By John McClaughry, Ethan Allen Institute

On December 4 Vermonters were treated to a well- orchestrated media event designed to terrify them into endorsing a very expensive special interest policy agenda. The occasion was the release of a new report by the Vermont Public Interest Group (VPIRG) claiming that “global warming will substantially increase the odds of extreme precipitation. scientists predict that warming temperatures will increase the frequency of major storm with heavy rainfall or snowfall.”

The report, entitled “When It Rains, It Pours”, was prepared by the Environment America Research and Policy Center created by US PIRG with funding from the Pew Charitable Trust. (Imagine the flip side: how much credibility would you give to a report on climate change produced by the National Coal Association?) The key finding of the report for Vermont is a finding that our state “experienced a 57% increase in extreme rainstorms and snowstorms during the period studied” (1948-2006)

Why did VPIRG choose the period 1948-2006? The report says its conclusions rest on the authority of Dr. David Easterling of the National Climatic Data Center. But the 2003 report cited to Easterling covers the period 1895-2000. In it, incidentally, Easterling observed that “[extreme precipitation] frequencies at the beginning of the 20th century were nearly as high as during the late 20th century for some combinations, suggesting that natural variability cannot be discounted as an important contributor to the recent high values.” Former Lyndon State professor of meteorology Joseph D’Aleo offers this explanation: the first half of the period studied was the beginning of the last cold phase of the Pacific Decadal Oscillation, an ocean current pattern that strongly affects storm tracks and thus precipitation over North America. Half way through the VPIRG study period the PDO flipped to its warm phase.  VPIRG carefully picked a period where it could hardly have avoided getting the higher precipitation frequency that it wanted for shock effect. D’Aleo believes that current global warming (and thus warming-related precipitation) is far more influenced by PDO and other ocean current changes than by any contribution produced by human activity.

To their credit, the Vermont news media (Free Press, Vermont Press Bureau, WCAX) sought out some expert opinion. Andy Nash, the National Weather Service lead meteorologist at Burlington, was clearly not buying the VPIRG climate fright.  The Free Press reported Nash as observing cautiously that the data could be artifacts of the natural variability of the weather. WCAX quoted Nash as saying that the report does not present new data and raises more questions than it answers. This won’t be the last time that enviro organizations pump up an enviro-scare to promote their political agenda. Vermonters need to greet these continual revelations with a lot of skepticism.  Read more here

John McClaughry is President of the Ethan Allen Institute