Week in review – science edition

by Judith Curry
A few things that caught my eye this past week

Winter weather whiplash: impact of meteorological events in seasonally snow covered regions [link]
Coral records of variable stress impacts and possible acclimatization to recent marine heat wave events on the northwest shelf of Australia [link]
Three times tectonics changed the climate [link]
The East Asian monsoon is many millions of years older than we thought [link]
The role of cyclone activity in snow accumulation on Arctic sea ice [link]
a new version 3 of the NOAA-CIRES-DOE 20th Century Reanalysis recreates a 180-year history of temp, precip, winds, humidity, & other variables from below the land surface to the top of the atmosphere. https://usclivar.org/research-highlights/reconstructing-past-200-years-global-weather
Equilibrium climate sensitivity estimated by equilibrating climate models. https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1029/2019GL083898….
New paper showing the (approx) equal importance of atmospheric circulation and soil moisture for driving heatwaves [link]
Internal waves can relieve coral reef heat wave stress [link]
Measurement errors of outgoing longwave radiation (OLR) reach 11 W/m². Cloud optical thickness (COT) and water vapor have “the greatest effect” on OLR…a forcing of 2.7 W/m². [link]
What America lost when it lost the bison [link]
130K to 120K years ago, or during the last interglacial, CO2 levels peaked at 280 ppm. Yet there are marine mollusck shells buried in silty sand and clay 12-35 m above today’s sea levels dating to this time period. https://sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1040618219307219…
New paper looks at how deformation of the solid-Earth due to mass redistribution affects GPS observations and tide-gauge data.(http://doi.wiley.com/10.1002/2016GL070552…)
The latest on aerosol radiative forcing [link]
New paper on an urban heat island effect on temperature trends.[link]
Our paper on the developpment of a multi-layer snow scheme for @ECMWF https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1029/2019MS001725…
“Using nationwide light trap data for the period 1967 – 2017, the findings reveal there is around twice the combined biomass of moths in the present day compared with the 1960s”. https://rothamsted.ac.uk/news/down-not-out
“Wetter global arid regions driven by volcanic eruptions” https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1029/2019JD031171
Atlantic warming since the Little Ice Age https://tos.org/oceanography/article/atlantic-warming-since-the-little-ice-age
shifting subtropical highs have a much stronger influence over North American summertime precipitation than the Hadley cell, and account for a large fraction of projected precip trends. https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10.1029/2019JD031282#.XcsU5Z4vX0o.twitter
The global climate anomaly 1940-1942 [link]
Out of the top 100 precipitation events in the contiguous U.S. in 1949, “rainfall for Hurricanes Harvey and Florence were ranked 1st and 7th, respectively” https://agupubs.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1029/2019GL085034…

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Is Extreme Daily Rainfall Getting Worse In England? The answer is No [link]
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Climate change causes functionally colder winters for snow cover-dependent organisms https://go.nature.com/2qDM99t
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Ocean Temperature Changes Are Uneven And Uncertain https://thegwpf.org/ocean-temperature-changes-are-uneven-and-uncertain/
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Jim Steele: Causes of California wildfires [link]
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How can it be that, during a a very cold phase of our Earth’s climate (between 40 000 and 26 000 years ago), the north-eastern part of the Greenland ice sheet was less extensive than today? Read about it in our #Cryoblog post by Ilaria Tabone! https://blogs.egu.eu/divisions/cr/2019/11/08/did-you-know-about-the-fluctuating-past-of-north-east-greenland/
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Policy & Technology
4 years after Paris COP21 it might seem surprising that countries plan for more fossil fuel extraction, not less http://productiongap.org But this could also be seen as prime example for deliberate inconsistency (& hypocrisy) in #climate policymaking https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/abs/10.1002/wcc.427
Granger Morgan: Use (and abuse) of expert elicitation in support of decision making [link]
A uniform carbon tax would negatively affect the competitiveness of East and South Asia and Eastern Europe [link]
Impact of energy uncertainty on systemic risk in 12 industries [link]
Time varying wind and solar cannibalization and cross-cannibalization [link]
Ken Caldeira on fusion energy [link]
Time is running out in New York’s bitter natural gas showdown [link]
How many lives are lost due to the precautionary principle? [link}
Unraveling the claims for (and against) green growth [link]
Achieving peak pasture [link]
Black boxing unknown unknowns through vulnerability analysis [link]
Environmental co-benefits and adverse side effects of decarbonization [link]
Ten ways to use CO2 and how they compare [link]
Methane leakage from coal mines is equivalent to all aviation and marine emissions globally [link]
‘Green’ Iowa wind energy sending many giant blades to landfill [link]
China set for massive coal expansion [link]
Study Says Fracking is Saving Families $2,500 Annually, Significantly Lowering Greenhouse Gas Emissions  [link]
By tweaking the chemistry of one of concrete’s essential ingredients — cement — and altering its curing process, researchers are trying to make concrete cheaper, while at the same time drastically cutting carbon emissions. [link]
These uses of CO2 could cut emissions – and make trillions of dollars [link]
Disentangling the impacts of human and environmental change on Hurricane Harvey’s flooding [link]
In the path of disaster: the big causes of bushfires that most of us are missing [link]
Why Venice is disappearing [link]
Climate risk disclosure:  Great, but to what end? [link]
Gernot Wagner: Green moral hazards [link]
China’s key role in scaling low carbon energy technologies [link]
Moniz makes case for $11 Billion carbon removal initiative [link]
The idea that denying access to natural gas in new homes is necessary to meet emissions reduction goals is false. In fact, denying access to natural gas could make meeting emissions goals harder and more expensive. [link]
Forget climate excuses: environment agencies ignored flood warnings for years [link]
Cap and trade is supposed to solve climate change, but California’s emissions are increasing [link]
Pielke Jr:  No, hurricanes are not bigger, stronger, more damaging [link]
Long read on the yellow vest revolt [link]
Climate politics and the fractal carbon trap [link]
Faced with energy insecurity, the Chinese government has signalled coal power will be a top priority as it prepares its next Five Year Plan (2021-25) [link]
Africa increases its reliance on fossil fuels [link]
Scientists, inspired by photosynthesis in nature, have created a mechanism that absorbs CO2 and produces methanol and oxygen. [link]
The True Cost of Renewables are Hidden Due to a Lack of Market Transparency https://wattsupwiththat.com/2019/11/14/the-true-cost-of-renewables-are-hidden-due-to-a-lack-of-market-transparency/
The costs of decommissioning wind turbines [link]
New York’s unstable electric grid [link]
How states are stepping up to make farmers a part of the climate change solution [link]
Why indigenous peoples and traditional knowledge are vital to protecting future global biodiversity https://ensia.com/features/indigenous-knowledge-biodiversity/…
Climate denial is inflating local real estate prices http://anthropocenemagazine.org/2019/11/climate-denial-is-inflating-local-real-estate-prices/…
Flooding caused by poor management and flood plain building [link]
The environmental toll of livestock antibiotics [link]
About Science & Scientists
Science beliefs, political ideology and sophistication [link]
Dealing with bias in artificial intelligence and science.  Scientists are some of the most dangerous people in the world because we have this illusion of objectivity…  [link]
Barry Myers has withdrawn his nomination to head NOAA [link]
Historical origins of ‘open science’:  Patronage, reputation and common agency contracting in the scientific revolution [link]
Ravetz: Stop the science training that demands ‘dont ask’ [link]
Peter Gluckman: Towards integrity in public dialogue on issues that matter [link]
Mann Vs Greta: Does Greta Thunberg’s lifestyle equal climate denial? [link]
Greta is right: Study shows that the public is more likely to support systemic climate action if individuals advocating it have a low carbon footprint [link]
Insane character assassination attempt on John Christ [link]
Einstein in Athens: modern science is unwittingly emulating Aristotle, and has much to learn from him [link]
The luxury belief class [link]
The secret ingredients of super-forecasting [link]
36% of respondents to Nature’s PhD survey said that they have sought help for anxiety or depression caused by their PhD studies. [link]
Academic Bias Against Industry Is Toxic Hypocrisy [link]
News stories written by an algorithm were rated as more objective, credible, and less biased than those written by real journalists. https://tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/17512786.2019.1682940?journalCode=rjop20
Why diversity issues fail [link]
iewpoint diversity describes a situation where people are approaching questions from a range of different perspectives: disciplinary perspectives, theoretical perspectives, experiential, demographic and also ideological. https://bigthink.com/videos/improve-education-debra-mashek…

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