Related to this story: The Pacific Decadal Oscillation Time Series from the University of Washington, seen below. Emphasis points mine. h/t to WUWT reader Richard Heg. – Anthony
Monthly Values for the PDO Index, January 1900 to September 2008. Positive (red) index values indicate a warm phase PDO; negative (blue) index values indicate a cool phase PDO. While short-term flips in PDO phases do occur, evaluation of 20th century instrumental records has shown that PDO phases generally persist for 20-30 years, as indicated in this figure. To download the data, see Nate Mantua’s PDO page.
Changes in Net Flow of Ocean Heat Correlate with Past Climate Anomalies
Physicists at the University of Rochester have combed through data from satellites and ocean buoys and found evidence that in the last 50 years, the net flow of heat into and out of the oceans has changed direction three times.
These shifts in the balance of heat absorbed from the sun and radiated from the oceans correlate well with past anomalies that have been associated with abrupt shifts in the earth’s climate, say the researchers. These anomalies include changes in normal storm intensities, unusual land temperatures, and a large drop in salmon populations along the western United States.
The physicists also say these changes in ocean heat-flow direction should be taken into account when predicting global climate because the oceans represent 90 percent of the total heat in the earth’s climate system.
The study, which will appear in an upcoming issue of Physics Letters A, differs from most previous studies in two ways, the researchers say. First, the physicists look at the overall heat content of the Earth’s climate system, measuring the net balance of radiation from both the sun and Earth. And second, it analyzes more completely the data sets the researchers believe are of the highest quality, and not those that are less robust.
“These shifts happened relatively abruptly,” says David Douglass, professor of physics at the University of Rochester, and co-author of the paper. “One, for example, happened between 1976 and 1977, right when a number of other climate-related phenomenona were happening, such as significant changes in U. S. precipitation.”
Douglass says the last oceanic shift occurred about 10 years ago, and that the oceans are currently emitting slightly more radiation than they are receiving.
The members of the team, which includes Robert Knox, emeritus professor of physics at the University, believe these heat-flux shifts had previously gone unnoticed because no one had analyzed the data as thoroughly as the Rochester team has.
The team believes that the oceans may change how much they absorb and radiate depending on factors such as shifts in ocean currents that might change how the deep water and surface waters exchange heat. In addition to the correlation with strange global effects that some scientists suspect were caused by climate shifts, the team says their data shows the oceans are not continuously warming—a conclusion not consistent with the idea that the oceans may be harboring “warming in the pipeline.” Douglass further notes that the team found no correlation between the shifts and atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration.
“An interesting aspect of this research is that no reference to the surface temperature itself is needed,” says Knox. “The heat content data we used, gathered by oceanographers, was gleaned from temperature measurements at various ocean depths up to 750 meters.” The team also found that the radiative imbalance was sufficiently small that it was necessary to consider the effect of geothermal heating. Knox believes this is the first time this additional source of heat has been accounted for in such a model.
The team notes that it’s impossible to predict when another shift might occur, but they suspect future shifts might be similar to the three observed. Both Douglass and Knox are continuing to analyze various climate-related data to find any new information or correlations that may have so far gone unnoticed.
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So looking at the sun climate ocean connection – if the sun continues in hibernation (almost 40 spotless days and counting, prolonged solar minimum, reduces intensity of sunspots) and the ocean is currently emitting heat rather than absorbing it – what is the climate likely to be in 20 years time? Here in Australia we fare well during colder periods (mini ice ages) but not so for Canada, Northern America and northern europe/Russia.
“The team also found that the radiative imbalance was sufficiently small that it was necessary to consider the effect of geothermal heating. Knox believes this is the first time this additional source of heat has been accounted for in such a model.”
Interesting. Geothermal is on the order of tens to hundreds of milliwatts per square meter. Compared to climate heat flows, it is usually too small to bother with.
Jim
We are being caught with our trousers down – negative/going to negative PDO&AMO and a bunch of weak solar cycles to follow.
I wonder how “robust” are the ocean depth temperature data prior to Argo system.
Really interesting article.
“These anomalies include changes in normal storm intensities, unusual land temperatures, and a large drop in salmon populations along the western United States.”
I posted a link to an SMH article relating to a significant reduction in salmon populations returning to spawn in N. America recently. I wonder what the correlations are? Cool = low numbers returning or warm = high/normal numbers returning.
Excellent, more proof that CO2 doesn’t have a major effect on GST and that ‘warming in the pipeline’ doesn’t exist. The AGW debate is far from over.
OT: Obama has ordered material from Bjorn Lomborgs “Copenhagen Consensus”.
It seems Obamas administration is in fact garthering information certainly not in line with IPCC. Sorry, in Danish, I can translate if asked:
http://jp.dk/indland/trafik/klima/article1784508.ece
Well slap me hard and call me Susan – the giant central heating system we’ve got on this planet (sun for a boiler, oceans for radiators) is the very beasty that’s been keeping us from freezing our cashews off all this time, not the minor outbursts of warm gas coming mainly from bovine backsides and Al Gore (choose your orifice).
Cheers
Mark
Hm, can’t wait for a copy to become available. This will take some digesting because it is looking at some new information not assessed very thoroughly yet.
I eagerly anticipate what discussion may come of this.
I bet the military guys giggling.
Just imagine what ocean temp. data the submarine fleet has! In 3D.
Now that would be classified me think…
NOT a random walk:
Sidorenkov, N.S. (2003). Changes in the Antarctic ice sheet mass and the instability of the Earth’s rotation over the last 110 years. International Association of Geodesy Symposia 127, 339-346.
“The purpose of this paper is to call attention to a close correlation of the decade variations in the Earth rotation with the mass changes in the Antarctic ice sheets.”
“The redistribution of water masses on the Earth entails changes in the components of the Earth’s inertia tensor and causes the motion of poles and changes of the Earth’s rotation speed.”
“Apart from all other reasons, the parameters of the geoid depend on the distribution of water over the planetary surface.”
Climate regime change-points evident in Sidorenkov’s Figure 1:
1902-1905; early 1930s; & early 1970s.
“Most considerable changes in the geoid parameters can result from the redistribution of water between the World Ocean and the polar ice sheets. In cold glacial epochs, when some portion of water was accumulated in the polar ice sheets, the geoid ellipticity was minimal. In warm interglacial epochs, when almost all the water went in the World Ocean, the geoid ellipticity was increased up to its maximal value.”
Great stuff. Of course there is no “correlation between the shifts and atmospheric carbon dioxide concentration”. It is fairly intuitive that the temperature of the ocean can affect the temperature of the atmosphere to a vastly greater extent than the temperature of the atmosphere can affect the temperature of the ocean. So I can’t see how, even thought it may increase the temperature of the atmosphere a little, CO2 can affect climate – By which I mean the ups and downs in temperature that occur over hundreds and thousands of years.
Jim Masterson (23:44:43) :
Geothermal is on the order of tens to hundreds of milliwatts per square meter. Compared to climate heat flows, it is usually too small to bother with.
yes, but geothermal, vulcanic activities under the oceans may initiate little shifts in ocean drifts and may produce a regional heat exchange in deep water aereas.
Exactly as I have been promulgating in the public domain since April 2008.
The oceans vary independently of the air as regards the rate at which they release to the air energy originally derived fom solar input.
Everything else of a climate and weather nature follows from that in the sequences described by me at climaterealists.com in a series of articles.
The systems in the air that deal highly effectively with the changes in energy flow from the oceans deal equally effectively with any energy budget changes induced by the air alone or by any component of the air including water vapour and CO2.
As regards human CO2 the climate adjustment required to deal with it is miniscule and undetectable amongst the natural background variations created by the oceanic variability in the rate of energy release.
Why did the sea level rise also betweeen 1940 and 1970 if the net radiation was from the ocean? Can’t imagine it was due to melting ice.
their data shows the oceans are not continuously warming—a conclusion not consistent with the idea that the oceans may be harboring “warming in the pipeline.”
“The heat content data we used, gathered by oceanographers, was gleaned from temperature measurements at various ocean depths up to 750 meters.”
Umm, will be interesting to read the actual paper, the researchers do realise that the average oceanic depth is nearly 3,800m don’t they?
Is it just me or does that graph have a striking resemblance to this one?
http://www.bom.gov.au/cgi-bin/silo/reg/cli_chg/timeseries.cgi?variable=rranom®ion=eaus&season=0112
Three climate shifts in ~55 years… Has anyone run into a paper about OHC prior to 1948? That’s the earliest date I’ve seen. The recent Wijffels, Levitus et al, Domingues et al, and Ishii and Kimoto OHC reconstructions all start in 1955. What does the curve look like prior to then. Does the shape mimic global SST anomalies? Does it include the significant dip from the 1870s to 1910 and rebound from 1910 to 1940?
http://i33.tinypic.com/rixdzq.jpg
Another nifty piece of scientific study and yet another nail in the coffin of warmism.
Keep these shots of probity and common sense coming guys. It’s all good stuff – at least from a non-scientist’s angle.
This is particularly useful information given the spin being applied to the Pine Island Glacier this week, and its vulnerability to ocean heat.
O/T but fascinating, did anyone else read Vox Day’s interview today with Air Con author Ian Wishart?
http://voxday.blogspot.com/2009/08/interview-with-ian-wishart.html
This part caught my eye in terms of the geopolitics of this whole debate:
“The eventual target is fifty percent of the 1990 level by 2050, and the same government report suggests a forty percent target will cost $3,000 per person per year, or $15,000 for a family of five, on top of existing taxes and living costs. To achieve emissions cuts at that sort of level will require the equivalent of financially carpet-bombing the industrialized first world back to the Stone Age. And once the UN gets enough countries to agree that agriculture should be included in cap and trade, American farmers will be hit too, because the US administration will already have put the mechanisms in place to recognize the obligations of these international agreements.
“If you look at the economic prize at stake, consider this. We currently have gold markets, but you are not forced to buy and sell gold and only a tiny percentage of the community are active in the gold markets. The financial markets are larger, but even then most of us are not forced to buy and sell shares or trade forex, and only a minority of us actually do so. But if carbon trading becomes compulsory worldwide, effectively every single one of us will be forced to buy and sell through this scheme. No one will be able to go through their daily lives without being represented directly or indirectly in the carbon markets. Those who control the carbon markets will effectively control the world.
“If we are going to cede that kind of control, and money, for a claimed crisis of planetary proportions, shouldn’t we first be absolutely certain that the crisis is real?”
It’s what makes websites like this one so important in providing some scientific balance.
This just goes to prove that climate science should be taken away from “climate scientists” and left to physicists. The climate is driven by the laws of physics, not the laws of computer models or mathematics or statistics. However, just because I’m a physicist, it doesn’t mean I’m biased towards physics.
Since the authors only considered the upper 750 m of the ocean, one would assume that geothermal would only be a factor at all in shallower seas. Geothermal is just about always neglible in statified lakes, even if the stratification is permanent.
Wow. The rocks at the bottom of the oceans are pretty cold. The ocean is like a giant ice cube sitting on the sea floor. How does heat from the core pass through this cold layer of rocks without warming them up? I’m sure that a theoretical physicist will come up with a 0.? whatever number, but an engineer would come up with ‘nothing useful, statistically unimportant because of insulation’. I agree with Jim- it is too small to bother with. Entropy. If the core is getting colder, then the sea floor is getting colder.
Interesting that they think geothermal heating is a factor.
A relative (here in Ohio) uses geothermal heating to heat his entire house. The heat is gathered by a heat pump at a depth of a few feet in his back yard from a grid of underground pipes. I considered it myself (but have gone with a standard air heat pump/furnace combined system).
The fact that geothermal is practical for home heating at such shallow depths using only part of the area of a “back yard” has lead me to speculate geothermal is a factor in global temperature. Probably more so in the ocean where the crust is slightly thinner and, apparently, thousands of underwater magma vents exist. I wondered when a scientific study might ascertain that connection.
“Douglass says the last oceanic shift occurred about 10 years ago, and that the oceans are currently emitting slightly more radiation than they are receiving.” I remember saying, on this blog, that the earth was capable of receiving more radiation than it emits, and visa-versa. I got hounded for that.
Geothermal, while it may be an order of magnitude or two below solar levels, is still significant if it adds to or subtracts from solar levels destructively/constructively.
Given fortuitous circumstances, the Earth could plunge or rise from Ice Age.
And if geothermal is controlled by external forces acting upon the mass of the Earth, it argues for an external mechanism(s) to cause changes in both the Earth and the Sun.
Humans may be alone in the Solar System and nearby stellar neigborhoods, but the Solar System surely is not alone.
This stuff does not exist in a vacuum.