(Chicago, Illinois – February 7, 2008) Remote Sensing Systems of Santa Rosa, California reports satellite data show January 2008 was the second-coldest January for the planet in 15 years. January 2000 was colder.
Meteorologist Anthony Watts of surfacestations.org has posted the data and a graph developed from it. He notes there has been a global drop in temperature of 0.63 degrees Centigrade in the past 12 months.
http://wattsupwiththat.wordpress.com/2008/02/04/rss-satellite-data-for-jan08-2nd-coldest-january-for-the-planet-in-15-years/
“Of course,” Watts notes, “we already have had a heads-up from all the wire reports around the world talking about the significant winter weather events that have occurred worldwide in the last month, but until now, there hasn’t been a measure of how the planet was doing for the winter of 2007/2008.”
Experts contacted by The Heartland Institute offered the following comments on the new satellite data. You may quote from these statements or contact the experts directly at the phone numbers and email addresses provided below.
“Global temperatures measured by satellite in January slipped to 0.04ºC (.07º F) below the long-term (1979-98) average, the first month in nearly eight years that University of Alabama scientists report as below normal. Further, the satellite records show absolutely NO warming since the beginning of 2001, while global carbon dioxide emissions increased 15 to 20 percent. The drop in temperature in the past year has been a whopping 0.63ºC (1.13ºF).
“The lack of warming in recent years is yet another piece of solid evidence that warming for this century is going to be near the low end of projections made by the United Nations, around 1.75ºC (3.15ºF), far below the end-of-the-world forecasts we hear so much of.
“The bottom line is there is hardly a planetary ’emergency,’ and the cooler heads urging no expensive and ineffective policies at this time are in tune with the planet’s climate.”
Patrick J. Michaels
Senior Fellow in Environmental Studies, Cato Institute
Professor of Environmental Sciences, University of Virginia
[email protected]
202/218-4616 land
434/760-0460 cell
“Over the past 10 years, global warming has essentially stopped. The warmest year in the instrumental record was 1998, and temperatures have been slightly cooler and very steady since then. If human emissions of carbon dioxide are such a powerful driving force regarding global temperatures, it is difficult to explain how carbon dioxide levels have continued to rise since 1998 and yet temperatures have not risen at all.”
James M. Taylor
Senior Fellow, Environment Policy
The Heartland Institute
[email protected]
941/776-5690
“Keeping in mind that there are large short-term fluctuations in climate parameters, one cannot and should not draw far-reaching conclusions about climate change–or about its cause–from only a limited set of observations.
“But having said this, I point out that if there had been a rise in temperature instead of a drop, there would be all kinds of news releases and panic–all blaming human-produced greenhouse gases.”
S. Fred Singer
President
Science and Environmental Policy Project
[email protected]
703/920-2744
“While it is nice to learn that we are experiencing one of the coldest winters ever, it will not deter the global warming alarmists, who will undoubtedly claim the exceptional cold is a result of man’s increasing contribution of carbon dioxide into our environment.”
Jay Lehr, Ph.D.
Science Director
The Heartland Institute
[email protected]
740/368-9393
For more information about The Heartland Institute, please contact Harriette Johnson, media relations manager, at [email protected] or 312/377-4000.
Diane Carol Bast is a former member of The Heartland Institute’s board of directors.
