Climate Climate & Energy

Sorry, glacial thinning does not equal glacial growth

On Sunday, Bjørn Lomborg wrote:

And while the delegations first fly into Kangerlussuaq, about 100 miles to the south, they all change planes to go straight to Ilulissat -- perhaps because the Kangerlussuaq glacier is inconveniently growing.

But is it? I questioned this claim -- and asked readers for the relevant citation, which they provided. The key article from which he is drawing this claim is "Rapid Changes in Ice Discharge from Greenland Outlet Glaciers" from Science in March of this year. The article begins by noting ominously:

The recent, marked increase in ice discharge from many of Greenland's large outlet glaciers has upended the conventional view that variations in ice-sheet mass balance are dominated on short time scales by variations in surface balance, rather than ice dynamics. Beginning in the late 1990s and continuing through the past several years, the ice-flow speed of many tidewater outlet glaciers south of 72° North increased by up to 100%, increasing the ice sheet's contribution to sea-level rise by more than 0.25 mm/year. The synchronous and multiregional scale of this change and the recent increase in Arctic air and ocean temperatures suggest that these changes are linked to climate warming.

What the ozone hole tells us about the science of climate change

The atmospheric sciences community is excitedly discussing new results that potentially cast doubt on our understanding of the chemistry of the Antarctic ozone hole. The ozone hole is formed when two molecules of chlorine monoxide react with each other to form what is known as the chlorine dimer, ClOOCl, and that molecule is subsequently blasted apart by sunlight to release the chlorine atoms. New results suggest that this reaction is actually much slower than previously suggested. If this is true, it suggests that there is some important chemical process destroying ozone in the Antarctic stratosphere that we do not know about.

In reaction to this unexpected scientific result, stratospheric chemists are attacking the problem, trying to think up potential mechanisms that reconcile these new measurements with everything else we know about the chemistry of the stratosphere. As a former stratospheric chemist, I can say that I have not seen this level of excitement in the stratospheric chemistry community in at least 10 or 15 years.

So what does this tell us about the science of climate change? It tells us that many of the criticisms of climate science coming from the skeptics are dead wrong.

Walt Patterson argues that electricity cost comparisons are political, not economic

Comparisons of electricity generation costs from various sources are a ubiquitous feature of energy discussions. Virtually everyone accepts as fact that coal is the cheapest source of electricity, that natural gas is the next cheapest, that solar PV is the most expensive, that wind is competitive in some states and not others, etc. Sometimes the […]

Rocky rocks against coal

Consider the following: Rocky Anderson, maverick mayor of Salt Lake City, is awesome. The Beatles are awesome. Coal is the enemy of the human race. Consider, further, whether this might be the greatest story you’ve ever read in your entire life.

GAO doubts efficacy of Energy Star label

You know the U.S. government’s Energy Star label, meant to direct consumers to energy-efficient electronics and appliances? The Government Accountability Office does not think it means what you think it means. In a new report, the GAO notes that, for example, TVs are tested in standby mode, because the latest available standards for testing tellies’ […]

Authors of recent climate books tell us not to worry so much about global warming

Proving conclusively that we have a long, long way to go before the mainstream media stops promoting climate misinformation disinformation, the Washington Post gave global-warming delayer Bjorn Lomborg a front-page opinion piece in its Outlook section.

Lomborg repeats his nonsense about polar bears, sea-level rise, and why global warming (at least on Planet Lomborg) is no big deal, which I have previously debunked here, here, and here, respectively. He also claims Greenland's "Kangerlussuaq glacier is inconveniently growing," which is the opposite of what experts say here and here (if anyone has a source for Lomborg's claim, I'd love to see it -- not that Lomborg is a stickler for facts).

The reason for this post is not to debunk Lomborg again, but to answer the question posed in the headline. S&N don't like being linked to Lomborg -- who can blame them? -- but I think the link is legitimate. Read Lomborg's article. The similarities are scary. Like S&N, Lomborg acknowledges the reality of human-caused climate change. And like S&N, Lomborg attacks the climate strategy endorsed by most environmental groups:

Cause for humility

Paul Gipe opens one of his books with a story about a big celebration of a new wind project in So. California that was marred when, a few hours beforehand, the turbine oversped and destroyed itself. An executive with the company building the project said something like, "I have some bad news and some good news. The bad news is that the wind turbine destroyed itself. The good news is that we didn't have to evacuate Los Angeles."

Popped into my head when I read this: "Huge nuclear-safe containment to be built over the Chernobyl sarcophagus: The 'New Safe Confinement' will be an arch-shaped structure 105 metres high, 150 metres long and with a span of 260 metres."

Why bother criticizing S&N?

The question has been raised: Why spend time "debunking" S&N when they seem to be well-meaning folks struggling for a genuine solution to global warming, unlike, say, Bjorn Lomborg? Aside from the fact that they are adding great confusion and misinformation to a critical debate, the answer is simple -- they aren't well-meaning.

S&N spend far more time attacking the environmental community (and Al Gore and even Rachel Carson) than they do proposing a viable solution. Worse, they don't even attack the real environmental community -- they spend their time creating a strawman that is mostly a right-wing stereotype of environmentalists.

S&N's core argument is that environmentalists only preach doom and gloom and sacrifice, and that solving global warming ...

... will require a more optimistic narrative from the environmental community. Gore's An Inconvenient Truth, like Silent Spring, was considered powerful because it marshaled the facts into an effective (read: apocalyptic) story ...

In promoting the inconvenient truth that humans must limit their consumption and sacrifice their way of life to prevent the world from ending, environmentalists are not only promoting a solution that won't work, they've discouraged Americans from seeing the big solutions at all. For Americans to be future-oriented, generous, and expansive in their thinking, they must feel secure, wealthy, and strong.

Gore has never promoted such an inconvenient truth -- they should read his book or listen to his speeches -- and indeed I don't know any major environmentalist or environmental group that has promoted such a message. Just spend some time on the climate websites for NRDC, Environmental Defense, the Sierra Club, and Greenpeace. They all support (most of) the same big solutions S&N do, they just don't think you get those solutions the way S&N do (i.e., a massive government spending program).

The threat from climate deniers

People forget that Margaret Mead's overused quote about small groups being able to change the world doesn't necessarily imply "in a good way."

Here's an interesting interview to think about when you next read something from folks like the National Assn. of Manufacturers, the Competitive Enterprise Institute, or Bjorn Lomborg:

Water limits on power plants

From Greenwire today (sub req'd): water availability may limit new power plants. This is widely appreciated in the power sector, but doesn't get as much attention elsewhere. It's especially acute as our population growth moves south and west where we are especially water-limited.

What's under-appreciated is that this is a story about efficiency. When two thirds of the fuel we burn in power plants is wasted as heat, and that heat is rejected in cooling towers (at least in coal and nuke facilities), any gain in energy efficiency is a reduction in water use. Given the huge gains available in efficiency, it ought to be central to this discussion. Also bear in mind that Clean Air Act compliance and carbon sequestration drive down the efficiency of coal plants, thereby increasing water use per MWh.

Excerpts of the full article below the fold: