Guest post by Dr. Norman Page
1. Methods and Premises
My approach to climate science is based on Baconian empirical principles as presented in a series of earlier posts on this site (http://climatesense-norpag.blogspot.com) notably:
6/18/10 Thirty Year Climate Forecast
7/19/12 30 Year Climate Forecast -2 year Update
10/30/12. Hurricane Sandy-Extreme Events and Global Cooling
11/18/12 Global Cooling Climate and Weather Forecasting
1/4/13 Response toWUWT post on Neutrons and 1970 cooling period.
1/22/13 Global Cooling Timing and Amount
2/18/13 Its the Sun Stupid – the Minor Significance of CO2
From the data and papers linked to on these earlier posts I have drawn on a few basic premises on which the new forecasts rely.
1 .The IPCC climate models on which the entire CO2 phobia depends ignore basic common sense and show poor scientific judgement and so were, and are, so badly structured as to be inherently useless for temperature prediction. Climate sensitivity to doubling CO2 is probably 1 degree or less. The GH analogy conceptually misleads both the climate scientists and the general public. A much better analogy for the atmosphere is an holey insulating blanket with holes of varying size at differnt times according to the size and number of Tropcal Cyclone convection cells. These holes provide a substantial variable negative feedback to warming which is not included in the climate models. see Trenberth
2.The best way of distinguishing the main climate trends and drivers is by power spectrum and wavelet analysis of any time series which might be pertinent and correlation of these power spectra to distinguish forcings and feed backs.
3.A small number of time series are useful proxies for and can usefully and economically represent the trends in and the drivers of a large proportion of the past global climate variabilty and point the way to the likely future.It is not necessary to know the precise mechanisms and time series interactions which produce these time series observations in order to use them for successful prediction.
4.The present analysis which looks ahead to 2042 and 2106 is based on a few simple ideas and empirical observations..
a) There has been no net warming since 1997 with CO2 up 8+% .Global Temperatures have been declining since 2003-4 The period from 2003- 2005 represents a peak in both the 60 year PDO cycle and in a millennial solar cycle.
b) Because of the thermal inertia of the oceans and the more extreme regional high frequency variability of the land data the Global SST data are the most useful representation of the overall global climate trend.
c)Not withstanding b) above and indeed because of the greater variability of the NH temperatures the currently most useful representation of temperature trends over the last millennial solar cycle for practical and conceptual purposes ie hockey stick or non hockey stick is
Christiansen and Ljungqvist 2012 fig5 at:
http://www.clim-past.net/8/765/2012/cp-8-765-2012.pdf see Fig1 below. – describe it how you will
d) It is not unreasonable to suggest that temperature trends from 2000 – 3000 AD could well repeat the pattern of trends from 1000- 2000. AD
e)The temperature trends in the first +/- 100 years after the peak are likely to be the reverse of the trends in the +/- 100 years before the peak and the Hadsst3 data set Figs 2 and 3 is a generally accepted representation of the latter trend.
f)The main climate driver is the sun . Incoming solar radiation is modulated by the Milankovitch orbital cycles and by variations in solar “activity” manifested by changes in GCR flux at the earth,by changes in EUV radiation, changes in the frequency and energy of CMEs and Proton events ,changes in solar wind speed and changes in TSI.Incredibly ,only the small TSI change is considered in the IPCC models-.The change in albedo caused by the GCR- cloud iris effect and the change in atmospheric chemistry caused by UV variations are probably more important than TSI itself.
g)A lunar influence is also evident in the temperature power spectrum.
h )The Neutron count can act as a useful proxy for solar “activity” particularly as the instrumental data can be projected back via the 10Be flux for millions of years..
2.Analysis and Forecast.
This post provides a revised version of the post on 1/22/13 “Global Cooling Timing and Amount (NH)” In this earlier post future temperature changes were estimated with reference to Christiansen and Ljungqvist 2012 fig5
FIG 1
Here I make the same assumption that the current temperature peak is an approximate repeat of the +/- 1000 AD solar cycle related temperature peak (Fig1 ) .The simplest assumption for trends following the peak is that the downslope to about 2650 AD may well look like the downslope from 1000 to1650.Naturally predictions beyond the 30 years which coincides with a PDO declining temperature trend would be increasingly more speculative.
Using the HADSST 3 data as a go-by (figs 2 and 3) produces the following estimates .
Fig 2
Hadsst 3(blue) and 2 (red) Feb 2013 from http://www.climate4you.com/Text/Climate4you_February_2013.pdf
The rising trend peaks out at 2003-5 Fig2..A rise occurred from 1975 – 2003-5. We might therefore look for a similar cooling from 2005 to 2035 The average peak temperature has an Hadsst 3 anomaly of about +0.38 . The rise from 1975 was from about -0.15 to +0.38 = +0.53 . and thus we might look for a similar decline in global SSTs temperatures to – 0.15 by 2035. This would coincide well with the current 30 year cooling phase of the PDO. More speculatively we might similarly estimate a recovery to + 0.1 by about 2060 followed by further Global cooling to – 0.5 by 2100 – equivalent to the 1910 temperature.
See the Hadley chart Fig3 below from http://www.cru.uea.ac.uk/cru/data/temperature/HadSST3.pdf
Fig 3
Of course these numbers relate to the general trend- during the downtrend we would expect higher frequency variabilty in temperature highs and lows to the same extent as seen in Fig 2. but both would generally decline until 2035.
These forecasts and trends are generally consistent with the broad trends in the Oulu neutron count since 1964 Fig4 which I suggest may well be considerd as a key Solar Activity Proxy — SAP. It seems that there is a +/- 12 year lag between the SAP and the temperature. see Fig3 in Usoskin et al
http://www.clim-past.net/8/765/2012/cp-8-765-2012.pdf
The decline in the count minima from solar cycles 20-22 ie from 1969 – 1991 corresponds roughly to the temperature rise from the early 1980s to the 2003-5 temperature peak . It also matches well with the increase in the count of hours of sunshine during the same period dicussed by Wang et al
http://www.atmos-chem-phys.net/12/9581/2012/acp-12-9581-2012.pdf
which may well represent an open phase of the iris effect.
The relatively higher counts at the cycle 23 and especially the cycle 24 neutron minima troughs (solar cycle SSN peaks) suggest a continuing downtrend in temperatures to at least 2024.
There was a secular change in the related Ap index in 2004-5 which could presage a sharp temperature drop in about 2016-17 and the Oulu data show an increase in the neutron count also in 2004- 5 which might indicate the same thing and which is alredy built in to the system.
Fig 4
It is possible that the record 20th century peak in the 2009 count might indicate a real cold snap in 2021-22.
3. Summary
- Significant temperature drop at about 2016-17
- Possible unusual cold snap 2021-22
- Built in cooling trend until at least 2024
- Temperature Hadsst3 moving average anomaly 2035 – 0.15
- Temperature Hadsst3 moving average anomaly 2100 – 0.5
- General Conclusion – by 2100 all the 20th century temperature rise will have been reversed,
- By 2650 earth could possibly be back to the depths of the little ice age.
- The effect of increasing CO2 emissions will be minor but beneficial – they may slightly ameliorate the forecast cooling and help maintain crop yields .
- Warning !! There are some signs in the Livingston and Penn Solar data that a sudden drop to the Maunder Minimum Little Ice Age temperatures could be imminent – with a much more rapid and economically disruptive cooling than that forecast above which may turn out to be a best case scenario.
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Dr. Norman Page has a PhD in Geology, and runs a consulting business in Houston, TX
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“My approach to climate science is based on Baconian empirical principles…”
“Empirical’? I’m sorry, Dr. I’m afraid you’ll NEVER make true ‘Climate Scientist’. Haven’t you heard, modification of empirical data to create the result you’re looking for is the ‘new normal’ in Climate Science. Bacon is probably spinning in his grave over the new meme for Climate Science. “Observation doesn’t match theory? Change the observations.”
Awesome! I love it.
Please remove all testable predictions – climatology is exclusively a belief and guilt based discipline. Gavin.
Someday we may come to thank the alarmists for forcing us to save our precious coal for when we truly needed it.
An interesting quote from Monckton in a piece defending Easterbrook:
“As an expert reviewer for the IPCC’s forthcoming Fifth Assessment Report, I can also report that the IPCC itself plans to publish a graph showing that the predictions of global warming in all four of its previous multi-thousand-page quinquennial Assessment Reports have proven to be enormous exaggerations. The computer models it uses have failed.”
I’m not sure if this information is dated, but the planned retraction by the IPCC (if correct) is news to me.
http://www.climatedepot.com/2013/04/01/former-thatcher-science-advisor-un-ipcc-reviewer-lord-christopher-monckton-weighs-in-on-warmists-smear-of-geologist-dr-don-easterbrook-dr-easterbrook-has-been-libeled-it-is-the-rent-seeking/
Is the 2650 date correct or typo. Based on Page’s timeline I could see a logical progression to 2150, so the jump to 2650 for another mini ice age seems to be better explained.
This prediction of a possible couple degree cooling scares me a hellova lot more than warmists prediction of a possible couple degree warming.
Is the 2650 date correct or typo. Based on Page’s timeline I could see a logical progression to 2150, so the jump to 2650 for another mini ice age needs to be better explained.
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2013/04/02/global-cooling-methods-and-testable-decadal-predictions/#comment-1264084
Link
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2011/06/01/old-prediction-may-fit-the-present-pattern/
The centre panel showing rate of change of SST says pretty much the same thing as Norman Page says in detail here:
http://curryja.files.wordpress.com/2012/03/icoads_monthly-triple1.png
this is based on a simple fitting of a three cosine plus fixed rate of change model, explained in more detail in the article.
http://judithcurry.com/2012/03/15/on-the-adjustments-to-the-hadsst3-data-set-2/
The article was looking at Hadley adjustment and was not intended as a projection or forcast but it remarkably similar to what N.P. says here. Scafetta’s work is very similar.
Met.Office Hadley recently reviewed their 10 year forcast into a tive year forecast of no significant change. Why did not they show the usual 10 year forecast.
a) because they no longer have the certainty they previously claimed to have in their models
b) because thier new model shows after five years it will get dramatically colder as N.P. and other have suggested and they can’t face that kind of about turn all in one hit.
Asiseeitnow Look at Fig 1 The Little Ice Age Maunder Minimum is about 650 years past the 1000 year peak.
With 7B people on Earth substantial cooling would be truly deadly on a mass scale. The silver lining is the looming population inflection point and subsequent decline may slightly lead the cooling.
Bill Marsh,
Hey, I just had an idea for a new energy source. Hook up electric generators to the corpses of the early pioneers of science. If we need more electricity, just give a climate “scientist” a public audience. 😉
Keep a close eye on the sizes positions and intensities of the permanent climate zones plus the degree of meridionality and equatorward positioning of the jet streams.
As long as they remain as meridional / equatorward as they are now then the increase in cloud cover will reduce solar energy absorbed by the oceans which will slowly cool.
The start of the switch from overall warming to overall cooling was clear to me by 2000 which was when I first noticed that jet stream zonality and poleward climate zone drifting were no longer intensifying.
These are multidecadal and multicentennial changes that underlie all the other climate periodicities and appear to be solar induced.
If the cause of cloudiness changes is simply the change in the length of the lines of air mass mixing when the jets become more meridional then we have a far simpler chain of causation to work from.
Watch the net position of the ITCZ. It should have drifted a little closer to the equator in recent years from its late 20th century net position north of the equator.
Observe the Sahara desert. It should have drifted a little towards the equator over recent years.
The slope of the tropopause height from equator to poles is a giant global see saw with the slope being affected from the top down as a result of solar variability affecting atmospheric chemistry differentially between equator and poles.
Changing that tropopause height gradient allows the entire global air circulation pattern to slide to and fro latitudinally beneath the tropopause as a negative system response to the solar forcing.
A similar process always occurs as a negative system response to ANY forcing element.
I think there’s a sun-climate connection, affecting different parts of the world a bit different, but generally cooling at low solar activity, and vice versa. I’ll put my money on Landcheidt’s theory. It predict like 30 years of low solar activity? Do that theory include like a Maunder Minimum?
I guess no solar cycle theory predicts when the new large ice age starts. That’s processes in the atmosphere. One Dalton Minimum til I’m 75. Brrr! 🙁
Thanks for the very clear post Dr. Page, but colour me unconvinced. The climate is a large, complex beast and sceptical old me tends to be wary of claims that *any* ‘control knob’ exists which allows acccurate forecasts.
Having said that, I’d bet a few quatloos that it will get colder in the next few years. 🙂
Dont worry, be happy – 1000MW from a single 600 tonne turbine.
http://www.shanghai-electric.com/en/business/cleanenergy/powergeneration/pages/pg100gw.aspx
Jimbo – I do not understand your comment . I worked in Aerospace for 31 years including the VIKING trip to mars . We did not load the spacecraft with a computer program and by itself guide the
spacecraft to MARS but we provided periodic updates to the guidance by means of attitude ,velocity,and accelerometer gyros along with star sighting eqpt .If we had used the program alone the spacecraft would have gone somewhere else then MARS . Also do you remeber when
Edward Lorentz (the original founder of using computers for weather ) loaded two separate super computers with the same climate data to 50 points of accuracy and let the programs run with a totally different prediction for the weather. How do CLIMATE MODELS differr from these examples?
PS – I have a degree in mathematics and have worked in computers and software since the 1960s.
bobprud
more soylent green! says:
April 2, 2013 at 1:40 pm
I said “alternative” but I didn’t say “green” (although some might argue it qualifies). The replacement for fossil fuels won’t be solar, wind, geothermal, hydro, fission or fusion.
There’s only one left.
And although fossil fuels are far more abundand than we’ve been led to believe, as you correctly state, they will still be relegated to petrochemical feedstock and not much more.
(Hint–NASA is designing rocket ships of the future based on this energy source.)
Robert R. Prudhomme says:
April 2, 2013 at 5:58 pm
Jimbo – I do not understand your comment . I worked in Aerospace for 31 years including the VIKING trip to mars . We did not load the spacecraft with a computer program and by itself guide the
spacecraft to MARS but we provided periodic updates to the guidance by means of attitude ,velocity,and accelerometer gyros along with star sighting eqpt .If we had used the program alone the spacecraft would have gone somewhere else then MARS . Also do you remeber when
Edward Lorentz (the original founder of using computers for weather ) loaded two separate super computers with the same climate data to 50 points of accuracy and let the programs run with a totally different prediction for the weather. How do CLIMATE MODELS differr from these examples?
PS – I have a degree in mathematics and have worked in computers and software since the 1960s.
bobprud
The climate models do not differ from the examples except in quantity. The climate ‘scientists’ have come up with a clever wheeze. They run multiple climate models (to the limit of time and funding say about 50) with slightly varied start parameters and call the resulting spaghetti an ensemble – then (you will like this part) they average the result!! as that is bound to work isn’t it !? Thus they demonstrate that they are both mathematically and logically challenged and do not have Lorentz’ understanding of chaotic systems. But it produces impressive funding politician impressing spaghetti graphics, and they can do linear projections of the averages of the chaotic model output (wince). Emphasizing still more their lack of a grasp of the fundamentals of chaos theory.
AGU Chapman Conference on the Causes and Consequences of the Extended Solar Minimum between Solar Cycles 23 and 24 (4CESM)
08 April 2013 — 12 April 2013, Key Largo, Florida, USA
“The most recent solar minimum, solar cycle 23-24 minimum, was unusually long (266 spotless days in 2008, the most since 1913), and the magnetic field at the solar poles was approximately 40% weaker than the last cycle; and unusually complex (the solar wind was characterized by a warped heliospheric current sheet, HCS, and fast-wind streams at low latitudes: the fast-wind threads the ecliptic more commonly in 2008 than 1996.) This complexity resulted in many effects observed from Sun to Earth, with many observations indicating unusual conditions on the Sun, in the heliosphere, and in the magnetosphere, ionosphere, and upper atmosphere of the Earth.
This remarkable set of conditions provide the scientific community with an exceptional opportunity to assess the nature and structure of a very quiet Sun, and an upper atmosphere relatively devoid of solar influences, helping to provide a better understanding of the relative roles of solar activity and internal variability in the dynamics of the Earth’s upper atmosphere and ionosphere. Such an understanding requires a multidisciplinary approach.
The main goal of the conference is to bring together the solar, heliospheric, magnetospheric, upper atmosphere, and ionospheric communities to debate and discuss interdisciplinary work and reach a better understanding of the nature and structure of a very quiet Sun, and of an upper atmosphere relatively devoid of solar influences, and in doing so, to help clarify the role of solar activity in the dynamics and variability of the Earth’s upper atmosphere and ionosphere relative to the internal variations.”
http://chapman.agu.org/solarminimum/
Under your point “1”, I believe the biggest error is not differentiating between convective cooling and radiative cooling. All cooling is radiative, but a large portion occurs from water (ice) droplets from high in the atmosphere. CO2 would not interfere with this mechanism. An interesting observation is that Oklahoma set an all-time cold temperature record 2 years ago. This is purely a function of radiative cooling at night. Since we are close to a doubling of CO2 during the temperature records, this should have been impossible.
I would also expect cooling. Based on current observations and my understanding of the mechanisms and what happened in the past, I would expect gradual significant cooling followed by a Heinrich event. I will provide more information when there is unequivocal evidence of gradual significant cooling.
The following are past and current observations which are interesting.
Linked to below, is the Greenland Ice sheet proxy temperature data for the last 12,000 years. The Greenland ice temperature date shows the so called Dansgaard-Oeschger cycle (named after the paleoclimate discovers of the cycle) which is a cycle of warming and cooling with a periodicity of 1450 years plus or minus 500 years.
http://www.climate4you.com/images/GISP2%20TemperatureSince10700%20BP%20with%20CO2%20from%20EPICA%20DomeC.gif
It appears, the Dansgaard-Oeschger (D-O) temperature cycle is driven by a solar magnetic cycle change, as there are cosmogenic isotope changes at each and every D-O cycle. What is missing is a physical mechanism to explain how a solar magnetic cycle change can cause the planet to cyclically warm and cool, sometimes abruptly cool.
I become interested in what causes the glacial/interglacial cycle 15 years ago and have followed all related research including the most recent discoveries and unresolved controversies.
In the last 10 years, the geomagnetic field specialists have found that geomagnetic field changes correlate with past climate changes. What delayed the geomagnetic field analysis (consensus on the finding), is there is no explanation as to why the geomagnetic field is changing cyclically and as the geomagnetic field changes are significantly faster than is possible with the current assumed model for how the geomagnetic field is generated.
There are burn marks on the surface of the planet (In the Northern hemisphere at multiple sites in North America and in Europe), that correlate with largest most rapid climate change, the Younger Dryas (the Younger Dryas is a special abrupt climate change event that is called a Heinrich event, again named after a paleoclimatic discover) planetary cooling event (planet when from interglacial warm to glacial cool with 70% of the cooling occurring in less than 10 years). The largest geomagnetic field change in the last 12000 years correlates with the Younger Dryas abrupt cooling event.
The geomagnetic field intensity increases during the interglacial periods and drops in the glacial periods following a 100 kyr cycle.
Prior to around 1996 planetary cloud cover and temperature tracked galactic cosmic rays GCR (high speed protons which are believed to be generated by super nova which strike the atmosphere creating MUONs (heavy electrons). The MUONs in turn create ions in the atmosphere. The GCR changes increase or decrease the amount of low level clouds and change the optical properties of clouds in specific regions of the planet, the magnitude and orientation of the geomagnetic field is also a factor. There are interesting series of papers that were published in the last 10 years concerning this subject.)
Starting sometime in 1996, there was a sudden reduction in planetary clouds. Planetary clouds still tracked GCR however there was roughly a 1% reduction in planetary clouds.
Starting in 1996, the geomagnetic North pole suddenly started to move. Prior to 1996 the geomagnetic field wandered moving year by year roughly 15 km in no fixed direction. The North geomagnetic pole is now moving at 45 km/year in a fixed direction, causing a 1 degree change in magnetic north every 5 years which requires airports in the Northern Hemisphere to re-number their runways as the standard system is to number the run related to alignment with magnetic North. (Prior to 1996, magnetic north did not change.)
Analysis if the geomagnetic field in the Northern Hemisphere has found there is an increase in magnetic field anomalies from 2 to 6. Theoretical the appearance of field anomalies is what occurs when there is geomagnetic excursion, however, there is no concern among the specialists as based on the theoretical model it takes 1000 to 2000 years a geomagnetic excursion to occur, however there is proxy data of extraordinarily large and rapid geomagnetic field changes which have no explanation.
The Southern geomagnetic pole is not moving, however, there is a very large geomagnetic anomaly in the South Atlantic where the geomagnetic field is 30% weaker than the main field. There is cold climate spot that is aligned with South Atlantic geomagnetic anomaly which is supports Svensmark’s cloud modulation theory.
William Astley You say “The geomagnetic field intensity increases during the interglacial periods and drops in the glacial periods following a 100 kyr cycle.”
Do you have a reference or link for this statement – Thanks in anticipation.
FYI:
Nelson, Fraser. “It’s the Cold, Not Global Warming, That We Should Be Worried About.” Telegraph.co.uk, March 28, 2013, sec. elderhealth. http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/elderhealth/9959856/Its-the-cold-not-global-warming-that-we-should-be-worried-about.html
Anonymous. “A Sensitive Matter.” Economics. The Economist, March 30, 2013. http://www.economist.com/news/science-and-technology/21574461-climate-may-be-heating-up-less-response-greenhouse-gas-emissions