THE SCANDINAVIAN TREE-RING DATA

"Proxy" data from tree ring and other sources has been much used by Warmists in attempts to prop up their theory. The once prominent "hockeystick" study was allegedly (but not really) based on such data. Proxy data were used in the hockeystick study to give an air of legitimacy to what was in fact a mathematical fraud. So there is no doubt that proxy data has an important, and maybe vital role to play in climate studies.

Some new proxy data has recently emerged from studies of tree rings in Northern Scandinavia. In part because of the cold temperatures there, wood residues from the last 7,000 years have been well preserved at the bottom of muddy lakes. From that, Finnish researchers have been able to reconstuct a temperature record covering that period.

The results of the study are set out via many good graphics in a PDF here so I will depart from my usual practice and refer readers to the site concerned rather than reproducing the material here.

You will see that the temperature record over the period is one of alternating ups and downs with the present situation being well within the range of normal fluctuations. See particularly their figure 6 for that.

Figure 7 is also interesting. The researchers have looked at the cycles in their data and have plotted a projection into the future of where those cycles are leading us. You will see that, based on past climate cycles, we are headed for some global cooling soon.


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