IPCC politics
This page is for discussion of the politics surrounding the IPCC.
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.
Some good sites on IPCC politics:
No frakking consensus
Shub Niggurath
The next one, EURef is not strictly a climate blog, but Richard North has covered a lot of stuff (including the Amazongate issue)
<A HREF = "http://eureferendum.blogspot.com"EUReferendum
fixing up the html
EUReferendum
Tip Andy, use JoNova http://joannenova.com.au/2010/10/away-til-monday/ for fancy formatting , unless you want to keep up to speed on html. (Cut n Paste so much easier)
The Non-Stop IPCC Spin Machine
October 18, 2010
Author worked on IPCC reports a decade prior to earning her PhD
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) press release issued last week talks about transparency and openness. But don’t be fooled. Preparation of the 5th assessment report – known internally as AR5 – isn’t even fully underway, yet the organization is up to its old tricks.
Take a look at the Notes to Editors on the second page of the press release. This is supposed to be the non-controversial stuff, the basic nuts and bolts. Instead, it’s spin, spin, spin. Here’s a sentence for you:
Thousands of scientists from all over the world contribute to the IPCC reports.
Back in June, the IPCC released the list of people who’ve been selected to work on AR5. It said that list contained 831 names – not thousands. But the situation is really worse than that, since only those individuals assigned to Working Group 1 deal with hard science. (Working Group 2 speculates on how climate change might effect our world. Working Group 3 discusses what might be done in response.)
‘High Priestess of Global Warming’ No More! Former Warmist Judith Curry Admits To Being ‘Duped Into Supporting IPCC’
Judith Curry
Climate etc
Oct 26, 2010
I’m having another “Alice down the rabbit hole” moment, in response to the Scientific American article, the explication of the article by its author Michael Lemonick, Scientific American’s survey on whether I am a dupe or a peacemaker, and the numerous discussions in blogosphere. My first such moment was in 2005 in response to the media attention associated with the hurricane wars, which was described in a Q&A with Keith Kloor at collide-a-scape. While I really want to make this blog about the science and not about personalities (and especially not about me), this article deserves a response.
The title of the article itself is rather astonishing. The Wikipedia defines heresy as: “Heresy is a controversial or novel change to a system of beliefs, especially a religion, that conflicts with established dogma.” The definition of dogma is “Dogma is the established belief or doctrine held by a religion, ideology or any kind of organization: it is authoritative and not to be disputed, doubted, or diverged from.” Use of the word “heretic” by Lemonick implies general acceptance by the “insiders” of the IPCC as dogma. If the IPCC is dogma, then count me in as a heretic. The story should not be about me, but about how and why the IPCC became dogma.
Great post from Judith Curry
Reversing the direction of the positive feedback loop
(The positive feedback here is the political one)
http://judithcurry.com/2010/11/03/reversing-the-direction-of-the-positive-feedback-loop/
Must read
Yes – must read.
Judith Curry’s epiphany is really reverberating now. That post will not go down well in some quarters internationally and lookout for damage control from Brian Walker and Gareth Renowden here in NZ.
Judith is now telling it like it is, pulling no punches, and catching the flack. Welcome to the world outside the “consensus”.
The tend toward power in the hands of economists is now the big battlefront, especially the climate-economic coupled models that will be in vogue for AR5.
BREAKING: UN IPCC Official Admits ‘We Redistribute World’s Wealth By Climate Policy’
November 18, 2010
If you needed any more evidence that the entire theory of manmade global warming was a scheme to redistribute wealth you got it Sunday when a leading member of the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change told a German news outlet, “[W]e redistribute de facto the world’s wealth by climate policy.”
Such was originally published by Germany’s NZZ Online Sunday, and reprinted in English by the Global Warming Policy Foundation moments ago:
I am wondering whose “wealth” they are planning to redistribute. Aren’t we all in debt up to our eyeballs?
Or is this a Dr Evil master plan to destroy the west?
Mwa ha ha ha ha …
The electrical analogy is apparent wealth as in apparent power.
I think Schwartzenegger would gladly redistribute some of California’s “wealth”.
Next climate warming report will be dramatically worse: UN
(AFP) – 1 day ago
UNITED NATIONS — United Nations leaders will demand “concrete results” from the looming Cancun climate summit as global warming is accelerating, a top UN organizer of the event said Monday.
Robert Orr, UN under secretary general for planning, said the next Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change report on global warming will be much worse than the last one.
Representatives from 194 countries are to meet in the Mexican resort city of Cancun from November 29 to December 10 for a new attempt to strike a deal to curb greenhouse gases after 2012.
Orr told reporters that negotiators heading for the Cancun conference “need to remind themselves, the longer we delay, the more we will pay both in terms of lives and in terms of money.”
He said UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon would make it clear to world leaders in Cancun “that we should not take any comfort in the climate deniers’ siren call.”
“The evidence shows us quite the opposite– that we can’t rest easy at all” as scientists agree that climate change “is happening in an accelerated way.”
“As preparations are underway for the next IPCC report, just about everything that you will see in the next report will be more dramatic than the last report, because that is where all the data is pointing.”
The fourth IPCC assessment released in 2007 said that global warming is “unequivocal” and mainly caused by human activity.
Its next report, involving contributions from thousands of scientists around the world, is due in 2014.
With many countries fearful of a repeat of last year’s bitter Copenhagen summit failure, Orr said that progress is possible in Cancun.
If governments “understand the peril that their populations are in, it is much easier to get over the political hurdles to do what you have to do,” he said.
The United Nations wants breakthroughs on verifying deforestation and financing to combat the lost of tropical forests.
Efforts to speed up technology transfers to combat global warming and financing projects to slow the phenomenon could also be advanced, Orr said.
Thirty billion dollars of emergency funding over three years was agreed at Copenhagen and a UN panel on how to raise 100 billion dollars a year from 2020 has already delivered its report.
The panel recommended taxes on carbon emissions and international transport, including air tickets.
Orr said no one should expect “the final deal” in Cancun.
But he said: “The time has come for some decisions on issues and therefore we do want some concrete results.”
“The evidence shows us quite the opposite– that we can’t rest easy at all” as scientists agree that climate change “is happening in an accelerated way.”
Yes scientists agree – but the climate most certainly does not.
UN scientists plan for failure at global climate change talks
December 1, 2010 – smh (UK Telegraph)
CANCUN: United Nations scientists are to consider putting mirrors in space and sprinkling iron filings in the sea to cut global warming, the climate change summit in Cancun has heard.
The announcement is a signal that the world’s leading climate scientists are losing faith in the prospects of a global deal to stop temperature rise by limiting emissions.
Speaking at the summit, Rajendra Pachauri, the head of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, said the panel’s next report on global warming would not only look at the threat of rising temperatures but also consider ”geo-engineering” options that could reverse warming.
There are already low expectations for the summit, being held at this beach resort on Mexico’s east coast.
Representatives from more than 190 countries are meeting at the Moon Palace Hotel to try to find a way to limit emissions so that temperature rises stay below 2 degrees.
The IPCC is responsible for setting out the scientific basis for the talks.
Addressing the opening conference, Dr Pachauri said if humanity continued to produce greenhouse gases at the current rate the world could experience catastrophic warming within 50 years.
He said the threat was so great that the fifth assessment report (AR5), due to be presented to the United Nations in 2014, would look at ”geo-engineering options”.
Later this year IPCC ”expert groups” will meet in Peru to discuss geo-engineering. Options include putting mirrors in space to reflect sunlight or covering Greenland in a massive ”blanket” so it does not melt.
Sprinkling iron filings in the ocean ”fertilises” algae, which absorbs CO2 and ”seeding clouds” means that sunlight is blocked. Other options include artificial ”trees” that suck carbon dioxide out of the atmosphere, painting roofs white to reflect sunlight, and human-made volcanoes that spray sulphate particles high in the atmosphere to scatter the sun’s rays back into space.
Critics have argued that the process could make climate change worse through unintended consequences.
Continues……..
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Almost every mitigation measure these idiots impose results in unintended consequences;-
REDD rorts in Indonesia
HFC reduction gaming in China
Carbon credit VAT tax fraud in Europe
Geo-engineering just has to be a fools invention by the dumbest “experts” in the universe, guaranteed to join the list of unintended consequences.
Ban Ki-moon ends hands-on involvement in climate change talks
guardian.co.uk, Thursday 27 January 2011
UN secretary general will redirect efforts to making more immediate gains in clean energy and sustainable development
In a strategic shift, Ban will redirect his efforts from trying to encourage movement in the international climate change negotiations to a broader agenda of promoting clean energy and sustainable development, senior UN officials said.
Obama’s State of the Union speech was along similar lines.
I think “Climate Change” has become a politically toxic subject.
Donna Laframboise has an interesting post on the political nature of the IPCC
The Sneaky, Not-So-Secret Purpose of the IPCC
…
But if one persists all the way through to the fifth and final paragraph on that page, matters get a bit more complicated:
By endorsing the IPCC reports, governments acknowledge the authority of their scientific content.
This sentence makes it clear that, despite the lofty rhetoric about knowledge and science, the IPCC actually serves a political purpose. It is a means to an end. It is the process by which the nearly 200 governments who belong to the United Nations agree on a single, official climate science perspective.
http://nofrakkingconsensus.wordpress.com/2011/01/26/the-sneaky-not-so-secret-purpose-of-the-ipcc/
I guess this puts Nick Smith’s statement “We accept the science” in context.
Accept, or shut up.
A couple of blog posts on IPCC Vice Chair Jean-Pascal van Ypersele’s antics:-
IPCC Vice Chair van Ypersele Suppresses Open Scientific Inquiry – Shuts Down SEII Skeptic Forum
http://notrickszone.com/2011/08/30/ipcc-vice-chai-van-ypersele-suppresses-open-scientific-inquiry-disallows-critical-debate/
IPCC chief tries to silence opposing view.
http://theclimatescepticsparty.blogspot.com/2011/08/ipcc-chief-silences-opposing-view.html
SCORE:
IPCC :1
Scientific Progress: 0
This is Dr Roy Spencer’s response to the resignation of Wolfgang Wagner, editor of Remote Sensing journal. See:-
Editor-in-Chief of Remote Sensing Resigns from Fallout Over Our Paper
http://www.drroyspencer.com/2011/09/editor-in-chief-of-remote-sensing-resigns-from-fallout-over-our-paper/
And
Journal editor resigns over ‘problematic’ climate paper
Richard Black By Richard Black Environment correspondent, BBC News
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-14768574
Note that the paper has NOT been retracted.
————————————————————————————————————————–
As an aside, I see Spencer has taken to adding a little interest to the UAH Global Temperature Update for August, 2011, saying:-
“Note that this month I have taken the liberty of adding a 3rd order polynomial fit to the data (courtesy of Excel). This is for entertainment purposes only, and should not be construed as having any predictive value whatsoever.”
http://www.drroyspencer.com/2011/09/uah-global-temperature-update-for-august-2011-0-33-deg-c/
Comment On The Resignation of Wolfgang Wagner As Editor-In-Chief Of The Journal “Remote Sensing” In Response To The Publication Of Spencer And Braswell (2011)
Climate Science: Roger Pielke Sr.
http://pielkeclimatesci.wordpress.com/2011/09/02/comment-on-the-resignation-of-wolfgang-wagner-as-editor-in-chief-of-the-journal-remote-sensing-in-response-to-the-publication-of-spencer-and-braswell-2011/
Quoting:-
“I have read the Spencer and Braswell paper in detail, and while I agree that some of the media exposure has been exaggerated and misplaced, the science in their paper appears robust. I certainly can be wrong, but I do not see a fatal flaw in what they did (i.e. an error such that the paper should have been rejected).
If their analysis is robust (even if minor technical errors exist), it is going to make Wolfgang Wagner look very biased. The ultimate arbitrator of the Spencer and Braswell analysis and conclusions will be in the peer-reviewed literature not on weblogs, or whether or not the Chief Editor of a journal decides to resign over a paper.
Having served as a Chief Editors for the Journal of Atmospheric Science and the Monthly Weather Review this very unusual behavior. The place to refute a published paper is in peer-reviewed papers, not in blogs (or the media). If the paper is not robust, it appropriately should be responded to by paper, not by the resignation of the Editor. In my view, he made a poor decision which has further damaged the scientific process of vetting new research results.”
Hatchet Job On John Christy and Roy Spencer By Kevin Trenberth, John Abraham and Peter Gleick
Climate Science: Roger Pielke Sr.
http://pielkeclimatesci.wordpress.com/2011/09/04/hatchet-job-on-john-christy-and-roy-spencer-by-kevin-trenberth-john-abraham-and-peter-gleick/
This will really get interesting when Dessler’s paper comes out that “undermines Spencer’s arguments about the role of clouds in the Earth’s energy budget” (as Trenberth, Abraham and Gleick put it).
A Primer on Our Claim that Clouds Cause Temperature Change
September 3rd, 2011 by Roy W. Spencer, Ph. D.
…and Why Dessler, Trenberth, and the IPCC are Wrong
http://www.drroyspencer.com/2011/09/a-primer-on-our-claim-that-clouds-cause-temperature-change/
Snippets:-
What it All Means
This cloud issue has become very contentious because, if we (or those working on the cosmic ray effect on clouds) are correct, it means Mother Nature is perfectly capable of causing her own climate change.
And this possibility cannot be permitted by the IPCC, because it then begs the question of whether climate change — both past and future — is more natural than anthropogenic. What is particularly discouraging is that the vast majority of scientists contacted by reporters to comment on our paper clearly had not even read the paper. They just repeated what other scientists had said. And I doubt even those original scientists read it. All they know is that it dissed the climate models, and so it must be wrong.
[We have even had papers rejected by peer reviewers who we KNOW didn't read the paper. They objected to "claims" we never even made in our paper. This is the sad state of peer review when a scientific discipline is so politicized.]
And:-
At the end of the day, the dirty little secret is that there is still no way to test the IPCC climate models for their feedback behavior, which means there is no way to know which (if any of them) is even close to being correct in its predictions for the future.
The very fact that the 20+ climate models the IPCC tracks still span just as wide a range of feedbacks as climate models did 20 years ago is evidence by itself that the climate community still can’t demonstrate what the real cloud feedbacks in the climate system are. Otherwise, they would tune their models accordingly.
The disconcerting conclusion is that global warming-related policy decisions are being guided by models which still have no way to be tested in their long-term predictions.
Hot off the press: Dessler’s record turnaround time GRL rebuttal paper to Spencer and Braswell
Posted on September 6, 2011 by Anthony Watts
I’ve been given an advance copy, for which I’ve posted excerpts below. This paper appears to have been made ready in record time, with a turnaround from submission to acceptance and publication of about six weeks based on the July 26th publication date of the original Spencer and Braswell paper. We should all be so lucky to have expedited peer review service. PeerEx maybe, something like FedEx? Compare that to the two years it took to get Lindzen and Choi out the door. Or how about the WUWT story: “Science has been sitting on his [Spencer's] critique of Dessler’s paper for months”.
If anyone needs a clear, concise, and irrefutable example of how peer review in climate science is biased for the consensus and against skeptics, this is it.
I’m sure some thorough examination will determine if the maxim “haste makes waste” applies here for Dessler’s turbo treatise.
Cloud variations and the Earth’s energy budget
A.E. Dessler
Dept. of Atmospheric Sciences
Texas A&M University
College Station, TX
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2011/09/06/hot-off-the-press-desslers-record-turnaround-time-grl-rebuttal-paper-to-spencer-and-braswell/
Another broadside from RealClimate:-
Resignations, retractions and the process of science
— gavin @ 6 September 2011
http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2011/09/resignations-retractions-and-the-process-of-science/
Dessler 2011 linked here:-
http://geotest.tamu.edu/userfiles/216/Dessler2011.pdf
Delingpole has written up (among other things) some sleuthing found in WUWT:-
Obscure editor resigns from minor journal: why you should care
By James Delingpole
http://blogs.telegraph.co.uk/news/jamesdelingpole/100103350/obscure-editor-resigns-from-minor-journal-why-you-should-care/
GEWEX in 2010 announced the appointment, by acclamation, of Kevin Trenberth, as its new Chairperson. (page 3 of this newsletter). On Page 4, is the announcement that the Soil Moisture Network (which is the department Wagner runs) is looking for help. Not, coincidentally, on Page 5 is an article on how cloud albedo is overestimated in models, thus it’s worse than we thought.
Dessler’s views from Bryan Walker’s “Jolting Contrasts” Hot Topic article:-
“can’t specifically say with accuracy”
“can say pretty clearly”
Team cheerleader Bryan of course (complete with pom poms), doesn’t see the non-scientific subtlety because according to him Dessler is one of “a couple of intelligent and knowledgeable American scientists which regular Hot Topic commenter Bill had recommended”.
Neither does he see the inversion of science, or as Anthony Watts puts it in relation to a climate prediction paper:-
Or – As Dessler thinks, Walker thinks.
Dessler:-
Walker obliges accordingly:-
Proving Joseph Goebbels correct in the process:-
“Climate worsens weather”
Interesting idea. I can accept (from a basic Physics point of view) that the presence of humans in a closed system will affect that system. Of course, we can’t know what that effect is unless we remove the humans.
However, does the idea of “worsens” actually exist in the scientific literature?
if I magically make a day warmer, does it make the day worse?
If I magically make more rain come through my super powers, does it make it worse or better? The farmers might like it, the shoppers not so.
I’m still struggling with how a 30 year average of all the worst weather events makes the next weather event worse.
You regard the atm as a closed system Andy?
TOA is free to expand and contract.
Scientific developments and background re: Dessler 2011, Spencer – Braswell 2011, Lindzen and Choi 2011 now at “IPCC Science” here.
http://www.climateconversation.wordshine.co.nz/open-threads/un/ipcc-science/#comment-67021
More background here:-
“More Thoughts on the War Being Waged Against Us” by Roy W. Spencer, Ph. D.
http://www.drroyspencer.com/2011/09/more-thoughts-on-the-war-being-waged-against-us/
How the WWF Infiltrated the IPCC – Part 2
http://nofrakkingconsensus.com/2011/09/26/how-the-wwf-infiltrated-the-ipcc-part-2/
I believe Donna’s book on the IPCC will be available soon (on Kindle, initially)
It should make for interesting reading, and I expect no stones to be left unturned, even NZ ones.
UN Seeks New Powers to Remake World at Rio Sustainability Summit
http://www.infowars.com/un-seeks-new-powers-to-remake-world-at-rio-sustainability-summit/
Claptrap science shrouds dark anti-growth agenda
Rodney Hide NBR
http://www.nbr.co.nz/article/claptrap-science-shrouds-dark-anti-growth-agenda-ck-125622
Pachauri declares, “Whatever we do is available for scrutiny at every stage.” The all-important IPCC Summary for Policy Makers is rewritten line-by-line by politicians behind closed doors over days.
And get this: the actual report is released weeks after the Summary is released. Pachauri explains that’s because “we necessarily have to ensure that the underlying report conforms to the refinements [made by the politicians in the Summary]”.
That’s right: the scientific report is “refined” to fit the Summary written by politicians and is then later released. No scrutiny of the process or the changes is allowed.
When convenient, Pachauri puts himself above the political fray, “We in the IPCC do not prescribe any specific action, but action is a must.”
However, he has declared “a radical value shift” is needed and a “new value system” required. “I am not going to rest easy until I have articulated in every possible forum the need to bring about major structural changes in economic growth and development. That’s the real issue. Climate change is just a part of it”.
There you have it. A pretend mantle of scientific rigour shrouding a deep and dark social, economic and political agenda.
New, improved “gold standard” IPCC: Business as (conflicted as) usual
http://hro001.wordpress.com/2012/10/23/new-improved-gold-standard-ipcc-business-as-conflicted-as-usual/
IPCC AR5 co-ordinating lead author blames global warming for earthquakes, volcanic eruptions, and tsunamis:-
“There is wide scientific consensus that the increased number and intensity of climate change induced natural disasters, such as earthquakes, volcano eruptions, tsunamis and hurricanes, is of alarming concern,” said Ruppel, though adding that not all climate events lead to disasters.
http://tomnelson.blogspot.co.nz/2013/02/ipcc-ar5-co-ordinating-lead-author-is.html
Professor Oliver C Ruppel is professor of Law at Stellenbosch University, specialising in Public International Law and Diplomacy, World Trade Law, Regional Integration Policy, Sustainable Development Law and International Environmental Law. He serves as AR5 co-ordinating lead author for the Chapter on Africa of the UN IPCC, Working Group II.
WGII is where the BS really gets going at the IPCC.
Leaving aside the tsumanis, asteroids, etc caused by global warming, Pielke Jr reminds us that:
http://rogerpielkejr.blogspot.co.uk/2013/02/a-case-for-playing-it-straight.html
IPCC Invites In the Activists
When Greenpeace personnel are participating, a political process is underway – not a scientific one.
http://nofrakkingconsensus.com/2013/03/06/ipcc-invites-in-the-activists/
Donna -
The IPCC is comprised of three working groups. Working Group 3 is led by Ottmar Edenhofer, an economist at Germany’s Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research.
Three days ago that institute posted an announcement on its website calling for “expert reviewers” to provide feedback to Working Group 3′s draft report. The first paragraph of that announcement includes the following:
“The scientists who are organizing this process ask for voluntary contributions from experts across all sectors, from scholars to business people or NGO representatives”