Well, it’s a tie actually. The final tallies are in and 2010 is even with 2005 as the warmest year on record. NASA and NOAA independently released their own reports yesterday, confirming the improbable and remarkable statistical tie. NASA’s Goddard Institute for Space Studies explains:

The two years differed by less than 0.018 degrees Fahrenheit. The difference is smaller than the uncertainty in comparing the temperatures of recent years, putting them into a statistical tie.

2010, climate central, NOAA, warmest year ever, climate change, global warmingSurface temperature records go back to 1880, and while both NASA and NOAA’s National Climatic Data Center use the average global surface temperature as their variable, they use different methodologies (as Climate Central explained nicely here). Two methodologies producing the same result only further cements the point.

Also, keep in mind that these records are being set during ‘the deepest solar minimum in nearly a century,’ which totally refutes one common argument of the climate skeptic. What’s more, the second half of 2010 was unique for its strong La Niña conditions, ‘which bring cool sea surface temperatures to the eastern tropical Pacific Ocean,’ as James Hansen, director of GISS noted:

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