Australia
This thread is for discussion of Australian aspects of global warming.
Climate Conversation Group
Taking the heat out of global warming
For the first time in history, people shouting “the end is nigh” are somehow
For the first time in history, people shouting “the end is nigh” are somehow
the sane ones, while those of us who say it is not are now the lunatics.
Latest climate models v. reality
As the models continue to leave actual temperature readings in their dust, sizeable warming halted about 1995 — although it might resume at any time. It must hasten to have any hope of catching up with the predictions.
If you claim warming continues, we want evidence of continued warming — eminently reasonable. Making us wait for 17 years for that evidence invites us to doubt you.
Claiming that warming hasn't stopped is the same as claiming it has — and both are ridiculous, for nobody knows the future. The best you can do is describe the past.
Click graph for larger version.
Who is Tony Cox? You may well ask.
Anthony Cox is a lawyer and secretary of The Climate Sceptics.
He has degrees in law and climatology and is a regular contributor to science blogs and the media.
http://www.abc.net.au/unleashed/anthony-cox-39612.html
Get that?
“degrees in law and climatology”
Alice Springs: coldest day on record
Sydney shivers through coldest September in five years
Monster cold snap hits state of Tasmania
Tasmania Cold – Google Search
Record looms, and shivers it’s cold in Adelaide
Adelaide Cold – Google Search
Murray-Darling Basin getting drier: study
Program director Dr David Post said these changes were linked to large-scale atmospheric circulation patterns.
They indicated a shift in the overall climate of south-eastern Australia, similar to what has been experienced in south-west Western Australia since the 1970s, Dr Post said.
“The research indicates that these changes can be linked to global warming, making it a likely contributor to the recent drought,” he said.
The next three years of research will look at the extent to which the changes can be attributed to climate change, improve projections of the impacts on water resources and improve seasonal forecasting of climate and streamflow.
The research was carried out by the CSIRO and the Bureau of Meteorology with financial support from the Murray-Darling Basin Authority, Victorian Department of Sustainability and Environment, Commonwealth Department of Climate Change and Energy Efficiency, and the Managing Climate Variability Program.
Yes, I saw that story yesterday but am doubtful without seeing the full paper of the reasoning behind the statement “The research indicates that these changes can be linked to global warming, making it a likely contributor to the recent drought”
The CSIRO BOM recently published a report entitled State of the Climate which is criticised here: http://www.quadrant.org.au/files/2010/Clearing%20the%20Air%20text.pdf
for example:
Global Warming
The claim by the CSIRO of greater than 90 percent certainty that man-made carbon dioxide threatens to increase global temperatures to dangerous levels is derived from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) reports and is not supported by statistical analysis. Moreover, it is not supported by any analysis in the CSIRO/BOM paper which provides only a graph showing an increase in carbon dioxide emissions. Without supporting analysis the statement has no value for development of policy.
In a recent article in „The Wall Street Journal‟, R. S. Lindzen, Professor of Meteorology, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, stated “It is sometimes claimed that the IPCC is 90 percent confident of this claim (that most of the warming of the past 50 years or so is due to man‟s emissions) but there is no known statistical basis for this claim; it‟s purely subjective.”
Conclusion (http://www.climateconversation.wordshine.co.nz/open-threads/climate/scene/australia/?replytocom=26983#respond)
The CSIRO/BOM paper provides no evidence man-made carbon dioxide has in the past, or will in the future, cause dangerous global warming.
Past records show there is no evidence of a dangerous cause and effect relationship between carbon dioxide and atmospheric temperature.
The simple proposition that man-made carbon dioxide determines increased global temperature fails a fundamental principle of science: that a cause must demonstrate a consistent effect.
There is no analysis to support the claim of greater than 90 percent certainty that man-made carbon dioxide threatens to increase global temperatures to dangerous levels. In fact, there is presently no evidence to show there is such a risk.
Methane levels have plateaued since the end of the twentieth century and therefore grazing animals and fugitive emissions from coal mines play no part in global warming.
The selective presentation of data by CSIRO/BOM does not provide the basis for objective analysis which is required to support a Climate Policy costing the Australian community billions of dollars.
In the absence of sound science the case has not been made for the economic costs to agriculture and industry associated with an ETS. Nor is there a case for the $30 million in the 2010 Federal Budget for a “national campaign to educate the community on climate change”, if such a campaign reflected the standard of information in the CSIRO/BOM paper. This is particularly so at a time when there are urgent and competing requirements for national resources.
So far as the report itself is concerned I think this is it (though this is dated May) http://www.csiro.au/files/files/py5t.pdf
(quoting from p 26)
There is strong evidence of an increasing trend in
temperature in south-eastern Australia, which could
be projected ahead for the next few years. Rainfall in
the region shows substantial decadal variability and it
is difficult to discern a long-term trend in the observed
rainfall record, although the last decade has certainly
been unusual in the observed Australian rainfall record.
There is also increasing evidence that at least part of the
current reduction in rainfall is associated with climate
change. Global climate models suggest reduced rainfall
across the region in future decades due to climate change.
Based on analysis of the climate record and on model
projections of future climate, it is therefore likely that the
climate baseline is shifting due to the global warming.
(Hmmm … if that is an example of reasoning … )
I’ve e mailed Warwick Hughes and Dr J Marohasy to see if either of them have time to comment…
“it is therefore likely that the climate baseline is shifting due to the global warming.”
Good Grief!
They seem to be oblivious (possibly intentionally – got to keep the Climate Change Gravy Train Express chuffing along) to mid 2000′s points-of-inflexion in almost all global metrics.
I wonder how long before the penny drops that we are entering a cool phase (see Don J. Easterbrook) in the Earths natural cycle.
As for the conclusion.
Similar can be said for NZ and the rest of the world (although it has been pointed out a couple of times in obscure parts of the blogosphere).
And they could do worse than take a peek at UNISYS; Current Sea Surface Temperature Anomaly Plot
When La Nina pushes all that warm water West, guess what?
Rain!
We in NZ even saw a TVNZ clip “Lake in a desert” (surprize!).
Doesn’t CSIRO-BOM get OZ news in OZ?
Ha! I’ve heard from Dr J Marohasy – she’s busy today and will do something tomorrow
Here’s her bio by the way http://jennifermarohasy.com/
Dr Marohasy is a biologist, Adjunct Research Fellow in the Centre for Plant and Water Science at CQ University, columnist for The Land newspaper (Rural Press), founding member of the Australian Environment Foundation and past Chair. She has a PhD from the University of Queensland and has worked for the Queensland sugar industry, the Melbourne-based Institute of Public Affairs and as an entomologist for the Queensland Department of Lands where she was instrumental in the successful biological control of the North Queensland weed, rubbervine (Cryptostegia grandiflora) following six years of field work in Africa.
Dr Marohasy is concerned that public policy on environmental issues is increasingly driven by moral crusading, rather than objective science or need.
Jennifer Marohasy is sceptical of the consensus position on anthropogenic global warming (AGW) and gives informative talks on climate change, agricultural and environmental topics.
So some cred there
Here’s Dr Marohasy’s take:
(produced in less than 5 hours from the time I asked her:)
On Thursday the New South Wales Government officially declared the nine-year drought ended. The very next day the CSIRO released a report warning that the ‘current drought’ appears to be at least partly linked to ‘climate change’.
The CSIRO report entitled ‘Climate variability and change in south-eastern Australia’ is an initiative of the South Eastern Australian Climate Initiative, SEACI, lead by CSIRO with input from the Bureau of Meteorology and the Murray-Darling Basin Authority.
The report forecasts a future decline in rainfall and works from the assumption there is already long term decline.
The first diagram, Figure 1, however, only shows historical rainfall data for the period 1997 to 2009 excluding the last very wet ten months. The first graph, Figure 2, shows inflows, not rainfall, across the Murray Darling Basin without explaining that many variables impact inflows that have nothing to do with rainfall including changes in land management, salt interception and drainage schemes etcetera.
A scientific report of this kind might have begun with a discussion of the complete historical rainfall record and avoided confusing inflows with actual rainfall.
The report’s forecast of a drier future could come to pass, but the track record of Australian climate scientists for predicting rainfall even one season ahead is dismal. The Bureau incorrectly forecast below average rainfall for spring this year for the upper Murray catchments just before the region was flooded. Last year the forecast for a hot and dry summer resulted in drought breaking rains across the upper Murray Darling Basin.
Rainfall – the most significant climate variable – is spectacularly changeable and non-robust from one climate model to the next.
Professor Gareth Paltridge in his book ‘The Climate Caper’ (Connor Court, 2009, pg 21) makes reference to an Australian National University study of the various simulations of rainfall as produced by the IPCC models. The simulations of average Australian rainfall apparently range from less than 200mm per year to greater than 1000mm per year. The actual measured value is 450mm. Considering the forecasts for the late 21st Century, apparently more than half the models predict an increase in rainfall over Australia, and the rest predict a decrease. The most extreme decrease is from the CSIRO IPCC model which suggests that average rainfall over Australia 100 years from now will be 100mm per year less.
At the global scale, according to AGW theory, an increase in carbon dioxide should lead to an increase in water vapour concentrations and therefore more cloud. But there is some empirical evidence to suggest that water vapour feedback is in fact negative, not positive.
In summary, there is no reason to suggest that the new SEACI forecast for a decline in rainfall across south eastern Australia will be any more accurate that previous CSIRO and Bureau of Meteorology seasonal and long range forecasts that have proven unreliable. Furthermore it is of concern that the report purportedly about south eastern Australia, released in October 2010, makes continual reference to the ‘ongoing drought’ and ‘current drought’ when south eastern Australia is no longer in drought.
Dr Marohasy says ‘Be careful not to confuse rainfall with runoff.’ and “runoff is calculated by climate modelling’
check Dr Marohasy’s site for her credentials http://jennifermarohasy.com/blog/2010/10/new-csiro-climate-forecast-for-se-australia-unbelievable/
A very astute analysis.
“many variables impact inflows that have nothing to do with rainfall”
‘Be careful not to confuse rainfall with runoff.’ and “runoff is [sic - as?] calculated by climate modelling’
Have raised “coefficient of runoff” previously, in regard to SSL.
“At the global scale, according to AGW theory, an increase in carbon dioxide should lead to an increase in water vapour concentrations and therefore more cloud. But there is some empirical evidence to suggest that water vapour feedback is in fact negative, not positive.”
See “CLOUDS in CLIMATE MODELS”
“Considering the forecasts for the late 21st Century, apparently more than half the models predict an increase in rainfall over Australia, and the rest predict a decrease. The most extreme decrease is from the CSIRO IPCC model which suggests that average rainfall over Australia 100 years from now will be 100mm per year less.”
Obviously a warm bias in the CSIRO model that (I’m guessing) uses IPCC RF methodology (ACO2 major climate driver).
I will be putting up links and info re the CSIRO model under “CLIMATE MODELS” eventually, but at the moment NIWA’s Supercomputer and its UKMO UM Climate Model takes precedence.
Another puzzle (to me) is reported at WUWT http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/10/15/bom-disappears-rainfall-data-no-trend-becomes-downtrend/
which relates to an article in Quadrant Online by Tom Quirk (quoting)
In the last two years some 900 mm of rainfall have been removed from the rainfall record of the Murray-Darling Basin. This startling discovery was made by comparing the annual Murray-Darling Basin rainfall reported on the Bureau of Meteorology website in August 2008 and the same report found yesterday.
Anthony went to some trouble to run graphs to illustrate the difference between the ‘before removal’ data and the post removal data and his conclusion ‘I notice the peaks post 1950 seem to be reduced, but the lows are not’
Fig 1 in the CSIRO/BOM report shows historical rainfall data for the period 1997 to 2009; is there some difference to the historical data – I don’t know
Good point Val – I’d forgotten about that.
The beauty of this forum is that we can bring together the various components of the “puzzle” – I love it, like a kid in a candy store.
From WUWT:
“The Bureau is already on record adjusting Australian temperature measurements and they now appear to have turned to rainfall, making the last 60 years drier than previously reported.”
Another astute observation.
And here’s Warwick Hughes take on the CSIRO/BOM report dated May 2010
http://www.warwickhughes.com/blog/?p=678&cpage=1#comment-25103
Warwick’s comment is no 7 on that page
Warwick’s credentials are impressive and I have mentioned them before on this site so just search for his name without quotes in the search room
anyway from what each of Warwick Hughes and Dr Marohasy say I would have serious reservations about the contents of the BOM/CSIRO report linked above
What a bizarre chain of events.
Thanks for the Warwick Hughes link Val – very enlightening.
I like this bit
“Anyway – the May 2010 “South Eastern Australian Climate Initiative” is a mish mash of the usual doomster predictions by the assorted collection of taxpayer funded Greenhousers – who in this case have all fallen spectacularly on their faces as there has been notable useful rains from the time the report was issued and the MDB runs from top to Murray-mouth. Any half-critical media would laugh at them – trotting out this failed report.
We can be sure that whenever the “expensive water lobby” – Wentworth Group – CSIRO – BoM – and assorted other members of the broad climate change cabal – want to get their views in the MSM – then the ever faithful GreenMSM obediently makes space and any critical faculties are suspended.”
Warwick’s analysis of “the issue of runoff/inflows and the unreliability of constructing long term time series of river data modeling so beloved by the “expensive water lobby”” is comprehensive too.
The participation of BoM in this “Initiative” provides no comfort leading up to the release of the results of BoM’s audit of the NZTR.
Particularly as NIWA denies there is an official or formal NZTR; it would be interesting exactly what BOM has been asked to audit (in NIWA’s words)
Another matter of concern to me in the CSIRO BOM report is the reliance upon modelling particularly for past run off and for future weather and run off predictions
Niche Modelling has a nice article upon the deficiancies of computer modelling http://landshape.org/enm/climate-model-abuse/
referring to a review by Roger Pielke Sr of a paper showing the abuse of models
(quoting from the article which has a link to the paper)
In the opinion of the editor Kundzewicz (who has served prominently on the IPCC), climate models were only designed to provide a broad assessment of the response of the global climate system to greenhouse gas (GHG) forcings, and to serve as the basis for devising a set of GHG emissions policies. They were not designed for regional adaptation studies.
To expect more from these models is simply unrealistic, at least for direct application to regional water management problems. The Anagnostopoulos et al conclusions negate the value of spending so much money on regional climate predictions decades into the future, for example on the South Eastern Australian Climate Initiative and the Queensland Climate Change Centre of Excellence. ”
It’s relevant to this topic because of the reliance upon modelling in the CSIRO/BOM report
Thank you Val – I’ve been searching all over for that link.
Climate model abuse – Niche Modelling.
Roger Pielke Sr. reviews another very important new paper showing the abuse of models.
“To expect more from these models is simply unrealistic, at least for direct application to regional water management problems. The Anagnostopoulos et al conclusions negate the value of spending so much money on regional climate predictions decades into the future, for example on the South Eastern Australian Climate Initiative and the Queensland Climate Change Centre of Excellence. ” – Niche Modelling
I note that although “South Eastern Australian Climate Initiative” does not seem to be a bona-fide scientific paper, this (possibly) related paper “Key findings from the Indian Ocean Climate Initiative and their impact on policy development in Australia” has 21 citations and “Enhanced greenhouse climate change and its potential effect on selected fauna of south-eastern Australia: A trend analysis” has 98! (also possibly related).
“Climate variability and change in south-eastern Australia” is merely a report also but Google Scholar brings up a paper “A discussion on aspects of the seasonality of the rainfall decline in South-Eastern Australia”, Timbal – CAWCR Research Letters, 2010. No citations to date.
It’s part of this series:
Evaluation of low latitude cloud properties in ACCESS and HadGEM AMIP simulations, C. Franklin and M. Dix
Real-time seasonal SST predictions for the Great Barrier Reef during the summer of 2009/2010, C. Spillman, D. Hudson and O. Alves
A discussion on aspects of the seasonality of the rainfall decline in South-Eastern Australia, B. Timbal
Evaluation of ACCESS-A Clouds and Convection using Near Real-Time CloudSat-CALIPSO Observations, A. Protat, L. Rikus, S. Young, J. Le Marshall, P. May, and M. Whimpey
Available here – [PDF] from psu.edu
So just like the NZTR, there’s a lot riding on these reports and papers (that are based on what?) and BoM is in the thick of it.
Also in “Real Science”
The Key Ingredient Of Climate Legislation
In order to get climate legislation passed, it is essential to exaggerate or fabricate crises. A good example is Australia, which is widely reported by the MSM to be in an historic drought due to global warming.
The Australian BOM shows about 3% of the country in drought over the last three years. Meaning that 97% of the country is not having a drought.
We better keep this in mind:
CAWCR Research Letters
Issue 4, July 2010
P.A. Sandery, T. Leeuwenburg, G. Wang, A.J. Hollis, K.A. Day (editors)
Copyright and Disclaimer
© 2010 CSIRO and the Bureau of Meteorology. To the extent permitted by law, all rights are reserved and no part of this publication covered by copyright may be reproduced or copied in any form or by any means except with the written permission of CSIRO and the Bureau of Meteorology.
CSIRO and the Bureau of Meteorology advise that the information contained in this publication comprises general statements based on scientific research. The reader is advised and needs to be aware that such information may be incomplete or unable to be used in any specific situation. No reliance or actions must therefore be made on that information without seeking prior expert professional, scientific and technical advice. To the extent permitted by law, CSIRO and the Bureau of Meteorology (including each of its employees and consultants) excludes all liability to any person for any consequences, including but not limited to all losses, damages, costs, expenses and any other compensation, arising directly or indirectly from using this publication (in part or in whole) and any information or material contained in it.
Thanks Richard; another problem though less so in my view in respect to the CSIRO/BOM report in respect to past rainfall is measurement of precipitation see WUWT Errors in global precipitation measurement
http://wattsupwiththat.com/
Yes, the specific link is
Errors in global precipitation measurement
I’ll put a thread header in “Economics” for this.
Go to “Economics”: “Errors in global precipitation measurement – Economic Impacts”
“Beware of false phrophets in a scientific guise” – The Australian
THE angst in Murray-Darling Basin communities about proposed water regime changes belies Australian farmers’ record in adopting research.
Economic discussion here
First carbon victim is the truth – smh
“Cutting through the climate change rhetoric has been Elaine Prior, the senior environment, social and governance analyst at Citigroup.
Last week, in the wake of a Greenpeace report on lending to the coal industry in Australia (covered previously here), Prior and her colleagues tried to quantify the exposure of our big four banks if a price on carbon were to wipe out the value of their loans to coal-fired power stations.
This is not far-fetched. The banks are definitely worried – especially in the Latrobe Valley of Victoria, where the first plant shutdowns are expected.
Bank shareholders are worried too. ”Investors, including super funds, have expressed concern about bank exposures to coal-fired power,” Prior says, ”more than about the banks’ internal carbon footprint.””
As one drought ends, hope dries up in west
“The only consensus on climate change is to chose the wrong policy” – The Australian
Geoff Carmody, October 25, 2010
THOSE advocating policies to reduce greenhouse gas emissions are pestered to reveal their views on the effects of human activities on climate change.
Well, I don’t know for sure. I’m just an economist. I’m told the science is subject to uncertainty. I start by assuming there might be a man-made problem. Given that assumption, what is the most cost-effective way to respond? That’s a question we economists can examine.
I’m not a fan of the precautionary factor which Penny Wong in her later days in the last Govt used to advocate
I wouldn’t be either if I was an Aussie, Val.
Especially given this brain-dead approach:
“I’m just an economist. I’m told the science is subject to uncertainty. I start by assuming there might be a man-made problem”.
Unfortunately for us Kiwis, we are already subject to the “precautionary factor” due to a similar approach but another important “factor” in the equation is NZ’s European trading markets.
I don’t detect a similar driving force in the Australian debate – unless I’m missing something.
yes, you’re missing something Richard but it’s not in the headlights at the moment; the current battle is the CSIRO/BOM debate; the RET and the Govt’s Climate Change committee
An interesting piece at Jo Nova’s this morning on temperature record shenanigans in WA
The Sydney Morning Herald
Climate INDEX
smh is really cranking out some drivel in the lead up to COP16 Cancun
http://www.smh.com.au/environment/climate-change
By 2020, power bills will shock
# Keith Orchison
# From: The Australian
# October 26, 2010
If the carbon price process that Julia Gillard has initiated delivers the thumbs-up for a scheme targeting electricity generation as a start to decarbonising Australia, the bad news for users is that they should expect their bills to rise by another 25 per cent this decade, in addition to other increases.
Once the carbon tiger’s tail is grasped, there is no letting go.
If, for example, there is a global agreement on a post-Kyoto treaty and Australia’s abatement target has to be put up to 15 per cent below 2000 levels (a step offered by Kevin Rudd and requiring abatement in 2020 to reach about 250 million tonnes a year), industry analysts expect a carbon price of about $50 a tonne to be needed, helping, along with network charges and other factors, to push end-user bills towards treble what they were in 2008 when the cost surge really got going.
Victoria facing electricity crisis, says opposition
* From: The Australian
* November 03, 2010 11:30AM
POWER cuts and brownouts will hit Victorians because of government red tape, the shadow energy spokesman Michael O’Brien has warned.
And he has placed the blame for soaring energy costs – power bills have risen by about 20 per cent in Victoria in the last year – squarely on the shoulders of the Brumby Labor government.
But energy minister Peter Batchelor has dismissed the warning and defended his government’s record.
Mr Batchelor, who is retiring at this election, said power prices for Victorias were some of the lowest in the country and attacked the federal Liberals and Greens for walking away from putting a price on carbon.
In a radio debate on 3AW this morning, Mr O’Brien said there was a “very real risk that Victorians are going to see brownouts’’.
Power bills had risen by 55 per cent in the nearly three and a half years since John Brumby took over as premier, he said.
“We are going to see problems, particularly on those really hot summer days we have seen disruptions to supply and we need to have new electricity generation coming online,’’ he said.
“The government has put all its eggs basically in the wind basket, there have been a lot of wind farms approved but not many operating and the government is actually holding up the development of a lot of gas-fired electricity which would be better, cheaper and cleaner.’’
NSW power prices will rise again
# From: The Daily Telegraph
# December 21, 2010
HOUSEHOLDS face even higher power prices from January 1 as electricity retailers recover the $360 million cost of the federal renewable energy scheme.
About 370,000 AGL electricity customers will be the first hit.
From next week a 3.8 per cent increase in charges will push up customers’ annual bills by $54.
It’s the first case of a NSW provider jacking up charges to recoup the cost of buying small-scale technology certificates, or STCs, which the Federal Government is introducing to help fund a shift towards green energy.
Continues…….
Power blame game heats up
* From: The Australian
* October 28, 2010 12:00AM
THE states face pressure to wind back schemes that pay households to generate electricity using rooftop solar panels.
This comes after NSW slashed its scheme in the wake of a surge in installations that threatened to add $2.5 billion to power costs by 2016.
Premier Kristina Keneally attributed the blowout in the scheme to the “windfall” gains participants experienced as a flood of cheap imports from China and Spain caused the cost of solar panels to halve since last year.
The unanticipated uptake has sent the cost of the scheme – recouped by electricity retailers from all customers – skyrocketing from an estimated $1.5bn over the six-year life of the scheme to about $4bn.
Ms Keneally was unwilling to say how much the scheme had pushed up the cost of power for the average household, but said the figure would be between $80 and $130 a year if the scheme were not pared back.
Solar rate cut to stop costs going through the roof
Brian Robins and Ben Cubby, October 28, 2010 – smh
The state government has reined in its popular solar panel scheme, saying it would otherwise have cost a crippling $4 billion, or more than twice the original estimates.
Same topic from smh:
Power price to rise unless carbon price is set soon
October 30, 2010
THE federal government has been warned electricity prices will rise further unless power generators get a clear carbon price by 2012, and that Australia’s greenhouse gas reduction targets are already ”difficult to achieve”.
Solar power plan without a carbon price is too good to be true
November 9, 2010 – smh
When Julia Gillard and Hillary Clinton announced they wanted to ”make solar power competitive with conventional power sources” within five years, they left out one important detail.
Their goal was based on solar being competitive with coal-fired power after a carbon price had been imposed.
When you think about it this is obvious – if solar power could provide electricity as cheaply as coal-fired power without putting a cost on the emissions from coal, then we wouldn’t need to impose that cost. The problem would be solved. We could forget the whole carbon price thing, because the only reason to have one is to give a leg-up to more expensive, low-emission sources of power.
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But according to the executive director of the Australian Solar Institute, Mark Twidell – who will be managing the $50 million the federal government has stumped up for the initiative – cost-competitive solar without a carbon price sounds too good to be true because it is too good to be true.
”Solar is getting cheaper but the prediction that it could enter the market as a competitive alternative in 2015 is based on the assumption that conventional forms of power will be also more expensive by then for a number of reasons, and one important reason would be a carbon price,” he said.
Gillard and Clinton don’t know what they’re talking about
It makes me furious when people who have no idea what they’re talking about
and sheep follow them
Peter Lang on the other hand is a retired geologist and engineer with 40 years experience on a wide range of energy products throughout the world, including managing energy R & D and providing policy advice for government and opposition. His experience includes coal, oil, gas, hydro, geothermal, nuclear power plants, nuclear waste disposal, and a wide range of energy and end use management projects.
start with this site;
http://co2insanity.com/2010/05/08/solar-power-realities/
here’s the abstract and link to the paper
This paper provides a simple analysis of the capital cost of solar power and energy storage sufficient to meet the demand of Australia’s National Electricity Market. It also considers some of the environmental effects.
It puts the figures in perspective by looking at the limit position, the paper highlights the very high costs imposed by mandating and subsidising solar power. The minimum power output, not the peak or average, is the main factor governing solar power’s economic viability. The capital cost would be 20 times more than nuclear power. The least-cost solar option would require 400 times more land area and emit 20 times more CO2 than nuclear power.
Conclusions: solar power is uneconomic. Government mandates and subsidies hide the true cost of renewable energy but these additional costs must be carried by others.
Val, thanks for this – some interesting issues arise here.
I’ll put the 2 blogs (co2 insanity and BraveNewClimate) under “Climate” “Science Blogs”.
Solar is not an issue in NZ that I can see but obviously is in OZ.
The article links to a website BraveNewClimate that carries this post “Who crippled the Murray Darling Basin?”
http://bravenewclimate.com/2010/10/18/who-crippled-the-murray-darling-basin/#more-3359
The issues that do arise that are common to NZ and OZ (and the rest of the planet) are:-
* Water use and water quality
This is becoming THE issue in NZ and has been big in OZ for some time, but guess who’s seen the potential in the crisis aspect – the UN. This is a big issue for NZ’s biggest earner – dairying.
* Deforestation
The impacts of deforestation just have not been given the prominence they deserve due to the “climate change” fixation. There’s all sorts of problems in NZ because of this – hill country erosion and harbour sedimentation just for starters. I agree with Greenpeace to a degree on this also (I’m a closet greenie) although not Greenpeace NZ – they haven’t got a clue.
* Hydrological models – Stochastic/Hydrological vs Global Climate Models/Regional Climate Models
The SEACI study really has brought this issue to a head so keep an eye on this space in the lead-up to AR5. It has a bearing on CSIRO and NIWA, both of which employ Regional models based on the warm and dry biased UKMO. CSIRO jumped the wrong way IMO when they dropped CSIRO Mk3 and went to ACCESS/POAMA.
To catch up with this follow this thread (it’s on-going):
http://www.climateconversation.wordshine.co.nz/2010/10/open-threads-as-promised/#comment-28251
And particularly down-thread of this:
http://www.climateconversation.wordshine.co.nz/2010/10/open-threads-as-promised/#comment-28553
And this:
http://www.climateconversation.wordshine.co.nz/2010/10/open-threads-as-promised/#comment-28380
Both Andy and I have got access to CESM/CAM and we are getting our heads around this model for this reason that you will come to at the bottom of the second thread:
“If I’ve got this right, this is HUGE because this model is not hard-wired for CO2 and can be tuned to mimic the last decades plateaued temperatures where other models, notably Hansen’s ModelE can not. I suspect that CO2 ramping would be minimal to do so.
I will need to ask the right questions to the right people to confirm this but I will really get my head into this before doing so as time permits although there’s plenty of time to do this before AR5.
This could make the CMIP5 results an explosive issue and might even bring down AGW conclusively.”
We may even be able to provide competition for CSIRO and NIWA.
I’ve left a comment and link at Jennifer Marohasy’s SEACI blog post alerting her that we are into this but whether she’s interested or not, I don’t know.
Fascinating Richard; I’ll keep an eye on your and Andy’s progress
Water plan will cost a tsunami
* From: The Australian
* November 12, 2010 12:00AM
THE Murray-Darling Basin policy has so far lacked any rational economic foundations.
Start with the facts. Far from destroying irrigation communities, the commonwealth is spending $4.4 billion in so-called water-saving initiatives that will fund irrigation upgrades. That spending is remarkably inefficient. Estimates suggest the benefits, in terms of additional water available, amount to barely $1bn: so that of every dollar of expenditure spent, more than 75c is pure waste.
Since 1992, more than $20bn has been allocated for the Murray-Darling. Even in the crowded field that is Australian public policy, rarely has so much been spent to achieve so little. No wonder, for the policy has lacked any rational economic foundation. Until that changes, expect a trickle of benefits from a tsunami of costs.
This is what Warwick Hughes says about the MDB
These are some essential points I have made re the ACT that mostly apply to the MDB too.
[1] Trends derived from the time series of historic inflow numbers so beloved by ACTEW and the doomsters and proponents of expensive water, the Wentworth Group etc – are nowhere near as credible as trends from long term rainfall data.
[2] Stream gaging was not common a century ago. Stream gaging was much more widespread post the 1940’s than pre 1940’s and equipment costs mean the networks are more sparse than rain data networks.
[3] Stream gaging has been carried out by a multiplicity of methods and techniques and can involve quite expensive equipment to be installed in remote areas – whereas measuring rainfall has always been relatively simple and cheap.
[4] The Queanbeyan rain history shows with crystal clarity that the last decade has NOT been exceptionally dry compared to the 1930’s-40’s and 1890’s thru to WWI.
[5] It also must be noted that there are NO reliable long term rain data from high up the vital Cotter catchment – so we are stuck with using Queanbeyan as a guide to ACT historic rain trends.
[6] So when the ACT Govt promulgates their inflows history which show the last decade to be exceptionally dry – in conflict with the Queanbeyan rain data – I say “..the ACT inflow data – not worth the paper it is printed on in terms of being an accurate comparison of recent inflows with late 19C and early 20C inflows..”
[7] When you also feed in the facts that the ACT Govt are promulgating this dubious inflow history and they are advocates of CSIRO climate modeling – my conclusion in 6 is reinforced.
If anybody can show me a 139 year long stream gage record from an ACT/MDB high country stream – using the same equipment throughout – no gaps and missed data – that would indeed be an interesting discovery.
Other facts worth stating that illustrate the complexities behind trying to make long term time series of inflows;
Changes in vegetation cover have a marked impact on inflow rates or catchment efficiency – more vegetation = less runoff / inflows.
So periods in our history when land clearing was dominant – say after settlement and post WWI and WWI soldiers block schemes- would have tended to increase runoff.
Other opposing factors such as post WWII soil conservation programs – reversion of marginal land to scrub – the huge increase in timber plantations in post WWII decades – the “plant a billion trees” campaign launched by PM Bob Hawke over 20 years ago – would have all acted to reduce runoff and inflows.
There is another neglected factor affecting our SE Australian rainfall and that is the post WWII airborne cloud seeding that ran intermittently for several decades – I think to the early 1990’s in some areas. This time series of NSW rain from 1900-2009 shows the huge jump in rain in 1950 –
which happened to be when cloud seeding started. The implications of this are that rain data for a wide area must be skewed upwards to some extent by cloud seeding which makes the BoM – CSIRO analyses even more worthless than they already are. Enough for now.
http://www.warwickhughes.com/blog/?p=678#comments
Yes, big difference between working with rainfall data and run-off (inflow) data.
I once assisted a Hydrologist stream gauging a hydro power catchment in the middle of the Kaingaroa Forest – ever tried to find a small white stake in an overgrown ditch in a working forest?
When all the MDB assumptions and formulations are then hidden in a model (an inappropriate one for hydrology) and the policy makers are given this in the SEACI summary:-
“…..there is considerable uncertainty in the future climate projections, and the modelled changes in long-term mean annual streamflow in the southern MDB and Victoria range from -30 per cent to +10 per cent for a 0.9 °C global warming (2030 relative to 1990).
The fact that the projected streamflow (and rainfall) reductions for 2030 across the region are smaller than the observed declines over the last decade raises important issues about how best to use the climate change projections – in particular, how to characterise the ‘baseline’ climate (in light of natural decadal variability in climate) to which the future projections should be applied………”
Then a 25c benefit for every $1 spent is not surprising and may even be a good outcome given the rubbish analysis.
Greens accuse gas industry of hiding real effect of carbon emissions
Tim Lester National Bureau Chief, October 27, 2010 – smh
The Greens have accused Australia’s gas industry of ‘cooking the books’ to hide a huge carbon emissions problem.
WA Greens Senator Scott Ludlam says a new analysis of publicly available industry figures, reveals “a massive expansion in Australian greenhouse gas emissions within six years if all proposed new LNG projects go ahead.”
The claims have opened up a war of words with the gas industry. It has hit back, accusing the Greens of “in essence declaring their support for coal to continue to dominate electricity generation.”
According to Senator Ludlam “the companies behind these gas projects claim that gas is a clean energy, but they don’t talk about the massive emissions that are caused when gas from high-CO2 gas fields is processed and that CO2 is stripped out and vented to the atmosphere.”
The Greens claim one joint venture alone, James Price Point hub, near Broome, will emit 32 million tonnes a year of greenhouse gases – equal to five per cent of Australia’s current greenhouse gas emissions, or all of New Zealand’s total annual greenhouse gas emissions.
Nice article by John McLean in Quadrant Online https://www.quadrant.org.au/blogs/doomed-planet/2010/10/glaciergate
John is a member of the New Zealand Climate Science Coalition and the article is about IPCC procedures
See – Polar regions, glaciers and ice
and IPCC organisation
I’ve put this comment on Jo Nova’s blog but it’s (I hope) worth repeating here:
Did anyone see the article in the Australian Climate change sceptics lose battle as onus of proof shifts http://www.theaustralian.com.au/business/legal-affairs/climate-change-sceptics-lose-battle-as-onus-of-proof-shifts/story-e6frg97x-1225941959223
It’s about the precautionary principle which I anticipate Julia Gillard will start to talk about shortly; As the article says ‘The principle appears in Article 3 of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change 1992. It is one of the four principles of ecologically sustainable development. Those principles have been absorbed into Australian environmental law at commonwealth and state levels since 1991.’
“the precautionary principle operates to shift the evidentiary burden of proof as to whether there is a threat of serious or irreversible environmental damage,” “Where there is a reasonably certain threat of serious or irreversible damage, the precautionary principle is not needed and is not evoked . . . “But where the threat is uncertain, past practice had been to defer taking preventative measures because of that uncertainty.’
This has been changed by the absorption into Australian law of the precautionary principle which “… operates, when activated, to create an assumption that the threat is not uncertain but rather certain. “… if there is a threat of serious or irreversible environmental damage and there is the requisite degree of scientific uncertainty, the precautionary principle will be activated.”
The author goes on to say ‘In Australia, the climate sceptics have failed. No political party is arguing that the threat does not exist or is negligible. The only argument now, in accordance with the precautionary principle, is determining what preventative measures have to be taken to reduce emissions.’
But she fails to explore the possibility that the threat does not exist or is negligible; just because political parties are not arguing that the threat does not exist or is negligible does not mean the threat does not exist or is negligible; I’m still firmly of the belief that a Royal Commission should be held to determine this issue for Australia;
Senator Penny Wong’s mantra “the science is certain” was unnecessary — the effect of the precautionary principle is that the science supporting the theory does not have to be certain, but the case against the theory does.
This is leading us down a very dark and disturbing path.
Thanks for posting, Val
Andy astute words; the substantive issue still remains whether or not there is a threat of serious or irreversible environmental damage
I do recall a speech of Wong (in Queensland I think) in which she spoke of the precautionary principle and one of our national newspapers (The Australian) recently ran an editorial espousing it in connection with carbon pricing
Andy a commenter on Jo Nova’s site has referred me to the comments at Climate Realists as well:
http://climaterealists.com/index.php?id=6514&linkbox=true&position=5
This is Bulldust’s comment:
I like the first comment by Stephen Wilde:
It is also uncertain as to what damage will be caused by the application of policy decisions based on the precautionary principle.
I have always hated the enormous arrogance that comes along with those that spout the Precautionary Principle. It is loaded with the pretense that the spoutee is in the right and it is up to you to prove otherwise. It is a lazy approach to debating and has no place whatsoever in science. It is the last resort of the ignorant.’
That’s certainly something to take into account
I stumbled on this on a thread at JoNova while looking for something else:
JaniePo:
August 24th, 2010 at 6:46 pm
Beware the Precautionary Principle!!
http://www.sirc.org/articles/beware.html comment 61
Bulldust gas a bit to say too.
Oops, the thread link was:
http://joannenova.com.au/2010/08/head-of-australian-science-academy-issues-decree-from-pagan-chieftans-of-science/#comments
“This is leading us down a very dark and disturbing path.’
Andy, in the same vein, I put this in “Controversy”
Futuristic climate schemes to get U.N. hearing
By Alister Doyle, OSLO | Wed Oct 27, 2010
(Reuters) – Futuristic schemes for slowing climate change such as dimming sunlight are fraught with risks but will get a serious hearing from the U.N. panel of climate scientists, a leader of the panel said on Wednesday.
The Sydney Morning Herald is running a poll about showing An Inconvenient Truth in Australian schools.
http://www.smh.com.au/environment/climate-change/mps-divided-on-educational-value-of-an-inconvenient-truth-20101027-17326.html
All vote NO now!!!
Is there a remote possibility that the film could be constructively used to teach critical thinking?
The article says:
“It is not a required text but will be used by English teachers to “analyse the way language and emotion can be used to convince viewers of a particular position”, the spokesman said.
Students may also be directed to undertake their own research on the film’s claims, he said.
If the second part is undertaken, I think it is a good thing and a Yes vote.
Big “if” though.
Too big Richard
It is not a required text but will be used by English teachers to “analyse the way language and emotion can be used to convince viewers of a particular position”
Isn’t that the definition of propaganda?
Propaganda is a form of communication that is aimed at influencing the attitude of a community toward some cause or position.
As opposed to impartially providing information, propaganda, in its most basic sense, presents information primarily to influence an audience. Propaganda often presents facts selectively (thus possibly lying by omission) to encourage a particular synthesis, or uses loaded messages to produce an emotional rather than rational response to the information presented.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Propaganda
Your key words are “remote possibility”. The majority of teachers, underpaid and overworked, will let the video do the talking. Some discussion, maybe an essay as homework…. Without explaining that this video has been found, in a court of law, to misrepresent at least nine pivotal matters in the argument. Without explaining that this is a political piece which exaggerates and warps the science to its own ends. Do you think the majority of teachers, much less their students, have the bandwidth to dig into each claim this video makes and decide for themselves whether the claims actually stack up? Surely the students and teachers will take it as gospel, as do/did many civic leaders and policy makers. This is why I exhort all to vote NO. I am damn sure I would not want my child or grandchild being spoon-fed this propaganda as part of the standard curriculum.
You can always respond with satire. Kids like that
http://www.thedailymash.co.uk/news/environment/gore-film-is-%27inconvenient-bollocks%27-says-judge-20071011463/
This might be the last time i play devils advocate.
I agree that the propaganda avenue will not be pursued by teachers.
A pity though that there is not study of it in history classes or somewhere. I’ve lost track of modern curricula so I don’t know what gets laid out, but it is evident in USA and Europe that the lessons of the past have not been carried into the present.
I studied Obama’s campaign, inauguration and Berlin speeches written by an expert in the field – Jon Favreau. Those speeches, delivered by a charismatic person, mesmerized both USA and Germany until the substance was found to be lacking by the Americans. The Germans still seem smitten true to trait – no lessons learned there.
I find it hard to imagine any university impartially studying propaganda these days.
Our educational institutions have become so inundated with Gramsci-esque teachings, particularly in the humanities, that distorting facts to suit your agenda is now officially accepted as “revisionism”.
.
Melanie Phillips – “The world turned upside down” is worth a read in this regard.
Yes I must admit (with abject embarrassment) that I was sucked in by the man’s rhetoric and oration. Particularly in the fallout from George Dubbwa’s pathetic show. It appears that Mister Obama is simply another puppet with a better stage presence. And, of course, the race card.
“a better stage presence” and a teleprompter. Watch the videos of his un-teleprompted speeches with the sound turned off – not quite the same impact, but his neck gets a workout.
Understandable, your falling under the spell; after the WMD-oil forays, everyone wanted a change – but I do miss Bushisms.
NZ’s National campaign had very little policy to back it, but after a long Clark reign, all Key’s guy’s had to do was sow the “Change” seed into the minds of the electorate and hey presto. It worked for Obama.and it worked for Key, but the development of crowd manipulation techniques goes way back.
I have given up listening to or reading political speeches and PR spin doctoring except as case studies in communication rather than for any substance there might be. Better to look behind the facades to find the real stories and to keep our BS detectors in good working order in case we are inadvertently subjected to those dark arts.
Tim Blair in the Australian Telegraph has some interesting (and amusing) suggestions on how studying Mr Gore’s movie could be put to good use in schools:
http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/opinion/the-inconvenient-truths-about-al-gores-hot-air-footprint/story-e6frezz0-1225944858524
The main piece on the film is even better:
Read all comments for a good overview of what Aussies think about “Climate Change”.
http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/national/climate-change-film-for-schools/comments-e6freuzr-1225943893760
Here’s a random sample of the comments:
It’s already been proven to be the Incorrect Truth… I thought we were looking at education not propaganda and indoctrination.
Inconvenient nonsense infiltrates the classroom
* Bob Carter
* From: The Australian
* November 11, 2010 12:00AM
AL Gore’s flawed climate change film is to be included in the new English curriculum.
[Snip]
In a famous judgment in October 2007, Justice Burton, discerning that Gore was on a “crusade”, commented that “the claimant substantially won this case”, and ruled that the science in the film had been used “to make a political statement and to support a political program” and that the film contained nine fundamental errors of fact out of the 35 listed by Dimmock’s scientific advisers. Justice Burton required that these errors be summarised in new guidance notes for screenings.
In effect, the High Court judgment typed Gore and his supporters as evangelistic proselytisers for an environmental cause.
Fast forward to this month and many Australian parents have been surprised to learn Gore’s film “will be incorporated in the [new] national [English] curriculum ), as part of a bid to teach students on environmental sustainability across all subjects”.
It is, I suppose, some relief the film has not been recommended for inclusion in the science syllabus. Instead, Banquo’s ghost has risen to haunt English teachers, doubtless in class time that might otherwise have been devoted to learning grammar.
Some Australian English teachers may feel competent to advise pupils on the science content of An Inconvenient Truth, but I wouldn’t bank on it. Of course, the same teachers have to feel competent also to shepherd their flock on to the green pastures of sustainability, that other pseudo-scientific concept so beloved by the keepers of our society’s virtue.
Australian schools are being transformed from institutions that impart a rigorous education into social reform factories that manufacture right-thinking (which is to say, left-thinking) young clones ready to be admitted into the chattering classes. This process is manifest in other aspects of the new syllabuses.
Continues….
Andy – the Daily Mash is a site I frequent when I need absolute satire. Thanks for the link mate – much appreciated!
Ho hum here we go again – I’ve put this comment on Jo Nova’s blog but it’s relevant here as well:
The Qld Govt has tabled this report today:
http://www.climatechange.qld.gov.au/pdf/climate-change-in-queensland-2010.pdf
It’s 100 pages but for scientists like Warwick and some of his readers it would make interesting reading
this from page 8:
Climate Change 2009 (Steffen 2009) reviewed the
science of climate change since the publication of
the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s
(IPCC) Fourth Assessment Report, Climate Change
2007 (AR4) (IPCC 2007a–c). Steffen suggests that
the AR4 was conservative in its range of projections
and that many aspects of the climate system are
changing at the upper level of the IPCC range
of projections—towards more rapid and severe
climate change with dangerous impacts.
The Science of Climate Change: Questions
and Answers published in August 2010 by the
Australian Academy of Sciences outlines changes
in Australian climate including:
• an increase of about 0.7 °C in average surface
temperature since 1960, with some areas having
warmed faster and others showing little evidence
of warming
• an increase in the frequency of extremely
hot days
• a decrease in the frequency of cold days
• significant increase in rainfall over
north-western Australia
• decrease in rainfall over south-eastern Australia
• sea level rise of about 1.2 millimetres per year
since 1920.
Figure 7 (a) at page 17 looks very much like the hockey stick and this is what the report says about it:
Figure 7(a) shows the strong warming trend in the
global temperature record since the early 20th
century. Figure 7(b) shows the individual years
in the record ranked according to their average
temperature, the year ranked as number one
(1998) being the warmest year on record. This
figure highlights the increasing trend in global
temperatures, with recent decades dominating
as the warmest years.
Sea level of course is rising and rainfall is diminishing (no mention of glaciers in this report) but lots to say about tipping points and future challenges and plenty of attribution to the IPCC
Jo Nova did a post on this attribution:
The Science of Climate Change: Questions
and Answers published in August 2010 by the
Australian Academy of Sciences
Here
http://joannenova.com.au/2010/08/head-of-australian-science-academy-issues-decree-from-pagan-chieftans-of-science/
Yes, I do recall that; Ken Stewart had something to say about the BOM/CSIRO report in March 2010 which preceded that at http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/07/27/the-australian-temperature-record-the-big-picture/
cutting and pasting selectively
Claims made in the State of the Climate report produced by BOM and CSIRO in March 2010.
Since 1960 the mean temperature in Australia has increased by about 0.7 °C . The long term trend in temperature is clear…
TRUE. But the raw data shows the mean temperature since 1910 has increased only 0.6 C.
Australian average temperatures are projected to rise by 0.6 to 1.5 ºC by 2030.
REALLY? That would require between 5 and 12 times the rate of warming seen in the raw temperature record, or between 3 and 7.5 times that shown by BOM’s published figures.
Much of Australia will be drier in coming decades
MAYBE NOT. See http://kenskingdom.wordpress.com/2010/03/20/political-science-101/
Our observations clearly demonstrate that climate change is real.
TRUE- that’s what climate does.
CSIRO and the Bureau of Meteorology will continue to provide observations and research so that Australia’s responses are underpinned by science of the highest quality.
“Highest quality”? REALLY?
Ken Stewart’s latest post (about sea rises) since the BOM/CSIRO report
http://kenskingdom.wordpress.com/2010/10/30/checking-the-logic-queensland-sea-level-rise/
By the way, in today’s Weekend Australian, there are quotes from the official briefing from the Department of Climate Change and Energy. One of the quotes is: “The rate of global warming over the past 50 years of approximately 0.13 degrees Celsius per decade is about 100 times faster than the warming after an ice age.” Have a look at the graph above and compare the rates of warming. 1960 -2010: 0.13 C per decade or 0.65 C over 50 years (as you can see it’s actually less- 0.6 C over 60 years!); 1860-1875: about 0.2 C over 15 years- much faster! Again, 1910 – 1940: about 0.4 C over 30 years is the same as the rate claimed for the last 50 years. There have been two additional phases of global warming equal or greater than the recent phase. It seems you can’t trust anyone these days.
Then on page 18 the Queensland report links this to sea level rise: “Sea level rise is caused by increases in ocean thermal expansion and ocean mass due to increasing global temperatures. Water expands when it heats up, increasing the level of the ocean.”
So let’s compare the “official” temperature record with some Australian sea level data.
First, Townsville. This is the official chart of sea level rise from NOAA.
So, if my grandchildren are going to see this 0.8m rise in sea level along the Queensland coast, there will have to be a very rapid increase very soon. If there isn’t, the Australian Academy of Sciences, CSIRO, and the Queensland Climate Change Centre of Excellence will have considerable explaining to do for their scare mongering.
But they’ll be long forgotten.
Please visit Ken’s site and leave a comment
This is the report to which Ken refers so far as I’m aware:
http://www.csiro.au/files/files/py5t.pdf
Sorry I think it’s this one
http://www.climatechange.qld.gov.au/pdf/climate-change-in-queensland-2010.pdf
val majkus says:
November 1, 2010 at 1:11 pm
Here’s another scheme stupid enough to earn the epithet ‘rubbish’
http://www.scu.edu.au/news/media.php?item_id=1641&action=show_item&type=M
Southern Cross University is set to lead a project testing the world’s first Personal Carbon Trading program conducted in a ‘closed system’ island environment on Norfolk Island commencing early next year.
This follows the announcement this week of a Linkage Projects grant by the Australian Research Council valued at $390,000.
Leading chief investigator Professor Garry Egger, a Professor of Lifestyle Medicine and Applied Health Promotion at Southern Cross University, said the main goals of the project were to test the effectiveness of a Personal Carbon Trading scheme over a three year period; reduce per capita carbon emissions and reduce obesity and obesity related behaviours
…
The principal researchers of the Norfolk island Carbon/Health Evaluation study trialling a Personal carbon Trading program are: leading chief investigator, Professor Garry Egger, a Professor of Lifestyle Medicine and Applied Health Promotion at Southern Cross University; chief investigator, Professor Boyd Swinburn, Alfred Deakin Professor and director of the World Health Organisation Collaborating Centre for Obesity Prevention at Deakin University; chief investigator, Professor Robyn McDermott is a public health physician and professor of Public Health at the University of South Australia; and Professor Kerin O’Dea, director of the Sansom Institute for Health Research at the University of South Australia.
Talk about weird …
Andrew Bolt has an article today ‘Warmist Puts Norfold Island on Rations – he interviewed Prof Egger this morning
http://blogs.news.com.au/heraldsun/andrewbolt/
Here’s Malcolm Roberts (the NZCSC know him; there’s a copy of his ‘Thriving with Humanity’ on their website
anyway the video is taken on Climate Fools Day in Brisbane and Malcolm’s Take on that
Thank you to the many people in Brisbane’s King George Square last Wednesday pausing on their way through during lunch. Your expressions of support and encouragement are appreciated.
3 minute video summary: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2qf9fTEp-8Q
Interviews confirm growing community realisation that attempts to ‘control’ Nature’s CO2 are forcing regulations onto every aspect of our lives. ALP-Greens coalition is ramming huge needless cost burdens onto everyone.
People know Nature’s carbon and CO2 are integral to every aspect of our lives. At stake are our economic livelihood, security and personal freedom.
People know fraudulent Julia and Bob cannot control huge galactic, solar and terrestrial forces driving climate.
They know cowardly Liberals are afraid to face truth: science has been corrupted and sacrificed to political control.
Thank you to the many people who readily agreed to an interview. While timid pollies fail, citizens are waking up—and opening up.
More from Malcolm Roberts
Friends:
Britons are waking to climate fraud.
Commemorating International Climate Fools Day, British parliamentarians invited climate sceptics to address them in parliament house.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=24aEw7f1Xuc
Court action is exposing the lack of evidence:
- Al Gore’s falsities and corruption were exposed in the British High Court in 2007;
- Reportedly, in facing a court challenge by kiwi climate sceptics, the New Zealand government has denied responsibility for its temperature records that are now known to have been unscientifically corrupted.
In her reply to my request for evidence, our own CSIRO’s Chief Executive, Dr Megan Clark, failed to provide any evidence showing a causal relationship between human CO2 and the modest, cyclic global warming that ended around 1998.
As legal analyst, John O’Sullivan said in the video: “When challenged, the government agencies cannot produce the records.”
This lack of evidence is global.
Visit http://www.conscious.com.au to see why we know for certain that there is no scientific real-world evidence for the government-Greens coalition’s fraudulent policies.
Malcolm Roberts
BE (Hons), MBA (Chicago)
Fellow AICD, MAIM, MAusIMM, MAME (USA), MIMM (UK), Fellow ASQ (USA, Aust)
Bob Ward’s reputation in Australia.
An interesting read, via Bishop Hill
The Grantham Institute should take a close look at their Director of Communications, Bob Ward. In the last few weeks in Australia he has been complicit in so many untruths that it should have a flow-on consequence for them in their dealings with the media.
http://www.bishop-hill.net/blog/2010/11/2/bobs-reputation-in-oz.html
Here’s Professor Carter’s website http://members.iinet.net.au/~glrmc/new_page_1.htm
You’ll find lots of interesting material there
My favourite is Global warming: Is the science settled?
In it he says:
The great danger of the current public
hysteria over speculative human-caused
global waming is that, wilfully disguised
as a “climate change” problem, warming
alarmism has removed attention and funding
from the real problem that requires a policy
solution. That problem is natural climate
change and events, and it is long since time
that we addressed it better.
here’s a funny piece, sorry it’s so long
http://papundits.wordpress.com/author/tonyoz/
HILLARY AND JULIA PROPOSE TO FIND A WAY TO MAKE THE SUN SHINE AT NIGHT
That may seem a little facetious, but in effect, it is what they are both proposing.
Secretary of State Hillary Clinton recently had a short 4 day visit to Australia.
Everybody in creation was falling over each other to be seen with her, most especially former Prime Minister, and now Foreign Minister Kevin Rudd.
Clinton appeared at numerous gatherings including a special ‘Town Hall’ event organised by the Australian National broadcaster, ABCTV, shown at this link, and this link also has further links shown under the small image of her at mid screen. This event was broadcast on the Sunday afternoon, and Clinton answered a variety of questions from audience members on many subjects.
One of the special announcements she made was with Australian Prime Minister Julia Gillard, and directly concerned renewable power, in this case Solar Power, and I would specifically like to comment on that.
The ABC media article on that piece is at this link, and a further article is at this link.
What this effectively indicates is that neither of these two has any knowledge at all on exactly how solar power produces its power. That’s understandable. They know politics. They are clueless when it comes to this type of thing, and in a way, that’s also understandable. However, surely they must have advisers who could at least give them some idea of what they are talking about, and that way, they would not have to spread the misinformation they do, which is then adoringly lapped up by the media as being the verbatim truth, and then passed onto a public who believe that because these two powerful people said it, then it must be true.
The one phrase that was said by the both of them, and was then repeated at both articles was this:
“We have a common goal of making solar energy competitive with conventional sources by the middle of this decade, 2015,” Clinton added.
Gee! I’d like to see that.
What they may have been alluding to is the overall costs of Solar power. This currently runs at 5 to 7 times (and that’s a conservative estimate) more costly than virtually any other form of producing electrical power.
Now, there is no way known to man that they can ever get the costs down to competitive with other forms of producing power. It will always be vastly more expensive than any other method.
However, the thrust of this article was about photovoltaic panels.
There are two methods of producing power from Solar methods.
They are Concentrating Solar, referred to as Solar Thermal, and Solar Photovoltaic Power, which is Solar PV.
That photovoltaic method uses specially constructed panels. Each panel has hundreds of tiny cells in it, similar to ones you may remember from those small solar powered calculators that were around in the 80′s. Each tiny cell is connected by wiring internally and the panel is made up of hundreds, and in some cases thousands of these tiny cells. Hundreds of these panels are then joined together to generate large amounts of power. Here, by large I mean around 15 to 30 MegaWatts, (MW) and keep in mind a large coal fired power plant can produce 2,000MW from its two generators. Some Solar PV plants are larger, and there are some planned to possibly produce a Nameplate Capacity of over 100MW, but the average is around that 15 to 35MW Nameplate Capacity.
As an example lets look at a large scale Solar PV plant in the U.S. the one at Nellis AFB in Nevada. This plant covers 140 acres and has 70,000 of these panels, with 11 panels attached to one tower, called a heliostat, which tracks the movement of the Sun across the sky.
Let’s not even consider the cost here, because after all, these two fine women both said they want to make the cost competitive with current conventional methods of generating power, code here for meaning coal fired power plants.
Okay then, compare the power they both produce. 14MW and 2,000MW.
Imagine the size of the solar plant if there was to be parity of power generation.
Consider how much the technology will need to advance for each of those tiny cells to produce a greater amount of power, and how many of those cells are in the complex panel. How are they going to get that cost down to even approach parity.
I don’t care. The way technology is advancing, they may actually be able to do that. Well, no, they won’t, but I’m a believer. After all, these two fine women know better than I do about this.
However, the principle is that they can only produce power while ever the Sun is shining on those panels.
Currently, the most efficient Solar PV plants can provide their maximum rated power on average for 3 to 5 hours a day, and forget about it in places above and below certain parallels on Planet Earth for all the non Summer months.
True, they might supply smaller amounts of power during the whole period of daylight, but projected over the full day, that maximum amount is extrapolated out to around three to five hours at the best. Also, as soon as a small cloud flits across the face of the Sun, these panels lose two thirds of their power, and then take a long time to get back up to full power after the cloud passes. The panels must also be cleaned, and here I mean polished pristine every day, because the tiniest film on those panels has the same effect as a cloud. Compare that variability to a conventional coal fired plant that hums along all day producing its maximum power all the time, rain hail or shine.
However, all these things are minor, and I’m sure they will be overcome. Well no, they won’t.
The biggest factor here is that these panels only produce their power…..WHILE THE SUN IS SHINING.
So, unless these two fine politicians can find a way to pass Legislation to make the Sun shine over these plants for the full 24 hours of every day, they will NEVER be competitive with any form of generating electrical power.
A coal fired power plant lumbers on 24/7/365 at 3600RPM (3000RPM in Australia) producing its huge amounts of electrical power for that full 24 hours.
These Solar PV plants may become economically competitive with conventional methods. Well no, they won’t, but until that Legislation to make the Sun shine gets passed by any Government, then these plants will never ever be competitive.
They will be boutique plants providing small amounts of variable electrical power, when grids require exact amounts of power to be there all the time. The power produced by these boutique plants will never be large scale, and will never be relied upon when it comes time to calculate how much power is required by the grid and for how long.
It was great photo op ladies, especially for Julia, but next time, get your people to tell you the real fact about what it is you are saying.
A link to an article by John O’Sullivan and myself
http://hockeyschtick.blogspot.com/2010/11/new-retreat-from-global-warming-data-by.html
New Retreat from Global Warming Data by Australian Gov Bureau
Global warmers in full retreat as Aussie experts admit growing doubts about their own methods as new study shows one third of temperatures not reliable.
The Australian Bureau of Meteorology (BOM) admits it was wrong about urban heating effects as a professional statistical analysis by Andrew Barnham exposes a BOM claim that “since 1960 the mean temperature in Australia has increased by about 0.7 °C”; the BOM assertion has no empirical scientific basis.
The article features the excellent work of Ken Stewart and Andrew Barnham
Less carbon, more hot air
November 13, 2010
How clean and green is media land. While Aussie newsagents are now promoting carbon-neutral Kyoto-brand diaries (65 per cent recycled paper) for 2011, Aunty ABC has come down hard on its wayward light bulbs. ”To reduce the ABC’s greenhouse emissions and its impact on the environment,” says Aunty’s annual report, ”[we have been] converting T8 fluorescent tubes to more energy-efficient T5 fluorescent lights at the Lancely Place site in New South Wales.”
It certainly sounds a climate-changing move, but there is so much more. Aunty has installed carpet mounted on recycled plastic bottles and has harvested 122 kilolitres of water at offices in Sale, Bendigo, Longreach and the Gold Coast. This clean green rainwater has been used exclusively for, er, clean green toilet flushing.
What else?
Continues (with a twist)…………
Flawed science and still a tax on carbon
Dr Dennis Jensen, Liberal Party Federal member for Tangney.
22 November 2010
The Gillard Government’s climate change committee is still investigating the best way to slug Australians with a new carbon tax, a climate change solution based on flawed IPCC scientific process.
Labor’s sudden panic over climate change is driven mostly by IPCC assessment reports that have now been corrected to better reflect this peak bodies understanding of the science of climate change.
Either the Labor government won’t back down on a ‘price on carbon’ to appease the Greens or they simply have not read the evolving literature. The carbon tax stance is now outdated.
The Government’s climate change sales pitch and carefully worded slogans mean the Australian public now sees the IPCC as a group of scientists independently evaluating the best available information before informing the world of a way forward. This is far from reality.
Independent Scientists have identified flaws in the computer models that form the basis for the IPCC’s 2007 global warming predictions.
The IPCC‘s own authors are now changing their minds on the carbon price approach.
IPCC vice chairman, Professor Jean-Pascal van Ypersele has conceded there “probably would be mistakes” in a report scheduled for 2013-14 and says the IPCC has been “naive and incompetent” in its handling of the incorrect claim that every glacier in the Himalayas could melt by 2035. Professor Richard Tol notes, “One should keep in mind that there is a history of exaggeration in the study of climate change impacts.”
The Federal Government is also partial to quoting the world’s oldest scientific academy, The Royal Society when creating urgency around climate change and the need for a carbon tax. But Britain’s leading scientific institution has also been forced to rewrite its guide on climate change and admit, “There remains the possibility that hitherto unknown aspects of the climate and climate change could emerge and lead to significant modifications in our understanding.”
Continues with comments……….
Labor censors Dr Dennis Jensen — denies peer reviewed science
Dr JENSEN (Tangney) (12:33): Speech to Parliament
Madam Deputy Speaker Burke, I seek leave to table these peer reviewed science reports.
Leave not granted.
Jensen is the only PhD scientist in the Australian Parliament and the papers are directly relevant to the policy under discussion.
Dennis Jensen has been warning us about climate science for years, his earlier warnings have turned out to be prescient, and ahead of his time — speaking out when few dared too. He deserves credit for his honesty and insight. Parliament could use more people like him.
>>>>>>>>
http://joannenova.com.au/2011/09/labor-censors-dennis-jensen-denies-peer-reviewed-science/#more-17301
John Boscawen, Don Brash et al, let’s see if NZ National denies the science.
Professor Bob Carter has an article in Quadrant Online today
http://www.quadrant.org.au/blogs/doomed-planet/2010/11/bob-carter
Gillard’s climate U-turn
Early in the recent election campaign, Julia Gillard was reported as saying that there would be no tax on carbon (dioxide) while she led the federal government.
Instead, she said, ”What we will do is we will tackle the challenge of climate change”, which turned out to mean the appointment of an assembly of 150 citizens to advise on the ways and means – a suggestion that prompted immediate public derision.
Just before voters went to the polls Ms Gillard again stated categorically: “I rule out a carbon tax”. Of course, that statement was rapidly rescinded after the election of a hung parliament created the political imperative that Labor court the Green and independent members who now held the balance of power.
Making a dramatic U-turn, Ms Gillard rapidly segued to a new policy position. This involved scrapping the idea of a citizen’s assembly and erecting in its place a new Multi-party Committee on Climate Change (MCCC) to advise on policy options, which now again were to include of necessity (hat tip to the Greens) a carbon dioxide tax.
….
The primary question that the MCCC needed to deal with, of course, was whether dangerous climate change is occurring, and if so what policy options might be available to mitigate it? First and foremost then, there was a scientific issue to be resolved.
The committee’s state of mind on that issue was rapidly clarified by Ms. Gillard, who announced on September 27 the starting assumption that a carbon dioxide price was required to reduce “pollution” and to encourage investment in low-emission technologies.
….
The Canberra climate committee is a farce. Whilst its members have been indulging in play school politics, the Canadian Senate, paying attention both to the real science and to the result of the US election, has rejected a Climate Change Accountability Act that called for greenhouse gases to be cut 25 per cent below 1990 levels by 2020. …
The government wants to declare a price on carbon dioxide, and businesses (especially energy suppliers) want certainty. As others before me have pointed out, these twin needs can best be met by allocating a price of $0 per tonne to carbon dioxide emissions – forthwith.
Time to catch up folks; global warming alarmism is on its deathbed.
Solar Panel subsidies: A billion dollars to provide cheap electricity to wealthy households
There is no sunnier first world country than Australia. If solar was going to be a raging success anywhere, surely it would be in the land of the Sunburnt Country. Instead the Australian government has poured in more than a billion dollars to install solar panels on the roof tops of private homes. Its a text book case of misdirected spending.
In the end the government drew money from the population-at-large to help Chinese solar panel manufacturers, and to provide cheap electricity to 107,000 households in mostly medium-high wealth areas. It reduced Australias emissions by a piddling 0.015 per cent, at an exorbitant carbon price of $300/ton.
Solar power is clearly not viable yet. So that billion dollars could have been spent on research to make solar power economic (in which case no subsidies would be needed). It could have made us world leaders with a product to patent and sell (or it might not). Instead governments of both major parties chose to pour a billion dollars into a program that never had any chance of helping the environment, or our export industry. Mere feel-good window dressing.
The program gifted up to $8,000 dollars as a rebate to encourage people to install solar panels on their roofs, but it had to be canceled suddenly last year because the bill for the overly generous scheme was blowing out. Another different rebate for solar generated electricity promised to pay 60c a kwhr (compared to the usual 20 c/kwhr) and met the same fate. It too was suddenly canceled. In both cases the local solar industry had to deal with rapidly changing rules and rewards, leading to bubbles and overnight busts. It makes a mockery out of the free market driving small businesses to the wall, and discouraging long term planning and employment.
Continues………
Intense La Nina pattern delivers more rain than usual
# From: The Australian
# December 04, 2010
The most powerful incarnation of La Nina in more than three decades has produced one of Australia’s wettest years.
The World Meteorological Organisation yesterday released data that showed the global average temperature this year was 0.55C warmer than pre-1990 averages — making it the third-hottest in recorded history.
However, Australia bucked the trend because of weather events in the Pacific Ocean.
A powerful La Nina, characterised by a fall in surface temperatures in the Pacific Ocean and heavy rains, has been blamed for the flooding that has plagued the eastern states since August.
The rain has also been attributed to cool weather, with inland Australia one of the few places in the world to record below-average temperatures this year.
David Jones, the head of the Bureau of Meteorology’s climate analysis office, said the rains were expected to continue through to autumn, on the basis that La Nina events usually lasted for a year.
“Australia at the moment is tracking its third-wettest year on record and there’s still another month to go, so we won’t exactly know where it’s going to be until January,” Dr Jones said.
“We’ve got the largest La Nina since the 1970s at least, and that’s leading to heavy — in places, excessive — rainfall for north and eastern Australia.”
Not even the driest year ever seen in parts of Western Australia was enough to stop the WMO recording the nation’s wettest spring on record.
“The one place that has missed out, and I guess tells us a fair bit about what’s going on in the background, is southwest Western Australia,” Dr Jones said.
He added that La Nina did not usually have an impact on South Australia.
At the beginning of the year, a drought-causing El Nino was well established in the Pacific Ocean, but was rapidly replaced with La Nina.
The WMO said that from May until October, northern Australia experienced rainfall 152 per cent higher than average, while drought-breaking downpours hit the southeast.
NSW Natural Resources commissioner John Williams, a former CSIRO chief, said while cooler than usual weather was recorded in Australia’s centre, the national average was slightly higher than pre-1990 levels.
Dr Williams said he expected temperatures to climb to extreme levels in some parts of the country, while other regions would become cooler.
Quadrant Online has a couple of interesting articles:
Sceptics losing clarity
by Peter Smith
and reply by Professor Carter linked at the foot of that article; read them both at
http://www.quadrant.org.au/blogs/doomed-planet/2010/12/sceptics-losing-clarity
Val, I’m more and more convinced by articles like this that the key to communication is simple graphics – not words.
The IPCC use them, Al Gore uses them. We really are missing key metrics in the media that clearly show the state of play in ocean and atmosphere.
Written argument is fine for those (like Lawyers used to case reading – I’ve done a bit of that and my eyesight has not been the same since) with time and inclination to digest it but there’s so much on the internet I’ve given up. Bob Carters response is a 1363 word essay which is commendable but how much influence will it have?
A lot of words can be replaced by the almost real-time metrics we have at our disposal; OHC, HadCRUT3, SST anomaly, AMSU etc which are revealing the disconnect between fossil fuel emissions and climate on a daily basis.
I’ve found on Hot Topic that presenting these metrics will soon attract enough “Dislikes” to hide them from view (and that’s just links) so they must be effective if they are so inconvenient. There’s enduring memory and understanding of a clear graphic that is not invoked by the written word.
Not for nothing it said “a picture is worth a thousand words”
Origin
This phrase emerged in the USA in the early part of the 20th century. Its introduction is widely attributed to Frederick R. Barnard, who published a piece commending the effectiveness of graphics in advertising with the title “One look is worth a thousand words”, in Printer’s Ink, December 1921. Barnard claimed the phrase’s source to be oriental by adding the text “so said a famous Japanese philosopher, and he was right”. A picture is worth a thousand words
Printer’s Ink printed another form of the phrase in March 1927, this time suggesting a Chinese origin:
“Chinese proverb. One picture is worth ten thousand words.”
http://www.phrases.org.uk/meanings/a-picture-is-worth-a-thousand-words.html
Case in point
Climate change: In the balance
While many people believe in climate change, others are unconvinced. An exhibition at the Science Museum reflects this ambivalence, says Nick Duerden
Monday, 6 December 2010
The Science Museum has just unveiled its new gallery, which is to be called, in unexplained lowercase, atmosphere. It is a low-lit neon blue, whisperingly atmospheric space that aims, says the introductory blurb, to deepen visitors’ understanding of one of the hottest topics of our age: climate science.
The “science” bit is pertinent. Where once we would talk, quite happily and with unswerving, if second-hand, conviction, about climate change, we now have to walk with more trepidation. Climate change is not quite so fundamentally black and white anymore, if only because so many people have come along to doubt and pour scorn on it. In the summer, the Science Museum, increasingly aware of this mounting mood swing, even felt it necessary to revise the contents of its exhibits in order to fully acknowledge the wave of scepticism that that has engulfed the issue in recent months.
Continues………………….
http://www.independent.co.uk/news/science/climate-change-in-the-balance-2151991.html
Flooding disaster across east Australia
8:00 AM Friday Dec 10, 2010 – NZH
SYDNEY – Four deaths have been reported in severe flooding which has hit the eastern states of Australia this week.
The latest victim was in Queensland. Police have recovered the body of a 15-year-old boy who drowned at a flooded water hole on the Sunshine Coast.
Yesterday a man’s body was retrieved from a river at Nebo, west of Mackay. Witnesses said the impatient driver passed other cars stopped on the roadside waiting for the floodwaters to subside.
An 81-year-old man also died when his ute was swept off a flooded causeway and into a creek on Friday night.
And a 55-year-old woman died when her car was swept off a flooded roadway near Dysart, north-west of Rockhampton in central Queensland, last week.
Reports are calling NSW’s floods the worst inundation to hit the state in 50 years.
The swollen Queanbeyan River yesterday peaked in the NSW city neighbouring Canberra but residents forced to evacuate were not expected to be allowed home until late last night at the earliest.
If there is more rain they could be stranded for even longer.
The river cut Queanbeyan in half when it peaked at 8.4m in the afternoon. It had risen 3m in less than three hours.
The city has been declared a natural disaster area, taking the total number of declared areas across NSW to 30.
“The flood peak, we think, has already occurred on the river,” NSW Emergency Services Minister Steve Whan said in Queanbeyan.
“At 8.4m we’ve had the town cut in half. We’ve had around 100 houses and businesses which have been asked to evacuate.”
A number of houses and businesses were inundated and 10 people had to be rescued by boat from Trinculo Place, which runs alongside the Queanbeyan River just south of the King’s Highway.
An upstream river gauge indicates the river is now falling dramatically.
But NSW emergency services commissioner Murray Kear said it would take a further six hours “for the water to get down to any level where we could be confident to allow people back into their homes”.
Residents were given little warning of the flood because the river rose extraordinarily fast.
Water flowed from the nearby Googong Reservoir, which was already full before it received 103mm in the 22 hours to 9am yesterday.
The weather bureau is predicting the rain band that wreaked havoc in Queanbeyan will move north.
Authorities are worried it will pose problems for areas such as Coonamble in northwestern NSW.
The deluge that hit Queanbeyan and the nearby hills will also boost the volume of water flowing into the already swollen Murrumbidgee system. That will add, over the coming days, to the woes being experienced in Wagga Wagga and further downstream.
In Victoria, a man swept away by floodwaters north of Melbourne clung to a tree for five hours before he was rescued.
Police said the 51-year-old was walking home at about midnight in Whittlesea when he tried to wade across a waterway that had risen in a downpour and was swept 100m downstream. He managed to grab hold of a tree branch and hung on until about 5am, when he was found by people who heard his cries for help.
Water police rescued the man and he was taken to hospital, where he is expected to make a full recovery.
State Emergency Service workers took about 400 calls for help for flooding and building damage in Victoria’s northeast.
- AAP
We should never let these guys take Australia’s chequebook when they go overseas: and where do they think we’re going to get the money from; borrow it from China?
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/breaking-news/australia-offers-indonesia-climate-change-aid/story-fn3dxity-1225968805023
AUSTRALIA announced climate change assistance for Indonesia as it urged UN-led talks in Mexico to move beyond process disputes and make progress.
Australia today said it was allocating $45 million for Indonesia, largely to help the neighbouring country set up measures for efforts to save forests – a major way to offset industrial pollution.
The funding is part of a $599 million package Australia earlier announced as part of “fast-track” funding – the climate assistance which wealthy nations have pledged to offer developing countries immediately.
“Australia is delivering on fast-start,” Climate Change Minister Greg Combet said in an address to the meeting of more than 190 countries at the Mexican beach resort of Cancun.
“Too often we allow ourselves to be distracted by process issues and by negotiating tactics,” he said.
Start of sidebar. Skip to end of sidebar.
.End of sidebar. Return to start of sidebar.
“It is time now to refocus on the major task at hand. It is imperative for the credibility of this process that we are able to make progress here,” he said, pledging that Australia will “continue to make every effort.”
Mr Combet said Australia was “flexible” on a dispute hanging over the Cancun talks on the future of the Kyoto Protocol, whose requirements for wealthy nations to cut carbon emissions runs out at the end of 2012.
Faced with the likelihood that no new treaty will be ready soon, the European Union has led calls to extend the Kyoto Protocol.
Japan, backed by Canada and Russia, has led opposition. Japan says Kyoto is unfair by making no demands of top polluters China, which has no requirements as a developing nation, and the Us, which rejected the treaty.
Australia, which emits more carbon per capita than any other large country, was a late entrant to the Kyoto Protocol. It joined the treaty after the Labor Party defeated the conservative government in 2007.
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/climate/australia-backs-binding-climate-treaty-but-says-it-must-be-flexible-in-seeking-outcome/story-e6frg6xf-1225968781608
In his official address to the UN conference, Mr Combet said Australia too would be affected by increases in temperatures.
“We will have less water and will experience an increase in the frequency and intensity of extreme weather events,” he said.
“These disrupt our communities and compromise infrastructure – just as they do for others.
“That is why Australia is committed to a durable, legally-binding and environmentally-effective outcome. Such an outcome must include mitigation contributions by all major economies.”
Mr Combet, who co-chairs a UN panel to investigate how funding for poor states could work, said Australia had come to Cancun determined to play its part in securing a successful climate change outcome.
“Australia accepts the climate science. Like my Sudanese and African colleagues who spoke before me, and my South East Asian and Pacific colleagues, we understand the effects of climate change on water, weather, and food production and how challenging this can be.”
The minister recommitted Australia’s pledge under the Copnhagen accord last year to a 5 per cent reduction on 2000 carbon emissions levels by 2020. If other countries accepted a binding target, Australia is willing to push its target to 15 per cent or higher.
Mr Combet also announced further allocations under the $599 million of funds Australia has commited to “fast start” financing for developing nations.
These include $15 million to an adaptation fund; $169 million in new regional adaptation allocations to the Pacific, South and South East Asia and Africa; $32 million for forest preservation initiatives in Indonesia; $10 million to boost renewable energy in low income countries; and $10 million to the “Partnership for Market Readiness”.
“less water”
Combet’s synapses have stopped firing – must be dehydrated at Cancun.
His cognitive faculties should return once he gets some water back in OZ – there’s certainly plenty of it at the moment.
At least Combet (and Smith NZ) are cutting the UN out of the loop (or have I got that wrong).
Snowy Hydro tops up floods with environmental flow
Posted by jennifer, December 11th, 2010 - under Uncategorized.
Tags: Floods, Murray River
Because of a formal agreement between NSW Office of Water and Snowy Hydro, involving an obligation to South Australia, approximately 500,000 megalitres, equivalent to one Sydney Harbour of water, must be released as soon as possible as environmental flow into the already flooded Murrumbidgee and Murray Rivers. Read more at Quadrant Online.
Bureaucratic flood damage?
by Jennifer Marohasy
December 11, 2010
Inconceivable but true:
Snowy Hydro tops up floods with environmental flow
While residents of Wagga Wagga scrambled to save their belongings from rising flood waters there was a rumour circulating that the crisis was exacerbated by bureaucratic incompetence, in particular that Snowy Hydro was releasing environmental flow water into the already flooded Murrumbidgee River.
I was angry at even the concept. It was inconceivable. I phoned Snowy Hydro early on December 10 to set the record straight.
Continues………
What struck me was the patience Dr Morahassy displayed to get her answer:
… (from the article)
But alas, Ms Urquhart was unable to answer my questions. She did, however, promise to try and find out and emailed me back with a message from her “water delivery manager” that the information I was after could be found in the operating licence between Snowy Hydro and the NSW Office of Water on the NSW Office of Water website.
Well I went there to have a look, but where to start? The licence has a package of agreements, licences and other regulations and the current licence as at May 1, 2010, is only 102 pages long. I started to read, but it was not easy going and the more I read, the more I doubted that I would recognise the answer even if I stumbled across it, because the document makes so many references to part three of schedule three then part four of schedule four, and in case of shortfall, in case of excess, in case of base passing flow, in this water year versus next dependent on how much water might be in which of the sixteen major dams at any one time.”
I left a message congratulating her on her blog
http://jennifermarohasy.com/blog/2010/12/snowy-hydro-tops-up-floods-with-environmental-flow/#comments
Alarmism rears its ugly head in the Sydney Morning Herald
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Rising sea levels will swamp parts of Sydney
Tom Arup ENVIRONMENT CORRESPONDENT – smh
December 16, 2010
A NUMBER of Sydney suburbs will be inundated regularly because of climate change-driven sea-level rises, threatening homes and community infrastructure worth billion of dollars by the end of the century, new projections show.
In the first detailed attempt to study the impacts of sea-level rises on low-lying coastal areas and help local government planning, the government has released high-resolution maps that show the areas in Sydney and the central coast most under threat from sea-level rises.
Sydney suburbs facing significant danger of inundation, even with limited rises, include Caringbah, Kurnell, Cromer and Manly Vale. Significant parts of Newcastle and the central coast are also potentially in harm’s way.
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And the problems associated with rising sea levels are not limited to coastal areas. Flooding could occur along the Parramatta River, threatening homes and infrastructure around Homebush Bay, Newington and Silverwater. Along the Cooks River, Arncliffe and Marrickville could suffer, with the threat of significant inundation at Sydney Airport, too The maps show projected inundation for sea-level rises of 0.5 metres, which is likely to be unavoidable, 0.8 metres and 1.1 metres by 2100. The projections combine rising sea levels and king tidal events, which can occur many times a year. The maps do not factor in protective infrastructure such as sea walls or show local effects such as beach erosion.
Continues……….(if you really care)
Where climate and conservation collide
December 13, 2010 – smh
If ever a case signalled the end of easy answers to our search for clean energy, it’s that of the wedgie.
We have had a complex relationship with the wedge-tailed eagle. Last century it was nearly annihilated as a sheep killer.
This writer remembers driving along a ghastly fence line hung for a kilometre with wedgie carcasses after a local shoot in Victoria’s western district.
Today such prejudices have largely disappeared. Respect for the country’s great raptor instead approaches the historic norm. Eagles have stood for us as symbols of strength and power from the days of the Ancient Greeks.
Still the wedgie gets run over on our roads, and flies into things that share its aerial domain — such as wind turbines.
As we search for means to sharply cut carbon emissions from energy production, increasingly we are turning to wind farms.
In Victoria alone there is the prospect of 1322 new turbines and their towers being built in 28 separate developments.
Another 376 would slice the breeze at three farms planned for Tasmania. And the country’s single largest wind farm, under development at Silverton, New South Wales, plans to landscape a tract of the outback with 598 towers.
All of this doesn’t happen without opposition, particularly from people who see losses to their previously unindustrialised homelands. Occasionally the issue will flare into national controversy, such as over the orange-bellied parrot.
The Howard government environment minister, Ian Campbell, halted a $220 million wind farm development at Bald Hills in Gippsland in 2006 because it might kill small numbers of the critically endangered parrot.
Campbell was ridiculed by Labor for a decision that coincidentally delivered electoral good news to a marginal Coalition seat around Bald Hills. Eventually he had to reverse it.
It’s a pity that the parrot, a fleet little beauty now close to extinction, became a joke in the Bald Hills barney. We should hope that if the wind farm explosion happens, we would deal much better with species protection.
That’s why the case of the wedgie, more exactly its endangered Tasmanian sub-species, gives pause for thought.
Larger than its mainland cousin at a 2.2-metre wingspan, its head often encircled with a regal golden feather ruff, the Tasmanian wedge-tailed numbers fewer than 1000 birds.
Its heartland is the state’s wild forests, where it can be glimpsed soaring the ridgelines, disdaining the harassing ravens and currawongs like a monster from prehistory.
At the state’s largest wind farm at Woolnorth in the island’s north-west, 19 wedge-tailed eagles are known to have been killed since it began operations in 2003. Another three sea eagles also have hit the rotors.
This is allowed. Federal and state environmental permits recognise Woolnorth’s rotors may kill a small number of eagles each year.
Continues…………
The Australian prints a game-changer?
I’ve snipped the first part due to the following comment, but the last part is encouraging and refreshing. I wonder if Asten made a concession to the consensus at the start in order to have the rest published
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JohnM Posted at 7:21 AM Today
On reading the first few paragraphs I thought this was going to be yet another pro-alarmist statement but was pleasantly surprised to find that it went on to raise some highly relevant points that for too long have been obscured by hype and eco-politics. Again it’s geologists and geophysicists who contribute rational and sober comment to a debate that’s so often driven by wild assertions from alarmists.
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The comments are well worth a read, e.g.
John Nicol of Brisbane Posted at 10:26 AM Today
This is one of the finest articles written in recent times on the topic of climate change. The carefully stated discussion on the matter of an appropriate “economic” approach to possible climate change and the rational considerations of the best means to achieve open scientific debate provide a well balanced presentation of the type which must form the basis for future progress in this area. The reticence by both political, economic, and scientific spokespersons, from government, CSIRO and University Climate units, to even consider any opposing view on this extremely important topic, so clearly demonstrated in the case of Clive Spash, has been a blight on science and politics alike. Let’s hope the veil is now lifting under the encouragement of articles such as this one by Michael Asten. John Nicol
(We have an excellent paper by John Nicol at CCG – Google it)
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Political interference will cripple climate debate
# Michael Asten
# December 17, 2010 12:00AM
[Snip]
As a geophysicist my reading and writing leads me to question the level of influence of human-related CO2 emissions on present versus past climate change, and it is of huge concern to our nation’s future if we commit to a price on carbon without a parallel high-priority, objective and ongoing scientific effort to quantify uncertainties and natural factors also affecting climate change.
The Cancun predictions on sea-level rises contrast with recent satellite observations on the rate of sea-level change and provide a timely example on the need for scientific objectivity.
A recent peer-reviewed paper by Svetlana Jevrejeva from Britain’s National Oceanography Centre, Liverpool, provides a calculation of 0.6m-1.6m by 2100 using a range of climate models. However, these models also show predicted sea-level change rates of 4.2mm-5.4mm a year for the first decade of the 21st century.
I contrast these predictions with just published observations by Riccardo Riva from Delft in The Netherlands and international colleagues who use satellite technology to measure actual global sea level rise in this same decade to be in the order of 1mm a year, which happens to be about the rate of sea-level increase that has been observed during the past century. In other words, the observational data suggests the problem as modelled may be overstated by a factor of five.
Did scientists from the no-longer independent CSIRO (or other competent body in Australia) brief minister Combet and his team at Cancun on this discrepancy and its implications? Are they permitted to make such comment publicly? And how will such observations affect the targeting of our funds on offer for regional adaptation programs?
Until we have confidence scientists can address such issues without censorship or denigration, we cannot have confidence that a price on carbon will be scientifically justified or wisely spent.
Michael Asten is a professorial fellow in the school of geosciences, Monash University.
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Joyce Posted at 1:42 PM Today
What a breath of fresh air this article is.
Meanwhile – in the Sydney Morning Herald “Climate Change” section
Rising sea a billion-dollar threat
Tom Arup Melbourne suburbs will be inundated regularly because of climate-change-driven sea-level rises, threatening billions of dollars in damage to homes, new projections show.
Rising sea levels will swamp parts of Sydney
Tom Arup ENVIRONMENT CORRESPONDENT A number of Sydney suburbs will be inundated regularly because of climate change-driven sea-level rises, threatening homes and community infrastructure worth billion of dollars by the end of the century, new projections show.
South-east Asia will be hardest hit by climate change, ONA predicts
Philip Dorling and Richard Baker Australia’s top intelligence agency believes south-east Asia will be the region worst affected by climate change by 2030, with decreased water flows from the Himalayan glaciers triggering a ”cascade of economic, social and political consequences”.
Maps predict how climate will affect coast
The possible effects of climate change on low-lying coastal areas of Australia have been outlined in new maps.
Another game-changer in The Australian?
They have printed Joanne Nova’s “A REPLY to a critic of The Australian’s coverage of the debate about climate change.” “DAVID McKnight’s criticism of The Australian over climate change(“Sceptical writers skipped inconvenient truths”, Inquirer,”
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Newspapers should lead the country
* Joanne Nova
* From: The Australian
* December 18, 2010 12:00AM
A REPLY to a critic of The Australian’s coverage of the debate about climate change.
DAVID McKnight’s criticism of The Australian over climate change (“Sceptical writers skipped inconvenient truths”, Inquirer, December 11) makes for a good case study of Australian universities’ intellectual collapse.
Here’s a University of NSW senior research fellow in journalism who contradicts himself, fails by his own reasoning, does little research, breaks at least three laws of logic, and rests his entire argument on an assumption for which he provides no evidence.
Most disturbingly – like a crack through the facade of Western intellectual vigour – he asserts that the role of a national newspaper is to “give leadership”.
Bask for a moment in the inanity of this declaration that newspapers “are our leaders”. Last time I looked at our ballot papers, none of the people running to lead our nation had a name such as The Sydney Morning Herald. Didn’t he notice we live in a country that chooses its leaders through elections? The role of a newspaper is to report all the substantiated arguments and filter out the poorly reasoned ones, so readers can make up their own minds.
The point of a free press is surely for the press to be free to ask the most searching questions on any topic. Yet here is an authority on journalism attacking The Australian for printing views of scientists who have degrees of doubt about global warming and/or any human component in it.
And these scientists that McKnight wants to silence are not just the odd rare heretic.
The swelling ranks of sceptical scientists is now the largest whistle-blowing cohort in science ever seen. It includes some of the brightest: two with Nobel prizes in physics, four NASA astronauts, 9000 PhDs in science, and another 20,000 science graduates to cap it off. A recent US Senate minority report contained 1000 names of eminent scientists who are sceptical, and the term professor pops up more than 500 times in that list. These, McKnight, an arts PhD, calls deniers.
Just because thousands of scientists support the sceptical view doesn’t prove they’re right, but it proves their opinions are nothing like the tobacco sceptics campaign that McKnight compares them with in a transparent attempt to smear commentators with whom he disagrees.
Ponder the irony that McKnight, the journalism lecturer, is demanding The Australian adopt the policy espoused by the dominant paradigm, the establishment, and censor the views of independent whistleblowers.
He thinks repeating government PR is journalism; the rest of us know it as propaganda.
McKnight doesn’t name any scientific paper that any sceptic denies. Instead, he seems to use a pre-emptive technique designed to stop people even discussing the evidence about the climate.
McKnight’s research starts with the assumption that a UN committee, which was funded to find a crisis, has really found one, and that it is above question. His investigation appears to amount to comparing articles in Fairfax versus Murdoch papers, as if the key to radiative transfer and cumulative atmospheric feedbacks lies in counting op-ed pieces. If he had made the most basic inquiry, McKnight might also have found out that the entire case for the man-made threat to the climate rests on just the word of 60 scientists who reviewed chapter nine of the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s Fourth Assessment Report.
He’d also know that the people he calls deniers, far from being recipients of thousands of regular Exxon cheques, are mostly self-funded – many are retirees – and that Exxon’s paltry $US23 million for 1990-2007 was outdone by more than 3000 to one by the US government alone, which paid $US79 billion to the climate industry during 1989-2009.
So “sharp” is McKnight’s analysis that he calls the independent unfunded scientists “a global PR campaign originating from coal and oil companies”, but all while he is oblivious to the real billion-dollar PR campaign that is waged from government departments, a UN agency, financial houses such as Deutsche Bank, the renewable energy industry, the nuclear industry and multi-hundred-million-dollar corporations such as the WWF.
The job of a newspaper, he indicates, is to decide which scientist is right about atmospheric physics. Is Phil Jones from the East Anglia Climate Research Unit right, or is Richard Lindzen, Massachusetts Institute of Technology meteorologist, right? Add that to the duties for aspiring national editors. Tough job, eh?
McKnight’s main error in his article – accepting an argument from authority – has been known in logic for 2000 years, and his entire synopsis is built around this fallacy.
Just suppose, hypothetically, that the government employed many scientists on one side of a theory and none from the other. McKnight’s method of “knowing” who is right involves counting the institutions and authorities who support the grants – I mean, the theory. If science were exploited this way, McKnight would fall victim every time, blindly supporting the establishment.
That doesn’t prove he’s wrong
but his analysis is confused at every level. He claims The Australian has zig-zagged from acceptance to denial but then later accuses The Australian’s columnists of repeating “the dominant editorial line”. But which editorial line would be dominant: the zig type or the zag? In science, evidence is the only thing that counts, not opinion. McKnight, the follower of funded opinions, has the gall to question The Australian’s standards of evidence but the only evidence he offers is a collection of opinions. McKnight paints himself as an authority on journalism yet fails to investigate his base assumption, research the targets of his scorn or understand the role of the free press: he is his own best example of why argument from authority is a fallacy.
If our journalism lecturers are feeding students with ideas of leadership roles, how decrepit is the institution where students are not even taught that the highest aim of a journalist is to ask the most penetrating questions and leave no stone unturned, so the people they serve might have the best information?
Such is the modern delusion of the activist-journo: McKnight wants to be the leader, to dictate what the public can think and to direct where public spending goes, but he doesn’t want to bother running for office or to expose his claim to open debate. He’s nothing more than a totalitarian in disguise.
Joanne Nova is a commentator and the author of The Skeptics Handbook. She is a former associate lecturer in science communication at the Australian National University.
joannenova.com.au
ALP flags fixed carbon price
December 18, 2010 – smh
CLIMATE Change Minister Greg Combet has sent a strong signal the federal government is considering implementing a fixed carbon price, followed by a fully fledged emissions trading scheme, to solve the political impasse.
Continues………
Cost blowout hits clean coal vision
# The Australian
# December 20, 2010 12:00AM
AUSTRALIA’S hopes to lead the world in generating “clean” electricity from coal have taken a hammering.
A massive cost blowout forced the Queensland government to scrap a prototype power plant that was to be in action by 2015.
The decision to go back to the drawing board on the ZeroGen project in central Queensland means carbon capture technology to trap greenhouse gases produced from coal-fired plants will not be in use for a decade at least.
While Premier Anna Bligh said yesterday the $192 million invested in ZeroGen had not been wasted, and the state and federal governments remained committed to developing clean coal processes, she admitted this was not yet economically viable.
Continues…….
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ZeroGen decision on the money
# The Australian
# December 20, 2010 12:00AM
BY pulling out of ZeroGen, the Queensland government has made a pragmatic decision.
[Snip]
According to Peter Cook, chief executive of the Co-operative Research Centre for Greenhouse Gas Technologies in Canberra, the research effort is swinging back in favour of capturing carbon emissions after the coal has been burned rather than trying to radically alter the coal itself before combustion.
“We are seeing that more conventional ways of making electricity are being looked at again for post-combustion capture,” Dr Cook said.
This included both underground storage and research into algae to soak up carbon emissions that could be turned into crude oil and other projects to lock up CO2 emissions in new generation cement-like construction products.
Research will continue on pre-combustion technology that turns coal into a synthesis gas, which is used in a gas turbine to produce electricity, with the heat generated used to drive a steam turbine, including at the Wandoan power plant project, also in Queensland, and in China.
The $150 million written off by the Queensland government on ZeroGen is small beer in the context of the more than $US26 billion ($26.3bn) committed by governments around the world to research and develop CCS technologies.
The fact of life in research is that not every project will bear fruit.
However, the Queensland government said that it remained committed to continuing support for CCS research.
And federal Resources Minister Martin Ferguson said the Australian government was considering advice from the Independent Assessment Panel on allocating $2bn in funding for so-called flagship projects.
“I expect to be in a position to announce the next significant state in the development of CCS flagships in the first half of 2011,” Mr Ferguson said.
The remaining projects are:
- The Wandoan power plant project northwest of Brisbane, which is based on integrating General Electric’s existing technologies with CO2 storage in the Surat Basin.
- The Collie South West Hub project, which aims to store up to 3.3 mega tonnes of CO2 a year, captured from surrounding industry including coal-fired power plants.
-The CarbonNet project in Victoria’s Latrobe Valley, which aims to store between three and five mega tonnes of CO2 a year, captured from coal-fired power plants in the region.
The $2bn CCS Flagships program was announced in the 2009-10 budget and is part of the federal government’s $4.5bn Clean Energy Initiative.
Leaders of the G8 countries who met in Hokkaido in Japan in 2008 had set a goal of having established at least 20 large-scale CCS projects around the world by 2020.
Summer snow falls at Perisher
20 Dec, 2010 10:30 AM – The Newcastle Herald
10 mm snow at Charlotte Pass Damaging winds predicted in Sydney, Hunter, Illawarra, Tablelands Christmas Day to be mostly sunny, 26 degrees
Snow is falling on the Snowy Mountains, Sydneysiders are bracing for damaging winds and much of the state’s east woke up to rain today.
It is hard to believe it’s summer in NSW, let alone Christmas.
Combet left red-faced as new green scheme gets the axe
December 22, 2010 – smh
THE successor to the government’s disastrous Green Loans scheme has been scrapped just days before it was due to begin, throwing the jobs of thousands of people into doubt.
[Snip]
The government has also been forced to commit $30 million in compensation for the approximately 10,000 people who were trained and accredited to work as household energy auditors, as many had been relying on Green Start to provide them with continued work when Green Loans ended.
Continues……..
Anna Bligh opens door to nuclear power
# The Australian
# December 24, 2010 12:00AM
ANNA Bligh has backed calls for the Labor Party to review its policy on nuclear power.
The Queensland Premier has warned that renewable sources cannot meet the surging demand for baseload electricity.
Ms Bligh and ALP national president said development of the only other viable alternative energy, hydro-electricity, had been hamstrung by resistance to new dams.
Ms Bligh said pointedly that “parts of the environment movement” had shifted on the nuclear option, and now supported it as an abatement measure for climate change.
Ms Bligh’s comments to The Australian reflect an important shift on nuclear power among Labor leaders, who now cite cost and perception issues rather than philosophical considerations as the impediment to introducing nuclear energy.
Continues……..
Farmers in Australia have borne the significant financial burden of meeting Australia’s obligations under the Kyoto Protocol by the enforcement (by Tree Police) of Vegetation Control Legislation which gives us sufficient ‘carbon credits’ to meet those Kyoto ‘targets’.
This cohort are the farmers and landholders who have had the value of the holdings reduced by an estimate $10.8 Billion to meet the United Nation’s expectations.
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/12/28/kyoto-protocol-bad-science-bad-policy/#more-30224
Bob Carter on Carbon Tax
Combet’s hot air tax: no seasonal break for the climate commissars
To the degree that statements such as those made by BMO’s Dr. Sligo represent the views of the professional meteorological community, that community has now moved beyond parody and demands to be ridiculed. Can it really be the case that amidst the hurricane of Green spin about global warming, not a single bureaucrat or government politician in Canberra has retained a functioning bullshit detector?
Remarkably, in enunciating their “eleven principles”, the Canberra MCCC managed to evade entirely any mention of the underpinning scientific justification for introducing a tax on carbon dioxide. That is, of course, because there is none (which is doubtless why only one, tame, scientist was included as a member of the committee in the first place).
As the government will discover from its focus groups over the next few months, no matter how hard Mr. Combet tries to spin it as beneficial, they will introduce a carbon dioxide tax at their considerable electoral peril.
For where global warming alarmism is concerned, the good news is that the bullshit detectors of the Australian electorate are both alive and activated.
http://bishophill.squarespace.com/blog/2011/1/4/bob-carter-on-carbon-tax.html
Wettest year in a decade as La Nina promises heavier falls until autumn
* From: The Australian
* January 06, 2011 12:00AM
The Bureau of Meteorology’s annual Australian climate statement released yesterday showed last year was Australia’s wettest year since 2000 and the third-wettest since records began to be kept in 1900.
……..last year was the coolest for Australia for eight years
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It might be interesting to compare the AU temperature record with the NZ record.
Poll Shows Vast Majority of Australians Couldn’t Give a XXXX About Global Warming.
From Hauntingthelibrary
A poll of Australians on issues they would consider at a Federal election has some bad news for the alarmists – some very bad news: nobody cares.
According to the survey, only 3% of the electorate rate “Addressing climate change” as their prime voting concern. A further 3% put it into second place, and a whopping 4% rated it as a tertiary concern (third place).
The response to “Controlling population growth” was similarly uninterested, with only 2% rating that as a primary issue. Ensuring supply of water scored 1%, perhaps unsurprisingly.
http://hauntingthelibrary.wordpress.com/2011/01/26/poll-shows-vast-majority-of-australians-couldnt-give-a-xxxx-about-global-warming/