Paper: 'Summer temperatures were about 10°C warmer than today, even though the concentration of atmospheric CO2 was similar'

From AAAS: From Russia with Lovely Data

Climate and the atmospheric concentration of CO2 are closely linked. Brigham-Grette et al. (p. 1421, published online 9 May) present data from Lake El’gygytgyn, in northeast Arctic Russia, that shows how climate varied between 3.6 and 2.2 million years ago, an important interval in the global cooling trend that accelerated rapidly at the end of the Miocene. Summer temperatures were about 10°C warmer than today, even though the concentration of atmospheric CO2 was similar.

Pliocene Warmth, Polar Amplification, and Stepped Pleistocene Cooling Recorded in NE Arctic Russia

Brigham-Grette et al.

Understanding the evolution of Arctic polar climate from the protracted warmth of the middle Pliocene into the earliest glacial cycles in the Northern Hemisphere has been hindered by the lack of continuous, highly resolved Arctic time series. Evidence from Lake El’gygytgyn, in northeast (NE) Arctic Russia, shows that 3.6 to 3.4 million years ago, summer temperatures were ~8°C warmer than today, when the partial pressure of CO2 was ~400 parts per million. Multiproxy evidence suggests extreme warmth and polar amplification during the middle Pliocene, sudden stepped cooling events during the Pliocene-Pleistocene transition, and warmer than present Arctic summers until ~2.2 million years ago, after the onset of Northern Hemispheric glaciation. Our data are consistent with sea-level records and other proxies indicating that Arctic cooling was insufficient to support large-scale ice sheets until the early Pleistocene.

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Mark Hladik
June 21, 2013 12:24 pm

Just to help keep time frame(s) and terminology straight, the lastest edition of the Global Stratigraphic Nomenclature committee has designated the following boundaries (some) for the Cenozoic epochs:
Miocene 23.03 ma – 5.332 ma
Pliocene 5.332 ma – 2.588 ma
Pleistocene 2.588 ma – 0.011700 ma
If this portion of the Russian platform did not develop into a full-blown glacial episode until 2.2 ma, it would be strong evidence that the Pleistocene had some significant variation WITHIN the hemispheres.

jai mitchell
June 21, 2013 12:33 pm

summer temperatures were ~8°C warmer than today, when the partial pressure of CO2 was ~400 parts per million. Multiproxy evidence suggests extreme warmth and polar amplification during the middle Pliocene.
This is the future that we are headed for.
Welcome to MIS-31 (X2)
Welcome to the Anthropocene

Will Nelson
June 21, 2013 12:40 pm

Aw man, the Pleistocene is over already? I feel like a dinosaur.

Henry Bowman
June 21, 2013 12:51 pm

Forest fires happen from time to time. If you build your house in the middle of a forest or immediately adjacent to a forest, the chances of your house burning down increases. This is not difficult to fathom.

June 21, 2013 12:59 pm

summer temperatures were ~8°C warmer than today, when the partial pressure of CO2 was ~400 parts per million. Multiproxy evidence suggests extreme warmth and polar amplification during the middle Pliocene.

Sure, if you carve out the isthmus of Panama and reconnect the tropical Atlantic / Pacific, maybe.

June 21, 2013 1:02 pm

There has never been any correlation in the geological record between CO2 and temperature. We have had ice ages when CO2 levels were several times todays and we have had hot temperatures when they were about the same as today. Can’t say anything about when CO2 was less than pre-industrial levels because we were at a record all time CO2 low for planet earth. But the misanthropes would want us to deplete the atmosphere of CO2 so as to more rapidly extirpate humans.

Chris @NJSnowFan
June 21, 2013 1:08 pm

Very easy answer to why and how temperatures could be warmer but That plant loving gas C02 is the same.
Axis of the planet was different. Earth has not always had the same axis.

Chris @NJSnowFan
June 21, 2013 1:17 pm

Reason why I say axis of earth was different now then now.
One impact from a large meteorite, commit or asteroid in the right placement can change our seasons as we know them on earth in a split second.
Even earth quakes can change the rotation speed of the earth.

Stephen Richards
June 21, 2013 1:24 pm

jai mitchell says:
June 21, 2013 at 12:33 pm
Do stop your wailing and gnashing of teeth, you dimbo.

jai mitchell
June 21, 2013 1:36 pm

Stephen Richards. . .
for your viewing pleasure. . .enjoy 🙂
[ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IsIU4Lzdew8 ]

Louis
June 21, 2013 1:38 pm

jai mitchell says:
“summer temperatures were ~8°C warmer than today, when the partial pressure of CO2 was ~400 parts per million. Multiproxy evidence suggests extreme warmth and polar amplification during the middle Pliocene. This is the future that we are headed for.”
Why would you say that when the evidence shows CO2 had nothing to do with the warmer temperatures? It doesn’t really matter to you what the evidence shows. A sheet of ice could swallow Minnesota and you would say, “Just wait until all that hidden heat in the deep oceans finally makes it way to the surface, and you’ll all be sorry!” Isn’t that what you would say?

milodonharlani
June 21, 2013 1:58 pm

jai mitchell says:
“summer temperatures were ~8°C warmer than today, when the partial pressure of CO2 was ~400 parts per million. Multiproxy evidence suggests extreme warmth and polar amplification during the middle Pliocene. This is the future that we are headed for.”
****************************
How many times does geologic history have to be explained to you?
Ice sheet glaciation began on Antarctica at the Eocene/Oligocene boundary despite higher CO2 levels than now not because of the One True Gas but because deep sea channels opened between the that continent & Australia & South America, forming the Southern Ocean.
Ice sheet glaciation began on North America & Europe at the Pliocene/Pleistocene boundary despite CO2 levels similar to today’s not because of lower levels of the laudable but made laughable Magic Gas then, but because the Isthmus of Panama closed off the previous oceanic circulation pattern.
Far from the prime driver of climate change, CO2 levels result from cooler or warmer climate, which is largely under the control of water movements, solid, liquid & gas, forced by the sun & orbital mechanics. You continue to confuse cause & effect.

Eugene WR Gallun
June 21, 2013 2:02 pm

jai mitchell
You need to take off the headphones and listen to reason.
Eugene WR Gallun

June 21, 2013 2:06 pm

Chris @NJSnowFan says:
June 21, 2013 at 1:17 pm
“Axis of the planet was different. Earth has not always had the same axis.”
Exactly!, the earths axis can and does change, most likely this is what causes a lot of the long term changes that have occurred on earth, glaciation and interglacial periods can be caused by changes in the earths axis. It’s actually one of the major players in climate change my opinion.
“One impact from a large meteorite, comet or asteroid in the right placement can change our seasons”
I wouldn’t think asteroid strikes would change the axis of the planet by very much in relation to the potential devastation they could cause anyway, but we share our solar system with other large bodies that are constantly interacting with the earth and frequently perturbing its orbit and there is a natural precession of the solar system as a whole at play, these factors can change earths orbit and axis even at an incredibly small rate that are only noticeable over long periods of time.
The good news is; we can build very accurate models by observing the planets and other large bodies to understand where and when these interactions will occur.

phlogiston
June 21, 2013 2:13 pm

Mark Hladic
Helpful, thanx. So the period after 11700 yrs ago is called wot? The Holocene? Or Anthropocene – or maybe Peccatacene?

tommoriarty
June 21, 2013 2:16 pm

Temperatures were also considerably higher (although not 10 degrees higher) in the Arctic in the much more recent mid-Holocene.
See…
http://climatesanity.wordpress.com/2008/10/15/dont-panic-the-arctic-has-survived-warmer-temperatures-in-the-past/

phlogiston
June 21, 2013 2:20 pm

We can return to the warmunists their own question – with interest. Concerning the last half of the 20th century with rising temps and CO2 they ask smugly “what else but CO2” can be causing the warming?
Well, how about 3 million yrs ago? 8 deg C warmer than now with identical CO2.
What else can be causing the warming?
It clearly is not CO2.

Lars P.
June 21, 2013 2:34 pm

jai mitchell says:
June 21, 2013 at 12:33 pm
This is the future that we are headed for.
Welcome to MIS-31 (X2)
Welcome to the Anthropocene

Thanks for the good laugh jai.
Don’t worry, even if we made the Panama channel, it does not cancel the effect of the Panama isthmus, build up around 3 million years ago and which caused the change of the climate.
It is not the magic gas that did it.

noloctd
June 21, 2013 2:53 pm

Kudos to those who can respond to jai mitchell without violating good taste or the site guidelines. Bravo!

DesertYote
June 21, 2013 2:57 pm

Mark Hladik says:
June 21, 2013 at 12:24 pm
If this portion of the Russian platform did not develop into a full-blown glacial episode until 2.2 ma, it would be strong evidence that the Pleistocene had some significant variation WITHIN the hemispheres.
###
I think you are a bit confused. Full blown glaciation of the Norther Hemisphere did not develop until the mid Gelasian. Redefining the base of the Pleistocene to coincide with the base of the Gelasian moved off of the start of full blown glaciation. This is where the base of the Pleistocene used to be defined, which makes little sense. The old definition was like defining the start of a race as the point at which some cares reach maximum speed, as apposed to when the cars start to accelerate.

Jimbo
June 21, 2013 3:54 pm

jai mitchell says:
June 21, 2013 at 12:33 pm
summer temperatures were ~8°C warmer than today, when the partial pressure of CO2 was ~400 parts per million. Multiproxy evidence suggests extreme warmth and polar amplification during the middle Pliocene.
This is the future that we are headed for.

Ordovician ice age, co2 at 4,000ppm.

davidmhoffer
June 21, 2013 4:06 pm

jai mitchell says:
June 21, 2013 at 12:33 pm
…and polar amplification during the middle Pliocene.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
Well jai, do you even know what the term “polar amplification” means? Can you explain in your own words the physics by which it is expected to exist? Let’s see if you’re just a troll throwing terms around or if you actually have reason, thought, and logic behind your remarks. Should only take you a paragraph or two. Let’s see what you got.

June 21, 2013 4:35 pm

It’s people like Jai Mitchel that make me feel even more strongly that AGW and CAGW is a hoax. I like to hear both sides of a story to test what I think. If Jai well represents the alarmist side of the story, then I can feel confident that we’ll be done with this wrong-headed energy policy nonsense very soon.

skunky
June 21, 2013 5:13 pm

JAI,
I have a bridge for sale. It crosses the Thames, and has two big towers. £50,000,000 and it’s yours. email me at scammer@nigeria.com

Bill Illis
June 21, 2013 5:18 pm

Here is Lake E’s temps (from the paper) and CO2 from 4.0 Mya to 1.5 Mya.
Wake me up when you find the correlation.
http://s8.postimg.org/s62bnbmyd/Lake_E_and_CO2_4_to_1_5_Mya.png

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