Gord Replies to Comments

UPDATE: Commenter 'Gord,' source of the analysis in the post originally here entitled Why 'Science of Doom' doesn't understand the 1st Law of Thermodynamics, was away from email for a few days and unable to respond to claims in the discussion. I unfortunately misinterpreted that he had dropped out of the discussion and therefore took it down with a "mea culpa." Gord is now back and thus I have put the discussions back up to allow further debate.

Although this debate is irrelevant to AGW for the reasons below, there is merit to continuing the discussions for those interested.

The Science of Doom 'thought experiment' does not prove anything relevant to the Kiehl/Trenberth (K/T) Earth energy budget or the earth/atmosphere system as claimed since

1. The atmosphere cannot behave as both an ideal gas and as a solid PVC blackbody (Science of Doom said elsewhere on this site, "...I realize you are right. As my example is made out of PVC and the atmosphere is made out of gas the example shows nothing useful.")
2. Limitation of conduction and convection by PVC has no relevance to the radiative transfer budget of K/T, which Science of Doom claims is supported by his thought experiment
3. The energy source  ["sun"] should be located outside the sphere
4. The energy source should be intermittent ["day & night"], not continuous. Better yet, the source could be continuous outside the sphere as long as the sphere continously rotates.

The K/T Earth energy budget shows

1. The incoming solar radiation (the only energy source) is 342 Wm-2
2. The earth surface radiation is 390 Wm-2, i.e. 48 Wm-2 more than the only energy source.
3. Another 102 Wm-2 is being lost from the earth surface via evapotranspiration and convection that is not limited by PVC or anything else, and conduction is not a part of the budget. Thus, we now have an energy source of 342Wm-2 creating 492 Wm-2 leaving the earth surface even without limiting convection and conduction as in the SoD example. An additional 30 Wm-2 is reflected from the Earth surface for a new total of 522 Wm-2 leaving the Earth surface.
4. Even if greenhouse gases could behave like a mirror, they cannot add energy to the system, and explain how

342 Wm-2 in becomes 522 Wm-2 out

Why conventional Greenhouse Theory Violates the 1st Law of Thermodynamics

U Mass thinks greenhouse gases can add energy to the system

And this explains why Earth energy budgets that don't incorporate greenhouse gases at all do balance whereas the K/T budget is described by it's creator Kevin Trenberth as "a travesty" that doesn't balance.

Magazine: 'Americans are Losing Faith in Climate Change'

Good Magazine laments in the latest issue that "Americans are Losing Faith in Climate Change," stating,

The ever-controversial topic has become increasingly politicized in recent years, with thousands of different theories and statistics circulating at any given moment. It is in this polarized environment that Americans form their opinions of climate change, and its importance as a legitimate threat to the future of life on our planet. Here we look at how these views have shifted over the last decade, and where Americans stand today on the issue of climate change.

"Faith" is a good choice of words by the magazine, expressing the religious nature of AGW and lack of scientific evidence.

Paper: Medieval Warming Period Hotter than Present in most Regions

A recently published book, Climate Change and Variability, features a chapter titled "A Regional Approach to the Medieval Warm Period and the Little Ice Age," by Fredrik Ljungqvist. The author finds the presently available paleoclimate data do not support the assumption that late 20th century temperatures exceeded those of the Medieval Warming Period in most regions. He finds that the conclusions of the IPCC were based on "too few proxy records or [have] been based on instrumental temperatures spliced to the proxy reconstructions." The author concludes that the claim of Michael Mann and the hockey team that the MWP was restricted to the North Atlantic region "can be rejected." From the conclusion,

Analysis: Serious Flaws in the IPCC Process

A new SPPI paper illustrates serious flaws in the IPCC assessment process using the "GlacierGate" example, including plagiarism from non-peer reviewed sources with false attribution to different sources, and authors who "are allowed to cite whatever sources they wish and write whatever they wish within a wide scope, safe in the knowledge that their work will not be checked, save by reviewers whose comments they can ignore with impunity."

Scientific American Poll: 81% think the IPCC is Corrupt, with Group-think & Political Agenda

'Scientific' American may regret taking their recent opinion poll on the state of climate science given the eye-opening results cast by their "scientifically literate" readership. With a total of 5190 respondents, a consensus of 81.3% think the IPCC is "a corrupt organization, prone to group-think, with a political agenda" and 75% think climate change is caused by solar variation or natural processes vs. 21% who think it is due to greenhouse gases from human activity. 65% think we should do nothing about climate change since "we are powerless to stop it," and the same percentage think science should stay out of politics. When asked, "How much would you be willing to pay to forestall the risk of catastrophic climate change?," 76.7% said "nothing."

Poll results hidden here

Climate of Change?
1. Should climate scientists discuss scientific uncertainty in mainstream forums?
No, that would play into the hands of the fossil-fuel lobby. 3.0% 157
Yes, it would help engage the citizenry. 90.1% 4,673
Maybe—but only via serious venues like PBS's the NewsHour and The New York Times. 6.9% 358
answered question 5,188
skipped question 2

2. Judith Curry is:
a peacemaker. 69.1% 3,585
a dupe. 7.6% 392
both. 4.3% 224
I've never heard of her. 19.0% 987
answered question 5,188
skipped question 2

3. What is causing climate change?
greenhouse gases from human activity 30.9% 1,602
solar variation 33.1% 1,718
natural processes 75.8% 3,934
There is no climate change. 6.2% 320
answered question 5,188
skipped question 2

4. The IPCC, or Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change is:
an effective group of government representatives, scientists and other experts. 18.0% 932
a corrupt organization, prone to groupthink, with a political agenda. 81.3% 4,220
something to do with Internet protocols. 0.7% 36
answered question 5,188
skipped question 2

5. What should we do about climate change?
Nothing, we are powerless to stop it. 65.4% 3,394
Use more technology (geoengineering, carbon capture and storage). 16.7% 865
Use less technology (cars, intensive agriculture). 5.8% 303
Switch to carbon-free energy sources as much as possible and adapt to changes already underway. 29.5% 1,528
answered question 5,188
skipped question 2

6. What is "climate sensitivity"?
the degree to which global temperature responds to concentrations of greenhouse gases 32.6% 1,692
an unknown variable that climate scientists still do not understand 52.2% 2,708
the phrase on which the fate of human civilization hangs 0.6% 30
all of the above 14.6% 758
answered question 5,188
skipped question 2

7. Which policy options do you support?
a carbon tax 15.1% 781
cap and trade (a price on carbon via an overall limit on emissions paired with some form of market for such pollution permits) 8.5% 441
increased government funding of energy-related technology research and development 38.8% 2,015
cap and dividend, in which the proceeds of auctioning pollution permits are rebated to taxpayers 6.6% 343
keeping science out of the political process 65.1% 3,375
answered question 5,188
skipped question 2

8. How much would you be willing to pay to forestall the risk of catastrophic climate change?
a 50 percent increase in electricity bills 3.8% 195
a doubling of gasoline prices 5.5% 286
nothing 76.7% 3,981
whatever it takes 14.0% 726
answered question 5,188
skipped question 2

Find...

Show replies

Hide replies

Review of Holocene 'Climate Optimum' shows Temperatures 2°C hotter than Present

A new peer-reviewed paper Climate change between the mid and late Holocene in northern high latitudes reviews 110 temperature proxies of the past 6000 years in the northern high latitudes and finds "A large majority of the here investigated temperature reconstructions indicate that temperatures were warmer at the mid-Holocene [6000 years ago] compared to the preindustrial period [500 years ago], both in summer,winter and the annual mean. By taking simple arithmetic averages over the available data, the reconstructions indicate that the northern high latitudes were 1.0°C warmer in summer, 1.7°C in winter and 2.0°C warmer in the annual mean temperature at the mid-Holocene (6000 years ago) compared to the recent pre-industrial." The paper also notes (p. 6) that the temperature change via proxy reconstructions from years 1501 to 2000 "appears to be only ~0.05°C for the Northern Hemisphere as a whole according to data from Mann et al (2009)." [that is not a typo - the paper states five one-hundredths of one degree change from pre-industrial 1501 AD to the year 2000]

Therefore, annual northern hemisphere temperatures during the Holocene 'Climate Optimum' 6000 years ago were ~1.95°C hotter than at the end of the 20th century. The "hockey team" of Michael Mann et al has claimed that prior warming periods were localized to the European Arctic, but this extensive review shows the current warming is not unprecedented, not localized, and was greatly exceeded in the recent geologic past. 

Note: the Corrigendum of this paper contains the updated figures above.

New Paper Says There's Little Empirical Evidence for AGW

A new peer-reviewed paper published in Theoretical and Applied Climatology points out that there little empirical evidence for AGW, and that "At best, the empirical evidence for human impact on  climate change...is based on correlational research." One of the first principles of science is that "correlation does not equal causation," but as this paper shows, the IPCC essentially equates correlation with causation without consideration of alternative theories that could potentially falsify the AGW theory. In addition, the paper is critical of the IPCC "cherry-picking" data to confirm AGW while ignoring contradictory data, and the use of a "consensus," stating "if reaching consensus were really the hallmark of sound science, the scientific theories of Galileo, Copernicus, Darwin, and many others would never have seen daylight" and "scientists need to make a living, and they will not bite the hand that feeds them, an argument used by some advocates of AGW who claim that climate skeptics are sponsored by “Big Carbon”. Therefore, consensus must be dismissed as a defining feature of science."

Selected excerpts from the paper:

Briefly stated, the major shortcoming of the verification criterion is that it allows only experience to decide upon the truth or falsity of scientific statements (Popper 1965: 42; see Rapp 1975). Popper's most important contribution to the debate was to state that every scientific theory should be able to list counter-examples which, if found in reality, disconfirm (“falsify”) the theory. This is the principle of falsification. In the case of anthropogenic global warming (AGW), the theory should list one or more counter- examples that could (potentially) disconfirm the theory. This listing of potential falsifiers appears to be missing in the present debate on AGW. In fact, some skeptics in the debate on AGW point out that all natural climatic disasters are used as evidence (verification) for the human impact on climate, whereas evidence that a post WWII global warming is absent in, e.g., the Greenland Ice-Core Bore Record [see related graph below] is ignored as falsifying evidence (see, e.g., Dahl-Jensen et al. 1998; Feldman and Marks 2009). Needless to say that a methodologically sound theory would encompass all available evidence and not “cherry-pick” those pieces of evidence that confirm the theory while ignoring those that do not.

Unfortunately, when a theoretical phenomenon such as AGW becomes a global political program, it soon becomes vulnerable to methodological fallacies in the realm of social and political science. Leaving aside the quality of used data and methods, the IPCC report aimed at reaching a consensus. Consensus is recognized by some social scientific method- ologists as the defining feature of social science (Swanborn 1996; Feyerabend 1987). However, if reaching consensus were really the hallmark of sound science, the scientific theories of Galileo, Copernicus, Darwin, and many others would never have seen daylight. Also, there is no guarantee that majorities will reach sensible opinions.

Finally, scientists need to make a living, and they will not bite the hand that feeds them, an argument used by some advocates of AGW who claim that climate skeptics are sponsored by “Big Carbon”. Therefore, consensus must be dismissed as a defining feature of science. The IPCC recognizes the limitation of consensus by adding the phrase ‘and much evidence’ when it makes statements as in, e.g., “there is high agreement and much evidence that with current climate change mitigation policies and related sustainable develop- ment practices, global GHG emissions will continue to grow over the next few decades” (IPCC 2007: p. 7, italics added). We must therefore discuss the sources of evidence that are used to formulate the many causal statements on AGW issued in the report.

The quality of all scientific research depends of course, on the quality of the data that are being processed. Regardless of the quality of the (statistical) model used for analysis, if bad data are fed to the model, then the result of the analysis will be bad. This principle is known as garbage in–garbage out. In other words, if the data that are fed into climate models are open to dispute, then so are the projections of these models. In the scientific (i.e., peer- reviewed) literature, several authors have expressed doubts about the quality of the analyzed data and the possibility to derive at valid inferences on human impact on global warming (e.g., Jaworowski 1994; Soon et al. 2004; Michaels 2008; Pielke et al. 2007).

For instance, if the AGW hypothesis is to be confirmed, data are required that quantify the amount of human produced CO2  as separated from the amount produced by other sources (e.g., volcano's) and as separated from the amount of CO2  dissipated in oceans for a time span that covers theoretically justified time lags (perchance in the order of centuries). An “aggregate” causal variable that combines radiative forcing of greenhouse gasses, anthropogenic sulfur emissions, and radiative forcing of solar irradiance cannot provide “direct evidence that, since 1870, human activity is largely responsible for the increase in global surface temperature” (cfr. Kauffmann et al. 2006: 225, 250).

In order to scientifically corroborate the AGW hypothesis, the present focus on verification of the AGW hypothesis should shift towards a focus on its falsification.

...in adopting Swanborn's (1996) “regulative idea of striving after truth by consensus within the scientific community over research results”, we are always in danger of replacing the purpose of science (knowledge) with a by-product of science (consensus in the form of “common sense”).
Theor Appl Climatol DOI 10.1007/s00704-010-0355-y

A methodological note on the making of causal statements in the debate on anthropogenic global warming

Jarl K. Kampen

Accepted: 4 October 2010

Abstract: At best, the empirical evidence for human impact on climate change, more specifically, the anthropogenic global warming (AGW), is based on correlational research. That is, no experiment has been carried out that confirms or falsifies the causal hypothesis put forward by the International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) that anthropogenic increasing of green house gas concentrations very likely causes increasing of the (mean) global temperature. In this article, we point out the major weaknesses of correlational research in assessing causal hypotheses. We further point out that the AGW hypothesis is in need of potential falsifiers in the Popperian (neopositivistic) sense. Some directions for future research on the formulation of such falsifiers in causal research are discussed. Of course, failure to find falsifying evidence in empirical climate data will render the AWG hypothesis much stronger.

Prop 23 and the Green Jobs Myth

Californians could protect a million or so jobs by overturning the state's self-imposed carbon dioxide limits
By T.J. RODGERS     WSJ.COM

I have an indelible memory of the one time I was on Rodeo Drive. There she was, a rotund matron dressed in a pink sequined jumpsuit, exiting a limousine and handing her three toy poodles to the doorman at an upscale shop specializing in $1,000 purses. It's a perfect metaphor for California's economy: We ignore the important, focus on the trivial, and spend way too much money in the process.

While our state government frets over issues like the disclosure of trans fat on restaurant menus and the habitat of the red-legged frog, our economy—the habitat of homo sapiens—is a disaster. Jobs and the companies that produce them are being pushed out of the state by excessive taxes and regulations. We have borrowed to the limit and at times have been forced to pay state employees and vendors with vouchers until more cash could be secured.

California, which once plowed through recessions, now has 12.4% unemployment, third worst in the nation. CEOs surveyed nationally by Chief Executive magazine recently rated California the worst state for business, for the fifth consecutive year. My company, Cypress Semiconductor, has recently stepped up its contributions of food and money—and even donated an extra warehouse building—so that San Jose's Second Harvest Food Bank can feed the swelling number of hungry people in Silicon Valley.

Californians have voted to avert economic disaster before. In 1967, we elected Ronald Reagan as governor. After improving our economy, he led the nation out of Carternomics. Then in 1978, we passed Proposition 13, which still limits property taxes to 1% of assessed value, a lifesaver today as our rapacious state government scrounges for revenue rather than cuts spending.

In a few days, we Californians have another chance to restore our competitiveness. We can elect as governor Meg Whitman, former eBay CEO, to make the structural changes necessary to stem the flow of jobs out of California. Or we can elect Jerry Brown, a recycled governor who took interim jobs as state attorney general and mayor of Oakland, where, under his administration, the public schools were taken over by the state for gross mismanagement. For U.S. senator we can elect either Barbara Boxer, another business-hostile veteran politician, or former Hewlett-Packard CEO Carly Fiorina, who understands the economic problems we face.

Most importantly, Californians have an opportunity to vote for Proposition 23, which will prevent implementation of the California law known as AB32. AB32 is yet another tax, this one on carbon dioxide, the substance that we exhale about 50,000 times per day, that comes from our cars when we drive to work, and from our Silicon Valley plants as we use power for our computers and air-conditioning. Pushed by dogmatic green politicians, the tax would put another burden on California companies that our Chinese and Korean competitors will not have to bear.

The basic premise of AB32 fails a grade-school math test. The latest EPA figures show that total U.S. carbon dioxide emissions in 2007 were 5.98 gigatons, of which California contributed 0.40 gigatons. If California had held its carbon dioxide emissions to its 1990 level of 0.36 gigatons, as AB32 mandates by 2020, the 2007 U.S. carbon dioxide emission figure would have been 5.94 gigatons, rather than 5.98 gigatons. For this our state government has chosen to terminate the jobs of 1.1 million Californians (the impact estimated by the California Small Business Roundtable) on top of existing unemployment.

I know firsthand about green jobs. SunPower Corp., a company I chair and the second-largest U.S. producer of solar cells, has produced about 800 green jobs in California. But that's just a fraction of the 4,700 jobs lost when Toyota pulled the plug on its local Nummi automotive plant due to the high cost of doing business in California.

This is a common unintended consequence of so-called green economies. For example, a recent study by Rey Juan Carlos University in Madrid showed that for every green job created in Spain, 2.2 jobs were lost at large. A similar Italian study showed an even worse result. Green jobs, because of the subsidies and regulations that surround them, are often overall economic losers. And there is no guarantee that new green jobs will even be domestic.

When Cypress acquired the 18-year-old, money-losing SunPower Corp. in 2003, I planned to make the company viable by shutting down its high-cost California solar cell factory and moving its manufacturing to the Philippines. One could say that I eventually exported 4,000 green jobs. Yet it's more accurate to say that SunPower created about 800 new American jobs that would not have existed without its offshore manufacturing capability.

After building its first and second manufacturing plants in the Philippines, SunPower chose to build its third in Malaysia. We never considered a California site due to high cost and red tape.

On Nov. 2, by supporting Prop. 23, Californians can prevent another job-killing tax.

Mr. Rodgers is the founder and CEO of Cypress Semiconductor.

Climate Fools Day in the UK Parliament a Success

email received from analytical chemist Hans Schreuder reporting the Climate Fools Day meeting in the UK Parliament was a great success. Perhaps a US version will occur in the US House of Representatives following the Nov. 2nd midterm elections.

The Climate Fools Day in London meeting was superb.

Will write a proper report on the event yet, when various video clips have been posted.

Attached two pics from the event. The room was nearly fully booked.

Lots of good contacts and a call for a monthly meeting at Parliament and for MPs to attend.

Wind energy in particular was demolished as the greatest waste of time and money. The momentum is building now.

Kind regards,
Hans Schreuder
http://www.ilovemycarbondioxide.com/

Professor Don Easterbrook on The Looming Threat of Global Cooling

Professor of Geology Dr. Don Easterbrook's essay, The Looming Threat of Global Cooling, predicts on the basis of natural climate cycles such as the PDO that "global cooling for the next 2 to 3 decades will be far more damaging than global warming would have been." The paper also finds there were numerous, abrupt, short-lived warming and cooling episodes, much more intense than recent warming/cooling, during the last ice age, none of which could have been caused by changes in atmospheric CO2:

Climate Models Without a 'Greenhouse Effect'

Several posts have demonstrated that the Earth's climate can be physically described without any need to invent a 'greenhouse effect' caused by 'heat-trapping' 'greenhouse gases' that 'back-radiate' from the colder atmosphere to heat the hotter Earth surface in violation of the 2nd law of thermodynamics. Five published Earth energy budgets which roughly agree and do not incorporate 'greenhouse gases' at all were shown in the post Earth Energy Budgets without Greenhouse Gases, including one from the NASA Langley Research Center. A peer-reviewed paper by Ozawa et al published in Reviews of Geophysics also develops an Earth energy budget and climate model that does not incorporate a 'greenhouse effect' from 'greenhouse gases.' This is in remarkable contrast to the Earth energy budget of Kevin Trenberth used by the IPCC, which claims that 'greenhouse gases' heat the Earth by 324 Wm-2 compared to only 168 Wm-2 directly from the Sun! Thus, we have at least 6 published Earth energy budgets stating the contribution to the Earth surface temperature from 'greenhouse gases' is zero, compared to the IPCC/Trenberth budget claiming 'greenhouse gases' heat the Earth almost twice as much as direct sunlight and in violation of the 2nd law. Kevin "missing heat" Trenberth's energy budget is indeed, in his own words, "a travesty." The reason Trenberth's budget has "missing heat" is because it never existed in the first place, since 'greenhouse gases' cannot provide added energy to warm the Earth; only the Sun and geothermal energy sources can add heat to the Earth's surface.

Ozawa et al Earth energy & entropy budgets

For fans of the real 2nd law of thermodynamics, see Fig. 3 in the paper which shows heat only flows one way from the hotter Earth to colder atmosphere. The paper discusses the 2nd law in the context of maximum entropy production, which also explains why the so-called 'fingerprint' of AGW - the "hot spot" - won't occur.

Reviews of Geophysics, 41, 4 / 1018 2003 doi:10.1029/2002RG000113

THE SECOND LAW OF THERMODYNAMICS AND THE GLOBAL CLIMATE SYSTEM: A REVIEW OF THE MAXIMUM ENTROPY PRODUCTION PRINCIPLE

Hisashi Ozawa, Atsumu Ohmura, Ralph D. Lorenz & Toni Pujol

Abstract: The long-term mean properties of the global climate system and those of turbulent fluid systems are reviewed from a thermodynamic viewpoint. Two general expressions are derived for a rate of entropy production due to thermal and viscous dissipation (turbulent dissipation) in a fluid system. It is shown with these expressions that maximum entropy production in the Earth's climate system suggested by Paltridge, as well as maximum transport properties of heat or momentum in a turbulent system suggested by Malkus and Busse, correspond to a state in which the rate of entropy production due to the turbulent dissipation is at a maximum. Entropy production due to absorption of solar radiation in the climate system is found to be irrelevant to the maximized properties associated with turbulence. The hypothesis of maximum entropy production also seems to be applicable to the planetary atmospheres of Mars and Titan and perhaps to mantle convection. Lorenz's conjecture on maximum generation of available potential energy is shown to be akin to this hypothesis with a few minor approximations. A possible mechanism by which turbulent fluid systems adjust themselves to the states of maximum entropy production is presented as a self-feedback mechanism for the generation of available potential energy. These results tend to support the hypothesis of maximum entropy production that underlies a wide variety of nonlinear fluid systems, including our planet as well as other planets and stars.

The Unseen Carbon Agenda: EPA wants to remove 7% of U.S. power generation

WSJ.COM  REVIEW & OUTLOOK OCTOBER 27, 2010

The Unseen Carbon Agenda

Anyone who cares about the U.S. economy is breathing easier now that cap and tax appears to be on the political garbage barge, but don't be so sure. The White House is still pursuing its carbon agenda through regulation, albeit with almost no public attention, and a new study shows the damage that is already being done.

Yesterday the North American Electric Reliability Corporation, a highly regarded federal energy advisory body, released an exhaustive "special assessment" of this covert program. NERC estimates that the Environmental Protection Agency's pending electric utility regulations will subtract between 46 and 76 gigawatts of generating capacity from the U.S. grid by 2015. To put those numbers in perspective, the worst-case scenario would amount to a reduction of about 7.2% of national power generation, and almost all of it will hit coal-fired plants, the workhorse that supplies a little over half of U.S. electricity.

The EPA's battery of new rules is mostly obscure, ranging from traditional pollutants such as mercury and sulfur to new regulation of coal ash and even water intake structures, which power plants use to cool down equipment. NERC notes that the "pace and aggressiveness" of issuing so many new rules at once is unprecedented. Keep in mind, too, that these are conservative estimates and don't even include the EPA's looming carbon "endangerment" rules.

Supposedly all this is separate from greenhouse gases, but the White House and the EPA are clearly targeting fossil fuels and coal in particular to achieve via rule-making what even the Democratic 111th Congress has rejected as legislation. As much as a fifth of the perfectly functioning coal-fired fleet will be forced into early retirement, to be replaced with a largely more expensive energy mix, especially natural gas.

Some plants can be retrofit with new environmental controls like scrubbers, but this is nearly as costly as building new plants from scratch. And just as you can't replace an engine while heading down the highway at 75 mph, this will still require shut downs in the interim, for at least five years.

In a recent research note, Credit Suisse estimates that compliance will cost as much as $150 billion in capital investment by the end of the decade. All of this will flow through to rising electricity prices, which is the same as a tax increase on businesses and consumers.

NERC also warns of "deteriorating resource adequacy" and of the logistical reality that replacing or upgrading so much capacity so fast may lead to brownouts and shortages. The danger is greatest throughout the Midwest in states like Ohio, Pennsylvania and West Virginia, where the costs will also be concentrated.

The larger point is that instead of debating a carbon program on the merits, the Obama Administration is now trying to impose the same burden step by step on the sly. At this point, the only way voters can stop the EPA is to install a check in one of the other branches of government. Election Day is Tuesday.

Another paper on the Fallacy of the 'Greenhouse Effect'

Adding to the list of papers disproving conventional greenhouse theory, this paper by geophysicists Gerhard Kramm and Ralph Dlugi shows the 'greenhouse effect' is a fallacy based upon erroneous data and physical assumptions including a simplistic 'global average temperature'. Using realistic empirical data, the authors find that the atmospheric models utilized by the IPCC and Kiehl/Trenberth "do not provide evidence for the existence of the so-called atmospheric greenhouse effect." Related and also recommended: a new chapter by professor Claes Johnson, Climate Thermodynamics, which also shows the 'greenhouse effect' to be a fallacy and that adding 'greenhouse gases' to the atmosphere does not cause warming.


On the meaning of feedback parameter, transient climate response, and the greenhouse effect: Basic considerations and the discussion of uncertainties
 
Gerhard Kramm, Ralph Dlugi

Abstract: In this paper we discuss the meaning of feedback parameter, greenhouse effect and transient climate response usually related to the globally averaged energy balance model of Schneider and Mass. After scrutinizing this model and the corresponding planetary radiation balance we state that (a) this globally averaged energy balance model is flawed by unsuitable physical considerations, (b) the planetary radiation balance for an Earth in the absence of an atmosphere is fraught by the inappropriate assumption of a uniform surface temperature, the so-called radiative equilibrium temperature of about 255 K, and (c) the effect of the radiative anthropogenic forcing, considered as a perturbation to the natural system, is much smaller than the uncertainty involved in the solution of the model of Schneider and Mass. This uncertainty is mainly related to the empirical constants suggested by various authors and used for predicting the emission of infrared radiation by the Earth's skin. Furthermore, after inserting the absorption of solar radiation by atmospheric constituents and the exchange of sensible and latent heat between the Earth and the atmosphere into the model of Schneider and Mass the surface temperatures become appreciably lesser than the radiative equilibrium temperature. Moreover, neither the model of Schneider and Mass nor the Dines-type two-layer energy balance model for the Earth-atmosphere system, both contain the planetary radiation balance for an Earth in the absence of an atmosphere as an asymptotic solution, do not provide evidence for the existence of the so-called atmospheric greenhouse effect if realistic empirical data are used.

California could feel Spain's pain

This article from the Orange County Register is by Dr. Gabriel Calzada, professor of applied environmental economics in Spain and lead author of a 2009 study detailing the economic costs of Spain's experiment with the green economy.

Barring voter intervention, Californians will soon suffer under full-blown European-style energy policies. These include mandated greenhouse gas emission reductions of a sort achieved to date only through economic collapse, and fantastic mandates for renewable energy that so far have caused economic hardship elsewhere.

Oddly, despite these policies having been tried throughout Western Europe at great cost and for no discernible environmental benefit, Californians are told their laws are the "world's first".

It is not because policies similar to those in Assembly Bill 32 have yet to be tried that you hear no shining examples of their success. The "world's first" pretense is likely employed to avoid discussing the harm the policies have already caused elsewhere.

A similarly odd phrase, "California must be a leader," is now invoked against Proposition 23, the Nov. 2 ballot measure to delay these policies until the state's economy significantly recovers.

Yet while promoting similar steps at the national level, President Barack Obama had serially directed Americans to examine several European experiments in orchestrating the "green economy." Chief among his examples was Spain. Whether or not related to what I and two other researchers found after taking this advice, Mr. Obama no longer directs Americans to gaze at our economic wonder.

In Spain we found that the economy, in fact, lost a net 2.2 jobs for every "green job" the state claimed credit for, just in an opportunity cost. That is, the private sector creates jobs much more efficiently than the state – less expensively and dedicated to produce goods and services that people really demand. We found the private section would have created that many more "real" jobs had the money not been removed and put toward politically divined ends. Think "stimulus jobs."

A Power Point presentation leaked from the Spain's socialist Zapatero government earlier this year actually suggests that the loss in terms of jobs is currently even higher.

In Spain we also found that green jobs mostly (9 out of 10) were temporary. That is, they are principally installation jobs. In Italy, researchers found that 4.8 jobs were lost for each green job created.

Climate Activists learn their 'solutions' are absurd

What Have Climate Activists Learned?
Bjørn Lomborg, 2010-10-12

COPENHAGEN – Advocates of drastic cuts in carbon-dioxide emissions now speak a lot less than they once did about climate change. Climate campaigners changed their approach after the collapse of the Copenhagen climate-change summit last December and the revelation of mistakes in the United Nations climate panel’s work – as well as in response to growing public skepticism and declining interest.

Although some activists still rely on scare tactics – witness the launch of an advertisement depicting the bombing of anybody who is hesitant to embrace carbon cuts – many activists now spend more time highlighting the “benefits” of their policy prescription. They no longer dwell on impending climate doom, but on the economic windfall that will result from embracing the “green” economy.

You can find examples all over the world, but one of the best is in my home country, Denmark, where a government-appointed committee of academics recently presented their suggestions for how the country could go it alone and become “fossil fuel-free” in 40 years. The goal is breathtaking: more than 80% of Denmark’s energy supply comes from fossil fuels, which are dramatically cheaper and more reliable than any green energy source.

I attended the committee’s launch and was startled that the “Climate Commission” barely mentioned climate change. This omission is understandable, since one country acting alone cannot do much to stop global warming. If Denmark were indeed to become 100% fossil-free by 2050, and remain so for the rest of the century, the effect, by 2100, would be to delay the rise in average global temperature by just two weeks.

Instead of focusing on climate change, the Climate Commission hyped the benefits that Denmark would experience if it led the shift to green energy. Unfortunately, on inspection these benefits turn out to be illusory.

Being a pioneer is hardly a guarantee of riches. Germany led the world in putting up solar panels, funded by €47 billion in subsidies. The lasting legacy is a massive bill, and lots of inefficient solar technology sitting on rooftops throughout a fairly cloudy country, delivering a trivial 0.1% of its total energy supply.

Denmark itself has also already tried being a green-energy innovator – it led the world in embracing wind power. The results are hardly inspiring. Denmark’s wind industry is almost completely dependent on taxpayer subsidies, and Danes pay the highest electricity rates of any industrialized nation. Several studies suggest that claims that one-fifth of Denmark’s electricity demand is met by wind are an exaggeration, in part because much of the power is produced when there is no demand and must be sold to other countries.

The sorry state of wind and solar power shows the massive challenge that we face in trying to make today’s technology competitive and efficient. Direct-current lines need to be constructed to carry solar and wind energy from sunny, windy areas to where most people live. Storage mechanisms need to be invented so that power is not interrupted whenever there is no sunshine or wind.

Proponents of carbon cuts argue that green-energy technologies only seem more expensive, because the price of fossil fuels does not reflect the cost of their impact on the climate. But allowing for this would make little difference. The most comprehensive economic meta-study shows that total future climate impacts would justify a tax of around €0.01 per liter of petrol ($0.06 per gallon in the United States) – an amount dwarfed by the taxes already imposed by most European countries.

Despite the fact that changing from fossil fuels to green energy requires a total economic transformation, Denmark’s Climate Commission claimed that the price tag would be next to nothing. The Commission reached this conclusion by assuming that the cost of not embracing its recommended policy would be massive.

The Commission believes that over the next four decades, fossil-fuel costs will climb sharply, because sources will dry up and governments will place massive taxes on fossil fuels. But this flies in the face of most evidence. There is clearly plenty of cheap coal for hundreds of years, and with new cracking technology, gas is becoming more abundant. Even oil supplies are likely to be significantly boosted by non-conventional sources like tar sands.

By the same token, the prediction that governments will impose massive carbon taxes has little basis in reality. Such assumptions seem like a poor framework on which to build significant public policy, and seem to ignore the substantial cost of eliminating fossil fuels, which is likely to amount to at least 5% of GDP per year.

The shift away from fossil fuels will not be easy. Policymakers must prioritize investment in green-energy research and development. Trying to force carbon cuts instead of investing first in research puts the cart before the horse. Breakthroughs do not result automatically from a combination of taxes on fossil fuels and subsidies for present-day green energy: despite the massive outlays associated with the Kyoto Protocol, participating countries’ investment in R&D as a percentage of GDP did not increase.

The change in message after the disaster of the Copenhagen summit was probably inevitable. But the real change that is needed is the realization that drastic, early carbon cuts are a poor response to global warming – no matter how they are packaged.

Bjørn Lomborg is the author of The Skeptical Environmentalist and Cool It, director of the think-tank the Copenhagen Consensus Center, and adjunct professor at Copenhagen Business School.

Environmental Coalition: Biofuels result in higher emissions than fossil fuels

Bioenergy’s Carbon Neutrality Dismissed by Coalition of NGOs
October 20, 2010 by Antonio Pasolini

A coalition of environmental organizations has warned that bioenergy is far from being carbon neutral and that related carbon accounting systems currently in place are deceptive.

According to Ecosystems Climate Alliance, an alliance of NGOs committed to “keeping natural terrestrial ecosystems intact and their carbon out of the atmosphere”, zero-emission bioenergy is a myth. It blames the loopholes in LULUCF’s (Land Use, Land Use Change and Forestry) accounting rules for the misconception. The organization made an announcement on the subject on the occasion of the Tianjin Climate Change Negotiations, which took place between 4 and 9 October 2010.

ECA says the LULUCF is ‘arcane’ and cryptic. It adds that developed countries at the Tianjin meeting, led by the EU, tried to manipulate the way emission targets are projected and reported to spur biofuel growth and hide its environmental cost. Countries with renewable energy targets allow biomass burners to stay out of emissions accounting, backed by the “deceptive assumption that prior sequestration is sufficient to neutralize the problem”, and give them generous financial incentives for generating “green energy”. This way they act as serious competition for real renewables like wind and solar, which have much higher unit cost of production.

The fact that emissions from logging and burning of biomass are left out of Kyoto Protocol accounting systems, ECA says, creates an “attractive but misleading way for industrialized countries to appear to be achieving their national emissions reduction targets under the Protocol through substituting bioenergy for fossil fuels. In reality, such substitution results in higher emissions than those from fossil fuel for the same amount of useable energy.”

“One of problems we face in trying to get the broader public, climate change and energy decision-makers to appreciate just how perverse it is to burn biofuels. Firstly, it's counter-intuitive - most people just tend to think about growing an agricultural crop and then processing and burning it where all those familiar notions of the renewability of growing vegetables on a patch of ground make it seem 'mostly harmless'” says Alistair Graham, of the Humane Society International, one of ECA’s partners.

CO2 is emitted when natural gas is extracted and wood is extracted from forests because a substantial proportion of the wood is unrecoverable (such as branches, roots and rot). This problem is worse in wet old growth and pristine forest where logging is followed by burning.

“The debate rarely dwells upon the almost inevitable fact that that patch of ground would have grown vegetation anyway - whether as agriculture, forestry or a natural ecosystem - that's just what naturally happens”, Alistair says. “So the growing of biomass is not 'additional' - the vegetation growth would have happened anyway. This argument does seem to be getting some traction in the guise of concern over the displacement of cropland away from growing food - especially food security issues in developing countries, subsistence communities.”

Besides emissions, ECA also highlights transport and storage problems associated with biomass, which requires massive infrastructure. This is one of the reasons wood is favoured over agricultural crops for pulp and paper production. The wood is stored ‘on the hoof’ in the forest and cut when needed. It also explains why agricultural crops are more commonly converted into liquid fuels, as these require less storage space.

“People do not appreciate how effective natural ecosystems are at storing carbon” says Alistair. “Some critics - usually those with vested interests in alternatives - are wont to assert that soil/peat carbon is less securely stored out of the atmosphere than fossil carbon. If left alone or managed carefully, natural vegetation is very good at maintaining itself and its soils for millennia, where climate change itself is the only thing that perturbs things - especially ice ages.”

Physicist: Global Warming 1980-2008 caused by Sun, not Man

Dr. Horst Borchert, the Director of the Department of Physics of the Johannes-Gutenberg Institute, Mainz, Germany, presented a paper, Using Satellite Measurements to study the Influence of Sun Activity on Terrestrial Weather at the Space Weather Workshop held in Boulder, Colorado earlier this year. Dr. Borchert finds from satellite measurements that global warming between about 1980 to 2008 was "not anthropogenic but caused by natural activities of the Sun’s surface." He relates changes of the solar magnetic field to cosmic rays and cloud formation (the cosmic ray theory of Svensmark et al) and to effects on the North Atlantic Oscillation, which affects weather phenomena around the globe.

Author: Horst Borchert

Using Satellite Measurements to study the Influence of Sun Activity on Terrestrial Weather

Abstract: The time rows of Terrestrial Climate Components (TCC) since the Eighties have shown some strong Influences by Extraterrestrial Components with the beginning of the 22. Sunspot period. Therefore the increase of ground near temperature on earth and oceans (2 –3 m above ground), called Global Temperature, during the warming period between about 1980 and 2008 seems to be not anthropogenic but caused by natural activities of Sun’s surface.
 
Some Extraterrestrial Components (EC) can be destined by measurements on the earth’s surface directly or indirectly: (a) The Reduction of Cosmic Rays by the magnetic fields of the sun-winds (Forbush-Reduction) by measuring the neutrons, which are secondary particles (Höhenstrahlung) of Cosmic Rays, and (b) the influence of the sun-winds on earths weather system by calculating the Sun-Wind-Index (SWI) from the difference of magnetic field in antipodal Stations.

Winter NAO Index

The link between TCC and EC is the “Svensmark – Effect”. It describes the formation of terrestrial clouds by the secondary particles of Cosmic Rays (Similar to Wilson’s Fog Chamber 1911). This effect modulates the North Atlantic Oscillation Index (NAO). It can be shown by using measured data, that the secondary particles of cosmic rays are controlling the NAO and therefore the weather in the Northern Hemisphere especially very strong since 1975. GOES – Satellites, geostationary stationed at about 35,800 km (22,300 miles) in equatorial plane above earth, measure the components of Sun-Wind that earth is exposed. These components are Flares, protons, alphas, electrons and magnetic fields. By correlating these extraterrestrial as well as terrestrial components, one can determine the strength and impact of sun’s activity on the weather on the earth. Applying this method by using the by NOAA published Data it will be explained that the warming period on earth, that started about 1980 and seems to be ending about 2010, in deed was caused and modulated by sun’s activity: Since 1975 GOES Satellites measured increasing strong flux of solar protons, which penetrated earths magnetic field and influenced the stratospheric O3 layer. Especially in 1989 the components of sun-winds caused strong disturbances of electricity and telemetric networks in the Northern Hemisphere. The magnetic fields reduced the Intensity of Cosmic Rays (Forbush Reduction) in this year partly of about 30% at 56 ° N (Moskau). From 1980 to 2009 Cosmic Rays and Cloudiness, which are delayed about 10 to 12 month, correlated with K~0,8 (Svensmark-Effect). The NAO correlates with Cosmic Rays (K~0,7) and confirms these connections between extraterrestrial and terrestrial components. That leaded finally since 1990 to increasing Sunshine-Duration of about 0,5 h/d and global rays of about 10 W/m2 in yearly averages around 50° N (Mainz) in Central Europe during this warming period. The ground near temperature increases of about 0,9 +-2 °C of the Yearly Averages. The Global Temperature increased since about 1980 more continuously to about 0,6 °C in 2006. With the end of sun’s activity in December 2006 (Sunspot Nr. 930 with “sun-tsunami”) the increase of ground near Temperature ended and weather started to become colder again in winter 2009 to 2010 in Europe and USA. Even the Sun-Wind-Index confirmed these development, it decreased very quick to values beneath 10 nTesla, which was never found since 1910, when it was very cold.
That means, that Measurements of sun wind components by Satellites like GOES help to understand and to forecast terrestrial weather development.

10. März 2010
1) Physikdirector a.D. Diplom-Physiker Dr. Horst Borchert
Geographical Institute of Johannes-Gutenberg Institute; Westring 159, 55120 Mainz
T.: 49 6131 683516, E: bcht01@aol.com, www.umad.de