In a previous post, I described some of the setbacks that those pushing the idea of man made global warming (or whatever today’s name is) were facing. Things have continued to go downhill at an ever increasing rate. If you are committed to the idea of man-made global warming (AGW) life sucks.
First came an opinion poll in the UK which showed that the British Government faces a backlash to their AGW policies caused by the rapid and steep increases in energy prices, with the prospect of worse to come.
Only 25% of the population are in favor of continuing the current policies if it means increased energy prices.
This was accompanied by a paper published in Remote Sensing, which shows that satellite measurements and those of the global warming models have huge discrepancies. Of course, the discrepancies are in the direction of showing that some of the basic assumptions used in the models are vastly exaggerating the potential for future warming.
The paper is available here.
The reaction was predictable – when there is a clash between the models and reality, then there has to be some problem with reality.
Really.
Then there is another paper published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences which tackles the idea that the reason that global warming has been absent for the last 10 years while CO2 levels continue to rise is because of all those coal-fired power stations (you know, the ones that we have to shut down and replace with windmills!) that China is firing up (about one per week).
Of course, claiming that more coal-fired power plants reduces global warming while saying that we have to shut down coal-fired power plants to reduce global warming strikes even the dimmest minds as maybe a rather strange idea. So to explain this, the claim is that Chinese coal is different. Very special coal, which creates lots more sulfate particles which reduce incoming sunlight intensity.
Well, this paper knocks that idea firmly on the head.
Again, this research is based upon actual observations and measurements, so again it is refuted on the basis that models must be right, and reality is obviously flawed.
That argument is used a lot, isn’t it?
Next, comes a paper published in Nature Geoscience, which looks at the AGW proponent claim that hydro-electric reservoirs are huge emitters of greenhouse gasses (CO2 and methane). The Green Lobby doesn’t like hydro-electric generation, because it falls under the heading of “renewable”, but actually produces large quantities of cheap electricity, whereas their view of the world requires small quantities of hyper-expensive electricity, so they came up with the idea that the reservoirs cause global warming. Somehow, these reservoirs are aware that the water is intended to produce electricity, as opposed to be for drinking, washing etc.
Anyway, this paper takes a real scientific look at the idea and determines that the actual emissions are approximately 1/6 of those claimed.
Next comes a report from the university of Copenhagen, which examines the claim that there is a “tipping point” for Arctic ice, beyond which there is no possibility of recovery, and once reached, will ensure that the Arctic becomes totally ice free, forever.
This is patent nonsense, of course, because the Arctic has been ice free in the past, and since we have ice there now, obviously “recovered” — of course, recovery implies that there should be ice at the North pole, which is a bit of a stretch. There is absolutely no such requirement.
Anyway, this study, to be published in Science, looks at the last 10,000 years and determines that there is no “tipping point” for Arctic ice.
Next, a poll by Rasmussen finds that 69% of people believe that Climate Scientists have very likely falsified global warming research data and findings.
Another nail in the coffin comes from Prof. Murry Salby the Chair of Climate, of Macquarie University. He takes a look at the claim that the rise in CO2 that we see is all due to man. The argument was that it is possible to deduce that CO2 comes from fossil fuels rather than other sources by looking at the ratio of two carbon isotopes (C12 and C13). Prof. Salby takes a close look at this and comes to the conclusion that atmospheric CO2 is most likely increasing due to increasing temperature, not increasing temperature increasing due to rising CO2 — which is agrees with observations based upon ice cores covering many thousands of years, which have always shown a CO2 rise lagging a temperature rise. This was even visible on Al Gore’s graphs, which were actually shown reversed, to make it appear that CO2 led temperature rises unless you paid very close attention to the graphs X axis.
There is a very good write up on Prof. Salby’s work on Jo Nova’s website.
Perhaps the most telling comment he made after doing his research is this one:
“Anyone who thinks the science of this complex thing is settled is in Fantasia.”
All this almost makes you feel sorry for those who have hitched their fortune, credibility and finances to the AGW hype.
