By ROBERT SEITZ

In my commentary of April 9, “We don’t need Alaska Climate Change Emergency Response Commission,” I covered that Alaska is not warming at two to four times faster than the rest of the world. 

I brought out that the comparisons are made with average annual temperature anomalies which have higher values when compared with the average over long period of time. I stated in that commentary that “If  you look at the data, you will find that while the comparison of average annual temperature reveal larger anomaly values for recent times, but you will also note that the high temperatures (summer temperatures) are not much different than they have been for a long time. It is a climate crisis sleight of hand, because the real change is not greater heat, but a lot less extreme cold.”

The average annual temperatures on the North Slope and in the Interior are still below freezing.  

One commenter, who made many comments, was hung up on the official national and international climate reports and quite unwilling to see that the official data interpretation may be flawed. This commentary is directed to Steve and any others who think the UN and IPCC have any goal other than domination of all things environmental, which includes the entire population of earth. 

I am not impressed by climate science as they seem miss the truth that science can help us find, and they do that by looking at the data wrongly. I looked at their data and found that Annual Average temperature data that shows a positive anomaly does not mean the summers are hotter, or even that the oceans are hotter. The average summer temperature is not higher; it is the average annual temperature anomaly that is higher. There is a big difference.

Every time I hear or read that the ocean is boiling I go on line to look at current ocean surface temperatures, and have usually found that the current temperatures were somewhere 3-4 degrees below the average for that month. I saw the reports of 100 degrees and higher temperatures and doubted them immediately. Being an expert in oceanographic instrumentation and physical oceanography I know that 100 degrees would be very difficult to attain, even near Florida.  

The one computation the Climate Science group provides that makes no sense at all to me is the Average Annual World Temperature. I can think of no practical or meaningful way they can arrive at such a value that could be considered valid.  But, they have a process that produces a result that keeps the masses excited about GHG warming so they stay happy. The rest of us who really apply science and look for real results can see the scam.

I stated previously what made the jet stream deviate from its recent past traditional patterns. Remember the Little Ice Age which brought a lot of cold a few hundred years ago?  Well it warmed up since then from the solar energy the earth received during the intervening years and a lot of ice melted and a lot of the cold went away. It was not warming from greenhouse gases that caused the changes. Tracking the jet stream will provide a lot more understanding of what the weather is around the world than will the running of computer climate models.

Steve, you are correct, weather is not climate, but weather is what we can experience, while climate is something we can analyze. It is the conclusions one makes after the analysis that make the difference. I have lived in Alaska for more than 80 years. I contend that if the weather doesn’t seem much different than in the past, it isn’t much different. I have experienced temperatures near 100 degrees in the Interior of Alaska in the mid 1940s and also in later years. 

What I know is that we have less cold than we used to have, but the summers are about the same temperature. We get warmer weather in the summer, in any location when high pressure areas persist for a long period of time. In Alaska and other northern areas high pressure areas in the winter make the area colder. The less cold winters provide that the date of last freeze in the spring is earlier and the first freeze in the fall is later to extend our growing season.

As for the Arctic Sea Ice, I find that the Sea Ice immediately surrounding Alaska has been recovering pretty well since the 2012 low ice year. The Bering Sea and Chukchi Seas seem to be near winter normals and have some ice area retained through the summer for 2023 and 2024. The Beaufort Sea has not had summer ice area recede as far as it did in 2012.   While the Arctic Sea ice is at low level, the sea ice immediately around Alaska has been recovering and is not at its minimum level.  

I have used Arctic Sea Ice data from NOAA’s National Centers for Environmental Information for the last five or six years. The announcement that they have decommissioned its snow and ice data products as of Monday took me by surprise. This is one set of data that has details of ice area and ice extent which is very useful for other than climate analysis, but also good for evaluation of the daily and monthly response to the weather. I hope the Alaska delegation will work to get this effort recommissioned.

The Chinook we had this spring is not new and has happened man times over my lifetime. Every time the “Arctic Express” sends cold air and snow to Florida and Louisiana, warm wet air will be sucked up from the North Pacific Ocean into Alaska. These events will have a temporary impact on local weather and will provide an early spring or other similar event.

We Alaskans must get the climate/weather challenge figured out very soon. While there is lots of evidence that greenhouse gas is not actually causing global heating there are enough people around the world who accept this whole heartedly and who are working hard at this time to halt production of all hydrocarbon fuels. 

The other side of the argument sees great benefit for agriculture from increased CO2 levels. The increased growing season is seen as a great benefit as well. The unfettered production of hydrocarbon fuels in Alaska will help us fill our treasury, allow development of an actual fiscal plan and remove the pressure on Permanent Fund dividends to be the filler for an unbalanced budget.  

With Washington State leading the fight against President Donald Trump and Alaska’s efforts increase energy independence and to help the economy by increased production of hydrocarbon fuels and increased production from metal mines the climate issue is the point about which the lawsuits and arguments will be centered. We need to keep monitoring air, sea and soil temperatures just so we can keep track of what is really happening, but we need to quit monitoring the CO2 and methane that might be released as soil in the Arctic thaws  seasonally or even if some amount of permafrost thaws.  

For the foreseeable future Cook Inlet Gas and North Slope gas into Fairbanks should be considered as the best way for a sustainable and resilient power system for the Railbelt. As innovations in energy storage, and wind, Solar, Cook Inlet tidal and geothermal power are worked at we can be secure through winters in Alaska which can still be cold. Our focus needs to be on energy and economy. It is important for all Alaskans to really understand that CO2 and CH4 are not the cause of the end of the world. 

It is time to quit pushing so hard to transition to renewable energy at the expense of hydrocarbon energy so that we can keep a good percentage of high inertia power sources in any electrical system.

Robert Seitz is a professional electrical engineer and lifelong concerned Alaskan.