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Global Warming: On Hold? (Scientists Mystefied at lack of Warming)
Discovery ^ | March 2, 2009 | Michael Reilly

Posted on 03/03/2009 8:07:50 AM PST by GOPGuide

For those who have endured this winter's frigid temperatures and today's heavy snowstorm in the Northeast, the concept of global warming may seem, well, almost wishful.

But climate is known to be variable -- a cold winter, or a few strung together doesn't mean the planet is cooling. Still, according to a new study, global warming may have hit a speed bump and could go into hiding for decades.

Earth's climate continues to confound scientists. Following a 30-year trend of warming, global temperatures have flatlined since 2001 despite rising greenhouse gas concentrations, and a heat surplus that should have cranked up the planetary thermostat.

"This is nothing like anything we've seen since 1950," Kyle Swanson of the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee said. "Cooling events since then had firm causes, like eruptions or large-magnitude La Ninas. This current cooling doesn't have one."

Instead, Swanson and colleague Anastasios Tsonis think a series of climate processes have aligned, conspiring to chill the climate. In 1997 and 1998, the tropical Pacific Ocean warmed rapidly in what Swanson called a "super El Nino event." It sent a shock wave through the oceans and atmosphere, jarring their circulation patterns into unison.

How does this square with temperature records from 2005-2007, by some measurements among the warmest years on record? When added up with the other four years since 2001, Swanson said the overall trend is flat, even though temperatures should have gone up by 0.2 degrees Centigrade (0.36 degrees Fahrenheit) during that time.

The discrepancy gets to the heart of one of the toughest problems in climate science -- identifying the difference between natural variability (like the occasional March snowstorm) from human-induced change.

But just what's causing the cooling is a mystery. Sinking water currents in the north Atlantic Ocean could be sucking heat down into the depths. Or an overabundance of tropical clouds may be reflecting more of the sun's energy than usual back out into space.

"It is possible that a fraction of the most recent rapid warming since the 1970's was due to a free variation in climate," Isaac Held of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration in Princeton, New Jersey wrote in an email to Discovery News. "Suggesting that the warming might possibly slow down or even stagnate for a few years before rapid warming commences again."

Swanson thinks the trend could continue for up to 30 years. But he warned that it's just a hiccup, and that humans' penchant for spewing greenhouse gases will certainly come back to haunt us.

"When the climate kicks back out of this state, we'll have explosive warming," Swanson said. "Thirty years of greenhouse gas radiative forcing will still be there and then bang, the warming will return and be very aggressive."


TOPICS: Front Page News; News/Current Events; Politics/Elections
KEYWORDS: agw; globalwarming
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To: GOPGuide
"Cooling events since then had firm causes, like eruptions or large-magnitude La Ninas. This current cooling doesn't have one."

Well, Kyle, perhaps you're just not looking in the right places for your "firm causes."

What it says, though -- as has been rather obvious for a long time -- is that all of the climate model-based hysteria is unwarranted.

41 posted on 03/03/2009 8:30:40 AM PST by r9etb
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To: JasonC

It’s in the rocks man ~ under your feet. Just walk around ~ feel the warmth? It’s there! Somwhere./s


42 posted on 03/03/2009 8:33:08 AM PST by muawiyah
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To: Puppage
We've heard these arguments before:

a) You must have faith that GW exists. Even if GW doesn't exist shouldn't you error on the safe side?

b) There's probably no GW. Now stop worrying and enjoy your life.


43 posted on 03/03/2009 8:33:51 AM PST by Reeses (Leftism is powered by the evil force of envy.)
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To: GOPGuide

There is no mystery if you correlate global temperature changes to something that actually affects it, such as solar activity rather than CO2 concentrations which doesn’t.


44 posted on 03/03/2009 8:37:24 AM PST by Busywhiskers ("There is a time when panic is the appropriate response." Eugene Kleiner)
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To: muawiyah
Accepted for argument. And it comes out again, flowing how? How many watts? An infinitessimal temperature gradient means an infinitessimal power.

It is all cover, they never had a power budget to begin with, and their "climate sensitivity" fudge factors that blew up the available power by a factor of 4 to 10, was and is simply fictional. That is quite completely all.

This was predictable --- and predicted.

45 posted on 03/03/2009 8:39:08 AM PST by JasonC
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To: GonzoGOP

Hydrogen to helium.


46 posted on 03/03/2009 8:39:44 AM PST by VanShuyten ("Ah! but it was something to have at least a choice of nightmares.")
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To: GOPGuide

http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/wti/from:2002/to:2009/plot/wti/from:2002/to:2009/trend

Global temperatures have DECLINED since 2002, they have not “remained flat”.

In the mean time, solar activity remains low, could there be a connection between Earth’s heat source and global temperature?


47 posted on 03/03/2009 8:42:16 AM PST by DBrow
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To: mikelets456

ok...I’ll be generous and go all the way up to 3 trillion Zimbabwe dollars!


48 posted on 03/03/2009 8:43:33 AM PST by xp38
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To: VanShuyten

True, but I was trying to wright like I was talking to a two year old cave man, you know a liberal. Actual scientific facts confuse them. Hence the whole global warming issue.


49 posted on 03/03/2009 8:44:18 AM PST by GonzoGOP (There are millions of paranoid people in the world and they are all out to get me.)
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To: ClearCase_guy

Swanson is right about that...we call it “summer” here.


50 posted on 03/03/2009 8:44:33 AM PST by GBA
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To: 353FMG

Al Gore:Integrity = Contradiction in terms; not to be used in the same sentence.


51 posted on 03/03/2009 8:45:00 AM PST by Renkluaf
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To: GOPGuide
Global Warming doesn't exist, dumbasses!!!

The obvious question is: Over what period?

18,000 years ago Cleveland and Detroit were under 3 miles of ice. Now they are on the Great lakes.

Has it warmed since then? Obviously.

Was it caused by man? Obviously not.

Has it warmed over the past 10 years? No it has cooled. Was it caused by man? No.

52 posted on 03/03/2009 8:45:59 AM PST by Mikey_1962 (Obama: The Affirmative Action President)
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To: GOPGuide

My prediction...

Temps will fall causing lowering of atmospheric CO2 (cooler bodies of water can retain more CO2 in dilution than warmer water. When this happens the ‘global cooling’ will be hailed as a success of BHO and his energy policies..


53 posted on 03/03/2009 8:51:50 AM PST by N3WBI3 (Ah, arrogance and stupidity all in the same package. How efficient of you. -- Londo Mollari)
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To: GOPGuide
the concept of global warming may seem, well, almost wishful.

Does this mean Al has to give back his speaking fees?

54 posted on 03/03/2009 8:53:06 AM PST by John123 (The US may be going down the drain, but everyone else will drown first...)
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To: GOPGuide
The discrepancy gets to the heart of one of the toughest problems in climate science -- identifying the difference between natural variability (like the occasional March snowstorm) from human-induced change.

To the unscrupulous, it's not a problem at all--they just ignore it, or make it up as they go along.

55 posted on 03/03/2009 8:59:13 AM PST by denydenydeny ("I'm sure this goes against everything youÂ’ve been taught, but right and wrong do exist"-Dr House)
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I think I read on here somewhere that there was a famine in CO2 on the earth right now. It is the lowest it has ever been and scientists are worried about that. I think it was on here, but may be wrong. Anyone else see a post about that on here, and if we are emitting so much CO2, how can there be a shortage? Add this to the pile of things that are good for you one day, and are killing you the next.

The only C I worry about right now are carbs, and that is because I am eliminating them from my diet so I don’t have to be fat at my sons wedding this fall. Now, I have a nobel prize project for an inquiring mind, how about creating a way to have a carbohydrate credit? I will gladly buy into that! I miss bread :( . I fear they will work as well as carbon credits do anyway, but someone could make a killing LOL.....


56 posted on 03/03/2009 9:00:00 AM PST by wombtotomb (since its "above his paygrade", why can't we err on the side of caution about when life begins?)
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To: GOPGuide

*******Global Warming doesn’t exist, dumbasses!!!******

Thing is until the $money dries up, they will keep preaching


57 posted on 03/03/2009 9:00:47 AM PST by TexasTransplant (NEMO ME IMPUNE LACESSET)
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To: GOPGuide
But just what's causing the cooling is a mystery.

I thought it was because sunspots were lessening. Or maybe it's just because weather is cyclical.

58 posted on 03/03/2009 9:01:51 AM PST by hsalaw
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To: GOPGuide
But just what's causing the cooling is a mystery. Sinking water currents in the north Atlantic Ocean could be sucking heat down into the depths. Or an overabundance of tropical clouds may be reflecting more of the sun's energy than usual back out into space.

No! No! No! If the government would give me a 3.5 million dollar grant I will prove the Earth is spinning out of control and away from the sun and it was all caused by American consumerism.

59 posted on 03/03/2009 9:07:05 AM PST by A message
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To: GOPGuide
... an overabundance of tropical clouds may be reflecting more of the sun's energy than usual back out into space.

This has been verified as an experimental hypothesis: Lack of sunspots (the current situation) means less magnetic activity of the sun, which means more cosmic rays hitting the earth, which means more clouds.

60 posted on 03/03/2009 9:11:33 AM PST by DuncanWaring (The Lord uses the good ones; the bad ones use the Lord.)
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