Category: Y2Kyoto

Y2Kyoto: State Of Anorexia Envirosa

Washington Examiner;

A repeat of last winter’s deep freeze could lead to electricity blackouts in a clutch of states spanning the Midwest to the Mid-Atlantic as proposed environmental regulations propel a switch toward natural gas-fired power.
PJM Interconnection, a regional grid operator, proposed new measures aimed at ensuring it doesn’t again flirt with losing 22 percent of its electricity capacity as it did during the “polar vortex” in early January. Echoing the concerns of Republicans and some centrist Democrats who have admonished the Obama administration for rules that would restrain the use of coal-fired power, PJM noted the situation could become more dire under a “rapid transition” from coal to natural gas.
“Last winter’s generator performance — when up to 22 percent of PJM capacity was unavailable due to cold weather-related problems — highlighted a potentially significant reliability issue,” it said. “PJM’s analysis shows that a comparable rate of generator outages in the winter of 2015/2016, coupled with extremely cold temperatures and expected coal retirements, would likely prevent PJM from meeting its peak load requirements.”

Related; The Obama administration is working to forge a sweeping international climate change agreement to compel nations to cut their planet-warming fossil fuel emissions, but without ratification from Congress.

Y2Kyoto: State Of Anorexia Envirosa

Forward!

In order to comply with the new Obama era EPA regs, American Electric Power, which supplies a major portion of the electricity used on the east coast, will be closing almost one quarter of their coal fired plants between now and next June. This is because they were economically unable to come into compliance with the new regulations in the impossibly short window of opportunity offered by the EPA. This is going to reduce the total surge capacity available for some of our most densely populated areas just when we may get hit with weather related demand spikes beyond anyone’s control.

Y2Kyoto: The Manitoba Ice Cap

Another Earth Day success story;

It will take a handful of bulldozers and a few more weeks of warm weather, but City of Winnipeg staff are confident they can take a dent out of an 18-metre snowpile that has stubbornly refused to melt before winter threatens to once again overwhelm the city’s snow-dumping sites.

Related.

First They Came For The Light Bulbs

Kevin, Gavin, Mike – it’s Seth again! *

Raising beef for the American dinner table does far more damage to the environment than producing pork, poultry, eggs or dairy, a new study says.
Compared with the other animal proteins, beef produces five times more heat-trapping gases per calorie, puts out six times as much water-polluting nitrogen, takes 11 times more water for irrigation and uses 28 times the land, according to the study, published Monday in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
[…]
Eshel calculates that the average American who switches from beef to pork would reduce the equivalent of 1,200 pounds of carbon dioxide a year, which is about nine days’ worth of the nation’s per capita greenhouse gas emissions. The EPA calculates that it is the same as the emissions from 61 gallons of gas or what comes out of the smokestack from burning 580 pounds of coal.

Y2Kyoto: Reindeer say…

Warmer is better!

The research team found out that the numbers of Svalbard reindeer have increased by 30% in the last year. This year’s result continues the trend which has been observed accurately over the last 36 years.
The scientists discovered this by counting the number of reindeer in the valley of Adventdalen in central Spitsbergen, part of a long term study of a reindeer population in Svalbard.
This is one of only a very few studies on animal populations and climate change that involves animals being physically counted annually rather than estimated.

How odd, given that they’re mammals and everything.
(h/t north of 60)

Y2Kyoto: Vapourized

Australia repeals carbon tax;

In a vote that could highlight the difficulty in implementing additional measures to reduce carbon emissions ahead of global climate talks next year in Paris, Australia’s Senate on Thursday voted 39-32 to repeal a politically divisive carbon emissions price that contributed to the fall from power of three Australian leaders since it was first suggested in 2007. […]
The former Labor government, while introducing a price on carbon, said the move would help slash emissions by 160 million metric tons by 2020. It offered voters billions of dollars in compensation through tax breaks and welfare payments for increased costs stemming from one of the most dramatic reforms ever attempted in the energy-reliant economy.
But after the global financial crisis took hold in 2008, followed by the end of a decade long mining boom in 2012 that slowed growth and employment in the $1.5 trillion (US$1.4 trillion) economy, Australian voters turned against climate laws–recognized by the International Energy Agency as model legislation for developed countries–blaming them for rising energy bills and living costs.

h/t Ed S.

Y2Kyoto: State Of Anorexia Envirosa

Victor Davis Hanson;

The state’s environmental fanatics over thirty years ago cancelled the critical tertiary phases of the California Water Project and the federal Central Valley Project. I guess those in the Bay Area whose lives rest on Hetch Hetchy delivered reservoir water deemed reservoirs for all others passé and so 19th century.
The result is that a brilliantly engineered water transfer system — 80% of Californians live where 20% of the state’s rain and snow fall — designed to incrementally expand as population grew, became frozen in amber. We had a wonderful water storage system for 23 million people in 1980. But it proved completely inadequate for the 40 million plus of 2014, who assumed household and drinking water, irrigation supplies, and clean hydroelectric power came out of thin air.

h/t Maz2

“Manitoba” – Old Indian Word Meaning “Flood Plain”

Now is the time at SDA when we juxtapose!
Global News, July 8thClimate change will force Manitoba to continue the flood fight in years to come, Emergency Measures Minister Steve Ashton said Tuesday.
Brandon Sun, July 8thOn June 19, 1881, he wrote, “the water started to rise suddenly. The Indians said it had never happened before and that the high water was usually in April.”
h/t Mike W.

The Sound Of Settled Science

Although the underlying technical material in the IPCC’s fifth major report was widely agreed upon and published intact, “heated negotiations among scientific authors and diplomats led to substantial deletion of figures and text from the influential ‘Summary for Policy-makers,'” writes Brad Wible, an editor at the journal Science […]
A chart removed from the IPCC summary but published in Science shows that much of the growth in recent greenhouse gas emissions comes from Asia, with smaller contributions from the Middle East, Africa, and Latin America. Emissions in developed countries have continued to rise, but at a much slower rate.

In other words, business as usual.
h/t Maz2

Climategate: Tortured Temperatures

Continued…

In 2007 I started monitoring a few GISS stations. Amundsen-Scott, Vostok, Halley, Davis in Antarctica. Then a few more over the years. It was just to check some of the claims of data changing. Also to see if I could plot the temps over time. Some small changes at first, but nothing of concern.
In 2008 I added more stations such as Nuuk, to check more claims. It is easy to save the temp files for each station. Picking a few stations at random points around the GISS globe, up to about 12.
Goddard was right. Past data points were changing. Usually small amounts on a monthly basis. Some station data did not change at all, but only the new monthly data were added.
In 2009 I was saving monthly data for 15 stations.Every month the most recent data is added to the end of each file. But, scanning past data it became apparent that some historical station data was being “revised” almost completely. That means that a time plot shifted by enough to notice on a temperature plot. Usually the “new” plot showed that the past became cooler. Small amounts, maybe one tenth of a degree. When I got to 20 stations, I noticed that one or two sets of data were being extensively revised every month. At the end of 2009 there was a sudden revision of more stations by larger amounts. Almost always the data before 1960 was getting cooler.
By 2010 I was up to 30 stations, plus the Antarctic four.
Akureyri, Bartow, Beaver City, Concordia, Crete NE, Ellsworth, Franklin, Gothenburg, Hanford, Honolulu, Hilo, Jan Mayen, Kodiak, Kwajaalein, La Serena, Loup City, Minden, Nantes, Nome, Norfolk Island, Nuuk, Red Cloud, St. Helena, St. Paul, Steffenville, Thiruvanantha, Truk, Wakeeny, Yakutat, Yamba.
Downloading 30 sets of temperature data to save. Then putting all data into an excel file to make plots. Then comparing time plots to see where individual data points had changed. It became clear that a regular revision of about 10 percent of all GISS stations was taking place on a monthly basis.
Every month in 2010, three of the 30 stations has changes to past data points that were visible by plotting. Looking at every point for every station is not possible, but scanning at random shows that many stations have small changes. 2011 was about the same, but at the end of 2011 was another substantial change to many stations.
In early 2012 my 10 year old hard drive died. I had a separate backup, but it was found to be virus infected to the extent that I could not save all data. I still have the drive and can open some files but can’t copy files to another drive.
In 2012 GISS began making larger changes to more past data. Some stations were showing monthly changes that could only be described as “erratic” with some large shifts for a couple months, followed by data returning to values from months earlier. Sometime in December 2012 was a very large change in past data for many stations. Some stations showed data that stopped in 2007 or 2008. In March 2013 those stations were suddenly “restored” and resumed showing complete data up to March 2013.
Every month GISS changes past data by small amounts to some historical data. Some stations are being selected for larger revisions at random times. For some stations, portions of data from decades ago vanishes completely. The numbers are replaced with “999.9″ indicating no data. Months later those same past data points re-appear, just as they were before, sometimes with small adjustments. If what is happening to a sample of 30 stations is any indication of the entire GISS data set, then I’d say that there is an Orwellian plot to manipulate the past.
There is no record of these past changes, it would be impossible to verify or reproduce those changes. Over the years, the past keeps getting colder.

h/t John Groves

The Sound Of Settled Science

New solar model predicts imminent global cooling;

As we head to the UNFCCC meeting in Paris 2015 where global bureaucracy beckons, a sharp cooling change appears to be developing and set to hit in the next five years. Yet consortia of five-star politicans are not preparing for climate change, only for global warming. Around the world a billion dollars a day is invested in renewable energy, largely with the hope of changing the weather.

Air Greenpeace

Telegraph;

One of Greenpeace’s most senior executives commutes 250 miles to work by plane, despite the environmental group’s campaign to curb air travel, it has emerged.
Pascal Husting, Greenpeace International’s international programme director, said he began “commuting between Luxembourg and Amsterdam” when he took the job in 2012 and currently made the round trip about twice a month.
The flights, at 250 euros for a round trip, are funded by Greenpeace…

I amuse myself.

Y2Kyoto: Let Them Grow Pineapples

Western Canada:

A weather and crop specialist with CWB reports this year’s late spring has resulted in close to two million acres left unseeded and raised concerns over the potential for crops that were planted being damaged this fall by frost.
Due to a delayed spring melt farmers in western Canada got onto the fields to begin spring planting much later than normal this year.

Related: Winter Storm in Montana, Utah, Wyoming As Summer Approaches

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