The New York Times on Sunday published a special section titled “How Close Are the Planet’s Climate Tipping Points?” The article is heavy on fancy infographics and short on actual references or facts about how many of the Earth’s natural features may be “in danger of collapse.” We will break it down and debunk the Times’ misinformation about coral reefs, the Greenland ice sheet, climate change causing loss of the Amazon Rainforest, and more.
On Episode 123 of The Climate Realism Show, we welcome back two special guests – CFACT’s Chris Martz and Steve Milloy of JunkScience.com – two of the best on X/Twitter at pushing back at climate alarmist nonsense. We will also cover some of the Crazy Climate News of the week, and a new report by the American Energy Institute report showing how the Climate Justice Project is corrupting the courts.
Join us LIVE at 1 p.m. ET with The Heartland Institute’s Jim Lakely, Linnea Lueken, Chris Martz, and Steve Milloy. Join our always lively chat and we’ll answer your questions on the air.
The Biden administration locked in a gas stove rule on Monday after insisting that it is not trying to ban gas stoves, rejecting efforts by opposed organizations to nix the rule.
The Department of Energy’s (DOE) efficiency rule for gas stoves, announced in January, will come into effect as expected in January 2028, according to a Monday entry in the Federal Register. The finalized rule is less stringent than a 2023 proposal that was subsequently abandoned, and nuance in the rulemaking process allowed for the agency to walk back parts of the regulation if it received a significant volume of negative public comments on the docket, according to E&E News, but the DOE has gone ahead with its rule over the objections of several Republican state attorneys general and advocacy groups, including the Competitive Enterprise Institute (CEI).
The DOE rolled out the rule as a “direct final rulemaking,” meaning that there was no published proposal for the policy, according to E&E News. The “direct final rulemaking” process also allowed for groups like CEI to leave comments about the rule with a chance of getting the agency to water down the rule. (RELATED: Forget Stoves! The Biden Admin Is Working Overtime To Phase Out All Your Gas Appliances)
“The Federal Register simply published a confirmation notice – which is a procedural step in our process for direct final rules,” a DOE spokesperson told the Daily Caller News Foundation. “We are simply following our statutory directed process for a direct final standards rule pertaining to cooking,” the spokesperson continued, adding that “the final rules mirror the joint recommendation received from a wide variety of stakeholders, including the Association of Home Appliance Manufacturers, Consumer Federation of America, and energy efficiency advocates.”
In its comments, CEI argued that the newer, less aggressive regulation was indeed watered down from the 2023 proposal, but that it nevertheless should be withdrawn because it represents federal overreach and remained a policy that would increase costs for American consumers, according to E&E News and the Federal Register entry. Besides CEI and some Republican attorneys general, the Antonin Scalia Law School Administrative Law Clinic and other groups also commented against the DOE’s rule.
The DOE has asserted that the suggestion the government wants to ban gas stoves is a “myth” and “misinformation.” Notably, Biden administration officials submitted an amicus brief asking a federal court to reverse a decision that nixed Berkeley, California’s 2019 ban on gas hookups in new buildings, a policy that ostensibly would have outlawed the installation of gas stoves in newly-constructed buildings.
“President Biden is committed to using all the tools at the administration’s disposal to lower costs for American families and deliver healthier communities—including energy efficiency measures like the one announced today,” Energy Secretary Jennifer Granholm said of the rulemaking when it was released in late January.
The DOE’s regulation applies to electric cooktops, gas cooktops, stand-alone electric cooktops, stand-alone gas cooktops and ovens. The rule will likely drive up the costs of particular models up front, but the Biden administration asserts that the policy will save Americans money on their bills over time by reducing the volume of energy household stoves use, according to The Washington Post.
“The new standards will also require only a small portion of models to make modest improvements to their energy efficiency to match the level of efficiency already demonstrated by the majority of the market today,” the agency said in its January press release announcing the rule. “For example, approximately 97 percent of gas stove models and 77 percent of smooth electric stove models on the market already meet these standards.”
Nearly 70% of respondents opposed policies that would essentially ban gas stoves, according to a June 2023 Harvard CAPS Harris poll. More than 80% of Republican respondents and 71% of independents were opposed to policies that would induce a gas stove ban, as were 55% of surveyed Democrats.
Beyond stoves, the DOE has also pushed energy efficiency rules for everyday items like water heaters, furnaces and pool pump motors. The Biden administration has also spent hundreds of millions of dollars to assist state and municipal governments in developing building codes intended to “decarbonize” buildings.
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Time for yet more climate model revision. This study is ‘demonstrating that the depth of the ocean’s mixed layer is the key player in global climate variability’, contrary to existing views, say the researchers. The climate cycle (AMV, see below) under discussion has an estimated period of 60-80 years, so longer than the entire satellite record of climate data.
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The churning of the upper ocean in the tropics of the Atlantic Ocean plays a crucial role in shaping long-term climate patterns across the world, a new study has found.
Researchers have discovered that changes in the ocean’s mixed layer—the topmost section where wind and waves blend warm surface waters with cooler depths—are the primary force behind a climate phenomenon known as Atlantic Multidecadal Variability (AMV) in the tropics.
The AMV has far-reaching effects on global climate, says Phys.org.
It influences weather patterns from North America to Europe and Africa, affecting everything from hurricane activity in the Caribbean to rainfall in the Sahel region.
Dr. Balaji Senapati, lead author of the study at the University of Reading, said, “Until now, it was believed that changes in heat exchange between the ocean and atmosphere drove the climate patterns that affect weather in the various parts of the world. Our new study challenges that view, demonstrating that the depth of the ocean’s mixed layer is the key player in global climate variability.
“This research advances our understanding of Atlantic climate variability and highlights the complex relationship between the ocean and atmosphere in shaping our planet’s climate. Insights into natural climate variability become increasingly valuable for developing effective mitigation strategies as we face the challenges of climate change.”
Forecasting improvements
The study, published this month in Geophysical Research Letters, found that when the extratropical North Atlantic is warmer than average, trade winds become weaker. This weakening causes the mixed layer of the ocean to become shallower, especially during summer. As a result, the sun’s energy warms a thinner layer of water, leading to more intense warming of the tropical Atlantic.
This process creates a feedback loop: warmer waters in the northern part of the Atlantic weaken the trade winds, which then leads to a shallower mixed layer and further warming in the tropics. When the AMV shifts to its cooler phase, this process reverses, resulting in cooler temperatures across the Atlantic.
The findings have significant implications for climate modeling and long-range forecasting. Many current climate models may not accurately represent these upper-ocean processes, potentially leading to poor predictions of the AMV and its global impacts.
Iowa Climate Science Education 