Will the forecasted El Niño later this year produce a new record? Spencer comments.
June 10th, 2014 by Roy W. Spencer, Ph. D.
The Version 5.6 global average lower tropospheric temperature (LT) anomaly for May, 2014 is +0.33 deg. C, up from April (click for full size version):
The global, hemispheric, and tropical LT anomalies from the 30-year (1981-2010) average for the last 17 months are:
YR MON GLOBAL NH SH TROPICS
2013 1 +0.497 +0.517 +0.478 +0.386
2013 2 +0.203 +0.372 +0.033 +0.195
2013 3 +0.200 +0.333 +0.067 +0.243
2013 4 +0.114 +0.128 +0.101 +0.165
2013 5 +0.082 +0.180 -0.015 +0.112
2013 6 +0.295 +0.335 +0.255 +0.220
2013 7 +0.173 +0.134 +0.211 +0.074
2013 8 +0.158 +0.111 +0.206 +0.009
2013 9 +0.365 +0.339 +0.390 +0.190
2013 10 +0.290 +0.331 +0.249 +0.031
2013 11 +0.193 +0.160 +0.226 +0.020
2013 12 +0.266 +0.272 +0.260 +0.057
2014 1 +0.291 +0.387 +0.194 -0.029
2014 2 +0.170 +0.320 +0.020 -0.103
2014 3 +0.170 +0.338 +0.002 -0.001
2014 4 +0.190 +0.358 +0.022 +0.093
2014 5 +0.329 +0.326 +0.333 +0.173
This is the 3rd warmest May in the satellite record:
1998 +0.56 (warm ENSO)
2010 +0.45 (warm ENSO)
2014 +0.33 (neutral)
John Christy thinks the coming El Nino will give us a new temperature record, since it is superimposed on a warmer baseline than the super El Nino of 1997-98. I’m not convinced, since we are in the cool phase of the PDO, which favors weak El Ninos (like 2009-10).
As we finish up our new Version 6 of the UAH dataset, it looks like our anomalies in the 2nd half of the satellite record will be slightly cooler, somewhat more like the RSS dataset….but we are talking small adjustments here…hundredths of a deg. C.
The global image for May should be available in the next day or so here.
Popular monthly data files (these might take a few days to update):
uahncdc_lt_5.6.txt (Lower Troposphere)
uahncdc_mt_5.6.txt (Mid-Troposphere)
uahncdc_ls_5.6.txt (Lower Stratosphere)
Re RSS and UAH,
As stated on the RSS data, it covers the globe from -70 (70 deg south) to 82.5 deg north. This means RSS misses out nearly all of the Antarctic continent, only touching it in places at the extreme periphery: http://www.mapsofworld.com/lat_long/maps/antarctica-lat-long.jpg
On the other hand, UAH covers the globe to 85 deg north and south, and so covers the vast majority of both the Antarctic and the Arctic. In its 2013 annual report UAH stated that the “warmest areas during the year were over the North Pacific and the Antarctic, where temperatures for the year averaged more than 1.4 C(more than 2.5 degrees Fahrenheit) warmer than normal.”
RSS missed most of that anomalous warming in Antarctica. This may go some way towards explaining why the two data sets differ.
Re UAH and GISS,
As stated by many above, UAH produces lower troposphere temperatures whereas GISS produces surface/sea surface temperatures. Nevertheless, there is very strong agreement between these two data sets when compared over the longer term (at least there is at the moment).
This chart compares UAH and GISS. GISS is offset by -0.39 so that both are base lined to the 1981-2010 period as described in the WfTs Notes section. (0.39 is the average temperature for GISS between 1981-2010.) http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/uah/plot/gistemp/from:1979/offset:-0.39/plot/uah/trend/plot/gistemp/from:1979/offset:-0.39/trend
So, IF Co2 warms the entire globe catastrophically, AND IF that warming is supposed to cause the Arctic sea ice to melt AND THAT melting is supposed to cause MORE CA global warming to melt more sea ice …
So, how could the Antarctic sea ice extents last October 2013 set an all-time satellite record high sea ice extents AROUND Antarctica if Antarctica was measured that same 2013 year with the earth’s highest regional temperatures?
Oh, and by the way, the Antarctic sea ice anomaly (the “excess” Antarctic sea ice alone) has been continuously positive since May 2011, and been regularly higher than normal since 2007, and that excess has been as large as 1.6 Mkm^2 several times .. an area 97% the size of Greenland. Now, just what is that funny “Arctic amplification” positive feedback the so-called “scientists” propagandize their politicians about?
RACookPE1978
The sea ice in the Antarctic may be healthy, but it seems according the Daily Mail that the ice on land there is melting fast.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/sciencetech/article-2632917/Antarctic-ice-losses-DOUBLED-2010-researchers-reveal-study-shows-159-BILLION-tonnes-ice-melting-year.html?ITO=1490&ns_mchannel=rss&ns_campaign=1490&utm_source=Daily+Carbon+Briefing&utm_campaign=d8e2a29f35-DAILY_BRIEFING&utm_medium=email&utm_term=0_876aab4fd7-d8e2a29f35-303421281
From Bob Weber on June 10, 2014 at 8:41 pm:
The absolute proof of the Sun causing warming, cooling, and other cycles as well as extreme weather events, is very easy to deduce.
Without the Sun, the weather would be much less variable with far fewer extremes.
Summing up the various posts on the pause, what it clear, even from those backing Monckton, is that his 17 + year pause is based on a narrow assessment of the available data sets.
In fact it is based on one data set.
Did he choose that one to give the longest pause possible whereas other data sets, including GISS and UAH show that the pause is at least 5 years shorter ?
dbstealey – you seem a supporter of that approach of selective use of data to deliver a pre-determined result but also can I also suggest you take some time to brush up on some basic maths and science. You can argue that a chosen baseline is “arbitrary”, but which ever baseline 30 years period you choose to use, it will still show the anomalies above and below that line. It is a standard way of looking at climate change, whatever the causes. The fact that we have 24 hours in day or the freezing point of water as key ways of measuring things could be argued to be arbitrary. But unless you set out these baselines, you are stuffed when trying to measure physical quantities and change.
James Abbott,
Dance all you want but you’re either being obtuse or purposefully mendacious with your assertions which first challenged Monkcton’s accuracy and now his motives.
Your shady shift from accuracy to motivation is a low brow technique that has saturated the climate debate and deserves to be admonished as unethical.
Pamela Gray says:
June 10, 2014 at 5:58 pm
” yet there is no observation that shows any such transition from the ocean surface to the deeper layers.”
.
Did you discount the 3mm per year SLR of which a significant amount is due to the thermal expansion of water?
James Abbott says:
Summing up the various posts on the pause, what it clear, even from those backing Monckton, is that his 17 + year pause…
And: Did he choose that one to give the longest pause possible…
The term “pause” is dishonest.
This is not a “pause”. This can only be a “pause” if global warming resumes. It may, or it may not — or global cooling may begin. We don’t know, and neither do you. So until then, global warming has stopped. And it may have stopped permanently, or for a long, long time.
Next:
You can argue that a chosen baseline is “arbitrary”, but which ever baseline 30 years period…
I don’t know if you are mendacious or stupid, but you still do not appear to understand the difference between an arbitrary baseline chart and a trend line chart. An arbitrary baseline chart looks frightening because it makes it appear that global temperatures are in an accelerating rise, when they are not.
An arbitrary baseline chart is deceptive. It does not reflect reality, while a trend line shows what is actually happening: global temperature has been in a steadily rising trend since the end of the LIA. But it stopped rising quite a few years ago, despite endless predictions to the contrary by people like Abbott.
It is amusing watching folks like Abbott squirm over the fact that global warming has stopped, no matter for how long. Whether it is ten years, or fifteen years, or twenty years, global warming has stopped. It is no more. That parrot is dead.
OK. I’ll ask: Of that 2.2 mm/year supposed rise in sea levels, how much is due to thermal expansion, and – if so – by what number of degrees C has the deep ocean increased the past 17 years? (Remember, no continental shelves – deep ocean only – since we are assured that the heat is hiding only there. )
And how has the heat gotten there?
I think it is obvious to everyone that Monckton cherry picks the RSS data set because it has the longest pause (hiatus or whatever you want to call it).
Joe,
I think it is obvious to everyone that you mis-label the current situation as a “pause” rather than what it is: ‘global warming stopped many years ago’, because you are a True Believer in catastrophic AGW — something for which there is zero evidence.
Joe,
I think it is obvious to everyone that Joe is misusing the expression “cherry picks”.
Monckton is not selectively using, or cherry picking, segments of RSS data in order to make some dubious claim.
He is openly and completely plotting the RSS data for the last 17 years, 9 months showing a zero trend.
He is not concealing anything, not misrepresenting anything or suggesting anything more or anything less.
Is it cherry picking because he is not analyzing or including other data sets?
Not hardly.
No, I think I used the term appropriately. From Wikipedia:
Joe:
Please allow me to help you.
In support of your mistaken assertion that Lord Monckton is guilty of cherry picking by analysing the RSS data set, at June 11, 2014 at 12:11 pm you write
Sorry, but you “think” wrongly.
According to the definition of cherry picking which you provide, Monckton of Brenchley would have been guilty of that offence if he had chosen to present the “data” which most supports his “particular position”. But
(a) he did not choose a “particular position”
and
(b) he did not present the “data” which most supports the “particular position” he states.
The “particular position” he states is a result of conducting regression analysis on the RSS data back in time from now as a method to determine the maximum period when there has been no positive linear trend (i.e. a warming trend) indicated by the data. This period of no rising linear trend in global temperature as indicated by the RSS data is more than 17 years.
However, it can be argued that his obtained period of time is conservative because he should have assessed the maximum period when there has been a linear trend (i.e. a warming or cooling trend) which is not discernibly different from zero at 95% confidence. Assessed in this way the RSS data indicates no warming or cooling discernible at 95% confidence for more than 22 years.
I hope this clarifies the matter for you.
Richard
Lord Monckton is merely following Roy Spencer’s advice:
“As can be seen, in the last 10 years or so the RSS temperatures have been cooling relative to the UAH temperatures (or UAH warming relative to RSS…same thing). The discrepancy is pretty substantial…since 1998, the divergence is over 50% of the long-term temperature trends seen in both datasets.”
and
“But, until the discrepancy is resolved to everyone’s satisfaction, those of you who REALLY REALLY need the global temperature record to show as little warming as possible might want to consider jumping ship, and switch from the UAH to RSS dataset.”
Meanwhile the AMO is out of gas and falling.
dbstealey
Can I suggest you drop the insults as they have zero effect on me and just distract from the real issues.
Aside from your thin grasp on baselines and the numerous statements you make which are not supported by the facts eg
“global temperature has been in a steadily rising trend since the end of the LIA”
I can assure you that I do not “squirm” that global warming has paused. Unlike your pre-determined position that ALL the changes we are observing are natural, I am interested in the science and have never made “endless predictions” that temperatures would rise continuously.
The world does not divide into two purist camps of “warmists and “sceptics”, much as some might like it to.
Nick Stokes,
Then isn’t it cherry-picking to insist on the UAH data set? Here is HadCRUT4. Are they wrong, too? And HadCRUT3. And CRUtem3. And BEST, all from 1997.
Where’s the global warming?
I prefer satellite data because it in effect takes a snapshot of the globe, instead of relying on widely spaced weather stations. It shows the trend better, without UHI effects.
+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
James Abbott,
OK then, why don’t you tell us how much ‘global warming’ over the past 15 years is due directly to human CO2 emissions.
If you say, “I don’t know”, that would be good.
My position is this: global warming since the LIA is natural. It is not accelerating. Global warming due to human emissions is too minuscule to measure, and on net balance, it is harmless and beneficial. More CO2 is better, and more global warming is better.
Have fun with that one. I’ll defend it, because it is a testable hypothesis — unlike catastrophic AGW.
RACookPE1978 says:
“So, how could the Antarctic sea ice extents last October 2013 set an all-time satellite record high sea ice extents AROUND Antarctica if Antarctica was measured that same 2013 year with the earth’s highest regional temperatures?”
_______________________
This is a question you should address to Dr Spencer. It’s his data set.
I would point out that it was the joint highest ‘anomalous’ temperature. The Antarctic continent didn’t suddenly get warm in 2013; it was just warmer than it usually is.
Is it possible that increased glacier melt from the bottom of the ice shelves is causing a fresher but less dense layer of cold water to stratify above the warmer water below?
It could be. We can’t rule that out.
dbstealey
“More CO2 is better, and more global warming is better.”
You would like Venus then. Plenty of both there.
OK that is an extreme example, but your position is untenable because the rise in CO2 since the pre-industrial era is undeniably caused by human society and CO2 is undeniably a GHG.
But if you know different ….
Joe,
Sorry but I’ll have to conclude you are being both obtuse and purposefully mendacious.
Obtuse for your convoluted use of cherry picking and mendacious for your efforts to distort Monckton’s thorough and fair analysis of RSS.
You are equally ill-equipped to address the proportionality and significance of the human attributable rise in CO2, it’s role as a GHG or contribution to warming.
Size matters. Saying humans have increased atmospheric CO2 and it is a GHG is meaningless.
No where can you find any science which identifies the relative dimension of human related CO2 warming. Climate models don’t cut it and neither do 10,000 published studies talking about what may be, could be or will be. No more than melting ice does.
I see you have a few mis-conceptions here. Politely, let us continue the conversation.
1. True, it is Dr Spencer’s presentation of the world’s data, BUT the conflict between a “very high” regional Antarctic temperature in in 2013 AND a simultaneous equally record HIGH Antarctic sea ice extents throughout May 2011 through May 2014 (with a record sea ice extents high set in October 2013) is NOT a problem with the database nor Spencer’s satellite temperature measurement process, but with the ENTIRE CAGW “theory” and superficial logic of single-level Algebra I grade school physics.
2. The edge (the part of the Antarctic sea ice that is ever-expanding (or retreating much slower than normal during the Antarctic summer months) average 5 – 7 degrees in latitude further OUT from the continental land mass than the few glaciers that are “claimed” to be melting underneath. (Note that no actual measurements have ever been reported showing this underground melting, only the conclusions of massive “underground” melting.) At 110 kilometers per degree latitude, that means 550 – 700 KILOMETERS of very cold! freshwater “spreading out under the sea ice and diluting the millions of square kilometers of seawater” enough so much that “the freezing point of the dilute seawater will freeze at higher-then-normal temperatures caused by global warming.
See above. Now, actually calculate the number of million of cubic kilometers of glacier land-locked ice that had to melt to dilute the salt water enough to freeze a radial band of 2 meter-deep area of sea water 1.7 million kilometers wide completely around the continent of Antarctic 600 kilometers out form shore…… Now remember, that 1.6 million square kilometers is not the amount of “regular” Antarctic sea ice. it is only the EXTRA Antarctic sea ice last October that EXCEEDS the normal sea ice area.
James Abbott says:
You would like Venus then. Plenty of both there.
That is such a lame response that I can only conclude that you have run out of sane arguments. You must be aware that I have posted this dozens of times:
“CO2 is harmless, and beneficial to the biosphere at both current and projected concentrations.”
That is, and has been my often-repeated, testable hypothesis. But since you have made it an issue now, either falsify it, or the hypothesis stands, and is on its way to becoming an accepted Theory — in which case you completely lose the debate. If you do manage to falsify it with testable, empirical measurements showing global harm that is due directly to the rise in CO2, and that the biosphere is not benefitting from more CO2, then you will be the first. But give it your best shot. Because if you don’t, silence is concurrence.
Next, Abbot says:
OK that is an extreme example, but your position is untenable because the rise in CO2 since the pre-industrial era is undeniably caused by human society and CO2 is undeniably a GHG.
“Undeniably” is an evidence-free assertion. You can try to prove that the rise in CO2 is due entirely to human emissions; I don’t care. Because as stated in my hypothesis above: CO2 is harmless, and beneficial to the biosphere. So it really doesn’t matter where CO2 comes from — unless you can show global harm due to the rise in CO2, and show that the biosphere is not benefitting, then it doesn’t matter.
Your arguments are über-lame. You can cry about that judgement. Or you can try to come up with better arguments.
dbstealey:
I write to support a minor point in your post at June 11, 2014 at 7:10 pm. I do not intend to divert the thread.
You write
The anthropogenic (i.e. from human activities) global warming (AGW) hypothesis consists of three components; viz.
1.
The observed recent rise in atmospheric CO2 concentration results from CO2 emissions from human activities overwhelming the ability of nature to sequester CO2 from the atmosphere.
2.
CO2 is a greenhouse gas (GHG) so any rise to atmospheric CO2 concentration will increase global temperature (i.e. the CO2 rise will cause global warming).
3.
There are positive feedbacks in the climate system which generate problematic global temperature rise from small global warming.
These three components must each be true for the AGW hypothesis to be true. If any one of them were shown to be false then the AGW hypothesis would be shown to be false.
But there are good reasons to dispute each of the three components of the AGW hypothesis.
Importantly there is no evidence that anthropogenic emissions are overwhelming the ability of nature to sequester CO2 from the atmosphere: the anthropogenic emissions may be doing that, but there is no evidence that they are doing it and there is evidence that they are not.
It is quite possible that all, some, or none of the observed recent rise in atmospheric CO2 concentration is natural behaviour of the carbon cycle.
These possibilities can each be modelled in accordance with available data in several different ways, and the models each match the empirical data without need for the 5-year smoothing of the data needed to get an agreement with the assumption that the anthropogenic emissions are overwhelming the ability of nature to sequester CO2 from the atmosphere.
(ref. Rorsch A, Courtney RS & Thoenes D, ‘The Interaction of Climate Change and the Carbon Dioxide Cycle’ E&E v16no2 (2005) )
This is the ‘dirty secret’ of the AGW hypothesis: nobody knows what – if any – effect emissions of CO2 from human activity have on atmospheric CO2 concentration.
It is the truth which cannot be stated if the AGW hypothesis is to be used as excuse for political actions, and that is why people such as Abbot falsely proclaim<blockquote the rise in CO2 since the pre-industrial era is undeniably caused by human society
Of course, it is of more immediate importance that – as you say in your words which I have quoted in this post – the AGW hypothesis fails unless and until it is shown there are positive feedbacks in the climate system which generate problematic global temperature rise from small global warming. But the lack of scientific evidence for effect of anthropogenic CO2 emissions on atmospheric CO2 concentration is pertinent to policy considerations.
Richard