“Climate idiocy at the Monterey Bay Aquarium – cow with a gas mask“. The Monterey Bay Aquarium had a goofy image in a display about threats facing ocean wildlife (including climate change) and now Anthony Watts can’t “marvel at the sea otters, jellyfish, and the Mola” because “it’s just another political hack.”
Get over yourself, Anthony.
“The Gulf oil rig explosion – on the scene photos“. Dramatic photos, and a smidgeon of insight, about the Deepwater Horizon rig explosion have been provided to Anthony Watts and he posts it.
Commenters are, of course, noting that “more oil seeps naturally than from human spills“, and that “the Feds have only made the problem worse by their slow and bumbling action/inaction” (maybe this can be spun as Obama’s “Katrina”!!!). There have also been deeply delusional speculations about “deliberate sabotage for political reasons“.
As noted by Climate Progress from the Wall Street Journal;
BP’s “it can’t happen here” mentality is no doubt why it decided to save $500,000 and didn’t bother with “a remote-control shutoff switch that two other major oil producers, Norway and Brazil, require,” the WSJ reported (subs. req’d).
BP knows it can’t blame the feds since it fought efforts to change the voluntary self-regulation laws, the industry opposed mandates for the remote-control shutoff switch, BP sold the Minerals Management Service on a laughable planning scenario — it was “unlikely that an accidental surface or subsurface oil spill would occur from the proposed activities” — and the industry, not the feds, have the relevant equipment to stop the gusher.
“New ground truth: soil microbe negative feedback“. Another month, another “game-changer” claim from Anthony Watts. Yes the denialist “game” does indeed keep changing.
In this case, Anthony has found a press release from the University of California, Irvine titled Soil microbes produce less atmospheric CO2 than expected with climate warming. Here’s a quote that sums up the findings:
The new simulations suggest that if microbial efficiency declines in a warmer world, carbon dioxide emissions will fall back to pre-warming levels, a pattern seen in field experiments. But if microbes manage to adapt to the warmth – for instance, through increased enzyme activity – emissions could intensify.
Fungi to the rescue! We’re saved, Anthony! Saved! Saved… Saved?
Anthony’s grasping at straws again. Yes, microbial contributions to the carbon cycle are significant. No, their potentially steady-state contribution isn’t going to magically offset human CO2 production.
Next “game-changer” coming in… one month.
“Who says asphalt isn’t natural?” Why is it that when scientists report something surprising Anthony Watts has to sneer? Here Anthony posts a University of California, Santa Barbara press release titled “Scientists discover underwater asphalt volcanoes“.
I guess Anthony sees it as a chance to build on the theme that scientists don’t know nuthin’. It’s especially hard for him to resist when it gives him an incidental chance to pump his discredited “analysis” of US weather stations. Today he includes a cherry-picked Utah “climate monitoring station” that has its temperature sensors in a paved parking lot. Is this station used for climate data? Who knows.
Asphalt volcano schematic. Source: University of California, Santa Barbara.
Quite interesting actually. Natural oil seeps are well-known, but this an unusual kind of deposit. By chance I have a natural “asphalt” specimen of my own, collected from a small High Arctic tar sand deposit.
Wott's Up With That? 