Climate Change Hysteria Falters: Water is the New Target – Slaying the Sky Dragon Excerpt
Self-proclaimed environmentalists and people who use the environment as a vehicle for political control, often the same people, have not quite destroyed environmentalism.
They are running out of exotic scares as coral bleaching, ocean acidification and a multitude of other claims prove unwarranted.
A sign of desperation is the shift to much larger targets, but they pose the problem that people know a little more and basic questions raise immediate doubts.
Water is the latest target. More and more stories about running out of water appear. Most are linked to the false claim by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) that droughts will increase in severity with global warming. It’s illogical because higher temperatures mean increased evaporation and more moisture in the air to create precipitation, but that doesn’t stop them. It’s part of the ongoing standard chain that links too many people with too many demands on limited resources causing environment collapse. The real goal is total political control, the shut down of industry and ultimately elimination of people.
Water Is Not A Problem
There is no shortage. As with climate and all the other issues used to panic people, there is lack of information and understanding. I know from chairing public hearings on water how it raises passions. Wars have been fought and future conflicts are possible because of the unequal distribution, but none of this is necessary.
Science incorrectly assumes the oceans have remained essentially unchanged for 600 million years. The theory is that as the Earth cooled the various elements settled out in layers according their specific gravity. Water is used as the base with a specific gravity of one. The error of the claim of constant volume is that every time a volcano erupts more water vapor is released into the atmosphere adding to the total.
There is another contentious claim that water comes from space.
“The main discoverer of the cosmic snowstorm, Dr. Louis A. Frank, whose initial hypothesis was ridiculed when he presented it in 1986, now says with great confidence that the terrestrial bombardment could easily have supplied all the planet’s water and perhaps also many of the chemicals that are essential for life.” “If the flux has been similar over geologic time, say, over four billion years, then it very closely accounts for the oceans we have now, including the ice caps,” Dr. Frank, a physicist at the University of Iowa, said in an interview.” Evidence of water on the moon seems to support this theory.
The Water Cycle So there is no agreement on how water is on the planet. Measures of the amounts and distributions are also totally inadequate. Approximately 97 percent is salt water and 3 percent freshwater, and there is constant movement between the two.
Figure 1: The Water Cycle showing the general flow of water in the Earth System. Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:Water_cycle.png
Figure 1 shows the general pattern of water disposition and movement known as the Water Cycle. We have no real measures of the distribution of the freshwater other than general percentages about the amount in glaciers, lakes and groundwater. There are inadequate measures of flow in most rivers and even fewer for groundwater volumes and flows. A major component of the system that drives transfer of heat from the surplus in the tropics to the deficit in the Polar Regions is evaporation, transport and condensation.
Solar energy strikes the surface in the tropics and most of the energy is absorbed, but a portion is used to increase the rate of evaporation. The energy is not lost but stored as latent energy in the water vapor molecule. Most of this occurs in great cloud developments called cumulonimbus or thunderstorm clouds. These are massive systems, but the grid system of the computer models is so crude that they cannot be encompassed. The water vapor is transported and released back into the atmosphere when condensation occurs. This is why temperature rises when it rains or snows. The energy in all its forms is carried up and distributed poleward by upper level winds.
Global temperature data is grossly inadequate, precipitation measures are even worse. The modern record is virtually nonexistent and historic record worse. Consider this comment about Africa. “One obvious problem is a lack of data. Africa’s network of 1152 weather watch stations, which provide realtime data and supply international climate archives, is just oneeighth the minimum density recommended by the World Meteorological Organization (WMO).
Furthermore, the stations that do exist often fail to report.” The quote is an article about trying to predict the critical monsoon in the Sahel region of Africa. Climate scientists cannot say what has delayed the monsoon this year or whether the delay is part of a larger trend. Nor do they fully understand the mechanisms that govern rainfall over the Sahel. Most frustrating, perhaps, is that their prognostic tools – computer simulations of future climate – disagree on what lies ahead.
We’re told the science is settled because they want the public to believe it. A recent request for more data tells you that we know little about the oceans. They are a massive source of moisture and energy and critical for precipitation over the land. “Scientists are urging governments around the world to invest in a ocean-based system that could provide warnings of droughts, floods and other environmental disasters.”
“Trevor Platt, a marine biologist with the Partnership for Observation of Global Oceans, says the system of devices would cost up to $15 billion.” So too much water, flooding, or too little, drought, are not adequately measured. No wonder the IPCC computer model predictions of the climate are wrong every single time.
Water is very attractive to alarmists and those who seek bigger government because it is so fundamental to life.
It is the one resource that essentially remains classified as a public good, which means it’s easier for government to control.
It’s also why the World Bank is involved in large-scale water projects.
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