Warmest September in satellite temperature record
Boosted by warmer than normal water in the equatorial eastern Pacific Ocean that peaked in June and July, global average temperatures in the atmosphere rose to record levels in September, according to Dr. John Christy, director of the Earth System Science Center at The University of Alabama in Huntsville. Not only was it the warmest September on record, it was also the warmest month (compared to seasonal norms) in the 38-year satellite temperature record that wasn’t associated with an “officially recognized” El Niño Pacific Ocean warming event.
Global climate trend since Nov. 16, 1978: +0.13 C per decade
September temperatures (preliminary)
Global composite temp.: +0.54 C (about 0.97 degrees Fahrenheit) above 30-year average for September.
Northern Hemisphere: +0.51 C (about 0.92 degrees Fahrenheit) above 30-year average for September.
Southern Hemisphere: +0.57 C (about 1.03 degrees Fahrenheit) above 30-year average for September.
Tropics: +0.53 C (about 0.95 degrees Fahrenheit) above 30-year average for September.
August temperatures (revised):
Global Composite: +0.41 C above 30-year average
Northern Hemisphere: +0.40 C above 30-year average
Southern Hemisphere: +0.41 C above 30-year average
Tropics: +0.46 C above 30-year average
(All temperature anomalies are based on a 30-year average (1981-2010) for the month reported.)
Notes on data released Oct. 2, 2017:
Of the 20 warmest monthly global average temperatures in the satellite record, only September 2017 was not during an El Niño. Compared to seasonal norms, the global average temperature in September made it the ninth warmest month in the satellite record.
Warmest Septembers (global average)
(degrees C warmer than 30-year September average)
1. 2017 +0.54 C
2. 2016 +0.45 C
3. 1998 +0.44 C
4. 2010 +0.37 C
5. 2009 +0.27 C
6. 2015 +0.25 C
2005 +0.25 C
8. 1995 +0.22 C
2013 +0.22 C
2012 +0.22 C
Warmest months (global average)
(degrees C warmer than 30-year seasonal averages)
1. Feb. 2016 +0.85 C
2. Mar. 2016 +0.76 C
3. Apr. 1998 +0.74 C
4. Apr. 2016 +0.72 C
5. Feb. 1998 +0.65 C
6. May 1998 +0.64 C
7. Jun. 1998 +0.57 C
8. Jan. 2016 +0.55 C
9. Spt. 2017 +0.54 C
10. May 2016 +0.53 C
While September was not during a typical El Niño, it did follow a summer of warmer than normal sea surface temperatures in the equatorial eastern Pacific, Christy said.
“We saw a big rise in sea surface temps in June and July. The atmosphere tends to respond two or three months later, so this is what you would expect. The atmosphere is still feeling this big heat anomaly, so this is the right time for the atmosphere to see this peak.”
In the past two months, however, sea surface temperatures in that critical central Pacific region have fallen significantly; so much so that what had been a forecast for an upcoming El Niño warming event has transitioned into a forecast for a possible La Niña Pacific Ocean cooling event. (See attached graph.)
“Based on what we saw during past events, we would expect some atmospheric cooling in the coming months,” Christy said. Cooling is more passive, while warming is active, so that transition might take a bit longer than the warming did. “Cooling is a bit more muted,” Christy said. “It might take a few months for the cooling to filter in.”
Compared to seasonal norms, the coldest spot on the globe in September was in the Western Antarctic, near Alexander Island. Temperatures there were 5.65 C (about 10.17 degrees Fahrenheit) cooler than seasonal norms.
Compared to seasonal norms, the warmest place on Earth in September was the Norwegian archipelago of Svalbard in the Arctic Ocean. Temperatures there averaged 4.64 C (about 8.35 degrees Fahrenheit) warmer than seasonal norms.
As part of an ongoing joint project between UAH, NOAA and NASA, Christy and Dr. Roy Spencer, an ESSC principal scientist, use data gathered by advanced microwave sounding units on NOAA and NASA satellites to get accurate temperature readings for almost all regions of the Earth. This includes remote desert, ocean and rain forest areas where reliable climate data are not otherwise available.
The satellite-based instruments measure the temperature of the atmosphere from the surface up to an altitude of about eight kilometers above sea level. Once the monthly temperature data are collected and processed, they are placed in a “public” computer file for immediate access by atmospheric scientists in the U.S. and abroad.
The complete version 6 lower troposphere dataset is available here:
http://www.nsstc.uah.edu/data/msu/v6.0/tlt/uahncdc_lt_6.0.txt
Archived color maps of local temperature anomalies are available on-line at:
Neither Christy nor Spencer receives any research support or funding from oil, coal or industrial companies or organizations, or from any private or special interest groups. All of their climate research funding comes from federal and state grants or contracts.
— 30 —
Hummm, looks like Paris and Kyoto were cool, and west Antarctica the poster child of Jerry Brown was very cold.
Here come the hurricane/heat attribution claims.
Escept that the warming was where the hurricanes weren’t. Unless you count the one in western Mexico.
The three hurricanes in the news in the US were Atlantic hurricanes, not Pacific hurricanes. The heat was in the eastern, tropical Pacific. And hurricanes don’t form near the equator, but farther poleward, while still however typically in the tropics. Subtropics are possible if the water is warm enough.
Except hurricanes are not powered by air temps, but by water temps, especially compared to air temps, and by WV levels. Air temps alone provide insufficient data for judging likelyhood of hurricane formation.
SR
Nonsense. Nothing is “powered” by absolute temperature. You’ve got to have a temperature gradient. AGW, if it is happening, results in decreased gradients, not increased ones.
Hurricanes originate from the difference between SST and air temperature, among other factors. Thus, warmer air temperature in the tropics should reduce not increase hurricanes.
Tropical depressions typically start at night, when the differential is greatest. There is a threshold SST for tropical depression formation. Heating beyond that doesn’t make them more common. Much of the tropical ocean is always above the threshold, such as the Gulf of Mexico.
I don’t see how you could miss that I was not talking about just air temps, Bartemis, or that I was not supporting AGW. Please reread my final sentence.
Maybe your reply was misplaced?
SR
Willy Pete October 2, 2017 at 5:56 pm
Willy, had your reply posted before I began mine, I would have let your excellent post speak for me.
SR
Ho-o-o-old on there, boys and girls!!! The Mayor of Chicago, disaffectionately known as Mayor Rahmbo, is blaming climate change on the hurricanes this year, and demanding cash for Puerto Rico as a “climate change resettlement”.
Now, how do I know this? Why, thanks to the internet and online news, I no longer have to live in Chicago to know what that idiot is up to. I can see it online. Excuse me while I fall down laughing. Rahmbo has to get in front of the camera at every possible opportunity, even though he can’t stop crime in the streets.
I sure hope folks don’t think the rest of us in IL are crazy too. If Cook County was part of Wisconsin, the state of Illinois would be sane and solvent. (…although we’d like to give East St Louis to MO.)
“sane and solvent” – you got that right! Maybe we could just build a wall around Cook County and charge people a tax for leaving it. (Snorrrttt!)
Frankly, we are all lucky to exist at this moment in the arrow of time given the last great policy misstep from Chicago. The America First Committee peace movement was centered in Chicago and got many donations from VIPs including JFK and Joe Kennedy. Had that movement succeeded for one more year the Kaiser and his successor’s blueprint of conquest would have been fulfilled with super weapons. Chicago place needs a warning label from historians and more history lessons of what could have ended history.
I’ve visited Chicago (from Toronto) many times, love it.
Probably won’t be visiting again anytime soon, until the recent crime rate spike is at least addressed.
The crime rate spike, apparently, isn’t much of a priority, though.
Wonder if there is a corresponding negative spike in tourism…
Looks like increasing water vapor is prevailing over declining solar activity and declining net of all ocean cycles . . . for now. But increasing clouds will limit that.
‘Compared to seasonal norms, the coldest spot on the globe in September was in the Western Antarctic, near Alexander Island. Temperatures there were 5.65 C (about 10.17 degrees Fahrenheit) cooler than seasonal norms.’
Its clearly a regional cooling signal and possibly linked to the southern annular mode (SAM).
Based on the Enso and AMO ocean cycles, we should have expected UAH TLT to be in the +0.3C range right now.
But you know, the climate exhibits some type of variability which is in the +/- 0.2C range. For example, my model of UAH temps has this type of error. Mostly a white noise error in my opinion although it does persist at certain levels for a few months at a time. I think this is “the” definition of climate variability from expectations.
this was to be expected… nearly no hurricanes in the pacific warm pool.
this all corresponds with the el nino step up i was suspecting;;; Only a la nina dominant episode of 10 years willmake it to “step down”
this absolutely was no surprise to me
The interesting thing about this year is that it is a normal (non-El Niña non-La Niña) and is right dead on the global models. What will next year bring?
Yeah, but we really don’t know what temps would be like without ACO2, do we? (it’s all speculation, my friend)…
RS …care to give a forecast ?
Me? La Niña, lower; El Niña higher; normal, on the models like this year. But that is just normal thinking human, not a WUWT human.
What’s an “El Niña”?
reallyseptical, i’ve saved your “prediction” for future reference. If your around in a couple years (God, i hope not) we’ll find out just how “normal thinking” you really are…
It the trangender phase of ENSO, ( a La Niña event which self-“identifies” as being a Nino) .
This is the reason why we have a record warm September despite Nino3.4 temps which are approaching the -0.5 deg C threashold .
this is a recent development in the politics of climate. Please try to keep up.
“But that is just normal thinking human”
I doubt a reallygullible thing like you has even the remotest idea how a normal person thinks.
If last year way dead on the models (according to GISS, updated forcings and scenario 4.5 mean) and this year is less warm than last year, how can the models be dead on? That mean only ever goes up in climate models.
It never ceases to amaze me how some will accept something readily (warmest September) and yet completely ignore the reasoning and then prediction the scientist made.
The ensemble average of 97% of climate models is “dead on” one of several different global anomaly records.
How close does something have to be for you to call it “dead on”.
Gavin Schmidt’s attempt at post hoc adjustment of the model mean ” projection” to make it fit the climate record is a beautiful example the Texas sharpshooting. Dead on.
I’m not even sure why GISS are allowed to maintain a temperature series. They actually have models running in CMIP5. Fox guarding the hen house comes to mind.
No, its right on one run of one model – and maybe not even that, just the “average”. Or are you now claiming that all runs of all the models give the same forecasts?
Still cooling down from the last El Nino.
Your glee is premature.
The charts that I have seen put the peak of the recent El Nino as barely breaking the model mean.
We are now well below that point.
What is the estimate of global temp during the medeval period ?
Well, while you are all arguing this point and/or that, remember that these are TENTHS of a degree, not whole degrees. There is a VAST difference between 3 TENTHS of a degree in any direction and 3 WHOLE degrees in any direction. I doubt seriously that anyone can detect a change of 3 TENTHS of a degree, up or down.
The constant exaggeration of TENTHs of a degree as HOT or COLD is acquiring the scary quality of an empty paper towel tube. It is not hot or cold. It is barely even WARM or COOL.
What it really is is nothing more than a difference so minute that you can’t detect it without some instrument to tell you about it. And then there are those “glitches”, which are special ways of saying “not the results I wanted, so I’m saying GLITCH”.
Oh, look!! WOLF!!!!
Sara – October 2, 2017 at 9:04 pm
Right you are, Sara.
And I am damn sure that those NOAA and NASA satellites cannot detect a 3 TENTHS of a degree, up or down, variance in air temperatures at a specific altitude within an eight (8) kilometers column of air.
Most everyone gets “bedazzled” when they see/read the numbers (1, 3, 7, whatever), but they ignore the decimal points and the numeric value descriptors such as: tenths, hundredths, thousandths, meters, centimeters, millimeters, whatever.
We all know that the Historical Surface Temperature Record is FUBAR, ….. whereas the satellite temperature record is similarly calculated, ….. it also has to be FUBAR, …… to wit:
Excerpted from article:
Multiple satellites, ……. collecting multiple temperature data sets, …… with all data sets combined into one and “processed” ……. resulting in the calculation of an “average temperature” for the entirety of earth’s atmosphere and specified in “tenths of a degree C or F”.
Me thinks such an “exercise” gives new meaning to “junk science”.
This is probably much ado about nothing. However I would be willing to change my position from sceptic to believer should any real genuine actual evidence show up. In fact it would not require belief at that point.
I started as a believer, then realized how much the BBC was propagandizing all of us wth their scare stores. Shortly thereafter came ClimateGate, which really opened my eyes to the shenanigans and goings on behind the scenes. But, if in future decades it becomes clear that there is in fact a signal that is not noise, I would be quite willing to change my opinion. But I need facts, not supposition, not propaganda, not motivated reasoning. And no more scientists advocating policy. As Joss Whedon recently almost said “Once you declare yourself politically, you destroy your integrity.” Well, close enough 🙂
No, the integrity was already long gone. Declaring oneself an advocate simply means they are no longer even interested in pretending to be objective scientists.
They are the white knights of the climate crusade and they want full social recognition. This brings them more self-esteem than being boring old, bald-headed scientists.
Brings more self-esteem, and millions in grant money.
Nature is not a binary decision between believer (religion) and skeptic (science). Please don’t make it so.
There is something typical with those warm September months.
Below the same list of 10 warmest Septembers from the text above, but now chronologically with the ranking number behind. The list gives an interesting sequence.
2017 (1)
2016 (2)
2015 (6)
2013 (9)
2012 (10)
2010 (4)
2009 (5)
2005 (7)
1998 (3)
1995 (8)
Seven of the last 9 years (2009 – 2017) are the top 10 of the warmest Septembers since 1979. It seems that in the 2000’s summer on the NH has a strong effect on global September atmospheric temperatures.
Northern Hemisphere sea surface temperatures could play a role. As El Nino shows, sea surface temperatures seem to be the driver for atmospheric temperatures. Atmosphere follows sea surface temperatures.
As per 2 October 2017 the NH shows anomalous high sea surface temperatures and the SH shows anomalous low sea surface temperatures:
http://cci-reanalyzer.org/wx/DailySummary/#SST_anom
SST anomaly as per 2 Oct. 2017: NH + 0.63, SH – 0,07, World + 0.24 degrees C. A huge difference between NH and SH.
In contrast to the differences in anomalous sea surface temperatures, the atmosphere in both hemispheres seems to be well mixed. September 2017 UAH data show: NH + 0.51, SH + 0.57, Global + 0.54 degrees C. It looks like the sea surface of the NH was ventilating all that anomalous sea surface energy and ‘atmosphere’ was redistributing it.
The high Svalbard September temperatures (warm seas ventilating upward) seem to reflect that ventilation of energy of the warm NH sea surfaces. Upward air transport of warm air results in more downward air transport on the other side of the Earth where lowering cold air diminishes temperatures in Antarctica. As is shown by the map in the text.
Seven of the last 9 years (2009 – 2017) are the top 10 of the warmest Septembers since 1979.
It has been warming for the last 400 years. I’d expect nothing different.
(It has been cooling for the last 4,500,000,000 years!)
The relevant term in AGW is about 50 years, or put it another way, plot the temp as a function of CO2 concentration.
The relevancy of AGW is determined by temperature variations in the past and the coming future temperature. 130,000 years ago there was a very warm period, so I guess polar bears are not gonna die soon.
Instead, increased CO2 is very useful to keep humans from starving.
About .5 degree above the average of an arbitrary 30 year period does not mean the climate is warming.Unless we actually had the average of several 30 year periods we cannot say that this average was not cool. All this means is that we had a warm September. It is now October, and we have just had a blizzard in my part of the world. Minus 7 degrees Celsius outside my window right now with about 100 mm of snow on the ground.
The next 6 warmest non El Nino Septembers differ by a mere 0.05 degrees…and this year its suddenly 0.3 degrees warmer than all of them? What the heck is going on? I would hope for better explanations, now that its clear the Pause isn’t coming back. Whatta shock, alarmists are now updating their models to show how brilliant they are.
Well, I believe Christy and Spencer did their best. It just is warmer, and there is some yearly fluctuation going on. I happen to believe the total pause is over for years, but I also see the warming past 40 years is pretty mild compared to what Hansen told us 30 years ago to expect.
What’s the normal temperature in the Norwegian archipelago of Svalbard on 1 September and on 30 September with justification and 0.01°C accuracy please?
While waiting for the reply and based on cAGW evidence so far, the following can be projected:
The cAGW signal, lost in the cAGW pink noise over decades, will not only rise like a whack-a-mole in September 2017 climate-related shock, but it will be enough to ignore the 18 year plateau weather anomaly.
President Emmanuel Macron is betting 1.5 million euro packages from French taxpayers’ pockets for something like this to happen.
My question about the Norwegian archipelago of Svalbard normal temperature is intended to the climate faithful, Didn’t mean to aim it at you rgbact. Sorry.
Are you sure? My understanding was that they do not measure surface temperature at all.
It appears to me that the satellite is more sensitive to warming than it is to cooling. It appears more sensitive to El Nino events than it does to La Nina events.
I have speculated that this is because of convection, and hot air rising. When the ocean temperatures are anomalously warm there is more convection carrying warm air up to the altitude at which the satellite takes its measurements. When ocean temperatures are anomalously cool, there is less convection, and hence less transport up to the altitude at which the satellite takes its measurements. I do not know whether this is the explanation, just a thought, as to why the satellite data appears more sensitive to El Nino type events.
Finally, the particularly active hurricane season may also have impacted upon temperatures. If so, this factor will be lost in the coming months once the season is over and any lags have come to an end.
richard verney October 2, 2017 at 11:52 pm: “My understanding was that they do not measure surface temperature at all.”
See: http://www.drroyspencer.com/2010/01/how-the-uah-global-temperatures-are-produced/
WHAT LAYERS OF THE ATMOSPHERE ARE MEASURED?
http://www.drroyspencer.com/wp-content/uploads/AMSU-weighting-functions.gif
WR: The way I see it: whole layers are measured, from the surface upwards. At warming, (extra) convection makes (extra) vertical ‘heat islands’, a vertical heat column that is measured in every horizontal layer it passes. The character of El Nino is such that ‘deeply stored heat’ from the West Central Pacific is spread quickly over a much larger surface area of the ocean. Convection quickly can bring lots of energy upwards. The total cooling down of both atmospheric layers and of anomalous warm sea surfaces takes more time.
As soon as winds start blowing again and as a result both mixing of upper surface waters and large scale deep sea upwelling would restart, sea surfaces will cool again. But because a general warming effect first diminishes the gradient between equator and pole which results in a lower wind speed, after warming less wind can be expected until ‘other cooling processes’ diminished the gradient.
Thanks.
I need to consider matters in more detail.
But I still remain of the view that what is being presented in the common satellite data set is the lower troposphere global mean. This is something other than the surface, and it is the reason why radiosonde balloon data is used for calibration/checking..
It is one reason why one cannot directly compare the satellite data set, with the thermometer data reconstructions
But of course, since AGW theory is a top down effect, one would expect to see change first in the atmosphere, before on the ground, and one would expect to see more change (ie., faster and greater warming) in the atmosphere than on the ground.
Yet further still,the models are projection atmospheric warming not ground warming.
What’s the margin of error?
I can guarantee there were some areas that didn’t have the “warmest on record” (I believe there were some September snows: https://weather.com/forecast/national/news/mid-september-pattern-change-rockies-first-snow, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mZ30PE4LEcc, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sFzGX43wgY0). I should also say that it only takes one fairly hot day to throw off the average for a place that was cooler than normal (and ours started off pretty cool when it’s normally so hot schools let out.)
Total eyeball guess, but the warm anomaly areas seem to be very widely spread compared to other months. In other words lots of the globe is a little above rather than some areas being quite a bit above. There are also very few cold anamolies by eye. Is there any simple way of measuring that?
Presuming Gaia exists, she first power-vacuumed hypocrite Branson’s and dictator Castro’s tropical islands and now she gently warms arctic circle autumn and the human-habited southern hemisphere spring while paradoxically cooling her worshippers’ focal point West-Antarctica peninsula. Could she be trying to say something?
Pretty much on target for Australia we recorded our warmest ever winter up 2 degrees on normal. It was predicted by the BOM earlier in the year.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-09-01/australia-winter-2017-was-hot-dry-and-a-record/8862856
Rainfall was up and down depending where you were as per the rainfall decline map on the link.
Hottest ever but not very exciting.
That 2 deg above normal warmth was located over Queensland and most of the desert regions of Australia..were few thermometers exist and where no one lives. This typical in a developing La Nina winter due to stronger subtropical high pressure over N Australia. What the BOM does not tell you is that most of the population in S Australia shivered through a cool wet and windy winter. Aust Alps recorded the biggest snowfalls since 2000.
Yet Arctic ice bottomed out at over four Wadhams and Greenland ice cap accumulated record – ly. I’m breaking out the woolies.
Ha, honestly I’m surprised that WUWT would make a post showing that the models are right on the ball. To bad they’ll never make the jump and admit that the models are actually working just fine. Despite this pretty clear evidence!
Cheers
Ben
“would make a post showing that the models are right on the ball.”
WUWT haven’t .. and the temps are only remotely near the models after manic adjustments and re-centering the start-point.
You are seriously gullible if you believe Gavin’s propaganda pap. !!
Real unadjusted temperatures show 2017 year to date to be below 1998, 2016, and 2010.
Only in the highly corrupted Schmidt et al. fabrications do temperatures come anywhere near the models,
even then he had to use statistical farce to allow him to suck gullible twerps like you in.
“Real unadjusted temperatures show 2017 year to date to be below 1998, 2016, and 2010.”
Yes, of course they are, err (unadjusted) ……
http://www.drroyspencer.com/wp-content/uploads/V6-vs-v5.6-LT-1979-Mar2015.gif
You are surprised, because you would never see a post showing that models are out, on the poster board of your church of CAGW, would you ?
You obviously don’t know shit about models, if you think a good result is enough to prove they work fine. Unless of course you trust the soccer expertise of Paul the Octopus. Do you ?
Haha oh WUWT commenters, you never fail to deliver. Sorry sometimes I just can’t resist but I’ll admit that this post was a bit too much on the trollish side. My apologies to the mods. Cheers from an actual environmental scientist!
Ben
benben,as usual doesn’t have a cogent argument to make,just blow a lot of bull.
Here is that awesome warming rate since 2001 from RSS,
http://www.woodfortrees.org/graph/rss/from:2001/mean:12/plot/rss/from:2001/trend
It down to about .10C per decade rate now.
“Cheers from an actual environmental scientist!”
Cheers to you too from the Commander of the Starship Enterprise!
You’re so full of excrement your eyes are brown.
Ben,
Just what kind of “environmental science” do you practice, and where?
“Just what kind of “environmental science” do you practice”
The oxymoronic sort?
benben,simply doesn’t get it when the warming which is not disputed here,doesn’t support the AGW conjecture anyway.
Why?
Because the IPCC PER DECADE warming rate of .30C is not even close to being met.
since 1990,the predicted per decade warming rate has been about .30C
RSS shows it is about HALF that predicted rate,
http://www.woodfortrees.org/graph/rss/from:1990/mean:12/plot/rss/from:1990/trend
As usual warmists are ignoring the failure of the AGW conjecture.
Right one month, and the clueless troll immediately starts a victory lap.
I guess when so little has been going it’s way in recent decades it’s normal to hype the one bright spot.
What’s clueless are the folks who said temperatures would come down quickly now the the El Nino was over.
Is it not interesting if warming is wanted or not?
We find a large anomaly round Svalbard. Typical September temperatures are +0,3 Degrees Celsius. This September they had +4,9 C.
It is a bit less cold.
http://www.yr.no/place/Norway/Svalbard/Longyearbyen/statistics.html
You cannot add daily max+min then divide by 2 then collect a set then average it and claim that the final numeric figure has a real physical meaning with respect to a continually time varying second by second complicated ensemble of heat transfer processes involving a rotating rock with a swirling multi-layrered gaseous shell and heated by the sun. It’s scientific nonsense.
Even if you ever had a perfect model for the Earth’s atmosphere and all the processes in it it’s still scientific nonsense to “average” temperatures. Temperature is simply a measure of the state of a body at a specific point in time. Heat/energy FLOWS is what is relevant here, it’s a DYNAMIC system.
Every day of my life when I get up in the morning the temperature outside my own house is DIFFERENT to when I eat my breakfast, DIFFERENT to when I eat my lunch, and DIFFERENT to when I have my tea. (Yes, I am British!) .
Germany was cool in September.
‘Germany’s DWD national weather service has the preliminary September 2017 report out. According to the result of the data measured by the country’s 2000 weather stations, last month was cooler than normal.
‘September 2017 in Germany saw a mean temperature of 12.7°C, which was 4.2°C cooler than last year’s record warm September (16.9°C). This means that the month came in 0.8°C colder than the 1981-2010 mean.’
Notrickszone
ironicman
It shows as much in the UAH global map. UK/Ireland a little below average for September too, which I can confirm from experience. Portugal a little above average for September, which I can also confirm from experience.
Seems like the UAH map is pretty reliable. Put all those global bits and pieces together and you still get the warmest September *globally* in the UAH TLT record.
The NAO is slightly on the negative side, which might explain the anomaly.
http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/precip/CWlink/pna/nao_index.html
“Seems like the UAH map is pretty reliable.”
Averting the most obvious political difficulties perhaps, but reliability is a completely different ballgame. Unless of course a recognised authority in the organised movement yet to be sustainably baptised can provide the normal temperatures with 0.01 °C precision and accuracy, for defined altitude, time and coordinates on the Earth. It should be a particularly interesting record for the vast expanses of our planet with 0 inhabitants per square kilometre – not limited only to oceans, deserts and mountaintops – even with recent tools such as satellites and weather balloons.
Why is it always ‘hottest ever’ somewhere else, never where I am?
Just reading a book that describing the arctic melt of 1817! Don’t think they were flying jumbos or driving SUVs back then.
Hottest on record, not ever.
Satellites measure since 1979. In 1817 there were no SUVs and no Satellites.
Natural oscillations driving the temps some degrees up and down. We are just not sure, if CO2 adds some few tenths or not.
So Svalbard is four and a half degrees warmer and Alexander Island in Antarctica is five and a half degrees colder and we are supposed to add up these and all the others in the world, create some imaginary average from it then go into panic mode because that average is point 2 of a degree warmer than the previous imaginary average. Meanwhile CO2 goes up a bit more and the Planet gets greener. Remind me why I should panic and cover the Earth in subsidized boondoggles ……Unless, of course, I live on Alexander Island and I am not a penguin nor an Australian Climate scientist surrounded by my own warming glow of self righteousness.
A world average temperature is quite ridiculous, but we’ll have to live with that until regional cooling signals become too numerous to ignore.
ironicman, some Volcanoes spewing ash can alter the prevalence of thought that Co2 is the scapegoat. It’s a lucre at iv concept that governments can impose a Carbon Tax on a Non-Visible gas. Ignoring the Black Carbon on the Greenland Ice Cap. Historically…
Year without summer: 200 years ago, the season passed the province …
http://www.cbc.ca/news/canada/new-brunswick/year-without-summer-200-1.4239701
Aug 9, 2017 – But this year marks the 200th anniversary of the return of summer to New Brunswick, … Prince Edward Island · Nova Scotia · Newfoundland & Labrador · North … never knew snow in summer before, never was there such weather. … It even went so far as to mandate the size and price for loaves of bread to …
A world average temperature is quite ridiculous, but it’s better to take an average instead of sticking to a temperature of a single place.
Gerald we are aware that large volcanic eruptions have an effect on temperatures for a year or so, but the real impact on temperatures should come from a quiet sun.
The Klimatariat say the solar influence is negligible, even though its well documented that the NAO gets its marching orders from sol.
So when the oscillations fall into place we should get a rerun of cold winters in Europe similar to the early 1960s and it will then be game, set and match for AGW catastrophism.
Naturbaumeister as a sun worshipper I think it would be more productive to break the world up into regions and look for trends in temperature and precipitation.
Michael Mann once commented that the LIA started regionally, so we need to be aware of what the oscillations are doing at any given time and come up with a global cooling forecast.
The plateau in temperatures for a couple of decades is coming to an end and a Gleissberg Minimum is on the horizon, a non catastrophic tipping point which cannot be ignored.
@naturbaumeister
an average, if you want, but which average, and why? There are plenty of averages, depending on the weighting you use… and the data you really have! You don’t turn insufficiently sampled data (both in time and geography) into a meaning full information just by averaging.
Actually we are not talking temperature. We are talking about some index based on some temperatures. this index may be relevant (or not !), but it is NOT a temperature. The index may be increasing, but how this translate into climate is still a mystery
Once again, the culprit of greater atmospheric temperatures are the oceans. What warms the oceans warms the atmosphere. Can anyone explain how CO2 can warm the oceans? Unless someone can explain how more CO2 results in more visible radiation reaching the oceans, I think there is a problem with the AGW theory. What warms the oceans warms the atmosphere, and it isn’t CO2 or IR between 12 and 18 microns.
Yep, spot on.
Could Nick or Mosher or anyone else for that matter, please go through the mathematics of how another 10 or 20 ppm of CO2 on a background of 40,000 ppm of water vapor can put additional heat into the tropical Pacific Ocean to any kind of depth? Is this the biggest quantitation error ever in the entire history of science or have cosmologist nincompoops got these climate nincompoops beat ??
50 orders of magnitude off ?? Who’s counting anyway ??
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The sea absorbs an average of 160W/m2 of sunlight. GHGs don’t change that. But that 160W/m2 can’t remain in the sea, else they would boil. The sea has to become warm enough so that the 160 W/m2 is lost, much by radiation.
CO2 increases down IR onto the surface. The sea then has to get warmer still, because it has to emit a net 160 W/m2, over and above the received IR.
“50 orders of magnitude” ??
That’s a big quantification error.
Nick Stokes October 3, 2017 at 3:21 pm: “CO2 increases down IR onto the surface”
WR: Nick Stokes, how many percent increase of down IR can we expect from 100 ppm extra CO2 as the air already has on average 40,000 ppm water vapour and 400 ppm CO2?
“how many percent increase of down IR”
As GHG increases, there are two effects that increase down IR. One is simply that the air is warmer. That means that all GHGs, including water, radiate more.
The other is that the lower boundary of the CO2 emission zone is lower in altitude, and so warmer. This is separate from the effect of warming of the atmosphere.
Nick Stokes: “That means that all GHGs, including water, radiate more.”
WR: The above is not an answer on my question: “Nick Stokes, how many percent increase of down IR can we expect from 100 ppm extra CO2 as the air already has on average 40,000 ppm water vapour and 400 ppm CO2?” So far I can only conclude that there is no scientific answer on the question of “how many percent “.
To make it a bit more complicated (sorry, this matter IS complicated) I have got another question. You stated: “CO2 increases down IR onto the surface.” (Nick Stokes October 3, 2017 at 3:21 pm). Because radiation is random in direction, CO2 also increases UP radiation. Indeed, direction ‘space’. My second question is, what is the net radiation effect of up and down IR by that 100 ppm of extra CO2, is it upwards or downwards? And of course I want to know: how many percent of extra net radiation will result in that specific direction?
Nature is a Freak Show of Un-predictability, notwithstanding that an Industry has developed on Mitigation of Co2. Universities have Re-Branded Environmental Studies to Climate Warming. Government Ministries have done the same adding the catch phrase “Global Warming” to their Environment Portfolio’s. The Prophets of Doom are wearing Horse Blinders ignoring the recent dramatic fluxes. Ref:
Given the cold water going into winter, the current “Ice Breaking Fleet …
https://wattsupwiththat.com/2014/…/given-the-cold-water-going-into-winter-the-curre…
Oct 16, 2014 – great-lakes-ice-feb-6-2014 With the Great Lakes at 92% ice coverage during the winter of 2013-2014 and far below … The Great Freeze Over The Great Lakes · Cold winter may actually cause Great Lakes water levels to rise ….. If the presented graph were current, and it should be, it would show the current …
Water has a thousandfold higher heat storage capacity than air. IR from the atmosphere cannot penetrate water, but sunlight can. Sunlight is only controled by cloud cover – so this is the main temperature control knob.
The temperature of the top layer of some meters of the oceans run quite parallel with air temps – or vice versa.
Excuse my sense of mandatory urgency, but I’ll get back to you in 10 years.
Oh no. The world is a half-degree C above average!!! We’re doomed! Doooooommmmmmed…
Margins of error? Tell me about all the adjustments used in the calculations, the associated margins of error and the cumulative margin of error. Then we can talk about what, if anything, these measurements tell us.
Why do climate scientists almost never seem to address the margin of error issue?
Indeed Patrick B, the error bands far exceed any change from average. Satellites of course don’t ‘measure’ temperatures, they use ‘models’ to interpret atmospheric readings which are interpreted as being likely to mean temperatures are such and such. An intelligent species looking at humans using complicated computer models to justify other complicated computer models must think we are completely nuts.
Anyway my personal global warming has deserted me. I can definitely confirm the ‘blue’ over SW France and soon myself and my wife will be going to Florida where I note its almost ‘blue’. Why have you forsaken me, oh godlike CO2 molecule??
Christy explained it all quite well. This higher value is due to being in the +AMO while having El Nino conditions in the tropical Pacific for about 3 months.
The El Nino conditions affect temperature about 3 months later as Bill Illis has pointed out many times. That should just about be over. You could see the effect on surface temperatures which was almost immediate in the CFSR data. If you look at that data you can see the bump in temperatures and the fact they have recently fallen.
The AMO has its largest effect in the NH winter by keeping sea ice levels lower and allowing the oceans to vent heat. We will probably see a drop in the UAH anomaly in October and November. After that it depends on whether a La Nina forms but even then it will be fighting the warming effect of the +AMO.
Interesting CFSR says its 6th and Oct is off to the coolest start since the super nino. CFSR is the model initialization of global temps every 6 hours. I suspect this will come down quite a bit as the la nina evolves
“degrees C warmer than 30-year September average”
Can’t we just tell people the actual temperature? That would be so much less confusing.
“actual temperature?” Where? UAH is measuring from near surface to high troposphere.
And so much less useful. The change is what matters. And don’t change the way you measure it or process the measurements. Both HIE and satellite drift change the way you measure it. The processing of the raw data needs to compensate objectively for these changes in measurement.
FWIW, Toronto here.
80 years of data, September 2017 was the 6th “hottest” month (direct median temp, not +/- 20 year avg)
Rank
2002 1
2003 17
2004 8
2005 5
2006 39
2007 9
2008 18
2009 20
2010 28
2011 13
2012 30
2013 35
2014 23
2015 2
2016 3
2017 6
Thing is, we set record highs from the 23rd to the 27th, but the rest of the month was cooler than normal. No “cold” records set, but this certainly demonstrates the unreliability of using “records” to measure anything.
More “weather”. The temperature at my house this month went from a high of 33.8 C to a low of minus 7.7 C. A record high one day and record lows shortly thereafter. Records of some sort are set somewhere every day. Considering much of our monitoring is only decades old, it’s pretty hard to distinguish climate from weather except when using a certain WMO policy which doesn’t really reduce certaintly at all. Expect Climate – but weather is what you get. So much ado about nothing.
Nevertheless I read and learn.
Useless factoid from the depths of my withering brain. “Gossip” is said to derive from the British habit of going for a sip in the afternoon to talk and imbibe and eventually the word “Gossip” was derived from this pastime. True or not, it makes a good story.
I suspect a great deal of Climate Science has been derived in this way. m 😉
Link
https://www.wunderground.com/personal-weather-station/dashboard?ID=IALBERTA501#history/s20170903/e20171003/mmonth