2007 is hardly a memory in our minds but already British forecasters are predicting that 2008 will be another member of the Top 10 hottest years since 1850 club. Thus, they say, there is no indication that global warming is on the wane; much is the pity!
The Met Office and experts at the University of East Anglia announced on Thursday that the global average temperatures for 2008 would be 0.37 of a degree Celsius above the long-term 1961-1990 average of 14 degrees and be the coolest since 2000.
The study behind the predictions took in to account not only the annual Pacific Ocean La Nina event which is expected to be especially strong, but also natural changes in the ocean currents, solar variations and atmospheric concentrations of greenhouse gasses.
“The fact that 2008 is forecast to be cooler than any of the last seven years does not mean that global warming has gone away,” said Phil Jones, director of climate research at UEA.
“What matters is the underlying rate of warming – the period 2001-2007 with an average of 0.44 degree C above the 1961-90 average was 0.21 degree C warmer than corresponding values for the period 1991-2000.”
Particularly influential are the effects of El Nino and La Nina, with the ocean-atmosphere phenomenon having a strong impact upon global temperatures. La Nina reduces the sea surface temperature by around 0.5 degrees Celsius while El Nino has the opposite effect.
“Phenomena such as El Nino and La Nina have a significant influence on global surface temperature and the current strong La Nina will act to limit temperatures in 2008,” said Chris Folland from the Met Office Hadley Centre.
“However mean temperature is still expected to be significantly warmer than in 2000, when a similar strength La Nina pegged temperatures to 0.24 degree C above the 1961-90 average. Sharply renewed warming is likely once La Nina declines,” he added.
The current La Nina is the strongest since the 1999-2000 one, but this time the Indian Ocean Dipole has occurred simultaneously causing the abnormal drought conditions in Australia, which should be much wetter during such a strong La Nina event.
Reuters via ENN – 2008 to be in top 10 warmest years say forecasters
Photo Courtesy of m o d e via Flickr
Déjà vu (all over again)…
When I saw Joshua Hill’s alarming headline “2008 Already Predicted as Member of Top 10 Hottest List” I had that déjà vu feeling.
Haven’t I heard this before?
So I checked Joshua’s source and read:
“The fact that 2008 is forecast to be cooler than any of the last seven years does not mean that global warming has gone away”, said Phil Jones, director of climate research at UEA.
http://www.enn.com/climate/article/28593
Mmm. Interesting. Was kinda reminded of the old song “When ya hot, ya hot. When ya not, ya not”.
But now its “When ya not hot, ya hot anyway (believe me, baby)”.
But back to déjà vu…
Just a year ago, in January 2007 the UK Meteorological Office predicted that 2007 would be “the hottest year on record”.
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2007/01/04/phew_what_a_scorcher/
Met office scientist Katie Hopkins said: “This new information represents another warning that climate change is happening around the world.”
The article went on to say, “The long-term prognosis is alarming. As Reuters puts it: ‘Most scientists agree that temperatures will rise by between two and six degrees Celsius this century due mainly to carbon emissions from burning fossil fuels for power and transport.’”
It’s great to be able to predict a whole year’s average temperature, and even to predict that it will be a “record hot year”.
Let’s see how well the UK’s Meteorological Office really did.
Under the eye-catching headline, “2007 ‘second warmest year’ in UK”, BBC tells us what really happened on a global scale.
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/sci/tech/7169690.stm
Turns out the top 10 were (from hottest to coolest): 1998, 2005, 2003, 2002, 2004, 2006, 2007, 2001, 1997 and 1995.
OOPS! So, despite the eye-catching headline, 2007 was number seven out of ten and not the “record hot year” at all. If you only take the years in the 21st century, 2007 ranked only number six out of seven, so it was kind of a “blooper”.
2008 is now projected to be number eight out of all the eight years in the 21st century, a double “blooper”.
So much for alarming headlines and predicting temperature for a whole YEAR in advance.
But cheer up, folks, as the article said IPCC’s scientists can predict (or project, as they prefer to call it) that “temperatures will rise by between two and six degrees Celsius” a whole CENTURY in advance.
Too bad none of us will be around in 2100 to see how well (or poorly) they actually did.
Max
PS: It would be so funny if every writer you tried to rile would just comment back to you, no matter what, “Black Wallaby, you are absolutely right.” HA HA HA!
Black Wallaby, aka Logic Lou, aka Stickler Stan,
Why are you obsessed with running around all over the internet trying to overanalyze every single word you read? Isn’t it exhausting? Is this your full-time hobby? Is this how you give back to society, by being the logic police?
It doesn’t matter if a writer says something positive OR negative – you aim to dissect everything as an attempt to bring people down, which is just lame and screams “I have low self-esteem and want to bring others down in order to make myself feel better! This is the only way I can interact with people because I am so socially awkward otherwise!”
I dated a guy like you once. If I said something and one word was out of place, he would take me to task and challenge me and make a big stink out of something minor. Another Logic Lou. Yeah, I dumped him.
It is so much fun having someone like you Black Wallaby, someone who is so willing to look for the faults, that they lose sight of the actual problem in the process.
No doubt, it is good news that 2008 is ‘predicted’ to be cooler than previous years. But the issue at hand is ‘global warming’ – ie, the world is getting warmer. 2008 will continue that trend by possibly positioning itself within the top 10 warm years.
Needless to say, attempting to attack my credibility as a journalist will get you nowhere!
Josh,
You headline that:
“2008 Already Predicted as Member of Top 10 Hottest List”
BUT IS IT NOT EQUALLY VALID TO SAY,
“GOOD NEWS: 2008 is forecast to be cooler than any of the last seven years!”
But then as a budding journalist, you know that “GOOD NEWS” is not good press, right?
Comments please Josh