David Leonhardt: Climate Bill, Like The Country, Overcome By Heat And Inertia

New York Times:

This city just endured its hottest June since records began in 1872, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. So did Miami. Atlanta suffered its second-hottest June, and Dallas had its third hottest.

In New York, the weather was relatively pleasant: only the fourth-hottest June since 1872. Then again, New York is on pace for its hottest July on record.

Yet when United States senators and their aides file into work on Wednesday, on yet another 90-degree day, they may be on the verge of deciding to do approximately nothing about global warming. The needed 60 votes don't seem to be there, at least not at the moment.

Read the whole story: New York Times

Comments

[Power2Truth]

09:23 PM on 07/24/2010

Suuummertiiiime and the living is easy
Fish are jumpin' and the cotton is HIGH Oh your Daddy's rich and...

[Publicola]

12:02 PM on 07/26/2010

Russia: Heat Wave Kills 71 in 24 hours, Worst Drought in 130 Years

20.07.2010

In the last twenty-four hours, seventy-one people have died in Russia as a result of the heat. The record temperatures felt across the country, but mainly in Moscow, have caused people to take risks swimming in unfamiliar environments. So far in July, 1,244 people have died, almost three hundred of these last week as the country faces its worst drought in 130 years...

Up to twenty per cent of Russia’s grain production has been destroyed in the worst drought for one hundred and thirty years, according to the Agriculture Ministry. 9.6 million hectares of grain-fields have been destroyed or severely damaged and a drought emergency has been declared in 19 regions.

http://english.pravda.ru/russia/economics/20-07-2010/114300-heat_wave-0

[Publicola]

06:39 PM on 07/24/2010

DownBeatLounge: "Good explanation. I'm not a huge fan of using running averages, but in the case of NOAA's data it removes the short term variation. Agreed on this point. I'd still like to see the 1 year, 5 year, and 10 year, overlaid on a graph to view the variation."

I already showed you a graph that has the 1 year, and probably 5 year, running averages overlaid - here it is again:

http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/img/climate/research/global-jan-dec-error-bar-pg.gif

I also gave you links to the yearly and monthly temperature data - from that data you can create graphs of whatever timescale running averages you want to that are monthly or greater.

DownBeatLounge: "The NOAA data, as short as it is, probably doesn't matter much in the context of climate change anyway. We're basically looking at 130 years of data, which in context is similar to the weird claims that last winter's snowfall disproves climate change."

Incorrect. As I explained in some detail downthread, the global temperature trend can be assessed by looking at trends that are multidecadal (actually ~15 years is the minimum to control for decadal weather "noise"). And from that data we know as fact that the Earth has warmed over recent decades and over the past century.

continued...

[Publicola]

07:02 PM on 07/24/2010

...continued

Global warming of course doesn't happen by itself - it is driven by physical processes. And exhaustive analysis tells us that the bulk of warming over recent decades cannot be explained by any known means other than by man-made greenhouse gases.

That is in no way similar to patently false claims that last winter's regional snowstorm disproves global warming, which is a scientifically invalid assertion on two levels: 1: globally it was one of the warmest winters on record; and 2) as explained in detail a previous post that's far too short of a time interval to assess the global temperature trend with scientific validity.

DownBeatLounge: "I would like to understand the sea ice estimates as well. If my reading is correct we've only been measuring for a few years, so I'm surprised that retreating ice is often linked as proof of AGW. We just don't have enough data to make that assumption.

You are incorrect again. We have 30 years of sea ice estimates - which again is long enough to detect a scientifically-valid trend, this trend shows sea ice decreasing over those 30 years.

http://psc.apl.washington.edu/ArcticSeaiceVolume/images/BPIOMASIceVolumeAnomalyCurrent.png

[Publicola]

05:26 PM on 07/22/2010

So which of the following global warming science facts are you denying, nameunused, and why?

* The Earth has warmed significantly over recent decades, to what may be the highest level in two thousand years or more.

* Anthropogenic greenhouse gases including CO2 -- which is generated mostly by fossil fuel burning -- warm the Earth. Without greenhouse gases including CO2 the Earth would be covered in ice from pole to pole.

* Atmospheric CO2 has increased by more than a third since the dawn of the fossil fuel era, to the highest level in at least 800,000 years.

* The scientific evidence strongly indicates that said increase in atmospheric CO2 concentration is due to anthropogenic CO2 emissions, and there is no other viable scientific explanation for said atmospheric CO2 increase.

* There is a strong correlation between said atmospheric CO2 increase and said recent warming.

* Known natural forcing agents of past global warming - including changes in orbital cycles, increases in solar radiation, and natural increases in atmospheric CO2 - cannot explain said recent warming. Neither has any scientific theory to explain the bulk of said recent warming other than AGW survived scientific scrutiny.

Again these are all scientific facts. Which is to say:

The scientific evidence supporting AGW is overwhelming.

[lunarsnare]

07:24 PM on 07/22/2010

@Publicola
I stopped counting at 900 none stop posts from in about a month yelling at people about your version of climate change.
Hogging the climate threads and ganging up on anybody willing to talk to you.
You really can’t expect people to take you serious under these circumstances.
Perhaps you have some problems and I say that with empathy….
Get help
I’m enjoying this lovely summer and you could also use a break.

[Publicola]

07:28 PM on 07/22/2010

lunarsnare, you can't refute the science so you go on the ad hominem attack.

Care to actually discuss the science instead?

[DownBeatLounge]

08:49 PM on 07/22/2010

Thanks for your post. I guess my main question remains...what do you think of using the 5 year averages? Do you accept the statistical practice of averaging averages to remove noise from the data set? What type of noise is this? Residual or just plain ol' error?

[Publicola]

09:29 PM on 07/22/2010

DownBeatLounge: "I guess my main question remains...what do you think of using the 5 year averages?"

As explained below, in this context - the context being that we want to ascertain what the multidecadal global temperature trend is - 5-year running averages provide more accurate picture than 1-year running averages.

DownBeatLounge: "Do you accept the statistical practice of averaging averages to remove noise from the data set?"

Yes. Again rolling averages is standard statistical methodology for long-term, relatively low signal trend assessment to help remove statistical "noise".

DownBeatLounge: "What type of noise is this? Residual or just plain ol' error?"

In this context, it is short-term weather variablity - the global mean temperature can be relatively cold one year and relatively warm the next due to numerous relatively short-term influences. Among most prominent of those are the El Nino/La Nina (aka ENSO) and North Atlanic Ocean oscillations - these ocean oscillations, which move warm and cold water to and around the ocean surface and thus have enormous influence on the surface temperature, are far larger than the longer-term global temperature signal, and thus drown it out unless they are controlled for via averaging.

continued...

[Publicola]

09:30 PM on 07/22/2010

... continued

By analogy, consider a scenario whereby one is to determine whether the tide is going in or out by measuring how far the waves come into shore. Any one wave, or even any small group of waves, tells us nothing - only by averaging how far the waves come in over a sufficiently long period of time can we tell what direction the tide is going. Also by analogy if you graphed that wave data which graph would be more informative with respect to showing the tide trends: a graph showing how far each and every wave cames in, or a graph showing 1-hour running averages of the waves? Both graphs would show you the same general result, but with the running average graph the relatively low-signal tide trend will be easier to discern.

Does that make sense and is that explanation clear?

[nameunused]

04:22 PM on 07/22/2010

Antarctica overcome by record cold. http://www.weeklystandard.com/blogs/coldest-temperature-recorded-arctic-last-week

I hope the penguins don't freeze. Do you think Pollution is causing global cooling?

Nor more bogus it's hot science please. Man caused global warming is dying-a-slow-death just like Al Gore as more and more women come forward with complaints as to what his real global agenda has been!

[Publicola]

05:23 PM on 07/22/2010

nameunused: "Antarctica overcome by record cold."

LOL.

Do you really think that one research station temporarily reaching a local record (a record going all the way back to the 1980s), and due to "very rare" regional "persistent lack of cloud cover and paucity of wind" means that the entire continent of Antarctica has been "overcome by record cold", nameunused?

For your sake I sincerely hope not.

nameunused: "Nor more bogus it's hot science please."

Right. And never you mind the scientific fact that Antarctica, like the Arctic, is rapidly melting.

[lunarsnare]

11:44 AM on 07/22/2010

I love this weather, finally a real summer again.
Awesome

[Publicola]

11:55 AM on 07/22/2010

Yeah, the warmest June in recorded history sure is "awesome".

[theMightyT v3]

10:45 AM on 07/22/2010

DownBeatLounge 3 hours ago (7:58 AM)
I was trying to get rid of the clingers that only shout talking points. Its annoying to be called a denier because I'm asking questions that many people can't follow. Its not that they are stupid, just uninformed on how the sausage is made.

===============

It really doesn't matter if the average person doesn't totally understand the methodology behind measurements and forecasting models. There's a method in place for reviewing those things in the scientific community, which takes place - in this case, rigorously - before findings are released.

I find it ironic that you're bemoaning the use of talking points while at the same time employing them.

Suggesting that it's too expensive and too damaging to the US economy to implement climate change legislation is a 20-year-old canard that successfully derailed any attempts to do something - anything! - about the problem when debate about it first arose.

[lunarsnare]

05:16 PM on 07/22/2010

theMightyT v3 6 hours ago (10:45 AM)
141 Fans
Become a fan
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It really doesn't matter if the average person doesn't totally understand the methodology behind measurements and forecasting models.
__________________________________________

With all due respect, I deeply disagree.
It’s very important that the average person understands and neither is it thaaat complex.
People are not that stupid.
And should not simply have to take some reviewers opinion or his talking points on blind faith.

[Publicola]

06:49 PM on 07/22/2010

lunarsnare: "neither is it thaaat complex."

LOL...

Do you think the average person understand atmospheric physics well enough to correctly assess the methodology of those global climate models, lunarsnare?

For that matter, do you think *you* understand atmospheric physics well enough to assess the methodology of those climate models?

How about assessing the methodology behind the temperature trends, which while quite a bit less complex than atmospheric physics nonetheless requires substantial understanding of trend statistics and climate science to correctly assess.

Do you think you understand statistical trend analysis and climate science well enough to correctly assess the methodology of temperature trend analyses, lunarsnare?

[DownBeatLounge]

08:54 PM on 07/22/2010

Dude,

Please leave me alone.

[dktshb]

10:29 PM on 07/21/2010

Interesting:
On July 11, the ongoing Russian heat wave sent the mercury to 44.0°C (111.2°F) in Yashkul, Kalmykia Republic, in the European portion of Russia near the Kazakhstan border. The previous hottest temperature in Russia (not including the former Soviet republics) was the 43.8°C (110.8°F) reading measured at Alexander Gaj, Kalmykia Republic, on August 6, 1940. The remarkable heat in Russia this year has not been limited just to the European portion of the country--the Asian portion of Russia also recorded its hottest temperature in history this year, a 42.3°C (108.1°F) reading at Belogorsk, near the Amur River border with China.

As I commented in Friday's post, six nations in Asia and Africa set new all-time hottest temperature marks in June. Two nations, Myanmar and Pakistan, set all-time hottest temperature marks in May, including Asia's hottest temperature ever, the astonishing 53.5°C (128.3°F) mark set on May 26 in Pakistan. Last week's record in Russia makes nine countries this year that have recorded their hottest temperature in history, making 2010 the year with the most national extreme heat records. My source for previous all-time records is the book Extreme Weather by Chris Burt. I thank Mr. Burt and weather records researchers Maximiliano Herrera and Howard Rainford for their assistance identifying this year's new extreme temperature records.

http://www.wunderground.com/blog/Jef...?entrynum=1546

[Publicola]

09:46 PM on 07/21/2010

The science deniers' war on science continues:

http://climateprogress.org/2010/07/15/lord-monckton-censor-john-abraham/

Christopher Monckton demands St. Thomas University censor, pay damages, and discipline Prof. John Abraham over his scientific dissection of Monckton's global warming/climate change screeds:

http://www.stthomas.edu/engineering/jpabraham/

TV weatherman Anthony Watts has posted Monckton's call for scientific censorship and suppression of criticism at his global warming denier blog:

"Once again I have much to thank Anthony Watts and his millions of readers for.... May I ask your kind readers once more for their help? Would as many of you as possible do what some of you have already been good enough to do? Please contact Father Dennis J. Dease, President of St. Thomas University, and invite him – even at this eleventh hour – to take down Abraham’s talk altogether from the University’s servers, and to instigate a disciplinary inquiry into the Professor’s unprofessional conduct"

http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/07/14/abraham-climbs-down/

You can show your support for Prof. Abraham academic freedom, and freedom of speech here:
http://hot-topic.co.nz/support-john-abraham/

[Publicola]

09:50 PM on 07/21/2010

George Monbiot on the science deniers' attempt to censor and suppress their critics:

--------------------------------
I’m struck by two thoughts. The first is how frequently climate change deniers resort to demands for censorship or threats of litigation to try to shut down criticism of their views... They claim to want a debate, but as soon as it turns against them they try to stifle it by intimidating their opponents.

The second thought is as follows: is this [Monckton] the man who was invited to testify before Congress [by the GOP as their climate change 'expert']? ... Who has been cited all over the internet as having proved that manmade climate change isn't happening?

One of the characteristics of the foot-soldiers of climate change denial seems to be their startling inability to spot a wrong 'un. As well as publishing a long series of falsehoods about climate change, Monckton has falsely claimed to be a member of the House of Lords...; falsely claimed to be a Nobel laureate; falsely claimed to have won the Falklands war (by suggesting to Margaret Thatcher that the SAS introduce a mild bacillus into the water supply in Port Stanley); maintained that he has invented a cure for HIV, multiple sclerosis, influenza and other diseases; and grossly exaggerated his role in shaping Margaret Thatcher's views. Yet none of this seems to have discouraged his disciples one jot.
--------------------------------

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/georgemonbiot/2010/jul/14/monckton-john-abraham

[lunarsnare]

06:44 AM on 07/22/2010

“ Climate change deniers”
do you have any idea how ridicules this terms is and how it mutes anything put forth in conjunction with it.

“ climate change denier”
A person who denies or is apparently unaware of that the earth has a changing climate.
Who are you referring to?

[Publicola]

08:52 AM on 07/22/2010

Lord "I'm A Fake House Of Lords Member" Monckton and Anthony "TV Weatherman" Watts are not climate change skeptics - true skeptics do not embrace and advance scientific disinformation and lies; by appropriating the label these people denigrate the concept of real scientific skepticism. They are instead climate change deniers - people who deny scientific facts about the issue of climate change.

[jimboy71]

02:04 PM on 07/22/2010

One cannot deny what one doesn't understand. None of the so-called deniers (or some of the supporters, such as Al Gore) are scientists. I ignore them, because they are largely ignorant of the facts. I rely on research, careful interpretation of data, solid methodology and broad scientific consensus that has been peer reviewed. It is the most reliable manner in which to form an opinion. I am frequently skeptical of SOME claims that are published, but then I want to look at wording, sample size, data collection methods, analysis and relevance to established fact and theory as a way in which to critique. To do this, I have to have a basic understanding of the methods and practices of the field.

For example, it makes no sense to be skeptical about marine mollusc CO2 levels if one doesn't understand annual growth patterns, chemistry and the formation of carbonates in a marine environment, isotope science and techniques, and basic geology (stratigraphic dating principles).

Many, many critics lack these (and other) basic scientific skills...

[theMightyT v3]

08:27 PM on 07/21/2010

DocSkull 53 minutes ago (7:32 PM)
When will you start debating? All I see is denial. Do you have some science to present?

==============

debating what, exactly?

[Publicola]

09:16 PM on 07/21/2010

I think DocSkull - who is a member of the reality-based (and thus pro-science) community - meant that question for PC Contrarian.

[DocSkull]

11:10 PM on 07/21/2010

It was a response to Mighty-whatever's complaint that "no one except for the rabid anti-climate change n.u.ts are trying to shut down debate."

But apparently he doesn't even know what to debate. Let alone have a fact-based argument.

[PresidentRobertBooth]

08:19 PM on 07/21/2010

***What about those hot rainy days. You when it's all muggy and humid? Eeew!***

My favourite type of days.


***PS: Cold rainy days depress me. :-(****

I find them refreshing.

[JEP57]

04:48 PM on 07/21/2010

So after we get rid of our SUV's and tax businesses (for environmental reasons, of course), temperatures will go back to a comfortable 80 degrees with a mild breeze out of the northeast.

[DocSkull]

07:31 PM on 07/21/2010

If the proposals were unreasonable, you wouldn't need to distort them.

[PC Contrarian]

04:24 PM on 07/21/2010

I remember after Katrina, we were told this was just the beginning of bigger and more frequent storms, because of AGW. Didn't happen.

We were also told that our polar ice caps were melting because of AGW; then we found out it was happening as well on Mars, in sync with Earth. Maybe solar activity explains things better.

Even if the Earth is warming, only people who take a religious view of AGW and are true believers will say for certain that we can affect the climate. It may or may not be true; but shutting down debate is very unscientific.

[theMightyT v3]

04:31 PM on 07/21/2010

lol

no one except for the rabid anti-climate change n.u.ts are trying to shut down debate.

[PC Contrarian]

04:34 PM on 07/21/2010

I thought Big Al said the debate was over; and all his sheep added that the "science is settled". Maybe you missed that; but then you probably missed this as well:
http://www.nationalenquirer.com/exclusive_al_gore_sex_scandal_two_new_female_accusers_assault/celebrity/69024

[Power2Truth]

07:30 PM on 07/21/2010

That's not true.
It's actually the other way around.

That said, hardly anybody in their right mind could ever be " anti-climate change" since the climate has fluctuated greatly through earth's history.
That would be as futile as being "anti-rain or anti-gravity.

[BrettnCalgary]

05:14 PM on 07/21/2010

http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2007/05/start-here/

[theMightyT v3]

03:43 PM on 07/21/2010

DownBeatLounge Congrats. You made a connection. The question is how much is that contribution and is it worth changing the economy at the short term cost of hundreds of billions of dollars. See there, that's what I did. I connected the science and the politics for ya'.

===========

Dude, you're so 20 years ago.

That's what the first Bush admin worked so hard to do: convince the country that it "wasn't worth it".

You figured you would have learned some new tricks by now.

Why not make a cool graphic with the a nice colorful globe on one side, and stacks of gold bars on the other?

THAT's never been done before.

[BLACKCAT66]

04:11 PM on 07/21/2010

I was thinking the same thing. Its bewildering how short sighted some people are. "Hey lets wait till we have exhaused all Fossil fuels and plunged the world back to the dark ages THEN lets start developing alternative solutions". What I don't is why people like DownBeat think that developing energy alternatives and making money have to be mutually exclusive to each other. Why do they think its either or?

[Publicola]

04:21 PM on 07/21/2010

BLACKCAT66: "What I don't is why people like DownBeat think that developing energy alternatives and making money have to be mutually exclusive to each other. Why do they think its either or?"

Especially given the following, as reported by Yale University:

-------------------------------------------

Reducing Carbon Emissions Could Help, Not Harm, U.S. Economy ...

Robert Repetto, an economics professor at the Yale School of Forestry & Environmental Studies... said, “As Congress prepares to debate new legislation to address the threat of climate change, opponents claim that the costs of adopting the leading proposals would be ruinous to the U.S. economy,” he said. “The world’s leading economists who have studied the issue say that’s wrong."

http://environment.yale.edu/news/Research/5624

[MrOmega]

03:20 PM on 07/21/2010

But...But... Jeebus, said it suppose to be hot!

[DuPageDem]

02:40 PM on 07/21/2010

Rethuglicans want to create a maze of energy regulations (instead of a simple and transparent carbon tax) because it allows them to pick and choose which industries and corporations will win, and which will lose. Their corporate owners don't actually support a free market -- they prefer monopolies and cartels subsidized by a captive government.