Spectacular on a clear, sunny day, Mount Adams rises a scant 53 miles from Yakima.

But the mountain holds what until now has been pretty much a secret.

In the first comprehensive study of its kind, a Portland State University study has found Mount Adams’ 12 glaciers have shrunk by nearly half since 1904 and are receding faster than those of nearby sister volcanoes Mount Hood and Mount Rainier.

It’s another sign of gradually warming temperatures that - if continued as expected by researchers - will mean significant problems for the water-dependent Yakima Valley.

The study lends urgency to an earlier federal report that shows the water content of Cascade Mountain snowpacks could dwindle by as much as 50 percent by the 2070s.

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The Portland State University study suggests that Washington’s gradually warming temperatures have caused Mount Adams’ to shrink by nearly half since 1904 and are receding faster than those of nearby sister volcanoes Mount Hood and Mount Rainier, but the National Climatic Data Center figures copied below indicate the following:

· Washington’s annual temperatures trended downward slightly at a rate of 0.07 degrees F per decade from 1895 through 1985.

· Washington’s annual temperatures trended downward more rapidly at a rate of 0.39 degrees F per decade from 1986 through 2011.

Portland State University suggests that Washington has been gradually warming since 1904, but the National Climatic Data Center data indicates that Washington’s annual temperatures trended downward slightly from 1895 through 1985 and then trended downward more rapidly from 1986 through 2011.  These two periods of downward trending Washington annual temperatures were separated by a curious and unexplained temperature step change increase of 3.6 degrees F occurring between 1985 and 1986.

Ken Schlichte

Gordon Fulks adds: “The quilty party is likely Andrew Fountain at PSU.  He has hawked this sort of rubbish for years by picking those cases where glaciers have retreated and ignoring those where they have advanced.  He also chooses the period of record as the entire 20th century, when he knows that much of the retreat occurred up to and during the Dust Bowl era of the 1930s before CO2 could have been a “problem.” When I nailed him about this at a seminar at PSU last summer, he refused to answer and quickly ducked out of the room.  He clearly knows that he is vulnerable but has gotten away with this poor excuse for science for many years.”

Annual Temperature
Washington

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Some of the following data are preliminary and have not been quality controlled.
For official data, please contact the NCDC Climate Services and Monitoring Division at ncdc.orders@noaa.gov.

Annual 1895 - 1985 Data Values:


Annual 1895 - 1985 Average = 47.81 degF
Annual 1895 - 1985 Trend = -0.07 degF / Decade
(Enlarged)

Annual Temperature
Washington

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Some of the following data are preliminary and have not been quality controlled.
For official data, please contact the NCDC Climate Services and Monitoring Division at ncdc.orders@noaa.gov.

Annual 1986 - 2011 Data Values:

Annual 1986 - 2011 Average = 48.85 degF
Annual 1986 - 2011 Trend = -0.39 degF / Decade
(Enlarged)

UPDATE: First snow in 40 Years in North India
From Madhav Khandekar

For the first time in 40 years, Pathankot in Punjab state, at the foothills of the Himalanyan range of mountains, experienced snow fall.

My simple assessment; snow and colder condions have beceome more frequent in Himalayan foothills in the last ten years. In 2010 and also in 2011 January several hundred people (mostly elderly living in poor houses, ) died due to long exposure to low temperatures. Last January ( 2011) when I was in India, max temp in many north Indian cities would be just at 12C to 15C! This is COLD for North where about 250 to 300 M people live and most of the houses have NO heating at all!  At best some small room heaters! Also the houses are NOT well insulated, so the cold wintry weather is felt inside the houses day long!

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(CNSNews.com) - A study by the Government Accountability Office (GAO) determined that the United States funded the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the United Nations’ authority on alleged man-made global warming, with $31.1 million since 2001, nearly half of the panel’s annual budget.

The GAO also found that this funding information “was not available in budget documents or on the websites of the relevant federal agencies, and the agencies are generally not required to report this information to Congress.”

In a Nov. 17, 2011 report, “International Climate Change Assessments: Federal Agencies Should Improve Reporting and Oversight of U.S. Funding,” the GAO found that the State Department provided $19 million for administrative and other expenses, while the United States Global Change Research Program (USGCRP) provided $12.1 million in technical support through the U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF), averaging an annual $3.1 million to the IPCC over 10 years—$31.1 million so far.

The IPCC runs an annual budget of $7 million, according to the Wall Street Journal, making the United States a major benefactor for its global warming agenda.

An international body, the IPCC was created in 1988.  Though thousands of scientists contribute to the panel, only 11 working members support the organization.  Set up by the World Meteorological Organization (WMO), the IPCC is an “effort by the United Nations to provide the governments of the world with a clear scientific view of what is happening to the world’s climate,” according to its Web site.

The organization has been the subject of controversy in the last several years when thousands of e-mails from the University of East Anglia’s (UEA) Climatic Research Unit (CRU) were stolen and released in 2009, and again in November 2011, on the eve of climate talks in Durban, South Africa.

The e-mails included those between Michael Mann, the director of the Earth System Science Center at Penn State University and author of the infamous “hockey stick” graph that apparently showed global temperatures reaching “unprecedented” levels, and Phil Jones, director at CRU, which brought into question the validity of the IPCC’s work, with the reported statements “hide the decline,” and “Mike’s Nature Trick.”

In explaining its reason for auditing U.S. funding of the IPCC, the GAO said, “Interest in IPCC’s activities increased after the theft of e-mails among IPCC scientists was made public, and with the discovery of several errors in its 2007 set of reports.”

The IPCC’s Fourth Assessment Report (AR4), released in 2007, included several errors, including claims that the Himalayan glaciers would melt by the year 2035, which the IPCC, in a statement, later admitted was based on inconclusive data.

After facing “key challenges” in determining the amount of funding to the IPCC, the GAO now recommends that U.S. funding be reported annually to Congress with “accurate and consistent information.”

The report said documents on U.S. financing for the IPCC were “not available in budget documents or on the websites of the relevant federal agencies, and the agencies are generally not required to report this information to Congress.”

Conflicting State Department numbers also made it more difficult for the GAO to assemble the data.  The GAO “reviewed documents and interviewed officials from federal agencies and IPCC” to reach its findings.

A 2005 GAO report entitled “Federal Reports on Climate Change Funding Should Be Clearer and More Complete” found that federal funding for climate change was not adequately accountable.  “Congress and the public cannot consistently track federal climate change funding or spending over time,” the report concluded.

The report also found federal funding for global warming had increased by 116 percent between 1993 and 2004, to $5.1 billion.

The $3.1 million annual U.S. funding goes towards the IPCC’s “core activities”: meetings of the governing bodies, co-ordination meetings, support for the developing country co-chairs, the IPCC Web site and Secretariat.  The IPCC assesses scientific information, but does not conduct any research of its own.

According to the U.S. Climate Change Science Program, the United States “has made the world’s largest scientific investment in the areas of climate change and global change research” with a total of nearly $20 billion over the past 13 years.

Time to defund the entire UN and climate science program.. since they claim the science is settled. We are not spending billions trying to confirm gravity. While the world worriies about paying their energy bills and finding jobs, Gore, Pachauri, Hansen, Mann, Trenberth, Gillard, Solomon, Karl, Stern, Huhne, the demonic trio of Holdren, Van Jones and Jackson not to mention the faceless EU bureaucrats in Brussels and their brainless UN counterparts in New York and at the enviro fascist groups with gentle appealing names like Greenpeace, the World Wildlife Fund and the Sierra club are committing global sovereign ecocide at our expense.

If ‘sovereign debt’ is now acceptable as economic jargon popularised by the global financial meltdown, let me have a crack at inventing a new term, ‘sovereign eco-cide” as descriptive of how nations can inflict on themselves economic suicide by means of carbon taxes, emissions trading schemes, cap-and-trade madness , etc, caused by the myth that human and animal emissions of carbon dioxide can cause ‘dangerous global warming’. For what led to this invention, see three links below - Terry Dunleavy, New Zealand Climate Science Coalition.

By Kirk Myers, Examiner

The is the first in a multi-part series of articles exposing the lies and misinformation behind legislation mandating the replacement of incandescent light bulbs with potentially unsafe compact florescent light (CFL) bulbs.

Most consumers by now are aware of a federal law mandating the phased transition from incandescent light bulbs to controversial mercury-activated compact florescent light (CFL) bulbs, starting this year.

According to provisions of legislation passed by congress in 2007, the 100-watt incandescent bulb was to be off the shelves this January, followed by a phase-out of the 75-watt version in January 2013 and the 60- and 40-watt versions in January 2014. But last month congress granted consumers a reprieve by including in its spending bill a measure delaying enforcement of the ban until the end of the 2012. 

Mercury - a deadly neurotoxin

From the time it was first proposed, the ban has run into opposition from consumers who are understandably concerned about outfitting their home light fixtures with bulbs containing, on average, 5 milligrams of mercury, enough to contaminate 6,000 gallons of water. Mercury is one of the most deadly neurotoxins on the planet.

According to Wattsworks.com, “Breaking a single CFL bulb in a room can result in mercury vapor levels 300 times in excess of what the EPA has established as safe for prolonged exposure. Serious health effects are associated with mercury exposure. Unborn and young children, elderly and those with weakened health are particularly vulnerable.”

The EPA continues to downplay safety concerns, but urges consumers to follow these safety precautions if a bulb is broken: 

•Open a window and ventilate the area for 15 minutes

•Avoid vacuuming the area (to prevent the spread of mercury dust)

•Use cardboard, not a broom, to sweep up the remains of the bulb

•While wearing rubber globes use a wet paper towel to wipe the area

•Seal the contents in a jar with a lid or plastic bag for disposal

“If clothing or bedding materials come into direct contact with broken glass or mercury-containing powers from inside the bulb that may stick to the fabric, the clothing or bedding should be thrown away,” the EPA recommends.

The EPA claims the amount of mercury in a single bulb is not enough to create a health hazard. But according to test data released in December 2010 by Germany’s Federal Environment Agency (UBA), mercury levels from broken CFLs were 20 times higher than regulations allow in the surrounding air for up to five hours after breakage.

The American Thinker reports:  “Based on a new method to measure mercury from broken CFLs, the New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection reports that only one-third of the mercury release occurs during the first 8 hours after breakage.  During the following two-week period, 17 percent to 40 percent of the mercury is released into the air.”

In a report last March, Fox News exposed the potentially dangerous health hazards of mercury-laced CFL bulbs:

“Mercury… is a potent, developmental neurotoxin that can damage the brain, liver, kidneys and central nervous system. Infants and young children are particularly vulnerable to mercury’s toxic effects. Even at low levels, mercury is capable of causing a number of health problems including impaired motor functioning, cognitive ability and emotional problems. Higher or prolonged exposure can result in much more serious health problems.”

Mercury Instruments, a Littleton, Colo., firm that specializes in removing mercury contamination, states the following on its Web site:

“If you break a “CFL” Compact Fluorescent light bulb and attempt to clean it up yourself, there is absolutely no way to know that you have removed the mercury unless you screen the area with a mercury vapor monitor . . . Without the proper equipment, equipment you will never be able to locate where the mercury came to rest.”

Concerned about mercury contamination, many environmental agencies have adopted strict regulations for the disposal and recycling of CFLs. In California, Illinois, Michigan, Minnesota, Ohio and Wisconsin, it is illegal to improperly dispose of florescent bulbs in trash or landfills. Consumers face stiff fines if they violate the law.

Investigate Magazine says this about broken CFLs: “The real cost is not one broken light bulb, but how badly affected homes will be after 20 years of amateur attempts to clean up one of the deadliest neurotoxins on the planet.”

Mercury vapors - another health hazard?

Toxic mercury from broken bulbs might not be the only danger posed by CFL lamps. During tests last year at Berlin’s Ala Laboratory, scientists discovered that various carcinogenic chemicals and toxins, including phenol, naphthalene and styrene, are released when CFL are switched on.

Environmental experts in Britain have downplayed the findings, insisting that CFLs are not a danger to the public and that more studies are needed to back up the German research.

But Peter Braun, who carried out the tests at the lab, claims that CFL lamps emit poisonous vapors when turned on and “should not be used in unventilated areas and definitely not in the proximity of the head.”

This report comes on the heals of research by Israel’s Haifa University suggesting that the CFL’s bluer light emissions, which closely mimic daylight, might interfere with the production of the hormone melatonin, contributing to higher rates of breast cancer.

In addition, the Migraine Action Association is warning that CFLs could trigger migraine headaches, “and skin care specialists have claimed that their intense light could exacerbate a range of existing skin problems,” according to a report in London’s Daily Telegraph.

Consumer anger

Many consumers are fuming over what they see as government meddling and are stocking up on incandescent light bulbs before the ban goes into effect. Judging from the pointed buyer comments on Amazon.com, the legislators who voted for the ban might want to update their resumes.

“You can pry my 100 watt incandescent from my cold dead hand (all apologies to Charlton Heston),” says Dukesuxheelrule. “Only a liberal green weenie would replace a perfectly safe tool of illumination with a much more expensive, lower quality, and highly hazardous product.”

Jeddy3 chimes in: “Every time the do-gooder nanny state shoves something down our throat “for our own good,” you can bet it’ll be found later that it wasn’t safer/better after all. If it were better, safer, or more economical, it wouldn’t be necessary to legislate its competition out of business.’

Another incensed buyer bashes the Green movement and defends freedom of choice:

“They [the incandescent bulbs] work well, shine bright, and - best of all - make me feel constantly proud to be screwing the eco-nazis,” said ahtimsa1970. “Screw you, Al Gore! Keep your hands off my thermostat, light bulbs and recycling bins. I worked hard for my money; I’ll spend it however I choose.”

During a recent appearance on Fox News, Marc Marano, the founder of the Web site Climate Depot, described the ban as an assault on consumer choice carried out by global warming alarmists and their allies on Capitol Hill.

“The only reason we’re talking about incandescent bulbs is because of fears of global warming. They’re trying . . . to control every aspect of our lives.”

As one critic quipped, “We know why GE dropped the ‘We bring good things to life’ slogan.”