William M. Briggs, Statistician » Two New Papers vs. BEST: Guest Post by Lüdecke, Link, and Ewert

LL demonstrates that the 20th century’s global warming was predominantly a natural 100-year fluctuation. The leftovers are caused by UHI, the warming effect by increasing station elevation, changes to the screens and their environments in the 1970s, variations in the sun’s magnetic field that could influence the amount of clouds, warming caused by increasing anthropogenic CO2, and further unknown effects.

Greenpeace stages protest at South African coal power station | Environment | guardian.co.uk

Melita Steele, a Greenpeace climate change expert, said the protest started at dawn Monday at the Kusile power station with activists chaining themselves to the gates of the construction site. Security guards later cut the chain. Steele said six activists climbed a crane at the site and were dangling there from ropes with a banner declaring: "Kusile – climate killer."

Eskom, the state-owned power company, says it needs Kusile because of rising electricity demand.

Deer, antelope harvest down in northeast Montana due to tough winter, disease | The Republic

The agency cut antelope hunting licenses after heavy snows over the winter prevented antelope from reaching forage and many starved to death. Game check stations this fall show harvest down 71 percent from last year, and a 79 percent reduction in the long-term average.

Straight Talk on Rising Seas in a Warming World - NYTimes.com

Among other things, he speaks about the recent study that, using patterns in layered salt marsh sediment, found a sharp recent uptick in the rate of sea-level rise after 2,000 years of fairly stable conditions — a pattern Willis refers to as a “sea-level hockey stick” — an allusion to the suite of studies finding a similar pattern for global surface temperatures (albeit a hockey stick with a warped shaft).