maribo

Why I am opposed to Northern Gateway

2012-02-05T17:27:00.000-05:00

After a few months of thinking, I came to the conclusion that there is no choice but to oppose the construction of the Northern Gateway pipeline. There are many worthy arguments on either side of this issue, from the economy to First Nations rights, and from the preservation of the BC coastline to the reality of oil consumption here and abroad. My argument, presented in the Mark, is entirely about climate:

If the Harper government were not so consistently obstinate on federal climate policy, people like me (a climate scientist who has long been wary of the NIMBYism of environmental groups) might not become vociferous opponents of projects like Northern Gateway. We are forced to oppose individual carbon-intensive projects because the government refuses to listen to scientific or economic reason on climate change.

My compromise solution is a federal carbon pricing system.

A carbon-pricing system, like those of British Columbia and Australia, would not necessarily prevent pipeline construction. Rather, it could allow the market to decide whether the costs of a new pipeline outweigh the benefits, and ensure that any emissions from such new projects are more than compensated for by cuts elsewhere. This would also help Canada slowly transition towards a 21st-century economy, based on innovation and our plentiful renewable resources, without ignoring extractive industries of our past.

I encourage people to read, consider and comment on this argument. It is not based on concern about the direct effect of an individual pipeline like Northern Gateway on the physics and chemistry of the climate system. The approval of an individual project, and for that matter, the overall expansion of oil extraction in Alberta, would not specifically be - physically or chemically speaking - "game over" for the climate, as some have claimed. They could, however, lead us down the wrong path.

Absent a federal effort to manage carbon emissions, there will be a pitched battle over every new pipeline and every new coal-burning power plant. Many of those seeming slam dunks, like Keystone XL, will clang off the rim. We could keep fighting like this forever. Or we could work together on a federal climate policy.

Who to trust about climate change

2012-02-01T16:15:00.000-05:00

My sister is a neurologist. She's highly active in her field and is often asked by the media to comment about her particular area of expertise within the field of neurology.

It is great having a sibling who is a medical doctor. Though she and I do technically both have the title "Doctor", I have zero medical expertise, outside of some wilderness first aid, and maybe little random bits I've gleaned from various sports-related accidents and drinking the water in the wrong village during a field trip. When something medical comes up, I call my sister. She listens, humours me, and provides general advice. But if it is anything important, or that anything is not neurological, she tells me to see my family doctor, who is better equipped to either diagnosis and treat the ailment or refer me to a specialist who can.

That's the gist of today's Wall Street Journal op-ed from 38 climate scientists, including myself. It was written in response to an earlier misleading op-ed about climate change by 16 scientists who were speaking far outside their field of expertise.

Do you consult your dentist about your heart condition? In science, as in any area, reputations are based on knowledge and expertise in a field and on published, peer-reviewed work. If you need surgery, you want a highly experienced expert in the field who has done a large number of the proposed operations.

The original op-ed argued that "There's no compelling scientific argument for drastic action to 'decarbonize' the world's economy". It's important to deconstruct that statement. Had the authors of that op-ed only argued against action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions, I would disagree with them, but not protest the publication of their op-ed.

What those 16 scientists did, however, was very different. They took advantage of their scientific credentials to raise questions about the evidence for climate change, using ad hominem attacks and analogies in place of math, before arguing against action to reduce emissions. Their credentials, though certainly legitimate in their fields, simply do not extend to all areas of science, just as my sister is not an expert in all areas of medicine.

Our response reminds the readers what the actual experts in the field of climate science think:

The National Academy of Sciences of the U.S. (set up by President Abraham Lincoln to advise on scientific issues), as well as major national academies of science around the world and every other authoritative body of scientists active in climate research have stated that the science is clear: The world is heating up and humans are primarily responsible. Impacts are already apparent and will increase. Reducing future impacts will require significant reductions in emissions of heat-trapping gases.

It concludes with a response to the original op-eds plea against action on emissions:

It would be an act of recklessness for any political leader to disregard the weight of evidence and ignore the enormous risks that climate change clearly poses. In addition, there is very clear evidence that investing in the transition to a low-carbon economy will not only allow the world to avoid the worst risks of climate change, but could also drive decades of economic growth. Just what the doctor ordered.

Andrew Revkin argues that with this final statement, which mixes science with economics and policy, we are speaking outside our area of expertise:

The reality for most of the signatories of the rebuttal letter is that they are more akin to medical technicians — making sure the thermometers gauging a fever are reliable — and radiologists — interpreting a CT scan — than diagnosticians prescribing the appropriate treatment.

The difference, I would argue, is twofold. First, some of the signatories to the letter actually conduct research at the interface of science (diagnosis, in Revkin's example) and policy (treatment). Second, we recommend a very general response to the diagnosis (reduce emissions) rather don't prescribe a particular treatment. Certainly an X-ray technician, after seeing hundreds and hundreds of X-rays and working with doctors over the years, is justified in telling a patient "Hey, you should probably put some type of a cast on that broken leg".

Cafe Scientifique, next Tuesday, at the Railway Club

2012-01-26T21:50:00.000-05:00

I've got a gig next week at the Railway Club, the fantastic music venue at the corner of Dunsmuir and Seymour in downtown Vancouver. Don't worry, I'm bringing my laptop, not the guitar I have not played (well) in years. I'll be talking about coral reefs as a part of Café Scientifique Vancouver. C'mon down!

Here's the description:

"Beyond Nemo: Coral reefs in a warming world"

Coral reefs, often called the rainforests of the ocean, are thought to be more sensitive to climate change than any other ecosystem on the planet. Drawing on his research in the Central Equatorial Pacific nation of Kiribati, Simon Donner will talk about the effects of changes in climate and ocean chemistry on tropical corals and the potential for adaptation.

Rolling with the punches

2012-01-25T19:11:00.000-05:00

In a short article on the Yale Forum on Climate Change and the Media, Keith Kloor compares online climate change discourse to a "roller derby" and a "street fight"

Taken together, the intimidation tactics of climate science bashers and the new pressure campaigns, by allies of the concerned climate community, promise to, if nothing else, ratchet up the rhetoric of both sides and deepen the politicization of global warming. Just what the public discourse doesn’t need. Meanwhile, the conflict-loving media will eat it up and stoke the fires.

For climate campaigners and their adversaries, the escalating war of wits is a fait accompli. They are not constrained by how they might be perceived by the public at large. But the stakes are higher for the climate science community, which must defend itself against scurrilous attacks while staying above the fray. Not an easy balancing act.

I've written and spoken about the need for humility among climate scientists and climate bloggers countless times in the past two years. A recent academic paper of mine on history, belief and climate communication concluded with this statement:

Reforming public communication about anthropogenic climate change will require humility on the part of scientists and educators. Climate scientists, for whom any inherent doubts about the possible extent of human influence on the climate were overcome by years of training in physics and chemistry of the climate system, need to accept that there are rational cultural, religious, and historical reasons why the public may fail to believe that anthropogenic climate change is real, let alone that it warrants a policy response.

Ironically, online "coverage" of that paper drew some amazingly angry and personal comments. Had I followed the ethos of the Nature editorial (which Keith cites) arguing that climate scientists need to realize they are in a street fight, then I suppose I would have fought back in kind.

To what end? You don't change the tone of the discussion by spewing venom. I am interested in the long game here. I certainly hope the same is true for other climate scientists. Better we make the effort to understand why people are so angry about this issue than we win cheap short-term points by responding in kind to every slight. Even if our siblings wish we did (sorry sis).

If climate discourse is a street fight, then we need to do more than fight back. We need to learn how to take a punch.

You've got mail, skeptical mail

2012-01-18T12:43:00.002-05:00

Last week, my colleague Hisham Zerriffi and I each received an envelope full of photocopied articles, from the Wall St. Journal and other sources, and various scribblings all attacking the scientific evidence that humans are primarily responsible for recent climate change.

Receiving mail from an ardent skeptic of climate change is not unusual for us scientists. Over the years I've got small envelopes, large envelopes, handwritten notes, phone calls, all-cap e-mails and no shortage of nasty online comments. I'll guess that Hisham and I were not the only people studying climate change to receive copies of this particular material (let me know in the comments).

This package was unique, however, in one important way. The return address - no name was given - was "One Physics Ellipse" in College Park, Maryland.

A retirement community for physicists, you ask? Well, sort of.

One Physics Ellipse is the Corporate Headquarters for the American Institute of Physics. The AIP, like most scientific bodies on the planet, has as policy endorsed the scientific evidence that humans are contributing to climate change.

While it is true that not all of its members agree on that statement, scientists and certainly physicists are not exactly pros at speaking in one voice, I do find it odd to receive a package of "skeptic" material, much of which was downright silly (CO2 emissions don't "rise"), from the actual headquarters.

Adapting to milder winters

2012-01-12T22:33:00.000-05:00

Just before the holidays, I posted this short video about how the shrinking lake ice "season" across much of the Northern Hemisphere is one of the clear physical signs of climate change, and might affect the holiday tradition in my family.

This year, there was no skating or hockey for us. The lake was frozen, but just barely thick enough for one person to walk around. A pile of people on skates was out of the question. The mild daytime temperatures led to some mixed precipitation, which made for a very thick, mushy surface which would have been terrible for skating anyway. That wet sleet and snow also knocked down a lot of trees.

So, in what you might call a bit of climate adaptation, we took advantage of the great packing snow to build this pretty solid snow fort (on land). It was New Year's Eve, so we did a flag-raising and candle-lighting ceremony for the kids in the family. I could just barely reach to light those candles

Here's the video again, in case you missed it:

The airing of grievances

2011-12-26T18:31:00.000-05:00

A large number of folks spent December 24th and 25th writing rather animated responses to the post of our short video on climate change and lake ice. In honour of traditional Festivus "airing of grievances", I've published many of the comments, and will continue to do so, even though in many cases I disagree with the contents, the tone and the writer's choice to remain anonymous.

A number of comments, however, were rejected because they were in extremely poor taste. I try to keep a civilized tone on the blog. Regular readers will know that on the blog and in my professional work I consistently argue that climate scientists should be humble and use civilized tone. I expect the same from commenters. Let's have an adult conversation and not resort to anonymous personal insults.

In light of this episode, there will be no more anonymous comments on Maribo.

Climate change and the holiday season

2011-12-22T18:49:00.000-05:00

This short video, made with the help of my great undergraduate assistant Cory Kleinschmidt, tells the story of how climate change might be affecting a holiday tradition among many Canadian families, including my own.

60 Minutes on Coral Reefs and the challenge of depicting ocean acidification

2011-12-20T12:35:00.000-05:00

This weekend's 60 Minutes featured this great segment on coral reefs, in which a well-protected "Gardens of the Queen" in Cuba are used a possible example of a resilient reef ecosystem.

The segment touches on coral bleaching, though perhaps not with the authority or depth that is warranted by science. What's most striking, however, is that the segment does not even mention ocean acidification.

I'm sure the media conspiracy theorists might claim this all as evidence a U.S. network shying away from discussing "controversial" subjects like climate change. But I suspect something else is at play, and it is something that science communicators everywhere need to consider. This is television - you need engaging, interesting video. Just how do you film ocean acidification? It's a slow, invisible process, nothing like the exciting action shots of the host and scientists diving among sharks and lionfish.

This is not a criticism - it is a challenge. What are the best ways for documentarians to capture the effect of changing ocean chemistry on coral reefs?

Why would Canada withdraw from Kyoto before the end of the year?

2011-11-29T18:33:00.000-05:00

Timing is everything, they say.

If the timing of this rumoured decision by the Canadian government to officially withdraw from the Kyoto Protocol near the end of December - rather than to remain a part of Kyoto and just continue ignoring the provisions - strikes you as curious, I strongly recommend reading Andrew Leach's post on the subject. He points out Article 27 of the Kyoto Protocol (bold is mine).

1. At any time after three years from the date on which this Protocol has entered into force for a Party, that Party may withdraw from this Protocol by giving written notification to the Depositary.
2. Any such withdrawal shall take effect upon expiry of one year from the date of receipt by the Depositary of the notification of withdrawal, or on such later date as may be specified in the notification of withdrawal.

It's been suggested that Canada will withdraw to avoid "non-compliance". The 2008 - 2012 Kyoto compliance period officially ends on December 31, 2012. After that, the math will be done to determine whether each country met their emissions targets.

If Canada withdraws before December 31, 2011 then Canada's withdrawal will be official before the compliance period ends, and Canada will, to be a scientist and use a double negative, not be considered in non-compliance. In other words, the Canadian government just a few weeks to play its get out of jail free card.

Coming clean: new e-mail leak proves climate change is a hoax

2011-11-24T14:32:00.000-05:00

One of the complaints I always here about politics is that we focus on the horse race and the scandals, rather than the actual issues that affect people's lives.

What I find depressing about the Climategate the sequel is not the theft of private e-mails, the fact that the e-mail correspondence is irrelevant to the general scientific understanding of climate change, the quite deliberate and obvious timing of the release, the bombastic coverage in some corners of the media and the blogosphere, the further revelation of the catty nature of a number of top scientists in my field, or the possible encouragement of future theft of private e-mails.

What I find is depressing is that, once again, the e-mail release is serving the purpose of the perpetrators: the blogs and the media are writing about the "scandal", rather than the actual issue at hand - the negotiations in Durban. Certainly, say your piece about this silliness, but then let's move on to the real questions. The world's governments are meeting to discuss long-term greenhouse gas emissions targets, reducing deforestation and forest degradation, and how to provide and manage climate change aid to the developing world. Let's talk about it.

Climate change aid and the upcoming Durban summit

2011-11-22T14:55:00.000-05:00

The next UN Climate summit - technically the 17th "Conference of the Parties" to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change - starts in less than a week in Durban, South Africa. The issues on the agenda, including the debate over continuation of the Kyoto architecture for emissions targets which did not include targets for developing nations, are contentious. The debate about the emissions targets, summarized briefly in a Nature News piece, will likely dominate the coverage of the summit here in North America.

But the other, equally complicated and arguably as important, issue is the management and operation of the proposed $100 billion per year in climate change financing, which we discuss in our new article in Science (also see good recent coverage in Climate Wire and the Vancouver Sun, as well as the Canadian Press and Agence France Press; you may also contact me for a copy of the paper).

Success in planning the Green Climate Fund, the proposed body that will manage a significant proportion of the $100 billion per year, is critical to building the public and political will to provide the funds and to ensuring there are real results on the ground. It is also could be critical to creating the unity necessary to tackle the other contentious issues; as Timmons Roberts argued in the Nature News piece, the promise of funding to respond to climate change is one of the things that kept the developing countries at the negotiating table.

More on managing climate change aid

2011-11-18T10:27:00.000-05:00

A primary goal of our work, published in Science, about managing climate change financing is to encourage the parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change to learn from the failures and successes of international aid in the design of the "Green Climate Fund". We argue that the initial $30 billion in "fast-track" financing to the Green Climate Fund represents an opportunity to demonstrate that funding pledges will be met, waste and misappropriation will be minimized, and the money will support the most effective climate change projects. This is critical in building the public and political will to meet the long-term pledge of mobilizing $100 billion per year by the year 2020.

Stories about this work are beginning to appear in the Canadian and international media, including Agence France Press, the Canadian Press (here via the CBC), the Vancouver Sun and elsewhere. For the most part, the articles I have seen capture some of the key points in our research paper, but as is always the case, there are important nuances to the research that can be missed from only seeing the short media articles.

There's one point in particular that I'd like to clarify: The lede of CP wire story, which appears in some publications, says "The UN's past record of suddenly injecting vast sums of money into countries to solve a problem doesn't bode well for the future of the massive Green Climate Fund say three University of British Columbia professors."

On this point, I must be clear: our work does not specifically mention or target the past practices of the United Nations or its agencies (nor, for that matter, does it state that the GCF is already being mismanaged). In the article, we look at evidence from across the whole international aid world, and provide advice for managing the GCF based on that evidence.

Raising, managing and disbursing international aid is inherently challenging, regardless of the organization or agency involved. Learning from the recent history of international aid can help ensure that the funding pledges are met and that the money provides real results in the developing world.

Science: Managing climate change aid

2011-11-17T14:29:00.004-05:00

My colleagues Milind Kandlikar, Hisham Zerriffi and I have an article in Science about managing the funding that has been pledged to help the developing world respond to climate change.

Here's the UBC press release:

In advance of a major United Nations climate conference, University of British Columbia researchers are recommending how to manage a $100 billion annual commitment made by the international community last year to help the developing world respond to climate change – a funding promise almost equal to all existing official development aid from major donor countries today.

In today’s issue of Science, three UBC professors – Simon Donner, Milind Kandlikar and Hisham Zerriffi – argue that the aid commitment made by developed nations at last year’s United Nations climate conference is unprecedented and that the world must learn from the troubled history of international development to ensure that countries meet the commitment and provide real actions on the ground.

“Climate change is expected to have a much greater impact on people in the developing world, even though they are least responsible for the problem,” says Donner, an assistant professor in the Department of Geography and faculty associate in the Liu Institute for Global Issues at UBC. “This funding is critically important. We need to make sure the money is provided and supports real action.”

The international community’s pledge to mobilize $100 billion in “new” and “additional” funding annually by 2020 was an agreement made at last year’s United Nations climate meeting, the 2010 Cancun Conference of the Parties to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change. The international community will review proposals for the management and operation of this program at a meeting in Durban, South Africa, beginning on November 28.

“The Cancun aid commitment represents a large influx of money into an international aid system already fraught with problems,” says Zerriffi, an assistant professor and the Ivan Head South/North Research Chair at Liu Institute for Global Issues. “To be effective, mechanisms must be established to ensure that the funding is administered wisely so that it can be sustained through political changes and economic constraints.”

Donner, Kandlikar and Zerriffi provide specific recommendations for ensuring that countries meet the funding commitment, that waste and misappropriation are minimized and that money is directed to the most effective programs. These guidelines include instituting an “adaptive” regulatory system to close funding loopholes, employing a decentralized network of third-party auditors and adopting a scientific approach to evaluating program effectiveness.

“Randomized control trials – a form of scientific experiment – are being increasingly used to improve outcomes in a wide range of development initiatives, from local governance to child education and infectious disease prevention,” says Kandlikar, an associate professor at the Liu Institute for Global Issues and the Institute for Resources, Environment and Sustainability at UBC. “The use of such trials could be very beneficial in improving climate change outcomes.”

The climate change funding, which amounts to more than twice the annual lending by the World Bank, is expected to flow through various channels, including a new Green Climate Fund (GCF) being discussed at the upcoming Durban climate summit. The UBC researchers say that careful stewardship of the initial “fast-track” funding to the GCF is critical.

“We can’t afford to make mistakes in the next few years,” says Donner. “That will sap the public and political will to support this incredibly important long-term initiative.”

New paper: Making the climate a part of the human world

2011-11-08T18:43:00.001-05:00

The full version of the promised paper on climate change and belief is out in the latest issues of BAMS (pdf).

New data on carbon emissions per capita

2011-11-07T15:03:00.001-05:00

To follow up Friday's post, I put together a chart of per capita emissions, based on the CDIAC's preliminary 2010 fossil fuel CO2 data and the estimated population. The per capita emissions were calculated using the most up-to-date source of population data I know (Wikipedia!).

The chart includes roughly the top twenty fossil fuel CO2 emitters in the preliminary 2010 data, shown in order from top (China) to bottom. Once again, keep in mind this is preliminary data and does not include other emissions from land use change or emissions of other greenhouse gas emissions.

The chart serves as a reminder that despite large increases in total emissions from fossil fuels over the past several years, countries like India, Indonesia and Brazil still have very low per capita emissions compared to North America. China has become an interesting in between, with per capita emissions still far below that of North America, but rivalling some European countries.

The simple calculation of per capita emissions is potentially misleadings, and raises a number of questions about attribution. If China is manufacturing goods for the North American market, should some of China's CO2 emissions be attributed to North America? Also, how is energy use and emissions distributed within each country? Is the per capita emissions value skewed by a very unequal distribution of wealth? [I'll let the Occupy movement tackle that one]

Stunning new carbon emissions data

2011-11-04T07:00:00.001-04:00

The headline from the Associated Press "Biggest Jump Ever in Global Warming Gases" tells part of the story. The preliminary estimates of fossil fuel carbon dioxide emissions for 2010 from Oak Ridge National Laboratory reveal what appears to be a quick rebound from the global financial crisis. Carbon dioxide emissions from fossil fuel burning and cement production increased 6% from 2009 to 2010, driven in large by by China. This was the largest one-year (and total) increase in carbion dioxide emissions in the Oak Ridge data.

If you drill into the numbers, which can be found here, you discover how economic turmoil, international development and, yes, maybe even a push to low-carbon economy in some countries, is changing the world. In the 2010 data (top right), China is by far the top emitter, ahead of the U.S., and India is now in the third spot. Of course, this ranking does not take population into account; the per capita emissions in China, and especially India, are far lower that that in the U.S. and Canada.

What is even more striking is the change over the past three years. I've plotted the percent change from 2008 to 2010 for the same "top twenty" countries (bottomr right). Here you can see that fossil carbon emissions increased rapdily in the major developing economies - China, India, Indonesia, etc, emissions from all of the major emitting countries in the developed world decreased. The industrialized nations that ratified the Kyoto might actually come close to reaching the emissions reductions targets set back in 1997 (we need to wait a couple more years to know for sure). Emissions growth in the developing world, however, is outpacing predictions, so total global emissions continue to increase. This will undoubtedly trigger further arguments about the value of the developed world actions without commitments from the developing world, and counterarguments about equity and sustainable development.

A final note: There are two very important things to keep in mind when looking at these charts. First, this is only carbon dioxide. Despite the use of the plural gases in AP headline, the data is just carbon dioxide. The country-by-country breakdown might be a bit different if the metric were carbon dioxide "equivalent", the catch-all term in which the radiative effect of methane, nitrous oxide and the other greenhouse gases is convered into units of carbon dioxide. Second, this is only from fossil fuel and cement. Again, the numbers would be different if greenhouse gas emissions from land use change were included. For one, Indonesia, might vault up the list, at least to sixth spot, probably even higher.

My "outtakes" from 24 Hours of Reality

2011-11-03T22:38:00.001-04:00

Check out the latest issue of UBC Reports for my brief "outtakes" story about participating in the Climate Reality Project with Al Gore. A snippet:

Once the make-up was done and the microphones were attached, the segment producer led us out to the stage and assigned us seats on the couch. I was last. “Simon, take the end there, and Mr. Gore will sit beside you before we go live.”

Wonderful, I thought. Thanks for the warning.

Once you are there, click over to the story about the brand new Centre for Interactive Research on Sustainability, the "greenest" building in North America. It is a really amazing place.

Climate in the era of humans

2011-10-26T20:01:00.000-04:00

The latest episode of the radio show and podcast Big Picture Science is all about the idea that we have entered the "anthropocene" or era of man. The guests include William Steffan, talking about the anthropocene concept, and a host of others including yours truly discussing the evidence that humans are changing the climate, and how we can best describe that evidence to people.

On a related note, the Yale Climate Media Forum has a story up about whether culture matters in discussing climate change, based on my upcoming publication on belief and climate change.

Can we make the climate a part of the human world?

2011-10-20T17:18:00.003-04:00

A new paper of mine, about to be published in the October issue of BAMS (Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society), looks at how the common, ancient human belief that the weather and climate are out of human control affects education and outreach about human-caused climate change. I outlined these ideas and my outreach message at a talk earlier this year. An early online version of the paper is available.

The article could really be a book, and, in fact, it may become one in a year or two. It grew out of several years of interdisciplinary research, involving everything from reading history and religious texts, to interviewing religious leaders, to participating in outreach programs, to donning a sulu and attending church in Fiji.

Here's the core argument:

Skepticism about anthropogenic climate change may therefore be reasonable when viewed through the lens of religion or the lens of history. In order to create a lasting public understanding of anthropogenic climate change, scientists and educators need to appreciate that the very notion that humans can directly change the climate may conflict with beliefs that underpin the culture of the audience.

I briefly trace the history behind this argument, and provide some modern evidence for the influence of belief on acceptance of the evidence for climate change. Despite what William Briggs, a critic of the early online release, my argument is not purely about religion, rather it is about the sense that the climate is to large to be affected by humans. This idea that we are small compared to the grand forces of nature and the atmosphere may be encoded in a structured belief system, or it may drive people's desire to climb mountains and stare at the view from the top.

Even in secular communities, a broad sense that forces beyond humans control the climate may partly explain the persistence of the argument that natural forcings like solar activity are the primary cause of observed 20th century climate change despite overwhelming scientific evidence to the contrary.

I conclude with two broad suggestions for reforming climate change education and outreach:

Climate change outreach efforts need to address the perceived conflict between the scientific evidence and deeply ingrained cultural perceptions of climate. First, the development of human beliefs about climate should be added to educational materials and lesson plans. Existing education and outreach efforts rarely acknowledge any thinking about climate or climate change prior to the Svante Arrhenius’ 1896 study on atmospheric carbon dioxide and temperature....

Second, educators and scientists should take lessons from approaches used in teaching of evolution, another subject where science can appear to conflict with pre-existing beliefs. Pedagogical research on evolution finds that providing the audience with opportunities to evaluate how their culture or beliefs affect their willingness to accept scientific evidence is more effective than attempting to separate scientific views from religious or cultural views.

The paper concludes with a message that I am regularly repeating at scientific forums, and will continue to write about at Maribo:

Climate scientists, for whom any inherent doubts about the possible extent of human influence on the climate were overcome by years of training in physics and chemistry of the climate system, need to accept that there are rational cultural, religious and historical reasons that the public may fail to believe that anthropogenic climate change is real, let alone that it warrants a policy response. It is unreasonable to expect a lay audience, not armed with the same analytical tools as scientists, to develop lasting acceptance during a one hour public seminar of a scientific conclusion that runs counters to thousands of years of human belief.

Climate change debates and flags of convenience

2011-10-18T23:04:00.000-04:00

One of the perverse thrills of paddling in Vancouver is cozying up to the massive container ships parked out in English Bay (right). A little while back, I paddled past one rusting behemoth with the word "Monrovia" painted in white on the red hull. Each letter was about the size of my little kayak.

Monrovia is the capital of Liberia, the country where that vessel is registered. There is no thriving trade between Liberia and western Canada. Merchant ships merely register in Liberia in order to avoid regulations and to reduce costs. Liberia is the flag of convenience.

As a scientist, I sometimes find the challenge of communicating about climate change similar to that of operating a ship according to the rules of your native country while the "competitors" take advantage of the lawless wilds of other nations.

People opposing the basic science of climate change in the public sphere need not adhere to the slow, rigorous method of hypothesis testing or build coherent arguments over time based on the balance of published evidence. That provides the rhetorical advantage of adopting whatever "flag" or argument is convenient that week, whether about sunspots, an error in an IPCC report, or temperature trends on Mars. If the argument is proven false in the court of public opinion, you adopt another flag. The sequence of arguments does not have to be logically consistent. The goal of the organized sceptic movement* is simply to keep the ship sailing.

The temptation for scientists to adopt the practices of the opponents in the debate is what the late Steve Schneider described called the "double ethical bind" in a famously mis-used quote:

On the one hand, as scientists we are ethically bound to the scientific method, in effect promising to tell the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but – which means that we must include all doubts, the caveats, the ifs, ands and buts. On the other hand, we are not just scientists but human beings as well. And like most people we’d like to see the world a better place, which in this context translates into our working to reduce the risk of potentially disastrous climate change. To do that we need to get some broad based support, to capture the public’s imagination. That, of course, means getting loads of media coverage. So we have to offer up scary scenarios, make simplified, dramatic statements, and make little mention of any doubts we might have. This “double ethical bind” we frequently find ourselves in cannot be solved by any formula. Each of us has to decide what the right balance is between being effective and being honest. I hope that means being both

The response to that honest, clear assessment of the communications challenge says enough. For years, that one line about offering up "scary scenarios" was itself a Liberia to many of Schneider's opponents.

It can be challenging to stay level-headed about communication in the face of often unscrupulous opposition. That's why I find that the keys to communication about climate change are not the usual suspects of technical expertise, passion, ability to drop jargon, etc. etc. In my experience, successfully communicating about climate change takes, more than anything else, patience and humility.

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* Note: It's important to separate the funded movement from individual people's doubts about the science of climate change, which can be grounded in science, culture, religion, politics, moral values, you name it. And there are vocal sceptics who rely on a consistent line of argumentation; perhaps Lindzen's earlier arguments about the water vapour feedback could fall in this category, though it's fair to say that ship has since migrated to other shores.

Nutrient limitation missing from an otherwise good NY Times story on forests and climate change

2011-10-02T21:14:00.000-04:00

The NY Times published a lengthy article about the climate implications of the forest diebacks and fires. It is, on the whole, a great and all-too-rare example of longform science journalism.

The article does miss one important point about CO2 fertilization, the increase in plant growth thought to come from adding more CO2 to the air.

Climate-change contrarians tend to focus on this “fertilization effect,” hailing it as a boon for forests and the food supply. “The ongoing rise of the air’s CO2 content is causing a great greening of the Earth,” one advocate of this position, Craig D. Idso, said at a contrarian meeting in Washington in July.

Dr. Idso and others assert that this effect is likely to continue for the foreseeable future, ameliorating any negative impacts on plant growth from rising temperatures. More mainstream scientists, while stating that CO2 fertilization is real, are much less certain about the long-term effects, saying that the heat and water stress associated with climate change seem to be making forests vulnerable to insect attack, fires and many other problems.

The CO2 fertilization effect is limited, because plants require more than just CO2 to do their job: photosynthesis. Water is certainly a limiting factor, but nutrients are just as important. In experiment after experiment, scientists find that the CO2 fertilization effect is short-lived without additional inputs of nutrients, particularly nitrogen.

One of the reasons CO2 fertilization may have accelerated plant growth in parts of Europe and North America over the past few decades may be the fact that we've inadvertently been fertilizing the plants with nitrogen, as well as CO2. We'll actually be talking about this in GEOB400 in a couple weeks. For the 6.7 billion or so of you who were unable to register this semester - yes, yes, the class is too small, I hear that all the time - I wrote about this on Maribo a few years ago, in a cross-post with Eli and Tamino:

One culprit is carbon’s chemical sibling nitrogen, that’s #7 on your periodic table if you’re scoring at home. Like many siblings, carbon and nitrogen are quite co-dependent, and, one might argue, a bit resentful about the whole thing. Carbon fixation - photosynthesis, plant growth – is limited by the availability of nitrogen. Though only up to a point. If there’s too much nitrogen, things get saturated, and the carbon-based plants pout and refuse to grow more.

You might find it strange that nitrogen is limited, given that N2 or di-nitrogen gas makes up the majority of the atmosphere. However, N2 is unreactive. It only becomes available to plants when converted to reactive form by microbes. In the process of making fertilizer and burning fossil fuels, we not only have increased the rate at which this conversion happens, leaving more nitrogen in our soils and waterways, we've emitted nitrogen in other reactive, gaseous forms, like nitrogen oxides or NOx...

The folly of broad statements about adapting to climate change

2011-09-26T21:53:00.001-04:00

In my climate change course, we devote a week to discussing climate and past civilizations. Among the goals of that week is to erase the notion that climate change is inherently "bad", or inherently "good", from the student's minds. The effects of climate change on any system, whether a society or an ecosystem, depends on the adaptive capacity and the rate of the climate change. The same climate change that spelled the end of the Norse settlements in Greenland did not affect (ed. crowd-sourced copy editing) the well-adapted Inuit of the region.

A recent, and controversial, book hypothesizing that the Easter Islanders were not done in by "ecocide", as argued by Jared Diamond and most archaeological evidence suggests, led to some discussion about the societal resilience to climate change. All roads lead to climate these days, I guess.

Judith Curry concludes a post on the subject with this statement, which supports a dangerously simple view of adaptation to climate change:

Occam’s razor suggests that we should tend towards simplest theories. However, in complex coupled social-ecological-environmental systems, simple theories are almost certain to be too simple. The complexity of such coupled systems precludes simple cause-effect analyses. If we are arguing about such a system on the scale of Easter Island, what hope do we have of understanding and managing such interactions on continental or even global scales? Ecosystems eventually adapt to climate change and insults from humans.

The comments about Easter Island notwithstanding - we argue about places like Easter Island because it all happened in the past and thus evidence is disputable, not because we can't understand complex systems - this statement concludes with exactly the type of simple, blanket view of complex problems that we should be teaching students to avoid. Theories like "Ecosystems eventually adapt to climate change and insults from humans" are indeed too simple!

Ecosystems do adapt. In a broad sense. But the question is not if they can eventually adapt, because we don't live in eventually. And, regardless of the time frame, we must remember that adapt itself is a vague term. To estimate the impacts of climate change, or other human insults, in the real world, we need to delve deeper and dispense with the vague generalities:

1. Define eventually: At what rate can the system adapt? Is the change happening faster than ecosystems, or people, can adapt such that they stay in the present state?
2. Define adapt: What exactly does adaptation look like? Say, coral reefs can "adapt" (in a collective, rather than an individual biological sense) to climate change by killing over the less resilient species and growth forms. That, for example, may be what is happening in South Tarawa where I do field work. You've got reefs dominated by a single, weedy species, and little habitat diversity. This new adaptation may not be desirable for those who depend on the ecosystem.

That's science. You don't just assume away an answer ("oh, we'll be just fine") based on a pre-conceived notions of what's "good" or "bad". You gotta analyse the data, do the math, unpack how the system works.

Climate change: An accounting problem

2011-09-22T01:51:00.001-04:00

The latest RealClimate post, which describes the latest ice melt data from Greenland, features this really important figure. It illustrates an issue that arises every semester in my climate change course, and is, in a sense, fundamental to understanding to biogeochemical cycles and issues like why carbon is accumulated in the atmosphere.

The figure shows model-based annual anomalies (thanks ED) of snowfall (reddish-orange), water loss through surface melt and runoff (yellow) and net accumulation of mass (blue), all in Gt/yr. The key point is that an ice sheet shrinks not simply because it is melting (yellow), but because the loss of water through melt (yellow) is greater than the gain through snowfall (red). The difference is the change in mass (blue). It is an accounting problem; like your bank account, you need to look at the debits and the credits to know whether the balance is changing.

This is the same fundamental concept that underlies carbon dioxide accumulation in the atmosphere, and as MIT management expert John Sterman has shown, befuddles most people. Carbon dioxide is accumulating in the atmosphere not simply because we are burning fossil fuels and clearing land, but because the flux in to the atmosphere from those sources is greater than the flux out (to land, and the oceans).

As an aside, in my climate change course, one of the many ways we discuss these points is by watching the infamous "CO2 is life" advertisements created a few years back by the Competitive Enterprise Institute. The "Glaciers" video cites scientific evidence for snowfall-driven growth of ice sheets in the interior of Antarctica to suggest that ice sheets around the planet are not shrinking. The mistake in the ad is that in order calculating whether an ice sheet is shrinking, on net, you need to do the full accounting of all inputs (from snow) and all the outputs (from melt), not just cherry pick one part of the ice sheet, or one flux in or out.

The CEI ads, by the way, are hilarious. If you've not seen them, you really must. They are well worth two minutes out of your day; the Onion News Network couldn't have come up with fake ads that funny.

24 Hours of Reality, 365 days a year

2011-09-20T12:26:00.000-04:00

If you missed it live, all of the videos from the 24 Hours of Reality are available online. Pick a region of interest and watch the video. Each hour is comprised of a short introductory video, a local speaker delivering a variation of Al Gore's presentation about climate change, followed by a panel of experts back at the studio talking about the science and the issues.

The panel members rotated throughout the 24 hours based on expertise, and who could stay awake. Kudos to Paul Higgins from AMS for doing the overnight shift as well as some of the daytime panels. It's worth watching the highlights from multiple hours and/or watching multiple panel discussions, as the rotating cast made for some fascinating and interesting conversations. I was a part of panels that included Al Gore and four scientists (Kotzebue, Alaska, Hour 4) as well as mix from academia, broadcasting the UN, Hollywood and NGOs (French Polynesia, Hour 5; Dubai, Hour 16).