Monday, July 10, 2017

More on Climate Change

From Laurie:
"Nothing I read lately on healthcare interests me enough to share or comment, but something I read on climate change does. There is this from K.Drum:

Our Approach to Climate Change Isn’t Working. Let’s Try Something Else.

I don't have the energy right now to read the Doom's day link Drum's post references. But here it is for people here to also ignore, as this topic never gets much interest here except from Jerry:

The Uninhabitable Earth Famine, economic collapse, a sun that cooks us: What climate change could wreak — sooner than you think.

26 comments:

Anonymous said...

We as a nation have decided to take the word on Rush Limbaugh on this one. I hope he turns out to be right. In any event, it's time to move forward.

--Hiram

jerrye92002 said...

It would be a shame to let this post go without comment. Thank you, Laurie, for reviving it. Perhaps I can help.

We can discuss all of the "signs" that show global warming is "happening now."
We can talk about the viability of wind and solar power as far as economics and reliability.
We can talk about alternative energy in the abstract and why it is important.
We can talk about "deniers" and "scientific consensus" as if such personal terms mattered to the supposedly scientific argument.
We can toss around data that seemingly prove or disprove our respective points of view, and whether the data represents any reality or "truth."
We can hear all about this or that prognostication about the climate 100 (or 20, or 10) years from now, whether from doomsayers, soothsayers, computers or crystal balls.

And, if we're lucky, we will eventually realize that not one whit of it matters, because in the end the ONLY evidence we have for a future catastrophe are the climate models, and those very same models tell us that human CO2 is an insignificant factor! All this clamor to "do something" is pointless because "do nothing" has the same result! And it is a LOT cheaper.

John said...

Thankfully these are still there for now.

NASA How Do We Know
California Answers
NOAA Strong Evidence
EPA GH gases primary driver

jerrye92002 said...

OK, here is the sum total of the scientific evidence that the EPA offers for the proposition that CO2 from human activities are the most significant driver of observed climate change since the mid-20th century.

"Greenhouse gases from human activities are the most significant driver of observed climate change since the mid-20th century."

From Wikipedia: "Circular reasoning differs from tautologies in that circular reasoning restates the premise as the conclusion, instead of deriving the conclusion from the premise. (This is often conflated with begging the question, in which the premise relies on the assumption of the conclusion). A tautology simply states the same thing twice."

Unfortunately, these liars, charlatans, hucksters and True Believers still control the narrative, even though their OWN DATA proves otherwise.

jerrye92002 said...

Let us tackle the others:

From NASA "Scientific evidence for warming of the climate system is unequivocal.
- Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change " And NOTHING proves it is caused by manmade CO2.

From NOAA: "The strongest evidence for a human influence was found for temperature-related events --- the increased intensity of numerous heat waves, diminished snowpack in the Cascades, record-low Arctic sea ice extent in March and the extraordinary extent and duration of Alaska wildfires." So, we simply assume human influence from seeing secondary effects assumed to be caused by global warming? WHERE is the evidence for all these serial assumptions?

California: "...as humans have put more greenhouse gases into the atmosphere, the global average temperature has indeed gone up." So? Correlation equals causation? What about all those periods of time in which the correlation does not hold? Or in which the correlation is actually negative?

All of these assertions do not begin to constitute proof, let alone contradicting the simple, immutable fact that their own data refutes their entire premise.

John said...

Jerry,
I know you are fixated on how to show they are wrong when you read these. However you may learn more if you look for how they may be right. A lot of really smart capable scientists think human driven climate change is very real.

Or maybe these IPCC folks are all in on propagating the most elaborate host ever.

IPCC Summary for Policy Makers

jerrye92002 said...

I'm fixated only on the fact that the IPCC says their climate models are unassailable gospel when they say the globe will get somewhere between 0 degrees and 8 degrees warmer by the end of the century. (I'm near certain in my prediction that I'll be dead sometime before that, but that's not a very helpful prediction for estate planning purposes.) Nonetheless, the IPCC and the whole CAGW cabal want to completely ignore those very same models when they say that curbing CO2 emissions will have almost zero effect on those temperatures!

I can speculate and exercise my confirmation bias all day long, but I really don't need to know anything else. The guys telling me there is a problem and that we need to do something are telling me there's nothing we can do.

As for all of those "smart capable scientists," if you read the IPCC detail report rather than the politicians' summary, you will find the vast bulk of the scientists couch their research in terms like: "the Earth has warmed and now the swallows come back to Capistrano a week earlier. ASSUMING THIS TREND CONTINUES, they may get back before the mayflies hatch and starve to death." Notice there is nothing in this research that says the trend WILL continue, nor that humans are causing it. There is this huge assumptive leap of causation that goes from: Assume that CO2 is the major factor in global temperatures. Assume that Human emissions are the primary component of global CO2. Assume those emissions cause a doubling of CO2. Assume that produces "catastrophic" warming. The climate models have just completely DISPROVED that elaborate leap of logic and science. What is left?

John said...

I keep hoping that your "confirmation bias based" prediction is correct for the health of billions of humans... (ie those living near the equator and the oceans)

To me IPCC Graphs seem pretty clear. Like Scrooge in the Christmas Carol, we are being warned and we can either keep pumping tons of energy and gases into our natural atmosphere (RCP 8.5) or we can learn and improve. (

"Anthropogenic GHG emissions are mainly driven by population size, economic activity, lifestyle, energy use, land use patterns, technology and climate policy. The Representative Concentration Pathways (RCPs), which are used for making projections based on these factors, describe four different 21st century pathways of GHG emissions and atmospheric concentrations, air pollutant emissions and land use.(RCP 2.6)

The RCPs include a stringent mitigation scenario (RCP2.6), two intermediate scenarios(RCP4.5 and RCP6.0) and one scenario with very high GHG emissions (RCP8.5).

Scenarios without additional efforts to constrain emissions (’baseline scenarios’) lead to pathways ranging between RCP6.0 and RCP8.5 (Figure SPM.5a).

RCP2.6 is representative of a scenario that aims to keep global warming likely below 2°C above pre-industrial temperatures.

The RCPs are consistent with the wide range of scenarios in the literature as assessed by WGIII5. {2.1, Box 2.2, 4.3} Multiple lines of evidence indicate a strong, consistent, almost linear relationship between cumulative CO2 emissions and projected global temperature change to the year 2100 in both the RCPs and the wider set of mitigation scenarios analysed in WGIII (Figure SPM.5b). Any given level of warming is associated with a range of cumulative CO2 emissions6, and therefore, e.g., higher emissions in earlier decades imply lower emissions later. {2.2.5, Table 2.2}"

John said...

Looks like a newer one is out. IPCC 5th Assessment Report

What fascinates me the most is how Man Made Climate Change deniers can think that having 7 Billion people on the planet releasing all the stored gases and heat energy can not have a significant impact on our planet?

I mean we aren't talking about dinosaurs passing gas here... We are talking about humans pumping, processing and burning 35,000,000,000 Barrels per year. And each of those Barrels is 42 US gallons. And each of those gallons weighs ~7 pounds. Now that is HEAVY... :-)

Then you have to add the Billions of Tons of Coal.

And of course those 7+ Billion humans pass a lot of gas, raise a lot of animals that pass a lot of gas, etc.

And the Deniers somehow think this would have no impact on the Earth's atmosphere. Maybe they think we have a big air exchanger hidden somewhere in the upper atmosphere.

jerrye92002 said...

"What fascinates me the most is how ..."

Fine, but you are seeing the trees not the forest. If you do the math, that "huge" amount of human emissions is somewhere between 3-4% of what Nature turns out.

And you are correct, that the IPCC uses a lot of various assumptions (hundreds, actually) and multiple "scenarios" in their climate models. That no doubt accounts for the wide variation in results, while 95% of them predict temps higher than the actual temperature record. BUT, using those very same models to predict the results of Kyoto, or Paris, or Obama's drastic "Clean Power Plan" to curb CO2 (and of course assuming total global compliance), the IPCC tells us that these drastic measures will reduce global temperatures, 100 years from now, somewhere between 0.01 and 0.2 degrees.

There is only one assumption here, and that is that the IPCC climate models are correct. Those who have accepted those models as gospel in predicting doom surely must accept those same models when they say that curbing CO2 does not matter, yes?

John said...

Apparently they disagree with your interpretation since the RCP's are what are driving different outputs from their models.

"Anthropogenic GHG emissions are mainly driven by population size, economic activity, lifestyle, energy use, land use patterns, technology and climate policy. The Representative Concentration Pathways (RCPs), which are used for making projections based on these factors, describe four different 21st century pathways of GHG emissions and atmospheric concentrations, air pollutant emissions and land use."

John said...

Now as for the it's only 3 - 4% rationale. (source unknown)

Please imagine a teeter totter (ie a balance) placed 100 feet in the air that can rotate 360 degrees...

Then imagine 2 children that weigh exactly 100 Lbs sitting on the seats.

Then imagine handing one of the children a 3.5 Lb weight each year for ever...

Even if there is some friction in the balance, sooner or later the kids will fall.

jerrye92002 said...

You can rationalize until the globe gets catastrophically warmer and you cannot change the fundamental fact that, when asked to predict the results of human efforts to curb CO2-- Kyoto, Paris, CPP, those same models-- regardless of which assumptions you use as a baseline-- show a negligible effect. I know, you BELIEVE there must be an effect, but the people doing the math says it isn't true. And remember, these are the same people saying we have this global warming problem, of somewhere between zero and 8.5 degrees of warming.

John said...

You can rationalize that somehow 7 Billion people can burn billions of tons of coal and oil yearly without impacting our ~6 mile thick atmosphere.. I really don't know how, but you apparently can and will.

And I am not sure if it will be catastrophic or not. But the reality is that most actions have consequences as we are finding out again.

jerrye92002 said...

I don't have to rationalize human impact on the atmosphere; I can do the math. The IPCC models are based on roughly a doubling of CO2, from 400 parts per million to 800 ppm. If the US cuts its emissions of CO2 by 50% (which nobody, thankfully, has suggested) atmospheric CO2 will be reduced by about TWO ppm, postponing that feared "catastrophe" by roughly 6 months. Sure, all those fossil fuels have an effect; they must. It's just that it is trivial because the Earth is big. Really big.

I don't know how else to explain it to you. The charlatans use the climate models to say we must DO something. Then, when THEY use those climate models to analyze the effects of the "something," we discover that, after all the math is done, it doesn't matter much at all but causes a whole lot of misery along the way. So before you ask, here is a subject matter expert:
Negligible

jerrye92002 said...

Let's try it even more simply. Either you believe the IPCC climate models or you do not. If you believe them, then you believe that curbing human CO2 does not matter. If you DENY the climate models are correct about coming warming, you believe that curbing human CO2 does not matter. Take your pick.

John said...

Wiki Lomberg

You might want to read more about the author. He is a Political Science major who has been dubbed dishonest and unqualified.

"After the publication of The Skeptical Environmentalist, Lomborg was formally accused of scientific dishonesty by a group of environmental scientists, who brought a total of three complaints against him to the Danish Committees on Scientific Dishonesty (DCSD), a body under Denmark's Ministry of Science, Technology and Innovation (MSTI). Lomborg was asked whether he regarded the book as a "debate" publication, and thereby not under the purview of the DCSD, or as a scientific work; he chose the latter, clearing the way for the inquiry that followed.[35] The charges claimed that The Skeptical Environmentalist contained deliberately misleading data and flawed conclusions. Due to the similarity of the complaints, the DCSD decided to proceed on the three cases under one investigation.

In January 2003, the DCSD released a ruling that sent a mixed message, finding the book to be scientifically dishonest through misrepresentation of scientific facts, but Lomborg himself not guilty due to his lack of expertise in the fields in question"

John said...

The Paris Accord is the IPCC's recommendation on how the world can best control the situation.

As you say, you either trust them or not.

jerrye92002 said...

I don't trust them as far as I can throw them, because their "recommendations" do nothing, according to their own models, to solve the problem they claim so loudly to solve.

That's the problem, almost anybody run the climate models, and the climate models say human CO2 doesn't matter. Lomborg used those models and got roughly the same answers everybody else that runs the models gets. I personally don't trust the models, but when the models say CO2 doesn't matter, I expect that all those who DO trust the models, including YOU, to understand that CO2 doesn't matter and that the IPCC "recommendations" do nothing to address the problem they purport to solve.

John said...

So help me understand...

The IPC uses their models to create graphs using different RCPs.

The different RCPs represent different levels of emissions.

The lines for each of the RCPs are different.

And yet you continue to say their models show no difference.

jerrye92002 said...

Thank you. I am trying.

Yes, the IPCC uses four different "Representative Concentration Pathways," (replacing the complex set of "scenarios" i.e. assumptions about what the future will bring) as far as human emissions are concerned. They make assumptions about population, economic growth, energy requirements and production, "carbon intensity" of that energy, etc. LOTS of assumptions, and put them in 4 general categories: RCP 8.5, 6.0, 4.5, and 2.6. [as I understand it, named after the "old" predictions of temperature rise for each] The 100-year warming predicted, based on those RCPs, range from 0.3 to 4.8 degrees C. [You see why I say their predictive value is worthless?] They then have a "standard" computer tool called MAGICC, which quickly calculates the results of any change to basic parameters, rather than run thousands of hours of computer calculations.

Read Lomborg's paper and you find that he used RCP 8.5 (the "business as usual" scenario) and MAGICC to get his answers, the same thing other researchers have done, and achieved the same result-- that Paris doesn't matter because human CO2 is relatively insignificant, as I have shown using very simple math. You can do it with the lower emissions scenarios-- 6.0, etc.-- but of course the impact of adding Paris is even smaller.

You simply have to get to the point where you believe the actual math rather than the hyperventilating politicians with vested interests in keeping this scare going. Even some of them will very quietly admit that Paris "doesn't do much" by itself and that "much more is needed" to keep temperature rise below 2 degrees (an increase many consider beneficial). Why should that be, when the average of the 100-year climate models is now 2.5 degrees and falling (because of better understanding of "climate sensitivity," for one thing), and is still above simple projections of the historical record?

jerrye92002 said...

One other thing that may help in understanding. The IPCC models (and MAGICC) calculate based on TOTAL CO2 in the atmosphere, and assume a "life cycle" for that CO2, that is, how long a given CO2 molecule "persists" in the atmosphere before some plant or body of water takes it out again. Years ago, the climate scientists were saying that, if humans stopped producing CO2 "today" that global warming would continue another 200 years because of that "persistence." Now some are saying it is more likely about 12 years. The lower that actually is, obviously, the less human CO2 "builds up" in the atmosphere, lowering total CO2 and its greenhouse effect.

jerrye92002 said...

Here is a video explaining that "simple math." You can extrapolate out from the Australian angle.
Like grains of rice

John said...

Soure Watch

Please remember... A balance works as follows.

"Now as for the it's only 3 - 4% rationale. (source unknown)

Please imagine a teeter totter (ie a balance) placed 100 feet in the air that can rotate 360 degrees...

Then imagine 2 children that weigh exactly 100 Lbs sitting on the seats.

Then imagine handing one of the children a 3.5 Lb weight each year for ever...

Even if there is some friction in the balance, sooner or later the kids will fall."

John said...

Even something as small as 3.5% can have serious consequences.

jerrye92002 said...

Yes, and there is that atmospheric persistence argument. If CO2 hangs around for 200 years, then nothing we do today can prevent the globe from getting a bit warmer, because CO2 will slowly build up to where it was many other times in Earth's history. But if, as is becoming apparent, the persistence is somewhere between 3 and 8 years, we have quite a different story, and the "doubling of CO2" will take much longer, giving plant life more time to adapt to the richer environment, and stabilizing the climate.