Climate myths: Any cooling disproves global warming

Let’s start with a thought experiment. Suppose you managed to find some children who knew nothing about the oceans, handed them a long measuring stick and sent them off to the seaside find out whether sea level is rising or falling.

As soon they saw the waves crashing on the shore, the children would realise they had been set a tricky task: how do you measure sea level when it is constantly changing?

If they were smart, the kids would try to find a quiet cove or harbour where there were no waves and start measuring. After an hour or so they would come running up to you. “The sea is going down! The sea is going down!” they’d shout in excitement.

“Not so fast,” you’d reply. “Keep going.” After a day or two, the children would realise the sea rises and falls at least once a day. If they were really dedicated and kept going for several days, they’d soon come running back to you.

 “The high water mark is getting lower,” they’d declare triumphantly. “That means sea level is falling.” And once again you’d have to tell them to keep at it.

The moral of this story is that it is very difficult to detect underlying trends that are small compared with short-term changes.

 

Climate: Will We Lose the Endgame?

It turns out that the geology of the region is bowl-shaped: beneath the glaciers the ground slopes downward, meaning that water can and is flooding underneath them. It is eating away at them from below and freeing them from the points where they were pinned to the ground. This water is warmer, because our oceans are steadily warming. This slow-motion collapse, which will occur over many decades, is “unstoppable” at this point, scientists say; it has “passed the point of no return.”

.. Indeed, by the time President Obama leaves office we will have passed Saudi Arabia and Russia as the largest oil and gas producer on the planet. We’re using less coal in our own power plants, but exporting more. Our actions have resulted in huge profits for oil and gas companies but have not been consonant with the emerging physics.

.. There, in the one country that has taken climate change seriously and done the work to change its energy infrastructure, a new record for renewable energy was set. On that afternoon Germany generated 74 percent of its electric needs from renewable sources.

On N.C.’s Outer Banks, scary climate-change predictions prompt a change of forecast

The 39-inch forecast was “a death sentence,” Kelly said, “for ever trying to sell your house.”

.. Now, the state is working on a new forecast that will look only 30 years out and therefore show the seas rising by no more than eight inches.

.. If the state ever activates the Web site that lets potential investors search by address, Kelly said, “all of a sudden, those properties would be worthless.”

.. he said, “it doesn’t seem reasonable to invest today’s tax dollars and punish the public for a problem that is 100 years away and may not exist. We aren’t arguing with science. We’re just trying to be reasonable.”