by Roy W. Spencer, Ph. D.
Yes, Virginia, it really has been a cold winter.
The winter months of December 2013 and January 2014 averaged over the contiguous 48 United States were the 3rd coldest Dec/Jan in the last 30 years.
The analysis is based upon ~350 NOAA/NWS stations that measure temperatures every 6 hours (or more frequently), many located at airports. This is different from the official NOAA temperature product (update not yet available), which is based upon daily max/min temperatures measured at 1,000+ co-op stations. Those stations have had large adjustments made due to (among other things) changing time of observation (TOBS) over the years.
Here’s a plot of the Dec/Jan averages for the last 41 years (click for large version):
An interesting feature is that 5 of the last 7 years have been below the 41-year average, which has happened only one other time in the 41-year period.
The data I use are adjusted for average spurious urban heat island (UHI) warming that increases with population density around the thermometer site. That relationship is shown at the end of this article. The analysis starts in only 1973 since that is the first year with a large amount of quality-controlled 6-hourly temperature data archived at NOAA.
So, does the cold winter disprove global warming theory? No more than an unusually warm winter proves the theory. It’s just what we used to call “weather”.
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More interesting stories about this winter are at Dr. Roy Spencer’s website: http://www.drroyspencer.com/ be sure to bookmark it.
It will be interesting to see what NOAA/NCDC comes up with for the December-January ranking in their “state of the climate” report due in a few days. My guess is that it won’t be anywhere close, probably something like 9th coolest.
Place your bets.
And in the “dog that does not bark” line: what does CRN show for Dec/Jan? How come we never hear of data from CRN?
Way to move the goalposts on the discussion, Steven Mosher.
You talk about *global* warming when the *global* trend is upward. Then, when the global trend is *downward*, you find some data subset that happens to have an above-average trendline for that time interval and announce, “See! If you look more closely, the indicators are *rising*! We were actually talking about *this* trend all along…”
Global surface temps rise? That’s global warming! Global surface temps *aren’t* rising? Hmm… Ummm… Look at some local surface temps! HAH! See! I found a subset of the surface temps that is rising! So, nyah! …And when those stop rising, I’ll, um, tell everyone to look at the oceans or something…
Two months out of 12 in conjunction with elevated areas of snow coverage is a harbinger of a late Spring. This will evolve into a cold deficit that will be difficult to overcome in the Summer months of 2014.
To wit, on that Daily Mean Temperatures in the Arctic 1958 – 2014 web page, we can see that arctic temperatures in the first few months of 2006 were *way* hotter than average, whereas 2010 was more or less tracking the average; yet 2010 is one of the hottest years on record, whereas 2006 barely makes the top 10.
So, Steven Mosher, if you want to talk about global average temperatures, talk about global average temperatures. If you want to talk about Arctic temperatures, talk about Arctic temperatures. But you don’t get to switch back and forth between one and the other when the argument (or, more to the point, when reality itself) isn’t going your way.
wws says:
February 3, 2014 at 9:07 am
“Especially fun to see when one or two warm weeks in Australia has all the warmists down there shrieking “See! It’s Global Warming, We told you so!!!” ”
But let’s get the perspective right on that, as well. It was hot mostly in just one narrow band, a reasonably small part of the whole continent. And that was caused by enhanced cooling trade wind flows this summer, which set up that pattern for overland heating of the returning air in the south. Several other people at WUWT have also pointed out that it has been anomalously cool where they are covering larger areas of Australia, for all of this Summer.
Today in fact was very cool and dry in North Queensland. Last Saturday morning, it was positively chilly when I woke up, and it was a bright sunny summers day. But also the coolest summers day I can remember – ever! It was like having outdoor air-conditioning. All of this summer we’ve had maybe 5 hot and humid days and nights. Where I’m at it’s normally hot and humid all summer long, and also well into early Autumn. But this year it’s easily the coolest Australian summer I’ve experienced in decades in northern eastern Australia.
I’ve literally never experienced a summer anywhere near this cool before. Everyone here’s been talking about how cool it’s been this year. The drought-stricken inland areas are feeling the pain though, due to no rainfall due to the lack of humidity from so much cool air coming up from the southern ocean and Tasman sea, but for most of the population on the east coast, it’s been a delightfully cool summer.
Though you would never guess this was the truth, if the media and was your only source of information and balanced reporting.
I have no doubt they’ll continue with the melodramas and misrepresentation of the actual situation though, but they must realize by now that the natives are getting restless. We know the spin is false, and more and more people are getting despondent and eventually annoyed by it. And they are starting to say so more often and more openly.
But to be more balanced myself I’ll add that last winter was also unusually and noticeably warm. I expect this was due similar wind-circulation induced reasons. So it’ll be interesting to see if that is repeated this coming winter, or if the Southern Ocean’s persistent coolness finally bites down.
If it does then at least BOM and the media might finally be forced to face the cooling southern summer facts, all of them, not just some of them. But I won’t hold my breath on that score.
@HenryP….Thanks for the response (on the other thread)….I didnt see it. I’m new to this so im still learning…but thats a good thing.
Steven Mosher says:
February 3, 2014 at 10:05 am
[IMG]http://i61.tinypic.com/2ylwzm9.png[/IMG]
Makes no sense. The 1930’s were warmer than recent warming as indicated on your plot.
Are you using the bastardized and homogenized data that is worthless to produce you plot?
The post’s headline says.
What if it said?
There would be much wailing and gnashing and grinding of teeth.
If one more person shows a temp data set…starting in 1850….to show how much global warming
…I’m throwing their happy butt in the freezer
Wow. Still 3°F to go to reach the depths of the 1970’s cooling. I’m glad BEST still shows it, it’s beginning to disappear everywhere else where such cooling is inconvenient.
Kenny says
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2014/02/03/u-s-decjan-temperatures-3rd-coldest-in-30-years/#comment-1557699
Henry says
if you want to follow a thread because you want to see replies to your positions/comments you can tick the notify comments button when you make a new comment
You then have to check the e-mail box and click on confirm follow, and “appy”
So far, just to be sure that he keeps up with his own personal record to date, Steven Mosher has never replied to any of my comments. So don’t feel bad if you don’t receive an answer from him.
I wonder if he is real.
Sorry
“appy”
should be “apply”
in the website
It does support GHG warming. The lowest temperature decreases as you move back in time in a nice exponenetial pattern, as you’d expect since the GHE limits how much cooling happens and the effect decreases as concentrations increase.
It does not support meaningful feedbacks.
28.2 78/79
29.1 83/84
31.8 91/92
31.3 09/10
31.6 13/14
@aaron chmielewski
try to understand the forces behind the patterns
see my answer to Kenny, here
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2014/01/31/open-letter-to-kevin-trenberth-ncar/#comment-1556131
Gary Pearse says: @ur momisugly February 3, 2014 at 9:28 am
I think I would prefer dog sled to walking.
unmentionable says
The drought-stricken inland areas are feeling the pain though,
henry says
try to understand why it is getting drier at the higher latitudes and paradoxically even it a bit warmer there (when there is more sunshine)
during a cooling period
http://blogs.24.com/henryp/2013/04/29/the-climate-is-changing/
Not only is it colder here in Buffalo than the past two winters, but we’ve gotten more snow than the past two winters … combined … so much this year that we’re about a foot and a half ahead of the average … with more on the way (though they have pulled back on the 6 to 10 inch forecast to just 4 to 8 inches … which is pretty good, considering the storm that’s going to do this doesn’t exist yet).
Is it Spring yet ???
Interesting that the Laurentide Ice Sheet has the same foot print as the Polar Express/Polar Vortex: http://imnh.isu.edu/digitalatlas/geo/glaciers/glacimg/glacMap.gif
Britain is on course for having a very wet, pretty mild winter. The Southern side of the Alps dividing range and the Pyrenees are having an exceptionally snowy one.
There are plenty of extremes going on but few are the same.
Leon Brozyna says: @ur momisugly February 3, 2014 at 12:05 pm …Is it Spring yet ???
>>>>>>>>>>>>>
That is why I left that area.
Happiness is never having to shovel snow again.
rtj1211 says: @ur momisugly February 3, 2014 at 12:10 pm
…There are plenty of extremes going on but few are the same.
>>>>>>>>>>>>>>
That is because of meridional (loopy) vs zonal jet stream and the blocking highs that go with a meridional jet stream.
With all due respect to you sir, you are obviously looking at the situation backwards. It wasnt the 3rd coldest, it was actually the 27th warmest year of the last 30 years. So warm in fact that of the last 41 years, only 5 years were cooler.
/sarc
“REPLY: But, what is the resolution of this skin temperature data? I’m guessing 2KM or maybe 5km? Since I’ve proven in my surfacestations study that proximity to human habitation acts over short distances, and since we know the majority of historic weather stations are often within 100 meters of the observer’s domicile, it is most likely that the effect is below the resolution of that data you present, making it essentially invisible. Many if not most, Arctic and Antarctic bases are less than 1KM wide. Eureka NWT is a good example. I think your premise falls flat.- Anthony”
1. Ross wrote this paper which you support
http://www.rossmckitrick.com/temperature-data-quality.html
In that paper Ross claims to have found a human effect in grid cells of 5 degrees. Of course
at that time no one but me made the resolution argument.
2. If the rate of warming from surface air stations is .17C per decade And IF 50% of this
is due to human effects then what do you expect the rate of warming to be when measured from space?
A. what will the rate of warming be at the surface?
B at 1018 hPa etc
3. Think of it this way. if a surface station is a point in the grid cell ( say 1 degree grid cell)
and that point source warms at .17C while all the land around it warms at .08C,
then when you look at the average over 1 degree what will you see?
Basically I’m just building on work that Peilke Sr. and other skeptics id when they compared UAH to surface stations. Oh ya, Ross had a contribution there as well
see KLotzbach et al 2010
http://pielkeclimatesci.files.wordpress.com/2010/03/r-345a.pdf
http://climateaudit.org/2011/11/07/un-muddying-the-waters/
REPLY: Nice dodge, you still didn’t answer the question. WHAT IS THE RESOLUTION OF YOUR SKIN TEMPERATURE DATA? If the resolution of that data can’t resolve the point sources, then you have no claim. Also, how much smoothing is applied to your data? No major cities appear, so it suggests braod smoothign much like GISS. Your map appears almost like a Koppen climate classification map, broad with no detail.- Anthony
henryP
http://berkeleyearth.lbl.gov/regions/alaska
February is looking abnormally cold nation-wide. Except FL.