Julia quotes "the science"

4 July, 2011 by

Hypocrite

And gets it spectacularly wrong. Hypocrisy Alert as Julia Gillard launches a scare campaign, and then accuses the Opposition of, er, a scare campaign:

JULIA Gillard has invoked a doomsday-like scenario of metre-high sea level rises and a 2000km southward shift of Australia’s climactic [the dumb journo means “climatic” – Ed] zones as she battles an opposition scare campaign over her proposed carbon tax.

Setting the scene for a week of intense debate on the government’s carbon tax – which is yet to be fully detailed – the Prime Minister today returned to scientific arguments for putting a price on carbon.

The move came as Opposition Leader Tony Abbott renewed his now hopeless call for a plebiscite on Labor’s carbon tax, but changed tack by saying he would accept a popular vote if it backed the measure.

Ms Gillard warned of threats to infrastructure, failures of urban drainage and sewerage systems, blackouts, transport disruption and private property damage as temperature rose by between 2.2 and 5 degrees by 2070.

“Now this is a huge change,”  said Ms Gillard, as she again accused Mr Abbott of mounting a scare campaign over prices under a carbon tax.

Where on earth does Gillard get 5 degrees by 2070? That’s total fiction. In fact it supposes a rate of warming of over 2 degrees per century MORE than the absolute WORST estimate of the IPCC (which is 6.4 degrees between 2000 and 2100):

IPCC AR4 WG1 Summary for Policymakers

And a 2000km shift in climatic zones? This is pure, unadulterated nonsense. A metre rise in sea levels? Again, the worst IPCC estimate is 59cm, and with sea levels currently rising by about 3mm per year, it’s probably more like 25cm. More exaggeration and spin.

Keep it up, Julia, your credibility is sinking faster than a Pacific island. Desperation has taken over, and invoking alarmist, hysterical claims like these is like tying a hundredweight of lead shot to your ankle.

This debate (if it could ever be called that) has descended into total and utter farce. At least Abbott’s scare campaign on the carbon dioxide tax is based on some kind of possible future reality, but this is just lies, pure and simple.

Read it here.

Filed Under: Climate Tagged With: , , ,

Open letter from Australian warmists

14 June, 2011 by

It's a bit one-sided (as always)

The Conversation publishes an open letter from a collection of Australian warmist academics, which repeats the usual IPCC line and adds little to the debate, except by smearing sceptics (again). I thought for a bit of fun we could examine in detail what the letter says. Before we do, however, let’s have a look at just a few of the signatories:

  • Andrew Glikson
  • David Karoly
  • Matthew England
  • Ian Enting
  • Ove Hoegh-Guldberg
  • Andy Pitman
  • Barry Brook
  • Neville Nicholls

A veritable gallery of Australian alarmists, well documented here on ACM (just search any of those names). So already we know what the letter will say. It is oddly titled “Climate change is real” by which I think they mean “man-made climate change is real”, so even before we’ve got past the title, there is an intentionally confusing ambiguity. Not a promising start.

Anyway, here we go – I warn you in advance, it’s not pretty:

The overwhelming scientific evidence tells us that human greenhouse gas emissions are resulting in climate changes that cannot be explained by natural causes.

That’s because we daren’t look too closely at natural causes in case we find out that CO2 isn’t as much to blame as our models say. Solar? Schmolar.

Climate change is real, we are causing it, and it is happening right now.

Scary tag line? Check.

Like it or not, humanity is facing a problem that is unparalleled in its scale and complexity. The magnitude of the problem was given a chilling focus in the most recent report of the International Energy Agency, which their chief economist characterised as the “worst news on emissions.”

Limiting global warming to 2°C is now beginning to look like a nearly insurmountable challenge.

As we all know, the entire climate system is just one big knob with CO2 scrawled on it. Cripple the world’s economies, and problem solved. The fact that temperatures went up and down by greater amounts than the present warming before any industrialisation is just a tiresome distraction. The models are programmed to result in a climate sensitive to changes in CO2 but not to natural forces, with significant but unverified positive feedbacks, which are little more than guesswork, just to make sure.

Like all great challenges, climate change has brought out the best and the worst in people.

Translation: “best” being the climate warriors on our side, and “worst” being the filthy sceptics.

A vast number of scientists, engineers, and visionary businessmen are boldly designing a future that is based on low-impact energy pathways and living within safe planetary boundaries; a future in which substantial health gains can be achieved by eliminating fossil-fuel pollution; and a future in which we strive to hand over a liveable planet to posterity.

Usefully confusing “fossil-fuel pollution” with harmless CO2 in order to muddy the waters. Of course there are health benefits to reducing proper pollution, such as toxins and particulates, but if that were the aim, we wouldn’t be planning on taxing our economy out of existence. Reducing CO2 emissions will have no effect on health whatsoever. Even these scientists refuse to be intellectually rigorous and unambiguously distinguish between harmless CO2 and “pollution”.

At the other extreme, understandable economic insecurity and fear of radical change have been exploited by ideologues and vested interests to whip up ill-informed, populist rage, and climate scientists have become the punching bag of shock jocks and tabloid scribes.

Yawn, yawn, ad hom, yawn… How about responding to their concerns? Breach of pre-election promise by the Prime Minister? The fact that nothing Australia does will make any difference to the climate? Or are they just too hard?

Aided by a pervasive media culture that often considers peer-reviewed scientific evidence to be in need of “balance” by internet bloggers, this has enabled so-called “sceptics” to find a captive audience while largely escaping scrutiny.

Laughs out loud. Sorry. Have these people actually seen the ABC or Fairfax? Read Unleashed on the ABC web site recently? Rarely is a critical word published in these two major news organisations (not to mention most of the international news agencies), but still they complain of media bias. Lamentable.

Australians have been exposed to a phony public debate which is not remotely reflected in the scientific literature and community of experts.

Beginning today, The Conversation will bring much-needed and long-overdue accountability to the climate “sceptics.”

And I bet they won’t invite a single one to take part. It will be a closed shop of warmists, all stewing in their own juices, like the Climate Commission. On the one hand they want to exclude sceptics from the process, and on the other, they then complain sceptics are resorting to other methods to get their views across. You can’t have it both ways.

For the next two weeks, our series of daily analyses will show how they can side-step the scientific literature and how they subvert normal peer review. They invariably ignore clear refutations of their arguments and continue to promote demonstrably false critiques.

My aching sides. Alarmists talking about subverting peer review? Climategate, anyone? When there is a cosy little coterie of warmists who all review each others papers, and make sure any that challenge the consensus are rejected? Please.

We will show that “sceptics” often show little regard for truth and the critical procedures of the ethical conduct of science on which real skepticism is based.

There will then follow the inevitable smearing of anyone who dares question the whole alarmist package put forward by the IPCC (and the signatories to this letter).

The individuals who deny the balance of scientific evidence on climate change will impose a heavy future burden on Australians if their unsupported opinions are given undue credence.

Do you know what would be really refreshing? If some of the signatories actually took the time to invite a respected “sceptic” like Bob Carter or Richard Lindzen to discuss his concerns about the IPCC position. But they won’t because they are afraid of what they might hear. Much easier to ignore the real issues and carry on smearing sceptics than to actually engage in proper scientific debate.

Read it here.

Filed Under: Climate Tagged With:

Shock: "It's all worse than we thought!" sez Commission

23 May, 2011 by

Alarmism in graphical form

What a surprise. Just exactly as expected, given the Climate Commission doesn’t have a single sceptical viewpoint represented, and right on cue for Julia Gillard to say, “see we told you so, we need to take action on climate”, despite the fact that nothing Australia does alone will make any difference whatsoever.

Parroting the IPCC line all the way, and blaming the media (natch), the Climate Commission  is simply a cheer squad for climate alarmism, and that’s exactly the result they have delivered. The Sydney Moonbat Herald virtually wets itself this morning:

THE evidence for global warming is now ”exceptionally strong and beyond doubt” and actions this decade will determine the impact of climate change for the rest of the century, according to the first big report produced by Australia’s Climate Commission.

The report, to be presented to federal parliamentarians today, is designed to cut through the noise of political debate about the government’s carbon tax and find common ground.

It catalogues the latest [alarmist] research on the impact of climate change on Australia, updating the most recent report from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, including reduced rainfall, recorded sea level rises and increasing temperatures.
Climate science was ”being attacked in the media by many with no credentials in the field”, the report said.

”The questioning of the IPCC, the ‘climategate’ incident based on hacked emails in the UK and attempts to intimidate climate scientists have added to the confusion in the public about the veracity of climate science. [See? Climategate and fudging data was just a storm in a teacup – move along, nothing to see here – Ed]

”By contrast to the noisy, confusing ‘debate’ in the media, within the climate research community our understanding of the climate system continues to advance strongly.” (source)

Words are useless to describe the hysteria. Coming at the same time as new research in Nature shows that it is the oceans that have far more of an effect on the climate than the composition of the atmosphere. And then there’s the non-existent sea level rises:

SYDNEY will be the Australian capital most vulnerable to extreme flooding events, the Climate Commission says.

While the likelihood of damaging floods, storm surges and king tides will increase around the coast, Sydney can expect to see ”extreme events” once a month by 2100, the commission’s report The Critical Decade says.

”While a sea-level rise of 0.5 metre … may not seem like a matter for much concern, such modest levels of sea-level rise can lead to unexpectedly large increases in the frequency of extreme high sea-level events,” it said. (source)

Sea level has been rising at 3mm per year since the year dot, with no sign of acceleration. Yet the Climate Commission manages to spin this into a scare story.

Isn’t it funny how the decade we are living in right now just happens to be the “critical decade” and we must act now. Planet has been here for four and a half billion years, but we have to save it in the next ten…

Filed Under: Climate Tagged With: ,

Avoid like the plague: ABC's "The Science Show"

15 May, 2011 by

The Anti-Science Show

Don’t go there. Really. You will not believe how Robyn Williams, John Cook and a couple of other hysterics lay into “deniers”. If you don’t sign up to the religion, you’re a fruitcake. Still attacking the Petition Project (that’s the best target they can come up with), if you had cancer, would you trust the quack, deniers questioning links between smoking and cancer, and you’re mentally deranged and suffering a delusion. And, the best bit of all, we’re LIARS! Yes, we’re LYING. It’s almost too funny for words.

I made it through about nine minutes before I shouted “F*** off” at my computer. See if you can do better.

Of course, there followed a detailed rebuttal by Bob Carter… ha, only joking! Not a chance. The ABC and Williams only want one side – the warmist side.

Their ABC – paid for by your taxes.

Link here (I did warn you).

Filed Under: Climate Tagged With: , ,

BBC: "left-wing, shallow and oh-so politically correct"

3 April, 2011 by

Speaking out. Sissons (L) and Buerk (R)

This should come as a surprise to no-one. Like the ABC, the BBC is stuffed full of trendy urban lefties, pushing their own agendas, pro-Labour, pro-Obama, pro-Palestine etc, and which naturally include extreme environmentalism and a love of global warming alarmism. Only when they are too old to care do employees speak out.

We previously covered newsreader Peter Sissons’ memoirs here where he described the corporation as a “propaganda machine for climate change zealots”. Now another newsreader, Michael Buerk, has similarly let the cat out of the bag:

Michael Buerk has launched a withering assault on the BBC’s ‘creed of political correctness’.

The veteran presenter accuses staff at the Corporation of an inbuilt ‘institutional bias’ and warns that they read the left-wing Guardian newspaper as if it is ‘their Bible’.

Reviewing a memoir by his former colleague Peter Sissons, Buerk endorses his view that the BBC is warped by the prejudices of its staff.

He says fellow reporters have ‘contempt’ for business and the countryside – and that a left-wing culture means the national broadcaster has been cast ‘adrift of the overriding national sentiment’ on issues such as climate change.

…

Buerk, who has previously voiced criticisms of fellow newsreaders for being overpaid, autocue-reading ‘lame brains’, praises Sissons for attacking ‘Autocuties, “Elf ’n’ Safety” and ‘its culture of conformity’.

Buerk also accuses BBC reporters of an ‘uncritical love affair with environmentalism’. (source)

And for the BBC you could of course substitute our own ABC, which employs climate alarmists in its top science reporter positions (think Robyn Williams and Bernie Hobbs), and Left-leaning presenters in key political roles (think Tony “Has anyone seen me and Kevin Rudd in the same room” Jones, and Kerry O’Brien, “Red Kerry” as he was called, and not because of the colour of his hair…).

Not only that, but the editorial policy of ABC news is blatantly pro-warmist, with climate scare stories reported uncritically, and sceptical papers ignored or rubbished. Its Unleashed section is nothing more than a platform for extreme environmentalists like Clive Hamilton, with the ratio of alarmists to sceptics probably in excess of 20 to 1. I could go on…

A sad record for our supposedly impartial national broadcaster, which has gone the same way as the BBC.

Filed Under: Climate Tagged With: , , ,

They never give up: "global warming" to increase toxic bacteria

20 February, 2011 by

Bacteria for breakfast

You have to admire their persistence. Fairfax and AFP continually churn out stories like this, regurgitated from press releases without a shred of critical thought. Latest “we’re all gonna die” scare is an increase in toxic bacteria and algae in the sea, and note how when it suits their purpose, they revert to to the discredited term “global warming”, but when it doesn’t, it’s “climate change”…

Global warming could spur the growth of toxic algae and bacteria in the world’s seas and lakes, with an impact that could be felt in 10 years, US scientists said Saturday.

Studies have shown that shifts brought about by climate change make ocean and freshwater environments more susceptible to toxic algae blooms and allow harmful microbes and bacteria to proliferate, according to researchers from the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA).

In one study, NOAA scientists modeled [ah, the wonderful GIGO computer model comes to the rescue – Ed] future ocean and weather patterns to predict the effect on blooms of Alexandrium catenella, or the toxic “red tide,” which can accumulate in shellfish and cause severe symptoms, including paralysis, in humans who eat the contaminated seafood.

“Our projections indicate that by the end of the 21st century, blooms may begin up to two months earlier in the year and persist for one month later compared to the present-day time period of July to October,” said Stephanie Moore, one of the scientists who worked on the study.

But the impact could be felt well before the end of this century — as early as 2040, she said at the annual meeting of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

“Changes in the harmful algal bloom season appear to be imminent. We expect a significant increase in Puget Sound (off the coast of Washington state where the study was conducted) and similar at-risk environments within 30 years, possibly by the next decade,” said Moore. (source)

There never seems to be any regard for the self-regulating processes that happen in nature. Just remember the Gulf of Mexico oil spill, which pumped billions of litres of toxic oil into the sea. The eco-tards were predicting an environmental catastrophe (natch), but what happened?

The BP spill offered an “accidental experiment” that showed particular bacteria with an all-methane diet multiplied quickly as the methane spread with the underwater plume from the broken well. Peak consumption of methane probably came in late July and early August, Valentine said.

Other organisms dealt with other hydrocarbons, including ethane and propane emitted in the worst offshore oil spill in U.S. history. The methane-eating bacteria were the last to the hydrocarbon banquet, and based on past observation, the scientists questioned whether they could do the job. (source)


Filed Under: Climate Tagged With: ,

Global warming to melt permafrost

17 February, 2011 by

I literally cannot keep up with the alarmism today. The warm-mongers must sense they’re on a roll and are churning stuff out for all they’re worth. Now it’s the permafrost:

Global warming could cause up to 60 percent of the world’s permafrost to thaw by 2200 and release huge amounts of carbon into the atmosphere that would further speed up climate change, a study warned.

Using projections based on UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) scenarios, scientists at the National Snow and Ice Data Center (NSIDC) in Colorado estimated that if global warming continues even at a moderate pace, a third of the earth’s permafrost will be gone by 2200.

If the planet warms at a faster pace, the world could see 59 percent of the permanently frozen underground layer of earth thaw out; as that happens, organic matter that has been trapped in the permafrost for tens of millennia will begin to decay, releasing carbon into the atmosphere.

The NSIDC scientists then used a model to predict how much carbon the thawing permafrost would release and came up with the staggering figure of 190 gigatons by 2200.

“That’s the equivalent of half the amount of carbon that has been released into the atmosphere since the dawn of the industrial age. That’s a lot of carbon,” NSIDC scientist Kevin Schaefer, the lead author of the study, told AFP. [I assume he’s just being sloppy and really means carbon dioxide – Ed]

A gigaton is one billion tons, so 190 gigatons is the equivalent of around a billion tons of carbon entering the atmosphere each year between now and 2200.

Schaefer said carbon that would be released from melting permafrost has to be accounted for in global warming strategies.

“If we don’t account for the release of carbon from permafrost, we’ll overshoot the C02 concentration we are aiming for and will end up with a warmer climate than we want,” he said.

But all was not doom and gloom, he said. [Gee, really? – Ed]

“If we start cutting emissions now [ah, there’s the rub – Ed], we will slow down the thaw rate and push the start of this carbon release off into the future,” he said. (source)

Of course, as it states at the start, this is based on the hugely exaggerated IPCC projections of 6 degrees by 2100 or something. But even if we ignore that, why didn’t all this happen thousands of years ago when temperatures were higher in the Holocene Optimum? Or the MWP? [The MWP didn’t exist, remember? Ask Michael Mann – Ed.] Why didn’t the climate spiral out of control then? Is there something different between temperature rises caused naturally and those allegedly caused by man-made CO2 which makes them melt permafrost faster? So many questions and so few answers.

Filed Under: Climate Tagged With: , ,

ABC: climate models predict "more of whatever we've just had"

14 February, 2011 by

Climate astrology

There’s an old scientific saying: “The wonderful thing about standards is that there are so many to choose from.” This could equally be applied to climate models. There’s also an old weather forecasting technique: look at the weather today, and that’s a pretty good indication of what the weather will be tomorrow. It’s actually more accurate than most forecast models, in any case!

The ABC, fully into “Groupthink Mode”, finds a scientist who just happens to say that we’re going to have more of whatever we had last week (that’s because given enough scientists, they will eventually predict everything, so you can choose exactly what you like). So if we have a cyclone, they’ll find a scientist to say climate change will cause more cyclones. If we have a drought, they’ll find a scientist to say climate change will cause more drought. More rain, higher temperatures, lower temperatures, you name it, the ABC will drag up a scientist to say we’re going to have more of whatever we’ve just had. But instead of treating it like the joke it is, the ABC takes the whole thing with a reverential solemnity:

While Queenslanders deal with a summer of natural disasters, climate scientists are warning that Australia faces a future of more frequent extreme weather events.

The Queensland Floods Commission of Inquiry is scrutinising the preparation and response to the 2011 floods, but planners are already looking ahead to minimise the loss of the past.

According to new modelling, Australia can expect 25 per cent more rain than was seen in the Queensland floods by the end of this century, as well as larger, more frequent storms.

“The modelling that’s been done by CLIM Systems in New Zealand has shown that in 2100 there could be a 25 per cent increase in rainfall,” sustainability consultant Stella Whittaker said.

“Now what that means is that the large storms which we currently describe as one-in-100-year storms, they are going to be more likely and it really means that people can see this type of event happening more than once in their lifetime.” (source)

Just like the old weather forecasters looking out of the window and writing tomorrow’s forecast, now climate modellers can look at whatever disaster we had last week and miraculously come up with a model to predict more of them due to “climate change”. They should have a look out of the window in Sydney today – maybe they could develop a model that predicts that climate change will cause more dull, overcast and drizzly weather – then I would feel like I was back home in London…

Filed Under: Climate Tagged With: ,

ABC stews in fetid warmist juices

10 February, 2011 by

Groupthink rules

The bias of the ABC knows no bounds, especially when it comes to climate change. Maurice Newman’s complaint that the organisation displayed “groupthink” on such matters has gone totally unheeded, as is evidenced by a report on severe weather and the link to climate change on last night’s Lateline (link). I’m not even going to bother to review what was said – that, in the circumstances, is wholly unnecessary. All that needs to be considered is the list of contributors:

  1. Tony Jones Presenter of Lateline. Well, we all know Tony’s history on climate. This is the man who felt he had to caveat a broadcast of The Great Global Warming Swindle, and it’s common knowledge that he’s a fully paid-up warmist.
  2. Margot O’Neill O’Neill was the reporter on the piece in question, and we all know her history too. Back in late 2009, she wrote an alarmist blog on the ABC entitled Countdown to Copenhagen, which praised the efforts of the global community to “tackle climate change”, and smeared anyone who challenged the consensus (see here and here).
  3. Matthew England Well known warmist scientist –  see here, here, here and here.
  4. Andy Pitman Well known warmist scientist – see here for a classic Pitman piece.
  5. David Karoly Well known warmist scientist, in fact ACM’s “favourite” warmist scientist, completes the quintet – see here, here, here, here, etc, etc…

Five true climate change believers. Count them. FIVE. So where was the dissenting view for balance? Where was the scientist putting the valid points that nothing we have seen in the last few weeks is in any way unprecedented, and is simply a result of natural weather variation? Where was the scientist showing that flood records and cyclone records have shown no change in frequency or severity in the last 150 years (or if anything a slight decrease in frequency)? Where was the scientist explaining the link between La Niña and the Interdecadal Pacific Oscillation, which resulted in the heavy rainfalls in Queensland? Where was anybody saying anything to question the orthodoxy presented here?

Answer: nowhere to be seen. Because the ABC is infected with the most virulent form of climate groupthink, just as Maurice Newman said. And they haven’t learnt a thing.

Their ABC, paid for by your taxes.

(h/t Graham)

Filed Under: ABC Bias, Climate Tagged With: , ,

Fires, floods, war, pestilence, famine, death…

8 February, 2011 by

Four Horsemen of Global Warming

… and they’re all caused by climate change, of course. Latest natural disaster to be pinned on ManBearPig is the Perth fires. It’s like every year, media hacks get a collective case of sudden amnesia, and forget that Australia has ever had any extreme events before! So when we get bushfires, they’re somehow shocked and surprised! And because it’s so unprecedented (everything is unprecedented if you have the memory of a house-plant), they rush to blame climate change:

Associate Professor Grant Wardell Johnson from Curtin University studies climate change and its effect on the environment. “All the climate change models to south western australia show we’re getting drier and warmer and we are getting more extreme events.” He warns Perth needs to treat the risk of bushfire as if it’s a war, and he says we need to rethink where we live. “In a fire prone environment that we’ve got in South Western Australia, very dangerous to be building in the bush.” (source)

And all this at the same time that the same climate change is being blamed for the floods and cyclones in eastern Australia. I sincerely hope the long-suffering public will, eventually, tire of this nonsense…

Filed Under: Climate Tagged With: ,
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