ENSO Dominates NODC Ocean Heat Content Data

lucklucky: You wrote, “How can anyone make a post in disparate geographic, time, instrument quality data AND still call it Science?”
You must be referring to the wiggle matching in my post and not the Levitus et al, HADISST, and Sato Index data. Apparently you only looked at the graphs and didn’t bother to read the post, because you would have noted that I discussed the reasons for including the NINO3.4 SST anomaly and Stratospheric Mean Optical Thickness data. Let me repeat it for you, “The NINO3.4 SST anomalies are used to illustrate the TIMING of the El Nino-Southern Oscillation (ENSO) events. The Sato Index of Mean Optical Thickness at 500nm are provided to illustrate the TIMING of explosive volcanic eruptions.” [Caps on the word TIMING added.] They’re simply time markers.
Have a nice day.

Paul Vaughan: You wrote, “Bob, if warm Indian water moved to the Pacific in a ‘bubble’ or burst in the 90s, I’ll be curious to see (in a future post) which path(s) you figure it might have taken. Politics & economics aside, there is something fundamental about nature to be learned here.”
As I just noted to hotrod…
The second dip in 1997 should be part of the 1997/98 El Nino. That El Nino was so strong it drew warm water from the eastern Indian Ocean. (Remember, the Pacific Warm Pool is also known as the Indo-Pacific Warm Pool because it stretches into the Indian Ocean at times.) Here’s a video if SSH anomalies. Note how the eastern tropical Indian Ocean anomalies drop during the 1997/98 El Nino, about one minute into the video.

And I believe the rise in the western Indian Ocean during the 1997/98 El Nino is a response to the cooling in the east. It would have increased the temperature difference (between east and west), which in turn would have kicked up the trade winds in the Indian Ocean, which would have pushed more waters to the west, draining more warm water from the east, and adding more positive feedback to the process.
What happened in 1995 is beyond me at the present time. I still haven’t narrowed down the location of the dip. I’ve assumed it was in the eastern Indian Ocean.

Lindsay H: You asked, “any theory as to why there is a coincidence with the 13 month smoothing , it seems to show a considerable lag of up to two years to recover from events…”
Sorry, Lindsay, I just found the apparent relationship between significant ENSO events and OHC. No theories yet. I agree that two (plus) years appears to be a long time before an apparent response from some datasets, like the Atlantic. Is it the magnitude of the La Nina that follows the significant El Nino that shifts cloud cover and causes what appears to be a delayed response to the El Nino? That is, are those shifts responses to the significant La Ninas, not the El Ninos themselves? Dunno.

Roy Spencer 10:34:43
That’s easy unless I’m wrong; the sensitive system cycles above and below the equilibration temperature, before settling, and the insensitive system goes straight to it
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Bob, I’ve just been thinking about methods of visualization that might help with this mystery that has arisen. It will be great if someone designs a tool that will allow a user-defined hovmollering reference-line (via mouse-trace, for example) rather than the usual fixed- lat or long. I’ll continue pondering other alternatives…

Bob Tisdale (04:42:15)
I was refering to the first graphic, although I wrote graph titled “NOAA/NESDIS SST Anomaly”. There is an area of relatively cool water in that graphic at about 118 W 5 N. I’m wondering if it is common during a develpoing El Nino to have an area of relatively cool water such as that. Perhaps someone can enlighten me.

Great stuff – even if it is complex and raises more questions than it answers! At least these questions are being approached. I have tried, as a general ecologist, to get a handle on the relationship of ENSO, the PDO, NAO and Arctic cycles from the point of view of mass movements of warm water generated in the equatorial regions by what appear to be pulses in the short-wave flux to the ocean surface. If you look at Hadley and NOAA (Scripps Inst., papers by Lyman and others) where they subtract various years of upper ocean heat content to get a sense of change according to the surface grid, it is clear that accumulated heat is primarily stored at depth in northern waters – in the main gyres of the north Pacific and north Atlantic. If we can figure out how these heat stores are built up over time and then how they are depleted over time, we may find our way to understanding the long term natural cycles that are missing from AGW models.
Cloud cover correlations are not easy to find. ISCCP data contradicts ship-board data, Earthshine data gives another picture. The ISCCP low level cloud data does show a 4% decline globally from 1983-2000 and this is certainly enough to account for the ocean warming (and land warming is a consequence of heat transfer).
With regard to Levitus’s new analysis – I am not sure how reliable it is. Prior to this 2008 paper, his previous estimates (before 2005) were used by climatologists to confirm their models (with much trumpeting) – but three further analyses (Gouretski and Koltermann, Palmer and others at Hadley, and Domingues and team) all held that these previous estimates were out by a factor of two – which is rather a lot when considering the planetary budget – this gave rise to Pielke’s conclusion that there was no more ‘warming in the pipeline’. Obviously, Levitus has responded to the critiques – at least to Gouretski’s and he cuts by half their previous cut – it is still lower and still a problem for the modellers than used the early analysis as validation of their models. But we might expect Levitus not to agree with the other three, and must wait until they respond. As you note, Bob, it is a complex field and not one for the generalist to second-guess.
I am surprised, however, at the size of the 21st century rise to 2000-2003, though not by the plateau thereafter, or the fall in the northern Atlantic. As many comments point out, it is this upper ocean heat content that is the only real measure of global warming or cooling that we have – and despite the vast array of monitors, there is still great uncertainty.
The spatial distribution of the deeper warm water pools holds the key to future patterns – I would like to see how these respond to the shifting jetstream as they are both in its track. Lower cloud in northern latitudes will lead to loss of heat and in equatorial latitudes, heat gain. More cloud in the north will insulate the waters and delay release, whereas in the tropics it will lower the heat gain.
Right now, I think the massive shift in the jetstream of the past 3 summers has depleted the Atlantic warm water pool (if SST is anything to go by) – the heat has been dumped in the UK and western Europe as rain! Hadley’s SSTs are showing a growing cold patch in the central northern Atlantic – this is the NAO on the turn, and the reason some modellers are now predicting cooling for the next decade. Hadley has such a model but they seem rather shy about, only publicising what they call the more certain outcomes of their long-term model to 2050-2080 (i.e. warming).
Once again, great work – a tribute to this blog and to the quest for truth!

Re: Bob Tisdale (03:31:33)
The software is very slow, the series only seem to go back to 2001, and frames are forced to be parallel & perpendicular to lines of longitude & latitude (i.e. it won’t even allow angled-straight-lines, let alone curved reference-lines & area-averaged hovmollers (as an integrated alternative to line-transects)), but I encounter few problems otherwise plotting from here:
http://las.aviso.oceanobs.com/las/servlets/dataset
Online software like this is a step in the right direction, but there are miles to go.
Data visualization needs to move up in the climate funding hierarchy. (The complex stuff we are going after isn’t going to show up in computer fantasies if no human has ever detected or imagined it.)

Indian-Pacific Hovmoller 11S 2001-2009
Looking 5 degrees further south (at 11S), reveals 1, 2, & 4 year waves. It looks like there are also 8 year waves, but the record is short. Note particularly how the 1 year waves cross the 2 years waves south of the tip of India (~75-80E) in some years.
Thanks for pointing out another useful site Bob.

Here’s a look at 61S.
Note the structure just east of NZ and off the tip of S.America. Considered in conjunction with the Antarctic Circumpolar Current (ACC), the Antarctic Circumpolar Wave (ACW), the Antarctic Oscillation (AAO), and Bob’s findings about the Southern Ocean, this continues becoming more & more interesting.

I think Stephen Wilde & Kim above have the right answer to Roy Spencer’s question above. The sensitive system will oscillate around the mean (“ring”) for an extended time, while the insensitive will be “damped” and in a short time quickly return to the mean. Essentually the sensitive system “stores” energy (in the pipeline, which then takes a while to come out), while the insensitive does not store much if any.
We see this action in the global temp records when a global impulse (+ or -) occurs, like Pinatubo or the 1998 El Nino (the time period for recovery is less than a yr!) We’ve even seen it last month on a much shorter time scale (because the impulse was prb’ly not global & more localized) when temps spiked up and in less than a month lost most of the “spike”.
IOW, little to no heat energy in the pipeline.

Independent Forensic Investigation If Visa deems necessary, an independent forensic investigation must be conducted by a QIRA. ,