Results suggest that global mean sea level may also be affected, though not yet fully confirmed.
Hot off the heels of an admission by NASA JPL that the satellite derived sea level data is “spurious” due to a lack of a stable reference frame and needs fixing, comes this new paper that suggests we may see a drop in sea level soon.
It is rather at odds with the notion that sea level rise is “accelerating” which is one of the unsupported memes being pushed by warmists and media, now even more so due to the hurricane that wasn’t when it made landfall, Sandy.
I wonder if it came up in discussion today at Dr. Mann’s “breaking news” breakout session?
Key Points
- The research reveals that there is a 60-year oscillation in the majority of long tide gauge records
- The signal is consistent in phase and amplitude in many ocean basins
- This has important implications for quantifying sea level acceleration
Cited by the CU Sea Level Group here.
Is there a 60-year oscillation in global mean sea level?
Don P. Chambers, College of Marine Science, University of South Florida, St. Petersburg, Florida, USA
Mark A. Merrifield, Department of Oceanography, University of Hawai’i at Mānoa, Honolulu, Hawaii, USA
R. Steven Nerem, CIRES, University of Colorado Boulder, Boulder, Colorado, USA
Abstract
We examine long tide gauge records in every ocean basin to examine whether a quasi 60-year oscillation observed in global mean sea level (GMSL) reconstructions reflects a true global oscillation, or an artifact associated with a small number of gauges. We find that there is a significant oscillation with a period around 60-years in the majority of the tide gauges examined during the 20th Century, and that it appears in every ocean basin. Averaging of tide gauges over regions shows that the phase and amplitude of the fluctuations are similar in the North Atlantic, western North Pacific, and Indian Oceans, while the signal is shifted by 10 years in the western South Pacific. The only sampled region with no apparent 60-year fluctuation is the Central/Eastern North Pacific. The phase of the 60-year oscillation found in the tide gauge records is such that sea level in the North Atlantic, western North Pacific, Indian Ocean, and western South Pacific has been increasing since 1985–1990. Although the tide gauge data are still too limited, both in time and space, to determine conclusively that there is a 60-year oscillation in GMSL, the possibility should be considered when attempting to interpret the acceleration in the rate of global and regional mean sea level rise.
GEOPHYSICAL RESEARCH LETTERS, VOL. 39, L18607, 6 PP., 2012
h/t to Paul Homewood
NOTE: I made a clarification in the title and first sentence not long after initial publishing – Anthony
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Mike Jonas says:
November 5, 2012 at 3:02 pm
“…. I have some time-related data on which I want to do a Fourier Transform looking for signs of cycles. I can’t find any (free) software to run on my Windows XP Home Edition PC….”.
You are actually spoilt for choice , when it comes to free software with capabilites to do Fourier transform, spectral analysis , periodograms etc, and using Octave as somone suggested is not a bad idea, there is also the Gnumeric spreadsheet program , it has a time series analysis plugin ( it is installed along with the program, but is not activated at startup by default so it has to be enabled in the preferences to show up in the functions menus ).
And then there is Gretl (Gnu Regression, Econometrics and Time-series Library) it has quite a lot of functionality, runs under all the main OS’es, has a GUI frontend option, and can run Octave/Matlab and R-scripts within the it’s own user environment. It might be somthing of an overkill for what you are after, but take a quick peek at homepage at “gretl.sourceforge.net” to see if it suits your purpose.
And the U.S. National Institute of standards also offers a free program called Dataplot a real heavy hitter that I think is possibly capable of doing any and all statistical and signal analysis anybody ever dreamt up, and then some . Its home page url is:
“http://www.itl.nist.gov/div898/software/dataplot/”
And there is a lot more out there, but as I said before we are spoilt for choise , so chosin the right package is perhance a problem of abundance rather than scarcity.
Leif Svalgaard says:
November 6, 2012 at 7:43 am
A dynamo is necessary because the magma is above the Curie temperature. As I said, the correlation is spurious.
You can’t help inventing the obstacles, can you?
Why would you need dynamo there anyway?
Let me try again. Induction reaches some 100km or so deep, it acts opposite to the existing earth’s field reaching the area from the core (http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/TMC.htm where lithosphere and magma coexist.
In far N. Atlantic crustal thickness in certain areas is as low as 10km
http://seismo.berkeley.edu/~rallen/research/iceland/iceMODELS/JGRfigsCrust/plate1.html
Conflict between two fields would cause geomagnetic jerks (as the lithosphere flexes and the magma flows). Flexing of the thin lithosphere skin under ocean floor would propagate into oceans.
http://www.geomag.bgs.ac.uk/images/image018.jpg
Jan Mayen http://www.mantleplumes.org/images3/JanMayenFig1_1000.jpg
field bidecadal variability is closely correlated to the Leohle’s bi-millennial temperature reconstruction
http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/LL.htm
Leif Svalgaard says:
November 6, 2012 at 7:43 am
As I said, the correlation is spurious.
Heh. he’s in denial Vuk.
vukcevic says:
November 6, 2012 at 8:26 am
You can’t help inventing the obstacles, can you?
The obstacles are physical.
Why would you need dynamo there anyway?
Let me try again. Induction reaches some 100km or so deep, it acts opposite to the existing earth’s field reaching the area from the core
Because the induction effects are temporary and go away in a few days [as the primary effects in the ring current that cause them in the first place], so do not make any long-term changes. For those, you need a self-sustaining dynamo.
Your physics is wrong and the correlation is spurious.
Mike Jonas says:
November 5, 2012 at 3:02 pm
While we’re on the subject of “cycles” – I have some time-related data on which I want to do a Fourier Transform looking for signs of cycles. I can’t find any (free) software to run on my Windows XP Home Edition PC. Please can someone point me at suitable software.
Try Octave (http://www.gnu.org/software/octave/). It is a free Matlab clone.
There are a lot of possibilities in the FOSS world. I would suggest either R, which has extensive built-in, time-series analysis capabilities, and for which there add-in packages that are even more potent. R is widely used and is now a leading analytical tool. I’m not too fond of the basic data format for time series data that R prefers, but there are packages that can help with that. Steep learning curve and sending output files can be obscure.
Alternatively, there is Octave which is close enough to Matlab, that code can be moved between them, sometimes requiring some minor editing. Books about Matlab are also useful for learning Octave.
ok, stupid question:
In the U of C sea level I see grey area north and south:
http://sealevel.colorado.edu/files/current/sl.jpg
In the navy sea level these grey areas appear to be areas with sinking sea level:
http://www7320.nrlssc.navy.mil/global_ncom/glb8_3b/html/plots/glb/ssh.gif
It almost looks like the pluses and minuses are about the same.
Now my stupid question – can this 60 years variations be such redistribution of waters between equator and poles and the U of C measuring only the rising part now missing the sinking part?
Could these be due to some changes in gravity – something like this:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2012/10/23/chnages-in-earths-gravity-in-relation-to-magnetic-field-measured/
or other? – day variations, Earth speeding or getting slower due to small variations in orbit?
btw Tokyoboy told us this long ago – he posted once this:
http://www.data.kishou.go.jp/shindan/a_1/sl_trend/sl_trend.html
Funny how “cycles” generate such a lively informative and interesting discussion. All good stuff. (As usual on WUWT).
Many thanks to everyone who recommended Fourier Transform software. I’ll try it out over the next few days.
ATTN: gymnosperm
You did not give the ref to the paper by LBK and AAL, and you got the DOI wrong. The paper is:
“On the Coherence between Dynamics of the World Fuel Consumption and Global Temperature Anomaly.” Energy & Environment, Vol.14, No 6, 773-782, 2003.
This paper was not cited in the IPCC’s AR 4 WG1 chapter.
LBK’s “FAO Fisheries Technical Paper. No. 410. Rome, FAO. 2001. 86p.” was also not cited in the WG1 chapter. Note the pub date. This paper should have been cited.
There was no disscuson of climate cycles in the WG1 chapter.
The 60-year cycles are obvious. How this can be new or astounding to anyone on the warmist side is itself astounding. But the “facts” of the skeptic side are not facts on the warmist side (and vice-versa ).
This popped into my brain and captures my wonder and maybe cynicism:
What The Climate Wars Are All About
I talk to you, you talk to me
We talk and talk and still disagree.
Black is white and white, black.
Back is front and front is back.
I lookk at the sky and you see the ground,
Our excitement goes ’round and ’round.
It is strange this you-and-me
How with the same-built eyes the differences we see.
Huh! When it’s emotions that drive us,
Facts don’t come much into play, and
Each day we talk we step further away.
For now what matters is not what is true,
But that each feels he has something
Important to do.
vukcevic says:
November 6, 2012 at 2:11 am
phlogiston says:
November 6, 2012 at 1:17 am
If so, this is an argument for periodic forcing, not for an unforced oscillator.
Absolutely, forced periodically:
Earth has a magnetic ‘ripple’ originating in the core and the sun has its cycles.
When two are in phase the oceans absorb more energy, when two are out of phase the oceans cool.
http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/EarthNV.htm
Geoff Sharp says:
November 6, 2012 at 3:13 am
Sea level modulation agrees with the PDO cycle, who would have thought?
Lots of valid comments re internal or external drivers, but no mention of the Aleutian Low. Sea level fluctuation could easily be linked to the PDO which has major influence over the ENSO cycle (Tisdale will no doubt disagree). Sustained periods of La Nina and the associated trade winds will have impact on sea levels of particular basins. The Aleutian Low also correlates with the PDO and is an atmospheric cycle, which is more likely to be influenced by solar/UV fluctuations. The 60 year cycle in the Aurora record is also of interest.
The PDO can be seen as an oscillation of the integrated ocean-atmosphere system, so atmosphere doesn not force ocean, or vice versa, the system as a whole exhibits an oscillation.
It would be very valuable if we could know with precision whether the PDO / AMO oscillation going back thousands of years, was (a) regular as clockwork – which would favour a direct astrophysical forcing or strong nonlinear forcing; or (b) if the period is variable, which would favour either an internal, unforced oscillation or a weakly forced nonlinear oscillator.
This is not a “discovery” . Jevrejeva published papers in 2006 and 2008 detailing cycles in tide gauge data.
http://www.psmsl.org/products/reconstructions/jevrejevaetal2008.php
Good to see Colorado are finally catching up with what Britain’s NOC published years ago.
It is also encouraging to see this sort of thing making it into GRL now. Some sanity returns.
“Although the tide gauge data are still too limited, both in time and space, to determine conclusively that there is a 60-year oscillation in GMSL, the possibility should be considered when attempting to interpret the acceleration in the rate of global and regional mean sea level rise.”
Data is too limited to be conclusive about an oscillation. Then it must be too limited to conclude anything else, like a global warming signal for example. Not that that has stopped them so far.
Work-related obligations prevented me from having time to read the paper and comment sooner:
http://judithcurry.com/2012/11/10/open-thread-weekend-2/#comment-266265