Cooling Down the Fears of Climate Change -- Wall Street Journal --- Opinion -- December 19, 2012 -- Absolutely Nothing About the Bakken

This is for my personal archives. This is not meant for my readers. If you came here looking for the Bakken, scroll up, down, or sideways. If you found this site by googling or surfing, you should probably just hit the backspace button and move on. There are much better sites for discussions on global warming. 

Normally my posts or comments about global warming are not posted as stand-alone posts; they are posted and/or linked as part of other stories, other posts. But this particular half-page essay in the Wall Street Journal puts things in perspective, and fits my worldview of the issue.

I referred to it earlier, and posted a link to another excellent essay on global warming, "signed" by 16 scientists.

From the first linked article:

In short: We can now estimate, based on observations, how sensitive the temperature is to carbon dioxide. We do not need to rely heavily on unproven models. Comparing the trend in global temperature over the past 100-150 years with the change in "radiative forcing" (heating or cooling power) from carbon dioxide, aerosols and other sources, minus ocean heat uptake, can now give a good estimate of climate sensitivity.

The conclusion—taking the best observational estimates of the change in decadal-average global temperature between 1871-80 and 2002-11, and of the corresponding changes in forcing and ocean heat uptake—is this: A doubling of CO2 will lead to a warming of 1.6°-1.7°C (2.9°-3.1°F). 

Yes, 2 degrees over the past 150 years.

And then this: 

A cumulative change of less than 2°C by the end of this century will do no net harm. It will actually do net good—that much the IPCC scientists have already agreed upon in the last IPCC report. Rainfall will increase slightly, growing seasons will lengthen, Greenland's ice cap will melt only very slowly, and so on.

Some of the best recent observationally based research also points to climate sensitivity being about 1.6°C for a doubling of CO2. An impressive study published this year by Magne Aldrin of the Norwegian Computing Center and colleagues gives a most-likely estimate of 1.6°C. Michael Ring and Michael Schlesinger of the University of Illinois, using the most trustworthy temperature record, also estimate 1.6°C.

But again, I'm disappointed. Neither article told us what the "correct" or "ideal" temperature for the earth is/was.  Neither article told us who set/sets the thermostat. An intelligent designer? And now man is messing with the thermostat? And neither article mentioned that the #1 greenhouse gas was water vapor, comprising about 95 - 97% of greenhouse gases. CO2 comprises less than 3% and most of that is not -- repeat, not -- anthropogenic.

But they are starting to approach the question a bit differently. Could global warming actually be beneficial? Global warming proponents mentioned from the beginning there would be more precipitation. Growing seasons will be longer.  A northwest passage might allow less expensive ocean transport from Europe to Asia.