UAH Global Temperature Update for April 2012: +0.30°C
By Dr. Roy Spencer
The global average lower tropospheric temperature anomaly increased again in April, 2012, to +0.30°C., with warming in both Northern and Southern Hemispheres, but slightly cool conditions persisting in the tropics (click on the image for the full-size version):
The corresponding April anomaly from RSS, using a common baseline period of 1981-2010, is considerably cooler at +0.21°C.
The 3rd order polynomial fit to the data (courtesy of Excel) is for entertainment purposes only, and should not be construed as having any predictive value whatsoever.
Here are the monthly stats:
YR MON GLOBAL NH SH TROPICS
2011 01 -0.010 -0.055 +0.036 -0.372
2011 02 -0.020 -0.042 +0.002 -0.348
2011 03 -0.101 -0.073 -0.128 -0.342
2011 04 +0.117 +0.195 +0.039 -0.229
2011 05 +0.133 +0.145 +0.121 -0.043
2011 06 +0.315 +0.379 +0.250 +0.233
2011 07 +0.374 +0.344 +0.404 +0.204
2011 08 +0.327 +0.321 +0.332 +0.155
2011 09 +0.289 +0.304 +0.274 +0.178
2011 10 +0.116 +0.169 +0.062 -0.054
2011 11 +0.123 +0.075 +0.170 +0.024
2011 12 +0.126 +0.197 +0.055 +0.041
2012 01 -0.090 -0.057 -0.123 -0.138
2012 02 -0.112 -0.013 -0.212 -0.277
2012 03 +0.110 +0.129 +0.092 -0.108
2012 04 +0.295 +0.411 +0.179 -0.120
As a reminder, the most common reason for large month-to-month swings in global average temperature is small fluctuations in the rate of convective overturning of the troposphere, discussed here.
Werner Brozek says
http://www.microsofttranslator.com/bv.aspx?from=&to=en&a=http%3A%2F%2Fwattsupwiththat.com%2F2012%2F05%2F10%2Fuah-global-temperature-up-in-april%2F%23comment-981295
Henry says
Hi Werner, do you perhaps know how they calibrate those instruments on board of the satelites?
In any case, although the average temps are interesting, they do not tell you the real story that is busy developing because of the weather. If you really want to see what is happening you must plot the maxima, see
http://www.letterdash.com/henryp/global-cooling-is-here
which nobody but me (I think) is doing….
@Kelvin Potter Vaughan: “I was told by a statistician once that any graph that does not show the zero axis is biassed.”
The statistician was right. Of course, any graph that does show the zero is also biased.
You must determine what bias there is and whether you are being played with visual trickery.
HenryP says:
May 10, 2012 at 8:19 am
Hi Werner, do you perhaps know how they calibrate those instruments on board of the satelites?
If you really want to see what is happening you must plot the maxima
As for the first question, sorry, you will have to ask Dr. Spencer.
As for plotting the maxima, you may be right. However I think a much more important thing is humidity as Ian W pointed out above. There is much talk about polar amplification and that Hadcrut4 shows 2010 was warmer than 1998. If this was arrived at by more cold and dry polar air warming up and being averaged with the rest of the globe, then the 2010 record is really not that meaningful.
lagomorphic – learnt a new word today.
Henry@Werner
I think Ian has it got it the wrong way around:
it is the drop in temperatures that causes the drop in humidity
as reported by me and others,ca. -0.02 to -0.01 %RH/ annum since 1975
http://www.letterdash.com/HenryP/henrys-pool-table-on-global-warming
In fact, it is an accelerator for cooling, since the more humidity drops out of the atmosphere as water (liquid), the more it enhances the cooling process.
(water vapor truly is a GHG, about the CO2 being a true GHG I am not so sure -http://www.letterdash.com/HenryP/more-carbon-dioxide-is-ok-ok )
In hindsight, I should re-do my analyses of humidity in the light of my latest findings,
and look at it before and after global cooling started
(1994)
I long to see the day when a giant asterisk is attached to every use of the word “global” in climate science. Beneath (actually, foremost) should be the lengthy disclaimer admitting the subjectivity – and sheer advocacy – of generalizations about “global” anything. Taken from a different perspective, a different elevation, a different point in time, temperatures are vastly different. It’s a magical conclusion to imagine that two successive readings of a satellite are even remotely comparable after an intervening revolution of the planet. But accuracy out to hundredths of a degree C?!
Seeing the best “skeptical” climatologists use “global” without intent to satirize the overweening presumptiveness of people like Hanson makes me cringe and want to revert to third person avatars like Rabbet. Perhaps a hamster. It gets Bill’s fur up… Nah, too creepy.
At the very least, couldn’t Spencer use quotation marks: “Global Temperature” For April. There. Doesn’t that look better?
HenryP says:
May 10, 2012 at 10:10 am
Henry@Werner
I think Ian has it got it the wrong way around:
it is the drop in temperatures that causes the drop in humidity
as reported by me and others,ca. -0.02 to -0.01 %RH/ annum since 1975
http://www.letterdash.com/HenryP/henrys-pool-table-on-global-warming
In fact, it is an accelerator for cooling, since the more humidity drops out of the atmosphere as water (liquid), the more it enhances the cooling process.
(water vapor truly is a GHG, about the CO2 being a true GHG I am not so sure -http://www.letterdash.com/HenryP/more-carbon-dioxide-is-ok-ok )
In hindsight, I should re-do my analyses of humidity in the light of my latest findings,
and look at it before and after global cooling started
(1994)
“it is the drop in temperatures that causes the drop in humidity
Atmospheric humidity will increase as temperature drops until it reaches 100% and condenses out onto cloud condenstation nuclei releasing latent heat of condensation. Seen in all clouds and radiation fog etc etc. and in the wet adiabatic lapse rate. The hotter the air the greater the amount of water vapor that it can hold. It is this increase in water vapor with temperature that is claimed to be the positive feedback driving AGW. It hasn’t happened – but that is what was claimed.
Speaking of enthalpy, this is the most recent global RH% chart I can find. I have seen this graph a few times over the years, I do not know the source.
http://i186.photobucket.com/albums/x70/AnthonyMarr/global%20warming/020GlobalRelativeHumidity300_700mb2.jpg
Nigel Harris says:
May 10, 2012 at 6:14 am
So here we are, ENSO-neutral and coming out of a prolonged La Niña, with solar activity at a very low level, and yet the UAH global temperature is at a higher level than it reached at any time from the start of the record in 1979 to the super-El Niño in 1998. Can anyone explain this?
Well, it shows that solar activity is not a relevant factor. ENSO is not a heat source in Watts.
A comparison of polynomials gives input. The polynomial of (11) synodic solar functions in a greater scope shows the basic function with a maximum in 1997. The ENSO impedances and the shorter scope of UAH data confuses the basic function, which is now on the same level as 1986.
http://www.volker-doormann.org/images/uah_temps_poly3.gif
Looking to the monthly values and the linear fit, temperature function is on the way down.
Don’t care it is only a temporary up:
http://www.volker-doormann.org/images/uah_temps_vs_solar_tf.gif
V.
Nigel Harris says:
May 10, 2012 at 6:14 am
So here we are, ENSO-neutral and coming out of a prolonged La Niña, with solar activity at a very low level, and yet the UAH global temperature is at a higher level than it reached at any time from the start of the record in 1979 to the super-El Niño in 1998. Can anyone explain this?
_____________________________
It is called “Adjustments”…..
USA Raw data vs Adjusted http://i26.tinypic.com/2bux35.jpg
Blink graph of raw vs Adjusted: http://www.climate-movie.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2008/12/temperature_adjustments1.gif
USA Raw vs urban: http://cdiac.ornl.gov/epubs/ndp/ushcn/rawurban3.5_pg.gif
graph of 3 different changes to USA temp data: http://i31.tinypic.com/2149sg0.gif
Adjustment to GISS data: http://notalotofpeopleknowthat.wordpress.com/2012/03/15/an-adjustment-like-alice/
The Day the thermometers died: “Bye Bye Miss American Pie, Drove my GIStemp to the Levy But the Levy was Dry; and them Good Ol’ Boys was Drinking Whiskey and Rye, and Singin’ ‘This Will Be The Day That I Die!, This Will Be The Day, That I Die’
Zombie Thermometers – Return of The Un-Dead
Steve Keohane says:
May 10, 2012 at 6:53 am
Robbie says: May 10, 2012 at 5:38 am
Will the temperature go up in May and June as well????
Then it will make 2012 another very warm year indeed. One for the record books again.
With the average catastrophic anthropogenic warming as measured by UAH for 2012 with 30+ years of unmitigated warming now averaging at .055°C, another unprecedented heat record!
/sarc
_____________________________
Better a .05C warming in global temperatures (and how you can actually measure that when the temperatures were rounded of to the nearest zero in some data as late as 1972 I could never figure out)
Just think if we have a 1C COOLING (Little Ice age temps) we are back into famines and revolutions.
Warmth + CO2 = MORE food
But the supermarket predators can never seem to figure that out. I guess that is why there has been a concerted effort to kick people of the land since 1945. and an even bigger move to kick them off now
IanW says:
The hotter the air the greater the amount of water vapor that it can hold
Henry says:
So the opposite is:
the lower the temps. the lesser the amount of water vapor it can hold/
which is what I was saying.
Problem is that you all wishfully think that it is still getting warmer
because you keep looking at the wrong figures.
http://www.letterdash.com/henryp/global-cooling-is-here
I cannot help you unless you decide to move away from a variable that is so strongly dependent on weather and current patterns that it might take years and years before you actually see any cooling there…and then it might be too late.
Henry@Steve Koahane
Where did you get to measure those figures? Must be very high up?
Most people (and weather stations with continuous humidity monitoring devices) live at around 1000 mbars.
Nigel Harris 6:14 am:
Yup. Easy. It’s anthropogenic greenhouse gases. I’ve been outside the Village and there are people who use something called the ‘Laws of Physics’ (things we don’t have here) to explain this warming.
I know, I know – it goes against the articles of faith here – that the world is actually cooling, cosmic rays will darken the sun, evil scientists are trying to take over the world and stuff.
Keep this between you and me, even the Village Idiot can get a turn on the ducking stool just for mentioning such witchcraft.
Ian is 100% right about enthalpy being THE significant variable,
so if the alarmists were smart they would be shrieking about
THE ENTHALPY CRISIS !!!!!
(You heard it here first.)
WUWT could talk all day about how there’s no such thing,
but nobody has even heard of enthalphy,
let alone being capable of understanding it.
Most people would find the very word scary in and of itself,
going very well before the word ‘crisis’.
Global enthalpy could plummet and
the Warmistas would call that a crisis and blame CO2.
No matter what happens they’ll have their bullhorns ready.
Village Idiot,
Don’t be an idio… oops. Sorry, wasn’t thinking.
The fact is that scientific skeptics have known for decades that the globe is warming [naturally], and has been warming since the LIA. Only an idiot would misrepresent the skeptical position: the planet is warming, but there is no testable, empirical evidence that can provide a measurement. Therefore, although emissions may add a little to the natural warming, at this point AGW is an untested and untestable conjecture.
Stephen Wilde says:
May 10, 2012 at 2:06 am
“Svensmark is right about the potential for GCRs to provide more condensation nuclei but fails to show how that could influence latitudinal air circulation shifts.”
Regional atmospheric circulation shifts induced by a grand solar minimum.
http://www.nature.com/ngeo/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/ngeo1460.html
lookupitseasy says:
May 10, 2012 at 6:29 am
Perhaps you were told that once, but if so, you probably shouldn’t take advice from this person in the future. Particularly in the context of temperatures,
He works on the IPCC now!
Speaking from a position of total ignorance on this subject I do find it curious that sea surface temperature sometimes seems to correspond with submarine volcanoes.
Seamounts-
http://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Spreading_ridges_volcanoes_map-en.svg
http://explorers.neaq.org/2011/03/seamounts-and-indonesia-expeditions.html
http://www.seaaroundus.org/ecosystemsmaps/default.aspx
SST 5.7.12-
http://www.osdpd.noaa.gov/data/sst/anomaly/2012/anomnight.5.7.2012.gif
Ian W, if you don’t think global temperature is a meaningful concept, why do you bother spending your time thinking of misleading ways to display it graphically?
fredb says:
“Edim: the statement that “The climate system is ‘getting ready’ for the deep drop” without any provided justification seems the most bizarre assertion …”
Fred, climate change at the timescale in question is caused predominantly by solar activity (whatever physical mechanism). That is my conclusion. My favorite index is solar cycle length or frequency (~11/22 y beat). It’s simple (min-min), the absolute sunspot counts are not that important… Even without any smoothing it correlates nicely with some global temperature indices (AMO for instance, other global temperature indices too). It needs to start dropping soon though to keep the correlation, maybe we have to wait when sc24 starts declining. By 2020 will know for sure.
The fact is that scientific skeptics have known for decades that the globe is warming [naturally], and has been warming since the LIA. Only an idiot would misrepresent the skeptical position: the planet is warming, but there is no testable, empirical evidence that can provide a measurement. Therefore, although emissions may add a little to the natural warming, at this point AGW is an untested and untestable conjecture.
O Self-appointed Inquisitor Smokey,
I beg your forgiveness. It’s so hard for an Idiot to learn the incoherent and contradictary creed of the Village.Now I’m having trouble again.
“… there is no testable, empirical evidence that can provide a measurement.”
Now that’s only if the figures show warming, right?
Brother Dr. Don J. wrote on the church niticeboard:
“1999 to 2010 global cooling. No global warming has occurred above the 1998 level and temperatures have declined slightly.”
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/12/28/2010%e2%80%94where-does-it-fit-in-the-warmest-year-list/
Help me believe, Smokey. Are we warming or cooling, can we measure it or not? I feel our creed is falling apart at the seams!
Is that why the Masters attacks on the evil enemy have had to become increasingly violent??
At no time in the last 30 year UAH record has temperature oscillated down, up, down and then up again by an amplitude of 0.5-0.6 degrees, in the course of just over a single year. Curious…
DWR54 says:
May 10, 2012 at 5:09 am
Bob Tisdale says:
“DWR54 says: “With warm water pooling off the coast of Central America, it looks more likely to be leaning towards El Niño rather than La Niña conditions, surely?”
And yet, looking at this animation, it seems that incipient Peruvian coast upwelling might be just starting to choke off this warm pool off central America,which has shrunk in the last month.
http://www7320.nrlssc.navy.mil/global_ncom/glb8_3b/html/anims/eqp/sst30d.gif
This will be interesting to watch…
Village idiot says
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/05/10/uah-global-temperature-up-in-april/#comment-982095
Henry says
I am going from the principle that you are not a fool and that in your heart you really want an intelligent conversation.
First of all, I set out to determine what caused the warming over the past 37 years (from which we have reasonably reliable records)
I had a sample of about 22 weather stations and the results are reported here:
http://www.letterdash.com/HenryP/henrys-pool-table-on-global-warming
You will note with me that the rates of increase of temperatures on earth i.e. maxima, means (=average temperatures) and minima have risen at a ratio of about 6:3:1. Remember: these are the summaries of actual measured results from a number of weather stations all around the world….No junk science. No hypothesis. Every black figure on the tables is coming from a separate file of figures. Obviously I am able to provide these files of every black figure on the table.
I think anyone – even a Village idiot – must be able to understand that it was the rise of maximum temperatures (that occur during the day) that caused the average temperature and minima on earth to rise? This implies clearly that the observed warming over past 4 decades was largely due to natural causes. Either the sun shone a bit brighter or there were less clouds. Or there was less ozone, shielding us. There are various theories. If it had been minima pushing up the average temps. I would have to agree with you that it was the increase in GHG’s that is doing it.
Next< I went a bit further, looking at 44 surface weather stations, coming essentially to the same conclusion as reported above:
http://www.letterdash.com/henryp/global-cooling-is-here
However, now I went a bit further, classifying the results into certain time periods.
The (black) figures you are looking at in the 3 tables (allow some time to load up), represent the average change in degrees Centigrade (or Kelvin) per annum, from the average temperatures measured during the period indicated. These are the slopes of the “trendlines” for the periods indicated, as calculated.
Again we note that the variable:" maxima" gives us the better information as to what is really happening whereas the means and minnima are reacting very sluggish and slow. This is because, as I said before, a lot of warmth on earth is stored in the oceans and in vegetation and in "weather cycles" so average temps and minima won't be affected immediately as the maximum warmth coming from the sun starts dropping.. ..
Based on my correlation coefficient found at 0.994 between the actual drop in maxima and time, I can calculate and tell you that we can be 99% sure that global warming turned into global cooling somewhere in 1994.
My findings will stand no matter how many village idiots will try to dispute it. In science we don't need "consensus". You only need one man to be right.
Typhoon says:
May 10, 2012 at 12:50 am
http://www.drroyspencer.com/wp-content/uploads/UAH_LT_1979_thru_April_2012.png
Where are the are the error bars?
What is the size of the statistical error on each data point?
How is it determined given that one is averaging over different spatial positions?
A great deal of data processing goes into producing this plot, in terms of taking various systematic effects into account, so what is the size of the total systematic error on each data point?
In other words, the total uncertainty in the systematic corrections to the data.
I fear you’re conflating/combining two different things in your expectations for an answer.
An error bar is a result (a prediction if you will) of the errors in measurement or calculation of a specific expected result from a determined and predictable event. An error bar might result from a dice if the paint had worn off of a smooth dice, and you could not tell if a 1 or 3 were rolled. An error bar would result from a thermometer being read daily, but the instrument were thought to randomly go +1/2 to -3/4 of a degree each reading. Additional error bars would come a bad clock telling you what time to take a reading each day. Etc. An error bar would also come from a processing error of how you wrote the temperatures or calculated a conversion … Not a good example for simple temperatures, but I hope you get the idea. If you were sawing a piece of wood, an error bar would reflect how accurately you cut the board compared to a “perfectly straight cut” drawn with a perfectly straight ruler with a infinitely thin point on a perfectly held pen.
Yes, error bars might be appropriate for the satellite temperatures for the upper atmosphere.
But what is really important in climate studies is that we have vivid proof of just how much random changes occur on earth – as a whole – every month from month to month. Here, there is NO “error bar” but actual unpredictable and very large changes in the actual data from month to month!
So what is an “error bar” on a list of dice rolls? How do properly describe a randomly varying quantity when that quantity itself is varying? How to plot or summarize a randomly varying value when the way you plot (smoothing over various sample intervals, averaging over different lengths, or “plotting everything”) the graph changes the results you are looking for by affecting the plot itself?
So, EVERY proxy chart and EVERY comment made by ANY person in the climate debate when they extrapolate yearly or monthly or decadal temperatures MUST be interpreted in the knowledge and proof that month-to-month worldwide average temperatures vary every month by +1/3 of one degree to -1/3 of a degree EVERY month.
So any climate description of the temperature 3 or 4 years ago, 10 or 20 years ago, 30 or 40 years ago or 300 to 1300 years ago must either be limited to a specific month in a specific year; or be recognized that the individual temperature proxy or reading or result (glaciers increasing, decreasing, snowfall, dinosaur poop levels, methane hydrates per cubic meter, or depth of diatoms in the seawater muck …. EVERY climate proxy can be no more accurate than 1/3 of one degree.
Because we SEE visually every temperature on earth swing by that much from month to month now.
Equally, how important is the late 20th century temperature increase of 1/2 of one degree in 25 years?
Zero point zero.
Why?
Because the world’s climate IS CHANGING that much every month now. And nothing globally has changed because of those changes. No animal had died out, over, or sideways due to “climate change” …. Etc.