James Renwick
Carbon dioxide emissions by humans are the major driver of modern climate change, contrary to Jerome Corsi’s claims in CBN News video
Claim:
Carbon dioxide is not a climate heat driver; we had an ice age when the Earth had extraordinarily larger amounts of carbon dioxide; in the 1970s scientists thought we were going to have a new ice age.
Climate scientists agree that human-caused greenhouse gas emissions are primarily responsible for climate change, contrary to claims in Clear Energy Alliance video
Claim:
The scientific consensus on whether global warming is human caused is not 97 percent, it’s less than 1 percent. There is no way to measure the human impact on climate change.
Global warming has not “ceased”, as Heartland Institute report falsely claims
Claim:
global warming ceased around the end of the twentieth century and was followed (since 1997) by 19 years of stable temperature
Climate sensitivity estimate given in Heartland Institute’s report is misleading
Claim:
Doubling the concentration of atmospheric CO2 from its pre-industrial level, in the absence of other forcings and feedbacks, would likely cause a warming of ~0.3°C to 1.1°C
Analysis of "Record-breaking climate change pushes world into ‘uncharted territory’"
“The article clearly and concisely documents some of 2016’s climate extremes and puts them in the context of the warming trend.”
Analysis of "Why are climate-change models so flawed? Because climate science is so incomplete"
“The facts given by the author regarding the skills of climate models and the state of the art are mostly wrong. The most important processes are not understood by the author and his logic is flawed.”
Analysis of "U.S. scientists officially declare 2016 the hottest year on record. That makes three in a row."
“The article accurately conveys the US agencies’ declaration of 2016 as the hottest year on record. It provides some good background material on why the agencies’ numbers differ slightly (treatment of the Arctic) and the contributing roles of El Niño and man-made global warming.”
Analysis of "Arctic ice melt 'already affecting weather patterns where you live right now'"
“The article nicely introduces some of the emerging science linking Arctic climate change to extreme weather at lower latitudes. There are no major inaccuracies and the author has sought expert comment form several prominent scientists. However, the article fails to fully capture the large uncertainty about how Arctic warming may influence weather in places further south and how big this effect might be.”
Analysis of "Australia’s Great Barrier Reef has worst coral die-off ever"
“This article is mostly accurate … the frequency of massive bleaching events is increasing, will continue to increase in the near future, and these events do not need to occur annually to kill the reef. The variability of El Niño Southern Oscillation on top of the background warming trend of surface temperatures means that we will exceed the bleaching thresholds more frequently.”
Analysis of "Amid higher global temperatures, sea ice at record lows at poles"
“Well outlined and balanced article, describing the evident link between low sea ice and climate warming and the melt-albedo feedback, but also mentioning the role of weather and short-time variability.”
Analysis of "The Phony War Against CO2"
“The article speaks about scientific questions under an “opinion” banner—as if questions about the role of CO2 in the Earth system could be a matter of opinions. For the major final conclusion “With more CO2 in the atmosphere, the challenge [to feed additional 2.5 billion people] can and will be met.”, there is absolutely no scientific credibility, nor support in the scientific literature—it is pure fantasy.”
Wall Street Journal op-ed ignores evidence of negative impacts of increasing CO2
Claim:
Increased atmospheric carbon dioxide has helped raise global food production and reduce poverty.
Analysis of "About Those Non-Disappearing Pacific Islands"
“This article is very interesting because it exemplifies a highly-misleading rhetorical practice that is effective, frequently used, but not easily recognized by the public: “paltering”… A successful palterer will try to avoid being untruthful in each of his/her utterances, but will nonetheless put together a highly misleading picture based on selective reporting, half-truths, and errors of omission…”
Analysis of "James Lovelock: ‘Before the end of this century, robots will have taken over’"
“Extraordinary claims demand extraordinary evidence, and Lovelock has not even come up to the standards of providing what the scientific community would consider to be ordinary evidence. The journalist did not balance Lovelock’s statements with a set of clear statements saying that the vast majority of informed climate scientists (as, for example, represented by the IPCC reports) have reached consensus on conclusions that are diametrically opposed to what Lovelock is saying, and that the IPCC scientists have backed up their statements with a wealth of empirical data, whereas Lovelock is largely opining without providing any substantive evidence to support his rather extraordinary claims.”
Analysis of "Disasters like Louisiana floods will worsen as planet warms, scientists warn"
“this article does a good job reporting on the recent floods in Lousiana and, more generally, the climate-change-induced changes in the water cycle that underlie scientists’ concerns about future increase in floods. However, “heavy rainfall” is not strictly synonymous to “flooding”…”
Analysis of "Thanks to climate change, the Arctic is turning green"
“The article reports about recent evidence that terrestrial ecosystems are ‘greening’ in response to human activities, principally the increasing atmospheric CO2 concentration. The author presents this ‘greening’ as a new finding while annual global carbon budgets have reported that about 25% of the fossil-fuel emissions have been taken up by the biosphere since the 1960s. Nothing is fundamentally wrong in the article but it is organized in a somewhat misleading way”
Analysis of "Great Barrier Reef may perish by 2030s…"
This Mashable article reports on new preliminary research that finds the ongoing coral bleaching event in the Pacific is mainly due to human-caused global warming, and that if global warming proceeds as currently expected, “large parts” of the Great Barrier Reef could die by the mid-2030s. Six scientists have reviewed the article and conclude that it is overall accurate and in agreement with the science.
Analysis of "The Climate Snow Job"
“This article is indeed a snow job, as the title implies. The author has twisted the facts and distorted the science wildly. The author is well known for his wildly inaccurate climate “forecasts”.”
Analysis of "2015 Was Not Even Close To Hottest Year On Record"
“This article makes startlingly inaccurate claims about the earth’s surface and satellite temperature records, as well as attempts to ascertain the earth’s temperatures over the past two millennia through proxy measurements. The author would do well to talk to scientists involved in surface and satellite records and to consult the peer-reviewered scientific literature rather than blogs when writing in the future.”
Analysis of "2015 Was Hottest Year in Historical Record, Scientists Say"
The article accurately covers the news that the global surface temperature of the planet in 2015 has set a new record, well above any previous measurement.
Analysis of "Scientists say human greenhouse gas emissions have canceled the next ice age"
“The article presents an accurate account of recently published research which suggests that human-induced global warming will delay the onset of the next ice age by 50,000 years. The research supports the findings of several studies published over the past 15 years, and is consistent with the scientific consensus that human activity is changing the climate with very long-term consequences.”