By Paul Homewood
h/t Dennis Ambler
From the Graiufaodd:
The veteran weatherman Bill Giles is calling on the BBC and other major broadcasters to radically overhaul their forecasts to incorporate information about climate change.
The former head of BBC weather presenters has said more needs to be done by broadcasters to highlight climate change to face the “reality more squarely and openly”.
Giles, who presented weather forecasts at the corporation for nearly two decades, is urging TV channels to come up with a “radical approach to keep viewers properly informed”.
In a piece for Radio Times, Giles, 79, writes: “The hourly forecasts that we now see do an excellent job in giving us the likely weather events over the coming few days, and this must continue. But to properly explain the underlying changes to climate they will need to look much further afield at the weather across the world, reporting and analysing extremes on a daily basis.
“So I am calling on the BBC and the other major broadcasters to incorporate an additional five- to 10-minute slot into the forecast that focuses properly and honestly on the Earth’s changing climate.
“This climate change slot should air at least once a week and would use our technical ability to show weather everywhere in the world to explain in clear, ‘non-jargony’ or technical terms the reasons why our climate is changing – largely due to human influences – and the effects of this on us and all other animals.”
The forecaster, who says he has been highlighting the effects of climate change since the 1980s, warns: “If our mathematics are correct, then a 2C change will mean that the London summer climate in 2050 would be similar to that of southern France of today – and by 2100 similar to that of Athens.”
It might seem astonishing that a supposedly objective meteorologist should want to get associated with such unscientific nonsense as this, but bring it on Bill!
It would be a great opportunity to remind viewers that:
1) Hurricanes are not getting more frequent, or severe, despite predictions that they would.
2) Violent tornadoes are far less common than they used to be.
3) Droughts are not getting any worse.
4) And neither are floods.
5) Summer temperatures may be a fraction of a degree higher than a century ago, but this does not mean that heatwaves are more common.
6) Equally cold winters are not quite as severe as in the past.
7) Above all, the world’s weather has changed remarkably little since the 19thC, and certainly not for the worse.
As Bill Giles should know better than the rest of us, it is weather which dominates our day to day existence, not climate.
The massive variability of weather from year to year, and week to week far outweighs the tiny long term trends in climate, which we would not even notice without modern databases.
After all, we have always had floods and droughts, heatwaves and extreme cold, hurricanes and tornadoes. It is these weather events which dominate human experience, and not slightly higher temperatures.
As for his assertion that we are on the way to a South of France climate, I suggest he checks the actual data:
https://www.metoffice.gov.uk/climate/uk/summaries/actualmonthly
https://www.holiday-weather.com/marseille/averages/
Of course, Bill Giles has been writing about this nonsense for a while now, for instance this article in the Radio Times in 2014.
https://notalotofpeopleknowthat.wordpress.com/2014/02/24/bill-giles-loses-the-plot/
I’ve no doubt writing such tosh earns the old booby a few bob. I just hope his proposed climate slot is given to someone with a bit more integrity.
via NOT A LOT OF PEOPLE KNOW THAT
March 20, 2019 at 05:42PM
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