Climate change

[Thedelldays]

To be fair, that isn't really to do with climate change - it's more to do with common ****ing sense.

 

Not really. Maybe in your opinion

 

in mine . They are poor and are not worth 3p lol

[Verbal]

Whilst this cold snap doesn't mean anything with regards to a warming climate, it does pose the question - Do we in the UK really care if the climate gets warmer?

 

It is a selfish point of view but whilst millions could die in Africa, America and Asia, from what I've read there is a good chance we could be one of climate change's winners.

 

It depends how cold you want to be. One of the great questions is what the Gulf Stream (or North Atlantic Drift) is going to do. If it's deflected, or fizzles out, we'll have roughly the same temperature as other places on the same latitude.

 

So if you want a weather forecast for today, check out Labrador, on the same latitude, and -26.

[Sheaf Saint]

Not really. Maybe in your opinion

 

in mine . They are poor and are not worth 3p lol

 

I know your lol on the end means you are just being a bit flippant, so this isn't really aimed at you, but it genuinely amazes me that people can be so lazy as to not bother to take their own bags to the supermarket, and then complain at having to pay 3p for a carrier bag.

 

The culture of convenience that has grown in this country over the last half a century is genuinely astounding.

[aintforever]

It depends how cold you want to be. One of the great questions is what the Gulf Stream (or North Atlantic Drift) is going to do. If it's deflected, or fizzles out, we'll have roughly the same temperature as other places on the same latitude.

 

So if you want a weather forecast for today, check out Labrador, on the same latitude, and -26.

 

True, if that happened we would be screwed.

 

Fact is, though scientists are pretty much agreed that man made climate change is happening, they don't appear to have a clue when it comes to predicting the effects - which is all the more reason to stop pumping out CO2.

 

On a positive note there is always the chance that the earth's natural cycles even out the effect man has had, much will be learnt in the next few years IMO.

[trousers]

check out Labrador

 

My dog's got no nose

[Sheaf Saint]

My dog's got no nose

 

How does he smell?

[trousers]

We are a collection of molecules hurtling through the universe at well over 960 miles per hour. Ergo none of this matters. HTH

[trousers]

How does he smell?

 

Through an artifical breathing sack strapped to his neck

[trousers]

And yet 2000-2009 has been the warmest decade in recorded history. How very odd.

 

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091208/ap_on_sc/climate

 

This has been the best period in the Earth's history for records since records began.

[Whitey Grandad]

I'm curious then - what was your source? The UN?

For one: http://www.nasa.gov/topics/earth/features/upsDownsGlobalWarming.html

 

It is almost impossible to get a true picture because the interpretation will depend on the religious fervour of the protagonist. The Met Office has been taken over:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1240082/It-gigantic-supercomputer-1-500-staff-170m-year-budget-So-does-Met-Office-wrong.html

 

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1235126/What-told-Global-Warming--missing-facts.html

 

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1091655/Climate-change-forecasters-know-global-warming-affect-world-physicist-claims.html

[Joensuu]

We are a collection of molecules hurtling through the universe at well over 960 miles per hour. Ergo none of this matters. HTH

 

Depending on which part of the planet you are standing on! Stand on either pole and the speed of the Earth's spin is next to nothing. Stand on the Equator and you are moving at 1038mph.

 

Of course, the Earth is orbiting the Sun at speeds of over 65,000mph; Our Solar system is orbiting the centre of our Galaxy at over 550,000mph; And relative to other close galaxies, ours is moving at over 660,000mph.

[Joensuu]

For one: http://www.nasa.gov/topics/earth/features/upsDownsGlobalWarming.html

 

Err, so you're trying to justify your claim that there hasn't been any warming in 11 years, by linking to data which clearly shows 2005 to be warmest year on record

[Whitey Grandad]

Err, so you're trying to justify your claim that there hasn't been any warming in 11 years, by linking to data which clearly shows 2005 to be warmest year on record

It's colder now than it was in 2005 (or 1998 for that matter). The Met Office has different figures.

[TopGun]

I know your lol on the end means you are just being a bit flippant, so this isn't really aimed at you, but it genuinely amazes me that people can be so lazy as to not bother to take their own bags to the supermarket, and then complain at having to pay 3p for a carrier bag.

 

The culture of convenience that has grown in this country over the last half a century is genuinely astounding.

 

Plus 1.

[Joensuu]

It's colder now than it was in 2005 (or 1998 for that matter). The Met Office has different figures.

 

You're right, it has indeed been slightly colder since 2005. Each of these years has still been in the top 15 ever recorded though.

That's why you need to ignore the peaks and the troughs, and focus on the trends. Or to put it another way, any fair way of interpreting the data would be to see a relatively steady global trend of increasing temperatures over the last 30 years. There isn't enough evidence since 2005 to suggest whether the temperature has reached a plateau, or is still increasing.

NB, there are two claimants for warmest year on record NOAA suggest 1998; NASA 2005. The NOAA and NASA analyses differ slightly in methodology, but both use data from NOAA's National Climatic Data Center – the federal government's official source for climate data.

[Verbal]

Depending on which part of the planet you are standing on! Stand on either pole and the speed of the Earth's spin is next to nothing. Stand on the Equator and you are moving at 1038mph.

 

Of course, the Earth is orbiting the Sun at speeds of over 65,000mph; Our Solar system is orbiting the centre of our Galaxy at over 550,000mph; And relative to other close galaxies, ours is moving at over 660,000mph.

 

Only on Saintsweb....

[badgerx16]

......there is a dire need for any government to increase gas storage supply by pushing schemes through planning.

 

As long as they do it fairly ; one of the proposed schemes runs pretty much under my house, in an area that is geologically unsuited to bulk gas storage due to the consequences of brine 'mining' by ICI. My worry is that the Government will push the scheme through, in the 'national interest', despite the genuine objections. ( And this isn't just nimbyism - the area is littered with massive sinkholes, some over 150 feet deep, where the salt 'caverns' have subsided. How would you feel having 60 billion cubic feet of pressurised natural gas under your village / town ? In the USA, many states prohibit such storage within 3 miles of habitation, this scheme in total runs directly under the homes of over 100,000 people ).

[mack rill]

And yet 2000-2009 has been the warmest decade in recorded history. How very odd.

 

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20091208/ap_on_sc/climate

 

Well of course it has,,,Otherwise Jock Brown the wookyeye clown would look a bit of a knut taxing us while throwing billions that we have née got into the global warming pot,

[JustMike]

I know your lol on the end means you are just being a bit flippant, so this isn't really aimed at you, but it genuinely amazes me that people can be so lazy as to not bother to take their own bags to the supermarket, and then complain at having to pay 3p for a carrier bag.

 

The culture of convenience that has grown in this country over the last half a century is genuinely astounding.

 

charging 3p for something that is now (in most stores anyway) made from recyclable material is wrong imo. whats lazy isnt not taking your own bags its driving 5mins up the road for a packet of biscuits!

[Viking Warrior]

Anybody watching the new series of rear, kill eat on BBC 3

 

Six people chosen to see how to rear live stock, kill it and the eat it

 

It contains two vegans , one who is so opposed to meat its unreal.

he's one of these climatic freaks and so far up his own back side.

 

Anyway monday the programme focus on cows.

This guy said we should not mass produce the amount of cows we do as they are seriously damaging the climate. He also stated that cows should be allowed to die naturally like humans.

 

Do mass produced cows really damage the environment or is this just another lie put round by supposed climatic experts.

 

Watch tonights programme , the six will be dealing with Pigs.

[Whitey Grandad]

You're right, it has indeed been slightly colder since 2005. Each of these years has still been in the top 15 ever recorded though.

 

That's why you need to ignore the peaks and the troughs, and focus on the trends. Or to put it another way, any fair way of interpreting the data would be to see a relatively steady global trend of increasing temperatures over the last 30 years. There isn't enough evidence since 2005 to suggest whether the temperature has reached a plateau, or is still increasing.

 

NB, there are two claimants for warmest year on record NOAA suggest 1998; NASA 2005. The NOAA and NASA analyses differ slightly in methodology, but both use data from NOAA's National Climatic Data Center – the federal government's official source for climate data.

But that doesn't mean much, we're only talking about 150 years or so. They were certainly not the hottest years ever, the earth has been warmer before and we could be entering a coooling period:

 

http://www.worldclimatereport.com/index.php/2009/04/08/has-the-climate-recently-shifted/#more-371

 

When I was a kid the big worry was that the next ice age was overdue. Take a look at this graph for the last 420,000 years:

 

http://hubpages.com/hub/Earths-Temperature-Brief-History-of-Recent-Change

[Sheaf Saint]

charging 3p for something that is now (in most stores anyway) made from recyclable material is wrong imo. whats lazy isnt not taking your own bags its driving 5mins up the road for a packet of biscuits!

 

Whether they are made from recyclable material or not is irrelevant IMO. The fact is that billions of them end up in landfill each year because people can't be bothered to recycle them. The same people who can't be bothered to take their own bags to the shops and who don't realise that when you throw stuff away, there is no 'away'.

 

If charging 3p a time for them makes people think twice about using their own bags (seriously, how hard is it?) then I am all for it.

 

Agree with your comment about driving to the shops for a packet of biscuits though.

[Joensuu]

Do mass produced cows really damage the environment or is this just another lie put round by supposed climatic experts.

 

The short answer is yes, without a doubt.

 

Meat and dairy consumption create more Co2 (+ Co2 equivalent) emissions than any other food groups (both in total, and per calorie consumed). In addition, meat and dairy farming produce relatively few calories per acre.

 

Dropping the meat would kill two birds with one stone - it would have a serious reduction in Co2 emissions, while increasing the amount of food produced globally (thus reducing some of the problems caused by population growth).

[Thedelldays]

Whether they are made from recyclable material or not is irrelevant IMO. The fact is that billions of them end up in landfill each year because people can't be bothered to recycle them. The same people who can't be bothered to take their own bags to the shops and who don't realise that when you throw stuff away, there is no 'away'.

 

If charging 3p a time for them makes people think twice about using their own bags (seriously, how hard is it?) then I am all for it.

 

Agree with your comment about driving to the shops for a packet of biscuits though.

 

3p does not make people think twice and they know this

 

I went shopping last night. Bought some bananas that were in a plastic bag (as it was late and they were the better ones on display) on to go to the checkout and put them in another plastic bag

 

if supermarkets really cared then they would be doing so much more

[Whitey Grandad]

I was on a day trip to Cairo last year and the piles of rubbish brought home to me the effects of modern packaging. Almost all of the rubbish was empty plastic drink bottles and plastic bags. 40 years ago this would all have been glass or paper.

[Joensuu]

Plastic bags are a red herring. Yes they look unsightly, but their impact on the environment is negligible. http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/aug/11/plastic-bags-welsh-assembly

[.comsaint]

Thinking she was doing her bit for the enviroment - my mate's mum bought one of those Tesco 'bags for life' just before Christmas.

 

She passed away a week later. Gutted or what...

[Whitey Grandad]

I was walking around the harbour in Málaga once and I saw a shoal of fish alongside the quay. One of them was separated from the rest having swum into a clear plastic bag and it couldn't get out again. It was condemned to a slow death. Add that to the stuff that ends up in whales' and dolphins' stomachs and it's not a nice thought.

[Whitey Grandad]

Thinking she was doing her bit for the enviroment - my mate's mum bought one of those Tesco 'bags for life' just before Christmas.

 

She passed away a week later. Gutted or what...

Most people opt for cremation...

 

(My deepest condolences to your friend)

[Sheaf Saint]

Plastic bags are a red herring. Yes they look unsightly, but their impact on the environment is negligible. http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/aug/11/plastic-bags-welsh-assembly

 

Very interesting article, and some of the comments left on there are identical to my own views on it: that the bags themselves may be a very small piece of the puzzle, but our lazy reliance on them is indicative of the general ignorance towards the larger issue regarding the amount of unnecessary packaging that the stuff we consume is sold in.

[JustMike]

Whether they are made from recyclable material or not is irrelevant IMO. The fact is that billions of them end up in landfill each year because people can't be bothered to recycle them. The same people who can't be bothered to take their own bags to the shops and who don't realise that when you throw stuff away, there is no 'away'.

 

If charging 3p a time for them makes people think twice about using their own bags (seriously, how hard is it?) then I am all for it.

 

Agree with your comment about driving to the shops for a packet of biscuits though.

 

i shop at sainburys and keep bags from them for the purpose of re-using them, only trouble is, you cant re-use them because they split so easily now due to what they are made out of. I re-cycle as much as i can and have got the kids into the habit as well, so when it comes to places charging me for bags it does annoy me if im honest. The worst one for this is the BP garage thats also a marks and spencer. All their products are so grossly overpriced and they still have the cheek to charge 5p a bag, again which is made from recyclable material.

[Whitey Grandad]

Wasted food is a big issue. This was recoovered from dumpsters (skips to you and me): http://www.wastedfood.com/gallery/ The biggest culprits are the supermarkets with their strict sell-by dates and obsession with appearance of fresh produce. What are needed are more localised sales points, such as the old corner shop but unfortunately modern lifetsyle doesn't allow for it. Packaging forms a large part of the food production and sales market. Ironically, a lot of food is wasted because of poor packaging.

[St Landrew]

i shop at sainburys and keep bags from them for the purpose of re-using them, only trouble is, you cant re-use them because they split so easily now due to what they are made out of. I re-cycle as much as i can and have got the kids into the habit as well, so when it comes to places charging me for bags it does annoy me if im honest. The worst one for this is the BP garage thats also a marks and spencer. All their products are so grossly overpriced and they still have the cheek to charge 5p a bag, again which is made from recyclable material.

 

The supermarkets say that they charge for bags in order to get the consumer to re-use old bags where possible. Now, I find that hard to believe, as they are not very strong [but we could talk about lightly loading the bags anyway] but conversely, how many people do you think would re-use their shopping bags if they were still free..? That charge apparently tips people over the edge into re-cycling.

 

Personally, I think some bright individual in a marketing department realised that charging for bags need not make a company look bad, but actually seem responsible for the environment, and incidentally raise profits. The idea was so good, from all sides, that everyone adopted it.

[TopGun]

As long as they do it fairly ; one of the proposed schemes runs pretty much under my house, in an area that is geologically unsuited to bulk gas storage due to the consequences of brine 'mining' by ICI. My worry is that the Government will push the scheme through, in the 'national interest', despite the genuine objections. ( And this isn't just nimbyism - the area is littered with massive sinkholes, some over 150 feet deep, where the salt 'caverns' have subsided. How would you feel having 60 billion cubic feet of pressurised natural gas under your village / town ? In the USA, many states prohibit such storage within 3 miles of habitation, this scheme in total runs directly under the homes of over 100,000 people ).

 

Canatxx?

[TopGun]

Plastic bags are a red herring. Yes they look unsightly, but their impact on the environment is negligible. http://www.guardian.co.uk/environment/2009/aug/11/plastic-bags-welsh-assembly

 

Plastic is a poisonous herring to birdlife.

[TopGun]

The supermarkets say that they charge for bags in order to get the consumer to re-use old bags where possible. Now, I find that hard to believe, as they are not very strong [but we could talk about lightly loading the bags anyway] but conversely, how many people do you think would re-use their shopping bags if they were still free..? That charge apparently tips people over the edge into re-cycling.

 

Personally, I think some bright individual in a marketing department realised that charging for bags need not make a company look bad, but actually seem responsible for the environment, and incidentally raise profits. The idea was so good, from all sides, that everyone adopted it.

 

But none of the supermarkets offer the bags for life on the self-service tills... which I find greatly annoying!

[aintforever]

Better to re-use your free carrier bags than buy these "bags for life" and then buy other bags for lining your bin etc.

 

A bit anal I know but it is annoying seeing these dumb tarts load up their 4x4s with their eco bags thinking they are saving the planet.

[Barney Trubble]

Depending on which part of the planet you are standing on! Stand on either pole and the speed of the Earth's spin is next to nothing. Stand on the Equator and you are moving at 1038mph.

 

Of course, the Earth is orbiting the Sun at speeds of over 65,000mph; Our Solar system is orbiting the centre of our Galaxy at over 550,000mph; And relative to other close galaxies, ours is moving at over 660,000mph.

 

Were the machines that calculated those figures correctly calibrated and did they possess an A4 size certificate to prove it? A3 or smaller are not officially recognised.

 

Was the 'Galaxy speed measurement operative' a fully trained employee when the device was measuring the other galaxies ;when the start button was pressed, if so; did he go giddy?

 

Also,was a full risk assessment carried out by a competent employee before the measuring device was used?

 

Ideally, who would have been wearing a white coat, sandles with white terrys socks, big half-glass spectacles and sporting a chest length beard.

 

If the answer is 'No' to any of the above then the figures are not worth printing. I simply refuse to accept these figures as fact, if this is the case.

 

I am sorry, but it's just not on, you can't just go about submitting figures, such as you have, as fact based, on TSW.

 

TSW is the definitive guide to climate change on the whole of the internet and has lots of Professors and NASA qualified scientists who know best.

 

I hope you are proud of yourself. Hang your head in shame.

 

Meanwhile, I shall be taking the plastic part out of the front of the now empty box of Quality Street and ensuring all material is placed into the correct recycling containers, so that I can watch my plasma tv with a clear conscience.

[badgerx16]

Canatxx?

Yup

 

 

Edited 6 January, 2010 by badgerx16

[dune]

Are you even sure you understand global warming? It has the OPPOSITE affect to 'what it says on the tin'. For example, the UK can expect many more frezing winters because as the world warms up from man made global warming, the ice caps melt. This in turn releases more fresh water into the sea which has/is/will continue to have an adverse effect on the gulf stream (which is what currently keeps Britain mild). I would buy some more thermals if I were you Dune.

 

HTH.

 

That's funny because your comrades at the BBC say:

 

Climate crisis: All change in the UK?

 

As ministers, environmentalists and lobbyists from 180 countries gather in the Hague for the UN Climate Change conference, BBC News Online looks at how global warming could affect the UK.

Many climate scientists agree that human pollution, mainly from burning fossil fuels, has increased global warming in the past 50 years.

 

Some researchers argue that global warming may already have had a significant effect on the climate in the UK. Four of the five warmest years for more than three centuries have occurred in the last 10 years.

 

By the 2050s, annual temperatures in the south east of the country could be on average more than 2C warmer than they are now - 30 years later that may rise to more than 3C.

 

http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/uk/1015796.stm

 

And the loony leftie controlled met office say:

 

Met Office: Effects on Gardening

 

The impact of climate change on gardening is likely to have far-reaching effects on our domestic gardens, as well as the many historic gardens around the UK. Already we are seeing an increase in the occurrence of severe weather events, such as floods, heatwaves and droughts. In the future this will have huge ramifications for gardeners everywhere and could change the landscape of the UK beyond all recognition.

 

Recent warming has already caused earlier timing of spring events, and plant and animal species have shifted to higher altitudes.

 

http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/climatechange/guide/effects/gardens.html

 

So does this mean you don't agree with Prudence Brown and his cronies, OR are you just making things up to try to wriggle out of a hole - the hole being the FACTS that the last two winters have been cold, the barbeque summer never happened and that NASA figures show the first 10 years of this decade have seen global cooling.

 

Thanks Whitey for putting the following links up. I wonder Gordon Browns climate comrades haven't commented.

 

 

For one: http://www.nasa.gov/topics/earth/features/upsDownsGlobalWarming.html

 

It is almost impossible to get a true picture because the interpretation will depend on the religious fervour of the protagonist. The Met Office has been taken over:

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1240082/It-gigantic-supercomputer-1-500-staff-170m-year-budget-So-does-Met-Office-wrong.html

 

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-1235126/What-told-Global-Warming--missing-facts.html

 

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1091655/Climate-change-forecasters-know-global-warming-affect-world-physicist-claims.html

 

It has a gigantic supercomputer, 1,500 staff and a £170m-a-year budget. So why does the Met Office get it so wrong?

 

Its supercomputer makes 1,000 billion calculations a second - then tells us to expect a mild winter. But what would you expect from a 'scientific' organisation that for 20 years has been dominated by climate change zealots, and whose current chairman is the former boss of the World Wildlife Fund?

 

http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1240082/It-gigantic-supercomputer-1-500-staff-170m-year-budget-So-does-Met-Office-wrong.html

 

Oh dear, another nail is driven into the Socialists big lie.

[trousers]

Depending on which part of the planet you are standing on! Stand on either pole and the speed of the Earth's spin is next to nothing. Stand on the Equator and you are moving at 1038mph.

 

Of course, the Earth is orbiting the Sun at speeds of over 65,000mph; Our Solar system is orbiting the centre of our Galaxy at over 550,000mph; And relative to other close galaxies, ours is moving at over 660,000mph.

 

Exactly

[trousers]

16 pages talking about the temperature of a large rock hurtling through the universe. Only on SaintsWeb...

[Thorpe-le-Saint]

Dune:

 

For a minute there, in my original post I thought I omitted the word "Winter", but I didn't, and so you OBVIOUSLY read the first few words, went all red in the face, and did a St.George on us.

 

As for the links, they all come from 'The Daily Mail', enough said.

 

To quote, 'Oh dear, another nail in to the deniers big lie.'

Edited 6 January, 2010 by Thorpe-le-Saint

[dune]

Dune:

 

For a minute there, in my original post I thought I omitted the word "Winter", but I didn't, and so you OBVIOUSLY read the first few words, went all red in the face, and did a St.George on us.

 

As for the links, they all come from 'The Daily Mail', enough said.

 

To quote, 'Oh dear, another nail in to the deniers big lie.'

 

It doesn't suprise me that an Adrian Mole Guardian reader dismisses the article because the truth hurts. It goes against the grain to believe anything other than the tripe trotted out by the far left.

 

Here is a part of the article. Try opening your mind and you might learn something:

 

How could the Met Office be so wrong, both about its barbecue summer and the mild winter? And could the answer to that question have anything to do with its remarkable transformation in recent years?

 

From a fuddy-duddy organisation created in 1854 to provide a service to mariners, and then aviators when the aeroplane was invented, the Met Office became an arm of the Ministry of Defence. But it has since transmuted into a powerful advocacy unit that sees its main mission to convince the world that we are prey to ' dangerous climate change'.

 

Much of this is down to one man - John Houghton (now Sir John) who was the director-general and later chief executive of the Met Office between 1983 and 1991.

 

It was he, way back in 1988, who attended the first World Conference on the Changing Atmosphere in Toronto and later became the first scientific chairman of the UN's Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.

 

It was Houghton who, with one of her senior advisers, Sir Crispin Tickell, convinced the then Prime Minister Margaret Thatcher to fund a new Met Office unit called the Hadley Centre for Climate Prediction and Research.

 

Opened in 1990, it is now based in Exeter and employs more than 200 staff, having become a temple to what many regard as the climate change 'religion'.

 

Its pivotal role is now well-recognised as it is this centre, working with the Climatic Research Unit (CRU) of the University of East Anglia, that produces one of the most relied-upon data sets used to track the global temperature and tell us that the planet is heating up.

 

Crucially, it is that same CRU that has been embroiled in the so-called 'Warmergate' scandal, where leaked emails suggest that climate scientists may have manipulated the evidence when it did not give the answers that proved that global warming was continuing. The University of East Anglia has ordered an independent review into the Warmergate row and the allegations made against the CRU.

 

The point of this row - which is often poorly understood - is that the so-called 'global temperature' which these scientists produce, upon which rests the whole case for 'dangerous global warming', is not a matter of observed fact.

 

The data collection system is far from perfect, designed primarily for weather recording, not long-term climate prediction. Reflecting the military origins of the Met Office, many weather stations are situated on airfields. They are there to provide real-time observations for aviators and to provide the basis for short-term forecasts. They are not climate monitoring stations and arguably should not be used as such.

 

Furthermore, the likes of Manchester and Aberdeen airports, which were once grass airstrips, are now vast stretches of concrete, ramping up temperatures well above the surrounding countryside. This is known as the urban heat island effect.

 

Because of this effect, instrument changes, inbuilt errors and the huge gaps in the record, the crude data has to be 'adjusted' - sometimes several times. Then sophisticated statistical techniques have to be applied before a single global figure can be produced.

 

The complexity of the calculations, and the considerable element of human judgment in choosing which of the limited number of specific temperatures to use from the thousands of weather stations all over the world, leave the process wide open to error and bias. Thus, the final results may actually reflect, to one degree or another, no more than the opinions of the scientists producing them.

 

This is where the good faith and the impartiality of the scientists involved is so important, and why the Warmergate scandal was so damaging. Far from being impartial custodians of the truth, some scientists were shown to have feet of clay, guarding their own patch rather than the science.

 

This was reinforced shortly after Warmergate, when Russian analysts complained that the Hadley Centre had been 'cherry-picking' temperatures from the Russian data set, using only those that were untypically high.

 

Similar complaints have been made of the United States' data set, where urban heat island effect and positioning errors may taint as much as 80 per cent of the weather station records. Last month the Met Office denied 'cherry-picking' and said it used data from a network of individual stations designated by the World Meteorological Organisation.

 

But there is an even greater reason to doubt the impartiality of the Met Office and the Hadley Centre. Having had at its helm Sir John Houghton, a conviction 'warmist', in 2006 it acquired a new and highly controversial chairman - Robert Napier.

 

Described as a 'committed conservationist' and then a 'passionate environmentalist', before taking over the most senior position at the Met Office, Napier had for seven years been the chief executive of World Wildlife Fund-UK, one of the foremost activist groups in the climate-change business.

 

Up to then, WWF was primarily concerned with wildlife issues and conservation. It is widely acknowledged that Napier put climate change on the map during his tenure, using his position to 'leverage the power and experience of the whole organisation', changing its focus to the extent that campaigning on this issue became its main activity.

 

The Met Office has become a powerful and vocal climate-change lobbyist, contributing hugely to the climate-change conference in Copenhagen last month, at which it launched its prediction that this year would be the hottest on record Among other things, he was particularly effective in making alliances with big business, doing deals with the likes of the insurance giant Allianz and convincing the company that there was money to be made out of climate change.

 

Bizarrely, although the Met Office is still part of the MoD and its staff are civil servants (who, as the Met Office itself says, 'cannot support individual campaigns that actively lobby for policy change'), the organisation has taken its cue from its new leader. It has become a powerful and vocal climate-change lobbyist, contributing hugely to the climate-change conference in Copenhagen last month, at which it launched its prediction that this year would be the hottest on record.

 

That raises the question whether the Met Office can still be relied upon to give accurate forecasts. Predicting the weather - both short-term and long - is not an exact science. Computers can do the number crunching but the programs or 'models' they work to are devised by human beings.

 

Exactly the same computer models that are used to forecast that we will fry by the year 2030, 2050 or even 2080, are also those used to produce the shorter-range forecasts. It was these models, back in September, that told us we were going to have a mild winter.

 

But the problems do not stop there. From a technical body, the Met Office has now become the producer and purveyor of endless propaganda on climate change. Its latest production is an expensive, glossy, 20-page pamphlet. It is packed with highly controversial and disputed assertions that are delivered with the authority of a government agency as if they were unarguable fact.

 

There is no room for doubt, for instance, in the assertion that humans are causing climate change.

'Human activities like burning coal, oil and gas have led to...extra warming. As a result, over the past century there has been an underlying increase in average temperatures which is continuing.'

 

Yet no discernible warming has been recorded since 1998.

 

Indeed, it has snowed in the UK for the past three years, famously last October as MPs were voting through the Climate Change Bill. Each winter has been harsher than the last, and many independent meteorologists, including Joe Bastardi, believe the Earth has entered a cooling cycle.

 

What was once a highly respected organisation risks becoming a laughing stock in the weather community and a danger to the rest of us.

 

Farmers who rely on the Met Office risk their animals dying and their crops being destroyed. Local authorities, who ran down their grit stocks because the Met Office said it would be mild, are putting the lives of motorists and pedestrians at risk. Airlines, unprepared for the snow, have lost millions of pounds, while the travel plans of hundreds of thousands of people have been disrupted.

 

The Met Office seems to have forgotten what it was set up for - to predict weather day by day. Instead, it is devoting it energies to the fantasy that it can predict climate decades ahead when it cannot even tell you whether it is going to snow next week, or whether we might have a barbecue summer.

 

 

Read more: http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-1240082/It-gigantic-supercomputer-1-500-staff-170m-year-budget-So-does-Met-Office-wrong.html#ixzz0brmZ6bO4

[Sheaf Saint]

.....

 

So? all this proves is that the Met Office has lost its impartiality. Are they the only organisation in the world campaigning about climate change now? No, of course they aren't. The Met Office are just a tiny bit-part player in the grand scheme of things.

 

Just because The Met Office are seemingly using the issue of climate change for their own political agenda doesn't in any way prove it isn't happening.

[Whitey Grandad]

So? all this proves is that the Met Office has lost its impartiality. Are they the only organisation in the world campaigning about climate change now? No, of course they aren't. The Met Office are just a tiny bit-part player in the grand scheme of things.

 

Just because The Met Office are seemingly using the issue of climate change for their own political agenda doesn't in any way prove it isn't happening.

No, of course it doesn't prove otherwise, but everybody has an agenda.

[Saintandy666]

Global Warming or Climate Change which is the term I prefer is based upon trends over many years, not one cold spell. It's the average temperature that counts and over the last decade average temperatures have steadily been climbing. In 50 years time, if we don't stop the effects of climate change, there will still be fluctuations that cause snow and so on, but on average temperatures will be higher. Weather happens and changes everyday, therefore we should not be looking at the weather, but the worldwide climate.

Edited 6 January, 2010 by Saintandy666

[Barney Trubble]

http://www.energysavingtrust.org.uk/Resources/Features/Features-archive/The-smart-gadget-guide-to-the-January-sales

 

It's actually a handy guide.

[Whitey Grandad]

http://www.energysavingtrust.org.uk/Resources/Features/Features-archive/The-smart-gadget-guide-to-the-January-sales

 

It's actually a handy guide.

Very useful. But what they never take into account is that in winter this 'wasted' energy goes towards heating the house so reducing your gas bill, or whatever.

[trousers]

What would we do without human beings wallowing in their own self importance? Keeps me amused anyway.