Source: YouTube
URL: http://www.youtube.com/watch?feature=player_embedded&v=KDFH0Hs4Q8s
Date: 01/08/2012
Event: Dr. Christy: Heatwave not what "global warming looks like", rather what "Mother Nature looks like"
Credit: JimInhofePressOffice
People:
Jeff Sessions: Dr. Christy is a distinguished professor of atmospheric science, I believe the only climatologist here today. Since 1987 he's been a professor at the Atmospheric Science department at the University of Alabama, Huntsville. He currently serves as Director of the Earth Science System Center. He holds a Masters and Doctorate degrees in Atmospheric Sciences from the University of Illinois, and in Mathematics, and a Master of Divinity. He has served as Alabama State Climatologist since 2000. During his time, he's worked with Dr. Roy Spencer to produce a global temperature dataset from satellite observations. For their work, Drs. Christy and Spencer were awarded NASA's prestigious medal for Exceptional Scientific Achievement in 1991. Five years later, he and Dr. Spencer were recognised by the American Meteorological Society for their development of a precise record of global temperatures from operational polar-orbiting satellites, and polar matter [?] satellite data.
For his contribution to climatology and research, he was inducted as a Fellow into the American Meteorological Society in 2002. He's been involved with the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change by serving as a contributor and lead author on UN reports, through his efforts working with the IPCC's satellite temperature became classified as high quality datasets for the purpose of climatology research. He's served on five different national research council panels and committees, participated in research projects funded by NASA, NOAA, DOE and DOT and the State of Alabama, published numerous times in journals including Science, Nature, Journal of the Climate and the Journal of Geophysical Research. He has spent time in Africa, he's married with children and no stranger to Washington - he's testified over a dozen times at the House and the Senate. [To Barbara Boxer.] Thank you, Madam Chairman.
Barbara Boxer: Thank you so much. And I reserve the right to extend and revise my introductions to include the life stories, the awards and the great speeches of our two witnesses, but you couldn't have done a better job. Dr. Christy - all right, Dr. Christy, go ahead.
John Christy: Thank you, Chairman Boxer and Ranking Member Inhofe, and Senator Sessions, and committee members. I'm a climate scientist and I build datasets from scratch to answer questions about climate variability and to test assertions people make about climate change. And that's really what this scientific method is all about. During the heat wave of late June and early July, temperature extremes were becoming newsworthy. Claims were made that thousands of records were broken each day, and that "this is what global warming looks like". And that got a lot of attention.
However, these headlines were not based on climate science. It's shown in Figure 1.3 of my testimony, which did not make it here today, it is scientifically more accurate to say "this is what Mother Nature looks like" because events even worse than these that we have seen here, have happened in the past, before greenhouse gases were increasing like they are today.
Now, it gives some people great comfort to offer a quick and easy answer, when weather strays from the average, rather than struggle with what the real truth is. The real truth is: we do not know enough about the climate to even predict events like this. Climatologists looking at the heat wave would not be alarmed because a number of daily high temperature records set in the most recent decade was only - well, actually less than half of that set in the 1930s. It is shown on my written testimony.
Jeff Sessions: You use this chart that I had -
John Christy: It didn't. Oh - no, it's a different chart. A different chart. Thank you, Senator. It's a different chart. More dramatic, I think, but it didn't make it up. I suppose most people have forgotten that Oklahoma set a new record low of 31 below - wasn't 27, it was 31 below, this past year. And in the past two years, towns from Alaska to my home state of California established records for snowfall. The recent anomalous weather can't be blamed on carbon dioxide. More evidence is available now to suggest that the climate is not as sensitive to extra greenhouse gases as previously thought - and now I will take that second one there.
This is a spaghetti chart. There are 34 climate models on there - but if you just focus on that black line that Senator Sessions showed earlier. That is what the models indicate should be happening now. And yet the real world, where the circles are - you see at the bottom, this is what has actually happened. The temperature of the models, clearly, has overdone what's happened, and when considering legislation, I would encourage you to base it on the observations, rather than speculative trends of climate models. And basing legislation on observations means addressing the large year to year variations that we've talked about, like droughts and floods that cause so much economic distress.
There is still a discrepancy between the warming in the traditional surface datasets and less warming in the deep atmosphere. A new study led by my colleague UAHuntsville, Richard McNider, along with my observational studies, explains part of the reason for the difference. When the surface and air around a thermometer station are disturbed by, say, urbanisation, farming, aerosols and so on, night time surface temperatures will appear to warm, due to a complicated turbulent process. not the greenhouse effect. The bottom line is that traditional surface temperature is contaminated by such effects, and is not an accurate indicator of greenhouse warming. When it comes to legislation or regulatory actions, there really is nothing that will definitively alter whatever the climate is going to do. However, I suspect there will be some discernable negative economic consequences if energy costs rise. As more CO2 is released back into the atmosphere, there are benefits that are often overlooked. Most notable of these is the invigoration of plant life, on which we and the rest of the animal world depend for food. CO2 is, fundamentally, plant food, and therefore our food.
Today, carbon energy provides about 87% of the world's energy demand. So, if CO2 is increasing, that's an indicator that a nation is providing energy for its people, who then live longer, healthier and more productive lives. As someone who's lived in Africa, I can say that without energy, life is brutal and short. So this is a goal of poor countries, to access energy. So, I'll close with this unpleasant thought. Demanding a reduction in worldwide CO2 emissions, without affordable, reliable alternatives, means reducing the hope for prosperity of our fellow world citizens who are struggling to escape their impoverished condition. Thank you for your time. I'll be happy to answer questions.
Barbara Boxer: Thank you so much, Dr. Christy.