Observatorio ARVAL

Climate Change ("Global Warming"?)

The cyclic nature of Earth's climate

"Weather is climate. More specifically, aggregations of weather are climate. Means, averages, and distributions of daily weather comprise climate."
See Actually, Weather Is Climate (William M. Briggs, Statistician & Consultant. Jan. 22, '10)

Climate is long-range weather, it is a description of the average or prevailing weather in each season along the years. Climate varies widely among different regions on Earth. Also, in some regions it varies more or less widely with the seasons.

Predicting the weather for a particular region, even for a few days in advance, is one of the most complex problems in science. One basis for these predictions is that weather changes slowly, so tomorrow's weather will be similar to today's weather and so on (but with less certainty the further we go on). Also, that weather tends to repeat seasonally, for each region, changing slowly with the years.

The most obvious local cycle in the weather pattern is diurnal, basically controlled by the Sun. The warmest time of the day is usually after noon, after receiving the highest energy influx. The coldest is usually before dawn, after cooling all night.

The second cycle in importance is yearly, also controlled by the amount of energy received from the Sun. The warmest days occur in the summer and the coldest in the winter, when one hemisphere is tilted towards the Sun while the other is tilted away. The axis of the Earth is currently tilted 23.5° in respect to its orbital plane.

Then there is the cycle of activity of the Sun itself, some 11 years, but not very constant in length or intensity. Some of the effects of the Solar activity on the Earth's atmosphere are now just beginning to be studied. The reconstructions of ancient climates reveal a close correlation between Solar activity and temperatures on Earth. The correlation between Solar activity plus oceanic heat transport and temperatures is much more closer than the correlation between the abundance of carbon dioxide (CO₂) and temperatures.
Presently, at the beginning of 2010, we are near a minimum of the Solar cycle (December 2008) that was "late to arrive", the next Solar maximum is now expected to occur in May 2013.
See Solar Cycle Progression and Prediction Center (NOAA / NWS Space Weather Prediction Center)

"The Maunder Minimum: Early records of sunspots indicate that the Sun went through a period of inactivity in the late 17th century. Very few sunspots were seen on the Sun from about 1645 to 1715 (JPEG image, 38 Kb). Although the observations were not as extensive as in later years, the Sun was in fact well observed during this time and this lack of sunspots is well documented. This period of solar inactivity also corresponds to a climatic period called the "Little Ice Age" when rivers that are normally ice-free froze and snow fields remained year-round at lower altitudes. There is evidence that the Sun has had similar periods of inactivity in the more distant past. The connection between solar activity and terrestrial climate is an area of on-going research."
See The Sunspot Cycle (Solar Physics, Marshall Space Flight Center)

The 'Variable Sun':

For some years now, an unorthodox idea has been gaining favor among astronomers. It contradicts old teachings and unsettles thoughtful observers, especially climatologists.

"The Sun", explains Lika Guhathakurta of NASA headquarters in Washington DC, "is a variable star".

"It's not even 11 years", says Guhathakurtha. "The cycle ranges in length from 9 to 12 years. Some cycles are intense, with many sunspots and solar flares; others are mild, with relatively little solar activity. In the 17th century, during a period called the 'Maunder Minimum', the cycle appeared to stop altogether for about 70 years and no one knows why."

There is no need to go so far back in time, however, to find an example of the cycle's unpredictability. Right now the sun is climbing out of a century-class solar minimum that almost no one anticipated.

"The depth of the solar minimum in 2008-2009 really took us by surprise", says sunspot expert David Hathaway of the Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama. "It highlights how far we still have to go to successfully forecast solar activity."

Astronomers were once so convinced of the Sun's constancy, they called the irradiance of the sun "the solar constant", and they set out to measure it as they would any constant of Nature. By definition, the solar constant is the amount of solar energy deposited at the top of Earth's atmosphere in units of watts per meter-squared. All wavelengths of radiation are included — radio, infrared, visible light, ultraviolet, x-rays and so on. The approximate value of the solar constant is 1,361 W/m².

"The 'Solar constant' is an oxymoron", says Judith Lean of the Naval Research Lab. "Satellite data show that the Sun's total irradiance rises and falls with the sunspot cycle by a significant amount."

At solar maximum, the sun is about 0.1% brighter than it is at solar minimum. That may not sound like much, but consider the following: A 0.1% change in 1,361 W/m² equals 1.4 Watts/m². Averaging this number over the spherical Earth and correcting for Earth's reflectivity yields 0.24 Watts for every square meter of our planet.

"Add it all up and you get a lot of energy", says Lean. "How this might affect weather and climate is a matter of — at times passionate — debate."

From Solar Dynamics Observatory: The 'Variable Sun' Mission [NASA Science. February 5, 2010]

See Solar Dynamics Observatory (SDO) [Launched on January 2010. NASA Goddard Space Flight Center]

See SDO Mission 2009's Channel [YouTube]

The Croll-Milankovitch Cycles:

"Variations in the intensity and timing of heat from the Sun are the most likely cause of glacial/interglacial cycles. This variability is partially driven by changes in the Sun's output, but is affected more strongly by variations in Earth's orbit."

"There are three major components of Earth's orbit about the Sun that contribute to changes in our climate. These are, the Precession of the Equinoxes, and changes in Axial Obliquity and Orbital Eccentricity.
The full cycle of equinox precession takes 25,800 years to complete. Presently, Earth is closest to the Sun in January and farther away in July.
Presently Earth's tilt is 23.5°, but the 41,000 year cycle varies from 22.1° to 24.5°.
Earth's orbit goes from measurably elliptical to nearly circular in a cycle that takes around 100,000 years."

"Individually, each of the three cycles affect insolation patterns. When taken together, they can partially cancel or reinforce each other in complicated ways."

See The Resilient Earth, Chapter 9, Variations In Earth's Orbit (.pdf Downloadable Book. Doug L. Hoffman & Allen Simmons, 2008 - Free)

Also see Milutin Milankovitch (1879-1958) (NASA Earth Observatory)

Extraterrestrial Climate Influence:

"Scientists have only recently come to suspect that cosmic rays have an important influence on Earth's climate. Cosmic rays are highly energetic charged particles that originate from various sources in outer space."
"Scientists have found a link between cosmic ray levels and thunderstorms. There is also a positive correlation between cosmic ray flux (CRF) and low-altitude cloud formation."
"Ions created in the troposphere by cosmic rays could provide a mechanism for cloud formation."
"The influence of galactic cosmic ray modulation is strongest on low-level clouds."
"When the Sun is active, its magnetic field is stronger and as a result fewer global cosmic rays (GCR) arrive in the vicinity of Earth."
"The variations of the cosmic ray flux, as predicted from the galactic model and as observed from the iron meteorites, are in sync with the occurrence of ice age epochs on Earth. The agreement is both in period and in phase."
"The inverse relationship between temperature and CRF is clear; when CRF rises, temperature falls, when CRF drops off, temperature climbs."
"The evidence of correlations between paleoclimate records and solar and cosmic ray activity indicators, suggests that extraterrestrial phenomena are responsible for climatic variability on time scales ranging from days to millennia."
"The movement of the solar system in and out of the spiral arms of the Milky Way galaxy is responsible for changes in the amount of cosmic rays impacting Earth's atmosphere."
"Cosmic Ray Flux variations explain more than two-thirds of the variance in the reconstructed temperature, making CRF variability the dominant climate driver over geologic time scales."
"It has been known for some time that a 62 ±3 million-year cycle in fossil diversity has persisted over the past 542 million years."
"Recently, it has been proposed that the cycle is caused by modulation of CRF due to the solar system's vertical oscillation in the galaxy, which has a period of around 64 million years."

"Decadal - Cosmic ray muons regulated by the Solar cycle. This accounts for temperature variability in sync with the 11 year sunspot cycle."
"Hundreds to thousands of years - Solar regulation of cosmic rays plus changes in Solar irradiance. This variability includes historical climate change as witnessed in the Little Ice Age and Medieval Warm Period."
"Tens to hundreds of thousands of years - The Croll-Milankovitch cycles that combine Earth's attitudinal and orbital variations. This variability drives the glacial-interglacial cycles during ice ages."
"Millions to hundreds of millions of years - The solar system's transit of the galactic spiral arms, causing variation in overall cosmic ray intensity. This variability regulates the cycles of ice ages and hot-house periods."

See The Resilient Earth, Chapter 11, Cosmic Rays (.pdf Downloadable Book. Doug L. Hoffman & Allen Simmons, 2008 - Free)

See The Svensmark Hypothesis (Calder's Updates, Nigel Calder)

El Niño and La Niña are natural oscillations of the ocean-atmosphere system in the tropical Pacific that have important consequences for weather around the globe. Current science can detect them, but not predict them in the long term.
They are part of a phenomenon known as El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO), a continual but irregular cycle (of about 3 to 7 years) of shifts in ocean and atmospheric conditions that affect the global climate.
El Niño is characterized by unusually warm ocean temperatures in the Equatorial Pacific, as opposed to La Niña, which is characterized by unusually cold ocean temperatures in the Equatorial Pacific.
Among these consequences is increased rainfall across the southern tier of the US and in Peru, which has caused destructive flooding, and drought in the West Pacific, sometimes associated with devastating brush fires in Australia.
The Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO) is a natural long-term fluctuation of the Pacific Ocean. The PDO waxes and wanes approximately every 20 to 30 years.
Even more irregular is the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) a large-scale mode of natural climate variability having large impacts on weather and climate in the North Atlantic region and surrounding continents.
Then there are the Madden-Julian Oscillation (MJO), the Arctic Oscillation (AO), the Pacific North American Pattern (PNA), and the Antarctic Oscillation (AAO), all contributing to natural global climate variability.

Negative values of the Multivariate ENSO Index (MEI) represent the cold ENSO phase (La Niña), while positive values of the MEI represent the warm phase (El Niño). See ESRL-PSD: Multivariate ENSO Index (Klaus Wolter, NOAA).

El Niño strengthened during December 2009, with above-average sea surface temperatures the central and eastern equatorial Pacific Ocean.
In 2010, according to the Tropical Meteorology Project of the University of Colorado, "We expect that the current trend from El Niño to neutral conditions will persist and that weak La Niña conditions will develop by the most active portion of this year's hurricane season (August-October)."

See Extended Range Forecast of Atlantic Seasonal Hurricane Activity and U.S. Landfall Strike Probability for 2010
(.pdf, June 2 '10)

"El Niño dissipated during May 2010 as positive surface temperature (SST) anomalies decreased rapidly across the equatorial Pacific Ocean and negative SST anomalies emerged across the eastern half of the Pacific."
See Climate Prediction Center: ENSO Diagnostic Discussion (3 June 2010, NOAA-NWS).

"El Niño events release heat from the tropical Pacific, and through ocean currents and changes in atmospheric circulation, they raise surface temperatures outside of the tropical Pacific."

"During La Niña events, the tropical Pacific releases less heat than normal, and global temperatures decline."

"La Niña events are a vital portion of the El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) coupled ocean-atmosphere process. La Niña events recharge the heat released from the tropical Pacific during the El Niño."

"Note that most La Niña events do not fully recharge the heat released by the El Niño events."

"During a La Niña event, tropical Pacific trade winds rise above normal levels. The increase in trade winds reduces cloud cover. Reduced cloud cover allows more Downward Shortwave Radiation (visible light) to warm the tropical Pacific."

"Contrary to the beliefs of anthropogenic warming proponents the 1997/98 El Niño was NOT fueled by a long-term accumulation of heat from manmade greenhouse gases.
The 1997/98 El Niño was strong enough to temporarily raise Global Lower Troposphere Temperature anomalies ~0.7°C."

"The La Niña event of 1973/74/75/76 provided the tropical Pacific Ocean Heat Content necessary for the increase in strength and frequency of El Niño events from 1976 to 1995. The 1995/96 La Niña furnished the Ocean Heat Content that served as fuel for the 1997/98 El Niño. And the 1998/99/00/01 La Niña recharged the tropical Pacific Ocean Heat Content after the 1997/98 El Niño, returning it to the new higher level established by the La Niña of 1995/96."

See Tisdale on the importance of El Nino's little sister - recharging ocean heat content (Bob Tisdale, Feb. 13 '10, Watts Up With That?).

See El Niño story, El Niño/Southern Oscillation (ENSO) (NOAA).
El Niño: online meteorology guide (WW2010, University of Illinois)
Tropical Atmosphere Ocean (TAO) Project (Global Tropical Moored Buoy Array, NOAA)
El Niño and La Niña: Tracing the Dance of Ocean and Atmosphere (The National Academies)

Global Warming: Natural or Manmade?

According to Dr. Roy Spencer, "Global warming" refers to the global-average temperature increase that has been observed over the last one hundred years or more. But to many politicians and the public, the term carries the implication that mankind is responsible for that warming. This website describes evidence from my group's government-funded research that suggests global warming is mostly natural, and that the climate system is quite insensitive to humanity's greenhouse gas emissions and aerosol pollution.

How atmospheric processes like clouds and precipitation systems respond to warming is critical, as they are either amplifying the warming, or reducing it. This website currently concentrates on the response of clouds to warming, an issue which I am now convinced the scientific community has totally misinterpreted when they have measured natural, year-to-year fluctuations in the climate system. As a result of that confusion, they have the mistaken belief that climate sensitivity is high, when in fact the satellite evidence suggests climate sensitivity is low.

See Global Warming: Natural or Manmade?
(Roy Spencer, Ph. D., Principal Research Scientist at the University of Alabama in Huntsville - UAH)

According to Dr. Roy Spencer, "most climate change might well be the result of .... the climate system itself!"
Because small, chaotic fluctuations in atmospheric and oceanic circulation systems can cause small changes in global average cloudiness, this is all that is necessary to cause climate change.

The less you know about how the climate system works, the more fragile the climate system looks to you.
If you simply assert that there are no natural causes of climate change, you will conclude that our climate system is precariously balanced on a knife edge.

A mostly-natural source of global warming is also consistent with mounting observational evidence that the climate system is much less sensitive to carbon dioxide emissions than the IPCC's climate models simulate.

See Global Warming as a Natural Response to Cloud Changes Associated with the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO) (Roy Spencer, Ph. D., Principal Research Scientist at the University of Alabama in Huntsville - UAH)

"Generally quoted uncertainty figures from studies going back to the start of the Holocene have temperature uncertainties in the range of ±3.0°C.
Even in more recent time frames, data quoted by the IPCC show temperature uncertainties that exceed the measured temperature increases for the last century.
In fact, the IPCC's projected increase falls within the uncertainty range of the data they based their predictions on."

"From studies of Antarctic ice cores going back half a million years, the average CO2 to temperature lag is 1,300 years ±1,000 years. Samples taken from around the end of the last glacial period indicate that the CO2 levels did not begin to rise until after the warming began."

"In results published in Science, a high-resolution deuterium profile is now available for the entire EPICA Dome C ice core. This profile allowed the construction of a climate record that extends back to 800,000 years before the present. The ice core has provided temperature data covering 11 glacial, and corresponding interglacial, periods. The authors used an atmospheric global climate model (GCM) to calculate an improved temperature record for the entire interval, finding temperatures during warm intervals as much as 8°F (4.5°C) warmer, and, during cold intervals, as much as 18°F (10°C) lower, than preanthropogenic Holocene values."

See The Resilient Earth, Chapter 13, Experimental Data and Error (.pdf Downloadable Book. Doug L. Hoffman & Allen Simmons, 2008 - Free)

Surface air temperatures have been of much interest lately, as some scientists have detected an accelerating 'global warming' trend since 1980, while others have detected more recently a significant slowing, and even a reversal of this trend since 2002, to near -2°C (-3.6°F) per century.

Global surface air temperature anomalies (-0.6 to +0.6 °C) from 1850 to 2010

See CRU Information Sheet no. 1: Global Temperature Record (March 2010, Phil Jones, Climatic Research Unit, University of East Anglia, UK)

See Don Easterbrook’s AGU paper on potential global cooling (Watts Up With That?, December 29 '08)

Predictions Of Global Mean Temperatures & IPCC Projections: (Dr. Girma Orssengo, April 27 '10)

"The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) claims that human emission of CO₂ causes catastrophic global warming."

"In this article, a mathematical model was developed that agrees with observed Global Mean Temperature Anomaly (GMTA), and its prediction shows global cooling by about 0.42 deg C until 2030. Also, comparison of observed increase in human emission of CO₂ with increase in GMTA during the 20th century shows no relationship between the two. As a result, the claim by the IPCC of climate catastrophe is not supported by the data."

"As a result, as year 2000 with GMTA of 0.48 deg C was the end of a global warming phase, it is also the start of a global cooling phase of 0.42 deg C in 30 years. As a result, the next GMTA turning point will be near 2000+30=2030 with GMTA of 0.48–0.42=0.06 deg C."

Figure 3. Comparison of observed Global Yearly Mean Temperature Anomaly (GMTA) with models.

Linear anomaly in deg C = 0.0059*(Year-1880) – 0.52   [Equation 1]

"Note that the increase in GMTA of 0.35 deg C from 1880 to 1940 (or from 1940 to 2000) in a 60 year period has a warming rate of 0.35/60=0.0058 deg per year, which is the slope of the linear anomaly given by Equation 1. As a result, the linear anomaly is not affected by CO₂ emission. Obviously, as the oscillating anomaly is cyclic, it is not related to the 5-fold increase in human emission of CO₂."

"One of the most important variables that affect global mean surface temperature is ocean current cycles. The rising of cold water from the bottom of the sea to its surface results in colder global mean surface temperature; weakening of this movement results in warmer global mean surface temperature. Various ocean cycles have been identified. The most relevant to global mean temperature turning points is the 20 to 30 years long ocean cycle called Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO):

Several independent studies find evidence for just two full PDO cycles in the past century: “cool” PDO regimes prevailed from 1890-1924 and again from 1947-1976, while “warm” PDO regimes dominated from 1925-1946 and from 1977 through (at least) the mid-1990's (Mantua et al. 1997, Minobe 1997).

These cool and warm PDO regimes correlate well with the cooling and warming phases of GMTA shown in Figure 3.

The model in Figure 3 predicts global cooling until 2030. This result is also supported by shifts in PDO that occurred at the end of the last century, which is expected to result in global cooling until about 2030."

See Predictions Of Global Mean Temperatures & IPCC Projections (Girma Orssengo, B. Tech, MASc, PhD. Watts Up With That?, April 27 '10)

See also A primer for disproving IPCC's theory of man made global warming using observed temperature data (Girma Orssengo, B. Tech, MASc, PhD. Watts Up With That?, August 1 '10)

The term 'global' should mean that every region shows the same trend.
The term 'global temperature' should be well defined and the relevant data made public.

Much attention has been given to the possible effect of the increase of 'heat retention gases' in our atmosphere; the atmospheric 'greenhouse effect', and its possible cause. There are a number of geologists and other Earth-science researchers that have concluded that the atmospheric 'greenhouse effect' is real and its increase has to be man-made; by CO₂ in particular, product of the recent industrial proliferation and its fossil-fuel energy demands.

But carbon dioxide is plant food, they use it to produce their energy and store it in their bodies. All animals produce it when they breathe, it is present in the interior of the Earth and surfaces during volcanic eruptions. The main store of available CO₂ is in the oceans, which give it off into the atmosphere when the temperature rises.

Other Earth-scientists have concluded that because, long before today's industrial age, there have been elevated levels of temperatures and 'heat retention gases' in our atmosphere repeating in a cyclical fashion, the Earth must now be doing what it always has done; warming and then cooling, the polar ice caps advancing and then retreating cyclically under the influence of the Sun, Earth's orbit and the ocean currents. They point out to the most recent global warming period around the middle ages when the climate warmed to include northern Europe having mild winters and very warm summers: the "Medieval Warm Period", from approximately A.D. 1000 to A.D. 1350. Then the Earth's climate was in a cool period from A.D. 1400 to about A.D. 1860, named the "Little Ice Age".
The "Holocene Maximum" was the warmest period in human history, from some 7,500 to some 4,000 years ago. Then the Earth cooled again till around year 1000.

Beginning about 18,000 years ago the Earth started warming up. Some 8,000 years ago the bridge between Asia and North America was submerged. During the past 750,000 years of Earth's history, Ice Ages have occurred at regular intervals, of approximately 100,000 years each.

See Global warming is all in the timescales (Thomas Fuller, SF Environmental Policy Examiner, Jul 22 '09)

See Shellfish could supplant tree-ring climate data (Richard A. Lovett, Nature News, Mar 8 '10)

See When the IPCC 'disappeared' the Medieval Warm Period (Frank Lansner, Watts Up With That?, Mar 10 '10)

The "Greenhouse Effect":

Svante Arrhenius (Physicist/Chemist, Sweden, 1859-1927) proposed in 1896 a theory to account for the Earth's the ice ages, he was the first scientist to speculate that changes in the levels of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere could substantially alter the surface temperature of the Earth through a "greenhouse effect".

He suggested that the human emission of CO₂ would be strong enough to prevent the world from entering a new ice age, and that a warmer earth would be needed to feed the rapidly increasing population. He was the first person to predict that emissions of carbon dioxide from the burning of fossil fuels and other combustion processes would cause global warming.

Arrhenius estimated that a halving of CO₂ would decrease temperatures by 4-5°C and a doubling of CO₂ would cause a temperature rise of 5-6°C. In his 1906 publication, Arrhenius adjusted the value downwards to 1.6°C (including water vapor feedback: 2.1°C). Recent estimates from IPCC (2007) say this value (the Climate Sensitivity) is likely to be between 2 and 4.5°C.

See Svante Arrhenius (Wikipedia)

"There appears to be a widespread belief that the comparatively high temperature produced within a closed space covered with glass, and exposed to solar radiation, results from a transformation of wave-length, that is, that the heat waves from the sun, which are able to penetrate the glass, fall upon the walls of the enclosure and raise its temperature: the heat energy is re-emitted by the walls in the form of much longer waves, which are unable to penetrate the glass, the greenhouse acting as a radiation trap."

"I have always felt some doubt as to whether this action played any very large part in the elevation of temperature. It appeared much more probable that the part played by the glass was the prevention of the escape of the warm air heated by the ground within the enclosure. If we open the doors of a greenhouse on a cold and windy day, the trapping of radiation appears to lose much of its efficacy."

"As a matter of fact I am of the opinion that a greenhouse made of a glass transparent to waves of every possible length would show a temperature nearly, if not quite, as high as that observed in a glass house. The transparent screen allows the solar radiation to warm the ground, and the ground in turn warms the air, but only the limited amount within the enclosure. In the 'open', the ground is continually brought into contact with cold air by convection currents."

"To test the matter I constructed two enclosures of dead black cardboard, one covered with a glass plate, the other with a plate of rock-salt of equal thickness. The bulb of a thermometer was inserted in each enclosure and the whole packed in cotton, with the exception of the transparent plates which were exposed."

"When exposed to sunlight the temperature rose gradually to 65°C, the enclosure covered with the salt plate keeping a little ahead of the other, owing to the fact that it transmitted the longer waves from the sun, which were stopped by the glass. In order to eliminate this action the sunlight was first passed through a glass plate. There was now scarcely a difference of one degree between the temperatures of the two enclosures. The maximum temperature reached was about 55°C. From what we know about the distribution of energy in the spectrum of the radiation emitted by a body at 55°C, it is clear that the rock-salt plate is capable of transmitting practically all of it, while the glass plate stops it entirely.
This shows us that the loss of temperature of the ground by radiation is very small in comparison to the loss by convection, in other words that we gain very little from the circumstance that the radiation is trapped."

"Is it therefore necessary to pay attention to trapped radiation in deducing the temperature of a planet as affected by its atmosphere?
The solar rays penetrate the atmosphere, warm the ground which in turn warms the atmosphere by contact and by convection currents. The heat received is thus stored up in the atmosphere, remaining there on account of the very low radiating power of a gas. It seems to me very doubtful if the atmosphere is warmed to any great extent by absorbing the radiation from the ground, even under the most favourable conditions."

"I do not pretend to have gone very deeply into the matter, and publish this note merely to draw attention to the fact that trapped radiation appears to play but a very small part in the actual cases with which we are familiar."

See Note on the Theory of the Greenhouse
(Professor R. W. Wood, Philosophical Magazine, 1909. Vol. 17, pp. 319-320) [in tech-archive.net]

Robert Williams Wood (1868–1955) was an American physicist and inventor.

See Robert W. Wood (Wikipedia)

The Earth seems to be always oscillating between a cooling period and a warming period. This would indicate that the climate could be an oscillator regulated by both negative and positive feedbacks, cycling between two states.

See New geologic evidence of past periods of oscillating, abrupt warming, and cooling (Dr. Don J. Easterbrook, Watts Up With That?, Nov. 10 '09)

There is some man-made effect taking part in the whole CO₂ abundance (Mauna Loa 387.35 ppm in 2009 + ~1.72 ppm per year globally). But CO₂ would be just a part of the alleged driving force in the present warming phase of the climate oscillation, most would be from H₂O (clouds and water vapor).

The Earth's atmosphere, in terms of mass percent abundance, is: Nitrogen (N₂) 75.52%, Oxigen (O₂) 23.14%, Argon (Ar) 1.28%, Carbon Dioxide (CO₂) 0.03%. (other even smaller components are disregarded)

The alleged "greenhouse effect" would be crucial to the survival of life on Earth, because without it our present global average temperature of some 15°C (59°F) would be instead of some -18°C (-0.4°F).

Earth's Greenhouse Gases Equilibrium Hypothesis:

Dr. Ferenc Miskolczi, a former contract researcher for NASA's Langley Research Center, discovered a self-regulating mechanism, or "constant", that keeps Earth's greenhouse gases in equilibrium. According to his equilibrium theory, this constant cannot be altered by increases in emissions of CO2 or other atmospheric gases such as methane.

"The only thing my theory is telling us is that the nature of the greenhouse effect is such, that under the conditions we have here on Earth, the atmosphere will maximize its cooling by keeping its infrared optical depth - or infrared absorption - at a preferred critical value."

"With relatively simple computations using NOAA's annual mean temperature, H20 and CO2 time series, I have shown that in the last 61 years, despite a 30 percent increase in the atmospheric CO2 concentration, the cumulative atmospheric absorption of all greenhouse gases has not been changed and has remained constant. There is no runaway greenhouse effect."

"The Earth’s atmosphere differs in essence from that of Venus and Mars. Our atmosphere is not totally cloud-covered, as is Venus: globally, about 40% of the sky is always clear. Also we have huge ocean surfaces that serve as a practically unlimited reservoir of water vapor for the air."

"With the help of these two conditions, the Earth’s atmosphere attains what the other two planets cannot: a constant, maximized, saturated greenhouse effect, so that adding more greenhouse gases to the mix will not increase the magnitude of the greenhouse effect and, therefore, will not cause any further "global warming"."

See Greenhouse effect in semi-transparent planetary atmospheres (Ferenc Miskolczi, Idojaras, Quarterly Journal of the Hungarian Meteorological Service, Vol. 111, No. 1, January-March 2007, pp. 1-40, .pdf)

See The Stable Stationary Value of The Earth's Global Average Atmospheric Planck-Weigthed Greenhouse-Gas Optical Thickness (Abstract, by Ferenc Miskolczi, Energy & Environment Special Issue: Paradigms in Climate Research, Volume 21 No. 4 2010, August)

See CO2 Cannot Cause Any More "Global Warming" (by Miklos Zagoni, Science and Public Policy Institute, 21 December 2009, .pdf)

See The Saturated Greenhouse Effect (by Ken Gregory, Friends of Science Society, June 2008, update July 2009)

See at Landshape.org (niche modeling): Free CO2 For All, Modeling Global Warming, Miskolczi Part 1, The Virial Theorem, Miskolczi Part 2, Kirchhoff Law, Miskolczi Part 3, Radiative Equilibrium, Miskolczi Part 4, Models of Greenhouse Effect, Greenhouse Effect Physics, Greenhouse Heat Engine

See The Work of Ferenc Miskolczi (Part 1) (by Jennifer Marohasy, May 2nd, 2009)

For a contrary opinion, see Comments on Miskolczi’s (2010) Controversial Greenhouse Theory (August 5th, 2010, by Roy Spencer, Ph. D.)

See Hungarian Physicist Dr. Ferenc Miskolczi proves CO2 emissions irrelevant in Earth's Climate
(Dianna Cotter, Portland Civil Rights Examiner, January 12 '10)
New research into greenhouse effect challenges theory of man-made global warming (Dr. F. Miskolczi, Feb. 9 '10),
Former NASA scientist defends theory refuting global warming doctrine (Dr. Ferenc Miskolczi, February 12 '10)
(Kirk Myers, Seminole County Environmental News Examiner)

A New And Effective Climate Model:

"Despite a substantial increase in the power of the Sun over billions of years the temperature of the Earth has remained remarkably stable.
My proposition is that the reason for that is the existence of water in liquid form in the oceans combined with a relatively stable total atmospheric density. If the power input from the sun changes then the effect is simply to speed up or slow down the hydrological cycle."

"A change in the speed of the entire hydrological cycle does have a climate effect but as we shall see on timescales relevant to human existence it is too small to measure in the face of internal system variability from other causes."

"Additionally my propositions provide the physical mechanisms accounting for the mathematics of Dr. F. Miskolczi."

"He appears to have demonstrated mathematically that if greenhouse gases in the air other than water vapour increase then the amount of water vapour declines so as to maintain an optimum optical depth for the atmosphere which modulates the energy flow to maintain sea surface and surface air temperature equilibrium."

See A New And Effective Climate Model (Stephen Wilde, Watt's Up with That?, April 6 '10)

The Thermostat Hypothesis: How clouds and thunderstorms control the Earth's temperature

The Thunderstorm Thermostat Hypothesis is that tropical clouds and thunderstorms actively regulate the temperature of the earth. This keeps the earth at an equilibrium temperature regardless of changes in the forcings.

Several kinds of evidence are presented to establish and elucidate the Thermostat Hypothesis - historical temperature stability of the Earth, theoretical considerations, satellite photos, and a description of the equilibrium mechanism.

See The Thermostat Hypothesis (Willis Eschenbach) (in ARVAL)

Global Temperatures?

"In this report^*, we present three global surface climate records, created from available data by NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies [GISS], NOAA National Climatic Data Center [NCDC], and the cooperative project of the U.K. Hadley Centre and the Climate Research Unit [CRU] of the University of East Anglia (HadCRUT2v)."
These three analyses are led by Tom Karl (NCDC), Jim Hansen (GISS) and Phil Jones (CRU).

^* Temperature Trends in the Lower Atmosphere: Steps for Understanding and Reconciling Differences (US Climate Change Science Program, April 2006, page 32)

In an interview with The Guardian titled "Climate scientist at centre of leaked email row dismisses conspiracy claims" Professor Phil Jones is quoted as saying:

"... Our global temperature series tallies with those of other, completely independent, groups of scientists working for NASA and the National Climate Data Centre in the United States, among others. Even if you were to ignore our findings, theirs show the same results. The facts speak for themselves; there is no need for anyone to manipulate them."

The differences between the three global surface temperatures that occur are a result of the analysis methodology as used by each of the three groups. They are not "completely independent".
"The data sets are distinguished from one another by differences in the details of their construction."
"Since the three chosen data sets utilize many of the same raw observations, there is a degree of interdependence."
"The best estimate that has been reported is that 90–95% of the raw data in each of the analyses is the same."

See An Erroneous Statement Made By Phil Jones To The Media On The Independence Of The Global Surface Temperature Trend Analyses Of CRU, GISS And NCDC (Roger Pielke Sr., Climate Science, Nov. 25 '09)
and Erroneous Statement By Peter A. Stott And Peter W. Thorne In Nature Titled "How Best To Log Local Temperatures" (Roger Pielke Sr., Climate Science, June 14 '10)

The 1997 Conference on the World Climate Research Programme to the Third Conference of the Parties of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change concluded that the global capacity to observe the Earth's climate system is inadequate and is deteriorating worldwide: "Without action to reverse this decline and develop the Global Climate Observation System, the ability to characterize climate change and variations over the next 25 years will be even less than during the past quarter century."

See Adequacy of Climate Observing Systems (1999) (Board on Atmospheric Sciences and Climate)
See surfacestations.org (Climate stations physical site survey data)

There has clearly been some warming in recent decades, most notably 1979 to 1998. However the global surface station based data is seriously compromised by major station dropout. There has been a clear bias towards removing higher elevation, higher latitude and rural stations. The data suffers contamination by urbanization and other local factors such as land-use/land-cover changes, and improper sitting. There is missing data and uncertainties in ocean temperatures. These factors all lead to overestimation of temperatures.

See A U.S. ClimateGate? (Joseph D'Aleo, Jan. 17 '10)
See Climategate: CRU Was But the Tip of the Iceberg (Marc Sheppard, American Thinker, Jan. 22 '10)
See Global Warming: The Other Side (Part 4) (Joseph D'Aleo, E. Michael Smith, Video, John Coleman, KUSI - News, Weather and Sports - San Diego, CA)
See Global Warming: The Other Side (Full, unedited interview) (Joseph D'Aleo, Video, John Coleman, KUSI - News, Weather and Sports - San Diego, CA)

"A simple graph by Canadian statistician, Ross McKitrick puts this in picture form. His graph shows that when many stations were selectively and suddenly eliminated from world temperature records, reported global temperature immediately and instantly appeared to step up alarmingly to higher levels—in the 1990’s and 2000’s."

"Temperature measuring stations are placed mostly, 2/3rd, on places where effects of urban heat affects measurements, exhaust of air condition, parking lots, airports jet engines exhausts, increased traffic, concrete grounds etc. cause incorrect measurements, i.e. too high temperatures."

"Globally, 12,000 to 14,000 stations during 1970-1989 were reduced to less than 8,000 in year 1991, further to less than 6,000 in year 2000 and to 1,500 now and mainly located at airports. Stations were relocated from previous sites in forests and rural areas to urban sites.
Measurements in cold Siberia were eliminated after the collapse of Soviet [Union]. Weather stations were moved from north to south, from high altitudes to low altitudes, all giving higher temperatures."

"90% of stations give 1-2°C too high temperatures, i.e. more than IPCC claim for AGW (Anthropogenic Global Warming).
During 1950 to 1989 with 12-14,000 stations, average temperature is around 10.0°C and 1990 to 2000 temperature is 11-12°C, average around 11.5°C thus an increase of 1.5°C.
90% of all air temperature measurements are taken over land, while land covers only 30% of the planet and the oceans cover 70%."

See two dead elephants in parliament (Malcolm Roberts, February 7, 2010)
See The Graph of Temperature vs. Number of Stations (Ross McKitrick)

"In 1988 the scientist James Hansen of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) announced to Congress (USA) and the world, "Global warming has begun". He went on to report that, at least to his satisfaction, he had seen the "signal" in the climate noise and that the earth was destined for global warming, perhaps in the form of a runaway greenhouse effect. Hansen later revised his remarks, but his statement remained the starting point of widespread concerns over global warming. That same year the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) was formed as a joint program of the United Nations Environmental Program, the World Meteorological Organization, and the International Congress of Scientific Unions. It has a mandate to prepare regular assessments of what is known and what should be done about anthropogenic climate change."

See Updating the Climate Science (Makiko Sato & James Hansen, Columbia University)
See Climate Definition, Synonyms (Answers.com)

Retired senior NASA atmospheric scientist, Dr. John S. Theon, the former supervisor of James Hansen, has now publicly declared himself a skeptic and declared that Hansen "embarrassed NASA". He violated NASA's official agency position on climate forecasting ("we did not know enough to forecast climate change or mankind's effect on it"). Hansen thus embarrassed NASA by coming out with his claims of global warming in 1988 in his testimony before Congress. [January 15, 2009]

Theon declared: "Climate models are useless".

See Watts Up With That? (January 27, 2009)

James Hansen is the director of the NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS) (Study of global climate change).

Time series of Arctic and Antarctic Sea Ice Extent:

NASA's Earth Observing System (EOS) Aqua Satellite was launched on May 4, 2002. The Advanced Microwave Scanning Radiometer - (AMSR-E) is one of the six sensors aboard Aqua.
AMSR-E was developed by the National Space Agency of Japan (JAXA).

Daily Updated AMSR-E Sea Ice Maps (2003-2010 with 1972/3-2008 averages)
(total area, in millions of square kilometers, of at least 15% floating ice concentration).

This service is part of the GMES project Polar View and of the Arctic Regional Ocean Observing System (Arctic ROOS).

Arctic. Click on the image to enlarge.	Antarctic. Click on the image to enlarge.

Sea ice is formed when ocean water freezes.
Because the oceans are salty, this occurs at about -1.8ºC.

See Daily Updated AMSR-E Sea Ice Maps (University of Bremen, Germany)

Sea level trends: Southern Ocean versus global ocean

Sea level trends of the world's oceans are shown in figure a.
The two curves represent the overall sea level variations averaged within the Southern Ocean south of 40° S and global ocean, respectively. The most remarkable feature is a large regional difference in sea level trend. The North Pacific and equatorial Pacific exhibit the most spectacular east-west seesaw pattern, with strong positive trends in the western side and strong negative trends in the eastern side. The Atlantic Ocean shows the most homogeneous field and is associated with weak positive trends in general, while in the Indian Ocean negative trends are dominant, except for positive trends in the Indonesian throughflow region and west of Australia.
The Southern Ocean south of 40° S shows noticeable positive trends in most places, with one notable exception in the Pacific Antarctic Basin, where there is a broad region of strong negative trends.

The Southern Ocean experienced a sharp rise in sea level during the 1997-1998 ENSO period (see figure b).
A similar sea level rise is also observed for the global ocean, although the amplitude there is only half that of the Southern Ocean.
Over the 1993-2000 period, the mean sea level trend of the Southern Ocean is estimated at 2.34 ± 0.34 mm/yr, compared to 1.21 ± 0.15 mm/yr for the global ocean. The latter value is close to the lower bound of the IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) global trend range over the last century (1-2 mm/yr) and is also not significantly different from the estimate of Cazenave et al. [1998] over the period 1993-mid 1997 (1.3 ± 0.15 mm/yr).
Globally, no dramatic sea level rising trend resembling the exponential concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere is observed during the past century.

See Interannual sea level variability in the Southern Ocean within the context of global climate change (NASA-JPL, TOPEX/Poseidon and Jason)

(a) Map showing sea level trends (mm/yr) calculated at each T/P crossover point over the period 1993-2000. Before the trend calculation, mean seasonal variations were eliminated from the monthly time series at each data point and then low-pass filtered using a Gaussian filter with a cut-off at six months.
(b) Mean sea level variations (mm) averaged for the whole Southern Ocean south of 40° S (green) and for the entire global ocean (red). Area-dependent weights were applied during the averaging process.

See Interannual sea level variability in the Southern Ocean within the context of global climate change (Figure 2) (NASA-JPL, TOPEX/Poseidon and Jason)

This negates a positive CO₂ feedback effect on the sea level trends, justifying skepticism.

"Long-term mean sea level change is a variable of considerable interest in the studies of global climate change."

"Since August 1992 the satellite altimeters have been measuring sea level on a global basis with unprecedented accuracy. The TOPEX/POSEIDON (T/P) satellite mission provided observations of sea level change from 1992 until 2005. Jason-1, launched in late 2001 as the successor to T/P, continues this record by providing an estimate of global mean sea level every 10 days with an uncertainty of 3-4 mm."

The most recent mean estimate is of 3.2 ± 0.4 mm/year.

See Global mean sea level (University of Colorado)

"IPCC predicts rapid, exponential CO2 growth that is not occurring."
"The 29-year (since 1980) global warming trend is just 2.5 °F (1.5°C) per century."

"The IPCC assume CO2 concentration will rise exponentially from today's 385 parts per million to reach 730 to 1,020 ppm, central estimate 836 ppm, by 2100." "However, for seven years, CO2 concentration has been rising in a straight line towards just 575 ppm by 2100."

See Trends in Carbon Dioxide - Mauna Loa (NOAA Earth System Research Laboratory)
See SPPI Monthly CO2 Report: March 2009 (Science and Public Policy Institute)

"The observed increase in global mean surface temperature over the industrial era is less than 40% of that expected from observed increases in long-lived greenhouse gases together with the best-estimate equilibrium climate sensitivity given by the 2007 Assessment Report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC)."

See Why Hasn't Earth Warmed as Much as Expected? (Stephen E. Schwartz et al. - AMS Online Journals)

"Global tropical cyclone activity remains near 30-year+ lows."

See Ryan N. Maue's Seasonal Tropical Cyclone Activity Update

All these negate a positive CO₂ feedback effect on the level of H₂O, justifying skepticism.

Michael Mann says hockey stick should not have become 'climate change icon'

From Mann says hockey stick "icon" is "misplaced", Anthony Watts, Watts Up With That?, June 29 2010

The scientist behind the controversial 'hockey stick' graph has said it was 'somewhat misplaced' to make his work an 'icon of the climate change debate'.

Professor Michael Mann plotted a graph in the late 1990s that showed global temperatures for the last 1,000 years. It showed a sharp rise in temperature over the last 100 years as man made carbon emissions also increased, creating the shape of a hockey stick.

The graph was used by Al Gore in his film 'An Inconvenient Truth' (2006) and was cited by the United Nations body the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) as evidence of the link between fossil fuel use and global warming.

But the graph was questioned by sceptics who pointed out that is it impossible to know for certain the global temperature going back beyond modern times because there were no accurate readings.

The issue became a central argument in the climate change debate and was dragged into the 'climategate' scandal, as the sceptics accused Prof Mann and his supporters of exaggerating the extent of global warming.

However, speaking to the BBC recently, Prof Mann, a climatologist at Pennsylvania State University, said he had always made clear there were "uncertainties" in his work.

"I always thought it was somewhat misplaced to make it a central icon of the climate change debate", he said.

Professor John Christy, an atmospheric scientist from the University of Huntsville in Alabama, said just a quarter of the current warming is caused by man made emissions. He said that 10 to 30 per cent of scientists agree with him and are fairly sceptical about the extent of man made global warming.

See Michael Mann says hockey stick should not have become 'climate change icon'
Louise Gray, Telegraph.co.uk, June 28 2010

See BBC - The Editors: What's up with the weather?
Mike Rudin, 15:54 UK time, Thursday, 24 June 2010

There is a new and important study on temperature proxy reconstructions, A Statistical Analysis of Multiple Temperature Proxies: Are Reconstructions of Surface Temperatures Over the Last 1000 Years Reliable? (McShane and Wyner 2010, .pdf, 2.5 MB) submitted into the Annals of Applied Statistics and is listed to be published in the next issue. According to Steve McIntyre (Climate Audit), this is one of the "top statistical journals". This paper is a direct and serious rebuttal to the proxy reconstructions of Mann. It seems watertight on the surface, because instead of trying to attack the proxy data quality issues, they assumed the proxy data was accurate for their purpose, then created a bayesian backcast method. Then, using the proxy data, they demonstrate it fails to reproduce the sharp 20th century uptick.

"We find that the proxies do not predict temperature significantly better than random series generated independently of temperature. Furthermore, various model specifications that perform similarly at predicting temperature produce extremely different historical backcasts."

"In sum, these results suggest that the ninety-three sequences that comprise the 1,000 year old proxy record simply lack power to detect a sharp increase in temperature."

See New paper makes a hockey sticky wicket of Mann et al 98/99/08
Anthony Watts, Watts Up With That?, August 14, 2010

Global Warming Advocacy Science: A Cross Examination

"Legal scholarship has come to accept as true the various pronouncements of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and other scientists who have been active in the movement for greenhouse gas (ghg) emission reductions to combat global warming. The only criticism that legal scholars have had of the story told by this group of activist scientists - what may be called the climate establishment - is that it is too conservative in not paying enough attention to possible catastrophic harm from potentially very high temperature increases."

"This paper departs from such faith in the climate establishment by comparing the picture of climate science presented by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) and other global warming scientist advocates with the peer-edited scientific literature on climate change. A review of the peer-edited literature reveals a systematic tendency of the climate establishment to engage in a variety of stylized rhetorical techniques that seem to oversell what is actually known about climate change while concealing fundamental uncertainties and open questions regarding many of the key processes involved in climate change. Fundamental open questions include not only the size but the direction of feedback effects that are responsible for the bulk of the temperature increase predicted to result from atmospheric greenhouse gas increases: while climate models all presume that such feedback effects are on balance strongly positive, more and more peer-edited scientific papers seem to suggest that feedback effects may be small or even negative. The cross-examination conducted in this paper reveals many additional areas where the peer-edited literature seems to conflict with the picture painted by establishment climate science, ranging from the magnitude of 20th century surface temperature increases and their relation to past temperatures; the possibility that inherent variability in the earth’s non-linear climate system, and not increases in CO2, may explain observed late 20th century warming; the ability of climate models to actually explain past temperatures; and, finally, substantial doubt about the methodological validity of models used to make highly publicized predictions of global warming impacts such as species loss."

"Insofar as establishment climate science has glossed over and minimized such fundamental questions and uncertainties in climate science, it has created widespread misimpressions that have serious consequences for optimal policy design. Such misimpressions uniformly tend to support the case for rapid and costly decarbonization of the American economy, yet they characterize the work of even the most rigorous legal scholars. A more balanced and nuanced view of the existing state of climate science supports much more gradual and easily reversible policies regarding greenhouse gas emission reduction, and also urges a redirection in public funding of climate science away from the continued subsidization of refinements of computer models and toward increased spending on the development of standardized observational datasets against which existing climate models can be tested."

See Global Warming Advocacy Science: A Cross Examination
(Dr. Jason Scott Johnston, Professor of Law and Coordinator, Program on Law and the Environment, University of Pennsylvania - Law School. Institute for Law and Economic Research, Paper No. 10-08, May 1 '10)

Have Atmospheric CO₂ Increases Been Responsible for the Recent Large Upswing (since 1995) in Atlantic Basin Major Hurricanes?

"The U.S. landfall of major hurricanes Dennis, Katrina, Rita and Wilma in 2005 and the four Southeast landfalling hurricanes of 2004 - Charley, Frances, Ivan and Jeanne, raised questions about the possible role that global warming played in those two unusually destructive seasons. In addition, three category 2 hurricanes (Dolly, Gustav and Ike) pummeled the Gulf Coast in 2008 causing considerable devastation. Some researchers have tried to link the rising CO₂ levels with SST [Sea Surface Temperatures] increases during the late 20th century and say that this has brought on higher levels of hurricane intensity."

"These speculations that hurricane intensity has increased have been given much media attention; however, we believe that they are not valid, given current observational data."

"There has, however, been a large increase in Atlantic basin major hurricane activity since 1995 in comparison with the prior 15-year period of 1980-1994 (22 major hurricanes) and the prior quarter-century period of 1970-1994 (38 major hurricanes). It has been tempting for many who do not have a strong background in hurricane knowledge to jump on this recent 15-year increase in major hurricane activity as strong evidence of a human influence on hurricanes. It should be noted, however, that the last 15-year active major hurricane period of 1995-2009 (56 major hurricanes) has, however, not been more active than the earlier 15-year period of 1950-1964 (57 major hurricanes) when the Atlantic Ocean circulation conditions were similar to what has been observed in the last 15 years. These conditions occurred even though atmospheric CO₂ amounts were lower in the earlier period."

"Although global surface temperatures increased during the late 20th century, there is no reliable data to indicate increased hurricane frequency or intensity in any of the globe's other tropical cyclone basins since 1979. Global Accumulated Cyclone Energy (ACE) shows significant year-to-year and decadal variability over the past thirty years but no increasing trend. Similarly, Klotzbach (2006) found no significant change in global TC activity during the period from 1986-2005."

See Extended Range Forecast of Atlantic Seasonal Hurricane Activity and U.S. Landfall Strike Probability for 2010
(Dr. William Gray, Dr. Phil Klotzbach, Colorado State University, part 10, June 2 '10, .pdf)

Taking Earth's temperature (UAH):

"In early November 1978 a microwave sensor aboard the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's TIROS polar-orbiting satellite started scanning the Earth's atmosphere."

"The 1997-1998 "El Niño of the century" made 1998 the hottest calendar year during the 28+ year record, with an annual average temperature that was 0.47°C (0.85°F) warmer than normal."

"There is no scientific evidence to support the belief that Earth's climate is stable and will not change if human activity does not intervene."

"While the approximately 0.14°C per decade of global warming seen in the satellite data is minor compared to the scale of some past climate shifts, it reminds us that the natural processes of climate change have not stopped."

"Looking at the history of paleoclimate data indicates that the climate is capable of significant changes for reasons that are not understood."

"The current level of knowledge about the climate doesn't provide the tools needed to predict when rapid natural climate changes will occur and what forms it might take.
This makes it impossible to say with high confidence how much human factors might influence climate change."

"The first thing is to do no harm. With the threat of catastrophic climate change, many proposals have been put forward to limit energy use."

"A fundamental point that needs to be understood is that if any of these proposals (including the Kyoto protocol) are implemented, they will have an effect on the climate so small that it cannot be detected.
None of these proposals will change what the climate is doing enough to notice."

"Those are good reasons not to artificially force energy prices up. While raising energy costs might damage the economy, it would disproportionately hurt the poor, especially those people living on the world's social and economic fringes."

"While the extent of human impacts on global climate change remains uncertain, research by our colleagues at UAH confirms that deforestation and land conversion are changing regional weather patterns and the local climate over some parts of the world.
We should encourage and support the scientists and engineers who will develop new sources of low-cost energy."

"Ironically, actions that artificially inflate the cost of energy might hamper those efforts, as healthy economies can better afford to find and develop alternative energy sources and cleaner energy technologies."

Published in "Taking Earth's temperature" (University of Alabama in Huntsville - UAH) [Internet Archive Wayback Machine]

Taking Greenhouse Warming Seriously
by Richard S. Lindzen, Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT)
Energy & Environment, Volume 18 No. 7+8 2007

"In science, there is an art to simplifying complex problems so that they can be meaningfully analyzed. If one oversimplifies, the analysis is meaningless. If one doesn’t simplify, then one often cannot proceed with the analysis. When it comes to global warming due to the greenhouse effect, it is clear that many approaches are highly oversimplified."

"Using basic theory, modeling results and observations, we can reasonably bound the anthropogenic contributions to surface warming since 1979 to a third of the observed warming, leading to a climate sensitivity too small to offer any significant measure of alarm – assuming current observed surface and tropospheric trends and model depictions of greenhouse warming are correct."

"We next showed that the defense of the attribution of recent warming to man involves an observed warming that is smaller than expected, and where the attribution, itself, depends on relatively subjective claims concerning the ability of current models to accurately portray natural unforced climate variability. Thus, the claim that models cannot account for recent warming without external forcing is held to imply the role of human forcing. To be sure, current models can simulate the recent trend in surface temperature, but only by invoking largely unknown properties of aerosols and ocean delay in order to cancel most of the greenhouse warming. Finally, we note substantial corroborating work showing low climate sensitivity."

"Ultimately, however, one must recognize how small the difference is between the estimation that the anthropogenic contribution to recent surface warming is on the order of 1/3, and the iconic claim that it is likely that the human contribution is more that 1/2. Alarm, we see, actually demands much more that the iconic statement itself. It requires that greenhouse warming actually be larger than what has been observed, that about half of it be cancelled by essentially unknown aerosols, and that the aerosols soon disappear. Alarm does not stem directly from the iconic claim, but rather from the uncertainty in the claim, which lumps together greenhouse gas additions and the cancelling aerosol contributions (assuming that they indeed cancel warming), and suggests that the sum is responsible for more than half of the observed surface warming. What this paper attempts to do is point the way to a simple, physically sound approach to reducing uncertainty and establishing estimates of climate sensitivity that are focused and testable. Such an approach would seem to be more comfortable for science than the current emphasis on models testing models, large ranges of persistent uncertainty, and reliance on alleged consensus. Hopefully, this paper has also clarified why significant doubt persists concerning the remarkably politicized issue of global warming alarm."

From Taking Greenhouse Warming Seriously (.pdf, 968 KB) at Publications by Lindzen, Richard S. Alfred P. Sloan Professor of Meteorology, Department of Earth, Atmospheric and Planetary Sciences, Massachusetts Institute of Technology

See also Lindzen: Earth is never in equilibrium, Richard S. Lindzen, Watts Up With That?, April 9 2010

Man-made global warming has not been scientifically proven, while significant reasons for considering this hypothesis as incorrect have been presented:

The Polish Academy of Sciences:

"The Earth's climate has predominantly been warmer than at present. However, there has been some significant cooling that resulted in the development of extensive glaciations, in some of which ice sheets even reached the tropics. Therefore, any reliable forecasts of climate change, before discussion of prevention or neutralization, should take into account evidence from the geological past when, obviously, neither humans nor industry affected the Earth."

"During the last 400 thousand years - still without anthropogenic greenhouse influence - the content of carbon dioxide in the air, as indicated by ice cores from Antarctica, was repeatedly 4 times at similar or even slightly higher level than at present."

"In the past millennium, after warm medieval ages, by the end of the 13th century a cold period started and lasted up to the middle of the 19th century, then gave pace to another warm period in which we are living now. The phenomena observed today, specifically a temporary rise of global temperature, just reflect a natural rhythm of climate change."

"Instrumental monitoring of climate parameters has been carried out for only slightly more than 200 years and exclusively on some parts of the continents that constitute a small part of the Earth. Several older measurement stations once set up in suburbs now appear, due to progressive urbanization, in the town centers which results among other effects in increased values of the measured temperatures. Profound examination of the oceans was initiated 40 years ago. Reliable climatic models must not be based on such a short measurement data base. Therefore, considerable restraint is desirable if ascribing exclusive or predominant responsibility to man for increased emission of greenhouse gases. The reality of such arbitrary statement on human influence has not been demonstrated."

"It is certain that increased content of greenhouse gases in the atmosphere is connected partly with human activity. Therefore, all steps that restrain this emission and agree with principles of sustainable development should be taken, starting from a cease of extensive deforestation, especially in tropical areas."

See Attitude of the Committee of Geological Sciences of the Polish Academy of Sciences to the question of impending of global warming (February 12 '09, .pdf)

E-mails leaked out of the Climatic Research Unit (CRU) (University of East Anglia, UK) show scientists colluding to distort data to favor the man-made global warming hypothesis and suppress opinion and scientific works opposing it.
Scientists from the Climatic Research Unit (CRU) at the University of East Anglia are leading authors and contributors of the IPCC Assessment Reports on Climate Change (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, UNEP).

These distorted data are the "physical" basis for "Global Warming" and "Climate Change".

See Climate Emails Stoke Debate (Keith Johnson, The Wall Street Journal, Nov. 23 '09)
See What the Global Warming Emails Reveal (Editorial, The Wall Street Journal, Nov. 24 '09)
See The Climate Science Isn't Settled (Richard S. Lindzen, The Wall Street Journal, Dec. 1 '09)
See Climategate: Follow the Money (Bret Stephens, The Wall Street Journal, Dec. 1 '09)
See How to Manufacture a Climate Consensus (Patrick J. Michaels, The Wall Street Journal, Dec. 17 '09)
See The Continuing Climate Meltdown (Editorial, The Wall Street Journal, Feb. 16 '10)
See The Climategate Whitewash Continues (Patrick J. Michaels, The Wall Street Journal, Jul. 18 '10)

See East Anglia Confirmed Emails from the Climate Research Unit (Searchable)

Cold Facts on Global Warming:

"What is the contribution of anthropogenic carbon dioxide to global warming?
This question has been the subject of many heated arguments, and a great deal of hysteria. In this article, we will consider a simple estimate based on well-accepted facts, that shows that the expected global temperature increase caused by doubling atmospheric carbon dioxide levels is bounded by an upper limit of 1.76 ±0.27 degrees Celsius. This result contrasts with the results of the IPCC's climate models, whose projections are shown to be unrealistically high. Even though global warming has become mostly an academic concern now that the climate has moved into a cooling phase, it's still important to understand what is and is not factual about the climate."

"Although carbon dioxide is capable of raising the Earth's overall temperature, the IPCC's predictions of catastrophic temperature increases produced by carbon dioxide have been challenged by many scientists. In particular, the importance of water vapor is frequently overlooked by environmental activists and by the media. This discussion shows that the large temperature increases predicted by many computer models are unphysical and inconsistent with results obtained by basic measurements. Skepticism is warranted when considering computer-generated projections of global warming that cannot even predict existing observations."

From Cold Facts on Global Warming (T.J. Nelson, Ph.D. in biophysics)

Science is not based on models but on autentic measurements. Models must be based on science, not the other way around.

The climate in Venus is not controlled by an atmospheric 'greenhouse effect' even though CO₂ is near 97% in its atmosphere, because it has an extremely high atmospheric pressure. The atmospheric pressure on Venus is 92 times greater than on Earth. The surface of Venus receives no direct sunshine. The Venusian atmosphere is full of dense, high clouds; 30 to 40 Km thick with bases at 30 or 35 Km of altitude. Venusian climate is controlled by atmospheric pressure.
On Earth's atmosphere, CO₂ is some 0.06%; surely not enough to cause a catastrophyc 'greenhouse effect'.
According to many climatologists and the IPCC climate models, there is a positive feedback action amplifying the CO₂ effect to be much more potent, but this theoretical effect has not been actually measured in practice.

Understanding that a trace amount of CO₂ can not be a main cause of a catastrophyc atmospheric 'greenhouse effect' means we are more in control of the quality of the air. We are more responsible for our planet regarding the atmospheric pollution we cause, and pollution must be minimized for the water and the ground too, and extensive deforestation must cease.

References:

AccuWeather.com: Global Climate Change Blog
Anthropogenic Global Warming - Fact or Hoax? (A Middlebury Community Network editorial by James A. Peden)
Bishop Hill blog (A.W. Montford)
C3 Headlines (Climate Cycle Changes)
Calamitology.com (Steve Schulin, Discussion of exaggerated claims about climate science)
Calder's Updates: Climate Change (Nigel Calder)
Carlin Economics and Science (Dr. Alan Carlin, Ph.D. in Economics, B.S. in Physics)
Christopher Booker's comment, columns and opinion (Telegraph.co.uk)
Climate Audit (Steve McIntyre)
Climate Change Fraud (Because the debate is not over)
Climate Change Reconsidered (2009 Report of the Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change [NIPCC])
Climategate (Anthropogenic Global Warming, history's biggest scam)
Climate Observations (Notes From Bob Tisdale on Climate Change and Global Warming)
Climate Realists (Real explanations as to what has made our climate change)
Climate Research News (Bridging the gap between reality and official science)
Climate Review (Home of the movie "Church of Global Warming", James Follett, 1hr. - Free)
ClimateSanity (Tom Moriarty)
Climate Scam (Review of the Climate Change News)
Climate Science (Roger Pielke Sr.)
Co2 Insanity (the insanity surrounding Anthropogenic Global Warming)
CO2 Science (Center for the Study of Carbon Dioxide and Global Change)
Committee For A Constructive Tomorrow (CFACT) (David Rothbard and Craig Rucker)
Don J. Easterbrook, Professor Emeritus (Department of Geology, Western Washington University)
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Global Warming (Roy Spencer, Ph. D., Principal Research Scientist at the University of Alabama in Huntsville - UAH)
Global Warming at a glance (JunkScience.com)
Global Warming Facts (The Heartland Institute)
Global Warming - Introduction (West Virginia Plant Fossils)
 - Global Warming: A closer look at the numbers
Global Warming Science (Applied Information Systems - AppInSys, Alan Cheetham)
 - AIS Climate Data Visualizer (Global Historical Climate Network temperature data graphing - from NOAA, HadCRU)
Global Warming: The Other Side (Part 1) (Joseph D'Aleo, E. Michael Smith, Video, John Coleman, KUSI - News, Weather and Sports - San Diego, CA)
 - Part 2, Part 3, Part 4, Part 5, The Amazing Story Behind the Global Warming Scam.
 - Continued in Global Warming: Meltdown - Part 1, Part 2, Part 3.
Hide the decline (Frank Lansner and Nicolai Skjoldby)
International Climate and Environmental Change Assessment Project (ICECAP)
JoNova - The Skeptics Handbook
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Michael Crichton - The Official Site: Videos
Minnesotans for Global Warming (M4GW)
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No Cap and Trade Facts, not Fiction on Climate Change
 - Hide the Decline - Climategate (Musical Videos)
NOconsensus.org (No Scientific Consensus on Global Warming. Donna Laframboise, Toronto, Canada)
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Ross McKitrick (Annotated Index to Publications and Papers)
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Science and Public Policy Institute (SPPI)
 - 35 Inconvenient Truths: The errors in Al Gore's movie (Christopher Monckton of Brenchley, Oct. 19 '07)
 - Three Speeches by Michael Crichton (Michael Crichton, December 11, 2009)
 - two dead elephants in parliament (Malcolm Roberts, February 7, 2010)
 - Response to John Abraham (Christopher Monckton of Brenchley, July 12 '10)
Seminole County Environmental News Examiner (Kirk Myers)
 - New research into greenhouse effect challenges theory of man-made global warming (Dr. F. Miskolczi, Feb. 9 '10)
 - Former NASA scientist defends theory refuting global warming doctrine (Dr. Ferenc Miskolczi, February 12 '10)
Shub Niggurath Climate
Socrates Paradox (to promote integrity in science)
Steven Goddard (A creative view of science, politics and the human condition)
The Air Vent (by Jeff Id)
The Case for Skepticism on Global Warming (Michael Crichton, National Press Club, January 25, 2005)
The Great Global Warming Swindle (A Documentary by Martin Durkin, Produced by WAGTV)
The Hockey Schtick (The Travesty of Global Cooling - 12 Years & Counting)
The Real Inconvenient Truth: Greenhouse, global warming and some facts (JunkScience.com)
The Resilient Earth (Science, Global Warming and the Fate of Humanity)
 - The Resilient Earth (.pdf Downloadable Book. Doug L. Hoffman & Allen Simmons, 2008 - Free)
Watts Up With That? (by Anthony Watts)
 - Global Sea Ice Reference Page (Arctic and Antarctic current graphs and imagery)
 - surfacestations.org (Climate stations physical site survey data)
Wood for Trees (Software tools for analysis and graphing of time series data. Paul Clark)
World Climate Report (Chief Editor: Patrick J. Michaels)

The Thermostat Hypothesis (Willis Eschenbach, Watts Up With That?, June 14 '09)
Global warming: Our best guess is likely wrong (Jade Boyd, Rice University News, Jul. 14 '09)
What happened to global warming? (BBC NEWS | Science & Environment, Oct. 9 '09)
Not Evil Just Wrong - Blog (The true cost of global warming hysteria)
 - Not Evil Just Wrong (Documentary film, Phelim McAleer and Ann McElhinney, Oct. 18 '09)
The real climate change catastrophe (Christopher Booker, Telegraph.co.uk, Oct. 25 '09)
CO2 heats the atmosphere...a counter view (Tom Vonk, Watts Up With That, August 5 '10)

Centre for Ocean and Ice (COI) (Danish Meteorological Institute)
Climate Change (NASA)
Climate Prediction Center (CPC) (NOAA)
Climatic Research Unit (CRU) (University of East Anglia, UK)
Daily AMSR-E sea ice maps: Arctic, Antarctic sea ice extent (University of Bremen, Germany)
Daily Updated Time series of Arctic sea ice area and extent derived from SSMI data provided by NERSC (Arctic ROOS)
Data of Sea Ice Extent [AMSR-E in the Arctic Ocean] (IARC-JAXA)
Distributed Information Services for Climate and Ocean Products and Visualizations for Earth Research (DISCOVER)
 - Daily Earth Temperatures from Satellites (AMSU-A Temperatures, University of Alabama in Huntstville - UAH)
Earth System Research Laboratory Global Monitoring Division (NOAA)
 - El Niño/Southern Oscillation (ENSO)
El Niño: online meteorology guide (WW2010, University of Illinois)
El Niño and La Niña: Tracing the Dance of Ocean and Atmosphere (The National Academies)
Global Warming (NASA Worldbook)
Global Warming Facts, Causes, Effects, Solutions (National Geographic)
IPCC Reports - Climate Change (UNEP)
 - Vital Climate Graphics - Update 2005 (UNEP/GRID-Arendal)
National Snow Analyses NOAA-NWS National Operational Hydrologic Remote Sensing Center (NOHRSC)
National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC)
 - Sea Ice Index (Artic/Antartic, Monthly/Daily)
National Weather Service (NWS) Space Weather Prediction Center (NOAA)
North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) (Ian Bell, Martin Visbeck, Columbia University)
North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) (David B. Stephenson, Exeter University)
Observing the Earth - Understanding Our Planet (European Space Agency - ESA)
Ocean Surface Topography from Space (NASA-JPL, TOPEX/Poseidon and Jason)
PALEOMAP Project (Earth & Climate History, Christopher R. Scotese)
Polar Science Center (Pan-Arctic Ice Ocean Modeling and Assimilation System (PIOMAS), University of Washington)
Polar Sea Ice Cap and Snow - Cryosphere Today, Global Sea Ice Area (University of Illinois)
Rutgers University Climate Lab :: Global Snow Lab
Securing Our Environment (European Space Agency - ESA)
Solar Physics (Marshall Space Flight Center)
State of the Climate (NOAA National Climatic Data Center - NCDC)
The Second Law of Thermodynamics (Frank L. Lambert, Professor Emeritus, Occidental College, Los Angeles) Tropical Atmosphere Ocean (TAO) Project (Global Tropical Moored Buoy Array, NOAA)
Tropical Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM) (NASA - JAXA)
World Meteorological Organization (WMO) (United Nations)

Musical Theme:
Santana - You've got to Change Your Evil Ways - Lissajous Patterns showing complex phase L and R chs
(Tektronix 465B Oscilloscope, YouTube)

Observatorio ARVAL - Meteorology for South Florida and the Caribbean - Global Warming?

This page was updated in: August 31 '10

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