Let hope our responses to the next ones are better than “Heckuva job, Brownie”.
Abstract: Detection and attribution of past changes in cyclone activity are hampered by biased cyclone records due to changes in observational capabilities. Here, we relate a homogeneous record of Atlantic tropical cyclone activity based on storm surge statistics from tide gauges to changes in global temperature patterns. We examine 10 competing hypotheses using nonstationary generalized extreme value analysis with different predictors (North Atlantic Oscillation, Southern Oscillation, Pacific Decadal Oscillation, Sahel rainfall, Quasi-Biennial Oscillation, radiative forcing, Main Development Region temperatures and its anomaly, global temperatures, and gridded temperatures). We find that gridded temperatures, Main Development Region, and global average temperature explain the observations best. The most extreme events are especially sensitive to temperature changes, and we estimate a doubling of Katrina magnitude events associated with the warming over the 20th century. The increased risk depends on the spatial distribution of the temperature rise with highest sensitivity from tropical Atlantic, Central America, and the Indian Ocean. Statistically downscaling 21st century warming patterns from six climate models results in a twofold to sevenfold increase in the frequency of Katrina magnitude events for a 1 °C rise in global temperature (using BNU-ESM, BCC-CSM-1.1, CanESM2, HadGEM2-ES, INM-CM4, and NorESM1-M).
Regarding the model simulations:
We have calibrated models from each individual grid cell and combined all of these into a single model. This downscaled model incorporates all of the competing teleconnection effects discussed above. We map the projected warming patterns through this statistical model to project future changes. We emphasize that this is not a blind statistical extrapolation exercise, as we have verified that the teleconnection patterns are consistent with well-known physical relationships. To demonstrate the cyclone number evolution over the 21st century (Fig. 3), we project changes in the frequency of Katrinas using gridded and global mean temperatures from an ESM with a ∼2.4 °C warming over the 21st century (RCP4.5) (38). We examine the intraclimate model variability using output from six models (BNU-ESM, BCC-CSM-1.1, CanESM2, HadGEM2-ES, INM-CM4, and NorESM1-M). The response to a 1-°C warming is consistently an increase by a factor of 2–7, despite the spread in climate sensitivity between ESMs. The model forced by global average temperature yield projections near identical to the full spatial model (Fig. 3 and SI Katrina Sensitivity to Global Warming). The MDR model is less sensitive to warming (Table 2, Fig. 3, and Fig. S1), but results in projections that are consistent with the results from both the full spatial model, and the global model. In SI Sensitivity Tests, we perform a range of sensitivity tests by changing statistical methods, data treatment, and impact of data gaps. All tests indicate confidence in the factor 2–7 increase in the number of Katrina magnitude surges for each degree of global warming. This increase does not include the additional increasing surge threat from sea level rise (21).
Fig. 3.
Number of Katrina magnitude surge events per decade (B) hindcast and projected changes in temperatures from BNU-ESM under for RCP4.5 (A). The thick blue line shows the projection using the full spatial gridded temperatures and confidence interval (5–16–84–95%); magenta and black show the projections using only MDR and global average surface temperature. Confidence intervals for MDR and global T (not shown for clarity) are about the same size as for the gridded model.
Of course, sea levels are rising, and apparently faster than earlier projected. From CNN today:
It was less than two years ago that the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change released its all-encompassing assessment on the current state of climate change research and made projections for the future climate of our planet.
According to the latest from NASA, however, the projections the panel made for a rise in global sea levels of 1 to 3 feet may already be outdated.
According to Steven Nerem of the University of Colorado, we are “locked into at least 3 feet of sea level rise, and probably more.”
Nerem said experts now think a rise in sea levels toward “the higher end of that range is more likely, and the question remains how that range might have to shift upwards.”
Trump is right about one thing: Overwhelming incompetence in government.
PeakTrader: It would pay to consult some analysis before making blanket statements. FEMA pre-Bush worked. See here.
There’s still overwhelming incompetence in government. I’m sure, people wouldn’t have any problem citing plenty of examples.
Peak Trader: I see. Proof by assertion.
Menzie,
President Obama admitted in his speech in New Orleans that the government has failed in New Orleans and there is still much to do even after 10 years, of course he didn’t point out that 7 years was his failure.
Another thing he didn’t point out is that Katrina made land fall at Bay St. Louis and Waveland, Mississippi. The hurricane did much more damage in Mississippi but because Mississippi had strong infrastructure because of a Republican government. New Orleans and Louisiana had been run by Democrats for years. New Orleans was devastated because of decades of Democrat mismanagement of the Levee boards. Being a Levee board commissioner can be very lucrative. Salaries are usually small but with per diem and travel compensation can exceed $100K per year. All before any maintenance on the levee. Levee commissioners have also made some interesting investments with levee funds such as buying air craft and financing casinos. The level of corruption of the levee boards is infamous in New Orleans.
President Obama’s speech reminded me of a contrast of management styles. Mississippi allowed the market to work and has virtually totally recovered. While New Orleans was waiting for government handouts and shipping citizens to Texas and Georgia, Mississippi was in recovery. President Obama was excited that after 10 years the government almost had a school built in the Touring Faubourg Lafitte neighborhood, but the Mississippi school districts opened on time in 2005.
As President Obama made clear, Katrina gives us a clear example of government central planning failure, Mississippi demonstrated the market once again working its miracle.
ricardo,
you have a very distorted interpretation of the events related to hurricane katrina. mississippi did not recover better because it had superior infrastructure and new orleans was mismanaged. two significantly different events occurred in those 2 locations.
the mississippi coastline is above sea level, which allowed the storm surge to recede very quickly once the storm passed. the elevation limited the acreage of land that was submerged-it was a small area compared to new orleans. transportation avenues were also not destroyed, allowing rescue and then construction vehicles easy access to the damaged areas. the damage zone was mostly limited to the storm surge area on the coast. most of the homes destroyed in this area were known to be in storm surge vulnerable locations with no protection.
the new orleans failure was a man made event for the most part. levee design and construction, from decades ago, were faulty from the very beginning. much of this can be attributed to the army corps of engineers. the local levee boards do not do the design and construction. of course maintenance could have been better through the years, but it would not have changed the performance of a faulty levee design and construction led by the corps. the new orleans levees failed during an event that should not have created failure, due to this combination of design and construction flaws. see the army corps about this.
Now, for the recovery aspect, the greater new orleans area subjected to the flooding was much larger than that experienced by mississippi. This is an enormous factor in the rate of recovery. in addition, access to the new orleans areas was essentially restricted to the interstate from baton rouge on the west side. the east side causeway system was destroyed by the storm surge. in addition, that led to mississippi, so little support could be expected from that direction anyway. for several months there was really only one was into and out of the city available to construction vehicles. try to support the reconstruction of a major city with only one road of egress. The issues new orleans had to address were significantly greater than those subjected to the mississippi coast. no housing for construction workers, clean water and sewer, electrical power, flood water that could not be pumped out…the list goes on and on. The initial cause was failure by the army corps. The local geography dictated the rest of the issues.
Mississippi had hardships, there is no doubt. but their recovery was not hindered nearly to the degree the people in new orleans had to endure. Party politics was not the major difference here, as you claim.
I can’t believe I’m agreeing partly with PeakTrader, but FEMA failed when tested to such a high degree. It’s a different form of failure and the response to that is not simple. For example, if we planned for a Katrina type disaster – replace with Hurricane Sandy – in the usual course of business, we’d be displacing potential future spending into the present, which would cause tradeoffs. A current example is Puget Sound: now that the area has been identified for a potential very large earthquake at some point from now to some hundreds of years, do we spend current dollars to retrofit schools and move those exposed to tidal waves, etc.? Even if we develop a longer term budget – say 50 years – how much do we spend now and what do we not spend on, partly because odds are low we’d raise revenue for this, partly because we aren’t going to mobilize the people and expertise necessary to pull together this kind of vast building effort.
When we build a FEMA, we make noises to ourselves about its capabilities but we can’t fund it, staff it, maintain its operating capacity for the worst cases. Imagine if we did, if for example we kept mobile housing units set up ready to be deployed. That would take money at every step, including maintenance and replacement of pieces and wholes over time plus all the people and training and so on. Even the Katrina case itself says this: in hindsight, the Army Corps of Engineers should have made the levees a higher priority but there hadn’t been such a disaster from way before living memory so how could they rationally say at the time “we should not do this with our resources so we can take care of a worst case that might never happen”.
So yeah FEMA failed. And it’s wrong to say it worked before because it failed in circumstances where it rationally would fail. I’m reminded of the models used in trading: tail events are by their nature tail events and models must put less weight on tail events to be accurate modeling for all the rest of the time. I don’t see how we can build a FEMA or other model that is robust across the entire distribution. Even if it accounts for tail events, it can’t weight them well except by historical reference and the nature of tail events is they don’t fit well into historical reference modeling or they wouldn’t be tail events. So for example, Hurricane Sandy exposed lots of problems with NYC’s transit and power capabilities … but those had never failed before.
Jonathon, a nice logical response without all the emotionalism and politicization. Nicely done!
Who cares what he is right about? Are you here to campaign for him?
PT: It would appear from the report that the overwhelming incompetence in government you refer to lay primarily in the executive and legislative branches of the federal government in not funding as needed to deal with known risks here at home. These were the same people who, for example, didn’t properly fund the VA and would preferentially cut taxes than care for veterans. They did provide funds for Iraq, of course. So if your premise is that government employees are generally incompetent, they are overall more likely to be orders of magnitude more competent than some of the people that get elected — or appointed by the Supreme Court. When it comes to dealing with climate science, the right wing political party is beyond incompetent.
I try to not spend a lot of time thinking about climate change alarmism, because, well, I’m not alarmed. Usually, I feel like making jokes when this topic comes up. But once in a while a climate paper comes along that reminds me why I don’t believe this stuff.
Looks like the climate change guys have realized that if they want to characterize rare events such as large hurricanes, extreme value theory is just waiting to be used. So, the paper estimates a generalized extreme value distribution. Of course, you look in vain for serious specification testing. Where are the Q-Q plots? What about out of sample testing that shows that the model really does have real world predictability? Don’t we need many centuries of data at the very least to estimate the tail of a distribution? A thousand years would be nice. Oh well, we’re talking about climate research.
But it gets worse. To estimate the effect of global warming on the number of large hurricanes going forward, the authors throw in some of the GCMs. So, the GCM models are solving partial differential equations to predict 3-dimensional fluid flow in the air and sea. But there’s a little problem. Because of the computational complexity of the problem, the GCM models have to discretize the ocean and atmosphere at a coarser level than cloud microphysical processes occur, so that cloud processes are crudely approximated in these models. But clouds are incredibly important in determining the feedback effects that either amplify or dampen the greenhouse effect. Oh well, we’re talking about climate research.
In this paper, we have now 2 sources of speculation: the extreme value theory model and the GCMs.
Of course, the third source of speculation is to have thinking man’s thinking man, Al Gore, to give us the inevitable policy advice to protect us from disaster: a high tax, regulatory welfare state.
If anybody really believed this stuff, they’d be looking at beach property set back from the beach in Maine. If the climate change alarmists are right, Maine will be the new Florida and when the ocean rises, they’ll be beachfront. Are the climate scientists buying property close to the beach in Maine? Seems like a great opportunity. Actually, I’d be happy to sell them some at a reasonable price. Given what they are trying to sell me, turnabout’s fair play.
Rick it gets even worse. Menzie cited the NASA report. So did Kevin in the other thread. Fro the site alarmist hate so much we get an analysis of Menzies CNN/NASA claim. “Of course, sea levels are rising, and apparently faster than earlier projected. From CNN today:
It was less than two years ago that the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change released its all-encompassing assessment on the current state of climate change research and made projections for the future climate of our planet.
According to the latest from NASA, however, the projections the panel made for a rise in global sea levels of 1 to 3 feet may already be outdated.
According to Steven Nerem of the University of Colorado, we are “locked into at least 3 feet of sea level rise, and probably more.”
Nerem said experts now think a rise in sea levels toward “the higher end of that range is more likely, and the question remains how that range might have to shift upwards.” (Yes, I did remove some white space.)
From WUWT we have this article: http://wattsupwiththat.com/2015/08/28/on-nasas-recent-sea-level-claim-science-isnt-broken-except-when-it-is/
In it is the Nerem comment actually broken down into real world numbers and graphics. This is graph shows the history of sea level rise for the Holocene.
https://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2015/08/global-mean-sea-level-1931-2013-3.png?w=720&h=523
And the numbers: “The only way sea level rise could approach the high end of the IPCC range is if it exponentially accelerates… (a graphs is here) The rate from 2081-2100 would have to average 20 mm per year, twice that of the Holocene Transgression. This is only possible in bad science fiction movies.”
The WUWT article concludes with this:
“…The claim that the 3 inches if sea level rise from 1992-2015 is inline with 3 feet of sea level rise in the 21st century is patently false and demonstrably disprovable. The accurate statement that sea level is rising faster now than it was 50 years ago is cherry-picking of the highest order. Warning that “it’s very likely to get worse in the future,” is the scientific equivalent of shouting “Fire!” in a crowded movie theater because you constructed a model which predicts that the projection system will burst into flames if it malfunctions at some point in the future.”
It is from these exaggerated claims and just plain bad science that so many of these articles stem. When confronted with actual data, and analysis of their own claims we see alarmists completely ignore the data. After ignoring the data, failing to do the simplest math, or performing any critical thinking, they continue down the alarmist path based upon this kind of rubbish, and its being put out by our own government(s).
Corev,
Given the alarmist environment, I think the media tends to exaggerate what climate scientists actually say too about extreme weather. Somebody writes a paper like the one cited in this post and the media will jump on the bandwagon. with the alarmist conclusion, implying that it’s a general conclusion of the scientific establishment. But when you look at the IPCC report on the the effects of climate on extreme weather, it’s filled with caution. The authors make the obvious point that extreme events are rare and that you need a lot of data to actually quantify changes in extreme weather (hence the paper above and its extreme value analysis).
The report is filled with “low confidence” and “medium confidence” statements. In IPCC speak, low confidence means that we don’t really have any evidence or if we do have evidence we can’t get most people to agree–but it might be true, while medium confidence means that there is evidence for and against it and opinion is divided
The IPCC ascribes low confidence to the notion that tropical cyclone activity has really increased. I love this one too. They ascribe medium confidence to the idea that droughts have intensified in some areas, such as southern Europe and West Africa and have de-intensified in other areas Central North America and Australia. In other words, there is some evidence, although not everyone agrees, that droughts have gotten worse in some areas and better in others.
Oh well, we’re talking about climate science.
The insurance companies writing home owners insurance in Florida, South Carolina and North Carolina apparently are big believers. Try buying some property down there close to the ocean and wait (with a defibrillator) for your insurance quotes. But then again what do insurance companies know about risk underwriting?
Since the arrival of Floridian conditions to the Maine coast are not projected to happen for another few decades you’ll have to wait for your hoped-for property appreciation.
rick,
“But there’s a little problem. Because of the computational complexity of the problem, the GCM models have to discretize the ocean and atmosphere at a coarser level than cloud microphysical processes occur, so that cloud processes are crudely approximated in these models. ”
it may be crudely approximated, but it also may provide reasonable results. science is filled with these types of crude approximations. people use a few elastic constants to represent the behavior of billions of electrons interacting with millions of atoms when conducting solid mechanics simulations. those are crude models, but they do produce reasonable results. in particular, if those crude models can help to capture a trend, not sure why you would disparage them? it is impossible on a large scale to calculate all of the microscale processes directly and accurately. this does not make the models wrong. we simply do not have the computing power. but that also does not mean there is no value in the models we do use.
baffled, for all the faith in the models they have been wrong on hurricane frequency and strength. Several other things also have been missed, by them. Some worse than others.
Baffles,
Clouds make a huge difference though and it’s important to understand them fully. Small changes in cloud properties can turn global warming to global cooling.
rick, clouds could be a major element. but your approach seems to exclude any possible modeling technique except the perfect and correct model as the only possible model we can use. obviously that model does not exist-and probably never will. but cruder models will exist which very well could produce acceptable results. you seem very quick to dismiss such models. yet you claim small changes in cloud properties can turn global warming to global cooling. based on what evidence? do you have the full fidelity model of clouds and their effect on global climate? no. this is also a statement based on crude modeling assumptions. why are you allowed to use these crude models to better understand behavior, but the other side is not permitted this luxury?
we strive for perfect models in science, but we accept coarse approximations along the path to that knowledge, and we continuously improve them.
Rick Stryker If your expected lifespan were 300 years, then I’m pretty sure you would be buying beachfront property in Maine. But because your expected lifespan is shorter than the expected global warming effects of what you do today, you disregard the costs. Finite lived agent models get the economics of climate change all wrong. Put another way, your comment is strong evidence that you put zero weight on the welfare of future generations.
I agree that the models have gotten a lot of predictions wrong….they have tended to underestimate the actual observed effects. Sea level rise is a good example.
Insurance underwriters use extreme value theory when the first moment parameters are uncertain.
CoRev Why do you think it is so unlikely that sea levels won’t increase exponentially? If Greenland loses 15% of its ice, that would be enough to raise sea level by one meter. Wouldn’t you expect Greenland’s ice melt to increase at an increasing rate if it melts year round instead of only part of the year?
2slugs, what makes you think 15% is even possible? We just had this discussion on the other thread. The actual measurements are some where between 1-3MM/Yr. Even during the Holocene transgression “The only way sea level rise could approach the high end of the IPCC range is if it exponentially accelerates… (a graph is here) The rate from 2081-2100 would have to average 20 mm per year, twice that of the Holocene Transgression. This is only possible in bad science fiction movies.”
There is nothing in the science that shows that level of increase has ever happened. There are thin tail concerns and then there are impossible, never, ever happened thin tails. Gotta watch those risk management concerns. 🙂
CoRev Sea level is not rising 1-3mm per year. Over the last 22 years the average increase has bee 3,2mm per year. You can get exponential growth quite easily if the melting season grows relative to the freezing season.
You’re confused about the tails. I would agree that if we were talking about thin tailed distributions. then the chances of a 7 std-dev event happening are essentially zero. Impossible. But with fat tailed distributions the chances of 7 std-dev events happening are not all that rare. If you’re managing risk and the first moment parameters are uncertain (as opposed to merely poorly measured), and if the distributions are fat tailed, then you worry about tail events, not most likely events.
2slugs, again we’ve had similar discussions for years. Perhaps you can determine how something might happen, but the issue is when it has ever happened. I said: “There is nothing in the science that shows that level of increase has ever happened. There are thin tail concerns and then there are impossible, never, ever happened thin tails. Gotta watch those risk management concerns. :-)”
Then you respond with an opinion without reference. Regardless, did you know that the tidal gauges compare favorably with satellite data if we remove some of the man made adjustments to the satellite data. BTW that gauge data is the lower. I do prefer actual measured data that have validation from independent datasets over any modeled (computer/statistical) outputs. Don’t you?
Yes, the models did miss the 17 year temperature pause.
Actually, my comment is strong evidence that I put low weight on the speculations of the current generation of climate scientists.
Here’s the problem: the projected rise of the sea level (average) is approximately 1 meter in 200 years. Over the past century, the rise has been about 7-8 inches. So the rate of increase is 2-3 times the present rate. Most of Greenland ice would have to disappear, plus some of Antarctic ice for this to happen. There is scant evidence that this is occurring. What these projections are is conjecture, “best guesses”, “worst case scenarios”.
It might be interesting to look at the history of the U.S. northeastern shoreline and the European shorelines (where there is actual history) to see what has happened as a result of naturally occurring melting (non-AGW). I suspect that the gradual aspect of any change has been readily accommodated by any number of strategies… all effective.
With regard to more frequent and severe storms, in 1998 NASA wrote this: http://www.giss.nasa.gov/research/briefs/druyan_03/
“As described in Druyan et al. (1997), we detected an intensification of African waves in climate simulations where present concentrations of atmospheric carbon dioxide were doubled. In fact, the counterclockwise (cyclonic) spin of winds speeded up for most disturbances over the coastal waters near West Africa (where hurricanes form) in the climate simulations with doubled CO2 levels than in those with present CO2 levels. Nevertheless, the waves in the doubled CO2 simulation did not occur more frequently. The stronger spin, however, implies that a greater percentage of African waves could eventually strengthen into hurricanes in the future, but additional research will be needed to determine the role of other climate variables in order to formulate more definitive conclusions.”
Now, nearly two decades later, we have this non-occurrence: http://www.livescience.com/50704-hurricane-drought.html
As was stated in 1998, “additional research will be needed to determine the role of other climate variables in order to formulate more definitive conclusions.”
the projected rise of the sea level (average) is approximately 1 meter in 200 years … Most of Greenland ice would have to disappear, plus some of Antarctic ice for this to happen.
Uh, no. The Greenland ice sheet alone has enough water for a 6 meter (20 feet) rise in sea level. The Antarctic ice sheet has enough for another 60 meter (200 feet). You don’t need to melt all of Greenland to get a 1 meter increase in sea level.
The rate of sea level rise over the last 3000 years has been flatline — plus or minus less than a millimeter per year. From 1900 to 1990, that rate has changed to plus 1.5 millimeters per year. Since 1990, it has increased to 3.2 millimeters per year. By 2080 it is projected to be as much as 16 millimeters per year. We have already seen an exponential rate increase and the beginning of the hockey stick. Those saying an exponential rate increase is impossible are ignoring the fact that we have already seen an exponential rate increase.
https://notalotofpeopleknowthat.files.wordpress.com/2012/05/douglas-update_htm_ef9a71a.jpg
http://230nsc1.phy-astr.gsu.edu/hbase/thermo/searise.html
The change in sea levels have been pretty consistent into the 21st century. The projections are speculative.
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/05/16/is-sea-level-rise-accelerating/
Bruce Hall provides a fine example of the futility of engaging climate deniers. He begins with the false belief that a 1 meter sea level rise requires the melting of the entire Greenland and part of the Antarctic ice sheets. Of course this false belief leads to the intuitive conclusion that climate modelers must be wrong.
Then when I point out the physical fact that only 1% of the ice sheets need to melt to provide the projected sea level increase (along with thermal expansion) , does he change his conclusion? No, he just doubles down. Is 1% melting of ice sheets more plausible than 100% melting? Not according to Bruce Hall.
Joseph, Uh no! Do the math again. What’s 1% of 6 meters? BTW, even the 6 meters is wrong. From Wiki “If the entire 2,850,000 cubic kilometres (684,000 cu mi) of ice were to melt, it would lead to a global sea level rise of 7.2 m (24 ft)” Your 1% is a long way from 1 meter.
So just what is it you are trying to prove?
It’s quite simple. Greenland ice represents 6 meters of sea level rise. Antarctica represents 60 meters of sea level rise, for a total of 66 meters. If 1% of that melts you get 0.66 meters of sea level rise. The rest comes from thermal expansion of existing sea water.
Here’s the thing. Bruce was under the false impression that you would have to melt the entire Greenland ice sheet to get a 1 meter sea level rise. He used this false information to conclude that projections of 1 meter sea level rise must be absurd because no one believes that the entire Greenland ice sheet is going to melt in the just the next 100 years.
I pointed out that a 1 meter sea level rise only amounts to melting of 1% of the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets. Certainly melting of 1% is not beyond the realm of possibility. There are good models to indicate this is likely.
Joseph, thank you. Now I understand from where you are coming. I only have two quibbles. There is no definition of how long. The example is models-based, and models have been shown to be far less than accurate. The the time frame is important, because you are basing your estimate upon an immediate acceleration of ~3MM to >~11MM/Yr in ice loss. The ~3MM is questioned and the acceleration is not evident. Where we see any acceleration is in the satellite data, and much of that is due to adjustments based upon post-glacial rebound and tectonic shifts. That adjusments has always concernec me since tectonic shifts cause changes in both directions and logically should be neutral.
This little older article and the paper it references show how the satellite data is adjusted. http://jonova.s3.amazonaws.com/guest/lansner/adjustments/sea-level-fig-2.jpg From here: http://joannenova.com.au/2012/05/man-made-sea-level-rises-are-due-to-global-adjustments/
There are couple of things to notice other than the gross impact of the adjustments. 1) ENSO has a significant effect on GMSL 2) Even the later satellite data is adjusted. Were their instruments and algorithms not developed using the latest science?
There are so many questions over the quality of the data adjustments in nearly all of the climate datasets it makes them seriously questionable. The Sea level are just another.
Joseph “Then when I point out the physical fact that only 1% of the ice sheets need to melt to provide the projected sea level increase (along with thermal expansion) , does he change his conclusion?”
I guess I missed where you stated that and where you get your suppositions. The fact is that sea level changes vary annually and decadally. It’s nothing new. A couple of years ago, it was pointed out that the Greenland ice sheet was smaller several millennium ago and somehow earth and mankind survived. http://sciencenordic.com/less-ice-greenland-3000-years-ago-today It’s a big deal to those who expect to profit from alarming the rest of us into draconian tax measures from which they can funnel out their personal fortunes. Why, even some well know politicians have done exactly that.
Climate change has been ever and will be ever. But man made global warming is an Al Gore scam, and it paid out pretty well. While you hear nothing from Al Gore anymore, for a good reason, a couple of CO2 traders are still following his agenda. Hopefully it gets warmer soon, as warmer time periods have always been positive for mankind, and global cooling a curse.
CoRev Sorry, I should have provided a link to the 3.2mm comment…although I thought it would have been well known to someone who has dedicated his life to denying climate change. Anyway, here’s one (of many) sources:
http://www.cbsnews.com/news/noaa-sea-level-rise-could-be-worse-than-we-thought/
As to fat tailed distributions, you still don’t get it. See some of the papers by Marty Weitzman at Harvard. One thing that people forget is that when you consistently shift the observed mean to the right, this effectively creates a fat tailed distribution. The point estimate of an 11 degree (C) increase in surface temperatures is unlikely; but the consensus of the models show that there is a tail probability of that happening. And an 11 degree warming over the next 200 years would essentially wipe out human existence. Think of it this way, there is a tail probability that your grandchildrens’ great-grandchildren could be the last human generation because of things that we do or do not do in the next generation. Is it likely? No. Is it impossible? No. If you’re Rick Stryker and put zero weight on future generations, then you won’t find this argument convincing. If you’re a normal human being with normal sentiments, then you ought to be losing some sleep over possibility of an extreme event. The odds of an 11 degree increase are small, but greater than the tail probabilities of global thermonuclear war during the Cold War. Somehow we didn’t have any problems spending money to deal with that threat. The difference is that global thermonuclear war is something that would affect the current living generation. Global warming is something that affects future generations.
Bruce Hall If you’ll go to the NOAA website on hurricanes and check out their 2012 fact sheet, you will see that while the number of hurricanes hitting US shores has been below the historical average, that is not true globally. The below normal number of Atlantic storms (not just those hitting US shores) was consistently below the norm for roughly the first 40 years of observations. Then it bounced around for about one-third of the history. The last third has been above normal…and the last decade has been more than 2 std-devs above normal. They have a nice graph that shows the total number of hurricanes nicely tracks with the anomalies in global surface temperatures.
The NOAA site plainly says that we do not have as good an understanding of the relationship between hurricanes and global warming. It’s not just a question of not having enough good history (we don’t have good history of Cat 3 thru Cat 5 hurricanes). Part of the problem is that some effects of global warming predict fewer hurricanes, while other effects predict more hurricanes. So it comes down to which effect dominates. What the models do predict is an increase in the number of extreme category 5 hurricanes. In other words, we could have fewer hurricanes overall, but the ones that we do get are far more intense. And by “we” I mean the Atlantic and not just the US shoreline.
2slugs, I am well aware of where the ~3.2mm rise and supposed acceleration. See my comment to Joseph about the sea level adjustments and especially the tectonic plate adjustments. Much of the glacial bounce back analysis is from GPS satellite data. We both know the accuracy possible from that data. AFAIK no one has challenged the estimates, but it looks to be quite possible just due to the adjustment decisions.
I know you like so many want to believe that the temperatures continue to rise, but the satellite data for the short term and the ice core data for the Holocene-wide long term say otherwise. I’ve show these graphs too man time to repeat the references, but the bottom lime stays the same. No overall warming so the median is shift in in the opposite direction than you think. If you insist on citing the surface data set, remember until the June Karl 15 (NOAA) update, the all showed the hiatus/pause in each. Not only can we say the sea level data adjustments, but the evidence is mounting the surface temperature data adjustments are even worse.
You might also note that the “long term” measured record amounts to just slightly more than 1% of the total Holocene period. Hard to consider that ~1% long term when we have adequate full length proxy data for the entire Holocene and longer.
2slugs, sorry. That should have been mean instead of median. Also apologize for my typos above.
CoRev “The NOAA site plainly says that we do not have as good an understanding of the relationship between hurricanes and global warming. It’s not just a question of not having enough good history (we don’t have good history of Cat 3 thru Cat 5 hurricanes). Part of the problem is that some effects of global warming predict fewer hurricanes, while other effects predict more hurricanes. So it comes down to which effect dominates. What the models do predict is an increase in the number of extreme category 5 hurricanes. In other words, we could have fewer hurricanes overall, but the ones that we do get are far more intense. And by “we” I mean the Atlantic and not just the US shoreline.”
Why, yes, then we agree… except we’ll have to see if the number of Cat 5 hurricanes actually increase… but, then, I guess you said that because you indicated the increase was actually a prediction.
Returning to the issue of FEMA’s incompetence under Brown, it’s worth recalling that the track record of private sector types coming in to manage government departments and agencies is nothing to write home about. Brown is hardly the only example. Dick Cheney comes to mind, although in Cheney’s case he was also a disastrous private sector CEO. Eleven of his twelve pet projects at Halliburton were bleeding red ink when he left. Another example is one of the OSD undersecretaries brought in under Rumsfeld. She served the same post under Bush 41, left during the Clinton years to work for a very large and well known ERP firm. As a large contributor she got her old job back when Bush 43 was appointed President. She compelled DoD to buy into the ERP software of the company she represented for 8 years…then left to go back to the same firm. It was a disaster. After the Bush team left DoD spent billions in order to get out from under the bad contracts. Another example at the subcabinet level was an executive that Team Bush brought in from WalMart. He was supposed to overawe DoD with his deep knowledge of logistics. Turns out the guy knew almost nothing and his knowledge of multi-item multi-echelon logistics models was 40 years out of date. People were shocked at his ignorance. He didn’t last long. Another great example would be the private sector gurus from Reagan’s old Grace Commission. Almost every one of their recommendations has been a disaster. They didn’t even comprehend the difference between acquisition logistics and sustainment logistics.
And a lot of these stories are true for other governments. For example, the Australian Defence Ministry had almost identical experiences.
Finally, people forget that the Katrina thing didn’t turned around until the political hacks from the private sector were replaced by government people with expertise in the kinds of logistics problems encountered with Katrina.
Interesting that you bring up Cheney. Recall that Cheney’s One Percent Doctrine was that if there was a 1% chance that some terrorist possessed weapons of mass destruction, we have to treat it as a certainty in our response. This One Percent Doctrine led to the spending of a couple trillion dollars and hundreds of thousands of deaths in pursuit of non-existent WMDs.
The IPCC reports not a 1%, not a 10%, but human effects and economic consequences in the likely (66% to 100%) and very likely range (90% to 100%).