Archive for August, 2009
“Standing Together to Organize a Revolutionary Movement (STORM), the revolutionary group formed by self-described “communist” and “rowdy black nationalist” Van Jones, held a vigil in Oakland, California, “mourning the victims of U.S. imperialism around the world” on the night after Sept. 11, 2001.
The reason this is important is because Van Jones is now President Obama’s green jobs czar. He does not appear to have distanced himself from his past communist activities and is now part of the Obama administration’s push to turn Sept. 11 into a National Day of Service focused on the promotion of the radical environmentalist agenda.” “Van Jones and his STORMtroopers denounced America the night after 9/11“
“[Abstract]: One of the mysteries regarding Earth’s climate system response to variations in solar output is how the relatively small fluctuations of the 11-year solar cycle can produce the magnitude of the observed climate signals in the tropical Pacific associated with such solar variability. Two mechanisms, the top-down stratospheric response of ozone to fluctuations of shortwave solar forcing and the bottom-up coupled ocean-atmosphere surface response, are included in versions of three global climate models, with either mechanism acting alone or both acting together. We show that the two mechanisms act together to enhance the climatological off-equatorial tropical precipitation maxima in the Pacific, lower the eastern equatorial Pacific sea surface temperatures during peaks in the 11-year solar cycle, and reduce low-latitude clouds to amplify the solar forcing at the surface.
[Text]: It has long been noted that the 11-year cycle of solar forcing is associated with variousphenomena in Earth’s climate system, in both the troposphere and stratosphere (1–9). Because the amplitude of the solar cycle (solar maximum to solar minimum) is relatively small, about 0.2 W m−2 globally averaged (10), and the observed global sea surface temperature (SST) response of about 0.1°C would require more than 0.5Wm−2 (11), there has always been a question regarding how this small solar signal could be amplified to produce a measurable response.
Postulated mechanisms that could amplify the relatively small solar forcing signal to produce such responses in the troposphere include changes in clouds in the troposphere caused by galactic cosmic rays, or associated global atmospheric electric circuit variations, though neither has been plausibly simulated in a climate model. However, there are two other plausible mechanisms, though each has not yet produced a modeled response of the magnitude seen in the observations.
The first involves a “top down” response of stratospheric ozone to the ultraviolet (UV) part of the solar spectrum that varies by a few percent. Peaks in solar forcing cause the enhanced UV radiation, which stimulates additional stratospheric ozone production and UV absorption, thus warming that layer differentially with respect to latitude. The anomalous temperature gradients provide a positive feedback through wave motions to amplify the original solar forcing. The changes in the stratosphere modify tropical tropospheric circulation and thus contribute to an enhancement and poleward expansion of the tropical precipitation maxima (5, 12–16). The first demonstration of the top-down mechanism in a modeling study showed a broadening of the Hadley cells in response to enhanced UV that increased as the solar-induced ozone change was included (17).
A second “bottom up” mechanism that can magnify the response to an initially small solar forcing involves air-sea coupling and interaction with incoming solar radiation at the surface in the relatively cloud-free areas of the subtropics. Thus, peaks in solar forcing produce greater energy input to the ocean surface in these areas, evaporating more moisture, and that moisture is carried by the trade winds to the convergence zones where more precipitation occurs. This intensified precipitation strengthens the Hadley and Walker circulations in the troposphere, with an associated increase in trade wind strength that produces greater equatorial ocean upwelling and lower equatorial SSTs in the eastern Pacific, a signal that was first discovered in observational data (1, 2). The enhanced subsidence produces fewer clouds in the equatorial eastern Pacific and the expanded subtropical regions that allow even more solar radiation to reach the surface to produce a positive feedback (18, 19). Dynamical air-sea coupling produces a transition to higher eastern equatorial SSTs a couple of years later (20, 21). There is observational evidence for a strengthened Hadley circulation in peak solar forcing years associated with intensified tropical precipitation maxima, a stronger descending branch in the subtropics, and a stronger ascending branch in the lower latitudes (3); a poleward expansion of the Hadley circulation in peak solar years, with stronger ascending motions at the edge of the rising branch, as well as a stronger Walker circulation with enhanced upward motions in the tropical western Pacific connected to stronger descending motions in the tropical eastern Pacific (7); and enhanced summer season off-equatorial climatological monsoon precipitation over India (6, 22). This cold event– like response to peak solar forcing is different from cold events (also known as La Niña events) in the Southern Oscillation in that, among other things, zonal wind anomalies in the stratosphere are opposite in sign (23).” “Amplifying the Pacific Climate System Response to a Small 11-Year Solar Cycle Forcing” Article in Space.com. Article in ScienceDaily. Article in Christian Science Monitor. Editorial at SEPP. h/t IceCap
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“Toyota Motor Corp. will shut an assembly plant for the first time in its 72-year history …
New United Motor Manufacturing Inc. [NUMMI] in Fremont, California, will end production of Corolla cars and Tacoma pickups in March 2010, Toyota said in a statement. GM in June said it would end assembly of Pontiac Vibes at the plant, known as Nummi, and quit the venture …
Nummi employs 5,400 people, including 4,550 United Auto Workers union positions. More than 1,000 suppliers work with the factory, which has annual payroll and benefits of $523 million, according to a plant publication. …
Toyota will shift production of Tacoma pickups to San Antonio and move Corollas to its factory in Ontario, Canada. …
Nummi has the capacity to make 420,000 cars and pickups each year. It only made money in 1992, the result of California’s taxes and labor and pollution rules, as well as the plant’s UAW contracts, according to an estimate by Credit Suisse Group AG analyst.” “Toyota Will Shut California Plant in First Closure” prior post here
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The article below uses various vague euphemisms (“environmental concerns”, “environmental issues”, “environmental edicts”) and speaks of a “water crisis”, but doesn’t even mention that the whole crisis has been manufactured by enviro lawsuits which forced water restrictions to farmers in favor of a 4-inch bait fish (prior post here), and that without the enviros there would be no crisis and 40,000 farmworkers would not be out of work:
“U.S. Agriculture Secretary Tom Vilsack promised California farmers Wednesday he’ll press for solutions to the water crisis hitting the state’s San Joaquin Valley, one of the most prolific farm regions in the world. …
Farmers kept returning to the issue of drought and water, however, and the state’s outdated system of conveyances that have cut deliveries because of environmental concerns in the Sacramento-San Joaquin Delta. …
The meeting at one of the valley’s largest fruit packing houses came as federal attention has been focused this week on the water crisis crippling the region. A three-year drought, combined with environmental issues that have slowed water deliveries, have forced farmers on the valley’s west side to fallow more than a quarter-million acres.
On Tuesday House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer toured the western Fresno County farm community of Mendota, where idled farmworkers have driven the unemployment rate to nearly 40 percent. …
“It’s important for the secretary of agriculture to understand that California’s water system is broken and the federal government has a role in fixing it,” said [Rep. Jim] Costa [D-CA], who represents much of the region and has been on a nearly full-time mission to find a solution to the water crisis.
Farms on the west side of the San Joaquin Valley depend on water shipped from the north through a system of canals. Tom Birmingham, general manager of the Westlands Water District, said 1 million acres of almonds, tomatoes, lettuce, grapes and other commodities are “in a crisis” because environmental edicts have limited the flow of high-quality water.” “Ag Secretary Assesses Calif. Water Problems“
NOAA recently claimed that July sea surface temperatures (SST) were the warmest on record for July. Alarmist AP journo Seth Borenstein then dutifully wrote a breathless news article. Now Roy Spencer has examined the claim:
Update (August 31) from Roy Spencer: “[I]t does look like July 2009 might well have experienced a warmer SST anomaly than July 1998, as was originally claimed by NOAA. (Remember, TMI can not see all of the global oceans, just equatorward of about 40 deg. N and S latitude.)” “Spurious SST Warming Revisited“
Update (August 27) from Roy Spencer: “After crunching data this week from two of our satellite-based microwave sensors, and from NOAA’s official sea surface temperature (SST) product ERSST v3b, I think the evidence is pretty clear:
The ERSST v3b product has a spurious warming since 1998 of about 0.2 deg. C, most of which occurred as a jump in 2001. …
Finally, the 0.15 to 0.20 deg. C warm bias in the NOAA SST product makes it virtually certain that July 2009 was not, as NOAA reported, a record high for global sea surface temperatures.” “Spurious Warming in New NOAA Ocean Temperature Product: The Smoking Gun“
Original (August 26 from Roy Spencer: “So, since we have another satellite dataset with a longer record that would allow a direct comparison between 1998 and 2009, I decided to analyze the full record from the TRMM Microwave Imager (TMI). …
The results are shown in the following three panels. The first panel shows monthly SST anomalies since January 1998, and as can be seen July 2009 came in about 0.06 deg. C below July 1998. At face value, this suggests that July 2009 might not have been a record. And as you can see from the first 3 weeks of August data, it looks like this month will come in even cooler. …
The third and final panel in the above figure shows that a substantial fraction of the monthly SST variability from year to year is due to the Southern Oscillation (El Nino/La Nina), and the Pacific Decadal Oscillation, PDO.” “TRMM Satellite Suggests July 2009 Not a Record for Sea Surface Temperatures“
“Arguing that the opposition should negotiate with Labor now to avoid uncertainty or to wield a moderating influence on the final shape of the ETS is extraordinarily short-sighted. Once an ETS is established, business groups will have lost all control and the zero-carbonites will make their anti-business moves in the Senate. …
There is one thing that will ensure that the canary-fatal ETS can fail a second time. Business must muscle up and tell its so-called spokespeople to defy the red-green alliance and put industry and the economy first. Reasonable thinkers know emissions reductions come at a price, so only successful business can invest in reduction technology and adaptation measures. Business must stand firm and that will keep the Liberal-Nationals Coalition strong in opposing the ETS. Groups such as the Business Council of Australia cannot serve two masters, the rent-seekers and the producers of real goods. It is strange how much of the public comment seems to have got these two mixed up.
It is in the hands of business now: whether it wants to see Australian industry eaten away inch by inch through a Senate-controlled ETS or whether it will stand firm against it. If business fails to hold the line that enabled us to block the ETS the first time, then the Labor-Greens alliance will carve up its investments.
The Nationals are not alone on this. We have many Liberals on side. A strong and public show of leadership from business will seal the fate of the ETS.” “Business can save us from ETS disaster“
“A SENIOR Nationals senator has called on corporate Australia to join his party’s rebellion against carbon emissions trading in direct defiance of the Liberals.
Senator Ron Boswell has also rejected Malcolm Turnbull’s negotiations with Labor on the ETS legislation, claiming they are short-sighted. The veteran Queenslander has also backed claims that Liberal MPs are spurning the Opposition Leader on the issue to back the Nationals.” “Ron Boswell calls on firms to bar ETS“
“A team of researchers says it has largely put to rest a long debate on the underlying mechanism that has caused periodic ice ages on Earth for the past 2.5 million years – they are ultimately linked to slight shifts in solar radiation caused by predictable changes in Earth’s rotation and axis.
In a publication to be released Friday in the journal Science, researchers from Oregon State University and other institutions conclude that the known wobbles in Earth’s rotation caused global ice levels to reach their peak about 26,000 years ago, stabilize for 7,000 years and then begin melting 19,000 years ago, eventually bringing to an end the last ice age.
The melting was first caused by more solar radiation, not changes in carbon dioxide levels or ocean temperatures, as some scientists have suggested in recent years.
“Solar radiation was the trigger that started the ice melting, that’s now pretty certain,” said Peter Clark, a professor of geosciences at OSU. “There were also changes in atmospheric carbon dioxide levels and ocean circulation, but those happened later” …
“We now know with much more certainty how ancient ice sheets responded to solar radiation, and that will be very useful in better understanding what the future holds,” Clark said. “It’s good to get this pinned down.” …
Sometime around now, scientists say, the Earth should be changing from a long interglacial period that has lasted the past 10,000 years and shifting back towards conditions that will ultimately lead to another ice age …” “Long debate ended over cause, demise of ice ages – may also help predict future“
“Ed Miliband says he is in “the persuasion business”. So how do you persuade people when research suggests that many of them don’t trust your message?
The secretary of state for energy and climate change told the BBC recently that his job is to convince people “to make big changes” in their lives. Unless that happens, he warns, the planet and our way of life will be damaged for generations to come.
But Whitehall research reveals that:
“[M]istrust is a critical issue which is potentially a major barrier to people becoming more pro-environmental”.
Government is suspected of “using” the environment to increase taxes. What’s more, people don’t like politicians telling them how to lead their lives.
There is still deep scepticism. Despite virtually unanimous academic opinion [!], half of us still believe science is divided on whether mankind’s activities contribute to climate change.
And more than a quarter of us don’t think our individual behaviour makes any difference to the environmental crisis.
So Mr Miliband needs a much more subtle approach. He hopes to “nudge” us into going green, to change the way we behave without ever realising that we are being coaxed and cajoled by central government.
The starting point for the strategy is a document published at the beginning of last year entitled A Framework for Pro-Environmental Behaviours [678KB PDF]. …
It all fits neatly with the government’s aims for behaviour change. …
[M]uch of the Act on CO2 campaign is built on the idea that saving the planet equals saving money [!]. …
Are you a “positive green” or a “stalled starter”, a “waste watcher” or a “sidelined supporter”? When it comes to climate change, we have all been categorised.
[E]ach cluster fits in terms of our ability and willingness to get greener. And there is a sophisticated strategy associated with each group. So, the toughest nuts to crack (“stalled starters” and “honestly disengaged”) will need to be forced to act.
The translation of “choice editing” means, for example, making it impossible for people to buy anything but environmentally-friendly light-bulbs.
It might also mean trying to make people feel guilty about buying South American green beans in mid-winter or serving strawberries at Christmas. …
Behind the scenes in Whitehall, committees are constantly assessing how successful they are in getting us to change. …
This memo illustrates how the Department for Transport measures progress.
With their thought-showers and their segmentation models, government ministers are trying to alter the social weather, attempting to create the right environmental conditions so we will see climate change as a reason for changing the way we live.” “Perfect Storm 2030: Public attitudes” h/t CCNet
“Major new offshore drilling for oil and natural gas in the Gulf of Mexico will soon be a reality. The big question is whether Americans will be part of it. Brazil, China, India, Norway, Spain and Russia have all signed agreements with Cuba and the Bahamas to initiate exploration and production in the Gulf of Mexico within the next two years. So the prospect of seeing Russian oil rigs 45 miles off the Florida Keys — where American oil companies are now forbidden to drill — is a very real possibility.
The U.S. Geological Survey estimates that the eastern Gulf region contains 3 billion barrels of oil and more than 11 trillion cubic feet of natural gas. Last summer, former President George W. Bush lifted the executive branch moratorium his father signed in 1990 on new drilling in 85 percent of America’s territorial waters. The Democratic Congress then wisely let the congressional ban expire as well. So the only thing keeping U.S. firms from drilling off our own continental shelf is President Barack Obama and his secretary of the interior, Ken Salazar, who is slow-walking the approval process that must be cleared before the work can begin. Meanwhile, foreign nations are jockeying for the best spots. The Obama administration, incredibly enough, is giving Brazil a $2 billion loan from U.S. taxpayers to finance that nation’s development of its own off-shore energy resources in the Atlantic.
According to the American Petroleum Institute, the development of America’s coastal oil and gas resources would generate more than $1.3 trillion in new government revenue and 160,000 high-paying jobs over the next two decades. Senators Lisa Murkowski, R-Ark., and Mary Landrieu, D-La., are bipartisan co-sponsors of a bill that provides coastal states such as Florida their fair share of revenues produced by off-shore drilling and production. The same thing should be done for states on the East and West coasts. California Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger and the state’s lawmakers hope to tap deposits off Santa Barbara to generate billions in royalties, and Virginia’s front-running gubernatorial candidate Bob McDonnell has made drilling 50 miles off that state’s coast a key component of his energy plan.” “A rush for black gold in the Gulf“
“What was learned
Since the early Holocene, according to the findings of the six scientists, sea-ice cover in the eastern Chuckchi Sea appears to have exhibited a general decreasing trend, in contrast to the eastern Arctic, where sea-ice cover was substantially reduced during the early to mid-Holocene and has increased over the last 3000 years. Superimposed on both of these long-term changes, however, are what they describe as “millennial-scale variations that appear to be quasi-cyclic.” And they write that “it is important to note that the amplitude of these millennial-scale changes in sea-surface conditions far exceed [our italics] those observed at the end of the 20th century.”
What it means
Since the change in sea-ice cover observed at the end of the 20th century (which climate alarmists claim to be unnatural) was far exceeded by changes observed multiple times over the past several thousand years of relatively stable atmospheric CO2 concentrations (when values never strayed much below 250 ppm or much above 275 ppm), there is no compelling reason to believe that the increase in the air’s CO2 content that has occurred since the start of the Industrial Revolution has had anything at all to do with the declining sea-ice cover of the recent past …” “Holocene Fluctuations in Arctic Sea-Ice Cover“
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“During the first half of August, Arctic ice extent declined more slowly than during the same period in 2007 and 2008. The slower decline is primarily due to a recent atmospheric circulation pattern, which transported ice toward the Siberian coast and discouraged export of ice out of the Arctic Ocean. It is now unlikely that 2009 will see a record low extent …
Ice motion changes in August
A recent atmospheric circulation pattern, which led to a change in ice motion, caused the ice loss rate to slow down significantly in the first two weeks of August. As discussed in the August 4 post, during much of June and July, a strong Beaufort Sea high-pressure pattern promoted winds that helped push ice out of the Siberian coastal seas, and also brought clear skies and warm temperatures that helped induce melt.
Toward the end of July, the atmospheric pattern changed. Averaged over the past two weeks, a high-pressure system has been centered over the Barents Sea, with low pressure centered over the Laptev Sea. In accordance with Buys Ballot’s Law, this pattern led to winds that redirected the motion of the ice cover, pushing the ice edge outward toward the Siberian coast and discouraging ice from exiting the Arctic Ocean through Fram Strait.
The Northwest Passage and Northern Sea Route
So far this year, neither the Northwest Passage nor the Northern Sea Route has opened. The Northern Sea Route appears likely to open soon, but ice still clogs many of the channels in the Northwest Passage.
Whether or not the navigational passages through the Arctic Ocean will open in a given summer depends on atmospheric circulation and ice thickness. For example, although 2007 was a record low extent in the Arctic and the Northwest Passage was nearly completely open, the Northern Sea Route was still choked with ice because of a circulation pattern that pushed a tongue of ice against the Siberian coast. Recent research by Stephen Howell at the University of Waterloo in Canada shows that whether the Northwest Passage clears depends less on how much melt occurs, and more on whether multi-year sea ice is pushed into the channels. Counterintuitively, as the ice cover thins, ice may flow more easily into the channels, preventing the Northwest Passage from regularly opening in coming decades.
Comment on atmospheric circulation patterns
James Overland of the NOAA Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory in Seattle, Washington has taken a close look at patterns of atmospheric circulation in recent summers. Overland notes that the periods June through August 2007 and June and July 2009 both saw an unusual atmospheric pattern of sea level pressure, with higher pressure on the Alaskan side of the Arctic and lower pressure on the Eurasian side. This pressure difference brought warm air into the central Arctic and transported sea ice towards the Atlantic. Historically, such a pattern is a rare event—before 2007, it only occurred twice in 30 years. Normally there is little difference in pressure across the Arctic during summer, and winds are slack.” “A change in ice motion slows seasonal decline” Prior post here
“The Chinese aerosol, however, can have another effect on the climate. That is, a possible influence of soot on the Arctic ice. It seems to me that Hofmann et al.’s paper, together with other recent findings, gives evidence for this possibility as follows:
1) Hofmann et al’s paper shows that stratospheric haze became densest in 2007 and declined a little after that. According to their claim, this is associated with the changes in sulfate emissions from China. This fact reminds me that the ice extent in the Arctic sea was significantly reduced in the 2007 summer and recovered after that. Since the amount soot should be proportional to that of sulfate, also the amount soot transported to the Arctic may have a peak in 2007, and may explain the dramatic reduction of the sea ice extent; the soot deposited onto the ice surfaces absorbs sun light of Arctic summer, gives heat to the ice, and lets it melt. This process should be particularly effective during summer of the Arctic when the sun does not set.
2) About half of the recent temperature increase in the Arctic region is reportedly due to aerosols (combination effects of sulfate and soot) (D. Shindell and G. Faluvegi, Nature Geosci. 2, 294-300 (2009)); this result convinces one that the influence of soot on the Arctic environment does exist.
3) There are other recent papers on soot: e. g., “Atmospheric brown clouds: Hemispherical and regional variations in long-range transport, absorption, and radiative forcing,” V. Ramanathan et al., J. Geophys. Res. vol. 112, D22S21, doi:10.1029/2006JD008124, 2007.
From these results, I suspect that the soot from China is responsible for the recent reduction of sea ice in the Arctic summer. To verify this, detailed chemical analyses, such as carbon allotropes, should be made if the soot can be sampled from the ice (this may be an interesting project).” “Soot And The Arctic Ice – A Win-Win Policy Based On Chinese Coal Fired Power Plants“
“The goal of the “American Clean Energy and Security Act” is to reduce overall U.S. greenhouse gas emissions by 17% from 2005 levels by the year 2020, and 83% by mid-century. In typical Congressional and Obama one-dimensional thinking they seem to have forgotten that it is global carbon dioxide production that we concerned about. American manufacturing which is already uncompetitive in the global market is about to become even less competitive.
Hooray we can reduce U.S. CO2 production by a miserly 17% by 2020. But by increasing the cost of manufacturing in the U.S. we will almost certainly demolish what is left of our manufacturing base and wind up outsourcing it to the least environmentally friendly country in the world, China. China has does not restrict CO2 for fear of making its manufacturing base uncompetitive.
China is by far the largest producer of carbon dioxide (CO2) in the world. A conservative estimate is that for every molecule of CO2 we save in the United States, China, our surrogate manufacturer will incrementally produce 3 CO2 molecules. In net effect by making manufacturing to costly in the U.S. we may technically reduce our CO2 production by 17% but we will have our proxy China incrementally increase their CO2 production threefold – resulting in a real increase in the U.S. related carbon dioxide production of 34%.” “New climate bill — guaranteed to increase CO2 production” h/t IceCap Aug. 23
“Global warming alarmists have suggested that the ice sheets of Greenland and Antarctica may collapse, causing disastrous sea level rise. This idea is based on the concept of an ice sheet sliding down an inclined plane on a base lubricated by meltwater, which is itself increasing because of global warming.
In reality the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets occupy deep basins, and cannot slide down a plane. Furthermore glacial flow depends on stress (including the important yield stress) as well as temperature, and much of the ice sheets are well below melting point.
The accumulation of kilometres of undisturbed ice in cores in Greenland and Antarctica (the same ones that are sometimes used to fuel ideas of global warming) show hundreds of thousands of years of accumulation with no melting or flow. Except around the edges, ice sheets flow at the base, and depend on geothermal heat, not the climate at the surface. It is impossible for the Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets to ‘collapse’.
In these days of alarmist warnings about climate warming, the ice sheets of Greenland and Antarctica have an important role. Many papers have described their melting at the present times, and dire predictions of many metres of sea level rise are common. Christoffersen and Hambrey published a typical paper on the Greenland ice sheet in Geology Today in May, 2006.
Their model, unfortunately, includes neither the main form of the Greenland Ice Sheet, nor an understanding of how glaciers flow. They predict the behaviour of the Ice Sheet based on melting and accumulation rates at the present day, and the concept of an ice sheet sliding down an inclined plane on a base lubricated by meltwater, which is itself increasing because of global warming. The same misconception is present in textbooks such as The Great Ice Age (2000) by R.C.L. Wilson and others, popular magazines such as the June 2007 issue of National Geographic, and other scientific articles such as Bamber et al. (2007), which can be regarded as a typical modelling contribution. The idea of a glacier sliding downhill on a base lubricated by meltwater seemed a good idea when first presented by de Saussure in 1779, but a lot has been learned since then.
In the present paper we shall try to show how the mechanism of glacier flow differs from this simple model, and why it is impossible for the Greenland and Antarctic Ice Sheets to collapse. Ice sheets do not simply grow and melt in response to average global temperature. Anyone with this naïve view would have difficulty in explaining why glaciation has been present in the southern hemisphere for about 30 million years, and in the northern hemisphere for only 3 million years. …
Conclusion
The global warming doomsday writers claim the ice sheets are melting catastrophically, and will cause a sudden rise in sea level of many metres. This ignores the mechanism of glacier flow which is by creep: glaciers are not melting from the surface down, nor are they sliding down an inclined plane lubricated by meltwater. The existence of ice over 3 km thick preserving details of past snowfall and atmospheres, used to decipher past temperature and CO2 levels, shows that the ice sheets have accumulated for hundreds of thousands of years without melting. Variations in melting around the edges of ice sheets are no indication that they are collapsing. Indeed ‘collapse’ is impossible.” “Why the Greenland and Antarctic Ice Sheets are Not Collapsing” h/t IceCap Aug. 25
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“The National party has unanimously rejected the federal government’s emissions trading scheme legislation at the party’s annual council in Canberra today.
The motion was first on the agenda and has opened the way for a potential split between the coalition parties in the Senate when the vote on the ETS comes up again in November.
Prior to the council vote, outspoken Senator Barnaby Joyce said it was a most “dangerous scheme for regional Australia.”
“The emissions trading scheme will do nothing to affect the climate of the globe,” he told delegates at the council.
Senator Joyce said it would be an “insidious tax” which would “completely undermine the structure for which this country is built on”.
Liberal [Australia's conservative party] MP Darren Chester, who seconded the motion, said if the unions were too gutless to stand up for regional Australia and country jobs, then it was up to the Nationals to do so.
The motion was passed unanimously by the more than 50 members present at the council.” “Nats vote against emissions bill“
“THE Nationals have directly challenged Malcolm Turnbull’s authority on climate change, boasting that Liberal MPs are beginning to back their blanket rejection of a carbon emissions trading system.
Nationals Senate leader Barnaby Joyce said yesterday that despite the Opposition Leader’s efforts to negotiate with Kevin Rudd on emissions trading, Liberal MPs were telling him that they, like the Nationals, did not believe in an ETS.
Asked if the Nationals’ advocacy was “bringing Liberals along”, Senator Joyce said: “I think on this one we are. I think on this one the National Party are leading.” …
“The National Party is turning people’s views around on this and we are winning,” he told his party’s meeting in Canberra.
“The National Party led, the Australian community is coming in behind, and now everybody will start ducking for cover.”
Senator Joyce said he was aware of many Liberals who were fervent opponents of the ETS, despite the Liberal leader’s search for common ground with the government. “People have woken up to what the ETS is,” he said. “It’s not going to change the climate. It’s just a massive new tax.” Senator Joyce said he hoped the Liberals would vote against the ETS when it returned to the parliament for a second vote. …
“Regional Australia does not want an ETS,” he said. “Overwhelmingly now, metropolitan Australia has got huge questions about it. Our job is not to vary on our commitment — a commitment that is against this ETS. We maintain that. We will pursue that agenda all the way through.”" “Nationals call to Malcolm Turnbull ETS rebels“
“The nation’s largest business lobby wants to put the science of global warming on trial.
The U.S. Chamber of Commerce, trying to ward off potentially sweeping federal emissions regulations, is pushing the Environmental Protection Agency to hold a rare public hearing on the scientific evidence for man-made climate change.
Chamber officials say it would be “the Scopes monkey trial of the 21st century” — complete with witnesses, cross-examinations and a judge who would rule, essentially, on whether humans are warming the planet to dangerous effect.
“It would be evolution versus creationism,” said William Kovacs, the chamber’s senior vice president for environment, technology and regulatory affairs. “It would be the science of climate change on trial.” …
The EPA is having none of it, calling a hearing a “waste of time” and saying that a threatened lawsuit by the chamber would be “frivolous.” …
[T]he chamber will tell the EPA in a filing today that a trial-style public hearing, which is allowed under the law but nearly unprecedented on this scale, is the only way to “make a fully informed, transparent decision with scientific integrity based on the actual record of the science.”" “U.S. Chamber of Commerce seeks trial on global warming” h/t Climate Depot See also “Chamber Threatens Lawsuit if EPA Rejects Climate Science ‘Trial’“
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“U.S. oil refiners could cut output by as much as 25 percent and the nation’s reliance on imported refined products could double in the next two decades if the House version of a climate bill becomes law, the American Petroleum Institute said on Monday.
Under the so-called cap-and-trade bill narrowly passed by the House of Representatives in June, refining output could plunge by as much as 4.4 million barrels per day by 2030 to 12 million bpd, the API said, quoting a study it commissioned by EnSys Energy.
Imports could account for up to 19.4 percent of consumption by 2030 under the climate law, the study said, up from a projected 9.6 percent if the law were not in place.
Investment in U.S. refineries could fall by as much as $90 billion by 2030, a decline of 88 percent. …
Analysts have said the House bill could cripple refiners, particularly small, independent facilities already reeling from weak demand and improving fuel efficiency.” “Climate bill could slash U.S. fuel output: study” Prior post here
“[T]oday the San Joaquin Valley is being transformed into a dust bowl. Hundreds of thousands of acres are fallow, while almond and plum trees are being left to die in the scorching sun. Tens of thousands of people have been tossed out of work—the town of Mendota alone has an unemployment rate of about 40%—and the lines for food donations stretch down streets. The reason? There isn’t enough water to go around this year, and the Obama administration is drawing up new reasons to divert more of it from farms and people and into the San Francisco Bay. …
Some claim that California is facing a three-year-old drought. But, according to the state’s Department of Water Resources, California reservoirs have received 80% of their normal amount of water and precipitation in the northern Sierras has been 95% of its yearly average this year. So why isn’t there more water for farms? Because theirs is a regulatory-mandated drought. The 1973 Endangered Species Act requires that the government take steps to save endangered species. In California, that’s meant diverting vast sums of water into rivers and streams to protect fish. Those diversions this year have forced federal authorities to decide who to serve—fish or farmers.
On Dec. 15, 2008, the Bush administration’s Fish and Wildlife Service chose fish, a decision driven by a lawsuit filed in federal court in 2006 by the Natural Resources Defense Council and other environmental groups. To settle the suit, the Fish and Wildlife Service agreed to divert more than 150 billion gallons of water this year away from farmers south of San Francisco in hopes of protecting the Delta smelt—a three-inch bait fish. The water is now flowing underneath the Golden Gate Bridge and out into the Pacific Ocean.
Of course, the Delta smelt isn’t a particularly attractive species to protect when it means throwing Americans out of work. On June 4, the National Marine Fisheries Service declared that delivering water to farms in the San Joaquin Valley would harm killer whales in the Pacific[!] And to save the whales, the Obama administration is now demanding even greater water restrictions beyond what has been diverted for the smelt. …
What is precious and what President Barack Obama should come to see for himself are the 40,000 people in the valley who are desperate for water so they can get back to work.” “It’s Fish Versus Farmers in the San Joaquin Valley” Prior post here
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“The House-passed climate change bill, if enacted, would expand the federal government so much that it would take billions of dollars and thousands of new employees to implement.
Now-obscure federal agencies such as the Commodity Futures Trading Commission and the Federal Energy Regulatory Commission would have to become mini-behemoths in order to handle their expanded responsibilities. Congress would have to appropriate billions of dollars for more bureaucrats, much of which is not reflected in the House bill. …
The [Commodity Futures Trading] commission, which would police the new futures market for [carbon] allowances, apparently would need to expand its work force by at least 31 percent initially to fulfill its obligations under the bill. The Federal Energy Regulatory Commission, which would oversee the day-to-day trading of allowances, has estimated that it would have to expand by 20 percent or 30 percent.
The Environmental Protection Agency, which would oversee pollution regulation, also would balloon in size. The agency regulates 330 million tons of pollution a year but would regulate 6 billion tons of carbon dioxide emissions a year from 7,400 facilities under the legislation.” “Climate bill would bloat federal agencies“
