Saturday, January 26th 2013, 6:39 AM EST
GLOBAL warming is likely to be less extreme than claimed, researchers said yesterday. The most likely temperature rise will be 1.9C (3.4F) compared with the 3.5C predicted by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
The Norwegian study says earlier predictions were based on rapid warming in the Nineties. But Oslo University’s department of geosciences included data since 2000 when temperature rises “levelled off nearly completely”.
Professor Terje Berntsen said: “The Earth’s mean temperature rose sharply during the Nineties. This may have caused us to overestimate climate sensitivity. We are most likely witnessing natural fluctuations in the climate system – changes that can occur over several decades – and which are coming on top of a long-term warming.” He insisted, though, that his study did not justify “complacency” about human-induced global warming.
But the climate sceptic Global Warming Policy Foundation said: “This research confirms what we have been saying all along. The global warming standstill of the last 16 years is having a dramatic effect on climate models and predictions. The Met Office should now reassess its own, flawed computer models and tone down the alarmist pronouncements which are no longer trustworthy.”
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The Met Office last month predicted cooler than expected temperatures for the next five years leading to claims global warming is stalling.
But a spokesman said: “Having an extra decade of observations shows we have greater confidence than ever that there has been a human influence on past warming and that greenhouse gases have dominated that for the last 50 years.”
Source Link: express.co.uk
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