So, Have They Figured Out That Global Warming Is Real?
November 7th, 2011 | 
Author: Is it really true that the earth’s climate is getting warmer?
According to what is called the “scientific consensus,” the answer is yes, and human activity is the cause. However, skeptics have questioned this conclusion, variously arguing that the climate isn’t really warming (or at least not as much or as fast as the consensus view asserts); or that if it is warming, human activity is not the cause; or that if human activity is the cause, it won’t necessarily have calamitous effects.
I’ve examined this controversy in previous articles here at ThomasNet Green & Clean – see “Does the Public Really Believe Humans Are Causing Climate Change?,” “All This Wrangling Over Climate Change – What’s Up With That?,” and “The Climate Change Controversy – What’s It Really About?”
The Study That ‘Settles the Climate-Change Debate’?
What brings me back to this topic is a recent announcement from the Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature (BEST, a.k.a. Berkeley Earth) project claiming that “global warming is real.” A study released on Oct. 20, 2011, “finds reliable evidence of a rise in the average world land temperature of approximately 1º C since the mid-1950s.”
The announcement was trumpeted as ‘the scientific finding that settles the climate-change debate‘ and as the ‘unraveling’ of ‘the war on climate science.’
Richard Muller, co-founder and scientific director of Berkeley Earth Surface Temperature
According to the organization, BEST undertook the study “to analyze current global surface temperature records in order to respond to concerns of critics and calm the debate about global warming.” Critics had argued that previous measurements of surface temperature could be skewed because, among other reasons, many of the monitoring stations were near artificial heat sources (in urban areas, for example). The new study uses data from a great many more temperature measurement stations and corrects for possible distortions.
The research was funded in a nonpartisan way by a group of sources, including the Folger Fund, the Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Bill Gates’s Fund for Innovative Climate and Energy Research (created by Bill Gates), the Bowes Foundation, the Koch Foundation, and the Getty Foundation.
Richard Muller, scientific director of BEST and principal author of the study, wrote in the Wall Street Journal Oct. 21, 2011 (see “The Case Against Global-Warming Skepticism”),
When we began our study, we felt that skeptics had raised legitimate issues, and we didn’t know what we’d find. Our results turned out to be close to those published by prior groups. We think that means that those groups had truly been very careful in their work, despite their inability to convince some skeptics of that. They managed to avoid bias in their data selection, homogenization and other corrections.
Global warming is real. Perhaps our results will help cool this portion of the climate debate. How much of the warming is due to humans and what will be the likely effects? We made no independent assessment of that.
Has Global Warming Stopped?
Judith Curry, climatologist at Georgia Institute of Technology
However, a little over a week later, a report emerged that one of the co-authors for Muller’s study, Judith Curry, was accusing him of “trying to mislead the public by hiding the fact that the BEST research shows global warming has stopped.” In the Daily Mail on Oct. 30, 2011, under the sensational title “Scientist who said climate change sceptics had been proved wrong accused of hiding truth by colleague,” David Rose wrote,
“In fact, Prof Curry said, the project’s research data show there has been no increase in world temperatures since the end of the Nineties …
“‘There is no scientific basis for saying that warming hasn’t stopped,’ she said. ‘To say that there is detracts from the credibility of the data, which is very unfortunate.’”
But then, the same day Rose’s article appeared in the Daily Mail, Curry seemed to backtrack from the positions attributed to her in the article. She wrote in her blog that she wasn’t accusing her colleague Richard Muller of hiding the truth. Her criticism was about his style of publicizing the BEST results. She writes,
“Hiding the truth” in the title is definitely misleading, I made it pretty clear that there was uncertainty in the data itself, but the bigger issues are to analyze the data and interpret it. I made it clear that this was not a straightforward and simple thing to do.
I told Rose that I was puzzled by Muller’s statements, particularly about “end of skepticism” and also “We see no evidence of global warming slowing down.”
…this is NOT a new scandal. An important new data set has been released. Some new papers have been posted for comments, which are not surprisingly drawing criticism and controversy. The main issue seems to be Richard Muller’s public statements. All this does not constitute a new scientific scandal in any way.
Some skeptics have asserted that data show global warming has stalled during about the past 13 years. Berkeley Earth argues that such time periods are too short to indicate real trends in climate change. Responding to the question “Has global warming stopped?,” the organization offers the following chart of land surface average temperatures for the last six decades:
(Chart Courtesy of Berkeley Earth.)
The researchers explain that the graph shows the results of their analysis with one-year averaging to smooth it. The blue line represents the data and the gray line represents the group’s 95 percent confidence limits. The group writes that:
The large fluctuations up and down that take place every few years correlate very strongly with the North Atlantic temperatures (the AMO index) and with El Nino (ENSO index 3.4)… The presence of these fluctuations makes any strong extrapolations from short-term behavior uncertain.
To those who argue that global warming has stalled, the researchers respond,
Some people draw a line segment covering the period 1998 to 2010 and argue that we confirm no temperature change in that period. However, if you did that same exercise back in 1995, and drew a horizontal line through the data for 1980 to 1995, you might have falsely concluded that global warming had stopped back then. This exercise simply shows that the decadal fluctuations are too large to allow us to make decisive conclusions about long term trends based on close examination of periods as short as 13 to 15 years.
David Whitehouse of the Global Warming Policy Foundation (GWPF), a think tank focused on “the contested science of global warming,” argues that the BEST data confirms the halt in global warming. He writes,
When examined more objectively Best data confirms the global temperature standstill of the past decade. That the standstill should be present in land-only data is remarkable. There have been standstills in land temperature before, but the significance of the past decade is that it is in the era of mankind’s postulated influence on climate through greenhouse gas forcing. Predictions made many times in the past few years suggest that warming should be the strongest and fastest in the land data.
Whitehouse displays a chart based on BEST data purporting to show that surface temperatures were flat from January 2001 to May 2010.
However, the science commentator who blogs under the pseudonym “Tamino” says that Whitehouse’s analysis is faulty. In his post, Tamino shows that if you remove the highly-uncertain data from April and May 2010, the trendline from 2001 to 2010 actually rises. He shows other analyses of the data that could easily indicate a rise in temperature over the past decade.
This, Tamino writes, “shows just how mistaken, how foolish, how downright boneheaded it is to say that ‘There is no scientific basis for saying that warming hasn’t stopped’” [as Judith Curry was quoted in the Daily Mail].
The Nail in the Coffin of Climate Skepticism?
The BEST results are unlikely to present an obstacle for some climate-change skeptics. Writing for Forbes, climate-skeptic blogger Warren Meyer says,
… few skeptics doubt or deny that carbon dioxide (CO2) is a greenhouse gas or that it and other greenhouse gasses (water vapor being the most important) help to warm the surface of the Earth. Further, few skeptics deny that man is probably contributing to higher CO2 levels through his burning of fossil fuels, though remember we are talking about a maximum total change in atmospheric CO2 concentration due to man of about 0.01% over the last 100 years.
However, he asserts,
What skeptics deny is the catastrophe, the notion that man’s incremental contributions to CO2 levels will create catastrophic warming and wildly adverse climate changes.
About global warming skepticism, Berkeley Earth says,
Our study addressed only one area of the concerns: was the temperature rise on land improperly affected by the four key biases (station quality, homogenization, urban heat island, and station selection)? The answer turned out to be no — but they were questions worthy of investigation. Berkeley Earth has not addressed issues of the tree ring and proxy data, climate model accuracy, or human attribution.
Berkeley Earth has produced four papers as a result of its research and has submitted these for peer review. The group has made these papers available for public review as well. The organization says its next project will be to study total warming of the oceans to gain a better picture of total observable global warming.
Posted in Feature Article | 
Tags: Berkeley Earth, BEST, climate change, denial, global warming, Judith Curry, Richard Muller, skepticism
52 Responses to “So, Have They Figured Out That Global Warming Is Real?”
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What a load of s–t.
Total farce.
“Tamino shows that if you remove the highly-uncertain data from April and May 2010, the trendline from 2001 to 2010 actually rises.”
Do you really not see the problem with this? Removing data that doesn’t fit your conclusion is not science.
Good point about not disregarding data that goes against your own point of view. Did you read Tamino’s article? I thought it was interesting. He shows the analysis both ways, with and without those last two uncertain data points.
Everyone I know believes in climate change (Repulicans and Democrats). The issue is, and always been whether man is doing it. If man isn’t doing it then there is nothing than man can do to stop it. There is nothing here that makes this issue settled.
I have a masters in statitics and one of the first thing they teach us is don’t project outside the bounds of your data. Unfortunately, that’s all some scientist do using their “sophisticated” models. Sophisticated models don’t predict the stock market and there are too many unknown variables to make any kind of accurate prediction of the weather.
But the use of existing data to improve our understanding of trends is often used very successfully to extrapolate beyond measurements. I assume that your friends “believe in climate change” because they recognize trends and extrapolate to the future.
Perhaps models can’t predict a particular stock price at a particular time, but a lot of people are successfully invested in the stock market with the belief that the overall value will continue to grow at about 7% per year.
Don’t project outside of the bounds of your data? Why would you need statistics for then if you’re only allowed to show what data already shows?
For simple things, you are correct. But for complex multi-variant analysis, statistics within the bounds of your data, can provide lots of useful statitics.
To label a minor temperature fluctuation of ONE DEGREE as “climate change” is patently ridiculous and unscientific. The World’s temperature has fluctuated for millenia and always will. I single volcano eruption will spew forth more greenhouse gasses than man ever will.
Can you provide a reference for the observation that a “single volcano eruption will spew forth more greenhouse gasses than man ever will”? As far as I see, the evidence is quite the opposite. That is, man emits 100 times more CO2 in a year than do volcanoes.
http://www.skepticalscience.com/volcanoes-and-global-warming.htm
Two responses to educate Backslider:
On whether a one degree change in climate is significant:
http://www.skepticalscience.com/few-degrees-global-warming.htm
On how much CO2 volcanoes release:
http://www.skepticalscience.com/volcanoes-and-global-warming.htm
Now go and learn something.
Backslider, how do you know one degree is little, because it sounds little? So you will only become concerned if the number will start “feeling” significant? So maybe the you’d be comfortable swallowing one gram of arsenic, does that feel little. Thankfully scientists operate on data not feelings.
I think its just so funny that people like you all read this or that and take it as Gospel and become armchair experts.
Let me ask you: What are YOU actually doing to reduce YOUR OWN carbon emissions? I’ll bet my bottom dollar: absolutely nothing. You still drive your car, waste electricity, consume goods that you have no real need for… on and on.
Hypocrites, politically correct morons who don’t have the nous to see that the carbon economy is just another plan to bleed the masses.
BRING ON a ten degree rise in global temperatures (a perfectly natural occurrence) and the World will turn into a tropical paradise while ridding the itself of the bulk of it’s human parasites!
If you’re are referring to me I do not drive my car, I do bike as much as possible and I recycle. However, I admit, I am not satisfied with my “efforts”. I know what you mean, people will always choose what inconveniences them the least and that’s not always the best choice. So why not make the right choice a little easier and the wrong choice a little more costly?
And you’re also right that there’ve been big climate changes before. The last time the temps were off by 6 deg. half the globe was covered by ice. No matter how natural, it doesn’t mean it’s good for us. And if we can stop it, why not?
Actually Backslider,
I have been doing energy efficiency/conservation is various ways for over twenty years. This past month we replaced the windows in our home with low-e Argon filled vinyl windows as just the latest in a long series of steps. My wife and I share one economy vehicle we always replace worn out items with more efficient ones and support green energy (we have had solar on our roof since May of 2003). Our power bill last month (including ~$10 service fees) was just over $23 in a house.
So unlike the myriads of concern troll hypocrites the right has, I am walking the walk out of understanding the grave and growing crisis of climate disruption.
Would some one please tell me what the temperature will be three weeks from Tuesday at Noon. Please be accurate to a 1/10 of a degree C.
I am trying to plan an event.
What do you mean you can’t do it? Just use your models.
That’s just silly. No serious climatologist has proposed the ability to do such a thing, nor has it anything to do with climate change.
Its no sillier than a bunch of climate “scientists” taking a sample of constantly fluctuating global temperatures and predicting doomsday. Utter guff!
Medieval warming, mini ice age… doh! Temperatures have changed since the year dot. It is only the sheer arrogance of humankind that allows them to actually believe the climate conspiracy and think that their own insignificance can make an iota of difference to what nature will do…. you are not even a blink in history, so just forget all your crap and enjoy life while you can.
Shipswake must have never bought seasonal clothes because his ridiculous argument is that he could never predict climatic fluctuations. Shipswake, do you want to make a long term bet on my prediction for climate in your area? It would be like taking candy from a baby…
I don’t know the exact day of your death but I would be willing to bet that by 90 you will most likely be gone. Am I totally out of my mind thinking that, how could I possibly know after all I am not God. In that case you probably won’t mind taking the bet
Tom,
If your post is for me you have missed the point. If it isn’t then you get it.
Why would you think it was addressed to you
Because ambiguity exists and communication is often imperfect and I don’t know you.
Backslider,
What is silly about humans unintentionally altering the climate we all depend on for a human habitable world and having researchers with expertise warning us that we are doing so?
You call this love, save the planet or else? I can’t do this anymore. I can’t condemn my children to the Greenhouse Gas Chambers any longer just to make them more environmentally aware and to turn the lights out more often. Now we use climate change as a catchall phrase for environmentalism when it’s really a CO2 death warrant to billions of children. What part of catastrophic climate crisis do you not understand people? This fear mongering of the CO2 mistake is thankfully coming to an end and this planet lover is happy, not disappointed that CO2 science was a tragic academic exaggeration. All we had to go on was the world of science and science gave us pesticides don’t forget so if any of you really believe in the worst disaster imaginable, climate crisis, at least start ACTING like it’s a climate crisis and march with you’re THE END IS NEAR signs like the other bible thumping freaks. Pollution is real, death by CO2 is not.
Former Believer,
Quit the diatribe there. How do you know what you think you know about this issue?
I recognize that cut and paste!!!
It looks like “mememine” aka “mememine69″ aka “DavidNutzuki” aka “Paul Merrifield” is also going by “Former Believer”.
How many online personas can a sockpuppet have?
Guess he needs to make his house payment.
Hi JimmySD,
Who is this poster and does he need a mental evaluation?
You can add “Meme Mine” (economist).
economist.com/user/3512722/comments
mememine69.gather.com/
Definitely smells of Astroturfing…
Why is CO2 not pollution? It’s toxic to humans and animals in concentration as low as 4%. It’s a waste product of our metabolism. Why would you want to breathe your own waste?
I wonder what the ideal temp for the Earth should be. Is it a little warmer than it is now? If so then global warming is a good thing. Or is it a little colder? 30 years ago when everyone warning people of global cooling. Would cooling bring us to the ideal temperature. Why is it that any deviation from are current temperation is pitched as a disaster?
Also, 10 years ago, it was “global warming”. Then it was pitched as “climate change” will lead us to disaster because there was data indicating that we may be in a cooling stage. Now were back to “global warming”. Funny how people change their phrases to meet the data and the times. And some people say this isn’t about politics and money. There is a fundamental problem when scientist get more money when they take a certain position.
The ideal temp is the one that doesn’t change. It’s not the number, it’s the stability that’s important. Life on earth has narrow tolerances to change. Humans also grew very dependent on stability especially now that more and more people and industries depend on things being precisely right and on time. Blocking just one major highway could send huge ripples throughout the country.
The average temps are increasing and they have been for a while. However the increased temps mean that there is more energy retained in the atmosphere and that leads to more violent volatility. The term “global warming” does not express the volatility, “climate change” does. Either term would be accurate however “climate change” paints a more complete picture.
Conservatives led the charge to change terminology on this man made catastrophe:
www .guardian.co.uk/environment/2003/mar/04/usnews.climatechange
“The US Republican party is changing tactics on the environment, avoiding “frightening” phrases such as global warming, after a confidential party memo warned that it is the domestic issue on which George Bush is most vulnerable.
The memo, by the leading Republican consultant Frank Luntz, concedes the party has “lost the environmental communications battle” and urges its politicians to encourage the public in the view that there is no scientific consensus on the dangers of greenhouse gases.
“The scientific debate is closing [against us] but not yet closed. There is still a window of opportunity to challenge the science,” Mr Luntz writes in the memo, obtained by the Environmental Working Group, a Washington-based campaigning organisation.
“Voters believe that there is no consensus about global warming within the scientific community. Should the public come to believe that the scientific issues are settled, their views about global warming will change accordingly.
“Therefore, you need to continue to make the lack of scientific certainty a primary issue in the debate.”"
Has it occurred to ANYONE that ALL leading Environmental Scientists agree that we are just now coming out of a Mini-Ice Age ? What do temperatures NORMALLY do when an Ice age ends ? THINK ABOUT IT………..
……..and for all the Alarmists who scream that ” the seas will rise ” I would like to point out that Ice and Snow have a LOWER average density than the amount of water they DISPLACE. This means that a huge amount of Ice equals roughly HALF it’s volume in water. The rest of it’s volume is air pockets.
When an Iceberg breaks off and melts, it leaves a volumetric space for the water it’s floating in to fill the balance, so THE SEAS MAY DROP QUITE A BIT INSTEAD. If you
doubt this, look at your Scotch on the Rocks before and
after the ice in it melts. Don’t drink it, you’ll spoil
the experimental data results. Notice the surface level.
AGAIN, THINK ABOUT IT…………
And have there been studies of Global Temperatures versus Solar Output ? The answer is YES, they map out at 1 : 1
PERFECTLY……….must be a coincidence……
The SUN shines brighter, we get warmer. Simple.
DUUUUHHH !!!!
Tiantan,
And you know what you know how? Please point to any credible study that A)uses only researchers in the field of climate and B) proves your claim that they “ALL” say we are coming out of an ice age. By the way, you do know that your claim using the term “Environmental Scientists” is vague right?
Note that any claim to the signatories of the OISM fake survey are debunked here:
skepticalscience.com/OISM-Petition-Project.htm
Also Tiantan,
The website I pointed you to is searchable and each of your other points is addressed and conclusively debunked by referring to the actual research. I don’t think you will change your mind based on this because you exhibit the usual writing style of a boor.
@Mark Schaeffer – The fact is that the sample of global temperatures that scientists have to play with is both minute and inaccurate and certainly not enough to make any kind of sound observation as to what is happening with the climate, which is a chaotic system anyway. The best that can be done is to make observations over millenia.
It is laughable that “global warming” made the transition to “climate change” – which is a direct result of observations contradicting modelling. Please keep up with the debate and stop linking to that pathetic website that is still preaching global warming – most climate change scientists no longer support global warming THEORY.
Like all typical climate change fanbois, you do not know the difference between scientific fact and theory. Climate change science is 99.9% theory, not fact. It is fraught with a multitude of assumptions borne from the fact that climate is chaotic.
You jump up and down cheering that most climate scientists agree with each other. Of course they do, their careers depend on it. There was a time also when most scientists agreed that the earth was flat, again because their careers depended on it.
I love this graph from scepticalscience.com: http://www.skepticalscience.com/images/Milankovitch_Cycles_400000.gif
While purportedly proving that global temperatures increase with the increase of CO2, it could just as easily prove that CO2 naturally rises with the rise of global temperatures.
Its interesting to note that the fluctuations over 400,000 years are as regular as a heartbeat, with the present on the rise to another peak. That is, if anything is proven by this chart it is that any global warming is a perfectly natural occurence.
BTW – water vapor has far more influence on warming than CO2 ever could, so all you who are jumping up and down please desist from boiling the kettle, taking a shower, driving your hydrogen powered cars immediately!!!
Backslider, the chart also shows that temperature changes
PRECEDE the change in Co2 levels, but if Co2 were causing
the temperatures to rise or fall, shouldn’t the Co2 levels
CHANGE FIRST ? OOOOPS, POLITICAL INCORRECTNESS, I simply
must watch what I say before I offend anybody………
Excuse me, I have this silly thing I do called THINKING.
It also shows that in the past levels have been MUCH HIGHER than they are now, or will be anytime soon. Unless I missed it the Earth hasn’t come to an end because of it, no matter how many “scientists” post articles that the sky is falling.
Those highs were so long ago I can say with conviction that MANKIND didn’t cause them……..
I would worry more about two things:
1. We are pumping what amounts to POISON for us into the atmosphere, but actually IT’S PLANT FOOD. What’s wrong with
this is that we are denuding the Planet of the one thing that would really LIKE to consume it…………
2. I worry MORE about the REAL greenhouse gasses, like the
water vapor you mentioned and especially METHANE. Where are all the study databases for THOSE LEVELS ?
I think it’s hilarious that METHANE is also a byproduct of
OIL DRILLING that is burned off in gas towers, but at the same time the political “environmentalists” haven’t tried
to shut down ALL oil drilling as a result.
THEY KNOW THEY WOULD GET NOWHERE. IT’S ABOUT OIL.
The Developed Countries are trying to ” reduce emissions ” so that smaller and third-world countries won’t use up all the OIL they want for their own use. Limited supply, too good for the likes of Africa, perchance ?
Just look what happened when China modernized it’s industrial complex; pollution out the yin-yang ( no pun intended ) and they use more oil than the U.S. does all of a sudden……..picture THAT going on in several African and third-world countries and OIL PRICES would SKYROCKET.
SO WOULD Co2 LEVELS, WAY MORE EVEN THAN NOW……
Sorry for the ranting, but you guys asked for it…..
….and someone PLEASE tell Mark Schaffer that my writing style is none of his business. Only a lowbrow resorts to insults…….
;-P
IF HAVING AN OPINION IS BEING A “BOOR” THEN I’M GLAD I’M NOT A ” SNOB ” LIKE YOU, MARK.
BTW: MARK, WHERE DO YOU GET YOUR FUNDING ? JUST CURIOUS….
@Tiantan – Mark Schaffer is one of these bigots who labels anybody who doesn’t agree with him as a boor, troll etc., somebody who doesn’t know the difference between “scientific” theory and fact. I put that word in quotes, since the so called science relied upon by climate change proponents is deplorable.
I am currently in Perú which has a proliferation of ancient cultures. Its interesting to note that a large proportion of the ancient ruins here are in desert. Its just plain dirt and it almost never rains. Did these people just like living in the dirt? No, previously these areas had abundant vegetation and agriculture.
So what happened? Natural climate change is what happened.
Both of you really need to do a lot of reading as you have very little understanding of the issues you are writing about.
I use skeptical science because they use the primary literature and are reliable. Tiantan, Yelling in caps doesn’t make your points any more true but does say something about you. Search Skeptical Science and again you will find all of your assertions wrong and uninformed. Since there is no one here but the two of you echoing each other feel free to continue convincing each other of your expertise.
@Mark Schaffer – He again we have your typical FUD. You have no comprehension whatsoever as to what either of us do or do not know, other than that we do not agree with you or your ilk.
Tiantan is not yelling, that is just emphasis. Its far better than your own biased garbage.
Skeptical Science is reliable to you, since its bias supports your *theories*, nothing more. Were you to spend a bit more of your own time reseaching without bias you may form a better comprehension of the true issues.
Oh yes, we are all alone, poor misguided fools that we are….
As always, you find yourself unable to answer the simplest of questions.
@Mark…….. Right, so can we take this to mean that you
are suckling the Political teat, and not the Corporate one ?
Not that it matters, it just says you have an axe to grind.
Authority or not, you have an opinion and nothing will change it, so I won’t even try. DO THE SAME, PLEASE.
BTW: Those Solar Panels on your roof, that you seem so proud of may not produce Co2 RIGHT NOW, but it took a MOUNTAIN of
C02 production to manufacture them, one that will not be “paying itself off” during the thing’s useful lifetime.
I know this, I worked in the Solar Industry.
WAY TO GO, CAPTAIN PLANET. ENVIRONMENTAL SUPER HERO.
……and I also know you should take any claims as to the wattage they produce and divide it BY FOUR over time. This means they only last ONE QUARTER of their “expected lifetime” , and indeed begin getting weaker the minute you hook them up………their USEFUL lifetime is maybe HALF of the so-called “expected lifetime” but at REDUCED POWER.
The Solar Industry KNOWS THIS, but count on not being in that business anymore when the “25 year warranty” kicks in.
Chinese manufacturers count on their laws being too different from ours, so they won’t have to honor ANYTHING they signed, WARRANTY or no WARRANTY.
Enjoy your smug superiority, and know that some of us (who don’t matter, right ? ) ARE LAUGHING AT YOU HYSTERICALLY.
Tiantan,
I’m just curious — what is it about solar panels that causes them to deteriorate? Do you have some references about that, and about CO2 emissions during their manufacture? Could make an interesting article.
Al B.
“According to research carried out by Kassel University in Germany, an average 20W solar panel uses 62.5kg of CO2 (not including any frames, mountings etc). It will however save approximately 6.4kg of CO2 every year in the UK (worked out by comparing its power output and the National Grid’s). That means a solar panel will take 10 years to cancel out its own CO2 emissions!”
liloontheweb.org.uk/handbook/solarpanelsphotovoltaics
Naturally there is a lot more involved than just the panels themselves. We also have wiring, storage batteries, warehousing, delivery etc., so the real number would be much much higher.
Interesting — looks as if there is research out there that addresses this question. Could be useful to investigate what is known about the environmental impact for solar PV of producing, installing, and disposing of materials at end of life.
I have no references, since I signed the “Non Disclosure terms” of the Company I worked for, but simple physics gives me an EXCELLENT idea HOW they break down over time.
FOLLOW : Solar Panels are just Silicon Crystals arranged in sheets, with a reactive dopant used to convert sunlight into electrical power. While the crystals perform this, they induce electron flow by generating a piezoelectric shock which is collected and fed out as power. This shock is harmful to the crystalline matrix of the Silicon at a slow rate, so the individual crystal structures slowly fracture over time and reduce it’s efficiency.
The Crystal matrices were produced using HIGH TEMPERATURES to BAKE the silicon, and these ovens CREATED Co2 EMISSIONS
LIKE YOU WOULD NOT BELIEVE………..
Aside from this, the dopants used are ALWAYS TOXIC, so recycling solar panels is A NIGHTMARE, even though they switched to using SILVER solder instead of LEAD………
and the dopants have CHEMICAL REACTIONS with the silicon caused by the heat of the sunlight that hits the panel, which makes the dopants less effective……..
Take this much at face value, and do with it what you will. It makes no difference to me since I’m not disclosing anything to void my non-disclosure sheet. This is simple Physics that anyone could look up in a High-School science book…….
@Mark……you asked for the sources I get info from ?
Nothing highbrow, but here goes :
National Geographics Documentaries
NOVA
Science NOW
NOAA
BBC Documentaries
Discovery Channel documentaries ( various )
…..just to name a few. Either ALL THESE PEOPLE are blowing smoke out their orifices, or you just want to
support your PARTY LINE to earn your next RESEARCH GRANT.
Now we know how you stayed off the Unemployment lines……
Sorry, not buying the bullsh** , game over.
@Backslider……..
Quote: “save approximately 6.4kg of CO2 every year in the UK ”
You also overlook the effect that CLIMATE has on Solar Panels. In places like the U.K. these panels are more likely to last longer because of the cooling effect that fog would provide, but their output would be diminished somewhat. They just might actually last the ten years plus needed to pay for themselves…….
In places like the American Southwest, these panels would not last as much as HALF their expected lifespan due to extreme temperature changes in the same day.
I’ve been there myself, and the deserts may be hot in the daytime, but they get pretty cold once the sun goes down.
Most crystals are adversely affected by rapid temperature drops, and silicon crystals are DEFINITELY among these….
their lattices tend to fracture internally much faster in such a climate.
Something that I always find laughable with “scientific climate modelling” is perfectly illustrated by the following in the above article:
“The new study uses data from a great many more temperature measurement stations and corrects for possible distortions.”
The key here is “corrects for possible distortions”. What this means exactly is that these so called scientists have massaged the data to make it fit their preferred outcome. Its pure guff!! And what is that outcome? A supposed ONE DEGREE rise in temperatures since 1950. I am sure that I also could massage the data to show a one degree DROP in temperatures since 1950.
Ross Kaminsky puts it perfectly:
“Global warming is a cult-industry in which everyone from scientists to trigger-happy so-called businesses work to redirect taxpayer dollars into their own bank accounts. No proposal or study is too self-serving, too self-contradictory, or too ridiculous to keep these profiteers away from their appointed rounds with the self-serving and ridiculous bureaucrats whose jobs similarly depend on maintaining the power of the cult.”
http://spectator.org/archives/2011/07/08/global-warming-tales-and-tail
JUST ONE LOUSY DEGREE ? HELL, I WAS HOPING FOR MORE…..
Just before Halloween, we here in the Boston area got a nice
little UNSEASONAL snow storm, in which we were buried by TWO FEET of snow. Many people lost power, and I hurt my back shoveling the figment of my imagination that the Global Warming crowd would have us believe…….
It NEVER snows this early in the season here, so maybe we should have those GW pundits “massage THIS data” to eliminate it from their models. If they do, they’d better bring a Snow shovel, mittens, and some sturdy boots…….
NATURE ITSELF DOES NOT SUBSCRIBE TO ” GLOBAL WARMING “,
film at eleven.
They could get a CLUE, but it doesn’t PAY THE BILLS…..
Check out the video “The Great Global Warming Swindle”
which is a documentary about how the IPCC set itself up
as the leading Authority for something that doesn’t exist.
They published a Signatories List of ” leading scientists of the world ” who supposedly supported their stance.
When asked about that, many “scientists” actually WERE NOT scientists involved in Atmospheric studies, and quite a few
had NO IDEA THEY HAD BEEN ADDED TO THE LIST.
Many of those who actually were the RIGHT KIND of scientist actually ASKED TO BE TAKEN OFF THE LIST, were told they would be, and then WEREN’T TAKEN OFF. THEY ARE STILL PISSED OFF TO THIS VERY DAY.
The International Panel on Climate Change is looking to be the clearinghouse for funding from several Developed nations
bent on keeping third world nations from modernizing, which would use up MORE OIL and create pollution FASTER.
Their smokescreen “Global Warming” is what these Alarmists use to get contributions from the contributing countries.
They then issue “Research Grants” for actual research, along with some of the DUMBEST research topics you can imagine. Some is good, some is bad, but ALL OF THE DATA IS SUBJECTED TO SCREENING AND INTERPRETATION.
THIS MEANS THAT ALL OF THE DATA IS BASICALLY USELESS.
The IPCC is a bunch of fund-raising SPIN DOCTORS.
@TOM……. The terminology of ” Global Warming ” versus ” Climate Change ” is seen by the IPCC based on it’s effectiveness in producing alarm in their target audience.
They are targeting the NIMBY crowd ( Not In My Backyard )
and tend to want to use ” Climate Change ” because it is more IMMEDIATE, AND CLOSER TO HOME than ” Global Warming “, which
implies something remote, over-the-horizon.
The more ALARM they can generate, the more DONATIONS they will have to use for issuing MORE bogus research grants.
It’s an INTELLECTUAL PONZI SCHEME that does have the potential to ” snowball ” out of control more than it already has.
If they succeed, progress will be restricted or outlawed, THEY will have more power than ANY government, third-world nations will be empty wastelands filled with corpses, SCIENCE itself will be based on the ” FLAVOR OF THE MONTH ” and the upper echelons of the IPCC will be RICHER THAN NATIONS from ” skimming off the top “. In short, Communist.
PAINTS A PRETTY PICTURE, DOESN’T IT ?