2008 was the year man-made global warming was disproved,according to the Telegraph's Christopher Booker.
Sceptics have long argued that there are other explanationsfor climate change other than man-made CO2 and here we look at some of thearguments put forward by those who believe that global warming is all a hoax.
Temperatures are falling, not rising
As Christopher Booker says in his review of 2008,temperatures have been dropping in a wholly unpredicted way over the past year.Last winter, the northern hemisphere saw its greatest snow cover since 1966,which in the northern US states and Canada was dubbed the "winter fromhell". This winter looks set to be even worse.
The earth was hotter 1,000 years ago
Evidence from all over the world indicates that the earthwas hotter 1,000 years ago than it is today. Research shows that temperatureswere higher in what is known as the Mediaeval Warming period than they were inthe 1990s.
The earth's surface temperature is not at record levels
According to Nasa's Goddard Institute for Space Studiesanalysis of surface air temperature measurements, the meteorological December2007 to November 2008 was the coolest year since 2000. Their data has alsoshown that the hottest decade of the 20th century was not the 1990s but the1930s.
Ice is not disappearing
Arctic website Crysophere Today reported that Arctic icevolume was 500,000 sq km greater than this time last year. Additionally,Antarctic sea-ice this year reached its highest level since satellite recordsbegan in 1979. Polar bear numbers are also at record levels.
Himalayan glaciers
A report by the UN Environment Program this year claimedthat the cause of melting glaciers in the Himalayas was not global warming butthe local warming effect of a vast "atmospheric brown cloud" overthat region, made up of soot particles from Asia's dramatically increasedburning of fossil fuels and deforestation.
Temperatures are still dropping
Nasa satellite readings on global temperatures from theUniversity of Alabama show that August was the fourth month this year whentemperatures fell below their 30-year average, ie since satellite recordsbegan. November 2008 in the USA was only the 39th warmest since records began113 years ago.