The agreement reached in Paris will only be meaningful if countries make progress on their pledges to reduce greenhouse gas emissions.
Lack of progress is often attributed to the influence of climate skepticism, and some observers expect a new wave of skeptical voices in the coming years. Yesterday Michael Oppenheimer was quoted in the Washington Post, saying
“Denialism draws its oxygen from larger political agendas and Paris won’t put an end to those... There will still be plenty of opposition to regulating greenhouse gas emissions, to regulation in general, and to any sort of international cooperation.”
Saturday, December 19, 2015
Tuesday, December 15, 2015
What Klimazwiebelists have to say on the COP21 result
All have an opinion on the result of COP21, even if these opinions may be based on rather different perceptions of the results. But we thought that it could be interesting if we Kimazwieblists would present some individual views. Four of us, Reiner Grundmann, Werner Krauss, Hans von Storch and Eduardo Zorita, have taken on the challenge - here are their views (in alphabetical order):
Saturday, December 12, 2015
While the dust settles
Compared to Copenhagen, the new deal reached today in Paris is a surprising success. It is a success in that parties to the conference have agreed on a document that represents a compromise on several issues that have proved contentious among different countries, and among different social groups within each nation.
Friday, December 11, 2015
Der Wissenschafts-Blog des Jahres wird gewählt.
Die Firma "Science&Media; Büro für
Wissenschafts- und Technikkommunikation" teilt mit:
Der Wissenschafts-Blog des Jahres wird gewählt.
Auch "Die Klimazwiebel" ist wieder unter den Kandidaten.
Wie im
letzten Jahr haben wir die Blogs, die sich mit Wissenschaft beschäftigen und die
Blogs, die Wissenschaftskritik zum Thema haben, in zwei getrennten Abstimmungen
zur Wahl gestellt: zum einen zum „Wissenschafts-Blog des Jahres 2015“, zum
anderen zum „Blogteufelchen der Wissenschaftskritik“.
Ich würde
mich freuen, wenn Sie sich an der Wahl beteiligen.
Falls Sie
in Ihrem Blog auf die Wahl hinweisen wollen, benutzen Sie bitte diesen Link: http://wp.me/1XAlm
Thursday, December 10, 2015
A sign of things to come?
Last week the North of the UK was hit by strong rain (storm ‘Desmond’) which led to massive flooding of various towns and villages, especially in Cumbria. As is routine in such cases, the question is asked if this has been caused by climate change. The Met office issued this statement by Professor Dame Julia Slingo, Met Office Chief Scientist:
“It’s too early to say definitively whether climate change has made a contribution to the exceptional rainfall. We anticipated a wet, stormy start to winter in our three-month outlooks, associated with the strong El Niño and other factors.
“However, just as with the stormy winter of two years ago, all the evidence from fundamental physics, and our understanding of our weather systems, suggests there may be a link between climate change and record-breaking winter rainfall. Last month, we published a paper showing that for the same weather pattern, an extended period of extreme UK winter rainfall is now seven times more likely than in a world without human emissions of greenhouse gases.”
“It’s too early to say definitively whether climate change has made a contribution to the exceptional rainfall. We anticipated a wet, stormy start to winter in our three-month outlooks, associated with the strong El Niño and other factors.
“However, just as with the stormy winter of two years ago, all the evidence from fundamental physics, and our understanding of our weather systems, suggests there may be a link between climate change and record-breaking winter rainfall. Last month, we published a paper showing that for the same weather pattern, an extended period of extreme UK winter rainfall is now seven times more likely than in a world without human emissions of greenhouse gases.”