Climate change deniers have had it pretty rough in the past week. It started with a very well documented paper that crushed all claims that climate models have been overestimating the rate and amount of heat increasing the Earth’s temperature.
Many fundamental flaws were found in that claim, which hasn’t surprised the public that much. However, the unlucky streak for climate change deniers was already starting, as another paper has seen the press on the issue of the global warming “hiatus” or “pause” heavily popularized in the recent past.
The original theory – supported by the usual suspects – claimed the global surface temperatures have seen a significant drop ever since 1998, resulting in a definitive stop of warming.
There are several problems with this claim, the most significant one being that fact that 1998 was one of the warmest years, so much that it registered outside the grids for the normal temperatures. Therefore, beginning any kind of measurement with this year is clearly unfair – there cannot be any cherry-picking when it comes to such important issues.
Another flaw in the original theory is that you can’t just take a few years and consider them enough to establish a trend. This is especially difficult to do when Earth’s average temperature is so inconsistent, going up and down all the time.
Thirdly, climate change deniers have used the planet’s surface temperatures in their measurements, which can be awfully misleading, as large amounts of heat goes into the deep waters of the ocean.
The new research digs even deeper, showing that, in the long run, the Earth’s warming hasn’t slowed at all. They did this by comparing the warming which occurred from 1950-1999 to the one from 2000-2014 – the difference was almost indistinguishable, from 0.113° C warming per decade to 0.116°C per decade.
Researchers combating the climate change deniers’ theory had to apply a few corrections on the original measurements, mostly on how sea surface temperatures were taken; there was plenty of room for miscalculation of data as the method has changed over time.
Understanding how the new methods are more accurate allows scientists to apply corrections on old data as well, as they go back and re-examine. Even though deniers will try to ignore the new information that shows no “hiatus” has been happening, the scientific data is becoming clearer than ever.
Global warming is scarily real and there hasn’t been any slowing down in the last two decades. People trying to tell you otherwise are just trying to protect their own interest. And that’s something you shouldn’t be interested in.
Image Source: Nicholas Goodden Photography