@smokingtyger Richard Crim who IS a climate scientist has been saying the same things (with charts!) for a while now. He is in agreement with Hansen and extends the analysis. Bottom line: our fate as a species is pretty much sealed. I have personally moved through the five stages of grief about that and I now accept we are where we are.
So. In the short term we should be doing every sensible thing to prepare and minimize to the extent possible human suffering.
I think we are going to be “taking stock” at the end of the year just how bad things are getting already. The LA fires were just the opening act.
Good commentary about Hansen. I find it almost pathetic that people with much lower levels of expertise try to puff themselves up by criticizing Hansen. Yes, what about our grandchildren? I wouldn't want to be the grandchild of someone whose focus is scoffing at Hansen. Edith
Adjusting for the known transient influences of ENSO, volcanic aerosols and the solar cycle shows accelerating global warming quite clearly, above the 95% confidence level. Tamino (aka Grant Foster) shows this at - https://tamino.wordpress.com/2025/01/28/every-tenth-matters/
This warming ought to be no surprise given that atmospheric CO2 is at record high and the emissions driving the enhanced greenhouse effect have not (yet) stopped rising.
I asked my son, who is now 42, to not have children back in 2017. I would be happy to have him married, but I am not willing to have a grandchild starve to death. (This was me, who had been buying cute baby clothes in thrift shops for years.) I believe that the climate crisis will end in a lack of food for everyone on the planet. Only Scandinavian countries and California have already met the 2030 climate goals. I believe the evidence shows that most people, especially out of government, have no understanding of what is happening, because they have an inability to understand consequences. We can do our best and cross our fingers, but unless countries get rid of their ignorant oligarchs, our species has no chance.
Still, the hope thing hangs about - technology will save us, or God, or world government cooperation, or it's just cyclical, or it's many decades away. While continuing to mitigate, we need to seriously review how we live and then, if we (you) haven't already, move to adaptation.
"Unfortunately, many high-profile, public climate change risk assessments are significantly underestimating risk because they exclude many of the real-world impacts of climate change, such as the impact of tipping points, extreme events, migration, sea level rise, human health impacts or geopolitical risk."
"Furthermore, they calculate ongoing economic growth, even in a hothouse world, with climate damages being lower than growth assumptions. These results conflict with scientific predictions of significantly reduced human habitability from climate change."
“These (mainstream) risk assessments are precisely wrong, rather than being roughly right.”
They forecast 2 Billion dead at +2°C of warming, which will happen over the next 10 years.
They forecast 4 Billion dead at +3°C of warming, which they assign a 50% chance of hitting by 2050.
Yes, I saw it and downloaded it. All kudos to them, I don’t think other nations’ actuaries have banded together to explore in the manner actuaries are best at, namely being sensible about the assumptions of long-term predictions. I haven’t read it yet but must do so.
1) The primary threat presented by climate change is that it will destabilize the global geopolitical order, leading to conflicts involving nuclear weapons. Once the nuclear threshold is crossed, the situation can spiral downward at incredible speeds.
2) There is actually no proof that life is better than death, and at least some reason to question that very common assumption. This is something to keep in mind when considering major disruptions to the status quo. Whether death is bad depends on what death actually is, and while there are many theories on the matter, nobody actually knows.
CO2(e) will cause the same amount of warming as CO2. The issue is, for how long?
For example, Hansen puts the CO2(e) level at around 530ppm. That will "pull up" the Rate of Warming (RoW) and increase temperatures BUT only for about 30-40 years. Because the CH4 will breakdown over that time span.
After that, the RoW will begin to fall back to what is supported by the CO2 level. ALTHOUGH temperatures will probably not decline.
So, in our example the CO2(e) level is at 535ppm. Using Hansen's climate sensitivity numbers this means about +6°C of warming over baseline. At 535ppm(CO2e) the RoW is "boosted" up to +0.5°C/decade because of the Earth Energy Imbalance being so large.
Now, suppose we ban natural gas tomorrow. As well as sealing all the wells and emptying the pipelines. The CH4 level stops increasing and the CO2 level is at 425ppm and increasing at +3ppm/year. What happens?
The RoW starts declining as the level of CH4 declines over a 30 year timeframe. It drops down to the level that is supported at what the CO2 level will be in +30 years.
So, 30 years x +3ppm/year = about +90ppm of CO2 or about 515ppm(CO2) at the point that the influence of CH4 falls to zero. Which is likely to mean +6°Cod long term warming.
The amount of warming by 2050 will be about +1.5°C OVER the +1.6°C we are seeing today.
That's a BIG part of WHY +3°C by 2050 with 4 billion dead is becoming the MOST LIKELY scenario. Trying to use natural gas as a "bridge fuel" just resulted in accelerating the speed of the warming.
Richard: Your assumption that methane might fall back is surely flawed - it seems to me that methane under Artic and Greenland ice, still to come from Siberian permafrost, under Antarctic ice, perhaps even from methane clathrates under fast-warming seas, are far more likely to accelerate than decline. And the few (wildly varying) estimates of methane quantities I have seen suggest truly massive quantities may yet be released.
I would suggest that methane may be the new driving force for climate change for the next century, exceeding CO2 emissions in effects. And taking away any mechanism for humans to reduce future global heating.
Hansen has been scare mongering for many years….. first with his debunked hockey stick and then with many papers that that use predictive models that never predict reality over time.
Many scientists are now declaring no climate emergency even though they all agree the planet is slightly warming due to its natural cycles.
This may help provide some information for those interested in some climate reality and truth.
Obviously, you haven't kept up with the science. The hockey stick has been well supported.
Wiki: "More than two dozen reconstructions, using various statistical methods and combinations of proxy records, support the broad consensus shown in the original 1998 hockey-stick graph, with variations in how flat the pre-20th century "shaft" appears.[12][13] The 2007 IPCC Fourth Assessment Report cited 14 reconstructions, 10 of which covered 1,000 years or longer, to support its strengthened conclusion that it was likely that Northern Hemisphere temperatures during the 20th century were the highest in at least the past 1,300 years.[14] Further reconstructions, including Mann et al. 2008 and PAGES 2k Consortium 2013, have supported these general conclusions."
It eradicated the other more significant warming periods that have preceded the one we are in now.
Take a look at the material I provided and you will see that the hockey stick is bunk.
Mann and the IPCC are falling into scientific dispute with other scientists that have far better data and logic.
How can we even trust the UN leaderships policy documents when they don’t even match with the scientific sections of the IPCC. Read Koonin’s book Unsettled.
Its even clear that the funding that has created the climate emergency industrial complex has even made the peer review process a politically subjugated activity that has to stay on the narrative to keep the snouts in the funding trough.. very sad..
The climate realists such as CLINTEL and CO2COALITION are getting to the truth of the science far more.
Look, if you guys want to argue with Exxon engineers and scientists, be my guest. Exxon has every reason to agree with you since they could face regulatory efforts, but instead, they have admitted what other scientists have been saying since 1988. (In fact, their own scientists predicted global warming in the 1980s as well.) Here's the Chairman's recent comments:
Please... one Eng from the past and a politically correct CEO and we should all go along with the scam...stop clutching at straws.... yes the planet is warming its done it before we may have participated but its not an emergency.. OK
The scientists at Exxon did not know how to translate this energy absorption in to climate impacts. They agreed it might cause warming but did not understand the heat distributions. We barely do today. Oil company execs are spineless (for some reason).
The hockey stick has been debunked and decoded to be full of poor choices by its author.
The fact that the fastest growing countries (in energy use) are all climate skeptics does not allow unilateral responses that make sense. The proposed cure is worse than the disease.
It is you who are behind the times. Climate catastrophism is all about the funding of scientists, 97% of whom then 'oddly' agree with the concept. It's yet another grift.
Have you not noticed that the earth is now perceived to be cooling, that CO2 is necessary for life and that corrupt billionaires like Gates are funding alternative foods (made of bugs) and trying to stop cow flatulence -- and making money hand over fist on all of it?
Carbon capture is another nonsense, which involves trading carbon contracts and making money - for what? It's like crypto currencies, money for nothing.
None so blind as those that will not see --- the pure corruption involved.
I don’t want to diminish the pain of those at the sharp end of extreme weather or inept adaption policies in challenging local climate conditions. And such ineptness will get reflected in insurance rates as they mirror risk.
But the risk is not generated by planet level climate change although smart adaption is always wise and the best approach.
Our adaptive capability correctly supported and undertaken with realistic policies has reduced our deaths and per person expense to such weather extremes by a 10 times reduction factor in the last 100 years and is being driven by the power of fossil fuels and predictive technology.
And yes the sun will continue to shine or if not that WILL be a climate emergency 😊
Absolutely agree with you on this. The corruption around the climate catastrophism may be exposed by the US finding that they have been contributing huge amounts of money unknowingly to the IPCC and other organisations who have much to gain from this global climate change fiction.
I'm concerned that those people quoting the IPCC here have no concept of what the IPCC stands for and where the original 'data' came from - some made-up charts relating to extremes of temperature, none of which have ever been borne out.
I'm flabbergasted that the world didn't end, drown or boil in 1980, 1990, 1995, 1998, 2000 .... as predicted!
May I point out that Richard Crim's substack post yesterday identifies that if you add the effects of methane CH4 emissions to CO2 emissions, a combined measure called CO2(e), then greenhouse gases aren't just 435ppm but already 530ppm. That would equate to a temperature rise of 5*C to 6*C already baked in. Literally!
Hansen and Co. recently published a paper giving a 0.4 degC global ave. surface temp increase over the past 2 yrs, so 0.2 degC annual increase, which those of us watching the gold standard C3S data stream (see "Climate Pulse" page) confirms, so, at this rate of increase, we may see 1.95 degC increase by 2026, 2.75 degC by 2030, and a 1 degC increase every 5 yrs thereafter. We are burning-up, and yet keep burning 8 billion tons of coal annually, and 100M+ barrels of oil DAILY. ANYONE still listening to the Madman-in-Chief from Merry-log-Asylum will finally get the message this summer, which is way, way too late for any child unlucky enough to be born today, who will turn 22 in 2047, when a 6 degC increase is predicted. Ignore the Tramp and his fav Muskrat. Have a blessed day!
@smokingtyger Richard Crim who IS a climate scientist has been saying the same things (with charts!) for a while now. He is in agreement with Hansen and extends the analysis. Bottom line: our fate as a species is pretty much sealed. I have personally moved through the five stages of grief about that and I now accept we are where we are.
So. In the short term we should be doing every sensible thing to prepare and minimize to the extent possible human suffering.
I think we are going to be “taking stock” at the end of the year just how bad things are getting already. The LA fires were just the opening act.
Good commentary about Hansen. I find it almost pathetic that people with much lower levels of expertise try to puff themselves up by criticizing Hansen. Yes, what about our grandchildren? I wouldn't want to be the grandchild of someone whose focus is scoffing at Hansen. Edith
Adjusting for the known transient influences of ENSO, volcanic aerosols and the solar cycle shows accelerating global warming quite clearly, above the 95% confidence level. Tamino (aka Grant Foster) shows this at - https://tamino.wordpress.com/2025/01/28/every-tenth-matters/
This warming ought to be no surprise given that atmospheric CO2 is at record high and the emissions driving the enhanced greenhouse effect have not (yet) stopped rising.
I asked my son, who is now 42, to not have children back in 2017. I would be happy to have him married, but I am not willing to have a grandchild starve to death. (This was me, who had been buying cute baby clothes in thrift shops for years.) I believe that the climate crisis will end in a lack of food for everyone on the planet. Only Scandinavian countries and California have already met the 2030 climate goals. I believe the evidence shows that most people, especially out of government, have no understanding of what is happening, because they have an inability to understand consequences. We can do our best and cross our fingers, but unless countries get rid of their ignorant oligarchs, our species has no chance.
Ellen I agree with you 1000% and I say that as an obstetrician. I am filled with absolute horror for what's to come
What is the reference to 323 ppm?
Still, the hope thing hangs about - technology will save us, or God, or world government cooperation, or it's just cyclical, or it's many decades away. While continuing to mitigate, we need to seriously review how we live and then, if we (you) haven't already, move to adaptation.
Thanks Susan, I really appreciate all your reporting. As an ex-actuary I’m watching what happens in the insurance sector with dread.
Do you have thoughts on this report?
https://actuaries.org.uk/document-library/thought-leadership/thought-leadership-campaigns/climate-papers/planetary-solvency-finding-our-balance-with-nature/
They find that.
"Unfortunately, many high-profile, public climate change risk assessments are significantly underestimating risk because they exclude many of the real-world impacts of climate change, such as the impact of tipping points, extreme events, migration, sea level rise, human health impacts or geopolitical risk."
"Furthermore, they calculate ongoing economic growth, even in a hothouse world, with climate damages being lower than growth assumptions. These results conflict with scientific predictions of significantly reduced human habitability from climate change."
“These (mainstream) risk assessments are precisely wrong, rather than being roughly right.”
They forecast 2 Billion dead at +2°C of warming, which will happen over the next 10 years.
They forecast 4 Billion dead at +3°C of warming, which they assign a 50% chance of hitting by 2050.
Yes, I saw it and downloaded it. All kudos to them, I don’t think other nations’ actuaries have banded together to explore in the manner actuaries are best at, namely being sensible about the assumptions of long-term predictions. I haven’t read it yet but must do so.
Two quick things…
1) The primary threat presented by climate change is that it will destabilize the global geopolitical order, leading to conflicts involving nuclear weapons. Once the nuclear threshold is crossed, the situation can spiral downward at incredible speeds.
2) There is actually no proof that life is better than death, and at least some reason to question that very common assumption. This is something to keep in mind when considering major disruptions to the status quo. Whether death is bad depends on what death actually is, and while there are many theories on the matter, nobody actually knows.
The only thing I wonder about is - is it raw co2 doubling, or will it be co2 equivalent doubling. Because in co2(e), we will double in the late 2030s.
It matters and it doesn't matter.
CO2(e) will cause the same amount of warming as CO2. The issue is, for how long?
For example, Hansen puts the CO2(e) level at around 530ppm. That will "pull up" the Rate of Warming (RoW) and increase temperatures BUT only for about 30-40 years. Because the CH4 will breakdown over that time span.
After that, the RoW will begin to fall back to what is supported by the CO2 level. ALTHOUGH temperatures will probably not decline.
So, in our example the CO2(e) level is at 535ppm. Using Hansen's climate sensitivity numbers this means about +6°C of warming over baseline. At 535ppm(CO2e) the RoW is "boosted" up to +0.5°C/decade because of the Earth Energy Imbalance being so large.
Now, suppose we ban natural gas tomorrow. As well as sealing all the wells and emptying the pipelines. The CH4 level stops increasing and the CO2 level is at 425ppm and increasing at +3ppm/year. What happens?
The RoW starts declining as the level of CH4 declines over a 30 year timeframe. It drops down to the level that is supported at what the CO2 level will be in +30 years.
So, 30 years x +3ppm/year = about +90ppm of CO2 or about 515ppm(CO2) at the point that the influence of CH4 falls to zero. Which is likely to mean +6°Cod long term warming.
The amount of warming by 2050 will be about +1.5°C OVER the +1.6°C we are seeing today.
That's a BIG part of WHY +3°C by 2050 with 4 billion dead is becoming the MOST LIKELY scenario. Trying to use natural gas as a "bridge fuel" just resulted in accelerating the speed of the warming.
Richard: Your assumption that methane might fall back is surely flawed - it seems to me that methane under Artic and Greenland ice, still to come from Siberian permafrost, under Antarctic ice, perhaps even from methane clathrates under fast-warming seas, are far more likely to accelerate than decline. And the few (wildly varying) estimates of methane quantities I have seen suggest truly massive quantities may yet be released.
I would suggest that methane may be the new driving force for climate change for the next century, exceeding CO2 emissions in effects. And taking away any mechanism for humans to reduce future global heating.
Hansen has been scare mongering for many years….. first with his debunked hockey stick and then with many papers that that use predictive models that never predict reality over time.
Many scientists are now declaring no climate emergency even though they all agree the planet is slightly warming due to its natural cycles.
This may help provide some information for those interested in some climate reality and truth.
https://nigelsouthway.substack.com/p/there-is-no-climate-emergency
Obviously, you haven't kept up with the science. The hockey stick has been well supported.
Wiki: "More than two dozen reconstructions, using various statistical methods and combinations of proxy records, support the broad consensus shown in the original 1998 hockey-stick graph, with variations in how flat the pre-20th century "shaft" appears.[12][13] The 2007 IPCC Fourth Assessment Report cited 14 reconstructions, 10 of which covered 1,000 years or longer, to support its strengthened conclusion that it was likely that Northern Hemisphere temperatures during the 20th century were the highest in at least the past 1,300 years.[14] Further reconstructions, including Mann et al. 2008 and PAGES 2k Consortium 2013, have supported these general conclusions."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hockey_stick_graph_(global_temperature)
We are up on it ..... We have just so much information on how this hockey stick is a rigged data set.. even the IPCC stopped reporting using it..
Climategate Hide the Decline Backgrounder - Climate Discussion Nexus
https://climatediscussionnexus.com/videos/climategate-hide-the-decline-backgrounder/
It eradicated the other more significant warming periods that have preceded the one we are in now.
Take a look at the material I provided and you will see that the hockey stick is bunk.
Mann and the IPCC are falling into scientific dispute with other scientists that have far better data and logic.
How can we even trust the UN leaderships policy documents when they don’t even match with the scientific sections of the IPCC. Read Koonin’s book Unsettled.
Its even clear that the funding that has created the climate emergency industrial complex has even made the peer review process a politically subjugated activity that has to stay on the narrative to keep the snouts in the funding trough.. very sad..
The climate realists such as CLINTEL and CO2COALITION are getting to the truth of the science far more.
Look, if you guys want to argue with Exxon engineers and scientists, be my guest. Exxon has every reason to agree with you since they could face regulatory efforts, but instead, they have admitted what other scientists have been saying since 1988. (In fact, their own scientists predicted global warming in the 1980s as well.) Here's the Chairman's recent comments:
https://corporate.exxonmobil.com/news/viewpoints/reframing-the-climate-challenge
Please... one Eng from the past and a politically correct CEO and we should all go along with the scam...stop clutching at straws.... yes the planet is warming its done it before we may have participated but its not an emergency.. OK
The scientists at Exxon did not know how to translate this energy absorption in to climate impacts. They agreed it might cause warming but did not understand the heat distributions. We barely do today. Oil company execs are spineless (for some reason).
The hockey stick has been debunked and decoded to be full of poor choices by its author.
The fact that the fastest growing countries (in energy use) are all climate skeptics does not allow unilateral responses that make sense. The proposed cure is worse than the disease.
It is you who are behind the times. Climate catastrophism is all about the funding of scientists, 97% of whom then 'oddly' agree with the concept. It's yet another grift.
Have you not noticed that the earth is now perceived to be cooling, that CO2 is necessary for life and that corrupt billionaires like Gates are funding alternative foods (made of bugs) and trying to stop cow flatulence -- and making money hand over fist on all of it?
Carbon capture is another nonsense, which involves trading carbon contracts and making money - for what? It's like crypto currencies, money for nothing.
None so blind as those that will not see --- the pure corruption involved.
Yes insurance companies see no issues
Homeowners insurance rates are dropping
The sun is shining
Everything is great
I don’t want to diminish the pain of those at the sharp end of extreme weather or inept adaption policies in challenging local climate conditions. And such ineptness will get reflected in insurance rates as they mirror risk.
But the risk is not generated by planet level climate change although smart adaption is always wise and the best approach.
Our adaptive capability correctly supported and undertaken with realistic policies has reduced our deaths and per person expense to such weather extremes by a 10 times reduction factor in the last 100 years and is being driven by the power of fossil fuels and predictive technology.
And yes the sun will continue to shine or if not that WILL be a climate emergency 😊
Am glad I rent
Let someone else deal with the disaster if it occurs
Where I live occasionally has massive hurricanes very occasionally
The local forest has massive oaks hundreds of years old felled by a hurricane
Who’d a thought
Absolutely agree with you on this. The corruption around the climate catastrophism may be exposed by the US finding that they have been contributing huge amounts of money unknowingly to the IPCC and other organisations who have much to gain from this global climate change fiction.
I'm concerned that those people quoting the IPCC here have no concept of what the IPCC stands for and where the original 'data' came from - some made-up charts relating to extremes of temperature, none of which have ever been borne out.
I'm flabbergasted that the world didn't end, drown or boil in 1980, 1990, 1995, 1998, 2000 .... as predicted!
Thank you for this most excellent and apprehendable analysis, Susan
May I point out that Richard Crim's substack post yesterday identifies that if you add the effects of methane CH4 emissions to CO2 emissions, a combined measure called CO2(e), then greenhouse gases aren't just 435ppm but already 530ppm. That would equate to a temperature rise of 5*C to 6*C already baked in. Literally!
Ooops! Just saw Richard's own post from earlier!
Hansen and Co. recently published a paper giving a 0.4 degC global ave. surface temp increase over the past 2 yrs, so 0.2 degC annual increase, which those of us watching the gold standard C3S data stream (see "Climate Pulse" page) confirms, so, at this rate of increase, we may see 1.95 degC increase by 2026, 2.75 degC by 2030, and a 1 degC increase every 5 yrs thereafter. We are burning-up, and yet keep burning 8 billion tons of coal annually, and 100M+ barrels of oil DAILY. ANYONE still listening to the Madman-in-Chief from Merry-log-Asylum will finally get the message this summer, which is way, way too late for any child unlucky enough to be born today, who will turn 22 in 2047, when a 6 degC increase is predicted. Ignore the Tramp and his fav Muskrat. Have a blessed day!
The administration conceives of people outside the US as potential climate refugees.
Not people who live in Florida, Louisiana, south Texas, North Carolina, and Manhattan?