Re: Nuclear Power Des NOT Need Gobal Warming Hoax!

["John Fleck" <jfleck@abqjournal.com>]

----- Original Message ----- 

From: "Maury Siskel" <maurysis@ev1.net>

> Most of the "global warming"

> claims still rest on the results of computer models which remain

> inconsistent  with records of (observed) past temperature changes.

> Science ultimately derives from observations, not from computer models.



This ignores a great deal of work being done to validate the models.



Computer modeling is always a tricky business, because one ultimately has to

make decisions about when and how to trust the model output when it goes

beyond that which can be experimentally verified. (This is the case, for

example, in the current work being done in the nuclear weapons stockpile

stewardship program.) One solution is to test the models in regimes where

benchmarking against empircal data *is* possible. In climate, the warming of

the past decade offers such an opportunity, allowing the modelers to make

predictions about what differences one might see between natural variability

and anthropogenic warming.



The models make specific predictions not just about overall temperature

change, but about its distribution - day versus night, for example, and

temperatures over ocean versus over land. Careful attempts to compare

empirical data with the models' predictions for current CO2 levels shows

that the models do a pretty good job.[1] This is just one example. There's

lots more work being done like this. Last summer's European heat wave, for

example, provided a great laboratory for trying to distinguish between

natural variability and anthropogenic change. Obviously one hot summer

doesn't prove anything, but it's useful to look at the statistics of how hot

it was and compare it with both historical variability and the models'

prediction of how variability might change as CO2 increases.[2]



That doesn't mean you have to trust the models' prediction for the future,

of course, but it does suggest the modelers do not "remain in their own

problem cage."



Cheers,

John





[1] Karoly et al., Science, Vol 302, Issue 5648, 1200-1203 , 14 November

2003,

[2] Schar et al., Nature \ 427, 332 - 336 (22 January 2004); Beniston, GRL,

Vol. 31, L02202





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