Can the Russell Report draw a line under Climategate?

Posted by TonyN on 07/07/2010 at 10:18 am CRU Email Hack 6 Responses »
Jul 072010

The report of Sir Muir Russell’s Independent Climate Change Email Review will be published today.

Let’s get one thing straight right at the outset: an inquiry that is set up, funded, and has its terms of reference set by the institution that it is intended to inquire into cannot be described as independent. Not under any circumstances. Not even in the fairy-tale world of climate politics.

Such an inquiry might – just might – come up with a report that is fair-minded and thorough, but that still does not mean that it is independent, nor is it likely to be effective in restoring confidence. Just imagine public reaction if BP announced that they had set up an independent inquiry into the causes of, and responsibility for, the Gulf oil spill.

There have already been two reports on the Climategate scandal. An extremely hasty and superficial report from the House of Commons Science and Technology Select Committee failed to address the issues that really concern sceptics. It did, however, set out some sensible recommendations as to how the University of East Anglia’s other inquiries should be conducted, and these were made very clear to Sir Muir Russell both when he gave evidence to the committee and in the published report. I will probably be returning to this later today.

The inquiry into the science produced at the CRU, which the university entrusted to Lord Oxburgh, has already become a laughing stock with, apparently, no written terms of reference and no record of the evidence taken.

So far, the Climategate scandal has been seen as a problem affecting only the climate community. It provided a window on a tribal culture in which it is very difficult to see how objective and effective scientific research could be carried out. This is clear to anyone who has browsed the emails that were released on the internet last November.

If the Russell inquiry now fails to address the real issues raised by Climategate, and there has been plenty of time for them to do so, then the scandal will no longer be confined to the climate science community. It will tell us that the scientific and political establishment, who are ultimately responsibility for ensuring that scientific research which has a massive impact on public policy is properly conducted, dare not lift the lid on climate science and have a very careful look at what is happening.

Alligators, fire insurance, ignorance, and risk

Posted by TonyN on 03/07/2010 at 9:41 pm The Climate 135 Responses »
Jul 032010

A while ago, I was sauntering along one of our local beaches with a physicist. There are three outstanding things about this guy, he is very clever, very tall, and an excellent walker with whom I’ve spent many days in the mountains, winter and summer, and in all kinds of conditions.

We were talking about climate change and he told me that he had recently read a book by Professor David McKay on the subject of alternative energy generation which, not surprisingly, had done nothing to convince him that there might be a few problems with the orthodox view of AGW. His attitude was that, as a physicist, reading a book by another physicist, he was inclined to accept what this told him rather than any of the reservations expressed by sceptics who were not physicists. To a certain extent I could see his point and was happy to treat it with respect. But what happened next did surprise me. Continue reading »

Of whitewash, reality, a crumbling consensus, and models

Posted by TonyN on 26/06/2010 at 10:06 pm The Climate 11 Responses »
Jun 262010

This post is just going to be a few jottings of things that I’ve noticed since I got back from holiday. At the moment there seems to be so many straws in the wind that it’s difficult to focus on any particular event or trend.

All you need is whitewash

I keep on thinking that nothing I see in the climate debate will surprise me now, and every time I’m wrong.

We’ve heard a lot about whitewash recently, mostly in connection with rather strange investigations into Climategate and the IPCC, but apparently this metaphorical material can also have real practical uses in climatology.  The BBC website has put up a perfectly serious report on an attempt to recreate a vanished glacier in the Peruvian Andes. Apparently all you need to do is paint the place where the glacier used to be with whitewash and, Hey Presto! the albedo effect will get your glacier back.

But wait a minute, the glacier had its own albedo effect before global warming supposedly wiped it out, and that didn’t stop it trickling away. So what possible reason could there be to suppose that creating an artificial albedo effect will produce anything at all except a lot of rather dirty grey rock? Continue reading »

Playing chicken with energy policy

Posted by TonyN on 08/06/2010 at 10:00 am Politics, The Climate 76 Responses »
Jun 082010

(This post was programmed to appear automatically while I was away, but for reasons that I have failed to discover, did not do so. In light of what I have come across in the reading that I have done since my return, there seems to have been few developments since I wrote it, including some press comments that are unlikely to keep Mr Huhne smiling.)

In the aftermath of the general election, Chris Huhne has succeeded Ed Miliband at the helm of the Department of Energy and Climate Change. There can be no doubt that he will be navigating in some extremely stormy waters.

Of all the cabinet posts other than those relating to the public finances, this is probably the one that will come with the highest risks attached. I am not going to rehearse the evidence that, unless the UK gets a viable energy policy together immediately, there is a very real likelihood that we will be suffering a third-world type energy crisis within as little as five years, the intended lifetime of the current parliament. Huhne’s post at the DECC needs to be filled by someone who can think straight, think big and think fast. It is by no means certain that the present incumbent possesses all these qualities.

There is no reason to think that Huhne is a fool. He was educated at Westminster School, like his party leader Nick Clegg, before going on to  the Sorbonne and then Oxford where he took a first in PPE. As a student he was active in Labour politics.

He went of to become an economist in the CIty of London, rising to be the managing director of Fitch ratings, an international credit ratings agency, so it would seem that someone thought that he had management abilities; no bad thing for a minister. He has also had a successful career as a journalist, rising to be financial editor of the Independent and the Independent on Sunday.

After unsuccessful attempts to enter parliament in 1983 and 1986 he turned his attention to Europe and became a Liberal Democrat MEP for South East England from 1995 to 2005, when he was elected to Westminster as member of parliament  for Eastleigh. Since then, his rise has been meteoric.

Continue reading »

We should watch the Royal Society very carefully

Posted by TonyN on 01/06/2010 at 10:30 am Royal Society, The Climate 59 Responses »
Jun 012010


It all started with a report by Roger Harrabin of all people. On Wednesday, under the headline ‘Society to review climate message’, the BBC website broke the news that the Royal Society was to review its public statements on global warming, and that this had been brought about by what appears to be an uprising within its ranks.

Disquiet led forty-three fellows of the Society to demand that the governing council should conduct a review in order to establish what is widely agreed on climate science, and what is not fully understood. At the heart of the rebel’s concerns is lack of objectivity about uncertainties and derogatory remarks about climate sceptics.

It would be hard to overestimate the importance of what is happening. The Royal Society occupies a very special place in the scientific firmament, not just in the UK, but worldwide. The impact of its very partisan outpourings about climate change is thought to have been crucial not only to the last government’s decision to put global warming at the top of the political agenda, but also in persuading national academies of science almost everywhere to throw their weight behind the warmist cause. The ructions behind the grand facade of 6-9, Carlton House Terrace will be watched closely by scientists everywhere, and there can be little doubt that if fellows of he Royal Society are prepared to stick there heads above the parapet, then others will follow their lead.

Perhaps the most encouraging thing about this news is that no less than three panels at the Society are now considering the problem, and at leas two of them include a number of fellows who have doubts about the current state of climate science.  Reaching an agreement will not be easy, and one fellow told Harrabin that it is by no means certain that reaching a consensus will be possible. The message that this would send to the rest of the scientific world would be even more potent than an admission that the evidence has been exaggerated. For years, the orthodox line has been that expounded by Lord May of Oxford when he was the society’s president: the debate is over and the science is settled. It will be very difficult to explain why the fellows of the worlds oldest and most highly respected scientific institution cannot even agree what the situation is among themselves, let alone why they have been misleading other scientists, politicians and the public for several years about the degree of consensus on  this subject.

Since the BBC report appeared, the society has put out a statement on its web site claiming that the review has been planned for a long time. This reminds me of the response I received from the BBC Trust recently to a letter about their review of the impartiality of science coverage, and particularly climate change, which is taking place this year. They told me that this has nothing to do with the Climategate scandal or criticisms of the IPCC, it is a purely routine exercise that would have taken place anyway. Such claims do not enhance the credibility of institutions that make them.

Looking at the coverage of this story in the rest of the MSM, it would seem that the Royal Society has only spoken to the BBC, and other reports are based on Harrabin’s original story together with what little information is available on the Royal Society web site. This seems to have been hastily posted in response to the demands of the forty-three fellows. One, headlined, ‘Royal Society to publish new guide to the science of climate change‘ quotes the president, Lord Rees, saying: Continue reading »

The Met Office just can't stop doing it

Posted by TonyN on 25/05/2010 at 12:02 pm The Climate 12 Responses »
May 252010

There are some kinds of behaviour that become compulsive. The alcoholic’s urge to fill another glass, a kleptomaniacs need to schlep away any enticing bauble, or some gambler’s attempts to prove to themselves and others that they really can profit by picking winners, in spite of the odds always being in the bookies favour. Such behaviour is well recognised by therapists as intractable unless the victim is sincerely committed to change their ways. The inevitable penalties of such compulsive behaviour – broken relationships and liver damage, criminal convictions and disgrace, bankruptcy and destitution – are not sufficient incentives for reform in themselves.

Yesterday I came across this headline in the Sunday Times:

El Niño could make 2010 the hottest year ever

Leaving aside the fatuous use of the term ‘ever’, my immediate reaction was that, whoever was making this prediction, it could not possibly be our very own Met Office. Surely they must have learned from their experiences over the last couple of years. Failed attempts to predict that the coming year would be the hottest yet, that we would have a barbecue summer, or a milder than normal winter, would make them think twice about risking ridicule yet again. So who could it be? Continue reading »

Climate Change Debate in London

Posted by TonyN on 19/05/2010 at 3:18 pm The Climate No Responses »
May 192010

Below is a press release that I received from the Global Warming Policy Foundation yesterday. If anyone decides to go along, could they please contact me with a view to a report on the proceedings here. This sounds as though it could be a very interesting evening, especially for those of us who are still racking their brains to work out what implications the election has for climate policy. Smart address too!

INVITATION TO A GWPF DEBATE

New Government – Old Climate Policy?

Debating the future of British climate policy

* Lord Lawson, Chairman of the Global Warming Policy Foundation

* Professor Lord Giddens, London School of Economics

* Moderator: Dr Terence Kealey, Vice-Chancellor of the University of Buckingham.

Wednesday, 9 June 2010, 16:00 – 17:45

Institute of Materials, Minerals and Mining, 1 Carlton House Terrace, London SW1Y 5DB

Members of the press are invited to attend the debate.  To register, please e-mail: info@thegwpf.org or phone 207 9306856

The Global Warming Policy Foundation is hosting a public debate between Nigel Lawson (GWPF) and Professor Anthony Giddens (LSE) on the future of British climate policy after the recent general election. The debate will be moderated by Dr Terence Kealey (University of Buckingham).

The key question for everybody interested in climate change and related energy issues is if and how the new government intends to change Labour’s policies in these fields and what it ought to do.

The new government has pledged to continue and accelerate Labour’s low-carbon economy agenda. A low carbon economy requires growing subsidies from taxpayers and sharply increased energy bills for business, industry, and households in order to force renewable alternatives to become competitive. This approach, however, conflicts with the government’s foremost priority to reduce the alarming and unsustainable budget deficit, and to do so while restoring the wider economy to health.

High energy prices and rising fuel poverty are likely to put the new government’s low carbon commitment under severe pressure. How will the coalition government respond to these challenges – and will the Labour opposition provide cover for the government’s green agenda?

About the Speakers

Lord Lawson
Nigel Lawson was educated at Christ Church College, Oxford where he gained a first class honours degree in Philosophy, Politics, and Economics. He was Secretary of State for Energy from 1981 to 1983 and Chancellor of the Exchequer from 1983 to 1989. He was created a life peer in 1992. He is the author of An Appeal to Reason: A Cool Look at Global Warming, which was published in 2008.

Professor Lord Anthony Giddens
Anthony Giddens served as Director of the London School of Economics from 1997 to 2003. He was previously Professor of Sociology at King’s College, Cambridge. Lord Giddens is the author of 34 books, among them The Third Way: The Renewal of Social Democracy and The Politics of Climate Change. He was adviser to former Prime Minister Tony Blair and was given a life
peerage in 2004.

Dr Terence Kealey
Terence Kealey has been Vice-Chancellor of the University of Buckingham since April 2001. He trained in medicine and lectured at Cambridge University for 13 years. Dr Kealey has authored 80 peer reviewed research papers and two books. He is a founding member of the GWPF’s Academic Advisory Council.

The Hockey Stick - what would Martin Luther do?

Posted by TonyN on 17/05/2010 at 11:32 am The Climate 176 Responses »
May 172010

While catching up on things this morning, a link at Bishop Hill took me to one of the most penetrating and concise commentaries on the Hockey Stick controversy that I have seen, and it comes from a rather surprising source.

I’m not going to attempt to summarise what it says, mainly because if I did so it would probably give the impression that the author – Sam Norton, a philosopher and country parson – is reiterating arguments that most of us have often heard before, and to some extent this is the case. The power of his post comes not from covering new ground, but from the clarity and rigour with which it brings together issues that are often discussed in isolation: the political influences that contaminate climate science, reliance on arguments from authority, and the insights that applying dispassionate philosophical analysis to a scientific controversy can provide.

If you are commenting here on what Sam has to say then please, please, lets not have yet another discussion of what Michael Mann’s work may or may not tell us about climate over the last millennium. That is not what the article is about. The Hockey Stick saga has far more interesting things to tell us about the relationship between politics, science and belief at the beginning of the 21st century than whether the 1990’s were the warmest decade for a thousand years – if that matters – and that 1998 was the warmest year.

If you consider commenting at Sam Norton’s blog, then I advise you to get all your ducks in a row first. He seems to be a very pleasant and courteous chap, but note his reply to ‘Tess’, third comment down.

Kudos to Andrew Montford (aka Bishop Hill) whose book The Hockey Stick Illusion is helping to bring what appears to be a rather grubby scandal to the attention of a far wider circle of people whose views are valuable.

Post-election blues: of clichés, coalitions, and wrong turnings

Posted by TonyN on 14/05/2010 at 9:56 pm General Election 2 Responses »
May 142010

I believe it was Oscar Wilde who was once asked what he thought about Charles Dickens’ heart-rending description of the death of Little Nell in the Old Curiosity Shop; a literary sensation in its time.

“You would need a heart of stone”, intoned the great Irish wit, “not to get a laugh out of it.”

On Tuesday evening I was reminded of these words as I watched Gordon Brown’s final, and very moving, performance outside the door of Number 10 Downing Street, just before he headed for the Palace and the political wastelands beyond.

There is an innate tragedy in witnessing a big man being brought low by events. And there can be no doubt that Gordon Brown is a big man; in stature, in the vast cragginess of his features, and in the depth and resonance of his voice, if nothing else. So, when the last choked words passed his lips and he turned away, why was I grinning?

Almost exactly thirteen years ago Tony Blair, the joint author with Brown of the New Labour project, was welcomed to Downing Street by a roaring crowd of party activists who had been bussed in specially for the occasion, to make sure that it looked as though the whole nation was euphoric about his election victory. Standing in exactly the same place where Brown was now giving his tear-jerking performance, he fixed those rather troubling eyes firmly on the cameras and, after a dramatic pause, intoned his first message to the public as prime minister; ‘A new dawn has broken ….’.

I remember thinking at the time that he might have come up with something a bit better than that well-worn cliché, but then no one could have foreseen that we were witnessing the dawn of an age of cliché. In fact one might even suggest that clichés have been the hallmark of the thirteen years that followed; the ever dependable props of a government that rarely seemed able to think further ahead than the next morning’s headlines.

So when Gordon Brown finally turned away with the parting words, ‘Thank you, and goodbye’, it seemed altogether fitting that the age of New Labour should come to an end with one of the oldest, most mind numbing, and banal of all clichés.

It is now a week since the last ballot papers were counted, and we seem to be divided into those who are still trying to work out what the voters were trying to say, and those who are pretending that they know, in spite of there not being much evidence to go on. At this point, the Lib-Con coalition must still be regarded as an uncertain, and very risky, experiment. Continue reading »

Greens win a seat in the UK's 'car crash' election

Posted by TonyN on 07/05/2010 at 2:13 pm General Election 163 Responses »
May 072010


Caroline Lucas’ narrow victory over Labour in Brighton Pavilion will no doubt be lauded by the BBC far beyond it’s significance. With a majority of 1252 (2.4%) on an 8.4% swing from Labour this is fragile enough, but having sat up watching results come in last night, the impression that I got is that elsewhere their candidates rarely if ever managed to save their deposits (see comment #1 below). According to various reports, the Brighton result owes much to the Greens putting the same amount of effort into taking this single seat as might have gone into a national campaign. With 200 activists phoning possible supporters as many as three times yesterday to offer them a lift to their polling station – by rickshaw or on someones back presumably – they certainly weren’t taking any chances.

It will be interesting to see how the Greens’ share of the popular vote stacks up against the BNP and UKIP when these figures are available. Caroline Lucas is a very experienced and competent politician who had the good sense to fight her campaign on local issues rather than traditional green ones. Perhaps the best analogy to draw is with George Galloway’s far left Respect Party’s successes in Bethnal Green and Bow in recent elections, although at the time of writing it seems likely that they will now lose this seat.

I watched BBC coverage of the election until after five o’clock this morning, without much relish, then took a glass of whiskey outside to look at the dawn, listen to the birds, and enjoy the heavy scent of bluebells wafting from the wood. I enjoy election nights. Usually there is real life drama and you can feel the political pulse or the nation beating in a way that is impossible at any other time. Some candidates are jubilant and clamouring to get at the future, while others know that, for them, it is all over, and try to smile through their tears. It is about the only time that politicians seem human.

But last night, for hour after hour there seemed to be only confusion and disappointment wherever one looked. Not one party was prepared to show any sign of real jubilation, right down to Plaid Cymru, who were ‘disappointed’, and Alex Salmon of the SNP saying, with a broad grin, that they had done very well really, except that they hadn’t got anywhere near their target number of seats. But Alex is like that.

How can you have an election where everyone is a loser? Well the analysts will probably be explaining that for months to come.

All this was played out against a background of occasional references to a dramatic escalation in the sovereign debt crisis on world financial markets, which I have not been able to catch up with yet. Surely this is no time for there to be doubt about who is running Britain.

Supposing that, over the next few days, the Conservatives manage to form a government, it is worth looking at what they have to say about Climate Change and Energy on their website. Even a cursory glance at this reveals that compliance with the requirements of EU carbon reduction policy is the main driving force. There are several things that this brings to mind.

Firstly, the Conservatives are divided on Europe. Secondly, even David Shukman was prepared to admit in a BBC report the other evening that a lot of conservative MPs are sceptical about climate change. Thirdly, any incoming government that is doing the job properly will have to take a very careful, cool and objective look at energy policy, because at the moment we don’t really have one that is credible. Bits of paper bearing fantasy figures for the contribution that immensely expensive wind power can make to keeping the lights on until 2020 just will no longer do at a time when the economy is in ruins and the coffers are empty. Lastly, if David Cameron manages to form a government, its hold on power is likely to be very tenuous indeed until there is another election.

Welcome to the brave new post-Blair’n’Brown world!

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