Hansen signs Petition stating All man-made CO2 Must Stop and Reverse to Negative

Press Release 3/30/10 from 350.org & The Center For Biological Diversity (Where Life is Good (TM)):

the unobtainable goal (according to IPCC models of CO2 lifetime in the atmosphere-see below)

Campaign Launched to Gather 500,000 Signatures to Cap Greenhouse Gas Pollution at 350 Parts Per Million



Dr. James Hansen, Barbara Kingsolver, Ed Begley, Jr., Bonnie Raitt, Lemony Snicket, Sierra Club Board Member Among First Signers



WASHINGTON— The Center for Biological Diversity today launched a campaign to gather 500,000 signatures on a People’s Petition asking the Environmental Protection Agency to set a national pollution standard to reduce carbon dioxide pollution in the atmosphere to 350 parts per million. Atmospheric CO2 is currently at 390 parts per million and growing, causing a dangerous climate disruption.



The People’s Petition is in support of a Clean Air Act legal filing submitted by the Center and 350.org in December 2009 to set an upper limit of 350 parts per million on dangerous greenhouse gas pollution. The EPA is currently reviewing the request and is expected to render a decision later this year.



Though Congress and the White House have been crafting legislation, and the EPA is beginning the process of regulation, there is as yet no formal scientific standard determining what the safe level of carbon dioxide is and how deeply emissions need to be reduced to return to the safety zone.



According to actor and environmental activist, Ed Begley, Jr.:



“Setting climate policy without a scientific target is like driving with your eyes closed. You don’t know where you’re going and you’ll probably crash. The EPA should open everyone’s eyes as soon as possible by determining the safe level of greenhouse gases.”

Begley is joined as an initial signer of the petition by Dr. Jim Hansen of NASA, who said:



“Science demands that we reduce atmospheric carbon pollution to a level of 350 parts per million (ppm) or less to sustain life as we know it. Energy and climate policies must recognize this 350 ppm limit.”



The grassroots campaign is also supported by musician and activist Bonnie Raitt, who said:



“In 40 years of performing and working for social change, I’ve learned that the best, longest-lasting policy reforms come from the ground up. I hope that 500,000 people join me in asking the EPA to bring atmospheric carbon dioxide pollution back down to 350 parts per million. The lives of polar bears, sea turtles, and the human race depend on it.” [note to Bonnie on what's happening to arctic wildlife at CO2 of 390 ppm]



Bestselling author Barbara Kingsolver explained the ethical and personal imperative of establishing a clear, specific target for greenhouse gas pollution reduction:



“Reaching 350 ppm is a matter of living by my values – which include both ‘love your neighbor’ and ‘try not to wreck every blooming thing on the planet while you’re here.’”



Among the many notables joining these initial signers of the People’s Petition are activists Michael Dorsey (Sierra Club board member), Brock Evans (president of the Endangered Species Coalition), Dr. Helen Caldicott (anti-nuclear activist), former government official Curtis Moore (Republican counsel to the Senate’s Committee on Environment and Public Works), scientists Dr. Thomas Lovejoy (biodiversity chair, Heinz Center), Dr. Niles Eldredge (American Museum of Natural History) and Dr. John Terborgh (Center for Tropical Conservation, Duke University), and authors Lemony Snicket (i.e. Daniel Handler), Jonathan Lethem (author of Motherless Brooklyn), Rick Moody (author of The Ice Storm) and Donna Tartt (author of The Secret History).

Once again, pseudo-scientist Hansen leads the alarmist crusade without a shred of evidence to support his claim that "science demands" levels of CO2 below 350 ppm to "sustain life as we know it". [note to Hansen on what happens to trees and the rest of the biosphere at levels of CO2 higher than 350 ppm]. Even if this was true, according to the faulty theoretical computer models used by the IPCC, man-made CO2 remains in the atmosphere from hundreds to infinite years. Therefore, since the current CO2 level is 390 ppm, in order to get back to Hansen's goal of 350 ppm, mankind would not only have to drop CO2 production to absolute zero forever, but would in fact have to find a way to sequester the additional 40 ppm already in the atmosphere. The first part of this goal could be accomplished as suggested in a book Hansen recently highly endorsed, which concludes, "The only way to prevent global ecological collapse and thus ensure the survival of humanity is to rid the world of Industrial Civilization". Then he'll need to figure out how to sequester the 40 ppm over 350 ppm already in the atmosphere, because science demands it.

CO2 Lifetime: Which do you believe- Models or Data?

The IPCC loves theoretical computer models, even when said models have not been experimentally verified or actually contradict experimental data. However, as Richard Feynman, PhD, Nobel Laureate in Physics, famously said "It doesn't matter how beautiful your theory is, it doesn't matter how smart you are. If your theory doesn't agree with experiment, it's wrong". As shown in a prior post, the IPCC AR4 states that the models at the heart of the confidence level of at least 90% that man is responsible for global warming have not been tested against observational data and furthermore the necessary tests to evaluate the models have yet to be developed. In addition, observational satellite data has since shown uniformly that the models fail miserably. Let that not be an impedance to the settled consensus, however. 

An analogous situation is also true of the second most important foundation of the AGW hypothesis, whereby the estimates of the lifetime of CO2 in the atmosphere are based upon entirely theoretical unvalidated computer models which estimate CO2 lifetimes in the atmosphere of hundreds to thousands of years in stark contrast to scores of observational measurements which show an average maximum lifetime of about 5 years:

Red line is IPCC computer model estimate (should actually be multiple hundreds of years)

 

If man-made CO2 emissions only resided in the atmosphere ~5 years rather than the hundreds to infinite years asserted by the IPCC, then there would not be any urgency to drastically reduce CO2 emissions even if the IPCC climate models were correct.  I recently had an in-person & email exchange on this topic with a senior atmospheric scientist studying the effects of CO2 for a federal agency, in which he stated that the CO2 residence time in the atmosphere is in the hundreds to thousands of years, in agreement with the IPCC. He admitted that the theoretical models do not close the "carbon budget", in other words there is a large "missing sink" unaccounted for by the models (a recent paper explains that the "missing sink" may really just be due to the models overestimating CO2 lifetime). When I mentioned that the observational data shows residence time to average only about 5 years he was surprised and said he knew of no papers to support such a notion. I sent him a link to an excellent Guest Editorial at co2science.org by Tom V. Segalstad, PhD, Associate Professor of Resource and Environmental Geology, The University of Oslo, Norway, who is a world expert on this matter. 

The atmospheric scientist replied "This calculation for a residence time only uses the net removal rates of CO2 and does not appear to include the net sources.  The definition of  lifetime in the atmosphere does vary somewhat but it includes both sources and sinks.  As the natural sources and sinks almost exactly balance, it leads to a much larger lifetimes on the order of many hundreds of years." I forwarded this reply to Dr. Segalstad, who was kind enough to reply:

The lifetime of atmospheric CO2 has been measured in many ways: carbon-14, radon-222, the carbon-13/carbon-12 ratio, solubility, and kinetics. All these methods find a lifetime of CO2 of about 5 years (plus/minus some few years); far from many thousands of years.



See the Table 2 in my paper here: http://www.co2web.info/ESEF3VO2.pdf



IPCC and their coworkers assume that the recent rise in CO2 is due to anthropogenic CO2 (but this is not proven by carbon isotopes, which show that only 4-5 % of this rise in anthropogenic). Hence, they assert, anthropogenic CO2 must have a lifetime of several thousand years, if this CO2 is just accumulating in the atmosphere.



But the anthropogenic CO2 molecules cannot accumulate in the atmosphere, because of Henry's Law, which says that most of the atmospheric CO2 must be exchanged with the ocean water.



See more in my paper here: http://www.co2web.info/ESEFVO1.pdf



In further discussions, you may ask what isotopic measurements support the view that atmospheric CO2 has a lifetime of thousands of years?

Although I forwarded Dr. Segalstad's reply to the atmospheric scientist, I did not receive any further reply from him. However, in further emails with Dr. Segalstad I asked about the Bern model of CO2, the standard model used in the IPCC projections, cited repeatedly in AR4 Chapter 10. Dr. Segalstad replied

In their description of the Bern Model, you see that they state their global carbon model is based on that everything is in balance, until anthropogenic CO2 enters the system as an additional pulse. This additional pulse is then, according to the Bern Model, not immediately taken up in their "equilibrium earth model", resulting in an anthropogenic rise in atmospheric CO2.



You see this in their introduction: "Atmospheric carbon dioxide has increased since pre-industrial time by almost 30 percent due to anthropogenic activities such as fossil fuel burning and land use changes." This introductory statement is what they are about to prove, by circular arguments. I have tried to show some of their faulty arguments in my chapter:

http://www.co2web.info/ESEF3VO2.pdf



You see the Bern Model coming into play in the Technical Summary of the IPCC FAR (Fourth Assessment Report) Table TS2, page 33-34, footnote a; used in their Chapter 10.



In their FAR report IPCC has replaced their "rough indication" atmospheric CO2 lifetime of 50 - 200 years from their IPCC 1st report, with the theoretical Bern Model exponential decay equation, which never will reach zero. The anthropogenic CO2 fraction will always be there, according to the Bern model.



Carbon isotope analysis of atmospheric CO2 proves that the theoretical Bern model is far from reality.



Furthermore, breweries test this experimentally numerous times every day. They artificially add CO2 to the air on top of water in bottles, to produce soda, "mineral water". It would be bad business for them if it was not possible to add this CO2 to the water. Either the 1st IPCC CO2 lifetime approach would take the breweries 50 - 200 years to produce their soda; or with the Bern Model, it would take forever. Pick your choice. It looks like the brewery industry is proving IPCC wrong every day?



Best regards,

Tom V. Segalstad

Well said and h/t to Dr. Segalstad. Indeed, as shown by Dr. Antti Roine/hidethedecline.com, the equilibrium curve for CO2 over seawater is far from saturated with no evidence to suggest that we are anywhere near saturation

But let that not be an impedance to the IPCC, to use a flawed theoretical model of CO2 levels that greatly exceeds observations as the primary input to the flawed theoretical model of climate change which also does not agree with observations. It requires cojones grande to then claim they have over 90% confidence in that result.

Related Segalstad paper: Carbon isotope mass balance modelling of atmospheric vs. oceanic CO2   

Other Related References:



Carbon Isotopes in Atmospheric CO2

Models trump measurement 

The lynching of CO2

IPCC FAQ

John Daly - New carbon cycle model

CDIAC

Carbon is forever

CO2 in atmosphere 5-15 years

Dr. Roy Spencer and here and here

The Missing Sink

Where has all the carbon gone?

More Evidence IPCC Models are Inadequate

The IPCC models place an unjustified and almost total reliance upon CO2 as the driver of climate, while ignoring ocean oscillations. Strange that a model of heat transfer would ignore the huge periodic oscillations of the reservoir of over 99% of the earth's heat content. A recent paper: Masahiro Ohashi and H. L. Tanaka, 2010: Vol. 6A (2010) : Data Analysis of Recent Warming Pattern in the Arctic. Special Edition -Special Edition of the Fourth Japan China Korea Joint Conference on Meteorology- p.1-4 is the subject of a highly recommended guest post at Roger Pielke Sr.'s Blog today. The article finds that most of the recent warming 1970-1990 in the arctic is a result of the natural variability of the Arctic Oscillation [AO] rather than the IPCC model explanation of anthropogenic global warming. From the abstract of the paper: "Since the decadal variation of the AO is recognized as the natural variability of the global atmosphere, it is shown that both of decadal variabilities before and after 1989 in the Arctic can be mostly explained by the natural variability of the AO not by the external response due to the human activity". On Dr. Pielke's blog posting, the author of the paper, Dr. Masahiro Ohashi, notes the implications of this work:

According to our result, the rapid warming during 1970-1990 contains a large fraction of unpredictable natural variability due to the AO. The subsequent period of 1990-2010 indicates a clear trend of the AO to be negative. The global warming has been stopped by natural variability superimposed on the gentle anthropogenic global warming. The important point is that the IPCC models have been tuned perfectly to fit the rapid warming during 1970-1990 by means of the ice-albedo feedback (anthropogenic forcing) which is not actually observed. IPCC models are justified with this wrong scientific basis and are applied to project the future global warming for 100 years in the future. Hence, we warn that the IPCC models overestimate the warming trend due to the mislead Arctic Oscillation.

Dr. Nils Axel Morner's Reply to Maldives Sea Level PR Stunt

On October 17, 2009, members of the Maldives' Cabinet donned scuba gear, dove to a table seated on the ocean floor, and used hand signals at an underwater meeting staged to highlight the threat of global warming to the lowest-lying nation on earth and requests for compensation from western nations emitting CO2. With a backdrop of coral, the meeting was a bid to draw attention to fears that rising sea levels caused by the melting of polar ice caps could swamp this Indian Ocean archipelago within a century. Its islands average 7 feet above sea level.

In response to this, sea level expert Dr. Nils Axel Morner wrote the open letter below to the President of the Maldives. Dr. Mörner is the past head of the Paleogeophysics and Geodynamics department at Stockholm University in Sweden. He is past president (1999-2003) of the INQUA Commission on Sea Level Changes and Coastal Evolution, leader of the Maldives Sea Level Project. Dr. Mörner been studying the sea level and its effects on coastal areas for over 38 years.

You have recently held an undersea Cabinet meeting to raise awareness of the idea that global sea level is rising and hence threatens to drown the Maldives. This proposition is not founded in observational facts and true scientific judgements, Accordingly it is incorrect. Therefore, I am most surprised at your action and must protest to its intended message.



In 2001, when our research group found overwhelming evidence that sea level was by no means in a rising mode in the Maldives, but had remained quite stable for the last 30 years, I thought it would not be respectful to the fine people of the Maldives if I were to return home and present our results in international fora. Therefore, I announced this happy news during an interview for your local TV station. However, your predecessor as president censored and stopped the broadcast.



When you became president, I was hoping both for democracy and for dialogue. However, I have written to you twice without reply. Your people ought not to have to suffer a constant claim that there is no future for them on their own islands. This terrible message is deeply inappropriate, since it is founded not upon reality but upon an imported concept, which lacks scientific justification and is thus untenable. There is simply no rational basis for it.



Let me summarize a few facts (1) In the last 2000 years, sea level has oscillated with 5 peaks reaching 0.6 to 1.2 m above the present sea level. (2) From 1790 to 1970 sea level was about 20 cm higher than today. (3) In the 1970s, sea level fell by about 20 cm to its present level. (4) Sea level has remained stable for the last 30 years, implying that there are no traces of any alarming on-going sea level rise. (5) Therefore, we are able to free the Maldives (and the rest of low-lying coasts and island around the globe) from the condemnation of becoming flooded in the near future.



When I was president for the INQUA commission on Sea Level Changes and Coastal Evolution (1999-2003), we spent much effort on the question of present-to-future sea level changes. After intensive field studies, deliberation within the commission and discussions at five international meeting, we agreed on a "best estimate" for possible sea level changes by the year 2100. Our figure was +10 cm ±10 cm. This figure was later revised at +5 cm ±15cm. Such changes would imply small to negligible effects. 3 From our sea level curve, we can directly see that such a small rise would pose no threat for the Maldives. Rather, it would be a natural return to the conditions existing from1790 to 1970; i.e. to the position before the sea level fall in the 1970s.



The same non-rising sea level story is recorded for all other areas claimed to be under a flooding already in progress; viz. Tuvalu, Vanuatu and Venice (Mörner, 2007b). Besides, the proposed global trend derived from satellite altimetry have been tampered by a "personal correction" in order to create a rising trend (Mörner, 2008), actually not measured.. Thermal expansion of the water column may affect the ocean level by some centimetres to adecimetre. At the shore, however, the effect is zero (Mörner, 2000, 2005a, 2009a).



The Maldives Sea Level Curve of the last 500 years and the proposed best estimate of possible sea level changes by year 2100 This curve is a detail (without error bars, anchor points and curved breaking points) from the one presented by Mörner,(2007). Sea level has been stable for the last 30 years. Future changes in the next century are by no means alarming; at the most it would imply a return to the pre-1970 situation with an about 20 cm higher sea level as was the case from 1790 to 1970. These are the observational facts and the consequences to face for the future: i.e. no real problems and certainly no reason for any alarm and SOS message.



So, Mr. President, when you ignore to face available observational facts, refuses a normal democratic dialogue, and continue to menace your people with the imaginary threat of a disastrous flooding already in progress, I think you are doing a serious mistake.



Let us be constructive. Let us discuss available observational facts. Let us continue and extend our sea level project to new sites in the huge Maldivian atoll archipelago.



And let us, for Heaven’s sake, lift the terrible psychological burden that you and your predecessor have placed upon the shoulders of all people in the Maldives, who are now living with the imagined threat that flooding will soon drive them from their homes, a wholly false notion that is nothing but an armchair fiction artificially constructed by mere computer modelling constantly proven wrong by meticulous real-world observations.



Your cabinet meeting under the water is nothing but a misdirected gimmick or PR stunt. Al Gore is a master in such cheap techniques. But such misconduct is dishonest, unproductive and certainly most un-scientific.



Stockholm, Sweden,



Nils-Axel Mörner

ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Our international research group have had the pleasure to undertake very sophisticated studies in the Maldives. Personally, I have been there six times in this mission, including three one month-long research expeditions. We have become much in love with the remarkable nature and the wonderful local people of the Maldives. My critics should be seen as a sign of this respect in combination with a non-negotiable conviction that we must base our claims and actions on observational facts. See figures here





Leader of the Maldives Sea Level Project (2000 on) Chairman of the INTAS project on Geomagnetism and Climate (1997-2003) Awarded the Golden Condrite of Merit from Algarve University (2008) "for his irreverence and contribution to our understanding of sea level change."



Head of Paleogeophysics & Geodynamics at Stockholm University, Sweden (1991-2005) President of the INQUA Commission on Sea Level Changes and Coastal Evolution (1999-2003)

Papers on the ANTI-Greenhouse Effect of CO2

Three papers which conclude that at current levels, CO2 (and methane) produce an anti-greenhouse effect due to interaction with H20 by forming clusters. The IR radiation absorption spectra and radiating power of the CO2-H2O and CH4-H2O clusters were calculated and determined to reduce the greenhouse effect.

link

link

link

The Hansen Mars Challenge

Analysis of Mars Atmosphere Disproves AGW

A challenge to Hansen et al 1988:

No matter what scientific facts are presented to challenge the AGW ideology it is impossible for scientists to sway public opinion on this issue because the issue is political. It is very easy for high profile people who quote a scientific consensus that is supported by sophisticated computer models to convince the general public of anything that they want. 

Even though the computer models have never yielded a single result that matches observations, any criticism of the models is met with some sort of complex justification that is beyond the comprehension of the general public so it is readily accepted by the masses and those questioning the validity of the models are vilified by the promoters of the AGW agenda as skeptics and deniers who are in the pockets of big oil.

The sole support for AGW is the climate models, and the sole support for the climate models with respect to CO2 is the forcing parameter. There is no actual physical rational for the forcing parameter, because it was simply contrived from the assumption that observed warming of 0.6°C was due entirely to a 100ppmv increase in atmospheric CO2 concentration. There was never any verification of this parameter either by theory or observation. There is no justification for this parameter based on the physical properties of CO2, because the molecular configuration of the CO2 molecule precludes any significant effect from CO2 beyond a concentration of 300ppmv, and the current concentration is 386ppmv. 

There is no justification for this parameter based on observation because the observed notch in the spectrum created by CO2 is virtually identical for both the Earth and Mars, and Mars has over 9 times the physical concentration of CO2 in its atmosphere than the Earth has in its atmosphere. 

Even the reference temperature value for the parameter is faulty because the maximum temperature increase possibly attributable to human CO2 emissions is 0.1°C per century; not the 0.6°C that is used in the forcing parameter. 

The climate models use a forcing parameter based on the equation: 

CO2 rf = f * ln([CO2]/[CO2]prein)/ln(2) 

 

where f= rf for CO2 doubling 

 

In further documentation according to the IPCC, the “Radiative Forcing” ÄF, in watts per square meter, due to additional carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, can be calculated from the formula: 

ÄF = 5.35 ln C/Co 

 

The value 5.35 in this equation and the term [CO2]prein in the generalized equation demonstrate that the forcing parameter is based on the 100ppmv increase from the preindustrial value of 280ppmv and the 0.6°C of measured temperature over the time period that this 100ppmv increase occurred. 

Further documentation in the IPCC reports states that the forcing of each watt/m2 raises the global temperature by 0.75°C + 0.25°C.

The Nimbus 4 satellite measured the thermal radiation spectrum of the Earth in 1970, when the CO2 concentration was 325ppmv as measured at Mauna Loa. 

Mars has an atmosphere that is 95% CO2 with virtually zero water vapour and the remaining 5% of the atmosphere is comprised of O2 N2 and Ar, so CO2 is essentially the only “greenhouse gas”. 

The atmosphere on Mars is so thin that the 950,000ppmv concentration of CO2 only represents about 9 times more actual CO2 than is in the Earth’s atmosphere in absolute terms. 

Recent measurements of the thermal radiation spectrum from Mars should show a spectral notch from CO2 that representing an increase in forcing representing the 9 times difference in CO2 according to the equation: 

ÄF = 5.35 ln C/Co 

 

Considering that this formula gives a forcing value of 3.708watts/m2 for just a doubling of CO2, this value of 11.755watts/m2 for a 9-fold difference should be readily visible on the two measured spectra. 

The spectral notch is virtually identical on both the 1970 Earth spectra with a 325ppmv and the Mars spectra from at least 9 times the concentration indicating that there is virtually no effect increases in CO2 beyond 325ppmv. 

EARTH THERMAL RADIATIVE SPECTRUM

MARS THERMAL RADIATIVE SPECTRUM

This clearly falsifies the equation and the numerical values used to determine the forcing parameter of the climate models that support the AGW hypothesis. 

In addition to this physical evidence of an invalid assumption forming the basis for the forcing parameter, there is a blatantly obvious error in the actual values used in determining the magnitude of the forcing parameter. The temperature record shows that the global temperature has been increasing naturally at a rate of about 0.5°C/century since the Little Ice Age. The forcing parameter is based on the full measured 0.6°C/century without subtracting the natural warming of 0.5°C/century giving a forcing parameter that is 6 times larger than can be attributed to the measured increase in CO2. 

Far less obvious, but the major fatal flaw of the forcing parameter is that it is based on an observation of temperature and CO2 concentration without taking into account the actual physical properties of CO2 and its limited effect on thermal radiation as defined by quantum physics. 

As you are aware, certain gases can be caused to rotate and vibrate by thermal radiation. The rotation mode is relatively independent of wavelength but the vibration mode is limited to specific resonant wavelength bands. The rotation mode results from the interaction between the thermal energy and the dipole moment of the gas molecule. The carbon dioxide molecule is formed from two oxygen atoms equidistant from a central carbon atom and all three atoms are in a perfectly straight line. This configuration and symmetry eliminates any dipole moment, limiting the CO2 molecule to vibration modes only. 

There is only a single vibration mode of CO2 that resonates within the thermal spectrum radiated by the Earth (and Mars). This bend vibration resonates with a band of energy centred on a wavelength of 14.77microns (wavenumber 677cm-1) and the width of this band is quite narrow as depicted on the spectra from Earth and Mars. 

It only takes a minute amount of CO2 to fully “capture” the energy at the resonant wavelength, and additional CO2 progressively captures energy that is further and further from the peak wavelength. At the 280ppmv CO2 preindustrial level used as reference in the forcing parameter, about 95% of the energy bandwidth that could possibly be captured by CO2 has already been captured. There is only 5% of this limited energy available within the confines of this potential “capture” band left to be captured. 

The greenhouse effect from CO2 is generally stated as 3°C, so an additional 100ppmv above the 280ppmv level is only capable of generating a maximum 5% increase or 0.15°C. The forcing parameter is based on a full 0.6°C which is four times the 0.15°C absolute physical limit of warming from CO2. 

Furthermore if this 0.15°C increase has used up the full 5% of the remaining possible energy as the concentration reached 380ppmv, there is zero warming possible from further increases in CO2. 

This is why the CO2 notch is virtually identical in the two spectra; the CO2 band was virtually saturated at the 325ppmv concentration level, so even nine times more CO2 has almost no appreciable effect.

Unless all these points can adequately be addressed, the climate models based on this forcing parameter must be declared invalid, and all work based on these models as a reference for global warming mitigation must also be declared invalid. 

Norm Kalmanovitch, P Geoph

Calgary Alberta Canada. 

-quoted from an email just received by the Hockey Schtick, one of the most compelling scientific rebuttals to the theory of anthropogenic global warming, again demonstrating that the greenhouse effect of CO2 is already saturated at current levels. Peer-reviewed literature using different methods also comes to essentially the same conclusion. (here and here and here)

Related

MUST SEE: New Video on Mann-made Global Warming

New taxpayer-supported video propaganda on Global Warming was just released by the National Science Foundation, in which Michael Mann plays a prominent role. The discredited Mann hockey stick graph is shown with "hide the decline" and "Mike's Nature trick" included as a single continuous line between the tree ring and thermometer records. In answer to the question "what's unusual about the earth's warming during the past century?" Mann claims that the Medieval Warming Period and Little Ice Age (mostly erased using Mann-made statistics from his hockey stick graph) were regional only, whereas the current warming is global. Mann chooses to ignore the peer-reviewed studies of more than 800 scientists indicating that the Medieval Warming Period was global and most studies show hotter than today.

Mann also states that the models agree with observations (they don't).

Q: How do we know the warming is due to CO2? Well, because the failed models say so. And the models predict more warming at the poles and that's what the thermometers show (but we won't mention that we have cherry picked stations that show warming out of ~20 in the arctic and extrapolate arctic temperatures from much lower latitudes).

.

Gore would be proud that they use the same trick of showing the temperature v. CO2 ice core data without mentioning that temperature leads CO2 levels by ~800 years:

The videos also have a host of other misrepresentations, including stating that the model-predicted tropical tropospheric hot spot has been observed (it has not), that only by including CO2 (imaginary) positive feedbacks can models predict temperature (without including any consideration of ocean oscillations, clouds, water vapor effects, etc.), and many others. Sad day for science.

Climategate: Professors Watson and Singer Debate

From climategate2009

The BBC’s Andrew Neil squares off with Professors Robert Watson and Fred Singer to discuss the theory of Mann made Global Warming and the perilous state of the IPCC under Pachauri’s mismanagement.

Go to site for additional parts



Other videos of interest: 

Goddard Data and Global Sea Ice Doesn't Fit (repetitive but he has a point)

Worldwide Cold Not Seen since '70s Ice Age Scare

US Temperature Extremes Index Plunges Below 99 Year Mean

The NOAA National Climatic Data Center US Climate Extremes Index is designed to answer

"How has the climate changed over the past 50 or more years? In what ways and by how much? Many people, including climatologists, have been struggling with these questions for some time now, not only for scientific interest, but also to aid in policy decisions (IPCC 2001) and to inform the general public. In order to answer these questions, it is important to obtain comprehensive and intuitive information which allows interested parties to understand the scientific basis for confidence, or lack thereof, in the present understanding of the climate system. One tool, first developed as a framework for quantifying observed changes in climate within the contiguous Unites States, is the U.S. Climate Extremes Index (CEI).





The CEI was first introduced in early 1996 (Karl et al. 1996) with the goal of summarizing and presenting a complex set of multivariate and multidimensional climate changes in the United States so that the results could be easily understood and used in policy decisions made by nonspecialists in the field. The contiguous U.S. was selected as the focus for this study in part since climate change is of great interest to U.S. citizens and policy makers and since climate changes within the U.S. have not been given extensive coverage in intergovernmental or national reports which focus on climate change assessments (IPCC 2001; NRC 1992; NRC 2001)." (emphasis added)

Step 1 used to produce the CEI is the US maximum temperatures computed as

The sum of (a) percentage of the United States with maximum temperatures much below normal and (b) percentage of the United States with maximum temperatures much above normal:

The other components of the CEI include minimum temperatures, droughts, precipitation, and storm activity as noted on the website, but will not be discussed in this post. The second chart combines the positive and negative anomalies and is easier to interpret. The chart shows US Maximum Temperature Extremes Index 5 year moving average currently less than the 99 year mean and that the 1997-1998 record El Nino period was matched or exceeded 3 times in the distant past. Where is the warming? Thanks to this index, I think I now "understand the scientific basis for confidence, or lack thereof, in the present understanding of the climate system."



Hansen & Co have 99% confidence in AGW given that by their recent analysis in a 3/19/10 draft paper, their latest massaged version of the US Temperature anomaly (mean temps not an index of max temperature extremes above) 5 year mean shows a peak in 1999 a mere 0.16°C above that of the 1930's, despite the inconvenient truth that the CO2 level has risen during that period from ~310 to 389 ppm:

(red horizontal lines added to show differences in 5 year mean peaks)

According to the IPCC Climate Computer, this change in CO2 levels should have caused a temperature rise of 1.07°C assuming the IPCC imaginary positive feedbacks. That prediction is only off track by a factor of 7. The current 5 year mean is also the same as the peak in the 1930's, but Hansen concludes that the recent unprecedented peak (in 1999) is due to anthropogenic CO2 (only 3.5% of total CO2) while ignoring the inconvenient peak in the 1930's. Yes, the US is not the whole globe, but does have one of the densest networks of temperature stations, flawed as they may be, and higher anthropogenic emissions of CO2 over this period than most of the rest of the globe.

More ex-post "adjustments" to Satellite Sea-Level Altimetry

From a 2002 publication showing the Topex/Posiedon satellite altimetry sea level data for the eight years from 9/92-9/00, the global map shows stable to declining sea levels in most areas with the exception of the western Pacific, which is strongly influenced by periodic ENSO/El Nino/La Nina conditions.

The accompanying data below shows declining sea levels throughout most of the Pacific Ocean. The mean of the sea level changes (first number in each column) for each of the bands of the 3 major oceans shows a mean global sea level decrease of .4 mm/year. Yes, the bands for the 3 oceans are not the same size, but since the largest bands by far are in the Pacific Ocean and show the largest declines, the mean for the 3 oceans by area would therefore show an even greater decrease in mean sea level over the 8 year period. This is despite the fact that this period was also marked by the largest El Nino in the 20th century, which resulted in a large increase in the global mean.  

 

But that's not what the TOPEX/POSEIDON data show today, as somehow a global decrease in mean sea level evolved into a global increase of 3.1 mm/yr. This appears to be further confirmation of Dr. Nils Axel Morner's claim that the TOPEX satellite data was ex-post adjusted upward many years after the fact to show a false positive trend.  The data was further adjusted upward between 2005 and 2010 (almost 20 years after the start of the satellite record).



Related: An Analysis of TOPEX Sea Level Record

Glaciers - Science and Nonsense

Cliff Ollier* takes issue with some common misconceptions about how ice-sheets move, and doubts many pronouncements about the “collapse” of the planet’s ice sheets.

Geoscientist 20.03 March 2010

In these days of warnings about climate change, the ice sheets of Greenland and Antarctica play an important role. Alan Carlin wrote “Hansen et al. believe that the most likely and most critical of these dangerous effects is the possibility of substantial sea level rise due to the breakup of parts or all of the ice sheets covering Greenland and West Antarctica.” (my emphasis).

Alarm started with ‘global warming’ but since the Earth failed to warm in the past 10 years it changed to ‘climate change” and most recently to “carbon pollution.” But the most graphic scare is still of rising sea levels, so many articles continue appear describing sea level rise of many metres caused by the melting of the icesheets.

Like the original warming scares, the melting scares are based on models, and poor models at that. The commonest one is the notion that glaciers slide downhill, lubricated by meltwater, and that this can pass a threshold and lead to melting of all the icesheets and a runaway rise in sea level. The sliding hypothesis was the best available to De Saussure (1779), but we have learned a lot since then – but it has been forgotten again in many modern models.
The mechanism of glacier flow was long controversial, as observers tried to reconcile the solidness of ice with its ability to flow as a non-rigid body. Early experimenters placed lines of sticks across glaciers and found the middle moved faster than the edges – there was plasticity in the ice. Fierce controversies raged and brought in occasional new aspects of physics (such as regelation), but it was not until the crystallography of ice could be studied that real progress was made. The crystals in a glacier take on a preferred orientation as they travel down glacier. The crystals of ice at the glacier terminus may be a thousand times bigger than those at the source. How can this be? Scientist in the 1940s such as Max Perutz (a Nobel Prize winner in Physics, not Peace!) explained glaciers as being like a metamorphic rock consisting of one mineral, which flowed by a process called creep (and incidentally developed petrofabric properties not explained in other models).

It is also worth noting the geometry and age of the great icecaps. The Greenland, East Antarctica and West Antarctica ice sheets occupy kilometre-deep basins, and the ice cannot possibly slide downhill – it has to flow uphill. In simple numbers the Greenland icecap has existed for three million years and the Antarctic Ice sheets 30 million. Why such contrast between the two hemispheres? The idea that both simply respond to average temperatures of today is oversimplified.

Glacier budget

Glaciers grow, flow and melt continuously, with a budget of gains and losses. Snow falls on high ground. It compacts with time, air is extruded, and it turns into solid ice. More precipitation of snow forms another layer on the top, which goes through the same process, so the ice grows thicker by the addition of new layers at the surface. This stratified ice preserves data on temperature and carbon dioxide over hundreds of thousands of years. When the ice is thick enough it starts to flow under the force of gravity, and when it reaches a lower altitude or latitude where temperature is higher it starts to melt and evaporate (ablate).



If growth and melting balance, the glacier appears to be ‘stationary’. If precipitation exceeds melting the glacier advances: if melting exceeds precipitation the glacier recedes, but there will be a time lag between cause and effect.



In ice sheets it may take many thousands of years for ice to flow from the accumulation area to the melting area. The balance between movement and melting therefore does not relate to today’s climate, but to the climate thousands of years ago.

How glaciers move

Glacier flow is by a process called creep, essentially the movement of molecules from one crystal to another. Ice crystals are in the hexagonal system with glide planes parallel to the base. In lake ice, the c-axes are vertical and the glide planes all parallel to the lake surface, so a push parallel to the glide planes deforms the ice readily. Greater stress is needed to deform ice perpendicularly to these glide planes. In the absence of any stress, an individual grain of ice will lose as many molecules as it gains, and so remain unchanged. A stressed crystal will lose more molecules than it gains and so shrink, while a nearby unstressed grain will gain more than it loses, and grow. In this way glacier ice acquires a preferred petrofabric orientation. The ice crystals at a glacier snout have a volume about a thousand times greater than that of the first-formed ice crystals at the source of the glacier. These observations cannot be explained by mechanisms that ignore the creep mechanism of glacier flow.

Creep - proportional to temperature

The closer the temperature comes to melting point, the greater the creep rate. In experiments at a fixed stress it was found that the creep rate at -1^oC is 1000 times greater than at -20^oC. In valley glaciers the ice is almost everywhere at the prevailing melting point of ice, because the latent heat of ice is very much greater than its specific heat. Very little heat is required to raise the temperature of an ice block from -1^oC to 0^oC - it takes 80 times as much heat to turn the same ice block at 0^oC into water at 0^oC. Because the temperature does not vary in valley glaciers, they are unaffected by this first law of creep.



Ice caps are very different. They are cooled at the surface to temperatures far below freezing point, which removes their capacity to flow. Ice caps can be kilometres thick, and their warmest part is actually the base, where the ice is warmed by geothermal heat, and where flow is concentrated. It is because only the lower part of ice sheets can flow that the great thicknesses of stratified ice found in ice cores can accumulate in the upper part.

At Vostok, Antarctica, during the month of July 1987 the surface temperature never rose above -72.2^o C. At these temperatures ice cannot flow under the pressures that prevail near surface. Warming has no effect at such low temperatures because ice will not flow any faster at -60^oC than at -70^o C.

Creep - proportional to stress



Stress in this context is proportional to the weight of overlying ice. The greater the weight, the faster the flow. This explains why the stratified ice revealed in ice cores can only persist to a certain depth. When the weight of the overlying pile reaches a threshold, the ice starts to flow and the stratification is destroyed. In the Vostok cores the undisturbed ice continued to a depth of 3310 m when yield stress was reached and the ice flowed.



The threshold boundary between non-flowing ice and flowing ice marks the yield stress level. The brittle upper ice in an alpine glacier is a solid being carried along on plastic ice beneath. A valley glacier flows faster in the middle than at the edges, and the solid, brittle ice is broken up by a series of cracks called crevasses. The base of crevasses marks the position of the yield stress and the transition from brittle to plastic ice. In Antarctic and Greenland ice sheets crevasses occur where the ice is flowing towards the edge, but not in the areas of accumulation.



Meltwater can only penetrate through the ice if crevasses reach the base. If the yield stress level is reached before bedrock, meltwater cannot reach the base. All those theories based on ice sliding on a lubricated base have very limited application.

There is no surface melting of icecaps

The stratified ice is of great age. In Greenland, several ice-cores have more than 3km of undisturbed ice which go back in time for over 105,000 years - far less than the Antarctic equivalent. The Vostok cores in Antarctica provide data for the past 414,000 years before the ice starts to deform by flow. Dome F core reached 3035 m and Dome C core 3309 m, both dating back to 720,000 years. The EPICA core in Antarctica goes back to 760,000 years, and retains complete records of deposition, although temperatures at times during that period have been higher than today. They do not fit a model of surface melting, either now or in the past. After three quarters of a million years of documented continuous accumulation, how can we believe that right now the world’s ice sheets are “collapsing”?

Glacial surges

Climate alarmists note some glaciers that have increased in speed, and attribute it directly to climate warming. It is much better explained, however, by known laws of creep. The speed of valley glaciers is rather variable. Sometimes a valley glacier will flow several times faster than it did earlier. Suppose we had a long period of heavy precipitation. This would cause a thickening of the ice, and more rapid glacial flow. The pulse of more rapid flow would eventually pass down the valley. The increase in flow rate is not related to present day air temperature, but to increased precipitation long ago. Hubbard Glacier surged in 1986, at the height of the global warming that took place between 1975 and 1998.

Pulling glaciers to the sea

A number of papers give the impression that melting of glacial ice at the sea somehow causes the glacier to flow faster. Hubbard Glacier is the largest tidewater glacier on the North American continent. Since it was first mapped in 1895 it has been thickening and advancing (at a rate of 25m per year), even though smaller glaciers in the vicinity have been retreating. Why?



One ‘explanation’ (USGS 2007) says: “This atypical behaviour is an important example of a calving glacier cycle in which glacier advance and retreat is controlled more by the mechanics of terminus calving than by climate fluctuations.” But glaciers are pushed by the weight of the glacier, not sucked by the calving at the ice front, and destruction at the ice front does not depend on present day climate. And why should calving cause an advance?

The cause of the advance is most likely that the glacier has been thickening since 1895, a feature described since the first observations were made.

Related false notions

The breakup of ice sheets



Wherever ice sheets or glaciers reach the sea, the ice floats and eventually breaks off to form icebergs. It is part of the glacial budget: the glaciers never flowed on to the equator. Icebergs have always been with us, and Captain Cook saw icebergs on his search for the great south land.



Yet we are shown many movies of ice sheets collapsing, and are told it is a sign of global warming. In fact although the break-up of ice sheets is simply part of the glacier budget, observers seem surprised by the size and suddenness of what they see. In 2007, when a piece of the Greenland ice shelf broke away, interviewed scientists said they were surprised at how suddenly it happened. How else but suddenly would a piece of ice shelf break off? The actual break is inevitably a sudden event – but one that can easily be built into a global warming horror scenario. The point to remember is that the release of icebergs at the edge of an ice cap does not in any way reflect present-day temperature.



The Hubbard Glacier in Alaska has long been a favourite place for tourists to witness the collapse of an ice front 10km long and 27m high, sometimes producing icebergs the size of ten-storey buildings. One tourist wrote “Hubbard Glacier is very active and we didn’t have long to wait for it to calve.” Yet the Hubbard Glacier is advancing at 25 metres per year!

It is easy to raise alarms over a large break. In 2009 Peter Garrett [Australian Minister for the Environment] claimed the break-up of the Wilkins ice shelf in West Antarctica “indicated sea level rises of six metres were possible by the end of the century, and that ice was melting across the continent”. Actually, when floating ice melts there is no change in sea level (by Archimedes’ Principle).



Ice sheet “collapse”



Claims that ice sheets ‘collapse’ are based on false concepts. Glaciers do not slide on their bellies, lubricated by meltwater. Ice sheets do not melt from the surface down – they melt only at the edges. Once the edges are lost, further loss depends on the rate of flow of the ice. The rate of flow of ice does not depend on the present climate, but on the amount of ice already accumulated, and the ice sheet will keep flowing for a very long time. The ice cores show that the stratified ice has accumulated over half a million years and has not been deformed, remelted or ‘collapsed’. Variations in melting around the edges of ice sheets are no indication that they are collapsing, but reflect past rates of snow and ice accumulation in their interior. Indeed ‘collapse’ is impossible.

The modern scene

All this suggests that the present climate has limited effect on melting ice and rising sea levels, but since the Alarmists keep up their horror stories it is good to know that even the present times are not all bad. A recent paper is entitled “A doubling in snow accumulation in the western Antarctic Peninsula since 1850 (Thomas et al. 2008). Another reports that “The East Antarctic ice-sheet north of 81.6oS increased in mass by 45 ± 7 billion metric tonnes per year from 1992 to 2003 … enough to slow sea-level rise by 0.12 ±0.002 millimetres per year” Davis et al. 2005. Wingham et al. (2006) wrote: “We show that 72% of the Antarctic ice sheet is gaining 27 ± 29 Gt yr^-1, a sink of ocean mass sufficient to lower global sea levels by 0.08 mm yr^-1.”

References and further reading

Christoffersen and Hambrey (2006) published a typical alarmist paper on the Greenland ice sheet, and their predictions are based on the concept of an ice sheet sliding down an inclined plane, on a base lubricated by meltwater, which is itself increasing because of global warming. The same misconception is present in textbooks such as Wilson et al. (2000), popular magazines like National Geographic (2007) and scientific articles such as Bamber et al. (2007), which is a typical modelling contribution. Alley et al. (2008) wrote a paper optimistically entitled Understanding Glacier Flow in Changing Times which is all about the role of meltwater reaching the base of the Greenland Glacier and speeding up ice flow, and also delivering heat to the glacier bed. If you can find it, the early article by Perutz is brilliant.

• Alley, R.B., Fahnestock, M. and Joughin, I. 2008. Understanding Glacier Flow in Changing Times. Science, 322, 10611062.


• Appenzeller, T. 2006. The Big Thaw. National Geographic, June 2007. 56-71.


• Bamber, J.L., Alley, R.B. and Joughin, I. 2007. Rapid response of modern day ice sheets to external forcing. Earth and Planetary Science Letters, 257, 1-13.


• Carlin, A. (2007), NCEE Working Paper #07-07: http://yosemite.epa.gov/ee/epa/eed.nsf/


• WPNumberNew/2007-07 OpenDocument.


• Christoffersen, P. & Hambrey, M.J. 2006. Is the Greenland Ice Sheet in a state of collapse? Geology Today, 22, 98-103.


• Davis, C.H., Li, Y., McConnell, J.R., Frey, M.M. and Hanna, E. 2005. Snow-driven growth in East Antarctica ice-sheet mitigates recent sea level rise. Science, 308, 1898-1901.


• De Saussure, H-B. 1779-1796. Voyages dans les Alpes. (4 volumes) Manget, Geneva.


• Hansen, J. (2007), “Scientific reticence and sea level rise.” Environmental Research


• Letters, 2(2): http://www.iop.org/EJ/article/1748-9326/2/2/024002/erl7_2_024002.pdf.


• Perutz, M. 1948. Glaciers. Science News, 6. Penguin, Harmondsworth.


• Thomas, E.R., Marshall, G.J. and McConnell, J.R. 2008. A doubling in snow accumulation in the western Antarctic Peninsula since 1850. Geophysical Research Letters, 35, LO1 706, doi:10.1029/2007GL032529


• Wingham, D.J., Shepperd, A., Muir, A. and Marshall, G.J. 2006. Mass balance of the Antarctic ice sheet. Phil. Trans. R. Soc. A. 364, 1627-1635.

Hansen: Urban Heat Island Effect is 0.06°C

From a 3/19/10 draft of a NASA GISS paper, Hansen & Co. find the urban heat island effect in the US to be a mere 0.06°C temperature anomaly over the entire span of 1900-2009:

Citations not cited in the report include a paper showing urban heat island effects of up to 8°C, the work of Dr. Roy Spencer, surfacestations.org (Anthony Watts & Joe D'Aleo), and others. (H/T Tom Nelson)

Spiel Climate Sister Site Launched

A fully-automated computer-model of a climate Blog about other climate Blogs

The climate blog and media news feeds have gotten unwieldy for The Hockey Schtick so there is a new fully-automated sister site SpielClimate.blogspot.com just to handle the mass of feeds. Spiel Climate has feeds from all corners of the skeptic, luke warmist, and warmist blogs and news feeds. If you are a climate junkie and don't mind the occasional item from these feeds not related to climate and the lack of any humanoid editing, then please have a look. Spiel Climate is open to suggestions for new links - just post a comment at the bottom of the page.

The Best of Recent Climategate News archives from the upper right column of The Hockey Schtick will be housed at the bottom of the page at Spiel Climate. Helpful references in this debate are also there and open to suggestions as well.

Climate Change Causing Negative Extinction in Arctic

Arctic Wildlife Index Increases 16% over last 34 years



From a paper presented today at The State of the Arctic meeting:

Tracking Trends in Arctic Wildlife: The Arctic Species Trend Index



For the first time, an index providing a pan-Arctic perspective on trends in the Arctic's living resources has been developed. The Arctic Species Trend Index (ASTI), like the global Living Planet Index (LPI), illustrates overall vertebrate population trends by integrating vertebrate population trend data of an appropriate standard from across the Arctic and over the last 34 years (1970 as the baseline). An increasing index indicates that overall more vertebrate populations in the Arctic are increasing than decreasing. Whereas a decreasing index, indicates the opposite situation.



A total of 965 populations of 306 species (representing 35% of all known arctic vertebrate species) were used to generate the ASTI. In contrast to the global LPI, whose overall decline is largely driven by declines in tropical vertebrate populations, the average population of arctic species rose by 16% between 1970 and 2004. This pattern is very similar to the temperate LPI and is consistent in both the North American and Eurasian Arctic.



The author of the paper was interviewed by PRI International today: Download MP3 (starts at 26:00). Author states that polar bear populations are difficult to measure and trend could not be assessed for polar bears. However, other studies find that polar bear populations have declined by -400%.



The arctic wildlife apparently haven't received the memo either on AGW. Somebody: tell Paul Erhlich about the "population bomb" in the Arctic.



UPDATE: Well guess how the mainstream media decided to spin this story (in stark contrast to the author's take on PRI and the verbatim abstract from the study above):



High Arctic Species on Thin Ice

 ScienceDaily (Mar. 18, 2010) — A new assessment of the Arctic's biodiversity reports a 26 per cent decline in species populations in the high Arctic. They don't even mention the overall trend for the arctic was an increase of 16%.



Full report on ASTI



UPDATE 2: New Scientist surprisingly decided to headline the overall trend:

Boom time for Arctic animals    New Scientist 20 March 2010

CONTRARY to popular belief, Arctic animals have done rather well over recent decades. The first analysis of a 40-year database of Arctic species reveals that populations grew by 16 per cent on average between 1970 and 2004.

Austrian Alps Glaciers Have Almost Disappeared Due to Abnormal Warmth!

(above photo from 1956 in National Geographic of the (melted) intersection of the Hintereisferner and Kesselwandferner glaciers, and photo below from August 2003)

From the National Geographic Article November 1976 "What's happening to our climate?" showing the melting of the glaciers due to the "abnormal warmth" of the 1940's, followed by the abnormal cooling from the 1940's to 1970's

 (click on image to read caption at bottom right)

The stupefying pace of glacier melt in the 1940s (GRL 12/2009)

The most recent studies by researchers at ETH Zurich show that in the 1940s Swiss glaciers were melting at an even-faster pace than at present. This is despite the fact that the temperatures in the 20th century were lower than in this century. Researchers see the main reason for this as the lower level of aerosol pollution in the atmosphere...



Huss points out that the strong glacier melt in the 1940s puts into question the assumption that the rate of glacier decline in recent years “has never been seen before”. “Nevertheless”, says the glaciologist, “this should not lead people to conclude that the current period of global warming is not really as big of a problem for the glaciers as previously assumed”. This is because it is not only the pace at which the Alpine glaciers are currently melting that is unusual, but the fact that this sharp decline has been unabated for 25 years now.

Additional Information on glacier monitoring

See Hide The Decline for more on revisionist climate history