by Bristol University, February 19, 2019 in ScienceDaily
A new study on the timescale of plant evolution has concluded that the first plants to colonize the Earth originated around 500 million years ago — 100 million years earlier than previously thought.
For the first four billion years of Earth’s history, our planet’s continents would have been devoid of all life except microbes.
by A. Watts, February 19, 2018 in WUWT
From Keele University and the “It’s like deja vu all over again” department with the leader of the “ship of fools” thrown in for comic relief. Long-time WUWT readers surely remember the single “Most influential tree in the world” from the Yamal fiasco, where the “signal” in one tree (YAD06) biased an entire paper with a hockey stick shape, making it worthless. Well, here we are again with another single tree used to define the entire globe. Obviously they’ve learned nothing, then again, it’s Chris Turney.
by Georgia Institute of Technology, February 17, 2018 in ScienceDaily
In popular culture, asteroids play the role of apocalyptic threat, get blamed for wiping out the dinosaurs — and offer an extraterrestrial source for mineral mining. But for one researcher, asteroids play an entirely different role: that of time capsules showing what molecules originally existed in our solar system. Having that information gives scientists the starting point they need to reconstruct the complex pathway that got life started on Earth.
by K. Richard, February 19, 2018 in NoTricksZone
The Warming ‘Hole’ Myth
Non-Warming Regions Are More Rule Than Exception
Earlier this month, the authors of a new paper (Partridge et al., 2018) published in Geophysical Research Letters promulgated the term “warming hole” to describe the cooling temperatures gripping most of the Eastern half of the United States from the late 1950s through 2015
by P. Homewood, February 18, 2018 in NotaLotofPeopleKnowThat
https://thsresearch.files.wordpress.com/2017/05/ef-gast-data-research-report-062717.pdf
I missed this report at the time, but it is a comprehensive account of how large scale adjustments of temperatures have made global temperature datasets virtually worthless. (…)
by Eck, February 15, 2018 in K. Richard NoTricksZone
A new scientific study says surface temperatures in the Northeastern U.S. (Appalachian Mountains) have undergone a significant long-term cooling trend since the early 20th century, complicating the detection of a clear anthropogenic global warming (AGW) signal for the region.
According to Eck (2018), the two coldest Appalachian winters since 1910 were recorded in recent years (2009-’10 and 2010-’11), and 9 of the 10 warmest winters occurred prior to 1960.
In the early 1930s, Appalachian winters were 4.7°C warmer than they have been during the last 30 years (1987-2017).
by A. Watts, February 16, 2018 in WUWT
From the “thanks to fracking, the biggest driver of lower carbon dioxide emissions has been declining natural gas prices” department.
Even without the clean power plan, US can achieve Paris Agreement emissions reductions
CMU researchers point out that there are many paths to compliance
by P. Homewood, February 17, 2018 in NotaLotofPeopleKnowThat
There is a footnote to yesterday’s story about the huge adjustments made by NOAA to the temperature record in NY State.
Recall the Jan 2018 temperatures for the three stations we looked at, as derived from the actual station data: (…)
by K. Richard, October 16, 2017 in NoTricksZone
A recently highlighted paper published by atmospheric scientists Scafetta et al., (2017) featured a graph (above) documenting post-2000 trends in the published estimates of the Earth’s climate sensitivity to a doubling of CO2 concentrations (from 280 parts per million to 560 ppm).
by Kip Hansen, February 14, 2018 in WUWT
Prologue: I have been writing recently about Sea Level Rise, both as particular local examples ( Guam, Canton, Miami, New York, and NY/NJ ) and in the series SEA LEVEL: Rise and Fall, of which this is the fourth-plus installment.
In Part 4, I showed how one gets a rise out of nothing, a neat trick performed by Nerem et al. That’s R. Steven Nerem, of the CU Sea Level Research Group. The blinking image is the summary of that essay.
by Helmholtz Centre for Ocean Research Kiel (GEOMAR), February 13, 2018 in ScienceDaily
When the seabed loses its stability and starts to move, it often happens in much larger dimensions than landslides ashore — and at slopes with very low gradients. At the same time, discplacement of large amounts of sediment under water scan cause devastating tsunamis. However, why and when submarine landslides develop is hardly understood. Marine scientists have now published possible causes based on observations on submarine landslides off the coast of northwest Africa.
by GEOMAR Inst., February 12, 2018 in WUWT
GEOMAR researchers find links between sedimentation and methane seeps on the seafloor off the coast of Norway
Large amounts of the greenhouse gas methane are locked up as solid gas hydrates in the continental slopes of ocean margins. Their stability depends on low temperatures and high pressure. However, other factors that influence gas hydrate stability are not as well understood. A German-Norwegian research team has found evidence off the coast of Norway that the amount of sediment deposited on the seafloor can play a crucial role. The study has been published today in the international journal Nature Communications.
by Thomas Frederikse, 2018 in AMS
Different sea level reconstructions show a spread in sea level rise over the last six decades and it is not yet certain whether the sum of contributors explains the reconstructed rise (…)
by Larry Hamlin, February 13, 2018 in WUWT
The record snowfalls of 2018 that are sweeping across the Northern Hemisphere and continuing the growth trend in winter snowfall levels provide yet more compelling evidence that the UN IPCC AR5 WG1 climate report and models are flawed because this report concludes that future snowfall level trends will only decline.(…)
by Julian Lee, February 11, 2018 in BloombergGadlfy
The latest surge in U.S. oil output will probably hasten the country’s rise to the top of the producer pile. More important, it’s starting to look as though at least half of OPEC’s nightmare scenario for 2018 — a surge in shale output and slowdown in demand growth — is coming true.
Last week’s avalanche of releases from the U.S. Department of Energy showed daily oil production above 10 million barrels a day for the first time since 1970.
by Dr S. Crockford, February 12, 2018 in ClimateChangeDispatch
It acknowledges that polar bear numbers have not declined in recent years even though summer sea ice dropped dramatically but goes on to perpetuate a number of myths that might not have happened if the author had done his homework or quizzed his other experts as thoroughly as he did me.
by A. Watts, February 12, 2018 in WUWT
Arctic Weather Brrrrreaking Records
Rankin Inlet, Nunavut gets cold in the winter. Located on the northwestern shore of the Hudson Bay at 62 degrees north and between Chesterfield Inlet and Arviat, the town is definitely in a remote yet exposed region. Weather is just a part of life and recently the weather has been colder than cold.
by Terri Cook, February 9, 2018, In WUWT A. Watts
Medieval Temperature Trends in Africa and Arabia
A synthesis of paleotemperature reconstructions from published case studies suggests warm onshore temperatures persisted across most of Afro-Arabia between 1000 and 1200 CE. (…)
Preliminary Conclusions:
1. During the first 2000 years of our 5000-year civilization, most of the time, the annual average temperature was 2ºC higher than now. The temperature in January was 3-5ºC higher than now.
2. From then on, there was a series of temperature fluctuations. The lowest temperatures occurred in AD 1000, 400, 1200, and 1700. The range of fluctuation was 1-2ºC.
3. In every 400-800 period, a smaller cycle lasting 50 to 100 years can be detected with a temperature range of 0.5 -1ºC.
4. During the above cycles, it seems that any coldest period started from the Pacific coast of East Asia. The cold waves then moved westward to Europe and the Atlantic coasts. And at the same time, there were also trends from the North to the South.
by A. Watts, February 9, 2018, in WUWT
Surprise! Poster child for sea level rise, Tuvalu, is actually growing!
From the “we told you so, again, and again” department. We’ve had several articles about the island of Tuvalu and the ridiculous claims of sea level rise causing it to disappear, while at the same time they are building new hotels and airports to attract tourists. Willis has also had several articles on how Pacific atolls grow, and float, rather than sink as sea level advances.
Now, a study confirms what we’ve already known – atolls, and in particular Tuvalu is growing, and increasing land area. So much for climate alarmism. From Nature communications:
by J.A. Marusek, February 2018, in WUWT
The sun is the natural source of heat and light for our planet. Without our sun, the earth would be a cold dead planet adrift in space. But the sun is not constant. It changes and these subtle changes affect the Earth’s climate and weather.
At the end of solar cycle 23, sunspot activity declined to a level not seen since the year 1913. [Comparing Yearly Mean Total Sunspot Numbers1]
The following was observed during the solar cycle 24: (…)
by P Homewood, February 10, 2018 in NotaLotofPeopleKnowThat
As mentioned yesterday, scientists now believe we could be heading into a 50 year period of reduced solar activity similar to what happened in the mid-17th century, which could lead to a drop in global temperatures of “several tenths of a degree Celsius”.
As has been pointed out, climate is a far more complex matter than climate scientists admit, and one about which we still know very little.
Whether a Maunder-like Minimum will happen again in the next few years, and whether it will have the effect claimed, remain to be seen.
But there is considerable evidence that the Maunder Minimum did coincide with a sharp fall in temperatures across the NH, as NASA show above.
See also here
by A. Watts, February 4, 2018 in WUWT
We’ve been told over an over again that global warming would melt the icecaps, and melt Greenland, and that would result in catastrophic sea level rise flooding cities. We’ve also been told that “sea level rise is “accelerating” but in an investigation done here on WUWT by Willis Eschenbach, Putting the Brakes on Acceleration, he noted in 2011 that there seems to be no evidence of it at all, and notes that sea level was rising faster in the first half of the record.
by Nic Lewis, February 5, 2018 in ClimateAudit
Recently a new model-based paper on climate sensitivity was published by Kate Marvel, Gavin Schmidt (the head of NASA GISS) and others, titled ‘Internal variability and disequilibrium confound estimates of climate sensitivity from observations’. It appears to me that the novel part of its analysis is faulty, and that the part which isn’t faulty isn’t novel.
by P. Gosselin, February 2, 2018 in NoTricksZone
Over the past months a spate of scientific papers published show sea level rise has not accelerated like many climate warming scientists warned earlier. The reality is that the rise is far slower than expected, read here and here
(…)
