As the cold snap continues there are advertisements on the television and radio reminding us to check on those who are unable to look after themselves so well. Making a few minutes in my lunch break to phone Downing Street and confirm that Gordon Brown was warm enough and had enough food in, i settled down to read the Daily Express with it's headline: SNOW CHAOS AND THEY STILL CLAIM IT'S GLOBAL WARMING.Although it makes a nice change from headlines about paedophile asylum seeking terrorists taking our jobs, it was pretty much the standard Daily Express puff piece whose jist was that it's snowing and temperatures have plummeted so it disproves Global Warming.
To be fair, i have heard the opposite end of the argument also where environmentalists use a few days of scorching hot temperatures in the summer as proof of Global Warming and both sides of the arguments are just as cringworthy as each other.
The Met Office (the same people who told us it would be a mild winter) have explained that the wintry spell is due to the perfect storm of a weakened gulf stream, a developing El Niño and Arctic oscillation which all means that the tonnes of snow usually dropped in Siberia has shifted West and dropped on us instead. Whether that is due to climate change one side will say yes and the other side will say no but arguing over a few shiveringly cold or steaming hot days doesn't do anyone any favours.
What we have to look at is the trend over decades and see if there is a steady pattern so things that affect the temperatures or amount of Carbon Dioxide in the atmosphere like El Niño, oscillations and even volcanic eruptions, get taken into account.
From 1900 to 2002, the Earth warmed, on average, 0.17C every decade. In this 102 year period there were undoubtedly years that were exceptionally cooler and those that were exceptionally warmer than average but even accounting for these anomalies, the trend is that the Globe is currently warming.
Why it is warming and whether it is mans actions causing it is another argument but to dismiss Global Warming just because Western Europe is shivering for a few weeks is ignorant, irresponsible and plain lazy.
3 comments:
Lucy, Australia has just added a new bushfire danger level. Instead of 'extreme' the top level is now 'catastrophic'.
This new level says, 'if there's a fire anywhere in your area get in your car and visit a distant relative!'
It's 40 degrees at the moment and I'm trying to cool down a bit after mowing the rest of the lawns.
The least you could do is to send me some snow!
lucy and david,
it isn't just europe gettig extra cold this year. north america is having the coldest winter in 20 years and is also setting some new all time low temperature records for individual days...
q
I couldn't handle temps of 40C. I'd just want to crawl into a fridge and stay there till it cooled down. I'd rather be cold and have to warm up than be hot and try to cool down.
I did see on the weather that one of the US coasts especially was having a hard time of it but i wasn't sure if they always had a hard time of it at this time of year. Hope ya'll in Texas are staying warm.
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