Status of Major Climate Parameters
Published:
Updated: August 1, 2023
Author: C. Michael Hogan
Editor:
Temperature
The present global temperature has been discussed fully in Human History and Earth Temperature. In summary present and projected global atmospheric temperatures are well within the range of prior historical periods of maximum crop yields, human health and cultural thriving. They are about one degree Celsius above the disastrous cold temperatures of the Dark Ages and Little Ice Age, where plague, crop failure and civilization decline were dominant human outcomes. In terms of Mortality from Thermal Extremes, humans presently experience about four million deaths per annum from freezing, and approximately 300,000 deaths from elevated temperature. These death rates are not as favorable as the Roman Warm Period or the Medieval Warm Period, but far better for humans than the much colder Dark Ages and Little Ice Age. In conclusion, the human race would suffer far fewer deaths from thermal extremes if the Earth were to become one to 1.5 degrees Celsius warmer than at present, in 2023.
Hurricanes
In North America records of hurricane frequency and intensity have been kept since about 1870. These records indicate wide variations in hurricane events from year to year; however, there is no evidence of increase in frequency or severity of the actual physical events. In fact, NOAA records indicate a gradual decline in hurricane frequency and intensity of hurricanes from 1850 to present. In particular there is no correlation between industrialization, greenhouse gases or fossil fuel combustion with hurricane frequency. Sometimes damage claims from insurance companies are used as a surrogate for the physical hurricane events; however, that provides great inaccuracy, because of increased numbers of people using property insurance and considerable inflation in real estate values in the last century. Furthermore, deaths from hurricanes in the USA within the last century have declined by over 90%.
Droughts and Floods
Present day trends or frequencies of droughts and floods cannot be differentiated from ancient and historic levels, except that droughts in the last five centuries are less severe and shorter in duration than centuries ago. Studies of tree rings and of coral reefs give the best insight to these facts, (Cook, 2001); in fact there is no evidence that claims of climate change are having any measurable impact on either droughts (severity or duration) or flooding. In fact, flood impacts as measured by human deaths show a decided declining trend, although much of that can be ascribed to improved preparedness and flood mitigation.
While trends in flooding show essentially no change since historical records have been kept, the number of deaths due to flooding has fallen dramatically over the last 170 years; this is predominantly due to the wealth effect and improved preparedness for flood events. In any case there is no adverse correlation between the small amount of temperature change and the extent of floods.
See Also
- Causes of climate change
- Dark Ages
- Drought and flooding
- Human History and Earth Temperature
- Little Ice Age
- Medieval Warm Period
- Roman Warm Period
References
- K. R. Briffa, P. D. Jones, T. S. Bartholin, D. Eckstein, F. H. Schweingruber, W. Karlén, P. Zetterberg, M. Eronen, Fennoscandian summers from A.D. 500: Temperature changes on short and long timescales. Clim. Dyn. 7, 111–119 (1992).
- Ed Cook. (2001) North American Drought Atlas. National Science Foundation, Division of Atmospheric Sciences, Paleoclimate Program, SGER Award ATM 03-22403
- Kam-biu Liu, Caiming Shen and Kin-sheun Louie (2001) A 1,000-Year History of Typhoon Landfalls in Guangdong, Southern China, Reconstructed from Chinese Historical Documentary Records. Annals of the Association of American Geographers. Vol. 91, No. 3 (Sep., 2001), pp. 453-464 (12 pages). Published By: Taylor & Francis, Ltd.
- R. J. Cooper, T. M. Melvin, I. Tyers, R. J. S. Wilson, K. R. Briffa, A tree-ring reconstruction of East Anglian (UK) hydroclimate variability over the last millennium. Clim. Dyn. 40, 1019–1039 (2013).wkins, E., and R. Sutton (2009) The potential to narrow uncertainty in regional climate predictions. Bull. Amer. Meteor. Soc., 90, 1095–1107
- Malcolm K Hughes & Peter M Brown (1992) Drought frequency in central California since 101 B.C. recorded in giant sequoia tree rings. Climate Dynamics volume 6,
- Jennings, Jesse (1957). Danger Cave. Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press Anthropological Papers, No. 27. ISBN 978-0874806120
