Climate Scientist make their case

FROM-Jennifer Marohasy

More Worst AGW Papers: A Note from Cohenite

SINCE Copenhagen the intensity of doom and gloom [D&G] has been ratcheted up with such anthropogenic global warming luminaries as Will Steffan and David Karoly declaring their previous predictions not dire enough and so have been superseded by much worse predictions.

Jay Leno has a good response to this;
“According to a new U.N. report, the global warming outlook is much worse than originally predicted. Which is pretty bad when they originally predicted it would destroy the planet.”

The question is, is there any evidence to support the worsening D&G?

Professor Chris Field was recently reported on the ABC doing D&G about an increase in fossil fuel emissions, but this quickly died when the penny dropped that the main increase in emissions was coming from China and India, not to mention the fact that temperature was declining concurrently.

With increased emissions insufficient to sustain the D&G could the peer-reviewed literature provide justification? Peer-review is the life-blood of AGW and lo-and-behold it was apparent that the D&G was backed up by several new and recycled papers. 10 of these papers which offer ‘evidence’ for the D&G are discussed. All of them exhibit the usual defects of pro-AGW papers; reliance on modeling regardless of contradictory or non-existent ‘real-world’ data.......More...

1. Warming of the Antarctic ice-sheet surface since the 1957 International Geophysical YearEric J. Steig et al [including Michael Mann].

http://holocene.meteo.psu.edu/shared/articles/SteigetalNature09.pdf

This paper is an instant classic and template for future virtual science projects. Forget the prior AGW orthodoxy of a cooling Antarctic; forget the latest British Antarctic Survey report showing cooling due to ozone depletion [which is no longer declining]; forget cooling in the satellite data and the AWSs and manned stations; forget the geological distinction between the Western Antarctic Peninsula [WAP] and the rest of Antarctica; forget the volcanoes; forget the Thomas, Marshall, McConnell [2008] paper which shows snow cover in the WAP doubling since 1850; forget the expanding sea-ice and ice cover over 95% of Antarctica. The real problem with Steig et al is Mann and PCA [RegEM]; insufficient principle components and inappropriate weighting of those used. The same old methods, the same old tricks, the same old faux reality.

2. Water vapor climate feedback inferred from climate fluctuations, 2003 – 2008.A.E. Dessler, Z. Zhang, P. Yang
http://geotest.tamu.edu/userfiles/216/Dessler2008b.pdf

Dessler et al say specific humidity, “q” is increasing as a factor of increased temperature, “Ta”, and the increased “q”, is a “strongly positive” feedback. There are only 2 problems; NOAA and NCEP data show declining “q” at mid and high altitudes; secondly, increased “q” at the surface is most likely not even a feedback but a cause of temperature [Spencer and Braswell]. Then there is the problem of decreased pan evaporation [Roderick et al, 2007] which means the increased “q” must come from the oceans. Sea surface temperature has been neutral or declining for almost 2 years;
http://rankexploits.com/musings/wp-content/uploads/2008/11/sst_oct_nov_dec.jpg

3. An analysis of the independence of clear-sky top-of-atmosphere outgoing longwave radiation on atmospheric temperature and water vapor.A.E. Dessler, P. Yang, J. Lee, J. Solbrig, Z. Zhang, K. Minchswaner

http://gesa.tamu.edu/people/faculty/dessler/Dessler2008.pdf

Dessler has a second shot at D&G and he concludes that the surface temperature, Ts, atmospheric temperature, Ta, and “q” combine, primarily in the tropics, to decrease outgoing long-wave radiation [OLR]. Dessler calls this the “super greenhouse effect”. Unfortunately neither “q” or Ts or Ta are increasing. Also the decrease in OLR is problematic with Professor Lindzen noting there has been an increase in OLR;

http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/03/30/lindzen-on-negative-climate-feedback/

This elegant synopsis by Professor Lindzen was critiqued by Chris Colose. Too bad Chris didn’t read p33 of this;

Richard Lindzen, Beyond Models-using physics to assess climate sensitivity, attribution, and the relevance of both to alarm.

http://portaldata.colgate.edu/imagegallerywww/3503/ImageGallery/LindzenLectureBeyondModels.pdf

We will just have to wait for the ‘super-doper greenhouse effect’.

4. How declining aerosols and rising greenhouse gases forced rapid warming in Europe since the 1980sRolf Philipona, Klaus Behrens, Christian Ruckstuhl

http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/2009/2008GL036350.shtml

Prolific Professor Philipona is a leading exponent of back-radiation and consequent temperature and humidity effects. Here he argues the rapid increase in temperature since 1980 is due to aerosol dimming ceasing, with a consequent increase in short-wave forcing. Some problems; the study covers Switzerland and a bit of Northern Germany, an area about the size of Al Gore’s backyard. Aerosols are assumed to have only a cooling effect and humidity only a warming effect; the temperature trends from the 25 Switzerland and 8 German sites have anomaly ranges from 0.56C and 0.87C respectively yet there is no consideration of UHI influence; long-wave down radiation [LDR] is derived from absolute humidity, Uabs, yet short-wave net radiation cloud effects are equated with LDR cloud effects [Table 1]; how can the top and bottom of clouds be equivalent? Read Clausius and Heinz Thieme instead.

5. Consistency of modeled and observed temperature trends in the tropical troposphere.Santer, B.D., et al [including G.A. Schmidt and S.C. {wind-shear} Sherwood]

http://www.realclimate.org/docs/santer_etal_IJoC_08_fact_sheet.pdf

This paper is one of the great obfuscations from a champion cherry-picker. Fig 9.1[c], AR4, p675, unambiguously predicts a tropical hot spot [THS] from increased ACO2 warming of the surface. Santer et al finds it using a “global” weighting function, T2lt, derived from a synthetic [sic] base, T2, with an error margin of 0.0 – 0.5CPD, which means no warming at all would still produce a THS. A crescendo of Santer support followed based on increased humidity [not happening], changes in the moist adiabat and a rising tropopause. The THS is not hotter, it’s taller. This height issue was rebutted by Spencer and Christy’s response to Fu et al. Finally, the non-existent THS was rationalized by Tim Lambert as a signature of surface warming from any source not just ACO2. The only problem with this is an equivalent solar forced THS requires a 2% increase in insolation. Now that’s hot [thanks Birdie].

6. Temperature trends derived from Stratospheric Sounding Unit radiances: The effect of increasing CO2 on the weighting function.Keith P. Shine, John J. Barnett, William J. Randel

http://acd.ucar.edu/~randel/2007GL032218.pdf

The other side of the coin to a THS is a cooling Stratosphere. Keith Shine and the lads claim to have found it, again riding on the well-worn back of model corrections of incorrect data. After corrections to the CO2 weighting function Keith finds Stratospheric temperature trends ranging from – 0.4K decade-1 to + 0.4K decade-1. Yep, Keith found nothing.

7. Is the climate warming or cooling?David R. Easterling, Michael F. Wehner

http://www.cdc.noaa.gov/csi/images/GRL2009_ClimateWarming.pdf

The previous Keenlyside et al effort predicted masking of underlying AGW due to SST driven natural variation. Unfortunately, when the ENSO is removed from temperature trends there is no post 2000 underlying AGW;

http://jennifermarohasy.com/blog/2008/10/temperature-trends-and-carbon-dioxide-a-note-from-cohenite/

Easterling and Wehner revisit this trainwreck of an idea to prove that future cooling will still have underlying AGW. Their null hypothesis [NH] really settles the matter. The NH is that there will be an “equal percentage of statistically significant positive and negative trends” [p6]. This is high order virtual reality; the concept of the 100 year flood explains why. Pacific Decadal Oscillation [PDO] climate phases have greater probability of floods during a negative phase during which time [about 30 years] there may be several 1 in 100 year floods. During the positive, El Nino dominated PDO phase there will most likely be no 1 in 100 year flood.
The same principle applies to temperature. Positive PDOs will have increasing temperature trends and vice-versa for negative PDOs. The paper doesn’t consider ENSO at all apart from an admission that it is not modeled well [p6]. Table 1 shows more positive temperature trends in the 20thC. This was due to positive PDO dominance not, as the paper claims, AGW. Still, it’s a great title.

8. Decadal-Scale Temperature Trends in the Southern Hemisphere Ocean.Sarah T. Gille

http://www-pord.ucsd.edu/~sgille/pub_dir/i1520-0442-21-18-4749.pdf

The issue of ocean warming is crucial for AGW but problematic. Sarah puts her hand up for warming and produces this gem;

“Overall, the results indicate that the Southern Hemisphere ocean has warmed substantially since the 1930s. Some 80% of this warming is concentrated south of 30 degrees S where it is evident at all depths. Observations are also sparsest in this latitude range. Estimates of the exact amount of warming that has occurred therefore depend on the details of the assumptions made about temperature trends in regions where no observations are available” [p4761] Priceless.
9. Role of water vapor feedback on the amplitude of season cycle in the global mean surface air temperature.Qigang Wu, David J. Karoly, Gerald R. North

http://www.agu.org/pubs/crossref/2008/2008GL033454.shtml

Speaking of Dr Karoly this little bit of virtual science; Dr K equates seasonal variation in Surface Air Temperature with water vapor feedback “since both are subject to the same feedback process” of downward long-wave radiation. The same problems with Dessler, Philipona and Santer apply. You would be excused in thinking they are reading from the same book.
10. Declining Coral Calcification on the Great Barrier ReefGlenn De’ath, Janice M. Lough, Katharina E. FabriciusScience. Volume 323, pp116 – 119; 2 January 2009

http://jennifermarohasy.com/blog/2009/01/global-warming-unlikely-reason-for-slow-coral-growth/?cp=all

Coral is one of the ‘Koala Bear’ emotive images of AGW. This study found coral growth from Great Barrier Reef [GBR] samples increased 5.4% between 1900 -1970, but declined 14.2% from 1900 – 2005; the culprit, ACO2. Professor Hoegh-Guidberg started waving his hands and Premier Bligh promised action on the coral and got elected. More salient facts: Dr Alina Szmant noted that studies on coral decline used hydrochloric acid, not CO2, to lower the pH of water, so conclusions about the role of CO2 were premature; John McClean and Warwick Hughes noted there had been no temperature increase from 1982 to the present along the GBR; in fact, in June 2007 record low temperatures caused extensive bleaching of GBR coral; Professor H-G began hand-waving again and the culprit, again, ACO2. The good news is, according to Dr Guillermo Diaz-Pulido, the coral has recovered and expanded; the culprit… Perhaps Dr De’ath’s conclusions from his earlier study, that further data on the “links between environmental change and effects on coral growth” is needed, should have informed this study.

In Conclusion: There is no evidence in the PR literature that AGW is worsening, or exists for that matter.