Past decade is the world's warmest on record

The denialist claim we're cooling. Some have even said we're back towhere we were 30 years ago.

Well, if you're going to lie, lie big.

Fact is, this has been the warmest decade on record -- I'm calling it. And we're at a solar minimum, which is when the sun is not very active. Actually, it's likely the deepest solar minimum in a century. When the sun comes out of its funk, we may be in for some hot times.


Some news reports:

CBC: 2000s warmest decade on record: UN

'Likely' the warmest is the quote. From what I've seen of the data, it will be. The US and Canada have been cooler than average the past year. I know not to gleam much from my Toronto weather, but I'm not surprised.

BBC: This decade 'warmest on record'

The first decade of this century is "by far" the warmest since instrumental records began, say the UK Met Office and World Meteorological Organization. Their analyses also show that 2009 will almost certainly be the fifth warmest in the 160-year record. Burgeoning El Nino conditions, adding to man-made greenhouse warming, have pushed 2009 into the "top 10" years.

Global Warming theory doesn't mean that each year must be hotter than the last, just that the overall trend is hotter. hot years get hotter, cold years less cold.

2000–2009, THE WARMEST DECADE (World Meteorological Association)

We are up almost one-half a degree C over the 1961-1990 average.

Met Office to release records that show global temperature rise:

This deals mostly with the SwiftHack affair, noting that the CRU will release it's initial data to the public shortly, with the rest to follow once permission is acquired to do so. The CRU is expected to proclaim the outgoing decade to be the hottest yet.

And the mother of all charts: From Climate Progress (<-- read that link for all the news in detail), all three independent surface temperature series, with some lines from me added.

The orange horizontal line and purple vertical line I added. The orange line is the coolest year on this past decade. The purple line is 1980, which is when global warming becomes quite clear. Notice how even the coldest year of the past decade surmounts most of the temperatures of the last 160 years?

The denialists say we're cooling. Right. Of course, they know they can't keep that lie up, so now they're just claiming it's all made up. One big conspiracy. *sigh*