Set the agenda
As part of The Sunday Age‘s Climate Agenda (see here for ACM’s question), I was asked to comment on one of the other questions, concerning the issue of “fruitful public debate” on climate change.
You can read the article here.
You can't be a sceptic anymore, sez warmist
22 October, 2011 by
Best or worst?
The blogosphere is abuzz with the results of the Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature project (BEST), the stunning conclusion of which seems to be “the planet is warming”. Even more stunning is that this is somehow supposed to be the ultimate rebuttal to filthy sceptics and deniers the world over.
Er, sorry to disappoint, but no it isn’t. We all knew the world was warming, and has been since the end of the Little Ice Age. We accept that. So, what’s your point again?
BEST’s results, which are based on surface temperature records from thousands of land-based stations across the globe, also seem to magically “disappear” the Urban Heat Island effect, despite the fact that previous studies have shown it to be a substantial component of recent temperature rises. BEST also seems to be able to take the fat, hairy sow’s ear of shonky surface temperature stations (many of which are located close to man-made heat sources like airports and air conditioning units) and turn them into a dainty silk purse of accurate global temperature. Whether this is successful or not I will leave up to you to decide. A technical post at Watts Up With That? looks at the statistical methods employed.
Richard Muller’s article in the Wall Street Journal concludes thus:
When we began our study, we felt that skeptics had raised legitimate issues, and we didn’t know what we’d find. Our results turned out to be close to those published by prior groups. We think that means that those groups had truly been very careful in their work, despite their inability to convince some skeptics of that. They managed to avoid bias in their data selection, homogenization and other corrections.
Global warming is real. Perhaps our results will help cool this portion of the climate debate. How much of the warming is due to humans and what will be the likely effects? We made no independent assessment of that.
But let’s just look at that last sentence again:
How much of the warming is due to humans and what will be the likely effects? We made no independent assessment of that.
So the key issue that sceptics raise, the attribution of present day warming to human effects, is something not addressed by BEST. For Muller to claim that this puts the final nail in the sceptics’ coffin is ridiculous. We all agree the planet is warming, it’s a question of how much of that warming is due to man, and how much is due to nature.
Climate Depot takes the BEST project and Muller’s WSJ article to the proverbial cleaners here (with stacks of links to other criticisms)
Delingpole has a great piece here – it is well worth the read.
IPCC: Integrity-challenged, Politicised, Compromised and Corrupt
21 October, 2011 by
Essential reading
Donna Laframboise’s new book “The Delinquent Teenager who was Mistaken for the World’s Top Climate Expert” blows the lid clean off the biased and politicised organisation otherwise known as the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
We have always known that the IPCC was a political construct. Senior figures at the World Meteorological Office and the United Nations had already formed the view back in the mid-1980s (based on virtually no evidence at all) that man-made carbon dioxide was damaging the climate, and all that was required was to find some science to back it up. Enter the IPCC. Established to find the evidence that was at the time so sorely lacking, the IPCC is manacled to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change – a political agreement between nations signed in 1992 – which has been described by Rajendra Pachauri as the IPCC’s “main customer”.
Even from that short introduction, it is utterly baffling how anyone (including our deluded government) could possibly still believe that the IPCC is an impartial scientific body. And yet the majority of the world’s climate policies are based on this organisation’s pronouncements.
However, the story is far more complex and shocking than that. The Delinquent Teenager describes numerous examples of the scientific message being massaged and manipulated to fit the preordained outcome. Grey literature is welcomed when it fits the agenda (despite Rajendra Pachauri’s protestations that the IPCC is nothing but peer-reviewed literature) – but oddly that peer-reviewed literature is excluded or played down when it doesn’t. Lead authors in IPCC reports write articles in journals which are then cited in the report – even when those journals were published after the official cut-off date. But who cares if it helps bolster the case? The lack of scientific integrity would shame a senior school physics student.
A classic example from the book is the much-touted link between natural disasters and “global warming”. The 2001 IPCC report claimed such a link, but the conclusion was based on a report prepared by an insurance company (Munich Re, an organisation which is well known for peddling climate alarmism, see here for example) which, naturally, would benefit financially from the greater demand for insurance that such a link may generate. The fact that this presents a clear conflict of interest seems to have escaped everyone down at IPCC Towers (funny how conflicts of interest with sceptics and oil companies seem to be pounced on rather more eagerly – as Daily Bayonet puts it, even accepting a free mug from a gas station is enough!).
If that wasn’t enough, one of the Munich Re report’s authors was also a lead author on the IPCC report. But the story doesn’t end there.
In 2005, the journal Science published a commentary on the subject by Evan Mills, citing the Munich Re report and the IPCC report as separate, independent sources. A few years later, Barack Obama’s scientific adviser John Holdren later prepared a report on the impacts of climate change, which cited the Mills paper as the definitive source on disaster costs and climate change. In a pithy summary of this incestuous series of events, Donna concludes:
So a dubious finding that originated in a document written by an insurance company was included in the Climate Bible in 2001. It then made its way into the peer-reviewed scientific literature in 2005. By 2009 it was being treated as gospel by a US government report. Welcome to the confidence-inspiring world of climate science.
There is much, much more. Every MP and Senator in Australia (and every attendee at the Durban Climate Summit) should be forced to read this book from cover to cover. Then maybe they would think twice about accepting without any critical thought the partisan conclusions of the IPCC.
This is a must-read book, and it’s a bargain at only $4.99 on Kindle. It expertly and thoroughly exposes the IPCC for the compromised and corrupt organisation we always suspected it to be.
Buy it here.
Donna’s excellent blog, No Frakking Consensus, is here.
Daily Bayonet GW Hoax Weekly Round-up
21 October, 2011 by
CSIRO boss is director of carbon sequestration company
19 October, 2011 by
If there's a climate crisis, carbon may need to be sequestered…
But there isn’t any conflict of interest, they protest, despite the fact that CSIRO provides a never-ending flow of alarmist predictions about climate change which will force Australia (and the world) to consider mitigation measures which might include, er, carbon sequestration:
THE head of the CSIRO is at the centre of conflict of interest claims over her role as a director of a Tasmanian company that purchases land for carbon sequestration.
It was revealed in Senate estimates today that the peak science body’s chief executive Megan Clark is the director of Cradle Mountain Carbon Pty Ltd and is also on the board of Bank of America Merrill Lynch.
Cradle Mountain Carbon Pty Ltd is a private family company that sets aside land to store carbon as part of efforts to combat climate change.
Liberal senator David Bushby said at the very least the public perception of Dr Clark’s additional appointments “should raise conflict of interest concerns”.
CSIRO’s acting chief executive Mike Whelan said Dr Clark, who was absent from today’s hearing, was an officer of the highest integrity and the organisation’s board believed there was no conflict of interest issue.
“She is driven on the basis of values and integrity,” Mr Whelan said.
“I don’t see, on the face of it, any issues there and I have no doubt the board has assured itself of the fact there is no conflict of interest.”
Well that’s OK then. Silly of me to even think such a heresy! Move along, nothing to see here. Just like there’s nothing to see at the IPCC, packed to the rafters with environmental activists… But we’re really unbiased – honest! Just trust us! Nothing can go wrong!
And look at Whelan’s immediate reaction – to defend Clark, and dismiss criticism with an arrogant wave of the hand. Instead, perhaps he should think, yes, it doesn’t look good does it? Perhaps Clark should consider whether her directorship of this company really sends the right message, which may compromise the impartiality of the organisation, whether there is any real conflict of interest or not. Ha – fat chance of that.
Read it here.
Occupy this…
18 October, 2011 by
Right on
Given the popularity of “occupation” at the moment, I have a few suggestions of my own. Wall Street and the Bank of England are so last year, therefore we proudly present ACM’s list of people and places to #occupy, for their generous and selfless contribution to the mess in which we presently find ourselves:
- The United Nations: has singlehandedly done more to damage wealth creation and the alleviation of poverty in the developing world than any other organisation in the history of the civilised world, thanks in no small part to its hysterical, dangerous and destructive climate policies (there are a thousand and one other reasons why the UN is a COMPLETE AND UTTER waste of space, but there simply isn’t time to go into them all…)
- The IPCC: high school students have more scientific integrity than this discredited bunch of environmental activists – just ask Donna Laframboise
- The Department of Climate Change: more spin than a launderette, the DCC happily lies and misrepresents the science behind Labor’s climate policy, to the extent that it calls CO2 “carbon pollution”, to deceive the Australian public into believing Labor’s climate policy will actually achieve something. Point blank refuses to acknowledge there may be uncertainties in the science, and shuts its ears to any contrary evidence.
- Tim Flannery: more failed predictions than Nostradamus, Flannery warns of catastrophic sea level rises… but has a house on the waterfront. Hmm.
- Anthony Albanese: narrowly wins the award for most obnoxious Labor front-bencher (in a very tough and hard fought field), having insulted a great many decent, hardworking Australians with his “Convoy of No Consequence” jibe,
and last but not least…
- Julia Gillard: “No carbon tax under the government I lead.” Need I say more?
Occupy that.
Big Green at work
18 October, 2011 by
Where's my Big Oil cheque?
Which puts Big Oil in the shade. It’s a nice cosy arrangement isn’t it? The Labor government hands out millions of dollars to environmental activist groups so they can spread misinformation and propaganda about Labor’s climate change and carbon tax policies. All the usual suspects are represented, the Climate Institute, the Australian Conservation Foundation, the Australian Youth Climate Coalition, all paid for by your taxes.
LABOR has handed $3 million in grants to supporters of climate change action to promote efforts to cut global warming and support the government’s clean energy package as it seeks to head off Tony Abbott’s anti-carbon tax campaign.
A Senate estimates committee hearing has also been told the Gillard government’s multi-million dollar carbon tax advertising campaign has reached almost $24 million, after a $4 million blow-out.
The almost $24 million in advertising includes $16 million on carbon tax advertising – up from $12 million – $3.9 million on developing the ad campaign and $4 million on household leaflets. Details also emerged about a series of ad-hoc grants to green groups.
The groups benefiting from grants included the Climate Institute, the Australian Conservation Foundation and Climate Works Australia. Some of the groups have been part of the “say yes” coalition and have backed Labor’s package to fight off the Opposition’s campaign against the policy.
In evidence to Senate estimates today, it emerged that:
The Australian Conservation Foundation received $398,000 to fund a series of [misre-]presentations on climate change from people trained by the movement started by former US vice president Al Gore;
The Australian Youth Climate Coalition received $271,000 for two forums in Brisbane and Perth on combating climate change;
The Climate Institute received $250,000 to produce an independent assessment of the impacts of the carbon price on the cost of living. It is working with ACOSS and Choice on the study;
Climate Works is negotiating with the Climate Change Department for a $460,000 grant aimed at raising community awareness to cut carbon emissions and;
The CSIRO has received $500,000 as part of a program aimed at cutting energy consumption in low-income households. (source)
It’s always the sceptics that are accused of being the highly organised, well-funded denial machine, paid for by Big Oil, when in reality the pay cheques of Big Green are far, far larger.
And with so much taxpayer money being wasted on distorting the message, no wonder Julia and Greg believe the debate’s over!
Carbon tax will bury Labor
17 October, 2011 by
Out - In
A big public kissy-kissy party in the House of Reps after the vote, to rub the electorate’s collective noses in it, probably didn’t do much to help either:
TONY Abbott would be handed an overwhelming mandate to abolish the carbon tax if the coalition won the next election and he became the prime minister.A clear majority of voters, 60 per cent, believe the Opposition Leader would have the electoral and moral authority to repeal the tax.
With the government’s asylum seeker policy also in disarray, the Coalition’s primary vote has now soared to a crushing 51 per cent, according to a Galaxy poll commissioned by The Daily Telegraph.
It is the largest primary vote the coalition has enjoyed in any poll since 1996 – when John Howard defeated Paul Keating – with Labor now stuck at a morale-sapping 29 per cent.
Meanwhile, a Nielsen poll, in Fairfax newspapers, shows the government would be swept away by a two-party preferred 57-43 per cent landslide.
Read it here.
Hypocrisy of the "anti-greed" protests
16 October, 2011 by
UPDATE 2: A number of commenters have drawn a distinction between capitalism and “corporatism” – I agree that this distinction has some merit. However, the socialist Left is attempting to blur that distinction in order to tar capitalism as an economic model with the brush of corporate malfeasance. Hence the predictable hijacking of the OWS demonstrations (which, had they been confined to a more legitimate protest at unacceptable corporate behaviour, would have a point) by the hard Left in order to use corporate excesses to justify an abandoning of capitalism as a “broken model”.
UPDATE: This post has generated a fair amount of criticism, so further explanation is required. Governments cannot create wealth. Corporations operating in a free market are the ONLY way of sustaining wealthy, vibrant economies – history has shown this many times over. The protesters comprising OWS aren’t simply complaining about the wage divide between CEOs and employees, they are primarily anti-capitalists – they wish to see the winding back of Western free-market capitalism and a return to the failed socialist, state-controlled industries of the past, where individual achievement and success is ignored and equality for all is the key.
And as for CEO salaries, no-one seems to complain when a star entertainer or footballer is paid millions of dollars a year (despite the fact that they too are generating many times that wealth, usually for a corporation – the movie studio or the football club), but take offence at a CEO of a finance corporation in a similar position. It’s all about what kind of money you earn, clearly.
This double standard exposes the true agenda behind OWS. “Corporate greed” is just code for envy.
If you need further proof that these protests are primarily organised by far Left groups, look no further than this article at Green Left Weekly, where spokespeople were interviewed from socialist groups “Solidarity”, “Socialist Alternative” and “Socialist Alliance”:
From the Sydney demonstration
Amusing how the great unwashed, protesting at corporate “greed”, rely so heavily on Facebook, Twitter, Apple and a bunch of other “corporates” to co-ordinate their activities. The protesters are comprised of all the usual suspects of course, Marxists, communists, socialists, extreme environmentalists (naturally), the hard Left, all using the demonstrations to advocate for “social change” – i.e. wholesale wealth redistribution, smashing the corporates that drive the economic benefits that make their lives so comfortable, global government, support for Palestine and hatred for the Jews (natch). If they get their way, we’ll all be back to knitting yoghurt in mud huts.
Emails uncovered by Big Government reveal a carefully constructed conspiracy to destabilise governments and global markets. As always, those protesting represent a tiny, tiny minority of the general population, and claims of majority (99%) support are delusional.
The eco-wackos have all but given up on climate change as an agent of social change, so they’re back to old fashioned protests. Good luck with that.
This image perfectly sums up the blatant hypocrisy, which they obviously haven’t worked out for themselves:
Busted. (click to enlarge)
ACM's "Alarmism Machine" map ruffles warmist feathers
15 October, 2011 by
Click for PDF
ACM’s Alarmism Machine map has been making waves in the warmosphere.
You will recall Andrew Revkin’s blog displayed a rather nasty map of “organised climate change denial” – I was so amused by this diagram that I prepared a response (see here).
Revkin then updated his post to include a link to my response, originally with the comment:
“I think some, though by no means all, aspects of the map are spot on.” [No link available – sadly]
This was hastily toned down [why? – Ed] to read:
“I think some, though by no means all, aspects of the map are not bad. But, as with so much of the climate debate, it is an overdrawn, overblown caricature of reality.”
Apparently a storm of protest ensued from the hardcore warmists, who were shocked, shocked I tell you, that Revkin dared publish a link to such heresy. The former editor of Scientific American, John Rennie, firstly weighed in:
Follow the link and take a look at that diagram. It apes the design of what Dunlap and McCright drew but whereas they only listed examples of the organizations that fit into each of the categories they named, the blogger insults them in keeping with his own biases.
Andy, just which aspects of this do you see as “not bad”?
Thank goodness he didn’t see the version of Revkin’s comment that said “spot on”!
ACM even scored a mention on Joe Romm’s blog, with this typical outburst:
Rennie was particularly critical of Revkin’s equating the climate denial machine with a laughable “climate alarmism machine” (whipped up by an Australian disinformer), which equates those who spread outright anti-scientific disinformation (often funded by fossil-fuel interests) with the serious work of climate scientists and governments (and others) who make use of that genuine, scientific work.
“Australian disinformer” – I like it! Actually British ex-pat, Joe, but I won’t press the point. And now Revkin has been forced to defend his publication of a link to my map (my emphasis). Revkin, however, firstly distances himself from the original map still further by stating that he was “insufficiently critical” of it in the original post (despite it having already been toned down), but does include some very interesting comments:
I disagree with Rennie and Joe Romm, who followed up on his criticism, on some broader points.
Here’s the prime question Rennie posed about my original post:
Was Andy implying that those on the climate activism side were an equivalent kind of propaganda machine, even though the case for the reality and gravity of climate change is much better validated by the scientific literature? It seemed unlikely, but he seemed to let his readers think so.
Setting aside the word propaganda, I will readily assert that there has been a longstanding and well-financed effort to raise public concern by downplaying substantial, persistent and legitimate uncertainty about the worst-case outcomes from greenhouse-driven warming and over-attributing the link between such warming and climate-related disasters and other events. Much of this is organized.
But it should be pointed out that there is a climate-style amplifying feedback process, in which a funding agency, a university and researchers highlight the most newsworthy aspect of a new study — even if it’s tentative — and that baton is passed to journalists eagerly sifting for “the front-page thought.” Kind of looks like a hype machine, in some ways.
At least Revkin concedes that there is some organised scaremongering at work in the warmist camp – it is impossibly to deny. But what I find more astonishing is that Romm and Rennie were so eager to criticise Revkin for even publishing a link – you would have thought Revkin’s readers should be able to make up their own minds.
And the funniest part of all of this? The fact that so many people have taken the map so seriously! Geez – it was knocked together in about 20 minutes as a satirical response to an offensive diagram about “deniers”. It was a joke! Yes, it was overblown and a caricature – that was the intention. Exaggeration to make a point. Whist my choice of words was intentionally over the top, the underlying points have more than a grain of truth.
UPDATE: Check out Jo Nova’s version here – much prettier!
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