Tom Nelson points out these three related items. It seems the “pretty good proxy for climate change” is proxying the wrong message this year.
Overheated Arctic update: Nenana ice was gone by this date in 1940, but still 41 inches thick this year
21-Apr 41.4 Inches
Nenana Ice Classic Breakup dates
20-Apr 1940 1998
The Ice Classic has given them a rare, reliable climate history that has documented to the minute the onset of the annual thaw as it shifted across 91 years. By this measure, spring comes to central Alaska 10 days earlier than in 1960, said geophysicist Martin Jeffries at the University of Alaska, Fairbanks — and that trend is accelerating. “The Nenana Ice Classic is a pretty good proxy for climate change in the 20th century,” Dr. Jeffries said.
=============================================================
* That great phrase coined by Kate at Small Dead Animals
[UPDATE] I hope Anthony won’t bust me for adding a graph of the Nenana breakup dates over time. The error bar (95%CI) shows the error for the Gaussian average.
You can see the changes due to the PDO in the data.
w.
Great phrase indeed. Should be the first line in the Abstract of tooooo many ‘published’ papers these days.
Or maybe they need a whole new Journal of Probably Nothing, peer reviewed by experts in that field.
May 9th 10:15 am
I am going to email this to my alarmist sisters, and ask for good warmist evidence in exchange. I will cite the ref you had two days ago that liberals see only the warmist evidence and never see things like this, while we see only things like this and never see the best alarmist evidence. (Actually, I think we do–you cannot escape that evidence. But I needn’t mention that to my sisters).
Shoot! Looks like I won’t be winning this year’s Classic. 🙁
How long does it take for 41.4″ to break up?
If daytime temps are in the 50s, and overnight just barely freezing, are we talking days or weeks?
And I chose a date in mid-May.
What was the point of this posting?
* The ice thickness is about normal for this time of year.
* The ice often breaks up when the thickness is ~ 35-40 inches, so it could go any time.
* 194o was cherry-picked. The other 4 earliest breakups are all 1990+
* The trend is to break up 0.07 days earlier each year, or 7 days earlier now than when the contest started ~100 years ago. That trend seems to be accelerating.
So overall, this seems to confirm that ice is breaking up earlier (ie that Alaska is getting warmer over the last 100 years).
REPLY: Read the tags, it’s humor, of which you have routinely demonstrated to have none. – Anthony
40″ of ice? Must have been a toaster of a winter according to the ‘theory of CAGW’. Look for a big red blotch in Alaska on Hansen’s next maps.
And we’re using 1940 as a baseline because… it’s the earliest recorded break-up date (tied with 1998)? 1941 occurred on May 3…
Last year, the break-up was on 4/29, which is on the early side, yet on 4/19, the ice was… 40.9 inches.
In 2009, the break-up was on May 1st, also on the early side (note that in 1964, the break-up occurred on May 20), and yet the ice thickness on 4/23 was 42.7 inches.
2008 broke a bit later (May 5), and they had 40.5 inches on 4/21.
2007 was quite early (4/27), and there were 46+ inches on 4/11 (the last reported measurement). And so on.
So, two things:
One, the presence of 40+ inches of ice on 4/22 isn’t indicative of a late thaw.
Two, that DenialDepot post about focusing on near term noise, instead of long-term trends, was satire, not an instruction manual!
Bi-modal distribution of the dates. Interesting….
Checking a handful of previous years, the thickness measurements stop several to many days before the ice actually breaks up, presumably for safety reasons.
In 1993, the last ice measurement was 25″ on 9-Apr, but the ice didn’t break up until 23-Apr.
1996’s last reading was 41.5″ on 22-Apr with a break up on 5-May.
Unless the weather interferes, we should see a 5-May break up.
To use this as an indication of spring start is flat out stupid, though. More likely than not, the break up date is more strongly correlated with melt water from upstream, which is mostly an indication of whether the surrounding weather is snow or rain.
Tim Folkerts: “That trend seems to be accelerating.”
Surprise … warmists always assume that an upward trend always continues and when it doesn’t its just an aberration that will be corrected “sooner than we thought”.
Weather goes in cycles.
Interesting that the two most common days for breakup 29-Apr and 30-Apr had these years:
1939,1953,1958,1980,1983,1994,1999,2003,2010
1917,1934,1936,1942,1951,1978,1979,1981,1997
Thats 5 1990+ Tim. Seems pretty well distributed to me.
The closest weather station suggests cooling since 1990.
http://data.giss.nasa.gov/cgi-bin/gistemp/gistemp_station.py?id=425702610000&data_set=1&num_neighbors=1
Nenana’s weather station stopped reporting in 1969.
http://data.giss.nasa.gov/cgi-bin/gistemp/gistemp_station.py?id=425702600010&data_set=1&num_neighbors=1
Another good proxy: mounds of snow and temps in the 30s in Michigan. Used to be golfing this time of the year.
I spent a full winter living in Fort McMurray, Canada in Northern Alberta; and the annual break up of the river is a huge event, with betting, and it is a site to see. Everyone visits the river to view the magnificent site of huge chunks of Ice lying around the bridge over the Athabasca river.
I’m sure that there are many other towns that find this event an important part of spring. After a long hard winter of many days at minus 40 degrees it is a welcome sign.
I’m not an expert with only 1 year of observation; but since the ice chunks are massive and thick, I’m not sure that the ice thickness itself determines the date for the breakup. I’m sure that the water flow and runoff/melting from the upstream areas has a huge effect. I wonder how thick the ice typically is at breakup.
Hopefully someone from the cold north country can provide a better insight.
I use Tioga Pass Road (Highway 120) through Yosemite National Park as my bench mark for spring in California.
Normally they open the road about Memorial Day. This year the Sierra high country is sitting on about 170% of normal for snow pack, so the first I will likely be able to drive this route is mid June this year.
This drive just after they open the road to traffic with the mountains in full spring melt is one of the best drive in the world IMO. Yosemite Valley gets the press, but I like this drive better than through the valley, and the valley is spectacular.
“Nenana ice was gone by this date in 1940, but still 41 inches thick this year”
This is obviously not peer reviewed as it is clear to me that if the Nenana ice was gone by this date in 1940 then it could not possibly still be 41 inches thick this year?
After May 12th I shall collect. my winnings! – Tripod or no tripod.
Another proxy, 36 degrees F, 40 MPH winds and snow in the warmer part of WY right now, where I live, and it is usually so nice this time of year. ( I am prevaricating through my clenched teeth.)
Spring has sprung,
No sign of sun,
The snow still flies,
While I tell lies,
So don’t move here,
Too many already so near,
Try Texas if you will,
East and west coast voices are too shrill,
Outsiders tend to vex us,
But our climate does protect us.
Video of the breakup. The ice is quite thin, with open water. Not what I expected to see based on the reported thickness. Perhaps the water was hot from global warming, which melted the ice very fast.
bricro says:
April 22, 2011 at 1:30 pm
“Two, that DenialDepot post about focusing on near term noise, instead of long-term trends, was satire, not an instruction manual!”
So, you say, it’s probably nothing?
“REPLY: Read the tags, it’s humor, of which you have routinely demonstrated to have none. – Anthony”
It’s also tagged “Climate News”
I’ll have to join Tim Folkerts in not getting the joke. I mean it’s not just I’m not personally amused, I literally don’t understand even what the underlying joke is. You picked a particular measure of a particular area by which the current year isn’t doing as bad as other years and then said it shows the Arctic is giving the “wrong message”.
Unless you intended to show how absolutely ridiculous it is do such a thing while ignoring the obvious trend for the whole area this year so far and in previous years then I don’t get it.
Looks like the river flow is picking up, which I assume is a major factor in the break-up.
http://waterdata.usgs.gov/nwis/uv/?referred_module=sw&site_no=15485500
http://seaice.alaska.edu/gi/observatories/barrow_webcam
Barrow Sea Ice Webcam
Web cam overlooking the landfast ice (or coastal ocean during the ice-free period in summer) from atop the ASRC building in downtown Barrow, Alaska. The camera is looking approximately NNW.
breakup date is not a good proxy for climate change … since nobody can define climate change … now if climate change is code for global warming … then, no, its still no a good proxy …
from NASA: “Weather is what conditions of the atmosphere are over a short period of time, and climate is how the atmosphere “behaves” over relatively long periods of time.”
so is the atmosphere the main driver of river ice breakup in Alaska ? If not then its not a good proxy …
Bruce Hall says:
April 22, 2011 at 1:49 pm
“Another good proxy: mounds of snow and temps in the 30s in Michigan. Used to be golfing this time of the year.”
Yeah, we’re supposed to get a rain/snow mix tomorrow morning in western New Hampshire (yuck). Well, at least I don’t have to mow the lawn yet…
What UK(US) says is true, (about river flow) but we have had a fairly cold/dry year, which means that the ice is pretty thick and there is not a lot of snow out there to cause the river to rise. I live about 200 miles south of Nenana and most of the snow at lower elevations is all gone, and the water content was not that high anyway… Temperatures are right down the middle of average, and are forecast to continue… On the other hand a really windy day or a warm sunny day could do it… If I was a betting man, I would bet early May rather then late April… 🙂 But I won’t be putting my money where my post is as it were. 🙂
The overall trend 1917 to 2010 is toward breakup getting earlier by an average of .75 days/decade, statistically significant but not large.
From 1950 to 2010, the trend was a bit steeper, 1.2 days/decade.
From 1970 to 2010, a bit steeper than that, 1.7 days/decade.
That does seem to indicate a change, as geophysicist Martin Jeffries suggested.
Lady Life Grows says:
April 22, 2011 at 12:55 pm
“I will cite the ref you had two days ago that liberals see only the warmist evidence and never see things like this, while we see only things like this and never see the best alarmist evidence.”
Hey, here I am. Cite the evidence. I have been in Central Florida for the last five years. Can you show me some evidence of global warming here in Central Florida? Right. I did not think you could. On the other side, I can give you ginormous evidence of global cooling. How about record low temperatures for three years in a row? How about dead plants in the yard, including some ornamental trees? These are plants that have been around forever but froze over the last three years. Anyone who cares not for doomsday theories has no reason to believe that the planet is warming.
Gneiss says:
April 22, 2011 at 4:20 pm
“The overall trend 1917 to 2010 is toward breakup getting earlier by an average of .75 days/decade, statistically significant but not large.
From 1950 to 2010, the trend was a bit steeper, 1.2 days/decade.
From 1970 to 2010, a bit steeper than that, 1.7 days/decade.
That does seem to indicate a change, as geophysicist Martin Jeffries suggested.”
The average length of a warming panic is 30 years.
In Central Florida, it used to be a common saying that you need a wetsuit only November through February, the water temperature has recovered by March. Not any longer. No. Nada. The water temperature at Daytona might have recovered by mid-April. Pictures of Spring Break drunks do not count as evidence.
Great post Anthony, it is a shame that some fail to comprehend your intent. As I mentioned earlier I spent a winter at Ft McMurray and the river breakup in the spring is something I will never forget. There are probably hundreds of locations that witness the ice breakup annually.
Following site provides two videos (2007) of U of Alberta study that will help one view and understand how important this annual event is to those who live along rivers in the far northern climes. Ft McMurray is 273 miles north of Edmonton. It is a violent event!! And flooding is a concern due to ice jams.
http://staff.civil.ualberta.ca/water/FEHicks/MAGS/Athabasca.htm
Watch the short video to get a picture of how violent the ice break up really is at least on the Athabasca River in Aberta. For me this gives a perspective that the break up timing is really determined by what happens upstream if the location
AW re Tim Folkerts above… I have also noted this throughout the AGW community, a very distinct lack of sense of humor about nearly any topic. Have others taken note?
Theo Goodwin writes,
“Can you show me some evidence of global warming here in Central Florida? Right. I did not think you could.”
Global warming? Of course not. Central Florida warming, perhaps. I happen to have these ones on hand:
Panama City 1895-2008, about +.1F/decade (+.6F/decade since 1970)
Ft Lauderdale 1895-2008, +.2F/decade (+.3F/decade since 1970)
Tallahassee 1895-2008, no trend (+.5F/decade since 1970)
All these trends except Tallahassee 1895-2008 are significant.
“On the other side, I can give you ginormous evidence of global cooling.”
No, you can’t.
The daylilies tell the tale. Usually first bloom here is between the 12th and 18th of April; earliest in the past 10 years was April 7 in either 2006 or 2007; can’t recall. This year: first bloom was yesterday, April 21, second latest since we’ve been here (1993). This winter was cold; the spring has been cool to warm to capricious; the season is late by at least a week, closer to two.
I should have mentioned that the Athabasca river in Alberta flows north into colder and more frozen land. Obviously it is a different and more problematic since the ice is not flowing into areas already broken up. Thus the ice jams and potential for flooding.
THE FACTS: Unless the land it totally flat, rivers of water run downhill. The vast percentage of rivers on the planet flow in a southerly direction because the source (usually in the mountains) is to the north of the mouth.
If the source of a river is at a higher elevation than the mouth, that river will run from the source to the mouth. However, if that (higher) source is to the south of the mouth, that river will then flow to the north (downhill).
Below is a partial list of rivers (length listed when known) that do just that. We haven’t listed rivers that run to the northwest, or rivers that don’t meet the exact requirements
Athabasca Alberta, Canada, 765 miles
Gneiss:
Satellite temperatures vs CO2.
More satellite temps vs CO2.
Still more satellite temps.
You can apologize to Theo any time.☺
icecover writes,
“I have also noted this throughout the AGW community, a very distinct lack of sense of humor about nearly any topic.”
You must be reading the wrong blogs.
But did any of the regulars here see a joke, before Anthony declared his post was one?
What a debacle!!!
Gneiss says:
April 22, 2011 at 6:33 pm
And I’m sure those trends were from raw temperature data taken at rural sites.
Gneiss, all of your temperatures are actually evidence of UHI.
In 1895 Tallahassee’s population was less than 3,000. It is now growing at a rate of 12% per year and is now 180,000+ people.
Maybe you could find some non-growing cities ….
I have added a graph to the head post showing breakup dates. One of the reasons it’s so hard to predict is that it depends on mechanical factors (thickness of ice vs. amount of water in the river) that may have little to do with temperature.
w.
Gneiss says:
April 22, 2011 at 4:20 pm
Sorry, but you can’t compare trends of different lengths like that. Doesn’t work, bad math, no cookies.
The trend in general was warmer to 1940, cooler to 1970, warmer to 1998, cooler since then … and the trend for the last 20 years is about zero.
w.
@Theo Goodwin says: April 22, 2011 at 5:28 pm
Hey, Theo!
You’re allowing your judgement to be clouded by logic again!
Now, if you used post-normal logic and paid more attention, you’d remember that things getting cooler are yet another sure-fire demonstration of warming.
And silly stunts like taking photos of a tripod on a frozen river aren’t “good proxies” past a certain date (to be plucked out of thin air) but are incontravertable proof of hyperthermalist doom when melting occurs an earlier date.
Simples!
Once you realise this, I’m sure you’ll be ecstatic that the great wad of your tax dollars that get thrown to those who promote the cAGW agenda and subsidising crackpot schemes to save the planet will be helping to keep that little tripod standing a just couple of seconds longer every year! (Using a cherry-picked and ‘homogenised’ trend line, of course!)
Probably NOTHING?
I’ve been waiting for the forgotten name of that town from last year! Nenana, how could I forget that? N..vowel..n..vowel..n.vowel. Got it. Now if I can’t remeber it again next year, I am getting older.
Just put in my 2 bucks in for a breakup of yesterday… guessing about what ice is going to do and when always ends up leaving me way way off the mark. ☺
Gneiss says:
April 22, 2011 at 6:52 pm
“You must be reading the wrong blogs.”
OK. Name one funny warmist blog.
w. says:
Nice graph, it’s always quicker to assimilate what’s going on with a graphic. Also good to see gaussian filter for smoothing. However, I wondered how you got it to run to then of the data, an 11year filter should stop in 2005.
We aren’t using some Mannian padding techniques are we?
To look at the data I’d guess you have padded the incomplete data by padding with the last value repeatedly. This gives the false impression of a levelling since 2005 whereas the data appears to continue downwards.
Jimmy Haigh says:
April 23, 2011 at 2:34 am
Gneiss says:
April 22, 2011 at 6:52 pm
“You must be reading the wrong blogs.”
OK. Name one funny warmist blog.
RealClimate is a joke.
😉
Is that your graph Willis? Link to data source anywhere. I’ve only found bits of it and in a messy html table I don’t want to waste time collating by hand.
rgds/
Ice thickness is a measure of the winter temperature (and duration) and the break up date is more related to the spring conditions than ice thickness:
2000 – Apr 13 – 36 inches: break up May 1
2001 – Apr 16 – 33.5 inches: break up May 8
2002 – Apr 29 – 42 inches: break up May 7
2007 – Apr 11 – 46.5 inches: break up Apr 27
So yes – “it’s probably nothing” 😉
Thanks for this post,
For the first time I went to Small Dead Animals. c/- of the ‘Its Probably Nothing* comment.
Kate runs one of the best blogs I have ever read (besides your et al Anthony).
What a hoot, this clever and gorgeous gal Kate has great insight with cutting edge commentary.
Willis writes,
“Sorry, but you can’t compare trends of different lengths like that. Doesn’t work, bad math, no cookies.”
I’m curious where you got this “math” rule from. Can you cite the source?
“The trend in general was warmer to 1940, cooler to 1970, warmer to 1998, cooler since then … and the trend for the last 20 years is about zero.”
So you refute me by comparing trends of length 45, 30, 28, 12 and 20 in one sentence?
P. Solar writes,
“OK. Name one funny warmist blog.”
I could name many, but your asking that confirms you read only [snip. Don’t use that insult here. ~dbs] blogs, or else have no humor.
“RealClimate is a joke. ”
No, they’re real scientists. But you didn’t get “Fracking Methane?”
Gneiss says:
April 23, 2011 at 5:52 am
<blockquote?
P. Solar writes
“RealClimate is a joke. ”
No, they’re real scientists. But you didn’t get “Fracking Methane?”
Sorry, “real scientists” permit debate. RealClimate deletes anything they don’t want to hear (or more likely don’t want the world to know). That is why their site IS a joke. Even the name is a joke , a satire of what science is all about.
If they called it RealClimateBogots I may be able to take it more seriously.
No idea what you methane reference is about.
Ice width/depth data …
http://www.nenanaakiceclassic.com/Ice%20Measurement.htm
RealClimate reminds me of countries with “democratic” in their name. Any country that is democratic has no need to use the word “democratic” in their name.
Tim Folkerts says:
April 22, 2011 at 1:27 pm
The trend is to break up 0.07 days earlier each year, or 7 days earlier now than when the contest started ~100 years ago. That trend seems to be accelerating.
This 100 years is cherry-picking. The entire edifice of AGW is built on cherry-picking a period of natural cyclical climate warming over several wavelengths of normal climatic oscillation.
How about the last 10,000 years? The trend here is definitely downwards. This will be accelerating downwards in the coming decades.
Jim G says:
April 22, 2011 at 2:41 pm
Another proxy, 36 degrees F, 40 MPH winds and snow in the warmer part of WY right now, where I live, and it is usually so nice this time of year. ( I am prevaricating through my clenched teeth.)
Spring has sprung,
No sign of sun,
The snow still flies,
While I tell lies,
So don’t move here,
Too many already so near,
Try Texas if you will,
East and west coast voices are too shrill,
Outsiders tend to vex us,
But our climate does protect us.
The spring is sprung, the grass is riz
I wonder where the birdy is?
Some say the bird is on the wing
But that’s absurd – the wing is on the bird
(The Goodies, BBC, 70’s or 80’s)
Gneiss, not one of those FL locations is actually in central FL, though the one with no trend is closest. If you are going to attempt to disprove something, it helps if you offer evidence that is at least supportive of your counter-argument. As it stands, you actually offered aid to your opposition. It takes a special sort of cleverness to do that while declaring victory.
Mark
ferd berple says on April 23, 2011 at 8:32 am
An astute observation. I suspect it applies to political parties as well, eg, The Democratic People’s party of Judea.
Hey Gneiss, I hope you appreciate the free continuing education classes offered by WUWT.
You might also want to check this out:
http://www.appinsys.com/GlobalWarming/RS_FloridaUSA.htm
One excerpt:
“A study of Florida’s climate by Florida State University Professor Morton Winsberg [ http://www.floridatrend.com/article.asp?aID=74738929.7299137.655837.79720802.29349702.748&aID2=50440 ] showed that: “the hot season in Florida has gotten a lot hotter — and longer — in some places, but not at all in others. The change, however, is unrelated to global warming … it’s a function of the lesser-known phenomenon of local warming. … the most notable climate changes along the state’s southeastern coast, where development and wetlands drainage have been heaviest … Winsberg and FSU meteorologists to blame the hot spots on local land-use changes that accentuate the urban “heat-island” effect — the pools of heat that large, dense concentrations of people produce in their local climates. Cutting down trees, draining wetlands and pouring concrete all make a place hotter”.
P. Solar says:
April 23, 2011 at 4:11 am
Yeah, that’s mine. I collated the messy html linked by Anthony above, partly by hand and partly by Excel.
w.
Gneiss says:
April 23, 2011 at 5:49 am
Source? The source is logic. Try your method with a slow sine curve and tell me what you get. It has also been discussed at WUWT, but I can’t find it right now. The point is that the method is not used because it is totally dependent on the choice of the final point. By picking that point properly, you can “prove” anything … which of course means the method is worthless.
Nope. I’m just pointing out the general trends, not making any mathematical evaluation. In addition, the trends (unlike your method) do not all end at the same point.
w.
Willis Eschenbach says:
April 23, 2011 at 11:31 am
“Yeah, that’s mine. I collated the messy html linked by Anthony above, partly by hand and partly by Excel.”
Care to share it somewhere?
thx.
Humor? I find Gneiss funny, ‘cos he don’t get the joke.
Gneiss guys finish last.
Hyuk hyuk hyuk
When the ice goes out in New Hampshire lakes there’s an interesting phenomenon where, within a day or two, the water in the lakes flips over. It occurs because fresh water is less dense at 33 degrees F than at 34, and less dense at 34 than at 35, but right around 35 it starts behaving more normally, and water at 35 is more dense than water at 36.
Therefore, when the surface reaches 35 or so, it all sinks to the bottom, pretty much all at once. Sometimes you can see bits of dead pond-weed churned about, the day it happens.
This doesn’t happen with salt water, and in trying to learn why not, and at what point salt halts the flipping-process, I managed to give myself a pretty good migraine. It taught me what a fascinating substance water is, and that it is no joke modeling the behavior sea ice, or what happens when fresh water enters salt water at a delta in an arctic climate.
Seems like a good subject for your restless and relentless mind, Willis.
phlogiston says:
April 23, 2011 at 8:55 am
“This 100 years is cherry-picking. The entire edifice of AGW is built on cherry-picking a period of natural cyclical climate warming over several wavelengths of normal climatic oscillation.”
Indeed, there is some artful deception in the IPCC’s choice of making statements about climate change in the “latter half of the 20th century”. It sounds like a reasonably chosen period. A nice round number , ends at the end of century, first half or second half, no bias or cherry picking going. Sounds fair. No need to justify why that period was chosen , it’s an obvious choice. Even though science is not based on choosing round numbers , no one will question it.
Of course the slight of hand is that this just happens to be a trough to peak sample of the dominant climate cycle. This adds >0.2C/50a to your slope.
http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/hadobs/hadcrut3/diagnostics/comparison.html
It’s similar if you look at the whole of 20th c. , to get a fairer idea of the long term trend you’d need to measure peak to peak ie. 1875-2003 but 1900 is near the trough in 1910. So you just “average” over the 20th century and you get another 0.2C for your money without anyone suspecting some cleaver cherry-picking of the sample period.
Your point was that trends are meaningless with cyclical data. Something Gneiss does not apparently understand. A sinewave has an infinite number of “trends” with slopes ranging from -1 to 1. With discrete time data, the number of possible trends is reduced to a finite number, but there are still a lot of possiblities.
Mark
P. Solar says:
April 23, 2011 at 12:47 pm
Glad to, that’s science. It’s here as an Excel spreadsheet. My gaussian function isn’t included, probably should be. Ah, well.
P. Solar says:
April 23, 2011 at 3:40 am (Edit)
I use my own method of smoothing. Mannian smoothing is a joke, and as far as I know, I was the first person to point this out. I wrote a paper on it and submitted it some years ago to GRL, I probably should post it up. They said I was being too mean to poor Michael …
Nope. I use my own method, which also bridges short gaps in the record (if there’s long gaps I use loess smoothing). What I do is I calculate how much of the data is missing and increase the value by that much …
The result is a fairly small error bar at the end. I haven’t found any method to beat mine, it gives the smallest error of all the methods I know of (which can be directly calculated for any given dataset).
Finally, the error at the end is roughly “trumpet shaped”, with the error increasing as you approach the end of the dataset. This means that the error decreases to a small value fairly quickly as you move away from the end.
So I run it all the way out. I could (and likely should) put an error bar at the end, but it is generally fairly small. Hang on … OK, the error of my method in this dataset (95%CI) is ±3.5 days. I’ve updated the chart in the head post to show the error.
w.
Willis, there’s a minor but clear calculation mistake in your graph, you might want to fix that as well.
Don’t play games, it isn’t Gneiss. Point out the calculation, and if it’s legit, Willis will fix it because he values truth and he’s a stand-up guy. Science doesn’t work by secrecy. Well, except for grant-fueled climate ‘science.’
Willis writes,
“Source? The source is logic. Try your method with a slow sine curve and tell me what you get.”
So when you said “bad math,” you didn’t actually mean bad math, but some other objection? Because temperature follows a sine curve, or something?
“The point is that the method is not used because it is totally dependent on the choice of the final point. By picking that point properly, you can “prove” anything … which of course means the method is worthless.”
Not sure what “method” you think I have here. I didn’t pick any end points. In the Nenana example the end point is 2010 because that’s all there is. The Florida data, as I said in my post, are just something I happened to have on hand. Which ended in 2008, because that’s when that job was done.
The pattern of recent northern hemisphere warming over the past century+ is well known: cool in the early 20th century, warming about 1920 to 40, level or cooling 1940s through 60s, modern takeoff starting in the 70s. So with any unfamiliar climate series over this time scale, I’m curious to see whether it also has that pattern. Comparing century-scale with 1970-to-present trends is a simple first check.
Tim Folkerts says:
>>The trend is to break up 0.07 days earlier each year, or 7 days
>>earlier now than when the contest started ~100 years ago.
phlogiston says:
>This 100 years is cherry-picking.
I don’t see how you could consider this “cherry picking” when I used every single data point available.
Tom Nelson, on the other hand, specifically chose 1940 because it was tied (with 1998 by the way) for the earliest break-up on record. Now THAT is cherry picking!
Now, if the record went back 200 years and I started ion 1917, then you would have reason to question my choice. And as P. Solar points out, if a specific period is chosen because it artificially highlights a desired result, that would also be cherry picking.
Mark T writes,
“Your point was that trends are meaningless with cyclical data. Something Gneiss does not apparently understand.”
I didn’t understand that because it’s false. Real data often have both cycles and trends.
Willis , thanks for the excel data and the explanation of your technique. I’ll have to examine that in more detail, looks useful.
To illustrate the point about starting points, I decided to do a least squares straight line fit to each 50 year interval in the HadCrut3 dataset and plot the 100 year slope given by looking at each period. This is a layman’s guide on cherry-picking your start date.
hadCrut3 50 year slopes
If you want to show there is minimal slope you pick cherries from 1867 or 1926. If you want maxed out warming trend you pick 1902 or late 50’s as your starting point.
As I pointed out above, the latter choice could be innocently presented as “latter half of 20th century”.
One other thing that seems to come out from this plot is the clear 60y cyclic nature , which is even clearer in this presentation than it is in the original data. If I smooth it , it’s damn near sinusoidal plus linear.
I’ll have to reflect on what that means but it’s interesting.
BTW I did the linear fits with gnuplots fit command which uses “an implementation of the nonlinear least-squares (NLLS) Marquardt-Levenberg algorithm”.
This may turn out to be a good metaphor for how the AGW belief system will go. Right now it still looks thick and solid in spite of all the stresses and strains, but it may already be edging toward a spectacular collapse.
Smokey says: April 22, 2011 at 6:46 pm
“Gneiss:
Satellite temperatures vs CO2.
More satellite temps vs CO2.
Still more satellite temps.
You can apologize to Theo any time.☺”
This is your “ginormous evidence” of global cooling?
The first two data sets seem to be very carefully cherry-picked from 2002 thru 2009. Why ending in 2009? Why 7 or 7.5 year periods? Maybe 2009 was just the date these graphs were made. But why start in 2002?
Well, that is the longest period that shows a steep downward slope. The start of 2002 happened to be an especially warm moment, so a decline after than would not be so surprising. Earlier or later periods show less decline (or, of course, they show increases). Longer periods show less decline — if you take a more typical 10 year period, then the slope up thru 2009 would be upward, not downward. Does anyone think this 2002 date was picked for any reason other than to “highlight the decline”?
Interestingly, the very end of 2010 and into 2011 does actually show a downward 10 year slope (the only time that has happen recently since a single month in 1997 and a ~ 3.5 year stretch in the late 1970’s. Perhaps there really will be a continued downward trend. Maybe the climate has “turned the corner”. The most recent dip below the long-term average offers a tantalizing hint (http://wattsupwiththat.com/2011/04/05/global-temperature-still-headed-down-uah-negative-territory/). That last graph you linked to highlights this latest drop, but then, 1.5 years is WAY to short to show a climate trend.
Do you really consider this as “ginormous evidence” of a switch to global cooling?
(All my calculations above are based on Hadley CRUTv3 data.)
@-P. Solar says:
April 23, 2011 at 4:01 pm
“If you want to show there is minimal slope you pick cherries from 1867 or 1926. If you want maxed out warming trend you pick 1902 or late 50′s as your starting point.
As I pointed out above, the latter choice could be innocently presented as “latter half of 20th century”.
One other thing that seems to come out from this plot is the clear 60y cyclic nature , which is even clearer in this presentation than it is in the original data. If I smooth it , it’s damn near sinusoidal plus linear.
I’ll have to reflect on what that means but it’s interesting.”
It might be wise to see if the ‘near sinusoidal’ signal is altered by the 50yr slope period. There could be ‘beat’ products between the 50yr range and shorter ‘cycles’.
There is also the problem that there are at most two ‘cycles’ of this hypothesised variation present. It may be quasi-periodic, with variations in amplitude and cycle length so that it is much less a sine wave, and more the scatter plot of the period and volume of a (chaotically) dripping tap.
As for any trend in the slopes, there is another justification for dating the warming from the “latter half of 20th century”. First, it is the period for which have good data of the significant factors, temperature, solar output GCR and CO2. Second it is when CO2 levels can be observed to rise significantly above geologically stable levels. Given the physical mechanism that would cause surface warming from such an increase it makes sense to look for that increase in temperature when the change in the hypothesised causative factor is well known.
Just a final aside, the rise in maximum temperatures in Florida is not a clear signal of global warming but probably does have more to do with land use changes. The draining of swamps and improved drainage for agriculture has reduced the surface water content which leads to hotter summers AND colder winters because of the lack of the thermal sink of surface water. As for weather the recent cold winter in Florida is a signal of a cooling trend… it seems to be the first ‘impact’ freeze in Florida since the 1980s, in the first half of the last century there were several more severe events.
http://www.flcitrusmutual.com/industry-issues/weather/freeze_timeline.aspx
Tim Folkerts,
To answer your questions:
Those are charts I had in a folder. They are not charts I made, as you can see [the last one was made by Bill Illis]. They comprise various time frames, so as not to cherry-pick one starting year. Futhermore, they are actual temperatures, whereas your link only shows anomalies.
The alarmist crowd loves them their anomalies for some strange reason. But what matters are actual temps. You want anomalies? I’ll give you anomalies:
click1
click2
click3
Anomalies are just variations from the average, or the mean, or whatever metric you’re using. They’re fine for scaring the public, but what really matters are raw temperatures and the long term trend, and whether the 40% rise in CO2 has made that trend line turn upward. Because that is the central alarmist claim [CO2=CAGW].
But that claim is hogwash. CO2 has had no measurable effect on the natural warming trend since the LIA. And the chart-diddling that results from dishonest folks pushing their “unprecedented” global warming scare is the result of using a zero trend line, instead of the natural warming trend line since the LIA.
The claim is made that CO2 is going to cause climate catastrophe [and if it’s not, then there is no reason to throw more money at a non-problem]. But where is the evidence of any global damage from CO2? In fact, there is no such evidence. If we simply look at temperatures on a zero y-axis, which are not divided into tenths and hundreths of a degree [impossible to accurately determine], the normal reaction is ho-hum.
The climate alarmist crowd is getting desperate because the planet is not following their narrative. Nothing unusual is occurring, and CO2 is not having the predicted effect. There is panic among the hogs at the public trough as the public tires of the incessant squesling of the pigs over something they can see is not happening. Just look out the window. In most areas spring has come very late this year. That is scary, because the long term trend is a cooling trend. And cold kills.
That trend seems to be accelerating Yes you are right! A change in the rate of change is an acceleration, it just happens to be negative at the moment.
Smokey,
Anomalies work just as well as actual temperatures for showing trends, so I don’t think that is an issue here.
“Click1”: Again, right after that graph cut off in 2009 there was a big upswing in 2010. While the trend up thru 2009 doesn’t look as extreme, the next year brought the trend upward (and the current year is bringing it back downward a bit).
“click2”: The number of record highs doesn’t tell us much. 1) since there are more stations (as well as more states!) since the start, you would expect more records. 2) since each record high makes it less likely to set a new record (think about it — the first year they collect records, they are guaranteed to set a record high and a record low), you would expect fewer records as time progresses.
“Click3”: this is the temperature anomaly difference between two different two different ways of averaging the data. see http://www.ncdc.noaa.gov/ghcnm/time-series/index.php?surface=land_ocean®ion=90S.90N&month=1&trend=true&beg_trend_year=1880&end_trend_year=2010&submitted=Submit#time-series
The trend is very definitely upward.
That said, there are lots of other questions you could ask about UHI and different types of thermometers and how to weight the averages. But the graph you show simply tells us that when NOAA changed their method of calculation, it did not make much difference.
“temperatures” and “trends”: could you describe what data sets these are and what areas they cover?
“If we simply look at temperatures on a zero y-axis, which are not divided into tenths and hundreths of a degree [impossible to accurately determine], the normal reaction is ho-hum.”
But sometimes tenths matter. If you looked at your own temperature on a similar scale, the difference between 98.6 and 100.6 would look pretty minuscule too. I’m not saying the earth is more or less sensitive to temperature changes as as a person is, but the biology of both WILL be affected by even minor shifts.
“The climate alarmist crowd is getting desperate…”
There is definitely some truth there. It was much easier to be certain of global warming in 1998 or 2002 than it is now. The fact that we are only holding steady at unusually warm temps rather than warming further puts a dent in the enthusiasm of the pro-AGW crowd. The next few years should prove interesting.
Finally, I am wary of any claims of “natural warming trend”. The surface temperature only changes as a result of energy imbalances. The world doesn’t randomly decide to change temperature. WHY did it warm? How long will this natural trend continue? In some ways this is the ultimate untestable cop-out. Any change could be attributed to “natural climate change” with absolutely no testability.
Tim Folkserts,
You’re right about the record temperatures vs the number of states, etc. So you can replace click2.
And regarding the null hypothesis, if there is no discernible difference whatever between current and past temperatures and trends, then Occam’s Razor tells us to accept the simplest explanation: “One should not increase, beyond what is necessary, the number of entities required to explain anything.”
Adding an extraneous variable such as CO2 is not necessary to explain the observed climate changes. The pre-industrial climate changed much more than today’s very mild, “Goldilocks” climate. Thus, it is reasonable to conclude that the addition to this beneficial trace gas has made little or no difference. In either case, urgent action is not only uwarranted, but it would be pointless since China, India, Brazil, and a hundred other countries have zero intention of limiting their CO2 emissions at the expense of economic growth. Fortunately, it doesn’t seem to matter one way or another.
Chart time. Let’s look at some temperatures, trends and CO2:
Here’s the long term CET record. Is it time to panic?
And the global temp anomaly since 1910. Panic?
And the surface temps since 1910.
This is the trend over the past decade vs the failed model projections.
Here we have the trend since 2000. Can you spot the runaway global warming?
I can’t.
And here is a chart showing the R^2 disconnect between temperature and CO2.
You will probably accuse me of cherry picking, but I post this chart to show that the ARGO array is in agreement with declining temps.
Next, yearly average temps since 1900.
And here we have the raw temperature data since 1830.
And average annual temperatures since 1895. Should we panic yet?
You are right that the next few years should prove interesting. But based on the complete lack of evidence that CO2 is a problem despite its ≈40% rise, it is reasonable to not only hold off from precipitous action; we should also de-fund most, if not all of the tax-funded grants to ‘study global warming.’ It has been studied to death. It’s time to stop demonizing “carbon” and move on to productive areas of science.
Tim Folkerts says:
April 25, 2011 at 10:11 am
The world doesn’t randomly decide to change temperature. WHY did it warm?
————————————-
Good question Tim. WHY did it warm going into the Roman warm period, and the Medieval warm period ??
I’m pretty sure we can rule out anthropogenic CO2, so the only way to change the null hypothesis was to remove them from the record. Nice try Mikey.
Now we’ve got Trenberth wanting to change the null hypothesis because it’s inconvenient.
Next
“Here’s the long term CET record. Is it time to panic? “
No, here is the long-term record.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/File:CET_Full_Temperature_Yearly.png
Your graph compares only two of the centuries. It compares only summer temperatures. It leaves out the last 10 years which, again, are exceptionally warm years.
“And the global temp anomaly since 1910. Panic? “
NO! that is NOT the global temperature anomaly! According to the source it is:
So with no global warming, the average should be 0.000C/month. If the difference was even 0.001 C/month (indistinguishable from 0 on the scale of the graph) for 100 years = 1200 months, global warming would be 1.2 C for the century. This graph seems intentionally designed to mislead.
“And the surface temps since 1910. “
No, that graph specifically says it was “detrended” — ie the trend was mathematically removed. So by definition it will show no trend.
I didn’t look closely at the rest of the graphs, but so far your graphs are 0/3 at showing anything interesting.
I agree that the last ~ decade has not shown a clear trend — in fact is seems to be sloping down in contrast to any CO2 hypothesis. I think it will be fascinating to see how it goes. But you need to find better graphs to support your conclusions.
“Good question Tim. WHY did it warm going into the Roman warm period, and the Medieval warm period ??”
If I knew that, I’d be rich. 🙂
I do know that, whatever may have forced climate changes in the past, the change in CO2 due to human activity is an additional factor. There is a clear theoretical reason why CO2 should influence temperature. So there is at least a plausible hypothesis that the current changes in climate may be different from any past changes.
Is CO2 the biggest factor in recent change? Is it even a small-but-significant factor? Would it be catastrophic even if CO2 continues to drive temperatures higher?
I’ll leave those questions to others, because I don’t have the answers. The fact that it MIGHT be catastrophic is enough reason to continue some funding to explore the question. (Just like the small but real chance of a catastrophic asteroid collision makes it a reasonable investment to watch for asteroids.)
Tim Folkerts,
Reading comprehension, me boy. You need it. When I wrote “…the surface temps since 1910,” that’s exactly what I meant. The graph clearly states that it shows global surface air temperatures. 1 for 1.
And the “monthly global temperature change” means the anomaly. Otherwise, the chart wouldn’t start and end at zero. Surely you can understand that? 2 for 2.
And I’m sorry I wasn’t clear enough for you, but the charts I posted followed my statement that “…it is reasonable to conclude that the addition to this beneficial trace gas [CO2] has made little or no difference.” The charts were linked to support my conclusion, which you have not even begun to refute.
Nitpicking the wording of my post is a diversion intended to distract from that conclusion: there is a complete absence of any measurable, testable evidence or observations showing that CO2 makes any difference in temperature, or causes any global damage. Therefore, the null hypothesis and Occam’s Razor rule: the increase in that minor trace gas can be disregarded for all practical purposes. The only verifiable result of more CO2 is increased agricultural production.
Thus, the scientific method shows that CO2 is both harmless and beneficial. The demonization of “carbon” is a baseless and harmful canard perpetuated by two kinds of people: those who financially and/or professionally benefit from perpetrating it, and those whose egos are so heavily invested in the CO2=CAGW belief that they are unable to admit that their arguments have failed due to the lack of either supporting evidence or observations.
Check out the rest of the charts I posted. I have lots more like them. The conclusion will eventually become inescapable to even the most fervent climate alarmist, whether they admit it or not: there is no testable, reproducible, empirical evidence or observations showing that CO2 does what they claim it does. It is simply a minor trace gas that provides an insignificant amount of warming, which is dwarfed by the planet’s natural variability.
I think we may need a panel of judges to score this one. 🙂
“The graph clearly states that it shows global surface air temperatures. 1 for 1.”
The title is “Global Surface Air Temperature (HadCRUT) Detrended for linear fit”
In fact, here is a plot of the original AND de-trended graph — apparently the very source you used.
http://www.climate4you.com/ClimateReflections.htm
“monthly global temperature change” means the anomaly.
No it means the change from the previous month. The first data point would be
… T(Feb, 1908) – T(Jan, 1908)
not
… T(Jan, 1908) – T(average)
This is from the same anti-AGW source as above.
This is the trend over the past decade vs the failed model projections.
This is the best graph in the lot IMHO (and a couple other graphs show the same basic trend). It shows predictions as well as confidence intervals for the actual data.
As I have said above, the lack of warming during this past decade is a tough bit of evidence to explain. Maybe it is the sun. Maybe it is some other forcing. I’m looking forward to seeing the graphs in 2020 to see what trend develops — is the recent hint of cooling a new trend or a bump in continued warming?
And here is a chart showing the R^2 disconnect between temperature and CO2.
And here is a different chart showing correlation, only this shows a longer time period. This graph suggest a definite correlation, combined with a definite random component.
Again, the recent trend is not following the script, but I don’t think we have enough of a trend downward for temperature to declare the relationship dead.
http://chartsgraphs.files.wordpress.com/2009/08/co2_temp_scatter_regression.png
And here we have the raw temperature data since 1830.
And average annual temperatures since 1895. Should we panic yet?
Interesting graphs. Do you have information about what areas these cover? I see nothing that says who made the graphs or what specific temperatures they are plotting.
I think we are not actually that far apart. I can be a stickler for accuracy, but the data the last decade is far from conclusive. Due to the potential size of the program, I think significant funding is still in order, but panic is not yet called for.
Tim Folkerts:
anomaly |əˈnäməlē|noun ( pl. -lies): 1. Deviation from the trend.
Your monthly “change” above and below trend is the anomaly, no?
Next, you say, “…the lack of warming during this past decade is a tough bit of evidence to explain.”
It’s easy to explain: the sensitivity number is lower than you think it is. If there was a high sensitivity to CO2, then temperature would track CO2 closely. But it doesn’t.
And the graphs you asked about came from this site.
Finally, I think you showed your hand with your last statement: “…I think significant funding is still in order…”
After almost $80 billion thrown at the non-problem of “carbon,” it’s time to call a halt to the wasteful extravagance. Grant money has become the goal, not honest science.
Smokey: simple question is a 3c increase for a doubling of CO2 considered “catastrophic” ?
Specific numbers if you like, for the sake of the argument CO2 was 280ppm pre-industrial a doubling by 2050 would be 560ppm CO2 and we’re currently approaching 400ppm.
The word “catastrophic” seems to leave so much wiggle room, a bit like the tobacco industry claiming that smoking was good for the economy as it got people off the pension quicker
Flat Earth,
First, re: ‘catastrophic.’ I recommend that you go to the source: Kevin “I want to replace the null hypothesis with my own version” Trenberth, Al Gore of your tobacco industry reference, and James “Coal Trains of Death” Hansen. They are the ones predicting runaway global warming, 20-meter rises in the sea level, etc. They are the CAGW experts. Ask them.
Next: “simple question is a 3c increase for a doubling of CO2 considered ‘catastrophic’?”
No.
The global temperature has been higher than that, at times when the biosphere teemed with life. Warmth doesn’t kill, but cold does. When the global temperature declined by 5°C or more, mass extinctions occurred.
That is not to say that there wouldn’t be major adjustments necessary if the planet’s temperature rose by 3°C. But human ingenuity can easily handle problems like that – and do it much cheaper than “carbon mitigation.”
Finally, only the UN/IPCC and a few assorted self-serving scaremongers claim that the climate’s temperature sensitivity to a doubling of CO2 is a preposterous 3°C. None of them has any credibility. If you want credibility, go to MIT’s Prof Richard Lindzen, head of its atmospheric sciences department. Lindzen puts the climate sensitivity number at ≤1°C. I will accept Dr Lindzen’s expertise over a crackpot railroad engineer like Rajendra Pachauri.
Forget the bogus 3°C per doubling, it has no basis in reality. It’s sole purpose is to scare money out of taxpayers. And Prof Lindzen’s view has a lot of company; he’s right in the middle of the rational estimates: Dr Miskolczi puts the sensitivity number at zero; Drs Idso put it at 0.37; Dr Spencer puts it at 0.46; Dr Schwartz puts it at 1.1, and Dr Chylek puts it at 1.4. Only the IPCC’s paid alarmists say it’s a preposterous 3°C [they used to say 6°, but they were laughed out of the room, so they backed and filled. They’re still wrong].
Smokey,
“Your monthly “change” above and below trend is the anomaly, no?”
No, it is not the anomaly. Look at the two equations.
They plotted:
T(Feb, 1908) – T(Jan, 1908), T(Mar, 1908) – T(Feb, 1908) …
The anomaly would be
T(Jan, 1908) – T(average), T(Feb, 1908) – T(average)
The first is what was plotted. The second is the anomaly as it is usually defined.
“It’s easy to explain: the sensitivity number is lower than you think it is. If there was a high sensitivity to CO2, then temperature would track CO2 closely. But it doesn’t.”
Touche. The sensitivity does seem to be much lower than the high estimates that were thrown around a decade ago.
And you may call this grasping at straws, but there is one other explanation. The climate could be fairly sensitive to CO2 AND fairly sensitive to something else. For example, everything else being equal, CO2 could lead to 2C per doubling. By itself, this would have predicted a considerably bigger increase in temperature this decade. However, a change in the sun or cosmic rays this decade could have an affect (the sun HAS been unusually quiet much of this past decade).
Occam’s razor is not particularly kind to adding an arbitrary extra factor like this. But Occam’s razor is a guideline, not a hard-and-fast law. Besides, we KNOW that there are factors beside CO2 concentration, since CO2 was presumably not the driving factor behind MWP & LIA and any number of other slight variations in the past.
Your comment about human ability to adapt is certainly apropos. I’m sure humanity will survive even a relatively large change in climate. The more difficult question is how to balance various costs and benefits of different courses of action.
And yes, I think “significant” spending (but not necessarily at current levels) is warranted. Science tends to be a good investment. Whatever is found, it will give us more knowledge about our world and our future. Maybe we will instead find the REAL causes of global warming 😉
Smokey, since you answer NO to 3c being catastrophic then you are building up a strawman argument, just a simple fraudulent argument. What would your definition of “catastrophic” warming be maybe more like 10c – 20c ?
Taking away the word “catastrophic” for a moment what warming do you expect to see from a doubling of CO2 and why. I believe the current best estimate is 3.5c
Flat Earth,
You asked, I answered. How does that make my answer “fraudulent”? And I’ve already recommended that you go to the source for a definition of “catastrophic.” Keep in mind that there is zero evidence of any catastrophe occurring, even after a quite substantial 40% rise in CO2. Gore, Hansen and their ilk have been consistently wrong in their CAGW predictions. Doesn’t that tell you something?
Finally, you ask: “…what warming do you expect to see from a doubling of CO2 and why.”
I expect around a 1°C warming. Why? Because I think Prof Richard Lindzen knows more about the subject than you, me, and the entire IPCC… doubled and squared. His highly educated assessment is that 2xCO2=1°C. And so far, observations have falsified the IPCC’s models.
And you incorrectly believe that “…the current best estimate is 3.5c”. You are being spoon-fed preposterous numbers that have no basis in reality. If temperature was that sensitive to changes in CO2, then current temperatures would closely track the rise in CO2. But they don’t. Furthermore, rises in CO2 follow temperature rises. What part of cause and effect confuses you? ΔCO2 is a function of ΔT.
I’m not going to go over all this basic science again, you can begin getting up to speed by reading the WUWT archives. Start with a search for “CO2”.
Flat Earth says:
April 25, 2011 at 10:45 pm
Smokey, since you answer NO to 3c being catastrophic then you are building up a strawman argument, just a simple fraudulent argument.
Please define exactly what (you so apparently so firmly believe) will be “catastrophic” about a 3 degree rise?
There are nothing but benefits from a 1 deg, 2 deg, or 3 degree rise in global temperatures AND global CO2 levels.
Ice just went out. May 4th 5:24 pm local time.
124 days is just within your 95% CI.
Doesn’t seem like anything special about this year.