Roy Spencer Slammed - major flaws found in his work

[Eric Swanson]

For several years, Roy Spencer has been promoting some work he did
which he claims shows that the feedback from clouds is negative.
Spencer has been a vocal critic of the science of climate change and
he works are frequently referenced by denialist, such as Rush
Limbaugh. Here's a link to Spencer's 2010 paper:

http://www.drroyspencer.com/wp-content/uploads/Spencer-Braswell-JGR-2010.pdf

Spencer has even written a book about his thinking, " The Great Global
Warming Blunder: How Mother Nature Fooled the World’s Top Climate
Scientists ". It now appears that Spencer's work is seriously
flawed, according to an analysis by geologist Barry Bickmore, which he
presents in three parts on his blog:

http://bbickmore.wordpress.com/2011/02/25/roy-spencers-great-blunder-part-1/

Worse yet, another analysis by Arthur Smith goes to the heart of the
situation with a detailed look at the math:

http://arthur.shumwaysmith.com/life/content/mathematical_analysis_of_roy_spencers_climate_model

For those in the US who might be interested, results from Spencer's
analysis was just used by John Christy in his presentation before the
US House Committee Energy and Commerce Committee. Here's a link, (see
graph on page 17):

http://republicans.energycommerce.house.gov/Media/file/Hearings/Energy/030811/Christy.pdf

The hearing is about H.R. 910, which prohibits the EPA imposing any
regulation of greenhouse gases. It would appear that the Republicans
in the House are working with improper information as they set out to
destroy the EPA's efforts to limit emissions of greenhouse gases. The
bill just passed out of the committee and is headed to floor for a
vote by the full house. The Republican War on Science continues and
all humanity will all "enjoy" the results...

E. S.

[David B. Benson]

On Mar 11, 8:10 am, Eric Swanson <e_swan...@skybest.com> wrote:
> ...  The Republican War on Science ...

All NASA's problem will be solved when they repeal Newton's Law of
Gravity.

[Eric Swanson]

I neglected to add the comment on RealClimate by Andrew Dresser

http://www.realclimate.org/index.php/archives/2010/12/feedback-on-cloud-feedback/

Spencer's blog ran a discussion as well:

http://www.drroyspencer.com/2010/12/the-dessler-cloud-feedback-paper-in-science-a-step-backward-for-climate-research/

The RC comments get down to the basics regarding Roy Spencer. I like
the comment which mentions the fact that Spencer appears to speak
differently depending on the audience. He can appear to be open and
honest when communicating with other scientists, but say things
differently on his blog or before the press. That certainly matches
my experience with him several years ago. He even criticized SCIENCE
for timing the publishing of Dressler's paper just before the Cancun
Conference:

http://news.sciencemag.org/scienceinsider/2010/12/science-criticized-in-cancun-for.html

E. S.
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