Global Warming Dips
Global warming ‘dips this year’
| By Roger Harrabin BBC News environment analyst |
with snarky commentary by Those Jerks at Carbon Credit Warehouse.
Global temperatures will drop slightly this year as a result of the cooling effect of the La Nina current in the Pacific, UN meteorologists have said.
The World Meteorological Organization’s secretary-general, Michel Jarraud, told the BBC it was likely that La Nina would continue into the summer.
Wait. Does this mean…are you telling me that cooler temps will continue until summer!? This is groundbreaking. Temps are warmer in summer. Who knew?
This would mean global temperatures have not risen since 1998, prompting some to question climate change theory.
But experts say we are still clearly in a long-term warming trend - and they forecast a new record high temperature within five years.
Mark this date on your calendar now and begin basting the crow for these fine “experts” to dine upon.
The WMO points out that the decade from 1998 to 2007 was the warmest on record. Since the beginning of the 20th Century, the global average surface temperature has risen by 0.74C.
O.k. let’s see if I’ve got this correct. You’re saying that mean global temperatures have not risen since 1998. Yet, the WMO claims the decade from 1998 to 2007 was the warmest on record. Hmmm. Sure, that sounds like a consensus to me.
Rises ’stalled’
La Nina and El Nino are two great natural Pacific currents whose effects are so huge they resonate round the world.
El Nino warms the planet when it happens; La Nina cools it. This year, the Pacific is in the grip of a powerful La Nina.
It has contributed to torrential rains in Australia and to some of the coldest temperatures in memory in snow-bound parts of China.
Not to mention record setting snowfall and cold in the U.S. and that once in a century snowfall in Iraq.
Mr Jarraud told the BBC that the effect was likely to continue into the summer, depressing temperatures globally by a fraction of a degree.
This would mean that temperatures have not risen globally since 1998 when El Nino warmed the world.
Just checking once again. Temps have not risen globally since 1998. O.k. and that year was warm because of an El Nino. But, that’s not an anomaly while any sort of La Nina cooling is. Right.
Watching trends
A minority of scientists question whether this means global warming has peaked and argue the Earth has proved more resilient to greenhouse gases than predicted.
But Mr Jarraud insisted this was not the case and noted that 2008 temperatures would still be well above average for the century.
Have we been in this century long enough to establish an average? Or does he mean the 20th century, when “experts” like Mr. Jarraud were running around with their hair on fire screaming about the coming ice age?
You remember. We had this great warming trend from about 1900 to roughly 1940. Then from the 40’s through the 70’s global temps dropped. Yet inexplicably the cooling occurred precisely at the time of the greatest increases in ”greenhouse theory” gases.
Go figure.
“When you look at climate change you should not look at any particular year,” he said. “You should look at trends over a pretty long period and the trend of temperature globally is still very much indicative of warming.
As long as you ignore that 30+ year cooling trend in the 20th century. I wonder if he has considered that his warming is a correction from the last cooling? Does anyone really know what the global mean temp should be? Anyone? Hello? Calling all “experts!”
“La Nina is part of what we call ‘variability’. There has always been and there will always be cooler and warmer years, but what is important for climate change is that the trend is up; the climate on average is warming even if there is a temporary cooling because of La Nina.”
Again, what about the temporary warming of El Nino? The only trend that is up in climate change is funding for hack scientists and speaking fees for Al Gore.
Adam Scaife, lead scientist for Modelling Climate Variability at the Hadley Centre in Exeter, UK, said their best estimate for 2008 was about 0.4C above the 1961-1990 average, and higher than this if you compared it with further back in the 20th Century.
0.4C. Man that’s hot. How many species will we lose? If the best estimate for ‘08 is so small when compared with a period that was dominated by a cooling and even higher when compared with further back in the 20th century we should what? Be concerned that these hacks are cherry-picking their data?
Farther back in the 20th cent. than 1961 would still be in the cooling of the 20+ years prior.
Mr Scaife told the BBC: “What’s happened now is that La Nina has come along and depressed temperatures slightly but these changes are very small compared to the long-term climate change signal, and in a few years time we are confident that the current record temperature of 1998 will be beaten when the La Nina has ended.”
You mean that record temp year of 1998 that was dominated by an El Nino that came along and increased temps slightly? Guess we will have to wait for a year without an El Nino or La Nina to have any chance of knowing what might be considered “normal” unless of course that would be considered an “abnormal” year.
Guess it all depends on the source of your funding or your political agenda.
Published: 2008/04/04 00:42:26 GMT
© BBC MMVIII
