As noted previously on GlobalWarming.Org, Obama’s “Clean Energy Standard” would effectively impose the Waxman-Markey cap-and-trade bill’s emission reduction target on the electric power sector.

Under Obama’s proposal, “By 2035, 80% of America’s electricity will come from clean energy sources” (i.e. from wind, solar, hydro, nuclear, “clean coal,” and natural gas). Similarly, an estimated 81% of U.S. electricity would come from such sources in 2030 in the Energy Information Administration’s “Basic Case” analysis of the Waxman-Markey bill.

There is one difference though. Emission reductions accomplished via Soviet-style production quota (mandates) such as a clean energy standard would likely be more costly than emission reductions accomplished via market-like mechanisms such as cap-and-trade. National Journal reporter Amy Harder spotted this issue last Friday:

“One of the things that happens implicitly when you set a standard is that you have in fact put a price on carbon, but it’s the clumsiest way to do it,” said Kevin Book, managing director at ClearView Energy Partners, an energy consulting company. “You’re not looking for an efficient, market-based solution. You’re looking for just enough to meet the standards solution.”

Get the picture? The public rejected cap-and-trade, punishing at the polls several Members of Congress who voted for Waxman-Markey. Instead of abandoning a policy designed to make our electric rates “necessarily skyrocket,” Obama offers a more costly version of the same agenda.

Cap-and-trade is dead because the public finally caught on that it is a stealth energy tax, a big reason being that it makes coal - the most economic electricity fuel in many markets - uncompetitive. Coal generated 44.5% of all U.S. electricity and almost 64% of U.S. baseload power in 2009, according to the U.S. Energy Information Administration (EIA).

Obama’s clean energy standard too would make coal generation uneconomic. “Clean” essentially means “anything but coal.” Instead of pricing the carbon emissions from coal, as a cap-and-trade program does, Obama’s new policy would simply prohibit “conventional coal” from competing with other energy sources in 80% of the nation’s electricity market. Existing coal plants could continue to operate within the 20% segment that is deemed “unclean” - unless, of course, EPA’s war on coal succeeds in forcing those plants into premature retirement.

Unless CCS gets a whole lot cheaper soon, Obama’s clean energy standard will effectively ban the construction of new coal-fired power plants. That is a long-standing goal of the Sierra Club and other eco-litigation groups. However, it is emphatically not what either major party campaigned for in last year’s congressional races.

On the day after Election Day, Obama told the Washington press corps: “Cap and trade was just one way of skinning the cat; it was not the only way.  It was a means, not an end.  And I’m going to be looking for other means to address this problem.” Obama’s proposed clean energy standard would skin the cat known as the American ratepayer every bit as much - and perhaps more - than cap-and-trade.

See full post.

In a leap of Orwellian logic, USA Today - America’s second-largest newspaper argued in its lead editorial Tuesday that banning the incandescent light bulb is a victory for free markets.

“The best way for government to boost energy efficiency isn’t to micromanage by picking winners and losers, a job better suited to free-market innovation. It is to set a reasonable standard - miles per gallon or light per watt, for example - and let the market sort it out,” spins the editorial in support of picking winners and losers.” That’s what Congress did in 2007 “in banning the bulb”.

War is Peace. Freedom is Slavery. Ignorance is Strength. Banning is choice. Regulation is freedom.

One wonders if USA Today’s editors would tolerate this doublethink if applied to their own industry. Were Congress to ban newspapers in order to force them onto the more “planet-friendly” Internet, would USA Today swallow this as free-market economics?

Michigan View contributor Ted Nugent quipped that “Obama slept through the election” after a State of the Union address that stubbornly plowed ahead with the hyper-regulation of carbon and Big Government spending. Obama’s MSM allies were apparently snoozing on the couch next to him.

Or perhaps Obamedia is very awake. And they realize that - given the unpopularity of their radical green agenda — the only way to move if forward is with Newspeak that would make Big Brother blush.

Read more at the Michigan View.com.

To the Members of the U.S. House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate:

February 8, 2011

In reply to “The Importance of Science in Addressing Climate Change”

On 28 January 2011, eighteen scientists sent a letter to members of the U.S. House of Representatives and the U.S. Senate urging them to “take a fresh look at climate change.” Their intent, apparently, was to disparage the views of scientists who disagree with their contention that continued business-as-usual increases in carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions produced from the burning of coal, gas, and oil will lead to a host of cataclysmic climate-related problems.

We, the undersigned, totally disagree with them and would like to take this opportunity to briefly state our side of the story.

The eighteen climate alarmists (as we refer to them, not derogatorily, but simply because they view themselves as “sounding the alarm” about so many things climatic) state that the people of the world “need to prepare for massive flooding from the extreme storms of the sort being experienced with increasing frequency,” as well as the “direct health impacts from heat waves” and “climate-sensitive infectious diseases,” among a number of other devastating phenomena. And they say that “no research results have produced any evidence that challenges the overall scientific understanding of what is happening to our planet’s climate,” which is understood to mean their view of what is happening to Earth’s climate.

To these statements, however, we take great exception. It is the eighteen climate alarmists who appear to be unaware of “what is happening to our planet’s climate,” as well as the vast amount of research that has produced that knowledge.

For example, a lengthy review of their claims and others that climate alarmists frequently make can be found on the Web site of the Center for the Study of Carbon Dioxide and Global Change (see Carbon Dioxide and Earth’s Future: Pursuing the Prudent Path). That report offers a point-by-point rebuttal of all of the claims of the “group of eighteen,” citing in every case peer-reviewed scientific research on the actual effects of climate change during the past several decades.

If the “group of eighteen” pleads ignorance of this information due to its very recent posting, then we call their attention to an even larger and more comprehensive report published in 2009, Climate Change Reconsidered: The 2009 Report of the Nongovernmental International Panel on Climate Change (NIPCC). That document has been posted for more than a year in its entirety at www.nipccreport.org.

These are just two recent compilations of scientific research among many we could cite. Do the 678 scientific studies referenced in the CO2 Science document, or the thousands of studies cited in the NIPCC report, provide real-world evidence (as opposed to theoretical climate model predictions) for global warming-induced increases in the worldwide number and severity of floods? No. In the global number and severity of droughts? No. In the number and severity of hurricanes and other storms? No.

Do they provide any real-world evidence of Earth’s seas inundating coastal lowlands around the globe? No. Increased human mortality? No. Plant and animal extinctions? No. Declining vegetative productivity? No. More frequent and deadly coral bleaching? No. Marine life dissolving away in acidified oceans? No.

Quite to the contrary, in fact, these reports provide extensive empirical evidence that these things are not happening. And in many of these areas, the referenced papers report finding just the opposite response to global warming, i.e., biosphere-friendly effects of rising temperatures and rising CO2 levels.

In light of the profusion of actual observations of the workings of the real world showing little or no negative effects of the modest warming of the second half of the twentieth century, and indeed growing evidence of positive effects, we find it incomprehensible that the eighteen climate alarmists could suggest something so far removed from the truth as their claim that no research results have produced any evidence that challenges their view of what is happening to Earth’s climate and weather.

But don’t take our word for it. Read the two reports yourselves. And then make up your own minds about the matter. Don’t be intimidated by false claims of “scientific consensus” or “overwhelming proof.” These are not scientific arguments and they are simply not true.

Like the eighteen climate alarmists, we urge you to take a fresh look at climate change. We believe you will find that it is not the horrendous environmental threat they and others have made it out to be, and that they have consistently exaggerated the negative effects of global warming on the U.S. economy, national security, and public health, when such effects may well be small to negligible.

See this PDF with the 68 signatories.

Recently sometimes liberal, sometimes conservative Bill O’Reilly posed this question, “Why has southern New York turned into the Tundra?” Of course Bill was being funny when he asked that. Tundra is located in the Arctic, mountainous areas and Antarctica. It has very few trees, in many areas none and under its surface there is permafrost, the ground a few inches down is permanently frozen. Actually the Tundra has very little snowfall and is really a cold desert in many parts of the world with 6 inches or less of annual precipitation. So if you think the Tundra is covered in 10 feet of snow you would be wrong.

Self proclaimed climate expert Al Gore responded to Bills question saying “In fact, scientists have been warning for at least two decades that global warming could make snowstorms more severe.” He went on to say “A rise in global temperature can cause all kinds of havoc ranging from hotter dry spells to colder winters, along with increasingly violent storms, flooding, forest fires (from global warming?) and loss of endangered species.”

Funny how Gore never mentioned that global warming would cause more severe snow storms or colder winters in his 2006 move “An Inconvenient Truth.” Not once in the movie was there any indication that global warming would cause anything other than higher temperatures, melting ice, shorter and less cold winters and less snowfall. His answer to Bill is clearly an attempt to cover his tracks.

Are snowstorms really getting more severe? No. History is replete with massive snowstorms decades and centuries ago. Chicago’s biggest snowstorm was from January 26th to the 27th 1967 with 23.0 inches, not the most recent storm. The Blizzard of March 11th to the 14th 1888 dumped an incredible 50 inches of snow on Connecticut! Can you imagine what the media would say if that happened today? In the late winter of 1717 a series of 4 storms from late February to early march buried parts of New England in 10 to 15 feet of snow! And you thought 3 feet was something unusual.

There is a fundamental problem with Al Gore and others who believe that global warming is causing bigger snow storms and every other severe weather event around the world. That problem is that they have no appreciation for the massive natural variability of everyday weather. They are confusing weather with climate. Weather is what we wake up to and deal with every day. But weather also operates on weekly, monthly and yearly time scales. If we had a hot summer last year that was not climate, it was weather. If we had a big snowstorm a few weeks ago that was weather, not climate. If December was record cold that was weather, not climate. A hurricane that struck 5 years ago was not climate, it was weather. Oh and by the way Al, a forest fire is not cause by global warming. Also, the earth’s interior does not have a temperature of several million degrees as he said on late night TV last year.

Climate is the average of the weather over a longer, rather arbitrary time period. Typically climatologists like to use 30 year time periods to take an average of the weather and then call it climate. Climate trends can be inferred from shorter time periods like 15 to 20 years but the standard is 30 years.

The average temperature of the earth, as inferred from our 160 years of thermometer measurements has increased about 1 degree Fahrenheit since those readings began. Historically this is not a big number, not even close. Data from ice cores in Greenland show us that over the last 10,000 years temperature has varied by 6 degrees Fahrenheit, far more than the rise of the last 160 years. In fact the average monthly global temperature of the earth can vary by 1 degree or more in just one year! This means that in just one year we can experience all of the average global warming that has taken 160 years to accumulate. What does that mean? It tells us that from day to day, week to week and year to year the variability of THE WEATHER can be massive and have nothing to do with the long term climate trend. If a baseball player hits 500 for the week with 7 home runs and knocks in 20 runs does that mean he will be in the hall of fame at the end of his career? Of course not, it’s his long term performance (his baseball climate history) that will determine that. In the same light big snow storms or floods or heat waves or any other extreme weather event is not an indication of what the long term climate is doing or will do, it’s just weather.

The Climate Research Unit at the University of East Anglia has temperature records dating back to 1850. Although the data is somewhat tainted due to very questionable “adjustments” that have been made, we can still roust out details of the large month to month and year to year temperature variability. One of the most striking examples of just how much the monthly average temperature can change in a short time was in the middle 1940s. From early 1945 to late 1946 the earth’s average monthly temperature fell 1.6 degrees Fahrenheit. That is one and a half times the total “global warming” of the last 160 years in a one year period! More recently the satellite derived temperature data showed a remarkable rise from of 1.7 degrees Fahrenheit from May of 1997 to March of 1998. In a little less than one year the temperature variation dwarfed all the average global warming of the last 160 years. This dramatic temperature rise was due to a dominant El Nino in the Pacific Ocean. The very warm water along equator warmed the entire planet just as El Nino’s always do to one degree or another.  The warmth from the El Nino peaked in spring of 1998 and a La Nina developed, cooling the waters. In response to this cooler water the earth’s temperature plunged 1.8 degrees from May of 1998 to February of 2000, a drop nearly double all the average temperature rise in the last 160 years in a little less than two years!

Recently NOAA declared that 2010 tied 2005 as the warmest year on record. “On record” is the period of time the earth’s temperature has been measured with thermometers, since 1880 for NOAA. The attempt was to make this sound like global warming had something to do with it since NOAA is firmly in he camp of global warming alarmists. But look at what’s happened to the average global temperature since last April. In the 9 months since then the temperature has crashed 1 degree as of the end of January 2011. In just 9 months we wiped out all the global warming of the last 160 years! No, of course that’s not true at all. And that’s my point. The big drop since April is the weather. The rise of the last 160 years is climate.

So what does that all have to do with Al Gore and climate alarmists and global warming making cold weather and snowstorms? What is says is that the year to year and even month to month variability of weather is so large that it can be double the average temperature rise of the last 160 years. It tells us that we could have the same weather experienced in March of 1888 today, tomorrow or next month or next year. Last winter Washington DC had 55.9 inches of snow. That total broke the record of 54.4 inches set in the winter of 1898/99, a record that stood for 111 winters. Many said hurricane Katrina was the worst hurricane in United States history but the Galveston hurricane of September 1900 killed 8,000 people. In England the winter of 1249 was a remarkable example of just how extreme the weather can be, 762 years ago. “Last winter there was so pleasant, sweet and warm that people fancied the season was changed. There was no snow or frost the whole winter. Folks threw off their cloaks and went in the thinnest, lightest summer dress.” Now that’s extreme. If that took place today the howls of terror from the global warming alarmists would be heard from here to eternity!

Extreme weather will come and go with all its amazing variety and social impacts, it always has and always will. The answer to Bill’s question is perhaps best addressed by Mark Twain. He said in 1876 “Now, as to the size of the weather in New England - lengthways, I mean. It is utterly disproportioned to the size of that little country. Half the time, when it is packed as full as it can stick, you will see that New England weather sticking out beyond the edges and projecting around hundreds and hundreds of miles over the neighboring states (New York). She can’t hold a tenth part of her weather. You can see cracks all about, where she has strained herself trying to do it.” That about says it all Bill.

We have published a set of papers that discuss an under recognized climate feedback which constrains how warm and cold the troposphere can become. These papers present a constraint based on the temperatures of the sea surface and the deep cumulus response to these temperatures.

The idea is straightforward and originated in an idea from Ben Herman at the University of Arizona. When cold air masses travel over unfrozen ocean, vertical mixing through deep cumulus convection mixes the air through the troposphere such that temperatures at 500mb, for example, hardly ever becomes colder than -40C to -45C.  These cold values are actually reached in November in the Northern Hemisphere despite several more months of winter.

This limit on tropospheric cooling is reported on in our papers:

Chase, T.N., B. Herman, R.A. Pielke Sr., X. Zeng, and M. Leuthold, 2002: A proposed mechanism for the regulation of minimum midtropospheric temperatures in the Arctic. J. Geophys. Res., 107(D14), 10.10291/2001JD001425

Tsukernik, M., T.N. Chase, M.C. Serreze, R.G. Barry, R. Pielke Sr., B. Herman, and X. Zeng, 2004: On the regulation of minimum mid-tropospheric temperatures in the Arctic. Geophys. Res. Letts., 31, L06112, doi:10.1029/2003GL018831

Herman, B., M. Barlage, T.N. Chase, and R.A. Pielke Sr., 2008: Update on a proposed mechanism for the regulation of minimum mid-tropospheric and surface temperatures in the Arctic and Antarctic. J. Geophys. Res.-Atmos., 113, D24101, doi:10.1029/2008JD009799.

Herman, B.M. M.A. Brunke, R.A. Pielke Sr., J.R. Christy, and R.T. McNider, 2010: Global and hemispheric lower tropospheric temperature trends. Remote Sensing, 2, 2561-2570; doi:10.3390/rs2112561.

Since, as discussed in my post

The Westerlies Explain The Recent Extreme Winter Weather, Not “Global Warming” it is the cold tropospheric air towards the poles and the warmer tropospheric air to the south that drives the westerlies, if the coldest that the troposphere can achieve is -40C to -45C, irrespective of a global average surface temperature trend, this is a self-regulation of the climate system.

Similarly, tropospheric temperatures cannot become warmer than about -5C at 500mb in the tropics for very long as deep convection over the warmest oceans still results in temperatures at that level of ~-5C.  This deep convection is prevalent over tropical oceans as air travels around the globe.

Only if the high latitude oceans warm to well above freezing almost everywhere (which means most of the Arctic and Antarctic sea ice disappears) and/or the tropical oceans warm substantially above their current values, will this self-regulation of the climate system change.  The role of human climate forcings would have to be large enough to alter these surface temperatures.

The latest sea surface temperature and temperature anomaly maps show that large enough changes have not yet occurred to alter this self-regulation of the climate system - as illustrated below. The 2007 IPCC, and more recent pronouncements have ignored assessing the role of this self-regulation of the climate.

H/T Climate Depot