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Rainforest Action Network issued the invitation to the former Vice President, according to RAN executive director Michael Brune. The San Francisco-based group has a twenty-year history of protesting against destructive logging practices and other causes of climate change; it specializes in targeting corporations as much as governments.

Read the rest of the article, ‘If Gore Were Arrested… ‘

Collectively, the current IPCC computer modelled scenarios for the iconic doubling of atmospheric CO2 range from 1.1C to 6.4C, with a ‘most likely’ range of 2C to 4.5C. Higher estimates have a much lower probability of being accurate.

In this week’s Science magazine there are two related papers that discuss climate sensitivity:

Why Is Climate Sensitivity So Unpredictable?

Gerard H. Roe* and Marcia B. Baker

Uncertainties in projections of future climate change have not lessened substantially in past decades. Both models and observations yield broad probability distributions for long-term increases in global mean temperature expected from the doubling of atmospheric carbon dioxide, with small but finite probabilities of very large increases. We show that the shape of these probability distributions is an inevitable and general consequence of the nature of the climate system, and we derive a simple analytic form for the shape that fits recent published distributions very well. We show that the breadth of the distribution and, in particular, the probability of large temperature increases are relatively insensitive to decreases in uncertainties associated with the underlying climate processes.

Call Off the Quest

Myles R. Allen and David J. Frame

Over the past 30 years, the climate research community has made valiant efforts to answer the “climate sensitivity” question: What is the long-term equilibrium warming response to a doubling of atmospheric carbon dioxide? Earlier this year, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (1) concluded that this sensitivity is likely to be in the range of 2° to 4.5°C, with a 1-in-3 chance that it is outside that range. The lower bound of 2°C is slightly higher than the 1.6°C proposed in the 1970s (2); progress on the upper bound has been minimal.

In a nut shell, the limits have been reached for model estimations of the upper bound and therefore even more complex models will be unable to resolve the greater uncertainty of higher bound estimates, so it’s time to “call off the search.”

New Scientist’s take is:

Climate is too complex for accurate predictions

Excerpt: “This finding reinforces not only that climate policies will necessarily be made in the face of deep, irreducible uncertainties,” says Roger Pielke, a climate policy expert at the University of Colorado at Boulder, US. “But also the uncomfortable reality – for climate modellers – that finite research dollars invested in ever more sophisticated climate models offer very little marginal benefit to decision makers.”

Personally, I disagree with the statement made in Science magazine that “This persistent, high-temperature tail of low probability has been one impediment to political action, as policy-makers have been reluctant to formulate policies to address climate change when the range of uncertainty is so large.” If this is true, then I haven’t noticed.

Climate alarmists never miss an opportunity to capitilise on other people’s misery in order to fuel the global warming gravy train. Hurricane Katrina was a prime example, and now the California fires are an opportunity not to be missed. CNN are leading the way with their ‘Planet in Peril’ special that may well try to make a link between the fires and global warming. The rest of the mainstream media aren’t far behind.

Meanwhile, the FBI have shot dead a suspected arsonist and confirmed that a huge fire in the town of Santiago in Orange County that destroyed 10 homes was started on purpose in two different places. Furthermore, Northern Hemisphere Tropical Cyclone Activity is on course to match the record low of 1977. This could at least partly explain the lack of moisture/drought in the US Southwest. Remember, global warming was supposed to increase hurricane intensity and frequency, and in 2005 alarmists were suggesting a new category 6 classification would be needed for hurricanes.

It seems that global warming has become a ubiquitous explanation for every natural weather event. Shame on you!

Climate policy after 2012, when the Kyoto treaty expires, needs a radical rethink. More of the same won’t do, argue Gwyn Prins and Steve Rayner.

The Kyoto Protocol is a symbolically important expression of governments’ concern about climate change. But as an instrument for achieving emissions reductions, it has failed. It has produced no demonstrable reductions in emissions or even in anticipated emissions growth. And it pays no more than token attention to the needs of societies to adapt to existing climate change. The impending United Nations Climate Change Conference being held in Bali in December — to decide international policy after 2012 — needs to radically rethink climate policy.

Read Time to ditch Kyoto in this week’s Nature News (no subscription required).