Note: At the time that this post was originally written my attempts at getting both sides of this story had been unseccessful. New information came to light after my original posting at my own blog. Rather than rewrite I'm just adding dates for when each section was written. The original piece, written on 6/7, still shows exactly as it was posted on that date. The addendum with updates written on 6/12 appears at the end. – BB ***
June 7, 2012
A few nights ago I caught on a friend's Facebook page a link regarding legislation passed in North Carolina regarding how they are dealing with Global Warming Climate Change. Apparently NC just passed a law stating that it will not accept any scientific studies that state that sea level will be rising by one meter by the year 2100.
I started googling to get more information, and almost all of the postings I found on the subject were leftists either giggling or angry at those knuckle-dragging red staters for passing yet another backward law. This whole thing had my BS detectors going off, so I kept searching and found the actual law that was passed.
To make a long story short NC is questioning the methodology used to generate that number. The one meter estimate came from IPCC studies that suggest that the last few decades point to an accelerated rate of seas levels rising. The methodology NC wants is to use all measurable years prior to 1900 as well. The stake is pretty obvious – this will direct huge dollar amounts of infrastructure spending and economic development, and obviously restrict the same in areas near the coast line.
Both sides have fair arguments. Personally I have a lot of trouble taking the IPCC seriously given it's recent declaration regarding its socialistsic rather than scientific mission. And if you live your life only use more recent trends to skew your data you would have probably also bought heavily into internet stocks in 1999 or real estate in 2006. That said, it doesn't seem like a good idea to ignore trends, either. The warm mongers basic argument is that if circumstances are changing they may be a trend of things to come and have to be taken into account.
Stupid laws usually come about as a result of some stupid action. My assumption was that somebody was threatening to kill some large construction projects near the coast based on some exaggerated predictions, and this law got passed as a pre-emptive strike against whoever was ready to file a suit with the EPA or some other environmental bureaucracy to stop it. So I searched online, and I searched. And I couldn't find the smoking gun anywhere. The deepest explanation I could get was the two sides feuding over the methodology being used and that is why this law passed.
Oddly enough, I find myself coming down marginally on the side of the warm mongers. While I've seen too many falsified and exaggerated claims used by their side to back some drastic claims that can only be miraculously saved by expanding bureaucratic control over our lives and punishing the poor with higher energy prices, I can't recall the last time I agreed with the greens on any kind of climate assertions.
But this is different. In this case, the North Carolina Legislature passed a law to in essence, fight preemptively against stupidity in their eyes. At the end of the day this is a battle that should be fought in a public forum – let the sides present their data and methodologies and find out what forecasts to make based on that. But passing policy that restricts your access to data that goes into the decision process does not help make a persuasive case. Silencing your critics only makes you look insecure and lacking confidence in your own supporting data. And while some conservatives might like the idea of muzzling the warm mongers, as I pointed to the leftists during the Catholic Church's contraception debate – you only like it because it's being done to someone you don't like. What makes you think the same won't eventually be done to you?
Again, I'm not supporting the one foot projection nor the methodology that produced it. Their data, along with the methods that NC decided to use can and should be questioned. Questioning data is a good thing – suppressing data is not. I'd really like to hear from anyone in the Carolina coastal region who might have more insight into this, because from where I'm sitting this law makes no sense.
June 12, 2012
Prior to publishing this piece I reached out to two contacts I have in NC to see if either had heard anything. Yesterday I received a response, and this time I found my smoking gun. The long and short of it is that new standards were trying to be hastily pushed through by the greens, and the opposition needed to move quickly to prevent new rules being imposed on them. And it looks like the greens' methodologies were as equally flawed as the ones I criticized in my initial write-up. My personal favorite is ignoring sea level increases for Wilmington while only using those for Duck, an area whose sea level “rise” is just as likely caused by the fact that Duck is sinking into the ocean. I still don't like the original form of the law restricting data use (a compromise bill was finally passed), but now my biggest problem with NC-20 is the messaging. They should have anticipated how the press would misrepresent this issue and worked toward getting their message out. The fact that my extensive sifting through search engines found only the leftist talking points until I had help to point me in the right direction speaks volumes. This is a problem that Republicans everywhere better resolve between now and November.
Cross posted from Brother Bob's Blog
Why is it that people who have never been to sea, never stop to look at the tidal charts for the last hundred years?
@Skookum 2: Growing up by Lake Erie where I could see boaters operating near a reef. Boaters don’t purchase or look at charts either. That said I also saw boaters try and go between people wading knee deep or less on the reef. sometimes you could even hear the crunch.
Just ignore those who look for the data. Anthony Watts has extensively documented the manner in which extant data has been “corrected” in order to fit the paradigm.
And the data is very interesting. Some years ago Thor Heyerdahl made some studies of a port in India. The port was a couple of hundred feet above sea level. This would have been 5000 or 6000 years ago.
What happened? All that water turned to ice. And the seas are lower now.
If there were, indeed, sea level increase, every port in the world would know about it. And no reports have come from ports where the ships are too high up to load and unload.
@mathman:
Good points, mathman.
I live quite near the Ports of Long Beach and Los Angeles.
I eat at fish places frequented by Port workers.
I was at Berth 55 waiting to put in my order when a couple of old Port workers were asked if the reason we see more berths unloading big cargo ships further in from the mouth of the Port was because of ”global warming.”
The guys laughed and said it was because of constant dredging and economic need.
So many import companies for the dock spaces meant dredge further in and set up new berths.
I am a radical believer in climate change!! Political Climate Change!! That being giving 0-bama a permanent change of address!!
Any scientific data would represent a “leftist” view. Scientific evidence is not like religious thought—everybody has their own religious view. Scientific evidence is consistent with the data, and subject to change if the data changes, based on peer review—not just a out-lying hypothetical construct. Ultra-conservatives are so busy arguing about climate change, they don’t have any constructive opinion—talk about narcissistic. They believe a man who has no advanced scientific degree, but has concocted an explanation as outlined (not documented) by Anthony Watts.
@liberal: OK, I’ll bite and respond to our favorite troll… What’s scientific about refusing to use data points that might not agree with your theory or using an area that’s sinking into the ocean as proof of rising water levels?
@Curt: Great pic with the post!
What Anthony Watts, Steve McIntyre and the other AGW skeptics have documented extensively is the de facto suspension of the scientific method in much so-called climate research. What the Climategate e-mails reveal is the behind-the scenes corruption of the peer-review process.
Some people talk about peer-review like it’s something perfect and incorruptible, like it absolutely guarantees high quality research. It does not. The people who view peer review that way have typically never had any experience with it. Much peer review is done competently and honorably. However, reviewers also do things like misunderstand the research, miss major errors, delay their reply for for months because the paper in question competes with their own work, and pursue vendettas against their enemies. The climate crew have really taken it to the next level, though – they’ve got themselves an old-boy club that completely excludes competing ideas from publication and retaliates against individuals for straying outside of this program. They have sought to get people fired and they have succeeded at it. The hell with them.
And speaking of advanced degrees in relevant subjects, Rajendra Kumar Pachauri, the head of the United Nations climate change bureau, the IPCC, is a railroad engineer by training.
It’s warming or it isn’t. The seas are rising or they aren’t. So what. Either way, no one in this world is going to control the thermometer on this planet. Arrogance of the highest form.
It is far worse than what you’ve written. Look at http://wattsupwiththat.com/. It has a guest post from the science adviser from NC-20. The warm mongers ignored any critique of their poor methodology and the law required the use of empirical data and not guesses.
By the way, if you google about climate change you have difficulty finding non-warm monger cites. Anthony Watts has difficulty finding his own page, which is the top rated site on climate change science.
Perhaps they (NC) saw this chart that shows the rate of sea level raising hasn’t changed in over 120 years (it goes back to 1880).