Forecast for warming revised downward.
The UK Met Office has revised one of its forecasts for how much the world may warm in the next few years.
It says that the average temperature is likely to rise by 0.43 C by 2017 – as opposed to an earlier forecast that suggested a warming of 0.54C.
The explanation is that a new kind of computer model using different parameters has been used.
The Met Office stresses that the work is experimental and that it still stands by its longer-term projections.
These forecast significant warming over the course of this century.
The forecasts are all based on a comparison with the average global temperature over the period 1971-2000.
The earlier model had projected that the period 2012-16 would be 0.54C above that long-term average – within a range of uncertainty from 0.36-0.72C.
By contrast the new model, known as HadGEM3, gives a rise about one-fifth lower than that of 0.43C – within a range of 0.28-0.59.
This would be only slightly higher that the record year of 1998 – in which the Pacific Ocean’s El Nino effect was thought to have added more warming.
If the forecast is accurate, the result would be that the global average temperature would have remained relatively static for about two decades.
Blog suspicions
An apparent standstill in global temperatures is used by critics of efforts to tackle climate change as evidence that the threat has been exaggerated.
Climate scientists at the Met Office and other centres are involved in intense research to try to understand what is happening over the most recent period.
The most obvious explanation is natural variability – the cycles of changes in solar activity and the movements and temperatures of the oceans.
The forecasts are based on a comparison with the average global temperature over the period 1971-2000A Met Office spokesman said “this definitely doesn’t mean any cooling – there’s still a long-term trend of warming compared to the 50s, 60s or 70s.
“Our forecast is still for temperatures that will be close to the record levels of the past few years.
“And because the natural variability is based on cycles, those factors are bound to change the other way at some point.”
The fact that the revised projection was posted on the Met Office website without any notice on December 24 last year has fuelled suspicions among bloggers.
However the Met Office says the data had been published in a spirit of transparency as soon as it became available from the computer that produced it.
Future forcings
It describes the decadal projections as part of an experimental effort launched in 2004 to fill the gap between daily weather forecasts and century-long estimates for climate change.
But this is an emerging and highly complex area of science because of the interplay of natural factors and manmade greenhouse gases at a time when a key set of temperatures – in the deep ocean – is still relatively unknown.
One aim of attempting to project the climate on this timescale is to be able to rapidly check the accuracy of the models being used.
A paper published last month in the journal Climate Dynamics, authored by scientists from the Met Office and 12 other international research centres, combined different models to produce a forecast for the next decade.
It said: “Decadal climate prediction is immature, and uncertainties in future forcings, model responses to forcings, or initialisation shocks could easily cause large errors in forecasts.”
However the paper concluded that, “in the absence of volcanic eruptions, global temperature is predicted to continue to rise, with each year from 2013 onwards having a 50 % chance of exceeding the current observed record”.
Scrutiny of Met Office forecasts and climate science generally is set to increase in the build-up to the publication of the next assessment by the UN’s Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) in September.
Source:
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-20947224
=========================================================
Re: that last paragraph, with the release of the IPCC AR5 leak #2 today, ya think?
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Jim Cripwell at 6:10am
Sorry about the delay but I work on Aussie time.
I can sympathize with anyone who has to put up a short term prediction (even the Met Office) since the short term is swamped by short term “noise” cycles. There is a 3.75 year cycle which swings about 0.8 degrees C from peak to peak and the chance of finding a warming signal of 0.2 degrees C per decade ( or less!) in shorter than the 3.75 year cycle is, lets face it, impossible. As Girma (and others noted) there is also a 60 year oscillation (0.36 degrees C peak to peak) as well which also is, in fact, just “noise” on the long term trend as well. To see the long term trends you have to see through that as well. The important thing to note is a strong CO2 warming, if it exists, should displace the 130 year long term trend out the “Little Ice Age” – and it isn’t there (yet). For those interested the global anomaly temp data (Climate4you or link from Hockeyschtick) shows a clear 7.5 year cycle in the moving 20 month average which is two 3.75 year cycles – a “weak” one followed by a “strong” one – the strong one causing a dip in the moving average.
Cheers
Herkimer at 11:26am
I guess I’m looking for lines – not just predictions
The problem all these models based on Houghton’s physics have is 8 mistakes. 3 of them are so elementary as to be cringe-making.
1. They wrongly assume the IR emitted from the surface is the same as the Earth would emit as an isolated body in a vacuum and all of it can do thermodynamic work. This is justified by the biggest mass scientific delusion in History, to believe that an instrument used for 50 years, an IR pyrometer called a pyrgeometer, measures a real energy flow, not temperature.
No professional with post-grad physics and heat transfer knowledge accepts this. The bottom line is that the near black body GHG thermal IR from the atmosphere turns off most of the same wavelength IR from the surface. There can be no CO2-AGW or positive feedback.
2. Even if this IR were emitted, it could not be directly thermalised in the atmosphere. The IPCC was warned of this in 1993 when US physicist Will Happer resigned rather than lie for Gore.
3. If (1) and (2) weren’t enough, because Carl Sagan got the aerosol optical physics wrong, the final big lie by Hansen, that polluted cloud cooling exactly offsets present AGW, is untrue. In 2004, to get AR4, NASA switched the partially-correct physics of Twomey who warned that thicker clouds behave differently, with fake ‘surface reflection’ physics.
This ‘science’ has been based on fraud since 1999 (The Mann hockey stick).
Richardcourtney, I am starting to suspect that you are a bot. Your statement is daft as you say.
‘The BOM adopting an altered colour scheme says nothing about the temperatures the schemes are intended to represent.’
Sorry but that is exactly why the BOM introduced them as the previous colour scheme didn’t cater for the new extremes of temperature we are experiencing.
Reading your comment has disappointed me. I thought that you were a thinking person and would accept statements of fact for what they are. But it appears any statement of fact (like the colour scheme change) I make, you have to disagree with. Please do you credibility a favour and think about your response to see if it makes sense. Just contradicting me, makes you look foolish.
Lower up:
re your post at January 9, 2013 at 3:48 pm.
Saying the data must be different because it is plotted in a new colour scheme is at the same intellectual level as your comments in other WUWT threads.
If you think the data shows a significant change then quote the data which shows the change.
The BOM changed a colour scheme (i.e. updated the style) it uses to present plots to the public.
Despite your daft assertion – repeated in your post at January 9, 2013 at 3:48 pm – alteration to the colour scheme says NOTHING about the data presented by the plots.
I may or may not look foolish, but your contributions on several threads demonstrate beyond doubt that you are (deliberately?) foolish.
Richard
Richard in this case you are incorrect. BOM has not changed the colour scheme, it has added two new colours to represent possible temps not seen before. It remains to be seen if they will be needed, I believe one of the two new colours was abandoned almost immediately. No existing colours have been “changed”.
Sorry Richard, reading more carefully it appears “Lower Up” introduced that error.
Richard, take a deep breath and do a littLe research. Enforce calling me foolish. A quick search turns up this:
The Bureau of Meteorology’s interactive weather forecasting chart has added new colours – deep purple and pink – to extend its previous temperature range that had been capped at 50 degrees.
I will adept your apology.
Santer comments to Andy Revkin are at the NY Times Dot.earth blog (I’m merely providing for discussion, don’t shoot at this messenger ha ha):
Revkin quotes email from Ben Santer
Ben Santer has another comment to Andy Revkin which has been placed in the comments section at Dot Earth:
Revkin quotes email from Ben Santer
Maps are colored as a means of propaganda – to alarm the public. Scary bright red is used for normal warm temperatures.
Here is an example of the mendacious use of map colors [source]. Note that the temperatures are always the same.
Also keep in mind that we are discussing a [natural] warming trend of only 0.8ºC over the past 150 years. That is almost flat.
Skiphil quotes typical alarmist nonsense:
“A human-caused warming signal is embedded in the rich, year-to-year and decade-to-decade noise of natural internal climate variability.”
Wrong. There is no testable, verifiable “human-caused warming signal”. That is merely an assertion, not a verifiable fact.
The planet has been warming along the same long term rising trend line for hundreds of years. There is no “signal”, which would necessitate global warming accelerating as CO2 rises.
But that is not happening. The global warming trend is rising at the same ≈0.35ºC per century, with no acceleration. Therefore, the ≈40% rise in CO2 has had no measurable effect, and there is no human-caused “signal”. None. It just is not there.
Assertions are not science. Remember that when someone tries to tell you that global warming is accelerating. It is not. In fact, global warming has stopped for the past sixteen years. Which is why the BBC has had to climb down from its alarmist assertions.
Please don’t associate me with Santer’s comments…. as I said I was merely passing them along for discussion. I am very ‘skeptical’ about anything that comes from Santer’s crew, knowing some of his history in these matters….
D Boehm, maybe in some cases but the BOM here use a gentle yellowish for ‘normal warm’ temps. “Scary bright red” ( to borrow your hyperbole ) in the map is not really what I would call normal temps. Anyway that is beside the point, whatever colour they use it doesn’t change the temp and it is damn hot down here. All sorts of records are being broken by this weather event.
http://www.bom.gov.au/jsp/awap/temp/index.jsp
Skiphil,
I didn’t intend to imply that the quote was yours. I was just commenting on the quote you posted. I’ve read enough of your comments to know that you’re no alarmist. Sorry for the misunderstanding.
• • •
Nick Kermode,
As I pointed out, they are the same map temperatures. The draft version used normal colors, but the “final” version [the version seen by the public] used bright, scary red for merely warm temperatures.
Finally, what you are experiencing is far from being unprecedented. It’s summer there, so it’s hot. Nothing unusual is occurring. Wait six months and you’ll be complaining about the how cold it is.
DBoehm, the temperatures in Oz are unprecedented that is the reason for the extra colours.
I see that you have snipped my posts. That is ok, but I suspect you are on the payroll of some anti AGW organisation and your job is to confuse the science of AGW, either outright lying about data or publishing half truths. The problem is people are experiencing climate change and your efforts are looking less and less credible with every temperature record broken.
I came to this site hoping to find evidence that AGW was wrong. I found the evidence was lacking. I expected the attemptS to shout me down with ridicule, mockery and out right abuse when I pointed out the errors, and I was truly surprised that it took you so long to snip me.
Still I have wizened up to how you mob operate (loved the attempt at showing the temperature is flat), and bad luck with your efforts to mis-inform. You’ll be finding it more and more difficult as time goes by.
D Boehm,
http://www.bom.gov.au/climate/current/statements/scs43b.pdf
It is very easy to overestimate the importance of ones own opinion.
Lower up,
I see that you have posted dozens of comments. If you lost one it is not because of me. Whether you are inventing stories or complaining, it is just projection. BTW, I have never gotten a single comment approved by any of your alarmist pals, and I’ve tried dozens of times. So enough with your projection. Now, let’s get to the point. You say:
“…the temperatures in Oz are unprecedented that is the reason for the extra colours.”
Wrong. You provide nothing in the way of verification for that assertion. Surface records go back only a short time, but ice cores go back hundreds of thousands of years. Let’s just look at the recent Holocene.
The 2nd Law does not allow one local climate to remain cold for hundreds of years, while the rest of the planet warms substantially. The record I posted shows that the entire planet has been much warmer in the past than it is now. Thus, your assertion that current temperatures are “unprecedented” is provably wrong.
Your entire argument is based on your assertions. Scientific facts are missing. It is all religious True Belief on your part. Read up on the Null Hypothesis, and get educated. Nothing unprecedented is happening. That is a fact.
DBoehm, yes of course it has been hotter once, big deal, but BOM doesn’t report on temperatures back in the Holocene, it reports on current temperatures. This is another half truth on your behalf as you said the temperature of the earth has increased by 0.8 degrees in the last 150 years. This has lead to spikes in temperatures that are unprecedented in the last 150 years.
I have no ‘alarmist pals’, but I do have friends that are concerned about what is happening to the climate. I came here to get see if there was anything to worry about, and I have come away with the feeling there is something to be very worried about, you have not done enough to convince (and in fact have done the reverse).
I am disappointed that you have not had any of your posts approved on other site run by ‘alarmists’ as that does not help anyone. Do you mind letting me know what sites you have attempted to post on?
On the second law of physics you quote, I am afraid you have got that wrong to, the part most people miss is ‘in a closed system’, as in you cannot destroy or create energy in a closed system. Earth is not a closed system.
Lower pup:
You have no idea of “support” or why it is required. You are simply pretension, nothing more. You did not come to learn, but to spew AGW propaganda. You are baffled by healthy skepticism and that is your measure.
Lower up says:
“…yes of course it has been hotter once…”
No, it has been hotter countless times during the MWP, the RWP, the Holocene Optimum, the Minoan Optimum, etc. Current temperatures are on the cool side, and they are not moving.
Next, you opine: “…BOM doesn’t report on temperatures back in the Holocene, it reports on current temperatures.”
We are in the Holocene right now.
Next, you say:
“…another half truth on your behalf as you said the temperature of the earth has increased by 0.8 degrees in the last 150 years. This has lead to spikes in temperatures that are unprecedented in the last 150 years.”
Wrong again. Are you wrong about everything? Seems so. There is nothing unprecedented happening. It has all happened before, repeatedly, and to a much greater degree. Educate yourself on the Null Hypothesis, which has never been falsified.
Next:
“…I have come away with the feeling…”
Everything you believe in is based on your feelings. Fear is a feeling. Being alarmed is a feeling. But science doesn’t work that way. You will never be convinced that the natural global warming since the LIA has nothing measurable to do with human activity; a hallmark of True Believers.
Next:
The alarmist blogs I have commented on [and where my comments were never approved] include RealClimate, SkS, OpenMind, and Tamino [among others; can’t recall them all]. Keith Kloor’s Collide-a-scape is the only blog that has posted my comments.
Finally, you are arguing that one part of the planet at the same latitude can be several degrees warmer or colder than another, for hundreds of years? The 2nd Law doesn’t like that, and would correct it over time. However, that is not the point. The point is that numerous different ice core measurements in both hemispheres show the same warming and cooling during the Holocene. Those measurements show that current temperatures are not unusual or unprecedented. They are routine, normal, and natural.
For a rational perspective comparing current temperatures with those of the past, see here. Watch it a few times. You might learn something.
Randomly quoted Lower Pup…
“I have no ‘alarmist pals’, but I do have friends that are concerned about what is happening to the climate” Lower Pup.
I guarantee none of them would have give a toss before someone was trying to make any money off of them. The Roman warming was cooler that the Minoan warming, the Medieval warming was cooler than the previous period, and modern day is cooler than all of them. That is a long term cooling trend. Short team trends are a blink of an eye in an unpredictable climate system that has existed for 4.5 billion years.
“The problem is people are experiencing climate change and your efforts are looking less and less credible with every temperature record broken.” Lower Pup.
And climate change has only existed for a short term period? As for temp records being broken, I guess it’s only high temp records that are broken right?
“Still I have wizened up to how you mob operate (loved the attempt at showing the temperature is flat), and bad luck with your efforts to mis-inform. You’ll be finding it more and more difficult as time goes by.” Lower Pup
Mob? Hmmm, sounds like someone showing their colours. The record is flat. Maybe you should got talk to the NOAA, UKMET or CRU rather than take the word of someone who has the audacity to question the ‘official’ line and their projections because real world observations don’t match. As for finding it more difficult, I don’t think anyone will bother. Though I dare say someone will quite happily sell you some carbon credits. Do you mind if they are second hand?
DBoehm, my apologies, I thought the Holocene was a log time ago, but my point is still valid, the BOM is reporting on temperature now and how it compares to the recent past (ie when they started using the palette to describe temperature on a map). If the temperatures have been at these levels in the distant past really doesn’t matter because we are now locked into this current climate for food production and the good life we live.
Thanks for the sites. I will check the out and will look at what they have to say that AGW is trivial. Still think it is a shame that they tossed you off their sites, I don’t like getting only one side to a debate.
Checked the graph, now is the whole truth or is it only related to Greenland, as we can see at the moment, America can have winter storms, while the Arctic ice cap is reducing and Australia has extreme hot weather. What is important is the earths temperature as a whole. Does that graph show that?
The BBC has not been “forced” to admit anything.
It reports that the MET office has announced “that the average temperature is likely to rise by 0.43 C by 2017 – as opposed to an earlier forecast that suggested a warming of 0.54C.”
That is an increase of “only” 0.43 C instead of 0.54 C, but still an increase.
Furthermore;
“This would be only slightly higher that the record year of 1998 – in which the Pacific Ocean’s El Nino effect was thought to have added more warming.”
So only slightly higher and not as high as with the superceded forecast, but higher none the less.
The BBC interpretation of this is that “the global average temperature would have remained relatively static for about two decades” if you compare it to a single year, the exceptional el nino year of 1998.
Lower up says: January 9, 2013 at 7:16 pm
DBoehm, the temperatures in Oz are unprecedented that is the reason for the extra colours.
– – –
“Yesterday, the bureau’s forecast maps for Sunday and Monday showed a deep purple area over the South Australian outback.
However, those forecasts have been revised today, with forecast temperatures no longer hitting the purple range.”
So the extra colours have now been recanted.
http://www.radioaustralia.net.au/international/2013-01-09/australias-heatwave-forecast-in-one-animated-map/1071774
Lower Up:
I remind of what I said to you; i.e.
If you think the data shows a significant change then quote the data which shows the change.
A change to the colour scheme used to present the data is NOT indication that the data shows a change.
Nick Kermode says at January 9, 2013 at 5:55 pm [with deletions by RSC to provide amendments stated by Nick Kermode at January 9, 2013 at 5:59 pm]
You have written at January 9, 2013 at 6:00 pm
Lower Up, you are a blithering idiot!
The extension of the colour scheme says NOTHING about how temperatures have changed. Indeed, the lack of need to use the extension suggests temperatures have NOT changed in a manner which required the extension.
And as garymount reports at January 10, 2013 at 12:24 am, the BOM has withdrawn a claim that the extension of the scale was required; see
http://www.radioaustralia.net.au/international/2013-01-09/australias-heatwave-forecast-in-one-animated-map/1071774
Lower Up, I repeat what I said to you before,
If you think the data shows a significant change then quote the data which shows the change.
An unused extension to the colour scheme on a plot of the data is NOT indication that the data shows a change.
I will accept your withdrawal from WUWT where your ridiculous posts have already disrupted two threads.
Richard