Earth a little more resilient than computer models

Hot Air ^ | March 23, 2008 | Ed Morrissey

[Delacon]

The Australian reports a few inconvenient truths regarding global climate change that have yet to receive much attention from a media sold on global warming. Not only has the Earth cooled since its peak year in 1998, not only are oceans cooler than predicted, but new NASA data shows that the computer models that predicted runaway global warming were based on a fundamental error. Rather than having clouds and water vapor amplifying the warming effect of carbon in the atmosphere, it turns out that they compensate for it (via Memeorandum):

Last Monday - on ABC Radio National, of all places - there was a tipping point of a different kind in the debate on climate change. It was a remarkable interview involving the co-host of Counterpoint, Michael Duffy and Jennifer Marohasy, a biologist and senior fellow of Melbourne-based think tank the Institute of Public Affairs. Anyone in public life who takes a position on the greenhouse gas hypothesis will ignore it at their peril.

Duffy asked Marohasy: “Is the Earth stillwarming?”

She replied: “No, actually, there has been cooling, if you take 1998 as your point of reference. If you take 2002 as your point of reference, then temperatures have plateaued. This is certainly not what you’d expect if carbon dioxide is driving temperature because carbon dioxide levels have been increasing but temperatures have actually been coming down over the last 10 years.”

Duffy: “Is this a matter of any controversy?”

Marohasy: “Actually, no. The head of the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) has actually acknowledged it. He talks about the apparent plateau in temperatures so far this century. So he recognises that in this century, over the past eight years, temperatures have plateaued … This is not what you’d expect, as I said, because if carbon dioxide is driving temperature then you’d expect that, given carbon dioxide levels have been continuing to increase, temperatures should be going up … So (it’s) very unexpected, not something that’s being discussed. It should be being discussed, though, because it’s very significant.” …

Duffy: “Can you tell us about NASA’s Aqua satellite, because I understand some of the data we’re now getting is quite important in our understanding of how climate works?”

Marohasy: “That’s right. The satellite was only launched in 2002 and it enabled the collection of data, not just on temperature but also on cloud formation and water vapour. What all the climate models suggest is that, when you’ve got warming from additional carbon dioxide, this will result in increased water vapour, so you’re going to get a positive feedback. That’s what the models have been indicating. What this great data from the NASA Aqua satellite … (is) actually showing is just the opposite, that with a little bit of warming, weather processes are compensating, so they’re actually limiting the greenhouse effect and you’re getting a negative rather than a positive feedback.”

Duffy: “The climate is actually, in one way anyway, more robust than was assumed in the climate models?”

Marohasy: “That’s right … These findings actually aren’t being disputed by the meteorological community. They’re having trouble digesting the findings, they’re acknowledging the findings, they’re acknowledging that the data from NASA’s Aqua satellite is not how the models predict, and I think they’re about to recognise that the models really do need to be overhauled and that when they are overhauled they will probably show greatly reduced future warming projected as a consequence of carbon dioxide.”

Hmm. How many have actually heard that the NASA Aqua satellite returned this kind of data? I searched the New York Times and found nothing since 2006 on Aqua — and that was just an announcement that NASA would launch more satellites to study weather. The Washington Post reported on ice loss in the Arctic just this week, but noted that Aqua shows an ice increase in the Acrtic this winter, but never reported on the other data that throws cold water on global warming.

So far, no one asserts that we have produced less carbon in the atmosphere. Global-warming activists continue to make Chicken Little predictions of catastrophe based on increases in carbon releases, especially from China and India as they modernize and industrialize. If carbon releases resulted in global warming, then the rate of increase should be constant; there definitely should be no decrease, especially given the theoretical amplification of water vapor.

Apparently, though, both assumptions have either proven incorrect or far too simplified to explain the actual impact of carbon on global temperatures. That’s not surprising, especially given the previous global-cooling scare of the 1970s and how baseless that theory turned out to be. What’s surprising is the utter lack of coverage that the new data has received. Why haven’t the same media outlets that relentlessly cover global-warming advocacy reported on the appearance of contradictory data?

Perhaps because global warming is more advocacy than science.

[patton]

The tangle of the dangle is mangled mainly in space?

[RightWhale]

Is that Tiros satellite data from 1880? I would not rely on Tiros data nuch before 1920.

[gondramB]

>>Is that Tiros satellite data from 1880? I would not rely on Tiros data nuch before 1920.<<

That’s funny..

But you have a point - those numbers lack error bars and thus give an excessive impression of accuracy.

[muawiyah]

The seas continued rising how much?

And where was this rise measured?

And, who did the measuring?

[skeptoid]

That’s problematic because the sun (and the measure you want is probably total solar irradiance -tsi) has been in a period of decline and does not correlate well with recent warming.relevant measure being observed is sunspot activity and its resultant radiation . There has been virtually NONE for some time, but on January 4 the first sunspot of the new Solar Cycle 24 was announced by NASA.

Then there is the effect of the sun's magnetic field on the amount of cosmic radiation that reaches us. It is very likely that cloud formation is greatly stumulated by those rays. Current research indicates that it easily accounts for the last 100 years of measured warming through regulation of beneficial greenhouse gas (low cloud) formation.

Total solar irradiance has been going down

It's the relatively small fraction of x and g band radiation that influences cloud formation, apparently. I'm also very curious if you have heard that Antartic ice cores show CO2 level follow historical increases in temperature.

And finally, were you actually dry behind the ears 35 years ago when scientific consensus gravely warned we were going to freeze, starve and be glaciated unless we took immediate and drastic action to stop GLOBAL COOLING?

[muawiyah]

Only goes up to December 5, 2007. Subsequent to that date we know that snow/ice cover in the Northern Hemisphere reached record levels (since such a characteristic had first been measured).

So, what happens now?

[muawiyah]

"historically" only refers to WRITTEN RECORDS. Temperatures have been measured for barely more than a century.

At the same time we infer temperatures from periods before measurement was possible from other sources ~ e.g. diatom deposits, ice cores, pollen layers in shallow lakes, etc.

Recently folks have been reporting that we know the mean global temperature. Turned out most of the devices used to do the measuring were not up to the task, and those that were had been improperly managed.

I'd suggest we don't know if it's getting warmer or cooler.

[muawiyah]

The weather gurus speak of “anomalies” ~

[JustDoItAlways]

Here is the same data presented by gondramB except this is monthly data over the past ten years.

Interesting how this chart can be have a moving average in it that is a straight line going up?

[Swordmaker]

Re: trends

Well, on the 10,000 year scale glaciers are most certainly receeding.

[Swordmaker]

Re: sea rising

Prove your assertion.

[Petronski]

...the seas are rising and continued rising even during the plateau of 1945-1976...

Oh, do tell.

LOL

[ProtectOurFreedom]

Yes, but it is scientific analysis with a definite bias toward catastrophe and hysteria which their sponsors want to hear. If they don’t toe the party line, the funding dries up, jobs are lost, graduate students will not receive money to pursue their studies. Follow the money.

Open your eyes, read a little and you’ll find a lot of scientific analysis that is contrary to what you believe. Then, look at the historical record, ie, the MWP and the little ice age. No “scientific analysis” needed there — you can observe the impact of cold vs warm on mankind and civilization.

[GBA]

"It is not widely accepted yet but when all the data is out and circulated and double checked I suspect that CO2 increase following some other warming event. The most common such warming even may well be tectonic movement effecting ocean currents."

You could be right about both. It's interesting and potentially dangerous how quickly the idea human activity causes global warming has become more or less accepted by the mainstream. I hope we learn enough to actually know before we do something drastic and stupid to "fix" what we don't yet understand.

[gondramB]

>>Re: sea rising

Prove your assertion.<<

>>The Contribution of the Cryosphere to Changes in Sea Level

Global sea level rose by about 120 meters during the several millennia that followed the end of the last ice age (approximately 21,000 years ago), and stabilized between 3,000 and 2,000 years ago. Sea level indicators suggest that global sea level did not change significantly from then until the late 19th century when the instrumental record of sea level change shows evidence for an onset of sea level rise. Estimates for the 20th century show that global average sea level rose at a rate of about 1.7 millimeters per year. Satellite altimetry observations, available since the early 1990s, provide more accurate sea level data with nearly global coverage and indicate that since 1993 sea level has been rising at a rate of about 3 millimeters per year. Climate models based on the current rate of increase in greenhouse gases, however, indicate that sea level may rise at about 4 millimeters per year reaching 0.22 to 0.44 meters above 1990 levels by the period 2090-2099 (IPCC 2007).<<

http://nsidc.org/sotc/sea_level.html

[Swordmaker]

Re: sea level

BS I read the link and they talk “estimates” and then trot out satellite data that is no where near accurate enough to even see 3mm per year sea level variation from the distance they orbit. That small of a change is lost in the noise of a turbulent sea. They are pulling “facts” out of their noses...

This organization receives its funding from global warming grants. That makes their “estimates” rather suspect. Other sources I’ve seen show very little rise in average sea level.

[I got the rope]

It's a lot different from the three time adjusted US Temp data. Oh yeah...good luck QA/QC ing the data used for the Global Temperature average.

[steveab]

Gondrams
You should not us the IPCC as reference.
Please read An Audit of the IPCC report by NPCA Study 308
http://www.ncpa.org/pub/st/st308

[Old Professer]

Cute!

I moved this link from an earlier thread on Climate Confusion:

I hope it updates regularly - this picture shows yesterday.

[Delacon]

You should post that on FR.