Met Office Climb Down; How Did The Media Do?

BBC weather presenter (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

It looks like the BBC did the story after David Whitehouse's devastating piece on the GWPF website yesterday. Whitehouse should get journalist of the year for his work on the standstill. He's been proven right. From now on I'm going to call him "The BBC's (Unofficial) Science Correspondent." What I might call Harrabin and Shukman is another matter. –Dhe, http://www.bishop-hill.net/blog/2013/1/8/today-on-met-office-models.html%23comments">Bishop Hill, 8 January 2013

The fact that the UK Met Office had changed its near-term global warming forecast quietly on Christmas Eve was noticed by some Met Office watchers, especially the ever-interesting Tallbloke’s Talkshop website which reported it on January 5th. This piece started a flurry of blog comments. We at the GWPF republished the story the same day on our website. The GWPF published my analysis of the considerable implications of the Met Office revision on the 7th January. The analysis was distributed via CCNet at 11:51 am, including hundreds of journalists. --David Whitehouse, http://www.thegwpf.org/met-office-warming-2017-media-do/">The Global Warming Policy Foundation, 9 January 2013

The great global warming debate was blown wide open again yesterday when the Met Office predicted cooler than expected temperatures for the next five years. The Met Office, one of the top cheerleaders for the man-made climate change camp, said global temperatures are likely to be lower than it forecast in December 2011. --John Ingham, Daily Express, 9 January 2013

These figures show that in all likelihood we will have had no warming in the past 20 years. That is almost as embarrassing as the Met Office’s ­Barbecue Summer forecast. This suggests that the Government’s climate change policies, including wind farms, are a waste of money and based on dodgy advice. Why should we trust Met Office forecasts about the climate for 2050 or 2100 if they get it wrong for the next decade? –Benny Peiser, Daily Express, 9 January 2013

Labour MP Graham Stringer said the Met Office’s short-term forecasts had improved, but their climate change analysis was ‘poor’. He said: ‘By putting out the information on Christmas Eve they were just burying bad news – that they have got their climate change forecast wrong. ‘For a science-based organisation, they should be more up front, both about their successes and failures.’ –Nick McDermott, http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2259012/Global-warming-Met-Office-releases-revised-global-temperature-predictions-showing-planet-NOT-rapidly-heating-up.html">Daily Mail, 9 January 2013

The new projection, if correct, would mean there will have been little additional warming for two decades despite rising greenhouse gases. It's bound to raise questions about the robustness and reliability of computer simulations that governments around the world are using in order to determine policies aimed at combating global warming. --Paul Hudson, http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/paulhudson/2013/01/met-office-scale-back-global-w.shtml">BBC Weather, 9 January 2013

To describe the Met Office as in utter shambles on the issue of decadal forecasts, is to sugar the pill considerably. I can say one thing for absolute certain. If the Met Office admits a slowdown in global temperatures they are going to go up --‏@BenJacksonSun