2020 officially saw a record number of $1 billion weather and climate disasters.

Oneiric 3 wrote: »

Yet another gem that adds absolutely nothing to the discussion
congratulations

Oneiric 3 wrote: »

And It takes just one year for over 9 million people to die of starvation:
https://www.un.org/en/chronicle/article/losing-25000-hunger-every-day#:~:text=Each%20day%2C%2025%2C000%20people%2C%20including,million%20into%20poverty%20and%20hunger.


Why rightly so?

https://www.aljazeera.com/economy/2020/3/30/developing-countries-face-economic-collapse-in-covid-19-fight-un

https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/2020/4/18/21212688/coronavirus-lockdowns-developing-world

Very easy to say such things when you are obviously not directly affected. The term 'ivory tower' springs to mind here.

Why am I not shocked that you’re also an anti lockdown pandemic denialist

Akrasia wrote: »

The link is to a text document that you needed to downloadt

A link to a text doc with data that I quite clearly and quite obviously didn't ask for. Are you even capable of understanding a basic request?

Just for the record, here are the IPCC's statements on Equilibrium Climate Sensitivity (the equilibrium temperature-rise due to a doubling of CO2 from pre-industrial levels (280 ppm -> 560 ppm) over their past three Assessment Reports (spanning 13 years). We're no closer to understanding it now that we were back in then. The 1.5 - 4.5-degree range actually goes back further to the SAR too (1996). Nineteen years and no progress.

Fifth Assessment Report (AR5)
there is high confidence that ECS is extremely unlikely to be less than 1 °C and medium confidence that the ECS is likely between 1.5 °C and 4.5 °C and very unlikely greater than 6 °C"

Fourth Assessment Report (FAR)
"likely to be in the range 2 to 4.5°C with a best estimate of about 3°C, and is very unlikely to be less than 1.5°C. Values substantially higher than 4.5°C cannot be excluded, but agreement of models with observations is not as good for those values."

Third Assessment Report (TAR)
The equilibrium climate sensitivity, that is, the range of the surface air temperature response to a doubling of the atmospheric CO2 concentration, was estimated to be between 1.5 and 4.5°C in the SAR (Kattenberg et al., 1996). That range still encompasses the estimates from the current models in active use.

Gaoth Laidir wrote: »

Just for the record, here are the IPCC's statements on Equilibrium Climate Sensitivity (the equilibrium temperature-rise due to a doubling of CO2 from pre-industrial levels (280 ppm -> 560 ppm) over their past three Assessment Reports (spanning 13 years). We're no closer to understanding it now that we were back in then. The 1.5 - 4.5-degree range actually goes back further to the SAR too (1996). Nineteen years and no progress.

Fifth Assessment Report (AR5)
there is high confidence that ECS is extremely unlikely to be less than 1 °C and medium confidence that the ECS is likely between 1.5 °C and 4.5 °C and very unlikely greater than 6 °C"

Fourth Assessment Report (FAR)
"likely to be in the range 2 to 4.5°C with a best estimate of about 3°C, and is very unlikely to be less than 1.5°C. Values substantially higher than 4.5°C cannot be excluded, but agreement of models with observations is not as good for those values."

Third Assessment Report (TAR)
The equilibrium climate sensitivity, that is, the range of the surface air temperature response to a doubling of the atmospheric CO2 concentration, was estimated to be between 1.5 and 4.5°C in the SAR (Kattenberg et al., 1996). That range still encompasses the estimates from the current models in active use.

The biggest change is that earlier estimates left the possibility of very low ECS as advocated by the likes of Bates and Lindzen, and allowed people like you to cling to the idea that climate change could be a storm in a teacup.
The latest estimates almost completely rule out the possibility of ECS below 1c but still leave open the possibility of ECS between 4.5c and 6c

Do you accept now that an ECS of 1.5c is now the lowest plausible ECS we can expect?

What do you think the most likely value for ECS is in your opinion?

The reason for the wide range of uncertainty is because the Physical direct effect of doubling CO2 concentration in the atmosphere is locked in at about 1c the science behind this is pretty much nailed down already

what is uncertain is the impact of the feedbacks associated with this warming. We do not yet know how fast thermafrosts will thaw, methane will be released from soils and ocean floors, how long it will take for the Arctic to melt fully in summer, exactly how much of an impact forest fires in the tundra will have, dark snow from extra soot changes albedo etc), changes in ocean and atmospheric currents that can drive changes in land use or release/sequester heat in the deep ocean with positive or negative feedbacks etc

Will there be self sustaining tipping points where climate can suddenly flip up a new equilibrium. Many scientists believe this is very likely to be true, but nobody knows what exactly would trigger such a tipping point

There is very active scientific research and debate on the nature and extent of these complex feedbacks and the only certainty we can arrive at, is the more warm the planet, the greater the risk that we may cross event horizons beyond which there is no going back

What is the danger that we enter a ‘hothouse earth’ I don’t know how to quantify that risk. What level of risk should we be comfortable with? 50/50? A 1 in 10 chance? 1 in 50?
What are acceptable odds to gamble the future of our planet?

https://www.pnas.org/content/115/33/8252
The above paper suggests we could start setting off tipping points at 2c, this is less than the most likely ECS value

This risk is represented in Figs. 1 and 2 by a planetary threshold (horizontal broken line in Fig. 1 on the Hothouse Earth pathway around 2 °C above preindustrial temperature). Beyond this threshold, intrinsic biogeophysical feedbacks in the Earth System (Biogeophysical Feedbacks) could become the dominant processes controlling the system’s trajectory. Precisely where a potential planetary threshold might be is uncertain (15, 16). We suggest 2 °C because of the risk that a 2 °C warming could activate important tipping elements (12, 17), raising the temperature further to activate other tipping elements in a domino-like cascade that could take the Earth System to even higher temperatures (Tipping Cascades). Such cascades comprise, in essence, the dynamical process that leads to thresholds in complex systems (section 4.2 in ref. 18).

Oneiric 3 wrote: »

Nah, I'm not falling for that. This is more just about you being unable to explain your comment.

I said the world rightly sacrificed economic activity to try to limit the spread of the virus. Not every country acted quick enough, many delayed action or took half measures

There is more than enough evidence now that countries that took this seriously and acted early with decisive actions to limit the spread of the virus have done the best both economically and in terms of having the lowest economic and social costs

Countries that didn’t act early are getting the worst of all worlds, worst economic impacts, and worst death rates, and longer more drawn out lockdowns when they eventually realize that it’s not actually a choice between protecting the economy and saving lives

Gaoth Laidir wrote: »

Let's first wait a few months for AR6 to see what the IPCC thought of his report and if it made any difference to their range. I assume they will consider all papers and throw out those they see as "extremely" unlikely.

Three degrees is a significant warming and if it comes to pass then so be it. My point is that we're still no closer to knowing how likely that is after several decades of so-called settled science.

I've always said we should be going to renewable energy sources, regardless of what the climate may or may not do. I still stand by that. That would be a much easier and more worthwhile investment than that crazy geoengineering fantasy that you seem to think could be done at the drop of a hat.

I don’t think we need to wait for AR6. AR5 has already stated this position and I can not see any new evidence to support any IRIS effect that has any significance, and especially not a strong enough effect to overwhelm the greenhouse effect from the increase in CO2 effect and every other positive feedback

I agree on investing in renewables, in fact I’ve been banging on about it on this forum for years, and do not support geoengineering. As I’ve already said, geoengineering is a last gasp admission of failure when faced with a choice extremely costly impacts, or extremely costly mitigation

The speed at which we can transition to zero carbon is intrinsically tied to government policies to tackle climate change, government action has been far too slow and the later they leave it, the more expensive it will become

Akrasia wrote: »

The biggest change is that earlier estimates left the possibility of very low ECS as advocated by the likes of Bates and Lindzen, and allowed people like you to cling to the idea that climate change could be a storm in a teacup.
The latest estimates almost completely rule out the possibility of ECS below 1c but still leave open the possibility of ECS between 4.5c and 6c

Do you accept now that an ECS of 1.5c is now the lowest plausible ECS we can expect?

What do you think the most likely value for ECS is in your opinion?

The reason for the wide range of uncertainty is because the Physical direct effect of doubling CO2 concentration in the atmosphere is locked in at about 1c the science behind this is pretty much nailed down already

what is uncertain is the impact of the feedbacks associated with this warming. We do not yet know how fast thermafrosts will thaw, methane will be released from soils and ocean floors, how long it will take for the Arctic to melt fully in summer, exactly how much of an impact forest fires in the tundra will have, dark snow from extra soot changes albedo etc), changes in ocean and atmospheric currents that can drive changes in land use or release/sequester heat in the deep ocean with positive or negative feedbacks etc

Will there be self sustaining tipping points where climate can suddenly flip up a new equilibrium. Many scientists believe this is very likely to be true, but nobody knows what exactly would trigger such a tipping point

There is very active scientific research and debate on the nature and extent of these complex feedbacks and the only certainty we can arrive at, is the more warm the planet, the greater the risk that we may cross event horizons beyond which there is no going back

What is the danger that we enter a ‘hothouse earth’ I don’t know how to quantify that risk. What level of risk should we be comfortable with? 50/50? A 1 in 10 chance? 1 in 50?
What are acceptable odds to gamble the future of our planet?

https://www.pnas.org/content/115/33/8252
The above paper suggests we could start setting off tipping points at 2c, this is less than the most likely ECS value

I note you have once again reverted to the use of near apocalyptic terminology on climate change and the end of times as favoured by the screamers in Extinction Rebellion and others.

I posted on this when you previously went down the same rabbit hole. No change there.

It remains that the IPCC has stated that - "a 'runaway greenhouse effect'—analogous to [that of] Venus—appears to have virtually no chance of being induced by anthropogenic activities."

IPCC current thinking on "Tipping Points" is that the precise levels of climate change sufficient to trigger a tipping point, remain uncertain.

As for the Hothouse Earth” scenario

This from Professor Richard Betts, Climate scientist University of Exeter

Another is that (the use of the term - Hothouse Earth)

The term "Hothouse " describes a scientific climatic extreme. The popularity of the term is growing because it allows for some to use it as a "dramatic narrative" and not surprisingly this has led to this term being used in some sensationalist articles to describe a largely doomsday scenario

"With some exceptions, much of the highest-profile coverage of the essay presents the scenario as definite and imminent. The impression is given that 2°C is a definite “point of no return”, and that beyond that the “hothouse” scenario will rapidly arrive.
Many articles ignore the caveats that the 2°C threshold is extremely uncertain, and that even if it were correct, the extreme conditions would not occur for centuries or millennia.

https://theconversation.com/hothouse-earth-heres-what-the-science-actually-does-and-doesnt-say-101341

*Richard Betts is Head of Climate Impacts Research at the Met Office Hadley Centre in addition to his role at the University of Exeter. He receives funding from the UK government department of Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS) and Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra), and from the Natural Environment Research Council (NERC). He was director of the European Union-funded project HELIX (High-End cLimate Impacts and eXtremes) which supported the contribution of Tim Lenton as a co-author of the paper by Steffen et al discussed in this article.

gozunda wrote: »

I note you have once again reverted to the use of near apocalyptic terminology on climate change and the end of times as favoured by the screamers in Extinction Rebellion and others.

I posted on this when you previously went down the same rabbit hole. No change there.

It remains that the IPCC has stated that - "a 'runaway greenhouse effect'—analogous to [that of] Venus—appears to have virtually no chance of being induced by anthropogenic activities."

Venus average surface temps are about 480c
We don’t need to worry about getting anywhere near Venus, we’ll be cooked way before then

Runaway climate change of only 5c to 10c would be enough to melt every glacier and ice cap and raise sea levels by hundreds of feet within a few centuries.

You might not like the language but apocalyptic would not be unreasonable
Ireland would change from an island to an archipelago

IPCC current thinking on "Tipping Points" is that the precise levels of climate change sufficient to trigger a tipping point, remain uncertain.

Is this supposed to be a rebuttal?
If you’re driving on an icy road and your grip levels are ‘uncertain’ does this mean you should be extra careful, or less careful?

If you read my post, I said the tipping points are uncertain but the risks only increase the higher temperatures rise, so to reduce the risk, we need to keep temperature increases as low as we can

As for the Hothouse Earth” scenario

This from Professor Richard Betts, Climate scientist University of Exeter



The term "Hothouse " describes a scientific climatic extreme. The popularity of the term is growing because it allows for some to use it as a "dramatic narrative" and not surprisingly this has led to this term being used in some sensationalist articles to describe a largely doomsday scenario

I look forward to Richard Betts’ peer reviewed paper where he demonstrates that the PNAS paper is ‘a dramatic narrative’ cause until he does the scientific analysis his opinion is not scientific data

If you have a link to such a paper, please post it here
I’m sure he’s written something given that it’s more than 2 years since the hothouse earth paper was published

Oneiric 3 wrote: »

A link to a text doc with data that I quite clearly and quite obviously didn't ask for. Are you even capable of understanding a basic request?

Is there actually something wrong with you? I don’t take kindly to being gaslighted

Akrasia wrote: »

You’re confusing yourself needlessly

It is confusing for people new to this ‘debate’ but you’ve been here long enough to know the context around this statement.

When anyone says the ‘science is settled’ in the context of climate change, they are only referring to one single question. The question of whether Anthropogenic Climate Change is real or not. In
other contexts you could say “the science is Settled “ in relation to the ‘great debate’ in quantum physics, or evolution, or plate tectonics’

It means the existential debate is over, refusing to accept ‘ the consensus’ is now science denialism

We can know plate tectonics is real without having to know when every earthquake or volcanic eruption will occur. We can say evolution is true without knowing every detail relating to epigenitics or Speciation

That is the singular question that ‘the science is settled’ is an answer for.

If you believe AGW is real, then you agree with the ‘settled’ side of the argument if you still think it’s a conspiracy or that there isn’t enough evidence to say this isn’t natural variability then you should disagree with that statement but you’re on extremely dodgy territory given the overwhelming scientific evidence that the greenhouse effect is real and humans are driving up CO2 concentrations in our atmosphere

Nobody who has ever said ‘the science is settled’ means all science is settled, or that no further uncertainty exists, or that we should stop studying and researching because we already know everything

It ONLY means that serious people need to move on from Debating the reality of AGW

Nope. This is the scenario:

IPCC: AGW is real and beyond discussion.
Me: Are you sure?
IPCC: Yep. We've added x ppm of CO2 and that alone has caused Y degrees of warming up to now.
Me: Ah, so if we add the same x ppm again we'll get another Y degrees of warming, right?
IPCC: Wait, what? Em, no, we don't know that.
Me: But you just said...
IPCC: I know what I said. It's just that we don't know how much warming 2X ppm will produce.
Me: So how do you know that X has been responsible for Y up to now?
IPCC: Because the overwhelming majority of experts say so.
Me: So they must also be pretty sure of how sensitive temperature is to this CO2 stuff.
IPCC: Actually no, it could be any multiples of X...or not. Now please go away.

Gaoth Laidir wrote: »

Nope. This is the scenario:

IPCC: AGW is real and beyond discussion.
Me: Are you sure?
IPCC: Yep. We've added x ppm of CO2 and that alone has caused Y degrees of warming up to now.
Me: Ah, so if we add the same x ppm again we'll get another Y degrees of warming, right?
IPCC: Wait, what? Em, no, we don't know that.
Me: But you just said...
IPCC: I know what I said. It's just that we don't know how much warming 2X ppm will produce.
Me: So how do you know that X has been responsible for Y up to now?
IPCC: Because the overwhelming majority of experts say so.
Me: So they must also be pretty sure of how sensitive temperature is to this CO2 stuff.
IPCC: Actually no, it could be any multiples of X...or not. Now please go away.

You’re completely shifting the goalposts

The conversation is actually.
Either

IPCC: increasing GHGs in the atmosphere leads to climate change
You: yes I agree
IPCC: ok that’s fine, now let’s talk about how to deal with that

Or

IPCC: increasing GHGs in the atmosphere leads to climate change
YOU: prove it?
IPCC: Fu.ck off we’ve had this ‘debate to death, your side lost, we need to start talking about how to actually deal with this now

Akrasia wrote: »

You’re completely shifting the goalposts

The conversation is actually.
Either

IPCC: increasing GHGs in the atmosphere leads to climate change
You: yes I agree
IPCC: ok that’s fine, now let’s talk about how to deal with that

Or

IPCC: increasing GHGs in the atmosphere leads to climate change
YOU: prove it?
IPCC: Fu.ck off we’ve had this ‘debate to death, your side lost, we need to start talking about how to actually deal with this now

A career in politics awaits you. How to dodge a question. Bunny Carr would be proud.

Gaoth Laidir wrote: »

A career in politics awaits you. How to dodge a question. Bunny Carr would be proud.

Im not dodging a question at all.
How clear can I make it. ‘The science is settled’ is a response only to the cretins who deny that anthropogenic climate change is happening. That part of the science absolutely is settled. If your not a climate change denier, then your more than welcome to debate impacts, sensitivity, mitigation, details relating to data reliability or evidence collection or a Miriad of other topics

All of these things and many more, are still uncertain. But the ‘debate’ gets constantly derailed by conspiracy theorists and science deniers who have no interest in the evidence or facts. It would be nice if you could challenge these posters at least sometimes, so we can avoid this tedious cycle over and over again

I’m glad you no longer accept Lindzen and Bates ludicrous ECS of .5c
You need to educate others who look to you as an expert as to why their CT views are invalid and unhelpful

Akrasia wrote: »

It would be nice if you responded to bull**** posts on both sides of the ‘debate’
You are clever enough to recognize absolute nonsense even if it is not directed at you personally

If everyone challenged this rubbish (from both sides) then we’d have a more productive environment to discuss important ideas

Akrasia wrote: »

Because while they may be off topic and disruptive, they are usually in line with the scientific consensus

If someone came on and started flaking scientifically inaccurate claims, that exaggerate the impact of climate change or peddle conspiracy theories, I would, and often have, challenge them or correct them

But in the spirit of transparency, I commit to challenging anyone who makes a claim on my ‘side’ of the argument that I view as inaccurate or not supported by evidence

I’ll commit to this to the best of my ability given my limited time available to post on these forums

So rubbish means only scientific stuff you don't agree with but personal abuse and childish trolling posts are fair game? Ok.

Gaoth Laidir wrote: »

So rubbish means only scientific stuff you don't agree with but personal abuse and childish trolling posts are fair game? Ok.

No, personal abuse and trolling from either side is wrong

The difference between robust debate and ‘personal abuse’ is a very grey area that the Mods need to grapple with

Gaoth Laidir wrote: »

But that's what I'm doing. I never said AGW was false, I'm just debating the exact impact of it, as in the conversation I posted above. That's an accurate reflection of the state of play, like it or not.

When you argued last year that ECS was .5c
That is equivalent with denying it is happening at
all
This was well below the scientific consensus at that time
Similarly when you promoted a paper by some lunatic who said atmospheric density dictated surface temperature in all planetary bodies, this was a effectively greenhouse effect denial. You’re welcome to hold such views, but when you spread them, or promote them, you align yourself with a certain side of the argument

It’s fine to make mistakes, but it’s only good manners to own up to them when you realize you screwed up and try to fix the consequences of those mistakes

And just this week, you said the models were inaccurate because they didn’t match observed warming
You admitted your graph was wrong, and that the model forecasts were actually very close to smack in the middle of the ensemble range. But you refused to alter your opinion even when you accepted new evidence

I’m not normally harsh on mistakes, but when someone thinks they know better that the consensus of globally recognized experts in their fields, they’d better be damned sure their calculations are correct

Akrasia wrote: »

When you argued last year that ECS was .5c
That is equivalent with denying it is happening at
all
This was well below the scientific consensus at that time
Similarly when you promoted a paper by some lunatic who said atmospheric density dictated surface temperature in all planetary bodies, this was a effectively greenhouse effect denial. You’re welcome to hold such views, but when you spread them, or promote them, you align yourself with a certain side of the argument

It’s fine to make mistakes, but it’s only good manners to own up to them when you realize you screwed up and try to fix the consequences of those mistakes

And just this week, you said the models were inaccurate because they didn’t match observed warming
You admitted your graph was wrong, and that the model forecasts were actually very close to smack in the middle of the ensemble range. But you refused to alter your opinion even when you accepted new evidence

I’m not normally harsh on mistakes, but when someone thinks they know better that the consensus of globally recognized experts in their fields, they’d better be damned sure their calcification are correct

Again, my corrected graph merely bumped up 5 years of data by a few tenths of a degree but the average before it was well below the ensemble mean. The correction only now brings the 5-year running mean back to the middle after consistently being below it. Let's see how the data continue from now.

Not sure what calcification has to do with anything but I reckon you meant calculation...

Gaoth Laidir wrote: »

Again, my corrected graph merely bumped up 5 years of data by a few tenths of a degree but the average before it was well below the ensemble mean. The correction only now brings the 5-year running mean back to the middle after consistently being below it. Let's see how the data continue from now.

Not sure what calcification has to do with anything but I reckon you meant calculation...

A few tenths of a degree over 5 years is a huge difference that completely invalidated the point you were making while also demonstrating the need up use peer reviewed sources instead of home made graphs from some guy who seems to think he knows what he’s going

So swings from - 7 to 12 degrees in our climate is normal occurrence in a 2 day period throughout history. Sry but in my lifetime it is not normal lads.