Guest Post by Werner Brozek, Edited by Just The Facts:
The comment referred to in the title is the following by Kevin Trenberth regarding heat in the deep oceans:
“The centre of action is the Pacific Ocean but the main places where heat goes deep into the ocean are the Atlantic and Southern Oceans rather than the Pacific,”
The following equation demonstrates how the temperature change of an object relates to the number of joules applied to the object versus the mass and specific heat capacity of the object. The equation is H = mcdt where H is the energy in joules; m is the mass in kilograms; c is the specific heat capacity in joules/(kilogram x C); and dt is the change in temperature in C.
Assume we have a 4.0 kilogram shot put made of iron and a 4.0 gram marble made of the same iron, illustrated by the image above. Now let us assume we apply the same quantity of heat to each. In this case, H will be the same and c will also be the same. The same amount of heat that will raise the temperature of the 4.0 kilogram shot put by 1.0 C, while it will raise the temperature of the 4.0 gram marble by 1000 C.
What would happen in a closed system if just the shot put was raised by 1.0 C and it then touched the marble? Answer: The marble would go up in temperature by 1.0 C and the affect on the shot put would not be measurable.
What would happen in a closed system if just the marble was raised by 1000 C and it then touched the shot put, once equilibrium was reached? Answer: The shot put would go up in temperature by 1.0 C and the marble would go down by 999 C ignoring significant digits for now.
Now we will apply the above equation to Earth’s air. The total mean mass of the atmosphere is 5.1 x 10^18 kg. We will assume the specific heat capacity of air is 1000 J/(kg C). Now, we will calculate how much heat it would take to raise the temperature of the air by 1.0 C. H = mcdt = 5.1 x 10^18 kg x 1000 J/(kg C) x 1.0 C = 5.1 x 10^21 J.
Now we will apply the above equation to Earth’s oceans. The total mean mass of the oceans is 1.4 x 10^21 kg. We will assume the specific heat capacity of the oceans is 4000 J/(kg C). Now, we will calculate how much heat it would take to raise the temperature of the oceans by 1.0 C. H = mcdt = 1.4 x 10^21 kg x 4000 J/(kg C) x 1.0 C = 5.6 x 10^24 J.
Keeping the ratios simple, we see it takes about 1000 times as much energy to raise the temperature of the oceans by 1.0 C than to raise the temperature of the air by 1.0 C.
What would happen to Earth’s air temperature if we warmed Earth’s oceans 1.0 C? Answer: The air temperature could stay the same (See next paragraph.) or it could go up by 1.0 C at the most.
At the present time, the deep oceans are at about 3 C. Let us just for discussion sake assume it warmed by 0.1 C in 60 years. And let us further assume the average air temperature is 14 C. That would mean the deep oceans need to warm by about 10 C before they start affecting the air temperature. At the rate of 0.1 C in 60 years, it would take 6000 years for the oceans to warm by 10 C.
And what would happen if we were to raise the temperature of Earth’s atmosphere by 10.0 C? Answer: The oceans would act as a huge heat sink and would warm by 0.010 C once equilibrium was reached. Of course, this may takes decades or centuries. However the greater the difference in temperature, the faster the hotter object loses heat.
I am fully aware of the fact that I am making many assumptions here. For example, I am assuming the average human emissions of CO2 over the next 6000 years will the same as for the last 60 years. As a result, rising temperatures in the oceans could accelerate if it were not for the logarithmic affect of additional CO2. This also assumes that there will be enough fossil fuels to last that long.
But regardless of any other unstated assumptions you may find fault with which could push things in either direction, I believe it is clear that my grandchildren (two so far) and the grandchildren of James Hansen will not be negatively affected by heat going into the deep oceans:
“The title of the book, Storms of My Grandchildren, refers to the ferocious and stormy weather events that will occur next generation if fossil fuel use continues in the way it has.”
In the sections below, as in previous posts, we will present you with the latest facts. The information will be presented in three sections and an appendix. The first section will show for how long there has been no warming on some data sets. At the moment, only the satellite data have flat periods of longer than a year. The second section will show for how long there has been no statistically significant warming on several data sets. The third section will show how January of 2015 compares with 2014 and the warmest years and months on record so far. For three of the data sets, 2014 also happens to be the warmest year. The appendix will illustrate sections 1 and 2 in a different way. Graphs and a table will be used to illustrate the data.
Section 1
This analysis uses the latest month for which data is available on WoodForTrees.com (WFT). All of the data on WFT is also available at the specific sources as outlined below. We start with the present date and go to the furthest month in the past where the slope is a least slightly negative on at least one calculation. So if the slope from September is 4 x 10^-4 but it is – 4 x 10^-4 from October, we give the time from October so no one can accuse us of being less than honest if we say the slope is flat from a certain month.
1. For GISS, the slope is not flat for any period that is worth mentioning.
2. For Hadcrut4, the slope is not flat for any period that is worth mentioning. Note that WFT has not updated Hadcrut4 since July and it is only Hadcrut4.2 that is shown.
3. For Hadsst3, the slope is not flat for any period that is worth mentioning.
4. For UAH, the slope is flat since February 2009 or an even 6 years. (goes to January using version 5.6 and based on Walter Dnes’ calculation.)
5. For RSS, the slope is flat since December 1996 or 18 years, 2 months (goes to January).
The next graph shows just the lines to illustrate the above. Think of it as a sideways bar graph where the lengths of the lines indicate the relative times where the slope is 0. In addition, the upward sloping blue line at the top indicates that CO2 has steadily increased over this period.
When two things are plotted as I have done, the left only shows a temperature anomaly.
The actual numbers are meaningless since the two slopes are essentially zero. No numbers are given for CO2. Some have asked that the log of the concentration of CO2 be plotted. However WFT does not give this option. The upward sloping CO2 line only shows that while CO2 has been going up over the last 18 years, the temperatures have been flat for varying periods on the two sets.
Section 2
For this analysis, data was retrieved from Nick Stokes’ Trendviewer available on his website. This analysis indicates for how long there has not been statistically significant warming according to Nick’s criteria. Data go to their latest update for each set. In every case, note that the lower error bar is negative so a slope of 0 cannot be ruled out from the month indicated.
On several different data sets, there has been no statistically significant warming for between 14 and 22 years according to Nick’s criteria. Cl stands for the confidence limits at the 95% level.
Dr. Ross McKitrick has also commented on these parts and has slightly different numbers for the three data sets that he analyzed. I will also give his times.
The details for several sets are below.
For UAH: Since July 1996: CI from -0.019 to 2.225
(Dr. McKitrick says the warming is not significant for 16 years on UAH.)
For RSS: Since December 1992: CI from -0.000 to 1.753
(Dr. McKitrick says the warming is not significant for 26 years on RSS.)
For Hadcrut4.3: Since June 1997: CI from -0.015 to 1.132
(Dr. McKitrick said the warming was not significant for 19 years on Hadcrut4.2 going to April. Hadcrut4.3 would be slightly shorter however I do not know what difference it would make to the nearest year.)
For Hadsst3: Since April 1995: CI from -0.006 to 1.710
For GISS: Since August 2000: CI from -0.007 to 1.412
Note that all of the above times, regardless of the source, with the exception of GISS are larger than 15 years which NOAA deemed necessary to “create a discrepancy with the expected present-day warming rate”.
Section 3
This section shows data about January 2015 and other information in the form of a table. The table shows the five data sources along the top and other places so they should be visible at all times. The sources are UAH, RSS, Hadcrut4, Hadsst3, and GISS.
Down the column, are the following:
1. 14ra: This is the final ranking for 2014 on each data set.
2. 14a: Here I give the average anomaly for 2014.
3. year: This indicates the warmest year on record so far for that particular data set. Note that the satellite data sets have 1998 as the warmest year and the others have 2014 as the warmest year.
4. ano: This is the average of the monthly anomalies of the warmest year just above.
5. mon: This is the month where that particular data set showed the highest anomaly. The months are identified by the first three letters of the month and the last two numbers of the year.
6. ano: This is the anomaly of the month just above.
7. y/m: This is the longest period of time where the slope is not positive given in years/months. So 16/2 means that for 16 years and 2 months the slope is essentially 0. Periods of under a year are not counted and are shown as “0”.
8. sig: This the first month for which warming is not statistically significant according to Nick’s criteria. The first three letters of the month are followed by the last two numbers of the year.
9. sy/m: This is the years and months for row 8. Depending on when the update was last done, the months may be off by one month.
10. McK: These are Dr. Ross McKitrick’s number of years for three of the data sets.
11. Jan: This is the January 2015 anomaly for that particular data set.
12. rnk: This is the rank that each particular data set would have for 2015 without regards to error bars and assuming no changes. Think of it as an update 5 minutes into a game.
| Source | UAH | RSS | Had4 | Sst3 | GISS |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1.14ra | 3rd | 6th | 1st | 1st | 1st |
| 2.14a | 0.27 | 0.255 | 0.564 | 0.479 | 0.68 |
| 3.year | 1998 | 1998 | 2014 | 2014 | 2014 |
| 4.ano | 0.42 | 0.55 | 0.564 | 0.479 | 0.68 |
| 5.mon | Apr98 | Apr98 | Jan07 | Aug14 | Jan07 |
| 6.ano | 0.663 | 0.857 | 0.835 | 0.644 | 0.93 |
| 7.y/m | 6/0 | 18/2 | 0 | 0 | 0 |
| 8.sig | Jul96 | Dec92 | Jun97 | Apr95 | Aug00 |
| 9.sy/m | 18/7 | 22/2 | 17/7 | 19/10 | 14/6 |
| 10.McK | 16 | 26 | 19 | ||
| Source | UAH | RSS | Had4 | Sst3 | GISS |
| 11.Jan | 0.351 | 0.367 | 0.686 | 0.440 | 0.75 |
| 12.rnk | 3rd | 3rd | 1st | 2nd | 1st |
If you wish to verify all of the latest anomalies, go to the following:
For UAH, version 5.6 was used. Note that WFT uses version 5.5 however this version was last updated for December 2014 and it looks like it will no longer be given.
http://vortex.nsstc.uah.edu/public/msu/t2lt/tltglhmam_5.6.txt
For RSS, see: ftp://ftp.ssmi.com/msu/monthly_time_series/rss_monthly_msu_amsu_channel_tlt_anomalies_land_and_ocean_v03_3.txt
For Hadcrut4, see: http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/hadobs/hadcrut4/data/current/time_series/HadCRUT.4.3.0.0.monthly_ns_avg.txt
For Hadsst3, see: http://www.cru.uea.ac.uk/cru/data/temperature/HadSST3-gl.dat
For GISS, see:
http://data.giss.nasa.gov/gistemp/tabledata_v3/GLB.Ts+dSST.txt
To see all points since January 2014 in the form of a graph, see the WFT graph below. Note that Hadcrut4 is the old version that has been discontinued. WFT does not show Hadcrut4.3 yet. As well, only UAH version 5.5 is shown which stopped in December. WFT does not show version 5.6 yet.
As you can see, all lines have been offset so they all start at the same place in January 2014. This makes it easy to compare January 2014 with the latest anomaly.
Appendix
In this part, we are summarizing data for each set separately.
RSS
The slope is flat since December, 1996 or 18 years, 2 months. (goes to January)
For RSS: There is no statistically significant warming since December 1992: CI from -0.000 to 1.753.
The RSS anomaly for January 2015 is 0.367. This would rank it as 3rd place. 1998 was the warmest at 0.55. The highest ever monthly anomaly was in April of 1998 when it reached 0.857. The anomaly in 2014 was 0.255 and it was ranked 6th.
UAH
The slope is flat since February 2009 or an even 6 years according to Walter Dnes. (goes to January using version 5.6)
For UAH: There is no statistically significant warming since July 1996: CI from -0.019 to 2.225. (This is using version 5.6 according to Nick’s program.)
The UAH anomaly for January 2015 is 0.351. This would rank it as 3rd place. 1998 was the warmest at 0.42. The highest ever monthly anomaly was in April of 1998 when it reached 0.663. The anomaly in 2014 was 0.27 and it was ranked 3rd.
Hadcrut4.3
The slope is not flat for any period that is worth mentioning.
For Hadcrut4: There is no statistically significant warming since June 1997: CI from -0.015 to 1.132.
The Hadcrut4 anomaly for January 2015 was 0.686. This would set a new record if it stayed this way. The highest ever monthly anomaly was in January of 2007 when it reached 0.835. The anomaly in 2014 was 0.564 and this set a new record.
Hadsst3
For Hadsst3, the slope is not flat for any period that is worth mentioning. For Hadsst3: There is no statistically significant warming since April 1995: CI from -0.006 to 1.710.
The Hadsst3 anomaly for January 2015 was 0.440. This would rank 2nd if it stayed this way. The highest ever monthly anomaly was in August of 2014 when it reached 0.644. The anomaly in 2014 was 0.479 and this set a new record.
GISS
The slope is not flat for any period that is worth mentioning.
For GISS: There is no statistically significant warming since August 2000: CI from -0.007 to 1.412.
The GISS anomaly for January 2015 is 0.75. This would set a new record if it stayed this way. The highest ever monthly anomaly was in January of 2007 when it reached 0.93. The anomaly in 2014 was 0.68 and it set a new record.
Conclusion
For all intents and purposes, the deep ocean is an infinite heat sink. And if some of our presumed AGW ends up there, that is good news. Or am I missing something?
About the Author: Werner Brozek was working on his metallurgical engineering degree using a slide rule when the first men landed on the moon. Now he enjoys playing with new toys such as the WFT graphs. Werner retired in 2011 after teaching high school physics and chemistry for 39 years.
Werner
“That would mean the deep oceans need to warm by about 10 C before they start affecting the air temperature.”
The 3 C is average ocean temperature. Heat transfer between ocean and air occurs at sea surface where temperature can range from zero to 30 C seasonally and geographically.
“And what would happen if we were to raise the temperature of Earth’s atmosphere by 10.0 C?”
It’s not physically possible to heat the atmosphere by 10 C without heating the ocean simultaneously. Water absorbs longwave and shortwave IR and light. The atmosphere is largely transparent to light and shortwave IR. The ocean will warm first then transfer the heat to the atmosphere.
Werner Brozek
Its so simple!
Thanks for so clearly summarizing basic thermal physics that I also learned in high school.
Beware the chick crying “The SKY is falling” after a leaf fell on her head!
C.S. Lewis, The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe
I have not seen much discussion of the fact that the extra solar heat from strong solar cycles was also buried in the ocean from approx 1945 to 1975 since the atmosphere failed to warm at that time also. In spite of Co2 rising rapidly after the post WW2 industrial buildup the cool ocean cycles overcame both solar and Co2 warming effects. As it will when the AMO cool cycle kicks in around 2020 along with the present cool PDO cycle . (currently in a temporary warm spike). When the PDO switched to warm cycle around the late 70’s it released the stored solar energy on top of 30 more years of strong solar cycles. Also cleaner skies from the introduction of the catalytic converter on cars in 1975 and the 80% collapse of the Soviet union industrial sector let the sun in too. Co2 being a minor factor compared to the aerosol pollution reduction. Now we see the buildup of sulfur dioxide again form Asia that could tip the balance to cool even more combined with possible increased volcanic activity. Perhaps Co2 will be considered a blessing someday if the planet cools since food production will suffer. Better models are needed that are not programmed by politicians. So if reducing pollution creates global warming you could say that it was partially man made warming along with a slight Co2 contribution of .2 Watts per sq meter per decade. You can see the extra warming on NASA temp maps around heavily polluted areas like Los Angeles that have since cleaned up a lot thanks to the catalytic converter. The best climate model is Mother nature which has been showing us for many years what affects the climate if people could only see through the politics. Even Prime minister Cameron has been taken in. One of my best friends who I have finally convinced to be a climate skeptic was just invited to have tea with him today so I am anxious to hear how that went.
Apparently my friend wrote to Cameron about widening the TV debates from one to 3 and was invited to meet with him about it. I have advised him as a new skeptic not to bring up climate change on the air ( he is a part time TV commentator) as he has not put in the thousands of hours that some like myself have. It took years of information to turn him around from being a global warming believer. It is such a hot button issue that one asks for instant abuse and better be prepared. It is a shame that such an important issue is so politicized. The world economy could be affected by the future climate and the funds spent on it that could be in the wrong direction. I hear Europe spends 20% of their trillion Euro budget on it which is hard to believe but might explain some of the struggles there. For every green job some countries lost 4 others. Spain”s unemployment is massive after a huge green expansion. And our government wants to go down the same road. Perhaps we should be building ice breakers and snow plows if Asia keeps up the pollution and sunspots remain low. Not to mention the coming cool ocean cycles of course.
Europe is now patching the economic problem with money printing that failed to reach main street here and mostly benefited the upper echelons. Nobody seems to learn from history. Apparently the Fed here could have sent every family a check for $50,000 to every family instead of printing trillions of dollars. Not that I would advocate that much stimulus. A much smaller amount might have done the trick to boost the economy but I am on to economics now, another favorite subject.
I don’t think Cameron would ever dare to debate Lord Monckton and who knows if Cameron really believes in the Co2 scare. So many politicians are pandering to the warming believers to retain their vote and sometimes have no choice if they want to win elections. Until people are directly affected by the carbon tax like in Australia they will not wake up. Even people like Mitt Romney and Gov Christie have apparently caved in to the pressure. Meanwhile 40,000 people died in the cold weather this year in England and many more in Europe perhaps because they cannot afford the expensive energy costs on a limited pension. It is a choice of food or heat. Bjorn Lomberg has said that 15 million people have died in Europe this way in the last 12 years or so but this is hard to believe?
There is some blatant misuse of statistics here. If the 95% confidence levels over a certain period are e.g. -0.000 to 1.753, this does not mean it is 95% certain that no warming has occurred during that period. If anything, these numbers show that it is very likely that warming has occurred. So basically this post is refuting the argument that there has been ‘no warming for 18 years’. The numbers here show there has been!
I just picked those numbers as one example. Could have picked any.
Note that the article is relatively old (2008) and as for the quote, they say exactly the same. Zero trends are ruled out at 95% confidence level. I.e. the NO WARMING claim is not supported.
Werner, you are correct again.
You’ve identified the reason that the temperature record is divided into tenths and hundredths of a degree, instead of showing a larger, more reasonable x-axis.
The error bars in those charts normally exceed a few hundredths of a degree — and tenths of a degree, for that matter. Aside from the problem of “adjusting” past temperatures [almost always showing scarier warming], there is the problem of trying to convince the public that a tiny, natural fluctuation represents man-made global warming.
That is plainly dishonest. “No statistically-significant global warming” means exactly what it says: There has been NO global warming. Period.
Next, satellites provide the most accurate temperature record we have, because they effectively take a snapshot of the entire globe [almost all of it, anyway], while other temp records are limited to land only, and similar problems.
If there was unambiguous global warming, scientific skeptics [the only honest kind of scientists] would alter their views to take new facts into account. That is the difference between skeptics, and climate alarmists: the alarmists try to make reality bend to their models, instead of vice-versa.
Pretty soon it will be twenty years with no global warming. What excuses will the alarmist crowd fabricate to explain that? If they were as honest as skeptics, they would simply admit that their original premise was wrong, and try to understand why. But scientific veracity is not in them as a group. Too much easy money has corrupted too many of them, I think.
Gavin Schmidt has said that we will have another 5 to 10 years without warming but then the .extra .2 watts per sq meter co2 effect will kick in and overcome the natural cooling factors to resume the warming. I am not sure how he figures this will happen because both ocean cycles will be in cool mode by then and continue for quite some time. Sunspots are low for now of course and who can predict volcanic activity at that time or what Asia will do about cooling sulfate aerosol emissions. It is hard to make short term predictions of ten years let alone 50 yrs. How can anybody predict that far out?
Aside from Aran’s assertions, I want to poinbt out that the 1/10th and 1/100th of a degree division are not credible. They are used only because some of them can show a slight warming trend [although the most accurate — satellite data — shows global cooling].
The alarmist crowd just loves those tiny divisions. But they are meaningless. If global warming was happening like the alarmist crowd wants people to believe, then it would be very clear in the temperature record. As we know, it isn’t clear at all. That’s because there is no global warming.
Aran doesn’t have what it takes to be a scientific skeptic. He has preconceived, cherry-picked notions, and therefore he searches for factiods to support his belief — instead of being skeptical like any honest scientist.
The fact is that global temperatures have been amazingly flat for the past century and a half. Only in the addled minds of climate alarmists is there a problem.
There is no problem. Humanity and the biosphere is very fortunate to be living through a true “Goldilocks” climate. The alarmist contingent only sees the glass as half empty, never half full, based on their religious beliefs. But based on reality, there is no problem at all:
http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-lPGChYUUeuc/VLhzJqwRhtI/AAAAAAAAAS4/ehDtihKNKIw/s1600/GISTemp%2BKelvin%2B01.png
Aran says:
You can make any change disappear by blowing up the y axis far enough.
Likewise, you can make any tiny, insignificant, and statistically meaningless fluctuations appear to mean something, when they don’t. As I wrote above:
…the 1/10th and 1/100th of a degree divisions are not credible. They are used only because some of them can show a slight warming trend [although the most accurate — satellite data — shows global cooling.
Despite decades of predictions by the alarmist crowd confidently stating that global warming would continue, and likely accelerate, it turns out that they were wrong. All of them. Even the IPCC admits that now [although they call it a “pause”].
When one side in a debate is 100.0% WRONG in every one of their scary predictions, honest scientists will admit that something was wrong with their basic premise. They will step back, and try to understand how and why they got it so wrong.
But the alarmist crowd doesn’t do that. Instead, they carefully select whatever factoids they can find that support their belief system — without ever admitting what everyone here knows, whether they will admit it or not: the man-made global warming conjecture was flat wrong.
So, why will you not admit that? More to the point: what would it take for you to admit that you were wrong from the get-go? It’s been eighteen years [or fifteen years, or ten years, depending on the database used] with NO global warming. Even über-Warmist Dr. Phil Jones admits that. In other words, it has been many, many years without the predicted global warming, even as CO2 levels have steadily increased.
What would it take for you to admit you were wrong? Twenty years without global warming? Arctic ice rising to previous levels? Or maybe a new great stadial, where glaciers cover Chicago a mile deep again? Really, what would it take? Pick a point. Because most everyone already knows you’re on the wrong track now. Constantly moving the goal posts back doesn’t help your credibility. Your conjecture was wrong, that’s all there is to it. You should be trying to figure out why, instead of always backing and filling.
Something was seriously wrong with your original premise. It is the job of skeptics to refute conjectures if possible, and the skeptic crowd has done that extremely well. There is nothing left of the original MMGW conjecture. In the event, it was flat wrong. You should be very happy about that — unless you are one of those feeding at the taxpayer trough. Then it would make sense to claim that global warming is chugging along as always.
It’s not. Global warming has stopped, despite incessant predictions to the contrary. Why won’t you admit it?
Global temperatures.
One reason the climate debate is so acrimonious is that our government chooses to use the low tech thermometer database (red) that has many alterations. Unlike the high tech satellite data base (green) showing .2 deg C above normal. (1/5 deg C) With such a wide divergence in data how can anyone come to agreement? And yet NCEP which is part of our government weather service seems to disagree with GISS on their graphs too? It is hard for me to see 2014 as the warmest year which was mostly a warm spike in Pacific ocean temps. Why are they combining the ocean temps with land temps since the ocean Enso is so variable?
http://models.weatherbell.com/climate/cfsr_t2m_2005.png
I notice that this graph says it is NCEP government data but it is from Weatherbell which is associated with Joe Bastardi, a well known skeptic. Is this graph accepted by both sides of the debate since it shows the last 5 year average anomaly as .067 deg C, barely above zero? http://models.weatherbell.com/climate/cfsr_t2m_2005.png
It appears that NCEP models predict global cooling in the yellow graph on page 2202 of this paper. I could not post the image of the graph for some reason. I am not a conspiracy buff but it seems strange that NOAA does not want to show their data in a global graph even though they are part of NOAA. http://www.cpc.noaa.gov/products/people/wd51hd/vddoolpubs/2014_2185-2208_JClimate27_CFSv2.pdf