“Droughts are becoming longer and more intense.”
That was Al Gore’s testimony before the United States Senate’s Environment and Public Works Committee on 21 March 2007. Gore offered no proof to his claim, so some researchers conducted a study on droughts of the 20th century; the conclusions of this study suggest that Gore was lying when he made his testimony.
The folks at CO2 Science, in their analysis, concluded with the following:
With respect to the temporal distribution of the 30 severe and persistent droughts identified by Narisma et al., seven of them occurred during the first two decades of the 20th century (1901-1920), seven occurred during the next two decades (1921-1940), eight during the middle two decades of the century (1941-1960), but only five during the next two decades (1961-1980), and a mere three during the final two decades of the century (1981-2000), which is not at all what one would have expected if the climate-alarmist thesis that is propounded by Gore and his followers was correct.
So just what is the situation here? The scientists who performed the analysis note that the 30 major droughts they identified were “mostly located in semi-arid and arid regions” that “are naturally prone [our italics] to large fluctuations.” And it’s as simple as that. The 30 major droughts of the 20th century were likely natural in all respects; and, hence, they are “indicative of what could also happen in the future,” as Narisma et al. state in their concluding paragraph. And happen they will. Consequently, the next time a serious drought takes hold of some part of the world and the likes of Al Gore blame it on the “carbon footprints” of you and your family, ask them why just the opposite of what their hypothesis suggests actually occurred over the course of the 20th century, i.e., why, when the earth warmed – and at a rate and to a degree that they claim was unprecedented over thousands of years – the rate-of-occurrence of severe regional droughts actually declined.
Just found your item
Australia is experiencing an unusually bad drought and predictably there are cries of “global warming”. No one seems to care that even the CSIRO which is usually associated with dire GW projections says otherwise. See below
If you want a good example of Gore bending the facts check out the work of Kerry Emanual of MIT who is cited as the “science” behind Gore’s hurrican hysteria. Emanual actually says we don’t have the data or the methodology to properly measure hurricane trends, that it is absurd to attribute Katrina to GW, there is no evidence …… I don’t think Al read much less comprehended Emanual.
Drought a result of natural causes, says researcher
December 28, 2006 – 8:00AM
Source: ABC
Drought a result of natural variation in climate: research
Drought a result of natural variation in climate: research
Photo: ABC TV
New research from the CSIRO suggests the current drought is due to natural variation in
climate, not the greenhouse effect.
Barrie Hunt, an honorary research fellow at the CSIRO’s atmospheric research centre in
Melbourne, has studied 10,000 years of climate variability in Australia.
His research shows about 30 periods of drought which occur at random times and he says
the length of each drought does not follow a predictable pattern.
Mr Hunt says this drought is not caused by the greenhouse effect.
“I think it’s probably a bit too early yet to say we’re having a greenhouse effect on rainfall,
rainfall’s a very difficult climatic term to get to grips with,” he said.
“There’s definitely a greenhouse effect on temperature; I’m not sure we’re having one on
rainfall yet.
“This drought will break and it’s important for people to say, ‘Well, I understand that when
the drought breaks, it’s not the greenhouse effect. It’s a load of rubbish, of course – it’s
rained again’.
“Everyone says this thing’s due to the greenhouse effect and therefore they expect it to go
on forever in a way, the naive people do.”
abc logo
Source: Bigpond News 28/12/2006
Roger,
Thanks for the reference. There are plenty of references available to debunk both drought and man-made temperature increase hysteria. Coming from the source it does, the reference you gave hints at the weakness of their own arguments.
I just got an invitation from a local elected official to attend a ‘town hall’ meeting on how we can prevent global warming. I have no problem with voluntary participation in conservation efforts, but the greenbats in our legislature want to mandate carbon caps, taxes, bureaucracies and penalties. All for the sake of a ‘sky-is-falling’ paradigm. It’s sad.