January 2010 UAH Global Temperature Update +0.72 Deg. C
by Roy W. Spencer, Ph. D.
UPDATE (4:00 p.m. Jan. 4): I’ve determined that the warm January 2010 anomaly IS consistent with AMSR-E sea surface temperatures from NASA’s Aqua satellite…I will post details later tonight or in the a.m. – Roy
YR MON GLOBE NH SH TROPICS
2009 01 +0.304 +0.443 +0.165 -0.036
2009 02 +0.347 +0.678 +0.016 +0.051
2009 03 +0.206 +0.310 +0.103 -0.149
2009 04 +0.090 +0.124 +0.056 -0.014
2009 05 +0.045 +0.046 +0.044 -0.166
2009 06 +0.003 +0.031 -0.025 -0.003
2009 07 +0.411 +0.212 +0.610 +0.427
2009 08 +0.229 +0.282 +0.177 +0.456
2009 09 +0.422 +0.549 +0.294 +0.511
2009 10 +0.286 +0.274 +0.297 +0.326
2009 11 +0.497 +0.422 +0.572 +0.495
2009 12 +0.288 +0.329 +0.246 +0.510
2010 01 +0.724 +0.841 +0.607 +0.757
The global-average lower tropospheric temperature anomaly soared to +0.72 deg. C in January, 2010. This is the warmest January in the 32-year satellite-based data record.
The tropics and Northern and Southern Hemispheres were all well above normal, especially the tropics where El Nino conditions persist. Note the global-average warmth is approaching the warmth reached during the 1997-98 El Nino, which peaked in February of 1998.
This record warmth will seem strange to those who have experienced an unusually cold winter. While I have not checked into this, my first guess is that the atmospheric general circulation this winter has become unusually land-locked, allowing cold air masses to intensify over the major Northern Hemispheric land masses more than usual. Note this ALSO means that not as much cold air is flowing over and cooling the ocean surface compared to normal. Nevertheless, we will double check our calculations to make sure we have not make some sort of Y2.01K error (insert smiley). I will also check the AMSR-E sea surface temperatures, which have also been running unusually warm.
After last month’s accusations that I’ve been ‘hiding the incline’ in temperatures, I’ve gone back to also plotting the running 13-month averages, rather than 25-month averages, to smooth out some of the month-to-month variability.
We don’t hide the data or use tricks, folks…it is what it is.
[NOTE: These satellite measurements are not calibrated to surface thermometer data in any way, but instead use on-board redundant precision platinum resistance thermometers (PRTs) carried on the satellite radiometers. The PRT’s are individually calibrated in a laboratory before being installed in the instruments.]
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NOTE: Entire UAH dataset is here, not yet updated for Jan 2010 as of this posting
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Stephen Wilde (14:52:22) :
I’ve got a question. Is not everthing you are raising a short-term (1-2 year) re-distribution of the earth’s heat. So when the effects you are mentioning balance out in near-future, the readings should all return to their normal levels or go the opposite side of normal. (That is, no long-term, permanent step up or down and normal being the long-term average)?
This certainly raises some questions about the accuracy of any historic land-based record and could represent a new learning experience.
“The only big blood red area they have in the projections is over Canada and Greenland.”
I tried to check GISS data, but it seems that there is basically no current surface measurement data for those regions. Hard to compare with satellite data.
Are there any surface stations left, which are not included in GISS data but are still active?
Hey, maybe Hansen’s “dark heat” is finally coming out of the “pipeline”! Will we have a “barbecue February” before we’re all barbecued in July? 🙂
Shouldn’t somebody, someday tell a journalist about this thing called the Ocean Heat Content? So that he can tell his colleagues? And write it into an article in the MSM? I know, the concept is outlandish… Heat! In an ocean!
Bob
Thanks for this – these references are truly great. El Ninos come and go and it’s good to know they are now on the way out.
Bob Tisdale (14:57:16) :
Peter Miller (14:32:55) : You asked, “Does anyone know exactly where we are in the current El Nino cycle?”
Weekly NINO3.4 SST anomalies peaked about five weeks ago and they’ve been dropping like a stone ever since:
http://i50.tinypic.com/ih2vtj.png
From my preliminary monthly SST anomaly update:
http://bobtisdale.blogspot.com/2010/02/preliminary-january-2010-sst-anomaly.html
A tie with 98 El Nino is a loss to the AGW hypothesis. If global warming was going on unabated, how come 12 years later we aren’t .12C+ higher than the 98 El Nino?
I realize that is completely devoid of any real scientific substance, but hey… that’s the kind of slick talk we get all the time. It’s all in how you word it.
The high January anomaly has been anticipated for some time. We’ll probably get a few more warm months and may even get 12 month (rolling if not calendar) record. The interesting thing will be what happens after that. Will there be a repeat of the 1998-2007 pattern, i.e La Nina followed by a ‘new’ higher background level of temperatures or something different.
Despite the weaker sun and the negative PDO, I don’t see any likelihood of significant cooling.
Ian C. (14:31:06) :
Olympic Lack Of Snow:
Lake Placid, 1932
Squaw Valley, 1960 (Native American had to do a snow dance… not kidding!… and it worked!)
Oslo , 1952 (last minute snow)
Innsbruck, 1964
Lake Placid, 1980 (used many snow machines)
Calgary, 1988 (artificial snow and Chinook)
Nagano, 1998 (but had too much snow during the games)
Torino, 2006 (snow machines and trucks)
Vancouver was just a bad choice… or Cypress Mountain was a bad choice.
People can read this article to have a feeling of winters in Vancouver, BC:
http://www.cbc.ca/olympics/blogs/brucearthur/2010/01/lack-of-snow-in-vancouver-hardly-a-surprise.html
“The lack of snow in Vancouver is not an unusual event… it’s life.”
Does anyone know how well the satellite handle snow cover? I ask because the NH probably has the highest percentage of snow cover in history and out pops satellite data that shows the warmest January ever recorded by the satellite. Matches with the most snow cover ever?…..John….
[quote JP (14:28:16) :]
This may have been asked before, but what is the data path from satellite to UAH and what steps that includes?
[/quote]
I’ve got a couple of posts on that here:
http://magicjava.blogspot.com/2010/01/aqua-satellite-data-processing.html
and here:
http://magicjava.blogspot.com/2010/02/summary-of-aqua-satellite-data-computer.html
could this be heat escaping from the oceans? almost like it had been trapped by heat in the atomosphere which has gone hence cold landmasses and now stored heat is escaping from the oceans?
Nonsense From
MJK (15:00:11) :
“Oh dear–this latest reading does not point to a cooling world now does it? or do we now no longer trust Dr Spencer”
The world has been warming for at least 150 years. Variation in global temperatures are natural. There is no debate on this. The link to CO2 is the question that is debatable.
Warmer types like you refuse to debate and some scientists appear to manipulate data to make a case that does not exist.
True scientists report the truth as they find it and then attempt to find out why. The case for CO2 as the cause for recent warming hasn’t been made.
Please do a little unbiased research on this site, join the informed. You’ll sleep better.
Bob Tisdale (15:14:51) :
Thanks Bob.
Does that mean next winter will be quite cold and really snowy?
It wont make much difference to the ENSO adjusted 12 year trend-
http://reallyrealclimate.blogspot.com/2010/01/twelve-year-satellite-temperature.html
unless February is hot too. I would bet on Stephen Wilde being right and this is an airflow issue as the ocean transfers heat from tropics to the pole.
Nearly all the “climate change global warming catastrophe” is in the Northern Hemisphere winter. NH summer? Mostly flat. For centuries now.
Sudden Stratospheric Warming anyone?
So, what will prevail at years’ end: El Niño or sun cycle 24? Bets.
Lars (14:30:02) : Well , Stockholm Sweden, has had the coldest January for 23 years. and that’s Official.
http://www.smhi.se/klimatdata/arets-januari-blev-kallast-sedan-1987-i-soder-1.9423 //Lars
Our January, on the other side of the world was dull, wet and cold also. And that too is official http://www.nzherald.co.nz/nz/news/article.cfm?c_id=1&objectid=10623669
Two thoughts:
1. January does not a year make and
2. Looking at the graph above- the 1998 El Nino pushed the temperatures up a great deal from a valley around 1993. This years El Nino has pushed the temperatures up not so much, but from a higher level.
Lets see how the coming months and years pan out.
Bob Tisdale (15:14:51) :
Your video of ocean heat is very nice and it looks like it’s alive… do you have an update that includes the last 9 years?
Stephen Wilde: You wrote, “As I have said elsewhere a quiet sun seems to reduce energy loss to space by encouraging a more negative Arctic Oscillation.”
And once again I will recommend that you plot the data before you make statements. There was a correlation between solar activity and the AO during Solar Cycles 22 and 23, but before 1983 and after 2003, they do not correlate.
http://i49.tinypic.com/30lkjm8.png
The rest of your comment could be brilliant and spot on, Stephen, but that one assumed correlation that does not exist calls into question the remainder of your comment.
Ray: You asked, “Does that mean next winter will be quite cold and really snowy?”
Sorry. I don’t make predictions.
magicjava – I agree the trend estimate will be biased by heterogeneity in warm/cold events (PDO, as well as El Nino). But I don’t think that will change the underlying trend, especially given there is now 30 years of data. The UAH trend was substantially stronger than the IPCC forecast even before January’s temperature spike.
“Just a technical note. The UAH satellite readings are not calibrated using surface measurements. But they have been validated using surface measurements. They are also validated using weather balloons.
Calibration is used to adjust raw readings in order to make them accurate. Validation is used to ensure calibration was done correctly.”
What happens if validation with surface measurement does not match? Is satellite data calibration adjusted based on surface data or is surfce measurements corrected based on satellite data?
Is satellite data calibrated based on surface measurements, but if validation fails calibration is not adjusted?
What is used as a surface data in this case? Is it data from NASA or as with UAH, is surface reference temperature coming from UAH?
Who does this calibration, NASA or UAH?
Sorry that I’m asking so many questions, but the processing for satellite data is new to me..
it would be interesting to also see the actual avg jan temps for 1979-2010 instead of just the anomaly…
At the end of 2007 Hansen made a very exposed predictionof a new temp record in the next 2-3 years.
He repeated this at the end of 2008:
If the El Nino effect has not yet peaked, then might we see this prediction confirmed even in the satelite data?
Jay Sezbria (15:12:42) :
Somebody should suggest to Spencer to just use a Loess smooth.
Bob Tisdale:
You say that “Warmists have tried to blame anthropogenic greenhouse gases for the increase in frequency of El Nino events since 1976”
I don’t think that’s fair. People have looked at it, sure, but it isn’t obvious what if any impact there would be on ENSO. At least, that’s the impression I have.
Jerry (15:44:18) :
You say there is no debate that there has been long-term warming? I think if you look around here, you’ll find some people who would debate that.