Friday, August 28, 2009

will the EPA jump at the opportunity ?

The guys over at http://thechillingeffect.org/2009/08/25/cowardly-epa-ducks-biggest-biz-group-on-global-warming/ offer their take on the U.S. Chamber of Commerce’s wonderful petition of the EPA demanding a bit of a trial on the premise for its “endangerment” finding that anthropogenic global warming (AGW) is real, threatening, and proven - or sufficiently proven to justify regulation, even if nothing the U.S. can do through regulation would do anything about the purported warming.

The EPA is of course ducking the opportunity to finally and for the first time make its case. To this point, they have appealed to authority of the IPCC, which says on its web page that it doesn't perform any research. That should tell you as much as you need to know about their confidence in the case: it’s nonexistent, and they are filled with terror over the thought of having to defend their stance.

Thursday, August 20, 2009

Thank God For Carbon

acidifying oceans, dying coral reefs, more frequent droughts, are all based on simulations carried out on very large computer models of the world’s climate. All the models are constructed on the assumption of global warming caused by increasing atmospheric CO2. These climate models have suffered major credibility setbacks in recent years.
They have been unable to predict the temperatures we have actually experienced,
particularly since 1998, as temperatures have remained stationary or, as in the last
two years, declined by 0.7 °C, despite increasing atmospheric CO2 concentrations.
Furthermore, there have been major changes in the model predictions, but these
have not diminished the faith of the global warmers (or carbonistas), nor of the policy makers who follow them. Early predictions included the idea of ever-increasing temperatures (as in the notorious hockey stick graph), but now we are told that global warming has been delayed until 2015.
The satellite and radiosonde (weather balloon) measurements taken of tropospheric temperatures in the tropical regions have shown no increase in the last ten years.
Every climate model requires these particular temperatures to increase with increasing
atmospheric carbon dioxide.
It has been admitted by some of the climate modellers connected to the IPCC that
their simulations cannot describe in any detail clouds or cloud formation. The type and extent of cloud cover over the earth has a very large impact on radiation input to the earth from the sun and on the earth’s radiation to space. Th is is, therefore, a damning admission from within the global-warming community.

ICSC EXECUTIVE DIRECTOR PRESENTATION - CO2 AND WAXMAN-MARKEY

http://www.nccoal.org/pdf/Harris_Presentation_090713.pdf

NSIDC on arctic ice: It is now unlikely that 2009 will see a record low extent

Daily Arctic sea ice extent on August 17 was 6.26 million square kilometers (2.42 million square miles). The orange line shows the 1979 to 2000 median extent for that day. The black cross indicates the geographic North Pole. Sea Ice Index data. About the data.

Seven arrested in suspected carbon tax fraud

"Those arrested are believed to be part of an organized crime group operating a network of companies trading large volumes of high-value carbon credits," it said.

"It is thought that the proceeds of this crime have then been used to finance lavish lifestyles and the purchase of prestige vehicles."

Greenpeace Leader Admits Arctic Ice Exaggeration

The outgoing leader of Greenpeace has admitted his organization's recent claim that the Arctic Ice will disappear by 2030 was "a mistake."

Greenpeace made the claim in a July 15 press release entitled "Urgent Action Needed As Arctic Ice Melts," which said there will be an ice-free Arctic by 2030 because of global warming.

Under close questioning by BBC reporter Stephen Sackur on the "Hardtalk" program, Gerd Leipold, the retiring leader of Greenpeace, said the claim was wrong.

"I don't think it will be melting by 2030. ... That may have been a mistake," he said.Sackur said the claim was inaccurate on two fronts, pointing out that the Arctic ice is a mass of 1.6 million square kilometers with a thickness of 3 km in the middle, and that it had survived much warmer periods in history than the present.

The BBC reporter accused Leipold and Greenpeace of releasing "misleading information" and using "exaggeration and alarmism."

Leipold's admission that Greenpeace issued misleading information is a major embarrassment to the organization, which often has been accused of alarmism but has always insisted that it applies full scientific rigor in its global-warming pronouncements.

Although he admitted Greenpeace had released inaccurate but alarming information, Leipold defended the organization's practice of "emotionalizing issues" in order to bring the public around to its way of thinking and alter public opinion.

Leipold said later in the BBC interview that there is an urgent need for the suppression of economic growth in the United States and around the world. He said annual growth rates of 3 percent to 8 percent cannot continue without serious consequences for the climate.

"We will definitely have to move to a different concept of growth. ... The lifestyle of the rich in the world is not a sustainable model," Leipold said. "If you take the lifestyle, its cost on the environment, and you multiply it with the billions of people and an increasing world population, you come up with numbers which are truly scary."

Tuesday, August 18, 2009

Who is Really Making Up the Facts

“When I asked Chu about the earth-is-cooling argument, he rolled his eyes and whipped out a chart showing that the 10 hottest years on record have all been in the past 12 years and that 1998 was the hottest. He mocked the skeptics who focus on that post-1998 blip while ignoring a century-long trend of rising temperatures: “See? It’s gone down! The earth must be cooling!” But then he got serious, almost plaintive: “You know, it’s totally irresponsible. You’re not supposed to make up the facts."”

Saturday, August 15, 2009

Four months till the end of the world

"We have just four months. Four months to secure the future of our planet."

How did a nut job like this ever become UN Secretary-General?

The New Politics, A Speech by carl Pope

* Increasing Mining Royalties and Grazing Fees on public lands -- "Mining claims on federal lands are property rights. The current grazing fee formula takes account of a permitee's private property rights."
* Blocking Interior Secretary Babbitt's Grazing Regulations --"Grazing permits result from pre-existing property rights. These rights are well documented throughout western water and land-use law."
* Mojave National Monument -- "Thousands of mining claims, numerous operating mines, and grazing permits would be included inside the boundaries of the new parks and wilderness areas.... Property rights supporters sparked significant opposition."
* Forest Service Road Budget -- "To reduce the Forest Service roadbuilding budget by $11.9 million. In addition to timber producers, these roads have multiple uses; private property inholders, mining claimants, grazing permittees and recreationists use them as well. Without access, private property is worthless...."
* National Biological Survey Volunteers -- Rep. Billy Tauzin offered an amendment forbidding the National Biological Survey from using volunteers. "Defenders of private property voted yes. Volunteers could have self interested motives to find endangered species and would be much harder to control through civil service regulations than federal employees."
* Mining Law Repeal -- "The General Mining Law of 1872 provides incentives to encourage people to discover and develop minerals .... The bill would radically change this system..."
* Montana Wilderness -- "Rep. Pat Williams' bill would create new wilderness areas in Montana totaling 1.6 million acres. Mining and other activities would be prohibited within these areas..."

Wednesday, August 12, 2009

Chevy Volt's "230 MPG" Propaganda

The Chevy Volt gets 230 MPG? Really? Using GM's "calculations" if you drive under 40 miles per day, you will get infinite MPG! The reality is that the Chevy Volt runs 40 miles on battery power, then a gasoline generator kicks in and you average around "40 MPG". However, I will wait for the real MPG rating as the Prius's initial 60 MPG rating was a lie - try 45 MPG. But what does a plug-in electrical charge (which is not free) have to do with MPG? Absolutely nothing, it is pure propaganda using it to calculate "MPG". How dishonest has Government Motors become to sell a car that only the mathematically challenged would buy? Apparently a sucker is born every minute...

Tuesday, August 11, 2009

Dangerous Deception?

Motive
It is difficult and dangerous to impute motive. How and why a person acts in a certain way is usually difficult to determine. A particular course of action may be taken with the best of intentions yet cause considerable problems. However, certain actions although not definitive may expose the motive.

Sunday, August 2, 2009

Arctic Ice Changes in past 3 years due to 'shifting winds'

Arctic Ice Changes in past 3 years due to 'shifting winds' - The Star Canada - July 28, 2009 - Excerpt: Oceanographer and Arctic researcher Jane Eert said "dramatic [Arctic ice] changes in the past three years are the result of shifting winds." "Enormous amounts of ice have 'been exported from the Arctic,' driven by winds that are shifting," according to Eert. Eert noted that climate models have many woes. "The guys who are running the long-term climate models have a tough problem," Eert says. "They're looking at really long time scales, and as result they can't look at a lot of details for each year. In order to get the results before you die, you have to fudge some things. And what they fudge is the small-scale stuff. But it turns out that probably the small-scale stuff is important and fudging it gives you wrong answers." [...] Jane Eert is science coordinator of the Three Oceans Project, a federal study of Canada's Arctic, Atlantic and Pacific oceans. [...] A physical oceanographer, Eert leads the scientific team aboard The Louis. It's her 10th voyage on the ship since 1999. Between 10 and 15 per cent of the Arctic Ocean is what Eert calls a data hole. It will take years' more research to fill it in with solid information, she adds. After years of reports that vast areas of Arctic ice are melting as the seawater below, and air above, warm up, scientists have discovered that dramatic changes in the past three years are the result of shifting winds, perhaps caused by climate change. Enormous amounts of ice have "been exported from the Arctic," driven by winds that are shifting as the climate changes, which pushed the ice into ocean currents that delivered it to the North Atlantic, Eert says. "The multi-year ice in the polar pack didn't melt in the Arctic Ocean,'' she says. "It moved out and what's left in the Arctic is thinner than it was." That doesn't mean some Arctic ice isn't disappearing altogether, just that the process is not as simple as some reports suggest, Eert says. Old ice that has shifted south from Greenland may have a counter-effect on the climate, which is just one of the many pieces of a very complex jigsaw puzzle that scientists are trying to piece together as they attempt to predict the effects of global warming.

North Pole expedition finds 'ice 100% thicker than expected' - April 28, 2009Excerpt: Surprising results - In Canada, "Polar 5", a research aircraft (see 27 hi-res pictures), has ended its recent Arctic expedition today. During the flight, scientists were measuring the ice thickness in regions that have never been overflown before. The result: the sea ice is apparently thicker than the scientists had suspected. Under normal conditions, the ice is formed within two years and ends up being slightly above 2 meters of thickness. "Here, the thickness was as high as four meters," said the spokesperson for the Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research in Bremerhaven. According to the scientists, this conclusion seems to contradict the warming of the ocean water.

Danish Meteorological Institute records show: No Arctic Warming Since 1958! - 'Arctic was warmer in the 1940s than now' - May 13, 2009 - Excerpt: The Danish Meteorological Institute has records going back to 1958 and GISSTEMP has even longer records. Below is a visual comparison of DMI 1958 Arctic temperatures vs. 2009, showing that temperatures have hardly changed since the start of their record.[...] Below is an overlay directly showing that 2009 temperatures (green) are similar to 1958 (red) and close to the mean. Temperatures have warmed since the start of the satellite record, but they cooled even more between 1940 and 1980. Everyone (including NSIDC) quietly acknowledges that most of the Arctic was warmer in the 1940s than now – so they shift the warming argument to the Alaska side. However, that argument also has problems. Alaska temperatures rose at the positive PDO shift in 1977, and have cooled again with the recent negative PDO shift – as seen below. 2008 was notable in that Alaska glaciers started to increase in size.