A new study by Rahmstorf and Coumou makes an explicit link between climate change and Western Russia’s long, brutal heat wave of July 2010, which caused numerous deaths, plunged Moscow into a sea of smog, and decimated the country’s wheat crops (leading officials to ban all grain exports). The study is significant as it contradicts earlier findings by Dole et al that seems to have confused, in Rahmstorf’s words, “an absence of evidence,” with “evidence of absence.” The authors assert that the “2010 Moscow heat record is, with 80% probability, due to the long-term climatic warming trend.” (more…)