What DID happen to the ice during the Arctic Storm?

The daily rate of change is plotted below:

During the storm period 3 days show increased loss. Over the 2007 loss this is 292812 sq km

WUWT claim that this loss exposed more ice to later attack but only 2 other periods show gross changes:
During the period 15th August to 17th August (additional loss over 2007 is 178438 sq km)
During the period 22nd August to 23rd August (additional loss over 2007 is 174687 sq km)

So the Absolute maximum loss that could possibly be attributed to the "Great Arctic Storm" of 2012 is 645937 sq km.

The difference between the 2007 and 2012 minimum is 765468sq km

So even if you subtract the largest possible storm induced loss you would still have a 119531 sq km additional loss in 2012 when compared to 2007.

Sky Temperature and Thermal Imaging

Sky, High and Low cloud temperatures  as measured on a thermal imaging camera.

These images show the cloud and sky temperatures as measured by a camera with a 2µ to 13µ pass band.

From a previous test done at night the clear sky temperature is less than -40°C (the camera lower limit).

These pictures show that this clear sky value is maintained as expected during daylight (about -43°C).

Cloud temperatures range from -20°C for high light cloud to +1.1°C for low heavy cloud.

The pictures were taken on 21^st December 2012 at approx. 14:00pm  (sunset @ 16:00)
All area temperatures are maximum for that area.
 

 

 

 

These temperatures of course represent what the camera "sees" through its Germanium lense. And as can be seen from the previous thermal camera stuff the camera struggles to measure temperature of gasses - they just do not give black body radiation.

 

Previous posts:

http://climateandstuff.blogspot.co.uk/2012/12/water-vapour-and-thermal-imaging.html

http://climateandstuff.blogspot.co.uk/2012/11/thermal-imaging-how-not-to-measure.html

http://climateandstuff.blogspot.co.uk/2012/05/cool-body-can-transfer-measurable-heat.html

 

 



 

Water Vapour and Thermal imaging

More stuff about thermal imaging.

Looking at the sensitivity spectrum for a FLIR thermal camera much of the CO2 and H2O emission spectra are included but it is not a black body spectrum as the camera expects.

So does this mean that CO2 and water vapour should be less visible to the camera?

For the camera this is important since taking a photo through air which is emitting photons visible to its sensor would make its use limited – you would see the air not the object behind the air.

So a simple test using water vapour was done to see if this was the case

Some videos of a hot plate with 2 wells filled with water, The water is boiling but no hot vapour visible (vapour bubbles show approximately the expected temperature but the only vapour visible is less than 40°C.

If you now place a sheet of paper in the vapour the actual temperature of the vapour as it hits the paper can be seen (greater than 70°C)

Steam shows up at 28C

Shows paper being heated to 75.5C by steam invisible in gap between boiling water amd paper.

Heated plate showing 2 wells with boiling water

These videos show differen views of the hotplate - steam - paper system.

  

Steam visible + paper

Top view of plate, boiling water and paper

side view of plate boiling water and paper

Above videos seem to have problems  so a youtube version:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=l3t9XeTIA1w

Conclusion: H2O vapour behaves as expected - despite the temperature being near boiling (100C) it does not appear so to the camera.

WUWT - cherry picking again

Water Vapour
The Watts nail in the coffin of AGW headline:

Another IPCC AR5 reviewer speaks out: no trend in global water vapor

Posted on December 14, 2012by Guest Blogger

New global water vapor findings contradict second draft of IPCC Assessment Report 5 (AR5)

Well, the paper this blogger / expert reviewer is behind a paywall so we have to assume that what he quotes is correct. But a quick search pulls up this paper

http://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/abs/10.1175/BAMS-86-2-245

This from the abstract TPW=total precipitable water:
...Further, we found out that the TPW anomalies are driven by the global surface temperature anomalies, but with a lag.

and from the text:

Time series plots of monthly and annual anomalies of TPW for the two datasets are shown in Figs. 8a and 8b, respectively. Also included in Fig. 8 is the global surface temperature anomaly, computed based on NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies (GISS) global surface temperature data (Hansen et al. 1999).

The first 3 yr (1988–90) and part of 1996 show significant discrepancies between the anomalies of the two TPW datasets. There is, however, a good agreement for most parts of the other years. Linear regressionsbetween the two datasets show a correlation coefficient of 0.66 for the monthly anomalies and 0.74 for the annual anomalies. TPW anomalies are closely correlated to surface temperature anomalies. The correlation with surface temperature is higher for R-2 than for NVAP (Fig. 8d). The maximum cross correlation between TPW and surface temperature is reachedwhen the temperature leads the TPW by 2 months and equals 0.67 for R-2 and0.50 for NVAP. This suggests that precipitable water anomalies are driven by the temperature anomalies.

 

The problem is which cherry to pick?!!!!

 

 

Then of course Watts puts his foot in the wet and smelly with this blog post:

IPCC AR5 draft leaked, contains game-changing admission of enhanced solar forcing – as well as a lack of warming to match model projections, and reversal on ‘extreme weather’

Posted on December 13, 2012by Guest Blogger

So in this headline post we have a total misreading of a document. One of the authors  (and surely he should know) sais so on Australian Radio: .

The leaked IPCC drafts cover a range of subjects from the quality of climate models to measurements of sea level rise and Arctic ice loss.

Professor Steve Sherwood is a director of the Climate Change Research Centre at the University of New South Wales.

He is also a lead author of chapter seven of the IPCC report, which happens to be the one the sceptics are claiming for their side.

But Professor Sherwood is scornful of the idea that the chapter he helped write confirms a greater role for solar and other cosmic rays in global warming.

STEVE SHERWOOD: Oh that's completely ridiculous. I'm sure you could go and read those paragraphs yourself and the summary of it and see that we conclude exactly the opposite, that this cosmic ray effect that the paragraph is discussing appears to be negligible.

MARK COLVIN: They're saying that it is the first indication that the IPCC recognises something called solar forcing.

STEVE SHERWOOD: It's not the first time it recognises it. What it shows is that we looked at this. We look at everything. The IPCC has a very comprehensive process where we try to look at all the influences on climate and so we looked at this one.

And there have been a couple of papers suggesting that solar forcing affects climate through cosmic ray/cloud interactions, but most of the literature on this shows that that doesn't actually work.

MARK COLVIN: So you're saying that you've managed to basically eliminate this idea that sunspots or whatever are more responsible for global warming than human activity.

STEVE SHERWOOD: Based on the peer-reviewed literature that's available now, that looks extremely unlikely.

MARK COLVIN: So what have these people done? Is this just a case of cherry-picking a sentence?

STEVE SHERWOOD: Yeah, it's a pretty severe case of that, because even the sentence doesn't say what they say and certainly if you look at the context, we're really saying the opposite.

http://www.abc.net.au/pm/content/2012/s3654926.htm

It looks as if IPCC has played a blinder.

They can see where the "skeptics" will find inconsitancies and then clarify before publishing and all for free

They also show that sketics cannot read or comprehend!.

 

Cycle Mania and Hadcrut3

From the fun school of posts here are a couple of plots that reconstruct hadcrut3v from a series of sine waves.
One shows reconstruction from cycles only; this has problems getting a good fit in the 1800s but shows rhat the next few years should be a period of reducing temperatures. The long period controlling the plot is 317 year long
The other is constructed round a smooth increasing trend. A better fit in the 1800s and still shows that despite the trend the temperatures will be flat for a few more years before increasing with a vengance. The underlying trend is defined by this polynomial
y = 2.40389E-07x3 - 1.34093E-03x2 + 2.49320E+00x - 1.545547E+03

Do either have any predictive skills. = NO

The most importasnt thing shown is in the the trending plot where  despite an ever increasing trend there is still a period where temperatures appear not to increase - from 1998 to 2018. this is due to an underlying 60year period being on a down part of the cycle. This is something that the "skeptics" cannot seem to grasp - CO2 is increasing so why is temperature static?.

The all cycle:

317 year and 60.1 year cycles controlling the "trend"

The trend+cycle plot

Trend and 59.75 year cycle controlling trend

So what curve are we "following" - only another 4 or so years will tell!.

Earlier posts:
http://climateandstuff.blogspot.co.uk/search/label/simulation

Thermal Imaging - How Not to Measure Temperature

Thermal imaging cameras offer amazing perfomance - The one used here is accurate to +-2K and will discriminate temperatrue differences of as low as 0.08K.

However it seems that not many people realise they have limitations:
You cannot just point one at a subject and say what the temperature is. In some cases it is not possible to even guess the temperature of the object (reflective surface).

Here are some indications of what can go wrong.
A copper heatsink 3mm thick with various surface finishes is used to show the pitfalls:

One end of the matt tinplated copper block was polished until pure copper was exposed

The centre of the block was polished untill the tin plate was still present.

The plate was then spray painted down one half with matt grey paint.

First a video showing reflection from the unpainted side of a hot object moving

A still from the video

:

Now a video of the WHOLE of the plate heating :





Is the temperature of the block 23 26 or 41C?

 

 Note that the painted area shows insignificant change to the temperature whereas the unpainted side shows a reflection causing the reported temperature to change by approximately 20C

Next observe the plate being heated by electronics attached to the other side.
You will see the painted area slowly heating whils the bare metal changes very little: 

Finally Just to prove that the shiny side has not been masked Plate is hot and shiny side reflects hot object

How good is the grey undercoat at normalising the emissivity These 2 plots show how the temperature changes along the line LI01 placed first in the unpainted area and then in the painted area.:

With no paint this is the response of the plate

Painted - not perfect but a lot better.

So just what is the temperature of the plate? The answer is I do not know - it is approximately the temperature shown on the grey painted area... but since I have not calibrated the emissivity of the paint I do not know! And since I have not measured the humidity I do not know. And since I did not measure the distance from sensor to object I do not know. And since I did not measure the air temperature I do not know.

How about outside - NOTE these are not calibrated images no emissivity/atmospheric corrections applied.
Time taken 2012-11-14 17:45  Ambient temperature 7.0C Camera range -40 to 120C hence some of the temperatures measured are outside the camera range (-45C seems to be the saturation level of measurement). Humidity ? high

So it seems that clear sky no sun has a "temperature" of about -44C and seems to decrease linearly with angle above the horizon.

Take a picture of a MMT thermometer and claim that the temperature of the case is X is wrong unless you have eliminated reflections and calibrated the emissivity.

Take temperatures of houses and you will show heat leaks and hot spots but you cannot claim that the temperature has much accuracy (it will be more accurate than the shiny MMT surface)

What is interesting is of course that you can take thermal images through the atmosphere. This proves there is little emissions in the thermal IR band from resident gases.

The IR spectrum (from FLIR documentation):

 FLIR S45 camera Spectral Range 7.5 to 13um

Germanium used for lens has this transmission vs wavelength property:

Beware of what you read at WUWT!

see also this post:
http://climateandstuff.blogspot.co.uk/2012/05/cool-body-can-transfer-measurable-heat.html





GWPF, Lies, Damn Lies

WUWT-
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/10/25/an-ill-wind-blows-from-wind-turbiines/

An ill wind blows from wind turbiines


Posted on October 25, 2012 by Anthony Watts

Newsbytes from the GWPF, Lies, Damn Lies And Green Statistics

Almost all predictions about the expansion and cost of German wind turbines and solar panels have turned out to be wrong – at least by a factor of two, sometimes by a factor of five. –Daniel Wentzel, Die Welt, 20 October 2012

==========================

A simple calculation:
http://www.indexmundi.com/g/g.aspx?c=gm&v=81


electricity consumption 545×10^9 kWh

subsidy cost 20×10^9

20/545=3.7 eurocents per kWh

========================

Where it gets distorted:
http://www.businessweek.com/news/2012-10-15/german-renewables-surcharge-rises-47-percent-opening-government-rift
The four grid companies set the fee paid through power bills at 5.28 euro cents (6.8 cents) a kilowatt-hour in 2013, up 47 percent from 3.59 cents now. Economy Minister Philipp Roesler wants to lower a federal electricity tax to help counter the increase, he told reporters today in Berlin. Environment Minister Peter Altmaier wants to offer consumers free advice on saving energy instead.
...
Total Subsidy

The total subsidy next year will amount to about 20.36 billion euros, which is paid for by consumers through their power bills. The fee increase will raise the bill of the average German household with 3,500 kilowatt-hours of consumption by 59 euros a year. That impact was inflated by exemptions for big industrial users and leftover costs from the previous year, the operators said.
...
While Altmaier says the country needs to take time to discuss changes to the clean-energy subsidy law, Roesler supports new legislation as quickly as possible, he said today, citing a proposal for a new model his party put forward last month.

Alarming Signal
The new surcharge is an “alarming signal,” Roesler told reporters. Altmaier’s proposal to draw up a bill after a round of stakeholder talks ends in May 2013 doesn’t reflect the urgent action needed, Roesler said. “We must act now,” he said.

Instead of blaming renewables, Roesler should cancel unnecessary exemptions for industrial consumers including banks and slaughterhouses, Juergen Trittin, co-leader of the opposition Green Party, said today in a statement. Such a move would reduce subsidy costs by 4 billion euros and push down the fee by 1 euro cent, he said.

The debate over power prices is short-sighted because Germany will save 570 billion euros by 2050 if it scraps nuclear plants, said the Renewable Energy Research Association, a group of clean-energy research institutes.

“The investments made now, at the beginning, will pay off within a foreseeable time frame and have a positive economic impact,” the group said on Oct. 10.

To contact the reporter on this story: Stefan Nicola in Berlin at snicola2@bloomberg.net
To contact the editor responsible for this story: Reed Landberg at landberg@bloomberg.net

==============================

So even at the rate inflated by giving a free pass to some industries will cost 59euros a year and it seems as if the nuclear industry is also subsidised

Lots of stuff al mussed up to produce a GWPF headline that cannot be supported.

Arctic/Antarctic Ice Extents 2012-09-30

No real comment - it's all been said elsewhere:

 

 

Watts & Co Misuse of Blogs

 

"THEY" talk about corruption of peer review

"THEY" talk about climate scientists forcing publication editors to resign.

 

"THEY" find it quite ok trying to destroy a scientists reputation because they disagree with his results - DESPICABLE, TWO-FACED ... etc. etc.

From CA

Anthony Watts

Posted Sep 22, 2012 at 10:15 AM | Permalink | Reply

for those that are keeping track, and wish to register a complaint on the statistical methodology being faulty (not to mention the sampling) you can contact:
Professor Robyn Owens

Deputy Vice-Chancellor (Research)

The University of Western Australia, M460

35 Stirling Highway, Crawley WA 6009

[full phone email details were included here]

• thefordprefect
  Posted Sep 22, 2012 at 2:14 PM | Permalink | Reply
  Your comment is awaiting moderation. well done watts trial by blog is an ideal way to improve science
• HAS
  Posted Sep 22, 2012 at 3:53 PM | Permalink | Reply
  Another way in is through the funding agency. L. is part funded through a Discovery Australia Linkage Project LP120100224 “Creating a climate for change: from cognition to consensus” (you can find details of the Australian Research Council site). The administering organisation is the University of NSW who have a contract with the ARC for this funding (the generic contract is on the ARC site). Ben R Newell Assoc Prof @NSW is likely the lead.
  Anyway there a number of points in the ARC contract that are possible breached by L. et al. and the associated publicity around it. A quick scan suggests that those climate sceptics that feel aggrieved should review clause 18.4 and 18.6 of the funding contract that reference the Australian Code for the Responsible Conduct of Research (2007) (also available at the ARC web site).
  The sections dealing with conflict of interest (L. other blog interests); respect for research participants; reporting results; and communicating research findings (informing interested parties before the media) appear to have been breached. These are matters that could well be referenced regardless of the contract in any communication directly with the UWA. The Code lays down the process for UWA to follow.
  However while UWA may seek to balance Code compliance with academic freedom there is the issue of the ARC contract under which L.’s activities have been part funded. It seems that UWA and the U. of NSW also have a responsibility in this regard that are not balanced by academic freedom, and the ARC as funder has a clear interest in breaches. These could all be approached by anyone who feels L.’s work has breached the code (or any other part of the funding agreement) pointing out these obligations are independent of academic freedom.

"Saving Humanity" or "Where's my Handout"

No one actually 100% understand how the climate works -  I think this is a fair statement.

So ask yourself is it SAFE to experiment with the only place we can live when you have

• No idea what the controls do
• Whether there are unknown controls
• What the linkage is between controls
• If it is a linear system
• If there are "tipping points"
• little idea of what positive feedbacks and their magnitudes are
• little idea of what negative feedbacks and their magnitudes are
• Only 200 years of prior data that is vaguely reliable.

And of course

• It takes 30+ years for the effect of each experimental tweak of a control to become clear
• It takes longer than 30+ years for the effect of the tweak to dissipate (much longer if you trigger an ice age).  
• It is not just YOUR hand tweaking the controls - there are other humans and natural inputs simultaneously affecting your experiment.
• Each experiment is disastrously expensive.

Even Watts believes that CO2 is causing warming and some of that is from anthropogenic sources. He just believes it is irrelevant.

Here's a plot with all data zeroed:

Note how small the swings in TSI are.
A couple of Kelvin increase in 288K may seem small but the wealthy nations rely on stability. We no longer have an easy option of migrating to colder/warmer areas, moving our dwellings from the shores of continents as they get inundated (see doggerland! on wiki).

The inhabitants of doggerland simply packed their dwellings took their pots and moved uphill. This would be a trifle more difficult now.

It is not even possible to say leave it until we are sure that there is a problem - the built in time constants ensure that by the time we are sure and take action there will be another multi-decade of environmental changes before we see the effect of our corrections.
I think it is very telling that from all the revelations from "climate gate" and other hacks not ONCE have I seen any one pointing out any climate scientists email (which it is obvious the scientists thought were and always will be private) which suggests that they have vast wealth to spend on themselves.
Watts seems very delighted at having access to a private blog on sks where he foams at the mouth over this snippet:

============================

And this isn’t about science or personal careers and reputations any more. This is a fight for survival. Our civilisations survival. .. We need our own anonymous (or not so anonymous) donors, our own think tanks…. Our Monckton’s … Our assassins.

  

Anyone got Bill Gates’ private number, Warren Buffett, Richard Branson? Our ‘side’ has got to get professional, ASAP. We don’t need to blog. We need to network. Every single blog, organisation, movement is like a platoon in an army. ..This has a lot of similarities to the Vietnam War….And the skeptics are the Viet Cong… Not fighting like ‘Gentlemen’ at all. And the mainstream guys like Gleick don’t know how to deal with this. Queensberry Rules rather than biting and gouging.

  

..So, either Mother Nature deigns to give the world a terrifying wake up call. Or people like us have to build the greatest guerilla force in human history. Now. Because time is up…Someone needs to convene a council of war of the major environmental movements, blogs, institutes etc. In a smoke filled room (OK, an incense filled room) we need a conspiracy to save humanity.

==============================================

To me it sound a bit like "saving humanity" not "where's my handout".

  

Lewandowsky Survey Lunacy

Firstly this survey seem just a bit of fun Just read the title.
It certainly mock the fake sceptics. And it is obviously this that causes the skeptic blogs to light up.


There was no need to do the survey. Just look at the kooky Komments on the skeptic blogs.
Iron Sun
marxist conpiracy
global covernment
new world order
common purpose
UN
its all there in abundance


My posting at Climate Audit pointing out that Smokey at WUWT knew about the survey and a link was posted in the comments

 

will it get past moderation?!!

 

« The SkS “Link” to the Lewandowsky Survey

Good God! This is really scary stuff

Who in their right mind would put their name and reputation to this.

WHAT WE BELIEVE


1.We believe Earth and its ecosystems—created by God’s intelligent design and infinite power and sustained by His faithful providence —are robust, resilient, self-regulating, and self-correcting, admirably suited for human flourishing, and displaying His glory. Earth’s climate system is no exception. Recent global warming is one of many natural cycles of warming and cooling in geologic history.

2.We believe ...  

WHAT WE DENY

1.We deny that Earth and its ecosystems are the fragile and unstable products of chance, and particularly that Earth’s climate system is vulnerable to dangerous alteration because of minuscule changes in atmospheric chemistry. Recent warming was neither abnormally large nor abnormally rapid. There is no convincing scientific evidence that human contribution to greenhouse gases is causing dangerous global warming.

...
4.We deny that such policies, which amount to a regressive tax, comply with the Biblical requirement of protecting the poor from harm and oppression.

 http://www.cornwallalliance.org/articles/read/an-evangelical-declaration-on-global-warming/     

now at:
http://www.cornwallalliance.org/2009/05/01/evangelical-declaration-on-global-warming/


Well, here are some signatories they highlight

Dr. Roy W. Spencer (Principal Research Scientist in Climatology, University of Alabama, Huntsville,
Dr. Joseph D’Aleo (Executive Director and Certified Meteorologist, Icecap
Dr. David Legates (Associate Professor of Climatology, University of Delaware
Dr. Ross McKitrick (Associate Professor of Economics, University of Guelph, Ontario, Canada,
Dr. Cornelis van Kooten (Professor of Economics and Research Chair in Environmental Studies and Climate, University of Victoria, British Columbia, Canada, Expert Reviewer, Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change)
Dr. Kenneth W. Chilton (Founder and Emeritus Director, Institute for the Study of Economics and the Environment, Lindenwood College); 

Contibuting Writers.
:Rev. Richard S. Courtney, Expert Reviewer, Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, and Methodist Preacher, Cornwall, UK
G. Cornelis van Kooten, Ph.D., Professor of Economics and Research Chari in Environmental Studies and Climate, University of Victoria, BC, Canada


Advisory board
James A. Wanliss, Ph.D., Associate Professor of Physics, Presbyterian College, Clinton, SC






How can any report from these people be believed? For them to even contemplate suggesting that there is man made climate change would be to deny their Gods omniopotence.
There is only ever one report they can give in order to retain their faith - All in the world is wonderful.
Yet some of these have given reports to governments. Surely this is much worse than ANY collusion/falsification shown in the stolen emails (i.e. none!)

Fragile ecosystems? self regulating? Protecting the poor?

If the poor of the world were to be brought up to the same energy consumption levels of the US (and others) what price would the rich be paying for fuel.

How long would resources of metals fossil fuels uranium last if consumption were leveled at the us values?

This just gets worse:
http://www.cornwallalliance.org/articles/read/a-renewed-call-to-truth-prudence-and-protection-of-the-poor/
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY OF CHAPTER ONE:


THEOLOGY, WORLDVIEW, AND ETHICS OF GLOBAL WARMING POLICY

Earth and all its subsystems—of land, sea, and air, living and nonliving—are the good products of the wise design and omnipotent acts of the infinite, eternal, and unchangeable Triune God of the Bible. As such they reveal God’s glory. Mankind, created in God’s image, is the crown of creation. Human beings have the divine mandate to multiply and to fill, subdue, and rule the Earth, transforming it from wilderness into garden. They act as stewards under God to cultivate and guard what they subdue and rule. Calling them to be His vicegerents over the Earth, God requires obedience to His laws—in Scripture and imprinted in the human conscience—in their stewardship. Although sin, universal among mankind, deeply mars this stewardship, God’s redemptive act in Jesus Christ’s death on the cross and His instructive activity through Scripture, communicating the nature of creation and human responsibility for it, enable people to create wealth and decrease poverty at the same time that they pursue creation stewardship and, even more important, the true spiritual wealth of knowing their Creator through Jesus Christ.

Garden? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Hobet_Mountaintop_mine_West_Virginia_2009-06-02.jpg
Garden? http://ngm.nationalgeographic.com/2009/03/canadian-oil-sands/kunzig-text
Garden? http://www.businesspundit.com/the-worlds-worst-environmental-disasters-caused-by-companies/
Garden? http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/3161812.stm
Resilient Ecosystems? http://www.huffingtonpost.co.uk/2012/08/20/uk-fish-stocks-low-brits--cods-haddock_n_1811461.html
Resilient Ecosystems? http://www.bigmarinefish.com/bluefin.html
Resilient Ecosystems? http://www.tigersincrisis.com/
Resilient Ecosystems? http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-15663982
Resilient Ecosystems? http://www.time.com/time/photogallery/0,29307,1888702_1863782,00.html
Resilient Ecosystems? http://www.orangutan.org.uk/
Self Regulating? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Extinction_event
Self Regulating? http://geography.about.com/od/globalproblemsandissues/a/trashislands.htm
Self Regulating? http://www.forestry.gov.uk/fr/HCOU-4U4JCL

Ater this visit
http://creationmuseum.org/whats-here/photo-preview/

and see what another saw

http://www.barefootandprogressive.com/2010/12/flashback-fun-at-the-creation-museum-my-field-trip-to-crazyland.html

Some more analysis of u/d lwir and clouds

Total / opaque cloud vs Temperature

No slope on the opaque cloud but a definite dip when teperatures are between 16 and 22C

 

The following plots limit RH to 20 to 40%. Day refers to time that cloud can be measured Night to when cloud is not measured.

D/U LWIR vs Temperature (night values - 0-100% cloud)

Both upward and downward LWIR linear proportional to temperature

D/U LWIR vs Temperature (day values cloud 0-100%)

Very similar to night - slopes are a bit different.

D/U LWIR vs Temperature (day values but limiting cloud to 20 to 40%) (note change in humidity limits

D/U LWIR vs Humidity Temp 22-24C cloud 40-50%

By constraining the temperature to a 2C band The temperature effects on IR are minimised whilst still returning a reasonable number  of results. Note that the ULWIR falls with increasing cloud but the DLWIR rises by 100w/sq m 

D/U LWIR vs Opaque Cloud cover temp 22-24C RH 35-40%

Temperature RH are constrained to minimise these effects. The DLWIR increases by approx 80 w/sqm

 

I think these last two plots conclusively prove relative humidity and cloud cover have a positive effect on the downward long wave ir (ir increases if cloud and/or RH increase)

 

Now how do you do this for CO2?

Data available from:
http://www.nrel.gov/midc/srrl_bms/

 

More stuff from NREL Solar Radiation BMS

Using hourly data from http://www.nrel.gov/midc/srrl_bms/ gives the possibility of checking the effect of cloud cover on upward and downward long wave infrared radiation (ULWIR and DLWIR), time of observation TOBs on temperature readings.

Cloud cover effect on D/ULWIR

Data from 2004 to present (hourly)

Using data at around dawn when solar heating is minimal (would be better to have data pre dawn but cloud coverage is not measured in the dark) it should be possible to see the effect of clouds on DLWIR.

This is the plot:

The effect of clouds is most noticeable up to 25% coverage but does continue increasing up to about 80%. In this plot temperature has been constrained to 16 to 22C and RH 20 to 45% for time from 0:00 to 8:00am.
Constraints cannot easily be made tighter else total data returned fall to zero.

Time of Observation (TOBS).

Assumed:
One measurement per day max and min calculated for 23 hours prior to last measurement. Constraints on cloud cover is tricky since no information is available over night so some expected perturbation may be seen at sunrise/sunset
Within the constraints noted in the chart header, the data for each hour over the record is split into 2 - 1st quartile and 3rd quartile (this lowers the effect of false max and min values). the hourly data returned is then averaged

Data is for all Augusts on record.
The day time cloud cover effect is noticeable (0 to 10% cover - night is o to 100%).

Removing the cloud constraint gives this plot:

It looks as if TOBs could change temperature measurements by +-1.5C

A couple of cloud coverage per hour plots January and July

The early and late drop offs in coverage may be an effect of the measurement method seems a bit consistent with both plots.

However it seems that cloud coverage in jan is costant with time of day wheras in july cloud coverage increases with time.

Effect of relative humidity on DLWIR.

USCRN Average vs Mean data

From the downloaded data from uscrn

        Average temperature, in degrees C, during the 24 hours of the day.
        Note: USCRN/USRCRN stations have multiple co-located temperature
        sensors that record independent measurements. This value is a single
        temperature that is calculated by averaging 24 full-hour averages
        derived from the multiple independent measurements of 5-minute intervals
        during each hour

        Mean temperature, in degrees C, calculated using the typical historical
        approach of (T_DAILY_MAX + T_DAILY_MIN) / 2.

 

Mean temperature gives twice the slope of average

The Effect on slope using base period from 1931 to 1995

As requested for WUWT here is a plot of linear curve fit to plots of the same data referenced to 30 year periods from 1931 to 1995
eg. base periods
1931 to 1961
1945 to 1975
1995 to 2012* THIS DOES NOT GIVE SUFFICIENT YEARS BUT IS PLOTTED.

Only stations returning over 15  reference base years were used as noted on the normal plot. The stations in this data set are from the UK

So it looks as if the slope changes by over 10% but 1961 to 1991 gives one of the lower slopes. Choosing 1931 the slope (deg C per year) is near the maximum!

Arctic Ice - The lady's not for turning (in the words of Thatcher)

Now at the last linear monthly fit before the minimum (see last plot). Been expecting the rate of loss to reduce but little change for weeks.

The plots now look like:

 

Nothing to say really - It is just incredibly odd.1

Watts disappears a post!

Just for fun!
Tony often makes fun of  sites removing information. So why not turn the tables!

He recently removed this post:

A letter to Justin Gillis of the New York Times on his misleading sea ice story today

Not Found
Apologies, but the page you requested could not be found. Perhaps searching will help.

The text I have recovered using search engines is:

TO: Justin Gillis, New York Times 8/27/12 1PM PDT

Mr. Gillis, Reference Story: http://www.nytimes.com/2012/08/28/science/earth/sea-ice-in-arctic-measured-at-record-low.html

Why do you not mention these two important facts:
1. You say: The amount of sea ice in the Arctic has fallen to the lowest level on record”. That this is a 30 year record of satellite data, not an “all record”. That wrongly misleads your readers.
2. According to NSIDC: That there was a contributory storm that broke up a lot of the Arctic sea ice: Sea ice extent dropped rapidly between  August 4 and August 8. While this drop coincided with an intense storm over the central Arctic Ocean, it is unclear if the storm prompted the rapid ice loss. Why do you ignore such facts?
----------
If that was it all then perhaps one can understand his withdrawal! Also, the english is not so good!

Of course If I were Watts I would also wonder why this blogger has stopped the wayback machine archiving his latest posts (since 2011). This obviously shows he has much to hide!

American Meteorological Society Statement on Climate Change

This is a damning statement from the American Meteorological Society on life as we know it. (I would expect this to be nobbled by (them) as soon as possible)

Climate Change

An Information Statement of the American Meteorological Society

(Adopted by AMS Council 20 August 2012)

http://www.ametsoc.org/policy/2012climatechange.pdf
...
Final remarks

There is unequivocal evidence that Earth’s lower atmosphere, ocean, and land surface are warming; sea level is rising; and snow cover, mountain glaciers, and Arctic sea ice are shrinking. The dominant cause of the warming since the 1950s is human activities. This scientific finding is based on a large and persuasive body of research. The observed warming will be irreversible for many years into the future, and even larger temperature increases will occur as greenhouse gases continue to accumulate in the atmosphere. Avoiding this future warming will require a large and rapid reduction in global greenhouse gas emissions. The ongoing warming will increase risks and stresses to human societies, economies, ecosystems, and wildlife through the 21st century and beyond, making it imperative that society respond to a changing climate. To inform decisions on adaptation and mitigation, it is critical that we improve our understanding of the global climate system and our ability to project future climate through continued and improved monitoring and research. This is especially true for smaller (seasonal and regional) scales and weather and climate extremes, and for important hydroclimatic variables such as precipitation and water availability.

Technological, economic, and policy choices in the near future will determine the extent of future impacts of climate change. Science-based decisions are seldom made in a context of absolute certainty. National and international policy discussions should include consideration of the best ways to both adapt to and mitigate climate change. Mitigation will reduce the amount of future climate change and the risk of impacts that are potentially large and dangerous. At the same time, some continued climate change is inevitable, and policy responses should include adaptation to climate change. Prudence dictates extreme care in accounting for our relationship with the only planet known to be capable of sustaining human life.

They certainly pull no punches with this.

It must be a good sock to the jaw for Watts, a retired AMS Television Seal Holder. His professional institution reject out right his stance on global warming.