UK MET: Global warming pause may continue

certaintychannel_IPCC_reality

Guest essay by Eric Worrall

h/t The Register – the UK MET Office has published a report which suggests the pause in global temperatures might continue for many years to come. Or the pause might not continue. They’re not really sure.

According to The UK MET (talking about the Atlantic Multidecadal Oscillation);

Despite these signals it is not certain that there will be a shift towards cooler Atlantic conditions over the next few years. Temporary cooling has occurred in the past without leading to a sustained AMO shift. However, the current trends suggest that the chances of a shift in the next few years have increased.

The current warm phase is now 20 years long and historical precedent suggests a return to relatively cool conditions could occur within a few years (Knight et al., 2005). However, the short observational record precludes a confident prediction based on observations alone.

Observational (Folland et al. 2013) and model (Knight et al. 2005) estimates further suggest AMO shifts have an effect on global mean near-surface temperatures of about 0.1 ̊C. A rapid AMO decline could therefore maintain the current slowdown in global warming longer than would otherwise be the case.

Read more: http://www.metoffice.gov.uk/media/pdf/8/c/Changes_In_The_Climate_System.pdf

Lets not forget, what we are dealing with is settled science.

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September 15, 2015 7:26 am

UK Met office is about OK 3-4 days ahead, 3-4 weeks 50-50, 3-4 months usually 75% wrong, 3-4 years just forget it.

me
Reply to  vukcevic
September 15, 2015 7:30 am

Where I live 3-4 hours is OK, but then it’s usually just easier to look out of the window.

Reply to  me
September 15, 2015 8:12 am

Predicting “the weather today will be about like yesterday” is good about 75 percent of the time.

Stephen Richards
Reply to  me
September 15, 2015 8:33 am

Last 2 days they have been struggling at 6 hours. I keep saying it, but they can only forecast well when the weather is in what they euphamistically call a predictable mode.

Jimbo
Reply to  me
September 15, 2015 9:15 am

The Met Office are about as useful as used toilet paper.
It’s good to see their previous confidence about continued global warming being shattered. Now they just hedge their bets.

Abstract – 10 August 2007
Doug M. Smith et al
Improved Surface Temperature Prediction for the Coming Decade from a Global Climate Model
Previous climate model projections of climate change accounted for external forcing from natural and anthropogenic sources but did not attempt to predict internally generated natural variability. We present a new modeling system that predicts both internal variability and externally forced changes and hence forecasts surface temperature with substantially improved skill throughout a decade, both globally and in many regions. Our system predicts that internal variability will partially offset the anthropogenic global warming signal for the next few years. However, climate will continue to warm, with at least half of the years after 2009 predicted to exceed the warmest year currently on record.
Author Affiliations
Met office Hadley Centre, FitzRoy Road, Exeter, Ex1 3PB, UK.
http://www.sciencemag.org/content/317/5839/796

BBC – 27 January 2014
Paul Hudson
Met Office global forecasts too warm in 13 of last 14 years
…It means that so far this century, of 14 yearly headline predictions made by the Met Office Hadley centre, 13 have been too warm.
It’s worth stressing that all the incorrect predictions are within the stated margin of error, but having said that, they have all been on the warm side and none have been too cold….
http://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/paulhudson/posts/Met-Office-global-forecasts-too-warm-in-13-of-last-14-years

Their models fail because they attribute greater powers to co2 than exists. FAIL

BCBill
Reply to  me
September 15, 2015 1:08 pm

Martin. I had a student who actually tested the weather tomorrow is more likely to be the same as the weather today hypothesis. He kept track of weather for several months through the fall. It is somewhat problematic how to define “the same”, but he had about 70% the same which I believe was better than the weather forecast for the changeable fall period.
Can’t imagine why anybody pays any attention to climate predictions from the MET. Must be the same reason that news media always interview economists. Any filler is good filler.

old construction worker
Reply to  me
September 16, 2015 1:50 am

Ok, call me confused. “It’s worth stressing that all the incorrect predictions are within the stated margin of error, but having said that, they have all been on the warm side and none have been too cold.”
Does that mean the error bars are wide and that the warming predictions [were all outside] the error bars. Then [when] the real adjusted data showed cooler than expected, but on the warm side of the error bars. Is that what they are trying to say?

Reply to  vukcevic
September 15, 2015 7:54 am

After reading the section about the AMO in the their report ‘Big Changes Underway in the Climate System?’, the first impression is that the author(s) are not entirely clear what the AMO is about. Looking at de-trended signal could be misleading. From here
http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/AMOq1.gif
it can be seen that the N. Atlantic SST from 1955 to the present time is a more or less repeat of the previous ~100 years with one off 0.4C temperature jump around 1925. It can not be said with any degree of certainty that this indeed happen (rope and bucket measurements). The previous plateau lasted nearly 40 years, while current is less than 20 yeas long, thus if it is premature to expect the SST to rapidly fall.
If there is a fall in the local and global temperatures about to happen it is unlikely to be caused by the AMO, it is more likely that the CO2 is not doing the job expected.

Reply to  vukcevic
September 15, 2015 7:57 am

typo: it should read “with one off 0.2C temperature jump around 1925”

ralfellis
Reply to  vukcevic
September 15, 2015 8:30 am

Yes, indeed. Temperatures measured with an accuracy of +-1 degree or more, results in an accuracy of 1/50th of a degree. Settled data, as well as settled science….

MscottFla
Reply to  vukcevic
September 15, 2015 8:50 am

Vukcevic,
I’ve never seen anyone compare the overlay of the two periods as you did. As a guy who spent most of my career identifying patterns in stock price data, the correlation is remarkable and I’m guessing not coincidence. The spikes around 1875, 1945 and 2008 are particularly interesting.

Mike
Reply to  vukcevic
September 15, 2015 12:38 pm

I suspect that 0.2C shift in 1925 is a data error or a misplaced “correction”. There is a strong similarity between accumulated cyclone energy and Atlantic SST . One thing that stands out is that jump (here 0.1C is removed to match the two).comment image
https://climategrog.wordpress.com/?attachment_id=215
Note that is labelled “AMO” but is also using actual SST, not a ‘detrended’ one.

Reply to  vukcevic
September 15, 2015 1:06 pm

M Scott
At first, I was inclined to think that it was a bit of ‘creative data adjustment, but comparing to two other events
http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/EAS.htm
it could be a case of ‘history-repeating-itself’.

Reply to  vukcevic
September 15, 2015 1:33 pm

Mike
Visual impressions using perspective, lot of colour and phoney 3D could be more persuasive when the correlation is not very convincing.
http://www.vukcevic.talktalk.net/AHA.gif
Climate modellers should try it.

QV
Reply to  vukcevic
September 15, 2015 8:06 am

The MO web forecast, for a specific location are only 37% accurate (weather symbols) for the first 24.
Added to which they will have changed radically in detail in the 5 day period prior to the first day.
They say;
“our four day forecast is as accurate as our one day forecast was 30 years ago”
But we’ve only got their word for that.

Jimbo
Reply to  QV
September 15, 2015 2:11 pm

Here’s Roger Harriban of the BBC’s take on the Met Office’s ‘forecast’ or whatever it’s called.

BBC – 14 September 2015
Next two years hottest, says Met Office
The next two years could be the hottest on record globally, says research from the UK’s Met Office.
http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-34226178

So there you have it. It could get hotter, pause or something else. We just don’t know but believe us.

george e. smith
Reply to  vukcevic
September 15, 2015 11:43 am

Fancy that; not being sure about the future.
UK MET should check with Spencer Weart, who is quite sure that over the next century (that would be the 22nd Century by my calculations) the world will warm up by a few degrees.
If that is the one-couple-few-some- numeral system, that would seem to predict about a three degree per century rate of rise.
And he’s quite sure about that.
I’m not going to hang around and find out if UK MET or Weart, is correct.
g

Reply to  george e. smith
September 15, 2015 1:13 pm

G.
You never know, the heaven is small place, you might bump into Mr. Weart and find out.

Auto
Reply to  vukcevic
September 15, 2015 2:03 pm

vuk old soul,
I wouldn’t trust A N Y forecast about the UK to even 4 days.
50-50 – at best, I suggest.
4 weeks is fantasy land . . . .
Guided guesses, helped by unicorn droppings I believe.
Months, plural – ohhh *#”./%#, don’t even go there.
When I was a kid – about 8 or 9 – Upstill, Nancekevill, Dixon & me did weather forecasts to our class: basically – ‘Same as today’, plus a sneaky look at the weather systems {if any} coming in.
Over five days we were pretty close on three, IIRC, and not too bad on one other.
The Met – even then [early 1960s] – got about two days right.
Auto

Reply to  Auto
September 15, 2015 5:39 pm

Oh, Oh. The MET forecasts a continuation of the Pause . Watch it get a lot warmer or colder.

Eustace Cranch
September 15, 2015 7:29 am

That’s it then. The science is settled. Debate over.

Steinar Midtskogen
Reply to  Eustace Cranch
September 15, 2015 8:50 am

Yes, temperatures will rise. Or they will drop. Who can argue otherwise? So the debate is over.

Mike
Reply to  Steinar Midtskogen
September 15, 2015 1:21 pm

Barring a large volcanic eruption or a very sudden return to La Niña or negative AMO conditions
which could temporarily cool climate, ten year global average warming rates are likely to
return to late 20 century levels within the next two years.

If nothing happens to make it go cooler, it will probably get hotter. You gotta luv em for trying.
At least they are recognising the presence of the pause not trying to rig the data to rub it out like Karl et al.
They should be given credit for taking a fairly balanced assessment of their state to lack of certainty. Not derided for it.

David A
Reply to  Steinar Midtskogen
September 15, 2015 2:03 pm

Mike, I will accept that of they call a major press conference and get folk like the Guardian to run the story, and they also follow up with what such an event would mean for natural influence on the climate vs. CO 2.

RoHa
Reply to  Steinar Midtskogen
September 15, 2015 4:38 pm

And we are doomed either way.

Don B
September 15, 2015 7:30 am

The Pause may, or may not, continue….. That is the pause Tom Karl “proved” does not exist.

knr
September 15, 2015 7:42 am

One of the many ‘interesting ‘ features of climate ‘science’ is its heavy use of the , ironically anti-science, ‘tails you lose heads I win’ approach , therefore in this the MET office is merely carrying on has normal.

AndyE
September 15, 2015 7:54 am

Actually, we should applaud the Met Office report. It is exactly what a scientific report ought to be : tentative theorising, meticulously presenting alternative predictions, humbly and honestly admitting ignorance. Long may they continue in that vein.

rogerknights
Reply to  AndyE
September 15, 2015 8:54 am

I agree. Unfortunately, conscientious dithering doesn’t provide the same psychic rewards as boldly prophesising.

Chris Hanley
Reply to  AndyE
September 15, 2015 2:29 pm

“It is exactly what a scientific report ought to be : tentative theorising, meticulously presenting alternative predictions, humbly and honestly admitting ignorance …”.
==========================
Nonsense read the summary, the report assumes CO2 is the underlying climate forcing factor with an assortment of ad hoc hypothetical adjustments or metaphoric epicycles added to avoid falsification.

Alan the Brit
September 15, 2015 7:54 am

I agree with “me”! I remember during the heavy rains we got here a few years back, the Wet Office was very very good at doing, what Piers Corbyn called, “Nowcasting”! They were great at telling us when the next burst was going to arrive within hours & even a day or two, but that was it. Immediately afterwards, as we wrang out everything that was anything, Dame Julia Slingo was banging on about how brilliant their computer modelling had been at predicting the rainfall, only she forgot to mention that her team had predicted absolutely nothing more than 12-24 hours ahead only, no more! Personally, I am still awaiting the “ah but we never actually said it was going carry on warming, nothing of the kind…….” type of statement from them! tehn we can post all the statements they have made over the last 10 years to really rub the salt in!

lucaturin
September 15, 2015 7:55 am

When I read the title, I thought “Oh no, that means it’s over”. But I agree with AndyE: if you don’t know, don’t act like you do.

Auto
Reply to  lucaturin
September 15, 2015 2:16 pm

luca
My friend, you are SO right.
“if you don’t know, don’t act like you do”
– and plus shedloads for the UK.
24 hours – well – OK, Slingo’s super-counting-boxes should get pretty close most of the time.
96 hours – no. Random walks, plus you don’t really know where you started, sees to that.
Months ahead – you’re being STOOOOOOPID; it’s like getting a blindfold chimpanzee to throw darts at a dartboard the size of a barn door.
Years/decades ahead – sorry, I will swim through vomit to prove it’s like getting a drunken blindfold chimpanzee to throw darts at a dartboard the size of a v e r y large barn door (think Canaveral’s VAB doors).
Mods – this is not /sarc. This is for real.
I have lived in the UK for >60 years.
We have weather.
It is changeable.
Jolly changeable.
Auto

G. Karst
September 15, 2015 8:03 am

Funny how with one side of the mouth warmists ask “What pause??” and then proceed with the other side of the mouth proffer numerous excuses for the pause. Are we ever going to get off this merry-go-round… it’s dizzifying. GK

herkimer
September 15, 2015 8:15 am

The last major pause was from 1940-1980 during which there were periods( 1964-1976 ) when both AMO and PDO were both in the negative or cool mode simultaneously . AMO is already slowly declining and PDO was in the negative phase since 2007 but it’s decline s was briefly interrupted by the El Nino and the ” blob” in the Pacific Ocean since 2014. By 2017 , the El Nino and blob will likely be both gone, and we could have the start of cooler weather for many l decades ( to 2035/45 at least ).During the latter part of this decade,the PDO pattern and AMO may both again go negative or cool for part of the upcoming cooler period of the climate cycle. . Karl et al manipulations will be shown to be just that with no ability to turn off the forces of nature.. The pause is clearly continuing on most global land areas.
• According to NOAA data, Annual temperature anomalies since 2005 or last 10 years for combined all GLOBAL LAND areas ( 149 million sq. km) have slight decline or flat trend at – 0.02 C/decade
.
• The pause is still real for global land with both land and satellite based measurements.
o It is clear that GLOBAL as in ‘GLOBAL WARMING” is meaningless as the warming is not global wide.
o The trend of North American annual land temperature anomalies has been steadily cooling whether you go back to 1998,2000 or 2005 at -0.20 C /decade, -0.05 C /decade and -0.41 C /decade respectively according to NOAA
o The trend of Northern Hemisphere annual land temperature anomalies has been slightly cooling or flat since 2005 at -0.05 C./decade
o The trend of Southern Hemisphere annual land temperature anomalies has been slightly warming or really flat at + 0.06 C /decade. Africa is also slightly warming or flat at -0.07 C/decade.

herkimer
Reply to  herkimer
September 16, 2015 2:48 pm

This plot of North American mean temperature changes from Berkley Earth is good model for the next 30 years for North America in my opinion . The temperatures peaked in 2005 like it did 1940 and are headed for cold trough by 2045 like it did in 1970’s.. Key climate factor to watch is first the PDO pattern as it turns mostly negative and later the same with AMO. as it also goes negative.
http://berkeleyearth.lbl.gov/auto/Regional/TAVG/Figures/north-america-TAVG-Trend.pdf

Tom O
September 15, 2015 8:17 am

What I find interesting about the explanations offered about the pause from the warmisters is that they never, ever seem to say “we found this in our model that threw this off, and now the model has been corrected and actually does show the pause.” They always say “we found this bit of natural variability that is causing the pause in spite of our correct models, thus as soon as this natural variability ceases, our models will be correct.” Or at least, that is how I see their explanations. Am I missing something?

Reply to  Tom O
September 15, 2015 12:02 pm

That’s how it always seems to come across to me too. They are fundamentally incapable of admitting the models just *MIGHT* be wrong.

QV
September 15, 2015 8:26 am

Dr. Rowan Sutton, “Director of Climate” at Reading University, was on the BBC, talking about the report yesterday, and despite much prompting, was very vague on the subject and what it meant for Global and UK temperatures.
One prediction he did make was for cooler SUMMERS in Europe.

bit chilly
Reply to  QV
September 15, 2015 10:16 am

last time the atlantic was cool we had better summer weather in the uk and more well defined seasons .

lgl
September 15, 2015 8:32 am
KennyDoug
September 15, 2015 8:52 am

“However, the short observational record precludes a confident prediction based on observations alone.”
However, this stock hasn’t been on the market long enough to make a confident prediction based on price history alone.

Reply to  KennyDoug
September 15, 2015 9:05 am

Exactly, one has to look at the internals of the issuer (the UK Met Office).
Take to some Dramamine first.

Editor
September 15, 2015 9:04 am

According to today’s Telegraph, the Met Orifice seem to think we (UK) are going to have another cold snowy winter due to a strong El Nino causing the Jet Stream over the Atlantic to move South. A few weeks ago they were predicting a mild, wet winter, in the Spring a hot dry Summer, by the law of averages they have to get it right at some stage (I think). Their attempts at forecasting the weather are so amateurish (the strong 2015 El Nino has been mentioned on WUWT fo at least a year) even the BBC has given up with them!

son of mulder
September 15, 2015 9:05 am

I’ve just consulted my bunnion and it confirms with a probability of 1 that the global average temperature will either rise, fall or be flat over any period of time into the future. Beat that Met Office.

Dave G
Reply to  son of mulder
September 15, 2015 11:45 pm

It could just do a somersault though. Then you’d be wrong.

September 15, 2015 9:06 am

The Met Office is now substantially hedging its bets on the certainty of its long term forecasts .The conclusion of their report states
“Further long-term global warming is expected over the coming decades but variations of climate worldwide from year to year or decade to decade will always depend on the subsequent variations in the patterns of climate variability described in this report”
In other words we expect global warming unless it doesn’t happen because of “climate variability”
The billions spent in the UK on wind, solar and biomass subsidies and its policy of CO2 emission reduction rest on this fragile level of scientific certainty.
There has been no global warming at all since about 1997.
The climate models on which the entire Catastrophic Global Warming delusion rests are built without regard to the natural 60 and more importantly 1000 year cycles so obvious in the temperature record. The natural 60 year temperature cycle shows up quite well in the AMO index – Fig 8 in the Met office report – but is not there identified as a temperature cycle. The Met scientists remain blind to the obvious millennial cycle which is ,as usual, completely ignored.
The modelers approach is simply a scientific disaster and lacks even average commonsense .It is exactly like taking the temperature trend from say Feb – July and projecting it ahead linearly for 20 years or so. They back tune their models for less than 100 years when the relevant time scale is millennial. This is scientific malfeasance on a grand scale.
The temperature projections of the IPCC – UK Met office models and all the impact studies which derive from them have no solid basis in empirical science being derived from inherently useless and specifically structurally flawed models. They provide no basis for the discussion of future climate trends and represent an enormous waste of time and money. As a foundation for the UNFCCC and Governmental climate and energy policy their forecasts are already seen to be grossly in error and are therefore worse than useless.
A new forecasting method needs to be adopted. For forecasts of the timing and extent of the coming cooling based on the natural solar activity cycles – most importantly the millennial cycle – and using the neutron count and 10Be record as the most useful proxy for solar activity check my blog-post at
http://climatesense-norpag.blogspot.com/2014/07/climate-forecasting-methods-and-cooling.html
For a simple summary see
http://climatesense-norpag.blogspot.com/2015/08/the-epistemology-of-climate-forecasting.html

Reply to  Dr Norman Page
September 15, 2015 2:50 pm

~ 60 (actually 63) year and millennial (1008 years, 16 x 63) cycles appear to be of the same parentage (see here ).

leon0112
September 15, 2015 9:10 am

So the Met Office is 90-95% confident that they don’t have the slightest idea what is going to happen.

george e. smith
Reply to  leon0112
September 16, 2015 5:35 pm

So leon, if you are 95% confident that an event is going to happen; based on your statistical analysis of a steam of data which is never ever going to happen again; and when the time comes, your confidentevent simply did not happen, are you still 95% confident that you made the right call, or does your confidence drop to zero.
And if your prediction should actually come true and the event occurs; does that mean your calculation is wrong, and you should have got 100% instead of 95%.
It seems to me, that an event (any event) which can only happen once, or only not happen once, will either not happen or will happen. Those are the only choices.
So how do you put a probability on a prediction where the outcome will either be a zero or a one, but can never be anything but one of those two.
I think that all that one can say about tomorrow’s Temperature or other variable is that it is impossible to choose between it going up or going down or staying the same as today’s value.
Whatever statistical analysis you do on past events (data set) that result gives no information at all about ANY event that is not in that data set, and that includes all of the future.

JimS
September 15, 2015 9:25 am

I am surprised that the Met Office did not read the memo from NOAA that the Pause in global warming is non-existent. Talk about a confused lot they seem to be.

Alan Robertson
September 15, 2015 9:43 am

Oh, what tangled web…

September 15, 2015 9:49 am

The global temp. trend will be down before this decade ends.

DWR54
Reply to  Salvatore Del Prete
September 15, 2015 2:07 pm

What do you mean by that exactly, Salvatore?
Do you mean the 10, 20, 30 year trend? Do you mean there will be cooling relative to today or relative to some prior time?
It’s a rather ambiguous statement.

Gary Pearse
September 15, 2015 9:51 am

Some years ago (2007(?)) I did an experiment that I wish I had continued for several years. I noted that theweathernetwork.com forecasts for Ottawa, Canada were almost invariably too high and I suspected that that was the CAGW bias that they believed would be there. It was as much as 2C too, high. Also, their 14 day prognosis almost always rose up near the end of the period, only to be pushed back down again. My experiment was to take their 5 day forecast and knock off, IIRC, 1C average from the last 3 days if their first day had been estimated too high in the forecast 5 days previously and 0.5C where they were close.
My forecast record proved to be considerably superior to theirs. I should have made a permanent file out of my pencilings and continued it. I reckon someone with the time and patience could actually work out the CAGW factor that is multiplied by regularly determined forecast temps and use it to make better forecasts. Maybe you could sell it to the BBC!! That the MetOffice was diametrically wrong on 11 of the last 12 seasonal forecasts is actually usable data! It would make a good paper. Possibly the fudge factor is directly related to the ratio of temperatures of a climate sensitivity of 2:1.

September 15, 2015 10:01 am

Wait a minute, the headline to this that sprang up on Yahoo! stated that the Met Office had predicted the end of the hiatus…

herkimer
September 15, 2015 10:27 am

“Temporary cooling has occurred in the past without leading to a sustained AMO shift.”
The last cool phase or pause of 1940-1980 in global temperatures did not start with a negative or cool AMO. Rather it started with a negative or cool patter of the PDO . AMO did not go negative until about 20 years into the cool cycle or pause . I think the key factor that starts and sustains the pause is the sign of PDO and when it goes and remains mostly negative (or cool pattern) A negative AMO makes the temperature trough worse or colder especially for the Atlantic provinces in Canada and primarily the North Eastern US States.
Here is a sequence of events leading into the pause of 1940-1980
PDO pattern starts to decline from mostly warm( positive ) phase pattern after 1936
• Arctic temperatures peak in 1938 and 1943 and start to cool after 1944
• Cooler temperatures start in western North America after about 1935/1940
• PDO fluctuates near zero 1937-1939, but positive 1940-1941 due to an El Nino and finally goes mostly negative in 1944
• North Pacific stays warm1940-1960 while PDO is in a negative pattern ( or cool mode)
• Cooler temperatures in Eastern North America after 1945/ 1950
• Eastern Canada starts to cool after 1950 ( almost 10 years after western Canada)
• AO goes mostly negative 1950
• Europe and Russia starts to cool by 1950 (except a brief cold period 1939/1942)
• Mexico temperatures start to decline after 1950
• AMO goes negative 1965
• Cold temperatures trough or coldest in the 1970,s
• No net warming( A PAUSE) between 1940’s and 1980’s
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/jisao-pdo/from:1930/to:1976/plot/esrl-amo/from:1930/to:1976

David A
Reply to  herkimer
September 15, 2015 2:10 pm

All NH and global records showed substainal cooling from the 1940s high to the 1979 Ice age scare. Not a pause, but cooling.

herkimer
Reply to  David A
September 16, 2015 6:37 am

David A
I agree that there was regional cooling for NH which bottomed about late 1970’s but by 1980 the temperatures had recovered , so no net warming during the period 1940-1980 . Globally there was more of a flat period than major cooling
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/gistemp/from:1940/to:1980/plot/gistemp/from:1940/to:1980/trend

herkimer
Reply to  David A
September 16, 2015 6:49 am

shows global and regional temperatures during 1940-1980.
https://www2.ucar.edu/news/how-much-has-global-temperature-risen-last-100-years

Matt G
Reply to  David A
September 17, 2015 4:50 pm

During the 1940’s and 1970’s the global temperatures showed significant cooling and the Arctic too.
The link is wrong and has been adjusted many times to remove the cooling.
The reason why the cooling has been increasingly removed through the decades is so it makes the difference between the 2000’s and 1940’s bigger. It is dishonest trick that has fooled many people.
Arctic temperatures showed significant cooling.
http://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/pdf/10.1175/1520-0485%281979%29009%3C0580%3AAAOASI%3E2.0.CO%3B2
“Fig. 6 shows the time series (24-month running mean) of the area averaged surface temperature for the polar cap north of 60N. The plot was constructed by adding data for the years 1976 and 1977 to the temperature set described by Walsh (1977). The slope of the linear regression line fitted to the temperature series is negative, implying a net temperature decrease over the past 25 years;”
HADCRUT4 and GISS still show a little cooling, but it was much bigger in the past.
http://www.woodfortrees.org/plot/hadcrut4gl/from:1940/to:1979/plot/hadcrut4gl/from:1940/to:1979/trend/plot/gistemp/from:1940/to:1979/plot/gistemp/from:1940/to:1979/trend

bit chilly
September 15, 2015 10:30 am

the met office and noaa are about as much use as a chocolate fireguard. the bbc said last night the el nino would be enhanced by man made climate change . now if we count all the hiroshima bombs worth of heat added to the system since 1998 as a result of all the extra anthropogenic co2 (according to the morons at places like sks) ,it must surely overwhelm any natural fluctuation.
if i see anything less than a larger spike in satellite temps than the 1998 el nino i am going to visit the met office personally,find out if these clowns have the courage of their convictions in the physical sense. i have had enough of the complete and utter shite these cretins spout remaining unchallenged by the msm, and soundbyte politicians all over the developed world that are more interested in what to wear for their next press conference than actually achieving anything meaningful.
they said global warming at the outset, they do not get to change the rules now, the met can f*** right off with regional cooling bullshit.

Dave_G
September 15, 2015 10:31 am

You only have to look at the Met Office forecasts for any period longer than 15 days and they read like a horoscope. You can make whatever you want of it……. conveniently.

Mike Smith
Reply to  Dave_G
September 15, 2015 3:23 pm

Horoscopes are significantly more science based (and accurate).

RD
September 15, 2015 10:33 am

Settled science, indeed. Do any of the models predict the pause?

September 15, 2015 10:38 am

Jokes are easy, but the take-away is good. The Pause exists. The Pause may well continue. This is a mainstream outfit obviously, and they are saying things that are highly inconvenient for the warmist crowd.

emsnews
September 15, 2015 12:57 pm

The damage to the Scientific Method is the greatest problem here. And predicting that everything will happen is the biggest cop-out of all.

Robdel
Reply to  emsnews
September 15, 2015 3:47 pm

No it is not the damage to the scientific method but it is the damage to the scientists that have corrupted it.

JohnKnight
Reply to  Robdel
September 16, 2015 6:14 pm

What damage to scientists that have corrupted it are you referring to, Rebdel?
Seems to me they have (so far) made out rather well for the most part . .
I believe the Scientific Method has been damaged, in the sense that the “scientific community” has become a more corrupt community, which makes ethical use of the Method more difficult in general, for those so inclined.
The integrity of the “community” is prerequisite for the Scientific Method to function as a source for reliable knowledge, it seems to me, and at this point I have virtually no faith in the community as a whole to resist the temptations which so glaringly resulted in the “success” of those who succumbed in this particular field. The “art” of corrupting science has been advanced greatly I believe, and I fully expect the “artists” both in scientific disciplines and their “patrons” with serious money and power, to be emboldened by what has happened in this realm we are discussing.
Also, all that corrupt science means less legitimate science has been done, for lack of resources and attention, it seems inevitable to me. Faith in science among the general populace is way up (beyond anything rationally justifiable under the best of circumstances I feel), but it’s basically “blind faith” in those presented as experts in the mass media, which could result in a sort of “pause” of the Scientific Method itself, in terms of publicly revealed truly scientific inquiry. (The fake/show stuff will need to be protected, after all.)

David S
September 15, 2015 1:37 pm

Like all warmist organisations they can’t even predict the past.The only way they can get that right is to change it.Ironically it is only a few sceptics who notice this. With the help of a complicit and subservient media everyone else is blissfully unaware.

Billy Liar
Reply to  David S
September 16, 2015 8:20 am

The one I like is the giant El Niño of 1998 which gets cooler and cooler as every year goes by, according to GISS that is.
https://stevengoddard.wordpress.com/2015/09/16/all-warming-since-1997-is-due-to-government-fraud/

September 15, 2015 1:49 pm

“Imaginary hiatus in global warming coming to an end, experts say”
http://www.newsbiscuit.com/2015/09/15/imaginary-hiatus-in-global-warming-coming-to-an-end-experts-say/

Bob Turner
September 15, 2015 2:39 pm

Strange article.
– Headed up with a graph that has nothing to do with the report.
– The header link is to an article in an IT news-sheet. The link to the original 20-page paper is included only in the footer.
– The first and last of the 3 quotations are taken from page 11. There was a paragraph between them, but this has been removed and replaced by a different paragraph from a different section, on page 9.
It’s unclear to me why the quotations have been manipulated in this way. I assume that replacing the middle paragraph, which contained numerous literature references, had the benefit of giving the impression that this report (with its 4 pages of detailed international references) was merely a rambling PR job, rather than the very serious and balanced overview that it actually was.

Billy Liar
Reply to  Bob Turner
September 16, 2015 8:39 am

The whole paper looks like a rambling PR job to me. It has a list of References at the end. Why therefore does it litter, and detract from, the text by including in-line references?
It looks like it was written by committee to several different standards and published unedited.

charles nelson
September 15, 2015 3:31 pm

‘I hope you’re not right about the lack of warming lasting till 2020 and beyond’.
Dr Phil Jones of CRU in a Climategate email.
They knew…even back in the day.

DDP
September 15, 2015 3:57 pm

Met Office probability based forecasts are nothing more than a fail-safe so they can claim a fantastic level of accuracy. Which isn’t difficult when your seasonal forecasts are now nothing more than a three way 35/30/35% split of cooler than average, seasonal average, warmer than average. No forecast is wrong, at least technically, and more importantly when it comes to retaining government funding, legally.
Jog on.

Matt G
September 15, 2015 4:10 pm

The most interesting part is if the current strong El Nino will cause a step up in global temperature after the immediate La Nina? (like the 1997/98 El Nino)
I don’t know, but sooner or later these strong El Nino’s will have a cooling affect after, once the accumulated energy has been released larger than the net intake. It’s been a long time coming since 1997/98 and after this event we should learn a lot from it. This strong El Nino also puts some of the ideas previously about the PDO into the bin. Usually during a long term negative PDO period you get weak El Nino’s, but we are in a short term positive PDO at the moment.

SAMURAI
September 15, 2015 4:46 pm

The 30-yr PDO cool cycle already started in 2008, and the 30-yr AMO cool cycle will start around 2020. Moreover, the sun is entering a very weak phase, which may evolve into another Grand Solar Minimum…
There is a growing probability global temps may actually FALL 1C by 2100 should a GSM event occur, which would entirely wipeout the 0.85C of warming recovery experience since the end of the Little Ice Age in 1850….
The tiny amount of CO2 warming will actually mitigate some of the negative effects of a GSM, so ironically, manmade CO2 induced warming is a good thing. Moreover, the increased crop yields and forest growth will help offset the negative impacts of shorter growing seasons should a GSM occur.
Oh, the irony…. it cuts like a knife…

September 15, 2015 5:07 pm

Some empirical evidence that the pause is a phenomenon and not natural variability within a warming trend
http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=2659755

September 15, 2015 8:18 pm

The plot of annual values in figure 8 on page 9 strongly resembles the current thermometer-based temperature reconstructions. (In fact, if you showed me that graph without any labeling, I would say it looks like GISTEMP or HADCRUT with a lot of smoothing.) But it’s the AMO Index.
It seems to me that the correlation between AMO change and temperature change is much, much stronger than the correlation between CO2 change and temperature change. Folks without preconceived notions would call that a clue.
Or am I misunderstanding something?

September 15, 2015 8:47 pm

I just noticed that the models mentioned in the graph are CMIP5 RCP 8.5. I think more realistic is an ensemble of the CMIP5 RCP 6 or maybe even the RCP 4.5 models. It seems to me that CO2 will increase less than predicted in the RCP 8.5 scenario, and methane is increasing a lot less than IPCC has predicted. Also, recent WUWT articles have mentioned a GMO rice and a dietary supplement for cattle that can substantially reduce methane emissions. If these methane-reducing technologies are widely implemented, then I expect the RCP 4.5 to use a fairly accurate radiation forcing from manmade greenhouse gases.
Even with those milder models, I expect some overprediction of future warming, because the models seem to be tuned to assume that multidecadal oscillations did not contribute to the rapid warming from the early 1970s to around 2004-2005.

rtj1211
September 16, 2015 2:49 am

The most important statement made by the Met Office in recent times is:
‘However, the short observational record precludes a confident prediction based on observations alone.’
At last, there is acknowledgement that the climate timescale unit of 30 years is a value considerably more than 30% of the time that accurate, globally uniform data collection about the earth’s climate has been taking place.

Evan Jones
Editor
September 16, 2015 4:16 am

the models seem to be tuned to assume that multidecadal oscillations did not contribute to the rapid warming from the early 1970s to around 2004-2005.
That’s what it looks like to me.

Matt G
Reply to  Evan Jones
September 16, 2015 4:53 am

That is exactly what the models assumed and why they have been wrong.

Julian Williams in Wales
September 16, 2015 6:07 am

That graph by Roy Spencer is a cracker

richard verney
September 16, 2015 7:47 am

Let us assume that the Met Office is correct and that there will be no resumption to warming for the next 10 years, what will that say about climate sensitivity assuming that we also see BAU CO2 emissions?
This is the problem for the IPCC. Already recent papers are suggesting Climate Sensitivity of below 2degC, some suggesting as low as 1.3degC. As the ‘pause’ continues and CO2 emissions continue to rise on BAU basis (or perhaps even steeper), there will be ever more papers suggesting ever lower figures for Climate Sensitivity. I envisage that by 2018, we will soon see many papers coming in suggesting a lower end range of 1.2degC (ie., the no feedback position), and some may well be suggesting a lower end range of 0.9degC.
Even by 2019, this will cause problems for AR6. What is the IPCC to do with the most recent papers say those appearing as from 2007 onwards suggesting ever lowering figures for Climate Sensitivity (none of which will be suggesting a sensitivity figure of more than 2degC)? What to do with the ever widening gap between model forecasts (projections) and observed reality (all models by then being outside the 95% confidence band)?
This is why Paris really may be the last ditch saloon. If nothing of substance is agreed at Paris, by the time AR6 comes around, it may be just too difficult to keep the wheels on the wagon.
Get the popcorn out.

Matt G
September 16, 2015 11:34 am

The recent claim by the Met Office has ended any hopes they had, but at least they are little more honest. The natural multi-decadal cycle that warms and cools had been ignored and now there is no hiding. Lets face it we know the alarmists have failed a while ago, but they won’t have it yet. Global temperatures have been warming at a rate not high enough to be any cause for concern, even if they had behaved like a linear trend line shooting up off a sine-wave. The peak rate observed of 0.2 c per decade is 2 c over a century and that value despite the IPCC turnaround is not dangerous to the planet. Remember they were claiming 4c to 7c over a century as catastrophic global warming. To believe that you would have to be seriously living on the moon with the IPCC.
Based on RSS even claiming 0.1 c per decade seems too high.
The reason being during the ~30 year warming cycle only 13 years had any significant effect. During the ~30 year cooling cycle the trend per decade will be slightly negative at best. Therefore at a rate of 0.2 c per decade (like the 13 year warming period), only bit more than a sixth of the full warming and cooling cycle showed this maximum rate. Hence over ~ 60+ year period the trend per decade would only be about 0.043 c if using the cooling period being zero per decade.
BUT, it’s even worse than that because during this century, two cooling sine-waves will fit in it and not just one like last century. Thinking it can’t get any worse for the alarmists and then the sun activity decides to go to sleep, with the possibility in future of even quieter sun activity and the next significant cooling period. Where will that leave CAGW, consigned to the trash bin of Earth’s history?

Alba
September 16, 2015 12:04 pm

On the other hand:
Next two years hottest, says Met Office
By Roger HarrabinBBC environment analyst
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-34226178

Matt G
Reply to  Alba
September 16, 2015 2:26 pm

Very hypercritical report that one with blaming pause on PDO and AMO that have warming and cooling cycles, not just cooling Met Office. The terrible science continues still blaming humans for the period where warming cycles of the PDO and AMO existed. At least they have finally admitted they even exist now. The next 2 years might have one of them the hottest with the tamperature data sets because of the strong El Nino. Only take this serious if the satellites follow suit because they have a bigger response to ENSO than the tamperature sets. One day the tamperature data sets may actually show a record without changing them just before.

Resourceguy
September 16, 2015 12:14 pm

The AMO is screaming “Buy coats and sweaters now!”

Dawtgtomis
September 16, 2015 12:52 pm

Well, I guess it’s best for the MET to jump on the train before it leaves the station, even if they’re not sure which way it’s going.

David Cage
September 16, 2015 11:13 pm

Can anyone tell me if the programs used in security and military circles to look for patterns in signals are just not available? The graphs put up by vukcevic show such an obvious sinusoidal pattern superimposed on the basic rise that it must be the dominant variant but this part is ignored by just about every article.
There is such a clear cut cycle between sixty and seventy years that we can say with near certainty that the pause will end in about a decade and the global warming brigade will be able to say see we told you so, global warming is back.

Mervyn
September 17, 2015 6:22 am

The UK MET Office has published a report which suggests the pause in global temperatures might continue for many years to come. Or the pause might not continue. They’re not really sure.
They’re not really sure. What an incredible statement … not one you would expect from an organisation that spends nearly £170 million a year, has 1,500 staff and a team of scientists operating a £30 million supercomputer capable of 1,000 billion calculations every second, with a carbon footprint the size of a small town.
Dr Tim Balls recent article on this blog was spot on about climate models.

quaesoveritas
September 17, 2015 9:56 am

I noticed that Roger Harrabin’s report on this, on the BBC, started with the following statement:
“Planet Earth is the most complex thing in the Universe”.
Surely he should have added “that we know of”!
But I think there are probably more complex things.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-34242508

herkimer
September 17, 2015 11:36 am

Climate has varied in the past and can be expected to do so in the future. Mankind has adapted
to both cool and warm periods, and trade and economic growth over the past 300 years has greatly
increased our ability to do so. In that context, forecasts of climate are of little value unless they are for a
strong and persistent trend, and are accurate.
The IPCC “forecasts” are for a strong and persistent trend, but they have been inaccurate in the
short term. Moreover, there is no reason to expect them to be accurate in the longer term. The IPCC’s
forecasting procedures violate all of the relevant Golden Rule of Forecasting guidelines. In particular,
their procedures are biased to advocate for the hypothesis of dangerous manmade global warming.
We found that there are no scientific forecasts that support the hypothesis that manmade global
warming will occur. Instead, the best forecasts of temperatures on Earth for the 21st Century and
beyond are derived from the hypothesis of persistence. Specifically, we forecast that global average
temperatures will trend neither up nor down, but will remain within half-a-degree Celsius (one-degree
Fahrenheit) of the 2013 average.
This chapter provides good news. There is neither need to worry about climate change, nor
reason to take action
http://www.kestencgreen.com/G&A-Skyfall.pdf

September 23, 2015 3:57 pm

The fact that there is so much sensible debate and analysis in blogs like this definitely shows that the science is not settled. Yet our politicians here (NZ) are convinced that it is and are embarking on programmes that will damage the economy. How do we rationally and coolly get them to see sense? Regarding the prediction of weather, my Physics lecturer was a big wig forecaster in the Pacific theatre during WW2. His prediction method was to hang a piece of string from his window overnight. In the morning he drew it in and felt it. If it was wet it was raining. If not, it wasn’t. Later, he graduated to using a toy Indian with a cobalt salt impregnated loin cloth. The instructions to the Indian stated “When Indian blue, skies are too. When pink, weather stink.” He preferred this improved technology as he was able to stay in bed as he made his forecasts.
Maybe we need an Indian for climate change?