February 4, 2010 8:12 PM

Mistakes in Climate Report Fuel Skepticism

By
Mark Phillips
(CBS)  The U.N.'s climate chief admitted Thursday that scientists made mistakes in a major study of melting glaciers in the Himalayas. It's the latest example of scientific errors in climate reports. Experts insist they don't change the overall conclusion - that climate change is real. But as CBS News correspondent Mark Phillips reports, they're providing ammunition for skeptics.

You know you're in trouble when you're being spoofed on YouTube.

The subject of the spoof is Michael Mann of Penn State University, who was accused of tampering with climate data to produce his famous hockey stick graph which shows that the rise in man-made greenhouse gasses corresponds to a rise in world temperatures.

An academic board today cleared Mann, saying his science holds up - but the damage may have already been done.

The biggest splash these days in the global warming argument may not be caused by the world's melting glaciers. It may be caused by a series of gaffes by climate change scientists.

The latest one involves temperature data from weather stations in China used in global warming calculations.

The problem is that where the weather stations are located matters. One located in the city will give consistently higher temperatures than one out in the country. The allegation is the researchers used Chinese data when they really didn't know where their weather stations were. It's just a small part of a worldwide database, but it's the little mistakes that make a difference.

Those mistakes include a line in the last report by the U.N. Panel on Climate Change - the bible of climate science - which claimed glaciers in the Himalayas might disappear by the year 2035. The panel had to admit the claim was wrong and the climate change skeptics jumped in.

"Any scientist who read that figure just laughed because they knew it couldn't be true," said Patrick Michael of the Cato Institute. "There is no doubt the trust in the U.N. panel has been undermined."

That trust had already been undermined by the series of leaked emails at Britain's University of East Anglia - one of the world's big climate science centers - which seemed to show that inconvenient facts were being hidden.

It's a frustrating time for climate scientists, the vast majority of whom believe that despite what they see as small errors, the basic science of the human role in global warming remains true.

"I am concerned that it appears the whole edifice has been undermined by these couple of bricks that are flaking a bit," said Brian Hoskins a professor at Imperial College London. It's a danger, he said.

The scientists may still believe they're winning the scientific argument, but they're in danger of losing the public relations war.

Copyright 2010 CBS. All rights reserved.
Add a Comment See all 25 Comments
by lakota2012 February 8, 2010 3:33 PM EST
by polly_sci:

http://epw.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Minority.Blogs&ContentRecord

scroll down, read comments from individual scientists and note their credentials. These are flat earth types.
-------------------------------------




Thank you so much for pointing out the miNOrity party of republiCONS, the party of NO and FLAT EARTHERS, that have twisted arms just like the OISM petition of fake scientists and imaginary cartoon characters, that continue the manufactured doubt campaign of BIG OIL and the fossil fuel industry!

Maybe YOU should check out the head denialist's page (dr. roy spencer and his cohort john christy) and see how January 2010's global warmth has him all twisted into a pretzel after claiming "global cooling."


NASA Aqua Sea Surface Temperatures Support a Very Warm January, 2010
February 4th, 2010

When I saw the ?record? warmth of our UAH global-average lower tropospheric temperature (LT) product (warmest January in the 32-year satellite record), I figured I was in for a flurry of e-mails.

The global-average lower tropospheric temperature anomaly soared to +0.72 deg. C in January, 2010. This is the warmest January in the 32-year satellite-based data record.

This record warmth will seem strange to those who have experienced an unusually cold winter.

http://www.drroyspencer.com/
Reply to this comment
by polly_sci February 7, 2010 6:15 AM EST
There are many, many credible scientists sceptical of the quality of IPCC claims. Please see

http://epw.senate.gov/public/index.cfm?FuseAction=Minority.Blogs&ContentRecord_id=2674e64f-802a-23ad-490b-bd9faf4dcdb7

scroll down, read comments from individual scientists and note their credentials. These are flat earth types.

A significant issue is quantifying the effect of added CO2: will doubling the CO2 level raise global average temps by 1 degree or 6 degrees? This is a critical piece of evidence and these scientists know it. It is important to get this right. Substantial economic sacrifice has been sought - how do we know it will have the desired effect?
.
Reply to this comment
by polly_sci February 7, 2010 6:20 AM EST
oops, typo alert, should read 'these are *not* flat earth types'

Please explore link and review comments.
by ReasonableGuy February 6, 2010 9:18 PM EST
"The scientists may still believe they're winning the scientific argument, but they're in danger of losing the public relations war."
----
A 1000 years from now, a father and daughter hold this conversation:

Gorpal, what happened to the people of this planet? Did not they see that burning fossilized carbon fuels would overload their atmosphere with carbon, upsetting the carbon cycle? Did they not understand what would happen if they altered their planet's atmosphere so severely?

Well, Branbab, from the old media we believe that the scientists on the planet understood. But, on this planet, most of the people did not understand anything scientific. Most of the people were afraid of mathematics, chemistry, physics, and any other area of science.

So, whenever any scientist made a mistake, it fed the mis-understandings of the science ignorant. Since all life-forms are imperfect, the scientists did make some mistakes.

And, by the time the science-ignorant did understand what they had done to their climate it was too late. Eventually too many of the people, and the other animals on the planet died. And that is why their are no people left on this planet.

Now, let's get back into our craft and head on home, so you can do your quantum physics homework before next pramody's class. . . .
Reply to this comment
by lakota2012 February 6, 2010 3:23 PM EST
"Scientists Say Small Errors Do Not Change the Reality of Global Warming; But Errors Have Given Traction to Warming Deniers"
------------------------



Yep.....small errors still do not change the science, and have only fueled a more religious denialism public relations campaign from the usual suspects of the continuous manufactured doubt industry!
Reply to this comment
by Somerschool February 6, 2010 9:35 AM EST
Whether you believe in man-made global warming or not, it should be clear that the window of political opportunity for a massive governmental regulatory program is closing. I would urge "warmists" and "skeptics" to come together in favor of a "Nuclear Future" program that combines the capital and creativity of business with the power of government. JFK pledged to put a man on the moon by the end of one decade. Obama could pledge to have one working nuclear reactor for every US Congressional district by 2030. (435 nuclear power plants could provide 100% of America's electricity needs, eliminating all coal- and oil-fired plants.)
Reply to this comment
by lakota2012 February 6, 2010 12:18 PM EST
Putting all of our eggs into one basket is short-sided and hardly close to visionary for an economy that needs to replace the 8.4 million jobs lost over the past few years of the bush/cheney Great Recession.

We need a 21st century plan to replace the finite fossil fuels we've been burning in huge quantities for over 150 years, and continued growth of renewable energy AND 4th generation nuclear IFR/LFTR will create needed jobs and energy into this new century. This will ensure more energy for the future, less GHG emissions/pollution and more jobs as we phase out these finite fossil fuels.
by jankebenzone February 5, 2010 5:32 PM EST
The only thing melting here is the last remnants of the global warming alarmist credibility. All the hot air emitted by Gore and his gullibles filled their baloney and bull ballon till the sharp edged arrows of truth punctured the thin fabric of hoax. The few remaiming die hards are but deflated fools clinging to the flotsam left behind.
Reply to this comment
by Andrew_30 February 5, 2010 3:31 PM EST
Does this look and 'mistake' to you?

"The scientist behind the bogus claim in a Nobel Prize-winning UN report that Himalayan glaciers will have melted by 2035 last night admitted it was included purely to put political pressure on world leaders.

Dr Murari Lal also said he was well aware the statement, in the 2007 report by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), did not rest on peer-reviewed scientific research."

From the World Wildlife Fund web site:
www.panda.org/about_our_earth/aboutcc/problems/people_at_risk/personal_stories/about_cw/cwscientists/

"Climate Witness Science Advisory Panel (SAP)

Prof. Dr Murari Lal, specialises in global and regional climate variability, scenario development, regional environmental change,..., water resource management; Environment and Carbon Trading Group Halcrow Consulting India Ltd., India"

Did you catch that:

"Environment and Carbon Trading Group Halcrow Consulting India Ltd., India"

See also:
www.halcrow.com/html/documents/pdf/india/halcrow_india_environment_brochure.pdf

Carbon Trading is part of the Environment Division, now that is a surprise.

From the CRUs own website we know the World Wildlife Fund funds the CRU.
bottom of this page:
www.cru.uea.ac.uk/cru/about/history

I wonder where a charity gets the money to fund climate research.

The WWF funds the CRU

Murari Lal->WWF->CRU
Murari Lal->Halcrow Consulting->Carbon Trading

How about we skip the pawn:

Carbon Trading-> Halcrow Consulting->WWF->CRU->IPCC

Simplifing..

Carbon Trading->WWF->CRU->IPCC
Carbon Trading->CRU->IPCC
Carbon Trading->IPCC

Carbon Trading->IPCC->Carbon Trading
Or
Carbon Trading->Pachauri->Carbon Trading


I see an employee of a Carbon Trading department, working for the World Wildlife Fund, submitting bogus content to the IPCC, just to scare people into implementing Carbon Trading.

This does not look like a 'mistake' to me. Looks pretty clear cut and well planned.
Reply to this comment
by jgriffin9 February 5, 2010 1:29 PM EST
Dr Mann and his hockey stick can only be believed if you know nothing of world history. Vikings colonized Greenland and named it 1000 years ago it supported an enonomy based on grazing animals and lasted for more than 400 years...until the little ice age put an end to the colony. The Medeival warm period and the little ice age do not exist according to Dr. mann's Hockey stick. Yet they are real it is his explanation of past climate that is false. Dr hansen of GISS has falsified data on at least two different occasions how can GISS be believed when they are guilty of using bad data in the past. East Anglia U. CRU was in on the game of making the data fit their preconceptions....emails show that. The faking of a major scientific issue is unbelieveable and tragic.
Reply to this comment
by lakota2012 February 6, 2010 1:24 PM EST
by jgriffin9:
"The Medeival warm period and the little ice age..."
---------------------------



...........have been proven to be regional anomalies, and certainly not anything global. As can be typical with the denialists, they have a need to "cherry pick" data anomalies in the most unscientific means, in order to attack credible climatologists.

Maybe YOU should check out one of the leading skeptic teams of christy/spencer, and see the latest January 2010 addition to their "Latest Global Temperatures" graph of 0.72 C anomaly that rivals the 1998 el Nino year -- especially after their "global cooling" rants the last couple of years!

Here, check it out here on dr. spencer's page, and get back to us about the huge increase in GLOBAL TEMPERATURE according to the "skeptics."

http://www.drroyspencer.com/latest-global-temperatures/


The proof is right there, and a smoothed graph like for the sunspot cycles, will undoubtedly show a WARMING trend from 1979 to the present!

Speaking of which, our SUN has awakened from it's long slumber, and a much longer sunspot cycle LOW than normal, but increasing numbers of sunspots have appeared recently, and we are now into solar cycle 24, and can expect more solar irradiation as we head to the solar cycle HIGH. I'm willing to bet the religious denialists substantial amounts of cold, hard cash, that they will have egg all over their faces in just a couple more years! But....it probably won't stop them from parroting the usual beck/rushbo propaganda in a delusional state!

http://solarcycle24.com/index2.htm
by anti-global3 February 5, 2010 12:15 PM EST
now that the EU is ready to collapse and the Euro is going to be funny money we see why the European countries were so eager to do a climate deal in which the U.S. would be giving them money. It was a global bailout, when their economies are falling inot worse shape, way worse shape then even the U.S. with our problems, you cannot believe the money they recieved was going to go toward green technology. They would have used the money to stay afloat, which is not our problem.
Reply to this comment
by lakota2012 February 5, 2010 1:00 PM EST
Hmmmm.....seems as if the U.S. is in much worse shape than Europe today, with $107 Trillion in unfunded future liabilities and a dollar worth far less than the Euro. You must be getting your propaganda from the king of the conspiracy theories -- delusional glenn beck on FAUX NoNooz!
by lakota2012 February 5, 2010 10:22 AM EST
"Scientists Say Small Errors Do Not Change the Reality of Global Warming; But Errors Have Given Traction to Warming Deniers"
--------------------



Yep, the physical evidence continues to overwhelm the silly mistakes made by a few scientists, and the religious denialists have merely jumped aboard the manufactured doubt public relations campaign by parroting the same misinformation from non-scientific blogs.
Reply to this comment
See all 25 Comments
.
Scroll Left
Scroll Right More »
CBS News on Facebook