“It’s not the oil that’s dirty, it’s the politics. “

If oil is moving around North America, the best way to do it is via pipeline, not via railroads (which is happening). The latest delay in Keystone XL is disgusting.

 

“Republicans are denouncing President Obama’s latest delay on the Keystone XL pipeline, six long years after it was proposed. But for cold political fury they have nothing on Terry O’Sullivan, who runs the Laborers’ International Union that represents a half-million construction workers.

This is once again politics at its worst,” Mr. O’Sullivan said in a public statement that deserves to be quoted at length. “In another gutless move, the Administration is delaying a finding on whether the pipeline is in the national interest based on months-old litigation in Nebraska regarding a state level challenge to a state process—and which has nothing to with the national interest. They waited until Good Friday, believing no one would be paying attention. The only surprise is they didn’t wait to do it in the dark of night.

It’s not the oil that’s dirty, it’s the politics. Once again, the Administration is making a political calculation instead of doing what is right for the country. This certainly is no example of profiles in courage. It’s clear the Administration needs to grow a set of antlers, or perhaps take a lesson from Popeye and eat some spinach.

“This is another low blow to the working men and women of our country for whom the Keystone XL Pipeline is a lifeline to good jobs and energy security.”

The pipeline is expected to create some 2,000 new jobs from construction and thousands more related to the project. Many of those jobs would go to Mr. O’Sullivan’s union members, who do not live on San Francisco’s Pacific Heights like billionaire donor Tom Steyer who opposes Keystone.”

 

We don’t want this:

 

Could Climate Change Have Caused the Polar Vortex?

According to Time Magazine: “Climate change skeptics are pointing to the record cold weather as evidence that the globe isn’t warming. But it could be that melting Arctic ice is making sudden cold snaps more likely—not less

Do you want to see what a cold snap really looks like according to the NOAA?

February 1936 – Coldest Month in USA History (click on the image for the full effect)

cag_[ Statewide Temperature Anomalies (Feb 1936) ]

 

In 2014, Feb was -1.69°F below the 1901-2000 average. In February 1936 the USA was -8.59°F below average. Big difference.

NOAA_Feb_1936_Lower_48

 

In North Dakota, February 1936 was 26.0°F below the 1901-2000 average. The whole month averaged -14.1°F below 0.

NOAA_Feb_1936_North_Dakota

In comparison, lets take a look at Feb 2014:

cag_[ Statewide Temperature Anomalies (Feb 2014) ]

USA March 1910 versus March 2014 (according to the NOAA)

March 1910 (Before Global Warming) 7.94°F Above the 1901-2000 Average

cag_[ Divisional Temperature Anomalies (Mar 1910) ]

 

Some of those divisions are 16F above normal.

March 2014 (After Global Warming)  -0.99°F Below the 1901-2000 Average

cag_[ Divisional Temperature Anomalies (Mar 2014) ]

http://gis.ncdc.noaa.gov/map/cag/#app=cdo

PS I just randomly picked 1934 without checking. And then I noticed 1910 … but I’ll post the 1934 map so it doesn’t go to waste.

March 1934 (Before Global Warming) 1.28°F Above the 1901-2000 Average

cag_[ Divisional Temperature Anomalies (Mar 1934) ]

 

Could CO2 have lowered the rate of natural warming in the oceans?

As a minor followup to my post “Could CO2 have lowered the rate of natural warming?” lets consider ocean warming.

From 1900 to 1945 oceans were warming at a rate of  0.0116188C per year.

After 1945 oceans were warming at a rate of 0.00654978C per year.

Which means the massive 1945 increase in CO2 after 1945 slowed the  rate of ocean warming by 0.00506902C per year. Which is a drop off 44%.

Could_CO2_SST

Woodfortrees Url is here.

 

 

Climate Change Is Damaging Brains (of the Researchers Probably)

Every once in a while I read the Daily Mail website Today I came across:

Climate change is damaging fish brains and causing them to lose their survival instinct, researchers warn

Immediately all I could think of was:

Climate change is damaging fish brains researchers brains and causing them to lose their minds

So lets get to the key point. They claim fish act bolder when exposed to water with a lower pH level:

There’s no difference between the fish treated with CO2 in the lab in tests for chemical senses versus the fish we caught and tested from the CO2 reef”

Could it be that catching the fish and not killing them causes the fish to act differently?

 

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2605560/Fish-losing-survival-instinct-climate-change-claim-researchers.html

Could CO2 have lowered the rate of natural warming?

Lets say you have a pot of water that is warming, but you can’t see underneath it. There is a thermometer in the pot, and intermittently you write down the temperature.

And at some point some people come up with a theory that suggests a 2nd candle is now adding its energy to the pot of water. So what are you going to do?

Well, one way is to take the temperature data and graph it and calculate the trend before and after the supposed appearance of the 2nd candle. The change in trend is possibly the extra energy added by the 2nd candle.

Of course the analogy is really about CO2. So lets pick say … 1945 as the supposed appearance of the 2nd candle (CO2).

Why 1945? That is when CO2 really took off. Here is the CDIAC data in million metric tons of CO2.

CDIAC-co2

 

And here is the data graphed. 1900 to 1945 in red. And 1945 to 2014 in blue. With trends.  I used Woodfortrees for the graph and here is the url.

Candle_1945_2014

 

So … what are the trends.

1900 to 1945 = 0.0110866C / Year

1945 to 2014 = 0.00954579 / Year

 

I conclude the 2nd candle actually changed the trend downward by 0.00154081C / Year.

Maybe it wasn’t a candle? Maybe it was an ice cube.

I think only conspiracy theorists could come up with a 2nd candle theory when the trend actually went down.

 

 

 

Climate Alarmist Backfire: People Buying SUV’s So They Can Cope With ‘Extreme’ Weather

I see that the NY Times isn’t quite as thick as they used to be in this article about climate alarmist tactics backfiring.

“But there is every reason to believe that efforts to raise public concern about climate change by linking it to natural disasters will backfire. More than a decade’s worth of research suggests that fear-based appeals about climate change inspire denial, fatalism and polarization.”

“Some people, the report noted, “are likely to buy an SUV to help them through the erratic weather to come” for example, rather than support fuel-efficiency standards.”

 

Embed from Getty Images

How To Get Cheap High Speed Trains

I have a foolproof plan for cheap high speed rail.

hs_train

  • Take a medium speed train. Paint it in a new color scheme. And announce it is a new high speed train.
  • Wait until a stupid greenie holds a news conference demanding that the high speed trains run slower to save on CO2.
  • Have the train company announce that it will gladly comply with the greenies and run the new “high speed” train at “medium speed” train velocity.
  • Bank the savings.

 

(Inspiration Tim Blair)

 

Putin: Helping Coal Make a Comeback in the Ukraine

It is too bad the EU has worked so hard to stop fracking in Europe. Europe might had have some spare natural gas to sell the Ukraine.

Ukraine’s Western-backed leaders scrambled on Friday to find new sources of energy after Russia hiked its gas price by 80 percent in response to the overthrow of Kiev’s pro-Kremlin regime.”

“We are now reviewing our electricity and fuel balance for 2014 with a view of using as much domestic coal as possible at the expense of natural gas,”

http://www.thegwpf.org/ukraine-shifts-to-coal-after-russian-gas-price-hike/

 

Embed from Getty Images