Unseasonably warm falls keep pushing back the season for the “Where’s global warming” spots on Fox News. F-4 Tornadoes in November tend to mitigate against the popular right wing meme.
But now we’re actually getting some winter weather, look for the inevitable “ah stuck mah haid outsahd, an’ it wuz snowin’, so there cain’t be no glow-bull warmin'”.
Below, Jerry Meehl of the National Center for Atmospheric Research discusses temp records, low and high.
Icon of the Great Folk Scare of the 1960s, Dave Van Ronk, does his signature piece.
Reportedly, Van Ronk was the inspiration for the Coen Brother’s new film.
When they’ve had a chance to live around wind turbines, and find out that they are quiet, clean, do not cause headaches, or herpes, as windbaggers claim – they quickly figure out who’s been lying to them.
A new survey finds that the wind turbines in Freiburg, Germany, are once again very popular after a brief concern over the impact on bats. The strangest thing was the timing of the bat issue.
A new survey conducted by the University of Freiburg (report in German) finds that approval of the city’s six turbines has risen from 65 percent when they were built to 80 percent today, further indication that acceptance of wind turbines increases when people live close to them.
Over time, the researchers say, initial concerns about the turbines possibly scaring away tourists died down when people realize that tourists keep coming unabated. Indeed, at one of Freiburg’s two sites with turbines, a tower for hikers and mountain bikers was also built directly next to four of the turbines, and it has become a popular attraction itself (see this video).
Continue reading “Wind Turbines: To Know ’em is to Love ’em.”
Reposting because in the space of the last few days, this video, posted just before Thanksgiving a few weeks ago, has become my most watched video, closing in on 100,000 views.
Right. Not exactly Gagnam Style, or even cute kitten territory, but not bad for a serious vid on a serious topic. The piece took off after it was posted first on BradBlog, from there to Upworthy, and then tweeted by Rainn Wilson, “The Office’s” Dwight Schrute.
Case study in small-time virality.
UPDATE:
If Tom Waits is too harsh, try this much smoother, but no less soulful, version by one of my favorite folky groups, the Spring Standards:
Continue reading “Music Break: Tom Waits “Come on Up to the House””
Go figure. Major corporations way ahead of the Tea Party base (I am shocked, shocked….).
Getting ready, and in some cases, actually imposing their own carbon limits – to make themselves more competitive.
The development is a striking departure from conservative orthodoxy and a reflection of growing divisions between the Republican Party and its business supporters.
A new report by the environmental data company CDP has found that at least 29 companies, some with close ties to Republicans, including ExxonMobil, Walmart and American Electric Power, are incorporating a price on carbon into their long-term financial plans.
Both supporters and opponents of action to fight global warming say the development is significant because businesses that chart a financial course to make money in a carbon-constrained future could be more inclined to support policies that address climate change.
But unlike the five big oil companies — ExxonMobil, ConocoPhillips, Chevron, BP and Shell, all major contributors to the Republican party — Koch Industries, a conglomerate that has played a major role in pushing Republicans away from action on climate change, is ramping up an already-aggressive campaign against climate policy — specifically against any tax or price on carbon. Owned by the billionaire brothers Charles and David Koch, the company includes oil refiners and the paper-goods company Georgia-Pacific.
The divide, between conservative groups that are fighting against government regulation and oil companies that are planning for it as a practical business decision, echoes a deeper rift in the party, as business-friendly establishment Republicans clash with the Tea Party.
Tom Carnac, North American president of CDP, said that the five big oil companies seemed to have determined that a carbon price was an inevitable part of their financial future.
“It’s climate change as a line item,” Mr. Carnac said. “They’re looking at it from a rational perspective, making a profit. It drives internal decision-making.”
This information comes from a recent report issued by the Carbon Disclosure Project, a nonprofit that specializes in organizing environmental information. The CDP report finds major oil companies, Wells Fargo, Wal-Mart, Walt Disney Company, automotive supplier Delphi, General Electric, energy companies like Duke, and even technology companies such as Google and Microsoft all including a future carbon price in their planning. The internal company projections range across industries, but generally it appears that the oil companies are forecasting the highest carbon prices in their internal planning, with BP pricing $40 per ton of carbon dioxide, Exxon Mobil $60, and Royal Dutch Shell $40.
Continue reading ““A Rational Perspective”: Corporations Prepare for Carbon Limits”
An ominous cloud rises over Superman’s icy man cave, the Fortress of Solitude, perhaps indicating that Lex Luthor is up to his dastardly tricks again.
Actually, it is completely natural, and nothing to do with supervillain antics. It is a lenticular cloud, which can be produced when air near the surface gets pushed upwards as it flows over peaks in the landscape, creating pressure waves. The clouds form at the top of the wave, where the air is coolest.
Continue reading “Due to Melting, Superman Relocates Fortress of Solitude to South Pole”
The other day I posted the crushing rebuttal from 5 for-realsies storm experts to the hapless pretend climate expert Richard Muller, who wrote in the fast-becoming-equally-hapless New York Times that “Tornadoes are getting weaker” due to climate change.
The major point being that due to changes in the way tornadoes are rated and recorded, there is no way to make such a claim about them, stronger or weaker. There is, however, an emerging body or research that tends to support the general strengthening of convective thunderstorms in a warming world.
Now one of those authors has co-written a letter to the same NYTimes.
Prof. Richard A. Muller (“The Truth About Tornadoes,” Op-Ed, Nov. 21) writes that “strong to violent tornadoes have actually beendecreasing for the past 58 years, and it is possible that the explanation lies with global warming.” However, a primary reason that the intensity of tornadoes has appeared to decline is that reporting has not been consistent over the period spanned by tornado records.
It is well known in the meteorological community that tornado intensities were overrated in the 1950s to 1970s and underrated in the last decade. For example, research-grade Doppler radars measured winds over 280 miles per hour, rated EF5 on the enhanced Fujita scale, in last May’s monstrous Oklahoma tornado that Professor Muller refers to. However, the official National Weather Service rating, which ignores the radar observations in favor of damage indicators, is EF3 (136 to 165 m.p.h.).
Because of the inconsistency in the records, it is not known what effect global warming is having on tornado intensity.
PAUL MARKOWSKI
HAROLD BROOKS
State College, Pa., Nov. 26, 2013Dr. Markowski is a professor of meteorology at Penn State University. Dr. Brooks is a senior research scientist at the National Severe Storms Laboratory.
We’re going to win this.
Continue reading “Music Break: Johnny Clegg – Asimbonanga – With Nelson Mandela”
Second time in a month. 140 mph winds this time.
Euro readers – weigh in.
