Medieval Warm period due to NAO

[10 Pence Short]

I'm surprised Nigel has the time to 'have a life', what with all his time spent worrying about our planet gradually changing climate (all by itself, by the way).

All b*llocks, all about power and control.

I don't know what's worse; the governments for abusing the situation or the idiots who believe in them.

[groucho]

nigelfr said:

Breaking news from Physics.org..."In the April 3rd edition of Science a collaborative group of scientists from Switzerland, California and the UK report that medieval climate over Europe was heated by the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO). This oscillation pattern, defined as the pressure difference between the Icelandic Low and the Azores High, also influences modern-day weather conditions and has contributed to the recent droughts in North Africa and floods in North-Central Europe."

So I guess that makes a big hole in the "It's the Sun" theory of Global Warming.

But it isn't warming, no?

[nigelfr]

groucho said:

nigelfr said:

Breaking news from Physics.org..."In the April 3rd edition of Science a collaborative group of scientists from Switzerland, California and the UK report that medieval climate over Europe was heated by the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO). This oscillation pattern, defined as the pressure difference between the Icelandic Low and the Azores High, also influences modern-day weather conditions and has contributed to the recent droughts in North Africa and floods in North-Central Europe."

So I guess that makes a big hole in the "It's the Sun" theory of Global Warming.

But it isn't warming, no?

The "But the temperature's stayed the same/gone down" train left the rails a long time ago.

Edited by nigelfr on Sunday 5th April 12:05

Edited by nigelfr on Sunday 5th April 12:06

[groucho]

That's what I said. Global Warming is no more, you can't argue that which makes your original post bks.

By the way, here's some abuse... tool!

[groucho]

groucho said:

nigelfr said:

groucho said:

nigelfr said:

Breaking news from Physics.org..."In the April 3rd edition of Science a collaborative group of scientists from Switzerland, California and the UK report that medieval climate over Europe was heated by the North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO). This oscillation pattern, defined as the pressure difference between the Icelandic Low and the Azores High, also influences modern-day weather conditions and has contributed to the recent droughts in North Africa and floods in North-Central Europe."

So I guess that makes a big hole in the "It's the Sun" theory of Global Warming.

But it isn't warming, no?

The "But the temperature's stayed the same/gone down" train left the rails a long time ago.

Edited by nigelfr on Sunday 5th April 12:05

Edited by nigelfr on Sunday 5th April 12:06

Really? So it's been warming then?

[Jasandjules]

nigelfr said:

The "But the temperature's stayed the same/gone down" train left the rails a long time ago.

When did that happen? Has someone adjusted the recorded data then to make it seem warmer?

[groucho]

Jasandjules said:

nigelfr said:

The "But the temperature's stayed the same/gone down" train left the rails a long time ago.

When did that happen? Has someone adjusted the recorded data then to make it seem warmer?

Take no notice of him, his bullst knows no bounds.

[elster]

nigelfr said:

The Dutch have had sea water defences for hundreds of years and they are currently considered adequate for a few more decades: so were they planning for AGW in the 1500's or did they just put a safety margin in the design?

How do you mean?

The sea defences are due to the country being below sea level.

I thought you were initially arguing FOR MMGW, or are you now changing your mind?

[nigelfr]

Guam said:

nigelfr said:

Guam said:

I love that TB the line is that they overspecced the design in essence, rather than oh look Global warming is cobblers so we will be fine with what we have These guys have no shame

Cheers

You guys make me laugh... the Thames Barrier was designed in 1974 on the basis of data and predictions then.

The Dutch have had sea water defences for hundreds of years and they are currently considered adequate for a few more decades: so were they planning for AGW in the 1500's or did they just put a safety margin in the design?

Thank you for just supporting our contention again Nigel, if they didnt take AGW into account in the speccing of these projects and they are proving more than adequate for the job then where is the evidence of the much vaunted Gloabal Catasrophes then Nige (any islands sunk lately that I am unaware of)?

Oh wait there isnt any and the Designers in both cases must have made reasonable projections as to the needs of the relevant low lying areas and would have assumed negligible sea level changes yes?

In which case the Chicken little screaming of the 3 meter doomsayers was (as with much of the arguement on AGW ) PR spin designed to put fear into the populace to drive political agendas no?



Cheers

"Experts at the Environment Agency said the Thames Barrier will protect the city for decades longer than engineers thought, with a six-year study revealing that the barrier's original designs overestimated the threat from climate change." The original design was in 1974, so thirty five years ago they estimated on the data and theories then available, accurate to within about 5 inches the height they would need in 2030. And you're kicking their arses for those five inches... gimme a break you are so unreasonable.

ETA: where do I get the five inches from? The article says that the barrier is good for an extra 40 years. Sea level rise is about 3mm year: 40 x 3 = 120mm

Edited by nigelfr on Sunday 5th April 13:11

[nigelfr]

Now why have you brought the Thames barrier up here rather than the current Sea level rise thread?

[Jasandjules]

nigelfr said:

"Experts at the Environment Agency said the Thames Barrier will protect the city for decades longer than engineers thought, with a six-year study revealing that the barrier's original designs overestimated the threat from climate change." The original design was in 1974

But there was no Climate Change in 1974 due to Global Warming scare mongering. Sooo, did they get a crytal ball when undertaking this design?

[nigelfr]

I've just had another thought about the Thames Barrier: by criticising the designers for their supposed error from 1974, you implicitly accept that AGW was postulated in that period and taken seriously enough to, at great expense, incorporate measures against it when building the Thames barrier.

Some of you claim AGW is a hoax to raise tax... so who planned this hoax prior to 1974 and why did they wait so long before raising taxes? (and why waste the extra money on the Thames barrier at the time? They could have fudged the figures at the design stage.) I say prior to 1974 because it must have built up a good head of steam to be taken seriously by designers in '74. So what's in it for them then... those late 60's/early 70's conspirators?

Answers wrapped in tin foil please.

[nigelfr]

Guam said:

nigelfr said:

Guam said:

nigelfr said:

Guam said:

You really are Myopic Nige you dont get any of the counter arguement do you (guess you cant afford to). THe Countercase has been consistently that warming and cooling phases are completely normal variations in a natural system affected (if at all) by human activity to a microscopic extent (certainly not measurable in any meaningful sense) you on the other hand selectively cherry pick the arguement whenever data comes out trying (specifically with TB) to rubbish ANY counter debate.

What is too funny for words is that trying to shoot TB down on one aspect of "Natural Forcings" you have actually re-inforced him with a generally supportive postulation. You do see how hilarious that is and how inane it makes your whole position dont you


Cheers

Tom

Sorry, Tom, but I think it's you that don't get the point. The sceptics use the MWP to show a global warm period. If it's an oscillation it's not global and it's not a forcing.

Obviously you don't understand the AGW position either Tom. Every time someone says "Cold today innit, where's yer global warming now?", they are told that AGW is a signal imposed on natural climate variation.

Oh Come on now Nigel thats not what the Pro AGW camp have been saying for YEARS now is it

The fact is its got beyond laughable now, as effectively if its warm, then its warmer than it should otherwise be and if its cold it should be colder

The arguement is spent with anyone other than the most blinkered believer now, furtunately the economic climate will shift focus and resources and politicians will eventually do what they have always done and move towards the view that will gain them the most votes (and that is increasingly NOT going to be AGW imho)


Cheers

Really Tom, I don't know what to make of this post. Maybe you had too much life last night

(I'm not trying to be offensive)

You obviously are aware of the concept of forcings. Here's what Hansen et al had to say in 1998 "The forcings that drive long-term climate change are not known with an accuracy sufficient to define future climate change. Anthropogenic greenhouse gases (GHGs), which are well measured, cause a strong positive (warming) forcing. But other, poorly measured, anthropogenic forcings, especially changes of atmospheric aerosols, clouds, and land-use patterns, cause a negative forcing that tends to offset greenhouse warming. One consequence of this partial balance is that the natural forcing due to solar irradiance changes may play a larger role in long-term climate change than inferred from comparison with GHGs alone. Current trends in GHG climate forcings are smaller than in popular “business as usual” or 1% per year CO2 growth scenarios. The summary implication is a paradigm change for long-term climate projections: uncertainties in climate forcings have supplanted global climate sensitivity as the predominant issue...

Natural Forcings

Natural climate forcings are limited to factors “imposed” on the climate system. Thus fluctuations of soil dust aerosols that occur with drought conditions are an internal climate feedback process. The dominant known natural climate forcings that may be important on global and decadal time scales are changes of the sun and stratospheric aerosols from large volcanoes. Both of these forcings have been measured accurately from satellites during the past two decades and are estimated for the preceding century from indirect measures.
Solar Irradiance.

Measured changes of solar irradiance since 1979 reveal a cyclic variation of amplitude ~0.1% in phase with the sunspot cycle (38). The variation is largest at UV wavelengths that are absorbed in the stratosphere, but ~85% of the variation occurs at wavelengths that penetrate into the troposphere.

Variations of solar irradiance on longer time scales are hypotheses based on ad hoc relationships between irradiance and observed solar features such as sunspot number or the length of the solar cycle. The estimated solar forcing of 0.3 W/m2 for the period 1850 to the present (Fig. 2) is based on the analysis of Lean et al. (39).

Additional indirect solar forcings have been hypothesized, but so far only a small effect via ozone changes has been quantified. The indirect solar forcing via ozone change is in phase with the direct solar forcing and approximately one-third of its magnitude (1). Thus, this indirect solar effect may have added a positive forcing of ≈0.1 W/m2 over the past 150 years.
Volcanos.

Stratospheric aerosols from large volcanoes can cause a large negative forcing. This forcing decays approximately exponentially with a time constant of ~1 year. The eruption of Mt. Pinatubo in 1991, which caused a peak forcing just over 3 W/m2 with an uncertainty of ~20% (13), was probably the largest volcanic aerosol forcing this century.

The climate forcing due to volcanoes in the century preceding satellite data can be estimated from measurements of atmospheric transparency (40). But, because of limitations in the spatial, temporal, and spectral coverage of these ground-based data, the accuracy of the global climate forcing is probably not better than a factor of two.

We calculate the decadal mean of this episodic forcing because our interest is long-term climate change. Fig. 2 shows the range of volcanic aerosol forcings between a decade with no large volcanoes and the decade estimated to have the greatest aerosol amount during the past 150 years (the 1880s). The forcings are calculated relative to the mean aerosol forcing for the period since 1850 (40). Note that use of the decadal mean for this episodic forcing differs from the other forcings in Fig. 2, which each represent the change since 1850. "

http://www.pnas.org/content/95/22/12753.abstract

and the IPCC reports have whole sections devoted to the natural forcings. See this from the technical summary TAR "Any human-induced changes in climate will be embedded in a background of natural climatic variations that occur on a whole range of time- and space-scales. Climate variability can occur as a result of natural changes in the forcing of the climate system, for example variations in the strength of the incoming solar radiation and changes in the concentrations of aerosols arising from volcanic eruptions. Natural climate variations can also occur in the absence of a change in external forcing, as a result of complex interactions between components of the climate system, such as the coupling between the atmosphere and ocean. The El Niño-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) phenomenon is an example of such natural "internal" variability on interannual time-scales. To distinguish anthropogenic climate changes from natural variations, it is necessary to identify the anthropogenic "signal" against the background "noise" of natural climate variability." http://www.ipcc.ch/ipccreports/tar/vol4/english/08...



BTW Tom you say

Guam said:

... you on the other hand selectively cherry pick the arguement whenever data comes out trying (specifically with TB) to rubbish ANY counter debate.

Tom, believe it or not, in a debate the object is to rubbish the counter argument: it takes all the fun out of it if all I'm allowed to do is agree with the other side. Interestingly, the reason I argue against TB's points is that he is often the only one who comes with anything that even resembles a plausible argument.

...
That being said.

What you are presenting above are many of the points that I raised (along with others) criticising the then line taken by you and the other accolytes. Now we see the comments coming out from you supporting our contentions that right now the whole hypothesis is so much smoke and mirrors (which is what some of us were saying 2-3 years ago on here).

Perhaps if the IPCC cleaned its act up they may salvage the final shreds of their credibility, however I doubt it would result in sufficient mea culpa as to get the job done.

...

Good try but...

That quote in bold of mine was the IPCC TAR from 2001: and you just state that you've been using the same arguments for a couple of years!

And here's a similar quote from the IPCC in 1995: "Any human induced effect on climate will be superimposed on the background "noise" of natural
climate variability, which results both from internal fluctuations and from external causes such as solar
variability or volcanic eruptions. Detection and attribution studies attempt to distinguish between
anthropogenic and natural influences."
http://www.ipcc.ch/pdf/climate-changes-1995/spm-sc...

Still, for me the good news is that I can count on your support the next time we get a "Cor blimey, it's a bit parky here today, whatever happened to global warming"

I see that Groucho hasn't got the point: would you mind explaining it to him please?

[10 Pence Short]

nigelfr said:

I've just had another thought about the Thames Barrier: by criticising the designers for their supposed error from 1974, you implicitly accept that AGW was postulated in that period and taken seriously enough to, at great expense, incorporate measures against it when building the Thames barrier.

Some of you claim AGW is a hoax to raise tax... so who planned this hoax prior to 1974 and why did they wait so long before raising taxes? (and why waste the extra money on the Thames barrier at the time? They could have fudged the figures at the design stage.) I say prior to 1974 because it must have built up a good head of steam to be taken seriously by designers in '74. So what's in it for them then... those late 60's/early 70's conspirators?

Answers wrapped in tin foil please.

Who said the climate isn't changing?

I'm perfectly happy to accept the climate is changing, just not that we are responsible for it or should try to do anything to prevent it from happening.

[nigelfr]

Guam said:

nigelfr said:

Guam said:

nigelfr said:

Guam said:

I love that TB the line is that they overspecced the design in essence, rather than oh look Global warming is cobblers so we will be fine with what we have These guys have no shame

Cheers

You guys make me laugh... the Thames Barrier was designed in 1974 on the basis of data and predictions then.

The Dutch have had sea water defences for hundreds of years and they are currently considered adequate for a few more decades: so were they planning for AGW in the 1500's or did they just put a safety margin in the design?

Thank you for just supporting our contention again Nigel, if they didnt take AGW into account in the speccing of these projects and they are proving more than adequate for the job then where is the evidence of the much vaunted Gloabal Catasrophes then Nige (any islands sunk lately that I am unaware of)?

Oh wait there isnt any and the Designers in both cases must have made reasonable projections as to the needs of the relevant low lying areas and would have assumed negligible sea level changes yes?

In which case the Chicken little screaming of the 3 meter doomsayers was (as with much of the arguement on AGW ) PR spin designed to put fear into the populace to drive political agendas no?



Cheers

"Experts at the Environment Agency said the Thames Barrier will protect the city for decades longer than engineers thought, with a six-year study revealing that the barrier's original designs overestimated the threat from climate change." The original design was in 1974, so thirty five years ago they estimated on the data and theories then available, accurate to within about 5 inches the height they would need in 2030. And you're kicking their arses for those five inches... gimme a break you are so unreasonable.

Show me where I am kicking their arses in any way Nige, you have been tasting too much of your homegrown plonk mate should ease up a bit.

Not a shingular "You" shTom, but a generic "you". I washn't addresshing you shpecifically with that posht hic.

[Bing o]

nigelfr said:

I've just had another thought about the Thames Barrier: by criticising the designers for their supposed error from 1974, you implicitly accept that AGW was postulated in that period and taken seriously enough to, at great expense, incorporate measures against it when building the Thames barrier.

Some of you claim AGW is a hoax to raise tax... so who planned this hoax prior to 1974 and why did they wait so long before raising taxes? (and why waste the extra money on the Thames barrier at the time? They could have fudged the figures at the design stage.) I say prior to 1974 because it must have built up a good head of steam to be taken seriously by designers in '74. So what's in it for them then... those late 60's/early 70's conspirators?

Answers wrapped in tin foil please.

Nigel, please.

The Thames Barrier was built to protect London from storm surges caused by low pressure over the North Sea, combined with spring tides, coupled with down stream flows from the Thames.

That is what it was designed for - any attempt to suggest otherwise is spin.

End.

[nigelfr]

Bing o said:

nigelfr said:

I've just had another thought about the Thames Barrier: by criticising the designers for their supposed error from 1974, you implicitly accept that AGW was postulated in that period and taken seriously enough to, at great expense, incorporate measures against it when building the Thames barrier.

Some of you claim AGW is a hoax to raise tax... so who planned this hoax prior to 1974 and why did they wait so long before raising taxes? (and why waste the extra money on the Thames barrier at the time? They could have fudged the figures at the design stage.) I say prior to 1974 because it must have built up a good head of steam to be taken seriously by designers in '74. So what's in it for them then... those late 60's/early 70's conspirators?

Answers wrapped in tin foil please.

Nigel, please.

The Thames Barrier was built to protect London from storm surges caused by low pressure over the North Sea, combined with spring tides, coupled with down stream flows from the Thames.

That is what it was designed for - any attempt to suggest otherwise is spin.

End.

I couldn't agree more: hence why I questioned the reason for bringing in up in a thread on MWP and the NAO:

turbobloke said:

Maybe I just contributed to the scorching heat.....ouch

Still. We can all relax now, not least because:

Guardian in Climate Change NOT Worse Than Previously Thought shock

http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/mar/31/...

nigelfr said:

Now why have you brought the Thames barrier up here rather than the current Sea level rise thread?

Funny how attention got diverted from the theme of this thread. I reckon there won't be anything substantive because the denierscepticwebblogramblingssphere don't want to discuss it.

[nigelfr]

Here's a link to the original article: http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/abstract/324...

The full article is behind a pay wall.

New Scientist have an article on the implications, so I expect the DSWBRS to get on the case straight away.

http://www.newscientist.com/article/dn16892-natura...

[mybrainhurts]

Nigel...do you lust after Citroens?

[groucho]

mybrainhurts said:

Nigel...do you lust after Citroens?

Never heard them called that before.