Parts per million is useful for describing the concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, but carbon comes out of the ground in tonnes and that is how it has to go back. GtC is giga tonnes of carbon. But, the 255 GtC extra carbon in the atmosphere just corresponds to the about 400-280=120 ppm increased concentration since preidustrial. Since we are working roughly and the oceans will fight your sequestration effort anyway, we’re calling 280 ppm and 300 ppm about the same concentration. If you want to make it a little closer, then sequester 212 GtC rapidly. The ocenas will help you some then hurt you some during that phase.
Killiansays
#334 wili said As to soil sequestration: I’m all for it, but going forward, there is no guarantee that soils will hold their carbon. Most soils will either dry up and lose it
You really need to learn how regenerative ag works.
or be washed into the sea by torrential downpours, where again much of it will be lost.
See above. Each addition of 1% organic material per sq. meter will hold 136 liters of water. Or is it gallons? I forget. Regardless, the problem is the solution. Add carbon, sequester carbon, sequester water.
More water in soil keeps plants cooler, particularly roots. More water in the soil means less flooding. More sequestered water in soil = lower sea level.
Just one big web of goodness.
And none of this happens without proper water management *anyway*. We start with energy flows: Water, sun, wind. To be clear, we ***start*** there.
No worries.
;-)
#338 Chris Dudley said It can be hard for people who don’t speak math to understand why it is important to ask clear questions, or even to understand what a clear question is. That took a huge amount of deciphering to get to that point.
And you had done so well for a few posts there. I have said this same thing for years and you are the only one to ever claim they did not understand what was being suggested.
Asking for models sounded at first like economic models like the one that shows that mitigation costs little that the IPCC presented.
You’re going to have to admit you were intentionally responding with silliness. I never mentioned a single word about economics. The context has always been drawing down carbon and how quickly temps might respond.
Then the claim was that negative emissions had never been modeled, however they had been.
Repeating it will not make it true. T’was quite clear sequestering carbon rapidly down to sub-300 had never been modeled. Still hasn’t. Which, btw, despite the very helpful posts above, was also missed in those posts. The math doesn’t help without a model, it only helps figure out how much to remove, not the effects.
The phrase falling emissions was then used rather than negative emissions which also lacked clarity since it seemed to be presented as an alternative to negative emissions.
If you say so! They can’t possibly have different meanings within the context.
Hopefully, now, the question is clear
Always was. You have ever only been the one confused individual.
and has been addressed.
Sadly, only partly, as noted above.
Now, get back to being polite. That was much, much more helpful and pleasant.
Maybe I’ve read more Lenin, Mao and Che than you. But forcing people to the countryside is a basic way to wreck social cohesiveness and institute dictatorial power. It also fails to feed people.
Solar panels often have lower efficiency than solar cells because cells don’t fill the whole area of the panel. It could be the panels are using high quality silicon cells though 21.5% is pretty good too.
Thomassays
Killian, I say give it a try. Those who are motivated usually by a desire to solve/understand something are those who learn math. Learning math is one part motivation, and one part effort, with maybe a bit of natural talent making it easier or harder. You might surprise yourself.
“If we fail in communicating that connectedness matters, cooperation is non-negotiable, then we will ultimately fail, period. If we succeed in that communication, you won’t need to militarize.:
I’ll try again. This didn’t get through last time.
If we have 400 ppmv of CO2, the volume fraction X is 0.0004. The mass fraction is related to the volume fraction by the ratio of molecular weights:
q = (μ / μ0) X
where &mu0 is the average MW of the total mix. For CO2, we have μ = 44.0098 AMU, and for normally moist air, μ0 = about 28.94. Thus the mass fraction of CO2 in the air is about q = 0.00608.
The total mass of the atmosphere is estimated at 5.148 x 10^18 kg (Trenberth 2005). Thus the CO2 mass is 3.13 x 10^15 kg.
If 400 ppmv is 3.15 x 10^15 kg, 1 ppmv is 7.825 x 10^12 kg. That’s 0.7825 GT.
Matthew R Marlersays
Here is a conjecture I wrote on a couple other blogs that you guys might like to critique.
Assume for the sake of argument that heat transfer from the surface due to evapotranspiration will increase 5% per 1C increase in surface temp. Assume Stefan-Boltzmann law is reasonably accurate. Assume that DWLWIR increases 4 W/m^2 and that the temperature warms up. When it has warmed 0.5C, evapotranspiration heat loss will have increased by 2W/m^2, and radiative heat loss by about 2.8W/m^2 — implying that the DWLWIR increase of 4 W/m^2 can not raise the Earth surface temp by 0.5C. Obviously these are approximations (based on flow rates by Trenberth), but there is no justification for ignoring the change in the evapotranspirative heat loss rate.
That 5% per 1C is within the range of estimates reported by O’Gorman et al “Energetic Constraints on Precipitation Under Climate Change”, 2011, Surveys in Geophysics, DOI 10.1007/s10712-011-9159-6, one of the papers recommended to me by Pat Cassen. The range is 2%-7%, with the lower estimates based on GCMs and the upper estimates from regressions of rainfalls vs temperatures in various regions of the Earth.
Much of this has been published: Trenberth et al and Stephens et al energy flow diagrams; 288 K as base mean Earth temp; Earth surface as homogeneous and obeying appx Stefan-Boltzmann law; 4 W/m^2 as radiative effect at surface of doubling CO2 concentration. All I “added” was:
2 + 2.8 = 4.8 > 4.
Possible avenues of attack:
2% instead of 5% increase in rainfall.
Take into account the distributions of rainfall and rainfall change, instead of working with global aggregates.
Include changes in advective/convective changes in surface cooling.
OnceJollysays
@Killian: I decided to check out the Egyptian study cited as the source for the figure of 4.1 Mg/ha per year reported in the Table 1 of the Rodale White Paper. From the conclusion of the paper by Luske and van der Kamp (2010):
“The increase in soil carbon in the upper 50 cm amounted to 4,1 tons of C/ha after one year of farming at the Sinai farm (figure 16). The carbon levels during 5 years of organic farming at the Sekem farm also increased steeply with an average rate of 2,7-3,8 tons C/ha per year in the upper 50 cm of the soil. After the first 5 years till 30 years, the increase in carbon was lower with a rate of approximately 0,5 tons C/ha per year. The results indicate that the potential soil carbon sequestration resembles a logarithmic curve (figure 17), until equilibrium is reached between carbon application and decomposition by microorganisms. It seems that this equilibrium is not yet reached after 30 years of organic farming, but this cannot thoroughly be concluded by this study. Over a period of 30 years, the carbon stock increased from 3,9 to 28,8-31,8 tons C/ha in the upper 50 cm of the soil, a raise of 24,9-27,9 tons C/ha. If one were to imagine a linear relation, this would mean that each year 0,83-0,93 tons C/ha could be stored in the soil. This corresponds to a mitigation potential of 3,1-3,4 tons CO2/ha/year.”
Apparently the “exemplar” sequestration rate applies to a single year of the study, while the average rate over 30 years was less than a quarter of this. However, I see no acknowledgement of these details in the Rodale White Paper. Maybe this will help you to understand why I think the Rodale White Paper is hype without substance.
#353–“Maybe I’ve read more Lenin, Mao and Che than you…”
Chris, you say that as if it were a *good* thing! ;-)
I’m thinking mostly of the Ukrainian collectivization under Stalin, in which few if any people were forced onto the land; mostly, the pre-existing peasantry was forced into collectives, and the upshot was very, very ugly. But the operative word in any of these cases was ‘forced,’ which a priori is not part of K’s proposal.
You’re right, of course, about panel vs. cell efficiency. I believe the Sunpower claim is for the panel, but I might be wrong. Either way, I think it’s ‘close enough’ to the 24% you mention that the idea you put forward starts to have some force. IOW, yes, I agree 21.5% is ‘pretty good.’
General note about comments nobody made but are being assumed:
1. Forcing people onto the land. Bull. Not being said, not being planned, not a viable policy.
2. The Rodale study was NOT about grasslands. Anything else in the study is presented as mere, what if…? type statements, not to present well-grounded, well-researched claims. Get over it. Also, the study cited is, what? fourteen years old? What is being done with rotational grazing, silviculture, agroecology is far beyond that. Understand what the study was trying to say, and move past cherry-picked, pointless criticism. Look at Mark Sheppard, Savory and others for CURRENT work with systems beyond crop farming, including the list of items I posted earlier in this thread, e.g. terra preta.
The actual point to be made is, regardless of the suite of actions, combining them with reduced consumption – necessary – *will* lead to negative emissions.
What about this research showing a sea level rise of 128 mm in NE-US during 2009-2010? Press reports on it are rather cryptical. Was it a temporary spike, and if so, how long did it last?
Kees van der Leun @365.
The abstract of the paper presenting the finding is here.
The SLR data under discussion is in their Figure 1b covering the coast – New York to Newfoundland. Figure 1b can be seen a little more clearly here. The lower plot is the number of tidal gauges used and the upper plot is SL 1920-2012. The paper is less about the size of this rise and more about the reasons for it happening. They point the finger at ocean currents and the NAO. What this means is that there was a very very slow 5″ tidal surge affecting that coast, so slow that a fair proportion of it might remain for decades or longer.
I just hope the fair folk of New England are more level-headed about it than the bonkers burgers of Broadchurch round my way who brand increases in the astrological high tides expected in coming months as “supertides”. Super? It will actually boost their peak ‘spring’ tides at the autumn equinox by a whopping 4 inches.
Of course, this fits with the more recent article about Soon et al., but I’ll leave it here for now.
Anyone who doubts the interconnectedness and concerted villainies of the doubt and delay distracters should study it well, and realize it’s only one piece of the Laocoon strangulation of reality and science and public understanding.
Of course, this fits with the more recent article about Soon et al., but I’ll leave it here for now.
Anyone who doubts the interconnectedness and concerted villainies of the doubt and delay distracters should study it well, and realize it’s only one piece of the Laocoon strangulation of reality and science and public understanding.
Angry much? Yes, I’m furious!
(apologies if this is a duplicate; first effort gone missing, I think)
“Democratic lawmakers in Washington are demanding information about funding for scientists who publicly dispute widely held views on the causes and risks of climate change.
Prominent members of the United States House of Representatives and the Senate have sent letters to universities, companies and trade groups asking for information about funding to the scientists….
The requests focused on funding sources for the scientists, including David Legates of the University of Delaware and Roger Pielke Jr. of the University of Colorado at Boulder.
In the letters, Representative Grijalva wrote, “My colleagues and I cannot perform our duties if research or testimony provided to us is influenced by undisclosed financial relationships.” He asked for each university’s policies on financial disclosure and the amount and sources of outside funding for each scholar, “communications regarding the funding” and “all drafts” of testimony.” http://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/26/science/lawmakers-seek-information-on-funding-for-climate-change-critics.html
Insurance and Climate Change column
Climate Change Modeling on Cusp of Paradigm Shift
By Don Jergler | February 26, 2015
In the face of growing interest in climate change impacts, several big catastrophe modelers said they’ve heard from more clients interested in receiving climate-related data and they believe the field is on the cusp of a change in the way modeling is done.
“It’s kind of like we’re in a paradigm shift,” said Karen Clark, owner of Boston-based Karen Clark & Co., a spe cia list in catastrophe risk, modeling and risk management….
Killiansays
364 Hank Roberts said, “!”
Learn to read, and try not to respond just being… less than useful.
See if you, in your infinite patronizing, can figure out what you missed.
James McDonaldsays
#340 (Ladbury) —
Yes, I’m fully aware that climate scientists have day jobs, and I in no way intended to denigrate them. To the contrary, I just assumed that weeks of work by me could be done in days by them.
And I know how traditional science works, but I asked for a compilation nonetheless, because (a) someone might already have created such a paper, and (b) climate science is, unfortunately, not treated as traditional science.
My 2 cents on the issue is that when you have an entire army of well-funded opponents trying to destroy the foundations of your scientific endeavors, it’s more than a bit myopic to say you can’t be bothered to counter that. If my research were under that kind of attack, I would be strongly motivated to set the record straight. But maybe that’s just me.
To the other posters that mentioned skeptical science or Koch organizational charts, thank you for your good intentions, but again not what I asked for.
At any rate, I asked for a review of the contrarian literature, and the answer seems to be that it’s unlikely to happen. Ce la vie.
James McDonaldsays
Ou, comme on dirait en France, “C’est la vie.”
(No idea how that got garbled.)
Susan Andersonsays
James McDonald, reference to John Mashey’s work on DeSmogBlog was for you. Do look at the linked graphic and follow some of his earlier work; he’s very thorough and over the years has tried to find means to get at the tangled imbedded mess. DeSmog is a good platform for that.
Apologies to all for the duplicate (now @371/372), system wasn’t letting me know my comment went through,
That would be me. James, just to be clear, I wasn’t suggesting that you’d find what you want ready-made. I was suggesting that it would be a good place to re-ask your question, as there are those on that board who would (IMO) be more likely to have the pieces of an answer ready to hand.
“So, Turthout will interview a suicidal, Jonestown-esque Pied Piper of smiles. How about a solutions-oriented designer of sustainable systems with a plan to avoid the mass global suicide?”
Killian’s displeasure refers to an interview with McPherson contained in the article. What I find interesting is that, when one examines RECOMMENDATIONS rather than long-term PREDICTIONS, the difference between Killian and McPherson is negligible. Killian recommends Sustainability, which he has defined at length. In his speeches, the closest McPherson has come to recommendations to avoid extinction is to reference works on collapse of the global economy. In his Magnum Opus on climate change (http://guymcpherson.com/2014/01/climate-change-summary-and-update/), he states:
“the excellent work by Tim Garrett, which points out that only complete collapse avoids runaway greenhouse.”…..
According to Yvo de Boer, who was executive secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change in 2009, when attempts to reach a deal at a summit in Copenhagen crumbled with a rift between industrialized and developing nations, “the only way that a 2015 agreement can achieve a 2-degree goal is to shut down the whole global economy.”
It seems to me that both Killian and McPherson are recommending collapse of industrial civilization and the global economy as we know it, although one is optimistic about the outcome and the other is pessimistic.
Switzerland has become the first country to formally communicate its contribution to a UN climate change deal: 50% greenhouse gas cuts on 1990 levels by 2030.
Released on Friday, the Swiss government says 30% of those cuts will be achieved within the country, with the remaining 20% through carbon markets or other forms of offsets.
“This objective of a 50% reduction in emissions reflects Switzerland’s responsibility for climate warming and the potential cost of emissions reduction measures in Switzerland and abroad over the 2020-2030 period,” says the Swiss communication.
“Switzerland, which is responsible for 0.1% of today’s global greenhouse gas emissions and, based on the structure of its economy, has a low level of emissions (6.4 tonnes per capita per year), will use emissions reduction measures abroad to reduce the cost of emissions reduction measures during the period 2020-2030.”
There are some papers which supply constructive criticism, along the lines of the enjoyable exchange between Robert Way and Michael Mann here. There is hardly anything which both contradicts the AGW paradigm and meets minimum standards of evidence and peer review.
Go onto sceptic sites and you will find a lot of amateurs nitpicking, but be prepared to pick the political subtext out of your teeth afterwards.
Radge Haverssays
James McDonald,
Well, there are surveys (like Oreskes) that look at the literature. In order to determine the consensus, you have to consider the alternatives as well, so it’s likely that lists (and problems of categorization) are maintained somewhere by surveyors– which seems like a better place to start looking. http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surveys_of_scientists%27_views_on_climate_change
I doubt that there is, of necessity, anything as tidy as what you may be hoping for.
“Documents sent to the media say the target is “compatible” with efforts to limit warming to below 2C above pre-industrial levels. The government is also discussing a long term target to reduce emissions 70-85% by 2050 on 1990 levels.”
A significant majority of Americans say combating climate change is a moral issue that obligates them – and world leaders – to reduce carbon emissions, a Reuters/IPSOS poll has found.
The poll of 2,827 Americans was conducted in February to measure the impact of moral language, including interventions by Pope Francis, on the climate change debate. In recent months, the pope has warned about the moral consequences of failing to act on rising global temperatures, which are expected to disproportionately affect the lives of the world’s poor.
The result of the poll suggests that appeals based on ethics could be key to shifting the debate over climate change in the United States, where those demanding action to reduce carbon emissions and those who resist it are often at loggerheads.
James McDonald @276.
Your original enquiry took as a start point Cook et al (2013) and that only about 100 of the 11,000 climate papers over a 20-year period rejected or were doubtful about the consensus view on AGW. You expressed your enquiry here thus “To oversimplify, I guess I’m asking to what extent those papers constitute a source of credible scientific argument, and to what extent are they problematic or even demonstrably incorrect.”
Yet now you are characterising these 100 papers as “an entire army of well-funded opponents trying to destroy the foundations of your scientific endeavors.” I’d hazard a guess that this army you talk of is not operating within the science.
If the opposition to the consensus on AGW was solely down to those 100 papers, then it might be worth examining the merits or otherwise of their content. But that is a simplisitic view. There is a lot of work carried out by the “army” you talk of and the divide between that extra-scientific work and the actual science is not so easy to define. (You may need convincing of this.)
I think what we can say about the denialistic science is that if someone did have an alternative to the consensus that passed muster and didn’t collapse into nonsense at the first review, that someone would obtain a lot of friends. And if that alternative theory proved to be correct and overturned the consensus, that someone would gain world renown, a Galileo of their day, a scientific figure as well-known in the future as say Einstein or Archimedes. As with all scientific theories, any such alternative would get a lot of attacks but that is the stuff of science. That is how science progresses.
So do you have some doubt as to whether such an alternative theory may exist?
I would say that there is very little that contradicts the AGW “paradigm”, period. Most of the “skepticism” is about the magnitude of the CO2 effect (maybe it is exaggerated), magnitude of natural temperature oscillation, the magnitude of other threats (there will always be alternations of flooding and droughts), timing (warming of the surface will take a long time to occur), magnitude of the damage done by warming (“change”, yes; damage, not so much, the clearest threat being sea level rise), pros and cons of direct effects of CO2 on biota, accuracy of models, other parts of the climate system (evapotranspiration, rainfall and clouds). Those are all “normal science” topics of research.
The blogs ClimateEtc and WattsUpWithThat have some egregious contributors to the comments, but most of the “headlined” authors accept the basic radiative physics of the green house gases and their warming effect in the climate.
That’s my take.
Matthew R Marlersays
385, Entropic man:
For example, this paper was reported on favorably at WUWT a couple days ago:
Nature | Letter
Observational determination of surface radiative forcing by CO2 from 2000 to 2010
D. R. Feldman,
W. D. Collins,
P. J. Gero,
M. S. Torn,
E. J. Mlawer
& T. R. Shippert
Nature
(2015)
doi:10.1038/nature14240
Received 09 June 2014
Accepted 15 January 2015
Published online 25 February 2015
Abstract and full text (behind paywall) are at the web page for Nature right now. Some of the commenters appear nuts (maybe you would include my comments in that), but the headline writer, Anthony Watt in this case, does not dispute that an increase in atmospheric CO2 will produce an increase in the DWLWIR.
Killiansays
#383 Jasper Jaynes said What I find interesting is that, when one examines RECOMMENDATIONS rather than long-term PREDICTIONS, the difference between Killian and McPherson is negligible.
Guy and I started out friendly. I met him in 2010. His schtick was relatively new then and didn’t include NTHE in the 2030’s.
Yes, as far as rapid climate change goes, there is agreement. We are both much more concerned about the Arctic than, Archer is, e.g. The differences come in collapse vs. simplification, misrepresenting the science and in encouraging people to accept we have already failed and extinction is nigh.
Guy’s reason for collapse of civilization is not to avoid *our* extinction – he says it’s too late – but to preserve some of current biota. He thinks it’s a moral imperative to end industrial civilization ASAP.
I do not call for the end of anything. I say the resource and climate issues require simplification, not eradication of all tech and civilization, to boot.
I also do not believe it is too late yet. The Arctic is acting up quite more than I’d like and now the WAIS is supposedly already toast. Great. Just flippin’ great. BUT, I firmly believe that if we can cool the planet we may get some of those clathrates the permafrost to cool quickly enough to avoid a catastrophic level of release. However, I also think near-term catastrophic release is a non-trivial risk.
This is why I wish someone would run a return to sub-300 scenario and see if it does result in fast enough cooling to reasonably expect SLR to stop at 10 ft and the clathrates to chill out.
Also, I do not distort the science to feed a gullible public. Guy presents the study recently linked on these pages as stating there is no way to sequester carbon, we’re stuck with it. Note how this so neatly fits into the meme of it being too late. What he doesn’t tell his followers is that paper didn’t address mitigation at all. It just supposed cessation of all emissions as a thought experiment, really. It did not address trying to sequester what is already in the atmosphere.
That is but one of his funky bits.
So, no, there is not a lot separating us in terms of where we stand, but there are huge issues on the future, how data is presented and suggesting we should think in terms of hospice for humanity.
Part of his problem may be he’s one of those that read a little on permaculture and thinks he understands it, but it is clear he does not.
Killiansays
Toward a scientific support of regenerative practices.
Just to be clear, part of the reason I and others are confident of the benefits of permaculture/regenerative design as a global design approach comes from science supporting what we already know. What studies do come out about trees, soils, bio-char, what have you, have pretty much supported our awareness. Will try to bring more of this to your attention.
All we lack are scientists and organizations willing to do science the way *you all* want it done. Us? We already know. Just waiting for you all to catch up.
Unbelievably, this show aired in 2012, a full three years after my PDC (permaculture course). This show talks about being surprised by the roles of microbes in the soil… but permaculturist and others have talked about this for many years.
It sounds as though some of Soon’s communications about testimony were essentially invoices or receipts for deliverables. Those sorts of business communications probably ought to be open to probing. So, perhaps asking for any drafts of testimony submitted to funders might be appropriate.
Here is the thing that I think ought to be transparent. A donor to a member of congress asks that a particular expert be called to give testimony. That expert prepares testimony and submits a draft to the donor as part of a financial relationship between the donor and the expert. The public should know both that the donor got a favor from the congressperson and that the donor has paid the expert for the testimony. Academic freedom is not contingent upon deceiving the public and probably suffers if that kind of thing is promoted by a misapplication of the principles of academic freedom.
Chuck Hughessays
Senator Inhofe has solid PROOF that the Climate is not warming:
In ongoing data collection by the Cultural Cognition Project at Yale Law School, fewer than one in four people in a general population sample in Southeast Florida understood that if human beings stopped emitting carbon dioxide tomorrow, global temperatures would continue to rise. “Believers” in human-caused global warming were just as likely as “disbelievers” to misunderstand the extent to which we are already committed to future temperature rises….
Killian (#345),
Parts per million is useful for describing the concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere, but carbon comes out of the ground in tonnes and that is how it has to go back. GtC is giga tonnes of carbon. But, the 255 GtC extra carbon in the atmosphere just corresponds to the about 400-280=120 ppm increased concentration since preidustrial. Since we are working roughly and the oceans will fight your sequestration effort anyway, we’re calling 280 ppm and 300 ppm about the same concentration. If you want to make it a little closer, then sequester 212 GtC rapidly. The ocenas will help you some then hurt you some during that phase.
#334 wili said As to soil sequestration: I’m all for it, but going forward, there is no guarantee that soils will hold their carbon. Most soils will either dry up and lose it
You really need to learn how regenerative ag works.
or be washed into the sea by torrential downpours, where again much of it will be lost.
See above. Each addition of 1% organic material per sq. meter will hold 136 liters of water. Or is it gallons? I forget. Regardless, the problem is the solution. Add carbon, sequester carbon, sequester water.
More water in soil keeps plants cooler, particularly roots. More water in the soil means less flooding. More sequestered water in soil = lower sea level.
Just one big web of goodness.
And none of this happens without proper water management *anyway*. We start with energy flows: Water, sun, wind. To be clear, we ***start*** there.
No worries.
;-)
#338 Chris Dudley said It can be hard for people who don’t speak math to understand why it is important to ask clear questions, or even to understand what a clear question is. That took a huge amount of deciphering to get to that point.
And you had done so well for a few posts there. I have said this same thing for years and you are the only one to ever claim they did not understand what was being suggested.
Asking for models sounded at first like economic models like the one that shows that mitigation costs little that the IPCC presented.
You’re going to have to admit you were intentionally responding with silliness. I never mentioned a single word about economics. The context has always been drawing down carbon and how quickly temps might respond.
Then the claim was that negative emissions had never been modeled, however they had been.
Repeating it will not make it true. T’was quite clear sequestering carbon rapidly down to sub-300 had never been modeled. Still hasn’t. Which, btw, despite the very helpful posts above, was also missed in those posts. The math doesn’t help without a model, it only helps figure out how much to remove, not the effects.
The phrase falling emissions was then used rather than negative emissions which also lacked clarity since it seemed to be presented as an alternative to negative emissions.
If you say so! They can’t possibly have different meanings within the context.
Hopefully, now, the question is clear
Always was. You have ever only been the one confused individual.
and has been addressed.
Sadly, only partly, as noted above.
Now, get back to being polite. That was much, much more helpful and pleasant.
Kevin (#344),
Maybe I’ve read more Lenin, Mao and Che than you. But forcing people to the countryside is a basic way to wreck social cohesiveness and institute dictatorial power. It also fails to feed people.
Solar panels often have lower efficiency than solar cells because cells don’t fill the whole area of the panel. It could be the panels are using high quality silicon cells though 21.5% is pretty good too.
Killian, I say give it a try. Those who are motivated usually by a desire to solve/understand something are those who learn math. Learning math is one part motivation, and one part effort, with maybe a bit of natural talent making it easier or harder. You might surprise yourself.
“If we fail in communicating that connectedness matters, cooperation is non-negotiable, then we will ultimately fail, period. If we succeed in that communication, you won’t need to militarize.:
– See more at: https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2015/02/unforced-variations-feb-2015/comment-page-7/#comment-626031
Very neat as a binary. But what if there is *partial* success in communicating this concept?
Hold that model! we need to recalibrate …
I’ll try again. This didn’t get through last time.
If we have 400 ppmv of CO2, the volume fraction X is 0.0004. The mass fraction is related to the volume fraction by the ratio of molecular weights:
q = (μ / μ0) X
where &mu0 is the average MW of the total mix. For CO2, we have μ = 44.0098 AMU, and for normally moist air, μ0 = about 28.94. Thus the mass fraction of CO2 in the air is about q = 0.00608.
The total mass of the atmosphere is estimated at 5.148 x 10^18 kg (Trenberth 2005). Thus the CO2 mass is 3.13 x 10^15 kg.
If 400 ppmv is 3.15 x 10^15 kg, 1 ppmv is 7.825 x 10^12 kg. That’s 0.7825 GT.
Here is a conjecture I wrote on a couple other blogs that you guys might like to critique.
Assume for the sake of argument that heat transfer from the surface due to evapotranspiration will increase 5% per 1C increase in surface temp. Assume Stefan-Boltzmann law is reasonably accurate. Assume that DWLWIR increases 4 W/m^2 and that the temperature warms up. When it has warmed 0.5C, evapotranspiration heat loss will have increased by 2W/m^2, and radiative heat loss by about 2.8W/m^2 — implying that the DWLWIR increase of 4 W/m^2 can not raise the Earth surface temp by 0.5C. Obviously these are approximations (based on flow rates by Trenberth), but there is no justification for ignoring the change in the evapotranspirative heat loss rate.
That 5% per 1C is within the range of estimates reported by O’Gorman et al “Energetic Constraints on Precipitation Under Climate Change”, 2011, Surveys in Geophysics, DOI 10.1007/s10712-011-9159-6, one of the papers recommended to me by Pat Cassen. The range is 2%-7%, with the lower estimates based on GCMs and the upper estimates from regressions of rainfalls vs temperatures in various regions of the Earth.
Much of this has been published: Trenberth et al and Stephens et al energy flow diagrams; 288 K as base mean Earth temp; Earth surface as homogeneous and obeying appx Stefan-Boltzmann law; 4 W/m^2 as radiative effect at surface of doubling CO2 concentration. All I “added” was:
2 + 2.8 = 4.8 > 4.
Possible avenues of attack:
2% instead of 5% increase in rainfall.
Take into account the distributions of rainfall and rainfall change, instead of working with global aggregates.
Include changes in advective/convective changes in surface cooling.
@Killian: I decided to check out the Egyptian study cited as the source for the figure of 4.1 Mg/ha per year reported in the Table 1 of the Rodale White Paper. From the conclusion of the paper by Luske and van der Kamp (2010):
“The increase in soil carbon in the upper 50 cm amounted to 4,1 tons of C/ha after one year of farming at the Sinai farm (figure 16). The carbon levels during 5 years of organic farming at the Sekem farm also increased steeply with an average rate of 2,7-3,8 tons C/ha per year in the upper 50 cm of the soil. After the first 5 years till 30 years, the increase in carbon was lower with a rate of approximately 0,5 tons C/ha per year. The results indicate that the potential soil carbon sequestration resembles a logarithmic curve (figure 17), until equilibrium is reached between carbon application and decomposition by microorganisms. It seems that this equilibrium is not yet reached after 30 years of organic farming, but this cannot thoroughly be concluded by this study. Over a period of 30 years, the carbon stock increased from 3,9 to 28,8-31,8 tons C/ha in the upper 50 cm of the soil, a raise of 24,9-27,9 tons C/ha. If one were to imagine a linear relation, this would mean that each year 0,83-0,93 tons C/ha could be stored in the soil. This corresponds to a mitigation potential of 3,1-3,4 tons CO2/ha/year.”
Apparently the “exemplar” sequestration rate applies to a single year of the study, while the average rate over 30 years was less than a quarter of this. However, I see no acknowledgement of these details in the Rodale White Paper. Maybe this will help you to understand why I think the Rodale White Paper is hype without substance.
#353–“Maybe I’ve read more Lenin, Mao and Che than you…”
Chris, you say that as if it were a *good* thing! ;-)
I’m thinking mostly of the Ukrainian collectivization under Stalin, in which few if any people were forced onto the land; mostly, the pre-existing peasantry was forced into collectives, and the upshot was very, very ugly. But the operative word in any of these cases was ‘forced,’ which a priori is not part of K’s proposal.
You’re right, of course, about panel vs. cell efficiency. I believe the Sunpower claim is for the panel, but I might be wrong. Either way, I think it’s ‘close enough’ to the 24% you mention that the idea you put forward starts to have some force. IOW, yes, I agree 21.5% is ‘pretty good.’
BPL (#357),
Everything seems good except the last number. You have 0.7825 GtCO2 but it should be 7.825 GtCO2 (7.81 here: http://www.skepticalscience.com/print.php?r=45 )
A headline i would like to see
“James hansen to head IPCC”
General note about comments nobody made but are being assumed:
1. Forcing people onto the land. Bull. Not being said, not being planned, not a viable policy.
2. The Rodale study was NOT about grasslands. Anything else in the study is presented as mere, what if…? type statements, not to present well-grounded, well-researched claims. Get over it. Also, the study cited is, what? fourteen years old? What is being done with rotational grazing, silviculture, agroecology is far beyond that. Understand what the study was trying to say, and move past cherry-picked, pointless criticism. Look at Mark Sheppard, Savory and others for CURRENT work with systems beyond crop farming, including the list of items I posted earlier in this thread, e.g. terra preta.
The actual point to be made is, regardless of the suite of actions, combining them with reduced consumption – necessary – *will* lead to negative emissions.
> Killian … Look at … Savory ….
You should too. And, as this is a science blog, consider adopting a scientific attitude: “how could I prove this idea is wrong?”
That works out far better than asserting that your ideas are right, because yours.
Consider: https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2013/11/cows-carbon-and-the-anthropocene-commentary-on-savory-ted-video
What about this research showing a sea level rise of 128 mm in NE-US during 2009-2010? Press reports on it are rather cryptical. Was it a temporary spike, and if so, how long did it last?
Kevin (#360),
“Chris, you say that as if it were a *good* thing! ;-)”
Those who won’t sift the dust heap of history will end up there themselves. My teachers were old school conservative.
I think Killian uses nature as menace while saying awh shucks but it is definitely a formula for diminution of liberty.
Chris–ouch! You’re right, I slipped a decimal place. Thanks for catching that.
#Chris Dudley, #366
Variation: Climate change / planetary overheating is definitely a formula for diminution of liberty. Hilarious! – NOT!
Kees van der Leun @365.
The abstract of the paper presenting the finding is here.
The SLR data under discussion is in their Figure 1b covering the coast – New York to Newfoundland. Figure 1b can be seen a little more clearly here. The lower plot is the number of tidal gauges used and the upper plot is SL 1920-2012. The paper is less about the size of this rise and more about the reasons for it happening. They point the finger at ocean currents and the NAO. What this means is that there was a very very slow 5″ tidal surge affecting that coast, so slow that a fair proportion of it might remain for decades or longer.
I just hope the fair folk of New England are more level-headed about it than the bonkers burgers of Broadchurch round my way who brand increases in the astrological high tides expected in coming months as “supertides”. Super? It will actually boost their peak ‘spring’ tides at the autumn equinox by a whopping 4 inches.
Hey Gavin,
More of those holes appeared (http://www.iflscience.com/environment/scientists-search-answers-following-discovery-several-new-mysterious-craters-russia)
Can we expect another update. Also the article itself doesn’t mention Methane, was that ruled out?
I don’t know if the questioner wanting a full compilation of unskeptical “skeptic” misdeeds is still around, but I don’t think many have done a more thorough job than John Mashey. I was reminded of this here:
http://www.desmogblog.com/2015/02/23/anti-science-associations-rand-paul-jane-orient-art-robinson-willie-soon-and-friends
and particularly here:
http://www.desmogblog.com/sites/beta.desmogblog.com/files/snagraph1.png
Of course, this fits with the more recent article about Soon et al., but I’ll leave it here for now.
Anyone who doubts the interconnectedness and concerted villainies of the doubt and delay distracters should study it well, and realize it’s only one piece of the Laocoon strangulation of reality and science and public understanding.
Angry much? Yes, I’m furious!
I don’t know if the questioner wanting a full compilation of unskeptical “skeptic” misdeeds is still around, but I don’t think many have done a more thorough job than John Mashey. I was reminded of this here:
http://www.desmogblog.com/2015/02/23/anti-science-associations-rand-paul-jane-orient-art-robinson-willie-soon-and-friends
and particularly here:
http://www.desmogblog.com/sites/beta.desmogblog.com/files/snagraph1.png
Of course, this fits with the more recent article about Soon et al., but I’ll leave it here for now.
Anyone who doubts the interconnectedness and concerted villainies of the doubt and delay distracters should study it well, and realize it’s only one piece of the Laocoon strangulation of reality and science and public understanding.
Angry much? Yes, I’m furious!
(apologies if this is a duplicate; first effort gone missing, I think)
“Democratic lawmakers in Washington are demanding information about funding for scientists who publicly dispute widely held views on the causes and risks of climate change.
Prominent members of the United States House of Representatives and the Senate have sent letters to universities, companies and trade groups asking for information about funding to the scientists….
The requests focused on funding sources for the scientists, including David Legates of the University of Delaware and Roger Pielke Jr. of the University of Colorado at Boulder.
In the letters, Representative Grijalva wrote, “My colleagues and I cannot perform our duties if research or testimony provided to us is influenced by undisclosed financial relationships.” He asked for each university’s policies on financial disclosure and the amount and sources of outside funding for each scholar, “communications regarding the funding” and “all drafts” of testimony.” http://www.nytimes.com/2015/02/26/science/lawmakers-seek-information-on-funding-for-climate-change-critics.html
http://www.insurancejournal.com/news/national/2015/02/26/358760.htm
Insurance and Climate Change column
Climate Change Modeling on Cusp of Paradigm Shift
By Don Jergler | February 26, 2015
In the face of growing interest in climate change impacts, several big catastrophe modelers said they’ve heard from more clients interested in receiving climate-related data and they believe the field is on the cusp of a change in the way modeling is done.
“It’s kind of like we’re in a paradigm shift,” said Karen Clark, owner of Boston-based Karen Clark & Co., a spe cia list in catastrophe risk, modeling and risk management….
364 Hank Roberts said, “!”
Learn to read, and try not to respond just being… less than useful.
See if you, in your infinite patronizing, can figure out what you missed.
#340 (Ladbury) —
Yes, I’m fully aware that climate scientists have day jobs, and I in no way intended to denigrate them. To the contrary, I just assumed that weeks of work by me could be done in days by them.
And I know how traditional science works, but I asked for a compilation nonetheless, because (a) someone might already have created such a paper, and (b) climate science is, unfortunately, not treated as traditional science.
My 2 cents on the issue is that when you have an entire army of well-funded opponents trying to destroy the foundations of your scientific endeavors, it’s more than a bit myopic to say you can’t be bothered to counter that. If my research were under that kind of attack, I would be strongly motivated to set the record straight. But maybe that’s just me.
To the other posters that mentioned skeptical science or Koch organizational charts, thank you for your good intentions, but again not what I asked for.
At any rate, I asked for a review of the contrarian literature, and the answer seems to be that it’s unlikely to happen. Ce la vie.
Ou, comme on dirait en France, “C’est la vie.”
(No idea how that got garbled.)
James McDonald, reference to John Mashey’s work on DeSmogBlog was for you. Do look at the linked graphic and follow some of his earlier work; he’s very thorough and over the years has tried to find means to get at the tangled imbedded mess. DeSmog is a good platform for that.
Apologies to all for the duplicate (now @371/372), system wasn’t letting me know my comment went through,
Thanks to all who took the trouble to check out my article on “How We Know CO2 Is Warming The Planet.”
Part 2 is out today:
http://doc-snow.hubpages.com/hub/How-Do-We-Know-That-Humans-Are-Responsible-For-Rising-CO2
(And if you missed the original, it’s just one click to back to it from the new piece.)
As always, your feedback is welcome…
“To the other posters that mentioned skeptical science…”
– See more at: https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2015/02/unforced-variations-feb-2015/comment-page-8/#comment-626201
That would be me. James, just to be clear, I wasn’t suggesting that you’d find what you want ready-made. I was suggesting that it would be a good place to re-ask your question, as there are those on that board who would (IMO) be more likely to have the pieces of an answer ready to hand.
[edit – not here]
Climate a Moral Issue
376, James McDonald: At any rate, I asked for a review of the contrarian literature, and the answer seems to be that it’s unlikely to happen.
You might check out the books by Rud Istvan.
I was reading an article in Truthout (http://www.truth-out.org/news/item/27714-are-humans-going-extinct) about potential extinction from climate change, when I came across a reader comment by none other than Killian (#15):
“So, Turthout will interview a suicidal, Jonestown-esque Pied Piper of smiles. How about a solutions-oriented designer of sustainable systems with a plan to avoid the mass global suicide?”
Killian’s displeasure refers to an interview with McPherson contained in the article. What I find interesting is that, when one examines RECOMMENDATIONS rather than long-term PREDICTIONS, the difference between Killian and McPherson is negligible. Killian recommends Sustainability, which he has defined at length. In his speeches, the closest McPherson has come to recommendations to avoid extinction is to reference works on collapse of the global economy. In his Magnum Opus on climate change (http://guymcpherson.com/2014/01/climate-change-summary-and-update/), he states:
“the excellent work by Tim Garrett, which points out that only complete collapse avoids runaway greenhouse.”…..
According to Yvo de Boer, who was executive secretary of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change in 2009, when attempts to reach a deal at a summit in Copenhagen crumbled with a rift between industrialized and developing nations, “the only way that a 2015 agreement can achieve a 2-degree goal is to shut down the whole global economy.”
It seems to me that both Killian and McPherson are recommending collapse of industrial civilization and the global economy as we know it, although one is optimistic about the outcome and the other is pessimistic.
Switzerland has become the first country to formally communicate its contribution to a UN climate change deal: 50% greenhouse gas cuts on 1990 levels by 2030.
Released on Friday, the Swiss government says 30% of those cuts will be achieved within the country, with the remaining 20% through carbon markets or other forms of offsets.
“This objective of a 50% reduction in emissions reflects Switzerland’s responsibility for climate warming and the potential cost of emissions reduction measures in Switzerland and abroad over the 2020-2030 period,” says the Swiss communication.
“Switzerland, which is responsible for 0.1% of today’s global greenhouse gas emissions and, based on the structure of its economy, has a low level of emissions (6.4 tonnes per capita per year), will use emissions reduction measures abroad to reduce the cost of emissions reduction measures during the period 2020-2030.”
Documents sent to the media say the target is “compatible” with efforts to limit warming to below 2C above pre-industrial levels. The government is also discussing a long term target to reduce emissions 70-85% by 2050 on 1990 levels. http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/feb/27/switzerland-becomes-first-country-to-submit-paris-climate-deal-pledge
James McDonald
There are some papers which supply constructive criticism, along the lines of the enjoyable exchange between Robert Way and Michael Mann here. There is hardly anything which both contradicts the AGW paradigm and meets minimum standards of evidence and peer review.
Go onto sceptic sites and you will find a lot of amateurs nitpicking, but be prepared to pick the political subtext out of your teeth afterwards.
James McDonald,
Well, there are surveys (like Oreskes) that look at the literature. In order to determine the consensus, you have to consider the alternatives as well, so it’s likely that lists (and problems of categorization) are maintained somewhere by surveyors– which seems like a better place to start looking.
http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Surveys_of_scientists%27_views_on_climate_change
I doubt that there is, of necessity, anything as tidy as what you may be hoping for.
Or you can go directly to the nutters and mine their dubious resources. Like this one:
http://www.populartechnology.net/2009/10/peer-reviewed-papers-supporting.html
“Switzerland has become the first country to formally communicate its contribution to a UN climate change deal: 50% greenhouse gas cuts on 1990 levels by 2030.” http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2015/feb/27/switzerland-becomes-first-country-to-submit-paris-climate-deal-pledge
“Documents sent to the media say the target is “compatible” with efforts to limit warming to below 2C above pre-industrial levels. The government is also discussing a long term target to reduce emissions 70-85% by 2050 on 1990 levels.”
A significant majority of Americans say combating climate change is a moral issue that obligates them – and world leaders – to reduce carbon emissions, a Reuters/IPSOS poll has found.
The poll of 2,827 Americans was conducted in February to measure the impact of moral language, including interventions by Pope Francis, on the climate change debate. In recent months, the pope has warned about the moral consequences of failing to act on rising global temperatures, which are expected to disproportionately affect the lives of the world’s poor.
The result of the poll suggests that appeals based on ethics could be key to shifting the debate over climate change in the United States, where those demanding action to reduce carbon emissions and those who resist it are often at loggerheads.
Two-thirds of respondents (66 percent) said that world leaders are morally obligated to take action to reduce CO2 emissions. And 72 percent said they were “personally morally obligated” to do what they can in their daily lives to reduce emissions. http://www.reuters.com/article/2015/02/27/us-usa-climate-poll-idUSKBN0LV0CV20150227
James McDonald @276.
Your original enquiry took as a start point Cook et al (2013) and that only about 100 of the 11,000 climate papers over a 20-year period rejected or were doubtful about the consensus view on AGW. You expressed your enquiry here thus “To oversimplify, I guess I’m asking to what extent those papers constitute a source of credible scientific argument, and to what extent are they problematic or even demonstrably incorrect.”
Yet now you are characterising these 100 papers as “an entire army of well-funded opponents trying to destroy the foundations of your scientific endeavors.” I’d hazard a guess that this army you talk of is not operating within the science.
If the opposition to the consensus on AGW was solely down to those 100 papers, then it might be worth examining the merits or otherwise of their content. But that is a simplisitic view. There is a lot of work carried out by the “army” you talk of and the divide between that extra-scientific work and the actual science is not so easy to define. (You may need convincing of this.)
I think what we can say about the denialistic science is that if someone did have an alternative to the consensus that passed muster and didn’t collapse into nonsense at the first review, that someone would obtain a lot of friends. And if that alternative theory proved to be correct and overturned the consensus, that someone would gain world renown, a Galileo of their day, a scientific figure as well-known in the future as say Einstein or Archimedes. As with all scientific theories, any such alternative would get a lot of attacks but that is the stuff of science. That is how science progresses.
So do you have some doubt as to whether such an alternative theory may exist?
385,Entropic Man: There is hardly anything which both contradicts the AGW paradigm and meets minimum standards of evidence and peer review. – See more at: https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2015/02/unforced-variations-feb-2015/comment-page-8/#comment-626216
I would say that there is very little that contradicts the AGW “paradigm”, period. Most of the “skepticism” is about the magnitude of the CO2 effect (maybe it is exaggerated), magnitude of natural temperature oscillation, the magnitude of other threats (there will always be alternations of flooding and droughts), timing (warming of the surface will take a long time to occur), magnitude of the damage done by warming (“change”, yes; damage, not so much, the clearest threat being sea level rise), pros and cons of direct effects of CO2 on biota, accuracy of models, other parts of the climate system (evapotranspiration, rainfall and clouds). Those are all “normal science” topics of research.
The blogs ClimateEtc and WattsUpWithThat have some egregious contributors to the comments, but most of the “headlined” authors accept the basic radiative physics of the green house gases and their warming effect in the climate.
That’s my take.
385, Entropic man:
For example, this paper was reported on favorably at WUWT a couple days ago:
Nature | Letter
Observational determination of surface radiative forcing by CO2 from 2000 to 2010
D. R. Feldman,
W. D. Collins,
P. J. Gero,
M. S. Torn,
E. J. Mlawer
& T. R. Shippert
Nature
(2015)
doi:10.1038/nature14240
Received 09 June 2014
Accepted 15 January 2015
Published online 25 February 2015
Abstract and full text (behind paywall) are at the web page for Nature right now. Some of the commenters appear nuts (maybe you would include my comments in that), but the headline writer, Anthony Watt in this case, does not dispute that an increase in atmospheric CO2 will produce an increase in the DWLWIR.
#383 Jasper Jaynes said What I find interesting is that, when one examines RECOMMENDATIONS rather than long-term PREDICTIONS, the difference between Killian and McPherson is negligible.
Guy and I started out friendly. I met him in 2010. His schtick was relatively new then and didn’t include NTHE in the 2030’s.
Yes, as far as rapid climate change goes, there is agreement. We are both much more concerned about the Arctic than, Archer is, e.g. The differences come in collapse vs. simplification, misrepresenting the science and in encouraging people to accept we have already failed and extinction is nigh.
Guy’s reason for collapse of civilization is not to avoid *our* extinction – he says it’s too late – but to preserve some of current biota. He thinks it’s a moral imperative to end industrial civilization ASAP.
I do not call for the end of anything. I say the resource and climate issues require simplification, not eradication of all tech and civilization, to boot.
I also do not believe it is too late yet. The Arctic is acting up quite more than I’d like and now the WAIS is supposedly already toast. Great. Just flippin’ great. BUT, I firmly believe that if we can cool the planet we may get some of those clathrates the permafrost to cool quickly enough to avoid a catastrophic level of release. However, I also think near-term catastrophic release is a non-trivial risk.
This is why I wish someone would run a return to sub-300 scenario and see if it does result in fast enough cooling to reasonably expect SLR to stop at 10 ft and the clathrates to chill out.
Also, I do not distort the science to feed a gullible public. Guy presents the study recently linked on these pages as stating there is no way to sequester carbon, we’re stuck with it. Note how this so neatly fits into the meme of it being too late. What he doesn’t tell his followers is that paper didn’t address mitigation at all. It just supposed cessation of all emissions as a thought experiment, really. It did not address trying to sequester what is already in the atmosphere.
That is but one of his funky bits.
So, no, there is not a lot separating us in terms of where we stand, but there are huge issues on the future, how data is presented and suggesting we should think in terms of hospice for humanity.
Part of his problem may be he’s one of those that read a little on permaculture and thinks he understands it, but it is clear he does not.
Toward a scientific support of regenerative practices.
Counting the Benefits of Agroecology
And…
57% of Land Use Emissions Avoidable?
Union of Concerned Scientists endorse regenrative practices (though they are kinda confused about it. :-) )
Agroecology, so say some scientists.
Just to be clear, part of the reason I and others are confident of the benefits of permaculture/regenerative design as a global design approach comes from science supporting what we already know. What studies do come out about trees, soils, bio-char, what have you, have pretty much supported our awareness. Will try to bring more of this to your attention.
All we lack are scientists and organizations willing to do science the way *you all* want it done. Us? We already know. Just waiting for you all to catch up.
Unbelievably, this show aired in 2012, a full three years after my PDC (permaculture course). This show talks about being surprised by the roles of microbes in the soil… but permaculturist and others have talked about this for many years.
Oh, my! Microbes and fungi and whatnot, oh, my!
Simplify, grow stuff. Just do it.
http://www.theecologist.org/blogs_and_comments/commentators/2772427/survivable_ipcc_projections_are_based_on_science_fiction_the_reality_is_much_worse.html
“We are basing our collective future safety on this planet on pure science fiction.” (About 3:30 in the embedded video.)
Discuss.
The AMS has spoken out http://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/capital-weather-gang/wp/2015/02/27/science-group-denounces-house-probe-into-climate-skeptics-funding/ against the probe of funding sources of climate deniers by members of congress but the AGU points out that asking for disclosure of funding is sound but objects to asking for drafts of testimony and communications about testimony is not OK. http://fromtheprow.agu.org/blog/protecting-academic-freedom-holding-accountable/
It sounds as though some of Soon’s communications about testimony were essentially invoices or receipts for deliverables. Those sorts of business communications probably ought to be open to probing. So, perhaps asking for any drafts of testimony submitted to funders might be appropriate.
Here is the thing that I think ought to be transparent. A donor to a member of congress asks that a particular expert be called to give testimony. That expert prepares testimony and submits a draft to the donor as part of a financial relationship between the donor and the expert. The public should know both that the donor got a favor from the congressperson and that the donor has paid the expert for the testimony. Academic freedom is not contingent upon deceiving the public and probably suffers if that kind of thing is promoted by a misapplication of the principles of academic freedom.
Senator Inhofe has solid PROOF that the Climate is not warming:
http://www.nationaljournal.com/energy/watch-jim-inhofe-throw-a-snowball-on-the-senate-floor-20150226
http://www.msn.com/en-gb/news/weather/the-siberian-crater-saga-is-more-widespread-%e2%80%94-and-scarier-%e2%80%94-than-anyone-thought/ar-BBhZntw?ocid=iehp
Looks like we Siberia has more holes now
Killian#392,
Good clarification; thank you.
https://www.google.com/search?q=U.S.+Dept.+of+Agriculture’s+Soil+Biology+Primer
Good one: http://thebulletin.org/climate-change-irreversible-not-unstoppable8044#
Shorter: Welcome to the AnthroPliocene …