EU to dial back measures against global warming

GlobalPost

Hillary Clinton Has 'Hard Hitting' Climate Change Chat with Harrison Ford

Breitbart

"We are in a race against time," former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton warned Wednesday night, in an interview with actor Harrison Ford.

"We still live in a state of denial," Clinton suggested, regarding the future impacts of climate change. "We see it, we experience it, but we have a great deal of difficulty in summoning the political will ... to address it."

German government targets skeptic Fred Singer in 2013; FLASHBACK: Germans forced Singer’s family to flee Austria in 1938

http://junkscience.com/2013/05/16/german-government-targets-skeptic-fred-singer-in-2013-flashback-germans-forced-singers-family-to-flee-austria-in-1938/

Defra slashes climate change staff

http://www.bishop-hill.net/blog/2013/5/17/defra-slashes-climate-change-staff.html

This study done by John Cook and others, praised by the President of the United States, found more scientific publications whose abstracts reject global warming than say humans are primarily to blame for it

- Bishop Hill blog - Cook's unreported finding

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The New Nostradamus of the North: CEO of Atlanta-based Southern Co about renewables: “What do you do when the wind doesn’t blow and the sun doesn’t shine?”

Tom Fanning, CEO of the Atlanta-based energy company Southern Co, gives the facts about renewable energy in a nutshell:

Reuters: ‘Obama climate agenda faces Supreme Court reckoning’ | Climate Depot

With a barrage of legal briefs, a coalition of business groups and Republican-leaning states are taking their fight against Obama administration climate change regulations to the U.S. Supreme.Court'

- Bishop Hill blog - Today does climate sensitivity

BBC Radio's flagship Today programme covers climate sensitivity and features, among others, yours truly.

- Bishop Hill blog - Cook's unreported finding

I really have been struggling to summon up much enthusiasm for the inanities of John Cook's paper, but Brandon Schollenberger has written an extraordinary analysis of the data, which really has to be seen to be believed. Readers are no doubt aware that the paper involves rating abstracts of a whole bunch of research papers to see where they stand on the global warming question.

12,793 Snow and Cold records broken in less than 2 months

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Twitter / dbiello: still waiting ...

still waiting http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/observations/2010/10/05/white-house-to-get-more-solar-panels/ … MT @billmckibben: WH promised solar on the roof by spring 2011; I believe it's now spring 2013...

A New Climate Survey Tells Us What? : Collide-a-Scape

[Yale report] Over many years of research, we have consistently found that, on average, Americans view climate change as a threat distant in space and time–a risk that will affect far away places, other species, or future generations more than people here and now.

That. Is. The. Stumbling. Block.

Twitter / BarackObama: Ninety-seven percent of ...

Ninety-seven percent of scientists agree: #climate change is real, man-made and dangerous. Read more: http://OFA.BO/gJsdFp

Hansen: "If we burn all the fossil fuels, that will take us back to being an ice-free planet. It will take a while for all the ice to melt but sea levels will end up 70 metres higher"

James Hansen: We are on the verge of creating climate chaos | EurActiv

[Hansen] You could stabilise climate by the end of the century if you reduced emissions by 6% a year...If we burn all the fossil fuels, that will take us back to being an
ice-free planet. It will take a while for all the ice to melt but sea
levels will end up 70 metres higher.

Hansen: Global warming may cause the North Atlantic to cool, driving much stronger storms

Hansen Says Exploiting Tar Sands Makes Climate Change Unsolvable - Businessweek

The scientist also said he’s working on a paper based on “speculative” research that indicates accelerating ice loss from Greenland will eventually cause the North Atlantic to cool, creating the conditions for more powerful storms along the lines of Hurricane Sandy, the largest Atlantic hurricane on record.

“The cold freshwater coming out from Greenland is going to likely cause this cooling,” said Hansen. “That’s what I call the ‘storms of my grandchildren’ because you get cooling of the North Atlantic; warming of the tropics continues to increase, so the temperature gradient get stronger and it drives much stronger storms.”

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THE HOCKEY SCHTICK: Review paper finds growth of atmospheric methane has significantly decreased, opposite of IPCC predictions

A new review paper from SPPI and CO2 Science finds the growth rate of atmospheric methane has significantly decreased over the past 30 years, the opposite of IPCC predictions. Separately, a new paper finds, "Warming may not release Arctic carbon – Element could stay locked in soil, 20-year study suggests."

Quark Soup by David Appell: About the SkS Study That Finds a 97% Consensus

The simple statement doesn't address questions like how much warming? What kind of warming (where)? How much are humans causing? How are they causing it? How well is this knowledge known? How good is the data? What are the consequences?

People using these kinds of numbers aren't so much interested in these kinds of questions or these kinds of debates as they are in avoiding questions and ending debates. They're for activists, not for those who want to really understand what's going on.

Look at this other drowning island, the Global Mail writer insisted. So I did… | Herald Sun Andrew Bolt Blog

Yesterday Lagan suggested I was a liar and “denier” to doubt his tale of global warming horror on Kiribati. An apology would be nice.

Even With His Most Recent Cheat, Hansen Can’t Get Above Scenario C | Real Science

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Political Diary: From the IRS to the EPA? - WSJ.com

"We know the Obama EPA has completely mismanaged FOIA, but granting fee waivers for their friends in the far-left environmental community, while simultaneously blocking conservative-leaning groups from gaining access to information, is really no different than the IRS disaster," Mr. Vitter told me in an email Tuesday.

Record cold continues in Interior Alaska - Fairbanks Daily News-Miner: Local News

In Bettles, 250 miles north of Fairbanks, the low of 11 degrees shattered the record of 22 degrees set in 1986. Galena saw a temperature of 13 degrees, breaking the record of 16 in 1965.

Appeals court dismisses Katrina-related global warming lawsuit | The Clarion-Ledger | clarionledger.com

A federal appeals panel has upheld the dismissal of a lawsuit filed by a group of Mississippi Gulf Coast residents and landowners who alleged that emissions by energy companies contributed to global warming, which intensified Hurricane Katrina, which, in turn, damaged their property.

DailyTech - Government Creates Global Warming "Refugee" Crisis in Alaska

The term "climate refugees" is somewhat ironic, given that the Yup'ik were nomadic by nature, migrating over the permafrost. In the 1950s the U.S. government told the Yup'ik that their nomadic lifestyle was no longer acceptable, they had to settle in one location so their children could go to school. The Yup'ik begrudgingly accepted, settling in Kayalavik, a village of sod huts, farther north.

But when Alaska became a state in 1959, federal officials began to pressure the Yup'ik to relocate, as the Kayalavik village was harder for supply barges to access. Eventually the ill-fated decision was made to relocate the tribe to Newtok -- a seasonal stopping place for the tribe's late-summer berry picking.

Global warming slowdown retrospectively “predicted” | The Curious Wavefunction, Scientific American Blog Network

People are usually not happy with prediction after the fact

Michael Mann: ‘I don’t mind being compared to Galileo’ | JunkScience.com

He said it just now at a Climate Desk-sponsored talk.

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Low Climate Sensitivity Making its Way into the Mainstream Press | Cato @ Liberty

When it comes to the press, the New York Times pretty much defines “mainstream.”

And Justin Gillis is the Times’ mainstream reporter on the global warming beat.

So it is somewhat telling, that his article on Tuesday, “A Change in Temperature,” was largely dedicated (although begrudgingly) to facing up to the possibility that mainstream estimates (i.e., those produced by the U.N.’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) of climate sensitivity are too large.

The Blackboard » I Do Not Think it Means What You Think it Means

Surely we can’t say people who work together to produce results are independent of each other. Nobody would call that independent.

Coldest April Ever in North Dakota – NOAA USA April 2013 (updated ranking table) | sunshine hours

In the last 119 Aprils, it was the coldest April ever in North Dakota. 2nd coldest ever in South Dakota. 3rd coldest ever in Minnesota, 4th coldest ever in Nebraska, 7th coldest ever in Oklahoma, 8th coldest ever in Wisconsin.

North Dakota was 18.5F colder than the warmest April (which occurred in 1915).

Errors in IPCC climate science » Blog Archive » Snow in UK and downunder on 15th of May

I am sure this is not rare – the BBC reports – Snow and winds of 65mph hit Devon and Cornwall. While our TV news last night carried video of snow in the NSW Alps. And I see the Canberra blog RiotACT has photos of snow yesterday in the ACT ranges near Canberra.

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Nenana Ice:  “I’m thinking we’ve probably got a record breaker here,” | Real Science

The Guardian has been whining mindlessly about Alaska melting, in the middle of Alaska’s coldest spring on record.

Raising April | Real Science

Thermometers show that April was the 11th coldest since 1895 in the US, but through the magic power of data tampering – NCDC was able to bump April up to only 23rd coldest.

NCDC accomplished this by cooling the past as much as 3.1 degrees.

THE HOCKEY SCHTICK: NASA climatologist Gavin Schmidt's profound ignorance that everything is 'based on assumptions that basically the climate is not gonna change'

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97.1% Of Scientists Agree That The Climate Can’t Change Without Human Intervention | Real Science

The climate was stable for the last 4.6 billion years – prior to humans increasing atmospheric CO2 by 0.0001 mole fraction.

Cook’s fallacy “97% consensus” study is a marketing ploy some journalists will fall for « JoNova

What does a study of 20 years of abstracts tell us about the global climate? Nothing. But it says quite a lot about the way government funding influences the scientific process.

John Cook, a blogger who runs the site with the ambush title “SkepticalScience” (which unskeptically defends the mainstream position), has tried to revive the put-down and smear strategy against the thousands of scientists who disagree. The new paper confounds climate research with financial forces, is based on the wrong assumptions, uses fallacious reasoning, wasn’t independent, and confuses a consensus of climate scientists for a scientific consensus, not that a consensus proves anything anyway, if it existed.

Given the monopolistic funding of climate science in the last 20 years, the results he finds are entirely predictable.

April U.S. Temperature trend/decade: – 9.2 F COOLER in 100 years | UD/RK Samhälls Debatt

And as I said in the beginning – always remember that these figures are based on the official data that has been tweaked, “adjusted” and manipulated to fit their agenda (cool the past, ignore UHI and land use change factors, huge smoothing radius – 1200km etc.)..

So the “warming trend” 2000-2013 for April is exactly - 0.92 F degrees a decade. That is a - 9.2 F COOLER in 100 years. That’s what I call “warming”!

Australia’s ABC comes round to what we said on WUWT years ago | Watts Up With That?

And as I and others have pointed out, the sea level scare is just another money making enterprise, as evidenced by the increase in airport expansion, among other things.

Links

- Bishop Hill blog - New Newsnight editor eulogises 10:10 campaign

Ian Katz, the deputy editor of the Guardian, has been appointed the editor of BBC's flagship current affairs programme Newsnight.

You can probably work out where he stands on climate change issues, but if you were in any doubt here's his eulogy to the "beauty" of the 10:10 campaign, of exploding children notoriety.

The Size of the C | Climate Abyss | a Chron.com blog

For policy purposes, the key question is not whether global warming is happening (it is), or whether man is a major cause (we are). The key question, upon which all policy decisions hinge, is the size of the C.

McKibben’s BS Gets Divested By His Own College | Real Science

Links

EasyJet soars on reduced losses as Britons flee cold weather | guardian.co.uk

It was helped by an earlier Easter and a rush of Britons flying off to escape the cold weather

The Reference Frame: Novim Group: "Just Science" AGW app

Moreover, these graphs not only fail to show the cause. They also fail to show the significance or, more appropriately, insignificance of the temperature changes since 1800. Whatever the temperature difference between two moments or two places is, you may visualize it in such a way that one temperature will be crimson and the other one will be light green or dark blue or anything else – two or three completely different colors. But this obscures the overall scale and the fact that we are talking about tenths of a degree of temperature change in two centuries – a temperature change most of us can't even detect when it takes place instantly or within a second.

Now divide, dilute, and slow down this temperature change from 1 second to 200 years, add it superimpose it with the constantly changing weather (where the outside temperature routinely jumps by ten degrees within a day) and try to answer the question whether this temperature change and its rate – whatever their cause is – is something that a rational person should become scared of or obsessed about or something that a rational society should spend billions or trillions for.

English major Chris Mooney's defense of the laughable hockey stick gets called out specifically in Reason.com's "The Myth of the Scientific Liberal"

Reason.com

For two decades, progressives have castigated those questioning global warming as "deniers."
But the Economist, once firmly in the alarmist camp, recently acknowledged that global temperatures have remained stagnant for 15 years even as greenhouse-gas emissions have soared.
This may be because existing models have overestimated the planet's sensitivity. Or because the heat generated is sinking to the ocean bottom. Or because of something else completely.
How should a scientifically inclined liberal react to this trend? By inhaling deeply and backing off on economy-busting mitigation measures till science offers clearer answers.
And how have liberals reacted? By sticking their fingers in their ears and chanting la-la-la.
...Most priceless, however, was Chris Mooney, author of The Republican War on Science.
He spilled serious ink in Mother Jones defending the highly questionable "hockey stick" graph -- the core evidence of global warmists -- which allegedly showed a sudden warming spike in the last century after a millennium of steady temperatures.

Links

US Spring Temperatures Declining For Almost Thirty Years | Real Science

US springtime temperatures have declined half a degree Celsius since 1985. The only year which alarmists remember is 2012.

The New Nostradamus of the North: Dr. Roy Spencer: Increase in "superstorms" is "an urban myth"

The mainly warmist Catholic Online is to be congratulated for publishing an interview with Dr. Roy Spencer. As usually, Dr. Spencer's views are wise and balanced

Robyn “100 metres” Williams comes up 99.3 metres short | Herald Sun Andrew Bolt Blog

A melt of ice on Greenland and Antarctica is likely to be less severe than expected this century, limiting sea level rise to a maximum of 69 cm (27 inches), an international study said on Tuesday.

The ‘New’ Confusion About Planning: T. Boone Pickens and Energy Public Policy — MasterResource

Thus T. Boone Pickens has fundamentally misconstrued the question of planning which is who will plan: the market through private property, voluntary exchange, and the rule of law or government through its “experts” and legal monopoly on coercion.

1950 Consensus Science : Glaciers Melting – Sea Level To Rise 150 Feet | Real Science

10 Jun 1950 – WEATHER MEN AGREE The Earth is Getting Warmer

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The Breakthrough Institute - How Electricity and TV Defused the ‘Population Bomb’

How does TV act as a contraceptive? Lewis notes it may be because "many of its offerings provide a model of middle class families successfully grappling with the transition from tradition to modernity, helped by the fact that they have few children to support." It may not be TV generally, but rather soap operas specifically that paint a vision for poor women of how much better life with fewer kids might be.

Record 98F Yesterday (hottest May 14 in Minnesota history; wet, potentially severe weekend on tap) | StarTribune.com

An omen for another sweltering summer to come? I doubt it. Overall I'm still predicting a cooler, wetter, stormier summer for Minnesota. Last year's debilitating drought will be a dusty memory for most of the state in a few weeks.

Last summer saw 31 days above 90F; I expect closer to 10-15 this year.

My Epiphany! | Real Science

I was riding my bicycle in the mountains, and suddenly it all became clear.

CO2 is a greenhouse gas, which has increased by one part per ten thousand over the last century. There was a hurricane last summer, and a drought. The evidence is overwhelming.

We can no longer ignore the tenets of faith which have been passed down by the holy trinity of James Hansen, Al Gore and Barack Obama. It is essential to turn over your money and your freedom, in order to prevent any more US made CO2 molecules from entering the atmosphere.

Fuzzy math: In a new soon to be published paper, John Cook claims ‘consensus’ on 32.6% of scientific papers that endorse AGW | Watts Up With That?

You have to wonder how somebody can write (let alone read) the claims made here in the press release by Cook with a straight face. It gives a window into the sort of things we can expect from his borked survey he recently foisted on climate websites which seems destined to either fail, or get spun into even stranger claims.

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Twitter / BobRyanABC7

Going to hear @MichaelEMann this week What is 1 question (science not politics) you would ask? @abc7news #climate #science

Twitter / KHayhoe: So exciting - @AJWVictoriaBC ...

So exciting - @AJWVictoriaBC currently leading in BC elec. Will he be our 1st climate scientist MPP? Canada needs him http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/bcvotes2013/#/43 …

Andrew Weaver makes history as the first elected Green MLA in B.C. | Georgia Straight

UVic climate scientist Andrew Weaver has been elected in Oak Bay-Gordon Head.

Gov. Rick Snyder to get bill to make up snow days - theoaklandpress.com

some schools in northern Michigan had more than the maximum six snow days

Twitter / RogerPielkeJr: Obvious, no? Martin Wolf says ...

Obvious, no? Martin Wolf says climate policy needs "a politically sellable vision of a prosperous low-carbon economy" http://on.ft.com/16xDnYP

Twitter / BigJoeBastardi: Britain virtually powerless ...

Britain virtually powerless in extreme cold snap this spring.4,500 turbines could only produce 0.3% of the nation’s power need 1 cold day

New political blogger at Daily Kos: Michael Mann

Daily Kos: Why the Attorney General Matters in Virginia

Mark's election would serve as a clear, unequivocal rejection of Cuccinelli's style of politics and a return to thoughtful, responsible governing. But it would also be a tremendous blow to the political extremists on a national level. Remember, the far right-wing Tea Party planted its roots in Virginia in 2009, which quickly bloomed into a resounding victory in 2010 and dangerous policy from the likes of Cuccinelli in the years since.

When you consider all of these factors, you can quickly see the importance of Virginia's 2013 elections.

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Enviros Livid as Brown Diverts Cap-and-Trade Funds

Under state law, cap-and-trade proceeds are supposed to go toward programs that help reduce the state's carbon footprint. And Brown himself has touted the potential uses of those funds in furthering the goals of California's central climate strategy under the 2006 law known as AB32. But the administration now says many of those carbon-cutting programs aren't ready for prime time, and in the meantime the funds can help balance the state budget. According to the governor's staff, the diversion is a "loan" that will be paid back with interest.

‘Black Sand’ helps Mother Nature melt snow a little quicker on mountain passes | Utah

Monday afternoon, plow crews were able to break through the remaining 4-foot snow drifts on state Route 39

Daily Kos: More global warming could be ahead than seen in millions of years

Paleo-climate Professor Michael Mann, author of The Hockey Stick and the Climate Wars (and today, a debut DKos diarist), emailed noting that "The last time we're confident CO2 levels breached 400ppm, was the mid Miocene, around 10 million years ago, though it could have been a bit later, e.g. 4 million years. In either case, we know that the globe was quite a bit warmer than today, with much less ice around, and much higher sea level." When asked, Mann added he could think of no significant factor present now and not present then that might dampen warming.

Tobacco Front-Group Chairman And Climate Science Denier Named President Of New Mexico State University | ThinkProgress

Carruthers has not yet commented publicly whether he will ensure the NMSU Climate Action Plan is followed.

Insurers Stray From the Conservative Line on Climate Change - NYTimes.com

Yet when I asked Mr. Nutter what the American insurance industry was doing to combat global warming, his answer was surprising: nothing much.

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Twitter / LFFriedman

Todd Stern on decades of #UNFCCC negotiations: "I'm sure we're going to break every Broadway record."

[Another warmist at Penn State]:  Navy rear admiral appointed to direct new center on weather risk solutions | Penn State University

Titley brings his knowledge of climate change as it relates to national security to Penn State

EPA Targeted Conservatives Too

The partisan pattern established by the IRS scandal--conservative groups being singled out for mistreatment--seems to have a corollary at the Environmental Protection Agency. Green groups had FOIA fees routinely waived by the agency while those from conservative groups did not.

What Consensus? Two-thirds of climate studies (8,000) from 1991-2011 take no position on cause of global warming | JunkScience.com

An inconvenient fact from a new study attempting to bolster the 97% consensus myth.

Green Humanity: Nuremberg-for-Skeptics Guy — ‘Now that Gosnell has been convicted, I’m moving from Not Caring Phase One to Not Caring Phase Two’ | JunkScience.com

Almost makes you wonder why Dave Roberts is so worried about the planet reaching 180-degrees F by the year 2300.

[Wait, wasn't that money supposed to be spent on healing the planet?]:  California to lend CO2 market revenue to state legislature - News - Point Carbon

SAN FRANCISCO, May 14 (Reuters Point Carbon) – The $500 million California expects to raise from the sale of carbon permits to businesses during the program’s early years should be loaned to the state legislature, which could use it to pay government bills for the cash-strapped state, California Governor Jerry Brown’s administration said on Tuesday.

Warmist Paul Douglas suggests that trace amounts of CO2 have caused natural weather disasters to increase by a multiple of three or four times over the past few decades

Meteorologist Paul Douglas talks climate change at Senior Expo

“It was like Mother Nature lost her equilibrium, and now we're floundering somewhat,” he said. “This week, we're gonna go from frost on Mother's Day, to 100 degrees in two days. I've never seen that.”
He says skeptics, meanwhile, will sound their usual refrain: “They'll say, 'Where's you climate change, Paul? It's snowing in May.' To that I say, 'Can you see the entire globe from your window?'”
Natural weather disasters, Douglas said, have increased by a multiple of three or four times over the past few decades.
...
“I tell people, don't look at your thermometer. Look out at your back yard and see the things that are there now that weren't there 20 years ago,” he said.

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The beginning of the end: warmists in retreat on sea level rise, climate sensitivity | Watts Up With That?

The forecast: It seems there’s less chance of gloom and doom these days.

For sea level rise, now a maximum of about two feet by 2100. As for climate sensitivity, now for the first time ever, we are seeing mentions of a quadrupling of CO2 rather than a doubling to get scary scenarios.

Michael Levi - Fracking, Pipelines, and Science | Point of Inquiry

[English major Chris Mooney] A few months back on this show, we heard from Bill McKibben, the celebrated environmental writer and, more recently, leader of a mass movement around preventing climate change that has focused on blocking the Keystone XL pipeline.

McKibben makes a compelling case that our climate system is at dire risk. But many thinkers who fully accept the science of climate change nonetheless take a very different approach to climate and energy policy. And as someone who personally sees strengths on both sides of this question, today I want to feature one of them.

New York Times Conceding Low Sensitivity! Now Talking About “CO2 Quadrupling” To Get Catastrophe Scenarios!

In the article Justin Gillis and scientist James Annan come across as having a very hard time departing from the hypothesis that CO2 climate sensitivity is high.

Nenana Ice Classic now past 4th latest ice breakup | Watts Up With That?

It’s hard to forget geophysicist Martin Jeffries at the University of Alaska, Fairbanks saying in 2009,

The Nenana Ice Classic is a pretty good proxy for climate change in the 20th century.

Sage insight.

Climatesense-norpag: Climate Forecasting Basics for Britain's Seven Alarmist Scientists and for UK Politicians.

The seven are Sir John Houghton,Sir Bob Watson, Sir David King, Sir John Beddington,Sir Robert May,Lord Rees and Sir Paul Nurse. Their titles indicate that they have been good reliable chaps and played the British Political Establishment's Honours game with some skill.It is increasingly clear, as the earth obstinately refuses to warm up,that they have got it all wrong .They and the Politicians need to start again from square one and rethink the whole thing.Here are some helpful suggestions.