With the end of the year, and all the global warming hype, I’ve been trying to understand how hot 2007 really was globally and also the direction in which temperatures are now trending considering the satellite and near surface measurements at the NOAA and Hadley websites respectively. Of course raw numbers, graphed and ungraphed, can give a different impression depending on your starting point – be that 1979 when satellite data was first collected, 1900 when surface temperatures were already being collected, or 1998 the hottest year so far.
Nevertheless, the various data sets do suggest that globally 1998 is still far and away the hottest and that temperatures have been stable or in decline since then. Also given 1998 was so hot, and only ten years ago, and that increases and decreases in temperature tend to be incremental it is not surprising that last year can be described as the sixth or seventh warmest even if the trend is one of cooling. But is it?
Anyway, I was surprised, but also interested, to see the analysis by Lubos Motl at this blog (http://motls.blogspot.com ). He’s a physicist and has been looking at the same data sets as I have over the last few days but coming to much more interesting and definitive conclusions including that the linear trend for the satellite data for the 1998 -2007 interval is -0.48C and that December 2007 was cooler than the average December since 1979.
Read the complete blog post here: http://motls.blogspot.com/2008/01/2007-warmest-year-on-record-coldest-in.html
[from http://motls.blogspot.com/2008/01/2007-warmest-year-on-record-coldest-in.html showing global cooling over the short interval 2005-2007]
Jennifer Marohasy BSc PhD is a critical thinker with expertise in the scientific method.
Jennifer – “Nevertheless, the various data sets do suggest that globally 1998 is still far and away the hottest and that temperatures have been stable or in decline since then.”
So what do you think will happen at the next really strong El Nino?
Ender -“So what do you think will happen at the next really strong El Nino?”
A lot of rain. Thick snowpack. Slopes open till May. Fewer hurricanes in the Atlantic.
“He’s a physicist” 🙂
I know the ice age is coming. I it was hot last night, and cooler this morning.
Seriously, since 1998,the climate seems to have kicked up into a new, stable, temperature range. It’s been bouncing around at a higher value, with no sign it’s heading back down to what it was before 1998.
http://www.bom.gov.au/cgi-bin/silo/reg/cli_chg/g_timeseries.cgi
Lubos should be ashamed of himself.
Coldest this century.
Good one, Louis.
Ender: “So what do you think will happen at the next really strong El Nino?” Sounds like natural variation is needed to help promote the hypothesis of AGW. Refer to:
http://www.climate.noaa.gov/images/about_climate/bigger_images/observing1.gif
There were only two “really strong” El Ninos in the last fifty years. Note also the preponderance of red El Nino years from 1975 to present. Again, natural variation is needed to help promote the hypothesis of AGW.
If the PDO switches fully to a negative mode, is a really strong El Nino likely?
SJT: “with no sign it’s heading back down to what it was before 1998” If it does over the few years, what then?
Correction to question to SJT: If it does over the next few years, what then?
We have just hit a weak La Nina, and all we have to show for it is pretty much a steady state. The next El Nino is going to be very interesting. Another 1998 hit is probably going to have drastic results.
“We have just hit a weak La Nina, and all we have to show for it is pretty much a steady state. The next El Nino is going to be very interesting.”
Maybe if you go by calendar year averages. The El Nino at the start of 2007 cancels out the La Nina at the end. The last few months of 2007 however have seen RSS MSU temperature anomalies drop into the negative range. And as to the next El Nino – same as it ever was, same as it ever was.
SJT
Now where do you think the BOM got that pretty graph from?
http://www.cru.uea.ac.uk/cru/data/temperature/nhshgl.gif
Definitely looks like cooling this century to me especially in the southern hemisphere.
SJT, we have just had an extended El Nino which clearly did not send us trending into the stratosphere so why should we assume that the next one will be a big one?
But to use your brand of desperate speculation, all it will take is a Pinatubo sized volcanic eruption in a cooler La Nina event and we will see some very serious cooling that blows the whole AGW circus right out of the water. And we are actually overdue for one of those.
So wake in fright, climate cretins, wake in fright.
Even the hallowed UHA shows a massive and unprecedented jump in the temperature with the 1998 El Nino. It didn’t just cause a jump, however, it lifted the climate into a whole new state.
What do you mean? Even the hallowed UAH?
“It didn’t just cause a jump, however, it lifted the climate into a whole new state.”
Really? A state of unfounded climate alarmism perhaps?
If you haven’t done so yet, download Lubos Motl’s spreadsheet comparison of RSS MSU, HADCRUT3, UAH MSU, GISS, and NCDC NOAA data.
http://www.volny.cz/lumidek/rss-msu-global.xls
Throw the annual data into one graph. The results are startling. The GISS calculated temperature anomaly is far greater than all others. The difference between HADCRUT and GISS anomaly data varies as follows:
1998 = 0.02
1999 = 0.03
2000 = 0.06
2001 = 0.07
2002 = 0.09
2003 = 0.08
2004 = 0.04
2005 = 0.14
2006 = 0.12
2007 = 0.17
I assume they represent the same world. Amazing! Calculation? Manipulation?
Correction, SJT, if any structural shift in temperature took place it was in 1983 but it was masked by El Chichon and, subsequently, Pinatubo.
And ironically, the most likely explanation for that shift would be the reduction in Sulfur Dioxide emissions in response to the “acid rain” scares of the late 1970s, and reinforced by the closure of soviet block emission sources in the 1990s.
For Bob Tisdale:
They represent different approximations of the real world, so of course they differ, although less than they used to [UAH used to show no warming, but errors were found.]
Most don’t include the polar regions, but GISTEMP does, and of course, in particular, the Arctic region is one of the fastest-warming areas.
This sort of issue gets discussed moderately often over in http://tamino.wordpress.com .
John did they happen to mention a rational for including polar regions in the Giss data during the discussion at Tamino?
By the way, a while back Steve Mosher, Leif Svalgaard and a few other notables brought a little too much truth for Tamino to handle, so he went the way of the Real Climate and New York Times. Only “approved” comments now.
http://tamino.wordpress.com/2007/10/29/new-policy/
The Open mind is closed. It’s policy now.
The article on Steven Milloy’s JunkScience (Sept.2006) included this graphical comparison of the ‘House of Hansen’ and satellite anomalies:
http://www.junkscience.com/MSU_Temps/Common/MSUvsGISS.html
The article is here:
http://www.junkscience.com/MSU_Temps/Common/Fruit_salad.html
The thing I was getting at (and somehow forgot to mention) is about that unprecedented warming trend in the Arctic. Could the reason for Hadcrut excluding the Arctic have anything to do with the placement of NOAA MMTS systems used to measure temperature for climate?
For example here is a picture of the MMTS of Cordova Alaska.
http://ccc.atmos.colostate.edu/images/AK_co-op_pics/cordova1.JPG
The transformer and buildings impart there own positive microsite temperature bias, but also note the 3 in conduit leading underground from the transformer into the metal building. That is a feeder line for city power. Also note the exhaust vent protruding from the metal building. That is the exhaust for the Orca Diesel Generation Plant which provides electricity to the town of Cordova and surrounding area.
http://www.cordovaelectric.com/orca.htm
It’s part of one of two Electro-Motive Division, (GM) model 645 E4 which is a 3,600 horsepower 900 rotations per minute (RPM), turbocharged 20 cylinder four stroke V-configuration engine, turning a 900 RPM 3 phase 2400 / 4160 volt generator with a load capacity of 2.5 MW.
Is this a typical setup for Arctic MMTS stations? Bet you it is.
James – “Could the reason for Hadcrut excluding the Arctic have anything to do with the placement of NOAA MMTS systems used to measure temperature for climate?”
Perhaps you should post on Prometheus and ask Dr Pielke about it.
” The Colorado Climate Center is located at Colorado State University within the Department of Atmospheric Science, in the College of Engineering. Dr. Thomas B. McKee is State Climatologist Emeritus (served the state from 1974-1999) and is an Emeritus Professor in the Atmospheric Science Department. Dr. Roger A. Pielke, Sr. was appointed State Climatologist beginning May 15, 1999 and was also a Professor of Atmospheric Science. He was President of the American Association of State Climatologists during 2002-2003 and served the AASC organization as Past President during 2003-2004. Dr. Pielke Sr. retired as State Climatologist June 30, 2006 to continue his work with his son, Roger Pielke, Jr. at CIRES in Boulder.”
Very interesting, James. And it is not as if this is an issue that hasn’t been around long enough for them to remedy.
If you graph the MSU RSS figures for the last 25 years (Jan 1983 to Dec 2007) and calculate linear trends of warming you get:
1983-2007 (25 years): +0.205 degrees C per decade
1988-2007 (20 years): +0.189 C per decade
1993-2007 (15 years): +0.189 C per decade
1998-2007 (10 years): minus 0.060 C per decade
2003-2007 (5 years): minus 0.391 C per decade
2005-2007 (3 years): minus 1.14 C per decade
So when is that massive acceleration in warming, needed for the catastrophe scenarios, going to kick in?
And when adjusted for volcanism there is zero change over 25 years. But when will they revise the CO2 sensitivity figures?
Mott, who knows? If you’ve been following the discussion on CA on climate sensitivity, there is no clear exposition, so how could one expect an appropriate means for revising figures in the light of new evidence.
And if you’ve come across this post, http://www.climateaudit.org/?p=2564 , with the following disquieting suggestion, “They produced global average surface temperature changes (due to doubled atmospheric CO2 concentration) ranging from 1.9°C to 5.4°C, simply by altering the way that cloud radiative properties were treated in the model” in Senior and Mitchell (1993) referred to in AR4 Chp 1, you’re probably shaking your head in bemusement.
Which brings us to Pielke Snr’s remark that GCMs, at the moment, serve a purpose in sensitivity studies alone. They are misleading and deceptive when used to project/ predict/ forecast future climate and thereby guide policy.
I’m not shaking my head in bemusement, the models are the best and only guide we have to look into the future of climate change. I’m just accepting that it’s getting warming, and it’s very likely it’s going to keep getting warmer.
“I’m just accepting that it’s getting warming, and it’s very likely it’s going to keep getting warmer.”
As above:
1998-2007 (10 years): minus 0.060 C per decade
2003-2007 (5 years): minus 0.391 C per decade
2005-2007 (3 years): minus 1.14 C per decade
If that’s a warming, christ I’d hate to see a cooling!
Mark – “If that’s a warming, christ I’d hate to see a cooling!”
I guess you are not a stockbroker or anything like that. Selling or buying based on a peak or a trough would make you a very poor person.
Selling or buying based on a peak or a trough would make you a very rich person.
Chrisgo – “Selling or buying based on a peak or a trough would make you a very rich person”
Not if you use the peaks and troughs as indications of the overall trend. The most reliable money is made from long term investments where the trend is upward despite peaks and troughs. People who sell stock prematurely in response to dips and who buy unwisely in response to unnatural peaks lose their shirts.
Which is the point here. Trying to decide on the overall temperature trend starting from the largest peak anomoly since records began is just plain dumb.
But buying in response to dips and selling in repose to “unnatural” peaks is the essence of success on any market.
However, in making my previous comment, I was having a brief ‘Bernard Woolley’ moment – I get your drift.
What the frig does the stock market have to do with what the temperature is doing? Or seat belts for that matter? No evidence so let’s argue by analogy!
Mark – “What the frig does the stock market have to do with what the temperature is doing?”
Nothing at all except to point out the folly of determining overall trends from peaks and troughs as you have attempted to do in your post.
How long is a piece of string? Overall trendlines are inevitably peaks and troughs and therefore the choice of where to begin a trendline involves some element of arbitrariness. Starting one in 1998 is no less arbitrary then starting one in the depths of the Little Ice Age, etc., etc.
Mark, I have lost the link to your charts. I have the one to the supporting docs so could you please post the chart link here again so I can re-insert it every time Ender & SJT claim it is still warming?
And while we are on arbitrary selection of data, what about Church et al and his selection of the sea level rise between 1993 and 1998 as being far in excess of the long term trend? He ignored the fact that there had been eight similar cyclical increases since the 1940s, and balanced by eight corresponding declines, against the trend.
Now lets see, that would make Church’s statement amount to only 1/16th (6.25%) of the truth. And who could possibly argue that the omission of 93.75% of the truth was not a misrepresentation of fact by omission?
And a very serious one at that, made with a knowledge of its untruth, with an intention that it be acted upon. And as Byron Shire in NSW has recently implemented a set of Global Warming planning measures, including development restrictions based on 1 metre of sea level rise by year 2100, people have now acted upon church’s misrepresentation to the detriment of others.
It would appear that, given Church’s prominent position, that there is a prima facie case that the legal test for fraudulent misrepresentation is complete. I wonder if the DPP would share that view and have the political independence to allow the courts to decide the matter?
Ian:
http://www.geocities.com/mcmgk/
When I get around to it I’ll build a version based on MSU which will be even more emphatic in it’s non-warming!
Ian:
It’s the top link. If it still doesn’t work clear the cache in your browser or use the link:
http://www.geocities.com/mcmgk/index.html
Thanks Mark, done.
1998 is such a good year. Could we have any charts based on 1997? I hear it is also a good year.
Or even 2000. From Prometheus.
http://sciencepolicy.colorado.edu/prometheus/archives/RSS%20TLT%202000-2007%20Monthly.png
So now Ender is a stock market guru? Yeah, right, the smell of filthy lucre just oozes from his posts.
The most interesting aspect of the adjusted temperature series in Marks link above is when it is overlaid with the Mauna Loa atmospheric CO2 data. This data set starts in 1959, soon after the post war cooling event.
And the El Chichon eruption rather neatly bisects this series into 24 years prior and 24 years after this event. The annual minimum CO2 reading in 1959 was 313ppm which had risen by 27ppm (142Gt) to 340ppm by 1983. The rise since 1983 has been 41ppm to 381ppm, a massive 215Gt CO2.
So the Climate Cretins are asking us to ignore the 41ppm/215Gt that has produced zero change over 24 years and, instead, accept that the smaller volume of 27ppm/142Gt produced a major temperature increase over a similar period.
But wait, there is more. If we take the temperature series back another 22 years to 1937 and make an estimate of the change in atmospheric CO2 we actually have another slightly shorter period of slight cooling that is associated with about 20ppm/105Gt CO2.
This period of temperature plateau actually extended to 1972, and some could argue that it extended to 1979 as the years in between these were cooler than 1937.
The conclusion from this past 70 years data is that, at best, real temperature increase has only been associated with rising atmoshperic CO2 during the ten years from 1973 to 1983 and at worst, the five years from 1979 to 1983.
Conversely, in 65 of the past 70 years there is zero correlation between rising CO2 and temperature change.
Furthermore, this immediate past 24 years of mild cooling is not the longest. That honour goes to the 41 years from 1937 to 1978, during which time a similar volume of atmospheric CO2 had accumulated.
So even if this claimed CO2 forcing remains intact, how do the Climate Cretins explain the lag and the apparent warming threshold of more than 40ppm CO2?
You’ve been told 100 times alraedy, Ian. If telling you 100 times didn’t work, telling you 101 times isn’t going to work either.
Really SJT. So tell “it”, in detail, again, for the 102nd time, just for readers who may have missed your scathing rebuttal. If your response really exists, and it is really that good, then you obviously won’t mind repeating it again in detail.