Cyclical or Natural Predictable Climate Change Forum

[ChescoWx]

Hello all,

I thought I would start a forum that provides climate data and research that illustrates the cyclical nature of our always changing climate. It will also present examples of failed climate alarmist predictions.  If you are a climate alarmist or a climate cycle denier who gets angry with dissenting views you may want to steer clear of this forum.

To start us off let's start with a peer reviewed article on this very topic of the cyclical, natural change in our climate.

I hope you all enjoy the forum!!

https://www.forbes.com/sites/larrybell/2012/01/10/global-warming-no-natural-predictable-climate-change/?sh=78b0b3bf73ad

[ChescoWx]

Some doom and gloom climate predictions that did not age well...

https://nypost.com/2021/11/12/50-years-of-predictions-that-the-climate-apocalypse-is-nigh/

https://cei.org/blog/wrong-again-50-years-of-failed-eco-pocalyptic-predictions/

https://www.aei.org/carpe-diem/18-spectacularly-wrong-predictions-were-made-around-the-time-of-the-first-earth-day-in-1970-expect-more-this-year/

https://norfolkdailynews.com/commentary/despite-so-many-failed-predictions-new-ones-of-climate-change-continue/article_cf325ee0-18b2-11ed-9f35-6b10c95d64ed.html

https://www.fraserinstitute.org/blogs/doomsday-predictions-rely-on-flawed-climate-models

https://www.aei.org/carpe-diem/50-years-of-failed-doomsday-eco-pocalyptic-predictions-the-so-called-experts-are-0-50/

https://www.forbes.com/sites/michaelshellenberger/2019/11/25/why-everything-they-say-about-climate-change-is-wrong/?sh=51a2486b12d6

https://www.foxnews.com/us/top-5-most-outrageous-2020-doomsday-predictions

https://heartland.org/opinion/being-a-climate-alarmist-means-never-having-to-admit-youre-wrong/

https://www.foxnews.com/politics/al-gore-history-climate-predictions-statements-proven-false

[ChescoWx]

NASA satellite for January 2023 shows we were colder this month than 36 years ago way back in January 1987... This occurred despite a doubling of man made CO2 in the atmosphere. The global warming hypothesis is that every CO2 emission warms the planet. Cooling phase starting early??

 

[ChescoWx]

All available un-adjusted raw National Weather Service COOP stations blended averages below clearly show the cyclical nature of the climate in Chester County PA. The overall warmest decades remain the 1930's and 1940's. We actually had the 2000's finish cooler than the 1990's and the 2010's warmed but still not quite to the warmth we observed in the 1990's. Note in the chart below I list all individual stations with a blue temperature indicating cooler temps vs the prior decade - red being warmer and black the same as the prior decade.

[dseagull]

Crickets

[ChescoWx]

24 minutes ago, dseagull said:

Crickets

Of course....they can't produce an actual disaster verification or prediction except what a model tells them how disastrous the world will be in 200 years.....

[ChescoWx]

Same UN source - but no worries let's make the same forecast 33 years later and see if folks today will buy into climate alarmism....

[Bhs1975]

Looks like your the only one here spouting denier nonsense.

[Wxdood]

“Some”? I believe every single doomsday prediction has failed miserably. Then they push the goalposts back again. 
 

al we need to do is put a million windmills out in the ocean and kill the last whale out there so we can be “green” and *magically* go back QUOTE “normal” and boom! The ice is back!

 

pathetic. 

[Cobalt]

48 minutes ago, Wxdood said:

“Some”? I believe every single doomsday prediction has failed miserably. Then they push the goalposts back again. 
 

al we need to do is put a million windmills out in the ocean and kill the last whale out there so we can be “green” and *magically* go back QUOTE “normal” and boom! The ice is back!

 

pathetic. 

Yet another fallacy perpetrated by the AGW denier group. Offshore windmills are not causing excess whale deaths, there is no evidence for it.

 

As for the "every single doomsday prediction", which such predictions are you referring to? 

[Wxdood]

34 minutes ago, Cobalt said:

Yet another fallacy perpetrated by the AGW denier group. Offshore windmills are not causing excess whale deaths, there is no evidence for it.

 

As for the "every single doomsday prediction", which such predictions are you referring to? 

Right, I’m supposed to roll over and trust the government, ipcc, etc that there is no other reason for warming other than it being from humans. The same government that has been lying and suppressing information to us the past 3 years about you-know-what… which conspiracy theories for THAT have actually come true. 
 

um…. I don’t know who you get your news from, but NOAA has authorized-take notices for every wind company out there building off the coast from Maine to Florida. It’s a fact that they themselves are doing sonic blasting loud enough to injure dolphins and whales. You’re a talking head. 
 

however like you probably know, the battery in nyc was supposed to be underwater in 2012, and the arctic was supposed to be ice free in 2008. 
 

the picture is for one wind farm in New Jersey. You can find the authorized incidental take on noaas website. The take for this farm is 11 right whales that is “allowable” which is 4% of the remaining population of that species  multiply this by all of the wind farms in the other picture I attached and that species is gone  we are literally killing the environment to “save” the environment, and people in charge can’t tel us the impact of all the wind farms will have on global temp.  They say it “depends on industrialized countries like china and India” for how much of an impact it’ll have.  So we will completely change our way of life, put sensitive species in danger, among other very bad things environmentally… for an unknown amount of change?  Is that a good idea pal? Edited to add - can you tell me why noaa has this paperwork for wind farms when they aren’t killing whales? Asking for a friend, since you seem like you have your wind power professional cap on today. 

[Cobalt]

7 minutes ago, Wxdood said:

I don’t know who you get your news from, but NOAA has authorized-take notices for every wind company out there building off the coast from Maine to Florida. It’s a fact that they themselves are doing sonic blasting loud enough to injure dolphins and whales. 
 

That same NOAA found no conclusive evidence on the idea that offshore wind developments have contributed to excess whale deaths.

9 minutes ago, Wxdood said:

Right, I’m supposed to roll over and trust the government, ipcc, etc that there is no other reason for warming other than it being from humans.  

No other coherent theory has been put forth to explain ongoing warming better than explaining the link between human-caused emissions and the rapid changes in our global climate. Not for a lack of trying either, as the trillion dollar fossil fuel industry has done their own research and has come across the same conclusion. In fact, they've been quite accurate at predicting the rise in global temperatures as a product of human-caused fossil fuel emissions.

https://www.houstonchronicle.com/us-world/article/Study-Exxon-Mobil-accurately-predicted-warming-17714068.php?utm_source=twitter.com&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=socialflow

Can you explain to me how despite there being trillions in incentive to find evidence that disproves AGW, none of the major fossil fuel firms have ever presented such evidence? 

16 minutes ago, Wxdood said:

however like you probably know, the battery in nyc was supposed to be underwater in 2012, and the arctic was supposed to be ice free in 2008. 
 

Can you link to the papers that predicted these things? I could not find the papers that would have discussed the predictions you mentioned. 

[Wxdood]

23 hours ago, Cobalt said:

That same NOAA found no conclusive evidence on the idea that offshore wind developments have contributed to excess whale deaths.

No other coherent theory has been put forth to explain ongoing warming better than explaining the link between human-caused emissions and the rapid changes in our global climate. Not for a lack of trying either, as the trillion dollar fossil fuel industry has done their own research and has come across the same conclusion. In fact, they've been quite accurate at predicting the rise in global temperatures as a product of human-caused fossil fuel emissions.

https://www.houstonchronicle.com/us-world/article/Study-Exxon-Mobil-accurately-predicted-warming-17714068.php?utm_source=twitter.com&utm_medium=referral&utm_campaign=socialflow

Can you explain to me how despite there being trillions in incentive to find evidence that disproves AGW, none of the major fossil fuel firms have ever presented such evidence? 

Can you link to the papers that predicted these things? I could not find the papers that would have discussed the predictions you mentioned. 

About the windmills, here is something I found from someone working on them. 
 

Statements from a former Industrial Wind Turbine Technician November 22, 2022

“All research into the seismic phenomenon produced by wind turbines is stifled and not funded. It’s called manufactured ignorance. Related research that is important is the study of pre-earthquake phenomenon. The seismic phenomenon the turbines produce are mostly identical and the two actually couple with each other. There is plenty of research into this. The best thing I can tell you is the companies lie about their vibration mitigation software. It only works during short coupling periods and at no time mitigates vibration from tower to ground. The software only controls over-torque, not regular vibrations.”

“As an ex-industrial wind turbine diagnostic and repair technician, I can tell you we used to practice responsibility when considering spacing between turbines. This is done no more and the acousticians are lying about their vibration mitigation software. Reduced spacing creates constructive interference within the ground when different turbine ground vibrations meet. If you don’t space the turbines far enough from each other it creates not only an airborne phenomenon, a seismic phenomenon of greater impact manifests. Cymatics in standing water would make it visible.”

“Wind companies adjust the pitch of the blades before a site visit. [by an environmental protection office responding to complaints] The less the blades are pitched out, the less torque on the machine, the less tower to ground vibrations, less constructive interference in the ground and the attenuation anomaly becomes less noticeable. The process of dynamic magnitude amplification is also diminished as to decrease the propagation area. These are the tricks of the trade. I know, I’ve lived them. When the engineers who designed the machines can’t diagnose or repair they called me. This is how I know they are lying about their vibration mitigation software. They say it prevents the seismic phenomenon. They also know the turbines are entirely too close to each other so they misrepresent the vibration mitigation software as what’s allowing them to ignore spacing between the turbines that causes the phenomenon. It has no name. The vibration mitigation software does nothing to diminish or stop tower to ground emissions at any time and is only applied during very short coupling periods to prevent over-torque to the inner mechanical workings of the nacelle. They claim the software allows them to put the turbines too
 close to each other because it prevents the seismic phenomenon. It’s an outright lie. They’ve fabricated that scenario to make more money from less land area. They know that anyone suffering from it will be diagnosed as insane. Fat chance any wind turbine diagnostic specialist would ever turn their back on that industry money. The spacing is also detrimental to the machines themselves and is the reason for the mechanical resonance disaster some turbines will face. The overall efficiency of the machines are destroyed and they randomly collapse. It’s about the money. None of these new sites are in compliance in any way, shape or form.”

“We used to recognize the spacing issue as important above and beyond all other siting issues. That was before the direct drive units and before acousticians were given power over all scientific matters. The religion of wind power opened up and the industry chose to feed that for profit vs. not creating a public and wildlife health phenomenon.”

“All new sites immediately seismically couple with pre-existing turbine phenomenon in the ground the moment they go operational. Before all this developed that was not happening. There is not a single turbine that we add to the landscape that won’t immediately add to the overall intensity of the phenomenon. The working model of wind farming has failed in reality but they’re going to keep this up for as long as they can dismiss the problem with made up scientific analysis. Sites couple seismically with each other now, there’s no fixing that and the site developers just continue doing it. They even hide the conversation about spacing from all politicians and the public. It is held privately between the manufacturers of the turbines and the purchasers of the turbines. There is nothing to prove that the conversations take place and all regulatory committees have absolutely no knowledge of it. If they did know the sites would never be approved. This is why the industry is pushing to skip environmental impact statements completely. It’s nothing to do with birds or the view. No EIS statement or investigation then they aren’t forced to perform ON-OFF testing that’s meaningful. They know the seismic phenomenon is the industry killer. They’re staying alive for now and trying to put up as many as possible before the scam falls apart. They can claim they had no idea and absolve themselves of any responsibility. The politicians can absolve themselves of it currently given the situation with the industry hiding it from them.
 We and the animals ultimately absorb the fallout while they get off scott free.”

“It’s making my son very ill, I’m sick from it. When the turbines shut off we recover almost immediately. I’m eight miles from a site and can view it from my hillside. In other words, even if we started using correct configuration on all new sites going forward it’s not going to matter. They will add to the phenomenon regardless. One can see the phenomenon on the surface of bodies of water now. Distortion interference patterns of standing waves that disappear when they shut the turbines down then reappear when they go back online. That’s the observable test they refuse to perform because it’s proof the ground emissions are escaping the sites.”

“I was involved with the industry for two years. I left once I couldn’t sleep anymore. I knew it had something to do with the turbine emissions so I quit and went home to raise my son. Before that I was and still am a master mechanic and diagnostics specialist. I worked for Global Energy Services while they were a subsidiary of Iberdrola. I was major operations traveling technician. I’ve been all over this country diagnosing and performing repairs and maintenance of many different platforms ranging from Nordic to Vestas to Gamesa brands.”

“I won’t go back to the industry even though I certainly could. It’s also an extremely dangerous job. The media makes it sound like anyone can get a job with wind turbines. That’s so far from the truth it’s disturbing. One site might employ two mechanics and have three or so site managers.”

 

or do you need a government-funded source?  The government lies. Fossil fuel companies are likely being paid off to show information they are told to show. The government has been incompetent the past 3 years and have worked with agencies to censor everything that opposes the “science”. So no matter how hard you look for info that contradicts the mainstream “science” you likely won’t find it because it’s been removed. 
 

there is a big time cover up going on while peoples pockets are being lined up fat and people that go along with it and force feed it to others that believe otherwise are just helping them out. 
 

do you think our emissions is the equivalent of 600,000 Hiroshima-level atomic bombs every second of the day? Cause Al gore said that, the creator of the global warming theory. 

[fujiwara79]

It's fascinating how people of a certain political persuasion are suddenly concerned about birds and whales when it comes to the windmills?  They've never cared about impacts on wildlife when it comes to any other industry.  But they suddenly want to save the whales and sing kumbaya when it's about those pesky windmills. 

Offshore oil rigs kill plenty of whales.  Skyscrapers kill one billion birds per year.  But I've heard nary a peep about these concerns.  It only seems to matter if it's those darn windmills doing it.  Which makes me think it's a bad faith argument made by those who have an agenda.

But yes, we should strive to reduce impacts to wildlife as much as we can, whether it be windmills or oil rigs.

[fujiwara79]

11 hours ago, Wxdood said:

here is something I found from someone

And this, my friends, encapsulates why so many people believe that every facet of life must involve a conspiracy.  They heard about it from randos on the Internet.

[Cobalt]

that darn UHI effect..

[Brewbeer]

On 2/21/2023 at 1:51 PM, Wxdood said:

About the windmills, here is something I found from someone working on them. 
 

Statements from a former Industrial Wind Turbine Technician November 22, 2022

“All research into the seismic phenomenon produced by wind turbines is stifled and not funded. It’s called manufactured ignorance. Related research that is important is the study of pre-earthquake phenomenon. The seismic phenomenon the turbines produce are mostly identical and the two actually couple with each other. There is plenty of research into this. The best thing I can tell you is the companies lie about their vibration mitigation software. It only works during short coupling periods and at no time mitigates vibration from tower to ground. The software only controls over-torque, not regular vibrations.”

“As an ex-industrial wind turbine diagnostic and repair technician, I can tell you we used to practice responsibility when considering spacing between turbines. This is done no more and the acousticians are lying about their vibration mitigation software. Reduced spacing creates constructive interference within the ground when different turbine ground vibrations meet. If you don’t space the turbines far enough from each other it creates not only an airborne phenomenon, a seismic phenomenon of greater impact manifests. Cymatics in standing water would make it visible.”

“Wind companies adjust the pitch of the blades before a site visit. [by an environmental protection office responding to complaints] The less the blades are pitched out, the less torque on the machine, the less tower to ground vibrations, less constructive interference in the ground and the attenuation anomaly becomes less noticeable. The process of dynamic magnitude amplification is also diminished as to decrease the propagation area. These are the tricks of the trade. I know, I’ve lived them. When the engineers who designed the machines can’t diagnose or repair they called me. This is how I know they are lying about their vibration mitigation software. They say it prevents the seismic phenomenon. They also know the turbines are entirely too close to each other so they misrepresent the vibration mitigation software as what’s allowing them to ignore spacing between the turbines that causes the phenomenon. It has no name. The vibration mitigation software does nothing to diminish or stop tower to ground emissions at any time and is only applied during very short coupling periods to prevent over-torque to the inner mechanical workings of the nacelle. They claim the software allows them to put the turbines too
 close to each other because it prevents the seismic phenomenon. It’s an outright lie. They’ve fabricated that scenario to make more money from less land area. They know that anyone suffering from it will be diagnosed as insane. Fat chance any wind turbine diagnostic specialist would ever turn their back on that industry money. The spacing is also detrimental to the machines themselves and is the reason for the mechanical resonance disaster some turbines will face. The overall efficiency of the machines are destroyed and they randomly collapse. It’s about the money. None of these new sites are in compliance in any way, shape or form.”

“We used to recognize the spacing issue as important above and beyond all other siting issues. That was before the direct drive units and before acousticians were given power over all scientific matters. The religion of wind power opened up and the industry chose to feed that for profit vs. not creating a public and wildlife health phenomenon.”

“All new sites immediately seismically couple with pre-existing turbine phenomenon in the ground the moment they go operational. Before all this developed that was not happening. There is not a single turbine that we add to the landscape that won’t immediately add to the overall intensity of the phenomenon. The working model of wind farming has failed in reality but they’re going to keep this up for as long as they can dismiss the problem with made up scientific analysis. Sites couple seismically with each other now, there’s no fixing that and the site developers just continue doing it. They even hide the conversation about spacing from all politicians and the public. It is held privately between the manufacturers of the turbines and the purchasers of the turbines. There is nothing to prove that the conversations take place and all regulatory committees have absolutely no knowledge of it. If they did know the sites would never be approved. This is why the industry is pushing to skip environmental impact statements completely. It’s nothing to do with birds or the view. No EIS statement or investigation then they aren’t forced to perform ON-OFF testing that’s meaningful. They know the seismic phenomenon is the industry killer. They’re staying alive for now and trying to put up as many as possible before the scam falls apart. They can claim they had no idea and absolve themselves of any responsibility. The politicians can absolve themselves of it currently given the situation with the industry hiding it from them.
 We and the animals ultimately absorb the fallout while they get off scott free.”

“It’s making my son very ill, I’m sick from it. When the turbines shut off we recover almost immediately. I’m eight miles from a site and can view it from my hillside. In other words, even if we started using correct configuration on all new sites going forward it’s not going to matter. They will add to the phenomenon regardless. One can see the phenomenon on the surface of bodies of water now. Distortion interference patterns of standing waves that disappear when they shut the turbines down then reappear when they go back online. That’s the observable test they refuse to perform because it’s proof the ground emissions are escaping the sites.”

“I was involved with the industry for two years. I left once I couldn’t sleep anymore. I knew it had something to do with the turbine emissions so I quit and went home to raise my son. Before that I was and still am a master mechanic and diagnostics specialist. I worked for Global Energy Services while they were a subsidiary of Iberdrola. I was major operations traveling technician. I’ve been all over this country diagnosing and performing repairs and maintenance of many different platforms ranging from Nordic to Vestas to Gamesa brands.”

“I won’t go back to the industry even though I certainly could. It’s also an extremely dangerous job. The media makes it sound like anyone can get a job with wind turbines. That’s so far from the truth it’s disturbing. One site might employ two mechanics and have three or so site managers.”

 

or do you need a government-funded source?  The government lies. Fossil fuel companies are likely being paid off to show information they are told to show. The government has been incompetent the past 3 years and have worked with agencies to censor everything that opposes the “science”. So no matter how hard you look for info that contradicts the mainstream “science” you likely won’t find it because it’s been removed. 
 

there is a big time cover up going on while peoples pockets are being lined up fat and people that go along with it and force feed it to others that believe otherwise are just helping them out. 
 

do you think our emissions is the equivalent of 600,000 Hiroshima-level atomic bombs every second of the day? Cause Al gore said that, the creator of the global warming theory. 

Can you provide a link to where you copied and pasted this from ?

[LibertyBell]

On 2/22/2023 at 1:07 AM, fujiwara79 said:

It's fascinating how people of a certain political persuasion are suddenly concerned about birds and whales when it comes to the windmills?  They've never cared about impacts on wildlife when it comes to any other industry.  But they suddenly want to save the whales and sing kumbaya when it's about those pesky windmills. 

Offshore oil rigs kill plenty of whales.  Skyscrapers kill one billion birds per year.  But I've heard nary a peep about these concerns.  It only seems to matter if it's those darn windmills doing it.  Which makes me think it's a bad faith argument made by those who have an agenda.

But yes, we should strive to reduce impacts to wildlife as much as we can, whether it be windmills or oil rigs.

it's why I hate skyscrapers.  fortunately, we are changing the way we build them, using more opaque glass and turning the lights off at night so as not to interfere with night flying birds.

 

[LibertyBell]

5 hours ago, Brewbeer said:

Can you provide a link to where you copied and pasted this from ?

It's probably not windmills or wind turbines, but whales are going further north than normal because of warmer waters and entering busier shipping lanes and getting into accidents.

[Roger Smith]

This is of course a complicated subject. But I detect a general tendency for observers to separate into two camps, one seeing the dominance of human activity modifying the atmosphere, and the other firmly resolved to stay in the mindset of the legacy climatology (which did great work in its day), and look for mostly or all natural variability causes of observable change. 

Then also there remains somewhat of a spectrum of opinion about what change is legitimate to observe. Notice I am not making any value judgments about who is right or wrong, partly because I take the view that recent trends are driven by a combination of natural variability and human activity. In fact, even back to around 1990 when this climate change movement was emerging (as global warming), I took the view that we were observing a blend of human caused impacts and natural variations. I have done a lot of independent study and research using publicly available data, and produced detailed studies of recent to long-term trends at a number of locations, including Toronto and New York City (augmented by some 1831-60 data for Providence RI), the Canadian arctic, western Canada, and the British Isles. 

My work has been presented in a number of internet threads on this forum, Net-weather (UK based), and the boards.ie weather forum (located in Ireland). 

The Toronto and New York City studies are located both here (in this climate change subforum) and on Net-weather (in their climate change forum). Canadian arctic studies are on Net-weather only at the moment; I will migrate a copy of the data sets over to this forum. Cambridge Bay on Victoria Island has the longest data set with intermittent values from the 1930s and fairly complete data since 1940. Resolute further northeast has fairly complete data from 1948 to present. And so does Eureka on Ellesmere Island. I have not yet delved into the eastern arctic record from Iqualuit and other locations on Baffin Island. 

The key UK analysis thread is located in a different part of Net-weather, the historical weather sub-forum. You'll find it a few pages in, because there are dozens of enthusiasts there who like to discuss very specific historical events and I don't post new material very often, I edit tables already developed with new material. This is generally my habit, to edit posts at a regular pace so just because my threads don't pop very often with new posts does not mean new material is not being posted. I try to keep all of them current to the latest averages and record values. 

Difficult to sum up any generalizations, but overall, my view is that

(a) the postulated "recent" trends are legitimate, not caused by any instrumental problems or hidden bias, manipulation etc. In particular, the Canadian arctic data definitely show trends towards warmer seasons, and this is supported by snow cover reports which would be more resistant to contamination than site changes for thermometers (a factor which is virtually non-existent at these arctic locations, for example, Cambridge Bay is a very small urban community but even so the airport is a mile away from that small village and urban heat island effects would be nil). 

(b) the cause of these warming effects, clearly visible in every study I've attempted so far, seems to be a combination of greenhouse gas emissions, circulation changes, and urban heat island growth in some cases. This opens up an interesting question, should we remove urban heat island effects entirely to maintain a "constant" climate record, or is the urban heat island part of the problem subsumed under the heading of human-caused climate change. I understand the physics involved, urban heat islands are temporary and occasionally ventilating build-ups that are different in nature from a steady build-up of greenhouse gases and their effects. However, at the same time, a lot of people live in large cities with growing heat islands, and when that heat does ventilate (usually in strong winds) or when it dissipates in an interval of cloudy wet weather, the heat escapes into the general circulation. That constant release of urban heat has to be part of the cause of rising global temperature. Is it a large portion? I suspect not. 

(c) My opinion is that if we accept a 1.5 C increase (more like 1.0 in lower latitudes, 2.0 in higher latitudes), then about two thirds of it may have a human cause and the other third may have its origin in natural variability. The IPCC takes a different view. As I understand their statements, they think the background climate should be cooling slightly (based mainly on solar activity and long-term Milankovitch cycles) but human activity has reversed that cooling and turned it into a sizeable warming. They may well be correct. I find it very difficult to find reliable indices for what the atmosphere should be doing in the absence of a proven theory of atmospheric variation similar to Newton's theory of gravitation (leaving out its flaws at near-light speed as improved by Einstein). There is no similar set of equations which allow me or you to calculate what today's atmospheric state ought to be, so that we could then say, but it is actually not that but this, and this happened because of us (not natural variation because the equation would be based on that). 

(d) So to sum up, I am not a skeptic or denier, I am also not in lockstep with the climate establishment. I am looking for what is actually true and I feel that if I can discover what is actually true I can make better predictions of what may happen. Let's say the current situation is a 2:1 blend of human and natural sources of warming. Then what if these natural trends are in a weak stage and return to some stronger stage (to some extent, like 1997-2006 compared to 2007-15 excl end of 2015)? What if we hit another peak of natural warming with no real diminution of human contributions? Then we are very likely to spike again as we saw around 1998 and 2006 (in most of the climate regions I studied, and earlier peaks around 1990 and 1975 and 1948-53 and 1921 etc, all seem fairly widespread). 

This is partly a political debate of course (as it should be). We need to figure out what is happening, what may happen in the future, and what we can or should be doing about it. I am a very big proponent of mitigation and adaptation. If we imagine that by making political and economic changes, we will "fix" the "broken" atmosphere, I am 99.9% sure that is a pipe dream. We might make some changes, but I am willing to bet they are miniscule and ineffectual. We could catch a break with a strong natural cooling cycle, and eventually of course technology will totally move on, but human activity will likely keep pushing the envelopes, and then if the global population keeps increasing and more and more people live in huge urban complexes, then the earth will warm significantly for at least 3,000 more years before really significant Milankovitch factors overcome that trend (at present all three main Milankovitch cycles are near pause or flat-line and really have next to no effect on climate trends). 

The two main problems to be solved are sea level rises and heat stress in already hot climates. As I mentioned to people on the Irish weather forum, the idea that a 2 or 3 C increase in temperatures in Ireland would threaten national security is rather ridiculous; people spend a lot of money to vacation in places that are 5 to 10 degrees warmer than Ireland and the UK. And the people who live there (Madeira, Costa del Sol, Greece) aren't dying in vast numbers. But you wouldn't want to be a resident of Pakistan or the Gulf states or possibly parts of the southwestern U.S. in an amplified warming trend. 

There isn't a lot we can really do to stop oceans from rising (in my view) short of surrendering to draconian schemes to reduce the population by a huge percentage and re-impose medieval economic feudalism. The number of bicycle riding civil servants that any society can actually tolerate before collapse is very close to being realized now. But massive desalination remains an option. There are places on earth where ocean water could be diverted and ponded. A large part of Mauretania is very close to sea level or below, behind coastal dunes. That could be expanded to give extra available volume. A lot of ocean water being desalinated could slow the rise also, and the effects on the landscape could further reduce the problems. We are spending trillions of dollars on weapons and other useless, destructive things, and not very much at all on desalination. It seems like madness to me, and Israel as one example has figured that out to their benefit. Other regions that could profit from larger desalination include the western USA, much of Australia, the Middle East, west Africa, southern Africa, and South America. 

Carbon capture technology seems to be in its infancy too, and might eventually be a larger solution. I think the trends towards wind power and solar are probably dead ends (especially wind), producing relatively small and in some cases unreliable components at prohibitive costs. We should keep on trying, of course, but the taboo on nuclear power is increasingly irrational and needs to be re-imagined for a more available and cost-friendly solution. 

Next time I come in to this discussion, I will bring some data along from the Canadian arctic, in graphical format, to show how much larger the increases are up there compared to down here. 

As to the much reported other aspects of climate change, like more frequent severe storms, displaced polar vortices, heavier rainstorms, the climate record largely negates these postulates. I actually think we should be talking about global blanding when I see the evidence of what the "healthy" older climate used to do on a regular basis. I don't believe we are seeing more frequent severe storms and heavy rainstorms and the places with long data sets support that view on any reasonable statistical basis. The evidence being used to support those aspects of the climate change theory is almost entirely anecdotal and lacking in proper context. That is a political phenomenon and is probably the main cause for widespread public skepticism about climate change (especially among older people who remember more weather events).

Also there is a considerable irony in the displaced polar vortex theory. As I understand it, the goal of the climate change movement is to restore the climate to what it "should" be and what it used to be. Like in 1895 and 1899 when huge displaced arctic air masses did considerable damage to the southern United States, so what exactly are we trying to accomplish, to have a different contextual explanation of displaced arctic air masses? Either way you get them. I find that rather ironic. Also if you really delve into 19th century weather records and even early 20th century, the weather was nothing you would really want to re-create with unseasonable cold spells on a frequent basis, too much rainfall (and snowfall in some cases) alternating with severe droughts. Maybe we should be happier with the bland dome climate we seem to have created for ourselves. 

 

[bdgwx]

You mentioned UHI @Roger Smith. I want to address that because it is interesting and because it is one of the most misunderstood topics in the climate debate. First, some definitions.

UHI Effect - This is an increase in localized temperatures in urban areas relative the surrounding region as a result of land use changes. It is a phenomenon that has a physical impact.

UHI Bias - This is a high or low bias in the measured regional average temperatures caused by defective spatial averaging techniques. It is a phenomenon that has an unphysical impact.

It is important that these concepts not be conflated. Ideally we want to keep the UHI effect in regional and global average temperature datasets because it is real. What we don't want to keep in the datasets are any UHI biases. The biases are caused by grid meshing strategies, station moves, station commissioning or decommissioning, urbanization or deurbanization, etc.

An example of a high bias is when you have a grid cell is that is 25/75 urban/rural but the station ratio is flipped such that it is 75/25 urban/rural. In this case you are overweighting the urban stations and effectively using them as a proxy for the rural area.

An example of a low bias is when the station ratio starts out 75/25 urban/rural for a grid cell where urbanization stalled and then changes to 50/50 urban/rural. In this case you create an artificial low bias even though you may still actually be overweighting the urban area.

The timing of urban/rural station ratio and the rate of urbanization (including stalls) affect how the bias plays out in that grid cell. Most people don't take the time to consider that the UHI bias can cause us to underestimate temperature trends. I'm not saying that low biases outnumber high biases. I'm just saying that the sword cuts both ways and if you want to a rigorous analysis then you need to consider how UHIs could cause low biases as well.

A lot of datasets deal with the bias by just simple removing the UHI effect altogether. That does mitigate the bias, but at the expense of underestimating the surface warming a bit. I think the reason why this is such an appealing approach is because it is simple and because the UHI effect isn't that much considering only 2% of the planet is urbanized. 

At the end of the day UHI is such a small part of the global average that it just doesn't matter either way. But I'll leave readers with the Berkeley Earth's analysis. They found that the UHI bias on the global average temperature trend is statistically equivalent to 0.00 C/decade, but that if anything it is more likely to bias the trend too low albeit by an insignificant amount. I think this shocks a lot of people because the thought process is that since the UHI effect is always positive then the bias must always be positive as well which isn't true. [Rohde et al. 2013] 

[LibertyBell]

1 hour ago, Roger Smith said:

This is of course a complicated subject. But I detect a general tendency for observers to separate into two camps, one seeing the dominance of human activity modifying the atmosphere, and the other firmly resolved to stay in the mindset of the legacy climatology (which did great work in its day), and look for mostly or all natural variability causes of observable change. 

Then also there remains somewhat of a spectrum of opinion about what change is legitimate to observe. Notice I am not making any value judgments about who is right or wrong, partly because I take the view that recent trends are driven by a combination of natural variability and human activity. In fact, even back to around 1990 when this climate change movement was emerging (as global warming), I took the view that we were observing a blend of human caused impacts and natural variations. I have done a lot of independent study and research using publicly available data, and produced detailed studies of recent to long-term trends at a number of locations, including Toronto and New York City (augmented by some 1831-60 data for Providence RI), the Canadian arctic, western Canada, and the British Isles. 

My work has been presented in a number of internet threads on this forum, Net-weather (UK based), and the boards.ie weather forum (located in Ireland). 

The Toronto and New York City studies are located both here (in this climate change subforum) and on Net-weather (in their climate change forum). Canadian arctic studies are on Net-weather only at the moment; I will migrate a copy of the data sets over to this forum. Cambridge Bay on Victoria Island has the longest data set with intermittent values from the 1930s and fairly complete data since 1940. Resolute further northeast has fairly complete data from 1948 to present. And so does Eureka on Ellesmere Island. I have not yet delved into the eastern arctic record from Iqualuit and other locations on Baffin Island. 

The key UK analysis thread is located in a different part of Net-weather, the historical weather sub-forum. You'll find it a few pages in, because there are dozens of enthusiasts there who like to discuss very specific historical events and I don't post new material very often, I edit tables already developed with new material. This is generally my habit, to edit posts at a regular pace so just because my threads don't pop very often with new posts does not mean new material is not being posted. I try to keep all of them current to the latest averages and record values. 

Difficult to sum up any generalizations, but overall, my view is that

(a) the postulated "recent" trends are legitimate, not caused by any instrumental problems or hidden bias, manipulation etc. In particular, the Canadian arctic data definitely show trends towards warmer seasons, and this is supported by snow cover reports which would be more resistant to contamination than site changes for thermometers (a factor which is virtually non-existent at these arctic locations, for example, Cambridge Bay is a very small urban community but even so the airport is a mile away from that small village and urban heat island effects would be nil). 

(b) the cause of these warming effects, clearly visible in every study I've attempted so far, seems to be a combination of greenhouse gas emissions, circulation changes, and urban heat island growth in some cases. This opens up an interesting question, should we remove urban heat island effects entirely to maintain a "constant" climate record, or is the urban heat island part of the problem subsumed under the heading of human-caused climate change. I understand the physics involved, urban heat islands are temporary and occasionally ventilating build-ups that are different in nature from a steady build-up of greenhouse gases and their effects. However, at the same time, a lot of people live in large cities with growing heat islands, and when that heat does ventilate (usually in strong winds) or when it dissipates in an interval of cloudy wet weather, the heat escapes into the general circulation. That constant release of urban heat has to be part of the cause of rising global temperature. Is it a large portion? I suspect not. 

(c) My opinion is that if we accept a 1.5 C increase (more like 1.0 in lower latitudes, 2.0 in higher latitudes), then about two thirds of it may have a human cause and the other third may have its origin in natural variability. The IPCC takes a different view. As I understand their statements, they think the background climate should be cooling slightly (based mainly on solar activity and long-term Milankovitch cycles) but human activity has reversed that cooling and turned it into a sizeable warming. They may well be correct. I find it very difficult to find reliable indices for what the atmosphere should be doing in the absence of a proven theory of atmospheric variation similar to Newton's theory of gravitation (leaving out its flaws at near-light speed as improved by Einstein). There is no similar set of equations which allow me or you to calculate what today's atmospheric state ought to be, so that we could then say, but it is actually not that but this, and this happened because of us (not natural variation because the equation would be based on that). 

(d) So to sum up, I am not a skeptic or denier, I am also not in lockstep with the climate establishment. I am looking for what is actually true and I feel that if I can discover what is actually true I can make better predictions of what may happen. Let's say the current situation is a 2:1 blend of human and natural sources of warming. Then what if these natural trends are in a weak stage and return to some stronger stage (to some extent, like 1997-2006 compared to 2007-15 excl end of 2015)? What if we hit another peak of natural warming with no real diminution of human contributions? Then we are very likely to spike again as we saw around 1998 and 2006 (in most of the climate regions I studied, and earlier peaks around 1990 and 1975 and 1948-53 and 1921 etc, all seem fairly widespread). 

This is partly a political debate of course (as it should be). We need to figure out what is happening, what may happen in the future, and what we can or should be doing about it. I am a very big proponent of mitigation and adaptation. If we imagine that by making political and economic changes, we will "fix" the "broken" atmosphere, I am 99.9% sure that is a pipe dream. We might make some changes, but I am willing to bet they are miniscule and ineffectual. We could catch a break with a strong natural cooling cycle, and eventually of course technology will totally move on, but human activity will likely keep pushing the envelopes, and then if the global population keeps increasing and more and more people live in huge urban complexes, then the earth will warm significantly for at least 3,000 more years before really significant Milankovitch factors overcome that trend (at present all three main Milankovitch cycles are near pause or flat-line and really have next to no effect on climate trends). 

The two main problems to be solved are sea level rises and heat stress in already hot climates. As I mentioned to people on the Irish weather forum, the idea that a 2 or 3 C increase in temperatures in Ireland would threaten national security is rather ridiculous; people spend a lot of money to vacation in places that are 5 to 10 degrees warmer than Ireland and the UK. And the people who live there (Madeira, Costa del Sol, Greece) aren't dying in vast numbers. But you wouldn't want to be a resident of Pakistan or the Gulf states or possibly parts of the southwestern U.S. in an amplified warming trend. 

There isn't a lot we can really do to stop oceans from rising (in my view) short of surrendering to draconian schemes to reduce the population by a huge percentage and re-impose medieval economic feudalism. The number of bicycle riding civil servants that any society can actually tolerate before collapse is very close to being realized now. But massive desalination remains an option. There are places on earth where ocean water could be diverted and ponded. A large part of Mauretania is very close to sea level or below, behind coastal dunes. That could be expanded to give extra available volume. A lot of ocean water being desalinated could slow the rise also, and the effects on the landscape could further reduce the problems. We are spending trillions of dollars on weapons and other useless, destructive things, and not very much at all on desalination. It seems like madness to me, and Israel as one example has figured that out to their benefit. Other regions that could profit from larger desalination include the western USA, much of Australia, the Middle East, west Africa, southern Africa, and South America. 

Carbon capture technology seems to be in its infancy too, and might eventually be a larger solution. I think the trends towards wind power and solar are probably dead ends (especially wind), producing relatively small and in some cases unreliable components at prohibitive costs. We should keep on trying, of course, but the taboo on nuclear power is increasingly irrational and needs to be re-imagined for a more available and cost-friendly solution. 

Next time I come in to this discussion, I will bring some data along from the Canadian arctic, in graphical format, to show how much larger the increases are up there compared to down here. 

As to the much reported other aspects of climate change, like more frequent severe storms, displaced polar vortices, heavier rainstorms, the climate record largely negates these postulates. I actually think we should be talking about global blanding when I see the evidence of what the "healthy" older climate used to do on a regular basis. I don't believe we are seeing more frequent severe storms and heavy rainstorms and the places with long data sets support that view on any reasonable statistical basis. The evidence being used to support those aspects of the climate change theory is almost entirely anecdotal and lacking in proper context. That is a political phenomenon and is probably the main cause for widespread public skepticism about climate change (especially among older people who remember more weather events).

Also there is a considerable irony in the displaced polar vortex theory. As I understand it, the goal of the climate change movement is to restore the climate to what it "should" be and what it used to be. Like in 1895 and 1899 when huge displaced arctic air masses did considerable damage to the southern United States, so what exactly are we trying to accomplish, to have a different contextual explanation of displaced arctic air masses? Either way you get them. I find that rather ironic. Also if you really delve into 19th century weather records and even early 20th century, the weather was nothing you would really want to re-create with unseasonable cold spells on a frequent basis, too much rainfall (and snowfall in some cases) alternating with severe droughts. Maybe we should be happier with the bland dome climate we seem to have created for ourselves. 

 

Population is already in the process of stabilizing and that is a good thing-- for environmental, health and ecological reasons.  It's a good thing.  Unless you plan on colonizing space, the same laws that apply to other species also apply to humanity.

[Roger Smith]

I think the main problem created by the urban heat island is that it creates an artificial warming component in any long-term data base like Toronto downtown or NYC Central Park relative to what would be available from a less urban site (such as the ones used in the CET although they do subtract 0.2 from their data to remove a slight but growing urban effect), which people intuitively realize is there in the data, but then because the effect is also real it becomes part of the discourse about warming. I have estimated the overall average impact of the u.h.i. for Toronto downtown at 1.1 C and I have created parallel data bases, one being the actual reported temperatures, and the other subtracting 0.1 per decade during the ten decades 1881-1980, and 0.1 for the period 1981 to present (assuming the urban heat island stabilized around 1980). I apply the same corrections to NYC although I assume that their overall warming is 1.4 C and it began before the data set began but grew at a similar rate, albeit from a base of 0.3 already embedded. 

The corrected data sets allow for a better comparison along the lines of, if there were rural sites with similar long-term data sets, this is how they would most likely compare. And the key point is that the temperature series show a warming even after the corrections for u.h.i., which tells me that either (a) my estimates are too low or (b) the climate is warming even in non-urban settings. 

I've found that for Toronto (data 1840-2023), the coldest third of months will shift about 15% of its members from the earliest third of data to the last third of data, and vice versa for warm months. To take one example, a month in the 1840s that ranks about 75th out of 183 in raw data will rank about 55th in adjusted data and move from the middle third to the warmest third. Meanwhile, a month in recent decades that ranks about 105th will move to 125th or so, from the middle third to the coldest third. But the overall distribution of raw data and adjusted data in color coded graphs only changes appearance slightly -- it still basically looks like the first third is cold, the middle third is moderate and the last third is warm, with variations. You can see these graphs in the Toronto excel file available within the Net-weather thread.

I would have preferred to use a data base in a less urbanized setting but unfortunately these only start up around the 1880s or 1890s leaving out (in the case of Toronto) four decades of weather. 

On a completely different subject, a complicating factor for anyone wanting to do research on 19th century weather is that a set of weather maps produced by NOAA for the period 1836 to present (it has been moving back steadily over the last decade) contains some very rudimentary and probably useless maps over North America especially before about 1850. I can see from the Toronto and Providence RI data that the pressure systems depicted are shadows of what surely existed (the Providence journal has three daily barometric pressure readings). The same is true to some extent for the maps over Europe; the infamous Jan 1839 windstorm in Ireland was known to have had a central pressure bellow 930 mbs but the weather maps produced only show a pedestrian 970 mb low. The track appears correct. On the east coast of North America, entire major storms are missed entirely or appear as very weak systems. I would caution anyone not to use these historical weather maps for any research purpose, and what is shown further west could be entirely bogus. Perhaps the mid-ocean components of these maps make some sense being based on some number of ship reports, but the mapmakers apparently didn't know of the existence of the Providence weather journal. The situation improves through the 1850s and I think the maps begin to resemble reality by the 1860s. 

[Wxdood]

On 2/22/2023 at 1:10 AM, fujiwara79 said:

And this, my friends, encapsulates why so many people believe that every facet of life must involve a conspiracy.  They heard about it from randos on the Internet.

Likewise on the other side of the political spectrum. However, on the red side, I can compile a list of “conspiracies” that were censored, put people in jail, among other negatives that actually were true all along! The cc conspiracies have all but fallen flat on their faces, but the goal posts keep moving years down the line… The government lies. The fact that there is no healthy scientific debate on cc makes me think we are going down the c o vid path with it. Meaning the “science” wasn’t to be debated, questioned, we had to do what we were told and believe everything that was said to us and if not, we would face consequences. It’s your choice to go along with it. Seems like you’re hook lined and sinkered with it, after reading your whiny posts in the mid Atlantic forum.. for example, the oceans are “saunas”.  How descriptive…
 

I may question cc, but I am very concerned about the environment from every negative, oil rigs included. When the deep water horizon disaster happened I was beside myself. When I see what happened in east palenstine happen, but all the “environmentalists” and mayor Pete were either too busy in bed with Ukraine, or for mayor Pete, too busy worrying about how diverse our work force is, instead of going to at least SHOW UP pissed me off to no end, and should piss everyone off after seeing what that creek bed looked likeYou must question the response to that, right?  On the subject of oil rigs vs windmills - research the wind farm in Hawaii and how it is functioning today. Hint - it isn’t even operational and the power it generates, or generated, was peanuts. Oil has been around for a long time. Without oil we would be energy starved. Practices have come a long way. 
 

The article above, how earth will be “unlivable” is absolutely ridiculous. Earth has gone through way, way WAY worse conditions. Earth has gone through so many changes it’s laughable that humans think we know what is going on. Live and let live, enjoy your lives, your offspring and their offspring will be fine. 
 

 

[fujiwara79]

4 hours ago, Wxdood said:

However, on the red side,

wow, so you admit to arguing in bad faith and being a partisan hack.  got it.  you pretty much discredited everything else in your post just by this statement.

 

4 hours ago, Wxdood said:

The government lies.

Yes, they do.  The problem is that crazy randos on the Internet are even worse.  you seem like the type that believes everything is a conspiracy by the WEF to have us eating bugs.

 

4 hours ago, Wxdood said:

Earth has gone through way, way WAY worse conditions.

There are no good or bad conditions.  The earth is not a sentient being.  But modern civilization didn't even exist during those times.  I doubt it could have.

 

4 hours ago, Wxdood said:

but I am very concerned about the environment from every negative, oil rigs included.

I seriously doubt that.

 

4 hours ago, Wxdood said:

The fact that there is no healthy scientific debate on cc

There is plenty of debate.  But debate doesn't preclude taking action.

 

4 hours ago, Wxdood said:

On the subject of oil rigs vs windmills

they both kill birds, but you only seem to care if windmills do, which is odd.  that was my point.

[dseagull]

On 3/10/2023 at 4:03 PM, Wxdood said:

Likewise on the other side of the political spectrum. However, on the red side, I can compile a list of “conspiracies” that were censored, put people in jail, among other negatives that actually were true all along! The cc conspiracies have all but fallen flat on their faces, but the goal posts keep moving years down the line… The government lies. The fact that there is no healthy scientific debate on cc makes me think we are going down the c o vid path with it. Meaning the “science” wasn’t to be debated, questioned, we had to do what we were told and believe everything that was said to us and if not, we would face consequences. It’s your choice to go along with it. Seems like you’re hook lined and sinkered with it, after reading your whiny posts in the mid Atlantic forum.. for example, the oceans are “saunas”.  How descriptive…
 

I may question cc, but I am very concerned about the environment from every negative, oil rigs included. When the deep water horizon disaster happened I was beside myself. When I see what happened in east palenstine happen, but all the “environmentalists” and mayor Pete were either too busy in bed with Ukraine, or for mayor Pete, too busy worrying about how diverse our work force is, instead of going to at least SHOW UP pissed me off to no end, and should piss everyone off after seeing what that creek bed looked likeYou must question the response to that, right?  On the subject of oil rigs vs windmills - research the wind farm in Hawaii and how it is functioning today. Hint - it isn’t even operational and the power it generates, or generated, was peanuts. Oil has been around for a long time. Without oil we would be energy starved. Practices have come a long way. 
 

The article above, how earth will be “unlivable” is absolutely ridiculous. Earth has gone through way, way WAY worse conditions. Earth has gone through so many changes it’s laughable that humans think we know what is going on. Live and let live, enjoy your lives, your offspring and their offspring will be fine. 
 

 

I've attempted to have conversation and debate on the subject with folks here.  I applaud your efforts, but it's probably not going to amount to much.   

 

Common sense has gone out the window.  I know you probably have the same logical counter arguments that you didn't see necessary to post to fuji.   

 

There comes a time when the double standards and selective research results just become laughable.  

 

As someone who lives, works, and relies on the ocean... And as an American than is against the tyrannical globalist narrative that is being fed to hungry sheep, I find the construction of windmills and the entire "green plan," to be nothing more than an extremely harmful power grab.  

 

Most folks that can use logic and actually live a based life, do as well. 

[Roger Smith]

I hope to be able to post some evidence of natural variability cycles or at least effects if not periodic cycles, in April, once I get the graphs suitable for transfer to the internet. We have had quite a discussion here of different perceptions of the role of AGW, which is not really why this thread was created. I think we could either agree, or more likely agree to disagree, that some natural variability input into climate is currently interacting with the AGW signals, the question being, are those natural variations being overwhelmed, distorted, or do they hold their own and compete? I think a few people continue to think the entire climate variation we see today is from natural causes alone. I don't go that far and have always figured that what we see is a blend of human and natural signals. How they interact is an important question, but until we can identify what natural signals may exist, it would obviously be difficult if not impossible to discuss how they interact. 

My graphs will tend to demonstrate that the signals are basically just being warmed up and sometimes diluted but that they continue to exist. That in itself is interesting. Finding natural signals really tells us nothing about the likely future course of AGW, it could overwhelm all of them, or it could work through them, in other words, the worst of the warming influences could superimpose over top of what would have been the warmest times anyway (but not as warm? and by how much?).

You'll find some of these cycles interesting, I hope. I get very busy at end of each month with contest management here and on two other weather forums, so I will get into this work after that comes and goes, maybe around April 6th and beyond. I don't have much of a workload otherwise, other than maintaining the data sets that I created years ago. 

Could I suggest in general that we've had a full enough (perhaps too much so) discussion of points of view on the AGW side of things, and let's try to reorient this thread to its original purpose, which I support, and see where that discussion leads us. 

[Roger Smith]

I promised to post some material about natural variability in the atmosphere. 

First, a disclaimer, I would not call myself an AGW skeptic nor am I in the forefront of AGW research. My belief is that temperatures are trending upwards and a portion of that increase is due to AGW, another portion due to natural variability. I believe that the components are approximately equal. I am aware that the IPCC holds a different view, namely that all of the recent increases are due to AGW and without a developed human civilization we would now be in a slightly cooling natural climate. 

In any case, my interest is more along the lines of trying to establish what natural variability can be expected and then to try to separate out an AGW signal from those conclusions.

I don't perceive that AGW proponents or researchers discount the existence of natural variability, but they may assume it is a series of ups and downs against that supposedly slightly cooling natural climate regime. 

Before we could have any hope of a decision about who would be right or wrong about relative size of AGW and natural warming (if any), we would need to know with some assurance what natural variations should be occurring and then compare that with actual trends. The difference would presumably be the actual AGW signal. 

Nor do I discount the possibility that a natural cooling signal could begin to occur at any time given that we are now two cycles into a lower energy solar variability regime. 

_______ _______

The first natural cycle I will examine is the often mentioned 11-year cycle of summer heat which proponents point out tends to peak in years that are multiples of 1900+11n (1900, 1911, 1922, 1933 etc). What is the truth of this assertion, and if any truth, what might be a potential cause of it? 

First of all, to present a raw data measurement of this cycle, I have turned to my data base discussed in another thread here on the climate change forum, the Toronto and NYC historical data series and analysis. From that, I have extracted mean summer temperatures (June to August) for NYC. My data is converted to Celsius. This is the data table for summers in the NYC record (1869 to 2022). I show the average values of all eleven years in the cycle. Since 1869 is two years after 1867, a back-extension year of the cycle, this table places the multiples of 11 summers in column ten out of eleven. 

TABLE: MEAN SUMMER TEMPERATURE FOR NYC ARRANGED FOR ANALYSIS OF 11-YEAR CYCLE

1869 to 2022

Cycle ______________________________________________________________________________________________ (1900+11n) ________

begins ______ Year 1 __ Year 2 __ Year 3 __ Year 4 __ Year 5 __ Year 6 __ Year 7 __ Year 8 __ Year 9 __ Year 10 __ Year 11

__ 1869 _____ 21.83 ___ 23.85 ___ 21.87 ___ 23.76 ___ 22.54 ___ 21.91 ___ 22.24 ___ 24.46 ___ 23.07 ___ 22.90 ___ 22.44 

__ 1880 _____ 23.09 ___ 21.61 ____23.15 ___ 22.76 ___ 22.39 ___ 23.31 ___ 21.67 ___ 22.56 ___ 21.89 ____ 21.91 ___ 22.20

__ 1891 _____ 22.83 ___ 23.46 ___ 22.08 ___ 22.22 ___ 23.17 ___ 23.46 ___ 22.33 ___23.45 ___ 23.98 ___ 23.54 ___ 23.57

__ 1902 _____ 21.39 ___ 20.72 ___ 22.56 ___ 23.21 ___ 24.41 ___ 22.85 ___ 24.56 ___ 22.56 ___ 22.57 ___ 23.00 ___ 22.43

__ 1913 _____ 22.96 ___ 22.15 ___ 21.76 ___ 22.20 ___ 23.41 ___ 22.76 ___ 22.42 ___ 22.46 ___ 22.98 ___ 22.57 ___ 22.93

__ 1924 _____ 22.26 ___ 23.18 ___ 22.20 ___ 21.07 ___ 22.72 ___ 23.05 ___ 23.61 ___ 23.59 ___ 23.57 ___ 23.53 ___ 23.61

__ 1935 _____ 23.33 ___ 23.22 ___ 23.89 ___ 23.91 ___ 24.39 ___ 22.59 ___ 23.28 ___ 23.13 ___ 24.63 ___ 24.72 ___ 22.76

__ 1946 _____ 22.22 ___ 22.94 ___ 23.30 ___ 24.92 ___ 22.67 ___ 23.17 ___ 24.59 ___ 24.29 ___ 23.17 ___ 24.43 ___ 22.68

__ 1957 _____ 24.00 ___ 22.69 ___ 23.89 ___ 23.20 ___ 24.22 ___ 22.76 ___ 22.85 ___ 22.94 ___ 22.52 ___ 25.18 ___ 23.34

__ 1968 _____ 23.52 ___ 23.94 ___ 24.00 ___ 24.42 ___ 23.09 ___ 24.52 ___ 23.45 ___ 23.09 ___ 23.39 ___ 23.87 ___ 23.28

__ 1979 _____ 23.50 ___ 24.80 ___ 24.35 ___  22.91 ___ 24.93 ___ 24.05 ___ 23.00 ___ 23.09 ___ 23.89 ___ 24.80 ___ 23.15

__ 1990 _____ 23.74 ___ 24.61 ___ 22.50 ___ 24.94 ___ 24.55 ____ 24.74 ___ 22.83 ___ 22.96 ___ 23.41 ___ 24.83 ___ 22.28

__ 2001 _____ 23.85 ___ 24.43 ___ 23.11 ___ 22.94 ___ 25.04 ____ 23.83 ___ 23.04 ___ 24.11 ___  22.20 ___ 25.44 ___ 24.41

__ 2012 _____ 24.17 ___ 24.28 ___ 23.54 ___ 24.63 ___ 24.85 ____ 23.48 ___ 24.33 ___ 24.22 ___ 24.93 ___ 24.41 ___ 24.85

__ 2023 _____

___ avg _____ 23.05 ___ 23.28 ___ 23.01 ___ 23.36 ___ 23.74 ___ 23.32 ___ 23.16 ___ 23.35 ___ 23.30 ___ 23.94 ___ 23.16

ANALYSIS: 

There is definitely a peak in this cycle as postulated, in year 10. The peak is around 1 F deg or 0.6 C deg above the run of data in the rest of the cycle. 

A sub-peak almost as warm occurs in year five, so a pulse of 5,6,5,6 years run hotter (in summer). It should be noted that proponents of this cycle have not claimed that it extends back before 1900 and the data show that to be the case, 1878 and 1889 are not particularly warm summers. 1900, 1911, 1944, 1955, 1966, 1977, 1988, 1999 and 2010 are more impressive members than 1922 or 1933 (which is warm but similar to all summers 1931-36). In the last opportunity, 2021 was a bit cooler than 2020 or 2022. 

The year five sub-peak has occurred in 1873, 1884, 1895, 1906, 1917, 1928, 1939, 1950, 1961, 1972, 1983, 1994, 2005 and 2016. This sub-peak only becomes noticeable after 1983, before that it did not stand out from the rest of the data at all.  

As to what might be causing this 11-year summer temperature peak, it does approximate the pulse of quiet sun years between sunspot cycles, although more precisely it falls during the rapid increase phase at the early opening stages of sunspot cycles from 1944 onward. That may be its actual cause, but solar irradiance peaks at the peak of sunspot cycles. Perhaps the slightly less radiant heat source at quiet to increasing Sun has the tendency of inducing a trough over central North America which would put NYC into a southwest flow. Your thoughts? It could be postulated that this is nothing more than a statistical fluke, something that will not persist into the future (just as it apparently had little vitality in the cooler 19th century). 

Future peaks would be expected in 2027 (yr 6) and 2032 (yr 10), then 2038, 2043 etc. We'll have to track this into those future decades, or perhaps you will do that as I am 74 now. 

Note there is nothing in this data set to suggest an alternative to AGW, the trends are rising for all columns and this appears to be a natural cycle superimposed on the human-induced or possibly partly-otherwise-generated recent increases. 

I will analyze a longer set of CET data to find out if any 11-year variations are evident there. From a brief inspection I don't think the peaks would be at the same two points in the cycle (if any exist at all). 

C to F conversions

22.0 C is 71.6 F, 23.0 C is 73.4 F. 24.0 C is 75.2 F, 25.0 C is 77.0 F

22.5 C is 72.5F, 23.5 C is 74.3 F, 24.5 C is 76.1 F, 25.5 C is 77.9 F

0.10 C is 0.18 F in terms of differentials. 

[Roger Smith]

Note also, if that cycle has a solar variation connection, the solar cycles were longer from 1870 to 1905 than during the stronger regular cycles of the 20th century, and you'll note that 1876 (year 8), 1887 (year 8), 1899 (year 9) are all warm peaks rather than year 10 in those first three periods. Using them would create an average a little over 24.0 C and would yield an overall cycle of 11.2 years which might begin to manifest again if we get a few consecutive weak solar cycles separated by 12-13 years (like 1870, 1883, 1893, 1905, 1917). 

Solar maxima since 1917 have been 1928, 1937, 1947, 1957, 1968, 1979, 1989, 2001, a double weak peak 2012-15, and the current developing peak expected to hit maximum in 2024-25. 

The pattern of solar activity has been generally following a trend of 5-8 regular strong cycles about ten years apart, separated by 2-4 weaker cycles 12-14 years apart. The Maunder minimum was a longer and more profound lack of activity, otherwise, according to Schove's index based on auroral reports before the observational age began around 1610, the Sun has been behaving in those irregular two-phase modes. Stronger cycles occurred 1718-1787 and 1838-1870. The interval between those is known as the Dalton minimum. Other strong pulses of solar activity are believed to have occurred in the 14th and 16th centuries. Much of the 15th century generated weaker activity and is known as the Sporer minimum. 

The shallower minimum including the 1883, 1893 and 1905 peaks does not have a widely accepted name, perhaps it could be called the Edison minimum or the Curie minimum. It was in fact almost identical to the Dalton (peaks 1801, 1816, 1829) if perhaps 10 to 20 per cent more active. This current downturn is often called the Gleissberg minimum and so far is keeping pace with the Dalton and "Edison/Curie" episodes. It has not turned out to be Maunder 2.0 as some had predicted or speculated. It is a bit stronger than the Sporer minimum also. 

Now, it's quite possible this 11-year temperature cycle has no connection to solar activity at all. I do not have ready theories as to what else could cause it (and note, it is not my claimed discovery either, it has been widely discussed here for years). If it is a multiple of a shorter cycle (for example, 5 x 2.2 yr, 4 x 2.75 yr, 3 x 3.67 y or 2 x 5.5 years) then its other peaks would avoid summer months when they hit. That might be one avenue of investigation. 

[TheClimateChanger]

On 3/2/2023 at 5:25 PM, bdgwx said:

You mentioned UHI @Roger Smith. I want to address that because it is interesting and because it is one of the most misunderstood topics in the climate debate. First, some definitions.

UHI Effect - This is an increase in localized temperatures in urban areas relative the surrounding region as a result of land use changes. It is a phenomenon that has a physical impact.

UHI Bias - This is a high or low bias in the measured regional average temperatures caused by defective spatial averaging techniques. It is a phenomenon that has an unphysical impact.

It is important that these concepts not be conflated. Ideally we want to keep the UHI effect in regional and global average temperature datasets because it is real. What we don't want to keep in the datasets are any UHI biases. The biases are caused by grid meshing strategies, station moves, station commissioning or decommissioning, urbanization or deurbanization, etc.

An example of a high bias is when you have a grid cell is that is 25/75 urban/rural but the station ratio is flipped such that it is 75/25 urban/rural. In this case you are overweighting the urban stations and effectively using them as a proxy for the rural area.

An example of a low bias is when the station ratio starts out 75/25 urban/rural for a grid cell where urbanization stalled and then changes to 50/50 urban/rural. In this case you create an artificial low bias even though you may still actually be overweighting the urban area.

The timing of urban/rural station ratio and the rate of urbanization (including stalls) affect how the bias plays out in that grid cell. Most people don't take the time to consider that the UHI bias can cause us to underestimate temperature trends. I'm not saying that low biases outnumber high biases. I'm just saying that the sword cuts both ways and if you want to a rigorous analysis then you need to consider how UHIs could cause low biases as well.

A lot of datasets deal with the bias by just simple removing the UHI effect altogether. That does mitigate the bias, but at the expense of underestimating the surface warming a bit. I think the reason why this is such an appealing approach is because it is simple and because the UHI effect isn't that much considering only 2% of the planet is urbanized. 

At the end of the day UHI is such a small part of the global average that it just doesn't matter either way. But I'll leave readers with the Berkeley Earth's analysis. They found that the UHI bias on the global average temperature trend is statistically equivalent to 0.00 C/decade, but that if anything it is more likely to bias the trend too low albeit by an insignificant amount. I think this shocks a lot of people because the thought process is that since the UHI effect is always positive then the bias must always be positive as well which isn't true. [Rohde et al. 2013] 

I've noticed this trend too. A lot of blame for warming placed on UHI, but then when you run the numbers, it's the rural, secluded sites surrounding by montane forests that have the most warming. I think the greenhouse warming effect may be more significant in places that used to radiate amazingly well, and it could be impacting mountainous, high elevation sites moreso than lower elevation sites through an increase in the conditions that lead to temperature inversions. That, or the urban sites changed locations and exposures a lot - from window sills, to rooftops, to modern ground-based measurements at suburban airport locations.

I think there's little, if any, evidence of any significant urban heat bias in the temperature records. I would even go further and argue that the urban heat island effect itself is exaggerated, and to some degree, the result of substandard siting and exposure of equipment, coupled with the fact that the dense urban cores tend to be located at lower elevations than the surrounding suburbs - a natural result of cities popping up around bodies of water, whether it be the coastal Plain or a broad valley at the confluence of multiple rivers. Obviously, the city resting hundreds of feet below the outlying areas will be hotter. When I ran the numbers last year based on airport records, I found little dependence on population of the surrounding county. Instead, almost all of the variance could be attributed to elevation and latitude. Airports, in particular, tend to be at higher elevations than the cities they service (for obvious reasons), or, alternatively, immediately adjacent to large bodies of water that have a cooling effect relative to locations even a few blocks inland.

I'm certainly a skeptic of the claim that most of the warming is due to urban heat and land use changes. Remarkable claims require remarkable evidence, and I don't see any evidence for that claim. I do see a lot of evidence of greenhouse gas warming, though.