Truth, Lies and In Between

Stockholm observatory weather station, source of the temperature record

Rebuttal to Åström et al. Attributing mortality from extreme temperatures to climate change in Stockholm, Sweden., published in Nature Climate Change by Paul C. “Chip” Knappenberger, Patrick J. Michaels, and Anthony Watts

Last fall, the press pounced on the results of a new study that found that global climate change was leading to an increasing frequency of heat waves and resulting in greater heat-related mortality. Finally a scientific study showing that global warming is killing us after all! See all you climate change optimists have been wrong all along, human-caused global warming is a threat to our health and welfare.

Not so fast.

Upon closer inspection, it turns out that the authors of that study—which examined heat-related mortality in Stockholm, Sweden—failed to include the impacts of adaptation in their analysis as well as the possibility that some of the temperature…