RealClimate: To no-one's surprise 2024 was the warmest year on record - and by quite a clear margin. Another year, another data point. Unlike the previous year, 2024 was anticipated to be a record breaker even before it began (I predicted a record - despite the huge anomaly in 2023 - with a 55% probability). It
Yet here in Belgium I’m walking around in a puffy winter coat hat and gloves, whereas preceding winters would wear less. The point is, isolated observations don’t tell us much about climate. In winter, warm and cold anomalies travel in waves (Rossby waves) around the pole, and mostly offset each other in the hemisphere average. Problem is that human population distribution evolved, over centuries, such that most people live in places with comfortable climates - and when we change the typical wave patterns, such distribution may no longer be a good adaptation to the new climate.
Yet here in Belgium I’m walking around in a puffy winter coat hat and gloves, whereas preceding winters would wear less. The point is, isolated observations don’t tell us much about climate. In winter, warm and cold anomalies travel in waves (Rossby waves) around the pole, and mostly offset each other in the hemisphere average. Problem is that human population distribution evolved, over centuries, such that most people live in places with comfortable climates - and when we change the typical wave patterns, such distribution may no longer be a good adaptation to the new climate.