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No smoking hot spot
David Evans
The Australian
Tuesday 22nd July, 2008
I DEVOTED six years to carbon accounting, building models for the Australian Greenhouse Office. I am the rocket scientist who wrote the carbon accounting model (FullCAM) that measures Australia’s compliance with the Kyoto Protocol, in the land use change and forestry sector.
FullCAM models carbon flows in plants, mulch, debris, soils and agricultural products, using inputs such as climate data, plant physiology and satellite data. I’ve been following the global warming debate closely for years.
When I started that job in 1999 the evidence that carbon emissions caused global warming seemed pretty good: CO2 is a greenhouse gas, the old ice core data, no other suspects.
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The evidence was not conclusive, but why wait until we were certain when it appeared we needed to act quickly? Soon government and the scientific community were working together and lots of science research jobs were created. We scientists had political support, the ear of government, big budgets, and we felt fairly important and useful (well, I did anyway). It was great. We were working to save the planet.
But since 1999 new evidence has seriously weakened the case that carbon emissions are the main cause of global warming, and by 2007 the evidence was pretty conclusive that carbon played only a minor role and was not the main cause of the recent global warming. As Lord Keynes famously said, “When the facts change, I change my mind. What do you do, sir?”
There has not been a public debate about the causes of global warming and most of the public and our decision makers are not aware of the most basic salient facts:
1. The greenhouse signature is missing. We have been looking and measuring for years, and cannot find it.
Each possible cause of global warming has a different pattern of where in the planet the warming occurs first and the most. The signature of an increased greenhouse effect is a hot spot about 10km up in the atmosphere over the tropics. We have been measuring the atmosphere for decades using radiosondes: weather balloons with thermometers that radio back the temperature as the balloon ascends through the atmosphere. They show no hot spot. Whatsoever.
If there is no hot spot then an increased greenhouse effect is not the cause of global warming. So we know for sure that carbon emissions are not a significant cause of the global warming. If we had found the greenhouse signature then I would be an alarmist again.
When the signature was found to be missing in 2007 (after the latest IPCC report), alarmists objected that maybe the readings of the radiosonde thermometers might not be accurate and maybe the hot spot was there but had gone undetected. Yet hundreds of radiosondes have given the same answer, so statistically it is not possible that they missed the hot spot.
Recently the alarmists have suggested we ignore the radiosonde thermometers, but instead take the radiosonde wind measurements, apply a theory about wind shear, and run the results through their computers to estimate the temperatures. They then say that the results show that we cannot rule out the presence of a hot spot. If you believe that you’d believe anything.
2. There is no evidence to support the idea that carbon emissions cause significant global warming. None. There is plenty of evidence that global warming has occurred, and theory suggests that carbon emissions should raise temperatures (though by how much is hotly disputed) but there are no observations by anyone that implicate carbon emissions as a significant cause of the recent global warming.
3. The satellites that measure the world’s temperature all say that the warming trend ended in 2001, and that the temperature has dropped about 0.6C in the past year (to the temperature of 1980). Land-based temperature readings are corrupted by the “urban heat island” effect: urban areas encroaching on thermometer stations warm the micro-climate around the thermometer, due to vegetation changes, concrete, cars, houses. Satellite data is the only temperature data we can trust, but it only goes back to 1979. NASA reports only land-based data, and reports a modest warming trend and recent cooling. The other three global temperature records use a mix of satellite and land measurements, or satellite only, and they all show no warming since 2001 and a recent cooling.
4. The new ice cores show that in the past six global warmings over the past half a million years, the temperature rises occurred on average 800 years before the accompanying rise in atmospheric carbon. Which says something important about which was cause and which was effect.
None of these points are controversial. The alarmist scientists agree with them, though they would dispute their relevance.
The last point was known and past dispute by 2003, yet Al Gore made his movie in 2005 and presented the ice cores as the sole reason for believing that carbon emissions cause global warming. In any other political context our cynical and experienced press corps would surely have called this dishonest and widely questioned the politician’s assertion.
Until now the global warming debate has merely been an academic matter of little interest. Now that it matters, we should debate the causes of global warming.
So far that debate has just consisted of a simple sleight of hand: show evidence of global warming, and while the audience is stunned at the implications, simply assert that it is due to carbon emissions.
In the minds of the audience, the evidence that global warming has occurred becomes conflated with the alleged cause, and the audience hasn’t noticed that the cause was merely asserted, not proved.
If there really was any evidence that carbon emissions caused global warming, don’t you think we would have heard all about it ad nauseam by now?
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11 Responses to “No smoking hot spot”
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July 22nd, 2008 at 10:17 am
Im still trying to convince everyone around me that there is no global warming…that ice caps on all planets or moons are receding and that most scientists protest the very idea as false…but Al Gores fucking movie is somehow gospel to everyone. I don’t understand what is so difficult to believe about it…and even after Gores mention of a carbon tax..people still don’t see what it’s about. I’m tired of trying to reach people who don’t wanna know the truth, so for all you bush supporters and blind masses of sheeple with those ribbons on your cars…GO DIG A HOLE, CLIMB INTO YOUR PLASTIC BIO-COFFINS AND DIE.
July 22nd, 2008 at 10:52 am
As a native New Orleanian, someone who lived through Hurricane Katrina and continues to live there, I have always been angered over the use of our devastation in Al Gore’s An Inconvenient Truth. If you watch the film you’ll notice that he uses Katrina as an example of the devastating storms that will wreck our shores in the near future due to increased carbon emissions. Anyone who paid an ounce of attention to the facts knows that New Orleans was destroyed by our flawed and neglected levee and canal systems (we actually made it through the storm itself without much damage). The more I read articles written by experts such as David Evans and the more that I learn about Al Gore’s plan to combat global warming (more taxes – hooray!) the angrier I get. Perhaps if the solutions to the global warming problem actually addressed the environment and not my bank account I might still be for making this a priority.
I also become more depressed at moments like this because it is another sign that it is hard to know where truth lies and who you can trust. Science, it seems, is not a realm dominated by logic with goals of discovering the mysteries of our world and improving life for us on Earth. Rather it is just another political tool swung high above the heads of our “leaders” and brought down upon our heads.
While I am not an environmental expert, I am aware of how we continue to abuse the Earth, and more to the point – ourselves (the planet will definitely survive us), through the use of chemical toxins and the creation of more and more waste (something no one can deny). I’m very happy to have read this article so that I can inform my diehard green friends that perhaps we have been mislead on this note and, even worse, distracted from much greater problems affecting our planet, our health, and our future.
So as not to get bogged down with feelings of hopelessness, I believe the solution to problems like this is to continue to listen, learn and remain abreast of all facets of the debate as much as we can. But also to speak up when we realize that no one else sees that the emperor’s butt is bare to the wind.
July 22nd, 2008 at 11:25 am
I tried to argue about global warming possibly being a myth at work once. (I am not 100% its a fraud but I am leaning towards it being) The person I told this to got FURIOUS! They said, “You can’t argue with that. It’s a FACT! You can’t argue with FACTS!” Kinda reminded me of Bill Clinton’s “How Dare you?!”. At least be willing to argue it for gods sake!
It’s sad that we live in a world where global warming skepticism is
comparable to holocaust denial. ie-nutjob
July 22nd, 2008 at 11:46 am
global warming sucks
end of conversation.
don’t worry. if global warming is a hoax then there is always bird flu or the bird flu vaccinations will kill us for sure. they got us all dead about a half dozen ways lol
in the meantime we keep living our lives
and it is just a matter of courtesy to bring our vehicles toxic emissions down as close to zero as possible.
i mean smog is not a hoax
and if you run your car in your closed garage long enough you will die.
and besides it is so unnecessary.
people are having their nitrous and carbon emissions go down towards zero from installing Water4Gas
oh, btw, it improved my gas mileage by 110% also!
GARKO
http://mywater4gasengine.com
July 22nd, 2008 at 3:57 pm
I simply cannot understand why the media simply does’nt destroy the GW nonsense once and for all…and in the process the reputations of the good and the great.
Governmants would fall.
Oh what fun!
July 22nd, 2008 at 6:52 pm
Everyone who has posted here so far is an idiot.
30 seconds with Google would have exposed the lies this “scientist” – in reality an electrical engineer who has NEVER studied climatology or climate modeling.
It never ceases to amaze me that people who wouldn’t believe the MSM’s take on war or economics, suddenly change their minds when it comes to their own comfort.
You lot will believe ANYTHING as long as you personally aren’t affected by the consequences. Well, in this case one of you may very well have, and STILL can’t see the truth.
And yet you lot also want me to believe that the PUBLIC is smart enough to determine the truth by calling for “public debate” rather than “good science” (of course if you called for and got “good science”, your argument would be flushed down the crapper where it belongs).
Fools and slaves, the lot of you.
July 22nd, 2008 at 6:54 pm
Stupid commentiong system that requires a second person to post before the last person to post’s post actually shows…
July 22nd, 2008 at 9:12 pm
Karmakaze:
The MSM opposes the human-caused Global Warming theory? Hardly. The MSM jumped on the Global Warming bandwagon a long time ago.
You do know that nearly all of the scientists who support the theory of human-caused Global Warming ARE NOT climatologists, don’t you? And that most actual climatologists don’t believe in the theory of human-caused Global Warming?
July 23rd, 2008 at 12:39 am
Global Warming has been around since the 1880’s even though at that time is was considered to be just a curiosity. The calculations at the time indicated that the planet should have increased by 1 degree C by 1940 and it did not.
When Mrs. Margret Thacker (now Lady Thacker) became the UK Prime Minister in 1979 everything changed. This was at a time when most scientists were still talking about the impending doom of Global Cooling and predictions of another ice age. Mrs. Thacker, though she won an election, didn’t have any credibility on the world stage. After all she was only ever a junior minister (Education Secretary in the Heath administration,)
Sir Crispin Tickell, UK Ambassador to the UN, suggested a solution to the problem. He pointed out that almost all international statesmen are scientifically illiterate, so a scientifically literate politician could win any summit debate on a matter which seemed to depend on scientific understandings. And Mrs. Thatcher had a BSc degree in chemistry. (This is probably the most important fact in the entire global warming issue; i.e. Mrs. Thatcher had a BSc degree in chemistry). Sir Crispin pointed out that if a ‘scientific’ issue was to gain international significance, then the UK’s Prime Minister could easily take a prominent role, and this could provide credibility for her views on other world affairs. He suggested that Mrs. Thatcher should campaign about global warming at each summit meeting. She did, and the tactic worked. Mrs. Thatcher rapidly gained the desired international respect and the UK became the prime promoter of the global warming issue.
Overseas politicians began to take notice of Mrs. Thatcher’s campaign if only to try to stop her disrupting summit meetings. They brought the matter to the attention of their civil servants for assessment, and they reported that – although scientifically dubious – ‘global warming’ could be economically important. The USA is the world’s most powerful economy and is the most intensive energy user. If all countries adopted ‘carbon taxes’, or other universal proportionate reductions in industrial activity, each non-US industrialized country would gain economic benefit over the United States. So, many politicians from many countries joined with Mrs. Thatcher in expressing concern at global warming and a political bandwagon began to roll. Mrs. Thatcher had raised an international policy issue and thus become an influential international politician.
Mrs. Thatcher could not have promoted the global warming issue without the support of her UK political party. And they were willing to give it. Following the General Election of 1979, most of the incoming Cabinet had been members of the government which lost office in 1974. They blamed the National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) for their 1974 defeat. They, therefore, desired an excuse for reducing the UK coal industry and, thus, the NUM’s power. Coal-fired power stations emit CO2 but nuclear power stations don’t. Global warming provided an excuse for reducing the UK’s dependence on coal by replacing it with nuclear power.
And the Conservative Party wanted a large UK nuclear power industry for another reason. That industry’s large nuclear processing facilities were required for the UK’s nuclear weapons program and the opposition Labour Party was then opposing the Conservative Party’s plans to upgrade the UK’s nuclear deterrent with Trident missiles and submarines. Unfortunately, the Three Mile Island and Chernobyl accidents had damaged public confidence in nuclear technology. Then, privatization of the UK’s electricity supply industry exposed the secret that UK nuclear electricity cost four times more than UK coal-fired electricity. Global warming became the only remaining excuse for the unpopular nuclear power facilities needed for nuclear weapons. Mrs. Thatcher had to be seen to spend money at home if her international campaign was to be credible.
So, early in her global warming campaign – and at her personal instigation – the UK’s Hadley Centre for Climate Prediction and Research was established, and the science and engineering research councils were encouraged to place priority in funding climate-related research. This cost nothing because the UK’s total research budget was not increased; indeed, it fell because of cuts elsewhere. But the Hadley Centre sustained its importance and is now the operating agency for the IPCC’s scientific working group (Working Group 1). Most scientists’ work depends on funds fully or partly provided by governments. Also, all scientists compete to obtain their share of this limited resource. Available research funds were shrinking, and global warming had become the ‘scientific’ issue of most interest to governments. Hence, any case for funding support tended to include reference to global warming whenever possible. Much science in many fields may be conducted under the guise of a relationship to global warming. Activities which have obtained funds by this method include biology, meteorology, computer science, physics, chemistry, climatology, oceanography, civil engineering, process engineering, forestry, astronomy, and several other disciplines. Now, funds for this work are provided to most UK Universities and several commercial research establishments.
Much peer pressure deters scientists from damaging potential sources of research funds. There is especial pressure – loss of future career – to avoid being the first to proclaim the scientific truth of global warming and thus damage the research funding of colleagues. But failure to proclaim the scientific truth does not mean that many scientists believe in the global warming hypothesis. In 1992 – at the height of the global warming scare – Greenpeace International conducted a survey of the world’s 400 leading climatologists. Greenpeace had hoped to publicize the results of that survey in the run-up to the Rio summit, but when they completed the survey, they gave very little publicity to its results. In response to the survey, only 15 climatologists were willing to say they believed in global warming, although all climatologists rely on it for their employment. Also, the Leipzig Declaration disputes the IPCC assertions about man-made global warming. It was drafted following the Leipzig Climate Conference in November 1995 and has been signed by over 1,500 scientists from around the world.
The global warming issue is political. It induced the ‘Earth Summit’ that was attended by several Heads of State in Rio de Janeiro during June 1992 and is the reason for the Kyoto Summit in Japan in December 1997. Governments have a variety of motives for interest in global warming. Each government has its own special interests in global warming but, in all cases, the motives relate to economic policies. In general, the USA fears loss of economic power to other nations while this is desired by those other nations. Universal adoption of ‘carbon taxes’, or other universal proportionate reductions in industrial activity, would provide relative benefit to the other nations. Unfortunately, if a few nations adopted the changes they would increase their manufacturing, transportation and energy costs and thus lose economic competitiveness and industrial activity to all other nations. Developing nations cannot afford technological and economic advances that would benefit them and also reduce their increases to CO2 emissions as they develop, so they are seeking gifted technology transfers and economic aid from developed countries.
The press is interested in selling papers and the TV companies want to gain viewers. Threat of world-wide disaster makes a good story, and the statements and actions of politicians together with great increase in scientific publications gave global warming an apparent authority. The media began to proclaim the worst imagined horrors. For example, massive floods were predicted due to melting of polar ice, and one UK TV program went so far as to assert that the polar bears would die out because their habitat would melt. The public rely on the media to provide them with their information, so they came to believe the global warming scare because they were only given one side of the story. Politicians respond to public concern, so the politician’s actions began to gain popular support.
On face value global warming is an environmental issue. Many environmentalists joined the bandwagon. Governments were offering money and the public were concerned at global warming. Any environmental issue which could be linked to global warming was said to be involved in the matter. But the environmentalist interest was aroused by the impact of the issue. Contrary to common belief, environmentalists did not raise awareness of global warming, they responded to it. Simply, environmentalist organizations were part of the general public and decided to use the issue when it became useful to them.
The UK Government lost interest in global warming when Mr John Major replaced Mrs. Thatcher as Prime Minister. The flow of Government money began to stop for conduct of global warming research. UK scientists then began to speak out in denial of the global warming hypothesis. It seemed that the issue was dying a natural death. Then the ‘coal crisis’ arose in October 1992 when the public protested at the scale of pit closures. This gave the UK Government a new need to find an excuse for its policy of closing coal mines. Global warming fitted this need and so the Government committed £16,000,000 to an advertising campaign which scare mongered about global warming, and re-established the funding priorities for climate research.
Later, at the start of May 1997, the Conservative Party lost office to the Labour Party and Mr Tony Blair became UK Prime Minister. The UK had initiated the global warming issue and a change of UK policy may have had a significant effect on the widespread imagined risk, but by then the global warming issue had become important in its own right. Many countries had a stated global warming policy, 122 of them had signed a declaration of intent to reduce CO2 emissions at the Rio Summit, and the Kyoto Summit was scheduled. The UK was one of the very few countries that had reduced its CO2 emissions since the Rio Summit because the UK had replaced coal-fired generating capacity by gas-fired generating capacity. This provided the UK with a position of authority in this international affair, and Mr Blair committed the new UK government to strict action to cut CO2 emissions.
July 23rd, 2008 at 9:12 am
@Gregory Fegel
“The MSM opposes the human-caused Global Warming theory? Hardly. The MSM jumped on the Global Warming bandwagon a long time ago.”
Bollocks. The MSM has consistently acted in a rear guard fashion, fighting for every last piece of real estate, but have been slowly pushed back over the years.
“You do know that nearly all of the scientists who support the theory of human-caused Global Warming ARE NOT climatologists, don’t you? And that most actual climatologists don’t believe in the theory of human-caused Global Warming?”
More bollocks. Name ten of them. Every single time I think I’m about to read an anti-AGW climatologists view, it turns out he or she is an Electrical Engineer, or Journalist posing as a climatologist, or any number of other fields that have zero to do with climatology. The one or two actual climatologists who step forward are quickly debunked and often proven to be in cahoots with the very people benefiting form pouring tons of CO2 into our atmosphere.
But go ahead, prove me wrong – name some of these “most climatologists”.
July 23rd, 2008 at 9:21 am
@GaryCol
So Maggie invented AGW? And thousands of scientists world wide suddenly fell in love with her and decided to lie their asses off for 2 decades?
Pull the other one, it has bells on it.