The purpose of the Green New Deal and climate alarmism in general, is to control and restrict the freedom of people. It has nothing to do with Polar Bears or the climate.
Heathrow third runway ruled illegal over climate change | Environment | The Guardian
It has been that way since day one of this scam.
via Real Climate Science
February 27, 2020 at 09:58AM
If I was a 17 year-old who didn’t attend school, perhaps journalists would talk to me about science.
via Real Climate Science
February 27, 2020 at 09:58AM
From the 1880s to 1940s, the Arctic’s Beaufort Sea was up to 3°C warmer than the 2000s (Durantou et al., 2012).
Consequently, during this warmer period, the region’s sea ice coverage endured over a month less (i.e., 34 fewer days of sea ice) than it does today.
Somehow the region’s polar bears managed to survive with warmer temperatures and less sea ice.
New study: No change in seal diet of Beaufort Sea polar bears (2004-2016)
A new study (Bourque et al., 2020) finds about 65% of the Beaufort Sea polar bear diet consists of ringed and bearded seals.
Trend analysis indicates this shows there is no “clear increases or decreases in proportional consumption of any prey species” from 2004 to 2016. Further, “the effect for melt season was not significant for any individual prey (p > .10)”.
In other words, polar bears were consuming no fewer seals in 2016 than they did in 2004.
The reduction in sea ice hasn’t limited polar bears’ feeding practices.
That polar bears continue to feast on seals when sea ice is less available in the late summer is not surprising to native populations. Inuit hunters have observed polar bears capturing seals on “really thin” ice (Wong et al., 2017). Thick sea ice isn’t necessary.
Polar bears’ best body condition is in August-October – after sea ice breakup occurs
Polar bears’ worst body condition – when they’re at their thinnest – occurs during the months of the year when sea ice is thick: April and May.
Their best, well-fed body condition occurs during the months when sea ice is at its thinnest, or after the seasonal ice break-up occurs: August to October.
Scientists acknowledge the “increase in body condition after break-up date was somewhat unexpected” (Galicia et al., 2020).
“Consensus” science and the “emotional charging of the polar bear”
The likely reason polar bears’ seal-hunting resiliency is “unexpected” is because many scientists have assumed the popular claim that polar bear habitats are threatened by declining sea ice is accurate.
After all, that’s what the “consensus” says.
Anyone who disagrees with the declining-sea-ice-threatens-polar-bears narrative is a “denier” engaging in “denial” according to scientists like Michael E. Mann (Harvey et al., 2018).
Some scientists have been honest enough to acknowledge the “horror stories” about “extremely skinny” or “starving” bears “on the brink of extinction” are an example of the “emotional charging of the polar bear” compromising objective analysis (Sellheim, 2020).
Estimates of of the size of polar bear populations can range from 19,000 to 30,000 – an enormous uncertainty range.
Of the 19 distinct polar bear populations in the Arctic, just 7 are thought to be declining. The status of the other 12 populations is either stable, increasing, or unknown.
Perhaps a little more skepticism – rather than “emotional charging” – would be recommended in polar bear ecological science.
via NoTricksZone
February 27, 2020 at 09:51AM
International Polar Bear Day is a good day to ask: Are polar bear researchers hiding good news? Extended lags in publishing polar bear counts and a failure to publish data on female polar bear body weights and cub survival in Western Hudson Bay for more than 25 years make it look like polar bear researchers are delaying and suppressing good news.
In particular, the failure to report the data on cub survival and weights of female bears suggests that these health measures have not declined over the last two decades as claimed. If these figures are indeed the strongest evidence that sea ice loss due to climate change is harming Western Hudson Bay polar bears, why on earth have they not been made public? And why won’t a single journalist ask to see that data?
GWPF press release, London, 27 February 2020:
A prominent Canadian zoologist has suggested that scientists may be hiding a spate of good news on polar bears.
In State of the Polar Bear Report 2019, published by the Global Warming Policy Foundation (GWPF) on International Polar Bear Day, Dr Susan Crockford explains publication of population counts for several Arctic regions have been long overdue.
Data on the body condition of female bears and survival of cubs in Western Hudson Bay have not been published in over 25 years, despite claims that these are key measures of the impact of climate change on bears.
According to Dr Crockford, this may well be because the data do not support claims of disaster for the bears.
Dr Crockford also says that sea ice conditions for Western and Southern Hudson Bay bears have been excellent in recent years.
“It can hardly be claimed that lack of sea ice is causing Western and Southern Hudson Bay polar bear numbers to decline as a result of poor cub survival and reduced weights of adult females when breakup and freeze-up dates have been so advantageous for the last three years,” Dr Crockford said.
The report also looks at recent incidents when two Russian Arctic towns were visited by polar bears, and suggestions that 2019 was the year of the polar bear ‘invasion’. The lives of local residents were certainly threatened by the congregations of bears, which numbered more than 50.
And as Dr Crockford explains, such large congregations of polar bears are likely to be an on-going problem because there are now so many polar bears roaming the Arctic and because virtually all communities still have open garbage dumps:
There is no evidence these 2019 ‘invasion’ incidents were caused by a local lack of sea ice or because the polar bears were starving. Right now, Arctic residents and visitors face a much greater risk of having a deadly encounter with a polar bear at almost any time of year than they did decades ago because polar bear populations are so much larger.
“Predictions of future calamity do not change the present reality that polar bears are abundant and thriving,” Dr Crockford said.
• Reports have yet to be published for polar bear population surveys of M’Clintock Channel and Viscount Melville (completed 2016 and 2014, respectively), Southern Beaufort and Gulf of Boothia (completed 2017) and Davis Strait (completed 2018), yet several were promised for 2019 or sooner.
• At present, the official IUCN Red List global population estimate (2015) is 22,000–31,000 (average about 26,000), but surveys conducted since then might raise the average to about 29,500.
• Despite having to deal with changes in summer sea ice habitat greater than all other Arctic regions, according to Norwegian biologists polar bears in the Svalbard area of the Barents Sea showed few negative impacts from the low sea ice years of 2016 through 2019.
• Despite repeated claims that the Southern Beaufort subpopulation is declining and nutritionally stressed, a summer survey of the coast of Alaska in 2019 documented 31 fat healthy polar bears onshore in July compared to only three in 2017, when sea ice retreat had been similarly early.
• In 2019, and contrary to expectations, freeze-up of sea ice on Western Hudson Bay came as early in the autumn as it did in the 1980s (for the third year in a row); sea ice breakup in spring was like the 1980s too, with the result that polar bears onshore were in excellent condition.
• If the public are to take seriously repeated claims of harm to polar bear health and survival due to climate change, data collected since 2004 on cub survival and weights of female polar bears in Western Hudson Bay must be made available: it has now been more than 25 years since data has been published on cub survival and weights of female polar bears in Western Hudson Bay but polar bear specialists continue to cite decades-old data to support their statements that lack of sea ice is causing declines in body condition and population size.
• Since polar bear researchers acknowledge that there has been no negative trend in either freeze-up or breakup dates for sea ice in Western Hudson Bay since at least 2001, the failure to report current data on cub survival and weights of female bears suggests that body condition and cub survival have not declined over the last two decades as claimed.
• Two separate incidents at opposite ends of the Russian Arctic at the beginning and the end of 2019 made this the year of the polar bear ‘invasion’. Belushya Guba in the Barents Sea over the winter of 2018/2019 and Ryrkaypiy, Chukotka in December 2019 were each besieged by more than 50 bears, which terrified local residents. Although tragedy was ultimately averted, this is likely to be an on-going problem for Arctic settlements in the future: not because there is not enough sea ice but because there are now so many polar bears roaming Arctic coastlines.
Crockford, S.J. 2020. State of the Polar Bear Report 2019. Global Warming Policy Foundation Report 39, London. pdf here.
via polarbearscience
February 27, 2020 at 09:36AM
Iowa Climate Science Education 