New paper finds significant cooling effect of irrigation; implies water vapor feedback is negative — Published in Environmental Research Letters
'A new paper finds a significant cooling effect of agricultural irrigation in Northwest China during the period from 1959-2006. The authors find an average cooling of May-September temperatures of −0.15 ° C to −0.10 °C per decade in areas with extensive agricultural irrigation. The data implies increased water vapor acts as a negative feedback on temperature, the opposite of claims by climate alarmists. The paper adds to prior work demonstrating that the true sign of water vapor feedback is negative, and that the assumption of positive water vapor feedback in all climate models is false'