Jim Hansen and buds offer an explanation of the 2005 global temperature numbers, in part in response to last month’s Washington Post story on their data. Money quote: The existing record in the period of instrumental temperature measurements occurred when the 1997-98 “El Nino of the century” occurred on the back of a strong two-decade …
I’ve been struggling to understand “environmental determinism,” and why some people think it’s so icky. Thanks to Wikipedia, I finally get it. I was stuck on the plain English meaning of the words, and thought I had stumbled down the rabbit hole of some sort of academic argument over the relative importance of environmental boundary …
I’ve been guilty in my journalism of playing the “thermohaline card” – using the example of a thermohaline circulation shutdown as an example of the sort of abrupt climate change that could happen unexpectedly as a result of anthropogenic climate change. I never pushed it hard, but I thought it relevant. But a good story …
Dennis Kucinich’s wacky “resolution of inquiry” into What the President Knew About Global Warming and When He Knew It (see Prometheus for background) has been defeated. Comments from House Science Committee chair Sherwood Boehlert (he’s an R), as reported in the committee press release: I want to make clear at the outset that any debate …
David Appell’s not around to do this, so I guess it’s my job to point out that October 2005 was the second-warmest globally in history. The three warmest Octobers in history have come in the last three years. It’s not that I think that a single global number is useless. I agree with Roger Pielke …
Given the recent discussions here and elsewhere about the suitability (or lack thereof) of globally averaged surface temperature as a measure of anthropogenic climate change, I note a paper by Swiss climate researcher Rolf Philipona and colleagues that found a positive water vapor feedback responsible for excess warming in Europe:
Roger Pielke Jr. links to an absolutely wacky press release from Dennis Kucinich documenting his request for all documents (including minutes and memos) in his possession relating to the effects of climate change on the coastal regions of the United States produced by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration, the National Weather Service, the National …
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I find myself scratching my head over the latest debate between the RealClimate crew and Roger Pielke Sr. regarding the definition and use of “chaos” (non-linear sensitive dependence on initial conditions) in weather and climate modelling. As often is the case in debates like this, both sides are correct in the point they’re making, differing …
While we’re on the subject of droughts, Ed Cook and his colleagues and Lamont-Doherty have a new review paper (preprint, 10 meg pdf) of North American drought that makes some relevant points about the differences between what happens here and the current African drought/famine I mentioned below. Point one is the distinction between the effects …
Michael Wines had a terrific story in Wednesday’s New York Times on famine in Africa that evokes a point Mickey Glantz makes in his book Climate Affairs. First Glantz: Closer scrutiny of most famine situations uncovers a multistressed political environment, of which drought was but one factor. Now Wines: War wrecked Mozambique’s economy; socialism and …