I’m still on watch

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Hi everyone,

Sorry I’m not much present these days, but there’s an election in about 13 weeks in which we really must dismiss this incompetent, divisive and destructive Labour government before we lose our last shreds of democracy. And it may already be too late for that.

I’m lending a hand as best I can but, just as with global warming, there’s more and more to read.

Many Kiwis are calling this a battle for our nation, though you won’t hear about it from our lamestream journalists, bribed off by the Public Interest Journalism Fund. I hope shortly to produce a website that features some of the behind-the-scenes thinking and strategy.

In the meantime I’m watching the Climate Conversation, and I promise to post some interesting climate news soon. I must say, you go a long way off the path at times, but it’s all interesting.

Cheers.

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Shift of focus — politics & democracy

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This blog must grow

My climate research has taken a hit because I’m focusing on the extraordinary electoral changes introduced by Jacinda Ardern’s government without approval or consultation with the electorate.

The effect is increasingly to distort the electoral balance away from ordinary voters, away from one voter, one vote in favour of Maoris. Not ordinary Maoris, but tribal activists and elites. Continue Reading →

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Developments under way

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Just to let you all know I’m still around but a bit busy and still eager to save the world.

There have been exciting developments in climate science, with many new confirmations that human activity is not dangerous but it’s taking politicians a very long time to get it.

The country’s democracy is being torn apart by the government’s constitutional vandalism but people are waking up to it. Some other democracies are being challenged too.

More later. Good luck.

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If you know some climate science, we’d love your essay

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Jarrod Gilbert, NZ Herald, 22 January, says:

Based on all of the information available to us, there is no sound argument against the existence of anthropogenic climate change, only ignorance of the scientific consensus and an arrogance to argue against it – often by people armed only with an elementary education and an internet connection.

When you have highly educated scientists amassed on one side, it’s prudent to stick with their assessment of matters relating to science. If you want to understand how to be a complete twonk, seek notes from those peddling the other side. But for science, definitely stick with the scientists.

It’s a bit early for arguments against its existence. Continue Reading →

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CCG in Australia

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I was in Bendigo last week with my wife, Ann, to celebrate a daughter’s nuptials. Now we’re in Melbourne for a few days with the happy couple, back to NZ on Wednesday. Out of touch a bit, but watching the emails. Off to the Victoria Market in a few minutes. Nice place but cold, wet and windy on Friday.

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Site traffic is great

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A non-trivial audience

 

I’ll try to post this once a month or so, keep you in touch with the real size of the CCG’s audience.

Hail, O audience!

UPDATE 6 FEB

These traffic figures have suddenly reduced themselves, and I think I know why. Only the number of visits has changed, the number of unique visitors has changed only minutely. For example, peak visits on 18 December is now 2232, when two weeks ago it was over 7000, but visitors number 743, when previously they were  almost the same at 739. I changed a setting a few days ago that now counts every visitor with over 50 visits in a day as a robot; so it eliminates their visits. I would guess one robot could easily account for up to 1000 page requests, as there are over 1000 posts, so losing 5000 visits might mean there were about five unidentified robots. Most robots are identified by a regularly updated database but it’s not infallible. The change means that more than 50 genuine page requests in a day by a real visitor aren’t counted in the statistics, but it’s the best we can do. I had to let you know of the change, and anyway daily average visits of 1400 is pretty impressive (over 42,000 visits a month). So thanks! You make the striving worthwhile.

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GWPF Newsletter 06/09/17

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GWPF newsletter – republished by permission

The Global Warming Policy Foundation is chaired by Lord Lawson and managed by Dr Benny Peiser, a man of seemingly boundless energy. They have a long list of scientists and other experts to call on for advice. The GWPF newsletter is a high-quality round-up of the mos significant climate-related news and a dependable source of scientific information with informed, level-headed analysis on a range of climate change topics covering science, policy, energy and economics.

Like many readers, I find the GWPF newsletter tremendously informative and often read it from cover to cover. It deserves the widest possible distribution. Here is the latest edition: the longer extracts have been shortened but the links retained, including one where you can sign up for your own copy.

Republishing should introduce it to even more New Zealanders and encourage discussion. I hope you enjoy it as much as I do. — RT

 

Pacific Ocean Cools Rapidly

La Nina Threatens Early Return

 

South Africa Set For Biggest Maize Crop Harvest On Record

Forecasts for an El Nino this winter have given way to the prospect of more La Nina-like conditions as sea surface temperatures in the central-eastern Pacific cool rapidly. Surface temperatures in the critical area of the Pacific have fallen to 0.2 degrees Celsius below average, down from 0.7 degrees above average in the week centred on June 28. The rapid cooling has forced meteorologists to reassess the outlook for the northern hemisphere winter. —John Kemp, Reuters, 5 September 2017

 

South Africa is set for its biggest maize crop harvest on record following improved weather conditions. At least 16.4 million tonnes of maize can be expected from the maize belt this season. Almost 60 percent of the yield will be white maize, which is the regional staple used for human consumption. —The South Africa, 1 September 2017

 

In 2015, a vicious El Niño weather pattern swept across southern Africa. When it intensified the following year, it caused severe droughts and threatened the food security of millions. But in 2017, that trend is set to reverse. South Africa is expecting a 15.63m tonne maize harvest, the highest yield of the crop ever. Now 85 percent of South Africa’s crop is genetically modified, with even Malawian and Zambian farmers taking up higher-yield seeds at a rapid rate. With the surplus, maize prices have dropped some 60 percent since last year. While this is good news for some consumers, for farmers it is making it hard to balance accounts. The solution: look to export the bumper crop. –Charlie Mitchell, This Is Africa, 27 June 2017

Continue Reading →

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Moving the blog

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Trying hard not to lose a call

Trying hard not to lose a call

When I started this blog over ten years ago I decided to host it temporarily on a subdomain of wordshine, just to see how it worked out. Well, it seems to be working fine so I’ve bought a permanent home for it. There could be glitches before we’re settled in, so pray patience, friends, while we make the move. When I say ‘we’ I refer to the nice boffin who hosts my domains in Hamilton.

The new domain is named simply climateconversation.org.nz, and I’ve owned it for several years (mustn’t hurry these things). Don’t change your links just yet, though; I’ll let you know if and when you have to. I want you to know we’re doing all we can to avoid losing any of you even for a moment.

Thanks for your patience.

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Post on no posts

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Around October or December last year, when we took possession of our house in Te Puke, a hot water leak began in the downstairs kitchen, soaking the wall, cabinets and floor unseen. In early January the leak was discovered and stopped. The insurance company settled our claim for thousands less than we hoped and we quickly agreed that our plans for renovation had to be brought forward. Continue Reading →

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Open thread

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open thread

A few weeks ago we put an offer on a nice big house in Te Puke. We’ll share it with our daughter, her partner and three children, and it couldn’t go through without selling our present house. It’s been a bit difficult keeping the house in pristine order as buyers streamed through at odd hours to inspect it but now an offer is about to go unconditional, which means we will move out in two weeks. But not into the new house until it is vacated, so our lives are still unpredictable. It’s frustrating having so little time to contribute to the blog and I apologise for apparently paying little attention to the flurry of climate activity ahead of Paris; well, not really climate activity but activity concerning the climate—the climate itself is no more chaotic than usual. Anyway, here’s a fresh open thread. I’m watching, and I’ll have something substantial for you soon. A special note to the fourteen thousand patient, unseen readers every month from all over the world: thank you very much for visiting.

UPDATE 2230, Friday Nov 6

The deal went unconditional late this afternoon. So, we’ve sold the house, hurrah! Two weeks to get out. Another adventure.

UPDATE 0955, Friday Nov 13

Late last Tuesday, we finally made our offer on the Te Puke house unconditional. So we have a house to go to! We just have to wait until the 8th of December to take possession. We are all such happy campers!

Just six days to go before the truck arrives here to take everything into storage.

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Personal tidbit

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Sorry I’ve been all but absent.

We’ve put our house on the market, it’s all been a bit of a rush and we’ve been battling to fix a few things and make it look nice. First open home is this Sunday. The intention is to buy a house in Te Puke. Yes, that place a few kilometres from the coast recently hit by a small (practice?) Chilean tsunami and shortly thereafter by a 5-point-something quake.

Ah well, seemed a good idea at the time.

But seriously, we’re chasing grandchildren. Again. We moved to Waiuku only a year ago. I’m putty in their hands.

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Fog of the Blog

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Expressed sometimes as State of the Nation

The Chinese hackers have been battering on the blog door until a couple of days ago but have now given up and gone away. The technical team at the web hosting company (nzwebhosting4u.com) have dealt to them. Turns out the high traffic figures I’ve alluded to over the past months were spurious.

The blog will be moving away from WordShine soon, to climateconversation.org.nz.

This writer is becoming busy with editing work, as the academic year gets under way.

Thank you, my loyal readers and friends, for keeping up the conversation in my frequent absences of late. I especially like the mentions of breaking, noteworthy stories. I’m now catching up and will post new comments shortly.

The unfinished analysis of the report from the Commissioner for the Environment has not been forgotten. It is at the top of the list.

It looks to be an exciting year ahead; my belated Season’s greetings to you all, a Happy New Year and may you each find in it that which opens your heart.

Peace and blessings.

Richard Treadgold.

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Cyber attacks continue

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malicious hacker

Malicious hacker.

But we’re winning

Well, last weekend was a washout. I got nothing done that I’d planned, dealing instead with electronic warfare and the extensive site disruption it caused. There were glitches turning up everywhere, caused either by the attack itself or by the methods required to combat it.

Almost two whole days were slowly eaten up, but there was no alternative, for exposing climate change misinformation is more important than anything else. Continue Reading →

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A DDOS attack takes CCG down

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If you tried to access the blog this morning but were blocked with the message

This Account Has Been Suspended

please accept my apologies.

My web site host explains it was a DDOS attack on this and other sites which brought down their network. We’re back online and on my host’s recommendation I’m looking into CloudFlare, which might bring an end to the malicious inconvenience. Continue Reading →

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Posting delayed

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A personal note

I’ve been laid low for the last three days by a virus (according to my ever-accurate wife it’s a virus, though it might be a bacterium; when I asked her why she calls it a virus, she was nonspecific—so it left me unsatisfied but ended the conversation) which has gone through the family from one end and out the other from babies to grandparents. Nobody said life would be easy.

Your host is back with reduced but reviving vigour.

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Chinese cyber attack thwarted

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The Climate Conversation web site has been under determined attack by cyber criminals over the last two months. Over 5.5 million web requests and 1.3 million spam messages deluged the server during September and October. I wondered at the persistently slow responses and recently complained. My web host provider was already diagnosing the problem and yesterday brought the attacks to an end, though at the cost of isolating China. Sorry, China!

Our web traffic, already busy, had soared to three times normal, 80% to 90% of it from China, enormously inflating our log files. The SysAdmin told me:

Your logs have been much larger than normal for months, but only caused the server to stop all processing in the last few weeks. Your logs haven’t processed for over a month but others on the server only stopped when yours hung for a week.

Continue Reading →

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The Conversation has a new theme

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Tell me what you think of it

The old theme was broken by the recent small changes to the site. I replaced it with one that works, though it’s not perfect and I’ll tweak it or find a better one.

I hope it works for everyone, but please tell me of any problems you find. Getting used to a new theme is rather like moving into a new house. It takes time and you find yourself turning towards the old kitchen for a while before the habitual movement is replaced.

Of course, just as you’re getting used to it, I’ll find the perfect theme and change it all again. I don’t know how to avoid that, sorry!

For those interested, the old theme was Freshy2 and this one is Twenty Fourteen Prana. Prana is a Sanskrit word meaning ‘breath’ or ‘life breath’. I hope it breathes new life through our conversations.

If you know something about WordPress themes, feel free to recommend one you like.

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Bad state of the blog

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Regrettably, the blog site is still broken, even after twice deleting all the WordPress installation files and uploading them again.

WordPress volunteers are still not replying to my request for assistance. It’s frustrating and I apologise to all my readers for the inconvenience.

Still, comments are still working, so at least you can tell me what’s going on. Continue Reading →

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WordPress broken

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Still working on fixing the site within the continued exigencies of domestic life. My continued apologies.

UPDATE 26 May 11:34 NZST

I’m in communication with Houston, sorry, I mean the WordPress forums, and I’m hopeful a solution is near.

UPDATE 26 May 16:09 NZST

Really frustrating that short posts are possible but not decently lengthy ones. Suspect it’s a scripting problem. Waiting on reply from support volunteers who I think are asleep.

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Plug pulled on extraordinary site activity

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I may never know what caused the outage, but much of the activity originated in China.

Checking on the blog late last night, my heart sank when I saw a notice in garish colours (that was bad, but it wasn’t the worst part) saying “This account has been suspended.”

Both my sites were down, along with the email. I imagined people around the world contemplating undeserved doubts about my ability to pay the bill.

Today, after webmail discussions with my hosting provider (they don’t accept telephone calls, but they are wonderfully inexpensive) and puzzling over my email settings, everything was running again.

The server software automatically suspended my sites (wordshine and fastproof) after the activity spiked to over 13 GB in just a few hours. The sites were moved to another server. What were they up to in China?

I’ll probably never find out, but I’m sorry for the disruption and it’s all back to normal. Thanks for your patience.

Well, my additional apologies!

After posting this piece explaining the outage, I went to read it online, as I usually do, just to make sure it worked properly. What further horror to discover that it and all the other posts gave a 404 Not found error!

The gremlin lay in the way WordPress codes its title links and fortunately was the work of moments to rectify, but I apologise to those who might have been frustrated all afternoon.

Well, back to the writing again!

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Conversation threads soon to be gone

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Speak now or forever hold your peace

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 →

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A robust conversation

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Personal statement

My apologies are overdue

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 →

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Climate denial undeniable, so no rest yet

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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 →

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The best way to post comments

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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?

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Housekeeping: can we control the conversation?

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Huub Bakker admonished us, saying:

Guys,

Much as Brandoch may throw unsubstantiated statements and ad hominems around, the responses are also laden with ad hominem attacks. This hardly does anyone on this website any favours.

Richard Treadgold, I see that you slapped Brandoch over the knuckles for calling people liars but then didn’t do the same when Richard C accused Brandoch of lying. [although Richard C made the point that his “accusation” was merely a spoof of what Brandoch had said, it’s a fair point that I rarely admonish “friends” – RT]

I enjoy reading a good discussion of the facts and putting people in their place using facts and references but we really could do without the abuse from both sides. Please enforce politeness and respect on both sides, Richard. People coming to this site to be informed would be horrified with the slanging that is currently going on here and might conclude that sceptics are no better than alarmists.

I agree with him. But with one enormous caveat: I have no wish to rule the world. One reason there are no “Rules of conduct” posted here is to avoid adding to the rules we already endure. Courtesy is enough. Continue Reading →

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Climate Conversation traffic sets records

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Thank you to all our visitors – both voluble and silent – for making this small corner of the free blogoverse a forum both informative and influential.

I just checked last month’s Climate Conversation web traffic figures out of cPanel and I’m mightily pleased. All metrics show record high figures. This is only for the CC sub-domain of WordShine (I really must shift it to climateconversation.org.nz, huh?). Here is the cPanel graph with October highlighted:

CCG traffic summary for October 2012

CCG traffic summary for October 2012. Four days plus a few minutes of the fifth day of November’s traffic are included, making the stats package divide by 5, not 4. If you divide the Monthly Totals for November by 4 you see a considerable increase in all metrics over the October daily averages. It’s early days, but shows the growth continues into this month for a while at least.

The release of the judge’s decision and the recently-filed costs arguments are obvious sources of increased interest. But there have been some notable threads of conversation on climate science which have pitted determined warmists against equally tenacious sceptics. Continue Reading →

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Ava is very cute

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It was Ava’s birthday yesterday (she’s one year old). There is a party tonight at Diana’s place. Afterwards some of us – probably not including Ava – will watch the Super Rugby 14 final.

Go the Chiefs!

I’ll see you tomorrow some time.

UPDATE: Some time tomorrow today

How were you to know that Ava is alleged to be my grand-daughter, one of an alleged six such lucky children. It was great to be hosted so well at our daughter Diana’s place in Pakuranga, with her fiance Carl, and staying overnight let me imbibe an extra glass of wine and tankard of ale while watching the climax of the Super Rugby competition.

And it was of course terrific to celebrate Ava’s birthday – go the Chiefs!

To prove beyond doubt Ava’s extremely high cuteness factor, here’s one of the pics I clicked yesterday.

Ava's first birthday party

Ava captivating at her first birthday party. “It was a wonderful ball, the prince was fabulous!
Somehow I lost a slipper…”

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With friends like these we need no enemies

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John O’Sullivan expressed interest in our court project against NIWA. But some of his comments describe more hope than fact, possibly through a misunderstanding of NZ law and the nature of our court case, and perhaps my inadequate reporting has contributed to that.

This morning my inbox was filling up with requests to explain and I could sense some people becoming distinctly over-stimulated by the imaginary achievements of the brave Kiwi sceptics.

The problem is that the judge hasn’t even made his decision, which my recent posts have made clear. We run a distinct risk of contempt of court if we appear to endorse the wild claims about the state of the case, of legal moves, even of victory, that are beginning to sound around the world.

It’s a shame, for the case contains enough of genuine merit; it can do without being overshadowed by needless exaggeration.

In an attempt to calm emotions, I’ve left a comment at John’s blog Continue Reading →

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Climate Conversation v. Hot Topic et al.

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Alexa world-wide rankings

I bow to you, my reader.

As measured informally on my Alexa toolbar, you’ve raised this humble blog into a leading Kiwi site for sceptical discussion of global warming. Though many of you are silent and your participation limited to quiet reading, you’ve achieved a remarkable thing with your frequent loyal visits (I’ll be sure to keep the kettle hot).

It shows that north of sixty thousand visitors per month prefer a moderate tone over stridency and a restrained view of climate data better than a doomsday clamour. Large numbers! MSM, are you noticing?

In June last year there was a bit of a fuss over climate blog rankings and whether the numbers were reliable. Nothing to do with climate, of course.

Then a while back I reinstalled the Alexa toolbar, just out of interest. Apparently you have to give Alexa time to get settled information on your traffic, so I waited. Just now I noticed our world ranking is up to 844,719, having started at over 1.3 million. The NZ rank is under 900. Wow! So it’s time to tell you. Continue Reading →

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Warmth ≠ warming

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In my previous post I said that, since the temperature hasn’t gone up (much) in about 15 years, nothing has happened as a result – in short, global warming hasn’t caused anything, harmful or otherwise.

That short chain of reasoning seemed justified by the observed and documented lack of significant warming of the near-surface atmosphere around the globe during the last 15 years, and I thought the logic unassailable.

The above link shows the HadCRUT3 record, but you’ll see a very similar trajectory with the GISTEMP dataset, UAH, RSS or NCDC. All of these records show that, from about 1997, there’s been precious little warming or cooling and that the global monthly mean temperature anomaly has, in the last six months or less, steeply descended through exactly the same band through which it rose in 1997.

To repeat: because global warming hasn’t occurred for about 15 years, global warming hasn’t caused anything else to occur in that time. Very simple. Continue Reading →

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I’ve been busy

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Business commitments have kept me from covering any climate topics for a while, but I plan to post an article or two at the weekend. There’s a paper on clouds by two Auckland researchers that has come to my attention and I may have time for further items.

So, my apologies, but I haven’t stopped either being interested in climate matters or spending time reading and writing about them. There’s a lot happening and some people have been quite excited at the extra realistic (sceptical) coverage of global warming.

I avoid getting excited because the great carbon-based wheel is now turning at a fair clip and will take a power of stopping. That’s no reason to slacken our efforts, but is a reason to raise the gaze to a slightly more distant finish line.

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