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Ken has been a very busy man. Another soul in the dedicated army of volunteer auditors. He’s been going through the entire Australian High Quality Data Set as supplied by the Bureau of Meteorology (BOM). He’s been assisted by two readers from this site — Lance and Janama — and we’ll be looking to increase the team (see below).
In the State of the Climate report, both the BOM and CSIRO told us that “since 1960 the mean temperature in Australia has increased by about 0.7 °C. The long term trend in temperature is clear… ” but as usual, what they didn’t say was that the raw data since 1910 (not just from 1960) increased only 0.6°C.
The BOM claim their adjustments are random and neutral. Yet when Ken looked at the raw data from Australia’s 100 high quality rural sites, the adjustments increased the trend in the raw data by 40% — from a 0.6°C rise over 100 years, to 0.85°C over 100 years.
In an email to Ken, Dr David Jones, Head of Climate Monitoring and Prediction, National Climate Centre, Bureau of Meteorology, made a clear claim that the adjustments had no real effect:
“On the issue of adjustments you find that these have a near zero impact on the all Australian temperature because these tend to be equally positive and negative across the network (as would be expected given they are adjustments for random station changes).”
Once again, the adjusted data shows a temperature change of 0.25°C.
Raw anomalies and high quality anomalies. Australian data 1910 - 2010. Blue line - raw data. Red line - adjusted data.
…
Perhaps there are good reasons for all these corrections. But if Ken’s analysis is right, the adjustments themselves account for a third of the reported warming trend in Australia.
Since the adjustments are so influential, BOM and CSIRO need to explain clearly why each adjustment is necessary, station by station. Ken graphed the full set. While some adjustments are cooling, the vast majority are warming, and some of the adjustments are as much as 1 whole degree.
…
Adjustments to raw Australian temperature records station by station. Median adjustment is 0.275. More adjustments are warming (red) rather than cooling (blue).
Rural now, used to be urban?
BOM claim that the top 100 stations are all pure “rural” (and obviously less likely to be affected by the urban heat island effect):
“Please note: Stations classified as urban are excluded from the Australian annual temperature timeseries and trend map analyses. Urban stations have some urban influence during part or all of their record.” [Source]
But 15 sites that are included used to be classed as urban at some point in the past. But BOM implies that they only include stations that were never affected by urban influences.
The full list is: Cairns AMO, Rockhampton AMO, Gladstone MO, Port Hedland AMO, Roebourne, Geraldton AMO, Albany AMO, Alice Springs AMO, Strathalbyn, Mount Gambier AMO, Richmond AMO, Mildura AMO, East Sale AMO, Cashmore Airport, Launceston Airport.
Stations were originally supposed to have 80 years of data records, but the newer analysis of Della-Marta et al have included six stations with less, including three that started after 1950.
…
The number of stations with data available for each year
Note that only 70% of raw data is available for 1910; 90% by 1930; another drop from 1945 to 1960; and the huge drop off in HQ data this decade.
Ken concludes:
This study shows a number of problems with the Australian High Quality Temperature Sites network, on which the official temperature analyses are based. Problems with the High Quality data include:
- It has been subjectively and manually adjusted.
- The methodology used is not uniformly followed, or else is not as described.
- Urban sites, sites with poor comparative data, and sites with short records have been included.
- Large quantities of data are not available, and have been filled in with estimates.
- The adjustments are not equally positive and negative, and have produced a major impact on the Australian temperature record.
- The adjustments produce a trend in mean temperatures that is roughly a quarter of a degree Celsius greater than the raw data does.
- The warming bias in the temperature trend is 40%, and in the anomaly trend is 50%.
It is most urgent and important that we have a full scientific investigation, completely independent of BOM, CSIRO, or the Department of Climate Change, into the official climate record of Australia.
We are awaiting a reply from the BOM with much interest.
The full post at Kens Kingdom
Janama was involved in looking at the NSW data and commented at WUWT:
There is site called Bourke Airport in New South Wales – it’s listed as a Rural Site as it is out of town and is therefore included in the national temperature analysis.
Yet Bourke Airport was established in 1999 and has only 9 years of data! So where did the data from 1910 – 1999 come from? Well it matches perfectly with Brewarrina Hospital 80kms away in the heart of Brewarrina that has a record back to 1910 – well it’s not an exact match because the earlier years have been systematically adjusted downwards along with the typical rural town UHI influence yet it’s included as Rural!
The same technique has been used for Glenn Innes airport which was established in 1997 yet by using the Glenn Innes Post Office data with it’s typical UHI ( increasing min temp) they have a record going back to 1910 yet it’s also classified as Rural.
I only studied NSW but I’m pretty sure it is similar throughout the country.
There is so much more to do in Australia
If you feel you have talents in statistics, coordinating people, sorting data, or knowledge of meteorology, we’d like to hear from you. We are putting together a team to do a more wide ranging survey, including site surveys. All of you travelling souls with a camera, please let us know. Comment here or email joanne AT “this domain name”.
Amazing, the “science” behind it all!
This is worth repeating:
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This is done to punish the sceptics.
Earlier anomalies were adjusted downward so that makes it even.
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This is totally absurd! You, Joanne, ‘downunder’ are experiencing the same attitude from the ‘officials’ as we are here in Sweden [from ‘all over’]. James Hansen puts out forged ‘graphs’ on polar [north] ice, where the ‘DMI’ is the only acknowledged institute covering this and which’s recordings are quite different… However MSM [here] only reflects… Yes, you got it!
Gee… this is, well, sorry.., my vocabolury isn’t enough ‘loaded’ for expression … 😉
Brgds/TJ
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Jo
This piece of propaganda today is what they are working towards but the Diurnal Bulge is something they have not taken into account. We are marching towards a multi faceted demolition job on AGW and we just need to get all the ducks in line!
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Gee [again…] all you have to ‘do’ is to take 2-3 minutes of reading the following:
http://www.appinsys.com/GlobalWarming/NOAA_JanJun2010.htm
As a matter of fact, the http://www.appinsys.com has a tremedous amount of info on all queries on ‘AGW’. The site is, as far I’ve found’ totally unbiased – regardless point of view.
[But, me thinking is that’s no news to you… 😉 ]
Brgds/TJ
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I’m happy to be part of the team. This is right up my alley.
I used to live at Mount Gambier and when I was at high school I set up my own weather station at home for a few years. That would be classed as urban.
In the past couple of months I have collected all temperature records available from the BOM’s two sites for Mount Gambier since 1861. These were recorded at the town’s post office until early 1952. In 1942 the Mount Gambier airport’s site was established about 10km north of the town. I visited it a couple of times when I was at school. It is well away from the airport itself and not affected by the air traffic (such that it is). Therefore official records for Mount Gambier since February 1942 are definitely rural and can be considered legitimate (the raw data that is). The last time I drove past that station was only a few years ago.
There’s an overlap of about 10 years from 1942-1952 where both sets are available. Mount Gambier’s population in 1942 was probably around 5000 (going on memory) and that doubled to 10000 by 1954 and then rapidly increased to 15000 by 1961. It’s now around 25000 I believe.
I was aware of Ken’s work and did a check of the temperature observations I had recorded for Mount Gambier as a student and young adult (1965-83) and my own at home (1969-72) at the time against those from the BOM now and could find nothing unusual. However, that is consistent with the site’s place on the chart.
Out of curiosity last week I plotted the data for Mount Gambier airport for the first six months of the year because of claims that the first six months of 2010 was the hottest on record in the Northern Hemisphere. It’s not strictly comparable of course, but there’s nothing unusual for 2010 at Mt Gambier. The hottest was 2007 (16.4C mean temperature), just higher than 1974 (16.3C).
I’ll wait to hear back from you Jo.
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And thanks to you too Jo. Let’s get a full surface stations project underway ASAP. Any volunteers with expertise please let Jo know.
Ken
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Just adding that from 2008 the mean temperature for the first six months at Mt Gambier is 15.7, 15.3 and 15.5 degrees Celsius respectively.
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Ian Hill:
BOM’s data only has maxima before 1940 for Mt Gambier. Do you have the minima? I would love to see them. The maximum is decreasing (> 1 degree in 40 years).
Ken
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Minister Garrett has provided a reply to concerns about possible UHI affects at Laverton, one of BOM’s high quality stations assessed by Ken. Seems the last time UHI was considered at this site was 2003, rather strange considering the significant rapid changes around the site. See the full letter by BOM Director Dr Ayers at UPDATE: UHI at Laverton – Minister responds.
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Don’t know much about it but there seems to be a lot of those online now.
http://www.wunderground.com/weatherstation/index.asp
This litte search brings up data from home weatherstations that are web connected and use this same screen format.
http://www.google.com/search?hl=en&q=%22now%3A%3Agauges%3A%3Atoday%3A%3Ayesterday%3A%3Arecords%3A%3Atrends%3A%3Aforum%3A%3Awebcam%22&btnG=Search&aq=f&aqi=&aql=&oq=&gs_rfai=
I’m glad to have contributed my small sporadic bits of cutting and pasting to Kens huge effort because this may help to keep things honest enough for people to figure out what is really going with the climate.
After listening to Anthony Watts speak, my son has found what looks to be an “interesting” official weather station. What information should we try to gather on it?
Lance Pidgeon
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MarcH:
“slight to non-existent” UHI?????? Why not say they don’t know? Check Cairns and Gladstone- surrounded by urban development. Also check Echuca- a clear cooling trend adjsted to become warming.
Ken
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Ken,
Based on their description of Laverton, BOM would probably classify a station in New York’s Central Park as “Rural”.
cheers
Marc
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Hi Ken; congratulations on finishing your huge task – I wish I had some expertise which would be useful but sadly I haven’t (I don’t think) my background is legal and with statistics and graphs I’m entirely out of my depth; but there are many other wonderful experts here – I’ve been reading articles on Jo’s blog for some time and some of the comments are so insightful – I’ll look forward to hearing what the BOM has to say
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Ken, minimum temperature data is available for Mt Gambier PO for:
1861-1882 except Feb, Mar 1862
1888-1907
April 1939-March 1952 but some months missing
Big gaps from 1883-1887 and 1908-1938
Maximum temperature is missing from 1883-1887 only
It’s a mystery why they wouldn’t have 1908-1938 if they had it for the previous 20 years. What I can do is go to the State Library and check the local newspaper, The Border Watch, to see if the minimum was published for those years. I’ll let you know.
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If Jones really believes that the “adjustments” are random and therefore cancel each other out for a “near zero impact”, why doesnt he just use the raw data? Clearly has no excuse to do otherwise, except to perpetuate a fraud.
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I assume Ken has a record of the raw data before it’s removed; after all it has the potential to lead to misinformation by nonexperts (who are in the pay of big oil).
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Ian:
Bom had no trouble finding means to 1940- who knows how? Thanks for your help.
Ken
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From the graph both Raw and “HQ” data show a decrease from 1910 to about 1970. So did the Industrial Revolution start around 1970?
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Ken, I’ve sent you the data I have via Jo.
Another potential source is the Adelaide University library where about 25 years ago I obtained monthly temperature averages for Mt Gambier going back to 1957. Those records might have it going right back, as well as for many other locations.
Siliggy, if I could do it all again I’d be right into all those resources. Back in the 60’s all the knowledge came from an encyclopedia. I built a Stevenson screen with the help of my dad. It was handy that he was a carpenter. We built a home-made anemometer and I got a rain gauge and thermometers for my birthday. The screen had to be placed under the pear tree, but on the northern side. It took a few knocks from backyard cricket. In later years a work colleague told me he also did much the same at his parent’s house in Sydney. I guess there were quite a few of us scattered around Australia!
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http://epw.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Minority.Blogs&ContentRecord_id=14e9bac3-802a-23ad-4a79-77dc1dcdeee8
I wouldn’t for a moment presume to be in the know about US politics but it seems that at least some reps are awake up to the ploy to sneak through a massive new tax over there.
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“On the issue of adjustments you find that these have a near zero impact on the all Australian temperature because these tend to be equally positive and negative across the network (as would be expected given they are adjustments for random station changes).”
Just too silly for words. What is “near zero”? Given that a trend of .006 degrees c per year is claimed to have been detected, would +/- .002 deg/y be “near zero”? Are adjustments equally positive/negative or not? Should they be? Does BoM know? What are “random station changes”? Seems to mean BoM has no idea what happened, hence “Random”.
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Hi Ken, splendid job; BoM, unfortunately, is now unreliable; I’m at Newcastle; Nobbys is interesting;
http://www.bom.gov.au/cgi-bin/climate/hqsites/site_data.cgi?variable=maxT&area=aus&station=061055&dtype=anom&period=annual&ave_yr=T
But this is only from 1910; if you go back to the full extent of the data, which BoM now excludes the history of Nobbys is even more anti-AGW:
http://www.bom.gov.au/jsp/ncc/cdio/weatherData/av?p_nccObsCode=36&p_display_type=dataFile&p_startYear=&p_stn_num=061055
Both David Stockwell and David Archibald used the full Nobbys’ data for their recent tour talks and the graphs they produced were remarkable; I’ll try and find them.
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Roger at number 22
I agree with you here. If the difference between raw and “adjusted” data is 0.25 degree C/100 years is regarded by Jones as “near zero, then the rise of the raw data of 0.6 degrees C/100 years is only around two times “near zero” and can also be safely ignored.
They cant have it both ways.
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Really interesting stuff and a worthwhile project. I went to Ken’s website and had a more detailed read of his material, especially the section on WA temperature records. The fact that so few stations are available to supposedly provide an accurate trend of long term temperatures in the state is amazing. Some of the inconsistencies in weather station data are incredible – the fact that Donnybrook and Busselton are used to cover gaps in Jarrahwood weather station is one that stands out. The difference between Busselton (on the coast) and Jarrahwood and Donnybrook (think apple orchards) is quite stark.
Another station that stood out to me was Wandering. The new station at wandering appears to have taken over from the old one in 2003 although it was run alongside the old one for about 5 years. I recall being told, while at University in the 1980’s, that Wandering was often mentioned as having the coldest temperatures on the daily weather because the measuring station was located under a tree. Unfortunately I have no way to confirm the veracity of this statement. I have, in the past, driven through Wandering and noted the location of the new weather station just north of town, but I never really took notice of the location of the old one although I believe it was near the town hall. There is no question that the new location is good, but I am not so sure that the old one was.
Anyway keep up the good work.
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sure!
29 July: SMH: Ben Cubby: Most want action now on emissions
“The results clearly showed we do not want to wait for the Americans and the Chinese to act, which was a surprise,” Professor Jordan Louviere, director of the Centre for the Study of Choice at the University of Technology, Sydney, said…
The study was not designed to find out what proportion of the population support emissions trading…
http://www.smh.com.au/environment/climate-change/most-want-action-now-on-emissions-20100729-10wdr.html
Centre for the study of choice: Professor Jordan Louviere
Jordan is internationally recognized as an expert in conjoint analysis and consumer choice modeling. He developed and pioneered the design and analysis of choice experiments and, up until 2006, has taught stated preference choice modelling and design of choice experiments with Moshe Ben-Akiva, Dan McFadden (McFadden shared the 2000 Nobel Prize in Economics for his pioneering work in choice modelling theory and applications) and others in the annual summer shortcourse in choice modeling at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT).
http://datasearch.uts.edu.au/censoc/members/detail.cfm?StaffID=158
i do not know a single person who wants carbon dioxide to be traded.
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“near zero impact on the all Australian temperature” would have drawn strong criticism from my lecturer at college unless I’d given it a specific number with probable error margins.
Given the incomplete nature of the records I wonder what the error bars on the above graph would look like. I like graphs with sharp zig-zag lines but in the real world of measurement, that might be a little inaccurate.
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ABC TV Midday Report today (Thu 29/7), is still preaching the Global Warming scary gospel to its Australian viewers without question. I thought the ABC Chairman warned the ABC to have balance in its reporting. I had to force myself to watch – it makes me angry, frustrated and sick in the heart.
It reported that Australia has been heating for decades with 2010 on the rise. The BOM and CSIRO are doing untold damage to our wellbeing with their pumped up lies and subterfuge. Have they sacked the CSIRO female head scientist yet?
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Yep; let’s call it as it is; BoM and CSIRO are political not scientific organisations; David Stockwell’s analysis of the slop put out by CSIRO recently is informative:
http://landshape.org/data/StockwellCSP.ppt.pdf
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OT but I think that while I have good general knowledge and had some met. education years ago, I might suffer from the Dunning-Kruger Effect. At Wiki it starts thus…”The Dunning–Kruger effect is a cognitive bias in which an unskilled person makes poor decisions and reaches erroneous conclusions, but their incompetence denies them the metacognitive ability to realize their mistakes.[1] The unskilled therefore suffer from illusory superiority, rating their own ability as above average, much higher than it actually is, while the highly skilled underrate their abilities, suffering from illusory inferiority.”
My guess is that there are people at both poles on this blog and in the AGW camp almost everyone is suffering from cognitive over-estimation.
Knowing where you are at is useful.
Keep up the good work Ken
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The Brisbane temperatures used to be read from a cool hill top near the CBD. It was next to a site for a convict built windmill. The BOM had to move because a new building took its place in about 1988. The new readings were taken from the new airport right beside Moreton Bay. As a result maximum temperature readings actually fell to about the same as Sydney which was a little embarrassing. Then, about 2000, a new automatic station was placed near the Pineapple Hotel, Kangaroo Point. I used to live 100 metres from the spot. It is right next to busy Main street and other urban heat sources. As a result, the temperatures recorded for Brisbane have been much higher this last decade.
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Cohenite, thanks for the link to Stockwell’s presentation
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Guys
I don’t know if many remember but a heat wave in January gave rise to a bit of comment in the media & supported a couple of articles in the magazine programs.
Specifically on the 12/01/10 the 7:30 report with Heather Ewart in the chair had a segment on the “record” overnight temperatures in an article “Southern Discomfort”. It featured 2 segments of vision of David Jones:-
DR DAVID JONES, CLIMATE ANALYSIS, BUREAU OF METEOROLOGY: You know typically in the past we might have had a look back and you can see in Melbourne a fairly classic case in point.
In the 20th century we had four days of 44 degrees. In the 21st century we’ve already seen five.
&
DAVID JONES: Heatwaves which might be longer, more frequent, more extreme than anything we’ve seen in the past.
So there’s a need to anticipate those heatwaves, anticipate the effects for example that they’re have on infrastructure. And I guess also be a little bit forewarned.
At the time I noted from Warwick Hughes – “Errors in IPCC Science” on UHI affected monitoring at Canberra AP (http://www.warwickhughes.com/blog/?p=447) a link to a Melbourne University study into the UHI effect in Melbourne. I posted on the thread & he responded by adding a graphic comparing the annual mean minimum temps in Melbourne & a station at Rutherglen. It is pretty plain that records in Melbourne have a significant cultural component & David Jones, as a senior representative of BoM, should have at the very least qualified his comments. They may have been made & edited out but I doubt it.
Taking this is an example of the calibre of the information (spin) the taxpayers are getting for their money; I for one would take any “record” figures on temperature from homogenised data with a whole bucket of salt
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What about the Global Cooling Consensus in 1975:-
http://www.uac-hq.com/files/pdfs/1974_global_cooling_CIA_Report.pdf
Have we got over that one yet.
Did we get a new tax then?
If we start a tax now and it cools do we get credits instead??
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Elsie, thank you for the info on the Brisbane weather station, I thought it was still at the airport. I live in Brisbane CBD, I will be looking for the station in the next day or so.
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I’m happy to throw my programming expertise into the mix. I can set up an independent temperature database with plotting and analysis functionality. While my climate science skills are poor, I can build tools. 😉
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Treeman #4. As an Applied Chemist, I found this was such a good read.
I have read others of course, but this one had some great practical proofs.
http://www.spinonthat.com/CO2_files/The_Diurnal_Bulge_and_the_Fallacies_of_the_Greenhouse_Effect.html
Thanks…it needs to be promoted far more widely, especially to our schools.
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Gabe – you make fun of global cooling, seemingly ignorant that many opponents of AGW are convinced we are indeed heading for an imminent, brutal and pulverizing ice age.
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The Climate Sceptics have posted the first of their election ads:
http://landshape.org/news/?page_id=1261
Feedback and donations are welcome.
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Obviously there are legal loopholes available for political adverts to be able to blatantly make stuff up. I guess since neither major party is planning on doing anything about CO2 emissions heading in to this election I can understand why you’ve had to change to a crazy anti-greens rant. Distasteful advert especially towards the end. Especially since greens have never been in power in Victoria or WA.
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What in that was made up? To my knowledge it looked pretty accurate.
As for the claim that “greens have never been in power in Victoria”: the ALP have been in power in Vic and the ALP fawns to Green agendas to get their preferences.
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Some one is going to get angry, no doubt dummy spits. The only scientists in the history of the world who will not permit any body looking over their shoulder, are our erstwhile government employed climatolagists. Setting these things up and daring to question the authority of these chosen ones will cause the odd neck ruff to stand on end, in anger. A good path to follow, as their path will lead us to the poor house.
MatttB not sure what you have been smoking, but a diligent perusal of the ice core record, the solar cycle records, the real geological proxy records, the recent satellite records, the recent rather severe cold spells, killing hundreds of people and millions of animals. Thus I would suggest it is far from global warming, by a long mile. We are on the wrong side of an interglacial, get over it.
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Well for a start licensed feedlots, new crop land and regenerating land are not outlawed to my knowledge. Greens cause deaths is also one I’d question.
Even if the claims were true I’d love to know any law passed that could not have been passed with the help of the opposition. Greens in power… pffft.
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Sorry MattB, you’re wrong; various bits of legislation in the various states and federally, passed on the basis of green ideology and AGW international treaties such as Kyoto has had profound effect on private property, especially rural and agricultural, rights; google Peter Spencer. As for the bushfires: consider these:
http://blogs.news.com.au/heraldsun/andrewbolt/index.php/heraldsun/comments/green_rules_black_forests/#commentsmore
http://www.theage.com.au/national/angry-survivors-blame-council-green-policy-20090211-83p0.html
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/opinion/inferno-stoked-by-green-vote/story-e6frg7ef-1111118803170
http://mises.org/daily/3343
After the Black saturday fires Brown and such green luminaries as Clive hamilton were quick to blame AGW; this was without foundation and when the political writing on the wall about the fires became apparent the Greens, like all good creatures of the night, scuttled back under their rocks. It was a pity that this happened because they should have debated this issue as part of the wider discussion which should be happening; that discussion is how humans should interact with nature; the greens have hijacked this debate and inculcated 3 throughly disingenuous and destructive criteria or parameters:
1 That nature is benevolent
2 That the interests and welfare of humans is dependent on what is ‘good’ for nature
3 That nature has intrinsic value.
I’m interested in your attitude towards those 3 points MattB and any of your fellow travellers; but don’t waste my time saying the video misrepresents the facts. It doesn’t.
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Mattb, I’ll just answer what I have close to hand.
“Greens cause deaths is also one I’d question.”
Well, it’s certainly a suggested cause here:
http://joannenova.com.au/2010/07/tyranny-how-to-destroy-a-business-with-environmental-red-tape/
and almost here:
http://www.australianclimatemadness.com/?tag=peter-spencer
“Even if the claims were true I’d love to know any law passed that could not have been passed with the help of the opposition. Greens in power… pffft.”
I don’t know what you mean by this. To govern a party only has to have a majority of members in the lower house. In the upper houses the party of government will often lack numbers (as does today’s fed govt) and so be forced to make deals with opposition parties (like the greens) to get legislation through both houses of parliament.
Anyway Green preferences is one of the ways the ALP maintains its power base. Of course the typical latte-sipping-cafe-going inner city green constituent is a LOT different to the working class labor constituent of old. Yet the ALP has to satisfy both. This may give you some clue as to why the ALP is now the party that stands for nothing but spin management (as the old saying goes: “you cannot serve two masters”)
LJ.
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Matt, if you ask any member of the CFS if the Greens opposition to controlled burns led to avoidable deaths the answer would be yes. Since the Victorian fires controlled burns have been reintroduced, at least in SA, and the Greens have been remarkable quite, I wonder why?
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The morning news in Adelaide began with four CAGW stories and there was an item pertinent to this thread. When discussing the up, up, upward temperature record they referred to period from 1910 onwards. Leaving out records back to the 1880s must have been an oversight.
This must be getting very desperate in the CAGW camp as the interviewee on the decline of ectoplankton was a graduate student. Next I expect we will have primary schoolers quoting from Gore’s “little book of horrors”.
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I see the AGW fraud is still with us. Of course it must. How else will our governments get more money to pay the debts, and big business to make more profits through sky rocketing prices? Oh, if anyone really thinks that us reducing our CO2 emissions by some trivial amount will make any difference to the climate while countries like China put out far more CO2 and their amounts are increasing rapidly, then you must have the intelligence of a rodent. By all means, let’s have a new tax. I love to see us all suffer liking stuffed pigs. Of course, if anyone really believed AGW was a real threat then the solution is very simple, cost effective and efficient. Just build nuclear reactors everywhere.
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“1 That nature is benevolent
2 That the interests and welfare of humans is dependent on what is ‘good’ for nature
3 That nature has intrinsic value.”
Answers:
1) some people thing a god is benevolent too. nature is nature.
2) don’t you agree with this? We certainly depend on nature for life so what is “bad” for nature is normally “bad” for us… I’m not talking “bad” like killing a fish or a cow or something.
3) No – nature has value that we may not know the value of, and another “value” is that nature intrinsically has a benefit to humans in terms of people genuinely do feel better knowing that there is “wilderness” and “wilds” out there whether or not they are interacting with it. I think plenty on the right would appreciate that “nature” has far more value to them than they could figure out a rational reason why.
Now Allen it takes more than a party with a handful of seats to reduce controlled burn offs. It saddens me that a major party would put lives at risk rather than deal with the other party that has an almost majority themselves.
No disagreement from me that the policy’s showed a lack of appreciation of the power of bushfire, but is that the greens or the developers or the government wanting to save some cash? I’ve not noticed the greens political party being held responsible by the Royal Commission – have you? It is too easy to blame a fringe minority party than point the finger where it ought to be pointed – the political majority.
Lastly, I drove Gippsland to Melbourne the early summer the year before the fires, and we did a drive up to is it Lake King and Marysville (again is that the town’s name?) – and I’m a greenie, my wife is a greenie, and I was GOBSMACKED at the fuel load. We were miles from nowhere one day south east of Melbourne and I commented to my wife as I drove that I literally felt scared and that there was no way they’d get me near there after mid summer. But people want their semi rural lots surrounded by bush – crazy.
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“Since the Victorian fires controlled burns have been reintroduced, at least in SA, and the Greens have been remarkable quite, I wonder why?”
Because they don’t hold ideological opposition to sensible burning?
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MattB:
July 29th, 2010 at 5:58 pm
MattB:
July 29th, 2010 at 5:58 pm
We are enjoying an interglacial (The Holocene) and are getting close to the end of it. We will probably go back into another ice age. It could have already started or it may take a couple of thousand years but we will almost certainly go back int an ice age.
The late Stephen Schneider was featured on a TV show, In Search Of, in the 1970’s hosted by Leonard Nimoy of Star Trek fame. Schneider is seen talking up the oncoming ice age that appeared, according to the “scientific consensus”, to be eminent. See http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5ndHwW8psR8 Schneider is in part 3. It is remarkable in that the fear mongering was eerily similar to what we are now constantly hearing about climate change and global warming today. Same B.S., different decade!
It isn’t the fact that the “experts” were so worried about a coming ice age as it was the hubris and overconfidence they projected in their certainty that the ice age was imminent. Ironically, they are doing the same thing today with global warming. Have they no shame?
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This manipulation of history is terrible, why doesn’t the Government ask authorities like Bill Kininmonth and Robert Carter to give their assessment? Because they wouldn’t like the answer, that’s why.
Why do the Australian and numerous other governments need to manufacture a crisis where there is none?
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Hackers shut down EU carbon-trading website…..
http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2010/jul/26/eu-carbon-trading-website-hacked
WELL DONE!
THERE HAS TO BE MORE OF THIS TYPE OF ACTION AGAINST THESE GREEN COMMUNISTS!
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BOM: Bureau of Meta-adjustment
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I had warned David Jones earlier that Jones was not useful name to have if one were in charge of temperature data. I suggested to him that he change his name to Michael Mann in order to avoid people concluding that the data was manipulated or selected to achieve a required result. I am disappointed that Mr Jones has not taken my advice.
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“On the issue of adjustments you find that these have a near zero impact on the all Australian temperature because these tend to be equally positive and negative across the network (as would be expected given they are adjustments for random station changes).”
If the adjustments are near zero in impact, then why bother to do them in the first place?
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Hi Joanne,
Please put me on the list as an assistant to research the Australian stations. I am based in Wagga Wagga, NSW.
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Gabe@53,
You know whats really good about that hack, it’s the green communists undermining each other. Let’s sell tickets to the fight!
Bravo!
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Just a note to those wishing to track down their local weather station if you go to http://www.weatherzone.com.au and look up your local area. Scroll down and follow the link to Full Climatology – go to the bottom of that page and you’ll find the exact lat/long location for your measuring station. Enter it into Google earth, remove the degree signs and it will take you directly to the exact position of the measuring unit.
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Hi to cohenite @39
I checked out the ads, but they are for a previous campaign. Are they also proposed for the current election? Comments were requested and I have duly made same.
The ads are hitting pretty hard and will hurt the looney element in our politics.
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Hi John; click on the link again; the top 2 ads are for this campaign; one is about wind, the other the effect of green ideology; the bottom 4 ads are for the last campaign.
http://landshape.org/news/?page_id=1261
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Thanks cohenite @ 61
I think my first download was corrupted for some reason. I got it okay this time.
JW
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Cohenite – the scripting is wrong for the ads – they play out of size like they are zoomed in.
here’s the direct link
http://landshape.org/images/windpower.wmv
http://landshape.org/images/carnage.wmv
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Excuse me for repeating a message I posted yesterday at WUWT but I believe the point I’m making is relevant …
I like to maintain a temperature comparison on my site at http://www.waclimate.net based on 32 locations in the western half of Australia with fairly consistent records dating to 1900 and earlier. I update it each month with the latest BOM data and when doing my update late last year I noticed the mean minimum and maximum temps had all been adjusted up by about half a degree from what had previously been on the BOM website for August 2009. e.g. with their initial data at the top as posted by BOM from September 1 to November 17, and their new adjusted data below:
August 2009:
Albany
9 16.2
9.4 16.6
Geraldton
9.5 20
10 20.5
Marble Bar
13.8 31.1
14.3 31.5
Perth
8.8 18.5
9.3 18.9
etc. I questioned the BOM on what happened and received this reply … “Thanks for pointing this problem out to us. Yes, there was a bug in the Daily Weather Observations (DWO) on the web, when the updated version replaced the old one around mid November. The program rounded temperatures to the nearest degree, resulting in mean maximum/minimum temperature being higher. The bug has been fixed since and the means for August 2009 on the web are corrected.”
The temps for all Western Australia locations in the BOM web database remain at the higher adjusted temperatures and I’m still not sure why they thanked me for pointing out the problem.
My independent, non peer reviewed, check it yourself comparison of temps at the 32 locations suggests the average min across Western Australia has increased by .8 C and the average max has increased by 1.31 C since the 19th century compared to the year to June 2010.
In the year to July 2009, a comparison with exactly the same 1800/1900 baseline showed the average min up by .31 C and the average max up by .64 C.
So for Western Australia, either the average min has leapt by about .5 degrees and the average max by almost .7 degrees in less than a year with extremely hot weather distorting the climate comparison … or inexplicable “bugs” raise questions about the validity of the BOM’s recent dataset as presented on the web.
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Chris Gillham, that is amazing
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Chris Gillham: #64
July 30th, 2010 at 3:15 pm
Well done Chris. Perhaps you can collect some more correspondence with BoM and collate this into a conscise post.
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janama; I think David had to ‘squeeze’ them to fit the ads in; thanks for the links.
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Matt @ 50
Bullshit, for years they opposed all burnoffs in the Adelaide Hills against CFS advice. Fortunately we had no major fires but it will still take years to reduce the fuel loads to safe levels. We have a major problem with a few “rural” greens who have allowed their properties to “return to nature”. Despite being warned that we will not attend a fire on their property because the risk is too great they are quite content with this. If their decision affected them only it would be acceptable but they also expose neighboring properties.
Their notional “return to nature” is farcical.In order to replicate the past vegetation it would require a mix of roughly 100 different, trees, shrubs and grasses as opposed to letting anything grow including noxious weeds and invasive introduced species.
We have some innovative environmentalists in our area but unfortunately they are a rarity among the many ignorant “urban greens” that have moved into the hills’ generally on small holdings of 10 to 50 acres, and who make life difficult for existing landholders.
I my experience many greens are fantasists suffering from verbal paraphasia.
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allen @ 68; I think you are too kind in describing the Green mindset; it now appears that the bulk of Green votes will come from inner city dwellers who have little or no direct experience of nature. Insulated in our great urban structures these people have been hoodwinked into accepting a benevolent view of nature which is nurturing and civilised; they appear to genuinely believe that the crucial elements of their lifestyle, cheap energy and technology, will continue with the use of primitive technology like wind and solar. The people perpetrating this deceitful and destructive state of affairs are the Greens who have infiltrated the msm, education and political process: it is a dishonest and misanthropic ideology.
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cohenite@69, Rousseau and the romantic movement have much to answer for.
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The warming bias in the world temperature records has been made clear for quite some time now, both in a time sense (old, colder & new, warmer) and in stations (more increased in warmth than decreased in warmth). I can understand why older (pre-80s, perhaps) temperatures may be changed one way or another due to different equipment sensitivities and accuracies, but I fail to understand why the most recent temperature readings still need “corrections” from raw, and why old temperatures get changed regularly. Should not the equipment corrections be finished? Or is there continuous bickering about what old equipment measured, but that the arguments are about how much warmer they read, not just that they do not read what the modern machines read?
What will it take to get the government agencies to justify the warming bias in the corrected data? A regional governmental lawsuit? A private lawsuit for fraud that forces the courts and plaintiff to justify the changes?
The fact that a significant temperature increase since the 60s is required to satisfy the AGW hypothesis is overlooked. An increase from 1850 to 1965 or so is irrelevant and the IPCC agree: that portion is non-AGW. A “plumped up” temperature increase from 1965 takes out the portion that separates the recent historical record from the CO2-as-agent period, and negates the crisis level. The bias IS the crisis.
The actual period of CO2 proposed impact and its actual vs proposed impact have been lost in a classic bait-and-switch tactic (conscious or not). I tear my hair out when I bring this up with the warmists: we`re not even discussing or arguing about the same thing any more.
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Doug Proctor: Absolutely spot on!!!!!
Ken
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MattB:
July 29th, 2010 at 10:10 pm
What has God got to do with nature? You are absolutely correct, Matt, naure is nature. Did that revelation come to you “naturally” or did sombody else “thing” it up? 😉
Nature is void of emotion because nature is not a sentient being. People who survive floods, droughts, hurricanes, tornadoes, blizzards, sandstorms, pestilence, plagues, etc. may see nature as being anything but being benevolent.
Matt, humans must be good stewards of the planet. Please remember that we are at the top of the food chain. We can best be prepared for what nature dishes out through risk management. The precautionary principal is a step backwards. Destroying the economies of the world to lessen future temperature increases by an amount that is virtually indiscernible will result in the unnecessary suffering of billions of people. All for no gain. People can afford to be environmentally conscious because of surplus wealth and discretionary income. If it is necessary to survive people will cut down the trees and use them for shelter and burn them for energy and they will kill the creatures of the forest and use their flesh for food and their skins for clothes.
The environment is a ruse, the greens want power, plain and simple. People are more important than animals, period. Humans are willing to live in harmony with nature but that is not good enough for the greens. They have killed millions of the poor in Africa with their idiotic green religious opposition to DDT. They romanticize the peasant lifestyle and tell the Africans to do without modern conveniences most westerners take for granted: clean water, indoor plumbing, electricity, plentiful supplies of food and clothing and modern medicine, just to name a few. The average life expectancy in most of Africa is 45! The greens can live with this because they think the world is overpopulated.
As Shakespeare says, “Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.” The reason why there is land set aside for nature is, as I have already written, we can afford to do so because of wealth generation. No wealth, no parks.
Mark my words, Matt, the inevitable backlash against the greens will have serious negative repercussions for the environment. The greens no longer have any credibility with the majority of voters and they will rue the day they cried wolf. The greens are their own worst enemy.
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Great work!
Wonder how many more independant efforts like this will turn up?
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Have not found ANY photos’ here yet:
http://maps.bonzle.com/c/a?a=br&o=65729501
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Adjustments to data are getting a little ho-hum these days. What would excite me is to find someone with data that hasn’t been bent, twisted and skewered to show something it doesn’t show.
Well, it’s just frustrating to see it keep going and going and going.
Eddy,
Unfortunately a rock the size of a Hummer will have to fall on their heads before they believe it. Fools always think they’re invincible.
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Thanks Eddie for your incisive comments at #73.
An essay on stupidity.
The antitheses of stupidity are commonsense and pragmatism. Stupidity is the embarking on a program of action without considering all the facts. Another description of stupidity is the non consideration of the consequences of your actions. Although I do prefer to refer to stupidity as concrete, there really are not varying degrees of stupidity, someone is either stupid or not. Some of the comments emanating from the CAGW camp show profound stupidity. Sounds as though I have inserted a qualification to “stupidity” here, and some may say that I have contradicted myself, but I don’t agree with this assertion. Stupidity is a deep and meaningful description.
Why have the looney tunes jumped onto the bandwagon of CAGW when there is little, to no actual evidence? Perhaps the “herd” mentality may have something to do with it. The CAGWers feel good and safe when they are with the herd and hiding behind “consensus”. Is being part of the “club” and being among “friends” the primary driver, with the tenets of the actual religion being only secondary? There is no requirement to engage on a study, as everything is neatly bundled up to promote the religion. If these people honestly believed their religion, they would be setting the example for the rest of us to follow, and not buying expensive condominiums within metres of the shore. They could gain more respect by scrapping their expensive homes and living in a mud hut. Perhaps these people engage in this religion from a believed sense of superior or esoteric knowledge? Unfortunately, they behave like gnu and lemmings. There is no application of common sense nor of pragmatism.
It requires effort and study to be able to debunk the looney claims: And we have to debunk the claims with proper science and facts. To take a contrarian stance and then just produce more stupid claims to match the CAGWers, would see ourselves subjected to ridicule and consigned to history. Yes Sir! It requires effort and knowledge to refute.
Hail commonsense and pragmatism.
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This any good?
http://newspapers.nla.gov.au/ndp/del/article/5035649
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Great posts. Here’s a good Julius Caesar – oh sorry
Julia Gillard should have noted before she gave her
cash for clunkers suggestion.
http://www.streetfire.net/video/why-cash-for-clunkers- was-stupid_833653.htm
Kevin was right – scrap the ETS – but Penny Wrong and her alternative life stylist mate Bob Brown can’t let
it go… vote the buggers out to start with, and get
the climate skeptics in the senate, the rest will take care of itself, I believe.
By the way I vote Independent New England electorate,
but the Nationals and Climate Skeptics will be getting my vote in the Senate.
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I wrote via the Hon.Richard Torbay re climate change
and believe it or not got a very good response from Frank Sartor. He sent me the CSIRO report and the BOM graphs etc., and I replied to …??@@@
I loved the responses..,.to Richard Torbay of course.
Talk about overkill.. well at least they responded I should be fair.
Dear Mr Torbay,
Thank you for your recent correspondence on behalf of
(me) regarding ‘Climate is what we expect, weather is what we get’
The matter raised will be brought to the Minister’s attention and appropriate action will be taken.
Signed Kathie Charalambous – Office Manager
I also got a response from Frank Sartor too. He would
be investigating my claims. I mentioned the graphs
were not conclusive to support AGW. (Bit more involved than that though). Or sea level rises.
Keep chipping away at the AGW block, it will collapse
eventually.
The USA have failed to pass their climate bill, even moderated. UK is battling though.
The sad thing is, and I’ve tried to explain this to
people who have responded to my letters in the local
rags. They have willingly spent thousands installing
solar panels, and this does reduce their electricity
bills. (Not for just hot water though) But they have asked me why have they now got thousands of carbon credits that they can sell.
I’ve told them it is paper money really, if they are prepared to pay 12000 dollars to receive 4000 rebate
from the government, with the promise their investment will return them 4750 carbon credits, vote
for a carbon tax. So they can sell them at a profit,
as it is dependent on an ETS and Carbon tax being established.
Now the politics is this present ALP government has conned people to put their investments or money in
carbon reduction etc, investments, when the science to substantiate this was a fraud, under the guise of carbon emissions and therefore contributing to terrible climate change. Now they have eggs on their faces.
The thing is solar panels are vunerable to damage and only guaranteed for 25 years. Now at 70 years of age
if I invested 8,000 dollars (plus rebate) to save on
electricity of $200 per quarter, somehow the sums don’t add up do they to you. But they have been encouraged they can sell their carbon credits to decrease the expense of their installment price for solar panels.
Same as wind turbines, in isolated areas I think they are a good idea, so long as the environmental damage
does not out weigh their usage, like birds etc., and reliability. And the noise I believe those running the saline plant near Sydney have 65 of them, and the noise is like a jet plane setting off for residents within a few kms. Driving them crazy. 24 hours a day?
Anyway, keep scribbling folks. Vote out the Greens and ALP and maybe one will see some sense in Government.
Sustainability YES! I loved the Hunt (present opposition to Wong) and Wong debate on ABC he won my vote.
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Just check out the temps in UK at the present time their summer. The lowest is -2C in the Hebrides. (Land of the midnight sun too, and within the Arctic circle but UK irrespective)
The Northern Hemisphere being the one most effected by the Gulf Stream stagnation is not a good global example
to judge the rest of the world.
I think I got this discription from this site, but attending TAFE recently, I nearly lost my temper with
one TAFE student over climate change. (Assertive possibly). She said ‘only 9% of Antarctica ice remains”. I nearly exploded. Greenland and Antarctica are land masses. The North Pole as such is not it is sea ice. It seasonally experiences melting as do parts of Antarctica sea ice shelves.
“If you place an ice cube in your Scotch and Soda, the liquid will rise, however, when the ice cube melts
it doesn’t rise any more, as the cube displaces volume
initially”. Same with sea ice.
Nice to hear from others on the same bent as me, must closenow – almost time for beddibyes.
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Siliggy @78,
It helps.
For much of my childhood and beyond I lived in the San Fernando Valley north of downtown Los Angeles. And summer temperatures there of 100 F (43 C) are not unusual. In the west end of the valley 110 is not unheard of.
Shall I now be scared to death by a fraction of a degree of increase or even a degree or two? I’ve been in Death Valley in the summer — 110 plus. I drove to Phoenix one August and stopped in Blythe just before the Colorado River and the temperature there was 122 at about 2:30. I arrived at my motel at 5:30 and the temperature there was 117. It was still over 100 the next morning.
They cry wolf, wolf, and wolf but can’t come up with even the shadow of a wolf when put to the test.
Yes, I’d like cooler temperatures. But real heat is daily summer fair in many places and in the San Fernando Valley for instance, there are over a million people at any given time. People can and do cope. We should thumb our noses at this nonsense.
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Where I live in Australia we are having a cold winter, the second in a row. There has been less snow in the mountains, but we have had more, colder, and earlier frosts. I don’t expect every winter to be the same, though. I wonder how GISS and the CSIRO determine how ’2010 is the hottest year ever’ which they seem to keep saying. How do they make this measurement? Where do they stick the thermometer? I can see that the number of temperature reporting stations used has been drastically reduced, and also that many of them are situated on airfields and near asphalt or air conditioners. Their output must be nonsense.
It seems to me that the only way to measure the GLOBAL temperature (and surely that’s what the ‘G’ in AGW stands for) would be to use a radiometer responding to all wavelengths at a distance of about 100,000 km in space. Its field would cover almost a whole hemisphere of the Earth. From this the energy flux could be measured over a long period – of course it would vary from hour to hour and day to day – and then this could be converted, using (I think) the Stephan-Boltzmann law relating radiation and temperature.
Nobody can say here and now what such an instrument might show!
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I’ve been able to confirm that Ken’s (see #18) gold line on the graph for Mt Gambier Post Office is a very good estimate of the mean temperature prior to 1940. While the place was a bit urban-ish then, I think it’s more accurate to call it rural. The buildings which I recall being next to the Post Office in my childhood were not in a 1920s photo of the PO I saw last week. Given that the airport is 10km to the north and further inland I can’t see how the BOM is justified in adjusting the HQ figures to be 1-2 degrees less than what the PO recorded prior to 1940.
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Ian Hill #84:
It could simply be a matter of incompetence. After all BoM don’t claim to have any competence. Or rather, disclaim any responsibility for the consequences of using their “produce”. Their advice isn’t professional advice.
People should read and think about the typical disclaimer Always Check the Information which appears in every published work of the BoM.
In essence: You MUST REPLICATE their work independently to be sure.
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Hi all,
I live 3500 feet above sea level on the Northern Tablelands of NSW. People do live on higher altitudes
and lower of course. We’ve had some pretty wicked
frosts when it is not overcast, and no snow yet but
on the higher areas where it hasn’t settled for long
anyway.
My house is brick and tile and we live on a ridge 3 km
from the valley & CBD below near the creek and earliest settlement area (1839)in the village (or city).
Where I live is 5 c warmer in winter (not sure about summer) and recently we have had record low temps
as much as minus 11.2 C. At night only.
But my girl friend of 43 years and I are English
She from near the Scottish border and me originally from Liverpool and then around London. All we had
were coal or coal lite fires before central heating.
I don’t heat my house. (We are all electric) I have ducted oil heating though, but use electric fires. (Only when we have visitors). We don thermal underwear and warm clothing. I watch TV etc., in my large bedroom that is warmed by the sun during the day, and with an electric blanket.
What I am trying to prove, we have to get used to cold or hot weather naturally, and like the Poms NOT become hot house flowers. If you live in a continually heated environment of 25 C (75 – 80 F)
then go out in to the freezing cold, you will be more vulnerable to colds and URTI.
I think central heating and air conditions have increased this likely hood and surely your body is
and relies on an internal thermometer. What happened to ceiling fans and fans generally. That’s fed by
good wholesome food. Eat salads in the summer sure, spuds, complex carbohydrates and pies in winter. How is it that I spoke to one of the first to climb Everest and he said, they never suffered from colds etc., until they returned to England and warmer weather. (Probably less virus’ at 28,000 feet)
Climate change – well I remember Jack Frost patterns
on the inside of our windows, and icicles on the taps
on the bathroom. (1940s and 50s) And they couldn’t grow grapes and citrus fruit in UK unless in big glass greenhouses.
They could more recently I believe, and started a wine
industry as they had in the 800-1300s before the mini ice age put pay to that in parts of Western Europe.
(But the wine presses were turned into printing presses).
But surprisingly, although my girlfriends environment
is 5 C lower than where I live, snow does not settle as easily because of the UHI created where she lives.
So turn that Central heating down in the winter folks.
Unless you have some permanent ailment that responses
well to warmth.
What they say ‘Douse the fever and feed the cold’
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Where I live there are documented 4 micro-climate areas
In an area of approximately 16 square miles. A population of approximate 22,000 but that’s not just in the urban area, that’s including rural areas too.
I live on the warmest place and can grow certain plants
there. Less than two miles away they can’t grow the
same plants as I can.
But how can you give an accurate temp, day or night that matches all these four micro climates.
And how can AGW’s answer the fact that 4 planets/moons
in our solar system are warming too. (I don’t know how the hell they can work that out). But as far as I know humans as bright as we are (and destructive also while trying to live and eat) haven’t ventured that far yet? LOL
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Bush bunny 87:
You need one of those GISS thermometers. They give true, indicative temperatures for areas of up to 1200 km radius; over land and sea!
😉
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And the wind factors that influence land temperatures.
I’m skeptical about their overall accuracy then.
From what I remember in UK the North wind brought snow, here where we are the Westerly winds brings heat from the Centre and Outback. And obviously the South wind brings cold up from the Antarctica.
But I don’t know nottin’ about thermometers. Mines reading 10C inside the house right now warmer in the
bedroom – but it’s colder outside the house with a brisk wind blowing.
I’ll be busy for the next 3 weeks, I work for Tony Windsor on his campaign and in his Armidale office.
Anyone know anything about the climate skeptics standing in the Senate?
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Bush bunny @89
Hi. The sceptics are running 2 candidates in each of the 6 states for the senate.
SA – Leon Ashby and Nathan Ashby
Vic – Chris Dawson and Lee Holmes
NSW – Chris McLachlan and Bill Koutalianos
Qld – Terry Cardwell and Lance Jones
WA – Beau Woods and Heather Dewar
Tas – Frank Waller and Colin Ely
They are also running candidates in some marginal seats, including Howards old seat of Bennelong
If you go to their web site you should be able to make contact.
Let me know if you want more information. JW
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I was born in Tenterfield on the northern tablelands of NSW too. But our family moved to Brisbane when I was 3 thank goodness. However, I had to endure almost every holiday back in Tenterfield to see relations. The shock of feeling the cold c.f. Brisbane was never something I could get used to. Older houses only had fireplaces which were useless unless one stood next to them. Electricity was not available in some houses and all the clothing or blankets seemed to make no difference. I vowed I would never live that way if I could help it. Only recently with full internal A/C, etc, did visiting become bearable. Electric power is the greatest invention of modern Man. Yet, we in Australia are facing a reduction in oil supplies for petrol and even use of coal for power. But Australia has no plans for nuclear power. TIME magazine for August 9 2010 shows a remarkable list of countries using and building nuclear power stations. e.g. USA 104; Canada has 18; South Africa 2; Spain 8 (remember it has a huge solar farm); Slovakia 4; Slovenia 1, etc. Look, if a whole lot of poor little nations can afford to find it necessary to use nuclear already I think Australia is already behind the 8 ball and will fall so far behind we will look ridiculous. Ridiculous because we have a lion’s share of uranium and of fossil fuel in coal. QLD has shale oil that could supply petrol for 70 years but it is banned from being used. Why don’t we just go out and hit ourselves on the head with a hammer? Makes as much sense.
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Bernd Felsche @ 85
True enough, and if it is I suspect it’s the same brand of imcompetence as displayed by the IPCC in not closely checking Mann’s hockey stick. An accidental on purpose oversight?
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elsie #91: I don’t know if the below linked economical report from the catastrophic situation Spain is in, very much of which i directly due to their tremendous push for ‘regenerable energy’ is known to you. It’s really scary… The Spanish government has also heavily curbed the subsidies [they cannot afford it], especially towards pv-technique, as also Germany is due to do also.
Link:
http://juandemariana.org/pdf/090327-employment-public-aid-renewable.pdf
And, although only in Norwegian language [sorry, but there has been no response on my asking them for a translation/subtitles] this video shows the devastating effects on the world [former] largest habitat for sea eagles.
Link:
http://www1.nrk.no/nett-tv/klipp/193197
(min 5MB BW]
http://www1.nrk.no/nett-tv/klipp/282395
(min 0,5MB BW)
The pics talk themselves, regardless language.
Brgds from Sweden
//TJ
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Corr. #93: following ..’energy’ + is known to you.
Sorry!
Brgds
//TJ
[fixed] ED.
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[…] Science is increasingly used as an instrument of authority to impose public policy. 8. NEW! Australia-gate Australia temperature adjusted upwards to show more warming. 9. Bangladesh-gate IPCC inflates […]
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I am not sure if this has been raised earlier, but the IPCC seem to be still on the trail to promote and publish someone with a newer, betterer, updated, peer reviewed, referenced, …wait for it….computer model to show that man-made CO2 (fossil fuel) will cause the planet to warm by 2C.!!
http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/08/100802110827.htm
I wonder what Dr Roy Spencer and/or Piers Corbyn would make of it?
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ThomasJ @ 93, a very interesting (and scary) PDF report!
I wonder how the report has been viewed by the proponents of “renewables”? It seems to me that the only thing that will be renewable is the higher cost of energy and the higher taxes necessary to balance the economy.
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Elsie 91. Well Tenterfield is a little warmer than Armidale where I live, but this is the question of acclimatisation of natives. But your question about
nuclear power generation? It’s similar to the question of solar thermal. It boils down (excuse the pun) to expense and necessity in the equation of environmental protection and health, versus overall expense to those who depend on the energy provided. Or dear I mention it AGW. Fossil fuels are the cheapest and no so unhealthy to provide us with electricity. And if we wish to provide short range
transportation electric cars seem to be the go.
The cost of a nuclear plant to set up is 5 billion dollars, plus the cost of technicians to run them who in the USA cost about 1 million US dollar per technician per year. A reactor needs 200,000,000 liters of water per day to keep them cool. OK on the coast (using sea water) but inland, that is impossible. 75% of Australian underground water (aquifers) is not renewable. (They are not replaced by rain water, they are from ancient water supplies). We should concentrate on recycling and storing storm waters (and flood waters).
Wind turbines, if they can provide the same electricity output as one nuclear plant, would need
4,000. At the cost of 4 billion or more dollars? And they are unreliable in output and efficiency.
However for smaller communities, there are operating
several alternative electricity generating operations.
Those that use the refuse from cane harvests. And two that are operating, different, that use ignition of coal underground. Google and see. This.
What interested me, is that coal dust and the waters
washing this are used in organic fertilisers fulmic
and humic acids. Nutri-tech organic fertiliser are
pushing these. I am studying my diploma in Agricultural Organic production. We never see coal
as being terrible in this environment. Obviously as in UK in London, where I was, SMOG killed people in the thousands, before they made it illegal and a smoke free zone. But this was mostly the reason being atmospheric conditions and also UHI, and dirty pollution.
If one does our sums, with a population of 22 million
all spread out over a large land mass, with a demographic inequality would 6 nuclear plants supply us all. Yes it could. ‘If’ we could find the water daily to cool them. If they are placed on coastal region surely.
But nuclear reactors are not renewable sources of energy either.
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Thomas J: Thanks for these. Antarctica. I was at TAFE (Technical And Further Education). Rural studies centre I do have a BA in archaeology and palaeoanthropology at UNE (University of New England) and nearly lost my cool when one visiting student, mentioned Climate Change, and how one proves this.
“There’s only 9% of Antarctica left!” (I nearly swallowed my false teeth!LOL) She was a junior
student to me – I’m a senior student and she was there to observe the autopsy of several animals that our Diploma students were required to observe and they were invited to join us… some disappeared early in the exercise – mind you.
“Are you sure that only 9% of Antarctica remains?”, I asked, “Are you sure you are not mixing it up with the
the North Pole or the ARCTIC?”
“No – The South Pole” she replied.
My blood pressure went up – “Possibly (and in my mind felt that adding ‘Dear’ but didn’t) – “Antarctica is a land mass – maybe 9% of the seasonal sea ice has
melted…? That’s what you mean?”
“No – only 9% of Antarctica remains that’s why the sea levels are increasing …?”
OH – GAWD! I think I am remembering what I replied
and it wasn’t very polite… Something like …
“Antarctic is a huge land mass with mountains, and when that sinks beneath the sea, we will be in REAL trouble…” (You F..king idiot and you have a vote,
like me!”
I think the end note was she said to me, “Well if you don’t like Al Gore at least he brought our attention to climate change..”
Well he did sure enough!
To me as very involved in environmental and agricultural science and protection, etc., is that the world or people seem to not understand, that humans do cause extremely bad environmental damage and exploitation that results in pollution and human health issues.
However, it doesn’t cause climate change, nor does it cause environmental damage to areas thousands of miles away, or create seas unnaturally rising, that results in atolls being deluged.
Anyway said my bit tonight, have to get back into
election mode tomorrow (I’m employed) for the Australia election on 21st August.
Well I’ll be voting for the climate skeptics in the Senate, can’t for my State electorate actually.
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John @ 90, they’ll get my vote remember everyone you only need to mention or tick the first 15 in preference. For the senate.
That’s below the line…
If you tick above the line, That gives your vote to one party Only and if they don’t win they can give their preference to whomever they choose.
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Hi Mark,
Well as far as I know, the authors of the report were invited last spring/summer to the US and gave info & explanations of their findings to some form of org. closely linked to Mr. Obama. Nothing, nothing was ever reported in the MSM about this [as well as, sigh! so many others..]. I’ve dstributed this report to quite a number of members of the Swedish parliament plus some ‘others’. From the parliament: zero, nada, ingen, noll.. response whatsoever. From ‘others’ some, mostly very [positive &] astounding respones, i.e. “is it really that bad/scary…”
Here in Sweden we do not yet have a sign of a report like the Spanish one…
Please also, although in other language, take the time to view the vids from Norway. They are, really, scaring [&, of course ‘hidden’ from Swedish publicum]. As I gathered, there are some heavy ‘talks’ about the windmill-energy-hype in Australia – please try to distribute this vid.
Plenty txs!
Brgds from Sweden!
//TJ
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ThomasJ,
I did view one of the videos and if true about the birds it will only add to my dislike of wind power as a replacement “renewable”. The only place for wind power is if you have no ability to be on the grid. Photo Voltaic is an absurd source of energy if you have anything else available. (it is great for remote sites that are simple and low demand).
As for Mr. Obama, I imagine that his ties to carbon trading will dictate how he responds to any renewable. Besides that, it appears that he is a socialist reformer and will not hesitate to bring anyone or any industry down to advance a government solution. Therefore the bad news in your posted PDF is perhaps good news to him and his insiders. Wiping out metals and manufacturing in France, for example, may have been the goal in the end. The excuse of “saving the world” is too important to have to worry about a few thousand jobs.
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Bush Bunny 98;
Certainly nuclear is expensive but so too are renewables especially if subsidised like the solar farm in Spain. Nuclear stations do need water but like coal stations most of it is recycled with just some loss via evaporation from the ‘fat’ cooling towers. BTW, mini nuclear stations are available for sale which can provide power for small cities like Mt. Isa. These are like ones used on USA aircraft carriers, submarines, etc. One point I was trying to make was that nations such as S.Africa which also exports coal finds it possible to build at least 2 reactors so why not us? You lived there but one recent doco’ described how domestic gas in UK (and here) was sourced from heating coal. This produced much of the air pollution that has reduced since the introduction of natural gas. The latest (july/august) SCIENCE ILLUSTRATED describes how a wave power station is being tested off Scotland. I emphasis TESTED. No real power is being drawn from it yet. Other types are described. But the technology is far from being proven because the designs have to be extremely robust, far more so than windmills. Thus, when conservationists airily claim renewables will, maybe, produce 20percent of power they are talking about a great deal not yet even beyond the research stage. I would also like people who say our population is too big or should not be bigger to realise that we already produce food for 66 million. We are a nett exporter of food especially wheat. This could be increased. I fear Australia has lost its vision of being a major player as it had years ago and has been replaced by fear of the future. Like on “Insiders” recently, someone said that nations to our north will not look at our squirreling away of resources forever. In 1942 Japan was on its way here to take them.
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Bush Bunny:
Nuclear power is of course not renewable. No source of energy is renewable. Entropy always increases.
Nuclear is sustainable for centuries using present technolgies and millennia by foreseeable means. I think that that’s long enough to develop the next sources of energy for civilisation.
For half the cost of an NBN (which will likely cost Australia much more than foreshadowed and deliver less than expected), Australia could have four 1.4 GW nuclear reactors built by KEPCO by about 2020. If they get a similar deal to the UAE. That contract includes construction and fuel loading. A further USD$20,000 million is for operation and maintenance over 60 years.
That works out at about USD$0.055/kWh over the life of the plant at full utilisation. IIRC, about double the cost of electricity from coal-fired power stations.
OTOH; it’s also about 10% the cost of wind power (at most-optimistic levels) and 2% the cost of solar.
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I would like to add another thought that seems to me go against the so called sense of urgency that ‘something must be done’ to reduce CO2 especially from power stations That is, the question of Fusion power. I know that it is always 50 years in the future and has been the case for the past 50 years. But that’s the point. Very small funds are given to research in USA, Europe or anywhere else to progress more than at snail’s pace. It only took 3.5 years to go from sheer theory to Hiroshima. It cost a lot and the top boffins worked on it. But like Churchill once said when objections were raised about how to make harbours for D-Day and transport fuel, etc, he replied..”Don’t bore me with the problems. The problems will argue for themselves!” With great funding and will the practical use of fusion power could be reality in say 20 years or less. BTW, it is interesting to note that the Hiroshima bomb “only” used 0.01 of its mass. The rest was fallout. In short, there was still 99.9 percent of its power not used. Something to think about. Fusion can create even more and would never run out of fuel in a billion years.
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I don’t believe we know how much radioactive material is actually down there given that the market has always been limited by factors other than supply availability.
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[…] says… Science is increasingly used as an instrument of authority to impose public policy. 8. NEW! Australia-gate Australia temperature adjusted upwards to show more warming. 9. Bangladesh-gate IPCC inflates […]
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Personally, I’m not against nuclear energy. It’s just the water the reactors require to keep them cool, I don’t think there is a reactor in a desert yet. And Australia is bar its coastal sea water somewhat considered ‘arid’.
I was married to a pilot (captain) on the nuclear strike force of UK. Vulcans. And we are all worried
about nuclear plants providing energy for nuclear weapons. Actually, …. it’s how you deliver effectively those nuclear weapons. That’s what is most important. Most countries don’t have the technological ability to deliver a nuclear weapon. (Other than the Hollywood rendition of in situ ie, someone delivering a little bigger than a suitcase with a nuclear weapon concealed ??? LOL) And most who threaten this are being very closely watched (even Isreal) once any country attacks another with nuclear weapons, they will be (unfortunately – and without prior warnings) destroyed. Its the end line of aggression. They know this..and beyond ‘sabre rattling’ like North Korea is right now, run by a twit, who loves DVDS etc. (God or Allah help us!)
Chernobyl was a terrible case of technical mismanagement. And I don’t think we can forget this. Yet there is a plant that has been operating in UK before this that had no problems.
Well I suppose this applies to any electricity generating plant, and possibly more to those operating with radio-active material. (Your fire alarm has radio active material, you low watt light bulb has mercury and should be disposed accordingly) If they were – ever bombed or terrorist attacked what would be the result? All electricity would cease. Back to the BBQ and ice generated containers for months, or just buying your easily decaying food by the day and not storing. Can be done. Like before our parents had fridges. Ice boxes etc. Obviously our internet would be destroyed for a while. TV and radio. But we would survive. Telephones don’t depend
on electricity.
However, with this present Australian General Election. Personally, the Greens if you check out their website, I don’t like their Global Governance agenda or global depopulation manifestos. Also I may sound very prejudiced here, but Bob Brown, Penny Wong are gay. Now I know a lot of gays within the Green party, and I have a great personal friend (who isn’t gay) is a rep for the NSW rep for New England.
I think ‘alternative life stylists’ now the term used
for gays, as well as hippies and environmentalists,
somehow non breeders (as gays stigmatize themselves)
have a somewhat different world view to ‘breeders’.
Well check out the Greens website… de population of the world, and global governance.
What they don’t realise, is it is hard to grow your own food, whether it is commercial or in your back garden. It doesn’t work always, and we could starve
being dependent on just home grown food.
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Bernd in 104 – I think it is worth noting, as discussed in today’s media re: impact of a carbon price, that a “doubling” of the cost of power is only about a 15% increase to the user, as the power from the plant is only a fraction of the cost of electricity infrastructure such as power lines, poles, substations etc – that is the distribution network.
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“Also I may sound very prejudiced here” yes yes indeed you do.
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Bush Bunny #108:
It’s easy to conflate nuclear energy with nuclear weapons. Nuclear reactors were operated inefficiently during the cold-war era by a number of countries, to maximise yield of isotopes for use in warheads and bombs.
For countries who seek to exploit only the peaceful uses of nuclear power, there have been verifiable and safe options since the 1960’s. The “Gen IV” reactors can “burn” a variety of fissile materials; as can earlier designs when adapted to the task. Such fissile material already includes that from nuclear warheads that are end-of-life (as a weapon) or from dismantled armories of nations that agree to reduce the “overkill” factor.
More importantly, the fuel from e.g. pebble-bed reactors contains too little fissile material to make a weapon. The density and the isotope types are simply unsuited. And it is very energy intensive to break down the pebbles to extract a few micrograms from each one. The “spent fuel” from modern reactors can be reprocessed/used until only “short-lived” radioactive isotopes remain – half-life on the scale of centuries and decades instead of 10’s of thousands of years. Which brings the management of the small volume of waste somewhat closer to the ability of people to predict and control what happens to it until it’s “cool”.
Chernobyl-like incidents are ruled out by inherently-safe reactor designs that have existed for 40 years. They cannot melt-down. When all the mechanical bits like coolantpumps and control rod positioners fail, the worst that happens is that it heats up a bit and that heat results in the rate of fission reducing (it’s called “Doppler broadening”). An equilibrium temperature is established.
That is the effect exploited to control the output of gas-cooled pebble-bed reactors… the coolant flow rate is slowed and the reaction slows down. Helium gas is the preferred coolant and working fluid for the high-temperature turbine because the gas is inert and it has no long-lived unstable isotopes. If helium leaks from containment, it also rises very quickly to high altitude, minimising risk of “fall-out” in the extremely unlikely event of a containment vessel and building breach.
There is wide-spread, irrational fear of nuclear power. All forms of high-density energy demand respect; not fear. Fear leads to abuse. It leads to inappropriate action.
Fear is promoted for political ends. Education and experience with the technology are not.
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MattB, (@109)
I’d like to see this information could you provide?
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Yeah, they do.
When you rent a phone line, the rental includes a quota of power sent from the telephone exchange to power your telephone. If the exchange loses power then all the phones connected to that exchange become useless. Most exchanges have a big stack of backup batteries, which means they hardly ever lose power, but ultimately it has to come from somewhere.
Also, I’ll point out that the trans-national data cables are all digital these days and carry a mix of Internet and telephone network traffic. That is to say, for the long haul runs there is no difference at all between telephone and Internet. It didn’t always used to be like this, but those old days are gone and never coming back 🙂
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This is a good one folks.
http:www.anhonestclimatedebate.wordpress.com/2010/08/08/co2-is-not-a-pollutant-but-a-huge-benefactor
I couldn’t agree more.
Check it out.
Cheers
Bush bunny from Oz
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I’ve forgotten the ‘//’ in that website, I’m sure you will find it OK?
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Bush Bunny,
There is a nuclear power plant in the middle of the Arizona desert. I don’t know the details but it’s definitely there, visible from the highway as you approach Phoenix and announced by a prominent sign.
Chernobyl is another matter. Not only was it mismanaged but its design was an open invitation to exactly the kind of disaster that happened when something went wrong. As you point out reactors have been operating for years without trouble. And as Bernd points out, it’s not viable to get weapons grade material from a power reactor. The waste disposal problem can also be mitigated.
Unfortunately nuclear plants are costly to build and operate. And the expertise to design build and operate them isn’t exactly widespread anymore. So I think they are the least desirable way to get electricity. But I don’t oppose them.
Electricity is nice where you use it, very clean and convenient. But it’s always a messy problem of one kind or another where you generate it. Nothing in life is without problems. Proponents of plug-in electric cars and high speed electric trains always leave out the inconvenient fact that electricity doesn’t just grow on trees. Somewhere falling water, fossil fuel or a nuclear reaction has to be turning a generator — all with various objectionable characteristics, large and small.
You can’t store it up for later use either. So you have to make exactly what the demand is at any given time. This is critical because if your system can’t meet the demand it goes down or you shut off some of your customers. Going down is destructive so you shut off enough load to stay within your capacity.
California has (foolishly) committed billions to a 200 MPH rail system between Los Angeles and San Francisco, while at the same time the state has prohibited addition of any new generating capacity. The physics I learned tells me that the faster you go the more power you need to keep it moving (friction, another inconvenient truth). At 200 MPH that train will be a power hog. With constant supply and increased demand from a rail system built to stroke our ego, where will the priority be? Go figure.
This is a very sore point with me because it flies in the face of common sense and good judgment. What we need is not energy conservation, not light bulbs with mercury in them but more capacity. Let there be more generating capacity of whatever kind is viable, including nuclear. I’m willing to let the market sort out the price and the availability. I am not willing to have government force me into what is not a shortage of energy but a shortage of will to have it.
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[…] says… Science is increasingly used as an instrument of authority to impose public policy. 8. Australia-gate and here […]
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[…] when it comes to data collection for temperature readings and the adjustments made to the data. Australian warming trend adjusted UP by 40% « JoNova Quote: This study shows a number of problems with the Australian High Quality Temperature Sites […]
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[…] Science is increasingly used as an instrument of authority to impose public policy. 8. NEW! Australia-gate Australia temperature adjusted upwards to show more warming. 9. Bangladesh-gate IPCC inflates […]
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[…] says… Science is increasingly used as an instrument of authority to impose public policy. 10.Australia-gate Jo Nova and here (climategate.com) and here (WUWT) Australia temperature adjusted upwards to show more […]
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[…] […]
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[…] says… Science is increasingly used as an instrument of authority to impose public policy. 8. NEW! Australia-gate Australia temperature adjusted upwards to show more warming. 9. Bangladesh-gate IPCC inflates […]
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[…] needed, decided to toss out the old so called High Quality (HQ) record, and start again. The old HQ increased the trends by 40% nationally, and 70% in the […]
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[…] says… Science is increasingly used as an instrument of authority to impose public policy. 10.Australia-gate Jo Nova and here (climategate.com) and here (WUWT) Australia temperature adjusted upwards to show more […]
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[…] 10.Australia-gate Jo Nova and here (climategate.com) and here (WUWT) Australia temperature adjusted upwards to show more warming. […]
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