Yes, Heat Waves Are a Part of Nature By Dr. Tim Ball and Tom Harris
https://pjmedia.com/trending/yes-heat-waves-are-a-part-of-nature/
As often happens when extreme weather hits, the media is featuring excited claims that the July heat wave is due to man-made climate change. But it isn’t. These events are easily explained as natural phenomena, yet a major practice used by those exploiting climate and environment for a political agenda involves claiming natural events are unnatural.
The Guardian is a familiar source of these stories. In “Heatwave sees record high temperatures around world this week” (July 13), the Guardian’s global environment editor Jonathan Watts writes:
Record high temperatures have been set across much of the world this week as an unusually prolonged and broad heatwave intensifies concerns about climate change.
On June 28, the Washington, D.C.-based group Public Citizen, through two members of the Public Citizen’s Climate and Energy Program,issued a “NOTE TO REPORTERS AND EDITORIAL BOARDS” with this headline:
As Extreme Heat Warnings Sound in New York This Weekend, Remember to Connect the Dots Between Extreme Heat and Climate Change
The sub-headline was even more definitive:
Extreme Heat and Record-Breaking Heat Are Linked to Climate Change
There is no doubt that some places have seen record high temperatures of late. For example, Glasgow just had its hottest day on record, hitting 89.4°F (31.9°C). But consider how short the historical record is: about 120 years.
That’s 0.000000026% of the Earth’s 4.5 billion-year history.
There were many times when the planet, Glasgow included, has been far hotter (and colder) than today. Consider the situation in the continental United States on July 1 and 2, as illustrated in the following figure:
PRISM Climate Group, Oregon State University, http://prism.oregonstate.edu. Map created 7/3/18.
While it was certainly warm in the U.S. Northeast at the beginning of July, no high temperature records were set. Consider also that, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s statewide extreme weather records database, probably the best of its kind in the world, there has been no increase in All-Time Maximum Temperature records for states.
No statewide maximum temperature record was set in the seven years from 2012 to 2018. In 2012, one maximum temperature record was set: 113°F in South Carolina. Then none were set in the five years from 2007 to 2011. In 2006, again one record was set: 120°F in North Dakota.
Comments are closed.
