The Berkeley Earth Project's new analysis of the global temperature record, which I covered on Thursday, raises a number of questions concerning the science and the politics of climate change, and the ways in which science should be conducted.

The headline conclusion - that the Earth's surface is indeed getting warmer and that the 20th Century did indeed see a pattern of warming, slight cooling and warming again - is hardly a surprise.

But in the febrile atmosphere of "the climate debate", its significance lies not only in its conclusions, but in who's done it and what they've found.

 

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-15400748

 

 

It's official: the world is getting warmer. The independent Berkeley Earth Project has concluded average global land temperature has risen by around 1˚C since the mid-1950s after assessing around a billion temperature records, some dating back to the 1800s.

The figure tallies with studies by Nasa, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (Noaa), and the Met Office's Hadley Centre at the University of East Anglia and seems to present an unassailable case.

http://www.businessgreen.com/bg/news/2119098/berkley-earth-project-confirms-global-warming

 

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With our present usage of fossil fuels (EXTRA carbon added into the recent past — a few million years mind you — of the carbon surface equation of the planet) we are actually achieving, in around 200 years, a comparable warming that occurred at the end of the last Ice Age, over 2000 years.

 

The scientists who have worked hard in the other climate change studies — often vilified and rattled by uneducated morons, including our own Tony Abbott — have been cleared of tempering the books:

The Earth is warming up — and FAST, in geological terms.

Other studies pinpoint that our usage of extra carbon, creating CO2, methane and other warming gases, is the culprit. We (humans of the planet) have to do something about it, urgently.

 

Party of Pollution

By PAUL KRUGMAN

Last month President Obama finally unveiled a serious economic stimulus plan — far short of what I’d like to see, but a step in the right direction. Republicans, predictably, have blocked it. But the new plan, combined with the Occupy Wall Street demonstrations, seems to have shifted the national conversation. We are, suddenly, focused on what we should have been talking about all along: jobs.

So what is the G.O.P. jobs plan? The answer, in large part, is to allow more pollution. So what you need to know is that weakening environmental regulations would do little to create jobs and would make us both poorer and sicker.

Now it would be wrong to say that all Republicans see increased pollution as the answer to unemployment. Herman Cain says that the unemployed are responsible for their own plight — a claim that, at Tuesday’s presidential debate, was met with wild applause.

Both Rick Perry and Mitt Romney have, however, put weakened environmental protection at the core of their economic proposals, as have Senate Republicans. Mr. Perry has put out a specific number — 1.2 million jobs — that appears to be based on a study released by the American Petroleum Institute, a trade association, claiming favorable employment effects from removing restrictions on oil and gas extraction. The same study lies behind the claims of Senate Republicans.

But does this oil-industry-backed study actually make a serious case for weaker environmental protection as a job-creation strategy? No.

Part of the problem is that the study relies heavily on an assumed “multiplier” effect, in which every new job in energy leads indirectly to the creation of 2.5 jobs elsewhere. Republicans, you may recall, were scornful of claims that government aid that helps avoid layoffs of schoolteachers also indirectly helps save jobs in the private sector. But I guess the laws of economics change when it’s an oil company rather than a school district doing the hiring.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/21/opinion/party-of-pollution.html?ref=general&src=me&pagewanted=print

Salvadoran President Mauricio Funes urged the international community to send humanitarian aid, saying in a televised message to the nation on Wednesday: "El Salvador is going through one of the most dramatic disasters in its history".

In Honduras, President Porfirio Lobo urged his countrymen to help their fellow citizens.

"This is a new call for solidarity," Lobo said.

Guatemala has reported 38 deaths, El Salvador, 34, Honduras, 15, Nicaragua 13 and Costa Rica, five.

Everton Fox, Al Jazeera's meteorologist, said "The arrival of three tropical systems in barely a week has brought flashfloods and mudslides into much of Central America. Hurricane Jova, Tropical Depression 12 and most recently, the remnants of Tropical Depression Irwin, have all caused widespread devastation to the region."

The United Nations has classified Central America as one of the parts of the world most affected by climate change.

http://english.aljazeera.net/news/americas/2011/10/2011102241527998644.html

COMMENTS FROM GUS IN CAPITAL LETTERS
How Global Warming Fell Off the National Agenda

 

Now that 'climate change' has become a bête noire, environmentalists need to broaden their strategy
By Dominique Browning

 

 Here is some more explicit finger-pointing, along with a few proposals. I speak as an informed, and deeply concerned, citizen; as a grumpy environmentalist fatoosted by my tribe; and as a person who has had a lifelong career in “communications.” But mainly, I’m up at night worrying about global warming because I’m a mom who hopes someday to have grandchildren. And I don’t like the terrifying mess my kids will face. (By the way, “climate change” is yesterday’s weak phrase; it doesn’t begin to convey the intensity of trouble that is now upon us. I’m going with “climate chaos.”)

President Obama: He has taken no leadership in educating the public about global warming.

YES HE HAS BEEN DISGRACEFULLY AMBIGUOUS ON THIS ISSUE

Major Media: When the media loses interest, so do its citizens. 

YES THE GENERAL MEDIA HAS BEEN VERY DISGRACEFULLY SLOPPY ON THIS URGENT ISSUE

Republicans: Coming as I do from a long line of diehard Republicans, and sympathetic as I am to many Republican causes, I know that there are plenty of Republicans who are mortified by the ignorance — feckless or reckless — on display by certain members of the GOP these days.

YES THE REPUBLICANS ARE DISGRACEFUL STUPID ON THIS ISSUE.

Post Cap’em Depression: Okay, it is cheeky, but that’s the way I think of the blanket of despondency that settled over many of our most influential environmentalists after hope of a Cap and Trade deal to curtail carbon emissions was lost in 2009.

NO, MOST ENVIRONMENTALISTS HAVE WORKED HARD TO BE HEARD, BUT THE MEDIA MAKE SURE THEY ARE NOT.

Memos to Ourselves: Enviros spend too much time talking to one another. Much of the public discussion about climate chaos is jargon-laden. Mere mortals are not included in the conversation — unless it is about polar bears.

NO. THE "JARGON" OF GLOBAL WARMING IS VERY VERY SIMPLE TO UNDERSTAND BUT MEDIA — STANDING AGAINST DOING SOMETHING ABOUT IT — MAKES SURE THE TERMS AND UNDERSTANDING ARE CONFUSED. FOR EXAMPLE MEDIA CONFUSES NATURAL CO2 EFFECT WITH THE EXTRA CO2 ADDED BY HUMANS... MEDIA GIVES MORE PROMINENCE TO THE DENIALISTS (SAY 5 %) AGAINST THE REAL SCIENCE (95 %) THAT POINTS TO THE URGENCY OF THE PROBLEM.

More Messengers: Deniers have the funding of the Koch brothers. Surely there’s a responsible gazillionaire (or a consortium) who can organize a fierce, impassioned and persistent campaign to educate Americans about the danger of global warming.

ARE YOU KIDDING? BIG MONEY SPEAKS AGAINST SCIENCE (UNLESS THERE IS PROFIT IN IT) — ESPECIALLY IN THE LAND WHERE MORE THAN HALF OF ITS CITIZENS DO NOT BELIEVE IN EVOLUTION AND THREE QUARTER OF THE REST DON'T CARE.

Bring Home the Message: Environmentalists could do more to bring home the message about climate chaos by using the concerns that galvanize people: children, work, religion, health. Weather, for instance, hits home.

ENVIRONMENTALISTS ARE DOING SO ALL THE TIME, BUT THE REFRAMING OF THE "DEBATE" (THERE SHOULD BE NO DEBATE — IT'S SCIENCE VERSUS FLAT EARTH THEORY) BY THE MEDIA HAS CREATED A KNOWLEDGE-WALL SO THE TRUTH DOES NOT COME OUT — PROTECTING THEIR ADVERTISERS WHO HAVE MOSTLY INTERESTS IN CARBON USAGE.

Reframe Global Warming as an Air Pollution Problem: Polls show over and over again that Americans support air pollution controls.

REFRAMING THE DEBATE IN SUCH A WAY WOULD BE A CON. SCIENCE COULD NOT CALL CO2 OR METHANE AS "POLLUTANTS" IN THE 'QUITE SMALL" QUANTITIES THAT WE RELEASE IN THE ATMOSPHERE. BUT THESE SMALL QUANTITIES — NOT NEGLIGEABLE AND ADDED TO THE NATURAL CYCLES (NEARLY DOUBLED SINCE 1900) STRONGLY AFFECT THE PERFORMANCE OF HEAT IN THE ATMOSPHERE.

Read more: http://ideas.time.com/2011/10/20/how-global-warming-fell-off-the-national-agenda/#ixzz1bUn5zez7

"These are fascinating, low-temperature ecosystems with wonderful, amazing things to be discovered. So most of the series is about that, but if you're going do it as thoroughly as we hoped to, you have to at some stage address the question of whether or not we are damaging it, or it's disappearing or changing. I won't say that we were reluctant to do so because that wouldn't be true, but it was not the prime motive."

And so, in the final programme, Attenborough appears on location, talking to camera in his own measured words about shrinking glaciers, warming oceans, and the threat posed by man-made global warming. "The polar bear is the easy one, it's a very charismatic animal that people can identify with," he says. "It's beautiful, and also savage; it's got a lot going for it. But it's only a white grizzly bear, really. All these big issues need a mascot and that's what the polar bear is. But climate change is going to affect us much more profoundly than the loss of the polar bear."

http://www.guardian.co.uk/tv-and-radio/2011/oct/21/david-attenborough-frozen-planet-climate-change

The Earth's surface really is getting warmer, a new analysis by a US scientific group set up in the wake of the "Climategate" affair has concluded.

The Berkeley Earth Project has used new methods and some new data, but finds the same warming trend seen by groups such as the UK Met Office and Nasa.

The project received funds from sources that back organisations lobbying against action on climate change.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-15373071

 

American readers may get the impression that Australia’s introduction of a carbon tax plan is indicative of a national embrace of environmentally progressive policies. In fact, the tax has been nothing if not controversial. The main opposition party, backed by an increasingly hysterical right-wing media, has virulently opposed the tax. As a result, the current government, a fragile coalition, has seen its political capital plummet.

The Labor Party now faces likely defeat at the next election. In these overheated times, American and Australian politics have this in common: take a stance to slow global warming and risk political suicide.

LEE WALLACE
Paris, Oct. 16, 2011

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/24/opinion/shifting-attitudes-on-global-warming.html?_r=1

An unseasonable snowstorm may bring up to 10 inches (25 cm) of early snowfall to the US East Coast this weekend.

The National Weather Service (NWS) has issued a winter storm warning from Saturday morning into Sunday and says travel conditions may be hazardous.

Connecticut Governor Dannel Malloy has warned some residents could lose power, while NWS meteorologist Bill Simpson said the snowfall could break records.

In 1979, southern New England received a record 7.5 inches of snow in October.

A region of low pressure brewing off the mid-Atlantic coast is expected to produce heavy, wet snow as it moves north-east, the NWS said.

The Massachusetts Berkshires, north-western Connecticut and southern New Hampshire could see the most snow.

But mountainous areas in Pennsylvania could see as much as six to 10 inches of snow while more than six inches of snow are predicted to fall in Maine on Saturday night.

http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/world-us-canada-15502380

More Than a Million Lose Power as Snow Coats Region
By ELIZABETH A. HARRIS, COLIN MOYNIHAN and JESS BIDGOOD

 

A rare winter storm bearing ferocious winds and wet snow rolled into the Northeast on Saturday, knocking out power for more than a million customers and threatening to topple October snowfall records in several states. Parts of Pennsylvania, New Jersey and southern New England received an unexpected fall guest: nearly a foot of drift.

“Along with snow we’re going to have wind and high seas,” said Charlie Foley, a meteorologist for the National Weather Service. “We seem to have hit the jackpot. It is unusual to have something like this before Halloween.”

By evening, Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey had declared a state of emergency for the entire state, where he said more than 500,000 people had already lost power. For areas in Westchester County and Connecticut, whose residents have been slammed repeatedly in recent years by unexpectedly severe storms, some found it difficult to even navigate home to check on their properties, from trips into Manhattan as the storm kicked in.

In New York City and Westchester and on Long Island, more than 786,737 were without power, according to local utilities, with 201,243 people powerless in Pennsylvania.

About 7 p.m., Connecticut Light and Power reported that 480,419 customers were without power.

Ten inches of snow had fallen in the Lehigh Valley in Pennsylvania, and in Lee, Mass., the salt trucks were out and people were already lining up to buy gas for their generators.

http://www.nytimes.com/2011/10/30/us/northeast-braced-for-noreaster-and-early-snow.html?hp=&pagewanted=print