By Paul Homewood
It’s worse than we thought!!
I won’t bother copying the whole article, it’s just the usual mixture of lack of long term perspective, computer models and emotionalism.
But below are some of the key segments:
Yes, this is what glaciers do!
Perhaps instead of subjectively focussing on the last 30 years, he should actually look at the longer term trends. Greenland’s climate is certainly warmer than it was in the 1990s, but equally it was also “significantly cooler” then than it had been 40 years before:
The simple reality is that Greenland’s ice cap has been slowly melting since the middle of the 19thC, which scientists know was the coldest epoch since the ice age. And as you would expect from the temperature profile, the ice melt between the 1930s and 50s was at a similar rate as now:
The article then goes on to spew the nonsense that Greenland’s climate has been stable for the last 6000 years, until 1990:
Not only is this an absurd claim, it is an unscientific one, particularly damning given that it was written by a Professor of Glaciology.
There is widespread scientific evidence that Greenland’s climate was warmer than now in the early Holocene. Of particular relevance are Kelly & Long’s studies, which have found that the Greenland ice sheet receded tens of kilometers within its present day margins during the early and mid- Holocene; and that the ice sheet and glaciers reached their maximum extent since the ice age during the 19thC:
Finally let’s tackle the claim that it’s all “going to get a lot worse”. For instance 10.8 inches of sea level rise, (he does not say when, but presumably this century). The current rate is a far from scary 0.04 inches a year:
Yet the rate of ice melt since satellite measurements began in 2002 show that the rate has if anything slowed, which is consistent with the flattening off of temperatures in the last decade:
Note that the author mentions the summer of 2012, but does not mention recent cold and snowy summers, when the ice cap has increased in size.
In summary the evidence clearly shows that:
1) Current temperatures in Greenland are not unprecedented, either on a 20thC scale, or a Holocene one.
2) Temperature measurements only began during the Little Ica Age, the coldest era since the ice age.
3) The ice sheet is smaller now than for much of the Holocene.
4) Proper satellite measurements of the ice cap began after 40 years of significant cooling.
The article ignores all of this, but finishes:
Such political statements simply detract from the scientific credibility of the article.
via NOT A LOT OF PEOPLE KNOW THAT
September 2, 2022 at 08:08AM
Iowa Climate Science Education 