Don Hooper, a New England regional representative for the National
Wildlife Federation, wrote an op-ed in the August 27 Boston
Globe describing his 500-mile bicycle trip across Iowa in July
as part of the NWF's 10-rider Global Warming Action Team. "I
was on a quest to see firsthand if global warming was ready for prime
time as a presidential election issue," explained Hooper. "Heady
and optimistic, I hoped America's heartland electorate was nearing
the tipping point in its alarm over the catastrophic consequences of
global warming."
Hooper and other team members, who wore "Cycling Against Global
Warming" jerseys, wanted to find out if Iowans were aware of the
warming that was supposedly taking place right under their noses. "We
tried to keep a light touch, often asking open-endedly, 'Has global
warming visited Iowa?' 'Is it real?' "
Hooper quoted a "soybean farmer from parched, cracked-soil Rolfe"
who obviously believes that global warming has visited Iowa: "Something
worrisome is happening out there; it's real all right. We've
got to address it." But he also quoted a Rock Rapids hardware store
manager who supposedly was still in denial. The store manager called
global warming "a liberal, sky-is-falling fantasy; you should've
been here in February when it was 15 below."
Overall, Hooper says that his "persistent but unscientific survey
… found that a majority of Iowans believe global warming is real."
But he also noted that "until Iowa, I hadn't really considered
the implications of obstinate denial."
But it is fair to ask who's in denial. Is the hardware store manager
quoted above in denial? Or is Mr. Hooper himself in denial — or perhaps
uninformed?
I find it amusing that Mr. Hooper's op-ed, which is titled "An
issue that heats up the heartland," was published just a few days
after we learned that the warmest year on record in America is no longer
1998 but 1934. As reported by an August 15 Los
Angeles Times article: "A slight adjustment to U.S. temperature
records has bumped 1998 as the hottest year in the country's history
and made the Dust Bowl year of 1934 the new record holder, according
to NASA." In fact, four of the ten warmest years on record in America
are now in the 1930s.
The adjustment was made because NASA researchers, after being tipped
off by a Canadian blogger, checked the data and "found that the
agency had merged two data sets that had been incorrectly assumed to
match."
It is significant that the change in the U.S. temperature record that
caused the re-ranking is very small. "When the data were corrected,
it resulted in a decrease of 0.27 degrees Fahrenheit in yearly temperatures
since 2000 and a smaller decrease in earlier years," the Los
Angeles Times explained. "That meant that 1998, which had
been 0.02 degrees warmer than 1934, was now 0.04 degrees cooler."
The Times also pointed out that "re-ranking did not affect
global records," and it quoted Gavin A. Schmidt of NASA's Goddard
Institute for Space Studies as saying "the global numbers show
that there is no question that the last five to 10 years have been the
hottest period of the last century." The Times also quoted
Schmidt as saying that "the changes were pretty negligible."
Which is precisely the point! If a small adjustment in the U.S. temperature
record can change the hottest year in America from 1998 to 1934, then
the upward trend in global warming is very small indeed. In fact, that
trend is so small that in America, as already noted, four of the ten
warmest years on record are in the 1930s.
When Mr. Hooper bicycled through Iowa in July, he had no way of knowing
that the U.S. temperature record would be adjusted a month later. But,
hopefully, he knows it now. And he should ask himself just how alarming
the slight warming that has occurred over the last century can be —
and if a soybean farmer in Iowa can actually see the difference with
his own eyes.
