Editor's Note: Due to some technical difficulties, you may've noticed that the CDR hasn't been posting over the last week. If you'd like to catch up, last week's posts are now up at the CDR blog, and will now resume normal posting to Climate Hawks.
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JoNova just published a new post intended to serve as a 'take down' of those who have been sounding the alarm bell on climate change for decades. However, for those who actually read the news and are familiar with the emerging and severe impacts of climate change (have you heard of the California drought?), it ends up being more of a stark reminder of how long we've known about the dangers of rising greenhouse gases, and how the impacts we're already experiencing were anticipated a quarter century ago.
In the piece, JoNova digs up a 1989 New York Times op-ed by Al Gore, in which then-Senator Gore warns about "record annual increases" in atmospheric CO2, record heat and predicted near-term warming of up to 5°C (the IPCC's most recent report [.pdf] similarly projects an increase of up to 4.8°C by the end of the 21st century). Referencing Gore's position, JoNova claims that climate change and 'alarmist rhetoric' have hardly changed in the 25 years since, saying, "CO2 levels have gone up by 50ppm, global population has risen by 2 billion," and yet we've "spent more years without significant warming than we've spent with it."
Except this is completely false. For starters, the IPCC has come out with five comprehensive climate reports documenting the mounting scientific evidence and escalating impacts of climate change, the most recent of which [.pdf] states unequivocally that, "recent climate changes have had widespread impacts on human and natural systems." And let's not forget that 2014 was the hottest year on record; that Vanuatu was devastated by a tropical cyclone, and Antarctica saw record heat this past March; and California's extreme drought continues to get worse, with increasing costs.
In 25 years, the climate has changed significantly,as models predicted. The only real issue JoNova's piece serves to highlight is that we've known for years what could happen, but haven't done enough to stop it.
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