With apologies to Dr. Roger Pielke Sr. and Steve McQueen, I offer this advice: run ! A giant temperature anomaly is attacking Canada and Greenland.
An Example Of Why A Global Average Temperature Anomaly Is Not An Effective Metric Of Climate
Roy Spencer and John Christy of the University of Alabama at Huntsville have reported in their Global Temperature Report that February 2010 was the 2nd warmest February in 32 years (e.g. see Roy’s summary).
Their spatial map of the anomalies, however, shows that most of the relative warmth was in a focused geographic area; see
The global average is based on the summation of large areas of positive and negative temperature anomalies.
As I have reported before on my weblog; e.g. see
What is the Importance to Climate of Heterogeneous Spatial Trends in Tropospheric Temperatures?,
it is the regional tropospheric temperature anomalies that determine the locations of development and movement of weather systems [which are the actual determinants of such climate events as drought, floods, ect] not a global average temperature anomaly.
Anybody complaining in West Greenland?
The coldest areas on the map are where the most CO2 is emitted, and presumably where the highest relative CO2 concentrations can be found.
So whatever the causes of a “globally” warm February are, it is hard to pin the warmth on CO2.
Who Author ?
“”” ‘Anomalies’ are friendly little things that wouldn’t hurt a fly. “””
I thought “Anomalies” were Malaria muskeetos !
OK, so what’s the real temperature around the big red blob? Minus 10 rather than -20? Since the cold was pushed far south this winter, is it surprising that the north was warmer than usual?
Do the white areas mean no returns or normal temps?
The math function ABS(x) can change the polar regions temperature in seconds.
Well R Gates how do you explain this one?
succintly put by Stephen Skinner (11:41:34) :
“{Considering that the bedrock of AGW is CO2 then this would be interesting overlayed with CO2 distribution. it could be that CO2 is really lumpy.”
Ask not for whom the blob tolls, it tolls for thee.
Those Canadians must be cooking up something. 🙂
Is there a color key for this map?
Weather is not climate. Hmm… that sounds familiar…
“”” S.E.Hendriksen (14:02:26) :
The math function ABS(x) can change the polar regions temperature in seconds. “””
Hey Svend,
I saw the start of the big JAXA Arctic ice melt for 2010 just last week; I figured, you’d be digging yourself out about now.
How goes the big Greenland ice collapse these days ?
Good to see, you back alive and kicking.
George
I believe the blob results from a temporary (winter 2010) cell of rising moist air masses over the eastern US that resulted in unusual amounts of snow coupled with dry warm descending air masses over Quebec similar to the Hadley cell in the tropics where the corresponding dry, warm descending air creates deserts across the world. The driver was the southwest -northeast trending jet stream and the anomalously moist, low pressure cells brought in from the subtropics due to the negative AO.
As someone living on the Canadian Prairies I can tell you that this past winter/early spring has been a pleasure compared to what we are normally used to. I think even the warmists in this area of the country aren’t going to argue with that. There have been some harsh winters in recent memory, especially ’07-’08 when temps were rarely above -20C from mid December right through to mid March. Most winters we see an average of 2-3 weeks of extreme cold, in the -35C to -45C plus windchill but, this wniter we had maybe a week in total. As I make my living working outside in these conditions I can attest to how nice this winter has been. I don’t take it for granted, though. Every winter is different, next year could bring something worse. Or, maybe more of the same, you never know.
For two years in a row I’ve cross country skiied here in Manitoba right up to the first of April. This year it ended the first week in March. Also the river ice is breaking up about a month early. Give me back my snow.
Can this be blamed on Al Gore? Did he take all my snow to Washington?
This gentleman has made a career out of showing how maps can be used.
http://www.flipkart.com/lie-maps-mark-monmonier-harm/0226534219-8qw3f73b6d
This book is #13 on the two page list here:
http://www.flipkart.com/search-books/mark+monmonier/author_10
There are quite a number of on-line presentations of map projections. However, I suggest you get an orange, draw a face or some such thing on it (an outline of a house will do), then peel the rind off carefully and flatten it out. When you get that flattened orange-peel-image to look reasonably close to what it did when it was spherical — post a photo for us to see.
Mosher: There’s no thermometer in the map above, but maps using surface thermometers have roughly similar patterns for Feb 2010.
Re: Trend map comments, I found this in a post at Jeff Id’s, it’s a map of the trends in UAH data:
http://i23.photobucket.com/albums/b370/gatemaster99/sattrend.png
In Melbourne Australia the BoM and also the AGW crowd are proudly quoting the record run of now 101 days above 20 degrees C. I’ve heard it said that this record is an obvious sign that CO2 emissions are the cause.
During a negative AO the very cold polar air is mixing with warmer temperate air. It could be a negative AO results in a positive temperature anomaly because energy varies as absolute T**4. The derivative or change in energy varies as absolute T**3dT. So a change in a lower temp represents less energy change than the same change in a higher temp. Conversely, an equal energy change in cold air results in a larger temperature change than warmer air.
I’m not saying it would change a long term global average trend, but could cause a spike in the positive anomaly direction.
The map is misleading. The tropics provided the most sigificant contribution to the Feb anomaly. The area between 23.4N and 23.4S represents around 40% of the total surface of the earth. The UAH Feb anomaly for the tropics was +0.81. RSS use the area between 20S and 20N. The RSS Feb anomaly for this region was +1.015.
The ‘blob’ probably offset some of the NH mid latitude cold but it wasn’t the main reason for the high anomaly.
Note that this temperature distribution is not uncommon for the El Ninos since 1957-58.
Re: Smokey (Mar 19 10:04),
But, but, but SkepticalScience says “The Science SaysR” OHC in the upper 750m is sooo old science. Now it bypasses that region and heads straight for the bottom where presumably it awaits the command to rise from the deep and fry the surface. 🙂
So, there’s no sense in falsifying a hypothesis when there’s always an out to save it. That’s the beauty of an irrefutable hypothesis.
http://www.skepticalscience.com/global-cooling.htm
Is it o.k., if I feel guilty about the Catastrophic weather i’ve caused, while enjoying the good weather??
Or should I just feel guilty, all the time?
For a comparison of the satellite anomaly above with the February surface temperature anomaly on this page for the continental US, try this URL:
http://www.hprcc.unl.edu/maps/current/index.php?action=update_daterange&daterange=Last1m
It looks like they track pretty well, although the surface temperatures are offset to the southeast somewhat.