(click for full size)
Comment 33;

Forgetting for a moment that none of those lines is what it purports to be … just take the whole mess at face value. What I see is this:
1) The caption is proven false by the graphic it allegedly describes. “… all suggest that it is warmer now than at any time in the last 1000 years”. No they dont all suggest that. Their ‘Esper 2002′ line suggests that it is no warmer now than at any time in the last 1000 years, and the ‘Juckes 2006′ graph says that it is cooler now than at least three past temp peaks. And many of the rest show current temps within ~0.1C of some pre-SUV peak … certainly within error.
2) Speaking of error, apart from the ‘Crowley 2000′ splice job, all ‘temperature reconstructions’ miss the ‘Direct measurements’ of the latest temperature by ~0.8C.
3) The error in 2) is pretty well matched by the typical discrepancy between the high and low estimates for any particular time in the last 1000 years, which seems to hover around 0.6C.
4) Uh, arent the errors in 2) and 3) approximately the same size as the alleged measured warming that is going to kill us all?
5) (-1.0C) – (-0.8C) = 0.4C
This is ‘The New Scientist’? Seems like ‘The Emperors New Tailor’ to me.

Comment 142;

I don’t know why it’s so hard to understand that nothing is a valid proxy for temperature unless there is a rigorous derivation of a temperature metric from the observable. This is the case for oxygen isotope fractionation. It’s not the case for tree ring widths or densities. Divergence raises the issue that the correlations could well be empirical happenstance. What divergence “proves” is that maybe tree rings correlate with temperature, and maybe they don’t. It proves that tree rings, as such, are not worthy of blind trust or qualitative justificationisms.
Only a derivation from theory will establish the issue, one way or the other. Until then, it’s all just shouting.
Some time ago on CA I discussed with Paul Dennis a 13-C kinetics approach to derivation of a true temperature from tree wood. If that worked out, it would be a method of deriving a valid temperature metric from ring wood that is independent of ring width and ring density. It would suffer from its own suite of confounding variables, primarily to do with night-time respiration, but it would be a physically valid metric on the same order as 18-O fractionation in ice cores. But I’ll bet no one is working on any such thing. If Rob Wilson or anyone else really loved their field of dendroclimatology and wanted to bring quantitative rigor to it, they’d be working on a project like that. Derive a valid temperature from wood from quantitative physical theory. Not doing one more hand-wavingly justified, speciously normalized, pseudo-temperature publicizing, tree ring study. Those things are nothing more than mathematically embellished propaganda for dendroclimatology groups — look guys, at what we did this time! Isn’t it fun!
In other areas of science, people who publish conflicting results argue about them in terms of theory until a clear winner emerges. And the winning idea is ultimately the one grounded most firmly in objective theory. Those spaghetti graphs all claim — each and every one — to tell a single story. However, they clearly have different story-lines, and the set we see doesn’t exhaust all the possible, equivalently pseudo-justifiable, story-lines. They are conflicting results that should cause the groups of origin to argue vigorously about who is right or wrong in terms of applicable theory. But that doesn’t seem to happen, perhaps because there is no applicable theory. Instead we get uncritical composite plots like Rob Wilson’s, or like the lovely IPCC hash that John A reproduced in #65, and various new proxy studies that merely present some new compilation of trees and cores representing yet one more soon-to-be-bypassed statement about past pseudo-temperatures. It’s a scientific scandal.

Comment 156;

While I am happy to discuss this elsewhere, the reason that it is important to the current topic is that we have several “global mean temperature” dataesets, which show both different trends and different anomalies. Because “global mean temperature” has no agreed upon meaning, none of these datasets is theoretically superior to any other. This has a couple of effects.
1) People are free to choose which “global mean temperature” dataset they wish to use to compare and fit their proxy data … which in turn changes the result of the proxy exercise in whatever direction they may prefer.
2) It increases the uncertainty of both the data and the proxy reconstruction. For example, even using a single dataset, an average of all of the stations in the world shows a different trend than averaging the hemispheres individually and then averaging the two hemispheres. Which one is correct? We can’t say, there is no theoretical reason to prefer one over the other, but it certainly must increase the uncertainty of whichever one we may choose.
For example, were all of the various proxies in the graphic above done using the same “global mean temperature” dataset? I would doubt it, although I don’t know … but if they are not, it must perforce increase the uncertainty.

Thus concludes today’s scientific consensus moment.
Thankyou.
h/t

At least, according to CBC Fruit Fly Guy (May 2006) (PDF);

The European Union (EU) has a Kyoto target requiring the original 15 EU member nations to collectively reduce their emissions 8% below 1990 levels during the Kyoto period of 2008 to 2012. The EU negotiated a burden-sharing agreement to unevenly allocate emission reductions among its members. Currently, emissions are already below 1990 levels. Existing programs and policies combined with the purchase of international credits are expected to allow the EU to go beyond its target and reduce emissions by 9.3% by 2010.

Figure 1: Total EU-15 greenhouse gas emissions in relation to the Kyoto target (source: European Environment Agency, 2006)

Chris Horner; “If you see any emission reductions in there, there’s a job waiting for you in Brussels.”

I so want to know if this received government funding.
(h/t Cal2)

Since IPCC climate modellers possess the super-computing power to use data collected from both past and present to predict sea levels, weather patterns, planetary temperature, and polar bear populations 50 years into the future… what are they waiting for?
Surely they can set an afternoon aside to tell us who’s going to win the 2007 World Series.
That wasn’t meant as a joke.
Prominent Scientists Reverse Belief in Man-made Global Warming…

The names included below are just a sampling of the prominent scientists who have spoken out recently to oppose former Vice President Al Gore, the United Nations, and the media driven “consensus” on man-made global warming.
The list below is just the tip of the iceberg. A more detailed and comprehensive sampling of scientists who have only recently spoken out against climate hysteria will be forthcoming in a soon to be released U.S. Senate report. Please stay tuned to this website, as this new government report is set to redefine the current climate debate.
In the meantime, please review the list of scientists below and ask yourself why the media is missing one of the biggest stories in climate of 2007.

Geophysicist Dr. Claude Allegre, a top geophysicist and French Socialist who has authored more than 100 scientific articles

Geologist Bruno Wiskel of the University of Alberta

Astrophysicist Dr. Nir Shaviv, one of Israel’s top young award winning scientists

Mathematician & engineer Dr. David Evans, who did carbon accounting for the Australian Government

Climate researcher Dr. Tad Murty, former Senior Research Scientist for Fisheries and Oceans in Canada

Botanist Dr. David Bellamy, a famed UK environmental campaigner

Climate scientist Dr. Chris de Freitas of The University of Auckland, N.Z.,

Meteorologist Dr. Reid Bryson, the founding chairman of the Department of Meteorology at University of Wisconsin

Global warming author and economist Hans H.J. Labohm

Paleoclimatologist Tim Patterson, of Carlton University in Ottawa

Physicist Dr. Zbigniew Jaworowski, chairman of the Central Laboratory for the United Nations Scientific Committee on the Effects of Radiological Protection in Warsaw

Paleoclimatologist Dr. Ian D. Clark, professor of the Department of Earth Sciences at University of Ottawa

Environmental geochemist Dr. Jan Veizer, professor emeritus of University of Ottawa.

Lots more at the link. PDF version

Those deniers just won’t let it go…

The strong effect of cloud processes on model sensitivities to greenhouse gases was emphasized further through a now-classic set of General Circulation Model (GCM) experiments, carried out by Senior and Mitchell (1993). They produced global surface temperature changes (due to doubled atmospheric CO2 concentration) ranging from 1.9°C to 5.4°C, simply by altering the way that cloud radiative properties were treated in the model. It is somewhat unsettling that the results of a complex climate model can be so drastically altered by substituting one reasonable cloud parameterization for another, thereby approximately replicating the overall inter-model range of sensitivities.

IPCC AR4 overview of the history of climate change science, cloud modeling and climate sensitivity. (More commentary at the link).
(Related: For those who want to do their part)

[edited transcript]

RUSH: Dr. Spencer [ climatologist from the University of Alabama in Huntsville] , thanks so much for joining us today.
DR. SPENCER: You’re welcome, Rush.
RUSH: Now, refresh people’s memories. You called the program once a few weeks ago discussing why you deviate from the established belief of manmade global warming. Your hypothesis basically is that precipitation is one of the primary factors and the computer models don’t measure precipitation because we can’t figure out — we don’t have the equipment, sophistication to even measure — total precipitation on the planet on a daily basis. Correct?
DR. SPENCER: Well, let’s be a little more specific than that. Basically, precipitation systems act as the atmosphere’s air conditioner. It’s kind of like in your house, the air is constantly being recycled, right? Well, precipitation systems constantly recycle the atmosphere’s air. The air you were breathing was probably, in the last few days, going through a precipitation system. Those systems are what cause most of the earth’s greenhouse effect, which is water vapor and clouds.
RUSH: Precisely. I remember. When you say “most,” could you attach a percentage of greenhouse-gases to water vapor?
DR. SPENCER: Over 90%. Our addition of CO2 has enhanced the greenhouse effect by maybe 1% so far.
RUSH: Okay. So that’s automobiles, exhalation of human breath, factory smoke stacks, all these things that we’re being told are really polluting the planet are really such a small percentage of the so-called greenhouse gases. By the way, is it a bad thing the planet might warm up?
DR. SPENCER: I don’t know. I think that’s a toss up.
RUSH: If you go back and look at — I forget what it was called, but back in the days of the Vikings, they were able to grow crops and so forth in Greenland, able to traverse the North Atlantic and come to North America. The Northern Hemisphere was a lot more fertile than it was. My point is that the idea that global warming is destructive, calamitous and deadly is a bit absurd.
DR. SPENCER: Yes. I think a little bit warmer would actually be better and I think the extra CO2… They estimate crop productivity has gone up 15 percent just because of the extra CO2 we’ve put in the atmosphere.
RUSH: So it’s a good thing in ways. All right. Now, I’m titillated here. Cold air, unusually cold air is responsible for the subtropical storm off the coast of Georgia?
DR. SPENCER: Yeah. The hint there is it’s not a tropical storm; it’s a subtropical storm. These things don’t usually form. It’s been a few years since we’ve had one like this. But it didn’t happen because of unusually warm ocean water. It happened because there was unusually cold air that came unusually far south, and there was such a contrast between that cold air mass and the sea surface temperatures which are running about normal in that area that then that can lead to a storm. Remember, most storminess on the earth is related to temperature contrasts.
RUSH: Right. Unusually cold air that came unusually far south.
DR. SPENCER: Right. If we’re going to start blaming that on global warming, then you can explain anything with global warming.

Emphasis mine.

Continue reading →

h/t

Q: Could you rank the things that have the most significant impact and where would you put carbon dioxide on the list?
A: Well let me give you one fact first. In the first 30 feet of the atmosphere, on the average, outward radiation from the Earth, which is what CO2 is supposed to affect, how much [of the reflected energy] is absorbed by water vapor? In the first 30 feet, 80 percent, okay?
Q: Eighty percent of the heat radiated back from the surface is absorbed in the first 30 feet by water vapor…
A: And how much is absorbed by carbon dioxide? Eight hundredths of one percent. One one-thousandth as important as water vapor. You can go outside and spit and have the same effect as doubling carbon dioxide.

Reid A. Bryson climate change denier and “Emeritus Professor and founding chairman of the University of Wisconsin Department of Meteorology—now the Department of Oceanic and Atmospheric Sciences… the first director of what’s now the UW’s Gaylord Nelson Institute of Environmental Studies … identified by the British Institute of Geographers as the most frequently cited climatologist in the world.

It’s not enough that the average Briton is captured on closed-circuit TV cameras in his car, in the street, in the shopping mall, and even in country lanes where the rural constabulary have hidden them in trees to catch illegal fox hunters. Now the government is monitoring his garbage. If they ever take up Sheryl Crow’s all-we-are-saying-is-give-one-piece-a-chance toilet-paper rationing, you can bet the enforcers will mandate CCTVs in every bathroom if not microchips in the bowl.
If George Bush put a microchip in your garbage under the Patriot Act, there’d be mass demonstrations across the land. But do it in the guise of saving the planet and everyone’s fine with it.

A global warming disciple was troubled by the Goracle’s presentation in Regina;

The slide I found particularly interesting/shocking/sad, was his new(?) slide containing a graph of human population growth over the past couple hundred-thousand years. It started off good. He pointed at the beginning of the graph, showing the population of humans on Earth from 200,000 years ago, and referred to the “rise of humans.”

Cool beans. So he believes that Homo sapiens evolved from other hominid ancestors, right? Nope. In the very same breath, he then continued to explain that according to his religious beliefs, this “rise of humans” was God’s creation of mankind – apparently 200,000 years ago. His graph then changed to include the caption “Adam & Eve” above this starting point.

I started laughing, and I had to consciously blink my eyes and double-check the screen to make sure I was seeing it properly. Let me get this straight…the guy’s entire presentation exists in order to present people with the scientific data showing that human-caused climate change is a fact. He does his very best to include references in all of the slides, showing to any thinking person that this data is not made up, that it comes from the forefront of our scientific research (there was many slides containing data from Science journal, and a few from Nature).
He tarnishes his beautifully crafted presentation by not only stating his belief in creationism – but by placing the words “Adam and Eve” right on the slide (which is actually a scientific graph) as a caption explaining the beginnings of mankind.
Something doesn’t add up here. On one hand, he is using science to predict the disastrous outcome of our current actions and rally support for taking proactive measures to make sure bad things don’t happen, but on the other hand, he is clinging to stone-age beliefs that another very important area of science has proven wrong (that we humans evolved from other forms of life, and that every organism on Earth has a common ancestor).
And of course, all the religious people in the audience get to feel good knowing that this important politician sees no dilemma in using this this zero-sum belief system. I should also note that at this point in the lecture (I’ll call it the schism) he stated that there is no conflict between science and religion. He appeared as though he wanted to say more about this, and even mentioned the Scopes trial, but then decided to continue on with the slideshow instead.
Whaaaaa???? You tell me that anthropogenic climate change is a scientific fact (to the degree that science can use that word), mankind came from God’s creation of Adam and Eve 200,000 years ago, there is no conflict between science and religion, refer to the Scopes trial, and then shrug it off and move on with the show?

Odd that none of the media in attendence picked up on this. Sharp as tacks, that crew.
An outraged Tim Blair – “He put the terrible words RIGHT ON A SCIENTIFIC GRAPH? Forget Korans down toilets, people. This is serious.”
(Global warming meets creationist science. Why is it that Warren Kinsella is nowhere to be found at times like this?)
h/t to Mississauga Matt.

Chronicle Herald;

While Prime Minister Stephen Harper, Liberal Leader Stephane Dion and New Democrat Jack Layton all took turns denouncing the analogy, Prince Charles was making much the same point as May in a speech in London.
“I do not want my children and grandchildren, or anyone for that matter, saying to me, ‘Why didn’t you do something when it was possible to make a difference and when you knew what was happening?” the prince told a business conference Tuesday at St. James Palace.
“We can do it, just think what they did in the last war. Things that seemed impossible were achieved almost overnight.”

I’ve linked to this before, but it seems appropriate to do so again. The Prince of Organics might pause to consider his own planet destroying gardening practices;

“In particular, organic agriculture poses its own environmental problems in the production of some foods, either in terms of nutrient release to water or in terms of climate change burdens.”
Using data from previous studies, the researchers singled out milk as a particular example of the environmental challenges presented by organic farming. Organic milk requires 80 per cent more land and creates almost double the amount of substances that could lead to acidic soil and “eutrophication” – the pollution of water courses with excess nutrients.
The study found that producing organic milk, which has higher levels of nutrients and lower levels of pesticides, also generates more carbon dioxide than conventional methods – 1.23kg per litre compared to 1.06kg per litre. It concluded: “Organic milk production appears to require less energy input but much more land than conventional production. While eliminating pesticide use, it also gives rise to higher emissions of greenhouse gases and eutrophying substances.”
Similar findings were recorded with organic chickens, where the longer growing time means it has a higher impact on all levels, including producing nearly double the amount of potentially polluting by-products and consuming 25 per cent more energy.
Vegetable production was also highlighted as a source of increased use of resources. Organic vine tomatoes require almost 10 times the amount of land needed for conventional tomatoes and nearly double the amount of energy.

Isn’t it odd that some studies on human contributions to global warming provoke wall-to-wall media coverage – while others receive nearly no mention at all?

“Who knew the Viking Landers were capable of so much pollution?”

The leader of the Christian left;

Preaching in London about the threat of climate change, Green party Leader Elizabeth May brought herself to tears yesterday, not for children who will inherit the Earth, but for the God she believes created it.
[…]
“This is a time for Christians to say we do believe in miracles, in the life-giving force,” she said.
The delicate balance God created is under assault as people increased exponentially their use of fossil fuels, unleashing carbon dioxide and destroying the forests that can return carbon to the Earth, she said.
“We’re playing with the forces that led to creation . . . we’re nearing the edge of the life force and we’re still playing around,” May said.
She said it’s as if the lessons of the Garden of Eden have been disregarded repeatedly and the results are already harming poorer nations.
“The first victims of the climate crisis are those who had the least to do with creating it.”
Unless we meet our moral obligation to restore the balance, our children and grandchildren will suffer, she said.
“Through the power of our Lord and Jesus Christ, we can meet this moral obligation,” she said.

And God bless Kyoto!

Ontario’s Environment Minister.
Via DMB

A Financial Times investigation into this century’s version of the tulip trade*;

A Financial Times investigation has uncovered widespread failings in the new markets for greenhouse gases, suggesting some organisations are paying for emissions reductions that do not take place.
Others are meanwhile making big profits from carbon trading for very small expenditure and in some cases for clean-ups that they would have made anyway.
The growing political salience of environmental politics has sparked a “green gold rush”, which has seen a dramatic expansion in the number of businesses offering both companies and individuals the chance to go “carbon neutral”, offsetting their own energy use by buying carbon credits that cancel out their contribution to global warming.
The burgeoning regulated market for carbon credits is expected to more than double in size to about $68.2bn by 2010, with the unregulated voluntary sector rising to $4bn in the same period.
The FT investigation found:
■ Widespread instances of people and organisations buying worthless credits that do not yield any reductions in carbon emissions.
■ Industrial companies profiting from doing very little – or from gaining carbon credits on the basis of efficiency gains from which they have already benefited substantially.
■ Brokers providing services of questionable or no value.
■ A shortage of verification, making it difficult for buyers to assess the true value of carbon credits.
■ Companies and individuals being charged over the odds for the private purchase of European Union carbon permits that have plummeted in value because they do not result in emissions cuts.

Previous: Terrapass– Business Week investigates the carbon offset trade.

A retired PCS executive writes;

Chapter 1: Have you been noticing that PCS, PotashCorp’s, stock has been skyrocketing in the last 6 months. Know why???….Kyoto Madness….GHG emissions. Sounds funny but here is the real reason. It’s all economics… If you go to PCS’s annual meeting this next month..You will hear Bill Doyle, CEO say that an emerging market for PotashCorp is the bio fuel demand…. Which requires… corn… and guess what, corn demands potash.
So the corn is being sold as fuel rather as food. Methanal producers are willing to pay more for a bushel of corn than food producers (good for PCS and good for farmers). In additon acreage for other crops such as wheat, sorghum, soy, cotton, lentils etc.. are being re-sowed to produce corn stock for methanol.
American farmers will produce corn for fuel rather than food if they can get a better return. Replacing acreage to corn will cause a rise in price for the other agricultural products as they become short in supply as acreage is reduced. (bad for the consumer)
American meat production that has historically increased by about 2 % per year, is in decline as feed (corn) is going to the production of fuel rather than producing protein for animals.
Chapter 2: China’s output of protein has increased. This is the second punch in the increase of PotashCorps share increase.
It takes 2 lbs. of grain to get 1 lb. of chicken, It takes 5 lb. of grain to get 1 lb. pound of pork, and 7 lb. of grain to get 1 lb. of beef.
China’s GDP has been increasing, and when you now have a multi billion population with disposable income, they are wanting to eat better, and that will mean they want MEAT. (Refer to any PCS publication in the last 2 years) . In addtion, the Chinese see a growing market in North America for Grain as the Americas use their grain for methanol.
Where does all the pet food come from lately…. See the call backs….Kate you have dogs… where is your dog food produced? Where do you think people food will produced in the future?
So in the end, North Americans will grow food to produce gas, and the Chinese will grow food to feed us. (hopefully a little better quality than the pet food) The ironic thing about this is that we North Americans had the most efficient GHG and low polluting technologies available to produce food, and we are now going to turn our Ag business over to a Third world country that doesn’t give a hoot about CO2 emissions..
But if you analyze this we have slowly turned over other manufacturing industrys to China (where do you think Walmart gets their stuff from).
China is adding 500 coal powered electrical plants in the next 10 years to meet their energy and new manufacturing production requierments. If you do the math, that’s about a coal fired CO2 monster every month. How many power plants does Canada build each month, let alone each year?
Flash! Flash! China is not signatory to Kyoto.
China is gearing up to provide the goods to fulfill the world market that will exist when we shutdown our manufacturing sector in a self flagelation penance, as preached by Dion, Layton, Suzuki et al… in the name of Kyoto.
China’s yearly Increase in CO2 equals the total amount of CO2 that Canada produces in a whole year. So if Canada was to turn off everything that produced CO2 ie…. cars, Suv’s, etc , all electricty, all home heating, all transportation, air travel, etc…we would have only achieved 1 year of grace as China’s increase in 1 year will equal all that we produce. Why in God’s name would we accommodate the transfer of Canadian manufacturing to a less efficient Chinese theatre?
Such is life.

PlanetGore;

This latest [in the carbon cap-and-trade] comes on top of a) plants being closed in Valencia and Zaragoza for lack of a Kyoto permit and b) Acerinox’s CEO announcing his (steel manufacutring) investment would all go outside Europe now (the US — so far, 175 jobs in Carroll County, KY — and South Africa)..
Ceramics are an industry that Spain seeks to protect from Brussels like Germany (ideally) would its chemicals — they tried, e.g., in the REACh debate — and they require a bit of energy to make their products. Now, in Galicia, a manufacturer announced that last year it earned more from selling credits than ceramics (reminding me of an email I once got in which a French pharma company announced that selling credits was where its future lies, not pharmaceuticals).
Their statement was couched in terms of thanking the government for generously (that is, “over-“) allocating ETS credits to them (for free, as industry lobbyists already demand of Congress), and noted that with the credit price having skyrocketed (before collapsing) they were able to reap a windfall by selling what the government had given them. They lamented that the price collapse, however, indicated this wasn’t, er, sustainable.
Buried in this however was the phrase that, taking that price spike into account, they had decided to “equalibriate” their operations so as to maximize profits with an ideal mix of selling allocations and using them by, well, using electricity to make stuff…which is to say they also went into the business of making nothing, dedicating more of their operations to the task, which is far less labor intensive. That is, they found it more profitable to partially shut down, to idle workers.

Emphasis mine. That said, it’s been proven possible to reduce C02 emissions on a national scale. Indeed, the US has accomplished it twice the recent past;

In modern times, according to the Department of Energy, CO2 emissions have dropped only twice _ during the recessions of 1981-82 and 1990-91. The 1981-82 recession, the deepest since the Great Depression, reduced CO2 emissions by 8 percent.

Read the whole thing and note the date.
Breaking… The world’s leading* geneticist on economics responds: “stop listening to the goddamn economists,”
“Because if you don’t do what I say, the economies of the world will suffer a collapse larger than the great depression and both world wars combined and the polar bears will drown in boiling seas, Vancouver will be under 20 feet of water and all your grandchildren will die.”.
“And besides, Baird is just scaremongering.”

Keeping up with the Schwarzeneggers;

One interesting addition to the Clean Air Act requires Canada to have the highest fuel consumption standards for vehicles in the entire world. If some other jurisdiction moves the bar higher, by law, Canada will have to do better.

Oh, goody.

Reader Phil Primeau (Defend Canada) has read the IPCC report so you don’t have to. His summary;

1. Using Data and Observations since 1970, we have witnessed evidence of a warming trend. We are between 90% and 95% certain that in the last 37 years there has been a warming trend that has caused changes such as early blossoming, changed behavior in native species etc.
2. Based on this warming trend, we are 66% confident that this is caused by man. In that 66% confidence level, we believe that if it is caused by man, we are 90% certain it is due to the rises in manmade CO2 since 1950. This is based on “models” that look at natural or external impacts and internal impacts – and the combination of both best fit what we would expect the result to be. That being said, “Limitations and gaps prevent more complete attribution of the causes of observed system responses to anthropogenic warming … the available analyses are limited in the number of systems and locations considered …. natural temperature variability is larger at the regional than the global scale, thus affecting identification of changes due to external forcing”. (In other words, we are flying by the seat of our pants on this conclusion)
3. “Nevertheless, the consistency between observed and modelled changes in several studies and the spatial agreement between significant regional warming and consistent impacts at the global scale is sufficient to conclude with high confidence that anthropogenic warming over the last three decades has had a discernible influence on many physical and biological systems.” (Despite the shortcomings in our model, and the fact we could only get 300 scientists to agree to a 66% certainty, we the editors of said document think our models are accurate, and that being said, we are going to say we are 95% confident that global warming is manmade anyways, despite lack of concensus.)
4. Other effects of regional climate changes on natural and human environments are emerging, although many are difficult to discern due to adaptation and non-climatic drivers. We are 50% sure that northern crops benefit an early spring, 50% sure that forests are more likely to be affected by wildfire and pests. We are 50% sure that heat related diseases (i.e. transferred by mosquitos) are more prevalent, and 50% sure that there are more allergens. We are alos 50% sure that warming is having a negative impact on winter sports. (Only 50% sure….really?)
5. Recent climate changes and climate variations are beginning to have effects on many other natural and human systems. However, based on the published literature, the impacts have not yet become established trends. Despite uncertainty, there may be a trend of glacial melting causing flood, there may be a trend to longer dry seasons in Africa, and there may be a trend of Coastal flooding. (all completely uncertain, because of lack of data)
6. Based on current trends, (which lack confidence and enough data to judge anything properly by our own admission) (i equate this to making a future stock price prediction based on looking at 3 months of the stock price) these are our predictions:
a) By 2050, Wet areas will get wetter by 10% – 40%. Dry areas will get drier by 10% – 30%.
b) By 2050, 20% – 30% of species will go extinct (if they don’t adapt as they have for the past billion years)
c) by 2050, 1-3 degree increase which will affect dry regions negatively and wet regions positively
d) by 2080 coast will be at risk (but we are not saying to what degree they might be affected)
e) Rich areas will get richer, poor areas poorer – mostly based on existing geo-economic situations.
It goes on….but all of the predictions are based on self admitted lack of evidence…

At Prometheus, attention is drawn to a chart correlating “weather related catastrophes compared with global temperatures”;

The Figure below is found in the IPCC WG II report, Chapter 7, supplementary material (p. 3 here in PDF). I am shocked to see such a figure in the IPCC of all places, purporting to show something meaningful and scientifically vetted. Sorry to be harsh, but this figure is neither.

I am amazed that this figure made it past review of any sort, but especially given what the broader literature on this subject actually says. I have generally been a supporter of the IPCC, but I do have to admit that if it is this sloppy and irresponsible in an area of climate change where I have expertise, why should I have confidence in the areas where I am not an expert?

Jim Manzi;

Not surprisingly, competent analysts have considered these issues in detail. [….] once you normalize for population, wealth and inflation at the national level, there is a weak upward trend in normalized weather-related disaster losses only if you include the 2004 / 2005 hurricane season. The authors are explicit that that US losses dominate these numbers and that a shift in US population into more vulnerable areas in Florida probably accounts for any trend.
It took me 15 minutes on Google to find the relevant research, and maybe two hours to assimilate it. Apparently this was too much work for 2,500 scientists.

Related – The Great Global Warming Swindle is now available on DVD via Amazon(UK).

Lorne Gunter employs something seldom seen in mainstream coverage of global warming – math;

Think of the atmosphere as 100 cases of 24 one-litre bottles of water — 2,400 litres in all.
According to the global warming theory, rising levels of human-produced carbon dioxide are trapping more of the sun’s reflected heat in the atmosphere and dangerously warming the planet.
But 99 of our cases would be nitrogen (78%) and oxygen (21%), neither of which are greenhouse gases. Only one case — just 24 bottles out of 2,400 — would contain greenhouse gases.
Of the bottles in the greenhouse gas case, 23 would be water vapour.
Water vapour is the most abundant greenhouse gas, yet scientists will admit they understand very little about its impact on global warming. (It may actually help cool the planet: As the earth heats up, water vapour may form into more clouds and reflect solar radiation before it reaches the surface. Maybe. We don’t know.)
The very last bottle in that very last case would be carbon dioxide, one bottle out of 2,400.

Previous – Hendrik Tennekes, retired Director of Research, Royal Netherlands Meteorological Institute, speaks of this;

If there is not even a rudimentary theory of the Polar Vortex, much less an established relation between rising greenhouse gas concentrations and systematic changes in the Arctic Oscillation, one cannot possibly make inferences about changes in precipitation patterns. We do not know, and for the time being cannot know anything about changing patterns of clouds, storms and rain. Holland’s national weather service KNMI circumvented this impasse last year by issuing climate change scenarios with and without changes in the position of the North Atlantic storm track. It did not occur to the KNMI spokesmen that they should have been forthright about their lack of knowledge. They should have said: we know nothing of possible changes in the storm track, so we cannot say anything about precipitation. But it is entirely consistent with the IPCC tradition to weasel around such issues.

(And lighter fare – this smackdown in the comments. Funny things happen when commentors share their “expertise” – one never can guess who else is reading.)
Update – Be sure to read this comment, and the one that follows.