Roy Spencer (scientist)

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Roy W. Spencer is a principal research scientist for University of Alabama in Huntsville. In the past, he served as Senior Scientist for Climate Studies at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center in Huntsville, Alabama. Spencer is a recipient of NASA's Medal for Exceptional Scientific Achievement.

He is principally known for his satellite-based temperature monitoring work, for which he was awarded the American Meteorological Society's Special Award. He is also a supporter of intelligent design[1] and is skeptical of the scientific consensus that human activity is primarily responsible for global warming.

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[edit] Contributions to science

Spencer designed an algorithm to detect tropical cyclones and estimate their maximum sustained wind speed using the Advanced Microwave Sounding Unit (AMSU) at the University of Alabama in Huntsville. The AMSU is microwave radiometer that can be used to detect temperature at different levels of the atmosphere. Based on gradients in temperature measurements in a given area, it is possible to estimate maximal sustained radial wind speed. [2]

[edit] Climate Change Research

Spencer is proposing hypotheses on climate change and modeling them.

[edit] Stabilizing "Infrared Iris" Effect

In August, 2007, Spencer published an article in Geophysical Research Letters regarding cloud feedback in the tropics. [3] Current understanding of the climate system predicts that an increase in high-level, heat trapping clouds will accelerate the warming due to increasing concentrations of greenhouse gases. Spencer's observations in the tropics found a negative feedback, though this was on a different time scale than climate models. The feedback possibly supports Richard Lindzen's Infrared Iris hypothesis of compensating meteorological processes that tend to stabilize climate change.[4]

In a subsequent press release Spencer said, "To give an idea of how strong this enhanced cooling mechanism is, if it was operating on global warming, it would reduce estimates of future warming by over 75 percent," Spencer said. "The big question that no one can answer right now is whether this enhanced cooling mechanism applies to global warming." [5]

[edit] Feedback of Cloud "Noise"

Spencer finds that:[6][7]

". . .daily noise in the Earth's cloud cover amount can cause feedback estimates from observational data to be biased in the positive direction, making the climate system look more sensitive to manmade greenhouse gas emissions than it really is."

[edit] Internal Radiative Forcing

Spencer hypothesizes there is an "Internal Radiative Forcing" affecting climate variability.[7][8]

" . . .mixing up of cause and effect when observing natural climate variability can lead to the mistaken conclusion that the climate system is more sensitive to greenhouse gas emissions than it really is. It also shows that a small change in cloud cover hypothesized to occur with the El Nino/La Nina and Pacific Decadal Oscillation modes of natural climate variability can explain most of the major features of global average temperature change in the last century, including 70% of the warming trend. While this does not prove that global warming is mostly natural, it provides a quantitative mechanism for the (minority) view that global warming is mostly a manifestation of natural internal climate variability."

[edit] Views on global warming

Roy Spencer describes himself as a global warming optimist working to quantify Nature's thermostat.[7] In several articles Spencer has espoused opinions that are skeptical of the scientific opinion on global warming.

In 2006 Spencer criticized Al Gore's An Inconvenient Truth saying, "For instance, Mr. Gore claims that the Earth is now warmer than it has been in thousands of years. Yet the latest National Academies of Science (NAS) report on the subject has now admitted that all we really know is that we are warmer now than we were during the last 400 years, which is mostly made up of the 'Little Ice Age.'" [9] The NAS report summary (p.3) [10] states:

"It can be said with a high level of confidence that global mean surface temperature was higher during the last few decades of the 20th century than during any comparable period during the preceding four centuries. This statement is justified by the consistency of the evidence from a wide variety of geographically diverse proxies.
"Less confidence can be placed in large-scale surface temperature reconstructions for the period from A.D. 900 to 1600. Presently available proxy evidence indicates that temperatures at many, but not all, individual locations were higher during the past 25 years than during any period of comparable length since A.D. 900. The uncertainties associated with reconstructing hemispheric mean or global mean temperatures from these data increase substantially backward in time through this period and are not yet fully quantified."

In a New York Post opinion column on February 26, 2007, Spencer wrote:

Contrary to popular accounts, very few scientists in the world - possibly none - have a sufficiently thorough, "big picture" understanding of the climate system to be relied upon for a prediction of the magnitude of global warming. To the public, we all might seem like experts, but the vast majority of us work on only a small portion of the problem. [11]

In an interview with conservative talk show host Rush Limbaugh on February 28, 2007, Spencer stated that he doesn't believe "catastrophic manmade global warming" is occurring. He also criticized climate models, saying "The people that have built the climate models that predict global warming believe they have sufficient physics in those models to predict the future. I believe they don't. I believe the climate system, the weather as it is today in the real world shows a stability that they do not yet have in those climate models."[12] Roy Spencer is also included in a film that argues against the theory of man-made global warming called "The Great Global Warming Swindle."

He has been referred to as the "official climatologist of the EIB Network" by Rush Limbaugh, who is the owner of the Excellence In Broadcasting network.[13]

He testified before the Waxman committee's examination of political interference with climate science on March 19, 2007.[14][15]

In 2008, Spencer published a book on climate change: Climate Confusion: How Global Warming Hysteria Leads to Bad Science, Pandering Politicians and Misguided Policies that Hurt the Poor.[16]

Spencer is listed as a member of the Heartland Institute and a contributor to the George C. Marshall Institute.

[edit] Views on Intelligent design

On the subject of Intelligent design, Spencer wrote in 2005, "Twenty years ago, as a PhD scientist, I intensely studied the evolution versus intelligent design controversy for about two years. And finally, despite my previous acceptance of evolutionary theory as 'fact,' I came to the realization that intelligent design, as a theory of origins, is no more religious, and no less scientific, than evolutionism. . . . In the scientific community, I am not alone. There are many fine books out there on the subject. Curiously, most of the books are written by scientists who lost faith in evolution as adults, after they learned how to apply the analytical tools they were taught in college."[1]

[edit] See also

[edit] Awards

  1. 1989: MSFC Center Director’s Commendation
  2. 1990: Alabama House of Representatives Resolution #624
  3. 1991: NASA Exceptional Scientific Achievement Medal (with John Christy)
  4. 1996: AMS Special Award "for developing a global, precise record of earth's temperature from operational polar-orbiting satellites, fundamentally advancing our ability to monitor climate." (with John Christy)[2]

[edit] Publications & Selected Papers

  • Spencer, R.W. (2008). Climate Confusion: How Global Warming Hysteria Leads to Bad Science, Pandering Politicians and Misguided Policies that Hurt the Poor. ISBN-10: 1594032106. 
  1. Spencer, R.W., et al. Cloud and radiation budget changes associated with tropical intraseasonal oscillations - Geophys. Res. Lett, 2007
  2. Spencer, R.W., and W.D. Braswell, 1997: How dry is the tropical free troposphere? Implications for global warming theory. Bull. Amer. Meteor. Soc., 78.
  3. Christy, John R., R.W. Spencer, and W.D. Braswell, 1997: How accurate are satellite thermometers? Nature, 25 September.
  4. Spencer, R.W., J.R. Christy, and N.C. Grody, 1996: Analysis of "Examination of ‘Global atmospheric temperature monitoring with satellite microwave measurements’". Climatic Change, 33, 477-489.
  5. Spencer, R.W., W. M. Lapenta, and F. R. Robertson, 1995: Vorticity and vertical motions diagnosed from satellite deep layer temperatures. Mon. Wea. Rev., 123,1800-1810.
  6. Christy, J.R., R.W. Spencer, and R.T. McNider, 1995: Reducing noise in the MSU daily lower-tropospheric temperature dataset. J. Climate, 8, 888-896.
  7. Spencer, R.W., R.E. Hood, F.J. LaFontaine, E.A. Smith, R. Platt, J. Galliano, V.L. Griffin, and E. Lobl, 1994: High-resolution imaging of rain systems with the Advanced Microwave Precipitation Radiometer. J. Atmos. Oceanic Tech., 11, 849-857.
  8. Spencer, R.W., 1994: Global temperature monitoring from space. Adv. Space Res., 14, (1)69-(1)75.
  9. Spencer, R.W., 1993: Global oceanic precipitation from the MSU during 1979-92 and comparisons to other climatologies. J. Climate, 6, 1301-1326.
  10. Spencer, R.W., and J.R. Christy, 1993: Precision lower stratospheric temperature monitoring with the MSU: Technique, validation, and results 1979-91. J. Climate, 6, 1301-1326.
  11. Spencer, R.W., and J.R. Christy, 1992a: Precision and radiosonde validation of satellite gridpoint temperature anomalies, Part I: MSU channel 2. J. Climate, 5, 847-857.
  12. Spencer, R.W., and J.R. Christy, 1992b: Precision and radiosonde validation of satellite gridpoint temperature anomalies, Part II: A tropospheric retrieval and trends during 1979-90. J. Climate, 5, 858-866.
  13. Spencer, R.W., J.R. Christy, and N.C. Grody, 1990: Global atmospheric temperature monitoring with satellite microwave measurements: Method and results, 1979-84. J. Climate, 3, 1111-1128.
  14. Spencer, R.W., and J.R. Christy, 1990: Precise monitoring of global temperature trends from satellites. Science, 247, 1558-1562.
  15. Spencer, R.W., D.W. Martin, B.B. Hinton, and J.A. Weinman, 1983: Satellite microwave radiances correlated with radar rain rates over land. Nature, 304, 141-143.

[edit] References

Wikiquote has a collection of quotations related to:
  1. ^ a b Faith-Based Evolution, Roy Spencer, TCS Daily, 08 August 2005
  2. ^ Detecting Tropical Cyclones Using AMSU
  3. ^ Cloud and radiation budget changes associated with tropical intraseasonal oscillations
  4. ^ Richard S. Lindzen, Ming-Dah Chou, and Arthur Y. Hou (2001). Does the Earth Have an Adaptive Infrared Iris?.
  5. ^ Cirrus disappearance: Warming might thin heat-trapping clouds
  6. ^ Roy Spencer, "Potential Biases in Feedback Diagnosis from Observational Data: A Simple Model Description", Journal of Climate (pending publication).
  7. ^ a b c Roy W. Spencer, PhD. "Global Warming and Nature's Thermostat". WeatherQuestions.com. Retrieved on 2008-05-12.
  8. ^ Roy W. Spencer, "Evidence for Internal Radiative Forcing of Climate Change". (In Review, April 19, 2008)
  9. ^ Star Search by Roy Spencer
  10. ^ Surface Temperature Reconstructions for the Last 2,000 Years
  11. ^ Spencer, Roy W.. "NOT THAT SIMPLE / GLOBAL WARMING: WHAT WE DON'T KNOW", New York Post, 2007-02-26. Retrieved on 2007-04-07. 
  12. ^ [1]
  13. ^ A Dispatch from Roy Spencer, Rush Limbaugh Show website
  14. ^ Spencer, Roy W. (2007-03-19). STATEMENT TO THE COMMITTEE ON OVERSIGHT AND GOVERNMENT REFORM OF THE UNITED STATES HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES (PDF). House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform. Retrieved on 2007-03-07.
  15. ^ Committee Examines Political Interference with Climate Science. House Committee on Oversight and Government Reform (2007-03-19).
  16. ^ Climate Confusion

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