Wednesday 12 March 2008

2007 "a bad year for warmists" (updated)

Steven Milloy sums up 2007 for warmists -- that is, for those who insist on the myth of man-made warming. 

“I’ve made up my mind. Don’t confuse me with the facts.” That saying most appropriately sums up [2007] in climate science for the fanatic global warming crowd.

His Top 10 Climate Myth-Busters for 2007 include:

  • Cracked Crystal Balls - observed temperature changes measured over the last 30 years "don’t match well" with temperatures predicted by climate models...
  • Pre-SUV warming - A more reliable study confirms globally averaged temperature 1,000 years ago was about 0.3 degrees Celsius warmer than today; this was before we started building factories and power plants, and started driving the kids to school in 4 -wheel drives...
  • A disciplined climate - the warmist fantasy of "runaway global warming" is confirmed to be just that: a fantasy...
  • Lazy temperature? - man-made global warming theory requires CO2 to precede warming, yet despite increases in the rate of emission of manmade carbon dioxide "ever-changing global temperatures are in no way keeping pace with ever-increasing atmospheric carbon dioxide levels."  In other words, temperatures and CO2 emissions don't match...
  • Don’t plant that tree! - trees aren't all good. Trees below 20 degrees latitude in the northern hemisphere "exert a cooling influence on global climate," but trees above that line don't. They're warmers.  That is, "forests north of the line of latitude running through Southern Mexico, Saharan Africa, central India and the southernmost Chinese Island of Hainan -- will warm surface temperatures in those regions by an estimated 10 degrees Fahrenheit by the year 2100."
  • Much ado about nothing - a report to Congress by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency estimates the difference for average global temperature ninety years from now between "a scenario where no action is taken to reduce manmade emissions and a scenario where maximum regulation is implemented" would be ... wait for it ... just 0.17 degrees Centigrade.  "For reference purposes, the estimated total increase in average global temperature for the 20th century was about 0.50 degrees Celsius."

All this, as Milloy reminds us, on top of

the spanking a British high court judge gave Al Gore’s movie for all its scientific inaccuracies and the thrashing non-alarmist climate scientists gave to alarmist climate scientists in a debate sponsored by the New York debating society Intelligence Squared.

Al Gore and the alarmist mob claim the debate about the science of global warming is “over.” Given the developments of 2007, it’s easy to see why they would want it that way.

Head here to see the whole list, and the links for all the research mentioned.

UPDATE: Andrew Bolt adds another point to the list:

Isn't it time we realised ... that China is now big enough to decide the future of the planet on its own...?  Folks, get over this white man's burden thing. China is now in charge. It will set the world's temperature...  nothing we do in little Australia, responsible for just 1.5 per cent of the world's emissions and falling fast, is remotely likely to affect the planet's temperature, which in any case still hasn't risen above the record set 10 years ago...

In fact, China is now the world's biggest emitter and by 2020, [warmists estimate], it and other developing countries will pump out more greenhouse gases on their own than the entire world dare emit if we want to stop what Garnaut assumes will be potentially catastrophic warming.

We can fiddle, but what's the point when China will burn, burn, burn?

UPDATE 2:  Oops!  I've fixed my incorrect transcription in the 'Don’t plant that tree!' section.

2 comments:

Anonymous said...

So how exactly do we reconcile trees causing a (localised) 10°F (in excess of 5°C!!!) vs a predicted 0.17°C worst-case increase?

Anonymous said...

".. what's the point when China will burn .."

The point is to maintain control.

D'ya think it might be a case of warmists not seeing the wood for the, ah, trees?! :)