Well Worth Reading: A Paper Just Published in Climate

Abstract:The rise in global average temperature over the last century has halted since roughly the year 2000, despite the fact that the release of CO2 into the atmosphere is still increasing. It is suggested here that this interruption has been caused by the suspension of the near linear (+ 0.5 °C/100 years or 0.05 °C/10 years) temperature increase over the last two centuries, due to recovery from the Little Ice Age, by a superposed multi-decadal oscillation of a 0.2 °C amplitude and a 50~60 year period, which reached its positive peak in about the year 2000—a halting similar to those that occurred around 1880 and 1940. Because both the near linear change and the multi-decadal oscillation are likely to be natural changes (the recovery from the Little Ice Age (LIA) and an oscillation related to the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO), respectively), they must be carefully subtracted from temperature data before estimating the effects of CO2

You can read the full paper here. The paper does not claim that there is no anthropogenic global warming, but it does make a case that failure to subtract the PDO creates an inaccurate contribution of carbon dioxide to the process, and this explains why there has been no warming since 2000, and perhaps even some cooling, in spite of carbon dioxide levels continuing to rise.  Ditto for the global temperature declines after 1910 and 1970, in spite of continuing carbon dioxide level rises.

One again, another reason to see what Watts Up With That? is posting each day.

Now Big Oil Is Bribing the Pacific Ocean!

August 28, 2013 Scientific American has an article about the roughly 15 year stop in global warming with this headline:

Is the Pacific Ocean Responsible for a Pause in Global Warming?

So Big Oil is paying off the Pacific Ocean now to make the global warming theorists look bad!  How dare they!

Weakest Solar Maximum in a Century

From July 15, 2013 Fox News:

This year's solar maximum is shaping up to be the weakest in 100 years and the next one could be even more quiescent, scientists said July 11.

"It's the smallest maximum we've seen in the Space Age," David Hathaway of NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Ala., told reporters in a teleconference. [Solar Max: Amazing Sun Storm Photos of 2013]

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/science/2013/07/15/sun-2013-solar-activity-peak-is-weakest-in-100-years/#ixzz2Z7yQVhAO

This may explain why there has been no global warming for a decade now.  A prominent German environmental scientist -- and former global warming believer -- has a book out on the subject, which is now appearing in English:

Amazon is now showing that Fritz Vahrenholt’s and Sebastian Lüning’s controversial book Die kalte Sonne (The cold sun), released in German last year, is now coming out worldwide in English.

The title of the English version: The Neglected Sun, and the publisher is Stacey International in London.

Their book created quite a stir in Europe, especially in Germany. The warmist establishment pretty much had seizures over it.

Fritz Vahrenholt, chemistry professor, is also the author of the 1986 book “Seveso ist überall” (Seveso is everywhere), a book on the deadly risks of chemical pollution. That book made him one of the fathers of Germany’s modern environmental movement. Until just a couple of years ago Vahrenholt was a big believer in anthropogenic global warming, and accepted the IPCC gloomy reports as the final word on the subject – until one day he began taking a closer look at the real data. He couldn’t believe some of the shenanigans going on in the science, and so together with geologist Dr. Sebastian Lüning, he co-authored Die kalte Sonne.

More Of That Smart Diplomacy That Was Going To Distinguish Obama From Bush

You have probably seen the coverage showing that the Obama Administration is already training the rebels in Syria.  (This may have been part of why the Benghazi disaster was hushed up and blamed on the world's least competent filmmaker.)  I have blogged in the past about the cannibalism by some of the Syrian rebels, eating their enemies, which some Muslims defend as being justified by the Koran.  This June 27, 2013 Washington Times news story is a reminder that we are almost certainly backing some pretty monstrous people -- and where there is really no vital American interest:

A priest and another Christian were beheaded before a cheering crowd by Syrian insurgents who say they aided and abetted the enemy, President Bashar Assad’s military, foreign media reported.
An undated video that made the Internet rounds on Wednesday showed two unnamed men with tied hands surrounded by a cheering crowd of dozens, just moments before their heads were cut off with a small knife, Syria Report said. The attackers in the video then lifted the head for show, and placed it back on the body. The incident took place in the countryside of Idlib, the media report said.

Read more: http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2013/jun/27/syrians-behead-christians-helping-military-cia-shi/#ixzz2Xa85K3Ae
Follow us: @washtimes on Twitter

Unlike traditional European beheading with an axe or a sword, which was a fast and relatively humane form of execution, the practice of al-Qaeda is to use a fairly small knife -- a very slow and torturous way to kill someone.  I wish that I had some confidence that we were only backing forces that share Western values -- but I am not sure that those really exist in Syria.

The Good News: The Flat Earth Society Agrees With Obama About Global Warming

A few days ago, Obama insulted those who are skeptical of the Anthropogenic Global Warming claims by comparing them to the Flat Earth Society.  But this article from the June 25, 2013 Salon interviews the Flat Earth Society's president concerning AGW -- and he agrees with Obama!

As it turns out, there is a real Flat Earth Society and its president thinks that anthropogenic climate change is real. In an email to Salon, president Daniel Shenton said that while he “can’t speak for the Society as a whole regarding climate change,” he personally thinks the evidence suggests fossil fuel usage is contributing to global warming.

“I accept that climate change is a process which has been ongoing since beginning of detectable history, but there seems to be a definite correlation between the recent increase in world-wide temperatures and man’s entry into the industrial age,” he said. “If it’s a coincidence, it’s quite a remarkable one. We may have experienced a temperature increase even without our use of fossil fuels since the Industrial Revolution, but I doubt it would be as dramatic as what we’re seeing now.”

Of course, Salon has a very progressive readership, so one of the comments:

That was a remarkably civilized  comment by Daniel Shenton. I'm tempted to join the FES to reward their politeness and, lets face it, their spokesman's views are more scientific and rational on this point than the Republicans and their wealthy backers. A pleasant exchange. 

"A Significant Thorn"

From the April 10, 2013 Idaho Statesman:

TORONTO — Alberta's premier says if the Obama administration rejects the Keystone XL pipeline it be would be a significant thorn in Canadian-U.S. relations.

It would be a significant thorn in Obama-U.S. relations, too.  Assuming many Americans find out about it.

Read more here: http://www.idahostatesman.com/2013/04/10/2528576/alberta-premier-rejection-would.html#storylink=cpy

New York Times On The Global Warming Threat

This from June 23, 1890:

Is our climate changing? The succession of temperate Summers and open Winters through several years, culminating last Winter in the almost total failure of the ice crop throughout the valley of the Hudson, makes the question pertinent. The older inhabitants tell us that the Winters are not as cold now as when they were young, and we have all observed a marked diminution of the average cold even in this last decade.

The Economist Is Even Figuring Out That Global Warming Predictions Are In Trouble

The March 30, 2013 The Economist finally admits that there are some serious concerns about the accuracy of the global warming predictions:

OVER the past 15 years air temperatures at the Earth’s surface have been flat while greenhouse-gas emissions have continued to soar. The world added roughly 100 billion tonnes of carbon to the atmosphere between 2000 and 2010. That is about a quarter of all the CO₂ put there by humanity since 1750. And yet, as James Hansen, the head of NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies, observes, “the five-year mean global temperature has been flat for a decade.”

This graph over at Watts Up With That? points out how much trouble the predictions are in:

The actual observed temperatures are about to fall through the bottom of the 95% confidence interval prediction of global temperatures.  James Hansen at NASA is arguing that it is the increase in goal burning that is causing this -- increased particulate matter is blocking sunlight more than increased CO2 is holding in the heat.  It isn't confidence inspiring, is it?