Links tagged “heatwave”

Meteorologist Cliff Mass: Without global warming, we “still would have experienced the most severe heat wave of the past century.” ... Mass concluded climate change didn’t play a central role in an event largely caused by the natural variability of our regional weather. He notes the temperature soared by more than 40 degrees above the normal high, and climate change added only a few degrees, thus “a record-breaking unique heat wave” would have occurred even without global warming. In his blog, he lays out a golden rule that — based on this analysis — the bigger the temperature surge in an extreme event, the smaller the role of climate change, and accuses the World Weather Attribution report of “misinforming millions.” Mass says his criticism is grounded in a deep knowledge of the intricate mix of ocean, mountains and atmospheric flows that help to produce Northwest weather, as well as climate models he runs. ...

“I don’t believe we are facing any kind of existential threat,” Mass said. “But it is not a good idea to muck around with the climate of the planet.”

NYT: "The study is the latest in a growing body of research termed “rapid attribution” analysis, which aims to establish if there is a link between climate change and specific extreme events like heat waves, heavy rain storms and flooding. The goal is to publicize any climate connection quickly, in part to thwart climate denialists who might claim that global warming had no impact on a particular event. The study, which took a little more than a week, is not yet peer-reviewed or published in a scientific journal.

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Extreme weather expert Dr. Roger Pielke reacts: "This is such an odd and troubling motivation for doing scientific research - to win the daily news cycle over your political opponents."

Charles Rotter also noted that climate activists also promote "pre-event attribution science."

Disturbingly, some scientists dependent on global warming funding also suggest only global warming explains that heatwave. However, they ignore the fact that the heatwave’s clear skies reduce the local greenhouse effect driven by water vapor. Additionally, global warming can’t explain cold events such as Europe’s record cold just 2 months earlier. So, beware! The media is promoting misinformation.