Particularly in view of all the balderdash concerning “climate science” being spouted in Washington DC on Wednesday lets first of all run through some Arctic sea ice facts from April 1st 2017 or thereabouts:
Northern Hemisphere Snow Extent:
Arctic Sea Ice Area:
Arctic Sea Ice Extent:
Arctic Sea Ice Concentration:
Thin ice map from the University of Bremen SMOS:
Thick ice map from CPOM CryoSat-2
Beaufort Sea ice thickness growth graph:
DMI sea ice temperature map:
DMI atmospheric temperature graph:
DMI Arctic Freezing Degree Days:
PIOMAS volume for March will follow in a few days, but it’s extremely unlikely to be anything other than “lowest for the date”.
What preliminary conclusions can we draw from this plethora of pretty pictures? First of all the Arctic hasn’t suddenly gone into “deep freeze” mode. Temperatures above 80 degrees north are rising again and are well above the climatology. Freezing degree days are still the lowest on record by a wide margin. Northern hemisphere snow cover is falling fast and is currently just above last year.
In contrast to last year, and thanks to lots of cyclones and very little in the way of anticyclones, there’s plenty of sub half meter sea ice in the Laptev and East Siberian Seas and hardly any in the Beaufort Sea. There’s also plenty of thin ice to be seen on both the Atlantic and Pacific peripheries.
The usual southerly arch hasn’t formed in the Nares Strait between Greenland and Ellesmere Island, and as SMOS shows the sea ice in the strait is consequently very thin. That leads one to wonder when the northern arch in the Lincoln Sea might give way.
It’s not immediately apparent from the still images above, but there’s been relatively large amounts of “old ice” exported from the Central Arctic on the Atlantic side, hence the recent increase in overall extent which is now second lowest for the date (since satellite records began). Area has been creeping up as well over recent days, but is still lowest for the date, as it has been for most of the last year. Sea ice “compactness” has decreased somewhat and given all the thin ice around the edges extent will soon start dropping once again.
All in all, the Arctic sea ice prognosis is not good. Are you watching Lamar Smith? (Pun intended!)
[Edit – April 4th]
The March PIOMAS update is out! As suspected, Arctic sea ice volume is still by far the lowest on record:
Volume on March 31st 2017 was 20.398 thousand cubic kilometers. The previous lowest volume for the date was 22.129 thousand km³ in 2011.
Here too is the PIOMAS modelled Arctic sea ice thickness map:
PIOMAS daily gridded thickness for March 31st 2017
[Edit – April 12th]
The latest edition of the NSIDC’s Arctic Sea Ice News confirms that their monthly extent metric for March 2017 was the lowest in the satellite record for the month:
As well as highlighting the anomalously warm temperatures across much of the Arctic:
the NSIDC article includes this telling pressure anomaly map:
New work by an international team led by Igor Polyakov of the University of Alaska Fairbanks provides strong evidence that Atlantic layer heat is now playing a prominent role in reducing winter ice formation in the Eurasian Basin, which is manifested as more summer ice loss. According to their analysis, the ice loss due to the influence of Atlantic layer heat is comparable in magnitude to the top down forcing by the atmosphere.
The show is over, and it went pretty much as Alice F. predicted it would. Lamar Smith has passed his verdict on the morning’s proceedings in strangely untheatrical style:
My own mileage certainly varied from Lamar’s! Here’s a hasty summary of events via the distorting lens of Twitter:
A more detailed analysis of United States’ House Committee on Science, Space and Technology’s “show trial” of climate models will follow in due course, but for now if you so desire you can watch the entire event on YouTube:
I’ll have to at least watch the bit where my live feed cut out as Dana Rohrabacher slowly went ballistic with Mike Mann:
Nevertheless, given our long running campaign against the climate science misinformation frequently printed in the Mail on Sunday it gives us great pleasure to reprint in full the following extract from his written testimony today:
For proper context, we must consider the climate denial myth du jour that global warming has “stopped”. Like most climate denial talking points, the reality is pretty much the opposite of what is being claimed by the contrarians. All surface temperature products, including the controversial UAH satellite temperature record, show a clear long-term warming trend over the past several decades:
We have now broken the all-time global temperature record for three consecutive years and a number of published articles have convincingly demonstrated that global warming has continued unabated despite when one properly accounts for the vagaries of natural short-term climate fluctuations. A prominent such study was published by Tom Karl and colleagues in 2015 in the leading journal Science. The article was widely viewed as the final nail in the “globe has stopped warming” talking point’s coffin.
Last month, opinion writer David Rose of the British tabloid the Daily Mail — known for his serial misrepresentations of climate change and his serial attacks on climate scientists, published a commentary online attacking Tom Karl, accusing him of having “manipulated global warming data” in the 2015 Karl et al article. This fake news story was built entirely on an interview with a single disgruntled former NOAA employee, John Bates, who had been demoted from a supervisory position at NOAA for his inability to work well with others.
Bates’ allegations were also published on the blog of climate science denier Judith Curry (I use the term carefully—reserving it for those who deny the most basic findings of the scientific community, which includes the fact that human activity is substantially or entirely responsible for the large-scale warming we have seen over the past century — something Judith Curry disputes). That blog post and the Daily Mail story have now been thoroughly debunked by the actual scientific community. The Daily Mail claim that data in the Karl et al. Science article had been manipulated was not supported by Bates. When the scientific community pushed back on the untenable “data manipulation” claim, noting that other groups of scientists had independently confirmed Karl et al’s findings, Bates clarified that the real problem was that data had not been properly archived and that the paper was rushed to publication. These claims too quickly fell apart.
Though Bates claimed that the data from the Karl et al study was “not in machine-readable form”, independent scientist Zeke Hausfather, lead author of a study that accessed the data and confirmed its validity, wrote in a commentary “…for the life of me I can’t figure out what that means. My computer can read it fine, and it’s the same format that other groups use to present their data.” As for the claim that the paper was rushed to publication, Editor-in-chief of Science Jeremy Berg says, “With regard to the ‘rush’ to publish, as of 2013, the median time from submission to online publication by Science was 109 days, or less than four months. The article by Karl et al. underwent handling and review for almost six months. Any suggestion that the review of this paper was ‘rushed’ is baseless and without merit. Science stands behind its handling of this paper, which underwent particularly rigorous peer review.”
Shortly after the Daily Mail article went live, a video attacking Karl (and NOAA and even NASA for good measure) was posted by the Wall Street Journal. Within hours, the Daily Mail story spread like a virus through the right-wing blogosphere, appearing on numerous right-wing websites and conservative news sites. It didn’t take long for the entire Murdoch media empire in the U.S, U.K. and elsewhere to join in, with the execrable Fox News for example alleging Tom Karl had “cooked” climate data and, with no sense of irony, for political reasons.
Rep. Lamar Smith (R-TX), chair of this committee has a history25 of launching attacks on climate science and climate scientists. He quickly posted a press release praising the Daily Mail article, placing it on the science committee website, and falsely alleging that government scientists had “falsified data”. Smith, it turns out, had been planning a congressional hearing timed to happen just days after this latest dustup, intended to call into question the basis for the EPA regulating carbon emissions. His accusations against Karl and NOAA of tampering with climate data was used in that hearing to claim that the entire case for concern over climate change was now undermined.
That’s pretty much the way we see things too Mike!
[Edit – March 31st]
In the aftermath of Wednesday’s hearing, the accusations are flying in all directions. By way of example:
No clarification has yet been forthcoming from Dr. Pielke.
The denialosphere is of course now spinning like crazy attempting to pin something, anything, on Michael Mann. Over at Climate Depot Marc Morano assures his loyal readers that:
Testifying before Congress, climate scientist Michael Mann denies any affiliation or association to the Climate Accountability Institute despite his apparent membership on the Institute’s Council of Advisors.
Whilst correctly quoting Dr. Mann as saying:
I can provide – I’ve submitted my CV you can see who I’m associated with and who I am not.
Here’s the video Marc uses to support his case:
Meanwhile over on Twitter:
As I said before, Mann said "No." He then added "I've submitted my CV. You can see who I'm associated with". The CV contradicts his lie.
Today is All Fools’ Day, but this is no joke. Last night Judith Curry posted an article on her “Climate Etc.” blog entitled “‘Deniers,’ lies and politics“. Here is an extract from it:
“Turns out Mann appears to be a bit of a denier himself. Under questioning, Mann denied being involved with the Climate Accountability Institute even though he is featured on its website as a board member. CAI is one of the groups pushing a scorched-earth approach to climate deniers, urging lawmakers to employ the RICO statute against fossil-fuel corporations. When asked directly if he was either affiliated or associated with CAI, Mann answered “no.” [JC note: Mann also lists this affiliation on his CV]
Some additional ‘porkies’ are highlighted in an article by James Delingpole.
Now the first thing to note is that I’d already explained the context of Mr. Mann’s “interrogation” by Rep. Clay Higgins on Judith’s blog several times:
At the risk of repeating myself Mann said, and I quote:
“I’ve submitted my CV. You can see who I’m ‘associated’ with”
His CV states, quoted by McIntyre:
Why on Earth Judith chose to repeat the “CAI” allegation is beyond me.
Secondly, Prof. Mann is NOT featured on the CAI website as a board member. He is instead listed as a member of their “Council of Advisors”.
Thirdly, quoting James Delingpole as a source of reliable information about anything “climate change” related is also beyond me. Needless to say Mr. Delingpole also repeats the CAI nonsense, whilst simultaneously plagiarising our long standing usage of the term “Porky pie“!
All of which brings me on to my next point. In the video clip above Rep. Higgins can be heard to say:
These two organisations [i.e the Union of Concerned Scientists & the Climate Accountability Institute], are they connected directly with organised efforts to prosecute man influenced climate sceptics via RICO statutes?
to which Dr. Mann replied:
The way you’ve phrased it, I would find it extremely surprising if what you said was true.
Now please skip to the 1 hour 31:33 mark in the video of the full hearing to discover what Marc Morano left out. Rep. Higgins asks Dr. Mann:
Would you be able to at some future date provide to this committee evidence of your lack of association with the organisation Union of Concerned Scientists and lack of your association with the organisation called Climate Accountability Institute? Can you provide that documentation to this committee Sir?
This is, of course, a “when did you stop beating your wife” sort of a question. How on Earth do you prove a “lack of association with an organisation”. Supply a video of your entire life? Dr. Mann responded less pedantically:
You haven’t defined what “association” even means here, but it’s all in my CV which has already been provided to Committee.
So what on Earth are Rep. Higgins and ex. Prof. Curry on about with all this “RICO” business? With thanks to Nick Stokes on Judith’s blog, the document he refers to seems to be the only evidence for the insinuations:
It turns out that what the congressman was probably referring to was a workshop they mounted in 2012 (not attended by Mann), which explored the RICO civil lawsuit mounted against tobacco companies.
It does mention for example “the RICO case against the tobacco companies” but it never mentions anything that might conceivably be (mis)interpreted as “pushing a scorched-earth approach to climate deniers”.
That being the case, why on Earth do you suppose Judith Curry chose to mention that phrase on her blog last night and why did Clay Higgins choose to broach the subject on Wednesday?
[Edit – April 2nd]
Perhaps this really is an April Fools’ joke? Over on Twitter Stephen McIntyre continues to make my case for me. Take a look:
Our title for today is borrowed then modified from the title of a Global Warming Policy Foundation report entitled “The State of the Climate in 2016”. The associated GWPF press release assures us that:
A report on the State of the Climate in 2016 which is based exclusively on observations rather than climate models is published today.
Compiled by Dr Ole Humlum, Professor of Physical Geography at the University Centre in Svalbard (Norway), the new climate survey is in sharp contrast to the habitual alarmism of other reports that are mainly based on computer modelling and climate predictions.
Prof Humlum said: “There is little doubt that we are living in a warm period. However, there is also little doubt that current climate change is not abnormal and not outside the range of natural variations that might be expected.
However it seems as though the sharp contrast to other reports is that the GWPF’s effort is evidently hot off their porky pie production line. By way of example, Prof. Humlum’s “white paper” is not “based exclusively on observations rather than climate models” nor is it “The World’s first” such “State of the Climate Survey”. As Dr. Roy Spencer of the University of Alabama in Huntsville pointed out on Watts Up With That of all places:
Ummm… I believe the Bulletin of the AMS (BAMS) annual State of the Climate report is also observation-based…been around many years.
Meanwhile on Twitter Victor Venema of the University of Bonn pointed out that:
Sorry Benny Peiser, if you use satellite temperature estimates, you are using a (radiative transfer) model.
All in all there are several “alternative facts” in just the headline and opening paragraph of the GWPF’s press release, which doesn’t augur well for the contents of the report itself!
Date: Wednesday, March 29, 2017 – 10:00am
Location: 2318 Rayburn House Office Building
Dr. Judith Curry
President, Climate Forecast Applications Network; Professor Emeritus, Georgia Institute of Technology
Dr. John Christy
Professor and Director, Earth System Science Center, NSSTC, University of Alabama at Huntsville; State Climatologist, Alabama
Dr. Michael Mann
Professor, Department of Meteorology and Atmospheric Science, Pennsylvania State University
Dr. Roger Pielke Jr.
Professor, Environmental Studies Department, University of Colorado
John Christy doesn’t seem to have a Twitter account, but the other three “expert witnesses” announced there involvement, as revealed in this slideshow of learned (and not so learned!) comments on Twitter:
You may have noticed that in response to the GWPF’s propaganda I pointed them at a “State of the Arctic in 2017” report of my own devising which is in actual fact “based exclusively on observations rather than climate models” and looks like this:
NASA Worldview “false-color” image of the Bering Sea on March 22nd 2017, derived from the MODIS sensor on the Terra satelliteNASA Worldview “false-color” image of the Kara Sea on March 22nd 2017, derived from the MODIS sensor on the Terra satelliteSynthetic aperture radar image of the Wandel Sea on March 21st 2017, from the ESA Sentinel 1B satellite
We feel sure that Lamar Smith and the House Committee on Science, Space and Technology won’t comprehend the significance of those observations, but will nonetheless be pleased to see the GWPF’s report become public knowledge shortly before their planned hearing next week.
We also feel sure they were pleased to view the contents of another recent “white paper” published under the GWPF banner. The author was ex Professor Judith Curry, and the title was “Climate Models for the Layman“. Lamar Smith et al. certainly seem to qualify as laymen, and Judith’s conclusion that:
There is growing evidence that climate models are running too hot and that climate sensitivity to carbon dioxide is at the lower end of the range provided by the IPCC.
will no doubt be grist to their climate science bashing mill next Wednesday. Unfortunately that conclusion is yet another “alternative fact” according to the non laymen.
This report, however, does little to help public understanding; well, unless the goal is to confuse public understanding of climate models so as to undermine our ability to make informed decisions. If this is the goal, this report might be quite effective.
That certainly seems to be the goal of the assorted parties involved, and consequently we cannot help but wonder if the David and Judy Show will put on another performance this coming Sunday morning? Paraphrasing William Shakespeare:
Friends, Romans, countrymen, lend me your ears;
Lamar Smith comes to bury Michael Mann, not to praise him
In our latest astonishing disclosure concerning David Rose’s optimistically named “Climategate 2” campaign in the Mail on Sunday in February we can now reveal the Mail’s botched attempt to cover up another “inadvertent” error in Mr. Rose’s February 19th article entitled “US Congress launches a probe into climate data that duped world leaders over global warming“.
In actual fact it’s the US Congress that’s being duped. Perhaps Lamar Smith, Chairman of the House Committee on Science, Space and Technology, would like to play “spot the difference” with us? Here’s an extract from the original article:
and here’s the same section of the allegedly “corrected” article.
One of Mr. Rose’s “porky pies” concerning a statement supposedly made last month by Peter Stott from the UK Met Office has gone missing. There’s no apology or explanation in either the online or print version of the apology for a “correction” issued by the Mail on Sunday at the weekend.
Not only that, but an entire paragraph concerning the alleged “pause” has evaporated into thin air.
Not only that, but the alleged “correction” included below the offending article is different to the “official” version published in print at the weekend. Take another look:
Something is rotten in the state of MayBeLand. And in the state of TrumpLand too.
For some relevant background to this weekend’s dose of “Alternative Facts” from David Rose in the Mail on Sunday you may wish to peruse this article in our sister journal “Alternative Facts Wetware™“:
From the conclusions to that article on Donald Trump’s rise to power:
Reflecting on the implications of this analysis for the specifics of this election, we can see that many Trump voters knew full well that their man was a reprobate, that they deplored his crudities and that they saw him as a risky choice. And yet in a world where the system is seen to be against “us” and where things appear to be driven in the wrong direction by “them,” the really irrational thing to do is to vote for the conventional candidate who represents sticking with that system.
Getting back to this morning’s batch of post truth alternative facts from the poison pen of David Rose, the latest porky pie fresh off the Mail’s production line is entitled:
It is of course Mr. Rose who is “twisting the truth” yet again. His opening salvo:
They were duped – and so were we. That was the conclusion of last week’s damning revelation that world leaders signed the Paris Agreement on climate change under the sway of unverified and questionable data.
A landmark scientific paper –the one that caused a sensation by claiming there has been NO slowdown in global warming since 2000 – was critically flawed. And thanks to the bravery of a whistleblower, we now know that for a fact.
Mr. Rose wouldn’t recognise “a fact” if it hit him in the back of the head at a million miles an hour. The “landmark scientific paper” in question isn’t “critically flawed” anywhere but in the fertile imagination of David Rose and the other “Merchants of Doubt”. Take a look at the facts:
As predicted yesterday, I’m off down to the local paper shop. I wonder if there’s an associated editorial this week too? I’ll be back in a bit with more. As David Rose so eloquently put it this morning:
We cannot allow such a vital issue for our future to be mired in half truths and deceptions.
[Edit – February 12th PM]
My pocket is now £1.70 lighter in exchange for the following information:
It seems that is what passes for “due prominence, and — where appropriate — an apology” in MailSpeak? Here’s the actual facts once again:
I don’t see an accurate graph in Mr. Rose’s profuse apology. I see no mention of “World leaders not duped, Mail readers conned again”. Do you?
[Edit – February 15th]
This will come as no shock to seasoned Lamar Smith watchers. The U.S. House Science, Space, and Technology Committee have issued another news release:
Lamar Smith (R-Texas) today sent a letter to National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) Acting Administrator Benjamin Friedman requesting information on the Karl study following reports the study ignored NOAA standards, was rushed to publication, and was not free from political bias.
“Allegations of politicization of government funded scientific research cannot be ignored. The Committee has a constitutional responsibility to conduct oversight in instances of alleged fraud, abuse, and misconduct especially where the government’s scientific integrity is called into question. Dr. Bates’ revelations raise additional questions as to whether the science at NOAA is objective and free from political interference. In light of this new information, the Committee requests the below information to better understand the depth and scope of internal debate at NOAA related to the Karl study,” the letter states.
Today’s letter requests documents and communications related to the release of the Karl study, the datasets used in the Karl study, concerns raised about datasets used in the Karl study, and the scientific integrity of the study. The committee also requested a briefing on the independent experts NOAA is engaging with to review this matter.
The news release continues to describe the alleged “background”, but I think we’re all pretty familiar with that by now? The letter itself is addressed to Benjamin Friedman, NOAA’s acting administrator. It demands to see a big pile of documents “related to the Karl study”. It will come a no surprise whatsoever to our regular readers that it references the leading actors in the David & Judy show!
As part of our ongoing alternative facts research program we flipped the switch on the first beta test version of Snow White’s Alternative Facts Wetware™ (#AFW™ for short) AF detection subsystem early on Saturday morning (UTC). We were astonished when the needle literally flew past the end stops later that morning. Initially we suspected a bug must have sneaked in via one of Snow’s unprotected ear canals. However when she rather reluctantly ran her exhaustive diagnostic routines they revealed that her mission was in actual fact absolutely nominal.
What happened next therefore came as no surprise whatsoever:
For those of you unfamiliar with some of Planet Earth’s leading alternate facts exponents perhaps we should explain at this juncture that we tweeted Congressman Dana Rohrabacher (amongst numerous other local, national and international politicians) long before ex Prof. Judith Curry “blew the whistle” with the aid of John J Bates and then Congressman Lamar Smith proudly published the House Science Committee’s “#NOAAGate press release”.
Here’s a close up of the graphic graphic we sent the pols, which emerged from our prior “debate” with Nigel, who changed the subject without addressing the issue and then turned strangely silent:
We cannot help but wonder what comment Messrs Smith and Rohrabacher might wish to make at this juncture. What do you make of all this Nigel?
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