Bishop Hill Maybe their computer is too small?
Dec 21, 2010 Bureaucrats Climate: MetOffice Climate: Models Delingpole has picked up on the Met Office's claims of innocence over the issuing of "mild winter" predictions and notes just how much money we are spending on not getting a long-range forecast.
So let’s get this right. We paid for 90 per cent of the Met office’s £30 million computer; we also fund a hefty chunk of its annual £170 million running costs. And now the Met office tells us that it is incapable of providing the effective long range forecasts we could get for a fraction of the price from Piers Corbyn or Joe Bastardi?
Interestingly, the other day I came across this paper produced by Sir John Beddington and his team, calling for more money to be spent on the Met Office. The Review of Climate Science Advice calls for £90 million to be spent on upgrading the Met Office's Hadley Centre, including the purchase of a shiny new supercomputer. Still, it will enable some important questions to be answered...
Q4: How can confidence in the most uncertain aspects of large-scale climate projections be improved? Answer needed perhaps by 2015, although the sooner the better to answer questions such as:
• Are current global climate projections for mitigation decisions accurate?
• What are the sign and magnitude of key cloud feedback processes?
• Is geo-engineering a safe option?
• How can aviation be operated to minimise the impacts of emissions?
I must say I agree that it would be useful to know if current global climate projections are accurate. Presumably not though, if the "sign and magnitude of key cloud feedback processes" are unknown.
Reader Comments (33)
It would be really nice if Rob Schneider could do an update and tell us how much the wind turbines are generating in the recent cold snap. How much we are using nationally, and how much they are generating. Its the future, coming towards us. This is from a post on WUWT - is it accurate?
Just realised, the idiots misspelled their domain name and bought the wrong one!
globalwarmingsuperheros.com
before finally registering: http://globalwarmingsuperheroes.com/
Eco-nazis really can't spell LOL
Wouldn't be surprised if MET office was behind this, such an idiotic and incompetent bunch.
Increasing the speed at which you can do computations only means that with bad algorithms and bad data you get bad results quicker.
Also, any practical linear increase in power, the computational speed goes up linearly, or the complexity does. Big more bucks aren't going to help much. Doing it smarter will make a big difference.
The recent articles from the Landscheidt community on planetary positions (affecting solar cycles affecting our weather) made me wonder if we would be better off using Stonehenge for weather forecasting than using the Met Office. Replace John Hirst with a Druid, I say.
Cart, it's perhaps time you met that horse that has been behind you for years.
I agree with Dellers. Sell off the Met Office and slip a bob or two to Piers, or give him a new laptop.
At least the heat generated by their super computer will be melting some of the snow in the local area.
Would someone please put Piers Corbyn in charge of the Met Office?
Seems to me they don't need £90 million to make predictions.
They only need a 10p coin and flip it to make a prediction.
And nobody would know the difference.
"How can aviation be operated to minimise the impacts of emissions?"
By routing it through Heathrow
Listen to the extraordinary interview with David King on Today (quarter to nine-ish). It'll be on iPlayer in a minute.
Apparently Climate science is now so good it has successfully predicted this years hot summer (WTF?) and this years terrible winter. Honest. He really said that.
Apparently it is all about the PDO ( which they knew about, but didn't bother to tell anyone) or add to any of their forecasts, and which may last 5-10 years, but there is no way of knowing unless the government build a massive computer to improve their (already perfect) climate models.
Gasp!
Unbelievably muddled thinking. An embarassment. It was like listening to a teenager constantly contradicting himself.
michel,
I'll get on the case. The data analysis I did on the wind data came from the National Grid at 5 and 30 minute intervals is published quarterly. I was waiting for the next quarterly data set to be available. I'll check now to see if they do it more quickly.
Meantime, I have a little iPhone application provided by "www.ideasproject.info" which is called "UK Grid Carbon Intensity". The purpose of the app is to show how much carbon is emitted. More interestingly to me is that they report "real time" power production. It has a big impact when I pull out my iPhone when talking to to people about wind power generation. The data appears to be correct as data is said to come from Elexon where the National Grid data is published. I presume/assume they are publishing the real figures.
Right now:
Gas, 20,400 MW, 39.2%
Coal, 22,400 MW, 43.0%
Nuclear, 8,100 MW, 15.7%
Wind, 43 MW, 0.1%
Hydro, 150 MW, 0.3%
A reality check.
Electricity consumed in the UK from various sources - coal, nuclear, oil, wind etc. can be found at http://www.bmreports.com/bsp/bsp.php In the past 24 hours, from 09.00 to 09.00 this morning, coal provided 42.4% of the electricity consumed, nuclear provided 16.5% and wind provided 0.1%.
Can grown-ups please take control of our energy future!
"What can be said with very little doubt is that, once this cluster of cold winters has finished, we will have another lengthy run of mild and rainy ones, and if we spend piles of cash on snowploughs and de-icing equipment, we may come to regret it."
By Philip Eden Vice President Royal Meteorological Society 2007-09
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/uk-12042733
Obviously living in cloud cuckoo land! The rest of us will be calling for heads to roll if services are suspended throughout the winter. We may even find winter stretching through March next year which of course should also be taken into acount by government when looking at resources. But then again the MET can not forecast that far into the future, only the next month retains acurracy acording to their source on the PM program last night.
neta - http://www.bmreports.com/bsp/bsp_home.htm - also shows what is generating and what isn't our electricity.
Total metered capacity 2430MW
Current 41MW
Last 24 hours, total power generated 1,206,208MW, wind's contribution 1490MW
Mickey Mouse economics of wind!
Adam: Those figures, such as 1,206,208 & 1490 are not power, but energy in MWh.
Still shows wind is Mickey Mouse useless (unless you are in on the scam, such as the PM's father-in-law and the deputy PM's wife, when it is a real money-printing machine).
So when I come in frozen, having been taking pictures of the lunar eclipse at dawn (Very beautiful it was too, over the snowfields) I find that the 2,430MW of installed wind turbines is producing 41MW of power, or 1.7% of its rated capacity. That's an expensive set of useless metal. Perhaps the £90m quid they want for a new computer is to help them work out likely energy production in still air when it's cold. If they'd like a hand with that rather intractable problem, I have an Amstrad PCW8512 up in the attic that should cope with the required complex mathematical model rather well, and it has a word processing package to write the report on too. There will be a fee though, - a cool £1m should cover my costs.
"How can aviation be operated to minimise the impacts of emissions?"
By routing it through Heathrow
Dec 21, 2010 at 9:01 AM | Unregistered Commentertty
Very very close to my "Comment of the Year" award......Unlike the "Hottest Year" award...We will have to wait until the end of the month!
Right now:
Gas, 20,400 MW, 39.2%
Coal, 22,400 MW, 43.0%
Nuclear, 8,100 MW, 15.7%
Wind, 43 MW, 0.1%
Hydro, 150 MW, 0.3%
Dec 21, 2010 at 9:10 AM | Unregistered CommenterRob Schneider
Thanks Rob. Now I know where the guy on Dellingpole article comments was getting his minute by minute wind power info ;-) Of to check if it works on the Ipad!
I was pleasantly surprised to see BBC weather man Peter Gibbs on a BBC special report about the adverse conditions explaining that it is pretty difficult to forecast the seasons even just a few years ahead.
Yet we are expected to swallow predictions for 80-90 years from now.
I quite like the idea of small scale wind power. A bit of battery charging for a few 12v lights and that sort of thing.
However, I have to question the effects (which are never mentioned) of large scale wind farms sucking the energy from the wind. The wind does not blow through a windmill. The power of it is removed to turn the blades. (Wave power may have a place in preventing cliff erosion) What effect is this having on our weather/climate? How much energy are the wind farms taking back in a no wind situation to turn the blades to prevent an imbalance by ice forming on the blades? How much does it really cost to build, transport, erect, and maintain the things?
There is a price to pay for all energy used. Nothing is free in any sense. If global warming was a fact (I think it's b*ll*cks) then surely the best way to offset its effect would be solar power? Taking the heat energy from the sun would surely reduce its damage to the earth surface?
The insanity surrounding power generation is summed up in this story which I assure you is true. A land owner with a constant water supply was offered the chance of generating electricity from it. The costs, to him, of plant installation were £250K. He would be paid (calculated from the power generated) £100K per year, for 20 years. There was no requirement to put this energy into the grid he simply powered his own farm (for free) heating his sheds with electricity to use up the excess supply. He would be paid by the electricty company who were then, with many such schemes and by issuing low energy bulbs to all, achieving their targets for alternative energy savings and sources. All this is ultimately paid for by the consumer!
How long will it be before some bright spark comes up with the idea of planting walnut trees in every garden? Rich in oil they will be lighting the lamps and saving the planet. The poor may yet have light! What have I said? God help us!
Let's not forget that putting up even more windmills is rather expensive, disregarding their proven uselessness by several people here, and remind ourselves that the minister who announced this said that this, and solar, would put £ 500 p.a. on top of our already inflated utility bills.
The economic inanity is astonishing, to say the least.
So pensioners, who are getting £ 250 winter fuel help, should get the £ 500 on top - it is only fair, no?
Therefore, our taxes will support the energy industry to build these things, and then support pensioners so they can afford to heat one room and eat a bit as well ...
It looks as if our oh-so-brilliant civil servants in the treasury don't have a clue about unintended consequences.
Oh - but perhaps they're aiming for a reduction of the British population? Getting pensioners to curl up and die means less pension payments and less NHS costs - huge savings!!!!
Cynical - moi????
To address the Bishop's comment "it would be useful to know if current global climate projections are accurate", the following hindcast paper at WUWT is worth a read:
"New peer reviewed paper shows just how bad the climate models really are"
http://tinyurl.com/24vgaso
Just a daft question: How many wind turbines does it take to power their supercomputer?
"it would be useful to know if current global climate projections are accurate"
No, they are useless.
Matt Briggs has pointed out several times that they are soundly defeated by the naive model, which says that this year will be just like last year, plus or minus a little bit.
Current wind output is 22MW, i.e. rounded to 0% of total output of 54.736GW.
How much did it cost to install all those wind power stations? How much grief is it costing nearby residents? How much is it costing pensioners? How much is it hurting the economy?
Stuck-record
"this years hot summer"
I heard that. It would have been nice if the Today presenter had queried it, but presumably someone was shouting in his ear telling him not to!
John in France is not so daft. I vote the Met Office should be compelled to run their operation solely on wind power; and the University of Easy Access. Any other candidates?
WikiDic:
"'Met Office' -- an abbreviation for 'Meteoastrology Office'. The Meteoastrology Office was a branch of the UK Civil Service that used supercomputers to generate claims about the weather that were consistent with the ideology du jour. It was closed by the MRLP government that took power in March 2012 after the election that followed the arctic winter of 2011/12. The senior staff were arrested on charges of manslaughter and abuse of public funds. Junior staff were simply dismissed. The supercomputer was sold to an on-line bingo company."
Thanks Rob and everyone, very illuminating! What on earth is Huhne thinking of?
Gareth
“BBC weather man Peter Gibbs .. explaining that it is pretty difficult to forecast the seasons even just a few years ahead”
I think we should keep an eye out for him. He could be sent to the frozen wastes (e.g. Exeter) for that...
Re Michel
You're assuming he can think. If he is, probably his career after politics. Blair did well picking up a couple of green jobs, as did Mrs Clegg.
So for thirty million quid they can get the winter right, yet Ireland has a postman who can? I think they should get on a plane (assuming the airports are open) fly over to Inishowen (it is a peninsula in Donegal) and have a pint with Micheal Gallagher. HERE
All the GCMs failed to predict the stall in temperature rise this century. It's clear that many major factors are left out or wrongly characterised and that the problem is likely to be incapable of being modeled. IMHO the idea of GCMs on which any reliance can be placed for long term predictions is simply misconceived and the producers of these models don't appear to follow the basic disciplines which computer modelers in other areas are obliged to follow.
I've long been of the opinion that the output of the models, infinitely adjustable as it is, is of great propaganda value (people are inclined to take anything coming out of a computer seriously), but of limited predictive value. The fact that they can't predict anything beyond about a week at most is conveniently skipped over, and supposed predictions of events decades ahead are taken as gospel. If someone produced a model which didn't predict catastrophic warming "worse than we thought", they'd soon find out which side their bread was buttered on.
High time the Met Office returned to being a meteorological service and was run at a fraction of the current budget.