The Impact of "Small" Volcanic Eruptions on Earth's Climate 11

[Maui]

These "small" volcanic eruptions are being viewed by some scientists as potentially having a greater influence on earth's climate than was previously believed:

http://www.rdmag.com/news/2015/01/s...?et_cid=4359172&et_rid=407330416&location=top

Please do not allow the vitriolic verbal pyrotechnics of your fellow contributors overshadow the points that you are attempting to make in your replies.

Maui

 

[GTTofAK]

"Cranky, see below an image of the range of model runs and observed temperatures from AR5 (Figure 1.4):"

I liked it better when it was this.

When this graph was leaked the IPCC caught holly hell. So they sprung into action. They extended the scale of the graph all the way back to 1950 in order to obscure the 1990-2015 period. If you think this was an accident I have so ocean front property in Arizona to sell you.

They then changed the standard that has been used since the FAR “Values are aligned to match the average observed value at 1990″ to “Annual mean anomalies relative to 1961–1990 of the individual CMIP3 ensemble simulations.” This widened the spread of the models to encompass the observed data.

Remember when I said that I’m a cynic. For decades models were aligned to match observed values at 1990. When we moved outside of the envelop the method was changed. This is just post hoc lying with statistics. If you chose the method after the fact to get the answer you want it isn’t science.

 

[CELinOttawa]

I actually come to these threads in the honest hope of finding something different, or learning something about the subject... Only after a wasted period of time get so frustrated that I leave an unproductive post.

You're absolutely right; the posts are not productive. They therefore break one of my primary rules for Eng-Tips participation, and I'll try damn hard in future not to be so hypocritical. I still think you're all wasting your time because the opposing side is ignoring you, just as you are ignoring them.

 

[rconnor]

Back in April of last year, I posted AR5 Figure 1.4 and, preemptively, included the following right after:

“But…but…the leaked draft version of that graph is the right one! The IPCC tried to cover it up with the other one! You’re cherry-picking!” said the “Skeptics”.

Let’s make sure we understand why it was changed – it was wrong. In the leaked draft version, all series (models and observations) were aligned at 1990, a single year. Observations inherently include the random year-to-year fluctuations. So to aligned to a single year, a hot one at that, makes the projections of the models appear hotter than they actually are. In other words, they took the projected trend from the models and attached it to the 1990 data point (which was hotter than the trend leading up to that). What should happen, and what did happen in the final report, is the projected trend line should be attached to the trend line leading up to 1990. That’s not “masking the truth”, that’s correcting a statistical error. If you’re curious, more info can be found here.

This is what the draft version did:
[image

http://tamino.files.wordpress.com/2012/12/compare1.jpg

]

And here is the same projected trends but, correctly, applied to the TREND leading up to 1990 (it looks almost identical to the IPCC final report):
[image

http://tamino.files.wordpress.com/2012/12/compare2.jpg

]

It’s no surprise to me that you “liked it better” when it was wrong, GTTofAk.

 

[GTTofAK]

Tamino? You mean grant foster? An out of work musician. You are telling me that the IPCC took the recommendation of a musician?

 

[rconnor]

It’s Grant Foster, the one with 69 citations of peer-reviewed publications he’s authored with other prominent climate scientists such as Stefan Rahmstorf and Gavin Schmidt:
Global temperature evolution 1979–2010 – 35 citations
Comparing climate projections to observations up to 2011 – 25 citations
Comment on “Heat capacity, time constant, and sensitivity of Earth's climate system” by SE Schwartz – 9 citations

But it seems like you’ve completely avoided the point and instead attempted to discredit the person making the argument. I think there’s a Latin phrase for that. Being the expert on Latin phrases, logic and debating, GTTofAk, could you help me remember what it’s called?...oh never mind. It’s unimportant.

 

[rb1957]

he was picking up on the domain name of your link.

another day in paradise, or is paradise one day closer ?

 

[GTTofAK]

Actually I'm attacking the IPCC. The IPCC claims to only rely on peer reviewed scientific literature. Yet when their back was to the wall they adopted a new convention from a blog no review no nothing.

As for Foster. I don't care much for him because I don't like frauds. The man claimed expertise he doesn't have he is an out of work musician who claimed to be a statistician.

I'll eviscerated his method later. In short if you are going to center the models on a trend you better do the same to the observations. That whole apples and oranges thing.[

 

[GTTofAK]

From Foster, Rahmstorf where Foster gives his qualifications.

'Grant Froster Tempo Analytics, 303 Campbell Road, Garland, ME 04939'

Plug that into Google earth and see what you get. I don't have a problem with someone being self-taught if they are honest about it. Foster however, both under his real name and even more so under the Tamino alias has lied about his qualifications. That the IPCC would adopt his conventions straight from his blog with no review at all is laughable.

 

[rconnor]

Just because Grant Foster, aka Tamino, pointed out an error in something and the IPCC corrected the error, it does not follow that the IPCC changed it because Grant Foster said it was wrong. A reviewer of the IPCC could have no idea about Grant Foster and spotted the same mistake.

It's funny that a Bobby Tisdale follower, a person with zero publications, zero citations and seemingly zero formal training in the field, would make ad homeninem attacks at Grant Foster for not being an expert in the field.

Regardless, it's rather meaningless as we know that model projections are higher than observations due to (as listed above):
- ENSO (Kosaka and Xie 2013, England et al 2014, Foster and Rahmstorf 2011 and many others)
- Lack of coverage of arctic warming in some data sets (Cowtan and Way 2013)
- Underestimating the amount of anthropogenic aerosols
- Underestimating the short term impact of smaller volcanic activity (Santer et al 2014, Ridley et al 2014)
- Required update to OHC (Durack et al 2014)
- The fact that models were never intended on matching short-term fluctuations perfectly

This has already been discussed. All I was doing was demonstrating to cranky that model projects are not a single value but a range of possible values.

 

[GTTofAK]

"Just because Grant Foster, aka Tamino, pointed out an error in something and the IPCC corrected the error, it does not follow that the IPCC changed it because Grant Foster said it was wrong. A reviewer of the IPCC could have no idea about Grant Foster and spotted the same mistake.'

Nope sorry not in the IPCC flow chart. The addition of the new graphic occurred after the review period. It was included after the fact with 0 review or documentation. And you have no evidence that it is an “error”. Where is the documentation supporting that centering on 1990 is an “error”. Under IPCC rules there should be some peer reviewed papers supporting this not some anonymous(poorly anonymous that is as everyone knows Tamino is Grant Foster). The centering is a convention. Different conventions might yield slightly different graphical results.

I would say that the actual error lies with the final graphic and Fosters new centering convention that the IPCC adopted. The error in Foster’s logic lies here.

“But observations include random year-to-year fluctuations, whereas the projections do not because the average of multiple models averages those out”

This is an error. In forecasting models year-to-year fluctuations average out. That is not the case in hind-casting. The models do not randomly hind-cast events. The events are already known and are built into the models. They might differ slightly on the degree of the event but the timing of the events is not random. If we align on the mean 1990 value this will drop the models below the observations because the models run hot in 1990 as they are correctly hind-casting known temperatures.

If you are going to center on a trend and not a year you have to do this for both observations and models. Foster and the IPCC don’t do this.

As you can see in this graphic the IPCC realigned the models to the trend but didn’t realign the observations

This creates an apples and oranges comparison.

Another side issue is that the IPCC is also expanding the envelope by using low emissions scenarios. Those low performing models come from low emissions scenarios that didn’t happen.

This is a slight of hand to trick people into thinking that we are still in the model range. The models that come close to the observed trend use emissions scenarios that didn’t happen.

 

[rconnor]

…and this is why we shouldn’t read too much into something from a leaked draft
All of the accusations that the IPCC secretly switched figure 1.4 at the 11th hour solely based on a blog post are completely baseless. The old figure was from a leaked draft. The image could have been a placeholder. The new image could have been approved long before the leak but wasn’t completed or added to the draft prior to the leak.

What we do know is there was a Lead Author’s Meeting (LAM) after the leaked draft (SOD – December 2012, 4th LAM – January 2013). At the LAM, comments from the SOD expert review are reviewed. It is very likely that the error in figure 1.4 was discovered during the SOD expert review, before Foster’s blog post, and commented. The comments were addressed at the LAM and the issue was corrected. To claim that the IPCC changed the image because of the blog post is utterly absurd and completely unfounded.

Trends Matter
The issue is that model projections represent the trends. The exact year-to-year values are not what they are trying to represent. So to apply model projections onto a single year, a hot one at that, and then compare trends is comparing apples and oranges. The model trends need to be applied to the temperature trend, not the single year.

But regardless of the baseline, as stated above, the trends are what matter. And what do you get when you compare model trends against observed trends (1990-2012)? A very close match. The "average" model run is slightly hotter than observations, mainly for the reasons which I’ve listed before. Both Schmidt et al 2014 and Huber and Knutti 2014 support that.
[image

http://tamino.files.wordpress.com/2012/12/rates.jpg

]

Emission Scenarios
While anthropogenic CO2 emissions are near the higher emission scenarios, anthropogenic aerosols and volcanic aerosols have been underestimated. This means that the total forcing, which is really what matters (and part of the reason why the IPCC moved to RCP scenarios which relate to forcings), is closer to the middle/lower emission scenarios.

Models obviously cannot predict anthropogenic aerosol emissions and have underestimated them. However, the harm caused by aerosols will mean that these emissions will reduce over time as more pressure is put on governments (i.e. protests in China over air quality). So the cooling forcing of anthropogenic aerosols is very likely to reduce in the future.

The papers that started this thread point to errors in how models handled volcanic aerosols (from smaller volcanic events). This improvement in the science will be used to improve models. This has a minor impact on the short-term predictions and explains some of the discrepancy between models and observations. However, it’s unlikely that this will have a long-term impact on model predictions as volcanic events are episodic.

The point of the matter is that it is incorrect to compare the recent short-term observed trends with the highest forcing scenarios when the forcings have been closer to medium/low-forcing scenarios. Furthermore, as volcanic activity does not have a long-term impact and anthropogenic aerosol emissions are very likely to decrease, the long-term trend is likely to shift towards the high-forcing scenarios without mitigation initiatives.

 

[rconnor]

(sorry, my wording was messing in one sentence (well, likely more than one...but no matter). The sentence under "Trends Matter" should read: "So to apply model trend projections onto a single year, a hot one at that, and then compare trends specific years is comparing apples and oranges.")

 

[GTTofAK]

"…and this is why we shouldn’t read too much into something from a leaked draft
All of the accusations that the IPCC secretly switched figure 1.4 at the 11th hour solely based on a blog post are completely baseless. The old figure was from a leaked draft. The image could have been a placeholder. The new image could have been approved long before the leak but wasn’t completed or added to the draft prior to the leak."


I think you need to look up the word baseless. Foster both posted his “correction” and publicly said the he had contacted IPCC lead authors about it. The IPCC then did exactly what Foster had recommended including Fosters error of only realigning the models and not the observations. All of these are facts and provide the basis for the argument.

It is your assertion that this was caught independently by an reviewer, somehow after the review period had ended, and then was changed just by coincidence how Foster had recommended including Fosters error is the baseless claim.

Up is down. Clod is hot. And my fact based claim is baseless while your pure supposition of some unknown reviewer doing this is fact based.

Let’s look at your sentence structure.

The image could have been …. The new image could have been … but

The one using the qualifiers is the one making the baseless claim.

“The issue is that model projections represent the trends. The exact year-to-year values are not what they are trying to represent. “

The IPCC graph isn’t a graph of the trends. So you are incorrect.

“So to apply model projections onto a single year, a hot one at that, and then compare trends is comparing apples and oranges. The model trends need to be applied to the temperature trend, not the single year.”

Again the IPCC graphic does not compare trends but the measured and predicted anomaly.

On the issue of realigning on the trend it actually makes little difference if its done correctly. The reason it makes such a big difference here that the Foster made an error and only realigned the models to the trend. If you are going to realign the models you need to also realign the observations. If the models and observations were perfectly in alignment applying Foster’s adjustment would still bias the models downwards relative to the observed. That is how you know its wrong.

“A very close match. The "average" model run is slightly hotter than observations, mainly for the reasons which I’ve listed before. Both Schmidt et al 2014 and Huber and Knutti 2014 support that.”

They don’t support that. They support that if you use after the fact fudge factors you can get the models back in alignment. Biasing a model after the fact proves nothing.

I suspect your Tamino graph does the same thing. But its hard as there is no support info. Since Tamino is an out of work musician who I just showed made a gross error I’m very skeptical of any of his analysis.

 

[GTTofAK]

On the issue of biasing the models after the fact I have had to laugh at a new term that has appeared in climate pseudoscience ”retrospective prediction” I’m not shitting you.

I went to vegas and tried to retrospectively put all of my money of the Patriots to win the superbowl. They told me to get bent.

Could it be that climate modelers failed miserably and are not trying to save their jobs and reputation??? Nah that couldn't be it.

 

[rb1957]

I know i'm hi-jacking this thread, but ... going back to a post back on 9th Feb ...
"If you want to post unrelated nonsense, open a new thread. Actually, don’t. Instead, apply the slightly ounce of (actual) skepticism to the nonsense you gobble up, understand that it’s actually nonsense and, rightly, decide not to post such nonsense."

I accept rconnor's point that what was reported (at first look) as an abuse, was (at second look) a systematic modification of data.

no "grassy knolls", no "your data sucks", no "your mother sucks" ... just, do we think it's a good idea to modify data ? I understand monitoring stations move, but shouldn't we say these are separate data streams rather than saying let's run these two data streams together (to get a longer record) by adjusting the recorded data by the mean of the two locations. how can any scientist countenance modifying virgin data ? I get that you want to account for urban island effects, and nearby ac outlets, etc but surely you'd want to retain the original record ?

another day in paradise, or is paradise one day closer ?

 

[rconnor]

You’re claiming that the IPCC change AR5 Figure 1.4 because Grant Foster blogged about it and only because Grant Foster blogged about it, in an attempt to cover-up the “truth” regarding model/observations. This is a wild accusation that carries many explicit and implicit implications. All of which are unfounded or directly disproven by reality.

1. The change was solely due to Greg Foster
As I said before, just because Foster blogged about it, it does not follow that the IPCC changed the image because of it. You’d need to prove that Foster was the only person that spotted the error or was absolutely instrumental in the IPCC changing the figure. This is a tall order and speaks to just how outlandish your claim is.

2. This was a backdoor move by the IPCC and no one had a chance to say otherwise
Second Order Draft review period ended Nov 30, 2012. The leak occurred sometime in December 2012. Foster’s blog post occurred Dec. 20, 2012. You claim that there were no review periods after this point and the IPCC snuck it in the changes. However, there was the Lead Author’s Meeting in Jan 2013, where comments from the SOD expert review are considered (including comments on Figure 1.4), papers are accepted for consideration up to March 15, 2012, the Expert and Government Review in Jun-Aug 2013 and the 12th WG1 Session in Sept 2013 (source). Your attempt to paint this as some sort of 11th hour change that no one knew about is wrong. There were numerous review periods after the leaked draft came out.

3. Figure 1.4 was set in stone in the leaked draft
Firstly, it’s a draft. In other words, not the final version. Things tend to change between drafts and final versions, especially when there numerous review periods after the Second Order Draft. This is not an oddity and does not support some conspiracy to suppress the truth.

The second clue should have been the wording in the draft. Figure 1.4 is included in the draft in the following form:

[INSERT FIGURE 1.4 HERE]
Figure 1.4: [PLACEHOLDER FOR FINAL DRAFT:…]

Not exactly ironclad.

4. The IPCC blindly accepted Greg Foster’s take on the image
Furthermore, even if Foster was the only person on the planet to spot the error, it does not follow that the IPCC blindly accepted his version.

They didn’t blindly accept his version. See Appendix 1.A for the discussion on how Figure 1.4 was produced. It’s different and much more robust than in Foster’s blog post.

5. The changes to Figure 1.4 undermine the message of the draft version
You’re assuming that the overall message of the report changed based off the changes to Figure 1.4 (i.e. the draft concluded that models did not match observations at all and the final version concluded they had). For this, we need look no further than the statements made in the draft version and compare them to the final version.

Even though the projections from the models were never intended to be predictions over such a short time scale, the observations through 2010 generally fall well within the projections made in all of the past assessments.

…

Analyses by Rahmstorf et al.(2012; submitted) show that accounting for ENSO events and solar cycle changes would enhance the comparison with the AR4 and earlier projections. In summary, the globally-averaged surface temperatures are well within the uncertainty range of all previous IPCC projections, and generally are in the middle of the scenario ranges. However, natural variability is likely the dominating effect in evaluating these early times in the scenario evaluations as noted by Hawkins and Sutton (2009).

As in the prior assessments, global climate models generally simulate global temperatures that compare well with observations over climate timescales (Section 9.4). Even though the projections from the models were never intended to be predictions over such a short timescale, the observations through 2012 generally fall within the projections made in all past assessments. The 1990– 2012 data have been shown to be consistent with the FAR projections (IPCC, 1990), and not consistent with zero trend from 1990, even in the presence of substantial natural variability (Frame and Stone, 2013).

…

In summary, the trend in globally averaged surface temperatures falls within the range of the previous IPCC projections. During the last decade the trend in the observations is smaller than the mean of the projections of AR4 (see Section 9.4.1, Box 9.2 for a detailed assessment of the hiatus in global mean surface warming in the last 15 years). As shown by Hawkins and Sutton (2009), trends in the observations during short-timescale periods (decades) can be dominated by natural variability in the Earth’s climate system. Similar episodes are also seen in climate model experiments (Easterling and Wehner, 2009). Due to their experimental design these episodes cannot be duplicated with the same timing as the observed episodes in most of the model simu¬lations; this affects the interpretation of recent trends in the scenario evaluations (Section 11.2). Notwithstanding these points, there is evi¬dence that early forecasts that carried formal estimates of uncertainty have proved highly consistent with subsequent observations (Allen et al., 2013). If the contributions of solar variability, volcanic activity and ENSO are removed from the observations the remaining trend of sur¬face air temperature agree better with the modelling studies (Rahm¬storf et al., 2012).

(source)

The message did not change. The graphic did.

It’s truly a ridiculous claim that borders on absurd conspiracy theory. It’s not only completely unsupported but actual disproven by what really happened. I’ve wasted enough time on this nonsense.

 

[GTTofAK]

"You’re claiming that the IPCC change AR5 Figure 1.4 because Grant Foster blogged about it and only because Grant Foster blogged about it, in an attempt to cover-up the “truth” regarding model/observations. This is a wild accusation that carries many explicit and implicit implications. All of which are unfounded or directly disproven by reality."

Your reading comprehension is poor. The leaked draft was big news. The IPCC went out looking for any reason to change it. Grant Foster while a scientific nobody isn't a nobody in terms of his influence. He is a member of the realcliamte group and therefore has access to IPCC lead authors who are also associated with real cliamte. He said that he contacted lead authors with his change. I take him at his word. In the end the IPCC adopted his recentering exactly with some other tricks as well, extending the reference period, adding the spaghetti both intended to make it illegible.

This is all fact based. Your assertion that some nameless reviewer came up with the change that just happened to be the same change Foster sent them is the baseless claim.

"It’s truly a ridiculous claim that borders on absurd conspiracy theory."

Everything boarders on conspiracy theory with you. That is just projection on your part.

 

[IRstuff]

"how can any scientist countenance modifying virgin data "

This done ALL THE TIME. Case in point, any photon radiometer's detector has parasitic dark currents, so any measurement performed by the detector is immediately corrected for an offset error as well as a scale factor. What's reported as uW/cm^2-sr is not really a virgin measurement. Any electronic temperature measurement using a PRT is likewise corrected for offset, scaling, as well as linearity, since the mapping of temperature to resistance is a non-linear function. These are all forms of calibration that are used to correct the measured data to reflect what is being measured.


So, what you might consider to be virgin data for temperature has already been modified. Now, admittedly, these are well-known and NIST-traceable calibrations, but, presumably, that could be said for station temperatures as well.

TTFN
faq731-376

Need help writing a question or understanding a reply? forum1529


Of course I can. I can do anything. I can do absolutely anything. I'm an expert!
There is a homework forum hosted by engineering.com:

http://www.engineering.com/AskForum/aff/32.aspx

 

[rb1957]

personally, i expect that the raw strain gauge output (similar to your photon detector) is kept prior to being modified for calibrations and corrections. I guess I could accept retaining only modified data if i was convinced that the modifications could be reversed (because maybe someone comes up with a theory that uses uncorrected data or maybe there was a error in these corrections (eg, gauge factors have been calculated incorrectly).

"what you might consider to be virgin data for temperature has already been modified." sure, by factors that should be recorded and so are reversible. what i'm concerned about are "adjustments" for station move, for urban heat island, etc that appear to replace the original data. For the case in point (the Berkeley example) the changes are traceable but i'm wondering if they're appropriate ? I understand the in the past corrections have been applied and overwritten the original data, which sounds very "odd".



another day in paradise, or is paradise one day closer ?

 

[GTTofAK]

"So, what you might consider to be virgin data for temperature has already been modified. Now, admittedly, these are well-known and NIST-traceable calibrations, but, presumably, that could be said for station temperatures as well."

You would think that but as bad as climate science might be now it was far worse a few decades ago when there was a handful of scientists laying the ground work for this young field. Many of the major adjustments that were still used today were the product of pure supposition. Take the bucket adjustment which is still used today and adds a large warming trend to the SST data. The support for the adjustment comes from Folland 1984

“The abrupt change in SST in December 1941 coincides with the entry of the USA into World War II and is likely to have resulted from a realization of the dangers of hauling sea buckets onto deck in wartime conditions when a light would have been needed for both hauling and reading the thermometer at night.”

In real science this is what is known as a hypothesis. The next step is to go out and support it. Once you have sufficiently supported it then you can apply it. Did that happen? Hell no. Climate scientists just took it as true, hey it sounded like a good explanation kind of like how Fosters realignment sounds like a good explanation until you realize that you need to realignment the observations as well. It wasn’t until 2007 that anyone bothered to check Folland’s hypothesis. Did the hypothesis stand up? Hell no, Kent 2007 found that buckets were still the predominate way of measuring SST temperatures all the way unit the 1980s.

So did climate scientists go back and correct their work? Did they admit that Folland was wrong? Hell no! This isn’t science anymore its politics and social science. These people are playing a poker game and they are 100% all in. And they know it. They are not about to admit a mistake and reduce the global trend by about a third. When your entire communication strategy is appeal to authority you cannot do anything that makes people question that authority.