Hot globe was a very cold year at the South Pole, very average year in Australia

I call it Met Bureau Bingo. Ultimately there are so many hair-splitting quixotic variants of weather stats that a dedicated team can always find a record. Here are some other trends that didn’t make the media.

We all heard about the record heat in the Arctic, but we didn’t hear about the unusual cold in Antarctica where running twelve month averages are equal to the lowest recorded since satellites began in 1979.

So carbon dioxide causes a hot Arctic and a cold Antarctic, and both at the same time.* Where’s the global warming?

Ken Stewart looked at the UAH 6.0 version of all the major regions. The graph below is a 12 month running average of the Southern Polar area.  The last  low “dotpoint” covers the whole last year to March. Pretty cold.

March 2016, Southern Polar Temperatures, UAH. Cooling.

Error bars are 0.2C

There’s a bit more error with satellites at the poles, so I won’t crack the second decimal and declare it a “record”. Maybe it was. Maybe it wasn’t. Maybe records are irrelevant worthless distractions. What’s 40 years out of 4 billion? Nitpicking.

Reader Phill suggests that the cold at the pole may be connect to the El Nino, see his interesting thoughts below. Scott of the Antarctic died in an El Nino year, caught in the coldest March. Curious.

Hot March in Australia, not hot year

We heard about how warm autumn nights made the hottest March in Australia, but we didn’t hear about the most ordinary year that the last 12 months was. Slightly cooler than average, if you care, but who would?

We’ve had 21 years of no warming downunder. We have to stop that. So fire up the windmills and put another $Billion on the barbie.

Australian Temperatures, UAH satellite, March 2016, not record heat.

Some Pauses have stopped some have not, but it really doesn’t matter

Ken Stewart looks at the UAH 6.0 version (the beta updated version on trial) and finds that The Pause is still 18 years and 10 months, in the 12 month running averages (but not the graphs of monthly data where the Pause has stopped) — the “Pause” may disappear any month — and reappear any month after that. Jennifer Marohasy looks at the data and calls the Pause over, see Regional Variability in Global Temperatures. 

I look at a messy squiggle-graph and say we won’t know for years til the El Nino washes out and the La-Nina-whatever washes in out and in. And it doesn’t matter. The Pause was long enough already to show the models are busted. Nothing that happens in 2016 can change that. From one monster El Nino spike to the next lies one inconsequential third of all human emissions of CO2.

Jennifer Marohasy has an interesting graph showing just how accurate the UAH set is compared with one station in Australia. See Chart 2 UAH compared to Richmond. Nice. The UAH data for Australia is a pretty good fit for one thermometer in Richmond which is a bit wierd. I’d like to know about other stations too…

Should we panic about one hot month, or look at the trends?

El Nino’s and cold South Polar zones. From Reader Phill:

Meteorologist Susan Solomon wrote a book the “The Coldest March” about the Scott’s death in the Antarctic in 1912.  “March” referred to both Scott’s march back from the Pole and the month March 1912.  (1911/12 was an El Nino year).  Scott’s second in command was the meteorologist George Simpson, who went on to work with Indian Meteorological Services and to become the longest serving Director of the Meteorological Office in London.  Simpson observed that there were strong correlations between pressure anomalies in Australia, both in the south and particularly the north, and in Antarctica.  He argued that Scott had been hampered by exceptionally cold weather that was related to these pressure oscillations and that 9 years out of 10 he would not have had the extreme cold that he met.  Susan Solomon searched the modern data and found only one year that matched Scott’s temperature data and that was the El Nino year 1988.   So just perhaps another cold March way down south is all simply part of the package.

——————————————–

* Hot and cold simultaneous poles? It’s a kind of quantum antientanglement where CO2 molecules made from the same car go to opposite poles and produce opposite effects. Someone give me a grant…

8.9 out of 10 based on 84 ratings

90 comments to Hot globe was a very cold year at the South Pole, very average year in Australia

  • #
    John F. Hultquist

    Someone give me a grant…

    Thinking about such things is more likely to lead to a headache.

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  • #
    Leonard Lane

    Nice post. The narrative and graphs, including links, show that there is very much we do not understand, the science is unsettled, and the pause shows no relation between CO2 and estimated global temperature. I see no reason to worry about CO2 or global warming; conversely we know that CO2 fertilizes plants and that plants provide oxygen. We should be happy with increases in CO2.

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  • #
    Yonniestone

    “Scott of the Antarctic died in an El Nino year” Interesting to note that where an IPCC GCM will never accurately predict El Nino’s (like humans) they still predict a consistent upwards trend that flies in the face of eventual raw and smoothed data, even over a miniscule 40 years.

    CO2 molecules going in different directions doing their own thing, perhaps they’re related to humans more than we think. 😉

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    • #
      Rereke Whakaaro

      Molicules spin. So they are more like Advertising Executives.

      Therefore, they are not related to humans at all.

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      • #
        OriginalSteve

        Maybe CO2 is attracted to cow manure?

        If so, not surprised that the IPCC publications attract it….that and blowies….

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  • #
    Manfred

    So fire up the windmills and put another $Billion on the barbie.

    Yep. That’s exactly right Jo. Turn up the heat on the barbie. There’s a mountain of Green Pork to fry.

    The [US] Senate is scheduled to begin debate on a reauthorization bill for the Federal Aviation Administration [FAA] Tuesday that has sparked anger among dozens of conservative groups for its inclusion of renewable energy tax extenders.

    “This [FAA] legislation contains green energy tax credits that are completely unrelated to FAA re-authorization,” the letter adds. “The $1.4 billion in expiring tax provisions for renewable energies — pertaining to wind power, geothermal heat pumps, fuel cell facilities and combined heat and power properties — are a distortion of the tax laws for special interests in the renewable energy industry.”

    Conservatives: Vote no to FAA green pork 12 APR 2016

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    • #

      Sorry, the windmills only produced approx. 400 MW from Thursday to Saturday, a spike to 1800 MW on Sunday and now back down to 400-600 MW. Can’t waste the MW on a barbie, needed for other things, so one has to use CO2 producing charcoal.

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  • #
    Pauly

    While completely unrelated to climate science, the article below shows the sloppy thinking that surrounds use of statistical data as simple as “the average”, and how it fails to represent reality at all.

    And I love the title: The Flaw of Averages!

    http://www.thestar.com/news/insight/2016/01/16/when-us-air-force-discovered-the-flaw-of-averages.html

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    • #
      RB

      I came across one study that showed Australian women had put on 4kg in a decade on average. Looking at the details, nothing had changed except for the category of women over 110kg aged 35-45. They had a much higher mortality rate 10 years ago. The 4kg every woman was putting on was purely a rise in the number of women 110+ not dying.

      Similar with global temperatures. While its made out to be a global rise, it could merely be localised warming plus a poor record and the method to make up for its inadequacies that creates an apparent global trend.

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  • #
    Peter Miller

    The ozone hole over the South Pole causes the CO2 molecules in the atmosphere to migrate electro-dynamically to higher latitudes, hence the extreme cold in the Antarctic last winter. Some of these CO2 molecules migrate along the Van Ellen radiation belts sinking lower as they near the North Pole, which is what caused the abnormal ‘warmth’ in the Arctic this winter.

    Making it all up, using a modicum of pseudo-scientific jargon as I go along, just like any typical climate scientist.

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    • #
      KinkyKeith

      🙂

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    • #
      KinkyKeith

      Another Analitical post.

      It’s good to be reminded to always be on the lookout for fluff and bubble and to critically assess information, even from known and trusted sources.

      Got to admit, it did look convincing and would probably sit on SkS site for a long time without being picked up.

      Kk

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  • #
    Peter C

    Jennifer Marohasy looks at the data and calls the Pause over

    http://jennifermarohasy.com/2016/04/accepting-regional-variability-in-global-temperatures/

    As it happens, I was reading her blog just yesterday about regional variations in global temperature. I am prepared to wait a few months before I call the Pause over because I think it is likely that the Pause will return as the El Niño collapses, similar to 1988.

    Jennifer did not try to explain how El Niño, which I had thought of as an equatorial phenomenon, directs all it’s heat to the high Northern Latitudes. Now Jo says that the Antartic has been especially cold during the same period. So perhaps I should be thinking of El Niño as a global phenomenon. The temperature and pressure changes in the Pacific are just a symptom of something much larger, which is not yet even defined let alone understood.

    The next few months should be very interesting. I doubt that I will be the only one hanging out to see Roy Spencer’s monthly UAH temperature announcement.

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  • #
    AndyG55

    What they have in the NH is a TRANSIENT spike from the Pacific blob and the El Nino. Nothing more.

    The southern tropical zone gets a bit of this spike, but UAH shows that there is no El Nino effect in the Southern Ex tropics or the lower part of the SH.

    http://s19.postimg.org/6i8mcowfn/UAH_So_Extropical.png

    http://s19.postimg.org/426syuecz/UAH_So_Pol_March.png

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    • #
      AndyG55

      Meant to add… in big letters

      The warm transient IS NOT GLOBAL

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      • #
        el gordo

        Its well known that when Greenland loses ice then Antarctica will pack it on, its the bipolar seesaw in action but on a very modest scale.

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  • #
    Ruairi

    All their models and hockey-stick bend,
    Predicted a sharp warming trend,
    But the long recent Pause,
    Is a lost warmist cause,
    With nothing to show in the end.

    330

  • #

    Looking at the most recent of these sea surface temperature maps (April 11) compared to the one before.
    There seems to be a very sudden drop in temperature around the equator @-100 Longitude.
    http://www.ospo.noaa.gov/Products/ocean/sst/anomaly/index.html
    I think the up spike was just a nail going up into the global warming coffin to fasten the pause on.

    51

    • #
      el gordo

      The waters off WA are cool but the Leeuwin current should pick up speed about now and raise SST, if it doesn’t then the game is up.

      Elsewhere a strong La Nina is factored in, should BoM be warning the populace of floods next Xmas?

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  • #
    handjive

    The 1998 natural phenomena known as El Niño as explained by Kevin Trenberth:

    “Jim Hansen famously went before Congress and declared that the drought was due to global warming, essentially,” Trenberth says.

    “And I wrote a paper along with two others that appeared in Science magazine which basically said that it wasn’t.”

    Instead, he says the drought had to do with what at the time was an unappreciated part of the climate system: the El Nino warming phenomenon in the Pacific Ocean.”
    ~ ~ ~
    The following ‘pause’ is natural:

    Scientists predict surge in global warming after 2009

    Climate experts have long predicted a general warming trend over the 21st century spurred by the greenhouse effect, but this new study gets more specific about what is likely to happen in the 10 years after 2005.

    To make this kind of prediction, researchers at Britain’s Met Office, which deals with meteorology, have made a computer model that takes into account such natural phenomena as the El Nino pattern in the Pacific Ocean and other fluctuations in ocean circulation and heat content.

    The researchers found that factoring in the natural variability of ocean currents and temperature fluctuations yields an accurate picture.

    This differs from other models, which mainly consider human-caused climate change.
    . . .
    It can’t be any clearer.

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  • #
    TdeF

    A world temperature is physics nonsense.

    Night to day, equator to poles, winter to summer, droughts and storms and El Nino to La Nina, -40C to +40C on any given day and in some places across a year, how do you weight all these numbers? You can create any temperature you like. It is not measuring anything. Even then it is not changing significantly but what is the implication of any change if it did?

    It may be like creating an average time for a day. We are comparing a stopped clock which is right twice a day with a real clock which agrees twice a day. It is a useless number. Unless there was a comprehensive and decisive world model which predicted this number in advance and this model was used to create the number and the predictions of movement were right to good precision, this is a nonsense number. Without a model, movements in this number are meaningless.

    2/3 of all sunlight hits oceans, not land. Only fish and phytoplankton live there and the historical measurements of 4km deep oceans 400x bigger than the atmosphere are poor to non existent. We cannot even begin to get any climate or temperature model right until the dynamic and fully engaged oceans are integrated into models too. You cannot just model the air alone. People do not even agree on where gases like CO2 largely originate and how long exchange with the oceans take. The IPCC considers thousands of years to 80 years for the one gas, CO2 when it is demonstrably 14 years half life. What happens in the ocean climates and gas content is vastly more important than what happens in the atmosphere in understanding our world climates.

    So we have one meaningless number, an arbitrary fabrication, a soup of numbers which has been created without a model representing our understanding of the significance of each contributing number. As such it may go up or down but without a model which explains this, it contributes nothing to our understanding of the planet.

    Then all this has been created just to vilify CO2, the tiny gaseous source of all living things. Why? There is a political agenda that Western democracies are killing the world and that they should just pay everyone else for the right to do this. So it is about the money. This is not science or about saving the planet. Besides, the number is not changing. What does that mean? Who knows?

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    • #

      I agree with TdeF here, and on a related point, with respect to those graphs showing the temperature spikes and the very gradual increase in temperature that we are constantly bombarded with, be they local for Australia, or the whole of World average.

      As regulars here at Joanne’s site, we look at those graphs and (sort of anyway) understand them.

      However, when I point them out to family and friends they look at the graph and see the spikes going up, naturally, and the trend average also going up. They see the overall as displayed. What they don’t look at is that scale used for the vertical axis. I can point out that it’s more often than not shown in tenths of one degree, and that even the trend average has risen barely 0.3/4 of one degree.

      More often than not, the response I get is, “Huh! I never noticed that before.”

      This is from people who would be hard pressed to notice a 2 to 5 degree rise or fall in temperature and here we are talking in tenths of one degree, spread across what is now amounting to many years.

      I know it’s pretty much meaningless to even mention something like this here, but I’m looking at it from the perspective of people who really have little interest in things like this.

      The graphs are widened on that vertical axis for effect, and in my opinion, are another pretty effective tool being used to perpetuate a scare campaign in people who rarely notice things like this.

      It’s okay for us to debate it from a (fairly) knowledgeable base, but the average person just says, “Yep, it’s rising.”

      Tony.

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      • #
        TdeF

        For your point and mine, Nobel Physicist an expert in temperatures Ivan Glaever 3:30 in. A fraction of a degree? What does that mean? Probably nothing.

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        • #
          TdeF

          Apologies. Ivar.

          I have lived as he does in American climates of -40C to +40C in Colorado, New England for Ivar. 0.5C does not make any difference. Humans could not detect it until recently. It was only because people came up with silly arithmetic, that 0.5C in 10 years meant 5C in 100 years that this idea was ever popularized. Now in hindsight, they were completely wrong of course.

          That is the scare in essence, that what goes up will keep going up at exactly the same speed and will never go down. Now they are left with two things have gone up in the same 100 year period so CO2 must increase temperature. However there is no correlation at all or perhaps this effect takes decades to be apparent? It is all so silly from a scientific point of view that it is amazing anyone took any notice.

          He does point out however that NASA and NOAA are mixing up the oceans with the atmosphere just to produce the warming not seen by satellites. Does anyone point out that warmer oceans would by themselves increase CO2? No. That is the logical conclusion, nor that CO2 directly warms the oceans through an as yet undiscovered heat stealing method?

          So no one explains how CO2 heat the oceans without heating the air. No one explains how CO2 changes climates without changing the temperature. Ivar is just flabbergasted. He can find nothing to deny as the earth’s temperature is remarkably stable.

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    • #
      toorightmate

      Ted,
      It’s a bit like the bloke with his head in a hot oven and his feet in the freezer.
      His GP says, “His average temperature is OK”.

      100

  • #
    Ken Stewart

    Hi Jo
    The drop in UAH for Australia in the past couple of years while surface temperatures rise higher is very largely due to the very weak (or failed) monsoons in Northern Australia, especially the one just past. I showed this in a series of posts last year. See https://kenskingdom.wordpress.com/2015/11/20/why-are-surface-and-satellite-temperatures-different/ and follow ups.
    Day time convective over turning carries moisture high into the atmosphere. When it condenses, it releases heat. In a normal or strong northern wet season, there is abundant moisture so the effect is greater, so tropospheric temperature as measured by UAH will be warmer than otherwise- plus there will be more cloud and more green vegetation to shade the ground, so surface temperatures will be cooler. In a dry year or years, much less moisture is available to condense, less heat is released, so the tropospheric temperature will be cooler, while the lack of cloud, low soil moisture, and lack of green ground cover means surface temperatures will be hotter.
    There is some effect from southern rain but tropical rainfall (or lack) is the major determinant.
    “Global” warming is limited almost entirely to the Northern Extra Tropics (north of 20 degrees North).
    I will post at kenskingdom more about Antarctica in coming days.

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    • #
      Robk

      Well done Ken. The logic and the figures seem to stack up.

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    • #
      el gordo

      What are the mechanisms which brings about a ‘very weak (or failed) monsoons in Northern Australia…’?

      What part did the Madden Julian Oscillation have on massive coral bleaching?

      Have you noticed the Subtropical Ridge has been too far south in the SH winter?

      20

      • #
        Ken Stewart

        1. A strong (but not record) El Nino.
        2. None that I’m aware of. Bleaching happens because of high water temperatures, calm water, and clear sunny skies. Happens with El Ninos.
        3. Yes. This has been happening for a number of years.

        50

        • #
          Peter C

          Ken,

          I am very skeptical of the proposed causes of coral bleaching, especially high water temperatures. Coral reefs thrive in higher temperatures throughout Microronesia. I propose that calm water might mean a lack of nutrients washed up on the reef.

          Do you have any better information or ideas?

          20

          • #
            AndyG55

            My thoughts are that colonies of coral get used to a very constant water temperature, and it is the change in temperature and extra sunlight, maybe particularly UV changes, during El Nino which causes the polyps to abandon home for a while.

            I don’t think there is any proof that they actually die, (can anyone confirm one way or another?), its just that the little fellas go on holidays for a while.

            31

          • #
            Ken Stewart

            Coral polyps can’t cope with a change in temperature above or below a small range they are used to. See Andy below. Corals can live far to the south and some live at considerable depths too.

            20

        • #
          el gordo

          Thanks Ken, I’ll drop over your way in a couple of days to see the Antarctica post.

          10

    • #
      Don Gaddes

      Spot on, Ken.

      10

    • #
      Don Gaddes

      You seem to have neglected the albedo-producing effects of explosive volcanism,(in Australia’s case,mainly from the Indonesian Archipelago.)

      10

  • #
    Analitik

    Let’s start the OT

    There is a proposal to set up a coal gasification plant at Leigh Creek, mainly to power a new 300 – 600 MW gas-fired power station, costing $450 – $900 million, depending on the final capacity.

    So why not just keep the current Port Augusta coal plants running instead of shutting them down in May?

    South Australia’s surging electricity prices prompt new power project plan

    60

    • #
      ianl8888

      The technique proposed – underground gasification of coal through heating – is NOT controversial, despite Fauxfacts best attempts at declaring it so. It’s an old technique, with many variations, but is very expensive of yield. It’s best done in high-vitrinite coal, which Leigh Creek deposits are not.

      So yes, it’s economically more sensible to keep mining Leigh Creek as before to supply the Port Augusta power plants. But B/S baffles brains when it comes to the narcissistic sociopaths called politicians and their running mates in the MSM.

      An interesting essay:

      http://www.the-american-interest.com/2016/03/31/twilight-of-the-climate-change-movement/

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  • #
    Popeye26

    I see the old “pea” trick being used by Jennifer to say the pause has stopped.

    I note with every one of her graphs she uses a different scale for the Y axis.

    Globe – Y reference is +/- 1 degree
    Northern Hemisphere – Y reference is +/- 1.5 degrees
    Australia – Y reference is + 2.0 – 2.5 degrees

    I trust and appreciate Jennifer’s work BUT with graph images we should be able to compare apples with apples, which in this case is hard due to the differing scales.

    Cheers,

    40

  • #
    pat

    continuing o/t…

    11 Apr: WaPo: Chris Mooney/Juliet Eilperin: Obama’s rapid move to join the Paris climate agreement could tie up the next president
    If the nations of the world, led by its two biggest contributors to climate change, jump through all the hoops needed to bring this agreement into force before President Obama leaves office, the next U.S. president could have a difficult time — or at least, a long wait — if he or she wanted to get out of it…
    It’s important to note that in earlier drafts of the Paris agreement being negotiated last year, it contained language suggesting that it couldn’t have entered into force so soon. Todd Stern, the U.S.’s special envoy for climate change and the agreement’s chief negotiator, noted on the March 31 press call that these earlier drafts had said it would not enter into force before 2020. “But that language fell out of the final draft,” said Stern, ***“so as soon as you hit that double threshold [55 countries representing 55 percent of emissions], the agreement is in force. And that could potentially happen this year.”…
    Granted, even if an unsympathetic U.S. president couldn’t formally withdraw immediately, that doesn’t mean that his or her hands would be overly tied by the agreement. That’s because when it comes to delivering actual emissions cuts, the agreement largely relies on the individual commitments by the world’s nations…
    John Bellinger, former legal adviser to the State Department under Condoleeza Rice and currently an attorney at Arnold and Porter: “…The administration has already complied with one of the binding provisions, which was to announce a carbon reduction goal. But the agreement does not require a future president actually to achieve that goal.”…
    https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/energy-environment/wp/2016/04/11/obamas-fast-move-to-join-the-paris-climate-agreement-could-tie-up-the-next-president/

    Christiana the Financial Adviser:

    12 Apr: ClimateChangeNews: Ed King: Paris climate change pact to come into effect ‘by 2018’
    UN’s outgoing climate chief says late change to text means agreement could be enforced well before 2020, raising hopes world can avoid dangerous climate change
    “You heard it here first. I think we will have [it] in effect by 2018,” Christiana Figueres told an audience at Imperial College, London.
    Late in last December’s UN talks, a collective decision was made to scrub references to 2020 as a start date for the deal said Figueres, who leaves her post in July…
    “Paris is only a blueprint – difficult as it was it took the entire world to contribute – that was the easy part,” said Figueres.
    “Now we come to the difficult part. Now we have to be intentional about every investment… are we making a choice towards more carbon?
    “If you are still putting your money into high carbon, I’m sorry, you are going to lose your money,” she added.
    http://www.climatechangenews.com/2016/04/12/paris-climate-change-pact-to-come-into-effect-by-2018/

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  • #
    el gordo

    “…the observed temperature evidence does not support the claims that carbon dioxide is dangerous.”

    Ted Cruz

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  • #
    pat

    ***just as the carbon cowboys co-opted “carbon bubble”, they’ve now co-opted “retirement savings”.
    the threat to these savings from CAGW policies & the various “carbon” scams has now morphed into a potential PROTECTION RACKET for the benefit of the carbon cowboys themselves! lol.

    11 Apr: ClimateChangeNews: Alex Pashley: Top money managers, ratings agencies scanned for climate risk
    ***NGO to rate exposure of ‘whole investment chain’ to perils of warmer planet to protect retirement savings
    The Asset Owners Disclosure Project said it would “hold suppliers and advisers to account over control of trillions in the low-carbon transition” as it unveiled a new index on Monday…
    The AODP is part of a drive towards greater disclosure of investor portfolios, spearheaded by the Financial Stability Board.
    The Global Climate Asset Manager Index will rate the top 50 asset managers covering 70% of the market and $40 trillion of investments. It will also target the 20 most prominent asset consultants and ratings agencies like Moody’s and Fitch…
    CEO of the AODP, Julian Poulter: “Asset owners need to see at a glance which agents are more progressive in the climate transition arena.”…
    In a survey of 500 leading asset owners last year, 85% did little or nothing to address climate risk. Only 7% had the ability to size up their carbon footprints.
    http://www.climatechangenews.com/2016/04/11/top-money-managers-ratings-agencies-scanned-for-climate-risk/

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  • #
    pat

    those pesky risking oceans! u have to laugh:

    12 Apr: CBS: AP: U.S. Navy now requires climate change reporting from vendors
    SUNNYVALE, California — The U.S. Navy on Tuesday became the first branch of the country’s military –the world’s single largest user of fossil fuels — to say it will start requiring big vendors to report their output of climate-changing greenhouse gases and work to lower it.
    Navy Secretary Ray Mabus announced the move at a Silicon Valley conference on tech, government and climate change, noting that the Navy is facing rising ocean levels and a surge of interest as ice melts in the Arctic…
    The move seeks to leverage the Navy’s $170 billion budget to encourage contractors to cut their overall output of climate-changing carbon…
    The U.S. military is also broadening its use of solar and other renewable energy, seeking to lessen its dependence on supply chains and on oil, a commodity vulnerable to global tensions…
    He spoke to an emissions-focused meeting of leaders of Google, Apple and other tech and financial firms.
    He cited Navy moves toward cleaner energy, including solar-power-generating blankets that help Navy SEALs stay out in the field with less conventional fuel and greater use of renewable energy at Navy facilities.
    http://www.cbsnews.com/news/united-states-navy-now-requires-climate-change-reporting-from-vendors/

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    • #
      KinkyKeith

      As we here know, this stuff is so crazy, we are looking at Alice in Wonderland reality, totally loopey.

      As a civilisation we are just as vulnerable now as when Hitler
      Dominated Germany and Mao led China.

      It seems that we have lost control of our western democracies and that the Obamas and Merkels care nothing for the real issues that face most of their constituents and feel only that lust for power that knows no boundaries.

      Surely life in the USA and Germany and the so called, free world is tough enough.

      Why make it harder when all the resources transferred to the elites via the war on Climate could have been devoted to so many other good uses.

      Paradoxically, this could have included proper research on Renewable technology.

      Kk

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      • #
        Peter C

        As a civilisation we are just as vulnerable now as when Hitler
        Dominated Germany and Mao led China.

        Perhaps it is worse now. Back then we had sovereign countries. Hitler was in Germany and Mao lead China. Now we are bvecoming globalised. Our Government wants to support the UN.

        I drove past a Doncaster High School today. They had banners out promoting various ideals including “being good Global citizens” OMG do they understand what they are doing?

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  • #
    pat

    12 Apr: Reuters: SunEdison financial woes also threaten yieldcos that hold assets
    by Jessica DiNapoli and Arathy S Nair
    The companies – TerraForm Power Inc (TERP.O) and TerraForm Global Inc (GLBL.O) – will likely avoid bankruptcy but may not escape unscathed, analysts and restructuring experts said.
    A judge could rule that the yieldcos must be included in a SunEdison bankruptcy, analysts said. The companies could also be sold…
    The filing could come as soon as this week as SunEdison reaches the end of a grace period set by lenders stemming from its delayed annual report…
    The companies are valued for the dividends they pay to investors. Their shares closed Tuesday at $9.52 and $2.58, respectively, compared to SunEdison’s at 40 cents…
    “If the yieldco never receives any additional assets in the future, they’re stuck with limited income every month, as the sun shines and wind blows,” said Jeffrey Osborne, an analyst at Cowen & Co who covers SunEdison…
    The yieldcos also rely on SunEdison to make interest payments for them – longstanding arrangements worth tens of millions of dollars each year. Those agreements could be nixed in bankruptcy, according to a public filing, leaving both of them to fend for themselves.
    Both companies, which have no employees of their own, also rely on SunEdison for back office functions…
    http://www.reuters.com/article/us-sunedison-inc-yieldcos-idUSKCN0XA02I

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  • #
    pat

    lots of detail in the following pieces:

    12 Apr: PV-Tech: Tom Kenning: US$10bn of commitments made at India’s Re-Invest 2015 now sanctioned
    A total of 40 banks and non-banking financial companies (NBFCs) have sanctioned INR712 billion (US$10.7 billion) to finance Indian renewable energy projects since the major Re-Invest event held in February 2015.
    Of this, INR295 billion (US$4.4 billion) had been dispersed by the financial instituions up to 21 March this year.
    During Re-Invest 2015, India’s flagship event in New Delhi to promote renewable energy development and investment in the country, these financial institutions pledged to provide debt funding for renewable energy projects of more than 78.75GW cumulative capacity over the following five years. Re-Invest is a government-backed “meet and expo” for stakeholders by invitation only…
    The news comes amid growing concern over the financing of Indian solar projects, while the PV industry ponders the possible long-term effects from US developer SunEdison’s financial woes – It may be trying to offload nearly 1GW of renewable capacity in India. Meanwhile, no developer which has bid for solar projects at a tariff below INR5/kWh has closed on financing yet…
    The next 2016 Renewable Energy Global Investors Meet and Expo (RE-INVEST) in India has been delayed to March 2017, as the initial was widely seen as a success and it was not necessary to hold another one the following year.
    http://www.pv-tech.org/news/financial-institutions-have-sanctioned-19-of-commitments-made-at-indias-re

    ***writer below seems concerned about Canadian CIM-owned SkyPower:

    13 April: Indian Express: Anil Sasi: Solar projects: Ain’t no sunshine
    Four months down the line, as the US solar company teeters on the brink of bankruptcy and its share reduced to a penny stock, it’s abundantly clear that SunEdison, flushed with low-interest bearing financing, was possibly playing a disruptive bidding game aimed at destroying competition in projects such as the one that it bagged in Andhra Pradesh. A number of Indian players had participated in the tariff-based reverse bidding for setting up solar plants, but despite going in for cheaper, fully imported solar panels, none of them could succeed in the face of the really low bids placed by companies such as SunEdison.
    For the Indian solar sector’s efforts to inch closer to grid parity, there are even bigger setbacks. The news of America’s biggest solar company going belly up comes close on the heels of the World Trade Organization’s Dispute Settlement Panel ruling last month that New Delhi violated global trade rules by imposing domestic content restrictions on the production of solar cells and modules as part of the Jawaharlal Nehru National Solar Mission — a blow to the country’s solar power programme…
    SkyPower, another one of the large investors in India, has announced aggressive plans to enter other markets too, thereby increasing the risk in investments and potential failures…READ ON
    http://indianexpress.com/article/india/india-news-india/solar-projects-aint-no-sunshine/

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    pat

    still believin’ but some good news…

    11 Apr: Vancouver Sun: Randy Shore: Forest growth accelerating in B.C. due to carbon dioxide ‘fertilizer effect’
    Rising levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere are accelerating the growth of B.C.’s forests by one to three per cent a year, enough to cancel out the impact on the climate from the mountain pine beetle outbreak by 2020, according to a new study from the Pacific Institute for Climate Solutions.
    “This turnaround will happen much sooner than we had imagined,” said lead author and Environment Canada climate scientist Vivek Arora…
    However, the effects of global warming — rising temperatures, higher rainfall, and an atmosphere richer in carbon dioxide — have created a “fertilization effect” which has accelerated the growth of trees, especially in the high-latitude forests that cover much of Canada, Russia and Europe…
    http://vancouversun.com/news/local-news/forest-growth-accelerating-in-b-c-due-to-carbon-dioxide-fertilizer-effect

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    pat

    12 Apr: CarbonPulse: Stian Reklev: CN (Carbon) Markets: Shanghai CO2 price falls below 5 yuan
    Shanghai Emissions Allowances (SHEAs) closed at 4.70 yuan ($0.73), down 6% on the day with almost 20,000 permits changing hands, setting yet another record low in the Chinese pilot markets.
    “Traders are shorting because of over-allocation, and the carbon borrowing mechanism has added fuel to the fire,” one observer told Carbon Pulse…
    http://carbon-pulse.com/18267/

    13 Apr: CarbonPulse: Stian Reklev: Cheap industry projects set to win up to half the volume in ERF auction -analysts
    Cheap, large-scale industrial projects may win as much as half the contracted carbon offset volume in Australia’s upcoming Emissions Reduction Fund (ERF) auction, pushing the average price down below previous levels, analysts Reputex said…
    The auction will be held on Apr. 27-28…
    http://carbon-pulse.com/18300/

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    tom0mason

    No matter what you say Ken Stewart, those with the consensus hypothesis (aka The Big Guess) still ‘believe’ that the Antarctic ice will rapidly melt.
    (lots of ‘could be’, ‘may’s and ‘might’s, and nonsense modeling…)

    A massive rise in sea level is coming, and it will trigger climate chaos around the world. That was the message from a controversial recent paper by climate scientist James Hansen. It was slated by many for assuming – rather than showing – that sea level could rise between 1 and 5 metres by 2100.

    But now, just a week after being formally published, it is being backed up by another study. “He was speculating on massive fresh water discharge to the ocean that I don’t think anybody thought was possible before,” says Rob DeConto of the University of Massachusetts Amherst. “Now we’re publishing a paper that says these rates of fresh water input are possible.”

    and of course some more FEAR!!!!

    “Today we’re measuring global sea level rise in millimetres per year,” DeConto says. “We’re talking about the potential for centimetres per year just from [ice loss in] Antarctica.”

    https://www.newscientist.com/article/2082628-unexpected-antarctic-ice-melt-may-trigger-2-metre-sea-level-rise/

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      Andrew McRae

      Plenty of believing the fear going on, TomO’. Here’s the relevant irony of the day:

      Kit says his generation has lost that idealistic spark – partly driven by the burden of a potential climate ‘catastrophe’ happening in our lifetime.
      “Our society is in a crisis of imagination really. We sort of seem to feel like a lot of big ideas have been exhausted.

      Complains his generation is not imaginative enough.
      Imagines the whole world is in catastrophic danger from CO2.
      Nice.

      And yet warmists tell me the abbreviation CAGW is an unfair unrepresentative exaggeration of their views.

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        tom0mason

        Andrew McRae,
        Oh no! We’ve passed peak imagination!

        Climate scientist™ everywhere will fall into an ever deepening pit of despair as they realize that humanity’s new generation has finally succumbed, and ran out of the imagination to be convinced of financing far-fetched far-reaching climate research.
        As the last publication from the Kitt, MacKibben, Glieck, Hockey-Mann, Hansbeen, et al., research paper read —

        “The Heat of CO2 has Extinguished Human Imagination — New Modeled Outcomes”

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    Rod Stuart

    AndyG55
    Evidence that CO2 is good for us.

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      AndyG55

      couple of unprovable/unproven/unsubstantiated statements.

      1. “rise in concentrations of CO2 and other greenhouse gases in the atmosphere has been much more rapid than at any time in the past 60,000 years”… really? where is the proof?

      2. “In BC the scientific evidence is that our forests are growing faster than in the past due to a warming climate” America hasn’t warmed this century, and raw data shows it was almost certainly warmer in the late 1930’s.

      So the article is “borrowing” warmista statements without any proof to them.

      And so many computer models and estimates…. and extrapolating trend lines?? seriously !!

      But I agree, CO2 is good for the environment. 🙂

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      toorightmate

      If CO2 is bad for us, why not change it to O2C?

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    TdeF

    In these comments, there appear to be two underlying principles. Firstly the idea is that if it is hot somewhere, it has to be cold somewhere else, a sort of conservation of energy in the air alone. So if it is cold somewhere, it has to be hot somewhere else simultaneously so the planet’s total temperature stays constant. So how does this work? There is also the idea that the world would be 35C colder without an atmosphere, so if the air is keeping the place warm, all the heat must be stored in the atmosphere. These two unstated principles seem to drive the thinking and modeling.

    Both of these ideas neglect the real storage system, the vast and deep oceans. At an average of 3.4km deep and at 1 atmosphere per 10 metres, the oceans are 340x heavier than the atmosphere. So the heat content of the oceans is 340x as well. Heat can come from the oceans or go into the oceans and move with ocean currents and cheat the alleged balance completely for many years, decades, even centuries as it has taken millions to get to the current equilibrium situation. A movement of the average air temperatures proves nothing.

    You feel the effect of the ocean buffering at night in Perth, when the Fremantle Docker/Doctor blows in, or in any sea side location. Night time temperatures within 5km of the water are far higher than 100km inland. So water moderates our coastal climate in a very short time. Our rains come from evaporation over the oceans, not the land. Much of the world is covered in oceans and much of the short term air temperature average is set by the oceans, not the sun. Consider the drama of the monsoons which feed India. The oceans essentially drive their weather.

    So what does a change in any average air temperature of +0.5C mean over a 10 or twenty year period? Absolutely nothing. A change in ocean temperature change of 0.5C/340 would do it and you could not measure it.

    It is interesting that if you Google ocean surface temperature, you are told immediately it is 17C. If you google land surface temperature, you get endless debate. People only care about air temperature where they live, their climate. No one seems to realise that we are living on a planet covered with water and this is the greatest regulator of long term air temperature. If nothing else, the average of air temperatures is free to move around without implying any heating or cooling overall. A change of 0.5C may mean nothing long term. As for CO2 going up, 98% of this gas it is in the ocean. I think anyone can explain why it would go up and down slowly and steadily and this has nothing to do with fossil fuel.

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      You are 100% correct, people forget about the oceans which cover 2/3 of the planet.

      But people also forget that most solar radiation is received in the tropics and is distributed around by the ocean currents and weather systems and not forgetting the very important role of water and its various forms, vapour, liquid and solid and their latent heats in controlling temperature, rather than exaggerating the importance of this benign gas CO2 which is only 0.04% of the atmosphere.

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    pat

    professor emeritus vs heartland:

    12 Apr: Philadelphia Inquirer: Commentary: Prosecute climate deniers? Yes, hold those who mislead accountable
    By Michael E. Kraft
    (Michael Kraft is a professor emeritus of political science and public and environmental affairs at the University of Wisconsin-Green Bay)
    Most of us recognize the value of science in dealing with complex problems that pose significant risks to public health and well-being. Thus we expect reputable science to be reported and used in helping us make difficult policy choices, such as what to do about climate change…
    Our limited policies reflect a history of science denial by fossil-fuel companies and others that has sown confusion and weakened public support for doing more. Those who intentionally misled the public about climate change should be held accountable.
    http://www.philly.com/philly/opinion/20160412_Commentary__Prosecute_climate_deniers__Yes__hold_those_who_mislead_accountable.html

    12 Apr: Philadelphia Inquirer: Commentary: Prosecute climate deniers? No, First Amendment protects debate
    By H. Sterling Burnett
    (H. Sterling Burnett is a research fellow on energy and the environment at The Heartland Institute)
    The German climate science site No Tricks Zone documented about 250 peer-reviewed academic articles published in 2015 disputing one or more of the many claims made by climate-change alarmists…
    Additionally, a survey of members of the American Meteorological Society found that 67 percent believe humans are responsible for more than half of climate change. Are we to believe that the 33 percent of members who disagree that humans are responsible for climate change are committing fraud?…
    http://www.philly.com/philly/opinion/20160412_Commentary__Prosecute_climate_deniers__No__First_Amendment_protects_debate.html

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      TdeF

      Does that mean people who mislead people about man made climate change should be prosecuted too? After all, Michael Kraft writes as someone with no science who just believes what he is told by one party and like the tobacco deceit, follow the money. It is all on the side of the people who allege without evidence that Western Democracies are responsible for the 0.5C change in the 1980s. Everything has been proven false with time and thirty years have passed.

      So if Michael Kraft is misleading people about man made Climate Change, should he be prosecuted?

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        Mari

        Anyone who has cost the world’s workers millions, billions, nay trillions, of dollars/euros/yen (etc.) combating what they know to be a false catastrophe, a non-existent threat, should be brought before a court. Those who say “We need more evidence”, or “We don’t see the problem”, aren’t costing anyone anything – just expressing doubt. And based on the reality of the lack of run-away temperature climbs, desert-earth and flooded coasts, the doubt is valid. Those poor souls who -really- believe the world is headed to a climate disaster of our own making, well, I hope they see the light soon.

        Prosecuting someone for disagreeing is the foundation of extremists of many sorts – religious, political, philosophical – and lends an air to the prosecutors – an air of fear, loss of control, knowledge of their own follies coming back to haunt them. I am more afraid of the PC elitists, the college-attending safe-space-carvers, the prosecutors of free speech in any guise, especially those who want to silence the debate and the doubters, than I am of any climate change that might occur in the next 500 years, much less next 25, or 5.

        Some editorial discretion applied -Fly

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    William Astley

    What is occurring is called the ‘polar see-saw’. The polar see-saw is the name for the phenomenon where the Antarctic ice sheet cools when the Arctic warms and vice versa.

    The following paper by Svensmark explains the phenomenon and its cause which is solar cycle modulation of planetary cloud cover.

    A reduction in low level cloud cover causes cooling in the Antarctic as the albedo of the Antarctic ice sheet is higher than low clouds. The high albedo of the Antarctic ice sheet is due to the extremely high velocity winds in the Antarctic which breaks down snow crystals.

    The reduction in low level cloud cover is caused by the phenomenon electroscavenging. Solar wind bursts cause a space charge differential in the earth’s ionosphere which in turns cause current flow from high latitude regions (both poles) to the equatorial regions. The flow electric current causes warming in both high latitude regions and the equatorial regions.

    The electroscavenging mechanism is primarily caused by solar coronal holes. Coronal holes can and do appear at anytime in the solar cycle. Coronal holes can last for months and hence cause recurring solar wind bursts. The electroscavenging affect requires a series of strong solar wind bursts as the cloud modulation from a solar wind bursts lasts for a few days.

    Comment:
    The Antarctic ice sheet is isolated from the Southern sea by the Antarctic polar vortex. A reduction in low level cloud cover of course causes the Southern sea to cool. The solar coronal holes which recently appeared are starting to dissipate which explains the abrupt end of the El Nino event and the start of cooling both poles.

    There is another mechanism which was delaying the cooling of Northern hemisphere in response to the current high GCR. That mechanism is starting to abate. We are, if I understand the mechanism going to see significant cooling high latitude regions both poles.

    Observations to support that assertion is the sudden appearance of weather events that occurred during the Little Ice age. Have a look at the weather events that occurred in the Little ice age and see if you can find what I am speaking of.

    http://arxiv.org/abs/physics/0612145v1

    The Antarctic climate anomaly and galactic cosmic rays

    Borehole temperatures in the ice sheets spanning the past 6000 years show Antarctica repeatedly warming when Greenland cooled, and vice versa (Fig. 1) [13, 14]. North-south oscillations of greater amplitude associated with Dansgaard-Oeschger events are evident in oxygenisotope data from the Wurm-Wisconsin glaciation[15]. The phenomenon has been called the polar see-saw[15, 16], but that implies a north-south symmetry that is absent. Greenland is better coupled to global temperatures than Antarctica is, and the fulcrum of the temperature swings is near the Antarctic Circle. A more apt term for the effect is the Antarctic climate anomaly.

    Attempts to account for it have included the hypothesis of a south-flowing warm ocean current crossing the Equator[17] with a built-in time lag supposedly intended to match paleoclimatic data. That there is no significant delay in the Antarctic climate anomaly is already apparent at the high-frequency end of Fig. (1). While mechanisms involving ocean currents might help to intensify or reverse the effects of climate changes, they are too slow to explain the almost instantaneous operation of the Antarctic climate anomaly.

    Figure (2a) also shows that the polar warming effect of clouds is not symmetrical, being most pronounced beyond 75◦S. In the Arctic it does no more than offset the cooling effect, despite the fact that the Arctic is much cloudier than the Antarctic (Fig. (2b)). The main reason for the difference seems to be the exceptionally high albedo of Antarctica in the absence of clouds.

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      TdeF

      The “solar cycle modulation of planetary cloud cover” combined with “electoscavenging” and “coronal holes” and “high velocity winds” breaking down snow crystals? It all reads as fantastic factual physics, but is it true or just reasonable conjecture or a single hypothesis?

      One of the annoying problems with climate related explanations of anything is that people now write as if hypotheses were fact and it is hard to tell.

      Usually you do not mind this but after so many Global Warming statements of fact which were wrong and infallible models which were wrong and glib explanations, you get inured. When there is a problem, the proponents of CO2 global warming simply state something as if it is true, proven, accepted and easily verifiable. It is usually none of those things. How does a man qualified in dead kangaroos get to be the salaried Chief Climate Commissioner for Australia?

      Then Professor Turney and his multi million dollars at public expense Ship of Fools was not trapped in ice because there was much more than he expected, even when he was warned by the Captain to get back to the boat. No it was Adiabatic winds combining with unusual trade winds to push the detritus from a local global warming caused calving into the path of his boat. Any old important sounding explanation with long words is used, even when he was utterly wrong.

      So when we have twenty years of no change at all, that is perfectly fine and expected and one of those common pauses due to natural variation. What causes natural variation? No one knows.

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      el gordo

      ‘Have a look at the weather events that occurred in the Little ice age and see if you can find what I am speaking of.’

      Starting at the end of the MWP, similar to our Modern Climate Optimum, we should see icebergs increasing in the North Atlantic, plus huge sea floods and wind storms.

      A slow motion version of a day after tomorrow.

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      el gordo

      As the LIA came to a close and warming gathered pace we still had to deal with a Centennial Gleissberg Cycle and its association with global cooling, remember the Titanic.

      ‘The recent extended minimum of solar and geomagnetic variability (XSM) mirrors the XSMs in the 19th and 20th centuries: 1810–1830 and 1900–1910.’

      Joan Feynman and A. Ruzmaikin

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    William Astley

    Further to my above comment.

    This is a link to a non pay wall protected review paper that discussions some of the mechanism by which solar cycle changes modulate planetary clouds and planetary cloud properties.
    http://www.utdallas.edu/physics/pdf/Atmos_060302.pdf

    http://www.albany.edu/~yfq/papers/TinsleyYuAGU_Monograph.pdf
    Atmospheric Ionization and Clouds as Links between Solar Activity and Climate, By Brian Tinsley and Fangqun Yu

    Coronal holes, open magnetic flux regions on the sun, also cause solar wind bursts. What causes coronal holes to form is not known by solar community however there is sufficient observational information to explain the phenomenon. Coronal holes can persist for months and have for some unknown reason occurred late in the solar cycle in low latitude regions thereby causing solar wind bursts to occur when there are few sun spots on the surface of the sun or no sunspots. Coronal holes make it appear that the solar magnetic cycle is not the primary modulator of the earth’s.

    Comment:
    The solar magnetic cycle also modulates the amount of high speed particles (called cosmic ray flux (CRF) or galactic cosmic rays (GCR) for historical reasons, the discoverers thought the phenomena was caused by a ray rather than a particle and the misleading name stuck) that strike the earth’s atmosphere creating cloud forming ions. Solar wind bursts remove and change the ions in the atmosphere, so solar wind bursts change make it appear that an increase in CRF/GRF does not cause there to be an increase in cloud cover in high latitude regions.

    GCR is now the highest ever record in at this point in a solar cycle. Recently there has been an sudden increase in extraordinarily large weak coronal holes on the surface of the sun. The coronal holes are not starting to abate. Based on there being cycles of warming and cooling in the paleo record that correlate with solar cycle changes the high latitude regions of the planet will now cool. It will be interesting to see if TSI also falls.

    Sun spot count is a rough measure of one of the two solar phenomena (closed magnetic flux) that creates solar wind bursts. The solar wind bursts remove cloud forming ions from the high latitude regions and the tropics changing the amount of cloud cover and the properties of the clouds, by creating a space charge differential in the ionosphere. The process where solar wind bursts cause modulation of cloud properties is called electroscavenging. Electroscavenging is what amplifies or inhibits El Niño events. This is a link to a paper that notes solar activity is tightly correlated to planetary temperature change if both closed (sun spots which modulate the solar heliosphere which in turn modulates the amount of GCR that strikes the earth) and open solar magnetic field effects (solar wind bursts from both sunspots and solar coronal holes) are taken into account.

    http://sait.oat.ts.astro.it/MmSAI/76/PDF/969.pdf
    Once again about global warming and solar activity
    Solar activity, together with human activity, is considered a possible factor for the global warming observed in the last century. However, in the last decades solar activity has remained more or less constant while surface air temperature has continued to increase, which is interpreted as an evidence that in this period human activity is the main factor for global warming. We show that the index commonly used for quantifying long-term changes in solar activity, the sunspot number, accounts for only one part of solar activity (William: Closed magnetic field) and using this index leads to the underestimation of the role of solar activity in the global warming in the recent decades. A more suitable index is the geomagnetic activity (William: Short term abrupt changes to the geomagnetic field caused by solar wind bursts, which are measured by the short term geomagnetic field change parameter Ak. Note the parameter is Ak rather than the month average with Leif provides a graph for. The effect is determined by the number of short term wind bursts. A single very large event has less affect than a number of events. As Coronal holes can persist for months and years and as the solar wind burst affect lasts for roughly week, a coronal hole has a significant effect on planetary temperature) which reflects all solar activity, and it is highly correlated to global temperature variations in the whole period for which we have data. ….

    …The geomagnetic activity reflects the impact of solar activity originating from both closed and open magnetic field regions, so it is a better indicator of solar activity than the sunspot number which is related to only closed magnetic field regions. It has been noted that in the last century the correlation between sunspot number and geomagnetic activity has been steadily decreasing from – 0.76 in the period 1868- 1890, to 0.35 in the period 1960-1982, while the lag has increased from 0 to 3 years (Vieira
    et al. 2001).

    …In Figure 6 the long-term variations in global temperature are compared to the long-term variations in geomagnetic activity as expressed by the ak-index (Nevanlinna and Kataja 2003). The correlation between the two quantities is 0.85 with p<0.01 for the whole period studied. It could therefore be concluded that both the decreasing correlation between sunspot number and geomagnetic activity, and the deviation of the global temperature long-term trend from solar activity as expressed by sunspot index are due to the increased number of high-speed streams of solar wind on the declining phase and in the minimum of sunspot cycle in the last decades.

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      TdeF

      “Solar activity, together with human activity, is considered a possible factor for the global warming observed in the last century”

      Again, what is this? What ‘human activity’ caused the warming? That’s two possible factors, not one. Are they weighted equally? Is this just a throw away to get funding and have a bet each way?

      Certainly solar activity is a real possibility, but what actually? Lord Monckton’s paper simply showed there were fewer clouds over the oceans in the period, a complete and simple explanation. What caused fewer clouds could be linked to solar activity or even lack of it, but throwing in ‘human activity’ is so vague as to be useless.

      If they mean fossil fuels cause additional CO2 and that warms the planet, say so. Then someone can disagree. What other ‘human activity’ was there? Polo?

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        AndyG55

        Human activity, as in building cities and urban areas that expand, has most certainly given rise to a positive trend in the calculated surface temperature.

        Homogenisation, infilling, and other “adjustments”, have also contributed to a very significant extend.

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    macha

    I recommend checking Earl happs site, reality…here.

    https://reality348.wordpress.com

    Lots of data showing temperature differences across the latitudes of the globe, and the mass transfer influence effects of ozone.

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    Analitik

    Hold on to your hats, people – here is a pro nuclear article from The Guardian

    Why it’s time to dispel the myths about nuclear power

    The article rationalizes the need for nuclear power in order to combat climate change (as per George Monbiot) but it otherwise an excellent analysis of how the Chernobyl and Fukushima incidents have been blown well out of proportion.

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      AndyG55

      Now the Gruniad is starting to post these sort of posts, it won’t be too long before the green/borg crowd-mind follows suit.

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        TdeF

        No, this often happens. People start getting reasonable. The revolt is usually put down very quickly. You cannot break with Groupthink and keep your job at the Gruniad.

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    Don Gaddes

    The current ‘Dry’ Cycle period mentioned above should read 2015/17. 2018 should be ‘Wet’.(depending on the possible exacerbating influence of the Lunar Metonic Cycle (2016.)
    What is ‘the extrapolation fallacy’?

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      el gordo

      The current dry cycle cannot be universal but we can test a few theories in isolation.

      https://tallbloke.wordpress.com/2014/06/23/ian-wilson-18-6-year-lunar-cycle-in-high-rainfall-years-in-victoria/

      In Australia we are at the mercy of ENSO and it appears that by December 2016 the whole continent will be awash.

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        Don Gaddes

        The presently occurring Three Year Solar-induced Orbital ‘Dry’ Cycle (X Factor) period is currently ‘universal’. It started circa 110 degrees East longitude (Beijing) in February 2014 – and reached Australia in early January 2015. (East to West with the Solar orbit of the Earth’s Magnetic Field.)
        Prevailing weather (on the other hand,) moves West to East,(axial spin.)
        This ‘Dry’ Cycle is due to be followed by a One Year ‘Wet’/Normal period, (Australia 2018) – but due to the possible exacerbating influence of the Lunar Metonic Cycle, Australia (and the rest of the planet,) may suffer a Five Year Dry Period, lasting until the next 2Year ‘Wet’/Normal Period, (arriving Australia in 2020.)
        Relief from this severe ‘Dry’ may occur courtesy of explosive volcanism (in Australia’ case, mainly from the Indonesian Archipelago – as happened in late March/April 2015.)
        These ‘Dry’ Cycles were identified, with an exact method of forecasting them, by Alex S. Gaddes in his work ‘Tomorrow’s Weather’ (1990.)
        An updated version of this work, (including ‘Dry’ Cycle forecasts to 2055,) is available as a free pdf from [email protected]

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    John PAK

    It’s good to see Sir George Simpson getting mentioned on a blog. A century ago he was onto the factors that really do alter climate. Simpson was one of the first proper meteorologists and I think he was Britain’s first university met lecturer. He was humble enough to admit that he could not explain how snow could fall in sufficient quantities to form mile thick ice-sheets in the desiccated Arctic or how ice could remain on the ground in the British Isles when it’s summers were quite warm.
    For me Simpson was a real life hero. He could think deeply without being swayed by popular opinion. He was a man at peace with the wild world and held great respect for those he worked with and was able to lead men both in the field and in academic circles.

    I notice his first child was named Scott.

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    Harry Twinotter

    Would you like to explain why you think CO2 is cooling the Antarctic, if that is your claim.

    Just eyeballing the UAH dataset for Australia, the data shows a warming trend. I have not calculated the confidence intervals, but the straight line trend does show warming.

    Either way 38 years of data is not a lot to work with – the WMO guideline is 30 years is required just to calculate a reasonable climatic baseline.

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