-
13 degrees in Surrey at 5am this morning. In the middle of January.
Got into London at around 6:30 this morning and joggers everywhere, all just in t-shirts / shorts.
I took the dog for a walk at around 8pm last night and knew something didn't feel quite right, but couldn't put my finger on it. It's very strange.
-
@MajorRage My first year in London was a particularly warm one. I was fine not wearing a suit jacket right into December..I thought "The weather here isn't bad, what are people moaning about?" ..I found out the following 6 years.
-
@MajorRage said in Climate Change #3 & Other Environmental Issues:
13 degrees in Surrey at 5am this morning. In the middle of January.
Got into London at around 6:30 this morning and joggers everywhere, all just in t-shirts / shorts.
I took the dog for a walk at around 8pm last night and knew something didn't feel quite right, but couldn't put my finger on it. It's very strange.
I remember playing Tennis in Late Feb over West London on a peach of a warm day. Then every other year we were there we would remind ourselves with incredulity how we managed to do that. Was just a one off.
-
I got married in the UK, mid-September, was 30 degrees...had played a few games of rugby in the new season that was starting as well, and had no skin on my knees from the rock hard grounds.
-
This is one of the best articles broadly about climate change that I've read recently. It bemoans the lack of scientific rigour which is a particular bugbear of mine. If there is any chance of a) figuring out what is happening, b) figuring out how much mankind is responsible, and c) innovating ways to cope / reverse the worst effects, then we need more science not less.
The UN's 'woke' climate change propaganda is an insult to science
SHERELLE JACOBS
DAILY TELEGRAPH COLUMNIST
Follow 3 DECEMBER 2019 • 7:00AMI was always a 'middle-grounder', rather than a 'denier' – until I discovered the extent of the dishonesty
The climate change “emergency” is fake news. Many will roll their eyes in exasperation at the conspiratorial bombastry of yet another “denier”. But for years I have been a plastic recycling, polar bear cooing middle-grounder. In fact, Aristotle would probably turn in his grave at the logical fallaciousness of my long-held presumption that the truth must lie somewhere between those two mutually loathing opposites – Scepticism and Armageddon.
But as the doom-mongering acquires the rubber-stamped smell of instutionalised illness, it is impossible to ignore that the “woke” are the new “slept” – too deep in their sugar coma of confected hysteria to realise they are being duped by disinformation.
Before I explain why the climate “emergency” is the most electrifyingly effective propaganda exercise of the 21st century, two clarifications. I have no fight to pick with glaring evidential realities: surface records clearly show the planet is getting warmer. Nor do I have a culture war-bloodied axe to grind with the fundamental chemistry: carbon dioxide indisputably contributes to the greenhouse effect. But I do take issue with how the mainstream debate has become an insult to both the public’s intelligence and basic science.
Greta Thunberg
It's time to call out the most powerful post-truth scam of the 21st century CREDIT: CHRISTOPHER HUNT/GQ MAGAZINE/ PAThis was clearer than ever yesterday, as bureaucratic catastrophists kicked up dystopian dust-clouds on their way into the UN Madrid climate change summit. As Greta Thunberg arrived by yacht (after her British skipper likely clocked up 3 tonnes of carbon emissions flying to the US to pick her up), UN Secretary General António Guterres rumbled that, over the horizon, he could see “the point of no return”. Delegates waved the UN’s latest Emissions Gap Report as if it were both a millenarian death oracle and a methodologically indisputable text; in it, the recommendation to cut emissions by at least 7.6 per cent per year for the next decade.
One can’t help but feel that we have heard such curiously precise warnings before. Last year the UN warned that we had just 12 years to save the planet. Scientists have since revised this to approximately 18 months. Or perhaps it is already too late. The experts don’t seem quite sure.
Indeed, the distinction between present and future seems to be fading to discardable subtlety. Take the study which has gone viral in recent days for claiming that parts of the world have either already reached – or are inching towards –“tipping point”, whereby the planet becomes caught in destructive feedback loops. Are we already doomed, or nearly doomed, or nearly already doomed? More is the mystery.
Claims such as these are projections, but they are routinely presented to the public as unquestionable facts. This effectively reduces them to fake news. Even more so, given that the accuracy of the climate modelling upon which these figures and scenarios rely is contested, and the climate does not change in a straight line.
To take one example, the UN’s international climate change body, the IPCC, said in 2007 that temperatures had risen by 0.2C per decade between 1990-2005 and used that figure for its 20-year projection. Inconveniently, warming turned out to have been just 0.05C per decade over the 15 years to 2012.
The IPCC acknowledges the uncertainty of the computations it champions; hence the disclaimer squirreled away on its website stating that it does not guarantee the accuracy of the information it contains. A caveat lost in translation at the resplendently funereal press conferences.
This post-truth scam is having a chilling effect on science. Experts are locked in a race to the bottom to make detailed and disastrous premonitions. And despite the fact that disciplined debate is the motor of scientific discovery, eco-extremists are shutting down discussions that dissent from the Apocalypse narrative. CO2 emissions may not be the only reason for warming. So sidelining studies that have, for example, found the natural climate system can suddenly shift, and ridiculing researchers who explore other possible variables – from solar changes to volcanoes – could be driving us further from the truth.
Laymen like me sense that something is amiss, because we grew up assuming science is more about possibility than limitations. But so it goes that, in this messed-up world, the optimists have become sceptics; and those unradicalised by global warming delirium, the extremists.
-
@TeWaio said in Climate Change #3 & Other Environmental Issues:
It bemoans the lack of scientific rigour which is a particular bugbear of mine. If there is any chance of a) figuring out what is happening, b) figuring out how much mankind is responsible, and c) innovating ways to cope / reverse the worst effects, then we need more science not less.
Nicely put.
It seems that the "tipping point" where things escalate is where it has gone wrong. Obviously predictions are a lot harder to make accurately than collecting historical data. It is like weather forecasting, most of the time it is accurate (within reason) but it does go wrong, and we have been watching weather for a lot longer than climate change.Whatever the outcome, if the masses reduce waste, reduce man made emissions and we clean up our act, the planet is still going to be a better place to live. I don't see the downside so we should be doing it regardless, denier or not.
-
@TeWaio said in Climate Change #3 & Other Environmental Issues:
carbon dioxide indisputably contributes to the greenhouse effect.
OK but.
CO2 is a minor contributor to back radiation (called The greenhouse effect). That is radiation leaving the earths surface and about 1 - 2 % returning a second or so later
The key though is how much warming does back radiation cause?
The CC "science" claims it cause TWICE the warming from the sun (that is now almost all due to CO2 only and esp CO2 produced by mankind). So radiation returning from the freezing cold atmosphere somehow magically results in twice the warming from the sun.
And based on this nonsense the Wests economy could be destroyed. And we (the West but not China) send many billions overseas to a fund that no one knows where the money ends up. Thank god Trump is pulling the US out. Hopefully NZ does likewise soon. Use the billion or so that NZ sends overseas to clean up real pollution. Or build housing etc
-
@Winger said in Climate Change #3 & Other Environmental Issues:
The CC "science" claims it cause TWICE the warming from the sun (that is now almost all due to CO2 only and esp CO2 produced by mankind). So radiation returning from the freezing cold atmosphere somehow magically results in twice the warming from the sun.
That's not too hard to understand is it? If you have an enclosed environment and a heat source then you get increased warming. Hence it being called the "Greenhouse effect". A greenhouse is warmer inside than its surrounds but the sun is the same.
-
@Snowy said in Climate Change #3 & Other Environmental Issues:
@Winger said in Climate Change #3 & Other Environmental Issues:
The CC "science" claims it cause TWICE the warming from the sun (that is now almost all due to CO2 only and esp CO2 produced by mankind). So radiation returning from the freezing cold atmosphere somehow magically results in twice the warming from the sun.
That's not too hard to understand is it? If you have an enclosed environment and a heat source then you get increased warming. Hence it being called the "Greenhouse effect". A greenhouse is warmer inside than its surrounds but the sun is the same.
Its not even close to being anything like a greenhouse effect. CO2 doesn't block energy leaving like a greenhouse. CO2 and water vapor supposedly deflects around 8% (the other 92% continues on its way) of radiation and some returns to the earths surface. About a second later.
But its extremely low energy radiation. Not like the suns radiation. That highly charged. So you can feel the suns radiation warming the body. Returning radiation has almost no warming impact. Real scientists know this
-
@Snowy said in Climate Change #3 & Other Environmental Issues:
@Winger Yes, terrestrial radiation is different from solar. Wavelengths are hugely different and trapped longwave terrestrial causes warming. Scientists understand this.
Yet somehow almost like magic this returning radiation that has almost nil warming impact (unlike the sun) results in over twice the warming from the sun (according to the climate scientists). And mankind's very very very minor addition to this impact will almost destroy the planet. unless of course we (or the West workers) send billions overseas to a fund
Even common sense should set the alarm bells ringing.
-
@Winger It's not leaving as it should. That is the point. Just the same as the blanket effect of clouds at night keep things warmer as terrestrial is kept in. Some might say like a greenhouse.
@Winger said in Climate Change #3 & Other Environmental Issues:
So you can feel the suns radiation warming the body. Returning radiation has almost no warming impact.
Oh, and this is how the sun warms us:
It is infrared radiation that produce the warm feeling on our bodies. Most of the solar radiation is absorbed by the atmosphere and much of what reaches the earth's surface is radiated back into the atmosphere to become heat energy. -
@Snowy said in Climate Change #3 & Other Environmental Issues:
@Winger It's not leaving as it should. That is the point. Just the same as the blanket effect of clouds at night keep things warmer as terrestrial is kept in. Some might say like a greenhouse.
@Winger said in Climate Change #3 & Other Environmental Issues:
So you can feel the suns radiation warming the body. Returning radiation has almost no warming impact.
Oh, and this is how the sun warms us:
It is infrared radiation that produce the warm feeling on our bodies. Most of the solar radiation is absorbed by the atmosphere and much of what reaches the earth's surface is radiated back into the atmosphere to become heat energy.So energy from the sun = 100 of which only 47 reaches the surface
Yet energy leaving the earths surface = 116and back radiation results in TWICE the warming from the sun
The is science today
a
-
@Winger Expanation of the units as you can't have seen this before it seems.
At the top of the atmosphere - Incoming energy from the sun balanced with outgoing energy from the earth.
Incoming energy Outgoing energy
Units Source Units Source
+100 Shortwave radiation from the sun. -23 Shortwave radiation reflected back to space by clouds.
-7 Shortwave radiation reflected to space by the earth's surface.
-49 Longwave radiation from the atmosphere into space.
-9 Longwave radiation from clouds into space.
-12 Longwave radiation from the earth's surface into space.
+100 Total Incoming -100 Total Outgoing
The atmosphere itself - Energy into the atmosphere is balanced with outgoing energy from atmosphere.
Incoming energy Outgoing energy
Units Source Units Source
+19 Absorbed shortwave radiation by gases in the atmosphere. -9 Longwave radiation emitted to space by clouds.
+4 Absorbed shortwave radiation by clouds. -49 Longwave radiation emitted to space by gases in atmosphere.
+104 Absorbed longwave radiation from earth's surface. -98 Longwave radiation emitted to earth's surface by gases in atmosphere.
+5 From convective currents (rising air warms the atmosphere).
+24 Condensation /Deposition of water vapor (heat is released into the atmosphere by process).
+156 Total Incoming -156 Total Outgoing
At the earth's surface - Energy absorbed is balanced with the energy released.
Incoming energy Outgoing energy
Units Source Units Source
+47 Absorbed shortwave radiation from the sun. -116 Longwave radiation emitted by the surface.
+98 Absorbed longwave radiation from gases in atmosphere. -5 Removal of heat by convection (rising warm air).
-24 Heat required by the processes of evaporation and sublimation and therefore removed from the surface.
+145 Total Incoming -145 Total Outgoing
The absorption of infrared radiation trying to escape from the Earth back to space is particularly important to the global energy balance. Energy absorption by the atmosphere stores more energy near its surface than it would if there was no atmosphere.The average surface temperature of the moon, which has no atmosphere, is 0°F (-18°C). By contrast, the average surface temperature of the Earth is 59°F (15°C). This heating effect is called the greenhouse effect.
-
The chart is nonsense (yet its supposedly proven "science")
47 is absorbed from the sun yet 116 leaves the surface. Apparently this extra energy created by back radiation. Somehow up there in the freezing cold atmosphere. Water and CO2 (magically) creating twice the energy of the sun
edit. Actually its even worse. Leaving is 116+24+5=145
-
@Winger said in Climate Change #3 & Other Environmental Issues:
The chart is nonsense (yet its supposedly proven "science")
47 is absorbed from the sun yet 116 leaves the surface. Apparently this extra energy created by back radiation. Somehow up there in the freezing cold atmosphere. Water and CO2 (magically) creating twice the energy of the sun
edit. Actually its even worse. Leaving is 116+24+5=145
I suspect that you might not understand it rather than it being nonsense.
It does balance. 3 metrics:
At the top of the atmosphere - Incoming energy from the sun balanced with outgoing energy from the earth. 100 units in and out.
The atmosphere itself - Energy into the atmosphere is balanced with outgoing energy from atmosphere. 156 units in and out.
At the earth's surface - Energy absorbed is balanced with the energy released. 145 units in and out.
You got the 145 out right, balanced by +47 absorbed shortwave radiation from the sun and
+98 absorbed longwave radiation from gases in atmosphere.Anyway, NOAA do employ a few scientists that have done this stuff for a while.
-
Glacier National Park is replacing signs that predicted its glaciers would be gone by 2020
*The signs at Glacier National Park (Montana USA) warning that its signature glaciers would be gone by 2020 are being changed.
The signs in the Montana park were added more than a decade ago to reflect climate change forecasts at the time by the US Geological Survey, park spokeswoman Gina Kurzmen told CNN.
In 2017, the park was told by the agency that the complete melting off of the glaciers was no longer expected to take place so quickly due to changes in the forecast model, Kurzmen said. But tight maintenance budgets made it impossible for the park to immediately change the signs.*
Everyone at US Geo ..., as would happen in Australia, kept their jobs despite the demonstrable incompetence.
"changes in the forecast model" is a euphemism for "we cooked the stats until they revealed the result that suited us best."
East Anglia University did precisely that a decade ago in return for more research funding into the myth of man made galaxial hottening/coldening leading inexorably to the fact that, if we pay the UN 10% of everyone's annual income, average temperature would drop 1° by 2080 or something.
Climate Change