The BBC recently ran a story claiming that the Antarctic ocean currents were heading for collapse, and to drive home the scare there was even a reference to the 2004 climate disaster film, The Day After Tomorrow. Rapidly melting Antarctic ice was reported to be causing a dramatic slowdown in deep ocean currents, “and could have a disastrous effect on the climate”. Like most of these fanciful scare stories, “could” is doing a lot of the heavy lifting work. But alas, missing from this Net Zero-promoting, model-inventing Armageddon tall tale was a note that the Antarctica ice cap appears to be in balance, and is not actually melting.
According to a paper written by NASA satellite ice-mapping scientists in 2021, Antarctica is “close to balance” in the period 2012-16 at -12 +/- 64 Gt a-1. Gt are gigatonnes and the formula is a scientific way of saying that as near as damn it, well within a margin of error, the Antarctica ice sheet loss is, more or less, zero. Back to 1992, the scientists found large total gains for the sheet.
According to the story in the BBC, reported faithfully in numerous media, as fresh water from the ice cap melts, sea water becomes less salty and dense and a downwards movement of water towards the sea bottom is interrupted. This in turn can affect world oceanic currents. The activist science blog the Conversation reported that “torrents of Antarctic meltwater are slowing the currents that drive our vital ocean ‘overturning’ – and threaten its collapse”. The BBC noted that a similar collapse in the North Atlantic was depicted in The Day After Tomorrow.
As regular readers will recall, the Daily Sceptic has observed that Antarctica is a difficult neighbourhood for activists to get a good scare story going. Over the last seven decades, there has been little or no warming over large parts of the continent. According to a recent paper, (Singh and Polvani), the Antarctica sea ice has “modestly expanded”, and warming has been “nearly non-existent” over much of the ice sheet. According to NASA figures, the ice loss is 0.0005% per year.
The latest scare arises from a paper published in Nature. It is the product of climate models – the BBC noting that the scientists spent 35 million computer hours over two years collecting their results. However, this story is also of considerable interest since it shows that the BBC and most mainstream media are seemingly incapable of questioning any statement that promotes human-caused climate change and the proposed command-and-control Net Zero political solution. This endemic lack of curiosity means that vast areas of science, including atmospheric physics and chemistry, together with weather, geology and geography, are simply off limits in case any doubt should be cast on the suggestion that humans control the CO2 climate thermostat.
The study lead author, Professor Matthew England from Sydney’s University of New South Wales, is able to state, without any inquiring question or contradiction, that “our modelling shows that if global carbon emissions continue at the current rate, then the Antarctica overturning will slow by more than 40% in the next 30 years”. The BBC repeats emissions continuing at the current rate, but England’s paper states that his model has been loaded with a “high emissions” scenario. The paper is behind a paywall, but the abstract in which this admission occurs is freely available.
These “high emission” scenarios are almost certainly RCP8.5 and SSP5-8.5 that forecast global rises in temperatures of 4-5°C within less than 80 years. As Dr. Judith Curry has recently pointed out, these have been dropped in many science circles on the grounds they are recognised as implausible. Global warming of barely 0.1°C over the last 20 years is almost certainly a factor in this reassessment. Nevertheless, Curry notes that many of the extreme events based on the scenarios are still quoted in IPCC documents. “Rejecting these extreme scenarios has rendered obsolete much of the climate literature and assessments of the last decade,” she states.
Not at the BBC, of course. Settled science – the Science – cannot move on because it suffers from the anti-science proposition that it is somehow settled. Model results suggest deep water circulation in the Antarctic could slow at twice the rate of decline in the North Atlantic, reports the BBC. “It’s stunning to see that happen so quickly,” said climatologist Alan Mix from Oregon State University, a co-author of the latest Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) assessment. “It appears to be kicking into gear right now. That’s headline news,” he told Reuters. No, Dr. Mix, it’s a model based on assumptions that are regularly contradicted by the data. Some climatologists it appears have trouble distinguishing fact from their own fevered predictions.
Chris Morrison is the Daily Sceptic’s Environment Editor.
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They’ll simply decide that they weren’t done properly and needed to be longer, harder and more restricitive
Although possible they have absolutely no evidence that that would work either. They already know, if it makes an iota of difference, that lockdowns are ruinous to society. The longer the lockdown, the more ruinous. Whatever ‘they’ find and ‘they’ decide, I ain’t doing it, no matter the consequences. And I think I speak for many.
Amen
So typical of them
I don’t care whether lockdowns and masks “work” or not. I’m not doing them for the flu/a bad cold. Normal life is much more important.
Amen. I second that. The motion carries.
I do wonder if these quangos would be missed at all if they were obliterated (yes, I mean that literally) because they appear able to do nothing other than contribute to government’s effluent overspill.
I’ve noticed a marked increase in public mask wearing hereabouts in the last couple of weeks, regardless of actual evidence or politicised ‘consensus’ change. For some, the mindf*ck damage is in too deep. Sad.
I observed this very morning a lady in her car driving along with a mask on, her husband (presumably..) sat in the passenger seat with face uncovered. Could be an interesting conversation over breakfast..
Indeed. I keep seeing couples in the supermarket where one is bemaskec and the other not. I wonder whether they cohabit and did they travel to the shop in separate vehicles
I’ve not noticed where I live, but in 2020/21 there were quite a lot of people not wearing masks and I never suffered verbal abuse for not wearing a mask and wasn’t aware of anyone else being subjected to this. Apart from constantly voting SNP it seems like Scots have a certain amount of common sense.
They should have read the bsi-guide-for-personal-safety-equipment-0520 v1.4 June 2020. Remember that in the UK, most of the junk sold to the public were NOT classified as “masks” – indeed, they would have tiny labels that say no (if you had a magnifying glass to hand), so as to avoid being done under trading standards. In the BSI guide they were classed as “face covering” and it said that: “The manufacturer/seller must not call it PPE or a medical device nor make any claim that the product will provide protection to any specific individual ”, and “General product safety regulations (product must be safe i.e. non- toxic, non-choking etc) ”. In short, they were of no physical value at all.
I’ve still got a copy of that one. And I never bought any of them.
So, ‘surgical masks’ were they?
It comes to something when NHS hospitals have face nappy mandates for more of the year than when they have not enforced this violation of human rights. But facts don’t matter in Clown World, seemingly. Anyone here in Leicester? Stay healthy and stay out of hospital. You also have the bonus of not being ‘Matt Midazolam’d’
”People in some parts of Leicester’s hospitals will be required to wear face masks again after a rise in coronavirus cases among patients.
Face coverings are now needed in clinical areas of the Leicester Royal Infirmary, the Leicester General and Glenfield Hospital, senior medics said.
University Hospitals of Leicester NHS Trust (UHL) insisted the number of infections were “low”.
However, it said the step would protect, patients, staff and visitors.
UHL’s chief nurse Julie Hogg said: “We are constantly monitoring Covid-19 levels in our hospitals, and as a result we are reintroducing mask wearing in clinical areas.
“The number of patients testing positive for Covid remains low but has increased, and we are determined to ensure the safety of patients, colleagues and visitors to the hospital.
“Mask wearing is not mandatory in non-clinical spaces, such as offices, lifts, restaurants and corridors, but we will keep the situation under review.”
https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-england-leicestershire-66988015.amp
The UHL Chief Nurse obviously knows the square roor of sweet FA about aerosol viral transmission. How the hell has she risen to this position of authority?!
I live in the Leicester area. I wonder what will happen if I need to go to hospital and refuse to wear their stupid muzzle. Will I be denied access? Denied treatment? What a world.
Yet more reason to look elsewhere for treatment and to take care of ourselves as a matter of urgency. How can these people be trusted with needles and scalpels if they think wearing a cloth over one’s mush will safeguard anyone.
The Conspiracy against “We, The People” was NOT a Theory. Shame on those who remained silent in 2020/2021. ALL Th evidence was already there.