![Hand%2BWaving[1]](http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2014/02/hand2bwaving1.jpg?quality=83)
Well not exactly #37, but it sure seems like it with all the handwaving we’ve seen lately.
So far, we’ve heard from Climate Science that ‘the pause’ was caused by:
Too much aerosols from volcanoes, ENSO patterns, missing heat that went to the deep ocean, ocean cooling, low solar activity, inappropriately dealt with weather stations in the Arctic, and stadium waves, to name a few. So much for consensus.
Now, it’s trade winds going too fast that are causing abnormal cooling in the Pacific. A new paper from the University of New South Wales says that once the winds return to normal speed, well, look out, the heat is on.
One thing for certain, even though the media is going predictably berserkers over this paper, the paper clearly illustrates that natural variation has been in control, not CO2. So much for control knobs.
Pacific trade winds stall global surface warming — for now
The strongest trade winds have driven more of the heat from global warming into the oceans; but when those winds slow, that heat will rapidly return to the atmosphere causing an abrupt rise in global average temperatures.
Heat stored in the western Pacific Ocean caused by an unprecedented strengthening of the equatorial trade winds appears to be largely responsible for the hiatus in surface warming observed over the past 13 years.
New research published today in the journal Nature Climate Change indicates that the dramatic acceleration in winds has invigorated the circulation of the Pacific Ocean, causing more heat to be taken out of the atmosphere and transferred into the subsurface ocean, while bringing cooler waters to the surface.
“Scientists have long suspected that extra ocean heat uptake has slowed the rise of global average temperatures, but the mechanism behind the hiatus remained unclear” said Professor Matthew England, lead author of the study and a Chief Investigator at the ARC Centre of Excellence for Climate System Science.
“But the heat uptake is by no means permanent: when the trade wind strength returns to normal – as it inevitably will – our research suggests heat will quickly accumulate in the atmosphere. So global temperatures look set to rise rapidly out of the hiatus, returning to the levels projected within as little as a decade.”
The strengthening of the Pacific trade winds began during the 1990s and continues today. Previously, no climate models have incorporated a trade wind strengthening of the magnitude observed, and these models failed to capture the hiatus in warming. Once the trade winds were added by the researchers, the global average temperatures very closely resembled the observations during the hiatus.
“The winds lead to extra ocean heat uptake, which stalled warming of the atmosphere. Accounting for this wind intensification in model projections produces a hiatus in global warming that is in striking agreement with observations,” Prof England said.
Credit: For articles on this paper only. Credit: Nature Climate Change. Recent intensification of wind-driven circulation in the Pacific and the ongoing warming hiatus. Prof Matthew H England et al.
“Unfortunately, however, when the hiatus ends, global warming looks set to be rapid.”
The impact of the trade winds on global average temperatures is caused by the winds forcing heat to accumulate below surface of the Western Pacific Ocean.
“This pumping of heat into the ocean is not very deep, however, and once the winds abate, heat is returned rapidly to the atmosphere” England explains.
“Climate scientists have long understood that global average temperatures don’t rise in a continual upward trajectory, instead warming in a series of abrupt steps in between periods with more-or-less steady temperatures. Our work helps explain how this occurs,” said Prof England.
“We should be very clear: the current hiatus offers no comfort – we are just seeing another pause in warming before the next inevitable rise in global temperatures.”
###
The paper:
Recent intensification of wind-driven circulation in the Pacific and the ongoing warming hiatus
Matthew H. England, Shayne McGregor, Paul Spence, Gerald A. Meehl, Axel Timmermann, Wenju Cai, Alex Sen Gupta, Michael J. McPhaden, Ariaan Purich& Agus Santoso
Nature Climate Change (2014) doi:10.1038/nclimate2106
Abstract
Despite ongoing increases in atmospheric greenhouse gases, the Earth’s global average surface air temperature has remained more or less steady since 2001. A variety of mechanisms have been proposed to account for this slowdown in surface warming. A key component of the global hiatus that has been identified is cool eastern Pacific sea surface temperature, but it is unclear how the ocean has remained relatively cool there in spite of ongoing increases in radiative forcing. Here we show that a pronounced strengthening in Pacific trade winds over the past two decades—unprecedented in observations/reanalysis data and not captured by climate models—is sufficient to account for the cooling of the tropical Pacific and a substantial slowdown in surface warming through increased subsurface ocean heat uptake. The extra uptake has come about through increased subduction in the Pacific shallow overturning cells, enhancing heat convergence in the equatorial thermocline. At the same time, the accelerated trade winds have increased equatorial upwelling in the central and eastern Pacific, lowering sea surface temperature there, which drives further cooling in other regions. The net effect of these anomalous winds is a cooling in the 2012 global average surface air temperature of 0.1–0.2 °C, which can account for much of the hiatus in surface warming observed since 2001. This hiatus could persist for much of the present decade if the trade wind trends continue, however rapid warming is expected to resume once the anomalous wind trends abate.
http://www.nature.com/nclimate/journal/vaop/ncurrent/full/nclimate2106.html
ja1 m1tchell:
At February 12, 2014 at 9:29 pm you rave
Since all the data sets indicate no discernible warming over at least the last 17 years,
either
(a) you accept the indications so discernible global warming has stopped
or
(b) you don’t accept the indications so there never was any discernible global warming.
Richard
Rob Nicholls:
At February 13, 2014 at 5:41 am you say
Please explain why you – or anyone else – would “think” such an evidence-free thing.
Richard
The US EPA (Environmental Protection Agency) Sea Surface Temperature Graph shows no warming in over ten years.
And you can not get any more rabidly CAGW than the EPA.
“How on Earth did this piece of crap pass review?”
Considering it was published in a journal called ‘Nature Climate Change’, thus likely a journal not entirely impartial and removed from vested interests, for a field notorious for junk and pseudo science, and riddled with confirmation bias if nothing else, I’d say there isn’t much rigor in weeding out time-wasting studies.
jai mitchell says:
“you keep asserting that global warming has STOPPED for the last 17 years…”
No, you keep incorrectly asserting that it hasn’t stopped.
The evidence I post is far more than an ‘assertion’. I’ve provided plenty of verifiable scientific evidence showing that global warming has stopped.
My sympathy for your affliction, jai. Most folks don’t suffer from a cranial/rectal inversion; most folks accept the mountains of scientific evidence. Even alarmist scientists are busy scratching their heads, wondering why global warming has
pausedstopped.But as I have repeatedly noted, you are simply a religious fanatic, and as such you will never accept any verifiable scientific evidence that contradicts your True Belief. Your cAGW religion trumps all contrary evidence. We see it in every comment you make.
Furthermore, we see your Belief in comments that you don’t make: you never reply to comments about that corrollary to the Scientific Method, the climate Null Hypothesis. That hypothesis, which has never been falsified, points out that current climate parameters have been exceeded by past parameters. That means that nothing happening now is unusual, or unprecedented. What we observe now has all happened before, and to a much greater degree.
But if you accepted the Null Hypothesis, your entire “carbon” scare would be debunked. That is what’s happening: no alarmist prediction has ever come to pass; they have all been wrong.
When they are wrong about everything, most folks would re-assess their position. You don’t, because with you it is not a position. It is a religious Belief.
[snip]
fortunately, there are MANY MORE graphics FROM THIS WEBSITE that also show that the warming has been happening like this one here: (Yes, another WUWT Bob Tisdale graphic)!!!!
since 2005 if that amount of heat went into the atmosphere, the heat that WUWT says went into the oceans had gone into the atmosphere, it would warm the atmosphere by over 20 degrees, on average every day and night throughout the year.
That means that a 40 degree night in Georgia would be more than 60 degrees.
a 75 degree day in Chicago would be more than 95 degrees
a 100 degree day in new York city would be more than120 degrees
a 110 degree day in Arizona would be more than 130 degrees
This data is taken from this very site, even though the previous graphic has been removed since yesterday.
Richard and db, the both of you and Jai are just talking past each other. Jai is talking about the new definition of global warming that includes all of the purported “anthropogenic-derived” heat that is hiding in the oceans.
I haven’t checked his calculations but, if correct, he is onto something absolutely stunning, groundbreaking and, quite frankly, it is f-kin Nobel Prizewinning stuff. I think he might even get the Nobel Prize for economics too if he can just refine his pitch.
In his post from 8:42 pm last night, he shows how ridiculous is the IPCC’s upper bound for the temperature increase from a doubling of CO2. Forget their measly and pathetic 6 degrees C as an upper bound for such doubling. Jai shows that from 2005 alone, the increase in atmospheric global warming is equivalent to approximately 16 degrees C. Wow, CO2 going from around 380 ppm to around 400 ppm can cause 16 degrees C of warming of the atmosphere, thereby making climate sensitivity to a doubling somewhere in the hundreds of degrees C. Eat your heart out Hansen !!! There’s the Nobel Peace Prize for Jai if his math(s) checks out.
Not content with just one Prize, Jai then shows that the top 2,000 meters of the oceans is capable of handling this whopping climate sensitivity by increasing its temperature by only 0.03 degrees/decade (assuming no cooling cycles).
… and I use the same link he used for the numbers:
http://bobtisdale.wordpress.com/2013/05/26/nodc-provides-1st-quarter-2013-ocean-heat-content-update-alarmist-writes-science-fiction/
Jai, here’s where the Nobel Prize for Economics beckons. You need to get to every important policy maker on the planet and tell them, not that the heat might jump out of the ocean all at once and kill us all, but rather that the experimental evidence that includes your hundreds of degrees of climate sensitivity shows that in fact the heat goes the other way, is dissipated in the top 2,000 meters of the oceans, and humanity can spend its trillions of dollars on anguishing about something more productive.
Voila. You owe me.
Update: I see it’s now 20 degrees C from 2005, and my link is live.
So, by your esteemed climate logic, if the sun went dark 2005 minutes ago, it would be dark outside.
However! If the sun went nova 2005 minutes ago, it would be very light outside.
(Hint: That “energy” that went into the oceans that you claim did NOT go into the atmosphere, and we are subsequently facing an abnormally cold northern hemisphere.)
Phil,
The amount of heat energy deposited in the oceans since 2005, measured by the ARGO buoy network and reported by bob tisdale on this website, if applied to the earth’s atmosphere, would raise the temperature of the total atmosphere by over 20 degrees Fahrenheit.
care to attempt to discredit the validity of this statement?
here phil,
I will post the calculation again so that you can dispute my math:
WUWT says:
A: Heat capacity of air: 1005 J/kg/K
B: The atmosphere has a mass of about 5×10^18 kg
therefore
B*A = 5.025 x 10^21 Joules/degree Kelvin
Total amount of heat energy differential (warming) measured by the ARGO network since 2005
= 17×10^22Joules – 9×10^22Joules = 8×10^22 Joules
Therefore if all of this heat energy went into the atmosphere instead of the ocean, the total amount of average temperature increase of the atmosphere would be:
=8×10^22Joules/5.025×10^21 Joules per degree Kelvin
= 15.9 degrees Kelvin increase.
= 28.6 degrees Fahrenheit increase SINCE 2005
go ahead, check my math.
by the way, in THIS bob tisdale graphic that you linked, the amount of total heat added to the oceans since 2005 is 10×10^22 not the 8×10^22 that I used from a different source, so the calculated equivalent warming of the atmosphere has to be increased by 25%.
=19.9 degrees Kelvin increase
=35.8 degrees Fahrenheit increase SINCE 2005
If my aunty had a willy, she’d be my uncle.
–that’s what I expected
jai mitchell says:
February 13, 2014 at 11:24 am
“Therefore if all of this heat energy went into the atmosphere instead of the ocean,…”
Even if it were true (it isn’t – it’s a massive flail to excuse the lack of atmospheric heating) how, precisely, do you see this miracle occurring?
It’s not likely your math that’s wanting, though I did not bother checking it, because the question is entirely moot. It’s your bizarre theory of heat flow.
This too is like heat deep in the ocean; buried and not seen so far. 😉
http://www.scribd.com/doc/206892158/THE-REPORTED-GLOBAL-WARMING-HIATUS-IS-NEITHER-A-RECENT-NOR-A-TEMPORARY-ONE
I have a formal write-up that I would like to submit to the same journal Nature Climate Change. This one is a warm up for that. Would appreciate your comments and feedback.
Richard M says:
February 10, 2014 at 4:58 am
The reason they looked at data starting in 1980 is because most of that period was a +PDO so the winds would be lower. This paper is basically a complete and total LIE. These people should be stripped of their academic degrees as an example to anyone else who would intentionally lie. Throw in the reviewers and the editor for good measure. Wouldn’t that make a difference in the crap we’re seeing out of climate science peer review.
——————————————————————-
+10
jai mitchell says:
February 12, 2014 at 8:26 pm
You went to great lengths to show that the “blip” at the end of the graph is after 1855.
I just plotted the actual data that you worked through to show you the graphic is complete. I even added key points and values to show you the actual dates and the temperatures in the chart.
I didn’t go to absolutely any lengths to show the blip is after 1855, I just copy/pasted the actual projects data. So you’re saying the actual projects data is wrong and whatever you want to make up is correct?
Meanwhile, you plotted pure nonsense that has no baring on actual reality. Case in point, the 1970s hit -32.0 Even a 1970s 10-year running average (as your graph claims to portray, but doesn’t) would be -31.75 (you have them at -31) Meanwhile the 1990s peaked at -31.2 (you have them at basically -29). You apparently just made up numbers to attach to the end of the graph, completely ignoring the actual real data the project obtained
I think I know at least some of your foolish problem is stemming from. Whatever your Propaganda Puppeteer told you to use is merely one of the many core samples taken, so you are using one small fraction of the actual data taken and plopping on some nonsense to the end of it to come up with your “omg, look, it’s scary” nonsense. I hope you know that isn’t how science actually works in the real world though…
http://www.co2science.org/data/mwp/regions/northamerica.php
That link shows all those many peer-reviewed papers using the actual real data (you know, not your fantasy stuff) that shows what I have been telling you over and over and over and over again, the whole damn time; the LIA in Greenland really started ending in the mid-1800s and our current temperatures don’t even peak above the running average of the MWP, let alone the asinine levels you have them at.
And here, I wont even stop at proving Greenland was warmer and your just a tool on that topic, I’ll evenl show you all the endless Peer-Reviewed papers that show the MWP was warmer all over the entire globe; including the oceans
http://www.co2science.org/data/mwp/mwpp.php
…but, as you always do, I imagine you will stick your head deep in the sand, flat out ignoring the actual real Science and hard Data, and instead pop back up later repeating whatever silliness your religions masters have told you to parrot.
p@ur momisugly Dolan says:
February 10, 2014 at 7:46 pm
a little Tennesee windage
———————————-
My dad taught me to use Kentucky windage, when teaching me how to aim with a rifle. Is there a Tennessee version?
@ur momisugly goldminor says:
February 13, 2014 at 1:14 pm ,
There is indeed! Tennessee Windage, like the luck of an inside straight, is best applied when pouring Tennessee Whisky (and NOT, ahem, bourbon…) so as not to miss the glass. Another way to not miss the glass is to just up-end the bottle in the vicinity of your mouth and swallow—can’t miss the glass if you don’t use one (just sayin’…).
My foxhound is from West Liberty in the fine state of Kentucky, a gorgeous Trig with a lovely singing voice… I suspect most states have their own variety of windage. For example, D.C. Windage is mostly hot air, like the nonsense alarmists, even a few posting here, keep emitting…
Seriously? I’m a shooter/reloader, among my other sins. My father taught me the same method your father taught you, I suspect, but just called it “windage.” If I’m talking accuracy, it’s windage, elevation/drop, and range.
On the other hand, the term, “Tennessee windage” I learned from Robert A. Heinlein as a kid, and for me it applies to situations OTHER than shooting. He seems to be the only one ever used the term, as far as I know; and his usage wasn’t even referring to shooting, and tha’s how I use it most often: in any situation where an approximation/guesstimate/swag (scientific-wild-assed-guess) is appropriate.
I’d say it’s a “term of art” but Bee-Essing isn’t always considered art…
jai mitchell ignores Bob Tisdale’s comment above:
“There’s nothing wrong with DBstealey’s graph, jai. It’s apparently raw ARGO data. Raw ARGO data shows cooling, or aren’t you aware of that?” [my bold]
Also, philincalifornia makes it clear in his amusing and pointed way how deluded jai mitchell is. mitchell cherry-picks only those charts that he believes support his religious Belief — but he conveniently left Bob’s other charts out.
And once again, mitchell hides out from the decisive climate Null Hypothesis, which shows that there is nothing either unusual or unprecedented happening. Everything currently observed has happened before, repeatedly, and to a much greater degree than now. What does that tell you, jai?
That tells the rest of us that your “carbon” scare is pseudo-scientific nonsense. If a 40% rise in [harmless, beneficial] CO2 cannot cause global T to rise, then any effect from “carbon” must be simply too small to measure [the effect is there, but it is too small to measure because most all of the forcing took place in the first 20 ppmv].
So. Question for jai mitchell: since you have been wrong about everything, including every wild-eyed prediction of climate catastrophe and carbon doom, what would it take for you to change your mind?
Or, is it exactly what I have said: that you are a total religious fanatic, and your religion is cAGW? Because religious True Believers cannot admit anything that conflicts with their dogma.
Really, what would it take for you to admit you are wrong, jai? Or is that simply impossible under any circumstances?
Thanks for your question Richard S Courtney.
I said “I think there hasn’t been a pause in global warming as the oceans have continued warming over the last 15 years.”
You asked “Please explain why you – or anyone else – would “think” such an evidence-free thing.”
There’s evidence based on observational data: Lyman & Johnson 2013:
http://www.pmel.noaa.gov/people/gjohnson/OHCA_1950_2011_final.pdf
There’s Levitus et al, 2012: ftp://140.90.235.83/pub/woa/PUBLICATIONS/grlheat12.pdf
My reading of this paper is that it is based on observational data.
Data “updated from Levitus et al 2012” is available from:
http://www.nodc.noaa.gov/OC5/3M_HEAT_CONTENT/index.html
There’s also evidence from a Reanalysis product, based on a combination of observational data and climate modelling.
See Balmaseda, Trenberth & Kallen 2013:
http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/grl.50382/pdf:
or see Trenberth & Fasullo 2013:
http://www.cgd.ucar.edu/cas/Trenberth/website-archive/trenberth.papers-moved/T-F_Hiatus_Earth%27sFuture13.pdf
I’d be interested to know your thoughts on the papers linked to above.
Best wishes
Have any of these idiots bothered to calculate the alleged increase in ocean heat content relative to the alleged decrease in OLWR flux?
@Rob Nicholls 2/16 9:13 am
Consider this from the Lyman & Johnson 2013 you linked:
Think for a moment how utterly unscientific is the phrase “measured over 50% of the globe”. It implies we are measuring 50% of the water volume on a continuous basis. Measured how? It was with ship born thermometers dipped into the ocean and measured only a cubic foot of water at a time. There is implied a fair sampling of that 50% of the globe, when in fact it is mostly the North Atlantic, Arctic, and NW Pacific. See Figure 1 data coverage: maps b=1960, c=1985. from Abraham, J. P., et al. (2013) (pdf),
The reality is that the US Navy and Office of Naval Research have made several hundred thousand soundings to about 300 m over a couple decades to understand thermoclines and their effect on sonar deflection and anti-submarine warfare. Therefore, the ocean soundings before ALACE [1992+] and ARGO [2003+], were highly clustered in the oceans populated by ballistic missile submarines and attack submarines which were concentrated in the North Atlantic and North Pacific. The coverage in the southern hemisphere is meager. Therefore, assumptions about the southern hemisphere are more important than its meager observations.
Thanks Stephen Rasey – you raise interesting points about southern ocean sampling. I didn’t really notice before that Lyman and Johnson 2013 (LJ2013) mentioned the sparseness of southern ocean sampling on pages 12 to 15, where they gave an account of historical sampling of ocean temperatues. LJ2013 also included some graphs estimating the sampling uncertainties in Ocean Heat Content Anomalies since 1950 (pages 41 and 42). The estimated uncertainties started off quite large but have reduced over time as sampling has improved.
You emphasised some of this sentence from LJ2013: “Furthermore, global ocean heat uptake estimates since 1950 depend strongly on assumptions made concerning changes in undersampled or unsampled ocean regions.” LJ2013 demonstrate this by plotting the estimated ocean heat content anomalies since 1950 using 3 different methods: 1) using “zero-infill mean” (ZIF) (assuming that the anomaly is zero for unsampled regions), with a baseline climatology based on Argo data from 2005 to 2010. 2) using ZIF with a colder baseline (based on the Argo data from 2005 to 2010 but “shifted uniformly by a global representative mean estimate of heat content anomaly for each distinct layer in 1950”, and 3) using “Representative Mean” (which assumes that unsampled regions have anomalies equal to the average anomaly of the sampled regions. This third estimate is not affected by the choice of baseline climatology). The trend since 1950 is markedly different for these 3 methods, as LJ2013 points out. However, all 3 of these methods seem to show warming since 1998.
The introduction of LJ2013 suggests that warming in the oceans is “well-documented”: “The world’s oceans have absorbed roughly 90% of the anthropogenic warming from greenhouse gasses since the 1960s (Bindoff et al. 2007). This well-documented ocean warming occurs primarily in the upper 0–700 m (Domingues et al. 2008; Ishii and Kimoto 2009; Levitus et al. 2009), but warming has also been observed at intermediate and mid-depths, from 700 to 2000 m (von Schuckmann et al. 2009; Levitus et al. 2012), and in the abyssal ocean, well below 2000 m (Purkey and Johnson 2010; Kouketsu et al 2011).”
Any thoughts on these papers quoted in the introduction to LJ2013 would be appreciated.
I’d also be interested to know about any peer reviewed papers published in scientific journals which suggest the oceans overall have not warmed since the 1950s, (and particularly since 1998.)
@Rob Nicholls at 2:37 pm
However, all 3 of these methods seem to show warming since 1998.
How much warming?
Please remember that for each 200 meters of ocean, you must have 2.75 ZJ per 0.01 deg C. (1 ZJ = 10^21 J)
What is the uncertainty of the earliest measurement you care to use? Does it make sense you can measure the temperature of the ocean to that precision? (See last paragraph)
What is the difference between the three scenarios?
Why should I believe these scenarios encompass the possibilities of an unmeasured southern hemisphere? Do they encompass ENSO and SOI states? How about unknown unknowns?
And why choose 1998? ALACE ought to give somewhat reasonable coverage back to 1992-94.
Willis had an excellent post called “Decimals of Precision”.
Ok. We get that. But it also works in reverse.
If we feel that we have a 0.01 deg C precision with 500 ALACE thermometers, do we feel we could know the temperature of the ocean to 0.10 deg C with just FIVE for the whole world? Not for the near surface, no-siree-bob!
So a critical eye must be use on what the reasonable precision of ocean temperature estimates that can be expected. REAL precision, not wished for.
The simple fact is that until the early 1990s, the Southern Hemisphere is woefully under-sampled. To make use of whatever data was there you have to use preconceptions about what it was IF you measured it, which is circular reasoning.