THE SATELLITE LOOKS DOWN..
Fascinating article here on global warming, or the lack of it...it's from an interview between journalist Michael Duffy and Jennifer Marohasy, a biologist and senior fellow of Melbourne-based think tank the Institute of Public Affairs
Duffy: "Can you tell us about NASA's Aqua satellite, because I understand some of the data we're now getting is quite important in our understanding of how climate works?"
Marohasy: "That's right. The satellite was only launched in 2002 and it enabled the collection of data, not just on temperature but also on cloud formation and water vapour. What all the climate models suggest is that, when you've got warming from additional carbon dioxide, this will result in increased water vapour, so you're going to get a positive feedback. That's what the models have been indicating. What this great data from the NASA Aqua satellite ... (is) actually showing is just the opposite, that with a little bit of warming, weather processes are compensating, so they're actually limiting the greenhouse effect and you're getting a negative rather than a positive feedback."
Duffy: "The climate is actually, in one way anyway, more robust than was assumed in the climate models?"
Marohasy: "That's right ... These findings actually aren't being disputed by the meteorological community. They're having trouble digesting the findings, they're acknowledging the findings, they're acknowledging that the data from NASA's Aqua satellite is not how the models predict, and I think they're about to recognise that the models really do need to be overhauled and that when they are overhauled they will probably show greatly reduced future warming projected as a consequence of carbon dioxide."
Time to scrap green taxes?
David Vance
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This...
temperatures have actually been coming down over the last 10 years."
Duffy: "Is this a matter of any controversy?"
Marohasy: "Actually, no
...tells you all you need to know about the accuracy/honesty of The Australian and Marohasy.
yeah Frank believes the story below where the Chief Quack says we are going to die or kill each other by 2040 due to global warming..LOL
Tonights forcast Dark, continued Dark with widely scatered Light at dawn.
Thats a more accurate forcast than anyone can make on either side of the issue.
Troll, nice try but I've said several times by now that I think Lovelock is alarmist.
I'm proud of ya Frank
The model is not the climate.
Frank,
Which part of the satellite record do you dispute?
David,
There is no data from any satellite record in that article. This is a newspaper article that says among other things there is no controversy regarding the claim that temperatures have declined in the last 10 years. Really? No controversy? LOL!
Why would anyone credit anything else she says when she tells a bald faced lie like that?
Supposing that there is satellite data somewhere that bears out her claim, which is a large supposing, she claims that there has been cooling since 1998 and in the next breath she says that the satellite gave the wrong answer when it warmed.
As for water vapor feedback this doesn't come from the models. It comes from theory (the Clausius-Clapeyron relation, which dates to the 1800s), and is confirmed by observation that absolute humidity goes up when temperature goes up. There is uncertainty about the magnitude of it and other feedbacks, but to suggest that the notion comes from the models is simply wrong.
is my hangover decieving me or is she on one hand ackowledging that there is global warming and it has feedback and then with the other claiming the planet hasnt warmed in the last 10 years?
She is saying that the negative feedback is stabilising the global temperature. Of course, this just shouldn't be happening because experiments in lab conditions show that ...... the Earth's climate system isn't a lab.
How many ATW regulars are prepared to come out and say like me; "we don't give a damn about the politics of global warming"
That may be nice to say Colm, but it is a political issue because politicians and enviro-lobbies have made it so. Look at the barrage of 'green' taxes etc.
Allan
Yes I know, and I am sure there is a lot of political opportunism surrounding the topic, but I have to say I just find it the least interesting topic that is discussed on ATW.
Colm, that's probably because you regard global warming as a benefit :-)
Allan,
" Of course, this just shouldn't be happening because experiments in lab conditions show that"
Well no, a suggestion in a newspaper that it might happen doesn't mean that it is happening. And theory and observations of the actual atmosphere suggest that that the atmosphere doesn't work that way. Absolute humidity goes up when temperature goes up.
Frank
No 'fraid not. I'm not a great lover of hot weather. I just have to admit I just don't have the slightest interest in the whole isue of AGW, wether it's true or not.
Colm, I think that the question of MMGW generates a lot of interesting politics especially the matters of the 'consensus', the "debate is over" when the debate hadn't even begun, and the taxes being brought in on the basis of countering MMGW. I don't think that it will be too long now before the theory (which is not necessarily outrageous) is disproven by facts. This will be the real 'tipping point' and, as it is approached, the attacks on those who are pointing out what is happening - especially scientists who recant - will become shriller and possibly violent. There are a lot of people who have invested their entire credibility in MMGW and its collapse will have a greater effect than that of the twin towers.
Allan,
"I don't think that it will be too long now before the theory (which is not necessarily outrageous) is disproven by facts."
That would be a refreshing change in approach from the usual attempts to disprove it using blatant falsehoods.
Well, Frank. We shall agree to disagree on MMGW. As more scientists find that the results they see do not concur with the theory, then the theory will be discarded or, at the very least, revised to being of lower order effect.
Allan,
"As more scientists find that the results they see do not concur with the theory, then the theory will be discarded or, at the very least, revised to being of lower order effect."
It is very unlikely that the theory will be found to be completely wrong and there is no evidence to support that view. More likely is that they will get more precise estimates of climate sensitivity as they get a better understanding. It would be very surprising if this were outside the range of current estimates but of course it is possible. It could be less, it could be more.
You're just assuming that we will be lucky and find AGW has been significantly overestimated. Equally (un)likely is that it might be revised to being of significantly higher order effect, if they discover that there are positive feedbacks they weren't aware of.
I'm reading a book called The Chilling Stars by Henrik Svensmark and Nigel Calder. Svensmark is a climate scientist and his theory is that most of the recent warming is attributable to solar activity. But he does not claim that increased sunspot activity has warmed the earth. Instead, his theory is that increased sunspot activity reduces the number of cosmic rays reaching the lower atmosphere and that cosmic rays are a significant factor in low level cloud formation. Consequently there are less clouds and warmer temperatures.
It is generally acceptedf that the sun has been very active for most of the past 100 years and it is well known that the Little Ice Age coincided with a very inactive period of sunspots. When sunspot activity declines, the effect will reverse and the climate will cool.
Svensmark does not claim that CO2 emissions have no effect on climate, just that their effect is insignificant compared to clouds or the lack of them.
Has anyone else read this book or come across this theory?
Peter,
I know of it - haven't read it though. The solar angle is a fascinating one in so many ways and gets such little media focus. Time for the government to tax sun-glasses?
Peter,
I've heard of the theory but not read the book. Nigel Calder features in the (awful) documentary The Great Global Warming Swindle and I think this theory does too.
The jury seems to be out on the mechanism Svensmark proposes however the big problem with it is that it is difficult to see how it could be responsible for recent warming because there is no comparable recent trend in cosmic rays (for which measurements exist). For example see here. And there is also this problem.
Frank
I'm only half way through the book, but it was published in 2007 and contains answers to some of the objections raised earlier.
Looks like the antarctic doesn't read the Australian and doesn't know it's cooling.