The growth rate of CO2 has never been greater...and climate-doomsday cult shrieking has never been shriek-ier...yet...to much embarrassment...2014 wasn't the 'warmest-evah'!...maybe next year, though...in the meantime, the history of global temperatures and CO2 growth since 1850 in a single chart.....
The HadCRUT4 (HC4) global temperature dataset is now considered the gold-standard for surface temperatures (the previous gold-standard was the HC3 dataset).
Using the annual HC4 calculated temperatures, the adjoining chart was created.
As observed, the global temperatures have essentially stalled since 1998, with 2014 likely not greater than that reached in 1998.
This chart also delineates the two major warming periods since 1850. The first from 1917 to 1944; the last from 1976 to 1998. The warming trend increase of the latter over the former was a paltry +0.4 per century - an increase well within what one would expect from natural variability, regardless of CO2 levels.
And then there's the CO2 growth itself.
The 20-year growth rates show an almost continuous climb since the early 1950's. At the end of 2014, it was the highest ever. This greater than 'business-as-usual' growth was discussed in the latest IPCC AR5 report - the growth rate for total greenhouse gases has followed a similar path.
Finally, the chart depicts where the much discussed 2º, 4º and 6º increases over the 1850 global temperature would be... see the red dashed lines.
How long to reach the 2º mark that elites fear so much? Well, per the last 18 years, that trend would indicate another 150+ years before the 2 degree increase would ever be reached.
From this empirical evidence, it would be fair to surmise that invoking more big government polices and regulations to combat unsubstantiated climate-doomsday speculation might not be in the best interests of the public.
Additional modern temperature charts.
Note: Trends of the past are not reliable predictors of future.