Climate Alarmism Exposed: No Surge in Natural Disasters Despite Record Emissions

by Dr. Matthew Wielicki

The debate surrounding the purported increase in natural disasters due to greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions has been a cornerstone of the climate crisis narrative for decades. However, a thorough examination of the data from sources like the Emergency Events Database (EM-DAT) shows globally reported natural disasters from 1970 to 2024 reveal a more nuanced reality. Upon closer inspection, the claim that increasing GHGs are responsible for an uptick in natural disasters appears increasingly tenuous, if not outright false.

The EM-DAT data, as illustrated by the figure below, shows a notable rise in the number of reported natural disasters from the 1970s to around 1999. However, after this point, the trend plateaus, with no substantial increase observed in the frequency of natural disasters up to 2024. This is critical because it contradicts the mainstream narrative that ties the rise of natural disasters directly to increasing GHG concentrations.

Since 2000, there has been a dramatic increase in CO2 emissions, driven largely by industrial growth in emerging economies like China and India. Indeed, more CO2 has been added to the atmosphere in the past two decades than in any previous period in human history. According to the climate crisis narrative, this should have led to a corresponding increase in extreme weather events and natural disasters. However, the data clearly show otherwise.

Historical Context and Data Quality Pre-2000

It’s crucial to acknowledge that the apparent increase in natural disaster reports from the 1970s to 1998 is, to a large extent, a reflection of improved data collection and reporting. The EM-DAT website itself acknowledges this issue:

 
This admission is significant because it undermines the narrative that natural disasters were increasing at an unprecedented rate before the year 2000. The rise in reported disasters is largely attributable to better monitoring, more comprehensive data collection, and improved communication systems, rather than an actual increase in the frequency of such events.

In essence, the data before 2000 were less complete, and the increasing number of reported disasters during the latter half of the 20th century can be attributed to improvements in record-keeping rather than a surge in actual events. After the turn of the millennium, when global reporting mechanisms had matured, the number of reported disasters stabilized, further emphasizing that any previous upward trend was a function of reporting, not reality.

The Role of CO2: More GHGs, No More Disasters

The most glaring contradiction in the climate crisis narrative is the fact that, despite a significant increase in CO2 emissions since 1998, there has been no corresponding increase in natural disasters. This fact alone dismantles the argument that CO2 is the primary driver of extreme weather events and disasters.

 
If CO2 were the primary cause of natural disasters, as climate alarmists often claim, we would expect to see a dramatic surge in disasters over the past two decades, coinciding with the steep rise in global CO2 concentrations. However, the data do not support this hypothesis. Instead, the number of reported disasters has remained relatively stable, despite record levels of CO2 emissions. This is a crucial piece of evidence that challenges the fundamental premise of the climate crisis narrative.

What About Extreme Weather Events?

Some proponents of the climate crisis narrative argue that while the total number of disasters may not have increased, the severity of these events has worsened due to climate change. However, this claim also lacks robust empirical support. While individual extreme weather events may garner significant media attention, there is no clear, consistent trend in the data to suggest that these events are becoming more frequent or severe on a global scale.

For instance, the data on droughts, floods, wildfires, and other disaster types do not show a clear increase since 1998. If anything, the data suggest that natural variability plays a far more significant role in determining the occurrence and intensity of these events than anthropogenic factors like CO2 emissions.

Challenging the Narrative

The data from EM-DAT and other sources should force us to reconsider the prevailing climate crisis narrative. While climate change is a complex issue that warrants careful consideration, the idea that increasing GHG emissions are driving a surge in natural disasters is not supported by the evidence. In fact, the stability of disaster frequencies since 1998, despite record-breaking CO2 emissions, suggests that the relationship between climate change and natural disasters is far more tenuous than is often claimed.

Moreover, a closer look at historical disaster-related deaths reveals a significant decline in fatalities over the past century, even as the world population has surged and more CO2 has been released into the atmosphere. The included image, which illustrates global deaths from disasters over more than a century, clearly shows that annual disaster death tolls in the millions—common in the early 20th century—have given way to much lower fatalities in recent decades. This trend holds true across different types of disasters, including droughts, floods, earthquakes, and storms. For instance, the 1928 Chinese drought claimed 3 million lives, while recent disasters show far fewer fatalities. This raises serious doubts about claims that modern climate change is making disasters deadlier.

The disconnect between CO2 levels and natural disaster frequency, coupled with declining disaster-related deaths, calls into question the rationale for the massive expenditures being made in the name of preventing climate-related catastrophes. If more CO2 is not leading to more disasters, and if improvements in technology and infrastructure are reducing fatalities, then the entire justification for climate policies focused on emission reductions becomes suspect.

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