Global warming goes under cover!

Global warming has proven to be not only evil, but even sneaky.

It's in disguise.

The British Newspaper The Telegraph reports that:

During January of this year, the average temperature of the global land surface was below that of the 20th Century mean- for the first time since 1982.

Temperatures were below average over large portions of the globe, and in parts of Asia snow fell for the first time in memory (anyone who lives here is well aware of the relative amount of snowfall we've experienced- though that, strictly speaking, is not a function of temperature, but of precipitation during a time when atmospheric temperatures are generally below freezing). Record snow and ice storms, in any case, were also experienced in Canada.

Australia has just experienced its coolest January on record- 3-4°C (5-7°F) above average over large parts of central and western Australia.

Surface temperatures last month were lower than average in the Atlantic, Indian, and northwest Pacific oceans.

In the contiguous United States, we just experienced the 49th coolest January on record.

A U.S. National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration report shows that ice levels- which had shrunk from 5 million square miles in January 2007 to just 1.5 million square miles in October of the same year- are almost back to their original levels.

Does that mean that the polar bears are saved after all? Nope. It seems that they're now starving because there's too much ice!

Prof. Phillip Stott points out something that is hardly news to those who have taken the trouble to hear both sides, but which one would never imagine from the news reports:

Of course, little can be gleaned from such a short data run of only 10-years, but the temperature anomaly has clearly dipped, and then flat-lined below its 1998 anomaly peak - and for nine years now. In other words, since 1998 there has been no global warming. Yet, atmospheric CO2 has continued to rise, from c. 368 ppmv in 1998 to c. 384 ppmv in November, 2007. Moreover, politicians persist in claiming that temperature is rising faster than at any other time in the history of the whole Earth.....

So, does this mean to say that other factors may actually be driving climate and temperature? Oh me, Oh my! What a shock! Perhaps with all those shredders in our offices and homes, there are just too many tiny bits and bobs of credit cards floating up into the air and cooling the atmosphere? Or, weddings may have increased in number, and particulate confetti is having an unknown effect? Or, then again, the rise out of the ‘Little Ice Age’, which ended c. 1880, might just be stuttering a tad? Who knows?

The "Little Ice Age" was followed by the "Medieval Warm Period," in which evidence from at least large portions of the world indicate warmer temperatures than existed in the Twentieth Century. The warming may have been global; the evidence to the contrary said in the linked-to article to be "absent" is reportedly limited to a few specific areas of measurement such as tree rings, and to take no notice of oceanic salinity data and other possible evidence leading to different conclusions- among them, that claims by global warming alarmists that temperatures have at any time in the last half millenia been "the warmest on record" are, at the very least, highly debatable..

So does this mean that global warming is all a hoax? Hardly. The numbers show what the numbers show. But it does offer a caution against the hysterical and catastrophic scenarios Al Gore and others on the environmental Left and in the mainstream media are pushing. The evidence is simply too sparse and covers too short a period to justify the drastic conclusions some are drawing. And credible evidence exists that global warming is caused primarily by sources other than human-related greenhouse gas emissions- which in any case are a drop in the bucket compared to purely natural emissions of greenhouse gasses with which the human race has nothing whatsoever to do.

Nor does this mean that we shouldn't take prudent steps to control emissions of greenhouse gasses if there is even the slightest chance that they're in any way bad for the environment. We have plenty of reasons to seek energy sources to replace fossil fuels even without global warming. But it does argue for a prudent comparison of the economic impact of specific steps with the likely good to be accomplished by them.

It does mean that perhaps the sky isn't falling after all, and the consequences of global warming may not be quite as catastrophic as we're told. And it means that prudence is probably a better course than hysteria when it comes to reacting to global warming- which, again, apparently ended in 1998 anyway.

HT: Global Warming.org