Resisting Climate Hysteria

Sidamo said:

One favourite argument of the anti-AGW crowd is that there has been no warming in the last decade. Interestingly, NASA published their end-of-year analysis of global temperature data a while back, which you can read here: http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/sotc/?report=global&year=2009&month=13&submitted=Get+Report

It lists the Top 10 hottest years, in order, as 2005, 1998, 2003, 2002, 2009, 2006, 2007, 2004, 2001, 2008, 1997. It also states that the decade from 2000-2009 was the warmest decade on record (since 1880), a full 0.54C hotter than the 20thC average. The 90's were next, 0.36C above the 20thC average.

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There are lots of reasons that that is doubtful, but once again, it's Groundhog Day.

We've been over this a hundred times.

wayneL said:

There are lots of reasons that that is doubtful, but once again, it's Groundhog Day.

We've been over this a hundred times.

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Where's Penny Wong?

Where is Kevin Rudd?

Starting to see the light or worried about his future as the world catches up with his spin.

Is this the light you were talking about lasty ?

wayneL said:

You can wiggle and wriggle and twist and turn, but still no quote. Context is everything.

I say ad hominem so often because you people use it as a standard tactic.

You preach science, yet are unwilling to even consider Lindzen's points and crap on about some illusory quote on smoking.

On the science, I'm not going to write a thesis, but I have posted many links over the years, possibly as many as you rederob, yet you continuously deny that I do so. Possibly because you refuse to read them; that they will damage your faith.

My position on climate change (which despite your ignorant straw man claim as denialism, which it isn't) is based on my readings of the available science.

You seem unable to discern any science which contradicts your religious faith in AGW as science. You you understand how ridiculous that seems to people able to look to both views without bias? It's cultism, ironically, only common with people on the far left.

Your are getting more irrelevant to this discussion with every post, attempting to drag it backwards with petty jibes and retrograde debate.

I can only conclude that you are not interested in finding solutions to actual problems, instead there is some other malodorous political agenda at play.

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Mr L, your many statements are poorly founded.

For the benefit of those that suspect a red herring, or believe context is everything in relation to the earlier Lindzen attribution, the link between smoking and climate change is thus: Despite what we read on cigarette packets, smoking does not cause lung cancer. The statistical link of causality is, however, legitimate. Similarly, we cannot yet prove that carbon dioxide causes global warming, especially as it remains one of many greenhouse gas contributors. Even if in a century's time the globe has warmed as CO2 emissions increase, there will be difficulty in separating the direct contribution of CO2 given the complexity surrounding climate change.

The science will hinge on two key factors; the known forcings inherent to CO2, and the statistical probability of warming being due to other factors (or vice versa).

In relation to Lindzen's recent scientific contributions on climate, I can advise that his 2009 collaboration with Choi was a good effort, although it fell down completely after it failed to correct what was acknowledged as a false signal in the data. In other words, as Lindzen and Choi continued to use data that was known to be erroneous, albeit smoothed, it rendered their conclusions deficient.

I have asked you to substantiate a number of claims, and you continue to refuse to do so, relying instead on me needing to troll through years of postings in related threads. While climate change might be complex, much can be said in plain English, or with just a few facts. For example, which climate scientists do not believe that radiative forcings impact on global temperature?

I do note that Basilio and rederob in other threads have posted similar themes to me, although I suspect their knowledge of the science is not as robust. Whatever label you choose for me will not wash, as I simply defer to the probabilistic linkage of CO2 to global warming that gathers more scientific support over time.

In relation to actual problems as your last paragraph refers, may I give an example that accentuates my view that we need to reduce CO2 emissions. A little understood or known linkage between ocean acidification and plant life has had major impacts on sea life and the capacity of fish stock to regenerate such that the ocean food chain is seriously out of balance. We mostly compartmentalise this to overfishing, and while this has some truth it fails to acknowledge the biological web that leads to a vibrant fish stock in the first instance.

Deniers of warming and CO2's role continually refuse to debate the science. They seek side issues and irrelevances, and sensationalise aspects of the science that seem implausible, except when placed in proper context.

This thread clearly demonstrates those tactics.

sneak'n said:

I do note that Basilio and rederob....

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I managed to read your repetitious and tangential post, an attempt to deflect having been called out on the Lindzen issue, without bursting out laughing...

...that is until you referred to yourself in the third person.

BAHAHAHAHAHA! C'mon rederob we all know it's you, admit it.

trainspotter said:

Is this the light you were talking about lasty ?

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I like how he draws Rudd as Tin Tin. Classic.

lasty said:

Where's Penny Wong?

Where is Kevin Rudd?

Starting to see the light or worried about his future as the world catches up with his spin.

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Astonishing, isn't it. Before Copenhagen we were "facing the greatest moral challenge of our times", it was absolutely imperative that the ETS be passed prior to Copenhagen, etc etc., but following the utter fiasco that was Copenhagen, it's as though the great moral challenge has simply disappeared.
Such is the authenticity of Rudd's and Wong's convictions.

And just consider how close we came to actually having the ETS. Just one vote sent Malcolm Turnbull on his way and as a result it all fell over.

Lasty, I don't mind if the world fails to appreciate how much of Mr Rudd is spin. It would just be good if most Australians understand this. It does seem to be starting to happen.

But then, if the alternative is Mr Abbott, that's hardly a satisfying outcome either.

France is just quietly resisting climate hysteria by dumping their proposed carbon tax.


http://www.investors.com/NewsAndAnalysis/Article.aspx?id=528328

Scariest end of world scenario since Y2K.

I have it on good authority ocean acidification is the next fake environmental catastrophe to keep the enviro loons busy.

France don't need a carbon tax.
95% of their energy is nucleur or wind.

I read somewhere that China in one week pollutes more to the atmosphere than Australia does in one year? I could be wrong as I am relying on my memory for this tidbit of info. Also that the top 3 Chinese electricity generating companies pollute more than the entire UK ? Can this be right?

trainspotter said:

I read somewhere that China in one week pollutes more to the atmosphere than Australia does in one year? I could be wrong as I am relying on my memory for this tidbit of info. Also that the top 3 Chinese electricity generating companies pollute more than the entire UK ? Can this be right?

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Where you see things like this



I would say it's quite possible. Tree hugger or not, that can't be good for the atmosphere.

Knobby22 said:

France don't need a carbon tax.
95% of their energy is nucleur....

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They should have a water vapour (a greenhouse gas) tax then... all them turbines.

They should also have an obnoxious garçon tax too.

THE worst polluted places in the world are socialist cities. Yet we have the socialist Greens and their army of useful idiots with a straight face pretending to want to save whales while setting up GULAGs for the humans.

Check this out, "10 most polluted cities":

http://www.time.com/time/specials/2007/0,28757,1661031,00.html

Atlas79 said:

THE worst polluted places in the world are socialist cities. Yet we have the socialist Greens and their army of useful idiots with a straight face pretending to want to save whales while setting up GULAGs for the humans.

Check this out, "10 most polluted cities":

http://www.time.com/time/specials/2007/0,28757,1661031,00.html

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Ignorance is bliss.

I think it is absolutely critical to keep up with latest research on climate change and in particular when we can recognise human caused intervention.

Came across an excellent article in the Real Climate blog which examines the albedo effect of sheep on climate change and points out that the sharp reductions in New Zealand sheep numbers appears to correlate extremely well with recent increases in global warming.

Cheers

The Sheep Albedo Feedback

The already-reeling "consensus" supposedly linking climate change to CO2 is about to receive its final coup-de-grace from a remarkable new result announced in a press conference today by Dr. Ewe Noh-Watt of the New Zealand Institute of Veterinary Climatology [1]. Noh-Watt and his co-workers, describing work funded by a generous grant from the Veterinary Climate Science Coalition, declared "We have seen the future of climate ”” and it is Sheep." Prof. Jean-Belliere Poisson d’Avril, star student of Claude Allegro Molto-Troppo (discoverer of the Tropposphere) reacted with the words, "Parbleu! C’est la meilleure chose depuis les baguettes tranchées!"

The hypothesis begins with the simple observation that most sheep are white, and therefore have a higher albedo than the land on which they typically graze (see figure below). This effect is confirmed by the recent Sheep Radiation Budget Experiment. The next step in the chain of logic is to note that the sheep population of New Zealand has plummeted in recent years. The resulting decrease in albedo leads to an increase in absorbed Solar radiation, thus warming the planet. The Sheep Albedo hypothesis draws some inspiration from the earlier work of Squeak and Diddlesworth [2] on the effect of the ptarmigan population on the energy balance of the Laurentide ice sheet. Noh-Watt hastens to emphasize that the two hypotheses are quite distinct, since the species of ptarmigan involved in the Squeak-Diddlesworth effect is now extinct.

The proof of the pudding is in the data, shown in the Figure below. Here, the Sheep Albedo Index is defined as the New Zealand Sheep population in each year, subtracted from the 2007 population. The index is defined that way because fewer sheep means lower albedo, and thus a positive radiative forcing. It can be seen that the recent warming can be explained entirely by the decline in the New Zealand sheep population, without any need to bring in any mysterious so-called "radiative forcing" from carbon dioxide, which doesn’t affect the sunlight (hardly) anyway ”” unlike Sheep Albedo. Some researchers have expressed surprise at the large effect from the relatively small radiative forcing attributable to New Zealand Sheep, or indeed to New Zealand as a whole. "This only shows the fallacy of the concept of Radiative Forcing, which is after all only a theory, not a fact," says Noh-Watt. "Evidently there are amplifying feedbacks at work which give the Sheep Albedo Index a disproportionate influence over climate."

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http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2007/04/the-sheep-albedo-feedbacki/langswitch_lang/en/

Further to the discussions on albedo effect of sheep on global warming there has been some shearing-edge research being conducted by the New Zealand Wool Board and the Wine Institute – code-named the vin de mouton project. Under normal conditions, turning an old sheep paddock into a vineyard would be a climate “double whammy” – loss of sheep albedo effect made worse by the heat-absorbing canopy of a growing vineyard (see here for an example).

The research programme began by exploring the concept of “wool offsets”, where vineyards could purchase sheep in other parts of the country to offset their warming effect, but it quickly became obvious that this would be difficult to monitor and implement. Sheep on south-facing slopes, for instance, have a much lower albedo effect than those on north-facing slopes (remember, this is the southern hemisphere). Trials with GPS monitoring of sheep movements in rolling hill country did show that the animals do seek out sunnier spots on colder days, but this was affected by fleece length (more fleece, less need for external heat) and by the animals’ need for shade in hot weather.

Recent work has established that the only way to make the wool offset concept work is to apply it at the vineyard level. Each vineyard maintains its own flock of sheep (about one sheep to 100 vines), and they are grazed between the vines at regular intervals – good for weed control and fertilisation, though they do have a tendency to like vine leaves (especially sheep with Greek bloodlines). This can be overcome by timing the application of sheep to the vineyard so that they animals can assist with leaf pruning to expose grape bunches to sunlight. The sheep are also fed all the prunings, and early results indicate that this diet significantly reduces the methane produced compared with an all-grass diet. Feed the sheep the grape skins left after the fruit is crushed for wine-making, and the sheepmeat develops a wonderful dark colour and marvellous flavours. Vine-fed lamb is expected to begin trial marketing soon, and it is expected to be a hit with gourmets in all our export markets (except, possibly, France).

The effect of sheep on wine quality is however a little more problematic. The flavour of sauvignon blanc – NZ’s flagship varietal – has been likened to “cat’s pee on a gooseberry bush”, and with overuse of wool offsets this can be a little more like “ram’s pee on a blackcurrant bush”. Trials with different breeds are continuing, and currently it looks as though merinos are the most benign on the basis of final bouquet.

Rererence. See above

basilio said:

The effect of sheep on wine quality is however a little more problematic. The flavour of sauvignon blanc – NZ’s flagship varietal – has been likened to “cat’s pee on a gooseberry bush”, and with overuse of wool offsets this can be a little more like “ram’s pee on a blackcurrant bush”. Trials with different breeds are continuing, and currently it looks as though merinos are the most benign on the basis of final bouquet.

Rererence. See above

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Sauvignon Blanc is for Champagne Socialists who haven't ripped off the public enough to afford genuine Champers and think themselves progressive for moving on from Chardonnay (which tastes like the gender specific urine of a specific indigenous group).

Real men and women drink Hawkes Bay Red. The producers of vino locale are also doing their best to stave off the imminent ice age by hovering choppers over the vines on frosty mornings. A truly heroic and selfless effort.

basilio said:

I think it is absolutely critical to keep up with latest research on climate change and in particular when we can recognise human caused intervention.

Came across an excellent article in the Real Climate blog which examines the albedo effect of sheep on climate change and points out that the sharp reductions in New Zealand sheep numbers appears to correlate extremely well with recent increases in global warming.

Click to expand...

The already-reeling "consensus" supposedly linking climate change to CO2 is about to receive its final coup-de-grace from a remarkable new result announced in a press conference today by Dr. Ewe Noh-Watt of the New Zealand Institute of Veterinary Climatology.

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You know what? I think Dr Ewe Noh-Watt pinched his name off Kevin Rudd.

Er, sheep and climate change?
What date is it?