by Paul Mulshine, The Star Ledger via the GWPF

Freeman Dyson is a physicist who has been teaching at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton since Albert Einstein was there. When Einstein died in 1955, there was an opening for the title of “most brilliant physicist on the planet.” Dyson has filled it.

So when the global-warming movement came along, a lot of people wondered why he didn’t come along with it. The reason he’s a skeptic is simple, the 89-year-old Dyson said when I phoned him.

“I think any good scientist ought to be a skeptic,” Dyson said.

Then in the late 1970s, he got involved with early research on climate change at the Institute for Energy Analysis in Oak Ridge, Tenn.

That research, which involved scientists from many disciplines, was based on experimentation. The scientists studied such questions as how atmospheric carbon dioxide interacts with plant life and the role of clouds in warming.

But that approach lost out to the computer-modeling approach favored by climate scientists. And that approach was flawed from the beginning, Dyson said.

“I just think they don’t understand the climate,” he said of climatologists. “Their computer models are full of fudge factors.”

A major fudge factor concerns the role of clouds. The greenhouse effect of carbon dioxide on its own is limited. To get to the apocalyptic projections trumpeted by Al Gore and company, the models have to include assumptions that CO-2 will cause clouds to form in a way that produces more warming.

“The models are extremely oversimplified,” he said. “They don’t represent the clouds in detail at all. They simply use a fudge factor to represent the clouds.”

Dyson said his skepticism about those computer models was borne out by recent reports of a study by Ed Hawkins of the University of Reading in Great Britain that showed global temperatures were flat between 2000 and 2010 — even though we humans poured record amounts of CO2 into the atmosphere during that decade.

That was vindication for a man who was termed “a civil heretic” in a New York Times Magazine article on his contrarian views. Dyson embraces that label, with its implication that what he opposes is a religious movement. So does his fellow Princeton physicist and fellow skeptic, William Happer.

“There are people who just need a cause that’s bigger than themselves,” said Happer. “Then they can feel virtuous and say other people are not virtuous.”

To show how uncivil this crowd can get, Happer e-mailed me an article about an Australian professor who proposes — quite seriously — the death penalty for heretics such as Dyson. As did Galileo, they can get a reprieve if they recant.

I hope that guy never gets to hear Dyson’s most heretical assertion: Atmospheric CO2 may actually be improving the environment.

“It’s certainly true that carbon dioxide is good for vegetation,” Dyson said. “About 15 percent of agricultural yields are due to CO2 we put in the atmosphere. From that point of view, it’s a real plus to burn coal and oil.”

In fact, there’s more solid evidence for the beneficial effects of CO2 than the negative effects, he said. So why does the public hear only one side of this debate? Because the media do an awful job of reporting it.

“They’re absolutely lousy,” he said of American journalists. “That’s true also in Europe. I don’t know why they’ve been brainwashed.”

I know why: They’re lazy. Instead of digging into the details, most journalists are content to repeat that mantra about “consensus” among climate scientists.

The problem, said Dyson, is that the consensus is based on those computer models. Computers are great for analyzing what happened in the past, he said, but not so good at figuring out what will happen in the future. But a lot of scientists have built their careers on them. Hence the hatred for dissenters.

Full story

In the Washington Examiner today, there is this: Op-Ed: EPA’s carbon regs not based on sound science.

It is published by Joe D’Aleo on behalf of a number of people.  A longer more complete version of the essay is below, which could not be published for space reasons. Also included is a list of the 13 signers who drafted it.

EPA’s CO₂ Regulations are NOT Based on Sound Science

The Supreme Court, in Mass v. EPA, stated that the EPA must treat CO₂ and other Greenhouse Gases (GHGs), as “pollutants” and then carryout an analysis to determine whether the increasing concentrations in atmospheric CO₂ may reasonably be anticipated to endanger human health and welfare. The Court did not mandate regulation; rather it mandated that EPA go through an Endangerment Finding process.

EPA did so and on December 15, 2009 issued its ruling that CO₂ and other GHGs must be regulated. This EPA finding and associated rulings were immediately challenged in the DC Circuit Court. The DC Circuit ruled in favor of EPA, but given the two dissents from the December 20, 2012 decision denying rehearing en banc, the matter will very likely go to the Supreme Court.

If allowed to stand, the very existence of EPA’s Endangerment Finding requires regulation that significantly increases U.S. fossil fuel and electricity prices–negatively impacting job creation as well as energy, economic and national security.

To many scientists this situation seems incredible given the ample evidence that EPA’s finding is grossly flawed. In its finding, EPA claimed with 90-99% certainty that observed warming in the latter half of the twentieth century resulted from human activity. EPA bases its finding upon Three Lines of Evidence (LoE.)

Using the most credible empirical data available, it is relatively straightforward to soundly reject each of EPA’s Three LoE.

1.) EPA claims that the Global Average Surface Temperature (GAST) has been rising in a dangerous fashion over the last fifty years, in large part due to human- caused increases in atmospheric CO₂ concentrations. But “Global Warming” has not been global and has not set records in the regions where warming has occurred. For example, over this time period, while the Arctic has warmed, the Tropical oceans had a flat trend, and the Antarctic was slightly cooling. The most significant warming during this period occurred in the Northern Hemisphere, north of the Tropics. But, as the figure shows, over the last 130 years, the decade of the 1930’s still has the most U.S. State High Temperatures records. And, over the past 50 years, there were more new State Record Lows set than Record Highs. In fact, roughly 70% of the current State Record Highs were set prior to 1940.

http://epw.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Files.View&FileStore_id=66585975-a507-4d81-b750-def3ec74913d

2.) EPA’s Greenhouse Gas Fingerprint Theory is that in the Tropics, the upper troposphere is warming faster than the lower troposphere, and the lower troposphere is warming faster than the surface, all due to rising CO₂ concentrations. This is totally at odds with multiple robust, consistent, independently-derived empirical datasets, all showing no statistically significant positive (or negative) trend in temperature and thus, no difference in trend by altitude. Therefore, EPA’s theory as to how CO2 impacts GAST must be rejected.

3.) EPA relied upon Climate Models, all predicated on this Fingerprint Theory, that all fail standard model validation and forecast reliability tests. The models all forecast rising temperatures beyond 2000 although GAST has actually been flat. This is not surprising because EPA never carried out any published forecast reliability tests.

Bottom –Line: No scientist or team of scientists has come up with an empirically validated theory proving that higher Atmospheric CO2 Levels will lead to higher GAST–not EPA’s team and certainly not to the EPA’s 90-99% certainty. Moreover, if the causal link between higher atmospheric CO2 concentrations and higher GAST is broken by invalidating EPA’s Three LoE, then EPA’s claim that higher CO2 concentrations also cause sea level increases and more frequent and severe storms, floods and droughts is also disproved. Such causality claims require a validated theory that higher CO2 concentrations cause increases in GAST. Lacking such a validated theory, EPA’s entire house of cards collapses.

More generally, EPA violated both the scientific method and the Scientific Advisory Board statute intended to enforce the scientific method when it made its highly influential scientific assessment in the Endangerment Finding.

EPA’s own Inspector General stated as follows:

“EPA did not conduct a peer review of the TSD [Technical Support Document] that met all recommended steps in the Peer Review Handbook for peer reviews of influential scientific information or highly influential scientific assessments. {—} The handbook provides examples of ‘independent experts from outside EPA,’ that include NAS, an established Federal Advisory Committee Act mechanism (e.g., Science Advisory Board), and an ad hoc panel of independent experts outside the Agency.”

EPA’s outsourcing of the science to international organizations beyond the reach of U.S. laws has also been challenged. Moreover, the ClimateGate saga is testimony to the dedication of some to subvert the science for their own agenda. And, a Hockey Stick is now famous as a symbol of temperature data manipulated to generate public alarm.

In summary, it is not incorrect to argue that further study of the role GHGs play in climate is in order. However, with what is known now, it certainly seems that a new Endangerment Finding analysis is required, using, for example, the far more rigorous Science Advisory Board process suggested by EPA’s Inspector General. A Remand of EPA’s Endangerment Finding by the U.S. Supreme Court would be appropriate.

Opinion Piece Signer List (alphabetically)

Dr. Timothy Ball
Climatologist & Environmental Consultant
Ph.D. (Faculty of Science), University of London, England

Joseph S. D’Aleo
Chief Meteorologist
WeatherBell Analytics

Dr. Donald Easterbrook (Emeritus)
Professor of Geology
Western Washington University

Dr. Gordon J. Fulks
Astrophysicist
La Center, WA

Dr. Laurence I. Gould
Professor of Physics
University of Hartford

Dr. William M. Gray (Emeritus)
Professor of Atmospheric Science
Colorado State University

Dr. Anthony R. Lupo
Professor of Soil, Environmental, and Atmospheric Sciences
University of Missouri

Dr. Thomas P. Sheahen
Western Technology Inc.
Deer Park Maryland

Dr. S. Fred Singer (Emeritus)
Professor of Environmental Sciences
University of Virginia

George H. Taylor
Certified Consultant Meteorologist
President, Applied Climate Services

Dr. James P. Wallace III
President, & CEO, Jim Wallace & Associates LLC
Ph.D., Economics, Minor in Engineering, Brown University
M.S., Mechanical Engineering, Brown University
B.S., Aeronautical Engineering, Brown University

Anthony Watts
Former TV Meteorologist and founder of
SurfaceStations.org, Intelliweather, WattsUpWithThat

By RALPH B. ALEXANDER
New York Post, December 9, 2012

We first saw the impact in the science world. Global warming was touted as a catastrophic threat to life on earth. Modern life was deemed to be the cause. More specifically, the blame fell to the burning of hydrocarbons—which are the source of the abundant, affordable, and available energy that has given the developed world its many advantages and luxuries. Carbon footprint guilt was heaped upon big energy-consuming countries. After all, we were ruining the planet.

Change was needed to slow the rise of the oceans.

This opened the door for a whole host of policies aimed at reducing the use of fossil fuels. A Renewable Portfolio Standard—which mandates a set percentage of electricity be from renewable sources (mainly wind and solar)—is law in more than half the states. Cap and trade was proposed and passed by the House. Because it didn’t make it through the Senate, the EPA has been successfully bringing about the end goal through regulation. On a global scale, oil and coal have been demonized and natural gas is next. Untold billions have been poured into wind and solar subsidies.

The supposed “science” behind global warming—which morphed into climate change, paved the way for politics above economics.

The Obama Administration’s stimulus allocated $80-90 billion for green energy—even though the economics didn’t add up. Companies like Solyndra and A123 Systems (the first and the most recent domino to fall) received loans, grants, and, tax incentives to produce “green energy,” despite the junk-bond ratings that prevented private equity from jumping in until taxpayer dollars were committed. The majority of the recipients of the funds had favored status—they had connections to high-ranking Democrats such as President Obama, Vice President Biden, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, House Minority Leader Nancy Pelosi, or Senator Diane Feinstein (just to name a few)—politics above economics.

Interestingly, a series of emails exposed global warming, er, climate change, and the funding of green energy to be the scams that they are. Together they are “sustainable.”

On global warming, the “climategate” emails revealed that data had been manipulated and suppressed to produce the desired results.

On green energy, emails that came to light in the hearings held by the House Committee on Government Reform and Oversight showed how political connections were used to push loan guarantees through and expedite permits.

Within the past week some interesting details came to light on both scams.

On October 13, The UK Daily Mail newspaper brought out some new data. The Met Office, a British government agency described on its website as “a world leader in providing weather and climate services,” released some new data on climate change that seem to conflict with the generally accepted view of catastrophic manmade global warming. Back in March, the Met Office promoted data from 1998-2010 that supported the idea that the world had warmed even more than expected in the past ten years. They sent out a press release and held briefings for journalists. However, when the full dataset—up through August 2012—was released, showing that “the world stopped getting warmer almost 16 years ago,” the Met Office issued the new data “quietly on the internet without any fanfare.” The Daily Mail quotes Professor Phil Jones, of the climategate scandal fame, as admitting that “the climate models are imperfect,” and quotes Professor Judith Curry, head of the climate science department at Georgia Tech as agreeing that the computer models used to predict future warming were “deeply flawed.”

The new data “poses a fundamental challenge to the assumptions underlying every aspect of energy and climate change policy.”

On October 12, the Denver Post featured a guest commentary from Roger Pielke Jr., professor of environmental studies at the University of Colorado-Boulder. Titled “Climate spin is rampant,” Pielke addresses the “willing media” “spreading misinformation.” He states: “The logic behind such tactics is apparently that a sufficiently scared public will support the political program of those doing the scaring.”

While not directly referencing the Met Office’s quiet data release, Pielke cites Andrew Revkin, “who has covered the climate issue for decades for the New York Times.” Revkin explains that “the media tend to pay outsize attention to research developments that support a ‘hot’ conclusion … and glaze over on research of equivalent quality that does not.” Surely this is what happened with the Met’s report.

Pielke concludes his commentary with these words: “There is one group that should be very concerned about the spreading of rampant misinformation: the scientific community. It is, of course, thrilling to appear in the media and get caught up in highly politicized debates. But leading scientists and scientific organizations that contribute to a campaign of misinformation—even in pursuit of a worthy goal like responding effectively to climate change—may find that the credibility of science itself is put at risk by supporting scientifically unsupportable claims in pursuit of a political agenda.”

Politics above science. But this politically driven “science” is needed to support politics above economics.

On October 15, the Wall Street Journal ran an editorial discussing the special treatment Solyndra, the bankrupt solar manufacturer, received from the Department of Energy: “Solyndra’s investors could be rewarded for their failures.” The WSJ claims that “Solyndra’s only real assets are what the IRS calls ‘tax attributes.’”

The short version is that Solyndra’s investors, who finagled a deal to subordinate taxpayer repayment rights to private investors, could emerge from bankruptcy with the ability to apply the net operating losses (NOL) against the profits of a profitable company owned by the same investors. What is interesting is who the “investors” are. WSJ states that Argonaut Ventures I LLC is “Solyndra’s largest shareholder and the primary investment arm of the George Kaiser Family Foundation. Mr. Kaiser is a Tulsa oil billionaire who bundled campaign checks for Mr. Obama in 2008.”

Emails revealed through the Solyndra bankruptcy show that Steve Mitchell, Argonaut’s managing director, wrote these words to Kaiser: “The DOE thinks politically before it thinks economically”—politics above economics. After Obama called Solyndra a “testament to American ingenuity and dynamism,” apparently the DOE wanted to “delay the Solyndra crack-up that was fast becoming inevitable.” Solyndra needed the “loan’s remaining $95 million immediately, instead of in monthly drawdowns, and to restructure its terms.” For Kaiser, the NOLs were the “consolation prize.”

The “true sustainability?” Government funds climate change research that supports the “catastrophic” messaging. Science and media willingly cooperate. Catastrophic reports provide the foundation for “green energy” investments that go to Obama—and other high-ranking Democrats—campaign donors. Investors get special favors—like the Solyndra taxpayer subordination—and come out on top. They, then, donate to the campaigns—getting their “friends” re-elected. The perpetual motion machine keeps running at the taxpayers’ expense—all to “evade political accountability.”

We know the story with Solyndra. Last week, A123 Systems filed for bankruptcy. Who knows what special deals they got? We won’t know before the election. There are 14 other stimulus-funded green-energy companies that have gone bankrupt—though the number could be higher. It will likely take years for the details of each deal to be exposed.

This is what happens when politics take precedence above all else. Obama’s economic model picks winners and losers and misallocates capital, while sticking it to the taxpayers.

Perhaps this is why Obama’s crony rich friends are willing to agree to higher taxes for millionaires and billionaires—they have their “tax attributes” in their NOLs (paid for by the average, middle-class taxpayer).

The author of Energy Freedom, Marita Noon serves as the executive director for Energy Makes America Great Inc. and the companion educational organization, the Citizens’ Alliance for Responsible Energy (CARE). Together they work to educate the public and influence policy makers regarding energy, its role in freedom, and the American way of life. Combining energy, news, politics, and, the environment through public events, speaking engagements, and media, the organizations’ combined efforts serve as America’s voice for energy.

by GLENN FARLEY / KING 5 News

WOODINVILLE -– Washington winemakers believe the 2012 vintage could be one of their best, thanks to this year’s long growing season filled with plenty of hot weather in the daytime and cool nights.

The weather has helped produce what’s expected to be a record-setting grape crop — 200,000 tons above earlier forecasts.

“This is the type of year that can really make a big difference. A pinnacle year for Washington,” said Ted Baseler, CEO of Chateau Ste.

Michelle, the state’s largest winery, which will handle over half the crop.

There are nearly 750 wineries in Washington state, a number that continues to grow. A new five-year plan from the The Washington Wine Commission envisions boosting vineyard acreage by a third, from the current 43,000 in wine production to more than 62,000 by 2017.

Baseler said he believes the industry will top 200,000 acres in 20 years, making it roughly half the size as the California industry is now.

“There’s high potential in the next 20 years. If we continue to see growth in the industry and focus and world demand on Washington,” he said.

A report published in April by the Washington State Wine Commission estimated the state’s wine industry was responsible for

$8.6-billion in direct and indirect economic activity and employed nearly 30,000 people.

Washington wines are currently exported to 100 countries and are sold all over the United States. And per capita wine consumption in the U.S. is only about a third of the amount in Europe.  That leaves a lot of room for growth in the American market, and awards are bringing more notice to Washington wine.”

Among significant wind storms in Oregon, the Columbus Day storm stands alone. Nothing before nor since has matched the intensity and damage of that storm, although a few have come close. The “storm” was actually three storms in quick succession. The first formed as a trough off the coast of Oregon on the 11th; it moved northward, and then northwestward, and began to taper off on the 12th. The second (and most destructive) storm formed from the remnants of Typhoon Freda, which moved northeastward from the Philippines, nearing the west coast early on the 12th. As it neared California, the storm nearly stopped moving, intensified, and began to slowly move northward just off the coast. As it moved, it wreaked havoc from northern California to British Columbia.

The storm reached the Oregon coast on the afternoon of the 12th. The central pressure of the storm dropped lower and lower, finally reaching 28.42 inches. Winds were strong along the coast, but even stronger inland. At Mt. Hebo in the Coast Range west of Salem, measured wind speeds reached 131 mph before the anemometer was destroyed by the winds. On the Morrison Street bridge in Portland, winds gusted to 116 mph (in Naselle, Washington they reached 160 mph). Trees, houses, and power lines were destroyed throughout the state; in some cases residents were without power for 2 to 3 weeks. Giant towers holding the main power lines into Portland (over 500 feet high) were knocked down. The Red Cross estimated that 84 homes were completely destroyed, 5000 severely damaged, and 50,000 moderately damaged. 23 people died in Oregon alone, and damages were estimated at $170 million.

Locally, something remarkable happened. Corvallis Airport collected hourly observations at that time, via a human observer (weather data are now collected on an automated station). On October 12, the wind speeds got higher and higher, finally peaking at 110 knots (127 mph) at 4 p.m. Just below that, where the next several observations would go, are several blank lines and the words “Abandoned Station” noted at 4:15. A few lines farther down, just before observations began again, the observer wrote that several readings were “unreported due to power failure and instruments demolished.”

That brings to mind several questions: (1) how much stronger did the winds get after the anemometer was destroyed? (2) where did the observers go?

To (1), my guess is that it didn’t get much stronger, since most Valley sites seemed to observe their maximum winds at about that time.

Question (2) is a different matter, and I’m clueless. I wonder if there was a cellar to hide in. Surely they wouldn’t go outside and drive away, would they?

I may never know. But I do know this: the Columbus Day Storm was by far the biggest and most significant wind storm the Northwest ever had. My friend Wolf Read, the Northwest’s premier wind expert, told it this way:

In the Willamette Valley on Columbus Day, the lowest of reported maximum wind gusts was Eugene at 86 mph (Salem was 90, Portland 116 and Troutdale 106). No other storm has had a SINGLE location that reached 86 mph in the Valley.

Finally, I’ll throw our an idea Wolf Read shared with me some years ago. Noting that the period from the late 1950s through the early 1960s had a surprisingly large number of big wind storms, Wolf discovered that those years were the heyday of above-ground nuclear tests, including a Russian detonation of 100 megatons (October 30, 1961). The “Partial Test Ban Treaty” signed in November, 1962 (a month after the Columbus Day Storm) ended the massive nuclear tests.

But Wolf’s question still haunts me: could nuclear testing have been responsible for the observed increase in wind storms at that time? We may never know.

“The Columbus Day Storm is the benchmark storm for which all other storms are compared to across the Pacific Northwest. The violent and deadly storm struck on October 12th 1962 with winds gusting as high as 130 MPH in the Willamette Valley and 170 MPH along the Oregon coast. Nearly 50 people perished in the storm.” Chapter President Steve Pierce says, “we have gathered together leading experts from across the Pacific Northwest to offer the public an event that will be remembered for years to come. We will take a look deep inside the storm, as seen through the eyes of the public and the Meteorologists who tracked it. We will present rare audio and video recordings from the night of the storm featuring late KGW Meteorologist Jack Capell and those who were present when the 600ft tall KGW transmitter tower fell to the ground. We will also feature several survivor stories and plenty of photographs, some of which have rarely been seen publicly. Finally, we will take a look at the chances of seeing a similar storm in the future. The public is encouraged to attend this event and bring along anyone who may have a harrowing personal story to share or memorabilia item to display. The demographic of folks who are old enough to remember this tragic storm is shrinking with time and it would be great if these folks would attend this event and share a memory with younger generations.”

Formal Commemoration Ceremony Lineup

Welcome & Opening Remarks
Steve Pierce, Oregon AMS President

Headline Technical Presentation
National Weather Service, Portland
“How the storm formed and where it tracked”

Supporting Presentations
Jim Little, Meteorologist – Oregon Department Forestry
“Broadcast media coverage of the storm”

George Miller, Meteorologist Retired – National Weather Service
“Photographic retrospective of storm damage”

Brian MacMillan, Meteorologist / Reporter  – KPTV Ch. 12 Portland
“The damage, the survivor stories (video)”

Wolf Read, Windstorm Expert / PhD Candidate (University of British Columbia)
“A climatological perspective – return cycles of powerful storms to strike the Pacific NW.”

Audience Question/Answer Session with Presenters

Raffle – Davis Weather Station & More

Please note — OMSI’s main auditorium will hold approximately 300 guests. Please arrive early in order to be assured a seat. Once standing room capacity has been met, the only additional viewing area will be from the hallway outside. For complete meeting details, including overnight accommodations in and around Portland, please see the Oregon AMS web site at: http://www.ametsoc.org/chapters/oregon/.

Who is the Oregon AMS? The Oregon chapter of the American Meteorological Society (AMS) was founded in 1947 and is the single largest local chapter of the American Meteorological Society (AMS) in the country, with 170 members. The national headquarters of the American Meteorological Society (AMS) has approximately 130 active local chapters across the country. The Oregon AMS chapter normally hosts eight monthly meetings from September to June that are free and open to all ages of the general public. The Oregon AMS welcomes the public to become chapter members for just $10 per year. The Oregon AMS chapter mission statement reads, “The purpose of this society shall be to advance professional ideals in the science of meteorology and to promote the development, exchange, and application of meteorological knowledge.” Our meetings are always found on our web site: http://www.ametsoc.org/chapters/oregon 

It’s been quite a year! Summer began late but seems to be persisting. But let me break the news to you: winter is coming soon!

Below is my forecast for “home” — the Willamette Valley. But overall conditions will be similar for most of northwestern Oregon and southwest Washington.

Every year for the last 20 I have issued a fall-winter “climate” forecast at this time. I don’t predict day-to-day conditions (“weather”) but rather overall averages (“climate”). Here’s what I predicted last year, and what happened:

September-

What I said: continued warm and dry for most of the month — above-average temperatures and below-average precipitation..

What happened: nailed it! The month was hotter than an average August, and very dry.

October-

What I said: dry, mild first half, cooler and wetter second half, but all told a mild and relatively dry month.

What happened: the month was mild, but not dry. Almost three inches of rain fell – slightly below average, but not exactly “dry.”

November-February-

What I said: a quiet November with considerable valley fog, with active weather beginning in December and continuing into February. Low elevation snow most likely in late January and early February.

What happened: November didn’t have much fog, but was “quiet.” December was quiet and foggy. The real active weather began in January, when we had almost twice the rain of an average January, plus some snow in mid-month. February was “dull,” but March got crazy, with lots of rain and wind.

March-April-

What I said: drier than average but rather cool.

What happened: Cool, yes, but wet, wet, wet!

Summary: all in all, I did okay. Nailed some, missed some.

This year’s forecast:

This year we are watching the tropical Pacific (as always) and see weak El Niño conditions occurring. El Niño conditions tend to bring us drier- and warmer-than-average winters. The Climate Prediction Center (NOAA) is predicting the following for our area:

September-November: average temperatures, below-average precipitation.

December – February: above-average temperatures, average precipitation

March-May: average temperatures, below-average precipitation

My forecast is based largely on the tropical Pacific, but I also look at similar years in the past, since “history tends to repeat itself.” Here’s what I predict:

September: continued warmer and drier than average

October: mild and dry first half but stormy second half

November: just the opposite of October: stormy mild first half but and dry second half

December: relatively dry and mild but with valley fog

January: similar to December

February: active month, with considerable rain; 50-50 chance of snow

March: wet, windy and wild

April: a dry and mild second half

May: dry and mild

We’ll see who’s right!

Comments from:

Judith Curry

Fred Singer:

Winning the AGW science debate: Here’s how

The upcoming election battles may be unique in offering for the first time a debate about Global Warming. Neither Bush-Gore nor McCain-Obama chose to discuss the issue – maybe because they were not that far apart. By contrast, Barack Obama has already announced that, if re-elected, climate change will be an important priority — while Paul Ryan is an assertive skeptic on AGW (anthropogenic global warming).

The science of climate change is not only of academic interest but has been leading to proposals that advocate large-scale changes in energy use and supply — with important economic consequences. The burden of proof for AGW therefore falls on those who call for such policies. They must demonstrate with reasonable certainty that human activities are causing global warming, that a future warming will cause significant global economic and ecological damage, and that it would be more cost-effective to mitigate now than to adapt later. They must also be ready to respond to any critique of the underlying science.

I would start by asking AGW supporters the following question “What is your single most important piece of evidence for AGW?” I have received many answers to this question but most of them can be disposed of in a trivial way. Some examples are:

• ”Man-made CO2 is increasing in the atmosphere.” True, but is warming increasing as a result?

• ”Climate models predict rising climate temperatures in the future.” True, but models are not evidence.

• ”Glaciers are melting, sea ice is shrinking, storms are increasing, droughts and floods are increasing.” Even if any of these were true, they don’t reveal the cause and certainly cannot furnish temperature data, like thermometers.

• ”Sea Levels are rising.” But they have been rising for 18,000 years, and there is no evidence that the current rate of rise is affected by temperature; 20^th century data show no acceleration.

• A common misleading reply by AGW supporters: “The past decade is the warmest in X years”
  This may be true, provided X is chosen appropriately, but the current trend over the past decade has been approximately zero. [One must not confuse Trend (measured in degrees C/decade) with temperature (measured in degrees C). According to climate models, it is an increased temperature trend that should relate to any increasing trend in greenhouse gases.]

But note also that climate seems to follow long-term cycles of about 1500 years [Singer and Avery “Unstoppable Global Warming: Every 1500 years” 2007]. If the ‘Bond-cycle’ is active now, we may expect further, irregular, warming in the present century and beyond – entirely due to natural causes, likely related to the Sun.

Finally, a common response simply appeals to the report of the UN-IPCC. To which one should say: “OK, then let’s see if it holds up to scrutiny.” [Note that the “evidence” presented as crucial has been different in all of the past four IPCC assessment reports.] The latest IPCC claim for AGW is laid out simply in the Summary for Policymakers on page 10 of the 2007 report: “Most of the observed increase in global average temperatures since the mid 20th century is very likely [i.e., 90-99% sure] due to observed anthropogenic increase of greenhouse gases.”

• This claim is advanced in the SPM and eventually backed up by fig. 9.5 on page 684 of the report. The models are “fitted” to the observed temperature record from 1900 up to about 1970 by choosing suitable sensitivities and model parameters, using “expert judgment.” But the figure shows a large gap after 1970 between reported temperatures and unforced models (i.e., models that do not incorporate an increase in GH (greenhouse) gases).

  

   

[Heavy Black line: Global Ave Surface Temp Blue: Superposition of models without GH gases]
________________________________________________________________________

The IPCC, claiming that they completely understand all natural forcings, now asserts that only AGW (i.e., forcing by anthropogenic GH gases) can explain the gap between the reported global average surface temperature (GAST) and models that do not include GH-gas forcing. (This is an instance of the common logical fallacy of ‘argument from ignorance.’ Even if the warming since 1970 were exceptional, and even if science were unaware of any natural explanation for it, that unawareness would not constitute certain evidence that GH gases are responsible.)

Even if we were to accept the IPCC’s assertion for the sake of argument, note that the temperature curve refers to global surface average temperature and that the models are retro-fitted to the temperature data by a suitable choice of climate sensitivities and parameters of the models.

Fair enough, but can the same sensitivities and parameters also explain temperature data that are non-global: e.g., the mean for the northern hemisphere (NH) and the mean for the SH? Can they explain ocean temperature data? Can they explain atmospheric temperature trends? And finally, can they explain temperature trends derived from non-thermometer data of various proxies (tree rings, lake sediments, stalagmites, ice cores, etc.)?

Note that the sensitivities and parameters are chosen with great care in order to reach agreement with the reported GAST data; yet the same IPCC report admits to very large uncertainties about most forcings (in fact, 11 out of 16), particularly from aerosols and clouds. But the greatest uncertainty arises from implicit feedbacks that the models assume will amplify direct warming from GH gases. In particular, there is uncertainty about the feedback from water vapor and clouds: the IPCC claims a positive feedback, i.e., an amplification of GH forcing of nearly threefold — while others adduce evidence for a negative feedback, i.e., opposing GH warming. This is a matter that needs to be resolved urgently; and, until it is, the science underlying the “official” IPCC claim cannot seriously be regarded as “settled.”

The models are largely unable to represent or capture important natural forcings, for example, well-documented climate oscillations involving the oceans, such as the North Atlantic Oscillation or Pacific Decadal Oscillation. Also omitted from the models are the effects of solar-activity changes– in spite of excellent evidence, supported by a growing body of published results, that solar-caused cosmic-ray variations strongly correlate with terrestrial climate changes.

Turning next to climate observations, there are many questions about the reliability of the reported land-surface temperature data reported by weather stations. Mid-troposphere temperatures do not agree with surface trends — a disparity that a National Academy of Sciences climate panel tried unsuccessfully to resolve in 2000. It seems that mid-troposphere temperature trends derived from radiosondes in weather balloons and from microwave instruments in satellites both show negligible tropical warming in the last decades of the 20th century. Data are never perfect and there may be corrections necessary. However, for the time being, these two independent datasets show remarkable agreement with one another, and remarkable disagreement with what the IPCC models would expect as a result of anthropogenic warming.

Ocean data have been notoriously difficult to reconcile, since they employ so many different types of instrumentation. These include buckets, buoys, ship-engine cooling-water inlet temperatures, and both infrared and microwave satellite observations. Unfortunately, there are problems with each of the datasets; their coherence is often different from what one might expect. One example: inlet temperatures seem to be warmer than bucket and drifter buoys that measure temperatures close to the surface– just opposite to what would be expected.

Additional ocean datasets do not show the warming observed by land weather stations; for example, night-time marine air temperatures (NMAT) confirm the strong warming up to 1940 and cooling to 1975, but show only a small recovery, with maximum temperatures in the 1990s no greater than 1940. Similarly, data of ocean heat content (OHC) do not show a warming trend from 1978 to 2000 — although it should be noted that 20^th-century OHC data is of poor quality and has been subject to frequent corrections.

Finally, we have non-thermometer proxy data, which mostly show no warming from 1978 to 1997. Most confirm the 1910-40 warming from weather stations — but also show no post-1940 warming. It would be interesting to examine the large dataset assembled by the authors of the “hockeystick” to see what temperatures are observed after 1978; unfortunately, their publication stops at just at that point and their underlying data have not been made accessible.

It should be clear by now that the strong AGW claims of the IPCC are based on rather flimsy evidence. We look forward to the next IPCC report due in 2013-14 to see if additional data and model results show better support for their claim. I serve as an “expert reviewer” of this report but have not seen any such evidence in the first draft.

***

In the meantime we can post certain question to the AGW supporters and await their answers:

**Why did climate warm between 1910 and 1940?

**Why did climate cool from 1940-1975? If the cause is assumed to be aerosols, also please explain the separate trends observed in the northern and southern hemispheres and compare with climate models. This asymmetry has been a puzzle for some time.

**Why is there a step increase (temperature “jump”) in 1976-77 — and again in 2001-2002? Such jumps are not in accord with the slow steady increase calculated by climate models.

**Why is there no pronounced warming trend since 2002?

**And finally, why no warming for night-time marine air temperatures, troposphere, and proxies in the last two decades of the 20th century — in conflict with reported land-surface temperatures? Could one admit the possibility that there might be something wrong with the land-surface data used by IPCC as ‘evidence’ for AGW?

For these and many similar reasons, scientific debate about the extent and implications of the anthropogenic contribution to past and future global warming is essential for formulating a rational energy policy as the keystone for economic prosperity. The upcoming election battles may provide such an opportunity.

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S. Fred Singer is professor emeritus at the University of Virginia and director of the Science & Environmental Policy Project.  His specialty is atmospheric and space physics.   An expert in remote sensing and satellites, he served as the founding director of the US Weather Satellite Service and, more recently, as vice chair of the US National Advisory Committee on Oceans & Atmosphere. He is a Senior Fellow of the Heartland Institute and the Independent Institute. He has also held several government positions and served as an energy adviser to Treasury Secretary Wm. Simon. He co-authored the NY Times best-seller “Unstoppable Global Warming: Every 1500 years.” In 2007, he founded and has chaired the NIPCC (Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change), which has released several scientific reports [See http://www.NIPCC.org. He is the founding chairman of Virginia Scientists & Engineers for Energy & Environment (VA-SEEE). For recent writings see http://www.americanthinker.com/s_fred_singer/ and also Google Scholar.

1. It is popular again to claim that extreme events, such as the current central U.S.
drought, are evidence of human-caused climate change. Actually, the Earth is very large,
the weather is very dynamic, and extreme events will continue to occur somewhere,
every year, naturally. The recent “extremes” were exceeded in previous decades.

2. The average warming rate of 34 CMIP5 IPCC models is greater than observations,
suggesting models are too sensitive to CO2. Policy based on observations, where year-to-year variations cause the most harm, will likely be far more effective than policies based on speculative model output, no matter what the future climate does.

3. New discoveries explain part of the warming found in traditional surface temperature
datasets. This partial warming is unrelated to the accumulation of heat due to the extra
greenhouse gases, but related to human development around the thermometer stations.
This means traditional surface datasets are limited as proxies for greenhouse warming.

4. Widely publicized consensus reports by “thousands” of scientists are misrepresentative
of climate science, containing overstated confidence in their assertions of high climate
sensitivity. They rarely represent the range of scientific opinion that attends our
relatively murky field of climate research. Funding resources are recommended for “Red
Teams” of credentialed, independent investigators, who already study low climate
sensitivity and the role of natural variability. Policymakers need to be aware of the full
range of scientific views, especially when it appears that one-sided-science is the basis
for promoting significant increases to the cost of energy for the citizens.

5. Atmospheric CO2 is food for plants which means it is food for people and animals.
More CO2 generally means more food for all. Today, affordable carbon-based energy is
a key component for lifting people out of crippling poverty. Rising CO2 emissions are,
therefore, one indication of poverty-reduction which gives hope for those now living in a
marginal existence without basic needs brought by electrification, transportation and
industry. Additionally, modern, carbon-based energy reduces the need for deforestation
and alleviates other environmental problems such as water and air pollution. Until
affordable energy is developed from non-carbon sources, the world will continue to use
carbon as the main energy source as it does today.