So what happened to global warming?
It’s not just that it’s disappeared from media headlines this year - shoved off by the credit crunch and natural disasters, for example. It can’t be ignored that 2007 came and went as another very warm year - the 7th hottest on record since 1850 according to the World Meteorological Organization.
But it wasn’t a record. In fact that was 1998, a full 10 years ago — the year of an exceptional El Nino, a Pacific weather pattern which heats the whole globe. So is global warming not living up to the hype?
Two weeks ago Leibniz Institute’s Noel Keenlyside stirred an academic hornet’s
nest by saying that we may have to wait longer - a decade or more - for another
peak year, because a natural weakening in ocean currents may be cooling sea
temperatures.
Many scientists flatly rejected the idea, saying Keenlyside had over-estimated the effect. But some pointed out that a recent switch in a weather pattern called the North Atlantic Oscillation could indeed cool temperatures globally.
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change said last year recent warming was
“unequivocal” and most of it ”very likely” manmade. And almost all scientists in the latest debate, including Keenlyside, agree that any temporary cooling doesn’t alter that - blips due to natural effects are to be expected.
But how long is a blip? No-one knows.
It could be many years before there’s an El Nino as bad as 1998, scientists say. And in the meantime the doubts will grow, just as policymakers try to negotiate one of the most complex global treaties ever. A new Kyoto Protocol will affect issues of equity and poverty: in the case of poor countries the right to grow, for island states perhaps the right to exist, and for rich countries the right to compete on a level economic playing field.
Meanwhile one or two doubters are already saying the present lull in warming
casts doubt on just how far manmade greenhouse gases are influencing the climate. MIT’s Richard Lindzen reckoned that if it was as bad as all that temperatures would be rising faster.
What do you think?
Trackback
35 comments so far
Previous | 2 | 1 | Next
It astounds me that so many people decide that global warming is a myth and that it is all just natural causes and that there’s hype about nothing.
I am a trained earth scientist. I have looked at the data. I always have an inclination to look at matters coldly and flatly and decide on the evidence presented.
What I find most disturbing is that there is PLETHORA of evidence to support the fact that the earth is undergoing climatic change and this evidence is overwhelming in the fact that it is human casued!
The earth has undergone climate change before, and yes ice ages have come and gone, but have also taken 10,000 years and more to make that change. The earth has also seen warming before, and yes, some of it due to increasing CO2 levels in the atmosphere, and yes, the CO2 has been as a result of natural causes, but again, this change occurred over tens of thoudsands of years, not hundreds of years! The difference is, that in the long past, species has had time to evolve (although 10,000 years is extremely quick in the eyes of evolution, a timescale of 100s of years to evolve to new conditions is CATASTROPHIC!).
The facts are staring us straight in the eye - a global AVERAGE (not everywhere!!) of 1 degree centigrade would cause huge problems - a 4 degree change in 100 years - which is what we could see - would mean vegetation extinction as they have not got enough time to grow and migrate with the temperatures. Less vegetation means less CO2 being converted back to oxygen, meaning increased temperatures, meaning increased species extinction meaning less vegetation meaning less CO2 being converted to oxygen - get the drift?
It’s simple - there is no conspiracy. The scientists have not got it wrong. The climate is changin, and the earth will change with it, and we are at the verge of the larges, greates extinction event ever! Forget the great extinction events of the past (such as the permian triassic event) - this now includes our own long term survival, as human beings.
Ignoring this fact is at our own peril!
- Posted by AlanIf humans are causing the global warming with the use of burning fossil fuels over the last century or two, what caused the reduction of the ice age over the last 30-40 thousend years before humans were burning fossil fuels?
- Posted by Fred CullWhat is wrong with us? Do you not remember back only 30 some years ago it was going to be an ICE AGE that was going to destroy us? I am so disgusted with the insane ignorance of most “regular” people and our so called “savior government” who have fallen so far into this, what one of our most well know and respected climatologists Dr. Phil Gray has called “The Greatest Hoax Ever Puled On the American Public” Global Warming. Not only is it insane but the “culprit” put forth by the ALGORE cult “CO2″ is one of the necessities of life itself. If they want to start taxing CO2 they better hook up every living and breathing organism on the planet because that is where most of it is coming from.
As for the Nuclear Power proponents I just ask what do we do with the waste that is deadly for 10,000 years? That is not figured into the cost of the electricity produced. Also every Nuclear Plant is a Deadly Terrorist Target and the cost of Protecting those plants against that terrible threat has never even been discussed to my knowledge.
- Posted by Craigpeople around the world is detroying the environment with trash!!!!
- Posted by Joya hekkanenJessie…
I never thought about it that way….
- Posted by JessieI had no idea the anti carbon tax lobby would attack this article with such abandon!
In reality though, as a response to the original article, I think that the lack of AGW in the media is due to the fact that there are much bigger stories (rev Wright and Bittergate) that have been hogging the spotlight this year. Of course thats the same conclusion you came to.
I think there’s also tremendous work done to confuse people. Oil companies (As per Exxon Mobil) spend huge amounts of money funding the extremely partisan “global warming debunking” groups.
In the end, denial of AGW requires denial of many prominent groups, including NASA (which has the largest concentration of climatologists). Ultimately it stems from a couple of things though, lack of immediate and obvious consequences being the most prominent. The other, being what was mentioned so many times already: the weather.
While it is neat to say things like “we couldnt measure the temperature or Co2 levels of the atmosphere in the 19th century” it’s really a lie. There are several ways to test both, most notably measurements of ice. Ice that is decreasing at an ever increasing rate in the arctic.
In the end though, refusal to reduce CO2 emissions do not carry any positive potentials. From the melting of the arctic ice, to the exponential release of what was formerly frozen methane gas (a greenhouse gas) to the acidification of the ocean, one of our greatest food sources.
In the end, continuing production of CO2 on a large scale serves only to benefit those who produce it on such a large scale, energy companies who thrive on oil and coal.
- Posted by TravisPolitical… If your conservative, you are suppose to think anyone concerned about the environment is a whaco, If you are liberal, you are suppose to embrace “green” and global warming initiatives.
I dont think we have enough data to decide either way about global warming. We do have enough data to support being good stewards of our environment - for us and for our kids.
Yes, there may be those who dont practice at all what they preach, but that doesn’t releive any of us our responsibility to the planet that we all (democrats and republicans) drink, eat, and breathe on.
To me, it isn’t political, it is common sense.
- Posted by Dave BarryLet me first say that I am a former science teacher with a degree in Biology who is now a school district superintendent. I am very concerned about the indoctrination of our children with any political viewpoint. I believe that a good teacher does not push children one way or the other, rather teaches them to think for themselves and learn how to collect and analyze data. Yet the propoganda piece of movie magic that Al Gore put out is in nearly every school and pushed by most science and elementary teachers. (Thanks, non-analyzing, left-leaning mainstream media!)
I believe as many do that nearly all of the AGW hype is for political purposes. Al Gore has been shown to be a charleton both in his lying and misrepresentation of facts in his film as well as his contradictory lifestyle.
That said, if these enviropolitical activists really analyzed their arguments, there is a serious conflict. For years they have complained that we are cutting down too many trees and not protecting our existing forests. More CO2 in the climate coupled with warmer temperatures would make for better growing conditions for our forests and farmers. CO2 is not - NOT - a pollutant. It is a critical ingredient for photosynthesis!
Fear! It is what the left uses to try to gain power and marginalize opponents. Live free of fear - support freedom.
- Posted by JeffI am constantly amazed that this topic hogs up all the headlines. It seems as though the debate of whether it is man made or a natural occurance, warming into the future or cooling is purely academic in nature, when the real topic of discussion should be that you cannot go anywhere in the world anymore without seeing, breathing, feeling, tasting and hearing pollution all around you - and the effects of it is astounding. Whether or not there is global warming, we are doing a terrible job of managing what resources we have left.
John
- Posted by John GudenkaufI would echo what Forrest has said. I am an engineer also, and as such seek efficiencies in everything I do. I also started off believing in the global warming hype. After much study myself, I have also concluded that what we have been witnessing is nothing more than natural variation from a multitude of factors. Most to complex to model. I reject the overblown CO2 sensitivities and lack of meaningful variables such as the sun spot cycle modelers have used to scare the populace. I believe what we have seen is the hijacking of a noble branch of science. Unfortunately, it will probably take years(perhaps a generation) for climatology to recover as a science that will be seen as credible. The global warming alarmists have done us all a disservice in more ways than just financial.
- Posted by RangerI want to thank Jim Peden for providing the link to the ClimateChange.doc paper. Like Larry, I am an engineer also. I happen to work in the nuclear energy industry which has much to gain from the acceptance of the CO2 driven AGW hoax. I have been a “denier” for some time and don’t really care if the fraud of global warming is finally exposed and the nuclear industry takes a dive (again). I hope it doesn’t because nuclear power really is a great way to go, but that’s another fight.
I didn’t really examine the paper in detail, but the important facts are there. If this could be distilled into something that the general public could understand, along with a few graphics, then maybe Algore and his ilk could finally be exposed for their lies. I recently had the opportunity to work on infrared CO2 gas detectors, and what I learned about CO2 energy absorption makes the truth of the paper’s conclusions painfully obvious: any level of atomospheric CO2 above a minimal amount, well below the current level, will NOT cause any perceptible change in global temperature. If I understand the science correctly, the IR wavelengths that CO2 can absorb will ALL get absorbed by CO2 and water vapor over a certain mininal distance and therefore are completely filtered out within that distance. Due to the conservation of energy, changing the concentration of GHG will only change the elevational distribution of any temperature changes but will not alter the overall temperature change.
- Posted by Tom LThe latest and greatest comments concern La Nina (making things cooler) and El Nino (making things warmer), but these events have been going on for thousands of years, at least long before there was any Industrial CO2 to cause any problem. This and many other natural events are much more likely to cause any climate change than the slight increase in the non-polluting CO2, a gas that is absolutely necesarry for life on our planet.
- Posted by NoOneI started out “believing” in Global Warming because the media and scientists said it was “fact”. My sister asked what I thought about GW so I decided I should research it for myself. I am not a scientist, but I am an engineer and make my living trying to understand data and how to control it. After all of my study, I have concluded (like so many others) GW is nothing but a political movement with no compelling science and no direct evidence that man is the problem. Everything is a theory with nothing but antidotal evidence (if you can call the polar bear that) to support it. The computer models are a joke. If a model can’t reconstruct the past, how can we trust it to predict the future? They tune the model outputs to support their underlying theories!
I do believe Global Warming will be a disaster for the planet. But it won’t be from climate change, it will be from the extraordinary measures our governments are going to take to “control” it. I guess that is the most amazing thing about this entire debate. Even after spending trillions of dollars, no one really expects it to make any real difference; with the exception that a lot of people (like Al Gore) are going to make massive amounts of money. Of course we all know who will pay for it.
- Posted by LarryHi everyone, I am an AGW denirer, My name is Forrest. I suppose that my denial comes from 15 years of caring and examining all the applicable data that has been avaialable to me, a love of math, statistical analysis, etc and so on.
I love being compared to people who believe the earth is flat, and think it is lovely that so many have taken pains to see that my judgement and ability to understand complex issues are so easily dismissed because I do not agree with their statements.
I love the earth and the enviroment, I ride an electric scooter ( because it is cheap ), and believe that people should be responsible for themselves.
I also believe that the Earth, by all accounts has warmed over the last hundred years. Most notebly if you examine the last 29 years you can see that the earth had warmed.
I also can see that in the last decade it has a cooling trend.
I suppose I need to go on a 12 steps program… I need to accept a belief in a higher power ( ‘Scientist and AL GORE’ ) and turn my life over to that higher power… Maybe then and only then I will be able to shake off this horrible, horrible problem of denying AGW… If only I could shut my brain off… Hmmmm… how to do that… Maybe I just need to watch “An Inconvieniant Truth” a few more times that would do it for me…
- Posted by ForrestI think every one here needs to take a breather and read the following paper.
http://www.ruralsoft.com.au/ClimateChang e.doc
This is the very straightforward physics behind the “greenhouse effect”… it’s well established and nothing new or startling.
Next, after carefully reading the true story behind how the green house effect works, ask yourself, ” Did I actually understand any of that?” If your answer is “no”, then ask yourself, “Then what is the basis for my current beliefs on this subject”?
In reality, few citizens are equipped to understand the science behind global climate, so everyone depends on someone else to “interpret” it for him/her. So who do you end up believing? The most quoted? The most popular? The most famous? The head of some large, well-known organization?
In the end, the public generally has no ability to understand any of it, and no ability to sort out the science of folks like Fred Singer, Dick Lindzen, Roy Spencer, Willie Soon and a host of other general experts in the field, and often choose to believe the scientific illiterates like Al Gore and Bill McKibben and others who have no scientific background but are very “popular” writers on the subject.
Trying to discuss global warming at the root science level with someone like Al Gore would be like trying to discuss the working of an automatic transmission with a chicken.
Yes, I’m an Atmospheric Physicist, but who in heck would believe me over the opinion of a science illiterate who has won an Oscar or sold 100,000 copies of a book….?
- Posted by Jim Peden