Dave Frame talks rot on climate poll


New Zealanders are more satisfied with the Government’s efforts to combat climate change than they were a year ago, but fewer than half actually rate the effort as good.

Last month’s IAG poll didn’t ask people what they might pay to fix climate change — and shame on them, for previous surveys show very low willingness. Families must be fed, so there’s little sense of climate change urgency. Thirty-one percent were more concerned about the effects of climate change on them than about any influence they might have on climate change.
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Tiresome climate propaganda

Here’s a (lightly improved) op-ed I submitted to the Herald a month ago with no acknowledgement. Prof Geoff Duffy describes scientific properties of greenhouse gases that raise significant doubt about the wisdom of mitigating our emissions of any gas. How odd that these fully informed colleagues make no argument against his criticisms, preferring an ineffectual allegation of being “wrong about many [unspecified] aspects of science.” So I ask you, lady and gentlemen: what aspects and how is he wrong? — RT

The letter Our impact on climate very clear, of 8 Oct 2018 (right), by Prof Dave Frame and seven other local climate scientists, gives misleading information about greenhouse gases.

Seeing a letter over those scholarly signatures sparks interest in the pending illumination. But, sadly, Frame et al. (or Frame ‘n Pals) recite the tiresome propaganda of the IPCC without demur and tip-toe around the scientific points made so well by our friend Dr Geoff Duffy.

They present sentences arranged to resemble a logical argument that are in fact unconnected. Each one tells part of the truth, so it’s not wrong, but it neither contributes to an argument nor supports the next sentence.

Any connection between them rests only on our gullibility. Continue Reading →

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Frame on methane GWP

Here’s good news for all those who despair at the defects and sheer incompetence (it seems) in the calculation of the Global Warming Potential of methane: it’s about to get a high-level airing. I emailed Professor David Frame a few days ago. Prof Frame is Director of the NZ Climate Change Research Institute at the Victoria University of Wellington, taking over from Martin Manning in October last year. He’s given us a prompt and encouraging response. – h/t Barry Brill

30/06/2012 12:21 pm

Dear Professor Frame,

Your opinion piece in the Dominion of 22 June makes good reading, thank you. I was especially struck by Tom Schelling’s remark describing the EU’s emissions targets as indicating its insincerity.

But I write concerning your comment following the post. There’s been much discussion at the Climate Conversation Group about the calculation of GWP for methane, what it should be and what might be done to make it more reasonable. Set too high, it is a considerable impost on NZ farming, which as you know is among the world’s most efficient. You say:

Shorter-lived gases (such as methane) are not obviously as important for the overall properties of climate change as is commonly thought, and the way we count them – or rather the way the folks who came up with Kyoto ended up counting them – masks this by giving them high emphasis. [Unwarrantedly high emphasis in my view, but that would be another article, which is a bit more technical to write.]

Now, Dave, this is like the aroma of frying bacon to a hungry man. Continue Reading →

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