IPCC "is a four-legged stool that is fast losing its legs"

From the National Post:

T

he official United Nation’s global warming agency, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, is a four-legged stool  that is fast losing its legs.  To carry the message of man-made global warming theory to the world, the IPCC has depended on 1) computer models, 2) data collection,  3) long-range temperature forecasting and 4) communication.  None of these efforts are sitting on firm ground.

Over the past month, one of the IPCC’s top climate scientists, Mojib Latif, attempted to explain that even if global temperatures were to cool over the next 10 to 20 years, that would not mean that man-made global warming is no longer catastrophic. It was a tough case to make, and it is not clear Mr. Latif succeeded. In a presentation to a world climate conference in early September, Mr. Latif rambled somewhat and veered off into inscrutable language that is now embedded in a million blog posts attempting to prove one thing or another.

A sample: “It may well happen that you enter a decade, or maybe even two, you know, when the temperature cools, all right, relative to the present level...And then, you know, I know what’s going to happen. You know, I will get, you know, millions of phone calls, you know —‘What’s going on?’ ‘So is global warming disappearing, you know?’ ‘Have you lied on us, you know?’ So, and, therefore, this is the reason why we need to address this decadal prediction issue.”

Read the rest here.

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Suggestions of “strong negative cloud feedbacks” in a warmer climate

Plus, a really cool photo, taken from the International Space Station!

 

Natural heat engine - the cumulonimbus cloud, transports heat from the lower to upper levels of the atmosphere. Source International Space Station NASA - click for large image

 

I thought this post on clouds and climate modeling below from Steve McIntyre’s Climate Audit was interesting, because it highlights the dreaded “negative feedbacks” that many climate modelers say don’t exist. Dr. Richard Lindzen highlighted the importance of negative feedback in a recent WUWT post.

 

One of the comments to the CA article shows the simplicity and obviousness of the existence of negative feedback in one of our most common weather events. Willis Eschenbach writes:

Cloud positive feedback is one of the most foolish and anti-common sense claims of the models.

 

This is particularly true of cumulus and cumulonimbus, which increase with the temperature during the day, move huge amounts of energy from the surface aloft, reflect huge amounts of energy to space, and fade away and disappear at night.

Spot on Willis, I couldn’t agree more. This is especially well demonstrated in the Inter Tropical Convergence Zone (ITCZ) The ITCZ has been in the news recently because early analysis of the flight path of Air France 447 suggests flying through an intense thunderstorm cell in the ITCZ may have been the fatal mistake. There is a huge amount of energy being transported into the upper atmosphere by these storms.

 

Full post at Watts Up With That?

 

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Common Sense and The Perils of Predictions

 

Forbes, “Absolute Return” column, April 21, 2008, page 246:

Here’s another name you should own, Freddie Mac ($29 per share)…Freddie is cheap at 1.1 times book [value].

Less than five months later, Freddie Mac’s stock was worth 25¢ per share, a loss of 99%.  It has since recovered to 70¢ per share, so the loss is “only” 97.6%.

 

A forecast of a stock of a single company five months into the future seems easy.  The company had government backing (federally sponsored corporation).  What could go wrong?

 

Yet, the forecast published by Forbes, short of an outright bankruptcy, could not have been more inaccurate.  It is worth examining how a situation that seemed rock solid (government-backed securities!) became catastrophic to see if there are any lessons that might apply to the atmospheric sciences.

 

The assumptions that Freddie Mac (and other financial stocks) were low risk was primarily a result of computer models.  As one expert stated (using pseudonym at http://blogs.zdnet.com/Murphy/?p=1265 ),

 

The problem is inherently complex – imagine being asked to value a portfolio of 10,000 residential mortgages issued to a total of something like 17,652 individuals. Each mortgage balances some issue amount against some payment stream; each has had zero or more payments recorded against it, each has an initial interest rate; an interest computation method; zero or more early payment opportunities; some mention of late or missed payment penalties and conditions, and an expiry, renegotiation, or call date.

 

While I do not doubt that is “complex,” the level of complexity is miniscule when compared to the complexity of the earth-atmosphere-ocean system and their interactions.

 

Full post at Watts Up With That?

 

Plus, the next installment of Tim Flannery Prediction Watch!

 

See how this prediction, made just last year, is going:

 

The water problem is so severe for Adelaide that it may run out of water by early 2009.

 

But I think you can guess

 

Which only goes to make this comment by Flummery, just a few weeks ago, not just strange, but really, quite disturbing. This man is clearly not telling the truth.

 

Australian scientist and campaigner Tim Flannery, one of the conference organisers, said climate change was harming his home country. “Water resources have dried out to the point where they’re now affecting the future of some of our cities.”

 

And while Flummery is a scientist, his field is palaeontology and his particular area of expertise the evolution of kangaroos.

 

But his real talent is obviously in marketing.

 

Andrew Bolt checks out a prediction made by the CSIRO:

 

Remember the CSIRO’s claim that global warming would kill the Australian ski season?  Six years on, the snow is actually even better:

VICTORIA’S snow resorts are enjoying the best ski and snowboarding conditions for a decade.

At the same link there's something wonderous and unexpected to behold - an ABC journalist covering both sides of the argument! What is the world coming too?

 

"One ABC program, however, is now trying to cover the other side of the argument. Brave journalist, that."

 

And who said Queensland was backward?

 

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