Here are some highlights of these two new papers published in Physics Letters A by :
- Central Pacific region temperature dataset SST3.4 from 1990 to 2014 is studied.
- SST3.4 contains a sustained signal at 1.0 cycle/yr implying solar forcing.
- SST3.4 also contains a signal (<1 cycle/yr) showing El Niño/La Niña effects.
- This signal contains segments of period 2 or 3 years, phase locked to the annual.
- A 12-month moving average improves on a “climatology” filter in removing annual effects.
- Global ocean temperatures at depths 0–700 m and 0–2000 m from 1990 to 2014 are studied.
- The same phase-locked phenomena reported in Paper I are observed.
- El Niño/La Niña effects diffuse to the global oceans with a two month delay.
- Ocean heat content trends during phase-locked time segments are consistent with zero.
The papers, the link downloads the full PDF:
Paper 1 Abstract
Equatorial Pacific Ocean temperature time series data contain segments showing both a phase-locked annual signal and a phase-locked signal of period two years or three years, both locked to the annual solar cycle. Three such segments are observed between 1990 and 2014. It is asserted that these are caused by a solar forcing at a frequency of 1.0 cycle/yr. These periodic features are also found in global climate data (following paper). The analysis makes use of a twelve-month filter that cleanly separates seasonal effects from data. This is found to be significant for understanding the El Niño/La Niña phenomenon.
The Sun is the climate pacemaker I. Equatorial Pacific Ocean temperatures Physics Letters A; ©2014 Elsevier B.V.; doi:10.1016/j.physleta.2014.10.057
Conclusions and summary
Phase-locked sequences are found in Pacific Ocean SST3.4tem-perature data during the periods 1991–1999, 2002–2008 and in 2009–2013. These three sequences apparently being separated by climate shifts. It is asserted that the associated climate system is driven by a forcing of solar origin that has two manifestations: (1)A direct phase-locked response to what is identified as a solar forcing at a frequency of 1.0 cycle/yrfor the whole time series; (2)A phase-locked response at either the second or third sub-harmonic of the putative solar forcing between 1991 and 1999; 2001–02 and 2008; and again between 2008 and 2013.
This study confirms the results of [1]that some of the largest maxima/minima in the oscillations of the phase-locked state corre-spond to well-known El Niños/La Niñas. For example, the sequence 1996 La Niña – 1997/98 El Niño – 1999 La Niña corresponds to a minimum–maximum–minimum portion of phase-locked segment #9. The climate system is presently (June 2014) in a phase-locked state of periodicity 3 years. This state, which began in 2008, con-tains a maximum (El Niño) at about 2010 followed by a minimum (La Niña) followed by a maximum (weak El Niño at about 2013). If the climate system remains in this phase-locked state, the next maximum will not occur until about 2016 – i.e., no El Niño before that date. On the other hand, if a maximum occurs before then, it will signal the end of the phase-locked segment (and therefore a climate shift).
On its web site [15]the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Ad-ministration asks: “How often does La Niña occur?” Answer: “El Niño and La Niña occur on average every 3 to 5 years. However, the histori-cal record the interval between events has varied from 2 to 7 years. …” Our findings show that duringphase-locked time segments the period is either 2 or 3 years. If a longer interval is observed, this is notrepresentative of a variable ‘period,’ but indicates the occur-rence of a climate shift between phase-locked segments.
It is pointed out that the 12-month moving average filter is demonstrably superior to the climatology method of removing sea-sonal effects in data. This is seen to be the case for interpretation of El Niño/La Niña data, which contains spurious annual effects when treated under the climatology scheme.
An extension of these results to global data will be presented in a second Letter [16]. It will be shown that patterns of sub-harmonics identical to those described here occur throughout the oceans.
Paper 2 Abstract
In part I, equatorial Pacific Ocean temperature index SST3.4 was found to have segments during 1990–2014 showing a phase-locked annual signal and phase-locked signals of 2- or 3-year periods. Phase locking is to an inferred solar forcing of 1.0 cycle/yr. Here the study extends to the global ocean, from surface to 700 and 2000 m. The same phase-locking phenomena are found. The El Niño/La Niña effect diffuses into the world oceans with a delay of about two months.
The Sun is the climate pacemaker II. Global ocean temperatures Physics Letters A; ©2014 Elsevier B.V.; doi:10.1016/j.physleta.2014.10.058
Conclusions and summary
Global ocean temperature time series from the surface to depths of 2000m since the year 2000 are found to agree in detail with those of other diverse climate indices. It is asserted that these systems are driven by a forcing unquestionably of solar origin that has two manifestations: (1) a direct phase-locked response to what is identified as a solar forcing at a frequency of 1.0cycle/yrfor the whole time series; (2) a second phase-locked response at a period of two years or three years.
With these findings it is becoming clear that the entire cli-mate system is responding to the varying incident solar radiation, and is subject to interactions, most likely nonlinear, thatproduce the subharmonics of two or three year period, and is moreover evolving non-continuously, as evidenced by breaks in the pattern whose timing can be identified with known climate shifts. The most prominent manifestations of the pattern are found in the El Niño/La Niña phenomena. As emphasized in [2], the “natural” pe-riodicity of El Niño/La Niña is two or three years, and observations of longer intervals should be considered probable evidence for an intervening climate shift.
Yes solar activity is always influencing the climate but at times of no solar extremes (solar flux 90-150 range) the solar contribution is going to be lost to noise in the climate system.
Also the mean state of the climate/earth dynamics at the times of solar forcing are going to cause given solar conditions to result in different climate outcomes. This statement applying to all items that may exert a force on the climate.
In summary I think climate sensitivity to various forcings is EXPONENTIALLY dependent upon the mean state of the climate/earth dynamics at the time the forcing is taken place which is why correlations are hard to come by and so many different climate outcomes (although a similar trend in a general sense) is always the result.
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This is why knocking yourself out to try to prove a climate connection beyond a reasonable doubt will always wind up questionable which as we know is exactly the case, hence the debate keeps going on and on back and forth with no conclusive 100% proof.
Willis won’t be able to stay a way from this one! Do they not give a physical reason? It would have to be related to something like the slight elliptical orbit (Willis could find no evidence of this in the Ceres data), or the fireworks and wild dancing of New Years celebrations if you want something anthropogenic, or Earth Day turning out the lights. I believe future statistics texts will have a cautionary chapter on wiggly lines. If this only began to happen in the last 30 years or so, I would mark this one down as one of the millions of temporary coincidences that people keep climatologist’s hearts beating too fast. This is why there is so much emphasis on CAUSE.
Length of day? Seriously? Do I have that right?
This appears to be another curve fitting exercise, with appropriately adjusted delays/lags, etc. I have always considered that at some stage we will be able to ‘see’ a primary solar connection/driver/link with the primary climate variations, but I have equally considered that sufficient data needs to be collected to be able to reach a reasonable conclusion of and such the link(s) – which we simply do not have. Hence, this requires more time and data – something the alarmists can obviously enjoy in the meantime!
About the only comfort we can take is that the CO2 ‘story’ (I refuse to call it even a hypothesis anymore) is gradually becoming less and less believable. I dunno, maybe another 10 years of frenzied feeding at the CO2 trough before someone finally says ‘Enough!’………..?
Well, in paper #2 there is reference to the fact that they found 10 such phase shifts from 1870-2008.
It is acknowledged that they were just going to examine the 1990-2013 period in both paper’s “Data and Methods”, but why they chose to drill in on just that period isn’t completely clear. I can speculate it’s just to demonstrate the phenomena.
Below is what someone said then I commented. I do not think the point I am trying to make is connecting. I will give it one more try with this post. I do think this is the heart of the problem, and I think the past 20000 years of climatic outcomes shows this to be the case.
gallopingcamel says:
“However, it bothers me that nobody has been able to use Milankovitch theory to predict when the next glaciation will commence.”
Of course because as I have said which no one seems to want to accept is as follows:
THE PROBLEM
Climate SENSITIVITY to various forcings is EXPONENTIALLY dependent on the mean state of the climate and earth dynamics ( state of the earth) which results in so many different climate outcomes and correlations not holding up over periods of time.
This is so true when it comes to Milankovitch Cycles which all break down over time in that at one time obliquity is thought to be the main regulator in glacial/inter-glacial cycles then it switches to precession around 1.4 million years and then oh no wait then it seems to correlate to eccentricity of the earth’s orbit for the last 800000 years.
Just a perfect example of my point which nothing so far is holding up even though the correlations are there because the mean state of the climate /earth dynamic is changing the climate SENSITIVITY to these forcing agents.
So everyone can keep knocking themselves out to prove beyond a doubt what makes the climate tick but all the correlations will break down to one degree or another overtime for the reason above..
Just take the last 20000 years of climate history so many UNKNOWN ABRUPT changes while the basic items which we think force the climate are present through out the time span, but look at the outcomes completely different.
I think it brings home what I am trying to convey
I agree. Another Small Ice Age does not have to be similar to the previous one.
Surprised that I did not find other comments that note the obvious fact that Willis pointed out; namely that there is an annual cycle of solar insolation of about 22 W/m^2 peak to trough due to the elliptical earth orbit. We are nearer the sun in early January each year. To my chagrin, I posted an article in which I had failed to realize that the corresponding temperature cycle was removed month by month, locale by locale, from anomaly records, but I did correctly calculate the mean 0.45C swing that it should produce on ocean surface temperatures. It will show up in direct unadjusted temperature records, and should be about double the mean in the equatorial zone.
If you think like a warmist there is only one possible conclusion. The CO2 is more powerful than we initially thought. It is causing variable output from the sun!!
fro the conclusioin:
“With these findings it is becoming clear that the entire cli-mate system is responding to the varying incident solar radiation,”
So they are addressing insolation not so much solar variation at the source. Is that correct?
That is correct.
I made the projection (below) in response to Bob “Carnac” Tisdale’s call for WUWT-reader’s ENSO predictions in his post:
http://wattsupwiththat.com/2015/01/06/final-the-201415-el-nino-part-22-january-2015-update-you-make-the-forecasts-for-the-201516-season/
http://i62.tinypic.com/2rn9ezt.png
When I examined the ENSO record, it seemed clear there are sets of El Nino-La Nina occurring in waves of various periods. The difficulty being that other factors conspire to blunt an El Nino or La Nina from always meeting the 5 consecutive 3 month ONI +/- 0.5º C criteria. In these two papers presented, these “other factors” are suggested by the authors to be “climate shifts.” As they suggested, and I agree, these are non-linear responses in a chaotic system, i.e. the climate system moves to a new “attractor.”
From my analysis, the stochastic record indicates a good chance for an El Nino starting in the second half of 2016. But after that, a new set starts. But with the current diminishing solar magnetic activity, all bets are off as to whether the climate system can stay phase-locked to such a weak solar magnetic signal. What I think is more likely is that the Earth’s climate will drift along for a decade or more, until solar magnetic activity picks up to again reassert phase-locking.
“Further more it has been shown that the Earth’s rate of rotation contains strong (~25% of its magnitude), 22 year cycle coincidental with the solar magnetic cycle.” –Vuk
¿Vuk-san, did you mean to say: Furthermore, it has been shown that variation in the Earth’s rate of rotation contains [a] strong (~25% of the variation magnitude), 22-year cycle coincidental with the solar magnetic cycle.
Right now solar activity is on the rise due to an increase in the solar wind probably related to coronal holes. Coronal holes complicate the already complicated solar dynamic climate relationship even further.
CORRECTION – it should read solar magnetic activity not solar activity . (ap index)
With the impending usefulness of CO2 for advancing the agenda the race is on to advance the next great threat. My money is on the theory that manages to suggest the greatest anthropogenic component.
Presently, the threat of a Carrington class event on our unshielded power grids would be more worthy of alarmism, or preemptive action, IMHO. If they’d switch the “Save the World” train to this track, it might even stimulate the economy.
Potentially, it is arguable that a Carrington event during a Maunder minimum could easily snowball into a near-extinction event for humanity. Certainly a repeat of The Dark Ages.
Ya exactly, there is simple and economy stimulating mitigating measure. Order 300 of those super large transformers that take 2 years to build, and stage them around the country where they may be needed, or put them into use as a type of capacitor to help absorb and release renewable energy gluts and sinks.
Question for Lief and the solar experts on this blog, can one interpret that coronal holes emitting solar winds, regulate the relatively constant background level of inbound cosmic particles, while CMEs produce pulses of magnetic plasma that intensify the shielding effect? (I assume this is demonstrated by the Forebush effect that follows a CME.)
Also, are there variations of incoming particle density as our heliosphere traverses the galaxy?
Should have checked myself, that was ‘Forbush Decrease’
Can’t spell Leif right, either. (i before e except after c dyslexia)
Yes CMEs produce additional shielding. Coronal Holes to not directly, but do indirectly by issuing fast solar wind that will collide with ambient wind and create interaction regions which do provide more shielding. And no, our travel through the Galaxy is too slow to expose us to varying cosmic rays.
Leif With the sun traveling at about 500’000 mph would there be a change in flow rate for when we are out in front of the sun to when we pass through it’s tail?
The cosmic ray intensity in the Galaxy is extremely uniform: http://imagine.gsfc.nasa.gov/science/objects/cosmic_rays1.html
meaning that cosmic rays come with equal intensity in all directions so it matters not how fast the Sun is moving [and I think it is 50,000 mph not 500,000 mph]. The tail of the heliosphere is attached to the Sun and moves with it so we don;t pass through that one either. If we enter a very think interstellar cloud that will have an effect, but the nearest cloud is so far away that we won’t encounter it for thousands of years.
Leif Here’s some useful facts http://www.iop.org/activity/outreach/resources/pips/topics/earth/facts/page_43079.html
“solar forcing at a frequency of 1.0 cycle/yr. ”
Is the 1 cycle per year tied to each orbit and obliquity?
or is it tied to the polar field cycles ~12 months within the 21-22 yr cycle that ran from 1992-2013?
See below.
http://wso.stanford.edu/gifs/south.gif
note: the big El Nino’s of 1982-83 and 1997-98 were both about 5 years into the ascending node of the Southern Polar field cycle.
With out question ! . The variation in equilibrium temperature for a ball in our orbit from perihelion to aphelion is about 4.3K .
That is not optional . It is the most basic physics , and it is time this field gets back to starting with the basics .
This annual variation in insolation MUST be accounted for in any model of planetary temperature .
“SST3.4 contains a sustained signal at 1.0 cycle/yr implying solar forcing… This signal contains segments of period 2 or 3 years, phase locked to the annual…”
Would that be, like, something to do with SEASONS?
Like, summer and winter? [weeps into beer].
Solar activity is NOT a ‘climate pacemaker’ solar activity is a fact.
Not entirely new – here is Tziperman, Cane and Zebiak 1995 with a similar take:
https://courses.seas.harvard.edu/climate/eli/reprints/Tziperman-Cane-Zebiak-1995.pdf
Talking about ENSO – insiders in Peru’s anchovy fishery hit by the weak almost-el Nino suggest a rebound of the fishery this year, indicating (a) renewed Peruvian upwelling and (b) likely a La Nina for 2015:
http://www.sharejunction.com/sharejunction/listMessage.htm?topicId=10237&msgbdName=China%20Fishery&topicTitle=China%20Fishery%20-%20Low%20PE
Your average Peruvian anchovy knows more about ENSO than most salaried climatologists.
I look forward to Bob Tisdale commenting on this. Particularly with reference to the following sentence “The El Niño/La Niña effect diffuses into the world oceans with a delay of about two months.” from the “Abstract paper 2”.
I think Bob has clearly demonstrated the diffusion into the global oceans following an El Nino.
Wait, I am confused. The science is settled, how are they still publishing conflicting work? This isn’t how neo science is supposed to work!!
A slightly belated Happy Perihelion !
I come at the question of how to explain the 0.3% variation in our planet’s estimated mean temperature associated with a 30 to 40% rise CO2 concentration as an APL programmer and implementer for whom claiming to understand quantitative relationships implies being able to express them in computable expressions .
So , picking up where my half century old PSSC highschool physics left off , the first relationship to implement is the temperature of a ball as a function of its distance from the sun . Here’s the relevant slide from my Heartland presentation last summer , The Basic Basics :
I mentioned that Tom Wysmuller had just presented ( in a slide on sea level thermal expansion ) the first evidence I had seen of that non-optional 1.7% variation in orbital equilibrium temperature .
I more recently commented on a post by Tom Harris :
It is to see this effect ( I still don’t know what the quantitative definition of a forcing is ) , several times larger than century+ secular trend , much less the decade scale variations , being examined . Given how precisely we know the driving quantities , it should be very useful in splitting out such effects as north-south hemispheric differences in absorption=emission spectra .
( I tried using the editor on another WordPress site to be sure this posted correctly . Where the hell are instructions as to what markup works on this cite ? )
There should be an image in the post above : http://cosy.com/Science/AGWpptSBplanetTemps815x613.jpg
Don’t use the image tag – just post the naked url for the image without the A tag. WordPress will convert it to an image tag…voila:
http://cosy.com/Science/AGWpptSBplanetTemps815x613.jpg
For a complete list of tags & special characters that work, or to test your markup, click the word “test” on the bar under the WUWT banner.
Wow , thanks !
Much Grass !
To measure the temp of a planetary sphere , don’t you measure the temp at its centre not the surface. ?