I looked at a number of Finnish weather stations in the GISTEMP database, and many of them suffer from step changes like the one below and/or data gaps, so I don’t put much stock in the claim as being anything more than an observational artifact that they have not dealt with effectively.
See also my peer reviewed paper on the claim of extra heat related deaths due to “global warming” in nearby Stockholm:
A good example of a step change artifact in the temperature record is in Tromo:
One wonders if the authors simply used all the weather stations in Finland without regard to their data quality. I don’t have time today to evaluate it all but perhaps readers will have a go, since the PDF is available as open source, which is a credit to the authors.
PRESS RELEASE: According to a recent University of Eastern Finland and Finnish Meteorological Institute study, the rise in the temperature has been especially fast over the past 40 years, with the temperature rising by more than 0.2 degrees per decade. “The biggest temperature rise has coincided with November, December and January. Temperatures have also risen faster than the annual average in the spring months, i.e., March, April and May. In the summer months, however, the temperature rise has not been as significant,” says Professor Ari Laaksonen of the University of Eastern Finland and the Finnish Meteorological Institute. As a result of the temperature rising, lakes in Finland get their ice cover later than before, and the ice cover also melts away earlier in the spring. Although the temperature rise in the actual growth season has been moderate, observations of Finnish trees beginning to blossom earlier than before have been made.
Temperature has risen in leaps
The annual average temperature has risen in two phases, the first being from the beginning of the observation period to the late 1930s, and the second from the late 1960s to present. Since the 1960s, the temperature has risen faster than ever before, with the rise varying between 0.2 and 0.4 degrees per decade. Between the late 1930s and late 1960s, the temperature remained nearly steady. “The stop in the temperature rise can be explained by several factors, including long-term changes in solar activity and post-World War II growth of human-derived aerosols in the atmosphere. When looking at recent years’ observations from Finland, it seems that the temperature rising is not slowing down,” University of Eastern Finland researcher Santtu Mikkonen explains.
The temperature time series was created by averaging the data produced by all Finnish weather stations across the country. Furthermore, as the Finnish weather station network wasn’t comprehensive nation-wide in the early years, data obtained from measurement stations in Finland’s neighbouring countries was also used.
Finland is located between the Atlantic Ocean and the continental Eurasia, which causes great variability in the country’s weather. In the time series of the average temperature, this is visible in the form of strong noise, which makes it very challenging to detect statistically significant trends. The temperature time series for Finland was analysed by using a dynamic regression model. The method allows the division of the time series into sections indicating mean changes, i.e. trends, periodic variation, observation inter-dependence and noise. The method makes it possible to take into consideration the seasonal changes typical of Nordic conditions, as well as significant annual variation.
###
S. Mikkonen, M. Laine, H. M. Mäkelä, H. Gregow, H. Tuomenvirta, M. Lahtinen, A. Laaksonen Trends in the average temperature in Finland, 1847’2013
Stochastic Environmental Research and Risk Assessment, Online First, 17 Dec 2014
DOI: 10.1007/s00477-014-0992-2 http://dx.doi.org/10.1007/s00477-014-0992-2
Full PDF: http://download.springer.com/static/pdf/96/art%253A10.1007%252Fs00477-014-0992-2.pdf?auth66=1419294105_93e936f512a2c987460f69cc3712d3ad&ext=.pdf
Discover more from Watts Up With That?
Subscribe to get the latest posts sent to your email.
Perhaps with 2C warmer temps, the employees of Lapua and Vihtavuori won’t have such creaky bones and can therefore move a bit faster, thus increasing their production and exports to the US, where such excellent items seem to be in perpetual short supply.
Those graphs use one year increments and are worthless. Use monthly increments and do not put any dots into the graph. You need this to be able to see the ENSO pattern. That is necessary to spot any discontinuites that you think you see.
19th century was quite cold in Finland. There was the May of 1867 that was abnormally cold (once in 500 years event) that contributed to the last famine in the country. 8% of the population died fo starvation and diseases. Here is a study of that year:
http://www.geophysica.fi/pdf/geophysica_2000_36_1-2_069_jantunen.pdf
Weather Conditions in Northern Europe in the Exceptionally Cold
Spring Season of the Famine Year 1867