From Dr. Roy Spencer:
UAH Update for January 2011: Global Temperatures in Freefall
…although this, too, shall pass, when La Nina goes away.
LA NINA FINALLY BEING FELT IN TROPOSPHERIC TEMPERATURES
January 2011 experienced a precipitous drop in lower tropospheric temperatures over the tropics, Northern Hemisphere, and Southern Hemisphere. This was not unexpected, since global average sea surface temperatures have been falling for many months, with a head start as is usually the case with La Nina.
YR MON GLOBE NH SH TROPICS
2010 1 0.542 0.675 0.410 0.635
2010 2 0.510 0.553 0.466 0.759
2010 3 0.554 0.665 0.443 0.721
2010 4 0.400 0.606 0.193 0.633
2010 5 0.454 0.642 0.265 0.706
2010 6 0.385 0.482 0.287 0.485
2010 7 0.419 0.558 0.280 0.370
2010 8 0.441 0.579 0.304 0.321
2010 9 0.477 0.410 0.545 0.237
2010 10 0.306 0.257 0.356 0.106
2010 11 0.273 0.372 0.173 -0.117
2010 12 0.181 0.217 0.145 -0.222
2011 1 -0.009 -0.055 0.038 -0.369
This is shown in the following plot (note the shorter period of record, and different zero-baseline):
SO WHY ALL THE SNOWSTORMS?
While we would like to think our own personal experience of the snowiest winter ever in our entire, Methuselah-ian lifespan has some sort of cosmic — or even just global — significance, I would like to offer this plot of global oceanic precipitation variations from the same instrument that measured the above sea surface temperatures (AMSR-E on NASA’s Aqua satellite):
Note that precipitation amounts over the global-average oceans vary by only a few percent. What this means is that when one area gets unusually large amounts of precipitation, another area must get less.
Precipitation is always associated with rising air, and so a large vigorous precipitation system in one location means surrounding regions must have enhanced sinking air (with no precipitation).
In the winter, of course, the relatively warmer oceans next to cold continental air masses leads to snowstorm development in coastal areas. If the cold air mass over the midwest and eastern U.S. is not dislodged by warmer Pacific air flowing in from the west, then the warm oceanic air from the Gulf of Mexico and western Atlantic keeps flowing up and over the cold dome of air, producing more snow and rain. The “storm track” and jet stream location follows that boundary between the cold and warm air masses.
What will be important is whether we see a similar fall in temps down to 2000 levels and even more importantly a slower and less recovery (bounce) than was seen in 2001 to 2005. If the temperatures bounce back but stay below the 2001 to 2005 levels then this will cause significant problems for the AGW theory.
Its just weather!
What a great, scientifically-sound post!!!!!!!!!
So, if I’m reading this correctly, the World just wasted several Trillion dollars on a hoax because we are now “Normal” based on the past 30 years?
I grew up believing, never trust over 30 so I guess the “Science is settled”. ; )
So everything is normal, assuming we can tell what normal is.
btw Don’t you mean El Nina?
El Nina is Spanish for…. the nina….
R.I.P. Chris Farley.
In 1930 it was settled science that the continents were stationary, among English speakers that is, excepting Australia and South Africa (down there they had a better grasp of the evidence for drift). Harold Jeffries and Gaylord Simpson ridiculed Wegener’s theory.
In 2011 it settled science by BBC and National Geographic that peregrine falcons can dive at 240mph. But like ET, we still don’t have one good picture. NASA has yet to weigh in on the subject except for one scientist who said they accomplish this by “flicking their wings.” I suggest the scientific world address this vastly simpler problem before taking on climate prediction. –AGF
Chartists would be looking at the double-shouldered nature of the first graph and going heavily short on (A)GW. Chartists are mugs, of course, but if the sun is indeed hibernating then they might be in the money.
“…although this, too, shall pass, when La Nina goes away.”
=============================================================
Or will it?
We’ve never had the chance to observe the effects of a protracted Solar minimum on the temperature rebound that habitually follows a departing La Nina.
The next 2-3 years could prove very interesting……….
Assuming this temperature trend is correct and taking into account that temperature is only a proxy for the heat energy in the Earth fluidsphere, where did the heat energy go? As my thermodynamics professor always proclaimed, “The heat goes to Mars!”
And assuming the temperature spikes back up again, where was the heat hiding?
But, but… where’s the CO2 warming/energy? It must still be “somewhere”. Maybe the EPA captured it in a bottle for later release in the Arctic so there will be less ice this coming summer….. Yes, it would be a pretty big bottle, but still there is so little of it.
/sarc
@NoAstronomer
Its El Nino “The Boy” – Warm lead up followed by the opposite, La Nina, “The Girl” – long cool down after. ” La” because the noun (Girl)is female. 🙂
this fits so well with decades of Queenslanders’ memories, growing up with what we called “the wet season”. now called La Nina, of course. anyone care to comment?
14 Jan: Australian: Siobhain Ryan: La Nina ‘here for decades’
Stewart Franks, associate professor in environmental engineering at NSW’s University of Newcastle, said his research suggested “enhanced” La Ninas would dominate eastern Australian summer weather patterns for years to come.
“What we noticed is El Nino and La Nina events are actually not random, they tend to cluster, and they cluster on time frames between 10 to 40 years,” he said.
Professor Franks, an Australian national representative to the International Association of Hydrological Sciences, said the last run of strong La Ninas occurred between the mid-1940s and mid-1970s, culminating in the 1974 floods.
They were followed by about three decades dominated by El Nino dry climate patterns…
“We are seeing a return to the devastating impact of the enhanced La Ninas we saw in 1945 to 1975, so that indicates to my mind that it’s entirely possible that were facing 20 to 30 years of repeated, frequent or enhanced La Ninas,” he said…
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/nation/la-nina-here-for-decades/story-e6frg6nf-1225987421955
Does anybody know why Climate Charts and Graphs is showing a -.12 degree anomaly for January? Are they using a different base period?
http://chartsgraphs.wordpress.com/
REPLY: That’s the daily reading plot, which is different from what Dr. Spencer does. – A
It does seem as though all the cards were lined up in favor of the AGW skeptics:
Negative PDO check; Dalton style solar activity check; La Nina check.
So now what more can be added to help sink the AGW hypothesis?
It seems to me that there should be a skeptical consensus on expected future climate, which could then be a clear counterexample to the silly hotcold projections currently emanating from the AGW spokespeople.
Keith Wallis says:
February 2, 2011 at 2:23 pm
Chartists would be looking at the double-shouldered nature of the first graph and going heavily short on (A)GW. Chartists are mugs, of course, but if the sun is indeed hibernating then they might be in the money.
******************************************
I don’t think chartists are entirely mugs, unless they look at the charts in isolation. If they look at the charts in conjunction with other patterns, then they are only doing similar things to forecasters like Piers Corbyn or Joe Bastardi, are they not? (I have the highest respect for both.) You don’t need to understand the cause of everything to be a good forecaster (or chartist). You just need to make more accurate forecasts than your competitors.
At a panel discussion on Capitol Hill last week, Joe Romm indicated that we would see catastrophic affects of GW by 2020 and will be desperate to get off carbon fuels. Based on the response of the audience and fellow panel members, no one took him seriously. But at least he did put a line in the sand that we can hold him to. So, if atmospheric temperatures and SST’s are falling, anyone want to bet on what chance Joe has of being correct in only 9 years?
etudiant says:
February 2, 2011 at 2:41 pm
“It seems to me that there should be a skeptical consensus on expected future climate, which could then be a clear counterexample to the silly hotcold projections currently emanating from the AGW spokespeople.”
=======
There is, its going to get colder from here and NO ONE is prepared because of the CAGW Idiots!
Cycles have been documented for the centuries — any country buying into the CAGW meme is unprepared for the next 30 years.
“While we would like to think our own personal experience of the snowiest winter ever”
“Note that precipitation amounts over the global-average oceans vary by only a few percent.”
=====================================================
So precipitation has not changed, which just means it’s colder.
Not cold= rain
cold = snow
And the warmth from global warming did not put any more moisture in the air.
You’d think that in a world which wasn’t warming going below the 1980-2010 average would be a non-notable event.
Bad news for alarmism but they have still have plenty of ammunition.
Both Arctic and Antarctic sea ice extent are presently below average and there are plenty of “exteme events” to back up their claims.
Good to see that Cyclone Yasi was not quite as catastrophic as the most of the media, who were beginning to froth at the mouth, predicted.
Goes to show that if we are fully prepared for climatic extreme events, they do not to be deadly. The citizens of N Queensland can now legitimately say with some pride “Kiss My Yasi”.
Hopefully it drops another half a degree and then I can laugh myself to sleep as warmists explain to the media how greater temperatures cause an increase in arctic sea ice due to increasing precipitation levels.
http://weaselzippers.us/2011/02/02/boxer-says-shes-going-to-hold-hearings-on-global-warming-skepticism/
http://thehill.com/blogs/e2-wire/677-e2-wire/141711-sen-boxer-says-climate-science-hearings-are-absolutely-in-the-works
====
get prepared to embarrass a Senator…
“Note that precipitation amounts over the global-average oceans vary by only a few percent. What this means is that when one area gets unusually large amounts of precipitation, another area must get less.”
===
Just a thought.
In Chicago we just got about 22 inches of low water content snow, I assume the albedo is still “snow”.
It must be cold to get “dry” snow.
Interesting that precipitation is not going up.
I understood from the CAGW crowd that the recent large amounts of snow were all because of the increased temperatures causing more moisture to be in the air (at least they said that once it started snowing a lot).
Now it seems that there is not much more moisture, but there is more snow because it is colder. I wonder how that can be spun to be caused by CAGW? I am sure it can, I’m just wondering how.
GSW says on February 2, 2011 at 2:37 pm
Pedant alert, but if you cannot enter characters with the tilde over them, then you should spell it La Ninya and El Ninyo.
Further pedant alert. A noun is feminine or masculine, not female or male.
Now if the *red* line dips below 0.0 anomaly, then I’ll be moderately impressed.
For now, eh, better than not, I guess.
It more or less looks to me like this last el nino/la nina cycle are going to average out to back around the .2C we’ve been dancing around for quite some time now.
Which is still a problem for the AGWers, because it’s supposed to be going up .2C every decade in the relentless fashion they insist on.
Jeff Norman says:
February 2, 2011 at 2:31 pm
Assuming this temperature trend is correct and taking into account that temperature is only a proxy for the heat energy in the Earth fluidsphere, where did the heat energy go? As my thermodynamics professor always proclaimed, “The heat goes to Mars!”
And assuming the temperature spikes back up again, where was the heat hiding?
…………………………………………
My question also. Last time I asked it I got a few short messages saying “Look at that bright object in the sky and think”. However, it is more complicated than that. AGW suggests that a warming change should be irreversible in the sort term, with reduction in GHG the main way to lower the temp. Here, we have temperatures lowering with increasing GHG. The mechanism, by elimination, must be that the fluctuations we have been measuring are transient weather noise and noise goes up and down in the sort term, much as seasons do.
So, do we have a conservative system of constant total global heat content, with weather noise wiggles, or are we seeing systematic changes such as those that would result from insolation variability? (I’me leaving out geometric effects such as orbital cycles here).
One can’t simply say “It’s wet because of La Nina”, because that might mean it is less wet somewhere else. That is, ocean oscillations are not the end of the story; they are but a step among several steps when viewed globally.
Where is R. Gates ?
In another thread a while ago, he saw a confirmation of climate models as the tropospheric temperatures remained elevated a few months after the ground temperatures have already plunged.
Though that was not true because longer term ground temperature trends were still higher while they should have been lower (Lindzen therefore assumes ground based temperature trends are inflated by a whopping 60%).
Anyways, the UAH plunge came a bit later than expected, but here it is.
Time to become a 51% sceptic!
And then, posting something of value over on realclimate, after you will get censored and deleted, you may become a 99% sceptic faster than you ever thought.
Are you now, after this a 51% sceptic ?
Shouldn’t we expect significant warming from all the latent heat released when snow forms?
GSW says:
February 2, 2011 at 2:37 pm
@NoAstronomer
Because the warm waters of El Niño arrive about the Christmas season along the Peruvian coast the connection to “the Christ child” seems to have been made. See here:
http://www.pmel.noaa.gov/tao/elnino/el-nino-story.html
For anyone interested here is a comment of the local effects of El Niño – also known as “The Callao Painter,” or simply “the Aguaje.”
“ . . . and the invasion of a southward flowing, inshore current, the “El Nino” and the accompanying phenomenon known as the “Aguaje” or Callao Painter . . . In the Aguaje of 1925, the temperature of the surf at Negritos in northwestern Peru rose sharply . . . Such a sharp rise in the temperature of the sea water, if prolonged, results in a catastrophic destruction of most forms of marine life along large parts of the Peruvian coast as well as an upset in the climatic pattern on land. At such times, the decomposition of the vast quantity of dead marine life, much of it cast upon the beach, generates volumes of hydrogen sulphide that blackens the walls of houses and hulls of ships which are painted with white lead (the Callao Painter). Evidence of the southward flowing El Nino current in 1925 was demonstrated by the large numbers of sea-snakes stranded on the beach . . .” [passage #34]
http://www04.us.archive.org/stream/mollusksoftropic00olss/mollusksoftropic00olss_djvu.txt
More?
http://manoa.hawaii.edu/hpicesu/2010_04_14/Seabirds%20and%20El%20Nino.pdf
“The 1982-1984 El Nino and associated events affected seabirds in the Pacific and Atlantic oceans. Effects ranged from extralimital dispersal to nest desertion and adult mortality, and appeared most severe in the eastern Pacific upwellings off Peru and California, and in the central Pacific. Up to 85% of seabirds died in Peru. ”
Yeah, in SWFL we are running about 10-15 degrees below normal … the inshore water temp is holding in the low 60s.
So those dashed lines through zero are a typo right; or maybe a joke ?
Or is some statisticator going to claim they mean something (relative to the plotted data that is; I presume the plotted is data; not counting the dashed lines.
So I’m a little puzzled about the Global Oceanic Precipitation. I presume the “Oceanic” implies “sansland”, so now how does
AMSR-E sense “precipitation”, and is it type specific, as in liquid or solid, or otherwise discriminatory. Enquiring minds would like to know what machine is reading what Physical signal/parameter; if Dr Roy could explain, please . And if these percentages 4-7% max excursions are from 41 day rolling averages, izzere some raw unaveraged plot we can see to get some idea of the peak smoothing (if such exists; please again.)
What do you want to the betGLOBAL WARMING CROWD will try to find out where the error ,which there isn’t one there ,will be.And of course they will have an answer like because of GLOBAL WARMING it turned everything cooler .Just a natural variance of course but in 30 years it will be hot hot HOT IN JULY.Don’t you jist love how they always have an answer where it’s believable or not.
Sea Level rise has stalled since 2006. How far will it drop?
And for those interested, I’ve posted the preliminary Reynolds OI.v2 SST data for January 2011:
http://bobtisdale.blogspot.com/2011/02/preliminary-january-2011-sst-anomaly.html
“”””” Dr. Bob says:
February 2, 2011 at 2:52 pm
At a panel discussion on Capitol Hill last week, Joe Romm indicated that we would see catastrophic affects of GW by 2020 and will be desperate to get off carbon fuels. Based on the response of the audience and fellow panel members, no one took him seriously. But at least he did put a line in the sand that we can hold him to. “””””
I take a dim view of rival gang members drawing any sort of graffiti on the sand. Lacking a super Teracomputer, I need all the sand clean, to do my calculations on. So Stop it Joe !
We just had the coldest january in living memory and the BOM are trying to tell us teh anomly for the month was +1.5 degrees celsius!
Hey i just had a thought, if there’s one good thing to come out of all this malarky is the fact that Americans might now start using celsius
The significance of a negative spike in the UAH global temperature is quite low, based on the number of times such a spike has occurred and the temperatures have increased subsequently. Looking at the large picture, it does not appear that the upward trend in UAH temperature has been statistically broken.
Darren Parker says:
“Hey i just had a thought, if there’s one good thing to come out of all this malarky is the fact that Americans might now start using celsius.”
Fat chance of that. It’s 58 degrees and chilly here.☺
King of cool said:
“Both Arctic and Antarctic sea ice extent are presently below average and there are plenty of “extreme events” to back up their claims.”
The real metric for the effect of AGW on the arctic sea ice is volume not extent. Of course it easy to measure sea ice extent by satellite since 1979. However the pips 2 data has been convincingly shown by posters here to demonstrate a substantial gain in volume since 2007. The cryostat 2 satellite that was launched in April should be measuring the volume and I believe will soon verify the estimates of growing volume.
Since increasing volume is an exothermic reaction, some of the heat observed in the arctic may be due to the freezing. In addition new glacial isostatic adjustment measurements using gps now show that Greenland is losing ice at a much lower rate than previously estimated. I am not as knowledgeable as most of the experts that post here but I have my own theory that based on ice core solar proxy measurements going back 750 years there appears to be a twenty year lag between a change in group sunspot number and climate. I believe that twenty year delay has just kicked in and it is going to grow colder for the next twenty years.
Actually, you can bet on a number of such things at Intrade. E.g.: Will Global Average Temperature for 2011-2012 Be Warmest on Record?
A number of others here: https://www.intrade.com/jsp/intrade/contractSearch/index.jsp?clsID=19&grpID=8628#
aaron says:
February 2, 2011 at 3:54 pm
“Shouldn’t we expect significant warming from all the latent heat released when snow forms?”
At what altitude did the snow form? How much CO2 was between that released heat and the ground?
Hmm….
“”””” aaron says:
February 2, 2011 at 3:54 pm
Shouldn’t we expect significant warming from all the latent heat released when snow forms? “””””
The normal order of procession, is for the Burro to be in FRONT of the cart; since they will stop dead in their tracks, if they see anything immediately in front of them.
So NYET on the warming; the snow simply will refuse to form, UNTIL all that latent heat of freezing is REMOVED from the water (or water vapor). Don’t forget, you have to extract about 539 +80 Calories per gram to go from water vapor to ice crystals. Only then can you have snow; AFTER the latent heat is already gone; kapische ?
And that heat is lost in the upper atmosphere mostly due to radiative cooling, hence at least 50% to space.
When water is cooled continuously so the Temperature is dropping, the Temp comes to a screeching halt, when it gets to zero (usually under normal conditions); and it stays at zero until the latent heat is removed, and then solidification starts (aka freezing) For a small quantity of water (so that temperature gradients are small), the whole lot stays at zero till it all freezes, and then the Temperature continues its downward journey.
This Temperature hesitation on freezing, is used to advantage, when doing black body cavity measurements, such as a freezing copper black body cavity for example. The Candela used to be specified as 1/60th of the Luminous Intensity of a one square cm Black Body cavity, at the Temperature of freezing Platinum. Only Bill Gates, can afford a Freezing Platinum Black Body Laboratory Standard; so most of the poor folks have to make do with a copper one.
Same goes for condensing from the vapor phase; the latent heat represents the energy that is keeping the molecules apart in the vapor phase, and that energy has to be dumped before the condensation can occur, and only then can the Temperature continue to drop.
So when steam condenses on your skin (or your wife’s) in the kitchen, it is going to dump about 539 calories per gram onto your skin, which is going to burn the hell out of you; but your skin Temperature is NOT going to suddenly rise to 639 deg C. It can never rise above the 100 deg C that the steam was (presumably) at the time.
So again; nyet on warming after precipitation.
Actually the names are “EL NIÑO” -the boy- and “LA NIÑA” -the girl. They first talked about EL NIÑO and EL ANTI NIÑO. But since here in Latin America EL NIÑO means EL NIÑO DIOS or the newborn Jesus Christ , el ANTI NIÑO sounded like the Anti-Christ. So they changed the name to LA NIÑA.
Here in Latin America for Christmas we honor Jesus Christ Child. NAVIDAD (spanish) means the birth of Jesus and NATALE (portuguese) too means the birth of Jesus. Almost every home will have a Christmas crib honoring EL NIÑO DIOS -Jesus Christ Child- So it is understandable that talking about EL ANTI NIÑO was unthinkable in this wonderful Latin America.
This UAH temperature shows the slow sinking of the “satanic co2” Titanic. Beautiful! Cheers
Building on what Anything Is Possible said,
In 2005 two solar physicists, Galina Mashnich and Vladimir Bashkirtsev, bet climate modeler James Annan $10,000 that global temperatures would be cooler in 2012-2017 compared to 1998-2003. When this La Nina goes away (this too shall pass), others may take her place.
Bruce says: February 2, 2011 at 4:34 pm
“Sea Level rise has stalled since 2006. How far will it drop?”
It is a secret.
Most recient published data data from
http://sealevel.colorado.edu/current/sl_noib_ns_global.txt
2010.7143 25.189
2010.7415 22.563
We are awaiting another eight or so data points (2 1/2 months of data) to finish off 2010, but for some reasone they do not seem to be being posted.
I wonder why?
Could the drop in sea level be worse then they thought?
Actually, you DO get warming — up where the snow is forming. Where the heat goes is another matter, as GES sez.
The La Nina looks like it has reached bottom now and is on the way back up. The Nino 3 region around the Galapagos Islands is warming pretty fast now even though there is still alot of cool water just below the surface. The lack of clouds means the sun is beating down day after day and the top surface of the ocean at least is warming now.
The Nino 3.4 minimum will be recorded as happening in the first week of October or in the week of January 12th but they are close enough that we can say the week of January 12th was the bottom peak in Nino 3.4.
So, there is still about 3 months of cooling yet to come after the January UAH numbers.
The extra rains and snowstorms will continue for awhile yet because the atmosphere is dumping water vapour as it cools.
Next up is the big red spot at 160E, 150 metres depth which is slowly making its way east.
http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/analysis_monitoring/ocean/weeklyenso/wkteq_xz.gif
goodlocust;
Yeah, there must be CO2 back-radiative insulation of the upper clouds from the ground, by GHG logic. Once the H2O heat-pipe has pierced most of the troposphere, it’s “up, up, and awaaayy!”
😉
Wow, I was close in the prediction thread. 0.0 +/- .05….
JER0ME says:
February 2, 2011 at 3:21 pm
Interesting that precipitation is not going up.
I understood from the CAGW crowd that the recent large amounts of snow were all because of the increased temperatures causing more moisture to be in the air (at least they said that once it started snowing a lot).
Now it seems that there is not much more moisture, but there is more snow because it is colder. I wonder how that can be spun to be caused by CAGW? I am sure it can, I’m just wondering how.
==================================================
Amazing, isn’t it?
God! I made an error. In spanish Christmas is NAVIDAD (the birth of Christ). In portuguese it is NATAL (the birth of Christ too). In my former post I said that Christmas in portuguese was NATALE. But NATALE is actually Christmas in italian… My portuguese writing skills are really poor, sorry (my portuguese talking skills aren´t so hot either… hehe).
Cheers
Where has the heat gone? Into the ocean. So we should see a rise in OHC concurrent with this drop in global atmospheric temperature.
Jeff Norman says:
February 2, 2011 at 2:31 pm
Assuming this temperature trend is correct and taking into account that temperature is only a proxy for the heat energy in the Earth fluidsphere, where did the heat energy go? As my thermodynamics professor always proclaimed, “The heat goes to Mars!”
And assuming the temperature spikes back up again, where was the heat hiding?
Sigh…..
Temperature of the atmosphere does not equal the heat content of the atmosphere
So (if you could) keeping the ‘heat content’ static while reducing the water vapor in a volume of air will result in a temperature spike up. And NO heat has gone anywhere
Similarly, keeping the heat content static and raising the water vapor content of a volume of atmosphere the volume will be at a lower temperature and no heat has gone anywhere.
This is the enthalpy of the atmosphere.
@aaron chmielewski
aaron says:
February 2, 2011 at 3:54 pm
“Shouldn’t we expect significant warming from all the latent heat released when snow forms?”
We don’t get warming we get heat radiated from the water molecules changing to liquid then ice. The heat is radiated without regard to temperature as it is latent heat being given up so Stefan Boltzmann does not apply.
look at:
http://www.ssd.noaa.gov/goes/east/natl/flash-rb.html
Watch the infrared from the top of the storm
If it had not been for the aftermaths of big eruptions (El Chichon, 1982-85; Pinatubo, 1991-94), each of which occurred during a fairly strong El Nino, the overall 31-year temperature trend appears to be basically flat with ups and downs due to Ninos/Ninas.
AGW proponents should at least be cheering this news and breathing a temporary sigh of relief. Any drop like this delays – even a little – the onset of the catastrophic results of global warming. So while I lament the effect it has had on me personally, what with the higher bill for home heating oil and all, AGW proponents can dance (carefully) in the slippery streets.
As far as trends, the chart shows that temperatres were flat between 1979 and 1996 at about the – 0.1 to -0.14C. Temperatures were again flatbetween 2002 and 2007 at about the +0.2C level. What the graph shows is that there was a significant amount of heat released and put into the system in the run up to and around the 1998 El Nino.
Apart from, there has been fairly level temperatures a little below or a little above the base line.
Someone help me out here. Looking at the daily AQUA ch05 figures for January
http://discover.itsc.uah.edu/amsutemps/execute.csh?amsutemps+002
I expected the overall monthly figure to be significantly lower. What am I missing? (Note: you may have to click on the average box and redraw — at the bottom — to see what I mean. It was more than .01 degrees below the average.)
The neg PDO, strong La Nina and neg AO & NAO are starting to show in the world temps. This trend should continue along with the massive winters in the northern hemisphere.
Solar output is one component of the downward trend which is also showing downward movement. The most important metric EUV is still on the slide and is at present lower than the SC22/23 minimum. The sunspot record is still not ramping up and continues to undercut SC5. F10.7 also refuses to move from its plateau recorded throughout 2010.
> NoAstronomer says:
> btw Don’t you mean El Nina?
I’m sure I wasn’t the only one who got your joke. Most here though have the attention span of gnats.
Wouldn’t it be easier to check the Earth’s “Average Daily Temp” –and get a much better ‘feel’ for whether (or weather) it’s getting warmer or cooler– if we did something like this:
1. Get a daily temp reading for Venus (the whole schlamasal)
2. Get a daily temp reading for Mars (the whole schlamiesel)
3. Add 1. and 2. together and divide by 2 (This is the Earth’s “Average Daily Temp”)
Well, it would be interesting, even if it didn’t change very much.
This is an interesting question. I have told some of the ardent Warmists at the Guardian that I expect to hear less from them in 2011 and hopefully onwards. This is the travesty but expect Al Gore et. al. to get louder and blame global cooling on global warming. ;O)
Hmm, global temperature has plummeted to the lowest value since……2008. Wow! I can’t wait for the next bombshell.
Guys, the base line was changed to be the average up to Dec 2010 and then the very next month we get a head line “anomaly goes negative” gees in other breaking news… yesterday was warmer than today therefore ever major scientific institution must be wrong
http://www.drroyspencer.com/2011/01/dec-2010-uah-global-temperature-update-0-18-deg-c/
Yeah… the CAGW theory fails again. Temperature not rising, Ice caps not melting, sea level rise not accelerating, number of cyclones not rising, glaciers not melting away, stratospheric hot spot not found. What else do they need to revise the theory?
Hey Geoff – also it is also possible that this La Nina lasts into 2012 with such a strong SOI and historical examples of 2 year La Ninas. Combined with stronger and more frequent La Ninas as part of the cold PDO and as you say with a quiet sun it would be likely that we will see an overall cooling trend with some warm bumps in between.
H’mm…
If there was no trend in the data, we would expect to spend around half the time below the average level. If dipping below the average is an event, then there seems to be an acceptance that there’s a trend.
As to where the heat goes, etc: I’m not confident in the actual numbers given. The anomalies in question are tiny compared to, say, seasonal fluctuation in temps. What is needed is some fairly-derived confidence limits on the temps.
twawki says:
February 3, 2011 at 2:54 am
Joe is also thinking the current La Nina might last or go back to back. We will see but the trend should be down. The current AMO position is probably ideal, the neg AO & NAO working better with a positive AMO.
Several years ago I did an analysis of the NCDC global land and sea temperature index.
At that time (these pesky global indexes keeping being revised) – at that time, there was an 0.7 degree per century long-term secular trend, plus an approximately 65 year zigzag running through it.
My projection at that time, was that the temperature in 2050 would be much the same as in 2009, but that itwould be somewhat colder in between. It would rise about 0.3 degrees higher by 2010. These projections were based on my assumption that the trends appearent since 1880, would continue unaltered until at least 2100.
Since then, my knowledge has increased.
I now see the secular trend as mainly an artifact of the effect of UHI on the data.
I see the 65 odd year zigzag as due to the PDO and other oceanic cycles.
We have had a dominant Le Nino upward zig and have now entered a dominant La Nina downward zag.
There is one fairly large proviso and that relates to any possible effect, if any, of the quiet sun.
That is evidenced by the relatively small number of sunspot numbers.
That may or may not add the the normal zigzag cycle, which may or may not plunge us into a new little ice age.
As usual, time will tell – these are most interesting times.
I will not live to see the like again.
Dr. Spencer,
You have for January 2011 :
-0.369 for tropics
+0.038 for the south hemisphere
-0.055 for the north hemisphere
So how in the world do you then get -0.009 for the global temperature?
I’m sure it has to do with the algorithm you use but could you just explain it for us here. I have always read that the tropics cover a higher percentage of the globe than either the north or south hemispheres combined excluding the tropics. That is a bit of a mystery.
Thanks. Enjoy your posts.
My solar causal intepretation of the UAH graph.
http://solarcycle24com.proboards.com/index.cgi?action=display&board=globalwarming&thread=1488&page=1
Wayne:
(-0.055 + 0.038)/2 is c. -0.009.
I think the tropics are negative but the poles are positive which almost cancel. That’s my reading of it anyway.
Thanks Jit, that was really shallow of me, always trying to get all three values in there. NH and SH must then be as they say literally the entire hemispheres and the tropics just tossed in the printout for additional information. Got it now. That right there says I need sleep.
Ian W.
“Sigh….”
How ingraciously melodramatic. Perhaps you missed my “temperature is only a proxy for the heat energy”. Yes, I get the “enthalpy of the atmosphere”.
But seeing as how you were so willing to patiently explain the parts I obviously missed, perhaps you can explain from whence the moisture in your column of air came? You see, the “UAH Satellite-Based Temperature of the Global Lower Atmosphere” indicates a sudden, dramatic decrease in temperature (only a proxy for enthalpy) over the last two months.
Your hypothesis is that the heat energy in the column of air was “used” to vapourize some moisture therefore sustaining the overall heat content in the column of air (minus the heat loss required to satisfy the 2nd law). That is all very well and good, but where did the moisture come from? Either the moisture was just hovering around waiting to be vapourized or the heat energy in the column of air swooped down and “scooped” up some moisture that happened to be laying around on the surface. How does that work?
The Temperature of 2010:
http://thegwpf.org/the-observatory/2360-the-temperature-of-2010.html
Unbelievable!
Richard Sharpe says (February 2, 2011 at 3:21 pm): “Further pedant alert. A noun is feminine or masculine, not female or male.”
No butch nouns? 🙂
The planet is stable. It’s the alarmists that are not.
Geoff. Noticed blank sun again today. As the sun follows a cycle if we start to get a prolonged downturn then does that mean solar maximum is over? Also how does the quiet sun and the declining SST affect LaNina? Interesting times.
twawki says:
February 3, 2011 at 4:27 pm
Geoff. Noticed blank sun again today. As the sun follows a cycle if we start to get a prolonged downturn then does that mean solar maximum is over? Also how does the quiet sun and the declining SST affect LaNina? Interesting times.
Still a long way to solar maximum I think, but the question is how much higher will it be compared to now. This graph compares SC24 with SC23 and shows the greater proportion of spotless days. Note how the sustained spotless days compare with SC23.
I think there are 2 major solar effects occurring now. In the north we have had the highest strongly negative AO that is altering jetstream patterns that encourage southern movement of polar air. The polar vortex and stratosphere ozone and temps are reacting to the lower EUV levels which is influencing the AO. In the south we have had the highest POSITIVE reading of the AAO which assists the building of the La Nina as we have observed in the past. I am not sure as yet why this index was so highly positive.
Trivial Pursuit Dept.
Q1. From Dec 2010 to Jan 2011 the global temp anomaly fell from 0.181 to -0.009, a total of -0.190°C. When was the last one month drop (or rise) of that magnitude?
Q2. The NH temp anomaly fell from 0.217 to -0.055. a total of -0.272°C. Same question.
Q3. If NH temps continue to fall at a rate of -0.272°C per month, how many months will it be before Chicago is buried under 2km of ice?
Note: Q3 is just for fun, Algore style.
Q3;
After the first 0.1 km or so, who cares?
I don’t want to be an alarmist, but has anyone noticed how far the magnetic North Pole has traveled since 1967?
If the pole moves between 14-17 miles a year at the pole, that distance translates into greater electromagnetic variances further south.
The CAGW claque patently ignored Solar activity as a culprit in the world’s weather paterns, ie: sun spots. But sun spot activity interacts with our magnetoshpere, and the magnetic North Pole is certainly part of that phenomenon.
I only mention this because it might have some bearing on the huge jet stream shift we’ve been watching over the last 40 years.
Someone please tell me why no one will draw a trend line through the UAH graph? Oh, I know why, silly me. It’s because there’s an upward trend. One slightly below average month and the sceptics claim that global warming has ended. Yeah, right.
6000 years ago it was much warmer than now. In fact, the archaeological digs in the Orkney Islands (North Sea) confirm that palm trees could have grown there 6000 years ago. It was that hot.
The last ice age ended 12,000 years ago.
This means that, half way between the end of the ice age and now, it got colder.
We still haven’t gotten back to where it was at 6000 years ago.
Are we going to get that hot again?
Yes. Of course. Give or take a few mini-ice ages along the way.
But, according to the CAGW claque, the natural upward trend is man-made.
What bunk.
This whole mess started when NASA farmed out the weather forcasting to the Brits, the Brits didn’t have enough resources to handle the job and started cooking the books while using NASA money to pay for upgrades hoping no one would spot the fraud until they could actually get everything on line, then ALGORE came along and hijacked the cooked data to foist off his carbon credit scam.
By the way, as Vice President, ALGORE had direct oversight at NASA .. so tell me this wasn’t an in-house scam.
Anthony,
Doesn’t your “Widget” need updating?
REPLY: Yes, the script keep breaking. I’ll have to manually update it, thanks for the reminder-
Anthony
“Mark Nobes says:
February 5, 2011 at 11:02 am
Someone please tell me why no one will draw a trend line through the UAH graph? Oh, I know why, silly me. It’s because there’s an upward trend. One slightly below average month and the sceptics claim that global warming has ended. Yeah, right.”
Over the last 9 years there has been virtually no warming. See the graphs since 2002 at
http://hidethedecline.eu/pages/posts/status-on-global-temperature-trends-216.php
Those graphs were drawn without the January data.
And do not forget Phil Jones quote from last February at
http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/science/nature/8511670.stm
“C – Do you agree that from January 2002 to the present there has been statistically significant global cooling?
No. This period is even shorter than 1995-2009. The trend this time is negative (-0.12C per decade), but this trend is not statistically significant. “
Nice, Werner. I wonder what Mark will have to say when confronted with facts? Probably go hide his decline.
Why yes JIT, there is a trend. There always has been and always will be. For the last few hundred years, it happens to be mainly upwards. The alarmists have tuned their models to reproduce that trend. Then, they set out on a campaign to hide the historical fact of that pre-existing trend so they could claim their models prove the trend is the result of man-made CO2. Arguing the pre-existing trend didn’t exist until man’s CO2 came along is where they were caught out in a lie (climate-gate).
Cheers.
“Mark Nobes says:
February 5, 2011 at 11:02 am
“Someone please tell me why no one will draw a trend line through the UAH graph? Oh, I know why, silly me. It’s because there’s an upward trend. One slightly below average month and the sceptics claim that global warming has ended. Yeah, right.”
Hi Mark, draw away, but do a few things first. as you plot your linear trend line please make certain you go from the 1940s peak to the 98/2000 area peak. I am completly aware you cannot go back to the 40s with UHA satellite graphs. However the surface ones are similar, so feel free to splice them to the UHA. (Just do not hide the splice (-; Also be certain not to use the past temperatures that were adjusted downwards. Now add some realistic UHI adjustments. Now account for volcanic cooling in appropriate areas. Please report back on your findings, with details of how you removed the lowered past and accounted for UHI. We are excited to see your results.
As I am typing this I am realizing that indeed it is true, most of climate change is human induced, just a small select group of humans.
From what I have read, greenhouse gases do not emit energy in the same bandwidth in which they absorb energy. Thus, emissions from CO2 are not absorbed by CO2. And, Earth’s outgoing energy is delayed, ever so slightly, but it does return to space. Also, 95% of the tropospheric warming effect in the troposphere is due to water vapor and around 5% for CO2. During the fuel crises in the 70s, there should have been a noticeable drop in ppm CO2 – there wasn’t. This tells me that the atmospheric increase in CO2 over the last several decades is, in fact, perfectly natural. Looking at this article: NOAA Confirms Recent Global Temperature Change Is Historically Small & Warming Is Decelerating, and their graph of Annual Global Temperature Change: Recent Warming Insignificant, I see no impact from CO2 to support any claims of unprecedented global warming.