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climate-debate

Reforesting is a good idea, but it is necessary to know where and how

by Charles the moderator, October 20, 2019 in WUWT

An international group of ecologists contests an article published in Science, which among other cardinal errors proposed ‘reforestation’ of the Cerrado, Brazil’s savanna biome

Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo

An article recently published in Science, entitled “The global tree restoration potential”, presents what it calls “the most effective solution at our disposal to mitigate climate change”. The lead author is Jean-François Bastin, an ecologist affiliated with the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology (ETH Zurich).

The article attracted enormous media attention. It reports the results of a study in which Bastin and collaborators used remote sensing and modeling techniques to estimate that forest restoration in areas totaling 900 million hectares worldwide could store 205 gigatonnes of carbon.

The study was contested by a large international group of ecologists led by Joseph Veldman, a professor in Texas A&M University’s Department of Ecosystem Science and Management (USA). At the invitation of the editors of Science, the group formulated a reply, now featuring on the October 18th edition of Science under the title “Comment on ‘The global tree restoration potential’..

Its authors include William Bond, Emeritus Professor in the University of Cape Town’s Department of Biological Sciences (South Africa) and considered the world’s foremost expert on savanna ecology. Several Brazilian researchers also co-authored the reply, such as Giselda Durigan, affiliated with the São Paulo State Forestry Institute’s Ecology and Hydrology Laboratory.

“The plan proposed by Bastin et al. is based on flawed calculations and is actually a threat to the planet’s savannas, meadows and water resources,” Durigan said.

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climate-debate

The Real Climate Debate

by Charles the moderator, October 20, 2019 in WUWT

Reposted from the Cliff Mass Weather and Climate Blog

The real climate debate is not between “believers” and “deniers”.

And not between Republicans and Democrats.

The real debate is certainly not over whether global warming, spurred by increasing greenhouse gases, is a serious problem that must be addressed.  Both sides of the real climate debate agree on that.

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The real rebate is between two groups:

1.   A confident, non-political group that believes technology, informed investments, rational decision making, and the use of the best scientific information will lead to a solution of the global warming issue. An optimistic group that sees global warming as a technical problem with technical solutions.  I will refer to these folks as the ACT group (Apolitical/Confident/Technical)

2.  A group, mainly on the political left, that is highly partisan, anxious and often despairing, self-righteous, big on blame and social justice, and willing to attack those that disagree with them. They often distort the truth when it serves their interests.  They also see social change as necessary for dealing with global warming, requiring the very reorganization of society.  I call these folks the ASP group (Anxious, Social-Justice, Partisan).

There is no better way to see the profound difference between these two groups than to watch a video of the testimony of young activists at the recent House Hearing on Climate Change, which included Greta Thunberg, Jamie Margolin, Vic Barrett, and Benji Backer.

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climate-debate

Finally! The missing link between exploding stars, clouds and climate on Earth

by Shaviv, December  19, 2017 in ScieneBits/fromNature

Blog topic:
astronomy, cosmic rays, global warming, personal research, weather & climate

By Henrik Svensmark and Nir shaviv

Our new results published today in nature communications provide the last piece of a long studied puzzle. We finally found the actual physical mechanism linking between atmospheric ionization and the formation of cloud condensation nuclei. Thus, we now understand the complete physical picture linking solar activity and our galactic environment (which govern the flux of cosmic rays ionizing the atmosphere) to climate here on Earth though changes in the cloud characteristics. In short, as small aerosols grow to become cloud condensation nuclei, they grow faster under higher background ionization rates. Consequently, they have a higher chance of surviving the growth without being eaten by larger aerosols. This effect was calculated theoretically and measured in a specially designed experiment conducted at the Danish Space Research Institute at the Danish Technical University, together with our colleagues Martin Andreas Bødker Enghoff and Jacob Svensmark.

Background:

It has long been known that solar variations appear to have a large effect on climate. This was already suggested by William Herschel over 200 years ago. Over the past several decades, more empirical evidence have unequivocally demonstrated the existence of such a link, as exemplified in the examples in the box below.