This weekly newsletter, focused on environmental issues, highlights relevant analysis done by the John Locke Foundation and other think tanks, as well as items in the news.
1. N&O suggests global warming has arrived in NC; State Climate Office thinks otherwise
This article appeared on the front page above the fold in yesterday’s issue of The News & Observer. The clear implication is that global warming has come to North Carolina and it is having an impact on plant life. Had the author, John Murawski, checked the web site of the State Climate Office of North Carolina, which would seem a logical starting point for any journalist doing a story of this kind, he would have found the following statements:
- "The annual statewide average temperature for NC from 1895-2007 is given in Figure 2, along with the linear trend of the data. If one focused only on the period since the mid-1970s, a clear warming signal is seen. This corresponds well with warming observed in global average temperatures from the best satellite data. However, a review of the entire period of record suggests that the warming since the mid-1970s may not be unprecedented, especially when compared with the warming observed from 1910-1950. Overall, the trend over the 113-year period is flat, with no long-term trend over the period."
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"local climate variability is so high in NC that significant trends are difficult to deduce."
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"…when we separate average temperatures into daily maximum and minimums (highs and lows), we can start to see some meaningful trends. While maximum temperatures show no trend, we do see a significant trend in minimum temperature (morning lows) in urban areas. Minimum temperatures are increasing in many urban areas. These minimum temperature trends are significant, but are not linked to the broader global warming. Indeed, we do not see similar trends at rural locations, suggesting that the observed changes in minimum temperatures are associated with urbanization of our cities and surrounding areas."
So that raises an interesting question: why did the article’s author miss all of this? There are several possibilities.
First, it is simply possible that he was lazy and didn’t feel like checking with the local experts on the subject. I don’t think that was the case.
Second, he’s pushing a global warming agenda and deliberately ignored the facts. Again, while many of us on the right tend to think that agenda-pushing explains all problems like this in the media, it certainly doesn’t make sense in this case. The story is actually about what could be considered to be a benefit of global warming–i.e., longer growing seasons. It is not the kind of story an ideological alarmist would write.
Actually, my thought is that the possibility that North Carolina hasn’t been warming just didn’t occur him. In other words, the problem stems from a lack of understanding of the issue.
As "everyone knows," global warming is occurring, and if it is, then it "must" be occurring everywhere on the globe, including North Carolina–which, of course, is faulty reasoning. Even if global warming were occurring, though it hasn’t been for at least a decade (see the story below and last week’s newsletter), it wouldn’t mean that all locations on the planet are warming. It would simply mean that those locations that are showing warming on average more than offset those that are showing cooling or no trend. Oddly enough, these are simple facts that most people, including reporters, just don’t know.
2. British Met Office announced no global warming for last 15 years–do sunspots tell the story?
The UK Daily Mail has run a story that is not getting much publicity: global temperature data suggest that there has been no global warming for 15 years. And given the source of the data, the UK’s Met (Meteorology) Office and the University of East Anglia Climatic Research Unit (yes the same group involved with "Climategate"), the evidence must be overwhelming. According to the Mail:
The supposed ‘consensus’ on man-made global warming is facing an inconvenient challenge after the release of new temperature data showing the planet has not warmed for the past 15 years.
The figures suggest that we could even be heading for a mini ice age to rival the 70-year temperature drop that saw frost fairs held on the Thames in the 17th Century.
Based on readings from more than 30,000 measuring stations, the data was issued last week without fanfare by the Met Office and the University of East Anglia Climatic Research Unit. It confirms that the rising trend in world temperatures ended in 1997.
So why might this be happening? The Mail does a little more digging:
Meanwhile, leading climate scientists yesterday told The Mail on Sunday that, after emitting unusually high levels of energy throughout the 20th Century, the sun is now heading towards a ‘grand minimum’ in its output, threatening cold summers, bitter winters and a shortening of the season available for growing food.
Solar output goes through 11-year cycles, with high numbers of sunspots seen at their peak.
We are now at what should be the peak of what scientists call ‘Cycle 24’ — which is why last week’s solar storm resulted in sightings of the aurora borealis further south than usual. But sunspot numbers are running at less than half those seen during cycle peaks in the 20th Century.
Yes I know that this might be quite shocking to you global-cooling deniers out there, but yes, what happens on the sun may actually have an impact on earth’s temperatures.
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