Archives mensuelles : août 2026

climate-debate

Another New Study Links Modern And Past Global Warming To Natural Changes In Cloud Clover, Not CO2

by K. Richard, Aug 12, 2026  in NoTricksZone

Cloud cover changes are a “top-down dynamical driver” of Earth’s climate.

A July 2026 Environmental Research Letters paper authored by Bellocchi et al.attributes ~80% of the rise in Earth’s absorbed solar radiation since 2000 to declining high-reflectivity cloud cover, primarily from circulation-driven contraction of storm-cloud zones.

The study highlights the climate’s “albedo governance,” suggesting a 1% shift in Earth’s albedo corresponds to a 1°C surface temperature change.

With more cloud cover, more solar radiation is reflected and the surface cools. With declining cloud albedo, which has been observed since 1980, less solar radiation is reflected and the surface warms.

Cloud cover changes are driven by natural atmospheric circulation modes and internal variability. This is supported by reconstruction data showing cloud cover decline has for centuries occurred independently from “greenhouse-gas forcing.”

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climate and geology

Enhanced marine burial of terrestrial organic carbon through the Palaeocene–Eocene Thermal Maximum

by G.N.Inglis et al., June 16, 2026, Nature OPEN ACCESS

Abstract

The Palaeocene–Eocene Thermal Maximum (PETM) occurred ~56 million years ago and was characterized by large-scale carbon release and transient warming. Erosion and subsequent burial of terrestrial organic carbon in marine sediments could have sequestered organic carbon during the PETM—stabilizing global carbon and climate systems—yet direct evidence for this process is lacking. Here we present source-specific biomarker records from five globally distributed shallow marine sites and show that vascular plant and soil organic carbon contributed ~40–95% of total organic carbon in coastal sediments during the PETM. This is higher than modern marine sediments (~12–20% of total organic carbon) and indicates greater terrestrial organic carbon delivery to marine environments during warmer climates. We find that terrestrial organic carbon burial fluxes can increase ~10-to-50-fold during the PETM due to enhanced physical erosion and higher coastal sedimentation rates, implying that marine burial of terrestrial organic carbon sequestered excess carbon released during the PETM. Palaeoclimate model simulations do not account for enhanced delivery of terrestrial organic carbon into the marine realm and are thus missing an important carbon sink. Terrestrial organic carbon burial could act as a negative feedback during other hyperthermals and may aid the long-term (>10,000-year) recovery of the Earth syste

better to know...?

Defining Temperature

by A. May, Aug 9, 2026 in WUWT

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Local temperature

This is the temperature used in climate and meteorological studies. It is the foundation of heat conduction, and hydrodynamics. One assumes local thermodynamic equilibrium over some volume and measures or assumes a local temperature for the volume. This is the logic used in the famous Navier-Stokes equations. This assumed “local equilibrium” is valid over small volumes (for example an “air parcel”) for short time periods. The problem with some climate models is that they assume “local equilibrium” for volumes and time periods that are too large and too long.

Discussion

Temperature is not a primitive mechanical property like mass; it is an emergent statistical property that characterizes the distribution of energy among degrees of freedom (Landau & Lifshitz, 1980). Mass can be measured independently of the rest of the universe or system and does not change as the system around it changes. Temperature follows from the 0th law of thermodynamics, which says:

If system A is in thermal equilibrium with system B,

and system B is in thermal equilibrium with system C,

then A is in thermal equilibrium with C.

The 0th law establishes that “temperature” is a meaningful physical quantity because thermal equilibrium is transitive. It does not define temperature, but it guarantees that temperature is meaningful and measurable. We often hear that temperature is transitive, but this is only true in laboratory settings or at equilibrium. Outside equilibrium, temperature can lose transitivity and different degrees of freedom can produce different temperatures. Transitivity is the basis of equilibrium temperature, but not all temperature measurements.

In summary, the thermodynamic definition of temperature applies only to equilibrium states, but physics uses many other temperature concepts like kinetic, effective, local, and generalized that are essential for describing real systems far from equilibrium. Restricting “temperature” to its equilibrium definition ignores the vast range of physical systems where temperature is well-defined and indispensable.

climate-debate

No, ScienceDaily, Data Show No ‘Sharp Acceleration’ in Warming

by A. Watts, 7 aug, 2026 in WUWT

ScienceDaily’s article, “Scientists detect a sharp acceleration in global warming,” promotes a new Geophysical Research Letters paper claiming that global warming has entered “a faster gear” since about 2015. This is false.  The authors argue that after statistically removing the effects of El Niño, volcanic eruptions, and solar variability from five global surface temperature datasets, they detect a statistically significant acceleration in warming of about 0.35°C per decade over the past 10 years. But historical temperature data show a much different picture.

There is no convincing evidence that Earth’s warming has suddenly accelerated. Instead, this appears to be an exercise in statistical manipulation built upon climate modeling assumptions, presented as though it were an observational discovery.

And there’s advocacy behind the paper too, as evidenced by this quote from the paper’s co-author, climate science blogger Stefan Rahmstorf:

If the warming rate of the past 10 years continues, it would lead to a long-term exceedance of the 1.5°C limit of the Paris Agreement before 2030. How quickly the Earth continues to warm ultimately depends on how rapidly we reduce global CO2 emissions from fossil fuels to zero.

Science and advocacy are not a convincing combination.

The paper does not report the discovery of a new measurement. It takes existing surface temperature records, applies a statistical procedure designed to subtract what the authors consider “noise” from El Niño, volcanic aerosols, and solar variability, and then analyzes the adjusted temperatures for an acceleration signal.

In other words, the claimed acceleration appears only after the authors modify the observations. ScienceDaily presents this as though scientists have discovered a new physical phenomenon. They haven’t. They have created a new statistical product.

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