Dr. James Hansen and Reto Ruedy of NASA GISS have written a paper (non peer reviewed) with a remarkable admission in it. It is titled Global Temperature Update Through 2012.
Here is the money quote, which pretty much ends the caterwauling from naysayers about global temperature being stalled for the last decade.
The five-year mean global temperature has been flat for the last decade, which we interpret as a combination of natural variability and a slow down in the growth rate of net climate forcing.
Gosh, I thought Hansen had claimed that “climate forcings” had overwhelmed natural variability?
In 2003 Hansen wrote a widely distributed (but not peer reviewed) paper called Can We Defuse the Global Warming Time Bomb? in which he argues that human-caused forcings on the climate are now greater than the natural ones, and that this, over a long time period, can cause large climate changes.
As we shall see, the small forces that drove millennial climate changes are now overwhelmed by human forcings.
According to Hansen’s latest essay, apparently not. So much for “da bomb”.
Here are some other interesting excerpts from his recent essay, Bob Tisdale take note:
An update through 2012 of our global analysis reveals 2012 as having practically the same temperature as 2011, significantly lower than the maximum reached in 2010. These short-term global fluctuations are associated principally with natural oscillations of tropical Pacific sea surface temperatures summarized in the Nino index in the lower part of the figure. 2012 is nominally the 9th warmest year, but it is indistinguishable in rank with several other years, as shown by the error estimate for comparing nearby years. Note that the 10 warmest years in the record all occurred since 1998.
The current stand-still of the 5-year running mean global temperature may be largely a consequence of the facr [sic] that the first half of the past 10 years had predominantly El Nino conditions, and the second half had predominantly La Nina conditions.
The approximate stand-still of global temperature during 1940-1975 is generally attributed to an approximate balance of aerosol cooling and greenhouse gas warming during a period of rapid growth of fossil fuel use with little control on particulate air pollution, but quantitative interpretation has been impossible because of the absence of adequate aerosol measurements.
That last part about 1940-1975 is telling, given that we now have a cleaner atmosphere, and less aerosols to reflect sunlight, it goes without saying that more sunlight now reaches the surface. Since GISS is all about the surface temperature, that suggests (to rational thinkers at least) that some portion of the surface temperature rise post 1975 is due to pollution controls being enacted.
But, he’s still arguing for an imbalance, even though flatness abounds. Seems like equilibrium to me…
Climate change expectations.
The continuing planetary imbalance and the rapid increase of CO2 emissions from fossil fuel assure that global warming will continue on decadal time scales. Moreover, our interpretation of the larger role of unforced variability in temperature change of the past decade suggests that global temperature will rise significantly in the next few years as the tropics moves inevitably to the next El Nino phase.
Except when natural forcings overwhelm the human component of course.
Hansen reminds me of Colonel Saito from “The Bridge on the River Kwai”. He’s equivocating now because he’s backed into a corner and there is no escape. Eventually he’ll have to abandon his stubborn, unreasonable belief in his own omniscience and accept reality.
The good news is that maybe he’ll stop scaring the heck out of his grandchildren.
From a piece I have nearly finished for GlobalCooler,Wordpress.com I have made the following observations:
I love how he described the cause of the “standstill”:
“The more important factor in the standstill is probably unforced dynamical variability, essentially climatic “noise”. ”
Regarding CO2, he claims the “airborne fraction of fossil fuel CO2 emissions has declined.” That is quite a turnaround! With 1/3 of all the emissions ever emitted having been emitted since the 1990’s(?) and the alarmist claim of long lifespan of CO2 in the atmosphere, why would he acknowledge that the fraction of airborne concentrations are declining? I see this as quite a revelation.
He then goes on to write:
“and the forcing per CO2 increment declines slowly as CO2 increases due to partial saturation of absorption bands, so the CO2 forcing growth rate has been steady despite the rapid growth of fossil fuel emissions.”
This apparently acknowledges the long held position by realists that concentrations of CO2 have less effect as their concentrations grow. “Partial” and “saturation” would appear to be countering each other. As is claimed by many, 95% would not likely be referred to as “partial”. I would classify this as almost completely saturated. Clearly, Hansen’s admission implies there really is a limit to the amount of warming one could expect from CO2.
Hansen: “Note that the 10 warmest years in the record all occurred since 1998.”
Mr. Hansen, please note that the “record” isn’t even an eyeblink in geologic time. Calling such a record meaningful is like warning of a global flood when it starts to sprinkle.
No it isn’t obvious, because there is no “global temperature”.
Gunga Din says: January 16, 2013 at 1:32 pm
mpainter says:
January 16, 2013 at 11:42 am
Gail Combs. says: January 16, 2013 at 11:30 am
Obama got his buddies one more year of the Wind/solar power boondoggle so they can exit and leave the chumps holding the bankrupt companies. If you have any money invested in ‘Green’ get it out NOW!
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mpainter: Goodness, gracious, such cynicism! You must have been a stockbroker at one time.
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Gunga Din: I think Gail has just had her eyes open and paid attention to what she’s seen.
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Gail knows that I understand this.
“‘Hostile’ is not the right word. I point out that the evidence is weak and the theories even weaker, and they do not convince a hard skeptic like me.”
– I was primarily referring to the ad hominems frequently attached to such rebuttals, but fair enough.
“That is what I would surmise.”
– I think this is honestly the reason behind much of the dogmatic “science” we are seeing in the field today. While I understand that climate science obviously has a basis in the hard sciences and should no doubt be a respected field, at least in time, I cannot help but get the sense that it is still undeniably in its infancy. This arrogant unwillingness on the part of certain key players (who shall remain nameless) to admit the abundant lack of understanding regarding baseline variability seems to drive many of them to a defensive stance where they inflate (publicly, at least) their stated knowledge of the system. I suppose it’s better for their self-esteem to say “We’re highly confident that ______” than “We really don’t have a @ur momisugly#!$ing clue what’s causing x, y, or z.” I find it highly analogous to religious adherents uncomfortable with an unknown, though presumably scientific, explanation of genesis. Quite ironic, indeed. Some humility, I’d imagine, could do wonders in helping prevent harsh repercussions shortly downstream.
Dr Svalgård. You have been quite categorical in disclaiming any Solar influence on climate, including secondary influences.
You have also expressed, to say the least, uncertainty of CO2 being a primary driver.
Do you have an alternative hypothesis for the warming?
In my World, I don’t know is a good answer.
DaveE.
Isn’t there a global temperature (or a global mean temperature)? That’s news to me.
David A. Evans says:
January 16, 2013 at 5:36 pm
Do you have an alternative hypothesis for the warming?
In my World, I don’t know is a good answer.
But it is too simplistic [implying that we know nothing], because we do know something. We know that solar variation and greenhouse gases have some effect and can actually put some numbers to that, we also know that those effects are small [although the two opposing camps claim they are major – one is to the detriment of the other]. We also know that the climate has had long cycles of hundreds or thousands of years. We do not know what caused those cycles, but complex, non-linear systems often exhibit quasi-cyclic behavior so we should not be surprised to find that in the climate system, and I’m not.
[snip ]
Rather huge concession here by Hansen etal. The CAGW proponents usually won’t touch this issue:
Rather huge concession here by Hansen etal. The CAGW proponents usually won’t touch this issue:
Seems to contradict all those thousands of model runs.
Tallbloke’s comment and link is insightful. Hansen’s and others had stated that the lack of warming, was caused by the warming hiding in the deep ocean and in a few years would be measureable warming of the ocean. There is almost a decade of accurate ocean temperature measurements. The accurate ocean temperature measurements show no warming.
There has been no warming for 16 years of the planet’s surface temperature or of planets oceans.
Energy is conserved. There appears to be multiple errors with the IPCC modeling and other work related to the extreme AGW hypothesis.
Obviously the planetary feedback to a forcing change is negative (resists the change rather than amplifies the change.) Planetary cloud cover in the tropics increases or decreases, to resist the forcing changes, thereby stabilizing planetary temperature. It is difficult however to explain no warming for 16 years even with negative feedback. There are likely multiple unanswered scientific questions.
On a political note, it will be interesting to see at what point the general scientific community will acknowledge that the IPCC “climate science” was cooked, fudged, and manipulated to for political reasons.
If there is a significant cooling this sham will abruptly come to an end.
tallbloke says:
January 16, 2013 at 8:16 am
The energy imbalance isn’t in the direction Hansen fondly believes:
http://tallbloke.wordpress.com/2010/12/20/working-out-where-the-energy-goes-part-2-peter-berenyi/
Try this.
Jan P Perlwitz says: January 16, 2013 at 4:31 pm
I do not know any statement by Hansen from the past, or by any other climate scientist, for the matter of fact, according to which anthropogenic greenhouse gas forcings supposedly overwhelmed natural unforced variability
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If GHG forcings do not overcome natural climate variability, then we are not talking about much of a forcing, are we? It is time to re-think AGW theory, is it not? For instance, the GCM’s, by incorporating AGW theory as algorithms, forecast a warming trend, and now you say that such forecasts are unreliable because of the predominance of natural factors in determining climate.
Leif Svalgaard says:
“We know that solar variation and greenhouse gases have some effect and can actually put some numbers to that, we also know that those effects are small [although the two opposing camps claim they are major – one is to the detriment of the other]. We also know that the climate has had long cycles of hundreds or thousands of years. We do not know what caused those cycles, but complex, non-linear systems often exhibit quasi-cyclic behavior so we should not be surprised to find that in the climate system, and I’m not.”
I mostly agree with that, except I’m not convinced the effects of solar variation is small just yet. There’s just so many competing influences plus system internal variations, all I can really say for sure is that we’ve still got a lot to learn.
Hansen got his start as a wild eyed adherent of Man caused global Cooling that was accelerating the start of an Ice Age! and then it warmed. 30 years of warming and of coarse Man Caused Global Warming was the greatest disaster of all time, but wait! It is Cooling! Hansen is just aligning himself for the next cycle.
30 years cooling, 30 years warming followed by 30 years cooling.Hmmmmm sounds like weather Cycles over about 60 years. This guy is a con-man as this was well known to me and he when we went to school in the 1950s Man caused weather disruption is the lead in to “Man Caused Global Cooling” the next great coming disaster that we will need to save humanity from. An Ice Age is coming, no doubt. How soon, unknown. Man caused, NOT LIKELY. pg
Jan Perlwitz,
Take it up with Judith Curry, she finds Hansen to be saying some curious stuff:
http://judithcurry.com/2013/01/16/hansen-on-the-standstill/#more-10934
As for me, I am grateful to Hansen for the ridiculous spectacle of such an Alarmist so-called scientist leading a march of Eco-religious activist nuts with a toy planet earth in his arms.
That photo farce will be useful whenever I talk to people about agenda-driven scientists who let their socio-political activism overwhelm their judgment.
Jan P Perlwitz says: January 16, 2013 at 4:31 pm
I do not know any statement by Hansen from the past, or by any other climate scientist, for the matter of fact, according to which anthropogenic greenhouse gas forcings supposedly overwhelmed natural unforced variability, for instance the ones related to ENSO, on any arbitrarily chosen short time scale.
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You admit that there is not enough “forcing” to overcome short term natural variability.
As for the long term climate variation, that is natural too, is it not? As in MWP, and LIA, right?
So why are we to believe that your AGW will overcome the long term variation if it cannot overcome the lesser, short term fluctuations?
But in fact, you cannot show that AGW will overwhelm any natural climate variable, neither short nor long term. Your AGW theory is a house of cards that collapses at a poke.
Mods, any chance of adding the photo of Hansen carrying beach ball saggy earth as an update on top of this thread?
http://www.mcclatchydc.com/2013/01/15/179955/climate-change-activists-turn.html
I just think that image is worthy of some ridicule…..
REPLY: Copyright issues with that photo are likely
@Patrick Guinness re Time Magazine article: ” It’d be nice to feel some optimism, but that’s vanishing faster than the remains of an increasingly rare snowfall in New York. ”
I was curious about the veracity of their statement, so thought I’d look into it more. Found stats for snowfall at Central Park from http://www.erh.noaa.gov/okx/climate/records/monthseasonsnowfall.html
Decadal totals:
Ending Sum
1880 355.2
1890 328.3
1900 347.3
1910 302.2
1920 326.6
1930 260.5
1940 256.6
1950 316.3
1960 226
1970 306.4
1980 212.5
1990 197.4
2000 247.3
2010 314.7
I lament the demise of journalism.
Jeff Alberts says:
No it isn’t obvious, because there is no “global temperature”.
There isn’t a GDP either, by such logic.
“Global temperature”, like GDP, is a statistical measure. You can argue about how it should be measured, or whether it is a useful measure (as economists do with GDP). But you can’t argue that it doesn’t exist because it is a statistical measure not a direct one.
For sure “IQ” is not necessarily a useful measure, but it goes too far to say that just because IQ measurements aren’t useful that they don’t exist. IQ is an attempt to measure a person’s intelligence. Can I conclude that there is no such thing as a smart person or a stupid person, on the basis that measuring it precisely is tricky?
So there is a global temperature. It isn’t a good metric, perhaps. But you just look like an argumentative fool trying to deny it merely on the basis you don’t like averages.
So Alberts says “there is no global mean temperature”. That means that WUWT and similar discussion pages might as well give up since we have no way to measure global cooling or warming.
Jan P Perlwitz writes:
January 16, 2013 at 4:31 pm
“I do not know any statement by Hansen from the past, or by any other climate scientist, for the matter of fact, according to which anthropogenic greenhouse gas forcings supposedly overwhelmed natural unforced variability, for instance the ones related to ENSO, on any arbitrarily chosen short time scale. It has always been said that natural variability dominates the atmospheric temperature record on short time scales.”
You might be right. But your interpretation renders meaningless Hansen’s words:
“The five-year mean global temperature has been flat for the last decade, which we interpret as a combination of natural variability and a slow down in the growth rate of net climate forcing.”
On your interpretation, that sentence reads:
“The five-year mean global temperature has been flat for the last decade, which we interpret as a combination of [something irrelevant] and a slow down in the growth rate of net climate forcing.”
I guess you could say that “mean global temperature” does not refer to something that “anthropogenic greenhouse gas forcings” affect, but that simply drains more meaning from the quotation.
You might be right. Hansen might have meant to write something meaningless that sounds meaningful. Now that truly would be a Red Herring on Hansen’s part. Or he might be unaware that his words are meaningless. That is my guess. I have never seen Hansen expend a moment’s effort to explain the meaning of his words. He should. He would write much less nonsense.
TimM says:
January 16, 2013 at 7:17 pm
1927-32 is one huge slump. Five inches? What happened?