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More evidence this week shows the effects of global warming may be largely exaggerated

Der Spiegel, Europe's largest weekly news magazine, has a lengthy piece on the effects of global warming.  Their conclusion, reached from interviews with prominent scientists, matches what you've been reading here in this blog for the past year.  There's absolutely nothing to panic about. 

According to the study, most nations will actually benefit from global warming, with drought-stricken areas like sub-Saharan Africa seeing a bit more rain, and extremely cold areas like Northern Europe blessed with a more moderate climate and longer growing seasons.  The Southeastern U.S. is expected to see a little less rain, but for tourism-heavy Florida (which bills itself as the "Sunshine State" despite abnormally high rainfall) this may be a net positive as well.

Nations like Germany and Scandinavia are predicted to see a tourism boom, along with saving billions in winter heating costs.  Areas already tropically hot are not expected to see temperature increases, but Germany alone is predicted to see up to 40,000 fewer deaths per year from cold-related illnesses.

More precise computer models have drastically reduced the anticipated amount of sea level rise.  It now stands at 16 inches over the next century ... a per-year rate which is tiny, and can easily be compensated in storm-surge prone areas by building taller dikes. 

As for increasing storm activity, the models just don't support it. The report indicates that cloud cover is the most significant factor in global warming models.  High clouds generally indicate warming activity, lower clouds indicate cooling.  Storm activity, it seems, does not play a direct correlation to cooling and warming cycles.

A few quote highlights from the piece:

  • "We have to take away people's fear of climate change," Hans von Storch, climate researcher,  director of the Institute for Coastal Research.
  • "According to our computer model, neither the number nor intensity of storms is increasing," Jochem Marotzke, director, Max Planck Institute for Meteorology.
  • "A warmer climate helps promote species diversity," Munich zoologist Josef Reichholf.

Here in the U.S., the Wisconsin Energy Cooperative Monthly has published an interview with Professor Reid Bryson, founder of the Center for Climatic Research, and the most cited climatologist in the world.  Bryson, one of the first researchers to claim humans were capable of affecting the climate, has this to say on the warming debate:

"All this argument is the temperature going up or not, it’s absurd.  Of course it’s going up. It has gone up since the early 1800s, before the Industrial Revolution, because we’re coming out of the Little Ice Age, not because we’re putting more carbon dioxide into the air.”

He points out recently-found silver mines and irrigation canals, found underneath retreating glacial ice sheets in the Alps, clear proof these areas were ice-free during the Middle Ages.   He also reveals some interesting statistics on the relative effects of various greenhouse gases, noting that water vapor is responsible for 80% of all absorbed heat, whereas CO2 accounts for only 0.08% -- a thousandth as much.

Bryson makes a number of other telling points.  The interview is highly recommended to anyone interested in separating fact from hype in the global warming debate.

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Ried F'n Bryson??
By sbandyk on 5/10/2007 12:15:36 AM , Rating: 2
I just googled a couple of the sources to see where the Der Spiegl article was coming from. My first try was an institute name that was so vague that there are many of them around the world. The second was Ried Bryson. Now I know who he is.

Ried Bryson is a favorite of the American Right Wing. He's also the point man for the Canadian Coal industry (and other industries). He's a crank.

I don't have time to track down all the background on him.. I encourage you all to weed through Right Wing, Pro-Business PR and look into him.

Here's what I remember about good old Ried.
He bills himself as a Paleoclimatologist and a Climatologist. He isn't. He's a meterologist. I'm not sure if it's still active but I had read that he was being sued for lying on his CV and misrepresenting himself.
He spent (if I remember correctly) 8 years as a faculty member [needs verification.. I could be mistaken] and he has an extremely light list of academic publication in respected journals.
He's a shill for the energy industry. The "Wisconson Energy Cooperative" noted in the blog.. which famously intervied Ried is a Cooperative of Energy Producers.

Oh, this one is great. Here's a quote from 'don't worry about Global Warming' Ried:
“There is very important climatic change going on right now, and it’s not
merely something of academic interest.” Bryson warned, “It is something that, if it continues, will affect the whole human occupation of the earth – like a billion people starving. The effects are already showing up in a rather drastic way.”

That was before he 'retired' and started working with the energy industry.

If you want to have some real fun.. just Google his name and notice how many times Reid Bryson is listed as a world famous "Climatologist". Small problem, HE ISN'T!

Personally, I'm not a researcher but I run IT at a research University with a large GeoPhysical Sciences department. I've yet to discover a single researcher here who doesn't believe humans are negatively affecting the environment.

There is a very large, very well funded disinformation operaton on Climate change. The disinformation campaign is run by corporations who benefit when we don't try to alter our carbon footprint. They have a direct and clear motivation to deny climate change.
On the other side are the researchers who are only wagering their professional reputations.
Until I see a smoking gun, I go with the vast majority of real independent Climatologists.

Steven.




RE: Ried F'n Bryson??
By sbandyk on 5/10/2007 12:32:52 AM , Rating: 1
dang, almost forgot.. I had a couple other things to get off my chest.

Just a few misconceptions I can't stand hearing:

No, the world isn't turning into a giant desert. Climate change will make the climate less stable, warming the Atlantic stream may actually push Europe into a mini ice age.

Yes, temperature changes will be small. 1C world wide change can wreak havoc.

These effects are cumulative and exponential. When polar ice melts it doesn't just free water, it puts some of it in the atmosphere (trapping heat more than CO2) and it reduces white (reflective) land mass increasing solar absorption and increasing total energy (heat). If it's happening, it'll start slow.. real slow.. but it will speed up.

Just because this spring was cold doesn't mean that refutes global warming any more than last December's warmth proves it. This is big picture stuff.

.. I quit, really, there's too much.

Oh, and the latest OBSERVATIONS indicate things are getting worse FASTER than we previously thought.
http://www.cnn.com/2007/TECH/science/05/02/arctic....
http://www.nbc6.net/msnbcnews/11621174/detail.html
The latest thinking is, it's worse than recently predicted:
http://blog.sciam.com/index.php?title=could_global...


RE: Ried F'n Bryson??
By TomZ on 5/10/07, Rating: -1
RE: Ried F'n Bryson??
By porkpie on 5/10/2007 9:54:01 AM , Rating: 2
Rofl, Bryson isn't 'working with the energy industry'. Amazing how low you guys will stoop.

BTW, you forgot to try and discredit all the other scientists in the article. Better get to work!


RE: Ried F'n Bryson??
By dever on 5/11/2007 1:19:37 PM , Rating: 1
It appears he didn't actually read the article... by the way, here's the correctly link for the der Spiegel article:

http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/0,1518...


RE: Ried F'n Bryson??
By dever on 5/11/2007 1:32:30 PM , Rating: 3
sbandyk, it appears that you believe that a researcher getting reimbursed by an "evil" company for a plane ticket and lodging to speak at a conference is tantamount to some corporate-conspiracy-flying-saucer-hoogy-boogy.

But, taking millions of dollars, by force, from the poorest in the country (ie federal taxes) to fund your entire life's work is great and honorable. Work that is shielded from the ultimate peer review - consumer preferences in the market.

Do you really believe that we should never question the motives of one who's living is made in academia through outright grant of money to one party taken by a second party (govt) from a third party (taxpayers)?


RE: Ried F'n Bryson??
By James Holden on 5/10/2007 2:26:12 AM , Rating: 2
Intersting post, good to see some of the sources for this, but I have a question for you -- why focus on the carbon footprint instead of, say, the methane footprint. Wasn't there a study that showed methane was 100x worse than CO2 with regard to trapping heat -- and that our methane footprint is much larger than the CO2 footprint?


RE: Ried F'n Bryson??
By peternelson on 5/11/2007 1:07:49 PM , Rating: 3
Methane is a significant contributor to greenhouse gases, and the figure I saw was that methane was 20x more warming than CO2 (for a given amount of emission).

Research on this has shown that COWS are responsible for most methane emissions. However simply by changing the cattle feed you can DRASTICALLY reduce methane emissions. That is where your tax dollars should go first.

The other methane source is decomposing in landfill. That can be captured and used to generate energy rather than leak to atmosphere.


RE: Ried F'n Bryson??
By grenableu on 5/10/2007 6:57:43 AM , Rating: 5
quote:
Bryson bills himself as a Paleoclimatologist and a Climatologist. He isn't. He's a meterologist
How typical. Yet another scientist speaks out against global warming alarmism and hundreds of enviro-whackos scurry out of the woodwork to try and trash them.

Bryson has been doing climate research for decades. He's a climatologist. His degree is in meteorology of course, the same as most climatologists. There isn't a degree in climatology itself. But Bryson has not only been doing climate research, he's been teaching climatology at U. of Wisconsin for over 30 years. He founded the department for chrissakes.

Here's a link to the University website:

quote:
1970
Chancellor and Board of Regents approve reorganization of Institute for Environmental Studies (IES) into comprehensive, independent academic unit. Reid Bryson appointed first director.
The IES department includes a center for Marine Stuides, a Center of Climatic Research, the Ecological Study Group, Biotic Systems groups, Quantitative Ecosystems Modeling, Environmental Monitoring and Data Acquisition, and several other research arms.

http://www.nelson.wisc.edu/about/history.htm


RE: Ried F'n Bryson??
By grenableu on 5/10/2007 7:08:26 AM , Rating: 4
quote:
Here's a quote from 'don't worry about Global Warming' Ried:
“There is very important climatic change going on right now, and it’s not merely something of academic interest.” Bryson warned, “It is something that, if it continues, will affect the whole human occupation of the earth – like a billion people starving. ”

That was before he 'retired' ...
You left off a few facts. Bryson made that claim in the 1970s, and he was talking about global cooling, not warming. Back then, most climatologists thought we were in for another ice age. Time Magazine even did a cover story on it, saying (just like they do global warming today), that the science was 'settled'.

Bryson freely admits they were mistaken. He's one of dozens of climatologists who have recanted, now that new research has showed the tremendous natural variation of the earth's climate.

Research in the 1970s supported global cooling. Research in the 1990s supported anthopogenic global warming. The research this decade has supported natural warming, driven by natural climatic changes.


RE: Ried F'n Bryson??
By Ringold on 5/10/2007 2:17:10 PM , Rating: 2
... And with that, IT man Steven's credibility goes up in a giant mushroom cloud of alarmist anti-business dust.

I could understand a few errors, but gross errors and wanton quoting out of context to some is misleading, but to me is propaganda.. and propaganda is lieing. Not only that, he went on to cite two liberal news agencies when there are at least a few impeccably neutral sources out there. But then, those neutral firms don't tend to run as many alarmist articles, either.


WTF?
By cheetah2k on 5/10/2007 2:00:20 AM , Rating: 5
I doubt anyone in Australia will agree with those comments that "a little warming is good for most nations".

Brisbane hasnt seen decent rain for over 5 years now. They are on level 5 water restrictions - that means 4 min showers, no watering grass/plants and no car washing! The place is looking like a desert now....

The Great Barrier Reef is the most affected natural phenomenon, and it will be gone in less than 10 years at the current rate of warming...

The above has to tell you that Global Warming isnt good. I mean, WTF do i know, but it doesn't take a scientist to work out this s.h.i.t aint good.




RE: WTF?
By TomZ on 5/10/2007 9:06:41 AM , Rating: 1
There is probably zero correlation between global warming and the issue you describe. Global warming is not a 5- or 10-year thing - it plays out over hundreds of years before you see measurable effects. Remember, most forcasts are in the 1°C/century range. Clearly that rate of change is not going to make Brisbane a desert in a five-year period.


RE: WTF?
By Ringold on 5/10/2007 2:29:41 PM , Rating: 2
I'm here in Florida, and I've already heard people try to blame beach errosion from this sub-tropical storm off our coast on global warming.

Yes, the errorsion has been eye-popping, but FFS..
A) When one moves there, they must be pretty damn dense if they havent over the course of their life noticed the coast gets at least a passing blow EVERY YEAR from a hurricane
B) If all it takes is one nasty low pressure system to annihilate the beaches then god help those people if they were to see a REAL hurricane -- much less "global warming". Gee, maybe New Symrna isn't naturally supposed to have such beaches -- maybe that's why nature destroys them every couple years?

Florida, too, is critically short on water, with over two hundred fires raging at the moment and visibility down to 2.5 miles yesterday. It's been going on over a decade, though, and I don't really pin it at all on GW. We've just been... very unlucky. All it would take is a nice storm system to park over us for about a week and years of neglect would be soaked away, but it just hasn't happened.


credability
By werepossum on 5/10/2007 6:07:47 PM , Rating: 1
I'm constantly amazed that scientists whose degrees are in microbiology or geology or such receive more press coverage, and are considered by the left and the press as being more reliable, on issues of global warming than are meteorologists, even PHDs and those teaching and studying climatology. I don't know how many times I've read that someone's study of fossil bacterial density, or spore counts, or tree rings not only proves global warming, but proves that it is driven almost solely by mankind. You don't find a lot of meteorologists (and almost none above age 45) who believe in manmade, catastrophic global warming. Centuries of carefully recorded human ice up/ice out dates, cycles of maritime ice hazards charted, records of caravans with women and children crossing the Alps - all that is discarded on the basis of CO2 concentrations in ice cores - a field where studies are considered successful if not more than half the data have to be discarded to match the model, and where predictive studies have been wildly unsuccessful.

Australia and Florida will take it in the shorts, though; both are severely overcrowded for their water tables, and even a little less rain is going to hurt. Luckily, both have lots of sea water and are prosperous enough to build desalination plants.

And blaming plate tectonics on mankind is light. There was a story on the news about the man piloting a boat when a ray leaped into the boat and speared him through the heart. (He lived.) The news clip I watched featured an "animal expert" chick who blamed the rash of "attacks" on global warming. Seems marine animals are being so stressed by global warming that they're fighting back by attacking humans, the cause of global warming.




RE: credability
By grenableu on 5/10/2007 7:46:36 PM , Rating: 1
quote:
Centuries of carefully recorded human ice up/ice out dates, cycles of maritime ice hazards charted, records of caravans with women and children crossing the Alps - all that is discarded on the basis of CO2 concentrations in ice cores - a field where studies are considered successful if not more than half the data have to be discarded to match the model, and where predictive studies have been wildly unsuccessful
Great post, and I wanted to comment on this point further. Ice core accuracy has increased a lot in the past 5-10 years. But as it has, scientists have noticed a very interesting fact. The new data shows CO2 increases in the earth's past don't match up precisely with past warming. The warming precedes the CO2 rise, by a few hundred years in most cases. Meaning that a naturally warming earth releases more CO2, and not vice versa.


Really?
By GI2K on 5/13/2007 5:56:44 AM , Rating: 2
“Nations like Germany and Scandinavia are predicted to see a tourism boom”
Why that if Scandinavia becomes warm then it becomes like any other country, their cold temperatures is what makes them “unique”, as for Germany doubt of it colder temperatures never stopped anyone from going there and if tourists want warm temperatures other south-European countries will look like the tropics compared to Germany.

“along with saving billions in winter heating costs.”
And spending billions in summer cooling costs...

"Germany alone is predicted to see up to 40,000 fewer deaths per year from cold-related illnesses"
Yeah but how many more deaths will Germany get from hot-related illnesses.
And let's not even speak of all the diseases transmitted by warm-loving insects and others.

Quite frankly I don’t think Germany will get anything positive out of it... but then again in a subject so vast I think anyone can point a thousand positive points while others can point just as much negative points...

Anyway global warming is today like some kind of boost for scientist and reporters seeking global fame be it by supporting or not global warming.

At least these guys admit that something is changing not like some...




Interesting read
By Xoddoza on 5/9/2007 7:54:55 PM , Rating: 1
Interesting read, I've always thought climate change was played up a lot, particularly its effects.

In some areas of the world however 14 inch's of water (or however much it was can still be an issue.) I live in New Zealand and have reasonable contact with pacific islands many of which would struggle to deal with rises like that, when your beach front holiday home is only half a meter off the see level.

Its also probably a reasonable certainty that these predictions will be very wrong in some areas and totally different in others as micro climates are all affected and flow on through to each other. Thats a largish issue for New Zealand with our farming industry.

Still nice to see not all doom and gloom.




Never doubted it
By cochy on 5/9/2007 9:03:10 PM , Rating: 1
Thanks for the nice blog. A little warming will be nice for us up in Canada =)

I don't think the Earth is on it's way to becoming Venus quite yet.