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You are here: Home / Climate Science / Unforced variations: Sep 2019

Unforced variations: Sep 2019

1 Sep 2019 by group

This month’s open thread for climate science topics. A new two-part community assessment of tropical storms and climate change is online at BAMS: Knutson et al. (2019a ; 2019b). And for those interested in Arctic Sea Ice, there is always the NSIDC.

References

  1. T. Knutson, S.J. Camargo, J.C.L. Chan, K. Emanuel, C. Ho, J. Kossin, M. Mohapatra, M. Satoh, M. Sugi, K. Walsh, and L. Wu, "Tropical Cyclones and Climate Change Assessment: Part I: Detection and Attribution", Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society, vol. 100, pp. 1987-2007, 2019. http://dx.doi.org/10.1175/BAMS-D-18-0189.1
  2. T. Knutson, S.J. Camargo, J.C.L. Chan, K. Emanuel, C. Ho, J. Kossin, M. Mohapatra, M. Satoh, M. Sugi, K. Walsh, and L. Wu, "Tropical Cyclones and Climate Change Assessment: Part II: Projected Response to Anthropogenic Warming", Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society, vol. 101, pp. E303-E322, 2020. http://dx.doi.org/10.1175/BAMS-D-18-0194.1

Filed Under: Climate Science, Open thread

Reader Interactions

277 Responses to "Unforced variations: Sep 2019"

Comments pagination

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  1. jef says

    1 Sep 2019 at 5:15 PM

    Can anyone comment on the Mann V Ball lawsuit? How can Mann be accused of not providing info that is in the public domain and easily available?

  2. Russell says

    1 Sep 2019 at 7:22 PM

    While Atlantic hurricanes frequently traverse the northern Caribbean to stike the Greater Antilles and northern Leeward Islands, the southern ( Latitude below ~15 dgrees N) Windward Islands and Barbados have historically been less frequenly affected.

    Can the Part II authors remark on how warming will impact the present southern boundary of tropical cyclone trajectories in the Northern Hemisphere?

  3. mike says

    2 Sep 2019 at 12:17 PM

    Is anyone tracking surface sea temps along the traditional hurricane pathway? I assume water temp is up a bit and would account for a storm like Dorian building to Cat 5.

    Cheers

    Mike

  4. mike says

    2 Sep 2019 at 12:28 PM

    I did a quick search and found:

    “Slow-moving storms like Dorian are getting more common as the Earth gets hotter. In the past 70 years, tropical cyclones around the world have slowed down 10%, according to a study published this year. Hurricane Florence, in 2018, and Hurricane Harvey, in 2017, were both slow-moving storms.

    When storms move slowly, they have time to drop a lot of rain. Warm ocean water also exacerbates the risk of extreme downpours. After Hurricane Harvey hit Texas, researchers found that record-high temperatures in the Gulf of Mexico sent enormous quantities of water vapor into the storm; that water vapor then fell as rain when the storm made landfall.”

    https://www.npr.org/2019/08/31/756257077/hurricane-dorians-path-shifts-towards-carolinas-could-avoid-direct-hit-on-florid

    and: https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2018/05/10/610140149/record-heat-in-the-gulf-fueled-hurricane-harveys-deluge

    I didn’t find anything on sea temps on traditional hurricane pathway, but I think it’s safe to assume the water has warmed by an amount that will show up in hurricane characteristics.

    Mike

  5. Adam Lea says

    3 Sep 2019 at 3:28 AM

    3: https://www.ospo.noaa.gov/data/sst/anomaly/2019/anomnight.9.2.2019.gif

    It looks like bath water across pretty much the whole northern hemisphere. Until recently tropical cyclone activity across the northern hemisphere had been very quiet, it seems to have come to life now, whatever was suppressing it seems to have gone now. Suggests to me that where the atmospheric conditions are ideal, there will be more powerful storms to come.

  6. Al Bundy says

    3 Sep 2019 at 10:25 AM

    Jef,
    Anyone can sue anyone for anything. Anyone with serious resources can use this fact to ruin anybody without resources. And if the jurisdiction doesn’t require payback of costs (or is partisan) then such suits can be used as a game of attrition. So, choose the most partisan jurisdiction and laugh at your victim.

    Apparently you are under the misconception that courts aren’t in the business of injustice and enforcing inequality.

  7. S.B. Ripman says

    3 Sep 2019 at 11:54 AM

    Can we connect Hurricane Dorian and James Hansen’s superstorm predictions? Will the superstorms he predicted be more catastrophic not because of greater size, but because of slow forward progress and increased energy and water volume?

  8. David Jesch says

    4 Sep 2019 at 1:31 AM

    Could somebody recommend a study analysing what role of the Amazon rain forest play in the global climate system and how would its disappearance affect it (global wind and rain patterns, etc.)? I am sure that somebody must have tried to model it. I have read the splendid articles (for example in The Atlantic) about the actual carbon budget of the forest and its share of O2 production clarifying some common misunderstandings and it led me to this question. Unfortunately I haven’t been able to find a really good and seemingly reliable overview.

  9. Chuck says

    4 Sep 2019 at 8:31 AM

    What are the possibilities of needing to create a Category 6 for hurricanes? The current scale only measures wind speed and obviously there are other devastating factors such as rainfall and how long a storm sits in one location. I’m thinking storms can only intensify from here on. I don’t think ocean temperatures will cool off enough in the future to allow for weaker storms. Just my guess of course.

    I do think James Hansen is correct about stronger storms in the future. We’re seeing that now. I also think Dr. Jennifer Francis deserves some type of award for pointing out the slowing down of the jet stream due to a melting Arctic. I’m willing to bet the ranch that that is affecting the direction and speed of storms, including this latest hurricane. I’m also pretty sure that Greenland melting is slowing down ocean currents in the North Atlantic, again affecting the speed and direction of topical storms. Thoughts?

  10. Mal Adapted says

    4 Sep 2019 at 11:01 AM

    Al Bundy:

    Anyone can sue anyone for anything. Anyone with serious resources can use this fact to ruin anybody without resources. And if the jurisdiction doesn’t require payback of costs (or is partisan) then such suits can be used as a game of attrition. So, choose the most partisan jurisdiction and laugh at your victim.

    That’s presumably true in Canada, where Mann’s suit was brought, as in the US. Yet their courts are constitutionally constrained to interpreting the laws passed by their legislative branch, just like ours. One should also be aware that AGW-deniers are, unsurprisingly, making shamefully exaggerated and/or false claims about the verdict. On Twitter, Mann dismissed them. The Daily Kos summarized his tweet thusly:

    In a statement responding to the wave of false coverage, Mann clarified that the “Court did not find that any of Ball’s defenses were valid. The Court did not find that any of my claims were *not* valid… The provision in the Court’s order relating to costs does NOT mean that I will pay Ball’s legal fees… In making his application based on delay, Ball effectively told the world he did not want a verdict on the real issues in the lawsuit.”

    IOW, any denier who thinks the ruling confirms Mann committed fraud, or declares his seminal Hockey Stick “broken”, is pathetically deluded.

  11. Karsten V. Johansen says

    4 Sep 2019 at 1:12 PM

    Looking at this simulation https://climate.nasa.gov/climate_resources/148/video-following-atmospheric-carbon-dioxide/ I have noticed that although carbon dioxide over some time is mixed up in the troposphere and equally distributed, the excess is coming out of the big industrial and populations centers in the northern hemisphere and building up to a yearly maximum in the early northern hemisphere spring, just before the photosynthesis is starting its yearly augmentation later in the spring. It also seems that the airmasses/the plumes of air carrying the excess amounts of carbon dioxide are spreading with the westerlies from SW towards NE (https://climate.nasa.gov/climate_resources/146/video-simulated-clouds-and-aerosols/ ) . Now I wonder if anyone has studied if there could be a correlation between the positions of these plumes with excess carbon dioxide (and probably tropsheric ozone and maybe methane too?) and the locations of recorded high surface temperature anomalies? Or is this a too simplistic thought?

  12. Dominik Lenné says

    4 Sep 2019 at 4:39 PM

    – Vegetation growth. –
    Could please someone with the expertise make the following clearer:
    On the one hand, we have still vegetation taking up a considerable part of human CO2 emissions. This implies growing biomass. [1]
    On the other hand, it has been shown by satellite analysis, that vegetation is actually shrinking because of higher air dryness.[2]
    Can somebody get it right? Can it be, that vegetation area is decreasing while overall photosynthesis is still increasing?

    [1] https://phys.org/news/2019-01-climate-sooner.html
    [2] https://advances.sciencemag.org/content/5/8/eaax1396

  13. Killian says

    4 Sep 2019 at 4:54 PM

    Mike, while ocean temps are, of course, part of the highly complex natural system, they are not primary drivers of winds and fronts, per se. That is, the temps of land and bodies of water have a local affect more so than steering major wind patterns.

    The primary effect of warm oceans is in the strength (heat and water content) of storms. You can play around with the Nullschool or windy applications to get a sense of the meta forces affecting storm tracks.

    Yes, complex, just pointing out the primary forces on winds are the larger weather features such as planetary rotation, atmospheric temp gradients from the equator to the poles, etc.

    https://earth.nullschool.net/

    https://www.windy.com/

  14. S_Nudds says

    4 Sep 2019 at 11:17 PM

    Re: #1

    “How can Mann be accused of not providing info that is in the public domain and easily available?”

    You just accuse him.

    AmeriKKKa is a land of insanity and make believe.

  15. S_Nudds says

    4 Sep 2019 at 11:35 PM

    A good read.

    “there has been no increase in average temperatures in the continental United States over the last 14 years, as measured by these new stations. If anything, overall temperatures are slightly cooler than they were.

    One big reason for this lack of warming is surely the explosion in U.S. natural gas production, thanks to fracking.”

    https://www.commentarymagazine.com/politics-ideas/climate-global-warming-data-locations/

    Author’s Email address.

    jsg@johnsteelegordon.com

  16. S_Nudds says

    5 Sep 2019 at 12:01 AM

    Re #1: Mann V Ball lawsuit

    The Canadian court vacated the case against Ball and apparently awarded him court costs.

    Mann apparently didn’t provide documents in a timely manner.

    Mann has claimed that he will appeal.

    The vacated charges are being used by Ball and others in the denial-o-sphere as “proof” that Mann’s hockey stick graph was fraudulent.

  17. Steve Savage says

    5 Sep 2019 at 2:38 AM

    Hi there. I am looking for studies of future global rainfall projections. In particular, I seem to remember a computer simulation showing a distinct lack of rainfall in southern latitudes in a 4 degree warming scenario. Does anyone know of such a study?

  18. Dan DaSilva says

    5 Sep 2019 at 2:58 AM

    1 jef :
    Anybody can accuse anybody of anything but the Court found that Mann did not provide the information as required to continue the case and therefore ruled in favor of Ball. This should make Al Bundy happy as he says “Anyone can sue anyone for anything”. Mann’s lawsuit has been dismissed and he is required to pay attorneys fees.
    Why Mann would not provide information that you say is in “the public domain and easily available” is not relevant to the case.

  19. nigelj says

    5 Sep 2019 at 5:46 PM

    https://www.nytimes.com/2019/08/30/world/americas/amazon-rainforest-fires-climate.html

    “It’s Really Close’: How the Amazon Rainforest Could Self-Destruct. Climate change and man-made fires could set off a cycle of self-perpetuating deforestation, scientists warn.”

    “In a healthy rainforest, plant life absorbs rainwater and groundwater, then sweats it back out into the atmosphere as moisture, seeding more rain. But once a section of rainforest has been thinned and fragmented, it gives off less moisture. Rainfall decreases, and the ground, of course, grows drier. As a result, the next fire burns hotter and reaches deeper, causing more damage. Past a certain point, the forest no longer produces enough rain to survive.“There’s already evidence that this can take place on phenomenal scales,” said Daniel Nepstad, an environmental scientist who studies the Amazon. “This is the imminent risk that could overshadow deforestation as a risk to this forest.”

  20. jgnfld says

    6 Sep 2019 at 6:21 AM

    @15

    Re. “there has been no increase in average temperatures in the continental United States over the last 14 years, as measured by these new stations.”

    What are we to infer from your factoid about GLOBAL warming over actual climate-related time intervals of 3 decades or more?

    Re. “One big reason for this lack of warming is surely the explosion in U.S. natural gas production, thanks to fracking.”

    What evidence can the author or you cite that this is “surely” the case?

    This is a science site. It has somewhat different standards identifying “sure” facts than you appear to have.

  21. DasKleineTeilchen says

    6 Sep 2019 at 9:43 AM

    @S_Nudds@15:

    A good read

    ?? in which way? because its ridicoulous and sloppy, with pretty old links (2009) to well-known “sceptics” and no sources for the “graphic-of-evidence” from the NOAA (?)in the linked article to “RealClear Energy” (???)

    oh. I see now that the author of that main-source-article at “RealClear Energy” is (starting drumroll)…

    James Taylor (JTaylor@heartland.org) is director of the Arthur B. Robinson Center for Climate and Environmental Policy at The Heartland Institute

    well, that figures. no further questions.

  22. Al Bundy says

    6 Sep 2019 at 9:50 AM

    Dan da stupido,
    You being deliberately stupid or is it an unfortunate condition?

    Anybody with more than a room temperature IQ would have no difficulty interpreting my comment. Since “anybody with more than a room temperature IQ” obviously doesn’t include you:

    I was whining, not cheering.

    Please buy, rent, or steal a brain and use it.

    EF off. You’re an evil self-made moron.

  23. MA Rodger says

    6 Sep 2019 at 10:11 AM

    Steve Strange @17,
    Your description brings IPCC AR5 WG1 Fig TS.16 to mind which plots % change in annual rainfall by the end of the century for the different RCPs, of which RCP8.5 is “a 4 degree warming scenario” with the most prominent areas of decreased rainfall through the SH.

  24. Al Bundy says

    6 Sep 2019 at 10:15 AM

    Nigel,
    Humans never take collective action until after a tipping point has been DECIDEDLY crossed.

    That means that any efforts to save the Amazon or the boreal forests will fail. Period.

    The question is “Should we continue to try or should we join Nemesis’ popcorn party?

    Given that even here I can’t find a single person who cares enough to do diddley I’m joining Nemesis on the couch.

    Seriously, why?

  25. Marco says

    6 Sep 2019 at 10:59 AM

    DDS@18: could you please be so kind as to show us the court documents that supposedly state that “the Court found that Mann did not provide the information as required to continue the case”?

  26. Marco says

    6 Sep 2019 at 11:05 AM

    S_Nudds@15:

    That supposed “good read” is probably only “good” to have eviscerated by students who are actual skeptics. They’d destroy many of the arguments quite quickly, but Zeke Hausfather has already debunked one:

    https://twitter.com/hausfath/status/1169805837704937472

    (it’s the same data that the source of your “good read” uses).

    I am curious, S_Nudds: what do you think about your sources when they come with such false claims? Do any alarm bells start ringing? What else did they lie about, when it is so easy to show them wrong on this one?

  27. mike says

    6 Sep 2019 at 1:26 PM

    https://www.carbonbrief.org/guest-post-why-chinas-co2-emissions-grew-4-during-first-half-of-2019

    I guess we should hope that Trump’s trade war with China slows their economy a bit.

    Mike

  28. Steven Emmerson says

    6 Sep 2019 at 1:42 PM

    S_Nudds@15

    A good read…

    Commentary magazine isn’t a peer-reviewed, scientific periodical.

  29. DasKleineTeilchen says

    6 Sep 2019 at 2:31 PM

    @S_Nudds: in case my first comment get through: sorry; I didnt get your sarcasm right away with the second half of the citation.

  30. Al Bundy says

    6 Sep 2019 at 7:32 PM

    Hi guys. I just took my first peek in the borehole and was pleasantly surprised that apparently I’m a Rock Star! Denialists hate me with unmitigated passion while slinging stupid insults, such as claiming that I hide my identity. Nope, I’ve been quite open about who I am, “Richard L Caldwell”. I use Al Bundy because it brings the sort of flavor to my work that resonates.

  31. Entropic man says

    7 Sep 2019 at 6:37 AM

    Re Mann v Ball

    This is the text of the order from the bench.

    1) Order that the claim made by Plaintiff be dismissed.
    2) Costs will follow the event and of the action since the action is dismissed.

    No detail, so anything you read about it will be speculation.

  32. CCHolley says

    7 Sep 2019 at 7:49 AM

    Re. Mann versus Ball

    Here is Mann’s response from Facebook

    There have been some wildly untruthful claims about the recent dismissal of libel litigation against Tim Ball circulating on social media. Here is our statement:

    The defendant Ball did not “win” the case. The Court did not find that any of Ball’s defenses were valid. The Court did not find that any of my claims were *not* valid.

    The dismissal involved the alleged exercise of a discretion on the Court to dismiss a lawsuit for delay. I have an absolute right of appeal. My lawyers will be reviewing the judgment and we will make a decision within 30 days.

    The provision in the Court’s order relating to costs does NOT mean that I will pay Ball’s legal fees.

    This ruling absolutely does not involve any finding that Ball’s allegations were correct in fact or amounted to legitimate comment. In making his application based on delay, Ball effectively told the world he did not want a verdict on the real issues in the lawsuit.

    https://www.facebook.com/MichaelMannScientist/posts/2470358663020321?__tn__=-R

  33. Tom Dayton says

    7 Sep 2019 at 10:15 AM

    S_Nudds @ https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2019/09/unforced-variations-sep-2019/#comment-743874

    That claim of cooling is the opposite of true:
    twitter.com/hausfath/status/1169805837704937472

  34. Adam Lea says

    7 Sep 2019 at 12:49 PM

    9: “What are the possibilities of needing to create a Category 6 for hurricanes?”

    I don’t think there is much point. Once you get to category 5 you are looking at catastrophic destruction. Adding a category 6 appear to offers no extra value, it is essentially the same catastrophic destruction.

  35. Johnno says

    8 Sep 2019 at 12:55 AM

    A friend just rang me to crow about the Mann vs Ball litigation. The claim is that the hockey stick is disproved and the denier community has won. My reply was that Mann was unwise to get involved with lawyers. The issues may be sub judice if an appeal is pending. Otherwise an article from RC could put some perspective on this case.

  36. Mr. Know It All says

    8 Sep 2019 at 2:14 AM

    3 – mike (and 7 – S.B. Ripman)
    “Is anyone tracking surface sea temps along the traditional hurricane pathway? I assume water temp is up a bit and would account for a storm like Dorian building to Cat 5.”

    You might be able to account for this particular Cat 5 storm based on water temps, but you’d need also water temp data from the 1935 Hurricane that matched it in sustained wind speeds. What you cannot do is attribute Dorian to CO2 since CO2 was ~100 ppm lower in 1935.
    Worst since 1935:
    https://www.iom.int/news/iom-begins-response-hurricane-dorian-damage-bahamas

    17 – Steve
    With a warming planet, I would think the air would hold more water. Would that result in more rain? Or would the increased water just stay in the air? My guess is both would be true.

    13 – Killian
    “Yes, complex, just pointing out the primary forces on winds are the larger weather features such as planetary rotation, atmospheric temp gradients from the equator to the poles, etc.”

    Since the Arctic is warming more than the rest of the planet, the gradient from equator to Arctic would be less. Would that result in weaker storm primary forces?

    11 – KVJ
    I’ve asked similar questions but was told that the CO2 is thoroughly mixed, but maybe the mixing takes a couple years?

    9 – Chuck
    “I do think James Hansen is correct about stronger storms in the future. We’re seeing that now.”

    Not necessarily, Dorian matched a 1935 hurricane.

    4 – mike
    “In the past 70 years, tropical cyclones around the world have slowed down 10%, according to a study published this year. Hurricane Florence, in 2018, and Hurricane Harvey, in 2017, were both slow-moving storms.”

    I didn’t click the links, what was the typical storm speed 70 years ago compared to today?

  37. Karsten V. Johansen says

    8 Sep 2019 at 4:24 AM

    “Google Is Promoting Climate Change Denialism On Its Apps And Mobile Homepage
    “Google is aiding and abetting the promulgation of climate science misinformation.””

    https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/ryanmac/google-discover-climate-change-denial

    And surely not just Google…

  38. Karsten V. Johansen says

    8 Sep 2019 at 4:34 AM

    See fx: https://m.huffpost.com/us/entry/us_5d5cb8f0e4b05f62fbd7067d/amp

    “Democratic National Committee Votes Down Climate Debate. Activists Vow To Fight On.

    The vote came a day after the 2020 climate candidate Jay Inslee, who had been pushing for the debate, dropped out of the race.”

  39. Mitch says

    8 Sep 2019 at 11:05 AM

    S_Nudds:
    You should be able to identify the red flag when the article you point to says “in 14 years”. The smaller the area, the more variability will be found. So, cutting the time to a small number like 14 years means that they are probably sampling the variability, and probably comparing an earlier high to a later low. Look at the NASA GISS temperature record for the US:
    https://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/graphs_v4/

    You will see that the temperature in the US has increased by about 1 deg C since 1970.

  40. Nicholas O. says

    8 Sep 2019 at 12:31 PM

    Just looking at the Global Climate Change Indicators report, link here:
    https://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/monitoring-references/faq/indicators.php

    Worth a look if you have not seen it.

    On the same theme, one question that occurs to me which I put to expert or better informed readers on this site and which they may be able to answer. If the extra energy trapped in the Earth system owing to warming gases (principally CO2) is not reflected to the extent predicted (by models and theory) in warming of the atmosphere, where is the heat going?

    My concern is that it is going mostly into the oceans, and that this, in turn, should lead to increased thermal expansion of ocean waters and an acceleration in the rate of global sea level rise. Is that broadly correct? And if it is, are we able to demonstrate this (yet) with observations, and thereby work out in what proportions the warming effect is being divided between the oceans and atmosphere?

    If it is possible to demonstrate this, with an appropriate level of statistical significance, then this might be a powerful counter to those skeptics who claim that because the atmosphere is not warming as predicted (just one of their claims), the whole global warming argument is not only wrong but a great fraud.

  41. David B. Benson says

    8 Sep 2019 at 7:16 PM

    Mr Know It All @36 — Increased global temperature results in a nonlinear increase in precipitation. The relative humidity cannot increase.

    Atmospheric carbon dioxide has a mixing time of about 2 years across the two hemispheres.

    See “Principles of Planetary Climate” by Ray Pierrehumbert.

  42. Kevin McKinney says

    9 Sep 2019 at 6:17 AM

    S Nuds, #15–

    The article linked is paywalled, apart from a teaser paragraph about Al Gore, which is to denialist climate discussions specifically as Poe’s Law is to internet discussions generally–that is, proof of a serious lack of imagination.

    However, it would appear to be just another iteration of a game that stupid people play: cherry-picking a span backwards from the present in the temperature record which due to natural variability fails to exhibit warming, and then go on to claim that, quite obviously, “warming has stopped.” Here’s a catalog of such:

    https://hubpages.com/politics/When-Did-Global-Warming-Stop

    Monckton did it for years; usually the graph was 18 years back or so, which is not coincidental as that’s a pretty typical value to obtain a robust warming trend given the structure of the temperature record data. Your current boy is apparently too naive to know that 14 years is actually pretty poor in the larger context of things.

    Even at that, he must be doing some *serious* cherry-picking to find a lack of warming over the last 14 years. I can’t tell what ‘new stations’ he’s talking about because of the paywall, but here’s what actual global temperature records show over that span:

    http://woodfortrees.org/plot/wti/from:2005/plot/gistemp/from:2005/plot/hadcrut4gl/from:2005/plot/rss/from:2005/plot/uah6/from:2005/plot/best/from:2005

    Clearly, there’s no lack of warming in those records.

  43. Kevin McKinney says

    9 Sep 2019 at 6:36 AM

    KIA, #36–

    https://www.nature.com/articles/s41612-019-0074-8

    “Over the 1944-2017 period, the annual mean coastal NA TC speed has fallen from 18.6 to 15.5 km h−1, about 17% (Fig. 1a).”

    They also demonstrate increased rainfall as a result of this slowing.

    However, the scope of the study was strictly observational and analytic: they did not attempt to make any attribution of the causes of these observed changes.

    That issue was addressed in this study, however:

    https://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/full/10.1175/JCLI-D-17-0391.1

    “These simulations produced tropical cyclones with faster maximum winds, slower storm translation speeds, lower central pressures, and higher precipitation rates.”

  44. MA Rodger says

    9 Sep 2019 at 8:16 AM

    DeSmogUK is reporting that some swivel-eyes denialists have written a letter to be sent to the EU, and also the UN. In it they claim that:-

    (1) Climate is always changing. Since 1850 the planet has been emerging from the Little Ice Age. So “it is no surprise we are experiencing a period of warming.”
    (2) There is no proof that anthropogenic CO2 emissions are “a major cause of global warming” or detrimental to quality of life yet “we do know … more CO2 is beneficial for nature and agriculture.”
    (3) Climate models are rubbish and “overestimate the recent temperature increase.”
    (4) There is no scientific evidence that higher CO2 has intensified hurricanes, flood, plagues of frogs, etc but “many indications that most CO2-mitigation measures in use today have a devastating effect on wildlife and land-use.”
    (5) We must base policy on “scientific and economic realities.”. Thus they “strongly oppose” net-zero emissions targets and see no Climate Emergency and “therfore no cause for panic and alarm. If better approaches emerge, we will have ample time to reflect and adapt. Our aim should always be to provide reliable and affordable energy at all times.”

    So far, there are some 400 names of “Scientists and Professionals” appended to the letter, 44 from the USA which include the likes of Freeman Dyson, Dickie Lindzen & Willie Soon. They did manage to find one woman for this list of 44 otherwise grumpy old men of the good old US of A – a Pamela Matlack-Klein who appears as a co-author of SLR papers alongside some better-known dodgy names. This rare example of her individual writing appears decidely denialist in nature.
    And an e-mail was been sent out a few days back to find yet more such worthy signatures. The e-mail states “Currently, signatures are being collected from persons who give a valuable contribution to the climate debate and are recogised as such.” I suppose if you are afflicted by climate change denial, your judgement of what is recognisable as a “valuable contribution to the climate debate” will be well beyond questionable.

  45. zebra says

    9 Sep 2019 at 8:36 AM

    #40 Nicholas O.,

    This…

    If the extra energy trapped in the Earth system owing to warming gases (principally CO2) is not reflected to the extent predicted (by models and theory) in warming of the atmosphere, where is the heat going?

    …and…

    If it is possible to demonstrate this, with an appropriate level of statistical significance, then this might be a powerful counter to those skeptics who claim that because the atmosphere is not warming as predicted (just one of their claims), the whole global warming argument is not only wrong but a great fraud.

    …really drives me crazy at this point.

    If you already accept that the system energy is increasing, then why do you feel the need to ‘prove’ it by “statistically significant sea level rise”?

    I’m going on the premise that you are sincere and not trolling here; I am just constantly amazed at how easily people are manipulated by the Denialists into validating their absurd arguments.

    Every time you “counter” their claims this way, you are accepting the premise that the underlying physics is somehow in doubt… that every question they raise about the precision of prediction is probative.

    You aren’t going to “counter” them; they will simply move on to another level of precision not yet achieved. It’s like the old “intermediate fossil” argument for Evolution… if you show that fossil two is related to fossil one, they would say: Where’s fossil 1.5? And when you found that, it would be “what about 1.25 and 1.75?” and so on, endlessly.

    Why have we still not learned the rules of the game by now?

  46. Kevin McKinney says

    9 Sep 2019 at 9:24 AM

    #36, KIA–

    “Not necessarily, Dorian matched a 1935 hurricane.”

    Let’s try to be a little more analytical here. From the first officially recorded Cat 5, back in 1924, to 1950, there were 8 Cat 5s.

    Counting back just 8 years, to 2005, we’ve had 11.

    That is not, of course, a rigorous statistical analysis*, but it does illustrate pretty clearly the trend toward stronger hurricanes in the Atlantic.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Category_5_Atlantic_hurricanes

  47. mike says

    9 Sep 2019 at 11:22 AM

    Co2 numbers looking great!

    Daily CO2

    Sep. 7, 2019: 409.20 ppm
    Sep. 7, 2018: 403.97 ppm 5.23 ppm increase in noisy yoy comparison! I think that might be the largest I have noticed. It’s probably not a record number thanks to the noise level in this signal, but still, wow!

    How did we do for August?

    August CO2

    Aug. 2019: 409.95 ppm
    Aug. 2018: 406.99 ppm

    Spectacular! a shade under 3 at 2.96 ppm

    co2.earth source

    Carbon Brief has an article about 4% rise in CO2 emissions from China: https://www.carbonbrief.org/guest-post-why-chinas-co2-emissions-grew-4-during-first-half-of-2019

    Strong and steady wins the race. We continue to plow along slowly and steadily increasing ghg accumulation in atmosphere and oceans. No need for skyrocketry, slow and steady will get the job done!

    Warm regards

    Mike

  48. TRM says

    9 Sep 2019 at 8:23 PM

    Can you please review this published paper?

    https://www.frontiersin.org/articles/10.3389/feart.2019.00223/full

    If it stands it disproves all the models and the policies implemented based on them.

    Thank you

    [Response: It’s nonsense. See Patrick Brown’s video and Nick Stokes blog. – gavin]

  49. Mr. Know It All says

    9 Sep 2019 at 11:55 PM

    49 – Gavin
    “[Response: It’s nonsense. See Patrick Brown’s video and Nick Stokes blog. – gavin]”

    B,b,but..How can that be-at least 2 of the “References” are yours!:)

    47 – Kevin
    “Let’s try to be a little more analytical here. From the first officially recorded Cat 5, back in 1924, to 1950, there were 8 Cat 5s.

    Counting back just 8 years, to 2005, we’ve had 11.”

    OK but on 9/5/2005 the alphabetically named hurricanes were up to Katrina; on 9/5/2019 they were only up to Dorian. ;)

    And then there’s those pesky facts; those 8 Cat 5s occurred from 1924 to 1938. And Michael only lasted 30 minutes! (mistake suspected) :)
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Category_5_Atlantic_hurricanes

    42 – Nemesis
    “Does Nature discuss anything at all?

    No, she doesn’t discuss anything. Enjoy your awareness of Nature and her undefeatable laws ect you attained along the road, no one can take that away from you, enjoy your life, enjoy yourself.”

    That’s exactly what George Carlin said:
    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7W33HRc1A6c

    46 – zebra
    ” I am just constantly amazed at how easily people are manipulated by the Denialists into validating their absurd arguments.

    Every time you “counter” their claims this way, you are accepting the premise that the underlying physics is somehow in doubt… that every question they raise about the precision of prediction is probative.”

    So, everyone should accept CC scientists claims without question? Noone can question CC science? OK, got it.

  50. MA Rodger says

    10 Sep 2019 at 2:49 AM

    RSS has posted for August with an anomaly of +0.68ºC, not much different Julys’s anomaly (as per UAH). It is the 3rd warmest August on the RSS TLT record (4th on UAH), putting it behind August 2017 (+0.74ºC) and 2010 (+0.69ºC) while ahead of 2016 (+0.67ºC), 1998 (+0.61ºC), 2015 (+0.61ºC), 2018 (+0.51ºC) and 2001 (+0.47ºC). August 2019 was 33rd in the RSS all-month record (43rd in UAH).

    The year is now two-thirds done and 2019 is looking a very strong candidate for 2nd-place in the full calendar year RSS TLT ranking. To drop to 3rd would require the remainder of the year to average +0.56ºC, a level of cooling relative to Jan-Aug that hasn’t occurred in the RSS record outside strong El Nino years (1983, 1991, 1998, 2007, 2010, 2016). (The trend-defying UAH TLT record puts Jan-Aug 2019 in 4th position and not so far ahead of a possuble 5th-place for the full calendar year.)

    …….. Jan-Aug Ave … Annual Ave ..Annual ranking
    2016 .. +0.86ºC … … … +0.79ºC … … … 1st
    2019 .. +0.71ºC
    2010 .. +0.68ºC … … … +0.62ºC … … … 3rd
    1998 .. +0.67ºC … … … +0.58ºC … … … 5th
    2017 .. +0.63ºC … … … +0.66ºC … … … 2nd
    2015 .. +0.53ºC … … … +0.59ºC … … … 4th
    2018 .. +0.52ºC … … … +0.52ºC … … … 6th
    2005 .. +0.46ºC … … … +0.46ºC … … … 8th
    2014 .. +0.46ºC … … … +0.47ºC … … … 7th
    2007 .. +0.46ºC … … … +0.41ºC … … … 10th
    2002 .. +0.42ºC … … … +0.39ºC … … … 12th

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