Politics

Senate Republicans release new report on IPCC scenarios

by William Yeatman on September 14, 2004

A new report from the Senate Republican Policy Committee looks at the poor state of economic analysis in current projections of global temperatures. The document, Scientists Set Off Wrong Alarm Bells with Global Warming Conclusions, examines the criticisms of Ian Castles and David Henderson and the reactions to the criticisms.

Castles and Henderson (see previous issues, passim) have produced a devastating analysis of the economic assumptions underlying the scenarios used in computer models by the U. N. Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Changes Third Assessment Report to predict future global temperatures. The RPC paper summarizes the ensuing debate.

The paper concludes that it is the IPCCs status as a body with a political, rather than scientific, agenda that led it to such technical sloppiness and use of dubious assumptions. The paper argues that the Principles Governing IPCC Work demonstrate that, The IPCC exists to support the Framework Conventions predetermined conclusions, not to objectively assess whether global warming is real or not, or whether it would be potentially harmful or benign.

The paper suggests that there is no indication that the next round of IPCC work will address these concerns. As a result, the paper warns, Policymakers should approach the IPCCs claims with a healthy dose of skepticism before considering whether restrictions on energy use based on the IPCCs conclusions are warranted. Alarm may well be in order alarm that the IPCCs science cannot be relied upon. The report can be found on the web at: http://rpc.senate.gov/_files/Sept1004GlobalWarmingPG.pdf.

Sen. McCain holds junk science climate hearing

by William Yeatman on September 14, 2004

in Politics, Science

Washington, D.C., September 15, 2004Today Sen. John McCain (R-AZ) is again holding hearings on the possible impacts of climate change and is again failing to present an accurate picture of the relevant science. Pursuing his policy of favoring alarmist predictions over balanced debate, the Commerce Committee Chairman leads a stacked witness list chosen to bolster support for his own legislative agenda.

Witnesses are expected to detail dramatic scenarios of localized climate impactsreduced snowfall in the Sierra Nevada Mountains, increasing drought in Californias wine-growing regionsdespite the widely acknowledged inability of current science to make such predictions.

The claims that one state will be impacted by climate change in a specific way are based on computer models that are simply not able to make such predictions, said Myron Ebell, Director of Global Warming & International Environmental Policy at the Competitive Enterprise Institute. Forecasting climate catastrophe state by state may be helpful in scaring the population of a particular part of the country, but it isnt scientifically honest.

Contact for Interviews:

Richard Morrison, 202.331.2273

Climate Change Expert Available for Interviews

Myron Ebell

Director of Global Warming & International Environmental Policy

202-331-2256

mebell@cei.org

Iain Murray

Senior Fellow

202-331-2257

imurray@cei.org

Inside the Beltway: Planting politics / Seeds of scandal

by William Yeatman on September 14, 2004

in Politics, Science

Planting politics

    More now on yesterday’s item about the national Democratic Party appealing for financial aid in hurricane-battered Florida, where a succession of deadly storms has seriously hampered fund-raising efforts at a critical time in the 2004 campaign.

    “In line with that,” writes Inside the Beltway reader Larry Whitehurst from Wisconsin, “I actually tuned to Air America radio and heard one of the morning-show hosts … comment that she believed it when she heard that … the Bush administration is seeding clouds over the Atlantic to enable more hurricanes so that Florida voters will not be able to reach the polls.”

    Have you been eating too much cheese, Mr. Whitehurst?

“When I heard this, I fell out of my chair laughing,” he insists. “I sure hope most other listeners did, because those that would believe something like this … should not be allowed even near the election voting booths.”

Seeds of scandals
(September 16, 2004 )

Our humorous (or so intended) item this week about “seeding” hurricanes so as to disrupt the political campaign season caught the eye of Christopher C. Horner, a top counsel for the Competitive Enterprise Institute.

Don’t laugh, advises Mr. Horner, who has actually dealt with the issue of cloud seeding on the worldwide front: “[U]nder international law, a state engaged in weather modification activities is responsible for any significant injuries if causation can be proved,” he reads from legal scripture.

    “True story,” Mr. Horner insists. “This could actually turn the campaign around.”

    He recalls Soviet howling over purported dirty tricks like cloud seeding “to disrupt their wheat crop (as if collectivism didn’t do enough) during the Cold War.”

    “The alleged cloud seeding,” adds Mr. Horner, “is a prima facie violation of not only a U.N. directive, but a U.S.-Canadian treaty, not to mention 601 of the Restatement (3d) of the Law of Foreign Relations.”

Blair puts global warming at top of international agenda

by William Yeatman on September 14, 2004

in Kyoto Negotiations, Politics

In a major speech delivered September 14, British Prime Minister Tony Blair detailed his plans to use the British positions as chair of next years G8 summit and president of the European Union during 2005 to put action to prevent global warming back at the top of the international agenda.

Mr. Blair began his speech by saying, What is now plain is that the emission of greenhouse gasesis causing global warming at a rate that began as significant, has become alarming, and is simply unsustainable in the long-term. And by long-term I do not mean centuries ahead. I mean within the lifetime of my children certainly; and possibly within my own. And by unsustainable, I do not mean a phenomenon causing problems of adjustment. I mean a challenge so far-reaching in its impact and irreversible in its destructive power, that it alters radically human existence.

After laying out the evidence for these assertions, Blair said, Even if there are those who still doubt the science in its entirety, surely the balance of risk for action or inaction has changed. If there were even a 50% chance that the scientific evidence I receive is right, the bias in favor of action would be clear. But of course it is far more than 50%.

And in this case, the science is backed up by intuition. It is not axiomatic that pollution causes damage. But it is likely. I am a strong supporter of proceeding through scientific analysis in such issues. But I also, as I think most people do, have a healthy instinct that if we upset the balance of nature, we are in all probability going to suffer a reaction. With world growth, and population as it is, this reaction must increase.

We have been warned. On most issues we ask children to listen to their parents. On climate change, it is parents who should listen to their children. Now is the time to start.

According to the prime ministers official spokesman, Blairs plan includes three major goals. First, Blair intends to seek an international agreement on the science and the threat posed by global warming. Second, he will seek to obtain agreement on a process to identify the science and technology measures necessary to meet the threat. And third, he will seek the active involvement of major developing nations, particularly China and India, in cutting greenhouse gas emissions.

The British prime minister also announced plans for a scientific conference preparatory to the G8 meeting: Prior to the G8 meeting itself we propose first to host an international scientific meeting at the Hadley Centre for Climate Prediction and Research in Exeter in February. More than just another scientific conference, this gathering will address the big questions on which we need to pool the answers available from the science: What level of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere is self-evidently too much? and What options do we have to avoid such levels?

Mr. Blair took pains not to personalize the issue as a disagreement with President Bush. Referring to American concerns over Kyoto, he said, Our efforts to stabilize the climate will need, over time, to become far more ambitious than the Kyoto Protocol. Kyoto is only the first step, but provides a solid foundation for the next stage of climate diplomacy. If Russia were to ratify that would bring it into effect. We know there is disagreement with the U. S. over this issue. In 1997 the U. S. Senate voted 95-0 in favor of a resolution that stated it would refuse to ratify such a treaty. I doubt time has shifted the numbers very radically.

But the U. S. remains a signatory to the U. N. Framework Convention on Climate Change, and the U. S. National Academy of Sciences agree that there is a link between human activity, carbon emissions, and atmospheric warming. Recently the U. S. Energy Secretary and Commercial Secretary jointly issued a report again accepting the potential damage to the planet through global warming.

Global jockeying over global warming

by William Yeatman on September 13, 2004

in Politics

British Prime Minister Tony Blair’s call for America to ratify the Kyoto Protocol this week tacitly acknowledges that Russian ratification, thought by then-Commissioner Wallstrom to have been secured by EU concessions on Russian World Trade Organization membership earlier this year, is no longer a serious prospect.

Instead, European eyes are turning once again to the United States. However, with John Kerry on record as saying the Kyoto protocol is “not the answer” and the U.S. Senate standing by its 1997 refusal by 95-0 to not ratify Kyoto, there appears to be little hope for Blair, Wallstrom, and their colleagues. Even a move by high officials of several American states sympathetic to them has been criticized by their usual allies.

In the meantime, the state attorneys general of California, Connecticut, Iowa, New Jersey, New York, Vermont, and Wisconsin, and the counsel for New York City, filed a complaint on July 21 in federal district court in Manhattan, alleging that five leading electric power generators in the United States had created a “public nuisance” by emitting carbon dioxide, thereby contributing to global warming. All but one of the officers who brought the suit are Democrats. Key environmental pressure groups criticized the move.

International atomic agency regrets lack of progress on Kyoto

by William Yeatman on September 1, 2004

in Kyoto Negotiations, Politics

In a press release assessing the state of nuclear power worldwide, the International Atomic Energy Agency regretted the lack of progress on Kyoto.

The relevant section reads, From the viewpoint of the IAEA, no progress was made in 2003 on the Kyoto Protocol, which would help make nuclear powers avoidance of greenhouse gas emissions valuable to investors. The next round of talks on energy and sustainable development is scheduled for the 13th session of the United Nations Commission on Sustainable Development in 20062007.

A large increase in the supply of energy will be required in coming decades to power economic development, the IAEA recognizes, projecting that to the year 2030 the part nuclear power will play in the global energy supply will first grow and then decrease.

The agency estimates a 20 percent increase in global nuclear generation until the end of 2020, followed by a decrease, resulting in global nuclear generation in 2030 that will be only 12 percent higher than in 2002. Nuclear powers share of global electricity generation is projected at 12 percent in 2030, compared with 16 percent in 2002, the IAEA said.

The agency expressed concern that the nuclear expertise that exists today might not be passed on to the next generation of scientists and engineers, now that the rapid nuclear expansion of the 1970s and 1980s has leveled off.

Media, environmentalists pounce on new Administration report

by William Yeatman on August 31, 2004

in Politics, Science

The annual report of the U. S. Climate Change Science Program for fiscal years 2004-5, entitled, Our Changing Planet, was released on August 25. It was immediately hailed as a turn-around in the Bush Administrations position by the media and environmental groups.

The New York Times in a story by Andrew Revkin on August 25 set the tone, and an editorial the next day called the report a striking shift in the way the Bush administration has portrayed the science of climate change. Other newspaper editorial columns and environmental groups jumped on this interpretation.

The striking shift is confined to several short passages in a 130-page document that are less qualified and more direct than in the FY 2003 edition. The statements that attracted the most attention are the following:

Multiple ensemble simulations of the 20th century climate have been conducted using climate models that include new and improved estimates of natural and anthropogenic forcing. The simulations show that observed globally averaged surface air temperatures can be replicated only when both anthropogenic forcings, e.g., greenhouse gases, as well as natural forcings such as solar variability and volcanic eruptions are included in the model. These simulations improve on the robustness of earlier work (pages 46-7).

Comparison of index trends in observations and model simulations shows that North American temperature changes from 1950 to 1999 were unlikely to be due only to natural climate variations. Observed trends over this period are consistent with simulations that include anthropogenic forcing from increasing atmospheric greenhouse gases and sulfate aerosols. However, most of the observed warming from 1900 to 1949 was likely due to natural climate variation (page 47).

Administration officials disputed that the report represents a striking shift in their position. In a Washington Post article on Aug. 27, White House Science Adviser John Marburger, one of the signatories to the report, was quoted as saying that the findings had no implications for policy.

Further, a New York Times reporter covering the presidential campaign put the question directly to President Bush (Aug. 27): Asked why the administration had changed its position on what causes global warming, Mr. Bush replied, Ah, we did? I don’t think so.

The report may be found on the web at http://www.usgcrp.gov/usgcrp/Library/ocp2004-5/default.htm.

Edwards contradicts Kerry campaigns official Kyoto policy

by William Yeatman on August 31, 2004

in Kyoto Negotiations, Politics

In contrast to Vice President Al Gores 2000 presidential campaign, references to global warming have been few and far between by the Democratic ticket of Senators John Kerry and John Edwards. Within one week in August, however, the Kerry campaign published its position on the Kyoto Protocol, which vice presidential nominee John Edwards then contradicted.

On August 19 the campaign issued a document aimed at West Virginia and other coal-producing States that promoted coal as a clean energy source. It states, John Kerry and John Edwards believe that the Kyoto Protocol is not the answer. The near-term emission reductions it would require of the United States are infeasible, while the long-term obligations imposed on all nations are too little to solve the problem. Unlike the current Administration, John Kerry and John Edwards will offer an alternative to the Kyoto process that leads the world toward a more equitable and effective answer, while preserving coal miners jobs.

Less than a week later, on August 24, the Journal Times of Racine, Wisconsin, published an account of Sen. Edwardss visit to the town the day before. According to the paper, Edwards lamented America’s failure to join the Kyoto treaty. The last thing this president should have done was walk away from Kyoto, he told the audience. Perhaps co-incidentally, Wisconsin is not a major coal-producing State, and public opinion there favors policies to address global warming.

State Attorneys General sue utilities over global warming

by William Yeatman on August 31, 2004

in Politics

The attorneys general of California, Connecticut, Iowa, New Jersey, New York, Vermont, and Wisconsin, and the corporation counsel of New York City, filed a complaint on July 21 in federal district court in Manhattan alleging that five leading electric power generators in the United States had created a “public nuisance” by emitting carbon dioxide and thereby contributing to global warming. All but one of the officers who brought the suit are Democrats.

“Save Our Planet,” Say Lawyers

The government lawyers are not seeking monetary damages but rather an abatement ordera court order requiring the utilities to reduce their emissions. Consequences for noncompliance would be fashioned by the court.

Connecticut Attorney General Richard Blumenthal said at a press conference on July 21, that the litigants’ aim was to “save our planet from disastrous consequences that are building year by year and will be more costly to prevent and stop if we wait.” Blumenthal also told reporters, “Think tobacco, without the money.”

The complaint alleges that the states and city that brought the suit are suffering and will continue to suffer damage from global warming in the form of heat-related deaths; rises in sea level; degradation of water supplies; damage to the Great Lakes; injuries to agriculture in Iowa and Wisconsin; harm to ecosystems, forests, fisheries, and wildlife; wildfires in California; economic damages; increased risk of abrupt climate change; and “Injury to States’ Interests in Ecological Integrity.”

The companies targeted by the suit are American Electric Power Co., Southern Co., Xcel Energy Inc., Cinergy Corp., and the federal Tennessee Valley Authority. As evidence that these firms manage and control the emission of carbon dioxide, the complaint uses various past statements and admissions by company spokespersons that global warming is a problem they want to do something about.

Only Xcel, through its subsidiary Northern States Power of Wisconsin, provides electricity to customers in any of the states that have filed suit. To establish some legal grounds for their federal suit, the complaint includes specific complaints for each state.

Lawsuit Rebuffed by Usual Allies

Some supporters of action to curb carbon dioxide emissions have strongly criticized the suit. Eileen Claussen, president of the Pew Center on Global Climate Change, told The New York Times on July 22 she found the suit “slightly perverse. … Of course, we need a national program and of course, we need some legislation. The real question is, does this help you get there? It’s not clear to me that this lawsuit will help.”

Initial response from newspapers was also unenthusiastic. The San Jose Mercury News on July 22 called the complaint “a cheap shot” and noted, “Generation by a public utility is about as regulated as an activity can be. Utilities are not only permitted to produce electricity, they’re also obligated to. So any ill effects from an operation that has been approved from the local to the federal level can’t be laid at the feet of the utilities alone.”

The Cincinnati Post on July 22 was equally unimpressed. It satirized Rhode Island Attorney General Patrick Lynch’s statement that “It’s imperative that we confront those responsible for unleashing an invader with the power to wreak unspeakable havoc on our climate and to damage, and destroy, our ecosystems” as follows: “Good golly. If fossil-fueled power plants are that much of a public nuisance, maybe we’d better shut them down right now. That might reduce Rhode Islanders to living off whatever fish they can catch with a net, but it would take care of that invader.”

Depending on the duration and outcome of procedural matters, the district court can be expected to address the substance of the suit in late 2004 or in 2005.

Junkscience.com response to New York Times on climate modeling

by William Yeatman on August 30, 2004

in Politics, Science

“Computers Add Sophistication, but Don’t Resolve Climate Debate” – “When the Bush administration issued an update last week on federal climate research, it was criticized with equal vigor by environmentalists and by industry-backed groups.

The update featured new computer simulations showing that the sharp rise in global temperatures since 1970 could only be explained by human influences, mainly rising levels of greenhouse gases.” (New York Times)

Oddly, Meehl’s graphic, reproduced here from the NYT, is truncated at 1999, just post-peak of the powerful 1997/98 El Nio-induced temperature spike evident in both MSU and GISS datasets. MSU data indicates a peak in April of 1998 at +0.746C (annual mean +0.472C) and GISTEMP peaked in February of that year at +0.97C (annual mean +0.711C) – by March ’99 both had fallen significantly, to -0.088C (annual mean -0.022C) and +0.3C (annual mean +0.437C) respectively.

We’re sure the resultant impression of runaway warming in Meehl’s graph is purely accidental. Basing his anomalies graphic on the 1890-1919 average is also a rather novel approach, other items here based on the climatological mean (1951-1980 average).

Regardless, Meehl’s graphic sure differs greatly from this one derived from one of the best financed and arguably best maintained near-surface datasets in the world – the continental United States of America. Kind of odd, considering they’re depicting the same period, that one indicates significant and quite rapid warming while the other shows no increase in 7 decades. Even more strangely, the GISSTEMP near-surface global mean temperature anomaly graph below does not appear to support Meehl’s version either.

So, which ‘reality’ is being modeled then?

The thumbnail to the left links to a graphic of lower troposphere temperature anomalies determined from data captured by NOAA satellite-mounted MSUs. July, 2004 global mean -0.213.

The thumbnail on the right is linked to a graphic of temperature anomalies as suggested by the NASA GISS surface temperature analysis (GISTEMP), a near-surface temperature amalgam – July, 2004 global mean +0.3.

Plotted together – the increasing disconnect between these datasets is obvious. The question is: how does the near-surface amalgam produce a resulting anomaly >0.5C warmer than so-called satellite temps? This does not accord with the enhanced greenhouse hypothesis. Under that hypothesis the troposphere should warm and some of that increase should be reflected subsequently in near-surface measures – diametrically opposite to what has supposedly been measured.

This leaves us with several possibilities: the enhanced greenhouse effects works nothing like we suppose; the lower troposphere measures are incorrect; the near-surface amalgam is incorrect or; some combination of the above. Although there are many uncertainties regarding climate we think we have a fair understanding of the greenhouse effect – if not then the entire argument is moot. That leaves the temperature records. Of these, the satellite data has been validated against balloon-sonde measures while the near-surface amalgam is “odd man out.” Satellite data gives near-complete global coverage while near-surface records increasingly reflect temperatures in cities and at airports, an urbanization of the record accelerated by closure of rural recording stations and urban development.

So, what are these computers modeling? Is it enhanced greenhouse effect (EGE) or urban heat island effect (UHIE)?