by Bloomberg News, July 4, 2017
China has promised to make its skies blue again, but having some of the world’s most-expensive natural gas isn’t helping.
Tous les articles par Alain Préat
On climate change, the uncertainties multiply— literally.
by Michael Bernstam, July 3, 2017 in GWPF
The following four stipulations must each be highly probable:
1. Global warming will accumulate at 0.12 degrees Celsius or higher per decade.
2. It is anthropogenic, due largely to carbon dioxide emissions.
3. The net effect is harmful to human well-being in the long run.
4. Preventive measures are efficient, that is, feasible at the costs not exceeding the benefits.
But even if the probability of each of these stipulations is as high as 85 percent, their compound probability is as low as 50 percent. This makes a decision to act or not to act on climate change equivalent to flipping a coin.
Surprise: 2 Recent Papers Show Sea Level Variability Have Little To Do With CO2
IMPRESSIVE COLD IN GREENLAND AND NEAR RECORD ACCUMULATIONS OF SNOW AND ICE
by Vencore Weather, July 4, 2017
Much of Greenland has been colder-than-normal for the year so far and has had record or near record levels of accumulated snow and ice since the fall of last year. The first week of this month was especially brutal in Greenland resulting in the record low July temperature and it also contributed to an uptick in snow and ice extent – despite the fact that it is now well into their summer season.
Does a new paper really reconcile instrumental and model-based climate sensitivity estimates
by Nic Lewis, July 8, 2017 in Climate Audit
A new paper in Science Advances by Cristian Proistosescu and Peter Huybers “Slow climate mode reconciles historical and model-based estimates of climate sensitivity” (hereafter PH17) claims that accounting for the decline in feedback strength over time that occurs in most CMIP5 coupled global climate models (GCMs), brings observationally-based climate sensitivity estimates from historical records into line with model-derived estimates. It is not the first paper to attempt to do so, but it makes a rather bold claim and, partly because Science Advances seeks press coverage for its articles, has been attracting considerable attention.
U.S. Shale Gas Booming Despite Global Glut
by Haley Zaremba, July 6, 2017 in OilPrice from AAPG
But now, just as shale gas prices are finally rebounding from last year’s all-time-lows, the United States’ two biggest shale gas deposits are producing record amounts of fuel, threatening to push gas prices back down. As the Appalachian Marcellus shale basin and the Texas-based Permian basin rush to conquer a market share, the U.S. gas glut shows no signs of stopping.
Methane Emissions: from blind spot to spotlight
by The Oxford Institute for Energy Studies, July 2017
Very comprehensive file, 39 pages .pdf
Methane emissions influence but do not undermine the environmental case for gas. If the industry can build on the progress to date and deliver a clearer picture on the level of emissions and actions to address them, the arguments for gas displacing coal in power generation and oil products in transport become much stronger.
Talking Truth to Climate Consensus
by Red Istvan, July 7, 2017 in WUWT
The climate consensus now has two derogation levels for those who disagree. Climate ‘contrarians’ like Bjørn Lomborg disagree about mitigation policies. Climate ‘deniers’ like Judith Curry disagree about the underlying climatology
Responsiveness of Atmospheric CO2 to Fossil Fuel Emissions: Updated
by Jamal Munshi, July 5, 2017 in SSRN
The IPCC carbon budget concludes that changes in atmospheric CO2 are driven by fossil fuel emissions on a year by year basis. A testable implication of the validity of this carbon budget is that changes in atmospheric CO2 should be correlated with fossil fuel emissions at an annual time scale net of long term trends. A test of this relationship with insitu CO2 data from Mauna Loa 1958-2016 and flask CO2 data from twenty three stations around the world 1967-2015 is presented. The test fails to show that annual changes in atmospheric CO2 levels can be attributed to annual emissions.
Why Climate Models Run Hot
July 4, 2017 : Coldest July Temperature Ever Recorded In The Northern Hemisphere
by Tony Heller, July 5, 2017
Greenland just set the record for coldest July temperature ever reported in the Northern Hemisphere at -33C.
Climate experts immediately responded to the record cold by saying Greenland is melting faster than expected at -33C.
Bombshell study: Temperature Adjustments Account For ‘Nearly All Of The Warming’ In Government Climate Data
by Michael Bastasch, July 6, 2017, in WUWT
A new study found adjustments made to global surface temperature readings by scientists in recent years “are totally inconsistent with published and credible U.S. and other temperature data.”
“Thus, it is impossible to conclude from the three published GAST data sets that recent years have been the warmest ever – despite current claims of record setting warming,” according to a study published June 27 by two scientists and a veteran statistician.
Despite Paris accord, G-20 countries invest four times as much in fossil fuels as green energy
by Ben Wolfgang, July 5, 2017, in The Washington Times
The biggest critics of President Trump’s decision to withdraw from the Paris climate accord are also the world’s biggest hypocrites on energy policy, top environmental groups charged Wednesday in a report that found many top nations’ rhetoric on cutting emissions doesn’t line up with how and where they spend their money.
The key finding: The G-20 nations spend roughly four times as much in public financing for fossil fuels as they do supporting renewable energy sources such as wind and solar. The report examines loans, grants, guarantees, insurance and other types of public finance offered either by the governments, government-owned financial institutions and credit agencies, and multilateral groups made up of G-20 countries.
Breaking: Fatal Courtroom Act Ruins Michael ‘Hockey Stick’ Mann
by John O’Sullivan, July 4, 2017
Penn State climate scientist, Michael ‘hockey stick’ Mann commits contempt of court in the ‘climate science trial of the century.’ Prominent alarmist shockingly defies judge and refuses to surrender data for open court examination
On Sunday, Goulburn got colder than the BOM thought was possible (and a raw data record was “adjusted”)
by JoNova, July 2017
The BOM got caught this week auto-adjusting cold extremes to be less cold. Lance Pidgeon of the unofficial BOM audit team noticed that the thermometer at Goulburn airport recorded – 10.4°C at 6.17am on Sunday morning, but the official BOM climate records said it was -10.0°C. (What’s the point of that decimal place?) Either way this was a new record for Goulburn in July. (The previous coldest ever July morning was -9.1°C. The oldest day in Goulburn was in August 1994 when it reached -10.9°C).
Coal Boom: 1600 new plants in 62 countries around the world – increasing 43%
by JoNova, July 2017
“End-Coal” Global Coal Tracker does a magnificent job of showing how essential coal is around the world, and which countries are pathetically backwards in developing new coal plants. It’s probably not what the “CoalSwarm” team was hoping to achieve, but this map is a real asset to those of us who want to show how tiny Australia’s coal fired assets are compared to the rest of the world
Fungi are key players of the deep biosphere
by Linnaeus University, July 4, 2017
In addition to the life on the surface of the Earth and in its oceans, ecosystems have evolved deep under us in a realm coined the “deep biosphere” which stretches several kilometers down into the bedrock. Down there, the conditions are harsh and life is forced to adjust to a lifestyle that we at the surface would call extreme. One major difference to surface conditions is the lack of oxygen; a compound we take for granted and consider to be a prerequisite for survival but which subsurface life has to cope without.
Original article here (Nature Communication)
Geologic forces fueling West Antarctica’s Larsen Ice Shelf Cracks
by James Kamis, July 4, 2017 in ClimateChangeDispatch
Geological heat flow is fueling bottom melting and associated cracks across West Antarctica’s Larsen Ice Shelf, having little to do with man-made global warming. Significant amounts of high-quality data and relevant geological observations support this revelation, given historical and current geological mapping efforts done in Antarctica.
see here, image credit NASA
See also here (in French)
Skillful prediction of northern climate provided by the ocean
by M. Arthur et al., June 20, 2017, in Nature Communication
We show that variations in ocean temperature in the high latitude North Atlantic and Nordic Seas are reflected in the climate of northwestern Europe and in winter Arctic sea ice extent. Statistical regression models show that a significant part of northern climate variability thus can be skillfully predicted up to a decade in advance based on the state of the ocean. Particularly, we predict that Norwegian air temperature will decrease over the coming years, although staying above the long-term (1981–2010) average. Winter Arctic sea ice extent will remain low but with a general increase towards 2020.
Pronounced differences between observed and CMIP5-simulated multidecadal climate variability in the twentieth century
by Sergey Kravtsov, June 15, 2017
The observed internal variability so estimated exhibits a pronounced multidecadal mode with a distinctive spatiotemporal signature, which is altogether absent in model simulations. This single mode explains a major fraction of model-data differences over the entire climate index network considered; it may reflect either biases in the models’ forced response or models’ lack of requisite internal dynamics, or a combination of both.
‘Perfect storm’ led to 2016 Great Barrier Reef bleaching
by James Cook University and Université Catholique de Louvain, July 3, 2017, in ScienceDaily
Professor Wolanski said the study was subjective to the extent that there was a lack of oceanographic field data in the Great Barrier Reef itself for the 2016 el Nino event. By contrast, the amount of oceanographic field data in the Torres Strait and the northern Coral Sea was very good.
“What we presented is our best-informed attempt to reveal the mechanisms involved in causing the event, based on the available oceanographic data combined with the existing body of knowledge on the water circulation in and around the Torres Strait/Northern Great Barrier Reef region.”
Cooling: UAH reports the Lowest global temperature anomaly in last 2 years
by Ph.D. Roy Spencer, July 4, 2017 in WUWT
Lowest global temperature anomaly in last 2 years (since July, 2015)
The Version 6.0 global average lower tropospheric temperature (LT) anomaly for June, 2017 was +0.21 deg. C, down from the May, 2017 value of +0.44 deg. C
…Importance of CO2…
by Donn Dears, July 2017
Here is a summary of the graph’s salient points:
- The CO2 safe limit for US Navy submarines is 8,000 ppm (Dotted red line)
- The CO2 safe limit for the space station is 5,000 ppm (Dotted blue line)
- A line depicting the gradual doubling of CO2 is near the bottom of the graph
- The minimum atmospheric CO2 requirements to sustain plant growth is 150 ppm (Dotted green line)
In addition, atmospheric CO2 has been as high as 7,000 ppm approximately 550 million years ago, and as high as 2,000 ppm as recently as 150 million years ago. (Also here in French)
What the graph clearly shows is how close mankind came to extinction when atmospheric CO2 levels dropped to 183 ppm during the last ice age.
China Met Office Confirms Global Warming Hiatus
by Dr David Whitehouse, July 4, 2017 in GWPF
The China Meteorological Administration (CMA) has recently developed a new global monthly land-surface air temperature data set called CMA GLSAT. Using it researchers from the administration reanalysed the change in global annual mean land-surface air temperature during three time periods (1901–2014, 1979–2014 and 1998–2014) to see if there was any evidence of a hiatus or pause in recent surface global warming.
The researchers find very clear evidence for the recent warming hiatus. Their results show linear trends of 0.104 °C per decade, 0.247 °C per decade and 0.098 °C per decade for the three periods, respectively. The trends were statistically significant except for the period 1998–2014, the period that is also known as the ‘‘warming hiatus”.
Just When You Thought Scientists Couldn’t Possibly Get Any Stupider …
by Tony Heller, July 4, 2017
Venus is hot because it has an atmospheric pressure almost 100X that of Earth. The same reason why the top of the Grand canyon is cold, and the bottom of the Grand Canyon is hot. Temperatures in Venus troposphere at the elevation where pressure is 1 bar, are similar to earth. Only a complete moron would believe that adding 0.0001 mole fraction CO2 to the atmosphere would cause that.