A new study published in the scientific peer-reviewed journal, Climate, by 37 researchers from 18 countries suggests that current estimates of global warming are contaminated by urban warming biases.
The study also suggests that the solar activity estimates considered in the most recent reports by the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) likely underestimated the role of the Sun in global warming since the 19th century.
It is well-known that cities are warmer than the surrounding countryside. While urban areas only account for less than 4% of the global land surface, many of the weather stations used for calculating global temperatures are located in urban areas. For this reason, some scientists have been concerned that the current global warming estimates may have been contaminated by urban heat island effects. In their latest report, the IPCC estimated that urban warming accounted for less than 10% of global warming. However, this new study suggests that urban warming might account for up to 40% of the warming since 1850.
Dr. John R. Christy, Distinguished Professor of Atmospheric and Earth Sciences at The University of Alabama in Huntsville, gave an excellent presentation titled “Climate Models for Policy?…‘a Bridge Too Far’*” at the 14th International EIKE Climate and Energy Conference (IKEK-14) on November 13, 2021 in Gera, Germany.
For anyone who would like to understand why the IPCC is not only grossly incorrect, but indeed unscientific in reaching all of its most significant conclusions about “the science” of climate and its never ending changes, this short presentation by Dr. Christy is an excellent and incisive overview.
Canadian wildfires have grabbed lots of headlines recently, but as usual, the press is reporting standard lies and baseless climate change hysteria. Here are the undisputed facts.
Anybody with eyes can see the obvious decline over the past several decades, but the fake media does everything it can to “hide the decline” just as Michael Mann plotted, planned, and secretly did in his infamous and totally debunked 1998 “hockey stick” piece of garbage math and science.
That’s the global picture, here’s Canada:
Again, the decline both in number of fires AND acreage burned is quite obvious over the last 30+ years — at least to anyone whose eyes are open.
And, the vast majority (around 80%) of the fires are human caused with a startling and recent massive change that has lead to human-caused fires also accounting for the vast majority of acreage burned as well. In the past, the vast majority of acreage burned was caused by lightning strikes and other natural causes. Not so anymore. Hmmm? No conspiracy theories here.
Furthermore, as renowned researcher Roger Pielke Jr. notes, the current burn rates in Canada over the last several decades are “much lower than in centuries past” going back to the 1700s.
Even the left-wing governmental propaganda organization run by the United Nations known as the IPCC doesn’t attempt to tie global wildfires to climate change. In the most recent IPCC tome known as AR6, the best propaganda they could muster was,
“There is medium confidence [about as likely as not] that weather conditionsthat promote wildfires have become more probable in southern Europe, northern Eurasia, the USA, and Australia over the last century. In Australia a number of event attribution studies show that there is medium confidence of increase in fire weather conditions due to human influence.” [emphasis added]
Indeed, there is no attribution of changes in global wildfire numbers or acreage anywhere to be found in AR6. Regionally, and notably NOT including anywhere in Canada. There are some regional areas where they believe that climate change has had limited influence, but they are not very sure about anything. Note that their “medium confidence” prognostications are, according to them, just as likely false as true.
None of these inconvenient facts will stop the climate change extremists and their co-propagandists throughout the media and the world of so-called climate scientists. Indeed you’ll have a hard time trying to find these facts mentioned anywhere there, and that’s why we publish them here at climatethetruth.com.
Amongst the long list of non-scientific nonsense promulgated by left-wing climate crazies is, “OMG, the glaciers are melting!” Putting aside for a moment that globally glaciers have been melting at a pretty constant rate for 6000 years or so — surprise, surprise, we are in an inter-glacial period — the liars who run the National Park Service, for example have signs all over Glacier National Park (their poster child” for glacier melt, which they dub “A showcase of melting glaciers…” ) saying, “THE GLACIERS, GONE BY 2020.” The great scientist Al Gore even used the park in his wonderful movie An Inconvenient Truth (cited by a UK court as being untrue on all of its most important claims).
Oops. It’s 2022. And the glaciers are still there. Another inconvenient truth to add to the list.
Judith Curry’s most recent post on Climate Etc. brings this whole Glacier saga into excellent scientific focus…
Glacier saga Posted on November 10, 2022 by Judith Curry
The loss of glaciers from Glacier National Park is one of the most visible manifestations of climate change in the U.S. Signs were posted all around the park, proclaiming that the glaciers would be gone by 2020. In 2017, the Park started taking these signs down. What happened, beyond the obvious fact that the glaciers hadn’t disappeared by 2020?
Not only are Montana’s glaciers an important icon for global warming (e.g. Al Gore’s Inconvenient Truth), it also seems that the glaciers are an important political icon for progressive politicians in Montana. Earlier this week, Reilly Neill, a (sort of) politician in Montana, went after me on Twitter:
A number of progressive academic types are leaving twitter owing to Elon Musk’s takeover. What??? And miss all this fun???
Well, it just so happens that I have some analyses of Montana glaciers and climate in my archives; maybe I can help Reilly (and the “real scientists of Montana”) understand what is going on.
When I ask people who are sure that humans are having an alarming impact on the earth’s climate, I ask them to name one single paper that convinced them. So far, I have never gotten a paper.
No one reads papers, but I do. Some of them I don’t think are worth sharing, but a few are, and I present them here. I’ll write summaries, because I know people won’t click through. If you are convinced humans are causing climate change, you might want to understand the science a bit more; these summaries are designed to help you do that. There is much more at Climatecurious.com.
[See the whole list of papers and the rest of this post HERE.]
Over the last several weeks, many mainstream news media outlets have claimed that hurricanes are becoming more expensive, more frequent, and more intense because of climate change.
The Financial Timesreported that “hurricane frequency is on the rise.”
The New York Timesclaimed, “strong storms are becoming more common in the Atlantic Ocean.”
The Washington Postsaid, “climate change is rapidly fueling super hurricanes.”
ABC Newsdeclared, “Here’s how climate change intensifies hurricanes.”
Despite terrible news of hurricane Ian in Florida this week, the good news is that hurricanes in Florida have become steadily less prevalent in Florida over the past 170 years, and that trend continues.
More and more media and climate alarmists have been claiming that hurricanes are getting, or going to get, more powerful due to human production of CO2, but this statement is not supported by any actual data, and is based purely on speculation using computer models that are known to have numerous flaws. Even the notoriously alarmist IPCC states in its most recent AR6 report that there is only “limited evidence for anthropogenic effects on TC intensifications” (Chapter 11, Weather and Climate Extreme Events in a Changing Climate, 11.7.1.4). Indeed most studies have concluded the opposite. See for example Klotzbach and Landsea (2015) which states, “Large, significant downward trends are present in accumulated cyclone energy [i.e. hurricane strength] in the Northern Hemisphere, the Southern Hemisphere, and globally.” Or Vecchi et al (2021) which concluded that over the past century, there is no discernible increase in the ratio of major (Category 3 to 5) hurricanes to all hurricanes in the North Atlantic notwithstanding a recent 50-year increase: “Our results indicate that the recent increase in NA basin-wide MH/HU ratio or MH frequency is not part of a century-scale increase. Rather it is a rebound from a deep local minimum in the 1960s–1980s,” and indeed the authors hypothesize that the “recent increases contain a substantial, even dominant, contribution from internal climate variability, and/or late-20th century aerosol increases and subsequent decreases…”
As the media continues to trumpet the false narrative that climate change is causing an increase in number of hurricanes and hurricane power, the data continues to say the exact opposite.
Indeed, the downward trend is quite consistent over different timescales. Looking at data from the last 250 years or the past 50 years show the same thing: hurricanes are getting fewer in number, and waning in intensity both here in North America and globally. Given that the world has warmed approximately 1.6ºC since 1750 (near the low point of the Little Ice Age), the overall decrease in hurricane activity and strength is to be expected because of the correspondingly smaller temperature differential between the poles and the equator.
Researchers from the National University of Mexico documented hurricanes in the Gulf of Mexico and the Caribbean Sea from 1749 through 2012 and concluded that the linear downward trend is 0.778 fewer hurricanes per year. Rojo-Garibaldi et al (2016).
Hurricane expert Ryan Maue also provides the clear data showing that total energy of hurricanes (also known as tropical cyclones), both globally and in the northern hemisphere, is slightly declining over the last 50 years and dramatically declining over the last 30 years.
None of these clear facts, however, stop climate alarmists from continually attempting to misrepresent the exact opposite.
A great example of such an alarmist is Don Lemon who on September 27, 2022 attempted to bully a weather reporter in to admitting that climate change is responsible for the severity of hurricane Ian. Don apparently does not understand the difference between weather and climate, even though the badgered weather reporter (National Hurricane Center Acting Director Jamie Rohme) tried unsuccessfully to educate him. Watch the video clip below.
This is amazing. Don Lemon tries to blame Hurricane Ian on climate change. NOAA's hurricane director shuts him down. pic.twitter.com/svTjHtE8hl
Lemon: Can you tell us what this is and what effect the climate change has on this phenomenon?
Rohme: Well, we can come back and talk about climate change at a later time, I want to focus on the here and now [details about hurricane Ian]…
Lemon: Ah, listen I’m just trying to get that you said that you want to talk about climate change, but what effect has climate change had on this phenomenon that is happening now, because it seems these storms are intensifying that’s the question?
Rohme: I don’t think you can link climate change to any one event. On the whole, on the cumulative, climate change may be making storms worse, but to link it to any one event, I would caution against that.
Lemon: Okay, well listen, I grew up there and these storms are intensifying something is causing them to intensify…
If you are tired of climate alarmism about hurricanes, check out @RyanMaue on Twitter and on the web. He is always a great source of real scientific information as opposed to propaganda.
Deconstructing what we knew in real-time. Midnight to 8 AM Wednesday (Sept 28) radar loop of nearly Category 5 Hurricane Ian pic.twitter.com/f4ooXdon0n
The latest data from hurricane (aka “tropical cyclone”) expert Ryan Maue continue to show a steady decline in global hurricane activity despite the alleged tiny increase in “global mean surface temperature” (a fiction of the “consensus” crowd of anti-scientists) over the past 40 years. The upper line is all hurricanes (winds at or above 64 knots) and shows a statistically significant and fairly steady decline in numbers. The lower line, showing major hurricanes (winds at or above 96 knots) is fairly flat overall with a notable spike in the 2015-16 season. All of this is of course much to the chagrin of the climate alarmists (aka liars from the anti-science crowd) who keep shouting from the rooftops and all the corporate media that “climate change” is causing massive increases in “extreme weather,” all the while when nearly every measure of “extreme weather” continues to decline or stay the same.
Figure: Global Hurricane Frequency (all & major) — 12-month running sums. The top time series is the number of global tropical cyclones that reached at least hurricane-force (maximum lifetime wind speed exceeds 64-knots). The bottom time series is the number of global tropical cyclones that reached major hurricane strength (96-knots+). Adapted from Maue (2011) GRL.
Real science demonstrates there is no climate emergency and there are no climate-related financial or other risks caused by fossil fuels and CO2.
Happer & Lindzen
In their response to a “Request for Information on Climate-Related Financial Risk” Fed. Reg. 34856 (July 21,2022), world renowned scientists William Happer (Professor of Physics, Emeritus, Princeton University) and Richard Lindzen (Alfred P. Sloan Professor of Atmospheric Science Emeritus, Massachusetts Institute of Technology) made it plain that not only is there no financial risk to fossil fuel use or CO2 production, but on the contrary it will be “disastrous” if fossil fuel and CO2 production is reduced to zero.
SCIENCE DEMONSTRATES THERE IS NO CLIMATE-RELATED FINANCIAL RISK CAUSED BY FOSSIL FUELS AND CO2, BUT THERE WILL BE DISASTROUS TRANSITION RISK CONSEQUENCES FOR PEOPLE WORLDWIDE AND THE U. S. IF FOSSIL FUEL USE AND CO2 EMISSIONS ARE REDUCED TO “NET ZERO”
August 8, 2022
We (Happer and Lindzen) are career physicists who have specialized in radiation physics and dynamic heat transfer for decades.
In our scientific opinion, there is no scientific basis for the CFTC inquiry. Real science demonstrates there is no climate emergency and there are no climate-related financial or other risks caused by fossil fuels and CO2.
Frankly, the “science” cited to support of the CFTC inquiry and possible action is merely government opinion by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and the U.S. Global Climate Research Program (USGCRP), which is not science and cannot be used as the scientific basis for any CFTC or other government action.
Moreover, there will be a disastrous transition risk for the poor, people worldwide, future generations and the country by reducing fossil fuel use and CO2 emissions to “net zero.” Contrary to what is commonly reported, CO2 is essential to life on earth. Without CO2, there would be no photosynthesis, and thus no plant food. Reducing CO2 will reduce the amount of food available for the poor and people worldwide.
And, without fossil fuels there will be no low-cost energy worldwide and less CO2 for photosynthesis making food.
Thus, with all due respect, the Commission should not adopt any guidance, interpretations, policy statements, or regulations, or take other action on the erroneous science there is a climate-related financial or any other risk caused by fossil fuels and CO2. If any such action is taken, it should be ruled invalid by the courts.
ClimateTheTruth.com 