Jennifer Marohasy

a forum for the discussion of issues concerning the natural environment

Climate & Climate Change

Peer Review Process at IPCC Formally Questioned

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A standing committee of the U.S. House of Representatives has formally written to the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) questioning the integrity of the Third Assessment Report and asking nine specific questions.

The letter from Committee Chairman, begins:

Questions have been raised, according to a February 14, 2005 article in The Wall Street Journal, about the significance of methodological flaws and data errors in studies by Dr. Michael Mann and co-authors of the historical record of temperatures and climate change. We understand that these studies of temperature proxies (tree rings, ice cores, corals, etc.) formed the basis for a new finding in the 2001 United Nation’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Third Assessment Report (TAR). This finding – that the increase in 20th century northern hemisphere temperatures is “likely to have been the largest of any century during the past 1,000 years” and that the “1990s was the warmest decade and 1998 the warmest year” – has since been referenced widely and has become a prominent feature of the public debate surrounding climate change policy.

However, in recent peer-reviewed articles in Science, Geophysical Research Letters, Energy & Environment, among others, researchers question the results of this work. As these researchers find, based on the available information, the conclusions concerning temperature histories – and hence whether warming in the 20th century is actually unprecedented – cannot be supported by the Mann et. al. studies. In addition, we understand from the February 14 Journal and these other reports that researchers have failed to replicate the findings of these studies, in part because of problems with the underlying data and the calculations used to reach the conclusions. Questions have also been raised concerning the sharing and dissemination of the data and methods used to perform the studies. For example, according to the January 2005 Energy & Environment, the information necessary to replicate the analyses in the studies has not been made fully available to researchers upon request.

The concerns surrounding these studies reflect upon the quality and transparency of federally funded research and of the IPCC review process – two matters of particular interest to the Committee. For example, one concern relates to whether IPCC review has been sufficiently robust and independent. We understand that Dr. Michael Mann, the lead author of the studies in question, was also a lead author of the IPCC chapter that assessed and reported this very same work, and that two co-authors of the studies were also contributing authors to the same chapter. Given the prominence these studies were accorded in the IPCC TAR, we seek to learn more about the facts and circumstances that led to acceptance and prominent use of this work in the IPCC TAR and to understand what this controversy indicates about the data quality of key IPCC studies.

For complete letter and questions click here:
http://energycommerce.house.gov/108/Letters/06232005_1570.htm

Cloud Seeding

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According to ABC Online :

A cloud-seeding project is expected to bring extra snow to the Snowy Mountains in New South Wales this season.
The State Government says when clouding-seeding was done in the area last year, it created 25 per cent more snow.
The technique involves sending tiny amounts of silver iodide into winter storm clouds, and is being trialled over a 1,000 kilometre square part of the Kosciuszko National Park.

The Minister for Primary Industries, Ian Macdonald, says the technology is bringing both economic and environmental benefits.
“This will help the amount of snow in the mountains, which is good for the ski industry, which is important for the regional tourism industry, as well as creating more water for electricity generation and irrigation,” he said.

“It’s environmentally sound because more snow pack will help the long-term survival of a number of endangered animals and plants.”

I wonder which endangered animals and plants will be saved?

Following on from my previous post, I wonder would the ACF or the NCC approve of this?

Do you?

Whales & Climate Change

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As Environment Minister Ian Campbell laments the playing of politics at the International Whaling Commission meeting in Ulsan (South Korea) today, I wish we had a better idea how population numbers of the different whale species are fairing – and also the ecosystems they are a part of.

For perhaps two weeks now the Australian media has diligently reported the Minister including while he has traveled the world rallying against whaling, but the average Aussie would still not have much of an idea about their ecology.

There is a theory in a research paper published in 2003 by Alan Springer et al (Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the USA) that commerical whaling has resulted in the decimation of populations of seals, sea lions and sea otters because killer whales have not had enough ‘regular whales’ to feed on. The abstract to this research paper includes:

We propose that decimation of the great whales by post-World War II industrial whaling caused the great whales’ foremost natural predators, killer whales, to begin feeding more intensively on the smaller marine mammals, thus “fishing-down” this element of the marine food web. The timing of these events, information on the abundance, diet, and foraging behavior of both predators and prey, and feasibility analyses based on demographic and energetic modeling are all consistent with this hypothesis.

According to John Whitfield writing in 2003, “The finding points to the importance of whales in the entire ocean ecosystem, and supports the International Whaling Commission’s decision to ban hunting until whales have returned to their original numbers.”

And I wonder, so what was the original number of regular whales? (I would be interested in links/references to estimates of whale population numbers.)

The same article by Whitfield quotes Andrew Trites of the University of British Columbia, Vancouver, suggesting that “It’s a compelling story, but it’s also a flawed one.” Trites believes that climatic shifts, leading to changes in fish populations, are behind the sea mammals’ decline.

What does he mean by this?

I thought of a piece written about the Pacific Decadal Oscillation and salmon that I read sometime ago by Ned Rozell from Geophysical Institute, University of Alaska Fairbanks. It includes:

Flipping through old issues of fishing journals, Steven Hare of the International Pacific Halibut Commission was struck by the correlations he saw between Alaska and Pacific Northwest fisheries. In 1915, a reporter in Pacific Fisherman wrote that Bristol Bay salmon packers returned to port early due to a lack of fish. At the same time, the chinook salmon run up the Columbia River that borders Oregon and Washington was the best in 25 years. In 1939, the Bristol Bay salmon run was touted as “the greatest in history,” while the chinook catch down south was “one of the lowest in the history of the Columbia.”

The salmon disparity occurred again in 1972, then most recently in 1994, when Alaska fisherman broke a record for salmon harvest while Washington and Oregon managers were forced to close the chinook fishery on the Columbia because so few fish were returning. The current woes of Pacific Northwest salmon fishermen are not due to salmon’s preference for a northern life; Alaska and Pacific Northwest salmon rarely mingle, and many are of different species. So why the correlation between good years here, bad years there?

Ocean conditions must affect the fish. That’s the theory of Hare and Nathan Mantua, an atmospheric scientist at the University of Washington. Simply put, the Gulf of Alaska and Bristol Bay since 1977 have been better places for salmon to be than the northern Pacific off the coast of California, Washington and Oregon. In the twenty years before 1977, years when Alaska’s fisheries were struggling, the northern Pacific were the better waters for salmon.

The researchers think the pattern has to do with a climate phenomenon similar to El Nino. Instead of El Nino’s recurrence pattern once every two to five years, the one that may affect salmon has phases that last 20 to 30 years. This Pacific Decadal Oscillation, as the researchers call it, has its strongest effect in the North Pacific Ocean, while El Nino’s more widespread effects originate closer to the equator.”

This is the third in a series of posts on whaling, see also
https://jennifermarohasy.com.dev.internet-thinking.com.au/blog/archives/000653.html (June 10)and
https://jennifermarohasy.com.dev.internet-thinking.com.au/blog/archives/000646.html (June 7)

Name Calling

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I dislike editing comments from contributors to this site. I have done so recently to try and remove at least some of the personal attack – from more than one contributor. The trouble is that it is a slippery slope – both ways. You don’t edit and a wad of comment ends up being ‘nasty’. You do edit and you ‘destroy’ the point that was being made amongst the name calling?

And then this morning I was emailed the link to Prof Bob Carter’s speech to the Melbourne Rotary Club last week in which, perhaps tired of being called a ‘climate skeptic’, he has labelled belief in human-induced climate change ‘Hansenism’.

When is name calling OK? Can it be a useful short-hand?

Anyway, perhaps this is just the excuse I need to stimulate discussion about how to ‘moderate’ this site. What should the rules be?

When I edited a post some weeks ago the angry ‘commenter’ emailed me asking for ‘the rules’. I lamely replied something along the lines that “I edit out the personal attacks when they don’t progress the argument”.

Your suggestions?

Perhaps you know of a site with some ‘good rules’ we could borrow?

Kiwi’s Counting Cost of Kyoto

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New Zealand has signed up to a contingent liability of $9 billion to $14 billion at present values through its commitment to the Kyoto protocol, according to what has become know as the Castalia Report. While the report was published last September it is still being quoted, and is still being emailed about.

The Executive Summary concludes:

The Government’s financial statements are required to comply with generally accepted accounting practice, including disclosure of contingent liabilities. It follows that the Government’s accounts should disclose its commitment to the Kyoto Protocol as a contingent liability. It is a possible obligation that arises from ratifying the Protocol, and it becomes a liability if and when the Protocol comes into force. Accounting standards require the disclosure of each class of contingent liability at the balance date, with a brief description
of its nature and an estimate of its financial effect.

We have estimated the financial effect. This involves two steps: estimate of excess emissions and forecast of the prices of emission units. Clearly, there is considerable uncertainty about
the likely outcomes. We therefore consider a range of possibilities. In general, we err on the conservative side, that is on the side of least cost to the Crown.

Depending on the assumptions, a conservatively estimated present value of the contingent liability for the first four Commitment Periods ranges from $9 billion to $14 billion. This is the amount that needs to be disclosed in the Crown accounts. We have not attempted to forecast beyond 2027, since by then new technologies may emerge. On current technologies, with the addition of each subsequent period, the liability would increase further. Hence again, we have deliberately erred on the conservative side.

Still in NZ, but on the subject of British PM Tony Blair trying to get President George Bush to move forward on cutting C02 emissions, the following is from a piece in yesterday’s New Zealand Herald.

WWF’s (Jennifer) Morgan said there was still a chance to get a strong deal to cut carbon dioxide emissions but that if it didn’t materialise then Blair and the rest of the G8 should go ahead without the US – the world’s biggest greenhouse gas polluter.

“If you can’t get something with Bush in it, then you shouldn’t reduce it to the lowest common denominator. You should move forward in other ways,” she said.

“There is a very heated debate going on right now about leaving Bush out in the cold.”

I am not sure about the choice of words from the WWF campaigner – so the earth is going to heat up because the US won’t cooperate, but their President is going to be left out in the cold?

Update: Nuclear, Forest & Cattle, &

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Pilliga-Goonoo

Pilliga-Goonoo forest communities want Premier Bob Carr to visit, but it doesn’t look like he will. They are lamenting job loses.

I reckon they would have a better chance of getting their jobs back if they focused on the environmental issues – the need for active management of these forests.

Alpine Grazing

In response to the Victorian government locking the mountain cattlemen out of the Alpine National Park the federal government appears to have successfully had the Park included on its National Heritage List under emergency provisions. The Victorian government has said cattle will still be banned. Which government will win this battle of the cattle?

Federal Labor AGainst Nuclear Debate

Federal Labor MPs have apparently shouted down New South Wales Premier Bob Carr’s call for a debate on the merits of nuclear power. The ALP’s state conference in Sydney is apparently set to reaffirm the party’s opposition to nuclear power with Peter Garrett saying it is an option not worth considering. Strong words.

Another Matter Altogether

Ian Beale PhD sent in the following thought: The trouble, at least on the surface, seems to be that any government department would rather spend a dollar on simulation than a dime on in-service testing, and the simulation frequently misses vital points while stressing irrelevancies.