By Bob Berwyn
SUMMIT COUNTY — Colorado may be warming up faster than anywhere else in the contiguous 48 states, according to a new map published as part of the 10-year “climate normals” update by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration.
A map included in the new materials shows that Colorado recorded the greatest increase in average maximum temperatures — between .7 and .9 degrees — from the old normals, compiled between 1971 and 2000, and the new normals, which are based on temperature readings between 1981 and 2010. On average across the U.S., the new average temperatures are about .5 degrees warmer.
NOAA cleverly picked the lowest point of the 1970s ice age scare to start their trend line. The eighty year trend shows a completely different story.
http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/oa/climate/research/cag3/co.html
Stephen, looks like you’re “cherry-picking” the part of the story you need to make your point. Probably worth reading the whole story for a decent discussion on why Colorado stands out in the climate picture. One of the scientists interviewed mentions the fact that the latest new normals stand in comparison to a well-known cold spell in the 70s, and there’s also some discussion of the heat-island effect.
Bob,
So it was you doing the cherry picking with this headline?
“New ?climate normals? indicate dramatic warning across the country”
Did you see the question mark? I was curious when I saw the map, so I interviewed the best sources I could find.
Bob,
You might enjoy reading this CIA report from 1976. http://news.google.com/newspapers?id=xb0yAAAAIBAJ&sjid=q-0FAAAAIBAJ&pg=3668,7007&dq=cold+kazakhstan&hl=en
http://www.climatemonitor.it/wp-content/uploads/2009/12/1974.pdf
So, Bob Berwyn, are you saying that leading questions aren’t just for mendacious bloviators?
Anyway, it’s this story that’s getting all the play today. More than 6K views on a Saturday morning: http://summitcountyvoice.com/2011/07/30/feds-may-be-muzzling-scientist-over-arctic-research/
On a nice day like this? People should be out hiking and enjoying the record snowpack in the mountains.
Bob, did you read the IG transcript. Funniest/saddest destruction of a “scientists” career.
Up to 1000 Polar Bears are shot each year legally. If there is any threat to the bears, its hunting. And stupid scientists.
No doubt, I forgot to mention the fact that the only witnessed drowning of polar bears was when our scientists shot them with tranqs and they went to the water to get away from the mob of morons. TWICE RECENTLY!! This is an example of our sciency types that we’re suppose simply trust about our climate. I swear pell grants and open admissions policies will the end of our society. I think its requisite to display an inordinate amount of stupidity before one can be designated a climate researcher. (In my best Bullwinkle voice…) “Duhhmmm, hey Rocky, I’m gonna be a brain surgeon!!!”
lol, Bob, did you read the interview? If that dolt was working for me I’d muzzle him, too!! …… oh, wait, …….
This goes to the heart of what’s wrong with science journalism and climate science in itself. So, this guy, while looking for whales, spots 3 or 4 dead polly bears in the water. This has never been witnessed before nor since. From that, we get, 1) that the bears drowned. There is no proof of that which I can find. 2) That ice loss was part of the causation. If that were true then 2007 should have been a bumper year for floaters. It wasn’t. 3) That the polar bear as a viable species is at risk The polar bear population hasn’t changed in over 30 years. and 4) The frequency of such occurrences is expected to increase. Well, it would seeing that we never kept stats on this until now. But, oddly, we’ve never spotted 3-4 floating polly bears since.
The storm, reported the day prior, while enough to ground flights, wasn’t exceptional in any way.
Bob, they published a paper with that garbage. A peer reviewed piece of …..sh….cience Yes, it went viral. Algore even used that crap in his film. It became accepted as fact that polly bears are drowning because of lack of ice. There was no scientific outrage at this publication nor any refutations. Journalism? Where is it? You want to write about something? Please make it worthwhile. Do something with meaning. New normals? Yes, only if one uses the arbitrary length of time of 30 years. It has no basis to be chosen over any other length of time. Why not 35? Or 22? At least 20 years is an approximate length of a particular climatic solar cycle. But then, one would have to acknowledge that the sun may play a part in our climate before that could happen.
Sorry, Bob, haven’t had my morning coffee quota…….
I would note there have been recent reports of cubs not making the long swims, but there are many questions to ask about that also. We seem to have a lack of bodies to study to determine if they are, indeed, drowning.
I did read the transcript. That’s why I’m questioning BOEMRE’s claims that the investigation is not targeting the science.
Why on earth would the Feds be targeting him? They are on his side.
I’d still like to know how close those dead bears were to each other…..
if something happened in one spot that killed 3 bears……you don’t average that out over the whole northern hemisphere
Did they get poisoned? shot by hunters? attacked by whales?
I’d like them to target the science. It’s deplorable that we’re paying such a doltish clown to be a scientist. If this is an example of our scientists, we’re in a world of hurt. I didn’t see anything untoward in the transcript, but surely we can get rid of him on the basis of general incompetence. —– Dude.
The Dude part still makes me laugh…..cause it’s so true
Was it 3 or 4 bears? he says both………
Deeewwwddd!!! I think what our inarticulate public payed doctorate was stating….. though I’m not entirely sure……. was that 3 bears were spotted in the search grid while one may have been spotted outside, while in route to, the search grid. I think that’s what he was trying to state.
Ever notice how evasive some people can be when attempting to nail down details of their proclamations? And did you notice how a date was pertinent to whether he recollected some documented criticisms of their calculations, of which, his good friend Gleason was in possession. Gleason kept in touch enough that Monnett would know his pay-grade, his romantic life, but not criticisms of their paper………. riiiight.
I write more of these “reports” every year than that brain dead slacker has ever seen….
…I can remember every one of them
If he really wrote that report, he could have breezed through that interview
The Feds muzzling a scientist who reported polar bear drownings? I have to admit that this is consistent with evidence that nameless gov’t functionaries are adjusting temperatures to exacerbate the downward trend.
Bob, you should do some cherry picking of your own. I went to the NOAA site and checked winter temperatures for Colorado over the past decade. When you do that, you find out that they’re on a steep decline of -2.62 degrees F per decade. You call that global warming?
Suyts:
Actually, your point 3) is understated. Polar bears are at record 50 year levels today.
Hmmm, the only numbers I’ve seen puts them at 20,000 to 25,000. I don’t think that’s changed much, but an actual unbiased count is getting hard to come by……. I hope we don’t have too many more than that, I think much more and they’ll go beyond their saturation point.
From what I’ve read, they’ve been at that level since the 80’s. This suggests to me that by the 80’s the population had reached its environmental carrying capacity – at which it’s (naturally) stayed ever since.
Sorry, in my mind, a 10-year seasonal trend is only one small part of a long-term global climate picture.
yep, especially when it’s 1/3 of the record.
20 years of warming…and 10 years of not warming
And a 20 year trend is not?
First off, its not just seasonal. Annual Colorado temperature shows a downward trend of 1.51 degrees F for the past decade. Also, I believe that global warming theory predicts warming winters. So its important to look at winter trends. Winter trends in Colorado, or for the entire US and globe for that matter, demonstrate that AGW is full of holes. If you go to NASA GISS and check their winter temperatures for the globe it shows a cooling from 2001-2011. And this is despite the fact all these measurements can be criticized for bad coverage and urban warming effects.
The graph above shows an 80-year trend – which shows no continuing change whatever.
Bob, did you consider the El Nino in 1998 and compare temperature trends on either side of it, before accepting the proclamations of experts?
Actually winter temperatures in Colorado also show a decreasing trend from 1980-1994. There wasn’t 2 decades of warming and 1 of cooling. I think its fair to say any warming signal at all is limited to a spike in 1995 (which can be discounted as a random fluctuation) and the “super” El Nino of the late 1990s. Take that out, and there is no long term global picture.
rw,
Even more interesting, I graphed Colorado winters for 191-1944, and the upward trend is much stronger than 1980-2010. I wonder what Bob thinks about that. Check it out here:
http://reasonabledoubtclimate.wordpress.com/2011/07/30/global-warming-in-colorado/
Interesting.
Truly, “nothing to see here” – at least with respect to the current bellicose claims.
To recap, according to Bob Berwyn:
10 years: insignificant
30 years: significant
80 years: cherry picked
180 years is three long term weather pattern average lengths of 60 years which would be a start with fairly uncorrupted data, which we do not have anyhoo! Ten periods of Peak to Peak variable weather data would give us an idea of what trend might exist. That would give you ten data points to play with and one hundred would be much better as that would give us a better idea of the true average time for regional weather patterns.
When we KNOW that long term weather varies it is a fools game to try to figure out where we are when we do not have an accurate map of where we were.
That only covers regional weather because until we understand regional weather patterns we are banging our heads against an invisible wall. FUBAR comes to mind as well as SNAFU!
So if we compare these “normals” to the Medieval Warm Period we can then drop any insinuations of alarm. It’s cooler on earth now than then. To not bring up the Medieval Warm Period when talking about how warm it is now and inferring what it instead should be to be “normal” is to be biased. Just bring the Medieval Warm Period up and let the chips fall where they may.
Let’s be fair minded, shall we?
To not bring up the 1930s is biased. The whole thing is a sham. I’m not saying there wasn’t any warming 1980-2010 but picking out a favorite 30 year period and declaring that “normal”, and then declaring any temperature increase above that as evidence of a looming catastrophe is complete nonsense. Why should temperatures from 1960-1990, or 1970-2000 or any other 30 year period be considered special?
There is no such thing as NORMAL weather unless you are referring to variations from one extreme to the other. Rate of change don’t mean squat and trends don’t mean squat. Average of the Mean is a fairy tale at best and normal temperature is the range between 124F and -90 something F, The scientific description of temperatures would be greater than HAH* to less than FC**
* Hot As Heck
**Friggin Cold