For Cliff Ollier to quote Monkton's response to Steketee was disingenuous given Steketee had absolutely demolished Monckton's arguments in his rebuttal of his response to Steketee's original piece. But that aside, while we can attribute the Queensland floods to La Nina, it was exacerbated by warmer ocean temperatures around the coast. Why higher ocean temperatures? Global warming. And such an extreme weather event has not been confined to Queensland. At the same time, Brazil lost over 600 people to a similar inland tsunami, while flooding has occurred along the Rhine and in Sri Lanka. Not that long ago the Pakistani floods killed over 1700 and displaced 20 million. 20 million people! The weather events are becoming more severe and more frequent (see Munich Re's press release from August 2010 http://www.munichre.com/en/media_relations/press_releases/2011/2011_01_03_press_release.aspx) as climate scientists have warned. I think it's time Cliff Ollier and his fellow denialists quietly went away, otherwise I'll support New York Times' columnist Paul Krugman who says denialists should be accused of treason.

"Sceptic" wastes no time

In abandoning his doubts

To preach denial

I dont see anything in your article that could justify your conclusion that the queensland floods are not related to anthropogenic global warming,

While many reckon the scientific arguments are complex, I believe at essence they are simple. To those that have an open mind my basic understanding summarises as follows:
1. Mankind is pumping huge amounts of carbon dioxide in to the atmosphere that would not otherwise be there (approx 30 billion tons a year) - fact.
2. This is changing the composition of our atmosphere - fact. While the percentage of the atmosphere that is carbon dioxide is small the percentage increase relative to pre-industrial levels is large.
3. There is a long held scientific view that this has acted and will continue to act to increase global temperatures around the world. One of the forecast outcomes is more extreme weather events. It is a fact that the vast majority of scientists in this field hold this view.

Given the scientific evidence that sea and air temperatures in the world are warming and that we now appear to be seeing an increasing number of extreme weather events around the world I dont see how anyone could logically say that a particular extreme weather event is not related (at all) to anthropogenic global warming.

Conversely its hard to see how anyone could say it is wholly due to anthropogenic global warming.

The safest statement would be to say that these extreme weather events are due to a combination of natural factors and man made factors, with the mix unknown.

This would mean that referring to these extreme weather events as "natural" disasters would be wrong. They are most likely a "partially manmade" disaster and I believe the media and those in the media such as Anna Bligh should change their terminology accordingly.

popnperish and rich2 - sorry but the author made several good points which you have not refuted or even touched. Floods in the 1880s and 1970s were far worse, so how can global warming be to blame for the current floods?

No the floods are due to the La Nina climate cycle - this is widley accepted - and very little is know about just how and why that cycle or its reverse, El Nino, occurs. At best, scientists can now spot the cycles developing. Linking any supposed changes in those cycles with any change in global temperatures is straight speculation.

Same with the North Atlantic Oscillation causing the very cold European weather.

I always think this table is useful to remember
Natural and Anthropogenic (man-made) Contributions to the "Greenhouse
Effect," expressed as % of Total
Based on concentrations (ppb) adjusted for heat retention characteristics % of Greenhouse Effect % Natural % Man-made
Water vapor 95.000% 94.999% 0.001%
Carbon Dioxide (CO2) 3.618% 3.502% 0.117%
Methane (CH4) 0.360% 0.294% 0.066%
Nitrous Oxide (N2O) 0.950% 0.903% 0.047%
Misc. gases(CFC's) 0.072% 0.025% 0.047%
Total 100.00% 99.72 0.28%

ie if people were really serious about global warming they would be draining the oceans and banning the use of water.

Why did we scare our kids with the CO2 death threat just to get them to turn the lights out and the thermostat down more often?
Pollution was real but this fear mongering wasn’t sustainable, especially for progressivism that preaches love and harmony.
Climate Change was a mistake, our Iraq War and is now dividing progressivism and environmentalism. The deniers won.
We need System Change, not Climate Change and let's act like real liberals again. Real liberals don't lick the boots of the likes of fat politicians as he promised to take our taxes and make the weather colder.
Let's admit the deniers won and admit our exaggerations and put this insanity behind us and get back to responsible stewardship of the planet.

The type of storms now circumnavigation the globe can be explained. What is causing the situation that needs to be explained.
Storms are set to become more severe and more frequent. Wether it be floods or drought we are in trouble.
Both polar ice caps are in demise, and increasing in thaw.
I can't understand someone that says nothing has changed, change has been increasing since the early 70's. The sun is more intense, skin cancer is rampant. Biggest fires ever, gigantic storms and weather all around the world.

BEWARE, THE LABYRINTH OF CLIMATE CHANGE SEMANTICS

Yikes!

Rich2, I feel your pain. Another poor soul lost in the labryinth of climate change semantics.

Folk once called phenomena of this type an act of God or bad weather; today alarmists describe it as an "extreme weather event" (EWE), and so on.

If, as you conclude, EWEs are indeed multi-causal, and caused by (i) (unspecified) "natural factors" - let's say "natural variability"; AND (ii) anthropogenic factors; then perhaps you can provide precise criteria that will enable us to identify what EWEs are due to each of your alleged "causes"; or at least what contribution each "cause" makes to the creation of an EWE?

If you can, Rich2, here's a (non-climate) prediction that will make you even richer. It is more likely than anything produced by a climate General Circulation Model (GCM): A Nobel awaits you, sir/madam.

Incidentally, if your "mix" is "unknown", on what basis are you advising the Queensland Premier to refer to what would normally be called a natural disaster as "partially manmade disaster"?

Perhaps I missed something in your argument? It does have some neat Carrollian twists and turns in it, like so much of today's CC discourse.

Attributing causality is a very tricky business, especially in a complex system like the Earth's climate - or the universe. That's why some folk a while back took the easy way out and invented "GOD" and "SATAN".

Is Nature - and climate - not in a constant state of change? Do descriptions of these processes of change (produced by experts in learned journals) really reveal anything infallible about its ultimate cause, or causes? If so, where are their Laws of Climate Change?

Alice (in Warmerland)

EQ
Your table is poorly set out and doesn't explain anything.
As for draining the oceans I ask where to? There is sufficient ocean water to cover the present land mass to a depth of 12km. Spread over the whole surface of the earth rather than just the present 70% the water would still be about 3km deep.

Rich2, did you actually READ the article you claim to be commenting on?

Ignoring the recent flood in Brisbane, there had been TEN other major floods in the Brisbane River since 1840. Read the graph. Of those, NINE were prior to 1920 tenth was in 1974. Please explain how that demonstrates any connection whatsoever with human emissions of carbon dioxide, most of which have occurred since the 1960s. And the floods of 1840 and 1893 were far more severe than the floods of 1974 or 2011.

Carbon dioxide is less than 0.04 per cent of the atmosphere by volume, with far lower global warming potential than water vapour at four per cent. Water vapour accounts for almost all of the so-called "greenhouse" effect.

Human emissions of carbon dioxide, after assuming about half is absorbed naturally, total about 1.5 per cent of atmospheric carbon dioxide by volume. That is, 1.5 per cent of 0.04 per cent. And Australia accounts for about 1.5 per cent of that 1.5 per cent. Do your own calculations. Then ask yourself whether the sun or human produced carbon dioxide is more likely to affect climate. Keep in mind that we wouldn't actually have a climate without the sun.

Oh, and temperature rises have historically PRECEDED increases in atmospheric carbon dioxide.

Hey, you got one thing right, it really is simple.

Popnperish, you obviously did not read Steketee’s non demolition of Monckton.

Steketee’s answer was to deny that he said any such thing. He further said, “I quoted Professor Nicholls as saying: “The reality is that we don’t know if there is a climate change component in it.”” .

Cliff Ollier has cleared that up. We do know that there is no “climate change” component in it, and Professor Nicholls is playing puerile games, as you are, popnperish.

There is no scientific evidence that human emissions have any measurable effect on climate. If you have a reference to any such science, pnp, the IPCC would love to have it. Their pathetic assertion at the moment is that it is “very likely”, based on their wishful thinking and on no scientific fact.

We are realists, not deniers, and it is about time you faced up to reality and stopped talking unsubstantiated AGW nonsense.

Rich2, you are about pnp’s standard of inability to comprehend that there is science which supplies answers and the answer is that there is nothing to support the AGW myth.

Foyle, it is a non solution to a non problem. Draining the oceans is as stupid a suggestion as the AGW assertion.

popnperish: "Why higher ocean temperatures? Global warming"

Higher ocean temperatures haven't occurred since the commencement of the Argos programme in 2003. But then there's been no atmospheric warming trend since 2003 either.

I think you'll find that any data showing higher sea surface temperatures in the Pacific are the result of the El Nino Southern Oscillation.

Dear Leo Lane
You ask for evidence of anthropogenic climate change. First there was Arrhenius who said that carbon dioxide in the atmosphere had a greenhouse effect, stopping some of the radiation hitting the Earth from being reflected back into space. Then there was Keeling on top of Mauna Loa in Hawaii, about as far from industrial centres that you can get, measuring atmospheric carbon dioxide. And the graph went inexorably up in an annual jagged way, reflecting greater absorption of carbon dioxide by trees in the northern summer. We have gone from 280 to 380ppm since the Industrial Revolution when we started pumping carbon dioxide into the atmosphere in a big way. Global warming is not all caused by volcanic activity - there is a large human component, from too many humans simply breathing out, to having too many farm animals belching methane (another greenhouse gas) or rice paddies spewing out methane, to humans burning fossil fuels in their factories and cars. So unless you can prove Arrhenius and Keeling wrong, you have to accept anthropogenic climate change.

Dear Australis. I understand that sea temperatures in the north eastern Indian Ocean near Australia were one degree higher prior to the recent floods and duly exacerbated the La Nina effect. As for global ocean temperatures, in 2009, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA), announced "...the global ocean surface temperature for June 2009 was the warmest on record, 1.06 degrees F (0.59 degree C) above the 20th century average of 61.5 degrees F (16.4 degrees C)." This "broke the previous record which was set in 2005, making last month the hottest since 1880 (when records began) when it comes to ocean surface temperatures."

Curmudgeon
Do you know what cognitive dissonance and confirmation bias is?

Alice in wonderland
Yes, there is uncertainty in ‘attribution’ literature and it is quantified. Not acknowledging that is akin to saying CO2 has no warming properties.

KenH
Tell us, do you also think a 30% increase in [CO2] in 200 years is trivial when compared to the blips in the last 800,000 years?

Do you know what a 'snowball earth' is, with no minuscule amount of CO2?

Oh, and temperature rises have NOT always preceded increases in atmospheric carbon dioxide - no matter that your furphy is trotted out all the time.

Leo
Do you agree with the eminent emeritus that Professor Karoly is not an expert and that the Lord Christopher Monkton is?

Australis
Probably more out of ignorance than malicious intent, you, like many, completely distort what the Argo research has found.

Heat content and ocean temperatures have been rising since the programme was deployed. See Levitus et al (2005), Domingues et al (2008), Wijffels et al 2008), Levitus et al (2009)

ALL consistent with the conclusions of Roemmich and Gilson (2009) AND substantiated by Josh Willis – who published his correction in 2008, overturning the errors and misinformation that people like you still rely on.

Yes, the SOI is very +’ve, as expected. But, warm anomalies in the western Pacific have continued to develop over the last four months, more than expected.

The Earth System is reacting to evermore energy being spewed into the air, oceans and terrestrial biosphere.

To assert that “there's been no atmospheric warming trend since 2003” is nonsense - you need more than 7 years of data for significance tests. But you knew that, right?

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2011/01/110113102154.htm

popnperish - the business about ocean temperatures making the la nina effect worse was either made up by you, or you took it from someone who made it up. The ocean cycles may (as I understand it) be due to temperature differences but as no-one really knows what makes these cycles tick, to say that overall higher ocean temperatures make them better or worse is straight speculation. No one knows.

As for NASA's pronouncements. Ocean temperatures are undoubtedly high at the moment so why are they high? global warmers insist that high concentrations of CO2 are somehow driving ocean temperatues, but skeptics point out that high ocean temperatures mean a lot of CO2 in the atmosphere. (Warmer water holds less CO2.)

You can pick your ground on that one but the business about overall temperature levels affecting cycles is straight speculation.

Curmudgeon

http://www.bom.gov.au/climate/enso/sub_surf_mon.gif

Hey bonmot

"Yes, there is uncertainty in ‘attribution’ literature and it is quantified." Not acknowledging that is akin to saying CO2 has no warming properties."

Quantified, yes, but....

An October 2010 critique of the IPCC’s evaluation of evidence and treatment of uncertainty by the InterAcademy Council noted (page 35, chapter 3), among other things, that “assigning probabilities to imprecise statements is not an appropriate way to characterize uncertainty. If the confidence scale is used in this way, conclusions will likely be stated so vaguely as to make them impossible to refute, and therefore statements of ‘very high confidence’ will have little substantive value.”

http://reviewipcc.interacademycouncil.net/report/Climate%20Change%20Assessments,%20Review%20of%20the%20Processes%20&%20Procedures%20of%20the%20IPCC.pdf

In a statement on 14 January 2011, the Congregation for the Causes of Saints said Vatican-appointed doctors had studied the case (of Marie-Simon-Pierre, bless her) "scrupulously" and determined her cure from Parkinson's disease had "no scientific explanation" and was therefore a miracle of the late Pope John Paul II, as she and her fellow sisters had prayed to him, also a Parkinson's sufferer. "Santo Subito!"

Is your hypothesis that anthropogenic global warming is the PRIMARY cause of "climate change", EWEs, etc, not a similar argument BY DEFAULT? "We don't know how else to explain it/them or what we think we are observing in Nature, therefore it must be due to anthropogenic carbon dioxide emissions."

But again, where are your - established and verifiable - Laws of Climate Change?

Only in Warmerland can a phenomenon - "climate change" - be both a CAUSE and EFFECT.

Alice (in Warmerland)

Interesting parallels between say the debate on the dangers of smoking (or the hole in the ozone layer) and the climate change debate. If we take smoking then firstly scientists proposed the link between smoking and cancer. Their work is validated by peer reviews but at the same time vested interests successfully spread doubt so the public is confused. Over time, many years, it becomes generally accepted that the link is there though it remains difficult to prove in absolute terms. However at some point the truth is obvious to just about all through their personal experiences. And so will it be with climate change......
With climate change we have the vast majority of scientists believing in anthropogenic warming and the forecast consequences of a destabilised climate. I can't think of one national scientific institute across the world that has publicly said it is flawed science. We have anecdotal evidence of people feeling that the climate is changing. We have science with a plausible reason why this might be. We have evidence that the climate is changing, from a seemingly endless string of extreme weather disasters and changing seasons. We have respected well known people saying they are convinced and concerned. The weight of evidence is building inexorably - but there may never be absolute proof in the same way that there isn't for smoking and cancer or for aerosols and the hole in the ozone layer.
Munich Re deal with reinsurance and their 3 Jan press release notes a total of 975 natural catastrophes in 2010, 90% of which were weather related like storms and floods, markedly exceeding the average for the last 10 years (785). They conclude by saying "The high number of weather-related natural catastrophes and record temperatures both globally and in different regions of the world provide further indications of advancing climate change". Not proof but adding to the weight of evidence. The suggested link between warmer seas noted in previous posts, likely caused by mankind, and the severity of storms impacting Queensland is not conclusive but again adds to the weight of evidence.....

Hey Alice
You want an answer about a hypothesis expressed in terms of a Law.
Yeah, right - just shows us how much you understand about the scientific process.
Byebye.

CLIMATE CHANGE CAN BE BOTH A CAUSE & AN EFFECT?

Hey Rich2

Interesting you begin your post with a red herring, Naomi Oreskes' preposterous thesis. As one of her targets S Fred Singer noted, her book is "shoddy and unprofessional." True historians of science "would present an UNBIASED account of the available FACTS and carry out sufficient DUE DILIGENCE to obtain such facts. In this case, we have little more than a polemic that expresses the considerable prejudices of the authors, particularly those of professor Naomi Oreskes."

Your worry about a "destabilisng climate" suggest (incorrectly) you believe there is a possibility of achieving Goldilocks climate that, like Heaven or some eco-Eden, will suit all folk from Tibuktou to Archangel.

Change is what climate does, and has done ever since the Earth acquired an atmosphere. Do you have any idea of the tremendous variations ver geological time?

Your Munich Re post is similarly revealing. Evidence of change tells little or nothing about WHY that change is occurring. Perhaps it's the translation, but for me the insurer's explanation confuses CAUSE and EFFECT.

In any case, are you seriously suggesting one can draw meaningful generalisations of this kind from a ten-year record? Even the (questionable) "standard climatological normal" is thirty years, 1961-1990.

Alice (in Warmerland)

Rich2 said: Given the scientific evidence that sea and air temperatures in the world are warming and that we now appear to be seeing an increasing number of extreme weather events around the world I dont see how anyone could logically say that a particular extreme weather event is not related (at all) to anthropogenic global warming.

Because it is not AGW causing it. It is not happening.The scientific evidence is definitely NOT IN.

Bonmot - thanks for the link but was there any point you wanted to make?

Rich2 - no the analogy doesn't hold. In the arguements over tobacco the tobacco companies did try to obfuscate the issues. In that case there was cearly plenty of funding for pro-tobacco research.

In contrast, in the climate debate, almost all the funding has flowed to pro-global warming science. Activists looking desperately for some evidence of funding from energy companies have only been able to find the odd $200,000 or 300,000 grants to lobby groups - derisory compared to the billions going into global warming research. (The Department of Climate Change's annual budget alone is around $80 million.)

The reason for this is that the climate stuff just does not affect the basic business of the energy companies the way that anti-tobacco material affected the tobacco companies. At worst, strident activism may slightly reduce the rate of growth of energy consumption. Makes more sense for energy companies to be seen to be green.

http://www.bom.gov.au/cgi-bin/climate/change/timeseries.cgi?graph=sst&area=aus&season=0112&ave_yr=9

Ocean is where most of the mass is, so the SST Anomaly is most relevant.
ENSO is getting most of the coverage but Indian Ocean dipole is at extraordinary levels, as is the Antarctic Ocean indexes. This is no surprise as the models *expect* the climate to change, so this means the main driving structures will start behaving differently.

Air temps are impacted by tropical flows to the poles, and pole air flowing to the tropics:->snowstorms in Europe, drought and floods all "attributable" to changing climate. ("Causation" is different story)

The title is clearly wrong: All weather is *related* to anthropogenic global warming...provided one is not one of the faithful who denies with 100% confidence. How "related" is a tricky science question which very few have the facts and expertise to discern.
Have fun with the "I reckon..." games!

Cliff Ollier makes 3 statements which he says refute the notion that global warming is in any way connected with the Queensland floods of 2010/11. He says that:

1. scientists are not agreed on the causes of the floods and that it is difficult to attribute global warming to a single climate event:

You may disagree with my view that increasing CO2 emissions are largely responsible for global warming. That does not mean that global warming is not happening. Indeed you can only prove it isn’t by ignoring empirical evidence which shows that it is.

Scientists disagree over many things but that fact does not mean there is no evidence which clearly points to the effects of global warming having some connection with the floods.

We know that sea surface temperatures around Australia have been at a historic high and that globally, 2010 has been the second hottest in the hottest decade. That heat has drawn moisture from the ground into the atmosphere, causing drought conditions over much of Australia. High moisture content strengthened the effects of the strong La Nina which became established in 2010. That combination produced the torrential rains resulting in the Queensland floods of 2010/11.

2. floods have occurred before CO2 induced global warming, so you can’t blame it for the floods which have just occurred.

Floods have indeed occurred in Brisbane before global warming was evident. The worst of these occurred in 1893 and 1974. Those floods resulted from large cyclonic rain depressions. The 2010/11 floods did not. They were caused by very high moisture in the lower atmosphere being concentrated and falling as torrential rain over a vast area of the State.

This was not just a Brisbane flood. Over 40 towns and cities were flooded, killing people and destroying food crops, property and livestock.

We should ask ourselves how such high moisture content got into the atmosphere. The answer is that high temperatures evaporated surface water from both land and sea. What caused those high temperatures?
Global warming - or some other cause Cliff Ollier does not explain?

3. Global warming can not be responsible for both drought and floods.

Anyone can make such statements but when a scientist does so he is required to offer proof of what he is saying. Cliff Ollier offers none.

In any case he is wrong. Warming climate increases the risk of both drought and floods but at different times and/or places. For example in 2002 Europe suffered from widespread floods, followed in 2003 by drought and record heat waves which killed 35,000.

There is growing empirical evidence that warming temperatures cause more intense hurricanes, heavier rainfalls and flooding, increased conditions for wildfires and dangerous heat waves.

In one respect, Ollier is right. It is difficult to attribute global warming as the cause of a single climate event. Here we are no longer talking about a single, isolated event but rather a growing number of severe climate events, all of which have one thing in common – global warming and its effects on other factors which determine climate and weather.

Several bloggers have referred to warming ocean currents having played a part in the recent floods. The BoM however, says that there is no warming at present; that we are in the midst of a La Nina which is actually a cooling event.... http://www.bom.gov.au/climate/ahead/ENSO-summary.shtml

And it will contnue they reckon for several months yet.

Other ACC acolytes,and general scaredy-cats, have tried to make out that all the dough given to the BS scamsters investigating their favourite delusion has allowed them to somehow predict a Bad Moon Risin', and trouble on the way. Which then leads to the claim that we should do something about it!!

OK. So all the Penny Wongs who threw money around because the Murray Darling...and all other rivers in Australia....would be bone-dry forever were doing the right thing eh? They were accurate weather/climate predictors as a result of the money given to every Climate Change scamster with their hand out, eh?

Most interesting in all this, is that the bloggers here who now reckon they saw the rain coming...because that's what the theory says...never told us (or Penny, or Kevvy, or Greg, or Peter)what they now reckon was all so clear. When all those ALP/Green idiots were telling us the drought was permanent, the "legends" on this blog weren't setting them straight.

Hmmm. At the racetrack when some tipster gets it wrong...and then says "yeah I knew that other one would win" I don't pay them much attention. I certainly wouldn't be comfortable with a tipster telling me that his "Computer-based modelling" had shown that every horse will win!!

I suppose I haven't got the DNA to be that gullible; explains why I'm not happy paying billions to scamsters who can only tell me "the weather may or may not be different next year" either. Cheers.

Punter57
You misread BOM - perhaps unintentionally.

http://www.bom.gov.au/climate/glossary/lanina.shtml

Australia lies in the western Pacific Ocean (not central or eastern).

You also seem to confuse sub surface ocean temperatures with sea surface temperatures.

This is is the temperature profile off the coast of Australia for the last few months.

http://www.bom.gov.au/climate/enso/sub_surf_mon.gif

Sub surface ocean temperatures have been getting warmer (look at the red bits). It has been higher than normal.

La Niña events for Australia does mean increased rain. Warmer waters off the coast, coupled with a string of low pressure cells, make even more rain. Walker and Hadley cell activity have exacerbated an already tenuous situation.

The potential for extreme floods are higher than normal - you can bet on it.

If punters (including politicians from all persuasions) don't want to look at the odds given by BOM, so be it. They'll lose.

NEVER BET ON ANYTHING THAT TALKS

Hey bonmot

"If punters (including politicians from all persuasions) don't want to look at the odds given by BOM, so be it. They'll lose."

Will the weather in 2015, 2020, 2050 or 2100 be fine, cold or apocalyptic? Punters are urged to weigh the balance of probabilities carefully. They should note this track wisdom too: “never bet on anything that talks”.

Alice (in Warmerland)

Warwick Hughes has spotted a neat trifecta: whether it be rain, maximums or minimums, the BOM gets it wrong.

For this spring the Australian BOM predicted it would be dry and warm, instead we got very wet and quite cold. The models are so bad on a regional basis, it’s uncannily like they are almost useful… if they call things “dry”, expect “wet”.

On August 24 the Australian BOM had pretty much no idea that any unusual wetness was headed their way. Toss a coin, 50:50, yes or no. Spring 2010 was going to be “average”, except in SW Western Australia where they claimed “a wetter than normal spring is favoured.” What follows were 100 year floods, or at least above average rain to nearly every part of the nation bar the part that was supposed to be getting more rainfall. In the chart below, all shades of “blue” got above average rainfall. The dark blue? That’s the highest rainfall on record.
The rainfall deciles chart original is here.

http://jonova.s3.amazonaws.com/graphs/australia/australian-rainfall-spring-2010.gif
On August 24 the BOM predicted that spring would be “hot across the north”. Instead it was cold everywhere except in the west of WA.

Australian Spring Maximum temperatures
Warwick Hughes linked to this unusually candid report of BOM seasonal rain forecasts (Vizard 2005). More »

Agnostic of Mittagong - look, I dunno where you got the business about the 70s floods in Brisbane being due to a cyclonic high or whatever it was, but if you look again you'll find its an old explanation. At the time they didn't know about the la nina - el nino cycle so that was the explanation they gave.. both floods are due to la ninas.

ozandy - as I've repeated to the others, no one knows what makes this climate cycle tick so trying to attribute a not so exceptional flood (historical floods have been higher) to high temperatures is a waste of time. As for the IPCC forecasts, the panel most emphatically did not forecast river floods. They equated forecast higher temperatures (which also haven't occured) with droughts.. the Brisbane river should be down to a trickle.. not in flood.

In September, BOM issued this:

“The Australian rainfall outlook for the December quarter (October to December) favours wetter than average conditions over large parts of the continent, with strongest odds across northern Australia...

The October to December outlook is the result of warm conditions in the Indian Ocean and cool conditions in the equatorial Pacific Ocean, both of which are associated with the current La Niña event.”

http://www.bom.gov.au/climate/ahead/archive/rainfall/20100923.shtml

What happened was this:

http://tinyurl.com/6zvcf4a

I don’t expect Alice (or her fellow Travellers in Novaland) has complained to BOM – their response would clear her confusion up. My guess, she wants to stay mired in wonderland.

If she wants to complain about BOM’s predictions, she should make one here:

GPO Box 1289
Melbourne VIC 3001
(700 Collins Street,
Docklands)
Tel: (03) 9669 4000
Fax: (03) 9669 4699

Next, Alice conflates weather and climate in typical ‘wonderland’ fashion:

“will the weather in 2015, 2020, 2050 or 2100 be fine, cold or apocalyptic?”

She is confused, most people know there is a difference between predicting short term chaotic noise (weather) and long term smoothed trends (climate).

Apologies to Charles Dodgson, the impostor's dim.

.

Curmudgeon
<< As for the IPCC forecasts, the panel most emphatically did not forecast river floods. They equated forecast higher temperatures (which also haven't occured) with droughts.. the Brisbane river should be down to a trickle.. not in flood. >>

Read that slowly and tell us you're serious ... with a straight face.

People that live where there is humidity will not notice The intensity of the sun. Live where you get clear heat and you notice the difference.
Floods across five states, something to look forward to.
We know there is warm sea one side and cool see the other side, what is causing this, is what we want to know. Record floods around the globe, i am sure the conditions on either side of AU is not causing world events.

The Brisbane floods of 1893 and 1974 both resulted from a cyclonic rain depression. This was not the cause of the 2010/11 floods and let us be clear, here we are not talking about Brisbane or even Australian floods but to widespread floods which have occurred in Sri Lanka, Southern Africa, Eastern Australia, Brazil and other places.

The cause of these floods has been the build-up of water vapour in the lower stratosphere during the last El Nino event, exacerbated by global warming making the build-up much larger than usual.

Water vapour is of course the most powerful of greenhouse gases and its build-up contributed to heightening the warming effects of the 2009/10 El Nino.

This was followed by mid-2010 by onset of a La Nina, a cooling event which, coming into contact with record build-up of water vapour, has resulted in record precipitation, largely in the southern hemisphere due to the Coriolis effect.

Those doubting this explanation should offer an alternative explanation and ask themselves: since what came down must have initially gone up, what made it go up in such volume if not atmospheric warming and if the latter, what caused it if not global warming induced by the greenhouse effect?

Ensuing floods point to two things predicted by climate scientists: 1. A growing severity in the number and frequency of extreme climate events and: 2. Greater climate sensitivity to temperature increase than previously indicated by climate models.

AoM
nit-pic 1. "lower stratosphere" should be: lower troposphere
nit-pic 2. "Greater" (climate sensitivity) could be better stated: instead of 2 - 4.5 degrees C, more like 3 - 6 degrees C
nit pic 3. "temperature increase" should be: doubling of [CO2]

Bonmot - the 2007 IPCC report did not include climate cycles at all - in part because they are not yet predictable. They most emphatically did not forecast anything like these floods - quite the reverse. If you believe otherwise, then what forecast are you relying on? In that sentence you quote I'm talking about the IPCC forecasts, not what actually happened. Obviously teh river is in flood, not a trickle, so the IPCC forecasts are looking sorry.

agnostic of mittagong - that's better, but the only known theory about changes in the strength or otherwise of the la nina - el nino cycle relates it to another, longer cycle called the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO). The PDO is now in its "cool" mode which emphasises la ninas. (NASA has issued various releases on the PDO if you want to look it up.) Why is it in its cool mode, as opposed to its warm mode? No one rally knows, but they know its flips from one mode to the other every 30 years or so. Expect strong la ninas for the next 20 years or so.

CHORUS OF CONCERNED RABBITS

Of all the beasts that God allows
In the green and grassy fields of Warmerland,
Most bonmots dislike the cows?
Their noxious eructations should be banned.
Yes, we most of all dislike the cows;
Their bovine flatulence we just can’t stand!
Let’s drive them from our grassy land.
All the other naughty ruminants should go too.
We’ve given it a lot of thought. What else are we to do?
They must be exiled somewhere. Why not France?
Millions go there every year, if given half a chance.

bonmot

".....Most people know there is a difference between predicting short term chaotic noise (weather) and long term smoothed trends (climate)."

Thanks for contact details. Most helpful. Are you a BOM employee?

Just love your probability maps. They adorn the walls of Warmerland's most sacred temples.

"Will the climate in 2015, 2020, 2050 or 2100 be fine, cold or apocalyptic?”

Perhaps you can share your OZ decadal "climate" predictions for this century with us?

But then, according to http://royalsociety.org/climate-change-summary-of-science/

“The ability of the current generation of models to simulate (not forecast) some aspects of regional CC is limited, judging from the spread of results from different models; there is little confidence in specific projections (not forecasts) of future regional climate change, except at continental scales.”

Incidentally, why is the 1961-1990 period accepted as your standard 'climatological normal'? Why is this "long-term smoothed trend" deemed to be "climate"? Is thirty years long-term? Why? By learned convention?

Alice (in Warmerland)

Bonmot ...... Thanks

Curmudgeon
You've demonstrated on the other thread

http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/user.asp?id=59360

that you do not have the capacity to find a report, let alone read and understand it. It’s all there, really.

Wait, conspiracy - the IPCC put up a false report because some science writer over in OZ is snooping.

Alice
Nice link, pity you do what curmudgeon does, cherry-pick and read into it only what you want to read into it – another case of cognitive dissonance and confirmation bias.

For the benefit of all, here is the link to the Royal Society again – I suggest it be read (and understood) in its entirety.

http://royalsociety.org/climate-change-summary-of-science/

Alice in wonderland, Australia is indeed a continent and we can project what Australia’s climate might be like given a number of scenarios, regardless that they do need to be revisited. Moreover, we have more data than ever and have access to more computing power. Stay tuned for AR5.

It's worth repeating, weather is not the same as climate - you seem to have difficulty with that concept.

AoM
To clarify my view, I think the temperature range for a doubling of [CO2] will narrow (i.e. uncertainty will decrease) rather than shift to a higher range.

Agnostic of Mittagong

Hi Agnostic

You write:

"Ensuing floods point to two things predicted by climate scientists: 1. A growing severity in the number and frequency of extreme climate events and: 2. Greater climate sensitivity to temperature increase than previously indicated by climate models.”

It would warm the hearts (and minds) of Warmerlanders if you could answer the following questions.

1.

Which climate scientists said this? Name three.

How did they define ‘extreme climatic events’?

How did they define ‘severity’?

How did they measure the frequency of ‘extreme climatic events’?

Over what period were the measurements taken?

2

Which climate scientists said this? Name three.

How did they define ‘climate sensitivity’?

How did they measure the ‘severity’ of climate sensitivity?

If climate sensitivity increased, how did they relate it to increase in temperature rather than, for instance, increase in CO2, sunspots, or polar bears?

Which models are you referring to?

Have they ever been tested?

Thank you.

Alice of Warmerland

Agnostic of Mittagong

Alice in Wonderland is following the copybook advice from her Queen of Hearts – Ms Joanne Nova – viz: the “Surgical Strike”:

1. Stick to the points that matter.
Alice shuts her eyes tight, covers her ears with her hands, and screams like a raving banshee “I can’t hear you”.
Ergo, she only wants to see and hear what she only wants to see and hear, regardless of the points that matter.

2. Ask questions.
Alice can’t do the homework herself so is relying on you (unlikely expert in all the climate sciences) to slip up. She will then shriek at the top of her lungs ‘gotya, na-na-nee-na-na’ and so will therefore debunk the whole of climate science.

3. Global warming and greenhouse are different.
Well, duh ... as if the Queen of Hearts and her fiefdom has discovered something that real scientists haven't known about.

4. Deal with the bully-boy.
I empathise with you Agnostic; the bully-girl is picking on you now.

Agnostic, if you want to feed the troll, go ahead – but the precious lady really doesn’t want to go to (let alone understand) the published research herself. Rather, she will 'hit' you with short, sharp, sound-bites that she's gleaned from her favourite anti-global warming blog site, or her favourite MSM shock-jock.

You may be interested in this interactive site:

http://zvon.org/eco/ipcc/ar4/#w_0

There are a number of ways to explore the reports, test the site yourself – it can quickly take you to any area of AR4, and it cross-references. For me, I make use of the referenced papers at the end of each chapter – not only for my own research, but to shed light on the nonsense that people living in Wonderland spew out.

There’s even a glossary of terms.My guess, our precious Alice in Wonderland hasn't gone there – unlike a real sceptic.

Curmudgeon

You go from this:

<< As for the IPCC forecasts, the panel most emphatically did not forecast river floods >>

to this:

<< the 2007 IPCC report did not include climate cycles at all >>

Seems to me you’re trying to weasel away (change the goal posts).

What the IPCC did ‘forecast’ (in AR4) was:

“A warmer climate, with its increased climate variability, will increase the risk of both floods and droughts ...

... Floods include river floods, flash floods, urban floods and sewer floods, and can be caused by intense and/or long-lasting precipitation...

... Floods depend on precipitation intensity, volume, timing, antecedent conditions of rivers and their drainage basins (e.g., presence of snow and ice, soil character, wetness, urbanisation, and existence of dikes, dams, or reservoirs)...

... Human encroachment into flood plains and lack of flood response plans increase the damage potential ... etc, etc.”

Curmudgeon, there is a veritable wealth of information in AR4 that you obviously haven't looked at.
Wait, maybe you can't find AR4 either? Pesky IPCC, hiding their reports again :)

Oh yeah, you state (to AoM) “Expect strong la ninas for the next 20 years or so.”

Why might that be?

Bonmot ….. Again, thank you.

The http://zvon.org/eco/ipcc/ar4/#w_0 is very good as is the most recent index to Skeptical Science provided by http://zvon.org/eco/ss/.

Alice will no doubt make good use of both to satisfy her curiosity.

A genuine thanks to you, Bonmot, for persisting with the Wonderland crowd...

It's people like you that keep me sane.

AoM: backatcha

popnperish: it's people like Alice that keeps me sane :)

I think Alice is an abuser .... of intellectual honesty

By the way, whoever asked why the 1974 floods were bigger than the 2011 one, it is now recognised that, without Wyvenhoe dam, the 2011 flood would have been 1.5 metres higher. http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/brisbane-saved-from-ruin-by-dam/story-fn59niix-1225992598096

“Gold” –Noooo! Bonmot.

THIS IS GOLD.

1) "Recent coordinated efforts, in which numerous general circulation climate models have been run for a common set of experiments, have produced large datasets of projections of future climate for various scenarios.... It is thus unclear by how much the confidence in future projections should increase based on improvements in simulating present-day conditions, a reduction of intermodel spread, or a larger number of models....Last, there is little agreement on metrics to separate “good” and “bad” models, and there is concern that model development, evaluation, and posterior weighting or ranking are all using the same datasets. While the multimodel average appears to still be useful in some situations, these results show that more quantitative methods to evaluate model performance are critical to maximize the value of climate change projections from global models."
http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?article=11519#196433

2) “The ability of the current generation of models to simulate (not forecast) some aspects of regional CC is limited, judging from the spread of results from different models; there is little confidence in specific projections (not forecasts) of future regional climate change, except at continental scales.”
http://forum.onlineopinion.com.au/thread.asp?article=11483#195902

Well done, Alice Thermopolis.

Bonmot, the earlier one you shouted EUREKA! over was merely fools gold (FeS2.) —better luck next time,eh!