Ross Clarke writing in the Spectator is telling us to keep things balanced when it comes to understanding climate change:
“The world is getting warmer, that much is clear. But the evidence for that needs to be dissociated from the tendency of some campaigners to try to pin every piece of adverse weather on man-made climate change.”
The writer is by no means a climate change denier, reporting on the latest figures:
“The World Meteorological Organisation (WMO) published its preliminary observations today for 2019. Averaged global temperatures for the first ten months of this year, it claims, were 1.1 Celsius above what it likes to call ‘pre-industrial’ levels.”
Don’t blame all ‘weird’ weather on climate change | Spectator
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Panic is not helpful:
Eco-anxiety: between doom and denial
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To quote from the WMO report, we need to keep things in proportion:
“Fire activity in the Amazon basin was also higher than in recent years, particularly in August, although it fell well short of previous severe drought years such as 2010. The number of reported fires in Brazil’s Amazonia region was only slightly above the 10-year average”.
WMO Provisional Statement on the State of the Global Climate in 2019
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It is a question of balance – and even Ross Clarke writing in the Spectator refers to “possibly the driest year recorded over much of Australia”:
Bureau of Meteorology declares spring 2019 the driest on record | abc.net.au
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And certainly the pressures on our landscapes – whether sheep in Australia or soya in Brazil – are only exacerbating the issues around climate change:
Climate change and the Amazon: trade, meat and tourism
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And we certainly need to be prepared:
