Ouch!

Climate Alchemy Exposed and Exploded

We confess that we have had enjoyed "a laughing into the cornflakes" experience this morning.  Climate "science" is casting a debilitating pall over the profession.  If economics deserves the appellation "the dismal science", climate science  deserves the appellation "scientific alchemy".  The longer climate alchemists continue to push their ideological barrow up the hill, the more discredit they bring to genuine science.

The event that caught our attention was an article published in The Guardian--a long time drum beater for the cause of fighting the noble fight against global warming.  Granted there are no surprises there.  The fight against global warming has always appealed to those who devotedly worship the State and actively advocate for its relentless expansion.  It's a cause big enough to justify universal organised human action, which in implies (at last) the UN will become the global uber-State.

The editors at The Guardian must hate having to publish articles with headlines like:

Southern Ocean showing 'remarkable' revival in carbon absorption ability

Unexpected findings show oceans’ potential to absorb CO2 fluctuates more over time than previously thought, researchers say

For those who do not worship at the feet of the State, such headlines are a frisson to the soul, and a belly laugh to the diaphragm.
  OK, so just let's review a few facts that us amateurs are aware of.  Most of the earth's surface is covered by water.  Carbon dioxide--the allegedly great warming gas--is heavy.  It tends to drop to the earth to feed plant life, and to the ocean, where it is absorbed.  The vast oceans play a key role in the carbon cycle.

Around about the turn of the century, climate alchemists were telling us that the oceans were no longer absorbing as much carbon dioxide.  They apparently had reached saturation point.  Doom! Doom! Doom!  The greatest crisis ever was beginning to unfold.  More money, more power, more rules, restrictions, regulations were essential.  More government!  We had to have more government action to escape the greatest crisis ever imagined.  The survival of the human race was under threat.  Apocalypse now!

Except that climate alchemists and their Statist cheerleaders somewhat over-egged their pudding.

The Southern Ocean, which acts as one of the natural world’s most effective sponges for absorbing carbon dioxide, is showing signs of an unexpected revival in its ability to do so, according to scientists.

The oceans absorb around a quarter of emissions caused by human activities, such as the burning of fossil fuels, reducing the speed of climate change. About 40% of this occurs in the Southern Ocean, which surrounds the Antarctic, making it the planet’s strongest ocean carbon sink.  The researchers said the new findings are surprising and remarkable.

New findings that are surprising and remarkable, eh.  Do tell.  

Earlier studies had suggested that rising emissions caused by humans had brought about the saturation of the Southern Ocean in the 1980s. Researchers estimated that the efficiency of the Southern Ocean to absorb CO2 had dropped by about 30% which they put down to higher wind speeds across the area which brought carbon-rich waters to the surface. This was itself a consequence of climate change and the depletion of the ozone layer, they said, creating a feedback loop that would only get worse over time.

But the new report published in the journal Science shows that this downward trend in capacity reversed around 2002 and regained its former strength in line with rising emissions by 2012. The scientists put the change down to a combination of dropping water surface temperatures in the Pacific sector and a change in ocean circulation keeping carbon rich waters below those at the surface.

Note the slinking retreat.  Now earlier studies are deemed to "have suggested" that the Southern Ocean was saturated in carbon dioxide and could not absorb any more.  At the time, there was no suggestion about it.  It was asserted a scientific fact, in the face of which all the world had to increase vastly the rule of despotic government and spend billions upon billions of dollars to prevent the forthcoming calamity.  The science was settled.  Even to this day, village clowns holding public office are telling us the situation is so dire, we have reached the Last Chance Saloon for the human race to prevent climate catastrophe.  Such leaders both abuse their position and bring shame to their office.

Prof Nicolas Gruber, lead author and environmental physicist, told the Guardian: “A strong carbon sink in the Southern Ocean helps to mitigate climate change for the moment, as otherwise even more CO2 would have stayed in the atmosphere, but we cannot conclude that this will continue for ever. One has to recognise that despite this remarkable increase in the Southern Ocean carbon sink, emissions have gone up even more.” [Emphasis, ours]

Thus speaks the climate alchemist.  To the layman this sounds bizarre.  It sounds like no amount of evidence or data will changed the fixed mind.  We fear we are confronted here with invincible ignorance.  So, the Southern Ocean is absorbing more carbon dioxide than before.  Maybe that's because more carbon dioxide (the greenest gas in the creation) has been released into the atmosphere.  And it takes time for the newly released carbon dioxide to perambulate down to the Southern Ocean  where it is absorbed.  So, one can now reasonably expect that whilst "emissions have gone up even more", the ocean absorption will also increase even more.  It's called the carbon cycle, after all. Things take time to cycle, non?

The international team analysed measurements of CO2 in surface waters over a 30-year period from 1982. They compared this data with atmospheric CO2 measurements and satellite observations. Gruber said the report did not contradict the findings of earlier studies but did challenge the conclusions drawn from them, arguing that previous research had been largely dependent on models, rather than observations. [Emphasis, ours.]

At last a confession of sin.  Well, a partial, teeth-grinding one.  So, where did the data in the models, which this chap is euphemistically calling "research" originate from?  Speculation.  Alarmist speculation. Alchemist speculation.  But because the speculation was transmitted by figures and by computer calculations (always subject to GIGO--garbage in, garbage out) it all assumed the appearance of factual measurement, otherwise passed off as scientific certainty.  All of which has led to village idiots telling us "the science is settled".   

“The models don’t do a particularly good job in modelling the Southern Ocean so I would say this is much much stronger evidence. It is crucial that we continue to make these observations and analyse them to detect further changes in the uptake.” 

Ouch.  That must have hurt.  "The models don’t do a particularly good job in modelling the Southern Ocean." Actually, models don't do a particularly good job modelling the global climate, either.  The cause of global warming is based on non-scientific alchemy, festooned in numbers and "facts" to disguise its wafer thin edifice of wild speculation.  

The research team say that it indicates that the ocean’s potential to absorb CO2 fluctuates more over time than previously thought. Scientists have cautioned that future trends cannot be predicted reliably.  Toby Tyrrell, professor in earth system science in ocean and earth science at the University of Southampton said: “This announcement is good news, on the face of it, because we want this enormous carbon sink to keep working efficiently. It is not any reason to be complacent, however, because we still understand rather little about the internal workings of the Southern Ocean carbon cycle. For this reason we cannot be sure how resilient the Southern Ocean carbon sink will be in the future.” [Emphasis, ours.]

Except that when the models indicate an apocalypse, there has been no question about reliability.  Anyone who did so question was immediately branded a heretic, a denier, akin to people wickedly denying that Jews were slaughtered by the Nazis.  But now that actual observation and actual measurement has exploded the prior speculation, we are urged to be cautious.  In this benighted mindset, the models still carry greater weight and authority than actual observation (about which we must, apparently, have a perpetual scepticism and caution).  Hence, we confidently predict that at the forthcoming global haj to Paris to fight global warming, none will be counselling caution on the grounds that "future (global warming) trends cannot be predicted reliably."  It took one thousand years to explode alchemy as an egregious error.  Why should climate alchemy be any different?

Finally, to conclude:

Although the ocean acifidication caused by the absorption of CO2 has been shown to pose serious consequences for marine ecology, Tyrrell said such conclusions could not be drawn in relation to the new study. “This extra carbon is unlikely to pose a large threat to life through ocean acidification. Most of the carbon taken up in the Southern Ocean is transported shortly afterwards to the deep ocean, where fewer organisms live,” he said.

That sounds like evidence that the earth's climate is remarkably self-correcting and self-balancing.  Sort of like so many things we experience daily on this wonderful planet.  It's what you would expect when you are enjoying the work of a kind and faithful Creator.  Maybe, just maybe, this is what climate alchemy is all about.  It is a vain attempt to replace the Creator with a new deity: Man, who via the potency of the State, holds all things in his hands.

Is it any wonder that climate alchemy has captured the febrile imagination of secularist, materialist Unbelief?