Hi all. Well, I’m packed and ready to go.
This is an open thread that will be all I have to offer until the end of July. Feel free to comment here.
Where I’m going, I cannot access WordPress, so I won’t be able to post. However, I will have access to my email account and WordPress sends me your comments and gives me limited administrative capabilities via email.
So, although I will not be able to access 90% of the blogosphere, you can help me defeat censorship (well, not the kind practiced at Real Climate or Planet 3) by giving me news of the day in the comments section here. I will even be able to reply via email, so there’s the possibility of continuing the dialogue.
I would be deeply appreciative if every now and then you would let me know what’s going on and say hi.
Have fun and play nice–the person you disagree with does not consider himself or herself a villain–and probably with good reason. People commenting about climate change care about the environment, sustainable corporate and government practices and almost all of you want a better planet. That’s more important than the disagreements we have on how to get there.
Xie-xie. Zai jian. At least until the end of July.
The Lukewarmer's Way 
Bon voyage!
Donna,
Would you ever conisder opening up your blog to comments and discussion?
Fly safe and have a great time over there! Best of luck. I’ve thoroughly enjoyed your writing and look forward to you finding a way to keep it up!
Thanks, Donna–keep up the good work!
Thanks, Jeff–we’ll find a way…
Safe travels, and enjoy your time in the worker’s and peasant’s paradise! I look forward to a commentary upon your return. 🙂
Thanks, kch–but let’s start now with the news and information, as I’m too busy to blogsurf. What’s happening out there?
You’re not missing anything.
Keith Kloor is talking about Islam and foodies, Revkin is talking about the Sun, The Brits are irritated about the cost of energy, Germany is building coal like gangbusters because it’s so green, Fisker is embarassing the greens, the warm are proclaiming it’s worse than we thought in hopes we’ll adopt solutions that don’t work, Watts and company are laughing at the warm, and commenters at Curry’s are having the same argument they have every hour of every day- hockey sticks, CS, the accuracy of models, and who is more evil than whom.
BAU, then.
more news:
Promise of shale gas throws ‘unexpected wrench’ into Germany’s green energy plans
http://www.washingtonpost.com/world/europe/new-hopes-for-shale-gas-in-greens-paradise/2013/04/23/64046428-a6a3-11e2-a8e2-5b98cb59187f_story.html
“But many of the calculations about the costs of Germany’s environmental plans assumed that fossil fuels would grow scarcer and therefore more expensive. That would have meant that energy costs in other countries would have risen along with Germany’s, even if others were not pouring up to $1.3 trillion into green efforts in the coming decades, as Germany is doing. Instead, rather than becoming more competitive on energy prices, Germany is becoming less so. German consumers and industries find their energy costs going up just as they are dropping elsewhere.”
What will be the consequences of a Malthusian mistake that results in a $1.3 trillion cost? Reminds me of that wonderful line from Animal House- “Face it Kent, you f#$ked up, you trusted us.”
The whole story is very interesting.
I guess nothing much is going on over there, is it?
Very best wishes, Tom.
I will be certain to post some interesting links and excerpts from time to time.
I check the email that I have listed for this post frequently.
If you have questions about things in particular, feel free to ask them directly or here.
Best wishes in China for a very prosperous and fulfilling experience.
Thanks, hunter–I will be asking about what’s up on a regular basis. Keep everybody in line for me, okay?
😉
There’s a good thread going at stoat. http://scienceblogs.com/stoat/2013/04/21/whats-the-connection-between-economics-and-climatology/
Connolley does get good discussions going, when he’s not talking about Wikipedia and/or climate change…
Best of luck, Tom.
Thanks, Greg.
Bon voyage and best of luck in your new appointment, Tom
Good luck, Tom
In an effort to restart the conversation and in response to a reply from another thread, I will post a list of books which I consider the most devastating critiques of modern science that are not about climate.
Tectonic Globaloney by Chris Smoot. Smoot worked for the Navy and spent 20 years mapping and dating the ocean floor. He explains how his measurements of the ocean ridges defy the plate tectonic explanation. But the best part of the book is his discription of the reaction of the geologic establishment when the Navy allowed them to look at classified data that refuted their model.
Seeing Red by Halton Arp. Again this is interesting for the wealth of data showing that quasars are nearby objects with anomalous redshift and that redshift is quantized. But the most interesting part is the reaction of the establishment to the greatest discovery in astronomy of the century.
Should the Laws of Gravitation be Reconsidered? Hector Munera, Ed. This was a tribute to Maurice Allais on his 100th birthday. It well documents two non general relativity effects. It also describes the politics behind the Einstein-Shankland-DaytonMiller affair.
I would like to recommend:
http://www.aracneeditrice.it/aracneweb/index.php/component/virtuemart/area/areascientifica/scienze-della-terra/9788854856936-detail.html?Itemid=201
Of interest to climate change are several articles in it on measuring altitude and drift with satellite. There could be systematic errors in the measurement of sea level rise. See in particular the article by Scalera. The book comes with a CD. It has the article by Koziar on satellite error.
Marty,
My take on SLR is that the alarmists have used very weak data and and powerful methods designed to get what they are looking for to rationalize the claims of disastrous slr. It seems that when known variables, such as erosion, subsidence, and historical slr data are used, the crisis, like so many other AGW related crises, simply fails to show up.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2013/mar/14/nuclear-power-european-commission-investigation
gotta love it.
That was an interesting, if confusing article.
I thought this report was interesting as well. http://liberum.eu.bdvision.ipreo.com/NSightWeb_v2.00/Handlers/Document.ashx?i=e7f798d1a60646efb76a03a030054be9
They seem to take the same position that the Washington Post did in the link I provided above- much of Europe’s investment in wind/solar was a bet that oil and gas prices would go through the roof. That bet is not looking very good. Policy makers seem slow to accept both the lessons learned about wind/solar over the last decade as well as lessons about oil and gas.
Well, a lot is happening out in that climate world. There’s an IPCC report being drafted. The consensus has moved the most likely sensitivity point to 2.7C. Many climate warriors are coming face – to – face with the phrase “not applicable”. Data gathering continues. Opinions vary.
The number one question among the climate concerned is, as ever, “Why isn’t our message working?” As it turns out, the reason is very poor and often counterproductive messaging. A successful climate message needs the correct process, approach and communication model. To date, the concerned advocate a political process, a top down macro economic approach, and the information deficit communication model.
Over the last few years, a number of social science research papers and seminars concluded that the deficit model is, in their words, not applicable to action on climate issues. Not applicable means you’ve got to try something else.
There have also been some rumblings toward a bottom up approach. Just now, one blogger is arguing that macro economics is not applicable to climate. There’s that term again.
It’s funny–the farther away I get, the less relevant the whole discussion starts to appear. I mean, Paul, tell me–has the conversation really moved an inch from when we were trading comments at Bart Verheggen’s blog a year or so ago?
It all seems like Pete and Re-Pete.
On 8 May 2013 22:46, The Lukewarmer's Way
Paul,
Tom has it right: nothing is really happening.
AGW believers still think that they can style the message and finally get all of the knuckle draggers to get on board.
It apparently never crosses their minds that it is the message itself, and its deeply flawed, failed claims, not the style.
The IPCC consensus on climate is as meaningful as the consensus on how many angels dance on the head of a pin.
Tom,
It is interesting how the perspective changes with geography.
Chapter 24 in “Why Wind Power is a Scam:
This came out on Friday but was overshadowed by other acts of public treachery.
Companies won’t face charges in condor deaths from the Los Angeles Times.
The U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service grants exceptions to a wind farm and a building project in harassing or killing the endangered birds.
Federal wildlife officials took the unprecedented step Friday of telling private companies that they will not be prosecuted for inadvertently harassing or even killing endangered California condors.
In a decision swiftly condemned by conservationists and wildlife advocates, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service said operators of Terra-Gen Power’s wind farm in the Tehachapi Mountains will not be prosecuted if their turbines accidentally kill a condor during the expected 30-year life span of the proposed project.”
H/T to WUWT..
This is ridiculous. Fracking is being attacked with no evidence, and wind is protected despite the evidence.
I confess I don’t see the logic of this decision. Would it be that tough to cage a turbine? How much extra would it cost?
Tom,
Wind barely works with large subsidies. Add caging to the windmills would be amazingly expensive and difficult.
The decision is just one example of many of an executive branch out of control.
From Tim Worstall: As the actual scientists continually downgrade the likely effects of climate change the propagandists keep upgrading their claims.
The estimates of climate sensitivity are being massaged down. We seem to be thinking that a doubling of CO2-e will lead to a 2 oC, 2.5 oC rise rather than the former possibilities of 4.5 and so on. And yet then we’ve got people insisting that we’re going to get 5 oC even as the estimates of the effect of CO2 fall.
Wouldn’t it all be rather more interesting if those claiming to be presenting the scientific consensus were in fact doing so?
http://timworstall.com/2013/05/12/its-weird-about-climate-change-isnt-it
The movement has been much more than an inch. The catastrophist position is suffering a death by a thousand cuts.
I think Tim quite correctly holds to a rough and ready heuristic on climate change based on what he knows he knows. I think he’s probably got a clearer idea of the rough range of impacts than many of us who have been following climate change closely for a lot longer. But if his Richie Murphy nemesis turns out to be a skeptic, I bet Worstall would become a more strident alarmist than James Hansen… but then so might I….
The policy-makers, who listened to the catastrophists, made three bad bets:
1. Peak Oil is here and prices are about to go through the roof! Nope.
2. Wind and Solar, with a brief but expensive boost, will prove effective at solving the peak oil issue when combined with the super-easy-to-do conservation measures! Nope.
3. Catastrophic global warming is “settled” enough to politically justify doing number 2.
http://closup.umich.edu/national-surveys-on-energy-and-environment/3/public-opinion-on-fracking-perspectives-from-michigan-and-pennsylvania/
Interesting poll. Please note that the actual numbers contradict their conclusions; but hey, what else is new?
Key finding clearly has to be this: “Residents of both states also support regulation and taxation of the hydraulic fracturing industry. And a majority, or 52 percent in Michigan and 58 percent in Pennsylvania, support imposing a moratorium on fracking until there is a fuller understanding of the possible risks.”
Gee Tom, You sorted through the chaff pretty fast. That 58% is amazing considering that we are inundated daily with pro-fracking propaganda. This is a real grass roots movement. It even has republicans and tea partiers.
and yet, on Table 5, we learn that people support fracking 54-35 in Michigan and 49-40 in PA. Some schizophrenia on the issue there.
Table 24 was fascinating. By far the preferred source for info was environmental groups with the state government a distant second. The least preferred sources of info were newspapers and the federal government- which score lower than drilling industry groups.
A third of the respondents say their go-to-source of info is eco activists? I hope that’s a signal of a bad survey sample and not a true trend for info sources. I really do.
I sincerely doubt the validity of the survey. My bet is it is a manipulated sample.
As to the anti-fracking- I understand Marty’s claims about water, but has it been verified? Fracking has been around for a very long time and has a long track record of safety.
Much more is known about fracking than, say, large windmills.
I sincerely question the reasoning behind those who are vehemently against something that is working and working well and safely.
Hunter, is there a body of work you can point to of studies done on groundwater, seismic stability etc.,? I know some of the issues are explored during geothermal plant reviews and is applicable, but is there a central resource of materials?
Tom,
This was just posted:
But more importantly, look at the dogs that have not barked since fracking started in 1947. Then look at how the accusations have held up.
And Texas leads the country in emissions reductions. Darn Republicans and their evil denial.
http://blogs.the-american-interest.com/wrm/2013/05/14/texas-a-global-green-paragon/
lol. And we are one of the strongest economies.
And we have great beaches, fisheries, ground water resources, etc.
Enviro extremists are such wankers.
Without gravity acting to restore the thermodynamic equilibrium which is stipulated in the Second Law of Thermodynamics (which says: “An isolated system, if not already in its state of thermodynamic equilibrium, spontaneously evolves towards it. Thermodynamic equilibrium has the greatest entropy amongst the states accessible to the system”) and thus, as a direct corollary of that Law, supporting (at the molecular level) an autonomous thermal gradient, then …
(1) The temperature at the base of the troposphere on Uranus would be nowhere near as hot as 320K because virtually no direct Solar radiation gets down there, and there is no surface at that altitude. The planet’s radiating temperature is under 60K because it receives less than 3W/m^2.
(2) The temperature of the Venus surface would be nowhere near as hot as 730K (even at the poles) because it receives only about 10% as much direct Solar radiation at its surface as does Earth at its surface.
(3) Jupiter would be nowhere near as hot, even in its core, which receives extra kinetic energy which was converted by gravity from gravitational potentential energy due to the continual collapsing of this gaseous planet. This is why Jupiter emits more radiation than it receives.
(4) The core of our Moon would be nowhere near as hot as it is thought to be, probably over 1000K.
(5) Earth’s surface would indeed be perhaps 20 to 40 degrees colder, and the core, mantle and crust nowhere near as hot, maybe no molten material at all.
Think about it! If you’re not sure why, it’s explained in Sections 4 to 9 and Section 15 here.
I think the folks that hang around this blog would be interested in this. In order to get an idea of the power industry’s take on future generation, I recommend this on-demand webinar: Clearing the Air on Air Emission Regulations Part II: The Three R’s: Rules, Regulations and Reactions. Click here to access the webinar on-demand (http://www.powermag.com/whitepapers/ep_environmental_webinar_registration/?hq_e=el&hq_m=2676878&hq_l=1&hq_v=47232edc0a). You have to register but it is free.
Three speakers offered varied opinions on the future of electric generation: a wind energy proponent, someone from a company that has wind and nuclear, and a consultant who looks at the big picture trends. Note that they all pretty much assume that carbon limits are just a matter of time. This discussion reinforced my concern that the current push for renewals is going to have unintended consequences. Many of those consequences are going to end badly for anyone who wants to keep electricity prices low.
Roger,
I look forward to seeing the seminar.
The AGW fanatics have already distorted the energy market to at least some degree.
Will it stand over the long haul? I doubt it.
Tom,
When you read this, I urge you to go to Lucia’s and see what she just did to a certain poster who has just made his first(?) post here. He apparently can spam stuff up pretty famously.
Lucia took strong action to protect her blog.
And please do tell us how things are going?
http://rt.com/news/beer-fracking-merkel-environment-710/
Finally, someone with their priorities straight.
Its funny, but it is sad: fracking has not been shown to contaminate water in over 50 years of fracking.
What they now refer to as fracking has little in common qualitatively or quantitatively with what they called fracking 50 years ago.
Regrettably the term is now associated with the whole process which includes horizontal drilling and disposing of the waste water with injection wells. Ironically, the last 2 processes might be the real culprits. Also, the pressures are much higher now.
I think that it would be possible to safely get the gas out. The waste water should be disposed of according to the guidelines other industries have to live with. There should be a limit as to the thickness of shale that can be horizontally drilled, and it should be determined by the accuracy of the drilling. The industry could clean it up, but it would cost. They won’t do it unless they have to.
marty,
I believe we are in agreement on those issues. Waste water is waste water and should be disposed of carefully.
I like it when people I like reach amicable agreement.
Another find for my mini-archive. This is Joe Romm: Unfortunately, sea level rise is already 60% faster than projected. Goodell reports:
With six feet of sea-level rise, South Florida is toast, says Tom Gustafson, a former Florida speaker of the House and a climate-change-policy advocate. Even if we cut carbon pollution overnight, it wont save us. Ohio State glaciologist Jason Box has said he believes we already have 70 feet of sea-level rise baked into the system.
Certainly without sharp cuts in CO2 starting ASAP, Jason Box is correct (see Manmade Carbon Pollution Has Already Put Us On Track For 69 Feet Of Sea Level Rise).
Tom,
Peace is often its own reward.
The piece from Romm is hysterical- literally. AGW extremists, like most other extremists, are not really rational, and are certainly immune to factual data.
My question is why 69 feet? Why not exaggerate a little and say 70, just to get a round number?
Tom,
The figure of 69 feet is already an exagerration of many, many feet. Some vestige of shame likely guided Romm to go for the 69 feet. Or maybe he is pulling a Beevis and Butthead double entendre?
I publicly apologized to Romm when I was writing for Examiner.com because I had accused him of saying sea level rise would reach 20 feet. He said he had never said such a thing and when I checked, he had always quoted bozos as saying it. So I apologized.
Consider this a retraction.
Tom,
So Joe Romm was quoting the slr hypester and pointing out their absurdity?
Unlike Tom I believe that a warm planet is a happy planet. I believe that “climate change” policies are a real, right-now disaster, as opposed to the hypothetical if-but-maybe logic of CAGW claims. Now I find that Matt Ridley (what a clever man!) takes this view as well:
http://www.rationaloptimist.com/blog/the-implications-of-lower-climate-sensitivity.aspx
One of the tenets of lukewarmerism is that lack of information is not the cause of inaction. No amount of additional climate science information changes the dynamics of energy transformation.
I didn’t know that was one of the tenets. I’ll ask the landlerd if they’ve ped the rent.
Paul,
Can you expand on that a bit more? I generally think the underlying tenet of the Hippocratic oath, “first do no harm”, is applicable to public policy as well as medicine.
Is part of the energy transformation dynamic to continue to subsidize the erection of windmills at large public expense and damage to landscape?
If you believe that planetary surface temperatures are all to do with radiative forcing rather than non-radiative heat transfers, then you are implicitly agreeing with IPCC authors (and Dr Roy Spencer) that a column of air in the troposphere would have been isothermal but for the assumed greenhouse effect. You are believing this because you are believing the 19th century simplification of the Second Law of Thermodynamics which said heat only transfers from hot to cold – a “law” which is indeed true for all radiation, but only strictly true in a horizontal plane for non-radiative heat transfer by conduction.
The Second Law of Thermodynamics in its modern form explains a process in which thermodynamic equilibrium “spontaneously evolves” and that thermodynamic equilibrium will be the state of greatest accessible entropy.
Now, thermodynamic equilibrium is not just about temperature, which is determined by the mean kinetic energy of molecules, and nothing else. Pressure, for example, does not control temperature. Thermodynamic equilibrium is a state in which total accessible energy (including potential energy) is homogeneous, because if it were not homogeneous, then work could be done and so entropy could still increase.
When such a state of thermodynamic equilibrium evolves in a vertical plane in any solid, liquid or gas, molecules at the top of a column will have more gravitational potential energy (PE), and so they must have less kinetic energy (KE), and so a lower temperature, than molecules at the bottom of the column. This state evolves spontaneously as molecules interchange PE and KE in free flight between collisions, and then share the adjusted KE during the next collision.
This postulate was put forward by the brilliant physicist Loschmidt in the 19th century, but has been swept under the carpet by those advocating that radiative forcing is necessary to explain the observed surface temperatures. Radiative forcing could never explain the mean temperature of the Venus surface, or that at the base of the troposphere of Uranus – or that at the surface of Earth.
The gravitationally induced temperature gradient in every planetary troposphere is fully sufficient to explain all planetary surface temperatures. All the weak attempts to disprove it, such as a thought experiment with a wire outside a cylinder of gas, are flawed, simply because they neglect the temperature gradient in the wire itself, or other similar oversights.
The gravity effect is a reality and the dispute is not an acceptable disagreement.
The issue is easy to resolve with a straight forward, correct understanding of the implications of the spontaneous process described in statements of the Second Law of Thermodynamics.
Hence radiative forcing is not what causes the warming, and so carbon dioxide has nothing to do with what is just natural climate change.
Nearly everyone, (including myself until a year ago) is still sucked into the line of thinking first thrust upon the world by the AGW crowd, namely that it is all to do with radiative forcing. Yes, this includes virtually all other PSI members..
I have been thinking this through for a long time and am now firmly of the opinion that all these energy budgets are incomplete, mainly because they don’t show the missing link. On Venus and Uranus that missing link is a huge amount of energy which must flow downwards in the atmosphere. It’s quite a lot on Earth too. Over the life of these planets there has been a build up of thermal energy from the Sun which can’t escape.
So these planets (Uranus, Venus, Earth) are not still cooling off. It’s cold out there where Uranus is because it only receives about 3W/m^2 in the very top of its atmosphere. It could easily have cooled off, but for the one thing that stops it. And that one thing is the gravitationally induced thermal gradient which forms by diffusion at the molecular level,, because molecules in free flight between collisions interchange kinetic energy and gravitational potential energy. In just two lines of calculations, you can derive the -g/Cp value by equating PE and -KE. Kinetic energy will tend towards being homogeneous during collisions, but only at each altitude. Inter-molecular radiation reduces the gradient by up to about a third, but by less than 5% on Uranus where there is just a little methane causing that.
The Clausius (hot to cold) statement of the Second Law is not comprehensive and for conduction and diffusion it only applies in a horizontal plane. The process described in the Second Law means that thermodynamic equilibrium evolves spontaneously, and, in the process of maintaining such equilibrium there must evolve a temperature gradient. Most importantly, extra energy absorbed at higher altitudes can actually flow up this gradient because that will help restore the equilibrium.
Hunter,
“Is part of the energy transformation dynamic to continue to subsidize the erection of windmills at large public expense and damage to landscape?”
No, not at all; at least not in the land where I am emperor. In that land the marketplace, not the statehouse, is the engine of the energy transformation dynamic.
Hmm. Carriage return Carriage return Emperor Norton’s carriage returns
Can I move to the land where you are emperor, Paul? And would that be the Land of Make Believe?
I’m putting up this link for all to see,but also because I don’t ever want to lose it. I don’t believe I have ever seen a clearer explication of the environmental issues facing the world today. It is, of course, by Freeman Dyson.
http://edge.org/conversation/heretical-thoughts-about-science-and-society
Good link.
Norman Page makes a point that I have been trying to make for several years now: AGW should lessen temperature gradients and make extreme weather less common.
I have heard that line if reasoning before–maybe from you, Marty… and isn’t that what’s happening now?
I was making this point on your old blog. Page also writes of the necessity of fitting cycles to the temperature trend.
Marty,
The idea that warming could lessen the dramatic temp gradients sounds quite reasonable. However this means that the AGW community is once again in the position to play “Heads I win, tails you lose”, since many in the AGW community claim the exact opposite.
The Nation magazine recently found evidence of secret corporate donations influencing partisan climate change websites and testimony to congress.
http://www.thenation.com/article/174437/secret-donors-behind-center-american-progress-and-other-think-tanks-updated-524
ooops
To Marty’s point above, I think Roy Spencer and/or Pilke Sr. like to point out that it has to be cold for tornadoes to form. It came up the last time someone tried to connect tornadoes to global warming. Which is interesting, because didn’t Marcott propose that the Northern Hemisphere – maybe even particularly the US – hasn’t warmed while the rest of the globe has? If so, it seems difficult (but not impossible, I guess) to be experiencing the affects of warming where it hasn’t happened.
JeffN,
The AGW money hunt has been going on for decades. Look at Gore’s career for a Brobdingnagian example of this.
The statement “Heat transfer depends on difference in temperatures” is indeed correct in a horizontal plane, and also for radiation in all directions. Heat transfer is always a one-way process. In the case of radiation, thermal energy is converted into electromagnetic energy as the source emits the radiation. Then, at the target, some or all of the radiation will resonate and be immediately re-emitted without its EM energy being converted to thermal energy. If the target were at zero (0) K then all the EM energy would be converted to thermal energy in the target with no re-emission because the target is at 0K. At higher temperatures that are cooler than the source, some of the EM energy is converted to thermal energy in the target, and so we have a heat transfer from hot to cold.
However, in a gravitational field, in a vertical plane, there is a state of thermodynamic equilibrium in which there is a temperature gradient but no heat flow either way, for the very reason that it is in thermodynamic equilibrium. If the equilibrium is disturbed, energy will flow in all accessible directions away from the source of new energy.
This explains how thermal energy can indeed flow up the temperature gradient towards the surface of a planet by non-radiative processes. Radiation cannot achieve this, and so it is not radiation which is heating the Venus surface, or the depths of the atmospheres of Uranus and other planets. And the process contributes to the energy build up at Earth’s surface which then supports the surface temperature.
Tom,
Please, please please slay the slayers.
I believe I have proved beyond reasonable doubt that it is the gravity effect which, in conjunction with natural variations in Solar flux reaching a planet’s atmosphere, determines that planet’s atmospheric, surface, crust, mantle and core temperatures. This is based on valid physics and is explained in my 20 page paper “Planetary Core and Surface Temperatures” which so far no one in the world has successfully rebutted, because when they study it they realise it is correct.
“I have proved beyond reasonable doubt…”
You certainly have. Now go away.
I second that. Mr. Cotton, I don’t find your comments edifying to any measurable extent.
Tom,
Is it possible to make a way to delete the drag-ons?
It is clear that left to simply speak on, the drag-on reveals itself as surely as Capt. Queeg.
I volunteer to do it, if your schedule does not permit. I give my solemn word that nothing more than drag-on slaying would take place.
Sincerely yours,
etc.
And you don’t have any valid argument against them – I throw down the gauntlet – prove me wrong.
I for one do not believe your theories rise to the level of engagement, let alone argument.
Capt. Queeg dabbling in physics. He scans like one, he engages like one, waddles like one, etc. I doubt if this is Cotton. But I frankly avoided reading much of him, as well. But if it is, then it is a much sadder state than I thought.
Tom, pretty please: I promise on everything good and holy to use it strictly under your authority.
The most compelling argument against AGW is the true one, namely that which proves no greenhouse effect is controlling surface temperatures.
I have spent thousands of hours looking into what must really be happening in the universe regarding temperatures above and below planetary surfaces. I have found, beyond any reasonable doubt that I could have, that …
(1) The answer to the dilemma lies in understanding that the Second Law of Thermodynamics (in its modern form – not the simplified “hot to cold” Clausius statement) is talking about a process in which thermodynamic equilibrium “evolves spontaneously” and so too does an autonomous temperature gradient (at the macro level) in a vertical plane in a planet’s atmosphere, crust and mantle.
(2) The absorption of new thermal energy disturbs the thermodynamic equilibrium (which results in the temperature gradient) and the new energy spreads out by convection in all available directions away from the new source of energy, but flowing over the sloping temperature plane. So some energy can actually move from cooler to warmer regions provided that the process stops when a new thermodynamic equilibrium evolves. Thus heat from the Sun “creeps” up the temperature gradient in the atmosphere, and then further up the steeper temperature gradient in the outer crust, and even further through the mantle until, whether you choose to believe it or not, it actually supports the core temperature, preventing the core from cooling off, even on planets like Uranus where no energy is created in the core.
By the time you have studied information about several planets in the detail and to the extent that I have, you may realise that this has to be what happens on all planets, including Earth. It is not radiative forcing associated with any greenhouse effect which is the primary determinant of planetary temperatures – it is the gravity effect which holds down thermal energy absorbed over the life of the planet. Instantaneous radiative energy balance is not doing it, and never could.
My own viewpoint is more engineering-oriented and skeptical, although with that golden ticket, the Physics degree. Perhaps I’m a bit one-sided in that skeptical direction, but I have made a lot of money cleaning out data malpractice in other areas. And I know a number of the investors who got sucked into this renewable game early on. It’s just a tax shelter. Right.
From that viewpoint, I would suggest the alarmist side is looking a bit discouraged in actions, even if the rhetoric hasn’t changed much. It isn’t all as fun or as easy as it used to be. The costs are coming home to roost, instead of being pushed out into someday-land. Energy costs are up; their favorite gadgets need a lot of expensive maintenance and aren’t scaling up well; their favorite companies/divisions are exiting; big projects and subsidies are being cut back or cancelled; fracking is making friends and green is seriously irritating some wallets; climate journalists are being culled (as you well know); green conferences are being held without even mentioning climate; it is getting harder to stiff-arm the FOIA requests and more data-rot is being exposed; the next round of negotiations towards the next exciting UN agreement in 2016 is “temporarily suspended”; the UN’s political consensus is breaking down; the front of the parade in Germany and the EU is losing the beat, let alone the rowdy countries in Asia; I’d just generally say it is getting harder, and there isn’t much exciting coming in the pipeline.
Oh, and Michael Mann’s suit against the National Review hasn’t got to court yet.
Roberto,
This has been a trying, tough day and you just cheered it up tremendously.
Thank you very much.
Models can never be correct if they continue to assume that knowing radiative flux we can somehow determine surface temperatures, completely disregarding non-radiative processes which remove two-thirds of the energy which transfers from the surface to the atmosphere before radiation does the rest. Because of this the surface acts nothing like a blackbody.
Even as of today, Principia Scientific International is still publishing an article “The Anthropogenic Global Warming Controversy” which refers to an article by Claes Johnson in which Claes quite incorrectly describes how thermal energy moves downwards in an atmosphere. I have added four comments pointing out the error, and written to Claes (copy John O’Sullivan) pointing out the error. The last of my comments on the PSI thread sums it up, and it’s worth repeating here …
The Second Law of Thermodynamics states that thermodynamic equilibrium will evolve spontaneously. In a gravitational field this thermodynamic equilibrium (with greatest accessible entropy) is isentropic. Hence, disregarding chemical and phase changes, the total of the gravitational potential energy and kinetic energy in any small region (even a few pictograms of the atmosphere) will tend towards homogeneity at all altitudes in calm conditions. This can happen by diffusion (conduction between molecules) without any convection. Because PE varies, so will KE, and thus there will be an autonomous temperature gradient.
Thermal energy flows over a sloping temperature plane in a gravitational field in all accessible directions away from any source of new energy which disturbs thermodynamic equilibrium. That, in effect, is what the Second Law says will happen. This is how the base of the troposphere stays warm and supports the surface temperature.
In summary, PSI (and Claes Johnson) are right in saying what I say in my “Radiated Energy” paper of March 2012 about radiation from a cooler blackbody not transferring thermal energy to a warmer blackbody. But they are wrong in endorsing an article such as today’s, which cites what Claes Johnson has said about non-radiative heat transfers in planetary atmospheres.
Please start your own blog and publicize your paper there. Your repetitive comments are just clogging up my blog.
Tom,
Snip, snip, and block.
If this really is what the dragons are claiming, they are complete kooks.
How are things in the far away lands?
MOVIE REVIEW. I finally saw Promised Land, and surprisingly I liked it.
(I didn’t care for Gasland.)
SPOILER ALERT. There is a courageous plot twist at the end that makes the movie a lot more interesting and believable. The beginning of the film portrays a quite predictable battle for and against fracking that appears stereotypical. But in the end we see it as a 3 way battle between the industry, a grassroots movement, and a very murky character played by John Kransinski from the Office. And it becomes very obvious why many of the Big Green organizations panned it. The film introduces the concept of an agent provocateur posing as a dedicated environmentalist. It hit too close to home.
It was filmed in Avonmore PA close to where I grew up and about 40 miles from the 2nd largest well contamination in PA. It is also near the town of Apollo, site of the largest nuclear scandal in the US.
The film does not state that it takes place in PA. In PA local government has no control over fracking, unlike the movie.
Coincidently, the Heiinz Foundation has been found to be contributing to both sides of the fracking issue. How better to control it?
Today the President is simply side-stepping Congress to impose radical ‘carbon pollution’ policies on Americans.
It seems likely that history will use the Obama terms in office as an illustration of Alexander Solzhenitsyn’s maxim, “To do a great evil, one must first be comvinced they are diong a great good.”
Obama, true to form has shoved his climate policy into the public square.
His behavior in pushing this out on to us is predictable by now:
Huge build up
Grandiose mis-statment of issue
Outline huge costly actions that won’t cure the small problem he is agitated over
Bet no one notices that his policy plans just happen to enrich his pals
Mock those who happen to disagree
Leave for an expensive vacation that would shame a king.
Let’s consider some facts. Is the Arctic warming? Yes, like everywhere else, with a long-term trend for 500 years rising out of the Little Ice Age at the rate of about half a degree per century, due to turn to cooling at least within 200 years. But is there a hockey stick? No.
In fact the Arctic is no hotter than it was in the late 1930’s and early 1940’s.
Is there a super-imposed 60 year natural cycle that caused all the alarm during the 30 years of rising prior to 1998? Yes.
But it’s all natural – every bit of it. And it’s nothing whatsoever to do with carbon dioxide, radiative forcing, back radiation, greenhouse effects or any such travesties of physics.
“Is there a super-imposed 60 year natural cycle that caused all the alarm during the 30 years of rising prior to 1998? Yes.” Do you suggest a mechanism? In previous comments I suggested the beat frequency of 9.5 and 10.8 years to be close to that.
In 1988, I had a long conversation with the lead climate forecaster for the Old Farmers Almanac. Their long term model also had a cycle of around 55-60 years. It would have been in phase with what you pointed out.
The 60-year cycle is not new with regards to weather patterns. I remember reading about it in th
Briffa has just corroborated that Steve McIntyre’s critique of his North Urals based hockey stick was in fact correct: There is no hockey stick.
Once again, the Flat Earth Society members are the ones making extreme claims and demanding extreme policies, not the serious skeptics.
Do you have a link?
http://www.globalresearch.ca/co2-and-the-ideology-of-climate-change-the-forces-behind-carbon-centric-environmentalism/5342471 Hard left expose’ on AGW funding.
martinkokus,
The data part is interesting. The kooky tinfoil hat conspiracy thinking behind the actual essay is laughable.
Tom,
You may find it of some interest to be told that Dana Nucitelli, the particularly arrogant self-righteous blogger and pseudo scientist, has been outed for what he is: an employee of a company that is directly profiting from oil and natural gas development.
What is interesting is to consider how he and his pals have used the accusation of skeptics being in the pay of ‘big oil’ as an excuse to dismiss skeptical questions of their extreme AGW hype.
Also worth considering is how many others, from Gore to the house of Lords to the climategate email writers are shown to be making money and grants off of their public positions.
Nucitelli is just another hack who feigns concern about the environment but is just carrying water for the gas companies. PA is full of them now.
Hiya hunter
I don’t care what his company does. Alarmists have been using that club to beat skeptics for years. There’s enough in what Nutella writes that I violently object to that I don’t need his company’s lack of bona fides.
Tom,
Typically pointing out the oppenent’s rank hypocrisy is useful. Dana and his ilk reek of hypocrisy.
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