SST UPDATE FROM AMSR-E
By Dr. Roy Spencer, PhD
The following plot shows global average sea surface temperatures from the AMSR-E instrument over the lifetime of the Aqua satellite, through Dec 31, 2010. The SSTs at the end of December suggest that the tropospheric temperatures in the previous graph (see post here) still have a ways to fall in the coming months to catch up to the ocean, which should now be approaching its coolest point if it follows the course of previous La Nina’s.
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Here’s a visual view of the global SST:
@ur momisugly FrankK & R.Shearer
Thanks for the comments guys, just a couple of points…
Yeah, it’s 2011 by a gnats whisker but the graph only goes up to the end of 2010.
I am aware that the seasons are reversed down under and I did think about that at the time but I couldn’t see anything on the graph to state whether it was Northern hemisphere or southern. Maybe I’m missing something but if you present facts to fit a theory then maybe important information should be clearly stated, otherwise you can mislead.
The visual representation (pretty colours) shows readings from both hemispheres. I have to look at it again on a proper screen when I get the chance, but there’s lies, damn lies and statistics to be considered. Don’t need Janet and John colouring books level of presentation but all important information needs to be clearly displayed, don’t you think?
Pamela Gray says:
January 3, 2011 at 7:23 pm
The Met Offices do have themometers in the soil and down to 4′. At one time they used to publish them. I always found them a brilliant indicator of temperature trends. The soil acts like a ‘damper’ so you get a smoothed curve unadjusted by human hands.
Stephen Wilde says:
January 4, 2011 at 12:12 am
I think Leif’s comment may have been a little piece of scandanavian humour.
Richard Sharpe says:
January 3, 2011 at 6:24 pm
tallbloke says on January 3, 2011 at 5:16 pm
You can call that a prediction.
Would you care to quantify that, otherwise that prediction is not very useful. For example, 0.0001C below 2008 could be considered well below by some people.
-0.32C +/-0.05 by September on Roy Spencer’s metric according to my model.
Leif Svalgaard says:
January 3, 2011 at 10:39 pm
I was lectured [when I remarked on this] that nobody in his right mind would recap or cork a bottle, once open.
Re-corking the bottle? That’s illegal isn’t it?
“stephen richards says:
January 4, 2011 at 1:01 am
Stephen Wilde says:
January 4, 2011 at 12:12 am
I think Leif’s comment may have been a little piece of scandanavian humour”
Yes I know but it was a chance to try to provoke a more serious comment.
Since I adjusted my scenario to broaden the proposed causes of the ozone effects above 45km and pointed out that in view of the involvement of chemical processes the matter of radiative physics is of little significance I have not had a further comment from him.
Leif Svalgaard says:
January 3, 2011 at 10:39 pm
In Russia where I lived for a while [actually then the CCCP] vodka bottles do not have corks, but tear-off caps. I was lectured [when I remarked on this] that nobody in his right mind would recap or cork a bottle, once open.
In that case, I implore you not to open another until next year.
Leif Svalgaard said:-
“January 3, 2011 at 8:25 pm
peterhodges says:
January 3, 2011 at 7:48 pm
holy smokes….did leif svalgaard make a joke?
Reminding people how they reacted to the drop in 2007-2008 [but with the reverse effect]. They shouldn’t jump on every little wiggle of a messy system and take that as confirmation of whatever pet theory they are peddling.”
Well that is just what the Warmistas are doing when they say that the “warm” 2010 is “proof” of AGW. I fact they are far the bigger culprits for wiggle jumping. Realists tend to look over longer time scales.
Looking at the graph, if you take out the El Nino “wiggle” then sea surface temps (and following them air temps) are still clearly trending downwards.
El Nino is just the Pacific releasing energy- it is not global warming.
It is too early to call how SST will respond in 2011.
Before I had seen this post, I had presumed that the drop in temps would be similar to 2008. Who knows, it may yet be.
I merely commented on the plot which for the extreme latter part of 201o appears to have flattened out and took this in conjuction with Dr Spencer’s comment suggesting that the SST should by now have approached its coolest point.
Of course, there are times between 2007 & 2008 where the temperatures momentarily flattened off before falling further and 2010/11 may in the end show a similar profile.
Whilst I do not like the cold, personally I would like to see the SST fall further to around 2008 levels.
The energy stored in the first few meters of our oceans contain the same energy stored in the whole of the planet’s atmosphere. This can be deduced by an O-level physics student. So, when Kevin Trenberth postulated that the oceans must be warming up due to AGW, he was scientifically correct, if AGW is correct. But he could not find the warming and he even said that “this is a travesty”, proving that AGW is a non-starter.
The oceans’ surface area constitute a major part of the planet’s total surface area and therefore receive pro-rate the solar energy radiation coming in. The question is what the b… hell the oceans do with this energy. I am no scientist, just a graduate (1974) in Mechanical Engineering, and assisted with my thermodynamics and mathematics can understand some or more than some, of the science being published on our climate’s antics.
I love reports such as this one by Dr. Spencer, they are to the point and immediately understood and reinforces my opinion (based on what I have been reading ever since Al Gore told me that my grand children are all gonna die of the heat-they are dying of the cold actually), that the oceans, with their great mass and the specific heat value of water, are the most important sink and store of the planet’s energy dynamics. The oceans smooth out the global temperature, abosrbing it during warm periods and releasing it during cold periods. IMHO, should the current solar slumber continue, the oceans would not have enough energy stored to keep the earth in global warming mode, but could send us reeling into a freeze. I hope not. I just wish that CO2 would bail us out of a big freeze, but apparently would not. I love CO2, it gives life to my grand children but alas, it does not actually keep us warm. What keeps us warm is producing it by burning hydrocarbons, but the econutters would not let me.
“the ocean, which should now be approaching its coolest point if it follows the course of previous La Nina’s.”
But, alas, will continue to cool into March, so sad.
Stephen Wilde says:
January 4, 2011 at 12:12 am
“I think Leif’s comment may have been a little piece of scandanavian humour”
Yes I know but it was a chance to try to provoke a more serious comment.”
Churchill said famously that a little joke is a serious matter. I know it’s good sport here to knock Leif’s skeptism about solar effects on climate. I’m sympathetic to Leif, because he is a slave to experimental data. Theories are nice, but data is real, or should be. Show me the data, prove the high and repetitive correlation, and then the scientific experiment to validate all of that. Then I buy the theory — when it’s proven. That’s the source of my skepticism about AGW and solar effects. Solar effetcs is more plausible to me, but it is far from proven.
This will definately cool the atmosphere considering the equator is the area with the most centrifugal force.
“I am in awe of is their smug, self-absorbed egocentricity.”
…in the comments and posts at WUWT, in general, and I just started looking yesterday.
You folks are a valuable lesson in how third rate science can sound convincing when you want it to.
We all look forward to reading your first class scientific contributions. This wasn’t it.
@Leif Svalgaard says:
January 3, 2011 at 7:00 pm
“Rising solar activity is clearly driving SST down…”
Many a (half) true word is spoken in jest, keep it up.
Hope you’re right but have a “feeling” we still have a way to go with the current SST drop AND much more tropospheric temperature drop before we start an upward trend in either graph. Something in my bones;-)
“NK says:
January 4, 2011 at 5:33 am ”
I accept Leif’s position and have taken account of various of his contributions by amending my propositions accordingly.
I also agree with this:
“Show me the data, prove the high and repetitive correlation, and then the scientific experiment to validate all of that. Then I buy the theory — when it’s proven.”
I do see a high and repetitive solar/climate correlation in the historical records on a 500/1000 year timescale but it often breaks down on less than century timecales due to a countervailing force (oceanic most likely).
The trouble is that the data we need has not been available until the satellite era which is itself too short for diagnostic purposes.
However the recent sudden step change in solar behaviour ought to be pronounced enough to see solar/climate effects on a relatively short timescale now that we have such good systems of data recovery.
So the scientific experiment is global and ongoing. Gaia is subjecting us to a little demonstration and it should produce enough data over the next year or two to substantiate or rebut my hypothesis.
If ozone really does increase above 45km when the sun is quiet and decrease above 45km when the sun is more active then my scenario becomes the only game in town.
fuddy man says:
January 4, 2011 at 5:56 am
Then people like you post your smug, self-absorbed egocentric insults demonstrating that the “problem” you refer to is likely universal.
You’ll get no arguments here that the IPCC reports (more particularly, the IPCC process) rates as third rate science packaged nicely to sound convincing to the hoi palloi.
Mark
Dr. Spencer’s data “obviously” do not account for the tremendous latent heat that is stored up in the arctic region that has contributed to the changes in air flow that triggers massive snows in Siberia that result in .
{reminder to self … next time must invite friends over before ripping off the cap, maintain a smaller stock of vodka on hand, or deign to maintain (and use) a supply of corks}
Vodka obviously confused my use of proper punctuation marks (see addition below):
Dr. Spencer’s data “obviously” do not account for the tremendous latent heat that is stored up in the arctic region that has contributed to the changes in air flow that triggers massive snows in Siberia that result in {insert here the current AGW “theory” that cooling is warming in the Northern hemisphere}.
{reminder to self … next time must invite friends over before ripping off the cap, maintain a smaller stock of vodka on hand, or deign to maintain (and use) a supply of corks}
Pamela Gray says: Cuz it’s FLIPPIN COLD!
As I get this mental image of a just under 5 foot (with boots…) double wrapped Redhead Penguin with “flippers” that won’t quite reach the holster… 😉
And with a worm garden to boot…
E.M. Smith here in soggy cold frosty California… sitting on top of the electric room heater with the 150 W bulb going in the lamp….
(Sidebar: California has banned the 100 W bulb, so I’ve put them in storage for ‘someday’ and replaced them all with the 150 W bulbs that are still ‘approved’. I understand this of going to save energy and I’m doing it “for the children”, though I’m not sure exactly what children, as mine are adults now… But hey, smarter minds than mine have decided “Hey Hey, HO HO, 100W has got to go!”, so it’s 150 W for me…. In a few more years, it’s only the 200 W bulbs that I’ll still be able to buy. Man, I’ll really be saving energy then… /sarcoff> )
Stephen Wilde says:
January 4, 2011 at 7:42 am
“So the scientific experiment is global and ongoing. Gaia is subjecting us to a little demonstration and it should produce enough data over the next year or two to substantiate or rebut my hypothesis.”
Stephen– keep that data coming, and stay on the honest side of science.
SST anomalies are interesting when looking at short term cycles such as ENSO and longer term cycles such as the PDO, but not so useful when trying to study a much longer term effect such as would be suggested by AGW. In this case, we would be talking about looking at longer term ocean heat content measurements, and even more so, the heat content of the ocean down to the deepest layers.
Fortunately, a recently completed long-term study of deeper ocean heat content with solid and reliable data seems to indicate exactly what AGW skeptics seem to want to try and refute when looking the short term SST cycles– namely, deeper ocean heat content seems to be rising:
http://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/abs/10.1175/2010JCLI3682.1
If future studies of the deeper ocean confirm the results of this study, at least some part of Dr. Trenberth’s “missing heat” may have been found, and this would never be possible by simply looking at shorter term SST cycles…
E.M.Smith says on January 4, 2011 at 11:30 am
This is very clearly a dirty scheme between politicians and companies that make those horrible mercury filled twirly lamps because the patents on incandescents long ago expired so the profits are minuscule and there’s too much competition.
The Greens must be happy to know that they have been used by Big-light manufacturing again.
R Gates said:
“Fortunately, a recently completed long-term study of deeper ocean heat content with solid and reliable data seems to indicate exactly what AGW skeptics seem to want to try and refute when looking the short term SST cycles– namely, deeper ocean heat content seems to be rising:
http://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/abs/10.1175/2010JCLI3682.1”
Well, RG, that might be so for the period of increased solar shortwave into the oceans whilst the sun was active, the jets were more poleward/zonal and there was reduced cloudiness and albedo.
All those factors are now in reverse so I don’t see that trend as continuing.