John Shade, thank you, a revealing post concerning the poor level of Science and evidence being presented. I particularly liked the use of Pinocchios

You might suppose a scientist invited to provide testimony at a Congressional Hearing would welcome the opportunity to lay out arguments, evidence, and supporting links to the scientific literature. 

Here's a selection of the references cited by Dr Mann:

Characterization of rainfall distribution and flooding associated with U.S. landfalling tropical cyclones: Analyses of Hurricanes Frances, Ivan, and Jeanne (2004)

From <https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1029/2011JD016175>

Changes in Tropical Cyclone Number, Duration, and Intensity in a Warming Environment

P. J. Webster,G. J. Holland, J. A. Curry, H.-R. Chang

From <https://science.sciencemag.org/content/309/5742/1844?ijkey=6a78a4b583ce2e5d7b73081dceba19578fcc9c60&keytype2=tf_ipsecsha>

Increased threat of tropical cyclones and coastal flooding to New York City during the anthropogenic era

From <https://www.pnas.org/content/112/41/12610.abstract>

Impact of climate change on New York City’s coastal flood hazard: Increasing flood heights from the preindustrial to 2300 CE

From <https://www.pnas.org/content/114/45/11861>

A global slowdown of tropical-cyclone translation speed

From <https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-018-0158-3>

The increasing intensity of the strongest tropical cyclones
James B. Elsner,, James P. Kossin, Thomas H. Jagger

From <https://www.nature.com/articles/nature07234>

Projected changes in persistent extreme summer weather events: The role of quasi-resonant amplification

From <https://advances.sciencemag.org/content/4/10/eaat3272>

In her 'list of sources' used by Dr Mann, Dr Curry omitted these: Science, Science Advances, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences and Nature.

She is of the opinion that Dr Mann spent too much time listing his achievements and indeed, his self-introduction runs to 330 words in the written testimony, but then Dr Curry expended over 500 words on her introduction and biography.

She is not keen on Dr Mann citing his own publications or using unreviewed sources, yet her own testimony is shot through with quotes to her own previous testimony, three of her references are reports produced the by the private company she owns and runs (conflict of interest anyone?), and she quotes sources such as Cliff Mass's blog, the 'Science Friday' podcast and the Sierra Sun.

Pot - Kettle. I grade her article 6 Pinocchios. ;-)

Quite. That's a partial list of Mann's sources. Lying by omission.

All of the other links (~20) are to news articles

This is misleading, the 'news articles' are largely write ups of published research, with links.

BTW, Dr Curry testified, in 2017, that AGW was 'as likely as not' to become a major problem.

Jul 1, 2019 at 7:44 PM | John Shade

Thank you for continuing with this thread "The Moral and Intellectual Poverty of Climate Alarm"

It seems that truth evades Mann, and he evades truth. Poverty should follow for Climate Alarmists

Aug 1, 2019 at 2:19 PM | John Shade

Some of these activists have nothing better to do, or contribute to the world, than flying around it a lot, telling others not to do the same thing.

This is one among the theories for why Chakrabarti's no longer chief of staff for Cortez the Killer. This will be a mighty nice soundbite when the political campaigns start focusing on climate change.

Expect it, because the relatively quiet Hillary Clinton recently got herself exercised over Greenland melting.
=============================

Gwyn Morgan:

Here are a few climate-change head scratchers for Canadian voters to ponder

We don’t need the IPCC’s hugely complex computer models to know that cities are hotter. All we have to do is walk from a paved sun-heated street lined with concrete buildings to a grassy park. Rather than reflecting the sun’s rays back to outer space, all that concrete and pavement absorbs the sun rays, creating a giant heat sink. 

The effect of UHI on GW is indistinguishable from zero.

http://static.berkeleyearth.org/papers/UHI-GIGS-1-104.pdf

 Government mandated biofuel content requirements in North America and the EU have driven the burning of critically important jungle habitat to make way for palm oil plantations. On the islands of Borneo and Sumatra, over 50,000 Orangutans have died because of palm oil deforestation.

Less than 5% of palm oil goes to energy production, and it is being phased out in the EU. You'd save more orangutans by not buying margarine or lipstick.

And here at home, the Trudeau Liberals have just introduced a tax specifically designed to discourage the building of new cleaner-burning gas-fired power plants as they continue to pursue the fantasy that wind and solar will keep the lights on. Good luck with that. After hundreds of billions of dollars invested, wind and solar contribute just two per cent of global energy supply. And that’s only when the wind is blowing, and the sun is shining.

Deliberately confusing energy and electricity generation, and wind and solar with other renewables, global and local. Electricity (keeping the lights on) is about 20% of all energy production. For all renewables the global figure for energy is 12% and for electricity 23%. (2015) For Canada specifically, 17% of energy and 65% of electricity is from renewables, which includes hydro.

Here again the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) provides the answer. Despite all the calamitous rhetoric, the NOAA states that sea levels “continue to rise at the rate of about one-eighth of an inch (3.2 mm) per year.” At that rate, a house built 10 feet above sea level today would still be 9 feet 7 inches above sea level 40 years from now.

Nobody plans infrastructure on a 40 year timescale. IPCC estimates an increase of up to 98cm by 2100, (others have said this is conservative), which means the storm surge from (probably more powerful) storms could start off from a metre higher.

The only headscratcher is why anyone would link to a post by a gas company founder published by the Canadian Financial Post. Does Clipe rhyme with 'Tripe'?

Phil Clarke:

"Less than 5% of palm oil goes to energy production, and it is being phased out in the EU. You'd save more orangutans by not buying margarine or lipstick."

I have no idea whether that "less than 5%..." claim is correct, but I have seen very different claims being made (and I have no idea if they are true either - can anyone provide a RELIABLE information source?).

For instance, there is this:

https://knect365.com/energy/article/e3d95b52-cdd9-43dc-b38b-ee779f913ce5/palm-oil-biodiesels-effect-on-carbon-emissions-explained

"Linked to deforestation, peatland fires and habitat destruction in South East Asia, palm oil has become probably the world’s most censured monoculture cash crop.

Although it is found in a bewildering range of consumer products – from shampoo, to bread, to low fat margarine – over half of the palm oil supplied to the European Union is used to produce biodiesel, intended to help decarbonise the continent’s vehicle fleet.

Following on from a controversial decision by the European Commission to phase out palm oil biodiesel, we examine the evidence for its land use impacts and effect on net carbon emissions."

They say "over half", rather than "less than 5%", though the comment is in the context of EU imports rather than worldwide use.

I don't know if KNect365 are climate alarmist, sceptic, or neutral. Does anybody know?

The effect of UHI on GW is indistinguishable from zero.
http://static.berkeleyearth.org/papers/UHI-GIGS-1-104.pdf
Aug 9, 2019 at 2:30 PM | Phil Clarke

Berkeley Earth is not a reliable source. Glowing endorsements by the Hockey Team in Wikipedia just confirm it. Quoting Phil Jones, author of the data deficient Chinese UHI paper is a bit of a give away.

Clarke rhymes with Snark.

https://cse.google.com/cse?cx=001344162711917842250%3A91rugphori0&ie=UTF-8&q=wwf

https://www.rainforest-rescue.org/topics/palm-oil/questions-and-answers#start

The Commission published its proposed criteria for determining what crops caused harm at the weekend, following a law passed by the European Union last year to end the use of feedstocks in biofuels that damage the environment.

Under the new EU law, the use of more harmful biofuels will be capped at 2019 levels until 2023 and reduced to zero by 2030.

Reuters

Berkeley Earth is not a reliable source.

Judith Curry is a coauthor on that paper. The Auditor found BEST ' brought welcome and fresh ideas' to the topic.

https://climateaudit.org/2011/10/22/first-thoughts-on-best/

Phil, thanks for the link, but it doesn't answer my question as to which, if either, of the figures is more reliable and accurate - over 50% or less than 5%?

Bas Eickhout, a Greens EU lawmaker who has been active on the file, said the exemptions were excessive and would allow large producers to wreak destruction.

“The battle is not over... (We) still have time to close these loopholes and clamp down on destructive palm oil entering the EU,” he said.

Campaign group Transport & Environment said loopholes meant that Europe could keep using the same amount of palm oil in diesel that it does today.

An exemption for small-holdings made no sense, it said, as there was no link between size of plantation and deforestation risk and because farmers of small lots typically sold to mills controlled by large corporations.

It also said it deplored the Commissions exemption for soy.

Reuters

https://www.scotsman.com/lifestyle-2-15039/scottish-word-of-the-day-clipe-1-2440624

Mark - 95% of global production goes to food and cosmetics, in the EU currently the balance is around 50%, but the imminent removal of subsidies of harmful biofuel will almost certainly mean it is phased out here.

Phil, thanks, as always, for the clarification.

Do you have a reliable link, please, to follow up on that?

At the time, I actually recall reading Judith Curry's blog about her wanting to be removed as BEST author. I don't know if that applied to everything she did with them, but it seemed quite clear to me that she wanted to wash her hands of them.

The more I read about it, the more it seemed that Mueller and at least one close family member seemed to be making quite a nice family business out of bilking the system for federal grants. Ably aided and abetted by at least one other name familiar to readers of this blog.

I am honored to have been invited to participate in this study, which I think was conducted very well.

Judith Curry, on her blog, on the occasion of the BEST papers being released.

https://judithcurry.com/2011/10/20/berkeley-surface-temperatures-released/

The 5% palm oil for energy figure appears in several places, sourced to AGEB 2015 (Arbeitsgemeinschaft Energiebilanz). I've been unable to find an English version of the study that is not paywalled, however AGEB is a reputable source.

The EU adopted Renewable Energy Directive II in February. Alarmist interpretations notwithstanding, this requires member states to reduce biofuels with a high Indirect Land Use Change potential, which includes palm oil, to zero by 2030.

The REDII Policy Reform determines that first-generation biofuels (those with a high risk of ILUC) cannot grow above each country’s 2019 consumption levels and should gradually be reduced from 2023 onwards until reaching zero in 2030. 

https://climate.org/eu-promotion-of-palm-oil-for-biofuels-set-to-end/

The EU policy on biofuels has been a disastrous example of the Law of Unintended Consequences, as some were warning 15 years ago.