» Home > In the News

Fun and Games

22 September 2017
Climate change

A paper in Nature Geoscience has sparked fun and games in the climate science fraternity. Various tabloid newspapers have enjoyed using it to show climate models really have a warming bias which has upset the authors it would seem – but that is what they said in the paper. Its wiggle time it seems and Ben Webster in The Times (Sept 19th 2017) nicely sums some of the issues. He says, 'We were wrong, climate scientists concede'. The world has warmed more slowly than computer models allowed – which are on the hot side. Joe Public has known this for years – but the CAGW crowd have spent the same amount of time changing reality. It seems they may well be the real deniers – not the sceptics (who have been pointing out the bias for years). New forecasts, bowing down to the political reality that Europe is not meeting its co2 reduction targets, concede that warming is moving slowly and we might, after all, not be faced with such a nightmare as the models predict. Politicos have more of a chance over a longer period of time to reach the Paris Accord goals. Have climate scientists shifted the goal posts on purpose in order to keep the Paris Agreement on track? It is all very suspicious behaviour – and these people have lots of form, as they say about old lags. Nevertheless, so engrossed with dabbling with numbers were they that they didn't realise they had shot themselves in the foot – by coming right out and saying the models were inflated. Nobody in Joe Public can be fooled anymore. It's writ loud and clear – in Nature Geoscience. Only people with blinkers can be fooled in the future – but I suppose if you want to believe something you will, even when the priests of your cult tell you its all a lot of cobblers. Michael Grubb, professor of energy and climate change at University College in London and one of the study authors admitted previous predictions have been wrong – which is a bit of an understatement. He actually said back in 2015 (at the Paris summit) 'all the evidence from the past 15 years leads me to conclude that actually delivering 1.5C is incompatible with democracy' – the reference being that a government like China, which was able to dictate, could better deliver a co2 reduction. Here in the West we are hampered by politicians with rival views – and some of these were opposed to climate change regulations. Meanwhile, China is the source of massive co2 emissions yet the Paris accord allowed them an indefinite time to 'catch up with the West' even though it is obvious China is making millions out of solar panels and wind turbines and is egging the West for all its worth as it wants to keep the cash cow going for as long as it takes. Grubb must live in a parallel universe to the rest of the people living in this country if he seriously thought we should ditch democracy in order to stitch up the economy and spoil the future for millions people. Is academia going whacky?

It would seem Grubb may have changed the thrust of his argument as he is now saying that it is less difficult to reach the desired target – as there is now more time to do this. Smacks of compromise in order to keep the toes of the politicos in front of the bunsen burner. However, it backfired as it admitted the models were completely useless as a predictor of the future. So intent were they to give elbow room to the politicos and keep Paris as a relevancy they didn't look at the significance of what they had written down for all to see. Too clever by half.

Myles Allen of Oxford University, another co-author, said, 'we haven't seen that rapid acceleration in warming after 2000 that we see in the models. We haven't seen it in observations …'. This is taking the proverbial Michael. Climate models extrapolated the extra heat produced by a very big El Nino event in the late 90s – no wonder they could not reproduce it in the 2000s. Did they really think the models through? Did they really think they could pull the wool over the eyes of everyone? 

David Whitehouse at www.thegwpf.com/climate-change-will-take-longer-say-scientists/ … said, 'climate change will take longer, say scientists' (which sums it up to a tee). The paper in Geoscience says global warming will take longer than the IPCC predicted it would (in its last major report). The new goal posts, you may note, take many of the culprits of alarmism well beyond retirement age – safely tucked up in bed in a care home when it all goes pop. No sign of humility though – but the desire to keep the gravy train rolling for a few more years is clear as daylight.

Benny Peiser at www.thegwpf.com/told-you-so-how-the-ipcc-hid-the-good-news-on-global-war… …  (Sept 18th 2017) refers to a GWPF report made 3 years ago, 'Oversensitive: How the IPCC  hid the good news on global warming' written by Nic Lewis and Dutch science writer Marcel Crok. It was obvious that long ago that the models were not agreeing with observations and yet the IPCC report buried it, out of sight and out of mind. Suddenly, the scientists want to bring it out of hibernation in order to coax the politicos to keep onboard with CAGW by saying there will be 1.3 to 1.4 warming over a 70 year period, and 'the observational evidence strongly suggests that climate models display too much sensitivity to co2 concentrations and in almost all cases exaggerate the likely path of global warming'. This appears to indicate co2 hysterics are misplaced and it has less effect than climate scientists have predicted. 

Graham Stringer MP has received an apology from the BBC after Adam Rutherford on Radio 4s 'Inside Science' programme trashed him and encouraged CAGW fanatics on social media to write to their MP and get them to oppose his re-election to the science and technology committee. His sin – he was a sceptic. The fact he is one of only a handful  of MPs with a science degree did not matter – and no wonder. It is easier to manipulate MPs without any knowledge of science – especially when it comes to atmospheric science. This very public statement of retraction is another downtick in the same week as the Nature Geoscience paper was released. Have the BBC realised all might not be well and have people like Rutherford been getting away with blue murder for years?

Benny Peiser, speaking at the University of Birmingham, (lecture theatre G35) had more to say on the Geoscience paper, in a lecture with the title, 'Climate Realism – a lukewarm approach to global warming'.

So much for the fun. The games are equally as good. Over at www.theguardian.com/environment/2017/sep/21/when-media-sceptics-misrepre… … is a reaction by Myles Allen and Richard Miller, two of the co-authors, and it seems they really did not like the fun that was had in the tabloids – picking up on their contradictions. It was they who said the models were running too hot. Media has been slavishing lapping up the CAGW output for years – but it seems that bubble might now have been burst, solely because the likes of Allen and Miller didn't twig they had made a serious error by admitting the models were hopelessly inadequate for the job they are supposed to do. Trying to backtrack after the train has left the station ain't very convincing. It seems they failed to realise the tabloids have a knack of digging deep to make a headline. They only have themselves to blame. It seems they especially did not like James Delingpole, arch sceptic, writing in The Sun newspaper, or that of Graham Stringer in the Daily Mail. The authors of the paper were unable to see that by shifting the goal posts they have undermined the models.

At https://wattsupwiththat.com/2017/09/21/scientists-go-after-the-media-for… … written by Michael Bastasch of the Daily Caller News Foundation (a US media company). Bastasch says, 'climate scientists have rushed to criticise a study published in the journal Nature Geoscience which found that less warming in the early 21st century suggests it's slightly easier – though still difficult- to meet the goals of the Paris accord'. Further, he says, 'one would think climate scientists, especially those alarmed about warming, would see this as positive, but prominent researchers were quick to to express their scepticism of results questioning the integrity of climate models'. Who exactly is speaking with a forked tongue we might ask – the media or the climate science community? Michael Mann, he of the notorious hockey stick model, said he was 'rather sceptical' of the research – distancing himself from the authors. University of Reading's Ed Hawkins said media headlines 'have misinterpreted' the new study that questioned models relied on by the IPCC. Hawkins contributed to the IPCC 2013 Report. However, other scientists were more positive. Patrick Michaels and Chip Knappenberger noted climate models have been over hyping warming for decades whilst John Christy said climate models show 2.5 times more warming in the bulk atmosphere than has been observed. It has been known for a long time the models do not conform with reality. Satellite observations completely contradict the idea there has been any warming of significance apart from the two El Nino events, one in the late 90s and the other in 2015/6. Climate scientists even went so far as to show a straight line between the two El Nino peaks in order to prove warming was still taking place (ignoring the 15 to 17 years in between) which is what Hawkins alluded to in his negative response.

The comments on Watts are often interesting (but not always) with further links of interest. Apparently, it's all down to damage limitation, according to one fellow. Javier, at 10.30am, on page 12, says 'these people can't take back what they said. They just don't like that people can connect the dots and remember what they have been saying all along. Their 'Oops' moment at the reaction is added fun'.

Getting back to reality – at https://wattsupwiththat.com/2017/09/21/2014-hgs-presentation-climate-cha… …by guest author David Middleton. He refers back to 2014 and a presentation made to the Houston Geological Society by Dr Rusty Riese of Rice University. He produced a graph – see below. the red line is the model average – way above the satellite data and the balloon data …

   … Riese said the heat content of the atmosphere has remained largely unchanged since 1995. Data prepared and compiled by a number of climate scientists illustrate the wide divergence of climate model projections from what has been occurring. The climate has not been warming any more than would be expected as the world continues to move out of the Little Ice Age. Water vapour in the atmosphere is a more potent greenhouse gas than co2. Climatologists have understood this for decades and this is a fact clearly expressed in all climatology textbooks. None of the climate models employed today adequately address the influence of water vapour. Cosmic radiation is the source of the particles which cause water droplet nucleation and cloud formation in the upper atmosphere. Its flux, in turn, is directly influenced by solar activity and the strength of the resulting solar wind. None of the climate models deal with either of these first-order climate influences.. A pretty damning view of the models.

Skip to content