Crazy Capers of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research
The Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (pictured), commonly known as “PIK” has been among Germany’s foremost climate doomsayers, oops, I mean prognosticators. 
Hardly a day goes by without one or the other PIK press releases telling the world that “we’ll all die if we do not … [decarbonize, or whatever]”. Some of their pronunciations even want you to think “we’ll all die, even if we do… [decarbonize, or whatever]” and that has nothing to do with the coming “Blood Moon” of Sep. 27/28, 2015, supposedly portending that the end of the world is nigh.
What are the poor schmucks like you and me to do in such a no-win situation?
PIK
The PIK is led by its founder and current president, Prof. Dr. HJ Schellnhuber, recently nominated member of the Pontifical Academy of Sciences, etc. Another outspoken doomsayer of the PIK is Prof. Dr. S. Rahmstorf. Actually, I think he’s running much of the daily doom-and-gloom show. From the (not exactly) melting Arctic sea-ice and the (not exactly) drowning polar bears, to the (not exactly) disappearing Antarctic ice shield and the (not exactly) dieing penguins, Rahmstorf and/or Schellnhuber have a finger-wagging answer for everything.
The fact that they are more wrong than right is immaterial, at least in their view – spare me with details. Actually, you can count yourself lucky to even get an answer to any question you may have about their numerous proclamations of climate doom and related items; presumably they are too busy to crack the whip over their new supercomputer to spit out the “correctly” prognosticated scenarios for 10,000 years from now or so. Just too bad that none of them will be around by then to be held accountable for their wrong predictions.
As of late, PIK’s messages of doom appear to be getting bolder and more deceptive than ever before.
For example, one of their latest “photos” shows “The ‘eternal ice’ of Antarctica,” as reproduced here (PIK-photo top). Nice shot – if it were not “photo-shopped” to the hilt, as I suspect, despite their claim to the contrary. As it so happens, a very similar photo (shown underneath) taken approximately a year later by another expedition certainly looks more realistic (Jo Cox).
What’s even more deceptive in PIK’s picture is the caption with the phrase “eternal ice” that appears to have melted away, except for a few pieces still floating forlorn on the sea and two, possibly superimposed, images of icebergs. Well, that picture was taken near the Rothera Research Station,located close to the northern tip of the continent Antarctica at the latitude of 67.5 S and, therefore, barely within the Antarctic, as defined by southern polar circle. As the crow flies, that is about 2,500 km from the South Pole and, therefore, it is certainly not in a region of “eternal sea-ice.”
This “photo” by PIK comes with the latest warning of “Burning all fossil energy would raise sea-level by more than 50 meters – and eliminate all ice of Antarctica.” Further on, it states “Crossing this [2 degree C] threshold, however, would in the long run destabilize both West and East Antarctica…”
That 2 degree C threshold or, for that matter, any other “degree threshold” are purely figments of their exuberant imagination. There is no climate threshold in nature, no “tipping point” or other boundary of sorts; they are all myths. The height of PIK’s doomsayer irresponsibility must be the continued insistence on theircomputer simulation’s predictions being “right.”
PIK’s Computer Simulations
PIK‘s computer models are modeling the world “climate” and claim, for example, that anything past a two degree (C) warming will spell disaster for much of mankind. Of course, as they see it, the use of fossil fuels is the source of that claimed calamity. The German and some other governments have bought into such claims and want to do away with most or all of coal, oil, and natural gas for all purposes within three decades or so, or even sooner.
PIK’s latest news is even more astounding: On Sep. 11, 2015, their website referred to a new study to be published soon with the headline “Burning all fossil energy would raise sea-level by more than 50 meters – and eliminate all ice of Antarctica.” PIK’s computer spoke; we are all doomed… You can read up on all the gory details at Science Advances. Oh, no need to rush though, the study says “We examine the [Antarctic] ice-sheet evolution over the next ten thousand years with the Parallel Ice Sheet Model…” so you’ll have a few years to digest the info. By then, a revised model may give you the exact date …
Just remember though, 10,000 years ago,Canada, central Europe and much of Asia were covered with a thick layer of ice that disappeared, presumably, because some of our early ancestors lit fires in some caves producing copious amounts of carbon dioxide.
The “beauty” of all these computer models is that they can neither be proven nor disproven within a reasonable time frame. However, in the past 25 years or so, ALL of the highfalutin 100+ world-climate-prediction-super-computer models failed totally. None of them predicted the “warming-pause” but each thought to know best. Dr. T. Ball recently described the problem in detail in his post “Is It Time to Stop the Insanity of Wasting Time and Money on More Climate Models?” Even the most assertive (“extremely likely”) model predictions for a decade out made just a few years ago were well above the actual observed temperatures. Does anyone really think that such models can even vaguely predict the earth’s climate 10,000 years from now?
On the basis of such models, some deluded people appear to truly believe that the world can (and should) replace all that carbon-based energy with a few windmills and solar panels. However, that’s not yet the height of delusion; for example, Germany has also committed to phase out all nuclear power generation within a few years from now to be replaced with wind and sun energy, all at the same time.
Wind Energy
Indeed, if and when the wind blows strongly, the current 10,000+ windmills in Germany produce electric power. Even if you want to disregard the blight of such in the former natural landscape, even if you are willing to forget their disastrous effects on birds, bats, butterflies and other creatures, and even if you forget the demands for new country-side roads to just build and maintain the windmills, they are not the panacea claimed. In fact, many of these the windmills consumepower for blade pitch control, yaw (directional) control, blade icing prevention, gear and/or hub heating, even when they produce some. But it’s “good business” for their builders and owners as they have government-guaranteed construction benefits as well as feed-in tariffs and delivery-preference over other energy sources. In other words, they are buying their standby power for a few cents per kWh and selling their product at a guaranteed multiple of that—whenever the wind blows. It’s like having your cake and eating it too; a win-win situation for the windmill developers and a guaranteed-loss situation for all electricity consumers.
How unprofitable the wind-power is in much of Germany has been shown in a study on 1,200 systems there over the last 13 years. That study shows that 2/3rds of the wind-farms within Germany were operating with a loss, despite the subventions.
Of course, such a system only is possible with large government subsidies. In reality though, the “government” is you and me and every other taxpayer who is forced to pay that bill, including your and my children and grandchildren – and well into the future. However, I’ve not mentioned the even more crazy aspect of the wind-power systems, namely their typical operating life span before major repairs or costly “upgrades” are needed.
Windmill Operating Life
The purveyors of such “modern” versions of 12th century windmill technology are keen to quote a 20-25 year operating life for their monstrosities. Actual experience though is different. The average time for wind turbines operating without major problems is more like eight years. After that, very costly repairs to gear boxes and other “improvements” are needed. For example, the hamlet of Wildpoldsried in southern Germany recently blasted two wind-turbine towers into oblivion after only ten years of operation. Among the reasons given was the “difficulty to get spare parts.”
No wonder, from small villages in southern Germany to cities in Sweden, such wind-power installations are being replaced well before their previously touted “best before date” with newer, more “modern” and/or “more efficient” designs. Oh yeah, the new designs will be lasting so much longer than the old ones, paying for themselves (as well as the previous systems not yet paid for by lower than expected income from insufficient electricity production), provide a steady source of financial return for the communities, the investors, and the government coffers to boot.
In fact though, these communities and investors are doubling down on a losing proposition. Perhaps they would also like to buy some snake oil from me? I promise it will cure all ills, in no time flat, if not sooner.
Alternatively, how about an investment in PIK’s computer predictions?
Dr. Klaus L.E. Kaiser — Bio and Archives
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