With all the warnings about the dangers
of Global Warming, maybe we should look
for just a brief moment at some of its advantages:
*What's wrong with New Jersey turning
into Florida. It would save New Yorkers
millions of dollars in moving/traveling
cost.
*It gives liberal teachers that can't teach
the Three R's opportunity to keep their
jobs filling first graders with horror stories.
*It teaches us that facts don't matter when
arguing your cause - just see what happens
when you say that somewhere is having the
worst winner ever to a dedicated G.W. Believer!
*It's given the world an opportunity for a new
religion with Algore as the founder & high priest.
However, I read one story recently that has
caused several sleepless nights for me, loss
of appetite and night sweats. If G.W. continues,
sharks will soon be swimming under the Polar
Cap at the North Pole. I have never considered
the terror of G.W. until I read that story. I may
well never sleep well again.
Personal Factoid: Coached Swimming for 4 summers.
5 comments:
Climate panel on the hot seat
March 14, 2008
By H. Sterling Burnett - More than 20 years ago, climate scientists began to raise alarms over the possibility global temperatures were rising due to human activities, such as deforestation and the burning of fossil fuels.
To better understand this potential threat, the World Meteorological Organization and the United Nations created the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) in 1988 to provide a "comprehensive, objective, scientific, technical and socioeconomic assessment of human-caused climate change, its potential impacts and options for adaptation and mitigation."
IPCC reports have predicted average world temperatures will increase dramatically, leading to the spread of tropical diseases, severe drought, the rapid melting of the world's glaciers and ice caps, and rising sea levels. However, several assessments of the IPCC's work have shown the techniques and methods used to derive its climate predictions are fundamentally flawed.
In a 2001 report, the IPCC published an image commonly referred to as the "hockey stick." This graph showed relatively stable temperatures from A.D. 1000 to 1900, with temperatures rising steeply from 1900 to 2000. The IPCC and public figures, such as former Vice President Al Gore, have used the hockey stick to support the conclusion that human energy use over the last 100 years has caused unprecedented rise global warming.
However, several studies cast doubt on the accuracy of the hockey stick, and in 2006 Congress requested an independent analysis of it. A panel of statisticians chaired by Edward J. Wegman, of George Mason University, found significant problems with the methods of statistical analysis used by the researchers and with the IPCC's peer review process. For example, the researchers who created the hockey stick used the wrong time scale to establish the mean temperature to compare with recorded temperatures of the last century. Because the mean temperature was low, the recent temperature rise seemed unusual and dramatic. This error was not discovered in part because statisticians were never consulted.
Furthermore, the community of specialists in ancient climates from which the peer reviewers were drawn was small and many of them had ties to the original authors — 43 paleoclimatologists had previously coauthored papers with the lead researcher who constructed the hockey stick.
These problems led Mr. Wegman's team to conclude that the idea that the planet is experiencing unprecedented global warming "cannot be supported."
The IPCC published its Fourth Assessment Report in 2007 predicting global warming will lead to widespread catastrophe if not mitigated, yet failed to provide the most basic requirement for effective climate policy: accurate temperature statistics. A number of weaknesses in the measurements include the fact temperatures aren't recorded from large areas of the Earth's surface and many weather stations once in undeveloped areas are now surrounded by buildings, parking lots and other heat-trapping structures resulting in an urban-heat-island effect.
Even using accurate temperature data, sound forecasting methods are required to predict climate change. Over time, forecasting researchers have compiled 140 principles that can be applied to a broad range of disciplines, including science, sociology, economics and politics.
In a recent NCPA study, Kesten Green and J. Scott Armstrong used these principles to audit the climate forecasts in the Fourth Assessment Report. Messrs. Green and Armstrong found the IPCC clearly violated 60 of the 127 principles relevant in assessing the IPCC predictions. Indeed, it could only be clearly established that the IPCC followed 17 of the more than 127 forecasting principles critical to making sound predictions.
A good example of a principle clearly violated is "Make sure forecasts are independent of politics." Politics shapes the IPCC from beginning to end. Legislators, policymakers and/or diplomatic appointees select (or approve) the scientists — at least the lead scientists — who make up the IPCC. In addition, the summary and the final draft of the IPCC's Fourth Assessment Report was written in collaboration with political appointees and subject to their approval.
Sadly, Mr. Green and Mr. Armstrong found no evidence the IPCC was even aware of the vast literature on scientific forecasting methods, much less applied the principles.
The IPCC and its defenders often argue that critics who are not climate scientists are unqualified to judge the validity of their work. However, climate predictions rely on methods, data and evidence from other fields of expertise, including statistical analysis and forecasting. Thus, the work of the IPCC is open to analysis and criticism from other disciplines.
The IPCC's policy recommendations are based on flawed statistical analyses and procedures that violate general forecasting principles. Policymakers should take this into account before enacting laws to counter global warming — which economists point out would have severe economic consequences.
H. Sterling Burnett is a senior fellow with the National Center for Policy Analysis, a nonpartisan, nonprofit research institute in Dallas.
http://xrl.us/bhq7m
If G.W. continues,
sharks will soon be swimming under the Polar
Cap at the North Pole.
Good one.:)
Quebec children get holiday as snow piles on roofs
Reuters
Reuters - Tuesday, March 18
MONTREAL - Several dozen schools were expected to remain shut this week in the Canadian province of Quebec over fears their roofs may collapse under the weight of near record amounts of snow, officials said on Monday.
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Administrators at Montreal's French-language school board said only 73 of the roughly 200 schools shut since Friday will reopen on Tuesday.
Some of the others may not open until after the four-day Easter weekend, which begins Friday.
"The objective, of course, is to open the maximum of schools but at the same time to proceed carefully because we want there to be zero risk," school board president Diane de Courcy told reporters.
All told, 90,000 students have been out of school in the Montreal area since Friday.
Primary and secondary schools and adult education centres will reopen only once their roofs have been cleared of snow and the buildings have been inspected for structural safety, de Courcy said.
Four people have been killed in the mainly French-speaking Canadian province of 7.6 million after roofs collapsed under the weight of accumulated snow, though none of the incidents involved schools.
In Shawinigan, about 150 kilometres northeast of Montreal, a 55-year-old man died on Saturday when the roof of his home collapsed.
Three women were killed in Morin Heights north of Montreal last Wednesday when part of a food warehouse roof caved in under the weight of snow.
To date, some 350 centimetres of snow has fallen in the Montreal area, approaching a record level of 383 centimetres set in 1971.
Despite periods of rain over the past few weeks, some school roofs have three meters of accumulated snow, school board officials said. About 300 workers were using shovels, scoops and even chainsaws to cut through the snow and ice.
There has been even more snowfall in Quebec's outlying areas. The Mont Orford ski hill about 120 kilometres to the east of Montreal has had 527 centimetres of snowfall since the beginning of the season.
Those seeking updates on the Montreal school closures can visit the school board's Web site at: www.csdm.qc.ca or call 514-897-4444.
It's a record year for snowfall
by David Jesse | The Ann Arbor News
Saturday March 22, 2008, 4:59 PM
BY DAVID JESSE
The Ann Arbor News
It's just as you suspected - this has been the snowiest winter ever in the Ann Arbor area, or at least since 1880 when record-keeping started.
And it's not over yet.
Leisa Thompson | The Ann Arbor NewsA pedestrian makes her way along Plymouth Road as the snow fell in Ann Arbor Friday.
That's because we're not even into April, a month that normally averages almost 2.5 inches of that pesky white stuff.
If this winter continues the way it's been going, we could be in store for more than that.
Consider this month.
Normally in March, we get about 8.3 inches of snow, said Dennis Kahlbaum, a University of Michigan weather observer. So far in March, with more than a week to go, we've seen 16.7 inches of fluffy precipitation.
A good chunk of that came Friday night and early Saturday morning.
The storm - a narrow band across southern Michigan - dropped 7.5 inches of snow in Ann Arbor, Kahlbaum said.
That was enough to send this winter into the record books and shove the 2004-05 winter aside.
In 2004-05, 83.9 inches of snow fell. This year, we're sitting at 85 inches.
That's a lot of shoveling.
"It seems like I've shoveled a lot this year," said Tori Williamson, 49, who was in front of her Ypsilanti home Saturday. "I've always been fine with shoveling, but now I'm thinking about a snowblower for next winter."
David Jesse can be reached at djesse@annarbornews.com or at 734-994-6937.
Excellent tropical photos.
I discuss the environment in my latest.
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