Swimming Among the Crocodiles

The case against Anthropogenic Global Warming

Introduction

The Consensus Myth

Computer Model Limitations

The 800-Year Lag

Medieval Warm Period

You Can't Have It Both Ways

Al Gore's Travesty

Climate Extremes

Milankovich Cycles

Cosmic Ray Flux

Is Warming Necessarily Harmful?

Web Links

Extreme Weather

One of the scare-mongering tactics of the AGW lobby is to attribute any extreme weather to global warming and to predict that these extreme phenomena will increase as a consequence of global warming. This just does not stand up to any sort of scientific or historical analysis:

• Weather is driven by thermal differentials. Most AGW models predict decreased thermal differentials (e.g. Karl et.al., 1995. Nature , v. 377, p. 217-320.), so incidence of extreme weather should, by their own logic, decrease.
• The evidence is that the incidence of storms was minimal in the Medieval Warming Period and greatest in the Little Ice Age. The severity of storms increased due to very cold air in the upper atmosphere during the warmer months, leading to, amongst other things, hail storms of such severity that they destroyed crops and killed livestock. (Lamb, H.H., 1995, Climate, History and the Modern World, Methuen, London.)
• The evidence is that a warmer climate is unable to sustain El Niño events (Andrus et. al., 2002, Science, v. 295, p. 1508-1511.); it is El Niño activity that is responsible for much extreme weather.
• The AGW lobby claims that there has been an increase in the intensity of hurricanes in the North Atlantic due to global warming, and cites an increase over the last 30 years. This ignores the fact that North Atlantic hurricane activity is known to follow the multi-decadal cycle of the North Atlantic Oscillation. By carefully selecting a starting point where the cycle is near a minimum, the AGW lobby can show this increase. However, this increase is not apparent if one takes a start-point in, say, the 19th Century. Max Mayfield, Director of the National Hurricane Center in Miami, has stated that global warming has nothing to do with the recent increase in hurricane frequency in the North Atlantic. On a global level, Tad Murty (professor of Earth Sciences at University of Ottawa) has stated, “In all other six ocean basins where tropical cyclones occur, there is either a flat or a downward trend..”
• The IPCC has systematically ignored the science, presented by its own experts, on hurricane intensity. One of these, Christopher Landsea (Atlantic Oceanographic & Meteorological Laboratory) has asked "Where is the science, the refereed publications, that substantiate these pronouncements? What studies are being alluded to that have shown a connection between observed warming trends on the earth and long-term trends in tropical cyclone activity? As far as I know, there are none." With respect to the 2007 IPCC report, he stated: [The IPCC leadership] seems to have already come to the conclusion that global warming has altered hurricane activity and has publicly stated so. This does not reflect the consensus within the hurricane research community. ... Thus I would like assurance that what will be included in the IPCC report will reflect the best available information and the consensus within the scientific community most expert on the specific topic." This assurance didn't come; Landsea subsequently did not write the section on hurricanes for the 2007 IPCC report.