From the Jet Propulsion Lab:
NASA/NOAA Study Finds El Niños are Growing Stronger
A relatively new type of El Niño, which has its warmest waters in the central-equatorial Pacific Ocean, rather than in the eastern-equatorial Pacific, is becoming more common and progressively stronger, according to a new study by NASA and NOAA. The research may improve our understanding of the relationship between El Niños and climate change, and has potentially significant implications for long-term weather forecasting.
Lead author Tong Lee of NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif., and Michael McPhaden of NOAA’s Pacific Marine Environmental Laboratory, Seattle, measured changes in El Niño intensity since 1982. They analyzed NOAA satellite observations of sea surface temperature, checked against and blended with directly-measured ocean temperature data. The strength of each El Niño was gauged by how much its sea surface temperatures deviated from the average. They found the intensity of El Niños in the central Pacific has nearly doubled, with the most intense event occurring in 2009-10.
The scientists say the stronger El Niños help explain a steady rise in central Pacific sea surface temperatures observed over the past few decades in previous studies-a trend attributed by some to the effects of global warming. While Lee and McPhaden observed a rise in sea surface temperatures during El Niño years, no significant temperature increases were seen in years when ocean conditions were neutral, or when El Niño’s cool water counterpart, La Niña, was present.
“Our study concludes the long-term warming trend seen in the central Pacific is primarily due to more intense El Niños, rather than a general rise of background temperatures,” said Lee.
“These results suggest climate change may already be affecting El Niño by shifting the center of action from the eastern to the central Pacific,” said McPhaden. “El Niño’s impact on global weather patterns is different if ocean warming occurs primarily in the central Pacific, instead of the eastern Pacific.
“If the trend we observe continues,” McPhaden added, “it could throw a monkey wrench into long-range weather forecasting, which is largely based on our understanding of El Niños from the latter half of the 20th century.”
El Niño, Spanish for “the little boy,” is the oceanic component of a climate pattern called the El Niño-Southern Oscillation, which appears in the tropical Pacific Ocean on average every three to five years. The most dominant year-to-year fluctuating pattern in Earth’s climate system, El Niños have a powerful impact on the ocean and atmosphere, as well as important socioeconomic consequences. They can influence global weather patterns and the occurrence and frequency of hurricanes, droughts and floods; and can even raise or lower global temperatures by as much as 0.2 degrees Celsius (0.4 degrees Fahrenheit).
During a “classic” El Niño episode, the normally strong easterly trade winds in the tropical eastern Pacific weaken. That weakening suppresses the normal upward movement of cold subsurface waters and allows warm surface water from the central Pacific to shift toward the Americas. In these situations, unusually warm surface water occupies much of the tropical Pacific, with the maximum ocean warming remaining in the eastern-equatorial Pacific.
Since the early 1990s, however, scientists have noted a new type of El Niño that has been occurring with greater frequency. Known variously as “central-Pacific El Niño,” “warm-pool El Niño,” “dateline El Niño” or “El Niño Modoki” (Japanese for “similar but different”), the maximum ocean warming from such El Niños is found in the central-equatorial, rather than eastern, Pacific. Such central Pacific El Niño events were observed in 1991-92, 1994-95, 2002-03, 2004-05 and 2009-10. A recent study found many climate models predict such events will become much more frequent under projected global warming scenarios.
Lee said further research is needed to evaluate the impacts of these increasingly intense El Niños and determine why these changes are occurring. “It is important to know if the increasing intensity and frequency of these central Pacific El Niños are due to natural variations in climate or to climate change caused by human-produced greenhouse gas emissions,” he said.
Results of the study were published recently in Geophysical Research Letters.
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Andres Valencia says: August 28, 2010 at 4:50 am
Seems to me that “Modoki” is a new Japanese word for modified, like “Gorofu” is for golf.
No consonant-ended words is the rule.
“N” is the only consonant allowed. It is the only consonant in the kana character sets that doesn’t have a vowel at the end.
“A relatively new type of El Niño, which . . .”
What does this mean? What the word “relatively” is doing here is a mystery. As for “new” – they contradict themselves before getting to the second sentence, namely with “becoming more common.” I guess they just mean ‘a type of El Niño is becoming more common’.
However, because the study seems to begin in 1982 they should have begun with a caveat something like this:
‘We have used a very short modern period and ignored the historical record and report on a type of El Niño new to us.’
One thing’s for sure there’s an academic cottage industry around data mining modern instrument records for correlations. And if you can’t find any correlations then make some up. Then cherry pick sparse unreliable records from the more distant past and make up a narrative about those describing how they relate with the modern records. Begin and end with a gratuitous warning about the dangers of climate change. Include in the final paragraph, right after the CAGW warning, the critical need for further study before we all die and then you’re all ready to publish in the pal review literature.
And another thing: The historical context for the naming of this pattern of weather need not be left in the dust of political correctness.
They write: “El Niño, Spanish for “the little boy,” is the . . .”
NASA knows better or, at least, did in January 2003 when this was written:
“South American fisherman have given this phenomenon the name El Nino, which is Spanish for “The Christ Child,” because it comes about the time of the celebration of the birth of the Christ Child-Christmas.”
http://kids.earth.nasa.gov/archive/nino/intro.html
The following is worth reading. Search on “Callao Painter” for one of the effects not often mentioned.
I wonder if the position of the warmest water in the Pacific is in any way inversely proportional to tropical atorm and hurricane activity in the Atlantic. During an El Nino year, hurricane activity is supressed. Last year, activity was around average. Now I learn that the El Nino settled in the Central Pacific not the Eastern Pacific.
I realize that there are a lot of variables in action here but it would be interesting if there was a corellation between location of warmest water and storm activity.
The way science is being twisted to support preordained conclusions is really getting astounding.
I wonder how they explain the coming snows. Or the current freezing in the southern hemisphere.
It’s a sight to see … the pretzel dances.
A paper published 2 weeks ago in JGR found that there was no increase in El Nino event frequency or magnitude since 1856, and found a normal distribution instead:
http://hockeyschtick.blogspot.com/2010/08/paper-no-increase-in-el-nino-events.html
The El Nino’s over the past 30 years are just releasing the extra energy build up from shortwave radiation that has increased in the oceans at the surface, thanks to the lowering albedo of the period. This is natures way of trying to address the balance and keep temperatures relatively stable. The energy from each El Nino will be eventually lost forever and expired into space, but it takes many years to remove from the oceans.
It was only a matter of time until someone tried to blame a natural phenomenon on AGW because it clearly demonstrates with the PDO, AMO that it has caused most of the warming. The AGW folks are running out of ideas and now the only poor excuse to try and keep hold on any little thread is to try a bring this strawman on. The temperatures shown say nothing and show absolutely no evidence in the report what caused it. There have been big El Nino’s detected many decades and even centuries ago.
“It is important to know if the increasing intensity and frequency of these central Pacific El Niños are due to natural variations in climate or to climate change caused by human-produced greenhouse gas emissions,” he said.
Looking at the PDO would be a good start where there are signs of change. Good luck in explaining how such a huge energy pool can be caused by CO2, while only the skin of the ocean can be affected for such a minute temporary moment before latent heat comes in. While the shortwave radiation penetrates down to 100m depth and has changed over this same period with decreasing albedo.
“Our study concludes the long-term warming trend seen in the central Pacific is primarily due to more intense El Niños, rather than a general rise of background temperatures,” said Lee.
“These results suggest climate change may already be affecting El Niño by shifting the center of action from the eastern to the central Pacific,” said McPhaden. “El Niño’s impact on global weather patterns is different if ocean warming occurs primarily in the central Pacific, instead of the eastern Pacific.
“If the trend we observe continues,” McPhaden added, “it could throw a monkey wrench into long-range weather forecasting, which is largely based on our understanding of El Niños from the latter half of the 20th century.”
The cart before the horses… Read “Dynamic Analysis of Weather and Climate” Springer 2010 2ed. by Marcel Leroux before believing that crap! El Nino is a consequence of circulation and these authors do not even know it…
In the age of CO2, the answer to every question is ‘CO2’.
In review of comments
Glaciers, Hurricanes, El Ninos and La Ninas may simply be temperature driven by ocean temperatures.
Formation temperatures:
Land Glaciers 22F Degrees
La Ninas need 40F degrees
El Ninos need 60F – 70F degrees
Hurricanes need 82F degrees 100 feet down.
I have only found numeric research back to 1899.
Warmer sunspot cycles tend to have about 8 of a 11 year cycle.
Cooler sunspot cycles; 3 to 5 of a 11 year cycle.
The 1964 to 1975 sunspot cycle was extraordinary. Chart wise flat, but working off of three preceding warm cycles, it had 121 named storms, 7 El Ninos and 7 La Ninas.
It eventually cooled the earth down and gave us a record Arctic Ice Sheet in 1979. Interesting climate lag there.
One scientist states El Ninos give rise to La Ninas.
La Ninas tend to stir up warmer waters needed for ocean food chains.
Paul
Phlgistin said: The paper here, while useful and informative, shows the myopic cherry picking to give an alarmist AGW conclusion without which nothing can be published in scientific journals concerning climate.
I’m beginning to feel sorry for young climate scientists trying to advance their profession. They try doing real science, but then have to produce what their boss pays them to produce.
….. OK, not THAT sorry. These are “professionals” after all … they do do it for the money.
Here’s a thought. If the jet stream moves poleward that would allow the El Niño to move northward as well. In addition, it would tend to bring about warmer temperatures with fewer cold incursions. The net may be that more Modokis will occur on a warmer planet. And, just possibly, another negative feedback.
Since El Nino was only associated with world wide weather patterns in the 1950s, and satellite data(very unfocused at that) has only been available since 1980, I would say that the novelty of this pattern is questionable. The authors might merely have pointed out that the locale of El Nino’s is not as fixed as once thought. There was no need for the arching conclusions.
This is a valuable contribution to weather science and offers further study into the types of consequential weather patterns appear as the locale of the El Nino varies.
First: The El Niño from 1525 to present:
http://www.scribd.com/doc/30810082/Ninos
Now, A relatively new type of El Niño, which has its warmest waters in the central-equatorial Pacific Ocean, rather than in the eastern-equatorial Pacific, is becoming more common and progressively stronger, according to a new study by NASA and NOAA
That it is not El Niño. The El Niño CURRENT was named as such by peruvian fishermen from the northern coast of Peru, in Piura, because this CURRENT appears around Christmas, opposing the most usual and cold Humboldt´s current which runs from south to north along the western coasts of south america.
In order to know something and not just describing facts, which is not science but a childish behaviour like saying: “mommy is dark in there!”, NASA s hould provide a ROBUST study pointing to the CAUSES why this is happening and not that, whatever it is. El Niño is a warm current in the pacific sea, running southwards, opposing the counterclockwise Humboldt´s current, which is driven by the pacific anticyclone (also called chilean anticyclone), and try to explain us, not so clever and funded people, what makes currents change direction. Is it the Moon?, is it the planets and the moon?, is it something “surprising and unknown”like antimatter or black holes?., is it Superman or Al Baby?. Please, tell us, because if you don´t we´ll get scared!
This is it:
vukcevic says:
August 28, 2010 at 2:24 am
EL NINO events arise in an area of the equatorial Pacific where crossings
of the magnetic (Z-component) and the geographic equators are found.
The equatorial crossing has moved towards the central Pacific during the last four centuries.
http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/LFC20.htm
However, my dear Vuk, what does it make those magnetic fields change direction?
Don´t take it wrongly, this is just Socrates´ Mayeutics.
BTW Magnetic equator is at about 12 S latitude.
Snowlover123 says:
August 28, 2010 at 4:17 am
What a load of BS. I don’t trust anything from NASA and NOAA these days.
My thoughts also.
Record this, record that, and still the temperature record remains flat. More importantly will we have a “record” La Nina over 2010/2011?
Nearly all the cooling factors are in place, these factors group together in a 60 year cycle but with an added influence when the phasing is right. This will see the northern hemisphere in general suffer this winter…Scafetta & Bastardi also agree.
This is the start of a 30 year cycle of cooling.
The difference between a regular El Nino and an El Nino Modoki needs to be explained. Any type of El Nino starts out as a mass of warm water at the beginning of the equatorial countercurrent near New Guinea and the Philippines. The countercurrent then normally carries it to South America where it washes ashore, spreads out, and thereby starts warming the atmosphere. The updraft from this may stop or even temporarily reverse the trade winds. Enough warmth is released this way to rise the global air temperature by half a degree. But any wave that washes ashore must also fall back. As that massive wave retreats for a return journey across the ocean water level behind it drops by half a meter or more, cool water from below wells up, and a La Nina has started. An El Nino Modoki happens if something stops the motion of the El Nino wave before it has reached the coast. A likely cause for this could be a storm surge from a typhoon. When this happens the warm water of the El Nino wave spreads out as though it had hit an obstacle like the coast, and its warm water again starts transferring heat to the atmosphere, but this time in the middle of the ocean. It has been reported that an El Nino Modoki sometimes may not be followed by a La Nina. This is understandable because once the El Nino wave that was held up does reach the coast and turn around it will have lost momentum and the drop in sea level behind it will not be as strong as usual.
Just because we can measure it does not mean we understand it. This is all well and good but ±30 years is grossly insufficient to make any kind of trend announcements for something that has been happening for hundreds of years. This begs the question of what is normal and on what scale. It puzzles me that more effort isn’t being put into finding all that missing heat. It also puzzles me that while everyone recognizes the ENSO, high heat to low heat changes many seem surprised that the centroid of this shifts around. ENSO is just another major ocean oscillating current, all of the ones I have looked at seem to be shifting around over time. Then maybe I have missed something. Maybe this is just another case of correlation looking for a cause.
Moderator: my early comment has been lost in the cyberspace, please rescue it.
REPLY: recovered – Anthony
jack morrow says: August 28, 2010 at 6:34 am
Maybe you are on to something…..
Nothing better to do. My late grandmother use to say ‘jobless pastor baptises piglets’.
I am being a bit flippant, but as a hobby and as natural curiosity, I enjoy looking into unknown ; and why not if data is available.
vukcevic says:
August 28, 2010 at 10:04 am
I am being a bit flippant, but as a hobby and as natural curiosity, I enjoy looking into unknown ; and why not if data is available
All great breakthroughs in science, arts, etc. have been always done by gifted individuals, usually, though we know it is not your case, by laymen as Thomas Alva Edison,etc,etc…
There is one intriguing fact: If you see the El Niño records, you will see that during the Maunder Minimum years there were a lot of intense El Niño. Either those records are wrong or we are about to live much more “interesting times” than before.
Enneagram says: August 28, 2010 at 9:49 am
BTW Magnetic equator is at about 12 S latitude.
Magnetic equator crosses the geographical twice, once in pacific (~ 200 degree latitude) and second time just north-east of Brazil (~ 315 degree latitude), swinging in between down towards Peru.
http://www.ngdc.noaa.gov/geomag/data/mag_maps/pdf/Z_map_mf_2005.pdf