By the end of my post Salinger’s status clarified earlier today we were assured by Professor Paul Kench, the friendly Head of the School of Environment, University of Auckland, that Dr Jim Salinger is, indeed, an Honorary Research Fellow at the University of Auckland.
I had queried the fact because the current UofA web site no longer mentions Dr Salinger as an honorary appointment. Continue Reading →
Views: 104
At times we’ve had up to ten levels of nesting in our comments but at some point I reduced it to six levels. This means that when levels run out one must scroll upwards through many screens in order to find the beginning so one can click Reply.
I’m rather firmly inclined to remove the threading altogether, as in WUWT and other popular blogs. Continue Reading →
Views: 58
Last Thursday, Dr Jim Salinger published an article at The Conversation entitled An insider’s story of the global attack on climate science. In it Salinger dishonestly characterises the Coalition’s court action against NIWA as an attack on science.
Salinger is conspicuously described at the top of that article as working for the University of Auckland — but as the university’s web site doesn’t list him as working for them, it seemed to be a fabrication. Continue Reading →
Views: 85
If you have been following the story of the Akademik Shokalskiy, you’ll know it’s a global warming boat stuck in an Antarctic ice pack. What piqued my curiosity was that the expedition is called ‘Australasian’. Now, I don’t mind when Aussies make absolute fools of themselves, but when Kiwis are involved in the foolishness, I get brassed off. More so when the stupidity is funded by my taxes. Continue Reading →
Views: 161
When you can’t make a proper rebuttal the only recourse is distortion.
Two months ago, in Epic fail, NIWA! Your methods are a global secret, I described how I asked John Morgan, CEO of NIWA, in the name of the Official Information Act what authority he had to say that NIWA scientists, when reconstructing the national temperature record, used methods which were “in accordance with internationally recognised methodology.”
His reply: “The judge said so.” A foolish answer, because the judge didn’t validate NIWA’s methods — he’s incompetent to do so. He freely admitted his inability to rule on the science:
[44] “…the Court is not in a position to definitively adjudicate on scientific opinions.”
Mr Morgan must have missed it. Continue Reading →
Views: 306
h/t Leonard G. Mills
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A letter appeared yesterday in the NZ Herald following Professor Chris de Freitas’ article Human interference real threat to Pacific atolls two weeks ago. It was this letter: Continue Reading →
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Regular readers appreciate that one of this blog’s principal concerns is NIWA’s failure to disclose the methods it has used to adjust the raw readings behind the national temperature record—the so-called 7SS or “seven-station” series.
NIWA has persistently claimed that its adjustment methods are recognised internationally, but failed at the High Court hearing in July last year to supply evidence of international approval; the court heard only assertions from NIWA itself, which, though empty, seemed oddly to convince Mr Justice Venning of their legitimacy. Now those mendacious claims are catching up with NIWA’s CEO, John Morgan—but I get ahead of myself. Continue Reading →
Views: 359
Posted on November 4, 2013, at Watts Up With That
This (17 years) is a non-event, just as 15 and 16 years were non-events. Non-events do not make headlines. Other non-events of the year are one of the fewest numbers of tornadoes (especially when corrected for under-reporting in the radar-free past) in at least the recent past (if not the remote past), the lowest number of Atlantic hurricanes since I was 2 years old (I’m 58), the continuation of the longest stretch in recorded history without a category 3 or higher hurricane making landfall in the US (in fact, I don’t recall there being a category 3 hurricane in the North Atlantic this year, although one of the ones that spun out far from land might have gotten there for a few hours). Continue Reading →
Views: 199
Kennedy Graham, another Greens MP who distorts environmental facts despite his immaculate steel-grey coiffure, says in the NBR that Rodney Hide’s depiction of the Greens (‘Zombie Greens chant false science mantra’) makes selective use of facts and conclusions. He should know, he’s an expert at it—for 16 years he was one of our diplomats. Continue Reading →
Views: 151
Barry Brill reveals a serial deception by the IPCC we need to wake up to. Why? Because the alarm peddled by this UN body relies on a simple, easily confirmed falsehood. The IPCC claims we should adhere to a 30-year observation period it has never itself respected. It implies that we should believe the IPCC that it’s been warming and disbelieve the temperature data that it hasn’t been warming. The IPCC’s parent body, the WMO, says that a far shorter period is quite all right (why won’t they correct the IPCC?). We cannot trust the IPCC, so we must take decisions regarding the expected future climate completely out of their insincere, incompetent hands.
Under pressure at a media conference following release of its Summary for Policymakers, AR5 WG1 Co-Chair Thomas Stocker is reported to have said that “climate trends should not be considered for periods less than 30 years.”
Some have seen this as the beginning of an IPCC ploy to continue ignoring the 16-year-old temperature standstill for many years into the future. But even the IPCC must know that any such red herring is dead in the water: Continue Reading →
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The NIWA case is to be heard before a panel of three judges at the Court of Appeal in Wellington tomorrow, Tuesday, 15 October.
The focussed grounds are that all three NIWA temperature series resulted from serious mistakes of fact, which impugned the rationality of the Crown Entity’s decisions.
The Coalition is also seeking reversal of the High Court’s costs order.
NIWA is cross-appealing. It apparently suggests that CRIs should not be subject to public law, but that CRIs are akin to SOEs. Also that NIWA’s supply of temperature research to the Crown is the result of commercial research contracts.
The judgement is likely to be reserved.
Views: 184
I’ve been absent without excuse for just over five weeks—unprecedented in over eight years of climate blogging—and it feels like a lifetime. It is surely rude not to let readers know what I’m up to.
My wife Ann and I are busy readying her late Aunt Rita’s property for sale. It is nearby and completely absorbing. In about another month or so, I’ll be free to spend some time on the Climate Conversation again.
It’s delightful indeed that the conversation continues so well without me. Continue Reading →
Views: 87
via Lawrence Solomon: Model mockery | Financial Post.
Top economist, a true believer in global warming, proves predictions of catastrophe are meaningless
All predictions of global warming doom and destruction rest on meaningless computer models, say climate change skeptics such as Freeman Dyson, America’s best known scientist, and Antonino Zichichi, Italy’s best known scientist. They and other skeptics looked at models touted as reliable and declared them meaningless.
Now these unabashed skeptics are joined by an unabashed true believer in rising sea levels, greater climate variability and other perils associated with global warming: Robert S. Pindyck, a physicist, engineer and Professor of Economics and Finance at MIT’s Sloan School of Management. Continue Reading →
Views: 162
Once again, Rodney Hide strips away useless decoration to reveal the essence that lies beneath. This time, his target is Sir Peter Gluckman and his report on how climate change might be expected to affect New Zealand. Not now, later on. In 77 years. Here is Rodney’s article in the NBR last Saturday, Prophecy fails the scientific test (paywalled).
The Prime Minister’s Chief Science Adviser, Sir Peter Gluckman, has done us all a favour and provided a textbook illustration of the difference between science and non-science.
His recent report, New Zealand’s Changing Climate and Oceans (pdf, 634 KB), boldly predicts an average temperature increase of 2.1° Celsius by 2090. That prediction is the key give-away. It’s not science, it’s prophecy. Continue Reading →
Views: 213
After extended time off to cope with a family bereavement and its aftermath, let me present insights from someone else. Perspicacious and humorous, resigned yet adamant.
Yesterday, by email to a climate forum I subscribe to, a scientist posted penetrating comments on the state of climate change understanding. The comments are too good not to circulate, so, without revealing his identity (because I haven’t asked his permission), here they are. He was responding to a radio broadcast by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation (ABC) by one Tony Eggleton.
Yes, I know, we all want to listen to yet another alarmist DAGW broadcast like we want to volunteer for washing-up duties.
But this one by retired geologist Tony Eggleton, of the Australian National University, broadcast on the ABC’s premier science programme Ockham’s Razor, is worth listening to from end to end in order to understand the immensity of the task of re-education that still lies ahead of us. Continue Reading →
Views: 42
When the house settles and the door jams, it’s easier and cheaper to shave the door. Preventing the ground from moving just to make the door close is overdoing it.
That’s a realistic metaphor for man’s response to global warming. The alarmists would persuade us to interfere with the soil at ruinous expense to stop the house from moving, but simply shaving the door compensates perfectly well for small kinks in the house.
A new paper, Is CO2 mitigation cost-effective? from Lord Monckton of Brenchley is a startling analysis showing that governments around the world are overdoing their response to the “threat” of global warming and could help bring a much-needed sense of perspective to the debate.
Intense pressure from the United Nations, assisted by modern Luddites in Greenpeace, the WWF and others, doesn’t conceal the inconvenient truth that global warming is too small for concern and its mitigation too expensive to contemplate. Continue Reading →
Views: 138
Please discourse with untrammelled exuberance.
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Dear readers, please pardon my absence. A very dear elderly relative has been ill and passed away yesterday.
Rita was 91 years old so her death was not entirely surprising. Still, it was traumatic and she is gone.
Thank you for your patience.
Views: 36
Always a low-performing, highly-priced “nice idea” and a gruelling sell, battery-powered electric cars are about to be blown off the road by the latest generation of diesel engines. Continue Reading →
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I posted a letter to TVNZ today as follows.
Dear Sirs,
Formal complaint — TVNZ News 7 July
This confirms my formal complaint emailed to you yesterday.
Concerning your TV1 news item last evening and available at http://tvnz.co.nz/world-news/low-lying-island-threatened-rising-sea-levels-video-5498764, I would have imagined that a careful, experienced reporter like Barbara Dreaver, in her research, might have noticed that an earthquake occurred on Lifuka in 2006, causing a subsidence of about 23 centimetres, causing a noticeable advance of sea level and causing a single householder to abandon his house. A documentary about the island was made by Tiy Chung and posted at http://vimeo.com/53200521 seven months ago.
Still, she evidently failed to check. Continue Reading →
Views: 69
Yesterday, Steven Goddard at Real Science posted a startling headline: United Nations Says That Cooling Temperatures Indicate Unprecedented Warming. But I think Steven has been deceived by Bloomberg.
Steven quoted an article at Bloomberg.com:
The planet has warmed faster since the turn of the century than ever recorded, almost doubling the pace of sea-level increase and causing a 20-fold jump in heat-related deaths, the United Nations said.
When I read this, I didn’t demur so much over the alleged doubling of sea-level rise (double the minuscule and you still have very little — little enough accuracy, for sure) or the large increase in heat-related deaths (no period was given; it sounded like, and seems to be, scare-mongering driven by highly variable data).
But I raised my eyebrows at the claim of “rapid warming” this century. Continue Reading →
Views: 296
Professor Bob Carter
It can’t be over yet. When people are still being fired for not believing in global warming, it’s far from over. The war continues.
Professor Bob Carter (an expatriate Kiwi) lost his job the other day at James Cook University (JCU) in Townsville. He had worked there for 31 loyal years, his professional life devoted to stratigraphy, understanding events in the deep past recorded in ocean sediments, and teaching.
Significantly, because it led to his dismissal, Bob made an honourable name for himself and earned a world-wide reputation for remaining faithful to scientific principles while analysing the outrageous predictions from global warming alarmists. He was never afraid to speak out against the alarmists and their dubious claims. Continue Reading →
Views: 133
Brochure for Taxing Air. Download the pdf (986 KB).
From our good friend, the always-in-touch Val Majkus, comes a reminder about Bob Carter’s new book (which she’s ordered already!) and encouragement to pass it on to anyone you know who may be interested.
Bob says the book will be available from July 1st, and he would appreciate any support or publicity we can give it. It’s especially significant in the context of the forthcoming Australian election and the new-old PM’s just-announced ditching of the hated carbon tax.
The book has its own web site, and a Twitter account is available.
Views: 45
Large German companies such as Siemens and Bosch are abandoning the solar industry. Their strategies resulted in debacles – their investments in solar power companies cost them billions. Compared to what investors have lost as a result of their investments in solar stocks, however, these sums are almost negligible amounts. The former stars at the stock exchange, SolarWorld and Q-Cells, have destroyed tens of billions of capital. –Thiemo Heeg, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung, 18 June 2013
via latest newsletter from the Global Warming Policy Foundation – h/t Benny Peiser at the GWPF.
The following is adapted from the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung.
Large German companies such as Siemens and Bosch are abandoning the solar industry. Their strategies resulted in debacles – their investments in solar power companies cost them billions. Continue Reading →
Views: 638
Bill McKibben, climate crackpot
This web site’s masthead proclaims: “For the first time in history, people shouting ‘the end is nigh’ are somehow the sane ones, while those of us who say it is not are now the lunatics.”
That’s how it used to be, but climate change is changing. The true lunatics are clearly seen. They were always alarmist, long before global warming, shrieking our environmental sins, Luddites razing the factories, breaking the machines, clamouring for havoc to save us all from ruin. Continue Reading →
Views: 274
From the GWPF comes this link to NoTricksZone who has a video of an outstanding presentation (opens in a new tab) three days ago by Professor Murry Salby.
The video begins in German, but after only 41 seconds shifts permanently to English (and later American), so don’t be dismayed. Stick with it.
The German professor, in his words of welcome, describes Professor Salby, from Macquarie University in Sydney:
He is known all over the world as one of the few specialists who really have a view over the whole area of climate development. Despite his long relationship with the most renowned climate institutes, he has preserved his own critical and constructive reasoning, which in some parts is in real contradiction to the official expert opinion and also [opposes] the assessment of the IPCC.
Views: 188
In the days of Queen Victoria they could say truthfully: “the sun never sets on the British Empire.”
But it does set on Australia, every single day. Even the green power engineers in Parliament must have noticed that the sun also sets on all those solar panels that their mandates and subsidies have plastered onto Australian roofs.
Solar energy is most intense on the equator but weakens towards the poles. It disappears when the sun sets or cloud obscures the sun. For just six hours or so per day during summer, in a clear tropical desert area, solar energy is reasonably reliable and collectible, although always very dilute. But at times of peak demand, about 6.30pm in winter, solar panels contribute nothing to electricity supply. Continue Reading →
Views: 219
Sorry, I’ve been trying to post this for a week. – Richard Treadgold
TVNZ now admits to me that its press release was wrong in claiming that Dr Renwick blamed the recent drought on global warming.
But TVNZ don’t apologise to us or the New Zealand public — or even to Dr Renwick. The Corporate Affairs Department is entirely absorbed in explaining their mistake, rather than caring that they made it.
That’s the third strike against these public relations masters.
Un – be – lievable. Continue Reading →
Views: 37
The thirty-eighth sessions of the Subsidiary Body for Implementation (SBI 38) and the Subsidiary Body for Scientific and Technological Advice (SBSTA 38), as well as the second part of the second session of the Ad Hoc Working Group on the Durban Platform for Enhanced Action (ADP 2-2) is taking place at the Maritim Hotel from 3-14 June, 2013 in Bonn, Germany.
According to the Irish Times, the eleven-day conference has 670 delegates from 176 countries and is working towards a global agreement in 2015.
The CFACT video posted earlier today has drawn criticism. It shows interviews with nine delegates, asking if they knew of the lack of warming since 1997. Most of them confess complete ignorance about the lack of warming but one or two actually dismiss it, saying it’s unimportant. Continue Reading →
Views: 73
Delegates to the United Nations, naturally, are well informed in their chosen field, right?
Wrong. Listen to these ones.
Far from having nothing to worry about because the world is in good hands, Kiwis have everything to worry about because chumps and cretins are now permitted to wander the corridors of power.
What will you do about it?
Views: 54
A paper published in Nature on 10 February 2013 could destroy the global warming scare.
It’s called Atmospheric verification of anthropogenic CO2 emission trends and the Abstract is available on our side of the paywall, along with the Supplementary Information. However, I’ve also obtained a copy of the paper (800 KB) and it’s fascinating. There’s a larger version (3 MB), not so heavily compressed and less murky. Continue Reading →
Views: 161
At The Daily Blog two weeks ago Renowden complained (emphasis mine):
What we object to, Andy, is not the obvious behaviour of the surface temperature record, but your continued conflation of temperature with warming. Stop claiming that “warming has stopped”, and we can move on to talk about ice melt, rapid Arctic warming, and the impact on northern hemisphere weather patterns instead of indulging in silly semantics.
At last! How wonderful. For years we’ve been saying it’s not warming — the readings aren’t going up! Can’t you see that? We suffered these stupid explanations that there’s no stasis, we still have warming, in fact (some said) warming has accelerated. Continue Reading →
Views: 91
Here’s a general question for everyone about how to make comments on comments.
When we “Reply” to a post, the first reply is displayed hard against the left-hand margin. The next reply is a little more to the right, or “nested”. The third reply is even further to the right, and so on. Eventually a limit is reached, or replies would have to be displayed in the width of a single character. WordPress defaults to 10 levels of nesting. After that, all replies are indented by the same distance, but you have to scroll up a long way sometimes to find the related Reply button.
Long ago I reduced the number of “Replies” possible from 10 to 6.
A maximum of six replies is inadequate, but so is ten. I lean strongly towards reducing it to zero, putting all comments at the same level and removing the problem entirely. But it would introduce a new problem, of identifying in a possibly long thread the comment we are responding to. We would have to somewhat carefully specify the “NAME at DATE at TIME” we’re answering and that would be a new discipline for us.
Would that be all right?
Any suggestions?
Views: 49
It’s early to say it, but I’ll say it early — Willis Eschenbach has achieved an earth-shaking breakthrough that’ll have him hailed a hero for years to come.
His fame will live on long after he has gone. He hasn’t merely found that carbon dioxide doesn’t control the temperature. He’s provided a reason to discard the very notion that any single forcing controls the surface temperature. The climate is a complex system.
His achievement is a triumph.
Views: 144
I have just been referred to this savage attack on Chris de Freitas by student Lola Thompson published in Craccum last July (thanks, Andy). It’s a fact-free romp through the ad hominem glories of Real Climate and Hot Topic, commissions the scientific skills of the Herald’s Chris Baron [sic], adds some insipid remarks from Martin Manning and learns from Gareth Renowden that Lord Monckton “doesn’t have a single climate science qualification.” Of course, neither does Renowden — and de Freitas is a professor in “climate science” — but that doesn’t slow Renowden down. With breath-taking irony, Renowden has the gall to claim that de Freitas doesn’t mention the IPCC “or current climate information” in his lectures (which I know is untrue). But he doesn’t reveal that the IPCC reports omit current (inconvenient) climate studies and that the IPCC has never investigated whether DAGW might be falsified — they take it as a fact without looking. So Lola quickly and easily learns about climate “denial” and how to write (and craft it well, I must say) a poisonous polemic but finds it hard to learn the objective science of geography, poor thing. She does not know, and is maybe too young to know, that scientific scepticism is the single attribute most likely to keep a scientist at the top of his field for a very long time. However, she so much doesn’t like having to learn climate skepticism [sic] that she insists on misspelling it. Her article reveals plenty of climate denial, but not where she claims it to be. Where is her refutation of de Freitas’ course? Where, for heaven’s sake, is even her description of it? Where is the science?
Should we be paying to be taught climate denial? | Craccum Magazine.
By Lola Thompson · In Columns, Eco-Matters, Issue 01 2012
On July 3, 2012
Chris De Freitas is an Associate Professor at the University of Auckland employed by the School of Environment as a lecturer in Climatology.
I encountered De Freitas during the first semester last year when I took Geography of the Natural Environment (101), a compulsory course for all geography majors.
After the first few lectures taught by De Freitas I became increasingly concerned about what I was being taught. Prior to attending the class I was under the impression that the debate around climate change was no longer in questioned and anthropogenic climate change is now a scientific fact.
However, De Freitas presented the changing climate as a natural cycle, to which fossil fuels were not a contributor.
I found what I was learning incredibly alarming, as it went against all the information I had ever read about climate change. I began expressing my concerns to other students, who had previously taken courses taught by De Freitas and found I was not alone in my concerns. Continue Reading →
Views: 211
Anthropogenic attribution to sea level rise and ocean heat accumulation relies on there being a verified mechanism or process by which rising anthropogenic greenhouse gas (aGHG) emissions impute heat to the ocean. John Cook’s Skeptical Science has been promoting one such posited mechanism in particular as explaining the accumulation of heat in the ocean over the last 40 years or so, the most prominent example being How Increasing Carbon Dioxide Heats The Ocean, posted in 2011 by Rob Painting. That post adapts a 2006 Real Climate article by Professor Peter Minnett, Why greenhouse gases heat the ocean, where an enhanced ocean surface insulation effect was posited.
…with attractive formatting and with all the references provided as working links.
NOTE: to easily get back here to comment, press the Back button or first load the article in a new tab and swap between them.
You can read the whole article here, but it lacks most of the formatting (which aids understanding) and all of the links (which are provided to assist understanding and to justify what is said). I apologise for any inconvenience this causes, but it takes a long time to convert the word document into the particular html format required by WordPress and to copy each link. So I haven’t done it yet. I’ve converted it to a “standalone” html page so you have access to the links. – RT
This series destroys the IPCC narrative on ocean warming—there’s no reason to think that human emissions warm the oceans at all, and certainly not dangerously. I notice Richard Cumming’s full Part 1 article includes links to his Part 2 and Part 3, but they should be here, too, so here are all of them together:
– RT.
Views: 158
Regrettably, the Herald has turned comments off, but that’s why blogs exist — leave your comments here where influential people will see them!
This is an adopted article.
Chris de Freitas: Science proves alarmist global warming claims nothing but hot air
Several aspects of Jim Salinger’s op-ed “Climate hurtling towards a hothouse Earth” Herald 24/5/13 are quite misleading. It is true most climate scientists would agree that rising carbon dioxide in the atmosphere due to fossil fuel use could affect global climate. The basic physics is there to support this view. But there is no evidence that the putative change would be large or damaging. Output from computer models is not evidence unless model performance has been validated. So far, it has not. Continue Reading →
Views: 127
A few days ago I reported on TVNZ’s naughty porky after James Renwick’s March interview. I have since been in correspondence with TVNZ and have news.
In their reply TVNZ have made an amazing error. Like a careless schoolboy failing to read the exam directions, someone didn’t read my letter properly. They’ve given a response that annoys me and will surely displease senior managers. Continue Reading →
Views: 98
Press Release 22/05/13
Global Warming Policy Foundation Invites Royal Society Fellows For Climate Change Discussion
London, 22 May: In response to a suggestion by Sir Paul Nurse, the President of the Royal Society, the Global Warming Policy Foundation has invited five climate scientists and Fellows of the Royal Society to discuss the current state of climate science and its wider implications.
In a letter to Lord Lawson, the GWPF chairman, Sir Paul stated that the Royal Society “would be happy to put the GWPF in touch with people who can offer the Foundation informed scientific advice.”
Sir Paul suggested that the GWPF should contact five of their Fellows: Sir Brian Hoskins; Prof John Mitchell; Prof Tim Palmer; Prof John Shepherd and Prof Eric Wolff.
The GWPF has now invited the five climate scientists to a meeting with a team of members of the GWPF’s Academic Advisory Council and independent scientists and has proposed a two-part agenda:
1. The science of global warming, with special reference to (a) the climate sensitivity to carbon dioxide and (b) the extent of natural variability;
2. The conduct and professional standards of those involved in the relevant scientific inquiry and official advisory process.
“I hope the Fellows of the Royal Society will be happy to meet with our team of scientists so that something positive can come out of Sir Paul’s recommendation,” said Dr Benny Peiser, the Director of the GWPF.
via Press Release: GWPF Invites Royal Society Fellows For Climate Change Discussion.
I like it when they talk to us.
Views: 120
At The Daily Blog on May 15, 2013, at 8:13 pm, while discussing The irrelevance of the rabid right, by Gareth Renowden, I asked a question.
What is the evidence for warming?
Rob Painting replied:
That’s an impressive list of evidence, so I want to thank Mr Painting for his trouble. I’m sure he would prefer to be rebutted if there are any faults in his evidence, rather than continue in his ignorance, so if you can contribute to an understanding of these pieces of evidence, I encourage you to comment below.
Let’s put together a convincing critique. Bear in mind that even if we don’t like it it’s not necessarily wrong, so we need to provide solid evidence. After warming, we should examine attribution.
Hmm, sounds as though I want my own AR5. Ok, why not?
My first thoughts include these:
So it was all quite learned discourse, but at the end he stoops to a gratuitous insult like any head-banger:
The question is, why do people like Richard Treadgold pretend as if this stuff has never been explained to them before? Anterograde amnesia perhaps?
Nasty, but all he’s doing is trying to avoid a too-close examination of his excuses for confiscating my self-drive motor car and overseas air travel.
Views: 154
Chris Hedges
The other day I was listening to an interview on C-Span of one Chris Hedges, an American journalist and author specialising in American politics and society. It was a very interesting interview about the signs of collapse of the American Empire. Hedges is remarkable for his ability to easily quote and cite many sources as he outlines his reasons for predicting the fall of the Empire. He is eloquent, well-versed in historical examples and, in a quiet and calm way, very provocative.
He talks about the mainstream media’s lack of investigation into contentious government policies and social issues. Continue Reading →
Views: 84
Don’t have time to look closely, but here’s a taste of good news.
*abridged* New research from Oxford University shows the rate of global warming has been lower over the past decade than it was previously.
The paper, “Energy budget constraints on climate response”, to be published online by Nature Geoscience, shows the estimated average climate sensitivity – or how much the globe will warm if carbon dioxide concentrations are doubled – is almost the same as the estimates based on data up to the year 2000.
Views: 64
What appeared to be a startling development in the important topic of global warming started with Dr James Renwick on Sunday 17 March, 2013, in an interview aired on TV1 at about 11:17 am. Susan Wood introduces it by describing the current severe drought.
TVNZ issued a press release a few hours later, stating: “Dr Renwick told the programme that global warming was the only explanation for the drought,” even though that was not a faithful reflection of the interview.
The NBR followed up the same day with an article in which they make an identical statement: “Dr Renwick told the programme that global warming was the only explanation for the drought,” which suggests that the NBR obtained the statement from TVNZ.
Rodney Hide picked up the story (which is how I discovered it) a week ago with an article in the NBR criticising Renwick for blaming global warming for the drought.
My initial post supported Rodney’s article in the NBR and I defended him when he was lambasted by Gareth Renowden.
It was a startling story, since reputable scientists say that you cannot blame this or that specific weather event on global warming. Although warming might increase the frequency or ferocity of an event, warming alone cannot create one. But the statement was corroborated by the very broadcaster which interviewed Renwick. They should know. So it appeared to be true.
Because the statement was outrageous, I was sceptical, but after reading the transcript and studying the video, I thought that taking that meaning from it was plausible and I wrote a post carefully explaining my reasoning.
There was a clamour of dissent until Andy suggested someone contact James Renwick. Good idea, I thought, and I emailed him.
Within half an hour, James politely confirmed that he never blamed the drought on global warming: “This is just not so.” It’s good to hear him say that, actually, but we must deal with the fallout.
So, I apologise to Dr Renwick for misquoting him so badly — that is, over a statement so disastrously incorrect. And I am asking TVNZ for an explanation.
Our public broadcaster has told a very naughty porky.
Views: 270
When Rodney Hide, in an NBR article, criticised Dr James Renwick for, in a TV1 interview, blaming anthropogenic warming for the recent drought, Gareth Renowden accused him of misrepresentation.
James Renwick has confirmed by email that he did not blame global warming for the recent drought. 10:00 pm 16 May 2013
First I defended Rodney. Later I pointed out that the NBR took exactly the same message from Renwick’s interview as Rodney had. It reported: “Dr Renwick told the programme that global warming was the only explanation for the drought.” In a detailed analysis of the interview and its introduction I show how this was the reasonable conclusion. Continue Reading →
Views: 280
I haven’t seen much lately of Gareth Renowden’s climate writing, although I came across him burbling recently about US activist Bill McKibben.
Today I read Renowden’s post at The Daily Blog complaining about Rodney Hide’s NBR article. In it, Rodney criticises Dr James Renwick for comments Renwick made during this interview for TV1’s Q+A programme.
In the Daily Blog post, Renowden is distinctly combative, immediately smearing Rodney as ‘irrelevant’ and ‘rabid.’ It’s nasty stuff, but Renowden seems inured to the dirt he shovels. There was nothing in Rodney’s article to deserve this treatment. It’s unclear why Renowden bothers with such an “irrelevant” commentator but comparing Rodney with a mad dog is as outrageous as it is patently untrue.
In the end Renowden shreds his own credibility by inviting Rodney to join the warmists, claiming rather feebly ‘we need all hands on deck’ — as though the rabidly irrelevant would chance his welcome.
James Renwick has confirmed by email that he did not blame global warming for the recent drought. 10:00 pm 16 May 2013
Disagreeing further with Rodney’s article, Gareth makes a point I cannot ignore: “There’s been no warming for 17 years, apparently. Tell that to the Greenland ice sheet, or the Arctic sea ice. Tell that to the warming oceans. Global surface temperatures may not be shooting up as fast as in the recent past, but heat continues to accumulate in the climate system. Rapid climate change is here, now.” Continue Reading →
Views: 154
Rodney Hide continues to support a realistic view of dangerous anthropogenic global warming.
The NBR today carries his article “Faith, not facts, drive[s] global warming.”
Rodney says Renwick “was in no doubt that man-made global warming was causing the summer drought,” then quotes Renwick from his TV interview:
“Oh, no, no. There’s no other explanation that’s remotely plausible.”
But Rodney rightly points out:
That’s religious zealotry in action. Science is never that certain. The best-ever scientific knowledge was Newtonian mechanics. And Einstein blew it to bits. That’s the nature of science.
He goes on to show how Renwick’s theory is falsified. It’s the right stuff.
Views: 231
Yesterday, Dr Vincent Gray sent out his Climate Truth Newsletter (no. 310). In it he adverts to an outrageous admission of common sense by James Hansen. Years ago, Hansen admitted on his GISS web page that there’s no agreement among scientists on what constitutes an acceptable surface air temperature.
Sensationally, he also said that it’s IMPOSSIBLE to obtain a scientifically meaningful surface air temperature (SAT).
Now, with Hansen’s resignation from NASA, Gavin Schmidt has rushed in to take charge of these surprising admissions. Curiously, I see that Schmidt’s description is “NASA Official,” where Hansen was the “Responsible NASA Official.” Significant, interesting or irrelevant? Speculation might be endless…
The link above to the previous version of the page at the Wayback Machine is from 15 October, 2008, but that page is marked as last updated on 12 July, 2005. There are three more words in the body text of the current version than on the old page; I conclude they’re essentially identical.
These comments asserting the impossibility of determining the SAT put a disturbing slant on Hansen’s alarmism based on the SAT during the last 20 years of the 20th Century. Continue Reading →
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Wind power is not free. All natural energy resources such as coal, wind and sun appear “free” — no one has to incur costs to create them. But turning a “free” resource into usable electricity costs money for collecting, generating and distributing that energy. To consumers and tax payers, the real cost of wind power is very high, no matter how well it is hidden by politicians.
Wind power is not reliable. No one can make the wind blow when the energy is needed Continue Reading →
Views: 154
Comments here from someone who shall remain nameless (thanks a lot, Andy!) forced my twice-yearly drive-by glance at Hot Topic, finding again that its unending invective, rancour, impatience, embarrassing ignorance and sheer mindless chatter is all too irksome.
But a recent post by Renowden calls for comment. He talks about Bill McKibben.
Bill McKibben — that most thoughtful and interesting of climate campaigners — is bringing his very successful Do The Maths campaign to New Zealand next month [June], and will be speaking in Auckland, Wellington and Dunedin. Bill’s argument is straightforward:
The maths are simple: we can burn less than 565 more gigatons of carbon dioxide and stay below 2°C of warming — anything more than that risks catastrophe for life on earth. Continue Reading →
Views: 52