Could we be in for a Super El Niño this year like the one in 1997/98?
Dr. Ryan Maue is seeing hints of a beginning in ocean heat content satellite visualizations.
Maue writes on Twitter:
Quick look at 1997 TC Ocean Heat content anomaly for April 4 shows equatorial extreme + anoms … compare to 2014
And here is April 2014:
Maue writes on Twitter:
Here’s the April 4, 2014 TC Ocean Heat content e.g. depth of 26° isotherm. Like 1997
Certainly, some similarities exist, and it appears the warm pool is just a bit bigger than the one in 1997. If the forecast is to be relied on, we expect to see some sort of ENSO event this year:
![nino34Mon[1]](http://wattsupwiththat.files.wordpress.com/2014/04/nino34mon1.gif)
More at the WUWT ENSO page
Of course, there’s no doubt that should this build into a full-blown ENSO event, we’ll hear things like “Trenberth’s missing heat has returned, and it’s angry” and “the global warming pause that we didn’t admit existed before is now over”
John FInn,
There is no Dalton or Maunder minimum going on right now. Some people speculate that is the era we are about to enter into, but it doesn’t mean it’s happening. There is nothing to be wishy washy about. This was a very low solar maximum, but it’s still a solar maximum. We just hit the second peak of that maximum (which has corresponded almost perfectly with this latest el nino and all the events which drove it). The sun is only NOW starting to calm down a bit from that.
It’s ridiculous to think that the sun DOESN’T control the temperatures of the earth (at least its energy). But most people understand that there isn’t a direct connection between sun and temperatures. Rather it’s the relationship between solar rays, the heat which builds (and stores) in the oceans and the release of that heat during ENSO events. If the sun isn’t producing as much energy, and it isn’t getting stored in the ocean, the temperatures will respond by falling. The weak solar cycle is only 5 and a half years old. The process takes time. The earth still has to expel all the stored energy from previous cycles. But el ninos are becoming fewer now, which indicates that the falling temperatures are not that far off.
The Earth temperatures first “paused” and then they will fall.
El ninos are natural, they happen every 4 or 5 years or so, they don’t disprove that the sun drives the climate on Earth.
utrex,
1. We only have kelvin wave information going back to what? The late 1990s? It’s similar to 1997 and 2010.
2. Kelvin waves are not the main drivers of el ninos, winds are.
3. We are in a negative PDO and the positive phase will be temporary due to the el nino itself, like 2010.
Jeff
You are wrong, change in the solar magnetic field cause a changes in the behavior of the polar vortex. They will be even stronger when the Sun blows over. The second peak does not change the trend.
http://www.solen.info/solar/polarfields/polarfields.jpg
ren,
All i’m saying is the reason the pacific warmed up so quickly (first in 2012, then at the end of 2013) was because of the spikes due to the solar maximum. Because the ocean has warmed, and there had been strong trades going on for a while now, it pushed all the warm water over to west and, thus, caused this very el nino.
ps (not to ren),
Alarmists are always most annoying when they are PREDICTING something will be “worst _____ ever.” We haven’t even had an el nino yet, much less a super el nino. They base this “super el nino” prediction on very narrow data and ignore other data which contradicts it.
And if it does turn out to be a super El Nino let’s hope the warmists agree that the earth has let off some steam, that the oceans have cooled and the surface warming is nothing to be alarmed about.
Of course they won’t.
During 1997 , the global SST was dramatically rising starting already at the beginning of the year and it rose by 0.35 C by year end . The oceans were in warming cycle .Currently global SST is flat with the slight rise in Southern hemisphere sst being off set by the cooling of the Northern Hemisphere SST. The oceans seem to be heading for a cooling mode led by the dropping Northern hemisphere sst . I see little similarity in sst patterns between the two periods . In my judgement a weak El Nino is more probable .
Thank you, mwhite.
For those who have not noticed , PDO has gone positive the first two months of 2014 and AMO has gone negative during the same two month period .
If an el niño is born won’t that give us a handle on just how much the Pacific influences the weather ?
I did not think strong long lasting El Ninos occurred in negative PDO cycles??
I agree with 1Sky1 re Kelvin Waves. A major point to consider is that no one has ever forecast an ENSO cycle in a satisfactory manner and one thing is for sure, no one should attempt to do so at this time of the year. There are too many variables to contend with in and around the equinox as mentioned in numerous papers. Many in this post are quite right in weighing in with the PDO but most everyone is missing the MJO; in my view this pulse can be a major driver. Combine the current pulse approaching northern Australia and the vestiges of the westerly monsoon winds and its no wonder we see the warm pool straining a bit to go east. It’s painful, but we have to wait, have a little patience, and in a month or so things will be clearer.
The sun determines how much energy enters the system. This varies by ~0.1% over a solar cycle. Greenhouse gases control the rate at which energy leaves the system. If the rate of emission slows due to an increase in atmospheric ghgs then energy will be stored in the system and the earth will warm.
But the sun clearly is “producing as much energy” since energy is still building up in the oceans. Temperatures are not going to fall because we still have more energy entering the system than leaving it.
How long? What about solar cycle 23? SC23 is part of the decline in solar activity.
Anthony, New paper out.
Also, Question, does WUWT have a new paper page and any thoughts of creating one? If yo don’t have one could you create one with a a viewer ratting tab on if the study is good or bad.
Thanks
http://hockeyschtick.blogspot.com/2014/04/studies-find-el-ninos-can-be-predicted.html?m=1
Thanks, A., Dr. Maue, Mr. Tisdale, contributors. Good information this is an excellent WUWT post.
It would seem most people who know agree an El Niño is the next move in the ocean.
ENSO – Diagnostic Discussion: (NOAA-NWS Climate Prediction Center):
“ENSO-neutral is expected to continue through the Northern Hemisphere spring 2014, with about a 50% chance of El Niño developing during the summer or fall.”
http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/analysis_monitoring/enso_disc_mar2014/ensodisc.html
How strong? How long would it last? These seem to be the questions.
Jeff says:
…
“2. Kelvin waves are not the main drivers of el ninos, winds are.”
Well speaking about a possibility of an extreme El-Niño itself, the extreme kelvin wave propagation process is more important IMO, but I can see how zonal winds are overall more important for all El-Niños in general.
“3. We are in a negative PDO and the positive phase will be temporary due to the el nino itself, like 2010.”
My apologies for being too broad, but I was referring to the positive PDO pulse which is occurring right now. There is as we speak a cooler pocket of water sitting in the Northern Pacific encased by warm water.
http://www.ospo.noaa.gov/data/sst/anomaly/2014/anomnight.4.3.2014.gif
+PDO regime___
http://jisao.washington.edu/pdo/pdo_warm_cool3.jpg
Well then I guess we will stop hearing about the drought in the southwestern states, if I remember right wouldn’t a nino bring them much needed rain? Of course that will be a disaster too somehow. I suspect though that the warming they desperately want, won’t be in the near future and hopefully the next time our sine wave swings to warm the mere mention of global warming will cause ridicule and shame. However there will always be a younger generation who has not yet experienced a cycle of warmer, cooler to base disbelief on.. that is our generations downfall, hopefully our kids will be smarter but we have to give them the tools. They are still showing an inconvenient truth in schools folks.. ps I am sick to death of super size. If it is an extended or intense event then be accurate in your name, I’m tired of super, it means nothing.
If this does turn out to be a major El Nino, on par with 1997-1998 then we will see something that hasn’t happened in the history of human civilization, a globally averaged surface temperature higher than that of the Holocene optimum. Highest than it has been since Marine Isotope Stage 5.5. over 130,000 years ago.
Then your entire world view will be seen as a self-deception. Hopefully we still have time to fix it together.
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/rss/from:1997/to:1998.4/mean:3/plot/uah/from:1997/to:1998.4/trend/plot/rss/from:1997/to:1998.4/trend/plot/uah/from:1997/to:1998.4/mean:3
jai mitchell is still trying to proselytize his religious fanaticism.
OK, to deconstruct jai’s current silliness:
The link mitchell fabricated is the ultimate cherry-pick. Just look at the start and end dates. Of course there is a sharp upward curve in that very short time. That’s because he cherry-picked the time frame.
But viewing a normal time frame shows what is really happening. For the past 17+ years, the trend line clearly shows global cooling. Only a religious True Believer cannot see that.
And the projection!! : “…your entire world view will be seen as a self-deception.” The self-deception is entirely on the side of the religious fanatics.
Finally, the “history of human civilization” is a blink of the eye geologically. Even “130,000 years” is the blink of an eye. So is the Holocene Optimum. The planet is now in one of it’s cooler phases. It has been much, much warmer in the past, with no ill effects. Anyone looking at a chart of the past 8 – 10 millennia can see that the current temperature is nothing to worry about. Hockey sticks are a normal and natural occurrence.
Well, that was easy. Throw me another slow pitch, jai.
Well with the choice available i.e., El Nino or Nina, you have a 50/50 chance of being right. And 50/50 chance of being wrong!
@jai mitchell
Wow – a 3-4 C warming excursion to make this “el Nino” reach the highest temperature of the Hocene? This really is desperation. Years of pent-up disappointment from the long “pause” years now focussed on fantastic hopes for a warming event of mythical proportions. This is reminiscent of Hitler’s hopes in a super-weapon in 1945 (sorry Godwin) as the wehrmacht crumbled.
This proto el Nino will fizzle out by the end of the year, and with it the hopes of the wretched warmists.
You would do well, jai, to remember the Spartan response to Philip of Macedon’s threat.
Well what about La Nina, this results in cooling and harsher winters. It’s all to do with ocean currents. Anyway, there is nothing we can do about it.
Jai, what do you suggest we do should an El Nino develop. We have been through this before, and predictions are not fact. El Nino’s have different effects on parts of the world. Same as La Nina. But neither are caused by CO2 or greenhouse gases, well one, water vapor. Just don’t throw away your gum boots, folks. Rain is on the way.
If a super El Niño is in the works, would be a good year for a northern winter vacation in Ecuador.