On the international stage, the move to declare CO2 a pollutant and man its evil cause agent began in the 1970s with the first communist billionaire in the west, Maurice Strong. In 1988, Strong was instrumental in creating the United Nations Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (UN IPCC), an organization that had as its primary purpose proving that “human activities” were increasing CO2 and to plan reparations for poor nations caused by western polluters.

Until 2007, the US resisted the claim that CO2 was a pollutant that could be regulated to adjust the world’s climate. That year, five activist Supreme Court Justices donned white lab coats of climate scientists in Massachusetts v. EPA to hold that the Clean Air Act was written so broadly that it gave the EPA, created simply to clean up pollution, almost unlimited authority to regulate carbon dioxide, an essential, albeit minute, part of our atmosphere.

This judicial overreach mattered because even a super-majority of congressional Democrats had rejected a law that would have authorized the EPA to regulate CO2. Armed with this Supreme Court ruling, Obama’s EPA acted unilaterally in 2009 to declare CO2 a pollutant it could regulate. How’s that for spitting in the face of Art. 1, Section 1 of the Constitution, which holds that the power to legislate is vested solely in Congress?

Today, according to those steeped in the canard of global warming, we sit at the edge of climate catastrophe. The climate is warming at an unprecedented rate. Sea levels will rise to inundate the lands. Floods and hurricanes are increasing in number and severity.

Perhaps worst of all, the evil little troll, Greta Thunberg, is mad at us

That’s the narrative: We are in a climate crisis and humanity itself is in danger. The WEF tells us that the cost of failing to respond to climate change will bankrupt the world. The only solutions are to adopt socialism and transfer the wealth of the US to the UN, where it can be redistributed as a form of green reparations.

Except...all of that is hot garbage.

Climate science is little more than modern Lysenkoism. It has been subject to decades of gatekeeping in universities, grant-making entities, the UN, and science journals, all working together to suppress any challenges to “the anthropogenic climate change consensus.” All too often, “climate modeling has transformed from a scientific tool into a mechanism for manufacturing hysteria.”

The climate models used to forecast doom in the coming decades are a canard. They have uniformly and grossly overstated the actual warming trends.

The temperature records have been reworked repeatedly over the past decades to create a warming trend far in excess of the raw historic data, and which data is, itself, questionable.

Many climate studies rely on questionable peer review as ostensible proof of their reliability rather than reproducing the studies.

Notably, there has been no increase in the number or severity of weather-related disasters for decades. The actual trendline, according to Roger Pielke, Jr., is completely flat.

[T]he completely false notion that global weather and climate disasters have increased and will continue to increase is commonly reported in the legacy media, buoyed by the promotion of false information by organizations that include the United Nations. In 2020 the U.N. claimed falsely of a “staggering rise in climate-related disasters over the last twenty years.”

Yet despite all of the above - much of it known for well over a decade - the climate change juggernaut has ignored it all and rolled on. The twin benefits to those pushing this canard are increased government power and access to almost limitless wealth.

Greenhouse Gas Initiative

The Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI) is a cooperative effort among eleven Eastern states to reduce carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions from power plants within each participating state.Together, the participating states have established a regional cap on CO2 emissions, which sets a limit on the emissions from regulated power plants within the RGGI states.

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When you list the states with the highest electricity prices for the residential sector, the list has the RGGI states and no surprise California.

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The lowest prices were in statesnd that have common sense energy policies.

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The same holds for all energy user sectors - first highest prices and then lowest prices.

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The RGGI Fact sheet tries to sell the benefits to the state and users.

Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative

The Regional Greenhouse Gas Initiative (RGGI) is a cooperative effort among eleven Eastern states to reduce carbon dioxide (CO2) emissions from power plants within each participating state. Together, the participating states have established a regional cap on CO2 emissions, which sets a limit on the emissions from regulated power plants within the RGGI states. Over time, the regional cap declines, so that CO2 emissions decrease in a planned and predictable way.

Since 2005, the RGGI 10 states have reduced annual power sector emissions 50%, which is almost 50% faster than the nation as a whole, and have so far raised over $8.6 billion to invest into local communities. How Does RGGI Work? Within the RGGI states, certain power plants must acquire one RGGI CO2 allowance for every short ton of CO2 they emit. The RGGI states distribute these allowances at quarterly auctions, where they can be purchased by power plants and other entities.

Some states hold a limited number of allowances in set-aside accounts to sell at a fixed price or otherwise distribute outside of the auction process. Once an allowance is distributed, it can be held and traded, which creates a secondary market for allowances.

1. Are Modern ‘Anthropogenic’ Sea Levels Rising At An Unprecedented Rate?  No.

Despite the surge in CO2 concentrations since 1900, the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) has concluded that global sea levels only rose by an average of 1.7 mm/yr during the entire 1901-2010 period, which is a rate of just 0.17 of a meter per century.

During the 1958 to 2014 period, when CO2 emissions rose dramatically, a recent analysis revealed that the rate of sea level rise slowed to between 1.3 mm/yr to 1.5 mm/yr, or just 0.14 of a meter per century.

Frederiske et al.,2018 “Anthropogenic” Global Sea Level Rise Rate (1958-2014): +0.14 of a meter per century

“For the first time, it is shown that for most basins the reconstructed sea level trend and acceleration can be explained by the sum of contributors, as well as a large part of the decadal variability. The global-mean sea level reconstruction shows a trend of 1.5 +/- 0.2 mm yr−1 over 1958-2014, compared to 1.3 +/- 0.1 mm yr-1 for the sum of contributors.”

2. ~15,000 - 11,000 Years Ago, Sea Levels Rose At Rates Of +4 to +6 Meters Per Century

In the past few thousand years, sea levels in some regions rose and fell at rates of + or - 0.5 to 1.1 meters per century. Sea levels during the Medieval Warm Period were+170 centimeters higher than today.

Hansen et al., 2016 Denmark, +1.7 meters higher than present during the Medieval Warm Period

“Continuous record of Holocene sea-level changes ... (4900 years BP to present). ... The curve reveals eight centennial sea-level oscillations of 0.5-1.1 m superimposed on the general trend of the RSL [relative sea level] curve [relative sea levels ~1.7 m higher than present from 1400 to 1000 years ago].”

Cronin et al., 2017 Global Sea Level Rise Rate: +4 meters per century (14,500 to 14,000 years ago)

“Rates and patterns of global sea level rise (SLR) following the last glacial maximum (LGM) are known from radiometric ages on coral reefs from Barbados, Tahiti, New Guinea, and the Indian Ocean, as well as sediment records from the Sunda Shelf and elsewhere. ... Lambeck et al. (2014) estimate mean global rates during the main deglaciation phase of 16.5 to 8.2 kiloannum (ka) [16,500 to 8,200 years ago] at 12 mm yr−1 [+1.2 meters per century] with more rapid SLR [sea level rise] rates (∼ 40 mm yr−1) [+4 meters per century] during meltwater pulse 14.5-14.0 ka [14,500 to 14,000 years ago].”

Abdul et al., 2017 Global Sea Level Rise Rate: +4 meters per century(11,450 to 11,100 years ago)

“We find that sea level tracked the climate oscillations remarkably well. Sea-level rise was fast in the early Allerod (25 mm yr-1), but decreased smoothly into the Younger Dryas (7 mm yr-1) when the rate plateaued to <4 mm yr-1 here termed a sea-level "slow stand". No evidence was found indicating a jump in sea level at the beginning of the Younger Dryas as proposed by some researchers. Following the "slow-stand", the rate of sea-level rise accelerated rapidly, producing the 14 +/- 2 m sea-level jump known as MWP-1B; occurred between 11.45 and 11.1 kyr BP with peak sea-level rise reaching 40 mm yr-1 [+4 meters per century]."

Ivanovic et al., 2017 Northern Hemisphere Sea Level Rise Rate: +3.5 to +6.5 meters per century (~14,500 years ago)

"During the Last Glacial Maximum 26-19 thousand years ago (ka), a vast ice sheet stretched over North America [Clark et al., 2009]. In subsequent millennia, as the climate warmed and this ice sheet decayed, large volumes of meltwater flooded to the oceans [Tarasov and Peltier, 2006; Wickert, 2016]. This period, known as the "last deglaciation," included episodes of abrupt climate change, such as the Bolling warming [~14.7-14.5 ka], when Northern Hemisphere temperatures increased by 4-5C in just a few decades [Lea et al., 2003; Buizert et al., 2014], coinciding with a 12-22 m sea level rise in less than 340 years [3.5 to 6.5 meters per century] (Meltwater Pulse 1a (MWP1a)) [Deschamps et al., 2012]."

Zecchin et al., 2015 Regional Sea Level Rise Rate: +6 meters per century(14,500-11,500 years ago)

"[M]elt-water pulses have punctuated the post-glacial relative sea-level rise with rates up to 60 mm/yr. [6 meters per century] for a few centuries."

3. Over 70 Papers Affirm Sea Levels Were 2+ Meters Higher Than Now A Few Thousand Years Ago When CO2 Levels Were 'Safe'.

70+ Papers: Sea Levels 2+ m Higher 9,000-4,000 Years Ago While CO2 Levels Were 'Safe' (265 ppm) More Here
Before the advent of the industrial revolution in the late 18th to early 19th centuries, carbon dioxide (CO2) concentrations hovered between 260 to 280 parts per million (ppm).

Within the last century, atmospheric CO2 concentrations have risen dramatically. Just recently they eclipsed 400 ppm.

Scientists like Dr. James Hansen have concluded that pre-industrial CO2 levels were climatically ideal. Though less optimal, atmospheric CO2 concentrations up to 350 ppm have been characterized as climatically “safe”.

However, CO2 concentrations above 350 ppm are thought to be dangerous to the Earth system.  It is believed that such “high” concentrations could lead to rapid warming, glacier and ice sheet melt, and a harrowing sea level rise of 10 feet within 50 years.

To reach those catastrophic levels (10 feet within 50 years) predicted by proponents of sea level rise alarmism, the current “anthropogenic” change rate of +0.14 of a centimeter per year (since 1958) will need immediately explode into +6.1 centimeters per year.

The likelihood of this happening is remote, especially considering Greenland and Antarctica combined only contributed a grand total of 1.54 cm since 1958 (Frederiske et al., 2018).

It is becoming more and more apparent that sea levels rise and fall without any obvious connection to CO2 concentrations.

And if an anthropogenic signal cannot be conspicuously connected to sea level rise (as scientists have noted), then the greatest perceived existential threat promulgated by advocates of dangerous man-made global warming will no longer be regarded as even worth considering.

Read more at No Tricks Zone

President Trump has long been a supporter of traditional energy. During his campaign, he spoke negatively about electric vehicles, wind, and other renewable energy sources. But in his first day in office, the new president began a historic shift in US energy policy, away from green energy and back to hydrocarbon energy.

On January 20, 2025, President Trump signed five wide-ranging executive orders that radically change United States energy and climate policy. These actions restore efforts to promote coal, natural gas, oil, hydropower, nuclear, and biofuels, while curtailing support for wind and electric vehicles. The Trump executive orders also rescinded orders issued by President Biden and closed federal departments established to promote climate change policies and green energy.

The executive order regarding “offshore wind” and “wind projects” immediately impacted the world wind industry. The US government owns all land from three miles to 200 miles offshore, so wind companies require a federal lease to build offshore systems. The order withdrew “all areas within the Offshore Continental Shelf” from wind leasing. The order also requires that the new Secretary of the Interior, Doug Burgum, “conduct a comprehensive review” to determine the necessity for “terminating or amending any existing wind energy leases” and to submit a report to the President. The order also put a hold on the Lava Ridge Wind Project in Idaho, pending a review by the Secretary of the Interior, a project which was approved by the Biden Administration in December.

Wind energy markets were shocked by Trump’s order. The stock price of Orsted, a Danish wind system supplier, dropped 17% to its lowest price in seven years. Orsted proposed to build Sunrise Wind, the largest planned US offshore wind system, to be located southeast of New York City. The company immediately took a $1.69 billion impairment charge on US wind projects.

Wind suppliers RWE of Germany, Equinor of Norway, Renovaveis of Portugal, and Vestas of Denmark also suffered stock price declines. Italy’s Prysmian announced that it would abandon a plan to build a plant in the US to make cables for offshore wind systems.

Wind energy plans for several states have been crippled. California planned to install 25 gigawatts of offshore wind energy by 2045, with initial projects at Morro Bay and Humbolt Bay, but these plans are on hold for at least the next four years. Maryland, Massachusetts, New Jersey, New York, North Carolina, South Carolina, Rhode Island, and Virginia are constructing or planning east coast offshore systems, but these programs will be reviewed, limited, or halted if not yet started.

The “Unleashing American Energy (UAE)” executive order calls for elimination of the “electric vehicle (EV) mandate” to promote consumer choice and access to gasoline-powered automobiles. It’s true that we have no formal EV mandate, but 22 states have zero-emissions vehicle laws or executive orders prohibiting sales of gasoline cars by a future date, typically 2035. On March 20 of last year, the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) issued updated emissions standards that would force auto manufacturers to sell an increasing number of EVs, rising from about 8% last year to about 56% of new light vehicle purchases by 2032.

A map of the united states with green and white states

The Trump orders also call for termination of state emissions waivers “that function to limit sales of gasoline powered automobiles.” The 1970 Clean Air Act established the federal government as responsible for regulating pollution, except where a waiver is granted by the EPA to a state.  For years, California has set emissions standards, receiving EPA waivers to do so, with other states following California’s lead. The orders seek to terminate these waivers to California and restore emissions control to the EPA. Earlier this month, California withdrew their request for a waiver for regulations to electrify heavy trucks and locomotives because it appeared that Trump’s EPA would not grant that request.

The order also calls for the “elimination of unfair subsidies and other ill-conceived government-imposed market distortions that favor EVs.” This probably refers to coming efforts to eliminate the $7500 tax credit on new EV sales and also efforts to eliminate the Corporate Average Fuel Economy standards issued by the Department of Transportation, which force auto manufacturers to sell a larger share of EVs.

The US economy today includes several green energy industries which probably would not exist without the vast array of federal and state subsidies and tax credits. Wind, solar, EV charging, carbon dioxide (CO2) capture, and green hydrogen receive a limitless stream of subsidies and tax credits from the Inflation Reduction Act (IRA) and the Infrastructure Investment and Jobs Act (IIJA), both of which were passed during the Biden Presidency. The CATO institute estimates that renewable energy will receive about $80 billion in federal funds during fiscal year 2025.

During his campaign, Mr. Trump vowed to eliminate the money flow from these two acts, and his first-day executive orders reflect this. The UAE order calls for “termination of the Green New Deal,” and a halt to the disbursement of funds from the IRA and IIJA. President Trump will probably need to pass Congressional legislation to permanently reduce the flow of IRA and IIJA funds.

Wind and solar systems are intermittent, use 100 times the land area, and require at least double the transmission infrastructure compared to traditional coal, gas, or nuclear power plants. Few utilities would build wind and solar systems if not for the fear of human-caused global warming. But the new executive orders make it clear that the US will no longer pursue efforts to “mitigate” climate change.

In the executive order titled “Putting America First in International Environmental Agreements,” the President directs the US Ambassador to the United Nations, nominee Elise Stefanik, to notify the UN in writing that the US withdraws from the Paris Climate Agreement, effective immediately. The order also states that the US will immediately cease financial payments under the Framework Convention on Climate Change.

The orders direct executive branch officials to cancel at least five Biden executive orders on climate change, and to disband the Climate Change Support Office, the American Climate Corps, and The Working Group on the Social Cost of Greenhouse Gases. The orders also call for the EPA to review the 2009 Endangerment Finding for “continuing applicability.” That finding concluded that carbon dioxide endangered US citizens and is the basis for regulating CO2 emissions in the US.

The Trump actions also seek to boost the development of hydrocarbon energy in the spirit of “drill, baby, drill.} Key actions include re-opening the licensing of liquified natural gas terminals, opening federal lands for onshore and offshore oil and gas production, reopening Alaska lands for energy production, and reducing efficiency regulations on dishwashers, stoves, and furnaces. The President also declared a national energy emergency to speed the deployment of pipelines and other energy infrastructure. The Trump EPA and Department of Energy will roll back regulations on oil and gas to expand US production.

Trump’s executive order bomb, followed by Congressional action to limit funds from the IRA and IIJA, promises to gut, or profoundly reshape, the US green energy movement. January 2025 may begin a long decline for green energy and a return to sensible energy policy.

Steve Goreham is a speaker on energy, the environment, and public policy and author of the bestselling book Green Breakdown: The Coming Renewable Energy Failure.

As discussed in my previous post, one of President Trump’s first-day Executive Orders - the one entitled “Unleashing American Energy” - directed a reconsideration of EPA’s so-called “Endangerment Finding” (EF) of 2009. The EF is the EPA regulatory action where it claimed to determine that CO2 and other “greenhouse gases” qualify as “pollutants” under the Clean Air Act because they are a “danger to public health and welfare.” President Trump’s January 20 EO directs that EPA, within 30 days, submit “recommendations to the Director of OMB on the legality and continuing applicability of the Administrator’s findings.”

Since the EF is the foundation underlying all the Biden-era regulations restricting and suppressing fossil fuels, you can be sure that any attempt to eliminate it will be met with a full-bore litigation attack from the forces of the crazy left. Can the EF really be rescinded in a way that will stand up to these attacks?

Absolutely, it can. Let me address a few of the issues.

Massachusetts v. EPA

This is the Supreme Court’s 2007 decision that held that EPA was required to make a determination as to the status of CO2 and other greenhouse gases as “pollutants” under the Clean Air Act. Here is a link to the Supreme Court’s opinion. Some commenters have suggested that Mass v. EPA must be reversed before the EF can be undone.

I disagree. I’m not saying that Mass v. EPA is a model of clarity, and there is some language in it that would suggest the opposite. However, I think that the language at the very end of Justice Stevens’s majority opinion is the holding:

We need not and do not reach the question whether on remand EPA must make an endangerment finding, or whether policy concerns can inform EPA’s actions in the event that it makes such a finding...We hold only that EPA must ground its reasons for action or inaction in the statute.

Thus Mass v. EPA did not determine that CO2 was a “pollutant” as defined in Section 202 of the Clean Air Act, but only directed EPA to determine whether it was or was not. Thus a new well-reasoned determination by EPA that CO2 and the other GHGs are not pollutants would not violate that case.

West Virginia v. EPA

The other important Supreme Court decision bearing on the EF is West Virginia v. EPA, the 2022 decision where the Supreme Court held that EPA’s Clean Power Plan was beyond its regulatory authority under the Clean Air Act. The basis for the Court’s decision was what it called the Major Questions Doctrine, by which it held that a “transformative expansion” of EPA’s regulatory power would require a clear direction from Congress, which had not been given.

In 2024, despite West Virginia v. EPA, and without any further clear direction from Congress, EPA went ahead and finalized two gigantic new regulations to restrict use of fossil fuels, one regarding power plants and the other regarding automobiles. They essentially decided to dare the Supreme Court to try to stop them (much like Biden with his repeated efforts to forgive student loans).

West Virginia v. EPA did not explicitly overrule Massachusetts v. EPA, but the two are fundamentally in tension. The big difference is that the Court that decided Massachusetts v. EPA has since been largely transformed in personnel. Of the nine justices on the Court in 2007, only three remain - Roberts, Thomas and Alito - and all of them dissented in Mass v. EPA. The five justices in the majority plus Scalia have been replaced by three conservatives (Gorsuch, Kavanaugh and Barrett) and three liberals.

On today’s Court, I think it highly likely that a majority will uphold a well-reasoned rescission of the EF, and will not think it necessary to overrule Mass v. EPA.

Substance of the rescinding determination

Three main points need to be made in an EPA regulatory action rescinding the EF: (1) Empirical evidence accumulated since the original EF invalidates the finding and makes it impossible to conclude that CO2 and other GHGs constitute a “danger” as required by the statute; (2) due to huge increases since 2009 in CO2 and other GHG emissions outside the U.S. and thus outside the ability of EPA to regulate, no regulations promulgated by EPA could have any meaningful impact on the overall atmospheric concentrations of the gases, and (3) efforts by EPA to control the climate by restricting CO2 and other GHGs, by contrast, would almost certainly have drastic adverse effects on public health and welfare by, for example, destabilizing the electrical grid and causing blackouts, driving up the cost of electricity or mobility, bringing about massive battery fires and explosions, and lots of other such things.

Only the first of these three points deals with the “science” of whether GHGs do or do not cause any significant global warming. Most important is that this argument needs to be written carefully to not take on more than needs to be taken on. To rescind the EF, EPA does not need to contend that GHGs will not or cannot cause any global warming. Rather, they can put the burden of proof on the other side to show that GHGs emitted under EPA’s regulatory jurisdiction will inevitably cause dangerous warming. EPA need only conclude that there is no sufficient proof of that.

Framed in that way, this is not a complicated or difficult task. There are hundreds of scientific papers in the peer reviewed literature since 2009 accumulating empirical evidence that the dangers predicted 15 years ago have not happened. For example:

There have been no upward trends in hurricanes, droughts, floods, tornadoes, wild fires, or other dangerous weather events.
Sea level has not risen beyond the slow rate of rise over the prior century.
Sea ice has not declined as predicted. The Greenland and Antarctic ice sheets have not meaningfully changed.
EPA can just create lists of dozens or hundreds of such scientific papers, and perhaps add a quote of a line or two from the abstract for each.

Points (2) and (3) are actually more important to the rescission than the point about the science of atmospheric warming. Trying to replace the fossil fuel energy system with something untried and untested actually does pose many real and immediate dangers - far more real, immediate, and dangerous than anything that might result from a hypothetical warming of a degree or two a hundred years from now. California is only up to about 30-40% of its electricity from wind and solar, and yet has suffered multiple instances of rolling blackouts. The extent of these blackouts has been relatively small only because California has the ability to import fossil-fuel- become lengthy and catastrophic. Similarly, batteries are proposed as the backup for intermittency of wind and solar generation. California and New York have both begun building massive battery farms to serve this role, although neither state has yet reached nearly 1% of the battery capacity they would need to back up a predominantly wind/solar generation system. But even with that small amount of batteries, both have suffered massive and explosive fires at their battery facilities. California had such a fire just last week at the facility known as Moss Landing in Monterey County. This was the fourth large fire at the Moss Landing facility over the past few years.

I actually have a high degree of confidence that a reconsideration of the EF will be successful. Likely, that will sweep away all of the restrictions on fossil fuels that have been put in place via regulation during the Biden years. One more thing: Once CO2 and GHGs are declared to no longer by “pollutants,” all of the billions of dollars of government grants under the Inflation Reduction Act to “reduce GHG pollution” can be suspended and never spent.

Atmospheric carbon dioxide: you can’t see, hear, smell or taste it. But it’s there - all around us - and it’s crucial for life. Composed of one carbon and two oxygen atoms, this simple molecule serves as the primary raw material out of which plants construct their tissues, which in turn provide the materials out of which animals construct theirs. Knowledge of the key life giving and life sustaining role played by carbon dioxide, or CO2, is so well established, in fact, that humans - and all the rest of the biosphere - are described in the most basic of terms as carbon-based lifeforms.

We simply could not and would not exist without it. Ironically, far too many demonize and falsely label this important atmospheric trace gas a pollutant. Nothing could be further from the truth. Instead of being shunned like the plague, the ongoing rise in CO2 should be welcomed with open arms. Why? Because plants love CO2. Far from being a pollutant, this colorless, odorless, tasteless and invisible gas is better than the best fertilizer ever invented. Essentially, it is the “food” that sustains all plants on the face of the earth. And the more of it they “eat” (or take in from the air), the bigger and better they grow.

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Conversations That Matter
Dr. Patrick Moore takes issue with NGOs over climate, genetically modified organisms and the “truth” about carbon

He says we were literally running out of carbon before we started to pump it back into the atmosphere. “CO2 has been declining to where it is getting close to the end of plant life, and in another 1.8 million years, life would begin to die on planet Earth for lack of CO2.”

According to Moore, it is life itself that has been consuming carbon and storing it in carbonaceous rocks. He goes on to say, “Billions of tons of carbonaceous rock represent carbon dioxide pulled out of the atmosphere, and because the Earth has cooled over the millennia, nature is no longer putting CO2 into the atmosphere to offset this.”

Please become a Patreon subscriber and support the production of this program, with a $1 pledge.

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Dr. John Robson

Wednesday posts Climate Discussion Nexus and videos are must watch. Here was the discussion today.

And like clockwork
29 Jan 2025 | News Roundup

No sooner had fires erupted around Los Angeles than the vultures swooped hissing that it was climate change. Why, you might even get told “Human use of fire has produced an era of uncontrolled burning: Welcome to the Pyrocene”. And when it snowed in Florida, well, the Climate Adaptation Center went ‘How climate warming contributed to record snow in Florida’, to which Roger Pielke Jr. replied, “like clockwork”. And of course should it snow in LA, burn in Pensacola, flood in Kapuskasing or go dry in Managua, the little cuckoo will pop out and go “climate change” over and over as it always does.

The ravages of global heating in Pensacola, Florida Jan. 22, 2025 (courtesy of an alert reader who lives there)
One California news outlet admitted that “The snow comes during an exceptionally cold pattern for the south.” But then it insisted that:

“According to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, Earth’s global average temperature has been rising since about 1850. Human activity including the burning of fossil fuels is accelerating the pace of that warming beyond what would occur naturally… NOAA analyses show that ocean surface temperatures are rising faster than air temperatures. Warmer oceans can drive more intense evaporation and send more water vapor into the air for developing storms. More water vapor typically means heavy rain and snow rates.”

OK. So more snow despite that stuff about the end of winter. Got it. But in Florida?

Oh yes. You see:

“Of all regions on Earth’s surface, the Arctic is warming the fastest. This warming creates imbalances in the polar vortex, an area of powerful winds near the Arctic Circle.”

Oooh imbalances. It never used to happen, which we know because we don’t. But it must be so:

“When the polar vortex weakens, lobes of bitter, cold air can drop south and bring prolonged cold spells to the United States and other countries at the middle latitudes. This phenomenon led to the intense cold in the Eastern U.S. this week.”

No hesitation about causation. And then a fearless prediction that weather may happen:

“As climate change continues, snowstorms are still going to be part of the weather we experience. Shifts in moisture and temperature patterns will change where we see that snow and how much. Some regions could see significantly less snow in the long run as warming air favors more rain than snow. This is a concern for California, which relies on Sierra snowmelt as part of the state’s water supply. Changes in storm track patterns could also lead to relatively infrequent but unusually big snow events like what fell this week in the southern Gulf states.”

Could. Might. Unless it doesn’t.

Bloomberg wrote that:

“The region’s worst snowstorm in 130 years has seen as much as 10 inches pile up in New Orleans, according to public reports, smashing a record of 2.7 inches set in 1963. Temperatures fell to 26F (minus 3C) overnight. Similar accumulations of snow were recorded in Pensacola, Florida, and more than four inches hit the Houston area.”

And normally when you get a once-in-a-century event the media tell you it’s definitely proof that climate change has made it more frequent even with no data to support the claim. But in this case, crickets. Or not even those, given the temperature.

In fact often-loose talk of smashing records is appropriate here. As an AP story in the Winnipeg Free Press observed:

“Milton is just northeast of Pensacola, where 8.9 inches (22.6 centimeters) shattered the city’s previous all-time snow record of 3 inches (7.6 centimeters) set in 1895.”

As in nearly three times as much fell. So tell us the one about the end of winter again?

Trends in landfalling Atlantic/western Pacific hurricanes have been stable or decreasing since 1950.

There is also no global trend in overall hurricane frequency since reliable records began in the 1970s.

The apparent increase in the number of hurricanes since the 19th century has been due to changes in observation practices over the years, rather than an actual increase.

Data show no long-term trends in US landfalling hurricanes since the mid-19th century, when systematic records began, either in terms of frequency or intensity.
Similarly, after allowing for the fact that many storms were not spotted prior to the satellite era, there are no such trends in Atlantic hurricanes either.

There is growing evidence that wind speeds of the most powerful hurricanes may now be overestimated in comparison to pre-satellite era ones, because of changing methods of measurement.

The increase in Atlantic hurricanes in the last fifty years is not part of a long-term trend, but is linked to a recovery from a deep minimum in hurricane activity in the 1970s, associated with the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation.

The author, climate researcher Paul Homewood, said:

“The observational findings of meteorological agencies in 2024 once again confound those who claim to see a ‘climate crisis’ in the hurricane data. It is clear that we have not seen an increase in hurricane frequency, even though the public have been scared into thinking that tropical storms are getting worse.”

GWPF Director, Dr Benny Peiser, said:

“The gap between media hype, popular perceptions and the reality of empirical data is becoming ever more evident. This report sets out the facts and is a welcome corrective to misleading news coverage of hurricanes.”

Read the full paper here: The 2024 Hurricane Season (pdf)

See the before and after images of the data here. Yes there is man made global warming but the men are at NOAA.

See animating before and after images at Tony Heller’s site here.

Published at theartofweather.net

Wednesday June 7th, 2023

There’s just too much going on not to talk about it. To quote Jack Klompus from Seinfeld “I’m sorry. I’m sitting here, the whole meeting, holding my tongue. I’ve known you a long time Morty, but I cannot hold it in any longer.”

I’m referring to the current situation of the Canadian wildfires and the resulting and persistent smoke issues down here in the United States. Under normal conditions a large very slow-moving storm rotating counterclockwise in the Canadian Maritimes would be circulating cool, dry, clean Canadian air into the New England. There is such a storm present in that location now. But with all these fires in Quebec Province the storm that is situated in the Maritimes is doing the opposite! The smoke from the fires is whirling around the storm and blowing into portions of New England.

Of course, predicably the media outlets are blaming climate change for the fires. But wildfires have always been part of nature’s balance between too much forest and too little. The “culling of the herd”, in this case old or weak trees, has historically been in part accomplished with what are called wildfires.

One of the most spectacular examples of this phenomena occurred on May 19th, 1780 during the revolutionary war. General George Washington noted in his diary that on that day darkness enveloped the sky. It was so dark during the morning that candles were lit to see their way about. People left their jobs and school children were sent home. Some prayed while others cried or went to taverns. Washington noted that the darkness varied and that the sun came out in the afternoon perhaps indicating that it was entirely hidden by the smoke in the morning.

Research indicates that the fires that caused the darkness were in the Algonquin Highlands of Ontario Canada. The meteorological conditions that brought the dense cloud of smoke to the region in 1780 is unknown but likely similar to what is happening now.

Today there are wildfires around the world every day just as there have been for millions of years. But today we have a new culprit of combustion that is not related to the doings of nature. I’m speaking of eco-terrorists. Nobody in the media seems to want to even suggest the idea that at least some of the current wildfires are the result of eco-terrorists. It’s not a far-fetched idea based on what’s been gong on around the world these days.

For instance, there’s the group “Just stop Oil” that’s made news with their adolescent, attention grabbing stunts of despoiling priceless works of art around the world. The group known as “Extinction Rebellion” and their antics such as holding protests in roadways to block traffic to call attention to their believe that climate change is going to end the world as we know it.

Another ultra-fringe climate change gang of bizarre individuals that calls themselves “Tyre Extinguishers” has claimed responsibility for deflating 100 sport utility vehicles in Copenhagen yesterday. They claim they are “defending themselves from climate change, air pollution and unsafe drivers. Gee, I guess climate change is so bad now that it causes unsafe drivers! They claim to have destroyed tires of people that own SUV’s in multiple countries. People have tried to reason with them but the negotiations fell flat!

The people that populate these extremist groups are, in my opinion hopeless malcontents. If it wasn’t climate change that they are fighting to stop, they would find some other cause to bring about their delusional mayhem.

Then we have the case of Audrey Elaine Dunham of Glendon Alberta. In court on February 15th, 2022 she was convicted on four counts of mischief against property in connection with multiple arson fires in the Bonnyville area of Alberta Canada. She actually admitted to setting 32 fires at the hearing! Apparently she was quite proud of her destruction. She was sentenced to 9 months in jail but amazingly she served no jail time.

Can I prove that at least some of these current fires have been deliberately set by eco-terrorists? No, not until someone claims responsibility or is arrested but it seems plausible to me.

Why would someone want to destroy forests that they claim they are trying to save? At least part of the answer is that by starting the fires and then blaming the cause on climate change they get the news coverage they couldn’t get any other way. The news media actually does the work for them since they are obsessed with climate change causing everything! Today every natural disaster they report about is now the result of climate change.

As a side note I saw yet another of the seemingly endless stories about sea ice loss in the Arctic. This story from the thedailybeast.com reports that another computer model study forecasts that after the year 2030 there will be no sea ice in the Arctic Ocean by the end of the summer.

Of course, one has to only go back to 2007 when there were similar predictions warning that by 2022 summer sea ice would be long gone from the Arctic. Another in the long line of climate change forecasts fails. Actually, sea ice data from the Danish Meteorological Institute reveals that as of today the amount of Arctic sea ice is within 75 percent of the 1981 to 2010 average for this time of year. Where are you going to see that in the news? Nowhere!

The official site for annual CO2 is Mauna Loa. The station at 11,300 feet high (3,444 meters), has a 131-foot (40-meter) tower that collects air to measure levels of carbon dioxide.

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In 1958, Charles Keeling choose to install an atmospheric carbon dioxide monitoring system on Mauna Loa, a volcanic peak on the Big Island of Hawaii as the remote location would allow only carbon dioxide that had mixed with the atmosphere to be measured.

The latest annual numbers are around 420 which averages 0.04% of the air. Levels are lowest during July as vegetation is using it in photosynthesis and releasing O2.

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It varies greatly where we actually live because when we breathe in the air with just 0.04% (420) ppm CO2), when we breathe out, we release 42,000 ppm. CO2 levels are much higher in populated areas and especially when people congregate (churches, schools, restaurants. even you home when the family and pets are there).

ITS NOT POLLUTION

HOME AND OFFICE AND SCHOOLS

Levels exceeding 2000 ppm are found in small offices and Ken. C., a science teacher writes, “In one classroom of 30 students after lunch reached CO2 levels of 4,825 ppm with the door closed. According to ASHRAE, the effects of poor indoor air quality in classrooms has been known for years. Chronic illnesses, reduced cognitive abilities, sleepiness, and increased absenteeism have all been attributed to poor IAQ. There is no direct harm from CO2, the claim is that it reduces oxygen levels.

CARS, TRAINS AND PLANES AND SUBMARINES

Studies found carbon dioxide levels rise to over 3,000 ppm in 30 minutes in an enclosed automobile with a single passenger.  In airplane cabins it may rise to 1700 ppm. The alarmists are more interested in the emission from the planes into the atmosphere and want those that fly (and drive or ride the rails) to be held accountable (see the proposed 50 tonnes CO2 per person as a lifetime limit here).

In submarines, levels range up to 11,300 ppm .

EDUCATING THE POPULACE

I have always considered myself an environmentalist and conservationist as well as a Meteorologist and Climatologist. I worked on my doctorate with an atmospheric chemistry grant.

In the post WWII boom, we had problems with air pollution from factories, coal plants, cars, inefficient home heating systems and incinerators in apartments. We had serious air quality issues with pollutants. We had problems with particulates, sulfur dioxide, carbon monoxide, nitrogen oxides, ozone and lead. The worst episodes that really drove efforts to fight pollution were from a atmospheric chemical reactions - cold season water droplets in fog mixed with SO2 to cause sulfuric acid mist. Smog events in Donora PA 1948 led to 6,000 of the 14,000 population to experienced damaged lungs, and the Great London 4 day 1952 Smog Event produced between 10-12,000 deaths.

Events like that still occur in China.

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We set standards that had to be met by industry and automakers. After my BS and MS work at Wisconsin in Meteorology, I received a grant to study Air Resources/Pollution at NYU while I worked 7 days a week producing the weather fro WCBS TV and radio and the National Network on the Special series on Energy. Many of my colleagues took jobs dealing with air quality at the EPA and elsewhere, After the work we all did there and at many schools on pollution, we have the cleanest air in my lifetime and here in the U.S. in the world today.

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CO2 IS THE GAS OF LIFE

Notice CO2 was not on the list. CO2 is a trace gas (.04% of our atmosphere). It is NOT a pollutant but a beneficial gas. CO2 is essential for photosynthesis. CO2 enriched plants are more vigorous and have lower water needs, are more drought resistant. Ideal CO2 levels for crops would be 3 to 4 times higher. They pump CO2 into greenhouses!

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The climate models used to predict the impacts of increasing CO2 deliver warming over 2 times that observed by our NOAA orbiting satellite measurements of the air above the boundary layer where the greatest changes occur diurnally.

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The apparent weak correlation to temperatures may be mostly the timing of the natural cycles. Longer term warming correlates with CO2 increases only 40% of the time.

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Sadly there have been changes that minimized the warm period from the 1920s to 1940s to try to make the case stronger.

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CONCLUSION: CO2 IS NOT POLLUTION BUT A VALUABLE PART OF LIFE ON OUR PLANET

I have 2 CO2 monitors - I bought one - actually using Amazon credits and it arrived the next morning. One high quality model was donated to me to use by the CO2 coalition.  I found with my daughter and 2 small dogs in the room, levels rise to over 800. At a football gathering of 8, it rose from 420 to near 1700 ppm. Had our team been doing better, we may have had a gathering with twice a many people and CO2 levels would have been well over 2000. I used and talked about our findings at a church organized meeting.

Many people confuse/conflate CO2 with the potentially deadly CO. That included a decade ago the chair of NH Science and Energy committee when I was one of the testifiers. She said she was taught CO2 was a health hazard (confusing with CO).

I found the story can influence people with open minds. If the CO2 is seen to be locally much higher where people congregate, I am a bit afraid the radical movement and would take that fact on as another cause and try to enforce extreme measures (limiting driving, flying, congregating in large events), to pretend it will keep levels low and it becomes another costly program with much more harm than benefit as their assault on fossil fuel energy usage and the whole COVID episode has been the last 4 years.

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From the CO2 Coalition

According to Patrick Moore, chairman and chief scientist of Ecosense Environmental and co-founder of Greenpeace, the climate change messaging isn’t based in fact.

“The whole thing is a total scam,” said Mr. Moore. “There is actually no scientific evidence that CO2 is responsible for climate change over the eons.”

Mr. Moore said that over the past few decades, the climate message has continually changed; first, it was global cooling, then global warming, then climate change, and now it’s disastrous weather.

This is from Epoch Times and pay walled. Here is a pdf of the article.

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I over the years gave many talks on climate - see a recent 50 minute story on local cable.

Climate Story

Here is a much needed compilation from highest level scientists willing to tell the real story. New documentary, “Climate: The Movie” (2024), features Dr. Willie Soon from CERES.

A new documentary on climate change by Martin Durkin, “Climate: The Movie”, was posted online today (March 21st, 2024). The film presents a different perspective on climate change from the standard narratives promoted by the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC).

Dr. Willie Soon, CERES co-team leader, was interviewed for this documentary, along with many other scientists and commentators. The 19th century philosopher, John Stuart Mill, noted in 1859 that “he who knows only his own side of the case knows little of that”. This documentary presents a different “side of the case” on climate change, and we think it is definitely worth watching and sharing with anybody who wants to hear different perspectives.

See and share this documentary below.

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Three projects I have worked on for the last 2 years have been completed. Together with my regular daily reports on Weatherbell with Joe Bastardi and other superstars, it limited my time on Icecap. I also struggled with the loss of my dear wife Emily, my lifelong companion. I will return to more regular posting and updating the important Alarmist Claim rebuttal work. I appreciate your donations to support the site.  SInce our inception, we have had an amazing 271,599,998 views. Thank you!

The election of former President Donald Trump a few days before the Conference of the Parties, known as COP29, began had a profound impact on zapping any potential success from the summit. The Times of London wrote that the “wind was taken out of [COP29’s] sails before it even started with the election of climate-skeptic Donald Trump in the U.S.”

The disillusionment of COP29’s attendees was palpable. No major Western leaders bothered to show up in Baku except the U.K.[s newly minted prime minister, Keir Starmer.

‘Total waste of time’

The supposedly sinking Pacific island nations could not even muster up enthusiasm for COP29 as the nation of Papua New Guinea boycotted the confab, declaring it a “total waste of time.”

France boycotted attending COP29. Politico reported, {The French climate minister’s withdrawal means Paris will not send any high-level political representative to Baku, as French President Emmanuel Macron will also skip the event.” Oui oui!

Oil is a ‘gift of God’

It gets better. In what can be described only as the “Trump effect,” Argentina withdrew its negotiators from the summit after President Javier Milei held talks with Mr. Trump; Argentina’s entire team was ordered home.

“We have instructions from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs to no longer participate,” Argentina’s top environmental official told The Guardian.

There’s more.

The opening day of the U.N. climate summit featured Ilham Aliyev, Azerbaijan’s president, declaring oil a “gift of God” and said people need oil. As you can imagine, Mr. Aliyev’s invoking God to defend the use of oil enraged and demoralized the attendees of COP29.

The BBC reported on the oily mess, noting in a headline: “UN climate talks ‘no longer fit for purpose’ say key experts.”

U.N. officials turn on - the U.N.

The COP process needs “an urgent overhaul,” according to an open letter by the former U.N. secretary-general, the former U.N. climate chief and other U.N. supporters, the BBC reported. The erstwhile U.N. officials demanded that {countries should not host the talks if they don’t support the phase-out of fossil energy.”

Former Vice President Al Gore agreed, saying: “I think that there should be a test for who is qualified to be a delegate to these COPs. Are they coming to try to find a solution or are they coming in order to block a solution?”

In other words, censor and ban any nation from the U.N. climate process that dissents in any way from the U.N. agenda. They appear to want to run the U.N. climate summits like a “woke” social media platform.

‘Worst U.N. climate summit’ ever!

COP29 was initially billed as the COP finance summit. The original $100 billion-a-year climate slush fund was pledged to increase to $300 billion a year. But no one seemed happy about these “pledges.”

The Times of London reported on the utter failure of the summit. “Cop29 was described by veteran negotiators as the worst UN climate summit they had experienced.”

And here[s one more scoop from CNN: “COP29 was described by climate activists as ‘an insult, a joke and a betrayal… A conference of chaos.”

A fake dead whale

One final bizarre note: COP29 featured a dead fake whale made of what appeared to be petroleum-based products on display in downtown Baku. The fake whale carcass had a backdrop of COP29’s neon messaging on a building, complete with a windmill. Just to be clear, the climate activists who sponsored this fake dead whale stunt believed that climate change is a threat to whales - and windmills will somehow save the whales.
No irony is lost in the fact that since the rapid ascent of offshore wind, deaths of actual whales have skyrocketed.

As with every U.N. climate summit, many studies are timed to be released in the weeks and days before the conference to maximize the alleged importance of the U.N.’s mission. This year’s round of studies was quite humorous. A study in the journal Lancet claimed that “Climate change is causing sleep loss.”

Not to be outdone, a study published in the peer-reviewed journal Environment, Development and Sustainability actually claimed that ‘climate change is encouraging unsanitary toilet practices among vulnerable communities.” How? “"Climate change makes toilets more likely to break, which leaves people more likely to ‘go’ outside.’”

Remember: Don’t ever question “the science”!
Meat tax for thee

The conference featured prominent speeches calling for meat rationing and a global “meat tax” to limit “cow emissions.” Willem Branten of the group True Animal Protein Price Coalition called for meat taxes :so that we can pay for the damages done by our past consumption of meat and animal proteins.”

The U.N. was full of meat hypocrisy as delegates chowed down on beef, chicken and hot dogs at the restaurants and food courts of COP29.

As Mr. Trump prepares to return to the White House, we must remember: The failure of a U.N. climate summit is great news for humanity!

* Marc Morano manages the award-winning ClimateDepot.com news and information service. He served as a reporter for Rush Limbaugh’s television show and as a senior adviser to Sen. James Inhofe.

1. Off-scale warming

Since the planet has been warming for 200 years, and our global records are even more recent, every few years a new warmest year in history is recorded. Despite all the publicity given each time it happens, it would really be news if it didn’t happen, as it did between 1998 and 2014, a period popularly known as the pause.

Figure 1. Berkeley Earth temperature anomaly

Since 1980, 13 years have broken the temperature record. So, what is so special about the 2023 record and the expected 2024 record? For starters, 2023 broke the record by the largest margin in records, 0.17C. This may not sound like much, but if all records were by this margin, we would go from +1.5C to +2C in just 10 years, and reach +3C 20 years later.

Figure 2. Berkeley Earth 2023 temperature anomaly

Moreover, to produce so much warming, almost the entire globe experienced above-average warming. 2023 was a year of real global warming, although most of the warming occurred in the Northern Hemisphere.

As a result, one of the major databases, Berkeley Earth, has exceeded the +1.5C limit for a full year for the first time, and 2024 promises another temperature record. Crossing the dangerous warming threshold so early has caused some confusion, exacerbated by the fact that not much difference seems to be noticeable. Even Arctic ice remains above the average of the last decade. And if we’ve already crossed the line and the climate is beyond repair, what’s the point of trying?

Figure 3. Global temperature calculation by Copernicus system.

But the authorities have been quick to point out that even if we are above +1.5C in 2023 or 2024, we will not have crossed the threshold. There is a catch. The global temperature is not the temperature of one month or one year, but the temperature of the linear trend of the last 30 years, which according to the European Copernicus system is +1.28C and is expected to exceed +1.5C in 10 years. Link

2. Uncharted territory

In June 2023, the North Atlantic experienced a heat wave unprecedented in 40 years, with temperatures 5C warmer than usual. Carlo Buontempo, the director of Copernicus, said the world was “entering uncharted territory. We have never seen anything like this in our life”. To understand what has puzzled scientists so much, it is necessary to look at the evolution of the temperature of the Earth’s oceans throughout the year since 1979.

Figure 4. 60N-60S global ocean surface temperature by year since 1979.

On average, the Earth’s oceans are warmest in February-March and coldest in October-November, with an intermediate maximum in August. This is an annual cycle caused by the tilt of the Earth’s axis, the arrangement of the continents, and seasonal changes in atmospheric circulation and albedo. A cycle that has never been broken as long as measurements have been kept until 2023. This year shows an accentuated warming since January, leading to daily temperature records since the beginning of April. But what is absolutely astonishing is that the ocean continued to warm in June and July and reached an annual maximum in August, something that has never happened before. And the warming through August is staggering, about 0.33C above the 2016 record, which is huge for the ocean. After that, the annual cycle begins to behave normally, but at a much higher temperature, which is slowly falling. In June 2024, after 415 days of record temperatures, the ocean is still about 0.2C warmer than it should be.

Buontempo means good weather in English, and his phrase “we have entered uncharted territory” has become very popular. However, it assumes that we have reached and will remain in this situation, whereas the data suggest that this is a one-off anomaly with diminishing effects. For now, it tells us that nothing dramatic is happening as we approach the politically established warming threshold.

Gavin Schmidt, director of NASA’s climate monitoring institute, also uses the expression “uncharted territory” when he explains that the 2023 anomaly worries scientists, saying that climate models cannot explain why the planet’s temperature suddenly spiked in 2023. Not only was the temperature anomaly much larger than expected, but it occurred months before the onset of El Nino. In his own words: “The 2023 temperature anomaly has come out of the blue, revealing an unprecedented knowledge gap perhaps for the first time since about 40 years ago. It could imply that a warming planet is already fundamentally altering how the climate system operates, much sooner than scientists had anticipated.:[iii] According to Gavin, we could have broken the climate and the models would no longer work.

Instead of abandoning science for wild speculation let’s examine the possible factors responsible for the abrupt warming that Gavin Schmidt dismisses by saying they could explain at most a few hundredths of a degree, for which he has little evidence.

3. The little boy is innocent

El Nino is unlikely to be responsible for the simple reason that such abrupt global warming is unprecedented in our records, and El Nino has many precedents. In addition, El Nino warms a specific region of the equatorial Pacific and primarily affects the Pacific, while the :2023 event” warmed parts of the North Atlantic to an extraordinary degree. This does not prevent scientists like Jan Esper and Ulf Buntgen from saying that 2023 is consistent with a greenhouse gas-induced warming trend amplified by an El Nino.[iv] They clearly did not examine the data before writing this, nor did the reviewers of their Nature paper.

The relationship between the temperature of the equatorial Pacific and that of the global ocean during an El Nino is shown in the figure below.

Figure 5. Nino 3.4 temperature anomaly (red) and detrended satellite global ocean temperature anomaly (black).

The temperature anomaly in the Pacific Nino 3.4 region shows the very strong Ninos of 1983, 1998, and 2016, and the strong Ninos of 1988, 1992, 2009, and 2024. The years correspond to the month of January during the event. When the satellite global ocean temperature anomaly is plotted without its long-term trend, we observe a very close correspondence. The long-term trend responds to other causes, but the temperature variations correspond to the export of heat from the equatorial Pacific to the rest of the globe.

We also observe two things. The first is that the correspondence fails in two periods, in 1992 as a result of the Pinatubo eruption a year earlier, and in 2024. The second observation is that in all strong or very strong Ninos, the source of the heat, the equatorial Pacific, warms earlier and warms more or as much in relative terms as the global ocean warms later. This does not happen in the 2024 El Nino. The warming is simultaneous and greater than it should be outside the equatorial Pacific.

The Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO) is often described as a long-lived pattern of climate variability similar to El Nino in the North Pacific. And this is evident when we compare the two after removing a long-term trend that the PDO should not have. The agreement is very strong, and again we see a significant anomaly in 1991 due to the Pinatubo eruption. But even more important is the anomaly in 2023-24, when the PDO shows extraordinarily small changes and remains negative when it should be positive.

Figure 8. During the 2023 event the North Pacific stayed in negative PDO conditions, while the equatorial Pacific displayed El Nino conditions.

To understand this response, one must consider that the warm phase of the PDO requires the Northwest Pacific to be cold, but as we have shown above, the Northwest Pacific was very warm in 2023, causing the PDO to remain in a cold phase. A negative phase of the PDO during El Nino is unprecedented and categorically rules out El Nino as the cause of the abrupt warming that has puzzled scientists. In fact, it is possible that the ocean warming that began in March 2023 was the cause of the 2024 El Nino by weakening the trade winds in the equatorial Pacific.

I’d like to thank Charles May for bringing this data to my attention and for doing such an excellent job analyzing it each month.

4. Sulfate aerosols are not responsible

Another possibility that is under consideration is the reduction of sulfate aerosols as a result of the change in marine fuel regulations in 2020.

Figure 9. Global sulfur emissions for the past 64 years

The reduction in sulfur emissions since the late 1970s is considered a significant warming factor by reducing emissions of shortwave radiation reflected from the atmosphere. However, the reduction in sulfur dioxide emissions from marine fuels since 2020 is estimated at 14% of total emissions.

Figure 10. Model-calculated global temperature effect of an 80% reduction (red curve) in marine fuel sulfur content from pre-2020 situation (blue curve), and decadal mean difference (green bars).

A recent study, still under peer review, used a climate model to calculate that sulfur emission reductions from 2020 could cause global warming of 0.02C in the first decade.[v] Since the warming in 2023 was 10 times greater, it is difficult to believe that emissions reductions since 2020 could have been a major factor in the abrupt warming in 2023.

In the figure, the blue curve is the global warming predicted with the previously used marine fuel, and the red curve is the one predicted with the fuel with 80% less sulfur. The difference between the two curves for the decade 2020-30 is the green bar of 0.02C.

5. CO₂ increase didn’t do it

The amount of CO₂ in the atmosphere has increased slightly by about 2.5 parts per million in 2023.

Figure 11. Monthly (red) and 12-month (black) CO₂ levels at Mauna Loa.

The increase from 418.5 to 421 ppm represents an increase of 0.6% and is similar to the increase that has occurred each year for the past several decades. Nothing in our knowledge of the effect of CO₂ increases on climate suggests that such a small increase could have led to such a large and abrupt warming. There is no study to suggest that the gradual increase in CO₂ could lead to a sudden increase in climate variability. Therefore, all model predictions are long-term and affect the statistics of weather phenomena. The proof is that scientists and models cannot explain what happened in 2023.

6. Tonga volcano prime suspect

Just over a year before the abrupt warming, in January 2022, an extremely unusual volcanic eruption took place in Tonga. How unusual? It was an eruption of VEI 5 explosivity, capable of reaching the stratosphere, which occurs on average every 10 years.

Figure 12. Time and cone elevation of VEI ≥5 volcanic eruptions of the past 200 years, their distribution by altitude (yellow bars), and the suggested depth for a submarine eruption capable of projecting a large amount of water to the stratosphere (red line).

There have been a number of eruptions with VEI 5 or higher in the last 200 years, although not all of them have affected the global climate. This figure shows with dots the date they occurred and the elevation at which the volcanic cone was located. The yellow bars show the distribution of eruptions in 500 m elevation bins. The Tonga eruption was a submarine explosion at very shallow depths, about 150 m below the sea surface. It ejected 150 million tons of water into the stratosphere.

In our 200 years of records there is only one other submarine eruption with VEI 5, which occurred in 1924 off the Japanese island of Iriomote at a depth of 200 m and did not affect the atmosphere. Only surface effects were observed. NASA scientists believe that the Tonga explosion occurred at the right depth to project a lot of water into the stratosphere.[vi] This depth is indicated by the red line. So, the Tonga eruption is a once in 200-year event, probably less than once in a millennium. Science was very lucky. We are not so lucky.

We know that strong volcanic eruptions, capable of reaching the stratosphere, can have a very strong effect on the climate for a few years, and that this effect can be delayed by more than a year. The eruption of Mount Tambora in April 1815 had a global effect on the climate, but it took 15 months for the effect to develop, during the year without a summer of 1816. These delayed effects coincided with the appearance of a veil of sulfate aerosols in the Northern Hemisphere atmosphere due to seasonal changes in the global stratospheric circulation.

Figure 13. Stratospheric water vapor anomaly at 45 N.

In this image on the vertical axis, we observe the water vapor anomaly in the stratosphere between 15 and 40 km altitude with ocher tones for negative values and greenish for positive ones. The measurement takes place at 45 latitude in the northern hemisphere. On the horizontal axis is the date, and we can see that the large anomaly created by the Tonga eruption does not appear in the Northern Hemisphere until one year later, in 2023, when the warming occurred. Thus, there are dynamical events in the stratosphere that have the appropriate time lag to coincide with the abrupt warming in 2023.

Because the Tonga eruption is unprecedented, there is much about its effects that we do not understand. But we do know that the planetary greenhouse effect is very sensitive to changes in stratospheric water vapor because, unlike the troposphere, the stratosphere is very dry and far from greenhouse saturation.

As a group of scientists showed in 2010, the effect of changes in stratospheric water vapor is so important that the warming between 2000 and 2009 was reduced by 25% because it decreased by 10%.[vii] And after the Tonga eruption, it increased by 10% because of the 150 million tons of water released into the stratosphere, so we could have experienced much of the warming of an entire decade in a single year.

Figure 14. Global water vapor anomaly above 68hPa.

The stratosphere has already begun to dry out again, but it is a slow process that will take many years. In 2023 only 20 million tons of water returned to the troposphere, 13%.[viii]

7. Dismissing natural warming

On the one hand, we have an absolutely unprecedented abrupt warming that the models cannot explain and that has scientists scratching their heads. Such anomalous warming cannot logically respond to the usual suspects, El Nino, reduced sulfur emissions, or increased CO₂, which have been going on for many decades.

On the other hand, we have an absolutely unprecedented volcanic eruption, the effects of which we cannot know, but which, according to what we know about the greenhouse effect, should cause significant and abrupt warming.

Of course, we cannot conclude that the warming was caused by the volcano, but it is clear that it is by far the most likely suspect, and any other candidate should have to demonstrate its ability to act abruptly with such magnitude before being seriously considered.

So why do scientists like Gavin Schmidt argue, without evidence or knowledge, that the Tonga volcano could not have been responsible? If the effect were cooling, the volcano would be blamed without a second’s hesitation, but significant natural warming undermines the message that warming is the fault of our emissions.

This article can also be watched in a 19-minute video with English and French subtitles.

Copernicus Global temperature trend monitor.