From Green Right Now Reports
New research by U.S. environmental and geo-science academicians shows a distinct warming trend in the nation’s breadbasket over the last two centuries.
The scientists drew that conclusion after examining 65,987 weather records, recording the daily mean temperatures since 1828. Those weather observations, made by doctors in pioneer forts and later Weather Bureau officials, helped Dorian J. Burnette and David Stahle of the University of Arkansas, with the help of geographer Cary Mock of the University of South Carolina, reconstruct the climate of Manhattan, Kansas, in the center of the nation. The scientists’ findings are published in the March 15 issue of the peer-reviewed Journal of Climate.
What they found was that 19th century temperatures were notably cooler than those in the 20th Century and the first decade of the 21st Century.
“It still gets cold today, but the trend from 1828 to the present day is unmistakable,” said Dr. Burnette, who holds a degree in environmental dynamics, in a news release. “There is a warming trend in the cold extremes of about 5 degrees Celsius since 1855.”
Burnette said he used daily data from seven historical stations and four modern stations in Kansas, Missouri and Oklahoma, to determine the daily mean temperature for each day dating back to July 1, 1828. He then computed seasonal and annual temperature means for each year, and looked at how these numbers have changed over time.
Calculating the most extreme warm and cold events for each year, Burnette found that the cold extremes are changing relative to the warm extremes, and are “warming at almost twice the rate as the warm extremes,” according to a news release.
The upsurge in warmer temperatures since 1855 tracks with the scientific belief that temperatures have been warming incrementally worldwide in concert with the increase in carbon emissions in the air from burning fossil fuels, a phenomenon of the industrial age.
Dr. Burnette’s data also show an accelerated warming trend since 1969, again fueled by a rise in cold season temperature extremes.
This is consistent with what we see globally on average,” Dr. Burnette said.
Burnette also studied records from the U.S. Army Surgeon General, the Smithsonian Institution and the Signal Service housed in the National Archives in his quest to find the detailed weather information from these early observers. In interpreting the data, the team developed a computer program that could help check readings against others in the region, to make sure that inaccurate data was excluded or to interpret weather vernacular that was used in the 19th century.