Global Warming Update
April 4th, 2008 at 03:14pm Mark Noonan
Curious how normally recurring weather patterns are resulting in a cooler earth this year - wonder if anyone in the global warming community will look into this?
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.
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.
Five years being a long enough time frame for all but conservatives to forget that 2008 represented a 10 year non-warming-trend, and 2013 will likely be the 15th year of said trend…but, in 2013, most people having forgotten this years global warming news, will key into predictions that, really this time, we’re in for a record hot year in the next five.
The best thing about global warming: no proof required, and nothing which happens can discredit it, in the eyes of its zealots.
Entry Filed under: Environment
24 Comments
1. SteaM | April 4th, 2008 at 3:22 pm
Ok Mark, I read the article.
I actually told you this a while back; that La Nina was the cause for the cooling we have seen as well as the increased precip which is now flooding the midwest where I live.
You turn.
Read this article on weather.com regarding glocal cooling. I think you will find it interesting. I certainly did.
http://climate.weather.com/blog/9_15153.html
2. Amanda | April 4th, 2008 at 3:29 pm
Cutting off, of course, before the countering piece of the article:
And then:
(Emphasis added.)
You shouldn’t link to articles that inherently disprove the point you’re trying to make.
3. SEW | April 4th, 2008 at 3:57 pm
http://video.google.fr/videoplay?docid=-4123082535546754758
4. NeoClown | April 4th, 2008 at 4:44 pm
Mark,
Before making any more proclamations regarding global warming, do yourself a favor and read a book relating to the density of salt and fresh water, and salinity. Also, do some research regarding the laws of thermodynamics. And finally read-up on wind and ocean currents.
You don’t know it but you are just embarrassing yourself.
5. Darva Conger | April 4th, 2008 at 5:00 pm
I always wonder why conservatives are anti-science.
6. News » Blog Archive&hellip | April 4th, 2008 at 5:18 pm
[…] 9/11, the bigger picture and the quest for truth :: Index wrote an interesting post today on Global Warming UpdateHere’s a quick excerptOrganization’s secretary-general, Michel Jarraud, told the BBC it was … most people having forgotten this years global warming news, will key […]
7. Rana Quijotesca | April 4th, 2008 at 5:42 pm
Oh Mark… 10 years is just a fraction of a blink of an eye in geologic time… unless you believe that the earth is 6000 years old… then you would be retarded…
8. bongoman | April 4th, 2008 at 5:49 pm
New compelling evidence that solar activity may not be a/the cause of global warming:
9. bongoman | April 4th, 2008 at 5:53 pm
Ooops: here’s the link:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/7327393.stm
10. Retired Spook | April 4th, 2008 at 6:05 pm
The Law of Unintended Consequences at work. An in Time Magazine, no less.
11. Retired Spook | April 4th, 2008 at 6:10 pm
bongoman, you’re right. It’s silly and illogical to even think that the sun could have anything to do with warming our planet. That cutting edge bunch of scientists at the BBC is certainly on to something.
12. TiredofLibBullSh** | April 4th, 2008 at 6:17 pm
THE GLOBAL WARMING SCAM
At a UN conference this week, poor nations have decided that they are not going to sign a global warming pact unless rich nations pay them billions of dollars. Must be nice. Island nations in the Caribbean and South Pacific say that they’ve been hit with floods, rising seas and cyclones all because of man-made global warming by industrialized nations. But unlike these nations, the poorer nations say they don’t have the money to build sea walls or relocate … therefore it is the rich nations’ job to give them the money to do so.
Rich nations are saying that they agree to help … but they can’t agree on how to do it. The United States wants to make this a voluntary aid program, and Europe wants to use the trading of pollution permits to generate money. The UN Development Program says that it is going to need $86 billion by 2015 in order to help the poor nations. China’s solution is to have rich nations give at least 0.5% of their GDP to help the poorer nations. For the United States, that would be a whopping $60 billion. All in the name of global warming.
Also, hurricane experts are already getting their boxers in a bunch over the idea of a disastrous 2008 hurricane season. More than 1,400 emergency managers, government officials and others involved in tropical disasters went to Orlando, Florida this week for a National Hurricane Conference. They went to prepare for “what may be a devastating storm season.”
Gee that sounds familiar, doesn’t it? Didn’t we hear this same thing for the last two years? But .. either way, they win. Hurricanes or no hurricanes, they’ll blame whatever happens on global warming or the new catch phrase global climate change.
The warming trend has stopped in 1998. According to libs CO2 concentrations have been increasing since then. But measurable data has shown that average temperatures have remained the same or have gone down slightly. Well the measurable evidence has contradicted the doomsayers. The models were found to be erroneous. Temperature stations were found to be installed incorrectly and provided slanted data. This has forced them to blame everything warming, cooling, draught, flood, blizzards, no blizzards, hurricanes, no hurricanes, tornadoes, no tornadoes, etc. etc. on global warming…..oops, climate change.
Anything short of an ice age, they will deny!! With a scam like this how can they go wrong???
13. bongoman | April 4th, 2008 at 6:25 pm
Why do you keep spouting this nonsense? The denialist claim that there has been no global warming since 1998 has been thoroughly debunked.
We have had the eight warmest years on record since 1998! Well, that’s what NASA says here:
http://www.nasa.gov/topics/earth/features/earth_temp.html
Also have a look at this:
http://mises.org/Community/blogs/tokyotom/archive/2008/01/15/did-global-warming-stop-in-1998-jim-hansen-says-no.aspx
14. Global Warming » Gl&hellip | April 4th, 2008 at 7:18 pm
[…] unknown wrote an interesting post today on Global Warming UpdateHere’s a quick excerptCurious how normally recurring weather patterns are resulting in a cooler earth this year - wonder if anyone in the global warming community will look into this? Global temperatures will drop slightly this year as a result of the … […]
15. TIredofLibBullSh** | April 4th, 2008 at 7:59 pm
uh, reliable temperature data has only been collected for 120 years and the “warmest” average temperatures have only increased <1 deg C in that time. It is the warmest since data has been collected and not that of the history of the earth. 100 years is such a small snapshot in time to draw such exaggerated conclusions.
The rate of change in temperature increases has not gone up since 1998. Thus the trend upwards has stopped.
I thought scams like this were illegal.
16. Greg-O | April 4th, 2008 at 9:31 pm
Bongoman, mentioned James Hansen who works at NASA. An interesting man to say the least.
How many people, for instance, know that James Hansen, a man billed as a lonely “NASA whistleblower” standing up to the mighty U.S. government, was really funded by Soros’ Open Society Institute , which gave him “legal and media advice”?
That’s right, Hansen was packaged for the media by Soros’ flagship “philanthropy,” by as much as $720,000, most likely under the OSI’s “politicization of science” program.”
http://ibdeditorial.com/IBDArticles.aspx?id=275526219598836
Hansen also had to correct his temperature data after the error was discovered by Steve McIntyre.
http://www.climateaudit.org/?p=1880
17. js | April 4th, 2008 at 10:21 pm
This high tech global science is still at a very young stage of development.
Barely 20 years ago, we started putting information together about this kind of stuff, and 10 years before that, they said a new ice age was beginning because it was getting colder.
Its not an amatuer game. The scant knowledge that we have on the earth and its reactions to a billion untold effects is akin to the knowledge we have about what all these wonder drugs, genetically altered foods, and everything else they pump into our food and water supply will have on human kind in another 70-150 years.
We are like kids in a candy shop, all exited about the colorful jars packed full of sugar based addiction, not concerned at all that our teeth may rot for the lust of it all.
No, we have a lot of guesses, but we dont know that we are going to cause the world to implode. We dont know that we wont either. And there isnt enough factual evidence to prove that global warming is actually a man made threat, or a natural occurance.
such it is in the real world, there is no science book that will show us either way, so all those paranoid schitzophrenics runnin about are not so important after all, just impotent………
18. Almiranta | April 4th, 2008 at 11:07 pm
FOLLOW THE MONEY.
“Global Warming” is a fantastically lucrative theme. It’s funny how those whose belief systems fall into the arenas of, say, abortion on demand or man-made global warming, never seem to care that the underlying reason behind the promotion of these agendas is the vast amounts of money they generate.
Another thing ignored by the Lemming Left is the fact that one can believe that it IS a good idea to cut down on pollution, on CO2 emissions, on carbon output, simply because these are good ideas, without having to have an elaborate victim/villain paradigm underlying it all.
For every climahysteric there are countless sensible people quiety working on reasonable solutions to real problems.
Here’s an example: While you loony libs are tooling around in your bombs-on-wheels, otherwise known as electricity-powered cars, VW of America just introduced a fantastically thrifty diesel engine, so far just in its Jetta, that gets something like 50 MPG. It’s a nice sturdy car, carries five (my brother has a 4-year-old diesel Jetta which gets around 48 MPG on the highway) doesn’t have explosive and expensive batteries, will run on biodiesel made from non-food organic material—-and is under the Lib radar.
I, the oft-identified and attacked uber-conservative, who is probably labeled as a villainous eco-vandal, happen to be working on a design for a new ranch property that will be as environmentally sound as possible, as high-tech as I can put together. I don’t need to get lathered up about why the earth has gotten a little hotter, or subscribe to a belief system that demands equal parts guilt and sacrifice—I am doing it because it makes sense.
Sun and wind generated electricity, sun-heated water with a super-efficient wood boiler as backup (we do have several hundred thousand acres of beetle killed trees to dispose of) and green building techniques are not just for Liberals, and don’t require a dedication to an elaborate theory which I believe exists mostly because it allows some people to feel morally and intellectually superior to others, as well as to provide yet another category of villains to sneer at and despise.
And call names.
And in the meantime, have you noticed the total lack of acknowlegment of the BENEFITS of a degree or so of increased warmth? Little things like longer growing seasons, more agricultural production, less need for burning the various fuels that provide heat…it’s not all bad.
At least not till most of us die and the rest become cannibals…..and you get all wound up when we call you the Loony Left.
19. Rico's ghost | April 5th, 2008 at 9:03 am
Let’s assume the earth is getting cooler. And of course if you do assume that then you can’t argue that emitting more GHGs are going to warm things up, right? That would be absurd. So if you assume the earth is getting cooler then you also have to assume GHGs don’t matter. So let’s a assume both… Does that make you any more fine about spending over $3/gal of gas? Does it make you any more fine about spending over $500 billion a year importing oil? Does that make you any more fine about supporting unstable regimes? Does that make you any happier about living next to an oil refinery or a coal mine?
I read a study recently that indicated that the people living in the counties surrounding an open pit coal mine in WV were four times more likely to develop some form of cardiopulmonary disease, presumably from the toxic fumes that emanate from the mine. A recent study by the American Lung Assoc indicated that over 15 years a transition to electric vehicles (i.e., eliminating internal combustion engines) could save about $100 billion — in CA alone. Another study indicated that by investing in what’s needed to optimize energy efficiency around the world (the kind of thing Almiranta talked about) could recoup about $900 billion/yr over their investment. The US’s share would be around $180 billion/yr. The bottom line: burning fossil fuels wastefully like we do is not only bad for the bottom line, it’s unhealthy (which is also bad for the bottom line). The above assumes current prices, too. If energy prices or health care costs go up, the savings would be greater.
Many people seem to think that because there appears to be a reasonable amount of oil left in the ground, and certainly gas and coal, that it will remain as inexpensive as it is now to recover in sufficient quantities to keep up with demand. Well if you think that, I challenge you to find a credible source to back you up. In particular, I challenge you to find such a source which doesn’t rely on “possible future technology developments”. If you do that then you have to admit that “possible future technology developments” aren’t limited to the oil industry. Broadly speaking, it is the thing that has made America great. And given that the oil industry has been a mature one for a long time, the likelihood is much greater that “possible future technology developments” will occur in emerging, alternative technologies.
Drilling in ANWR (which is arguably the most economical current option) will cost billions in infrastructure (and take many years). Drilling deep off shore will cost even more billions of dollars (and take years). Harvesting tar sands or oil shale (assuming someone eventually figures out how to do the latter on a commercial scale) requires large amounts of water and natural gas, which puts a pinch on both of those resources. Converting coal to oil also requires lots of natural gas — and coal, of course.
I’m afraid there’s no way around it — fossil fuel prices will continue to go up. That alone is reason to consider other options. And really… are we that far away? Solar thermal is still more expensive than coal (at present prices), but not by much. And with new heat storage technology they can run all day (and night) long. Solar photovoltaics are still more expensive than coal (at present prices), but the prices there are dropping quickly too. Geothermal is already cheaper than coal (at present prices), though only in certain spots. But new advancements are making it economical in more and more regions. And in that regard it’s important to keep in mind that if you drill deep enough anywhere you will find really hot rocks. So geothermal has huge potential. On shore wind is almost as cheap as coal (at present prices) in many locations. Nuclear is very expensive up front, but they’re also cheap to run. So unless you assume coal prices won’t go up over the next 40 years or so they are also worth a look (assuming you have no problem with radioactive waste). These are alternatives that require little to nothing in terms of “possible future technology developments”. All they require are improvements in manufacturing and deployment efficiencies — which invariably come with economy of scale. Future technology developments can’t be ruled out. In fact, I’d say that’s a very good bet. But they aren’t dependent on them.
There are those of the attitude, “well, when those sources get down below coal, then we’ll talk”. But it’s really a chicken and egg sort of issue: economy of scale pressures which drive prices down significantly can’t kick in until you reach ecomomy of scale. So basically, it boils down to a question of… do you want to pay more now and effectively lock in a price, or pay more (perhaps much more) later? That’s the only risk involved in everything said above. Climate change or no climate change, the potential solutions regarding the future of energy remain largely the same. Either way, getting on the bandwagon of renewable fuels represents a huge economic opportunity — assuming we aren’t real stupid about it. Then again, we’d be stupid to do nothing as well. Unintended consequences cut both ways.
Now let’s assume global warming is real and humans are responsible… What changes fundamentally from what I described above? I would argue nothing changes at all. Said in another way, where you stand on global warming matters little in the above contexts, and thus should not be part of the global warming debate.
The global warming debate should only change one’s inclination to do even more — like get the rest of the world involved, particularly developing nations like China and India. Obviously, that’s exceedingly difficult. And as Spook pointed out, it can lead to some immense unintended consequences. Some people mistakenly point to those sorts of things and use them to insist we should do nothing about burning fossil fuels ourselves. But if you insist that you’ve just rejected everything I said above.
I personally believe that developing nations would heartily welcome technologies that would allow them to forego the burning of fossil fuels. They understand that fossil fuels are going up in price, that they’re unhealthy, and all that. But they don’t have the expertise to do anything about it. And they sure aren’t going to sacrifice their economic development for the sake of future promises. So unless and until we have something better yet equally cost-effective to offer them they will resist mightily.
20. FmrMarine | April 5th, 2008 at 1:58 pm
This nonsense about “man made” global warming is a total SCAM
http://www.globalresearch.ca/index.php?context=viewArticle&code=20070315&articleId=5086
http://www.freerepublic.com/focus/f-news/1923865/posts
http://www.climatepolice.com/
http://icecap.us/index.php/go/joes-blog/comments_about_global_warming/
http://www.channel4.com/science/microsites/G/great_global_warming_swindle/index.html
21. js | April 5th, 2008 at 2:46 pm
reality, you and the oil companies keep citing billion needed to extract oil from alaska or the gulf, but they are already spending that money in other countries looking and drilling anyways
the US Oil industry lost over 1,000,000 domestic jobs between 86-92
they are drilling, just not here, so all they really need to do is to divert thier cash flow back into the USA and we would solve many of our import issues, and reduce our costs at the same time
bringing the jobs back wouldnt hurt much either….
22. Mark Noonan | April 5th, 2008 at 8:03 pm
Retired:
Fascinating article - loved this bit:
When government subsidises a thing, it just distorts reality…and so now, with government setting the pace, we’re having explosive growth in biofuels, which may end up more environmentally degrading than petroleum based fuels.
Of course, the real solution is plain as a pikestaff right in front of us - nuclear power. ‘Course, the enviro-whackos don’t like that, either…
23. Mark Noonan | April 5th, 2008 at 8:06 pm
Rico,
Why be a ghost?
Anyways…
No problem with cleaning up the environment and I’d love to see us end our dependence on petroleum based fuel…but to listen to an environmentalist idelogue - who is probably masking socialism under a green label - is just plain and simple stupid.
24. Plantation Owner | April 8th, 2008 at 9:48 am
The global warmers aren’t going to go down without a fight. It looks like climate activists were trying to convince the BBC to change it.
http://newsbusters.org/blogs/noel-sheppard/2008/04/07/climate-activist-got-bbc-change-global-temperatures-decrease-article
Truth is an enemy to the global warming moonbats.