as the CPW has been occurring more frequently since the 1990s, the modification of El Niño pattern due to anthropogenic global warming is already in progress (see "El Niño in a changing climate" in Nature, Sept. 24, 2009). "However, it is shown in this study that neither our independent data analysis of Atlantic tropical cyclones nor further numerical modeling experiments supports the suggested impact of CPW events on increasing Atlantic tropical storm activity," counter Lee et al. In yet another recent study, scientists measured historical changes in El Niño. Lead author Tong Lee of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory and Michael McPhaden of NOAA's Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory measured changes in El Niño intensity since 1982. They analyzed NOAA satellite observations of sea surface temperature, checked against and blended with directly-measured ocean temperature data. The strength of each El Niño was gauged by how much its sea surface temperatures deviated from the average.  El Niños Are Growing Stronger. The NASA investigators say the stronger El Niños help explain a steady rise in central Pacific sea surface temperatures observed over the past few decades in previous studies--a trend attributed by some to the effects of global warming. Lee and McPhaden found the intensity of El Niños in the central Pacific has nearly doubled, with the most intense event occurring in 2009-10. While Lee and McPhaden observed a rise in sea surface temperatures during El Niño years, no significant temperature increases were seen in years when ocean conditions were neutral, or when El Niño's cool water counterpart, La Niña, was present. "Our study concludes the long-term warming trend seen in the central Pacific is primarily due to more-intense El Niños rather than a general rise of background temperatures," said Lee. Lee added that further research is needed to evaluate the impacts of these increasingly intense El Niños and determine why these changes are occurring. "It is important to know if the increasing intensity and frequency of these central Pacific El Niños are due to natural variations in climate or to climate change caused by human-produced greenhouse gas emissions," he said. Tong Lee's party line closing comment cannot change the fact that, once again, no smoking gun for anthropogenic global warming has been found. On August 5, NOAA released its mid-season 2010 forecast. It was revised slightly downwards, to 14--20 named storms, 8--12 hurricanes, and 4--6 major hurricanes. The agency noted that the new estimate was revised downwards from the initial estimate since the latter included the possibility of even more early season activity. However, NOAA indicated that a La Niña event had in fact developed, and that the conditions for an active season remained in place.  The 2010 Atlantic hurricane season as of Sept. 16. Combine over-hyped claims of increased hurricane danger with the news media's strident coverage of even minor storm threats since the Katrina disaster and the public is left believing that this all may be true. The fact is, without an occasional tropical storm the US Southern and Gulf states rapidly descend into drought--hurricanes are a normal and necessary part of the area's climate cycle. This fact is not new, nor is the observation that, as more people crowed the US coastal regions, the deadlier and more damaging hurricanes become. In 2006, MIT climate scientist Kerry Emanuel and colleagues issued a statement on the perceived US hurricane problem:
Though they obviously should have known better, this spate of new research must still disappoint global warming boosters like Obama's science czar John Holdren, who has recently tried to re-brand global warming as "global climate disruption." Sorry John, this is an example of global climate non-disruption. It should be obvious even to the clueless that employing such evasive verbal tactics is just another sign of the troubled state of climate science.  While the frequency of strong El Niños is increasing, at least as measured over the past quarter century, science doesn't have a clue why. Ocean surface temperatures in the central Pacific are up, but only part of the time. Regardless, CPW does not seem to be affecting hurricane frequency or storm paths. Even so, despite their own evidence to the contrary, scientists cannot help but reflexively blame hurricane activity on global warming. Bottom line--Central Pacific Warming is not caused by global warming and CPW does not influence Atlantic hurricane frequency. Never have so many scientists looked so long and so hard for corroborating evidence to prop up a theory. After looking for a smoking gun for 50 years, it is about time for the eco-alarmists and warm-mongering climate change supporters to admit that their pet theory is not supported by the facts. The reason they have not found the proof they seek is simple--the anthropogenic global warming theory is wrong and changing its name to global climate disruption will not make it right. Be safe, enjoy the interglacial and stay skeptical. (Doug L. Hoffman, The Resilient Earth)
Reference September 26th, 2010 Source: Real Science by Steve Goddard
Most people probably assume that measuring the US temperature is as simple as this. And perhaps it should be. Prior to the year 2000, the GISS US temperature graph appeared as below. Note that 1998 was more than half a degree C (almost 1ºF) cooler than 1934.
In the year 2000, they switched places. 1998 became warmer than 1934. How did this magic occur? Read the rest of this entry » (SPPI)
Der Spiegel: The Ocean's Influence Greater Than Thought 24. September 2010 Alex Bojanowski at Germany's online Der Spiegel reports here on a new paper appearing in Nature that shows climate change in the 1970s was caused by ocean cooling. Climate simulation models once indicated that the cooling in the 1970s was due to sun-reflecting sulfur particles, emitted by industry. But now evidence points to the oceans. I don't know why this is news for the authors of the paper. Ocean cycles are well-known to all other scientists. The following graphic shows the AMO 60-year cycle, which is now about to head south.  Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation (AMO).
Source: http://www.appinsys.com/globalwarming/SixtyYearCycle.htm
Computer models simulating future climate once predicted that it would soon get warm because of increasing GHG emissions, but, writes Der Spiegel, citing Nature:
The paper was authored by David W. J. Thompson, John M. Wallace, John J. Kennedy, and Phil D. Jones. The scientists discovered that ocean temperatures in the northern hemisphere dropped an enormous 0.3°C between 1968 and 1972. Der Spiegel writes:
This shows, again, that the climate simulation models used for predicting the future are inadequate. It's not sure what caused the oceans to cool. But scientists are sure that aerosols were not the cause. Der Spiegel describes a possible scenario how the oceans may have cooled:
But, as Spiegel reports, that hardly explains why there was also cooling in the north Pacific. Der Spiegel:
I'd say that's a very polite way of saying: Your models have been crap, and it's back to the drawing board. This time don't forget to properly take the oceans and every thing else into account. Yes, there's a quite a bit more to climate than a single trace gas in the atmosphere. Hooray -- the warmists are finally beginning to realize it! (Maybe) (No Tricks Zone)
Arctic Temperatures Coincide With AMO -- And Not CO2 25. September 2010 Guest writer Ed Caryl recently looked at 9 "rural" stations scattered over the Arctic: from Alaska, to Canada, to Northern Europe western Russia and Siberia, and found Arctic temperatures follow the AMO, and not CO2. Read here A Light In Siberia. It's important to note that the 9 stations were selected because they appeared to be NOT influenced by man-made heat sources. First, here's the AMO going back more than 150+ years. The cycles are clear to see.  Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation (AMO).
Source: http://www.appinsys.com/globalwarming/SixtyYearCycle.htm
 North Pole, 17 March
1959. Image from NAVSOURCE
The AMO shows warm periods centering at about 1880, 1940 and 2005, i.e., 60 year cycle. We recall seeing photos of submarines surfacing at the North Pole back in the 1950s, see photo left, meaning it was relatively balmy back then too, as the AMO chart suggests. Well how do the temperature curves of Ed's 9 untainted Arctic stations match up with the AMO? The following are the GISS graphs of these 9 stations, each shown individually. Take a look at each of them:
What happens from 1940 -- 1980, a time when CO2 was increasing? What happens after 1980? How do these charts match up with the above AMO chart? Fit pretty well? It seems so. Some of the temperature records shown above are shorter and some are longer. But they all show that temperatures between 1940 and 1980 were dropping. Remember that the Arctic is called the canary in the coal mine. When the globe cools or warms, you really see it in the Arctic, so they say. Next Ed Caryl plotted each of the above graphs on a single chart. Ed calls these "rural" stations isolated because they are not impacted by man-made heat sources like asphalt, light bulbs, etc:  Plot of the 9 "rural"
(isolated) stations.
And then he normalized the plots and generated an average. He explains how here, scroll down to "The averaging of station data". The resulting plot with a linear trend line is shown as follows:  Average of the "rural" stations
Sure some hot-shot statisticians out there are going to say you can't do this, or that, or whatever blah blah blah…but that's just nitpicking. Attention to tiny detail is a later thing. Ed's method suffices for now to generate a good general picture. If the math hotshots out there want to do it with micrometers, no one is stopping them. I doubt the general picture is going to change that much, though. If you look at the 9 individual plots above and imagine how a composite of all 9 would look like, it would look like Ed's chart -- common sense. Doesn't the shape of above curve look eerily similar to the shape of the AMO from 1920 to today? Ed thought so too, and so he superimposed the average of the 9 isolated stations and the AMO:
Gee, do you think Arctic temperatures correlate better with CO2? Of course this is only a preliminary analysis that examined only 9 isolated stations scattered over the entire Arctic perimeter. But I suspect that if all stations were thrown in, except the crappy ones equipped with light bulbs and of that sort, you'd end up with similar results. Could the AMO possibly drive climate? Well, the latest paper authored by Phil Jones and others seem to be hinting at this. Read my post from yesterday http://notrickszone.com/2010/09/24/der-spiegel-the-oceans-influence-greater-than-thought/. Obvious conclusion: Trace gas Co2 drives the Arctic climate about as much as a sea breeze drives a loaded freight train. (No Tricks Zone)
In my opinion, this essay is a must read because it clearly illustrates correlation between ocean cycles to; Arctic ice loss and gain, glacier advance and retreat, and land surface temperature rise and fall. As I said graphically in a previous post…
From OceanCycles.com -- click Guest post by Juraj Vanovcan The following article shows, that decadal oscillation in North Atlantic sea surface temperature is the driving force behind observed variations in European climate during 20th century. Long-term North Atlantic SST trend is well correlated to European temperature station record, Alpine glacier retreat/advance and changes in Arctic ice extent as well. Considering the problems with ground station record being contaminated by urbanization, land use changes and selective use, SST record offers an alternative metrics of changes in climate record, since it is free of at least some issues mentioned above. North Atlantic SST record is unique in this view, since it is quite reliable also in the early part of 20th century, when the ship measurement coverage of Atlantic between American continent and Europe had been much denser than in other parts of the globe [1]. Here is presented North Atlantic sea surface temperature record since 1850. While the pre-1880 data are rather noisy, probably because of sparse coverage, the 20th century record shows regular cyclical pattern of warming and cooling. The cycle length is 65 years, with cold minimums reached in 1910 and 1975 and warm maximums in 1940 and 2005.
Figure 1: North Atlantic SST record, expressed as monthly anomalies against 1971-2000 period (HadSST2 dataset) Let's now compare the North Atlantic SST record with the European ground stations within 40-70N and 10W-30E. Continue reading
Climate Wars: EU Threatens Rest Of The World With Flight Ban Friday, 24 September 2010 14:58, Thomas Ludwig, Handelsblatt EU threatens international airlines with banning of landing rights Foreign airlines are threatened with a flight and landing ban from 2012 in the European Union if they do not participate in emissions trading. The ban is proposed in an internal document by the EU Commission seen by Handelsblatt. Summarised on nine pages, the guidelines describe how such a ban could be implement. The Commission considers a flight and landing ban as a last resort to make the airlines surrender over its Emissions Trading Scheme. An EU Directive stipulates that airlines from Europe and third countries are mandated to be included in the trading of emissions rights. On their flights to and from Europe, they may then only emit as much CO2 as the CO2 certificates they hold. 85 percent of the certificates are free of charge while 15 percent of the allowances have to bought via auctions. "The whole project has not been thought through. The EU cannot impose its law on third countries," Holger Krahmer, environmental spokesman for the German Liberal Party in the EU Parliament told Handelsblatt. In fact, international resistance against the EU plan is growing. Several American, Asian and African airlines are suing the EU over its emissions trade project. The US Aviation Association ATA is attempting to have the policy suspended by the European Court of Justice. And the Russian government has also voiced its displeasure in Brussels. Not even critics of the project believe that the European Commission will actually ban flights by American and other foreign airlines. "They will use it as leverage, and accept compensation measures," estimates Liberal MEP Holger Krahmer. The EU Commission is looking for a face-saving way out: "What remains are the costs of CO2 allowances, which will only burden European airlines and make them uncompetitive" Airlines such as Lufthansa and Air Berlin had already warned of this danger in the legislative process. "The EU has once again overestimated itself," said Krahmer. "The project was not thought through. The EU cannot impose its legal authority on third countries." At the end of September, the general assembly of the International Civil Aviation Organisation (ICAO) will take place. Some countries, such as the U.S. want to adopt a resolution, which will make clear that emissions trading systems may only be applied by mutual agreement. "Greenhouse gas emissions have increased dramatically, particularly in air traffic," said Social Democrat MEP Matthias Groote. The climate expert warns against granting exemptions to noncompliant airlines from third countries. "If the U.S. and other countries try to suspend the EU emissions trading regime for third countries, it would lead to a huge distortion of competition for European airspace." It is more important than ever to integrate international aviation into the EU's emissions trading system. After all, the emissions of greenhouse gases in air traffic have doubled in the past two decades. The EU Directive, which includes aviation in emissions trading, is part of a package of regulations with which the EU wants to meet its climate protection goals. Emissions of greenhouse gases should fall by a fifth by 2020 under the 1990 level […] The inclusion of aviation in the Emissions Trading Scheme will impact consumers too. According to calculations by the EU Commission, a ticket for a return flight within the EU could become more expensive by up to nine Euros because of emissions trading. For long-haul flights, larger price increases can be expected, a return ticket to New York could be up to 40 Euros more expensive. [transl. Philipp Mueller] Handelsblatt, 22 September 2010 (GWPF)
Short Circuit: Surmounting the Many Barriers to A National Electricity Grid
This week, the Manhattan Institute (disclosure: I'm a senior fellow at MI) released a pair of reports that look at the obstacles to building and financing a nationwide electricity grid. [Read More] (Robert Bryce, ET)
by Sam Van Vactor U.S. energy markets face a new regulatory framework arising from the failings of the financial sector. Trading costs will rise, threatening liquidity. However, many key elements of the Wall Street Transparency and Accountability Act of 2010 (Dodd-Frank Act) have been passed on to regulators. Their true nature will emerge only with time. The Act does little to streamline oversight activities, while the biggest problem may prove to be "regulatory creep'. Background The Dodd-Frank bill cleared the U.S. House-Senate Conference Committee back on April 25 following intensive days of negotiation, lobbying, and a final all-night drafting session. The House of Representatives quickly approved the legislation, but it stalled in the Senate where a super-majority is required to avoid filibuster. After considerable maneuvering, the bill passed on July 15 and was signed into law by President Barack Obama the next week. Many superlatives have been used to describe the Act -- historic, all encompassing, groundbreaking, etc. But it is far too early to judge its long-term impact. This is because many, if not most, of the key elements have been delegated to regulators to work out over the next year. The Act only provides an outline. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce counts more than 350 rules and regulations, not to mention dozens of studies that regulators will be required to craft. Like so many policy decisions taken in response to the 2008 financial crisis: "the can has been kicked down the road." Now the real lobbying can begin. Treasury on Top For the energy sector, the Commodity Futures Trading Commission (CFTC) will make the key decisions. Its authority expands to include the market for Over-The-Counter swap trading, which until now has been largely unregulated. However, from another perspective, the independence of the CFTC and other Commissions has been constrained. The CFTC, along with nine other agencies and financial regulatory bodies, will form the body of a newly created Financial Stability Oversight Council. The Secretary of the Treasury chairs the Council. To support the Council's work the Act establishes an Office of Financial Research at the Treasury. According to the House's press release, the Office will "be staffed with a highly sophisticated staff of economists, accountants, lawyers, former supervisors, and other specialists to support the council's work by collecting financial data and conducting economic analysis." For those not familiar with the bureaucratic vernacular, this means that the Treasury Department is more or less going to run the show. A number of federal regulatory agencies -- particularly the Securities and Exchange Commission -- were criticized during the financial crisis for inadequate oversight and insufficient interagency coordination. For a time, Congress considered merging the SEC and the CFTC, or setting up completely new regulatory bodies. The FSOC may be a reasonable resolution of the obvious difficulties surrounding either of these alternatives; it remains to be seen. The Act also mandates much closer direct coordination between the CFTC and the SEC. Indeed, much of the Act's language provides parallel directions to the two Commissions, and it orders them to prepare a joint memorandum of understanding on jurisdiction. Clarity may be difficult to come by, since the line between securities and commodities has blurred and promises to become even fuzzier. This obfuscation is further compounded by the plethora of electronic exchanges, "dark pools," bulletin boards, hedge funds, high-frequency traders, and related computer systems that have grown up around the OTC market. Attempts to rationalize regulation broadly through all markets will be a major challenge. [Read more →] (MasterResource)
Brazil's oil prospects break all records of share placing: 70 billion US dollars Brazil's government managed oil and gas company raised 70 billion US in the world's biggest-ever share offering Thursday. The success of Petrobras issue showed the extent of investor interest in Brazil's massive offshore oil reserves, one of the world's fastest-growing regions for energy production. (MercoPress)
Low-Emission Shale Gas to Discourage Nuclear, Carbon Capture, Chatham Says Cheap, low-emission shale gas, with double the global reserves of conventional sources, will discourage investment in nuclear reactors and carbon storage
that would fight climate change, a British study shows.
Sure are worried about darn CO2 emissions, eh? Germany To Lobby For EU Support Vs Commission's Coal Subsidy Plan BERLIN -- Germany will lobby for support among other European Union countries to change European Commission plans to end state aid for coal mines in 2014,
four years earlier than previously scheduled in Germany, a government said Wednesday.
Bob Barr, [un]Principled Supporter of Ethanol by Brian McGraw Barr attributes a "lack of public awareness," and the tax credit's apparent complexity to the trouble ethanol… Read the full story (Cooler Heads)
Solar Stocks Mostly Rise After California Move Solar panels sit on the roof of SunPower Corporation in Richmond, California March 18, 2010. SunPower is a San Jose, California-based maker of
high-efficiency solar panels.
The Thanet wind farm will milk us of billions The media remain conspicuously silent about the real price we pay for wind energy, says Christopher Booker.
Bulgaria Plans Caps On New Green Energy Assets Bulgaria plans to put limits on new renewable energy assets to avoid a spike in sensitive energy prices and a collapse of its aging power grid, Economy and
Energy Minister Traicho Traikov said on Friday.
Wood fired power plants help reduce climate change A retro idea in the UK is already in the US, I'd say it is a better method than some traditional power plant operations, but only works if you have an unlimited supply of trees nearby. From the University of Manchester: How heating our homes could help reduce climate change  New Hamsphire's
wood power project - from power-technology.com click
A radical new heating system where homes would be heated by district centres rather than in individual households could dramatically cut the UK's greenhouse gas emissions. In a series of reports to be presented at a major conference this week, scientists at The University of Manchester claim using sustainable wood and other biofuels could hold the key to lowering harmful greenhouse gases. Continue reading
The Fight to Protect Your Employee Health Care Coverage
A year ago, the President addressed Congress and the American people to explain his vision for the health care plan that would later be signed into law. During that speech, President Obama said that “if you are among the hundreds of millions of Americans who already have health insurance through your job, or Medicare, or Medicaid, or the VA, nothing in this plan will require you or your employer to change the coverage or the doctor you have. Let me repeat this: Nothing in our plan requires you to change what you have.” In an attempt to fulfill this promise, Obamacare includes a provision to allow existing plans to be “grandfathered” under the new law, so that Americans won’t have to change coverage they like to adhere to the new law’s numerous rules and regulations. Continue reading... (The Foundry)
Still No Good News for ObamaCare ObamaCare addresses every healthcare problem, with every solution further centralizing power and decision making in Washington. The promises do not come cheap. (Joseph Antos, American Magazine)
Side Effects: Premiums Will Rise Because of Obamacare
By now, most Americans who have been following the effects of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act (PPACA) realize that the health care overhaul is going to cause health insurance premiums to increase. Even President Obama admitted that his health care plan was “going to increase our costs—we knew that.” However, the number of provisions in Obamacare that will increase premiums is likely far larger than most people realize. In recent research, Heritage analysts Brian Blase and Rea Hederman, Jr., highlight a dozen ways in which Obamacare will raise premiums. Three of the reasons they cover are listed below. To read about all twelve, check out this link. Continue reading... (The Foundry)
The Misery Index has been soaring under Barack Obama, due to his own errors and government failure By Steve H. Hanke President Barack Obama has been marked by the curse of government failure. But you wouldn’t know it by listening to the political and chattering classes in Washington, D.C. and other world capitals. In a classic response, the great dissemblers have done what they do best: When trouble strikes, they dissemble. Indeed, following the Panic of 2008, they have been busy burying their mistakes by pointing fingers, covering up and rewriting history. Alas, their assertions are rarely subjected to what they regard as the indignity of factual verification. Never mind. When it comes to pointing fingers at the alleged culprits of our current economic troubles, the Obama administration has reached back to the rhetoric of class warfare. Who is better to blame than the usual suspects: bankers, businessmen, speculators and, of course, the “rich”?
Millennium Development Goals: Failing to Alleviate Poverty
This week at the U.N. General Assembly President Obama is set to address U.S. efforts to reduce global poverty by reaffirming support for the Millennium Development Goals. After 10 years and trillions of dollars spent, little progress has been achieved. With a ambitious 2015 deadline for the MDG’s completion, the U.N. has a lot of work to do. In his chapter in ConUNdrum, Heritage Director for the Center of International Trade and Economics, Ambassador Terry Miller, states that while U.N. Millennium Development Goals are noble aspirations, they are unachievable. U.N. development programs fail to recognize that development is ultimately a process of individual change that governments can, at best, facilitate. Success is achieved primarily through the efforts of the poor themselves, entrepreneurs, businessmen, and other private actors that organize productive economic activity. A system that lends itself to the inefficiencies created by central planning does little to help those who are in greatest need. A better way to alleviate global poverty is to transform the U.N. system into one that promotes transparency, competition, and democratic values. (The Foundry)
President Obama to the U.N: Do as I Say, Not as I Do!
President Obama said a number of good things in his address yesterday at the United Nation’s Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) Summit in New York. Unfortunately, he has not been following his own good advice. Saying his administration will no longer rely exclusively on metrics of money, food or medicine distributed to the world’s poor but judge the effectiveness of development programs by how successful they are in helping countries move “from poverty to prosperity,” the president advised other world leaders to direct taxpayer-funded foreign aid to countries pursuing economic growth by promoting “good governance and democracy; the rule of law and equal administration of justice; transparent institutions with strong civil societies; and respect for human rights. Because over the long run, democracy and economic growth go hand in hand.” He also urged others to adopt policies that “unleash the next generation of entrepreneurs.” Continue reading... (The Foundry)
EPA rules threaten the economy By Sen. James Inhofe (R-Okla.) - 09/22/10 09:27 PM ET
Traditional religion is having a tough time in parts of the world. Majorities in most European countries have told Gallup pollsters in the last few years
that religion does not “occupy an important place” in their lives. Across Europe, Judeo-Christian church attendance is down, as is adherence to religious
prohibitions such as those against out-of-wedlock births. And while Americans remain, on average, much more devout than Europeans, there are demographic and
regional pockets in this country that resemble Europe in their religious beliefs and practices.
In parts of northern Europe, this new faith is now the mainstream. “Denmark and Sweden float along like small, content, durable dinghies of secular life, where most people are nonreligious and don’t worship Jesus or Vishnu, don’t revere sacred texts, don’t pray, and don’t give much credence to the essential dogmas of the world’s great faiths,” observes Phil Zuckerman in his 2008 book Society without God. Instead, he writes, these places have become “clean and green.” This new faith has very concrete policy implications; the countries where it has the most purchase tend also to have instituted policies that climate activists endorse. To better understand the future of climate policy, we must understand where “ecotheology” has come from and where it is likely to lead. (Joel Garreau, New Atlantic)
Gotta start indoctrination young: Congressman Calls For Schools To ‘Promote The Agenda’ Of Climate Change, Population Limitation Rep. John Sarbanes says more environmental education in public schools will promote the agenda of climate change and population growth.
U.S. Education Secretary Vows to Make American Children 'Good Environmental Citizens' "Today, I promise you that under my leadership, the Department of Education will be a committed partner in the national effort to build a more
environmentally literate and responsible society," said Education Secretary Arne Duncan.
The enduring myth: The world's lungs (pretty picture though) There is hope for forests, but mankind needs to move faster if they are to be saved
THE summer dry-season, now drawing to an end, is when the Amazon rainforest gets cut and burned. The smoke this causes can often be seen from space. But not
this year. Brazil’s deforestation rate has dropped astoundingly fast. In 2004 some 2.8m hectares (10,700 square miles) of the Amazon were razed; last year
only around 750,000 hectares were.
Seeing the wood (the picture with this one, however, could just as easily be smoke-laden wasteland anywhere) Purveyors of water, consumers of carbon, treasure-houses of species, the world’s forests are ecological miracles. They must not be allowed to vanish, says James Astill (Economist)
All is Not What It Appears to Be Hey! Did you know that what is depicted in those nature documentaries is not always genuinely "in the wild?" It's often set up in controlled circumstances, according to Chris Palmer, author of a new book that uncovers the tricks used by wildlife videographers. From the Washington Post: (Paul Chesser, AmSpec)
A Troubling Decline in the Caribou Herds of the Arctic Across the Far North, populations of caribou — an indispensable source of food and clothing for indigenous people — are in steep decline. Scientists point to rising temperatures and a resource-development boom as the prime culprits. (Ed Struzik, e360)
Model deaths: Talking to death: texts, phones kill 16,000 WASHINGTON - Drivers distracted by talking or texting on cell phones killed an estimated 16,000 people from 2001 to 2007, U.S. researchers reported on
Thursday.
EU finds no narcolepsy link to flu vaccine LONDON - There is no evidence to link GlaxoSmithKline's H1N1 swine flu vaccine Pandemrix to cases of narcolepsy, European drugs regulators said on Thursday,
but a full review is needed and will take three to six months.
Norwegian research questions benefit of mammograms BOSTON - Routine breast screening with mammograms is less effective at preventing cancer deaths than expected, Norwegian researchers said on Wednesday in a
study that reignites a fierce debate over the value of screening.
Not getting too hot can save you from heat-related problems? Just don't know how they do it... Air conditioning drives down hospitalizations NEW YORK - Air conditioning not only keeps you cool during the summer heat, it may also keep you alive.
University of Western Australia seeks survey respondents: Attitudes Towards Science* This study explores people’s beliefs about a wide range of topics, ranging from scientific propositions to claims made in the media and on the internet. In
addition, the survey is interested in your attitudes towards your own life and issues confronting modern societies at the moment. The survey consists of around
40 questions and should take less than 10 minutes to complete.
Federal Register Notice: Call For Public Comment Public comment is sought on the development of the next USGCRP National Climate Assessment. JunkScience.com visitors are encouraged to submit comments as requested by the FR notice.
Issa calls for 'relook' at climate science By Darren Goode - 09/23/10 07:44 AM ET
Sigh... California's Whitman Against Climate Law Challenge Republican candidate for California governor Meg Whitman said on Thursday she would vote against a challenge to the state's vanguard climate change law,
although she would still suspend it for a year if elected.
Immelt Has Some “Thought Bullets” by Fran Smith Mr. “Ecomagination” — GE’s CEO Jeffrey Immelt — called on the U.S. to put a long-term price on carbon so this country could compete with China in being “green, green, green, green - four greens,” according to a news article today in Bloomberg. In his speech, the article notes, Immelt said that a carbon pricing scheme would create jobs:
So taxing energy use — raising the price of energy — will be a job stimulator. Doesn’t sound like it, if he… Read the full story (Cooler Heads)
Pressure mounting for Rajendra Pachauri to resign as IPCC head Pressure is mounting for Rajendra Pachauri to resign as head of the UN climate change panel over fears that his increasingly troubled tenure is hampering efforts to halt global warming. (TDT)
Et tu Harrabin? UN climate chief resignation call Several environmentalists, UK MPs and scientists has called for the resignation of Rajendra Pachauri, chair of the UN's climate science body.
Climatism: Redoubling Misguided Efforts Undaunted by Climategate disclosures and the failure to pursue climate legislation in the Senate, the climate movement is stepping up the attack. At an
August 10 virtual town hall held by Repower America, former Vice President Al Gore stated, "We are not defeated. We are redoubling our efforts ...We need
to solve the climate crisis." Thousands of supporters listened to the call. Inspired by Mr. Gore, they intend to "roll up their sleeves" and
"turn their attention to the future." Unfortunately, the climate movement is long on enthusiasm and ideology, but short on science and economic sense.
Disasters mirror climate models: US environment chief The flurry of exceptional weather disasters in recent years is completely consistent with scenarios about an aspect of climate change, the head of the US
National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) said on Tuesday.
Eilperin with more of the manufactured "emergency": Signs of climate change fail to improve political environment for cap-and-trade The evidence for climate change grows: The first eight months of 2010 put this year on track to tie 1998 as the hottest year on record, global bleaching is
devastating coral reefs and Arctic summer sea ice is reaching new lows.
Accuweather's Joe Bastardi thrives on controversy swirling around his beliefs STATE COLLEGE -- Summer is just so yesterday.
Rebranding exercise: China's great green wall grows in climate fight China is speeding ahead with its massive tree-planting project to combat climate change - but questions still remain over the great green wall's
effectiveness
Trying the alternate "crisis" of "acidification": Some North Atlantic Pollution Falls, New Threats Loom Efforts to clean up and protect the North East Atlantic have made some progress since 2000 but new threats are looming such as ocean acidification linked to climate change, a study said on Thursday. (Reuters)
Global Warming Hoax Weekly Round-Up, Sep. 23rd 2010 Global warming has a new name to scare the kids with, California has something called ‘air activists’, there is something rotten in Finland and the age of discovery is dead. (Daily Bayonet)
Funnier by the day: UK’s shipping emissions six times higher than expected says new report Carbon dioxide emissions produced by UK shipping could be up to six times higher than currently calculated, according to new research from The University of
Manchester.
Oh... Richard Branson on climate change
(Economist)
Paper: Current Arctic Sea Ice is More Extensive than Most of the past 9000 Years A peer-reviewed paper published in the Canadian Journal of Earth Sciences finds that Arctic sea ice extent at the end of the 20th century was more extensive than most of the past 9000 years. The paper also finds that Arctic sea ice extent was on a declining trend over the past 9000 years, but recovered beginning sometime over the past 1000 years and has been relatively stable and extensive since. The paper also demonstrates that even though annual sea ice extent has been less than the present throughout most of the last 9000 years, low sea ice has consistently failed to cause a planetary albedo 'tipping point' claimed by warmists. (Hockey Schtick)
Grudging admission from Nude Socialist: The sun joins the climate club
Comment To Andy Revkin On The Dot Earth Post “A-Sharp-Ocean-Chill-And-20th-Century-Climate” Dot Earth has a post titled A Sharp Ocean Chill and 20th Century Climate David W. J. Thompson, John M.Wallace, John J. Kennedy & Phil D. Jones, 2010: An abrupt drop in Northern Hemisphere sea surface temperature around 1970. Nature. doi:10.1038/nature09394 The abstract reads
In response to Andy’s alerting me to this post, I replied (Roger Pielke Sr., Climate Science)
Schmidt, Mann, Rutherford: just clueless Mostly off-topic: Yesterday, Czech President Václav Klaus gave a talk at Johns Hopkins University in D.C. about the EU, the evolution of the recent crisis, and a new case for capitalism: full transcript. In a discussion with the students, our leader has also identified plans for a "world government" to be an utter left-wing cosmopolitan nonsense that he will attempt to annihilate.  One
month ago, we discussed thepaper by McShane and Wyner (MW)in Annals of Applied Statistics that has demonstrated something we have known for years - namely that the methodology behind the hockey sticks is not a reliable tool to reconstruct the temperatures. The very method is flawed and can be seen to produce hockey stick graphs out of red noise, as McShane and Wyner have explicitly concluded, too. The journal has just published a Mannian reply, reply to MW by Gavin Schmidt, Michael Mann, and Scott Rutherford.It's quite incredible: they're clearly completely clueless, or at least they pretend to be. » Don't Stop Reading » (TRF)
Own Weather Records Contradict Germany’s Weather Service Director 23. September 2010 
Berlin temperature record for the last 300 years The European Institute For Climate and Environment (EIKE) in Germany recently had a piece at it’s blogsite here, which I have summarized. The USA has James Hansen, and England has Phil Jones. Germany now has Prof. Dr. Gerhard Adrian, the new President of the German Weather Service. His mission: to produce a trend to climate catastrophe as quickly as possible. Recently he said:
and:
This is the new message from the once respected German Weather Service. Suddenly, doom and gloom are the forecast. Inconveniently for Dr. Adrian, his own data and earlier statements made by German Weather Institutes seem to contradict his claims. Firstly, why choose a timescale that starts in 1881 when records go back as much as 300 years in Europe? The following graphics are temperature charts going back more than 200 years for some European cities (visit EIKE for better quality graphics (here). 
Temperature plots for some European cities. Here’s the temperature chart for Berlin going back 300 years (same as above in the introduction): 
Berlin's weather record There we don’t see much going on until about 1990. In fact the total trend is 0.08″C rise per century – statistically insignificant. Surely Dr. Adrian is aware of this. Now let’s take a look at the temperature CO2 correlation. 
Berlin temperature vy CO2 concentrations. Poor correlation there too. While atmospheric CO2 concentrations climbed from 1750 to 1980, Berlin’s temperature did the opposite. But when one is hired to promote global warming alarmism, then 1881 is a good place to start. Let’s go back and look at the last 2000 years. Maybe that’ll reveal something more earth-shattering. 
Pre-Mannian temperature reconstruction for the last 2000 years All the climate catastrophe talk put out by Hansen, Jones, and now Dr. Gerhard Adrian, simply do not materialize when you take an honest look at the statistics. As far as weather extremes occurring, here’s what the German Weather Institutes said in the pre-Gerhard-Adrian days, just a couple of years ago. According to the German Weather Service, recently quoting the German Meteorological Society, 3/2002, p. 2:
According to a German Weather Service press conference 24 April 2007, Berlin;
And again, according to the German Meteorological Society 3/2002, S. 2, on the flood of 2002:
Dr. Adrian ought to listen to his own data. (No Tricks Zone)
The University of Ottawa has a notorious record regarding access to information and protection of personal information: LINK-1, LINK-2, LINK-3, LINK-4, LINK-5, LINK-6, LINK-7, LINK-8.
More dirty pool by NCDC’s Karl, Menne, and Peterson  Embedded with permission from dilbert.com - click to see original
I’ve mentioned more than once in the past how the Tom Karl managed National Climatic Data Center (NCDC) team has taken to using my data without my permission. They even ignored my letter sent direct to Tom Karl. I’d written to him to explain how Menne et al took that data, against my protestations of it being incomplete and not yet quality controlled, but planned on using it to write a paper refuting my work anyway. This was done before I could even get the surfacestations project survey completed. The goal of course was to preemptively refute what I and the volunteers had exposed: the pathetic condition of the USHCN climate observation network in the USA where only 1 in 10 stations meet the NOAA’s basic 100 foot exposure rule. When you are faced with budget killing criticisms, I guess in their view playing dirty pool doesn’t seem so bad. Dr. Roger Pielke Senior voiced some similar criticisms of this amateurish behavior on the part of NCDC, Karl, and Menne, saying it amounted to professional discourtesy. Even NCDC GHCN guru Tom Peterson got into the act early on, writing a ghost authored “talking points” memo about the surfacestations project. Dr. Pielke weighed in on that too. Forgetting to clear his PDF editor document properties, Peterson was promptly busted for writing a ghost paper: Here is a screencap: Continue reading
Further Confirmation Of Klotzbach Et al 2009 In Klotzbach, P.J., R.A. Pielke Sr., R.A. Pielke Jr., J.R. Christy, and R.T. McNider, 2009: An alternative explanation for differential temperature trends at the surface and in the lower troposphere. J. Geophys. Res., 114, D21102, doi:10.1029/2009JD011841. Klotzbach, P.J., R.A. Pielke Sr., R.A. Pielke Jr., J.R. Christy, and R.T. McNider, 2010: Correction to: “An alternative explanation for differential temperature trends at the surface and in the lower troposphere. J. Geophys. Res., 114, D21102, doi:10.1029/2009JD011841″, J. Geophys. Res., 115, D1, doi:10.1029/2009JD013655 we concluded
In our paper, Christy, J.R., Herman, B., Pielke, R., Sr., Klotzbach, P., McNider, R.T., Hnilo, J.J., Spencer, R.W., Chase, T., and Douglass, D. What Do Observational Datasets Say about Modeled Tropospheric Temperature Trends since 1979?. Remote Sens. 2010, 2, 2148-2169. in which this issue was explored further we reported that
An ideal candidate for explaining this divergence between the lower tropospheric and surface temperature records is a systematic warm bias in the surface temperature trend data. As presented yesterday (see), even the research groups who are using this data to admit to a lack of information on the siting history of these surface (GHCN) observing locations. (Roger Pielke Sr., Climate Science)
Russia’s Pre-emptive Arctic Strike
(Moscow) Let’s face it, though the UN Law of the Sea Department has yet to confirm it, at least 60 percent of the Arctic is Russian territory. [Read More] (Peter C. Glover, ET)
“Why They Go Green” (WSJ editorial says much in few words) by Robert Bradley Jr. When will Democrats and true environmentalists wake up to windpower, or what Robert Bryce calls the ethanol of electricity? Industrial wind is a scam when seen in all of its dimensions–economic, environmental, and esthetic. Bryce has identified five myths of green energy–and post after post at MasterResource by Kent Hawkins, Jon Boone, and John Droz Jr. have shown that meaningful CO2 reductions from windpower are highly debatable. Industrial wind is chock full of environmental negatives and isn’t nearly as effective at reducing air emissions than advertised. Big Wind is corporate welfare with companies like GE and FPL skipping their federal taxes. Wind today is the legacy of Enron, the Ken Lay model of political capitalism. Wind is an assault on lower-income energy users, not only taxpayers. (And Democrats are supposed to be for the little guy….) Yet the Left marches onward with no inkling of a need–given their own purported values–to make midcourse corrections. Industrial wind and on-grid solar were supposed to be competitive by now. Beginning in the 1980s, the (false) promises have come again and again from wind and solar proponents. Read the quotations here. And now, desperation has set in for an industry that needs more government (point-of-a-gun) energy policy to continue its artificial boom. And so a fundraiser yesterday was held by the renewable lobby for Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D. Nevada) that caught the eye of the Wall Street Journal, which published this short op-ed, Why They Go Green: [Read more →] (MasterResource)
The Government’s Light Bulb Ban Is Just Plain Destructive
The economic theory of “creative destruction” is important when understanding the value innovation has on long-term economic growth. Popularized by Austrian economist Joseph Schumpeter, the theory says the short and long-term benefits of entrepreneurial activity and competition will far outweigh the short-term losses caused by a new product replacing an old one. Audiotape makers may lose their jobs to the makers of compact discs, who may lose their jobs to the digital age. When it occurs organically, it’s a beautiful process that begets economic progress and benefits the consumer. When forced on businesses and consumers by our government, it does far more harm than good. And that’s exactly what’s occurring with the federally mandated incandescent light bulb ban. In 2007, Congress passed an energy bill that placed stringent efficiency requirements on incandescent bulbs in an attempt to phase them out beginning in 2012 and replace them with more expensive but more energy-efficient bulbs, the most popular being compact fluorescent bulbs (CFLs). Politicians used a distorted view of creative destruction mixed with global warming concerns to sell the regulation. They said it would create jobs, save consumers money, and reduce greenhouse gas emissions. But what’s really happened? Continue reading... (The Foundry)
Will High Costs Kill Merkel's Green Revolution? Chancellor Angela Merkel's vision of completing Germany's conversion to renewable energy by 2050 is bold and ambitious. But she has remained silent about the risks and the tremendous costs the green revolution will entail -- for Germany and all of Europe. (Spiegel)
Germany Could See Solar Power Cap: BlackRock Rising costs for solar power in Germany could either trigger a further large cut in sector subsidies or a cap on new installations in the world's No.1 solar
market, a BlackRock fund manager said.
Analysis: Firms Jump On UK Offshore Wind Bandwagon The promised vast expansion of the UK's offshore wind resources is proving to be a powerful lure for companies not normally associated with renewables but
keen to generate eco-friendly and reliable sources of revenue.
 Rare Earths used
in Hybrid cars - Image from thetruthaboutcars.com - click
From Slashdot: The NY Times reports that the Chinese government has placed a trade embargo on all exports to Japan of a crucial category of minerals used in products like hybrid cars, wind turbines and guided missiles. China mines 93 percent of the world’s rare earth minerals, and more than 99 percent of the world’s supply of some of the most prized rare earths, which sell for several hundred dollars a pound. Continue reading
Resistance To Health Reform Still Runs High Happy Birthday, ObamaCare. Six months old today and raising the cost of medical care, restricting patient options and causing employers to drop workers three years before even being fully implemented. (Kerri Houston Toloczko, IBD)
ObamaCare: The first provisions of the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act take effect Thursday, and casualties are already piling up. This week's include children who'll have to go without health insurance. (IBD)
Tell me again why Democrats want socialized medicine? German government passes health reform to plug funding gap BERLIN - German Chancellor Angela Merkel's cabinet passed a controversial reform on Wednesday meant to overhaul the country's cash-strapped health system and
plug a funding gap, Health Minister Philipp Roesler said.
The U.N. Wants to Tax the World Out of Poverty
At the United Nation’s Millennium Development Goals (MDGs) Summit in New York this week, French President Nicolas Sarkozy and Spain’s Prime Minister José Luis Zapatero both called for a global financial transaction tax to fund foreign aid projects to lift the world’s poor out of poverty. Sounding more like a populist politician than an international civil servant, U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon chimed in supportively, warning developed countries not to “balance budgets on the backs of the poor.” Trouble is, there is little evidence that the vast sums of tax dollars expended on Official Development Assistance (ODA, or foreign aid) by U.N. donor governments in the past 50 years have made much of a difference. In fact, foreign aid may actually impede the economic growth needed to achieve the MDGs. Continue reading... (The Foundry)
The U.N.’s Perpetual Effort to Attain the Power to Tax Tell me if you’ve heard this one. The United Nations champions many good ideas and efforts afoot that would vastly benefit people around the world if only it had the resources to pursue them. Standing in the way of all of this “good” are stubborn, stingy nations (like the U.S.) that do not give the U.N. enough resources to pursue their goals. If only the U.N. could circumvent the pesky issue of national sovereignty and tax individuals directly the U.N. could do wonders. Although this may sound reasonable to those unfamiliar with the U.N., it is a recipe for disaster considering the U.N.’s extensive record of mismanagement, ineffectiveness, unaccountability and opacity. Creating an international tax to fund the U.N. and other multilateral programs has long been a dream of global government advocates. Over the years, various U.N. reports and government officials have proposed taxing currency transactions and carbon, airline flights, international arms sales, resources harvested from outer space or the oceans, and e-mail. Continue reading... (The Foundry)
Criticism Grows of Afghanistan's Bloated NGO Industry The NGO community in Afghanistan has grown into an industry where a large part of aid budgets is spent on security, and money gets frittered away on pointless projects. Afghans are becoming increasingly skeptical about the foreign organizations that are supposed to be rebuilding their country. (Spiegel)
Red Tape Rises Again: Cost of Regulation Reaches $1.75 Trillion
How much does federal regulation cost Americans each year? The question is not an easy one. While the revenues and expenditures of the government are budgeted and accounted for each year, the costs of regulation are largely hidden from view, paid for indirectly via higher prices, fewer choices, and less innovation. The best estimates of the total cost, however, have come from a series of reports commissioned by the Small Business Administration (SBA). The latest such report was released today by the SBA’s Office of Advocacy, and the results are startling. Rules and restrictions imposed from Washington now cost Americans some $1.75 trillion each year. That is sharply higher that the $1.1 trillion in costs reported in 2005 in the SBA’s last such study. Continue reading... (The Foundry)
This will have the antivaxxers baying at the moon :-) All pregnant women should get flu shot, say ob-gyns NEW YORK - Despite landing in the hospital more often if they catch the flu, no more than a quarter of pregnant women in the U.S. get vaccinated against it.
Eye-roller: Expert Jennifer James calls for infant formula to be prescribed to boost breast feeding rate INFANT formula should be available only on prescription to boost breast feeding rates, an expert says.
PC nonsense: Environment Key To U.S. Security: Congress Briefing Environmental degradation and waning natural resources threaten U.S. security in the 21st century, in a shift from "kinetic" security threats,
defense experts told a Capitol Hill briefing Wednesday.
Lack of development: Water, sanitation vital to poverty goals: U.N. UNITED NATIONS - The lack of clean drinking water and sanitation in the world's poorest nations threatens U.N. goals to cut poverty and disease, and raises
the risk of conflict, leaders and aid groups said on Wednesday.
Merkel's Backpedaling on Aid Is 'Cynicism, Pure and Simple' On Tuesday, German Chancellor Angela Merkel told world leaders gathered at the UN in New York that the Millennium Development Goals would not be met and that recipient nations must be more efficient in their use of the aid they get. In Germany, some commentators found her new stance cynical, while others welcomed it. (Spiegel)
Guest post: only trade-fuelled growth can help the world’s poor By William Easterly
Clinton unveils U.S. funds for clean cookstove push NEW YORK - Secretary of State Hillary Clinton announced on Tuesday a U.S. contribution of some $50 million toward providing clean cooking stoves in
developing countries to reduce deaths from smoke inhalation and fight climate change.
Radical Environmental Groups Extorting Federal Money with Lawsuit Threats A federal project comes up, radical groups threaten to entangle it in litigation, the government pays them to go away. Fundraising! (Karen Budd Falen, PJM)
'Lost' species of frog rediscovered Three ‘extinct’ species of frog have been rediscovered as part of a search for the world’s ‘lost amphibians’.
Bypasses seal deal for eels to return to Britain They are as fragile as their name suggests, yet glass eels survive being hurled about by terrifying storms as they evade sharp-toothed predators on a
4,000-mile, three-year odyssey from the North Atlantic. Then they arrive in Britain only to find that the barricades are up.
Biodiversity is the variety of genes, species, and ecosystems that constitute life on Earth. It represents the diversity of materials available from nature that we humans turn into food, timber, medicines, and fibers for clothing. Some estimate that the economic value of benefits from biodiverse natural ecosystems may be 10 to 100 times the cost of maintaining them. So how are we doing in this International Year of Biodiversity? In “Despite Progress, Biodiversity Declines ,” Science reporter Erik Stokstad lays out a number of key areas, taken directly from the CBD report Global Biodiversity Outlook 3:
While things could probably be better, this report does not sound like humans are creating a sixth major extinction event as some have claimed. Progress is being made all but one area, consumption of biological resources, and that is to be expected. We will either hunt/harvest some species to extinction or learn to conserve and manage those resources. If you are really into sushi, learn to protect the bluefin tuna. Many nations are taking active steps to protect and restore marine harvest, from cod to krill. What's more, nations like Brazil and Indonesia are taking steps to preserve their forests. Perhaps things are not as bad as some eco-alarmists would have us believe. Besides, it is hard to judge humanity's impact on biodiversity when science still doesn't have a firm idea of how many species share the planet with us. Appearing in the same issue of Science, a news focus article by Dennis Normile, “Joint Expedition Discovers Deep-Sea Biodiversity, New Volcanoes,” report that scientists are still discovering new species by the thousands:
The deep ocean “is hugely unexplored,” states Stephen Hammond, chief scientist for ocean exploration at the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA). Meryl Williams, a former director general of The WorldFish Center in Penang, Malaysia, and a member of the Census of Marine Life steering committee adds that large swaths of the oceans “haven't been touched yet.”  Some new species of ocean life recently discovered. Photos NOAA. Back on land, large-scale deforestation in the Amazon has declined by 47.5% over the past 12 months, according to a preliminary survey by the Brazilian Ministry of Environment using a low-resolution satellite. This is one of the largest declines since measurements began 20 years ago. If confirmed by a second set of satellite measurements due out later this year, it would mean more than an 80% drop in forest loss since a 2004 peak. According to the report “Brazil Says Rate of Deforestation in Amazon Continues to Plunge ,” by Antonio Regalado, recent decisions by large food processors and supermarkets not to buy soybeans and beef from newly deforested areas has helped to slow the rate of deforestation. Naturally this report is not welcome news to the professional eco-alarmists and green NGOs. Greenpeace in Brazil labeled the government's use of such preliminary figures as “propaganda.” Evidently, environmental activists are incapable of accepting good new. In the review article, “Biodiversity Conservation: Challenges Beyond 2010,” Michael R. W. Rands et al. paint a grimmer picture. In 2002, scientists with WWF published a map of 238 ecological regions selected to represent the range of Earth's ecosystems. The color coding, shown in the figure below, groups the terrestrial regions into 14 biome types. The eco-regions include areas with particularly rich biodiversity or unusual ecology or evolutionary phenomena, such as the radiation of Galápagos finches. Many of these areas face dire threats, whereas others are better protected.  Rands et al. claim that continued growth of human populations and rising individual consumption have resulted in unsustainable exploitation of Earth’s biological diversity. Exacerbated by climate change, ocean acidification, and other anthropogenic environmental impacts, biodiversity continues to decline. “We argue that effective conservation of biodiversity is essential for human survival and the maintenance of ecosystem processes,” the authors state. “Moving beyond 2010, successful conservation approaches need to be reinforced and adequately financed.” They sum up the current state of affairs this way:
Increasing demand for vegetable oils—for food, cosmetics, and biofuels—has put further pressure on biodiversity. Expanded corn, sugar cane and palm oil production threatens uncleared forest lands. Marine biodiversity is also under increasing pressure, with steep declines in fish populations and loss of marine habitats resulting from over fishing. As though rapacious human nature isn't bad enough, some say we are also threatening biodiversity through anthropogenic climate change:
Some how you knew that AGW would enter the argument. And evidently, we are damned if we do and damned if we don't—mitigation strategies like biofuels make the cure worse than the disease. That is why this blog has called for the end of all government backing for the biofuel industry. Wind, solar, hydro and geothermal can also damage ecosystems. These facts have become clearer over time but that has not stopped fatuous ecotards like John Holdren from calling for the “de-development” of the industrial world. I'm sorry, but all of this wailing and gnashing of teeth has a familiar sound to it. One would think that species had never before gone extinct or been forced to shift their ranges. I guess the all those glacial-interglacial and interglacial-glacial transitions don't count, only the supposedly man made changes. Or maybe, because it takes a long time for continents to bash into one another, it is only a terrible thing when humans introduce “invasive species.” Species invade new habitats all the time, and an invasion doesn't always require a new land bridge. There used to be giant ground sloths in South America. The first sloths arrived in North America about 7 million years ago, presumably by swimming between islands from South America. Some sloths even evolved into fully aquatic creatures similar to modern seals, though they are now extinct. By 13,000 years ago, all North American ground sloths were also extinct, except for a few populations on Caribbean islands. H. sapiens did not create them, did not move them from continent to continent, and did not drive them to extinction. Face it, when it comes to killing off species, nature is the champion.  Aquatic sloths evolved and went extinct, with no interference from man. Those who would vilify humanity while ignoring the sanguinary 4 billion year history of life on this planet are contemptible. No matter how bad you think humans are, nature is worse. Humans have even come close to going extinct. I have repeated this statement from the Smithsonian's paleobiology web site before:
And while humans have undoubtedly become a significant additional cause of extinction for many species over the past 25,000 years, our impact is trivial compared with nature's own killing sprees. Again quoting from the Smithsonian site:
Personally, I am all for preserving biodiversity. All of those field tested, successful genomes running around represent a wealth of useful information that mankind can tap. According to a PNAS article, “What lies underneath: Conserving the oceans’ genetic resources,” by Jesús M. Arrieta et al., “human appropriation of marine genetic resources (MGRs), with over 18,000 natural products and 4,900 patents associated with genes of marine organisms, with the latter growing at 12% per year, demonstrates that the use of MGRs is no longer a vision but a growing source of biotechnological and business opportunities.” This reflects my long standing opinion that if you wish to save a species put it on the menu—cows and chickens are certainly not endangered species. While the growing commercial importance of MGRs bodes well for their future preservation, Arrieta et al. further state that diversified human use of marine resources calls for an urgent revision of the goals and policies of marine protected areas. The protection of MGRs or any other natural genetic resources is a good thing, and better international laws, treaties and cooperation in this area are certainly called for. But trying to elevate biodiversity decline to the level of “crisis” or declaring the beginning of an Anthropocene Epoch will backfire, just like the climate change “crisis” self-imploded.  The CBD will meet soon to adopt a new strategic plan. The new plan revises several of the 21 previous sub-targets, such as controlling invasive species, creating more nature reserves and of course, climate change. “The challenges of addressing the social and behavioral contexts for biodiversity conservation are daunting,” state Rands et al. “This is the year in which governments, business, and civil society could decide to take seriously the central role of biodiversity in human well-being and quality of life and to invest in securing the sustainable flow of nature’s public goods for present and future generations.” It could be, but I wouldn't bet on it. People are more interested in raising themselves out of poverty, curing the ravages of childhood diseases or simply eating regularly. Nature lovers and ecological NGOs must learn that people do not respond well to hyped up claims of a biodiversity “crisis.” Particularly calling humanity evil for the piddling impact we have had on biodiversity. If the goal is to have people value nature more, then nature must be made more valuable to people. Stop trying to frighten people and work on the harder problem of convincing them that biodiversity is a good thing. Spreading frightening and accusatory biodiversity balderdash will not work, and for everyone's sake, stop yammering on about climate change. Be safe, enjoy the interglacial and stay skeptical. (Doug L. Hoffman, The Resilient Earth)
By Steve Milloy Will Sam Brownback’s last act as a senator be to sellout Kansas and the rest of America on capping greenhouse gas emissions? Sen. Brownback joined Sen. Jeff Bingaman (D-NM) and several other senators earlier this week in introducing a bill to establish a national renewable electricity standard (RES), which Sen. Harry Reid (D-NV) has indicated he would try to make the consolation prize in this Congress’ final lame duck-clash over global warming regulation. Sen. Brownback called RES a common-sense energy policy and said, “the beauty of this is it is not cap and trade.” What is RES and why should Sen. Brownback not let an RES bill stain his senatorial legacy? An RES would require that electric utilities generate a set percentage of their power from so-called “renewable” power sources, like solar and wind, by a certain date. The Waxman-Markey cap-and-trade bill, which was disastrous-for-House-Democrats, passed in June 2009 and would, for example, require that utilities generate 20 percent of their power from renewables by the year 2020. Sen. Bingaman’s bill would reduce the Waxman-Markey standard to 15 percent as per Sen. Brownback’s request. But even a 15 percent RES would be quite the monumental challenge given that solar and wind power provide less than 2 percent of current electricity generation and require massive subsidies to do even that much. According to the Department of Energy, solar and wind are each subsidized at a rate 55 times that of coal, 97 times that of natural gas and 15 times that of nuclear power. Solar panels and windmills aside, it’s only the taxpayer wallet that makes these forms of energy “renewable.” But cost is not the main reason for rejecting the arbitrary targets and deadlines of a national RES. Imagine a utility that generates 100 percent of the electricity it sells by burning coal or natural gas . Impose the Bingaman-Brownback RES standard on that utility and, all of a sudden, only a maximum of 85 percent of its electricity can be generated by fossil fuels. In other words, the utility’s use of fossil fuels has been capped. Since the passage of the Waxman-Markey bill, Americans have been up in arms against cap-and-trade. But the same reasons for opposing cap-and-trade can, and ought, to be applied to RES, which should be labeled “cap-and-subsidize.” Under cap-and-trade, electric utilities would be compensated for higher generation costs by charging consumers more for electricity and by selling billions of dollars of carbon credits, received for free courtesy of taxpayers. Under RES, electric utilities would be similarly compensated for higher generation costs, courtesy of over-charged consumers and untold billions in taxpayer subsidies. So the difference between RES and cap-and-trade is merely a change in form, not a change in substance of an economy-killing consumer/taxpayer rip-off. Sen. Brownback hasn’t yet figured out that the effort to regulate greenhouse gases is not spurred by good faith intentions to protect the environment as much as it is spurred by the left-wing political agenda to increase government control over the U.S. economy through energy rationing. It is ironic that just as Kansas succeeds in beating back the radical green agenda — witness the likely permitting this year of the controversial Sunflower coal-fired power plant in southwest Kansas — Sen. Brownback would surrender the state and nation to the agenda of the Obama administration’s admitted socialists, energy czar Carol Browner and former green jobs czar Van Jones. America has rightly rejected cap-and-trade and its associated political agenda. Sen. Brownback should too; and if he returns to Kansas as governor, he needs to leave such bad green ideas in Washington, D.C. Steve Milloy publishes JunkScience.com and is the author of “Green Hell: How Environmentalists Plan to Control Your Life and What You Can Do to Stop Them” (Regnery 2009). Tell Sen. Brownback that an RES is a bad idea and he’s being played for a sucker by Harry Reid.
Motion to Stay Makes Strong Case Court Should Overturn EPA Global Warming Rules by Marlo Lewis Last Thursday (September 16, 2010), three groups, each led by the Coalition for Responsible Regulation (CRR), filed motions with the D.C. Circuit Court of Appeals to “stay” (put a hold on) the Environmental Protection Agency’s recently finalized greenhouse gas regulations. The EPA regulations at issue are: The Endangerment Rule, which finds
that greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions endanger public health and welfare, thereby obligating EPA to develop and adopt GHG emission standards for new
motor vehicles. Read the full story (Cooler Heads)
<chuckle> Environmentalists need a new president I confess that when I initially heard of it, I thought Bill McKibben's drive to return solar panels to the White House was essentially a waste of time: of
all the things to ask the president, it seemed like the smallest, most insignificant, and easiest. It certainly wouldn’t solve the climate crisis. And it
would allow President Obama to cloak himself in a symbolic green action that let him cover a rapidly worsening environmental record.
New propaganda: Can a video game help us adapt to climate change? A new video game attempts to shock young people out of ecological apathy.
Kremlin Adviser Says Kyoto Can't Stop Climate Change The Kyoto Protocol will have virtually no impact on slowing global warming unless it expands to take in the United States, China and more developing countries, Russia's chief climate negotiator said on Wednesday. (Reuters)
Cancún talks may not reach a deal but there are still reasons for optimism There is time to agree a new commitment period of the Kyoto protocol from 2012 if rich countries face their responsibilities (Guardian)
Combet admits carbon tax an option Climate Change Minister Greg Combet has given a clear sign the Federal Government is prepared to consider introducing a carbon tax.
Chris Huhne fights Treasury to save his climate department Chris Huhne's climate department is under threat from the Treasury which wants to swallow it up
Access to Energy, Poverty Alleviation and Policy Blinders 
More than $36 billion a year is needed to ensure that the world’s population benefits from access to electricity and clean-burning cooking facilities by 2030, the International Energy Agency said Tuesday.But as anyone who understands the Kaya Identity knows, bringing people out of poverty will necessarily lead to greater greenhouse gas emissions. Birol tries to sidestep this issue: I have discussed these estimates before, and they simple to not stand up to the most basic of arithmetic. As I wrote last November, when I critiqued a similar statement from Birol: [T]he IEA is arguing that electricity can be provided to 1.3 billion people by 2030 and it will add only 0.24 GtCO2. Somehow I don't find that to be credible.I understand what Birol is trying to do -- he wants to avoid any perception that poverty alleviation comes into conflict with efforts to reduce carbon dioxide emissions. So he is arguing that you can lift people from poverty with almost no effect on carbon dioxide emissions. This argument is just wrong. While this argument allows the poverty alleviation and carbon dioxide reduction agendas to seemingly co-exit harmoniously, it dramatically downplays the challenge of emissions reductions. This is a shame, because the best path forward to accelerating decarbonization of the global economy lies not in pretending that a conflict does not exist between poverty alleviation and emissions reductions, but precisely the opposite. The only way that we will meet the world's energy needs of the future -- especially the needs of the 1.5 billion lacking access -- is to diversify and reduce the cost of energy via a commitment to innovation. When we put on policy blinders to avoid seeing things we'd rather not, sometimes the result is that we miss out on seeing some pretty important things as well. (Roger Pielke Jr.)
It'll get worserer! Vulnerable Arab World Lags On Climate Change Action The Arab world will be one of the regions worst hit by climate change but still lacks any coordinated response to its potentially devastating effects,
experts said at a conference this week.
Well, it is a conference on climate change and creativity: Samoan clerics finger homosexuals over global warming Clerics in the South Pacific have fingered the key cause of climate change - homosexuals.
Old, Pressed Flowers Give Climate Clues: Study Flowers picked up to 150 years ago in Victorian England show that old collections of pressed plants around the world can help the study of climate change,
scientists said on Wednesday.
Questioning the Arctic Ice Melt and Temperature Scare BY JACK DINI –Whatever we hear about the Arctic these days we should keep in mind that most information is based on satellite measurements of Arctic sea ice since 1979. With a little over thirty years of data many scientists and environmentalists use decreases in Arctic sea ice as a sure sign of man-made global warming. A little over thirty years of data is hardly a blink of an eyelid in terms of geological time. As Richard Lindzen, a prominent global warming skeptic and professor at MIT puts it, “this is a primitive field where nobody has much idea of anything.” (Hawaii Reporter)
Back to "it's hiding in the deep ocean": Scientists Find 20 Years of Deep Water Warming Leading to Sea Level Rise Scientists analyzing measurements taken in the deep ocean around the globe over the past two decades find a warming trend that contributes to sea level rise,
especially around Antarctica.
Ocean cooling contributed to mid-20th century global warming hiatus (and so did the PDO) NOTE: As is typical these days, and in keeping with co-author Phil Jones tradition of not giving up anything, the publicly funded scientific paper is not included with the news, and is hidden behind a paywall. All we can get is the press release and abstract and this silly picture of the researcher grinning like a banshee. Speculate away with impunity. I wonder why he has the ozone hole in Antarctica next to the HadCRUT temperature series?
Caption: David W.J. Thompson, professor of atmospheric science at Colorado State University, is the lead author of a Nature paper that shows sudden ocean cooling contributed to a global warming hiatus in the middle 20th century in the Northern Hemisphere. Credit: Colorado State University FORT COLLINS – The hiatus of global warming in the Northern Hemisphere during the mid-20th century may have been due to an abrupt cooling event centered over the North Atlantic around 1970, rather than the cooling effects of tropospheric pollution, according to a new paper appearing today in Nature. David W. J. Thompson, an atmospheric science professor at Colorado State University, is the lead author on the paper. Other authors are John M. Wallace at the University of Washington, and John J. Kennedy at the Met Office and Phil D. Jones of the University of East Anglia, both in the United Kingdom. Continue reading (WUWT)
Pollution not to blame for rapid ocean cooling, says Phil Jones paper Research from UEA finds drop in temperature is too quick to be caused by the build-up of sulphur aerosols from fossil fuels
UPDATE: Dr. Lamb was also the source of the paleoclimate graph used in the 1990 & 1995 IPCC reports which shows an inconvenient hotter Medieval Warming Period than the present. The following IPCC report threw away Dr. Lamb's graph in favor of Michael Mann's hockey stick graph, which served to eliminate the the Medieval Warming Period. This was the purpose of Mann's hockey stick -to eliminate the MWP- as stated in the climategate emails. 
(Hockey Schtick)
With the permission of Joshua Willis of JPL, I have posted a set of e-mails that he and I have exchanged over the last month. I present from the earliest to the latest (Roger Pielke Sr., Climate Science)
Good luck with that: Countries lay claim to Arctic in battle for oil and gas reserves Nations laid out their claims to territory in the polar North yesterday and the vast untapped mineral wealth that lies under the Arctic Ocean.
Crackdown On Coal Subsidies Overdue Dozens of Spanish coal miners just spent their 20th night underground in northern Spain. They're not trapped, as in Chile, but are there voluntarily, to protest an EU decree that will force governments to phase out coal-industry handouts by next year. This week hundreds more miners are joining the cause in strikes around the country. If anything, the European Commission's crackdown on coal-production subsidies is long overdue. Until now, Brussels has spared coal mining in its long-running war against industrial subsidies thanks to the miners' political clout, and so politicians have been able to keep high-cost and low-quality production alive on public life-support. In Spain, that amounts to an estimated €1 billion per year total being shoveled into the industry. Given this public largesse, it's hardly surprising that the EU's order could endanger the livelihoods of the country's 8,000 coal workers, and up to 40,000 jobs in peripheral sectors. Spanish coal workers have never had to conform to market demands before, so being forced to now may well be an existential threat to the entire industry. Rather than make the case that ending the subsidies will benefit all Spaniards and reduce a €1 billion drain on Madrid's overstretched public fisc, Socialist Prime Minister José Luis Rodríguez Zapatero has instead fed coal miners' expectations of public charity. He had previously assured them that Madrid's subsidies would satisfy EU antitrust rules—even its scheme to pay utilities to use domestic coal over foreign imports or gas. That plan is now on hold, and many of Spain's coal workers say they haven't been paid in months. (GWPF)
In an interview with SPIEGEL, Green Party floor leader Renate Künast, 54, discusses her opposition to Chancellor Merkel's plan to extend the lifepans of nuclear power plants and her party's dramatic recent surge in the polls (Spiegel)
What’s New About Windpower? Erich Zimmermann in 1933 by Administrator
Not only are new uses of water as a source of energy being studied, but the power of the wind is likewise being subjected to renewed scrutiny. Two recent proposals are mentioned here in order to indicate the trend of this development. The first is a German proposal which was reported in a wireless from Berlin, February 11, 1932, as follows:
The second proposal is based on the application of the rotor principle of Anton Flettner, whose ill-fated rotor ship attracted wide attention some years ago. It was seriously discussed by Waldemar Kampffert, an authority on scientific subjects, under the headline “Harnessing of Wind in New Jersey Plant May Hold Importance for Industry.” An excerpt from the lengthy article follows: [Read more →] (MasterResource)
Electricity collected from the air could become the newest alternative energy source Imagine devices that capture electricity from the air — much like solar cells capture sunlight — and using them to light a house or recharge an electric
car. Imagine using similar panels on the rooftops of buildings to prevent lightning before it forms. Strange as it may sound, scientists already are in the
early stages of developing such devices, according to a report at the 240th National Meeting of the American Chemical Society.
As they must: Short of Repeal, G.O.P. Will Chip at Health Law WASHINGTON -- Republicans are serious. Hopeful of picking up substantial numbers of seats in the Congressional elections, they are developing plans to try to
repeal or roll back President Obama’s new health care law.
Side Effects: The Obamacare Threat to Your Liberty
Last week, The Wall Street Journal reported that several health insurers “plan to raise premiums for some Americans as a direct result of the health overhaul.” Starting this year, Obamacare prohibits plans from placing lifetime limits on coverage, severely limits rescissions, and requires all plans to cover children up to age 26. Plans also have to fully cover preventive services and are prohibited from denying children due to pre-existing conditions. The list goes on. Since extra benefits cost more, it makes sense that insurance premiums would climb as a result of the new law. Insurers cited increases between 1 and 9 percent. Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Kathleen Sebelius responded to the insurers’ claims in a letter to America’s Health Insurance Plans, where she wrote that “there will be zero tolerance for this type of misinformation and unjustified rate increases.” Continue reading... (The Foundry)
ObamaCare’s Premium Refunds: Bad News for the Sick Posted by USA Today and Politico Pulse report that ObamaCare has prompted BlueCross BlueShield of North Carolina to rebate $156 million to its customers in the individual market. This may seem like good news. It’s actually bad news, particularly for BCBS’s sickest customers. Pre-ObamaCare, BCBS’s customers – whether healthy or sick – had coverage with an insurer that had already pre-funded their future medical needs. Competition protected them from BCBS skimping on care: if BCBS got a reputation for skimping, it would have a hard time enrolling new customers. Post-ObamaCare, BCBS no longer needs that pile of cash, so they’re returning it to their customers. That hurts sick enrollees because BCBS is doling it out to all enrollees – not just the sick enrollees whom that money is supposed to serve. This cash-out is actually a transfer from the sick to the healthy. Also, every BCBS customer who is sick or becomes sick in the future will have less protection against their insurer skimping on care. Competition used to discourage insurers from providing lousy access to care, but under ObamaCare competition will reward skimping. Under ObamaCare’s price controls, insurers that gain a reputation for providing quality coverage to the sick will attract sick people and go out of business. Insurers that gain a reputation for providing lousy access to care will drive away sick people and thrive. (Cato at liberty)
Posted September 21st, 2010 at 2:30pm in Health
“Some of the country’s most prominent health insurance companies have decided to stop offering new child-only plans, rather than comply with rules in the new health-care law that will require such plans to start accepting children with preexisting medical conditions after Sept. 23,” the Washington Post reports. The Post quotes one Ethan Rome, executive director of the liberal advocacy group Health Care for America Now: “We’re just days away from a new era when insurance companies must stop denying coverage to kids just because they are sick, and now some of the biggest changed their minds. … [It] is immoral, and to blame their appalling behavior on the new law is patently dishonest.” This type of posturing is the pat move of liberals every time their designs for society are frustrated by the reality that other people pursue their self interests. Continue reading... (The Foundry)
The rewards of fear mongering and eco lunacy: 2010 Heinz awards announced This year's Heinz Family Foundation awards include honors for a scientist documenting the effects of endocrine disruptors, a champion on the global seed
vault and one of the giants in the field of 'green,' or non-toxic, chemistry.
Environmentalism – What Has It Become? BY MICHAEL R. FOX – On May 18, 2010 Vice president Al Gore gave an incredibly depressing commencement speech at the University of Tennessee (http://tinyurl.com/2eypqqa). According to Gore, doom was imminent, even if he had to fudge the climate data to make it
sound frightening. Glaciers are melting (some are growing, some are receding, as they have for centuries--Antarctica, for example, is growing, sea levels are
rising--but very little. Just check with world expert Nils Axel Morner, (http://tinyurl.com/d4zayx). It is difficult to
measure Gore’s impact on those who were there at Commencement or had read his speech, but it could not have been good.
Eat local organic food if you like, but don’t kid yourself that it’s ‘green’ Don’t get me wrong, I love farmers’ markets. I love going to the fashionable one in Borough, London, and that wonderful rich feeling you get whenever you
don’t buy anything. And I love going to the one near me in south London and bantering and haggling with the fish man till he succumbs to giving me some
amazing bargain like five decent-size Dover sole for a tenner.
US obesity rates remain 'disturbingly high' NEW YORK - Chances are slim to none that the US will meet its public health goal of sharply reducing the number of obese adults by this year, according to
federal health officials with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention in Atlanta.
Finding Patient Zero in the High Fructose Corn Syrup Hate Epidemic Katherine Mangu-Ward | September 21, 2010
Of course, there are good reasons to hate corn sugar--as it shall henceforth be known--including the subsidy-sucking industry behind it. But the nutritional reasons were always dubious, and even some of the most sugar-hostile experts are coming out against the idea that corn syrup is uniquely culpable for American obesity. Reason has been on this beat for a while now. (Reason)
No link seen between moderate drinking, dementia NEW YORK - While some research has suggested that light drinking may do the aging brain good, a new study finds that older adults who drink moderately may be
no more or no less likely than abstainers to develop severe cognitive impairment.
Suspension of disbelief? ITV embarrassed by report of polar bear washed up on beach When reports came in that a polar bear had washed up on a Cornish beach, television presenter Naomi Lloyd was first with the news. (TDT)
Tanzania's Serengeti National Park facing 'collapse' due to highway plans One of world's last great wildlife sanctuaries, the Serengeti National Park in Tanzania, would be destroyed by plans to build a highway through it, experts have warned (TDT)
Researchers develop protein-packed potato in India SHANGHAI - Researchers in India have developed a genetically modified potato that is packed with up to 60 percent more protein and increased levels of amino
acids.
Biotech Salmon Leaves Many Questions The first genetically modified animal aimed at consumers' dinner plates faces an uncertain future following a federal advisory panel on Monday that gave a
mixed assessment on whether such food -- a salmon -- is safe to eat.
GM Salmon and Science Arbitration in Practice 
Science arbitration is on display this week at the Food and Drug Administration, where the agency is grappling with issues associated with genetically modified salmon. The Washington Post describes the context: [A] panel of experts convened by the Food and Drug Administration, . . . is poised to make a landmark decision that could mark a turning point in the way American food is produced.Why didn't the advisory panel actually vote on the matter? Wouldn't be important to actually hear what the scientific experts recommend related to regulation? Is the diversity of views harmful to policy making? Actually, the answer to the to the last two questions is No. The advisory committee -- called the Veterinary Medicine Advisory Committee -- is empaneled to provide scientific and technical advice. Here is how the background document to the meeting explains the role of the committee: The VMAC is composed of members in technical specialties necessary to provide recommendations on the scientific and technical issues before the Center.The committee is not comprised of experts to provide guidance on regulatory or policy matters. Its function is to arbitrate scientific and technical questions. The FDA faces a number of decisions related to the scientific and technical questions, such as how to label the product and whether or not to approve it. Science can inform but does not determine the outcomes of these decisions. Because science plays an important role in the FDA decision making process, significant effort is made to ensure the legitimacy and credibility of the advisory process: Members [of the VMAC] are thoroughly vetted to determine whether they have conflicts of interest with the matter before the Committee. As part of that process, members are required to provide detailed information to permit evaluation of possible sources of conflict of interest. . .The importance of advisory panel composition and conflict of interest is not unique to FDA, and is fairly standard in most high-level processes of scientific advice. In this case, the scientific experts on the committee presented a range of opinions on genetically modified salmon: A number of the panelists raised concerns about the fast-growing fish, saying there was not enough data to answer key questions about allergens and other potential risks.Such diversity of views is a characteristic of a healthy process of science arbitration. The messy reality is that on many issues -- especially those at the leading edge of science and policy -- uncertainties and ignorance abound. Policy making is best served with a clear-eyed view of these unknowns. As we will see in the case of GM salmon, such unknowns will present no obstacle to the FDA making definitive decisions (one way or the other) on this issue. There is no shortage of advocates for and against GM salmon, including members of the scientific community. Such advocacy is an important part of democratic processes. Sometimes however, decision makers would benefit from experts who render judgments not on what to do, but on what the science says about particular questions related to risks and uncertainties. A formal process of science arbitration helps to distinguish between advice and decision making, which serves not only policy making, but democratic politics as well, as it is the decision makers who are ultimately accountable to the public for their decisions, not the experts that they rely on to provide advice. (Roger Pielke Jr.)
Proposed Energy Taxes Would Send Billions in Investment, Value Overseas
The Obama Administration’s proposed new taxes on the oil and gas industry are threatening a consistent, value-producing component of millions of portfolios and pensions. Energy stocks have remained one of the most fertile long term options throughout the recession. [Read More] (Michael Economides, ET)
US envoy plays down expectations for climate talks NEW YORK -- The top US climate negotiator warned Tuesday against expectations of any binding deals on cutting greenhouse gas emissions at the next UN
conference on the issue in Mexico later this year.
There is an excellent post on the weblog Climate Etc by Judith Curry and Peter Webster titled Their text includes the insightful recommendations
Their weblog provides a very well written and effective documentation of the application of the reduction of societal and environmental vulnerability perspective that has been discussed, for example, in the weblog post A Way Forward In Climate Science Based On A Bottom-Up Resourse-Based Perspective Judy Curry and Peter Webster weblog post Pakistan on my mind should be required reading. (Roger Pielke Sr., Climate Science)
Sigh... Ocean Acidification: A National Strategy to Meet the Challenges of a Changing Ocean The ocean has absorbed a significant portion of all human-made carbon dioxide emissions. This benefits human society by moderating the rate of climate
change, but also causes unprecedented changes to ocean chemistry. Carbon dioxide taken up by the ocean decreases the pH of the water and leads to a suite of
chemical changes collectively known as ocean acidification. The long term consequences of ocean acidification are not known, but are expected to result in
changes to many ecosystems and the services they provide to society. Ocean Acidification: A National Strategy to Meet the Challenges of a Changing Ocean reviews
the current state of knowledge, explores gaps in understanding, and identifies several key findings.
NOAA/NCDC – USHCN is broken please send 100 million dollars While this would certainly put an end to the poor siting problems discovered by the surfacestations.org project, I can’t help but think almost everything related to climate can be solved with money:
Here’s the letter: Continue reading
Rethinking Climate Sensitivity: Roy Spencer Speaks by Chip Knappenberger The Holy Grail of climate change is a quantity known as the climate sensitivity--that is, how much the average global surface temperature will change from a doubling of the atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration. If we knew this number, we would have a much better idea of what, climatologically, was headed our way in the future and could make plans accordingly. Thus far, however, this prize has been elusive. Back in 1990, in its very first Assessment Report, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) suggested that the climate sensitivity was somewhere between 1.5°C to 4.5°C. In its latest Fourth Assessment Report published in 2007, the IPCC said the climate sensitivity was likely to be between 2.0°C and 4.5°C, and unlikely be to less than 1.5°C. Not a whole heck of a lot more certain than where things stood 20 years ago--and this despite a veritable scientific crusade to determine a more precise value. A predominant member of the quest is the University of Alabama in Huntsville’s Dr. Roy Spencer. Dr. Spencer has, for several years now, been trying to untangle climate feedbacks from climate forcings. If apparent feedbacks are really forcings, or vice versa, then the determination of climate sensitivity is confused and prone to being wrong (and likely erring on the high side). Dr. Spencer has long held that what has generally been taken to be a positive feedback from cloud cover changes in response to climate warming (i.e. cloud changes act to further enhance a CO2-induced warming) is actually the other way around--random cloud cover changes force temperature changes. However, trying to demonstrate that this is the case has proven challenging, and trying to convince the general climate community has been virtually impossible. To help bring his ideas to a wider audience, Dr. Spencer has written a book about his hypothesis and his research in support of it, and has now, after years of tireless pursuit, published a paper in the peer-reviewed scientific literature. Realizing that his findings run counter to the extant mainstream view of things, he has taken the step to ask for “physical scientists everywhere” to try to debunk his ideas. The appeal for scrutiny is intended to serve both science and Dr. Spencer in helping to solidify and illuminate a potential new way forward to finding the elusive Grail. Recently, Dr. Spencer has written a nice summary of his on-going research and what, in his views are its implications. Rather than having me rehash his synopsis, Dr. Spencer has graciously permitted us to reprint a piece that originally appeared on his excellent website (a site well-worth checking from time to time). Hopefully, readers of MasterResource will find this cutting-edge climate research interesting, and I am sure that if any of you have any pertinent suggestions for Dr. Spencer regarding his work, he would be happy to hear them. Here is the excerpt: [Read more →] (MasterResource)
<chuckle> Big Warming responds: 'Chemical nonsense': Leading scientists refute Lord Monckton's attack on climate science Nine 'profoundly wrong' claims made by Ukip deputy leader refuted by climate experts in a document filed with US Congress (Guardian)
Are the climate change sceptics with no evidence just naturally gullible? To dismiss a scientific canon on the basis of evidence that has been debunked evinces an astonishing level of self-belief (George Monbiot)
Further Evidence Of The Diversity Of Human Climate Forcings There is a news report today by Eryn Brown of the Los Angeles Times titled The article starts with the text
Excerpts include
As we have discussed in our paper Pielke Sr., R., K. Beven, G. Brasseur, J. Calvert, M. Chahine, R. Dickerson, D. Entekhabi, E. Foufoula-Georgiou, H. Gupta, V. Gupta, W. Krajewski, E. Philip Krider, W. K.M. Lau, J. McDonnell, W. Rossow, J. Schaake, J. Smith, S. Sorooshian, and E. Wood, 2009: Climate change: The need to consider human forcings besides greenhouse gases. Eos, Vol. 90, No. 45, 10 November 2009, 413. Copyright (2009) American Geophysical Union
This new report on the role of dust on the climate in the western United States is an example of the range of influences of humans on the climate system. This is also another issue that the 2007 IPCC failed to adequately assess. (Roger Pielke Sr., Climate Science)
New Paper “Recent Energy Balance Of Earth” By Knox and Douglas 2010 There is an excellent new paper by Bob Knox and David Douglas that provides further insight into the issue of the monitoring of global climate system heat changes. The paper is R. S. Knox, David H. Douglass 2010: Recent energy balance of Earth International Journal of Geosciences, 2010, vol. 1, no. 3 (November) -- In press doi:10.4236/ijg2010.00000. The abstract reads
This paper provides new evidence with respect to the comment and discussions of this climate metric on the weblog post on Skeptical Scientist titled “Pielke Sr and scientific equivocation: don’t beat around the bush, Roger”. The new Knox and Douglas 2010 paper is an important benchmark study to use when the data is further fine tuned and updated into 2010 this Fall. (Roger Pielke Sr., Climate Science)
From CO2 Science Volume 13 Number 38: 22 September 2010 Editorial Subject Index Summary Journal Reviews The North American Summer Arctic Front: How far north did it march from 1966 to 2007? The Medieval Warm Period at Lake Silvaplana in Switzerland: How did its warmth compare with that of the mid- to late-20th century? The Greening of the Russian Arctic Since 1942: How was it assessed? ... and how significant is the finding? Shrub Expansion Along a Coastal Soil Chronosequence: Does it enhance or reduce soil carbon and nitrogen contents? Plant Growth Database
U.S. Government: No Sign Of Undersea Plume From BP Spill The government is unable to confirm reports of a miles-long plume of oil lurking beneath the surface of the Gulf of Mexico from BP Plc's giant oil spill, a
government scientist said on Tuesday.
Seek a sustainable future! Wind, solar and biofuels will ensure an eco-friendly, climate-protecting, planet-saving, sustainable inheritance for our children.
Or so we are told by activists and politicians intent on enacting new renewable energy standards, mandates and subsidies during a lame duck session.
Oil sands opponents are motivated by anti-capitalist, anti-development ideology and organizational self-interest An Alberta government delegation came east this week to sell the embattled oilsands as a good news story for all of Canada. The Pembina Institute took a group of Athabasca aboriginals to Washington to claim that they were being poisoned. One of the frustrations of observing the oilsands “debate” is how one-sided it is. The Albertan government officials couldn’t stop apologizing for how much harder they had to work -- like the carthorse in Animal Farm -- to be more “sustainable.” Their opponents -- who never created a productive job in their lives -- continued to unload factual garbage by the dump truck, to be faithfully served up by the media.
Campaigners Board Shetlands Oil Drilling Vessel Environmental campaigners have boarded an oil drilling ship operating off the Shetland Islands under contract to U.S. oil giant Chevron, the second such
boarding in European waters in recent weeks.
A new oil rush as Cairn Energy reports first find off Greenland Cairn Energy has struck oil off the coast of Greenland, just weeks after an earlier exploration well found traces of gas in the region.
Speech - Brownlee: Opening Address To The New Zealand Petroleum Conference The theme of this year's New Zealand Petroleum Conference is "Transformation".
In what may be an ominous shot across the bow for green jobs advocates, Japan on September 13 submitted a complaint to the World Trade Organization alleging that a Canadian renewable energy law violates WTO non-discrimination rules. [1] At issue are a set of domestic content requirements built into Ontario’s landmark green energy law, [2] which are designed to guarantee that local producers – and local jobs –supply a minimum percentage of the technology used to meet the province’s ambitious goals for renewable energy generation. [3] While Japan’s “Request for Consultation” with Canada does not formally initiate a case before the WTO’s Dispute Settlement Body (DSB), it nevertheless sets the stage for a high-stakes showdown between the two countries, with potentially global repercussions for energy and industrial policy linking renewable power to high tech employment opportunities.What does this mean for the US? Firger says that is not yet clear. What is clear that efforts to prop up industries using government subsidies are unlikely to go unnoticed in our globalized world. (Roger Pielke Jr.)
Huhne Sees Nuclear, Renewables In UK Energy Mix Nuclear and renewables both have a part to play in meeting Britain's future energy needs, Energy Secretary Chris Huhne said on Tuesday, adding it was not a
choice between one or the other.
Huhne says yes to £22bn green tax: Petrol could soar under LibDem minister's drive Energy Secretary Chris Huhne yesterday backed plans for an extra £22billion in green taxes – in a move which could send petrol prices soaring.
Central America Taps Volcanoes For Electricity Dotted with active volcanoes, Central America is seeking to tap its unique geography to produce green energy and cut dependence on oil imports as demand for
electricity outstrips supply.
Jeff Tsao's 1999 white paper on the case for next-generation, super-efficient light bulbs makes a point so obvious that it seems to require no explanation.What is this? Advances in efficiency might presage greater energy consumption?! That is right. Fleck explains: To understand why, take a trip to the villages in rural Costa Rica where Michael Fark has been working.Here is how I described Jevons Paradox one year ago: The paradox was described in 1865 by William Stanley Jevons as follows:(Roger Pielke Jr.)
Western surge in obesity may have been caused by a virus The obesity explosion that has swept the Western world over the past 30 years may have been caused by a virus, scientists have said.
Children Exposed to Virus Weigh 52 pounds More, Obesity Researchers Find Children who tested positive for a virus strain that causes respiratory and gastrointestinal illness weigh more than those who didn't, suggesting that
infections may cause or contribute to obesity, a study showed.
Poor biological clock leads to obesity UC San Diego biologists have discovered biological clocks of mammals are related to development of obesity and diabetes.
Report: Obesity hurts your wallet and your health WASHINGTON -- Obesity puts a drag on the wallet as well as health, especially for women.
Boston Officials Consider Sugary Drink Ban Boston, the city that has already banned smoking in bars and trans-fats in restaurants, now wants to keep sugary drinks out of city-owned buildings.
Not definitive but plausible: Flu shot linked to reduced heart attack risk NEW YORK - Middle-aged and older adults who get the flu vaccine may be less likely to suffer a first-time heart attack in the following year than those who
skip the shot, according to a study published Monday.
Scavenger seagulls carry superbugs Seagulls from a species that feeds on garbage are harbouring drug-resistant superbugs, a study has found.
Keeping it real: Food authenticity My latest HND piece is about food authenticity--not the most exciting topic in the world, but one that should appeal to more than just foodies. After all, most of the knock-offs are done by giant agribusiness, while the genuine items tend to come from smaller, often family-owned companies. Sadly, as current events have shown, our government has seen fit to prop up failed enterprises such as GM, and tends to run away from defending the legitimate claims of the little guy. It might have something to do with political contributions and unions. We also touch upon the formerly Golden state of California talking the talk, but not walking the walk on protecting its own food companies, and the importance of regional authenticity to the locavore movement. Read the complete article. (Shaw's Eco-Logic)
Global Warming Alarmist Calls For Eco-Gulags To Re-Educate Climate Deniers Finnish philosopher says oppressive and brutal government should exert "tireless control of citizens" in shocking insight into threat of eco-fascism movement -- Linkola openly calls for Nazi-style mass extermination policies to "kill defectives" (Paul Joseph Watson, Prison Planet.com)
Why We Need a New Green Revolution to Stop Hunger World leaders are meeting in New York this week to discuss progress on the UN's Millennium Development Goals. The world's nations have failed miserably in addressing one of the main goals, the fight against hunger. Researchers believe that small farmers, not large-scale farms, are the key to feeding the planet. (Spiegel)
FDA panel to consider GMO salmon WASHINGTON - The first genetically modified animal could move one step closer to the U.S. market on Monday, when a federal advisory panel makes its recommendation on whether such food - a salmon - is safe for consumers to eat. (Reuters)
We can build whatever animal you want to eat, say scientists  This Chinook
salmon proves Mother Nature still has a few freaky tricks left in her bag.Source: California Department of Fish and Game TINKER with the genetics of salmon and maybe you create a revolutionary new food source that could help the environment and feed the hungry.
BIOTECH: TO SURVIVE THE MEGA-DROUGHTS, BY: DENNIS T. AVERY CHURCHVILLE, VA--When, O Lord, will the public turn its back on the ill-founded "concerns" of the Green movement that misinformed us about DDT, salmon extinction, deformed frogs, man-made global warming, and a host of other fake "calamities"? When will we support more high-yield farming research to meet redoubled world food needs in 2050? Especially since the alternative would be to plow down more wild species' habitat to plant additional low-yield crops. (CGFI)
The Last Green Puppy: Still a Dog Named 'Cap' Should Senate Republicans turn the "last living puppy" out in the cold this fall?
Climate Change Skeptics Sweeping GOP Senate Primaries Oklahoma Republican James Inhofe stood on the Senate floor last year to declare 2009 "the year of the skeptic."
Democrats fighting election battles ask environmentalists, 'Where are you guys?' Energy companies and businesses are ramping up spending on candidates and issues, while environmental groups face lagging donations and enthusiasm for campaigns key to climate change action. (LA Times)
US companies not so stupid: U.S. Companies Lag Global Ones On Carbon Disclosure European companies are working harder at disclosing their financial risks associated with greenhouse gas emissions than North American companies, according
to an annual report.
German Parliamentarian Under Massive Fire -- For Skepticism 20. September 2010  Marie-Luise Dött.Intolerant German establishment demanding she be politically burned at the stake for expressing skepticism. It was bound to happen sooner than later. A high level German politician speaking out against dubious climate science. Marie-Luise Dött, German Parliamentarian and a central figure on Angela Merkel's environmental committee, expressed scepticism on climate change, the Financial Times Deutschland reports here in an article titled: The Climate Revisionists. Now she is at the receiving end of brimstone and hellfire from all sides, including the media. Here in Germany, climate skeptics face a level of intolerance not seen here in 65 years. Last Wednesday, she made comments at a parliamentary forum discussion on the economic impacts of climate protection held by the FDP Free Democrats, the junior coalition partner of Angela Merkel's CDU/FDP coalition government. Fred Singer - "a tobacco lobbyist" - was a guest speaker. Dött's comments not only left environmentalists and climate protection activists speechless and gasping for air, but exposed Dött as a climate skeptic. She is reported to have called climate protection a
Well, the vicious intolerant reactions she is now reaping confirm that her views are accurate, more than ever imagined. Even colleagues from within her own CDU Party piled on:
The intolerance from the opposition came swiftly. Hermann Ott, a spokesman for the German Green Party, blasted Dött and her CDU Party:
(Note: denying the Holocaust in Germany is a crime. Ott is de facto calling Dött a criminal of the worst kind). A member of the SPD was said to be in "shock" and demanded Dött be fired. He added it all confirmed the "real intentions of the coalition government." I'm not even going to get into what the media snobs are saying. Noses could not be higher. Frau Dött not only has revealed herself to be skeptical of climate science, but has exposed Germany's return to last century's intolerance. (No Tricks Zone)
Yeah! Australia trailing world in climate policy AUSTRALIA is trailing the rest of the world in climate change policy and risks becoming uncompetitive, a leading climate change economist says.
Has The UK Establishment Got Any Confidence In Climate Science? Among the few things I have learned after thirteen years of living in England, there's an appreciation for understatements and reading between the lines. Prurient, tight-lipped local society is in fact constantly trying to verbally channel its anger and other frustrations in "acceptable" ways, so the language is hammered day-in day-out by the search of new ways to speak the unspeakable (eg the number of objects whose names can't be used for sexual innuendos is dwindling if not already zero). That's why I am developing a feeling that the botched, inconclusive, confused Climategate inquiries have actually been yelling their underlying message loud and clear. See? Neither Parliament or Lord Oxburgh or Sir Muir Russell of the "independent" UEA commissions tried to deal with climate science as such: to the point that Oxburgh himself wrote:
And what made them all think unwise to touch climate science with a long pole? Why, it's all easy to understand under the hypothesis that very few people, either in Parliament, or at the UEA, or among the top echelons of British Science, have got the confidence that climate science would survive any serious scrutiny… (Maurizio Morabito, OmniClimate)
IPCC Studies And Reports Have Nothing to Do with Climate Change Most people have no idea what the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) actually studies. They believe their reports are complete reports of climate change. This misconception is mostly because the IPCC arranged it and does little to correct it. In fact, they only look at that portion of climate change caused by humans. Here's how they limit their study. (Tim Ball, CFP)
Physicist says fossil fuel burning is insignificant in the global carbon pool Physicist Dr. Denis Rancourt, a former professor and environmental science researcher at the University of Ottawa, has officially bailed out of the man-made global warming movement, calling it a 'corrupt social phenomenon'. He writes this in an essay on science trust issues plus adds this powerful closing passage about climate science:
Now he thinks that fossil fuel burning isn't a problem of significance based on the scale. Excerpts below. Is the burning of fossil fuel a significant planetary activity? by Denis G. Rancourt
We certainly make every effort to see ourselves as significant on this spinning ball in space. We like to point out that the lights from our cities can be
seen from our extra-atmospheric "spaceships" at night and that we have deforested continents and reduced the populations of large wild mammals and of
fishes but is all this really significant in the planetary web known as the biosphere?
Enlightenment George? How apt: Climate change enlightenment was fun while it lasted. But now it's dead The collapse of the talks at Copenhagen took away all momentum for change and the lobbyists are back in control. So what next? (George Monbiot, Guardian)
Do a search on "Global Warming and Amazon Rainforest" and enjoy over 200,000 sites mostly proclaiming that "Amazon rainforest may become a
desert" or "large portion of the rainforest will be lost" or you name it. Throw in the 200 indigenous cultures in the forest, add in some clever
phrases like "lungs of the planet," argue that the rainforest is being destroyed faster than anyone expected, and then claim "incalculable
damages" all because of global warming. The cure for everything and anything is surely hidden in the rainforest of the Amazon, and the loss of that
ecosystem could spell the end of us all.
Windborne Dust on High Peaks Dampens Colorado River Runoff Dust-on-snow: on spring winds, something wicked this way comes
News from the Non Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change
I have great respect for the team that put together the exhaustive, comprehensive NIPCC report. This team is constantly updating their information on the NIPCC site. If you want information on the peer reviewed references related to the climate, it's a resource par excellence. Here's just a sample of new material posted on the NIPCC Web site:
Details follow: More ? (Jo Nova)
At the meeting in Exeter, UK September 7-9, 2010 , Surface temperature datasets for the 21st Century there were several candid admissions with respect to the robustness of the global and USA surface temperature record that are being used for multidecadal surface temperature trend assessments (such as for the 2007 IPCC report). These admissions were made despite the failure of the organizers to actually do what they claimed when they organized the meeting. In their announcement prior to the meeting [and this information has been removed in their update after the meeting] they wrote
In asking colleagues (such as my co-authors on our 2007 JGR paper) Pielke Sr., R.A., C. Davey, D. Niyogi, S. Fall, J. Steinweg-Woods, K. Hubbard, X. Lin, M. Cai, Y.-K. Lim, H. Li, J. Nielsen-Gammon, K. Gallo, R. Hale, R. Mahmood, S. Foster, R.T. McNider, and P. Blanken, 2007: Unresolved issues with the assessment of multi-decadal global land surface temperature trends. J. Geophys. Res., 112, D24S08, doi:10.1029/2006JD008229 which has raised serious issues with the USHCN and GHCN analyses, none of us were "entrained" to provide input. Nonetheless, despite the small number of individuals who were invited to be involved, there still are quite important admissions of shortcomings. These include those from Tom Peterson who stated in slide 8
[from Introductory remarks - Tom Peterson]; Matt Menne, Claude Williams and Jay Lawrimore who reported that
and Peter Thorne from Agreed outcomes -- Peter Thorne who wrote
There are very important admissions in these presentations. First, outside of the USA, there is inadequate (or no) publicly available information on station histories, yet these data are still used to create a "homogenized" global average surface temperature trend which reaches up to the "highest level of government". Even in the USA, there are undocumented issues. While the organizers of the Exeter meeting are seeking to retain its leadership role in national and international assessments of the observed magnitude of global warming, it is clear that serious problems exist in using this data for this purpose. We will post information on several new papers when ready to introduce readers of this weblog to quantification of additional systematic biases in the use of this data for long-term surface land temperature trend assessments. There is a need, however, to accept that the primary metric for assessing global warming and cooling should be upper ocean heat content, since from 2004 onward the spatial coverage is clearly adequate for this purpose (e.g. see). While there, of course, is a need for regional land surface temperature measurements including anomalies and long-term trends, for obtaining a global average climate system heat content change the oceans are clearly the more appropriate source of this information. (Roger Pielke Sr., Climate Science)
Low-tech garbage heap makes for simplest carbon sequestration  Photograph
of the front of Mount Trashmore Park in Virginia Beach, Virginia Image: Wikimedia
By Hugh Price In New Haven, W.Va., the Mountaineer Power Plant is using a complicated chemical process to capture about 1.5 percent of the carbon dioxide it produces. The gas is cooled to a liquid at a pressure of about 95 atmospheres and pumped 2,375 meters down to a sandstone formation, where it is meant to remain indefinitely. The objective is to reduce the amount of carbon dioxide being added to the atmosphere from the coal burning at the plant. This certainly seems to be doing it the hard way. Extracting just this 1.5 percent of the CO2 from the plant's flue requires a $100 million investment, and whether the gas will remain underground or bubble to the surface is in question. Continue reading
A 132-Year Payback On The All-Electric Car There are few examples where government interference in the economy is more pervasive than energy. Now, the term energy encompasses a plethora of
technologies, and each attracts the gimlet eye of Big Brother. In recent years, environmental groups have been very successful in insinuating themselves into
the halls of government so that today there is a revolving door between government and the environmental movement just like the revolving door between the
government and other key industries, such as banking and the military-industrial complex. Government would have us believe that a new regulation is the result
of some great, objective, and careful investigation. But mostly these regulations and spending programs are foisted upon us by the people who only yesterday
were nothing more than lobbyists for some fervently held cause. There has been no new data, but yesterday's lobbyist today carries the mantle of great authority
and prestige as a high level government bureaucrat.
Good luck with that: Geothermal Power Waiting For Its Renaissance all the talk of a geothermal renaissance fueled by government incentives and the quest for clean energy, Canadian investors are cool on the sector, despite a
list of compelling business advantages.
China Power Generation by Source 
Zhang Ping, director of the National Development and Reform Commission (NDRC), hailed the achievement as "a new stage of development" for China's power industry at a forum held in Beijing on nuclear power development.(Roger Pielke Jr.)
NYTimes critic on DDT doc: Ongoing genocide isn't news On the bright side, New York Times film critic Neil Genzlinger reviewed the new DDT-malaria documentary "3 Billion and Counting" on the morning of the film's premier in New York City. On the less bright side, Genzlinger was decidedly less than impressed by the film's message:
No, it's not news that millions of poor Africans (mostly children under 5) continue to die preventable deaths. That's been going on for decades -- ever since the New York Times helped advocate for DDT to be banned in the 1960s. The Times was even warned about the coming "genocide" in 1969 letters-to-the-editor by Thomas H. Jukes. Then again, the Holocaust isn't news either, yet when Genzlinger reviewed "Verdict on Auschwitz" in 2007, he found that film to be "emotionally draining." AIDS has been around since the early 1980s, but an HBO show about AIDS in Africa was "compelling." That show's producer told Genzlinger,
Apparently, the same consideration is not merited for the millions who have already died and will continue to die from malaria in Africa. Genzlinger credited CNN's "Planet in Peril" with being "thought-provoking" for showing how the introduction of the wolf into Yellowstone National Park had affected the ecosystem. But millions of kids allowed to die preventable deaths? Bo-ring. (Green Hell Blog)
Health Care: The Census Bureau reported last week that the number of uninsured Americans jumped to almost 51 million last year. Is this a reason to become
panicked and reform the system? No.
The White House released a report entitled "100 Recovery Act Projects That Are Changing America" to counter criticism of the stimulus as a failure. Vice President Joe Biden said,
And the Vice President is spot on. The Recovery Act has created some great jobs. The report covers some $7.5 billion spent to create about 27,400 jobs -- as best as can be gleaned from the report, including giving the projects the benefit of doubt when the jobs figures are unclear. That works out to about $273,723 per job. The top ten egregious projects described in the report are:
Applying the outrageous average cost/job for these 100 projects to the $787 billion stimulus plan means that the Recovery Act should have produced 2.88 million jobs. However since the Recovery Act, we've actually lost about 2.5 million jobs. Recovery Act? Indeed. The nomenclature is reminiscent of Chairman Mao's own "recovery" program -- the Great Leap Forward. (Green Hell Blog)
Unfortunate side-effect of throwing money at a "problem": Disorder in the classroom on the rise THE nation is in the grip of an epidemic of autism, with at least one state reporting an incidence as high as one child in 50. But a growing number of
medicos, parents and politicians are questioning the validity of the diagnosis, arguing that many children are being labelled for life with a disability they
simply don't have in the pursuit of extra education funding.
U.S. invests in drug to protect against radiation CHICAGO - Tiny biotech Cleveland BioLabs Inc has won a $45 million contract from the Department of Defense to conduct clinical trials of a drug to prevent
cell damage in the event of nuclear attack.
Drywall Flaws: Owners Gain Limited Relief Linda and Randall Hunter own their dream house in Plant City, Fla., with an oversize master bedroom, granite countertops in the kitchen and a screened-in
pool.
A nanny too far: When Citizens (Gasp) Are the Smoking Police Would you mind putting your cigarette out?
Some truth in it: Why exercise won't make you thin Got a few pounds to lose? Cancel the gym membership. An increasing body of research reveals that exercise does next to nothing for you when it comes to losing weight. A result for couch potatoes, yes, but also one that could have serious implications for the government's long-term health strategy (Emma John, The Observe
Sigh... Efforts to protect ozone layer from depletion have been successful, says UN International efforts to protect the ozone layer shielding life on Earth from harmful levels of ultraviolet rays have stopped additional ozone losses, potentially averting scores of millions of cases of skin cancer and eye cataracts, according to a new United Nations report released today. (MercoPress)
EDITORIAL: The left's war on home appliances European nanny-state regulations are coming to America
Not just appliances: Cleaner for the Environment, Not for the Dishes "My dishes were dirtier than before they were washed," one wrote last week in the review section of the Web site for the Cascade line of dishwasher
detergents. "It was horrible, and I won't buy it again."
Guardian: Ecofascism isn't working, let's execute corporations instead The Guardian has a commentary piece that you have to read to believe. Entitled 'An alternative to the new wave of ecofascism', Micah White exposes the inconvenient truth that green groups have been radicalized by 'ecofascists' who yearn for authoritarian solutions to combat global warming. White illustrates his point with James Lovelock's call to suspend democracy: (Daily Bayonet)
Pitiful Little Protest Leads to Reporter's Firing By Paul Chesser on 9.17.10 @ 1:17PM
(American Spectator)
Vinci Says Undeterred By Russian Environmentalists France's Vinci, the world's largest construction group, said on Saturday it was undeterred by environmental protesters who forced President Dmitry Medvedev
to suspend its $1 billion project in Russia.
Look how "climate change" even pollutes wildlife policy: In Search of the Grizzly (if Any Are Left) PASAYTEN WILDERNESS, Wash. -- Past the asters and aspen and subalpine fir, past the quick, cold creeks and the huckleberry hillsides, the bear hunter stopped
and cocked his tweezers.
Mass extinction: Scientists prune list of world's plants A project helping conservation work has deleted more than 600,000 species of flowering plants that were duplicated or not 'new' (Guardian)
Ancient Seeds In Mexico Help Fight Warming Effects More than 500 years after Spanish priests brought wheat seeds to Mexico to make wafers for the Catholic Mass, those seeds may bring a new kind of salvation
to farmers hit by global warming.
World leaders warned that approach to African aid needs a total rethink As key summit on Millennium Development Goals begins, experts cast doubt on conventional approach to poverty reduction
Federal Register Notice: Call For Public Comment Public comment is sought on the development of the next USGCRP National Climate Assessment. JunkScience.com visitors are encouraged to submit comments as requested by the FR notice.
State hammers EPA on science of global warming In legal briefs, attorney general says science is unreliable.
CEI Seeks To Delay EPA Climate Regs by William Yeatman Soon the U.S. Circuit Court for Appeals in Washington D.C. is expected to address legal challenges (brought by the Competitive Enterprise Institute, among others) to the EPA's plan to regulate greenhouse gases under the Clean Air Act. In the meantime, CEI this week filed a motion to delay the implementation of the regulations until the Court makes a decision. To read the motion, click here. (Cooler Heads)
Sen. Inhofe Confident He'll Be EPW Chairman After Midterm Elections The Senate's top global warming skeptic is confident he'll reclaim the gavel of the Environment and Public Works Committee next year, and he's got big plans
in store.
For crying out loud! The time is right for a carbon tax The case for a carbon tax is a compelling one, given our current macroeconomic quandary and our apparent inability to deal with climate change. Each of these
factors alone can make the case persuasively. When we take them together, the tax becomes even more convincing as a solution to some seemingly insurmountable
problems.
[B]ecause runaway pollution in China means wasted lives, air, water, ecosystems and money -- and wasted money means fewer jobs and more political instability -- China's leaders would never go a year (like we will) without energy legislation mandating new ways to do more with less. It's a three-for-one shot for them. By becoming more energy efficient per unit of G.D.P., China saves money, takes the lead in the next great global industry and earns credit with the world for mitigating climate change.It is a great story. Except for the fact that it is not true (see also). (Roger Pielke Jr.)
More on the "Iron Law" of Climate Policy 
It shows up on the front page of today's NYT, in a comment by Elke Weber at Columbia University: "Most Americans want to do things that are good for the environment, but not everyone wants to pay the price"Here is a thought experiment that you can conduct to see if you too follow the "iron law": Imagine some environmental objective, such as reducing greenhouse gas emissions. Would you agree to pay $1 to achieve that objective? Most everyone would say, "sure, why not, it is just a dollar." OK then, would you agree to pay $1 million dollars to achieve that same objective? Most people would say, "I don't even have a million dollars, and if I did, I could probably find other uses." If you are like most people as I've characterized them above, then you have a preference function that runs between $1 and $1,000,000 which shows a decreasing willingness to pay as the price goes higher. Certainly in the aggregate such a function accurately characterizes public opinion. A decreased willingness to pay might be because of competing values (you'd rather send your kids to college than pay for environmental objectives) or because of means (your ability to pay is financially limited). Such a preference function using actual public opinion data is illustrated in Figure 2.4 of The Climate Fix, which draws from the bottom panel of the figure at the head of this post, for the US in 2009. The Figure show support for a "climate bill" decay rapidly as a function of annual household cost. The implications of the "iron law" for both climate policy and politics will be the subject of later posts. (Roger Pielke Jr.)
Better late than never: California Braces for Showdown on Emissions LOS ANGELES -- A ballot initiative to suspend a milestone California law curbing greenhouse gas emissions is drawing a wave of contributions from
out-of-state oil companies, raising concerns among conservationists as it emerges as a test of public support for potentially costly environmental measures
during tough economic times.
Obama's Plan May Be on Hold, But Cap-and-Trade is Still Advancing in the States While the prospects for passing a federal cap-and-trade law in the Senate are dwindling, this economically-damaging energy policy is alive and well in the
states.
EPA to Drop Climate Leaders Program for Corporations WASHINGTON, DC, September 17, 2010 - The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency has decided to phase down services the agency offers to companies under its
eight-year-old Climate Leaders program, including technical assistance and setting greenhouse gas reduction goals.
Climatism: Redoubling Misguided Efforts By Steve Goreham
Climate change falling off public radar, speakers say A year after the Copenhagen conference on global warming that failed to produce a comprehensive international agreement to limit greenhouse gas emissions,
climate change has taken a back seat to issues such as the recession but continues to influence economic and government policy decisions, the Global Business
Forum heard Friday.
Oh dear... Torpor on emissions must end Renewed co-operation is needed as the world continues to warm.
By Andrew Montford At the end of 2009 hundreds of emails were hacked or leaked from the servers of the Climatic Research Unit at the University of East Anglia. The emails appeared to show scientists at the very centre of global warming science manipulating and withholding data, perverting the peer review process in order to keep their critics from publishing in the academic literature and having much more sanguine private views of climate science than the ones they presented to the public. There was a worldwide furore as the possible implications for policymakers sank in. A number of inquiries were set up in the wake of the allegations. In the U.K., the House of Commons science and technology committee held a brief investigation, regrettably curtailed by the impending general election. The University of East Anglia, meanwhile, set up two panels, under Lord Oxburgh and Sir Muir Russell. All three inquiries have now presented their findings and, while making minor criticisms of the scientists involved, all have largely exonerated them of serious wrongdoing. Read More (Financial Post)
George Monbiot: scrubbing the record clean This is a guest post by Shub Niggurath Background Last November things began to go seriously wrong for the IPCC version of science. Things started after a leading Indian glaciologist called VK Raina publicly pointed out that he disagreed with the IPCC conclusion that the Himalayan glaciers would melt away within 30 years. Raina said studies showed that at the present rate of melting, the glaciers would take hundreds of years to do so. The Indian public had previously been told that the waters from the Himalayas would dry up within their lifetimes, so this good news was published on the front pages of the Indian newspapers. Click to read more ... (Bishop Hill)
How sad... 'Green degrees' target solutions to climate-change issues Universities are meeting the growing demand for environmental skills with a range of 'green' degrees (Guardian)
BHP boss's call to action on carbon price is just smoke MARIUS Kloppers' big call to put a price on carbon before an international agreement is unlikely to persuade his peers to follow suit.
Kloppers' call for a carbon tax mixes self-interest and silliness BHP Billiton chief Marius Kloppers' call for a carbon tax was a mix of self-interest, unknowing corporate self-loathing and silliness.
Silliness down-under: State carbon plan puts heat on Julia Gillard PRESSURE is growing on the Gillard government to come up with a price on carbon.
Firms in secret plan to flee power bills SOME of the state's biggest employers are secretly planning to leave New South Wales after rises of up to 50 per cent in their power and gas bills, with
Victoria and Queensland most likely to benefit.
They wish: Climate change could benefit UK farmers Climate change and global food shortages could bring unexpected benefits for British farmers in the next two decades, ultimately relieving taxpayers of the
burden of subsidising them, Caroline Spelman, environment secretary, has claimed.
Engineers have to get things right. They design things which have to work in the real world. When bridges fall down, there are consequences. If your computer
doesn't work, there are consequences. If a rocket crashes, there are consequences.
Conclusions From Allen and Sherwood (2008) and Thorne (2008) Are Refuted In 2008, there were two papers published in Nature which received quite a bit of attention. The papers are Robert J. Allen & Steven C. Sherwood, 2008: Warming maximum in the tropical upper troposphere deduced from thermal winds Published online: 25 May 2008; | doi:10.1038/ngeo208 P. W. Thorne, 2008: "Atmospheric science: The answer is blowing in the wind; Published online: 25 May 2008; | doi:10.1038/ngeo209 I posted on these two papers in Use Of Winds To Diagnose Long Term Temperature Trends -- Two New Papers Comments On The Science In The Nature Paper By Allen and Sherwood It has taken over two years but in our paper Christy, J.R., Herman, B., Pielke, R., Sr., Klotzbach, P., McNider, R.T., Hnilo, J.J., Spencer, R.W., Chase, T., and Douglass, D. What Do Observational Datasets Say about Modeled Tropospheric Temperature Trends since 1979?. Remote Sens. 2010, 2, 2148-2169 we refute the findings in the Allen and Sherwood (2008) and Thorne (2008) papers. In our paper in Section 3.1.3, we write
and
In other words, The Allen and Sherwood (2008) finding that
has been refuted as reported in the Christy et al 2010 paper. (Roger Pielke Sr., Climate Science)
Solar flares could paralyse Britain's power and communications, Liam Fox says Britain's electrical system, financial networks and transport infrastructure could all be paralysed by a solar flare or a nuclear attack, Liam Fox will warn next week. (TDT)
Britain's energy policy is in crisis The Government's policy on renewable energy is wasteful and counter-productive, says Christopher Booker.
Lawrence Solomon: Are you frying your eggs at 4 a.m. yet? Instead of retooling the technology, retool the people By Lawrence Solomon Ontario Premier Dalton McGuinty is under fire for forcing smart meters onto the province's electricity customers. The meters make no economic sense for consumers, critics point out, costing consumers far more than can ever be offset through lower power bills. The meters, in fact, make perfect sense when understood from Mr. McGuinty's viewpoint, despite a total price tag estimated to run as high as $10-billion.
Gulf of Mexico 'Idle Iron' Oil Wells Must Be Plugged WASHINGTON, DC, September 15, 2010 - Oil and gas companies operating in the Gulf of Mexico will have to set permanent plugs in nearly 3,500 nonproducing
wells under a new federal government policy aimed at preventing more oil leaks into gulf waters.
Subsoil Privatization: The Ultimate Post-BP Spill Reform by Robert Bradley Jr.
Government intervention in free markets is prefaced on market failure. But no such rationale explains why federal and state governments have owned and managed hydrocarbon-bearing onshore and offshore lands. Government involvement can be explained by little more than the historical precedent of sovereign ownership of unowned property and of habit. In a private property world, surface and subsurface areas would be unowned until the positive acts of discovery and intent to use. Under the "homestead" theory of first property title, the state of nature (unowned area) would not be the property of government but the first resource entrepreneur who, in the immortal words of John Locke, "tills, plants, improves, cultivates and can use the product of" the surface or subsurface to "enclose it from the common." Sovereign ownership would be displaced by a rational ownership system within the private sector, and individual accountability and economic incentives would reign over the inherent land-use conflicts on behalf of "all of the people." The privatization process can follow many forms--such as a Cato Policy Analysis by Terry Anderson, Vernon Smith, and Emily Simmons, "How and Why to Privatize Federal Lands," espousing a 20--40 year transfer. But other things equal, the sooner the transfer the better, so long as meeting the basic criteria as outlined by Anderson et al.:
As it is now, government ownership of a resource transforms authorities into central economic planners to answer the questions of who does what, when, where, and how much. Such is the position of the Department of the Interior's Bureau of Ocean Energy Management, Regulation and Enforcement (formerly the Minerals Management Service) in regard to offshore leasing and publicly owned onshore development. If all subsoil rights had been socialized in the United States, a severe economic calculation problem would have existed for the Department of Interior. But a coexisting (and much larger) private lease market, at least on dry lands, has provided crucial information that Interior over many decades has used to make decisions. Nonetheless, political control over swaths of mineral-bearing subsoil for over a century has led to administrative problems at Interior such as: [Read more →] (MasterResource)
Oilsands 'acceptably clean': U.S. senator Lindsey Graham is one of three U.S. senators in Alberta who toured the oilsands. (Alex Brandon/Associated Press)A U.S. senator is rejecting the 'dirty oil'
tag pegged on Alberta's oilsands by some environmentalists, saying that label should instead be applied to some oil sources in the Mideast.
Chinese oil company after BP's stake in Argentina's Pan American Energy CNOOC, Ltd, China's biggest offshore oil explorer, may bid 10.2 billion USD for BPs 60% stake in Argentina's Pan American Energy LLC and will probably seek a partner in the acquisition, Citigroup Inc. said. (MercoPress)
Successful testing of ninth out of ten oil-wells in extreme south of Chile Latin American oil and gas firm GeoPark Holdings Ltd said on Thursday it successfully drilled and tested a new well in the Guanaco oil field on the Fell Block in the extreme south of Chile. (MercoPress)
U.N. Panel Delays Ruling On Green Rewards For Coal A United Nations panel has delayed key decisions on a scheme meant to reward projects that cut carbon emissions in developing countries, including whether to
approve a modern coal plant for such incentives.
Five States Sue Allegheny Energy Over Downwind Air Pollution PITTSBURGH, Pennsylvania, September 16, 2010 - Trial has begun in a lawsuit filed by New Jersey and four other states to force coal-fired power plants
hundreds of miles away in western Pennsylvania to clean up emissions of pollutants that degrade air quality in the downwind plaintiff states.
Will this boondoggle never end? Agriculture Secretary, Producers Confident On Ethanol Hike U.S. regulators are likely to approve a higher blend of ethanol in U.S. gasoline shortly, an ethanol producers group and the top U.S. agriculture official
each said on Friday, and the new fuel mix could be selling at the pump by next spring.
Fifteen Bad Things with Windpower--and Three Reasons Why by John Droz Jr. Trying to pin down the arguments of wind promoters is a bit like trying to grab a greased balloon. Just when you think you've got a handle on it, it squirts away. Let's take a quick highlight review of how things have evolved. [Read more →] (MasterResource)
Mafia 'Hits' EU Wind Subsidies
With Europe's public subsidy regime for wind and other green energy projects being slashed, all it needed was for the Mafia to blow into town. Unfortunately, organized crime has already hit town -- and I do mean hit -- to make local officials offers they couldn't refuse. [Read More] (Peter C Glover, ET)
Centrica alert over a nuclear snub British Gas owner Centrica will be forced to spend billions of pounds on new gas-fired power stations to keep the lights on if it does not secure consent for
the Hinkley nuclear reactor by early 2012.
Thousands Surround Merkel Office In Nuclear Protest Tens of thousands of Germans surrounded Chancellor Angela Merkel's office Saturday in an anti-nuclear demonstration that organizers said was the biggest of
its kind since the Chernobyl disaster in 1986.
Aaron Hillis: Inhuman Idiot Film Critic? What does a connoisseur of erotic gay cinema think of a documentary that's trying to save children's lives? First-time film producer Dr. Rutledge Taylor's new epic/call-to-action on DDT and malaria, "3 Billion and Counting," opens Friday at the Quad Cinema in New York City. Sadly, Left-wing media is already on the attack in its typical ad hominem, knee-jerk, ignorant and misanthropic ways. Take Village Voice movie critic Aaron Hillis who opens his commentary on the film as follows:
Compare that with Hillis' opening line in his review of "No Impact Man" last September:
So to Hillis, eco-self-flagellation is "bold" while trying to save millions of real children from dying real deaths from a preventable disease is "hysterical." Hillis criticizes "3 Billion and Counting" because it,
Aside from the fact that any documentary filmmaker can only ever present his findings, Hillis omitted mention of the numerous opportunities in the film that Taylor provided environmentalists and other DDT opponents to defend themselves. For the most part, DDT opponents don't take Taylor up on his offers because they aren't willing to defend their indefensible actions on camera. Hillis objects in ad hominem fashion to Taylor's vilification of William Ruckleshaus and Rachel Carson while erroneously writing that malaria is responsible for "hundreds of millions of deaths each year." [Earth to Hillis, the annual malaria death toll is on the order of 1-3 million per year. If you had paid attention to the movie, you wouldn't have made such a basic mistake.] Aaron Hillis is too stupid to realize his good fortune in growing up to be a Manhattan-based film critic -- as opposed to dying before the age of 5 years, which is what happens to about a million African children every year due to malaria. Worse, perhaps, is that once presented with uncontroverted facts about this ongoing tragedy, Generation Me's Aaron Hillis is too callous to to care. Until he can complete some sort of program in compassion/humanity/empathy, maybe Hillis should just stick to reviewing films more up his alley, like gay zombie movies. (Green Hell Blog)
Tyrone Hayes--A Frog in His Throat Dr. Tyrone Hayes of UC Berkeley--in his personal quest to demonize the herbicide atrazine just as a previous generation successfully demonized Alar--gave an
encore performance before the EPA's fourth Scientific Advisory Panel on this subject on Wednesday.
Lawyers aim to harass and intimidate growers in atrazine issue Sometimes, individuals and groups decide to stand up for something.
Making healthy food is easy. Making people eat it is not A SERVING of Kraft's Ranch dressing boasts 370mg of sodium and 12g of fat. That is what nutritionists would describe as "far too much" and consumers would describe as "yummy". The Kraft food company has brilliant scientists, of course, so it can easily take the salt out of its dressing. Alas, what remains tastes horrible. (Economist)
Uh-huh... Air pollution linked to deadly cardiac arrests NEW YORK - Breathing in soot and other fine particles from the urban air may increase the risk of suffering a deadly heart stoppage, suggests a new study of
more than 8,000 cardiac arrests in New York City.
<groan> Ozone Recovering But Will Take Longer Over Poles: U.N.  An outhouse sits by itself in a small inlet across the harbour from Iqaluit, Nunavut in the Canadian Arctic August 24, 2009. Photo: Reuters/Andy Clark The ozone layer that shields life from the sun's harmful rays is projected to recover from harmful chemicals by mid-century, but it will take longer over the
polar regions, a United Nations study said on Thursday.
A U.N. Internet Governance Power Grab?
At the Internet Governance Forum meeting earlier this week in Vilnius, Lithuania, Rod Beckstrom, President and Chief Executive Officer of Internet Corporation for Assigned Names and Numbers (ICANN) expressed his concern and worry about efforts by some governments to constrain the independence of the Internet at the upcoming U.N. General Assembly session. For those who are not familiar with ICANN, the organization is a nonprofit corporation charged with regulating and managing the Domain Name System under which Internet Protocol addresses and registration of top-level domains (such as .org and .com) are assigned. "Governance" of the medium has been historically minimal and led by non-governmental entities and overseen by the U.S. government, which has exercised a light regulatory touch. This freedom allowed the Internet to grow and develop at a truly remarkable pace. Continue reading... (The Foundry)
Terence Corcoran: The myth of inequality
For several years now the American left has been fixated on the idea that the United States has become a divided nation in which an aristocracy of the rich, the super rich and the stinking rich have subjugated the poor, the middle class and everybody else, turning America into the equivalent of some pre-Robespierreian France. This Marxist class war message was embedded in President Barack Obama's first budget: "For the better part of three decades, a disproportionate share of the nation's wealth has been accumulated by the very wealthy." The basis for that claim and others in the Obama budget is the work of Thomas Piketty and Emmanuel Saez, two economists who in recent years have become the darlings of activists and politicians whose prime aim appears to be to foment class envy and promote new higher tax rates and bigger government. One of their graphs appeared in the Obama budget, apparently showing that the "top 1% of earners have been increasing their share of national income" to the point where the stinking rich 1% earn 20% of the total, double their share from 10% in 1980. Read More (Financial Post)
Mao's Great Leap Forward 'killed 45 million in four years' Mao Zedong, founder of the People's Republic of China, qualifies as the greatest mass murderer in world history, an expert who had unprecedented access to
official Communist Party archives said yesterday.
Price of greenie anti dam hysteria: Desal plant a $570m-a-year drain VICTORIANS will pay an average $570 million a year for the next three decades to have the southern hemisphere's largest desalination plant - even if no water
is needed.
Eris O'Brien campaigns to 'Save the Locust' as huge swarm looms UPDATE 1.28pm: FARMERS have slammed a radical environmental activist's "Save the Locust" campaign that aims to teach us to value the ravenous
insects.
France Still Opposed To EU Plan On GM Crop Growing France remains opposed to a plan by the European Union's executive to let each member country decide on whether to approve the growing of genetically
modified (GM) crops, the French farm minister said on Thursday.
Federal Register Notice: Call For Public Comment Public comment is sought on the development of the next USGCRP National Climate Assessment. JunkScience.com visitors are encouraged to submit comments as requested by the FR notice.
Kerry forecasts cloudy future for comprehensive Senate climate bill Sen. John Kerry (D-Mass.) -- whose never-say-die attitude fueled months of long-shot climate talks -- admitted defeat Tuesday.
EU Will No Longer Commit To Unilateral CO2 Targets Whether intended or not, this timing offers the EU the opportunity to make its future climate policy conditional on the moves by the world's other regional powers. By linking its decision to that of the rest of the world, Europe would begin to act as a mature competitor on the stage of international power diplomacy. It would appear that the EU, at long last, is on the brink of breaking away from its unilateral and self-destroying climate policy. -- Benny Peiser, Financial Post, 20 October 2008 Der Spiegel, 14 September 2010: EU will no longer commit to unilateral obligations to reduce CO2 emissions. The EU climate change commissioner sees especially the United States under an obligation to commit to binding reduction targets. Only then Europe would do the same. Setting a good example - this strategy will no longer apply for Europe at international climate negotiations. Climate change commissioner Connie Hedegaard said the EU will no longer unconditionally play the lead role in the haggling over CO2 reduction targets. "We will only accept new commitments if others accept commitments too," Hedegaard said on Tuesday in Brussels. Thus, the EU will not necessarily sign a new international climate agreement. In particular, the U.S. should commit to binding targets for reducing carbon dioxide, the Danish commissioner demanded. "It is not possible to persuade China, India or Brazil if the largest industrialized country is not contributing enough." Hedegaard - then as Danish Environment Minister - had organised the ultimately unsuccessful 2009 Copenhagen summit negotiations on a successor treaty to the Kyoto Protocol that expires at the end of 2012. In Copenhagen, the EU countries had committed to CO2 reductions and pledged initial funding for climate protection projects in developing countries even before the negotiations started. But at the Copenhagen summit the other key emitters - especially the U.S. and China -- refused to follow the example of the EU and did not to commit to reduction targets to prevent global warming of more than two degrees Celsius. [transl. Philipp Mueller] Full story (in German) (GWPF)
Obama's Science Adviser: Don't Call it 'Global Warming' John Holdren, director of the White House Office of Science and Technology Policy, says that the term "global warming" is "a dangerous
misnomer" that should be replaced with "global climate disruption."
White House Science Czar Says He Would Use 'Free Market' to 'De-Develop the United States' In a video interview this week, White House Office of Science and Technology Director John P. Holdren told CNSNews.com that he would use the "free market economy" to implement the "massive campaign" he advocated along with Paul Ehrlich to "de-develop the United States." (CNSNews.com)
An alternative to the new wave of ecofascism By liberating humanity from the compulsion to consume, climate catastrophe can be averted without recourse to authoritarianism
Green movement needs a different approach to appeal beyond the usual audience Campaigners should focus on things people care about, not polar bears and melting ice caps
So what's new... Prince Charles baffled by 'extraordinary' climate change scepticism The Prince of Wales said he found the views of climate change sceptics ''extraordinary''.
How science will shape climate adaptation plans Scientists must press on in developing the emerging tools that will help governments make decisions on adapting to climate change (Vicky Pope, Guardian)
Climate change committee will assess carbon tax: Julia Gillard JULIA Gillard refused today to commit to a tax on carbon despite public pressure from BHP Billiton chief executive Marius Kloppers.
Business condemns carbon price call MICHAEL Chaney has joined the chorus of business opposition to BHP Billiton chief Marius Kloppers's call for a price on carbon.
<chuckle> Graft could jeopardize Indonesia's climate deals (Reuters) - Billions of dollars Indonesia stands to earn every year in climate change deals could be at risk if it fails to stamp out corruption in its
forestry sector, long notorious for graft and focus of an ongoing investigation.
HWGA: Exploring the Links Between Ocean Warming and Hurricanes One of the more contentious issues facing climate scientists is whether rising ocean temperatures will cause more frequent and powerful hurricanes. In an interview with Yale Environment 360, Kerry Emanuel, of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, says that amid the uncertainty, one thing seems likely: an increase in the most potent -- and destructive -- storms. (e360)
Global Warming Hoax Weekly Round-Up, Sep. 16th 2010 Coal dust kills in a spectacularly expensive fashion, Prince Charles will sheep with the fishes in a woollen coffin and Canada will be the place to be and be seen when the warmpocalypse comes. (Daily Bayonet)
Lawrence Solomon: Chilling evidence Two years ago, William Livingston and Matthew Penn of the National Solar Observatory in Tucson, in a controversial paper that contradicted conventional wisdom and upset global warming theorists, predicted that sunspots could more or less disappear after 2015, possibly indicating the onset of another Little Ice Age. As they stated then, "the occurrence of prolonged periods with no sunspots is important to climate studies, since the Maunder Minimum was shown to correspond with the reduced average global temperatures on the Earth." The Maunder Minimum lasted for approximately 70 years, from about 1645 to 1715, and was marked by bitter cold, widespread crop failures, and severe human privation. They concluded their 2008 paper by noting, "Finally, observations of this type during the onset of the next sunspot cycle will be critical in determining if the observed trends continue." We are now in the onset of that next sunspot cycle, called Cycle 24 -- these cycles typically last 11 years -- and Livingston and Penn have this month published new, potentially ominous findings in a paper entitled Long-term Evolution of Sunspot Magnetic Fields: "we are now seeing far fewer sunspots than we saw in the preceding cycle; solar Cycle 24 is producing an anomalously low number of dark spots and pores," they report. Their conclusions have potential "dramatic implications." Cycle 24 could have just half the number of sunspots as the recently completed Cycle 23, and there could be "virtually no sunspots in Cycle 25." The implications of their research points to decades of spotlessness. The authors base their conclusions on the assumption that recent trends will continue, an assumption that, they note, may well be proven in time to be false. At the same time, given that their findings are consistent with those of other solar scientists, and given the stark implications of another little ice age for society at large, they felt compelled to publish a warning. "It is important to note that it is always risky to extrapolate linear trends; but the importance of the implications from making such an assumption justify its mention," they state. The upshot for scientists and world leaders should be clear, particularly since other scientists in recent years have published analyses that also indicate that global cooling could be on its way. Climate can and does change toward colder periods as well as warmer ones. Over the last 20 years, some $80-billion has been spent on research dominated by the assumption that global temperatures will rise. Virtually no research has investigated the consequences of the very live possibility that temperatures will plummet. Research into global cooling and its implications for the globe is long overdue. Lawrence Solomon is executive director of Energy Probe and the author of The Deniers. LawrenceSolomon@nextcity.com. Click here for the authors' 2008 and 2010 studies. (Financial Post)
Global warming could cut number of Arctic hurricanes, study finds Research says storms that hamper the exploitation of Arctic reserves may halve by 2100, but experts warn against oil rush
More PlayStation ? "climatology": Avoiding dangerous climate change: An international perspective The world will need to make substantial reductions in greenhouse gas emissions below current levels over the next few decades if the worst impacts of
dangerous climate change are to be avoided. This was a key conclusion from UK and US climate scientists at an international workshop on the UK AVOID program in
Washington, DC exploring the most policy-relevant aspects of understanding dangerous climate change.
Media Climate Change Bias; Only Melting Ice Makes News Figure 1 shows the extent of Antarctic sea ice for 2010 up to September 10. Ice extent has been about 1 million square kilometers above the 1979 -- 2000
average. Notice the 2009 ice amount was above average as well. This matches reports of record cold temperatures around the Southern Hemisphere. On July 27, 2010
we learned from Peru, "Temperatures plummeted to below -20 ?C prompting the government to declare a state of emergency for nearly half of the country
Friday."- Source
CA Climate Change is Caused by the Pacific Decadal Oscillation, Not by Carbon Dioxide Written by Roy Clark The analysis of minimum temperature data using the PDO as a reference baseline has been demonstrated as a powerful technique for climate trend evaluation. This technique may be extended to other regions using the appropriate local ocean surface temperature reference. The analysis found no evidence for CO2 induced warming trends in the California data. This confirms prior 'Null Hypothesis' work that it is impossible for a 100 ppm increase in atmospheric CO2 concentration to cause any climate change. Read more... (SPPI)
Yet more from the virtual realm: Optimizing climate change reduction Palo Alto, CA--Scientists at the Carnegie Institution's Department of Global Ecology have taken a new approach on examining a proposal to fix the warming planet. So-called geoengineering ideas--large-scale projects to change the Earth's climate--have included erecting giant mirrors in space to reflect solar radiation, injecting aerosols of sulfate into the stratosphere making a global sunshade, and much more. Past modeling of the sulfate idea looked at how the stratospheric aerosols might affect Earth's climate and chemistry. The Carnegie researchers started out differently by asking how, if people decided what kind of climate they want, they would go about determining the aerosol distribution pattern that would come closest to achieving their climate goals. This new approach is the first attempt to determine the optimal way of achieving defined climate goals. The research is published in the September 16, 2010, issue of the Environmental Research Letters. (Carnegie Institution)
Aerosols Control Rainfall in the Rainforest Precipitation-controlling aerosols over the Amazon rainforest originate from the forest ecosystem
U.N. Gives CO2 Auditors Time To Study Liability Plan A United Nations panel will give clean energy project auditors three weeks to study a proposal to make them liable for over-issuing Kyoto carbon offsets,
according to a webcast of a panel meeting on Thursday.
Carbon Capturing Technology Doomed In Europe: Study Innovative carbon-trapping technology might barely get past the testing phase in Europe after the economic crisis and a shift to green power destroys
incentives, a new study warns.
Spending Review May Axe CCS Subsidies For Coal Companies The Treasury's public spending review has cast doubt on the future of Longannet power station's ambitious carbon capture programme, despite a commitment by ScottishPower to invest ?5 million in university research on the project. The question mark comes despite commitments by the UK coalition Government to maintain the previous Labour government's plans to finance four large-scale carbon capture and storage (CCS) demonstration projects. The projects are needed to prove that 90 per cent of the carbon emitted by coal-fired power stations can be removed and stored underground without making the cost of the electricity produced prohibitive. Because power firms are unwilling to pay the costs of ?1 billion or more to prove this, a government competition was announced in 2007. The prize is payment of all the costs of fitting CCS to a commercial-scale power station. In March, the Government whittled competitors for the first demonstration project down to two -- ScottishPower's Longannet scheme and a plan by E.ON to build a new CCS-fitted power station at Kingsnorth in Kent. The companies were given ?90 million to produce full designs by early 2011. But now the Treasury spending review threatens these schemes. Although the cost of them is to be financed by a levy on electricity bills rather then by taxes or borrowing, the Treasury is understood to regard this as public spending. This is because any increase in electricity bills will reduce the spending power of consumers and businesses, cutting the yield from taxes such as VAT. In July, Chris Huhne, the Energy and Climate Change secretary, announced that he was setting up an Office for Carbon Capture & Storage and would launch the selection process for the remaining three projects this autumn. But yesterday his department confirmed that a Treasury review was under way. A spokeswoman said: "It is right that the Government carefully scrutinises all major capital projects given the current economic circumstances -- CCS projects are no different in this respect. Full story (subscription required) (GWPF)
Elbowing a place at the public trough: Aerospace Firms Float "Cash For Carbon" Plan Airlines that reduce carbon emissions would receive billions in government financing to help pay for aircraft upgrades tied to U.S. air traffic modernization
under a proposal advanced by aerospace manufacturers on Thursday.
Well gosh! China Admits Energy Efficiency Goals Unrealistic 
Despite huge investment in new technologies, China is finding it difficult to make its economy more energy-efficient, a senior official said Thursday.That China is unlikely to hit its targets should not be a surprise (see also this PDF). What I did find eye-popping in the article was the projections of the size of the automobile market in China in coming years: While China is investing heavily in electric cars, they are still years away from reaching the market in numbers large enough to affect overall Chinese energy consumption, executives said Thursday at the Global Automotive Forum in Chengdu.Wow, 30 to 40 million (!) cars sold in China every year by 2020, and electric cars still a ways off. (Roger Pielke Jr.)
Americans can't afford the offshore drilling moratorium At a time when the economy is reeling and national unemployment hovers just under 10%, the President and Congressional leaders are ignoring the wishes of the
American people; seemingly working overtime to drive up energy costs and send jobs overseas by punishing our own energy industry. The President's insistence on
maintaining a ban on deepwater exploration and drilling for oil and gas along with the de facto ban on near shore activity is wreaking havoc on the Gulf Coast's
economy and could easily impact national energy prices this winter.
As Europe Kicks Coal, Hungarian Town Suffers OROSZLANY, Hungary -- When the directors of Hungary's last remaining coal-fired power plant announced that they would close the coal mine and begin
dismantling the plant at the end of this year, the news sent shock waves through this weathered industrial city, where a statue of three miners stands in the
square.
So with the news today reflecting the recycling-mania of the very same peoples' republic I voted against with my feet just a few years ago -- installing
"tracking chips" in recycling bins (now in Cool Ranch flavor!) to assist the Green Police -- I see another, written example of the environmentalist's
fetish. (Of course, when I lived in Alexandria, I had Greenpeace tracking my garbage already, removing it every Sunday night. Think of the possibilities with
this scheme had I not moved.)
The Paradox of Success for Germany's Green Party Never before have so many Germans been prepared to vote for the Green Party. But its success comes at a price. The party's mobilization against Merkel's plan
to extend nuclear lifespans means its hoped-for path to power has now been blocked.
Greens think locally, act stupidly on uranium The Australian Greens want to stop all uranium exploration, close all of Australia's existing uranium mines, oh, and while they're at it, they'd also like a
nuclear free world.
World's Largest Solar Plant Wins Key Approval The world's largest solar power plant cleared an important hurdle on Wednesday, laying the groundwork for a dramatic expansion in solar energy generation in
the United States and around the world.
OVERBLOWN: Where's the Empirical Proof? (Part IV) by Jon Boone EXTRAORDINARY CLAIMS REQUIRE EXTRAORDINARY PROOF --Marcello Truzzi How can an ancient source of energy, which
effectively replace the capacity of modern machines and their fuels, in the process removing significant amounts of greenhouse gas emissions that are the by-product of the burning of those fuels? This final post in our four-part series discusses the nature of the scientific method and shows that there are a number of challenges to the claims wind technology can abate meaningful greenhouse gas emissions--challenges that require access to actual wind performance data showing how wind affects thermal behavior throughout the grid. Any explanation about causation must honestly and transparently account for all variables at play. It should not consist of cherry picked items favorable to a particular agenda while ignoring other, less favorable factors. Dr. Truzzi (above) also recounted who is obligated to do what in the process of investigating, vetting, and validating explanation: "In science, the burden of proof falls upon the claimant; and the more extraordinary a claim, the heavier is the burden of proof demanded. The true skeptic takes an agnostic position, one that says the claim is not proved rather than disproved. He asserts that the claimant has not borne the burden of proof and that science must continue to build its cognitive map of reality without incorporating the extraordinary claim as a new "fact." Since the true skeptic does not assert a claim, he has no burden to prove anything. He just goes on using the established theories of "conventional science" as usual. But if a critic asserts that there is evidence for disproof, that he has a negative hypothesis--saying, for instance, that a seeming [paranormal] result was actually due to an artifact--he is making a claim and therefore also has to bear a burden of proof."[i] AWEA's extraordinary claim is this: That an ancient source of energy, which relentlessly, continuously, destabilizes the balance between supply and demand, is highly variable and unresponsive, and provides no capacity value while inimical to demand cycles, can effectively replace the capacity of modern machines and their fuels, in the process removing significant amounts of greenhouse gas emissions that are the by-product of the burning of those fuels. This claim is particularly egregious given that wind does not even provide modern power performance--only desultory energy. Since energy is the ability to do work and power is the rate work is done, wind technology delivers fluctuating power at a rate appropriate for 1810, not 2010. The assertion that wind technology is a necessary, let alone sufficient, cause of reductions in the use of fossil fuels and their various emissions cannot withstand even casual scrutiny, for there are, in virtually every case, other much more plausible causes for any CO2 or fossil fuel reductions--viz, a falling away of demand, substitution of other fuels, improvements in conventional machine efficiencies, even changes in weather conditions. [Read more â ?'] (MasterResource)
U.S. judge sets Dec. 16 hearing on healthcare suit PENSACOLA, Fla. - A Florida judge said on Tuesday he would hear arguments on Dec. 16 on a lawsuit by 20 U.S. states seeking to block President Barack Obama's
overhaul of the U.S. healthcare system.
Another dangerous loon who wants to "protect" people from vaccinations: The man who encourages the sick and dying to drink industrial bleach Vulnerable people with cancer, Aids, influenza and malaria are being urged to drink Miracle Mineral Solutions (MMS) -- described by the FDA as 'industrial bleach' (Guardian)
Vaccine superstitions have consequences: Baby boy dies from whooping cough A five-week-old South Australian boy has died from whooping cough, as state health authorities report a rise in the number of cases of the highly contagious
disease.
Deadly Whooping Cough, Once Wiped Out, Is Back California is in the midst of its worst outbreak of whooping cough in a half-century. More than 2,700 cases have been reported so far this year -- eight
times last year's number at this point. Seven of the victims, all infants, have died.
Deadly Diseases Making a Comeback Whooping cough, measles, rickets: These diseases, once considered Victorian plights, are making a comeback in the U.S. Decades ago, such diseases bloomed due to poverty, malnutrition and a lack of health care; these days, they're in due mostly to anti-vaccine anxiety and a modern lifestyle. Dr. Camille Sabella, who practices pediatric infectious diseases in the Center for Pediatric Infectious Diseases in the Pediatrics Institute and Children's Hospital at Cleveland Clinic, gives us some insight into why these illnesses are once again causing outbreaks. (AOL)
Measles outbreak alarms health authorities Health authorities across New South Wales and Queensland are urging residents to make sure they are immunised against measles.
Americans' immunity to mumps less than ideal About 90 percent of young to middle-aged Americans have antibodies against the mumps virus -- a level of immunity that is at the low end of what's needed to
prevent significant outbreaks of the infection, a government study finds.
UN health agency reports on spread of polio outbreak in Angola and DR Congo 8 September 2010 -- The United Nations World Health Organization (WHO) reported today that the recent outbreak of polio in Angola is spreading into other,
previously polio-free parts of the country and the neighbouring Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC).
Antivaxxers take note: vaccines stop polio outbreak in Tajikistan This is wildly good news! Through Vaccine Central I learned that a major polio outbreak in Tajikistan has been stopped! How? Through vaccination. Yup. The first reports of polio were confirmed in April -- 413 of them. However, that ended in late June, when no new cases were reported. That is credited to the thousands of doctors and nurses who not only vaccinated at least 97% of the children in each region of the mountainous country, but also flooded the area with multi-lingual informational leaflets, posters, and banners. And they succeeded! With no new reports, it appears this outbreak was stopped cold. And with the AVN in Australia getting hammered repeatedly in the press, I can now have some hope that the movement here in the United States, spearheaded by Jenny McCarthy, will die off as well. Vaccinations work, and they save a lot of lives. (Bad Astronomy)
Malaria fight saves 750,000, report finds WASHINGTON - Programs to fight malaria, such as distribution of bed nets and drugs and spraying insecticides, have saved nearly 750,000 lives over the past
10 years, according to a report released on Tuesday.
Swine flu can become drug-resistant quickly - study WASHINGTON - A swine flu virus infecting a woman in Singapore mutated into a drug-resistant form virtually overnight, doctors reported in a study that they
say shows the limitations of using drugs to treat influenza.
DNA 'Volume Knobs' May Be Associated With Obesity When it comes to our expanding waistlines, we usually blame either diet or genes. But a new study fingers a third culprit: chemicals that attach to DNA and
change its function. A survey of millions of these modifications has uncovered a handful associated with body mass index, a measure of height and weight.
Although the findings don't prove that the modifications cause obesity, they may one day help doctors better predict who should be counting their calories.
U.S. Meat Farmers Brace for Limits on Antibiotics RALSTON, Iowa -- Piglets hop, scurry and squeal their way to the far corner of the pen, eyeing an approaching human. "It shows that they're healthy
animals," Craig Rowles, the owner of a large pork farm here, said with pride.
The Clean Air Act's Birthday Is Not Worth Celebrating
Yesterday marked the 40th birthday of the Environmental Protection Agency's (EPA) Clean Air Act (CAA), and environmentalists celebrated by reminding us how beneficial the regulation has been at improving air quality in the U.S. Now the EPA wants to turn the Clean Air Act's birthday party into an all-out rager by allowing them to do what elected officials could not: regulate carbon dioxide (CO2). First things first. Air quality was improving before the passage of the 1970 CAA. Environmentalists should give more credit to innovation and less to top-down regulation. The air quality improvements are attributable to the cost-saving, energy-efficiency gains made by business and industry that go hand-in-hand with environmental improvement. Engineer and environmental expert Indur Goklany explains: Continue reading... (The Foundry)
Dispatch: No Re-Re-Respect For Atrazine The FDA today began re-re-reevaluating
AAtrex, Syngenta Crop Protection's brand name for the 50-year-old herbicide atrazine, which opponents allege is a potential carcinogen and "endocrine
disrupter." The EPA estimates that banning atrazine would cost more than $2 billion annually, while University of Chicago economist Don Coursey believes
that a ban would lead to 21,000 to 48,000 jobs lost from corn production losses alone. Addressing fears over the presence of "harmful" chemicals in
pesticide-treated foods, a minyanville.com blog-post references P.J. O'Rourke's book All The Trouble In The World and ACSH's Holiday Dinner Menu, illustrating that many common food plants naturally contain
"carcinogens" and "toxins" -- but at doses that do not cause us any harm.
New Studies Reaffirm Atrazine is Safe Study methodology parallels potential real-world exposure. No adverse effects shown at any possible environmental levels.
Green Protectionism's Recycled Playbook If union bosses and a few industrial titans have their way, a hearing in a Washington, D.C. bureaucratic back room this week will lead to higher prices on
ordinary daily goods for virtually every consumer in America.
Oh god, not another Greenpeace guilt-trip Green advertising campaigns are aimed at scaring adults witless and turning kids into Mao-style mum-policing spies.
They don't give a dam about development Greens must have very hard hearts if they can look at flood-hit Ethiopia and still say 'don't build dams'.
Famine threat in Africa's Sahel eases - for now DAKAR - Abundant rains in Chad have raised hopes for an end to severe food shortages but the effects will linger and lead to new difficulties across Africa's
Sahel region in 2011, aid workers predict.
Indian farmers adopt flood-tolerant rice at unprecedented rates Farmers cultivating rice on 12 million hectares of flood-prone areas in India are planting flood-tolerant rice varieties at unprecedented rates, thanks to
faster seed multiplication, targeted dissemination, and linking of partners.
Um, this actually has nothing to do with climate change: Chocolate Potentially Made Safe From Climate Change: YIPEEE!!!! An environmental breakthrough has never sounded so....delicious. Today, candy giant Mars Inc, the U.S. Department of Agriculture and IBM announced that they
have mapped a preliminary genome sequence for the cacao plant, which produces the crucial ingredient for making chocolate, and placed it in the public domain.
Ex-minister Lord Sainsbury of Turville urges fresh debate on GM crops A former science minister called today for the debate on the cultivation of genetically modified crops to be reopened, warning that it would be "very
foolish" to rule out use of the technology in the UK.
Scientists see risks and benefits in nano foods LONDON - In a taste of things to come, food scientists say they have cooked up a way of using nanotechnology to make low-fat or fat-free foods just as
appetizing and satisfying as their full-fat fellows.
Henry Waxman: Democrats would push climate legislation in 2011 The campaign to pass climate legislation will continue on Capitol Hill in 2011 -- if Democrats are still in charge, that is.
GOP considers plan to stymie new greenhouse gas rules at Senate markup Senate Republicans may use a markup of EPA's annual spending bill Thursday to try and block the agency from implementing new climate change rules.
Senate takes another bite at the EPA's greenhouse apple UPDATE: Senate Democrats have cancelled the mark-up of the EPA budget reportedly because they were concerned that Republicans would offer an appropriations rider to block EPA regulation of greenhouse gases (described in the article below). By Steve Milloy The Senate has a chance to at least partially redeem the 111th Congress when the Appropriations Committee meets to vote on the budget of the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency on Thursday, September 16. Two Committee Democrats, Sen. Ben Nelson (D-NE) and Sen. Byron Dorgan (D-ND), have indicated they may vote favorably on an appropriations rider that would block the EPA from regulating greenhouse gas emissions starting in January 2011. Given the 18-12 Democrat-Republican split on the Committee, only two more Democrats would be needed (along with a unanimous Republican bloc) to stop the EPA from implementing the most sweeping, expensive and controversial environmental/energy/economic regulation in history. Those two Democrats might not be hard to find given that Committee members Sen. Mary Landrieu (D-LA) and Sen. Mark Pryor (D-AR) voted earlier in the year for the Murkowski resolution to block EPA regulation. And Committee member Sen. Tim Johnson (D-SD) is a co-sponsor of the Rockefeller proposal to delay EPA regulation for two years. Why should the Appropriations Committee take the extraordinary step of reining in the EPA? First, greenhouse gas regulation would necessarily impact the entire U.S. economy, as it would affect 70 percent of electricity generation and nearly 100 percent of transportation energy use. The totality of this impact demands that Congress, as opposed to a single and often controversial federal agency, address the issue. Next, there is no serious dispute over the fact that greenhouse gas regulation will raise energy costs without providing any offsetting and near-term economic benefits. Given current economic conditions, making energy cost more will do nothing but further set back, if not reverse economic recovery. EPA has shown precious little concern for the real-world impacts of its impending regulations, so it's time for the adults in Congress to step forward and assert authority over the EPA. Third, there is a misconception among many on the Hill and in the public that that Supreme Court ordered to the EPA to regulate greenhouse gases. Nothing could be further from the truth. In its 2007 Massachusetts v. EPA decision, the Court merely ruled that the EPA could, not that it must, regulate greenhouse gases. Evidence of the debatable nature of EPA regulation is that the Bush EPA opted not to regulate greenhouse gases while the Obama administration reversed that decision. It is no secret that President Obama ordered the EPA to regulate greenhouse gases as a prod to get Congress and industry moving on greenhouse gas regulation. The Senate now has another chance (after the 51-47 defeat of the Murkowski resolution) to reassert Congress as the driver of this major domestic policy. Moreover, the EPA may have acted illegally and usurped congressional authority by issuing its so-called "tailoring rule," part of the suite of greenhouse gas regulations. Under the Clean Air Act, if the EPA decides to regulate a "pollutant," then all sources that emit 250 tons annually of that pollutant must be regulated. But the EPA has unilaterally decided to change the law for greenhouse gases. Over the course of the past year, the EPA has arbitrarily and without congressional authorization raised the threshold from 250 tons to 50,000 tons and then to 75,000-100,000 tons -- otherwise the agency would find itself with the Herculean and unpopular task of regulating thousands of small businesses and apartment buildings. If Senate Democrats want to take steps to stem the bleeding that seems likely to occur in November and perhaps beyond, they should remember that America has pretty much rejected the policy known as "cap-and-trade" and that EPA regulation of greenhouse gases amounts simply to "cap" -- that is, all pain with no gain. Any politician that takes no action to stop that will be in deep trouble this fall and in 2012. Steve Milloy publishes JunkScience.com and is the author of "Green Hell: How Environmentalists Plan to Control Your Life and What You Can Do to Stop Them" (Regnery 2009). (Green Hell Blog)
What's Scarier Than Cap and Trade? A Renewable Electricity Standard
For the past year, the phrase "cap and trade" was as taboo as using Lord Voldemort's name in J. K. Rowling's Harry Potter series. Wizards scared of the Dark Lord referred to Voldemort as "He-Who-Must-Not-Be-Named." For those hoping to pass cap and trade, it became "The-Energy-Policy-That-Will-Create-Jobs." But opponents correctly labeled cap and trade a significant tax, and the bill died in the Senate. In fact, congressional votes on cap and trade are a major talking point on campaign ads--ads that vilify Members who voted for the Waxman--Markey cap-and trade-bill last year. Cap and trade has dim hopes of revival, and as a result, politicians are turning to a plan that could actually pass: a renewable electricity standard (RES). Continue reading... (The Foundry)
Oil industry trade group chief rips governor on Prop. 23 The head of an oil industry trade group described California's landmark climate change law as "political correctness gone mad" and said Gov. Arnold
Schwarzenegger appears "hell bent on becoming a real life Terminator" to the refining industry.
Former Civil Service chief calls for climate shakeup What do our mandarins really think of global warming?
Doubt remains over 'climategate' A 'huge cloud of doubt' remains over the case for man made global warming, according to Lord Lawson of Blaby, following a new study into the 'climategate' scandal. (TDT)
Understanding the Climategate Inquiries News broke on or around 19 November 2009 that a large archive of emails and files from the Climatic Research Unit (CRU) in the UK had been released on the
internet. The contents of the files were sufficiently disconcerting to the public, governments and university administrations that a number of inquiries were
established. Several of my research projects were discussed not only in the so-called "Climategate" emails themselves, but also in the investigations,
and I made detailed submissions of evidence to three of the panels. Consequently I take considerable interest in the outcome of these inquiries, especially with
regards to whether they approached the issues impartially, investigated thoroughly and drew valid conclusions that fully reflected the evidence.
Climategate whitewashers squirm like maggots on Bishop Hill's pin Just back from the House of Lords for the launch of the Global Warming Policy Foundation's report on the failings of the three Climategate inquiries.
Damning New Investigation Into Climategate Inquiries London, 14 September - The Global Warming Policy Foundation today publishes a detailed assessment of the Climategate inquiries set up by the University of
East Anglia and others which finds that they avoided key questions and failed to probe some of the most serious allegations.
Warmist Slander of Scientific Skeptics Warmist true believers bitterly cling their mantra that only the corrupting influence sinister money could possibly explain skepticism toward the theory they
embrace as gospel truth.
Lomborg: No, I Didn't Flip-Flop on Global Warming September 15, 2010 9:00 A.M.
(Planet Gore)
Response to Misinformation from Deutsche Bank Written by Ross McKitrick
Imaginative little souls: Britain Not Prepared For Climate Change: Report Britain is not doing enough to prepare for the impacts of climate change, raising costs for homes and businesses, two separate bodies said this week.
Europe's climate chief scolds and praises China BRUSSELS, Sept 14 - China's climate negotiators are moving too slowly, but the country's green energy companies are advancing at an "astonishing"
pace and threaten to outpace western competitors, Europe's climate chief said on Tuesday.
CO2 reductions slip down EU priority list EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS - EU climate action commissioner Connie Hedegaard has said that achieving an agreement on reduced CO2 emissions at a United Nations'
conference later this year is no longer a top EU priority.
Oh good grief! BHP chief Marius Kloppers puts end to emissions trading scheme THE head of the nation's biggest company and the world's largest mining house has declared that Australia must wean itself off its fuel dependency.
ACCI does not agree with Kloppers A leading business group does not agree with BHP Billiton chief executive Marius Kloppers that a carbon tax is inevitable and Australia should get on the
front foot.
Global climate agreement not 'inevitable' Now the trumpet summons us again - to take action on climate change.
Bob Carter
We Are Thinking The Wrong Thoughts Written by Dennis Ambler Those of who have long been in denial about the realities of global warming and the credibility of the IPCC, can now feel relieved, there may be hope for us yet. The diagnosis has been made; we have a psychological problem, which so far has failed to respond to the millions upon millions of dollars spent in "communicating" climate change to the masses. Read more... (SPPI)
Don't think I agree here either: It is Not About Science, but Values Here is how a pre-publication version of the paper explained its hypothesis: Kahan, Dan M., Jenkins-Smith, Hank and Braman, Donald, Cultural Cognition of Scientific Consensus (February 7, 2010). Journal of Risk Research, Forthcoming. Available at SSRN: http://ssrn.com/abstract=1549444The paper used an experimental methodology in the sense that it actually looked at how individuals characterized various experts. The paper explains its findings: The study furnished two forms of evidence in support of this basic hypothesis. The first was the existence of a strong correlation between individuals' cultural values and their perceptions of scientific consensus on risks known to divide persons of opposing worldviews. Subjects holding hierarchical and individualistic outlooks, on the one hand, and ones holding egalitarian and communitarian outlooks, on the other, significantly disagreed about the state of expert opinion on climate change, nuclear waste dis-posal, and handgun regulation. It is possible, of course, that one or the other of these groups is better at discerning scientific consensus than the other. But because the impressions of both groups converged and diverged from positions endorsed in NAS "expert consensus" in a pattern reflective of their respective predispositions, it seems more likely that both hierarchical individualists and egalitarian communitarians are fitting their perceptions of scientific consensus to their values.A press release from NSF that accompanied the paper, explains, . . . the study also found that the American public in general is culturally divided on what "scientific consensus" is on climate change, nuclear waste disposal, and concealed-handgun laws.These empirical findings help to explain why there are obvious contradictions in what areas of science different groups tend to accept and reject, with no apparent systematic explanation. For instance, many more Europeans than Americans think that GMOs are unsafe, yet many more Europeans than Americans are worried about climate change. Similarly, US conservatives are opposed to stem cell research while the left does not, and opposition to geoengineering is generally found on the political left and its supporters on the right. The paper explains the significance of its findings for the communication of scientific information: This conclusion does not imply, however, that there is no prospect for rational public delibera-tions informed by the best scientific evidence on global warming, nuclear waste disposal, handguns, and like issues. But because the source of the enfeebled power of scientific opinion is different from what is normally thought, the treatment must be something other than what is normally prescribed. It is not enough to assure that scientifically sound information--including evidence of what scientists themselves believe--is widely disseminated: cultural cognition strongly motivates individuals--of all worldviews-- to recognize such information as sound in a selective pattern that reinforces their cultural predispositions. To overcome this effect, communicators must attend to the cultural meaning as well as the scientific content of information.The authors suggest that attending to the cultural meaning of science entails three tasks, first: When shown risk information (e.g., global temperatures are increasing) that they associate with a conclusion threatening to their cultural values (commerce must be constrained), individuals tend to react dismissively toward that information; however, when shown that the information in fact supports or is consistent with a conclusion that affirms their cultural values (society should rely more on nuclear power), such individuals are more likely to consider the information open-mindedly . . .This is why expanding the scope of policy options in highly politicized contexts can be politically important, as it gives people an opportunity to interpret science in a manner consistent with their cultural values. Efforts to focus on green jobs or the security implications of climate policies reflect such an awareness. Second: Individuals reflexively reject information inconsistent with their predispositions when they perceive that it is being advocated by experts whose values they reject and opposed by ones whose values they share. In contrast, they attend more open-mindedly to such information, and are much more likely to accept it, if they perceive that there are experts of diverse values on both sides of the debate . . .This helps to explain why efforts to enforce a rigid consensus of views in climate policy have back-fired so strongly among many in the so-called skeptical community. The more that a consensus is invoked and the narrower it is defined, the more it puts off the very people that those seeking to share scientific knowledge should be trying to communicate with, the unconvinced. Denigrating one's cultural or political opponents may feel satisfying, but it is not a good strategy for getting them to accept that your views are sound. Thus, open, transparent and diverse expert advisory processes are more likely to be generally viewed as legitimate and robust. Third: Individuals tend to assimilate information by fitting it to pre-existing narrative templates or schemes that invest the information with meaning. The elements of these narrative templates--the identity of the stock heroes and villains, the nature of their dramatic struggles, and the moral stakes of their engagement with one another--vary in identifiable and recurring ways across cultural groups. By crafting messages to evoke narrative templates that are culturally congenial to target audiences, risk communicators can help to assure that the content of the information they are im-parting receives considered attention across diverse cultural groups . . .Again ironically, efforts to identify or label those who are skeptical of certain expert views as "anti-science" or "deniers" are like to become self-fulfilling in the sense that they reinforce the rejection of expert views as they play directly to a narrative conditioned on cultural considerations. Consequently, breaking down, rather than reinforcing differences across cultural groups would this seem key to broader acceptance of certain scientific findings. Building bridges is harder work than tearing them down. In many respects, the advice given here is exactly the opposite of that of some of the more ardent advocates for action on climate change in the scientific community (and their allies). (The same could be said as well as nuclear power and gun control, the two other issues that the paper looked at). Much of this just sounds like common sense, but given the state of the debate over climate, apparently it is not. But there is a final irony here. The advice of this paper is likely to be dismissed by those practicing such strategies for exactly the reasons described in the paper. Experts in climate science are not experts in the science of judgment and decision making. Thus, they will interpret the findings of this research through their own cultural lenses. And more likely than not, that probably means giving far less weight to these findings than they deserve. (Roger Pielke Jr.)
GE: Imaginative Rent-Seeking at Work There's a big difference between free enterprise and crony capitalism. One fosters competition to serve consumer demands but the other feeds off taxpayers
and exploits privileged access to Washington's political class for private gain and protection from competitors. Increasingly, America's corporate giants are
opting for cronyism over the rigors of competition.
Reducing Hunger and the "Iron Law" of Climate Policy 
First, why the big drop in 2010? According to FAO: The 2010 lower global hunger number resulted largely from renewed economic growth expected this year -- particularly in developing countries -- and the drop in food prices since mid-2008.Thus, economic growth means less hungry people. Second, why the big spike in 2009? According to FAO last year (PDF), one primary reason was the cost of fuel: Given the increased importance of biofuels and the new linkages between agricultural and energy markets, increased cereal yields, if achieved, may not necessarily continue to lead to lower cereal prices. Because the world energy market is so much larger than the world grain market, grain prices may be determined by oil prices in the energy market as opposed to being determined by grain supply.Thus, higher priced energy means more hungry people. These twin dynamics illustrate several important boundary conditions for a successful climate policy -- that is, one focused on stabilizing atmospheric concentrations of carbon dioxide at a low level. The boundary conditions are that (a) economic growth must not be slowed, and (b) energy cannot be made appreciably more expensive. (You need only have a look at the Kaya Identity to see why this is the case.) Policies that reduce economic growth and/or make energy more expensive will lead to more hungry people around the world. This is just an empirical reality. The FAO notes: Two thirds of the world's undernourished live in just seven countries -- Bangladesh, China, the Democratic Republic of Congo, Ethiopia, India, Indonesia and Pakistan.In 2008, those seven countries accounted for almost 30% of total global carbon dioxide emissions, a proportion that is growing rapidly. The realities of poverty alone help to explain why India and China, in particular, have approached climate policy as a lower priority than economic growth. Yukiko Omura, Vice President of the International Fund for Agricultural Development, explains that, "the world's hungry are not just numbers. They are people -- poor women and men struggling to bring up their children and give them a better life; and they are youth trying to build a future for themselves. It is ironic that the majority of them actually live in rural areas of developing countries. Indeed, over 70 percent of the world's extremely poor -- those people who live on less than US$ one a day -- live in rural areas. That's a billion people, and four out of five of them are farmers to some extent or the other."In this context, arguments about long-term costs and benefits and unaccounted for externalities -- no matter how theoretically valid -- simply will not trump the immediate challenges of reducing hunger. To put more bluntly -- few are going to be willing to increase (or arrest the decrease of) the number of starving people around the world to further an emissions reductions agenda. So we'll simply have to find another way -- one that prioritizes (rather than slows) economic growth and one that focuses on making energy less costly. Until we do so, climate policy will continue to make little progress. It is an iron law. (Roger Pielke Jr.)
Home Of "Ice Giants" Thaws, Shows Pre-Viking Hunts Climate change is exposing reindeer hunting gear used by the Vikings' ancestors faster than archaeologists can collect it from ice thawing in northern
Europe's highest mountains.
They wish... Canada to become global power thanks to climate change: Author A top U.S. geographer says Canada will emerge as a major world power within 40 years as part of a climate-driven transformation of global trade, agriculture
and geopolitics highlighted by the rise of the "Northern Rim" nations.
Australian Temperatures in cities adjusted up by 70%!? Ken Stewart has been hard at work again, this time analyzing the Australian urban records. While he expected that the cities and towns would show a larger rise than records in the country due to the Urban Heat Island Effect, what he found was that the raw records showed only a 0.4 degree rise, less than the rural records which went from a raw 0.6 to an adjusted 0.85 (a rise of 40%). What shocked him about the urban records were the adjustments ? making the trend a full 70% warmer. The largest adjustments to the raw records are cooling ones in the middle of last century. So 50 years after the measurements were recorded, officials realized they were artificially too high? Hopefully someone who knows can explain why so many thermometers were overestimating temperatures in the first half of the 1900's. 50 years later?  The raw Australian urban temperature
records are in blue. The adjusted records in red. Note that temperatures in the middle of last century appear to be adjusted downwards. These are the annual
average recordings for all 34 sites.
Remember Dr David Jones, Head of Climate Monitoring and Prediction, National Climate Centre, Bureau of Meteorology said:
Yet it's obvious that there are far more warming adjustments than cooling ones, and remember, many (almost all?) of these urban sites will be markedly
different places than what they were in say 1920. The encroachment of concrete, cars and exhaust vents can surely only go in one direction, though I guess, it's
possible all these sites have new sources of shade (why aren't the themometers moved, if that's the case?) Like the rural records, the temperatures overall are
roughly a quarter of a degree higher after the "corrections"
More » (Jo Nova)
Here's something which actually might be worth worrying about: Say Goodbye to Sunspots? Scientists studying sunspots for the past 2 decades have concluded that the magnetic field that triggers their formation has been steadily declining. If the
current trend continues, by 2016 the sun's face may become spotless and remain that way for decades--a phenomenon that in the 17th century coincided with a
prolonged period of cooling on Earth.
Uh-oh... CAGW advocates will be unhappy: New Paper "What Do Observational Datasets Say about Modeled Tropospheric Temperature Trends Since 1979" By Christy Et Al 2010 We have a new paper published. It is Christy, J.R., Herman, B., Pielke, R., Sr., Klotzbach, P., McNider, R.T., Hnilo, J.J., Spencer, R.W., Chase, T., and Douglass, D. What Do Observational Datasets Say about Modeled Tropospheric Temperature Trends since 1979?. Remote Sens. 2010, 2, 2148-2169. The abstract reads
The full paper is available at http://www.mdpi.com/2072-4292/2/9/2148/pdf. (Roger Pielke Sr., climate Science)
Assessment of Intraseasonal to Interannual Climate Prediction and Predictability More accurate forecasts of climate conditions over time periods of weeks to a few years could help people plan agricultural activities, mitigate drought, and manage energy resources, amongst other activities; however, current forecast systems have limited ability on these time- scales. Models for such climate forecasts must take into account complex interactions among the ocean, atmosphere, and land surface. Such processes can be difficult to represent realistically. To improve the quality of forecasts, this book makes recommendations about the development of the tools used in forecasting and about specific research goals for improving understanding of sources of predictability. To improve the accessibility of these forecasts to decision-makers and researchers, this book also suggests best practices to improve how forecasts are made and disseminated. (NAP)
Five Reasons Why Water Vapor Feedback Might Not Be Positive Since it has been a while since I have addressed water vapor feedback, and I am now getting more questions about it, I thought this would be a good time to revisit the issue and my opinions on the subject. Positive water vapor feedback is probably the most "certain" and important of the feedbacks in the climate system in the minds of mainstream climate researchers. Weak warming caused by more carbon dioxide will lead to more water vapor in the atmosphere, which will then amplify the weak warming through water vapor's role as the atmosphere's primary greenhouse gas. Positive water vapor feedback makes sense intuitively. Warmer air masses, on average, contain more water vapor. Warmer air is associated with greater surface evaporation rates, which is the ultimate source of almost all atmospheric water vapor. And since water vapor is the atmosphere's main greenhouse gas, most scientists have reasonably inferred that climate warming will be enhanced by increasing water vapor amounts. After all, water vapor feedback is positive in all of the IPCC climate models, too. But when one looks at the details objectively, it is not so obvious that water vapor feedback in the context of long-term climate change is positive. Remember, it's not the difference between warmer tropical air masses and cooler high-latitude air masses that will determine water vapor feedback ?its how those air masses will each change over time in response to more carbon dioxide. Anything that alters precipitation processes during that process can cause either positive or negative water vapor feedback. Here are some of those details. The average amount of water vapor in the atmosphere represents a balance between two competing processes: (1) surface evaporation (the source), and (2) precipitation (the sink). While we know that evaporation increases with temperature, we don't know very much about how the efficiency of precipitation systems changes with temperature. The latter process is much more complex than surface evaporation (see Renno et al., 1994), and it is not at all clear that climate models behave realistically in this regard. In fact, the models just "punt" on this issue because our understanding of precipitation systems is just not good enough to put something explicit into the models. Even cloud resolving models, which can grow individual clouds, have gross approximations and assumptions regarding the precipitation formation process.
There are a variety of processes (e.g. tropospheric wind shear causing changes in precipitation efficiency) which can in turn alter the balance between evaporation and precipitation, which will then cause warming or cooling as a RESULT OF the humidity change -- rather than the other way around. This cause-versus-effect issue has been almost totally ignored in feedback studies, and is analogous to the situation when estimating cloud feedbacks, the subject of our most recent paper. Similar to our cloud feedback paper, evidence of causation in the opposite direction is the de-correlation between temperature and humidity in the real world versus in climate models (e.g. Sun et al., 2001). 4) Evidence from Radiosondes Of course, water vapor measurements from radiosondes are notoriously unreliable, but one would think that if there was a spurious drying from a humidity sensor problem that it would show up at all altitudes, not just in the free troposphere. The fact that it switches sign right where the turbulent boundary layer pushes up against the free troposphere (around 850 mb, or 5,000 ft.) seems like too much of a coincidence. 5) The Missing "Hot Spot" Conclusion I am not saying that's what I necessarily believe. I will admit to having waffled on this issue over the years, but that's because there is evidence on both sides of the debate. At a minimum, I believe the water vapor feedback issue is more complicated than most mainstream researchers think it is. (Roy W. Spencer)
We have been alerted to a new paper on land use/land cover change over time [thnaks to Dev Niyogi for alerting us to this!]. The paper is Kees Klein Goldewijk, Arthur Beusen, Gerard Van Drecht, Martine De Vos, 2010: The HYDE 3.1 spatially explicit database of human-induced global land-use
change over the past 12,000 years The abstract reads
As they write in the conclusions
This paper builds on the research we summarized in our papers Pielke Sr., R.A., G. Marland, R.A. Betts, T.N. Chase, J.L. Eastman, J.O. Niles, D. Niyogi, and S. Running, 2002: The influence of land-use change and landscape dynamics on the climate system- relevance to climate change policy beyond the radiative effect of greenhouse gases. Phil. Trans. A. Special Theme Issue, 360, 1705-1719. Marland, G., R.A. Pielke, Sr., M. Apps, R. Avissar, R.A. Betts, K.J. Davis, P.C. Frumhoff, S.T. Jackson, L. Joyce, P. Kauppi, J. Katzenberger, K.G. MacDicken, R. Neilson, J.O. Niles, D. dutta S. Niyogi, R.J. Norby, N. Pena, N. Sampson, and Y. Xue, 2003: The climatic impacts of land surface change and carbon management, and the implications for climate-change mitigation policy. Climate Policy, 3, 149-157. In the Pielke et al 2002 paper, in section 2 we reviewed the data available to assess land cover/land change over time. The new Klein Goldewijk et al paper is a very important new addition to this information. Their statement that
is a message we emphasized in our paper Pielke Sr., R., K. Beven, G. Brasseur, J. Calvert, M. Chahine, R. Dickerson, D. Entekhabi, E. Foufoula-Georgiou, H. Gupta, V. Gupta, W. Krajewski, E. Philip Krider, W. K.M. Lau, J. McDonnell, W. Rossow, J. Schaake, J. Smith, S. Sorooshian, and E. Wood, 2009: Climate change: The need to consider human forcings besides greenhouse gases. Eos, Vol. 90, No. 45, 10 November 2009, 413. Copyright (2009) American Geophysical Union. (Roger Pielke Sr., Climate Science)
New Paper "Anthropogenic Transformation Of The Biomes, 1700 To 2000" By Ellis Et Al 2010 In response to my post yesterday on the Klein Goldewijk et al paper, Dallas Staley alerted me to the following related paper. Erle C. Ellis, Kees Klein Goldewijk, Stefan Siebert, Deborah Lightman and Navin Ramankutty, 2010: Anthropogenic transformation of the biomes, 1700 to 2000. Global Ecology and Biogeography, (Global Ecol. Biogeogr.) (2010) 19, 589--606. The abstract reads
The conclusion contains the text
The concept of "ecosystem function" is, of course, just an integral component of the climate system. This recognition of the importance of the human role in ecosystem function is yet another example that illustrates the complexity of the climate, as well as the diversity of ways humans influence this system. (Roger Pielke Sr., Climate Science)
From CO2 Science Volume 13 Number 37: 15 September 2010 OPEN LETTER: Editorial: Subject Index Summary: Journal Reviews: Gulf of Mexico Coastal Hurricane Strikes: How did they vary in response to global climate change over the late Holocene? U.S. Mid-Atlantic Temperate Forest Growth Over the 20th Century: How and where has it been discovered? Shrubs on the Move in Alpine Tundra: Where are they going? ... and why? Effects of Predicted Climate Change on Australian Fisheries ... and More!: A good example of the fact that not all such assessments presage doom and gloom. Plant Growth Database:
This week, OPEC turns 50 years old. An oil cartel, formed in mid-September 1960 by Iran, Iraq, Kuwait, Saudi Arabia and Venezuela, was supposed, as its mission states still today, "to coordinate and unify the petroleum policies of its Member Countries and ensure the stabilization of oil markets in order to secure an efficient, economic and regular supply of petroleum to consumers, a steady income to producers and a fair return on capital for those investing in the petroleum industry." [Read More] (Michael J. Economides, ET)
Well duh! World Bank invests record sums in coal Last year, $3.4bn was invested in the dirtiest fossil fuel despite international commitments to cut emissions
Wind Energy's Real Problems: (Hint: It Has Nothing to Do With The Wall Street Journal)
My August 24 article in the Wall Street Journal has apparently caused some discomfort among various advocates of wind energy.(1) Given that discomfort, it's worth revisiting the thesis of my Journal piece. As a reminder, here's the thesis statement: several studies have concluded that "wind-generated electricity likely won't result in any reduction in carbon emissions -- or that they'll be so small as to be almost meaningless." The subsidy-dependent wind industry has gone to great lengths to counter that thesis. Rather than respond to the fusillade of ad hominem attacks and misinformation that have been unleashed since my article was published, let's look at what the industry's own documents are saying about wind energy's ability to cut carbon dioxide emissions. After that, I'll discuss the real threats to the wind industry -- threats that have nothing to do with opinion pieces in the Wall Street Journal. (Robert Bryce, ET)
Italy seizes $1.9 billion of assets as Mafia goes green ROME -- Italy Tuesday seized Mafia-linked assets worth $1.9 billion -- the biggest mob haul ever -- in an operation revealing that the crime group was trying to "go green" by laundering money through alternative energy companies. (Reuters)
OVERBLOWN: Further Analyses (Part III) by Jon Boone
This post in our series looks at how the integration of wind variability affects thermal activity on the grid, favors flexible natural gas generators, and influences economic dispatch and the spot market. It also examines how estimates of carbon emissions are derived and summarizes the limitations of statistically based knowledge. It concludes with a discussion of what Energy Information Administration (EIA) actually says about the causes of carbon emission reductions in the country over the last three years It is true, as the American Wind Energy Association (AWEA) notes, that any wind production must displace some existing generation, but only in terms of electricity--not any of the underlying energy forms transposed into electricity. It is rather due to the stricture that supply match perfectly with demand at all times (and this is another oversimplification of a complicated situation). Just as the grid must reduce supply in precise increments to keep pace with specific reductions in demand--or increase supply in just the right increments to keep pace with increasing demand, the grid must respond to increased wind penetration, which, to a grid operator, looks much like a reduction in demand. Since wind plants are continuously generating between zero and 100% of their rated capacity in flux, providing who-knows-what for any future time, conventional generation must infill any reduction in wind energy at the precise increment of that reduction and, conversely, it must be withdrawn in increments that match any wind increases. If wind generation were merely intermittent and unpredictable while producing at a steady rate, it might achieve some of its claims about backing down coal. However, wind's relentless variability imposes daunting challenges for integration. Clever engineering schemes can mask the problem, but not without imposing increased costs and thermal activity. [Read more →] (MasterResource)
No link found between vaccine mercury and autism NEW YORK - A new government study adds to the evidence that thimerosal, a mercury-based preservative until recently found in many vaccines, does not increase
children's risk of autism.
Almost interesting until you see it's just more yuks from UCS: Industry has sway over food safety system: study WASHINGTON - The food industry is jeopardizing U.S. public health by withholding information from food safety investigators or pressuring regulators to
withdraw or alter policy designed to protect consumers, according to a survey of government scientists and inspectors.
I wouldn't throw away your glasses: Short-sightedness gene discovery could consign glasses to history Spectacles could be consigned to history after scientists identified a collection of genes linked to shortsightedness. (TDT)
Kids' physical activity declines with age NEW YORK - Ten-year-olds spend more time sitting on their rears and less time running around than they did at age nine, according to a new British study.
Norway Says Green Taxes Can Help Jobs And Economic Growth Green taxes are among ways to spur jobs and economic revival despite less focus on environmental solutions since the U.N.'s Copenhagen summit in 2009, Norway's Prime Minister Jens Stoltenberg said Monday. (Reuters)
The Nation's River Reveals Nature's Resilience
The glum folks who insist that government control of all natural resources is necessary to save the planet, who regard nature as defenseless and doomed, ought to click here for hope. New research by the U.S. Geological Survey documents the dramatic revival of a 50-mile stretch of the Potomac River that was once considered "decimated" and "barren." The case demonstrates once again that government is not the ultimate environmental steward and that nature is resilient enough to forgive our mistakes. Decades of discharges from government-run wastewater treatment plants--particularly Washington, D.C.'s Blue Plains facility--loaded the Potomac with nitrogen and other nutrients that nurtured colonies of algae. In conjunction with sediment from runoff, the algae clouded the water and blocked sunlight from reaching riverbed vegetation--the source of oxygen, food, and shelter for invertebrates, fish, and waterfowl. A dark emptiness thus descended, prompting President Lyndon B. Johnson to declare the river "a national disgrace," according to The Washington Post. Continue reading... (The Foundry)
America's "10,000-Metric-Tonne Children" 13. September 2010 
American 10,000-tonne babies are planet's biggest threat On the surface, looking at warmist blogs and sites can be quite entertaining at times. But reading more closely between the lines, the entertainment always seems to turn into a surreal horror story. For the most rabid among the environmentalists, who strangely never seem to run out of funding, saving the planet means having to deny others life. I happened to go to Al Gore's site where he linked to a piece in Seed Magazine called Eating Away. It takes a look at growing human population, the agriculture needed to feed it, its consumption and impact on the planet. Seed Magazine admits that the population growth rate peaked in the 1980s and that the world has gone from Baby Boom to Baby Bust, much of this trend owing to the education and empowerment of women, especially in developed countries. But having population growth under control here and there is not enough. Poor countries still have exploding populations. Environmentalists worry about
the extent the planet could sustain a population of 9 billion, projected to be reached by 2050.
The news report was stark, the details sketchy: a lone gunman had entered the offices of The Discovery Channel and had issued a list of demands. [Read More] (Mac Johnson, ET)
Russia's misguided decision to ban exports of wheat for the next 12 months has sent a destabilizing shock through agricultural markets, pushing prices of
grains to their highest levels since 2007 and 2008, when food shortages sparked rioting around the world. The situation in poor grain-importing countries in
Africa is tense. In Mozambique, the government backtracked on its decision to raise bread prices by 30 percent after riots in which more than a dozen people
died. Still, the world need not experience another food crisis.
Wheat Harvest, Exports From Australia May Surge After Rains, Bureau Says Wheat exports from Australia, the fourth-largest shipper, may surge to the highest level in more than a decade after rains boosted this year's harvest,
according to revised predictions from the government's forecaster.
Ah, Socialists... 'Cut government spending and cute kittens like this will die!' says hard-hitting, unbiased BBC 'report' It's not often I feel much sympathy for Dave "Grocer" Cameron's dismal, grubbily compromised Coalition government. But when you see leftist
propaganda as blatant as this on the BBC website, you do begin to appreciate the scale of the challenge ahead of them as they try impose their "cuts"
-- (which aren't actual spending cuts at all; rather they are decreases in the increase of public spending) -- on the bloated public sector. (H/T Sheumais)
Intent to Deceive: Bloomberg's Gun Control Group Repeats the 'Mexican Gun Canard' Again, an anti-gun group uses intentionally misleading language to claim that most Mexican cartel weapons can be traced to U.S. gun dealers. ( Bob Owens, PJM)
The Last Green Puppy: Still a Dog Named 'Cap' By Steve Milloy Should Senate Republicans stomp all over the "last living puppy"? Yes, because in this case the "last living puppy," according to Grist.org writer David Roberts, is the so-called renewable electricity standard (RES), which Sen. Harry Reid (D-NV) says he will try to make the consolation prize in this Congress' final clash over global warming regulation. What is RES and why should Senate Republicans --pay attention Sen. Sam Brownback (R-KS) and Sen. George Voinovich (R-OH) -- make sure it gets put to sleep (permanently)? An RES would require that electric utilities generate a set percentage of their power from so-called "renewable" power sources, like solar and wind, by a certain date. The Waxman-Markey cap-and-trade bill passed in June 2009 would require that utilities generate 20 percent of their power from renewables by the year 2020. This would be quite the monumental challenge given that solar and wind power provide less than 2 percent of current electricity generation and require massive subsidies to do so. According to the Department of Energy, solar and wind are each subsidized at a rate 55 times that of coal, 97 times that of natural gas and 15 times that of nuclear power. Solar panels and windmills aside, it's the taxpayer wallet that makes these forms of energy renewable. But even cost is not the main reason for rejecting the arbitrary targets and deadlines of a national RES. Imagine a utility that generates 100 percent of the electricity it sells by burning coal. Impose the Waxman-Markey RES standard on that utility and, all of a sudden, only a maximum of 80 of its electricity can be generated by coal. In other words, the utility's use of coal has been capped. Since the passage of the Waxman-Markey bill, Americans have been up in arms against cap-and-trade. But the same reasons for opposing cap-and-trade can and ought to be applied to RES, which ought to be labeled as calling cap-and-subsidize. Under cap-and-trade, electric utilities would be compensated for higher generation costs by charging consumers more for electricity and by selling billions of dollars of carbon credits, which they received for free courtesy of taxpayers. Under RES, electric utilities would be similarly compensated for higher generation costs, courtesy of over-charged consumers and untold billions in taxpayer subsidies. So the difference between RES and cap-and-trade is merely form of the consumer/taxpayer rip-off. But not every Republican in Congress yet understands this. Sen. Brownback recently stated that he could support a "modest" RES where energy efficiency gains count toward the RES standard. Sen. George Voinovich (R-OH) previously indicated he could consider an RES that included so-called "clean coal" as a form of renewable energy. Whatever RES deal Sens. Brownback and Voinovich might try to cut with Harry Reid, rest assured that the only part of it that would be kept and enforced would be the "cap." Energy efficiency gains are uncertain and difficult to ascertain. Clean coal, insofar as it implies so-called "carbon capture and storage" (CCS), is far closer to fantasy than reality given its multi-trillion dollar costs, and physical and political challenges. America has rejected cap-and-trade. As adorable and palatable as advocates will try to make it sound, RES is just a different flavor of an idea that has already been euthanized. Steve Milloy publishes JunkScience.com and is the author of "Green Hell: How Environmentalists Plan to Control Your Life and What You Can Do to Stop Them" (Regnery 2009).
EPA's Power Grab Endangers the Economy
Nowhere in the Clean Air Act does the term "greenhouse gas" (GHG) appear, yet the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) is invoking the statute to unleash economy-busting emissions strictures. The agency's latest power grab is not going unchallenged, however. The U.S. Chamber of Commerce has filed a federal lawsuit to force the EPA to reconsider the regulatory scheme that will otherwise encumber the energy and manufacturing sectors as well as millions of offices, apartment buildings, shopping malls, restaurants, hotels, hospitals, schools, houses of worship, theaters, and sports arenas. Continue reading... (The Foundry)
Here's that Dane again: A radical solution to climate change POLITICIANS and commentators are understandably pessimistic about the chances of an international deal on carbon cuts emerging from the UN summit in Mexico
this December.
September 13, 2010 -- 8:20 pm Cool It, a new film featuring Bjorn Lomborg, is far more convincing than An Inconvenient Truth Danish "skeptical environmentalist" Bjorn Lomborg is at least as charismatic as Al Gore and far more personable. Cool It, the film about Mr. Lomborg's crusade to bring some rationality to the climate change issue -- which premiered on Sunday night at the Toronto International Film Festival -- is also every bit as well done as An Inconvenient Truth, the Oscar-winning movie about Mr. Gore's ghastly but self-interested psychic projections. Every schoolchild who was forced to watch Mr. Gore's apocalyptic whoppers should also be given the opportunity to see Cool It, which presents a balanced and convincing case against doom and gloom. The movie starts by demonstrating the disgraceful way in which children in the West have been terrorized by -- and used for -- catastrophic propaganda. It also cleverly uses bright-eyed poor kids in an African school to highlight aspirations that for the foreseeable future can only be fed by fossil fuels.
AGW skepticism and declining trust in institutions An extreme environmentalist website called Grist has recently complained that The right's climate denialism is part of something much larger.The bigger "problem" as identified by David Roberts is that the people began to realize that various corrupt institutions are corrupt, indeed. The author shows that since 2008, the number of people among leftists, moderates, and conservatives who believe that "effects of global warming are already occurring" dropped by -2, 6, and 20 percentage points, respectively. Roberts correctly says that "When people are feeling safer and more prosperous, climate scientists will magically become more persuasive." I think this is a valid observation: when people feel that they have too much money and they don't know what to do with it, they lower their standards for a "good investment" and start to invent ways how to throw the money into the toilet, too. That's also why the rich countries witness a higher support for the global warming insanity than the poorer ones. » Don't Stop Reading » (TRF)
Gore's "Unprecedented And Irreversible" Decline
Last week, I think it was, I remember reading something about Al Gore's The Climate Project having slumped to an all-time low with the number of Climate Crisis presentations delivered. The French sceptic climate website Changement Climatique has compiled a graphic showing the number of presentations given each month. I've posted it below. Using complex Mannian statistical techniques, I've fitted a curve (red line) to the chart (sorry, code is not available). Conclusion: Al Gore's TCP is headed for a crisis. He really needs to dramatically cut back his hot air emissions. 
Gore becomes a victim of climate change. Source: www.skyfall.fr Probably the only 2 things performing worse are the all-but-defunct Chicago Climate Exchange and Obama's Economy. Changement Climatique describes Gore's project situation as follows:
Quelle misere. (No Tricks Zone)
They said this with a straight face? Don't wait for US on cap-and-trade, OECD urges Canada Canada could gain credibility at home and abroad if it unilaterally applied a cap-and-trade system to reduce carbon emissions instead of waiting for
Washington to do it first, the OECD said.
"Minuscule": Effects of European ETS on CO2 Emissions 
In The Climate Fix, I present data suggesting that Europe's rate of decarbonization was essentially unchanged before and after implementation of the Kyoto Protocol, up to the period covered by the Sandbag analysis. The Sandbag analysis suggests that this finding holds to the present. The strong implication is the that EU ETS has not accelerated BAU decarbonization in Europe. Of note, the European Commission agrees with the Sandbag analysis, but not the implications that they draw: The European Commission agrees in broad terms with the analysis underlying the Sandbag report, in that supply exceeds demand for allowances in the current trading phase, Maria Kokkonen, spokeswoman for Climate Action Commissioner Connie Hedegaard, told EurActiv.This response would seem to suggest that the spell of emissions trading is still working its magic. It will be interesting to see how long this illusion can persist. (Roger Pielke Jr.)
Cooler Heads Digest 10 September 2010 by William Yeatman In the News Green Jobs No Longer Golden in Stimulus Eeyore Environmentalism Kiss
Your Ash Goodbye Sword of Damocles Salmon Runs, Global Warming As Clear As
Mud The Accidental Cap-and-Trade Scarlet Letters for the Auto Industry News You Can Use As part of a last-minute lunge to make good on a pledge to reduce energy use per unit of economic output by 20 per cent over the five years ending this December, the Chinese government has ordered energy rationing, resulting in rolling blackouts across the ? Read the full story (Cooler Heads)
Dopey Clive writes again: The powerful coalition that wants to engineer the world's climate Businessmen, scientists and right-wing thinktanks are joining forces to promote 'geo-engineering' ideas to cool the planet's climate, writes Clive Hamilton (Clive Hamilton for OurWorld 2.0, part of the Guardian Environment Network)
Sigh... Climate change is inevitable, says Caroline Spelman Britain can no longer stop global warming and must instead focus on adapting to the 'inevitable' impacts of climate change such as floods, droughts and rising sea levels, Government ministers will warn this week. (TDT)
CBI says businesses need better warning of climate risks Employers' group says all listed firms should detail their "climate exposure " in corporate reports
Oh dear... Celebrating science home and away Professor Sackett has been back on the road again, this time to promote science relationships between Australia and China and develop a climate change tool with a research institute in Germany.
World Wide Font of nonsense animal mythology: Scientists investigate massive walrus haul-out in Alaska Scientists fear declining Arctic sea ice may have caused an unprecedented mass migration to dry land
Global warming causes coral bleaching -- and there is absolutely no doubt about it, right? Tens of thousands of websites found searching for "Global
warming and coral bleaching" seem to agree that when the ocean warms, the oxygen content reduces, and the corals become "bleached." The heat
affects the tiny algae which live symbiotically inside the corals and supply them with food. The heat stress damages the algae and in consequence leads to coral
death. The argument for the global warming/coral bleaching connection is bolstered by the massive El Niño event in 1997 and 1998 that led to unusually warm
tropical waters throughout the world's lower latitudes and coral bleaching in many locations. But, as with so many other topics covered in World Climate Report,
the idea that corals are in peril because of global warming turns out to be considerably more complicated than is commonly presented to the public at large.
Why 33 deg. C for the Earth's Greenhouse Effect is Misleading In my previous post I argued, using commonly cited numbers, that the greenhouse effect enhancement of adding carbon dioxide to the atmosphere would be about 3% for a doubling of CO2 ("2XCO2"). The 3% enhancement is based upon 2 commonly quoted numbers: (1) 33 deg. C global-average surface warming for the natural greenhouse effect, and (2) about 1 deg. C additional surface warming from 2XCO2, without feedbacks. (Interestingly, these numbers can only be computed from theory, which always requires a variety of assumptions.) The value of 33 deg. C represents the difference between the observed average surface temperature of the Earth, and the estimated surface temperature if there was no atmosphere. I explained that the 3% statistic is the one we should be dealing with conceptually, rather than what some people seem to be interested in, which is what portion of the Earth's greenhouse effect is due to CO2. I argued that the answer to that question, which has been recently addressed in a new paper by Schmidt et al., really tells us very little regarding the impact of adding more CO2 to the atmosphere. But what many people don't realize is that the 33 deg. C of surface warming is not actually a measure of the greenhouse warming -- it represents the balance between TWO competing effects: a greenhouse warming effect of about 60 deg. C (the so-called "pure radiative equilibrium" case), and a convective cooling effect of about 30 deg. C. When these two are combined, we get the real-world observed "radiative-convective equilibrium" case. This has been known since at least 1964 (Manabe and Strickler, 1964). It was also discussed in Dick Lindzen's 1990 paper, Some Coolness Regarding Global Warming, which is when I became aware of its significance. Why is this Important? When global warming is discussed, the warming effect of greenhouse gases is obviously of prime interest. But it is seldom if ever mentioned that about 50% of the surface warming influence of greenhouse gases has been short-circuited by the cooling effects of weather, as just discussed. When Danny Braswell and I did similar calculations in 1997 to better understand the physics, we found that 1 deg. C of surface warming was true even for the pure radiative equilibrium case (no convective cooling by weather processes). This would mean that the REAL enhancement of the greenhouse effect with 2XCO2 is really only about 1.5%, not 3%, since the natural greenhouse effect is trying to warm the surface by over 60 deg. C, not by 33 deg. C. Is this Simple Evidence of Negative Feedback? These climate basics, which have been known since the 1960s, also raises an intriguing question: If the surface warming effect of 2XCO2 before surface
cooling by convection is 1 deg. C, and (as even the IPCC knows) 50% of I believe this is entirely possible. How could this happen, since there is so much evidence that water vapor feedback is positive? Because, even if water vapor feedback is positive, an increase in the solar shading effect of clouds (negative cloud feedback) could more than overwhelm the positive water vapor feedback, leading to little net warming. The IPCC already admits feedbacks due to low clouds are the least understood. Indeed, the evidence presented in Spencer and Braswell (2010), at face value, would suggest this could happen. We already know that the net effect of clouds is to cool the climate system in response to solar heating. Are we to believe that cloud changes turn into a warming influence when temperatures get a little bit higher? Well, that's what all of the IPCC coupled climate models do now. The Importance of Convective Cooling Versus Greenhouse Warming I sometimes get e-mails asking why I don't mention convection as a cooling mechanism in the context of global warming. Folks, I used to be virtually the only one speaking out on the subject. For years I harped on this issue. The reason why I have been recently defending the basic physics of the greenhouse effect is because I think the credibility of those who claim that the greenhouse effect of the atmosphere cannot be increased (or doesn't even exist) is compromised when they object to something that -- as far as I have seen -- has no alternative explanation. I'm always [open] to new theories, but as I have said before, until someone puts their alternative physics into an energy-conserving model of the vertical temperature profile of the atmosphere, which then produces the present-day temperature profile as current models do, it is little more than hand-waving. (Roy W. Spencer)
Further Discussion Of Global Warming The report National Research Council, 2005: Radiative forcing of climate change: Expanding the concept and addressing uncertainties. Committee on Radiative Forcing Effects on Climate Change, Climate Research Committee, Board on Atmospheric Sciences and Climate, Division on Earth and Life Studies, The National Academies Press, Washington, D.C., 208 pp provides a valuable summary of global warming, as utilized by the IPCC and others. The text we will use to discuss global warming will be based on the equations below.
The use of T' to diagnose global warming can be diagnosed [which is dH/dt] clearly involves estimates of f and λ which necessarily introduces complexity into obtaining dH/dt. Moreover, as we have documented in our papers; e.g. Pielke Sr., R.A., C. Davey, D. Niyogi, S. Fall, J. Steinweg-Woods, K. Hubbard, X. Lin, M. Cai, Y.-K. Lim, H. Li, J. Nielsen-Gammon, K. Gallo, R. Hale, R. Mahmood, S. Foster, R.T. McNider, and P. Blanken, 2007: Unresolved issues with the assessment of multi-decadal global land surface temperature trends. J. Geophys. Res., 112, D24S08, doi:10.1029/2006JD008229 and Klotzbach, P.J., R.A. Pielke Sr., R.A. Pielke Jr., J.R. Christy, and R.T. McNider, 2009: An alternative explanation for differential temperature trends at the surface and in the lower troposphere. J. Geophys. Res., 114, D21102, doi:10.1029/2009JD011841 there remain major problems with the accuracy of obtaining a global average value of T'. Among the unresolved problems are:
There is an obvious solution to these problems with respect to diagnosing global warming and cooling. We should adopt measuring a finite difference version of dH/dt [e.g. monthly intervals]. There has been quite a bit of discussion in the posts on the accuracy of monitoring dH/dt from upper ocean heat content. The first requirement, however, is to agree that this is the now preferred metric to measure global warming and cooling, and to replace T' [or, at least in addition to that metric]. My recommendation for the report of the meeting that was held September 7-9 2010 in the United Kingdom in Exeter titled Surface temperature datasets for the 21st Century is to focus on improved temperature data sets for regional studies (in which the issues we have raised in items #1 to #4 among others need to be addressed), while accepting that the time to use T' as the primary metric to diagnose global warming and cooling has passed. It is my opinion that they should recommend we move to the monitoring and reporting of dH/dt [in real time] to policymakers and the public using upper ocean heat content. (Roger Pielke Sr., Climate Science)
Gulf Oil Spill Energizes Foes Of NY Shale Drilling Critics of natural gas drilling in New York on Monday urged U.S. regulators to enact tougher regulations, saying the BP oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico
proves the industry cannot be trusted.
Coal has a Future in Australia 
As part of its deal to secure government, Labor signed a formal alliance with the Greens, whose policies include the eventual phasing out of the coal industry, Australia's biggest export earner.It is a simple mathematical reality that Australia cannot meet even the least ambitious targets for emissions reductions with coal having today's share in Australia's energy mix (of consumption plus exports, see figure above) -- unless CCS is perfected. Eventually, something will have to give here -- coal, CPRS, Labor, Greens or Combet. Time will tell which it is. (Roger Pielke Jr.)
A Multi-Trillion-Euro Price Tag for Energy Efficiency Chancellor Angela Merkel's plan to make Germany's residential buildings the most energy-efficient in the world has run into resistance within her cabinet. The project's price tag could be as high as 2.4 trillion euros -- and the minister responsible told SPIEGEL it is impracticable. (Spiegel)
Oh so predictable: Greens fight Labor on uranium THE Greens have threatened to use their historic alliance with Labor to stop billions of dollars of planned uranium projects from securing government
approval, in the first sign of the party's push for greater influence over government policy.
Merkel's Nuclear Plan Encounters Mounting Opposition Chancellor Angela Merkel had hoped that with a quick resolution, she could sidestep a national debate over nuclear energy. Many, though, see her new plan as a windfall for the country's power utilities. Opposition, both within her government and elsewhere, is on the rise. (Spiegel)
Carbon offsets: Green project offends Indian farmers who lose land to windmills A Dutch bank that bought carbon offsets to neutralize its carbon footprint was unaware that poor Indian farmers had been aggrieved by the green project. (CSM)
OVERBLOWN: Windpower on the Firing Line (Part 1) by Jon Boone THE LESS ONE KNOWS ABOUT THE UNIVERSE, THE EASIER IT IS TO EXPLAIN Have truth and consequences arrived for the biggest energy sham of all? Energy journalist Robert Bryce recently broke the news to mainstream American media. In a hard-hitting article published in the Wall Street Journal, he reported the findings of a Colorado energy research study, which earlier this year concluded that the industrial wind technology it sampled in the regions of Colorado and Texas neither reduced carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions in the production of electricity nor rolled back consumption of fossil fuels. The raison d'être of the wind industry is to abate significant levels of the greenhouse gas emissions many feel are causing precipitous and adverse warming trends in the earth's climate. Wind technology is also sold as an alternative source of power to coal-fired plants. Therefore, the American Wind Energy Association (AWEA), the trade organization for a constellation of limited liability wind companies, did not exactly welcome Bryce's report with arms open. Instead, AWEA spokesman Michael Goggin penned a stern riposte, which alleged that Bryce and others skeptical about the efficacy of wind technology were "lobbyists" for the fossil fuel industry, spreading lies "to avoid losing market share to wind energy," and compared Bryce and a range of people and organizations to the groups and pundits from the tobacco industry who once told Congress there was no causal link between cigarettes and cancer. Goggin also produced evidence and testimonials in ABC fashion that he claimed validated "one of the universally recognized and uncontestable (italics added) benefits of wind energy: that (it) reduces the use of fossil fuels as well as the emissions and other environmental damage associated with producing and using these fuels." He further boasted that there were "reams of government data and peer-reviewed studies" supporting the effectiveness of his employer's technology. Before addressing AWEA's evidentiary offerings on behalf of wind's carbon saving/ fossil-fuel slaying potential--a bit of clarifying context. [Read more →] (MasterResource)
OVERBLOWN: Getting to the Facts on Emissions (Part II) by Jon Boone FACTS ARE STUBBORN, BUT STATISTICS ARE MORE PLIABLE --Mark Twain This section reviews the criticism AWEA makes about the Bentek report and the evidence the organization offers purporting to prove how wind reduced substantial greenhouse gas emissions in Texas and Colorado. The section concludes with an examination of what the EIA data really show for those states for 2007 versus 2008--and what the official Energy Information Administration (EIA) reports say about causal factors for any CO2 reductions. The Bentek study showed that wind volatility in the sampled regions of Colorado and Texas caused more CO2 emissions than would have been the case with less wind and more efficient coal plants. Using mostly sub-hourly performance data, Bentek was able to "examine in detail how coal, gas and wind interact and the resulting emissions implications." In general, the research team found that wind, typically much more active at night when demand is least, was more entangled with base load coal plants given that more flexible and costly gas plants were dispatched to meet higher daytime demand. As Robert Bryce reported in his influential Wall Street Journal article, the repeated cycling--ramping up and back--of coal plants, with their higher CO2 concentrations, created heat rate penalties that produced a greater volume of CO2 emissions. The coal plants in a wind balancing role were operating more inefficiently, and thus required more fuel, much in the way an automobile does when driven in stop-and-go traffic. As noted in Part I of this series, Bentek then recommended that better results for carbon emissions offsets could be produced by introducing more responsive natural gas units on the system, in part replacing the coal plants with machines that burned 50% cleaner. AWEA's Surface Criticism AWEA maintains this study must have been seriously flawed, since, as more wind was installed on the systems, EIA data showed that CO2 and other greenhouse gas emissions declined between 2007 and 2008, and, within both states, coal and natural gas consumption fell as well. Goggin then quotes Frank Prager, who "pointed out the flaws ? in the (Bentek) study and reconfirmed that wind ? significantly reduced fossil fuel use and emissions ?." But as vice president of environmental policy for the energy company, Prager is not a disinterested party. But it's the evidence that's important, not his testimonial. Let's look at the evidence more closely. [Read more →] (MasterResource)
We will eradicate malaria by 2010, stricken families were promised a few years ago. Well, 2010 is nearly gone and, instead of eradication, we have more
malaria than before ? and a new target date: 2015.
3 Billion and counting: The cost of banning DDT CHURCHVILLE, VA--3 Billion and Counting is a new documentary film on the awful human cost of banning DDT. The film's producer, medical doctor Rutledge
Taylor, circled the tropical world, finding that malaria has claimed some three billion human lives throughout history--and the toll of needless deaths is
continuing to mount by perhaps 1.5 million per year.
The fear entrepreneurs are trying to scare you about cosmetics The easiest way to get media coverage these days is to come up with some prospect--no matter how nonsensical--that is designed to scare people. After all, fear is a great motivator, right? Amazingly, lack of credentials usually presents no problem to the aspiring fear entrepreneur. If anything, it helps draw more attention, since these con artists come across as real people, not pointy-headed scientists or evil representatives of government or industry. How else would you explain the media's embrace of two women with absolutely no science or government affairs background, who tell us that the heavily-regulated cosmetics industry is poisoning us, and then goes on to peddle some of the most pathetic "science" we've seen in a long time? I'm referring to Siobahn O'Connor and Alexandra Spunt, the co-authors of No More Dirty Looks, a work I call a "remarkably uninformed and sophomoric attack on the cosmetics industry" in my latest HND piece. Apparently, O'Connor and Spunt have taken more than a page from the so-called Campaign For Safe Cosmetics, whereby facts and science are completely unimportant. Instead, the methodology is pure, unadulterated scare tactics. It's easy. Just mention the name of a chemical, and say that it has been "linked to" cancer or birth defects, or whatever. Don't bother looking for any details on this "linkage," and above all don't mention the most fundamental tenet of toxicology--The Dose Makes the Poison. It would be tempting to simply dismiss this bilge as unworthy of response, but the sad fact is that far too many people buy into it. Unfortunately, there is gobs of junk science extant that can be used to support their claims. Moreover, industry is not doing nearly enough to combat this barrage. To tip the scales a bit, I skewer a few of the duo's most egregious contentions. Read the article. (Shaw's Eco-Logic)
If we're to truly effect fundamental and long-lasting change, we must identify, examine and challenge the basic premises responsible for the regulatory
state.
When Forecasting Aging Policy-Makers Need to Adjust for Increases in Longevity and Health Indicators of aging based only on chronological age are misleading and need to be adjusted to take into account advances in health and life expectancy, a
Stony Brook professor and colleague from the Austrian Academy of Sciences report in the September 10, 2010 issue of Science.
I hadn't read anything by Derrick Z. Jackson in years and now I recall why: Obesity's punch to the gut IT IS time for President Obama to declare a war on fat as a matter of national economic security.
The Green Party is beginning to be taken seriously after nearly four decades beyond the political fringe (Geoffrey Lean, TDT)
Going Green, or Growing Mould? September 10th, 2010 by Ben Pile During my very busy spring and summer, one of the things I didn't have time to do was look more closely at the UK's General Election results. This post comes a bit late, but it's worth saying, nonetheless. The election was perhaps the dullest and least inspiring in Britain's history (certainly in my history), which means that anything remotely unusual appeared as some kind of phenomenon. And so it was with the first ever seat in the House of Commons for Caroline Lucas, one of our favourite subjects here on Climate Resistance. Lucas won the seat for Brighton Pavilion. Caroline Lucas's prominence in the media has always intrigued us. As a Member of the European Parliament, Lucas always got far more attention than most of her counterparts, more even than her fellow Green MEPs. As pointed out in previous posts here, Lucas has hardly scored well in European elections. In 1999, the Green Party in Lucas's constituency -- the South East of England -- only took 7.42% of the vote which only had a 24.73% turnout, i.e. they only earned the votes of 1.8% of the electorate. In the 2004 elections, they only performed slightly better, taking 7.9% of the vote with a 36.78% turnout -- 2.9% of the electorate. In 2009, the Green Party took 11.6% of the vote with a 37.45% turnout, meaning 4.35% of the electorate -- 271,506 out of 6,231,875 people. That's an improvement, of course -- possibly largely due to the attention given to Lucas by the media -- but it's an improvement only from virtually nothing to minor fringe in an era of mass cynicism of politics. (Climate Resistance)
UN totalitarians want your money and your life After a Year of Setbacks, U.N. Looks to Take Charge of World's Agenda  The World: It's part of
the United Nations
It's a story that just begs to be translated into English. It's just another naked grab for power disguised as a helping hand. We come in peace, we'd like to run your country. The UN bureaucrats that no one elected, want to decide what happens to everyone everywhere in the world. They want p o w e r and control (I'm shocked I tell you!)
In charge of the worlds agenda? They want to control our weather, our money, our sources of power (is there anything much left?) Maybe we still get to choose the movies ? They really want to award the money you earned, to the people who didn't, which includes their friends, their fans, and that enormous group of people who are about to become their friends. This is known as patronage. If you are the man handing out the money, you get the "thanks". If you are the man forced to pay, your reward is, to not-get-jailed. More » (Jo Nova)
D'oh! 'Green' jobs no longer golden in stimulus Environmental projects fail to live up to hype
Thomas Edison, You're Under Arrest Eco-Extremism: A light bulb factory closes in Virginia as mandated fluorescents are made in China. It's now a crime to make or ship for sale 75-watt
incandescent bulbs in the European Union. Welcome to green hell.
And Then There Was Light: Will Energy-Efficient Light Bulbs Increase Energy Use?
It seemed so simple: To reduce energy use, Americans must abandon the old-fashioned incandescent light bulb in favor of new energy-efficient lighting. Congress even passed legislation in 2007 mandating a phase-out of the familiar "Edison" bulb in the name of saving energy. Now comes a study concluding that energy-efficient lighting will likely increase energy use. The study, sponsored by Sandia National Laboratories in New Mexico and funded by the U.S. Department of Energy, is based on the observation that the percentage of gross national product spent on artificial lighting has remained remarkably constant for the past three hundred years. Instead of using advances in technology to reduce expenditures on energy, individuals have consistently opted to take advantage the lower costs made possible by those advances to increase the light around them. Continue reading... (The Foundry)
Animal, Vegetable, or E. O. Wilson Guest Post by Willis Eschenbach Buoyed by the equal parts of derision and support I received for writing in "I am So Tired Of Malthus" about how humans are better fed than at any time in history, I am foolishly but bravely venturing once again into the question of how we feed ourselves. In a book excerpt in the February 2002 Scientific American entitled "The Bottleneck", the noted ant entomologist Professor Edward O. Wilson put forward the familiar Malthusian argument that humans are about to run out of food. He said that we are currently getting wedged into a "bottleneck" of population versus resources. He warned of the dangers of "exponential growth" in population, and he averred that we will be squeezed mightily before the population levels off. His solution? In part his solution was that everyone should become a vegivore.
Figure 1. Vegans are not aliens from the star Vega. They are humans who are strict vegivores, as the food chart above shows. They are known for their barbaric habit of boiling and eating the unborn fetuses of rice and wheat. And don't get me started on what they do to the poor baby carrots, with their so-called ? but I digress ? Is this correct? Would we have a net gain in carrying capacity if all the human carnetarians agreed to become vegivores? Continue reading (WUWT)
USDA Sued Over Genetically Modified Beet Permits Groups opposed to genetically modified foods announced a lawsuit against the U.S. Department of Agriculture on Thursday over the agency's recent decision to
allow limited plantings of altered sugar beets.
In the Yahoo Canada News article "Mass Extinction Threat: Earth on Verge of Huge Reset Button?," it is as though time has stood still. The same old tired arguments, the same reflexive blame-humanity-first mentality pervades a piece of journalistic drivel that could pass for IPCC propaganda. From the first paragraph, Hsu proclaims his obeisance to the climate change party line:
After inadequately setting the scene in his first paragraph, Hsu wastes no time in linking extinction and anthropogenic climate change. Here is the second paragraph of the "news" article:
That's right, humanity is as dangerous as all of the natural disasters that caused mass extinctions in the past. We are raising temperatures, increasing erosion, messing up ocean chemistry and destroying the entire food chain! The real tip-off that Hsu is an eco-alarmist is the mention of the Anthropocene, an unrecognized geologic time period dreamed up by green alarmists. For background information on the Anthropocene see "Welcome To The Anthropocene" and "A Brave New Epoch?" Hsu is trying to report on the findings of a real journal article that appeared in the September 3, 2010, issue of Science, and he is evidently incapable of correctly interpreting the results without the ingrained bias of the news establishment coloring his assessment. To understand the article, "The Shifting Balance of Diversity Among Major Marine Animal Groups," by paleobiologist John Alroy, one needs a little background information about mass extinctions and species diversity over the past half billion years or so. We examined the history of life and mass extinctions in Chapter 6 of The Resilient Earth:
 Many families, genera and species vanished in the end-Ordovician extinction.
 The Manicouagan impact structure seen from space. NASA/JPL
 The KT extinction killed a lot of strange critters.
A summary of the major extinctions is shown in the illustration below, depicting diversity in terms of marine families. Starting with the newly discovered early-Cambrian event, the extinctions are numbered from zero. This is to avoid changing the normal numbering of the "big five" extinctions, as they are widely called in the literature. The figure is based on work done by University of Chicago paleontologist Jack Sepkoski in the early 1980s. Sepkoski categorized marine animals into Cambrian, Paleozoic, and Modern evolutionary faunas on the basis of shared curve shapes. This categorization has served as a benchmark for evolutionary research at the Phanerozoic scale for a quarter of a century.  Marine diversity during the Phanerozoic. After Sepkoski. I have used this figure before, both in The Resilient Earth and in other blog posts, but the story it tells is worth repeating. The three differently colored areas of the graph represent the numbers of families belonging to the Cambrian, Paleozoic, and Mesozoic periods. As you can see, the early Cambrian life forms started being superseded by the intermediate forms of the Paleozoic prior to the end-Ordovician Extinction and had almost vanished by the late-Devonian. The life-forms characteristic of the Paleozoic undergo a major decline until the Permian-Triassic Extinction, and some related species linger to this day. But notice the rise in diversity after each extinction event--after each horrible, life-ending catastrophe, life bounces back stronger and more diverse than ever.
Alroy, once a student of Sepkoski's, is not the first to revisit the macro-evolutionary history of the Phanerozoic. The fossil record is patchy and long-term evolutionary principles are still hotly debated, leaving much room for new analyses and interpretations. Alroy and colleagues (including Sepkoski) created the Paleobiology Database (PBDB), a compilation of data from nearly 100,000 fossil collections that continues to grow. Alroy's article is an updated analysis of the contents of the PDDB. Alroy was not looking for a sixth extinction marking the beginning of an Anthropocene era--he was trying to answer the question whether global mass extinctions are just short-term diversions in life's preordained course, or if they send the evolution of life in wholly new directions. Alroy's analysis suggests that the future is inherently unpredictable, that what comes next cannot be predicted from current conditions, no more than a mid-Cretaceous observer could have guessed that a few tiny mammals would someday occupy every ecological niche then ruled by reptiles. As he states in the Science article:
Sepkoski's model impled that average diversification rates are a good predictor of long-term success. Alroy has found that this is not so, a conclusion that Sepkoski had also come to in his later work. Alroy offers this updated diversity plot for the Phanerozoic.  Marine diversity during the Phanerozoic. After Alroy. While it is true that Alroy uses the term "current global crisis" in his article's abstract, that is not what the article is about--it is about how extinctions redirect the course of evolution. Nowhere in the article does he identify human induced climate change as the cause of the "crisis." Alroy certainly adheres to the environmentalist party line by mentioning "today's extinction crisis" but in the summary paragraph of his paper he offers up this more detached scientific conclusion:
There is nothing unexpected here. If humanity manages to kill off a large number of species through intent or neglect the future course of evolution may be changed. Certainly, our hunting of whales to near extinction is not an act for our species to be proud of. If we do drive whales to extinction the future of life in the ocean will undoubtedly be changed. But the important point is that global diversity should rebound if we stop destroying natural habitats. Given half a chance nature will bounce back as it has in the past. Alroy's conclusions are not being accepted at face value by the scientific community either. In an accompanying perspective article, paleontologist Charles Marshall, of the University of California Berkeley, notes that Alroy's statistical methods must still be reviewed by the paleobiology community. The PBDB, as large as it is, is undoubtedly incomplete in ways yet to be discovered. "There will be no immediate consensus on the details of the pattern of diversity," he wrote. "How today's extinction crisis - species today go extinct at a rate that may range from 10 to 100 times the so-called background extinction rate - may change the face of the planet and its species goes beyond what humans can predict," Hsu concludes in his Yahoo article. There is an important difference between species diversity being limited by all ecological niches being filled and diversity being wiped out by a sudden ecological calamity--normal competition for habitat is far less likely to cause extinction than the oceans turning anoxic or a large meteor striking the planet. No reasonable person can equate mankind's current impact on species diversity with the major extinction events in the past. The claim that we are forcing extinctions at 100 times the "normal" rate is not backed by sufficient evidence. All of this diversity analysis is based on what has been found in the fossil record--it is neither complete nor conclusive. Fossil records are notoriously sparse and spotty; whole species may have come and gone from Earth without leaving a trace for paleontologists to puzzle over. Science is even unsure how many species are present on Earth today, keeping track of diversity in the distant past is even more uncertain.  Using cute animals to spread green propaganda is part of the scam. It is right and reasonable to be concerned with preserving nature in today's modern, industrialized world. Man wields greater destructive power than any previous species and does not have a good record of using that power wisely. However, H. sapiens cannot even come close to the power of uncaring nature. Comparing humanity's impact on nature to mass extinctions in the past requires a mixture of half hubris and half ignorance. The use of research like Alroy's to promote an atmosphere of crisis over reduced species diversity is simply another example of the eco-activists creed--to get people to pay attention we must scare them to death. And using people's natural empathy for cute, cuddly animals to spread feelings of self loathing is just another cynical ploy used by those who claim to love nature but actually hate humanity. With the global warming "crisis" dying a slow and painful death, the green crowd is looking for a new crisis to frighten the world with. Unfortunately for them, diversity is an even less supportable crisis than climate change. Be safe, enjoy the interglacial and stay skeptical. (Doug L. Hoffman, The Resilient Earth)
Green groups press Barack Obama for 60MPG fuel efficiency standard Environmental campaigners focus on more modest goals as hopes of US climate legislation dwindle ahead of expected Republican gains (Guardian)  Greenie-preferred transport for you
Economic crisis has left ETS 'thoroughly obsolete' EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS - The economic crisis, which has shut down manufacturers, idled factories and left lorries and ships with fewer products to transport,
has rendered the EU's flagship climate change policy, the emissions trading scheme "obsolete," according to fresh research out on Friday (10
September).
Still pretending: EU Cuts Emissions For Sixth Year, Mulls Forestry European Union climate experts launched a consultation on Friday into the complex issue of accounting for greenhouse emissions from forestry, and new data
showed 2009 emissions fell for the sixth year running.
Deutsche Bank -- A Wunch of Bankers  Carbon credits: Just another excuse to "print money"
If this was Exxon pushing a PDF promoting skeptical views, it would be on the front page tomorrow. Where are the front page headlines? "Bankers feed scare-mongering report" Instead it's just Deutsche Bank try to save the world their profit line. Just in case you are missing your daily dose of being spoon fed propaganda by Bankers who want your money, see Climate Spectator Balancing reason and risk, where Deutsche Bank is helping the skeptics by giving us yet another example of just how desperate they are to get carbon trading running. Q: When will the bankers worry about whales? (Ans: When they can trade Humpback Credits.) The good news is we are getting to them, and we are marking the lines they need to jump over. They now admit it looks bad when they denigrate scientists (they finally "get" that they shouldn't call scientists deniers):
Watch how they pretend to care about the science (science-schmaltz), even as they trash the scientific method by arguing from authority: More » (Jo Nova)
Former UN Climate Chief: Emissions Targets and Timetables are Irrelevant In another clear sign of the steadily unraveling pollution paradigm, Yvo De Boer, the former head of the UN climate negotiations, has acknowledged that the long debate over targets and timetables for the reduction of carbon dioxide emissions is irrelevant. Asked by Bloomberg about emissions reductions targets in the context of the upcoming climate negotiations in Cancun, De Boer replied:
De Boer was singing a different tune in the run up to last year's Copenhagen climate negotiations, which ended, predictably, without a comprehensive and legally binding emissions treaty. In August 2009, de Boer told TIME Magazine that even if the U.S. didn't show up to Copenhagen with a new climate change law in hand, an ambitious target would be enough to placate the international community:
(Breakthrough Institute)
Correspondence received: La Mesa, California, Mayor attempting to use a City resolution to further his opposition to Prop 23 The agenda for next Tuesday's La Mesa City Council meeting has been posted. Item number 10 on the agenda is a proposed resolution by Mayor Artie Madrid to
pass a "Resolution Opposing Proposition 23-An initiative to suspend implementation of Assembly Bill 32." You may know AB32 as the controversial clean
air measure passed by the state legislature a few years ago. Regardless of how one feels about the wisdom of AB32 the larger question here is the use of
prestige and power of City of La Mesa official declarations to support political positions. This is not the first time city council has had it's collective arms
twisted to make political statements. Fortunately in the recent past, enough citizens have protested such attempts and the majority did not succumb to be
politically correct in their decision. This time should be no different.
China says rich-poor divide still dogs climate pact talks BEIJING, Sept 13 - The prospects of a new global climate change pact still hinge on resolving the divisions between rich nations and the developing world, a
top Chinese climate negotiator said in remarks published on Monday.
This must be one of the most extraordinary statements made by anyone on the subject of the climate change controversy: ''And I would say to all these sceptics - alright it may be very convenient to believe that somehow all these greenhouse gases we're pouring into the atmosphere just disappear through holes conveniently into space, it doesn't work like that.'' One of the little bonuses that come to you for being a sceptic in Britain is that you get to be slandered by the heir to the throne. You have "no love of nature and her works" and you are some kind of weirdo who believes in physical mechanisms unknown to science, such as "Holes into space". Who are these sceptics who believe such things? Name one! Oddly enough, however, the carbon dioxide does disappear through holes. They are called stomata and are tiny pores that exist in abundance throughout the surfaces of green plants. The carbon dioxide and water vapour enter these holes and through the agencies of chlorophyll and sunlight begin the processes that make possible the miracle of life on earth, including human life. In the weird world of Prinny, however, carbon dioxide, the source of life, is a fearful miasma that wreaks death and destruction on the whole living world. His pronouncements are so extreme that he makes even Al Gore look like the paragon of moderation and he claims a superior knowledge of science that is totally belied by his words. It makes life difficult to those of us who are royalists at heart and lifelong admirers of Her Gracious Majesty. Even making allowances for the fact that he has been born into a position of wealth and authority, both unearned, and he is surrounded by a large gang of manipulative sycophants, his interventions on a whole range of subjects for which he is totally unqualified are an unsought irritant. His words and ideas, however mangled, are broadcast around the world, not for their worth but because of his position. (Number Watch)
'Is this science, or literature?' MPs mull 'climate enquiries' that failed to enquire
Lord Oxburgh caught in the headlights Yesterday I watched the House of Commons Science and Technology Select Committee questioning Lord Oxburgh. Once the official transcript becomes available I
expect that this will cause quite a stir. If there was any doubt before that his inquiry was a fiasco, then there can be none now.
The Global Warming Establishment Needs More than Cosmetic Fixes When a woman consistently messes up her relationships, her therapist doesn't just tell her to wear a new dress and change her lipstick before her next date;
s/he asks her to do some real soul searching. But a new dress-and-lipstick combo is pretty much what an agency charged with reviewing the Intergovernmental
Panel on Climate Control's procedures in the wake of the GlacierGate mess recommended last week.
The New Graduate Who Served as IPCC Lead Author I've been blogging about the climate bible's health chapter. It's worth remembering that this chapter, like the rest of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report, is supposed to be a balanced, disinterested account of what the scientific literature says. (No Consensus)
Richard Tol Challenges IPCC Co-Chair Ottmar Edenhofer Saturday, 11 September 2010 20:27 Richard Tol, Die Klimazwiebel Ottmar Edenhofer claimed in ?ZDF umwelt" on September 5, 2010 "Die Aussage, der IPCC hätte bewusst Dinge herausgehalten, die ihm
unbequem waren, die nicht gewissermassen in eine Gesamtstory gepasst hätten, kann ich beim besten Willen nicht sehen". (I cannot understand, even if
I try hard, the assertion that the IPCC would deliberately have omitted things, which would have been inconvenient, which would not have been consistent with
the overall story.)
Klaus: I am increasingly convinced that freedom, not climate, is threatened Translated from Parliamentary letters and klaus.cz » Don't Stop Reading » (The Reference Frame)
Will silly season never end? This utter nonsense regurgitated, again: Global warming is happening, it has huge implications for health Jonathan Davies of the Welsh NHS Confederation explains why climate change is an issue for us all
An Open Letter to Mr. Bill Gates The Quality of Life for the World's Poorest Can Be Advanced Farther, Faster, Cheaper and More Surely Through Adaptation than Through Zero-Carbon Technologies Guest Post By Indur M. Goklany A few days ago, Tom Nelson had a link to a blog posted by Mr. Bill Gates titled, Recommended Reading on Climate Change, in which he claims that the risk of "serious warming" from anthropogenic climate change is large enough to justify action. Mr. Gates adds, "I agree, especially because even moderate warming could cause mass starvation and have other very negative effects on the world's poorest 2 billion people. This is one of the reasons why I've gotten very interested in new energy technologies that could move us toward zero carbon emissions. As I said at TED, my dream is to create zero-carbon technologies that will be cheaper than coal or oil. That way, even climate skeptics will want to adopt them, and more of the world's poorest people will be able to benefit from the services and the improved quality of life that energy makes possible." Over the years I have been very impressed by Mr. Gates' desire and efforts to improve the quality of life for the world's poorest people and to literally put his money where his mouth is, but the notion that "even moderate warming could cause mass starvation and have other very negative effects on the world's poorest 2 billion people" is fundamentally flawed. And there are far better and more effective methods of improving their quality of life than through squandering money on zero-carbon technologies. So, to make these points, I fashioned a response to Mr. Gates' post, but was frustrated in my efforts to post it either on the specific thread or via the General Inquiry form at his website. Accordingly, I decided to write Mr. Gates an open letter to convey my thoughts. The letter follows. I thank Mr. Watts for publishing it on his invaluable blog. ---------------------- Dear Mr. Gates,
Global warming? It doesn't exist, says Ryanair boss O'Leary (LANGUAGE WARNING: expletives not deleted in original item) Outspoken airline chief says climate change is a plot by scientists seeking research cash
The hockey stick graph remains an illusion Bob Ward failed in his attempt to prove the arguments in my book wrong (Andrew Montford, Guardian)
The truth is getting lost in the Amazon A warmist coup seems to have taken place on Amazon, the online bookseller, writes Christopher Booker.
A New Little Ice Age Is Called Off By FOCUS Magazine 12. September 2010 The last two years of minimal solar activity did not prevent the earth from warming, and thus shows that the theory that the recent abnormally low solar activity could lead to a little ice age is false, so writes German FOCUS magazine. (No Tricks Zone)
Only sensible way: Britain must adapt to 'inevitable' climate change, warns minister As experts call for action now, the coalition withholds green funding and appeals to private enterprise
New Australia Climate Minister Backs Coal: Report Australia's new climate change minister, Greg Combet, believes the country's coal sector has a future under government policies, The Australian newspaper
reported on Monday.
Imagine that... Climate change law to rip £8bn hole in budgets SPENDING on schools, hospitals and other key services is set to be hit by the estimated £8 billion cost of Scotland's world-leading climate change laws, the
government have admitted.
GISS: August 2010 was 7th warmest August For years, we would think of the surface record as being the main empirical pillar supporting the idea of a global warming trend. The satellite RSS AMSU and
especially UAH AMSU records showed a significantly smaller warming trend than GISS and HadCRUT3, the surface station-based datasets.
This video was shot elsewhere but it's still true that Tom's Diner from Suzanne Vega's song is right below NASA's GISS. I included this video because I prefer the instrumental version. ;-) You
may also try the Václav Havel 20th Velvet Anniversary 2009 version of the first MP3
song by the mother of MP3. ;-)
Christy on irrigation and regional temperature effects  Irrigation
in a valley of Kamloops Park, British Columbia. Stock image licensed from BizArt
In this recent post I discussed a paper on regional temperature divergence issues related to irrigation from Dr. John Christy saying: New irrigation effects study counter to what Christy discovered This press release below from Columbia University shown below suggests that irrigation cools the region undergoing irrigation. However, a study published three years ago of California's central valley by Dr. John Christy suggests exactly the opposite. See this WUWT post from 2007, then read the Columbia story and decide for yourself. From UAH: Irrigation most likely to blame for Central California warming
===================================================== Dr. Christy responds via email, and I've added graphs and links to enhance his presentation to us. Continue reading (WUWT)
On the Relative Contribution of Carbon Dioxide to the Earth's Greenhouse Effect
[NOTE: What follows assumes the direct (no-feedback) infrared radiative effects of greenhouse gases (water vapor, CO2, methane, etc.) on the Earth's radiative budget are reasonably well understood. If you want to challenge that assumption, your time might be better spent here.] I was recently asked by a reader to comment on a new paper by Schmidt et al. which put some numbers behind the common question, What fraction of the Earth's greenhouse effect is due to carbon dioxide? There are a wide variety of answers to this question depending on how you define "greenhouse effect", what your assumed baseline is, etc. Conceptually, in any greenhouse atmosphere, greenhouse gases warm the lower layers and cool the upper layers compared to if those gases were not present. That never changes. It's the way you compute the relative magnitude (say, in percent) of that warming that depends greatly upon your assumptions. Note that the greenhouse effect can only be calculated based upon theory. The greenhouse effect isn't a physical variable like temperature that you can measure. It is a radiative process that affects the atmosphere's energy budget at all altitudes, warms the surface, and whose components must be calculated based upon radiative transfer theory and the IR absorption characteristics of greenhouse gases (and clouds). The Wrong Question I will argue that if what we are REALLY interested in is how much the Earth's greenhouse effect will be enhanced by adding CO2 to the atmosphere (the only reason we are interested in the CO2 issue anyway, right?), then the above question is not very relevant. In fact, the answer to it can totally mislead us. This is easy to show with 2 simple examples. First, assume there was NO naturally occurring carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, and we added 300 ppm. In that case, the natural influence of CO2 on the Earth's greenhouse effect would be zero, but the influence of adding 300 ppm would be quite significant. Now, as the second example let's assume the natural CO2 concentration is high, say 1,000 ppm, and THEN we added 300 ppm. In this second case, the natural role of CO2 in the Earth's greenhouse effect would be very significant, but our addition of 300 ppm more would have a relatively small direct warming influence. This is because the more CO2 there is in the atmosphere, the more "saturated" the CO2-portion of the greenhouse effect becomes, a well known feature that has a standard simplified, logarithmic formula for its computation. Everyone already knows about this mostly saturated condition relative to the radiative effect of carbon dioxide -- even the IPCC. Adding more and more CO2 causes incrementally less and less warming (again, assuming no feedback, which is a separate issue) ?.but the radiative effect of CO2 in the atmosphere is not totally saturated. And it never can be, for the same reason that you can keep dividing a number by two forever, and the resulting number will get extremely small ?but it will never reach zero. So what do these two examples tell us? If the natural contribution of CO2 to the greenhouse effect was ZERO, then the warming effect of our addition of 300 ppm would be relatively large. But if the natural contribution of CO2 to the greenhouse effect was already large, then the incremental warming effect of adding more will be small. An extreme example would be Venus, which has 230,000 times as much CO2 in its atmosphere as Earth does. Our addition of CO2 to that atmosphere would have essentially no effect. The point is that knowing what percentage of the Earth's natural greenhouse effect comes from carbon dioxide alone tells us little of use in determining how much warming might result from adding more CO2 to the atmosphere. How Much is the Earth's Greenhouse Effect Enhanced by Adding More CO2? Schmidt et al. assumes the commonly quoted 33 deg. C as the amount of surface warming due to the Earth's greenhouse effect, and for the time being I will assume the same. (In my next blog post, I will explain why this number is NOT a good measure of the Earth's greenhouse effect.) Thirteen years ago, Danny Braswell and I did our own calculations to explore the greenhouse effect with a built-from-scratch radiative transfer model, incorporating the IR radiative code developed by Ming Dah Chou at NASA Goddard. The Chou code has also been used in some global climate models. We calculated, as others have, a direct (no feedback) surface warming of about 1 deg. C as a result of doubling CO2 ("2XCO2"). So, this immediately gives us numbers we can use to compute a percentage increase in the greenhouse effect: Doubling of atmospheric CO2 (which will probably happen by late in this century) enhances the Earth's greenhouse effect by about (1/33=) 3%. This value (3%) for the enhancement of the Earth's greenhouse effect from our addition of CO2 is much smaller than the 20% value that Schmidt et al. get ?but remember that we are addressing two different issues. I claim what we should be interested in is the relative size of our enhancement of the greenhouse effect, rather than how much of the Earth's natural greenhouse effect is due to CO2. The latter question really proves nothing about how much effect adding MORE CO2 to the atmosphere will have. Next Time: Why 33 deg. C is a Misleading Number In my next post, I will discuss why the use of 33 deg. C for surface warming due to the greenhouse effect is very misleading. The issue is not new, as it has been known since the 1960s. I wasn't aware of its central importance to the global warming debate until Dick Lindzen published his 1990 paper, Some Coolness Concerning Global Warming. (Roy W. Spencer)
On May 27 2008, I presented the following post I am reposting most of the post today, in response to the discussions in the post Pielke Sr and scientific equivocation: don't beat around the bush, Roger on the weblog Skeptical Scientist [and also in the comments on the weblog Watts Up With That]. A Short Explanation Of Why The Monitoring Of Global Average Ocean Heat Content Is The Appropriate Metric to Assess Global Warming (Roger Pielke Sr., Climate Science)
Total equivalent area of Agricultural Land and Urban Surfaces (>55%) in the Continental U.S. In the battle over global warming, it is sometimes said that humans are too small to make a significant impact on global climate. However, surveys of land use and land cover changes over the last decade suggest that the amount of land altered by human activity is large enough to modify climate on a regional, continental, and even hemispheric scale. In the U.S., as in most countries, the largest alterations have been made by agriculture. Nearly 54% of the continental U.S. is agricultural land. Though much smaller (about 1.5%), urban surfaces exert an influence proportionally greater than their size. Globally, 38% of the world's land area is used for agriculture and about 0.5% consists of urban surfaces. This is a conservative estimate which does not include surface modifications such as private, commercial, and municipal landscaping, deforestation, watersheds, surface mining, landfills, reservoirs, etc. When all such modifications are taken into consideration, global landscape changes approach 40%-50% of the total landmass. These vast modifications to the land can significantly alter temperature, evaporation, cloud cover, precipitation, pressure fields, and wind over a region--and perhaps beyond. Unfortunately, their impact has been largely ignored by many in the climate community owing to a disproportionate emphasis on the role of CO2 in climate change. Urban Heat Islands (UHI) In a little known study published by NOAA in 2004, scientists used Landsat data, satellite observed nighttime lights, U.S. Census Bureau road vectors, and high resolution aerial photographs to create a map of Impervious Surface Area (ISA) for the continental U.S. ISA consists of human constructed surfaces including buildings, roads, parking lots, roofs, airports, etc. In 2004 the total ISA was 112,610 km2 (± 12,725 km2) which is slightly smaller than the state of Ohio (116,534 km2) as shown on the map below.
In a 2007 study, another survey was undertaken by some of the same researchers to tabulate the global constructed surface area. Due to the size of the survey area, a lower resolution model was used which, as the lead author indicated to me in an email, probably underestimates ISA (e.g., for the continental U.S. the estimate of 83,337 km2 is 26% lower than the 2004 study). The total ISA for the top 100 countries is 579,703 km2. China, the United States and India have the largest constructed surface area by far, totaling 252,284 km2. Assuming this estimate is 26% lower than the actual value, the world wide total would be closer to 783,330 km2--an area slightly larger than Turkey (780,580 km2). Impervious surfaces have a major impact on local and mesoscale climate by altering sensible and latent heat fluxes. According to recent studies, the rapid growth of urban areas may account for 50% of the warming in the U.S. since 1950 (Stone, 2009, see Fall 2009). ISA also modifies watersheds by increasing the frequency and magnitude of surface runoff pulses and raising water temperatures. Nearly all runoff is removed from impervious surfaces by storm sewers, thus reducing available moisture. But higher water temperature increases the potential for evaporation of standing water. A large UHI can actually establish its own circulation pattern when conditions are favorable. As dry warm air rises over the city, it is replaced by a cool, moist inflow from the surrounding countryside. This sets up a low level convergent flow which is favorable for cumulus formation and thunderstorm development downwind. Convergence is enhanced by surface roughness. As air slows due to increased friction, the continued inflow causes mass to accumulate. Equilibrium is maintained as updrafts form to remove mass. Frictional drag also tends to divert air around the city which then converges again on the downwind side producing more lift. Studies done in the St. Louis area during the 1970's showed a 25% average increase in summer rainfall. This included a 58% increase in nocturnal rainfall. Deep convective activity from the increased heat fluxes resulted in a 45% increase in thunderstorm frequency and a 31% increase in hailstorms. Thunderstorms have been observed to persist and reform for hours downwind of large urban areas. Since thunderstorms are a major mechanism for transporting heat and moisture deep into the troposphere, the cumulative impact of UHIs on regional and continental climate has yet to be determined. The upshot is that UHIs not only cause an increase in average temperature, but they may also have teleconnections to synoptic scale phenomena. Agricultural Land 
Unlike UHIs, agricultural lands are coextensive, covering thousands of square kilometers. The surface area covered by agricultural land is large enough to create regional and continental scale modifications to climate. The 2007 "U.S. Census of Agriculture" issued by the USDA, reported that in 2002 there were 2.2 million farms, covering an area of 4,148,027 km2. Consequently, 54% of the contiguous U.S.(which is approximately 7,689,027 km2) has been modified by croplands, grassland pastures, and ranges as shown in the census table below. 223,850 km2 of U.S. agricultural land was irrigated in 2003--an area slightly smaller than the state of Minnesota.
Globally 38% of the world's land area is used for agriculture (crops, pastures, and range). This amounts to 56,597,200 km2--an area slightly larger than Asia, the Middle East, and Europe combined (World Bank). Worldwide, there is 2,788,000 km² of irrigation equipped infrastructure (year 2000 figures)--an area slightly larger than Argentina.
Total equivalent area of Global Agricultural Land Numerous studies have shown that there is often a reduction in near surface temperature (both day and night) when land is converted to agriculture due to the increase in plant transpiration. In other words, a greater percentage of solar energy is now used to change liquid water into vapor making less energy available for heating the ground. The same is true of evaporation from irrigated land. Irrigation causes a sharp gradient in temperature between irrigated and non-irrigated areas. Using satellite derived data, one study measured IR temperature gradients of 10ºC -12ºC over distances of 10-20 km in Northeast Colorado (see Cotton & Pielke, 118-121). As with UHIs, a large temperature gradient is sufficient to set-up a local solenoidal circulation. Landscape heterogeneities on the order of tens of kilometers are sufficient to produce a mesoscale circulation. Convergent zones associated with these circulations can become the focus of deep thunderstorm convection, though in some cases (e.g., the Indian monsoons) reduced surface roughness over croplands can actually inhibit deep convection. Increased evaporation and transpiration over agricultural land adds a considerable amount of moisture to the air raising dew point temperatures. This moisture can enhance cloud formation and even thunderstorm development as latent heat is released from condensing water vapor. The magnitude of latent heat flux is enormous in terms of heat content or moist enthalpy. A 1ºC increase in dew point temperature is equivalent to a 2.5ºC increase in air temperature (at a pressure of 1000mb). The result is an increase in convective available potential energy (CAPE) for cumulus and thunderstorm growth (though initiation may be delayed by evaporative cooling in the surface boundary layer) and an increase in precipitation. These impacts undergo seasonal changes especially in dryland agriculture such as wheat. The leafing out of vegetation in the spring causes cooling while the harvest in the fall may actually produce a warming effect. Crop rotation, conversion to pastureland, desertification, deforestation, and overgrazing of ranges also produce warm anomalies. The immense spatial scale of agricultural land leads to the palpable conclusion that anthropogenic modifications to land cover are altering temperature, evaporation, cloud cover, precipitation, pressure fields, and wind over entire regions and continents. While these modifications usually act to modulate natural climate variability, on some spatial and temporal scales they may actually dominate certain parameters. Agricultural activity has produced large scale changes in average rainfall (Florida, the Midwest, North America, and India), decreases in average summer temperatures, and increases in average summer dewpoints (irrigated land, Midwest cornbelt). The challenge for the future is to further demonstrate how changes in land use and land cover teleconnect to synoptic scale phenomena and to untangle the complex biophysical, bigeochemical, and biogeographic interactions created by changes in soil and vegetation. This includes the impact made by aerosols as well as CO2 sinks and sources. References: 2007 US Census of Agriculture. http://www.agcensus.usda.gov/Publications/2007/Full_Report/index.asp Lubowski, Ruben, Marlow Vesterby, and Shawn Bucholtz (2006-07-21). Agricultural Resources and Environmental Indicators, 2006 Edition. USDA Economic Research Service. "AREI Chapter 1.1: Land Use" World Bank Database. http://data.worldbank.org/topic/agriculture-and-rural-development "The Digital Global Map of Irrigation Areas -- Development and Validation of Map Version 4" Siebert, Stefan, Jippe Hoogeveen, Petra Döll, Jean-Marc Faurès, Sebastian Feick and Karen Frenken Tropentag. University of Bonn, October 11-13, 2006, Conference on International Agricultural Research for Development. http://www.tropentag.de/2006/abstracts/full/211.pdf CIA World Factbook, "irrigation." https://www.cia.gov/library/publications/the-world-factbook/fields/2146.html Cotton, William R., and Pielke, Sr., Roger A. Human Impacts on Weather and Climate, 2nd Edition (Cambridge U. Press, 2007). Elvidge, C. D., C. Milesi, J. B. Dietz, B. T. Tuttle, P. C. Sutton, R. Nemani, and J. E. Vogelmann (2004), U.S. Constructed Area Approaches the Size of Ohio, Eos Trans. AGU, 85(24), doi:10.1029/2004EO240001 http://www.ngdc.noaa.gov/dmsp/pubs/ElvidgeEtAl-EOS-ConstructedAreaApproachesSizeOfOhio.pdf Summary in AGU News: http://www.agu.org/news/press/pr_archives/2004/prrl0423.html Elvidge, C.D.; Tuttle, B.T.; Sutton, P.C.; Baugh, K.E.; Howard, A.T.; Milesi, C.; Bhaduri, B.; Nemani, R. Global Distribution and Density of Constructed Impervious Surfaces. Sensors 2007, 7, 1962-1979. http://www.mdpi.com/1424-8220/7/9/1962/pdf Cotton, William R., and Pielke, Sr., Roger A. Human Impacts on Weather and Climate, 2nd Edition (Cambridge U. Press, 2007). Pielke Sr., R.A., 2005: Land use and climate change. Science, 310, 1625-1626. Stone, Brian, Land Use as Climate Change Mitigation. Environ. Sci. Technol., 2009, 43 (24), pp 9052--9056 http://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/es902150g Fall S., D. Niyogi, R. A. Pielke Sr., A. Gluhovsky, E. Kalnay and G. Rochon, 2009: Impacts of land use land cover on temperature trends over the continental United States: assessment using the North American Regional Reanalysis, International Journal of Climatology. http://www.landsurface.org/publications/J80.pdf (Roger Pielke Sr., Climate Science)
Coal and oil are the key ingredients that have lifted much of mankind from a Stone Age existence to a world of comfort and plenty never before seen.
Download here: http://carbon-sense.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/09/learning-from-history.pdf [PDF, 83 KB] (Carbon Sense Coalition)
Alaska Seeks To Overturn Delay In Arctic Drilling The state of Alaska on Thursday filed a petition in federal court to overturn the Obama administration's moratorium on drilling in federal waters of the
Arctic, even though Interior Department officials insist that no such formal moratorium exists.
Peter Foster: The oil sands and the Democrats' death march September 10, 2010 -- 8:24 pm Radical environmentalism is an attractive indulgence when economies are booming, but doesn't look so hot during an extended downturn U.S. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi came to Canada this week for a meeting of G8 speakers and to chat with those who would alternately promote, or kill, the Alberta oilsands. She has always been firmly in the killer camp, but her main concern right now is the death march of her own Democratic Party towards the November Congressional elections. Obamacare is toxic. U.S. financial reform is incomprehensible and likely to be counterproductive. Vast Keynesian stimuli have gone down the drain to such an extent that the White House doesn't even use that "s" word any more, referring to this week's announcement of another $50 billion of unfunded spending as a "spur." Many Democrats are attempting to save their skin by distancing themselves from Mr. Obama, who compounded the inheritance of an economic crisis by pursuing a divisive -- and expensive -- social agenda. Ms. Pelosi has been behind him all the way.
UK Government Told To Cut 2020 Biofuels Target Britain should cut its target for biofuels use by 2020 so that tropical forests are not cut down to make way for biofuel crops, government climate advisors
said Friday.
Looking an awful lot like wishful thinking: Has Israel Just Figured Out How to Make the Electric Car Worthwhile? A design allowing for battery swapping rather than long recharges gets a trial run this month.
Half-way to Doubling Renewable Energy
In 2008, President Obama declared that the U.S. would double the amount of energy that comes from renewable sources by the end of his first term. Later, in a televised address to a joint session of Congress, he proclaimed that we'll reach that goal in three years, not four. [Read More] (Stan Jakuba, ET)
An ill wind blows for Denmark's green energy revolution Denmark has long been a role model for green activists, but now it has become one of the first countries to turn against the turbines. (TDT)
Wind is Not Power at All (Part III -- Capacity Value) by Kent Hawkins This three-part series assesses utility-scale wind's ability to provide reliable power, a necessary qualification for its use in electricity systems. After Part I's introduction, Part II dealt with power density, where wind fails to meet today's standards. This final part will look at the extension to power density, that is, capacity (power) value, which takes into account wind's randomness and intermittency of supply. Again wind fails to qualify as industrial energy. Electricity capacity is measured in power terms, for example MW. In this connection it is important to note the importance of the distinction that must be made between capacity factor, capacity credit and capacity value. Compared to capacity value, capacity credit and capacity factor are of small importance. Jon Boone has long called attention to this as follows: "Modern society exists on a foundation built upon productivity that comes from reliable, controllable, interdependent high-powered machine systems. All conventional units that provide electricity must pass rigorous tests of reliability and performance; they must produce their rated capacities, or a desired fraction, as expected whenever asked--or be removed from the grid. Some are like refrigerators, doing heavy-duty long-term work; others are like our toasters or irons, not working all the time but responsive when called upon to do so. This ability to perform as expected on demand is known as a machine's capacity value. Conventional power generators have a capacity value of 99.999%. Using them for 97% of our electricity, the country achieves high reliability and security at affordable cost. Wind provides no capacity value and can pass no test for reliability; one can never be sure how much energy it will produce for any future time. Generating units that don't provide capacity value cannot be reasonably compared with those that do. This is a practical way to think about this concept: You don't drive your car all the time, with the result that its capacity factor--the percentage of your car's potential that you actually use--is probably 15-20%, if that. But when you do wish to drive it, the car works virtually all of the time, getting you from pillar to post in line with your own schedule. This is its capacity value. Ditto with your chain saw--or television, or any modern appliance we all take for granted because it works when we want it to work. Appliances that don't do this are quickly discarded, although this wasn't the case for much of our history (look at the early days of television or radio or even the automobile). Only in the last hundred years or so have we in the West come to rely on machines with this standard. In fact, it's the basis of our modernity and it underlies contemporary systems of economic growth and wealth creation." In other words, for electrical energy to be useful, we must be able to switch it on and off at the level needed and rely on it being available during the period of use. To accomplish this, capacity (in this context capacity and power are interchangeable terms) must be reliably available on a continuous basis. This is as opposed to wind "activity" as described in Part I, which is available only randomly and in continuously varying amounts over time. Statistical expectations of this are not meaningful. This cannot be over-emphasized, as electricity is a vital resource for many of our activities and continued well-being. Further, unlike most resources, electricity cannot be stored, and in most applications, in its absence, substitution of some non-electrical power source is not feasible. [Read more →] (MasterResource)
Well, duh! Castro's Confession The Left: Fidel Castro stunned the world this week by admitting socialism had failed in Cuba. The implication of the dictator's statement is unclear, but one
thing isn't: Castro's sycophants have some explaining to do.
Posted by Here's a story for the better-late-than-never file. Former Cuban dictator Fidel Castro confessed that communism doesn't work and that his nation's economic system should not be emulated.
Too bad Castro didn't have this epiphany 50 years ago. The Cuban people languish in abject poverty as a result of Castro's oppressive policies. Food is harshly rationed and other basic amenities are largely unavailable (except, of course, to the party elite). This chart, comparing inflation-adjusted per-capita GDP in Chile and Cuba, is a good illustration of the human cost of excessive government. Living standards in Cuba have languished. In Chile, by contrast, the embrace of market-friendly policies has resulted in a huge increase in prosperity. Chileans were twice as rich as Cubans when Castro seized control of the island. After 50 years of communism in Cuba and 30 years of liberalization in Chile, the gap is now much larger.
Dear FDA: There are much bigger fish to fry than abuse of cough and cold meds In an earlier posting, we examined the abuse by teenagers of dextromethorphan (DEX or DXM)--a safe and widely used ingredient in many over-the-counter cough and cold medications. We also mentioned that the FDA has scheduled an advisory committee meeting for September 14th to determine if DEX-containing drugs will require stricter purchasing controls. One of the points made in my related Health News Digest piece was that teen abuse of prescription (rather than OTC) drugs is actually a much bigger problem. Now, a survey just released by the Center for Medicine in the Public Interest (CMPI) indicates that police officers and high school teachers nationwide believe alcohol and marijuana are the most serious problem substances facing teenagers. In fact, exactly ZERO police officers and only 1 percent of high school teachers cited cough and cold meds as having the greatest impact on teens! More than that, by a margin of nearly two to one, police officers and high school teachers support educational efforts over reducing accessibility, as a means to address abuse of OTC cough and cold medicines. It looks as if our FDA--anxious to polish its damaged reputation after the Vioxx, Baycol, Permax, Cylert, and Palladone fiascoes (all of which occurred in the last decade)--is taking the easy way out by catering to the "Save the Children" crowd. Robert Goldberg, PhD, CMPI vice president, is absolutely right:
A federal policy that will create more problems than it will solve? Imagine that. Grab more details here. (Shaw's Eco-Logic)
What? The rise and rise of water shortage Over the past 2000 years, population increase has been four times more significant than climate change in the rise of water shortage. That's according to
researchers from Finland and The Netherlands, who have analysed population growth, climate data and water-resource availability.
Peru Water Wars Threaten Agricultural Export Boom The World Bank, which has lent millions of dollars to turn Peru's fragile desert coast into verdant farmland, has stumbled into a film noir scene straight
out of Roman Polanski's 'Chinatown' about the violent water wars of 1930s Los Angeles.
Column - The green totalitarian itch Andrew Bolt -- Friday, September 10, 10 (07:02 am)
TWO years ago Tasmanian police held an anti-terrorism drill that sounds more realistic by the day. The scenario for their exercise had a forest campaigner hijacking a plane and threatening to crash it into a pulp mill. No surprise, right? But the news leaked out and police had green activists howling in outrage at being seen as totalitarians in koala suits. As is too common, the police buckled before their moralising wrath, and a spokesman grovelled out to apologise. No offence intended, he whimpered. "We deliberately drew up a scenario unconnected with events in history, unconnected with current events or what police expect in the future." Really? So police train for what they don't "expect in the future"? Can't wait for their next exercise, involving a mock siege of Parliament by giant cane toads. But what of the claim that this eco-terrorist scenario was "unconnected with current events"? Last week a global warming believer burst into Discovery Channel's Maryland headquarters to demand the station do more to save the planet from the Armageddon we're told will be caused by global warming. To make his request harder to ignore, James J. Lee held three hostages at gunpoint until police shot him dead. You're right, Lee does not represent the typical warming activist, who is as open-minded and see-both-sides as, say, Christine Milne. Yet read the enviro-rants of this man who says he experienced an "awakening" on seeing Al Gore's An Inconvenient Truth, the documentary. which told every child in the country that wicked humans are killing the earth. Phrase after phrase of Lee's writings sounds so familiar. Consider the demands he served on Discovery with the aid of his gun. Continue reading 'Column - The green totalitarian itch' (Andrew Bolt)
Greenie/"Climate Expert" an environmental plunderer: Climate change expert Ross Garnaut behind controversial PNG mines CLIMATE-change expert Ross Garnaut is linked with two companies accused of using a controversial method of releasing mine waste into rivers and the ocean in
Papua New Guinea.
From wooly-headed Wails: Woolly coffins on display in Prince's garden People should be buried in woollen coffins because it is a more environmentally friendly way of being laid to rest, the Prince of Wales has suggested, as part of a new campaign to promote green living. (TDT)
Big surprise: Slop buckets reprieve for fear of fly tipping and 'bin police' Households will no longer have to install slop buckets in every kitchen after a Government report warned that forcing people to separate food waste could lead to an increase in fly tipping. (TDT)
Oh dear... Rockefeller Tells W.Va. Not to Deny Global Warming The senator is a supporter of the evidence pointing to global warming, feeling some need to be open to the science.
The hazards of simply believing models: What If Today's CO2-Emitting Devices Were The Last? What would happen if cars, trucks, power plants and factories that now give off climate-warming carbon dioxide were allowed to die after their expected
lifespans, and no new ones were built?
Pacala and Socolow (8) analyzed a scenario that envisioned stabilizing atmospheric concentrations of CO2 at 500 ppm within 50 years. They found that reaching that goal required the deployment of seven existing or nearly existing groups of technologies, such as more fuel-efficient vehicles, to remove seven "wedges" of predicted future emissions (the wedge image coming from the shape created by graphing each increment of avoided future emissions). Those seven wedges, each of which represents 25 gigatons of avoided carbon emissions by 2054, are cited by some as sufficient to "solve" climate change for 50 years (9).The total is even more than 25 wedges if you want to avoid using the oceans as a store of carbon dioxide or reduce emissions below 2010 levels.. The numbers that Hoffert presents in his perspective are the same as those that I present in The Climate Fix, under a similar analysis. However you do the math, the challenge is huge and making progress will take decades of effort. (Roger Pielke Jr.)
<chuckle> Climate change law's suspension slammed by UC Berkeley study Suspending California's landmark climate change law would result in the loss of millions of dollars in state revenue and hurt the state's growing clean-tech
industry, a new report says.
Another angle on the redistribution meme: Greener pastures and better breeds could reduce carbon 'hoofprint' New study by the International Livestock Research Institute finds reductions in greenhouse gases could be worth a billion dollars to poor livestock
farmers if they could sell saved carbon on international markets
Local CO2 Emissions Reductions in Aspen: "Viciously Difficult"
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[R]educing the carbon emissions is difficult because the Skico's operations are growing. There are more summer activities and greater use of snowmaking. That results in the Skico burning more fossil fuels that produce carbon emissions. Those greenhouses gases cause climate change. The Skico's extensive environmental policy is concentrated on one goal -- battling climate change.The relationship between economic growth and emissions reductions is clear: economic growth wins out. I call this fact -- and it is a fact -- the "iron law of climate policy" in The Climate Fix. I'll have more more on this in the coming weeks. (Roger Pielke Jr.)
Two Lies Make A Truth In Green and Liberal Views on Climate Science In the world of green and liberal politics, where they practice extreme environmentalism, nothing bears examination: two lies make a truth. We now learn that Bjorn Lomborg, who was never a climate skeptic, has magically disavowed that status. As the entire mockery of human induced global warming collapses, it is a convenient conversion. (Tim Ball, CFP)
Global Warming Hoax Weekly Round-Up Sep. 9th 2010 David Suzuki's new movie will open this weekend to the sound of scratching audiences, wind farms add whales and seals to the list of 'will it blend' wildlife and British bees have been inappropriate with their close relatives. (Daily Bayonet)
Floods in the Eastern United States 
Only a small fraction of stations exhibited significant linear trends. For those stations with trends, there was a split between increasing and decreasing trends. No spatial structure was found for stations exhibiting trends. There is little indication that human ?induced climate change has resulted in increasing flood magnitudes for the eastern United States.Logically, the inability to detect a signal of human-induced climate change in flood magnitudes means that it is impossible to detect such a signal in the damage record, which is comprised of more moving parts than just high water. (Roger Pielke Jr.)
Oh boy... 1500 to Discuss Carbon Capture and Storage at GHGT-10 Later This Month 'From research to reality' is the theme of the 10th Greenhouse Gas Technologies Control Conference (GHGT-10), which will be held in Amsterdam from September 19 - 23. More than 1500 scientists will discuss barriers to and opportunities for implementing carbon capture and storage (CCS). (AZ CleanTech)
Geoengineering is not a new idea, it has been around in one form or another for half a century. Some want to drop iron, nitrates and phosphorous in the sea to encourage the growth of plankton colonies which can sequester oceanic CO 2. Others wish to place sunshades in space, directly between Earth and the Sun. This blog has note some of the wackier schemes in earlier posts. Several have won our coveted Crank of the Week award: John Latham suggested the creation of a fleet of 1500 robot sailing ships to combat global warming; Tom M. L. Wigley, Senior Scientist at the National Center for Atmospheric Research, suggests releasing sulfur dioxide (SO 2) into the stratosphere; and President Obama's science adviser John Holdren has mentioned several extreme options, including shooting pollution particles into the upper atmosphere to reflect the sun's rays and developing artificial trees to suck carbon dioxide from Earth's atmosphere.  Geoengineering schemes abound. According to Doug Parr, chief scientist for Greenpeace UK, the scientific community is becoming so scared of our collective inability to tackle climate emissions that such outlandish schemes are being seriously considered. We here at The Resilient Earth are seldom in agreement with the neo-Luddites at Greenpeace, but we certainly do not support experimenting with Earth's climate system--our level of scientific knowledge is simply too primitive. "The scientist's focus on tinkering with our entire planetary system is not a dynamic new technological and scientific frontier, but an expression of political despair," said Parr in an article in the UK's Guardian. Whether the authors of the two papers presented hear are in despair is debatable, but they are seriously looking into manipulating Earth's climate. Both of these recent studies address climate regulation using aerosols to reduce incoming solar radiation. The PNAS article, "Efficacy of geoengineering to limit 21st century sea-level rise," compared reducing CO 2 emissions verses using aerosols in an attempt to limit sea-level rise. J. C. Moore, S. Jevrejeva, and A. Grinsted described their work in the article abstract:
The researchers simulated the impact of both stratospheric SO 2 injection and reduction of radiation by reflecting mirrors, using measurements from the 1991 Mount Pinatubo eruption as a guide. The amount of SO 2 aerosol required to counteract the impact of a doubling of atmospheric CO 2 depends on the size of the particles and the location of injection. The models indicated that the continuous injection of SO 2 would produce larger particles than a natural volcanic eruption, which would reducing their effective cooling capability. This is because the larger particles would not stay airborne as long as finer, natural aerosol particles. The radiative impact of the Pinatubo eruption over four years was −1.29, −1.59, or −1.89 Wm -2, depending on which forcing reconstruction model is used. Moore et al. calculate that, to counteract a CO 2 doubling, the geoengineering effort would need to provide a constant 4 Wm -2 reduction in radiative forcing--equivalent to a Pinatubo eruption every 18 months. Halting the particle injections would quickly reverse the cooling effect.  Results of modeling runs using three different scenarios, labeled RCP3PD, RCP 4.5, and RCP 8.5 , are shown in the figure above. Sea-level simulations (relative to mean sea level 1980 to 2000) using mean forcings from before 2000 and RCP scenarios since 2001. The past is constrained by observed global sea level, post 2010 simulation with the RCP scenarios labeling the figure with no geoengineering (black); with the scenario plus a constant −1.56 Wm -2 (blue); the scenario plus space mirror (from 0 to −4 Wm -2 ) linear ramp (red). Shadows represent 5--95% confidence bands in each simulation. The scenarios are described in detail by R. H. Moss et al. in "The next generation of scenarios for climate change research and assessment." Though the authors concluded that aerosol injection could delay sea-level rise by 40--80 years, the injection of material would need to be maintained for the indefinite future. "Aerosol injection appears to fail cost-benefit analysis," they state. "Substituting geoengineering for greenhouse gas emission abatement or removal constitutes a conscious risk transfer to future generations." In "Regional climate response to solar-radiation management," Katharine L. Ricke, M. Granger Morgan and Myles R. Allen apply similar geoengineering measures to the regulation of temperature and precipitation. They present an analysis of regional differences in a climate modified by solar-radiation management, using a large-ensemble modeling experiment that evaluated the impacts of 54 scenarios for global temperature stabilization. They describe their motivation this way:
From the model results, the researchers concluded that solar-radiation management would generally lead to less extreme temperature and precipitation. All of the modeled scenarios produced stabilized five-year average global-mean surface air temperatures (SATs), at levels between approximately 14.6 and 15.7 ?°C. This is roughly plus or minus half a degree from the temperature at the time SRM activities are initiated--depending on the level of forcing applied. The control scenario (shown in black) resulted in an increase in global-mean SAT of approximately 2.5 ?°C over the course of the 80-year simulations.  But there is a component of long-wave forcing of the hydrological cycle that is independent of temperature. As a result, SRM with stratospheric aerosols cannot simultaneously compensate for the impacts of rising greenhouse gases on both temperatures and the hydrological cycle. "Although it might be possible in principle to 'fine tune' the hydrological response by injecting aerosols with different optical properties at different latitudes or altitudes, no proposal yet exists for how this might be implemented in practice, and some variability in response remains inevitable," the authors state. In short, the simulations showed that it is "not feasible" to stabilize global precipitation and temperature simultaneously if atmospheric greenhouse gas concentrations continue to rise. "Hence, it may not be possible to stabilize the climate in all regions simultaneously using solar-radiation management," they concluded. "Regional diversity in the response to different levels of solar-radiation management could make consensus about the optimal level of geoengineering difficult, if not impossible, to achieve."
Researchers, accompanied by policy experts, social scientists and journalists, are doing their bureaucratic best to develop guidelines for regulating geoengineering. Given the lawsuits by Pacific islanders--seeking reparations from developed countries because of sea level rise supposedly caused by anthropogenic global warming--just imagine the furor if geoengineers were actively messing with the climate. Every natural disaster would be blamed on geoengineering. Litigation would be rampant, all aimed squarely at the developed nations. After all, you cannot sue Mother Nature for damages. When science cannot even predict climate change accurately, trying to change the climate on purpose is shear lunacy. Experimenting on the environment we live in is a bit like doing experimental surgery on one's self--it may work in the movies but would probably be fatal in real life. For now, geoengineering remains the domain of mad scientists and cartoon super-villains. Not wishing to go all tree-hugger here, but mankind really shouldn't be messing with Mother Nature. Be safe, enjoy the interglacial and stay skeptical. (Doug L. Hoffman, The Resilient Earth)
How often do you hear anyone make the obvious point global warming will be good for Canada?
Lawrence Solomon: Another cold Arctic summer September 9, 2010 -- 7:42 pm The summer of 2010 was unusually cold, according to the Centre for Ocean and Ice at the Danish Meteorological Institute. For almost the entirety of the June to August period, mean daily temperatures were below the corresponding daily temperatures over the past half century during which the Centre has maintained records. The cold progress of this past Arctic summer can be seen in the Centre's graph, seen here. The red line -- this year's temperatures -- falls below the green bell curve starting just before Day 150 (late May) of 2010, indicating that just about every day this last summer was colder than normal. The green bell curve represents the historical record -- the temperatures that the Arctic has experienced since 1958. Of even greater significance for those concerned about a melting of the Arctic ice, however, is the graph's blue line, which indicates the freezing point of water. When the red line appears above the blue line, temperatures are above 0 degrees and ice will melt. As the graph shows, the unseasonably cold summer gave the Arctic a short melt season in 2010. With temperatures in September now plummeting, 2010 is unlikely to log any more melt days, and the Summer of 2010 will go down in the history books as yet another year in which the Arctic did not melt. Lawrence Solomon is executive director of Energy Probe and author of The Deniers. To see the Danish Meteorological Institute's graph, click here. (Financial Post)
Comments On The Greenhouse Effect By Herman and Pielke Part III Ben Herman and I have already discussed the greenhouse effect on this weblog (i.e. see and see). In response to comments on other weblogs regarding our contributions there remain continued misconceptions on the greenhouse effect. To further emphasize the physics, we have written this new text. Our discussions are based on the effect of adding absorbing (greenhouse) gases to the atmosphere. Of course there are many other things going on as the comments on the weblogs have stated. These will add or subtract from the warming effect due to greenhouse gases. This does not mean that greenhouse gases do not have a warming effect (by virtue of reduced cooling). That effect is still there. It is that effect and that effect alone that we were discussing, and the presence of all of the other factors that influence atmospheric temperatures will not eliminate that effect. They will only modify the final outcome. One other point also seems to have been misunderstood by some. Infrared radiation (IR) will, in general, cool the surface of the earth. So how can addition of greenhouse gases which are primarily active only in the IR cause a warming of the surface? As we pointed out originally, it is the absorbed solar energy that causes the warming. This absorbed energy, in equilibrium, is balanced by an equal emission of IR energy. When more of the emitted IR from the surface is absorbed by the addition of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere, and some of this additionally absorbed IR is re-emitted downward towards the ground, the ground cools more slowly, and thus is warmer than it was before the addition of the greenhouse gas. Thus the final result is that the addition of an IR absorbing gas in to the atmosphere, results in a warming of the surface, and subsequently the lower levels of the atmosphere. The important remaining question, of course, is how much is this warming effect and in our opinion, this has not yet been satisfactorily answered. (Roger Pielke Sr., Climate Science)
Obama May Have Just Done Both By Issuing a Secretive Executive Order
by Ben Lieberman The Environmental Protection Agency's effort to regulate carbon dioxide as an air pollutant is currently garnering most of the attention from the agency's critics, but it is far from the only problematic EPA regulation in the works. Another proposal that also deserves strong opposition is the agency's attempt to label coal combustion byproducts (CCBs) as hazardous waste. Doing so is not only environmentally unnecessary but downright counterproductive, and would raise energy costs and kill jobs to boot. Like several other Obama administration regulations, this extreme proposal goes well beyond anything contemplated under Bush or under Clinton. In fact, it was the Clinton administration EPA that concluded in 2000 that CCBs, chiefly the fly ash from burning coal to produce electricity, should ? Read the full story (Cooler Heads)
Analysis: Argentina Revives Its Nuclear Energy Ambitions Argentina, whose pioneering nuclear energy program was sidelined for years, has embarked on an ambitious plan to build nuclear power plants again to ease
reliance on dwindling fossil fuels.
On Clean Energy, China Skirts Rules CHANGSHA, China -- Until very recently, Hunan Province was known mainly for lip-searing spicy food, smoggy cities and destitute pig farmers. Mao was born in
a village on the outskirts of Changsha, the provincial capital here in south-central China.
Will a new real estate tax save us from solar insanity? The subsidized photovoltaic industry has exploded in the mostly cloudy Czech Republic. Within a year, the amount of electricity produced by solar panels has
increased by a whole order of magnitude. As a result, the leading power utility, ČEZ, estimates that it may have to raise the price of electricity by a
whopping 20 or 30 percent starting from January 2011. » Don't Stop Reading » (TRF)
More wind turbines needed to meet climate change target The planning system must allow more wind farms or Britain will fail to meet key climate change targets, Government advisers have warned. (TDT)
Wind Is Not Power at All (Part II -- Power Density) by Kent Hawkins Part I of this three-part series set the stage for examining intermittent power sources, especially wind, as viable sources of electricity. Part 2 addresses one of the critical power considerations: power density. In his MasterResource series, Vaclav Smil compared the power densities of a range of fuels for electricity production, which demonstrates the inadequacies of renewables. David MacKay also makes a useful contribution to this topic. Table 1 summarizes the results, which take into account entire fuel cycles, transportation and transmission requirements for a range of assumptions. Note that all renewable energy sources are ten to over a thousand times less effective than those serving our needs today, with wind providing one of the poorest performances of the renewable sources shown, outside of wood. Areas required for renewables are large because of the dispersed, and often remote, nature of their energy supply. The problem that this presents is that our current electricity infrastructure is based on high power density generation facilities supplying the low power densities of users, and in general, user power density is about ten times higher than most renewable sources, including wind. [Read more →] (MasterResource)
Australia can meet it's 2020 targets with just 35 nuclear power plants or 8000 solar ones! Roger Pielke, Jr. has looked closely at Australia's ETS targets and helpfully put some numbers into the hypotheticals. With all their subsidies, goodwill and fervent wishes, solar, wind, and geothermal produce just 3% of our energy needs. Fossil fuels produce a whopper 94%. And "energy" on these grand continental scales is measured in quadrillion BTUs which is known as "one quad". Australians use about 5 quads / year, and to make that we pump out about 400 Mt of carbon dioxide per year. (These kind of big-picture numbers are often hard to find, so I wanted to capture that to keep things in perspective.) 
Population growth is a big factor in Australia More » (Jo Nova)
About That Cloncurry Solar Thermal Plant . . . 
It turns out that while I am in good shape with my nuclear and wind examples, the Cloncurry plant has run into some troubles: Cloncurry in the state's northwest was meant to be the centrepiece of a radical $30 million plan to use solar energy to heat water and generate electricity, cutting carbon emissions and reliance on diesel -- and eventually taking the town off the grid.Had I instead used Australia's Lake Cargelligo solar thermal plant, at 3 MW peak, I'd have had to multiply all the solar thermal plant equivalencies by 3.33. So, for instance, rather than Australia needing to bring online the equivalent of 24 Cloncurry plants every week to 2020 (starting last January) to meet its decarbonization goals, it would need to bring online 80 Lake Cargelligo plants every week. Details on the math can be found in this PDF. Obviously, my overall argument is not affected. (Roger Pielke Jr.)
SunPower To Research Large-Scale Energy Storage Solar panel maker SunPower Corp is planning to research large-scale storage technologies, a key requirement for the widespread use of renewable energy.
Regular readers know I''m a fan of diesel cars, having test-driven some terrific models at recent car shows, as well as renting them on past trips to Europe. For drivers who travel mainly highway miles, the fuel economy benefits of dieselization can approach those of hybrids at a much lower initial cost premium. [Read More] (Geoffrey Styles, ET)
After a Year of Setbacks, U.N. Looks to Take Charge of World's Agenda After a year of humiliating setbacks, United Nations Secretary General Ban ki-Moon and about 60 of his top lieutenants -- the top brass of the entire U.N.
system -- spent their Labor Day weekend at a remote Austrian Alpine retreat, discussing ways to put their sprawling organization in charge of the world's
agenda.
Despite the reporter's best efforts: Regulator says banned chemical Bisphenol A is not a risk to Australians A CHEMICAL banned in several countries does not pose a risk to Australians, according to the nation's food regulator.
Idiot! The greenest government ever? Only if the Treasury can be tamed The silence from Osborne and Cable is ominous. The next few weeks are crucial to keep the low-carbon economy on track. (Michael Jacobs, Guardian)
» Don't Stop Reading » (TRF)
NASA satellites reveal surprising connection between beetle attacks, wildfire If your summer travels have taken you across the Rocky Mountains, you've probably seen large swaths of reddish trees dotting otherwise green forests. While
it may look like autumn has come early to the mountains, evergreen trees don't change color with the seasons. The red trees are dying, the result of attacks by
mountain pine beetles.
Protect Corals With Reef Networks, U.N. Study Says The world should safeguard coral reefs with networks of small no-fishing zones to confront threats such as climate change, and shift from favoring single,
big protected areas, a U.N. study showed.
Record numbers of salmon and trout in British rivers The number of sea trout and salmon found in English rivers hit record highs this year, figures showed.
Telework would help address some of the biggest problems currently plaguing the United States, including budget crises, environmental pollutants, and costly energy use. (Hiwa Alaghebandian, American Magazine)
Grist commenter incites violence against CEOs, corporations The leaders of Greenpeace, 350.org and the Rainforest Action Network published an article today on Grist.org entitled, "A call for direct action in the climate movement: we need your ideas" -- and boy did they get one. Less than one week after Discovery Channel gunman James J. Lee went down in a blaze of violent ignominy, one commenter wrote,
The radical green management can call for non-violence all it wants -- the zombies it has created seem poised to achieve their ends by other means. BTW Grist, incitement to violence is NOT protected by the First Amendment. (Green Hell Blog)
Another Grist commenter rejects nonviolence Following up on yesterday's post about greens urging violence now that they're are losing politically on cap-and-trade, here's another Grist.org commenter's suggestion:
(Green Hell Blog)
It's been a rough few weeks for the "eco-progressive" fringe.
Environmental lobbying group shuts down after climate bill stalls Climate advocates stung by defeat in the Senate are folding one of their big umbrella lobbying groups.
Carbon cuts leave Chinese factories in chaos AN ABRUPT command from Beijing to follow through with ''iron-fisted'' energy and carbon emission cuts has thrown China's industrial heartland into chaos.
Oxburgh: UEA vice-chancellor was wrong to tell MPs he would investigate climate research Edward Acton gave 'inaccurate' information to MPs by telling them the university would reassess key scientific papers following the UEA climate emails controversy (James Randerson, Guardian)
The EU Connection in Climate Research Written by John Rosenthal The leaking of the East Anglia "Climategate" e-mails and data last November shattered the appearance of a scientific consensus on supposed "man-made global warming" and provided a disturbing insight into the corruption of the scientific process as it relates to the "man-made global warming" hypothesis. The spectacle of scientists stonewalling freedom of information requests, destroying records, hiding unwelcome results, colluding to keep dissenting viewpoints out of scholarly journals, and even suppressing their own acknowledged doubts -- all of this made it perfectly clear that other interests were at stake than the pure pursuit of knowledge. The centrality of the quest for funding in the e-mail exchanges made it equally clear that for the scientists in question, money, unsurprisingly, was first and foremost among those interests. Read more... (SPPI)
No Science Without Contradiction High-brow climate science specialists might almost be a lost cause, yes, but they are not the only ones working about climate-related stuff. So the latest development in terms of investigating the relationship between people and climate is very welcome, because it shows that not the whole world is supinely enthralled in fashionable doom-and-gloom deathwish: tentatively, the analysis of what "climate" means to us may have actually put a step forward. I am talking about the 'Climate not to blame for African Civil Wars' piece from PNAS, also described at the Centre for the Study of Civil War (CSCW) at PRIO's website and in an article on the BBC News website. What is important is not so much in the conclusions ("the paper concludes that climate variability is a poor predictor of armed conflict"): those contradict an earlier study, so we can only assume another peer-reviewed paper will soon get published contradicting CSCW's work (perhaps even, putting forward a third interpretation). What is important is that (finally!) an immature field such as climatology (finally!) sees some kind of scientific debate, instead of the usual circling of the wagons. So far, that had surfaced only regarding hurricanes. Note that of course, this can only come about when theories meet empirical evidence ?as per Alan Sokal's "refrain",
But in reality, that is the standard framework of science: peer-reviewed articles more often than most contradicting each other (see here, here and here), because to "do science" means to freely investigate, to see even dead ends as the results of a fun journey, to start anew. And to consider contradicting articles as a great chance for a synthesis, rather than a mortal, dangerous opportunity for the enemies of science. Why, does anybody remember ?"all human knowledge begins with intuitions, proceeds from thence to concepts, and ends with ideas" ? ================= What will a mature climate science look like? From one of Scientific American's blogs, take the word of "late, great anthropologist" Clifford Geertz:
"Vexing each other": instead of working in the background to prevent people from publishing at all. (Maurizio Morabito, OmniClimate)
Austerity's Impacts on Science Policy
Martin Rees, president of the Royal Society, has an op-ed in today's FT in which he pleads for increased funding: Even after a period of sustained growth, we are still investing only 1.79 per cent of gross domestic product on research and development. This is below Germany (2.54 per cent) and the US (2.68 per cent) -- not to mention fast-developing countries such as South Korea (3 per cent).In stark contrast, in the government's first major speech on science policy Vince Cable, UK business secretary (pictured above), says: There is a school of thought which says that government commitment to science and technology is measured by how much money it spends. Money is important both for the quantity and quality. But it is an input, not an output, measure. We could do more for less. It would be wrong to measure only how much money is invested in scientific research as a mark of our commitment.As the era of austerity begins to bite the scientific community's approach to science policy -- in the UK and beyond -- is going to have to become much more realistic and sophisticated in a hurry. Special pleading is not going to work. (Roger Pielke Jr.)
Oh Andy... Weird Weather in a Warming World GIVEN the weather of late, extremes seem to have become the norm.
Sigh... Risk of beetle outbreaks rise, along with temperature, in the warming West The potential for outbreaks of spruce and mountain pine beetles in western North America's forests is likely to increase significantly in the coming decades,
according to a study conducted by USDA Forest Service researchers and their colleagues. Their findings, published in the September issue of the journal
BioScience, represent the first comprehensive synthesis of the effects of climate change on bark beetles.
Satellite data reveal seasonal pollution changes over India CHAMPAIGN, Ill. -- Armed with a decade's worth of satellite data, University of Illinois atmospheric scientists have documented some surprising trends in
aerosol pollution concentration, distribution and composition over the Indian subcontinent.
Making a half-hearted attempt to blame CO2: Study adds new clue to how last ice age ended New Zealand glaciers melted as European glaciers briefly expanded
An extensive literature exists linking global warming to human health and mortality. There is no doubt that atmospheric conditions have a profound effect on
human health; outbreaks of pneumonia, influenza and bronchitis have been linked many times to both weather and climate. Pollen concentrations and pollution
levels are certainly related to both weather and human health. Furthermore, the impact of heat waves and cold outbreaks on health and mortality are well
established. Humidity not only influences health in terms of allowing bodies to cool in hot periods, but on the other side of the coin, dry, cold air leads to
excessive dehydration of nasal passages and the upper respiratory tract increasing chances of microbial and viral infection. Precipitation events, particularly
large snowfalls, are directly linked to an immediate decline in human health and an increase in mortality. Given the large literature on the subject, it has
been fairly easy for alarmists to make claims that changes in weather and climate will result in higher mortality and an overall decrease in human health.
August 2010 Global Temperature Report Phil Gentry of the University of Alabama at Huntsville has provided us with the August 2010 Global Temperature Report. I have reproduced it in full below. An interesting aspect of the spatial map of lower tropospheric temperatures is the dominance of warm anomalies. This provides a key metric to compare with anomalies in coming months. If they remain well above average, it provides support for the perspective of long term warming of the climate system (at least the lower tropospheric portion). (Roger Pielke Sr., Climate Science)
(Roger Pielke Sr., Climate Science)
Here's a lad in serious need of a reality check: Chu says carbon capture 'will save coal' CHARLESTON, W.Va. -- Energy Secretary Steven Chu on Wednesday urged West Virginians not to fear the Obama administration's energy policies and to embrace
carbon capture and storage technology as the way to continue burning coal while fighting global warming.
Light bulb factory closes; End of era for U.S. means more jobs overseas WINCHESTER, VA. - The last major GE factory making ordinary incandescent light bulbs in the United States is closing this month, marking a small, sad exit
for a product and company that can trace their roots to Thomas Alva Edison's innovations in the 1870s.
Wrong answer all 'round: Smart Meters Alone May Not Save Much Energy: Study Smart meters to boost energy efficiency in homes do not automatically achieve a significant reduction in energy demand, research showed on Wednesday.
Oxygen Drops Near BP Spill But No "Dead Zone": U.S. Hungry microbes feasting on spilled BP oil caused a drop in oxygen levels in the Gulf of Mexico, but did not create a marine "dead zone" near the
wellhead, U.S. scientists reported on Tuesday.
New Cartel Threat: U.S. Energy Supply Energy: Mexico's state oil firm, our second-largest foreign supplier, is under attack from drug cartels. But that's not stopping the U.S. from investing more
in its operations while American rigs lie idle in the Gulf.
Large Number Of Dead Whales Wash Up. Offshore Windpark Construction May Be The Cause 8. September 2010  Baltic I windpark is 15 km from the Baltic
shore where the dead whales washed up
Earlier today German Radio reported that an uusually large number of dead whales have washed up on the North German Baltic beaches over the last 2 weeks. Now some believe that a newly installed Baltic 1 offshore windpark (see map) consisting of 21 2.3-MW turbines may be responsible, according to reports. I searched the Internet for more information, but the story appears to be bottled up for now. The online dnews.de has a small report. It writes that according to the German Marine Museum, 12 cadavers have appeared so far. According to whale researcher Stefan Bräger:
The windpark was just completed and is operated by energy giant EnBW. This video link here is an animation of how the windpark was constructed. The video shows how huge mono-piles with a wall thickness of 100 mm are pounded into the seabed. That certainly cannot be very pleasant for any marine wildlife nearby, and certainly represents a major disturbance of habitat. The issue of ramming huge piles into the seabed is becoming increasingly controversial in the installation of offshore windparks. According to the Director of the German Marine Museum in Stralsund, Harald Benke, in this n-tv report here:
And according to Kristin Blasche of the Federal Ministry For Maritime Shipping And Hydrography:
Update / More here: http://www.neuepresse.de/Nachrichten/Magazin/Uebersicht/Ungewoehnlich-viele-tote-Schweinswale-an-Ostseekueste (No Tricks Zone)
Wind Is Not Power at All (Part I) by Kent Hawkins Based on policy pronouncements of governments, the media, and Left environmentalists, one might believe the world is about to enter the renewable energy era. In reality, however, the "new" is about a long gone era that ended before the dawn of the 20th century. Then the primary fuel was wood. Other renewables, including water and wind, were used because they were available and technologically harnessable for some very localized situations. However primitive, renewables relating to the sun's flow was the best our ancestors could do. Will there be a renaissance of this era? Perhaps there will be, but it will be in a significantly different form and dependent upon a vastly transformed world, in both technological and societal terms, which will not be achievable for many generations. The question is: are we as societies and individuals prepared to make the necessary adjustments to realize the potential opportunities, which we do not currently understand sufficiently, that this may present in the future? But this series of posts is about wind power specifically, a relic from this earlier period, which is inappropriately named, especially when applied to modern needs. Wind appears to be an electrical power source because it has some ability to generate electricity, which can be expressed as watt-hours, that is, energy. This is a term that we are fairly familiar with because it is the common measure of our use of electricity. But this is not power, which can be expressed as watts. [Read more →] (MasterResource)
California's proposed stealth tax increase on nursing home residents is an outrage It's no secret that the once golden state of California is in deep trouble. To make matters worse, its assemblymen and state senators are so incompetent that the state is currently into its third month of not having a budget. While Gov. Schwarzenegger has laid down the law on "No new taxes," it becomes a matter of semantics. What if an existing tax that exempted certain individuals will now have that exemption removed? What if the majority of those affected are on fixed incomes? The criminals in Sacramento think they can pull this off since Mr. and Mrs. Average Voter aren't old, and probably won't hear about it. This sort of thing is what we call a "stealth tax increase." Welcome to the terrible truth of the once greatest state going rapidly down the tubes. I cover this entire mess in my latest HND piece. And, just so you won't think I'm exaggerating any of this, here are a couple of links to check out: Senior Citizen Nursing Home Tax Increase Has No Place In Final Budget Deal Letter from Senators Wolk and Padilla to Gov. Schwarzenegger With apologies to 2 Samuel 1:19... Your glory, O California, lies slain upon your high places! How the mighty have fallen! Read the complete article. (Shaw's Eco-Logic)
I call "Bullshit!" Tax junk food and booze to save lives A WORLD-FIRST study has called for the introduction of a 10 per cent tax on junk food.
Excessive drinking may lead to poor brain health via obesity Prior research has shown that alcohol abuse and dependence are typically associated with higher rates of obesity, as evidenced by a high body mass index
(BMI). Findings from a new study of the relationship between BMI and regional measures of brain structure, metabolite concentrations, and cerebral blood flow
suggest that alcohol-related brain injuries may result from a complicated fusion of hazardous drinking, chronic cigarette smoking, and even elevated BMI.
[UK] 28 ¾: How Constant Age Checks are Infantilising Adults With the coalition government planning tougher penalties for under-age serving, our new report finds that 'Think 25' policies are already penalising
thousands of innocent adults.
Replacing one dogma with another? Long-term weight loss may be harmful to health HONG KONG - Long-term weight loss may release into the blood industrial pollutants linked to illnesses like diabetes, hypertension and rheumatoid arthritis,
researchers said on Tuesday.
A missing link from obesity to infertility found Obesity and infertility frequently go hand in hand. Now, researchers reporting on studies of mice in the September issue of Cell Metabolism, a Cell Press
publication, might have figured out why that is, and the results come as something of a surprise.
Dispatch: Childhood Obesity Varies By Neighborhood A large study of New York City children indicates that the incidence of childhood obesity ranges from 51 percent in Corona to 12 percent in the Upper West
Side. The study assessed more than 635,000 kindergarten through eighth grade children using "Fitnessgram" assessments -- which measure strength,
endurance, flexibility, and body mass index -- and found that obesity affects 40 percent of the city's children overall, predominantly afflicting low-income
neighborhoods.
Oh brother... Study links cholesterol, nonstick coating chemical CHICAGO - Chemicals used to make non-stick coatings on cookware and to waterproof fabrics may raise levels of cholesterol in children, U.S. researchers said
on Monday.
And you thought the object of bariatric surgery was to lose pounds: More obesity surgery 'could save millions of pounds' Millions of pounds is lost in England by the failure of the NHS to provide more obesity operations, a study says.
Satellite data reveal why migrating birds have a small window to spread bird flu In 2005 an outbreak of the H5N1 'bird flu' virus in South East Asia led to widespread fear with predictions that the intercontinental migration of wild birds could lead to global pandemic. Such fears were never realised, and now research published in the British Ecological Society's Journal of Applied Ecology reveals why the global spread of bird flu by direct migration of wildfowl is unlikely but also provides a new framework for quantifying the risk of avian-borne diseases. (EurekAlert)
Not popular with the anti-humanists: Scientists find evidence discrediting theory Amazon was virtually unlivable SAN MARTIN DE SAMIRIA, PERU - To the untrained eye, all evidence here in the heart of the Amazon signals virgin forest, untouched by man for time immemorial
- from the ubiquitous fruit palms to the cry of howler monkeys, from the air thick with mosquitoes to the unruly tangle of jungle vines.
Unusual feed supplement could ease greenhouse gassy cows Cow belches, a major source of greenhouse gases, could be decreased by an unusual feed supplement developed by a Penn State dairy scientist.
Higher Yields: The Only Farming Answer, By: Dennis T. Avery CHURCHVILLE, VA--Is the Green Movement finally ready to face the global need to triple crop yields over the next 40 years--and drop its dedication to
land-selfish organic farming? Maybe yes, and none too soon. The planet's wild biodiversity is at stake.
U.S. Won't Pass Carbon-Price Law for Power Generators This Year, Reid Says The U.S. won't pass legislation this year that charges power plants a price for releasing carbon dioxide and other gases that scientists have linked to
climate change, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid said.
A welcome White House legal rebuke to the mass climate tort.
Hope of deal in Cancun fades as rich break vow NEW DELHI: Hope of progress on a global climate deal at the year-end Cancun summit is rapidly dimming with rich countries backtracking on their commitment to provide climate funds. Finance is a key issue for rebuilding trust among developing and developed countries. (Economic Times)
Wishful thinking? Low-Carbon Market To Treble By 2020: HSBC The world's low-carbon energy market is likely to treble by 2020, HSBC analysts forecast on Monday, saying that rising concerns about resource scarcity would
support broad consensus on the threat of climate change.
[Flawed] Analysis: Nod For Australia's Labor Likely Boost For CO2 Law Australia is now much more likely to introduce a price on planet-warming carbon pollution after support by independents and Greens returned the Labor Party
to office on Tuesday.
When is Australia's Next Election?
Climate policy was an issue for the previous government, leading to a loss of trust in the previous prime minister, and was among Gillard's missteps leading up to the election. What happens next is unclear, however it looks like the Green party is ready to flex a bit of muscle by pushing out Labor's climate change minister Penny Wong. Much remains unclear. Here is how Reuters summarized the agreement on climate between Gillard and the Greens: Climate policy is the biggest area to change under the Labor-Greens agreement. Gillard has agreed to set up a new climate committee of lawmakers and experts, who will work toward a policy to price carbon pollution. That will now take precedence over Gillard's election policy of holding an assembly of 150 people, to build a community consensus for carbon trading. The agreement makes no mention of government plans for carbon trading, or the Greens' wish for an interim carbon tax.The Greens did do Gillard the favor of relegating her roundly criticized "citizens' assembly" to a historical footnote. The really important question, of course, is whether my analysis of Australia's proposed emissions reduction targets gets published before the next election occurs. I handicap the odds at less than 50-50. You can see an updated version here: Pielke, Jr., R.A., 2010 (submitted). An Evaluation of the Targets and Timetables of the Proposed Australian Emissions Trading Scheme, Environmental Science & Policy.(Roger Pielke Jr.)
Things are going well so we better panic: Climate change may add to disaster death tolls OSLO, Norway - Natural disasters are tending to kill fewer people but climate change may add to the toll by unleashing more extreme weather and causing
after-effects such as disease and malnutrition, experts say.
7. September 2010 Anke Richter of Der Spiegel has a piece on tourism at the epicentre of climate change catastrophe: the islands of Tuvalu. According to Der Spiegel, the small group of islands is milking the catastrophe scenario for all it's worth. Call it Tuvalu-gate. The tiny islands may disappear under the rising oceans in just the matter of a few decades, so it is claimed. Book now and travel to Tuvalu and see a sinking island for yourself! Catastrophe tourists are now jetting in to the Tuvalu island of Funafuti.
A paradise it is not. Groups of tourists check into the only hotel on the island. Behind its courtyard one finds rotting garbage between the stones. It reeks of raw sewage. The lukewarm shallow lagoon is littered with broken bottles and cans. Eco-tourism seems as remote as it could get. But don't bother with that. Tuvalu is raking in the money with climate catastrophe. Tuvalu even has its own Climate Change Official who telephones and organises tours, interviews, studies or projects for climate journalists and tourists. Even though no one is in danger on the islands, the PR machine needs to tell a different story, describes Der Spiegel. One main attraction for climate catastrophe tourists is beach erosion. Uprooted palm trees, bleached by the sun, lay on the coral beach like
corpses as tourists snap photos from every angle. Afafoa Irata, State Secretary in the Foreign Ministry freely admits it:
The Japanese are especially attracted to the islands. Der Spiegel writes:
As the circus takes place, the island inhabitants wonder what all the fuss is about. Focus on other real problems is non-existent. Westerners don't care at all about the rampant problems of alcohol, diabetes, violence. corruption and pollution. Der Spiegel writes:
That's the way to attract international funding. Not surprisingly, what is being conveyed to the world has nothing to do with reality. Many of the islands are in fact growing a couple of millimeters annually. The situation is the same for all the atolls. Arthur Webb is coastal specialist at the geoscientific organisation of Sopac in Fiji and says much of it has to do with decadal tidal cycles. Erosion is a natural process that has always existed. The sea takes away the beach at some places and deposits it elsewhere. Webb says;
Meanwhile, writes Der Spiegel, the Finance Minister of Tuvula has to attend a conference in Brussels to take care of some things involving the UN Global Environmental Fund, which will funnel money to the islands. How much can Tuvalu expect? The Minister says:
Catastrophe have never been so profitable. Meanwhile the next plane lands. Der Spiegel writes:
It's the little island that bilks big -- all helped along by the UN. (No Tricks Zone)
The Censorship is alive and well Celebrations among those of a sceptical persuasion about the apparent breakup of the media warmist consensus might be a little premature. Although more books and articles deviating form the orthodoxy are now appearing, there are still serious cases of concerted suppression of startling news, none more dramatic than the scandal of the NOAA satellite errors. This story, in media jargon nothing less than a sensational scoop, has appeared all over the internet but has been steadfastly ignored by the establishment media. Inevitably, in this age of clichés, it is dubbed Satellite Gate. Not only are there serious errors in the NOAA satellite data, but some of them are so grotesque that it beggars belief that they could pass through any system, automated or not. As an example, one temperature reading was so high that it would require Lake Michigan to disappear in an invisible cloud of superheated steam. As usual there was the attempt at a whitewash, which collapsed in one day. Even if the story were a complete fabrication, that fact would merit a comment in an unbiased press. This is not just one of those errors that could happen to anybody. It is a case of unforgivable gross incompetence. Many millions of dollars were spent in designing, manufacturing and launching satellites, also in building highly computerised ground stations. The worldwide costs arising from the use of those faulty data could run into many billions. To put all this into the context of known technology, your bending author and many younger colleagues were among those who laid down the principles of computer aided measurement over the last quarter of the twentieth century, starting with a book on Laboratory online computing in 1975. Here is an excerpt from a later book. Intelligent Sensor Systems (IOP, 1994, paperback 1996): ? ? Even without such elaborations it is possible to obtain some information to indicate whether the sensor is behaving correctly by, in effect, asking certain questions: Is the output a reasonable value? That is to say, is it in range? Is it consistent with the prevailing conditions and plant history? Is the rate of change of output reasonable? For example, a temperature sensor embedded in a thermal mass will have a constrained rate of response, and any more rapid changes would indicate some form of intermittency. Is the output actually changing? In an active plant one would expect small changes to be occurring continuously. If they are not it is at least worth flagging a query to central control. Is the output consistent with that of adjacent sensors? This question could be posed centrally, but it is also possible for the intelligent sensor to pick up the responses of its neighbours, thereby carrying out one of our prime requirements to relieve the central control of unnecessary calculation. ? ? Ironically, during the editing we once considered removing this passage as being too obvious. Is it not extraordinary that all these years later a group of people disposing of huge quantities of taxpayers' funds should totally neglect such elementary precautions? How could such apparent gross incompetence come about? It is not just the absence of error checking or even the grotesque nature of the errors themselves, but also the cack-handed attempt at a cover up. Or is it just this (from our essay on lying): Powerful patronage makes people over-confident. They come to believe that they are untouchable. Like the royal favourites of mediaeval times, they soar in the air on a zephyr of preferment, only to get too close to the sun and plunge to earth. Whatever it is, if the public don't know about it, no harm done. (Number Watch)
Climate Science's Troubles With The Physical World My original concern about global warming back in 2003 was quite simple: if we are experiencing climate change, where is the change? Something noticeably different, that is, such as a weather pattern consistently showing up in places where it had never or seldom been seen. Alas, I soon discovered that those questions are considered blasphemous or worse, by many people deeply and wholly convinced about the Truth of Climate Science. And in fact, there are signs that mainstream climate science is curiously uninterested with verifying what the physical world actually does: for example, check the disdain reserved for the IPCC's own Working Group II Report "Impacts, Adaptation and Vulnerability", the one that after all contains the most practical chapter of them all, "Assessment of observed changes and responses in natural and managed systems". Here's RC's take as of last January, eulogizing about the Working Group I Report "The Physical Science Basis":
How come the WG1 ?s report is superior to WG2 ?s? Because it deals with "hard data and peer-reviewed studies"
I am pretty sure most scientists of all sorts (but not climatologists, as it seems) would find it peculiar to see the physical impacts of a scientific theory relegated in the background so that people can celebrate their "relatively mature" science. And no, the belief that understanding some physical mechanisms means understanding what happens in the real world is a naive, dangerous fallacy. The same attitude surfaces at Connolley's blog. Look at the recent "case closed!" about WG1 ?s science
In comparison to that, poor WG2 ?s authors become little more than amateurs
Has any climate scientist actually read the WG2 Report? Here's one that hasn't, and forgets two thirds of it
Tellingly, not even the Aristotelian phalanxes at Skeptical Science can come up with much about "empirical evidence". What is happening here? Perhaps, the physical world is just too complex to deal with, for people used to draw their neat theories (and models). In truth, so far there still is nothing to show for climate change, and yet plenty of educated scientists are so convinced by it, nothing would ever change their mind. Hence the need to elevate "climate science" above those earthly, physical troubles, to a realm where it actually works. The realm, that is, of meta-physics ? (Maurizio Morabito, OmniClimate)
Climate Change and African Civil War 
The Cal-Berkeley press release included this quote (and the image above) from one of the authors: "We were definitely surprised that the linkages between temperature and recent conflict were so strong," said Edward Miguel, professor of economics at UC Berkeley and faculty director of UC Berkeley's Center for Evaluation for Global Action. "But the result makes sense. The large majority of the poor in most African countries depend on agriculture for their livelihoods, and their crops are quite sensitive to small changes in temperature. So when temperatures rise, the livelihoods of many in Africa suffer greatly, and the disadvantaged become more likely to take up arms."Not long after, the paper was strongly criticized in a reply also published in PNAS: [T]he proposition by Burke et al. (1) that warming may be a directly causative factor in the risk of civil war in Sub-Saharan Africa seems unlikely. . . Our greatest concern with the analysis is the characterization of the link between warming and large-scale conflict (>1,000 battle deaths). The title of the paper, "Warming Increases the Risk of Civil War in Africa," suggests causation, but the evidence presented is not substantive enough to warrant such a conclusion. Although warming may serve as a proxy for correlated variables such as decreased soil moisture and reduced agricultural production, identifying warming, or even agricultural production, as primary factors in civil war oversimplifies systems affected by many geopolitical and social factors.In their rejoinder to the reply Burke et al. appeared to back off their claims of causation: Our paper does not argue that temperature is the only--or even the primary--determinant of civil war. Further work is needed to understand how climate affects civil war, and we note this clearly in our paper.Just this week PNAS has published a new paper by Halvard Buhaug that thoroughly eviscerates Burke et al. Buhaug's conclusion is unambiguous (I do not see it at PNAS yet, but an early version is here in PDF): The simple fact is this: climate characteristics and variability are unrelated to short-term variations in civil war risk in Sub-Saharan Africa. The primary causes of civil war are political, not environmental, and although environmental conditions may change with future warming, general correlates of conflicts and wars are likely to prevail. . . The challenges imposed by future global warming are too daunting to let the debate on social effects and required countermeasures be sidetracked by atypical, nonrobust scientific findings and actors with vested interests.Burke has reacted strongly against Buhaug, accusing him of having cherry-picked his datasets (Note: Figure 2 in Buhaug is pretty convincing to me.). While climate change may not be the cause of African civil wars, it does seem to be the cause of civil wars in academia. (Roger Pielke Jr.)
Sigh... Decline in bee pollination linked to climate change: study Scientist studying wild lily finds flowers bloom earlier when bees are hibernating (Globe and Mail)
U of C scientist offers better ways to engineer Earth's climate to prevent dangerous global warming There may be better ways to engineer the planet's climate to prevent dangerous global warming than mimicking volcanoes, a University of Calgary climate
scientist says in two new studies.
From CO2 Science Volume 13 Number 36: 8 September 2010 OPEN LETTER: Editorial: Subject Index Summary: Journal Reviews: Drought on the Northern Great Plains of America: How common or uncommon is it? The Medieval and Roman Warm Periods in Southeast Italy: How do they compare with the Current Warm Period? The Mushroom Corals of Singapore: Global vs. Local Challenges: Which have been the more devastating? Woody Plants Acting as Carbon and Nitrogen Magnets: What kind of magic is this? Plant Growth Database:
Irrigation's Cooling Effects May Mask Warming--For Now If Water Runs Short, Some Regions May Suffer Significantly
There is a new paper that examines the role of urbanization on extreme temperatures (h/t to Dallas Staley). The role of landscape change on surface air temperatures is significant and illustrates one reason why the use of these temperatures as part of the construction of a multi-decadal estimate of global warming produces biases. The new article is Grossman-Clarke et al, 2010: Contribution of Land Use Changes to Near-Surface Air Temperatures during Recent Summer Extreme Heat Events in the Phoenix Metropolitan Area. J of Applied Meterology and Climatology. DOI: 10.1175/2010JAMC2362.1
One excerpt from the paper reads (Roger Pielke Sr., Climate Science)
Peter Foster: Yet another hit and run on the oil sands September 7, 2010 -- 6:54 pm Environmental scientist David Schindler may have 10 honorary degrees, but über-alarmist Maurice Strong has more The Globe and Mail unstabled its highest horse yesterday from which to pontificate on the Alberta government's response to a study by environmental scientist, alarmist and activist David Schindler. The report, released last week, suggested that development of the Alberta oilsands was poisoning the Athabasca river, and thus wildlife and people. The Globe poured scorn on "predictable responses from some in [Premier Ed] Stelmach's government." Singled out was Energy Minister Ron Liepert, whose instant reaction was that: "If you look back at the work that [Prof. Schindler] has done in the past, I'm not surprised that this was the result." The Globe thundered that: "Albertans and Canadians deserve more than innuendo directed at a distinguished scholar who has 10 honorary degrees to his name, is an officer of the Order of Canada and a recipient of the Alberta Order of Excellence, that province's highest honour. ? Rather than imply some sort of sinister agenda, Alberta needs to know the facts."
Off the Hydrocarbon Dole, Persian Gulf Countries Begin Phase Out of Energy Subsidies
In a process will almost surely take years and vary significantly from one country to the next, the hydrocarbon-rich countries of the Persian Gulf are slowly but surely moving to phase out heavily subsidized energy prices, starting at the pump. [Read More] (Andres Cala, ET)
German Wind Capacity Revisited: High Cost versus Least Cost by Donald Hertzmark My post last week evaluated the claim that wind generation can save money for power pool customers. It was found that the supposed savings could be realized only if the elephant in the room -- the above-market feed-in tariff -- was ignored. In other words, consumer payments for electricity from a power pool was half of the story; the real price had to include the consumer-qua-taxpayer funding of the feed-in-tariff (FIT). And with this two-part scheme, games are played. Wind generators can bid a low price into the pool only to receive a higher FIT, which gives them an incentive to underbid. This might reduce the pool price but not overall cost to Germans for electricity. Investing in New Generation: What Makes Sense? If a generation resource is a good investment for its developers then it must return a profit to them. In a normal electricity market this profit comes from supplying a segment of the demand (peak, intermediate/cycling, baseload) from a plant that is efficient technically and financially. For existing plants and determinations of electricity costs in the here and now we can figure out the average cost of supplying electricity by calculating the weighted average cost of supply for each time period in the market every day. If the addition of one generation source raises this weighted average without improving service quality or reliability, then it is not economical and would generally not be chosen in a well-functioning market. But what about the future? Electricity suppliers must invest large sums in new generation plants with the expectation that these plants will meet demand at the least cost. This cannot be known with certainty, and mistakes are made all the time, especially when government policy and rent-seeking drive investment choices. Transmission network operators -- those in charge of the "natural monopoly" part of the power business -- try to reduce the risk attendant to future supply by figuring out the least costly way to supply power and energy to their customers in the future, including the wires to transmit the electricity. They have to take account of a long list of considerations: investment cost, fuel supply, emissions and licensing regulation, proximity to existing load centers and transmission nodes, transmission congestion -- you get the idea. The transmission system operator also has to pay attention to public policy -- renewable energy mandates ("portfolio standards"), federal tax incentives (producer tax credits for wind and solar), feed-in tariffs, powerful politicians who do not want their vistas impaired -- in a host of ways that directly impact their views of an optimal future generating system. What Does the Wise Transmission Operator Do? A wise investor in generation will first figure out what is economic to build? what are the physical constraints on the system? and finally, what limitations will public policy put on otherwise least cost generation choices? A Case Study of "Germania"[i] Let us imagine that we have a rather large and wealthy country to play with, one that currently has about 129 GW of installed generation capacity. Further, we can imagine that this wealthy country, responding to its powerful environmental movement, has decided to
[Read more →] (MasterResource)
France Needs More Cuts to Solar Power Subsidies, Government Study Says France needs to revise targets for solar energy and further cut subsidies to curb costs to consumers that may balloon to 54 billion euros ($70 billion) by
2020, according to a government report.
XRF Testing Is Disavowed By The Federal Interagency Task Force On Problem Drywall An earlier posting covered findings from the Consumer Product Safety Commission, published in May, 2010, that blew the doors off the "science" of X-Ray fluorescence spectroscopy screening of corrosive or tainted (often referred to as "Chinese") drywall. XRF testing of the drywall is based on the now completely discredited notion that high strontium levels are indicative of tainted drywall. This contention was never supported by any real science, and was merely based on certain observations. I and many others had objected to this sort of voodoo, and repeatedly challenged proponents to at least proffer a theory as to why strontium should be related to tainted drywall. No such theory was ever proposed. Finally, tests were done by famed Lawrence Berkeley Labs which conclusively demonstrated that there is no correlation between strontium levels and the amount of corrosive gas that is emitted from tainted drywall. As stated, this data was released last May. Unfortunately, this was not enough to stop the promoters of XRF home testing, who are charging high fees to give useless reports to hapless and scared homeowners. So, on August 27, the new Interagency Task force--comprised of CPSC, HUD, EPA, and the CDC--released a more aggressive statement on the matter:
It is worth noting that the Court in the major federal case on tainted drywall IN RE CHINESE MANUFACTURED DRYWALL PRODUCTS LIABILITY LITIGATION, relating to Germano, et al v. Taishan Gypsum Co, Ltd, et al found in February, 2010 that:
So, let's summarize here...
It can't be any clearer than this. When it comes to XRF for Chinese drywall, put a fork in it, it's done. Therefore, run--do not walk--from anyone who wants to inspect your house using XRF. The only reliable method at the moment is non-destructive evaluation, whereby the effects of the tainted drywall are observed and evaluated. (Shaw's Eco-Logic)
Source: SPPI by Dennis Ambler After discussing how to detect pathological science, Goodstein presents a set of 15 precepts on how science works, including the charge that scientists must "bend over backwards" to report any way in which they might be wrong. He then succinctly describes our scientific "reward system" -- a mechanism for promoting star performers that is closely linked to the scientific "authority structure". Goodstein defines this structure as an 11-step ladder that starts with being admitted to a prestigious college and culminates in prizes such as named professorships, membership in the National Academy and a Nobel prize. Read the rest of this entry »
Cockroaches could help fight deadly infections, say UK scientists COCKROACHES could be more of a health benefit than a health hazard, as their brains contain powerful antibiotic properties which could lead to new treatments
against superbugs.
Dubious claim: Coles supermarkets upset with cows implanted with hormone growth pill TOUGHER beef is routinely dished up at dinner tables because cattle are being pumped with hormones, supermarket giant Coles says.
Here's Landrigan again: Dental sealants temporarily raise BPA levels A new study shows that dental sealants used to treat and prevent cavities may expose children to an estrogen-like chemical called BPA.
HGWA: In Feast of Data on BPA Plastic, No Final Answer The research has been going on for more than 10 years. Studies number in the hundreds. Millions of dollars have been spent. But government health officials
still cannot decide whether the chemical bisphenol-A, or BPA, a component of some plastics, is safe. The substance lines most food and drink cans, and is used
to make hard, clear plastic bottles, containers and countless other products. Nearly everyone is exposed to it.
Written by Robert Ferguson The scientific literature fails to support the hypothesis that the trace amount of naturally occurring mercury in the fish we eat in any way endangers or threatens health, especially that of expectant mothers and their babies. Exactly the opposite is true: those alarming people away from fish pose the real danger to public health. Read more... (SPPI)
The UN? Right.... Anti-corruption academy with UN and EU sponsoring opens in Austria An anti-corruption academy co-sponsored by the United Nations opened Thursday in Austria with the aim of filling the rising global need for training, research and contemporary measures and techniques in the fight against corruption. (MercoPress)
Another step toward world governance Source: SPPI by Dennis Ambler Click here: Anti-corruption academy with UN and EU sponsoring opens in Austria -- MercoPress More global governance, bit by bit ?. The International Anti-Corruption Academy (IACA), based in Laxenburg, will educate public and private sector anti-corruption practitioners in more effectively implementing the UN Convention against Corruption (UNCAC). Read the rest of this entry » (SPPI)
UN calls for the collective global protection of oceans Highlighting the centrality of the marine environment to human well-being, Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon stressed the collective global responsibility to
protect the world's oceans.
September 3, 2010 -- 6:29 pm Time to put the tired salmon farming debate behind us Ruth Salmon For years, environmental activists have done their best to scare Canadians into thinking fish farms would "decimate" wild salmon stocks. Savvy campaigns have employed a range of media stunts, such as dumping farmed fish at the door of an aquaculture company, marching to the legislature en-masse, hassling customers in front of retailers wearing salmon costumes ? you get the picture. The campaign has been effective from a PR perspective, but what about the dire predictions? Has the foreboding prophecy that sea lice from salmon farms would wipe out entire runs of wild salmon come true?
Hmm... Where Dams Once Stood, Prospectors Spur Anger GOLD HILL, Ore. -- When four dams on the Rogue River here were scheduled for removal, environmentalists predicted many benefits: more salmon and steelhead
swimming upriver to spawn; more gravel carried downriver to replenish the riverbed; more rafters bobbing along 57 miles of newly opened water.
Uh-huh... Prince Charles embarks on lavish train trip to spread green message Eight carriages for a core party of 14 people to preach a message of sustainability on week-long tour of Britain (Guardian)
The environmental movement in retreat The collapsing crusade for legislation to combat climate change raises a question: Has ever a political movement made so little of so many advantages? Its implosion has continued since "the Cluster of Copenhagen, when world leaders assembled for the single most unproductive and chaotic global gathering ever held." So says Walter Russell Mead, who has an explanation: Bambi became Godzilla. (George F. Will, WaPo)
Figures... Los Angeles school named after Al Gore He's the first vice president to have an L.A. school named after him, sharing the honor with author Rachel Carson. Fittingly, the campus will be devoted to
environmental themes. But there's a catch.
Why We Blink In Face Of Eco-Terror Extremism: An environmental activist inspired by Al Gore's "An Inconvenient Truth" takes hostages at the Discovery Channel headquarters. This isn't
the latest example of eco-terrorism, just the latest to be ignored.
Greenpeace Violence Is Escalating: "The Lines Are Drawn" 3. September 2010 Greenpeace is known for breaking the law, trespassing, putting other people at risk, and chaining its members to drilling platforms to protest and, more importantly, to reap the capital of publicity. That's one thing -- but it's quite another to recruit, psychologically manipulate, and exploit a child for the purpose waging psychological war on people who have different opinions. Greenpeace is ratcheting up the level of violence. (No Tricks Zone)
UK Telegraph: Greenpeace Is Turning People Off  Greenpeace has become a bad spirit
for the Inuit
5. September 2010 Award-winning Daniel Hannan, a conservative MEP of East England, has written a critical piece of Greenpeace called: Greenland to Greenpeace: your hunger for publicity is putting our lives at risk. h/t: R. de Haan Readers may have noticed I've been focused on Greenpeace over the last week or so. The once peaceful organisation, which used to be concerned with real environmental issues, has long since turned into a militant, intolerant, greedy and increasingly violent group that is bent on forcing others to submit to their will. So I'm pleased when people like Hannan bring it up. (No Tricks Zone)
Gasp! If you don't increase productivity to feed the world you must increase... acreage! Most new farmland comes from cutting tropical forest, says Stanford researcher A new study led by a Stanford researcher shows that more than 80 percent of the new farmland created in the tropics between 1980 and 2000 came from felling forests, which sends carbon into the atmosphere and drives global warming. But the research team also noted that big agribusiness has largely replaced small farmers in doing most of the tree cutting in Brazil and Indonesia, which may make it easier to rein in the trend. (Stanford Report)
U.N. Raises Concerns as Global Food Prices Jump UNITED NATIONS -- With memories still fresh of food riots set off by spiking prices just two years ago, agricultural experts on Friday cast a wary eye on the
steep rise in the cost of wheat prompted by a Russian export ban and the questions looming over harvests in other parts of the world because of drought or
flooding.
Rampaging wild boar draw pleas for military response They are laying waste to crops in record numbers and their snouts are seriously damaging the autumn harvest. But soon the rampaging wild boar that have been causing havoc in rural areas of Germany could be gunned down by army marksmen, if farmers get their way. (Independent)
Diverse Water Sources Key To Food Security: Report Increasingly erratic rainfall patterns related to climate change pose a major threat to food security and economic growth, water experts said on Monday,
arguing for greater investment in water storage.
Matt Ridley picks up on Stephen Budiansky's posting on locavores - those who would have us buy our food from farmers' markets and local producers. In particular, he notes Budiansky's comment:
If this is right, then could it be that microwave meals are actually the green option? Wouldn't that represent a dilemma for the chattering classes? (Bishop Hill)
Moonbat learns (a little): I was wrong about veganism. Let them eat meat -- but farm it properly The ethical case against eating animal produce once seemed clear. But a new book is an abattoir for dodgy arguments (George Monbiot, Guardian)
From the realm of the trumped up crisis: Meat back on menu for animal feed 20 years after BSE crisis Meat could once again be fed to animals under plans to relax rules introduced to prevent the transmission of BSE more than 20 years after the emergence of
"mad cow disease" caused a public health and political crisis.
Why your sustainable fish may not be as guilt-free as you think Since its establishment more than a decade ago, the reputation of the Marine Stewardship Council (MSC) has been as spotless as the consciences of shoppers
who buy fish bearing its blue "tick" logo in the expectation it has been sustainably caught. Until now.
Fast growing salmon cleared as fit for human consumption in US A genetically modified salmon which grows twice as fast as normal is completely safe for human consumption and poses little risk to the environment according
to the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA). The regulatory body's verdict paves the way for GM animals to be produced commercially for food for the first
time.
Now that's a hardy perennial - East Arnhem Land plant clones itself It might be the loneliest plant on the planet.
Altered Movie Poster Puts the Spotlight on a San Francisco Agency's Gun Ban SAN FRANCISCO -- A recent Supreme Court decision could alter what public transit riders here see in advertisements on city buses and trains and in transit
shelters.
Milloy: W.Va.: Beware of Greens bearing gifts Carbon capture and storage is a very bad bargain
Judge in Virginia 'Global Warming' Investigation Blocks Inquiry Into ?His Wife's Former Employer As you can read here, retired Albemarle County (Virginia) Circuit Judge Paul Peatross has ruled that Virginia Attorney General Ken Cuccinelli may not have access to records under Virginia's Fraud Against Taxpayers Act, as he seeks to determine the propriety of Michael "Hockey Stick" Mann's claims made to obtain research funding. Judge Peatross's ruling protects Mann, the University, and specifically the Department of Environmental Sciences, at least for now. (Christopher C. Horner, Big Government)
U.S. Reiterates Commitment To 2020 Climate Goal The United States reiterated on Friday that it was committed to cutting greenhouse gas emissions by 2020 even though the Senate has failed to pass
legislation.
Hamilton rages on, Monckton replies
The Australian newspaper: MP's obligation is to the planet Hamilton was trying to guilt trip and intimidate the independent parliamentarians in Australia (who will probably announce their decision tomorrow about who will form government). Almost everything he says is based on a bluff.
Can't one journalist just ask Hamilton to name the scientific paper that we "deniers" deny? Something that shows carbon dioxide has a major effect on our climate (ie. more than 1.2 degrees?) [See this post for more info on the kind of paper that Clive can't name.]
Hamilton's target is Tony Abbott (leader of the opposition), but Hamilton can't really do the character assassination attempt on Abbott, so he goes for the assassination-by-association, and derides Abbott for even meeting a skeptic. Imagine the sin. Tony Abbott actually was in the same room as Christopher Monckton. More » (Jo Nova)
It is and always ahs been about wealth redistribution and that is why it will always fail: Progress Seen On "Green Fund" For Climate Deal Almost 50 nations made progress on Friday toward a "Green Fund" to help poor countries fight global warming but hosts Mexico and Switzerland said a
full U.N. climate treaty was out of reach for 2010.
A cunning bid to shore up the ruins of the IPCC The Inter-Academy report into the IPCC, led by Rajendra Pachauri, tiptoes around a mighty elephant in the room, argues Christopher Booker. (TDT)
Some people think early editions of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) report were scrupulously science-based, but that the process became more politicized in recent years. A look at the first appearance of the health chapter -- in the 1995 edition -- challenges this view. [29-page PDF of the chapter] (No Consensus)
Climate Change and Precipitation -- Another IPCC And Climate Science Failure Farming looks mighty easy when your plow is a pencil, and you're a thousand miles from the corn field. Dwight D. Eisenhower.
Pachauri admits the IPCC just guesses the numbers
Such is the pressure finally beginning to bear on the IPCC that Pachauri has been forced into the ridiculous position of trying to rescue credibility by contradicting most of their past PR campaign. He's taken the extraordinary step of admitting they don't have hard numbers, hey, but it's all OK because the IPCC is really a government agency to make policy, not to write scientific reports "that don't see the light of day". So he's admitting that the IPCC was all about policy prescriptions all along? And the science was just fudged-up window dressing to provide an excuse? Well, who would have guessed. Hidden beside Pachauri's declaration that he's happy about the IAC report, he let slip a corker of a line: Times of India asks: Anything in the UN probe report you completely or partly disagree with?
So if you can't quantify uncertainties (like is climate sensitivity say 0.5 degrees or 6.5 degrees, and with what probabilities) just go with your best guess, call it expert opinion (especially if you only pick and pay the "right" experts) and say that there is a 90% certainty, even if there are no numbers you can add up to get that. More » (Jo Nova)
Nice work, Sherlock! What tipped you off? New climate change mitigation schemes could benefit elites rather than the rural poor A key event in the run-up to the UN Climate Change Conference stresses role of improved forest governance in determining whether REDD+ will flounder or
flourish
Kyoto is costing Russia too much There has never been a consensus that man is to blame for global warming among the experts at the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change
<chuckle> Openness urged on UK's emissions The UK government's chief environment scientist has called for more openness in admitting Britain's apparent cuts in greenhouse gases are an illusion.
Oh good grief! A carbon border tax can curb climate change As global growth picks up after the economic crisis, carbon emissions are going back up too. With China and India back on track to double their gross
domestic product every decade, and with coal providing nearly 30 per cent of global energy, the chances of stabilising and reducing emissions are low. Indeed,
little progress has been made in the last two decades. Only recessions lower emissions -- and then only for a short time.
Oh my... Google and Galaxy zoo could aid global climate project Climate scientists meeting in Britain this week hope to build a database to predict natural disasters precisely. And records of the voyages of the Bounty and Beagle will assist them in their task (Robin McKie, The Observer)
The Grief Lectures 2010 -- Part Three August 31st, 2010 by Ben Pile In the previous two posts, I looked at the first lectures by Royal Society president, Martin Rees. This post relates to his third of four lectures, 'What We'll Never Know'. Lighter on the doom, it is a less dark story than
the previous lectures. Indeed, Rees makes little mention of the climate.
Huh? Amazon May Be Headed For Another Bad Drought Drought has cut Peru's Amazon River to its lowest level in 40 years and it is already below the minimum set in 2005, when a devastating dry spell damaged
vast swaths of South American rainforest in the worst drought in decades.
Politically incorrect: Global warming's silver lining: Northern countries will thrive, grow As global pressures mount, the New North is well-positioned to prosper economically in the 21st century, UCLA author says
Hah, even Nature has noticed: Climate change not linked to African wars Claims that global warming can drive civil unrest are hotly disputed.
I have been interviewed by Hans von Storch for the August issue of the Atmospheric Sciences Section of the AGU Newsletter. The interview is reproduced below. Comments that have been made on the interview can be read on Hans's weblog Die Klimazwiebel. (Roger Pileke Sr., Climate Science)
Further Information On My Interview For The Atmospheric Science Section Of The AGU Newsletter I posted my interview There was a disclaimer that was added which I did not include in the above post. It was required by the AGU editors in specific response to my interview. The disclaimer reads (see at the end of the interview)
I see nothing wrong with this disclaimer, but it should be included with ALL interviews. (Roger Pielke Sr., Cliamte Science)
There is a weblog called "Skeptical Science -- Getting Skeptical About Global Warming Skepticism" that has a misleading post on ocean heat content titled Ocean cooling: skeptic arguments drowned by data The post starts with
The post starts by mislabeling me as a "climate change sceptic" and a "denialist". Not only is this completely incorrect (as can be easily confirmed by reading our article Pielke Sr., R., K. Beven, G. Brasseur, J. Calvert, M. Chahine, R. Dickerson, D. Entekhabi, E. Foufoula-Georgiou, H. Gupta, V. Gupta, W. Krajewski, E. Philip Krider, W. K.M. Lau, J. McDonnell, W. Rossow, J. Schaake, J. Smith, S. Sorooshian, and E. Wood, 2009: Climate change: The need to consider human forcings besides greenhouse gases. Eos, Vol. 90, No. 45, 10 November 2009, 413. Copyright (2009) American Geophysical Union), but it sets the tone of their post as an ad hominem attack, rather than a discussion of the issue. The author of this post documents in the figures that they present, that upper ocean heat, in terms of its annual average, did not accumulate during the period ~2004 through 2009. This means that global warming halted on this time period. There is no other way to spin this data. The claim in the post (apparently written by Graham Wayne) Does ocean cooling prove global warming has ended? that
is false (unless the author of this post has new data since 2009 which may show warming). The recent lack of warming (the data do not support a cooling, despite what the Skeptical Science weblog reports) does not prove or disprove whether global warming over a longer term has ended. However, the ocean heat content provides the most appropriate metric to diagnosis global warming in recent (since ~2004 when the Argo network became sufficiently dense) and upcoming years, as recommended, of example, in Pielke Sr., R.A., 2008: A broader view of the role of humans in the climate system. Physics Today, 61, Vol. 11, 54-55. The author of the post on Skeptical Science continues to present misinformation in their Intermediate level post where it is stated
This is an erroneous statement. There was not continued warming for the time period 2004 to 2009, as confirmed by Josh Willis in Pielke Sr., R.A., 2008: A broader view of the role of humans in the climate system. Physics Today, 61, Vol. 11, 54-55. Recently, Josh Willis reported that an updated analysis will be available this Fall. What the Skeptical Science fails to recognize is that with respect to the diagnosis of global warming using Joules of heat accumulation in the oceans, snapshots of heat content at different times are all that is needed. There is no time lag in heating or cooling. The Joules are either there or they are not. The assessment of a long-term linear trend is not needed. For example, if the ocean lost its heat in one or two years (such as from a major volcanic eruption), the global warming "clock" would be reset. The Skeptical Science statements that
illustrates their lack of understanding of the physics. If ocean cooling does occur, it DOES mean global warming as stopped during that time period. What would be useful is for the weblog Skeptical Science authors to discuss the value of using (and issues with using) the accumulation of Joules in the climate system as the primary metric to monitor global warming. (Roger Pielke Sr., Climate Science)
You can only fool some of the people most of the time: As much as 90 per cent of airline passengers decline to pay for carbon offsets CHEAP fares outrank climate change concerns when it comes to flying in Australia
New Study Says Cash for Clunkers Was ? a Clunker
The White House hailed last year's "cash for clunkers" program as a successful government initiative that stimulated the economy, particularly the ailing auto industry. It provided $3,500--$4,500 rebates to consumers who purchase more fuel efficient cars and trade in their old vehicles, which dealerships then destroyed. President Obama's economic team said cash for clunkers lured consumers who would have bought a new car two to three years in the future into the immediate market. However, a new study from economists Amir Sufi of the University of Chicago and Atif Mian of University of California-Berkeley suggests otherwise. According to NPR: Continue reading... (The Foundry)
BP Says Limits on Drilling Imperil Spill Payouts BP is warning Congress that if lawmakers pass legislation that bars the company from getting new offshore drilling permits, it may not have the money to pay
for all the damages caused by its oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico.
Interior Chief Salazar Voices Doubt On Arctic Drilling Interior Secretary Ken Salazar said on Friday he cannot predict whether Royal Dutch Shell, which has invested $3.5 billion in an offshore Arctic
oil-development program, will be allowed to drill the five wells it plans next year in Alaska's Chukchi and Beaufort Seas.
In December 2008, a gigantic storage pond belonging to the Tennessee Valley Authority near Kingston, Tenn., effectively burst at the seams, spilling a
billion gallons of mainly toxic coal ash from a T.V.A. power plant into surrounding lands and rivers.
Wind Falters while Nuclear Surges
Despite growing evidence that the global warming scare was just the latest in a long string of pseudo-science based overreactions, politicians and activists have charted a course of diminishing CO 2 emissions for the foreseeable future. But the favorite choices of renewable energy advocates, solar and wind, have fallen on hard times. Recently, activists enlisted the aid of Senator Dianne Feinstein in blocking the development of industrial scale concentrating solar plants in the California desert. This is just the latest action to block alternate energy development, on a scale where it could make a meaningful contribution to the world's energy needs, be it wind, solar or geothermal. Because of several adverse trends, some of the countries that have pushed wind most aggressively may be approaching a saturation point where further turbine investment would be counter-productive. Even though wind meets 20% of electricity demand in Denmark, 14% in Spain and Portugal, and 8% in Germany, wind power expansion has stalled. Problems with variability and concernes over damage to birds and bats have dampened the public's enthusiasm for this most mature of alternative energy sources. From Austrailia to Scotland, and from Main to California people in increasing numbers are opposing wind power development. And as the public support has waned, the wind industry has suffered.  The Burbo Bank Offshore Wind Farm in Liverpool Bay, England . Christopher Furlong / Getty. On August 18, after a second straight quarterly loss, the top Danish wind manufacturer Vestas saw the value of its shares drop 20%. While wind currently provides about 2.5% of electricity in the United States, leaving room for significant growth, things are not looking good in the world's largest wind power market. In fact, according to Bill Sweet in an online IEEE article, "After Soaring, Wind Glides," the outlook in the US is decidedly gloomy:
More bad news comes from the independent business intelligence service Wind Energy Update. The WEU's Wind Energy Operations & Maintenance Report found that current operation and maintenance (O&M) costs are two or three times higher than first projected and that there has been a 21% decrease in return on investments from wind farms. O&M costs were found to be especially high in the United States. The report states that while close to 80% of the world's wind turbines are still under warranty, "this is about to change." Ongoing wind turbine development is focusing on gearbox reliability: "Many gearboxes, designed for a 20-year life, are failing after six to eight years of operation." The US Department of Energy (DOE) registered a rather sharp increase in "wind curtailments" during 2009. A curtailment is an order to generators to stop feeding energy into the grid. They can happen because demand is low or transmission lines can't handle the load. Regardless of the cause, US wind capacity factor--a measure of the time a wind generator is producing at its maximum possible rate--dropped to 30% from 34% the previous year. This means in effect that for every watt of coal, gas, or nuclear capacity installed, about three times as much wind capacity has to be built to deliver equivalent output over time. Enter the nuclear renaissance. In a thoughtful article in the August 13, 2010, issue of Science, Robin W. Grimes and William J. Nuttall identify the questions that must be answered for the new nuclear renaissance to succeed. They see the coming nuclear rebirth as a two-stage process: replacing or extending the life of existing nuclear power plants in the short term, and a large-scale second period of construction after 2030. They identify the key major problems to be overcome this way:
While Grimes and Nuttall are strongly motivated by nuclear energy's ability to reduce human CO 2 emissions, plugging the looming energy gap should be motivation enough. They present a possible two-stage nuclear renaissance for the United Kingdom in the graphic below (Grimes is at the Centre for Nuclear Engineering, Imperial College London, and Nuttall the Engineering Department, Cambridge University).  Steps to develop the first wave are already underway, allowing the United Kingdom to "replace nuclear with nuclear." The second wave would allow nuclear energy to play a major role in electricity "decarbonization." For most nations, the most immediate challenges are nuclear life extension and how best to renew existing nuclear generation infrastructure. Such steps do little to meet future need, but they can preserve diversity of fuel sources and technology in the electricity generation mix. To realize the second phase of the nuclear renaissance, new reactor designs will be needed to take power plant design beyond the current Generation III plants. Among the new Generation IV plant designs are pebble bed reactors, the Toshiba 4S (the four S's in the name stand for super, safe, small, and simple), and the TerraPower TP-1 , a reactor that can run for decades by producing a nuclear reaction wave that breeds and burns its own fuel. Other possibilities include small modular reactors, a favorite of Secretary Chu, such as the small light-water reactor from NuScale and the Hyperion Power Module. The Hyperion design is interesting because they had been developing a revolutionary, inherently safe sealed small reactor. The Hydrogen Moderated Self-Regulating Nuclear Power Module (HPM), also referred to as the Compact Self-regulating Transportable Reactor (ComStar), is a new type of nuclear reactor originally developed at the Los Alamos National Laboratory. It uses uranium hydride as both its nuclear fuel and neutron moderator. However, in 2009, Hyperion Power Generation decided to use a different lead-cooled fast reactor design for its power module, based on uranium nitride, citing the long development and regulatory licensing process for the uranium hydride reactor design. Once again, government red tape at the DOE has stifled needed innovation. If the Obama administration wants to prove that they really have a future energy vision the President needs to clear out the ossified bureaucracy at the DOE.  The revised Hyperion Power Module design. Because intermittent energy sources like wind and solar have by nature much lower capacity factors than baseload coal, gas, and nuclear, their maximum contribution to power generation is limited to around 20%. As Denmark and other European nations have discovered, without the steady baseload power of Scandinavian hydroelectric generators and French nuclear power plants, the wind just doesn't provide what the public demands--stable, reliable electricity.
In 2008, the US DOE reported that wind could in principle supply 20% of America's electricity by 2030. In and EnergyBiz interview, Spanish wind power giant Iberdrola's Renewables executive Don Furman answered that projection succinctly: "Certainly not in the next 20 years." The question that seldom gets asked is, what happens after we get to 20 percent? Hopefully, the nuclear renaissance will have rendered that question moot before an answer is neaded. Be safe, enjoy the interglacial and stay skeptical. (Doug L. Hoffman, The Resilient Earth)
Merkel Confident On Nuclear Plan Despite Opposition German Chancellor Angela Merkel said she was confident a law extending the lives of nuclear power reactors could be passed without backing from the upper
house of parliament, setting up a clash with opposition parties.
Mafia mobsters go green to get their dirty hands on wind farm grants TRAPANI, Sicily: Rising above the sun-scorched countryside, looking out over hilltop villages and vineyards, Italy's wind farms - promising a clean, green
future - have acquired a dirtier whiff. They are the latest industry to be infiltrated by the country's mobsters.
Remembering When Enron Saved the U.S. Wind Industry (Best of MasterResource)
January 7, 1997, some 13 years ago, was one of the worst days in my 16-year career at Enron. Enron had already entered into the solar business (1994) in partnership with Amoco (Solarex), and the U.S. wind industry was on its back. Zond Corporation was struggling, and rival Kenetech had recently suspended its dividend and was on the way to bankruptcy. Enron bought Zond on this day and renamed it Enron Wind Company. Enron Wind would never turn a profit, and it would be sold in May 2002 by the bankrupt parent to GE. (GE and Enron would have other ominous parallels.) Enron came in at just the right time for a troubled, undeserving industry by
Regarding the third point, the Texas mandate created an unholy business-government alliance of sufficient size for the state to increase its renewable mandate in 2005. Texas is the leading wind power state in the country--but hardly by consumer choice. [Read more →] (MasterResource)
Germany: Wind and the Power Pool Savings Myth by Donald Hertzmark Germany is a country that has been a leader in many aspects of "clean" energy development during the past decade. They were among the leaders in establishing pricing mechanisms for wind and solar, phasing out nuclear power and granting incentives to biomass energy producers. Germany has the highest proportion of wind in its generation mix, now around 20%, but is no longer the absolute installed capacity leader behind the U.S. and China. With a vast investment in above-market generation resources some in Germany are channeling "Mad Man Muntz" of early US television history -- "lose money on every sale but make it up with the volume." It did not work for Muntz TV and it will not work for Germany. A New Fairy Tale, Starring Wind Energy Generators Lately, a story has gone round with the following general points:
In other words, even though wind generators are more expensive to build and require above-market prices to sustain, somehow they are able to reduce prices across the power pool. This would certainly be a neat trick if someone could do it. [Read more →] (MasterResource)
Energy Conservation and Future Energy Demand
The electricity industry is wrestling with how to restructure its business model to account for efforts to convince consumers to reduce their energy use while being paid for promoting this efficiency. Historically, utilities have experienced demand growth with the annual pace of growth dictated by the health of the economy. [Read More] (Allen Brooks, ET)
Simpson is right on agent orange White House fiscal commission member Sen. Alan Simpson is drawing fire from veterans groups for objecting to the Obama administration decision to expand
Agent Orange benefits to Vietnam vets. Simpson is right and the vets wrong.
Guest Blogger: Rep. Peter Roskam (R-IL) on Obamacare
If at first you don't succeed, change the message. That's the lesson learned when it comes to the new trillion dollar health law passed this spring. One of the central advocacy groups who pushed for the Obamacare recently held a confidential "messaging" conference call with the progressive movement where they revealed the results of extensive polling on the new law. Remember when the left was confident their controversial health care vote would soon be cheered by the public? The thinking was that Jane and John Doe simply needed more time to understand the two and half thousand page bill, because the year-long health care debate wasn't enough time for them to get a grasp on it. The left might not want to hold their breath while waiting for the public to applaud their bill. That's because the people know this bill better than progressives do. In fact, just yesterday the Kaiser Health Tracking Poll reported that favorability of the bill dropped to 43% in August. The professional left has now realized this and thus the reason for the advocacy group's hush-hush "messaging" call. Continue reading... (The Foundry)
As November approaches, Obamacare's defenders are quite plainly desperate. They see public opinion solidly against them, and a devastating election fast approaching. Their latest gambit to protect what was jammed through Congress in March is to claim that repeal would be so costly to the federal budget that it would be impossible to pass, even with overwhelming popular support. That's the spin some on the left put on a recent letter from the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) to Sen. Mike Crapo (R-ID). But unfortunately for these advocates, that's not what the CBO letter says. CBO's message to Senator Crapo actually just states what is already obvious: If an effort were made to repeal just the Medicare cuts in the new law, it would, on paper, increase Medicare spending, and thus the federal budget deficit, by about $450 billion over ten years. Moreover, enacting a real "doc fix" to avoid deep and unrealistic cuts in Medicare physician fees will cost another $300 billion or so over the coming decade. Continue reading... (The Foundry)
Overlawyered: Fearing lawsuits over injuries, a West Virginia county is removing swing sets from elementary schools. A minor, local issue? No. America's litigious society has changed the way kids play. (IBD)
A new study from the Center for Interdisciplinary Chronobiological Research at the University of Haifa has found an additional link between Light At Night (LAN) and cancer. This research joins a series of earlier studies carried out at the University of Haifa that also established the correlation. "High power light bulbs contribute more to 'environmental light pollution', which the study has shown is a carcinogenic pollution," notes Prof. Abraham Haim, who headed the study. (University of Haifa)
That's the way the cookie crumbles One reason dieting does not work
Many Americans Don't Even Know They're Fat Harris Interactive/HealthDay poll finds 30 percent of those overweight think they're normal size
From Spiegel? Now you know it's really bad: Obama's Misguided Approach America Has Become Too European A Commentary by Thomas Straubhaar
A Steady, Steep Decline for The Lowly, Uncharismatic Eel The freshwater eel, which spawns in the middle of the ocean, was once abundant in much of the world. But the proliferation of dams, coastal development, and overfishing have drastically reduced eel populations, with few defenders coming to the aid of these fascinating -- though still not fully understood -- creatures. (James Prosek, e360)
Discovery Gunman: The Green Frankenstein The radical green movement is rapidly trying to distance itself from Discovery Channel gunman James J. Lee. That will be difficult to do. Wednesday afternoon, an armed Lee walked into the offices of the Discovery Channel, took hostages and demanded that the TV network alter its programming to suit his demands as laid out in an 11-point manifesto. The incident ended when police shot him dead. Lee called for saving the Earth by getting rid of people, whom he referred to as "filth," and stopping global warming. He called for TV programs encouraging human sterilization and infertility, and exposing civilization's "disgusting religious-cultural roots and greed." "All human procreation and farming must cease," he raved, because "the planet does not need humans." Curious to see how the greens would react to the incident, I visited the Grist.org web site, perhaps the most popular green website, where I found an article by Grist senior editor Lisa Hymas entitled, "Discovery hostage taker is a population-obsessed eco-wacko.". I read on as I had never seen one green refer to another as an "eco-wacko." Although Hymas wrote that, "Lee is giving us sane and humane enviros and childfree people a bad name," her effort to distance her cause from Lee was soon challenged. The first comment following her post stated, "So, what is wrong with [Lee's] logic that he deserved to be shot? He wasn't wrong." Two comments later, a commenter stated, "I pretty much agree with what he said ? In reality, at this point, the human race is like a growing fungus covering and consuming a grapefruit ?" Like Dr., Frankenstein tying to escape the reputational stain of his eponymous monster, the radical green movement cannot runaway so easily from Lee. While Lee clearly popped his cork, the comments to Hymas' article indicate there are apparently others out there whose corks are under similar pressure -- thanks to green publications like Grist and green personalities like Al Gore, whose movie, "An Inconvenient Truth," Lee reportedly credited for "awakening" him to global warming. Gore, Grist.org and others have urged their followers to civil disobedience. Grist staff write Jonathan Hiskes says he's all for the easy stuff first (like weatherization and energy efficiency), but if that doesn't work, Hiskes calls for civil disobedience and ensuing prison, if need be. Ironically, Lee tried civil disobedience with the Discovery Channel in 2008 and wound up in prison. His probation from that incident ended just two weeks ago. Greens have tried using civil disobedience (even if it involves criminal trespass) to shut down coal mining, coal-fired power plants and gas stations. None of these efforts have succeeded. So what's next when civil disobedience fails? More James Lees? Some greens have already leap-frogged over civil disobedience and moved straight into terrorism. In the wake of fire bombings at new housing developments, car dealerships and a ski lodge, the FBI has labeled the Earth Liberation front as a domestic terrorist group. Then there's sawmill worker George Alexander who was almost decapitated in 1987 when his saw blade hit a tree spike embedded by the California chapter of Earth First! The greens would also like to harness the power of the state to do violence to their opponents. About so-called global warming "deniers," Grist writer Dave Roberts wrote in 2006, "we should have war crimes trials for these bastards -- some sort of climate Nuremberg." It's true that James Lee was a psycho, but he was just taking radical environmentalism to its logical conclusion. People threaten planet and, if they won't stop voluntarily, then they must be made to stop. Lee believed that because he steeped himself in today's radical environmental movement. (Green Hell)
Eco-terrorism hits Maryland: 'Inconvenient Terrorist' latest in long line Inconvenient terrorist James Lee who was shot and killed by a SWAT team in the Discovery Channel Building in Silver Spring, Maryland, is the latest of a long line of eco-terrorists (Bonner Cohen, CFACT)
How Malthus drove the Discovery Channel gunman crazy The greatest pessimist in economic history has been wrong for 200 years, but he's still freaking people out (Salon)
Get ready for a world of nanotechnology If the biggest technological leap since the Industrial Revolution is to benefit us all, governments and educators have work to do (Guardian)
EPA To Issue More Rules In Climate Fight The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency will roll out more regulations on greenhouse gases and other pollution to help fight climate change, but they will
not be as strong as action by Congress, a senior administration official said.
Greenhouse Protection Racket -- An Update by Marlo Lewis Last week, the Obama Administration filed a brief on behalf of industry petitioners urging the Supreme Court to vacate an appeals court decision (State of Connecticut et al. v. American Electric Power et al.) that would allow States and private parties to sue coal-burning electric utilities for their alleged contribution to global warming-related "injuries." The brief clearly lays out the absurdities of attempting to regulate greenhouse gases via common-law public nuisance litigation. Because global warming is, well, global, practically anyone on Earth could claim to be a victim. And because companies emit carbon dioxide (CO2) only as a byproduct of providing goods and services (electricity, cars, food, medical care, bites of information, etc.) to people, practically everyone on the planet could be sued as a contributor to the alleged injuries. In the memorable ? Read the full story (Cooler Heads)
I feel like I keep stating the obvious. A carbon tax is bad because it's unnecessary and nobody wastes money better than big government, but a carbon trading scheme is worse. The latter is a fake market that feeds corruption and creates it's own vested industry of financial brokers who profit no matter what the price and no matter who buys or sells (they just need a government mandated scheme that forces businesses to buy and sell), and no matter whether anything useful happens to the environment. Once the financial houses are set (and they are already well advanced) how could this policy ever be unwound? Carbon Tax = bad Carbon Trade = sew raw steaks to your shirt and swim with sharks ?
So everyone has a handy pocket list as a reference:
More » (Jo Nova)
Shell pulls out of CO2 injection project Shell has abandoned plans to truck CO2 into the Montezuma Hills near Rio Vista, for which it had joined with the West Coast Regional Carbon Sequestration
Partnership (WESTCARB). The intent was to demonstrate the viability of pumping excess CO2 emissions more than two miles under ground.
Nations Meet On Climate Cash, UN Sees Long Haul About 45 nations met on Thursday to seek ways to raise billions of dollars in aid to help the poor combat climate change as the United Nations warned them of
a long haul to slow global warming.
Naturally: China Sustains Blunt 'You First' Message on CO2 Yu Qingtai, China's lead negotiator in climate talks from 2007 through the tumultuous conference in Copenhagen last December, recently gave a blunt speech at
the Bejing University School of International Studies on climate, diplomacy and the balance of national and global interests in limiting global warming.
EU SAYS: HAMMER BRITISH DRIVERS BRITISH drivers face being hammered by taxes from Europe to pay for climate change policies.
Latest Report On IPCC Another Insult As They Move Deck Chairs On The Titanic It's time to stop the lies, deceptions, denials and fantasy that is the world of political climate science known as the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate
Change (IPCC). Official climate science recently offered more insults, comparable to the whitewash investigations of Michael Mann, and the Climatic Research
Unit (CRU) gang, with its latest 'investigation' of the IPCC.
This moment is a turning point in the climate change debate. Not because the report released Monday addresses every concern raised by critics of the
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), but because it knocks the IPCC off its pedestal.
Tony Blair Explains Why IPCC "Science" Is A Difficult Endeavour
One wonders what an InterGOVERNMENTAL Panel is supposed to do? (Maurizio Morabito, OmniClimate)
Discrepancies in CO2 Reporting
CO2scorecard.org has released a report (PDF) showing that different sources arrive at sometimes very
different estimates of carbon dioxide emissions for different countries. The figure above comes from the report and shows various estimates of 2006 US
emissions. I come to a different conclusion -- namely, that the uncertainties in data provide (yet) another reason to disfavor top down programs focused on scheduling annual, national commitments to carbon dioxide reductions. If you want to measure progress towards stabilization, then a far more meaningful metric will be the proportion of energy generation from carbon free or carbon neutral sources. Efforts to measure decarbonization of the economy depend on having a consistent set of estimates over time, and so are less impacted by the presence of different estimates and methodologies. I am all for improved measurement, which in this case would be useful for carbon cycle science. But to suggest that climate policy is being held up by CO2 measurement uncertainty says more about the shortfall in policy design than anything else. (Roger Pielke Jr.)
Global Warming Hoax Weekly Round-Up, Sep. 2nd 2010 Sockeye salmon sock it to Suzuki, greenwashing corporations boycott their own boycott when faced with a counter-boycott and Greenpeace gets whacked by Greenland and unfriended by Facebook (Daily Bayonet)
Eye-roller: New discovery could pave the way for identification of rogue CFC release A new discovery by scientists at the Universities of East Anglia and Frankfurt could make it possible in future to identify the source of banned CFCs that are probably still being released into the atmosphere. (UEA)
Just for laughs: Disasters show 'screaming' need for action - climate chief GENEVA -- UN climate chief Christiana Figueres on Thursday warned that a string of weather calamities showed the deepening urgency to forge a breakthrough deal on global warming this year. (AFP)
Tropical Cyclone Activity As Of September 2 2010 From Ryan N. Maue Ryan N. Maue's 2010 Global Tropical Cyclone Activity excellent website has been updated through September 2 2010. The latest text he has provided (August 31) reads
As we continue to have enhanced activity in the Atlantic basin, this is a very valuable website to keep up with the increase in the ACE in this basin as well as elsewhere. (Roger Pielke Sr., Climate Science)
Tibetan nomads struggle as grasslands disappear from the roof of the world Scientists say desertification of the mountain grasslands of the Tibetan plateau is accelerating climate change (Guardian)
Extreme Weather Extreme Claims Written by Dennis Ambler The on-going claims of catastrophic anthropogenic global warming have been ramped up again lately because of the opportunities presented by the heat wave in Russia and the floods in Pakistan, which are also being claimed as attributable to anthropogenic CO2. If the amount spent on global warming were to be diverted to mitigating and preventing the worst effects of natural disasters, then the desperate plight of the people of Pakistan would be relieved more quickly. Read more... (SPPI)
August 2010 UAH Global Temperature Update: +0.51 deg. C
As of Julian Day 243 (end of August), the race for warmest year in the 32-year satellite period of record is still too close to call with 1998 continuing its
lead by only 0.06 C: As a reminder, six months ago we changed to Version 5.3 of our dataset, which accounts for the mismatch between the average seasonal cycle produced by the older MSU and the newer AMSU instruments. This affects the value of the individual monthly departures, but does not affect the year to year variations, and thus the overall trend remains the same as in Version 5.2. ALSO ?we have added the NOAA-18 AMSU to the data processing in v5.3, which provides data since June of 2005. The local observation time of NOAA-18 (now close to 2 p.m., ascending node) is similar to that of NASA's Aqua satellite (about 1:30 p.m.). The temperature anomalies listed above have changed somewhat as a result of adding NOAA-18. [NOTE: These satellite measurements are not calibrated to surface thermometer data in any way, but instead use on-board redundant precision platinum resistance thermometers (PRTs) carried on the satellite radiometers. The PRT's are individually calibrated in a laboratory before being installed in the instruments.] (Roy W. Spencer)
Study: Ammonium as ice core proxy shows strong Medieval Warm Period in the tropics The MWP has been vigorously argued to be a regional northern hemisphere phenomenon only, but this new study finds it in South America. In this new paper they write: "The most striking features in the reconstruction are the warm temperatures from ∼1050 to ∼1300 AD compared to the preceding and following centuries, the persistent cooler temperatures from ∼1400 to ∼1800 AD, and the subsequent rise to warmer temperatures which eventually seem to exceed in the last decades of the 20th century the range of past variation. While the onset of the warm period around 1050 AD is almost consistent within the dating error (±60 years at 1000 AD) with the perception of a Northern Hemisphere (NH) MWP from 950 to 1100 AD, it is remarkable to note that it seems to have lasted about 200 years longer in the tropics."  Figure 7.
Reconstructed tropical South American temperature anomalies (normalized to the 1961--1990AD average) for the last ∼1600 years (red curve, smoothed with a 39 ?year
Gaussian filter). The shaded region envelops the ±2s uncertainty as derived from the validation period. Poor core quality precluded any chemical analysis for
the time interval between 1580 and 1640 AD
When I first saw this paper (PDF here h/t to Dr. Leif Svalgaard) I was intrigued by the idea, especially since it demonstrated the MWP very well. The authors also say that "The last decades of the past millennium are characterized again by warm temperatures that seem to be unprecedented in the context of the last ∼1600 years." But then a question arose in my mind; how well have they separated all of the Ammonium from worldwide Ammonium fertilizer use (which started in the late 1800 ?s) from the proxy samples? They do touch on the subject, but I'm not convinced that they have separated the impact. They cite Mann and Jones in the references, and use principal component analysis methods (PCA) so that makes me wonder even more. Perhaps Steve McIntyre or Jeff Id can have a look to see how the PCA was carried out, since I'm no expert in it. Continue reading (WUWT)
Back in October Tony asked me to help with a big idea. Searching Norwegian climate site Rimfrost (www.rimfrost.no) Tony had found many climate stations all over the world with a cooling trend in temperatures over at least the last thirty years -- which is significant in climate terms. You see Tony had a grand vision of a website with blue dots on a map representing these "cooling stations", where clicking on the dots brought up a graph of the data and the wonderful cooling trend. Would this not persuade people to look again at the notion of worldwide global warming? (Digging in the Clay)
Climate CO2 Sensitivity Overestimated
Climate sensitivity is generally given as how much temperature rise would result from a doubling of atmospheric CO 2 levels. Using IPCC figures for radiative forcing, a doubling of CO 2 would lead to a temperature rise of about half a degree (see "Another Look at Climate Sensitivity"). Yet the UN IPCC Fourth Assessment Report (AR4) gives a much higher value for climate sensitivity. It claims a 2°C to 4.5°C rise for a CO 2 doubling, or from four to nine times higher than what is see in the real climate system. Why? Climate models assume that there are large positive feedbacks as Earth warms. Among these feedbacks is the impact of rising temperature on emission and absorption of CO 2 by Earth's biota. Accurately predicting future levels of atmospheric CO 2 requires a clear understanding of how land and atmosphere exchange CO 2. Each year, photosynthesizing land plants remove (fix) one in eight molecules of atmospheric CO 2. Land plants and soil organisms return a similar amount of the dreaded greenhouse gas. The balance between removal and respiration determines whether terrestrial ecosystems are a net carbon sink or source. Two papers in the August 13, 2010, issue of Science bring a new understanding of land-atmosphere CO 2 exchange.  The terrestrial carbon cycle. In "Terrestrial Gross Carbon Dioxide Uptake: Global Distribution and Covariation with Climate," Christian Beer et al. estimate total annual terrestrial gross primary production (GPP) in an approach more solidly based on data than previous approximations. Terrestrial GPP is the largest source of global carbon exchange. It drives many ecosystem functions, such as respiration and growth. Food, fiber, and wood production from plants are all part of terrestrial GPP. Moreover, GPP is one of the major processes controlling land-atmosphere CO 2 exchange. The researchers used a combination of observation and calculation to estimate that the total GPP by terrestrial plants is around 122 billion tons per year. In part, the capacity of terrestrial ecosystems acts to offset human CO 2 emissions, which total around 7 billion tons annually. Thirty-two percent of this uptake occurs in tropical forests, and precipitation controls carbon uptake in more than 40% of vegetated land. Here is how Beer et al. sum up their findings:
 Shown above, in figure 3 taken from the paper, the percentage of vegetated land surface (A) and corresponding GPP (B) that is controlled by precipitation, depending on the chosen threshold for the partial correlation coefficients that signal a control of GPP by a climate factor. The blue areas represent the range of data-driven estimates using different climate sources. This is compared to the range of process-oriented model results in red. Purple shows the overlapping area. The thick lines represent the medians of both ranges. See the article for details. The most important statement from Beer et al. is that last line: "Most likely, the association of GPP and climate in process-oriented models can be improved by including negative feedback mechanisms (e.g., adaptation) that might stabilize the systems." Instead of a positive feedback as is widely assumed in climate models, they suggest that the feedback should be reduced and may even be negative. There are even signs that the climate system adapts and self regulates. None of these factors are used in the IPCC's models. In the second report, "Global Convergence in the Temperature Sensitivity of Respiration at Ecosystem Level," Mahecha et al. assess how ecosystem respiration (R) is related to temperature over week-to-month and longer annual time scales, and find a potentially important but difficult-to-interpret relationship. Attempting to understand the sensitivity of respiratory processes to temperature, they approximated the sensitivity of terrestrial ecosystem respiration to air temperature (Q 10) across 60 FLUXNET sites. The authors expand on their motivation:
The investigators report that the week-to-month scale sensitivity is stable across sites varying in mean temperature, but annual sensitivity varies markedly from cold to warm ecosystems. Overall, they found an empirically inferred Q 10 of approximately 1.4 at the ecosystem level. "These results reconcile the empirical evidence with findings that the global carbon cycle can be well modeled only with an ecosystem level sensitivity of Q 10 < 2," Mahecha et al. conclude. "Moreover, our results may partly explain recent findings indicating a less pronounced climate--carbon cycle sensitivity than assumed by current climate--carbon cycle model parameterizations." Ecosystem respiration is influenced by many complex factors (see figure below). Land plant and microbe respiration of CO 2 into the atmosphere can be increased (yellow) or reduced (red) by a wide range of processes that enhance or limit metabolic processes, operate over varying time scales, and go beyond direct temperature effects on physiology [figure below expanded from M. Reichstein & C. Beer, J. Plant Nutr. Soil Sci. (abstract)]. This new work indicates that previously used estimates were erroneous and model representations overly simplistic.  Complex factors influence carbon dioxide respiration. The combined impact of these two papers is yet another blow to the validity of current computer models. Previous assumptions about the absorption and production of CO 2 by terrestrial plants under changing conditions are in error. These new results imply that rising CO 2 levels will not cause the temperature increases predicted by existing computer models. In an accompanying perspective article, Peter B. Reich, an environmental biologist at the University of Minnesota, summed up the implications of these papers:
More plainly put, making simplifying assumptions about nature has led to an over estimation of carbon dioxide's impact on temperature. As experienced modelers will tell you, simplifying assumptions can be the death of any simulation. Here is more proof that the climate models used by the IPCC and other climate researchers don't have a chance in hell of getting future climate change correct. The closer science looks at the real world processes involved in climate regulation the more absurd the IPCC's computer driven fairy tale appears. Instead of blithely modeling climate based on hunches and suppositions, climate scientists would be better off abandoning their ivory towers and actually measuring what happens in the real world. Be safe, enjoy the interglacial and stay skeptical. (Douk L. Hoffman, The Resilient Earth)
New Paper "Effects Of Irrigation On Global Climate During The 20th Century" By Puma and Cook (2010) The papers that document the major role of landscape change on the climate continue to appear [h/t to Faisal Hossain!]. The latest important contribution is Puma, M. J., and B. I. Cook (2010), Effects of irrigation on global climate during the 20th century, J. Geophys. Res., 115, D16120, doi:10.1029/2010JD014122. The abstract reads
The paper concludes with the text
This paper further documents the role of human land management as a first order climate forcing as discussed, for example, in Pielke Sr., R.A., 2005: Land use and climate change. Science, 310, 1625-1626. (Roger Pielke Sr., Climate Science)
What a misanthropic bunch of stunts Greenpeace's latest stunt in the Arctic suggests that what it really fears is human exploration and expansion. (Rob Lyons, spiked)
Drill, Baby, Drill Is Back, Baby, Back by Ben Lieberman Public support for tapping America's oil reserves has been strong over the past several years, but it received its toughest test with the Deepwater Horizon spill. The verdict is now in -- and it's drill, baby, drill! A clear majority continued to support drilling in American waters even during the height of the spill, when oil was gushing uncontrollably and dying birds headlined network newscasts. Pollsters at Rasmussen report that, "since the oil rig explosion that caused the massive oil leak, support for offshore drilling has ranged from 56 percent to 64 percent." That's not far below the 72 percent who supported it before the spill, nor much different than the support back in the summer of 2008 when pump prices topped $4 a gallon. Now that the leak has been stopped, the percentage in favor should start rising again. Support was always strongest in Louisiana--which bore the brunt of the environmental and economic damage--where 79 percent of residents remained in favor of drilling, the same as before the spill. [Read more →] (MasterResource)
U.S. Test Shows Water Problem Near Natgas Drill Site U.S. government officials urged residents of a Wyoming farming community near natural gas drilling sites not to use private well water for drinking or
cooking because of chemical contamination.
Analysis: German Coal Imports To Rise Despite Green Lobbying Germany's coal imports look set to increase until at least the middle of the decade, despite carbon pollution concerns and anti-coal lobbying that has
succeeded in stopping many new coal-fired projects.
Since I've been taking potshots at German energy policy recently, I was pleased to see that it appears the country's government is nearing a reasonable compromise concerning nuclear power, which accounts for 22% of the electricity generated in Germany. [Read More] (Geoffrey Styles, ET)
Sheesh! Energy secretary Chris Huhne warned not to cut subsidies for green electricity Reducing funding for household generation of renewable energy will jeopardise job creation and energy security, Huhne is told (Guardian)
Where are the solar power projects?  Electric
towers and power lines cross the proposed site of a BrightSource Energy solar plant near Primm, Nev. The presence of existing towers make the area a prime site
for solar development.
From the Ventura County Star: ROACH DRY LAKE, Nev. -- Not a light bulb's worth of solar electricity has been produced on the millions of acres of public desert set aside for it. Not one project to build glimmering solar farms has even broken ground. Instead, five years after federal land managers opened up stretches of the Southwest to developers, vast tracts still sit idle. Continue reading (WUWT)
Solar boom likely to burn bills End-users will start to shoulder the high subsidies solar plants are guaranteed from the state
The Medicare Bureaucracy: Ready To Disrupt Seniors' Drug Coverage
"If you like your health care plan you can keep it." This was a mantra from President Obama throughout the health care debate. The President also promised that his health care overhaul would not affect seniors' benefits. But, despite all the promises, a new report from Avalere Health shows that, in addition to the upheaval caused by Obamacare, the Medicare bureaucracy is taking administrative steps to change the Medicare drug program that will have adverse impact on seniors' choices. Millions of seniors will have to switch their prescription drug plans due to changes within Medicare. Avalere is a private research firm founded by a former budget official from the Clinton Administration. Its analysis shows that more than 3 million seniors--roughly 20 percent of those enrolled in stand-alone drug plans--won't be able to keep their current plan. According to the AP's Ricardo Alonso-Zaldivar, some of seniors' drug plans will be eliminated as "Medicare tries to winnow down duplicative and confusing coverage, in order to offer consumers more meaningful choices." Continue reading... (The Foundry)
Side Effects: Future of Private Insurance Rests in Secretary Sebelius' Hands
Obamacare requires insurers to meet a federally-specified medical loss ratio. That is, they must spend a certain percentage of premiums on medical expenses. The remainder can be used to cover administrative costs and, if there's anything left, profits. But if insurers don't shell out enough in medical losses to meet the requirement, they'll have to rebate the difference to policyholders The idea is to limit insurers' profits and create incentives to reduce administrative costs. But it's not as clear cut as it sounds. After all, what exactly counts as a medical expense? Continue reading... (The Foundry)
Indirect eco-death? Bottled water company sued in Ind. worker's death The family of a woman who died after a pallet of bottled water fell on her at a Kroger store in central Indiana is suing the water bottler, arguing a new
eco-friendly bottle design might have contributed to the accident.
ALARMING levels of the toxic chemical BPA are lurking in tinned foods including popular baby brands, a study claims.
Drugs? Australia's food watchdog says there is no proof of danger drugs in food UPDATE 11.10am: THERE is no scientific evidence to suggest food packaged in cans which contain Bisphenol A (BPA) is harmful, the Australian Food and Grocery
Council says.
China to vaccinate 100 million children to fight measles HONG KONG - Nearly 100 million children in China will be vaccinated against measles this month to help eliminate the disease, a leading cause of avoidable
death and disability in developing countries, the WHO said on Wednesday.
Too little sleep bad for teenagers' diets: study Teenagers who sleep less than eight hours a night on weeknights eat more fatty foods and snacks than those who get more than eight hours of sleep a night,
U.S. researchers said on Wednesday.
BMI Is a Fatheaded Obesity Tool
Those worried about a high BMI should be sure to get both cardiovascular and weight-resistance workouts, the Times notes. And what better complement to that advice than new research showing that a genetic predisposition to obesity can be largely offset by getting a healthy dose of physical activity? As epidemiologists struggle to accurately classify data, and governments labor to accurately classify kids, the obesity solution seems to be as obvious as ever: Eat in moderation, and move your body often. (Consumer Freedom)
The don't say? Study: Exercise Can Counteract Obesity Genes Some families, alas, are fatter than others. But for dieters continually at war with their genes, there's good news in a study published in this week's PLoS Medicine: they can burn off 40% of their genetic predisposition to obesity by exercising. (Time)
Study shows human activity may have boosted shellfish size In a counter-intuitive finding, new research from North Carolina State University shows that a species of shellfish widely consumed in the Pacific over the
past 3,000 years has actually increased in size, despite--and possibly because of--increased human activity in the area.
EPA Disapproves Parts Of Texas Permit Program The Environmental Protection Agency said on Tuesday it had disapproved parts of Texas' program for permitting new industrial pollution sources.
Hand wringer... Bold action is needed to protect the diversity of life on Earth Instead of spending taxpayers' money propping up factory farms, UK government should support planet-friendly farming (Guardian)
Question of the day: Exactly how much daylight is there between the population control rantings of Discovery Channel Channel gunman James Lee and the writings of Obama science advisor John Holdren? (Green Hell)
September 1, 2010 -- 7:21 pm By Silvia Santacruz
Desperate Greens Make Desperate Claims by Steven Milloy As the chances of a cap-and-trade bill recede in the 111th Congress, expect the increasingly desperate greens to amp up their gloom-and-doom rhetoric--as they already have. Amid Al Gore's recent concession speech to his zombie followers, for example, he apparently couldn't help himself from linking every recent bad weather event he could think of with global warming--from floods in Nashville and Pakistan to the recent heat wave and forest fires in Russia. Before that, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) took the opportunity of an ongoing East Coast heat wave to proclaim the current decade to be the hottest on record and to proclaim that global warming is "undeniable." (Green Hell)
Speak of the devil: Alarmist scientists issue call for scary scenarios at AGU conference Global warming alarmist scientists Steve Sherwood (University of New South Wales) and Matthew Huber (Purdue University) have asked colleagues to develop scary scenarios for their session at the December 13-14, 2010 meeting of the American Geophysical Union (AGU). (Green Hell)
Post-Carbon Left Enviro Blues (Why the Senate rejected cap-and-trade) by Robert Michaels Everyone knows that our industries contain a large collection of minds that are almost indecently fertile. Name the business and you can see lots of people who were quick to spot the growth possibilities in climate policy, whether they were financial, political or technological. The semiconductor industry turned sand into wealth, and we were going to do the same with the world's exhalations. And now it's as good as over. Only the problem is that those of us who were smart enough to get into carbon on the ground floor refuse to acknowledge what is becoming more obvious by the hour. The great bulk of groups that call themselves "nonprofit" and "nonpartisan"are little more than shills for environmentalists and Democrats. But here is an unusual one: the Breakthrough Institute. "Breakthrough" is usually a word reserved for psychotherapy, but the Breakthrough Institute is green with an attitude. It has managed to separate itself from the other carbon controllers, thanks to a sense of realism about both technological issues and political reality. Co-founder Michael Shellenberger recently appeared in the Washington Post and pretty much set the world straight about why the Senate finally dropped cap and trade and a national renewable quota, and what it all means. He says that the usual explanations for the change generally fail. Republicans aren't to blame, because they needed and got enough Democrats to also reject the policies. Environmentalists in fact made massive efforts and didn't change a single vote. The administration pushed it hard and also failed to influence marginal votes. And you can't blame business, because as Shellenberger points out, cap and trade "arguably had more industry support than any other environmental policy in history." A protégé of Ken Lay, James E. Rogers, once at Enron and now head of Duke Energy, for example, got the electric utility industry to the table and behind cap-and-trade. [Read more →] (MasterResource)
Bad climate bill belongs in limbo Will a lame duck Congress pass cap-and-trade?
<chuckle> Stern warning for climate sceptics ONE of the world's leading climate change experts, Sir Nicholas Stern, has warned that countries such as Australia will face future trade barriers unless they move to a low-carbon economy. (The Age)
This is more serious: Shockwave sent through mining heartland after ALP-Greens alliance LABOR'S alliance with the Greens has sent a shockwave through Australia's mining heartland.
Really? IPCC's Rajendra Pachauri is damaging the world The IPCC's head should quit to avoid harming the global warming cause further, says Geoffrey Lean. (TDT)
It is eight years since, in a review of The Skeptical Environmentalist, that Number Watch warned that its author was not only far from being a sceptic, but for one who lectures in statistics has a remarkably loose conception of statistical significance. Though bombarded (literally) as an apostate, he has always been an adherent of the true religion. Furthermore, at a conference, your bending author publicly accused him of sailing under false colours, to which he made no reply. Thus it is no surprise that he has now reversed his position on the only vestige of scepticism to which he could legitimately lay claim; namely that spending billions of dollars on combating climate change is a game not worth the candle. What does it matter what you say, as long as you sell books? (Number Watch)
Bjørn Lomborg wants to waste trillions for AGW
» Don't Stop Reading » (The Reference Frame)
But Lomborg was always a Warmist ? The ecotard media -- led, naturally enough, by the Guardian -- has been making great play of "Skeptical Environmentalist" Bjorn Lomborg's apparent
Damascene conversion. Where once Lomborg was a card-carrying evil climate-change denier he is now an ardent worshipper at the Church of Al Gore, supposedly.
Skeptical Environmentalist - Still Skeptical of Carbon Rationing - Never Skeptical of Warming Yesterday, the Guardian ran a puzzling article claiming that Bjorn Lomborg, the self-described Skeptical Environmentalist, has now accepted that man-made global warming is a problem. The subtext being that if this prominent climate change skeptic has come over to the side of alarmism, then surely everyone else must too. (Ronald Bailey, Reason)
Three More Outrageously False Statements from NOAA Makes one wonder if their recent climate announcements are politically influenced. (Art Horn, PJM)
Another Day, Another Dollar - CFC's and the UN Written by Dennis Ambler The CFC story is a parallel for the CO2 story and was another EPA "cause celebre". Claims of dramatic changes to the atmosphere were made; time was running out, the world was in danger and it could only be saved by "Global Action". Read more... (SPPI)
Financing Said Vital For World Climate Change Deal A global fund to help poorer countries switch to green industrial technology is vital in any new international pact to battle global warming, Switzerland's top climate change negotiator said on Wednesday. (Reuters)
Eye-roller: 'Climate migrants' projected to flood U.S. Climate change in Latin America -- and the accompanying drought, flooding and desertification -- is likely to drive increased illegal migration across the Mexico-U.S. border in coming years, according to a report. (Washington Times)
The ol' rope-a-dope: Warmer Temperatures In China To Reduce Crop Yields With the climate set to get warmer from greenhouse gases, Chinese scientists predicted on Thursday that freshwater for agriculture will shrink further in
China, reducing crop yields in the years ahead.
September 1, 2010 -- 7:17 pm By Julian Morris Millions are suffering and thousands have died from flooding in Pakistan and China. An extraordinary heat wave in Russia sparked
fires causing dreadful pollution and wiping out swaths of the wheat crop. Are these weather-related disasters caused by global warming? Do they portend worse
catastrophes? Should Pakistan get more aid?
Quarter of the way in, we are perhaps further from holding back the warming tide than when we began. But there is still time (Andrew Simms, Guardian)
The IPCC, Tipping Points, and Why Global Warming Must Remain Uncertain
Now that I have opened the political Pandora's Box, I might as well continue getting some of this off my chest. Some people think that I hurt my scientific credibility by revealing my political views from time to time. Well, I don't like politicians exploiting and ultimately destroying public faith in my scientific discipline (climate science) for their own political and financial gain. We scientists will be sorry we ever allowed ourselves to be manipulated by powerful people who transformed what was a theoretical possibility for climate scientists, into a near certainty for public consumption. While I firmly believe that the ultimate motivation behind the IPCC's existence is not at all what they advertise it to be, I must admit the United Nations still has the upper hand: the theoretical possibility of catastrophic global warming (aka 'climate change'). As a scientist, I must admit that warming of 4 deg. C or more this century is theoretically possible. But it's a little like concerns that the Large Hadron Collider will cause the Earth to be swallowed by a black hole when it is switched on. Unlike particle physicists, climate researchers currently have no way to objectively determine the probability of dramatic changes like climate tipping points. At least when particle physicists talk probabilities, they are talking about real probabilities, based upon real observable events which are repeatable. The IPCC's probabilities regarding one-of-a-kind events with uncertain causes (e.g. warming in the last 50 years) are no more than measures of their faith expressed in pseudo-scientific jargon. And the people who write the Summary for Policymakers for the IPCC reports are masters at wordsmithing their documents to convey maximum alarm without resorting to outright falsehoods. How clever. The fact that catastrophic warming will remain a possibility indefinitely allows the U.N. to continue its propaganda campaign. Living is Risky Modern fears of global warming and other perceived dangers to the consumer support my claim that our society is more risk adverse than any in history. The very existence of the Precautionary Principle shows that even though every one of us weighs risks against benefits in every decision we make on a daily basis, some people can still dream up totally illogical reasons why humanity should stop doing this or that. Never in history have so many advocates with so little common sense held so much influence over so selfish a political class who were elected by so gullible a public for such irrelevant reasons. Living is risky. Get over it. I'm sure that the IPCC's embattled Grand Poobah, Rajendra Pachauri, flies in airplanes even though they might crash, crosses streets even though he might get
run over, eats food even though he might choke to death, and writes vapid steamy
romance novels even though he might be ridiculed. Political Versus Climatic Tipping Points We are endlessly fascinated by tipping points. The movie Day After Tomorrow involved a mini-Ice Age forming in a matter of days as a result of your SUV getting together with other SUVs after work and drinking too much at the local Exxon watering hole. Scientists and engineers think of tipping points in terms of nonlinear relationships. A given forcing results in a certain response, but beyond a certain level of forcing the response grows dramatically. The future behavior of nonlinear systems is notoriously difficult to forecast. The climate system is a nonlinear system. This doesn't necessarily mean it has tipping points, but it sure doesn't exclude the possibility either. As long as people like James Hansen believe that the Ice Ages were the greatly amplified response to a weak forcing, they will be able to claim that our climate system has experienced tipping points in the past. No matter how long we go without significant warming, influential people like Hansen will still claim that it is only a matter of time before Mother Nature decides she has had enough, and turns the oven up from "warm" to "broil". As a result, there will always remain some science that can be used to justify the work of the IPCC. The Future of the IPCC The IPCC is now at a tipping point. Will its self-destruct? Probably not. Dramatic organizational changes will be instituted, and at some point success will be declared. The IPCC will be refocused, leaner, meaner, more transparent, more open to the views of the deniers ?er ?I mean skeptics. But the ultimate purpose of the IPCC will remain unchanged: to cherry pick and misuse climate science in order to eventually control humanity's access to energy. So, in order to put the IPCC out of its misery, it will take more than to just point out its selective use of facts and its biased science. Its demise will have to be the result of political pressure related to its biased political agenda. And at least in the U.S., the current indications are that the citizens have had just about as much as they can take from those whose (arguable) good intentions force others to pay for paving that proverbial road to hell. (Roy W. Spencer)
There is an important research contribution that reports on a natural and human climate forcing that has a direct and indirect effect on tropical cyclones, as well as other climate effects such as radiative forcing. The paper is Amato T. Evan and Sujoy Mukhopadhyay, 2010: African dust over the northern tropical Atlantic: 1955--2008. Journal of Applied Meteorology and Climatology 2010 ; e-View doi: 10.1175/2010JAMC2485.1 African dust results both from natural landscapes but also land that has been degraded by overgrazing as in the Sahel region of Africa. The abstract reads
Amato also has a forecast each year for the dust expected for the hurricane season at Atlantic Dust Products. The June 1 2010 forecast reads
The report starts with the text
This study continues to add to the important papers and reports that document that climate variability and change are dominated by regional climate forcings and feedbacks, NOT a global average surface temperature trend. (Roger Pielke Sr., Climate Science)
On the Debunking of Spencer's Feedback Ideas: An Appeal to Physical Scientists Everywhere I am seeing increasing chatter about one or more papers that will (or already have) debunked my ideas on feedbacks in the climate system. Yet, I cannot remember a climate issue of which I have ever been so certain. I understand that most people interested in the climate debate will simply believe what their favorite science pundits at RealClimate tell them to believe, which is fine, and I can't do anything about that. But for those who want to investigate for themselves, I recommend reading only our latest and most comprehensive paper in Journal of Geophysical Research. It takes you from the very basics of feedback estimation -- which I found I had to include because even the experts in the field apparently did not understand them -- and for the first time explains why satellite observations of the climate system behave the way they do. No one has ever done this before to anywhere near the level of detail we do. [Unfortunately, our 2008 paper in Journal of Climate, I now realize, had insufficient evidence to make the case we were trying to make in 2008. I believe our claims were correct, but the evidence we presented could not unequivocally support those claims. Only after finishing our most recent 2010 paper did I realize the insufficiency of that previous work on the subject.] Then, once you think you understand the main points we make in the new JGR paper, read any other critiques or criticisms that catch your fancy. As a teaser, one of the clear conclusions the new paper supports is this: The only times that there is clear evidence of feedback in global satellite data, that feedback is strongly negative. All I ask is that you evaluate whether anyone can come up with a better explanation than what we have given for the structures we see in the satellite observations of natural climate variations. Do not settle for others' vague arm-waving dismissals based upon preconceived notions or what others have told them. You engineers and scientists from other fields are capable of understanding this, and I am appealing to you to bring fresh eyes to a field where the research establishment has become hopelessly inbred and too beholden to special interests to see that which is staring them in the face. This is the main reason why I wrote The Great Global Warming Blunder ?the evidence is simple enough for the science-savvy public to understand. But the experts do not see the evidence because they refuse to open their eyes. (Roy W. Spencer)
Greenland's prime minister lambasts Greenpeace for raiding Arctic oil rig Kuupik Kleist claims environmental campaigners are damaging country's economy by occupy drilling platform (Guardian)
Greenpeace - the energy deniers Greenpeace is in the news for shutting down an oil exploration rig off the coast of Greenland. In what is an act of trespass if not outright piracy,
activists have climbed onto the rig in an effort to cease all activity. This stunt is just the latest attempt by Greenpeace to deny the modern world the energy
it needs.
Military Study Warns of a Potentially Drastic Oil Crisis A study by a German military think tank has analyzed how "peak oil" might change the global economy. The internal draft document -- leaked on the
Internet -- shows for the first time how carefully the German government has considered a potential energy crisis.
The hype over biofuels has pretty much died down. While they're acknowledged as being an important part of the shift away from fossil fuels, they are not a solution in and of themselves. However, a report from the Renewable Fuels Agency (RFA) on the use of biofuels in the UK reveals a worrying trend. (The Engineer)
Iowa is to corn ethanol what Saudi Arabia is to oil. At present Iowa has the capacity to produce 3.5 billion gallons of ethanol per year, which is 26% of the nation's total. This is of course due to the large amount of corn production in Iowa, enabled by ample rainfall and rich topsoil. [Read More] (Robert Rapier, ET)
Minnesota Governor directs state to decline health reform CHICAGO - Minnesota Governor Tim Pawlenty directed state agencies on Tuesday to decline all discretionary participation in federal healthcare reform,
throwing up roadblocks to President Barack Obama's goal of providing health insurance to all Americans.
Monkeypox rising in wake of smallpox eradication NEW YORK - Some thirty years after authorities doled out the last dose of smallpox vaccine, the world faces another multiplying menace: monkeypox.
MMR -- the vaccine damage myth that will not die Despite the disproving of a link between MMR vaccination and autism, MMR is under attack again (Guardian)
UCLA researcher James Enstrom not reappointed to position Epidemiologist James Enstrom's appointment ended today because his research on air pollution did not align with the department mission and failed to reach funding requirements, according to a June 9 layoff notice from Richard Jackson, environmental health sciences department chair. (Daily Bruin)
Exercise can offset obesity-linked genes, study finds People with a genetic predisposition to obesity can reduce their risk of being overweight by being physically active, researchers conclude. ( Jeannine Stein, Los Angeles Times)
Scientist devises faster test for detecting E.coli CHICAGO - A Purdue University food scientist using infrared spectroscopy took only an hour to find harmful E. coli bacteria in ground beef, a discovery that
could cut days off investigations of outbreaks, the university said in a statement on Monday.
Posted by Bill McClellan, the excellent St. Louis Post-Dispatch columnist, had a must-read column the other day telling the story of Gary Heffernan, a 35-year veteran of the tuckpointing (masonry repair) business, and his recent run-in with an inspector from the federal government's Occupational Safety and Health Administration (OSHA). The inspector wrote up Heffernan with thousands of dollars in fines, though no one had been injured and the business's only other employee -- Heffernan's nephew -- had not complained. The violations? I won't spoil the suspense, but they included, to name one, letting the nephew work on a chimney without posted warnings of the toxic dangers of sand. [Whole column here.] Regulatory ordeals like Heffernan's may soon become much more frequent and more likely to imperil business survival, under proposed legislation that would greatly expand OSHA's authority [GovTrack/Thomas; Chamber letter in opposition]. Here's a description from J.L. Wilson of Associated Oregon Industries:
Notice the bill's misleading name, intended to capitalize on much-publicized recent disasters in underground mines; despite this terminology, the bill would impose broad new federal regulation in workplaces of every other sort as well. And note that although Wilson used the past tense in his account, the bill is very much alive: following hearings before the House Education and Labor Committee it cleared the committee late last month and now heads for the House floor. (Cato at liberty)
Manhattan Moment: Litigating over the environment makes big bucks for trial lawyers By: James R. Copland
Thousands of Growers Stand Up for Atrazine Longstanding pesticide faces government review, activist campaign, and two lawsuits
Bulldozing Homes, Billing Homeowners Posted by Officials in Montgomery, Alabama, are bulldozing homes in their historic civil rights district -- and billing the homeowners for the cost of demolition:
Christina Walsh of the Institute for Justice writes about this injustice at the Daily Caller:
The rest of her article is here. Also, see ABC News, Big Government and Reason magazine. And you can find Cato's work on property rights here. (Cato at liberty)
Deep Greens & Big Coal win from Cropping Land Bans. The Queensland Government has proposed a new category of restricted land called "Strategic Cropping Land" which bans mining or development. This
could blight 4% of Queensland, representing an area more than twice the size of Holland and including many areas likely to contain valuable mineral and energy
resources.
Wheat Genome Work Just At Initial Stage: scientists Efforts to sequence the wheat genome are only at an initial stage of what will be a long-term project requiring more government support, leading Chinese and
international scientists said on Tuesday.
Obama Urges Court to Vacate AGW Decision. I Smell a Rat (or Two!) This tactic points in only one direction: allowing an EPA power grab.
Reid Hopeful For GOP Energy Votes After Elections U.S. Senate Majority leader Harry Reid (D-NV) reviews his notes as he waits for Britain's Prime Minister David Cameron to arrive for a meeting on Capitol
Hill in Washington July 20, 2010.
L.A. mayor, Latino activists take on oil companies over Proposition 23 They say the ballot initiative to suspend the state's climate change law would hurt low-income communities already suffering the most from pollution. (Margot Roosevelt, Los Angeles Times)
Global Warming: America's media are largely uninterested in what a scientific association is saying about the United Nations' climate change panel. Which
tells you that the findings are, indeed, worth knowing.
August 31, 2010 -- 6:56 pm Nobody doubts that climate change is happening. Nor might one doubt some marginal effect from increased levels of CO2 due to industrial society The phrase, "curate's egg" derives from an 1895 cartoon in the satirical British magazine Punch. A humble curate is having breakfast at the table of a bishop. The bishop suggests that the curate may have a bad egg. "Oh, no, my Lord," responds the curate, "I assure you that parts of it are excellent." Of course, you can't have an egg that is partly bad, which is why the curate's egg came to mind when looking at this week's "independent" review of the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) by the InterAcademy Council (IAC).
Matt Ridley: This Discredited IPCC Process Must Be Purged We cannot make sane decisions on global warming if the 'experts' present us with evidence that is biased
Telegraph View: The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change was rightly warned not to stray into what might be seen as scaremongering and policy
advocacy.
Report recommends UN climate panel shakeup Rearrange the chairs please
UN climate experts 'overstated dangers': Keep your noses out of politics, scientists told UN climate change experts have been accused of making 'imprecise and vague' statements and over-egging the evidence.
IPCC report raises fresh questions over Dr Rajendra Pachauri's leadership The UN's climate change panel must introduce a structure to prevent conflicts of interest, according to a report by the world's top science group that raised fresh questions over the leadership of the body. (Louise Gray, TDT)
The Express states the case more forcefully: CLIMATE CHANGE LIES ARE EXPOSED THE world's leading climate change body has been accused of losing credibility after a damning report into its research practices.
U.N. To Study Impact Of Incomplete Climate Action The U.N. panel of climate scientists will look at the costs of "second best" ways of fighting global warming amid doubts that all countries will
sign up to U.N.-led action, a leading expert said on Tuesday.
Breaking: 'Hockey Stick' Judge Rejects 'Academic Freedom Argument,' Denies Cuccinelli anyway August 30, 2010 7:00 P.M.
Russia Submits 1st Kyoto CO2 Offset Project To U.N. Russia has submitted its first clean energy project to a U.N. climate panel for registration to earn carbon credits under the Kyoto Protocol, the United
Nations' Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) said on Monday.
"Beyond Belief" (Climate Spectator) The "believers" have suddenly realized how uncool it is to talk about being "beliefs" when it's supposed to be about science. So the rush is on to post articles warning believers to hide their "faith" and to throw in token comments about evidence instead. Indeed the Real Deniers are scrambling to claim the "name" skeptic that they used to despise. It's a measure of how far this debate has come. Such was the success of the PR campaign, some skeptics gave up on the term and opted to use "realist". But the skeptics have been proved right time after time, and the unskeptical scientists have been embarrassed by their own conniving words, mistakes, tricks and lies. The resurgence of the word "skeptic" is rising like a rocket. As I've said many times, the opposite of skeptical is gullible. And an unskeptical scientist is an oxymoron. So here's Paul Gilding in the publication that panders to the climate industry: Climate Spectator, offering the fake guise of a skeptical soul:
How do we know he's not rational? Because he doesn't rely on evidence, he relies on authority: More » (Jo Nova)
I received a question from a reader today regarding why the writer of a recent article summarizing the state of the science on cloud feedbacks did not mention our newly published work. The usual suspects were questioned, but there was nothing new there. Cloud feedbacks are just as uncertain today as they were 20 years ago, blah, blah. More of the same. Now, I would like to think our new paper demonstrated not only the main reason why cloud feedbacks have remained so uncertain, but why their estimation from satellite data tends to give the illusion of a sensitive climate system. None of the so-called experts mentioned what has been ignored as a potential climate change mechanism: Natural cycles in cloud cover. I had wondered for years why no one investigated the possibility, and our work clarified for me that this indeed is a huge question mark that most researchers do not even realize exists. Unfortunately, I predict it will be at least 2 years before our paper is digested and believed by influential people in the climate community ?if even then. (They still think the truth is lurking in computer models somewhere ?just turn this knob a little more to the right ?) This brings up the issue of how entrenched some ideas get in the scientific community, and not only for scientific reasons. Dr. Roy in a Previous Millennium In an earlier life, my claim to fame was demonstrating that satellite passive microwave radiometers could be used to measure rainfall over land. My first paper on the subject (actually, my first published paper ever) had the cover illustration on the front of Nature magazine. Ha! If they only knew I would grow up to be a "denier". At the time (1983) the established scientists working with NASA wanted to build the first weather radar to fly in space. While this was a worthy effort in its own right -- finally realized with the Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM) -- one of the radar's original justifications was to measure rainfall over land. My work was apparently providing evidence it was not needed. So, as a post-doc newcomer to the field, I was rocking that boat. For me, that experience was when I lost my innocence. My research worldview was shaken. Scientists are not objective after all! Gasp! Now, even after over 20 years of telling people of all of my subsequent experiences that only reinforced my claim that scientists are not objective, it seemed like no one was particularly worried about this. Then Climategate broke upon the scene. Scientists behaving badly! Gasp! What Was I Talking About? Oh, Yeah, Cloud Feedbacks So, what I am getting around to is that it will take a long time before the climate research community looks at, understands, and believes what we have done. Sometimes I have half-jokingly mentioned that it will probably take an IPCC-ordained scientist to "discover" the same thing. I experienced that behavior, too. NASA research centers can be pretty competitive with each other. If it wasn't invented at their center, it wasn't invented. So, getting back to the original question: Why did this science writer not mention my work in his summary article on cloud feedbacks? I'm afraid he's the last one I would expect to know. Consider: Fortunately, I have been getting some good feedback in recent days (Hah! Feedback!). A nice note from Lord Monckton basically said, "NOW I see what you have been talking about!" A blog reader who doesn't even do climate research read the whole paper and understood it. Now, THAT is cool. But, while this is heartening, we still need the mainstream climate scientists to pay attention. Unfortunately, scientific discovery never was the purpose of the IPCC, and you disagree with them at your professional peril. (Roy W. Spencer)
Marine animals suggest evidence for a trans-Antarctic seaway A tiny marine filter-feeder, that anchors itself to the sea bed, offers new clues to scientists studying the stability of the West Antarctic Ice Sheet -- a
region that is thought to be vulnerable to collapse.
Another Paper That Documents The Complexity Of The Climate System -- Vautard Et Al 2009 We have been alerted to yet another research paper that documents the complexity of the human role in the climate system (h/t to Erik). It is Robert Vautard, Pascal Yiou and Geert Jan van Oldenborgh: 2010: Decline of fog, mist and haze in Europe over the past 30 years. Nature Geosciennces. 18 January 2009 DOI: 10.1038/NGEO414. The abstract reads
Text in the conclusion reads
This paper documents a particular major role of aerosols in regional climate, and also the inability of current climate models to skillfully simulate (much less predict) this effect. (Roger Pielke Sr., Climate Science)
From CO2 Science Volume 13 Number 35: 1 September 2010 Editorial: Subject Index Summary: Journal Reviews: The Naturally Oscillating Climate of Northern Norway: Fjord sediments reveal the four major cool and warm periods of the last 1500 years. The Temperature Sensitivity of Global Biospheric Respiration: Terrestrial ecosystem respiration was long believed to increase strongly with temperature; but that is now believed no longer. The Power of Acclimation: How Trees Respond to Warming in Natural Settings: Are the air temperatures at which different tree species optimally photosynthesize firmly fixed? ... or can they adjust their physiology to accommodate a modest warming? ... or maybe even a warming of the magnitude predicted by the world's climate alarmists? The Effects of Warming on Alpine Vegetation in the Swiss Alps: They wouldn't be negative, would they? Plant Growth Database:
Greenpeace blocks Greenland drilling COPENHAGEN, Denmark -- Greenpeace forced a Scottish company to stop drilling off Greenland on Tuesday by having four activists climb onto an oil rig.
Questioning the Incandescent Light Bulb Ban "Is the modern incandescent light bulb ready to retire from society and find its final resting place in the halls of the American History Museum? Politicians seem to think so, but consumer behavior indicates otherwise," observes Kelsey Huber. (Jack Dini, Hawaii reporter)
Banks Grow Wary of Environmental Risks Blasting off mountaintops to reach coal in Appalachia or churning out millions of tons of carbon dioxide to extract oil from sand in Alberta are among
environmentalists' biggest industrial irritants. But they are also legal and lucrative.
A new US oil rush could rock OPEC It contains hundreds of billions of barrels of light crude oil and thousands of wells and should be scaring the pants off any oil exporter needing high crude
prices to balance its budget.
The International Energy Agency (IEA) recently issued their 2009 Wind Energy Report. Brian Smith, chair of the IEA Wind Executive Committee, states that wind member countries "installed more than 20 gigawatts of new wind capacity" (nameplate). [Read More] (Steve Goreham, ET)
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In an example of what Presidential Science Advisor John Holdren would label "global climate disruption," a 2009 report claimed that
warming surface water in the Pacific Ocean was having an impact on the frequency of tropical storms. Moreover, landfalls along the Gulf of Mexico coast and
Central America were supposedly increased. Now a new study appearing in Geophysical Research Letters has found these claims to be untrue. It seems that
there is little correlation between the Atlantic hurricane activity and Pacific Ocean warming. In fact, the increased tropical storm frequency in 1969 and 2004
can be readily explained by increased warmth in the Atlantic where the storms form. Once again, those looking for a smoking gun in the form of human caused
climate change are forced to look elsewhere.
The double blow of the Permian-Triassic followed by the end-Triassic cleared the way for the rise of the dinosaurs and, eventually, mammals.
Without the KT extinction mammals would never have risen to dominate life on the land and consequently, humanity would never have evolved. It may well be that
after each successive extinction life recovered more energetically because is was starting from a more evolved ecological base. Whatever the reason, the trend
is clearly evident.
The lesson here
is clear: geoengineering is not a solution to the perceived problems of climate change. Keeping in mind that both of the studies presented here are based on
models that are imperfect and cannot accurately predict future climate conditions. The model results indicate ineffectiveness and possible negative impacts, but
the actual results remain uncertain. Obviously, all geoengineering proposals are extremely premature, if not down right dangerous. While I have a great deal of
faith in human inventiveness, any such massive effort would entail some trial and error--and any error could have devastating consequences for humanity. Nothing
having to do with climate change is truly "irreversible," short of the eventual death of our Sun, but short term effects could lead to drought and
famine or to devastating floods.
Clive Hamilton, the Australian "public intellectual", and failed Greens candidate, is a busy man: leave no ad hominem unsaid, no law of
logic unbroken. The man has a predictable formula. Rule one: Make an unsubstantiated claim; cast aspersions on all who so much as question it -- dig deep
for an attempted character assassination if possible; then top it off with feigned moral indignation mixed with grandiose generalizations. It helps to toss in
some strawman conspiracies, and confound it with unrelated topics. Rule two: never discuss the evidence.
Britain's "fat" surveillance of schoolchildren has once again backfired. The Sun reported last week that 
Here's a devout follower telling off his own kind for showing their "faith".
