New data show no stopping or slowing of global warming

Associated Press

WASHINGTON

Global warming has not stopped or even slowed in the past 18 years, according to a new federal study that rebuts doubters who’ve claimed that heating trends have paused.

Scientists at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration readjusted thousands of weather data points to account for different measuring techniques through the decades. Their calculations show that since 1998, the rate of warming is about the same as it has been since 1950: about two-tenths of a degree Fahrenheit a decade.

The so-called hiatus has been touted by nonscientists who reject mainstream climate science. Those claims have resonated; two years ago, the United Nation’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change felt the need to explain why the Earth was not heating up as expected, listing such reasons as volcanic eruptions, reduced solar radiation and the oceans absorbing more heat.

“The reality is that there is no hiatus,” said Tom Karl, director of the National Centers for Environmental Information in Asheville, N.C.. He is the lead author of a study published Thursday in the peer-reviewed journal Science.

One key to claims of a hiatus is the start date: 1998. That year there was a big temperature spike; some of the following years were not as hot, though even hotter years followed in 2005, 2010 and 2014, according to NOAA, NASA and temperature records kept in England and Japan. This year is on pace to break last year’s global heat record.

Scientists keep updating the way they measure Earth’s temperatures. This study focuses on the effects of the way ocean temperatures are taken. The old way, going back generations, is with ships. Sometimes people would dip a bucket in the water; other times they’d measure water that came into the engine. They also did it at various times of day.

The new way is on buoys at the same time of day. Karl said the buoy measurements are more accurate but can’t be compared directly to the ship measurements for a trend without making adjustments, because that would be comparing apples and oranges. So to come up with a trend using comparable numbers, NOAA increases the buoy temperatures a bit.

Several outside scientists contacted by The Associated Press said the new and previous adjustments are sound. Kevin Trenberth, climate analysis chief at the National Center for Atmospheric Research, said the new work was “good and careful analysis” but only confirms what most scientists already knew, that there was no such hiatus.