The month’s open thread on climate topics. More record monthly warmth, but only the second lowest Antarctic sea ice though (growing since 2023!).
Reader Interactions
447 Responses to "Unforced variations: March 2024"
Barry E Finchsays
If by chance the entire top 90m well-mixed of ocean warmed 0.3 degrees 2023 rather than just surface waters then that’s ~5.0 mm of extra expansion which drops the WMO SLR 2014-2023 from 4.77 to 4.27 mm/year without it at: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-03-20/wmo-climate-records-broken-global-temperature/103604076
Of course, the 5 mm still applies as a big 1-shot but the topic is ice loss. If I reduce the 4.27 mm/year by the 4.3 mm drop in 2013 (storage on land) that was skipped in the plot then it’s 3.84 mm/year SLR 2014-2023. The plot clearly shows that the rate of acceleration has decreased. If I subtract a guess for expansion so’s I don’t scammily water down the ice mass loss contribution with linear thermal because I don’t wan’t to fart around playing silly games like e.g. Martin Durkin or Paul Beckwith (just random examples because they’re current here, there’s hundreds of course) (because I don’t actually care, I’m just interested) then from the link it’s:
ice expand total
— ——– —–
1.60 0.53 2.13 1993-2002
1.80 1.53 3.33 2003-2012 Increased 1.53 / 0.53 = 2.9 Times as much in 10 years !!!!!!
2.00 2.77 4.31 2014-2023 Increased 2.77 / 1.53 = 1.8 Times as much in 10 years !!!!!!
(I should do Googley videos with my (I should do Googley videos with my gripping outreach skillset)
The doubling time will be a millennium soon at this rate.
WMO didn’t draw the trend. I assumed they falsely added the 4.3 mm drop in 2013 to their 2014-2023, I’ve traced enough screen plots onto paper and drawn them myself over `1`1 years to last me for a while. I’m trying to goad anyone browsing into doing it, not me. I just guessed some expansion, I’m not searching right now for this sort of rough discussion with Geoff Miell’s Dog’s Breakfast of asserted SLR by 2100 (subject change before I forget, I just stole Eric Rignot’s 4.5 m / century after all the (~60 is it ?) ice shelves have collapsed and pretend I worked it out all myself when posting the last 6 years, because he can’t stop me, that’s just speedup 6-7 times == (2,200+600) * 5.5 / 360 = 4.24 m / century plus 0.26 m / century for expansion and the insult).
Barry E Finchsays
Kevin McKinney 23 MAR 2024 AT 11:00 AM “would be a doubling rate of ~8.3 years yield a doubling time of just under 12 years”. The formula used for the trend fit is quadratic (a 2nd-order polynomial) so it doesn’t have any “doubling rate” and that is the underlying issue. A 2nd-order polynomial isn’t an exponential function. It will be geometrically increasing or geometrically decreasing but it isn’t exponential, has no doubling time. Since 2016 when I started noticing bods typing like “No way because we’re extinct before 2050 they don’t understand the exponential function” I found it only mildly ironic that none of these people typing “they don’t understand the exponential function” knew what an “exponential function” is. I’ll likeIy get statistics off that nice plot and table them here unless somebody else does it, rather than keep replying with dribbles & drabbles to dribbles & drabbles unless someone else does it right. Not this week for sure.
John Pollacksays
I don’t see a good justification for assuming an exponential function. One essentially assumes that the rate of SLR is dependent somehow on the previous rate. Why not a function of climate warming as a whole, or better yet, the rate of energy accumulation beyond equilibrium?
The whole business is made worse by the relatively small changes and large noise component so far. This makes it impossible to distinguish statistically the shape of the very large future SLR curve from the present
small rise. The important issue is that SLR is going to keep getting worse at an accelerating rate, with very large changes in the pipeline. Exactly how fast we get there, or the shape of the curve, are quite secondary
in my opinion.
Those points are fair, and I previously expressed my reservations about exponential projection in this context. But I understood Karsten to have posited doubling rates, rightly or wrongly, and I was looking for a quick sanity check on how realistic they might be. Turns out, they do seem fairly consistent with the UCol record, regardless of the caveats you and Barry bring. They’re not prophecy, of course. Apart from the quick and dirty approximation I used, the SLR record is quite noisy. But Karsten’s numbers aren’t obviously crazy.
Piotrsays
Kevin Mar 27 – “[Geoff] have posited doubling rates […] Turns out, they do seem fairly consistent with the UCol record, regardless of the caveats you and Barry bring”
Still, it may be difficult to distinguish the exponential growth in absolute numbers from other growth rates early on, _particularly_ when these early data are “noisy” compared to the small early signal. The difference between the different functions may become clear only when once you extrapolate the past observations further enough into the future.
So unless there is a physical reason to expect exponential growth, I would be careful in assuming it for projections too far into the future.
Yes, my math is not strong, but I do know that a quadratic fit is not the same as an exponential one. But my assumption–untested, to be honest–is that the difference in the case of the UCol SLR graph will not be very large, and therefore I can derive an estimated doubling time. Karsten’s OP was envisioning doubling times, and that was what I was responding to. Should you follow through with the table you mention, that would be great!
Barton Paul Levensonsays
This paper will be of interest in the save-the-world-from-global-warming-with-irrigation debate:
You will note that the expressions for latent heat involve a term for temperature–as temperature increases, so does the latent heat transfer–and as it decreases, so does LH. If the irrigation schemes succeeded in increasing LH and thus decreasing the temperature, the lower temperature would decrease the latent heat transfer. Fighting that feedback would make that type of scheme even more difficult.
Tomáš Kaliszsays
in Re to Barton Paul Levenson, 26 Mar 2024 at 8:00 AM,
that you recetly cited does not consider any constraint for water availability, and thus may not be particularly relevant for the discussion on this topics.
Perhaps you might have missed the discussion about the article by Lague et al
I can’t speak for irrigationists – rather I promote simply to recognize the value of existing wetland and soils conservation; with option for a remediation plan also. I understand this is actively ridiculed, distorted, misunderstood, and/or perceived as a threat here.
The temperature dependence of equilibrium evaporation is not controversial, with relation imposed by vapor pressure saturation curve and psychrometric constant.
In a condition of permanently saturated surface, Ts is lower than it otherwise would be as evaporation depletes the available energy until “equilibrium” (optimum).
In this state of uninhibited moisture availability, the atmospheric heat storage (sensible heat) is lower than it otherwise would be. Unlike sensible heat flux into the boundary layer, the latent heating of the free troposphere at LCL must be matched by radiative cooling to space.
In this uninhibited scenario, mean total turbulent flux (net upwards and away from surface) is higher than a moisture limited case. Atmospheric heat storage, reflected by 2m air temperature (Ta), is reduced.
In a moisture limited case, water limits evaporation so that available energy results in enhanced sensible heat flux and surface radiative emission. This is accomplished by a warmer Ts. In this scenario, atmospheric heat storage is higher than the unrestricted moisture case, and total turbulent flux (net upwards and away from surface) is lower. Heat storage, reflected by 2m air temperature, is increased as moisture is limited.
Recognizing the bounding radiative controls on near-surface climates, ET is critical in regulating the SW down (cloud), LW up (surface radiative emission temperature), LW down (atmospheric heat storage or Ta), and column radiative emission temperature (Tr). I do recognize the obvious tradeoffs therein, but I think it is not controversial that dryness is associated with hotter temps overall, as demonstrated comprehensively by Lague with the CESM. The notion is widely understood outside these pages, and the knowledge has been used for practical purposes ongoing for generations.
Piotrsays
JCM Mar, 27″ I promote simply to recognize the value of existing wetland and soils conservation; with option for a remediation plan also. I understand this is actively ridiculed”
Maybe if y0u didn’t quote extensively Lague et al. 2023 – whose model brings NO new insight into your “ value of existing wetland and soils conservation; with option for a remediation plan also. but deals instead with GLOBAL averages of extreme cases (Earth with all continents converted to deserts -minus Earth with all continents converted to swamps) – people would not question your ability to understand what the paper you quote is really about. Particularly that after your understanding of it was challenged, you dismissed that model as “ imaginary process mechanisms that apply arbitrary “rules about how things ought to be ” according to the model authors, and as such, offering no insight into the real world?
[JCM complaining about being] distorted, misunderstood, and/or perceived as a threat here.
. The only “threat” I am perceiving from you is that I may get my eyebrows “frozen” in the elevated position from the constant bewilderment: “What is this guy talking about ?”; “How is _this_ relevant to anything that is discussed here???”
JCMsays
perhaps Dr Lague should be issued a notice to resign from the discipline by the realclimate comment crew, who’s twitter (X) profile has the caption “Climate scientist @CompHyd_Earth exploring how land changes modify the atmosphere”. She is not in the least disrespected by actual professional academics. I suppose she also should have been disallowed a spot in the ECS and cloud feedback symposium sessions hosted by Dessler, Lutsko, Proistosescu, and Williams; which is well attended by the likes of Hartmann, Schmidt, and Stevens. Similar scrutiny could be applied to Dr. Pin-hsin Hu and others, particularly women, who share an interest in the biophysical terrestrial influence on hydroclimates. The Lague paper, the title of which literally includes the word “swamp” i.e. wetland, was initially introduced following the failure here by participants to provide objective insight into the possible effects of land change / hydrological influences upon climates, and a better conceptual framework was requested. I do recognize it is a high level platform. It was immediately evident to me those with motivated interest to resist the subject had never given it any thought and were improvising a conceptual understanding as a reaction. My own interest in catchment stabilization is comprehensive including multiple co-benefits across fields. It is deeply personal and ingrained in my daily life. When contributing to realclimate, my insights are filtered through personal experiences and tailored to the page’s focus on a globally averaged perspective of climates.
JCMsays
I should add additionally that if you are a professional academic, Piotr, it appears to me that your contributions on these pages not only bring considerable disgrace upon your peers and institution, but also demonstrate a notably limited ability to envision beyond your existing capabilities.
Barton Paul Levensonsays
JCM: I should add additionally [sic] that if you are a professional academic, Piotr, it appears to me that your contributions on these pages not only bring considerable disgrace upon your peers and institution, but also demonstrate a notably limited ability to envision beyond your existing capabilities.
BPL: I should add additionally that you not only bring considerable disgrace upon yourself, but also demonstrate a notably limited ability to learn.
Piotrsays
JCM MAR 29: “ Perhaps Dr Lague should be issued a notice to resign from the discipline perhaps Dr Lague should be issued a notice to resign from the discipline by the realclimate comment crew ”
Why? If I can speak for my one-person “comment crew” – “we” didn’t criticize Lague,
but the understanding of the Lague’s paper by JCM and Tomas. If anyone did a number on “Dr Lague”, it would be … a certain JCM, who dismissed Lague’s modelling as:
“ imaginary process mechanisms [that apply arbitrary] rules about how things ought to be [according to the model authors]”, and as such, offering no insight into the real world.
But again that’s JCM, so no reason to resign, Dr. Lague. It’s not like he [ silent shudder here ] PRAISED you: now _that_ would call for frantic doublechecking of your paper.
JCMsays
BPL it’s perfectly fair to fire that back…
Currently, I’m sidelined with a fracture in my right foot, affording me ample time.
on teaching and learning I sense we have generally circled all the back to the mainstream that terrestrial flux partitioning significantly influences the observed climates in our communities. I have not seen any credible debunking of this concept. Initially, I faced unexpected resistance when efforts were made over an extended period to educate me by introducing the hypothetical doubling of ET concept, which, when examined, showed no change or even a warming influence.
I concede I did refuse that teaching because contradicts fundamental principles outlined in microclimate/boundary layer textbooks like Oke, academic literature, lectures by scholars such as Denning, and my own empirical observations. I have been teaching here about that for ages now and a reciprocal refusal appears to be entrenched.
Nonetheless, a great deal of available energy in the form of solar input intensity and greenhouse effect enhancement potential is consumed by the power of latent flux, which is approximately equal to the atmospheric heat transport, and it is essential to the existence of cloud albedo. The latent portion is about 10x the thermally direct circulation and I previously provided reference to Fajber’s work on remote “heat tags” and the radiative cooling.
In your latest teaching, a study cited from https://journals.ametsoc.org/view/journals/atsc/66/1/2008jas2797.1.xml adopts the common perspective that surface flux variables passively respond to changes in the atmosphere, such as LW radiative forcing. In the work the LCL pressure is prescribed and cloud radiative effects are ignored. So it’s worth recognizing that the work specifically does not address the issue. It is stated explicitly that “Although there is a possibility that clouds may have a radiative effect relevant to the problem at hand, the issue is so complex that it is left open for future research.” Additionally, by adopting the atmosphere first perspective, it cannot explicitly consider the forced surface flux re-partitioning from direct catchment deterioration. Critically, the relevant factors to surface-atmosphere forcing are assumed fixed or ignored. I interpret the work implicitly recognizing that the magnitude of convective flux is strictly related to Ts – Tr, and that the “vertical transport of dry static energy by the large-scale circulation… is small (less than 10 W m−2 globally) compared to the latent heat flux”. However, if this work was provided to teach me, it specifically neglects the key matter of interest. Tomas recognized that immediately.
Previously I have provided references where independent groups such as Lague and the Kleidon/Ghausi address the missing parts in such semianalytical solutions specifically, where they each independently teach that clouds are fundamental to the problem and it is quantified. Additionally, I recall Makarieva’s main point is that existing schemes postulate a critical temperature profile and are thus deemed unsuitable to detect landuse effects. She cautions that conclusions drawn from ESMs and related semianalytical designs about landscape management may not be robust and policy advice gleaned therefrom could result in a deepening of the environmental crisis (in some respects), by ignoring critical factors. I can attest the damage caused by this trickling down even to local committee, however I understand Makarieva may have introduced some flawed criticisms of models.
Ultimately the semianalytical solution you provided arrives at a change of LHF 1.7 W m−2 K−1. It’s uncontroversial that latent flux will increase with greenhouse-forced global warming due to increased evaporative demand. The matter of interest is the increasing disparity between the observed and equilibrium rates, resulting in potentially warmer temperatures compared to scenarios with equivalent CO2 forcing. This is especially critical for the landscapes as the surface availabe energy in the form of solar must be completely accounted-for above the surface. When moisture is limited the relative humidity is lower, lapse rate effect and atmospheric radiative cooling weaker, and less abundant cloud albedo compared to a system with catchments unperturbed. I have previously tried to communicate this concept as a delta lambda “Humanity” factor to appeal to common perspectives within the current overwhelming paradigm of atmospheric radiative forcing.
In a more concrete way to appreciate this, envision the nation of Malaysia which was featured in the brilliant film Entrapment where Sean Connery and Catherine Zeta-Jones visit the urban area of Kuala Lumpur which is characterized by hot and humid conditions juxtaposed with rugged, jungle-filled hills. Having traveled through Malaysia myself in 2004, I can attest to its climate. Now, envision the nation completely eroded, desertified, and stripped of biodiversity. Such a hypothetical disturbance would conceivably raise the annual mean temperature from around 25C to nearly 30C, with associated temperature and hydrological extremes. This principle, rooted in simple and longstanding knowledge, has been understood for generations, such as in agricultural practices where fields are occasionally cleared and left fallow to induce extreme temperatures and kill off diseases. In the mainstream today I think the effect is not disputed in local domains and it is shown by cleared plots in the Amazon how much hotter things become. The assumption is simply that humanity is too insignificant to effect any cumulative change remotely. Lague is laying the groundwork to explore such issues quantitatively. https://marysalague.com/
JCMsays
re: “”””a certain JCM, who dismissed Lague’s modelling as: imaginary process mechanisms”””
that is a shameful and twisted distortion. How much lower can one stoop?
Piotrsays
JCM Mar 29: “I should add additionally that if you are a professional academic, Piotr, it appears to me that your contributions on these pages not only bring considerable disgrace upon your peers and institution,”
My criticism of you is specific – I base my opinions of you on the quotes from your posts, and both the veracity of these quotes and the logic of my interpretation of them – are open to falsification. You, unable to falsify either of them – try to shoot the messenger – hurling your unsupported “opinions” about me, and now, adding a veiled threat of denouncing me to my institution:
since I have never used my profession, the name of my institution, nor my peers, to increase the weight/credibility of my arguments – the most plausible (only?) reason why you would write about my “ bringing considerable disgrace upon [my] peers and institution” – is to intimidate me into silence, with a veiled threat of a denouncement to my institution for my “bringing considerable disgrace upon it”.
Just when you thought they couldn’t get any lower, they do.
4. Conclusions
In a global model with realistic continental geometry,
reducing terrestrial evaporation increases the total
amount of atmospheric water vapor over most land
and ocean regions. The residence time of water vapor
in the atmosphere increases by roughly 50% from the
simulation with fully saturated land to the simulation
with desert land. Suppressing land evaporation has a
direct warming effect on the land surface by reducing
latent cooling of the surface, but also drives atmo-
spheric feedbacks including reductions in terrestrial
cloud cover. The anomalous surface energy fluxes
driven by atmospheric cloud, water vapor, and tem-
perature feedbacks are larger than the initial change
in latent heat flux driven directly by suppressed
terrestrial evaporation. The cloud feedback is crit-
ical for increasing near-surface MSE and generating
anomalous atmospheric circulations throughout the
depth of the troposphere. Simulations conducted in
a cloud-free model still show surface warming with
suppressed terrestrial evaporation, but also show a
decrease, rather than an increase, in near surface
MSE. Anomalous atmospheric circulations over the
continents in cloud-free simulations are much shal-
lower, and the atmosphere shows reduced atmo-
spheric water vapor with suppressed terrestrial evap-
oration. This extreme experiment raises the ques-
tion of how real-world changes to the land surface
(e.g. land use, agriculture) may be contributing to cli-
mate change by altering atmospheric water vapor and
cloud cover, and how terrestrial evaporation modu-
lates climate on other planets or in past continental
configurations of Earth’s history.
As I pointed several times in the previous discussion, my understanding to these conclusions is as follows:
The authors brought a hint that water availability for evaporation on land plays a significant role in Earth climate. I tried to show that human interferences with the water availability, like converting 4 % of the considered land area from the swamp land hydrology to the desert land hydrology or vice versa, could already have a measurable effect on global climate. For that reason, I think that the topics touched by Lague may deserve further attention and proof by other models, and further expansion of this research.
It is my understanding that JCM agrees to conclusions presented by the authors and that he basically shares my view on the potential importance of the topics and of further research in this direction.
Oppositely, at the start of the discussion, it was my feeling that you interpreted the article basically oppositely to the conclusion provided by the authors. It was further my feeling that during the discussion, you have modified your view and that you, now, may basically agree with conclusions offered by Lague et al.
In this respect, however, I still do not understand why you think and assert that JCM misinterprets Lague 2023.
Could you perhaps clarify for others (who do not like to peruse the entire discussion that became quite discouraging by its extent and style) if your view currently anyhow differs from the conclusions provided by Lague et al, and if not, in which aspect JCM does not understand the article?
It is my feeling that there may be in fact no substantial difference between you both, and that using conclusions provided by Lague et al as a reference, the present discussion could be perhaps brought to a conclusion as well, without further unnecessary disputes that seem to be based on unimportant details or misunderstandings / misinterpretations presented in the discussion but not in the disputed article itself.
Thank you in advance and best regards
Tomáš
Susan Andersonsays
Some current fire insights just posted by Henson and Masters:
Fire suppression ruled, enforced in Texas mainly by local volunteers, and many small farms and highways served as natural firebreaks. Today, farming and ranching have been consolidated into larger operations, and many smaller acreages now serve as weekend retreats for landowners who prefer a natural — and perhaps more fire-prone — landscape. ….
In many settings around the globe, the worst firestorms occur after an unusually wet growing season that causes grasses and shrubs to proliferate and then dry out. That’s especially the case in the Southern Plains, where such fire-supportive fuel is far denser after wet years than after dry ones. [discussion of El Nino v. La Nina, latter being more fire-prone in the region]
The growing season of 2023 was indeed wetter than average in the northeast Texas Panhandle. ….
by the late 20th century, decades of fire suppression coupled with changes in land use were allowing brush to expand across the Plains more widely than ever observed. ….
wildfire was most prevalent where woody vegetation predominated or coexisted with grasslands. ….
Although most of the participants said that wildfire risk was increasing, the concerns they expressed centered on the wildland-urban interface, increased exposure, fuel and land management, local staffing, and other on-the-ground issues. Only 10% said they thought climate change existed and was related to wildfire, while 20% did not think climate change existed at all, and the other 70% were more equivocal or said they didn’t know. “There’s a change, whatever you want to call it, there is a change in the traditional pattern,” one participant said.
Comments from yet another respondent touch on the challenge of dealing with more than one threat multiplier at the same time: “As population increases, the risk goes up. It’s just that simple.”
“Nigelj I would argue that both yourself and Ned Kelly are correct. I agree with you that it’s possible to convince others based on logical argumentation and presentation of facts. Except, and this crucial, as long as the information you are trying to impart does not contradict and conflict with another individuals deeply held beliefs and sense of identity. In that case the information will be registered as a threat and rejected.
I accept that people typically reject facts if they contradict beliefs. This is settled cognitive science and Ive seen it myself with friends and family etc,etc.
However I already pointed out in my previous comment that the information is not rejected by everyone with strong beliefs! I gave an example that some religious people have eventually accepted the facts about human evolution despite their deeply held beliefs. I only need this one example to show the cognitive theory is just a general observation and is not true all the time of all people with deeply held beliefs. I can think of plenty of other examples.
The problem is persuading such people on the basis of the facts is a very slow process and it doesnt work with everyone, so its likely climate science denialism will be slow to change (polls tend to show only a slow increase in acceptance of the science) and some people will be lifelong denialists probably even if SLR rose 20 metres. But because some people with deep beliefs do change their views it seems useful to still present the facts to everyone even religious adherents.
“The fossil fuel lobby, Fox News etc. seem well aware of this and exploit it by associating terms like “climate change” with concepts we have been taught to fear such as “communism”.”
Correct and the usual rebuttal is to point out how the claim is false, again on the facts which will struggle to convince everyone. But I don’t think there’s a viable alternative.
“There are workarounds, I believe. The best is simply generational. Later generations are not bound by the fundamental beliefs of previous generations and overall acceptance can increase.”
Correct. Something related. They say science progresses as the dogmatic adherents of various theories die off.
“Another workaround is the brute force method in which emotional manipulation is used to convince a person that their currently held beliefs are, in fact, more threatening to them than the alternative. …Generally this is not a pleasant alternative and not something I would approve of except in the most extreme cases of risk. This may be what Ned is trying to do.”
Correct. Emotional manipulation is a risky move, because we are used to scientists presenting very dry facts based arguments and I believe they are respected because of that. If the scientists try something that is emotionally manipulative, it could backfire on them. They could loose the trust and respect of the public. Admittedly that is perhaps not great at the moment anyway but it might get worse.
I also thought Ned might be suggesting that sort of thing. I really think Ned should give some examples of what he means by superior communications style or some links.
I agree with Ned to the extent that scientists communications style when addressing the public is sometimes not very good. But then neither is mine at times. We could mostly all do better. There are simple uncontroversial things that can be done. For example 1)avoid too much jargon and define the jargon you do use. Some websites hyperlink jargon so you get a definition by clicking on the term. 2) Avoid getting lost in detail. 3) get the main point up front. 4)In lengthy discourse have a summary. 4) KISS principle. Etcetera.
Ned Kellysays
Nigelji, here’s an example for you to ponder —
QUOTES FYI
Climate models can’t explain huge heat anomaly
we could be in uncharted territory (soon)
More and better data are urgently needed. (what we got isn’t working anymore)
confounded climate scientists’ predictive capabilities
temperatures have overshot previous records each month
a huge margin at the planetary scale
sudden heat spike
greatly exceeds (climate models’) predictions
(un)able to reconcile our theories
(Only 20% odds of) turning out to be a record warm year
the current (El Nino) is milder than similar events in 1997–98 and 2015–16.
SSTs in NAO began to shoot up
sea ice around Antarctica was by far the lowest on record.
a patch of sea ice roughly the size of Alaska was missing
anomaly has – been much larger than expected
this heat spike
the divergence – remains — roughly the gap between the previous and current annual record.
In 2020, new regulations-that reduce sulfur emissions.
Sulfur compounds – having an overall cooling effect
Preliminary estimates – show a negligible effect
–
But reliable assessments of aerosol emissions rely on networks of mostly volunteer-driven efforts, and it could be a year or more before the full data from 2023 are available.
–
This is too long a wait.
more nimble data-collection systems are clearly needed
The data will be invaluable for reducing the substantial aerosol-related uncertainty in climate models.
(aka Climate Models ARE CURRENTLY UNRELIABLE)
Hindcasts, informed by new data, could also provide insights
But it seems unlikely (even though the AUTHOR says he does NOT know…)
anomaly has come out of the blue, revealing an unprecedented knowledge gap
If-then the world will be in uncharted territory
could imply- fundamentally altering how the climate system operates, much sooner than [EXPERT] scientists had anticipated
COULD MEAN- adding more uncertainty
world’s climate is driven by — teleconnections
we need to know about such changes in real time
WHY- the warmest year in possibly the past 100,000 years.
we need [ANSWERS] quickly.
The Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service (CAMS) and @NASA CERES data show a very strong anticorrelation between reduced SO2 emissions from shipping and increased absorbed sunlight over areas with most shipping.
2003 to 2023 https://nitter.poast.org/pic/orig/media%2FGJrqPP3WUAAL7RF.png
+4.3 W/m² is higher than the global greenhouse gas forcing.
(grin)
Also see in 2023 climate scientists published a paper on the need to bring climate models more in balance with Earth’s Energy Imbalance. Aerosol forcings are crucial here: Especially on how much sunlight is absorbed by our planet. Models are not in agreement with @NASA’s CERES satellite observations! Global surface air temperature change is a very limited variable to compare your climate model against, as every climate scientist (should) know(s).
QUOTE_ “Available climate model simulations suggest that these trends are incompatible with purely internal variability, but that the full magnitude and breakdown of the trends are outside of the model ranges. Unfortunately, the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project (Phase 6) (CMIP6) protocol only uses observed forcings to 2014 (and Shared Socioeconomic Pathways (SSP) projections thereafter), and furthermore, many of the ‘observed’ drivers have been updated substantially since the CMIP6 inputs were defined. Most notably, the sea surface temperature (SST) estimates have been revised and now show up to 50% greater trends since 1979, particularly in the southern hemisphere. Additionally, estimates of short-lived aerosol and gas-phase emissions have been substantially updated. These revisions will likely have material impacts on the model-simulated EEI. We therefore propose a new, relatively low-cost, model intercomparison, CERESMIP, that would target the CERES period (2000-present), with updated forcings to at least the end of 2021. The focus will be on atmosphere-only simulations, using updated SST, forcings and emissions from 1990 to 2021. The key metrics of interest will be the EEI and atmospheric feedbacks, and so the analysis will benefit from output from satellite cloud observation simulators. ”
and
Quote – “However, examining the breakdown of shortwave and longwave components (Figure 2B) shows that these AMIP runs do not match the shortwave component of the trends at all, though the updated AMIP run has a better response in the longwave. The coupled models, particularly the MATRIX simulations, have better (but still deficient) shortwave trends and less of a discrepancy in the longwave. These results underline the previously reported potential discrepancy in EEI trends, and suggest that the results are affected by the aerosol components, at least with the original CMIP6 emissions. There may be important dependencies on variations in model physics as well, which further motivates the need for an organized intercomparison.”
5. Summary
We propose a short, low cost extension to the CMIP6 DECK protocols to examine and attribute the increasing EEI seen in the CERES and in-situ data since 2001. We welcome broad contributions from all atmospheric modeling groups.
A related “so-called climate science” REF
Global warming in the pipeline
James Hansen et al
Quote- “…. decline of aerosol emissions since 2010 should increase the 1970–2010 global warming rate of 0.18°C per decade to a post-2010 rate of at least 0.27°C per decade. Thus, under the present geopolitical approach to GHG emissions, global warming will exceed 1.5°C in the 2020s and 2°C before 2050. Impacts on people and nature will accelerate as global warming increases hydrologic (weather) extremes.” https://academic.oup.com/oocc/article/3/1/kgad008/7335889
The great inadvertent aerosol experiment, from page 18)
there is a significant increase in Absorbed Solar Radiation in the North Atlantic and North Pacific Ocean regions, where most of the shipping occurs. Together with the rapid NASA CERES Net flux (= Earth’s Energy Imbalance) increase, this indicates a potentially very strong forcing increase from IMO2020. https://academic.oup.com/oocc/article/3/1/kgad008/7335889
“In reality, the IPCC aerosol forcing is the forcing required for GCMs to yield global warming
comparable to observed warming. In the many years between successive IPCC reports, the
modeling groups make hundreds of climate simulations. Results reported to CMIP (climate
modeling intercomparison project) and used by IPCC tend to be model runs with global
warming comparable to observations. The ensemble of model results yields a fog of projected
future warming. The real world falls within the projected model fog because each successive
IPCC report has a new model fog consistent with the new models and updated observations.
Knutti20 pointed out individual models in the model fog each tend to yield global warming
comparable to observations, even though the models differed in many ways and had a range
of climate sensitivities. This result is at least partially explained by the fact that the aerosol
forcing is not well constrained, which provides each GCM model a degree of freedom in the
choice of aerosol forcing. Knutti also pointed out that most GCM simulations did not even
include the aerosol indirect climate forcing (the effect of aerosols on cloud cover and cloud
albedo). Aerosol and cloud physicists who wrote the aerosol section of IPCC reports
suggested that the indirect effect was probably the larger aerosol forcing, yet this larger
(negative) aerosol forcing was not employed in most of the GCMs.
There were two reasons that the GCM modelers did not want to include the full aerosol
forcing in their models. First, many of the oceans in the GCMs tended to mix heat into the
deep ocean too effectively, which meant that the GCM needed a slightly exaggerated forcing
to match observed surface warming. Increased net forcing could be achieved with a smaller
(less negative) aerosol forcing. Second, and more important, the GCMs tended to have
climate sensitivities in the neighborhood of 3°C for 2×CO2; with such climate sensitivity only
moderate aerosol forcing (~1-1.5 W/m2) is needed to match observed global warming.
[We are not suggesting that modelers were up to something nefarious. For example, the GISS
GCM21 in that era had sensitivity ~3°C for 2×CO2 and the aerosol forcing was −1.39 W/m2
(direct = −0.52, indirect = −0.87). It was admitted that we had no ability to compute aerosol
indirect forcing; instead, we used a global distribution from an aerosol model multiplied by a
factor intended to yield an indirect aerosol forcing of −1 W/m2. When used in the GCM with
computed cloud cover, the aerosol indirect forcing turned out to be −0.87 W/m2. Other GCM
groups made their own choices, but no group had realistic aerosol-cloud modeling.]
The basic difficulty is that cloud modeling is hard and aerosol-cloud modeling is very hard.
The simplest cloud models, used for decades, yield climate sensitivity near 3°C for 2×CO2.
Several recent models that attempt to model cloud microphysics more realistically, including
mixed phase clouds, yield higher climate sensitivity, ~4-6°C for 2×CO2. Empirical evaluation
of climate sensitivity has finally been achieved thanks to accurate definition of ice age global
temperature by Seltzer et al.22 and Tierney et al.,23 with the result that climate sensitivity is
4.8°C ± 0.6°C (1σ), with 3°C sensitivity excluded with 99.7% certainty.1
There is independent support for high climate sensitivity. In a webinar,24 George Tselioudis
showed figures of Zelinka et al.25 and Jiang et al.26 revealing that high sensitivity climate
models yield much better agreement with satellite observations of seasonal and latitudinal
cloud changes; the low sensitivity models do not have even the correct sense of the changes.
In addition, Williams et al.27 show that the improved aerosol and cloud physics (particularly
production of liquid water in mixed phase clouds) in the British Met Office GCM (widely
agreed to be one of the most realistic GCMs) leads to an increase of the model’s sensitivity
from 3.2°C to 5.5°C for 2×CO2. As described also by Palmer,28 the physics changes that yield
the higher climate sensitivity also yield improved 6-hour tendencies in the GCM used for
short-term (weather) simulations, an insightful approach that has been recommended for
assessing the realism of supposed improvements in model physics.
High climate sensitivity is a double whammy. High sensitivity implies a large (negative)
aerosol forcing because aerosol forcing, unfortunately, so far has been an implied quantity,
not a directly measured quantity. Further evidence that IPCC underestimates aerosol forcing
is provided in our Pipeline paper.1 For example, greenhouse gas climate forcing increased by
0.5 W/m2 over the past 6000 years, yet global temperature held steady or declined slightly,
especially in the Northern Hemisphere. Given that greenhouse gases and aerosols are the two
significant global forcings and the fact that wood-burning was the fuel source as civilization
developed, we argue that the human-made aerosol forcing was already at least (negative) 0.5
W/m2 in 1750, when IPCC assumes that it was zero, and we argue that the release of aerosols
in burning of wood and other biofuels has not decreased globally since 1750.
Decreased aerosol forcing since 2010 accelerates global warming and, in combination with
a moderate El Nino, accounts for the magnitude and geographical location of unusual 2023
warming. There is no need for concern that the physics of the climate system has changed.
Little light is shed on global climate change by the IPCC model fog approach. Real world
global temperature change always is included within the projected model fog, as reset with
each successive assessment, but that does not expose the physics of the climate system.”
end quote
I recommend the whole article, it has juicy bits all the way through.
Barton Paul Levensonsays
NK: Deductive reasoning is not entirely killed off in climate science yet, but it may as well have been ….
BPL: [CITATION NEEDED]
Ned Kellysays
Please don;t hide your light under a bushell …. 19 March 2024
The following is commentary on a new heavily revised DICE model that models future economic costs of climate change. Looks like an improvement, and that Nordhaus has listened to his criticis, but the devils in the detail and I’ve only read the abstract. Excerpts:
Policies, projections, and the social cost of carbon: Results from the DICE-2023 model
Significance
The DICE model is the most widely used climate-change integrated assessment model, employed in calculating the social cost of carbon by the US and other governments as well as for creating consistent scenarios and evaluating policies and uncertainties. The present study updates the 2016 DICE version and introduces approaches for including nondiversifiable risk, includes a revised carbon cycle, updates the damage estimates, and includes results on the Paris Accord and temperature-limited scenarios.
Abstract
The present study examines the assumptions, modeling structure, and results of DICE-2023, the revised Dynamic Integrated Model of Climate and the Economy (DICE), updated to 2023. The revision contains major changes in the treatment of risk, the carbon and climate modules, the treatment of nonindustrial greenhouse gases, discount rates, as well as updates on all the major components. Noteworthy changes are a significant reduction in the target for the optimal (cost-beneficial) temperature path, a lower cost of reaching the 2 °C target, an analysis of the impact of the Paris Accord, and a major increase in the estimated social cost of carbon.
(My comment. The commentary said “Noteworthy changes are a significant reduction in the target for the optimal (cost-beneficial) temperature path”. Only an economist would come out with something like an optimal temperature path. )
“…….. limiting global heating to 1.5C beyond pre-industrial times…… would require the curtailing of an unprecedented boom in gas infrastructure along the US’s Gulf of Mexico coast, which Joe Biden’s administration recently sought to dampen by announcing a pause in new exports of liquified natural gas from these facilities. At Cera Week, however, Jennifer Granholm, Biden’s energy secretary, said that the pause will be “long in the rear-view mirror” in a year’s time.
SHE aught to know! You should believe her. She’s a Biden Democrat! (Grin)
Ned Kellysays
Geoff Miell says
27 Mar 2024 at 7:03 PM
“MA Rodger, I think you display classic reticence. [Effective] Science [Communication] is about explaining the data. I think you fail to do that and instead denigrate the people who do so that don’t fit with your ideological narrative.”
Correct Geoff.
Rodger, like Piotr, is a member of that new breed where Minimisation is the New Denialism…. and where personal denigration is their forte and only real claim to notoriety.
nigelj says
28 Mar 2024 at 3:30 PM
“If you believe Hansen that global warming is now accelerating sharply due to aerosols issue, 10 cms by the fourth decade might be possible. ”
Of course. Yet still getting to 10cms is still possible by the second decade too. If Greenland Ice loss has slowed there is every reason to know already that it can accelerate at anytime unannounced. They (the Experts) have no clue why it slowed in the first place. Nor why 2023 was a record global temps ……
IN A WORLD WHERE EVERYTHING IS INTERCONNECTED IN WAYS UNKNOWN,
AND KNOWN NOT TO BE MEASURED ACCURATELY, IF AT ALL,
THEN ANYTHING MIGHT HAPPEN UNANNOUNCED TO THE EXPERTS OF THE WORLD.
And especially to those who have no idea about or responsibility for the RISKS INVOLVED IN NOT KNOWING
Barton Paul Levensonsays
NK: IN A WORLD WHERE EVERYTHING IS INTERCONNECTED IN WAYS UNKNOWN,
AND KNOWN NOT TO BE MEASURED ACCURATELY, IF AT ALL,
BPL: Don’t make stuff up. It’s too easy for people to check, and then you look dishonest.
Piotrsays
“ Rodger, like Piotr, is a member of that new breed […] where personal denigration is their forte and only real claim to notoriety. […] IN A WORLD WHERE EVERYTHING IS INTERCONNECTED IN WAYS UNKNOWN, AND KNOWN NOT TO BE MEASURED ACCURATELY THEN ANYTHING MIGHT HAPPEN UNANNOUNCED TO THE EXPERTS OF THE WORLD
The author of the above demonstrated:
– contempt toward science and scientists
– “all or nothing” fallacy – if we can’t understand everything then we know nothing
– belief that the uncertainty is his friend
– arrogance of ignorance – a guy with weak? non-existent? background in natural science believes he knows more than professional climate researchers publishing in prime scientific journals
– projection of own motives onto others – unable to falsify their arguments – resorts to “personal denigration” of opponents by ascribing to _them_ … “personal denigration” of opponents
– psychological payout of a conspiracy theorist: if the best scientists in the world can’t see, what _I_, without much/any formal education in the field, can see, then _I_ must be really, really smart, and therefore – my life is not pathetic at all
A question to the reader: who are we talking about – Victor or Ned Kelly?
Then again – does it even matter? If you:
– attack the credibility of climate science
– imply that the consequences of our actions are so complex that will never be able to say anything useful about them,
and therefore: since actions cannot be based on science, actions based on one set of untestable, beliefs is as good as actions based on any other set of untestable beliefs
then does it even matter, where the author is coming from? By their fruits, not by where they started from, you shall now them.
Ned Kellysays
[ Sorry the page formatting is wonky, and I replied to the wrong comment – take two – please delete the other one. Thank you very much. ]
PS to Geoff FYI
The Straw man fallacy is the distortion of someone else’s argument (instead of addressing the actual argument) to make it easier to attack.
Putting words not said nor meant into another person’s mouth is called projection.
Exaggeration is distortion, a lie barely clad to make it seem truthful when it is patently false.
A strawman fallacy is deliberately misinterpreting somene’s argument or proposition to something similar that’s easier to rebut than the actual proposition being put.
Often this fallacy involves putting words into somebody’s mouth by saying they’ve made arguments they haven’t actually made, in which case.
Pointing out a logical fallacy is a way of removing an argument from the debate rather than just weakening it. Much of the time, a debater will respond to an argument by simply stating a counterargument showing why the original argument is not terribly significant in comparison to other concerns, or shouldn’t be taken seriously, or whatever. That kind of response is fine, except that the original argument still remains in the debate, albeit in a less persuasive form, and the opposition is free to mount a rhetorical offensive saying why it’s important after all.
On the other hand, if you can show that the original argument actually commits a logical fallacy, you put the opposition in the position of justifying why their original argument should be considered at all. If they can’t come up with a darn good reason, then the argument is actually removed from the round.
When you have no argument and lack awareness of reality then all you have left is a choice between sophistry, insults, lies, and ad hominem abuse. The refuge of irrational unscientific scoundrels no less.
How are we doing now? The rise from feb. 2023 til feb. 2024 was 4,25 ppmv and now, nearing the end of march, the rise from last year is trending above 5 ppmv, source https://www.co2.earth/daily-co2 . “Only recently in January 2024 Mauna Lau Observatory Hawaii anticipated a “relatively large” surge in annual average CO2 concentrations for 2024, estimating an increase of approximately 2.84 ppm more than 2023. But current trends put that into question as too low” Robert Hunziker writes here: https://www.pressenza.com/2024/03/co2-bursting-into-the-atmosphere/ Is he correct? Surely denialists will deny this problem, the data etc. altogether, but frankly I’m not interested in their trumpisms at all, I’m interested in what the climate scientists here have to say about the matter.
After the El Niño 2015-16, the norwegian CICERO scientist Glen Peters wrote that El Niño was causing the acceleration in CO2 rise then. To me it seemed too simplistic to say that only rising sea-surface temperatures were causing the acceleration, and I was proven correct, when the acceleration continued during the years with La Niña, even during the last three-year-La-Niña 2020-2023. I strongly suspected that the growing discrepancies between reported CO2 emissions had nothing whatsoever to do with El Niño, but a whole lot whith countries and industries simply lying their emissions lower than they are – a new level of greenwashing, to compensate for the complete lack of any kind of climate action except for the usual symbolisms and fakeries inherent in the socalled Paris “agreement” (according to James Hansen in november 2015 “pure bullshit”, and everything happening since then has proven him utterly correct) and the resulting socalled COP “process”. (which is by now reduced to just another public relations stunt for the fossil fuel lobby).
And now, Glen Peters is confirming my suspicions: “They are supposed to be the climate-savers’ gold standard — the key data on which the world relies in its efforts to lower greenhouse gas emissions and hold global warming in check. But the national inventories of emissions supplied to the United Nations climate convention (UNFCCC) by most countries are anything but reliable, according to a growing body of research.
The data supplied to the UNFCCC, and published on its website, are typically out of date, inconsistent, and incomplete. For most countries, “I would not put much value, if any, on the submissions,” says Glen Peters of the Centre for International Climate Research in Norway, a longtime analyst of emissions trends.
The data from large emitters is as much open to questions as that from smaller and less industrialised nations. In China, the uncertainties around its carbon dioxide emissions from burning coal are larger than the total emissions of many major industrial countries. And companies preparing data for its carbon-trading system have been accused of widespread data fraud.
In the United States, an analysis published this month of the air over the country’s oil and natural gas fields found that they emit three times more methane — a gas responsible for a third of current warming — than the government has reported.” https://e360.yale.edu/features/undercounted-emissions-un-climate-change
I told you so. And thank you, mr. Biden, for your trumpism light…
Around 1975, 75 pct. of the global energy use was supplied by fossil fuels. What is this percentage nowadays? Surprise, surprise, it is rising:
“Renewables Growth Did Not Dent Fossil Fuel Dominance in 2022, Report Says, Reuters, June 26, 2023
Global energy demand rose 1% last year and record renewables growth did nothing to shift the dominance of fossil fuels, which still accounted for 82% of supply, the industry’s Statistical Review of World Energy report said on Monday.
Last year was marked by turmoil in the energy markets after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, which helped to boost gas and coal prices to record levels in Europe and Asia.
The stubborn lead of oil, gas and coal products in covering most energy demand cemented itself in 2022 despite the largest ever increase in renewables capacity at a combined 266 gigawatts, with solar leading wind power growth, the report said.
“Despite further strong growth in wind and solar in the power sector, overall global energy-related greenhouse gas emissions increased again,” said the president of the UK-based global industry body Energy Institute, Juliet Davenport.
For some strangely unknown reasons (sarcasm off) none of this is appearing in the media. It probably doesn’t seem relevant from the “perspective”/”horizon” of the chattering classes, their subject is by now reduced to celebrity lifestyle only. “How green do I look today, darling?” “Oh, don’t bother. That is sooo out of fashion now”.
It’s called “freedom of expression”… – amusing ourselves to death.
Barton Paul Levensonsays
KVJ: But the IPCC seems to ignore that ugly fact.
BPL: [CITATION NEEDED]
Karsten V. Johansensays
Thanks for correcting me, BPL. What I meant was that *the IPCC doesn’t mention that the emssions are underreported*.
It’s not possible to cite anything on this from the IPCC, simply because they don’t mention it. They keep silent about this: “….the national inventories of emissions supplied to the United Nations climate convention (UNFCCC) by most countries are anything but reliable, according to a growing body of research.” https://e360.yale.edu/features/undercounted-emissions-un-climate-change
Meaning: the CO2 and methane emissions are much higher than reported, as explained. Which explains much, probably most, of the growing gap between faster rising CO2 and methane measurements at Mauna Loa etc. and the reported emissions.
Why does the IPCC keep silent about this? Probably because they have to keep the “diplomatic tone”, they are dependent on the economic and political support of the big powers of this world. And the big powers are what I call “climate ignorants” or climate deniers. Some like the US-dem.s and EU, Norway (a petrostate…), GB etc. are more “lukewarmers”, while others like US-trumpist, Russia, Saudiarabia, China, India etc. are more openly deniers. In practical terms the difference is zero. China and India are hiding behind their false status as “developing countries” as if this would make their growing emissions non existant. Of course especially China has become the “factory of the world” and most of their emissions stems from the production of commodities for the old/former industrial countries, but then they should say that, and not lie about their growing emissions and their causes and effects, as they are now.
But everyone is simply – and more and more consciously (they all know it’s a big fat lie) – suffering from *the antiscientific illusion that money can overrule the laws of nature,* We are living under the unenlightened rule of the oiligarchy. The COP-“process” now degenerating into a commercial show for the petroholics/the fossil fuel lobby is a clear symptom of this.
As long as this goes on and on, we are speeding towards *and past* both 1,5 degrees C and 2,0 above preindustrial global mean temperature.
Ned Kellysays
Happy Easter ya bunch of cranky pants! May Jesus’ love pour down upon thee and melt your hardened cynical hearts of yee of little faith.
Barton Paul Levensonsays
NK: Happy Easter ya bunch of cranky pants! May Jesus’ love pour down upon thee [sic] and melt your hardened cynical hearts of [sicL/i>] yee [sic] of little faith.
BPL: Corrected to actual Renaissance English: “Happy Easter ye bunch of cranky pants! May Jesus’s love pour down pon you and melt your hardened cynical hearts, O ye of little faith.”
“Speaking forsoothly” is one of the banes of the SCA, since very few people do it correctly. Some just add “eth” to every verb.
Actual Renaissance English is not that hard:
I am
Thou art
He, she, it is [or he, she, it be if speaking about habitual or repeated action]
We are
Ye are
They are
I run
Thou runnest
He, she, it runneth
We run
Ye run
They run
I give it to me
Thou givest it to thee
He, she, it giveth it to him, her, it
We give it to us
Ye give it to you
They give it to them
No need to thank me. All in a day’s work.
Radge Haverssays
Well, I for one will be slightly less cranky if we can make it past April MAGAs Day without major incident and if April’s “showres soote” can bath “every vein in swich liqor, of which vertu engendred is the flowr”, without washing them all away.
Cheers.
Adam Leasays
I have noticed the occasional post on here criticising climate change communication by climate scientists. Sabine Hossenfelder does similar but on a different angle, claiming that appealing to emotion by trying to scare people is counterproductive and manipulative, and we should be framing the issue by addressing how we can work together.
Sabine is a very talented and effective science communicator to the public. But not respected here much.
Another good communicator about complex reality … with high end communication skills.
quote @12 mins from Information Bifurcation – 10 Lenses https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZRQ3g36ZtWo
quote – “This is an example of metamodern thinking, someone that’s mature enough to be self-aware of their own reactions and still try to glean what they could from a conversation. … I do think writ large, this is where we’re at. Can we as a species suppress our identities, suppress our built image of the world, which is of course influenced by our own background and by the media to suss out what is true, what is false, what is important, what’s trivia, what’s relevant? What’s a side story? I think we have to rebuild the Fourth Estate in a way that works for the crises that are ahead. So we need a new information infrastructure in our society. But along with that, we have arrived at a point where some of us have to evolve beyond the tribal single issue, binary thinking that was adopted in the distant past. We have to evolve how we approach information, how we use information towards discourses, collaboration, and a broader discussion on how we engage with the events of the day. “ end quote
The video can be set at x1.5 speed which is easier/faster, or just read the transcript at your own speed.
Karsten V. Johansensays
How many centuries of “discussion” resulting in some noises but still growing use of fossil fuels do you expect it would take before the use of fossil fuels actually just began just to slow down, if the ressources weren’t limited?
My guess, based on history until now: the relentless growth in fossil fuel consumption will go on and on until the reserves run out or at least until it results in so enormous catastrophes, that they simply are impossible to ignore. Knowing the capacity of homo sapiens for ignorance and lying, as shown by the popularity of trumpist, putinist, bidenist, hillarist, xipingist, modiist etc. etc. complete nonsense and demagoguery, that probably means until simultaneously occuring accelerating but ignored climate and ecosystems collapse, another global total war over the remaining ressources, totalitarianism plus gradual societal collapse and the slow and ignored end of fossil fuel ressources. Fact is: humankind is pouring CO2 into the atmosphere at least ten times faster than during the enormous eruptions that created the siberian traps 252 million years ago, and even more times faster than during the PETM 55 million years ago. More than thirty years of “talks” haven’t produced any practical results other than a growing mount of ignored science, “pure bullshit” (James Hansen nov. 2015 about the Paris “agreement”) and still faster growing emissions.
This will probably happen within less than half a century, probably even faster. I mean we are already in the middle of at least two attempted ethnic cleansings at a level not seen since 1945 (in Palestine and in Ukraine), while global heating and it’s effects are accelerating faster than expected by most scientists. These are facts, not scaremongering.
Ned Kellysays
double down
verb
1. strengthen one’s commitment to a particular strategy or course of action, typically one that is potentially risky
nigeljsays
Piotr. Regarding your comments above thread that you don’t believe the term lukewarmer is useful or helpful and that it conceals more than it illuminates.
I don’t agree that we should give up on the term lukewarmer. The problem is we would have to put everyone opposing the IPCC findings into the same basket of denier regardless of whether they object to fundamental parts of the scientific consensus or more superficial parts and regardless of the number of their objections or validity of their objections. Or alternatively we have no name for people with minor objections to the IPCC findings.
Calling everyone with any objections a denier is analogous to right wingers labelling people communists because they suggest maybe some limited parts of the economy be publicly owned, or that governmnets should have a carbon tax. Its a cheap shot and a form of emotional manipulation and intellectual bullying, and its not an accurate reflection of those peoples overall position.
You call Ned Kelly a denier because he criticises some scientists views, thinks IPCC and models typically underestimate warming and other changes, and Ned promotes solutions you dont think are viable like degrowth, and simplification (and I have doubts about these as well ).But James Hansen also thinks we are badly underestimating the warming rate and modelling is inadequate, and he promotes nuclear power (which I think you have criticised?) so by your logic he is a denier as well, which is patently absurd.
Now they obviously aren’t lukewarmers either. I think such people fit a label like contrarians or alarmists. The point being that a range of categories have developed and while you are right it can create problems, the alternative of just a couple of categories of denier and warmist is just worse IMHO.
Of course some people are denialists and I’m coming around to your view TK is more of a denialist than a lukewarmer, because everytime he opens his mouth lately he shifts towards the denier category. He seems to like it. He reminds me of a Charles Dickens character called Uriah Heep.
I learned that if the analogy works, I do not have particularly bright prospects of future.
Piotr already predicted a slightly different but also relatively dire fate for me, by analogy with another popular character, namely with a man-eating monster called Jožin z bažin
what seems to be an almost perfect fit as I was indeed born in Zlín.
Personally, I am not sure if would prefer rather being deported into Australia, or ending up in ZOO.
Greetings
Tomáš
Jonathan Davidsays
Nigelj, how would someone like Charles Koch be characterized? Koch is an MIT trained engineer and respects the scientific consensus. However, Koch is opposed to any governmental action to address climate change. Instead he advocates that this problem be address through market-based private sector initiatives.
Ned Kellysays
It’s already clear the integrated complex of the UNFCCC, IPCC and COP ‘climate treaty’ systems and the global network of climate scientists are failing badly. Their goals are unachievable by any stretch of the imagination. What I think is more likely however is that rather than any rational reforms occurring, which is what the global south have been demanding for decades already, is that this ‘complex’ is going to collapse / implode within the next decade.
The ongoing denial and denigration of the work output and thoughtful openminded scientific analysis of people like Hansen et al is only contributing to the undermining of the credibility of climate science generally. Especially among those who used to be it’s finest outspoken defenders. Now mainstream climate science is seen more like just another knee on the necks of the global south. I see many unemployed western camp climate scientists in the near future as the tectonic plates of the political world keep shifting ever faster – much faster than even global warming is increasing now.
Tomas, I responded favorably, but my detailed comment has not be published.
I am not going to repeat myself.
Noe was this one, a second time, but I saved a copy ….. the point being? imo it’s impossible to have a reasonable conversation on this forum for multiple reasons not worth exploring again.
Tomáš Kaliszsays
In Re to Ned Kelly, 31 Mar 2024 at 4:40 AM
Dear Ms. Kelly,
Thank you very much for your reply. Pitty that your contribution has not been published. Although I have often very different views, I appreciate your efforts and will any time welcome your critical feedback to my comments.
The only other platform that I occassionally visit and wherein we could perhaps exchange our thoughts is, however, X (formerly Twitter). You can simply try @tomas.kalisz
Sincere greetings
Tomáš
Ned Kellysays
For the record: and later reflection.
Quote:
Prof Michael E. Mann
@MichaelEMann
Planet is warming ~0.03C/year. Aerosols (see below) account for ~1/8 of that, i.e. ~0.004C/year. La Nina/El Nino transition led to ~0.5C warming during past year, 100 x as much warming as aerosols.
It is absolutely absurd to attribute the warming spike to aerosols.
To summarize:
1) Aerosols have little if any role in the recent warming
2) The claim that IPCC climate models underestimate that warming is equally false (see below)
3) Using unsupportable claims to campaign for geoengineering is (dangerous) advocacy, not science.
The models and observations are quite consistent–little if any acceleration (technically there’s a bit because aerosols have slowly been decreasing while greenhouse warming is steady–but this is captured IN the models).
If by chance the entire top 90m well-mixed of ocean warmed 0.3 degrees 2023 rather than just surface waters then that’s ~5.0 mm of extra expansion which drops the WMO SLR 2014-2023 from 4.77 to 4.27 mm/year without it at:
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-03-20/wmo-climate-records-broken-global-temperature/103604076
Of course, the 5 mm still applies as a big 1-shot but the topic is ice loss. If I reduce the 4.27 mm/year by the 4.3 mm drop in 2013 (storage on land) that was skipped in the plot then it’s 3.84 mm/year SLR 2014-2023. The plot clearly shows that the rate of acceleration has decreased. If I subtract a guess for expansion so’s I don’t scammily water down the ice mass loss contribution with linear thermal because I don’t wan’t to fart around playing silly games like e.g. Martin Durkin or Paul Beckwith (just random examples because they’re current here, there’s hundreds of course) (because I don’t actually care, I’m just interested) then from the link it’s:
ice expand total
— ——– —–
1.60 0.53 2.13 1993-2002
1.80 1.53 3.33 2003-2012 Increased 1.53 / 0.53 = 2.9 Times as much in 10 years !!!!!!
2.00 2.77 4.31 2014-2023 Increased 2.77 / 1.53 = 1.8 Times as much in 10 years !!!!!!
(I should do Googley videos with my (I should do Googley videos with my gripping outreach skillset)
The doubling time will be a millennium soon at this rate.
WMO didn’t draw the trend. I assumed they falsely added the 4.3 mm drop in 2013 to their 2014-2023, I’ve traced enough screen plots onto paper and drawn them myself over `1`1 years to last me for a while. I’m trying to goad anyone browsing into doing it, not me. I just guessed some expansion, I’m not searching right now for this sort of rough discussion with Geoff Miell’s Dog’s Breakfast of asserted SLR by 2100 (subject change before I forget, I just stole Eric Rignot’s 4.5 m / century after all the (~60 is it ?) ice shelves have collapsed and pretend I worked it out all myself when posting the last 6 years, because he can’t stop me, that’s just speedup 6-7 times == (2,200+600) * 5.5 / 360 = 4.24 m / century plus 0.26 m / century for expansion and the insult).
Kevin McKinney 23 MAR 2024 AT 11:00 AM “would be a doubling rate of ~8.3 years yield a doubling time of just under 12 years”. The formula used for the trend fit is quadratic (a 2nd-order polynomial) so it doesn’t have any “doubling rate” and that is the underlying issue. A 2nd-order polynomial isn’t an exponential function. It will be geometrically increasing or geometrically decreasing but it isn’t exponential, has no doubling time. Since 2016 when I started noticing bods typing like “No way because we’re extinct before 2050 they don’t understand the exponential function” I found it only mildly ironic that none of these people typing “they don’t understand the exponential function” knew what an “exponential function” is. I’ll likeIy get statistics off that nice plot and table them here unless somebody else does it, rather than keep replying with dribbles & drabbles to dribbles & drabbles unless someone else does it right. Not this week for sure.
I don’t see a good justification for assuming an exponential function. One essentially assumes that the rate of SLR is dependent somehow on the previous rate. Why not a function of climate warming as a whole, or better yet, the rate of energy accumulation beyond equilibrium?
The whole business is made worse by the relatively small changes and large noise component so far. This makes it impossible to distinguish statistically the shape of the very large future SLR curve from the present
small rise. The important issue is that SLR is going to keep getting worse at an accelerating rate, with very large changes in the pipeline. Exactly how fast we get there, or the shape of the curve, are quite secondary
in my opinion.
Those points are fair, and I previously expressed my reservations about exponential projection in this context. But I understood Karsten to have posited doubling rates, rightly or wrongly, and I was looking for a quick sanity check on how realistic they might be. Turns out, they do seem fairly consistent with the UCol record, regardless of the caveats you and Barry bring. They’re not prophecy, of course. Apart from the quick and dirty approximation I used, the SLR record is quite noisy. But Karsten’s numbers aren’t obviously crazy.
Kevin Mar 27 – “[Geoff] have posited doubling rates […] Turns out, they do seem fairly consistent with the UCol record, regardless of the caveats you and Barry bring”
Still, it may be difficult to distinguish the exponential growth in absolute numbers from other growth rates early on, _particularly_ when these early data are “noisy” compared to the small early signal. The difference between the different functions may become clear only when once you extrapolate the past observations further enough into the future.
So unless there is a physical reason to expect exponential growth, I would be careful in assuming it for projections too far into the future.
Agreed! But the gist was rather that you don’t have to go very far into the future to get to some numbers that are worrisome.
A corrigendum: I ascribed the OP to Karsten, wrongly, it was in fact Geoff’s.
Sorry!
Yes, my math is not strong, but I do know that a quadratic fit is not the same as an exponential one. But my assumption–untested, to be honest–is that the difference in the case of the UCol SLR graph will not be very large, and therefore I can derive an estimated doubling time. Karsten’s OP was envisioning doubling times, and that was what I was responding to. Should you follow through with the table you mention, that would be great!
This paper will be of interest in the save-the-world-from-global-warming-with-irrigation debate:
https://journals.ametsoc.org/view/journals/atsc/66/1/2008jas2797.1.xml
You will note that the expressions for latent heat involve a term for temperature–as temperature increases, so does the latent heat transfer–and as it decreases, so does LH. If the irrigation schemes succeeded in increasing LH and thus decreasing the temperature, the lower temperature would decrease the latent heat transfer. Fighting that feedback would make that type of scheme even more difficult.
in Re to Barton Paul Levenson, 26 Mar 2024 at 8:00 AM,
https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2024/03/unforced-variations-march-2024/comment-page-2/#comment-820570
Dear Barton Paul,
Welcome back in the discussion of the influence of water availability (for evaportion) on global climate.
It is my feeling that the article
https://journals.ametsoc.org/view/journals/atsc/66/1/2008jas2797.1.xml
that you recetly cited does not consider any constraint for water availability, and thus may not be particularly relevant for the discussion on this topics.
Perhaps you might have missed the discussion about the article by Lague et al
https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1748-9326/acdbe1/pdf
that seems to provide a deeper insight?
Greetings
Tomáš
I can’t speak for irrigationists – rather I promote simply to recognize the value of existing wetland and soils conservation; with option for a remediation plan also. I understand this is actively ridiculed, distorted, misunderstood, and/or perceived as a threat here.
The temperature dependence of equilibrium evaporation is not controversial, with relation imposed by vapor pressure saturation curve and psychrometric constant.
In a condition of permanently saturated surface, Ts is lower than it otherwise would be as evaporation depletes the available energy until “equilibrium” (optimum).
In this state of uninhibited moisture availability, the atmospheric heat storage (sensible heat) is lower than it otherwise would be. Unlike sensible heat flux into the boundary layer, the latent heating of the free troposphere at LCL must be matched by radiative cooling to space.
In this uninhibited scenario, mean total turbulent flux (net upwards and away from surface) is higher than a moisture limited case. Atmospheric heat storage, reflected by 2m air temperature (Ta), is reduced.
In a moisture limited case, water limits evaporation so that available energy results in enhanced sensible heat flux and surface radiative emission. This is accomplished by a warmer Ts. In this scenario, atmospheric heat storage is higher than the unrestricted moisture case, and total turbulent flux (net upwards and away from surface) is lower. Heat storage, reflected by 2m air temperature, is increased as moisture is limited.
Recognizing the bounding radiative controls on near-surface climates, ET is critical in regulating the SW down (cloud), LW up (surface radiative emission temperature), LW down (atmospheric heat storage or Ta), and column radiative emission temperature (Tr). I do recognize the obvious tradeoffs therein, but I think it is not controversial that dryness is associated with hotter temps overall, as demonstrated comprehensively by Lague with the CESM. The notion is widely understood outside these pages, and the knowledge has been used for practical purposes ongoing for generations.
JCM Mar, 27″ I promote simply to recognize the value of existing wetland and soils conservation; with option for a remediation plan also. I understand this is actively ridiculed”
Maybe if y0u didn’t quote extensively Lague et al. 2023 – whose model brings NO new insight into your “ value of existing wetland and soils conservation; with option for a remediation plan also. but deals instead with GLOBAL averages of extreme cases (Earth with all continents converted to deserts -minus Earth with all continents converted to swamps) – people would not question your ability to understand what the paper you quote is really about. Particularly that after your understanding of it was challenged, you dismissed that model as “ imaginary process mechanisms that apply arbitrary “rules about how things ought to be ” according to the model authors, and as such, offering no insight into the real world?
[JCM complaining about being] distorted, misunderstood, and/or perceived as a threat here.
. The only “threat” I am perceiving from you is that I may get my eyebrows “frozen” in the elevated position from the constant bewilderment: “What is this guy talking about ?”; “How is _this_ relevant to anything that is discussed here???”
perhaps Dr Lague should be issued a notice to resign from the discipline by the realclimate comment crew, who’s twitter (X) profile has the caption “Climate scientist @CompHyd_Earth exploring how land changes modify the atmosphere”. She is not in the least disrespected by actual professional academics. I suppose she also should have been disallowed a spot in the ECS and cloud feedback symposium sessions hosted by Dessler, Lutsko, Proistosescu, and Williams; which is well attended by the likes of Hartmann, Schmidt, and Stevens. Similar scrutiny could be applied to Dr. Pin-hsin Hu and others, particularly women, who share an interest in the biophysical terrestrial influence on hydroclimates. The Lague paper, the title of which literally includes the word “swamp” i.e. wetland, was initially introduced following the failure here by participants to provide objective insight into the possible effects of land change / hydrological influences upon climates, and a better conceptual framework was requested. I do recognize it is a high level platform. It was immediately evident to me those with motivated interest to resist the subject had never given it any thought and were improvising a conceptual understanding as a reaction. My own interest in catchment stabilization is comprehensive including multiple co-benefits across fields. It is deeply personal and ingrained in my daily life. When contributing to realclimate, my insights are filtered through personal experiences and tailored to the page’s focus on a globally averaged perspective of climates.
I should add additionally that if you are a professional academic, Piotr, it appears to me that your contributions on these pages not only bring considerable disgrace upon your peers and institution, but also demonstrate a notably limited ability to envision beyond your existing capabilities.
JCM: I should add additionally [sic] that if you are a professional academic, Piotr, it appears to me that your contributions on these pages not only bring considerable disgrace upon your peers and institution, but also demonstrate a notably limited ability to envision beyond your existing capabilities.
BPL: I should add additionally that you not only bring considerable disgrace upon yourself, but also demonstrate a notably limited ability to learn.
JCM MAR 29: “ Perhaps Dr Lague should be issued a notice to resign from the discipline perhaps Dr Lague should be issued a notice to resign from the discipline by the realclimate comment crew ”
Why? If I can speak for my one-person “comment crew” – “we” didn’t criticize Lague,
but the understanding of the Lague’s paper by JCM and Tomas. If anyone did a number on “Dr Lague”, it would be … a certain JCM, who dismissed Lague’s modelling as:
“ imaginary process mechanisms [that apply arbitrary] rules about how things ought to be [according to the model authors]”, and as such, offering no insight into the real world.
But again that’s JCM, so no reason to resign, Dr. Lague. It’s not like he [ silent shudder here ] PRAISED you: now _that_ would call for frantic doublechecking of your paper.
BPL it’s perfectly fair to fire that back…
Currently, I’m sidelined with a fracture in my right foot, affording me ample time.
on teaching and learning I sense we have generally circled all the back to the mainstream that terrestrial flux partitioning significantly influences the observed climates in our communities. I have not seen any credible debunking of this concept. Initially, I faced unexpected resistance when efforts were made over an extended period to educate me by introducing the hypothetical doubling of ET concept, which, when examined, showed no change or even a warming influence.
I concede I did refuse that teaching because contradicts fundamental principles outlined in microclimate/boundary layer textbooks like Oke, academic literature, lectures by scholars such as Denning, and my own empirical observations. I have been teaching here about that for ages now and a reciprocal refusal appears to be entrenched.
Nonetheless, a great deal of available energy in the form of solar input intensity and greenhouse effect enhancement potential is consumed by the power of latent flux, which is approximately equal to the atmospheric heat transport, and it is essential to the existence of cloud albedo. The latent portion is about 10x the thermally direct circulation and I previously provided reference to Fajber’s work on remote “heat tags” and the radiative cooling.
In your latest teaching, a study cited from https://journals.ametsoc.org/view/journals/atsc/66/1/2008jas2797.1.xml adopts the common perspective that surface flux variables passively respond to changes in the atmosphere, such as LW radiative forcing. In the work the LCL pressure is prescribed and cloud radiative effects are ignored. So it’s worth recognizing that the work specifically does not address the issue. It is stated explicitly that “Although there is a possibility that clouds may have a radiative effect relevant to the problem at hand, the issue is so complex that it is left open for future research.” Additionally, by adopting the atmosphere first perspective, it cannot explicitly consider the forced surface flux re-partitioning from direct catchment deterioration. Critically, the relevant factors to surface-atmosphere forcing are assumed fixed or ignored. I interpret the work implicitly recognizing that the magnitude of convective flux is strictly related to Ts – Tr, and that the “vertical transport of dry static energy by the large-scale circulation… is small (less than 10 W m−2 globally) compared to the latent heat flux”. However, if this work was provided to teach me, it specifically neglects the key matter of interest. Tomas recognized that immediately.
Previously I have provided references where independent groups such as Lague and the Kleidon/Ghausi address the missing parts in such semianalytical solutions specifically, where they each independently teach that clouds are fundamental to the problem and it is quantified. Additionally, I recall Makarieva’s main point is that existing schemes postulate a critical temperature profile and are thus deemed unsuitable to detect landuse effects. She cautions that conclusions drawn from ESMs and related semianalytical designs about landscape management may not be robust and policy advice gleaned therefrom could result in a deepening of the environmental crisis (in some respects), by ignoring critical factors. I can attest the damage caused by this trickling down even to local committee, however I understand Makarieva may have introduced some flawed criticisms of models.
Ultimately the semianalytical solution you provided arrives at a change of LHF 1.7 W m−2 K−1. It’s uncontroversial that latent flux will increase with greenhouse-forced global warming due to increased evaporative demand. The matter of interest is the increasing disparity between the observed and equilibrium rates, resulting in potentially warmer temperatures compared to scenarios with equivalent CO2 forcing. This is especially critical for the landscapes as the surface availabe energy in the form of solar must be completely accounted-for above the surface. When moisture is limited the relative humidity is lower, lapse rate effect and atmospheric radiative cooling weaker, and less abundant cloud albedo compared to a system with catchments unperturbed. I have previously tried to communicate this concept as a delta lambda “Humanity” factor to appeal to common perspectives within the current overwhelming paradigm of atmospheric radiative forcing.
In a more concrete way to appreciate this, envision the nation of Malaysia which was featured in the brilliant film Entrapment where Sean Connery and Catherine Zeta-Jones visit the urban area of Kuala Lumpur which is characterized by hot and humid conditions juxtaposed with rugged, jungle-filled hills. Having traveled through Malaysia myself in 2004, I can attest to its climate. Now, envision the nation completely eroded, desertified, and stripped of biodiversity. Such a hypothetical disturbance would conceivably raise the annual mean temperature from around 25C to nearly 30C, with associated temperature and hydrological extremes. This principle, rooted in simple and longstanding knowledge, has been understood for generations, such as in agricultural practices where fields are occasionally cleared and left fallow to induce extreme temperatures and kill off diseases. In the mainstream today I think the effect is not disputed in local domains and it is shown by cleared plots in the Amazon how much hotter things become. The assumption is simply that humanity is too insignificant to effect any cumulative change remotely. Lague is laying the groundwork to explore such issues quantitatively. https://marysalague.com/
re: “”””a certain JCM, who dismissed Lague’s modelling as: imaginary process mechanisms”””
that is a shameful and twisted distortion. How much lower can one stoop?
JCM Mar 29: “I should add additionally that if you are a professional academic, Piotr, it appears to me that your contributions on these pages not only bring considerable disgrace upon your peers and institution,”
My criticism of you is specific – I base my opinions of you on the quotes from your posts, and both the veracity of these quotes and the logic of my interpretation of them – are open to falsification. You, unable to falsify either of them – try to shoot the messenger – hurling your unsupported “opinions” about me, and now, adding a veiled threat of denouncing me to my institution:
since I have never used my profession, the name of my institution, nor my peers, to increase the weight/credibility of my arguments – the most plausible (only?) reason why you would write about my “ bringing considerable disgrace upon [my] peers and institution” – is to intimidate me into silence, with a veiled threat of a denouncement to my institution for my “bringing considerable disgrace upon it”.
Just when you thought they couldn’t get any lower, they do.
In Re to Piotr, 30 Mar 2024 at 11:27 PM,
https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2024/03/unforced-variations-march-2024/comment-page-2/#comment-820737
Dear Piotr,
The conclusion of the article Lague 2023 reads:
4. Conclusions
In a global model with realistic continental geometry,
reducing terrestrial evaporation increases the total
amount of atmospheric water vapor over most land
and ocean regions. The residence time of water vapor
in the atmosphere increases by roughly 50% from the
simulation with fully saturated land to the simulation
with desert land. Suppressing land evaporation has a
direct warming effect on the land surface by reducing
latent cooling of the surface, but also drives atmo-
spheric feedbacks including reductions in terrestrial
cloud cover. The anomalous surface energy fluxes
driven by atmospheric cloud, water vapor, and tem-
perature feedbacks are larger than the initial change
in latent heat flux driven directly by suppressed
terrestrial evaporation. The cloud feedback is crit-
ical for increasing near-surface MSE and generating
anomalous atmospheric circulations throughout the
depth of the troposphere. Simulations conducted in
a cloud-free model still show surface warming with
suppressed terrestrial evaporation, but also show a
decrease, rather than an increase, in near surface
MSE. Anomalous atmospheric circulations over the
continents in cloud-free simulations are much shal-
lower, and the atmosphere shows reduced atmo-
spheric water vapor with suppressed terrestrial evap-
oration. This extreme experiment raises the ques-
tion of how real-world changes to the land surface
(e.g. land use, agriculture) may be contributing to cli-
mate change by altering atmospheric water vapor and
cloud cover, and how terrestrial evaporation modu-
lates climate on other planets or in past continental
configurations of Earth’s history.
As I pointed several times in the previous discussion, my understanding to these conclusions is as follows:
The authors brought a hint that water availability for evaporation on land plays a significant role in Earth climate. I tried to show that human interferences with the water availability, like converting 4 % of the considered land area from the swamp land hydrology to the desert land hydrology or vice versa, could already have a measurable effect on global climate. For that reason, I think that the topics touched by Lague may deserve further attention and proof by other models, and further expansion of this research.
It is my understanding that JCM agrees to conclusions presented by the authors and that he basically shares my view on the potential importance of the topics and of further research in this direction.
Oppositely, at the start of the discussion, it was my feeling that you interpreted the article basically oppositely to the conclusion provided by the authors. It was further my feeling that during the discussion, you have modified your view and that you, now, may basically agree with conclusions offered by Lague et al.
In this respect, however, I still do not understand why you think and assert that JCM misinterprets Lague 2023.
Could you perhaps clarify for others (who do not like to peruse the entire discussion that became quite discouraging by its extent and style) if your view currently anyhow differs from the conclusions provided by Lague et al, and if not, in which aspect JCM does not understand the article?
It is my feeling that there may be in fact no substantial difference between you both, and that using conclusions provided by Lague et al as a reference, the present discussion could be perhaps brought to a conclusion as well, without further unnecessary disputes that seem to be based on unimportant details or misunderstandings / misinterpretations presented in the discussion but not in the disputed article itself.
Thank you in advance and best regards
Tomáš
Some current fire insights just posted by Henson and Masters:
https://yaleclimateconnections.org/2024/03/new-warning-system-could-save-lives-during-wildfires/
“Eighteen of Mexico’s 32 states are currently experiencing forest fires due to strong winds and severe drought conditions exacerbating the situation.”
https://twitter.com/volcaholic1/status/1772971433192280531
Jonathan David
“Nigelj I would argue that both yourself and Ned Kelly are correct. I agree with you that it’s possible to convince others based on logical argumentation and presentation of facts. Except, and this crucial, as long as the information you are trying to impart does not contradict and conflict with another individuals deeply held beliefs and sense of identity. In that case the information will be registered as a threat and rejected.
I accept that people typically reject facts if they contradict beliefs. This is settled cognitive science and Ive seen it myself with friends and family etc,etc.
However I already pointed out in my previous comment that the information is not rejected by everyone with strong beliefs! I gave an example that some religious people have eventually accepted the facts about human evolution despite their deeply held beliefs. I only need this one example to show the cognitive theory is just a general observation and is not true all the time of all people with deeply held beliefs. I can think of plenty of other examples.
The problem is persuading such people on the basis of the facts is a very slow process and it doesnt work with everyone, so its likely climate science denialism will be slow to change (polls tend to show only a slow increase in acceptance of the science) and some people will be lifelong denialists probably even if SLR rose 20 metres. But because some people with deep beliefs do change their views it seems useful to still present the facts to everyone even religious adherents.
“The fossil fuel lobby, Fox News etc. seem well aware of this and exploit it by associating terms like “climate change” with concepts we have been taught to fear such as “communism”.”
Correct and the usual rebuttal is to point out how the claim is false, again on the facts which will struggle to convince everyone. But I don’t think there’s a viable alternative.
“There are workarounds, I believe. The best is simply generational. Later generations are not bound by the fundamental beliefs of previous generations and overall acceptance can increase.”
Correct. Something related. They say science progresses as the dogmatic adherents of various theories die off.
“Another workaround is the brute force method in which emotional manipulation is used to convince a person that their currently held beliefs are, in fact, more threatening to them than the alternative. …Generally this is not a pleasant alternative and not something I would approve of except in the most extreme cases of risk. This may be what Ned is trying to do.”
Correct. Emotional manipulation is a risky move, because we are used to scientists presenting very dry facts based arguments and I believe they are respected because of that. If the scientists try something that is emotionally manipulative, it could backfire on them. They could loose the trust and respect of the public. Admittedly that is perhaps not great at the moment anyway but it might get worse.
I also thought Ned might be suggesting that sort of thing. I really think Ned should give some examples of what he means by superior communications style or some links.
I agree with Ned to the extent that scientists communications style when addressing the public is sometimes not very good. But then neither is mine at times. We could mostly all do better. There are simple uncontroversial things that can be done. For example 1)avoid too much jargon and define the jargon you do use. Some websites hyperlink jargon so you get a definition by clicking on the term. 2) Avoid getting lost in detail. 3) get the main point up front. 4)In lengthy discourse have a summary. 4) KISS principle. Etcetera.
Nigelji, here’s an example for you to ponder —
QUOTES FYI
Climate models can’t explain huge heat anomaly
we could be in uncharted territory (soon)
More and better data are urgently needed. (what we got isn’t working anymore)
confounded climate scientists’ predictive capabilities
temperatures have overshot previous records each month
a huge margin at the planetary scale
sudden heat spike
greatly exceeds (climate models’) predictions
(un)able to reconcile our theories
(Only 20% odds of) turning out to be a record warm year
the current (El Nino) is milder than similar events in 1997–98 and 2015–16.
SSTs in NAO began to shoot up
sea ice around Antarctica was by far the lowest on record.
a patch of sea ice roughly the size of Alaska was missing
anomaly has – been much larger than expected
this heat spike
the divergence – remains — roughly the gap between the previous and current annual record.
In 2020, new regulations-that reduce sulfur emissions.
Sulfur compounds – having an overall cooling effect
Preliminary estimates – show a negligible effect
–
But reliable assessments of aerosol emissions rely on networks of mostly volunteer-driven efforts, and it could be a year or more before the full data from 2023 are available.
–
This is too long a wait.
more nimble data-collection systems are clearly needed
The data will be invaluable for reducing the substantial aerosol-related uncertainty in climate models.
(aka Climate Models ARE CURRENTLY UNRELIABLE)
Hindcasts, informed by new data, could also provide insights
But it seems unlikely (even though the AUTHOR says he does NOT know…)
anomaly has come out of the blue, revealing an unprecedented knowledge gap
If-then the world will be in uncharted territory
could imply- fundamentally altering how the climate system operates, much sooner than [EXPERT] scientists had anticipated
COULD MEAN- adding more uncertainty
world’s climate is driven by — teleconnections
we need to know about such changes in real time
WHY- the warmest year in possibly the past 100,000 years.
we need [ANSWERS] quickly.
https://www.nature.com/articles/d41586-024-00816-z
Gets a Minus 100 points for using the jargon word FLUX in the text.
NK: Climate Models ARE CURRENTLY UNRELIABLE
BPL: If you type it in ALL CAPS, it’s more believable.
“…..much sooner than scientists had anticipated…….”?
OH if I had a dollar for every time I have heard that old line trotted out!
Should we be terrified of climate change?
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BbSEC6VN4Rs
Well, what do you think the answer is? :-)
The Copernicus Atmosphere Monitoring Service (CAMS) and @NASA CERES data show a very strong anticorrelation between reduced SO2 emissions from shipping and increased absorbed sunlight over areas with most shipping.
2003 to 2023
https://nitter.poast.org/pic/orig/media%2FGJrqPP3WUAAL7RF.png
+4.3 W/m² is higher than the global greenhouse gas forcing.
(grin)
Also see in 2023 climate scientists published a paper on the need to bring climate models more in balance with Earth’s Energy Imbalance. Aerosol forcings are crucial here: Especially on how much sunlight is absorbed by our planet. Models are not in agreement with @NASA’s CERES satellite observations! Global surface air temperature change is a very limited variable to compare your climate model against, as every climate scientist (should) know(s).
CERESMIP: a climate modeling protocol to investigate recent trends in the Earth’s Energy Imbalance
Gavin A. Schmidt et al
https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/fclim.2023.1202161/full
QUOTE_ “Available climate model simulations suggest that these trends are incompatible with purely internal variability, but that the full magnitude and breakdown of the trends are outside of the model ranges. Unfortunately, the Coupled Model Intercomparison Project (Phase 6) (CMIP6) protocol only uses observed forcings to 2014 (and Shared Socioeconomic Pathways (SSP) projections thereafter), and furthermore, many of the ‘observed’ drivers have been updated substantially since the CMIP6 inputs were defined. Most notably, the sea surface temperature (SST) estimates have been revised and now show up to 50% greater trends since 1979, particularly in the southern hemisphere. Additionally, estimates of short-lived aerosol and gas-phase emissions have been substantially updated. These revisions will likely have material impacts on the model-simulated EEI. We therefore propose a new, relatively low-cost, model intercomparison, CERESMIP, that would target the CERES period (2000-present), with updated forcings to at least the end of 2021. The focus will be on atmosphere-only simulations, using updated SST, forcings and emissions from 1990 to 2021. The key metrics of interest will be the EEI and atmospheric feedbacks, and so the analysis will benefit from output from satellite cloud observation simulators. ”
and
Quote – “However, examining the breakdown of shortwave and longwave components (Figure 2B) shows that these AMIP runs do not match the shortwave component of the trends at all, though the updated AMIP run has a better response in the longwave. The coupled models, particularly the MATRIX simulations, have better (but still deficient) shortwave trends and less of a discrepancy in the longwave. These results underline the previously reported potential discrepancy in EEI trends, and suggest that the results are affected by the aerosol components, at least with the original CMIP6 emissions. There may be important dependencies on variations in model physics as well, which further motivates the need for an organized intercomparison.”
5. Summary
We propose a short, low cost extension to the CMIP6 DECK protocols to examine and attribute the increasing EEI seen in the CERES and in-situ data since 2001. We welcome broad contributions from all atmospheric modeling groups.
https://nitter.poast.org/pic/orig/media%2FGCmyt2dWUAAdy43.jpg
A related “so-called climate science” REF
Global warming in the pipeline
James Hansen et al
Quote- “…. decline of aerosol emissions since 2010 should increase the 1970–2010 global warming rate of 0.18°C per decade to a post-2010 rate of at least 0.27°C per decade. Thus, under the present geopolitical approach to GHG emissions, global warming will exceed 1.5°C in the 2020s and 2°C before 2050. Impacts on people and nature will accelerate as global warming increases hydrologic (weather) extremes.”
https://academic.oup.com/oocc/article/3/1/kgad008/7335889
(grinnier grin)
*Is grinnier a word?
Deductive reasoning is not entirely killed off in climate science yet, but it may as well have been ….
see
https://nitter.poast.org/pic/orig/media%2FGEe1kUdWcAAnNj9.jpg
The great inadvertent aerosol experiment, from page 18)
there is a significant increase in Absorbed Solar Radiation in the North Atlantic and North Pacific Ocean regions, where most of the shipping occurs. Together with the rapid NASA CERES Net flux (= Earth’s Energy Imbalance) increase, this indicates a potentially very strong forcing increase from IMO2020.
https://academic.oup.com/oocc/article/3/1/kgad008/7335889
Is it really such a mystery? I think not ….
QUOTE from Hansen et al
http://www.columbia.edu/~jeh1/mailings/2024/Hopium.MarchEmail.2024.03.29.pdf
“In reality, the IPCC aerosol forcing is the forcing required for GCMs to yield global warming
comparable to observed warming. In the many years between successive IPCC reports, the
modeling groups make hundreds of climate simulations. Results reported to CMIP (climate
modeling intercomparison project) and used by IPCC tend to be model runs with global
warming comparable to observations. The ensemble of model results yields a fog of projected
future warming. The real world falls within the projected model fog because each successive
IPCC report has a new model fog consistent with the new models and updated observations.
Knutti20 pointed out individual models in the model fog each tend to yield global warming
comparable to observations, even though the models differed in many ways and had a range
of climate sensitivities. This result is at least partially explained by the fact that the aerosol
forcing is not well constrained, which provides each GCM model a degree of freedom in the
choice of aerosol forcing. Knutti also pointed out that most GCM simulations did not even
include the aerosol indirect climate forcing (the effect of aerosols on cloud cover and cloud
albedo). Aerosol and cloud physicists who wrote the aerosol section of IPCC reports
suggested that the indirect effect was probably the larger aerosol forcing, yet this larger
(negative) aerosol forcing was not employed in most of the GCMs.
There were two reasons that the GCM modelers did not want to include the full aerosol
forcing in their models. First, many of the oceans in the GCMs tended to mix heat into the
deep ocean too effectively, which meant that the GCM needed a slightly exaggerated forcing
to match observed surface warming. Increased net forcing could be achieved with a smaller
(less negative) aerosol forcing. Second, and more important, the GCMs tended to have
climate sensitivities in the neighborhood of 3°C for 2×CO2; with such climate sensitivity only
moderate aerosol forcing (~1-1.5 W/m2) is needed to match observed global warming.
[We are not suggesting that modelers were up to something nefarious. For example, the GISS
GCM21 in that era had sensitivity ~3°C for 2×CO2 and the aerosol forcing was −1.39 W/m2
(direct = −0.52, indirect = −0.87). It was admitted that we had no ability to compute aerosol
indirect forcing; instead, we used a global distribution from an aerosol model multiplied by a
factor intended to yield an indirect aerosol forcing of −1 W/m2. When used in the GCM with
computed cloud cover, the aerosol indirect forcing turned out to be −0.87 W/m2. Other GCM
groups made their own choices, but no group had realistic aerosol-cloud modeling.]
The basic difficulty is that cloud modeling is hard and aerosol-cloud modeling is very hard.
The simplest cloud models, used for decades, yield climate sensitivity near 3°C for 2×CO2.
Several recent models that attempt to model cloud microphysics more realistically, including
mixed phase clouds, yield higher climate sensitivity, ~4-6°C for 2×CO2. Empirical evaluation
of climate sensitivity has finally been achieved thanks to accurate definition of ice age global
temperature by Seltzer et al.22 and Tierney et al.,23 with the result that climate sensitivity is
4.8°C ± 0.6°C (1σ), with 3°C sensitivity excluded with 99.7% certainty.1
There is independent support for high climate sensitivity. In a webinar,24 George Tselioudis
showed figures of Zelinka et al.25 and Jiang et al.26 revealing that high sensitivity climate
models yield much better agreement with satellite observations of seasonal and latitudinal
cloud changes; the low sensitivity models do not have even the correct sense of the changes.
In addition, Williams et al.27 show that the improved aerosol and cloud physics (particularly
production of liquid water in mixed phase clouds) in the British Met Office GCM (widely
agreed to be one of the most realistic GCMs) leads to an increase of the model’s sensitivity
from 3.2°C to 5.5°C for 2×CO2. As described also by Palmer,28 the physics changes that yield
the higher climate sensitivity also yield improved 6-hour tendencies in the GCM used for
short-term (weather) simulations, an insightful approach that has been recommended for
assessing the realism of supposed improvements in model physics.
High climate sensitivity is a double whammy. High sensitivity implies a large (negative)
aerosol forcing because aerosol forcing, unfortunately, so far has been an implied quantity,
not a directly measured quantity. Further evidence that IPCC underestimates aerosol forcing
is provided in our Pipeline paper.1 For example, greenhouse gas climate forcing increased by
0.5 W/m2 over the past 6000 years, yet global temperature held steady or declined slightly,
especially in the Northern Hemisphere. Given that greenhouse gases and aerosols are the two
significant global forcings and the fact that wood-burning was the fuel source as civilization
developed, we argue that the human-made aerosol forcing was already at least (negative) 0.5
W/m2 in 1750, when IPCC assumes that it was zero, and we argue that the release of aerosols
in burning of wood and other biofuels has not decreased globally since 1750.
Decreased aerosol forcing since 2010 accelerates global warming and, in combination with
a moderate El Nino, accounts for the magnitude and geographical location of unusual 2023
warming. There is no need for concern that the physics of the climate system has changed.
Little light is shed on global climate change by the IPCC model fog approach. Real world
global temperature change always is included within the projected model fog, as reset with
each successive assessment, but that does not expose the physics of the climate system.”
end quote
I recommend the whole article, it has juicy bits all the way through.
NK: Deductive reasoning is not entirely killed off in climate science yet, but it may as well have been ….
BPL: [CITATION NEEDED]
Please don;t hide your light under a bushell …. 19 March 2024
https://pubs.giss.nasa.gov/abs/sc02900o.html
The following is commentary on a new heavily revised DICE model that models future economic costs of climate change. Looks like an improvement, and that Nordhaus has listened to his criticis, but the devils in the detail and I’ve only read the abstract. Excerpts:
Policies, projections, and the social cost of carbon: Results from the DICE-2023 model
Significance
The DICE model is the most widely used climate-change integrated assessment model, employed in calculating the social cost of carbon by the US and other governments as well as for creating consistent scenarios and evaluating policies and uncertainties. The present study updates the 2016 DICE version and introduces approaches for including nondiversifiable risk, includes a revised carbon cycle, updates the damage estimates, and includes results on the Paris Accord and temperature-limited scenarios.
Abstract
The present study examines the assumptions, modeling structure, and results of DICE-2023, the revised Dynamic Integrated Model of Climate and the Economy (DICE), updated to 2023. The revision contains major changes in the treatment of risk, the carbon and climate modules, the treatment of nonindustrial greenhouse gases, discount rates, as well as updates on all the major components. Noteworthy changes are a significant reduction in the target for the optimal (cost-beneficial) temperature path, a lower cost of reaching the 2 °C target, an analysis of the impact of the Paris Accord, and a major increase in the estimated social cost of carbon.
https://www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/pnas.2312030121
(My comment. The commentary said “Noteworthy changes are a significant reduction in the target for the optimal (cost-beneficial) temperature path”. Only an economist would come out with something like an optimal temperature path. )
All the Data and the really knowledgeable Experts keep telling you the clean-energy transition is failing.
https://www.theguardian.com/environment/2024/mar/20/fossil-fuels-oil-and-gas-clean-energy
eg quote-
“…….. limiting global heating to 1.5C beyond pre-industrial times…… would require the curtailing of an unprecedented boom in gas infrastructure along the US’s Gulf of Mexico coast, which Joe Biden’s administration recently sought to dampen by announcing a pause in new exports of liquified natural gas from these facilities. At Cera Week, however, Jennifer Granholm, Biden’s energy secretary, said that the pause will be “long in the rear-view mirror” in a year’s time.
SHE aught to know! You should believe her. She’s a Biden Democrat! (Grin)
Geoff Miell says
27 Mar 2024 at 7:03 PM
“MA Rodger, I think you display classic reticence. [Effective] Science [Communication] is about explaining the data. I think you fail to do that and instead denigrate the people who do so that don’t fit with your ideological narrative.”
Correct Geoff.
Rodger, like Piotr, is a member of that new breed where Minimisation is the New Denialism…. and where personal denigration is their forte and only real claim to notoriety.
nigelj says
28 Mar 2024 at 3:30 PM
“If you believe Hansen that global warming is now accelerating sharply due to aerosols issue, 10 cms by the fourth decade might be possible. ”
Of course. Yet still getting to 10cms is still possible by the second decade too. If Greenland Ice loss has slowed there is every reason to know already that it can accelerate at anytime unannounced. They (the Experts) have no clue why it slowed in the first place. Nor why 2023 was a record global temps ……
IN A WORLD WHERE EVERYTHING IS INTERCONNECTED IN WAYS UNKNOWN,
AND KNOWN NOT TO BE MEASURED ACCURATELY, IF AT ALL,
THEN ANYTHING MIGHT HAPPEN UNANNOUNCED TO THE EXPERTS OF THE WORLD.
And especially to those who have no idea about or responsibility for the RISKS INVOLVED IN NOT KNOWING
NK: IN A WORLD WHERE EVERYTHING IS INTERCONNECTED IN WAYS UNKNOWN,
AND KNOWN NOT TO BE MEASURED ACCURATELY, IF AT ALL,
BPL: Don’t make stuff up. It’s too easy for people to check, and then you look dishonest.
“ Rodger, like Piotr, is a member of that new breed […] where personal denigration is their forte and only real claim to notoriety. […] IN A WORLD WHERE EVERYTHING IS INTERCONNECTED IN WAYS UNKNOWN, AND KNOWN NOT TO BE MEASURED ACCURATELY THEN ANYTHING MIGHT HAPPEN UNANNOUNCED TO THE EXPERTS OF THE WORLD
The author of the above demonstrated:
– contempt toward science and scientists
– “all or nothing” fallacy – if we can’t understand everything then we know nothing
– belief that the uncertainty is his friend
– arrogance of ignorance – a guy with weak? non-existent? background in natural science believes he knows more than professional climate researchers publishing in prime scientific journals
– projection of own motives onto others – unable to falsify their arguments – resorts to “personal denigration” of opponents by ascribing to _them_ … “personal denigration” of opponents
– psychological payout of a conspiracy theorist:
if the best scientists in the world can’t see, what _I_, without much/any formal education in the field, can see, then _I_ must be really, really smart, and therefore – my life is not pathetic at all
A question to the reader: who are we talking about – Victor or Ned Kelly?
Then again – does it even matter? If you:
– attack the credibility of climate science
– imply that the consequences of our actions are so complex that will never be able to say anything useful about them,
and therefore: since actions cannot be based on science, actions based on one set of untestable, beliefs is as good as actions based on any other set of untestable beliefs
then does it even matter, where the author is coming from? By their fruits, not by where they started from, you shall now them.
[ Sorry the page formatting is wonky, and I replied to the wrong comment – take two – please delete the other one. Thank you very much. ]
PS to Geoff FYI
The Straw man fallacy is the distortion of someone else’s argument (instead of addressing the actual argument) to make it easier to attack.
Putting words not said nor meant into another person’s mouth is called projection.
Exaggeration is distortion, a lie barely clad to make it seem truthful when it is patently false.
A strawman fallacy is deliberately misinterpreting somene’s argument or proposition to something similar that’s easier to rebut than the actual proposition being put.
Often this fallacy involves putting words into somebody’s mouth by saying they’ve made arguments they haven’t actually made, in which case.
Pointing out a logical fallacy is a way of removing an argument from the debate rather than just weakening it. Much of the time, a debater will respond to an argument by simply stating a counterargument showing why the original argument is not terribly significant in comparison to other concerns, or shouldn’t be taken seriously, or whatever. That kind of response is fine, except that the original argument still remains in the debate, albeit in a less persuasive form, and the opposition is free to mount a rhetorical offensive saying why it’s important after all.
On the other hand, if you can show that the original argument actually commits a logical fallacy, you put the opposition in the position of justifying why their original argument should be considered at all. If they can’t come up with a darn good reason, then the argument is actually removed from the round.
When you have no argument and lack awareness of reality then all you have left is a choice between sophistry, insults, lies, and ad hominem abuse. The refuge of irrational unscientific scoundrels no less.
While the average atmospheric CO2-level rise in the 1960s was 0.9 ppmv/year, in the 1970s it was 1.2 ppmv/year, in the 1980s 1,6 ppmv/year, in the 1990s 1.6 ppmv/year, in the 2000s 1.9 ppmv/year and in the 2010s 2,4 ppmv/year (source: https://www.metoffice.gov.uk/research/climate/seasonal-to-decadal/long-range/forecasts/co2-forecast . The rise in the atmospheric CO2-level is accelerating.
But the IPCC seems to ignore that ugly fact.
How are we doing now? The rise from feb. 2023 til feb. 2024 was 4,25 ppmv and now, nearing the end of march, the rise from last year is trending above 5 ppmv, source https://www.co2.earth/daily-co2 . “Only recently in January 2024 Mauna Lau Observatory Hawaii anticipated a “relatively large” surge in annual average CO2 concentrations for 2024, estimating an increase of approximately 2.84 ppm more than 2023. But current trends put that into question as too low” Robert Hunziker writes here: https://www.pressenza.com/2024/03/co2-bursting-into-the-atmosphere/ Is he correct? Surely denialists will deny this problem, the data etc. altogether, but frankly I’m not interested in their trumpisms at all, I’m interested in what the climate scientists here have to say about the matter.
After the El Niño 2015-16, the norwegian CICERO scientist Glen Peters wrote that El Niño was causing the acceleration in CO2 rise then. To me it seemed too simplistic to say that only rising sea-surface temperatures were causing the acceleration, and I was proven correct, when the acceleration continued during the years with La Niña, even during the last three-year-La-Niña 2020-2023. I strongly suspected that the growing discrepancies between reported CO2 emissions had nothing whatsoever to do with El Niño, but a whole lot whith countries and industries simply lying their emissions lower than they are – a new level of greenwashing, to compensate for the complete lack of any kind of climate action except for the usual symbolisms and fakeries inherent in the socalled Paris “agreement” (according to James Hansen in november 2015 “pure bullshit”, and everything happening since then has proven him utterly correct) and the resulting socalled COP “process”. (which is by now reduced to just another public relations stunt for the fossil fuel lobby).
And now, Glen Peters is confirming my suspicions: “They are supposed to be the climate-savers’ gold standard — the key data on which the world relies in its efforts to lower greenhouse gas emissions and hold global warming in check. But the national inventories of emissions supplied to the United Nations climate convention (UNFCCC) by most countries are anything but reliable, according to a growing body of research.
The data supplied to the UNFCCC, and published on its website, are typically out of date, inconsistent, and incomplete. For most countries, “I would not put much value, if any, on the submissions,” says Glen Peters of the Centre for International Climate Research in Norway, a longtime analyst of emissions trends.
The data from large emitters is as much open to questions as that from smaller and less industrialised nations. In China, the uncertainties around its carbon dioxide emissions from burning coal are larger than the total emissions of many major industrial countries. And companies preparing data for its carbon-trading system have been accused of widespread data fraud.
In the United States, an analysis published this month of the air over the country’s oil and natural gas fields found that they emit three times more methane — a gas responsible for a third of current warming — than the government has reported.” https://e360.yale.edu/features/undercounted-emissions-un-climate-change
I told you so. And thank you, mr. Biden, for your trumpism light…
Around 1975, 75 pct. of the global energy use was supplied by fossil fuels. What is this percentage nowadays? Surprise, surprise, it is rising:
“Renewables Growth Did Not Dent Fossil Fuel Dominance in 2022, Report Says, Reuters, June 26, 2023
Global energy demand rose 1% last year and record renewables growth did nothing to shift the dominance of fossil fuels, which still accounted for 82% of supply, the industry’s Statistical Review of World Energy report said on Monday.
Last year was marked by turmoil in the energy markets after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, which helped to boost gas and coal prices to record levels in Europe and Asia.
The stubborn lead of oil, gas and coal products in covering most energy demand cemented itself in 2022 despite the largest ever increase in renewables capacity at a combined 266 gigawatts, with solar leading wind power growth, the report said.
“Despite further strong growth in wind and solar in the power sector, overall global energy-related greenhouse gas emissions increased again,” said the president of the UK-based global industry body Energy Institute, Juliet Davenport.
“We are still heading in the opposite direction to that required by the Paris Agreement.”” https://www.reuters.com/business/energy/renewables-growth-did-not-dent-fossil-fuel-dominance-2022-statistical-review-2023-06-25/
For some strangely unknown reasons (sarcasm off) none of this is appearing in the media. It probably doesn’t seem relevant from the “perspective”/”horizon” of the chattering classes, their subject is by now reduced to celebrity lifestyle only. “How green do I look today, darling?” “Oh, don’t bother. That is sooo out of fashion now”.
It’s called “freedom of expression”… – amusing ourselves to death.
KVJ: But the IPCC seems to ignore that ugly fact.
BPL: [CITATION NEEDED]
Thanks for correcting me, BPL. What I meant was that *the IPCC doesn’t mention that the emssions are underreported*.
It’s not possible to cite anything on this from the IPCC, simply because they don’t mention it. They keep silent about this: “….the national inventories of emissions supplied to the United Nations climate convention (UNFCCC) by most countries are anything but reliable, according to a growing body of research.” https://e360.yale.edu/features/undercounted-emissions-un-climate-change
Meaning: the CO2 and methane emissions are much higher than reported, as explained. Which explains much, probably most, of the growing gap between faster rising CO2 and methane measurements at Mauna Loa etc. and the reported emissions.
Why does the IPCC keep silent about this? Probably because they have to keep the “diplomatic tone”, they are dependent on the economic and political support of the big powers of this world. And the big powers are what I call “climate ignorants” or climate deniers. Some like the US-dem.s and EU, Norway (a petrostate…), GB etc. are more “lukewarmers”, while others like US-trumpist, Russia, Saudiarabia, China, India etc. are more openly deniers. In practical terms the difference is zero. China and India are hiding behind their false status as “developing countries” as if this would make their growing emissions non existant. Of course especially China has become the “factory of the world” and most of their emissions stems from the production of commodities for the old/former industrial countries, but then they should say that, and not lie about their growing emissions and their causes and effects, as they are now.
But everyone is simply – and more and more consciously (they all know it’s a big fat lie) – suffering from *the antiscientific illusion that money can overrule the laws of nature,* We are living under the unenlightened rule of the oiligarchy. The COP-“process” now degenerating into a commercial show for the petroholics/the fossil fuel lobby is a clear symptom of this.
As long as this goes on and on, we are speeding towards *and past* both 1,5 degrees C and 2,0 above preindustrial global mean temperature.
Happy Easter ya bunch of cranky pants! May Jesus’ love pour down upon thee and melt your hardened cynical hearts of yee of little faith.
NK: Happy Easter ya bunch of cranky pants! May Jesus’ love pour down upon thee [sic] and melt your hardened cynical hearts of [sicL/i>] yee [sic] of little faith.
BPL: Corrected to actual Renaissance English: “Happy Easter ye bunch of cranky pants! May Jesus’s love pour down pon you and melt your hardened cynical hearts, O ye of little faith.”
“Speaking forsoothly” is one of the banes of the SCA, since very few people do it correctly. Some just add “eth” to every verb.
Actual Renaissance English is not that hard:
I am
Thou art
He, she, it is [or he, she, it be if speaking about habitual or repeated action]
We are
Ye are
They are
I run
Thou runnest
He, she, it runneth
We run
Ye run
They run
I give it to me
Thou givest it to thee
He, she, it giveth it to him, her, it
We give it to us
Ye give it to you
They give it to them
No need to thank me. All in a day’s work.
Well, I for one will be slightly less cranky if we can make it past April MAGAs Day without major incident and if April’s “showres soote” can bath “every vein in swich liqor, of which vertu engendred is the flowr”, without washing them all away.
Cheers.
I have noticed the occasional post on here criticising climate change communication by climate scientists. Sabine Hossenfelder does similar but on a different angle, claiming that appealing to emotion by trying to scare people is counterproductive and manipulative, and we should be framing the issue by addressing how we can work together.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BbSEC6VN4Rs
Sabine is a very talented and effective science communicator to the public. But not respected here much.
Another good communicator about complex reality … with high end communication skills.
quote @12 mins from Information Bifurcation – 10 Lenses
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZRQ3g36ZtWo
quote – “This is an example of metamodern thinking, someone that’s mature enough to be self-aware of their own reactions and still try to glean what they could from a conversation. … I do think writ large, this is where we’re at. Can we as a species suppress our identities, suppress our built image of the world, which is of course influenced by our own background and by the media to suss out what is true, what is false, what is important, what’s trivia, what’s relevant? What’s a side story? I think we have to rebuild the Fourth Estate in a way that works for the crises that are ahead. So we need a new information infrastructure in our society. But along with that, we have arrived at a point where some of us have to evolve beyond the tribal single issue, binary thinking that was adopted in the distant past. We have to evolve how we approach information, how we use information towards discourses, collaboration, and a broader discussion on how we engage with the events of the day. “ end quote
The video can be set at x1.5 speed which is easier/faster, or just read the transcript at your own speed.
How many centuries of “discussion” resulting in some noises but still growing use of fossil fuels do you expect it would take before the use of fossil fuels actually just began just to slow down, if the ressources weren’t limited?
My guess, based on history until now: the relentless growth in fossil fuel consumption will go on and on until the reserves run out or at least until it results in so enormous catastrophes, that they simply are impossible to ignore. Knowing the capacity of homo sapiens for ignorance and lying, as shown by the popularity of trumpist, putinist, bidenist, hillarist, xipingist, modiist etc. etc. complete nonsense and demagoguery, that probably means until simultaneously occuring accelerating but ignored climate and ecosystems collapse, another global total war over the remaining ressources, totalitarianism plus gradual societal collapse and the slow and ignored end of fossil fuel ressources. Fact is: humankind is pouring CO2 into the atmosphere at least ten times faster than during the enormous eruptions that created the siberian traps 252 million years ago, and even more times faster than during the PETM 55 million years ago. More than thirty years of “talks” haven’t produced any practical results other than a growing mount of ignored science, “pure bullshit” (James Hansen nov. 2015 about the Paris “agreement”) and still faster growing emissions.
This will probably happen within less than half a century, probably even faster. I mean we are already in the middle of at least two attempted ethnic cleansings at a level not seen since 1945 (in Palestine and in Ukraine), while global heating and it’s effects are accelerating faster than expected by most scientists. These are facts, not scaremongering.
double down
verb
1. strengthen one’s commitment to a particular strategy or course of action, typically one that is potentially risky
Piotr. Regarding your comments above thread that you don’t believe the term lukewarmer is useful or helpful and that it conceals more than it illuminates.
I don’t agree that we should give up on the term lukewarmer. The problem is we would have to put everyone opposing the IPCC findings into the same basket of denier regardless of whether they object to fundamental parts of the scientific consensus or more superficial parts and regardless of the number of their objections or validity of their objections. Or alternatively we have no name for people with minor objections to the IPCC findings.
Calling everyone with any objections a denier is analogous to right wingers labelling people communists because they suggest maybe some limited parts of the economy be publicly owned, or that governmnets should have a carbon tax. Its a cheap shot and a form of emotional manipulation and intellectual bullying, and its not an accurate reflection of those peoples overall position.
You call Ned Kelly a denier because he criticises some scientists views, thinks IPCC and models typically underestimate warming and other changes, and Ned promotes solutions you dont think are viable like degrowth, and simplification (and I have doubts about these as well ).But James Hansen also thinks we are badly underestimating the warming rate and modelling is inadequate, and he promotes nuclear power (which I think you have criticised?) so by your logic he is a denier as well, which is patently absurd.
Now they obviously aren’t lukewarmers either. I think such people fit a label like contrarians or alarmists. The point being that a range of categories have developed and while you are right it can create problems, the alternative of just a couple of categories of denier and warmist is just worse IMHO.
Of course some people are denialists and I’m coming around to your view TK is more of a denialist than a lukewarmer, because everytime he opens his mouth lately he shifts towards the denier category. He seems to like it. He reminds me of a Charles Dickens character called Uriah Heep.
In Re to Nigel, 30 Mar 2024 at 3:21 PM,
https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2024/03/unforced-variations-march-2024/comment-page-2/#comment-820722
Dear Nigel,
Thank you for reclassifying me as a specific denialist “Uriah Heep like” subtype.
I have not read David Copperfield yet, however, from the synopsis,
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Uriah_Heep_(character)
I learned that if the analogy works, I do not have particularly bright prospects of future.
Piotr already predicted a slightly different but also relatively dire fate for me, by analogy with another popular character, namely with a man-eating monster called Jožin z bažin
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jo%C5%BEin_z_ba%C5%BEin
https://www.google.com/search?client=firefox-b-d&q=jo%C5%BEin+z+ba%C5%BEin+lyrics
what seems to be an almost perfect fit as I was indeed born in Zlín.
Personally, I am not sure if would prefer rather being deported into Australia, or ending up in ZOO.
Greetings
Tomáš
Nigelj, how would someone like Charles Koch be characterized? Koch is an MIT trained engineer and respects the scientific consensus. However, Koch is opposed to any governmental action to address climate change. Instead he advocates that this problem be address through market-based private sector initiatives.
It’s already clear the integrated complex of the UNFCCC, IPCC and COP ‘climate treaty’ systems and the global network of climate scientists are failing badly. Their goals are unachievable by any stretch of the imagination. What I think is more likely however is that rather than any rational reforms occurring, which is what the global south have been demanding for decades already, is that this ‘complex’ is going to collapse / implode within the next decade.
Mainly because of the realpoliik of today’s world reality as exemplified by the following items (of many)
https://asiatimes.com/2024/03/this-is-the-way-the-west-ends/
https://thetricontinental.org/studies-on-contemporary-dilemmas-4-hyper-imperialism/
The ongoing denial and denigration of the work output and thoughtful openminded scientific analysis of people like Hansen et al is only contributing to the undermining of the credibility of climate science generally. Especially among those who used to be it’s finest outspoken defenders. Now mainstream climate science is seen more like just another knee on the necks of the global south. I see many unemployed western camp climate scientists in the near future as the tectonic plates of the political world keep shifting ever faster – much faster than even global warming is increasing now.
Tomáš Kalisz says
27 Mar 2024 at 9:10 AM
https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2024/03/unforced-variations-march-2024/#comment-820596
Tomas, I responded favorably, but my detailed comment has not be published.
I am not going to repeat myself.
Noe was this one, a second time, but I saved a copy ….. the point being? imo it’s impossible to have a reasonable conversation on this forum for multiple reasons not worth exploring again.
In Re to Ned Kelly, 31 Mar 2024 at 4:40 AM
Dear Ms. Kelly,
Thank you very much for your reply. Pitty that your contribution has not been published. Although I have often very different views, I appreciate your efforts and will any time welcome your critical feedback to my comments.
The only other platform that I occassionally visit and wherein we could perhaps exchange our thoughts is, however, X (formerly Twitter). You can simply try @tomas.kalisz
Sincere greetings
Tomáš
For the record: and later reflection.
Quote:
Prof Michael E. Mann
@MichaelEMann
Planet is warming ~0.03C/year. Aerosols (see below) account for ~1/8 of that, i.e. ~0.004C/year. La Nina/El Nino transition led to ~0.5C warming during past year, 100 x as much warming as aerosols.
It is absolutely absurd to attribute the warming spike to aerosols.
To summarize:
1) Aerosols have little if any role in the recent warming
2) The claim that IPCC climate models underestimate that warming is equally false (see below)
3) Using unsupportable claims to campaign for geoengineering is (dangerous) advocacy, not science.
The models and observations are quite consistent–little if any acceleration (technically there’s a bit because aerosols have slowly been decreasing while greenhouse warming is steady–but this is captured IN the models).
https://nitter.poast.org/MichaelEMann/status/1774438094688653680#m
—-
and Quote Prof Michael E. Mann
@MichaelEMann
9 Oct 2023
And yes, there is empirical, peer-reviewed support for the conclusion that climate deniers, in general, are truly awful human beings:
https://nitter.poast.org/MichaelEMann/status/1711445094681735185#m