Another week: selection from the blogs

Here is a selection of links to climate blogs in the past week.  Later I will link to the report on the various reports which have been carried out this year following the release of emails from the Climatic Research Unit in East Anglia.

1. IPCC Fourth Assessment Report (AR4) 2007:  Richard Tol, Professor of the Economics of climate Change in Amsterdam, pointed out yet more flaws in the 'climate bible' - this time in Chapter 11 dealing models to show the costs of reducing emissions using technology.  His post at Die Klimazwiebel is well worth reading.  Tol concludes his article: "Review comments on both drafts pointed out that Chapter 11 misrepresents the literature."  
2. The University of East Anglia's claim in a press release, repeating an egregious error in the Muir Russell report, is shown to be false in another forensic analysis of the evidence by Steve McIntyre at ClimateAudit.  His post relates to the email from Professor Jones in which he wrote on 29th May 2008 "Can you delete any emails you may have had with Keith re AR4."     The Muir Russell report glossed this with ". . . we have seen no evidence of any attempt to delete information in respect of a request already made."  It turns out the Jones email was written after Freedom of Information requests and the Russell report was mistaken.    Here is the fascinating and sorry tale with the key background post here.  This really is an extraordinary account.
3. Lord Oxburgh appeared before the Science and Technology Committee of the House of Commons last week.  McIntyre begins a post with this assertion: "Almost none of Oxburgh's testimony . . . can be taken at face value" and then proceeds to evidence his opening statement.  Lord Oxburgh is the man who was called in by the University of East Anglia to lead a Science Appraisal Panel after the emails were released to 'appraise the science of the CRU'.  He later said "the science was not the subject of the study".   And Lord Oxburgh was  not independent.  He is president of the Carbon Capture and Storage Association, Chairman of the wind energy firm Falck Renewables and a member of the Green Fiscal Commission.  Another independent 'official' report which is not all it is supposed to be.  Until the enquiries have credibility there will always be good reason for doubt about the conduct of climate science.
4. For a number of years polar bears have been a poster child for the alleged catastrophic nature of global warming.  The evidence for the demise of polar bears, however, is not as the posters would have you believe.  See here for more.