Greenland Ice Record Shows Current Temps Are Cool

Published February 26, 2013

Although current temperatures are significantly warmer than during the depths of the Little Ice Age (1300-1900 A.D.), temperatures are still substantially cooler than the average temperatures over the past few thousand years. Science reporter Joanne Nova has posted a powerful graph on her website showing the proper context of current temperatures.

The temperature graph, derived from Greenland ice cores and available here, shows the Little Ice Age was an extremely cold aberration to temperatures that dominated the earth during the rise and expansion of human civilization. When global warming alarmists claim current temperatures are the warmest “on the record” or “in recorded history,” they conveniently define these terms to go back only as far as the abnormally cold Little Ice Age.

According to the ice core data, temperatures during the past 10,000 years averaged approximately 1.5 degrees Celsius warmer than temperatures during the Little Ice Age. Even with the approximately 0.6 degrees Celsius of warming during the 20th century, temperatures are still relatively cool in the longer and more appropriate climate context.