Archives de catégorie : climate-debate

New Study: The Arctic Was 9°C Warmer Than Today During the Holocene Thermal Maximum

by K. Richard, July 8, 2025 in WUWT


Holocene (11,700 to 8,200 years ago) Arctic (Svalbard) temperatures “were up to 9°C higher than today” according to the authors of a new Nature journal study. At that time CO2 was thought to only hover around 260 ppm.

Svalbard then cooled as CO2 rose for the next 8,000 years – a negative correlation that wholly contradicts the rising-CO2-drives-Arctic-warmth narrative.

Nonetheless, climate models are predicated on the assumption rising human CO2 emissions (RCP 8.5) will lead to a warming of ~8°C by 2100.

Ocean “Reversal” Hysteria: Facts Not Included

by W. Eschenbach, July 6, 2025 in WUWT


ery so often, the climate media machine spits out a headline so breathless you’d think the laws of physics had just been accidentally repealed by a badly-worded executive order. Case in point: bne IntelliNews in Germany recently told us that a “major ocean current in the Southern Hemisphere has reversed direction for the first time in recorded history,” and that climatologists are calling it a“catastrophic” tipping point. It also quotes a climatologist as saying “The stunning reversal of ocean circulation in the Southern Hemisphere confirms the global climate system has entered a catastrophic phase.”

And the headline for that hysteria?

Southern Ocean current reverses for first time, signalling risk of climate system collapse

The implication: pack your bags, the climate apocalypse is here, and don’t forget your floaties.

But as is so often the case, the devil isn’t just in the details—it’s in the words they didn’t mention. The article, like a magician with something up both sleeves, never links to the actual scientific study.

So, after a bit of digital spelunking, I dug up the source. It’s an article in PNAS, the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, yclept “Rising surface salinity and declining sea ice: A new Southern Ocean state revealed by satellites.”

And when I got to the study, what do you know? The study doesn’t mention “tipping point,” “collapse,” “current reversal,” “Southern Ocean current” or even “overturning circulation.” The only “reversal” in the paper refers to satellites detecting a reversal in surface salinity trends from decreasing to increasing, not a reversal in the the direction of the Southern ocean’s most complex circulation shown above.

So what did the study actually say? Here’s the paper’s abstract:

“For decades, the surface of the polar Southern Ocean (south of 50°S) has been freshening—an expected response to a warming climate. This freshening enhanced upper-ocean stratification, reducing the upward transport of subsurface heat and possibly contributing to sea ice expansion. It also limited the formation of open-ocean polynyas. Using satellite observations, we reveal a marked increase in surface salinity across the circumpolar Southern Ocean since 2015. This shift has weakened upper-ocean stratification, coinciding with a dramatic decline in Antarctic sea ice coverage. Additionally, rising salinity facilitated the reemergence of the Maud Rise polynya in the Weddell Sea, a phenomenon last observed in the mid-1970s. Crucially, we demonstrate that satellites can now monitor these changes in real time, providing essential evidence of the Southern Ocean’s potential transition toward persistently reduced sea ice coverage.”

UAH v6.1 Global Temperature Update for June, 2025: +0.48 deg. C

by R. Spencer, July 3rd, 2025 in ClimateWarming


The Version 6.1 global average lower tropospheric temperature (LT) anomaly for June, 2025 was +0.48 deg. C departure from the 1991-2020 mean, down slightly from the May, 2025 anomaly of +0.50 deg. C.

The Version 6.1 global area-averaged linear temperature trend (January 1979 through June 2025) now stands at +0.16 deg/ C/decade (+0.22 C/decade over land, +0.13 C/decade over oceans).

The following table lists various regional Version 6.1 LT departures from the 30-year (1991-2020) average for the last 18 months (record highs are in red).

YEAR MO GLOBE NHEM. SHEM. TROPIC USA48 ARCTIC AUST
2024 Jan +0.80 +1.02 +0.58 +1.20 -0.19 +0.40 +1.12
2024 Feb +0.88 +0.95 +0.81 +1.17 +1.31 +0.86 +1.16
2024 Mar +0.88 +0.96 +0.80 +1.26 +0.22 +1.05 +1.34
2024 Apr +0.94 +1.12 +0.76 +1.15 +0.86 +0.88 +0.54
2024 May +0.78 +0.77 +0.78 +1.20 +0.05 +0.20 +0.53
2024 June +0.69 +0.78 +0.60 +0.85 +1.37 +0.64 +0.91
2024 July +0.74 +0.86 +0.61 +0.97 +0.44 +0.56 -0.07
2024 Aug +0.76 +0.82 +0.69 +0.74 +0.40 +0.88 +1.75
2024 Sep +0.81 +1.04 +0.58 +0.82 +1.31 +1.48 +0.98
2024 Oct +0.75 +0.89 +0.60 +0.63 +1.90 +0.81 +1.09
2024 Nov +0.64 +0.87 +0.41 +0.53 +1.12 +0.79 +1.00
2024 Dec +0.62 +0.76 +0.48 +0.52 +1.42 +1.12 +1.54
2025 Jan +0.45 +0.70 +0.21 +0.24 -1.06 +0.74 +0.48
2025 Feb +0.50 +0.55 +0.45 +0.26 +1.04 +2.10 +0.87
2025 Mar +0.57 +0.74 +0.41 +0.40 +1.24 +1.23 +1.20
2025 Apr +0.61 +0.77 +0.46 +0.37 +0.82 +0.85 +1.21
2025 May +0.50 +0.45 +0.55 +0.30 +0.15 +0.75 +0.99
2025 June +0.48 +0.48 +0.47 +0.30 +0.81 +0.05 +0.39

The full UAH Global Temperature Report, along with the LT global gridpoint anomaly image for June, 2025, and a more detailed analysis by John Christy, should be available within the next several days here.

The monthly anomalies for various regions for the four deep layers we monitor from satellites will be available in the next several days at the following locations:

Stop Lying, The Guardian, the World’s Oceans Aren’t Becoming Dangerously Acidic

by H.S. Sterling, Jul 5, 2025 in WUWT


From ClimateREALISM

The U.K.’s The Guardian ran an article claiming that the world’s oceans have surpassed a critical tipping point in acidity threatening sea life. This is false. The pH content of the world’s oceans varies by time and place throughout the day, rising and falling modestly, but the average pH content remains far from acidic and there is no evidence crustaceans or other types of shellfish are being threatened by the sea water becoming acidic.

Lisa Bachelor, the writer of The Guardian’s article, “‘Ticking timebomb’: sea acidity has reached critical levels, threatening entire ecosystems – study,” says:

The world’s oceans are in worse health than realized, scientists have said today, as they warn that a key measurement shows we are “running out of time” to protect marine ecosystems.

Ocean acidification, often called the “evil twin” of the climate crisis, is caused when carbon dioxide is rapidly absorbed by the ocean, where it reacts with water molecules leading to a fall in the pH level of the seawater. It damages coral reefs and other ocean habitats and, in extreme cases, can dissolve the shells of marine creatures.

Bachelor’s story is based upon a study which claims that ocean acidity has breached a “planetary boundary,” the seventh of nine such milestones or boundaries to be breached, threatening to cause permanent damage to the planet’s health.

The study looked at ice core records and studies of marine life, run through algorithms of complex computer models to assess the past 150 years, concluding the ocean acidification boundary had been breached, with the world facing a “ticking timebomb,” of sea life destruction.

This study’s findings are driven by woefully flawed computer models, a limited time horizon and understanding of long-term history, and lack a basis in real world data. As such it and The Guardian’s dire warnings based on it, are unjustified.

Model outputs are only as good as the assumptions, data, and our understandings of the feedbacks and systems built into them. Even as our knowledge improves, our understanding of the oceans and the interactions of its various currents, systems, inputs, and outputs remain limited, thus the assumptions built into the models are weak and uncertain. As discussed at Climate Realism, here, here, and here, for example, the climate model outputs fail to match reality.


Climate change causes WHAT!!? Pink lakes, divorcing albatrosses, shrinking goats and lots else

by C. Rotter, Jul 5, 2025 in WUWT


One of my favorite statistics about climate change
…is that apparently, 60% of Americans reckon that climate change has become like a religion, quote, “used to control people.”

  • Climate change elephant — You’ll be surprised to know that climate change is a significant threat to elephants.
  • Climate change kangaroo — Climate change is impacting kangaroos in various ways, including changing their habitat, food availability, and overall health. They didn’t mention whether the kangaroo’s mental health is affected, but I’m pretty sure it is.
  • Climate change chameleon — Yes. Chameleons. Global warming poses significant threats.
  • Climate change giraffe — Raid your house in Kenya for extinction because of poaching and climate change.
  • Climate change albatross — Climate crisis pushes albatross divorce rates higher. Albatrosses form monogamous relationships. But apparently… and this is in the Royal Society for goodness’ sake. You know—Isaac Newton.

I can barely believe this. Right?
Apparently, albatrosses are splitting up more often.

  • Climate change gorilla — Yep. Climate change is making endangered mountain gorillas more thirsty.

SHOCK NEWS – CYCLONES HAVE DECREASED AS THE WORLD HAS WARMED

by Climate Science, Jul 4, 2025


Researchers have studied things like pebble layers, shell fragments, and coral rubble in Fiji to find out what has happened there in the past. Yanan Li and others drilled cores to find debris pushed 120m into the mangroves by the worst of the worst tropical cyclones.  Handily, they also had two bad storms recorded in the last century to calibrate what they found.  Awkwardly, the big storms were more common in the Little Ice Age.

Blessed be global warming: There were more Big Cyclones in Fiji when it was cold 200 years ago « JoNova

New Study Indicates The North Atlantic Is Colder Now Than Any Other Time In The Last 9000 Years

by K. Richard, Jul 3, 2025 in NoTricksZone


According to a new study, abrupt (±1-2°C per century) shifts in North Atlantic sea surface temperature (SST) have occurred routinely over the last 9000 years. These decadal- to centennial-scale climate changes were “induced by Holocene summer insolation and atmosphere-ocean internal variability.”

The average SST throughout the 8.2 ka fluctuation was 10.0°C. The average 4.2 ka SST was 8.1°C. And during the Little Ice Age (LIA, 1600-1900 CE) the North Atlantic SSTs averaged 7.5°C.

Since 1900, SSTs have been stable to declining, suggesting the modern period is the coldest of the Holocene.

Gardi Sugdub’s ‘Climate Exodus’ Myth: Overcrowding, Not Rising Seas, Drives Relocation

by H. Sterling Burnett, June 27, 2025 in WUWT


Yahoo News recently posted an article from the environmental website The Cool Down claiming that the native residents of the very small Panamanian island, Gardí Sugdub (also known as Cartí Sugdupu), are being forced to flee due to fast rising sea levels swamping the land as a result of climate change. This is false. Sea levels at Gardi Sugdub aren’t rising unusually fast, and the best evidence is that most of the island’s residents are voluntarily abandoning it with government help due to overcrowding and insufficient services and infrastructure on the small island.

Grace Howarth, the author of the article, “Residents forced to flee from ‘disappearing island’ due to heartbreaking crisis: ‘There were no more friends, no more kids playing,’” writes describing the situation there:

Rising sea levels are splitting communities apart in Gardí Sugdub and leaving people behind, possibly in danger.

. . .

One year ago, around 1,200 Indigenous Guna people were transported to the mainland by the Panama government for their safety as ocean waters encroached upon their community.

Climate Realism debunked an earlier article from the BBC making the same claims in February of this year; nothing has changed in the four months since then.

A 485-million-year history of bad science

by W.  Essenbach,  June 27, 2025


A few days ago I published another analysis of mine, called pHony Alarmism. Take a moment to read that if you haven’t, because this is a sequel. Both are about a new study in Science Magazine yclept “A 485-million-year history of Earth’s surface temperature”, paywalled, of course.

A short digression. One of the ways I truly benefit from publishing the results of my scientific investigations on the web and interacting with the commenters is that my mistakes don’t last long. When I go off the rails, and notice I didn’t say “if” I go, my mistakes rarely last more than a day before they’re pointed out and I can consider and correct them.

But that’s only one of the ways that it’s beneficial to write for the web and then stick around. Perhaps more importantly, it lets people ask me interesting questions and point out overlooked avenues to investigate.

Here’s an example. In a reply to my post yesterday, I got this …

Jeff Alberts, June 25, 2025 4:26 pm

No graph with the co2 and pH together?

To which I answered …

They’re sampled at different times. I could interpolate both ways. Thought about it, then decided that was enough for one post. Hang on … we know pH is proportional in some sense to the log of the CO2. Give me a minute …

In a bit I came back to say:

…well, of course it takes more than a minute but most interesting.

Looks like that will be the subject of my next post. Stay tuned.

w.

This is that next post. End of digression.

One of the reasons that I didn’t look at graphing pH versus CO2 was that I was given to understand that the procedure for calculating the pH was very complex. The paper says (or at least the Supplementary Information (PDF) says, the paper is paywalled:

4.3 Estimating the temporal variability of pHsw [pH of saltwater]

Basic Physics All at Sea in Sky News Climate Scare Nonsense Story

by C. Morrison, May 31, 2025 in WUWT


Possibly one of the dumbest and most scientifically illiterate climate scare stories ever written has been published by the fast-fading UK Sky News. Climate reporter Victoria Seabrook notes that the sea ice on the Arctic “continent” is melting at 12% every decade but she backs it up by publishing a graph clearly showing it has been stable since 2007. She goes on to claim that the Arctic melt will push up sea levels around Britain and fuel worse coastal flooding, seemingly unaware that melting ice in liquid does not raise its level (suggested educational tip, check out ice in a gin and tonic glass). Just for good measure, her silly story throws in the wobbling jet stream and a “shocking” prediction that global temperature could rise by nearly 1°C in just five years.

This story is a classic of its kind – late climate psychosis folderol to back up the collapsing Net Zero fantasy. After decades of relentless mainstream gaslighting, mass audiences are still vaguely concerned that the climate is in some kind of ‘emergency’. Net Zero is retreating around the world, partly because it is increasingly understood that human civilisation cannot abolish the use of hydrocarbons without returning to the dark ages, and partly because nobody is prepared to pay for it when given a choice. But the great climate science con that is the foundation of the collectivist Net Zero lunacy continues, and, if Seabrook’s latest work is an example, it is getting more desperate by the day.

So she publishes the graph below with the misleading 12% decline every decade heading.

Germany’s Scorching Summer of 1911 Undermines Today’s Heat Hysteria

by P. Gosselin, June 03, 2025 in ClimateChangeDispatch


Escaping The Heat
The German blog site lokalgeschichte examines the German summer of 1911, which was exceptionally hot, dry, and sunny. It disproves the previously widespread idea that Central Europe’s heat waves are something new and caused by more CO2 in the atmosphere. [emphasis, links added]

Although temperatures in the summer of 1911 were very high in places (up to 40°C [104°F] in Chemnitz), no new records were broken. The year 1892 had similar or even higher values (41.5°C [106.7°F] in Reichenhall).

The most remarkable feature of the summer of 1911 was not the absolute maximum temperature, but the duration of the hot spell and the persistent tendency towards dry and warm high-pressure weather, which lasted from spring until well into September.

In 1911, Germany saw extreme drought, particularly in western and central Germany. In Berlin, for example, only about half of the normal precipitation fell between April and July, and only a seventh in August.

Such an event occurring today would have climate alarmists blaming CO2.

….

Predictive? Study Finds IPCC Climate Models Overstate Warming Up To 4.5°F

by K. Richard, May 28, 2025 in ClimateChangeDispatch


A new evidence-based study provides compelling evidence that for decades, the IPCC has been engaged in “advocacy research,” or the “antiscientific practice of undertaking research designed to support a given hypothesis.” [emphasis, links added]

The IPCC favored climate model parameters used to support the narrative that climate change is primarily caused by humans burning fossil fuels (referred to as the Anthro models in the study).

[It is] so fraught with errors that even a stripped-down benchmark model that merely projects future temperatures will not deviate from the historical average, overwhelmingly outperforming the IPCC’s modeling.

“The IPCC’s models of anthropogenic climate change lack predictive validity. The IPCC models’ forecast errors were greater for most estimation samples – often many times greater – than those from a benchmark model that simply predicts that future years’ temperatures will be the same as the historical median.

The IPCC’s Anthro models, which hypothesize that (primarily) CO2 will foment dangerous global warming over the coming decades, woefully overestimated the warming from 1970-2019 by anywhere from 1.8°C [3.2°F] to 2.5°C [4.5°F].

“The errors of forecasts from the anthropogenic models for the era of concern over man-made global warming, starting in 1970, were 1.8°C (AVL), 1.7°C (AVSL), 2.3°C (AVR), and 2.5°C (AVSR) warmer than the measured temperatures.”

Over the 2000 to 2019 period, the Anthro models’ forecast errors were a staggering 16 times greater than the simple benchmark model’s errors.

“…forecasts for the years 2000 to 2019 from models estimated with 50 observations of historical data (1850 to 1899) have MdAEs [median absolute errors] of around 17°C or 1,600 percent greater than the 1°C MdAE of forecasts from the naïve benchmark model.”

In contrast, the authors found the models that centered on Total Solar Irradiance (TSI) as a climate change factor did indeed have predictive validity, and their error ranges were much smaller.

Considering the magnitude of the error in using CO2 emissions as a basis for climate forecasts, the authors conclude the Anthro models’ unreliability “would appear to void policy relevance.”

Big Chart Alert: Share of Global Carbon Emissions by Country in 2022

by Voronoi, May 21, 2025


Key Takeaways

  • China accounts for 26% of all global emissions, while the U.S. is responsible for another 11.5%.
  • This was equivalent to 12.7 billion tons of carbon dioxide for China and 5.6 billion tCO2e for the U.S. in 2022.
  • Most of the top 10 emitters are also the world’s most populous countries, barring Iran, Saudi Arabia, and Canada.

Developing Countries Are Driving Emissions Growth

There’s a pattern as to why middle-income countries are seeing emissions growth.

  1. They are prioritizing economic development and have larger populations, driving an overall increase in energy consumption.
  2. Most emissions-heavy industries have moved from high-income countries to middle- and low-income ones.
  3. Thus, high-income countries are able to sustain their consumption levels while the emissions from producing the goods they consume are accounted for elsewhere.

Dataset

Rank Country ISO Code Share of Total Emissions Carbon Emissions (in million tCO2e, 2022)
1 China CHN 26.16% 12,716
2 U.S. USA 11.53% 5,604
3 India IND 7.69% 3,737
4 Russia RUS 3.75% 1,821
5 Brazil BRA 3.16% 1,538
6 Indonesia IDN 3.15% 1,530
7 Japan JPN 2.15% 1,044
8 Iran IRN 2.06% 1,004
9 Saudi Arabia SAU 1.60% 775
10 Canada CAN 1.54% 750

BBC Warming Arctic Claims Are Fake News

by P. Homewood, May 24, 2025 in WUWT


The BBC are at it again!

Their latest report about Norway, “Tensions rise as superpowers scrap for a piece of the Arctic”, claims:

Climate scientists say the Arctic is warming four times faster than anywhere else. This impacts ecosystems, wildlife and local populations

In reality temperatures in the Arctic have been stable for the last two decade. The Arctic is not “warming” at all.

Looking further back, temperatures were at similar levels to now in the 1930s and 40s. In between that era and now, there was a plunge in temperatures, followed by a recovery:

CNN Lies in its AMOC Collapse Story: Another Flip-Flop in a Long Line of Alarmist Claims

by A. Watts, May 23, 2025 in ClimateRealism


A recent CNN article by Laura Paddison, titled “A crucial system of ocean currents is slowing. It’s already supercharging sea level rise in the US, references new research on the Atlantic Meridional Overturning Circulation (AMOC) to claim the current is slowing down leading to rising seas and costly, deadly coastal flooding. This false claim is based solely on a single, as yet unpublished and unverified, study which used a single climate model’s projections. Evidence, such as other studies and historical reporting on AMOC trends demonstrate that there is no consensus on the status of the AMOC. Rather, scientists’ predictions and the media’s reporting on the AMOC have been flip-flopping for nearly two decades—unable to decide whether AMOC is speeding up, slowing down, or staying steady.

Figure1. A simplified illustration of the global “conveyor belt” of ocean currents that transport heat around Earth. Red shows surface currents, and blue shows deep currents. Deep water forms where the sea surface is the densest. The background color shows sea-surface density. The AMOC is the currents in the Atlantic Ocean off the east coast of the US. Source: NASA/Goddard Space Flight Center Scientific Visualization Studio.

Nigeria’s Water Crisis: Why Poor Management, Not Climate Change, Is Drying Up Farms

by L. Lueken, May 21, 2025 in WUWT


AfricaNews (AN), in collaboration with the Associated Press, recently posted an article claiming that recent drought in Nigeria is due to climate change. This is unlikely to be the full story. Although data is sparse for the region, human activities are just as likely to be contributing to desertification as cycles of drought are.

The article, “Nigerian farmers struggle as climate change dries up water sources,” claims that climate change is the cause of recent drought in Nigeria, leading to crop declines. Surface water is becoming scarce during the dry seasons, so some farmers are forced to dig wells to irrigate their crops. AN writes that “[r]iverbeds have started to run dry,” and so the blame “is pointed firmly at climate change, with conservationists warning that food could become scarce if measures are not urgently put in place to help the farmers irrigate their land.”

While it is true that Nigeria has been suffering from extended drought, particularly in the northern part of the country, it is not clear that this is all or even mostly because of any human-caused climate change due to changing temperatures. Natural drought, combined with human error in land and water management, seems to be the more likely culprit.

According to the article, over 80 percent of Nigeria’s farmers are smallholder farmers, and they make up 90 percent of the nation’s crop production. The article points at maize (corn) as a sample crop that is suffering due to the water shortage, it “saw a decline in cultivated land from 6.2 million hectares in 2021 to 5.8 million hectares in 2022.”

Crop production data from the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) show that Nigeria’s corn production has been increasing over time. It actually shot upwards the most in recent decades, after remaining relatively flat through the 1980s. Between just 1990 and 2023, Nigerian corn production increased 91 percent, while yields increased 71 percent. (See figure below)

Live at 1 p.m. Eastern: SHOCK CLIMATE REPORT! Urban Heat Islands Responsible for 65% of Global Warming

by C. Rotter, May 16, 2025 in WUWT


The Heartland Institute

A new study from the University of Alabama in Huntsville addresses the question of how much the Urban Heat Island (UHI) effect is responsible for the higher temperatures at weather stations across the world. Dr. Roy Spencer and Dr. John Christy have spent several years developing a novel method that quantifies, for the first time, the average UHI warming effects related to population density. Their finding: no less than 65% of “runaway global warming” is not caused by our emissions of carbon dioxide, but by the urbanization of the world.

Dr. Spencer will join us to go over his findings. We’ll also cover the Crazy Climate News of the Week, including an absurd new bit of unscientific propaganda from the U.S. Climate Reference Network at NOAA, wonder if the sun is setting on wide-scale solar energy, and discuss how alarmists refuse to see that we live in a climactic “golden age”—and more.

Join Heartland’s Anthony Watts, Linnea Lueken, H. Sterling Burnett, Jim Lakely, and Dr. Roy Spencer LIVE at 1 p.m. ET for Episode #157 of The Climate Realism Show. We’ll be answering questions in the chat for us, and for Dr. Spencer, on the show.

James Hansen: Climate Cassandra or Science Salesman?

by C. Rotter, May 15, 2025 in WUWT


One would think that James Hansen—once lionized as the father of modern climate alarmism—might bask in the limelight after a fresh round of histrionics about Earth hurtling toward a “point of no return.” Instead, we find him on the pages of his latest blog-style polemic, “Large Cloud Feedback Confirms High Climate Sensitivity”, complaining that he’s being ostracized by the very media and institutions he helped train to bark on command every time the CO2 concentration ticks up another ppm.

“A strange phenomenon occurred… almost uniformly, these reports dismissed our conclusions as a fringe opinion… Are there important repercussions for the public… indeed, for the future of all people? The answer… is ‘yes.’”

https://www.columbia.edu/~jeh1/mailings/2025/CloudFeedback.13May2025.pdf

One might suggest that after decades of theatrics, people have simply stopped buying tickets to the same show.

But let’s not be hasty. His newest round of publications deserves scrutiny, not for its recycled gloom, but for the increasingly acrobatic logic and interpretive liberties embedded within.

The ‘Big FXcking Deal’ and the Cloud Feedback Feedback

At the heart of Hansen’s thesis is the observed decrease in Earth’s albedo—the fraction of sunlight reflected back into space. Hansen pegs this decline at 0.5% over the last two decades, translating to a 1.7 W/m² increase in absorbed solar radiation. This, he insists, proves that cloud feedback must be large and positive, confirming an equilibrium climate sensitivity of 4.5°C ± 0.5°C for doubled CO2.

“Earth’s albedo… has decreased about 0.5%… we described this change as a BFD… because it has staggering implications.”

https://www.columbia.edu/~jeh1/mailings/2025/CloudFeedback.13May2025.pdf

The Media Hype Extreme Weather—But Data Tells A Different Tale

by K&K Media, May 14 2025 in ClimateChangeDispatch


Hurricane Winds
These days, stories of extreme weather are everywhere you look. But a crucial detail often goes overlooked: We’re safer from the consequences of that weather than ever before. [emphasis, links added]

There was a time when extreme weather events that led to massive fatalities were depressingly common in the U.S.

In the last 85 years, however, there have only been three such events that took over 1,000 lives: Hurricane Katrina, Hurricane Maria, and a 1980 heatwave.

There’s a reason for that.

The most important factor in determining a natural disaster’s destructiveness isn’t its intensity, but how well people in its path are protected. And on that front, things have improved … a lot.

Better building codes have prevented about $1.6 billion in damage a year since 2000. Advances in hurricane forecasts and early-warning systems have given people more time to prepare.

Having air conditioners in nearly 90% of American homes has severely cut the risk of extreme heat.

And while you often hear that the economic damages from extreme weather are growing, you don’t often hear why.

Antarctic Ice Is Increasing…Climate Models “No Longer Reflect Reality”

by Prof. F. Vahrenholt, May 13, 2025 in NoTricksZone 


If you look at the climate website of the Helmholtz Association with the ambitious name “Climate Facts” under Antarctica, you will read the following: “The important mainland ice of Antarctica is disappearing, and at an increasing rate”. According to the Helmholtz Association, this is of great significance for rising sea levels. And indeed, the rising sea level caused by the melting Antarctic ice is one of the central arguments of climate policy that has worried people.

This makes the result of a recently published study, according to which the picture has changed since 2021, all the more surprising: Antarctica’s continental ice is increasing again.

Chinese researchers from Tongji University led by Prof. Shen and Dr. Wang found that Antarctic ice masses have increased significantly since 2021. The data evaluated by NASA’s GRACE satellite showed an annual loss of 74 billion tons per year from 2002 to 2010. From 2011 to 2020, the amount even doubled. Now the ice has increased by around 108 billion tons year on year.

Source: Science China Press)

As the melting of the Antarctic glaciers contributed around 20% to sea level rise, a slowdown in the rise has been observed since 2021. Wouldn’t this good news be worth reporting on the news? Not so far.

Current Climate Conditions Aren’t Historically Extreme or Unusual, New Research Shows

by S. Burnett, May 09, 2025 in WUWT


Recently, a number of new studies and analyses have been published indicating what readers of CCW have long known: recent climate conditions are not historically unusual. An examination of long-term wildfire trends, plus research comparing past climate conditions to current conditions in central Africa and Germany, show current conditions are well below extremes experienced historically.

A relatively new Substack platform, “Grok Thinks,” publishes analyses of scientific and technological developments and research by the AI tool/assistant Grok3beta. A post in its first week of operation examined claims by geographer Elizabeth Hoy, Ph.D., a senior support scientist with NASA’s Carbon Cycle and Ecosystems Office Goddard Space Flight Center. Grok’s analysis used hard data to show Hoy makes at least 10 false claims about wildfire history and trends on NASA’s “Wildfire and Climate Change” webpage.

Grok writes, in introducing the analysis,

On its “Wildfires and Climate Change” page, and in the accompanying video on YouTube, NASA—through Physical Geographer Elizabeth Hoy—paints a stark picture: climate change, fueled by human activity, is making wildfires longer, more frequent, and more destructive. It’s a compelling story, one that resonates with our instinct to connect dramatic events to a larger cause. But when you peel back the layers, something unsettling emerges: NASA’s claims don’t match the evidence.

This isn’t a minor quibble over data points. NASA’s narrative, endorsed by Hoy, is riddled with exaggerations, omissions, and outright fabrications. Over ten key claims, they twist regional trends into global crises, ignore contradictory evidence, and sidestep the messy reality of wildfire dynamics. Using global datasets, historical records, and peer-reviewed studies—including a groundbreaking paper I co-authored, A Critical Reassessment of the Anthropogenic CO₂-Global Warming Hypothesis—this article dismantles their story piece by piece. The stakes are high—when a trusted institution misleads, it doesn’t just confuse us; it undermines our ability to tackle wildfires effectively.

The paper Grok refers to was published in Science of Climate Change and coauthored with an international group of scientists from the United States and Hungary. Among the lies that NASA tells about wildfires which Grok AI refutes, data ignored or suppressed by NASA, are that the world is experiencing longer wildfire seasons and is experiencing a surge of wildfire activity, both of which are resulting in growing wildfire-related carbon dioxide emissions.

Each of these three claims is refuted by hard data, some of which comes from NASA itself. Grok reports:

The Climate Scaremongers: More Lies From The UK’s Crackpot Climate Change Committee

by P. Homewood, May 09, 2025 in ClimateChangeDispatch 


The UK’s Climate Change Committee has warned the government that the country is heading for disaster unless it quickly ramps up efforts to tackle what it calls ‘climate risks’. [emphasis, links added]

In their latest Progress Report on Adaptation, they claim:

‘The increasing impacts of climate change are clear, both globally and in the UK. Adaptation is needed now to ensure that the UK is prepared for today’s extreme weather as well as the rapidly increasing severity of future risks. The costs of these impacts are already being felt, and the risks will continue to grow even if international targets to limit global warming are met. Action is needed now whilst we still have the opportunity to address these risks in a way that is both cost-effective and timely.’

They say that by 2050:

Over half of England’s prime farmland, one in four homes, and half of roads and rail lines will be at risk of flooding;

Heat-related deaths could pass 10,000 in an average year;

Unchecked climate change could cost 7 percent of GDP.

Absurd claims such as these, which have no basis in reality, show that the CCC is a body that we should not take seriously.

Their statement about floods ignores the reality that only a few thousand properties a year are affected by flooding, and there has been no upward trend in the numbers, according to official data from the Environment Agency.

New Study: Antarctic Ice Sheet Surface Mass Balance Has Been Increasing Due To Recent Mass Gain

by K. Richard, May 05, 2025 in NoTricksZone 


The Surface Mass Balance (SMB) for the Antarctic Ice Sheet (AIS) has been remarkably stable since the 1970s.

However, according to the authors of a new study (a preprint soon to be published), “in recent years, the SMB has increased on the AIS, in particular for 2022, which mostly originates from mass gain on the EAIS.”

Phys.org Editorial Falsely Links Hurricanes To ‘Widespread’ School Closures

by A. Watts, May 06, 2025 in ClimateChangeDispatch 


school closed storm damage
In a recent editorial published by Phys.org, researchers claim that climate change is driving more powerful and frequent hurricanes, which in turn are causing widespread school closures, labeling it an “overlooked consequence” of our supposedly worsening climate. [emphasis, links added]

This narrative is false.

The available data shows no trend of increasing hurricane frequency or intensity due to human-induced climate change, and if the storms themselves aren’t worsening, the claim that they are causing more missed school days due to climate change collapses under its own weight.

The central claim that hurricanes are becoming more destructive and frequent due to climate change is contradicted by both long-term observational data and the official position of major scientific institutions.

According to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s (NOAA) Geophysical Fluid Dynamics Laboratory (GFDL), there is no strong evidence of an increase in either the number or intensity of hurricanes globally due to human-caused climate change.

Puncturing the Apocalypse: Curry and DeAngelo Expose the Myth of Climate Catastrophe


by H. DeAngelo and J. Curry, Feb 20, 2025 in WUWT


Abstract

The Apocalyptic climate narrative is a seriously misleading propaganda tool and a socially destructive guide for public policy. The narrative radically overstates the risks to humanity of continued global warming, which are manageable, not existential. It prescribes large-scale near-term suppression of fossil-fuel use, while failing to recognize the huge costs that such suppression would inflict on humans because fossil fuels are currently irreplaceable inputs for producing food (via ammonia-based fertilizer), steel, cement, and plastics. This paper details the flaws in the Apocalyptic narrative and articulates nine principles for sensible U.S. policies on energy and global warming.

In an era where fear sells faster than facts, a refreshing gust of sanity has arrived in the form of a new paper by Dr. Judith Curry and economist Harry DeAngelo. Titled “A Critique of the Apocalyptic Climate Narrative,” the paper dismantles, brick by shaky brick, the popular belief that humanity teeters on the edge of climate-induced extinction and that salvation lies in the urgent abandonment of fossil fuels.

Curry and DeAngelo open with a sober reminder: “Alarming narratives that have an aura of plausibility can be highly effective tools for shaping public opinion and public policies.” That, in a nutshell, is the story of climate politics over the last 30 years. A narrative has been spun, polished, and weaponized—not to inform public understanding, but to shepherd it toward economically and politically ruinous policies.

The paper doesn’t just question the urgency of decarbonization—it eviscerates it.