Checking in

 Keeping this blog alive (just).

The foliage on native plants in Australia's arid zones is boosted by CO2

Increased levels of carbon dioxide (CO2) have helped boost green foliage across the world’s arid regions over the past 30 years through a process called CO2 fertilisation, according to CSIRO research.

In findings based on satellite observations, CSIRO, in collaboration with the Australian National University (ANU), found that this CO2 fertilisation correlated with an 11 per cent increase in foliage cover from 1982-2010 across parts of the arid areas studied in Australia, North America, the Middle East and Africa, according to CSIRO research scientist, Dr Randall Donohue.

"In Australia, our native vegetation is superbly adapted to surviving in arid environments and it consequently uses water very efficiently," Dr Donohue said. "Australian vegetation seems quite sensitive to CO2 fertilisation.

The fertilisation effect occurs where elevated CO2 enables a leaf during photosynthesis, the process by which green plants convert sunlight into sugar, to extract more carbon from the air or lose less water to the air, or both.

This, along with the vast extents of arid landscapes, means Australia featured prominently in our results."

"While a CO2 effect on foliage response has long been speculated, until now it has been difficult to demonstrate," according to Dr Donohue.

"Our work was able to tease-out the CO2 fertilisation effect by using mathematical modelling together with satellite data adjusted to take out the observed effects of other influences such as precipitation, air temperature, the amount of light, and land-use changes."

The fertilisation effect occurs where elevated CO2 enables a leaf during photosynthesis, the process by which green plants convert sunlight into sugar, to extract more carbon from the air or lose less water to the air, or both.

If elevated CO2 causes the water use of individual leaves to drop, plants in arid environments will respond by increasing their total numbers of leaves. These changes in leaf cover can be detected by satellite, particularly in deserts and savannas where the cover is less complete than in wet locations, according to Dr Donohue.

"On the face of it, elevated CO2 boosting the foliage in dry country is good news and could assist forestry and agriculture in such areas; however there will be secondary effects that are likely to influence water availability, the carbon cycle, fire regimes and biodiversity, for example," Dr Donohue said.

"Ongoing research is required if we are to fully comprehend the potential extent and severity of such secondary effects."

This study was published in the US Geophysical Research Letters journal and was funded by CSIRO's Sustainable Agriculture Flagship, Water for a Healthy Country Flagship, the Australian Research Council and Land & Water Australia.

Reprinted from CSIRO

Donohue, R. J., M. L. Roderick, T. R. McVicar, G. D. Farquhar. 2013 "Impact of CO₂ fertilization on maximum foliage cover across the globe's warm, arid environments. Geophys. Res. Lett. 40, doi:10.1002/grl.50563

Non-deciduous perennials are responding better than deciduous, annual and ephemeral plants

Here is the abstract from a previous paper by Dr Donohue (my paras):

Using Advanced Very High Resolution Radiometer data spanning 1981–2006 and calibrated for long-term analyses of vegetation dynamics, we examine whether vegetation cover has increased across Australia and whether there has been a differential response of vegetation functional types in response to changes in climatic growing conditions. Trends in vegetation cover are interpreted within Budyko's energy – water limitation framework.

Results from an Australia-wide analysis indicate that vegetation cover (as described by the fraction of Photosynthetically Active Radiation absorbed by vegetation; fPAR) has increased, on average, by 0.0007 per year – an increase of ∼8% over the 26 years. The majority of this change is due to a 0.0010 per year increase in persistent fPAR (representing nondeciduous perennial vegetation types; up 21%).

In contrast, recurrent fPAR (representing deciduous, annual and ephemeral vegetation types) decreased, on average, by 0.0003 per year (down 7%), the trends of which are highly seasonal.

Over the same period, Australian average annual precipitation increased by 1.3 mm yr−2 (up 7%).

A site-based analysis using 90 long-term meteorological stations with minimal localized land-cover changes showed that energy-limited sites where total fPAR increased generally experienced decreases in precipitation, and water-limited sites that experienced decreases in cover were almost always associated with decreases in precipitation.

Interestingly, where vegetation cover increased at water-limited sites, precipitation trends were variable indicating that this is not the only factor driving vegetation response. As Australia is a generally highly water-limited environment, these findings indicate that the effective availability of water to plants has increased on average over the study period. Results also show that persistent vegetation types have benefited more than recurrent types from recent changes in growing conditions.

Regardless of what has been driving these changes, the overall response of vegetation over the past 2–3 decades has resulted in an observable greening of the driest inhabited continent on Earth.

The Heat is On....Stop Procrastinating, People

Don't take comfort from the Bayesians or other low estimates of climate sensitivity - this study says it's going to get bad, and worse if we don't act now...

Uncertainty no excuse for procrastinating on climate change

By Roger Bodman, Victoria University and David Karoly, University of Melbourne

Today we released research which reduces the range of uncertainty in future global warming. It does not alter the fact we will never be certain about how, exactly, the climate will change.

We always have to make decisions when there are uncertainties about the future: whether to take an umbrella when we go outside, how much to spend on insurance. International action on climate change is just one more decision that has to be made in an environment of uncertainty.

The most recent assessment of climate change made by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change in 2007 looked at what is known with high confidence about climate change, as well as uncertainties. It included projections of future global warming to the end of this century based on simulations from a group of complex climate models.

These models included a range of uncertainties, coming from natural variability of the climate and the representation of important processes in the models. But the models did not consider uncertainty from interactions with the carbon cycle – the way carbon is absorbed and released by oceans, plant life and soil. In order to allow for these uncertainties, the likely range of temperature change was expanded.
Our recent study has re-visited these results and tested an approach to reduce the range of uncertainty for future global warming. We wanted to calibrate the key climate and carbon cycle parameters in a simple climate model using historical data as a basis for future projections. We used observations of atmospheric carbon dioxide concentrations for the last 50 years to constrain the representation of the carbon cycle in the model. We also took the more common approach of using global atmospheric and ocean temperature variations to constrain the response of the climate system.

This led to a narrower range of projected temperature changes for a given set of greenhouse gas emissions. As a consequence, we have higher confidence in the projections. In other words, using both climate and carbon dioxide observations reduces the uncertainties in projections of global warming. (Click the chart to enlarge it.)

Figure 1. Global-mean temperature change for a business-as-usual emission scenario, relative to pre-industrial. Black line: median, shaded regions 67% (dark), 90% (medium) and 95% (light) confidence intervals. The sidebars are uncertainty ranges based on the IPCC likely range and best estimate (grey column) for 2090-2099 and our corresponding results (purple column) from the simple climate model (MAGICC); the black bars are the respective best estimates (modified from Nature Climate Change paper). Bodman & Karoly

We found that uncertainties in the carbon cycle are the second-largest contributor to the overall range of uncertainty in future global warming. The main contributor is climate sensitivity, a measure of how the climate responds to increases in greenhouse-gas concentrations.

Climate sensitivity has been discussed recently on The Conversation. A recent study by Alexander Otto of Oxford University and colleagues, published in the journal Nature Geoscience, also considered future global warming in the context of observations of global mean temperature change over the last decade.
Unlike that study, our results do not show lower climate sensitivity or lower mean projected global warming. Our study uses the same observed global atmospheric and ocean temperature data. But we also used observed carbon dioxide data and represented important additional processes in our simplified climate model, particularly the carbon cycle on the land and in the ocean and uncertainties in the climate forcing due to aerosols.

In our study, the reductions in uncertainty came from using the observations, the relationships between them and how these affect the parameters in the simple climate model. We found 63% of the uncertainty in projected warming was due to single sources, such as climate sensitivity, the carbon cycle components and the cooling effect of aerosols, while 37% of uncertainty came from the combination of these sources.
Once we reduced the uncertainty we found there is an increased risk of exceeding a lower temperature change threshold, but a reduced chance of exceeding a high threshold. That is, for business-as-usual emissions of greenhouse gases, exceeding 6°C global warming by 2100 is now unlikely, while exceeding 2°C is virtually certain.

These results reconfirm the need for urgent and substantial reductions in greenhouse gas emissions if the world is to avoid exceeding the global warming target of 2°C. Keeping warming below 2°C is necessary to minimise dangerous climate change.

It is unlikely that uncertainties in projected warming will be reduced substantially. Indeed, if you allow for population growth, levels of economic activity, growth in demand for energy and the means of producing that energy, overall uncertainty increases. We just have to accept that we will have to manage the risks of global warming with the knowledge we have. We may not know exactly how much and by when average temperatures change, but we know they will. This is an experiment we probably don’t want to make with the only planet we have to live on.

Roger Bodman received funding from the Australian Research Council while completing his PhD.
David Karoly receives funding from the Australian Research Council and the Australian Antarctic Division. He is a Chief Investigator in the ARC Centre of Excellence for Climate System Science, a member of the Climate Change Authority and a member of the Science Advisory Panel to the Climate Commission.


This article was originally published at The Conversation. Read the original article.

Coming soon...

I've cleaned this blog out again.  I'm going to be writing some more serious articles here about science and environment with a particular focus on Australia.  That's a job for the first quarter in 2013.

I now have a sister blog, blog.HotWhopper.com, which I started as a way of letting off steam about the appalling treatment I got from the operators and moderators at a large Australian share trading discussion board.  I plan to develop that blog with articles about a variety of topics, including sexism and bullying, but with an emphasis on climate science denial - what motivates people to lie and deceive and discussing tactics of deniers etc.

Meanwhile, I wish you all a very happy Christmas, Hanukkah or whatever you celebrate over the holiday season, and a healthy, happy and prosperous 2013.

Cattle Banned! Finally some protection for Victoria's High Plains

Victoria's high country is safe from cattle grazing in the national park. The Victorian Government says it is not ruling out a High Court challenge, but lets hope they don't waste their money. It's enough that they've reneged on other environmentally important issues, like restricting wind farms.

After the cattle were kicked out last time around, the plants grew profusely. I've been visiting the high plains for forty years and, until a couple of years after the cattle had left, I had never in my life seen such a density of growth with so many different plants growing together.

Here is the media release from Tony Burke MP, the Federal Minister for Sustainability, Environment, Water, Population and Communities:

A proposal by the Victorian Government to reintroduce cattle to the National Heritage listed Alpine National Park in Victoria has been determined to be clearly unacceptable under national environmental law and will not proceed.

Environment Minister Tony Burke said after careful consideration he had accepted the advice of the Environment Department that the proposal to reintroduce cattle to the Alpine National Park would have a clearly unacceptable impact on the national heritage values of the Australian Alps National Parks and Reserves National Heritage Place.

In December, the Victorian Department of Sustainability and Environment submitted a proposal to the Federal Government for assessment under the Environment Protection and Biodiversity Conservation (EPBC) Act 1999 to reintroduce up to 400 cattle to graze in the state's Alpine National Park for up to five months a year for five years, as a research trial.

Nine out of the 10 sites selected by the Victorian Government are partly or entirely located within the Australian Alps National Parks and Reserves which was included on the National Heritage List in 2008. The area contains a number of important ecological environments.

Last year, the Federal Government made regulatory changes that formally recognise the significant impact of livestock grazing on the Australian Alps National Parks and Reserves National Heritage place under the EPBC Act.

The regulation specifies that grazing of domestic stock including cattle could have a significant impact on the heritage values of the Australian Alps Heritage Area and that any future new grazing activities proposed in the Australian Alps Heritage Area, including the Alpine National Park, need to be assessed under the EPBC Act.

"My decision is based on a thorough and rigorous assessment of the proposal, taking into account the advice of my department," Mr Burke said.

"I have accepted the advice of my department that the proposed action of reintroducing up to 400 cattle would have a clearly unacceptable impact on the listed national heritage values of the Australian Alps National Parks and Reserves National Heritage Place.

"The assessment has shown there is irrefutable evidence that cattle grazing would damage the sensitive natural environment, disturb the remote and wild character of the area, detract from aesthetic values, and erode its heritage values.

"While my personal views on this matter are known, in determining this decision I have considered only whether or not the proposed action would be in breach of the EPBC Act.

The Alpine National Park forms part of the Australian Alps National Parks and Reserves national heritage place that was listed on the National Heritage List to identify and protect the wide range of nationally significant natural and cultural values found within it. The parks and reserves extend over the Victorian, New South Wales and Australian Capital Territory borders and in total cover over 1.6 million hectares.

Scientists say the Draft Murray-Darling Basin Plan should be scrapped

The Wentworth Group of Concerned Scientists have called for the Draft Murray Darling Basin Plan, released last month, to be scrapped

They say the plan should be started afresh. Not throwing out all the work they've done - but they need to completely re-think what the plan is meant to be a plan of (water management, irrigation, environmental flows and so forth). It's not a plan yet and it won't do the job.

This is the next episode in the ongoing sad saga of planning for the Murray Darling Basin.

Previously - Mike Taylor quit as Chair of the Murray Darling Basin Authority, saying the government set impossible expectations that could not be delivered and were not in accordance with the Water Act. He had just released the Guide to the proposed Basin Plan, flagging "a long-term average increase of 7,600 GL/y (would mean) the environmental targets are all met and all catchments improve from their existing status to good flow levels".

The Minister then appointed former NSW Labor MP Craig Knowles as Chair. Shortly afterwards, Wentworth Group of Scientists who were consulting on the plan quit. They said the process itself was flawed and that a decision had already been made that the minimum flows required (4,000 GL/year) would not be met.

Knowles released the draft Basin Plan last month, which only provides for environmental flows of 2,750 GL/year.

The prospects for the Murray Darling have fallen a lot, as shown by:

2010 - Desirable 7600 GL/year
2010 - Probably target 4000 GL/year
2011 - 2750 GL/year - less 2600 GL/year removed from groundwater.

From the Wentworth Group of Scientists:

STATEMENT ON THE 2011 DRAFT MURRAY DARLING BASIN PLAN

The draft Plan released for public comment by the Murray-Darling Basin Authority on the 28 November 2011 does not provide the most basic information required to allow anybody to make an informed decision on the future management of the water resources of the Basin.

The absence of this information makes it impossible for the community, science or Parliament to understand the implications or have confidence the Plan has any prospect of delivering a healthy working river:

1. The Plan specifies a volume of water but it does not identify the volume of water required to deliver a healthy working river, as required by the Commonwealth Water Act;
2. The Plan cites river management infrastructure as the limiting factor however there is no assessment of the feasibility or cost of redesigning river management infrastructure (such as periodically flooding paddocks or raising the height of a bridge) so that a healthy working river can be delivered;
3. The Plan does not incorporate in the modelling the impact that increasing groundwater extractions by over 2,600GL will have on surface water flows, many of the groundwater systems in the Basin are linked to river systems;
4. The Plan sets long term diversion limits on the assumption that there is no risk to river health from climate change; and
5. There is no information presented on the effectiveness of the Plan to cope with long dry periods such as that experienced throughout the Basin during most of the last decade, or deliver the volumes of water required keep the Murray mouth open as a functioning (Ramsar listed) estuary and export the 2,000,000 tonnes of salt accumulating in the river system each year.

Details of their statement can be found here.

We'll probably be into the next drought within the next year or two. What will happen then? I do hope it is not too late for the Coorong and the red gum plains along the Murray.

Will USA wake up soon that climate change is already here?

On the fires in Texas - like the 2009 fires in Victoria - more precautionary burning wouldn't have made much difference. And it would probably have been dangerous to attempt it any time in the past 12 months - too dry. From Jeff Masters:

As I reported in yesterday's post, there has never been a Texas summer hotter than the summer of 2011. The summer of 2011 now holds every major heat record for the city of Austin, including most 100° days (67 so far), hottest month in recorded history (August, breaking the previous record by a remarkable 2.1°), hottest summer (by 1.1°), and hottest day in history (112°F, tied with Sep, 5, 2000.)

As wunderground's weather historian Christopher C. Burt documents in his latest blog post, the situation is similar across the rest of the state. Seventeen major cities in Texas recorded their hottest summer on record in 2011. Most of these stations had records extending back more than 100 years, and several of the records were smashed by an amazing 3.4°F--at Lubbock and at Wichita Falls.

Neighboring states also experienced unprecedented heat, withOklahoma recording America's hottest month by any state in recorded history during July, and Shreveport, Louisiana breaking its record for hottest month by 3°F in August. Mr. Burt commented to me: " I do not believe I have ever seen a site with a long period of record, like Shreveport, where records go back to 1874, break its warmest single month on record by an astonishing 3°. This is unheard of. Usually when a site breaks its single month temperature record, we are talking about tenths of a degree, rarely a whole degree, let alone 3 degrees! Hard to believe, frankly."

Texas has also had its worst fire season on record, with over 3.5 million acres burned this year, and it's driest 1-year period in recorded history.

While people are trying to control the Texas fires, rain is pelting down elsewhere. More from Jeff Masters:

An extreme rainfall event unprecedented in recorded history has hit the Binghamton, New York area, where 7.49" fell yesterday. This is the second year in a row Binghamton has recorded a 1-in-100 year rain event; their previous all-time record was set last September, when 4.68" fell on Sep 30 - Oct. 1, 2010. Records go back to 1890 in the city.

The skies have now cleared in Binghamton, with this morning's rain bringing the city's total rainfall for the 40-hour event to 9.02". However, another large region of rain lies just to the south in Pennsylvania, and all of the rivers in the surrounding region are in major or record flood.

The Susquehanna River at Binghamton is at 25.18', its highest level since records began in 1847, and is expected to overtop the flood walls protecting the city this afternoon. In Hershey, Pennsylvania, Swatara Creek is 18' over flood stage, and more than 8' above its record flood crest. Widespread flash flooding is occurring across the entire area, and over 125,000 people have been evacuated from their homes.

And read the comments here on ClimateProgress for more about what rainfall records are being broken around the world.

Congrats to John Cook of SkepticalScience.com

Congratulations, John, on winning a Eureka prize. Well done and very well deserved.

Send him your best wishes, everyone.

Cadel Evans - You're the Winner of le Tour de France - You bloody beauty!

Cadel Evans - a heart bigger than Pharlap!


You are brilliant! First Australian Winner of le Tour de France.

Congratulations!!!!!

Building on the shoulders of Oppie and the great Phil Anderson, championsRobby McEwen and Stuart O'Grady, cyclists Brad McGee, brilliant Mark Renshaw and all the other great Australians - more here.

And congrats as well to Richie Porte from Tasmania Australia = great ride.

Now for the champion - Cadel Evans - formerly from the Northern Territory now a fellow Victorian.

With congratulations from mountain bike country - the beautiful Mount Beauty Victoria.

BBC to improve science reporting

The BBC is going to improve its reporting on science, following a "review of impartiality and accuracy of the BBC's coverage of science" - as reported in The Guardian:

The BBC is to revamp its science coverage after an independent review highlighted weaknesses and concluded that journalists boosted the apparent controversy of scientific news stories such as climate change, GM crops and the MMR vaccine by giving too much weight to fringe scientific viewpoints.

The wide-ranging review found the network's science reporting was generally of high quality, and praised the BBC for its breadth, depth and accuracy, but urged the broadcaster to tackle several areas of concern.

Commissioned last year to assess impartiality and accuracy in BBC science coverage across television, radio and the internet, the review said the network was at times so determined to be impartial that it put fringe views on a par with well-established fact: a strategy that made some scientific debates appear more controversial than they were.

The criticism was particularly relevant to stories on issues such as global warming, GM and the MMR vaccine, where minority views were sometimes given equal weighting to broad scientific consensus, creating what the report describes as "false balance".

The review comprised an independent report by Professor Steve Jones, emeritus professor of genetics at University College London, and an in-depth analysis by researchers at Imperial College London of science coverage across the BBC in May, June and July of 2009 and 2010.

In his report, Jones lamented the narrow range of sources that reporters used for stories, poor communication between journalists in different parts of the organisation, and a lack of knowledge of the breadth of science.

"The most important aspect is a vote of confidence in what BBC science is doing. It is head and shoulders above other broadcasters. As always, though, there is a but," Jones told reporters on Wednesday.

Jones likened the BBC's approach to oppositional debates to asking a mathematician and maverick biologist what two plus two equals. When the mathematician says four and the maverick says five, the public are left to conclude the answer is somewhere in between.

The report will disappoint some climate change sceptics who hoped it would find the BBC at fault for promoting a green agenda. "There is a consensus in the scientific community that anthropogenic climate change exists," Jones said. By failing to move the debate on, the BBC was missing other stories, he added.

Another bit of fluff from political denier & campaigner for devastation by climate, Bob Carter

The Sydney Morning Herald today printed another bit of fluff from the political denier and campaigner for devastation by climate, Bob Carter. It was a response to an article by Australia's Chief Scientist, Professor Ian Chubb. Let's hope SMH will now provide 'balance' by making sure the next 99,999 articles it publishes on climate are from climate scientists. (My comments are in dark blue and italics.)

Carter starts with a reference to the editor's lead in to Professor Chubb's article:

IAN CHUBB says the climate change debate is not about politics but science. Would that it were so.

The lead in was wrong - editors seem to get stuff wrong often. This the only time Ian Chubb mentioned debate:

Is the debate, or critique, confined to experts? No. But if ''non-experts'' want to be part of the debate, they have a responsibility to respect the science that has led to the knowledge that we have at hand. In order to make a considered intervention, they need to understand the scientific process and the robust contest of ideas and interpretations that are part and parcel of civil scientific inquiry and which lead us to where we are.

There is no place for deliberate misrepresentation of data either by expert or by commentator. It is easy to make a dollar or two by being the instant expert on everything and substituting decibels for substance.

If only Carter took heed of Chubb's words, particularly the part about misrepresentation and substitution of decibels for substance. But he doesn't, so Carter continues:

But it is not that simple, for there really are two matters at hand, namely the science relevant to global warming and the principle of sound empiricism and calm rational thought to determine important affairs of state (politics).

Alas, in the public debate about global warming, these principles of sound science and sound governance have become entwined with political self-interest by well-funded lobby groups of both the ''save the world'' and ''let's make money'' variety. How's the IPA going for funding these days, Bob?

First, the science. The scientific method is a brilliantly successful technique for discovering, understanding and managing the world around us, born out of the fire of the European Enlightenment. Don't you just love his poetic turn of phrase :)

Sound science is based upon observation, experiment and the testing of hypotheses in the context of the principle of simplicity (often termed Occam's Razor). Simple is nice but the world isn't always simple, is it.

Carter then moves into areas about which he knows zilch and understands less:

The unvalidated computer models that now dominate the public face of climate ''science'' are a jungle of complexities, and represent speculative thought experiments not empirically tested science.

The above statement is completely false, whether he is discussing complex general circulation models or simpler models to calculate global temperature. The former are based on known physics, not speculation and thought experiments. The latter are based upon measured temperature observations. Models can be simple or complex. They are not 'thought experiments' - at least not in climate science.

In support of these methods, the former director of the British Meteorological Office, Professor John Mitchell, has said that ''people underestimate the power of models. Observational evidence is not very useful … Our approach is not entirely empirical''.

I tried to track down this 'quote'. It seems to have originated in a report of a session held in May as viewed through the eyes of a journalist. I did a search and the quote has flown around all the denier website with the usual lightning speed and is roundly misunderstood by all. It is a snippet of a quote, not necessarily accurate, and with no context. Given the source it is not clear a) whether or not it is accurate, or b) to what Prof Mitchell was referring. In any case, the emphasis appears to be on the power of models - which to most people would be self-evident. Maybe Carter is still using pen and paper for everything.

Carter himself misunderstands it and emphasises the - well I don't know what he is referring to in this bit. Maybe someone else can help me out here.

The last part of this statement is only too true, and leads to the discomfit expressed by those such as the British engineering professor John Brignell: ''The ease with which a glib algorithm can be implemented with a few lines of computer code, and the difficulty of understanding its implications, can pave the path to cloud-cuckoo land.'' What is Carter on about? Anyone?

From this point on Carter shows how little he knows about ordinary science that any high school student should understand, and most primary school students should probably know:

Climate science is not primarily about modelling, albeit a powerful tool, but about testing hypotheses against key empirical facts, including:

• Atmospheric carbon dioxide is a mild greenhouse gas that exerts a diminishing warming effect as its concentration increases; True that the effect diminishes as concentration increases - it's a logarithmic relationship. Not true that 'it's a mild greenhouse gas'. CO2 is known as earth's thermostat. Dial it up and the temperature goes up and causes all sorts of other responses to make the temperature go up even more. Dial it down and the temperature drops, and water condenses and all sorts of other responses that cause the temperature to drop even more. CO2 is not mild, it is very powerful.
• We live in a carbon dioxide-starved world (levels 15 times higher having been reached about 500 million years ago and diminishing since); Patently false. If the world was starved for CO2 why are we alive and how did the earth survive for the last few million years?
• Carbon dioxide is a vital plant fertiliser; and the point is? (So is nitrogen, phosphorus and a number of other nutrients.)
• The world warmed in the earlier and latter parts of the 20th century; True and
• The world has cooled slightly over the past 10 years despite a 5 per cent increase in carbon dioxide.False: 2010 was the equal hottest year on record and the temperature trend continues to rise. The 2000s were hotter than the 1990s, which were hotter than the 1980s, which were hotter than the 1970s, which were hotter than the 1960s.

These facts are consistent with the conclusion that enhanced levels of carbon dioxide are good for the environment , and do not cause dangerous global warming. Wrong again. First they are not facts, and second even were they facts they are not sufficient to prove what is contended. The biggest risks are from the rapid pace of accumulation of greenhouse gases. We just don't have time to adapt. The weather this past decade has caused the loss of many lives, shifts of climate, loss of biodiversity. The oceans are rapidly warming and acidifying. It is all happening much too quickly and will be devastating if we don't stop it.

Professor Chubb claims: ''Ross Garnaut has summarised the state of climate science in his recent report.'' But what Professor Garnaut in fact summarised were the official findings of the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), an undeniably political body. Professor Garnaut also said that IPCC views are supported ''by the learned academies of science [all disciplines] in all of the countries of scientific accomplishment''. Which invites the obvious response, ''Well, they would say that, wouldn't they?''

The IPCC is an independent non-political organisation. Carter is talking through his hat.

The ''IPCC and most academies'' line is, of course, the argument from consensus, which raises the question: When did you last hear a scientist say ''there is a consensus that the sun will rise tomorrow''?

Is Bob Carter questioning whether the sun will rise tomorrow or is he saying there is no scientific consensus that the sun will rise tomorrow?

Never, of course, for the very use of the phrase ''consensus'' in science tells you that a matter is not settled. Global warming science is not just unsettled but profoundly uncertain and controversial.

Aah - he's trying on a 'gotcha'. I wonder how Carter goes with the evolution 'debate' in the good old USA?

Consensus is a political, not scientific, concept. As Michael Crichton wrote: ''There is no such thing as consensus science. If it's consensus, it isn't science. If it's science, it isn't consensus. Period.''

Now he is quoting a writer of popular fiction (and climate change denier), who, despite studying biological anthropology and medicine, reportedly believed people created their own illnesses, had astral spirits and other nonsense. So if there is consensus there isn't science. Okay, there goes gravity, relativity, genetics etc etc down the tube. We've got to start all over again from, maybe, Aristotle?

Returning to real science, Professor Chubb said that when ''science is conducted properly, and interpreted after extensive, and critical, analysis, knowledge and understanding is increased and improved. We shift [our views] or confirm what we think.''

Quite so, and nothing about consensus there. But the problem remains of improper science, which is now widespread. Oh?

In particular, the IPCC - which was set up to advise only on the climatic effect of human greenhouse emissions - has shown repeatedly that it is not in the business of shifting its beliefs, whatever the evidence; instead, facts contrary to its convictions are either ignored or neutralised by adjusting the models.

For example, the sun recently entered a quietude unknown since the Little Ice Age. Accompanying this, planetary warming has ceased despite still increasing carbon dioxide emissions. Some solar physicists have issued warnings that strong cooling may be imminent.

I see. Because neither the evidence nor the physics suggests that the world is or should be cooling like 'some solar physicists' think it should - then the evidence and the physics must be wrong? But the world isn't cooling is it, and not showing any signs that it's going to do so. So where does Carter get his odd ideas? Even if the sun were to go very quiet, like a Grand Minimum, it would hardly make a dent in the medium term rise in temperature.

Has the IPCC revised any of its views as a result? Fat chance.

Carter doesn't understand how the IPCC operates. He seems to think there is an organisation that writes reports independently of the latest scientific papers and observations. He doesn't realise that what it is is a coordinating body which, though lots of volunteer effort from experts all over the world, pulls together the latest knowledge based on scientific papers (WG1) and other information (the other working groups).

Professor Chubb also points out the impossibility of waiting for certainty (Godot arrives more quickly) before setting climate policy, and the need for insurance against climate change, two points with which I entirely agree. I doubt Prof Chubb cares tuppence for what Carter thinks.

Good governance on scientific issues is based on the twin principles of prudence and do no harm, especially to society's most disadvantaged. Everything that we know about climate change tells us that it is both dangerous and uncertain. The appropriate insurance is a national policy based on preparing for and adapting to all climate events as and when they happen, irrespective of their cause.

Sounds good, doesn't it. But then Carter contradicts himself:

If, instead, political pressure from lobby groups defeats contestable scientific advice, then Australia will get a swingeingly (sic) expensive, regressive and environmentally ineffectual carbon dioxide tax - and live to regret it.

Carter just said to prepare and take action, now he says don't take action. What gives? We will never know, because that's where the article ends.


Professor Bob Carter is a geologist, a fellow of the Institute of Public Affairs and author of the book, Climate: The Counter Consensus. Which means he is a denier of the first order, not a climate scientist, and aligned with the political right wing.

Addendum: For an excellent critique of Bob Carter's recent 'presentations' and the misinterpretations and misreprentations and disinformation he provides as charts - Click here for a post from Tamino on Open Mind

Canadian Tar Sands Means Game Over - Silence is Deadly

James Hansen writes that exploitation of the Canadian tar sands could be catastrophic. He writes:

...Although there are multiple objections to tar sands development and the pipeline, including destruction of the environment in Canada and the likelihood of spills along the pipeline's pathway, such objections, by themselves, are very unlikely to stop the project. An overwhelming objection is that exploitation of tar sands would make it implausible to stabilize climate and avoid disastrous global climate impacts. The tar sands are estimated (e.g., see IPCC AR4 WG3 report) to contain at least 400 GtC (equivalent to about 200 ppm CO2). Easily available reserves of conventional oil and gas are enough to take atmospheric CO2 well above 400 ppm. However, if emissions from coal are phased out over the next few decades and if unconventional fossil fuels are left in the ground, it is conceivable to stabilize climate. Phase out of emissions from coal is itself an enormous challenge. However, if the tar sands are thrown into the mix it is essentially game over. There is no practical way to capture the CO2 emitted while burning oil, which is used principally in vehicles....

The Critical Decade

Yesterday, Australia's Climate Commission released a new report with important messages:

The following points highlight the key messages arising from the accompanying report The Critical Decade:

1. There is no doubt that the climate is changing. The evidence is overwhelming and clear.

• The atmosphere is warming, the ocean is warming, ice is being lost from glaciers and ice caps and sea levels are rising. The biological world is changing in response to a warming world.
• Global surface temperature is rising fast; the last decade was the hottest on record.

2. We are already seeing the social, economic and environmental impacts of a changing climate.

• With less than 1 degree of warming globally the impacts are already being felt in Australia.
• In the last 50 years the number of record hot days in Australia has more than doubled. This has increased the risk of heatwaves and associated deaths, as well as extreme bush fire weather in South Eastern and South Western Australia.
• Sea level has risen by 20 cm globally since the late 1800s, impacting many coastal communities. Another 20 cm increase by 2050, which is likely at current projections, would more than double the risk of coastal flooding.
• The Great Barrier Reef has suffered from nine bleaching events in the past 31 years. This iconic natural ecosystem, and the economy that depends upon it, face serious risks from climate change.

3. Human activities – the burning of fossil fuels and deforestation – are triggering the changes we are witnessing in the global climate.

• A very large body of observations, experiments, analyses, and physical theory points to increasing greenhouse gases in the atmosphere - with carbon dioxide being the most important - as the primary cause of the observed warming.
• Increasing carbon dioxide emissions are primarily produced by the burning of fossil fuels, such as coal and oil, as well as deforestation.
• Natural factors, like changes in the Earth’s orbit or solar activity, cannot explain the world-wide warming trend.

4. This is the critical decade. Decisions we make from now to 2020 will determine the severity of climate change our children and grandchildren experience.

• Without strong and rapid action there is a significant risk that climate change will undermine our society’s prosperity, health, stability and way of life.
• To minimise this risk, we must decarbonise our economy and move to clean energy sources by 2050.
• That means carbon emissions must peak within the next few years and then strongly decline.
• The longer we wait to start reducing carbon emissions, the more difficult and costly those reductions become.
• This decade is critical. Unless effective action is taken, the global climate may be so irreversibly altered we will struggle to maintain our present way of life. The choices we make this decade will shape the long-term climate future for our children and grandchildren.

Murray Darling Plan turning into a fiasco, with the Wentworth Group of Scientists leaving the process

Late last year the then Chair of the Murray-Darling Basin Authority, Mr Mike Taylor, quit because the Government made demands that were not only in conflict with the Water Act but were impossible to achieve.

Now the Wentworth Group of Concerned Scientists have left the process on the grounds that the plan is proposing to let the river die by not ensuring sufficient flow. (A paper on the Murray-Darling by the Wentworth Group can be found here.)

A group of leading scientists contributing to the development of the Murray-Darling Basin Authority's (MDBA) plan has pulled out of the process, calling the plan to fix the ailing river system seriously flawed.

The Wentworth Group of Concerned Scientists says it can not be part of a plan which it says will fail to fix the river system but waste billions of taxpayer dollars.

The group says no less than 4,000 gigalitres must be returned to the Murray-Darling river system in order to fix it, but says it appears that will not happen under the draft plan so it has resigned from the process.

"There's no point in us being part of a process if the process is fundamentally flawed, and unless there is an independent review of the science then we believe it is a fundamentally flawed process," Wentworth member Peter Cosier said.

The group says the MDBA is now aiming to return less than 3,000 gigalitres to the system following angry protests by irrigators when the initial figures and cuts to water entitlements were released last year.

More on the ABC website.

Quadrant article by Bob Carter, David Evans, Stewart Franks and Bill Kininmonth - how confusing

Here is a summary of the points raised by Bob Carter, David Evans, Stewart Franks and Bill Kininmonth in an articlepublished online in Quadrant yesterday (link below). I've loosely grouped the points they made into topics for clarity.  The statements are not direct quotations.  They represent a summary of the main points made by these eminent men in their short article.  I've put my added interpretation in brackets.

What they say about global temperature trends

1. The temperature is level - neither cooling nor heating.
2. The earth is cooling.
3. There has been late 20th century warming.
4. So what if 2010 was the hottest year on record?
5. The earth is not warming, or maybe it is warming (but we don't want it to be warming so it isn't).
6. The sun is quiet so it shouldn't be warming (therefore it isn't).
7. The Minister has just made it all up.
8. We don't believe any temperature record that includes the Arctic (and anyway, we don't like Dr Hansen of NASA; he's a bit of a pessimist).
9. All the thermometers are wrong.

What they say about reducing CO2 emissions

1. Even cutting CO2, it will take a long time to come out of the atmosphere, (therefore we should keep adding it instead).
2. Cutting CO2 would stop the rise in temperature and even cause it to decline slightly. (Therefore we shouldn't cut it.)
3. Increasing atmospheric CO2 is good for the environment.
4. Australia doesn't pollute any more than anywhere else with the same environmental regulations.

What they say about evidence
There is none.  Tell us, where is the empirical evidence:

• that warming is caused by CO2 emissions
• of an increase in weather disasters

What they say about terminology

• We don't like the term 'carbon pollution', (it's not nice; our friend Carbon would find it offensive).

What else they say

1. Other things have been the main cause of global warming in the past (therefore it can't be CO2 this time around).
2. It's a cycle (temperatures don't need a cause to go up and down)
3. Forty years ago, some scientists thought the world was cooling (therefore it is still cooling, even though forty years ago more scientists said it was going to warm).
4. We're not sure if global warming is a dangerous problem or not.

Summarised from this article in Quadrant.

Believe it or not, one of the authors is an active academic, two are retired academics and one was once a government employee (now a conspiracy theorist).  Will the current academic hold his job after this?  (Probably yes, unfortunately.)

Which companies will advertise on Andrew Bolt's new show on Channel 10?

How about telling the Channel 10 advertisers what you think of them supporting Andrew Bolt.

Glen Beck, infamous for spouting ultra-right wing views, has been effectively fired from Fox News. It appears that a large number of high profile advertisers pulled out, not wanting their products to be associated with his unAmerican sentiments. (You'd think the son of Lachlan Murdoch might have learnt a lesson from this.)

It will be interesting to see which companies support Andrew Bolt. So far he has been able to survive on the ABC Insider's program, which doesn't have advertising, and with a blog buried in a newspaper that has a lot of different journalists, some quite sane and rational. He has never been exposed out on his own before.

I might even watch one of his television episodes (with the volume turned off) just to see which businesses support him - and write to these advertisers letting them know what I think of their support for him and his opinions. Hopefully a few other people will do the same.

Julie Bishop's followers support a carbon tax!

Julie Bishop, deputy leader of the opposition (Liberal Party, Australia, welcoming climate catastrophe), ran a survey on her website, checking support for a carbon tax.

What's that?

80.2% support a carbon tax!

75.6% strongly support a carbon tax!

I grabbed this screenshot of her website last night:

Now this and all previous survey's on her website seem to have disappeared. What went wrong? Didn't she like what Australians told her?

On House Republicans overturning science - by Rep. Ed Markey (D-MA)

The Republicans yesterday voted to increase pollution in the USA and to accelerate global warming and make weather disasters worse, more frequent and more widespread. This is what Rep Markey had to say about it:

http://thinkprogress.org/climate/2011/03/10/174942/markey-flat-earthers/

Will democracies survive global warming?

Down here in Australia we have Sophie Mirabella MP, shadow Minister for Industry, Innovation and Science, dog-whistling the crazies to murder and mayhem. In reference to PM Gillard's proposed introduction of a price on carbon, Mirabella said:

"If Ms Gillard believes Australians want to pay higher electricity and higher petrol prices, she is as deluded as Colonel 'my people love me' Gaddafi."

Mirabella has joined the list of infamous politicians such as Palin for effectively calling for people to resort to violence.

Given the trend in US conservative politics to stop any research relating to climate and stop any regulation of pollution; and the trend in Australian conservative politics to not repair damage from weather disasters as well as to not do anything to combat global warming, I fear that democracy will not survive too much longer.

Mirabella is already dog-whistling for civil war. What will she call for when global warming makes the weather even worse than it has been this past decade? In her own electorate, people have suffered a decade of drought, more major fires burning more land than ever before in a similar time period, and just this summer, deluges the like of which have never been recorded. Still Mirabella doesn't want to take any action to reduce the cause of these disasters. If she and extremists like her in other countries have their way, we won't know what has hit us in a few years time.

Which countries will do better? Perhaps western-style democracy is not up to the task of dealing with the massive problem of global warming.

Cardinal Pell backs Plimer against the Pope and the Catholic Church

As discussed in the Sydney Morning Herald and numerous other places, Cardinal George Pell has made a bit of a fool of himself on the record in the Australian Parliament's primary record, Hansard. In line with his numerous pronouncements that global warming is not a threat (such as here), Pell wrote to the Senate to immortalise his lack of understanding of climate science and his faith in a book of 'science fiction' that was penned by a chap called Ian Plimer.

Tim Lambert has published Pell's letter and the response from Dr Greg Ayers of the Bureau of Meteorology. Dr Ayers explains to the Senate Committee, why Ian Plimer's book is not credible.

Pell is in conflict with the Pope on the matter of global warming and has probably been in conflict with the Vatican for twenty years or more, on human welfare and environmental matters generally. Here is an excerpt from Pope Benedict XVI World Peace Day address last year (which refers also to concerns in 1990 expressed by Pope John Paul II):

4. Without entering into the merit of specific technical solutions, the Church is nonetheless concerned, as an “expert in humanity”, to call attention to the relationship between the Creator, human beings and the created order. In 1990 John Paul II had spoken of an “ecological crisis” and, in highlighting its primarily ethical character, pointed to the “urgent moral need for a new solidarity”.[7] His appeal is all the more pressing today, in the face of signs of a growing crisis which it would be irresponsible not to take seriously. Can we remain indifferent before the problems associated with such realities as climate change, desertification, the deterioration and loss of productivity in vast agricultural areas, the pollution of rivers and aquifers, the loss of biodiversity, the increase of natural catastrophes and the deforestation of equatorial and tropical regions? Can we disregard the growing phenomenon of “environmental refugees”, people who are forced by the degradation of their natural habitat to forsake it – and often their possessions as well – in order to face the dangers and uncertainties of forced displacement? Can we remain impassive in the face of actual and potential conflicts involving access to natural resources? All these are issues with a profound impact on the exercise of human rights, such as the right to life, food, health and development.

Click for the Pope's World Day of Peace message - 1 January 2010

And the US Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB) is as strong or stronger on the issue than the Pope and the Vatican, and writes:

The U.S. Catholic bishops have declared, "At its core, global climate change is not about economic theory or political platforms, nor about partisan advantage or interest group pressures. It is about the future of God's creation and the one human family. It is about protecting both 'the human environment' and the natural environment." (Global Climate Change: A Plea for Dialogue, Prudence and the Common Good, United States Conference of Catholic Bishops, 2001, p.1).

In parishes, dioceses and other Catholic organizations, we encourage efforts to bring about a discussion on climate change that is civil and constructive, that invokes the virtue of prudence in seeking solutions, and that is more responsive to the needs of the poor, both here in the United States and abroad. As Catholics, we have a unique opportunity and responsibility to make a difference in addressing the potential impacts of global climate change, particularly on those least able to bear its burdens.

The USCCB urges specific action at the personal, state, national and global level; including at the national level:

The U.S. Catholic bishops are urging that any legislative action on climate change include provisions that: (1) ease the burden on poor people; (2) offer some relief for workers who may be displaced because of climate change policies; and (3) promote the development and use of alternate renewable and clean-energy resources, including the transfer of such technologies and technical assistance that may be appropriate and helpful to developing countries in meeting the challenges of global climate change.
Write to your Senators and Representatives in Congress and let them know that you care about climate change and support action on a national level that includes the three key priorities above. For background information on the issue, go to http://www.usccb.org/sdwp/ejp/climate.

Keep up to date on new science and technology relating to climate change by checking the websites of the National Academies of Sciences (http://www.nasonline.org) and the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) (http://www.ipcc.ch/).