Global warming, climate change, all these things are just a dream come true for politicians. I deal with evidence and not with frightening computer models because the seeker after truth does not put his faith in any consensus. The road to the truth is long and hard, but this is the road we must follow. People who describe the unprecedented comfort and ease of modern life as a climate disaster, in my opinion have no idea what a real problem is.
โโฆ trace toxic metals like lead and cadmium can pollute soil and water if mishandled โฆโ
Indiaโs solar boom faces a hidden waste problem
Nikita Yadav
Indiaโs rapid solar energy expansion is widely hailed as a success. But without a plan to manage the waste it will generate, how clean is the transition?
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Solar growth has cut Indiaโs reliance on coal. Though thermal and other non-renewables still supply over half of installed capacity, solar now contributes more than 20%. Yet the achievement carries a challenge: while clean in use, solar panels can pose environmental risks if not properly managed.
Solar panels are mostly recyclable, made of glass, aluminium, silver, and polymers โ but trace toxic metals like lead and cadmium can pollute soil and water if mishandled.
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A new study by the Council on Energy, Environment and Water (CEEW) estimates that India could generate more than 11 million tonnes of solar waste by 2047. Managing this would require almost 300 dedicated recycling facilities and an investment of $478 (ยฃ362m) over the next two decades.
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Damaged or discarded panels often end up in landfills or with unauthorised recyclers, where unsafe methods can release toxic materials. The BBC has contacted Indiaโs renewable energy ministry for comment.
How insane is this? Three decades after lead was banned in gasoline, renewables have re-introduced the risk of lead contamination back into the environment through the challenge of disposing of millions of tons of e-waste.
Given illegal dumping is more likely to occur in rural areas, a disproportionate amount of that solar panel heavy metal contamination could end up in the human food chain.
Of course you donโt have to dump the panels in the countryside. In cities there is another cheap and nasty way to dispose of solar panels. Non-recyclable solar panel silicon, which contains much of the heavy metal contamination, can be burned in an industrial incinerator providing the incinerator temperature is above 750F. The ash from solar panels would look like high quality construction sand โ the heavy metal contamination would not be obvious. I can easily imagine such contaminated sand being deviously inserted into the construction industry as cut price building material, ending up in play ground sand pits or being used to build homes and schools.
Surely it is time to review this ghastly new threat to our childrenโs health, before we end up with 10s of millions of tons of contaminated solar panel waste poisoning our kids.
As the year draws to a close, the guardians of climate orthodoxy have once again unleashed their ritualistic howls of indignation at the actions of the Trump administration. Last weekโs op-ed in The Guardian, Bob Ward and Michael Mannโattack dogs of the alarmist establishmentโlikened the US governmentโs decision to dismantle the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) to tyranny, โpaid forโ by fossil fuel interests. Their op-ed opens with the astonishing claim that the Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin โwould have understood and even appreciatedโ Trumpโs actions.
As the year draws to a close, the guardians of climate orthodoxy have once again unleashed their ritualistic howls of indignation at the actions of the Trump administration. Last weekโs op-ed in The Guardian, Bob Ward and Michael Mannโattack dogs of the alarmist establishmentโlikened the US governmentโs decision to dismantle the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) to tyranny, โpaid forโ by fossil fuel interests. Their op-ed opens with the astonishing claim that the Soviet dictator Joseph Stalin โwould have understood and even appreciatedโ Trumpโs actions.
They accuse President Trump of suppressing climate science, evoking the spectre of Lysenkoism, that infamous episode where ideology trumped empirical inquiry under Stalinโs regime. The irony is exquisite even if lost on its progenitors. Here are two figures who have spent their careers calling for the cancelling of dissenters, now projecting their own sins onto a political leader intent on liberating science from ideological captivity.
An Orwellian Malignancy
This latest salvo is no aberration but a symptom of a deeper malaise. The climate alarmist narrative, much like its twin in the COVID-19 hysteria, relies on a censorship complex that brands any deviation as โmisinformation.โ Ward, a fixture in the environmental NGO circuit, has long specialized in ad hominem attacks on respected academics like Richard Lindzen and Richard Tol, dismissing their peer-reviewed critiques as heresy. Mann, infamous for his โhockey stickโ graph that conveniently erased historical climate variability to fabricate a crisis, has faced courtroom rebukes for his litigious zeal. In his defamation suits, judges have accused him and his legal team of misleading tactics, underscoring the fraudulence of his claims. Yet, in the pages of The Guardianโthat reliable echo chamber for green ideologuesโthe pair inverts reality, portraying Trumpโs defunding of activist institutions as censorship, when it is precisely the opposite.
Consider the economic and institutional realities underpinning this charade. NCAR, after over five decades, has devolved into a taxpayer-funded propaganda mill, churning out models that predict apocalyptic futures while ignoring the stubborn facts ofย atmospheric physicsย andย human adaptation. The Trump administrationโs move to shutter it aligns with a broader push to restore scientific integrity, as outlined in the presidentโs โGold Standard Science โexecutive order. This directive mandates transparency in federally funded research, ensuring that models and data are replicable and free from the biases that plague alarmist projections. Far from Stalinist suppression, this is a reclamation of science from the clutches of unelected bureaucrats and theirย NGO allies, who funnel billions into โclimate educationโ grants that invariably promote one-sided advocacy. NOAA, for instance,ย routinely awardedย multimillion-dollar sums to nonprofits peddling green dogma, all under the guise of environmental stewardship.
The parallels with the COVID-19 debacle are striking, revealing how the misinformation label serves as a blunt instrument for silencing debate across scientific domains. Just as climate skeptics are tarred as โdeniers,โ COVID dissenters were branded spreaders of falsehoods. Stanfordโs Jay Bhattacharya, a leading epidemiologist, recently highlighted this hubris in a post on X: the notion that a cabal of bureaucrats and activist scientists can infallibly discern truth from error on complex matters is not just arrogantโitโs delusional. Bhattacharya himself endured censorship orchestrated by Anthony Fauci who among others in the medical establishment pressured social media platforms to throttle views challenging lockdowns and vaccine mandates.
Across the Atlantic, the European Unionโs censorship regime under European Commission president Ursula von der Leyen exemplifies this technocratic overreach. The unelected Eurocrat boasts of safeguarding free speech against โharmful and illegal activitiesโ online with its Digital Services Act. It aims to restrict media platforms which host โdisinformationโ and critical views on mass immigration, the Ukraine conflict, or the ruinous costs of the green agenda in Europe.
In a rant that would impress Orwell, Ms. Von der Leyen speaks about how โpre-bunkingโ is preferable to โde-bunkingโ alleged untruths and where alleged โmisinformationโ is a virus:
โโฆwe need to build up societal immunity around information manipulation, because research has shown that pre-bunking is much more successful than debunking. Pre-bunking is basically the opposite of debunking. In short, prevention is preferable to cure. Perhaps if you think of information manipulation as a virusโinstead of treating an infection once it has taken hold, that is debunkingโitโs much better to vaccinate so that the body is inoculated.โ
Where have we heard that vaccination/inoculation story before? Perhaps we should not digress into Ms. Von der Leyenโs missing SMS phone messages which sealed the EUโs deal for 1.8 billion doses of corona โvaccineโ costing โฌ35 billion negotiated with Pfizer CEO Albert Bourla.
In New Zealand, former Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern went further, declaring government sources the sole arbiters of COVID truth, effectively criminalizing legitimate critiques from sceptical doctors and scientists upholding their Hippocratic oath. This Orwellian stanceโwhere state-approved narratives are sacrosanctโmirrors the climate arena, where questioning net-zero fantasies invites professional ruin.
The Trumpian Pushback
The EUโs Digital Services Act plans to coerce social media giants into suppressing content that challenges Brusselsโ orthodoxies, leading to a chilling effect on open discourse throughout the world. Earlier in the month, the European Commission fined Elon Muskโs X $140 million for โfailing to complyโ with regulations. But it is now a Trumpian world which frustrates Eurocrats to no end. Americaโs commitment to First Amendment principles clashes with Europeโs slide into regulatory authoritarianism. The US house judiciary committee describes the digital regulations as censorship which is โlargely one-sided, almost uniformly targeting political conservatives.โ
The US Secretary of State Marco Rubio shot back last week:
โFor far too long, ideologues in Europe have led organized efforts to coerce American platforms to punish American viewpoints they oppose. The Trump Administration will no longer tolerate these egregious acts of extraterritorial censorship. Today, @StateDept will take steps to bar leading figures of the global censorship-industrial complex from entering the United States. We stand ready and willing to expand this list if others do not reverse course.โ
The U.S. state departmentโs sanctions on NGO leaders and a former EU official involved in these efforts underscore the geopolitical rift. Under Secretary Sarah Rogers detailed the individuals and the reasons why they have been barred. On the US state ban list are Imran Ahmed (Centre for Countering Digital Hate), Josephine Ballon and Anna-Lena von Hodenberg (HateAid), Thierry Breton (former EU Commissioner) as well as Clare Melford (Global Disinformation Index).
Letโs go through each of these censors. Thierry Breton was a key architect of the Digital Services Act. In August 2024, as European Commissioner for Internal Markets and Digital Services, he issued a letter to threaten Elon Musk ahead of his live stream interview with candidate Trump who was campaigning for his second term. The hubris of an EU functionary to warn Mr. Musk that his platform could be charged for amplifying harmful content in the EU can only be described as bizarre.
Undersecretary Rogers accused the UK citizen ImranAhmed of collaborating โwith the Biden Administrationโs effort to weaponize the government against U.S. citizensโ in a social media post on December 23rd, writing that his organization published the โinfamous โdisinformation dozenโ reportโ that spurred a campaign to de-platform those questioning the safety of COVID-19 vaccines including the current Department of Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy Jr. . โLeaked documents from CCDH show the organization listed โkill Muskโs Twitter,โ and โtrigger EU and UK regulatory actionโ as prioritiesโฆThe organization supports the UKโs Online Safety Act and EUโs Digital Services Act to expand censorship in Europe and around the world.โ It is interesting and not coincidental that Imran Ahmedโs CCDH was founded by Morgan Sweeny, Kier Starmerโs chief adviser. Clare Melford is the founder of the Global Disinformation Index, another British NGO that vigorously pursues anti-โhate-speechโ activism, in fact hunting down anyone who has views different from the official dogma on climate change or so-called anti-vaxxers
Anna Lena von Hodenberg is the leader and founder of Hate Aid, a German NGO founded after the 2017 German federal elections to counter conservative groups such as the AfD. Ms. Anna and her NGO is an official โtrusted flaggerโ under the EUโs digital services act. Clare Melford. Ahmed is the CEO of The Center for Countering Digital Hate, and Melford is the founder of the Global Disinformation Index, both two entities extremely active in anti-โhate-speechโ activism, in fact hunting down anyone who has views different from the official dogma on climate change or so-called anti-vaxxers,
Morally Bankruptcy of the Eurocrats
Von der Leyenโs pronouncements on โinoculated informationโ ring hollow amid Europeโs deindustrialization, where energy policies driven by climate ideology have shuttered factories, spiked power prices, and eroded competitiveness. Germanyโs Energiewende, once hailed as a model, now stands as a cautionary tale of economic self-harm, with manufacturing output shares plummeting and GDP growth stagnating.
At the heart of this EU-led censorship complex lies a modern Lysenkoism, where ideology masquerades as science. Todayโs climate Lysenkoists similarly dismiss empirical inconveniences: satellite data showing no acceleration in sea-level rise, historical records of globally warmer periods like the Medieval Warm Period, or the economic models demonstrating that net-zero targets would cost trillions while yielding negligible climate benefits. But Eurocrats will condemn as โmisinformationโ self-evident arguments that cheap, reliable energy is the bedrock of human welfare. Witness Asiaโs ascent, where coal, oil and gas have fueled GDP growth rates averaging 7% over decades, slashing poverty from 60% to under 5% in regions like East Asia.
The institutional incentives behind climate alarmism are pernicious. Multilateral agencies like the IMF and World Bank, alongside green lobbies, perpetuate myths of โfossil fuel subsidiesโ that distort markets, penalizing hydrocarbons while subsidizing intermittent renewables to the tune of $1.3 trillion annually globally. In Africa, the push for โrenewable leapfroggingโ ignores the continentโs dire need for baseload power, condemning millions to energy poverty under the banner of climate justice. Western elites, insulated from the consequences, preach degrowth while developing nations in BRICS+ reject such masochism, opting for pragmatic energy mixes that prioritize growth over virtue-signaling.
The contradictions of the censors of โmisinformationโ are glaring: alarmists decry โmisinformationโ while propagating doomsday scenarios that fail to materializeโrecall the 50 years of apocalyptic predictions. Europeโs precipitous industrial decline exposes the folly of subordinating energy policies to ideology. In the U.S., the virtue signalling ESG investment drive — pushed by BlackRockโs Larry Fink among others — which funnelled trillions into underperforming green assets, is unravelling as returns lag and lawsuits mount over fiduciary breaches.
A New Yearโs Gift
Yet, there is cause for optimism in this twilight of technocratic hubris. President Trumpโs re-election signals a pivot toward evidence-based policy, unshackling science from the misinformation inquisition. By defunding activist enclaves like NCAR and enforcing transparency via executive order, the administration paves the way for genuine inquiry. Imagine a world where debates on climate sensitivity, the role of solar cycles, or the costs of adaptation are conducted openly, without fear of cancellation.
As Jay Bhattarcharya reminds us, free speech and replication as the standard of truth are necessary conditions for science to flourish. We need rational argument and data, not the censorship of state-defined โmisinformationโ. The US state department censoring the censors is good news as the New Year beckons.
A PRIVATE Membersโ Bill is currently wending its way through Parliament. Called the Climate and Nature Bill (CAN), it threatens to wreck the UK economy, damage lives and undermine democracy.
We continue our year ending tradition of publishing our top ten most read articles of the year. At number three is TCWโs wonderful regular climate sceptic correspondent Paul Homewood and his most popular post of the year. This article was first published on January 10, 2025.
A PRIVATE Membersโ Bill is currently wending its way through Parliament. Called the Climate and Nature Bill (CAN), it threatens to wreck the UK economy, damage lives and undermine democracy.
And thatโs just for starters! It makes Theresa Mayโs Net Zero legislation look like a walk in the park.
Private Membersโ Bills rarely turn into law, but worryingly this one already has the public support of 192 MPs โ you can check the list here. And as we know, Theresa Mayโs Net Zero legislation passed with barely a murmur, despite having no democratic mandate.
Originally the brainchild of the then Green Party MP Caroline Lucas, the Bill is due for its Second Reading on January 24. It is based on the premise that the current legislation mandating Net Zero by 2050 is inadequate. It calls for UK emissions to be rapidly cut โin line with the 1.5C targetโ. In effect, this means cutting emissions by about 90 per cent in the next ten years.
If passed, it would oblige the Energy Secretary to create a new climate change strategy and present it to Parliament within a year. The Government would be required by law to โlimit the UKโs total CO2 emissions to no more than its proportionate share of the IPCCโs remaining global carbon budget, for a 67 per cent chance of limiting heating to 1.5 deg Cโ.
Worse still, it lays down that imported emissions are accounted for as well, not just territorial ones, ie those that occur within our geographical borders, as at present. When all emissions are counted, including shipping and aviation, UK emissions have fallen by only about 23 per cent since 1990, the Billโs proponents say. This is much less than the 48 per cent claimed for territorial under the current system.
Given that territorial emissions are little more than half total emissions, such a target physically could not be achieved without radical changes to the UK economy, energy system and peopleโs lives. We would have to do without most of what we currently import, for example.
To meet the Billโs demands, total emissions, including imports, would need to be cut by two thirds by 2030, and virtually eliminated in ten yearsโ time.
It does not seem to have occurred to the Billโs supporters that if we eliminated UK emissions tomorrow it would not have the slightest effect, given that the rest of the world is still increasing emissions year-on-year. Since the Paris Agreement in 2015, for instance, world emissions of CO2 have increased by 7 per cent, while ours have fallen.
The Bill would make it law that both the production and import of fossil fuels must end โas rapidly as possibleโ. Imports of food would have to be virtually eliminated as well since food emissions account for a third of our total, and we import half our food.
Given that the UK would also have to shut down most of its meat farming, it is not clear exactly where we would get our food from. Apparently, the Billโs proponents believe we can live on โlow carbon fruit, veg, nuts, pulses and grainsโ instead!
One of the most insidious parts of the Bill lays down a legally enforceable role for a โClimate and Nature Assemblyโ, a body similar to the Climate Assembly set up in 2019. This body is supposed to reflect the views of the public. In reality, the 2019 version took a handful of ordinary citizens, brainwashed them with the help of โexpertsโ and then presented their conclusions as โpublic opinionโ.
We already have a system which gives the public the chance to offer their views โ it is called elections. But this new Bill would go further. The Assemblies would not just be advisory. The Bill states: โThe Secretary of State must include in the strategy all recommendations of the Assembly that have the support of 66 per cent of its members, where those recommendations are also jointly proposed by . . . the Climate Change Committee.โ
Such a proposal would severely undermine democracy by taking away the rights of voters to make these choices and tie the hands of future Parliaments.
As the Bill also states: โIf the Government fails to deliver a strategy that meets the Billโs objectives and fundamental principles, the Government can be challenged in the High Court through judicial reviewโ. Therein lies the real threat. If this Bill becomes law, it will be activist judges who will be making decisions, not elected politicians.
If all of this was not bad enough, the Bill not only wants to lay down laws about climate change, it also proposes exactly the same for โNatureโ. In its own words, it prioritises โnatureโ in decision-making and calls to restore and expand natural eco-systems. Any development or activity that threatens nature must prioritise the protection of nature.
And we must also address the UKโs entire ecological footprint at home and overseasby accounting for the โdestruction of natureโ.
The Billโs supporters say that the UKโs โenvironmental footprintโ must be reduced by three-quarters by 2030.
Reducing something tangible like emissions is one thing. But how on Earth do you measure an environmental footprint (whatever that is)? It opens the door for any crackpot green outfit to sue the Government, and any left-wing judge to make whatever crazy decisions he wants.
Nobody voted for this lunacy, yet 192 MPs plan to vote for the Bill, and no doubt many more will join them. Even if this Bill fails, the policies it contains will surely find their way into public policy sooner or later.
Net Zero is already doing great harm, but if this Bill becomes law, the country will be unrecognisable in ten yearsโ time. There will be energy and food shortages, industry will be decimated, private transport and foreign holidays a thing of the past. What we take for granted today will be unaffordable for most.
And there will be nothing we can do about it.
Zero Hour, the campaign group for the Climate and Nature Bill, have more detail of what is in store for us here.
We have been fortunate to witness the largest climate event to occur on the planet since the advent of global satellite records, and possibly the largest event since the eruption of Mount Tambora in 1815. It is clearly a naturally occurring, externally forced climate event. However, mainstream climate scientists are not treating it appropriately. This is because climate science does not function like other sciences and is subject to strong confirmation bias. The first step to learning from the 2023 event is accepting its exceptional nature, which many fail to do.
We have been fortunate to witness the largest climate event to occur on the planet since the advent of global satellite records, and possibly the largest event since the eruption of Mount Tambora in 1815. It is clearly a naturally occurring, externally forced climate event. However, mainstream climate scientists are not treating it appropriately. This is because climate science does not function like other sciences and is subject to strong confirmation bias. The first step to learning from the 2023 event is accepting its exceptional nature, which many fail to do.
An externally forced extraordinary event
If you are still not convinced of the extremely anomalous nature of the climatic event of 2023, letโs review some of the events of 2023-24. Taken together, they make it clear. The following list is incomplete and comes from my notes:
Extraordinary ocean warming that models canโt explain.[1]
31 atmospheric river events in the western US from November 2022 to March 2023. Nine made landfall in California marking the record in the 70-year database.[4]
The snowiest season in 71 years occurred in California after a 1-in-54-year event.[5]
NYC had the least snowy season on record, breaking a 50-year record on latest first snow.[6]
Cyclone Freddy in the Indian Ocean was the longest-lasting tropical cyclone ever.[7]
ITCZ displacement and unusual rains in the Sahara in 2024.[8]
The first half of the 2024 hurricane season was surprisingly quiet, and models canโt explain it.[9]
In 2023, 42% of the globe experienced heat exceeding two standard deviations. Louisiana, for example, had its hottest summer in 129 years of records.[10]
2023 was the warmest year on record, and 2024 was even warmer.
In October 2024, the North Polar Vortex was the weakest in 40 years. The three sudden stratospheric warming events that occurred in the same season are a one-in-250-year event according to models.[11]
The biggest global low cloud cover anomaly ever recorded occurred in 2023.[12]
Figure 1. ERA5 Zonal-mean anomaly in low cloud cover suggests that 2023 planetary albedo may have been the lowest since at least 1940.12
No one seems to be connecting the dots indicating that a series of extraordinary atmospheric events took place in 2023โ24. These events suggest that an external factor significantly impacted atmospheric circulation. Climate science focuses heavily on a relatively uninformative and uncertain parameter called surface temperature anomaly, which is the variation in the average of the daily maximum and minimum temperatures across widely disparate areas. Nevertheless, even this inadequate parameter reflects the unusual nature of the 2023 event.
Figure 2. The 2023 climate event can be seen most clearly in the global sea surface temperature anomaly (NOAA, 60ยฐNโ60ยฐS, baseline 2021). It began in December 2022. By November 2025, 90% of the warming from the 2023 event has disappeared.
Many 2023 temperatures were not only record temperatures, but they also broke the previous records by the largest margin in the datasets, as I pointed in the article, I wrote for Climate Etc. in July 2024 โHunga Tonga volcano: impact on record warmingโ. Rantanen and Laaksonen (2024) selected September 2023 in ERA5 reanalysis as the 2023 record warming month by the largest margin and, using the CMIP6 ensemble for the likely transient climate response, as recommended, found only a 0.2 % probability that it could be due to the unforced internal variability and the forced greenhouse gas-induced trend.10 They conclude that an external forcing is required and point to the Hunga Tonga eruption and the removal of sulfur pollution from ships as possibilities.
Rounding up the usual suspects in an unusual crime
One might think that the lack of precedents for such an unusual event would make scientists skeptical of the factors affecting the climate over the last hundred years, since nothing similar appears in the records. However, to publish another paper, scientists must explain what happened, and the models are incapable of providing explanations outside their programming. This programming obviously does not include extraordinary events of which we had no prior knowledge.
Therefore, it has been argued that El Niรฑo in 2023 may have been one of the main causes. However, in my article of 2024 I presented two compelling reasons why the 2023 El Niรฑo cannot be held responsible. First, the warming of the globe oceans occurred simultaneously with El Niรฑo, rather than subsequently, as was the case in previous Niรฑos. Second, unlike all other Niรฑos except the one caused by the eruption of Mount Pinatubo in 1992, the PDO was in a negative state during the 2023 El Niรฑo.
Despite supporting ENSOโs involvement in what happened, Minobe et al. (2025) provide further arguments.[13] First, they demonstrate that the extraordinary warming event of 2023 started in the Southern Ocean in November 2022, which was four months prior to the tropical Pacificโs warming and the onset of El Niรฑo. A consequence cannot precede its cause. Second, they demonstrate that the Earthโs energy imbalance anomaly between 2022 and 2023 was over 75% larger than during the onset of similar recent El Niรฑo events. This unprecedented event first impacted the top of the atmosphere and began in 2022. Furthermore, the set of atmospheric and oceanic indicators included in the multivariate El Niรฑo index (MEI) suggests that the 2023 El Niรฑo event was not particularly intense. An El Niรฑo event like many others cannot cause an unprecedented event.
Figure 3.ย a)ย Global top of the atmosphere anomalies of shortwave (downward) and longwave (downward) radiation and Multivariate ENSO Index (MEI). A strong increase in shortwave radiation started in 2022. Global warming caused a strong increase in upward longwave radiation in 2023 in advance of an average intensity El Niรฑo.ย b)ย Monthly anomaly time series of sea surface temperature in selected regions of the Southern Ocean and the Tropical Pacific. The anomaly started around November 2022 in the Southern Ocean, about 4 months before El Niรฑo started in the Pacific.13
Those who believe ENSO played a significant role in the 2023 event point to the three years of La Niรฑa preceding it. They claim this overloaded the heat system, causing it to explode with the 2023 El Niรฑo event. However, there are precedents for three consecutive Niรฑas in the records, in 1974-1976 and 1999-2001, yet nothing like the 2023 event occurred. While explanations can be sought as to why the three Niรฑas produced such a different result this time, given that things never repeat exactly the same way, these explanations are still ad hoc with no evidence to back them up.
More surprising is the argument that the event was caused by anthropogenic factors. Anthropogenic forcing is small and constant, and can only produce noticeable changes over long periods of time, decades or centuries. Interannual changes, by definition, are due to natural factors or internal variability. As an example, after 50 years of global warming, it is still unclear what changes we can expect in the ENSO system if the warming continues for another 50 years.
One exception to this long-term anthropogenic forcing is the reduction in sulfur emissions due to the maritime fuel regulations that came into force in 2020, and was therefore abrupt. However, we can rule this out as a cause of the 2023 event because the reduction is permanent, whereas the ocean warming that occurred in 2023 was essentially reversed in 2024 and 2025 (see Figure 2).
Most scientists are ignoring the cooling that has taken place since the 2023 event.
The truth is that climate scientists have much more difficulty explaining cooling than warming when CO2 levels increase. This inherent bias embedded in the models probably indicates that there are fundamental aspects of the climate that are not well understood. This may explain why the 2023 warming generated a multitude of headlines and articles, while the 2024 and 2025 cooling is characterized by scientistsโ silence in the face of something equally spectacular.
For example, the annual scientific reports titled โ10 New Insights in Climate Scienceโ by the Future Earth organization, publisher of the journal Anthropocene, are worth highlighting.[14] Two of the ten insights in each of the 2023, 2024, and 2025 reports refer to abrupt warming. However, despite cooling beginning in early 2024, no article refers to it.
It is difficult to find any mention of ocean cooling. In 2024, New Scientist magazine reported that a part of the Atlantic Ocean was cooling at a record speed:
โOver the past three months, temperatures in that part of the Atlantic cooled off more rapidly than at any time in records extending back to 1982. This sudden shift is perplexing because the strong trade winds that normally drive such cooling have not developed, says Franz Philip Tuchen at the University of Miami in Florida. โWeโve gone through the list of possible mechanisms, and nothing checks the box so far.โโ[15]
We can add ocean cooling as another anomaly that remains unexplained in terms of its magnitude, speed, and cause.
When an El Niรฑo event transitions to a La Niรฑa event, the equatorial Pacific usually cools rapidly. However, the cooling in 2024 was global. Although La Niรฑa conditions occurred in the winter of 2024โ2025, they were not intense enough and long enough to qualify as an actual La Niรฑa event. In other words, the tremendous cooling of the planetโs oceans has included the equatorial Pacific, but the equatorial Pacific has not induced it.
The only known extraordinary factor is the eruption of Hunga Tonga.
According to Occamโs razor, a climatic event of unparalleled magnitude in modern records requires an exceptional cause. The factors responsible for normal climate variability are insufficient. The only extraordinary factor preceding the 2023 event was the explosion of the Hunga Tonga underwater volcano. The 150 megatons of water vapor that it released into the stratosphere are without precedent in our records. We do not know all the effects this may have had on the climate. Eruptions that reach the stratosphere have radiative, chemical, and dynamic effects. However, only the first two are well known.
There are several aspects of the Tambora eruption in April 1815 that scientists have not yet explained satisfactorily. First, the effects were delayed, as the anomalies that led to the year without a summer in 1816 did not begin until 15 months after the eruption. The usual explanation is that atmospheric dynamics delayed the radiative effects in the Northern Hemisphere. However, this explanation conflicts with the second unexplained aspect: the climatic effect on the Northern Hemisphere was much greater than on the Southern Hemisphere. The cause of this inequality between the hemispheres is unknown since volcanic aerosols and their radiative effects are distributed across both hemispheres in a tropical eruption.
Figure 4. The inability of models to reproduce the climatic effects of large volcanic eruptions calls into question the reliability of their diagnosis that the Hunga Tonga eruption had little effect on the surface climate.ย a)ย All models reproduce a cooling effect in the southern hemisphere as a result of the 1815 Tambora eruption, but this effect is not supported by evidence.[16]ย b)ย The models greatly exaggerate the cooling of sea temperatures that occurred as a result of the 1815 Tambora eruption and a previous one in 1809. The observations (in black) show a much smaller cooling.[17]
Climate models do not adequately reproduce the effects of the 1815 Tambora eruption, suggesting that dynamic atmospheric changes caused by stratospheric eruptions or other factors have a much greater impact on climate than previously thought. It is striking that the evolution of the ocean temperature anomaly generally coincides with the evolution of water vapor anomalies in extratropical middle-stratospheric latitudes in the Northern Hemisphere but not in the entire stratosphere.
Figure 5. The global sea surface temperature anomaly (NOAA, 60ยฐNโ60ยฐS, baseline 2021) is shown in red over a background image of the water vapor anomaly in the stratosphere at 45ยฐN.
Because models cannot adequately incorporate the effects of stratospheric eruptions on atmospheric circulation dynamics, the conclusion that the Hunga Tonga eruption had minimal effects on the surface climate is not convincing.[18] This conclusion is based primarily on knowledge of the radiative properties of water vapor. Studies support a relationship between these eruptions and changes in global atmospheric circulation, the polar vortex, El NiรฑoโSouthern Oscillation, evaporation, and cloud cover.
Without a doubt, we know that the climatic event of 2023 was caused by a drastic decrease in global cloud cover, the largest in at least 40 years (see Figure 1). This reduction caused the planet to absorb more solar energy and warm up. However, we do not know what controls changes in clouds. Itโs astonishing that we claim to understand the cause of recent climate change yet remain ignorant of such a fundamental aspect.
Clouds cannot form without evaporation. In their recent work, Fajber et al. (2023) present compelling evidence that the evaporation gradient between the tropics and the poles controls the amount of heat transported through the atmosphere.[19] However, they made the common mistake of assuming that evaporation is controlled by temperature via the ClausiusโClapeyron relation. This error stems from the assumption that wind is constant at the global level. The ClausiusโClapeyron relation is accurate at the microscopic level, at the interface between water and air. However, at the macroscopic level, wind speed has a greater impact on evaporation than temperature or humidity. In a cold, humid environment, clothes hung out to dry will dry if there is enough wind. However, few climate scientists have experience hanging clothes out to dry in the wind. Furthermore, wind speed is not constant; rather, it exhibits significant changes and opposing trends over oceans and land. These changes lead to important changes in evaporation, cloud formation, and their transport and distribution.[20]
If changes in the clouds caused the temperature changes, then we cannot use the temperature changes as the cause of the cloud changes. The most likely cause is the change in atmospheric circulation, which occurred due to the atmospheric anomalies that have taken place since the end of 2022, as discussed in Section 1.
For anyone who is not committed to the explanation of climate change due to the radiative properties of greenhouse gases, the Hunga Tonga eruption is currently the best explanation for the 2023 climate event. In July 2025, I analyzed that โif Hunga Tonga is responsible for the 2023-24 warming event, a clear prediction is that we should observe most of this warming disappear in 3-5 years.โ[21] This projection does not arise from any of the other considered causes. By December 2025, four years after the eruption, this prediction had come true: the ocean temperature anomaly in November was only 0.05ยฐC higher than in November 2021, before the eruption. 90 % of the ocean warming from the 2023 climate event has disappeared.
The greatest failure of climate science
Climate science has failed the test of an externally forced natural climate event. Most scientists who have published studies on the 2023 climate event have not recognized its nature. Any climatological manifestations of the event that do not align with the dominant consensus have been treated as either natural variability or rare events whose probability has increased due to anthropogenic climate change. No studies have addressed the climatic event in all its manifestations or analyzed its possible causes without relying on models clearly not designed to shed light on something we did not know was possible.
Rather than trying to determine the causes of the event, scientists have attempted to fit it into the dominant theory using models. In light of evidence of major natural climate change, this approach reveals its greatest flaw: the theory relies on an excessive focus on greenhouse gases and aerosols as the cause and temperature changes as the effect.
Personal note:
2026 will mark the tenth anniversary of my first post on Judith Curryโs Climate Etc. blog. Believe it or not, I began researching climate change in 2015 because I was concerned about its potential impact on our society. As a scientist from a different field entirely, I trusted my fellow scientists, learned societies, and scientific journal editors to evaluate the risk. As an avid reader of scientific literature from many disciplines, I immersed myself in hundreds and then thousands of papers, convinced that evidence of dramatic human-caused climate change was there. However, I came away empty-handed and profoundly skeptical of everything I had been told without ever being shown the evidence. I realized natural climate change is greatly misunderstood and insufficient effort is being done to correct that. Over these past 10 years, Iโve spent a lot of time trying to straighten out the science of climate, and I will spend 10 more years doing so if necessary. If you would like to hear more often from me, you can find me on ๐ @JVinos_Climate
The Green-on-Green civil war is heating up in Australia.
Experts say climate change bigger threat to biodiversity than renewable energy projects
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As aging coal-fired power stations along Australiaโs east coast reach the end of their lives, the country is looking to transition to renewable energy to secure our energy sources into the future in the face of climate change.
But what happens when these developments have the potential to hurt sensitive ecosystems or biodiversity?
Is some environmental damage an unfortunate โ but unavoidable โ casualty in the battle against climate change?
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The proposed wind farm is adjacent to an internationally significant Ramsar-listed wetland and a number of national parks, sparking concerns it could pose a risk to a number of endangered birds, including the Australasian bittern, orange-bellied parrot and south-eastern red-tailed black cockatoo.
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Australian National University professor of environmental and climate change economics Frank Jotzo said renewable energy projects have a โminimalโ impact on the environment, and while thatโs unfortunate, they are for the greater good.
โWhatever we do, there will be some undesirable effects,โ Professor Jotzo said.
โIn the big picture, thereโs no omelette you can make without breaking any eggs.
โClimate change is the far bigger threat to biodiversity, to our environment, agricultural systems and economy.โ
There is no way to prevent mass bird deaths around wind farms. During my time as a pilot, I saw first hand how insensitive to aerial threats some birds are. Raptors are especially vulnerable. Small prey species of birds will dive for cover, but millions of years of evolution have taught large raptors they are the lords of the sky. That is why in the tragic video below the eagle doesnโt even try to get out of the way of the turbine blade, they are incapable of visualising the turbine blade is a threat. As a pilot of a light aircraft I could take evasive action, because I knew the large raptor wasnโt going to evade. Wind turbines not so much.
Hereโs a thought Victoria โ if you want zero carbon energy, instead of decimating sensitive wetlands, why donโt you build a few nuclear reactors?
The problem of nuclear safety has long since been solved. Even if there was a Chernobyl style accident in a modern nuclear plant, we donโt have to be stupid like the Soviets were. If Victoria followed the modern US practice of building the sarcophagus around the plant BEFORE the accident, rather than trying to cobble something together afterwards, no matter what happens to the core the radiation would be contained.
So long as Australia rejects such an obvious solution this green-on-green conflict will continue. Green energy advocates who claim you have to bulldoze nature to protect the environment vs old style environmentalists who actually care about endangered species, who after 30 years of shameful silence in the face of large-scale destruction of sensitive wilderness areas are finally finding their voices.
Anti-oil and gas advocates across the country have pursued litigation in recent years attempting to force the fossil fuel industry to pay for decades of financial damages the advocates claim were caused by climate change.
Anti-oil and gas advocates across the country have pursued litigation in recent years attempting to force the fossil fuel industry to pay for decades of financial damages the advocates claim were caused by climate change.
Several cases have been dismissed while others advanced through court systems, with some being considered before the U.S. Supreme Court in 2026. Critics of the litigation call it โwoke lawfareโ and an attempt to force progressive political policies via the judicial system.
Critics also argue the lawsuits threaten U.S. energy independence and, depending on outcomes, will have sweeping impacts on every American.
Here are some of those cases.
Chevron USA Inc. v. Plaquemines Parish, Louisiana
On Jan. 12, 2026, the U.S. Supreme Court will hear oral arguments in Plaquemines Parish, Louisiana, vs. Chevron USA Inc. The case questions to what extent a state court can litigate against an oil company for its production of oil even if it obtained federal permits to produce the oil.
The litigation challenges activities of the oil companies dating back to World War II in some cases. Chevron argued the lawsuit was flawed, claiming that the activities in question were permitted, legal, and often conducted under federal direction โ particularly those tied to national security during World War II.
A Plaquemines Parish jury in April ordered Chevron to pay $744 million in damages for its role in the degradation of the stateโs coastal wetlands. Environmental activists celebrated the verdict. It was the first of 42 lawsuits filed since 2013 by parishes across coastal Louisiana to go to trial.
The Trump administrationโs Justice Department stepped in on Chevronโs side, urging the Supreme Court to move the case from state court to federal court.
Business groups and energy advocates warned the verdict will drive jobs and investment out of Louisiana. The Louisiana Association of Business and Industry called the decision โshortsighted,โ saying it would โbrand Louisiana as a state that will extort the most recognizable companies on earth for billions of dollars, decades later.โ
O.H. Skinner, executive director of Alliance for Consumers, told the Center Square the case seeks to score large settlements from the energy industry and stop oil production.
โThe case arises from a broader campaign of woke lawfare in which activists and municipal governments seek to use courtrooms to determine what companies are allowed to produce and what consumers can buy,โ Skinner said.
Suncor Energy Inc. v. Boulder
The nationโs highest court is still deciding whether it will hear arguments in Suncor Energy Inc. v. Boulder; a case to decide whether state and local governments can use nuisance laws to sue energy companies for activities that may cause climate change.
The case, originating in Colorado, centers around a City of Boulder and Boulder County lawsuit in state court against Suncor Energy claiming it misled the public in its activities that the local governments claim led to climate change effects.
Lawyers for Suncor Energy argue that allowing a case like this one to play out goes against protections in the Clean Air Act that prevent lawsuits from occurring against emitters from across state lines.
โPublic nuisance canโt be used for global problems. It can be used for local problems,โ Skinner told The Center Square. โThatโs what itโs supposed to be used for.โ
However, Skinner said many organizations that are pursuing climate change litigation are seeking to bankrupt energy companies with large monetary settlements. He said litigants will likely attempt to drain energy companies of their resources and use the funds to advocate certain ideological causes.
โThese are highly ideological dark-money-funded, multi-faceted legal campaigns to bankrupt an entire industry and confiscate it for ideological reasons,โ Skinner said.
City and County of Honolulu v. Sunoco
Similarly, in 2020, City and County of Honolulu v. Sunoco was one of the first examples of public nuisance lawsuits pursued in a state court. The city and county of Honolulu filed a lawsuit in 2020 accusing oil and gas companies, including Sunoco, Exxon Mobil, BP, Chevron and Shell, of misleading the public for decades about the dangers of climate change induced by burning fossil fuels.
The companies asked the U.S. Supreme Court to intervene in the case, but the court, without ruling on the merits, declined to do so in January.
While the case is based in Hawaii, Skinner said litigants there hope it will have far-reaching effects across the country.
โTheyโre not trying to stop behavior just in those states,โ Skinner said. โThe thing that really freaks me out is how people in regular, everyday, real America are going to potentially be affected.โ
The People of the State of California v. Exxon Mobil Corporation
Going a step further than Boulder and Honolulu, California Democrat Attorney General Rob Bonta filed a complaint against ExxonMobil in 2024 for what he says are its contributions to โthe deluge of plastic pollutionโ affecting the state.
Exxon countersued, alleging โBonta and the US Proxies โ the former for political gain and the latter pawns for the Foreign Interests โ have engaged in a deliberate smear campaign against ExxonMobil, falsely claiming that ExxonMobilโs effective and innovative advanced recycling technology is a โfalse promiseโ and โnot based on truth.,โ American Tort Reform Foundation reported.
One of the foreign interests is IEJF, an Australian nonprofit thatโs connected to an Australian mining conmpany โthat competes with ExxonMobil in the low carbon solutions and energy transition markets, ATRF reported.
Skinner said the litigants in this case are attempting to significantly reduce plastic use throughout the state of California and potentially beyond.
โThatโll make your average personโs life dramatically harder, and itโll make a lot of things a lot more expensive, and itโll make having kids, like, brutal,โ Skinner said.
Leon v. Exxon Mobil Corp.
Aside from monetary settlements, petitioners in this case also are seeking wrongful death claims against energy companies for their contributions to climate change. The case stems from a woman in Washington state who said her mother died from heat-related illness due to the exacerbated effects of climate change.
She is suing energy companies for their alleged creation of conditions over a period of decades that led to increased temperatures on the day her mother died.
Skinner told The Center Square this case is one of the more blatant examples of ideology affecting the way a litigant pursues cases.
โI think they care because a death is worth a lot of money,โ Skinner said. โThe climate homicide cases are one of the more far-fetched legal theories Iโve ever seen, because youโre leveling this incredibly staggering charge.โ
Climate cases will continue to move through the court system, with one to be heard before the U.S. Supreme Court in early 2026.
Skinner is urging the U.S. Supreme Court and lower courts to rule in favor of energy companies across the country.
โWe want the energy companies to win, not because they are perfect actors, but because the alternative is that our lives are governed day in and day out by woke trial lawyers, woke [nongovernmental organizations] and local governments,โ Skinner said.
From the โcontrails, NOT chemtrails departmentโ comes this research that seems to exist only to make airline travel look to be bad for the planet. โ Anthony
Contrails are a major driver of aviationโs climate impact
Aviationโs climate impact extends beyond carbon dioxide emissions. A new study from Chalmers University of Technology and the University of Gothenburg, Sweden, and Imperial College, UK, reveals that contrails can represent a significant portion of aviationโs overall climate cost. The study also shows that climate impact can be reduced by optimising flight routes.
In a new article in Nature Communications, The social costs of aviation COโ and contrail cirrus, the researchers demonstrate that both COโ emissions and contrail formation contribute materially to aviationโs climate impact โ and that the associated societal costs differ substantially depending on weather patterns and routing decisions. They find that, at the global level, contrails account for about 15 percent of aviationโs climate impact when measured in economic terms.
After also analyzing nearly half a million flights across the North Atlantic, the research team has generated new insights that can support both industry and policymakers in guiding aviation towards more climate optimal operations. Drawing on extensive flight and meteorological data, in combination with a contrail model and an advanced climate-economy model, the researchers estimated the climate and societal cost attributable to each emission source.
โOur research provides a basis for strategies to reduce the climate impact of contrails. Our calculations can be used for optimisation of flight routes where climate impact is considered alongside, for example, fuel cost and travel time. The results give airline operators and air traffic management new tools for climate optimisation. This could bring significant climate and societal benefits,โ says Susanne Pettersson, postdoctoral researcher at the Department of Space, Earth and Environment at Chalmers.
The study shows that 38 percent of flights generate contrails that have a warming effect. It also shows that it would be beneficial from a climate perspective to reduce the formation of contrails of almost all these flights through minor rerouting, to avoid contrail formation, even if this results in slightly higher carbon dioxide emissions.
โThe new knowledge also provides a foundation for designing new regulations and policy instruments to reduce aviationโs climate impact. The European Commission is currently working on proposals to steer aviation towards lower climate impact, and our new study can hopefully support this process,โ says Daniel Johansson, associate professor at the Department of Space, Earth and Environment at Chalmers and one of the lead authors of the next IPCC climate report.
NOAA deploys a new generation of AI-driven global weather models
I am watching them. So far, they are a joke. All over the place, little run to run consistency, in short, they mimic the NOAA GEFS, the flagship of the US models that over the years billions have been spent to develop, being abysmally in last place even on day 5 vs the European (red) and Canadian (blue). I am sure the UKMET is beating it, too.
The Euro AIโs are also all over the place. The recent Thanksgiving to Christmas cold shot, seen by us and bullet pointed in the Aug 29 issuance of our winter forecast, was not seen till mid November by models. Even now they are all over the place on January. But believe it or not, I am not here to hammer them on the weather, but on something else I found out.
Every December, I meet with some prominent climate skeptics (who shall remain nameless to protect their innocence)ย at an undisclosed location, which we always keep secret, to make sure Climate nuts donโt show up and spray paint us orange (Okay it’s a place near Boston). So, two of them are engaged in a major project to make sure the AIโs are getting all climate information, not just what the existing paradigm is. Basically, they are doing on a grand scale what you have seen me do in some of the blogs.ย So, I assumed that once corrected, once the AI admits its wrong and did not see something, it becomes part of the AIโs database.
WRONG
Apparently, what goes on here, as I understand it, is that it will not incorporate what itโs forced to correct. So, itโs getting a continuous stream of information that is one sided and even if corrected, will not adapt it. It may come to the conclusion that it does, and the conclusion may be opposite of what it was before you asked it to go look at the other ideas, but then it does not get incorporated in.
So it will respond and correct itself with you, but it wonโt then change its database to adapt that as its answer to someone else.
This is quite interesting to me. The man-made climate agenda is not going away. Itโs simply retooling for the day that the current people in charge are no longer in charge. The idea that I see with people on my side that we are โwinningโ is laughable to me. History should tell you that. A small group of zealots convinced they have the answer have always managed to somehow seize control, and to them, climate policy is the ultimate control tool.
The AI is a tool, also. But I suspect most of them are being programmed by people who have a worldview that is strongly in support of the man-made climate disaster scenario. And since that exists so strongly in the AIโs, itโs a daunting task to get an even-handed presentation of information for them to consider. Their fallback position is always what was fed into them, as even when admitting something, they apparently are not incorporating it.
And I donโt know about you meteorologists out there, but if you are watching AI models like I am, youโll see that theyโre only arguably a bit better. The analog method of forecasting beat them like Scarlett OโHaraโs mule for the early cold, and another major battle is evolving in front of us for 2 weeks ago models were singing a winterโs over tune, and now they are coming around to our analog ideas about January.
Obviously, a tool that can summon facts quickly and advise on an answer is great. Just beware what you are being fed here. Including NOAA headlines about their AIโs, but most importantly, understanding that just because you get an AI to admit your point, it doesnโt mean it will become part of its database.
Someone once said, โit’s not who votes that matters, but who counts the votes.โ
With the AIs what really matters is who is feeding it the information. And given statements like what that eminent climate giant John Kerry just said:
โYou know, thereโs a lot of discussion now about how you curb those entities in order to guarantee that youโre going to have some accountability on facts, etc. But look, if people only go to one source, and the source they go to is sick, and, you know, has an agenda, and theyโre putting out disinformation, our First Amendment stands as a major block to be able to just, you know, hammer it out of existence,โ
They are not going away, and they are going to make darn sure they control the AIโs. The goal is to push AIโs as the answer ( be it NOAA headlines) and then make you naturally accept their authority.
In a further sign of declining interest in the Net Zero fantasy, a major climate grooming course has shut up shop. The terminated six-month indoctrination was run by the Oxford Climate Journalism Network (OCJN) and was funded by a number of tax-efficient billionaire foundations. Over the last four years it has hosted around 800 journalists from over 100 countries. Described as a โflagship online courseโ, it will be โhaltedโ from January 2026
In a further sign of declining interest in the Net Zero fantasy, a major climate grooming course has shut up shop. The terminated six-month indoctrination was run by the Oxford Climate Journalism Network (OCJN) and was funded by a number of tax-efficient billionaire foundations. Over the last four years it has hosted around 800 journalists from over 100 countries. Described as a โflagship online courseโ, it will be โhaltedโ from January 2026.
As regular readers will recall, the OCJN is one of a number of grooming operations that ensures a regular media drum beat of Greta-inspired climate BS. It is particularly keen on promoting the idea that extreme individual weather events can be tied to humans fiddling with the climate. Attribution Queen Dr Freiderike Otto sits on the OCJN Advisory Board and is a frequent speaker on this exciting new alchemical branch of pseudoscience. Another past speaker Climate and Society Professor Saffron OโNeill from Exeter University has speculated on the need for โfines and imprisonmentโ for expressing scepticism about โwell-supportedโ climate science.
The market for mainstream climate journalism is falling off a cliff. An OCJN suggested essay around the theme of less tasty mangoes due to climate change can be easily farmed out to AI. In fact, all journalism written to a set political narrative can be entrusted to an AI programme. Given a recent essay published by the OCJN entitled โNewsrooms should develop a mental health strategy to help climate journalistsโ, there are likely to be a number of delicate flowers looking for future employment. They might wish to avoid other journalist areas of interest such as conflict and riot. Even local court reporting might tax their nervous dispositions.
The world has tired of clickbait, centrally organised climate claptrap, whether it be computer-generated tipping point tittle-tattle or sandwich board warnings of imminent Sodom and Gomorrah destruction. Forty years of the Gulf Stream still streaming, the coral reefs not disappearing and extreme weather not getting more extreme have all combined to generate cynicism about the real political/Malthusian reasons for the orchestrated gaslighting.
Reality is starting to dawn that humans cannot currently stop using hydrocarbons without destroying modern society. The fact that a little extra warmth from the ending of the Little Ice Age over the last 200 years has been almost entirely beneficial for life on Earth is starting to cut through. Carbon dioxide has been demonised as a โpollutantโ, but more people seem aware that the recent atmospheric top-up has โgreenedโ the planet by around 15%โ20%. Captured mainstream media doesnโt talk about this, but grooming help is available if, perish the thought, the subject of all this extra food should ever come up. SciLine is another Green Blob-funded agitprop promoter and is connected to the Association for the Advancement of Science, publisher of Science. Its suggested response to all the inconvenient greening is to note that โin many cases, CO2 disproportionately favours weeds over crops, causing more problems for agricultureโ.
In the real world, you couldnโt make some of this stuff up, however hard you tried. Wrong sort of plants threaten Climate Armageddon.
There is plenty of anecdotal evidence that climate change gaslighting is falling down the editorial agenda. Last year in the US, the volume of climate change coverage on mainstream morning and nightly TV news programmes as well as Sunday morning political shows is reported to have fallen by 25% from the year before. The Trump effect is highly unlikely to have improved the time given over to invented doomsday scenarios. Earlier this month, the BBCโs Rowlatt-in-waiting Mark Poynting ran a 40 paragraph-plus story highlighting the Met Officeโs claim that 2025 in the UK could be the โhottest year evahโ since it was on course to be 200th of a degree centigrade warmer than 2022. Cynics might note that the activist-riven Met Office published its forecast assuming an average temperature pattern until the end of the month. Curiously, at the same time the Met Office was forecasting a prolonged forthcoming spell of colder weather. The usual media suspects fell on the concocted story, but interestingly it seems to have been ignored by a number of mainstream outlets including the Telegraph, the Times, the Daily Mail, the Sun, the Daily Express and the Mirror.
Predicting โhottest evahsโ based on 200ths of a degree from a largely junk UK temperature network, with measuring โuncertaintiesโ ranging from 2ยฐC to 5ยฐC over 80% of the sites, is becoming very last year in many editorial rooms.
It is not clear if the OCJN will shut down completely, but its published material seems to suggest it relies on networking journalists around the world via its six-month course. It is part of the Oxford-based Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism, which is backed by the Thompson Reuters Foundation and numerous billionaire funders such as Knight and Laudes. Media supporters are said to include the BBC, Google News Initiative, You Tube and the UK media regulator Ofcom. An interesting new recruit to the party is the former BBC Director of News Helen Boaden, who recently became the chairwoman of the Reuters Instituteโs Steering Committee, replacing the former Guardian editor Alan Rushbridger. Boaden attended the infamous secret meeting in 2006 that helped put the BBC on the path of covering climate change to a strict political narrative determined by Net Zero. Rushbridgerโs role in setting the Guardian on its hysterical climate change path requires no further comment.
Chris Morrison is the Daily Scepticโs Environment Editor. Follow him on X.
I recently had the honor to write CFACT comments in response to an Energy Department (DOE) request for information (RFI). The topic is โTransformational Artificial Intelligence Modelsโ where the transformation in question is that of improving scientific and engineering research. DOE is one of the worldโs biggest funders of physical and computer science research, so this is potentially an important opportunity to make a big difference.
I recently had the honor to write CFACT comments in response to an Energy Department (DOE) request for information (RFI). The topic is โTransformational Artificial Intelligence Modelsโ where the transformation in question is that of improving scientific and engineering research. DOE is one of the worldโs biggest funders of physical and computer science research, so this is potentially an important opportunity to make a big difference.
The focus of their RFI is on using AI models to do research. But we pointed out that they can also be used to understand what is going on in research across the huge number of publications that are often published on a major topic. Our point is on the โIโ side of AI. It is a specific form of intelligence that AI models can emulate.
Here are the CFACT comments:
Transformational AI Models for Analyzing Science and Engineering Research
By David Wojick, Senior Analyst, CFACT
Here are CFACT comments in response to the U.S. Energy Departmentโs โRequest for Information (RFI) on Partnerships for Transformational Artificial Intelligence Models.โ
DOE proposes โto curate DOE scientific data across the National Laboratory complex for use in artificial intelligence (AI) models and to develop self-improving AI models for science and engineering using this data.โ
Our basic comment is that DOEโs Transformational AI Program should include the use of AI models to analyze ongoing research. A major research area typically produces far more publications than a human can read. Those models focused on language and reasoning capabilities can be configured to effectively analyze these massive bodies of information, where the data is textual.
For example, plasma physics is a major topic of DOE research, both scientific and engineering. According to Google Scholar the number of journal articles specifically addressing plasma is on the order of 40,000 a year or more. Articles at least mentioning it number in the hundreds of thousands a year. These numbers are well beyond what a human can read and analyze.
A properly designed and trained AI model can read all of these articles and answer well formulated questions about the entire corpus. Here are some of the sorts of questions the answers to which could dramatically assist American researchers.
1. Who is doing what, including by country? For example China now rivals America in research output. In which topics are they most active?
2. How do the articles on a given topic all fit together? This includes mapping the cognitive structure of the research.
3. How does that cognitive structure changes over time? Examples include the dynamics of the findings, methods, applications and questions being addressed. All change over time, sometimes rapidly emerging. Early identification could be crucial.
4. What are the competing hypotheses and schools of thought regarding a specific problem or question? The frontier of science and engineering is a land of conjecture and debate. These debates often generate central questions for new research.
A model or models that can answer these crucial questions will give new meaning to the concept of keeping up with oneโs field of research. This new power can both speed up the diffusion of knowledge and lead to new discoveries.
Regarding curation this AI research analysis will of course require access to a large number of journals, conference proceedings, research reports and other sources. DOEโs Office of Scientific and Technical Information (OSTI) has already made considerable progress in this regard. DOE should also consider partnering with major journal publishers. A small number of leading publishers account for a large fraction of the journals.
Initial efforts could focus on a specific research topic, or a specific community like DOE funded research, or both.
By way of background I was Senior Consultant for Innovation at OSTI for almost ten years under director Walt Warnick, where I did a lot of research on mapping the cognitive structure and dynamics of scientific and engineering research. This research has continued at CFACT and CFACT has also done research on AI cognition. I will be happy to provide additional information on these comments.
The singular ability of language and reasoning models to analyze huge bodies of technical information opens up new ways to understand and advance research.
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