Potsdam Institute’s Stefan Rahmstorf Uses Tricks To Warn Against “Trickster Skeptics”
It’s safe to say that the only people who still believe the ultra-alarmist scenarios of the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research are the leftist media and green activists. Even the government funders of this institute know they aren’t really true. After all Germany hasn’t cut CO2 emissions in close to 10 years. Dr. Sebastian Lüning at Die Kalte Sonne exposes the latest dubious attempt by Potsdam scientist, Stefan Rahmstorf, to spread climate fear and to attack on journalist Daniel Wetzel of flagship daily Die Welt, who not long ago dared to question the science. The method of attack used by Rahmstorf is every time the same: Smear the dissenting journalist as a con-man. Insist the science has long been settled (it isn’t). Float out charts that use statistical trickery to mislead. =================================== Again and again: Stefan Rahmstorf and his solar trick By Dr. Sebastian Lüning and Prof. Fritz Vahrenholt (Translated/edited by P Gosselin) The Sherlock Holmes of climate sciences, Stefan Rahmstorf, at his climate blog post “Klimawandel XY Ungelöst” at Klimalounge, warned on 29 July 2017 – of climate con-men, fraudsters and hustlers: The global CO2 increase: the facts and the tricks of con-men The facts surrounding CO2 rise are clear, unequivocal and agreed on – yet Die Welt again and again gladly recycles old, worn-out climate skeptic myths. Are forests to blame for the CO2 rise?” Here Stefan Rahmstorf’s rails against an article by Daniel Wetzel “Kurzschluss bei der Energiewende” [The Energiewende shorts out] in Die Welt, where Wetzel dared to question Rahmstorf’s favorite project. The main focus was man’s share of the total CO2 budget, which is a rather dry issue in itself. Also the article looked at the magnitude and its signficance. Depending on its toxicity, even small amounts can have an impact. The same old stuff. But looking at his Figure 5, Rahmstorf’s seriousness really needs to be called into question. It involves his favorite chart which he regularly presents. Here it is (Fig. 2): Figure 2. Chart from Rahmstorf’s Blog posting “The global CO2 rise: the facts and the tricks of the con-men” dated 29 July, 2017. Rahmstorf*’s text concerning the chart follows: Curves showing global temperature, CO2-concentration and solar activity. Temperature and CO2 are scaled so that they correspond to the expected CO2-effect on climate (e.g. the best estimation of climate sensitivity). The amplitude of the solar curve is scaled in such a way as to correspond to the observed correlation between solar data and temperature data. (Details are explained here). You can generate this chart here and copy a code there that allows you to install the chart as a widget on your own website (like at my home page) – where here every year it is updated with the latest data. Thanks to Bernd Herd, who programmed it). First remark: Contrary to Rahmstorf’s claim, there is no “best estimate of climate senstitivity“. The 5th IPCC report intentionally left this value open as no agreement among the report’s authors could be reached. Instead a very broad range of 1.5°C to 4.5°C for a doubling of CO2 was given, which ranges from manageable to catastrophic. Second remark: The scaling of the solar curve was designed so as to make it impossible to detect a trend. Also the solar curve that was purposely selected is not really representative if one looks at the solar reconstructions of isotopes and cosmic rays. A more scientifically robust version of the chart would look as follows: Figure 2: Global temperature (GISS), CO2-concentration and solar activity (Steinhilber et al. 2009). Rahmstorf complains about con-men and tricksters, but completely fails himself when put to the test. Is this person, who gladly speaks at Green Party campaign events, really as credible as he fancies himself to be?
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