UPDATE#2 I finally found a graph from Professor Akasofu that goes with the text of his essay below. I’ve added it above. You can read more about Akasofu’s views on climate in this PDF document here. (Warning: LARGE 50 megabyte file, long download) The two previous graphs used are in links below.
UPDATE: Originally I posted a graph from Roger Pielke Jr. see here via Lucia at the Blackboard because it was somewhat related and I wanted to give her some traffic. As luck would have it, few people followed the link to see what it was all about, preferring to question the graph in the context of the article below. So, I’ve replaced it with one from another article of hers that should not generate as many questions. Or will it? 😉 – Anthony
THE IPCC’S FAILURE OF PREDICTING THE TEMPERATURE CHANGE DURING THE FIRST DECADE
Syun Akasofu
International Arctic Research Center
University of Alaska Fairbanks
Fairbanks, AK 99775-7340
The global average temperature stopped increasing after 2000 against the IPCC’s prediction of continued rapid increase. It is a plain fact and does not require any pretext. Their failure stems from the fact that the IPCC emphasized the greenhouse effect of CO2 by slighting the natural causes of temperature changes.
The changes of the global average temperature during the last century and the first decade of the present century can mostly be explained by two natural causes, a linear increase which began in about 1800 and the multi-decadal oscillation superposed on the linear increase. There is not much need for introducing the CO2 effect in the temperature changes. The linear increase is the recovery (warming) from the Little Ice Age (LIA), which the earth experienced from about 1400 to 1800.
The halting of the temperature rise during the first decade of the present century can naturally be explained by the fact that the linear increase has been overwhelmed by the superposed multi-decadal oscillation which peaked in about 2000.*
This situation is very similar to the multi-decadal temperature decrease from 1940 to 1975 after the rise from 1910 to 1940 (in spite of the fact that CO2 increased rapidly after 1946); it was predicted at that time that a new Big Ice Age was on its way.
The IPCC seems to imply that the halting is a temporary one. However, they cannot give the reason. Several recent trends, including the phase of the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (PDO), the halting of sea level increase, and the cooling of the Arctic Ocean, indicate that the halting is likely to be due to the multi-decadal change.
The high temperatures predicted by the IPCC in 2100 (+2~6°C) are simply an extension of the observed increase from 1975 to 2000, which was caused mainly by the multi-decadal oscillation. The Global Climate Models (GCMs) are programmed to reproduce the observed increase from 1975 to 2000 in terms of the CO2 effect and to extend the reproduced curve to 2100.
It is advised that the IPCC recognize at least the failure of their prediction even during the first decade of the present century; a prediction is supposed to become less accurate for the longer future.
For details, see http://people.iarc.uaf.edu/~sakasofu
* The linear increase has a rate of ~ +0.5°C/100 years, while the multi-decadal oscillation has an amplitude of ~0.2°C and period of ~ 50-60 years, thus the change in 10 years is about ~ -0.07°C from the peak, while the linear change is about ~ +0.05°C.
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“foinavon (15:54:23) : Dr. Akasofu is asserting stuff that doesn’t accord with the scientific data.”
I don’t see assertions from Syun Akasofu. He is presenting data. He is not ‘asserting stuff’. He also presents known variability. You claim he does not. You claim he ‘asserting stuff’.
What is the ‘stuff’ you think he is ‘asserting’?
BTW, I have debated people just like you for almost two years. What usually happens when ask this kind of a question is I get answers like “the literature is unanimous in AGW”, “there is a consensus”, “the science of anthropogenic warming is well know”, etc.
Please do not give answers like this as they would not be answering the question I asked.
I want to know the specifics on the ‘stuff’ you see Syun Akasofu presenting and how it is not science.
Chris V. (21:19:47) :
Re “Heat in the Pipeline”
I’ll repeat- there is no heat “hiding” in the ocean, waiting to unleash itself on the atmosphere. Nobody is saying there is.
The ocean is a big heat sink, that absorbs heat very slowly. So some of the energy that would otherwise be warming the atmosphere is going into the ocean.
You don’t have to agree with this idea (if you don’t believe that the specific heat and mixing time for the ocean are much greater than for the atmosphere, then go for it!) but that’s what Hansen et al are referring to when they say there is more “heating in the pipeline”.
—–
OK. ??? So there is a constant level of “heat in the pipeline” – according to Hansen (who would never lie for the sake of his cause or his funding or his power or his influence – nor call for others to lie or destroy things for the sake of his cause.
So, from 1900 until 1940, while CO2 didn’t increase and temperatures increased 3/10 of one degree, all this heat “in the pipeline” went towards heating the atmosphere (and ocean temperatures/levels/currents/etc anything else did not measureably change.)
And, from 1940 until 1972, while CO2 increased steadily and temperatures declined 4/10 of one degree, all this heat “in the pipeline” went towards heating the oceans (and ocean temperatures did not measureably change.)
And, from 1972 until 1998, while CO2 increased steadily and temperatures increased 1/2 of one degree, all this heat “in the pipeline” went towards heating the atmosphere (and ocean temperatures did not measureably change.)
And, from 1998 until 2009, while CO2 increased steadily and temperatures declined 2/10 of one degree, all this heat “in the pipeline” went towards heating the oceans (and ocean temperatures did not measureably change..)
And …..
So – now everybody who has a stake in wanting a part of that three trillion in energy taxes is claiming that – for some reason – all this “heat in the pipeline” is going to “go into the oceans” for the next 20 – 30 years – then (for some unexplained reason) “global warming is coming back with a vengeance” ….. At (just by coincidence of course – because Hansen would never lie or call for anyone to lie or commit crimes in support of his beliefs or change old temperature data that didn’t support his beliefs) just about the same time and the same cyclical pattern that the PDO and AMO and the sun follows, the ole global warming “heat in the pipeline” is going to flip-flop (for some some mysterious reason) and the temperatures and the CO2 are both going to increase.
What pipeline? Where is the pipeline? What is the pipeline? How is it measured? How the energy exchange flip-flopping from one direction to the other – without being able to be measured by anything? Why is the “pipeline” energy exchange flip-flopping? This “pipeline” Hansen believes in is large enough that it is changing the temperatures and water and soil over the entire globe (and Venus, and Mars, and Jupiter, and Saturn, and even Pluto and Charon) – and it is changing direction every 33 years – but it cannot be measured nor defined.
Other than as a “pipeline” that changes direction every 33 years ….. While CO2 either increases, or decreases, or stays the same, Hansen’s ole “pipeline” somehow just keeps on flip-flopping every 33 years.
If the flip-flopping energy exchange IS the PDO and the AMO and the other ocean currents, then why is Hansen worried about CO2 levels – by HIS “measurements” THEY have no measureable effect – except on Hansen’s funding, his travels, his interviews with the media, his influence over government, his power over international policy, his ability to kill innocents from poverty – poor food, endless work, and unaffordable housing, food, water, and medical care.
The only thing I see flip-flopping is the sun – and Hansen doesn’t want to believe the inconvenient truth that the sun is flip-flopping! It would be an inconvenient truth if the sun were flip-flopping every 33 years wouldn’t it? Because, if the sun were flip-flopping every 33 years – or every 950 years – or in any other cyclical pattern it would be an inconvenient interruption in his power, influence, and belief system wouldn’t it?
Devastating. Will it even phase those who wish to control us through manufactured crises? Doubtful.
Personally, I am getting a bit tired of statements like “energy imbalance” or “equilibrium”. Folks, we are talking about weather and climate here, there is NO such thing as an “energy balance” or an “equilibrium”, never has been, never will be! Man, I’m tired of reading such stupidity.
FatBigot (11:19:59) wrote:
“I’m somewhat befuddled by the concept of “recovering” from the Little Ice Age, what on earth does that mean? Are we not dealing with purely physical processes which require a cause as well as an effect? What caused the LIA to end and the earth to warm thereafter? It didn’t just happen by magic.”
Here’s an uneducated guess: If the (unknown) cause of the LIA were removed, then the earth would recover to its normal temperature not instantaneously, but over many centuries, as the oceans gradually warmed and glaciers retreated. The cool oceans would act as a drag on the recovery, IOW.
Anthony
Just a suggestion, but when you update a blog like you have done here, with a new graph, could you include the date & time you did the update in the update message below the new graph. If you did that, it would be possible for readers to go straight to comments that relate to the updated graph, rather than having to sift through all the messages, looking for where the current start. Thanks
foinavon (10:50:33) wrote:
“There isn’t a LIA “linear” recovery trend. It’s difficult to understand why Dr. Akasofu would suggest such an odd notion. Although the temperature record is sparse through the 19th century, the data indicates that the earth had “recovered” from the LIA by the mid 19th century so that the period from 1850 – 1900 was pretty flat temperature-wise.”
See Akasofu’s article on the recovery from the Little Ice Age, here:
http://people.iarc.uaf.edu/~sakasofu/little_ice_age.php
All I see in the CC debate is obsessive scientists acting like young students to fit curves and lines to dodgy data to match it to the conclusion that they’ve already reached. All I see in the data is variation of temperature over time with or without CO2 and not a shred of evidence anywhere showing that we are at risk of catastrophe due to increasing CO2 levels in the atmosphere. The hockey stick effect that would insupport this would appear to be absolutely discredited now. All I see is ant [snip] of trivia and the gross misinterpretation of the big picture. I am far more impressed by the views of the more independent who show that the AGW theory is nothing more than that, that CO2 may not even be a greenhouse gas or that our understanding of how greenhouse gases work in such a complex environment is very sketchy.
Unfortunately though I realise that the issue is politicised and there will be no changing of minds. I have written to my MP and the response bore that out.
foinavon
You asked me for some cites re the MWP. When you have read those below I have several hundred more over at the thread I ran on Climate audit I can point you to.
I can also walk you through the climate references of the Byzantine empire AD 380 to 1453 and we can go into much more details on the Roman warm period (the western empire of course not the eastern one centred on Constantinople) (with thanks also to Max).
Loehle + McCulloch (2008): “The mean series shows the Medieval Warm Period (MWP) and Little Ice Age (LIA) quite clearly, with the MWP being approximately 0.3°C warmer than 20th century values at these eighteen sites.”
Both Loehle and Moberg show a distinct MWP, followed by a LIA; Moberg shows medieval temperatures “similar” to those of today while Loehle shows these to be slightly higher than today.
On his ClimateAudit site Steve McIntyre has made an interesting comparison of Loehle’s methods and findings with those of Moberg.
http://www.climateaudit.org/?p=2403
Soon + Baliunas (2003): “A review of more than 200 climate studies led by researchers at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics has determined that the 20th century is neither the warmest century nor the century with the most extreme weather of the past 1000 years. The review also confirmed that the Medieval Warm Period of 800 to 1300 A.D. and the Little Ice Age of 1300 to 1900 A.D. were worldwide phenomena not limited to the European and North American continents. While 20th century temperatures are much higher than in the Little Ice Age period, many parts of the world show the medieval warmth to be greater than that of the 20th century.”
A few other studies showing a MWP warmer than today in various parts of the world:
Bartholy et al. (2004) – Hungary
Blundell + Barber (2005) – Scotland
Chuine et al. (2004) – France
Dahl-Jensen et al. (1998) – Greenland
Esper et al. (2002) – Pakistan, Kirghistan
Fleitman et al. (2004) – Oman
Gray et al. (2004) – North America, Europe Middle East
Holmgren et al. (2001) – South Africa
Hu et al. (2001) – Alaska
Kitagawa and Matsumoto (1998) – Japan
Luckman + Wilson (2005) – Canada
Munroe (2003) – North America
Yadav + Singh (2002) – India
Yang et al. (2002) – China
Zhang et al. (1998) – China
How the climate cooled and hastened the collapse of the Western Roman empire is also interesting. Fancy walking Hanibals route over the Alps with me?
Tonyb
Now I’m schocked!
The initial figures were showing projections of the IPCC from 1990, 1995, 2000 till today. The graphs were showing a quite good agreement between the projections and temperatures (as has been noted). Now what do I see?
The figure has now been changed… The new one is using a projected rate for the 2000-2100 period and magically displaces it to the 1980-2008 period to show that it is not “correct”? What is the point in using a projection for the future to model the past?
REPLY: The original graph is linked right below it. Here is the reason I changed graphs. In the original graph, some people were confusing part B (sea level) with temperature and drawing erroneous conclusions from that instead of following the link and reading about it. You yourself apparently missed it too, referring only to temperature in your posts. – Anthony
Vibenna wrote:
“I think that is the key challenge for climate skeptics – what is the cause of this ‘natural warming trend’. There is a competing causal explanation being offered – to knock it down, you need to offer something with genuinely explanatory and predictive power.”
The earth could just wobble naturally, without being pushed, due to its internal delayed reactions and feedback loops and heat sinks, etc. Along this line, Richard S. Courtney wrote (within the past week in a thread not yet cataloged by Google):
“The climate system is seeking an equilibrium that it never achieves. The Earth obtains radiant energy from the Sun and radiates that energy back to space. The energy input to the system (from the Sun) may be constant (although some doubt that), but the rotation of the Earth and its orbit around the Sun ensure that the energy input/output is never in perfect equilibrium.
“The climate system is an intermediary in the process of returning (most of) the energy to space (some energy is radiated from the Earth’s surface back to space). And the Northern and Southern hemispheres have different coverage by oceans. Therefore, as the year progresses the modulation of the energy input/output of the system varies. Hence, the system is always seeking equilibrium but never achieves it.
“Such a varying system could be expected to exhibit oscillatory behaviour. And, importantly, the length of the oscillations could be harmonic effects which, therefore, have periodicity of several years. Of course, such harmonic oscillation would be a process that – at least in principle – is capable of evaluation.
“However, there may be no process because the climate is a chaotic system. Therefore, the observed oscillations (ENSO, NAO, etc.) could be observation of the system seeking its chaotic attractor(s) in response to its seeking equilibrium in a changing situation.”
Ummm the Huang et al paper ends with the following:-
“The reconstructions show the temperatures of the mid-
Holocene warm period some 1–2 K above the reference
level, the maximum of the MWP at or slightly below the
reference level, the minimum of the LIA about 1 K below
the reference level, and end-of-20th century temperatures
about 0.5 K above the reference level. All of these amplitude
estimates are, as with the timing of these episodes,
generally consistent with amplitudes estimated from other
climate proxies as summarized by Intergovernmental Panel
on Climate Change [2007].”
So if my tags worked then the bold type indicates the authors believe the MWP was indeed warmer than present.
Paul S. wrote:
“All in all, I think these papers have been chosen to defend a tenable position.”
Didn’t you mean “untenable”?
I’ve replaced it with one from another article of hers that should not generate as many questions. Or will it? 😉 – Anthony
Who’s monkcton? 🙂
in any of these pictures, the match between data and trend depends a lot on the starting point in x (=time) AND y (=temperatures) coordinates.
i would rather just try to find data intervalls where the slope given by the ipcc matches the trend in measured data. the only period that supports this trend was approx. between 1993-2002.
any other and particularly any longer period does not support this high trend.
data after 2002 also strongly refutes the ipcc trend.
(all comments under the (false) assumption, that there is a linear trend, as projected by the ipcc)
John Philip wrote:
“Dr Akasofu has no academic credentials or publications whatsoever in the field of climate science.”
Well, he’s a professor of geophysics, which impinges on climatology (a fledgling science that is too big for its britches and could do with some cross-disciplinary input). His books (and presumably also his papers) deal with the northern lights, the solar wind, the magnetosphere, and the troposphere. (Here’s the Amazon link to his titles: http://www.amazon.com/s/qid=1237628312/ref=sr_pg_1?ie=UTF8&rs=1000&sort=relevancerank&unfiltered=1&rh=i%3Astripbooks%2Cp_27%3AAkasofu&page=1 .) So he’s not “off the reservation” the way he would be if he were a microbiologist or something. He’s been dealing with the sky and its layers.
Here’s more about him, from an extract from his home page at http://people.iarc.uaf.edu/~sakasofu/
Dr. Syun-Ichi Akasofu, IARC Founding Director and Professor of Physics, Emeritus, was the the director of the International Arctic Research Center of the University of Alaska Fairbanks from its establishment in 1998 until January of 2007. … He has been professor of geophysics since 1964. Dr. Akasofu has published more than 550 professional journal articles, authored and co-authored 10 books and has been the invited author of many encyclopedia articles. …
Dr. Akasofu’s auroral work has earned national and international recognition. … [A long list of awards and honors follows.]
As Director of the Geophysical Institute (1986-1999), Dr. Akasofu concentrated his effort on establishing the institute as a key research center in the Arctic. … Upon his retirement in 2007, the University of Alaska Board of Regents officially named the building that houses the International Arctic Research Center the “Syun-Ichi Akasofu Building” in recognition of “his tireless vision and dedicated service to the university, the state, and country in advancing arctic science.”
Probably been posted. Probably most significant data to kill AGW just hot off the press!Graig Loehle shows the acean buoys were right after all and boosted from more rcent dat OCEANS ARE COOLING since 2003
http://jennifermarohasy.com/blog/2009/03/the-ocean-really-is-cooling/
Going right back to Akasofu’s subject, he talks about (1) a linear increase in temperature since 1800 and (2) decadal variations overlapping an overall linear increase. I don’t need to project from this picture into the future, to see that it has a good fit from 1800 up to the present. But you need to see his clearest pictures to get interested. So for those who baulk at the pdf, I’ve uploaded two pics:
The trend that first caught Akasofu’s interest
Decadal variations on this trend
Personally I think Akasofu caught an uptick on a long sinusoidal solar curve – but we need the evidence of ALL the known overlapping solar cycles to be more sure of that. What Akasofu does show is that the IPCC science is inadequate. And he does it well, with some of the best science writing I’ve seen. He deserves to be read in the original.
Regarding the hockey stick, here’s Monckton’s long paper describing the shenanigans behind protecting it from criticism and “verifying” it, followed (pages 16-29) by summaries of 21 published papers that provide evidence of warming during the MWP. (Ten papers deal with Europe and the North Atlantic, eleven scientific papers address the period elsewhere on the planet.) Each summary occupies about half a page and contains a graph that illustrates key data points.
http://scienceandpublicpolicy.org/monckton/what_hockey_stick.html
Why do the predictions start about 0.15deg.C below the actual measured temperature for 1980. If they commenced from +0.41deg.C (the 1980 anomoly) rather than the apparently arbitrary +0.26deg.C, then the disparity between the predicted and the measured anomolies would be much larger.
AGW is officialy over since 2003
Craig Loehle has analysed the data from only the profiling floats for ocean heat content from 2003 to 2008. In a paper recently published in the journal Energy and Environment he has concluded that there has been ocean cooling over this period.
timetochooseagain (18:21:56),
Thanks for that link, which seems to put to rest the question of hidden “heat in the pipeline”.
Brendan H (22:08:52)
This is probably what you would call an “unattributed picture”: click, because there is no explanation. But the source in the address bar shows where it came from.
However, when a chart has written in the corner: “Chart prepared by Climatologist Cliff Harris & Meteorologist Randy Mann”, then I assume someone [foinavon in this case] is deliberately running interference by saying “those are just unattributed pictures.”
It’s easy to find out where the charts came from. Demanding that someone else must jump through an endless series of hoops, when they could do the search themselves, is an obstructing tactic. They are not interested in knowledge, but rather in sidetracking the debate.
Same situation with “Could you link each picture to a scientific paper so that we could see how they are derived? What data is used and how it is assessed and so on.” That is unreasonable, since the questioner has the resources and can find out for himself. And no doubt if those questions were answered, there would be still more questions.
That’s the problem with some folks: they never answer the questions put to them by others, they just answer a question with another question. Their tactic is to ask endless follow-up questions in an attempt to avoid the obvious conclusion. For instance, I’m still waiting for an answer to the hidden heat [although an actual climate scientist has answered that question in the link @18:21:56.]
There is a lot of genuine skepticism over the constant assertions made regarding tipping points, heat in the pipeline, runaway global warming, etc., etc.
If the believers in these alarming situations would simply answer straightforward questions, it would be a big help in getting to the truth of the matter. But some folks would rather obstruct the debate than find answers, I suspect because the answers would be uncomfortable. Thus their deliberately obstructionist tactics.
Hmm. Well that’s replaced the graphs with one that looks more comfortable if you’re that way inclined, but that’s a bit naughty. The new graph is mostly a comparison of an old – nearly twenty years old – IPCC prediction with Hadley’s temperature record isn’t it? ie he’s specifically chosen the two most ‘extreme’ to make a point?
The AR4 simulations match temperature quite well, which they should since they were run in 2007, but what are they doing on the graph?
Somewhat OT, and probably a dumb question…but I’ll ask it anyway.
When I make ice cubes…the measured volume of the frozen water is larger than the unfrozen water. Same thing happens when I freeze gallon jugs of water to place in a cooler for a long trip. Always have to dump a little out to make room for the expansion when it changes state.
It is consistantly pointed out here that when oceans cool, they contract, and sea levels drop. So does this mean that as the temp drops, the water contracts, until at some magic point, just before it solidifies, it expands? 🙂
JimB
softestpawn,
The new graph replaced the old graph because of some complaints about the old graph. Now there are complaints about the new graph. Is there a graph that would keep everyone happy?