Causing real harm with no realistic chance of improving the world makes no sense.
via Big Picture News, Informed Analysis
June 13, 2018 at 06:27AM
Month: June 2018
Prices have more than doubled from 2016 lows, boosting profits of big producers
Thermal coal, tagged the least-loved major commodity by analysts, is defying sceptics, with prices rising to the highest level since 2012 thanks to strong Asian demand.
High-grade Australian thermal coal, the benchmark for the vast Asia market, was quoted at $112.60 a tonne on Monday by Argus Media.
The fuel, which is burnt in power stations to generate electricity, has now jumped 130 per cent from its 2016 lows, boosting the profits of big producers such as Glencore and Peabody. The price of South African thermal coal has also hit a six-year high as consumers in Asia scramble for supplies.
While thermal coal is being phased out in Europe on environmental grounds, it still accounts for about 40 per cent of energy consumption in emerging markets, especially Asia.
Demand from India, Japan and South Korea has been robust in the first five months of the year, while an early summer heatwave has lifted imports into China despite Beijing’s efforts to keep a lid on domestic coal prices.
Full post
via The Global Warming Policy Forum (GWPF)
June 13, 2018 at 05:16AM
Has the media been trying to bury bad news here? Embarrassingly bad news for its enthusiasm for supposed man-made global warming, that is.
Last week a team of researchers from the UK Met Office, the University of East Anglia, the University of Gothenburg, the University of Southern Queensland and the Sorbonne published in the journal Science Advances an interesting paper showing that the recent much debated and researched 21st century “slowdown” in global surface temperatures was real and could be explained by reduced solar activity and increased volcanic counteracting climate forcing from greenhouse gases.
It achieved almost no media coverage despite being published in a high profile journal, writes Dr David Whitehouse @ The GWPF.
Its stated aim was to “place the slowdown in a longer term context.” It chose not to use the words “pause” or “hiatus” because it says warming did not entirely cease on decadal timescales.
That’s where I disagree. It depends upon when you start the decade. All the global databases clearly show that warming did cease between 2001 – 2013 (before the recent very strong El Nino), though I would advise the reader to experiment with trends by altering start and end dates to get a better picture of what is going on.
Over this period HadCRUT4 for example has a trend of -0.005 +/- 0.167 degrees per decade which is statistically equivalent to no trend in any researchers notebook.
The krigged HadCRUT4 has 0.051 +/- 0.185 degrees per decade, GISTEMP 0.038 =/- 0.175 degrees per decade, Berkeley 0.050 +/- 0.176, NOAA 0.044 +/- 0.185. The satellites also show the same effect RSSv4.0 TLT 0.001 +/- 0.301, RSSv4.0 TTT -0.069 +/- 0.294, UAH v5.6 TLT 0.044 +/- 0.292 and UAH v5.6 TTT -0.070 +/- 0.291. See graph here.
From 2001 to 2013 it is flat and after that period the El Nino takes over. Because of this the post-2001 period contains no information that can be extrapolated backwards to see if it is a continuance of previous warming statistics. It is a true break with the warming before it.
Some maintain that you can take the data starting in 1980 (the start of the most recent warming period) and fit a linear trend to it and maintain there is no slowdown whatsoever. They should take up their position with these scientists who say there was a slowdown.
Perhaps it would be interesting to read this paper alongside the famous Karl et al paper in 2015 that removed the slowdown by upgrading an ocean temperature database. It hasn’t stood the test of time, has it?
Continued here.
via Tallbloke’s Talkshop
June 13, 2018 at 04:43AM
A very recent study by Swedish scientists appearing in the journal Climate of the Past examining bottom water temperature (BWT) off the coast of Western Sweden (Gullmar Fjord) going back 2500 years found that “the most recent warming of the 20th century does not stand out.”
Team of researchers led by Irina Polovodova Asteman , University of Gotheberg, produced a record of bottom water temperature off the coast of western Sweden and found 20th century warming “does not stand out.” Photo: ResearchGate.
The 2500-year winter temperature record was of reconstructed by using a fjord sediment archive from the NE Atlantic and through analysis of oxygen isotopes and other methods. The study was based on an approximately 8-meter long sediment core extracted from the Gullmar Fjord (Sweden).
They found that the Gullmar Fjord d18O record mainly reflects variability of the winter bottom water temperatures with a minor salinity influence.
The researchers also pointed out that a comparison with instrumental winter temperature observations from Central England and Stockholm shows that the fjord record picks up the contemporary warming of the 20th century, see following diagrams:
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Chart: Polovodova et al 2018
According to the scientists, the Gullmar Fjord record shows a substantial and long-term warming during the Roman Warm Period (~350 BCE – 450 CE) which was followed by variable bottom water temperatures during the Dark Ages (~450 – 850 CE).
The Viking Age/Medieval Climate Anomaly (~850 – 1350 CE) is also indicated by positive bottom water temperature anomalies, while the Little Ice Age (~1350 – 1850 CE) is characterized by a long-term cooling with distinct multidecadal variability.
The team of Swedish scientists, led by Irina Polovodova Asteman, Department of Marine Sciences, University of Gothenburg, Sweden, noted “the most recent warming of the 20th century does not stand out, but appears to be comparable to both the Roman Warm Period and the MCA (Medieval Climate Anomaly).”
via NoTricksZone
June 13, 2018 at 03:42AM
Iowa Climate Science Education 
