Research: Greenland Glaciers Disappeared During Holocene Thermal Maximum

By Bob Ellis on January 7th, 2010

A graphical description of changes in temperature in Greenland from 500 – 1990 A.D. based on analysis of the deep ice core from Greenland and some historical events.

C3 Headlines once again points us to the fact that temperatures in Greenland were once much warmer than they are today, and to the fact that modern hysteria about anthropogenic global warming is pure hot air.

From the referenced analysis at CO2 Science:

temperatures derived from the GRIP borehole [were] 2.5°C warmer than at present (Dahl-Jensen et al., 1998).” Thereafter, however, local glaciers began to grow once again; and for all regions except a few locations in western and southeastern Greenland, the two researchers report that glaciers “grew to their maximum Holocene extents during Historical time,”

Glaciers in Greenland “experienced recession and advance approximately during the Medieval Warm Period (~800-1170 AD) and Little Ice Age (~1300-1850 AD), respectively.”

And

It was only to be expected that once the millennial-scale oscillation of temperature bottomed out and began to rise again, the result would be a significant warming and recession of local glaciers, irrespective of anything the air’s CO2 content might do concurrently, as the climate rebounded towards its more normal Holocene mid-range.

Greenland was once home to thriving Viking colonies around the year 1,000.  The climate there was warm enough to grow vineyards.  Unfortunately, when things began to cool off a few hundred years later, civilization became unsustainable in the cold climate with the primitive infrastructure available at the time.

The evidence for natural, cyclic climate change–not anthropogenic global warming–is overwhelming.   No amount of wishful thinking (or propaganda) on the part of socialists like Al Gore is ever going to change that.

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Categories: Commentary
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  • Sabretruthtiger
    It's amazing that people still hold on to their religious AGW beliefs. All science shows that Anthropogenic Global Warming is baseless. The Earth has been warming steadily for 300 years, well before humans could've had any impact, and cooled for the past 8 years. The medieval Warm period was warmer than today, Global ice levels are normal and sea levels have not risen significantly.
    Also climate models and IPCC predictions vastly exaggerate warming, they overstate CO2 levels, and vastly exaggerate upper tropospheric water vapour leading to understated Outgoing Longwave Radiation, and thus vastly exaggerating warming. They also ignore low level clouds resulting from increased humidity that reflects radiation back to space and cools the planet.
    Polar Bears are at record numbers.

    In other words there is ZERO evidence supporting AGW. All the evidence supports the view that we are at the peak of a Holocene Climactic Optimum and that the climate is entirely within natural variability.
  • Brian rutledge
    I am glad to see the Holocene mentioned which began around 12,000 years ago. At least some creationists will agree that the earth is older than the 6000 years that so many adamantly hold on to.
  • Many if not most creationists usually allow up to about 10,000 years for the age of the earth, in the event there might possibly be some misunderstood portions of the genealogies used to calculate the Biblical timeline.

    But while I disagree with many of time timelines in these and other figures which purport to be 12,000+ years old, they do nevertheless show that the earth has experienced much warmer periods long before modern industrial activity. We only need go back a couple of hundred years to about 1,000 to see drastic climate change in both directions...with no anthropogenic source to blame.
  • Brian rutledge
    I looked at the study and it says that boreholes or cores were taken and examined from the Pleistocene and
    Holocene eras.The Pleistocene took place 2.5 million years ago to 12,000 years ago and the then Holocene began. Since you accept this science about the CO2 findings, as do I, do you also accept these scientists science that supports an old earth since they accept the Pleistocene and a much older earth,millions of years old.
  • I think you know the answer to that, since I already provided it in my previous comment.
  • Brian Rutledge
    Sorry Bob. Just trying to point out an inconsistency I don't think I'll ever understand which is accepting scientific techniques used to show CO2 levels for 10,000 years and then rejecting these same techniques that say also say the world is very old.

    But I do understand now why some creationists adhere to James Ussher's 4004 B.C. creation date and other creationists say it could have occuurred 10,000 years ago. It is simply allowing for geneological error. I CAN understand that.
  • As I said, I explained the "inconsistency" before. People hopelessly stuck in the evolution/materialist mindset always make flawed assumptions about the age of the earth and about ancient chronologies (at least, ones that go back farther than recorded history--convenient, that).

    While their timeline is flawed, the fact remains that, as I said, one need only go back (1) 150 years to get behind the industrial revolution, (b) 200-300 years to hit the last cooling trend, and (c) about 1,000 years to hit a warming trend greater than modern times.

    The farther back they go, the more flawed their guess-timates of chronology, but one thing the study does show: at some point prior to the industrial revolution, it was hotter than now and the glaciers melted.
  • Brian rutledge
    Help me with the logic. This study was done by taking ice/soil samples at different depths. At a certain depth, the samples show what was happening with CO2 approximately 150 years ago. A little deeper depth shows what CO2 was doing approximately 300 years ago. Further down, the samples show what was happening approximately 1000 years ago. You accept this.

    But even further down the samples show what was happening to CO2 approximately 100,000 years ago. The same techiques and math were used, but you say when they go that deep that their time guess-timates are flawed. Well not even flawed but completely break down past 6 or 10 thousand years ago.

    According to your belief, the technique and math work for a hundred and a thousand years ago although become less accurate the deeper one goes into the ground. but then at any depth past 6 thousand or 10 thousand years ago depending on the creationist, the math and techniques completely break down and are completely flawed. What do you know of these techniques and the math to honestly make such a claim ?
  • What I know of the assumptions made about dating ice cores, etc. is that it is assumed that one ice layer is equivalent to one year.

    This is a highly presumptive assumption, based on the belief that there is only one layer per year, etc., that we can establish a uniform thickness for each year-layer, etc. All of these are highly assumptive and assume a layer cannot be thicker or thinner than our assumption, and that not more than one layer can be accumulated in one year.

    Such assumptions are error-prone in just a few short years, and the farther back you go, the more such errors can be multiplied.

    Which is why I say that while the accuracy of such dating methods is unreliable once you get very far back in history, but nevertheless, we can still tell that at some point prior to the industrial revolution, things were much hotter than they are now.
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