Oh, gosh. It seems “global warming” stopped about 16 years ago. UPDATED: Met Office replies

**Posted by Phineas

Now there’s an “inconvenient truth” for the Church of Anthropogenic Global Warming. And the source is none other than the UK’s Met Office, a veritable temple of the faith:

The world stopped getting warmer almost 16 years ago, according to new data released last week.

The figures, which have triggered debate among climate scientists, reveal that from the beginning of 1997 until August 2012, there was no discernible rise in aggregate global temperatures.

This means that the β€˜plateau’ or β€˜pause’ in global warming has now lasted for about the same time as the previous period when temperatures rose, 1980 to 1996. Before that, temperatures had been stable or declining for about 40 years.

The new data, compiled from more than 3,000 measuring points on land and sea, was issued quietly on the internet, without any media fanfare, and, until today, it has not been reported.

This stands in sharp contrast to the release of the previous figures six months ago, which went only to the end of 2010 – a very warm year.

Ending the data then means it is possible to show a slight warming trend since 1997, but 2011 and the first eight months of 2012 were much cooler, and thus this trend is erased.

Some climate scientists, such as Professor Phil Jones, director of the Climatic Research Unit at the University of East Anglia, last week dismissed the significance of the plateau, saying that 15 or 16 years is too short a period from which to draw conclusions.

Others disagreed. Professor Judith Curry, who is the head of the climate science department at America’s prestigious Georgia Tech university, told The Mail on Sunday that it was clear that the computer models used to predict future warming were β€˜deeply flawed’.

Even Prof Jones admitted that he and his colleagues did not understand the impact of β€˜natural variability’ – factors such as long-term ocean temperature cycles and changes in the output of the sun. However, he said he was still convinced that the current decade would end up significantly warmer than the previous two.

Be sure to click through for the rest of the article and the Chart of Doom.

You won’t be shocked to learn the Met Office released this data without any publicity — not surprising since it blows a hole in their precious theory theology big enough to drive a 16-wheeler through. Later in the article it’s observed that the current “plateau” period has been about as long as the warming trend that preceded it. A little bit of reading and some thought based on observable evidence (and not computer models) might lead one to think this is part of a natural cycle, not some sign that man has angered Gaea and will be punished for it.

That’s the theory I prefer, at any rate, and I think it’s more empirical than anything the Met Office, the University of East Anglia, Phil Jones, James Hansen, Al Gore, and the rest of the alarmist, Green Statist, rent-seeking cult has ever produced.

This will not stop them, of course, as Jones’ bleatings and pleadings in the article show, even while he admits they don’t know enough about natural cycles. Well, then doesn’t that make their oracles –their computer models– worthless?

Not to the true climate alarmist. They’ll just wait a little for the fuss to die down, then go back to selling their predictions of doom and claiming mathematical proof in the hope of convincing a few more uncritical suckers.

And we’ll be waiting for them.

RELATED: More from Pirate’s Cove.

UPDATE: TheΒ Met Office has replied, attacking the author and his article.

(Crossposted at Public Secrets)

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