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Earth Science

NASA's Non-Expert Climate Experts

By Keith Cowing
NASA Watch
April 12, 2012
Filed under ,

From a Boy Who Loved NASA: How 49 Heroes Lost the Right Stuff and Sullied Their Names, Huffington Post
“I guess it shouldn’t have surprised me these gentlemen — 49 out of tens of thousands of former NASA employees (more than 18,000 people currently work for NASA, so this is about 0.27% of current employees) would next move into the emotional language. It shouldn’t have surprised me, but it disappointed me just the same.”
On Astronauts, NASA, and Climate Concerns, NY Times
“Here’s the note I received from Russell Schweickart after I alerted him about the letter (he was unaware of it): To my knowledge most of the signatories on this letter are in fact engineers (or former engineers). Some are (or were) scientists… But none, to my limited knowledge, are what I would consider qualified climatologists. AND… they have every right to state and argue for their opinion, and I fully support their right on that score.”

Attacks on climate science by former NASA staff shouldn’t be taken seriously, The Guardian
“Based on the job titles listed in the letter signatures, by my count they include 23 administrators, 8 astronauts, 7 engineers, 5 technicians, and 4 scientists/mathematicians of one sort or another (none of those sorts having the slightest relation to climate science). Amongst the signatories and their 1,000 years of combined professional experience, that appears to include a grand total of zero hours of climate research experience, and zero peer-reviewed climate science papers.”
JSC Human Space Flight Vets Complain About NASA’s Climate Change Position, earlier post

NASA Watch founder, Explorers Club Fellow, ex-NASA, Away Teams, Journalist, Space & Astrobiology, Lapsed climber.

24 responses to “NASA's Non-Expert Climate Experts”

  1. Nassau Goi says:
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    Rusty Schweickart is a very understanding person. He doesn’t necessarily agree with them, but he supports their ability to express a view. He made for a good astronaut.
    That said, I bet you there are more equally credentialled people that do not agree with these letter makers, yet aren’t so egotistical they have to make a letter about it. 

    It really doesn’t matter how many people think this or that on this issue when it comes down to it. The fact is that the view  of these letter makers is wrong is all that matters. We know what these greenhouse gasses do, it’s not controversial unless someone has a  problem with facts.

  2. Anonymous says:
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    An ancillary issue is that climate scientists need to shut the hell up when talking about solutions.  This is a prime example.

    http://news.yahoo.com/globa

    In a 2009 probe into so-called geo-engineering options to brake global warming, Britain’s Royal Society gave low marks to “white roof” methods.
    There would be benefits locally in hot countries, it said.But only 0.05 to one percent of the world’s land surface would be covered, which meant it would lack effectiveness on a global scale, the prestigious academy said.And it estimated the cost at “about $300 billion a year, making this one of the least effective and most expensive methods considered.”

    I will bet anyone here quite a lot of money that not one study of resources from space has been done to show how that can be used as an AGW mitigation scheme.  I ran some numbers in my book regarding off planet platinum group metals production and the numbers look good.I will make my statement once more, space people are fighting the wrong fight here.  It is time for us to step up and show how space can make a meaningful difference in solving global problems.

    WE ARE NOT EVEN ON THE BATTLEFIELD

    No wonder space is not respected as it should be.  Gerard K. O’Neil was the only one that I saw even in the 70’s making this argument.Here is a thought experiment.What if space got $150 billion a year for 30 years, how could that amount of funds be used to solve the AGW problem, and what would the world look like afterward.This is the scale that these people talk about all the time.  Space is a bunch of pissants in comparison.

    • Hallie Wright says:
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      That people who don’t know things should shut the hell up is a fair statement, and it is conceivable that the public skepticism about what climate scientists say is that they use their expertise as a platform to talk policy instead of science.

      But the example you give is a curious one. The “white roof” advocate wasn’t a climate scientist. He’s a civil engineer. He was told off by a climate scientist. So here’s a case where someone who was not a climate scientist should have shut the hell up. That’s the lesson that this thread is about.

      Schweikart is right. From a free-speech standpoint, these folks should be able to say anything they want to say. That they attach their very much non-climate science job titles to their names, and expect people to take them seriously is laughable (or maybe frightening).

      • Anonymous says:
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        Hallie

        The article states…

        Scientists sketched a vision on Friday of converting the world’s cities into giant sunlight reflectors to help fight global warming but met with scepticism from fellow academics.

        If you read up on the subject of who contributes to the IPCC TAR documents on mitigation strategies, you have people like Phil Jones, Keith Biffra, and Mike Mann talking about schemes for mitigation.  The literature is rife with climate scientists calling for more solar panels and wind turbines and you have James Hansen doing stupid crap like protesting coal fired power plants.

        If we take the proposition that we can only listen to climate scientists when it comes to issues that are within their domain of expertise, then we must also question why they have the level of input they have into realms where they have zero expertise.

        I read a lot of the policy works associated with the issue of AGW and the dominant theme of them is still in line with the precepts of the book “Limits to Growth” that takes as an axiom that technology cannot solve our problems and that we must completely reorganize our global political system in a manner as to effectively neuter the last several centuries of progress.  Albert Gore’s “Earth in the Balance” carries this them forward and in just the last couple of weeks the UN conference “Planet Under Pressure” echoed the same themes.  This time they are using AGW as the hook upon which to base their policies in the same manner that other politicians have used the war on drugs for theirs.  

        Why is this so?  There is no reason that it must be this way.  The development of the economic resources of the solar system is well within our grasp and those resources can be used to completely eliminate the limits to growth and be used to bring the rest of our planetary civilization to the level of affluence of the western world.  

        Thus when you have this marriage of the scientific and political in an agenda that people feel is wrong you will have people questioning the science, no matter how it is presented or the qualifications of the presenters.  

        I go into this in some detail in my last book and it is time for a new one to take the subject further.

        • Anonymous says:
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          No, those guys are/were part of working group I, the physical basis of climate change, mitigation is the bailiwick of WGIII with an entirely different cast of characters

          http://www.ipcc-wg3.de/publ

          Still you had an excellent rant

          • Anonymous says:
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            If you read the climate gate emails you will see that they reviewed and edited the docs.

          • Anonymous says:
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            Which ones Dennis? When? Cites please.  Each group edits it’s own chapters and prepares a technical summary.  The review leaders then prepare an overall technical summary and a summary for policy makers.

        • Hallie Wright says:
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          Let’s be clear. You offered, as a prime example of climate scientists who should shut the hell up, a yahoonews article about white roofs. Now, I haven’t looked at the journal article they were referring to, but the reporter who wrote the article queried Hashem Akbari about it. Akbari was presented as an advocate for the idea of white roofs as a solution to global warming. With all due respect to him, he is a civil engineer. The civil engineering of white roofs is likely quite solid, but the climactic impact of them is not what he seems to be assuming it is.

          I think you’re right, about people who overstep the bounds of their expertise, but the example you offered, at least the news article, is about civil engineers who are overstepping the bounds of their expertise, not climate scientists. Certainly there are other examples of the latter doing so.

          • Anonymous says:
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            Here are a couple for your perusal.

            How to Curb Discharge of the Most Potent Greenhouse Gas: A 50 Percent Reduction in Meat Consumption and Emissions Is Needed

            http://www.newswise.com/art

            Here is a whole raft of gems from the recent “Planet Under Pressure” UN sponsored conference.

            http://www.icsu.org/news-ce

            It is beyond time that the space community wake up and understand that there is a battle for the future of our civilization at stake and that we do not have a seat at the table though our solution is one of the best not only to maintain but to improve the status of all humans and our planetary civilization.

            Kudos to Elon Musk for having the grumbas to go out and make the case for us being a multi plant species.

          • Hallie Wright says:
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            Well, since I can’t reply to Dennis’ offer of examples of climate scientists who overstep their professional training down below, I’ll do it here.

            Re the first reference, in newswise, Eric Davidson of Woods Hole, who is asking us to protect us from climate change by not eating meat, isn’t a climate scientist. At least he has no evident expertise in atmospheric radiative transfer and atmospheric energetics, if you look him up. He’s a biogeochemist, whatever the hell that is. So again, a person who is offering a solution to global climate change but doesn’t quite know what he’s talking about.

            If you think he’s a climate scientist who’s offering that vegetarian solution, that’s incorrect.

            It’s one thing for a biogeochemist to pretend to be a climate scientist, but it’s even worse when you believe him.

            I remember when people were being counseled to save energy to stave off the energy crisis by only using wind-up clocks. That’s a lot like these fine ideas.

  3. Saturn1300 says:
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    If they do not like climate theory,how about writing letters to Charlie and Pres.Obama explaining how using the Centers to build a launcher, a crewed spacecraft and launch and control it.At $136,000(about $10 a lb.)for raw material for a Titan-2,it would be faster,better,cheaper.Cut the deficit.Have more flights.Get to an asteroid,Moon,or Mars quicker.They know at lot about this.Thanks.

    • Steve Whitfield says:
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      Saturn13,

      A study was done and possible mission plans mapped out in the 60’s, during the time of Project Gemini. A Titan II could have put 2 men in a Gemini-mass capsule (or a shoe box) into a high Earth Orbit, and maybe do a TLI, and there was a slight possibility of an Apollo 8-type free return mission, but you couldn’t carry a lunar lander; and even if you could, you couldn’t get your people off the Moon again; and even if you could, you couldn’t do a TEI to bring them home. And you wouldn’t get to Mars or an asteroid a all, except maybe as an aim, fire, coast and hope, with no course corrections, and your astronauts would be dead on arrival.

      The Titan II was nothing more than an ICBM (barely more than an IRBM) with some electronics and systems modified or added for safety reasons. It has just about worst rough ride (exceeding 8 G’s on launch and a wicked vibration problem) of any LV that NASA ever used for HSF. And NASA doesn’t own the design, so add that to your cost. Also, a Gemini high orbit mission required the capsule to dock with an Agena booster in low orbit which provided the thrust necessary for raising the capsule’s orbit. And NASA doesn’t own the Agena design either. (BTW, the electronics in these two LVs combined was a tiny fraction of what’s in your wrist watch, so who would build it again, even if they could?)

      And yet again:
      1) NASA doesn’t build anything and is not set up to do so.
      2) Your cost estimates are just plain wrong, by a lot, even if we don’t include all of the things you ignore.

      It’s time you faced the facts. Your proposal for NASA to build LVs and spacecraft is not going to fly and your costing estimates are meaningless. By continuing to push this, you’re just attacking your own credibility. You’re not going to convince anybody. Sorry to be so blunt Saturn13, but we need to get you off of this no-go idea and thinking about possible and practical things.

      But, I’m just one person; don’t take my word for it. Ask other people; do some research. Get the facts.

      Steve

      • Saturn1300 says:
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         What in the world are you talking about? The Titan-2 was just an example of cost of aluminum for a rocket.F-9 would work just as well.I found that aluminum sheet used in rockets is $10 a pound.Any other angle etc. would be about the same.This is worst case.Retail off the Internet.So find the empty weight of any rocket,less engines and X ten and you have the cost of material.I have posted my math.Is it in error?I have done the research.I can back up with quotes on anything in this theory.1] is incorrect.NASA centers built Ares-1X. Could you give some examples of my thinking that are not logical?Nobody  writing on NASA Watch ever writes about possible and practical things.There are none.NASA is not going to change and do anything anybody has suggested.If you want to be right,just say what ever NASA says.If I can point out the hypocrisy of the Feds,I will. So you like privatization and do not like government doing anything?I have always written about balancing the budget.Did I  ever attack your impossible writing?Sorry I made you mad.Will you attack Marcel?You see that little image of the USAF reusable rocket.We must think alike as I wrote a post on that several years ago.Those people are right wingers.They can not endorse my plan since that is big government.But they love NASA.

        • Steve Whitfield says:
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          Saturn13,

          Why did bring up Titan II then if it’s irrelevant to your argument? I was responding to that; showing you why NASA (or anybody else) would not consider building a Titan II (the LV or the missile) today or ever again.

          Ares 1-X was a can with no capabilities, put together from pieces already manufactured and was not part of the program plan. It was a desperate attempt to try and make it look like something in the program had actually been built after all of that time and bad press. It served no other purpose because it was not representative of the Ares 1 and was not part of the program requirements.

          And above all, you seem to imply (over and over again) that the cost of building a launch vehicle or spacecraft is basically the cost of the materials that go into it, which is outright not true. Does your aluminum shape and assemble itself? Is the welding done for free just by wishing it. Does nobody need to test it? Are your “Retail off the internet” materials mil spec, all quality grades necessary for LVs and spacecraft? Are the facilities costs zero? Does no one require being paid? etc…

          For the record, you didn’t make me mad. I tried to explain to you that your proposal for NASA to build LVs and spacecraft itself isn’t going to fly; for example, your “posted math” leaves out more costs than it includes. I’m not mad; I was not attacking you; I was trying to explain that I think your proposal is invalid, and some of the reasons why. I was trying to help. Think about it at the most basic level, out of all the many thousands of people involved are you the only one to have thought of something so fundamental, a game changer, a new paradigm? If such a fundamental concept was valid, don’t you think that many people before you and I would have thought of it before now? Would we not have seen it written about by other people in other places? If it were valid I think we would have seen it proposed repeatedly starting many years ago. I have never seen it proposed, and although I’m not a high-level expert in LV and spacecraft manufacturing, I’ve edited many books on space and NASA (I’m now retired), and even written a few. Before that I worked in aerospace (design, not manufacturing). I’ve read anything related to space and its hardware that I could get my hands on since I was a teenager. All in all, I think it’s fair to say that if anything had been proposed before now I would have likely seen some reference to it.

          I’m sorry if I’ve upset you. I won’t bring it up again.

          With respect,

          Steve

          • Paul451 says:
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            “Why did bring up Titan II then if it’s irrelevant to your argument?”

            Steve, I believe S13’s (repeated) premise is that NASA could save money buy hiring a bunch of engineers and constructing its own launchers in-house, much like SpaceX is doing. With a cost not much more than the raw material costs (presumably the labour cost would be offset by eliminating admin staff associated with the external programs). And since he had the numbers at hand, he used Titan IIas an example, but the actual vehicle is not significant. He just wants NASA to do it in-house.

            “out of all the many thousands of people involved are you the only one to have thought of something so fundamental, a game changer, a new paradigm? If such a fundamental concept was valid, don’t you think that many people before you and I would have thought of it before now?”

            They have. Isn’t he describing SpaceX’s development philosophy? Keep as much as possible in-house. And they’ve claimed that their costs and delays multiply significantly every time they have to work with an outside company/agency. NASA’s development philosophy (and that of the primes) is the opposite, to spread the work as widely, and involve as many entities, as possible.

          • Steve Whitfield says:
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            Paul,

            I hear what you’re saying, but then it goes back to an earlier set of posts where I asked him how he was going to get away with firing many thousands of NASA and contractor employees and hiring a small work force of alternative people, with different skill sets, to replace them.

            I think that what SpaceX is doing technically is evolution (in small steps), much as has been the case with EELVs, but what we ideally need is one or more revolutions. As for company structure and philosophy, a small start-up can do what SpaceX has done, but a huge set-up like the NASA/contractor situation, entrenched in and addicted to its empire-building structure, can not be turned into anything else than what it has already become. A small skunk works-type offshoot is about the best we could hope for, and historically such ventures don’t excel for more than a few years (why they don’t is probably a pretty ugly story). NASA will never be a SpaceX-like organization, but I’m not going to type all the reasons. The readers here either already know them or wouldn’t accept them if stated. I don’t foresee any middle ground.

            I believe that NASA has the potential (although many people don’t) to gives us needed revolutions, if it alters its habits and its goals accordingly, because it is not constrained by the need to make a monetary profit, and because it can exchange and share information and services with companies, whereas the companies don’t share among themselves, being competitors.

            Now, if Elon Musk suddenly had Bill Gates’ money, I might have to retract that statement.

            So, I may be completely wrong, but I don’t see the two situations as being equal or even comparable.

            Steve

  4. dogstar29 says:
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    The problem for NASA is not finding ways to mitigate climate change. The problem is that many people within NASA are politicized, and their positions are determined not by any objective discussion of the facts, but by what position they believe is favored by “liberals” or “conservatives”. Consequently we have politicians (including Adams and Posey, the representatives from the KSC area) who quite literally believe NASA funding for climate research should be terminated because climate research is a liberal plot. They are not interested in the facts, because in the political sphere facts are irrelevant. It’s unfortunate that the authors of the letter make factual claims based on their political beliefs.

  5. kapzen says:
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     http://wattsupwiththat.com/

    The inventor of AGW also predicted an ice-age just 20 years before he made a U-turn. And now he is resorting to “adjusting” data and deleting e-mails and pressuring magazines to reject critical research articles that don’t fit his own views.

    And no one ever explained to me why central Europe (GER-where I am located) is seeing one cold and rainy summer after another and yet every year they claim “it is the warmest year ever in Germany” while people are letting their heating systems run year-round which they did not have to 20 years ago.

    And why is the sea level FALLING despite the (supposedly) ever rising (and accelerating!) temperatures? They felt the need to adjust for the rise of the continents after being freed from the weight of the glaciers of the ice age – whcih is still continuing until today, so they can partially hide the decline in sea levels.

    I believe the “experts” are being blinded by their “expertise”.

    I may not have a PhD in climatology, but then again I deny that climatology is really “science” to begin with, or at least the way it is handeled nowadays by the supposed “overwhelming majority”. And the chief of the IPCC, THE “authority” on everything climate-change (or climate armageddon) is a railway engineer.

    • dogstar29 says:
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      Europe is heated by the Gulf Stream, otherwise it would be as cold as Moscow. Melting of the Arctic Ocean ice is creating a freshwater buildup in the North Atlantic that is deflecting the Gulf Stream southward, leaving Europe cooler. Presumably when the ice all melts Europe will warm up, but since it is at such a high latitude this will still be dependent on the ocean currents. Sea levels are clearly rising in the latitudes where there are no glaciers, like Florida, where MSL has increased more than a foot over the past century. The solution to the uncertainty that still exists is to gather more facts. http://research.fit.edu/sea… ). 

      • Anonymous says:
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        like Florida, where MSL has increased more than a foot over the past century.

        If you actually read the linked paper the sea hight has increased at Key west by 30 cm in 136 years (11.8 inches), with a rate increase that began in 1923 (to a 75% confidence level).  Lack of accuracy when referencing papers does not add knowledge.

  6. bascientist says:
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    There are always people who want absolute proof before they take any action. Two good examples are the link between tobacco use and cancer and the now emerging relationship between cell phone use and brain cancer. The situation here is very similar to the above two examples. The oil companies are now campaigning via TV adds against global warming. One doesn’t have to look very hard to see evidence
    of the problem. For example these two articles that were quoted by yahoo weather

    http://www.chicagotribune.c

    http://www.statesman.com/ne

  7. no one of consequence says:
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    http://www.smbc-comics.com/

  8. CrossoverManiac says:
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    The Guardian and Huffington Post has no shame as they lash out at anyone that steps out of line and don’t jump on the anthropogenic global warming bandwagon, even so far as to claim that these NASA .  Even if these former NASA employees are wrong and human activities do cause global warming, the Guardian and Huffington Post should have been more respectful and even handed about the story rather than join forces with Greenpeace and play the role of a partisan advocate for climate change policy.