Errors in IPCC climate science

There is a 20 questions Q & A paper attached to the WMO “Scientific Assessment of Ozone Depletion: 2006″.

In the second column in Question 2 – near top right page Q4 – is the statement:

“Some stratospheric ozone is transported down into the troposphere and can influence ozone amounts at Earth’s surface, particularly in remote, unpolluted regions of the globe.“

Natural processes that can cause injection of stratospheric ozone down into the surface layer will happen regardless of whether the location is above “…remote, unpolluted regions of the globe.” or above urban and inhabited areas.

I think the WMO should rewrite the above very odd passage – without any spin.

There is a controversy about the origin of common high levels (circa 50-100ppb) in peak daily surface level ozone measured at non-urban stations.

The WMO view would emphasise that these are due to mass transport of polluted urban air – outward to rural sites.

The opposing view that I see evidence for in my studies of hourly air monitoring data – is that daily ozone peaks can form in rural air due to natural ozone precurssor chemical species.

This book by New Zealand journalist Ian Wishart – a #1 bestselling author four times, surprised me by the completeness with which he reviewed and presents alternatives to the plethora of IPCC inspired spin and publicity which floods our media today. His sixteen chapters examining aspects of the debate are meticulously footnoted and thus are a valuable reference resource for those wishing to dig deeper or keep up to speed with the unfolding global warming / carbon reduction political drama in years to come.

Note- AIR CON is available online for about US$22 – dont miss out – see below.

Having followed much of the debate over two decades or so I was particularly interested in his last four chapters to see what the author says about where the entire IPCC driven brouhaha is heading. Wishart traces the rise and fall of Enron which after all was designed to make large profits from carbon trading. He sketches for us an entertaining international tableaux overun with mostly unelected public service professionals and swashbuckling business and financial characters.

From an Australian perspective it is fascinating to watch the Rudd Goverments squirmings as it attempts to weave a local Carbon Trading Scheme CTS that will not result in disaster for our economy. Now safely postponed until after the next Federal election in 2010 there is more time for the profiteers and rentseekers to jockey for positions like a multitude of Remora beneath a shark – squadrons of latterday mini-Enrons.

There is a marvellous juxtaposition of global events right now as the Global Financial Crisis (GFC) bites deeper, sapping the ability of the West to throw borrowed money at imaginary problems. There grows a realization that due to a lengthy and quiet transition between solar cycles – a period of reduced sunspot activity is likely in decades ahead and history tells us that climate could cool rather than warm.

It is against this background that we are counting down to the UN Climate Change Conference (COP15) in Copenhagen December 7th to 18th 2009 – a talkfest that is planned to produce the legal framework to succeed Kyoto which ends in 2012.

In the countdown to COP15 we can expect an unprecedented blizzard of media articles breathlessly informing us along the lines:

• global warming will be worse than previously thought
• sea level rise will be worse than previously thought
• threats to wildlife will be worse than previously thought
• ice melting – breaking up will be worse than previously thought
• cyclones can be expected to be worse than previously thought
• droughts and water shortages will be worse than previously thought
• threats to the Great Barrier Reef will be worse than previously thought

Ian Wishart’s well researched and referenced book AIR CON will be a most valuable resource for those wanting to make sense of the media blitz that will descend upon us as 2009 rolls on.

It is amazing that a simple enough phenomenon such as the rebound of global temperatures from the chilly depths of the Little Ice Age a few hundred years ago – has been transmogrified into the mother of all threats to life on Earth.
All this for for under a degree of warming – vastly less than most people would happily pay to enjoy on their vacations.

AIR CON: The Seriously Inconvenient Truth About Global Warming by Ian Wishart, Howling at the Moon Publishing, NZ$34.95

The New York Times reports how land is rising from the sea around Juneau and that this is due to glaciers melting. Whatever the relationships between these various phenomena – temperature data from NASA GISS – NCDC and University of Alabama at Huntsville satellite data for the lower troposphere – all point to there being no significant warming in the Juneau 2.5 degree grid box over 109 years 1900-2008.

Notes on the data – the GISS warm anomalies post the mid-1990′s look too warm compared to the other two datasets and the surface warmth in 1981 was not found in the lower troposphere. You would need to examine all available surface data to resolve the last 30 years better. As usual when T data are examined closely, you find problems.

By Viv Forbes, Chairman of the Carbon Sense Coalition.

7th May 2009
The Carbon Sense Coalition today called on the Australian Federal Parliament to stop playing Global Warming politics and focus instead on the irresponsible damage being contemplated by the Cap-N-Tax promises.

In testimony this week to the New Zealand Parliamentary Enquiry into the ETS, the Chairman of Carbon Sense, Mr Viv Forbes, said that it was impossible to achieve the gigantic cuts in carbon dioxide emissions suggested by various western governments without a crash program of Carbon Capture and Burial (CCB). He expanded on those comments today (quote):
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Dr Jim Salinger, a long time prominent NZ climate researcher was suddenly sacked by the National Institute of Water and Atmospheric Research (NIWA) on 23 April 09 because of repeatedly giving interviews to the media – a self appointed task he was warned to stop- Nature records the event.
A minute or so in Google will turn up lots of media stories where Dr Salinger is quoted.
Here is one where he was not quoted.
Scorcher day put mercury at record levels

We expect our scientists to be able to get on with their research without political interference but I suppose that nowhere is it written on tablets of stone that the deal includes unlimited scope for giving media interviews. It would be a long job to go through all the articles that Dr Salinger contributed to and try to balance that with a look at meteorological events that he did NOT comment on. Given the usual blocks, obstacles and secrecy surrounding met data, I will not be rushing to attempt the task.
It must be a rare event for a pro-IPCC scientist to be sacked in this way.
Full Nature article below here.
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Dr Maxine Cooper the ACT (Australian Capital Territory) Commissioner for Sustainability and the Environment has a page discussing ACT weather and if you scroll down about half way you see this headline. “Has development around Canberra International Airport adversely affected its use as a climate reference station?”

BoM Climate Ref Stations map
and list

Dr Cooper sees the encroaching of carparks and hangars only from 2005 but I would suggest to her that the increasing size of Canberra and associated increased urban warming over the last half century has been warping the Canberra AP data warmer for decades. Last February, air masses warmed by the SE Australian heatwaves travelled ~2500 km across the Tasman Sea to give Auckland its hottest day (32.4 on 12 Feb) since 1872. I think it is obvious that Canberra air warmed a few degrees by urban effects could at times limp its way the 10 km to the airport and affect readings there.

Anyway, the good Doctor asks the question, “How much do these developments affect the Bureau’s ability to keep using this site as a long-term reference station?”
Heavens above, if Dr Cooper is getting concerned about the Canberra AP site then the list of global sites that that Dr P. D. Jones and the Hadley Centre use to generate “global warming” trends for the IPCC should really give her cause to be alarmed.
And note, Canberra is on the Hadley Centre / Jones list.
949260 -353 -1492 578 CANBERRA AIRPORT AUSTRALIA
I have heard a term, “strain at a gnat while swallowing a camel”
Anthony Watts should be pleased that some well heeled Govt. group down-under is on the job, helping him.

Read this latest illustration of the famous saying by Sir Walter Scott along lines, “..what a tangled web we weave when we set out to deceive..”
May 2 article in “The Australian”, no compromise over the length of this headline.

“Bureau blows hot and cold over Antarctica warm-up as Bureau of Metereology backs down from a claim that temperatures at Australia’s three bases in Antarctica have been warming over the past three decades”

You need to read right to the end of the article for the lines,

“Dr Watkins declined to release the temperature data to The Weekend Australian. He said it had still to be fully analysed by the bureau.”

Can I please add – but the data was quite OK to be a base for Dr Watkins to trumpet his version to the media.

Here you can see some graphics of BoM data from Australian Antarctic stations, thanks to Geoff Sherrington and to the stalwart observers who ventured out in thick and thin to record these data over the decades.
Thanks to Romanoz for his mention on another thread.
Below here for the article text, in case it vanishes.
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