News The Scientific Consensus on Climate Change

[Skyhunter]

The reviews from climate scientists of Gores film "An Inconvenient Truth" are in.

Climate scientists who have seen Gore's film say on the whole it presents a scientifically valid view of global warming and does a good job of presenting what's likely to occur if human-induced greenhouse gas emissions continue unabated. Dr. Gavin Schmidt, a climate modeler for NASA, was pleased the film didn't say: "You're all going to die, woo-hoo." Schmidt, who stressed that his views are his own, not NASA's, says the movie plays it relatively safe by saying, "These are the things that have happened so far. These are the things that are likely to happen should we continue on the trajectory we're on, and these are the moral consequences of it."

Scientists express surprise that Gore could present the science in an accurate way without putting everyone in the audience to sleep. "Such an amount of relatively hard science could have been extremely dull, and I've been to a lot of presentations on similar stuff that were very dull," says Schmidt. "Where there was solid science, he presented it solidly without going into nuts and bolts, and where there were issues that are still a matter of some debate, he was careful not to go down definitively on one side or the other."

http://www.salon.com/news/feature/2006/06/10/truths/index.html

There are detractors of course.

To the tune of the Allman Brothers Band's "Ramblin Man," Al Gore's face rides a cartoon airplane across a map of the United States. As he zips from coast to coast in a Web video clip titled "Al Gore: An Inconvenient Story," a ticker at the bottom of the screen displays his rapidly rising CO2 emissions next to the comparatively modest emissions of everyday folk. The climate-change Paul Revere's steed is an airplane, powered by fossil fuels. The implication: Gore's sure spewing a lot of carbon dioxide as he travels the land spreading the word about global warming.

Produced by the industry flacks at the Competitive Enterprise Institute, which is funded in part by Exxon-Mobil, the clip dismisses Gore as a hypocrite, leading a carbon-intensive lifestyle while scolding us plebes that we should strive to reduce our own carbon footprints. Of course, nowhere does this oil-industry-funded propaganda mention that Gore used carbon offsets to mitigate the global warming impact of his travel for "An Inconvenient Truth," that Gore pledged to make the documentary carbon-neutral.

Another review.

How well does the film handle the science? Admirably, I thought. It is remarkably up to date, with reference to some of the very latest research. Discussion of recent changes in Antarctica and Greenland are expertly laid out. He also does a very good job in talking about the relationship between sea surface temperature and hurricane intensity. As one might expect, he uses the Katrina disaster to underscore the point that climate change may have serious impacts on society, but he doesn't highlight the connection any more than is appropriate (see our post on this, here).

There are a few scientific errors that are important in the film. At one point Gore claims that you can see the aerosol concentrations in Antarctic ice cores change "in just two years", due to the U.S. Clean Air Act. You can't see dust and aerosols at all in Antarctic cores -- not with the naked eye -- and I'm skeptical you can definitively point to the influence of the Clean Air Act. I was left wondering whether Gore got this notion, and I hope he'll correct it in future versions of his slideshow. Another complaint is the juxtaposition of an image relating to CO2 emissions and an image illustrating invasive plant species. This is misleading; the problem of invasive species is predominantly due to land use change and importation, not to "global warming". Still, these are rather minor errors. It is true that the effect of reduced leaded gasoline use in the U.S. does clearly show up in Greenland ice cores; and it is also certainly true that climate change could exacerbate the problem of invasive species.

Several of my colleagues complained that a more significant error is Gore's use of the long ice core records of CO2 and temperature (from oxygen isotope measurements) in Antarctic ice cores to illustrate the correlation between the two. The complaint is that the correlation is somewhat misleading, because a number of other climate forcings besides CO2 contribute to the change in Antarctic temperature between glacial and interglacial climate. Simply extrapolating this correlation forward in time puts the temperature in 2100 A.D. somewhere upwards of 10 C warmer than present -- rather at the extreme end of the vast majority of projections (as we have discussed here). However, I don't really agree with my colleagues' criticism on this point. Gore is careful not to state what the temperature/CO2 scaling is. He is making a qualitative point, which is entirely accurate. The fact is that it would be difficult or impossible to explain past changes in temperature during the ice age cycles without CO2 changes (as we have discussed here). In that sense, the ice core CO2-temperature correlation remains an appropriate demonstration of the influence of CO2 on climate.

For the most part, I think Gore gets the science right, just as he did in Earth in the Balance. The small errors don't detract from Gore's main point, which is that we in the United States have the technological and institutional ability to have a significant impact on the future trajectory of climate change. This is not entirely a scientific issue -- indeed, Gore repeatedly makes the point that it is a moral issue -- but Gore draws heavily on Pacala and Socolow's recent work to show that the technology is there (see Science 305, p. 968 Stabilization Wedges: Solving the Climate Problem for the Next 50 Years with Current Technologies).

I'll admit that I have been a bit of a skeptic about our ability to take any substantive action, especially here in the U.S.
Gore's aim is to change that viewpoint, and the colleagues I saw the movie with all seem to agree that he is successful.

In short: this film is worth seeing. It opens in early June.

http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2006/05/al-gores-movie/#comment-14433

Then there is the rebuttal endorsed by the right, and the rebuttal to the rebuttal.

http://thinkprogress.org/2006/05/26/balling-rebuttal/

BALLING: “Gore discusses glacial and snowpack retreats atop Kenya’s Mt. Kilimanjaro, implying that human induced global warming is to blame. But Gore fails to mention that the snows of Kilimanjaro have been retreating for more than 100 years, largely due to declining atmospheric moisture, not global warming.”

THE FACTS: Dr. Balling is distorting the scientific data. The climate scientists at realclimate.org explain studies of Kilimanjaro “only support the role of precipitation in the initial stages of the retreat, up to the early 1900’s.” Moreover, “the Kilimanjaro glacier survived a 300 year African drought which occurred about 4000 years ago.” The most likely explanation for why it has almost completely disappeared this time is “anthropogenic (human-induced) climate change.”

BTW Mr. Lindzen's professorship is sponsored by the Alfred P Sloan foundation (Alfred P. Sloan was long time chairman of General Motors.)
Does General Motors have an economic interest in this issue?

 

[edward]

We can banter about endlessly about who dissagrees with whom as far as anthropological effects on global warming.

It is very difficult for scientists to get empiricle laboratory test tube type information out of a test tube the size of the earth. On the other hand most scientists will agree that there currently is global warming. The Scripps ocean temperature studies confirmed that much and a lot more.

The Scripps study also proved, as far as they are concerned and to my satisfaction, that global warming is directly connected to human activity.

Researchers at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography at the University of California, San Diego, and their colleagues have produced the first clear scientific evidence that human activity-and very little else- is warming the world's oceans.

The Scripps' report, coming from one of the world's leading ocean research institutions, may turn out to be the "smoking gun" that finally establishes the link between greenhouse gases (carbon dioxide and other pollutants) and the increase in temperature worldwide, or global warming.

The authors contend that their results clearly indicate that the oceans' warming is produced "anthropogenically," i.e. by human activities. The study, conducted by Tim Barnett and David Pierce, along with colleagues at Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory's Program for Climate Model Diagnosis and Intercomparison (PCMDI), used a combination of computer models and real-world "observed" data to capture signals of the penetration of greenhouse gas-influenced warming in the oceans,

http://www.insurancejournal.com/news/international/2005/02/21/51777.htm

My observations are much simpler. Since we do have global warming and it is associated with increases in CO2, would it not be reasonable to assume that the billions of tons of CO2 human activity is emitting each year is involved to some extent?

Personally I don't know which will be the most difficult, dealing with the effects of global warming, or dealing with the situation that will come about when the fossil fuels are gone.

 

[edward]

By the way, professor Lindzen seems to make a living trying to debunk global warming. I haven't found a direct link to the congressional records for 1995 but:

"Look in the Congressional record at Richard Lindzen's funding sources...which he tried to hide even under oath (this is extremely unethical for a scientist)...one of his funding sources is a FOREIGN fossil fuels organization -OPEC(-Harpers Magazine- DEC. 1995.) In other words, Lindzen is unethical in the scientific community."

http://www.jennifermarohasy.com/blog/archives/001306.html

 

[Skyhunter]

By the way, professor Lindzen seems to make a living trying to debunk global warming. I haven't found a direct link to the congressional records for 1995 but:


http://www.jennifermarohasy.com/blog/archives/001306.html

Could it be that is why he writes OP/ED's for a major business paper, the Wall Street Journal instead of science journals?

 

[SOS2008]

We can banter about endlessly about who dissagrees with whom as far as anthropological effects on global warming.

It is very difficult for scientists to get empiricle laboratory test tube type information out of a test tube the size of the earth. On the other hand most scientists will agree that there currently is global warming. The Scripps ocean temperature studies confirmed that much and a lot more.

The Scripps study also proved, as far as they are concerned and to my satisfaction, that global warming is directly connected to human activity.


http://www.insurancejournal.com/news/international/2005/02/21/51777.htm

My observations are much simpler. Since we do have global warming and it is associated with increases in CO2, would it not be reasonable to assume that the billions of tons of CO2 human activity is emitting each year is involved to some extent?

Personally I don't know which will be the most difficult, dealing with the effects of global warming, or dealing with the situation that will come about when the fossil fuels are gone.

Agreed -- The Earth IS warming, the glaciers are disappearing, the ice shelves are melting, the caribou are being eaten by mosquitoes, the polar bears are drowning, the fish are changing migration, etc., etc.! But we must be careful, or like Al Gore, we too will be compared to Hitler.

As for members of congress, or research by oil companies (let's not forget the studies done by cigarette companies), or Bush/Cheney who are oilmen in cahoots with oil companies, none are credible sources of information because they are not qualified and/or are very biased. But most of all, they are denying it because they don't want to be held responsible by the public for doing nothing about it.

 

[Mech_Engineer]

My observations are much simpler. Since we do have global warming and it is associated with increases in CO2, would it not be reasonable to assume that the billions of tons of CO2 human activity is emitting each year is involved to some extent?

I'm doubt that anyone has finally and definitively proven any connection between CO2 and AGW... The problem with this is the fact that first of all, CO2 is not the main contributor to the greenhouse effect, H2O is. CO2 is a relatively small part of the atmosphere, and will continue to be, even if we keep dumping CO2 into the atmosphere. Another important thing to consider is the fact that plant growth tends to increase as CO2 does, providing some CO2 absorbtion effects. There is an interesting online paper that covers this subject, as well as several others:

http://www.oism.org/pproject/s33p36.htm

Most important, however, is the fact that CO2 levels in the atmosphere do not follow atmospheric temperature trends. I would like to cite arguments that I made in the [Earth] area before the discussion was locked:

https://www.physicsforums.com/showthread.php?t=117182&page=3

...
1) Much of temperature increases in the last century were before 1940, when CO2 could not have been a dominant factor.

2) CO2 levels seem largely INdependent of global temperature, as shown by the fact that CO2 levels increased from 1940 to 1970, but there was a mean cooling trend recorded.

Very well then, where can this be verified? Quite simple if you look around. This data has been published by NASA, and a quick search for Mauna Loa CO2 levels and a temperature history will confirm my claims, both in the fact that about one-half of the warming occurred pre-1940, and that CO2 levels rose while temperature did not.
...

Sorry if it seems overly aggressive or argumentative, Skyhunter and I were right in the middle of heated debate I suppose I think that the fervor over CO2 is a misplaced one, given that there seem to be bigger contributors to the illeged problems that we face.

Personally I don't know which will be the most difficult, dealing with the effects of global warming, or dealing with the situation that will come about when the fossil fuels are gone.

This is probably a more important question to ask, along with the issue of industrially developing nations and their impacts that we cannot control... China is well on its way to producing far more emissions than the US (if it isn't already, I'm not sure), as well as India. What happens when every person in China or India owns a car? As these nations industrialize, any trillion dollar policies implemented in the US will have little to no effect on overall CO2 emissions (even though CO2 emissions will not be the biggest problem in my opinion) unless they of course are aimed at these countries, which would lead to politically unstable situations... Is that a productive use of our money?

 

[edward]

I am convinced that global warming does include CO2 from human activity as a factor. Scripps and Livermore labs are very credible sources. Their data is from 2005, which is very recent compared to the data of most sceptics.

Science, especially new science has always been viewed with scepticism.
His fellow scientists laughed at Farraday when he suggested "invisible lines of magnetic force". Today those invisible lines of magnetic force turn our hard drives.

Other than that I am not about to get into a more scientific dialog, except to say that the science of many published sceptics seems to be funded by big energy companies, and that it is probably too late to stop anthropologic global warming anyway.

What is unusual with the modern day global warming situation is that it has become a poliital football. In times past new science, or most science for that matter, was a religious football.

Leaving science out of the picture completely, conservative tend to be the global warming skeptics and liberals the believers. The Al Gore movie has simply kicked off the ball again.

 

[Evo]

I'm doubt that anyone has finally and definitively proven any connection between CO2 and AGW... The problem with this is the fact that first of all, CO2 is not the main contributor to the greenhouse effect, H2O is. CO2 is a relatively small part of the atmosphere, and will continue to be, even if we keep dumping CO2 into the atmosphere. Another important thing to consider is the fact that plant growth tends to increase as CO2 does, providing some CO2 absorbtion effects. There is an interesting online paper that covers this subject, as well as several others:

http://www.oism.org/pproject/s33p36.htm

I wouldn't place too much trust in this paper.

http://www.sourcewatch.org/index.php?title=Oregon_Institute_of_Science_and_Medicine

"The Oregon Institute of Science and Medicine (OISM) describes itself as "a small research institute" that studies "biochemistry, diagnostic medicine, nutrition, preventive medicine and the molecular biology of aging." It is headed by Arthur B. Robinson, an eccentric scientist who has a long history of controversial entanglements with figures on the fringe of accepted research. OISM also markets a home-schooling kit for "parents concerned about socialism in the public schools" and publishes books on how to survive nuclear war."

 

[Amp1]

Just to make an attempt to get BOT, I noted that Edward mentioned the CO₂ dumped by humans is a factor in the increasing concentration. Billions of tons per year does accumulate even with CO₂ sinks. Keep in mind also that many thousands of acres of forests have been destroyed in the Amazon and other locations around the world which decreases some of the sinks. Next consider that as was mentiond by another poster CO₂ isn't the only GW factor, there's H₂O, and Methane and probably some others that man has had a role in introducing in larger than natural amounts into the atmosphere. With these considerations it seems inconceivable that GW isn't human induced. The jury is in and the increased pace of temperature rise in the equatorial oceans is evidence that there is a problem. By increased pace I mean rises in temperature that are notably faster than geologic increases. I wonder if the glaciers on Kilimanjaro are shrinking because of a lack of precipatation then what about the US's own Glacier National Park? Or Greenland's shrinking glaicers or Anartica- where there are now areas that were once covered in meters deep snow/ice layers. The plight of polar bears in the Artic that are in trouble because of documented reduction in the ice cover/floes that used to occur during the six months of winter. I don't think it wise to play the ostrich.

http://www.newscientist.com/channel/earth/climate-change/dn8850-atmospheric-cosub2sub-accumulating-faster-than-ever.html [/URL]

[PLAIN] http://www.newscientist.com/channel/earth/climate-change/mg18825203.700-arctic-ice-shrinking-as-it-feels-the-heat.html [/URL]

[PLAIN] http://www.newscientist.com/channel/earth/climate-change/mg18925425.200-coastal-carbon-sinks-are-shrinking.html [/URL]

[PLAIN] http://zebu.uoregon.edu/2004/es399/lec02.html [/URL]

[PLAIN] http://www.hydrogen.co.uk/h2_now/journal/articles/3_Methane.htm [/URL]

[PLAIN] http://www.newscientist.com/channel/earth/climate-change/mg18925424.700-gravity-reveals-shrinking-antarctic-ice.html [/URL]

[PLAIN] [URL]http://news.independent.co.uk/world/science_technology/article312997.ece[/URL] [/URL]

[PLAIN] http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/4660938.stm [/URL]

[PLAIN] http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2006/02/16/60minutes/main1323169.shtml [/URL]

 

[Skyhunter]

This is the man I believe is leading the dissent. His name is Richard Lindzen.

Richard Siegmund Lindzen (born February 8, 1940) is an atmospheric physicist and a professor of meteorology at MIT renowned for his research in dynamic meteorology - especially atmospheric waves. He is also a member of the National Academy of Sciences and has held positions at the University of Chicago, Harvard University and MIT.

He was a lead author of Chapter 7 [1] of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change Third Assessment Report of 2001.

He frequently speaks out against the IPCC position that significant global warming is caused by humans (see global warming) although he accepts that the warming has occurred, saying global mean temperature is about 0.6 degrees Celsius higher than it was a century ago [2].

His position with regard to the IPCC can be summed up in this quote: "Picking holes in the IPCC is crucial. The notion that if you’re ignorant of something and somebody comes up with a wrong answer, and you have to accept that because you don’t have another wrong answer to offer is like faith healing, it’s like quackery in medicine – if somebody says you should take jelly beans for cancer and you say that’s stupid, and he says, well can you suggest something else and you say, no, does that mean you have to go with jelly beans?" [3].

He is using the uncertainty and complexity of atmospheric science as an argument against the IPCC, its conclusions, and recommendations.

His professorship at MIT is sponsored by the http://www.sloan.org/main.shtml

Interesting man was Alfred P. Sloan.

During Alfred P. Sloan's leadership of GM, many public transport systems of trams in the US were replaced by buses. Many of the trams themselves were literally burnt in order to prevent any reversal in public transport policies. Some believe that GM orchestrated this bustitution; see General Motors streetcar conspiracy for details. Frequencies of bus services were decreased on less profitable routes, helping to encourage people to buy their own automobiles and travel independently.

I am learning about Transit Oriented Development, many cities are beginning to plan and development communitees that are pedestrian, bicycle, and transit oriented. Part of their reasoning is to curb GHG emissions another is cleaner more livable cities.

Looking at the old right of ways, and historic tram routes, I realize how well thought out the cities were.

http://www.culturechange.org/issue10/taken-for-a-ride.htm

Then GM, Firestone, and Standard Oil bought the railways.

A 1974 report by government attorney Bradford Snell ignited the conspiracy theory by claiming that General Motors was convicted of conspiracy in 1949 (and fined $5000) in its program to buy up and destroy electric urban trolley systems so that urban transit would be forced to rely on GMC buses, and that this is the principal reason that modern-day trolley systems are rare in the United States today. Between 1936 and 1950, National City Lines, a holding company sponsored and funded by GM, Firestone, and Standard Oil of California, bought out more than 100 electric surface-traction systems in 45 cities (including New York, San Francisco, Philadelphia, St. Louis, Salt Lake City, Tulsa, Baltimore, and Los Angeles) to be dismantled and replaced with GM buses. In 1949 GM and its partners were convicted in U.S. district court in Chicago of criminal conspiracy in this matter and fined $5,000.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Motors_streetcar_conspiracy

I can get everything I need from public transit, bicycling, or walking. It is however not nearly as convenient and inexpensive as it could be. http://www.transitorienteddevelopment.org/pages/1/index.htm is a way to reduce the cars in the cities and make them more livable. This is antithetical to selling cars, tires, and gasoline.

I only need a truck when I am working, so I leave it at the shop and bike to the local lightrail, when I can. The greatest problem I face is the cars that go zooming by, making it difficult and hazardous to navigate, not to mention the nasty exhausts. Transit Oriented Development is a step into the past in order to restore intelligent transportation and quality of life in our cities.

But I digress.

Mr.Lindzens position on global warming is the preferred position of industry. I wonder if that position is not somehow influenced by his professorship. Alfred P. Sloan was one of the greatest industrialists of the 20th century.

Alfred P. Sloan was a ruthless industrialist. I think that Mr. Lindzen is living up to his professorship's namesake.

 

[Skyhunter]

Sorry if it seems overly aggressive or argumentative, Skyhunter and I were right in the middle of heated debate I suppose

Oh it wasn't heated...just globally warmed.



On the serious side.

Most of the warming did not occur pre 1940, as this http://www.grida.no/climate/ipcc_tar/wg1/figspm-1.htm illustrates.

[edit] The graph above does not include the last 6 years which have shown an even greater increase n temperature. [/edit]

 

[Bystander]

1860-1920 lumps, rises, falls, no obvious net change; 1920-1940 0.5 increase; 1945-1970 cools a couple tenths; 1970-2000 increase of 0.4-0.5.

Care to give us short sketches of economic activity, global political activity, station locations, and measurement methods for those periods?

 

[Skyhunter]

1860-1920 lumps, rises, falls, no obvious net change; 1920-1940 0.5 increase; 1945-1970 cools a couple tenths; 1970-2000 increase of 0.4-0.5.

Care to give us short sketches of economic activity, global political activity, station locations, and measurement methods for those periods?

I didn't produce the data. It is all part of the IPCC report. Not even Mr. Lindzen disagrees with the science behind the report, just the predicted consequences. Until I see compelling evidence to the contrary I will go with the data that the top climate scientists in the world have compiled.

[edit] Looking at the second graph of the past 1000 years is even more telling. The warming coincides with widespread industrialization.

Nevertheless the rate and duration of warming of the 20th century has been much greater than in any of the previous nine centuries. Similarly, it is likely7 that the 1990s have been the warmest decade and 1998 the warmest year of the millennium.

And 2005 was warmer still.

[/edit]

 

[Bystander]

... go with the data that the top climate scientists in the world have compiled.

From http://www.nws.noaa.gov/pa/history/timeline.php

1933: A science advisory group apprizes President Franklin D. Roosevelt that the work of the volunteer Cooperative Weather observer network is one of the most extraordinary services ever developed, netting the public more per dollar expended than any other government service in the world. By 1990 the 25 mile radius network encompasses nearly 10,000 stations.
​

Examining the map from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mean_center_of_U.S._population the population center is near Columbus, Ind. in 1900 http://www.wunderground.com/NORMS/DisplayNORMS.asp?AirportCode=KBAK&SafeCityName=KBAK&StateCode=IN&Units=none ; Bloomington in 1930 http://www.wunderground.com/NORMS/DisplayNORMS.asp?AirportCode=KBMG&SafeCityName=KBMG&StateCode=IN&Units=none ; and Rolla, Mo. in 2000 http://www.wunderground.com/NORMS/DisplayNORMS.asp?AirportCode=KVIH&SafeCityName=KVIH&StateCode=MO&Units=none

"Volunteer observers" may, or may not, be distributed uniformly throughout the general population. Are they "New Soviet Citizens" loyal to their duties, tending fixed "weather outposts" for the "good of the proletariat?" Or, do they pack up and move with the job market like the rest of us?

Or, more bluntly, has the center of "mass" of the "global thermometer" moved to warmer climes?

The mid-June to August gap for Columbus is one of today's "features" for whatever's going on with the net --- it's more or less a set of equally ragged interpolations between the pairs of points defining the gaps in each record.

 

[Skyhunter]

Or, more bluntly, has the center of "mass" of the "global thermometer" moved to warmer climes?

When a volunteer weather and temperature observer moves from Columbus Indiana to Bloomington Indiana, don't you think he/she will report their new location as well as the temperature?

 

[Bystander]

http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/img/climate/research/ushcn/ts.ushcn_anom25_diffs_pg.gif

A "description" of these six "corrections" (don't want to call them out and out fudge factors just yet) is included with the document from which the link to the plot of the "corrections" is taken,

http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/oa/climate/research/ushcn/ushcn.html#KDK88 .

Haven't been to the library yet to hunt down Karl, '86 and Karl '88; all should feel free to add summaries of these two papers (the two large "corrections" applied to temperature data in this case).

 

[edward]

Any data older than three or four years can be tossed out of the global warming equation. It doesn't really matter what the temperature of the Earth was in 1940-1960-or1980.

More recent studies are the gold standard now. The melting of the permafrost in Siberia alone will greatly affect the rate of global warming by increasing the amounts of CO2 and Methane in the atmosphere. This fact wasn't even considered relevant until recently.

The researchers found that what was until recently a barren expanse of frozen peat is turning into a broken landscape of mud and lakes, some more than a kilometre across.

Dr Kirpotin told the magazine the situation was an "ecological landslide that is probably irreversible and is undoubtedly connected to climatic warming". He added that the thaw had probably begun in the past three or four years

http://www.guardian.co.uk/climatechange/story/0,12374,1546824,00.html

Human activity does not have to be the total cause. Anthropogenic warming only had to be the catalyst that started the natural processes that are beginning.

 

[Skyhunter]

Why are you trying to confuse the issue?

Here is the final graph from the same website. Minus the raw data.

http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/img/climate/research/ushcn/ts.ushcn_anom25_diffs_urb-raw_pg.gif

Looks very similar to the one I linked in my previous post.

 

[Bystander]

That's called "clarification" of the issue; we're interested in discovering the origin of the temperature trend --- right now it's not based on the data, but on "corrections" to the data. Next question (already stated) is, "What are Karl's "corrections" based upon?"

 

[Skyhunter]

That's called "clarification" of the issue; we're interested in discovering the origin of the temperature trend --- right now it's not based on the data, but on "corrections" to the data. Next question (already stated) is, "What are Karl's "corrections" based upon?"

My apologies, I misunderstood.

This graph has the raw data.

http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/img/climate/research/ushcn/rawurban3.5_pg.gif

Karl's adjustments are explained in the Quality Control, Homogeneity Testing, and Adjustment Procedures section on the same NOAA website. For the exact methodology and procedures I guess we will have to read their publications.

Easterling, D.R., and T.C. Peterson, 1995: A new method of detecting undocumented discontinuities in climatological time series, Int. J. of Climatol., 15, 369-377.
Karl, T.R., C.N. Williams, Jr., P.J. Young, and W.M. Wendland, 1986: A model to estimate the time of observation bias associated with monthly mean maximum, minimum, and mean temperature for the United States, J. Climate Appl. Meteor., 25, 145-160.

Karl, T.R., and C.W. Williams, Jr., 1987: An approach to adjusting climatological time series for discontinuous inhomogeneities, J. Climate Appl. Meteor., 26, 1744-1763.

Karl, T.R., H.F. Diaz, and G. Kukla, 1988: Urbanization: its detection and effect in the United States climate record, J. Climate, 1, 1099-1123.

Karl, T.R., C.N. Williams, Jr., F.T. Quinlan, and T.A. Boden, 1990: United States Historical Climatology Network (HCN) Serial Temperature and Precipitation Data, Environmental Science Division, Publication No. 3404, Carbon Dioxide Information and Analysis Center, Oak Ridge National Laboratory, Oak Ridge, TN, 389 pp.

Peterson, T.C., and D.R. Easterling, 1994: Creation of homogeneous composite climatological reference series, Int. J. Climatol., 14, 671-680.

Quayle, R.G., D.R. Easterling, T.R. Karl, and P.Y. Hughes, 1991: Effects of recent thermometer changes in the cooperative station network, Bull. Am. Meteorol. Soc., 72, 1718-1724.

[edit] Maybe this thread is ready to be moved back into Earth Sciences Forum. [/edit]

 

[SOS2008]

We know there has been a history of dramatic climate changes on the Earth. This may well be cyclical most of the time, but some times it is due to cataclysmic events, such as an asteroid impact. The current climate changes also may be cyclical. However, the accelerated rate of change remains suspect. How much of an effect human activity is having on the rate of change may not need to be that large to "push the envelope" as it were.

Regardless of cause, ultimately the change is not likely to be a positive one. We must look at all the variables (e.g., deforestation) to slow or reverse the trend. To argue against this is very irresponsible and a great disservice to all. Including other species that we share this planet with:

"Is climate turning polar bears into cannibals?
U.S. and Canadian scientists report kills linked to shrinking ice"
http://msnbc.msn.com/id/13288936/?GT1=8211

 

[Bystander]

(snip)This graph has the raw data.(snip)Karl's adjustments are explained in the Quality Control, Homogeneity Testing, and Adjustment Procedures section ...(snip)

Thank you for going through the link.

[edit] Maybe this thread is ready to be moved back into Earth Sciences Forum. [/edit]

Prolly, it ain't --- still getting "political" positions on the question --- and, those do NOT belong in Earth Science.

Back to USHCN, and raw data plus six corrections; let's just play with the "Urban Heat Island" (UHI) for the moment. The argument is that urbanization over the past century has affected temperatures recorded by stations around which urban centers have built in, increasing them over time. Is that your understanding?

Further, since we're interested in the "temperature signal" resulting from climate change, it's necessary to apply a "correction" if the UHI effect can be quantified (Karl '88)?

"Karl '88" uses satellite data to quantify the UHI from daytime and nighttime IR data over urban and rural areas within same, or similar, regions, microclimates, climate zones, whatever. From this, Karl, USHCN, or others, arrive at a UHI effect which increases from near zero at the beginning of the century to 0.3 degree at the end of the century.

Then, since the raw data includes the UHI effect, and the climate signal is the information of interest, the time dependent correction is ADDED ??! to the raw data?

Understand that I've concluded nothing to this point; description of "adjustment procedures" on the USHCN page is unacceptably vague from the standpoint of publication in the scientific literature, and translation from the "turnip-speak" of internet pages for public consumption to some idea of what was actually done during data reduction is a bit of a slow and painful process --- that's what libraries are for --- Karl is on the list for the next trip. The sciences are full of "sign conventions," European vs. American redox potentials, q+w vs. q-w in thermo --- the climate crowd may have borrowed some sort of "debit-credit" system from bookkeepers, and I'm just tripping over their definition of "correction."

 

[Skyhunter]

Thank you for going through the link.

thank you for posting it.

Back to USHCN, and raw data plus six corrections; let's just play with the "Urban Heat Island" (UHI) for the moment. The argument is that urbanization over the past century has affected temperatures recorded by stations around which urban centers have built in, increasing them over time. Is that your understanding?

Yes it is. I find the science fascinating and would like to hear of your trip through to the library.

Back to the politics.

Referring back to Edwards point about data from the last few years only, being relevant to what is happening now is poignant. The oceans are warming rapidly and as anyone who lives next to a coast can attest, the water warms and cools much slower than the land and air.

From the link Edward posted.

In an interview with the BBC Barnett noted that the world's oceans cover around 71 percent of the Earth's surface, and that what happens in them therefore has significant consequences on the world's weather and climate. The study used advanced computer models of climate "to calculate human-produced warming over the last 40 years in the world's oceans," said Scripps' bulletin. "In all of the ocean basins, the warming signal found in the upper 700 meters predicted by the models corresponded to the measurements obtained at sea with confidence exceeding 95 percent. The correspondence was especially strong in the upper 500 meters of the water column."

The bulletin noted that it is this "high degree of visual agreement and statistical significance that leads Barnett to conclude that the warming is the product of human influence. Efforts to explain the ocean changes through naturally occurring variations in the climate or external forces- such as solar or volcanic factors--did not come close to reproducing the observed warming."

95% is the threshold of statistical significance. If the warming is real, and the ocean temperature in my mind is a certain indicator of global warming, and that warming is significantly due to human activity, then that is a political problem that should be dealt with, not denied because there is a 5% chance, or 10%, 20%, even 50% chance it could be something else.

To argue that there is nothing we can do because soon we won't be the major contributor is shirking the responsibility this country has to lead the world through innovation and example.

America has the resources, we should be taking the lead not sitting on the sideline in denial.

 

[Bystander]

Quote:
(snip)Back to the politics.

Referring back to Edwards point about data from the last few years only, being relevant to what is happening now is poignant. The oceans are warming rapidly and as anyone who lives next to a coast can attest, the water warms and cools much slower than the land and air.

From the link Edward posted.

Quote:
In an interview with the BBC Barnett noted that the world's oceans cover around 71 percent of the Earth's surface, and that what happens in them therefore has significant consequences on the world's weather and climate. The study used advanced computer models of climate "to calculate human-produced warming over the last 40 years in the world's oceans," said Scripps' bulletin. "In all of the ocean basins, the warming signal found in the upper 700 meters predicted by the models corresponded to the measurements obtained at sea with confidence exceeding 95 percent. The correspondence was especially strong in the upper 500 meters of the water column."

The bulletin noted that it is this "high degree of visual agreement and statistical significance that leads Barnett to conclude that the warming is the product of human influence. Efforts to explain the ocean changes through naturally occurring variations in the climate or external forces- such as solar or volcanic factors--did not come close to reproducing the observed warming."

The Guardian links to Scripps and AAAS didn't go anywhere but to "treasure hunting" generic sites --- so, let's see what we can come up with for "predicted signals" (the LLNL model) and field data that are going to confirm the model and AGHGW. Little snooping gives depth-T profiles for vicinity of Canary Islands ( http://www.atlantic-cable.com/Cables/1970TRANSCAN/ ), and the summer-winter variation at 700 m is 3 K. That's almost entirely due to vertical mixing processes; summer-winter insolation rate difference is around 60W/m², and that'll account for maybe 1-2%. Vertical temperature gradient is 15-20 mK/m. Depth control on towed or stationary measurements (currents dragging instrument cables sideways) isn't going to be much better than 10 m; 0.15 to 0.20 K is going to be the smallest difference I can see and call significant. Year to year variations in the summer-winter difference? Due to decadal variations in average surface wind speeds? Drifting of gyres? "Whipping" of currents (Gulf Stream, Humboldt, Japanese, you name it)? Order of 1 K --- maybe more. How densely populated is the field data to which the model is compared? No more densely than any other oceanographic data type --- translates as "sparse." The "model predictions?" Gonna be based on a "greenhouse" decrease in surface heat loss of 1-2 W/m², over 40 a, is around 0.5 K at 700 m --- not really out of the background noise level.

95% is the threshold of statistical significance. If the warming is real, and the ocean temperature in my mind is a certain indicator of global warming, and that warming is significantly due to human activity, then that is a political problem that should be dealt with, not denied because there is a 5% chance, or 10%, 20%, even 50% chance it could be something else.

To argue that there is nothing we can do because soon we won't be the major contributor is shirking the responsibility this country has to lead the world through innovation and example.

America has the resources, we should be taking the lead not sitting on the sideline in denial.

"Tipping point" is one phrase to "tip" you off to the fact that you're being handed a line. "Smoking gun" is another. "Efforts to explain the _______ through naturally occurring variations in the climate or external forces- such as solar or volcanic factors--did not come close to reproducing the observed warming," is yet another --- it translates as, "We are either too incompetent to recognize the factors affecting the system we're examining, or we're too damned lazy to do so, and would rather pull the wool over peoples' eyes if they're too lazy to call us on it."

 

[SOS2008]

While the climate system is very complex and difficult to model precisely, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) is increasingly certain that humans have a discernible influence on the global climate. Confirmation of the measured warming trend is substantiated by the rise in sea level of between four and 10 inches that has occurred since 1900 and the decrease in the average snow cover and glacial ice worldwide. Unseasonable weather phenomena are becoming commonplace and intensities appear to be increasing. A continued increase in greenhouse gas emissions, and the associated temperature rise, is likely to accelerate the rate of climate change, producing further impacts.

http://www.climatechange.ca.gov/background/faqs.html

Increased emissions of greenhouse gases have led to changes in precipitation, ocean salinity, CO2 absorption by the sea, water temperature, winds and pH levels. This is having a demonstrated impact on marine ecology and fisheries. The Inter-Governmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) reports that marine-disease and algal species are affected by these factors and that “in recent decades there has been an increase in reports of diseases affecting coral reefs and sea grasses, particularly in the Caribbean and temperate zones” (14)

Future climate change scenarios and models vary widely, but all agree that marine ecology will change significantly and quickly.

The IPCC is a UN-funded group of 2,500 leading climate scientists. Their fifth technical report found that coral reef systems have already begun to be affected by climate change, and refers to flow-on effects – being recorded now – that affect temperate zone fisheries too. In Australia, for example, it is predicted that temperate endemic species will be more severely affected than tropical (AGO, 2003).

A report commissioned by WWF (Are we putting our fish in hot water?) found that increased ocean temperatures means less food, less offspring and even less oxygen for marine and freshwater fish populations.

Global warming can cause fish populations to migrate: fish stocks in the North Sea have been forced to move scores of miles north to cooler waters, according to a study by climate change scientists

One scientist that took part in the North Sea study said: "What's striking is people tend to think of climate change as something that's going to affect us in the future, whereas more and more we're seeing signs that these changes are already happening and are going to continue."

via a link on this site: http://risingtide.org.au/node/60

I don't have time to google for more sources at this moment. But why argue about modeling methods to predict the future when there are variables such as rising water levels, shrinking glaciers/ice, etc. that can be clearly measured right NOW?

 

[Bystander]

http://www.climatechange.ca.gov/background/faqs.html

via a link on this site: http://risingtide.org.au/node/60

I don't have time to google for more sources at this moment. But why argue about modeling methods to predict the future when there are variables such as rising water levels, shrinking glaciers/ice, etc. that can be clearly measured right NOW?

From the IPCC: http://www.grida.no/climate/ipcc_tar/wg1/420.htm#tab118 ; the table is the only thing we're interested in at the moment, IPCC estimates of terrestrial (continental --- excluding Antarctica and Greenland) contributions to mean sea level over the past century as annual rates for assorted terms in the global mass balance for water. Dept. of Interior's figures for U. S. are that the nation has pumped 1000 km³/a for the last 20-25a. Global pumping is around 3000. Hydrologists estimate the average recharge time for aquifers exposed to normal rainfall (whatever that is) to be 3ka. Wells tapping aquifers in the U. S. exhibit water level drops of hundreds of feet over the century. That's right, this is P&WA --- I've got to do the arithmetic for people --- 100,000 -180,000 km³ pumped from aquifers globally over past century. IPCC says 90% went right back in --- a bit of a disagreement with hydrologists, conservationists, and well water levels, but we'll let that slide for the mo'. For the math impaired, a 10 cm sea level rise is a change in ocean volume of 35,000 km³; using IPCC's 90% recharge, that's 0.3-0.5 mm/a over the century. Using hydrologists' recharge rates, "... aquifers are being pumped at many times the recharge rate," we're into the field of "adjectival quantification," or, more colloquially, "hand-waving." What does "many times" equal numerically? Probably more than IPCC's 1.1 --- 1.5? That's a 70% recharge rate, implies aquifers would recover in decades rather than millennia (the 3000a recharge figure), puts 30-54,000km³ into the oceans, pretty much in line with the 10-20 cm rises for the 20th century. What's IPCC missed? Aquifers were full "to the brim" at the end of the last ice age --- melting at the ice-substrate interface (ground) had been going on at the rate of 0.1 - 1.0 mm/a for a couple hundred thousand years, and that crustal heat flow meltwater had no place to go but into the ground. Ice age ends, and the aquifers are back to precipitation recharge --- they "relax" to some new steady state water level that is a function of recharge rate, porosity (capacity), and permeability (controls rate of lateral movement in response to whatever pressure head is present). What's the time constant for that relaxation? Archaeologists have been locating coastal settlements 10 m below current sea level, ages around 6ka, at the rate of one every 2-4 years. Sea level stopped rising at the time of the Renaissance? The industrial age? Don't think so --- there's going to be a natural background rate that's on the order of 3-30 cm a century just from aquifer relaxation. Whatta we got? 13-50 cm rise for the 20th century without having to melt anything --- an overstatement of GW as THE driver for sea level change.

What's next? Melting tundra? Accelerating glaciers? Atmospheric CO₂ levels?

Tundra? Okay --- this is a homework assignment: calculate the change in heat transport northward through the Bering Strait due only to a 10 cm increase in sea level; report the result in mid-summer insolation days at the latitude of the Arctic Circle for 10,000 km² and 100,000 km² areas.

Glaciers? Extra credit: write an expression for flow at any point of a circular ice sheet of fixed radius sitting on a perfectly flat surface bounded by a drop-off, or sink, being replenished at a uniform rate over its areal extent by snowfall; use cylindrical coordinates, with origin at the center of the ice sheet.

CO₂? This is an "n"-parter: compare annual fossil fuel emissions to annual exchange between atmosphere and biosphere (terrestrial and marine); compare equilibrium solubility in oceans with total carbon content of oceans; estimate a "sequestration" rate for the marine biosphere from the marine carbon content and the circulation time for the oceans; compare this to the annual catch by commercial fisheries; compare the "sequestration" rate to marine productivity; compare the sequestration rate to historical estimates of "commercial" fish stocks.

 

[edward]

No homework assignments for me thanks. Your are basing too much on sea levels transferring heat north?? The sun will do that as snow and ice melt and the bare dark exposed Earth absorbs much more heat than the reflective snow or ice. Plus that bare unfrozen ground only needs a fraction of the amount of the heat that was needed to thaw it to warm it significantly.

This is already happening in several vast areas. That is why the permafrost is melting. The Siberian permafrost alone will nearly double the amount of CO2 presently in the atmosphere. see the link.

People are too hung up on old data. It is the information which is new that will be the big surprise, especially in determining the rate of accelerated change in the global warming issue.

 

[SOS2008]

<snip>

Skipping past the unnecessary insults... The growing human population has increased demand for potable water, which is only a small percentage of the total amount of water on the Earth. So if this water is being pumped faster to meet growing needs and resulting in lower aquifer levels, that would be no surprise to anyone. If anything, it is only an additional concern.

Global warming causes hot, arid regions to become hotter and more arid, and wet regions to become wetter. When there is rain, it becomes more torrential and erosive. That means potable water will simply become less available in more areas of the world. It's certainly a big concern here in the Southwest, for example:

"Due to last summer's drought conditions, the soil is very dry, deeper ground water is reduced and water storage reservoirs are well below average. Therefore, a significant portion of the melt from this year's snowpack will be absorbed into the ground and into ground water before beginning to fill depleted reservoirs," said Pielke. "It will take more than average snowpack to produce average runoff into reservoirs, and much more than an average snowpack to fill the depleted reservoirs to average levels."

Other climate and weather experts agree. According to NOAA's U.S. Drought Outlook, recent storms greatly improved water supply prospects in Colorado's basins. However, the report states that the odds for significant change in the status of the long-term drought decline as the snow season wanes, and their forecast is for limited improvement.

http://ccc.atmos.colostate.edu/newsapr1.php

In addition to water shortages, there are increasing wildfires that affect the atmosphere. For how long does this trend need to continue before the consequences are serious? What can be done to reverse it? I don't understand why anyone would not want to address such questions.

 

[Skyhunter]

According to the study cited in this article the rate of rise in sea level is accelerating.

In an attempt to reduce the scale of uncertainty in this projection, the Australian researchers have analysed tidal records dating back to 1870.

The data was obtained from locations throughout the globe, although the number of tidal gauges increased and their locations changed over the 130-year period.

These records show that the sea level has risen, and suggest that the rate of rise is increasing.

Over the entire period from 1870 the average rate of rise was 1.44mm per year.

Over the 20th Century it averaged 1.7mm per year; while the figure for the period since 1950 is 1.75mm per year.

Although climate models predict that sea level rise should have accelerated, the scientists behind this study say they are the first to verify the trend using historical data.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/4651876.stm

During my reading about sea levels I read that approximately 6% of total water influx to the oceans and seas comes from direct groundwater discharge.

Change in climate means there is a change in precipitation and evaporation rates, constituents of the hydrologic cycle, which affect surface runoff, and groundwater and ocean levels (Klige, 1990; Zester and Loaiciga, 1993; Loaiciga et al., 1996).

If the rate of rise is increasing, is it due only to the pumping of groundwater?

 

[Bystander]

No homework assignments for me thanks. Your are basing too much on sea levels transferring heat north??]/QUOTE]

Nope. That was the point of the homework --- you inform yourself, we don't have to go through this drill.

Atlantic conveyor moves heat northward to the tune of 10¹⁵W; current through the Bering Strait moves heat northward into the Chukchi Sea at 4x10¹³W. Atlantic heat keeps Europe warm enough to be inhabitable. The heat transferred to the Chukchi from N. Pac. is then transferred to Siberia by the southwesterly surface winds (driven by the north polar atmospheric circulation cell and coriolis effects). Average depth of the Bering Strait is around 50m; sea level rise over the past century is 10-20 cm; flow increase is 0.2-0.4% --- water temperatures in N. Pac. haven't changed that much, so heat flow has increased by same amount, 0.2-0.4W/m² over the area of the Chukchi. Average insolation above the Arctic Circle? 15-20W/m². Increase "expected" due to "GHW?" Around 1%, 0.2W/m². Sea level rise is real. The north polar atmospheric convection is real. GHW should affect the entire Arctic Circle uniformly, not in spots.

(snip)
People are too hung up on old data.

That was Aristotle's complaint, wasn't it? You know --- the guy who spontaneously created mice from piles of old clothes.

"Climate" isn't too well defined; the closest thing I've seen to a decent definition as far as taking a scientific approach is that, "Climate is an average temperature." I'd add, "and other variables describing weather, wind speed, direction, humidity, rainfall," you get the picture; and I'd specify the time period over which these variables are to be averaged, 200 year sliding average, global (over all time of observation); something along the lines of tide gauging --- you set up your tide station, you run it for 26 years (lets you "look" at the precession of the lunar orbital axis), then you start reporting 26 year sliding averages of "mean sea level" for 13 years earlier. Lunar precession affects weather patterns; solar sunspot cycles (9-11 years) also affect weather patterns; we're looking at a minimum time span for a "climatic sliding average" of 200-300 years to see all combinations of lunar and solar effects on weather before we can start reporting 100-150 year old climate data.

It is the information which is new that will be the big surprise,

Computer models? No surprise --- GIGO, couple truckloads of lousy meteorological data (perfectly serviceable for its original purpose, weather prediction), plus a couple dozen flaky assumptions, push the button, and out pop a couple truckloads of garbage plus a couple dozen flaky assumptions all dressed up as the "latest in climate models."

especially in determining the rate of accelerated change in the global warming issue.

 

[Astronuc]

I am not sure about the 'scientific consensus'. There are scientists who support GW, and those who disagree. Clearly politics is involved. For example, Exxon-Mobil sponsors some scientific groups who question GW, so one has to question the integrity of those groups.

Meanwhile,

http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=3412657607654281729&q=tvshow%3ACharlie_Rose (availability might be limited timewise)

An hour with former Vice President Al Gore. He discusses his new film, 'An Inconvenient Truth' and the science and politics surrounding global warming.

Visit www.climatecrisis.net (but turn the sound down - broadband may be necessary due to the graphics and audio).

More to the point -

http://www.climatecrisis.net/thescience/

http://www.climatecrisis.net/takeaction/

 

[Ivan Seeking]

There are scientists who support GW

I recently saw a bumper sticker on an old, smokey Suburban, that said:
I support global warming.

 

[Astronuc]

I recently saw a bumper sticker on an old, smokey Suburban, that said:
I support global warming.

Let me rephrase my comment then, "There are scientists who support the idea that human activity (vis-a-vis production of greenhouse gases) is primarily responsible for GW (i.e. increase in atmospheric and oceanic enthalpy), and those who believe human activity does not.

 

[edward]

No homework assignments for me thanks. Your are basing too much on sea levels transferring heat north??

Nope. That was the point of the homework --- you inform yourself, we don't have to go through this drill.

Below is your statement that I was referring to. It seems to be linking heat transferred north to sea levels. That is why I included the ?? in my post.

Tundra? Okay --- this is a homework assignment: calculate the change in heat transport northward through the Bering Strait due only to a 10 cm increase in sea level; report the result in mid-summer insolation days at the latitude of the Arctic Circle for 10,000 km2 and 100,000 km2 areas.

I AM NOT YOUR STUDENT so please refrain from this type of ulterior motive posting to sling insults, it is useless.

Atlantic conveyor moves heat northward to the tune of 10¹⁵W; current through the Bering Strait moves heat northward into the Chukchi Sea at 4x10¹³W. Atlantic heat keeps Europe warm enough to be inhabitable. The heat transferred to the Chukchi from N. Pac. is then transferred to Siberia by the southwesterly surface winds (driven by the north polar atmospheric circulation cell and coriolis effects). Average depth of the Bering Strait is around 50m; sea level rise over the past century is 10-20 cm

Very true, but as I am sure you are aware, the natural systems by which the oceans tranfer heat north are very fragile. The melting of the northern ice, and it is melting, will inevitably dilute the salinity of the northern ocean waters. This has been discussed in other threads. We may end up having Northern Europe freeze while the rest of the Earth is still warming.

"Climate" isn't too well defined; the closest thing I've seen to a decent definition as far as taking a scientific approach is that, "Climate is an average temperature." I'd add, "and other variables describing weather, wind speed, direction, humidity, rainfall," you get the picture; and I'd specify the time period over which these variables are to be averaged, 200 year sliding average, global (over all time of observation); something along the lines of tide gauging --- you set up your tide station, you run it for 26 years (lets you "look" at the precession of the lunar orbital axis), then you start reporting 26 year sliding averages of "mean sea level" for 13 years earlier. Lunar precession affects weather patterns; solar sunspot cycles (9-11 years) also affect weather patterns; we're looking at a minimum time span for a "climatic sliding average" of 200-300 years to see all combinations of lunar and solar effects on weather before we can start reporting 100-150 year old climate data.

Thank you sir. You have summed up exactly why the use of extravagant old data is futile in determining what is happening right now because GW is happenning right now.

The Scripps studies which were backed up and supported by Livermore were enough to convince many people, with the possible exception of certain politicians who still live on a flat earth. Add the more recent melting of the permafrost data to that and we a big problem.

Here is an intersting link from the Woods Hole Institute.
http://www.whoi.edu/institutes/occi/viewArticle.do?id=9206

 

[Skyhunter]

I came across this in my studies.

[The following was posted by Dr. Jeff Masters (Ph.D. in air pollution meteorology from U. Michigan), and a co-founder of Weather Underground]

[see http://www.wunderground.com/blog/JeffMasters/ comment.html?entrynum=385&tstamp=200606]

I've had several people ask about the study Al Gore talked about in his movie, which found found no scientific papers disputing the reality of human-caused climate change over the past ten years. Well, to be sure, there have been a few papers disputing the reality of human-caused climate change published in the past ten years, but they didn't happen to have the key words "global climate change" included in their citations. The study Gore cites was published in December 2004 in Science magazine by Naomi Oreskes, a professor at UC San Diego. The article examined peer-reviewed studies in the world's major scientific journals between 1993 and 2003 containing the phrase "global climate change" as keywords. Oreskes found that 75% of the 928 articles with those key words in their citations agreed with the consensus position stated by the UN's panel on climate change, that the observed global warming over the past 50 years has been caused in part by human activity. The other 25% of the papers took no position, and none of the papers disagreed with the consensus view. While the study is not a perfect measure of the scientific uncertainty in the published literature, the study does show that an overwhelming majority of published scientific research supports the idea that human activity is significantly modifying Earth's climate.

As Gore noted in his movie, the situation is quite different in the media, where about half of the stories in the study he cited cast doubt on the reality of human-caused climate change. The media are fond of trying to report both sides of an issue, so in the name of journalistic fairness, the public is receiving a highly skewed view of the scientific debate on climate change. In many cases, the opposing views presented by the media are from fossil fuel industry-funded "think tanks" that routinely put out distorted and misleading science intended to confuse the public.

I've collected a list of climate change position papers put out by the major governmental scientific institutes of the world that deal with the atmosphere, ocean, and climate. All of these organizations agree that significant human-caused climate change is occurring:

United Nations IPCC American Meteorological Society NOAA U.S. National Academy of Sciences NASA EPA American Geophysical Union National Center for Atmospheric Research Royal Society of the United Kingdom Canadian Meteorological and Oceanographic Society

Science Council of Japan, Russian Academy of Science, Brazilian Academy of Sciences, Royal Society of Canada, Chinese Academy of Sciences, French Academy of Sciences, German Academy of Natural Scientists Leopoldina, Indian National Science Academy, Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei (Italy), Royal Society (UK)

Australian Academy of Sciences, Royal Flemish Academy of Belgium for Sciences and the Arts, Brazilian Academy of Sciences, Royal Society of Canada, Caribbean Academy of Sciences, Chinese Academy of Sciences, French Academy of Sciences, German Academy of Natural Scientists Leopoldina, Indian National Science Academy, Indonesian Academy of Sciences, Royal Irish Academy, Accademia Nazionale dei Lincei (Italy), Academy of Sciences Malaysia, Academy Council of the Royal Society of New Zealand, Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, and Royal Society (UK)

If anyone can find examples of governmental scientific organizations that deny the consensus position, I'd be happy to make a second list of links. Saudi Arabia and Kuwait have long been hostile to international climate change negotiations, so their scientific organizations may well have official positions opposing the consensus. However, the Saudis are apparently changing their stance, as announced in May 2006 at a U.N. sponsored meeting in Germany. "I believe the petroleum industry should actively engage in policy debate on climate change as well as play an active role in developing and implementing carbon management technologies to meet future challenges," said the president of the Saudi state-run oil industry giant, Aramco. In 2005, both Saudi Arabia and Kuwait signed and ratified the Kyoto Protocol to limit greenhouse gases. The Protocol does not call on them to reduce their emissions.

In summary, there is an overwhelming level of scientific consensus on human-caused climate change. Those who defend the contrary view are fond of pointing out that we shouldn't stifle their opposing point of view, since heroes like Galileo with his sun-centered solar system view and Wegener with his continental drift theory both challenged the overwhelming scientific consensus of their day and were proved to be correct. That is true. However, Galileo and Wegener did not have the public relations staff of multi-billion dollar companies helping them promote their contrary views. I'm not too worried about the contrarian view of human-caused climate change being stifled, and contrarians are encouraged to publish in the peer-reviewed scientific literature. I would like to see the media sharply reduce their coverage of the contrary views of such think tanks as the Competitive Enterprise Institute, George C. Marshall Foundation, and scientists such as S. Fred Singer of the SEPP. Let's focus on the published scientific literature.

Jeff Masters

Are there any governmental scientific institutions denying AGW?

[edit] Go to his web page for links to the position papers of the above mentioned science institutes. [/edit]

 

[Bystander]

I am not sure about the 'scientific consensus'. There are scientists who support GW, and those who disagree. Clearly politics is involved. For example, Exxon-Mobil sponsors some scientific groups who question GW, so one has to question the integrity of those groups.
(snip)

--- and, GE, Westinghouse, Bechtel, Brown & Root (the nuclear power club), the insurance industry (anticipatory rate hikes to cover increased casualty losses), and, the biggie, the Chicago Board of Trade --- got to be hundreds of billions a year in CO₂ futures. There's plenty of money on both sides, and BIIGGG stakes.

_______________________________________________________

I recently saw a bumper sticker on an old, smokey Suburban, that said:
I support global warming.

https://www.physicsforums.com/showthread.php?t=114123

________________________________________________________

Below is your statement that I was referring to. It seems to be linking heat transferred north to sea levels. That is why I included the ?? in my post.

Increased sea level implies increased mass transport through the Bering Strait implies increased heat transport. If you're talking about melting in the Arctic Circle region you are familiar with the geography?

"Climate" isn't too well defined; (snip); we're looking at a minimum time span for a "climatic sliding average" of 200-300 years to see all combinations of lunar and solar effects on weather before we can start reporting 100-150 year old climate data.

You have summed up exactly why the use of extravagant old data is futile in determining what is happening right now because GW is happenning right now.

I'm paraphrasing because I'm not certain I understand what you're saying here: you are asserting that you can, from a single observation, with no history of the system, determine the dynamic state of the system and predict its future behavior? Don't wanta go putting words into your fingers.

 

[Skyhunter]

Aramco has reversed it's position on AGW.

http://planetark.org/dailynewsstory.cfm?newsid=36492&newsdate=23-May-2006

"I believe the petroleum industry should actively engage in policy debate on climate change as well as play an active role in developing and implementing carbon management technologies to meet future challenges," Saudi Aramco president and CEO, Abdallah Jumah, told the meeting.

"National oil companies -- like Saudi Aramco -- can make meaningful contributions to those efforts," he said.

The oil industry accounts for up to 40 percent of carbon dioxide increase in the atmosphere which scientists believe is the prime cause of global warming, Robert Socolow of Princeton University said on the sidelines of the meeting.

Aramco officials said the company had already begun research on removing carbon dioxide given off by oil during shipping in tankers and filling empty oilfields with the unwanted gas instead of salt water.

"We are beginning to see in the oil industry ... some companies making that (reducing carbon emission) part of their strategies," said Adnan Shihab-Eldin, former secretary-general of oil producer cartel OPEC.

Is this the beginning of a more general acceptance of AGW and the start of serious efforts to mitigate the possible consequences?

 

[Mech_Engineer]

Man, this thread is going to wander on forever... And I do mean wander... The emotion is still running high, but the "evidence," if it can be called that, is growing thin. Perhaps we are beginning to revisit the stongest arguments of pgs. 1-3?

I'd like to state that after reading through this entire thread (all 6 pages of it, thus far. I'll bet it will hit 20 at this rate...) there have been arguments for and against AGW, but the fact is there is no definitive end-all evidence for or against it. Data is still being taken, and as our methods imporve, so too will our predictions.

I like to think of the overall consensus on climate change as a uniform standard deviaition curve: most of the arguments are in the middle, and they taper off as we get closer to "AGW is happening, no doubt about it" or "AGW is a crock, we can't change the planet." The overall average of the arguments is a big fat ZERO, wherever someone is arguing within the curve.

The only thing I can definitively say is that the Earth's climate, in some form or another, will continue on with or without our discussion. Earth is definitely NOT going to turn into Venus, and "Waterworld" and "The Day After Tomorrow" are at the very edges of my standard distribution. Man, it's going to be cool when we look back at times like this 10 or 25 or 50 years down the road and laugh at how misguided we were

Sorry to interrupt the heated debate (if it can still be called that), I'm going to move on to greener pastures. Something like Thermodynamics is actually quite refreshing after mucking through AGW debates...

 

[Skyhunter]

Atlantic conveyor moves heat northward to the tune of 1015W; current through the Bering Strait moves heat northward into the Chukchi Sea at 4x1013W. Atlantic heat keeps Europe warm enough to be inhabitable. The heat transferred to the Chukchi from N. Pac. is then transferred to Siberia by the southwesterly surface winds (driven by the north polar atmospheric circulation cell and coriolis effects). Average depth of the Bering Strait is around 50m; sea level rise over the past century is 10-20 cm; flow increase is 0.2-0.4% --- water temperatures in N. Pac. haven't changed that much, so heat flow has increased by same amount, 0.2-0.4W/m2 over the area of the Chukchi. Average insolation above the Arctic Circle? 15-20W/m2. Increase "expected" due to "GHW?" Around 1%, 0.2W/m2. Sea level rise is real. The north polar atmospheric convection is real. GHW should affect the entire Arctic Circle uniformly, not in spots.

I agree that the oceans are responsible for the thawing that is happening in the Arctic. I just think it is more the Atlantic ocean.

http://www.answers.com/topic/arctic-ocean

Since the Arctic's connection with the Pacific Ocean is narrow and very shallow, its principal exchange of water is with the Atlantic Ocean through the Greenland Sea. Even there, though surface waters communicate freely and a strong subsurface current brings warm water from the Atlantic into the Arctic basin, exchange of deeper waters is barred by submarine ridges. Thus a near stagnant pool of very cold water is found at the bottom of the Arctic basin.

And as you can see by this map the Norwegian current would bring much more warm heat into the Arctic Ocean than would spill over the Bering Strait.

This is interesting, and I believe supports my argument.

http://www.fou.uib.no/fd/1997/f/406001/

Ocean Weather Ship Station M
(66°N, 2°E)
The longest existing homogeneous time series from the deep ocean

The low temperature of the Norwegian Sea Deep Water (NSDW) is maintained by the contribution of the Greenland Sea Deep Water (GSDW). The bottom water in the Greenland Sea is renewed locally by surface cooling of relative fresh water, resulting in the coldest bottom water found in the deep ocean. NSDW is formed by mixing GSDW and the deep water from the Arctic Ocean. The recent warming of the NSDW has its forerunner in an even more markedly warming of the GSDW, see figure 5, consonant with the idea that the deep water formation in the Greenland Sea has ceased. The Greenland Sea and the Norwegian Sea basins are separated by the Mohn Ridge (Figure 1), and the exchange of water masses between the two deep basins takes place through a channel which has a threshold depth of 2200 m and is situated just north of Jan Mayen. Since the warming of GSDW appears to have continued unchecked to date, (Figure 5) the cessation of warming observed in the NSDW since 1990 is certainly unexpected, (Figure 4) suggesting that as GSDW production has (virtually) ceased, the transport through the Jan Mayen Channel may have reduced or even reversed, see figure 6, cutting off the deep Norwegian Sea from the influence of the GSDW and its changes, see Østerhus and Gammelsrød, 1996, and Østerhus et al., 1996.

 

[Skyhunter]

I'm going to move on to greener pastures.

Is that like cutting and running?

https://www.physicsforums.com/showpost.php?p=1006806&postcount=25

Oh man, this topic really gets me revved up...

 

[edward]

Increased sea level implies increased mass transport through the Bering Strait implies increased heat transport. If you're talking about melting in the Arctic Circle region you are familiar with the geography?

I do know the approximate location of the Arctic Circle.

But since the oceans have not yet warmed enough to produce any dramatic increase in temperature or transport of heat, and the increase in sea level is still minimal, what is your point with all of the data and homework demands??

You didn't mention the melting of the ice in antarctica. Is that due to conveyor activity? What about the melting of the ice in Glacier national park in Wyoming?

you are asserting that you can, from a single observation, with no history of the system, determine the dynamic state of the system and predict its future behavior?[/B] Don't wanta go putting words into your fingers.

Absolutely not! We have plenty of history of the system and how it works, your own posts indicate that. What I am saying for the 42 time is that until the Scripps study last year we never really had any data that we could hang our hats on.
At this point we need to quit fiddling around with data and concepts from 100 years ago and get some real scientific measurments.

Getting large numbers of temperature transponders in the water under that arctic ice to see what is happening right now and for the duration of the problem would be a good start. We have had the technology to do this for many many years.(this is actually being done currently , but with limited funding and with one unit which must stay at a constant depth. It is a recording device that can only be accessed when the ice thaws in the summer.)

I have read numerous articles n scientific publications that indicate that when significant melting has taken place the process will accelerate very rapidly. No one knows that point, but with the right equipment in the right places it most likely could be determined.

Standing around watching the ice melt or placing thermometers in remote locations of the oceans , and then waiting twenty years to process the data is ridiculous. Yet this is the method that has been prescribed and funded by political and special interests.

 

[Bystander]

(snip)But since the oceans have not yet warmed enough to produce any dramatic increase in temperature or transport of heat,

Warming of the oceans is not necessary for heat transport --- all that is required is a temperature difference between the source of the heat (tropical and temperate zones of N. Atl. or N. Pac.) and the regions to which the heat is delivered (Arctic). Exchange of heat with air masses then raises (or lowers) the air temperature and lowers (or raises) the temperature of the water. The amount of heat transported is equal to the mass of water transported times the heat capacity of the water times the temperature difference between the water (10-15 C for N. Atl. and N. Pac. --- give or take), and 4 C, the temperature for maximum density of water (at which it definitely sinks out of contact with air --- actually at some higher temperature --- whatever yields enough density difference to result in sinking).

and the increase in sea level is still minimal,

The Bering Strait is shallow (averages 50m depth), and currents through it are not fully developed in the sense that there is a boundary layer effect from the shallow bottom; water velocity at the bottom is zero, and increases as the surface is approached. Increasing the depth of water by the 10-20 cm cited for increased sea level increases the flow rate through the strait, and as a result, the heat transport, without any increase in the temperature of the N. Pac.. The same argument does not apply to the Atlantic conveyor; the water depth, 2-3 km, is such that there is no boundary layer effect, drag, and, increased sea level has no effect on the flow rate. Increased heat transport to the West Arctic areas around the Chukchi is then a natural consequence of increased sea level.

what is your point with all of the data and homework demands??

I'm trying to get you to look at the identified physical properties of the system, and what effects those properties have on the system and its interactions with other systems which together comprise the climate of this planet.

You didn't mention the melting of the ice in antarctica. Is that due to conveyor activity?

South Atlantic, and South Pacific conveyors? Get mixed at the surface with the South Circumpolar Current (Roaring Forties, Furious Fifties, Seasick Sixties); and, the surface winds off Antarctica (south polar atmospheric convection cell) are blowing the wrong direction to transport heat to the Antarctic ice sheet.

What about the melting of the ice in Glacier national park in Wyoming?

Wouldn't know a thing about GNP in Wyo.. Montana glaciers grow when it snows, and shrink when it doesn't --- you can call it drought, or you can call it global warming --- might as well ask me about the drought that erased the Anasazi --- was that global warming?

Absolutely not! We have plenty of history of the system and how it works, your own posts indicate that. What I am saying for the 42 time is that until the Scripps study last year we never really had any data that we could hang our hats on.

"Smoking gun?" What's necessary to establish temperature-depth profiles as a function of time as a meaningful measurement of anything?

1) a zero flow, or stagnant ocean, situation in which one monitors a change in profile with no questions about the thermal history of the sample location --- obviously not the case;
2) tagged sample volumes, water masses, that maintain their identity as they move, and that can be located after forty years for further measurement --- not on this planet --- water bodies can move cohesively in open deep water, but don't retain discernible identities for longer than months to a year, and technology might be near the threshold of tracking cohesive water movements, but ain't there yet;
3) a fixed circulation pattern in which every water parcel moves in a prescribed pattern (N. Atl., 2 turns in the Beaufort, down the west side of the mid-ocean ridge, deflect upward at the equator, warm, move back up the N. Atl., sink without riding Beaufort's merry-go-round, down the east side of the mid-ocean ridge, cross the equator, hop on the Antarctic circumpolar, do 5 1/2 circuits, move north on S. Pac. floor --- is this getting ridiculous enough to discard;
4) exact knowledge of ocean circulation patterns (some pattern, lots of chaos) that enables measurement of properties of water parcels with thermal histories identical to those measured previously --- ain't no such thing --- oceanographers dream about the day;
5) can someone come up with a plausible set of conditions for expecting T as a function of depth, lat, lon to remain constant?​

Smoking dope? Smoke blowing from some other orifice? 'Nother journalist's confabulation of what may, or may not, be decent science. Forty years at 2W/m² gives a maximum "signal" of 1 K for a perfectly mixed 600 m water column; natural variation is a minimum of 3 K. Picking 1 K from 4.5 K noise (the two measurement uncertainties added in quadrature) is humbuggery, picking a few hundredths to maybe a tenth (water stratifies by its density as a function of T) is crackpottery. The LLNL-Scripps study results as described in the link are garbage --- like I say, what got written in the link probably doesn't have anything to do with the subject or results of the study.

At this point we need to quit fiddling around with data and concepts from 100 years ago

Newton did his thing 300 years ago --- leave him out, and it ain't going to be science.

and get some real scientific measurments.

By all means.

Getting large numbers of temperature transponders in the water under that arctic ice to see what is happening right now and for the duration of the problem would be a good start. We have had the technology to do this for many many years.(this is actually being done currently , but with limited funding and with one unit which must stay at a constant depth. It is a recording device that can only be accessed when the ice thaws in the summer.)

The Navy's got truckloads of data --- getting them to "sanitize" it for declassification and public use would be a start --- write your congressman.

I have read numerous articles n scientific publications that indicate that when significant melting has taken place the process will accelerate very rapidly.

Enthalpy of fusion of water hasn't changed in the nearly two hundred years since it was first measured --- 't'aint likely to now.

No one knows that point, but with the right equipment in the right places it most likely could be determined.

Standing around watching the ice melt or placing thermometers in remote locations of the oceans , and then waiting twenty years to process the data is ridiculous. Yet this is the method that has been prescribed and funded by political and special interests.

It is necessary to know what is and what ain't going on before running off half-cocked --- you know that. Finding out what's going on takes time. Ill considered actions have huge consequences --- take a look back at the "Dustbowl" for an example.

 

[Astronuc]

--- and, GE, Westinghouse, Bechtel, Brown & Root (the nuclear power club), the insurance industry (anticipatory rate hikes to cover increased casualty losses), and, the biggie, the Chicago Board of Trade --- got to be hundreds of billions a year in CO2 futures. There's plenty of money on both sides, and BIIGGG stakes.

Yeah, but that's not scientific - most of that is based on emotion about what 'might' happen.

GW does correlate with rising CO₂ levels, but does not necessarily prove cause and effect.

It has been pointed out the water vapor H₂ also absorbs EM radiation (infrared and microwave) at much the same frequencies as CO₂. Could GW be simply a matter of natural positive feedback. On the other hand, humanity has cut down huge amounts of forest which stored water and maintained lower temperatures than bare land (or concrete and asphalt). Possibly cooling towers from fossil plants and evaporation from irrigation of agricultural land has contribued to additional moisture.

Also, humanity generates a lot of thermal energy through consumption of fossil fuels and nuclear energy. Much of the energy generation is based on the steam Rankine cycle which has about a 33-38% efficiency, meaning that nearly two-thirds of the thermal energy gets dumped right into the environment.

A solution could be reduce energy generation, reduce use of fossil fuels, develop more carbon sinks (fast growing vegetation, more trees, . . . ).

 

[Bystander]

Yeah, but that's not scientific - most of that is based on emotion about what 'might' happen.

You understand that these are the pro-greenhouse lobbying groups? Yes, the insurance industry and CBOT are very emotional about their wallets.

GW does correlate with rising CO₂ levels, but does not necessarily prove cause and effect.

It has been pointed out the water vapor H₂ also absorbs EM radiation (infrared and microwave) at much the same frequencies as CO₂. Could GW be simply a matter of natural positive feedback. On the other hand, humanity has cut down huge amounts of forest which stored water and maintained lower temperatures than bare land (or concrete and asphalt). Possibly cooling towers from fossil plants and evaporation from irrigation of agricultural land has contribued to additional moisture.

Atmospheric water content is reasonably constant at 10¹² tons (residence time about a week), enough to saturate the lower km of the atmosphere at 20-25 C. Frequency of events driving precipitation (movement up slopes or orogenic, overriding air masses, convection column cooling or thunderstorms, und so weiter) seems to limit water load to the teraton neighborhood.

Also, humanity generates a lot of thermal energy through consumption of fossil fuels and nuclear energy. Much of the energy generation is based on the steam Rankine cycle which has about a 33-38% efficiency, meaning that nearly two-thirds of the thermal energy gets dumped right into the environment.

Crackpot got locked in "Earth" couple days ago for this --- U. S. runs at 3 kW per capita, give or take, all uses --- TW; "5% of the world's population using 95% of the world's resources," but we'll assume we ain't that big a swarm of swine, and let the rest of the world have 2 TW, one for the EU, and one for everyone else; added to 1.25x10¹⁶ W solar input (still haven't convinced myself whether the 200 W "average" at the equator is or is not an overall average, so we'll stay on the short side) to radiate to the CMB is 0.02-0.03%, 0.005-0.006% in T, or 15-20 mK --- probably more like 3-5 mK, below threshold on absolute scale.

A solution could be reduce energy generation, reduce use of fossil fuels, develop more carbon sinks (fast growing vegetation, more trees, . . . ).

--- or, take a can of Drano to identifiably clogged carbon sinks --- commercial fisheries are suspect, but without carbon content from 1000 year cores from the Grand Banks, no one's going to prove anything.

 

[edward]

I'm trying to get you to look at the identified physical properties of the system, and what effects those properties have on the system and its interactions with other systems which together comprise the climate of this planet.

But you have only been concentrating on the N Atlantic and the Bering strait. They are definelty the areas most involved in the heat conveyor, but there is a lot more involved than those two places. Plus the warm ocean currents flowing northward would only increase the melting which would leave bare land and open oceans which will absorb even more heat.

South Atlantic, and South Pacific conveyors? Get mixed at the surface with the South Circumpolar Current (Roaring Forties, Furious Fifties, Seasick Sixties); and, the surface winds off Antarctica (south polar atmospheric convection cell) are blowing the wrong direction to transport heat to the Antarctic ice sheet.

Yet the antarctic ice has its own problems.
http://uwamrc.ssec.wisc.edu/iceberg.html

"Smoking gun?" What's necessary to establish temperature-depth profiles as a function of time as a meaningful measurement of anything?

1) a zero flow, or stagnant ocean, situation in which one monitors a change in profile with no questions about the thermal history of the sample location --- obviously not the case;
2) tagged sample volumes, water masses, that maintain their identity as they move, and that can be located after forty years for further measurement --- not on this planet --- water bodies can move cohesively in open deep water, but don't retain discernible identities for longer than months to a year, and technology might be near the threshold of tracking cohesive water movements, but ain't there yet;
3) a fixed circulation pattern in which every water parcel moves in a prescribed pattern (N. Atl., 2 turns in the Beaufort, down the west side of the mid-ocean ridge, deflect upward at the equator, warm, move back up the N. Atl., sink without riding Beaufort's merry-go-round, down the east side of the mid-ocean ridge, cross the equator, hop on the Antarctic circumpolar, do 5 1/2 circuits, move north on S. Pac. floor --- is this getting ridiculous enough to discard;
4) exact knowledge of ocean circulation patterns (some pattern, lots of chaos) that enables measurement of properties of water parcels with thermal histories identical to those measured previously --- ain't no such thing --- oceanographers dream about the day;
5) can someone come up with a plausible set of conditions for expecting T as a function of depth, lat, lon to remain constant?​

Smoking dope? Smoke blowing from some other orifice? 'Nother journalist's confabulation of what may, or may not, be decent science. Forty years at 2W/m² gives a maximum "signal" of 1 K for a perfectly mixed 600 m water column; natural variation is a minimum of 3 K. Picking 1 K from 4.5 K noise (the two measurement uncertainties added in quadrature) is humbuggery, picking a few hundredths to maybe a tenth (water stratifies by its density as a function of T) is crackpottery. The LLNL-Scripps study results as described in the link are garbage --- like I say, what got written in the link probably doesn't have anything to do with the subject or results of the study.

WOW, So to sum it up you are saying that everything that has been done in the past is useless, Scripps is garbage, and oceanographers don't have the science to measure what needs to be measured.

I am saying that 20% of the arctic ice has melted and we better be dam sure of exactly what is going on. And now, not 20 years from now. If we can measure the wind velocities and temperatures on the surface of other planets we can do what is necessary here on Earth to find out what we need to know. Lack of proper funding and political catering to special interests have been the biggest problem.

Enthalpy of fusion of water hasn't changed in the nearly two hundred years since it was first measured --- 't'aint likely to now.

But when there is little ice left to melt, the latent heat of fusion really won't matter. Heat enthalpy is not a factor on bare ground, or air. And with water it is only involved in change of state.

It is necessary to know what is and what ain't going on before running off half-cocked --- you know that. Finding out what's going on takes time. Ill considered actions have huge consequences --- take a look back at the "Dustbowl" for an example.

I don't think we are going to do much damage to the Earth by taking its temperature. There are few actions we can take, that would harm anything except the bottom line of the big energy companies.

 

[Bystander]

This kinda got lost in the shuffle ---

According to the study cited in this article the rate of rise in sea level is accelerating.

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/4651876.stm

During my reading about sea levels I read that approximately 6% of total water influx to the oceans and seas comes from direct groundwater discharge.

"6%" plus or minus what limits of uncertainty? Doing the global mass balance on water requires measuring discharge rates of all rivers, streams, trickles, rivulets, springs, glaciers, and I've missed a few, into the ocean, measuring evaporation from the sea surface, measuring pptn rate to the sea, measuring storage volumes of lakes, reservoirs, ice sheets, glaciers, aquifers, vadose water, water content of atmosphere, water content of lifeforms... Some of these items are reasonably constant, "bio-water," atmospheric load, vadose water (?), are about it from the list I've given --- the rest wander around seasonally, and with weather patterns (Pacific High moves, and pptn to sea increases or decreases at expense of decreased or increased pptn on N. Amer.). "Direct" groundwater discharge is what? What's pumped? Or, includes natural groundwater discharge? 6% of the twenty-five to thirty thousand cubic kilometers per year estimated for total discharge from all rivers, streams, ... , is fifteen to eighteen hundred cubic kilometers --- I've told you the global extraction rate is estimated to be three thousand --- that minus the "6% estimate" is the fraction lost to transpiration, groundwater "recharge" (since that's where it came from), and evaporation --- gives us an upper recharge rate of 40-50%, more like 20-25% including evaporation. (I'm sick of spelling out numbers --- back to sci. notation.)

Okay, I know that's not what you or the sources meant --- "6%" of the total contribution to sea level rise, 10-20 cm; multiplied by the area is 3.5-7.0x10⁴ km³, and all but "6%" comes from melting glaciers and ice sheets. Antarctica has an area of 1.4x10⁷ km², Greenland 2x10⁶, and we'll throw in another 4 for Canada, GNP, Siberia, Scandinavia, Kilamanjaro --- 2x10⁷ km² furnishing 3.5-7.0x10⁴ km³ of water. 3.5-7.0 divided by 2 is 1.75-3.5, 10⁴ divided by 10⁷ is 10^-3 --- 1.75-3.5 x 10^-3 km missing --- [sarcasm]that's not much, hardly noticeable.[/sarcasm]

1.5-3.0 meters of ice have vanished over the past century (1.5-3.0 cm/a), if melting is uniform over the entire area? And Ray Charles didn't spot it? 3.0 m isn't going to be that noticeable on barometric pressure readings, granted, and relating such measurements to those from early in the century isn't worth the effort at that level of resolution. Photos, topographic surveys, surface "dust" accumulations should exhibit some changes for melts of such magnitude.

If the rate of rise is increasing, is it due only to the pumping of groundwater?

Aquifers are "high impedance" water sources; you can pump at rate A from a single well, and half rate A from each of two wells (oversimplification). Pumping on the scale of the past century competes with my hypothesized natural groundwater relaxation by transmission to the oceans by reducing, or reversing flows through aquifers. Is the sum of pumping plus natural more or less than natural alone? Who knows? "Insufficient data." Is the global pumping rate increasing? "Insufficient data."

The temperature-depth profile crowd goes for thermal expansion --- going through the LLNL-Scripps study, maximum temperature signal for 40 years at 600 m depth from 2 W/m² decrease in heat loss from the sea surface (GH), came up with raising 600 m 1 K --- or 1500 m in a century; expansivity of water is around 30 ppm/K (once we get above the 4 C minimum --- and below 4 inversion), time 1500 m is 45,000 micrometers, or 4.5 cm per century.

Rate increasing? Tide gauges are reasonably reliable data sources --- comparing average rates over three different period lengths to derive a change in rate is questionable from a statistical standpoint --- pick a period length, plot it, and see what it looks like. Mixing periods boils down to something called "data torture," a trap statisticians are cautioned to avoid.

 

[Futobingoro]

10,000 years ago there was sudden and swift global warming. I find it a pity. If today's scientists had been there to implement emissions cuts, mankind could have averted climate change!

 

[Bystander]

But you have only been concentrating on the N Atlantic and the Bering strait. They are definelty the areas most involved in the heat conveyor, but there is a lot more involved than those two places. Plus the warm ocean currents flowing northward would only increase the melting which would leave bare land and open oceans which will absorb even more heat.

You ask about Siberia --- I talk about Siberia.

Yet the antarctic ice has its own problems.
http://uwamrc.ssec.wisc.edu/iceberg.html

Just looked at the S. Polar Stn. --- -89 F, 204 K, 100 W/m² maximum radiation to space; 6 mos. ago (Boreal winter), the north pole was at 240 K, radiating a maximum of 190 W/m². South polar atmospheric convection cell is transporting 100 W/m² from the "Seasick Sixties" to the continent, leaving a lot of heat behind to chew at the continental margins. 'Mong other things, comparing the Boreal and Austral winters, Austral winter leaves the rest of the planet with an extra 2-3 W/m² to get rid of by other means than polar heat loss. Compare this to the accepted paleoclimatic position that movement of the Antarctic continent to its polar location and opening of the Drake passage resulted in a cooling of the planet and its climate.

WOW, So to sum it up you are saying that everything that has been done in the past is useless, Scripps is garbage,

No, I'm saying that press releases, journalistic confabulations of managerial confabulations, and PR games are "garbage." You have to read the actual papers, skipping the "paeans to Chairman Mao" in the introductions and conclusions (ignore all the "weasel worded" "if" and other conditional statements that are inserted to allow funding bodies to put their own "spins" on the work).

and oceanographers don't have the science to measure what needs to be measured.

No, they have the science --- they do NOT have the data --- they are four or five orders of magnitude short in the size of data body necessary to reach conclusions of a global scale.

I am saying that 20% of the arctic ice has melted and we better be dam sure of exactly what is going on.(snip)

What's going on? The entropy of the universe is increasing. Little more detail? The Earth is intercepting 4.5x10^-10 of the sun's radiated energy, reflecting some, absorbing the rest and reradiating it to space. More? The absorbed energy is distributed about the surface of the planet by a combination of convective, conductive, and radiative heat transfer processes. Something quantitative? Be a while --- bundle of heat reservoirs and convective processes to identify, and a whole lotta measurements to be made.

Arctic pack ice thaws, open Arctic radiates heat at 200 + W/m², Atlantic conveyor speeds up, N. Atl. (equator to Arctic Circle) cools, conveyor slows, Arctic pack ice reforms, N. Canada dumps 1000 km³/a fresh water under ice pack forming insulating layer (no convective heat transfer from deeper Atl. water), heat builds up under pack, pack melts, and around and around we go.

But when there is little ice left to melt, the latent heat of fusion really won't matter. Heat (snip typo) is not a factor on bare ground, or air. And with water it is only involved in change of state.

This doesn't make sense after I fix the typo --- these are "tipping point, runaway" arguments?

I don't think we are going to do much damage to the Earth by taking its temperature.

I'm talking about the damage resulting from committing the global economy to actions based on conclusions drawn from inconclusive data.

 

[Skyhunter]

10,000 years ago there was sudden and swift global warming. I find it a pity. If today's scientists had been there to implement emissions cuts, mankind could have averted climate change!

Do you have some evidence of this that you could provide?

Or are you just being sarcastic?

 

[Skyhunter]

I'm talking about the damage resulting from committing the global economy to actions based on conclusions drawn from inconclusive data.

Now that is the crux of the biscuit.

What damage by converting to clean energy? The only people harmed are those that want to squeeze the last few trillion dollars from fossil fuels.

The reality is that the Earth is warming. The greenhouse effect is real and growing stronger as we continue to dump GHG into the environment. Lindzens theory that increased cloud cover would mitigate the effect is not playing out. It is hotter now than it has been in the last 400 years, perhaps the last 2000.

And the main argument is discount the science supporting AGW while decrying the economic damage of converting to clean energy.

What about the cost of not doing something?

Ask an asthmatic what the cost of air pollution is to them. Even without AGW converting to clean energy should be a priority.