With egg all over the faces of global warming alarmists given the halt in temperature increases the past fifteen years, you would think media outlets would be a little gun-shy concerning "studies" predicting environmental doom with the help of climate models.
Not the Associated Press's Seth Borenstein who actually published a piece Wednesday about a study having the gall to predict the exact year when "temperatures go off the charts" for cities around the world:
Starting in about a decade, Kingston, Jamaica, will probably be off-the-charts hot — permanently. Other places will soon follow. Singapore in 2028. Mexico City in 2031. Cairo in 2036. Phoenix and Honolulu in 2043.
And eventually the whole world in 2047.
A new study on global warming pinpoints the probable dates for when cities and ecosystems around the world will regularly experience hotter environments the likes of which they have never seen before.
And for dozens of cities, mostly in the tropics, those dates are a generation or less away.
"This paper is both innovative and sobering," said Oregon State University professor Jane Lubchenco, former head of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration, who was not involved in the study.
And here's the money paragraph (emphasis added):
To arrive at their projections, the researchers used weather observations, computer models and other data to calculate the point at which every year from then on will be warmer than the hottest year ever recorded over the last 150 years.
Now wouldn't it be prudent of the AP given the failure of climate models to accurately predict the halt in rising temperatures the past fifteen years to be skeptical of new studies reliant upon them?
Quite the contrary, Borenstein didn't even mention this recent lull in advancing temperatures, nor did he advise readers that as a result, one should look upon such studies with at least the tiniest grain of salt.
Instead, he actually presented doomsday dates for American cities:
By 2043, 147 cities — more than half of those studied — will have shifted to a hotter temperature regime that is beyond historical records.
The first U.S. cities to feel that would be Honolulu and Phoenix, followed by San Diego and Orlando, Fla., in 2046. New York and Washington will get new climates around 2047, with Los Angeles, Detroit, Houston, Chicago, Seattle, Austin and Dallas a bit later.
And here's the second money paragraph:
The 2047 date for the whole world is based on continually increasing emissions of greenhouse gases from the burning of coal, oil and natural gases. If the world manages to reduce its emissions of carbon dioxide and other gases, that would be pushed to as late as 2069, according to Mora.
So, if the world manages to reduce carbon emissions, we'd only gain 22 years before the world ends.
You know what that means, don't you?
Drill, baby, drill!
As readers might imagine, this piece has elicited some of the loudest online laughs I've experienced in years.
Climate Depot's Marc Morano said, "Global warming activists have finally committed to a Mayan calendar like deadline for the planet's doom. Kudos to the warmists for finally shaming Nostradamus. He never allowed his prognostications to get this specific."
Anthony Watts of Watts Up With That asked, "Has Harold Camping approved the date yet?"
Real Science's Steve Goddard answered, "Ehrlich will be angry. He finished off Earth 30 years ago, and this study just isn't taking his past work seriously."
Dr. Tim Ball added, "If the accuracy equals Phil Jones estimate of global temperature in the 2001 IPCC Report the accuracy will be ±33 percent."
But the best line in my view came from University of Alabama-Huntsville's Roy Spencer who offered this gem: "I'm gonna plan for 2046, just in case they are off by a year."
I think that's wise, Roy.
(HT Marc Morano)
