German Geology Professor Rejects Claim Of Accelerating Sea Level Rise

 Germany’s leading political daily the Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung (FAZ) published an open letter written by geology Professor Dr. Friedrich-Karl Ewert rejecting the claims made by the Potsdam Institute for Climate Impact Research (PIK) that sea level rise is accelerating. The open letter is now available at the European Institute for Climate and Energy (EIKE), read here (part after Schellnhuber). 

According to the PIK:

“Due to global warming, sea level is rising today faster than at any time in the last 2000 years. Since the start of the Industrial Revolution, the curve is going ‘up steeply’.”

These claims are based on cherry-picked data from a single location at the North Carolina coast. In response Ewert’s wrote the open letter, excerpts of which follow. Ewert writes (emphasis added):

This claim must be refuted because the declaration made by the PIK is factually false. Correct is that scientists have determined just the opposite. The Journal of Coastal Research reported in journal 27/3 (May 2011).”

Here according to the journal, the global temperature increase during the last 100 years did not accelerate sea level rise, Indeed sea level rise has recently slowed down.

Ewert writes that there is a simple proof for the falsehood of PIK’s claim:

At the coral reefs in the Great Barrier Reef and also at the coasts of the Caribbean Islands one finds dry coral reefs which were about 3.5 meters over today’s sea level, When these reefs formed, the sea level was accordingly higher. No one knows how fast the sea level rose during the time before that.”

Ewert also rejects the PIK’s claim that the Western Antarctic Ice Shelf is about to tip and that global warming is racing ahead. Ewert writes in his letter:

Detailed evaluation of temperature data shows a completely other picture: In many parts of the globe a rewarming took place after 1700, after the Little Ice Age, and has reached its peak in the mid 1990s. During this long period a number of warming and cooling phases took place, and were earlier often much stronger; the last pronounced warming phase took place in the first half of the 20th century, before man made carbon emissions; and since 1998 a new cooling phase has started in many regions of the earth, and is still taking place and is at times quite stark. The results of the evaluation will be published after the conclusion of a comprehensive analysis. ‘Our CO2’ has not had any real impact on this development.”

20 responses to “German Geology Professor Rejects Claim Of Accelerating Sea Level Rise”

  1. DirkH

    The German Greens suggest to cover the electricity shortage caused by Nuke phase-out in winter by activating idle biofuel cogeneration plants worth 300 MW. The plants sit idle due to current high prices of plant oil, and the Greens suggest, now comes the kicker, to run them on FOSSIL FUELS (read: Diesel) in cases of electricity shortages.

    http://wirtschaft.t-online.de/gruene-biosprit-anlagen-sollen-stromluecke-schliessen/id_48083236/index

  2. R. de Haan

    The chickens are coming home to roast.

    Now keep on the pressure and don’t let go.

  3. GregO

    Some places the sea level is receding in relation to the shore; some places sea level is rising slowly as it has for a long time now; and some places there is land sinking in relation to the sea (like the gulf coast of the USA):

    http://tidesandcurrents.noaa.gov/sltrends/sltrends.shtml

    Average sea level (as far as such an artifact can be constructed) shows itself to be rising but that rate of rise is slowing or decelerating:

    http://theinconvenientskeptic.com/2011/02/sea-level-deceleration-inverted-barometer/

    How is it possible that serious people can make themselves believe we face an immanent crisis from sea-level rise after even the most cursory review of empirical measurements?

    And if the sea-level rise rate is not an immanent crisis, or even a current problem at all, why are we worrying about any thing else than simply keeping our eyes on the tide gauges and satellite readings?

    You know, I have heard that there are some diseases that the treatment can be worse than the disease and one that comes to mind is prostate cancer – a long-time friend of mine has been diagnosed with prostate cancer.

    Sometimes it is recommended, and in fact in his case it has been recommended, that rather than embark on a potentially harmful treatment regimen, it is better to just do regular check ups and watch for problems. This treatment, I am told, is called “watchful waiting”. More than likely medical doctors recommend this because they have found it the most prudent thing to do. And remember, medical doctors swear to the Hippocratic oath: Above all, do no harm.

    1. DirkH

      We will all die as the sea encroaches on us millimeter by millimeter as we stand there helplessly.

  4. Sundance

    The coast in NorthCarolina is subsidng as seen here. To use data from this area is surely cherry picking of the worst kind.

    http://www.ncwater.org/Permits_and_Registration/Capacity_Use/Central_Coastal_Plain/landsub.php

    It seems that for activist scientists like Schnellenburger, sinking land is really rising oceans. Climate science may not survive these activist scientists for whom wish fulfillment is more important than science.

    1. John Marshall

      A close study of the NC coast shows sinking and for thousands of years. Far longer than water has been pumped from aquifers . Whether pumping has accelerated the subsidance rate it is difficult to see because the orriginal sink rate would not have been constant.

  5. cthulhu

    What I say is don’t trust anyone who repeats the “cooling since 1998” lie. So thanks for highlighting that lie in bold so I can write Ewert off as just another fool who has fallen for the propaganda.

    1. DirkH
      1. Ulrich Elkmann

        Re: “hello-cthulhu”: No. That way lies madness. There ARE things the eyes of men were not meant to see (e.g. ). Is this Great Cthulhu, described by one authority thus: “The Thing cannot be described—there is no language for such abysms of shrieking and immemorial lunacy, such eldritch contradictions of all matter, force, and cosmic order.” (“The Call of Cthulhu”, 1928)? – that’s more like it.

        1. DirkH

          I always bring up the Hello Cthulhu comic when somebody on a forum calls himself Cthulhu. I think i found it on http://cthuugle.com/en/ .

          1. DirkH

            Another variation on the theme.
            http://www.logicalcreativity.com/jon/plush/11.html

    2. GregO

      Wasn’t this a post on sea-level rise? Red Herring perhaps?

      For an interesting technical discussion on global temperature, going on right now, check this out:

      http://noconsensus.wordpress.com/2011/07/15/subsampled-confidence-intervals-zeke/#more-11907

      Oh and since 1998 the thermometers show a plateau to a cooling depending and where you are. I believe it was Dr Von Storch who said something like “anyone can read a thermometer…”

      Looks like Global Warming may be pooping out. Time for a new fad idea.

    3. DirkH

      The Mongols will be glad to hear the good news, tentaclewarmist.
      http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/asia-pacific/8592408.stm

  6. Mike Odin

    fantasy island antarctica +13 C and +32 C
    Svea Ep6 (Antarctica)
    Latitude: 74-28S Longitude: 011-31W Altitude: 0 m.
    http://www.ogimet.com/cgi-bin/gsynres?lang=en&ind=89018&ano=2011&mes=7&day=17&hora=12&min=0&ndays=30
    Straight up lies- yes the government
    is lying as it always does.

    vs

    reality minus 50 C
    Kohnen Ep9 (Antarctica)
    Latitude: 75-00S Longitude: 000-00E Altitude: 0 m.
    http://www.ogimet.com/cgi-bin/gsynres?lang=en&ind=89507&ano=2011&mes=7&day=17&hora=12&min=0&ndays=30

    http://www.ogimet.com/cgi-bin/gsynop?lang=en&zona=antartida&base=bluem&proy=orto&ano=2011&mes=07&day=17&hora=12&vtn=Tn&Send=send

    Of course the warmer temperatures
    will be recorded and the
    colder temperatures will be discarded.

  7. Gary Hemminger

    1895 “Geologists think that the world may be frozen up again” (NY Times)
    1912 “Human race will have have to fight for its existance against cold” (LA Times)
    1912 “Titanic hits an iceberg and sinks. An ice age is encroaching” (NY Times)
    1923 “The ice age is coming here” (Washington Post)

    1930 “America is in longest warm spell since 1776, with temperatures in a 25 year rise (NY Times)
    1939 “..weathermen have no doubt, that the world, at least for the time being, is growing warmer (Time Magazine)

    I could keep going. The we are warming to death crowd kept going into 1950’s. Then in the 70’s it switched back to we are all going into an ice age again. Then in the 80’s it switched back into global warming again. Since the late 1800’s, the NY Times has said 2 times we were entering an ice age, followed by 2 times that global warming is coming.

    As a Stanford grad (a long time ago), I knew the late Stephen Schneider. He was one of the AGW proponents that was screaming ice age in the 70’s and switched in the 80’s to screaming AGW. I asked him what he would do if the world started cooling again, and he said, “switch back to ice age.”

    To believe either that we are going into an ice age or going to heat to death is to suspend disbelief completely and to completely ignore history.

  8. Edward

    Aye, they’ll be saying next, that, the Himalayan Glaciers will melt in 35 years or summat.

    Sea level rise? Well I live at 450′ above current sea level, so I ain’t gonna worry unduly.

    And so the BS goes on and on – don’t these wa**ers [PIK/IPCC et al] ever get tired?

  9. Carol Gacioch RN RHIA

    I am not a geologist but the pictures I have seen that show ice melting is a normal part of the ice melting in the northern regions. If anyone believes Al Gore or Michael Moore than you need a physical exam. These guys just love the limelight and will do anything to get your attention. Ice age, warming, oil is low, we need to charge for using carbon blah blah blah!!! I am all for conserving our resources but having to pay for “carbon” that is a normal part of breathing is “crazy”. Iam tired of the scare tactics. It’s time that the truth be told and that these crazies go back in their prospective holes and leave us alone.

  10. Bernd Felsche

    The EIKE link appears broken.

    But I’m not here to complain… Ewert spoke at a Schiller Institut conference in Rüsselsheim:
    http://www.schiller-institut.de/seiten/2011/ruesselsheim/20110702-ewert.html
    (translations available on that page)

    There’s a translation of the paper:
    http://cecaust.com.au/pubs/pdfs/ewet_gw.pdf

    Enjoy.

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