Arctic Ice melt media misinformation retracted

onAug 25, 2008 @ 14:53 PDT

The Register reporter Steve Goddard is admitting today that his article last week on melting Arctic Sea Ice (Arctic ice refuses to melt as ordered) is incorrect.

Too bad the damage has already been done.

In his article, Goddard claimed that National Snow and Ice Data Center plot of Arctic Sea Ice Extent was wrong and that,

“The Arctic did not experience the meltdowns forecast by NSIDC and the Norwegian Polar Year Secretariat. It didn’t even come close. Additionally, some current graphs and press releases from NSIDC seem less than conservative. There appears to be a consistent pattern of overstatement related to Arctic ice loss.”

Today, Goddard is retracting the claim:

“… it is clear that the NSIDC graph is correct, and that 2008 Arctic ice is barely 10% above last year – just as NSIDC had stated.”

But as Joe Romm at ClimateProgress points out it may be too little too late. Goddard’s article has already caught fire in the climate denier-sphere with over 70 references to the story according to blog search engine Technorati, with titles like:

Arctic Ice Grows 30 Per Cent In a Year
The Global Warming Theory takes a hit
Fishy Data From the Government
Here’s another installment about the silliness of “global warming” as posited by politicians and “environmentalists”.
Cooking the Books to Cook the Ice
Global Warming is about global government and depopulation

Unless Goddard, or intrepid DeSmog readers, have the time to go out and urge bloggers to correct this latest misinformation, it will be popping up as yet another false piece of information on the true state of our planet and the realities of global warming for some time to come. And as the old adage goes , “If you repeat something long enough it eventually becomes true.”

For more on the who’s who of the climate denial industry, check out our comprehensive climate deniers research database.

By Kevin Grandia

Kevin is a contributor and strategic adviser to DeSmog. He runs the digital marketing agency Spake Media House. Named a “Green Hero” by Rolling Stone Magazine and one of the “Top 50 Tweeters” on climate change and environment issues, Kevin has appeared in major news media outlets around the world for his work on digital campaigning. Kevin has been involved in the public policy arena in both the United States and Canada for more than a decade. For five years he was the managing editor of DeSmogBlog.com. In this role, Kevin’s research into the “climate denial industry” and the right-wing think tank networks was featured in news media articles around the world. He is most well known for his ground-breaking research into David and Charles Koch’s massive financial investments in the Republican and tea party networks. Kevin is the first person to be designated a “Certified Expert” on the political and community organizing platform NationBuilder. Prior to DeSmog, Kevin worked in various political and government roles. He was Senior Advisor to the Minister of State for Multiculturalism and a Special Assistant to the Minister of State for Asia Pacific, Foreign Affairs for the Government of Canada. Kevin also worked in various roles in the British Columbia provincial government in the Office of the Premier and the Ministry of Health. In 2008 Kevin co-founded a groundbreaking new online election tool called Vote for Environment which was later nominated for a World Summit Award in recognition of the world’s best e-Content and innovative ICT applications. Kevin moved to Washington, DC in 2010 where he worked for two years as the Director of Online Strategy for Greenpeace USA and has since returned to his hometown of Vancouver, Canada.