Block’s Indicator of Sustainable Growth

by Ray Block

Climategate in November 2009 is the name global warming sceptics gave to the theft of 61 megabytes of material from the University of East Anglia, Norwich, UK. The cache contained hundreds of files, code and documents from the University of East Anglia’s Climate Research Centre, which Russian or Chinese hackers had stolen and subsequently leaked around the world.

The sceptics rubbed their hands with glee. Embarrassing as the leaks were, they showed exaggeration, and possibly some manipulation of the scientific data. The Telegraph London was a major recipient of the sceptics having a field day. It had the atmospherics of an English foxhunt, with the sceptics on horseback.

Glaciergate in December saw concerted attacks on the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) peer group reports, particularly that of 2007. The sceptics cast their greatest censure on Dr Rajendra Pachauri, the chairman of the IPCC. Sceptics whipped up calls for Pachauri’s resignation.

One claim in the 2007 report from an obscure Indian scientist that the Himalayan glaciers, so vital to the Indian and Chinese river systems, could melt to the stage of vanishing by 2035, was itself subsequently disowned by the IPCC.

Treegate is my idea, but who knows the sceptics may be hot on the scent.

There were three separate reports in recent months from the science media that global warming is causing some tree species growing faster.

Four researchers from the Tree-ring Research Lab of the University of Arizona say that ancient pines close to treeline have wider annual growth rings for the period from 1951 to 2000 than in the previous 3,700 years. Regional temperatures have increased, particularly at high elevations, during the same 50 year time period. The tree stands in eastern California and Nevada are separated by hundreds of metres.

The original report is from “Recent unprecedented tree-ring growth in bristlecone pine at the highest elevation and possible causes.” Proceedings of the National Academy of Science 2009. Co-author Matthew Salzer said, “Only trees within 150 metres of treeline showed the surge in growth. In general, those trees were at or about 3,300 metres in elevation. This tree species is said to be the oldest on the planet.

“You can come downslope less than 200 vertical metres and sample the same species of tree, and it won’t show the same wide band of growth, said Salzer.”

Co-author Malcolm Hughes said, “Something very unusual at high elevations is happening.  The higher you go, the faster it’s warming.”

The second case study from four scientists at the University of Wisconsin- Madison and the University of Minnesota at Morris (UMM) (Global Change Biology December 4 2009) reported a new study of 919 quaking aspen trees in Wisconsin. The tree study subjected to tree-ring analysis showed that “elevated levels of atmospheric CO2 during the past 50 years have boosted aspen growth rates by an astonishing 50 per cent.”

Aspen and their poplar cousin is a dominant tree in mountainous and northern forested regions of the US and Canada. “We cannot forecast ecological change, said Don Waller, professor of Botany at UW-Madison. It’s a complicated business.”

The third case study, (Science Daily (February 2 2010) involved the growth of 55 stands of mixed hardwood forest plots in Maryland, which has been tracked by forest ecologist, Geoffrey Parker for more than 20 years at the Smithsonian Environmental Research Centre in Edgewater. As in the two other case studies, the trees are growing at an accelerated rate. The science report is in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Something unusual is happening, and the scientists can’t really understand it. But perhaps the sceptics will discover another sinister plot. Let’s wait and see.