Next step-beyond Kyoto• Meeting in Copenhagen in December 2009• The Copenhagen Accord was drafted by the US, China, India, Brazil

and South Africa on December 18, and judged a "meaningful agreement" by the United States government.

• It was "taken note of", but not "adopted", in a debate of all the participating countries the next day, and it was not passed unanimously.

• The document recognized that climate change is one of the greatest challenges of the present day and that actions should be taken to keep any temperature increases to below 2°C.

• The document is not legally binding and does not contain any legally binding commitments for reducing CO2 emissions.

• Many countries and non-governmental organizations were opposed to this agreement, but, as of January 4, 2010, 138 countries have signed the agreement.

Cap and Trade• An environmental policy that caps emissions while giving source flexibility

in how they comply with those caps-uses economic incentives to get compliance

• A limit or cap on the amount of a pollutant that can be emitted is set. • Companies or other groups are issued emission permits and are required

to hold an equivalent number of allowances (or credits) which represent the right to emit a specific amount. The total amount of allowances and credits cannot exceed the cap, limiting total emissions to that level.

• Companies that need to increase their emission allowance must buy credits from those who pollute less called a trade. In effect, the buyer is paying a charge for polluting, while the seller is being rewarded for having reduced emissions by more than was needed.

• In theory, those who can reduce emissions most cheaply will do so, achieving the pollution reduction at the lowest cost to society.

• Allowed under Kyoto for nations to sell their credits.• Main objections are it will raise energy costs to the consumer.

American Clean Energy and Security Act

• Also known as the Waxman-Markey Act• Proposes a cap and trade system for Greenhouse Gas emissions• Requires electric utilities to meet 20% of their electricity demand through renewable energy sources and energy

efficiency by 2020.• Invests in new clean energy technologies and energy efficiency, including renewable energy, carbon capture and

sequestration, electric and other advanced technology vehicles, and basic scientific research and development.• Protects consumers from energy price increases. According to estimates from the

Environmental Protection Agency, the reductions in carbon pollution required by the legislation will cost American families less than a postage stamp per day.

• The bill requires a 17-percent emissions reduction from 2005 levels by 2020; this would reduce United States' emissions by about 80 percent by 2050. Complementary measures in the legislation, such as investments in preventing tropical deforestation, will achieve significant additional reductions in carbon emissions.

• It includes a renewable electricity standard) requiring each electricity provider who supplies over 4 million MWh to produce 20 percent of its electricity from renewable by 2020. There is a provision whereby 5% of this standard can be met through energy efficiency savings, as well as an additional 3% with certification of the Governor of the state in which the provider operates.

• It provides for modernization of the electrical grid• It provides for expanded production of electric vehicles• It mandates significant increases in energy efficiency in buildings, home appliances, and electricity generation.

Climategate• Also known as the Climate Research Unit e-mail

controversy• Internet leak of thousands of emails and other

documents from the University of East Anglia's Climatic Research Unit (CRU).

• emails and documents were obtained through the hacking of a server.

• hacker had filtered them using keywords, including "Yamal", "tree rings", and "Phil Jones", so that these names appear in many of the documents

Climategate-what was stolen• more than 1,000 emails, 2,000 documents, as well as

commented source code, pertaining to climate change research covering a period from 1996 until 2009.

• The vast majority of the emails related to four climatologists: Phil Jones, the head of the CRU; Michael E. Mann of Pennsylvania State University (PSU), one of the originators of the graph of temperature trends dubbed the "hockey stick graph”; Tim Osborn, a climate modeller; and Mike Hulme, director of the Tyndall Centre for Climate Change Research.

• The four were either recipients or senders of all but 66 of the 1,073 emails,

Climategate-allegations• Allegations that the hacked emails showed evidence that climate scientists manipulated data.• A few other commentators said that the evidence supported claims that dissenting scientific

papers had been suppressed.• The Wall Street Journal reported the emails revealed apparent efforts to ensure the IPCC include

their own views and exclude others and to withhold scientific data. • Reason reported that the CRU evidently plotted to remove journal editors with whom they

disagreed and suppress the publication of articles that they disliked.[• The ICO made a statement that the emails revealed that freedom of information requests were

'not dealt with as they should have been under the legislation' but that they could not prosecute due to statue of limitations.

• Academics and climate change researchers said that nothing in the emails proved wrongdoing, and dismissed the allegations.

• Independent reviews by FactCheck and the Associated Press said that the emails did not affect evidence that man made global warming is a real threat, and said that emails were being misrepresented to support unfounded claims of scientific misconduct. They also concluded that there were disturbing suggestions that scientists had avoided sharing scientific data with skeptical critics.

Climategate-understanding the trick

• Many commentators quoted one email referring to a "trick" used in Mann's graph to deal with the well-known tree ring divergence problem to "hide the decline" that particular proxy showed for modern temperatures after 1950, when measured temperatures were rising.

• These two phrases were taken out of context by climate change skeptics including Senator Jim Inhofe and former Governor of Alaska Sarah Palin as though they referred to a decline in measured global temperatures, even though they were written when temperatures were at a record high.

• In their inquiry into allegations of research misconduct, Penn State reviewers found ”the so-called 'trick' was nothing more than a statistical method used to bring two or more different kinds of data sets together in a legitimate fashion by a technique that has been reviewed by a broad array of peers in the field.

• The Parliament of the United Kingdom select committee inquiry concluded that "[Trick] appears to be a colloquialism for a "neat" method of handling data," and "[hide the decline] was a shorthand for the practice of discarding data known to be erroneous”.

Hide the decline?

• Refers to the omission of Siberian tree ring data from after 1960, as it shows a discrepancy with thermometer data.

• Not yet understood why these are discrepant, but a number of factors besides temperature (soil properties, precipitation and the tree’s age) can effect tree ring width.

How do scientists handle data?

• Experimental data is not perfect• Scientists need to evaluate the reliability of data– Error bars– Understanding how it was gathered(experimental

design)• It is legitimate to discard data from an analysis,

provided:– You have a defensible reason for doing so– You are up front about what data was discarded from

the analysis and why

The hockey stick graph again:

BEST Project results

Has it stopped in the last 15 years?

Finally last 130 years

Different views of the same data

Be a critical thinker!