Global Temperature Report: December 2013

I’m note sure what all the fuss is about. The IPCC GCM’s have consistently projected global temps significantly above what has been observed. That is, their GHG model of our atmosphere is seriously flawed. None of the major signatures of AGW have come to pass. The tropical mid-tropesheric hotspot never materialised, tropical storms both in the Pacific and Atlantic basins remain at or below normal levels when looking at decadal trend lines. The polar source regions continue to create significant cold air masses the routinely penetetrate the mid latitudes in the Northern Hemisphere. And most significantly, our mid to long term weather patterns continue to steered more by ENSO, the NAO, AO, and AMO than anything else.
These monthly updates do nothing more than needlessly excite people. We shouldn’t lose sight that the LIA began in 1315. And it wasn’t blizzards or huge artic outbreaks that signaled the change. It was a spring-summer outbreak of continuous North Atlantic cyclones that hit Northwest Europe, which resulted in a disasterous famine. And even during this period, Nordic sailors still managed to travel to Greenland and North America; droughts and heat waves still plagued Central and South America, and the MWP still controlled regional weather across Oceania. The growth of the Franz Josef glacier in New Zealand began several decades after the Northern Hemisphere began its fitful starts and stops toward cooling.
The MWP was no different in its evolution. The globe warms and cools on its time frame. Any major climatic shift is only noted decades after its occurance. And each region reacts differently to these changes. During the coldest decades of the LIA (1630-1690), the Tidewater area of the America’s east coast went through one of the harshest North American droughts during the last 1100 years; a similar drought hit the high desert areas of Arizona, Nevada, and New Mexico. In 1666, London suffered through a drought/heatwave that led to the Great London Fire.
In 1976, the year know as the Great Pacific Climate Shift (major PDO shift accompanied by a strong El Nino) the North America suffered through an early and brutal winter only to followed by an even more intense drought and heave in 1977. And in Jan 1978 one of the worst blizzards hit the Great Lakes-Upper Mississippi Valley.

Anecdotally
None of my friends and family in Ontario (5 of them) which I asked this AM
Think the bangs are due to ground ice
The all say it’s on roofs, in eaves (gutters) or the like
Just sayin
🙂
No evidence

“There is a constant regression to the mean (cycles), but the mean has been going up since the 19th century. I simply can’t understand people who claim that global temperatures are cooling when you look at the 150 year graph.”
It’s very simple. Using a sports analogy, say Team A scores 35 points in the first quarter of a football game. They lead 35-0 after the 1st quarter. From quarters 2 through 3, Team B scores 21 points. Through three quarters, Team A leads 35-21. Yet, a statistician can also say that for the last 2 quarters Team B has outscored Team A 21-0. Fans of Team A will say that Team A is still ahead; and fans of Team B will say that Team B has outscored Team A 21-0 during the last 2 quarters and further more Team A hasn’t scored in 2 quarters. Both fans are right to be optimistic.
One can look not only at the last 150 years, but the last 320 years to point out that global temps have warmed. Global temperatures have been on the rebound since the coldest decades of the LIA (that is, 300+ years). However, sceptics have pointed out that the warming in the last 15-20 years has been statistically meaningless. Why this is so important to point out is the simple fact that GCM projections have over-stated GHG warming significantly. Since the early 1990s, CO2 concentrations have increased 12%; but global temperatures haven’t risen even close to what they were projected to rise. Additionally, the GCMs cannot account for changes to ENSO. If you cannot project changes to ENSO you might as well go back to the drawing board.

re: James Abbott says: at both January 3, 2014 at 2:28 pm AND January 3, 2014 at 3:15 pm
If you’ve yet to see a skeptic answer the question of what would happen were there no CO2, you haven’t looked very hard at all. For one thing, James, if there was no CO2 there’d also be no plant life, and therefore no O2, and no life period.
But more to your point, apparently you are grossly unaware that CO2 as a greenhouse gas has a logarithmic curve – and it’s nearly saturated. Virtually all of the warming that’s necessary to keep the planet from being an iceball occurred in the first 20ppm of CO2. The curve is just about saturated at this point, and added CO2 has only a small impact. And, of course, there are many other mechanisms at this point that affect temperature more than CO2 levels – including water vapor, which even the IPCC attributes far more warming than they attribute to CO2.
Try this article to get you started (and it also clearly debunks your claim that no skeptic has ever answered the question of what temperatures would be without CO2): http://wattsupwiththat.com/2010/03/08/the-logarithmic-effect-of-carbon-dioxide/

climatereason says:
January 4, 2014 at 11:46 am
Another useful idiot.
Can you tell me why when it comes to Climate discussions peoples reasoning powers and common sense goes out of the window.
In what other walk of life would you accept this bollocks so readily ?
People, whose whole livelihoods, careers and reputations are absolutely tied to trying to show an increasing warming trend today compared to the past tell you they have been re-examining the data and have been improving the algorithms and have found that changes need to be made to previously published trends.
Every single time, without exception, these changes result in a cooling of the past and a warming of the present. Does it never ever cross your mind about how likely that would be? Are you so gullible in dealing with other matters?
Personally I think it would be absolutely extraordinary even if these results were produced by people who had no investment in any outcome and I would be asking serious questions about methodologies etc and asking for extraordinary further proof because that is what extraordinary results demand.
When such results are produced by people who are absolutely invested in such results appearing I would disregard them as easily as I did the people who rang me up last week asking to invest in the art market and how they would send me charts and results that would prove I would get an extraordinary return on my money if I only invested with them.
Mind you I expect you will reply asking for their details so you can send them your money, they have data and charts etc proving everything they say!
Alan

Alan Millar
I suggest you retread my posts as you have got hold of completely the wrong end of the stick. Of course I don’t believe in the correctness of this changing of past temperatures. What on earth made you think I was that gullible?
Have you never read any of my dozen or so detailed articles exposing this sort of stuff?
Tonyb

dbstealey says:
January 3, 2014 at 2:00 pm
“I cannot break thru James Abbott’s religious belief, but for rational readers, this chart http://i.snag.gy/BztF1.jpg of the past 8,000 years shows that the current “carbon” scare is nonsense. How many ‘hockey stick’ shapes can you count in the chart? Ten Twenty? More?”
How come you keep on posting that chart of the Greenland ice core that ends in the year 1855?
It is misleading to circle that part of the chart that ends in 1855 and claim that it is Mann’s hockey stick.
These graphs show has happened to temperatures at the top of Greenland ice sheet since 1855.
http://i0.wp.com/hot-topic.co.nz/wp-content/uploads@2011/01/GRIPtempBoxlarge.png
http://i2.wp.com/hot-topic.co.nz/wp-content/uploads/2011/01/GISP210klarge.png

Alan
If you would like to actually READ it you will see that I was relaying a conversation I had with Mosh. My bit of the conversation ended with a dry :
“I’m still not convinced.” the rest is his own words, not mine. An apology would be nice, thank you
Tonyb

re: Mike Mellor says: January 3, 2014 at 4:27 pm

…The warmist nuts desperately want huge temperature increases and lots of weather disasters with millions of people killed. The skeptic nuts desperately want rapid cooling and a little ice age with millions of people dying from cold and starvation. Get a grip, people.

Er, no. The skeptics want real science and for the “warmist nuts” to stop with the pseudo-science and the chicken little scare mongering.

Great stuff. Sat era objective. Big question is will the cooling amo in coming years lead to predicted ( by me) downturn to where we were in 70s. If not, then I will be forced to concede point to AGW crowd that co2 has some effect. But its a test I am not afraid of, but cherish since an objective test via satellite is something anyone that truly wants the correct answer should welcome, not shut down in despotic manner

dbstealey says:
January 4, 2014 at 12:42 pm
Werner! You might have cost me some E-Z money! ☹
I must be more careful next time! But if the other person still wishes to bet, be certain exactly which data set is used. I recall an earlier bet about HadCRUT, but in the meantime, HadCRUT4 came out and the outcome of the bet would have been determined by which version of HadCRUT was to be used. But having said this, your bet could be lost by a revised version of HadCRUT8 in ten years time. On the other hand, if you agree to HadCRUT3, what guarantee is there that HadCRUT3 will even be around in ten years time?