What if scientists one day concluded that climate was influenced mostly by natural factors and that man had little impact? What would be the result? For one, lots of people would find themselves in the unemployment line. And for many, their companies and operations would have to close shop. Hat-tip: Reader DirkH.
One person who likely would be negatively impacted is Katherine Hayhoe, who is not only an atmospheric scientist with expertise in climate modelling, regional climate impacts and science-policy interface at Texas Tech, but also happens to be CEO of ATMOS Research and Consulting, a Lubbock-based company “providing detailed reports, maps, and other graphics that vividly illustrate changes that have already been observed, as well as highlighting the possible future impacts of climate change over the coming century“.
The bold print in layman terms: climate fortune-telling services.
Climate consulting is surely a business that derives much benefit from the notion that climate change is now happening rapidly and that a catastrophe is imminent. A lot folks want to know what to do in order to prepare, and Katherine takes big money for telling them. I really don’t see how it is possible for people like Ms Hayhoe to avoid conflicts of interest here. Is it possible to remain objective in a science when you run a business whose very success depends on the output of that science? God knows that consulting fees are exorbitant. Tempting to say the least.
Should we be surprised that Hayhoe, as the CEO and top beneficiary of the climate consulting company, is a big proponent of climate catastrophe scenarios? Seems it would certainly help the ATMOS bottom line.
And how much of the services rendered by ATMOS are actually sourced from the tax-payer funded university where Hayhoe is a professor? As a professor at a state university, is she using research money and all the number-crunching facilities there to supply reports that ATMOS Consulting in turn sells at a high price to clients (after a little cut and paste editing)? I’d like to know what part of them high-priced consulting reports were actually generated by ATMOS resources alone, and what part was actually generated by her employer Texas Tech (taxpayer). Would Hayhoe confirm it’s 100%/0%?
ATMOS is an ideal set-up as a real money-making machine: scare the bejesus out of clients on one side, and sell them lucrative consulting services on the other. Though legal, there seems to be some ethical issues here.
And who are her clients? What proportion are private and what proportion are taxpayer funded government agencies, who just happen to love scary reports that sway public opinion? It all seems dubious to me and the potential for conflicts of interest is simply too high.
Crystal ball services: possible 100-year scenarios
The ATMOS website does not provide any information about the quality of its products, especially its climate forecast-related scenarios. Do they come with a guarantee? We get the sense that they don’t and that it’s mostly speculation dressed up to look scientific. Indeed if there is no guarantee, then it would be safe to say that ATMOS is actually selling high-priced crystal ball fortune-telling services. The ATMOS website writes that they “provide possible impacts of climate change over the coming century.”
Read the fine print – no money back!
Judith Curry is another climate scientist running a weather prediction consulting business, Climate Forecast Applications Network (CFAN), since 2006.
The identities of Curry’s clients have not been disclosed.
I think they all should come clean. Judtih, however, is no longer running around scaring the bejesus out of people with the potential to cash in on it.
Muller of BEST fame:
Frontman for geo-engineering NOVIM group
http://jer-skepticscorner.blogspot.com/2011/04/best-novim-and-other-solution.html
And this is Muller’s own company, some The-End-Is-Nigh consultancy:
http://www.mullerandassociates.com/index.php
[…] Gosselin writes at No Tricks Zone: What if scientists one day concluded that climate was influenced mostly by […]
Rahmstorf and his wife used to sell silver medaillons with an imprinted number of an EU carbon certificate that they promised to retire after the sale. Under the address
http://www.rahmstorf.eu/co2pins/background.htm
but the domain is up for grabs now.
Here’s a blog entry in German from the time when it was still working.
http://aristo.excusado.net/comments.php?y=10&m=11&entry=entry101127-235801
Another green job gone.
Follow the money!
I’ve met Katherine,
She isn’t a fortune teller (that’s superstition), but she does know her climate science.
If that is threatening to anyone – there is always superstition to fall back on.
What goes for science inAGW circles.
I’ll tell you about a science, it’s called mathematics, and it has a word to say about chaotic systems and the ability of models to forecast their behaviour. If you’re a climate scientist who thinks you can beat mathematics, I have two words for you.
You. Lose.
Dr Katharine Hayhoe is an associate professor and director of the Climate Science Center at Texas Tech University and, as such, she deserves some respect.
Dr Heyhoe is an expert in the science underpinning man-made global warming. Deny it all you like — it doesn’t change the facts. As explained by NASA : http://climate.nasa.gov/keyIndicators/
Quercus
NASA’s own data shows no increase in IR backradiation, as analyzed by Ferenc Miskolczi while being a NASA employee.
http://hockeyschtick.blogspot.com/2012/03/water-vapor-not-co2-controls-climate.html
It is you who denies the data and prefers toy models.
And I wonder – the NASA page you link to shows declining Arctic sea ice – yet it doesn’t show increasing Antarctic sea ice. It doesn’t really fit the narrative, right? So what you linked to is a little bit one-sided… One gets the impression that that page has not been done by a scientist but by a PR agency pushing an agenda.
A scientist would have shown the data.
Don’t think much of her science, but she sure is one savvy saleslady! Probably making a bundle, too.
I would pay $50 to have my picture taken with her.
I’m sure she’ll appreciate the compliment.
Wow, we got an infestation of the last warmists. Hayhoe surely knows how to pick cherries. I guess that makes her a revered world class AGW scientist.
http://www.real-science.com/klueless-katherine
Luckily, we don’t need models or math to tell us what happens when we use the atmosphere for a sewer. All we have to do is go out into the real world – not the concrete jungle we made, but the natural world…the one we depend on for food to eat, water to drink, and oxygen to breathe.
All we have to do is look with our eyes and what do we see? We see melting glaciers that are needed for irrigation to grow crops. We see empty, acidifying, rising oceans. We see soils depleted of essential minerals. We see blooming out of synch with pollinators. We see increasingly violent and frequent tornados, hurricanes, droughts and floods. We see species extinction from habitat destruction – deforestation, dams, mountaintop removal and tar sands – and chemical pollution. We see contaminated water. Most tragic for me personally, I see dying trees, a collapsing ecosystem, and a horrible future for our children.
Above all, we see a human population that is well beyond the carrying capacity of this planet.
Oh, but let’s not worry! Somebody will fix it!
The planet is nowhere near as bad as you perceive it.
You really need to do something about the chronic pessimism that afflicts you. It’s a shame when a person allows his/her your whole life to be ruined by such a chosen state of mind.
People are living much better today than they were 100, 200 or 1000 years ago. Try it if you don’t believe it.
At least we agree that the climate models are unnecessary. So let’s ditch them! Sorry Katherine… hey go wait tables…
Gail,
Cheer up. This weekend is our local conservation district’s plant sale.
http://kccd.net/plant_sale.htm
Within a few days there will be over 7,000 new trees and shrubs planted one-by-one in holes dug by hand. Now maybe that doesn’t sound like many plants but we are a rural county with many thousands of acres of trees and shrubs. And we do this every year. I have 15 new trees coming and an extra shovel. Yes, it is a bit cold and rainy here this spring but I promise no tornados or hurricanes – disclaimer: one of our volcanoes could blow and that can ruin one’s day, but that’s nature. So come on out.
Washington State – east of the Cascade Mountains.
“People are living much better today”
What this really means is YOU and YOUR BUDDIES are living better. Many, many people are not.
But you’re right. Who cares about them? It would be better to enjoy life and ignore the suffering others.
Don’t suppose you’re fond of Ayn Rand?
If you can say the globe is warming, then you can certainly say the lives of people on the planet on average are far better.
Again, I don’t see you or anyone else going back to the days of the past. I see you’re using a computer – and I’m sure you live under a roof with electricity, lights and all kinds of nifty gadgets that allow you to complain in comfort.
It’s the green movement that doesn’t want everyone to have these things. In fact it’s your ilk who keep saying there are too many of us on the planet.
If that were true, then I could think of one whiner we would all be better off without.
Gail, you are wrong.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jbkSRLYSojo
Hans Rosling’s 200 Countries, 200 Years, 4 Minutes
also at http://www.gapminder.org
Notice that I disagree with Rosling in at least one regard; when talking about future convergence he mentions “greentech” as one of the drivers.
As past convergence didn’t need “greentech” as a driver, it is completely arbitrary to assume that it will be so in the future. One could just as well say “cold fusion” – might happen, might not happen – the important thing is that the currently developing countries can exploit a second mover advantage so NO MATTER WHICH new technology comes along, they will continue to converge towards the affluence level of the west.
“But you’re right. Who cares about them? It would be better to enjoy life and ignore the suffering others.
Don’t suppose you’re fond of Ayn Rand?”
You have not understood how a market works. A free market is exactly what enables the developing countries to advance with the current speeds.
Can yo imagine that, “100+ unpaid hrs”! But I guess Katherine has leaned how to leverage her paid university hours? Guess that should balance the ledger.
“100+ unpaid hrs”?
When the quality of the work is such, then Newt had no choice but to file it in its rightful place.
It’s very similar in scope to E. Mann scam @ the Earth System Science Center at Pennsylvania State University.
You know, “give us a scare [says USG] and we’ll fund your laboratory!” – a win, win situation and Michael gets to strut the world stage and have a nice earner + pension too.
Hayhoe, way to go!
Now, what ever happened to my global warming dude?
Try this!
http://rogerpielkejr.blogspot.com/2012/03/handy-bullshit-button-on-disasters-and.html
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fi7WOQde7fI
She’s on this programme, BBC Horizon – Global Weirding (2012) .
Ah ha ah – just as I predicted a few days ago (maybe it was on Steve Goddard’s , I don’t remember)- 07:43: heroic scientist (Kerry Emanuel) braces the weather in outdoor cloths explaining something he could just as well or much better have explained at his desk, maybe showing some data… I always watch such mockumentaries with the sound off first to get a feeling for the editing. We know what they say anyway.
Oh Lawdymine, 11:43, Emanuel DRAWS A GRAPH IN THE SAND and AS EXPECTED FROM PROPAGANDA, THERE A NO UNITS on the graph… Yawn, always the same old tricks…
Who better to go to explain how future climate change will affect you interests than a climatologist researching that topic?
Perhaps you would go to a fortune teller?
Laz, Climate Scientists have always argued that they can’t meet the requirements of the scientific method, and needed a new, laxer standard called Post-Normal Science; they try to evade making predictions and dabble only in non-predictive projections, and fill up their IPCC documents with loads of gray literature.
They are gravy train riders and rent seeker, but not scientists. A meteorologist is a scientist; he will give you data about how far and with what probability his models can forecast.
AGW climate scientists have left science behind and became charlatans; but tried to preserve the respectful nimbus real science deserves. They are butchers of science. What’s the most dangerous place on Earth, the place between a TV camera and an alarmist scientist.