US Funded World Bank “Climate Program” – Helping China put American Farmers Out of Work
US Funded World Bank “Climate Program” – Helping China put American Farmers Out of Work
Guest essay by Eric Worrall The World Bank, to which the USA is by far the largest contributor, has launched a climate program in rural China, to help Chinese farmers improve infrastructure and productivity. This will in turn help the Chinese drive down the profits and job opportunities in rural America. Project Helps Farmers Adapt […]
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Ban plants! ‘Plants may be responsible for up to 30% of the world’s methane’
Ban plants!
http://climatechangepredictions.org/uncategorized/6518
The surprising discovery that plants may be responsible for up to 30 per cent of the world’s methane, a powerful greenhouse gas, is no reason to stop planting forests, a scientist has warned. A team led by Frank Keppler, of Max Planck Institute for Nuclear Physics in Germany, found that living plants emit 10 to 1000 times more of the gas than decaying matter. And plants increase their methane emissions when warmed by the sun, it was found. Plants have long been seen as weapons against global warming because they absorb another greenhouse gas, carbon dioxide. It’s a surprise, said David Etheridge of the CSIRO’s Marine and Atmospheric Research division. “You think you know everything.” Sydney Morning Herald, 13 Jan 2006
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Blame Climate Change? New orchid looks like the devil
…MIT Study: No Scientific Consensus On Global Warming Crop Impact
…Analysis: ‘The Real Reason Why US Farmers Are Sceptical Of Climate Change’
But has it not occurred to these geniuses that maybe, just maybe, these farmers actually understand their climate and its history much better than they do? Or that climatic patterns change all the time?
Let’s check out what NOAA have to say about the climate of the Corn Belt (and bear in mind that these graphs are based on their already heavily doctored data).
First, annual temperatures.
As we can see, temperatures have risen since the 1970s, but only back to the level of the 1940s.
When we look at summer temperatures, we find that they were much higher back in the 1930s.
Meanwhile, rainfall has been increasing in recent decades, and the long and severe droughts, regularly seen in the past, have become much less common. If this is due to climate change, I am sure farmers will be more than happy about it.
Snotty little academics like Arbuckle and Prokopy actually do themselves a great disservice by ignoring the accumulated knowledge and experience of the farmers who actually till this land.
Many will be aware, and certainly those whose families have farmed there for generations, that climate on the Great Plains runs in cycles, of which the period since 1910 only offers a small window.
The belief that “the rain follows the plough” actually stems from an unusually wet period on the plains in the 1880s, which was then followed by drought in the 1890s, and then another wetter period in the early 20thC. (There is a full analysis of this period here.)
It may, just may, be that global warming has improved rainfall levels in the Mid West. However, to assume that is just as dangerous, and naive, as believing that rain follows the plough.
In any event, whatever impact man is having, it is evident to anybody with a passing knowledge of the climatic history of the Corn Belt that it is small compared to the great natural changes that always take place.
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Poll: ‘Only 8% of farmers believe climate change is taking place and caused primarily by human activity’
http://fortune.com/2016/06/29/monsanto-farmers-climate-change/
Warmist writer confused: “Farmers are perhaps the segment of the population most affected by climate change, and yet a significant number of them don’t believe in it—especially the notion that it’s man-made.”
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A survey conducted by Iowa State Professor J. Arbuckle and Purdue University professor Linda Prokopy of 5,000 Cornbelt farmers—representing about 60% of U.S. corn production and 80% of farmland in the region—found that only 8% believed climate change is taking place and caused primarily by human activity. That 8% figure is significantly lower than the general population. A poll from January found that 27% of the general public primarily blames human activity.
Meanwhile, 33% of the farmers surveyed said climate change was caused more or less equally by natural changes and human activities, 25% said it was caused by changes in the environment, 31% said there wasn’t sufficient evidence to know if climate change is occurring, and 4% said climate change is not happening.…
Thanks to climate change, the Arctic is turning green
Thanks to climate change, the Arctic is turning green
By Chris Mooney Energy and EnvironmentJune 27
Using 29 years of data from Landsat satellites, researchers at NASA have found extensive greening in the vegetation across Alaska and Canada. Rapidly increasing temperatures in the Arctic have led to longer growing seasons and changing soil for plants. (Cindy Starr/NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center)
Earlier this month, NASA scientists provided a visualization of a startling climate change trend — the Earth is getting greener, as viewed from space, especially in its rapidly warming northern regions. And this is presumably occurring as more carbon dioxide in the air, along with warmer temperatures and longer growing seasons, makes plants very, very happy.
Now, new research in Nature Climate Change not only reinforces the reality of this trend — which is already provoking debate about the overall climate consequences of a warming Arctic — but statistically attributes it to human causes, which largely means greenhouse gas emissions (albeit with a mix of other elements as well).
[Alaska’s huge climate mystery, and its global consequences]
The roughly three-decade greening trend itself is apparent, the study notes, in satellite images of “leaf area index” — defined as “the amount of leaf area per ground area,” as Robert Buitenwerf of Aaarhus University in Denmark explains in a commentary accompanying the study — across most of the northern hemisphere outside of the tropics, a region sometimes defined as the “extratropics.” Granted, there are a few patches in Alaska, Canada and Eurasia where greening has not been seen.…
Another benefit of climate change? NASA says the Arctic is ‘greening’
Another benefit of climate change? NASA says the Arctic is ‘greening’
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2016/06/03/another-benefit-of-climate-change-the-arctic-is-greening/
NASA studies details of a greening Arctic From the NASA/GODDARD SPACE FLIGHT CENTER The northern reaches of North America are getting greener, according to a NASA study that provides the most detailed look yet at plant life across Alaska and Canada. In a changing climate, almost a third of the land cover – much of…
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Scientific Research Confirms: Increased CO2 Improves Southern Hemisphere Forest Growth
Plant life across the world has improved and increased profoundly,everywhere, due to the higher levels of atmospheric CO2, in combination with the modest global warming since the Little Ice Age.
The most recent study confirming this benefit to the biosphere pinpoints exceptional growth and health for older forests in the Southern Hemisphere – specifically, the Cordilleras region of southern Chile.
Per the study:
“Urrutia-Jalabert et al. performed a series of analyses on tree ring cores they obtained from long-lived Fitzroya cupressoides stands, which they say “may be the slowest-growing and longest-lived high biomass forest stands in the world.” … the authors write “the sustained positive trend in tree growth is striking in this old stand, suggesting that the giant trees in this forest have been accumulating biomass at a faster rate since the beginning of the [20th] century.” And coupling that finding with the 32 percent increase in water use efficiency over the same time period, Urrutia-Jalabert et al. conclude the trees “are actually responding to environmental change.” … the researchers state “we believe that this increasing growth trend…has likely been driven by some combination of CO2 and/or surface radiation increases,” adding that “pronounced changes in CO2 have occurred in parallel with changes in climate, making it difficult to distinguish between both effects.””
As is often the case, scientific research again confirms that the dogmatic consensus climate science, such as the “expert” prediction that the globe’s biosphere would suffer great harm from anthropogenic CO2, has proven to be spectacularly wrong.
Additional peer-reviewed articles.…
BBC: Rise in CO2 has ‘greened Planet Earth’ – ‘Plant boom’
The new study is published in the journal Nature Climate Change by a team of 32 authors from 24 institutions in eight countries.
Carbon dioxide emissions from industrial society have driven a huge growth in trees and other plants.
A new study says that if the extra green leaves prompted by rising CO2 levels were laid in a carpet, it would cover twice the continental USA.
Climate sceptics argue the findings show that the extra CO2 is actually benefiting the planet.
But the researchers say the fertilisation effect diminishes over time.
They warn the positives of CO2 are likely to be outweighed by the negatives.
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The authors note that the beneficial aspect of CO2 fertilisation have previously been cited by contrarians to argue that carbon emissions need not be reduced.
Co-author Dr Philippe Ciais, from the Laboratory of Climate and Environmental Sciences in Gif-sur‑Yvette, France (also an IPCC author), said: “The fallacy of the contrarian argument is two-fold. First, the many negative aspects of climate change are not acknowledged.
“Second, studies have shown that plants acclimatise to rising CO2 concentration and the fertilisation effect diminishes over time.” Future growth is also limited by other factors, such as lack of water or nutrients.
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The scientists say several factors play a part in the plant boom, including climate change (8%), more nitrogen in the environment (9%), and shifts in land management (4%).
But the main factor, they say, is plants using extra CO2 from human society to fertilise their growth (70%).
Harnessing energy from the sun, green leaves grow by using CO2, water, and nutrients from soil.…