This month’s open thread. Please stay on climate topics and try to be constructive.
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225 Responses to "Unforced variations: Jun 2025"
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Final hours: 100 Hours to Save America’s Forecasts, Weather and Climate
https://www.youtube.com/@wclivestream/live
– 2:30pm ET/11:30am PT: Jhordanne Jones
– 3:15 ET/12:15pm PT: Marshall Shepherd
– 4:15 ET/1:15pm PT: Zack Labe
aka crying over spilt milk.
Always A dollar short and day late.
William responds with cynicism, moaning, and a cheap shot. Massaging his own ego. Susan provides useful information.
Yes, that was a lamentable whine. Always ready to dismiss practical actions in favor of ‘radical’ vaporware.
Watching 100 hours of video qualifies as “practical actions”? Hmmmm……
Speaking of whines, I’ve input the content of this year’s RC comments into a political climate model (PCM) running on the world’s most powerful super-computer. The summary analysis can be revealed here for the first time. Here ya go:
https://www.reddit.com/r/ConservativeMemes/comments/et1bkj/official_seal_of_the_democrat_party/?rdt=36273
KIA, I seriously doubt that “100 hours” referred to the length of the videos.
Mr Know F_Al;l, do you lie awake at night wondering, “How can I become an even bigger prat, tomorrow?” Cause that would explain a lot.
Re my https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2025/05/unforced-variations-may-2025/comment-page-2/#comment-833994
Oops!
1. Some of that was re some of what William & Thessalonia have said.
2. “ and at least then we can then have some energy sources that don’t (on their own) add to the problems” – admittedly too strong of a statement; there are some environmental impacts eg. birds, bats, fish, scenery, mining – but some of that might be mitigatable, there may be some positive side effects in some cases (solar agrivoltaics, and solar panels reducing evaporation from canals – I think I saw that somewhere, pollinators…), and of course this has to be weighed against trade-offs of other options, etc. CO2 and fugitive CH4 are not the only problems with fossil fuels, for that matter.
Also, clarification: https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2025/05/unforced-variations-may-2025/comment-page-2/#comment-833986 : AIUI, Jerry Falwell was a segregationist.
in Re to Paul Pukite, 14 May 2025 at 11:26 AM,
https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2025/05/unforced-variations-may-2025/#comment-833252
Dear Paul,
As you might have missed my post of 23 May 2025 at 11:43 AM,
https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2025/05/unforced-variations-may-2025/#comment-833676
I would like to repeat my question regarding the planned PubPeer thread on the 6-year paper herein:
It appears that you could convince broader scientific public about your theory if you showed that in the frequency spectrum, the respective signals are not only present but have also sufficient strength.
Do I understand correctly that these signals are indeed well-known (due to their amplitudes that make them remarkable), however, they were still omitted for some reason as possible modulators of the ENSO / QBO / AMOC oscillations?
Thank you in advance and best regards
Tomáš
The 6-year cycle is a bit of a canard. The frequency spectrum of an ENSO time-series such as NINO4 is loaded with tidal artifacts, it’s just that no one seems to have a deep understanding of how frequency modulation works. Here’s a clue: spectral components in NINO4 are found close to 0.42, 0.58, 1.42, 1.58, 2.42 (in 1/yr units) — not hard to figure out what’s happening.
In Re to Paul Pukite, 2 Jun 2025 at 2:24 AM,
https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2025/06/unforced-variations-jun-2025/#comment-834070
Dear Paul,
Thank you very much for your prompt response.
As a layman, I am, however, somewhat confused thereby. It was my understanding to your post of 14 May 2025 at 11:26 AM, reading
“because of the symmetry above and below the equator, the first transform that must take place is at least some rectification in the signal so that the 6 year signal will likely appear as a 3 year result”
that there should be a 3 year period (instead of the 6 year one) in the frequency spectrum.
Do I guess correctly that the respective spectral component in NINO4 should be 0.33?
If so, is it or is it not present (as a sufficiently strong signal) in the spectrum?
Please consider that I may not be the single reader for whom it is, in fact, really difficult to “figure out what’s happening”. I will be very grateful if you could explain in more detail.
Greetings
Tomáš
When it comes to applying a tidal analysis to a problem, one must apply all the appropriate tidal factors collectively. The 6 year and 3 year tidal factors are known but they should be evaluated in the context of the other strong factors. It’s a mistake to just point out one tidal factor when the known stronger factors are also already there.
People tend to get worked up about LLM, and yes they are a bit sloppy, but they do work in explaining what is being observed — This is a prompt I gave ChatGPT:
” A temporal signal processing problem, applying the strength of AI deduction. In a frequency spectrum, peaks are observed in an ocean cycle at near 0.42, 0.58, 1.42, 1.58, 2.42 (in 1/yr units). Also at 0.37, 0.73, 1.37. Also between 0 and 1, peaks are symmetric with I(f) matching I(0.5-f).”
response:
https://chatgpt.com/share/683dbae5-5828-8010-b414-0b4284d57c5a
Read the whole thread and see if it makes sense.
The beauty of an LLM is that it has the subject domain insight of someone conversant in tidal analysis, but then it can come in from left field and drop some signal processing bombs that the same domain expert may not know about.
In Re to Paul Pukite, 3 Jun 2025 at 12:21 AM,
https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2025/06/unforced-variations-jun-2025/#comment-834133
Dear Paul,
Thank you very much for your kind response.
I went through the provided link to ChatGPT analysis, however, I must admit that I am incapable to grasp an answer to my question therefrom. Hopefully, experts will do so.
For me, could you herein just summarize whether or not your tidal analysis identified some signals with frequencies fitting the ENSO / QBO / AMOC oscillations and amplitudes sufficiently strong for explaining the observed natural variations?
Greetings
Tomáš
what do you want to know? The frequency spectrum of NINO4 has peaks at 0.43. 0.36, 0.27/yr, which are exactly as predicted for annual aliasing of the main monthly lunar tides. The majority of the other secondary peaks line up as well, in this case when interacting with the lunar perigean cycle. I wrote and published this aliasing analysis in 2018
Can peruse through all the model fits on the GIT GIST site here:
https://gist.github.com/pukpr/51e33b47417391f091a20ade48920c93
One of the brilliant insights IMHO is to do this same analysis at the ocean coastal sites that track sea-level heights (SLH). I have focused on 3 sites that have had near continuous measurements for over 100 years — Ft Denison in Sydney Harbor, Brest on the French coast, and Honolulu. Using monthly averages (which filter out the diurnal and semi-diurnal cycles) and removing the largely predictable annual cycles, one can cross-validate in a similar fashion to NINO4. No one else does this kind of analysis. Maybe it’s been overlooked — jeez, could tidal forces cause tidal changes in these locations, but perhaps in a slightly different way that has been applied to the daily tidal cycles? Nah … that’s too obvious to consider (yes, I know that the inverse barometric effect plays a role here as well, but the root cause may be the same).
In any case, the same analysis with nearly identical tidal forcing has been applied to these long term ocean cycles (all monthly and over 100 years in length =>
NINO4
AMO
PDO
NAO (averaged)
TNA (Tropical North Atlantic index)
TSA (Tropical South Atlantic)
IOD East
IOD West
EMI (Modoki)
M4 aka North Pacific Gyre Oscillation
M6 aka Atlantic NINO
NINO34
NINO3
NINO12
Darwin SLP (1/2 of the SOI)
Honolulu SLH
Brest SLH
Ft Denison SLH
The only index that doesn’t match in terms of a common forcing is the atmospheric QBO time series, And that’s OK because it has global group symmetry and so only a few of the lunar forces apply.
The intriguing bit about the GIST site is that it’s really not that hard for someone to do a deep learning screen scrape of all the data and try to replicate the modeling results via whatever machine learning algorithm is appropriate. Guaranteed it will pick out the pattern easily.
Piotr can try his hand at finding a concordance with sunspots LOL
Paul Pukite Piotr can try his hand at finding a concordance with sunspots LOL
The frequency of the sunspot cycles is SEVERAL times lower than your “0.43. 0.36, 0.27/yr”,
hence only a scientific ignorant would demand proving “concordance” of the former with the latter.
That you, Paul Pukite, have no idea about it, quite the opposite – you are so confident that you bring this up in the UNRELATED discussion, and finish with the self-satisfied “LOL” – tells quite a bit, not about me or Gavin (who is the real target here), but about you.
And is consistent with the reason for you bringing it up – your attempt to elevate your ego – If I, Paul Pukite, can call out the ignorance of the best climate scientists in the world – then I Paul Pukite must be really, really smart. And brave for calling the scientists out:
————– Thread “Comparison Update 2024” Jan 2025 —————
Gavin: “ “There are two potential issues – the timing of the solar cycle 25 (a solar max warms the stratosphere) – which happened earlier and bigger than expected by CMIP6”
Paul Pukite “ That’s embarrassing to mention sunspots. Attributing solar sunspot cycles to climate variation is the equivalent of prescribing Ivermectin to a medical condition. Perhaps worse because you guys claim to understand the physics.”
—————————————————–
If you ever wonder how people will remember you – I suggest this – 3 short sentences encapsulating the scientific competency, intellectual qualities, and psychological drivers of Paul Pukite. [For more detailed diagnosis – see the original thread]
Yesterday in honor of D-Day, Physics Today reposted an article describing how the Allies optimized tidal analysis for determining the timing of the Normandy landing:
https://pubs.aip.org/physicstoday/article/64/9/35/413743/The-tide-predictions-for-D-DayBased-on-the-physics
https://x.com/PhysicsToday/status/1929536503106908640
What’s challenging nowadays is to analyze the 2nd-order tidal analysis. Consider that while the beaches at Normandy show a daily (at times) 6 meter change from low-to-high tide that’s largely understood, there’s still about a 0.1 meter (non-annual) amplitude that varies erratically over years and decades. In some locations, such as in Sydney harbor, there’s a significant correlation to ENSO cycles. In other locations, such as at Brest along the Atlantic French coast, it’s not as apparent. My conjecture is quite basic — since astronomical tidal forces easily explain the 6 meter excursions, isn’t it possible that the same forces can explain the 0.1 meter variation, but only in some more complex non-linear interaction, possibly involving the annual cycle?
And the intriguing part is that this could also involve the oceanic indices via tidal interaction with the thermocline, which is extremely sensitive to mechanical forcing due to a reduced effective gravity environment. Thais why I think any effort expended on sunspot correlation is misguided at best. No one is going to say sunspots have any effect on tidal cycles, yet here we have an especially promising avenue to explore — the richness of astronomical lunisolar cycles as a forcing — and no one is really looking at it.
I mentioned the identification of peaks in the frequency spectrum of an ENSO index such as NINO4 that match the predicted aliasing of lunar cycles with an annual modulation. And also that the NINO4 spectrum shows a symmetry about 0.5/yr, confirming a clear annual modulation with some forcing. The monthly tidal analysis over a 100 year interval in Sydney harbor also shows these peaks and that symmetry. Isn’t that enough of a coincidence to get scientists interested in that research path?
One topic that’s worth exploring is the nature of the inverted (or inverse) barometric effect. In terms of physics, that’s the one climate behavior that can cause a remote sea-level height (SLH) change less directly tied to lunisolar forcing. But what happens if the root cause is the same?
I really have no interest in rationales related to sunspot activity, and what happens in the upper stratosphere. That’s not going to have an impact on ocean cycles.
Paul Pukite 7 Jun: “ I really have no interest in rationales related to sunspot activity, and what happens in the upper stratosphere.
That … certainly explains your attacks on Gavin and his colleagues:
===== Jan 2025 ================
Gavin: “ “There are two potential issues – the timing of the solar cycle 25 (a solar max warms the stratosphere) – which happened earlier and bigger than expected by CMIP6”
Paul Pukite “ That’s embarrassing to mention sunspots. Attributing solar sunspot cycles to climate variation is the equivalent of prescribing Ivermectin to a medical condition. Perhaps worse because you guys claim to understand the physics.”
===
With “the lack of interest” like this – who needs pathetic attempts to elevate your ego by arrogant lecturing people who achieved more in life than you?
P.S. And your continued “lack of interest” surely explains why for 5 months since – you have tried to win the argument you lost in January (the latest attempt: Paul Pukite, 6 Jun “ Piotr can try his hand at finding a concordance [of shorter-term cycles nobody explained with sunspot cycles] with sunspots LOL ).
The AGU posted this yesterday on BlueSky:
https://bsky.app/profile/agu.org/post/3lr4nrvqk6b2r
Please don’t take us for idiots. The two differential equations referred to relate subsurface heat content to temperature at the surface. At best, they describe a typical second-order response of the forcing (i.e. heat content) as it presents as an SST. It still in no way describes the “key dynamics” of subsurface heat redistribution via a thermocline modulation. Some of us know math-based physics and don’t easily get fooled by an assertion backed by “equations” — we’re not that gullible,.
Something mechanical is causing the thermocline to vary and it’s certainly not sunspot variations. The fact that the thermocline exists within a reduced effective gravity environment means that any of the expected gravitational or inertial forces are greatly amplified in strength. Sunspot variations are not gravitational or inertial. Yet lunar and seasonal solar variations have plenty of mechanical torque at their disposal.
The seasonal modulation is very apparent in the ENSO time-series and associated frequency spectrum, while the lunar modulation is readily apparent if aliasing of lunar cycles with the annual modulation is taken into account. As I said above, the expected spectral locations of aliased lunar periods match those predicted.
This really should not be that difficult for a lay-person to understand, in contrast to the AGU playing the “elegant math” card to an unsuspecting public. Everyone at least appreciates how tides are a response to lunar cycles, and so that needs to be at least considered on a more global basis. Consider the over 100 year time series of sea-level-height in Sydney harbor – diurnal cycles account for likely 95% of the variation, while annual comprises perhaps 4%, and the rest (which I assert is lunar nonlinearly modulated by annual) is 1% at most. The key finding is that this 1% residual variation matches exceedingly well the ENSO variation as exemplified by the NINO4 time-series.
So why is it that if SLH variation is almost 100% accounted for by lunisolar variation, why can’t the research community even allow for the consideration that the ultimately much more gravitationally-sensitive Pacific ocean thermocline is not impacted by lunisolar forces in a similar fashion? If that’s the case, ENSO may in fact be 100% driven by tidal forces. This is just logical thinking, and not some ego-driven mindset that Piotr believes every curious scientist is afflicted with.
Some of us know math-based physics and don’t easily get fooled by an assertion backed by “equations” — we’re not that gullible,.
You Paul are not alone.
” don’t easily get fooled by an assertion backed by “equations” — we’re not that gullible,”
I rely on “equations” as much as they do — the issue is that the ones I use actually advance the research. And that’s not a subjective statement if the results are tested via cross-validation.
in Re to Paul Pukite, 6 Jun 2025 at 2:36 AM,
https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2025/06/unforced-variations-jun-2025/#comment-834248
Dear Paul,
To your question what I would like to know, please let me repeat that I asked if the frequencies of the periodic tidal forcings that you have identified as likely causes of ENSO, AMOC and PDO have also sufficiently high amplitudes to cause the respective effects.
Specifically, you mentioned the influence of the tidal forces on thermocline. Have you calculated the amplitude of the respective thermocline oscillations? I suppose that they should be big enough to be observable – are there data, e.g. from ARGO buoys, that fit with the predicted amplitude and frequency of thermocline oscillations accompanying the ENSO, AMOC and PDO?
Greetings
Tomáš
I thought David Rind’s guileless account of how climate modeling’ ascended from one to three dimensions wonderfully lucid, but the indoctrination in the art of story telling of many of the speakers was all too apparent.
In Re to Russell Seitz, 1 Jun 2025 at 9:51 PM,
https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2025/06/unforced-variations-jun-2025/#comment-834054
Dear Russell,
May I ask if you refer to the livestream announced by Ms. Anderson?
What kind of indoctrination have you noticed / could you offer a specific example?
Best regards
Tomáš
Tomáš Kalisz says
2 Jun 2025 at 9:58 AM
Is your Czech Google broken or what? Do you ever do anything yourself. You are like an AI without a computer connection and no power.
But to the group, the comment mentioned refers to Rind’s presentation during the “100 Hours to Save America’s Forecasts, Weather and Climate” livestream event. He works at GISS with Gavin S. Look it up dude!
The latter part of the comment critiques other speakers at the event, suggesting that their presentations were overly rehearsed or tailored to fit specific narratives, possibly at the expense of scientific objectivity. This implies a concern that some talks prioritized persuasive storytelling over impartial scientific communication.
Hear Hear!!!
In summary, Russell appreciated Rind’s lucid explanation of climate modeling advancements but expressed skepticism about the presentation styles of other speakers at the event.
Russell is obviously somewhat on board with William’s characterization recently of “The climate consensus narrative”. I recommend both David and William’s commentary because they are right.
One might imagine a bit of a commentary here about Rind, but yeah nah.
The obvious? You’d think they might have done a 100 hours stint toward early November 2024, but yeah nah.
“Gawd dammit Jed Clampett ya gone left the barn door wide opened and all our chickens, raccoons and possums escaped.”
PP: Is your Czech Google broken or what? Do you ever do anything yourself. You are like an AI without a computer connection and no power.
BPL: Let’s see, PP has gratuitously insulted MAR, Nigel, TK, Piotr, myself, and, of course, climate scientists and the IPCC. Let’s keep a list.
BPL: let’s keep a list
SA: Good list. But still, let’s not and say we did.
Honestly, the call and response needlessly amplifies the boringness of self-publication, correction, correction of correction, correction of correction of correction. It makes it hard to find the kernels of useful information in this comment area.
TK: as I said elsewhere, do your own homework. Your attempt to exploit others to do it for you is inconsiderate at best.
Me too! Me too! ;-)
Though several spoke at length of storytelling as a climate communications imperative, and many appeared to have undergone playbook training , none seemed to consider the blowback from audiences that take a dim view of infantilizing policy debates.
In Re to Russell Seitz, 3 Jun 2025 at 12:54 PM,
https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2025/06/unforced-variations-jun-2025/#comment-834165
Dear Russell,
Thank you very much for your amendment.
Best regards
Tomáš
Tomas: Russell Seitz’s comments are often informative and always amusing. If you were seeking information, you would have done well to follow as much of the 100 hours as you had time for.
Please do your own homework. fwiw, the ‘indoctrination’ was about ‘the art of storytelling’, not something else. Reading for sense in a foreign language may be challenging, but demanding elucidation from the source while ignoring the obvious sense reminds me of the story of the emperor with no clothes: “an idiom referring to a situation where a blatant truth is being ignored by a group due to a perceived need to maintain a false image of competence or authority. It originated from Hans Christian Andersen’s fairy tale, “The Emperor’s New Clothes,” where an emperor is fooled into believing he’s wearing beautiful, invisible clothes.”
Reply to Russell Seitz
This is not discipline breaking down; it’s a strategic reset to restore leverage in a world that values influence over order.
TINA to riding it out. On one end the ‘bureaucratic academics’ and on the other ‘billionaire oligarch’ inmates took over the asylum long ago.
What was conspicuously absent was any meaningful confrontation with the realities of energy return, systemic complexity, ecological boundaries, or the intrinsic nature of human societies. The prevailing narrative was seductively simple: if fossil fuels were to blame for our predicament, then so-called “renewables” must surely be the cure. There was little room—if any—for critical reflection, uncertainty, or dissenting voices. Such doubts were inconvenient, and thus quietly brushed aside.
And then, surprisingly, in what feels like an instant—here we are. Is it time to sort the wheat from the chaff yet?
PP: if fossil fuels were to blame for our predicament, then so-called “renewables” must surely be the cure. There was little room—if any—for critical reflection, uncertainty, or dissenting voices. Such doubts were inconvenient, and thus quietly brushed aside.
BPL: Except that there was a lot of critical reflection, acknowledgment of uncertainty, and dissenting voices. The only dissenting voices that were “brushed aside” were the crackpot denialists and the doomers like yourself. Biologists tend to “brush[] aside” creationists, too.
It CAN happen in science. Consider how “drifters” were treated at conferences especially in the US for some time before plate tectonics was finally nailed down as one example.
The problem with that “logic” when deniers employ it is they fail to realize 1. that it was other groups of actual scientists doing actual research in the actual real world collectiung key data from key locations who overturned the prior more uniformitarian consensus, NOT some activists creating propaganda in some think tank. Those who invoke Feynman, et. al. are almost always the most antithetical to his actual life and thinking.
I missed this comment when posted.
I applaud it’s honesty and accuracy. This speaks for me as well.
Russell Seitz says
3 Jun 2025 at 12:54 PM
“Though several spoke at length of storytelling as a climate communications imperative, and many appeared to have undergone playbook training, none seemed to consider the blowback from audiences that take a dim view of infantilizing policy debates.”
https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2025/06/unforced-variations-jun-2025/#comment-834165
Quote saved for posterity and reuse.
A Review of the Recent “Conversation” on RealClimate — May 2025
(ref: https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2025/05/the-most-recent-climate-status/#comments)
What began as a reasonable and important question from Ken Towe quickly spiraled into an increasingly hostile and intellectually dishonest exchange. The constant denial of what was actually said and meant, combined with a barrage of insults posing as debate, made for a disturbing spectacle.
Here’s the timeline in brief:
Ken Towe began with a sober and technically sound comment on 15 May:
“What realistic actions can be taken that would not otherwise create difficulties for all economies? Conventional vehicles do all of the transportation to feed billions of people as well as making the energy transition to renewables and EVs possible. Rapid reductions in CO₂ emissions takes none of the CO₂ already added out of the atmosphere to lower global temperatures. Carbon capture technologies are costly and energy intensive. Scaled up globally they can’t even store one part-per-million of CO₂ by 2050. The real enemy… root cause is population growth.”
Piotr responded the next day, but notably clipped out the rest of Ken’s argument. When Ken pointed this out and reiterated the physical reality that GHG emission reductions don’t remove legacy CO₂ already in the system, Piotr and others began misrepresenting both his statements and the fundamental science behind them.
Let’s clarify, point by point:
1 Transportation Reality
“Conventional vehicles do all of the transportation to feed billions…”
✅ Correct. This remains a fact of global logistics. The energy transition cannot occur without fossil-fueled machinery — at least for now.
2 Legacy CO₂ Remains in the Atmosphere
“Reducing emissions does not remove past emissions.”
✅ Correct. That’s basic physics. Only active carbon removal (via sinks or DAC) can do that.
3 Limits of Carbon Capture
“Scaled up globally, DAC can’t even remove one ppm by 2050.”
✅ Correct. Piotr and nigelj themselves admitted this in other comments. DAC is nascent and barely scratches the surface.
4 Sink Stability Is Assumed — Without Proof
No one has offered evidence that Earth’s natural sinks — already under stress — will remain effective in drawing down CO₂, especially as climate feedbacks worsen. This undermines the foundation of most “Net Zero” assumptions.
4 Insults in Lieu of Arguments
Repeated personal attacks (notably from nigelj) replaced thoughtful engagement. Dismissing Ken as a “denialist” — despite his fact-based concerns — shows the deterioration of debate into tribal performance.
5 Energy Transition Is Energy-Intensive
Ken pointed out that fossil fuels are ironically required to build the infrastructure for an energy transition. This is rarely acknowledged, let alone addressed in strategy documents.
6 Population Growth as the Core Issue
Ken correctly identified population growth as the engine behind emissions, resource depletion, and ecological stress. This point was ignored — likely because it’s politically inconvenient, despite being ecologically central.
Conclusion: In Defense of Reason — and Physics
Ken Towe is not a climate denier, science denier, or troll. He is one of the few who raised foundational questions based on physical limits and known realities. Disagreeing with political orthodoxy or marketing slogans like “Net Zero by 2050” does not make one a denier — it makes one honest.
Over the past 15+ years, global warming has accelerated. Atmospheric CO₂ levels are increasing faster than ever, not only from fossil fuel emissions — which haven’t meaningfully declined — but increasingly due to amplifying feedbacks like permafrost melt, soil respiration, and forest degradation. Peer-reviewed work by scientists such as James Hansen now suggests climate sensitivity may be 4–5°C, not the 2–3°C once assumed. Meanwhile, declining aerosol levels and Earth’s albedo further reduce natural cooling.
Against this backdrop, the idea that we are “on track” for Net Zero by 2050 is not just optimistic — it borders on fantasy. Many credible voices have pointed out that this narrative leans heavily on speculative carbon removal technologies and evasive carbon accounting. The numbers don’t add up — and pretending they do helps no one.
Ken Towe asked the right questions. The reaction he received tells us more about the state of public climate discourse than it does about the substance of his arguments.
Troll impersonating Pedro Prieto: “ Ken Towe began with a sober and technically sound comment
Compliments coming from you – mean so much …:-) . Talk about the kiss of death.
TiPP: “ Piotr responded the next day, but notably clipped out the rest of Ken’s argument.”
1. That’s how discussions work, Genius – you are supposed to respond to the specific points you are addressing, and NOT litter your answer with the rest of text you are NOT commenting – if anybody is interested in that “rest” – they are in the Ken’s original.
2. I didn’t have to address EVERY point of your Ken – it was enough to falsify two major ASSUMPTIONS on which he built his attack on renewables and reductions in GHG emissions:
===
Ken Towe: “GHG reductions, reducing emissions, will take none of the CO2 already added out of the atmosphere”
Piotr 18 May: “First – if large enough – they WILL result in the taking down CO2 already in the atmosphere – as natural uptake will no longer be overpowered by the new human emissions – currently only half of the emitted CO2 stays in the air the reset is absorbed by the natural sinks.
Second – yours is a typical denier/doomer all-or-nothing argument – if we can’t reduce the current levels of CO2 then let’s do nothing and keep increasing atm. Co2. The obvious and fallacy here is that the world at 425ppm won’t be as hellish as the world at 850 ppm.
==================== end of quote =============
See? You remove two pillars supporting the house that Ken built, and the house crumbles like a house of cards. No need to describe and discuss details of every shingle.
Incidentally, the second point – not only collapses Denier Ken argument above but ALSO destroys the all-or-nothing fallacy at the basis of the doomers attacks on renewables, EVs, and other technologies and mechanisms (carbon pricing) of GHG reductions.
=======
P.S. Your insinuations – quite rich coming from you:
– I QUOTED the Towe’s sentence I was challenging –
– while YOU “clipped” EVERY SINGLE word in Nigel’s and my arguments, and REPLACED them with … your “description” of our arguments. as …. supporting Ken’s claims.
But please do lecture OTHERS on their intellectual dishonesty. ;-)
Piotr says
2 Jun 2025 at 11:45 AM
……… if anybody is interested in that “rest” – they are in the Ken’s original.
Reply to Piotr
TPP: Would that be “in the Ken’s original” you couldn’t find?
I’m inclined to imagine there are several dozen layers of aluminium foil hidden under that fur cap. But I cannot know for certain.
Piotr says
2 Jun 2025 at 11:45 AM
“then let’s do nothing “
TPP: I’m calling you out, Piotr.
If I — or anyone else you’ve decided to chase across these threads with your bad-faith distortions, sloppy paraphrases, and obsessive quotes-out-of-context — have ever posted the words “then let’s do nothing” or promoted or wanted anything remotely equivalent in-context, then kindly:
Quote it. Word for word. With a link to the original comment.
If you can’t — and I know you can’t — then please, and I say this with the utmost possible respect–just shut the fuck up.
And as for your latest melodramatic whinge:
P: while YOU “clipped” EVERY SINGLE word in Nigel’s and my arguments, and REPLACED them with … your “description” of our arguments. as …. supporting Ken’s claims.
Oh really? Then explain this — your own words, no less:
1. “That’s how discussions work, Genius – you are supposed to respond to the specific points you are addressing, and NOT litter your answer with the rest of text you are NOT commenting – if anybody is interested in that ‘rest’ – they are in the original….”
2. “I didn’t have to address EVERY point of your Ken – it was enough to falsify two major ASSUMPTIONS on which he built his attack on …” blah blah blah:
Bravo! Couldn’t have said it better myself. You’ve just described exactly what I did. So what’s the problem?
You can’t have it both ways, mate. Either “summarizing and addressing key points” is a valid rhetorical practice (as you say), or it’s some sinister act of manipulation (as you accuse). Pick one. Preferably the one that doesn’t make you look ridiculous, a hypocrite and intellectually dishonest.
So again — with all due respect — this is too stupid for words.
About that “timeline”
Piotr says
16 May 2025 at 3:36 PM
Ken Towe: What realistic actions can be taken that would not otherwise create difficulties for all economies?
Ken Towe says
17 May 2025 at 7:30 PM
You left out the rest of the quote. GHG reductions, reducing emissions, will take none of the CO2 already added out of the atmosphere. Neither does putting a price on emissions. The cost of doing northing? improved infrastructure to help survive and adapt to extreme weather is less costly than hopeless mitigations doomed to failure. For hundreds of years CO2 was “dumped” to vastly improve lives and standards of living. The alternative, stone age living and/or starvation.? The energy transition cannot be done without using vehicles that run on fossil fuels., Making that process more expensive will only delay things.
Piotr says
18 May 2025 at 12:58 PM
Ken Towe: GHG reductions, reducing emissions, will take none of the CO2 already added out of the atmosphere.”
Pedro Prieto comment
>>> Ken Towe is 100% correct. What reduces atmospheric GHG are GHG SINKS- and not ghg reductions. If those sinks are destroyed or weakened by climate change and long term warming then they stop operating as SINKs this is raised in TIPPING POINTS Physics a change of natural behaviour of SINKS and so on.
This is physics. But watch how Physics is slaughtered in real time by Piotr and nigelj repeatedly. But do you even care?
Ken Towe says
19 May 2025 at 12:15 PM
If large enough?? Just ONE ppm of CO2 is 7.8 gigaton..7,800 million metric tons. Climeworks just reported they took out 105 tons last year. Even one ppm would do nothing at all. Try to remember that there are eight billion people who need to be fed and EVs are not doing it. Stab the victim?
PS.. personal insults are not helpful.
Piotr says
20 May 2025 at 12:45 AM
Ken Towe: “If large enough?? Just ONE ppm of CO2 is 7.8 gigaton..7,800 million metric tons. Climeworks just reported they took out 105 tons last year.”
Nobody talks about industrial direct air CAPTURE – we are talking about reductions of GHG EMISSIONS …
Pedro Prieto: live now
No, Piotr is not talking about reductions of GHG emissions at all. He is are talking hypothetical horse pukey narrative rhetoric. Nothing more. With not a single energy or emission fact or data point in sight.
Ignorance ≠ Science.
Handle: “Pedro Prieto”:
Here’s the timeline in brief: […]
6. Ken correctly identified population growth as the engine behind emissions, resource depletion, and ecological stress.
Hmm, I thought it was correctly identified by “William” and “the Prieto Principle” (the same one who claimed that whoever posts as Pedro Prieto is an imposter). No? Could you provide then a link to Ken’s post to which you refer in your “timeline” ?
I am asking because when I searched for the word “population” in recent discussions – the only Ken’s post I found was this:
====== Ken Towe 16 May =============
“The 20th century average temperature for the US 48 states at ~40°N. is 52° F. The same value for the globe at the Equator? is 57° F. Five degrees F warmer. Where is global population’s energy use centered?”
=============================
which is … not only a perfect example of your Ken’s Towe “ sober and technically sound” thinking, but also, since he believes that “the global population’s energy use” is NOT correlated with the Earth temperature thus reducing the population would achieve NOTHING climatewise!
Thus blowing the argument by “William”, “the Prieto Principle who Says that troll” Pedro Prieto” is an Imposter”, and of the said “Pedro Prieto” – out of the water.
So – to which OTHER words of Ken have you referred in your timeline?
Pedro Prieto says 1 Jun 2025 at 11:15 PM above:
@ https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2025/06/unforced-variations-jun-2025/#comment-834058
The Prieto Principle (TPP) says:
(Replying to Piotr, June 2 @ 1:02 PM)
P: “The Prieto Principle” (the same one who claimed that whoever posts as Pedro Prieto is an imposter). No?
TPP: Climate science’s answer to the Energizer Bunny — Piotr’s Persecution Patrol. Oh dear, where to begin? Maybe start with the simple question: Is anyone home?
As for the “imposter” nonsense — yeah, no. If memory serves (and no guarantees there), someone noted that the handle “Pedro Prieto” was probably a tribute account, not the real Pedro P., referencing the Spanish grid expert. That was clear at the time. No one — aside from the usual peanut gallery — seriously accused the commenter of impersonation. And “The Prieto Principle” was transparently an homage as well, not a sock. Only Piotr could pretend this is a Cold War mole hunt. Sí?
P: Could you provide then a link to Ken’s post to which you refer in your “timeline” ?
TPP: What, no please? Your father must have been a Baltic fishmonger, eh?
Here you go:
https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2025/05/the-most-recent-climate-status/#comment-833305
Sometimes it feels like every hour is amateur hour around here — especially when Piotr shows up. Nigel’s not much better, but hey, one slow car at a time.
P: Thus blowing the argument by “William”, “the Prieto Principle who Says that troll” Pedro Prieto” is an Imposter”, and of the said “Pedro Prieto” – out of the water.
TPP: Please stop! My brain hurts. I’m begging you — diagram that sentence before using it on the open internet. It’s like watching a word salad get run over by an electric freight train of misplaced vendettas.
P: to which OTHER words of Ken have you referred in your timeline?
TPP: Wow. You’re really chasing ghosts in the data fog, aren’t you? I’d tell you, but I think you already believe you know the answer. That’s the thing with Piotr — he seeks them here, he seeks them there, those dastardly sockpuppets hiding everywhere.
The Prieto Principle 2 Jun: “ No one — aside from the usual peanut gallery — seriously accused the commenter of impersonation.”
;-) Sure – troll using the real Pedro Prieto first and last name, giving a link to his interview as a support of troll’s claims, and claiming the authorship of one of his PhD thesis:
===
RC’s “Pedro Prieto”: 7 May 10:38 PM: “This Variability was one of my chapters of my Ph.D. thesis is applying variability to energy returns.”
===
is …. not pretending to be Pedro Prieto at all!
“The Prieto Principle”: “ [RC’s] “Pedro Prieto” was probably a tribute account.
Sure – a “tribute” by …. claiming the authorship of HIS Ph.D. thesis, by spreading UNDER HIS NAME the incoherent drivel in which troll misrepresents HIS views as the rejection of all renewables in favour of extremist doomers ideology (that calls for the destruction of Capitalism, and rapid global deindustrialization and depopulation that to stabilize climate within a decade or two would REQUIRE a genocide of many billions of people).
With a TRIBUTE like that – WHO NEEDS opening fake accounts in your name, and attributing TO YOUR NAME the troll’s drivel and their arrogant contempt toward the people you don’t even know? Which being archived – will continue to affect YOUR reputation into the future?
The Prieto Principle says
2 Jun 2025 at 11:48 PM
Pedro Prieto: Thanks TPP
I approve this message.
Nothing to add.
Pedro Prieto.
Why do you persist with this farsical nonsense? Is it an act of continuing trolling, sock-puppeteering, or do you enjoy displaying your stupidity to the world?
Firsetly, what began with what-you-call a Ken Towe’s “reasonable and important question” was provided with an answer by Ken Towe himself.
Question – “What realistic actions can be taken that would not otherwise create difficulties for all economies?”
Answer – “The real enemy/root cause is population growth. The correlation between Mauna Loa CO2 and global population numbers is almost perfect.”
That said, I’m not sure what to make of this idea that some “almost perfect … correlation between Mauna Loa CO2 and global population numbers” makes global population the “real enemy/root cause” of the rising atmospheric CO2 levels. And were it the case, given that world population is accelerating while CO2 levels are decelerating, presumably the way to cut CO2 is to quickly increase poulation which will then quickly reduce CO2 levels. Thus, using these numbers below, a rapid doubling of population would return CO2 to pre-industrial levels.
Five-year percentage increases in world population & MLO CO2
1965 – 1969 … 11.0% … 1.2%
1970 – 1974 … 10.6% … 1.7%
1975 – 1979 ….. 9.7% … 1.8%
1980 – 1984 ….. 9.4% … 2.3%
1985 – 1989 ….. 9.5% … 2.3%
1990 – 1994 ….. 9.0% … 2.0%
1995 – 1999 ….. 7.6% … 2.2%
2000 – 2004 ….. 7.0% … 2.5%
2005 – 2009 ….. 6.6% … 2.8%
2010 – 2014 ….. 6.6% … 2.7%
2015 – 2019 ….. 6.1% … 3.1%
2020 – 2024 ….. 5.0% … 3.1%
Secondly, your attempted “timeline in brief” of the comment thread interchange failed to relate details of the response to Ken Towe’s “reasonable and important question” that immediately followed it in the thread. This pointed to the obsurdity of the repeatingly-proposed “almost perfect … correlation between Mauna Loa CO2 and global population numbers”.
So there is really no need whatever to continue this CO2/population farce, unless you wish to explain why you feel the need to defend the undefensible?
MA Rodger, the godfather to mediocrity says:
2 Jun 2025 at 2:45 PM
MAR: That said, I’m not sure what to make of this idea that some “almost perfect … correlation between Mauna Loa CO2 and global population numbers” makes global population the “real enemy/root cause” of the rising atmospheric CO2 levels.
TPP: Did I mention that correlation? No. Solves that issue immediately. Next?
MAR: Secondly, your attempted “timeline in brief” of the comment thread interchange failed to relate details of the response to Ken Towe’s “reasonable and important question” that …….
TPP: Gee, that’s a tough one MA. “Here’s the timeline in brief:” I wonder what ‘brief’ means?
Solves the second issue nicely. The brevity looks quite successful from here. Will there be anything else my dear fellow? I hope not.
TPP,
You ask me “Did I mention that correlation?”
Why do you ask me such a question? Did you forget which sock-puppet to shove your hand into when you replied to me? Given the two pseudonyms which you mix-up also carry out a fake interchange just up-thread, your error further exposes your duplicitousness.
And having made the mistake, it took you six hours to spot it.
Mind, the rank stupidity exhibited of both The Prieto Principle and Pedro Prieto is a big give-away, both being happy to accept “farcical nonsense” as their “reality”!!
For the record, responding to the detail of your puerile reply, neither sock-puppet mentioned Ken Towe’s “perfect correlation” but by saying that ” Ken Towe is 100% correct” you’re telling the world you agree with his statement 100%. Perhaps this concept “100%” is too difficult for you to grasp what is meant by it.
You certainly fail to grasp what a “timeline in brief” entails.
Your “posting a note to UV June has indeed “contribute(d) to this confusion as well.” Be aware that useful brevity requires understanding of the thing being summarised. Such a task is evidently well beyond the abilities of a hopeless case like you sock puppeteer.
MA Rodger says
2 Jun 2025 at 2:45 PM
Just quickly — I don’t have much time — but this post warrants a response.
To be clear, none of this is “about me.” I summarized a timeline of what has been a lengthy and often circular exchange. I stand by what I said. I could easily list the timestamps of each comment I referenced — but what would be the point? It seems unlikely to matter to those like Piotr or MA Rodger, who appear allergic to straightforward human conversation by default. I have no idea why that is — and I don’t particularly care to know.
The point remains: beneath all the rhetoric, uncertainty, personal digs, and overconfident declarations lies one basic fact — a global population of 8 billion people, growing toward 9 billion by around 2040. That’s the central, often-ignored driver behind nearly every pressure placed on ecosystems, the climate, energy demand, and emissions — exactly what Ken Towe highlighted at the outset.
Whether some correlation is “perfect” or not isn’t the issue. It as not ‘my’ correlation anyway. The scale of human activity — economic, industrial, and biological — is the context in which all these numbers, including CO₂, exist and evolve. Ignoring that bigger picture in favor of semantic nitpicking or gotcha graphs feels like deliberate avoidance.
You’re welcome to call that “farcical nonsense” if you like. But I’ll keep calling it reality.
PP 3 Jun 2025 6:53 AM says:
The scale of human activity — economic, industrial, and biological — is the context in which all these numbers, including CO₂, exist and evolve. Ignoring that bigger picture in favor of semantic nitpicking or gotcha graphs feels like deliberate avoidance.
JP: This is a climate blog. When some of us persist in talking about climate, I can’t help what it feels like to you. I certainly agree that underlying the planetary crisis is human activity, and rising CO2 is but one manifestation. I don’t agree that world population is THE central driver. I’d call it an important contributor, along with economies and political systems that are dependent on growth, vast inequalities of income and consumption, the institutions that perpetuate these systems, etc. I’m not really interested in discussing which might be the most important of those or how to address them on this blog, either. Over 50 years ago, we had “The Population Bomb” and “Limits to Growth” to bring awareness of those problems to many people. Silence on these subjects doesn’t indicate indifference. Personally, it doesn’t say anything about my actions regarding these issues in the rest of my life.
Regarding “nitpicking” – this is a science blog. Bad math has no place here, and needs to be addressed. KT brought in some bad math about a “near perfect” correlation a while back. Several of us pointed out his errors, and gave him a chance to make a correction. He didn’t. Instead, he returned with the very same false assertion about correlation last month. Second time, it’s a tiresome lie. If he’s satisfied to repeat it, I see no need to regard the rest of what he might have to say. I’m not open to arguments that he’s being mistreated when his further points are therefore disregarded.
John Pollack says
3 Jun 2025 at 8:55 PM
You sound intelligent, and it feels like you probably are, though I am far from convinced about the quality of judgment. Therefore I am I’m curious what the following meant to you the first time you read, and before you made the comment above; and MA Rodger made his two comments?
“What began as a reasonable and important question from Ken Towe quickly spiraled into an increasingly hostile and intellectually dishonest exchange. The constant denial of what was actually said and meant, combined with a barrage of insults posing as debate, made for a disturbing spectacle.”
Your feedback will determine my final judgment how I will proceed. The others’ response feels to me self-evident.
MAR , good points. A supposed correlation between population growth and CO2 levels would not be causation. Correlation is not causation. Population growth does not cause higher CO2 levels and the global warming any more than it causes car accidents, or cancer or divorces. The use of fossil fuels is the real causation. of climbing CO2 levels.
And clearly the correlation between population growth and CO2 growth is weak at best.
However I’m mystified by your statement that “And were it the case, given that world population is accelerating while CO2 levels are decelerating, ” Surely the opposite is true? I think you have made a typo or something.
nigelj,
I did indeed mistype.
One is accelerating, one decelerating and I tapped them in the wrong way round.
Also I miscalculated the % rise in population to return CO2 to pre-industrial levels under the assumption that the correlation was “almost perfect” and a %pop → % CO2 causation was real. But given the whole premise is nonsense, I couldn’t be arsed to provide a correction.
MAR: “But given the whole premise is nonsense, I couldn’t be arsed to provide a correction.”
Ha ha. Quite right, and fair enough.
nigelj: “Population growth does not cause higher CO2 levels and the global warming any more than it causes car accidents, or cancer or divorces.”
It is not a cause but it is a factor. Unless every extra human being on the planet lives a life of zero carbon footprint, how can CO2 emissions not increase with increasing global population? If traffic on roads increases due to more people living in an area, there will be more car accidents even if the fundamental cause of almost all road accidents is carelessness. One significant reason U.S. hurricane damage has increased with time is because of increased population along vulnerable tropical coastlines although other factors are important. This doesn’t mean that the solution is to decrease the population, the solution is to address the fundamental causes, which in the case of CO2 emissions is our mindset and way of living, especially in wealthy Western countries.
Adam Lea “ how can CO2 emissions not increase with increasing global population?”
Hence Nigel didn’t say that it “does not increase” – but that it does not cause any more than it causes car accidents, or cancer or divorces.”
(the above does NOT presume the total number of car accidents, cancers, or divorce “not increase with increasing global population?)
And the above is in the context of the unholy alliance of deniers and doomers who BOTH attack renewables and other current reductions in Co2 emissions they won’t have any effect on the climate, because:
Doomer William: “I don’t understand why people think a full switch to electricity is either feasible or wise. We’re treating symptoms, not causes. The real issue is massive industrial scale consumption and population overshoot”
and: What we need is less solving of the putting GHGs into the atmosphere by burning fossil fuels” [and more massive deindustrialization and depopulation].
Denier Ken Towe: disparages renewables, EV by arguing that “ The real enemy…root cause is population growth. The correlation between Mauna Loa CO2 and global population numbers is almost perfect.
Denier Pedro: “ Population Growth as the Core Issue, Ken correctly identified population growth as the engine behind emissions, resource depletion, and ecological stress.
Conclusion: In Defense of Reason — and Physics Ken Towe is not a climate denier, science denier, or troll. He is one of the few who raised foundational questions based on physical limits and known realities”
Hence Nigel argument that one could make identical argument correlating global populations with car accidents or cancers. And use it to dismiss the sense of actions that reduce per capita car accidents and cancers, because the only way to address the “root cause” of car accidents and cancers is to reduce the number of people.
Both deniers and doomers agree on derisive dismission renewables, EV, putting the price on carbon and all other attempts to reduce CO2 emissions, because the “root cause”/”core issue” of the AGW is human population – thus the only viable way to deal with AGW is to reduce it.
What they start to differ – is what to do with their presumption. Since the required depopulation would have to be MASSIVE (removal of 5.6 BIllion of people to just stabilize CO2, MORE to the actual goal of stabilizing T):
– Deniers conclude Oh well – this means that we can’t do anything about so let’s continue business as as usual
– Doomers – refuse the quantify the scale of the needed depopulation, and when pressed – shrug off it with saying that all these billions would die anyway from the AGW and their planned extermination is much better than the chaotic one from AGW.
Since stabilize atm. CO2 would require a 70% reduction in human population, to stabilize T – even more. Since we need these within the next few decades – the only way to achieve it would be a targeted genocide of 0.7*8 bln= 5,6 billion people for CO2 stabilization, or MORE for T stabilization.
Adam, yes population growth is a factor. My point is the fundamental cause of warming is fossil fuels (and some agriculture). Population growth is effectively an amplifier and maybe a bit like a positive feedback.
But we can’t realistically solve the problem by cutting population size drastically enough quickly enough, so renewables is the preferred option. Piotr understood exactly what I meant.
PP: Repeated personal attacks (notably from nigelj)
BPL: Who wants to bet he doesn’t even see it?
I have get back to my question on lapse rate feedback from april..
https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2025/04/unforced-variations-apr-2025/#comment-832376
Barrry E Finch was so kind to answer..
“For a Forcing of 3.7 w/m**2 the climate scientists’ assessment of Lapse Rate change -ve Feedback is -4.1 w/m**2 from a plot I saw presented on UTube either by Jennifer Francis or (more likely) by Mark Zelinka, not https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kE1VBCt8GLc evidently,”
I looked up the video and there we have a “temperature feedback” (?) of -4.02W/m2 around the 11:20 mark. While the graph shows different kinds of feedbacks, it does not mention lapse rate feedback at all. I assume their “temperature feedback” will account for planck feedback (making up the bulk of it) plus lapse rate feedback. Their total feedback of -0.98W/m2 would then equate to an ECS of say 3.7/0.98 = 3.77K, or something like it. Anyhow, it does not address my issue.
The fundamental problem I have is still the same and simple: If the troposphere warms significantly faster than the surface, then the emission temperature (Te) will do so as well and you get a very large LRF. For instance, even if Te would only increase a 50% more than Ts (it should be more in theory!), it would go from 255K to 256.5K per K in Ts. And so we can do a little calculation…
255^4*5.67e-8 = 239.74
256.5^4*5.67e-8 = 245.43
245.43 – 239.74 = 5.69W/m2
Accounting for a planck feedback of 3.3W/m2 we get..
5.69 – 3.3 = 2.39W/m2 for LRF
That is a huge negative feedback of 2.39W/m2, kind of dominating positive feedbacks. Striktly following the theory (as in the emagram) you will get even larger figures above 3W/m2.
An LRF of a mere -0.5W/m2, as is the central estimate in AR6, is only compatible with a minimal lapse rate shrink, where Te outpaces Ts by only ~13%, or 0.13K per K in Ts. But that is not the theory, nor what we have in the models.
So that is the mistery. How can we have a strong tropospheric warming, as compared to Ts, including the “tropical hot spot” and so on, while not having this large negative LRF. It made no sense. But then I found this quote in AR6:
“Feedback parameters in climate models are calculated assuming that they are independent of each other, except for a well-known co-dependency between the water vapour (WV) and lapse rate (LR) feedbacks”
Given the problem, what this suggests is, LRF will not depend on the change in the lapse rate, which logically it has to, but instead would be coupled with WV and their sum then be a hard coded positive feedback of ~1W/m2. But that is not very elegant, to say at least. Also it would violate logic and physics..
Hartmann had a good discussion in:
The Vertical Profile of Radiative Cooling and Lapse Rate in a Warming Climate
https://atmos.washington.edu/~dennis/Hartmann_Cooling_2022.pdf
“””The departures of the temperature profile from moist adiabatic may increase with global warming, which would mean that the cooling rate remains more uniform with altitude as the surface warms, rather than becoming more top-heavy as would be the case if the temperature profile remained always approximately moist adiabatic.”””
This suggests that warming may not always lead to a more efficient vertical radiative cooling structure. But, the deeper issue is that the energy accumulation itself appears to arise primarily from increased solar absorption, not just by a classical longwave “greenhouse” forcing. It doesn’t resemble a classic Manabe framework at all.
As Raghuraman and co. explain in:
“Forcing, Cloud Feedbacks, Cloud Masking, and Internal Variability in the Cloud Radiative Effect Satellite Record”
https://journals.ametsoc.org/view/journals/clim/36/12/JCLI-D-22-0555.1.xml:
“””“The classical picture of an increased greenhouse effect from increases in greenhouse gases is correct, however, it gets cancelled by increased surface and atmospheric emission.”
“Put simply, in response to external forcing in LW and SW radiation, Earth has a stabilizing feedback only in the LW and not in the SW, so the planet accumulates heat in the SW.””””
The forcing–feedback paradigm becomes ambiguous or even misleading when the radiative imbalance comes from increased solar absorption. Trying to apply a forcing–feedback–sensitivity breakdown becomes artificial.
Previously it was surmised by Donohoe et. al 2014 in “Shortwave and longwave radiative contributions to global warming under increasing CO2”
https://www.pnas.org/doi/pdf/10.1073/pnas.1412190111
that “Altogether, these estimates imply that the current global energy accumulation is still dominated by decreased OLR. However, they also suggest that a transition to a regime of global energy accumulation dominated by enhanced ASR could occur with only 0.5 K global warming above present—by the middle of the 21st century if warming trends continue as projected.”
That is NOT what happened. Enhanced ASR has already been dominating for as long as we have observations.
When the imbalance comes from longwave forcing (reduced OLR) the forcing–feedback paradigm fits well. GHGs introduce a step change in TOA radiative imbalance. The system warms until feedback-adjusted OLR offsets that forcing.
In this case, the Planck response sets the baseline damping based on temperature profile, while other feedbacks determine how far OLR deviates from the Planck slope. So you can meaningfully decompose λ into Planck + WV + clouds + albedo, etc. That separation holds well in textbook CO2 forcing cases: greenhouse gases reduce outgoing longwave radiation (OLR), the system warms, and feedbacks shape how OLR rises back toward balance.
But, the forcing–feedback–sensitivity framework breaks down when the observed warming is tied to enhanced ASR. In this case, the “forcing” is itself a feedback outcome, and so it’s practically indistinguishable from unforced variability. The “forcing” and “feedback” decomposition is meaningless.
The OLR–Ts slope (~1.8 W/m²/K in observations) appears to be a structural property of the system; not a residual signal to be parsed into forcing & feedback components. The initial longwave signal is effectively invisible, submerged beneath cloud-driven shortwave variability. The earth energy imbalance appears to be a consequence of the lagged surface-climate response to solar input changes (buffered through ocean). Hansen’s oceanic diffusion concept suggested a response function to equilibrium about 1/e over 100 years. A lot of the response occurs in the first couple decades, with the remainder stretching out over centuries.
We can see clearly from the recent Myhre and co. in “Observed trend in Earth energy imbalance may provide a constraint for low climate sensitivity models”
https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.adt0647
that models of any sensitivity are not able to calculate the correct trends of SW and LW radiation at top of atmosphere [at all]
https://cdn.bsky.app/img/feed_fullsize/plain/did:plc:t2djpdnyzyyqvyja3w65dlz2/bafkreibmnkekivi6nb4ebaux75a45kmnohsdpbqngxn3ue6s254okcyaqy@jpeg
This was also echoed in Schmidts CERESMIP discussion.
When the signal is solar input increase (for whatever reason), use energy conservation directly:
ΔASR=ΔOLR
Here, the equilibrium OLR slope (dOLR/dTs) should be treated as a property of the coupled system, not as a sum of forcing, Planck and feedback terms. There’s no “restoration” of a perturbed balance – there is a shift to a new one. The increase in equilibrium emission temperature is not a deviation to be damped, but a consequence of the new radiative input. Trying to reverse-engineer it into forcing-feedback components becomes a conceptual dead end, because the energy gain is itself already a feedback expression.
Pedro quote on Jun 1:
“6 Population Growth as the Core Issue
Ken correctly identified population growth as the engine behind emissions, resource depletion, and ecological stress…….”
That is not true. The engine behind emissions IS USING FOSSIL FUELS. Nearly all of those who are screaming about the evils of FFs are using them just like everyone else. They don’ t have to. There is A LOT each of us can do to reduce our use of FFs, but the vast majority will do very little. Many of those folks are content to yell and scream about the evil “other side”, the MAGA’s, Trump, Republicans, etc, but do almost nothing to seriously reduce their own FF use.
Please describe how YOU have achieved ZERO FF usage? NOT NET ZERO FF usage – but ACTUAL ZERO FF usage.
Mr. Know It All says
2 Jun 2025 at 6:55 PM
Can I answer too?
I see Mr. Know It All often provokes for effect — but not entirely unreasonably. He raises a valid challenge (about personal hypocrisy and behavioral consistency), even if it comes wrapped in judgmental dismissiveness.
KIA — your point about people still using fossil fuels while attacking others is fair in spirit, even if it’s framed to needle. Many of us do struggle with our dependence on the very system we criticize. And most people — on both sides of the emissions debate — are still trying to “save the system” as if it’s sacred. They won’t go near systemic critique. It’s always the evil fossil fuel companies or Donald Trump’s fault. While apparently, manufacturing millions of BEVs every year forever will somehow “save the planet.” It’s nuts. (smile)
But let’s be clear: the engine behind emissions isn’t just fossil fuels — it’s the scale and structure of the human enterprise that demands them. It’s not just semantics; it’s framing. Fossil fuels weren’t burned by penguins — they were burned to expand human societies. That’s population, chum.
Also, not all emissions come from fossil fuels. Land use change, agriculture, cement, melting permafrost, degraded soils and wetlands — these all emit GHGs too, often with no fossil fuels involved. Ecosystem breakdown is already on autopilot. Even if we cut emissions, most of the cascading feedbacks are already baked in. It’s likely too late to avoid the iceberg — but yeah, we still ought to steer.
You’re right to challenge personal complacency. But calling for “actual zero fossil fuel use” from individuals is asking them to opt out of industrial civilization entirely. That’s not a reasonable bar. The real task is systemic transition — not lifestyle purism. And that transition? Still entirely out of reach. The ship will sink, I expect. Then we’ll see what gives. But it won’t look anything like today, when we’re still burning 100 million barrels of oil every single day.
“Please describe how YOU have achieved ZERO FF usage?”
Me? I haven’t. I won’t. And I’m not pretending I will. I live responsibly, creatively, ethically, and without waste. That’s my baseline. That’s enough. I’m not the problem here. Demanding individual purity is irrelevant to climate change, ecological collapse, or sustainability. It’s not how this works.
Systemic problems require systemic shifts. This whole “gotcha” game — demanding total purity from individuals while the system runs on rails — is a deflection. It’s not hypocrisy to live in the world while trying to change it. That’s always been the human condition.
Still, I get where you’re coming from. Honestly. I really do.
Th: And most people — on both sides of the emissions debate — are still trying to “save the system” as if it’s sacred. They won’t go near systemic critique. It’s always the evil fossil fuel companies or Donald Trump’s fault. While apparently, manufacturing millions of BEVs every year forever will somehow “save the planet.” It’s nuts.
BPL: Not as nuts as doomerism. And as for completely changing the system–good luck with that. That can happen only long-range, and we’ve got a problem now.
BPL: Not as nuts as doomerism.
And not as lethal as doomerism. Most of their solutions have been already tried:
– Communism – in the Soviet Union, China, N. Korea and others – much more murderous than nazizm – many 10s of millions victims. Extremely ineffective and therefore extremely destructive to environment.
– The concept of building a New Man who was to be motivated by the greater good, not by personal gain and importance (a.k.a. Homo sovieticus) – provided excuse for the opposite
– Deindustrialization – Pol Pot murdered about 1/4 of Cambodia population – class enemies from the cities – “seeking to create an agrarian socialist society that he believed would evolve into a communist one”
– Rapid reduction of human population – to get to net zero – given very limited anthropogenic sequestration – we would need to eliminate almost ALL of human population – net zero by 2050 would require extrermination of 7.5? 8? billion people, the scale by which Soviet death toll as well as Holocaust and starvation to death of many millions of Russians and Ukrainians by the Nazis – would seem a child’s play.
Those who cannot learn from the past, are condemned to repeat it…
(cont. from https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2025/06/unforced-variations-jun-2025/#comment-834027 , & re Thessalonia @ https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2025/06/unforced-variations-jun-2025/#comment-834148 )
Aside from a few things, I agree very much with some of what Thessalonia said here, in particular that it is unfair to leave it all up to voluntary individual actions; when there is an externality involved and if not everyone acts accordingly (and how can we expect them to know all what to do if they don’t keep track of supply chain structures, etc.), those who act must be the heros, and the options available to individuals (categorically and in terms of affordability/accessibility) won’t improve as much as they should (eg. HOAs sometimes pop up as the villains who get in the way of individual actions). See my https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2025/05/unforced-variations-may-2025/comment-page-2/#comment-833994 [emph. added]: “ “As for individual carbon footprints — mine, yours — they’re all irrelevant. ” – wrong, but it is certainly easier to reduce them if the rest of society creates/makes the lower CO2-eg. options easier. I think Gittemary Johansen would agree that individual voluntary actions alone are not enough (or perhaps more accurately, shouldn’t be required to do it all) – see what she says starting at ~0:48 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U9cjO_Y7tGw I included those two videos ( https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2025/05/unforced-variations-may-2025/comment-page-2/#comment-833770 ) because of the reference to overconsumption. ” – and my support for a CO2eq. tax and other policies (link in my name) – which would solve the supply chain (& waste chain) knowledge problem. [my “wrong” was addressing the idea that individual voluntary actions are worthless; of course they do something.]
“Many of us do struggle with our dependence on the very system we criticize.” Yes!
…
“ But let’s be clear: the engine behind emissions isn’t just fossil fuels ”… Credit for use of “just”, there.
…
“ Also, not all emissions come from fossil fuels. ” … Very true.
…
… “ calling for “actual zero fossil fuel use” from individuals is asking them to opt out of industrial civilization entirely. That’s not a reasonable bar. The real task is systemic transition — not lifestyle purism.” … well said. Etc.
But
“ And most people — on both sides of the emissions debate — are still trying to “save the system” as if it’s sacred. They won’t go near systemic critique. It’s always the evil fossil fuel companies or Donald Trump’s fault. ”
Depends on what system changes you have in mind. I have some in mind: pollution taxes (and related trade corrections (tariffs that are actually justified)), public spending and planning R&D and infrastructure: electric grid, walkable/bikeable cities, public transportation, efficiency standards, regulations of mining to protect local environment better, H2O resource management (permeable surfaces, holding ponds, … where should we grow almonds and which bees (or drones?) … – I love almond butter and extract, prefer not to give it up), other things less directly related to the climate issue (incl. election reforms) …
Just because someone is reluctant to give up capitalism* (*as they understand it to be – if fair prices and pay are negotiated, is it no longer capitalism? Also, the ability to supply labor seems like a means of production to me), doesn’t mean they don’t want systemic change.
… “It’s always the evil fossil fuel companies or Donald Trump’s fault. ”…
And to they extent they have thwarted good changes, those agents have become bad.
…“ While apparently, manufacturing millions of BEVs every year forever will somehow “save the planet.” ”…
Make them to last, recycle, etc. Of course recycling & repurposing/reusing/etc. isn’t perfect (PS this was pointed out in a “Do The Math” post which was linked to by Kevin McKinney some months ago.)– w/ tornados, fires, floods, earthquakes, accidents, etc., the ultimate fate of our products may be “dust in the wind” (or on the sea floor). And mineral resources are not generally renewable on human timescales. So possibly, maybe, after 100, 1000, … 1,000,000 years? we might have to go back to the stone age(?). But that doesn’t necessarily mean we should do so right now. Sustainability is important but not all that is destined to end should be avoided.
…“ It’s nuts. (smile) ”
Seriously, dude, do you want us to think you’re Darth Nedious (or an asset of Putin)? And what’s with that (smile), anyway; it seems creepy to me. Why not use :) or ;), and when something’s funny or cute.
————— —
Also, re my https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2025/05/unforced-variations-may-2025/comment-page-2/#comment-833985
““Kicking fossil fuel out of industry! Here’s how it’s done…” (haven’t watched this one yet) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vljqz20qg2E ” – As it turns out, I did see that one before, and I think I even linked to it before; it’s about the potential for electrification of process heating in industry. Combine that with thermal storage, and we’ve got an additional capacity to help match electric power supply and demand.
KIA: The engine behind emissions IS USING FOSSIL FUELS. Nearly all of those who are screaming about the evils of FFs are using them just like everyone else. They don’ t have to. There is A LOT each of us can do to reduce our use of FFs, but the vast majority will do very little. Many of those folks are content to yell and scream about the evil “other side”, the MAGA’s, Trump, Republicans, etc, but do almost nothing to seriously reduce their own FF use.
BPL: Yeah, you guys! Stop building those home gigawatt power plants!
When people do, in fact get motivated, BP, you might be surprised. I woud have thought the same thing about Canadians boycotting US products. For one example, breakfast cereals like flakes, pops, etc. aren’t really produced much in Canada historically given the closeness of Canada to the Michigan factories. But as of the past week or two I’ve already been seeing a lot of non-USA-produced muesli-types already on the shelves. Even more telling is that US cereals haven’t been selling and are now on clearance prices like 75% off so I expect more “normal” processed grains soon enough.
So yes, whole business models _can_ fail suddenly. Buggywhips just don’t sell like they used to.
Reply to Mr. Know It All
Thanks for the question. I appreciate Thessalonia’s response. Seems reasonable to me. Please allow me to respond in my own way.
The Deeper Failure?
No es que no fuimos advertidos. No es que la ciencia fuera ambigua!
No—the warnings were clear, and often urgent. But the framing itself… was deeply flawed. Simplistic. Infantilizing, even. We tried to solve the climate problem in a way that allowed us to sidestep the real questions—questions of physical limits, of societal scale, of how we live and what exactly we think we’re “powering” toward.
This was never just a climate failure. It reflects a deeper civilizational pattern. We confuse GDP with well-being. We prescribe technologies for social decay. We write laws to battle addiction, yet ignore its roots in despair. We isolate problems, tinker at the edges, and declare the system “stable”—until it breaks again, only harder.
We embraced acceleration—automation, globalization, digitization—but lacked the wisdom, or perhaps the courage, to apply the brakes. Each fix compounded the contradictions. Every solution created new dependencies, new fragilities. And still we called it progress.
We harnessed fossil fuels, built systems of staggering complexity, and let growth become our guiding god. Then, faced with the fallout—planetary heating, ecological overshoot, systemic risk—we reached, once more, for familiar tools: substitution, carbon pricing, techno-markets. Anything but real reflection.
This is why climate policy failed. Not because we had no options. Because we misunderstood the problem. We made it about emissions, when it was always about our relationship with energy, with scale, with Nature herself. We tried to patch the atmosphere while keeping the machinery of civilization intact. But systems don’t work like that.
The truth is harder—and it doesn’t yield to wishful thinking. We don’t need new energy sources. We need a new relationship with energy: one grounded in restraint, humility, and biophysical reality. One that honors the fact that some limits, once breached, do not offer second chances. And some systems, once overbuilt, do not transition—they collapse.
And now—June 2025—the signs are everywhere: CO₂ at record highs, the warmest anomalies on record, wildfire seasons with no end, and still the faithful chant “net zero by 2050” as if the calendar were the solution. I cannot see how Trump or his Maga fans have anything to do with this, more than anyone else does.
We are not heading for an energy transition Mr. Know It All. We are running out of time to manage an unraveling.
” Nearly all of those who are screaming about the evils of FFs are using them just like everyone else. They don’ t have to. ”
False. The very act of existing in a country where the fundamental products/services/infrastructure required to live involve fossil fuel use involves a contribution to that fossil fuel use, so the only way I can achieve zero FF usage is to commit suicide, which is not a reasonable request to make of anyone. What you are doing is firing a combination of the Tu-quoque and Nirvana fallacies at people, which is about as much use as a cat flap on a submarine.
I can name names, if needed, but I’m genuinely curious:
Why is it that some here seem to believe that anyone who asks a question — or offers their own opinion or conclusion based on their reading of the science to date — are expected to already possess exhaustive knowledge of every relevant dataset, every past discussion, and every peer-reviewed analysis ever published?
Expected to flawlessly separate every fact from fiction automatically, and fully grasp the entire history of the issue… and if they don’t they’re assumed to be trolling and disingenuous. Or worse — automatically treated as if they are a proven climate science denier, a sock puppet, or a bad-faith enemy actor here to deceive and disrupt. It’s a strangely hostile dynamic which pervades.
But isn’t sharing an informed conclusion — or asking a question — usually a way of saying: “Hey, this is how it looks to me… what do you think? What do you know?” In other words, an invitation to conversation, or at least a respectful reply, and for openly seeking more information.
Why do people who only ever push their own opinions continually disparage and criticise others for posting their opinions?
So what exactly underlies this prevailing paranoia — this tendency to treat nearly every post as a potential ambush, and every new participant as guilty until proven innocent? Makes you wonder what exactly people are so afraid of.
TPP: Why is it that some here seem to believe that anyone who asks a question — or offers their own opinion or conclusion based on their reading of the science to date — are expected to already possess exhaustive knowledge of every relevant dataset, every past discussion, and every peer-reviewed analysis ever published?
BPL: Why is it that some here ask counterfactual questions?
When Science Gets Framed Out of the Conversation
Getting Net Zero Right: What “Actual” Actually Means
MA Rodger says 30 May 2025 at 4:37 AM
https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2025/05/unforced-variations-may-2025/comment-page-2/#comment-833899
Speaking to and about William, MA Rodger says:
However, let me be helpful and provide a bit of learning.
Within the “dismissals, insults, (and) false accusations” of your recent serving of comments here at RC, you tell us “atmospheric CO₂ concentrations will continue to rise each year until we achieve actual net zero.”
That is untrue.
There is an army of sciency folk involved in the Global Carbon Project and their primary objective is to fully quantify the carbon cycle. Each year they publish a Carbon Budget.
and
So once the world gets CO2 emissions down below the capacity of the ocean/land/concrete sinks and keeps down below, atmospheric CO2 will decline. [NOTE -insert- and not before then] (The sinks will also slowly decline as well.)
Thus it is entirely untrue to assert that “atmospheric CO₂ concentrations will continue to rise each year until we achieve actual net zero.”
Thessalonia: My view is William is right and Rodger is wrong to say it is untrue. William tells the truth, Rodger does not-he distorts it. I’ll let William explain it–I was following this and it’s disappointing to see it being swept under the carpet–and ignored by MA Rodger in his next reply.
What a pity there is no neutral umpire to make a judgement about science matters here on Real Climate. No wonder it’s a dog fight. Please bear with me here:
William says
31 May 2025 at 6:51 PM
https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2025/05/unforced-variations-may-2025/comment-page-2/#comment-833995
To Thessalonia – 30 May 2025 at 6:39 PM
Yes it is all very strange isn’t it?
Rodger smugly opines above:Thus it is entirely untrue to assert that “atmospheric CO₂ concentrations will continue to rise each year until we achieve actual net zero.” Hopefully that will be useful learning for you.
William continues:
Rodger is wrong — again. What I said — “atmospheric CO₂ concentrations will continue to rise each year until we achieve actual net zero” — is 100% scientifically true.
Right now, if we emit around 11.3 GtC, while natural sinks (oceans, forests, land, etc.) absorb only about 5.4 GtC. The result? Atmospheric CO₂ continues to rise. That’s what I said — and exactly what both the data and the science confirm.
The facts aren’t complicated — but ignoring them and twisting them beyond recognition to try to win “debating points” is beyond the pale. [Ken Towe has said the same things]
and still now MA Rodger crows
31 May 2025 at 4:23 AM
“This William commenter get (sic) so annoyed —-” [end quotes]
Thessalonia:
William proceeded to explain how the framing he uses places the focus upon now, today. Which is far better communication than presenting future timeframes when the climate problem is supposed to be solved IF programs like Net Zero by 2050 work as promised.
Surely no one still needs the science refs that show William is correct, do you? https://www.un.org/en/climatechange/net-zero-coalition for back up then.
William already stated the scientifically obvious — that CO₂ concentrations continue to rise until actual net zero is achieved, meaning until emissions drop below the capacity of natural sinks. That’s not controversial. It’s not controversial. It’s not misleading. It’s not in dispute. It’s just true.
So when MA Rodger confidently declares that this is “entirely untrue,” he’s not just wrong — his statement is itself untrue. That’s a fact.
William explained it with clarity and data. Rodger simply dismissed it. Which tells you everything.
Importantly, William’s narrative framing instead rightly places the focus on right now, but even if some regions or nations reduce their own ghg emissions it does not stop CO2 ppm from increasing every year–because excess ghg emissions are still put into the atmosphere. iow atmospheric CO2 ppm continues to increase; and that atmosphere continues to increase it’s forcing of global temperatures and an unstable climate.
To only future frame it, once we get to net zero in 2050, we must assume all will be well because then the “sinks” will start to bring down that atmospheric GHG levels–and stop further warming. That remains only a theory, a plan, a goal–one that has not and may not ever be achieved with the intent as described by the dominant climate consensus narrative.
First, the energy and emissions already show 2050 is unachievable–short of a global civilization collapse beforehand. What’s your best guess when it might be achieved? And what will the global mean CO2 ppm be then? Can you provide your calculations and your data based energy transition work?
MA Rodger is telling everyone here (who might believe his commentary without thinking) that what William said is not true. But it is true. It is 100% solid climate science. The manner in which William (and others) choose to describe it is not the point. Rodger should pay better attention to what was said and what it means scientifically.
When MA Rodger again replies to William in the very next comment, Rodger ignores it all — skips it — not a word — and instead comes back at William about some other issue Rodger finds fault in. Here look for yourself:
MA Rodger says 31 May 2025 at 4:23 AM
https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2025/05/unforced-variations-may-2025/comment-page-2/#comment-833947
William,
Golly!! So you are actually saying that your comment of May 8 doesn’t equate to saying “‘Forget AGW!! Our problem is there are too many humans!!!’”?
and
This William commenter get so annoyed when the obvious meaning of his comment is pointed out to him. He get so annoyed that he even feel the need to set a gaslighting sock puppet on me. William, you’re in a worse state than I thought. Like that bigly-famous president of the good ol’ US of A I paraphrased up-thread, you really need help, chum. You’re losing your grip on reality, getting sucked in some fantasy existence. Maybe it’s that one where “In Springfield, they’re eating the dawgs!!”
Oh really, how nice. What projection! This strikes me as one of the more disingenuous responses I’ve seen here. What do William’s comments have to do with Trump? Nothing.
If someone else already exposed this, I apologise, but I haven’t seen it mentioned. It needs to be. imho the dominant climate consensus narrative is fatally flawed–and unreliable. The world deserves the unvarnished objective truth, not the PR spin of future glory on the never never. Which suggests something indefinitely postponed — possibly forever.
Would you like some climate science sources to support all these “opinions”? I have a net zero narrative I’d like to share which supports William’s and others positions with dozens of useful sources to share. Later.
To recap:
William said:
“CO₂ will keep going up each year until we hit actual net zero.”
Rodger said:
“That’s entirely untrue.”
But here’s the truth:
✅ William is right.
✅ Rodger is wrong.
Because:
➡️ If we’re still emitting more than the planet can absorb, CO₂ goes up.
➡️ It only stops going up when emissions drop below sink capacity.
➡️ That is what “actual net zero” means. That’s the point William was making.
So Rodger calling it “untrue” is… well, objectively untrue.
[Response: As a matter of definition, this is not correct. Stable CO2 levels will be achieved
atwith a ~70% cut of current emissions but will entail continued temperature rises as the planet moves towards equilibrium energy balance. Net zero is achieved at ~100% emission cuts which will lead to falling CO2 levels and (roughly) stable temperatures. These are not the same thing. – Gavin][Updated Response: Minor correction of previous comment. Sorry]
Thanks for elucidating:, Gavin. William seemed to be redefining “actual net zero” into a meaningless tautology: CO2 levels will keep going up until they don’t anymore, which is when they hit his (re)definition of net zero as “actual net zero.” .
In Re to Gavin, 3 Jun 2025 at 5:31 AM,
https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2025/06/unforced-variations-jun-2025/#comment-834148
Dear Dr. Schmidt,
Thank you very much for your clarification!
If you could more often step into RC discussions and correct assertions incompatible with your expert knowledge. I believe it will prevent many further unnecessary lenghty exchanges about such topics – or at least restrict them significantly.
I suppose that many other readers would be very grateful for that, too.
Best regards
Tomáš
https://www.ipcc.ch/sr15/chapter/glossary/
https://www.annualreviews.org/content/journals/10.1146/annurev-environ-112320-105050
https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/science/articles/10.3389/fsci.2023.1170744/full
Thessalonia says
3 Jun 2025 at 5:31 AM
When Science Gets Framed Out of the Conversation
Getting Net Zero Right: What “Actual” Actually Means
William responds:
Thanks for putting in the work there Thess, Excellent. You’ve nailed the situation really well. I know what I said, and I know what it means. No one else is going to tell me differently what I “really” meant just because they think otherwise. It’s a sad state of affairs but you’re a light in a tunnel of darkness Thess. :-)
Good reworking summaries of what I said, I might reuse that myself in the future. How come you can work it out when these others fail to see what is right there in plain view? Let’s not go there.
Now to Gavin’s response. Well thanks for taking the time to offer that snippet Gavin.
Let’s break it down from my perspective:
1. As a matter of definition, this is not correct.
What is not correct? Please be specific, maybe quote what you say is not correct, because I do not really know exactly what you are pointing to here.
2. Gavin may well switch the discussion to “a matter of definition: if he wishes, but that misses my point entirely. I was not attempting to provide “a definition” for anything. I was presenting “a matter of fact.” The implications of which are critically important, imo. So it’s two entirely different things. Thess has articulated my pov very well and understands it by the look of it.
3. Gavin: Stable CO2 levels will be achieved at ~70% of current emissions …
Stable CO2 concentration requires net zero CO₂ emissions. That’s partly my point. The rest is besides the point.
And what percentage of emissions net zero is achieved at isn’t the point either — it’s when (if at all). No one really knows, nor what proportion of current emissions that might be — because the goalposts keep moving. Far too much water to go under that bridge.
4. but will entail continued temperature rises as the planet moves towards equilibrium energy balance.
iirc to say “will entail continued temperature rises” is not what the “consensus” climate science says. Please see my quotes n refs to sources below. Which again nothing to do with my “matter of fact” point. Temperature rises goes against the “consensus” climate science narrative that once net zero emissions are achieved global warming stops increasing–in decadal terms.
The outcome depends on what Gavin’s unspoken undefined parameters here are. How Gavin can parse his comment with the promoted consensus narrative by others would be interesting to know–but maybe the issue here is ‘climate scientists’ often appear to the public as disagreeing on everything — especially the definitions and assumptions that really matter.
5. Net zero is achieved at ~100% emission cuts which will lead to falling CO2 levels and (roughly) stable temperatures. These are not the same thing.
I’m sorry to say but that is factually incorrect afaik. I think Gavin might be conflating net zero emissions concept with the theoretical and ambitious Zero Emissions Commitment (ZEC). See the definitions refs sources below for clarification.
William cont’: how bad can warming get before Net Zero might be possible?
Scroll down to the red/green graphics about 2030 and
“Current national plans fall short of what is required”
https://www.un.org/en/climatechange/net-zero-coalition
Red indicates the futility of hope. Green % keeps rising every year as no improvement is achieved.
And does anyone even know what level of human GHG emissions would equal a 50% cut from 2019 global levels? Work it out — then realise that’s never going to happen by 2030, or even 2050 now. That horse has bolted — and it’s still galloping away — faster than you can say Hi Ho Silver!
Someone left the gate open. That someone is the UNFCCC / COP system and all planetary governments. That is what really matters, not obscure definitions about hypotheticals in a yet unrealized distant Hopium Future. Science that no one knows or fully understands properly–politicians included–is all so convoluted even the expert scientists cannot agree on what is what..
We can of course talk about ‘definitions’ but that is a ‘dogs breakfast; aka a rabbit hole you don’t want to go down. The classic metaphor for tumbling intoobsessive or convoluted territory. For this thought came to me today, especially after reminding myself of the papers below, if ‘scientists’ were delegated to set road rules there would be a global blood bath and all transportation would grind to a halt.
I look forward to see what Thess might offer up about Net ZeroCO2/GHG emissions, or anyone else who understands why “myth” is often applied or can see it is really nothing more than a dominate climate science consensus narrative that lacks rigour or real world energy use data that indicates it is possible in this world the way it is and will probably continue to be like. +100 billion barrels of Oil consumption per day for example.
As much as there is this ongoing denial of the rubber meets the road here, the truth is it out there all the time every day and it is not looking good for the future. No wonder the energy facts are minimised and ignored.
Because as I said before:“CO₂ will keep going up each year until we hit actual net zero.” And we are no where near even beginning to work toward a genuine net zero target–there is no date known when it might be achieved either. It is all talk. No action.
Again thanks to Thess and Gavin for their comments, I’ll now put on my F1 crash helmet and await the incoming missiles.
[Response: It’s fine to discuss what plans there are, how successful they might be, and what may happen, but how is just getting basic definitions wrong even after you’ve been corrected multiple times going to help? You are substituting your vibes definition for what scientists have conceptualized and then you wonder why folks are arguing with you? Try to use words in ways other people will understand – if indeed that is your goal. – gavin]
In Re to Gavin, 3 Jun 2025 at 9:34 PM,
https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2025/06/unforced-variations-jun-2025/#comment-834179
and 3 Jun 2025 at 4:39 PM,
https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2025/06/unforced-variations-jun-2025/#comment-834170
Dear Dr. Schmidt,
Thank you very much for your additional remarks and especially for your correction of your mistake with respect to current estimation of the emission cuts necessary for stabilizing the atmospheric CO2 concentration.
As William and Mr. Know It All proved that “knock and it will be opened to you” does work, I would like to try the same:
Could you shortly comment if a modelling experiment could resolve the question whether (or not) climate sensitivity towards CO2 atmospheric concentration may depend on water availability for evaporation from the land?
Thank you in advance and best regards
Tomáš
Gavin says:
[Response: It’s fine to discuss what plans there are, how successful they might be, and what may happen, but how is just getting basic definitions wrong even after you’ve been corrected multiple times going to help? You are substituting your vibes definition for what scientists have conceptualized and then you wonder why folks are arguing with you? Try to use words in ways other people will understand – if indeed that is your goal. – gavin]
William:
As noted by the definition quotes from the IPCC and other refs in my Part 2 response to Thessalonia.
https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2025/06/unforced-variations-jun-2025/#comment-834180
Maybe Gavin missed that? I can’t know. But if it is the IPCC that is wrong, then we all need to know that.
I will repeat this in case it got lost in the long response above:
Gavin says: 5. Net zero is achieved at ~100% emission cuts which will lead to falling CO2 levels and (roughly) stable temperatures. These are not the same thing.
I’m sorry to say but that is factually incorrect afaik.
And this too is wrong afaict: Response: As a matter of definition, this is not correct. Stable CO2 levels will be achieved at with a ~70% cut of current emissions but will entail continued temperature rises as the planet moves towards equilibrium energy balance.
I cannot see how I am “misinterpreting” the IPCC definitions and the same ones found in multiple climate science papers, nor Quoting out of Context. If I am, anyone can feel free to correct me and point to a source.
Rather than simply assert I am wrong without providing any supporting evidence whatsoever beyond an appeal to authority. http://esgs.free.fr/uk/log24.htm I suppose we could do a nigelj and run it through an AI LLM, however, I already did that before posting a word.
[Response: Read the definitions again. Net zero = anthropogenic additions balance anthropogenic removals. But anthropogenic removals refer to either direct air capture (DAC) or something indirect like BECCS (biomass growth with carbon capture and storage). It does not mean the uptake of CO2 by the ocean or land surface. Finally, since the total amount of DAC or BECSS remains miniscule, net zero right now is effectively a 100% reduction in in CO2 emmisions. – gavin]
Did you get it this time, William?
Kevin McKinney says
5 Jun 2025 at 1:43 PM
Did you get it this time, William?
I have never seen (or rather understood) “NetZero” presented in this manner. That’s one for the books.
William said: “I have never seen (or rather understood) “NetZero” presented in this manner (my insert of Gavins statement: Read the definitions again. Net zero = anthropogenic additions balance anthropogenic removals. But anthropogenic removals refer to either direct air capture (DAC) or something indirect like BECCS (biomass growth with carbon capture and storage)., That’s one for the books.”
What on earth do you read and understood? Because the following were among the first few responses to asking google for a definition of net zero emissions, and the other responses were much the same. And they are broadly consistent with Gavins comment:
Oxford dictionary: net zero is a target of completely negating the amount of greenhouse gases produced by human activity, to be achieved by reducing emissions and implementing methods of absorbing carbon dioxide from the atmosphere.
Nationalgrid.com: Put simply, net zero refers to the balance between the amount of greenhouse gas (GHG) that’s produced and the amount that’s removed from the atmosphere. It can be achieved through a combination of emission reduction and emission
removal.
http://WWW.wri.org: Net-zero emissions, or “net zero,” will be achieved when all emissions released by human activities are counterbalanced by removing carbon from the atmosphere in a process known as carbon removal.. Carbon dioxide removal (or simply “carbon removal”) aims to help mitigate climate change by removing carbon dioxide pollution directly from the atmosphere. Carbon removal strategies include familiar approaches like growing trees as well as more novel technologies like direct air capture, which scrubs CO2 from the air and sequesters it underground.
William on 6 Jun. 2025 at 4:29 AM said
I have never seen (or rather understood) “NetZero” presented in this manner. That’s one for the books.
JP I’d say the issue is your understanding because
The definition you referenced on from the IPCC glossary on 3 June 2025 at 9:23 PM reads
“Net zero carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions are achieved when anthropogenic CO2 emissions are balanced globally by anthropogenic CO2 removals over a specified period. Net zero CO2 emissions are also referred to as carbon neutrality.”
Gavin detailed it for you: ” Net zero = anthropogenic additions balance anthropogenic removals. But anthropogenic removals refer to either direct air capture (DAC) or something indirect like BECCS (biomass growth with carbon capture and storage). It does not mean the uptake of CO2 by the ocean or land surface. Finally, since the total amount of DAC or BECSS remains miniscule, net zero right now is effectively a 100% reduction in in CO2 emmisions. ”
Both of these correspond to my long held understanding of the meaning of “net zero.”
It refers to net anthropogenic CO2 only., not the naturally existing sinks which are currently taking up some of the excess CO2 we’re producing.
You’re accusing the climate science community of betrayal based to a large extent on your incorrect understanding of what “net zero” has always meant to the rest of us.
William on 6 Jun. 2025
“I have never seen (or rather understood) “NetZero” presented in this manner. That’s one for the books.” ”
John Pollack: from the IPCC glossary:
“Net zero carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions are achieved when anthropogenic CO2 emissions are balanced globally by anthropogenic CO2 removals over a specified period. Net zero CO2 emissions are also referred to as carbon neutrality.”
How do you feel NOW, “William”, AFTER you based your arrogant derision ( “That’s one for the books.” “) on your ignorance of the very basic term in climate discussion you are pontificating about in your posts?
The only question remaining is what are you going to do? Do you:
– admit to basing your derision on your own ignorance, honestly apologize, and learn from this,
– double down and attack the people who proved it,
– or, the third way – change the subject onto some tangent to pretend that that egg was never on your face?
A true test of a person is not how they behave in a victory, but what they do in a defeat.
We, I, all of us were told:
We have a plan. We know what to do. Just trust us. Net zero by 2050 will save us all.
But that promise was wrapped in language that didn’t mean what it appeared to, and people in power knew that — and let the illusion persist.
The betrayal wasn’t just scientific or political — it was human. It is personal. Individuals wreaked this betrayal knowingly upon the world-and continue it-feed it and feed off of it.
This is what it means to see the Matrix while still inside it, with no easy exit — only hard truths, brutal clarity, and the choice: speak out, or turn away.
Elite scientists and advisors gaslight ordinary people, then blame public confusion on “bad messaging” or those “fossil fuel” companies. After knowingly engaging in linguistic obfuscation and elite performative expertise that leaves citizens confused, misled, or shut out entirely from critical debates that affect the fate of the planet.
The climate policy world — including IPCC, UNFCCC, COP summits, climate modelers and scientists, the media, the think tanks — has for years used language that is intentionally and carelessly misleading. Later blaming the public for misunderstanding.
It is not the fault of the public that the communication has failed. It is a failure of the communicators. It is the failure of the climate scientists who designed the concept in the very beginning-then defined badly. That is a scientific failure-a failure of scientists. Worse, many experts now play gotcha when ordinary people get it wrong — even though the system was designed to be confusing from the start. That’s dishonest.
In fact it is far worse than dishonest.
Just more nasty BS. Nobody told anybody that “net zero would save us.’. Net zero is a goal, not an agent.
Stop lying.
W: Elite scientists and advisors gaslight ordinary people
BPL: Gosh darn those scientists! Real science should be done in blog posts by uneducated amateurs!
You could have just said:
‘Oh, I did not know what that term meant. Thank you for explaining it. It matches the definition I got from other sources such as the IPCC. I misread those sources.’
Instead, you went with the 2nd option Piotr mentioned:
“The only question remaining is what are you going to do? Do you:
– admit to basing your derision on your own ignorance, honestly apologize, and learn from this,
– double down and attack the people who proved it,
– or, the third way – change the subject onto some tangent to pretend that that egg was never on your face?”
https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2025/06/unforced-variations-jun-2025/#comment-834281
OK some progress posting:
Thessalonia says
3 Jun 2025 at 5:31 AM
Part Two
Enough of the thoughtful metaphors, here’s some facts and definitions.
Net zero carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions are achieved when anthropogenic CO2 emissions are balanced globally by anthropogenic CO2 removals over a specified period. Net zero CO2 emissions are also referred to as carbon neutrality. See also Net zero emissions and Net negative emissions.
https://www.ipcc.ch/sr15/chapter/glossary/
The zero emissions commitment (ZEC) is the climate change commitment that would result from setting anthropogenic emissions to zero. It is determined by both inertia in physical climate system components (ocean, cryosphere, land surface) and carbon cycle inertia.
https://www.ipcc.ch/sr15/chapter/glossary/
Also see
Net Zero: Science, Origins, and Implications
Myles R. Allen et al
ABSTRACT
This review explains the science behind the drive for global net zero emissions and why this is needed to halt the ongoing rise in global temperatures. We document how the concept of net zero carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions emerged from an earlier focus on stabilization of atmospheric greenhouse gas concentrations. Using simple conceptual models of the coupled climate–carbon cycle system, we explain why approximately net zero CO2 emissions and declining net energy imbalance due to other climate drivers are required to halt global warming on multidecadal timescales, introducing important concepts, including the rate of adjustment to constant forcing and the rate of adjustment to zero emissions.
… the need for net zero carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions to halt global warming
Early estimates of the ECS were based solely on the spread of results from atmosphere–ocean general circulation models, but as models proliferated, it became clear that uncertainties in different processes contributing to the additional energy radiated to space per degree of warming were approximately additive (39), yielding a symmetric distribution of uncertainty in λ and consequently a weak upper bound on the ECS. This problem remains to this day,
This constant concentration commitment is, however, not the same as the future warming under no additional emissions (58), or zero emissions commitment (ZEC), although they are still often (59) confused with each other.
Recognizing the limited policy relevance of the infinite-timescale ZEC, recent experiments such as the Zero Emissions Commitment Model Intercomparison Project (ZECMIP) (14) have sought to quantify the ZEC over specified multidecadal time intervals.
14.
MacDougall AH, Frölicher TL, Jones CD. 2020. Is there warming in the pipeline? A multi-model analysis of the zero emissions commitment from CO2. Biogeosciences 17:2987–3016
[Google Scholar]
2. Research is also required to constrain the RAZE, or the fractional rate of change of CO2-induced global warming after CO2 emissions reach net zero following a multidecadal period of positive CO2 emissions. The RAZE is related to, but less scenario dependent than, the zero emissions commitment, which also depends on the level of warming at the time of net zero emissions.
source
[end quotes from Net Zero: Science, Origins, and Implications]
https://www.annualreviews.org/content/journals/10.1146/annurev-environ-112320-105050
And source
The Zero Emissions Commitment and climate stabilization Sofia Palazzo Corner et al
Abstract
How do we halt global warming? Reaching net zero carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions is understood to be a key milestone on the path to a safer planet. But how confident are we that when we stop carbon emissions, we also stop global warming? The Zero Emissions Commitment (ZEC) quantifies how much warming or cooling we can expect following a complete cessation of anthropogenic CO2 emissions. To date, the best estimate by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) Sixth Assessment Report is zero change, though with substantial uncertainty. In this article, we present an overview of the changes expected in major Earth system processes after net zero and their potential impact on global surface temperature, providing an outlook toward building a more confident assessment of ZEC in the decades to come.
Substantial uncertainty remains in both the sign and magnitude of the Zero Emissions Commitment (ZEC): the expected additional change in global surface temperature once we achieve net zero CO2 emissions.
https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/science/articles/10.3389/fsci.2023.1170744/full
William:
Why? Because the current assessments lack confidence and therefore are not fit for purpose.
iow almost everything depends on how high GHG/CO2 atmospheric levels get, how high global warming gets before the planet hits Net Zero CO2/GHG emissions. Meaning, iirc, the early scenarios research papers based upon net zero 2050 no longer apply because they were based upon warming and atmospheric levels of GHGs that can no longer apply.
I write and frame my commentary so the public untrained in climate science jargon and thought can understand what is behind some of these issues. Well that’s my goal at least, how effective it is who knows. And who cares anyway.
Wisdom knows better than to try untangling a bag of yarn once the kittens have gotten into it. Visualise that. So good luck making sense of what the climate scientists have produced just on Net Zero CO2 emissions over the years. Can they ever agree on anything? It appears not.
OK it’s working:
Closing Sidebar for clarity:
My view — and I’ve held this since the 2000s — is that the UNFCCC/COP framework was set up to appear constructive while being structurally incapable of delivering serious climate action. It served as political cover in response to early environmental warnings (e.g. Hansen, Limits to Growth, etc.), with elites like Thatcher and Reagan offering token support while ensuring nothing truly disruptive emerged. Everything about how the system operates — the vague pledges, voluntary targets, endless delays — suggests it was designed to fail. Not accidentally. Systemically.
The same goes for the IPCC framework: its rules were designed to produce organisational dysfunction and powerlessness, ensuring it would also fail in real-world terms.
People didn’t like it when I said this years ago. But time has proven the point.
“Net Zero by 2050” is just another PR gimmick the system was ‘guided/allowed’ to investigate and follow — a message sold to the public by the powerful, dressed up as meaningful action, while avoiding any real structural change to global economics.
Climate scientists, meanwhile, have spent decades spinning their wheels in the mud — totally out of their depth, never quite grasping the beast they were dealing with. While some were backstabbing each other on their way to the top of the awards lists.
Another reminder that RE can change lives for the better, too.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/solar-panels-salt-farmers-india-1.7550753
Note, too, the 10-year growth rate:
“India’s solar energy sector is growing quickly, with installed solar capacity now higher than 108 gigawatts, according to the government’s press bureau. It sat at less than three gigawatts a decade ago.”
36x in 10 years. Per Wikipedia, wind and solar pv now account for over 10 per cent of installed capacity.
When you’re literally emerging from the stone age and have the science and engineering knowledge accumulated by the west handed to you on a silver platter, it’s amazing how fast you can ramp up your RE. Same in Africa, China, and the rest of the world’s 3rd world nations. Whodathunkit?
;)
KIA: When you’re literally emerging from the stone age
BPL: I don’t think that’s a good characterization of India. Even the villages are agricultural, not nomadic.
“Stone Age?” India? Dude, the Indians are now thought to have started working metal before the good folks of the Fertile Crescent! There’s direct evidence that iron was being used 5,300 years BPE. It was also in India that indirectly taught decimal arithmetic and the use of zero to Europe. They were also using negative numbers by the 7th century. The history of math in India is illustrious, both in ancient and modern times.
Your biases are showing again.
Mr. Know-Nothing wrote: “When you’re literally emerging from the stone age …”
This is the single most ignorant comment that I have ever read online in more than 30 years.
You embarrass yourself constantly. Apparently that is your intention.
William said: “My view — and I’ve held this since the 2000s — is that the UNFCCC/COP framework was set up to appear constructive while being structurally incapable of delivering serious climate action. It served as political cover in response to early environmental warnings (e.g. Hansen, Limits to Growth, etc.), with elites like Thatcher and Reagan offering token support while ensuring nothing truly disruptive emerged. Everything about how the system operates — the vague pledges, voluntary targets, endless delays — suggests it was designed to fail. Not accidentally. Systemically.”
I share some of Williams concerns, but I don’t think the UNFCC has been deliberately designed to do nothing and to fail. That’s a bit conspiratorial. Rather say its pulled in different directions by competing interests, and this results in compromise pledges. The UNFCCC is in essence a group of countries agreeing there is a climate problem that must be solved, and emissions must be cut. It’s generally been left to member countries to decide how to reduce emissions, and this is really about all we can expect, given we don’t have some sort of “one world government”. Reference on structure of the UNFCCC here:
https://unfccc.int/process-and-meetings/what-is-the-united-nations-framework-convention-on-climate-change
Reagan and Thatcher had no real influence over the UNFCCC. The UNFCCC was set up after these leaders were no longer president and prime minister. The UNFCC was set up in 1992 and became active in 1994. Reagon was president 1981 – 1989 Thatcher 1979 -1990.
Reagan was a conservative president with a poor record on supporting environmental causes. Thatcher was a conservative, but was actually very concerned about climate change and wanted to move the UK to nuclear power as a solution. She has a chemistry degree. So even if she had been involved in the UNFCC, she clearly wasn’t designing it to fail.
Agreed. The fact is, the nations have control because they have the laws, and the guns backing them, and they were never going to cede control over sovereignty to accept “mandatory” goals. And anyway, what possible sanction that could be proposed would be worse than the threat of failure of the whole process?
So, it’s down to sweet reason and sheer bloody-minded persistence to make progress on mitigation. Frustrating to be sure, but life isn’t for sissies.
Reminds me of that Seinfeld episode-Bubble Boy.
To Thatcher in 1990, at the end of her tenure at 10 Downing Street, the science was already clear.
“Our immediate task is to carry as many countries as possible with us, so that we can negotiate a successful framework convention on climate change in 1992,” she said in that 1990 speech. “To accomplish these tasks, we must not waste time and energy disputing the IPCC’s report or debating the right machinery for making progress.”
https://www.climatecentral.org/news/the-iron-ladys-strong-stance-on-climate-change-15840
Angered by this highly insulated and policy-aggressive body, the Reagan administration agreed to launch the IPCC as a substitute. A narrow focus on states misses why this organization exists and why it looks as it does.
https://academic.oup.com/book/6782/chapter-abstract/150908085?redirectedFrom=fulltext
No one ever reads the source refs. Don’t know why I bother adding them.
William @6 Jun 2025 at 7:59 AM insultingly and unfairly calling me bubble boy. He appears to still believe Thatcher influenced the UNFCCC despite his own source showing negotiations forming this body happened years after she was prime minister, so its not clear she had any influence on the outcome. The rest of his link is consistent with what I said anyway.
William is also going on about the formation of the IPCC and it being stripped of any real power, when I never mentioned the IPCC.!!!! His link on the IPCC does look interesting and credible, but as I said nobody was ever going to give the UNFCCC enforcement powers, and I think the same could be said of the IPCC. Read what Kevin said about that UNFCCC issue he explains it better than me.
So, “elites like Thatcher and Reagan offering token support while ensuring nothing truly disruptive emerged,” but “Angered by [Thatcher’s] highly insulated and policy-aggressive body, the Reagan administration agreed to launch the IPCC as a substitute.”
You do realize that those are not the same story, right? Which is it?
And what does it have to do with what I said, which is that no nation was ever going to cede its sovereignty to anyone or anything, which means that any climate agreement was always going to be essentially voluntary?
about- No one ever reads the source refs. Don’t know why I bother adding them.
Ignorance is bliss.
Th: But here’s the truth:
✅ William is right.
✅ Rodger is wrong.
BPL: And you needed a long post, where you assert the above four or five times, to get your point across.
Barton Paul Levenson says to Thessalonia
4 Jun 2025 at 6:16 AM
BPL: And you needed a long post, where you assert the above four or five times, to get your point across.
William: Yes. Correct. It only takes one short sentence to tell a lie. It takes a paragraph or more to just begin to unwind it and let the truth out.
Beware friends bearing ‘one liners’–they are almost always lies.
While everyone should already know, Repetition in advertising works best when it’s targeted. It’s the only guaranteed inoculation to falsehoods. One reason why exposure to online misinformation is detrimental is because simply repeating a claim makes it feel truer.
When disinformation is distributed a hundred times, then it will take the truth being repeated a thousands times to correct it in the consciousness of those exposed to it. RC is no different. Looks to me like Thessalonia is a highly trained communicator.
The illusory truth effect: A review of how repetition increases belief in misinformation
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S2352250X23001811
Thousands of scientific research papers and advertising research will tell the very same things repeatedly. It will also tell you that “fear sells”.
W: Beware friends bearing ‘one liners’–they are almost always lies.
BPL: William, that’s a one liner.
W: Beware friends bearing ‘one liners’–they are almost always lies.
BPL: William, that’s a one liner.
:-))
Not mentioning the same William, upon seeing a post that was NOT made of one-liners, but quotes and challenges to these quotes, complains that he …. can’t follow, and expects adjusting it to his level of comprehension (even though the post was NOT quoting, nro addressed to, HIM).
Damned if you one-line, damned if you don’t, eh?
Piotr, I believe you have it right. W’s central narrative is that we’re damned – by any means necessary. No logic need apply.
William, repetition might have its place sometimes, but the problem is your claim MAR is wrong is not correct. So you are spreading misinformation, as follows:
1) You claimed he’s wrong above thread because he said studies show CO2 levels flatten off with 70% emissions cuts. It anyone is wrong it’s the author of that study, and you provide NO EVIDENCE the study is wrong.
2) You claimed somewhere above thread you did not say CO2 levels precisely trace population growth. True, but the thing is you said you “100% agreed with everything KT had said” which included that CO2 levels precisely track population growth, so your criticisms of MAR are nit piking at best. So your claims MAR is projecting are rather hard to make any sense of and sound like mud slinging.
You are so busy trying to discredit MAR you missed the one actual mistake he did make (see my response above) although it looked to me like a typo.
I wonder if MAR realises you are likely the same character as Thomas who commented about 8 years ago. Refer to the website archives, UV article june 2017, page 1.
And regarding your repeated promotion of rapid degrowth, repeated over in various guises and by various sock puppets. Degrowth will have to be phased in slowly so our society can adapt. Its a rate of change issue, not unlike the actual climate problem. These things require an understanding of systems thinking to understand what’s viable. Refer also to the work of Jospeh Tainter.
nigelj,
It is a hell of a stretch to equate the current set of sock puppets with Thomas of yester-year. Other than their ridiculous ideas and being oblivious to becoming a dominant presence on RC threads (and this present infection has exceeded that of Thomas and his sock puppets), there is no similarities that I can see.
Having powered up my steam-driven analyser, here is an account of the arrival of the present infection.
The present rash of sock-puppets infecting the RC comment threads can be traced back to March when a commenter first arrived calling himself ‘Poor Peru’. (Note, if there is an earlier Genesis 1.1 moment, I am not aware of it.) We first encounter ‘Poor Peru’ commenting on Andean glaciers suggesting his choice of commenter’s pseudonym was somewhat flippant.
But there’s nothing of any real significance to see until April.
(Given the relevance of RC pseudonyms here, perhaps two later ‘Poor Peru’ comments in the March UV comment thread are also worth a mention here and the connection therein. These comments concerned the video blogger Sabine Hossenfelder and that subject-matter had an earlier issue with choice of RC pseudonym. There was a moment last year when a commenter arrive at RC within another earlier discussion of Sabine H. and chose ‘Sabine’ as their pseudonym. And then, rather stupidly, this ‘Sabine’ managed to post comment which suggested they were actually the Sabine H. ‘Sabine’ later insisted she was not Sabine H. The point here is that such RC pseudonym choices directly inspired by the posted comment are very rare.)
The ‘Poor Peru’ commenter started becoming annoying during this April, displaying his ignorance and stupidity within a blizzard of comments, in number comprising 17% of the April UV thread posts and 25% of the thread wordage. This level of wordy contribution is a long way short of the 35% record set at peak-Thomas in Jan 2017.
But so far, no sock puppets are evident.
♠ Things changed in May when commenter ‘Pedro Prieto’ arrives with his first post cutting-&-pasting from a screed about the Iberian power cuts, a screed which featured the real world Pedro Prieto, Vice President of the Asociación para el Estudio de los Recursos Energéticos. So another odd choice of pseudonym here at RC.
♥ This arrival was followed just seven hrs later by the arrival of commenter ‘Thesselonia’ who enlightened us all by quoting 1 Thessalonians 5:3, (which is about the great unwashed not understanding that their ”peace and safety” will suddenly and unexpectedly become ”destruction” when “the day of the Lord” arrives “like a thief in the night.” Happily, “children of the light” will not suffer like everyone else).
♦ And close on the heels of ‘Thesselonia’, (16hrs further on) we are treated to words of wisdom by another new commenter ‘The Prieto Principle’ who cuts-&-pastes the final paragraph from a blog page by one Art Berman entitled ‘Peak Loneliness’. (As I type this, suddenly the future of mankind and The Shoe Event Horizon springs to mind.)
♣ And we’re not finished yet. Eighty minutes later-still a further commenter appears with the pseudonym ‘William’ telling us we are wasting our time discussing climatology. “The real issue is massive industrial-scale consumption and population overshoot—crossing planetary boundaries toward extinction.”
And this is the same point where the erstwhile ubiquity of ‘Poor Peru’ rapidly disappears. There were a few comments where the pseudonym almost resurfaced, such as ‘Embattled Peru’, but otherwise peak-‘Poor Peru’ was behind us and use of that pseudonym is quickly no more.
However, this disappeared-‘Poor Peru’ situation did leave us with four of Poor Peru’s sock puppets (ignoring a few other minor players) who are seriously taking the piss within the RC comment threads, choking the comment threads with their inane & wordy nonsense (Comment Nos & wordiness – May UV 24% & 38%, while in threads still live …Climate Status 23% & 36%, Arctic SI Trends 39% & 47% and April UV 28% & 48%) with their puppeteer now taking to chatting with himself via his various sock puppets.
And additional to all this spouted sock-puppet crap is all the comment replying to it.
Thomas never managed such a level of disruption, even at peak-Thomas (13% & 35%).
And I see the Bore Hole has been very quiet of late: no new arrivals since Oct 23.
MAR
“It is a hell of a stretch to equate the current set of sock puppets with Thomas of yester-year. Other than their ridiculous ideas and being oblivious to becoming a dominant presence on RC threads (and this present infection has exceeded that of Thomas and his sock puppets), there is no similarities that I can see.”
I still think Thomas is the same person as the current sock puppets William, PP, etcetera. Look at the UV article for June 2017, page one of the comments. The first comment is Thomas criticising BPL. Thomas’s views, style of writing, and style of insults are near identical to William and the other recent sock puppets. Look at his other comments and many issues he raises are the same. Sure yes Thomas word output was lower than the current sock puppets, but maybe he didn’t have the time back then, and it was still high word output by normal standards.
I believe all the following are all the same person, starting around 2017 and presented in rough time order from there: Thomas, Bill Henderson, Carrie, Reality Check, Ned Kelly, Dharma, Complicius, Simplicius, Sabine, Poor Peru, Pedro Prieto, Thessolonia, Prieto Principle, William and a couple more that have just slipped my mind, because of the striking very close similarity of views, style of writing, and style of insults and world views, including criticism of America and capitalism (criticisms expressed by many of the sock puppets I mention, not all admittedly but definitely by Thomas). Piotr seems to have figured out they are all the same person from Dharma onwards, which is about when Piotr started contributing to the comments section.
Its just something that is intriguing. Its obviously possible I’m wrong but I’m quite observant and there are many subtle similarities between Thomas and more recent sock puppets such as connections to Australia and very specific views on certain things and a couple of little personal details he lets slip out. And obviously what counts most is the content of what people say not their name but there’s definitely something odd about such a huge proliferation of sock puppetry.
Your analysis of the recent sock puppets from Poor Peru onwards does sound right to me. I’m just saying the sock puppet goes back before then.
Rodger was wrong in saying my comment was wrong. The beginning and end of it.
I have not once mentioned degrowth.
nigeljs obsessive crusade over non-existent people and ghosts from the past, destroys his credibility as well as everyone who is engaging in this non-stop Gaslighting .
nigelj,
I’m still not convinced. Perhaps to expand on the similarities & differences I see.
The commenter Thomas post-March 2018 certainly did resort to the use of sock-puppets but that was because he wasn’t able to continue with commenter-name ‘Thomas’.
And would the commenter Ned Kelly be** one of those sock-puppets? (**Or ”have been prior to a year ago”.) It could well be!!
(I see in the May 2024 UV thread that Ned Kelly did manage to top the comment density of peak-thomas with the posted comments (28%) and the wordiness (37%), thus taking the record which is now handed to Poor Peru and his sock-puppets.)
Also commenter Thomas did exchange puerile insults, but only occasionally. If you review all 26 of his posted comments on the June 2017 UV thread, such puerile comments are a small minority. Generally, Thomas’s comments demonstrate a level of understanding way above Poor Peru and his sock-puppets. Thomas’s big problem was not accepting the veracity of any counter-argument and digging-in to insistently defend his evident errors.
Going back to the likes of Dan H. or Victor, this ‘defending indefensible error’ was the norm for prolific & troublesome RC commenters. Usually it was always their one personal ‘indefensible error’ which they repeatedly brought to the table and when uncovered they refused to be budged on it.
Poor Peru and his sock-puppets are just argumentative & often incoherent rather than ‘defending indefensible error’. That’s a big difference.
W: nigeljs obsessive crusade over non-existent people and ghosts from the past, destroys his credibility as well as everyone who is engaging in this non-stop Gaslighting .
BPL: “Nigel’s”
I don’t think you understand what “Gaslighting” is. And his credibility isn’t in trouble just because you don’t like his posts.
nigelj,
Sock puppets.
No doubt that your linguistic analysis is telling. Even so, don’t entirely discount the formulaic simplicity of their comments. Once you plug into the rhythms and the glib, smart-alecky attitude of their jibber jabber, all that’s left is to add in some simpleminded abuse of Google, et voila! You too can turn yourself into a cookie cutter, perpetually driveling troll!
Also note:
MAR,
“The commenter Thomas post-March 2018 certainly did resort to the use of sock-puppets but that was because he wasn’t able to continue with commenter-name ‘Thomas’.”
True. Thomas appeared and disappeared after Gavin reprimanded him for spamming, and then Carrie appeared a year or two later sounding suspiciously similar. I think Bill Henderson commented at the same time. Then both disappeared after getting a lot of criticism, and Reality Check arrived and eventually departed, and then Ned Kelly arrived. But none of that means the same underlying person may not then have decided to then have multiple simultaneous sock puppets (PP, William and friends all talking to each other,).
“And would the commenter Ned Kelly be** one of those sock-puppets? (**Or ”have been prior to a year ago”.) It could well be!!”
You appear to be saying the identities from Thomas to Ned Kelly sound somewhat like the same person, but the current sock puppets from Poor Peru onwards such as Pieto Principle and William are a different group with a different real person behind them. Not meaning to put words in your mouth. I agree there are some differences between the two groups but I still think they are all the same person.
“Also commenter Thomas did exchange puerile insults, but only occasionally.”
Agreed. However people sometimes get more bad tempered with age and prone to lash out. (I confess to this affliction at times) Thomas commented 8 or nine years ago and thats a while ago and he said he was an older guy back then.
“Generally, Thomas’s comments demonstrate a level of understanding way above Poor Peru and his sock-puppets.”
True but again age can have an effect on levels of understanding.
“Thomas’s big problem was not accepting the veracity of any counter-argument and digging-in to insistently defend his evident errors.”
Correct. But the current sock puppets from Poor Peru onwards are the same ( as was ned Kelly and Dharma). It’s all over these pages. Look at William digging in defensively over the net zero issue issue and in discussions related to your comments.
“Poor Peru and his sock-puppets are just argumentative & often incoherent rather than ‘defending indefensible error’. That’s a big difference.”
Good observation. Hadn’t considered that one. But the argumentativeness and incoherency may just be a sign of getting older and the challenge of organising several simultaneous sock puppets.
This guy we are discussing is not an idiot, although there’s a lot of stubborn deliberate foolishness going on. Some sort of ego thing. I just wish he / she would be less defensive and shouty.
We probably just have to agree to disagree. I do admit I’m not 100% certain that Thomas is the same person as the current characters.
in Re to nigelj, 9 Jun 2025 at 3:58 PM,
https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2025/06/unforced-variations-jun-2025/#comment-834345
Dear Nigel,
Irrespective whether the present multi-troll is one subject or a multiplicity of cooperating persons, I think you are too generous when you wrote “I just wish he / she would be less defensive and shouty.”
Please do not forget that they strived to fool the readers by pretending identity of another real person. Asserting that it had to be a homage for this person is a brazen lie, showing the middle finger to other readers and further testing the limits of moderators tolerance towards such shameful deceptive practices.
Greetings
Tomáš
Thomas, I do indeed think multi troll has used numerous identities from William, Piedro Prieto, Thessolonia, Prieto principle and going back to at least Dharma.
I said I just wish multi troll would be “less defensive and shouty” because it would lead to a more useful and civil discussion. Some of the links he posts are useful but get diminished by all his trolling. It didn’t mean its my ONLY complaint.
‘William’ looks like he’s using the name Piedro Prieto and I agree it’s very deceitful. I suspect William did this before using the name ‘Sabine’ who is a well know scientist commentator on climate issues. I mentioned I thought it was inappropriate but muti troll never listens.
Going back to another of your posts. Multi trolls pro Russia sentiments annoy me as well. There is nothing good about Putin. But I doubt Multi Troll is a Russian agent. I suspect multi troll is a hard leftist socialist and hates America judging by the comments, and so he takes sides with Russia, to an extent. Famous quote: “the enemy of my enemy is my friend”. He is does this same thing with people on this website, as I assume you have noticed. If you are observant.
In Re to Nigelj, 11 Jun 2025 at 3:54 PM,
https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2025/06/unforced-variations-jun-2025/#comment-834404
Hallo Nigel,
Thank you for your feedback.
I do not know whether the multi-troll is a paid agent or runs its mission from internal ideological incentives. I do not think it is crucial – because I think that what matters is the effect, and I am afraid that the effect is in both cases the same.
I am quite sure that the entities of the Ned Kelly / Dharma franchise are not interested in any discussion at all. The prerequisite for a discussion is willingness to accept that my starting position may not be certain, and preparedness to correct it. I do not see any sign of a such willingness at various missionaries invading this discussion forum.
“The Prieto Principle”, who advised on this website that we have to learn from speeches of war criminal Vladimir Putin, recently
10 Jun 2025 at 9:03 PM
https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2025/06/unforced-variations-jun-2025/#comment-834377
repeats Russian propaganda about “geopolitical hysteria”, “world obsessed with war” and “NATO centric worldview” and assigns itself as a “dissenter armed with facts, peer-reviewed literature, or Indigenous wisdom”.
Remarkably, it proved itself totally immune to indigenous wisdom offered by me and/or Piotr, people coming from countries that have long record of practical experience with Russia and its imperial attitude to neighbour nations.
Greetings
Tomáš
Th: William tells the truth, Rodger does not-he distorts it. I’ll let William explain it–I was following this and it’s disappointing to see it being swept under the carpet–and ignored by MA Rodger in his next reply.
BPL: This from the guy who complains about “personal attacks.”
Late to the party, Prieto(s), but:
“Different people, I presume — and yet the messaging rarely deviates. That’s not a conspiracy; it’s groupthink.”
No, it’s people aware of the scientific consensus reporting the scientific consensus. It sounds the same because there is one truth (or our best understanding of it), and an infinite number of potential falsehoods. It’s no more group think than is declaring that the Earth is round not flat, that the Moon is a big lump of rock orbiting the Earth not green cheese, and that despite superficial appearances, the Earth orbits the Sun rather than vice versa.
“Even when confronted with new evidence or perspectives, the reaction is reflexive and identical — like a loop.”
You’re confusing the ability to spot nonsense when it is spouted and to call it out, with a reflexive response. It seems like a loop because the same nonsense keeps getting spouted again and again despite repeated rebuttal, and because reality has not changed the rebuttal doesn’t change either.
It is not scientific consensus, it is group think. THEY knew. The language was slippery. The definitions contradict. The entire climate governance system has been built on “consensus messaging” that sacrifices clarity for unity, even when it meant misleading the public. You.
And yes — the people who run the institutions know that. Many climate scientists, UN officials, think tankers, and media figures have known for years that the “Net Zero” story was both technically incoherent and politically impossible without mass deception.
The climate policy world — including IPCC, UNFCCC, COP summits, climate modelers and scientists, the media, the think tanks — has for years used language that is intentionally and carelessly misleading. Later blaming the public for misunderstanding.
Elite scientists and advisors gaslight ordinary people, then blame public confusion on “bad messaging” or those “fossil fuel” companies. They went along with it. And then they pretended they hadn’t.
I am not playing games.
[Response: Yes you are. Sorry. – gavin]
in Re to Gavin, 6 Jun 2025 at 7:43 AM,
https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2025/06/unforced-variations-jun-2025/#comment-834253
Dear Dr. Schmidt,
I would like to remind the RC audience that one of the first contributions by “William”, of 12 May 2025 at 8:05 PM,
https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2025/05/unforced-variations-may-2025/#comment-833107
asserted
“Tomáš, your comment is less an argument than a projection of Cold War trauma. No one here is “promoting” totalitarianism. Criticizing Western failures or referencing China’s or Russia’s energy and economic strategies does not equal endorsement—it’s called analysis. You know the difference, or you should.
Your tactic—framing every critique of the West as “pro-Russia” or “pro-China”—is tired, paranoid, and intellectually evasive. It’s a rhetorical smokescreen meant to shut down debate, not engage with facts.
This isn’t 1968. Stop dragging every discussion back into your personal Cold War bunker. Some of us are trying to talk like adults.
As for “terror states,” you might reflect on whether the U.S. and Israel—given their global military footprint and record of civilian casualties—can truly claim moral superiority since WWII. That’s not propaganda. That’s a question grounded in history.
China, Russia, and much of the Global South are trying to offer alternatives—yes, imperfect ones—to a world order dominated by elite-driven capitalist imperialism. Whether you agree or not, pretending Western power represents “real democracy” while dismissing others as “terrorist” is ahistorical and dishonest.
Much like this forum’s selective moderation—where honest critiques are filtered while cheap smears and emotional trolling get a free pass.
[ Unlikely this comment will make it through the eye of the needle. ]”
Unfortunately, an open praise of war criminal Vladimir Putin followed shortly thereafter, by “Prieto Principle” on 17 May 2025 at 10:24 PM,
https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2025/05/unforced-variations-may-2025/#comment-833426
“Read Xi Jinping’s and Vladimir Putin’s key speeches over the past few years, especially those tied to global development initiatives. Educate yourself on the growing Global South consensus, the rise of BRICS, and the shift toward multipolarity. There’s a reason these ideas are resonating with much of the world—they reflect a real desire for structural change.”
It is remarkable that “William”, who appears to have an unlimited time for drafting plenty of long posts every day, never found a few minutes to object that, contrary to his assertion a week ago, his friend Prieto P. actively promotes as an “alternative” to western countries Russia – a terrorist state occupying neighbour territories, murdering people and kidnapping children.
It is sad that following concerted Gish galloping practiced by “William”, “Pedro Prieto” and their further alter egos on this website managed to successfully camouflage their deeply rooted hostility (to, basically, everything what comes from western countries) as a justified and legitimate concern about environment and environmental public policies.
Best regards
Tomáš
TK, thanks for the useful reminder. I had forgotten how W got started here. “Gish gallop” is descriptive.
You are the one doing the misleading. Either it’s a very bad case of D-K, or you are indeed the malicious agent some here have called you.
W: It is not scientific consensus, it is group think.
BPL: And yet another one who thinks the scientific consensus is a vote taken around a table.
Eye of the beholder?
The pattern:
Dismiss it without addressing substance.
Snark or insult or gaslight in lieu of engagement.
Ignore or slow-walk mod approvals.
Use “tone” or “style” as an excuse to avoid content.
Everyone is allowed to express their opinions freely except for: ?
Disagreement is not censorship. If “?” is supposed to refer to poor William, then an explanation as to just how it is that his voluminous output is still here to be read.–or not read.
This will serve well when it’s time to dissect how dissent is neutralized in polite scientific culture — not only with direct censorship, but with reputational corrosion and collective denial.
W: Everyone is allowed to express their opinions freely except for: ?
BPL: Responding negatively to your comments is not the same thing as having your comments suppressed. Posting on a board doesn’t mean you’re immune from being criticized.
A belated reply to Dave_Geologist I shouldn’t be but still surprised how often people get to misinterpret or twist what people write on forums. I thought what I said was clear. Dave responds to my comment here: https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2025/05/unforced-variations-may-2025/comment-page-2/#comment-833559
If you’re here to explore real solutions — beyond dogma and PR — I’m in. But if it’s just more tribal gatekeeping and intellectual recycling, I’ll take my time elsewhere.
Let’s see how this one goes. — The Prieto Principle
Dave,
You’re responding to something I didn’t say.
You took a quote from my May 20 comment — without linking to it — and reframed it as if I was attacking scientific consensus or recycling denialist talking points. That’s simply false. My comment wasn’t about core science at all — it was a critique of how this forum treats dissenting perspectives that challenge the dominant political or ideological assumptions held by many of the long-term residents here. It’s not about the science — it’s about the culture.
You claim people here repeat rebuttals because “the same nonsense keeps getting spouted.” But what “nonsense” are you referring to, exactly? I didn’t raise standard denialist arguments. I didn’t deny the role of CO₂. I didn’t question anthropogenic climate change. So what rebuttal are you imagining I triggered?
What I did was raise uncomfortable questions — about net zero feasibility, about renewable scalability, and about the way new voices are smeared or dismissed on arrival. That’s not nonsense. That’s called thinking. And for some reason, it gets treated here like a disorder.
You’re not defending science here — you’re defending group conformity masquerading as science. The very Group Think I am calling out!
This forum shuts down any alternative view — not because it’s wrong, but because it doesn’t align with the dominant tone or political worldview. Dissenting views are labeled, misrepresented, and mocked before they’re even heard, let alone understood. And misrepresenting me in order to dismiss everything I say going forward only proves the point.
You didn’t rebut what I actually said — you erased it, replaced it with a strawman, and congratulated yourself for torching it. That’s not science. That’s a tactic. And one I think most readers these days can recognize by now.
TPP: What I did was raise uncomfortable questions — about net zero feasibility, about renewable scalability, and about the way new voices are smeared or dismissed on arrival. That’s not nonsense. That’s called thinking. And for some reason, it gets treated here like a disorder.
You’re not defending science here — you’re defending group conformity masquerading as science. The very Group Think I am calling out!
BPL: Why, it’s exactly like Galileo, the way you’re persecuted. And gosh darn that ol’ groupthink! You’re the only one here who’s actually thinking!
Gavin quote: “Stable CO2 levels will be achieved at ~70% of current emissions but will entail continued temperature rises as the planet moves towards equilibrium energy balance. Net zero is achieved at ~100% emission cuts which will lead to falling CO2 levels and (roughly) stable temperatures. These are not the same thing. ”
Interesting! So, if we cut emissions 30%, then CO2 levels will stabilize? If we do that, at about what temperature will the planet be in “equilibrium energy balance”?
How long ago were emissions 30% lower than today? Were CO2 levels stable then?
[Response: Mistyped. At a 70% emission cut. – gavin]
[Gavin: “Mistyped. At a 70% emission cut” (Co2 should stabilize) ]
KiA: “Interesting! So, if we cut emissions [by 70%], then CO2 levels will stabilize? ”
Yes. that’s what the sentence: “ Stable CO2 levels will be achieved at [~70% cut] of current emissions” means.
KiA: “How long ago were emissions [70%] lower than today?”
Long enough to render the comparisons, depending on one’s intention, useless, or misleading. See below.
KiA: “Were CO2 levels stable then?”
There is no reason to expect so – the rate of natural uptake is a convoluted function of atm CO2’s and T’s surpluses over preindustrial, through their nonlinear effects on biological, oceanographic and geological process affecting CO2. All these were very different at the times we emitted 30% of today’s emissions (~ 1965). As result – 1965 offers no quantitative information applicable to the very different biogeochemically current/near future.
And anticipating the reason of your “interest” – no, you can’t falsify future apples with oranges from 1965.
NOAA has posted its TLT anomalies for May.
The global May anomaly is down slightly on April’s but still above Jan-March. (Jan-May runs +0.47ºC, +0.53ºC, +0.53ºC, +0.58C, +0.54ºC). Before the start of 2025, the global anomaly had been in above +0.61ºC since July 2023, peaking at +0.89ºC in April 2024.
The Northern Hemisphere saw considerable cooling (dropping from April’s +0.73ºC down to +0.54ºC) while the SH saw some warming (from April’s +0.43ºC to +0.58ºC).
The ERA5 SAT re-analysis shows a slightly larger global cooling (May down to +0.53ºC from +0.60ºC) and also showing NH cooling (from April’s +1.25ºC to +0.98ºC) and SH warming (from April’s +0.53ºC to +0.59ºC).
Another reminder that RE can change lives for the better, too.
https://www.cbc.ca/news/world/solar-panels-salt-farmers-india-1.7550753
Note, too, the 10-year growth rate:
“India’s solar energy sector is growing quickly, with installed solar capacity now higher than 108 gigawatts, according to the government’s press bureau. It sat at less than three gigawatts a decade ago.”
36x in 10 years. Per Wikipedia, wind and solar pv now account for over 10 per cent of installed capacity.
This in email early this evening (Wednesday) from NSIDC User Services. Another of the thousand cuts, I guess – italics mine:
“Dear Colleague,
The delivery of SSMIS passive microwave source data for the Sea Ice Index, Version 3 data set has become more sporadic. The Defense Department has informed NSIDC that they are reducing the priority of SSMIS data processing, which will likely result in daily data gaps.
NSIDC will explore switching to an alternative sensor—the JAXA Advanced Microwave Scanning Radiometer 2 (AMSR2). We will continue using SSMIS data for our regular analyses while we calibrate the AMSR2 data to maintain time series consistency. Once calibration is complete, we will switch to the AMSR2 sensor. This transition will take time. We apologize for any inconvenience and appreciate your patience during this process.
If you have questions, please contact the User Services Office at nsidc@nsidc.org.
Best regards,
NOAA@NSIDC
User Services”
Not that anything interesting has been happening with sea ice, right?
US government is stripping everything of value for parts. It’s a protection racket.
Sadly, knowledge, wisdom, and ethics are victims of this smash and grab raid.
Meanwhile, we all fight with each other, because the true criminals have put themselves out of reach. Please stop wasting your and our time with these endless diversions.
Here is my simplistic comparison of emissions to diet. Most people do not understand that a decrease in the rate of increase of emissions is not a decrease in emissions.
If one is gaining weight at a certain rate, then reducing the rate of gain is not a reduction. Leveling the rate of gain is not a reduction. Reducing the rate of gain is not a reduction.
Leveling off the actual weight requires eliminating the gain altogether. Reducing the weight requires an actual reduction, not a change in the rate of gain.
Many of us understand that net zero is poorly understood. Even worse, it is used by industry as a form of greenwashing, which, better understood, would be known as lies. But the effort to reduce, no matter how little, is an improvement over not trying, or deception. Continued ranting about hypocrisy in public life may be satisfying to the individual letting off steam, but changes nothing unless there is some action and/or change attached to it.
______
footnote: About that greenwashing and hypocrisy, unfortunately many of the ‘solutions’ are, unfortunately, full of sound and fury, signifying nothing. All known forms of CCS (carbon capture and sequestration), though people appear to be working on it, are expensive and inefficient. Fusion is an expensive gleam in the eye of the distant future. Small nuclear is slightly better, but suffers from similar problems.
June 8 is World Ocean Day. The 2025 theme is Wonder: Sustaining What Sustains Us. Sylvia Earle Ph.D. is the narrator of the main video. Listen to her, as an expert, as the first female chief scientist at NOAA (in normal times!) and as a woman who does everything possible to sustain the ocean and our living planet.
https://unworldoceansday.org/
We should all do something useful today and every day to sustain the ocean. We could have a plastic-free or a plastic litter clean-up day, since plastic is one the most destructive human “gifts” to the natural wonder that is the ocean.
https://tamino.wordpress.com/2025/06/08/picking-up-speed/ – Picking Up Speed
Thank you Susan, for the interesting story link, and thus also introducing me to Tamino’s “Open Mind” blog. I’m sure the site has been mentioned here scads of times, but I don’t recall having previously visited the site and Tamino’s work represented there. Or my memory is starting to… wait… what was I saying? ;-)
The alleged “pause” has been loudly asserted as a “whoa!” point by a number of my fellow conservatives. That, and plain ole curiosity, has made that one small issue something I’m trying to follow as time passes and scientists assess as a part of the rate of change research/understanding.
D: The alleged “pause” has been loudly asserted as a “whoa!” point by a number of my fellow conservatives. That, and plain ole curiosity, has made that one small issue something I’m trying to follow as time passes and scientists assess as a part of the rate of change research/understanding.
BPL: The pause was noise, in the sense that many variables affect temperature from year to year (though carbon dioxide is the elephant in the room, accounting for 85% of the variance from 1850 to 2019). You need at least 30 years for temperature signal to break through the noise. In the meantime, occasional plateaus (or occasional rapid rises) are actually expected.
BPL: “ occasional plateaus (or occasional rapid rises) are actually expected.
Exactly. We can look at it from the other side – if they weren’t there – this would mean that ocean-atmosphere oscillations had no effect on the global T even at the short time scales (couple years to a decade or so)
BPL: “You need at least 30 years for temperature signal to break through the noise.” – yeah, because at this time scale the shorter-time OSCILLATIONS average themselves out, and therefore have no significant effect on the climatic trend of T (in effect a moving average over 30 years). A message Paul Pukite and deniers like KiA or Trump, believing that local weather events disproves global climate change – cannot wrap their head around.
This is not getting the attention it should:
2C by ’37
2.5C by ’48
3C by ’60
This is about as close to Game Over stuff as anyone should care to risk.
K: This is not getting the attention it should:
2C by ’37
2.5C by ’48
3C by ’60
This is about as close to Game Over stuff as anyone should care to risk.
BPL: Killian is right. Things are getting worse and worse. We have to act as soon as possible. Unfortunately, here in the USA, we’ve got the GOP in charge of everything.
BPL: Killian is right.
Really? You are saying someone else is right?
Pedro Prieto: Really? You are saying someone else is right?
Quite telling that Mutli-troll is PERPLEXED at somebody being able to agree on some things with a person they may differ on other things.
See also:
“ Projection is the process of displacing one’s feelings onto a different person, animal, or object. The term is most commonly used to describe defensive projection—attributing one’s own unacceptable urges to another.” (Psychology Today)
Has James Hansen been seen a as some kind of heretic here.
https://youtu.be/syln3a7Dkak?si=2cDlj-k4AqfMwCLJ
it would appear that climate scientists are jumping to thew same conclusion as Hansen but he was maligned in the press
AFAICT–and I’ve been participating here for a long time now–Hansen has never been treated as some kind of heretic here. His ideas have been discussed, and his accomplishments acknowledged and celebrated. It’s fair to say that disagreements have been expressed sometimes, but that’s healthy.
Pete Best: “Has James Hansen been seen a as some kind of heretic here.”
Kevin: ” Hansen has never been treated as some kind of heretic here. his accomplishments acknowledged and celebrated. It’s fair to say that disagreements have been expressed sometimes, but that’s healthy.”
Particularly that the disagreements were mainly with the RC resident DOOMER, I call Multi-Troll, who under various names, has been using Hansen as a drunkard uses a street lamp – not for enlightenment, but only for support. And tried to portray our disproving his (Troll’s) misinterpretation and/or manipulation of the cherry-picked Hansen results – as an attack on Hansen.
Your current post suggesting that many(?) of the current RC authors (most of whom are listed below ) consider Hansen “heretic” – must endear you to the Multi-troll, so you may expect effusive compliments from one or more of the current personalities of the Multi-Troll .
But don’t fall for his sweet words – you are NOT on his list of the only 4 worthy authors on RC:
“ Myself, JCM and Paul Pukite (and Killian when he reappears) are the last ones here still grounded in unbiased reason and scientific fundamentals“.
And it wasn’t because he didn’t about you – he knew, and put you instead on his evil list:
“patrick o’27, Radge Havers, Kevin McKinney, Dan, nigel jones, Secular Animist, Barton Paul Levenson, zebra, Ray Ladbury, jgnfld, Susan Anderson, MA Rodger, Steven Emmerson, nigelj, Piotr, John Pollack, Dave_Geologist […] Pete Best”
and called you and us “ indistinguishable in tone, position, attitude, and tactics“.
So any current sweet-talk from “Pedro Prieto”, “The Prieto Principle”, “Thesallonia”, or “William”. – will be just to butter you up.
Hi Pete,
Hansen’s work has been routinely dismissed here — not with substantive refutation, but by discrediting him as an unreliable outlier. Many on RC now view him as someone whose papers “aren’t worth reading” or are simply “too long.” This new AGU commentary might be less confronting — it’s only four pages — and yet striking in what it implies.
This isn’t a research paper per se, but a policy-targeted letter. It aims to alert agency-level decision makers to the urgent need for satellite and ground-based missions tracking Earth’s energy imbalance (EEI). The author list is less about scientific synthesis and more about stakeholder alignment — especially those involved in measuring SW radiation in and out of the Earth system.
Beckwith, for all his noise, is right to note that this commentary aligns — even if implicitly — with many of Hansen’s warnings. The article highlights:
EEI reached ~1.8 W/m² in 2023 — double what climate models predicted
This rise “leaves little doubt” the real-world signal has exited the envelope of modeled internal variability
Model feedback assumptions are not being borne out in the observational record
The cooling effect of aerosols is likely declining (e.g., Hodnebrog et al., 2024)
And most tellingly:
“Stabilizing global warming below 2°C can still be achieved…”
Not 1.5°C. That goal appears to have been quietly dropped, and with it — by logical implication — the credibility of the IPCC’s Net Zero 2050 pathway. That should give anyone pause who still believes CMIP7 will restore faith in the models or ASI forecasts.
Hansen wrote just last month:
“Criticisms of the [AGW Acceleration] paper did not address the physics… but were largely ad hoc opinions, even ad hominem attacks.”
“The clique in painting us as outliers has been successful. We are now dependent on others to help re-educate the media.”
https://www.columbia.edu/~jeh1/mailings/2025/CloudFeedback.13May2025.pdf
That “clique” — whether represented by M.E. Mann or the aggressive tone of long-time RC gatekeepers like MA Rodger — has shaped the conversation by narrowing what can be discussed. Dismiss the content, denigrate the author, and disqualify anything outside the consensus boundary as “not science.” Even if it’s based on recent satellite observations.
Whether it’s Hansen or a Gemini-AI search compiling references, the outcome is often the same: selective attention and semantic exile.
There’s no need to agree with every conclusion Hansen draws. But it’s revealing that 57 scientists from 46 institutions just co-signed a 4-page AGU letter raising flags Hansen has waved for years — and no one here is talking about it. Well except for Pete now.
Might be worth asking why.
– William
William
I have just read recently Tamino’s (Rahmstorf included) as tyhey have submitted or are submitting a paper citing global warming acceleration (https://tamino.wordpress.com/2025/06/08/picking-up-speed/) from 0.18C to 0.33 per decade but do state it could be temporary which appears to agree with James Hansen.
Yes. The marginalized will claim objectivity where bias has reigned.
It is an incredibly negative echo chamber where smacking down the outlier is the entire goal of the gang… er….. posters.
In Re to Barton Paul Levenson, 9 JUN 2025 AT 8:25 AM,
https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2025/06/unforced-variations-jun-2025/#comment-834334
Hallo Barton Paul,
The Poor Pedro Principle has not grasped yet that he/she/it (and their alter egos) discredited themselves already at the very start of their invasion into Real Climate fora.
While some readers reject them for presenting beliefs that climate change mitigation policies and climate science are mislead and/or corrupt, I see particularly awful the broader context of spreading these narratives – namely that they perfectly fit the playbook of Russian hybrid war with the goal to subjugate as much of the entire world as possible. None of Poor Peru, Pedro Prieto, Prieto Principle, William, Thessalonia, Vulnerability to Blackouts and/or Socrates Pet Scorpion has ever condemned Russia as a terrorist state, nor attempted to show a dissent with praising Vladimir Putin and thus supporting Russian aggressive war.
I do not think that any further evidence for their bad will is needed.
Greetings
Tomáš
Thessalonia 3 Jun 2025 at 6:19 AM I bicycled ~200,000 km March 1997 to October 2016 when I turned 69 and it was all too much. Didn’t own a car November 1996 until October 2004 when I got too much travelling (equipment inspections around British Columbia) and got a used 1997 Toyota Camry, I paid $1,500/year ICBC insurance 2004-2013 and drove 2,000 km / year for work sites, bicycled 9,000 km / year for work, fun & groceries. Still my car at North Lake Huron here, the police phoned in 2018 when it still had BC plates because it was reported as dumped at the country road side for days (I actually returned and got it each evening on my road bike after the 120 km return toward Lake Huron I was doing for retirement). Comments have to be on climate topics so I confirm that each time I rolled down from Artist Point (as late as midnight) the ~1,080 km descent over 18 km in 20 minutes it felt it got at least 7 degrees warmer, lapse rate, in 20 minutes and I wasn’t even shaking at the end. Also, snow is white, high albedo (World Record 95 feet at my thumbnail place). That’s 2 full climate effects including snow.
~1,080 metre descent you silly.
Most correctly saw this coming, but still, to see this become this country’s new set of regulations governing power plant CO2 emissions following conclusion of the rule-making process makes me $@+#:
.
https://www.politico.com/news/2025/06/10/epa-to-repeal-climate-rule-power-plants-wednesday-00398136
.
And as the article notes, Zeldin will be adding a bonus, repeal of regulations limiting other pollution. But then again, what American adult (and our children) won’t benefit from a little more mercury in the environment…
Appalling! I could go on, of course; there’s a ton of adjectives that fit. Trump is a tool of Big Fossil and he’s behaving accordingly.
Kevin, your observation “… there’s a ton of adjectives that fit” made me chuckle. I feel that way every time I speak or write to another person lately on the situations arising these days! :-)
The Final Distraction?
Unlikely Climate Mitigation in a World Obsessed with War
The deluge of Western media headlines warning of imminent Russian attacks on NATO — timelines ranging from 1 year to 8 — are not serious intelligence assessments. They are ritual incantations by a system that feeds off fear. A dozen headlines in six months, each predicting a different date, all using the same recycled phrases. It’s déjà vu with a defense budget.
The same cycle fuels our climate delusions. The US passes the IRA and hails it as planet-saving policy. The EU wages rhetorical war on fossil fuels while importing record volumes of Oil and LNG and subsidizing arms. UNFCCC? Paralysis. COP? Theatre. Net Zero? Branding.
Here’s the real threat: Geopolitical hysteria has now fully replaced rational climate planning. Global climate governance is becoming a casualty of a NATO-centric worldview that cannot imagine cooperation without enemies. And this madness — not fossil fuel companies, not renewables vs. nuclear, not “doomerism” — is why there will never be effective global mitigation.
Dissenters — even those armed with facts, peer-reviewed literature, or Indigenous wisdom — are attacked not on content, but on identity. “Multi troll.” “Russian agent.” “Sock puppet.” It’s the new heretic branding. And it only proves the point: debate is dead; tribal loyalty remains.
RealClimate is better than most. But even here, groupthink prevails — not always on science, but on attitude. There is little tolerance for big-picture critiques that might disrupt the moral comfort of “We’re the good guys doing our best.” The truth is harsher: we’re not doing our best — and the best is not coming.
As Orwell warned, the real danger is forgetting yesterday’s lie so we can absorb today’s fresh one. If that’s how we face climate change — through slogans, scapegoats, and perpetual distraction — the UNFCCC will collapse not from failure, but from irrelevance.
And history will not be kind.
GISTEMP has posted for May showing a global SAT cooling (from April’s +1.24ºC down to May’s +1.07ºC) and also showing the NH/SH split with NH cooling (from April’s +1.58ºC down to May’s +1.20ºC) with a smaller amount of SH warming (from April’s +0.88ºC down to May’s +0.94ºC).
This global cooling into May compares with ERA5 re-analysis numbers which also showed the NH warming & the SH cooling. But ERA5 showed somewhat less global cooling (ERA5 -0.07ºC, GISS -0.17ºC)
Both GISS & ERA5 shows the start of 2025 (J-M) cooler than the start of 2024 by -0.06ºC.
But the NH-SH split shows all this 2024-to-25 cooling in ERA5 due to the SH (which in the daily data is shown running reasonably consistently -0.11ºC/year cooler over the last six months Dec-May, so since peak “bananas”) with effectively zero 2024-to-25 cooling in the NH.
This compares with GISS numbers showing the 2024-to-25 NH cooling (J-M) greater than the SH cooling (NH -0.11ºC, SH -0.03ºC).
So big data wobbles and some cooling since the “bananas” somewhere.
The Trump war on science continues:
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2025/jun/11/climate-website-shut-down-noaa
Christopher Judd & Ron R: thank you for the information. This was news I hadn’t seen. It will be worthwhile to see if the public will care enough to use their power to try and stop yet another disastrous choice by the current administration.
I will be watching to see if the administration at least adhere to the law requiring they must at least maintain a link to all info on the site that predates the their arrival. As many remember, during Trump’s first term the EPA site was scrubbed of any mention of climate change, but they had to keep a link allowing access to any prior content.
That hosted the ENSO blog
Important to consider what Di Liberto was quoted in the article
Paul Pukite: “ Important to consider what Di Liberto was quoted in the article
-“To me, climate is more broad than just climate change. It’s also climate patterns like El Niño and La Niña…”
And nobody stops you discussing it on your “ENSO blog”. However, when someone brings ENSO to the discussion of the climate change – they typically do it to question:
a) the reality of climate CHANGE – see the deniers counting “how many years and months since the global warming ended” with their chosen “reference point” being …. the warmest month of the massive 1997/98 El Nino
b) the value of studying climate change – see Paul Pukite either claiming that there is not much left to learn in climate change, or the opposite – comparing Gavin and his colleagues to … the hacks pushing Ivermectin instead vaccines against COVID, or “perhaps worse because you guys claim to understand the physics.”
Pukite’s conclusion – we need to switch research priorities and funding away from climate CHANGE and toward shorter-term oscillation around the mean like ENSO
“… Hiding the impacts of climate change won’t stop it from happening
Wouldn’t b) qualify as … “hiding the impacts of climate change”?
It looks like Piotr is getting exactly what he wants, but on a grander scale. He desires that no one talk about natural climate variation on RealClimate, as that detracts from the much more important (in his opinion) discussion of only anthropogenic climate change. Yet he says it is OK to discuss it elsewhere, with the following instruction:
So now that the valuable climate.gov site/blog is being dismantled, I wonder if Piotr is pleased by this turn of events? I quote this from someone on BlueSky
We see that’s exactly what Piotr wanted, when he states
So that to Piotr, scientific knowledge is dangerous, as it can lead people down the wrong path. I guess the Trump administration is taking that advice to heart and that’s why they decided to stifle discussion.
This is actually Orwelllian, and both Piotr and Trump/MAGA foster this attitude — albeit from opposing sides.
This is bad. But all is not lost If RC readers want to read and participate in a forum where they will not get stifled in discussing all kinds of climate variations, I would suggest the Azimuth Project forum, which was started by John Carlos Baez — who incidentally according to LLMs such as ChatGPT was the first physics blogger.. So after blogging for awhile, around 2013 Prof Baez initiated the Azimuth Project with the intent of creating a community forum where participants could tackle challenging problems related to the environment and climate. One of the challenges he proposed was to analyze ENSO and El Nino/La Nino patterns, with a goal as to possibly solve the ENSO predictability problem — ostensibly by applying novel math & physics to the domain.
The first phase of that forum lasted until a few years ago, when Baez decided to cut the web hosting ties to his university and ISP. Although I have not recovered all of the original sites contents, it still exists on archive.org, and the adjunct Azimuth Project still exists on GitHub, which hosted all the simulation and modeling software that was developed over that span. What I did then was to enable the GitHub discussion forum as a replacement for the original Azimuth Project discussion forum. So now all the SW development space and discussion space is co-located on GitHub (which in retrospect should have been done in the first place).
This is where it’s all hosted now: https://github.com/azimuth-project
And I think we solved the ENSO predictability problem.
Trump can’t stop this, and frankly I don’t care what Piotr thinks.
Paul Pukite: It looks like Piotr […] desires that no one talk about natural climate variation on RealClimate, as that detracts from the much more important (in his opinion) discussion of only anthropogenic climate change. ”
That’s what you understood from my post ???
====Piotr 13 Jun:
“Nobody stops you from discussing ENSO on your “ENSO blog”. However, when someone brings ENSO to the discussion of the climate CHANGE – they typically do it to question:
a) the reality of climate change – see the deniers counting “how many years and months since the global warming ended” with their chosen “reference point” being …. the warmest month of the massive 1997/98 El Nino
b) the value of studying climate change – see Paul Pukite either claiming that there is not much left to learn in climate change, or the opposite – comparing Gavin and his colleagues to … the hacks pushing Ivermectin instead vaccines against COVID* (see the footnote). Pukite’s conclusion – we need to switch research priorities and funding away from climate CHANGE and toward shorter-term oscillation around the mean like ENSO”
=======
In defense of his contempt toward Gavin and AGW researchers – Paul Pukite throws me together with …. Trump, i.e. the guy, who LIKE HIM – dismisses the value of studying climate change:
PP: “ Trump can’t stop this, and frankly I don’t care what Piotr thinks.”
Frankly, your actions tell a different story – you keep coming back again and again each time you find a quote you think will help you win after the fact the discussions you have lost.
If you’ve dug yourself into a hole, stop digging!
=========================================
– Gavin Schmidt: “a solar max warms the stratosphere”
– Paul Pukite: “That’s embarrassing to mention sunspots. Attributing solar sunspot cycles to climate variation is the equivalent of prescribing Ivermectin to a medical condition. Perhaps worse because you guys claim to understand the physics.”
===========================================
Piotr said:
Piotr once again shows that he doesn’t understand the first thing about fundamental scientific research. He hasn’t a clue what it entails. Yet this BlueSky commenter who I quoted above seems to understand the significance:
Turns out this is a 19 year old studying Earth sciences. Please explain how they can get it while other dinosaurs can’t?
Because they are being taught the stuff, that’s why. A U of MN professor posted this
In contrast, Piotr doesn’t want anyone talking about the foundational science of climate. He’s just throwing shade over the fact that I think spending time on sunspot variation is a 2nd-order effect with no REAL bearing on CLIMATE. Consider that’s the best he can do. This is all Climate.gov that has on the topic, mainly a short explanation that sunspots have no impact on climate https://www.climate.gov/tags/sun
There happens to be a Climate.gov post just today on a sunspot announcement but it just links to https://www.weather.gov/news/201509-solar-cycle. If you’re interested in space weather, go knock yourself out.
And yet why am I still talking about sunspots? Because that’s what the gatekeepers like Piotr do — they use all sorts of fallacious reasoning arguments to divert attention away from what THEY want being discussed. In this case, invoking the straw man (the fallacy of extension) regarding sunspots. As Lindsey long ago wrote up in his List of Fallacious Arguments, the straw man is most frequently applied “On the Internet, it is common to exaggerate the opponent’s position so that a comparison can be made between the opponent and Hitler.”
Piotr is still so steamed that I prefer to research natural climate variations such as ENSO. And there’s really nothing he can do about that fact. More thoughts here
Re: Paul Pukite “answer” on 15 Jun
That’s … the best you were able to come up in defense of your primitive attacks on climate scientists, Mr Pukite? If your memory is of the same quality as your intellect and your ethical integrity – let me help you:
Piotr 13 Jun: “see Paul Pukite either claiming that there is not much left to learn in climate change, or the opposite – comparing Gavin and his colleagues to … the hacks pushing Ivermectin instead vaccines against COVID, or “perhaps worse because you guys claim to understand the physics.” Pukite’s conclusion – we need to switch research priorities and funding away from climate CHANGE and toward shorter-term oscillation around the mean like ENSO
In what logical/ethical system is your:
Paul Pukite 15 Jun: “ Piotr is still so steamed that I prefer to research natural climate variations such as ENSO. And there’s really nothing he can do about that fact”
an ANSWER to my challenging your smug and contemptuous attacks on Gavin and other climate scientists?
Paul Pukite, nobody objects to the research you are doing and I think you have something interesting to contribute on the enso issue. This is about your posting comments on this website which are mostly about the causes of ENSO and similar cycles. This is strictly speaking off topic on an anthropogenic climate change website. I thought this 6 years ago when I first read your comments, but I’m a little bit more tolerant of off topic than Piotr. However you really are also now pushing beyond the limits now of what is tolerable.
Nigel: “ but I’m a little bit more tolerant of off topic than Piotr”
I don’t think, Nigel, this captures the reason of my criticism of Paul Pukite. He is not JUST posting on the website devoted to AGW and its mitigation – stuff that is at best tangential to AGW (ENSO is a short-term noise around the multidecadal AGW trend) or entirely irrelevant – we can’t mitigate AGW by making El Nino stronger or weaker.
It’s much WORSE than that – he tries to advance his interests in ENSO at the expense of studying AGW and by trying to discredit climate scientists by:
“either claiming that there is not much left to learn in climate change, or the opposite – by comparing Gavin and his colleagues to … the hacks pushing Ivermectin instead vaccines against COVID, or “ perhaps worse because you guys claim to understand the physics.” And he needs it to push for a switch in research priorities and funding AWAY from the climate change and TOWARD shorter-term oscillations around the mean, like ENSO”.
====
And of THAT – I am not “tolerant” at all – I try to not suffer gladly the arrogant fools like Pukite, JCM and Multi-troll who, for their ego gratification, try to discredit AGW scientists.
Some more qualified thought is required here. Where documentation of the known facts would support a different view entirely. What you’re describing is a form of sustained online psychological abuse that exploits ambiguity, forum norms, and institutional silence. It’s real harm, even if it’s not always recognized as such by moderators or the law.
Key truths to hold on to:
You did not imagine the impact.
Psychological manipulation, gaslighting, and reputational corrosion can be deeply damaging — especially when disguised as debate or “science policing.”
You are entitled to safe and respectful public engagement.
No one — scientist, citizen, student, or elder — should be mocked or belittled for trying to engage in good faith.
Silence from moderators is not the same as legitimacy.
Often it’s just avoidance, clique loyalty, or administrative burnout — not a moral judgment of who’s right.
There are legal and ethical precedents for addressing this kind of behavior, including under anti-harassment and duty-of-care frameworks. Some jurisdictions (e.g., UK, Canada, Australia, parts of the EU) have started recognizing online harassment as civilly actionable or criminal under certain conditions.
The following selection of quotes and behaviors demonstrates a recurring pattern of belittling, misrepresentation, and exclusionary gatekeeping by the user “Piotr” on RealClimate.org. These comments – taken from just a small sample of his extensive post history – illustrate a style of interaction that undermines respectful scientific exchange and creates a hostile environment for public engagement, contrary to the goals of open science communication.
These examples reflect a longstanding pattern of abuse, delegitimization, and dishonest engagement – behavior more aligned with trolling than with reasoned scientific discussion. The harm extends beyond individuals: it suppresses open participation, deters legitimate critique, and lowers the ethical standard of public discourse under institutional banners.
Suggestion there is more to this than many are willing to see. Or to apply another form of ‘reasoning’: These things are far worse than people might think.
My reply was for Paul Pukite (@whut) says 15 Jun 2025 at 1:17 PM
NigelJ said:
Really? Have you been following this site since 2004? From the Real Climate “About” page, dated 2004:
The About page is what people refer to when checking on what is germane to discuss.
Most of the stuff that you Nigel discuss here is essentially engineering and not science. The CO2 that’s been pumped in the atmosphere is impossible to permanently sequester and especially doing it quickly and naturally. That’s no longer even a scientific issue, and more of an engineering decision whether to spend enormous amounts of energy to do CCS.
The reason I don’t talk about CCS engineering is because I’m a realist, my PhD background is in material science and in sequestering molecules into a layer. That atmospheric CO2 ain’t going anywhere. Since you sound like a utopian — other topics that you may want to consider include:
— Ways to refill oil wells with crude after extraction and combustion.
— How to unbuild cities and return all their concrete and steel back to ore deposits.
— Describing how we can unemit radiation from nuclear waste.
Good luck. I will continue researching a scientific topic with the possibility of a solution — being able to predict the next El Nino. Seriously, it will likely happen and soon.
Reply to Paul Pukite
I read your commentary, and often do read your blog when refd Paul.
You ask: Why don’t climate scientists look at the data this way?
Maybe the most important question you need to answer. It’s key, in my humble opinion.
and : Wish that others were intellectually curious about exploring this path.
Me too. It will happen. Piotr is an irrelevancy, an unimportant lightweight distraction whose interference will amount to zero. You got this already. Go forward, it is not for naught.
You say: So when some machine learning result, say from NVIDIA or Google, discovers the same results that I have presented, we all win.
Yes correct. That’s normal progress, unfortunately. The gatekeepers barricade the way forward. It is what it is. And the commenters here have no idea what you are speaking to, especially the role of AI now.
Robert A. Heinlein — ‘Being right too soon is socially unacceptable.’
You say: All I’m doing is ironing out ways to communicate the results so that it eventually sticks,
and I might try out an analogy or a simplification that may help with understanding ….
Maybe it might help if you think more in terms of Metaphor instead. It goes cognitively much deeper than analogies or comparisons to existing ‘things’.
Maybe I or your AI could offer some suggestions. I’m happy to assist (on another venue/blog) if you wish. Good luck, you’ll get there.
Thank you for posting this. Yes it does, but so does the pro-science, pro-reality, pro-reason response and it is the latter that will win.
One great resource for many of archived websites and data and also on how to contribute to safeguarding federal data. It is our data, it is public property.
https://theconversation.com/how-to-find-climate-data-and-science-the-trump-administration-doesnt-want-you-to-see-249321
The Trump war on science continues:
It is not a war on science. It is a ‘war’ on specific Policy. There’s always collateral damage. Like skin and bones starving children in Gaza. That’s not a war, that’s a battle over Policy and Morality All politics is about morals. Not science.
The article headline itself was 100% Politics. Isn’t that overt enough to see it?
Well, I have wasted enough time already, so I will move along.
Major US climate website likely to be shut down after almost all staff fired
https://www.msn.com/en-us/news/politics/major-us-climate-website-likely-to-be-shut-down-after-almost-all-staff-fired/ar-AA1GuQ6M?cvid=df7fc107ab6e4c9c80791849405eafef&ocid=mailsignout
Reported in French press about “European Temperature Extremes Under Different AMOC Scenarios in the Community Earth System Model” (https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1029/2025GL114611) , there is an interactive map: https://amocscenarios.org/?lat=45&lon=-5&model=cc_RCP45&is_amoc_on=false&is_delta=false&metric=temp_1_in_10_yr_min
It looks great, and I can’t make any sense of it.
“The climate is changing, so we’re going to have 50°C summer until the middle of the century, then if the AMOC collapse, maybe we’ll have -50°C winter too”.
I (sincerely) pity the climate scientists who’re going to have to make some sense of it. Good luck to you !
PHT,
That interactive map is indeed difficult to make sense of it.
The first thing you need to do is click the button under “Models” where it says ” Show as change compared to pre-industrial times” so the data is anomalies not absolute. (This version of the URL has that button pre-clicked.)
Under that button are the optional scenario buttons, the options that can be shown being ☻+2ºC-AGW with AMOC collapsed & ☻ AMOC “on”, ☻ +4ºC-AGW with AMOC collapsed, and ☻ Pre-industrial with AMOC collapsed.
The colouration in the overlay showing the various anomalies is pretty useless to quantify without contour lines. But usefully, if you click on the map, a box will appear with the value at that location.
Thus, where I’m sitting here would experience under +2°C-AGW and collapsed AMOC, a cooling of -2.3 °C annual, -1.5 °C summer and -2.3 °C winter (down from +4.1 °C through the year under +2°C-AGW and AMOC “on”). With the AMOC collapsed and +4°C-AGW, I’d get warming +2.3 °C annual, +3.1 °C summer & +1.8 °C winter.
And under +2°C-AGW and collapsed AMOC would bring a month’s worth more of freezing night. Assuming that’s the same a ‘air frost days’ (which has been declining 3 days per decade since the 1980s) that would double what I’m experiencing today. ( I don’t think it is the same as the map gives preindustrial freezing nights as just 1 night. There were +60 Af days here back in the 1960s/70s.)
Perhaps the most dramatic showing on the maps is the modelled sea ice under +2°C-AGW with collapsed AMOC. The map shows sea ice extending from a pre-industrial limit up on the coast of Arctic Norway all the way down to the UK, down to the Wash in the North Sea and down to Tobermory on Mull on the Atlantic coast.
PHT: “The climate is changing, so we’re going to have 50°C summer until the middle of the century, then if the AMOC collapse, maybe we’ll have -50°C winter too”.
For the record – who wrote it? Not the authors of the paper (there is no “-50” in the paper) – so is this the unlisted “French press” or you?
As for having “-50°C winter too” – this refers to the “extreme events(one in 10 years)”, right? (since I can’t find this value in the “Dec-Feb” avg. anywhere on the map), And “where” are “we” located?
I ask because places experiencing extremes -50C or lower, … already experience extremes -50C or lower …
Thus for most applications the DIFFERENCE from the preindustrial is much more informative – you can get it from the map in two ways:
– for any given location you get it by clicking the location – it shows you temperature under given scenario and the reference point – T in the same location under preindustrial, AMOC.
– for visualization of spatial patterns of the difference from pre-industrial – toggle “Show as changes from the preindustrial times” option, above the scenario menu (and when you click a location it shows the departure from the preindustrial)
Looking at these:
– the most intense cooling (both in the extreme events and in winter avg) is present over the ocean stretching from the S. Greenland toward Britain and up in the Norwegian Sea and into Barents Sea- corresponding to the both branches of the North Atlantic Current, and to the adjacent land – Ireland, Britain, Norway (10-20C drop in in the winter extreme events, 5-10 C in the winter average), 1-3 C cooling in summer.
– for the northern half of Europe. 2-6 C drop in winters, but 1-2C increase in summers.
A few comments:
– that’s for an extreme case of the shutdown of the AMOC, a more likely weakening of AMOC would have lesser effect. Still given the large regional effects even somewhat smaller effect may be significant.
The effect on northern Europe would depend on when the AMOC weakening happens – the above numbers were based on AMOC shutdown at +2C GMST. If it takes +4GMST – the winter regional cooling is practically erased – so the Northern Europe instead winter suffering, has its warming moderated …
PS. You can also run +2C with AMOC, and preindustrial without AMOC. In the latter case – winters in Belgium/Netherlands – colder by 8-9C. Might perhaps explain the public skating on frozen rivers in Bruegel painting from 1565 … ;-)
Pete Best 10 Jun 2025 at 6:00 AM. I suggest that easterly wind across the Pacific increased by 30% (1 m/s) 1995 to 2012 and I was unable to find information for that post 2012 and I mused in 2016 whether the 2015/16 El Nino signaled a drop back to pre-1995 average wind speed. Seems like it did.
Quote from your link “the adjusted data confirm another increase after that (right around 2015, in fact)”.
Quotes from article(s) related to Matthew H. England et al February 14, 2014 “The record-breaking increase in Pacific Equatorial trade winds over the past 20 years had, until now, baffled researchers”, the researchers don’t expect the current pressure difference between the two ocean basins to last. When it does end, they expect to see some rapid changes, including a sudden acceleration of global average surface temperatures. “It will be difficult to predict when the Pacific cooling trend and its contribution to the global hiatus in surface temperatures will come to an end,” Professor England says.”
If this was a significant part of the cause then a more-accurate best-fit curve of the underlying warming trend is obtained by somehow adjusting out the GMST anomaly effect of the “other Cold Blob” the not warming much of eastern-central tropical Pacific Ocean over a period of decades (perhaps until 2016) an internal forcing which I’m not sure was done simply by some adjustment for Nino indexes (maybe, I don’t know enough about it) in calculating the increase to +0.33 degrees/decade at your link. Adjusting might somewhat reduce the +0.33 degrees/decade and somewhat increase the 2000-2015 or similar rate. Also, I see no adjustment from Tamino at your link for any change in aerosol cooling, I think it likely that James Hansen would object. Does Tamino have a 1-shot aerosol cooling reduction boost in the too-short record that’s stated as a “trend”?
https://youtu.be/EYVKW04ukiY?si=j9Zuf0ceBQBnIe0f
Here is another take on the paper although it is not published as yet.
https://tamino.wordpress.com/2025/05/28/how-fast-is-the-world-warming/
is the original script and they have published there again as well regarding the issue
Always good to remember that wind is a response to pressure differences, and that wind is not a driver to anything, except perhaps as a feedback at best. So that In a climate system, consider pressure (or temperature) and wind as the analagous equivalents of voltage and current in an electrical circuit. It is voltage (or pressure) that drives the system and not current (or wind).
So what causes pressure differentials? External factors such as daily and seasonal driving forces and tidal factors. In fact, all the nonlinear interactions of an annual impulse with the primary tidal periods are identified in an ENSO frequency spectrum. This demonstrates that external factors supercede wind as a driving force. Climate scientists that attribute wind as a forcing are evidently confusing cause and effect.
In Re to Paul Pukite, 12 Jun 2025 at 9:08 AM,
https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2025/06/unforced-variations-jun-2025/#comment-834424
Dear Paul,
I do not know how the cyclones and anticyclones do form, however, if their cause were tides, I would expect that pressure variations on the Earth surface should more-less mimic variations in sea level, at least as regards periodicity and phase. It appears that the observed pattern of air pressure variability does not fit sea tides very well. Could you comment?
Best regards
Tomáš
TK: I do not know how the cyclones and anticyclones do form, however, if their cause were tides
BPL: No, it’s from coriolis force–the rotation speed around the Earth’s axis decreases from equator to poles, so you have a bit of net force in different directions at the south and north borders of a storm.
In Re to Barton Paul Levenson, 14 Jun 2025 at 7:58 AM,
https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2025/06/unforced-variations-jun-2025/#comment-834474
Hallo Barton Paul,
Thank you for your remark. I would like to clarify that I have not addressed the cause for the orientation of the rotation of the respective eddy but rather the cause for atmospheric pressure decrease or increase therein.
It was my understanding that Paul Pukite supposes that tidal forces play a role in formation of more or less dense air masses in Earth atmosphere. I am afraid, however, that duration and/or location of these weather phenomena do not fit with tidal forces as the supposed cause very well.
Greetings
Tomáš
Coriolis is a virtual deflecting force which will lead to complex dynamics when interacting with a varying force, such as the buoyancy driven impact of lunisolar forces.
Take a look at this frequency spectrum of the ENSO NINO4 time-series:
https://imagizer.imageshack.com/img923/9901/rI7DcW.png
This spectrum acts like a fingerprint (or akin to a diffraction pattern of a crystal lattice) where every peak is explained by a specific cyclic tidal interaction interacting with the annual cycle and subharmonics (4/2, 4/3, 4/1). It appears erratic when viewed in the intuitive time frame but reveals regularity when viewed in the reciprocal or 1/time frame.
Why don’t climate scientists look at the data this way? That’s a good question, as Earth scientists and specifically geophysicists have long been innovators in spectral analysis — just consider Burg’s work on Maximum Entropy Spectral Estimation. which was used to great effect for seismic oil exploration.
This is actually a toehold into further analysis, as there are other spectral approaches one can use given prior information is available, or at least hinted at. Wish that others were intellectually curious about exploring this path.
in Re to Paul Pukite, 14 Jun 2025 at 5:30 PM,
https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2025/06/unforced-variations-jun-2025/#comment-834484
Dear Paul,
To be honest, I thought that if you speak about pressure systems causing winds, you mean the most usual ones, cyclones and anticyclones. Now you speak about ENSO..
Is ENSO accompanied with some variations in atmospheric pressure, too?
Could you clarify which pressure systems, if any, are in your opinion caused by tidal forces?
Best regards
Tomáš
Tomas said:
(Unless this is a sea-lioning attempt) You mean that you don’t understand that a tilting of the thermocline across an ocean will (1) lead to an imbalance of sea-surface temperatures (SST) that will then (2) propagate upward to the atmosphere and thereafter by the ideal gas law (PV=nRT) (3) lead to a variation of atmospheric pressure east to west?
There’s actually a measure of ENSO called the SOI which amazingly consists only of differences of atmospheric pressure readings between Tahiti and Darwin.
Let me remind everyone that this site’s charter reads:
So even though it’s an elementary question, it’s on topic.
An acknowledgment that we in the U.S. concerned about tackling the C.C. issue are not, and have not, succeeded breaking through with the majority of the general public:
.
https://www.politico.com/news/2025/06/11/trump-biden-obama-climate-regulations-legacy-00395857
.
Makes me think about what can I do differently…
I suggest that both the northern Polar Cell and the weak mechanically-driven-backwards northern Ferrell Cell have been weakening and causing reduction of the wind-mixed depth of the well-mixed ocean layer (nominally 90 m deep) aka “shoaling” in the nominal latitude range 30N to 60N, causing some of the temperature (SST) increase and some of recent global warming increase. A +ve feedback of “Arctic Amplification”.
Additionally, I suggest that any adjusted plot to remove natural variability (such as Tamino’s) should take the 1995 to 2015 period and rotate it anti-clockwise to line up more (dunno how much because there’s been many factors lately) because ENSO wind speed started increasing 1995 after decades of no long-term trend in it and had increased 30% (1 m/s) by 2012 when the plot ended.
Published Science Reference: “Recent intensification of wind-driven circulation in the Pacific and the ongoing warming hiatus” Nature Climate Change 4, 222–227 (2014) doi:10.1038/nclimate2106 Corrected online 14 February 2014 Matthew H. England, Shayne McGregor, Paul Spence, Gerald A. Meehl, Axel Timmermann, Wenju Cai, Alex Sen Gupta, Michael J. McPhaden, Ariaan Purich & Agus Santoso
“Here we show that a pronounced strengthening in Pacific trade winds over the past two decades—unprecedented in observations/reanalysis data and not captured by climate models—is sufficient to account for the cooling of the tropical Pacific and a substantial slowdown in surface warming through increased subsurface ocean heat uptake.”
Quote of Feb 2014: “The record-breaking increase in Pacific Equatorial trade winds over the past 20 years had, until now, baffled researchers …. The solution was found in the rapid warming of the Atlantic Ocean basin, which has created unexpected pressure differences between the Atlantic and Pacific … Professor Axel Timmermann… When it does end, they expect to see some rapid changes, including a sudden acceleration of global average surface temperatures.
I suggest that it started 1995 and ended 2015, hence any adjusted plot to remove natural variability (such as Tamino’s) should take the 1995 to 2015 period and rotate it anti-clockwise to line up more.
Courtesy of the Yale Program on Climate Change Communication June 12, 2025:
“We are delighted to announce the publication of a new research article, “Understanding six ‘key truths’ about climate change predicts policy support, discussion, and political advocacy,” in the journal Climatic Change.”
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10584-025-03934-3
Reply to David,
Good one. As I said all roads lead to “policy decisions” based on the evidence. Which is already all around us.
This is just one more occasion where elitist ‘all knowing’ academics tell the world it’s the publics fault.
How about instead of again blaming the public for not being educated enough to parse the endless contradictory gobbledygook of climate scientists, that the resource rich Governments simply follow the rational take out of the scientific work already completed decades– and do that?
It’s difficult to decide which is worse-the net zero by 2020 definition which is hiding behind this papers first paragraph or the paper itself. We all truly deserve better than this. Then again, maybe we don’t.
PP: the endless contradictory gobbledygook of climate scientists
BPL: the endless contradictory gobbledygood [sic] of Pedro Prieto
There. Fixed it for you.
A scathing criticism. I’m completely crushed. So devastatingly embarrassed I could never show my face here again.
Oops. Last syllable should have been “gook” instead of “good.” My bad.
Bigot!
:)
Be aware one of our resident propagandists will likely quote this back to you completely out of context in a year or so as an example of your “offensive content and beliefs”.
jgnfld provides sage advice: Be aware one of our resident propagandists will likely quote this back to you completely out of context in a year or so as an example of your “offensive content and beliefs”.
I have seen many examples of this carried out by Piotr, nigelj, Barton BPL, Tomas, MA Rodger, and possibly others.
re “This is just one more occasion where elitist ‘all knowing’ academics tell the world it’s the publics fault.” Is that really what they said? (I haven’t read most of it, but…)
“How about” […] “the resource rich Governments simply follow the rational take out of the scientific work already completed decades– and do that?”
But how are we supposed to get those governments to do what we want them to do? Wouldn’t it help to have an enlightened, motivated public to pressure them?
As for […], I’d expect the cutting edge of scientific knowledge growth will have greater uncertainties with some contradictory ideas being explored. But there is a core of well-established understanding/theory. A person could be confused if they just jump right into it without guidance or sufficient prior knowledge, but those prerequisites have been offered. It’s just that it has to compete with misinformation/disinformation/propaganda, and busy lives. If you’re referring to confusing terminology, well, there’s going to be jargon. What is confusing to one seems like common sense to another (eg. net zero (anthropogenic) emissions.) Words can be confusing; meanings shift with context.
Agreed Patrick. IMHO the scientific community have provided reasonably clear basics on the climate issue for decades, that the public should be able to understand. The public don’t need to read the more complex issues discussed on this website although its worth the effort. I do feel they could be a little bit simpler to read but you can only simplify scientific things so much before they become meaningless. It’s possible to describe what an equation means in words but it needs a lot of words and the public only have so much time. I’m a lay person and retired and like reading this websites articles and the comments.
IMHO the scientific community have provided reasonably clear basics on the climate issue for decades, that the public should be able to understand.
The paper posted by David above —
https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10584-025-03934-3 — it’s findings and references specifically disagrees and directly challenges nigeljs humble opinion.
But never will a highly qualified piece of science get in the way of a man’s humble opinion.
Define “we”. I believe if you grasped the point being made you wouldn’t be asking those kinds of questions now. And I recommend you not go into the ‘definition’ business quite yet. Using words like bandaids doesn’t work well. Yet here we are.
My comment was for patrick o twentyseven says 17 Jun 2025 at 12:15 PM
Paul Pukite: Always good to remember that wind is a response to pressure differences, and that wind is not a driver to anything, except perhaps as a feedback at best
Thank you Captain Obvious – (other than deniers) NOBODY claims that it is not the human emissions of GHGs that are the “driver” of AGW. And no feedback, being an internal interaction, could be a “driver” (i.e. external influence) – so no “except as feedback” either.
Climate scientists that attribute wind as a forcing are evidently confusing cause and effect.
The only thing confused seems to be your logic:
– if you use “forcing” and “driver” interchangeably, as a “root cause” – then I don’t know any climate scientists who “attributes” the “root cause ” of AGW not to emissions of GHGs, but to wind instead.
-if, OTOH, by “forcing” you mean loosely any A that can directly influence B, then wind can influence T – e.g. by altering the heat exchange between ocean and air.
Piotr says:
Reminder that the charter of this web site is: “We aim to provide the context sometimes missing in mainstream commentary on climate science. The discussion here is mostly restricted to scientific topics”
The gas-lighting by Piotr is wondrous to behold. He keeps on trying to convince everyone that the only forcing that matters in causing variations in climate is via changes in GHG a la CO2. Sure, that’s certainly a contribution.. But another Captain Obvious forcing is the daily cycle, and another is the annual/seasonal cycle. Tidal forcing is another.
Gas-lighting is a forcing performed by gatekeepers. Straw man arguments forced down our throats is one form of gas-lighting. Nice science you have going on here.
The straw-man that Piotr continually ascribes to me is that what I am discussing has nothing to do with AGW, He then continuously hammers on this as a means to gas-light any further discussions on the topic of natural climate behaviors such as ENSO. We are already going through this on a much grander scale by the Trump administration, who have sufficiently gas-lit the public and were able to shutter the climate.gov site. So watch as the discussions of ENSO on the ENSO blog disappear if in fact climate.gov goes away.
I finally found a time series concerned with water use on land. The FAOSTAT database (Food and Agriculture Organization) lists the global area irrigated from 1961 to 2022. That’s a big enough sample size (N = 62) to do some time series analysis with. My results are here:
https://bartonlevenson.com/Irrigation.html
Spoiler: Increase irrigation is not causing global warming.
BPL: Spoiler: Increase irrigation is not causing global warming.
and just like that, you lost Tomas and JCM … ;-)
Although in the context of their views, you probably should kept the more universal conclusion from your calculation link:
“ irrigation has minimal, if any, influence on the global temperature.”
i.e. that it neither warms nor cools the global climate in significant way.
This is important, since Tomas and JCM staked their credibility on the increases in evaporation NOT as a cause of warming, but as an effective way to REDUCE this warming, all the while decrying the “ artificial fixation and overemphasis on the reductions in GHGs, and accusing people doing so of “ denying or actively minimizing ” massive destruction of Earth’s ecosystems^*.
.
^* Footnote: ========== JCM, 5 June 2024, UV ===========
“ UNCCD reports up to 40 % of the planet’s land is degraded and annual net loss of native ecologies continues unabated at >100 million ha / decade. This is a profound forcing to climates and puts our communities at risk. It’s hard to imagine denying or actively minimizing the consequences to realclimates due to an artificial fixation and overemphasis on the outputs of trace gas and aerosol forced model estimates. ===============
in re to Piotr, 14 Jun 2025 at 12:39 PM,
https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2025/06/unforced-variations-jun-2025/#comment-834482
Hallo Piotr,
Thank you for your correct remark that JCM consistently defended an opinion that the surface cooling effect of increased latent heat flux from a wet surface may be decisive for the sign of the “water availabiity for evaporation” forcing, because the potential opposite warming effect of an increased water vapour concentration is prevented by the said surface cooling that keeps the water vapour concentration low. This assumption has been later supported by results of modelling experiments described by Lague et al
https://iopscience.iop.org/article/10.1088/1748-9326/acdbe1
As far as I know, JCM has never asserted that irrigation should or should not have a measurable effect on global climate, because he focuses rather on soil quality and preservation of other complex ecosystems, such as natural forests.
Although I proposed a thought experiment with Sahara irrigation as an argument in our 2023 discussion whether or not a massive change in global latent heat flux can measurably influence global mean surface temperature, I agree with JCM that negative, destabilizing effects of human caused deterioration of soils and destruction of other ecosystems might have prevailed over possible positive, stabilizing effects of artificial irrigation. Unfortunately, Barton’s statistic does include irrigation only and not the other anthropogenic activities that might have influenced latent heat flux from Earth surface as well.
Last but not least, I would like to remind you that besides of the direct cooling effect of latent heat flux and cloud formation linked thereto, there may be also an indirect effect of water availability for evaporation from the land on climate sensitivity. If the above mentioned anthropogenic disruptions inflicted to natural ecosystems indeed decreased water availability for evaporation from the land and thus, possibly, increased climate sensitivity towards changes in atmospheric concentration of non-condensing greenhouse gases, it could be an explanation for the observed or assumed acceleration of the global warming during the last two decades.
That is why I repeatedly asked if an extension of the modelling experiment described by Lague et al perhaps could clarify whether or not the climate sensitivity indeed may depend on water availability for evaporation from the land.
Greetings
Tomáš
Tomáš Kalisz – 15 Jun: “As far as I know, JCM has never asserted that irrigation should or should not have a measurable effect on global climate”
That’s because he is sharper than you. You allowed your claims to be specific, so they opened themselves to be tested – see my calculations how your Sahara irrigation scheme is absurdly expensive and unfeasible (many $ trillions a year, FOREVER, for a fraction of o.3K reduction in warming after my 100s of years)
JCM on the other hand avoids testable specifics:
– that’s why he was at pains to distance himself from you and your TESTABLE Sahara scheme
– that’s why he promoted here the Lague et al 2023 paper – implying that the paper supports his claims. But then, damn it, patrick o27 and I used the Lague et al. numbers to show that even if we abandoned ALL AGRICULTURE and converted it into swampy forests – the cooling effect of the increased evaporation would be … a fraction of a fraction of 0.3K, and even that – ignoring
factors in the opposite direction (decreased land albedo and less eavp. from no longer needed irrigation).
Unable to falsify these numbers – your JCM … threw his own source ( Lague et al.) under the bus – he tried to discredit Lague et al, and by extension, ALL climate modeling as:
“ imaginary process mechanisms [using] rules about how things ought to be” ” (c) JCM July 2024.
And that’s why he prefers to catch fish in murky waters – a quote of some numbers – and IMPLICATION that it somehow supports his attacks on the mainstream climate science.
.Like in his famous post where he used real world examples:
“ UNCCD reports up to 40 % of the planet’s land is degraded and annual net loss of native ecologies continues unabated at >100 million ha / decade.
and blamed it on …climate science:
“ It’s hard to imagine denying or actively minimizing the consequences to realclimates due to an artificial fixation and overemphasis on the outputs of trace gas and aerosol forced model estimates ” (c) JCM
No wonder the fellow anti-scientist, Multi-troll Pedro/William etc., praised JCM, Paul Pukite, Killian and himself to heaven, as: “ the last ones here still grounded in unbiased reason and scientific fundamentals“.
in Re to Piotr, 18 Jun 2025 at 12:26 AM,
https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2025/06/unforced-variations-jun-2025/#comment-834587
Hallo Piotr,
I share JCM’s concerns that the strong focus of climate science on greenhouse gases may be harmful. I think so because at least until it is proven that land hydrology does not affect climate sensitivity towards changes in atmospheric concentration of non-condensing greenhouse gases, the assumption that these changes are the sole cause of the observed climate change may be premature, and some policies relying on this assumption, e.g. subsidizing fossil fuel replacement with “biomass” that incentivizes chopping forests for wood pellets, may be in fact counter-productive and dangerous.
I do not think that JCM attacks science when he expresses these concerns. In my eyes, his effort for conservation of soils and natural ecosystems is justified, honest and respectable.
Greetings
Tomáš
Out today 05/13/2025:
.
Courtesy of Inside Climate News:
“New Climate Study Highlights Dire Sea Level Warnings -To learn about how polar ice sheets melted during an ancient era, scientists examined fossil coral reefs in the tropics.”
.
https://insideclimatenews.org/news/13062025/dire-sea-level-warming-polar-ice-sheets/
.
And the paper :
.
SCIENCE ADVANCES
13 Jun 2025
Vol 11, Issue 24
.
“Episodic reef growth in the Last Interglacial driven by competing influence of polar ice sheets to sea level rise”
K. Vyverberg, A. Dutton, B. Dechnik, J. M. Webster, & R.M. Deconto
.
https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciadv.adu3701
re my “Also, How did Dan and Scott Nudds, in particular, end up on your list of apparent group-thinkers? What comments are you basing that on? I’m curious.” https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2025/05/unforced-variations-may-2025/comment-page-2/#comment-833770
Clarification: I thought of Scott Nudds as being between ‘us’ (by analogy, the Green Team (incl. spring green, mint green, lime green, pine green, sea green, olive green…) and The Prieto Principle, Thessalonia, & William (the Blue (at their best) or perhaps Purple Team) (Scott Nudds~cyan?) (where MKIA and some others would be the Red/Magenta Team); I mentioned Dan because at the time I only remembered clearly his comment https://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2025/05/unforced-variations-may-2025/#comment-833483 – which was not about clean energy, net-0, or capitalism vs. communism.
P27: It is a great waste of time to compile lists of people’s position in these comment sections.* Either they contribute or they detract, from (a) increasing knowledge and understanding of climate change/global warming and its effects, (b) possibly providing succinct debunking of falsehood, and (c) providing relevant news about the interface between enaction or dismantling of policy in favor of having a future on our once hospitable earth, or they don’t. Either they are willing to see facts are they aren’t. Either they can give up their addiction to occupying column inches here or they can’t.
If they just like to see themselves in print, or are promoting fake skeptic boilerplate for political reasons, they are just BS artists lacking the ability to see themselves as others seem them.
___
* Bear in mind that by doing so you are amplifying the ones you deplore (if your opinion is correct) and burying the few kernels of instructive information available to anyone who cares and can learn from it.
“It is a great waste of time to compile lists of people’s position”…- I do generally agree; and don’t plan on making it a habit; the above was motivated in part by wanting to clarify that I was not trying to distance myself from Dan. I could have left the rest off.
patrick o27 “ I thought of Scott Nudds as being between ‘us’ and and [The Prieto Principle] team.”
I don’t think he is “between” at all – Scott Nudds is as much a doomer, as derisive toward scientists, and as anti-Capitalist (with the record of raging against “AmeriKKKan state” going back all way to env. discussion groups on the Usenet) – as is the PP “team”. As such, he is not “between” but would be in the PP Team, IF ONLY the PP team wasn’t restricted to ONE person posting under dozen(s)? of handles.
And ONE person there isn’t a team player – he uses Scott Nudds and others instrumentally:
either as a tool in his attacks on his opponents:
– defending Nudds’ derision toward climate scientists
– portraying Nudds as a victim of Gavin’s censorship of the scientific discussion
or when rhetorically-convenient …. sacrificing Nudds for the greater good – to discredit “us” by association with him, Tomas Kalisz and Pete Best – claiming that these three are “ indistinguishable in tone, position, attitude, and tactics from us, and assigning them to the same “ groupthink ” with us. (The P. Principle, May 22).
My impression was just based on his May comments (those which I saw), so I certainly could have missed some context.
Anticapitalism by itself doesn’t bother me so much, up to a point. Some of my favorite Youtubers have expressed dislike or disdain for capitalism; I can disagree respectfully – or agree, depending on what exactly they mean/want (replace or reduce or repair? Ie. regulate it better, balance it better with the public sector (as one must balance fatty acids of different ω numbers https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Omega-3_fatty_acid), or completely dumping it – and replacing it with? …)
Patrick 027: “I can disagree respectfully – or agree, depending on what exactly they mean/want (replace or reduce or repair?
Scott Nudds has been raging on …. “AmeriKKKa” since at least early 2000s, so I doubt he is into “reduce” or “repair” of capitalism.
And both Nudds and Multi-troll are all-or-nothing fanatics, thus consider those who want to “reduce/repair” as traitors, and such – reserve to them more venom than to the promoters of unrestricted capitalism. Hence Scott Nudds attacks are centred on “us” (people OPPOSING MAGA anti-environmentalism), and Multi-troll having the contempt for “us”, while finding kind words for general-purpose deniers like Ken Towe, and the “anything but GHGs” like JCM and Paul Pukite.
Another great Youtube channel:
“Engineering with Rosie” https://www.youtube.com/@EngineeringwithRosie/videos :
“Electricity Across Oceans: Is HVDC the Future?” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JH9-0AbR_1U
“Why is China Dominating Ultra High Voltage DC?” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1CVlbBYl5OU
(see also “Rethinking electricity grids.” “Just Have a Think”: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VKpDvCGqUv8 (reconductoring))
( https://energyinnovation.org/report/the-2035-report-reconductoring-with-advanced-conductors-can-accelerate-the-rapid-transmission-expansion-needed-for-a-clean-grid/ )
“Can You Run a Grid on 100% Wind + Solar? South Australia Shows Us How” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=daZvZ4fEOp8
(haven’t seen/finished yet):
“Batteries Are So Last Year: Meet the Game-Changing Ocean Energy Storage Systems Taking Over” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CTj1dwE0hgo
“Will Critical Minerals Stop the Energy Transition?” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nBotCbgLlt0
“Zero-Emission Mining Technologies are Here” https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4xfiRuIspCc
…
f = Fractional loss = P’/P₀ = V’/ V₀
V’ = IR = (P₀/ V₀)R
Al (@ 20 °C):
ρ_e = 26.5 nΩ⋅m,
ρ_m = 2.699 g/cm³ = 2.699 t/m³
( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aluminium )
R = ρ_e·ℓ ÷ A = ρ_e ·ℓ² ÷ (A·ℓ) = ρ_m·ρ_e · ℓ² ÷ m
V’= ( ρ_m·ρ_e · ℓ² ÷ m ) · (P₀/ V₀)
f = V’/ V₀ = ( ρ_m·ρ_e · ℓ² ÷ m ) · (P₀/ V₀²)
m/ P₀ = ( ρ_m·ρ_e ÷ f ) · (ℓ²/ V₀²)
to be cont…
A progressive framework for green industrial policy (2025)
Research Article
This progressive framework represents a departure from traditional green industrial policy approaches. It acknowledges that the scale and urgency of the ecological crisis requires more than just market-based solutions or incremental changes. Instead, it proposes a fundamental restructuring of economic priorities and approaches to industrial policy, with a focus on reducing overall resource use in high-income economies while enabling sustainable development in the global South.
Clearly, the systemic change we call for is not out of step with the public or with scientists. Of course, even strong public support for a policy framework does not mean it will be implemented. Indeed, it is reasonable to expect very strong resistance from elite factions who benefit so prodigiously from the existing arrangement. The path forward will require not only protest and demonstration – the dominant mode of popular political engagement over the past decades – but the establishment of mass-based political parties that can represent the interests of the working-classes, achieve power, and implement industrial policy measures that can resolve the social and ecological crises of the twenty-first century. Meaningful, systemic socio-economic change has often been unpopular with policy elites, including the British suffragette movement, the civil rights movement in the United States, and the anti-apartheid movement in South Africa (Malm Citation2020). Nelson Mandela, recognising that the anti-apartheid movement was calling for change that was deemed unrealistic by policy elites at the time, pointed out that ‘It always seems impossible until it’s done’.
Although the framework we outline above calls for systematic transformation, the policy pathways are not simply thought experiments. They build on real-existing implementation, both at present and historically, including carbon taxes, credit guidance, anti-trust legislation, consumer protection laws, and public ownership structures. But we do indeed question the status quo of the capitalist economic system more fundamentally than existing frameworks for green industrial policy.
https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/13563467.2025.2506655#d1e539
Thanks for a useful reference. This is just the sort of thing I’ve been asking for: a vision of how we can get closer to a truly sustainable world. I’ve been at pains to point out what I consider to be useful trends today. But I’ve also said that while mitigation of emissions should receive an extremely high priority, we also need systemic change away–among other things–from a society built on the practice of disposability.
So I was delighted to see this very topic addressed, and at some length, in the paper presented above.
The main thrust of the article is that degrowth is necessary in the developed economies, as a complement to the transition away from unsustainable and polluting technologies; that the best way to accomplish this degrowth is to target socially damaging or unproductive industries and phase them down. They name the fossil fuel industry (of course!), the advertising industry, aviation, and, commercial beef production. (Personally, I’d add blockchain currencies to the list–they mar be sexy, but I have yet to hear of a single application which is unambiguously positive for society, and of course the whole technology is extremely energy intensive. And while we are at it, maybe we should, if we had the power, also hit the brakes hard on AI development. It may have more potential upsides than cryptocurrency seems to, but it’s also an energy hog of a technology, and is being developed headlong with far too little care for consequences. But I digress.)
There are several methods proposed to drive this targeted degrowth, but the prime one seems to be the reclamation of the power of money creation by governments:
Who Will You Become As AI Accelerates?
8 caricatures or personality types people may become in the near future. Not certainty nor expert advice of what is, but something intended to help people think for themselves. By Nate Hagens only 13 minutes. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Wmb0eXvfuNY
Luddite or a Cyborg? Nate thinks the Meek shall inherit this Earth.
You have not seen anything yet. The holy grail of artificial superintelligence (GAI) is far off. Meantime, watch the geopolitical currency bond dislocation followed by a global financial breakdown unfolding in real time. Maybe then you will find out who your friends truly are.
So called economics experts have been predicting financial problems and crashes and other problems would cause the catastrophic collapse of the global economy and society for decades, and it hasn’t happened. For example Economist Ravi Batra predicted a huge economic collapse in the 1990s. Never happened. Things recovered quite quickly.
Other experts predicted the 2008 crash would turn into a huge global depression. Didn’t happen. The y2K issue was a fizzer. The club of Rome said the world will run out of lead, zinc, tin by 1990, the list goes on.
Of course the economy could collapse, and resource scarcity is real, but economies are more resilient than you think. I have given evidence, not slick sounding pseudo intellectual BS on YouTube.
N: The y2K issue was a fizzer.
BPL: It was a fizzer because programmers put in a lot of time and effort to make sure the software and the things it controlled would work.
Two short articles, the first is courtesy of E&E News from yesterday (in front of their pricy paywall) about the continued dissassembly of NOAA’s science mission and includes a comment from RC’s Michael Mann. The second is courtesy of Politico this morning and expands on a similar theme, looking at NOAA, EPA, FEMA, Interior Department, etc.
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“How Trump’s assault on science is blinding America to climate change”
https://www.eenews.net/articles/how-trumps-assault-on-science-is-blinding-america-to-climate-change/
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“ ‘Set up for failure’: Trump’s cuts bring climate and energy agencies to a standstill, workers say”
https://www.politico.com/news/2025/06/17/trumps-energy-cuts-means-agencies-failure-00406526
.
.
I hope that those concerned about the science missions (and the financial costs of these actions being ignored) outlined in the article’s will contact their Representative and both of their Senators and express their opinions on what I view as “penny wise, pound foolish” approach on several levels being wielded by the current administration. That’s what I am doing locally, trying to encourage more outreach to D.C. It’s worth it!
Why imperfect climate models are more helpful than you think
Even flawed models are helping scientists unlock new truths about our changing planet.
https://yaleclimateconnections.org/2025/06/why-imperfect-climate-models-are-more-helpful-than-you-think/ [author Ryan O’Loughlin … philosophy and climate change, Queens College & CUNY Graduate Center.]
Headlines aren’t as helpful as you might think.
The question remains, how helpful did the readers think ‘imperfect climate models’ were in the first place? You’d have to know that before working out if they were ‘more helpful’ than they thought.
That being so, this quote was a good one: “One answer is to emphasize that models are fit for purpose. As Rood put it, models must be “designed, built, and evaluated to address a specific application.”
and
“One challenge in making models “fit for purpose” is that while some priorities are obvious, many of the more fine-grained decisions may not be so clear-cut.”
and
“A major challenge is that performance analyses of climate models yield a sort of mixed bag: Some models perform better with respect to some variables while others excel elsewhere.”
Meaning to me, the specifics and context matters here. Which models and why matters. Including what their primary purpose was and do they meet the requirements or not. If some of those flawed models can be reapplied to other purposes, fine, but they are still flawed for the purpose they were deigned for. And it takes years to find out if they are or aren’t. Which appears to usually coming down to, well yeah, nah. Let’s see how the next batch do, then we’ll know more.
And it’s useful not to miss the most obvious point made: “On the other hand, climate models can be wrong in that they give us inaccurate output about past, present, or potential future climates. That is, climate models can give us the wrong answers. It is easiest to see this for cases of past and present climate, where model output can be compared against observations.“