“Yes, the climate does change,” Mr. Bessent said, adding that “we are going through cycles, and I believe that it is very difficult to deconstruct the reasons around why anything changes.”
The impact of CO2 on our planet is dwarfed by the sun, clouds, and the water cycle. But this is not an excuse to keep using the atmosphere as a trash can.
The climate has been warming in fits and starts since the depths of the Little Ice Age around 1700AD
Why did global temperature cool down to the chilly temperatures of the Little Ice Age?
No one knows, including Andrew Dessler.
Why did it stop cooling around 1700AD instead of just heading into a new glaciation?
No one knows, including Andrew Dessler.
Why didn't it just stay cold after 1700 AD?
No one knows, including Andrew Dessler.
Why did it start warming around 1700 AD?
No one knows, including Andrew Dessler.
But we do know the first two centuries of that current warming can't be from CO2, it hadn't risen enough.
Given our lack of understanding of the reasons that the climate cools and warms, claiming that we know that humans are the sole cause of the current warming is hubris of the highest order.
At best we can say that humans likely contributed something to the last century of warming. But even the scientists Andrew claims understand the climate can't say how much the contribution is.
Estimates from a host of different scientific studies put the warming from a doubling of CO2 at somewhere between 1/2°C and 8°C … and the uncertainty of that number has only INCREASED in the last 50 years we've been studying it.
And when the uncertainty about that critical central value is increasing over time, when climate models with climate sensitivities differing by a factor of 3 are able to reproduce the historical period, that's clear evidence that no, Andrew … we don't know what drives the climate.
As the nice graph shows, predictions (based on the laws of physics) not only foresaw warming, but got the amount of warming right--actual numbers are the gold standard for science. And the paleoclimate evidence gives essentially the same number (viz. sensitivity of three degrees C for doubled CO2). When you get the same number from two fundamentally different methods, you are in touch with reality.
I’ve asked multiple climate scientists to investigate my potential findings about Hunga Tonga creating a 0.2C warming pulse in 2023 that could account for the currently unmodeled portion of that unusual event.
I published a post explaining the rationale in supercooled stratospheric water vapor creating an insulating layer above Antarctica that trapped the equatorial heat that is transported there via thermohaline circulation.
I included peer-reviewed studies demonstrating the southward dispersion of the vapor cloud and the warming of the southern ocean in 2022 that preceded the warming of the northern ocean in 2023.
I also recently posted a response to Peter Carter’s sharing of a study about the rapid loss of Antarctic sea ice that began immediately after the eruption in 2022, but wasn’t in the public consciousness until Zeke Hausfather noted the ‘gobsmackingly bananas’ extreme warming pulse and sea ice loss in 2023.
My posts also noted this rapid loss of Antarctic sea ice beginning in 2022, a full year earlier than its debut into public awareness. I noticed it from Climate Reanalyzer, albeit Antarctic sea ice was at a local maximum at the time of the eruption and that obscured the initial rapid sea ice loss.
The study I relied upon for understanding the drift of the water vapor plume is one of the same studies that alleged an atmospheric model showing net cooling from Hunga Tonga. This study and its model did not take into account supercooled stratospheric water vapor that is known to drive the trend of poorly-modeled polar amplification.
As atmospheric water vapor increases due to global warming, polar amplification makes the modeled warming lag the actual warming in polar regions. The weakness in polar amplification modeling has been known for at least a decade, and I’ve included two studies spanning that decade, one in the Arctic and one in Antarctica.
This modeling weakness is unusually susceptible to the effect of Hunga Tonga eruption.
When Hunga Tonga increased stratospheric water vapor by 10%, that vapor initially blanketed the southern hemisphere because Hunga Tonga is south of the equator. The actual abrupt localized southern hemispheric increase in water vapor was closer to 20% in 2022 owing to the southward atmospheric drift.
It wasn’t until 2023 that the vapor dispersed northward, and then two years after the eruption its warming effect dissipated as the vapor precipitated out of the atmosphere.
A 20% increase in southern hemisphere stratospheric water vapor, combined with a poorly modeled polar warming that is driven by supercooled insulating water vapor where the scarcity of nucleation particulates inhibits ice formation, could explain a lot of the currently unexplained events of 2022-2026 that my own modeling apparently detected.
My amateur SST proxy for global warming demonstrated that the warming pulse decayed by 2026, albeit delayed for two years by thermal inertia. By that time we seem to have accumulated a full 0.1C of additional anthropogenic warming since January of 2022.
I included a comparison with Pinatubo eruption that my model also detected. Inverted and time-shifted overlay of Pinatubo upon Hunga Tonga reveals remarkable similarities.
A shallow submarine stratovolcanic eruption that washes the sulfur out of the plume while injecting a significant load of water vapor into the stratosphere perhaps has potential to cause pulsed warming that climate scientists have not yet acknowledged, but without help, I can’t prove or disprove this possibility.
I’ve repeatedly asked climate scientists to investigate, as I lack the experience, resources, and stamina to continue my investigation independently. I’ve also offered full disclosure and whatever support I can provide, gratis, with no expectation of compensation in any form.
No one has taken me up on my offer.
I don’t find this lack of interest at all surprising, given how conservative the research profession is, and how defensive its posture has become in light of the ongoing and recently escalated anti-science attacks.
However, I am saddened by the lack of energy to invest in this exploration.
Hunga Tonga gave us all a unique opportunity to gain significant understanding and redress polar amplification modeling shortfalls. We likely will never again see a similar shallow stratospheric eruption like this in all of human history, and we captured it at the peak of the weather satellite era, just before the inevitable decline of industrial civilization.
Great post, Andy!
And on the same "Whodunnit" theme:
https://www.sigmaxi.org/news/keyed-in/post/keyed-in/2019/11/11/how-do-we-know-that-human-activities-have-affected-global-climate
Thanks, Ben. I liked your post. “Great minds think alike!”
Global warming is exacerbated by the heat from Hell the diabolical POTUS brings to the world.
“Yes, the climate does change,” Mr. Bessent said, adding that “we are going through cycles, and I believe that it is very difficult to deconstruct the reasons around why anything changes.”
My head nearly exploded when I read this.
He hasn’t seen your plot :)
What the heck does Bessent know? He thinks there are climate epicycles?
The impact of CO2 on our planet is dwarfed by the sun, clouds, and the water cycle. But this is not an excuse to keep using the atmosphere as a trash can.
Good article. Are there any generally accepted causes for the Medieval Warm Period or the Little Ice Age?
The climate has been warming in fits and starts since the depths of the Little Ice Age around 1700AD
Why did global temperature cool down to the chilly temperatures of the Little Ice Age?
No one knows, including Andrew Dessler.
Why did it stop cooling around 1700AD instead of just heading into a new glaciation?
No one knows, including Andrew Dessler.
Why didn't it just stay cold after 1700 AD?
No one knows, including Andrew Dessler.
Why did it start warming around 1700 AD?
No one knows, including Andrew Dessler.
But we do know the first two centuries of that current warming can't be from CO2, it hadn't risen enough.
Given our lack of understanding of the reasons that the climate cools and warms, claiming that we know that humans are the sole cause of the current warming is hubris of the highest order.
At best we can say that humans likely contributed something to the last century of warming. But even the scientists Andrew claims understand the climate can't say how much the contribution is.
Estimates from a host of different scientific studies put the warming from a doubling of CO2 at somewhere between 1/2°C and 8°C … and the uncertainty of that number has only INCREASED in the last 50 years we've been studying it.
And when the uncertainty about that critical central value is increasing over time, when climate models with climate sensitivities differing by a factor of 3 are able to reproduce the historical period, that's clear evidence that no, Andrew … we don't know what drives the climate.
Best to all, including Andrew,
w.
Good post, but here's a point worth adding:
As the nice graph shows, predictions (based on the laws of physics) not only foresaw warming, but got the amount of warming right--actual numbers are the gold standard for science. And the paleoclimate evidence gives essentially the same number (viz. sensitivity of three degrees C for doubled CO2). When you get the same number from two fundamentally different methods, you are in touch with reality.
I’ve asked multiple climate scientists to investigate my potential findings about Hunga Tonga creating a 0.2C warming pulse in 2023 that could account for the currently unmodeled portion of that unusual event.
I published a post explaining the rationale in supercooled stratospheric water vapor creating an insulating layer above Antarctica that trapped the equatorial heat that is transported there via thermohaline circulation.
https://x.com/cheryl_josie/status/1932239972993782036?s=46&t=i6-2Z-IgbPdkE-B1uOQrXw
I included peer-reviewed studies demonstrating the southward dispersion of the vapor cloud and the warming of the southern ocean in 2022 that preceded the warming of the northern ocean in 2023.
I also recently posted a response to Peter Carter’s sharing of a study about the rapid loss of Antarctic sea ice that began immediately after the eruption in 2022, but wasn’t in the public consciousness until Zeke Hausfather noted the ‘gobsmackingly bananas’ extreme warming pulse and sea ice loss in 2023.
My posts also noted this rapid loss of Antarctic sea ice beginning in 2022, a full year earlier than its debut into public awareness. I noticed it from Climate Reanalyzer, albeit Antarctic sea ice was at a local maximum at the time of the eruption and that obscured the initial rapid sea ice loss.
https://x.com/cheryl_josie/status/2033521498221363478?s=46&t=i6-2Z-IgbPdkE-B1uOQrXw
The study I relied upon for understanding the drift of the water vapor plume is one of the same studies that alleged an atmospheric model showing net cooling from Hunga Tonga. This study and its model did not take into account supercooled stratospheric water vapor that is known to drive the trend of poorly-modeled polar amplification.
As atmospheric water vapor increases due to global warming, polar amplification makes the modeled warming lag the actual warming in polar regions. The weakness in polar amplification modeling has been known for at least a decade, and I’ve included two studies spanning that decade, one in the Arctic and one in Antarctica.
This modeling weakness is unusually susceptible to the effect of Hunga Tonga eruption.
When Hunga Tonga increased stratospheric water vapor by 10%, that vapor initially blanketed the southern hemisphere because Hunga Tonga is south of the equator. The actual abrupt localized southern hemispheric increase in water vapor was closer to 20% in 2022 owing to the southward atmospheric drift.
It wasn’t until 2023 that the vapor dispersed northward, and then two years after the eruption its warming effect dissipated as the vapor precipitated out of the atmosphere.
A 20% increase in southern hemisphere stratospheric water vapor, combined with a poorly modeled polar warming that is driven by supercooled insulating water vapor where the scarcity of nucleation particulates inhibits ice formation, could explain a lot of the currently unexplained events of 2022-2026 that my own modeling apparently detected.
My amateur SST proxy for global warming demonstrated that the warming pulse decayed by 2026, albeit delayed for two years by thermal inertia. By that time we seem to have accumulated a full 0.1C of additional anthropogenic warming since January of 2022.
I included a comparison with Pinatubo eruption that my model also detected. Inverted and time-shifted overlay of Pinatubo upon Hunga Tonga reveals remarkable similarities.
A shallow submarine stratovolcanic eruption that washes the sulfur out of the plume while injecting a significant load of water vapor into the stratosphere perhaps has potential to cause pulsed warming that climate scientists have not yet acknowledged, but without help, I can’t prove or disprove this possibility.
I’ve repeatedly asked climate scientists to investigate, as I lack the experience, resources, and stamina to continue my investigation independently. I’ve also offered full disclosure and whatever support I can provide, gratis, with no expectation of compensation in any form.
No one has taken me up on my offer.
I don’t find this lack of interest at all surprising, given how conservative the research profession is, and how defensive its posture has become in light of the ongoing and recently escalated anti-science attacks.
However, I am saddened by the lack of energy to invest in this exploration.
Hunga Tonga gave us all a unique opportunity to gain significant understanding and redress polar amplification modeling shortfalls. We likely will never again see a similar shallow stratospheric eruption like this in all of human history, and we captured it at the peak of the weather satellite era, just before the inevitable decline of industrial civilization.
It seems a shame to waste this opportunity.
This is settled; how to reduce atmospheric carbon at scale is not; without that, we can only slow global warming.
Yes, that's settled too. POTUS and friends don't like that answer. We don't need incantations.