Climate Science Denial Group GWPF Admits It Used False Temperature Graph

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The climate science denying group the Global Warming Policy Foundation has admitted that it shared an โ€œerroneousโ€ temperature dataset to support Lord Lawsonโ€™s false claims to the BBC last week that global temperatures arenโ€™tย rising.

Three days after Lawsonโ€™s BBC interview โ€“ which was immediately and widely criticised in the media and by scientists โ€“ the climate denial group tweeted out Sunday afternoon that it was โ€œhappy to correct the recordโ€ and has since removed the tweet after a request to do so by climate scientist Edย Hawkins.

According to the tweets, the graph was originally produced by US meteorologist Ryan Maue, an adjunct scholarย of the libertarianย think tank the Cato Institute co-founded by Charles Koch. It was published by weather forecaster and climate science denier Joe Bastardi. Both Bastardi and Maue work for WeatherBELL Analytics, a private weather consultingย firm.


Screenshot of GWPF tweets taken on August 14ย 2017.

As a number of climate scientists have beenย quickย toย point out, Lawson was wrong to claim that the average global temperature has โ€œslightly declinedโ€ since 2007. In fact, the global surface temperature over this period has risen, with theย three hottest yearsย on record occurring in 2014, 2015 andย 2016.

In addition to being a reaction to those debunking the graphโ€™s false and misleading claims, the GWPFโ€™s efforts to distance themselves from the inaccurate data comes one day after neo-Nazi website the Daily Stormer featured a story using the same graph with the headline โ€œItโ€™s Colder Now Than When Al Gore Won the Nobel Prize for Kook Theory inย 2007โ€.ย 

The article was published on Saturday August 12 and appeared next to stories about the Charlottesville, Virginia white supremacist rally over the weekend. (Hackers purportedly linked to international hacking network Anonymous have now reportedly taken over the website with a headline reading โ€œEnd ofย hateโ€.)

Photo: Wikimedia Commons | CCย 2.0

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Kyla is a freelance writer and editor with work appearing in the New York Times, National Geographic, HuffPost, Mother Jones, and Outside. She is also a member of the Society for Environmental Journalists.

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