AGW Claims vs. Truth: Claim 11. There is a consensus among climate scientists on the causes and dire consequences of global warming

kaykiser

Claim 11. There is a consensus among climate scientists on the causes and dire consequences of global warming.

Truth: According to the climate change advocates, there is a consensus among climate scientists, the science is settled and the debate is over. But is that true? Not according to over 30,000 scientists who have signed a petition disputing their conclusions.(1.) However, neither the “consensus” nor the petition has any meaning in science. Consensus applies only to opinion, not truth. Truth is never decided by a popular vote. It only takes one scientist with new (or ignored) facts to disprove the currently popular theory aka COWDUNG.(2.) Remember that before Copernicus’ new theory and Galileo’s new facts the consensus was that the sun, and indeed the universe, revolved around the earth. The real scientific question should be, “What does the data say?” not how many experts believe or assume something is true. In the 1970s some of the same people who made the global warming computer models were predicting a coming ice age because of a short-term cooling trend and computer models that assumed a continuation of the trend.

(1.) See Petition Project at http://www.petitionproject.org/

(2.)  COWDUNG stands for the “conventional wisdom of the dominant group.”

“In short, under the new authoritarian science based on consensus, science doesn’t matter much anymore. If one scientist’s 1,000-year chart showing rising global temperatures is based on bad data, it doesn’t matter because we still otherwise have a consensus. If a polar bear expert says polar bears appear to be thriving, thus disproving a popular climate theory, the expert and his numbers are dismissed as being outside the consensus. If studies show solar fluctuations rather than carbon emissions may be causing climate change, these are damned as relics of the old scientific method. If ice caps are not all melting, with some even getting larger, the evidence is ridiculed and condemned. We have a consensus, and this contradictory science is just noise from the skeptical fringe.”

——Terence Corcoran, in “Climate consensus and the end of science,” Financial Post, June 12, 2006.

THE TRUTH ABOUT ANTHROPOGENIC GLOBAL WARMING

Climate change predictions are based almost totally on projections of computer models that assume that all factors of climate are known and their complex, often chaotic, interactions are really understood. It also assumes the current trend will continue. A projection is not a true prediction unless the computer model is 100 percent empirically correct and agrees with reality in every way. For a computer model to have any credence, every single factor must be thoroughly understood, the data on which it is based must be complete and beyond question, the correct mathematical formulas must be used, and unpredictable or chaotic behavior must be eliminated or managed. Computer models are only as good as the data used and the way it is analyzed. The rule is GIGO – garbage in, garbage out. There are many climate models used by the IPCC (United Nations International Panel on Climate Change), none of which agree on the degree of change although all project change based on the manmade CO2 theory. The projections of the models differ from each other by up to 400 percent for the year 2100. However, these models failed to predict the El Nino in 1997-1998, the dearth of hurricanes striking North America in recent years or the current stagnation of global temperatures.

5 No_CAGW_for_18_Years___2_Months_image_RSS_Dec_2014There has not been any global warming in the last 18+ years, which has the climate scientists baffled and worried that governments will fail to act in the ways that they have advocated. The models predict continued warming but the data show otherwise. Advocates refer to this as a hiatus, not a need to correct the models. Some have tried to say there is no pause in warming, but the data of even the staunchest advocates show there is. See the chart below for comparison of models vs. reality according to Hadley Climate Research Unit (HadCRU), University of East Anglia, UK, a leader in the warmist camp.

20-climate-models-vs-reality

The models all assume that the future is predictable based on current data trends. Is that true? The truth is that we don’t even know if we CAN predict climate in the future. The “predictions” are really projections based on previous data and a set way of analyzing it under the assumption that past trends will continue unchanged into the future in the same way that short-term weather predictions are done. When applied to the past, these models fail to postdict (predict into the past) what actually happened in the twentieth century when reliable data was available, much less the more distant past. The Medieval Warm Period certainly did not predict the Little Ice Age a few centuries later, nor did the Little Ice Age predict the continuing warming since that time.

Excerpted from Chapter 15 of Perverted Truth Exposed, How Progressive Philosophy has Corrupted Science by T. Kay Kiser.  Available online through WND.com, Amazon, Barnes & Noble online, Books A Million online in print or e-book as Kindle or B&N Nook.

Advocacy research, incentives and the practice of science

kaykiser

curryja's avatarClimate Etc.

by Judith Curry

There is a problem with the practice of science. Because of poor scientific practices, and improper incentives, few papers with useful scientific findings are published in leading journals. The problem appears to be growing due to funding for advocacy research.

View original post 1,393 more words

AGW Claims vs. Truth – Claim 10: World governments must take drastic action now to prevent catastrophic consequences.

kaykiser

Claim 10:  World governments must take drastic action now to prevent further warming and catastrophic consequences.

Truth:  The jury is still out as to whether warming is a good thing or a bad thing. More people die from cold weather-related events than from heat. Warming periods in the past such as the Medieval Warm Period were times of increased prosperity and peace. There is no indication that any sort of a tipping point is approaching that would cause the predicted catastrophic consequences. There has been no warming since 1998 and a possible cooling since 2005.

         It is not even certain that government action could have any effect on warming. If carbon dioxide is not the main cause of warming, then regulating it might be a fool’s errand. (See Claim 2.) Developed nations might curtail use of fossil fuels, but treaties proposed like Kyoto and Rio exempt developing countries. This includes China, India, and Mexico, among the largest and most industrialized developing countries in the world. Their output of carbon dioxide and pollutants from power plants and industry more than overpowers any gains from developed countries’ gains in efficiency or a change to “renewable” and “sustainable” solar and wind energy.

       Additionally, the money collected by the UN through these treaties is designated only for such unreliable energy development, not for improving the lives of impoverished peoples.  Improving the lives of these people would go much farther to protect the environment than any of these things. (Meanwhile, the development of over 200 hydroelectric dams in Africa have been prevented by activists within and outside the UN.)  People who have to worry about eating and feeding their families have no incentive to care for the environment.  Higher standards of living lead to more caring for the environment.

Global coal consumption

 

Bring back DDT – Save Africa and other impoverished areas

kaykiser3 Comments

Bring back DDT – Save Africa and other impoverished areasmosquite-feeding

Over 80% of infectious diseases are caused by insects and other arthropods. DDT is desperately needed in impoverished countries where insect borne diseases kill and sicken millions every year, cutting lifespans and productivity.  Africa, India and South-Central Americas are most affected. This unpardonable crime amounts to continuing genocide of brown races by western powers.

Without these insect borne diseases, populations may increase at first, but better health will facilitate the building of infrastructure and industry that can raise millions out of poverty, ignorance and hopelessness.

“How much labor and waste of time these wicked insects do cause, but a ray of hope, in the use of DDT, is now held out to us.”            — Out of My Life and Thought: An Autobiography, Dr. Albert Schweitzer (translated from Ma Vie et Ma Pensee)

DDT worked so well that malaria and similar diseases were eradicated in most developed countries and were near eradication in poorer countries before DDT was banned in 1972 by EPA in spite of failure to find any harm to humans or the environment by an overwhelming body of research.

“To only a few chemicals does man owe as great a debt as to DDT. It has contributed to the great increase in agricultural productivity, while sparing countless humanity from a host of diseases, most notably, perhaps, scrub typhus and malaria. Indeed, it is estimated that, in little more than two decades, DDT has prevented 500 million deaths due to malaria that would otherwise have been inevitable. Abandonment of this valuable insecticide should be undertaken only at such time and in such places as it is evident that the prospective gain to humanity exceeds the consequent losses. At this writing, all available substitutes for DDT are both more expensive per crop-year and decidedly more hazardous.”

— National Academy of Sciences, Committee on Research in the Life Sciences of the Committee on Science and Public Policy, The Life Sciences: Recent Progress and Application to Human Affairs, The World of Biological Research, Requirements for the Future (Washington, D.C.: GPO, 1970), 432.                             (Emphasis added)

Rachel Carson’s 1962 book, Silent Spring, was filled with lies, half-truths, misinterpretation of research results and wild speculations.  Rather than being an attempt to protect humans and the environment as stated, it was really part of an effort to stop population increases in Africa, India and other impoverished countries.

“My own doubts came when DDT was introduced for civilian use. In Guyana, within two years it had almost eliminated malaria, but at the same time the birth rate had doubled. So my chief quarrel with DDT in hindsight is that it has greatly added to the population problem.”

                          —Alexander King, cofounder of the Club of Rome, 1990

Population Bomb by Paul Erilich (1968) was a another book based on Malthusian, eugenicist, racist lies, aka propaganda.

“The battle to feed all of humanity is over. In the 1970s hundreds of millions of people will starve to death in spite of any crash programs embarked upon now. At this late date nothing can prevent a substantial increase in the world death rate…”                              — Paul Ehrlich, The Population Bomb, 1968

Population control groups such as the Club of Rome, supported by charitable foundations such as the Rockefeller Foundation, continue to spread the myth of overpopulation.  Many rural areas have too few healthy people to build roads, other infrastructure and industry.

In 1972 DDT was banned by US EPA Administrator William Ruckelshaus in spite of overwhelming scientific evidence presented at hearings that refuted claims of harm by activist groups such as Environmental Defense Fund and Audubon Society.

“DDT is not a carcinogenic, mutagenic, or teratogenic hazard to man. The uses under regulations involved here do not have a deleterious effect on fresh water fish, estuarine organisms, wild birds, or other wildlife…and…there is a present need for essential uses of DDT.”                — EPA Administrative Law Judge Edmund Sweeney, after months of hearings, “In the Matter of Stevens Industries, Inc., et al., L.F. & R. Docket Nos. 63, et al.). Hearing Examiner’s Recommended Findings, Conclusions, and Orders, April 1972.” (40 CFR 164.32). (Consolidated DDT Hearings)  As summarized in Barrons, May 1, 1972

Beginning the 1970’s, US AID, UN WHO, UNESCO and the World Bank have pressured leaders of poor countries to discontinue DDT as a prerequisite to receiving essential aid. This continues to the present with exception of recently allowing limited spraying of interior wall in selected areas.

Although DDT is the most studied pesticide on the planet, it is still listed as an environmental toxin and possible carcinogen because the EPA listing has not changed, in spite of all of the studies that failed to find harmful effects on humans or the environment. It is much safer and more economical than any of the proposed replacements.

Verifying the Claims of Silent Spring

None of Rachel Carson’s “facts” about environmental and human harm were true. Most of the facts below, except where noted, are from “DDT: A Study in Scientific Fraud,” by J. Gordon Edwards, Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons Volume 9 Number 3 Fall 2004. (See link below)

Dr. Edwards examined each of Silent Spring’s claims and found them wrong and possibly fraudulent.

Not one person has been harmed or died from DDT.

  • The only death associated with DDT was a 3 yr. old child that drank a solution of DDT in kerosene, which is a hydrocarbon known to be toxic.
  • J. Gordon Edwards was a Ph.D. entomologist who sometimes ate a spoonful of DDT powder at his lectures as a demonstration of its safety. He suffered no significant ill effects and died of a heart attack at age 84 while hiking in the Rockies.

DDT is not carcinogenic, mutagenic or teratogenic

  • “Workers in the Montrose Chemical Company had 1,300 man-years of exposure, and there was never any case of cancer during 19 years of continuous exposure to about 17mg/man/day.”
  • “Concerns were sometimes raised about possible carcinogenic effects of DDT, but instead its metabolites were often found to be anti-carcinogenic, significantly reducing tumors in rats.”
  • Expected rise in leukemia in children and breast cancer years later in girls exposed during puberty never happened.

Bird deaths, thin egg shells and buildup in the environment have proven to be false.

  • Bird deaths at the University of Michigan, cited by Carson, were not from DDT, but were probably from soil fungicide containing mercury. In later tests, mercury was found in the soil and earthworms there. Other areas did not experience bird deaths from spraying of DDT. Carson’s Source was: Bird Mortality in the Dutch elm disease program in Michigan, Bulletin 41, Cranebrook Institute of Science by George John Wallace; Walter P Nickell; Richard F Bernard
  • According to Audubon Society Annual Christmas Bird Counts, bird populations actually increased during the thirty years of DDT use. Numbers rose from 90 birds seen per observer in 1941 to 971 birds seen per observer in 1960.
  • The eggshell thinning studies cited by Carson could not be replicated and had actually reduced dietary calcium, needed to build egg shells, of experimental birds to get that result.
  • Museum specimens compared to wild population eggs may have led to false claims of thinning because the museums used the best specimens available; natural variability in the wild may have been interpreted as thinning. “the whole idea that pesticides are concentrated as one moves up the food chain, which is crucial to Carson’s arguments about distant and delayed effects, has become increasingly dubious in the years that followed” (Fleming, New Conservation Movement, 31). Source: Reading Rachel Carson by Charles T. Rubin
  • DDT is not metabolized by birds and is rapidly excreted in their droppings.
  • “The counts of raptorial birds migrating over Hawk Mountain, Pennsylvania, indicated that there were many more hawks there during the “DDT years” than previously. The numbers counted there increased from 9,291 in 1946 (before much DDT was used) to 13,616 in 1963 and 29,765 in 1968, after 15 years of heavy DDT use.”

Aquatic life has not been harmed by DDT; it is practically insoluble in water, with only 1.2 parts per billion at saturation.

  • A study cited by Carson claimed 500 ppb DDT in seawater inhibited photosynthesis and killed algae. The problem with this study is that alcohol was added to the tank to dissolve the DDT in the water. Alcohol alone would do that.
  • The assumption of persistence of DDT in seawater for decades was also challenged. Tests showed DDT and its metabolites disappeared in as few as 38 days.

References:

See “DDT: A Study in Scientific Fraud,” by J. Gordon Edwards, Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons Volume 9 Number 3 Fall 2004. On the web at:

http://www.jpands.org/vol9no3/edwards.pdf

See also “The Truth about DDT and Silent Spring” by Robert Zubrin, adapted from Robert Zubrin’s Merchants of Despair: Radical Environmentalists, Criminal Pseudo-Scientists, and the Fatal Cult of Antihumanism, published in 2012, in New Atlantis Books series. On the web at:

www.thenewatlantis.com/publications/the-truth-about-ddt-and-silent-spring

The Truth about Zika Virus and Microcephaly

kaykiser

Facts about Zika virus and Microcephaly.microcephaly

Is there a cause and effect link or merely a correlation of unrelated events? Here is the story and the facts so far.  In October 2015 an increase in microcephaly was reported in Brazil. A Brazilian doctor, Adriana Melo, at IPESQ, a research insti­tute in Campina Grande, was the first to report a firm link between Zika and microcephaly. Several months before, there had been an outbreak of Zika virus throughout Brazil. The increase in microcephaly cases occurred only in a coastal state in the northeast of the country.

90% of the 1709 cases of microcephaly and birth defects were concentrated in this limited area. Of this number 1153 were diagnosed as microcephaly. There was no increase in other parts of the country, including an adjoining coastal state with a similar population, which only had 3 cases. This suggests there may be other contributing factors. Socio-economic factors may contribute since most of the mothers of the microcephalic babies were young, single, black and poor, living in small cities near larger cities. Additionally, this same northeastern region has always had the highest incidence of microcephaly in Brazil.

A study by the Latin American Collaborative Study of Congenital Malformations (ECLAMC) called for more controlled studies, and concluded that the data so far is inconclusive of a cause and effect link between Zika infection in the first trimester of pregnancy and microcephaly and similar nervous system defects. For an English translation of the original Portugese summary of the ECLAMC studies, see http://www.nature.com/polopoly_fs/7.33594!/file/NS-724-2015_ECLAMC-ZIKA%20VIRUS_V-FINAL_012516.pdf

This report discusses weaknesses in the methods used by IPESQ, recommendations for further studies and several other factors that may have caused or contributed to the birth defects as listed below.

  • Rumor may have caused over reporting due to active searches and over diagnosis. Brazil health authorities estimate that as many as 2/3 of cases are normally not reported to authorities. If the estimate is correct, this would partially account for an increase, but not the degree reported, so other factors must be involved. However, Brazil reports a rate of 0.5 per 10,000 births compared to EUROCAT of 2.85 per 10,000 births, indicating a gross under reporting.
  • Broadened criteria for microcephaly diagnosis from 3 standard deviations to 2 standard deviations below normal average age and sex adjusted head circumference, and no confirming follow up brain scans or autopsies in most cases.
  • Zika infection in the first trimester of pregnancy cannot be confirmed at the time of birth because the virus is short-lived in the body and will not be present in the mother. Unless the mother was diagnosed early in her pregnancy, occurrence and connection cannot be confirmed.
  • In the original studies other known causes were not ruled out such as STORCH (syphilis, toxoplasmosis, “other,” rubella, cytomegalovirus, herpes simplex), prematurity, diabetes of the mother and fetal alcohol syndrome, a major cause of microcephaly in Brazil.
  • Also not ruled out are possible co-infections with dengue or chikungunya, both present in the population in recent outbreaks. The dengue virus is similar to the Zika virus and difficult to differentiate in tests.
  • A low rate of yellow fever vaccination also seems to correlate to this incident. Yellow fever virus is similar to Zika virus and vaccination may offer some immunity to it.
  • At IPESQ Bovine diarrheal virus (BVDV) was found in brain tissue of 3 fetuses in a later study. This virus does not usually infect humans but is known to cause birth defects in cattle. If true, this may be significant, but Dr. Adriana Melo suspects it may be a contaminant in the sampling or testing procedures.
  • Contaminated water was not considered, although it is common for small cities without proper sanitation and water purification to have biologically contaminated water.
  • Nutrition was not considered in this study other than a mention of general socio-economic influences, although the CDC, NIH and other agencies recognize folic acid (a B vitamin) deficiency as one of the leading causes of neural tube defects (NTD), including microcephaly, anencephaly, and spina bifida. In a recent NIH study they found that other micronutrients may decrease the risk of NTD occurrence, including thiamin (B1), riboflavin (B2), niacin (B3), pyridoxine (B6), betaine (a B vitamin), vitamin A, retinol (A1), vitamin C, vitamin E and iron.

In conclusion, the “link” between Zika virus and microcephaly is far from proven because the original studies lacked scientific discipline and controls. More studies are needed to clarify what role the virus may play in these birth defects. However, it is probably best to take a precautionary approach until more is known.

Is it time to bring back DDT to eradicate the mosquitos that carry Zika and other diseases such as malaria, dengue fever, chikungunya, yellow fever and other diseases? Over 80% of infectious diseases are caused by insects. Assumed adverse environmental and health effects of this important insecticide have failed to materialize in many repeated controlled studies over the last 40 years. See “DDT: A Case Study in Scientific Fraud,” by J. Gordon Edwards, PhD entomology, Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons Volume 9 Number 3 Fall 2004, at http://www.jpands.org/vol9no3/edwards.pdf

References:

“Eclamc Final Document – V.3, Summary and conclusions of Documents 1-5,” December 30th, 2015 http://www.nature.com/polopoly_fs/7.33594!/file/NS-724-2015_ECLAMC-ZIKA%20VIRUS_V-FINAL_012516.pdf

“Neural Tube Defects and Maternal Intake of Micronutrients Related to One-Carbon Metabolism or Antioxidant Activity,” US National Institute of Health, Angela L. Chandler1, Charlotte A. Hobbs1, Bridget S. Mosley1, Robert J. Berry2, Mark A.Canfield3, Yan Ping Qi2, Anna Maria Siega-Riz4, Gary M. Shaw5, and National Birth Defects Prevention Study, in Birth Defects Res A Clin Mol Teratol. 2012 November ; 94(11): 864–874. doi:10.1002/bdra.23068.

  1. Department of Pediatrics, College of Medicine, University of Arkansas for Medical Sciences, Arkansas Children’s Hospital Research Institute, Little Rock, AR 72202
  2. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Atlanta, Georgia
  3. Birth Defects Epidemiology and Surveillance Branch, Texas Department of State Health Services, Austin, Texas
  4. Departments of Epidemiology and Nutrition, University of North Carolina School of Public Health, Chapel Hill, North Carolina
  5. Department of Pediatrics, Division of Neonatal and Developmental Medicine, Stanford University School of Medicine, Palo Alto, California

“Brazil’s birth-defects puzzle, Zika virus might not be only factor in reported microcephaly surge.” By Declan Butler, 28 July 2016, Nature, Vol. 535, Page 475-6.

“Zika epidemic uncovers Brazil’s hidden birth defect problem,” by Alex Cuadros, March 1, 2016, Washington Post

“Disease Transmission by Arthropods,” E. J. L. Soulsby and William R. Harvey, Science 176, no. 4039 (1972): 1153–1155.

“DDT: A Case Study in Scientific Fraud,” by J. Gordon Edwards, PhD entomology, Journal of American Physicians and Surgeons Volume 9 Number 3 Fall 2004, at http://www.jpands.org/vol9no3/edwards.pdf

 

 

 

 

To the Student who dreams of a Carbon free life

kaykiser

To the Student who is dreaming of a Carbon free life

  • First, sell your car, bicycle or other means of transportation – they were made using carbon based fuels, cars use fossil fuels and even crude handmade carts drawn by animals use and emit carbon (fodder – excrement & CO2). Even electric cars were made with carbon based fuels and use electricity from fossil fueled power plants.
  • Never buy or use solar panels or wind generators – they were produced using carbon based fuels and require fossil fueled power plants as back-up when sun and wind are absent.
  • Sell your house or give up your apartment – it was made by using carbon based fuels, uses fossil fuels to heat and cool, whether with carbon based electricity or directly from oil, gas, coal, wood. Never shelter from weather or use any heat in cold weather.
  • Sell your household goods – Chairs, tables, beds, sheets, towels, etc. – all were made using fossil fuels.
  • Sell your appliances and electronic gadgets – they were made using carbon based fuels and get their electricity from fossil fueled power plants.
  • Never drink purified water from a water system – pumps and purification all run on and were made using fossil fuels. Drink only “natural” water from streams, complete with parasites, bacteria and viruses.
  • Never buy or use any paper, plastic, cloth, wood, metal or glass products, including books and paper money, pens, pencils, dishes, pans, etc. –all are produced by using fossil fuels.
  • Never use any cleaning products, soap, cosmetics or shaving or hair care materials or implements – they were all made from and with carbon based fuels.
  • Remove and give away all of your clothes and shoes – they were made using fossil fuels, use water, detergents and electricity for cleaning and ironing.
  • Don’t buy food from stores – it was transported, processed and kept fresh using fossil fuels.
  • Never cook your food – it takes heat ultimately produced by carbon based fuels.
  • Stop eating – you are using carbon based foods and excrete carbon pollutants.
  • Stop breathing – you are emitting CO2.
  • Your short, miserable life is now over and your dead body is now polluting the planet.

Dreaming of Carbon Free Living?

kaykiser

To the Student who is dreaming of a Carbon free life

  • First, sell your car, bicycle or other means of transportation – they were made using carbon based fuels, cars use fossil fuels and even crude handmade carts drawn by animals use and emit carbon (fodder – excrement & CO2). Even electric cars were made with carbon based fuels and use electricity from fossil fueled power plants.
  • Never buy or use solar panels or wind generators – they were produced using carbon based fuels and require fossil fueled power plants as back-up when sun and wind are absent.
  • Sell your house or give up your apartment – it was made by using carbon based fuels, uses fossil fuels to heat and cool, whether with carbon based electricity or directly from oil, gas, coal, wood. Never shelter from weather or use any heat in cold weather.
  • Sell your household goods – Chairs, tables, beds, sheets, towels, etc. – all were made using fossil fuels.
  • Sell your appliances and electronic gadgets – they were made using carbon based fuels and get their electricity from fossil fueled power plants.
  • Never drink purified water from a water system – pumps and purification all run on and were made using fossil fuels. Drink only “natural” water from streams, complete with parasites, bacteria and viruses.
  • Never buy or use any paper, plastic, cloth, wood, metal or glass products, including books and paper money, pens, pencils, dishes, pans, etc. –all are produced by using fossil fuels.
  • Never use any cleaning products, soap, cosmetics or shaving or hair care materials or implements – they were all made from and with carbon based fuels.
  • Remove and give away all of your clothes and shoes – they were made using fossil fuels, use water, detergents and electricity for cleaning and ironing.
  • Don’t buy food from stores – it was transported, processed and kept fresh using fossil fuels.
  • Never cook your food – it takes heat ultimately produced by carbon based fuels.
  • Stop eating – you are using carbon based foods and excrete carbon pollutants.
  • Stop breathing – you are emitting CO2.
  • Your short, miserable life is now over and your dead body is now polluting the planet.

 

AGW Claims vs Truth: Claim 9 Oceans are more acidic due to increased CO2

kaykiser

Ocean_park_wikiClaim 9: The oceans are becoming more acidic due to the increased CO2 and erosion of carbonate rocks by acidified rain, so that corals and other animals are being harmed or killed.

Truth: This is partially true, but not to the extent that is claimed. The oceans are naturally alkaline (non-acidic) and are buffered by minerals and by the activities of biological systems. (See below for explanations of pH and buffering.) The normal pH of the oceans is in the range of 8.1. Like the manmade global warming hypothesis and the progressive nitrogen limitation hypothesis, (see Claim 2b), the ocean acidification hypothesis is a model scenario based on theory, not real experimental data. The models in the IPCC reports project a maximum reduction in pH of 0.3 by 2100. They also claim that a reduction of pH will slow the growth rate of coral or worse. So, are the corals and shelled creatures in danger? Hardly.

These models use a purely geochemical approach and do not take into account the effect of living systems on pH. For example, photosynthesis is known to increase pH. Increased algae growth rate from increased CO2 can offset any drop in pH.  There is a temporary seasonal variation in pH from such processes that is greater than the projected pH changes from CO2[1]. Real experiments by bubbled CO2 through ocean water don’t result in the same pH changes projected by the models. In these experiments, no net negative effect on coral growth is seen even with actual acidification by adding hydrochloric acid. As a matter of fact, in these experiments a slight reduction in pH may have been beneficial.

As stated in Claim 2, item d, CO2 is less soluble in warmer water so temperature also affects pH. Warmer water means less CO2 is dissolved in it by giving off more CO2 to the atmosphere. A lower concentration of CO2 with warming should, if anything, raise the pH (less acid) not lower it (more acid). However, due to buffering, no net change in overall pH has been found other than temporary localized variations from other processes like photosynthesis and agricultural run-off.

CO2 becomes carbonic acid (HCO3– and H2CO3) in water. H2O + CO2 = H2CO3, a very weak acid, some of which splits to form HCO3– ions and H+. The free H+ is what erodes carbonate (CO3=) rocks. For example,  insoluble CaCO3 + H+ = Ca++ + HCO3– (both soluble).

 Understanding pH:

pH is a measure of the hydrogen ion (H+) concentration in a water solution. The more hydrogen ions there are the more acid the solution is.  However, pH is the negative log of hydrogen ion concentration, so that the higher the concentration, the lower the pH number. For example, a pH of 5 is a hydrogen ion concentration of 10-5. A pH of 8 is a hydrogen ion concentration of 10-8. With less hydrogen ions, the hydroxyl ions from water make the solution “basic” or alkaline. 10-5 = 0.00001 or 0.001 percent. 10-8 = 0.00000001 or 0.000001 percent. So pH 5 is 1000 times the hydrogen ion concentration of pH 8. Neutral water is pH 7 with equal amounts of hydrogen ions and hydroxyl ions.

Understanding buffering:

When water is buffered, it has at least two related molecules or ions in balance that resist changes in pH of the solution by changing their ionic state when acids or bases are added or when diluted. Any added hydrogen ions from a more acidic solution causes a change in the ratio of the two buffer species offsetting any tendency to change pH. Water exposed to the atmospheric carbon dioxide is never neutral pH 7. It is in the range of pH 5.4. Oceans are in the range of pH 8 so it is obvious that the oceans are “buffered” against changes in pH by rain that is naturally more acidic. Biological systems and a complex mixture of buffering molecules/ions contribute to the buffering of oceans and other bodies of water, so that pH remains relatively steady over long periods of time under various stresses from sources ranging from acid rain to volcanoes.

Example: CO2 combines with water to form one of three forms of carbonate/-ic depending on the direction the pH is being pushed. These reactions can go back and forth between species as needed to maintain a constant pH.

CO2 + H2O <=> H2CO3 <=>  H+ + HCO3_ < => CO3= + 2H+

carbonic acid      bicarbonate ion      carbonate ion

The CO2 to carbonate series is one of the most important buffer systems in the oceans and is supplemented by carbonate in its various forms from erosion of rock. This example is simplified for clarity by leaving out other ions that affect pH such as Calcium, Magnesium, sodium, chlorine and sulfite (Ca++, Mg++, Na+, Cl–, SO3=). Chemicals produced by living organisms also affect buffering and overall pH.

[1] “Marine Photosynthesis and Oceanic pH,” Sherwood, Keith and Craig Idso, CO2 Science (online journal), Volume 10, Number 34: 22 August 2007 http://www.co2science.org/articles/V10/N34/EDIT.php Center for the Study of Carbon Dioxide and Global Change

 

Unbelievable? Science supports the Christian view

kaykiser

The Greens – The (unofficial) Guide

kaykiser

Andy's avatarSatire .. not quite dead. Yet.

Who Are the Greens?

People who love the planet earth are called Environmentalists or Greens.

Greens believe that the planet earth is being destroyed and everyone needs to work together to save it.

Greens think that people are bad and the planet is good. Some Greens call people a “cancer” on the earth.

let-s-save-our-lovely-earth.jpg

Natural Is Good

The Greens believe that things that are already on the earth are “natural”. The Greens like natural things.

This includes trees, whales, snow leopards, icebergs, oceans, rainbows and lots more. Viruses, genetic defects, disease-carrying mosquitos, illness and death are all natural too. The Greens don’t mention these much.

The Greens believe that people are destroying nature when they make their lives better. Lots of people have better lives by using things made by modern science and technology.

The Greens don’t like modern things. They call them “un-natural”.

VetDay-CadoganMosquitoes Some “natural” things are out to kill us. Humans are successful because…

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