From the Cliff Mass Climate Weblog
Maybe I shouldn’t learn the Seattle Occasions anymore.
In the course of the previous weeks, there have been a number of climate-related tales and opinion/cartoon items which can be just plain unsuitable. Clear factual errors, or hyping/exaggerating the impacts of world warming.
And there are dozens of extra examples of profound errors in Seattle Occasions local weather items over time, a number of mentioned on this weblog. Newspapers needs to be about speaking the reality, not advocacy of a sure politized viewpoint.
The residents of a democracy have to be effectively knowledgeable about vital problems with the day, with newspapers enjoying an vital function. As proven beneath, the Seattle Occasions is failing in its duties.
Worse than that, the Occasions has suppressed info contradictory to their problematic info.
Let me present some current examples.
Is Local weather Change Inundating the Quinault Nation on the Central Washington Coast?
It began with an article about how the Feds are offering funds to maneuver a Quilayute Village away from the coast due to local weather change: The ST claimed that rising sea stage and stronger storms ensuing from world warming was the trigger.
The article is sort of particular about this:
And the Seattle Occasions doesn’t cease there. Seattle Occasions editorial cartoonist David Horsey has a “Local weather Carol”. Practically all of it’s unsuitable.
And he makes the declare in regards to the Quinault village. The ocean is rising and coastlines are sinking from local weather change. And sure storms are getting larger.
The issue? None of that is true. And it may be PROVEN to not be true.
Let’s begin with the claims that storms on the Washington Coast have elevated. This isn’t true. For example beneath is the plot of the annual most sustained wind (blue shade) and wind gusts (crimson line) on the Washington Coast for roughly the final 50 years. No long-term development.
The identical is true of different parameters (just like the lowest strain on the coast). Storms aren’t getting stronger The UW Local weather Affect Group examined regional local weather fashions for the upcoming century (hyperlink right here) and located no enhance in storms in our area:
“The worldwide mannequin ensemble confirms the outcomes from the regional local weather fashions, with no constant development towards extra excessive wind storms over western Washington in future local weather projections”
What in regards to the claims about sea stage going up on the Washington Coast resulting from world warming?
Properly, it seems that sea stage is not any rising as a result of the land is rising! Sure, the ocean water ranges are going up slowly because the earth warms up. But when the land rises, the precise water stage on the coast can keep the identical or go down.
The coastal terrain of Washington is RISING, with sea stage going DOWN or regular.
There are two causes for this. One has to do with the deep glacial ice that lined the northern Olympic Peninsula, pushing down the land. When the glaciers melted out about 16,000 years in the past, the land began to rebound upward. And it’s nonetheless rebounding.
Alongside the coast, one other geological function is contributing to the coastal land being pushed up: the subduction of the Juan de Fuca plate underneath the North American plate (see determine). Because the Juan de Fuca tectonic plate is pushed downward, coastal land is elevated.
The truth is, utilizing very refined GPS-derived measurements, the Pacific Northwest Geodetic Array has discovered the realm across the Quinault coast village in query is rising round 2 mm per yr (see beneath).
Primarily based on satellite tv for pc altimetry, sea stage rise offshore has been about 2 mm per yr (see outcomes from 1993-2020 beneath). Once more, world warming is contributing to this.
Primarily based on this info, you wouldn’t anticipate a lot sea stage rise alongside our coast as a result of the land is rising. However let’s verify the info from NOAA.
NOAA has a sea stage development web site with information from three native coastal websites (Astoria, Neah Bay, and Toke Level close to Westport). Neah Bay and Astoria have the longest information (again to about 1930).
Neah Bay, on the northwest facet of the Olympic Peninsula, has sea stage DROPPING by 1.74 mm a yr. Small uncertainly in comparison with the development (+-.27 mm/yr)
Astoria has a decline in sea stage as effectively, however a lot much less (.16 mm a yr) and the uncertainty is bigger than the development.
Toke Level close to Westport, has a a lot shorter document (begins mid-70s). It nominally reveals a small rising development (.38 mm a yr), however the uncertainty is giant (twice the development). The issue with such a brief document is the development would change with a barely completely different begin date). For instance, beginning round 1980 there’s primarily no development.
The underside line in all that is the Seattle Occasions’ claims of world warming inflicting extra flooding at Quinault coastal village is clearly bogus. Sea stage shouldn’t be rising a lot on the coast (and falling at many areas) and storms that might push water onto the coast aren’t growing.
In one other weblog, I’ll describe the factual errors in one other current Seattle Occasions article, claiming that world warming is inflicting a “tipping level”.for Western Purple Cedars. You’ll be shocked by how sloppy the article was.
Seattle Occasions Censorship of Contradictory Viewpoints.
That is, maybe the primary “Twitter recordsdata” for the Seattle Occasions local weather protection. On a few of their problematic articles, I’ve sometimes left some feedback, offering details about the precise state of scientific data. I’ve revealed over 150 papers, many on Northwest climate and local weather.
Think about how shocked I used to be to search out that the Seattle Occasions eliminated all my feedback from all articles and froze my potential to go away anymore. Under is the message. They have been accusing me of offering disinformation about local weather change.
I protested this apparent ploy to silence differing viewpoints and requested for a single instance of my making a scientific error. Crickets. I lastly emailed the administration of the Seattle Occasions and that led to them reversing the choice.
David Horsey is continually doing editorial cartoons on local weather. The Seattle Occasions has been sad about people’ feedback about his “work” and so they now forbid feedback. Right here is their message:
Editor’s observe: Seattle Occasions Opinion now not appends remark threads on David Horsey’s cartoons. Too many feedback violated our neighborhood insurance policies and reviewing the handfuls that have been flagged as inappropriate required an excessive amount of of our restricted workers time.
You need to really feel sorry for the Seattle Occasions. As a result of it took an excessive amount of time to average/censor the feedback in regards to the Horsey work, they kill the flexibility to go away feedback.
I realized lots in regards to the Seattle Occasions’ censorship of conflicting views, with their Sea Change article in 2012. They claimed that growing CO2 was killing child oysters in manufacturing facility amenities. It wasn’t true and the oyster enterprise has completed fairly effectively over the past decade. However I criticized their science in a weblog at the moment and so they stopped speaking to me after that.
The unusual factor is that I used to have a really shut relationship with the Seattle Occasions after they cared in regards to the fact. After they had devoted science journalists like Hill Williams and Dedtra Henderson. They wished to get the details proper. However issues have modified within the newspaper.
Anyway, the decline of science protection and the transfer to climate-change advocacy on the Seattle Occasions has not been in the very best curiosity of anybody, notably the Occasions. They’re misinforming the general public. International warming is a critical concern that requires a reality and a science-based response.
