From Antarctic Ice Shelf Disintegration Underscores a Warming World, March 25.
Satellite imagery from the National Snow and Ice Data Center at the University of Colorado at Boulder reveals that a 13,680 square kilometer (5,282 square mile) ice shelf has begun to collapse because of rapid climate change in a fast-warming region of Antarctica.
Source: National Snow and Ice Center/NASA, via Cnet news.
The Wilkins Ice Shelf is a broad plate of permanent floating ice on the southwest Antarctic Peninsula, about 1,000 miles south of South America. In the past 50 years, the western Antarctic Peninsula has experienced the biggest temperature increase on Earth, rising by 0.5 degree Celsius (0.9 degree Fahrenheit) per decade. NSIDC Lead Scientist Ted Scambos, who first spotted the disintegration in March, said, “We believe the Wilkins has been in place for at least a few hundred years. But warm air and exposure to ocean waves are causing a break-up.”
Satellite images indicate that the Wilkins began its collapse on February 28; data revealed that a large iceberg, 41 by 2.5 kilometers (25.5 by 1.5 miles), fell away from the ice shelf’s southwestern front, triggering a runaway disintegration of 405 square kilometers (160 square miles) of the shelf interior (Figure 1). The edge of the shelf crumbled into the sky-blue pattern of exposed deep glacial ice that has become characteristic of climate-induced ice shelf break-ups such as the Larsen B in 2002. A narrow beam of intact ice, just 6 kilometers wide (3.7 miles) was protecting the remaining shelf from further breakup as of March 23 (Figure 2).
Scientists track ice shelves and study collapses carefully because some of them hold back glaciers, which if unleashed, can accelerate and raise sea level. Scambos said, “The Wilkins disintegration won’t raise sea level because it already floats in the ocean, and few glaciers flow into it. However, the collapse underscores that the Wilkins region has experienced an intense melt season. Regional sea ice has all but vanished, leaving the ice shelf exposed to the action of waves.”
…
The Wilkins is one of a string of ice shelves that have collapsed in the West Antarctic Peninsula in the past thirty years. The Larsen B became the most well-known of these, disappearing in just over thirty days in 2002. The Prince Gustav Channel, Larsen Inlet, Larsen A, Wordie, Muller, and the Jones Ice Shelf collapses also underscore the unprecedented warming in this region of Antarctica.
Complete press release here: Antarctic Ice Shelf Disintegration Underscores a Warming World, March 25.
Some macro policy implications of global climate change (aka global warming), see Congressional Budget Office, “Issues in Global Climate Change,” statement of the director, Nov. 17, 2007.
Wow! What scary language full of scare! words!
It Isn’t Just the Arctic That’s Changing
Menzie Chinn posts on the ongoing breakup of the Wilkins Ice Shelf in Antarctica, with a link to a Congressional Budget Office presentation from last November on greenhouse gas emissions control policy options: Antarctic Ice Shelf Disintegration Unders…
Don’t be scared Max. Just lock yourself in your big SUV.
The plural of anecdote is not data. Furthermore, given the NYTimes rather tenuous grip on reality, I am not entirely sure if they understand that, even though Winter is ending in New York City, it is Summer which is ending in Antarctica.
Anyone who is really interested in the amount and extent of ice in Antarctica should look at these charts: Southern Hemisphere sea ice area and South Polar sea ice anomaly, which were posted by the Polar Research Group of the Department of Atmospheric Sciences at the University of Illinois.
If anything, the charts show neither a warming tend nor a negative sea ice anomaly in Antarctica.
Fat Man: You’re citing deviations from a mean over the 1978-08 sample period?
Also, not certain why the dig at the NYT. There are no hyperlinks to the NYT in my post. Just asking.
Other scientists have noted that Antarctica achieved an all time record sea ice level about six months ago and is now about 1 million sq km greater sea ice coverage above the average at this time (end of summer in southern hemisphere). Overall global sea ice coverage is currently above average. See Dr. Roger Pielke, Sr’s blog at climatesci.org.
How does this happen during the coldest winter in about 20-30 years? At least where I am it is the coldest winter, hitting -58 with wind chill in January. It was -20 this morning and is -8 now.
“You’re citing deviations from a mean over the 1978-08 sample period?”
No. I linked a chart that showed the anomaly from the 1978-2000 mean. I also linked the parent of that chart. You are free to study the information presented therein and reach your own conclusions. But, the anecdote you cite does not persuade me that there is a warming trend in the Antarctic in the face of the data on those charts.
“not certain why the dig at the NYT. … Just asking.”
Broken Ice in Antarctica beat you to the punch I guess. If you want credit for independent invention, you can have it. You may want to study the UIUC data before you do, however.
Menzie, how’s that Kool Aid taste? This one was too too simple. This is what the good Dr Pielke has to say about it. http://climatesci.org/2008/03/27/reality-check-on-antarctic-sea-ice/ :
Next you’ll be telling us about the warming in the climate for the past 5-6 years. Take a look here: http://globalwarmingclearinghouse.blogspot.com/2008/03/2007-hadley-cru-temp-chart.html
Note the trends in the most recent years on the charts. Remember seeing that reported recently?
The flat Earth crowd who still insist on disputing global warming remind me of the “don’t worry, the credit problems are contained” crowd. They both refused to believe the overwhelming data that contradicted they faith-based belief system.
The funny thing about reality is that it catches-up with you whether you believe in it or not.
CoRev,
Arctic sea ice is well below its long-term mean. There is a trend in arctic sea ice which one can see presented nicely in Figure 4 at the NSIDC.
http://nsidc.org/news/press/2007_seaiceminimum/20071001_pressrelease.html
I agree that the Wilkins ice shelf collapse isn’t remarkable in its magnitude or in the relative extent of sea ice around Antarctica. What is interesting scientifically is the manner of the collapse, which was captured in near real-time by the scientists.
As far as your graph on your web page, you are correct to state that cherry-picking a start date can result in an apparent trend. As we know, the longer you go back, the better you can estimate the trend, but at the expense of less available data. This is a compromise we have to make when trying to understand the data.
Next you’ll be telling us about the warming in the climate for the past 5-6 years. Take a look here: http://globalwarmingclearinghouse.blogspot.com/2008/03/2007-hadley-cru-temp-chart.html
Note the trends in the most recent years on the charts.
Are you extrapolating a trend based only on the last five years of data rather than the last 25 or 150? I’m not sure what you are claiming, but the last six years have all been among the 10 warmest years on record.
Global sea ice area is above 1978-2000 average (http://arctic.atmos.uiuc.edu/cryosphere/IMAGES/global.daily.ice.area.withtrend.jpg ) but the volume most certainly is not. There was a lot of loss of thick multiyear ice on 2007 on the Arctic. Much of this bounce from that bottom is thin new ice; we will see how it fares next year. You can see in the graph that after each minimum there is usually a big “dead cat bounce”, after wich the downward trend is resumed.
FatMan: I’ll stick to peer reviewed analysis, as discussed in this post. I don’t have training in atmospheric sciences, so I won’t try to interpret trends without training (just like I wouldn’t expect atmospheric scientists to interpret macroeconomic data trends without training in econometrics, see here).
Re: NYT, I try to stick with primary sources when possible and convenient, as opposed to secondary.
CoRev: I remember reading about the last year being particularly cool in North America. Indeed, having shoveled out nearly 100″ of snow this winter, I can believe that in a visceral sense. But then I know that over the past 100 plus years, Lake Mendota has been freezing later and thawing sooner on a trendline basis. So as we say in macroeconometrics, don’t overinterpret a few observations, especially when there is a high degree of persistence in the data, as there does in this case.
I believe that we should accept the scientific consensus on anthropogenic global warming. After all, that expertise is what we pay our scientists for. And it seems pretty clear that the consensus is in favor of a substantial global warming trend with a significant human contribution.
At the same time, the media has a well documented tendency to focus on stories that fit into a certain narrative. This means that at present, news that favors global warming will get reported far more widely than news that casts doubt on the phenomenon (except on conservative blogs, of course!).
It is well documented that in the Caesar period of Roman Era (2050 years ago), grapes were grown in Britain to produce wine. This is well-documented.
Today, Britain is too cold for grapes, and vineyards have moved down to France, Italy, and Spain.
Also, animals presently found only in Sub-Saharan Africa, such as Lions, roamed Greece and Turkey at the time.
So the world today is much colder than it was 2000 years ago.
“I believe that we should accept the scientific consensus on anthropogenic global warming. ”
There is an equal degree of consensus that refutes the nonsense. Ray Kurzweil, among others, says it is a bunch of baloney.
“(except on conservative blogs, of course!).”
It is a well-known fact that conservatives are more capable and productive than leftists.
Furthermore, your whine itself shows that ‘global warming’ is just the latest Socialist scam. If you truly cared about GLOBAL warming, you would be more bothered by China, the #1 emitter of CO2, not the US, which is the #2 emitter. Since China is your ideological ally, you have no problem with their emissions.
I thought the scam of ‘global warming’ would end on 1/20/09, but as the Democrats are likely to snatch defeat from the Jaws of victory, the scam will continue as a means to bash President McCain.
“I’ll stick to peer reviewed analysis”
I didn’t know press releases were peer reviewed. Is that something new? Are press releases primary sources?
“I believe that we should accept the scientific consensus on anthropogenic global warming.”
2 comebacks:
Galileo, your refusal to accept the scientific consensus on planetary orbits is intolerable. You must recant.
OK. It’s a consensus, great. I guess you don’t need to do any more research, so we can delete that line item from the budget.
I am not a climate scientist, but Roger Pielke, Sr. is. CoRev gave a url for one of his blog posts on this very subject. Read it. I note that Prof Pielke links to data at the same web site I did. Better than echoing the NYTimes, even unknowingly.
The History of English Wine
Fat Man: No, the press release is not, but that’s just an observation. Regarding the debate over time trends in temperature readings, and inference regarding those trends, I will stick to peer reviewed journal articles, and meta-analyses thereof.
I’m sure there are some climate scientists who hew to your views. Just like there are a some PhD economists who believe that aggregate tax revenues rise when tax rates are reduced, in the United States (although I note that Mr. Chapman, who is the contact point at the website you mention, is a senior research programmer with a Master’s, rather than a PhD, so perhaps the analogy is not quite apt).
I didn’t say I just accept the consensus; but I have read the NRC document I cited in a previous post, and have read some of the working papers and blog posts in some contrarian sites, and have done what I think an appropriate weighting given what I know of science and statistical methodologies.
The extent of sea ice and the stability of the ice shelves are two different things. Sea ice extent depends on temperature and recent precipitation where heavier precipitation favors sea ice growth. A warming Antarctica is expected to have more rain and snow. The sea ice melts away entirely each summer. The ice shelves are extensions of the glaciers and their age is in the hundreds of years. Their breakup reflects temperature of the sea water upon which they float and surface melting. If these shelves are really shrinking, as seems to be the case, this reflects long term warming.
Menzie, first, let me apologize for the snarky response. I was reacting to something you phrased very well:
You observe quite correctly that
Global ?Warming is essentially a case study in statistics. Here’s a first part of an article written by an economist using econometric statistical practices:
http://wattsupwiththat.wordpress.com/2008/03/26/evidence-of-a-significant-solar-imprint-in-annual-globally-averaged-temperature-trends-part-1/
Your comments would be appreciated.
For the record, most skeptics agree that there is Global Warming, AND some may be caused by “Man.” What is most often argued is represented by your article. Alarmists, Al gore et. al., are just too far over the top, and their solution(s) are going to cost way too much for a scientific issue still under serious debate. An iceberg, even a big iceberg, is still just a single event. Don’t overinterpret a few observations,
“and have done what I think an appropriate weighting given what I know of science and statistical methodologies” … and we know what Disraeli said about statistics.
Regardless, statistics can show a warming trend from the 1880s through 2000. Whether or not that is attributable to CO2 produced by humans or a variety of other factors is debatable and is being vigorously debated among scientists.
What is not being addressed is the economic benefit of having a climate that is slightly warmer now than the 1880s which was particularly cold.
What is not being addressed is the economic disaster waiting to befall the world as simple-solutionists attempt to reconfigure world economies around CO2 confinement schemes.
I would think that Econbrowser would have more interest in addressing those two issues rather than stepping into the mud of whether CO2 [which has been increasing steadily] is the cause of an oscillating climate with a possibly increasing trend line.
Speaking of trend lines. The slope of a line can be determined by the starting point. Since the 1880s were among the coldest years since the beginning of modern weather records in the U.S., it does have an impact on the slope. Are we getting warming from an 1880s starting point… yes. Are we getting warmer from a 1930s starting point… no.
http://bp1.blogger.com/_b5jZxTCSlm0/R-Hr-8oHrcI/AAAAAAAABEE/6zCyGgTOhRA/s1600-h/Data+Starting+Point.JPG
“There is an equal degree of consensus that refutes the nonsense.”
Data is better than anectdotes, and anectdotes are better than lies. Guess which one yours was?
As Bruce Hall has said starting point is important. How about starting form the 1860-1870, nearly as hot as recent history. Here are three interesting charts illustrating that issue.
http://globalwarmingclearinghouse.blogspot.com/2008/03/temp-charts-updated-3302008.html
d_rumsfeld
They have been warm anomalies, but not the necessarily the, warmest years, the 1860s and 70s, have their own share, 1934, 1998, etc. It is really difficult to tell since the raw data and the publicly available data sets are smoothed, adjusted and those algorithms and values are mostly withheld from public view.
M1EK, to lie is to make a false statement that you know to be false. I wonder on what basis you presume to be informed as to the personal knowledge or beliefs of others, whom you know only through brief internet communications, and where you presume their true beliefs to be something other than what they have in fact expressed.
JDH, anybody who is that well-informed about the skeptic scientists, who asserts that the consensus on that ‘side’ is the same quality and quantity as the consensus on the AGW ‘side’ is knowingly making false statements.
One could assert that the skeptics are right – and that would be impossible to accurately declare a lie (consensus can be wrong). One could also assert, knowing little about climate science, that the ‘consensus’es on ‘both sides’ were roughly equal.
But they aren’t equal; and the person making that claim has made enough other statements to make it clear they know better.
All over the internet, the climate denial machine, for reasons of both ideology and naked economic self-interest, is doing this stuff. I would hope that like Menzie, you can see through it and call it what it is. The climatologists aren’t in any debate on this at all.
As for Dr. Peiser, he’s had his share of problems in the past – he supposedly refuted the famous Oreskes paper establishing consensus on AGW, but his refutation was so full of flaws that he, himself, had to retract it.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Benny_Peiser#Objections_to_Oreskes_Essay
M1EK, you show the pattern of platitudes of the “true” believers.
You better go to a better set of sites. Because, if anything, the debate has gotten hotter. Much of the newest analysis is refuting some of the earlier “consensus” opinions regarding man’s influence over nature’s.
If it’s all man’s fault, why has the temperature stopped climbing while GHGs are still rising? Sounds like ole Ma Nature is playing around in this issue too.
What a shock it would be to find that CO2 and GHGs play only a minor part in a Warming Climate. And, we are about to pass the $trillion mark on mitigation.
Sadly, it seems that intelligent people, on topics such as global warming, are only going to believe what they want to believe.
The ecological far left blames far too much on global warming. The libertarian and conservative right doesn’t believe in it or refuses to consider whether humans may be the cause. Both are ideological, non-referential, post-modernist in their attack on consensus.
This is what I find most appalling: the way in which the right, in many ways, has joined the left in abandoning scientific consensus when it doesn’t meet their ideology, in particular with respect to matters of religion–evolution–and economics–global warming.
For example, Kurzweil is a guy who built some speech recognition software and the likes, voice synthesizers, etc. And now he’s obsessed with living forever, taking pills, and in general looking like a nut. Yet he’s mentioned as somehow having something to do with “consensus” on global warming. And Galileo was not up against scientific consensus. He was up against ideology.
All red herrings.
Those who attack scientific consensus when the science doesn’t meet their ideological needs are undermining one of the primary grounds on which stands science and reason.
Nobody here on this blog has seen, nor can prove/disprove the existence of a quark on their own without the consensus built from a large amount of collective data. Quarks don’t exist–or exhibit their behaviors–simply because scientists are funded to find them. Quarks weren’t created by physicists simply to get funded. Yet they have received billions in funding through the years. Yet we hear false argument about the connection between global warming investigators and funding–and why that undermines their scientific consensus.
But as I said: I’m increasingly led to believe that with respect to religion, politics, and economics–people simply believe what they want to believe. Hence the right loves consensus if it supports their beliefs with respect to race and IQ but are appalled and belittle consensus when it indicates humans may be interfering negatively with the climate.
CoRev, the system is complex, has many inputs, and has multiple opportunities for feedback. The AGW theory does not say that the temperature will always go up all over the globe every single year – it says that CO2 emissions are making the world’s average temperature rise, all else being equal, and are forcing the climate system in ways that may be too abrupt to be beneficial to human life.
None of that consensus has been challenged. Not one tiny little bit. Not by Peiser, who had to back away from his claims. Not by the skeptics, dwindling day by day (although you’d never know it by the denialist machine).
In the rest of the civilized world, this isn’t even a debate. People in Western Europe look at us today like we might look at somebody in 1970 who insisted that RJR Reynolds was funding all that lung cancer ‘research’ out of their love of pure science, and that the matter was still up for debate.
Gen Spec, Sir, I agree with nearly all you said here with only one exception:
I believe that the vast majority of us ~60% believe the climate is warming. But, fewer believe the alarmist predictions.
I usually ask these questions: 1) What is the planet’s “normal” temperature? That is not for the past 150 years, but at least since man has been around. 2) What is nominal for mankind? Once we answer these questions, then we can discuss Global Warming within a meaningful context.
CoRev: I think conservatives and libertarians have come around to the possibility that the planet is warming. Hence my statement of two major camps: (1) deny globe becoming warming or (2) deny humans are causing it.
True: There is a third category–agree humans may be contributing but deny it is a problem, or one we can solve, or want to solve, or need to solve. (E.g. Lomborg).
Similar to the way in which some religious people have accepted aspects of evolution but bring in creationism to satisfy ideological needs (non-science), I see conservatives and libertarians starting to agree that warming is happening but looking for other outs–e.g. natural cycles, etc.
And science requires that people try to poke holes in theories. All for the good.
I would rephrase your question. Instead of asking what is normal since humans have been around, I’d ask what the earth will be like at a given set of temperatures and how that state of the earth matches the needs of a technological/industrial civilization of approximately 7 billion people and the needs of its supporting ecosystem.
I don’t know what the answer to that is.
I don’t know what you mean by “nominal temperature for mankind.”
1) The good Dr. Pielke and the website refenced on sea ice are skeptic sites, not to be confused with peer-reviewed consensus. That said, extent of Antartic ice melt and the relation between glaciar flow and expected increased snowfall over Antarctic interior is the least well-understood and modelled aspect of warming science. The Wilkins ice shelf event was indeed over-covered and doesn’t tell us much about Antarctica’s response.
Recent data on the Arctic ice extent and Greenland melt, on the other hand, are not ambiguous. I hope the recent jag down in temperature persists–but as we know one year does not a trend make. China’s and India’s globalization and carbon use suggest the climate of our grandchildren will be challenging, given the emissions their industrialization will produce. I’m not planning on buying a sea-side cottage in Galveston to bequeth to my grandchildren, but you skeptics are welcome to buy it all up. That said, I probably won’t see the effects in my lifetime. Just be sure to leave 2 days ahead of the hurricane arrival.
2. Despite the hoo-rah from skeptic sites, the role of CO2 & greenhouse gases in warming and link to atmospheric increases is long known. To cite this as contested reminds me that evolution remains contested.
3. The Medieval warming canard was probably regional and there is debate over global extent. It snowed several times in Dallas this year, so I suppose warming is thus refuted.
4. I wish the skeptics were right, but most rely on sites like Pielke and Exxon-funded talking points, not the peer-reviewed science which has steadily painted in a more and more disturbing picture.
Most depressingly, many appear to listen primarily to Mr. Limbaugh, whose recent citing of winter temperatures to confute global warming may have risen to an all-time high of uninformed literacy. Given a choice between the NYT and him, the former at least tries.
I believe most everyone is in that third category, skeptics and believers. You make my point:
Why is this statement not surprising? If we don’t know what is best for us, then how can we say what is Better? Worse? bad?
But we are going at a breakneck speed to spend $trillions to mitigate to a level of comfort defined by today.
M1EK, Here’s one study which reviewed much of the scientific literature. Its findings:
From here:
http://scienceandpublicpolicy.org/images/stories/papers/reprint/schulte_two_colmun_fomat.pdf
I haven’t read the whole paper so … take it for what it’s worth.
CoRev,
Where do you get the trillions of dollars figure for mitigating global warming? As an atmospheric scientist, I would like to get my hands on some of that largesse, if possible….
CoRev said,
They have been warm anomalies, but not the necessarily the, warmest years, the 1860s and 70s, have their own share, 1934, 1998, etc. It is really difficult to tell since the raw data and the publicly available data sets are smoothed, adjusted and those algorithms and values are mostly withheld from public view.
Your argument is that the older years had higher global average temperatures than more recent years? Or that the data set is insufficiently comprehensive to determine the record?
I’m a bit confused about this, since it is clear that if you go back for the last 30 years, the global temperatures have been increasing. Once we lose the satellite record, there are multiple difficulties with assessing land records which will cause problems, but I’m very confident that the multiple datasets available (tree rings, ice cores, borehole temperatures, meteorological sites, ocean temperatures at multiple depths, etc.) are more than sufficient to construct a reasonable estimate of global temperatures over the past 150 years. So I’m unclear what your argument by proxy is stating…Would you care to make your argument more explicit?
Rob, there are always two sides to a discussion, and i find that the two sides in this discussion quote their favorite sources without questioning them. Here, again is what I found interesting from that previous quote (see above):
It is the alarmist/catastrophic predictions of which most are skeptical.
Global Warning being shown by trend lines, it appears that the trend line for support of the catastrophic result is going down. At least for now.
Rob, M12EK, et. al. this is Dr Pielke’s own view:
If that is a skeptic’s views then count me in that category.
We are in the process of spending $trillions, seriously impacting countries’ economies, and changing man’s life style worldwide, for a theory whose impact, has been proven only in models. Models that have proven to be much less than accurate short term. Before complaining about the short term comment, if they truly understand the mechanics of climate then it is reflected in their short term predictions. Any other belief in the models is going on blind faith.
Pielke’s comment from here:
http://climatesci.org/2008/03/31/roger-a-pielke-srs-perspective-on-the-role-of-humans-in-climate-change/
1. It doesn’t have one. It is well known that there have been regularly occuring ice ages in the last several hundred thousand years.
2. I don’t understand the question? Humans live at the equator and at the poles.
The real question is is the population density now so high, that any change in climate will have catastrophic effects on some significant part of the human population? In particular, very large populations live in areas subject to desertification and/or flooding.
d_rumfeld, I was objecting to your comment that the past few years have been the warmest on record. On record is a limiting factor, and the HadCRUT3 raw data (at least as raw as publicly available) show several years as warm or warmer.
And, yes, this is my argument:
Furthermore, I argue that selecting the starting point matters. If, for example we start calculating trend lines sometime in 1860 or 1870, we get a completely different picture. Nearly “NO” global warming.
I will not argue the proxie issue at this point. Just refer you to Steve McIntyre’s site. In a nut shell using the proxies to measure the past 150 years is problematical. Many are not even useful for these short time frames. McIntyre’s site: http://www.climateaudit.org/
As far as using the past 30 years for a time frame (Yes, I know it is a common construct) then I can use the past 10 years. Thus making my point of the impacts of starting points.
The $trillion refer to the multitude of mitigation laws being enacted and proposed. Sorry, not grant funds.
Reason, I think you are making my point that these questions have not been answered. I also think you are making a point that they are not important? Please clarify for this ole brain.
Do any of you know the difference between sea ice and glacial ice? Hint. The Wilkins ice was galcial. Economists, sadly are not equiped to do more than worry about weather.
Remember the sun spot theories?
“Their breakup reflects temperature of the sea water upon which they float and surface melting. If these shelves are really shrinking, as seems to be the case, this reflects long term warming.”
Well in this case the climatologists need to talk to the geologists as there appears to be a recently discovered active volcano operating underneath the nearby ice sheet. See here
Sebastian:
“Co-author Professor David Vaughan (BAS) says,”This eruption occurred close to Pine Island Glacier on the West Antarctic Ice Sheet. The flow of this glacier towards the coast has speeded up in recent decades and it may be possible that heat from the volcano has caused some of that acceleration. However, it cannot explain the more widespread thinning of West Antarctic glaciers that together are contributing nearly 0.2mm per year to sea-level rise. This wider change most probably has its origin in warming ocean waters.””
In this case you should read what you link to before you post.
CoRev, your excerpts are from a previous Peiser attempt to challenge Oreskes’ paper, which he himself had to back away from as it was completely invalid (he didn’t replicate her procedure; and others that tried to replicate HIS procedure ended up with results more similar to hers than his).
M1EK-
If you read CoRev’s posts you will see that he cites a report by Pielke, not Peiser.
Actually, we’re both off – the comment I was responding to excerpted Schulte, although it’s similar to the discredited Peiser paper.
Also, you should be aware that “Energy and Environment” is not exactly a well-regarded journal in the field.
More background here:
http://www.yaleclimatemediaforum.org/features/0907_oreskes_schulte.htm
“But after his work was criticized by a number of climate scientists, who said most of those 34 papers did not actually reject the IPCC consensus, Peiser later retracted his critique, saying only one of the 34 papers had actually rejected the IPCC position. That one paper, from the American Association of Petroleum Geologists Bulletin, was not peer-reviewed and had not been included in Oreskes’s original analysis.”
[…]
“Without knowing specifically which 32 papers Schulte identifies as implicitly or explicitly rejecting the consensus position on climate change (because his full study itself has not yet been published), firm conclusions remain elusive. Lord Christopher Monckton, in the United Kingdom, however, has said seven abstracts in the Schulte paper explicitly reject the consensus position.
That view is in turn is challenged in a detailed analysis finding that only three of those seven abstracts reject the consensus position, with the other four remaining neutral or implicitly supporting the consensus.
Perhaps in response to the online controversy generated by leaked versions of the article, the journal in which it was to appear, Energy and Environment, appears to have reversed course. Its editor, Dr. Sonja A. Boehmer-Christiansen said in an e-mail to Richard Littlemore of desmogblog.com that the Schulte paper “was a bit patchy and nothing new … not what was of interest to me; nothing has been published.”
While proponents of Schulte’s findings may no longer rightly claim the mantle of peer review, the article has already been spread relatively widely in some media circles. Printed retractions will inevitably reach a much smaller audience. The situation demonstrates the dangers of reporting, perhaps particularly in the popular media, on “sensational” and “breakthrough” research not yet formally published.
So it appears that Schulte’s research is unlikely to unseat the continued view of a consensus in the peer-reviewed literature and among most climatologists that humans are the primary driver of current climate change as a result of the continuing buildup of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. Critics of that consensus likely will have to look elsewhere to support their position.”
M1EK, I haven’t found any reference to your comment that Peiser “backed away” from his original research. I did find the letter of rejection from “Science”.
It certainly does not refute his research; furthermore, it appears “Science” rejected all letters conflicting with Oreskes research. Bias? I dunno.
My reference for the Oreske quotes was from a medical paper, citing here earlier and later research. At least that’s how I read the paper.
If you have a reference to the Peeiser backing away, i would appreciate it. I want to write an article over at my site.
As I wrote earlier in this thread:
What is not being addressed is the economic benefit of having a climate that is slightly warmer now than the 1880s which was particularly cold.
What is not being addressed is the economic disaster waiting to befall the world as simple-solutionists attempt to reconfigure world economies around CO2 confinement schemes.
I would think that Econbrowser would have more interest in addressing those two issues rather than stepping into the mud of whether CO2 [which has been increasing steadily] is the cause of an oscillating climate with a possibly increasing trend line.
For example, is the focus on unproven/unreliable power technologies such as wind/solar reasonable and logical and will the cost/benefit be positive or negative compared with other alternatives such as 4th generation nuclear power plants.
For example, should the focus be on clean-burning turbo diesels that have equal or better fuel mileage than gasoline/nickel-hydride battery hybrids and avoid the environmental concerns of expanded nickel mining.
It seems that Econbrowser has lost its way temporarily by venturing into the political/scientific/quasi-religious realm of climate debate rather than examining the economic logic of proposed “solutions.”
Where is the scholarship?
Bruce Hall: Please direct your criticisms at, not Econbrowser, but me, since James Hamilton bears no responsibility for posts I have written.
If oil doubles will wind still be considered “unproven”? At this point, in many areas it is already cost-competitive with everything but coal (without a carbon tax or trading). I believe the Danes and Euros have already “proven” it–and the U.S. fell far behind in the manufacturing race for wind components. Same is happening in solar. We’re continued to lump our incentive eggs in oil/gas, and now we’re beginning to reap the “benefit.”
That said, you can’t rely on merely wind or solar for base load. Nuclear will help, particularly on the Co2 front.
CoRev
No, the answer to your questions is well known. But your questions are irrelevant. Everybody, it seems to me misses the main point. We should stop thinking of the looming crisis as an economic or an environmental crisis. (It is both locally, but not universally). The real crisis will be political, with unheard of numbers of refugees. Read Jared Diamond and think about it.
Satellite imagery from the National Snow and Ice Data Center at the University of Colorado at Boulder reveals that a 13,680 square kilometer (5,282 square mile) ice shelf has begun to collapse because of rapid climate change in a fast-warming region of Antarctica.
Wow! Our satellites have really become amazing. Not only do they show ice shelves collapse in Antarctica but they even know why. I wonder if they could tell us the reason for every ice shelf collapse for the past 10,000 years.
Oh, BTW does anyone know how much global warming there has been in the past 5 years?
CoRev, I already provided the wikipedia link for Peiser, and the following is contained within:
“Peiser has recently conceded in a letter to the Australian Media Watch that he no longer maintains one of his criticisms, and that he no longer doubts that “an overwhelming majority of climatologists is agreed that the current warming period is mostly due to human impact. However, this majority consensus is far from unanimous.”[7]”
Peiser was rejected from Science because his ‘research’ doesn’t meet the standards for a peer-reviewed journal.
M1EK, I think our posts crossed on the ether.
DickF,
Yup, I do. Actually, if we go back to 98 or 1934 we can see a drop in Global Warming. Or if we go back to the 1860/70s we can see little or no warming. But, then we would have to admit starting and ending points matter when we calculate trend lines.
Going back to the original message in this article, there are many physical weather forces that caused the ice shelf to collapse. Are those physical forces caused by “Climate Change/Global Warming?” Perhaps, perhaps partially, perhaps not at all.
Regarding criticism of Econbrowser:
Authors
* James D. Hamilton is Professor of Economics at the University of California, San Diego
* Menzie Chinn is Professor of Public Affairs and Economics at the University of Wisconsin, Madison
Regardless, the point is not to criticize a discussion about global warming, but to point out that the real focus on this forum ought to be about the economic impact of certain schemes related to beliefs about global warming [aka Climate Change].
For example, are we running out of oil or are we simply legislating ourselves out of it:
* http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?file=/c/a/2008/04/01/MNEVVTF63.DTL&type=printable
* http://alfin2100.blogspot.com/2008/03/lot-more-oil-where-that-came-from.html
Does it make sense to incur the economic [and environmental] cost of mining nickel for hybrid vehicle batteries when turbo-diesels use less fuel [even comparing a smaller hybrid to a larger diesel-powered car]:
http://www.timesonline.co.uk/tol/audio_video/times_online_tv/?vxSiteId=d8fa78dc-d7ad-4d5a-8886-e420d4bc4200&vxChannel=Life%20and%20Style&vxClipId=1152_Flashmini_0381&vxBitrate=300
Or since the largest landmasses on the planet are in the northern hemisphere, what would be the economic impact of longer growing seasons?
It seems as if this blog misses many opportunities to discuss important economic issues related to popular topics.
“Does it make sense to incur the economic [and environmental] cost of mining nickel for hybrid vehicle batteries when turbo-diesels use less fuel [even comparing a smaller hybrid to a larger diesel-powered car]:”
A common piece of FUD. Nobody comes close to the Prius for its interior size. No, not even diesels.
Re economic impact, does it make sense not to try to prevent the economic cost of global warming? Sea level rise, drought, infectious diseases, etc. don’t occur without a price.
The economic discussion is ultimately a discussion about who benefits and who bears the cost. The loudest “skeptic” voices are those who benefit from the creation and fallout of the problem.
“A common piece of FUD. Nobody comes close to the Prius for its interior size. No, not even diesels.”
I used to drive a BMW 740iL but dumped it (and I mean almost literally dumped it–BMW’s are junk in my book) three years ago for a Prius, which has an impressive amount of interior space–even for adult in the back.
I’ll match your puny Prius against my F-350 Crew Cab for space. BTW, even in that 8,000 lb truck with cap, it got 16.81MPG East coast to Las Vegas, MI, and back. if you’ve driven US I40 west, you know what speed are run.
This thread has digressed, so I will bring up one other GW point about CO2 and GHGs.
Water vapour is by far the most important greenhouse gas, followed by the first 40 ppm of CO2, then by the next 80 ppm, then the next 160 and so on. The few ppms that we are now adding to the atmosphere are very minor in the overall greenhouse effect. The greenhouse effect of CO2 decays logarithmically as concentrations increase. Too many people falsely believe that it is a linear function. It is not. A few more ppms of CO2 are insignificant!
And CO2 is growing exponentially (from what I read).
This discussion, in many ways , is the problem I referred to above. I could be wrong, but I suspect CoRev, while an intelligent guy, is just pulling out data that “proves” his belief, not unlike my quicky perusal of the data to determine that while CO2 forcing is logarithmic, CO2 is growing exponentially, negating his logarithmic counter-argument.
Without a community of experts, we have noise–which is pretty much what I find in blogs. Noise.
In the present case though–global warming–the peer process is convering on an answer that is unwanted by many–so they rely on blogs and “alternative sources” of data to–at minimum–increase uncertainty.
Re economic impact, does it make sense not to try to prevent the economic cost of global warming? Sea level rise, drought, infectious diseases, etc. don’t occur without a price.
The economic discussion is ultimately a discussion about who benefits and who bears the cost. The loudest “skeptic” voices are those who benefit from the creation and fallout of the problem.
I suspect that we haven’t really had a study that confirms rising sea levels, et al and that also confirms deleterious-only effects from any warming that might have/might occur. There will be winners and losers and I suspect that warming will bring more winners than losers economically… without the dire consequences. It certainly will bring money into the coffers of those who go on the traveling-show trail… such as Al Gore… and will be a big winner for energy companies that will receive all kinds of subsidies to develop higher-cost alternatives for consumers.
But that’s what needs to be examined by economists, not the debatable science of climate change. How will over-reacting to unsubstantiated possibilities affect our nation and the world… economically?
And, further, ask yourselves why people are moving to warmer climes if they fear increasing warmth? That’s not rational… but it is happening.
Land and homes are plentiful and cheap in the cold north, so why move south? Perhaps because the political machinations of a few have resulted in an energy policy that assures most of us will have homes that we can’t afford to heat or jobs to which we can’t afford to drive?
http://money.cnn.com/2008/03/24/news/economy/camden_alabama/index.htm?section=money_topstories
General, Sir, CO2 exponentially???? Really?? Care to find that scientific paper? I would like to put it up at my clearinghouse.
“There will be winners and losers and I suspect that warming will bring more winners than losers economically…”
That’s absurd – species we depend on to make our life on this planet comfortable for 6 billion of us (more or less comfortable for some) aren’t remotely as able to adapt to rapid changes in climate as we are.
The historical record is full of past climate changes which weren’t as abrupt as this one is shaping up to be which were massive extinction events.
Next you’ll trot out the hoary old joke about how we’ll all be better off because we can buy beachfront property in Houston instead of Galveston.
For the econbrowser suggestion box: An infrequent guest blogger who posts about the economics of climate change. I agree with Bruce that the economics of climate change is apropos to this blog. It would be nice to get beyond the jejune logic in statements like, “And, further, ask yourselves why people are moving to warmer climes if they fear increasing warmth? That’s not rational… but it is happening.”
“”The de-seasonalized, postindustrial trend in added carbon dioxide has been increasing exponentially, with a doubling time of about 32 years,” according to a NOAA report on global CO2 measurements.”
from
http://starbulletin.com/2007/03/29/news/story08.html
That’s how this works right: find a reference that supports one’s position and then make an argument based upon it that leads–lo and behold–to the conclusion I want?
Not trying to be difficult here. Just that I find mostly noise in blog discussions about anything having to do with religion or regulation. Some good arguments, but blog comments will never converge.
Sorry GS, but the record doesn’t support your contention. See the actual graph at http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/gmd/ccgg/trends/co2_data_mlo.html.
Eyeballing the 50 years of data, CO2 rose from about 315 PPM to 385 PPM. No doubling every 32 years – more like every 173 years. Graph sure looks more like a linear trend than an exponential one.
Anonymous-
That’s 50 years of data, and your opinion. I’d say it’s marginally exponential (assuming you’re talking about the full Mauna Loa record). And what do you see in the full ice core record?
CoRev-
Do you have the IPCC reports in your clearinghouse?
Anonymous: The reference I provided says it’s picked up since 2005. CoRev made a statement with no reference about the logarithmic relationship. Do I think CO2 is buliding up exponentially now? Who knows. I’d want to see more data. I’m simply saying that most of what takes place in blogs is noise, a hallway conversation with a crown of hecklers, hecklers with google.
Google does not an expert make. Nor does just assembling data and a set of references. What was the process for assembling data? And what are the credentials of those assembling data?
I’ve seen some economists (libertarian) argue that blogs are the new place for truth and economics to happen, consensus is old hat, credentials are passe. They are postmodernists. And the result will be noise.
fido, absolutely!
General, doubling is not exponential growth. (315 X 315) or (315 X 315 X 315) = exponential. 315 X 2= ??? well doubling/simple arithmetic. I guess a reporter without a science background can misquote or a Station Director can over state. Pick your poison on this one.
BTW, my request was for a scientific paper, not a newspaper. If you do find it I would like a link.
fido, absolutely!
General, doubling is not exponential growth. (315 X 315) or (315 X 315 X 315) = exponential. 315 X 2= ??? well doubling/simple arithmetic. I guess a reporter without a science background can misquote or a Station Director can over state. Pick your poison on this one.
BTW, my request was for a scientific paper, not a newspaper. If you do find it I would like a link.
It’s the following:
“NOAAs global measurements of CO2 are
shown in Figure 2 along with the Keeling
CO2 records from South Pole and Mauna Loa
[Keeling and Whorf, 2005]. As indicated in
the inset, the deseasonalized, postindustrial
trend in added carbon dioxide has been
increasing exponentially with a doubling
time of about 32 years.”
The added amount. Which is pretty obvious given that humans use of fossil fuels has been growing exponentially–as does the economy.
http://equake.geol.vt.edu/acourses/3114/global_warming/061114eos-climate.pdf
My point is that one cannot just pull out “it’s logarithmic” and then somehow assume that everything’s cool.
CoRev-
“Contributions to accelerating atmospheric CO2 growth
from economic activity, carbon intensity, and
efficiency of natural sinks”
PNAS, Canadell et al. 104 (47): 18866. (2007)
First line of the abstract:
“The growth rate of atmospheric carbon dioxide (CO2), the largest human contributor to human-induced climate change, is increasing rapidly.”
fido, General, please, you are misreading what I said. I asked for GS to show me the scientific paper that states CO2 is growing exponentially. The comment I was referencing
What he has found is a statement that says a “trend (line) is increasing exponentially. quite different. BTW, thanks I will put the source up at my site.
fido, your find is even further from GS’s. I NEVER said CO2 was not increasing. I did say:
From here: http://www.climateaudit.org/?p=2594 and references this Blog response: http://motls.blogspot.com/2008/01/why-is-greenhouse-effect-logarithmic.html which gives even more history of the theory. BTW, the theory has been around from the first papers explaining CO2 (carbonic acid.)
Thus negating GS’s contention that the blogs mostly have noise. Although I must admit this thread has provided much proof otherwise.
CoRev-
If the rate of growth is increasing rapidly, is this not an exponential function?
fido: No. If you only consider the CO2 humans have added, one would expect it to grow exponentially–because economic growth is exponential and the consumption of fossil fuels largely tracks economic growth (with a few glitches here and there for shocks and efficiencies).
But there is a base of CO2 not produced by humans that exists in and of itself (call it natural) and therefore one cannot say that the CO2 as a whole is growing exponentially. Now, if humans continue to add it exponentially, then over time the human component would overtake the non-human part and one would expect the growth to become more exponential.
So I suppose one could say that growth is becoming more exponential.
But it is not exponential. My main point in bringing it up is that CoRev’s saying that additional ppm of CO2 is insignificant completely ignores the feedback mechanisms. He’s looking at a narrow aspect of this issue and then writing a broad statement that people might misunderstand (similar to this exponential issue I introduced).
If there is a tipping point, then whether logarithmic or not, additional ppm of CO2 will push us over it, driving feedback mechanism that will make the additional ppm of CO2 very significant.
That’s my point. In a blog conversational environment like this, comments are thrown about willy-nilly, they then have a life of their own, a sort of echo chamber, and I’m not convinced whether all this noise converges to anything useful. I’m just not sure.
fido, not mathematically.
Fido-
Mathematically, growth in a quantity “y” is exponential if it can be expressed in the following way: y = ab^x. A and b are coefficients. If you graph this function, you see that y goes up at an increasing rate as a x increases. Colloquially, exponential is used to describe very rapid growth. GS makes this claim about CO2 because CO2 has “picked up since 2005”. That’s a pretty slim support for his argument. The Mauna Loa graph looks pretty close to linear to me.
Incidentally, there is an interesting blog that features climate resources and opposing points of view – http://climatedebatedaily.com/. The latest post under “Dissenting Voices” concerns the Wilkins Ice Shelf.
I have nothing to do with CDD – it was started by the same people who have been doing Arts & Letters Daily.
Menzie – you have a great BLOG site it is a wealth of valuable insights into economics. Just a word of advice: stay away from “speculation” about global warming.
As someone who has studied atmospheric physics, I can assure you there is an awful lot of “we don’t know what we don’t know” in this domain! But panicking, that the sky is falling because the trees are dropping acorns (actually it happens to be fall and it is normal), might simply prove to be a grand mistake that is triggered when scientists all compete with eachother to jump to dramatic conclusions. This type of scientific blunder had all happened before.
Indeed it might be a worthy “economics” study to understand if there is indeed an “economic self-interest angle” to competing doomsday claims by scientists.
My last comment seems to have been lost or deleted.
Fido: CO2 is not growing exponentially. The human additions are. Which makes sense–use of fossil fuels tracks economic growth which is exponential. The growth in CO2 will become more exponential as human contributions increase–unless we use less fossil fuels or remove the carbon.
CoRev: When you say that the logarithmic relation of CO2 to climate makes additional ppm’s irrelevant, I think we have to consider the broader picture, in particular feedback mechanism. The last bit of co2 that leads to a tipping point–if one exists–is relevant.
Rich: Yeah, that climate site might prove to be a useful source for information, art and letters author’s personal conservative libertarian bias notwithstanding (I read it daily and it seems relatively balanced in my opinion–so I’m not complaining). But sites like that still seem like the news: let’s look at all opinions. Fine. But no convergence. No consensus from which policy can or cannot sensibly be derived.
Thanks, Rich. If Canadell et al are right, it makes perfect sense. Simply put: increasing rate of emissions and less efficient sinks lead to increasing growth rate of atmospheric co2. So the curve may be close to linear, but exponential nevertheless.
Gentlemen,
General S’s statement that there is a lot of noise here is confirmed.
We are now bogged down in a silly agrument about whether “A doubling every 32 years” constitutes “exponential groth” (it does, since it can be expressed as 2 ^ (32*t)), or if the CO2 does indeed double every 32 years (I don’t know).
But I do know that this is an irrelevant discussion, similar to the old religious fights about how many angels could dance on a pin-head.
I share the view that it would be much more interesting to analyze what economic effect a moderate temperture increase would have, or: What would the cost side of the equation be, if we decided that we wanted to limit CO2 growth (it isn’t clear that it must be in the Trillions).
Similarly I think it is legitimate to discuss the cost of global warming, regardless of whether we belive that it is ongoing or not.
Bellanson
Really, this thread started with noise (“Wow…scare! words!”). Now, maybe we all should have read the CBO’s report that Prof. Chinn links to in his post and discussed, but it’s much easier to do a quick Google search and make a terse statement based upon what’s found (something I am clearly guilty of). I would argue that noise in discussion threads is no different than noise in letters to newspaper editors – and equally as inconsequential. I post to discussions because I like discussions. Where there is room for concern is when there is noise in original blog posts in the form of disinformation. Wow, now even I am annoyed with how far off-topic we’ve gotten…