By Sierra Rayne ——Bio and Archives--July 31, 2014
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"In the deserts of the Southwest, adaptation will likely involve learning to live with more extreme heat. Scientists predict in the newly released National Climate Assessment report that annual average temperatures in the Southwest could rise by 5.5-9.5 degrees by the end of the century if emissions of greenhouse gases continue to grow. That would make the climate of cooler high-elevation deserts more like the region's hottest low-elevation deserts. Palm Springs, Indio and El Centro, among other places, could be scorched by average temperatures hotter than those seen today in Death Valley, which holds the record for the hottest temperature ever recorded: 134 degrees."There hasn't been a significant trend in "annual average temperatures in the Southwest" since the late 1980s. Since the mid-1990s, the correlation has been negative -- not positive. Emissions of greenhouse gases have been increasing rapidly for the past quarter-century, and yet average temperatures in the Southwest exhibit no significant trend, and show a nearly significant declining trend since 2000.
"'That's what climate change can mean for this basin, that you're going to see not only less precipitation but precipitation that doesn't get into the river and ultimately results in less water,' Entsminger said. 'All of us are going to have to come together and, in my opinion, in the 21st century figure out how to live with less water.'"Less precipitation? I can find no significant trends in annual precipitation since 1895 (i.e., almost 120 years) for the areas comprising the Colorado River basin in California, Arizona, Nevada, Utah, New Mexico, Colorado, or Wyoming. More claims that need to be challenged:
"The average number of days each year with temperatures hotter than 90 degrees increased by more than 25 percent [in the Southwest]. And while the comparison of those periods showed only a slight decline in precipitation region-wide, some areas -- such as Indio, Blythe and Palm Springs -- have grown significantly drier ... Low-lying Indio has seen a sharp rise of about 2.5 degrees in average temperatures, as well as a drop in average annual rainfall from 3.1 inches to 1.8 inches."I find no significant trend in annual precipitation at Palm Springs/Indio since records began in 1908. No significant trend at Blythe, either, since records began in 1949 -- indeed, the correlation is positive towards more precipitation, not less. As for the "number of days each year with temperatures hotter than 90 degrees," the San Diego, Los Angeles, Las Vegas, Phoenix, Yuma, Flagstaff, and Albuquerque climate regions all show no significant trends over at least the past 30 years. How is that consistent with the catastrophic anthropogenic global warming mechanism and a supposedly continuing warming trend at each location? Another problematic claim:
"Climate records show significant shifts already occurring across the region and in particular in areas near Joshua Tree National Park, which straddles the boundary between the higher Mojave Desert and the lower Sonoran Desert. During the past 20 years, the high desert town of Twentynine Palms has grown 1.4 degrees warmer on average and slightly drier than it was in the decades before 1960."What nonsense. According the NOAA National Weather Service database, there has been absolutely no significant trend whatsoever in precipitation at Twentynine Palms since records began in 1936. The temperature record for this town over the past 30 years also looks to be far too incomplete for any reliable statistical analyses to be conducted. Only half of the years during the last three decades have complete monthly temperature records. There are serious scientific problems throughout this piece of so-called science journalism. Just read the following description of the methods used for the series:
"In order to analyze changes in climate in the Southwest, The Desert Sun used the National Climatic Data Center's online database and obtained monthly summaries for a selection of weather stations across much of the region. Thirty-one weather stations with some of the longest continuous records were chosen, with data on temperatures and precipitation starting between the 1890s and 1940s. The data were analyzed by converting monthly average temperatures, as well as average monthly highs and lows, into averages by decade. Temperatures and precipitation during the past 20 years, since 1994, were then compared with the averages in the decades before 1960 -- a time frame often used by scientists in studying climate change."It doesn't appear as if any statistical tools whatsoever were used to determine if the trends and/or "differences" between time periods were statistically significant. Pure junk science. In addition, it sounds as though the average since 1994 was compared to "the averages in the decades before 1960," which could apparently mean any period from either the 1890s to 1960 or from the 1940s to 1960.
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Sierra Rayne holds a Ph.D. in Chemistry and writes regularly on environment, energy, and national security topics. He can be found on Twitter at @srayne_ca