Climate denier Malcolm Roberts on Q&A

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adjusted data, AGW, Anthony Watts, anthropogenic global warming, Australia, BOM, Brian Cox, Bureau of Meteorology, climate, climate change, climate denier, consensus, data, empirical evidence, global warming, Greg Hunt, James Powell, John Cook, Lily Serna, Malcolm Roberts, metadata, models, NASA, National Academy of Sciences, NOAA, Q&A, raw data, scientific organisations, scientific processes, scientists, statistical agency, statistical processes, statistics, Steve Goddard, temperature, weather bureaus, weather stations

In Australia, new senator and climate denier Malcolm Roberts appeared on television on the ABC’s Q&A program last Monday, 15 August 2016. I posted the following comment on his Facebook page but it got deleted and I got tossed off (haha). I guess the truth sometimes hurts …

After watching Q&A, I think I’m figuring out why Malcolm Roberts keeps saying there is no empirical evidence for warming or AGW [anthropogenic global warming] despite abundant evidence. He just doesn’t believe in any of the data that shows warming. Brian Cox [physicist and television presenter] showed a graph of NASA data that clearly shows significant warming since the 19^th century. Roberts said not true as the data is corrupted and manipulated, by NASA. His reason for this: a well known denier, Steve Goddard showed that the 1930s were allegedly warmer than the current decade and that 1930s recordings were reduced and latest decade inflated, and that BOM [Australia’s Bureau of Meteorology] did the same.

For years, Goddard has been picking off bits of data and declaring there’s no warming. Sometimes, he admits he’s wrong but not always although his claim that NASA and NOAA were fabricating data was even rejected by fellow denier Anthony Watts. For an account of the whole silly saga, see http://blog.hotwhopper.com/2014/06/noaa-and-temperature-data-it-must-be.html.

Seems that much or most of the problem was Goddard’s failure to understand that raw data is adjusted to give a truer picture, including estimates of missing data. Statistics of all sorts are adjusted for seasonal and other impacts. It means the data gives a more accurate representation of what is actually happening. All official statistical agencies around the world do it for all sorts of collections. Temperature data are also adjusted. Weather recording stations move and this can have a big effect on temperature; moves from a post office to an airfield have been common. Adjustments are also made due to changes in measuring instruments and their accuracy over the years. Another reason is that a weather station may become more closed in, such as by additional nearby buildings, which can affect temperatures. These things are taken into account by all weather bureaus around the world.

Hunt [Greg Hunt, ex-environment minister, now industry minister] wasn’t buying Roberts’ argument for no warming either. He pointed out that weather bureaus, scientific organisations and leading universities all come to the same conclusion: global warming is real. Serna [Lily Serna, mathematician and television presenter] couldn’t believe we were still having this conversation, that there was overwhelming consensus from scientists who are the experts in their field, and that we should be getting on with mitigation and adaptation. Roberts said consensus isn’t science and that he still needs empirical evidence. Cox tried to explain the scientific process to him, including measuring temperature and CO2 and making predictions. Roberts said the numbers have been hopelessly wrong.

My conclusion was that Roberts doesn’t understand scientific or statistical processes and just looks for any odd bit of data that supports his case for no warming and especially no AGW. I’ve looked at statistical adjustment above. On models, we can get an idea of what might happen, but it’s impossible to know exactly how hot it will be or how far sea levels will rise in however many years’ time, just as it is impossible to know what the economic growth rate will be: there are just so many variables. On consensus, the following is probably the best empirical evidence there is for warming and AGW, i.e. looking at the metadata:

– In 2013, John Cook et al looked at about 12,000 academic papers on climate change / global warming, covering all sorts of issues. They found that 66.4% of abstracts had no position on AGW, 32.6% supported it, 0.7% didn’t and 0.3% were uncertain. Thus about 97% of papers with a view on AGW supported it. According to Roberts on Q&A, the figure for support was 0.3%, which is strange given that most scientific organisations have a statement supporting AGW [and most governments accept it too].

– In 2004, Naomi Oreskes analysed 928 papers published between 1993 and 2003. About 75% went with the consensus view of AGW, 25% were about methodology and paleoclimatology, and 0% opposed the consensus view.

– In 2007, Harris Interactive took a random sample of 489 members of the AMS and two other relevant bodies and found that 97% agreed with global warming, with 84% saying it was AGW and 5% said there wasn’t AGW.

– Bray and von Storch found that 40% of climate scientists agreed with AGW in 1996, 53% in 2003 and 84% in 2008.

– Doran and Zimmerman in 2008 found 97% agreed with AGW.

– A National Academy of Sciences study in 2010 put it at 97-98%.

– James Powell in 2013 found 24 of 13,950 articles disagreeing with AGW. In 2014, Powell found 1 author out of 9136 rejecting AGW.

And of course all national and international scientific organisations believe there is warming and most of it is due to our activities except a handful of geology groups that are still sitting on the fence.

Some conspiracy, like thousands of scientists around the world study in areas relevant to climate science and undertake careers in science to be involved in a scam; ditto all scientific organisations; and governments of all major countries. Yeah, and the world is flat too.

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Man-made global warming deniers are back

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anthropogenic global warming, atmosphere, Australia, blanket, carbon dioxide, carbon pricing, CO2, coastal flooding, correlation, deniers, earth, emissions, Facebook, global warming, greenhouse gases, hoax, ice, Industrial Revolution, Malcolm Roberts, man-made global warming, orbit, scientists, sea levels, senator, solar activity, storms, temperatures, tidal surges, video, volcanic eruptions, warming, water vapour

Here in Australia, one of the new senators, Malcolm Roberts, denies anthropogenic global warming. He and/or one of his staff plus a few other deniers have been busy posting odd things refuting AGW on his Facebook page, including various odd explanations and selective bits and pieces, old quotes, etc, to declare that AGW is all a hoax by scientists, scientific organisations and governments around the world. I’ve been picking the deniers to pieces over there but they don’t give up. I posted this comment on his video which he posted to his page a few days ago (although all I get in response is that I’m talking rubbish and more odd comments and selective quotes as the deniers continue to try and support their position) …

This video is misleading and gives totally the wrong impression. Carbon dioxide might be a small percentage of the atmosphere and man-made CO2 a smaller percentage still. But I think he’s mixing up his stocks and flows. He’s right in saying that man-made CO2 is only 3-4% of all CO2 but he seems to be saying that this is the level (stock) of man-made CO2 when in actual fact this is the percentage of man-made CO2 emissions (flow).

The problem is that only about two-fifths of this additional CO2 is absorbed and the rest stays in the atmosphere, building up steadily over time. Roberts seems to forget this. Before the industrial revolution, the CO2 absorption and release sides were pretty much in balance. Since then, we’ve had additional CO2 released by humans in ever-increasing volumes through all our various activities. It may seem small overall but, as I said, it builds steadily over time.

CO2 is now at about 400 parts per million or 0.04% of air as per the video. But over the last 400,000 years and up to the industrial revolution, CO2 varied between about 180 and 280 parts per million, in natural cycles. It was around the top of this cycle at the start of the industrial revolution and is now 40-45% higher at 400 ppm. Normally, it takes 5,000 to 20,000 years to increase by 100 ppm; this time, it has taken perhaps 150 years to increase by 120 ppm. The extra CO2 acts like a blanket, or a thicker blanket, enveloping the earth and keeps the heat in, thus the steadily increasing temperatures. This causes the ice the melt, sea levels to rise and an increase in wilder weather, with increasingly severe storms, larger tidal surges and more coastal flooding, causing damage and displacing people, often in the poorer parts of the world.

He then seems to compare Australia’s CO2 with the world’s total air. His subsequent statistics and analysis are therefore quite flawed.

I’m not sure where his carbon dioxide tax figures come up: $72 billion in five years. This was the estimated cost over this period of an American scheme in the 1990s. Emissions fell when we had carbon pricing in place, they rose before that and have risen again since. Also, getting rid of carbon pricing was estimated by the PBO to cost the budget $18 billion over four years, adding extra pressure to the budget. We now have the useless Direct Action policy.

Roberts says that temperature changes come first and then CO2 levels follow. It actually works both ways. In other words, changes in carbon levels both cause, and result from, changes in temperature. For example, when ocean temperatures rise, more CO2 is released into the atmosphere making the air warmer which means more CO2 is released. We have to also consider the rapid increase in temperatures this time around, much faster than historically. Graphing temperatures and CO2 levels since the 19th century, we can see a very high correlation over this period, which makes sense because the large increase in CO2 acts as a blanket keeping the heat in. To say that nature alone determines CO2 levels not humans, as Roberts states in the video, is simply wrong.

He doesn’t seem to offer any explanation for the increasing temperatures. It can’t be solar activity as that has fallen if anything since the 1970s, nor volcanic eruptions (these are low historically), nor Earth’s orbit (variations and effects on temperature are long term). That leaves greenhouse gases, which includes CO2 which causes up to a quarter of the greenhouse effect. Water vapour has a larger effect but it’s CO2 levels that have easily changed the most. Or does he think scientists use faulty thermometers, or are fudging the numbers?