CLIMATESCEPTICS ANNUAL REPORT 2002
Moderator's Overview
1. MODERATOR'S OVERVIEW
The following proverbs and quotations describe the philosophy adopted by the Group.
"The recognition of facts is the root of all wisdom." (a proverb)
"The improver of natural knowledge absolutely refuses to acknowledge authority, as such.
For him, scepticism is the highest of duties; blind faith the one unpardonable sin." (Thomas H. Huxley)
"If the facts change, I'll change my opinion. What do you do, Sir ?" (John M. Keynes)
"To dwell only on horror scenarios of the future shows only a lack of imagination." (Kari Enqvist)
1.A. Preface
This is the first Annual Report of the "Sceptical Climate Science" discussion group.
Climate scientists have used emails for discussion and debate since this communication medium first became available. In recent years the number of participants in critical and sceptical discussions of Climate Science grew remarkably with resulting increase to their flow of emails. In 2001, the flow became a flood with anticipation and knowledge of papers to be included in the then coming Third Assessment Report (TAR) of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC, ref.). The amount of this correspondence required a single e-forum, and the "Sceptical Climate Science" discussion group (here known as ‘the Group’) was established in November 22, 2001.
This first Annual Report, of the Group is for year 2002 but also includes a short historical overview of Climate Science (Climatology) up to the end of year 2002 by the Group’s Moderator (Timo Hämeranta), and in Appendix it lists 63 studies by members from 2002 and previous years.
This Overview is entirely and solely the Moderator's personal view.
1.B. Summary
It is possible to assert that year 2002 was the End of the Era when the alleged human-caused global warming hypothesis dominated ideas about the causes of recent climate change.
However, the hypothesis still governs much scientific discussion, and it rules in media and politics concerning the environment.
In year 2002 new studies, observations and real world data revealed this hypothesis to be flawed.
During the past decades we have experienced
- natural variations in temperatures, and
- not global, but regional warming due to land cover changes, population growth, urbanisation (the UHI effects), etc.
CO2 has its physical properties, but the alleged "man-caused enhanced greenhouse effect" or man-made "climate change" is indiscernible.
According to the newest studies, no discernible warming has occurred due to increased man-caused CO2 concentrations in the way the models have projected.
Climate models are unable to truly imitate past, present or future climate and they are unlikely to be able to do this in the foreseeable future.
This is the End of the Era when climatology was dominated by concerns about 'dangerous' anthropogenic interference caused by man-made CO2 emissions (UNFCCC).
It remains to be seen when this true scientific understanding gets the publicity it urgently deserves.
The Kyoto Protocol is Dead, both scientifically and politically.
Fall 2002 at COP-8 Conference in New Delhi the developing countries and the U.S.A. agreed that Trade, Development and world wide Growing Economies are the best ways to protect environment and climate.
Implementation of the Kyoto Protocol would ruin those ambitions.
The Kyoto Protocol signatory countries (i.e., EU etc.) were left on their own. It remains to be seen if and when the signatory countries are able to correct their energy and climate policies.
It may be hoped that year 2003 will become epoch-making.
There is no "consensus" in Science. The existence of such a "consensus" would be the end of the scientific method, and it would be a return to orthodoxy belief systems like those of the Middle Ages. Climatologists throughout the world naturally have differing views of details. And, of course, scientists who still rely on the outdated IPCC "findings" disagree. It remains to be seen when the IPCC authors will update their views and conclusions."
1.C. Climatology
In Natural Sciences, new ideas, hypothesis, theories, observations, studies, experiments, results, and conclusions replace old ones.
Although Climatology is a very young branch that has been widely studied for only about 20 years, this progress can be seen clearly. The progress is so swift – thanks to immense research funding – that many findings only two years old are outdated.
Another aspect is the huge advancements achieved, and the following fragmentation of research into more and more detailed and specific areas.
The progress and advancements make difficulty in mastering all the enormous amount of information. In "the good old days" one qualified scientist could master his/her branch. Not any more, and especially not in Climatology, a branch including so many sub- and adjoining branches.
Climatology contains all the branches of Science which have to do with climate and weather and the tools to master those; e.g. meteorology, geology, oceanography, and cryosphere, lithosphere and biosphere studies, ecology, biology, chemistry, physics, astrophysics, solar, planetary and galactic cosmic ray studies, history, mathematics, statistics, etc., etc., etc..
No one person can master all these subjects, and the adopted solution is co-operation.
This co-operation has three forms:
a multiscientific approach: climatology is studied simultaneously by different branches, but the actual co-operation and especially integration remains feeble,
an interscientific approach: this integration is most effective when research ideas, methods and views of various branches are utilised in a planned co-operative process,
a cross-scientific approach: this provides an abstract conformity and finally a common theory for Climate.
It seems to me that Climatology has become a combination of multiscience and interscience. And it is certain that we have not yet achieved an all-inclusive theory of climate.
The IPCC was established to gather overviews of Climatology and especially of humans' role in the alleged global warming.
We now have three IPCC overviews, but the IPCC authors have not even tried to outline any theory for Climate.
The recent US Climate Change Science Program Workshop Dec. 3-5, 2002, did not attempt to formulate an all-inclusive theory of climate, either.
It is obvious why there has been no significant attempt to formulate an all-inclusive theory of climate. Our knowledge and understanding of climate are still too little and are likely to remain very limited for the foreseeable future.
Climate scientists have collected numerical observational data that have provided knowledge of climate behaviour. However, the collected numerical observational data are very limited in time and in space. Climate measurements have only been made for about a century but climate varies in millennial time scales. Also, few direct measurements of climate are made over the oceans that cover four-fifths of the globe.
The gained knowledge of climate behaviour and known physical properties are used to construct computer models as a method to try to detect causes and effects of climate behaviour.
To date, the attempts to emulate much climate behaviour have remained unsuccessful. It seems that accurate emulation of global climate is difficult without all-inclusive data and a theory of global climate.
Nevertheless, climate modellers have run their computer models to make projections of future climate behaviour for times up to 100 years in the future. These projections are theoretical laboratory studies – they test only the limited data available – without any broader significance (see e.g. Courtney, 2001).
1.D. Media
Scientific journals have published, and continue to publish, results of the computer runs.
It seems strange to me that the modellers and the "peer-reviewed" scientific journals do not stress that these computer runs are only limited tests proving nothing about the real climate.
On the contrary, I gain an impression that even the modellers believe their results imitate the real climate.
They explain how well their computer runs correlate to real world data. But they seem to forget mere correlation – even with some supporting physical theory – proves nothing. And worse, they seem to ignore that the "real world data" they rely upon for their correlations are very limited and unreliable.
Reasons for this unscientific behaviour have been studied (e.g. Mathiesen, 2000).
The lay media cannot be expected to report the limitations of the computer runs when even the expert "peer-reviewers" seem to ignore the deficiencies of these computer studies.
So, all kinds of groundless, non-scientific assertions and arguments are repeatedly reported in the popular media world wide.
1.E. Politics
In a democracy, the people are represented by politicians. And the politicians are normally laymen who rely on experts and listen to their voters.
When experts, media and voters are in "consensus" then politicians naturally make the necessary resolutions. And such a "consensus" exists in the belief that human-caused CO 2 emissions are to blame for harmful climate change. So, the politicians have responded with resolutions (e.g. the Kyoto Protocol) to combat such averse man-made consequences
But if the experts provide the media and the voters with only one misleading story then the "consensus" is false and, therefore, the responses may not be appropriate.
It is false to claim that projections of the future made by climate models are more than theoretical laboratory studies without any broader significance. But this is the impression that has been promoted by some experts. It seems to me, very many scientists, and therefore also popular media, public opinion and politicians, have fallaciously relied on expert calculations of unilateral global "mean" temperatures and on computer runs containing insufficient data. Hence, the political responses may not be appropriate.
1.F. Human Influence
Since the 1980's the main interest in Climatology has been to determine what part the human-induced CO 2 emissions from (industrial) burning of coal and fossil fuels play in the variations of climate.
The Intergovernmental Panel of Climate Change (IPCC) in its Second Assessment Report (SAR) 1996 concluded that the ability to quantify the human influence on global climate was limited.
Nevertheless, that report also concluded "the balance of evidence suggests a discernible human influence on global climate".
The IPCC in its Third Assessment report (TAR) 2001 concluded, "There is new and stronger evidence that most of the warming observed over the last 50 years is attributable to human activities" but also "These results show that the forcings included are sufficient to explain the observed changes, but do not exclude the possibility that other forcings may also have contributed."
The IPCC findings are results of climate modelling. The validity of the models and of the IPCC findings depends on our level of scientific understanding and on the models' ability to truly represent the real climate.
Both have been and still are very limited, as stated above. (Legates, 2002).
The role of CO 2 in climatic variations has been studied intensely. One difficulty is the chicken - egg problem. Which comes first: the temperature rise or the CO 2 rise? Which is the cause and which is the effect?
Recent glacial and interglacial studies prove temperature clearly leads CO 2 . That means the rise in temperature caused the rise in CO 2 . Further, CO2 has only a very weak effect on climate (Monin et al., 2001). And "results suggest that factors in addition to CO 2 are required to explain these past intervals of global warmth" (Royer et al., 2001).
The weak effect of an increase to CO 2 provides no obvious problem to Man or Nature; indeed, it only seems to be beneficial.
But, climate change hypothesis adherents argue the possibility of possibly ‘chaotic’ climate response; a so-called "butterfly effect".
Classical, Newtonian mechanical understanding suggested "big things only cause smaller things, smaller and smaller until dissipation, while small things never cause bigger effects on upward. There was only one direction in that picture" (Essex and McKitrick 2002).
But now we know better. "The computed solutions of the Lorenz equations revealed a remarkable thing. Small things had big consequences after all" (ibid.) when a system exhibited ‘chaotic’ behaviour.
1.G. The State of Climatology in Year 2002
The computer model results and the real world data disagree, often.
One reason for the disagreement is that the computer models assume that greenhouse gases (GHGs) in the air dominate climate behaviour, but the Earth's climate is not only affected by the GHGs.
New studies almost weekly reveal features affecting climate that were not previously known and are not yet included in the models.
For example, "a relatively small change in solar output can produce much larger changes in Earth's climate.". (e.g. Carslaw et al., 2002). Also, sunspots and solar winds, the Earth's magnetic field, the Moon, the planets, and galactic cosmic rays affect the Earth's climate (see MSA 1 / 2003). Other features that force climate are, for example, the Earth's biodiversity, and the Earth's numerous oscillations, fluctuations and cycles in various time scales.
But, most importantly, not only climatic forcings, but also thermodynamical chaos and turbulence affect the Earth's climate. "… most interannual climate variability in the period 1979-1996 at middle and high latitudes is chaotic, …" (Hansen et al, 1997). Our climate is also "wind driven" (Jelbring, 1998).
For now and the foreseeable future, climate modellers are not able to compute thermodynamical chaos and turbulence in the climate system.
Each of the IPCC papers is only the overview of the scientific understanding of its authors, although it has been evaluated by critical and sceptical climatologists.
Numerous omissions, flaws and logical fallacies have been found in the IPCC documents.
Here I refer to one crucial point, the CO 2 - Water Vapour connection. Water Vapour is not even mentioned in the IPCC list of forcings, although it is the most important factor in climatic variations, and the real core in the climate change hypothesis.
Further, I refer to the study by Michaels et al., December 2002 (ref.). A computer model version that was used to produce global-mean temperature projections in the SAR was run with the newest data, scenarios and assumptions, and the results are: The "enhanced greenhouse effect" is only 1.0 C – 1.6 C in 100 years. Next to nothing.
The appendix lists some studies by members of the Group that are critical of IPCC documents.
1.H. The End of an Era
Thanks to massive funding, new research studies have crystallised a false belief in the importance of man-caused greenhouse gas emissions' role in causing climatic variations.
It is possible to assert that year 2002 was the End of the Era when the alleged human-caused global warming hypothesis dominated ideas about the causes of recent climate change. However, the hypothesis still governs much scientific discussion, and it rules in media and politics concerning the environment.
In year 2002 new studies, observations and real world data revealed this hypothesis to be flawed.
According to the hypothesis the globally evenly spreading carbon dioxide should warm first and most prominently climate in the polar regions. But that has not happened. As atmospheric CO 2 concentration recently increased 30% the polar regions failed to show any significant warming; indeed, Antarctica cooled.
And "Satellite measurements of temperatures in the troposphere, the lowest five miles of the atmosphere, as well as independent measurements from balloons, show no evidence of significant global-scale warming.
That's at odds with surface temperature records, which show warming during the same period of time. The apparent disagreement between the datasets has been the source of scientific investigation and controversy.
The satellite data coverage includes remote ocean, desert and wilderness regions for which climate data are either scarce or not available at all.
During the past 22 years, the satellite dataset shows a warming trend of about 0.22 degrees C (0.4 degrees Fahrenheit) per decade for the northern third of the globe," Christy said. That covers the area from the North Pole to 20 degrees north latitude, including all of North America, Cuba and most of Mexico, all of Europe, the northern half of Saharan Africa and most of Asia.
The satellite data show that the atmosphere over the southern two-thirds of the globe has actually cooled by about 0.04 degrees C per decade over the past 22 years.
Looked at as a composite, the satellites show a "global" warming trend of about 0.04 degrees C per decade - with the bulk of that warming concentrated in the Northern Hemisphere." (Christy 2001).
But, the in situ studies show a more detailed picture: - during the last 35 years Antarctica has cooled (Doran et al., 2002), and - the Arctic regions have not warmed (Kahl et, al., 1993, Polyakov et al., 2002, Przybylak, 2002)
Thanks to modern measurements the alleged "global" warming is to be seen where it really appears: Only in the mid-latitudes of the Northern Hemisphere and only in the winter half-year.
Further, "We have been examining some dozen published proxy records. So far none show a warming since 1980." (Singer Dec 2002). There is no "global warming" (Essex and McKitrick, 2002).
During the past decades we have experienced
- natural variations in temperatures, and
- not global, but regional warming due to land cover changes, population growth, urbanisation (the UHI effects), etc.
CO 2 has its physical properties, but the alleged "man-caused enhanced greenhouse effect" or man-made "climate change" is indiscernible.
It seems strange to me that during the past 20 years climate scientists have not concentrated their efforts to the polar regions to detect the alleged human-caused warming, when according to the models that's where it should manifest itself most clearly.
The reason were "Arctic is not a good place to search for a human influence on climate. The signal may be high, but so too is the noise of natural variability". (Wigley and Jones, 1981).
Well, for misjudgement of the priorities in the research allocation we have lost 20 years and spent a huge amount of research funding.
According to the newest studies, no discernible warming has occurred due to increased man-caused CO 2 concentrations in the way the models have projected.
Crucial points have been omitted in the search for global warming. We have no all-inclusive theory at all for Climate, and if had, we have no possibility to test our theories of climate in laboratory experiments (Essex and McKitrick, 2002).
Further, all the significant IPCC conclusions so far are based on logical fallacies. All the IPCC conclusions omit the fact that climate variations have very many causes and effects: the identified causes are only a part of the entire genre of interacting causes and effects.
Climate models are unable to truly imitate past, present or future climate and they are unlikely to be able to do this in the foreseeable future.
The extremely limited and insufficient data the IPCC authors used in their projections has been sharpened in the past two years. Using the newest data, human emissions' influence on climate becomes almost indiscernible and of no importance.
All the current modelled projections are filled with inadequacies. But one conclusion has become clear: Any recommendations to combat the alleged warming 'caused by human CO2 emissions' are unscientific and unjustified.
In 1992 UNFCCC (ref.) put the following goal:
"The ultimate objective …. is to achieve …. stabilization of greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere at a level that could prevent dangerous anthropogenic interference with the climate system." (Article 2.)
Today, with current understanding and based on the new scientific findings the following conclusion has also become clear: greenhouse gas concentrations in the atmosphere are not dangerous to Nature or Man, not now or in the foreseeable future. On the contrary, they are only beneficial.
This is the end of the era when climatology was dominated by concerns about 'dangerous' anthropogenic interference caused by man-made CO2 emissions.
It remains to be seen when this true scientific understanding gets the publicity it urgently deserves.
1.I. Kyoto Is Dead
The Kyoto Protocol is Dead, both scientifically and politically.
1.H.a. The Kyoto Protocol is dead scientifically.
The newest observations, real world data, calculations and studies have already proved the alleged man-caused "enhanced greenhouse effect" hypothesis is flawed, as stated above.
We have no scientific basis to believe human CO 2 emissions will have any catastrophically warming consequences on the Earth's climate in the foreseeable future (Singer, Aug 2002).
Any such conclusions are unscientific and unjustified.
1.H.b. The Kyoto Protocol is dead politically.
The Kyoto Protocol is primarily a political document (see e.g. Hämeranta, 2001, Boehmer-Christiansen and Kellow, 2002).
This conclusion was confirmed at the 8th Conference of the Parties to the UNFCCC (COP8) held from 23 October to 1 November 2002 in New Delhi, India (see: http://www.unfccc.de/ ).
At COP8 the developing countries and the U.S.A. agreed Trade, Development and world wide Growing Economies are the best ways to protect environment and climate.
Implementation of the Kyoto Protocol would ruin those ambitions.
The Kyoto Protocol signatory countries (i.e., EU etc.) were left on their own. It remains to be seen if and when the signatory countries are able to correct their energy and climate policies.
It may be hoped that year 2003 will become epoch-making.
There is no "consensus" in Science. The existence of such a "consensus" would be the end of the scientific method, and it would be a return to orthodoxy belief systems like those of the Middle Ages.
This Overview is my personal view. It is based on my intense studies and also on my continuous discussions with IPCC authors and adherents and climatologists who are sceptical and critical of IPCC documents.
Climatologists throughout the world naturally have differing views of details.
And, of course, scientists who still rely on the outdated IPCC "findings" disagree.
It remains to be seen when the IPCC authors will update their views and conclusions.
It would be better if, in the future, the IPCC were to concentrate only on Science.
January 15, 2002
Timo Hämeranta, M.LL., Moderator, Finland, EU
timohame@yahoo.co.uk
1.J. REFERENCES
Boehmer-Christiansen, Sonja and Kellow, Aynsley, 2002. International Environmental Policy. Interests and the Failure of the Kyoto Process. Edward Elgar Publishing Ltd. UK. October 2002. www.e-elgar.co.uk
Carslaw et al. Cosmic Rays, Clouds, and Climate. Science Vol 298, No 5599, pp. 1732-1737, November 29, 2002
Christy, John R., 2001. Differential Trends in Tropical Sea Surface and Atmospheric Temperatures since 1979. Geophysical Research Letters 28, 183-186, January 1, 2001
Courtney, Richard S., 2001. Crystal balls, virtual realities and 'storylines'. Energy and Environment, vol.12, No.4, 2001
Doran et al., 2002. Antarctic climate cooling and terrestrial ecosystem response. Nature DOI: 10.1038/nature710, January 13, 2002
Essex, Christopher and McKitrick, Ross, 2002. TAKEN BY STORM. The Troubled Science, Policy and Politics of Global Warming. Key Porter Books, November 2002 http://www.takenbystorm.info
Hämeranta, Timo, 2001. CLIMATE CHANGE: Critics on the IPCC TAR Summaries and an Alternative Summary for Policymakers. A Presentation in the Seminar "Main Findings of the IPCC Third Assessment Report (TAR)" Helsinki, Finland, EU, March 26, 2001. http://personal.inet.fi/koti/hameranta/critics.htm
Hansen et al., 1997. Forcings and chaos in interannual to decadal climate change. Geophysical Research Letters 102, pp. 25679-25720, 1997
IPCC TAR 2001 papers - first Summaries for Policymakers by Working Groups I, II and III, then Synthesis Report, then Technical Summary, and finally the actual overview "Climate Change 2001 – The Scientific Basis" by J.T. Houghton, Y. Ding, D.J. Griggs, M. Noguer, P.J. van der Linden, X. Dai, K. Maskell and C.A. Johnson (Eds.). Cambridge University Press, 2001 http://www.ipcc.ch/
Jelbring, Hans, 1998 Wind Controlled Climate. Paleogeophysics & Geodynamics, Stockholm University, 1998.
Kahl et al., 1993. Absence of evidence for greenhouse warming over the Arctic Ocean in the past 40 years. Nature, 361, 335-337, 1993
Legates, David R., 2002. Limitations of Climate Models as Predictors of Climate Change. National Center for Policy Analysis, May 16, 2002 http://www.ncpa.org/pub/ba/ba396/
Mathiesen, M. Mikhel, 2000. Global Warming in a Politically Correct Climate. How Truth Became Controversial. Writers Club Press, iUniverse.com Inc, Lincoln, NE, 2000
Michaels, Patrick.J., Knappenberger, P.C., Frauenfeld, O.W., and R.E. Davis. 2002. Revised 21st century temperature projections. Climate Research, 23, pp. 1-9, December 2002
Monnin et al., 2001. Atmospheric CO2 Concentrations over the Last Glacial Termination. Science Vol.291, p.112-, January 5, 2001
MSA 1 / 2003 - Moderator's Special Announcement No. 1 / 2003 "Climate Areas to Watch in 2003" released January 2, 2003 http://personal.inet.fi/koti/hameranta/climate-MSA1-03.htm
Polyakov et al., 2002. Trends and variations in Arctic climate system. EOS Transactions, American Geophysical Union Vol. 83, No. 47, pp 547-548, November 19, 2002
Przybylak, R. 2002. Changes in seasonal and annual high-frequency air temperature variability in the Arctic from 1951-1990. International Journal of Climatology 22: 1017-1032, 2002
Royer, Dana L. et al., 2001. Paleobotanical Evidence for Near Present-Day Levels of Atmospheric CO2 During Part of the Tertiary. Science Vol 292, No 5525, pp. 2310-2313, June, 22, 2001
Singer, S. Fred, Aug 2002. How likely is a human-caused climate catastrophe? Presentation in London Conference "Environmental Catastrophes and Recovery in the Holocene" at Brunel University Aug 29 to Sept 2, 2002
Singer, S. Fred., Dec 2002. A close look at temperature trends from surface stations and proxy data. US Climate Change Science Planning (CCSP) Workshop, December 3-5, 2002 http://www.sepp.org/NewSEPP/tempratureTrends-Singer.htm
UNFCCC 1992 - United Nations Framework Convention of Climate Change http://unfccc.int/resource/docs/convkp/conveng.pdf
Wigley, Tom M.L. and Jones, Phil D., 1981. Detecting CO2-induced climatic change. Nature 292, 205-208, 1981.