And now for the inquiry into sceptics?

WE’VE now had four major reviews into climate change science, all of them prompted and demanded by deniers, sceptics, [insert appellation of choice here] or whatever other descriptor you choose.

Most of the grist for this mill came from the illegal hacking of emails and data from the University of East Anglia’s Climate Research Unit, but other bits of raw material came via accusations of the methods of the IPCC.

According to the cacophony from some media commentators, climate scientists had tricked the global public, manipulated data, conspired to ban sceptics from peer-reviewed journals, killed Bambie, drowned one of the Care Bears and plotted to take over the world.

All four of the reviews have found the main thrust of the accusations to be without substance or, in other words, plain wrong.

Before a single review had made its conclusion, some commentators screamed it was the greatest science scandal of the modern age and proved that human-caused climate change was a conspiracy  made-up to scare people witless.

At the time, I claimed the scandal was the greatest since Darren from Year Seven torched the Year Nine science project with a bunsen burner.

After two independent reviews, a UK parliamentary inquiry and a Dutch government agency review, I think it’s fair to say my analysis was the closest. I’d like to call Darren, but we’re no longer in touch.

Continue reading “And now for the inquiry into sceptics?”

Review finds IPCC science is sound. The Australian thinks different.

The Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency has just published its review into the main findings of the IPCC’s “latest” assessment report, which came out three years ago.

Here’s the report’s main conclusion on the science.

The foundations for thirty-two IPCC Fourth Assessment summary conclusions on the regional impacts of climate change have been investigated. These conclusions show examples of projections of climate-change impacts on food, water, ecosystems, coastal regions and health, for all the earth’s continents. These conclusions have not been undermined by errors, although one of the conclusions contains a minor inaccuracy: in hindsight, not 75 to 250 million people, but 90 to 220 million people are projected to be exposed to increased water stress due to climate change in Africa, by 2020. Given the large uncertainties surrounding such projections, this difference is not significant.

Seems pretty straightforward. There are concerns expressed that the summary conclusions made by the IPCC put too much emphasis on “the main negative impacts of climate change” rather than, presumably, pointing out that it might be great for cane toads.

The thrust of the Netherlands review is obvious. It’s repeated in the press release, just in case anyone misses the point.

Netherlands Environmental Assessment Agency found no errors that would undermine the main conclusions in the 2007 report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) on possible future regional impacts of climate change.

The Australian newspaper has written a story about the findings, but you’d be forgiven for thinking they must have read a different report. Continue reading “Review finds IPCC science is sound. The Australian thinks different.”

Presenting the non-experts

IT’S fun when a scientific study confirms what lots of people already know. Scientists who deny that we should do anything about climate change don’t actually know very much about climate change.

New research in the prestigious journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS… no sniggering), has concluded that

… the expertise and prominence, two integral components of overall expert credibility, of climate researchers convinced by the evidence of Anthropogenic Climate Change vastly overshadows that of the climate change skeptics and contrarians.

The method of the researchers was to first take the names of scientists who had been co-signatories of statements supporting or questioning the science of climate change and the need to act (or not act), based on evidence.

The researchers list the source of those statements here, which include letters to prime ministers, public declarations and newspaper adverts such as this one from the Cato Institute, which was reported to have cost US$150,000 . Sourcewatch lists Cato’s alliances with fossil fuel money and tobacco denial here. Continue reading “Presenting the non-experts”

Curse of the popularity contest

LIKE it, lump it or form it into a distasteful dough-like structure and swallow it, we’re all taking part in a popularity competition.

Politicians want our vote and to get it they need to say and do things that they think the majority of people will like.

Now of course politics is far more complex, devious and engaging than this and, occasionally yes, it’s sometimes a right-on righteous exercise too.

But what democracy boils down to for most politicians is the need to retain power with enough of the public on your side to keep your seat.

Sounds easy, right? Wrong. Getting people to vote for you is a lot harder than you would think. Not only do you need to be likable, but you need to say the right things throughout your campaign. People need to believe that you are the best person to represent you in the government. You don’t want to say the wrong things like Caylan Ford has been known to do in the world of Canadian politics. She had to resign because of the comments she made, making the opposition party appear more likable to the wider community.

It really is as simple as ensuring that enough of the public is on your side.

For want of a less clumsy alliteration, it’s a never-ending fascination that this fundamental fact gets forgotten, yet it colours every aspect of public life. We’re all part of it.

Take the resources tax and the current debate this has generated (please let it stop).

The Australian government proposes a new tax regime which, when times are good, will see mining companies making a little bit less profit than they would have otherwise.

In simple terms, the mining companies don’t like it too much because they stand to make less money.

This would effect the profits of companies such as Rio Tinto, which made more than $9 billion in pre-tax profits last year, and BHP Billiton, which made more than $7 billion in the last six months of 2009.

So faced with taking home a bit less money they decide to hit the Government where it hurts – by running some adverts on that other popularity medium, the telly. Others, such as the Australian Workers Union, have their own TV ad.

These adverts are unregulated in practical terms and run alongside miracle age-defying skin creams and deodorant brands that make men irresistible to women (or some men). They also make it nigh-on impossible to understand who’s right or wrong and, depending on which emotional triggers they pull, both will have a certain appeal.

Then the adverts are placed between other popularity competitions like, say, Australia’s Got Latent, So You Think You Can Dunce or My Kitchen Roos (a show, staged on genuine marbled bench tops, where kangaroos fight to the death armed only with… oh I don’t know… silicone oven mitts and a set of steak knives).

As any TV ratings expert will tell you, there are far more Australian people voting for talent shows than there are voting for more current affairs or arts coverage. And I’m confident that people looking for top torrenting sites 2022 in the future will still be looking to download episodes of their favourite reality shows rather than documentaries.

But what’s popular doesn’t always, or even most of the time, equal what’s actually best for the community or the individual.

This curse of the popularity contest is one reason why our democracy here in Australia, like other democracies across the globe, have been unable to take any meaningful action on climate change.

According to the United States Government’s National Climatic Data Center (yes, they persist with the ‘e’ in the wrong place), the world has just experienced its warmest March to May quarter of any time since 1880, when their records started.

At the same time, the US National Snow and Ice Data Center (or, centre) reports that during May the Arctic was losing ice at a rate of 68,000 square kilometres per day.

This rate of melting ice was the highest for the month of May during the satellite record, which now runs to about 30 years.

And all this as climate change and emissions trading drops almost completely off the political agenda.

But try and win a popularity competition, such as the impending general election, by taxing emissions from burning fossil fuels (which, under the current regime, are linked to practically everything) or unsustainable resource extraction and you’ve got as much chance as an ice-block in Moreton Bay or, it seems, in the Arctic.

Climate broken records

LATEST findings from the US government’s National Climatic Data Center show the average global temperature on sea and land in May was the warmest of any May since 1880, when the US records started.

Also showing the current state of affairs is the UK Met Office, which has recently been cleaning-up some of the data for its HadCRUT3 data record, which goes back even further to 1850.

Same story, different bunch of data.  The other biggie in the climate yardstick is the extent of Arctic sea-ice . How’s that going?

During May, the satellite data shows the Arctic was losing ice at a rate of 68,000 square kilometres a day, causing the US National Snow and Ice Data Center to conclude that “this rate of loss is the highest for the month of May during the satellite record”.

All these broken records are starting to sound like a broken record.

Top Aussie carbonators and old men

ABC Carbon has just published a list of the 50 people in Australia contributing the most to awareness and action on climate change, conservation and green issues.

The list, which excludes journalists and politicians (there’s going to be another list of those types soon), has everything from world famous actresses to local campaigners, business people, scientists and activists, and a few who blur the lines.

Ken Hickson, author of the book ABC of Carbon and the excellent ABC Carbon newsletter, asked me to help review and shorten the long list of nominees – a process which made me realise just how many people really are trying to make a positive difference.

Boiling this list down a bit further, I’d be picking out the likes of the massive-brained author Clive Hamilton, the courageous climate activist Anna Keenan and Professor Will Steffen, the science advisor to the Department of Climate Change and Energy Efficiency.

I’ve just finished reading Clive’s book Requiem For A Species which examines why civilisation has failed to act on climate change and how, not to put too fine a point on it, we should all forget the notion of being able to “beat” climate change. You can buy a copy of Clive’s book all over the place, but in a plug for a local company you can also order it from Sustainable Insight.

Anna Keenan is a young women for whom I have the utmost admiration. No commitment issues for Anna, who managed a 40-day hunger strike in the run up to, and during, the ill-fated Copenhagen climate change conference. Here’s a blog she wrote for me in the middle of that ordeal.

A few weeks ago, Professor Will Steffen was brave enough to say publicly what most other climate scientists must surely be saying privately all the time when he described the manufactured debate over climate change to be “infantile”. Here’s a great profile of the Professor here, on The Age.

And now to the second bit of the headline for this blog (look up there), the bit about old men, because they came up in a seminar I attended last night hosted by Professor Steffen.

His main 45-minute speech covered the importance of a multi-disciplinary approach to research on climate change adaptation, but it was an off-the-cuff remark made during questions which prompted the biggest round of applause of the evening.

He was talking about the general need for everyone in Australia to be innovative in finding ways to adapt to climate change. And why isn’t this happening now?

There’s a blockage caused by old men who largely block innovation.

So there you go. We can now add “old men” to the list of climate change foes which includes fossil fuels, money, consumerism and political cowardice.

Climate blogging

ECOS magazineCHEERS go to bloggers Tim Lambert at Deltoid and Ove Hoegh-Guldberg at Climate Shifts for giving a nod to a feature of mine just published in ECOS magazine.

The feature looked at climate blogging and had input from Ove, Tim and also John Cook at the excellent and world famous Skeptical Science website (well OK, maybe not world famous, but if you’ve been featured on the websites of The Guardian and the New York Times, then I reckon that’s as close as you’re going to get in this line of work).

All three of the blogs featured have done as much, if not more, to communicate the science of climate change than any politician has been able to manage, perhaps because it does actually take more than a 30-second news grab to explain the complexities.

Anyway, the feature is available free here.

Didn’t see this whale-sized one coming

Whales form a vital part of the marine ecosystem, sequestering thousands of tonnes of carbon each year and delivering nutrients to the surface of the ocean as part of the nitrogen cycle. Not only this, but they are also majestic to look at, which is probably why many head to a site like kaikanani.com for a chance to book a whale-watching boat tour. The site of a breaching whale is truly a site to see, and not something many get to witness. In recent days I’ve been talking to several anti-whaling campaigners and an international professor of law but none of them saw this one coming.

Government initiates legal action against Japanese whaling

The headline on the joint statement from Australian ministers Stephen Smith (Foreign Affairs), Peter Garrett (Environmental Protection and Definitely-Nothing-To-Do-With-Insulation) and Attorney-General Robert McClelland sort of gives the story away really.

The statement comes as delegates arrive in Agadir for the annual meeting of the International Whaling Commission where all eyes will be on agenda item 3 – a so-called compromise deal to bring the three whaling nations of Iceland, Norway and Japan into line.

At the end of April, in a speech to the Australian National University, Peter Garrett outlined Australia’s dislike of the new proposal and did warn we would pursue legal action if the Government’s demands were not met. Perhaps that’s why this announcement will have caught most people on the hop.

There has been much written about that compromise deal already. The BBC has a good summary here, but in short it would allow whaling by non-indigenous hunters from those nations still killing the animals – Japan, Iceland and Norway. It would also set up an international team of observers and set quotas (campaigners say more than half of the species included in the draft proposal have not had a scientific assessment conducted on the health of their populations).

There’s been a moratorium on commercial whaling since the 1985/86 hunting season, but it didn’t stop nations from killing the animals.

Norway and Iceland get around the moratorium by just objecting to it (if only parking fines worked that way). Japan also tried this tactic, but these days uses a condition from the original 1946 convention that allows whaling in the name of science, known as Article VIII.

We can see today’s announcement as a statement of intent by Australia – a bit of diplomatic positioning – that if it doesn’t get it’s own way in Agadir, it’ll be heading for The Hague.

By the way, I took the pic of the whale myself during a whale watching trip off the coast just north of Brisbane. They look better alive than dead.

UPDATE: Here’s why I was talking to the campaigners an law experts. Feature on ABC Environment.

Future mapped out for lizards

IF you’ve not seen it in the wild then you’ve probably seen it on telly – lizards sat out in the daylight, sunning themselves when there’s surely some housework to be done.

So to the ignorant or uninformed (I’m one of them), you’d think that warmer global temperatures would just mean more fun in the sun for the world’s lizard populations. Not so, according to a new study in Science.

Australia lizard extinctions 2009

Even though lizards do love to warm up in the sunshine before going off to find food, they all have a point at which they’ve had enough.

Higher temperatures can force them to run for cover, which the international team of researchers explain cuts down the time they can spend foraging for food. So, if by any chance you happen to have a lizard as a pet, such as a bearded dragon, ensuring that their space is kept warm and comfy should be a priority. Proper bedding substrates for bearded dragons may help in this matter as substrate material could play a vital role in maintaining the heat levels making it comfortable for the pet.

The researchers first looked at this physiology in the lizard and then developed a model taking into account rising temperatures across the globe.

They then used the model to see if it matched observed extinctions in 2009, which in Australia look like this first map. The model replicated their observations of extinction rates on five continents. Next, they used the model to see what will happen if emissions of greenhouse gases and, in correlation, global temperatures, both keep rising.

Then, the extinction rates for lizard populations looks like this. First for 2050….

… and then for 2080.

On a global scale, by the year 2050 the probability of any species becoming extinct was 6 per cent and by 2080, it was 20 per cent, the study concluded.

But with all those other pressures on lizards such as disease and human population growth, couldn’t those extinctions be just as easily blamed on something else? Lead researcher Professor Barry Sinervo, at the University of California, says:

We did a lot of work on the ground to validate the model and show that the extinctions are the result of climate change. None of these are due to habitat loss. These sites are not disturbed in any way, and most of them are in national parks or other protected areas.

The loss of lizards isn’t just bad for, well, lizards, but researchers said it would also have an impact up and down the food chain. Lizards represent food for other animals as well as keeping the insect population in check.

Sales of lizard sunscreens and shade umbrellas (also used in cocktails), could receive a boost, no one said.

Map images: Barry Sinervo.