Author: Robert Zimmerman

top NASA scientist says that all global warming models are too gloomy

8:01 pm

The uncertainty of science! A top NASA scientist says that the models used by global warming scientists are far too gloomy, leaving out the cooling effects of increased plant production in a carbon dioxide rich atmosphere. Key quote:

It now appears, however, that the previous/current state of climate science may simply have been wrong and that there’s really no need to get in an immediate flap. If Bounoua and her colleagues are right, and CO2 levels keep on rising the way they have been lately (about 2 ppm each year), we can go a couple of centuries without any dangerous warming.

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Falcon 9 launch a success. Dragon capsule returns successfully

6:15 pm

SpaceX is two for two! The Falcon 9 launch today was a success, and was topped off by the successful return of the Dragon capsule after two orbits.

This is big news. Think about it: a private company — not a government — has designed and built a rocket and capsule, capable of carrying astronauts, and successfully launched both and recovered the capsule. Hot dog! True space travel might very well be around the corner at last.

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The November sunspot graph – still low and below expectations

8:58 pm

NOAA’s Space Weather Prediction Center today published its monthly update of the Sun’s developing sunspot cycle (see below). The graph shows the slow rise in sunspots (blue/black lines) in comparison with the consensis prediction made by the solar science community in May 2009 (red line).

Novembe sunspot graph

As I noted last month, the rise in sunspots as we ramp up to the next solar maximum has definitely slowed, which indicates clearly that we are heading towards the weakest solar maximum in more than two centuries. And as I have noted repeatedly on this website as well as on the John Batchelor Show, that means very cold weather!

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Climate models used by IPCC fail to predict past climate patterns

8:48 pm

A recent paper published in Hydrological Sciences Journal states that climate models used by IPCC cannot even predict known past climate patterns. Key quote:

It is claimed that GCMs [General Climate Models] provide credible quantitative estimates of future climate change, particularly at continental scales and above. Examining the local performance of the models at 55 points, we found that local projections do not correlate well with observed measurements. Furthermore, we found that the correlation at a large spatial scale, i.e. the contiguous USA, is worse than at the local scale. However, we think that the most important question is not whether GCMs can produce credible estimates of future climate, but whether climate is at all predictable in deterministic terms.

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