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Where is your "real world" data coming from

The peer reviewed literature. People claiming that there is evidence that warming is increasing weather extremes today are basically making crap up. The only data point that actually supports the alarmist fantasies are increases in hot weather extremes, however, this has been matched by a decline in cold weather extremes so no net increase. Edited by TimG
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Yes, and I explained using thermodynamics earlier in this thread why many of the alarmist claims such as more heat = more extreme weather is retarded. But I guess I have to repeat myself.

Winds and weather systems are the result of temperature (and as a result, pressure) differences in the earth's atmosphere which is due primarily due to unequal heating of the earth by the sun in equatorial regions compared to polar regions (equatorial regions have more direct sun light). Increasing CO2 concentrations and other greenhouse gases reduces the global temperature gradient between equatorial regions and polar regions, which reduces available energy for weather events. For example, most climate models predict a decrease in the frequency and severity of tornadoes in tornado alley as a response to climate change.

you keep stumbling and bumbling over jet stream changes... notably the more northward & southward reaching jet stream waves being attributed to climate change impacts that I've referenced in several posts within this thread. You have this "old school" view of polar/equatorial temperature gradients. Somehow you manage to discount/avoid/ignore the large localized temperature gradients associated with shifting jet stream waves... and related large pressure gradients that result in extreme/unstable weather regions. Throw into that same mix the "blocking, stalling" effects being seen and voila! You do claim to be the "science guy", right?

.

In addition, climate models predict that increasing CO2 will increase the temperatures of the planet's upper atmosphere more than the planet's oceans. This reduction will reduce the workable energy for hurricanes (which are essentially giant heat engines, which transfer heat from the air near the ocean's surface to the earth's upper atmosphere), which will reduce the severity and frequency of hurricanes (even the recent IPCC report admits this).

you and your sockpuppet keep making unsubstantiated IPCC references... over and over again. You keep making the references, but somehow never quite manage to actually provide a direct quote from an IPCC report. Care to actually step up and quote the IPCC AR5 reference that speaks to both a reduction in severity as well as frequency of hurricanes.

.

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The peer reviewed literature. People claiming that there is evidence that warming is increasing weather extremes today are basically making crap up. The only data point that actually supports the alarmist fantasies are increases in hot weather extremes, however, this has been matched by a decline in cold weather extremes so no net increase.

Ah nope. You can't get much more peer reviewed than the IPCC. They have long since said that warming will cause extremes both up as well as down the temp. scale with the overall trend being up. And that's what we are seeing.

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I've put up past versions of the following atmospheric CO2 time history graph... I believe the last update I've referenced was 2010. As below, an updated 2012 version... stick with it to the end!

What variation of the "hockey stick" do you keep posting incessantly?

incessantly? I put the above up twice in this thread... the second time I put it up because MLW member 'GostHacked' tried his usual ploy to attempt to bury the first post. Good on ya for noticing the shape of that historical CO2 accumulation!

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Ah nope. You can't get much more peer reviewed than the IPCC. They have long since said that warming will cause extremes both up as well as down the temp. scale with the overall trend being up. And that's what we are seeing.

WRONG. The IPCC has said that extremes MIGHT get worse in the future but they also said there is no compelling evidence that current weather extremes have been affected by warming. Anyone who claims that *current* weather extremes are worse because of global warming is simply making crap up. Edited by TimG
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WRONG. The IPCC has said that extremes MIGHT get worse in the future but they also said there is no compelling evidence that current weather extremes have been affected by warming. Anyone who claims that *current* weather extremes are worse because of global warming is simply making crap up.

citation request

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recently published study... further to previous study/references I've provided that speak to the impact of melting Arctic sea ice on extreme weather (re: Arctic/Polar amplification):

Extreme summer weather in northern mid-latitudes linked to a vanishing cryosphere

The past decade has seen an exceptional number of unprecedented summer extreme weather events1, 2, 3, 4 in northern mid-latitudes, along with record declines in both summer Arctic sea ice5,6 and snow cover on high-latitude land7. The underlying mechanisms that link the shrinking cryosphere with summer extreme weather, however, remain unclear8, 9, 10, 11, 12. Here, we combine satellite observations of early summer snow cover and summer sea-ice extent13 with atmospheric reanalysis data14 to demonstrate associations between summer weather patterns in mid-latitudes and losses of snow and sea ice. Results suggest that the atmospheric circulation responds differently to changes in the ice and snow extents, with a stronger response to sea-ice loss, even though its reduction is half as large as that for the snow cover. Atmospheric changes associated with the combined snow/ice reductions reveal widespread upper-level height increases, weaker upper-level zonal winds at high latitudes, a more amplified upper-level pattern, and a general northward shift in the jet stream. More frequent extreme summer heat events over mid-latitude continents are linked with reduced sea ice and snow through these circulation changes.

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Just lurking but I just read an article from the Financial Post stating the planet has not warmed for the last 17 years, the ice caps are expanding and co2 emissions and levels have increased.... I'm just a layman on this subject but to me it seems the evidence against co2 as the driving force behind climate change is starting to wane.... the popular claim that " the science is settled " is starting to be challenged .... I would like to hear peoples opinions on the claims made in this article... here is the link... http://opinion.financialpost.com/2013/12/19/lawrence-solomon-for-global-warming-believers-2013-was-the-year-from-hell/

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I'm just a layman on this subject but to me it seems the evidence against CO2 as the driving force behind climate change is starting to wane...

There is a lot of information around and it is difficult to sort the nonsense from the stuff that has merit. I have been reading a lot on this topic for several years and come to the following conclusions:

1) Human emitted CO2 will warm the planet.

2) The amount of warming that CO2 will cause is basically unknown. There are many confounding factors.

3) Climate models generally predicted much more warming than has actually occurred over the last 15 years.

4) This over-prediction suggests that the climate models exaggerate the influence of CO2.

5) Whatever the real answer there is no doubt that CO2 has some influence.

Notwithstanding the above the questions we really care about:

1) Is a warmer world actually worse than the one we have now?

2) Can we actually do anything significant about CO2 emissions even if we wanted to?

The answer to 1) is not clear. The transition will likely create difficulties but it is rather arrogant to assume that the current climate is the "optimum" and any change is "worse".

In my opinion, the answer to 2) is emphatically no. CO2 reduction technologies are expensive and often ineffective. There are a few things that could be done to reduce emissions by 10% or so but that is about it. Reducing to 0% by 2050 is not on the table. This means that the only policy worth discussing is adaption.

Edited by TimG
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Just lurking but I just read an article from the Financial Post stating the planet has not warmed for the last 17 years, the ice caps are expanding and co2 emissions and levels have increased.... I'm just a layman on this subject but to me it seems the evidence against co2 as the driving force behind climate change is starting to wane.... the popular claim that " the science is settled " is starting to be challenged

what are you basing your view/opinion on that, as you say, "the evidence against CO2 as the driving force behind climate change is starting to wane"?

if your view/opinion is being shaped by climate disinformation/lies spread by the likes of your linked reference to renowned denier "journalist" gasbag, Lawrence Solomon... you need to broaden your information base to include real science/AGW/CC references written by reputable sources. Your linked article is nothing more than twaddle written by someone with no credibility... debunking it, gives it more... much more... visibility than it certainly deserves.

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2) Can we actually do anything significant about CO2 emissions even if we wanted to?

In my opinion, the answer to 2) is emphatically no. CO2 reduction technologies are expensive and often ineffective. There are a few things that could be done to reduce emissions by 10% or so but that is about it. Reducing to 0% by 2050 is not on the table. This means that the only policy worth discussing is adaption.

citation request

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Just lurking but I just read an article from the Financial Post stating the planet has not warmed for the last 17 years, the ice caps are expanding and co2 emissions and levels have increased....

Anyone who knows my posts realizes I am certainly not a believer in AGW or global warming. That being said I won't adopt the methodology of the warmistas in using unrepresentative base years for measurement. 17 years ago happens to have been the end of a long "warm phase" of the Pacific Decadal Oscillation or PDO. It culminated in the extreme, basin-wide El Niño of 1997-8. Before that, during the Warm Phase (albeit during a brief La Niña interval of winter 1988-9) a major ice structure apparently gave way, allowing a surge of relatively warm water to disrupt the Arctic sea ice. Thus, using the period of 17 years ago is highly deceptive.

The warmistas tend to measure climate change from 1979, the nadir of the last "cold phase." This is also deceptive. During the years leading up to 1979, as pointed out, I believe, in this thread there was a similar alarmist view of "global cooling" and a "Little Ice Age."

I think the real problem is that in the First World populations are highly concentrated in megalopolitan areas. There are sever adaptation difficulties inherent in not being able to move populations such as Toronto or New York City the way nomadic hunters could move with the game. Thus, climate change is a real problem but one that is not caused by us, and which we are relatively helpless to stop.

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I am not a Greenpeace member but I heard an interesting comment during the interview with one of the recently released members from Russia today.

He harked back to the blowout that BP had in the Gulf not so long ago that took months to plug. I'm sure we still haven't seen all the fallout from that. But his point was can you imagine that same thing happening on a seafloor that has ten feet of ice over top? A little hard to get boats into position I'd bet.

The corexit used to disperse the oil was more dangerous than simply letting the oil continue to gush from the gulf floor. You could not fish in the Gulf of Mexico without getting contaminated yourself. Reports of burning eyes and skin, along with rashes and respiratory issues. Don't hear to much about that.

Then there is the continuing irradiating of the Pacific Ocean from Fukushima ...... this is my continued stance on toxicity in the environment. There are other things that are killing the oceans ability to take in C02, even if you think that C02 is an issue. Like the way we deforest areas, we reduce the ability for nature to take the Co2 out of the air. What could really be the issue is that the planet won't be able to produce oxygen in the amounts needed to sustain life on earth. Planting trees has another benefit than just reducing Co2. Allows each one of us to breathe, which just produces more C02.

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Anyone who knows my posts realizes I am certainly not a believer in AGW or global warming.

Thus, climate change is a real problem but one that is not caused by us, and which we are relatively helpless to stop.

ya ya, again... don't hesitate to attempt to support your repeated claim that today's relatively recent warming is simply the result of, as you state, "earth coming out of the Little Ice Age". You're continually challenged... you continually refuse to support your claim... to even attempt to support your claim.

citation request

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...tend to measure climate change from 1979, the nadir of the last "cold phase."

nonsense! You're speaking to reference baseline periods... the state against which change is measured... the period relative to which anomalies are computed. A 30-year baseline period typically defines a climatology (comparsion period) and is the standard used by organizations such as the World Meteorological Organization (WMO) and the U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA)... 30 years is considered long enough to average out most year-to-year variability, but short enough to ensure longer-term climate trends are not obscured.

per the IPCC:

Observed Climate Data

Q. Should I take 1961-90 or 1990 as my baseline?

A. IPCC have usually taken the year '1990' as the baseline year for the presentation of emissions scenarios and for calculations of future climate and sea-level change. '1990' has also been adopted by the UN FCCC in their definition of emissions reductions targets. Choosing a single year as a baseline is appropriate for some applications, but not for others.

With regard to climate, for example, a single year is not appropriate to use as the baseline. Climate variability means that a single year may be unusually warm or cold or dry or wet and does not therefore make a useful reference point for measuring climate change. More common in climatological applications is the use of the average climate over a 30-year period to define the reference or baseline climate. A 30-year climatic average smoothes out many of the year-to-year variations in climate, while the individual 30 years of such a period captures much of the interannual and short time-scale variability of climate that may be relevant for an impact application. It is also desirable to use such a multi-year period rather than a single year to define climate change fields extracted from GCM simulations.

For these reasons, we suggest the period 1961-90 generally be used as the baseline period. This period has generally good observed data availability (e.g. the observed climatology described by the DDC), it represents the recent climate to which many present-day human or natural systems are likely to be reasonably well adapted, and the period ends in 1990, the year adopted by many IPCC and UN FCCC applications.

your misinformation concerning 1979 stems from the typical past practice followed by scientists studying Arctic sea ice. In that regard, a baseline period of 1979-2000 was used for two reasons:

- 30 years of the most representative (satellite) data were not available; instead, scientists used a 22-year period 1979 to 2000 when comparing current sea ice extent to past conditions.

- useful satellite data concerning sea ice began in late 1978 with the launch of NASA’s Scanning Multichannel Microwave Radiometer (SMMR) satellite.

just this year, coincident with the availability of a more representative 30 years of reference data, NSIDC adjusted its practice to use the baseline reference period from 1981 to 2010

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Americans in California can see through all the smoke and mirrors, and even Pravda has taken notice:

Grimes: Pravda laughs at American global warming hysteria

Imagine my surprise when I found an article in Pravda mocking Western academics, scientists, environmentalists and government elites for using the cause célèbre of “man-made global warming” as a way to “control the lives and behaviors of their populations.”

“Now, with their economies in a spiral of debt laden, non-manufacturing recession (if not out and out depression), the Elites, who sense they are loosing their grip or toe hold on key economic regions outside their home regions, are once again calling out their inquisitors of Global Warming and sending them towards the developing world,” Pravda writer Stanislav Mishin wrote in ”Global Warming, the tool of the West.”

...And Monckton says, “To the global classe politique, the placemen, bureaucrats, academics, scientists, journalists and enviros who have profiteered at our expense by peddling Thermageddon, I say this. The science is in; the truth is out; Al Gore is through; the game is up; and the scare is over.”

http://capoliticalnews.com/2013/01/08/grimes-pravda-laughs-at-american-global-warming-hysteria/

Edited by bush_cheney2004
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Welcome Stamps. You've entered the Climate Change battlefield. Your linked article is a good place to start, most of which is "mostly" accurate.....there is always a "context" to statements when it comes to Climate Change/Global Warming. I say it's a good place to start because it opens one's mind to observations - against the predictions. You'll find hundreds/thousands of "studies" that purport to what could or may happen. You'll also be inundated with computer models - over 95% of which have over-estimated the effect of CO2 in warming the planet - leading to predictions that have been embarrassingly inaccurate as shown with a 17 year absence of increasing warming. Just keep an eye on the indicators and keep an open mind. Are temperatures really rising? Is Antarctica melting? Is the Arctic ice-free? Is there a tropospheric hot-spot. Ski resorts were supposed to be passe. You'll see a number of regular contributors on this board. Have fun.

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Just lurking but I just read an article from the Financial Post stating the planet has not warmed for the last 17 years, the ice caps are expanding and co2 emissions and levels have increased.... I'm just a layman on this subject but to me it seems the evidence against co2 as the driving force behind climate change is starting to wane.... the popular claim that " the science is settled " is starting to be challenged .... I would like to hear peoples opinions on the claims made in this article... here is the link... http://opinion.financialpost.com/2013/12/19/lawrence-solomon-for-global-warming-believers-2013-was-the-year-from-hell/

The lack of warming in the past 13 years falls within natural climate variability and does not debunk the idea that increasing atmospheric CO2 will result in a long-term increase in temperatures. The absorption spectra of CO2 is more opaque to the black body radiation of the earth than it is to the back body radiation of the sun, which is why we have this warming effect. That said, the recent cooling has caused many scientists to rethink their modelling of the effects of CO2 and it has hurt the claims of the climate alarmists.

1) Human emitted CO2 will warm the planet.

2) The amount of warming that CO2 will cause is basically unknown. There are many confounding factors.

3) Climate models generally predicted much more warming than has actually occurred over the last 15 years.

4) This over-prediction suggests that the climate models exaggerate the influence of CO2.

5) Whatever the real answer there is no doubt that CO2 has some influence.

This is basically correct, thought I think statement 2 is a bit too strong and understates our understanding of the Earth's climate.

Then there is the continuing irradiating of the Pacific Ocean from Fukushima ......

Lol, your making the climate alarmist claims look more reasonable (by many orders of magnitude). How is the amount of radioactive material released into the pacific ocean even remotely comparable to the size of the pacific ocean and the amount of radiation that occurs naturally due to naturally occurring radioactive isotopes and the small amount of radiation that penetrates to the earth's surface from space? You might as well be arguing the validity of homeopathy.

Like the way we deforest areas, we reduce the ability for nature to take the Co2 out of the air. What could really be the issue is that the planet won't be able to produce oxygen in the amounts needed to sustain life on earth.

Replanting of trees and increasing the plant biomass of the earth is important in solving the issue of CO2 emissions. Personally, preventing deforestation and increasing the earth's biomass to prevent excessive levels of CO2 concentrations seems like a far more feasible option than mitigation of CO2 emissions. Maybe one option is we create genetically modified plants that can grow in the earth's harshest conditions (say the Canadian Arctic or the Sahara desert) to forest these areas.

Planting trees has another benefit than just reducing Co2. Allows each one of us to breathe, which just produces more C02.

There is 528x more O2 in the atmosphere than CO2. Furthermore, the amount of O2 in the atmosphere is primarily in equilibrium due to the tendency of greater levels of O2 to cause forest fires.

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Well I guess the good news about those "hockey sticks" is that we eon't need them since we are missing nearly a million square km. of sea ice in the arctic. Lowest level in the history of our records summer 2012. And we all know what happens when ice goes missing-heat is absorbed not radiated. Then you have problems with everything from polar bears to algea. And dammit all I like skating.

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your misinformation concerning 1979 stems from the typical past practice followed by scientists studying Arctic sea ice. In that regard, a baseline period of 1979-2000 was used for two reasons:

- 30 years of the most representative (satellite) data were not available; instead, scientists used a 22-year period 1979 to 2000 when comparing current sea ice extent to past conditions.

- useful satellite data concerning sea ice began in late 1978 with the launch of NASA’s Scanning Multichannel Microwave Radiometer (SMMR) satellite.

just this year, coincident with the availability of a more representative 30 years of reference data, NSIDC adjusted its practice to use the baseline reference period from 1981 to 2010

lol @ waldo, trying to justify the use of the misleading hockey stick graph and the use of 1979 as the baseline year (cause it's not like this year maximizes the perceived warming or anything).

step up and state what's misleading about the video graphic that highlights the historical rise of atmospheric CO2... waiting!

and again, we see further evidence of your comprehension difficulties. I clearly emphasized the distinction between a baseline year and a baseline period... I clearly spoke of the baseline period associated with Arctic sea ice analysis (1979-2000)... and I clearly stated the 2 reasons why that baseline period was chosen/existed. And, I clearly stated why that baseline period has now been shifted (this year) to 1981-2010.

and by the by, "Mr. Thermodynamics"... you've got an outstanding post waiting for you - here:

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Welcome Stamps. You've entered the Climate Change battlefield. Your linked article is a good place to start, most of which is "mostly" accurate.....

there's little to nothing accurate within that POS article... most of which has been debunked several times over through an assortment of past MLW threads.

how nice of you to come down from your mount and offer sage words of advice/welcoming! :lol:

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