This scientist proved climate change isn’t causing extreme weather — so politicians attacked

[Rob_Zepp]

https://business.financialpost.com/opinion/ross-mckitrick-this-scientist-proved-climate-change-isnt-causing-extreme-weather-so-politicians-attacked

 

This scientist proved climate change isn’t causing extreme weather — so politicians attacked

And so, many scientists who have the facts and know the truth remain silent

Hurricanes have not been proven to be more frequent or more dangerous than in the past.NOAA / AFP / Getty Images

 

This week in Vancouver, Prime Minister Trudeau said the federal carbon tax, a key pillar in his government’s climate policy, will help protect Canadians from extreme weather. “Extreme weather events are extraordinarily expensive for Canadians, our communities and our economy,” he said, citing the recent tornadoes in Ottawa and wildfires in Western Canada. “That’s why we need to act.”

 

While members of the media may nod along to such claims, the evidence paints a different story. Roger Pielke Jr. is a scientist at University of Colorado in Boulder who, up until a few years ago, did world-leading research on climate change and extreme weather. He found convincing evidence that climate change was not leading to higher rates of weather-related damages worldwide, once you correct for increasing population and wealth. He also helped convene major academic panels to survey the evidence and communicate the near-unanimous scientific consensus on this topic to policymakers. For his efforts, Pielke was subjected to a vicious, well-funded smear campaign backed by, among others, the Obama White House and leading Democratic congressmen, culminating in his decision in 2015 to quit the field.

 

A year ago, Pielke told the story to an audience at the University of Minnesota. His presentation was recently circulated on Twitter. With so much misinformation nowadays about supposed climate emergencies, it’s worth reviewing carefully.

 

Pielke’s public presentation begins with a recounting of his rise and fall in the field. As a young researcher in tropical storms and climate-related damages, he reached the pinnacle of the academic community and helped organize the so-called Hohenkammer Consensus Statement, named after the German town where 32 of the leading scientists in the field gathered in 2006 to sort out the evidence. They concluded that trends toward rising climate damages were mainly due to increased population and economic activity in the path of storms, that it was not currently possible to determine the portion of damages attributable to greenhouse gases, and that they didn’t expect that situation to change in the near future.

 

Shortly thereafter, the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) released its 2007 report, largely agreeing with the Hohenkammer Consensus, while cherry-picking one unpublished study (and highlighting it in the Summary for Policymakers) that suggested a link between greenhouse gases and storm-related damages. But the author of that study — who just happened to be the same IPCC lead author who injected it into the report — later admitted his claim was incorrect, and when the study was finally published, denied the connection.

 

In 2012, the IPCC Special Report on Extreme Weather came out and echoed the Hohenkammer Consensus, concluding that once you adjust for population growth and economic changes, there is no statistical connection between climate change and measures of weather-related damages. In 2013 Pielke testified to the United States Congress and relayed the IPCC findings. Shortly thereafter, Obama’s science advisor John Holdren accused him of misleading Congress and launched a lengthy but ill-informed attack on Pielke, which prompted congressional Democrats to open an investigation into Pielke’s sources of funding (which quickly fizzled amid benign conclusions). Meanwhile heavily funded left-wing groups succeeded in getting him fired from a popular internet news platform. In 2015 Pielke quit the climate field.

… there’s no solid connection between climate change and the major indicators of extreme weather.

 

 

So where did the science end up?

 

In the second half of his talk, Pielke reviews the science as found in the most recent (2013) IPCC Assessment Report, the 2018 U.S. National Climate Assessment, and the most up-to-date scientific data and literature. Nothing substantial has changed.

 

Globally there’s no clear evidence of trends and patterns in extreme events such as droughts, hurricanes and floods. Some regions experience more, some less and some no trend. Limitations of data and inconsistencies in patterns prevent confident claims about global trends one way or another. There’s no trend in U.S. hurricane landfall frequency or intensity. If anything, the past 50 years has been relatively quiet. There’s no trend in hurricane-related flooding in the U.S. Nor is there evidence of an increase in floods globally. Since 1965, more parts of the U.S. have seen a decrease in flooding than have seen an increase. And from 1940 to today, flood damage as a percentage of GDP has fallen to less than 0.05 per cent per year from about 0.2 per cent.

 

And on it goes. There’s no trend in U.S. tornado damage (in fact, 2012 to 2017 was below average). There’s no trend in global droughts. Cold snaps in the U.S. are down but, unexpectedly, so are heatwaves.

 

The bottom line is there’s no solid connection between climate change and the major indicators of extreme weather, despite Trudeau’s claims to the contrary. The continual claim of such a link is misinformation employed for political and rhetorical purposes. Powerful people get away with it because so few people know what the numbers show. Many scientists who know better remain silent. And the few who push back against the propaganda, such as Roger Pielke Jr., find themselves on the receiving end of abuse and career-threatening attacks, even though they have all the science in their corner. Something has gotten scary and extreme, but it isn’t the weather.

 

• Ross McKitrick is a professor of economics at the University of Guelph

[mpt]

Funny how so many people are convinced by corrupt politicians that carbon tax somehow helps the planet and don’t just see it as another revenue stream largely used for wealth redistribution

[Dazzle]

With all due respect, this isn't a "proof"; it's just that we don't know more to indicate otherwise.

 

On the topic of drugs, some recreational drugs if taken once in a while show no measurable impact on the brain or body. Yet there isn't information about it when used in higher doses, specifically for recreational effects.

 

Some have speculated that hallucination on drugs is 'bad' for the brain. It probably isn't healthy but more research should be done to see what happens, when practical.

 

What we do know is that climate change is affecting many parts of the earth, effecting extinction in some cases.

 

That being said, carbon tax, while effective in many parts of the world (California, and previously Ontario and Quebec), doesn't "protect" Canadians from extreme weather. It's not like you pay a mafia-like protection fee and extreme weather won't come and haunt you.

Edited June 7, 2019 by Dazzle
Grammar

[Wilbur]

1 minute ago, mpt said:

Funny how so many people are convinced by corrupt politicians that carbon tax somehow helps the planet and don’t just see it as another revenue stream largely used for wealth redistribution

All taxes are used for wealth redistribution.  If a Carbon Tax can cause people to lower their carbon emission producing habits it will help the planet.  It's not the only solution but it can be a part.

[Dekey Pete]

What a misleading article.  The whole point of this guy's project is to determine if there is an increased ECONOMICAL cost of weather events.  He argues that the cost as a percentage of GDP has actually decreased, but in his own research admits that climate change has a significant human component and that climate change is a factor that influences trends in disasters.  They also go to say that for future decades that we will experience increases in the occurrence and intensity of extreme weather events, as a result of anthropogenic climate change. 

 

The author of this article tried to spin the research as "Climate change ain't real" BS you'd expect from Trump's mouth.  

 

Straight from Pielke's research if you follow his link through...

https://sciencepolicy.colorado.edu/research_areas/sparc/research/projects/extreme_events/munich_workshop/ccdl_workshop_brochure.pdf

 

"Summary Report In summer 2005 Roger Pielke, Jr. of the Center of Science and Technology Policy Research at the University of Colorado and Peter Höppe of the Geo Risks Research Department of Munich Re learned from each other that each planned to organize a workshop on the assessment of factors leading to increasing loss trends due to natural disasters. Both agreed that such a workshop was timely, especially given the apparent lack of consensus on the role of climate change in disaster loss trends. Roger Pielke, Jr. and Peter Höppe decided to have a common workshop in 2006 in Germany to bring together a diverse group of international experts in the fields of climatology and disaster research. The general questions to be answered at this workshop were: What factors account for increasing costs of weather related disasters in recent decades? What are the implications of these understandings, for both research and policy?

 

Consensus (unanimous) statements of the workshop participants:

1. Climate change is real, and has a significant human component related to greenhouse gases.

2. Direct economic losses of global disasters have increased in recent decades with particularly large increases since the 1980s.

3. The increases in disaster losses primarily result from weather related events, in particular storms and floods.

4. Climate change and variability are factors which influence trends in disasters.

5. Although there are peer reviewed papers indicating trends in storms and floods there is still scientific debate over the attribution to anthropogenic climate change or natural climate variability. There is also concern over geophysical data quality.

6. IPCC (2001) did not achieve detection and attribution of trends in extreme events at the global level.

7. High quality long-term disaster loss records exist, some of which are suitable for research purposes, such as to identify the effects of climate and/or climate change on the loss records.

8. Analyses of long-term records of disaster losses indicate that societal change and economic development are the principal factors responsible for the documented increasing losses to date.

9. The vulnerability of communities to natural disasters is determined by their economic development and other social characteristics.

10. There is evidence that changing patterns of extreme events are drivers for recent increases in global losses.

11. Because of issues related to data quality, the stochastic nature of extreme event impacts, length of time series, and various societal factors present in the disaster loss record, it is still not possible to determine the portion of the increase in damages that might be attributed to climate change due to GHG emissions.

12. For future decades the IPCC (2001) expects increases in the occurrence and/or intensity of some extreme events as a result of anthropogenic climate change. Such increases will further increase losses in the absence of disaster reduction measures.

13. In the near future the quantitative link (attribution) of trends in storm and flood losses to climate changes related to GHG emissions is unlikely to be answered unequivocally

Edited June 7, 2019 by The Sedge

[Ghostsof1915]

Find out where his funding comes from. I bet it's an oil company or other polluter. 

So if one person says it's not true the other 99 out of 100 scientists are wrong? 
The point of science is to show the proof of their data, and replicate it. 

Not have an opinion and then make the facts match your opinion. 

 

I don't like the carbon tax, because we should be addressing the roots of the problem. The carbon tax does nothing to change bad practices. 

And be trying to change industry, to produce products in a better way. And preserve the environment, and try to encourage less waste.

Alternatives to the energy mix is not a bad thing. More biodegradable materials, and recyclable materials. And long term jobs, not get rich quick and shut the company down.

And start putting in massive fines to companies like Imperial Metals, who contaminate our water supplies then leaves the taxpayers to clean it up. 

[PhillipBlunt]

I think the truth lies somewhere in between. Cumulative human activity is affecting the natural world in devastating ways. While the majority of alarmists point to the use of fossil fuels as the main instigator for climate change, many fail to address the massive loss of forested areas on the Earth, that help to clean and purify the air, and the use of the world's oceans as a dump.

 

As well, the dwindling population of various species should scare the crap out of people, as losing certain members of the animal kingdom will have long lasting, horribly negative effects overall on life on Earth.

 

Fact is, humanity is out of control and nature needs to thin the herd. No other animal has been able to circumvent nature's designs to shape the environment to suit their needs and purposes. Humanity has, and it's had an effect on the Earth, without a doubt. To say that it hasn't is to be morally obtuse.

Edited June 7, 2019 by PhillipBlunt

[thejazz97]

conversely, flooding and precipitation has gotten worse in New Brunswick in the past 10 years

[Tortorella's Rant]

8 minutes ago, Wilbur said:

All taxes are used for wealth redistribution.  If a Carbon Tax can cause people to lower their carbon emission producing habits it will help the planet.  It's not the only solution but it can be a part.

It is more difficult to make that case however when the tax is treated as general revenue instead of towards green projects. Climate change is supposedly the greatest crisis of this era but we're not going to use the tax dollars accrued for projects to combat it. People will anyway but it is extremely easy to see why they see it as a simple cash grab.

[JM_]

So the title says "proves" but the story says "it was not currently possible to determine the portion of damages attributable to greenhouse gases"

 

which is it @Rob_Zepp? you can't have both. 

[inane]

lol

[Dekey Pete]

Just now, Jimmy McGill said:

So the title says "proves" but the story says "it was not currently possible to determine the portion of damages attributable to greenhouse gases"

 

which is it @Rob_Zepp? you can't have both. 

The scientist didn't even claim to prove what the title implies.  It's just the opinion of Ross McKitrick, an economics professor

[JM_]

3 minutes ago, The Sedge said:

The scientist didn't even claim to prove what the title implies.  It's just the opinion of Ross McKitrick, an economics professor

it doesn't make much sense to me as an argument against the carbon tax either.

 

Lets just say for arguments sake that the author is correct and we've put more infrastructure in harms way and thats the reason for the bigger costs, we'll still need to pay for it somehow. A broad-based carbon tax is a fair way to do that. 

[Fanuck]

Equivalent of academic click-bait.

 

I'll pass like I pass on 99% of proposals in the moron, I mean GM forum.

[Down by the River]

Lock this thread for misinformation. This is what happens when you let your political opinion dictate your interpretation of information. 

 

#1 - This article is not about climate change, it is about the damage caused by climate change.

 

They concluded that trends toward rising climate damages were mainly due to increased population and economic activity in the path of storms, that it was not currently possible to determine the portion of damages attributable to greenhouse gases, and that they didn’t expect that situation to change in the near future.

 

#2 - The article still did NOT rule out that climate change was not responsible for the rising damages caused by climate:

 

It was not currently possible to determine the portion of damages attributable to greenhouse gases

 

I wish people could just read the article instead of getting so excited that something might support their political opinion that they blow their load and immediately go to post the article. I'm referring to you @Rob_Zepp

[HerrDrFunk]

.....why would you not read an article before posting it?

[JM_]

6 minutes ago, Down by the River said:

Lock this thread for misinformation. This is what happens when you let your political opinion dictate your interpretation of information. 

 

#1 - This article is not about climate change, it is about the damage caused by climate change.

 

 

 

#2 - The article still did NOT rule out that climate change was not responsible for the rising damages caused by climate:

 

 

 

I wish people could just read the article instead of getting so excited that something might support their political opinion that they blow their load and immediately go to post the article. I'm referring to you @Rob_Zepp

 

disagree on the lock - we need to discuss this stuff from different pov's, if for nothing else to show flaws in the opinion pieces or heck maybe we all learn something. 

 

Edited June 7, 2019 by Jimmy McGill

[Gaudette Celly]

Well of course.  It was NEVER about science but always about politics... and how to find new tax revenue streams.

 

First they taxed business, then transactions, then your property, then your income, then paper representing assets, then paper representing paper, and now... the very air you breathe.  And people love it and eagerly open their wallets without a peep or second thought.

[inane]

1 minute ago, Hutton Wink said:

Well of course.  It was NEVER about science but always about politics... and how to find new tax revenue streams.

 

First they taxed business, then transactions, then your property, then your income, then paper representing assets, then paper representing paper, and now... the very air you breathe.  And people love it and eagerly open their wallets without a peep or second thought.

 

[Down by the River]

1 minute ago, Jimmy McGill said:

 

disagree on the lock - we need to discuss this stuff from different pov's, if for nothing else to show flaws in the opinion pieces or heck maybe we all learn something. 

 

But one of the POVs is objectively wrong. What was claimed to be proved was not actually proved. We've established that. Why continue?