Archives for January 2008

Roger Pielke, Jr. is a believer in man-made global warming. Pielke Jr. directs the University of Colorado’s Center for Science and Technology Policy Research and also is an associate professor of environmental studies. So the article below is a very significant slam against Andrew Dessler, Eli Rabett and Raymond Pierrehumbert.

Pielke JR (not SR) Takes on Critics of Senate 400 ‘Consensus Busters’ Scientist Report!

Pielke Jr. Slams ‘Attack Dog climate scientists’ engaging in ‘Character Assassination’ of Scientists on Senate Report

Excerpt: And this leads to the repugnant behavior of the attack dog climate scientists who otherwise would like to be taken seriously. By engaging in the character assassination of people who happen to find themselves on Senator Inhofe’s list they reinforce the absurd notion that scientific claims can be adjudicated solely by head counts and a narrow view of professional qualifications. They can’t. (See this enlightening and amusing discussion by Dan Sarewitz of leading experts arguing over who is qualified to comment on climate issues.) But by suggesting that knowledge claims can be judged by credentials the attack dog scientists reinforce an anti-democratic authoritarian streak found in the activist wing of the climate science community. Of course, from the perspective of the activist scientists such attacks may be effective if they dissuade other challenges to orthodoxy, but surely climate scientists deserving of the designation should be encouraging challenges to knowledge claims, rather than excoriating anyone who dares to challenge their beliefs. […]The climate science community – or at least its most publicly visible activist wing – seems to be working as hard as possible to undercut the legitimacy and the precarious trust than society provides in support of activities of the broader scientific community. Senator Inhofe is a politician, and plays politics. If activist climate scientists wish to play the Senator’s game, then don’t be surprised to see common wisdom viewing these activists more as political players than trustworthy experts. If this is correct then maybe the Senator is a bit more astute than given credit for.

http://sciencepolicy.colorado.edu/prometheus/archives/science_politics/001338witanagemot_justice_.html

A new paper published in the journal Geology suggests that it may be possible to seed carbon-rich environments with bacteria to create natural gas reservoirs. The study may also help explain high levels of methane in the atmosphere that occurred between ice ages, a trend recorded in ice cores taken from Greenland and Antarctica.

Read more in ScienceDaily: ‘Natural Gas Formation By Bacteria Linked To Climate Change And Renewable Energy’

The original paper is here:

Geology
Article: pp. 139–142 Volume 36, Issue 2 (February 2008)

Abstract

A new model linking atmospheric methane sources to Pleistocene glaciation via methanogenesis in sedimentary basins

M.J. Formolo1, J.M. Salacup1, S.T. Petsch1, A.M. Martini2, and K. Nüsslein3

1. Department of Geosciences, University of Massachusetts–Amherst, Amherst, Massachusetts 01003, USA, 2. Department of Geology, Amherst College, Amherst, Massachusetts 01002, USA, 3. Department of Microbiology, University of Massachusetts–Amherst, Amherst, Massachusetts 01003, USA

Methane (CH4) is an important greenhouse gas and amplifier of climate change. However, the causes of atmospheric CH4 variations over glacial-interglacial cycles remain unresolved. We propose that microbial methanogenesis along the shallow margins of sedimentary basins provides a source of atmospheric CH4 temporally connected with both advance and retreat of continental ice sheets. Extensive biodegradation of hydrocarbons in the Antrim Shale Formation, Michigan, United States, is associated with an active subsurface consortium of fermentative and methanogenic microorganisms. This activity was initially stimulated when saline formation waters were diluted by meltwater derived from overriding Pleistocene ice sheets. During glaciation, CH4 produced by this community accumulated in the shale at a rate of 1 Tg CH4 per 1000 yr as a result of ice coverage and increased hydrostatic pressure. We estimate that at present the Antrim Shale contains only 12%–25% of the cumulative mass of CH4 generated in the shale over the Pleistocene, indicating that CH4 that had accumulated during glaciation was subsequently released following ice-sheet retreat. While release from the Antrim Shale represents only a small part of the global CH4 budget, when extended to other glaciated sedimentary basins, subsurface methanogenesis may generate a substantial, previously unrecognized source of atmospheric CH4 during deglaciation.

Keywords: methane, biogeochemistry, black shale, glaciation

The UK’s CRU has updated its HadCRUT3v temperatures. Global average anomalies for November and December 2007 are now present but are provisional for a few months in case late data arrives.

No wonder newspaper reports haven’t mentioned it – November’s global temperature anomaly of 0.258 was the lowest since October 2000’s 0.201 and December 2007 was 0.221. The annual global average anomaly for 2007 is currently shown as 0.398, or the coolest since year 2000.

The annual average for the Southern Hemisphere in 2007 was the lowest since 1996. November and December temperatures were the coolest since 1992.

The annual average for the Northern Hemisphere remained at the 2002-2006 level. A very warm start to the year offset the cooling late in the year.

Global data at http://www.cru.uea.ac.uk/cru/data/temperature/hadcrut3vgl.txt.

Other data available via
http://www.cru.uea.ac.uk/cru/data/temperature/

(under “HadCRUT3v” in table about 50% down the page).

John McLean

I can barely keep up with the current raft of peer reviewed papers that drive yet more nails into the coffin of climate alarmism. Following on from the fading huricane scare that I recently blogged about here, a new paper published in Nature on 17th January, further destroys the myth that ocean currents will slow due to global warming:

The scientific community has long believed that as global warming continues and large amounts of freshwater ice melt into the ocean, the ocean’s circulation will slow. This would have a catastrophic impact on the environment as vividly, if somewhat overdramatically, portrayed in the film “The Day After Tomorrow.” But a paper published last week in Nature magazine, the result of several studies of past and possible future weather, says that in fact the very opposite is true and ocean circulation will become stronger as the icecaps melt.
Eric Schwartz, Arizona Daily Star, 30 January 2008

The evidence is piling up, that those models predicting a weakened ocean circulation in the coming decades are wrong.
Joellen Russell, University of Arizona, Russell, 30 January 2008

Current climate-system models say that the ocean’s overturning circulation will weaken over the next century, but these predictions might not rest on a solid foundation… From the observations, it is clear that large circulation changes took place, and it seems unlikely that circulation changes of this magnitude could have happened without substantial changes in the wind forcing. It seems that the information from the past is telling us to expect a stronger oceanic circulation in the warmer climate to come.
J. R. Toggweiler & Joellen Russell, Nature 17 January 2008

The full paper is here:

Nature 451, 286-288 (17 January 2008)

Ocean circulation in a warming climate

J. R. Toggweiler 1) & Joellen Russell 2)

1) J. R. Toggweiler is at the Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Princeton, New Jersey 08542, USA.

2) Joellen Russell is in the Department of Geosciences, University of Arizona, Tucson, Arizona 85721, USA.

Correspondence should be addressed to J.R.T. (Email: robbie.toggweiler@noaa.gov).

Climate models predict that the ocean’s circulation will weaken in response to global warming, but the warming at the end of the last ice age suggests a different outcome.

Enjoy!

Hat tip to Benny Peiser’s CCNet.