I suppose this was inevitable, and Exxon Mobil probably expected it as well.

According to the Justin Gillis NYT story, the New York attorney general’s “investigation focuses on whether statements the company made to investors about climate risks as recently as this year were consistent with the company’s own long-running scientific research.”

The thing that astounds me about this is, as far as I know, Exxon Mobil “scientific research” would not have uncovered anything that was not already widely hypothesized (not “known”) by the scientific community, Al Gore, Greenpeace, school teachers, Hollywood actors, your 8 yr old son, et al.

How one compares a tobacco company cover-up of evidence that smoking kills millions of people, to human-caused climate change, which cannot be demonstrated to have occurred let alone cause even one death (or even inconvience) is beyond me.

But then, we live in a brave new world, don’t we?

That this was coming can be seen from the popular meme that conflates “climate change” with “human caused climate change”. For example, a few months ago The Guardian had a headline which crowed, “Exxon knew of climate change in 1981“.

What a stupid headline. Of course “climate change” exists. Medieval farmers enjoyed the fruits of it. Vikings in Greenland cursed it.

We knew about climate change long before Al Gore earned his “D” in Natural Science and decided to become an expert on the subject.

Natural climate change has caused (or at least contributed to) millions of deaths over the centuries. But our use of fossil fuels has enabled a level of prosperity which has made us much more resilient to climate change and weather disasters, maybe akin to the prosperity enjoyed in Medieval times when warmer conditions prevailed.

Where are the studies to investigate the possibility that modest warming has actually prevented severe weather? Major tornadoes and hurricanes in the U.S. have certainly seen a downturn in recent years. Maybe Exxon Mobil should be charging extra for this ‘positive externality’?

What about all the prevented cold weather, which still kills many more people than hot weather?

Instead, every bad thing that happens in weather is now blamed on carbon dioxide emissions. Too hot. Too cold. Not enough snow. Too much snow. It’s all our fault.

Medieval witchcraft. Time to burn some CEOs at the stake.

Even though sea level was slowly rising long before CO2 could be blamed, we now blame it on your SUV. In order to even begin to blame it even partially on CO2, the rise should be accelerating, which it (arguably) hasn’t.

Investigating Exxon Mobil for some sort of undisclosed knowledge of “climate change” is like investigating the agricultural industry for undisclosed knowledge that too much food can make people fat…except that there isn’t even any human fingerprint of global warming, like there is a stomach-print of overeating.

Or, maybe a better analogy is an investigation into the Mexican or Italian food industry for their secret knowledge that their spicy food causes peptic ulcers…except that theory was finally debunked, despite a 99% consensus in the medical community.

It’s easy to go after corporate giants, since they have so much money. Too bad people don’t realize the reason these corporations are so rich is they provide us with a standard of living we want more than other things we could have spent that money on. Econ 101.

And natural climate change is Climatology 101.

Or, at least it used to be.

DISCLOSURE: I’ve been known to give Exxon Mobil money in exchange for gasoline. But I usually use Chevron gas, which contans Techron which keeps my intake manifold and valves clean.

Alpine Meadows, CA basecam, 4 November 2015.

A series of Pacific storms mixed with some cold Canadian air is expected to result in up to 12 feet of new snow during the next week to 10 days over portions of the western U.S.

The latest GFS model forecast shows that about a dozen states will be receiving substantial pre-Thanksgiving snows, likely helped out by the current strong El Nino (graphic courtesy of WeatherBell.com, click for full-size):

GFS model forecast total snow accumulation by Sunday, Nov. 15, 2015.

A few states have already opened ski resorts early, with about 10 states now reporting snow on the ground.

While El Nino usually results in less snowfall over the West, this isn’t always the case, and the presence of the warm ocean “Blob” off the west coast is likely making this El Nino more unpredictable in its impacts on U.S. weather.

John Christy and I received an email today from Marcel Crok, who presented our satellite observations-vs-models graphs to the Dutch version of the American Physical Society (APS).

He said there was considerable push-back about the way we plot the data…not from the society itself, but from global warming activist bloggers.

I’ve heard these objections before, and mostly ignored them as uninformed and lame, since I’ve never heard one from an actual climate scientist.

But apparently it’s worthwhile to address the objections, since they seem to be lurking out there in the blogosphere.

Marcel summarized the objections he heard as follows, where “they” refers to us (Spencer & Christy):

1. They shift the modelled temperature anomaly upwards to increase the discrepancy with observations by around 50%.

2. Using a four year baseline from 1979-83 shifts UAH down lower compared to the surface record.

3. Why did John Christy use a four year baseline period instead of a 30 year baseline as is usual?

4. One other trick played in the Spencer/Christy graph is to start all of the models from the same point. That’s not what is done in practice – they are run-up over a period of time and and have a distribution along the entire period.

5. The baseline Christy used 1979-1983 is a 5 year period, it includes 79,80,81,82 and 83. It’s basically the first point on his running 5 year mean. Of course that ISNT the 5 year average centered on 1983. It’s the average centered on 81. So Christy’s graph is shifted 2 years to the right.

These complaints are all interrelated, and are mostly variations on the same objection.

Let’s start with one of our graphs Marcel presented (this isn’t exactly the same as the one he presented, but it would cause the same objections he encountered):

Now, see the text on the graph about how the warming *TRENDS* are almost always greater in the models than the observations?

Well, the difference in trends between models and observations is not affected by any of the 5 objections listed above.

It doesn’t matter how you plot the data with vertical offsets, or different starting points: these issues do not affect the trends, and trends are probably the single most important statistical metric to test the models against observations.

The vast majority of the models have greater warming trends than the observational data show. How members of a Dutch “Physical Society” would not know any of this is beyond me.

Beyond this overriding issue which make the 5 objections moot, I will still answer them (in sequence, see above) because John Christy and I believe that the way we plot the data is the most physically meaningful and the most defensible.

1. We do NOT shift the models upward to enhance the discrepancy with the observations. They diverge upward when starting at the same initial point: the 1979-1983 average (the first 5 years of the satellite record).

2. See #1.

3. The anomalies ARE relative to the same 30-year baseline. But when you plot the results, and the models have such a different warming trend, you then must decide whether to plot just the anomalies (which would have the models too COLD early in the record, then too WARM late in the record), or have them all start the “warming race” at the same time…like we did…relative to their respective 1979-1983 starting temperatures.

4. See #3.

5. Shifting of the year labels on the graph by 2 years has no impact on the discrepancy between models and observations.

I hope the above helps to clarify why we plot the model-vs-observations comparisons the way we do.

NOTE: The above has been edited to better reflect who Marcel Crok received objections from.

NOTE: This is the seventh monthly update with our new Version 6.0 dataset. Differences versus the old Version 5.6 dataset are discussed here.

The Version 6.0 global average lower tropospheric temperature (LT) anomaly for October, 2015 is +0.43 deg. C, up from the September, 2015 value of +0.25 deg. C (click for full size version):

The global, hemispheric, and tropical LT anomalies from the 30-year (1981-2010) average for the last 10 months are:

YR MO GLOBE NH SH TROPICS
2015 01 +0.28 +0.40 +0.16 +0.13
2015 02 +0.17 +0.30 +0.05 -0.06
2015 03 +0.16 +0.26 +0.07 +0.05
2015 04 +0.08 +0.18 -0.01 +0.09
2015 05 +0.28 +0.36 +0.21 +0.27
2015 06 +0.33 +0.41 +0.25 +0.46
2015 07 +0.18 +0.33 +0.03 +0.47
2015 08 +0.27 +0.25 +0.30 +0.51
2015 09 +0.25 +0.34 +0.17 +0.55
2015 10 +0.43 +0.64 +0.21 +0.53

As can be seen, there was a rather large jump in the global average anomaly, but instead of it being due to the tropics being warmer (as El Nino continues), it was due to a very warm (but not record warm) month in the Northern Hemisphere extratropics.

(NOTE: Due to a typo on my part, the Sept. 2015 anomaly for the Northern Hemisphere was misreported as +0.14 C last month, when it should have been +0.34 C).

The global image for October, 2015 should be available in the next several days here.

The new Version 6 files (use the ones labeled “beta3”) should be updated soon, and are located here:

Lower Troposphere: http://vortex.nsstc.uah.edu/data/msu/v6.0beta/tlt
Mid-Troposphere: http://vortex.nsstc.uah.edu/data/msu/v6.0beta/tmt
Tropopause: http://vortex.nsstc.uah.edu/data/msu/v6.0beta/ttp
Lower Stratosphere: http://vortex.nsstc.uah.edu/data/msu/v6.0beta/tls

Most of the rain that fell on southeast Texas (up to 20 inches) will end up flowing into the Gulf of Mexico, a process which has already started.

Here is yesterday’s color MODIS image of the turbid water along the coast, compared to twelve days before. Some of the water is sediment-laden (tan color), while in other areas the water is relatively sediment-free (darker than normal). Click for full-size.

NASA MODIS imagery of Texas floodwaters entering the Gulf of Mexico.

As Hyper-Hurricane Patricia approaches the western coast of Mexico with 190 mph sustained winds, satellite imagery shows what is usually only seen in typically-stronger West Pacific typhoons — a very constricted eye (in the center of the imagery), roughly akin to an extremely large tornado (but different physics, I know):

MODIS color imagery of Hurricane Patricia with 190 mph maximum sustained surface winds.

Eastern Pacific hurricanes are typically not flown into with “hurricane hunter” aircraft, so it’s questionable whether this one really is a “record setter”…they flew into this one because it looked like it would be unusually strong. The intensity of these systems is usually estimated based upon appearance in satellite visible and infrared imagery, which is prone to error.

This one is the strongest “hurricane” (Atlantic or East Pacific nomenclature) they have happened to fly into. It’s doubtful that a stronger one hasn’t occurred in, say, the last 50 years which wasn’t flown into with aircraft.

A TV meteorologist named Greg Fishel (WRAL, Raleigh, NC) posted an article yesterday on their WRAL Weathercenter Blog entitled Choose science, stewardship in understanding climate change. In the blog post Mr. Fishel claims — I hope I am not putting words in his mouth — to have finally accepted human-caused climate change, and therefore encourages other conservative Christians like himself to put aside partisanship for the good of humanity and the Earth.

I actually agree with most of the science he presents, but I want to address why he is misguided in his conclusions.

Mr. Fishel got (at most) 1 in 3 correct

In order to actually do something about human-caused climate change, primarily caused by our carbon dioxide emissions from fossil fuel use, you must answer “yes” to the three following questions:

1. Do humans significantly contribute to climate change?

2. Does that human contribution have a demonstrably negative impact?

3. Can we do anything to significantly avert it with new energy technologies without causing human suffering?

Unfortunately, while Mr. Fishel spent most of his time on #1, he sort of skipped #2 and #3…or at least hasn’t spent much time researching them.

So, let’s take these three steps, one at a time.

1. Do humans significantly contribute to climate change?

I actually mostly agree with him on #1. I believe humans have caused maybe 50% of the recent warming of the oceans and the atmosphere, say since the 1950s since we have a published paper analyzing that time period. But Mr. Fishel seems to believe it was all caused by humans, since he says that “it can’t be the Sun”. Well, there are actually quite a few other possibilities, since even without humans the climate system changes all by itself. For example, a small change in ocean circulation can cause a small change in cloudiness. The recent multi-decadal period of stronger El Ninos by itself can explain about half of recent warming. Yes, the stratosphere has cooled, partly due to increasing CO2. But “weather” makes attribution of a human effect on tropospheric temperatures — where people live — much more difficult.

2. Does that human contribution have a demonstrably negative impact?
Here’s where Mr. Fishel has little to say. It has not been demonstrated that any kind of severe weather has increased because of our addition of 1 CO2 molecule to each 10,000 molecules of atmosphere over the last century. He ignores the benefits of mild warming (which likely isn’t even all our fault, and which has been demonstrably below computer model projections), as well as the benefits of more CO2 on the biosphere and agriculture (based upon satellite measurements of global greening and literally hundreds of agricultural experiments).

3. Can we do anything to significantly avert it with new energy technologies without causing human suffering?
This is where Greg Fishel appears to be the most misguided. Here’s a quote from his article:

“And on top of all of this, we hear the argument that it is economic suicide for the U.S. to act alone, and that we need the cooperation of China and India. Did you know both of those countries are leaving us in the dust when it comes to pursuing new technologies relating to energy production? Those countries see the economic opportunity and are going after it while we sit around and have politically partisan arguments.”

This simply could not be further from the truth.

In the lead-up to the Paris climate conference in December, China and India are basically thumbing their nose at the world on carbon dioxide emissions. They will continue to burn fossil fuels at an increasing rate.

There is no “magic bullet” green energy technology which can replace fossil fuels, period. Plus, wind and solar power are so expensive (and did I mention intermittent?) that to rely on them in any but isolated, special cases will hurt economies and make poverty worse, not better.

This is why green energy programs, where they have been tried, are now being abandoned as too expensive and provide too little return in energy production.

As I’ve said before, I really don’t care where our energy comes from…as long as it is inexpensive and abundant, because that’s what humanity requires. And I don’t care if the CEOs of every coal and petroleum company ends up disagreeing with me, and decide to join the ranks of the alarmists.

Since Greg Fishel invoked “Christ’s teachings”, let me do the same.

How can we provide for widows and orphans if we can’t even provide for ourselves?

Until new energy technologies are eventually developed — (the U.S. does not sit on our hands in alternative energy research) — the most moral thing we can do for humanity is to use fossil fuels.

(A good place to start for Christians who want to learn more about our options from a biblical world view is the Cornwall Alliance.)

There is no question that the flooding in South Carolina is exceptional, even historic.

But a once on 1,000 year event? Sorry, but there is no way to determine that…there are simply not enough rainfall statistics over a long enough period of time to establish such a claim.

But we do have information on previous floods over the last 100 years or so. So, let’s look at how the current event compares.

The greatest multi-day rainfall reported on the CoCoRaHS cooperative rainfall monitoring website was 27 inches in Columbia, SC. The Congaree River crested at 31 ft. there on Sunday:

Congaree River gage height at Columbia, SC.

Here’s a photo taken about the time the river crested:

Photo of Congaree River, Columbia, SC, Oct. 4, 2015, taken about the time of cresting.

Now, for comparison, take a look at a bridge over the Congaree River during the record flood of 1908, when the river crested at 40 ft…about 9 ft. higher than the current flood event:

Congaree River bridge in Columbia, SC, during the 1908 record flood event.

Not to discount the misery and likely billions of dollars of damage caused by the current event, but when someone claims that a weather disaster is 1 in a 1,000 year event, they need to back it up.

Unfortunately, there seems to be an trend toward classifying events as “1 in 1,000 years”, when there is no way of knowing such things. This is especially true for floods, where paving of urban and suburban areas causes increasing runoff, making river flooding worse for the same amount of rainfall. This is a big reason why flood events have gotten worse in the last 100 years…it has nothing to do with “climate change”.

For some areas the current flood is no doubt a 1 in 100 year event, or even worse. But remember, it is perfectly normal to have a 1 in 100 year event every year…as long as they occur in different locations.

That’s how weather records work.

UPDATE: (8:50 a.m. EDT Sunday, Oct. 4). As predicted, heavy rain has spread over much of SC during the night, and there are widespread reports of over 10 inches of total storm rainfall, with one of 24 inches (Mt. Pleasant, near Charleston). Columbia has received 8-10 inches, and heavy rain continues there. Unbelievably, the midnight GFS model run predicts an additional 12 inches of rain over much of central and southeast SC by mid-day Monday. I suspect we are looking at a catastrophic flooding situation in some areas.

The Pacolet River, South Carolina, flood of 1903.

As much as two feet of rain is expected in South Carolina this weekend, which could produce the worst flooding in the state since records began. Governor Nikki Haley has already declared a state of emergency for the state. For comparison, the worst SC floods on record occurred in 1903, 1908, 1940, 1945, and 1990.

Flooding has already begun in Charleston, where 5-7 inches of rain has accumulated as of this morning and some water rescues are being made. North Myrtle Beach has received 9.30 inches so far.

Here is the latest GFS model predicted rain totals by Monday morning (graphic courtesy of Weatherbell.com):

Total predicted rainfall by Monday morning, Oct. 5, from the GFS model.

Purple areas in the above image indicate over 12 inches of predicted rainfall.

So far, most of the rain has been restricted to the eastern half of the state where several inches have fallen, but the heavy rain will spread over the rest of the state today.

Local flood information for the Midlands of South Carolina from WLTX can be found here.

Current South Carolina radar

NOTE: This is the sixth monthly update with our new Version 6.0 dataset. Differences versus the old Version 5.6 dataset are discussed here.

The Version 6.0 global average lower tropospheric temperature (LT) anomaly for September, 2015 is +0.25 deg. C, down slightly from the August, 2015 value of +0.28 deg. C (click for full size version):

The global, hemispheric, and tropical LT anomalies from the 30-year (1981-2010) average for the last 9 months are:

YR MO GLOBE NH SH TROPICS
2015 1 +0.28 +0.40 +0.16 +0.13
2015 2 +0.18 +0.30 +0.05 -0.06
2015 3 +0.17 +0.26 +0.07 +0.05
2015 4 +0.09 +0.18 -0.01 +0.10
2015 5 +0.29 +0.36 +0.21 +0.28
2015 6 +0.33 +0.41 +0.25 +0.46
2015 7 +0.18 +0.33 +0.03 +0.48
2015 8 +0.28 +0.25 +0.30 +0.52
2015 9 +0.25 +0.14 +0.17 +0.55

The tropics continue to slowly warm with El Nino conditions there.

The global image for September, 2015 should be available in the next several days here.

The new Version 6 files (use the ones labeled “beta3”) should be updated soon, and are located here:

Lower Troposphere: http://vortex.nsstc.uah.edu/data/msu/v6.0beta/tlt
Mid-Troposphere: http://vortex.nsstc.uah.edu/data/msu/v6.0beta/tmt
Tropopause: http://vortex.nsstc.uah.edu/data/msu/v6.0beta/ttp
Lower Stratosphere: http://vortex.nsstc.uah.edu/data/msu/v6.0beta/tls