Hurricane warning? Don't worry, be happy... 24 October 05

Reminds me when Lois Gibbs (housewife in Love Canal at the time) was concerned about her child and others who were sick & dying – they figured from the ka-zillion toxic wastes under their suburb, unbeknowst to them when they bought their homes. The gov officials never did attribute it to that. For one thing the numbers were too small (like hurricanes) to reach stat significance of 95% certainty.

Lois with a scientist’s help & friends got a map of the original swales underlying the neighborhood & bingo, nearly all illnesses were along the swales, where the toxins flowed, & the stats became very convincing (with the universe limited now to those living along the swales) – but the gov never did accept it.

Of course, no one wanted to buy their houses, so this working class community was left with big mortgages, and blamed for not moving immediately.

They also blamed parents for not making their children stay on the cement walkways.

That reminds me of contrarians who blame hurricane victims (who were not expecting such increased hurricane intensity & frequency) for living near the ocean…It’s called “blaming the victim” & sure takes the heat off of those really resonsible. Like the perpetrators.

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If so, then he was dead wrong.

The fact that this list was insufficient to accommodate this season is evidence to me that GW/CC is not being addressed enough and these weather guys need to go back and recalculate their projections and double check their initial conditions and assumptions.

Anyone with any common sense knows that something is different and very different. Maybe some scientists can learn something from the engineers. It is called reality. Engineers have to deal with reality because they are accountable for their mistakes.

I think William Gray needs to feel this accountability more. He is responsible for our future and he is taking a big risk to claim GW/CC is not to blame. If GW/CC is not to blame, then what is? How can he be sure? Uncertainty does not make a certainty so no one can claim GW/CC is not responsible. No one can do this and claim to be a scientist.

All the best,

Dan

and I have the same interest. Not everyone has the resources to rebuild their existing structure and need to find ways to make what they have more efficient with the financial resources available to them.

Good luck with the March!

Best Wishes,

Dan

Hooker Chemical Company used a former canal (Love Canal) as a waste disposal site. They did so with the knowledge and consent of health agencies at the time. Hooker designed the landfill in accordance with the best engineering principles of the day and constructed it carefully.

Long after Hooker closed the landfill and stopped burying wastes in it the Niagara Falls School Board decided to purchase the land to build a school. Hooker recognized the potential danger that penetrating the clay top liner might pose and refused to sell the land, but finally yielded to governmental pressure.

Hooker negotiated a contract that included a clause that prohibited any excavation on the site forever (to preserve the top liner); the land was to be used for a school parking lot and playground. The city decided to build a subdivision as well as a school. The basements, sanitary sewer, storm sewer lines and water lines all penetrated the top liner.

During the height of the since discredited chlorinated dioxin hysteria, the putative toxicity of the Love Canal hit the media. Thousands of residents were frightened out of their wits, sampling, analysis and lawyers consumed billions of dollars. When the dust settled, the analyses proved that exposure to the site had harmed no one.

A 1981 New York Times editorial said, “it may well turn out that the public suffered less from the chemicals there than from the hysteria generated by flimsy research irresponsibly handled.”

just as they set out to do…They didn’t follow the swales….

How about the Michigan PBB case? Another (state) gov cover-up. A company that made both cattle feed enhancement AND flame retardant for childrens clothes (with PBB) got the bags mixed up and PBB entered the Michigan dairy cows & thru them the people (it bioaccumulates), and many cows & people sickened or died. The state gov didn’t want to alarm the public & harm one of their main products – dairy. One farmer finally held a media event & shot all his milk cows, and only after that it became public.

You don’t want to yell fire in a crowded theater when there isn’t a fire – even, perhaps, when there is a fire. But at least there should be efforts to get the people to file out peacefully….

And at least we should be taking every cost-effective measure we can to combat AGW, letting the eager beavers go beyond and sacrifice (lower their living standard), if they wish. Which is what I plan to do as soon as the plug-in hybrids come out. We never buy new, but I’m planning to pony up & buy one.

I’m not a climatologist. I think that Gray leaves no question what he feels about the paper published in premier climatology journal Nature. Given the fact Gray has been in the hurricane business for 50 years I wonder who is vetting the articles for Nature and Science…

What I got out of the rebuttal to Emanuel’s paper,

+Emanuel considered data which had been skewed downwards from 1973 to 1986 (AH scaling)

+Emanuel measured the wrong part of the hurricane to gain estimates of it’s “force” (Vmax vs. the outer most bands)

+The data doesn’t jive with his conclusions (Hurricanes had a lower Vmax between 1975 and 1994, when global sea temps were rising. AND much higher Vmax in the 1950s and 1960s when global sea temps were undergoing a modest decrease)

+Comparing the decades doesn’t show net increases in hurrcane activity.

About the Science study Gray says, “The near universal reference to this paper over the last few weeks by most major media outlets is helping to establish a false belief among the general public that global hurricane intensity has been rising and that global warming may be a contributing factor.”

If someone in the business of hurricane research for 50 years says these kinds of things about studies published in the premier climatology journals it makes a layman, like myself, wonder what is going on within the climatology field and who makes decisions about what is published as valid research.

Gray doesn’t say they are a little bit inaccurate but that they are flat out wrong and completely inaccurate in their research methodology and conclusions! Further that the bad information is being propogated to the public…

I guess the saying, “if it bleeds, it leads” still holds true… thanks media we can count on you!

you forgot, norb, to show how it is reminiscent. You just made sh*t up and provided no evidence nor explanation as to how the subject heading is actually true.

Best,

D

because AGW is predicted to increase the intensity & perhaps frequency of hurricanes. So look out, people. Katrina & this entire hurricane season (wich Gray figures is within the normal range) will seem like a small whistle in the park once GW really kicks in!

Is that scary enough for Halloween?

This is science, Jimbo.

You must not pass judgement on whether Gray is correct or not, as Emanuel’s response may highlight what Gray forgot, or KE may take the information and refine his calculations, or whatever.

It is too early to judge who is correct.

HTH,

D

media hyperbole and shoddy science created hysteria where no real problem existed. The artificial hysteria caused real harm. The same thing happened following the Chernobyl accident. The same is happening now vis-àis global warming. There are many other examples.

To quote Pete Seeger, “When will we ever learn?”

1. More intense hurricanes are not the only possible effects of AGW, so even if Gray is right, we still have to reduce GHGs, just the same.

2. People concerned about other people & the earth, shouldn’t even be following the scientific model (or demanding its perfection).

Here’s what wrote today on RealClimate:

Let me clarify the difference between scientists and environmentalists. I assure you the hosts of this site [RealClimate] are definitely scientists, though I heard of a Chicago scientist buying a SunFrost frig (1/10 electricity), so some might also be environmentalists in their private lives.

SCIENTISTS follow “THE SCIENTIFIC MODEL” of avoiding false positives (making a claim when it is false); that is, they do not make claims unless there is high confidence that they are right (usually 95% certainty), so as to protect their reputations; otherwise no one will believe them again (like the boy who called wolf).

ENVIRONMENTALISTS, those concerned about reducing harm to people and the earth, follow “THE MEDICAL MODEL” of avoiding false negatives (acting as if there is no problem, when indeed there is); that is, they do not need high certainty of a problem to start addressing it. It’s unimaginable for a doctor to tell a patient that there is only 94% certainty that the lump is cancerous, so they won’t operate. Some environmentalists even follow the precautionary principle of disallowing actions, unless they are proven safe—like not emitting GHGs beyond needs and simple pleasures, unless we are 99% certain AGW is not happening (the higher level of certainty is due to the risks being so grave).

I’m an environmentalist. I already figured AGW was happening back in 1990, 5 years before it reached 95% scientific certainty (as did Pope John Paul II, who told us it is everyone’s responsibility to solve), and I started reducing my GHGs in cost-effective ways and am saving $$hundred per year without lowering my living standard. Since evidence of GW has continued to pour in and become stronger & stronger (and since I’m saving heaps of money by abating it), I don’t think any contrarian or scientist can convince me to start emitting more GHGs, even if it becomes 100% certain AGW is not happening.

The HOCKEY STICK was a done deal for me back in 1990, well before the first articles came out on it. Regular GW is no longer my greatest concern. I’m on to worrying about RUNAWAY GW, or the VENUS EFFECT, our human-induced warming causing nature to start emitting more & more GHGs (CO2, CH4) in positive feedback fashion, perhaps leading to near extinction of life on earth, as happened from GW during the end-Permian extinction, and the other 4 great extinctions. I’m convinced we’re already into or on the brink of the 6TH MASS EXTINCTION, though we may not reach scientific certainty until it’s a done deal. It’s possible we may not be able to reverse this, even with big GHG cuts, but I have to keep doing my best with the hope it’s not too late – and would keep doing my best, even if scientists finally do tell me it’s too late (hoping they’re wrong). That’s what it means to be an environmentalist (or Christian, or Buddhist, etc).

It’s either a coal-burning plant, a nuclear power plant, or a windmill in your back yard. The choice it up to you.

...by repeating talking points. There’s no shoddy science. Most of the surface of the planet is warming, some places more than others. What’s shoddy about that? If the intent is to assert that there’s no problem, well that’s an opinion.

If the intent is to say that there’s ‘hysteria’, you haven’t shown, ever, never, not once, where science is the cause of the hysteria.

Best,

D

Here.

Best,

D

This idea came from Mom, but she does not know where she read it!

So, I wonder. If photosynthesis absorbs solar energy and stores it chemically in the form of sequestered carbon and in this process absorbs heat energy which would have otherwise gone directly into heating the ocean surface, then reintroducing the wetlands in the Mississippi Delta may not only help slow hurricanes but also reduce the intensity by reducing some the regions SSTs.

I am curious about the actual numbers on it. This would be a good research project if it is an unknown quantity and knowing it would add more value to this particular bio solution as wetlands slow down storm surges as well!

Again, solutions which comprise more than one modality have a greater effect and should always be analyzed in this light. The more the added value of any idea, then the more an idea can be “sold” to smart policy makers.

What may be useful is to know precisely the chemical reactions used to grow this ecosystem and any endothermic relationships from those chemical equations. And then determine how much heat was “not” absorbed by the water. Then by applying simple physics, we can determine how much the SSTs can be reduced from reintroducing the wetlands to large areas of the Mississippi Delta.

Certainly ocean currents play a role and will distribute this water. The best part is since it will be new growth (the original wetlands were destroyed by us), then the sequestration and cooling effect will be maximized in the short term. Therefore, plant growth rates would be useful in this analysis as well. I guess the marine life which the plants support also sequester more carbon and allow the plants to absorb more solar energy through more new growth which protect the shoreline, sequester carbon, and cool the water.

Anyone interested in lowering SSTs? So, I leave this for others to answer since this is outside my current focus right now. Also, I am not trained in biology.

Maybe this question has already been answered. I am not sure. I think it would help if we all knew. I am curious.

Best Wishes, Dan

I hope you don’t mean that “no real problem existed” at Chernobyl! And I think the “hysteria” was justified. If our nuclear plants in Sweden and other places in Europe hadn’t noticed the increased radiation as quickly as they did, and the media and politicians hadn’t got involved, Soviet would have tried to continue to conceal it and probably caused more damage. Though the damage was already made – people are still dying from that catastrophe. So don’t say that no problem existed. Even our Swedish reindeers got contaminated… Read more on http://www.chernobyl.info/

So do you think, by the way, that the families at the Love Canal should disregard what happened to their children, continue to live there since there were no evidence? Would YOU be willing to move in there? “Why worry? There’s no evidence anyway, just circumstances.” In these long term developments, like climate change, that is a very risky approach.

Tiny points:

If photosynthesis absorbs solar energy and stores it chemically in the form of sequestered carbon and in this process absorbs heat energy which would have otherwise gone directly into heating the ocean surface, then reintroducing the wetlands in the Mississippi Delta may not only help slow hurricanes but also reduce the intensity by reducing some the regions SSTs.

There’s some things mixed up here:

Photosynthesis (PS) doesn’t sequester carbon per se, it uses carbon as a carrier for metabolic reactions. Carbon is sequestered in tissue.

PS doesn’t absorb heat energy per se, it uses a photon as the kicker to start the reaction. Leaf surfaces can absorb heat energy if they don’t have hairs or coloration preventing absorption.

Wetlands being heated has nothing to do with heating the ocean surface directly, as they are two separate, distinct ecosystems. Therefore, reintroducing wetlands will not directly affect SSTs.

Wetlands would affect SSTs indirectly by filtering water, shading water (maybe), changing the albedo (likely lowering it) of adjacent lands.

...solutions which comprise more than one modality have a greater effect and should always be analyzed in this light.

Hmmm…multipartite solutions also have greater complexity and require more intensive management and information flows, and are thus more apt to have more critical paths that can lead to failure. The energy flows and information flows into and out of such systems are greater.

Socioecological systems with multiple stakeholder groups may be stronger and more cohesive because of the multiple relationships formed in such an arrangement, but that is still no guarantee for the undefined “greater effect”.

Best,

D

I went on an assumption but did not know for sure. Your answer is appreciated.

Best,

Dan

I meant that the widespread predictions of doom to large numbers of persons who received low-level radiation doses from the explosion were unwarranted hysteria. There was no need to fear that the future death toll would be huge. I think that the recent UN report on the subject confirms that the disaster had very little effect beyond the immediate environs of Chernobyl. The fear of the explosion caused more deleterious effects than the explosion caused.

I had not heard that the Soviets tried to cover up the accident (though I don’t doubt it) and that we discovered it only when downwind monitors found excess radiation. I am not sure that it makes any difference in the outcome. Outside knowledge did little to mitigate the effects of the explosion. The effects on the health of persons other than those in the immediate vicinity appear to be minor to nonexistent; as at Love Canal.

Has the excess radiation harmed the reindeer, or the humans in Sweden? I think that the UN report and other assessments demonstrate that the answer is no. I think that we are comparing the exposures to an indefensibly low standard of allowable radiation exposure when we say that the reindeer and Swedes have been harmed.

I think that Chernobyl and Three Mile Island (TMI) have demonstrated that we have little if anything to fear from nuclear power generators. At TMI, we learned that the horror scenario portrayed in the movie “China Syndrome” is not going to happen. Ironically, the TMI accident followed the movie script right up to the point that the molten core escaped the containment building. The TMI containment held the molten core.

I think that long-term follow up investigations of the health of persons exposed to low-level doses of toxicants at Love Canal have shown that their health has not suffered. I think that we have compared their doses to indefensibly low allowable exposure doses.

There are many reasons why I do not wish to live in Buffalo, NY, but the contamination at the Love Canal site is not one of them. I would gladly live in a similar environment in a place with less snowfall.

I think that we overestimate the potential harm of radiation and toxic substances because we use excessively conservative methods to estimate safe exposure levels. We fear them far more than they deserve.

I think that Chernobyl and Three Mile Island (TMI) have demonstrated that we have little if anything to fear from nuclear power generators.

You marginalize yourself everytime you type these days.

You dipsh*t, I lived over there when it went off.

As a result of that, I got a contract to work on a team to upgrade dedicated landlines and hardware to DWD weather offices in FRG, Aus and Switz so their disaster preparedness was better (this was before the Internets). Sadly, I didn’t get to work in Italy. Anyway,

Do you know how many excess cases of leukemia, bone and brain cancers have been diagnosed around Chernobyl since the accident?

No?

Do you know how many square miles around there are not habitable to this day?

No?

Do you know what % of my primary care doctors insist I continue to get screened for cancer after they find out where I was when Chernobyl went off?

Huh.

You’re talking out your 8ss, norb. You don’t know what the f you’re talking about.

But I appreciate the extra-poor post, norb, because I think if anyone had any doubts you were off the deep end, this does it and I can save time by ignoring you from now on.

Best,

D

The climate has been warming nearly steadily since the last Ice Age, about 10,000 ago. A brief cooling spell that ended about 1850 temporarily interrupted the warming, but the warming has resumed.

What I do not accept is the claim that the increased concentration of carbon dioxide in the atmosphere has caused most of the warming over the past 150 years. That claim is supported by only simulation science, i.e. computer models. The computer models are inaccurate and unreliable.

I also object to the forecasts of doom that we hear every day. It seems that everyone has accepted the value at the top of the range of model-predicted temperature increases as gospel and projects resulting harm from that. It is hysteria. The models predict a most likely temperature rise of a couple of degrees C. Even if they are accurate, the temperature rise will be similar to the rise that has occurred since 1800, without harm.

Ecological effects, sea level rise, spread of disease vectors and diseases, heat related death, water shortages, all predicated on the 6 degree C temperature rise. Then there is the matter of warming causing more frequent and more severe hurricanes. All of it is balderdash. All of it is shoddy science creating hysteria.

You tell me what problem the existing temperature rise has caused. Moreover, let’s compare any harm that you can name to the benefits that have occurred, i.e. longer growing seasons (more food), less cold-related death.

When will we learn that not all of the bad things that happen are our fault? Shall we go back to burning witches?

Dano, may I chip in here as you seem to know your stuff.

There are record high temperatures in the UK now (27 October’s highest ever was up in Scotland, not in the south; that’s another puzzle), which may have something to do with the movement of this year’s unusually warm water from the Gulf of Mexico up the Gulf Stream.

On the other hand, a very cold winter is forecast for western Europe this year.

How do we reconcile these? That is, why isn’t this coming northern winter expected to be moderated by the warm water flowing up from the Gulf?

Keith

Forecasts for record-breaking cold this winter, the coldest since 1963 seem a bit of a media invention. The Met Office merely say that their forecasts is 2:1 in favour of a negative North Atlantic Oscillation (NAO) (which we last had in 1995, when the global temperature was below what it is now, so if anything we might be looking at the coldest winter since then).

This forecast is based SOLELY on sea-surface temperatures around the Azores in May. Statistics gained from past experience suggest that the pattern in May can be used to predict the NAO the following winter. Nobody really knows, though, particularly not in a changing climate. Some studies suggest that the cooling of the satrosphere (due to greenhouse warming and ozone depletion) in itself may already have pushed us into a permanently positive winter NAO – perhaps this winter will tell. If the UK get another mild winter, then I guess we can foreget about cold winters here for good.

In any case, the Met Office don’t predict a cold winter throughout the northern hemisphere, just a distribution of wintry weather different from that in the past nine years (including warm westerlies pushing further south, not over the UK). A negative NAO means a warmer winter in southern Europe, Greenland and Newfoundland.

Did people see the prediction for 2005 to be the warmest year on record (NASA) – it may yet fall very marginally behind 1998, but then 1998 had a strong El Nino, 2005 had none (apart from a very weak one which finished in spring). Which means a lot of global warming even since 1998!

Yes, Scientists must judge as that is the scientific process. Weigh the criticisms, test the hypothesis and replicate the methodology to compare the outcome data. Oh and challenge the illogical or wrong information.

It would seem sciencE and naturE are not seeming so scientific. Were they the ones who also published the Global Cooling theories of the 70’s?

Yes Dano I decided to ignore him and his ilk some time ago. There is a role for a well informed, well intentioned sceptic but more often than not these contrarians fall into some other category!

Douglas Coker

It would seem sciencE and naturE are not seeming so scientific.

Examples please.

“Seems, madam? Nay, it is, I know not seems.”

Were they the ones who also published the Global Cooling theories of the 70’s?

No. And no.

Best,

D

Two that come to mind are Von Storch’s contention with the hockey stick methodology and now Gray’s contention with the design methodology of Emanual’s study.

But what is the point, you ask for examples and then don’t accept what is given or say it is “talking points” or it is “cut and pasted” or some or minimalization of it…

Well, so what? A problem with statistical method chosen isn’t “not seeming so scientific”. This has nothing to do with “not seeming so scientific”. You’ll want to show what was not seeming so scientific about it. Like I said before, this is how science is done.

And, again, a discussion (“contention”) with design methodology isn’t “not seeming so scientific”. A problem with design method chosen isn’t “not seeming so scientific”, it is how science is done. You’ll want to show what was not seeming so scientific about it. Just saying something doesn’t make it so.

But what is the point, you ask for examples and then don’t accept what is given

You’re right – I should just accept a poor example that is given and let it go at that – why, poor examples should be accepted as given! That’s good enough! Our world should run on shoddiness and not get bogged down in whether a contention is true or not.

Silly me.

D

Wikipedia (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chernobyl_accident#Civilians) and the UN documents that I have read, report an increase in childhood thyroid cancer, deny an increase in leukemia and do not mention brain or bone cancers among the results of the Chernobyl accident. The reports also say that so far all treatments of the thyroid cancers have been successful.

Apparently, the governments established 30-km exclusion zone around the reactor and allowed only workers at the Chernobyl plant to enter the zone. The also established three more distant zones. The reports also suggest that some of the increase in thyroid cancer rates may be an artifact of the increased screening after the accident.

It appears that the zone has become something of a wildlife refuge and that the flora and fauna are thriving within the human exclusion zone.

I do not know where you were in relation to the reactor when it exploded or what your exposure might have been. It is clear from your last post that you are afraid that you might have been heavily exposed and destined to suffer some form of radiation sickness. For your sake, I hope not. Perhaps you are among those who have been frightened needlessly.

It seems the standards of these peer reviewed journals are slipping. I just summarized what Gray found in his analysis of the study conducted and the apparent shoddy reviewing done by the editors at Science and Nature…. or was it hidden bias?

I also find it funny that the “old timers”, the ones who have been in the field a LONG time or in Von Storch’s case, pioneered the field, disagree with some of the latest findings touted as fact and evidence…

and read the debates over eugenics.