Guest post by Bob Tisdale
The first part of this post, Can El Nino Events Explain All of the Global Warming Since 1976? – Part 1, should be read prior to this the second part. Part 1 gives an overview of the datasets used in the following, illustrates the processes that take place during an El Nino event, and discusses the primary reasons for the step changes in global SST anomalies that result from significant El Nino events–those El Nino events that are not influenced by volcanic eruptions.
In the following, the periods from January 1981 to December 1995 and from January 1976 to December 1981 are examined.
THE STEP CHANGE FROM 1981 TO 1995
As noted in the introduction (Part 1), the volcanic eruptions of El Chichon in 1982 and Mount Pinatubo in 1991 interrupted the normal heat distribution processes of the El Nino events that occurred at or near the same time. Figure 14 illustrates the East Indian-West Pacific SST anomalies, scaled NINO3.4 SST anomalies, and scaled (inverted) Sato Index data for the period of January 1981 to December 1995. (This is another graph you may wish to open in a separate window to keep you from having to scroll back and forth.) Again, the Sato Index and NINO3.4 SST anomaly data are not scaled to any specific level; they are provided for timing purposes only. The volcanic eruptions show up as the two depressions in the Sato Index data (green curve). The smoothing rounds off the start time of the Sato data, making it appear as though the Mean Optical thickness reacted prior to the eruption, but because the SST data is smoothed as well the impact on the discussion is nil.
http://i41.tinypic.com/20a8okz.jpg
Figure 14
The 1982/83 El Nino was the ENSO event with the second highest NINO3.4 SST anomaly of the 20th Century, yet there was little to no response by the East Indian-West Pacific SST anomalies to it. The El Chichon eruption effectively suppressed the heat distribution of that El Nino to the East Indian and West Pacific Oceans. In fact, the East Indian-West Pacific SST anomalies reacted quite sharply to the El Chichon eruption; they dropped quickly. Then as the volcanic aerosols subsided, East Indian-West Pacific SST anomalies rebounded to approximately the same level they had been at before the eruption. Considering the lags in the response of the East Indian-West Pacific SST anomalies to El Nino events, part of that rebound from mid-1982 to mid-1983 may be attributable to the 1982/83 El Nino. Then, from mid-1983 to mid-1986, East Indian-West Pacific SST anomalies modulated slightly until being swept up by the 1986/87/88 El Nino, lagging by approximately 7 months. While the SST anomalies of the 1986/87/88 El Nino did not peak as high as the 1982/83 El Nino, the 1986/87/88 El Nino lasted through the summer of 1987, making it a substantial ENSO event. The response of the East Indian-West Pacific SST anomalies was similar to that of the 1997/98 El Nino inasmuch as East Indian-West Pacific SST anomalies shifted significantly (eyeballing it, more than 0.12 deg C at the lowest level after the 1986/87/88 El Nino). East Indian-West Pacific SST anomalies then rose slightly as NINO3.4 SST anomalies rebounded from the 1988/89 La Nina. Note that, like the response to the 1998/99/2000 La Nina, there was little to no response of the East Indian-West Pacific SST anomalies to the 1988/89 La Nina. Then in 1991 two events, the Mount Pinatubo eruption and the beginning of a multiyear El Nino, occurred at the same time. Due to the magnitude of the Mount Pinatubo eruption, and likely its location in the West Pacific, East Indian-West Pacific SST anomalies dropped almost 0.25 deg C over approximately two years. When East Indian-West Pacific SST anomalies finally did rebound, possibly due to the ongoing multiyear El Nino, they did not return to their pre-1991 elevated levels.
In Figure 15, the SST anomaly data for the East Pacific, Atlantic, and West Indian Oceans (red curve) were added to the comparative graph. East Pacific-Atlantic-West Indian Ocean SST anomalies rise and fall from 1981 to 1991, mimicking the variations in NINO3.4 SST anomalies. There was no visible response by the East Pacific-Atlantic-West Indian Ocean SST anomalies to the El Chichon eruption in 1982.
http://i43.tinypic.com/s5jrkl.jpg
Figure 15
A step change in East Pacific-Atlantic-West Indian Ocean SST anomalies occurs during that period as well. Following the 1986/87/88 El Nino, East Pacific-Atlantic-West Indian Ocean SST anomalies react to the subsequent 1988/89 La Nina. Then the East Pacific-Atlantic-West Indian Ocean SST anomalies (red curve) rise in response to the rebound in NINO3.4 SST anomalies until they nearly match the East Indian-West Pacific SST anomalies (black curve), and they remain at that elevated level. That is, prior to the 1986/87/88 El Nino, the mean of the East Pacific-Atlantic-West Indian Ocean SST anomalies (peak to trough) was approximately 0.05 deg C, but after it, the East Pacific-Atlantic-West Indian Ocean SST anomalies remained almost 0.1 deg C higher, with some minor fluctuations. A final note, the East Pacific-Atlantic-West Indian Ocean SST anomalies did not drop in response to the Mount Pinatubo eruption, but it appears Mount Pinatubo limited the rise of the East Pacific-Atlantic-West Indian Ocean SST anomalies to the El Nino. The minor rise in East Pacific-Atlantic-West Indian Ocean SST anomalies (red curve) countered the significant decrease in the East Indian-West Pacific SST anomalies (black curve), each responding to different natural events and making it appear that there was little reaction in the global SST anomalies to the Mount Pinatubo eruption or the El Nino at that time.
In summary, referring to Figure 16, which is the same graph as Figure 3 (Part 1), the step change in global SST anomalies between 1981 and 1995 was in response to the 1986/87/88 El Nino. The volcanic eruptions of 1982 and 1991 suppressed the normal step response to El Nino events at those times.
http://i43.tinypic.com/i74utd.jpg
Figure 16
THE STEP CHANGES FROM 1976 TO 1981
Note: I changed the smoothing to a 5-month running-average filter for this period.
The East Indian-West Pacific SST anomalies and scaled NINO3.4 SST anomalies for the period of January 1976 to December 1981 are illustrated in Figure 17. There was no volcanic activity during the period, so I deleted the Sato Index data. East Indian-West Pacific SST anomalies rose first (eyeballing it, approximately 0.1 deg C) in a lagged response to the first half of the 1976/77/78 El Nino, then rose again (approximately another 0.03 to 0.04 deg C), responding to the second half of that El Nino.
http://i40.tinypic.com/ors18w.jpg
Figure 17
Then the East Indian-West Pacific SST anomalies respond in a way that was in no way typical of their reaction to all other El Nino events. It may not be unusual if we take a closer look at the 1979/80 El Nino, which was unusual on its own. Refer to Figure 18, which is the raw and smoothed NINO3.4 SST anomaly data for the period of January 1976 to November 2008. The 1979/80 El Nino was not a significant El Nino; its NINO3.4 SST anomalies barely rose above the threshold of 0.5 deg C for a few months. It is so minor it does not register as an El Nino event on the ONI Index. It peaked at approximately 0.7 deg C. It also appears as a gradual rise and fall of NINO3.4 SST anomalies, not a sudden spike typical of other El Ninos.
http://i43.tinypic.com/a31ap0.jpg
Figure 18
In Figure 19, the SST anomaly data for the East Pacific, Atlantic, and West Indian Oceans (red curve) were added to the graph. The East Pacific-Atlantic-West Indian Ocean SST anomalies again mimic NINO3.4 SST anomalies, making a specific point at which they acquire an upward step difficult to determine. Note, however, that there are underlying steps in the East Pacific-Atlantic-West Indian Ocean SST anomalies that show themselves in the values at the minimums of its cycles in 1976, 1978, and 1980. In other respects it appears that the East Pacific-Atlantic-West Indian Ocean SST anomalies (red curve) are simply following a “baseline” established by the East Indian-West Pacific SST anomalies (black curve). This could be accomplished by natural ocean-atmospheric heat transfer processes and ocean currents.
http://i39.tinypic.com/mufjth.jpg
Figure 19
Note: The 1976 Pacific Climate Shift also occurred at the start of that period. I illustrated the changes in various SST subsets in that post and the possible influence of the Southern Ocean on the 1976 Pacific Climate Shift.
Figure 20 is a simple recap of the cause of the step change in SST anomalies from 1976 to 1981. It was due primarily to the shift of the SST anomalies in East Indian and West Pacific Oceans in response to the 1976/77/78 El Nino.
http://i41.tinypic.com/2mi0umx.jpg
Figure 20
A CONFIRMING PHENOMENON?
Two of my first three posts on this blog (Is There A Cumulative ENSO Climate Forcing? & Is There a Cumulative ENSO Forcing? Part 2) dealt with a phenomenon I had discovered in the long-term NINO3.4 SST anomalies provided as part of a Trenberth and Stepaniak study. The appropriate citations are included in the posts linked above. That NINO3.4 SST anomaly data is in fact HADSST data and uses 1950 to 1979 as base years. The dataset and base years are critical for the following. One question I can’t answer is why Trenberth and Stepaniak chose 1950 to 1979 as base years, but using those base years helped to create a unique response when a running total of that NINO3.4 SST anomaly data is graphed. Note the shape of the curve in Figure 21.
http://i35.tinypic.com/166wxnk.jpg
Figure 21
(I’ll update that running total graph as soon as I get a chance.) The curve mimics the curve of global temperature anomaly time-series data. The scale is wrong, but the proper coefficient would account for that.
Do the step changes illustrated in this post provide a mechanism for this phenomenon? And does the running total confirm that El Nino events are the primary driver of global temperature?
NON-NINO EVENTS
Figure 22 is a graph of NINO3.4 SST anomaly data from 1976 to 2008 in which I’ve noted El Nino events that were impacted by volcanic eruptions. The questions that came to mind were: What would have happened if El Chichon eruption had NOT been disturbed the heat distribution process of the 1982/83 El Nino? Would the equatorial Pacific have needed all of the additional El Ninos to distribute heat to higher latitudes? The same questions apply to the Mount Pinatubo eruption since it delayed the distribution of equatorial heat another few years.
http://i44.tinypic.com/3442jo9.jpg
Figure 22
HADSST
To check my earlier graphs and to assure that the step changes illustrated in the preceding were not resident in the ERSST.v2 data alone, I plotted the four major datasets again, but this time using HADSST2 data available through the KNMI website. Refer to Figure 23. The same step changes and responses to volcanic eruptions appear in the HADSST data.
http://i43.tinypic.com/24zivjt.jpg
Figure 23
GLOBAL SST
There will be those who will note that I used the word “Global” in numerous graphs in this post when in fact I had used data within the coordinates of 60S to 65N, 180W to 180E, excluding the Arctic and Southern Oceans.
It just seemed more appropriate to me to illustrate datasets within the same longitudes.
And there will be those who believe I was misrepresenting the data or hiding additional warming in the areas I excluded.
Nothing could be more from the truth. But to prove the longitudes had little effect on this discussion, Figure 24 is a comparative graph of the two primary datasets used throughout this post, the East Indian-West Pacific SST anomalies (black curve) and the East Pacific-Atlantic-West Indian Ocean SST anomalies (red curve), compared to GLOBAL [90S to 90N, 180W to 180E] SST anomalies.
http://i44.tinypic.com/65tisz.jpg
Figure 24
CLOSING
In summary, step changes in global SST (and global surface temperature) result from El Nino events because warm water that was once below the surface of the Pacific Warm Pool (and not part of the instrument temperature record) is driven to the surface and eventually returned to the surface of the East Indian and West Pacific Oceans (making it a significant part of the instrument temperature record). The other major point of this post was that the heat distribution associated with El Nino events did not occur for all of El Ninos since 1976. The El Chichon and Mount Pinatubo explosive volcanic eruptions suppressed the heat distribution of the 1982/83, the 1991/92, the 1993, and possibly the 1994/95 ENSO events.
SOURCES
Smith and Reynolds Extended Reconstructed SST Sea Surface Temperature Data (ERSST.v2) is available through the NOAA National Operational Model Archive & Distribution System (NOMADS).
http://nomads.ncdc.noaa.gov/#climatencdc
It is also available through the KNMI webpage listed below.
The Sato Index Data is available from GISS at:
http://data.giss.nasa.gov/modelforce/strataer/
Specifically:
http://data.giss.nasa.gov/modelforce/strataer/tau_line.txt
The HADSST data is available through the KNMI Climate Explorer website. http://climexp.knmi.nl/selectfield_obs.cgi?someone@somewhere
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George: Thanks for the thought-provoking response, which I will consider more thoroughly when I have the time… research, kids, teaching, admin… aaaagh!
Bob
Very interesting stuff which I will have to wade through a few times to get the complete idea.
A question:
On graph 15 for example the red title says:
West Pacific- Atlantic-East Indian SST……
and the text says:
East Pacific, Atlantic, and West Indian Oceans (red curve)
I’m confused by this (nobody else seems confused!!). Am I missing something? (It is the same on your web site)
Stephen Wilde seems surprised at how quickly the atmosphere reacts to solar input compared to the oceans, but the answer seems clear: The atmosphere weighs a lot less than the oceans. It therefore heats up quicker, and cools down quicker. A cooler atmosphere is going to suck dissipated heat from the ocean quicker too.
Bob has shown us a mechanism at work. The heat was hiding away from our thermometers, already stored in the ocean from years ago. It’s very sensible that he sticks to elucidating the data and doesn’t speculate on the source. Others can pick up the football and run with it.
Personally, I think the sun provides it, the atmosphere transmits most of it in, the oceans store it, the weather releases and dissipates it, and the atmosphere transmits it out again. Bob’s patient and careful work has found the big battery which stores it away from our sst and land and satellite measurements.
The IPCC attributes 0.1C to solar over the C20th. This will be because they weren’t measuring the increase in the Pacific Warm Pool, and correlating it to the heightened C20th solar cycles.
The further ramification of this revelation is that changes in cloud albedo would only have to be small globally, and a bit larger in the region of the PWP to have a profound feedback effect on the earth’s energy balance.
Maybe the next thing to look at is how much of the heat in the warm pool is insolated locally, and how much arrives by eddying out of passing currents coming from far away.
Bill Illis,
Thanks for the solar link. I hadn’t seen that one before but a 0.1C solar effect out of a total change in temperature over the period of 0.7C suits my ideas just fine.
It gives an adequate background trend over which one can overlay the oceanic effects detailed in Bob’s work. It is also not a lot more as a proportion of total observed warming than Leif conceded. He suggested a maximum solar contribution of 10% but, hey, we are all guessing at this stage.
It would be useful to know the scale of the average oceanic amplification or suppression of any background solar signal. As a first guess I’ve suggested elsewhere that a multiple of 5 times either way would explain all observed temperature trends without involving any CO2 effect.
One further thought: does anyone know how much volcanic activity there is on the ocean floor below the pacific warm pool, and how much energy it releases into the ocean above it? Do we know from basic principles whether it is lots of orders of magnitude less than the amount of energy being dissipated via the mechanism Bob has identified?
Steve Hempell: You wrote, “On graph 15 for example the red title says:
West Pacific- Atlantic-East Indian SST……
and the text says:
East Pacific, Atlantic, and West Indian Oceans (red curve)”
Steve, THANK YOU for finding those typos. And, of course, since I cut and pasted the titles, the error on one got transferred to all. The text in the post (East Pacific-Atlantic-West Indian Ocean) is correct, the coordinates in the graph title (60S-65N, 180-80E) are correct, and most importantly the data for the datasets are correct, but the titles for the “Red Curves” in those 6 graphs, unfortunately, are wrong. They should read “East Pacific-Atlantic-West Indian Ocean”. Then I repeated the error in the supplemental graphs.
I am making the corrections now.
Thanks again.
Bob: you’re wellcome.
Feel free to mail if you wanto to talk about it (WUWT is fully authorised to disclose my mail to you)
Am I missing something? Bob’s post is titled: Can El Nino Events Explain All of the Global Warming Since 1976? Then he goes into great depth to discuss the sea surface temperatures of the oceans (11 SST graphs in total), the heat distribution and the suppression of the effects by volcanic eruptions.
But nowhere he makes the link to the global temperature record, which after all includes land surface temperatures as well. He doesn’t show any global surface temperature anomaly graph. Only in his closing remarks he mentions out of the blue between brackets: (“and global surface temperature”). He also concludes that El Nino events are the result of “warm water that was once below the surface of the Pacific Warm Pool (and not part of the instrument temperature record) is driven to the surface and eventually returned to the surface of the East Indian and West Pacific Oceans (making it a significant part of the instrument temperature record).”
Sure, when that happens SST increase. But the more fundamental question is: What is the origin of the heat content of that warm water and WHY is it there in the first place and WHEN and from WHERE was that heat added to the oceans? During the warming period between 1910 and 1945 or more recently or centuries ago? One would expect the heat content in the oceans to increase during an extended period of increased radiation (in a period of less cloudiness and/or increase TSI).
We don’t want to fall into the trap of the chicken and the egg. One could try to explain the universe (Global warming) as an act of God (ENSO) but that only begs the more fundamental question, ad infinitum, of who or what created God.
I can only conclude that there is a disconnect between his closing statement and the title of his post.
Don’t get me wrong, I liked the effort he made to explain the temporal and areal SST distributions during El Nino’s.
Chris Schoneveld,
Normally one would expect the heat content in the oceans to decrease during a period of warm SST because more heat is being released to the atmosphere BUT it depends on the amount of incoming solar radiation at the time.
During the period 1975 to 2000 total heat content seems to have increased DESPITE repeated strong El Nino events. It is a question of balance between the two at any given time.
The reason could have been that because solar input was at a historically high level it was still putting in more energy than the oceans were releasing.
That still begs the question about time lags within the ocean but that will have to be resolved elsewhere.
Chris Schoneveld, you wrote, “But nowhere he makes the link to the global temperature record, which after all includes land surface temperatures as well.”
The second part of this post was written on Sunday. In its first draft, I included a closing paragraph about global combined (LST+SST) surface temperature, but felt it was an opening for off-topic discussions, so I deleted it. By that time, the first part of the post had already been on-line at my website for a day and was already receiving above normal activity, about five times my normal hits for a Sunday. I didn’t feel it appropriate to go back and change the title.
Regarding the rest of your comment, the intent of a blog post is to spark discussion. This one has and much of it has remained on-topic. If you were to scroll up through the comments, you’d find that many of the points you raised, other than the philosophical, have already been covered.
Bob,
I have to admit, due to time constraints, I didn’t read through all the comments.
Stephen Wilde (01:23:12) :
It is also not a lot more as a proportion of total observed warming than Leif conceded. He suggested a maximum solar contribution of 10%
Not quite. I said that I would not quibble with that number, although I do think it is too high. As long as it is that low, it can be neglected and why bother or quibble with negligible quantities?
I found Bob’s paper very thought provoking. As a mechanism for storing and redistributing energy it looks very plausible, and his graph 21 does tend to convince me that at least the medium term pattern of air temperatures is largely governed by ocean effects. Whether this is a direct effect (the sea warming the air) or the warm sea’s affect on cloud cover (which also seems to be correlated) I guess we will find out later. However, as others have pointed out, it does not, in itself, challenge the anthropogenic warming theory. His paper confirms that there has been warming this century; the question is what has caused this increase. Whilst the absence of the Mann “hockey stick” in the sea anomaly tends to suggest that the rate of warming has not been increasing as the climate models predicted, it does not address the question of why there is a positive energy balance for most of the last century. However in a later Blog Bob stated that paleoclimatological data suggests that the current warm pool temperature is within the normal range of the last millennium so it could be argued that the current trend is just a rebound from the little ice age.
What is new for me is the amount of energy that can be stored in this way. I have long been perplexed by the pattern of ice ages, where it has been said that interglacial periods correlate with peak insolation in the northern hemisphere. I have always been sceptical of this because insolation should be correlated with the rate of increase of temperature. However if one looks carefully one can see the temperature has often risen rapidly at a point when the insolation is barely past its minimum. On the other hand the recent paper by Salamatin et al uses the Milankovich cycles to indirectly calibrate Vostok ice cores. The approach assumes the correlation of insolation and temperature (in the Antarctic at least) so one cannot say it proves anything directly, but their results cross reference to other proxies suggesting that this assumption is correct. This made me think that the interglacial periods started with warming in the Southern hemisphere. I found this more plausible since it appears to me that the southern hemisphere is capable of absorbing more of the sun’s energy than the north. The reason for this is two fold. Firstly the albedo of the sea is very low so more energy is absorbed rather than reflected, and the southern hemisphere has more sea. Secondly energy absorbed by land results in a large temperature increase. For example much of the land at tropical latitudes is desert. These are not only highly reflective but also very hot, compared with the sea at the same latitude. In fact the temperature has to increase until there is sufficient energy reradiated to balance the incoming energy. The same is true for the sea except that, particularly at high sea ice cover, we have the possibility of energy being removed to melt ice and to form these warm pools. This means that more of the energy is retained. Until I read Bob’s paper I could only surmise how the particular Milankovich cycles which increased the relative length of the southern hemisphere summer might melt the ice in the southern hemisphere. What I could not fathom was how one achieved the bounce back to high temperatures in the North; the warm pools seem to provide this mechanism. It might also explain why these interglacial periods are so short (typically less than the 10000 years we have currently enjoyed). Although the warm pools are huge they are finite. Once the southern hemisphere starts cooling again (as it is now!) we are only left with what has been stored in the sea before the next cold cycle begins. I’m going out to buy a big coat.
By the way the energy balance at the ocean surface would appear to me to be exremely difficult to estimate. Does anyone know how the climate models handle this? As far as the weather goes I guess it does not matter why the sea is particular temperature but for long term climate trends one needs to know if energy is being used to melt ice or is being stored in warm pools.
“” Stephen Wilde (01:23:12) :
Bill Illis,
Thanks for the solar link. I hadn’t seen that one before but a 0.1C solar effect out of a total change in temperature over the period of 0.7C suits my ideas just fine.
It gives an adequate background trend over which one can overlay the oceanic effects detailed in Bob’s work. It is also not a lot more as a proportion of total observed warming than Leif conceded. He suggested a maximum solar contribution of 10% but, hey, we are all guessing at this stage.
>>>It would be useful to know the scale of the average oceanic amplification or suppression of any background solar signal. As a first guess I’ve suggested elsewhere that a multiple of 5 times either way would explain all observed temperature trends without involving any CO2 effect.<<< ""
Stephen, not sure I can decipher which of the above is yours and which is Bill’s.
It seems to me that there is a good deal of confusion surrounding "solar effects".
Before the space age, there wasn’t much very good "solar constant" data, and accurate measurments were done so infrequently that watching solar variability, as far as solar constant is concerned was not a favorite passtime.
But now we have some pretty good data over about three complete sunspot cycles, from satellites, and unfortunately not all from the same satellite; but that data is good enough to show a very clear cyclic variation in solar output thoughout a sunspot cycle. To me those plots look sort of scalloped like a cycloidal curve, which one can visualize as approximating a sine wave with a second harmonic component, which sharpens the maximum and flattens the minimum. It might also be just a shallow version of the sunspot numbers graph.
Leif explains that the cooler susnpots are surrounded by a brighter halo which evidently is the source of the extra radiation; and that sounds fine to me.
But the problem I see is that this small 0.1% or thereabouts peak to peak change in the observed solar constant, is just a red herring.
I believe it is a mistake to look to this effect; real as it is, as somehow being a cause of earth climate change, as a result of some "amplification" caused by who knows what here on earth.
Suppose that all of the changes that are observed on the sun over a solar cycle took place as they do, BUT the total solar emittance and observed solar constant remained exactly constant. So I just eliminated that 0.1% cyclic change in the soalr constant. NOTHING ELSE WAS CHANGED.
If that were to happen, I don’t believe we would discern any change in what the earth climate has been doing. That 0.1% variation in solar constant is having no real effect here on earth.
The effect of the sun on our climate; other than the minor fact that solar energy causes it all; relates more to the magnetic changes, the charged particle changes; the effect on cosmic ray trajectories; the solar "shockwave that surrounds us or whatever they want to call that.
Those are the things that modify our climate through variations in cloud cover and cloud distribution around the planet.
The AGW crowd take great pleasure in dismissing the small variability (of the solar constant) as too puny to affect our climate.
I AGREE WITH THEM COMPLETELY. So let’s ignore that 0.1% change; that is simply a smokescreen that diverts our attention away from what is really happening which is all the magnetic effects and the effects of and on cosmic rays.
Henrik Svensmark’s hypothesis does not rest on that very small solar constant variation; his thesis is quite intact even with zero variation in the solar constant.
I first got turned on to the solar effects in reading Willie Soon’s nifty book.
"The Maunder Minimum and the Variable Sun-Earth Connection." Willie Wei-Hock Soon and Steven H. Yaskell. I think Yaskell is a ghost writer. I’ve exchanged a number of e-mails in the past with Dr Soon, and his written English is not Shakespearian, so I can understand why he might collaborate with a writer.
So I don’t think we should be looking for amplifiers of the small solar cycle change in solar constant; that isn’t the target, except for the AGW fans.
It is in other ways that the sun is messing with us, and those effects are not insignificant.
George
Leif Svalgaard (10:33:31) :
Stephen Wilde (01:23:12) :
It is also not a lot more as a proportion of total observed warming than Leif conceded. He suggested a maximum solar contribution of 10%
Not quite. I said that I would not quibble with that number, although I do think it is too high. As long as it is that low, it can be neglected and why bother or quibble with negligible quantities?
Because it is not so negligible if producing a cumulative effect over a period of,say, 400 years (since the LIA) and can provide a slow background trend overlaid by various amplification or suppression processes.
Hi Bob,
Thanks for your response, even though you did not respond to the question. I understand why you didn’t. I know a few “deniers” and all of their arguements fall apart when asked “Why wouldn’t it be prudent, considering the possible consequences, to error on the side of caution, when it comes to global warming?” The reason is that there is no rational response for this question.
Now we can argue for years on who is right on the global warming issue, but no one can rationally argue that it is not rational to error on the side of caution with something as potentially devastating as this.
Thanks anyway,
Roger from Loveland
Roger from Loveland: Regarding your redundant comment of 11:33:43, thanks again for failing to notice that your original comment had nothing to do with my post. I noted that in my first response to you. There is no agenda associated with my post, other than illustrating a process that has not been discussed previously, or if it has, has not been put into terms that most people would understand. If you feel your cause, whatever it is (you have not actually stated it), has been threatened by my post, that is something you must come to terms with, not me.
Have a nice day.
Stephen Wilde (11:25:54) :
Because it is not so negligible if producing a cumulative effect over a period of,say, 400 years (since the LIA) and can provide a slow background trend overlaid by various amplification or suppression processes.
Like the cumulative effect of the Sun shining every day since the LIA?
Cal, much of your comment is outside the scope of my post, so I’ll only comment on two specific sentences that do pertain to it.
You wrote, “However, as others have pointed out, it does not, in itself, challenge the anthropogenic warming theory.”
Cal, I read the comments above and I can’t recall one that stated or implied that. Our interpretations of what was written must differ. I did illustrate in this post that the effects of individual El Nino events are not simply a lagged blip in the global temperature anomaly curve. They create steps in the SST of a significant portion of the global sea surface, and that those steps are not impacted to any great extent by a subsequent La Nina. In other words, the global response to El Ninos and La Ninas over that period was not the same.
You also wrote, “His paper confirms that there has been warming this century; the question is what has caused this increase.”
My post dealt with the period from 1976 to present, not this century or the 20th. It illustrated as noted many times above that the increasing steps in SST since 1976 are the aftereffects of the significant El Nino events that were not impacted by volcanic eruptions.
George E. Smith (11:10:09) :
what is really happening which is all the magnetic effects and the effects of and on cosmic rays.
Henrik Svensmark’s hypothesis does not rest on that very small solar constant variation; his thesis is quite intact even with zero variation in the solar constant.
The cosmic ray hypothesis posits that in the end, the albedo must show a solar cycle effect. Only trouble is that it does not. The albedo has been decreasing since 1984 to 1999, then increasing [or flat] since: Figure 2 of http://www.leif.org/research/Palle_Earthshine_2008.pdf
The cosmic ray flux has been constant since at least 1952 except for the cyclic 11-year changes. The solar magnetic field [as observed in space – either by a craft or by the Earth] has been constant since at least 1830s except for the cyclic 11-year changes. The Ca II K-line chromospheric flux [that outlines the magnetic network on the Sun] has been constant since 1915 except for the cyclic 11-year changes. The spicule ‘forest’ seen at the limb during eclipses in 1706 and 1716 is consistent with reports of a persistent photospheric field throughout the Maunder Minimum from analyses of 10Be radioisotopes. All recent evidence point to a baseline solar magnetic [and therefore also TSI] level with no long-term change, superposed on which the 11-year cyclic changes ride.
Leif says, in responding to something Stephen Wilde said:
Heh, nothing like three orders of magnitude (I think) to put things in perspective.
Two or three watts/cm2 seems to be unlikely to have much effect. Even 10 W/cm2 seems to leave two orders of magnitude difference.
Has anyone made any mention of this phenomenon during the life of WUWT? I notice there it is in the abbreviations when doing a search but found no mention within articles. Maybe I am doing something wrong :-0
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Madden-Julian_oscillation
The Madden-Julian Oscillation (MJO) is an equatorial traveling pattern of anomalous rainfall that is planetary in scale. The mechanism and cause of the MJO is as yet not well-understood and is a subject of ongoing study.
The MJO is characterized by an eastward progression of large regions of both enhanced and suppressed tropical rainfall, observed mainly over the Indian Ocean and Pacific Ocean. The anomalous rainfall is usually first evident over the western Indian Ocean, and remains evident as it propagates over the very warm ocean waters of the western and central tropical Pacific. This pattern of tropical rainfall then generally becomes very nondescript as it moves over the cooler ocean waters of the eastern Pacific but reappears over the tropical Atlantic and Indian Ocean. The wet phase of enhanced convection and precipitation is followed by a dry phase where convection is suppressed. Each cycle lasts approximately 30-60 days
http://www.apsru.gov.au/mjo/index.asp
The Madden-Julian Oscillation (MJO), also known as the 40-day wave, is a large scale oscillation (wave) in the equatorial region. The MJO originates over the Indian Ocean and travels east at 800 km per day (10m/s).
It is monitored and reported here – http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/precip/CWlink/MJO/mjoupdate.pdf
The MJO is expected to contribute to dry conditions for northeast Brazil and decrease
rainfall seen in recent weeks associated with La Nina across portions of Indonesia.
Above-average rainfall is also expected in vicinity of the South Pacific Islands along with an increased threat for tropical cyclogenesis in the Southwest Pacific.
We have seen the effect in NW QLD where a monsoonal trough has given the area a good soaking recently. Fiji was a bit wet too!
Keep yer mojo workin’
Leif Svalgaard (13:07:42) :
Stephen Wilde (11:25:54) :
Because it is not so negligible if producing a cumulative effect over a period of,say, 400 years (since the LIA) and can provide a slow background trend overlaid by various amplification or suppression processes.
Like the cumulative effect of the Sun shining every day since the LIA?
You overlook the variable storage capability of the oceans.
A small increase in solar activity over time would eventually result in a larger energy store in the oceans.
The daily sunshine and the commencement of the period just provides the initial base level.
Atmospheric temperature is a reflection of ocean temperaure. It all comes from the sun in the first instance. More from the sun means more in the oceans.
George E Smith
Actually I agree with you completely. I just got diverted by Leif’s points and tried to deal with them in isolation.
In my articles I do say more than once that I am not happy with TSI as the sole indicator of the sun’s effect on our climate. I am sure more than just TSI is involved but TSI is a useful proxy for the level of solar activity generally because even with the recent amended TSI numbers going back to 1600 it is clear that the sun is more active than it was then however slightly and an effect of some sort on climate seems to me to be irrefutable from historical records even if the fit is not perfect.
If Bill Illis provides evidence that the sun contributed 0.1C from a rise of 0.7C then that is good enough (in my mind) to explain observed warming when one combines sun with ocean cycles.
The issue may well be one of sensitivity rather than the absolute level of TSI variation and it may well be something other than simply TSI which has the effect.
Whatever the truth it is not a CO2 issue and the science is not settled.
I know a few “deniers” and all of their arguements fall apart when asked “Why wouldn’t it be prudent, considering the possible consequences, to error on the side of caution, when it comes to global warming?” The reason is that there is no rational response for this question.
Oh, well, I can think of one “rational response”, which in fact is based upon your own “Precautionary Principle’s” logic. That is, you must apply the Precautionary Principle to your own Precautions.
I had already learned this way of thinking at least by the time I was 6. So why are we still having to deal with you?