The similarities between the COVID-19 era and the global warming/climate change movement are interesting.
In both cases, we are supposed to blindly accept what our governments, politicians and bureaucrats are telling us. The instrument of manipulation that they use is fear and guilt. For instance, if you oppose the COVID-19 vaccines, you are labelled an anti-vaxer or extremist with no concern for your fellow human being. You're also told you may die. This deserves our mockery because the overwhelming evidence is that the vaccines don't work and increase your odds of immediate or future health problems. The magical powers of vaccines are a religion.
Suppose you don't accept wholeheartedly the elimination of fossil fuels and deny that the planet is in a climate crisis. In that case, again, you are labelled a climate denier and an extremist, and there is already talk that your freedom should be curtailed. The climate change hysteria has also taken on the elements of a religion.
Now, scientists are looking at various elements of the anthropogenic-induced climate change paradigm and the urgent need to eliminate fossil fuels by 2050 with a total reliance on wind and solar energy.
A recent paper authored by 37 scientists from 18 countries in the Journal Climate are challenging the amount of warming that is purported to have occurred since 1850
New study suggests global warming could be mostly an urban problem .
The researchers contend that current estimates of global warming are contaminated by urban warming biases. The study also suggests the solar activity estimates considered in the most recent reports by the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the IPCC, underestimated the sun's role in global warming since the 19th century.
There is something called the "Urban Heat Island Effect". It is well known that cities heat up the surrounding environment. Bricks and buildings retain the day's heat, and many city dark surfaces absorb heat. In addition, tall buildings create a "Canyon Effect", in which heat is funnelled downwards and intensified, causing higher daytime temperatures and an increase in evening temperatures because the tall buildings prevent rapid dissipation of heat.
The paper considered two different temperature estimates: a rural-urban blend that matches almost exactly with most current forecasts and a rural-only assessment. The rural-urban mix indicates a long-term warming of 0.89°C per century since 1850, while the rural-only indicates 0.55°C Celsius per century. This contradicts a common assumption that current thermometer-based global temperatures are unaffected by urban warming biases.
In urban areas, we have a greater concentration of vehicles putting out heat not only from exhausts but also from heating vehicle bodies and friction of tires on pavement. Even electric cars are releasing heat into the environment.
The fact that urban areas are hotter than rural areas has been dismissed by many scientists as of minimal importance. However, the researchers in the study looked at temperature estimates only from rural areas rather than from the urban-rural mix. They found that 40% of the warming since 1850 is attributable to urban heat. They suggest that rural areas are not warming at the rate that we have been told. The entire globe is warming because what you have is a lot of data being taken from urban areas.
This is what they said:
"The rural and urban blend indicates a long-term warming of 0.89 °C/century since 1850, while the rural-only indicates 0.55 °C/century. This contradicts a common assumption that current thermometer-based global temperature indices are relatively unaffected by urban warming biases."
“…urbanization bias remains a substantial problem for the global land temperature data”
It is true that cities are warming and that it's a real phenomenon. It is also true that in the past 163 years, the world's population has increased dramatically. The rural stations are now only 14% of the temperature stations. What were once rural areas are now urban. In 1850, the world's population was 1.6 billion. Today, it's 8.1 billion. Just taking a city like New York, in 1850, its population was 555,000. Today it's 8.5 million.
The other thing about 1850 is that it's recognized as the end of the Little Ice Age, and temperatures naturally started to climb after that time. So, the mass of people, industrialization, and urbanization impact warming the planet and, with it, an increase in CO2. However, that is a good thing. There is a benefit to higher CO2 levels on the earth, as explained recently by Dr. William Happer, an American physicist and Professor Emeritus in the Department of Physics at Princeton University.
“In theories of physics, getting the sign right is the hardest thing, whether it's good or bad, and they've gotten the sign wrong for CO2. More CO2 is good for the world. It's not bad for the world, and so it's absurd to be trying to reduce CO2.
With all the other problems, you know, the absurd projections of lower costs for renewable energy. It's clearly a lie. It's not true.
If you look at geological history and you've got lots of good geologists here in Australia who've made this point many times, we're in a CO2 famine now compared to what is normal for plants. Just about any plant, if you give it more CO2 and a lot more, it will do better.
In my country, most greenhouses double or triple the amount of CO2 and they have to pay for it. It's not cheap, but it's worth investing in it because the plants grow so much better. The quality of the flowers and the fruits are so much better, and the situation is even better outside of greenhouses, because in addition to the benefits you get in a greenhouse where you have plenty of water, you get resistance to drought. That's particularly important in Australia, which has large areas that are quite arid.
This is unbelievable that they've managed to turn this beneficial gas, a part of life, into a threat. You know, they talk about carbon pollution. I can't imagine what they're talking about. We're made of carbon, and we breathe out two pounds of CO2 a day, each of us, right? Eight billion people, you know, two pounds a day. Multiply that by the number of days in the year.”
Since the Cambrian explosion of life that we've been measured with good fossils, that was maybe 500 billion years ago, CO2 levels have gone way down. You know, they've typically been three, four, five times what they are now and plants are adapted to much higher levels, and so they're harmed in a number of ways by the low levels now.
They're particularly sensitive to drought, for example. They didn't used to be so sensitive to drought, and there's a more subtle problem they have as it turns out this enzyme they use is poisoned by oxygen if there's not enough CO2. So plants have to devote a lot of their resources to detoxifying this oxygen poisoning. If you double CO2, they don't have to work as hard to protect themselves from oxygen.”
The other factors affecting the amount of CO2 on the planet are volcanic activity and solar variability, which are discounted by some yet play an important role. Solar flares and coronal ejections can cause the eruption of billions of tons of material beyond the sun, which can impact our Earth.
We know the sun significantly impacts us because solar effects alter communications on Earth and cause beautiful displays such as the Northern Lights (Aurora Borealis).
In conclusion, the authors in their Climate research article state, "The scientific community is not yet in a position to confidently establish whether the warming since 1850 is mostly human-caused, mostly natural, or some combination." So, is it rational to turn our world upside-down when there is so much uncertainty and many of the previous predictions have turned out to be wrong?
Creon Levitt, a former NASA research scientist, decided to do a thorough analysis of historical temperature data. His reasoning was, "I don't like accepting authority or the so-called scientific consensus without double-checking." He focused on a worldwide database of (approximately) hourly temperature data from hundreds of airports, considered more accurate. Here are four of his graph plots over many years.
You can read his complete series of plots here. The methodology entails knowledge of statistical analysis, so if you're up to it, have a read. One of Levitt's conclusions is that the graphs reveal that things "look pretty close to random".
More than 1,600 scientists, including two Nobel laureates, declare climate ’emergency’ a myth
These scientists formed a group called Climate Intelligence (CLINTEL. Their main points are the following:
Natural as well as anthropogenic factors cause warming
Warming is far slower than predicted
Climate policy relies on inadequate models
CO2 is plant food, the basis of all life on Earth
Global warming has not increased natural disasters
Climate policy must respect scientific and economic realities
It sounds reasonable to me.
One of the hypocrisies of the American and Australian climate change adherents is that they also want open-ended immigration. In the U.S., there have been almost 5 million illegal immigrations since President Biden took office in January 2021. In Australia, migration is at record levels, with an increase of 563,200 in the year ending March 2023.
Almost all the migrants settle in the large cities, further putting pressure on services and housing, which are already in very short supply. In addition, more people mean more cars and more emissions, so if CO2 is such a concern, what are these leaders doing? It doesn't make logical sense because if these leaders were concerned about global warming, they would cease immigration. Still, better yet, they would try to reduce the population. Oh wait, isn't that Bill Gates' idea that the Earth should only have one billion people?
Unfortunately, Today's leadership and rationality are an oxymoron.
I'm a Geologist.
Every single layer in sedimentary rocks, is a record of a change in climate.
The climate has always changed, the evidence is in the rocks around us.
Great post!