A new report from the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) finds that the Antarctic ice cap has exceeded 20 million square kilometers, a freeze that hasn’t been seen since 1979 when the agency began to compile records. 

“Sea ice surrounding Antarctica reached a new record high extent this year, covering more of the southern oceans than it has since scientists began a long-term satellite record to map sea ice extent in the late 1970s,”  the NASA website reported on October 7.

NASA went on to say:

Since the late 1970s, the Arctic has lost an average of 20,800 square miles (53,900 square kilometers) of ice a year; the Antarctic has gained an average of 7,300 square miles (18,900 sq km). On Sept. 19 this year, for the first time ever since 1979, Antarctic sea ice extent exceeded 7.72 million square miles (20 million square kilometers), according to the National Snow and Ice Data Center. The ice extent stayed above this benchmark extent for several days. The average maximum extent between 1981 and 2010 was 7.23 million square miles (18.72 million square kilometers).

The single-day maximum extent this year was reached on Sept. 20, according to NSIDC data, when the sea ice covered 7.78 million square miles (20.14 million square kilometers). This year’s five-day average maximum was reached on Sept. 22, when sea ice covered 7.76 million square miles (20.11 million square kilometers), according to NSIDC.

Scientists at Princeton are reporting the observation of Majorana fermion, a particle first predicted over 70 years ago that behaves like matter and antimatter at the same time. 

Confident that it can, once again, breach the constitutional separation of powers and bypass Congress, this time, by recasting a complex multilateral environmental treaty as a simple executive agreement not requiring Senate approval, the Obama administration touted its climate change bona fides to the world this past week at the United Nations Climate Summit in New York. 

The President crowed about how the U.S. has significantly reduced its carbon emissions since 2006, and alluded to Environmental Protection Agency (“EPA”) automobile and power plant greenhouse gas (“GHG”) emissions control regulations triggered by EPA’s controversial 2009 Clean Air Act GHG Endangerment Findings.

Apparently, the president had been misinformed about the legal soundness of those findings and the regulations they have spawned. Indeed, White House officials should have told him that many of the climate assessments cited as scientific support for such findings did not satisfy the strict scientific peer review standards imposed by the U.S. Information Quality Act (“IQA”).

Undoubtedly, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (“NOAA”), the U.S. government’s lead climate change agency, like EPA, would prefer to bypass the IQA if possible. The IQA requires all federal agencies to ensure the quality, objectivity, utility and integrity of the scientific information that federal agencies rely upon as the basis for regulations.

As the Daily Caller and other media have reported, the nonprofit Institute for Trade, Standards and Sustainable Development (“ITSSD”) has called upon EPAand NOAA, in new separately filed Freedom of Information Act (“FOIA”) requests, to produce records substantiating that the peer reviews performed of NOAA and other agency-developed climate assessments supporting EPA’s GHG Endangerment Findings had satisfied the IQA’s strict peer review standards. Neither agency has responded substantively to these requests, despite the EPA’s assessment of an estimated document search fee of more than USD $27,000.

All the way from the battery in a pocket to the LED TV on a wall, the colour blue is a problem: blue LEDs are less efficient than the reds or greens that make up the other two primary display colours, and that’s a problem for power consumption.

Researchers at the University of Michigan are now claiming as much as a fourfold improvement in blue OLED (organic LED) efficiency coupled with a tenfold improvement in lifetime. 

Engineering professor Stephen Forrest explains that while blue PHOLEDs have been around for a long time, they don’t live long enough for use alongside reds and greens in consumer devices. That means fluorescent OLEDs are used for the blues, and that in turn imposes a power consumption penalty.

According to Forrest, the higher energy needed to produce light at the blue end of the spectrum (compared to red or green) is the problem his research team has been working on since 2008. That higher energy can break down the molecules in the OLEDs, when enough is poured in to get light sufficiently intense to use in a display.

In a study lead-authored by Yifan Zhang with work from doctoral student Jae Sang Lee, the researchers worked to spread the light emitting energy across enough molecules to avoid individual molecules getting burned.

More than six months have elapsed since climate science data-fraudster Michael Mann’s multi-million dollar legal team bullishly announced the climate science trial of the century would be underway “shortly.” Oh, how the internet makes liars of them. What has transpired since?  Answer: Nothing. 

In February the world’s only truly independent science association dedicated to exposing government-funded junk research (Principia Scientific International) broke the news that the former golden boy of global warming “science” is down and out in a courtroom battle not seen since the famous Scopes Monkey Trial of 1925.

As our story went viral Mann’s legal team, led by top Canadian libel expert, Roger McConchie, swiftly counter-punched issuing their own press release retorting:

“The Mann lawsuit is currently in the discovery phase, with further examinations for discovery (depositions) of the defendants to be scheduled shortly, following which I will either set the action for trial by jury in the usual manner, or bring a summary trial application.”

We foretold Mann would either face bankruptcy upon Dr. Ball’s stunning victory, or his deep-pocketed backers (including David Suzuki) would be liable for costs in the millions. But weasel words from McConchie proclaimed:

“The review of Tim Ball’s new book by Hans Schreuder and John O’Sullivan makes preposterous statements…”

Our “preposterous statements” are backed by the shocking revelations in Dr. Ball’s astonishing publication, ‘The Deliberate Corruption of Climate Science’ exposing the science fraud of the century. Literally hundreds of climate science papers are based on Mann’s fraudulent work. When Ball wins, all alarmist climate science loses. Game over.

But as we move deeper into the fourth year of this shameful attempt to misuse the courts to stifle public debate – while there has been no further global warming for 17 years despite relentless rises in atmospheric CO2 – the public sees clearly what “climate science” is really all about. 

A Mexican ecologist has blown the whistle on the corruption, lies and incompetence of the wind industry – and on the massive environmental damage it causes in the name of saving the planet. 

  Recent news stories underscore the tremendous benefits brought by America’s fracking revolution. 

* The shale oil production boom could boost US crude production to 9.5 million barrels of oil per day (bopd) next year, reducing America’s crude oil imports to 21{154653b9ea5f83bbbf00f55de12e21cba2da5b4b158a426ee0e27ae0c1b44117} of domestic demand, the lowest level since 1968. Output from fracked wells represents 43{154653b9ea5f83bbbf00f55de12e21cba2da5b4b158a426ee0e27ae0c1b44117} of all US oil production and 67{154653b9ea5f83bbbf00f55de12e21cba2da5b4b158a426ee0e27ae0c1b44117} of natural gas production; “frack oil” could hit 10 million bopd by 2016, the Energy Information Administration says.

* The global economy saves $4.9 billion per day in oil spending because of the shale oil boom. Without it there would be a 3 million barrel per day shortfall and prices would likely be 55{154653b9ea5f83bbbf00f55de12e21cba2da5b4b158a426ee0e27ae0c1b44117} higher: $150/barrel.

* Constantly improving hydraulic fracturing technologies continue to increase production. For example, Cabot Oil & Gasrefracked a 2013 Pennsylvania well, increasing its output to 30.3 million cubic feet of gas per day; that’s four times the output from the best well drilled in 2003. Fracking is even being used in decades-old onshore and offshore wells, to keep them producing for many more years.

* Rust Belt cities and industries – from manufacturing, real estate and law to hotels, restaurants and many others – are rebounding because of drilling, fracking and production in nearby shale areas. In Ohio unemployment fell to 5.7{154653b9ea5f83bbbf00f55de12e21cba2da5b4b158a426ee0e27ae0c1b44117} in July from 10.6{154653b9ea5f83bbbf00f55de12e21cba2da5b4b158a426ee0e27ae0c1b44117} four years ago; oil output increased 26{154653b9ea5f83bbbf00f55de12e21cba2da5b4b158a426ee0e27ae0c1b44117} just from the previous quarter, while gas production rose 31{154653b9ea5f83bbbf00f55de12e21cba2da5b4b158a426ee0e27ae0c1b44117} – generating billions in state and local revenues.

* The US oil and natural gas boom means jobs and business for almost 30,000 companies within the industry’s vast and complex supply chain. Indeed, the petroleum industry accounts for nearly 10 million jobs and almost 8{154653b9ea5f83bbbf00f55de12e21cba2da5b4b158a426ee0e27ae0c1b44117} of all domestic economic activity, including states far from actual drilling activities.

Hefty German scientist Dr Stefan Hell – and American colleagues Eric Betzig and William Moerner – have been awarded the 2014 Nobel Prize in Chemistry for their development of super-high-res microscopes: so hi-res, in fact, that they are really nano-scopes. 

“Due to their achievements the optical microscope can now peer into the nanoworld,” enthuses the Swedish Royal Academy of Sciences, conferring the prestigious boffinry gong upon the brainy trio.

The Swedish science judges go on to explain just how the three eminent scientists managed to get past the justifiably presumed limit on optical microscopy, that of half a wavelength of the light frequencies used:

Two separate principles are rewarded. One enables the method stimulated emission depletion (STED) microscopy, developed by Stefan Hell in 2000. Two laser beams are utilized; one stimulates fluorescent molecules to glow, another cancels out all fluorescence except for that in a nanometre-sized volume. Scanning over the sample, nanometre for nanometre, yields an image with a resolution better than Abbe’s stipulated limit.

Eric Betzig and William Moerner, working separately, laid the foundation for the second method, single-molecule microscopy. The method relies upon the possibility to turn the fluorescence of individual molecules on and off. Scientists image the same area multiple times, letting just a few interspersed molecules glow each time. Superimposing these images yields a dense super-image resolved at the nanolevel. In 2006 Eric Betzig utilized this method for the first time.

Today, nanoscopy is used world-wide and new knowledge of greatest benefit to mankind is produced on a daily basis.

What, you don’t love ubiquitous Sticky Tape, the stuff that holds everything together? In my earlier life we called it “100-mile an hour tape.” These days you find sticky tape/stuff everywhere, especially on items you don’t like it attached to.  Their embedded bar codes helps the stores to keep track of the inventory and your personal shopping needs, perhaps even helps the government to collect higher tax revenues and so forth. How could you not like Sticky Tape?

The Sunday Times has reached a new height of incoherence with its science editor’s, (Jonathan Leake) column on Arctic ice cap in ‘death spiral.’  

Scientist claims she has mathematical proof black holes cannot exist and it is impossible for stars to collapse and form a singularity. Professor Laura Mersini-Houghton said she is still in ‘shock’ from the find. 

Previously, scientists thought stars much larger than the sun collapsed under their own gravity and formed black holes when they died. During this process they release a type of radiation called Hawking radiation. But new research claims the star would lose too much mass and wouldn’t be able to form a black hole. If true, the theory that the universe began as a singularity, followed by the Big Bang, could also be wrong. [Editor’s note: finding confirms studies by Stephen J. Crothers]

When a huge star many times the mass of the sun comes to the end of its life it collapses in on itself and forms a singularity – creating a black hole where gravity is so strong that not even light itself can escape.

At least, that’s what we thought.

A scientist has sensationally said that it is impossible for black holes to exist – and she even has mathematical proof to back up her claims. If true, her research could force physicists to scrap their theories of how the universe began.

The research was conducted by Professor Laura Mersini-Houghton from the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill in the College of Arts and Scientists.She claims that as a star dies, it releases a type of radiation known as Hawking radiation – predicted by Professor Stephen Hawking.

“Greenhouse gases” have a profound effect on the climate as can be seen in every climate system that has a high concentration of water vapor (H₂O) and carbon dioxide (CO₂)—the two “most potent ‘greenhouse gases’”. Here are some photos:

The climate change that water vapor brings, far from being catastrophic, is quite the opposite. Water vapor brings an otherwise dead biosphere to life and makes it lush and green and, as we will see, even cools it down somewhat. What about carbon dioxide? Take a look:

 It is such a scientific certainty that higher concentrations of carbon dioxide promote robust plant growth that commercial gardeners pump carbon dioxide into their greenhouses up to levels > 3 times higher than is currently present in the open atmosphere.

“In general, carbon dioxide supplementation of 1,000 ppm during the day when vents are closed is recommended [to bring the total concentration up to 1,300.]”Carbon Dioxide In Greenhouses, Ontario Ministry of Agriculture, Food and Rural Affairs.

If we were to look at pictures that compare the Arabian Desert to Bangladesh or the Nairobi Desert to the Congo the result would be the same. It is incontrovertible that water vapor and carbon dioxide bring life into a climate system as can be seen in the lush eco-systems of New Zealand, Bangladesh and the Congo compared to the deserts in Nevada, Saudi Arabia and Nairobi and it is no mystery as to why.

Water vapor in high enough concentrations condenses into clouds, which produce rain that drenches the soil. Plants, using the sun’s energy, pull carbon dioxide out of the air and water out of the soil to create carbohydrates and oxygen—the food that animals eat and the air that they breathe.

Dear Professor Raupach,

On Thursday 4th September we attended an event hosted by the Fenner School of Environmental Science which was held in conjunction with the ANU Climate Change Institute. The title of the event was “Climate Change- Why facts and Opinion are both important”.  

This letter is to inform you of our concern regarding what the MP3 recording http://fennerschool.anu.edu.au/news-events/event-recordings/climate-change-why-facts-and-opinions-are-both-important   evidences as an underlying political agenda directed against the Abbott Government.  Both the petition and invitation to join a protest march on the 21st September are clearly a political agenda and have no place in a science forum. 

As the recording evidences, the presentations by Professor Smithson, Ms Bruer and Dr Will Grant were littered with seemingly unfounded misrepresentations. The recording also evidences what appears to be an attempt to seize the high moral ground and use it to provoke antagonism against the Abbott Government amongst University and High School Students.  Let us remind you that the Abbott Government was overwhelmingly voted in and given a mandate to remove the carbon tax and all its dysfunctional hangers on.

Professor Raupach my question to you (1.06.33 on the recording)  quote“……when you talk about carbon pollution and carbon emissions you are, actually I think it was Will, referred to it as carbon dioxide, which is what the full word is. It is carbon-dioxide emissions.  Carbon dioxide has two states: its gaseous state and its solid state, which is dry ice. How can it be either a pollutant or a warming agent?”

To quote your response (1.07.23):- 

“It is not a pollutant any more than water is a pollutant…………”