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Tom Curtis at 00:44 AM on 7 November 2011Eschenbach and McIntyre - Seeing the BEST part of the Satellite Temperature Record?
Camburn @18, your post continues the off topic discussion you seem intent on pursuing. If you wish to take the discussion to where it is on topic, I'll happily participate. As it stands I will merely observe that you draw your conclusion on the sole basis that you do not accept other theories. You have in no way shown the evidence supports it. If you want to give your reasons why the gradual recovery of ozone from the destruction due to sulfuric aerosols from a volcano (the only long term effect of volcanoes on the stratosphere) is a significant warming factor, while the gradual recovery of ozone from destruction by anthropogenic chlorofluorocarbons is not in an appropriate thread, I'll be all ears. In the mean time, could you keep on topic in this thread. -
Tom Curtis at 00:36 AM on 7 November 2011Global Surface Temperature: Going Down the Up Escalator, Part 1
JMurphy @48, I am going to go out on a limb here, and disagree with both Dikran Marsupial and Tamino. (That may be more akin to going out on a limb and then sawing of the branch on the trunk side;). IMO, Judith Curry is (almost) making sense in that post. The key point is that you can ask many different questions of a given data set. They may not be sensible questions, but you can still ask them. Given that, it is important that (apart from measurement error) what constitutes noise depends on the question you ask. If you ask the most obvious question, "What is the long term trend?", then small variations introduced by temporary or short term cyclical events like volcanic eruptions, ENSO and the sunspot cycle are noise. In that case, the short term data is dominated by noise, and short term trends in the data tell us very little, if anything, about the future long term change in temperature. That is the question Tamino, and Dikran are asking. Unsurprisingly (in one respect) Judith Curry agrees with them. She writes:"If one is seeking to identify an anthropogenic signal, one should choose years at each end point that are neutral in terms of ENSO and also the 9.1 year AMO signal discussed by Muller et al. For a short temperature record (i.e. of relevance to assessing whether there has been a pause over the past decade), this isn’t feasible. In any event, identifying an AGW signal on this short timescale isn’t useful."
That is basically correct. You cannot identify the anthropogenic signal (ie, the long term trend) over short time scales. I think you can correctly quibble about her reasons given. Lack of statistical significance (Tamino and Dikran) is more important than finding corresponding conditions (Curry) both because finding corresponding conditions across multiple variables is rare even over the long term, and because we cannot be certain of which factors determine temperature and over the short term correspondence in the limited number of variables on which we are fairly certain does not necessarily mean correspondence on all conditions. Further, saying "identifying an AGW signal on this short timescale isn’t useful" is an odd turn of phrase. Of course identifying the AGW signal would be useful. What it is not, in the short term, is practicable. However, Curry then goes on to ask a very different question:"What is of interest on this timescale is whether natural variability (forced and unforced) can dominate the AGW signal on decadal timescales and produce a ‘pause’ or a ‘stop’."
In my own terms, the question is, are the short term variations of temperature due to temporary or short term cyclical events of similar slope to the long term trend introduced by anthropogenic forcings? I am not saying this is a useful question, but it is certainly one you can ask. And because it asks a question about the relation between short term effects on temperature and the long term effect, neither are noise. For this question, the only things that would count as noise are measurement error, and a change in the long term trend. Such a change would prevent us from knowing whether any "pause" or "stop" was due to short term variations or to a change in the long term trend, and thus prevent a comparison of the two. Therefore Curry's question only makes sense on the assumption that the long term trend is continuing unabated. Now, fairly obviously, if the slope of the long term trend was similar in value to the slopes that would induced in the temperature by short term variations in a stationary climate, then when those short term slopes are negative, the data will show little or no positive slope, whereas when the stationary short term trends alone are positive, the data will show positive slopes nearly twice the value of the long term trend. This is where Curry comes unstuck. Because short term effects can effect the slope of the data in both directions, both positive and negative slopes are relevant to this question. Further, because not all short term effects have the same absolute magnitude, the correct way to answer this question is by a statistical analysis of all short term trends of a given length over the period in question. If you were to analyze the data correctly for this question, you would be interested in the fact that the trend in the data from January 1998 to March 2010 is 0.22 degrees C per decade, 0.5 degrees C per decade then the 30 year trend to the same period. But you would also be interested in the fact that the trend from Sept 1995 to Dec 2007 (ie, the same duration as the 1998-2010 trend) was 0.46 degrees C per decade. Curiously Curry shows no interest in this fact. I think the reason is straightforward. She wants to give cover to (or keep on side; or maintain an open dialogue with) the people who are trying to ask the wholly illegitimate question of, "Has the long term trend stopped?" Illegitimate, of course (and solely because) the short term trends do not give enough information to answer the question. That is because, for this question short term temperature effects (such as ENSO) are noise. Indeed, earlier in the week it seemed like Curry was asking this question too. She seems now to have changed he tune to give herself a cloak of intellectual integrity, but does not pursue the question she is purporting to ask in any sort of legitimate way. -
muoncounter at 00:29 AM on 7 November 2011Eschenbach and McIntyre - Seeing the BEST part of the Satellite Temperature Record?
Camburn: "why a layer of Earth's upper atmosphere went through its biggest contraction in 43 years." Or it could be based on this observation from 2009: Careful measurements by several NASA spacecraft show that the sun's brightness has dropped by 0.02% at visible wavelengths and 6% at extreme UV wavelengths since the solar minimum of 1996. The changes so far are not enough to reverse the course of global warming, but there are some other significant side-effects: Earth's upper atmosphere is heated less by the sun and it is therefore less "puffed up." -
muoncounter at 00:23 AM on 7 November 2011Watts, Surface Stations and BEST
Bob L#51: "On a hot, summer day, the overlying air will be cooler." Back in August, I measured the mid afternoon air temperature in my backyard with in IR thermometer - 108 F. At the same time, the temp of the dead grass in the full sun was 138 F. Clearly the ground temp is not an equilibrium temperature and is therefore not a relevant measurement to this question (it does help explain the dead grass, though). -
Camburn at 00:09 AM on 7 November 2011Eschenbach and McIntyre - Seeing the BEST part of the Satellite Temperature Record?
Thank you Glenn @ 16&17. I have read both your explanations as reasons as well as others. It is clearly evident that a large erruption has a long term influence on the stratosphere. The question becomes how long does this influence last. We can observe that in the past 20 years the temperature has been stable, within error bars. -
JMurphy at 22:18 PM on 6 November 2011Global Surface Temperature: Going Down the Up Escalator, Part 1
Another odd thing from Curry, from her website, which Dikran (as well as one or two others) have queried over there, is this assertion :A key issue in identifying and interpreting the pause is the start date chosen to evaluate a pause. If one is seeking to identify an anthropogenic signal, one should choose years at each end point that are neutral in terms of ENSO and also the 9.1 year AMO signal discussed by Muller et al. For a short temperature record (i.e. of relevance to assessing whether there has been a pause over the past decade), this isn’t feasible. In any event, identifying an AGW signal on this short timescale isn’t useful. What is of interest on this timescale is whether natural variability (forced and unforced) can dominate the AGW signal on decadal timescales and produce a ‘pause’ or a ‘stop’. This is the issue addressed by Santer et al., searching for the AGW signal amidst the natural variability noise. Santer et al. argue that “Our results show that temperature records of at least 17 years in length are required for identifying human effects on global-mean tropospheric temperature.” So in this context, starting the analysis in 1998 is not unreasonable.
Can anyone understand how all that allows her to start her analysis "in 1998" ? Or is just another case of her own words being misinterpreted (again) - whatever she really means ? -
Glenn Tamblyn at 20:55 PM on 6 November 2011Eschenbach and McIntyre - Seeing the BEST part of the Satellite Temperature Record?
Camburn @8. Looking at the TTS, TUS & TMS cuarves after the peak one tends to see the volcanic peak, then a dip below the trend line that recovers after several years. Suggesting that the impact of the eruptions on the stratosphere takes longer to fade away than in the Troposphere. This isn't too surprising at one level. If a major event can inject some sort of change into the Stratosphere the significant mixing timne delay between Troposphere and Stratosphere could easily mean that 'clearing' the effect could take a number of years. As to what might be 'injected' into the stratosphere, I can speculate about 2 possibilities: Water vapour is injected into the stratosphere where it might have a disproportionate impact. Or, as a result of some unknown process, the eruption might have an impact on the availability of OH Radicals in the Stratosphere and thus the conversion of Methane to H2O. Both seem at least possible, but beyond that these are just conjectures on my part. -
MA Rodger at 20:52 PM on 6 November 2011Global Surface Temperature: Going Down the Up Escalator, Part 1
Hey! I was just updating some climate graphs (as I do) when a whole new aspect of skeptic cherry-picking showed itself. We know that any meaningful regression or smoothing exercise demonstrates a continual rise in global temperatures. And we know this is why skeptics have to cherry-pick the data to get any chance of it supporting their delusions. One feature of the temperature record they regularly home in on is the prominence of the 1998 ENSO-induced temperature maximum and that is all that matters – the peak global temperature 13 years ago. And with such a ripe cherry, it is logical to say that the world has been cooling ever since 1998. But this is also cherry-picking in the sense that it is only half the story. These skeptics concentrate their so-call analysis solely on the maxima within the global temperature record. The rest of it they do not even notice – I can't think why. We all call what we're doing to the climate “global warming” but it is the nature of GHGs not to warm us but to prevent us from cooling down. It should be called “global not-cooling-down” and with not-cooling-down the issue, perhaps those clever skeptics should turn their enormous analytical power on minima rather than just maxima. So is there any evidence that we are getting less cool? The answer looks a pretty convincing 'No'. Year minima value 1976 -0.29 1978 -0.07 1982 0.00 El Chich'on 1985 -0.06 1988 +0.09 Mt Pinatuba 1992 +0.05 1996 +0.13 2000 +0.26 2008 +0.29 This data (which is HadCRUT3 rolling annual average) is probably best seen graphically. The link here should allow that. HadCRUT3 & ENSO graph The only times the minima pause in their upward march is after a big volcano. Without a volcano blowing there is zero evidence of any pause in the warming, let alone the cooling so often alleged by those skeptic folk.Response:[DB] For convenience, here's the graph linked to above:
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Glenn Tamblyn at 20:48 PM on 6 November 2011Eschenbach and McIntyre - Seeing the BEST part of the Satellite Temperature Record?
Camburn Note the series from TTS, TUS & TMS at the top of the Star graphic - my apologies for the poor quality, the colour scheme used by Star & shrinking it to fit the SkS format has reduced its clarity. You could look at the Star original for more detail. What it shows is that cooling over much of the stratosphere is more clear-cut than in the lower stratosphere with Volcanic eruptions having less of an impact. But that is a secondary point. The key issue is that in considering what the temperature anomaly for the Upper Troposphere is at any point in time, we need to take the corresponding anomaly in the lower Stratosphere into account. How the stratosphere came to have that value isn't relevent to interpreting what is happening in the Upper Troposphere. -
LewisC at 16:03 PM on 6 November 2011Extreme Melting on Greenland Ice Sheet, Reports CCNY Team
DB - my thanks for your response and my apology for straying too far off topic - I hadn't realised how rigorous are the thread parameters here on SkS. My thanks too for your invitation to write up these ideas for consideration as a guest post - which I'd be glad to make time for. Regards, Lewis -
Stanmck at 15:44 PM on 6 November 2011Is there a case against human caused global warming in the peer-reviewed literature? Part 1
Friends of Science volunteers. Dr. Tim Patterson - Not included in WoS. Dr. Chris de Freitas - One peer-reviewed paper. Dr. Madhav Khandekar - No peer-reviewed papers. Not the international status Director Ken Gregory has been advertising. -
Bob Loblaw at 15:20 PM on 6 November 2011Watts, Surface Stations and BEST
In #50, I talked about what it takes to get a good measurement of air temperature. But what does air temperature tell us? That depends on where we measure it. Anyone that has walked around in bare feet on a sunny summer day knows that actual ground surface temperature varies greatly. Bare concrete? Hot. Wet grass? Cool. Dry grass? Somewhere in between. But what about the overlying air? On a hot, summer day, the overlying air will be cooler. In fact, with at least a gentle breeze so that we have some mechanical turbulence, the temperature will decrease logarithmically with height - the change from 25cm to 50cm, will be about the same as the change from 50cm to 1m, or 1m to 2m. This decrease in temperature will be related to the rate at which thermal energy is being transported away from the surface into the air. Another characteristic is that as you move away from the surface, the air temperature becomes dependent on the surface temperature over a wider and wider area. With a wind, it is basically dependent on the surface that is upwind of the location. A rough rule of thumb is that at 1m height the air temperature is dependent on the upwind surface of 100-200m distance. What climatologists call "surface temperature" is really an abbreviation for "surface air temperature", and is typically measured at a height of 1.5m (IIRC). So, this "air temperature" represents a fairly large area. It is desirable to keep this area uniform, so that things like wind direction don't cause shifts in what the air temperature is responding to (or representing). This is how siting can affect temperature readings, as a station with different surface conditions will experience a different air temperature. ...but again, the use of anomalies in global temperature trends means that any bias at a particular station won't affect the trend unless the bias is changing. -
Dave123 at 14:59 PM on 6 November 2011Global Surface Temperature: Going Down the Up Escalator, Part 1
(cross posted with excisions from Tamino's blog) I’m reading Kahneman’s new book “Thinking, Fast and Slow”. (Nobel prize in economics 2002.) I think part of the cognitive problem is that we have teh ol’ eyecrometer….we’re can’t turn it off and it says “10 year pause”. Kahenman points out that it’s experimentally demonstrated that humans are terrible intuitive statisticians, especially for small samples. Those of us trained to ignore the eyecrometer don’t “see” a 10 year pause….those without the training don’t get why we don’t trust our eyes or theirs. -
Bob Loblaw at 14:57 PM on 6 November 2011Watts, Surface Stations and BEST
Coming into the fray a bit late.... Let's start with part of the first paragraph of the post:"It has been known since its invention that when using a thermometer to record weather, siting is of vital importance. It was also known that a thermometer could not measure air temperature accurately unless it was shielded from precipitation and direct sunlight. One device used to shield thermometers is the Stevenson Screen.
The physics of this is also well understood. To start, the only thing you can measure accurately with a thermometer is the temperature of the thermometer. To do anything useful, you have to find a way to get the thermometer temperature close to the temperature of the thing you're interested in. In our case, we are interested in air temperature. A thermometer has an energy balance. There are three primary forms of energy transfer we are concerned with: - radiation - thermal transfer - evaporation We can express this energy balance as follows:C*dT/dt = Q* + QH + QE
where C is the heat capacity of the thermometer, dT/dt is the rate of temperature change of the thermometer with time (i.e., how fast is it warming or cooling?), Q* is the net radiation (sum of received visible and IR, minus losses of visible and IR), QH is the rate of thermal energy transfer between the air and the thermometer, and QE is the loss of energy due to evaporation from the thermometer. QH depends on the temperature difference between the air and the thermometer. Obviously, if we want to measure air temperature, we want this term to equal zero. We also want the thermometer temperature to be stable (at least, as stable as air temperature is), so we want dT/dt to equal zero. How do we accomplish this? Well, we want to block radiation, so that Q* = 0, and we want to keep the thermometer dry, so that QE = 0, So then we have C*dT/dt = Q* = QE = 0, and thus QH = 0 and our thermometer gives a good measurement of air temperature. If we have a radiation error (Q* > 0), then our thermometer reads high. If our thermometer gets wet (QE > 0), then our thermometer cools until QH = -QE. Keep it good and wet, and compare it to a dry bulb thermometer, and you can measure the humidity of the air (see Wikipedia Wet bulb temperature discussion). So, what is needed for good air temperature measurements is some form of radiation shield, a way of keeping the thermometer dry, and a way of making sure air flows over the thermometer. The Stevenson Screen is the classic (although many other devices exist). In olden days, Stevenson Screens were often left to use natural ventilation, but now days all the ones I've seen use forced ventilation (a fan and air intake). Forced ventilation is a requirement for wet bulb/dry bulb humidity measurements, and it helps bring a thermometer to rapid equilibrium and reduces radiation errors for a normal temperature system. If a sensor has errors (e.g. radiation), then a long-term trend in temperature requires that the error change over time. This is why anomalies are used instead of actual temperatures. I'm going to give away my age, but my bookshelf includes the second edition (1990) of Principles of Environmental Physics. I see there is a third edition available. The first edition was published in 1973. Many, many useful discussions of such basic micrometeorology. I'll make my next point in another comment. -
skywatcher at 14:28 PM on 6 November 2011Eschenbach and McIntyre - Seeing the BEST part of the Satellite Temperature Record?
Camburn, you posted a source just as I commented above, thanks for the source but it does not support your statement. -
skywatcher at 14:27 PM on 6 November 2011Eschenbach and McIntyre - Seeing the BEST part of the Satellite Temperature Record?
Camburn, you're still not providing a source that supports your statement. From your link: "An increase in CO2 could be one reason why a layer of Earth's upper atmosphere went through its biggest contraction in 43 years." I'd also be intrigued as to how the mysterious Dr Svelsgaard could attribute a 30-year declining trend (or any 'plateau' since Pinatubo) to a solar cycle which began in 2008? -
Camburn at 14:25 PM on 6 November 2011Eschenbach and McIntyre - Seeing the BEST part of the Satellite Temperature Record?
Thanks skywatcher. Glad that I could be valuable to you as I posted the link, but really did think this was common knowledge. -
skywatcher at 14:19 PM on 6 November 2011Eschenbach and McIntyre - Seeing the BEST part of the Satellite Temperature Record?
Unsupported assertions like Camburn's in #7 really need to be highlighted to show that they are as valuable as me suggesting that there are fairies at the bottom of my garden. -
skept.fr at 14:18 PM on 6 November 2011Watts, Surface Stations and BEST
Like Watts, no qualification in climate or meteo. But I clearly don’t understand the point. My problem is not the IR photo in particular, but what is measured by the thermometer. I imagine a sensor, in the middle of a field. First case, nothing happen around the field from 1970 to 2010. Second case, the field is progressively surrounded by houses, roads, factories, etc. There are no other change except these local ones. Because the sensor is shielded in a box, it will be absolutely indifferent to change in sensible and latent heat fluxes in the environment, or radiative changes from albedo ou local GHG concentrations ? And the sensor will not register any temperature difference in the two cases, after 40 years of differential land-use?? But... what is measured by the sensor??? Totally weird for me. -
Camburn at 14:17 PM on 6 November 2011Eschenbach and McIntyre - Seeing the BEST part of the Satellite Temperature Record?
dana1981@9: Do you have an open source for the paper presented in this link? It is behind a paywall but there may be a copy that you have read?Response:[DB] Try here.
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Camburn at 14:13 PM on 6 November 2011Eschenbach and McIntyre - Seeing the BEST part of the Satellite Temperature Record?
Per DB request at 7: I thought everyone who reads would know about this: Eathers shrinking atomosphereResponse:[DB] Perhaps you should look into what the thermosphere is...and isn't. Like it's not the stratosphere, for one. You are being off-topic. Cease.
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barry1487 at 14:06 PM on 6 November 2011Watts, Surface Stations and BEST
logicman, the link to Fall et al 2011 in your article is broken. Replace it with this one. http://pielkeclimatesci.files.wordpress.com/2011/07/r-367.pdfResponse:[DB] Updated link, thanks!
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dana1981 at 13:50 PM on 6 November 2011Eschenbach and McIntyre - Seeing the BEST part of the Satellite Temperature Record?
Camburn, please actually read the link I posted @5. Ozone is only one of many factors impacting stratospheric temperatures. Part 2 of 'going down the up the escalator' will also address "skeptic" misconceptions about "step changes" in temperature. -
Camburn at 13:49 PM on 6 November 2011Eschenbach and McIntyre - Seeing the BEST part of the Satellite Temperature Record?
Tom: TUS, TMS and TLS were on a very substantial cooling path till Mr. Pinatubo. Since the time of erruption, for whatever the reason, the cooling virtually stopped. I don't know why, I have not been able to find out why. I have read numerous reasons as to why, but upon close examintation they didn't make sense, to me at least. If you know the reason I am all ears to learn.Response:[DB] "If you know the reason I am all ears to learn."
Read the links you were given; questions, if any, may be placed there.
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Camburn at 13:45 PM on 6 November 2011Eschenbach and McIntyre - Seeing the BEST part of the Satellite Temperature Record?
composer99@4: The whole atmosphere has contracted because of the drop in the solar wind. Dana1981@5: Yes, I have looked. From this article, and others, it does not seem that ozone has recovered enough to warm the strat. NASA article concerning ozoneResponse:[DB] "The whole atmosphere has contracted because of the drop in the solar wind."
Citation, please. Or is this yet another assertion without evidence from you?
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Tom Curtis at 13:35 PM on 6 November 2011Eschenbach and McIntyre - Seeing the BEST part of the Satellite Temperature Record?
Camburn @3, I see that when it comes to the stratosphere, fake "skeptics" like to go down the up elevator. As it happens, volcanic events warm the stratosphere. Mount Pinatubo is responsible for the sudden peak in temperatures (most obvious in the upper stratosphere). A sudden peak, is obviously a poor explanation of a supposed cooling step change. -
Tom Curtis at 13:30 PM on 6 November 2011It's the sun
jpenhall 46: What an incredibly poorly informed screed. It should be noted that the IPCC has examined potential additional effects from the sun such as the purported effects of Galactic Cosmic Rays (modulated by the solar magnetic field). However, most of the items on your list have no known causal mechanism whereby they could effect climate. Why changes of the length of the day should cause warming or cooling is completely unexplained, but you are here to criticize climate scientists, not for ignoring your alternative theory, but for not inventing it for you as well. Further, some of the items are not even solar related. For example the Lunar Nodal Cycle is, surprise surprise, a Lunar, not a solar effect. More bizzare is the inclusion of Bond Cycles (conjectured climate cooling events) as being a solar cycle. They may be, but the evidence for that has not been presented, and simply naming a climate cycle as a solar cycle is not evidence. Tellingly you equate the Bond cycle to warming events, whereas it is a cycle of cooling events with a quasi-periodicity of 1470 years. Of course, given that Bond events are multi-century events and that the last one peeked 1400 years ago, if they theory of Bond Cycles is any good, we should be in the middle of a massive cooling event at the moment, not a warming one. Ignoring all theory, however, you simply take the name, invert the sign and suppose that it is coming centuries early (based on your incorrect suposition that the MWP being the last event) as an explanation of the modern warming because, evidently, for you straw is preferable to following the clear evidence of anthropogenic global warming. -
dana1981 at 13:28 PM on 6 November 2011Eschenbach and McIntyre - Seeing the BEST part of the Satellite Temperature Record?
Canmburn @3 - you haven't found an explanation for the flattening of stratospheric temperature? Have you looked for one? I think it's pretty common knowledge that ozone recovery has a warming effect on the stratosphere, for example. We discussed the subject briefly here, for example. Composer @4 has identified another post in which we discussed the issue. It's important to note that overall, the stratospheric cooling has been very steep, even moreso that the surface and tropospheric warming. -
Composer99 at 13:25 PM on 6 November 2011Eschenbach and McIntyre - Seeing the BEST part of the Satellite Temperature Record?
Camburn: See fingerprints 8, 9, and 10 in this post for links to scientific literature on stratospheric cooling. -
Camburn at 13:21 PM on 6 November 2011Eschenbach and McIntyre - Seeing the BEST part of the Satellite Temperature Record?
Thank you Tom: I would like to have noted the step change in temperature of the stratosphere when Mr. Pinatubo errupted. Since that erruption, the strat has not cooled nor warmed but remained flat. I have no explanation for this and have not found a credible source to explain why this is happening. -
Composer99 at 13:19 PM on 6 November 2011Chinese translation of The Scientific Guide to Global Warming Skepticism
Resources such as this one show why Skeptical Science remains one of the best online resources about climate science and the pseudo-skepticism surrounding it. -
Rob Honeycutt at 13:04 PM on 6 November 2011Eschenbach and McIntyre's BEST Shot at the Surface Temperature Record
muon... Ah, I see you're an Iron Chef fan too. :-) -
jpenhall46 at 12:44 PM on 6 November 2011It's the sun
The mention of solar irradiance points to another major failing of climate models: that they totally ignore the sun, which is the source of all the energy in the world, except for minor contributions from the molten core of the planet and the decay of radioactive elements. The Total Solar Irradiance (TSI) varies in an 11 year sunspot cycle, during which the sun builds up from a small to a large number of sunspots, which then again decline in number. The importance of the Solar cycle for climate on earth is convincingly demonstrated by the Maunder Minimum, which saw the lowest temperatures of the Little Ice Age. During one 30-year period within the Maunder Minimum, astronomers observed only about 50 sunspots, as opposed to a more typical 40,000-50,000 spots in modern times. The IPCC discounted the significance of the sun for increasing temperatures, because there has been only a 0.1% increase in TSI since the seventeenth century. But, as Carter (2010: 48-50) pointed out, this is to forget the other ways in which the sun can influence climate: • Variations in the intensity of the sun’s magnetic field with cycles including the Schwabe (eleven year), Hale (22 years) and Gleissberg (70-90 years). • Effect of the sun’s plasma and electromagnetic fields on rates of the earth’s rotation, and hence the length of the day. • Effect of the sun’s gravitational field through the 18.6 year Lunar Nodal Cycle, causing variation in atmospheric pressure, temperature, rainfall, sea-level and ocean temperatures, especially at high latitudes. • Known links between solar activity and monsoonal activity, or the phases of climate oscillations such as the Atlantic Multidimensional Oscillation, a 60-year long cycle during which sea surface temperatures vary about 0.2°C above and below the long-term average, with effects on northern hemisphere air temperature, rainfall and drought. • Magnetic fields associated with solar flares, which modulate galactic cosmic ray input into the Earth’s atmosphere. This in turn may cause variations in the formation of low-level clouds. This causes cooling: a one per cent variation in low cloud cover producing a similar change in forcing to the estimated increase caused by human green-house gases. • The 1500 year-long Bond Cycle, as a result of which the three most recent warm peaks of this cycle had a major effect on the Minoan, Roman and Medieval Warm Periods As Robert Carpenter (2010) has stated: “That many of the mechanisms and possible mechanisms by which the sun influences Earth’s climate are poorly understood is no justification for ignoring them.” Of immediate relevance is the fact that solar cycles longer than the eleven year average are followed by later cycles of lesser intensity, and with it a cooler climate. According to Archibald (2010), Cycle 24 may produce cooling of up to 2.2°C for the mid-latitude grain-growing areas of the northern hemisphere. This may have already started. Dr. Vincent Courtillot, who is a professor of geophysics at the University Paris-Diderot and Chair of paleomagnetism and geodynamics of the Institut Universitaire de France, has pointed (2011) to the failure of climate models in relation to the sun. He notes that while the total solar irradiance (TSI) only varies by about 0.1% over a solar cycle, the solar UV varies by about 10% and that secondary effects on cloud formation may vary up to 30% over solar cycles. The IPCC computer models dismiss the role of the sun by only considering the small variations of the TSI and ignore the large changes in the most energetic and influential part of the solar spectrum – the ultraviolet. John Penhallurick -
muoncounter at 12:22 PM on 6 November 2011The BEST Kind of Skepticism
No, I did not suggest that Wunderground was being critical of SkS. But you missed the best graphic in that post:
And this quote:
It should be noted that in the past the discrepancy between surface and satellite temperature trends was much larger. Correcting various errors in the processing of the satellite data has brought them into much closer agreement with the surface data.
Imagine that: the satellite data had errors in processing and had to be brought into agreement with the surface data.
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Tom Curtis at 11:48 AM on 6 November 2011Eschenbach and McIntyre - Seeing the BEST part of the Satellite Temperature Record?
Camburn, you may wish to examine the 6th (last) figure above. From the original source (link provided above), the caption reads:"Bottom three traces: STAR MSU/AMSU Version 2.0, monthly global mean anomaly time series and trends for the layer temperatures of mid-troposphere (TMT),upper-troposphere (TUT), and lower-stratosphere (TLS). The TMT, TUT, and TLS time series are updated every month. Each update adds the monthly-mean, inter-calibrated and well-merged AMSU-A observations from the last month to the dataset. The up-to-date, monthly gridded (2.5 latitude by 2.5 longitude resolution)and global mean MSU/ASMU v2.0 data can be downloaded from here. Top three traces: STAR SSU Version 1.0, 5-day averaged global mean anomaly time series and trends for layer temperatures of mid-stratosphere (TMS), upper-stratosphere (TUS), and top-stratosphere (TTS). The well-merged, gridded (2.5 latitude by 2.5 longitude resolution) global dataset for SSU v1.0 can be downloaded from here."
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Camburn at 11:40 AM on 6 November 2011Eschenbach and McIntyre - Seeing the BEST part of the Satellite Temperature Record?
Glenn: You state that the stratosphere is cooling. Would you be so kind as to provide the data source for this? Thank you. -
Tom Curtis at 11:02 AM on 6 November 2011The BEST Kind of Skepticism
Sorry, forgot to note that the original article has links to the "amateur compilations" under the names of the people who did them. (I have not checked to make sure they are live links). -
Tom Curtis at 11:01 AM on 6 November 2011The BEST Kind of Skepticism
muoncounter @102, I failed to notice some points in that SkS article, which goes to show that SkS is a better resource than I realize ;)"Similar results can be obtained using different software and methods Over the past year, there has been quite a flurry of "do-it-yourself" temperature reconstructions by independent analysts, using either land-only or combined land-ocean data. In addition to the previously-mentioned work by Ron Broberg and Clear Climate Code, these include the following: Nick Stokes Zeke Hausfather Joseph at Residual Analysis Chad Herman JeffId and RomanM Tamino (There are probably others as well that we're omitting!) Most recently, the Muir Russell investigation in the UK was able to write their own software for global temperature analysis in a couple of days. For all of these cases, the results are generally quite close to the "official" results from NASA GISS, CRU, and NOAA NCDC. Figure 3 shows a collection of seven land-only reconstructions, and Figure 4 shows five global (land-ocean) reconstructions."
We also have the graphs of reconstructions of global and land only temperatures:
I believe most of the listed names count as amateur climatologists (if not amateur computer programmers), so Climate Underground was referring to SkS for a list of "amateur compilations". As has been happening a lot lately, he found SkS the most useful resource for facts about climate change on the internet.
He was certainly not denigrating SkS. I interpreted you as believing he had. Did I get that wrong?
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muoncounter at 10:29 AM on 6 November 2011The BEST Kind of Skepticism
Tom C, I inserted the link from the Wunderground text - its an SkS post from 2010. -
muoncounter at 10:23 AM on 6 November 2011Eschenbach and McIntyre's BEST Shot at the Surface Temperature Record
SkS Iron Chefs vs. the short-order cooks from the Denial Diner: "Allez cuisine!" Surely anyone with a year or two of high school science looking at Eschenbach's figure (figure 2 here) can see at least these two points: a. the differences between datasets within the first 20-25 years is much much less than the last ten years. b. the variation from peaks to troughs is much greater than any of the differences between data sets. Is Eschenbach suggesting that urbanization is only a factor during the last decade? Seems unlikely. Has Eschenbach ever even heard of signal to noise ratio? The quoted text below figure 2 is also puzzling. Dividing the trend by 1.4 based on models, when we are told the models are wrong? And the last paragraph: "it is highly legitimate" ... and "presume"? Dr. Curry, author of the 'Uncertainty Monster,' must object to the ambiguous nature of that language. Does this explanation not even rise to the level of a 'likely' or 'very likely'? In this battle, the Iron Chef's cuisine reigns supreme. -
Tom Curtis at 10:16 AM on 6 November 2011The BEST Kind of Skepticism
Muoncounter @100, I believe the reference to "amateur compilations" refers to a number of reanalyses of the GHCN or gisstemp data which have shown the various fake "skeptic" arguments to be fallacious. I believe this was first done by Tamino (no surprise), and has been done by a number of people since. The most comprehensive effort has been be Clear Climate Code. -
dana1981 at 09:43 AM on 6 November 2011Eschenbach and McIntyre's BEST Shot at the Surface Temperature Record
Okay as long as Kevin didn't mind. I hated to delete it after he put so much work into his estimate. Sorry Kevin! :-) You're still credited as a co-author on the post at least, and your efforts are very much appreciated. -
Kevin C at 09:36 AM on 6 November 2011Eschenbach and McIntyre's BEST Shot at the Surface Temperature Record
No objections from me (despite the hours spent getting it right). -
robert way at 09:33 AM on 6 November 2011Eschenbach and McIntyre's BEST Shot at the Surface Temperature Record
dana1981, I would get rid of the GISS CCC estimate. It might add confusion. The point is also to show how the agreement exists between the additional datasets (with the except of Hadley) -
WheelsOC at 09:25 AM on 6 November 2011Eschenbach and McIntyre's BEST Shot at the Surface Temperature Record
BEST already has a paper examining the effect of the UHI, so Eschenbach and McIntyre should have tried to deal with that directly instead of by insinuation. McIntyre pretends he's dealt with the issue before but hasn't actually done anything with BEST's method other than attack the credibility of the person running the analysis of MODIS data. Eschenbach doesn't even acknowledge with the BEST UHI paper's method at all, let alone criticize it. It's as though they never said anything about it other than the one line he quotes, which makes it mighty convenient for him to then cherry pick warm cities as a lazy rebuttal to imply that UHI is really at play. -
dana1981 at 09:25 AM on 6 November 2011Eschenbach and McIntyre's BEST Shot at the Surface Temperature Record
Thanks for the heads-up, Robert @1. I updated the figures in the post to include the data GISS provided to BEST, which has a 0.28°C/decade trend, as Kevin noted @3. -
Kevin C at 09:04 AM on 6 November 2011Eschenbach and McIntyre's BEST Shot at the Surface Temperature Record
In my figure at #3 about I labelled GISS-land and BEST the wrong way round. Sorry. -
Utahn at 09:00 AM on 6 November 2011Eschenbach and McIntyre's BEST Shot at the Surface Temperature Record
Worth the wait, I hadn't known about the other 3 analyses...How many times do you have to look at UHI before you start to wonder if it's not the culprit? A few more for some people I guess... -
Kevin C at 08:40 AM on 6 November 2011Eschenbach and McIntyre's BEST Shot at the Surface Temperature Record
Thanks Robert, that's what we were after! Here's a quick comparison with the clear climate code version.
Using that data the slope from 1979-01 to 2009-12 is 0.274C/decade (0.277C/decade to 2010-12), bringing it much closer to BEST.
(It's still a mystery that we can't reproduce this result with CCC, but there's probably a simple answer).
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Dave123 at 08:37 AM on 6 November 2011Eschenbach and McIntyre's BEST Shot at the Surface Temperature Record
I'm sure we can look forward to them submitting a joint publication for peer review somewhere major, like Science or Nature.
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