Plain talking about climate change science and the mangling of the message
The sort of story that has caused an uproar in the UK through this Daily Mail report on an abnormal solar cycle is a controversy that high profile climate change message managers have unfortunately brought on themselves.
There is no reason why it makes the elimination of excess liberation of fossil carbon any less urgent than it is, in fact, it has nothing to do about the inherent dangers of industrially forced climate change, which can only be fixed by new non-fossil-carbon-releasing energy technologies.
But it underlines the perils of the lies and exaggerations that ensue when science adopts the techniques of political or corporate PR messaging, which for those that follow aviation and defence issues, has parallels with the untruths that accompanied the 787 and JSF Joint Strike Fighter programs, or the efforts made in Japan and by the nuclear establishment to suppress the truth about the Fukushima Daiichi disaster.
Climate change alarmism went for the short term headline grabbing predictions of enormous sea level rises in a short time, of the disappearance of snow in Australia, the desertification of the continent and depopulation of Perth, when the insidious consequences of widespread long term changes, which may well include elements of all of the above, were regarded as in need of ‘help’ in order to bring about change (or in other cases, the sale of plastic jets and an X-box collection of comic book weaponry with wings designed for the strategic threats of the 1990s).
Part of that process was to sideline references to natural influences on global climate change, which also meant restraining references to solar science that could be argued to be a contrary voice in getting an accelerated political response to anthropogenic global warming, or AGW, to the extent that if an issue couldn’t be framed in terms of AGW its chances of attracting funding were sharply reduced.
It was like asking for funds for Mars missions that didn’t claim to be able to find life, but would embark on missions of scientific discovery as distinct from seeking vindication for popular and salable beliefs.
This writer experienced this response when, as a keen follower of astronomy, he published a report noting in early 2009 that there was something ‘odd’ about the solar cycle, which should have ended two years earlier, and that similar drops in sunspot activity, a proxy for solar activity, had been associated with (let’s go acronymical here) NGC or natural global cooling in the past.
It was just an observation, but the writer was slandered in Crikey by Dr Andrew Glickson of the ANU and others for a wide range of sins which included being an opponent of AGW which was absurd.
I had been writing about the dangers of excess fossil carbon release in the environment since early 1979, before the term AGW was minted, when I interviewed Dr John Bortniak inside the Clean Air Facility, at the geographical south pole, for the Sydney Morning Herald, and he raised the possibly unwelcome consequences of increased carbon concentrations that had been discovered in ice core samples dating back to the start of cement making and larger scale smelting.
And at that stage, I had no idea how important his comments would prove to be, other than hoping for the next 10 years that he was wrong before Dr Graeme Pearman at the CSIRO convinced me, while writing a cover story for The Bulletin, that he was right.
The problem with the Daily Mail story is that it is just as deliberately framed to discredit AGW concerns as was the sidelining of the work of solar scientists by the pro-AGW establishment, up until recently, when a more sober assessment of the issues began to gain traction.
PR campaigns are based on an all-or-nothing take-no-prisoners approach to the truth, and they usually come apart as a result.
As it turned out, the world had a 13 year solar cycle between 1996 and 2009 that even late in 2008 had left some scientists who should have known better in denial. The normal solar cycle is approximately 11 years between successive minimums as defined by sunspot counts. And there is a risk that this episode of lowered solar activity, with a depressed sunspot count, may in fact be continuing, despite the odd X-flare and some nice big clusters of sunspots in the last year.
The previous 13 year solar cycle was in 1900-1913. (There are disagreements about when solar cycles end. Some argue that a single sighting of a reversed polarity sunspot marks the turning point, while others reference the total sunspot counts, which in the period before 1913 and that which ended two years ago, occupy a very flat and extended period of low sunspot numbers as shown in the graphs taken from NASA/GISS papers).
The 'modern' solar cycles, as summarised by NASA using sunspot counts
In the solar cycle that ended ‘around’ 1913, the world experienced some severe cold events even worse than those that have afflicted eastern Europe this week, where until a short time ago it had been looking rather mild.
There was no glacial response in that earlier abnormal cycle between 1900-1913, which the literature attributes to it having included balmy summers as well as bitter winters, in which heavy winter snows, including some incredible snow storms in SE Australia, are never a match for heavy late summer rainfalls.
The one difference between the recent cold snaps of the last solar cycle and that of 1900-1913 is that the atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration was then only just passing through 300 ppm, compared to over 385 ppm now.
And that is just an empirical observation, the writer isn’t a scientist, but a journalist, and a keen amateur astronomer. This story isn’t so much about the science, but the messaging.
The Daily Mail story refers to the Dalton Minimum, of around 1790-1830, which not only saw low sunspot counts right across the highs and lows of its extended solar cycles, but the massive eruption that removed the top 2000-3000 metres of the extensive Mt Tambora strato volcano on the island of Sumbawa in Indonesia in 1815, preceding the year without summer in the northern world in 1816, and the famines that resulted.
The Dalton Minimum was not as severe as the minimums of the earlier Little Ice Ages but if we have entered anything like it then the gross contamination of the atmosphere with excess carbon dioxide may reduce its effects.
And when such a new 21st century minimum passes-if there really is one-the natural cycle and any industrially forced cycle will be moving in the same direction, to a hotter world, and not in opposite directions, and the consequences could make the worst of the nightmare scenarios for global warming come true.
11 Comments
Err, where does one find data for these erstwhile little ice ages Ben? AAnd why would the current longish but otherwise unremarkable solar cycle suggest even the slightest comparison to Dalton?
Glen,
I can’t take you by the hand and lead you into the library, but unless there has been a centuries long conspiracy by several thousand different climate historians separated by around 400 years and without recourse to modern communications, the accounts of the solar minimums of the Little Ice Ages are independently valid accounts of the times, and they were indeed more severe than the Dalton Minimum. Remind us why the most recent solar cycle with a sunspot account half that of the average of the those since 1913 is unremarkable and why the solar scientists are clearly, to a man and woman, totally in error in comparing it to the Dalton Minimum and then perhaps we will gain an additional valuable understanding about these matters
C’mon. You could be there in Stockholm next time around, having proven all these people wrong.
The major mistake which has been committed was by those who constantly referred to “global warming” rather than “climate change”. Thanks to these knuckleheads, every tie it snows or is unseasonably cool, we get the “Cancel the global warming conference” jokes from late night chat hosts, serious news media and people on the street.
http://metofficenews.wordpress.com/2012/01/29/met-office-in-the-media-29-january-2012/
The daily mail article is more about “journalists” who don’t care for the facts.
Scott,
I think you are largely right. The issue I have is with the use and abuse of political or corporate style PR by science. Every exaggeration, misrepresentation,and deliberate silencing of contrary evidence or line of inquiry had damaged the pursuit of a much needed policy focus on retarding and as soon as possible, replacing, processes that liberate fossil sourced carbon.
What I regard as pure, deliberate, and inspired climate change research has been sold up and down the river by stupid, unscientific actions in pursuit of a populist objective.
If we look carefully at the experience of the planet in what was a somewhat remarkable solar cycle between 1996-2009 I think we can see the role of fossil sourced carbon in masking the weather impact. Unfortunately deep solar minimums do seem to have an effect on the weather, indeed even Glickson in one reported article has started to introduce this as a factor, when James Hansen was already making this the focus of much more determined comments, and which ought to have produced a more measured response by the science establishment.
I suppose in hindsight I’m writing more in this blog about the power and power abuse of established views, mainly in air transport, than anything else. The powers of established wisdom,and the often faulty or conflicted self interest of those that benefited from it in our society was something that concerned the professors and lecturers that strongly influenced my perceptions of this as an undergraduate in the 60s, and while I was a bad student, I hope it made me a better reporter.
Ben – I wholeheartedly agree with you on the over-hyped PR campaign from the global warming alarmists. However I continue to disagree with you on the science.
I know I keep repeating it, but I just can’t get around the fact that the world has only warmed by 0.7C since 1850. This came in three roughly equal spurts, from 1860-1880, 1910-1940 and 1975-1998. And there has been no warming since 1998.
Now, the THEORY is that our CO2 emissions warm the planet. But the DATA suggests that these cycles are entirely natural. There seems to be little correlation to our CO2 emissions. The above graphs suggest that the warming cycles are tied in with the Sun’s cycles.
In any case, we can certainly agree that established wisdom can be wrong. And thanks for your comments on my blog.
the world has only warmed by 0.7C since 1850.
No, it’s warmed 0.6C since the base period 1951-1980. Only a small amount of warming was extant before the mid-20th Century.
the THEORY is that our CO2 emissions warm the planet.
No, that’s proven fact. If it weren’t for CO2, the world would be a frozen ball of ice. This is entirely uncontested: the physics for this have been accepted for well over a century.
And there has been no warming since 1998.
1998 was the hottest El Nino on record, meaning that less of the earth’s heat was absorbed into the Pacific Ocean, and more stayed on the surface. However, despite this, 2005 and 2010 were statistical ties for the hottest year ever, and 2011 was in the top 12 despite being a strong El Nino.
All of these things are facts. Dispute the grey areas, but when you manage to write a single paragraph with three absolute falsehoods in it, you deserve advice telling you to be more careful.
Sorry GeorgeD – but I’ve done the maths myself. Look at the CRU data. A linear regression shows 0.7C warming since 1850. The warming spurts from 1860-1880 and 1910-1940 were similar to the 1975-1998 warming spurt. In any case, how is 0.6C warming since 1951 a crisis?
And no, it is not a proven fact that our CO2 warms the planet. Yes, CO2 is a greenhouse gas, but why hasn’t it warmed the planet since 1998? Water vapour is by far the biggest greenhouse gas. CO2 is inconsequential in comparison.
Finally, so what if 2005 and 2010 tied with 1998 for the warmest ever years (and UAH data says they were cooler, actually). why isn’t it getting WARMER? Why isn’t there an acceleration in the temperature trend given our record CO2 emissions?
Tamas Calderwood, if you’ve really done the maths yourself, why are the answers to your own questions not obvious to you? Surely everyone who knows about statistics knows that CO2 didn’t stop warming the planet in 1998? Obviously there are other things affecting temperatures as well. Statistics can be used to separate them out.
The warming that we’ve already had is not itself a crisis (though it has probably caused some local crises by increeasing the frequency and severity of droughts in some areas and tropical cyclones in others). But the real crisis is yet to come if greenhouse gas levels in the atmosphere continue to increase, as it will cause sea levels to rise (as well as further increases in the frequency and severity of droughts, floods, hurricanes etc).
And yes it is a proven fact that CO2 warms the planet. What we can’t yet say with certainty is how much. But your claim that it’s insignificant compared to water vapour fails to take into account the most important feature of water vapour: when it cools down it condenses into water! Increasing the levels of other greenhouse gases increases the temperature, increasing the time that the H2O stays as a vapour.
Tamas, how do you explain that each of your three warming “spurts” started and finished at a higher level than the previous one?
If you add a linear trend (e.g. CO2 induced global warming) to a cyclic process (solar cycle and El Nino) you will get a stepwise pattern. That is what is happening.
I suppose I was thinking Maunder Ben, but Dalton will do. Look at your own plot. The current cycle is unremakable except for the “longish” (and, granted, rather deep) recent low. It’s likely to peak around the hundred mark or above, as every cycle in the last century has. Dalton, OTOH, peaked nearer 60.
The pluralisation “Little Ice Ages” is controversial. There are millenial-scale glacial variations for sure, but what they are and what causes them seem far from clear. (My library has Matthews and Briffa 2005; yours?).