Nature, record heat, tipping points, Hansen's opinion on weather noise, and all that

From NCDC’s spring report here

More record warmth as scientists warn of global tipping point – CNN.com

— It’s hot out there. But this time, it’s more than idle watercooler talk, according to weather scientists.

At the same time the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s National Climatic Data Center has released a report noting that this spring in the United States has been the warmest since record-keeping began in 1895, a group of scientists has published a paper in the journal Nature warning that the planet is approaching a critical tipping point because of climate and other factors.

Rampant population growth and changes to the environment caused by humans, including the burning of fossil fuels and the conversion of nearly 43% of the planet’s land to farms or cities, threaten to cause an abrupt and unpredictable shift in the global ecosystem, 22 scientists from five countries said in their paper.

In its report issued Thursday, the climate data center said the average U.S. temperature between March and May was 57.1 degrees, 5.2 degrees above the long-term average from 1901 to 2000.

While May was only the second-warmest on record, it was still in the top third for monthly average temperatures, marking 12 consecutive months with temperatures in that range, said Jake Crouch, a NOAA climate scientist.

“For that to happen 12 times in a row in a random circumstance is one in 540,000,” he said.

Globally, NOAA reported in May that the average temperature in April was 1.17 degrees warmer than the average from the past century, making it the fifth-warmest April since at least 1880.

It was the 326th consecutive month that global temperatures exceeded the 20th-century average, NOAA said.

The warm spring weather in the United States was partially the result of the waning La Niña, a pattern of below-average sea surface temperatures in the central Pacific that tends to help direct the high-level jet stream and influence weather patterns nationwide.

But it was also partially the result of long-term climate change, Crouch said.

“The pattern we’ve been in for the last 12 months is exactly what we would expect in climate change,” he said.

…

A shift in the biosphere is possible by 2100 if nothing is done to better predict changes and act upon them, said Anthony D. Barnosky, professor of integrative biology at the University of California, Berkeley and lead author on the Nature article.

“If we do nothing, I personally think we hit this tipping point,” Barnosky said Friday. “It means the world will be very different, losing biodiversity and (affecting where) species live in particular places.”

Full story here

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It is also interesting and a bit humorous to note this table at NCDC, where the word “coolest” is verboten.

For example:

5th coolest would be the way I would describe that.

Yes it was a warm spring. But not warm everywhere. But was it really driven by AGW, and was it “The pattern we’ve been in for the last 12 months is exactly what we would expect in climate change,” ?

This is the same sort of logic that is employed as we saw during the Russian Heat Wave of 2010.

One spot on the globe becomes the focal point and “proof” that AGW is happening. This gets touted in the media. Then later, a study comes out saying AGW wasn’t the main driver.

NOAA on the Russian heat wave: blocking high, not global warming

But that doesn’t get much attention because it doesn’t have a gloom and doom quality for  MSM News.

But this was found to be based on a synoptic pattern, basically weather noise. This spring in the USA is no different. Even the father of global warming, Jim Hansen says the same thing: (hat tip to Chris Horner and the CEI FOIA efforts for us being able to see this email)

And here in the article excepted above, Jake Crouch,  CNN, and other MSM outlets aren’t even talking about a full year, just three months.

“If it bleeds it leads”, was never more true.

Some graphs: (thanks to Joe D’Aleo, all data NCDC data)

The state monthly records through the end of the 2009.. This depicts the 12 monthly records for the 50 states (600 data points). There were likely March heat records set in some states and perhaps some other months so the 2010s will show and take away from some prior years.

The 1930s stands out as the hottest decade, the 1910s and 1950s were second, 1990s third and 1980s fourth. This decade doesn’t rank although it is early.

All time cold records look like this.

It seems the climate was much more variable, with more extremes in the 1930’s.