From the department of ENSO denial, “the Brady Bunch” and NOAA’s weather.gov comes this ridiculous statement:
Was El Niño solely responsible for the record warm winter for the contiguous United States? No, but for some areas, like the northern U.S., the El Niño likely played a role. We know that other factors including climate patterns in the north Atlantic, Pacific, and tropics also influenced our weather during winter. Longer-term climate change was also a player, similar to Alice, the Brady family’s housekeeper—an ever-present force influencing outcomes to varying degrees.
They say that with a straight face, while at the same time pushing this graph showing about 90% of the CONUS above normal:
It seems blindingly obvious to me (and to Dr. Ryan Maue) that ENSO is the main driver of these warmer and record temperature, but NOAA would never show the public a graph like this that clearly demonstrates global temperature tracks the tropical temperature increase from the 2015-2016 ENSO event very, very, well:
It is instructive to look at what NOAA wrote about the 1997-1998 super El Niño:
The winter of 1997-1998 was marked by a record breaking El Nino event and unusual extremes in parts of the country. Overall, the winter (December 1997- February 1998) was the second warmest and seventh wettest since 1895. Severe weather events included flooding in the southeast, an ice storm in the northeast, flooding in California, and tornadoes in Florida. The winter was dominated by an El Niño-influenced weather pattern, with wetter than normal conditions across much of the southern third of the country and warmer than normal conditions across much of the northern two-thirds of the country.
…
The first two months of 1998 were the warmest and wettest in the 104-year record of temperatures and precipitation measurements for the contiguous 48 states.
Source: National Climatic Data Center Technical Report No. 98-02 (PDF) NCDC-tr9802-1998-elnino-event
They also said:
“The persistent 1997-1998 El Niño, which lingered into the first half of the year, and the unprecedented warmth of the Indian Ocean contributed to this record warm year,” said NOAA Administrator Dr. D. James Baker
Source: http://www.publicaffairs.noaa.gov/releases99/jan99/noaa99-1.html archived here: 1998-Warmest-Year-on-Record-NOAA-Announces (PDF)
So while no two El Niños are the same, this one in 1998 had quite an effect on global temperatures, calling them “unprecedented”. It seems odd that they’d place the slightly smaller 1998 El Niño event as the cause of record breaking temperatures, but then try to dilute it when an even bigger event comes along in 2015.
In fact, in the press release about 1998, they make no attribution to “climate change” at all. The phrase “Longer-term climate change”, “climate change”, or even any close variation does not appear in the 1999 press release document.
It seems pretty clear then by NOAA’s statements that the El Niño of 97-98 was the biggest factor in record breaking temperatures. Note that in the graph above from Dr. Ryan Maue, we have the “pause” clearly visible until about April of 2015, when global temperature was about 0.1 to 0.3 °C above normal during that period. In 1997, according to this plot from NASA GISS in 2007 where they fixed a bug pointed out by Steve McIntyre, the global temperatures preceding that super El Niño were similar, if not a little higher at almost 0.4°C:
Source: http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/updates/200708.html
So it seems to me that the claims made in the 2016 NOAA analysis such as
“Longer-term climate change was also a player, similar to Alice, the Brady family’s housekeeper—an ever-present force influencing outcomes to varying degrees.”
Really aren’t that strong at all, and the language is far more political, speaking to the perceived “consensus”, than it was in 1999. Meanwhile, neither the Earth nor El Niño cares.
From climate.gov
Marcia, Marcia, Marcia
Is El Niño the Marcia Brady of climate variability? No doubt that El Niño is the sexiest, most popular, and most studied aspect of climate variability. And we do continue to talk about El Niño events decades after they seem relevant, much like Marcia.
Now that the U.S. has just finished its warmest winter on record, we naturally ask ourselves just how influential the strong El Niño was. But how did other factors in the earth’s climate system contribute to the record-breaking season? How did Greg and Bobby and Cindy—or even Jan—influence the hit TV show from yesteryear? Was the success of the show solely due to Marcia, and was our warmest winter on record solely a result of El Niño?
In this Beyond the Data post, we take a closer look at the warmest winter on record and what role El Niño might have played.
No two El Niños are the same, but…
One of the most straightforward tools that climatologists have to examine how a particular climate pattern influences weather is comparing similar events from the past. It has been stated numerous times on this blog and others that no two El Niño events are the same, and that is definitely true for the current El Niño event. Still, we can use the past to identify big picture similarities that many El Niño events have in common.
To help us examine historical trends, we have identified six previous strong El Niño events in the 1950-present historical record: 1957-58, 1965-66, 1972-73, 1982-83, 1991-92, and 1997-98. According to NOAA’s Oceanic Niño Index (ONI), the current El Niño event is one of the strongest on record and of similar magnitude to the events in 1982-83 and 1997-98.
The table below shows the contiguous U.S. temperature during the past six strong El Niño winters (December-February) as well as this past winter. Winter seasons in the past tended to be close to or warmer than 1981-2010 average when a strong El Niño was present.
Average winter temperature in the U.S. for the 6 strongest El Niños since 1950 along with the winter of 2015-16. Colder-than-average winters are shaded blue, and warmer-than-average winters are shaded red. More often than not in the U.S., strong El Niño winters have been warmer than average, but that’s partly because winters overall have warmed. *61st place sits exactly in the middle of the historical record, so it is also the 61st warmest.
As previously reported by NOAA, the winter (December-February) of 2015-16 was the warmest and 12th wettest on record for the contiguous United States. The average temperature was 36.8°F, 3.3°F above the 1981-2010 average, while the precipitation total was 8.05 inches, 1.25 inches above average. As you can see in the graph below, the record warm winter season for the contiguous U.S. was an unprecedented occurrence—with or without an El Niño present.
It is clear in the data that winters in the contiguous U.S. have warmed over time. Winters are warming at an average rate of 2.1°F per century since U.S. record keeping began in 1895, and 3.3°F per century since 1950 when our operational El Niño records begin. So, El Niño winters have gotten warmer through time due to climate change, despite no significant strengthening of El Niño events themselves. This warming trend means that the odds of having a record warm winter have increased, much like rolling loaded dice, and the El Niño potentially loaded the dice even slightly more.
A comparison to past El Niño winters
Temperature
During December-February 2015/2016 much of the contiguous U.S. was warmer than the 1981-2010 average, particularly areas across the North and east of the Rockies. Much of the warmth east of the Rockies occurred during the record-smashing heat wave during the last two weeks of December—an example of how a multi-week event can influence seasonal outcomes. Parts of the Mountain West saw temperatures that were near to below average.
Now compare this winter’s temperature pattern to an average temperature map of the previous six strong El Niño events (below). There isn’t much similarity across the southern half of the contiguous United States. However, there is a similar signal across the northern half of the country, with past strong El Niño events being warmer than average for the region.
That northern-tier warmth stems from a strong, semi-permanent low pressure system called the Aleutian Low that sets up in the Gulf of Alaska during El Niño events. Downstream from the Aleutian low here in the contiguous U.S., cold air outbreaks from the Arctic tend to occur less frequently.
Precipitation
During December-February 2015-16 parts of the Northwest, Midwest, and along the East Coast, particularly South Florida, were wetter than average while parts of the Rocky Mountains, Southwest, Southern Plains, and Northern Plains were drier than average.
When we compare this winter’s precipitation pattern to the average precipitation map of the previous six strong El Niño events, there is not much similarity across the Southwest and Southern Plains. Part of the reason might be the small number of cases examined. With only six strong events observed over 67 years on top of a changing climate base state, we might not fully be able to represent what the signal of a strong El Niño actually looks like. One atypical event could have skewed the entire average.
Much of California was also drier than average during the winter of 2015/2016, which caused drought conditions to persist into mid-March. California has been dealing with drought going on five years, and many had high hopes that this El Niño would be the state’s savior because past El Niño events tended to be wet for the state. However, the precipitation received in California during the wet season through the end of February made only a minor dent in the multi-year precipitation deficits. However, early reports of heavy precipitation during March look promising!
Station data
How did major cities across the country fare during this winter in terms of average temperature, precipitation, and snowfall? Below are tables that compare what happened during the winter of 2015-16 to the winter seasons during past strong El Niño events. First up is temperature…
And here is total winter precipitation…
Finally, here is snowfall during strong El Niño winters…
Episode recap
Was El Niño solely responsible for the record warm winter for the contiguous United States? No, but for some areas, like the northern U.S., the El Niño likely played a role. We know that other factors including climate patterns in the north Atlantic, Pacific, and tropics also influenced our weather during winter. Longer-term climate change was also a player, similar to Alice, the Brady family’s housekeeper—an ever-present force influencing outcomes to varying degrees.
But exactly how much of the record warm winter was due to the El Niño, and how much was due to other climate patterns, including climate change? That is a question yet to be answered, but the answer—like most climate extremes—is likely some version of “all of the above.”
When trying to determine how a strong El Niño impacted winter seasonal outcomes across the contiguous U.S., we might be easily lulled into false expectations. Just like Jan’s complaint that no one could keep their eyes off Marcia, we often can’t keep our eyes off El Niño. Yes, El Niño events have well documented historical impacts in the U.S., but there are always other players involved, just like other members of the Brady family influenced an episode’s outcome.
Our climate is changing and our assumptions of how El Niño will impact the U.S. might need to be revisited. But we also need to understand that there is variability even within well-understood climate patterns like El Niño, and we must keep an open mind when it comes to the impacts of less exciting climate patterns.
Was Marcia ever really going to be a teen model, and was this El Niño ever going to manifest itself in the way we expected? Probably not. To truly understand the beauty of the Brady family, we must look beyond the obvious choice.
Good post!
Semi off topic…U.S. Navy sub finds out the hard way that Obama and friends lied !…LOL
http://video.foxnews.com/v/4807077713001/watch-us-navy-sub-punch-through-arctic-ice/?intcmp=hpvid1&playlist_id=trending#sp=show-clips
Lied about what?
The Arctic would be ice free by now.
I can’t say I recall Obama ever saying that the Arctic would be ice-free by now.
Tsk, tsk, pesky facts..
That would be Al Gore that said the Artic should be ice free by now.
Yes it was Al Gore saying that the Arctic would be ice free in 5 years. That was in 2008 I think. Come 2016, plenty of ice in the arctic, or is that rotten ice?
“Yes it was Al Gore saying that the Arctic would be ice free in 5 years. That was in 2008 I think. Come 2016, plenty of ice in the arctic, or is that rotten ice?”
That is incorrect. Gore quoted from 2 research papers during a talk he gave. One of them predicted 2013 or 2014, the other predicted as early as 2022, but more likely 2027.
The papers Gore quoted referred to ice free in the summer, it’s certainly not summer yet!
Yea yea. Gore will be dead before we can say his facts were incorrect. What an inconvenient truth.
I really do not have a problem with their announcement that El Nino played a part, and Climate Change too. I am a firm believer in Climate Change and that it is occurring all the time. I just don’t think man has much effect on Climate Change.
We know, on average, the U.S. is getting warmer. We know it goes through small, medium, and large cycles. If the a cycle (or several cycle) peaks line up with an El Nino, one would EXPECT record temperatures – because its getting, on average, a little warmer every year.
Each El Nino, just like weather patterns, is going to be a little different. Sure there are similarities, but there should be differences too – otherwise it would not be chaotic and easy to model. Why any of this is a headline is bewildering.
..Yes, that is what happens when you come OUT of an Ice Age..If was continually getting cooler, we would most likely be going INTO an Ice Age ! As a Canadian, I say, Go GloBull Warming !!
Marcus, We are NOT coming out of an ice age so that argument does not explain the recent upward trend in temperatures. If anything, the data suggest that temperatures had peaked in this interglacial (see below) and temperatures were SLOWLY (I emphasize slowly to counter those that get get their knickers in a twist about a coming ice age) trending downward. I would rather live in a very slowly cooling world than a rapidly warming one.
http://cdn.zmescience.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/03/10000-year-graph.jpg
Luke says “I would rather live in a very slowly cooling world than a rapidly warming one.”
Wow. Really? So every year in a cooling world, you could expect the earth’s ecosystem to decline a little and you’d rather live under those conditions?
You’d rather the extreme events were tending towards cold ones than warm ones?
Hi again Luke
Antarctica might be a good place, I gather it is cooling slightly.
Luke: “We are NOT coming out of an ice age”
YES WE ARE!
“I would rather live in a very slowly cooling world than a rapidly warming one.”
Be careful what you wish for.
In any case, the World is not rapidly warming.
Oh, and by the way Luke, I presume you are aware that Marcott himself has debunked that Hokey Schtick you seem to be obsessed with, right?
Luke, put away your computer and use common sense. It’s a powerful force…
“Oh, and by the way Luke, I presume you are aware that Marcott himself has debunked that Hokey Schtick you seem to be obsessed with, right?”
Not to mention the temporal resolution of Marcott’s Stew, wouldn’t even show a spike that shows at the end. It’s a Climate Smoothie.
I rarely ( if ever ) say something negative about anyone, but Luke needs to see a doctor. Saying he would prefer to live on a cooling planet is a very negative outlook on life in general. As it is, even in today’s climate the people ( and their live stocks and no time to grow fodder, think Mongolia), that have to live in colder conditions are way worse of then those that do not. Luke honestly, remember in a cooling climate we would have to use even more of the evil fossil fuel your warmist’s side always scream about. A doctor Luke , see a doctor. ( because Luke you are an A.., there you are my negative bad words.).
catweazle666
You say that the temperatures have been increasing because we are coming out of an ice age. I provided a figure showing that temperatures during this interglacial peaked about 7,000 years ago and were on a slow decline. Where are the data to support your assertion?
You went on to say the world is not rapidly warming, again where are the data? Temps were declining by about 0.01 C/century for the last 7,000 years until about 100 years ago. In the past 50 years, global temperatures have been increasing at about 1.5 C/century- a 100 fold difference in the rate of change.
Luke, the earth is STILL in an ICE AGE, right now. You can even google it if you like. The earth just happens to be in a rather comfortable INTER-GLACIAL…which is coming to an end. Maybe not in my lifetime, or yours, or your grandchildrens, but it is coming to an end as earth heads towards the next glaciation period. So, maybe your future family will get to live in a world you wish, a frozen world.
The ignorance is strong in this one!
Luke
That graph from Marcott and Mann is a hockey stick offshoot and was created in an effort to further bolster the elimination of the MWP and has been refuted numerous times. The span from 1100 to 700 years ago was estimated to be 1-2C above today and the Roman Warm Period about 2000 years ago was even warmer still but BOTH time periods were warmer than today
That graph is just plain silly. It tacks on yearly temperatures to a line that is using far longer time scales scales. I hesitate to call it fraud but it is getting there. It’s like having say an ice cube at zero, heating it to 100 degrees then freezing it again. On one scale the ice cube never changes, on another it goes through massive changes.
Comparing the two scales is entirely meaningless.
Patrick MJD;
Our current INTER-GLACIAL is the coolest INTER-GLACIAL over the past 400,000 years …. and also has the highest CO2 levels ….
http://i255.photobucket.com/albums/hh154/crocko05/Temp%20vs%20CO2%20-%20400000%20years_zpskyy0qvra.jpg
…. go figure?
Patrick,
You’re right, I should have specified that we are in an interglacial period within a general pattern of cycles between ice ages and interglacials. The point I was making is that I would rather live in a world cooling at 0.02 degrees C per century- it would be thousands of years before there would be significant changes in global temperatures (assuming that the rate of change remained constant). Right now the temperature is increasing at 1.5 C per century, we will be living in a very different world in just 100 years including large increases in sea level, shifts in temperature and precip that will have major consequences for agriculture, and increases in droughts. Why do you think the Pentagon has identified climate change as a major driver of instability and conflict in the coming century (and please don’t give me the answer that they are doing it at the behest of the Obama administration- unless you can prove it)?
Luke, you continue to post Marcott’s debunked reconstruction. Surely, you can realize that that graph will not win you any converts.
When one tacks an unsmoothed section onto the end of a heavily smoothed prior section, surely you can see that the result is statistical gibberish. It means nothing. Everyone here can see that, and you are simply exposing your ignorance by not acknowledging the problem.
The real question which ought to interest you is why Marcott’s reconstruction was accepted by peer review and endlessly lauded by the media, DESPITE being obvious statistical gibberish.
Luke: “Right now the temperature is increasing at 1.5 C per century”
No it isn’t.
#Data from Hadley Centre
#http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/hadobs/hadcrut4/data/download.html
#—————————————————-
#File: hadcrut4_monthly_ns_avg.txt
#
#Time series (hadcrut4) from 1850 to 2015.42
#Least squares trend line; slope = 0.00482829 per year
1850 -0.509351
2015.42 0.289329
#Data ends
#Number of samples: 2
#Mean: -0.110011
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/hadcrut4gl/plot/hadcrut4gl/trend:2001
See that line that says Least squares trend line; slope = 0.00482829 per year?
That gives 0.482829°C per century.
Or would you prefer NASA GISS?
#Data from NASA Goddard Institute for Space Studies
#http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/
#—————————————————-
#
#File: GLB.Ts+dSST.txt
#
#Time series (gistemp) from 1880 to 2016.17
#Least squares trend line; slope = 0.00687911 per year
1880 -0.444523
2016.17 0.492183
#Data ends
#Number of samples: 2
#Mean: 0.0238301
That gives 0.687911°C per century.
Still not even close to 1.5°C per century.
Stop making stuff up, you are just making a fool of yourself.
Looks like NOAA is in serious need for grant money.
Looks like Luke got into his mom and dad’s adult medications then got on the internet.
Luke: it’s fake: the 20th century didn’t warm.
And Yes Luke there was a little ice age in an otherwise warm, but slowly cooling period.
And no you do not want the temperature to continue to drift to cool, it precipitously drops off into glaciation.
And no, using fire can not make the sky hot.
No matter how hard you squeeze your eyes shut and visualize the Education Department Flag flying over some building,
the atmosphere stops many percent sunlight from reaching the surface of the planet.
It then scrubs that heat off with freezing water and frigid winds,
to emit that
reduced density surface energy
from an overall
larger, colder, combined mass.
That’s the definition of cooling.
No matter how hard you hold your breath till the world doesn’t make sense to you,
that’s not a giant, magical heater in the sky.
That’s the definition of
less energy
emitting from more, cooler, overall mass.
Here’s an experiment so you can find out for yourself.
Write down the words ”Less surface energy density emitted from an overall larger, colder, combined mass”
then shut your eyes very tight, and then open them –
when you do,
shout ”A Magic Heater!! A Magic Heater!! A Magic Heater!!”
When that’s not the definition of cooling any more,
you can be a government certified climatologist.
Just like Mike ”So what if it always makes hockey sticks?” Mann
Just like Phil ”The scientific community would come down on me in no uncertain terms if I said the world cooled since 1998. Ok it has but it’s only seven years of data and it isn’t statistically significant, ” Jones
Just like James “I’m going to work in a rowboat because we’re going to be under water!” Hansen
Just like Keith ”These six shaggy bark trees, notorious for unreliability regarding temp, said the sky is getting hot. Right now. Really,” Briffa.
You will have finally broken the secret of atmospheric processing those hockey sticks couldn’t.
And you alone among all humanity’s
great mathematical minds,
fanatical eco-fascist activists,
avid amateurs and retired atmospheric chemists/radiation professionals,
students hoping to get that big PhD break,
bored housewives looking for fame but not being personally acquainted with Hulk Hogan –
You – and you alone among all these human intellects,
will be able to explain to real scientists,
who haven’t been caught faking data
and lying to the press a dozen years,
and making kook class end of the world statements,
about heating supplies being death trains to Auschwitz and going to work in a rowboat,
how less surface energy
emitted from more, colder, combined total mass
is a magic heater in the sky.
If you’d like to, you can record and put the process leading to the momentous occasion on YouTube.
We’ll wait,
you go get that big proof
that’s gonna throw us all back on our thermodynamic heels,
and change our story. And admit – your leadership aren’t kooks who fake having been given Nobel Prizes
in court documents when they’re suing people for calling them liars
and that stuff all makes perfect sense about the laws of thermodynamics turning around,
and us not really being on cue for glaciation,
but the sky getting too hot because we used fire.
And how if we use other fire the sky won’t get hot.
LoL
Remember we’re talking about y o u r story Luke.
Any time you want to clear it all up, people have been looking for a good ”communicator of the science” ever since Death Train Homer Hansen, got in his rowboat and went off down the street in Manhatten the day he retired.
Intrinsic, you need to get back on your meds.
Luke: “Intrinsic, you need to get back on your meds.”
No Luke, judging by your scientifically illiterate hysterical outbursts and massive tendency to exaggeration, I think that’s you.
That was an excellent comment. Value added!
Always have been and always will be. As such necessitates the continual state of alarm…. gotta have $$$.
I do not believe and will not believe anything this agency make up anymore ,they have shown too many times to be very loose with the truth .
Wasn’t it 2014 warmest evvvva with 37 percent confidence level what a joke .
You have a way with words. The phrase “this agency make up anymore” is beautiful.
But it isn’t a joke, when madness effects the minds of hapless and pathetic people. As we live midst a time when the antics of the climate (likely due to the “Quiet Sun”) are particularly fascinating, they must studiously ignore the most fascinating aspects, because it would be politically incorrect. Therefore I have to grit my teeth to read any NOAA papers, for they resemble blathering.
“Blather” is defined as to talk in a long-winded way without making much sense.
Perfect word, aye?
aye caleb. perfect.
“… It seems odd that they’d place the slightly smaller 1998 El Niño event as the cause of record breaking temperatures, but then try to dilute it when an even bigger event comes along in 2015. …”
It does not seem odd to me. The people we are discussing have little or no concern for the truth. When they are not
cooking the booksadjusting the temperature data by cooling the past and warming the future (you should see their neat time machine!) they are calling every weather event imaginable a sure sign that CO2 is going to destroy the planet.Even Chicken Little was a more reliable source of information.
Let’s look at the El Nino weather impact maps.
http://www.seas.harvard.edu/climate/eli/Images/ElNino-teleconnections.jpeg
Pretty accurate compared to what happened over the last 90 days don’t you think.
Let’s also look at the Out-going Long-wave Radiation map which gives you an indication where it was more cloudy [Blues and Reds] (and hence more precipitation) versus less cloudy [Brown and Yellows] (and hence less precipitation). Again, pretty accurate.
http://www.esrl.noaa.gov/psd/map/images/olr/olr.anom.90day.gif
The big Red Spot in the middle of the Pacific is really what makes the Earth warmer in an El Nino. All these thunderstorm clouds hold the extra heat from the central Pacific in. The heat from the El Nino does not get to escape to space, the clouds hold the heat in. It takes time for these thunderstorms to develop and then time for the general atmospheric circulation patterns to spread the extra heat around to the warmer than normal areas in the rest of the planet. This is actually the reason for the 3 month lag as well. The El Nino peaked in mid-November but the temperature impact did not peak until mid-February.
Incidentally, the Big Red Spot, at lower than normal OLR of 50 W/m2 is an astounding difference from normal (especially over 90 days). Nowhere else on the planet has numbers anything like this. 50 W/m2 should be compared to the forcing from doubling CO2 of just 3.7 W/m2 so a -50 W/m2 over such a big area is a big deal. This is how an El Nino impacts the weather.
Hi Bill, Looking at the red area, how much of the drop in OLR is due to the fact that there is less ISR reaching the surface due to increased albedo from the clouds ?. It would be useful to overlay OSW to gain a full picture.
You are right Dan. The extra cloudiness also reduces solar radiation reaching the surface, allowing the El Niño waters to cool down faster than they would have otherwise. The reduction in solar radiation is on the order of 50 W/m2 as well.
But this water is 3.0C above normal before the clouds help cool it off. The ocean already held lots an extra energy in it. As it cools off and releases that energy to the atmosphere and the extra clouds hold more of it in than normal, it translates into a big dump of energy to the atmosphere.
But the clouds do help in making an El Niño more like a spike in ocean temps. Nino 3.4 has cooled from 3.1C to 1.8C just 3 months later. The niño charts are spike-like due to the clouds build-up (lack of cloud build-up in a La Niña) partly because of solar radiation differences.
Very interesting.
The map seems to show a lot of heat escaping from the Pole this winter, which was obvious if you watched the maps up there. The El Nino mildness almost seemed to get sucked north into a whirlpool over the Pole, (which I saw as our planet squandering its extra warmth).
As bulges of Atlantic mildness prodded the Pole, it seemed to nudge the cold ordinarily up there south, resulting in cold-weather-events further south. Turkey got amazing amounts of snow, Mongolia suffered a “dzud”, the army of Thailand handed out blankets to villagers, Bangladesh had many children hospitalized with cold-related ailments, Saudi Arabia had unrepresented snows, Kuwait had its first snow ever, and so on. (It should be obvious I lurk at the “Ice Age Now” site.)
But one thing your map does not explain to me is all the snow they had down in Mexico. It really has been a wonder (especially if you are Mexican.) I haven’t been able to find a decent explanation, (or even an attempt to study), how that cold got down there.
Considering all the money forked out to them, you’d think NOAA could study such things, but at times I feel they can’t even see the nose on their own faces.
Graduates of the Kool Aid policy boot camp, along with EPA
I think Crouch spent too much time on the couch – in TV Land.
Will the next La Nina be named Greg? Does Crouch know any Spanish?
Tune in tomorrow for more scary comparisons!
The Climate Change Cultural Revolution continues.
NOAA was telling the truth. The high temperatures were caused not by El Nino but adjustments to the data, urban heat island effect, poor station siting, and homogenized data.
Just like RSS v4.0 then.
http://images.remss.com/figures/blogs/2016/msu_update_march04_02.png
And remember:
“It’s the best data we have” (J Curry – Senate hearing).
Judith Curry was talking about RAW data, not COOKED data !
..Obviously, your brain has been cooked to long ! California sun and swamp weed ??
…Too
Marcus, historically the satellite data has been changing faster than the surface data. It’s got a long history of being adjusted — and of being hard to correctly calibrate, for that matter.
It’s tough when you’ve only got 1, maybe 2 satellites measuring at a time, each of which has their own constantly-changing calibration issues.
It is still “raw” data it’s just that the interpretation of it has altered – via an algorithm
AKA a Model.
If you disagree would you care to explain how RSS and UAH arrive at “the best data we have”.
Maybe you should inspect Mears spurious adjustments again. Why is it that NOAA 14 MSU, having the rough calibration and the greatest drift, get equal billing in the mix with NOAA 15 AMSU? Mears has equalled Karl in providing the public a garbage paper with garbage results. Curry will not be accepting Mears recent adjustments.
http://www.skepticalscience.com/pics/JohnN-G_ENSO_trends.gif
…Ooooh, more crayons !!
It was in response to this Paragraph:
“So while no two El Niños are the same, this one in 1998 had quite an effect on global temperatures, calling them “unprecedented”. It seems odd that they’d place the slightly smaller 1998 El Niño event as the cause of record breaking temperatures, but then try to dilute it when an even bigger event comes along in 2015.”
Through that was clear 😉
Damned autocorrect!
‘Thought that was clear’
Dear der Wagen
When I see this linear fit, I always think about acceleration which is so clearly visible.
Exactly:
And Marcus would you care to crayon a graph that shows that ENSO (whether Nina or Nino) is not following a rising trend of temps that underlie, and so prove that somehow continued warming is somehow magically cause solely by the ENSO cycle..
…What part of ” Coming out of the Little Ice Age ” do you not understand ? Did you think it would get colder ?
He?
We should be going slowly (10000s of years stuff to leave an inter-glacial), but we are going in smth else (few 100s of years of forcings changing reality in the opposite direction to unknown end effect).
Wow! Thanks
…Wow Wagen, that must be good stuff you are smoking, you almost made sense with that reply !…. D’oh !
Marcus:
What part in the Milankovitch cycle do you think we are at in your “coming out of an IA nonsense!
I do take it you do understand how IA’s are driven by orbital eccentricity ?
Here is a graph showing our current position….
TSI of ~480W/m^2 at 65deg N
Whereas at the peak of the Holocene we were at ~530 W/m^2
So the “coming out” was prior to that. – At around 25,000 ya when TSi at 65N was @465W/m^2 and rising.
So below ~500 watts/sm is getting colder, above is getting warmer. We’ve been cooling since a peak at around 10 Ky bp, with probably a 1-2 Ky lag due to ocean thermal inertia. That coincides nicely with the HTO at 8 Ky bp.
The first derivative of that graph of 65N insolation says we should be moderating for the next 3Ky, but still slightly cooling (below 500 but rising) till 4-5Ky forward from today. It’s nice to know man’s anthro CO2 contribution to the biosphere may help us through this difficult period with enhanced biosphere photosynthetic output (food), enhanced hydrologic cycling, and reduced warming needs of our buildinds, offices, factories, and homes.
“We’ve been cooling since a peak at around 10 Ky bp, with probably a 1-2 Ky lag due to ocean thermal inertia. That coincides nicely with the HTO at 8 Ky bp.”
Exactly – so we are not coming out of an IA, “Little” or not.
Just another “sceptic” myth.
So what was the warming from 1850 to 1950, and the cooling from 1950 to 1980 caused from?
Toneb March 18, 2016 at 3:22 pm
Such Hubris, that you think that the graph you have presented actually represents the world from up to 120,000 years ago, complete with the actual insolation at that time.
It is a Guess, an Estimate, but it is not reality.
Climate Science cannot even identify the cause of the pause, let alone what happened 1000s of years ago.
The boyz and girlz of NOAA Boulder are enjoying a fine Friday at the end of this Winter 2015-2016.
As I write this, the local weather in Boulder is 28F (- 2 C) and light snow. They have about 12″ of fresh wet snow on the ground from the last 24 hrs.
Here is the current snowfall accumulation (in inches) from the 17-18 March storm:
http://www.weather.gov/images/bou/SnowfallCloseup.PNG
I mention this with wee bit ‘o schadenfreude… I’m sitting on my patio in Tucson at a nice sunny 82 F, while NOAA prattles on about an El Nino warmed winter. I haven’t used my house HVAC since early February, lovin’ it.
Well splendid:
So Boulder at an altitude of ~5,500ft has a temp of -2C and some snow in March.
Would you credit it?
No. Warm winter proclamations from NOAA usually get reality check from nature to remind folks its always just weather what we actually experience, not climate. It’s somewhat akin to the Gore Effect. The boyz and girlz at NCEI are going to have wet and cold start to spring, while upper New England gets snow and ice. (I lived in eastern Mass for 9 years, any snow after 15 March really sucked because it was wet and very heavy to shovel.)
But I did get the “Marcia, Marcia, Marcia” dark humor because we now know what another Brady Bunch cast member (played as Greg) was doing to the actress (played as Marcia) off set in his wardrobe trailer between sound stage shoots.
Sub-zero temps and snow at 5,500ft in the Rockies in March is entirely normal – El Nino or not.
Thank you for admitting that. Which is my point. Its normal. Not exceptional, even with an El Nino imposed on our current weather, everything we are experiencing is “normal”. NOAA has a pathological need to politicize their message under the watchful eye of their political appointtee masters. Sad.
Global warming provides the underlying trend that’s boosting temperatures. But El Nino / La Nina is the biggest source of year-to-year variability in temperature.
Most record hot years are El Nino years for that reason. But they keep getting hotter and hotter, because of global warming. Overall, a pretty simple concept.
So what NOAA said is true: El Nino is not solely responsible for the record warming. But it played a role.
..But that was not what they ” hinted at “
Nah, it’s pretty much what they just directly said; what climate scientists usually say.
Crazy idea, but there’s more than one thing that affects climate. And even more things that affect weather. =)
So this is a fact? You can tell us all what is the contribution made by warming factors in our eco system. Allez-y.
We need a cartoon of a shaded red elephant El Nino sitting on a NOAA spokesman repeating what they said….
” Yale’s climate change program out of gas
Published March 02, 2016 FoxNews.com
Facebook85 Twitter116 livefyre158 Email Print
Yale is closing its Climate & Energy Institute.
Yale is closing its Climate & Energy Institute.
After years of feeling the heat, Yale’s Climate & Energy Institute is finally facing an inconvenient truth: the program will close at the end of June.”
Sweet music to my ears !
http://www.foxnews.com/science/2016/03/02/yales-climate-change-program-out-gas.html?intcmp=hpbt2
Oh boy, NOAA to a new low. Maybe they need a Snickers!
…WTF,,ROTFLMAO !! Thanks !
So now Climate Science is deriving it’s fundamental understandings of primary climate motivating forces from a prehistoric (pre-internet) television comedy show.
Unfortunately, it makes a certain amount of sense when you think about it.
At least we now know that it was the Brady Bunch all along, and CO2 has nothing to do with it, as we have long maintained.
It’s all part of Schmidt’s “less science more propaganda” plan, paraphrasing Schmidt “texans are dumb and bigots” and I guess NOAA are rolling out this tactic nationally
So, are you going the bob tisdale argument? Yes, we get warmer, but has nothing to with CO2, it’ only El Ninos? Really?
…R U Drunk ???
Hmmmm. Land only temps for 2015. Northern Hemisphere for Jan\Feb 2016.
Clearly NOAA are trying to separate the temperature increases for El Nino in order to attribute them to CAGW
I find it cute how you believe every word from the US Gov, they are as honest as the Nigerian Gov.
When politics decides something is real, politically appointed scientists like Karla nd Schmidt, will provide whatever they are asked for, and have, at the cost of NASA’s reputation.
NASA have a history of lying, they lied about the Columbia shuttle in order to get more funding, and it cost lives, they lied about the craft’s condition, and it cost the lives of several astronauts.
The record since 1950 is actually much too short to establish a truly secular trend in the presence of strong, albeit irregular, multidecadal and longer oscillations What is apparent on a shorter-term basis is that the winter (Dec-Feb) anomalies have recovered from a decline to a deep trough in 1979 and have been holding relatively steady thereafter.
Aint’t seeing no pause! 😛
..You couldn’t see a tree for the forest, it is beyond tour comprehension !
…your…dang sticky fingers ! LOL
Actually Marcus, he is calculating the forest’s size by examining one large tree. IMHO, when the satellite era is 200 years old scientists will have long recognised that climate change is a symphony of cosmic and terrestrial interactions playing in rhythm while this star system traverses the galaxy.
Small minds can only conceive the process as a solo instrument improvisation whose accompaniment dutifully struggles to maintain harmony and follow the meter changes. They pitifully never are able to cycle of the verse and refrain, dwelling on the tension and ignoring the repose.
Sorry, that should be “They pitifully never are able to get the cycle of the verse and refrain, dwelling on the tension and ignoring the repose.”
…Thanks POP !!
You don’t see a pause because you have little difficulty accepting lacluster papers; Karl et al 2015, and Mears recent dogs lunch. If you held your intellect to a higher standard you would be singing a different tune. But please go ahead and let’s get into it. Why don’t you defend Carl and Karl
I’ll try to make it as SIMPLE as I can for you.
suppose you are listening to some monks droning a monotone… (the plateau)
then someone hits a gong.. (the El Nino spike)
The droning will be inaudible while the gong is ringing…
.. but the droning is still there.
Is that a simple enough concept for you to grasp ?
When the US is cold, it doesn’t mean anything because “the US is only 2 percent of the entire globe.” When the US is warm, it is an indicator of global climate.
“NOAA declares current El Niño stronger”
It’s a blog post that comes with this disclaimer:
“Disclaimer:
Beyond the Data is written and edited by Derek Arndt and Jake Crouch (NOAA NCEI), Jessica Blunden (contractor to NCEI), and Rebecca Lindsey (contractor to NOAA CPO). Posts reflect the views of the bloggers or guest contributors themselves, not necessarily those of Climate.gov, NOAA, or NCEI. “
Without the warming since the end of WWII, would the 1997-1998 and 2015-2016 El Ninos have pushed the temperatures above the ca. 1944 local maximum? From the graphs, the NOAA summary that BOTH the global warming AND the 2015-2016 El Nino produced the recent (local?) maximum is quite reasonable.
NOAA can bask in the warmth of this “son”
‘Til this baby boy leaves and his new sister comes.
When the ice caps have grown, they’ll use that to moan
“Look now at what CO2’s done!
‘It seems odd that they’d place the slightly smaller 1998 El Niño event as the cause of record breaking temperatures…’
Except that they don’t. Here is the quote from the NOAA news release about the 1997-1998 El Nino:
‘“The persistent 1997-1998 El Niño, which lingered into the first half of the year, and the unprecedented warmth of the Indian Ocean contributed to this record warm year,” said NOAA Administrator Dr. D. James Baker.’
The relevant phrase there is ‘contributed to’. This not the same as ‘the cause’.
This understanding is supported by a couple of comments in the pdf about the 1997-1998 El Nino:
‘“This year, the strong El Nino on top of the continuing gradual increase of temperature and precipitation set the stage for many all-time state records.”
And: ‘“With the newest figures, the long-term trend of increasing temperatures and precipitation in the United States continues.”’
The relevant phrases here are: ‘continuing gradual increase of temperature’, and ‘long-term trend of increasing temperatures’.
That is, in their report on the 1997-1998 El Nino, NOAA set the record-breaking temperature within the context of the longer-term rise in temperatures.
And during the strong la Nina which will inevitably happen starting quite soon, they will NOT announce ‘record drop in temperatures’.
BRANDON doesn’t like reality !