Global Warming/Climate Change Super Thread

[Good2Golf]

Kilo_302:
Was going to continue...but with this much consensus the onus is definitely on the tiny minority of voices who doubt that AGW exists or is even problem.

Since I have repeatedly acknowledged AGW's contribution to overall GW, I see you're not referring to me then.

As an aside, what is your perspective on the validity of 'qualified' statements, versus I 'quantified' statements,  you seem to like qualified statements, yet eschew quantified statements and/or records that are demonstrably detailed and agreed upon by all, including that long list of organizations you provided. 

I agree that consolidated support appears to be an important factor for you, as it should.  There is also no doubt that whether it is flattening or still trending towards an increase, that 0.6°C incremental anomoly above mean is a rather large amount of increased energy within the Earth's atmosphere, and whatever reasonable an truly achievable measures that can be taken to reduce the trend, should be. Banning of CFCs was a worthy, and although arguable to some, positive action taken by mankind to reduce the pact of humans upon the environment.  Until true alternatives are found for fossil fuels, GW, be it A or N, will continue to influence the oceanic and terrestrial environments. My own personal choices for high energy efficiency at home and a ULEV for both me and my wife (and use of oublic transportation where possible) sit well with me as my part to directly reduce the impact I personally place on the Earth.  Getting grid-neutral, or even off-grid and minimal impact footprint (abd not just CO2, or whatever the next flavour of the month/year will be) remains a personal lifestyle goal, but that will occur within my own educated and analytical framework/perspective. 

Let me ask you this, Kilo, do you volunteer your own frequent flyer points to help reduce green house gas emmisions when you buy your ticket?  I don't because I don't trust the Governments or other regulatory agencies to translate such personal concessions into actions/activities that positively and correlatably improve the  AGW situation.

:2c:

Regards,
G2G

 

[daftandbarmy]

The Religious-like fanaticism of the 'climate crazies' will cause us more damage than the CO2, sadly:

The Climate-Change Religion

Earth Day provided a fresh opening for Obama to raise alarms about global warming based on beliefs, not science.

Instead of letting political ideology or climate “religion” guide government policy, we should focus on good science. The facts alone should determine what climate policy options the U.S. considers. That is what the scientific method calls for: inquiry based on measurable evidence. Unfortunately this administration’s climate plans ignore good science and seek only to advance a political agenda.

http://www.wsj.com/articles/the-climate-change-religion-1429832149

 

[daftandbarmy]

Journalists warm up the story

It’s time for another round of extreme weather hysteria, this time about the “melting North Pole.” It’s the kind of reporting that has made newspapers and TV news among the least-trusted institutions in America. Let’s start with an example of professionally done journalism to show how far the rot has spread: excerpts from “Freak storm in North Atlantic to lash UK, may push temperatures over 50 degrees above normal at North Pole” by Jason Samenow (editor and meteorologist) at WaPo, 28 December.

“Big Icelandic storms are common in winter, but this one may rank among the strongest and will draw northward an incredible surge of warmth pushing temperatures at the North Pole over 50° above normal.  This is mind-boggling.

… Ahead of the storm, the surge of warm air making a beeline towards the North Pole is astonishing. In the animation {computer model forecast} below, watch the warm temperature departures from normal, portrayed by red shades, explode towards the Pole between Monday and Wednesday.

“It’s as if a bomb went off. And, in fact, it did.”

Samenow demonstrates how weather reporting has become misleading. Forecasts are “mindboggling” and “astonishing”, and their results are described in tabloid-like terms (“a bomb went off”). He makes no comparisons with history to show that this storm looks unusual (see the some actual data below). Predictions create both fear and clicks in modern journalism.

That’s not the oddest aspect of the story. America has thousands of meteorologists and climate scientists, but journalists increasingly turn for lurid copy to climate activists lacking any professional qualifications. Preferencing the analysis of a fiction writer with actual climate scientists is low-grade propaganda, not journalism. But the WaPo does so…

http://fabiusmaximus.com/2016/01/04/melting-north-pole-story-92549/#more-92549

 

[a_majoor]

The Religious-like fanaticism of the 'climate crazies' will cause us more damage than the CO2, sadly:

The Climate-Change Religion

Earth Day provided a fresh opening for Obama to raise alarms about global warming based on beliefs, not science.

Instead of letting political ideology or climate “religion” guide government policy, we should focus on good science. The facts alone should determine what climate policy options the U.S. considers. That is what the scientific method calls for: inquiry based on measurable evidence. Unfortunately this administration’s climate plans ignore good science and seek only to advance a political agenda.

http://www.wsj.com/articles/the-climate-change-religion-1429832149

The proper way to fight Earth Day propaganda is to celebrate "Human Achievment Day" with family and friends as an alternative to "Earth Day". Nothing like a little counter propaganda to derail a narrative  :nod:

 

[a_majoor]

The colision between real science and politicised science:

http://dailycaller.com/2016/02/02/scientist-ruthlessly-debunks-one-of-nasas-central-climate-claims/

Scientist Ruthlessly Debunks One Of NOAA’s Central Climate Claims
Michael Bastasch
12:06 PM 02/02/2016

In face of intense criticism from alarmist scientists, Dr. John Christy went to great lengths in a Tuesday congressional hearing to detail why satellite-derived temperatures are much more reliable indicators of warming than surface thermometers.

“That’s where the real mass of the climate system exists in terms of the atmosphere,” Christy, a climate scientist at the University of Alabama and Alabama’s state climatologist, said in a Wednesday hearing before the House science committee.

“When a theory contradicts the facts” you need to change the theory, Christy said. “The real world is not going along with rapid warming. The models need to go back to the drawing board.”

Texas Republican Rep. Lamar Smith, the committee’s chairman, convened a hearing on the implications of President Barack Obama’s recent United Nations deal in Paris, which agreed to cut carbon dioxide emissions.

Christy doesn’t think signing onto a U.N. deal is good for Americans, and challenges the very data politicians and environmentalists rely on to push green energy policies.

“One of my many climate interests is the way surface temperatures are measured and how surface temperatures, especially over land, are affected by their surroundings,” Christy wrote in his prepared testimony.

Christy recently co-authored a study with veteran meteorologist Anthony Watts that found the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) was basing its temperature adjustments on “compromised” temperature data.

The study found most of NOAA’s 1,218 thermometers were sited near artificial surfaces and heat sources like concrete, asphalt, and air conditioner exhausts that were causing more warming to show in the U.S. temperature record than was present at weather stations that were well-sited.

Christy and Watts surmised NOAA was basing its temperature adjustments (efforts made to get “biases” out of the temperature record) on bad data.
 
“I closely examined individual stations in different regions and have come to the conclusion that the magnitude of the relatively small signal we seek in human-induced climate change is easily convoluted by the growth of infrastructure around the thermometer stations and the variety of changes these stations undergo through time, as well as the variability of the natural ups and downs of climate,” Christy noted in his testimony.

“It is difficult to adjust for these contaminating factors to extract a pure dataset for greenhouse detection because often the non-climatic influence comes along very gradually just as is expected of the response to the enhanced greenhouse effect,” Christy added.

But that’s why Christy argues satellite-derived temperatures are a better way to look at how greenhouse gases are impacting the Earth’s climate.

“The bulk atmospheric temperature is where the signal is the largest,” Christy said in the hearing, referring to the greenhouse gas effect. “We have measurements for that — it doesn’t match up with the models.”

Satellite-derived temperatures have come under fire recently by scientists more alarmist about global warming than Christy, but the Alabama climatologist addressed those criticisms.

“Because this result challenges the current theory of greenhouse warming in relatively straightforward fashion, there have been several well-funded attacks on those of us who build and use such datasets and on the datasets themselves,” Christy said.

Climate models for the bulk atmosphere (where satellites measure temperature) show 2.5 times as much warming as has been observed by satellites and weather balloons.

“It is a bold strategy in my view to actively promote the output of theoretical climate models while attacking the multiple lines of evidence from observations,” Christy wrote. “Note that none of the observational datasets are perfect and continued scrutiny is healthy, but when multiple, independent groups generate the datasets and then when the results for two completely independent systems (balloons and satellites) agree closely with each other and disagree with the model output, one is left scratching one’s head at the decision to launch an offensive against the data.”

Follow Michael on Facebook and Twitter

 

[Loachman]

http://joannenova.com.au/2013/09/david-suzuki-bombs-on-qa-knows-nothing-about-the-climate/

David Suzuki bombs on Q&A, knows nothing about the climate

“What data? “  David Suzuki on Q&A

David Suzuki’s performance on Q&A last night was extraordinary. I was knock-me-over amazed that he has not heard of UAH, GISS, HADcrut and RSS, and knew nothing of the pause in global surface temperatures that even the UK Met Office and IPCC lead author climate scientists like Hans von Storch are discussing.

How afraid is Suzuki about man-made global warming? So afraid, it doesn’t occur to him to check the data, incredibly he doesn’t even know what the data is. Tony Jones had to rephrase the questions to explain them to Suzuki, who doesn’t even understand them.

How much is his reputation as a scientist worth when he doesn’t even bother to check the evidence for a cause he stakes his reputation on?

Three times in Q&A he admitted he didn’t know — he didn’t know there was a pause in warming for the last 15 years, he didn’t know how global temperatures are measured, and he didn’t know that cyclones were not increasing over the Great Barrier Reef. He wants politicians jailed for “denying the science”. “You bet!” he exclaims, but then admits he hasn’t thought that through either.

The cartoon-like responses were incongruous. Should we go nuclear to reduce emissions? Suzuki tosses numbers, evidence, and cost-benefits down a deep well of ignorance: “It’s just crazy”. “What the hell is going on”. “You’ve got sunlight!” “Solar farms could be spread everywhere”.  “There is plenty of sunlight beyond anything humanity needs”. The audience member who asked then pointed out we don’t have the batteries to cope with sunless cloudy days. Even Tony Jones asks how realistic solar is. At this first prod, Suzuki throws his hands up in the air, “I don’t know”.

The man is emphatically an activist who might as well be innumerate. He is unburdened by data, evidence or logic. Why is the ABC giving him such a hallowed space, which is usually only given to PM’s?

Credit to the ABC for allowing Bill Koutalianos and Professor Stewart Franks to ask the first two questions and to respond. The event quickly became the “Professor Stewart Franks versus Professor Steve Sherwood Show”, because it was obvious it was a waste of time asking Suzuki a scientific question. The two of them, for a short while, were debating by proxy, and Suzuki was sidelined. He simply didn’t know enough to keep up. Even Tony Jones knew more about climate science than Suzuki did.

With typical bias, Stewart Franks was introduced as simply a professor of Environmental Engineering while Steve Sherwood was introduced as a “professor” and a “lead author of the IPCC” and a “Director of the Climate Change Research Centre at UNSW” (8:50). Stewart Franks had to point out that he is an expert reviewer of the IPCC report as well.

Suzuki’s research on our atmosphere amounted to reading Naomi Oreskes, Jim Hoggan and DeSmog. He promotes the smear campaign against senior scientists but apparently has never read anything those senior scientists have written. This is living in a fishbowl, where Suzuki made a religious decision years ago to believe in the evil of corporate polluters and only ever reads people who agree with him. It leaves him completely naked in any science debate, knocked over by the average reader of any skeptical blog.

Credit to Tony Thomas for asking if Suzuki still thought politicians should be jailed for denying the scientific consensus, thus exposing the inner-totalitarian. For a man who argues that consensus is a reason to be alarmed about the climate, it’s a tad hypocritical that Suzuki later discussed GM, where he disagrees with the consensus. He later  talks about how the Canadian government is building new jails and seems to be afraid of being jailed himself: “I’m wondering whether our Prime Minister thinks he is going to be creating new categories of crime, like eco terrorism or, as he calls us, environmental radicals, radical extremists.” Righto. Talking power to truth again David. He hasn’t noticed that all the power and money is on the climate consensus side. His principle seems to be “jail them if they disagree with me”.

Suzuki’s world view is simplistic: “Government good, corporations bad”. He says ” …big corporations are bigger than most governments on the planet, they have the ability to fund political campaigns…” . There go the numbers again. The US Government has a $4 trillion annual budget, while the largest corporations in the world have less than $500bn annual revenue each. The US Government also has that slight military advantage over those scary corporations, who may wield malevolent cheques, but not so many missiles.

When I was a student of science communication we were wheeled out to see David Suzuki speak as a hero of the field. That says it all really.

Andrew Bolt was right.

 

[GR66]

http://joannenova.com.au/2013/09/david-suzuki-bombs-on-qa-knows-nothing-about-the-climate/

David Suzuki bombs on Q&A, knows nothing about the climate

“What data? “  David Suzuki on Q&A

David Suzuki’s performance on Q&A last night was extraordinary. I was knock-me-over amazed that he has not heard of UAH, GISS, HADcrut and RSS, and knew nothing of the pause in global surface temperatures that even the UK Met Office and IPCC lead author climate scientists like Hans von Storch are discussing.

How afraid is Suzuki about man-made global warming? So afraid, it doesn’t occur to him to check the data, incredibly he doesn’t even know what the data is. Tony Jones had to rephrase the questions to explain them to Suzuki, who doesn’t even understand them.

How much is his reputation as a scientist worth when he doesn’t even bother to check the evidence for a cause he stakes his reputation on?

Three times in Q&A he admitted he didn’t know — he didn’t know there was a pause in warming for the last 15 years, he didn’t know how global temperatures are measured, and he didn’t know that cyclones were not increasing over the Great Barrier Reef. He wants politicians jailed for “denying the science”. “You bet!” he exclaims, but then admits he hasn’t thought that through either.

The cartoon-like responses were incongruous. Should we go nuclear to reduce emissions? Suzuki tosses numbers, evidence, and cost-benefits down a deep well of ignorance: “It’s just crazy”. “What the hell is going on”. “You’ve got sunlight!” “Solar farms could be spread everywhere”.  “There is plenty of sunlight beyond anything humanity needs”. The audience member who asked then pointed out we don’t have the batteries to cope with sunless cloudy days. Even Tony Jones asks how realistic solar is. At this first prod, Suzuki throws his hands up in the air, “I don’t know”.

The man is emphatically an activist who might as well be innumerate. He is unburdened by data, evidence or logic. Why is the ABC giving him such a hallowed space, which is usually only given to PM’s?

Credit to the ABC for allowing Bill Koutalianos and Professor Stewart Franks to ask the first two questions and to respond. The event quickly became the “Professor Stewart Franks versus Professor Steve Sherwood Show”, because it was obvious it was a waste of time asking Suzuki a scientific question. The two of them, for a short while, were debating by proxy, and Suzuki was sidelined. He simply didn’t know enough to keep up. Even Tony Jones knew more about climate science than Suzuki did.

With typical bias, Stewart Franks was introduced as simply a professor of Environmental Engineering while Steve Sherwood was introduced as a “professor” and a “lead author of the IPCC” and a “Director of the Climate Change Research Centre at UNSW” (8:50). Stewart Franks had to point out that he is an expert reviewer of the IPCC report as well.

Suzuki’s research on our atmosphere amounted to reading Naomi Oreskes, Jim Hoggan and DeSmog. He promotes the smear campaign against senior scientists but apparently has never read anything those senior scientists have written. This is living in a fishbowl, where Suzuki made a religious decision years ago to believe in the evil of corporate polluters and only ever reads people who agree with him. It leaves him completely naked in any science debate, knocked over by the average reader of any skeptical blog.

Credit to Tony Thomas for asking if Suzuki still thought politicians should be jailed for denying the scientific consensus, thus exposing the inner-totalitarian. For a man who argues that consensus is a reason to be alarmed about the climate, it’s a tad hypocritical that Suzuki later discussed GM, where he disagrees with the consensus. He later  talks about how the Canadian government is building new jails and seems to be afraid of being jailed himself: “I’m wondering whether our Prime Minister thinks he is going to be creating new categories of crime, like eco terrorism or, as he calls us, environmental radicals, radical extremists.” Righto. Talking power to truth again David. He hasn’t noticed that all the power and money is on the climate consensus side. His principle seems to be “jail them if they disagree with me”.

Suzuki’s world view is simplistic: “Government good, corporations bad”. He says ” …big corporations are bigger than most governments on the planet, they have the ability to fund political campaigns…” . There go the numbers again. The US Government has a $4 trillion annual budget, while the largest corporations in the world have less than $500bn annual revenue each. The US Government also has that slight military advantage over those scary corporations, who may wield malevolent cheques, but not so many missiles.

When I was a student of science communication we were wheeled out to see David Suzuki speak as a hero of the field. That says it all really.

Andrew Bolt was right.

Totally true...but also old news.  This was a 2013 TV appearance.

 

[a_majoor]

Australia vs. Canada. Compare and contrast:

http://www.csmonitor.com/Science/2016/0209/Australia-redirects-climate-research-funding-blow-to-science-or-boon-for-innovation

Australia redirects climate research funding: blow to science or boon for innovation?
The chief executive of the country's main scientific research agency has announced deep cuts to two departments studying climate change, prompting international concern.

The chief executive of Australia’s main scientific research agency has announced deep cuts to its climate change programs, prompting intense criticism from scientists around the world who say that the new focus on "innovation" and corporate cooperation is a misguided move that will severely limit understanding of how global warming will impact the Southern Hemisphere.

Larry Marshall, a former venture capitalist brought on to head the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO) in January 2015, announced at a Friday staff meeting that up to 350 employees would be relocated and retrained within the agency. The cuts include about 110 staff in the atmosphere and oceans division, and 120 in the land and water division.

The changes appear in line with Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull's National Science and Innovation Agenda, announced in December, although officials said Mr. Turnbull was not aware of the staffing changes. "Australia is falling behind when it comes to commercializing good ideas and collaborating with industry," Turnbull said, launching a focus on innovation and partnerships between research institutions and business.

Mr. Marshall used similar language while defending the changes in a Monday statement called "Correcting the public record on changes at CSIRO." The agency must "focus where we have most need and that need is in innovation, turning inventions into benefit for society," he wrote. "No one is saying climate change is not important, but surely mitigation, health, education, sustainable industries, and prosperity of the nation are no less important."

In a staff memo sent February 3, Marshall wrote that "the question [of climate change] has been answered, and the new question is what do we do about it, and how can we find solutions for the climate we will be living with," according to ClimateWire.

Hundreds of scientists around the world have protested that strategy misses the point: in order to find intelligent solutions to climate change, precise research about is needed – research that has been carried out in the teams most impacted by CSIRO's cuts.

"Australia is ground zero for climate change," one CSIRO scientist told ClimateWire. "In order to adapt, you need climate models that are going to tell us what you need to adapt to, where you need to adapt, and by when you need to adapt."

That data benefits Australians, but also the rest of the world, since Australia has some of the only advanced climate research stations in the Southern Hemisphere. Its carbon-dioxide (CO2) recording station at Cape Grim, for example, is one of only two in the Southern Hemisphere, and provides "some of the most important long-term records of climate that exist on the planet," according to UC San Diego CO2 scientist Ralph Keeling, who called the staff cuts "mind-boggling." CSIRO is also a leader in Southern climate models, which help predict the impact of weather and climate changes.

Marshall, the chief executive, has said that Cape Grim will continue to monitor air pollution, and that climate model data "will continue to be available to any researcher." Some scientists were skeptical, however, about the suggestion that the data could find a new home.

Andy Pitman, who directs a climate science center at the University of New South Wales, told the Guardian Australia that moving the data would be unrealistic. "I run a centre of excellence which is the the best-funded university capability in the country and we do not remotely have the capability to be the custodians for the climate modeling systems," he said.

On Monday, the World Climate Research Programme issued a strongly-worded letter warning that "Australia will find itself isolated from the community of nations and researchers devoting serious attention to climate change."

 

[a_majoor]

So tell me again, where does the energy to drive the global climactic system come from......

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-3444633/What-happened-sun-Solar-activity-remains-quietest-century-trigger-mini-ice-age.html

The silent sun: Eerie image revealed as solar activity remains the quietest it has been in more than a century - and some claims it could even trigger a mini ice age
We've had smallest number of sunspots in this cycle since Cycle 14
This cycle reached its maximum solar activity in February of 1906
Low solar activity can lead to extended periods of cooling, researchers say
By ELLIE ZOLFAGHARIFARD FOR DAILYMAIL.COM
PUBLISHED: 19:02 GMT, 12 February 2016 | UPDATED: 20:25 GMT, 12 February 2016

The sun is in the midst of its quietest period in more than a century.
Several days ago, it was in 'cue ball' mode, with an incredible image from Nasa showing no large visible sunspots seen on its surface.
Astronomers say this isn't unusual, and solar activity waxes and wanes in 11-year cycles, and we're currently in Cycle 24, which began in 2008.
However, if the current trend continues, then the Earth could be headed for a 'mini ice age' researchers have warned.
Scroll down for video

The sun is in the midst of its quietest period in more than a century. Several days ago, it was in 'cue ball' mode, with an incredible image from Nasa showing no large visible sunspots seen on its surface
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The sun is in the midst of its quietest period in more than a century. Several days ago, it was in 'cue ball' mode, with an incredible image from Nasa showing no large visible sunspots seen on its surface

Conventional wisdom holds that solar activity swings back and forth like a simple pendulum.
At one end of the cycle, there is a quiet time with few sunspots and flares.
At the other end, solar max brings high sunspot numbers and frequent solar storms.
It's a regular rhythm that repeats every 11 years.
Reality is more complicated.

Astronomers have been counting sunspots for centuries, and they have seen that the solar cycle is not perfectly regular.
We've had the smallest number of sunspots in this cycle since Cycle 14, which reached its maximum in February of 1906.
'With no sunspots actively flaring, the sun's X-ray output has flatlined,' wrote Vencore Weather.

'The number of nearly or completely spotless days should increase over the next few years as we continue to move away from the solar maximum phase of cycle 24 and approach the next solar minimum phase and the beginning of solar cycle 25.'

'The current level of activity of solar cycle 24 seems close to that of solar cycle number 5, which occurred beginning in May 1798 and ending in December 1810,' added an analysis by Watts Up With That.

The previous solar cycle, Solar Cycle 23, peaked in 2000-2002 with many furious solar storms.
During Solar Max, huge sunspots and intense solar flares are a daily occurrence. Auroras appear in Florida. Radiation storms knock out satellites.

The last such episode took place in the years around 2000-2001.

During Solar Minimum, the opposite occurs. Solar flares are almost non-existent while whole weeks go by without a single, tiny sunspot to break the monotony of the blank sun. This is what we are experiencing now.

The most recent image of our sun, taken this week, shows just a few sunspots (the top right dark freckles on the sun's surface).  We've had the smallest number of sunspots in this cycle since Cycle 14, which reached its maximum in February of 1906
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The most recent image of our sun, taken this week, shows just a few sunspots (the top right dark freckles on the sun's surface).  We've had the smallest number of sunspots in this cycle since Cycle 14, which reached its maximum in February of 1906

THE MAUNDER MINIMUM
Maunder Minimum (also known as the prolonged sunspot minimum) is the name used for the period starting in about 1645 and continuing to about 1715 when sunspots became exceedingly rare, as noted by solar observers of the time

The Maunder Minimum (also known as the prolonged sunspot minimum) is the name used for the period starting in about 1645 and continuing to about 1715 when sunspots became exceedingly rare, as noted by solar observers of the time.
It caused London's River Thames to freeze over, and 'frost fairs' became popular.

This period of solar inactivity also corresponds to a climatic period called the 'Little Ice Age' when rivers that are normally ice-free froze and snow fields remained year-round at lower altitudes.

There is evidence that the Sun has had similar periods of inactivity in the more distant past, Nasa says.
The connection between solar activity and terrestrial climate is an area of on-going research.

Some scientists hypothesize that the dense wood used in Stradivarius instruments was caused by slow tree growth during the cooler period.
Instrument maker Antonio Stradivari was born a year before the start of the Maunder Minimum.
The longest minimum on record, the Maunder Minimum of 1645-1715, lasted an incredible 70 years.

During this period, sunspots were rarely observed and the solar cycle seemed to have broken down completely.
The period of quiet coincided with the Little Ice Age, a series of extraordinarily bitter winters in Earth's northern hemisphere.
Many researchers are convinced that low solar activity, acting in concert with increased volcanism and possible changes in ocean current patterns, played a role in that 17th century cooling.

A study last year claimed to have cracked predicting solar cycles - and says that between 2020 and 2030 solar cycles will cancel each other out.
This, they say, will lead to another 'Maunder minimum' - which has previously been known as a mini ice age when it hit between 1646 and 1715.
The model of the sun's solar cycle produced unprecedentedly accurate predictions of irregularities within the sun's 11-year heartbeat.
Animation of the TVLM 513-46546 magnetic field
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Show here is a plot of the monthly sunspot number so far for the current cycle (red line) compared to the mean solar cycle (blue line) and the similar solar cycle no. 5 (black)
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Show here is a plot of the monthly sunspot number so far for the current cycle (red line) compared to the mean solar cycle (blue line) and the similar solar cycle no. 5 (black)
The Frozen Thames, 1677 - an oil painting by Abraham Hondius shows the old London Bridge during the Maunder Minimum
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The Frozen Thames, 1677 - an oil painting by Abraham Hondius shows the old London Bridge during the Maunder Minimum

It draws on dynamo effects in two layers of the sun, one close to the surface and one deep within its convection zone.
Predictions from the model suggest that solar activity will fall by 60 per cent during the 2030s to conditions last seen during the 'mini ice age' that began in 1645, according to the results presented by Prof Valentina Zharkova at the National Astronomy Meeting in Llandudno.
The model predicts that the pair of waves become increasingly offset during Cycle 25, which peaks in 2022.
During Cycle 26, which covers the decade from 2030-2040, the two waves will become exactly out of synch and this will cause a significant reduction in solar activity.

'In cycle 26, the two waves exactly mirror each other – peaking at the same time but in opposite hemispheres of the Sun,' said Zharkova.
'Their interaction will be disruptive, or they will nearly cancel each other.
'We predict that this will lead to the properties of a 'Maunder minimum'.

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-3444633/What-happened-sun-Solar-activity-remains-quietest-century-trigger-mini-ice-age.html#ixzz40C4RNfO7
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I'm sure science deniers will be out in full force to tell us this just isn't so....

 

[Kilo_302]

More great news:

https://www.theguardian.com/science/2016/mar/14/february-breaks-global-temperature-records-by-shocking-amount

February smashed a century of global temperature records by “stunning” margin, according to data released by Nasa.

The unprecedented leap led scientists, usually wary of highlighting a single month’s temperature, to label the new record a “shocker” and warn of a “climate emergency”.

Analysis Why is 2016 smashing heat records?
January and February have both broken temperature records. Karl Mathiesen examines how much is down to El Niño versus manmade climate change
Read more
The Nasa data shows the average global surface temperature in February was 1.35C warmer than the average temperature for the month between 1951-1980, a far bigger margin than ever seen before. The previous record, set just one month earlier in January, was 1.15C above the long-term average for that month.

“Nasa dropped a bombshell of a climate report,” said Jeff Masters and Bob Henson, who analysed the data on the Weather Underground website. “February dispensed with the one-month-old record by a full 0.21C – an extraordinary margin to beat a monthly world temperature record by.”

“This result is a true shocker, and yet another reminder of the incessant long-term rise in global temperature resulting from human-produced greenhouse gases,” said Masters and Henson. “We are now hurtling at a frightening pace toward the globally agreed maximum of 2C warming over pre-industrial levels.”


The UN climate summit in Paris in December confirmed 2C as the danger limit for global warming which should not be passed. But it also agreed agreed to “pursue efforts” to limit warming to 1.5C, a target now looking highly optimistic.

Climate change is usually assessed over years and decades, and 2015 shattered the record set in 2014 for the hottest year seen, in data stretching back to 1850. The UK Met Office also expects 2016 to set a new record, meaning the global temperature record will have been broken for three years in a row.

One of the world’s three key temperature records is kept by Nasa’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies (Giss) and its director Prof Gavin Schmidt reacted to the February Giss temperature measurements with a simple “wow”. He tweeted:


“We are in a kind of climate emergency now,” said Prof Stefan Rahmstorf, from the Potsdam Institute of Climate Impact Research in Germany. He told Fairfax Media: “This is really quite stunning ... it’s completely unprecedented.”

“This is a very worrying result,” said Bob Ward, policy director at the Grantham Research Institute on Climate Change at the London School of Economics, noting that each of the last five months globally have been hotter than any month preceding them.

“These results suggest that we may be even closer than we realised to breaching the [2C] limit. We have used up all of our room for manoeuvre. If we delay any longer strong cuts in greenhouse gas emissions, it looks like global mean surface temperature is likely to exceed the level beyond which the impacts of climate change are likely to be very dangerous.”

A major El Niño event, the biggest since 1998, is boosting global temperatures, but scientists are agreed that global warming driven by humanity’s greenhouse gas emissions is by far the largest factor in the astonishing run of temperature records.

Record global temperatures are shocking — and yet we don't respond seriously
James Dyke
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Prof Adam Scaife, at the UK Met Office, said the very low levels of Arctic ice were also helping to raise temperatures: “There has been record low ice in the Arctic for two months running and that releases a lot of heat.” He said the Met Office had forecast a record-breaking 2016 in December: “It is not as if you can’t see these things coming.”

Ed Hawkins, a climate scientist at the University of Reading, UK, said: “It is a pretty big jump between January and February, although this data from Nasa is only the first set of global temperature data. We will need to see what the figures from NOAA and the Met Office say. It is in line with our expectations that due to the continuing effect of greenhouse gas emissions, combined with the effects of El Niño on top, 2016 is likely to beat 2015 as the warmest year on record.”

The record for an annual increase of atmospheric concentrations of carbon dioxide, the main greenhouse gas, was also demolished in 2015.

Fossil fuel-burning and the strong El Niño pushed CO2 levels up by 3.05 parts per million (ppm) to 402.6 ppm compared to 2014. “CO2 levels are increasing faster than they have in hundreds of thousands of years,” said Pieter Tans, lead scientist at Noaa’s Global Greenhouse Gas Reference Network. “It’s explosive compared to natural processes.”

 

[cavalryman]

More great news:  [

https://www.technologyreview.com/s/601055/global-carbon-dioxide-emissions-have-now-been-flat-for-two-years-running/#/set/id/601047/

New data published by the International Energy Agency extends the surprising finding, discovered last year, that global carbon dioxide emissions have stopped growing despite continued economic growth. The latest data show the trend has continued for a second consecutive year, which the IEA says is a result of renewable energy accounting for 90 percent of new electricity generation in 2015. China’s slowing economic growth has played a key role in these figures as well, though, and with India and several other developing economies set to grow substantially over the next several years, it’s not clear how long we can expect this “decoupling” trend to continue.

 

[Kilo_302]

More great news:  [

https://www.technologyreview.com/s/601055/global-carbon-dioxide-emissions-have-now-been-flat-for-two-years-running/#/set/id/601047/

I read this this morning, it is indeed great news. It means that the fears of addressing climate change leading to a collapse of our economy are unfounded. We can grow AND we can switch over to renewables which are becoming cheaper and more viable by the day. We can have our cake and it too. Of course, scientists and policy people have been saying this all along, despite the protests from the fossil fuel industry. It's clear it's time to move on.

 

[Loachman]

So one lone report is absolute confirmation of your religion...

Interesting.

And anybody have his/her cake and eat it, too.

It is trickier by far to eat one's cake and have it, too, however - which is the correct version of the most-frequently screwed up cliche ever.

 

[Kilo_302]

So one lone report is absolute confirmation of your religion...

Interesting.

And anybody have his/her cake and eat it, too.

It is trickier by far to eat one's cake and have it, too, however - which is the correct version of the most-frequently screwed up cliche ever.

A religion suggests I have faith in something. This describes your position much more accurately. A meaningless, useless belief in something lobby groups are paid to say. Praise be to Big Oil!

 

[George Wallace]

A religion suggests I have faith in something. This describes your position much more accurately. A meaningless, useless belief in something lobby groups are paid to say. Praise be to Big Oil!

???

Let me see now.....Many have not followed in lock step with your views, so they must be the ones who are ignorantly following a meaningless, useless belief in something that lobby groups are being paid for by "BIG Oil".  All those of your ilk, who religiously follow the lobbyists touting "Global Warming" are in no way fanatics.  Interesting concept. 

I think you are full of it.

 

[Kilo_302]

???

Let me see now.....Many have not followed in lock step with your views, so they must be the ones who are ignorantly following a meaningless, useless belief in something that lobby groups are being paid for by "BIG Oil".  All those of your ilk, who religiously follow the lobbyists touting "Global Warming" are in no way fanatics.  Interesting concept. 

I think you are full of it.

This is for you George. Enjoy.

http://classics.mit.edu/Plato/republic.8.vii.html

 

[George Wallace]

This is for you George. Enjoy.

http://classics.mit.edu/Plato/republic.8.vii.html

Sorry.

I did not enjoy.

 

[Oldgateboatdriver]

Actually, George, I have a strange feeling that you and I had Plato read and mastered well before Kilo was born. Truly, it's not enjoyable anymore (not to mention that many other more recent and relevant philosophers have come along since.)

Ah well! Que sera sera.

 

[Loachman]

Praise be to Big Oil!

So Big Oil caused the Mediaeval Warm Period and controls solar activity?

Powerful juju indeed.

 

[Kilo_302]

So Big Oil caused the Mediaeval Warm Period and controls solar activity?

Powerful juju indeed.

Right back into arguments that have been debunked over and over again.

http://grist.org/climate-energy/the-medieval-warm-period-was-just-as-warm-as-today/