While England basks in a winter wonderland, with more on the way, and bookmakers are now slashing odds on a white Christmas (The Times reports “The odds on a White Christmas fell to match the lowest price ever offered at 6/4 today”.), it seems like a good time to review the Met Office forecast for the coming year.
The Met Office is forecasting 2010 to be the warmest year ever, due to El Nino. The moderate El Nino we have now appears to be weakening, with additional weakening in the next few months.
The Met Office did the same kind of forecast in 2007, right before the temperature dropped more than 1C. The UAH (Channel5 LT) temperature has dropped this past week and is the closest to the 20 year average it has been in six months. With these factors in play, has the Met Office has made a serious blunder with their current high visibility forecast? Is it a repeat of the now famously wrong Met Office BBQ summer forecast?
See the 2007 Met Office forecast here:
4 January 2007
2007 – forecast to be the warmest year yet
2007 is likely to be the warmest year on record globally, beating the current record set in 1998, say climate-change experts at the Met Office.
Each January the Met Office, in conjunction with the University of East Anglia, issues a forecast of the global surface temperature for the coming year. The forecast takes into account known contributing factors, such as solar effects, El Niño, greenhouse gases concentrations and other multi-decadal influences. Over the previous seven years, the Met Office forecast of annual global temperature has proved remarkably accurate, with a mean forecast error size of just 0.06 °C.
See the 2009 (for 2010) forecast here:
Climate could warm to record levels in 2010
10 December 2009
A combination of man-made global warming and a moderate warming of the tropical Pacific Ocean, a phenomenon known as El Niño, means it is very likely that 2010 will be a warmer year globally than 2009.
Recently released figures confirm that 2009 is expected to be the fifth-warmest year in the instrumental record that dates back to 1850.
The latest forecast from our climate scientists, shows the global temperature is forecast to be almost 0.6 °C above the 1961–90 long-term average. This means that it is more likely than not that 2010 will be the warmest year in the instrumental record, beating the previous record year which was 1998.
Here are some video’s from England that give some idea of the snowstorm:
Don Penman,
As you live nearby, why don’t you find the location and go take a look – indeed, why not take a picy?
Question: is this data raw data or adjusted?
I have a theory on why the MET use the Jan to Sept figure for its prediction on how hot a year is and why they normally get it too high.
As the northern hemisphere has a higher proportion of land/sea than the southern hemisphere then as land loses heat in winter faster than the oceans then they will always be pronoucing in advance that a years average temp is higher than a final figure as the last 3 months is always winter in the northern hemisphere.
Does this sound valid ?
Reference to the Met Office prediction that 2010 could warm to record levels due to the combination of manmade greenhouse gases and an El Nino.
The Met Office just issued a report concluding that the warming between 1999 and 2008 can be comletely accounted by El Nino’s . So how we suddenly know that manmade greenhouse gases will be responsible for the record warming in 2010 [ may actually turnout to be cooling instead ] is false. There appears to be real scientific confusion at the Met Office.
The UK MET Office recently reported that global temperature had slowed , and that the entire warming from 1999-2008 when all the global warming records were set can be accounted for by a natural cycle called El Nino and the warming seemed to have had very little to do with manmade greenhouse gases.
Here is a quote from their article
Observations indicate that global temperature rise has slowed in the last decade (Fig. 2.8a). The least squares trend for January 1999 to December 2008 calculated from the HadCRUT3 dataset (Brohan et al. 2006) is +0.07±0.07°C decade–1—much less than the 0.18°C decade–1 recorded between 1979 an2005 and the 0.2°C decade–1 expected in the next decade (IPCC; Solomon et al. 2007). This is despite a steady increase in radiative forcing as a result of human activities and has led some to question climate predictions of substantial twenty-first century warming (Lawson 2008; Carter 2008).
El Niño–Southern Oscillation is a strong driver of interannual global mean temperature variations. ENSO and non-ENSO contributions can be separated by the method of Thompson et al. (2008) (Fig. 2.8a). The trend in the ENSO-related component for 1999–2008 is +0.08±0.07°C decade–1, fully accounting for the overall observed trend. The trend after removing ENSO (the “ENSO-adjusted” trend) is 0.00°±0.05°C decade–1, implying much greater disagreement with anticipated global temperature rise.
http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/corporate/pressoffice/2009/global_temperatures_09.pdf
And this is the latest forecast from the Met. Its in a piece they issued to explain why the increase in temps stopped after 1998.
‘Our decadal forecast predicts an end to this period of relative stability after 2010. We project at least half of the years after 2009 will be warmer than the 1998 record. Climate researchers are, therefore, reinforcing the message that the case for tackling global warming remains strong.’
So if the cooling continues they are stuffed.
http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/climatechange/policymakers/policy/slowdown.html
One of the knock on effects of poor Met Office forecasts is that some councils use them to gauge whether they need to grit the roads. Snow that is a surprise to the Met Office is a surprise to the gritters as well.
winter 09/10 forecast England
The Met vs. Piers Corbyn
cold 2009/2010 winter forecast for USA from Farmers Almanac
they compare the Farmers Almanacs forecast to the NOAA’s—they’re opposites
Someone gave me a link to the download page for hadleycru world weather stations it is station 033770.I am not sure if it has been adjusted or not.It gives average monthly temperatures from 1951 onward.I have wanted to find out where the weather station is situated for sometime now, more so now
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JohnH (05:48:42) :
I have a theory on why the MET use the Jan to Sept figure for its prediction on how hot a year is and why they normally get it too high.
As the northern hemisphere has a higher proportion of land/sea than the southern hemisphere then as land loses heat in winter faster than the oceans then they will always be pronoucing in advance that a years average temp is higher than a final figure as the last 3 months is always winter in the northern hemisphere.
Does this sound valid ?
***************
Why should we be surprised at anything these jokers do. It is becoming clear that the resistance to releasing raw data is because it will be seen and shown to be a sham.
“2007 is likely to be the warmest year on record globally, beating the current record set in 1998, say climate-change experts at the Met Office.”
Conveniently forgotten, they said the same for 2002.
Hoping that 2010 may be third time lucky perhaps?
Another below freezing day in E England – might have to go back to 1997 or even the eighties to beat that…
“So the guy from Kent is just excited, and freaked out by all the white stuff and the cold. They’re just not used to it down there”
I live in Gravesend, myself – have done for 14 years – and I have to say that up until maybe 4-5 years ago we never got any snow here past occasional flakes that didn’t settle. I don’t know if it’s the proximity of the Thames or what, but this area is (with the possible exception of Heathrow!) often the warmest place in Britain. It can snow up on the Downs [if you know what I mean!] but be quite snow-free here. It just didn’t happen.
Before we had kids, I used to regret that they’d probably never get a chance to play in the snow. Yet now we’ve had heavy snowfalls (for Britain!) on and off through the last 5 years and in both of the last two winters. Met Office notwithstanding, the winters seem to be getting colder and the summers seem to be getting worse!
Four years ago in a fit of rampant optimism, my wife bought a sledge for the kids expecting maybe to use it once or twice. It’s starting to look worn, now…
The new name:
MET forecast = Magnificently Erroneous Temperature forecast.
My ex, who works as a seed shipper, used to rename railroad companies. For example the Union Pacific RR was renamed the Utterly Pathetic RR. But the Southern Pacific was renamed Simply Pathetic because they were a bit better.
You guys have GOT to take a look at the monster jet stream!!!! Such claws! And it looks like the horrid thing is about to EAT California!
http://squall.sfsu.edu/gif/jetstream_norhem_00.gif
BBC – On FIVE trains getting stuck in the Chunnel for 16 hours – “What was UNPRECEDENTED was the weather conditions particularly in northern France with heavy snowfall and very, very cold temperatures outside of the tunnel.”
Unprecedented? Hmmm… I see. Well NO train has ever broken down in the Chunnel due to “heavy snowfall and very, very cold temperatures outside of the tunnel” EVER in its 16 year history.
IPCC – Virtually Certain for the 21st Century – warmer and fewer cold days and nights, reduced disruption to transport due to snow and ice, (thats nice – so even less chunnel breakdowns?), reduced energy demand from heating (The power grid unit of French utility giant Electricite de France SA (EDF.FR) warned Monday that electricity demand could surge to surpass record highs in France this week due to the cold and said it will import power from abroad to help meet demand.)
“Major Snowstorm Hits Eastern U.S.”
They are not doing very well in their virtually certain predictions so far.
He added: “It is utterly unprecedented to have five trains failing in the tunnel at the same time. We will obviously be looking very closely at this to make sure that is does not happen again.” (Let the Globe get warmer?)
A true deja vu for the met office goes something like this:
[snip]
What?
The data don’t fit.
So, do the trick.
Isn’t that old already?
Don’t matter, if the map don’t fit reality, change reality.
Any ideas for post deja vu?
A fall off in Global avg temps in the last 3 months is not untypical. Dec 2009 will be interesting when it gets added
http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/graphs/2009+2005+2007.pdf
John, personaly I have no longer any belief that any gov agency will give honest data so their pretty maps and graphs are just works of art. When independent scientists tell me the solar activity is down (and I read in 2001 or thereabout, that a Russian scientist pointed out the low solar activity with respect to solar flares and he had looked at data going way back to ancient chinese observations, predicted this minimum.) that I will listen to because although I am not scientifically trained I am an engineer by training and I do not like being treated like an idiot and that is what A Gore, the CRU and UN do. WUWT give information, if as clearer form as is logical and give decent analysis the rest sound like Jehovah’s witnesses “discussing” Darwin (in their books they say “of course you can dismiss Darwin”
I would like to say thank you to all of you decent scientific and mathematical good guys here who have made it possible to shame the greedy bastards who nearly stole our future!
Happy Christmas for next week.
Chris Edwards
I understand several people have frozen to death in the areas struck with severe weather.
In 2007, the Met Office also said that, “Warming will begin in earnest in 2009.”
This statement has since been removed form their website, but I remember it and so do many others observers, as google shows,
http://www.google.co.uk/search?hl=en&safe=off&rlz=1C1GGLS_en-GBGB298GB304&ei=21IvS8KEJ5iRjAfnrbzSAg&sa=X&oi=spell&resnum=0&ct=result&cd=1&ved=0CAYQBSgA&q=met+office+warming+will+begin+in+earnest+in+2009&spell=1
I understand that the only temperature measuring station with an unbroken (and publicly accessible) record since sampling began int he mid C19th is the one in Ulster. This appears to reveal a continuous cyclical warming and cooling, with no overall increase over the 160+ years. I saw the graph on a site a couple of weeks ago but can’t find the link now – can anyone reference please?
As for the Met office, I’m a sports photgrpaher so have to keep a close eye on the weather to decide what to ear and take to a job. Twice in November the Met was still predicting gale force winds and driving rain on their website at midnight before a top race meeting – on both days we had almost constant sunshine and little wind.
This is not just an inconvenience for people in the business like myself – it impacts massively on gate attendance as people opt to stay home and watch on TV. I wish sports venues would start to sue the useless t*ssers who make these predictions at vast public expense