Global Warming

Global Warming Has Not Paused: Study

New research finds that while the rate of surface warming of the planet due to climate change has slowed since 1998, the effects of warming are still advancing at a rapid pace.

Climate researchers from the U.S. National Center for Atmospheric Research say it is a myth that global warming has paused, owing to solid evidence that the world’s oceans are now absorbing more than 90 percent of the excess heating of the planet.

Researcher Kevin Trenberth estimates that the oceans are accumulating heat equivalent to about 6 Hiroshima atomic bomb detonations per second on average.

Warming of the planet due to greenhouse emissions is still melting glaciers and ice caps, lifting ocean levels and creating some of the hottest periods on record around the planet.

Writing in the American Geophysical Union open-access journal Earth’s Future, Trenberth and colleague John Fasullo say that “global warming has not stopped; it is merely manifested in different ways.”

Greenhouse gas emissions continue to surge from polluting industry and transportation, setting the stage for even more intense warming in the decades ahead, researchers warn.