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Marcel Bökstedt at 05:31 AM on 20 April 2010Tracking the energy from global warming
Berenyi Peter> I'm inclined to agree with you, this seems to be a point where the model does not agree with the data. The situation is unclear though, so its probably best to wait for better observations both from satelites and from the deep ocean. Humanity rules> I agree, whatever the answer is, it has to explain the observed rise in sea level, and this is also a restriction on the warming of the deep ocean. I'm not sure I understand the relevance of the satelite data as they exist today, Trenberth seems to claim that they do tell us something, but I'm not sure what. If someone has got this point, please explain!Response: The point with the satellite data is it's not able to determine the absolute energy imbalance with great accuracy. However, as Trenberth puts it, "satellite measurements are sufficiently stable from one year to the next, so that by measuring incoming solar radiation and outgoing infrared radiation, it is possible to track changes in the net radiation".
So satellite measurements are useful to determine whether the energy imbalance is rising or falling. And what we're finding is the satellites are measuring an increase in the energy imbalance while ocean heat measurements find a decrease in energy imbalance. As both these metrics are measuring essentially the same thing, this discrepancy needs resolving. -
garythompson at 04:27 AM on 20 April 2010Tracking the energy from global warming
#22 vocta - thanks for pointing me to the right paper! so i read that one and it appears that the 0.9W/m2 net TOA imbalance comes from models. the actual measurements were 6.4 W/m2 which is way "outside the realm of current estimates of global imbalances" as Trenberth states. the authors further go on to state that "the TOA energy imbalance can probably be most accurately determined from climate models...." so am i understanding this correctly? every time we rely solely on measured data we get a TOA imbalance that is impracticle so instead we use model results. Pardon my ignorance but this seems very troubling to me why the scientist can't reconcile this and bring models and measurements into agreement. to me, TOA imbalance seems like the perfect tool to use to validate and/or monitor AGW. The fact that there is so much uncertainty in this is troubling. as a somewhat unreltated question - it seems to me that most satellite measurements of OLR are over bodies of water/ice. do we have any over land? -
Peter Hogarth at 04:24 AM on 20 April 2010Arctic Sea Ice (Part 1): Is the Arctic Sea Ice recovering? A reality check
HumanityRules at 19:55 PM on 17 April, 2010 I wouldn't say there is really a contradiction. You may argue the "turning point" is different in the simulation (from Vinje 2003) compared with the actual observations, but it depends how we fit a curve or trend. If one curve went upwards, - now that would be a contradiction! I would suggest the curve "fit" I originally used is an indication, used to illustrate long term "increase" or "decrease" in slope. It is useful in this regard. I used the simulation image (perhaps lazily) to highlight what the experts (who also use the data Peter B nicely animated) believe sea ice extent was like during this period, when actual data is extremely sparse. I would expect the models/simulations to have improved somewhat since 2003. -
mike roddy at 02:58 AM on 20 April 2010Earth's five mass extinction events
Thanks for this, fascinating stuff, especially Chris #45. I have a question for nobody in particular: Hansen says that burning all the coal and tar sands will lead to Venus. BAU projections call for 5-7C temps in 2100, which is deadly, but not Venus. Does this mean that feedbacks at 5-7C will subsequenstly overwhelm the planet, since the rise in CO2 has been so rapid? -
Tom Dayton at 02:55 AM on 20 April 2010Flowers blooming earlier now than any time in last 250 years
JMurphy, I think this is close: We’re coming out of the Little Ice Age And a runner-up is It’s a climate regime shift -
Tom Dayton at 02:45 AM on 20 April 2010Tracking the energy from global warming
And, RSVP, the Earth's core continues to cool despite the contributions of radioactive decay. This topic is addressed by a Scientific American article, Why Is The Earth's Core So Hot?. -
GFW at 02:39 AM on 20 April 2010Tracking the energy from global warming
Chemware @12. Presumably everyone ignored this because it was wrong. Watts are already energy/time. 1W = 1J/s. So Wm-2 is an energy flux, and the area under any curve segment in figure one would represent energy (per square meter) accumulated during that time. -
GFW at 02:33 AM on 20 April 2010Tracking the energy from global warming
RSVP @34. Although the earth's core was initially so hot due to the energy of gravitational infall as the earth accreted, it is believed that the source of the majority of the heat keeping it so hot is simply radioactive decay. -
Doug Bostrom at 02:32 AM on 20 April 2010Tracking the energy from global warming
RSVP the Earth's heat derives from energy conserved during the accretion of material forming the globe as well as by isotope decay, principally potassium-40, uranium-235 & 238, thorium-232. -
JMurphy at 02:22 AM on 20 April 2010Flowers blooming earlier now than any time in last 250 years
Is there a thread dealing with the common refrain that 'temperatures are naturally rising because we are recovering from the last ice age' ? The closest I can find is one dealing with the postponement of the next glacial maximum (or ice age), because of all the CO2 in the atmosphere. -
dhogaza at 02:16 AM on 20 April 2010Tracking the energy from global warming
The discrepancy is not between net radiation balance at TOA as measured by CERES and OHC as measured by ARGO, but between OHC measurements and computational model predictions. In cases like this the standard pre-postnormal science procedure is to abandon model and stick to measurement.
Yeah, well, Christy and Spencer said the same thing when their early satellite temperature reconstructions showed cooling rather than warming. Turns out the models (and surface temp measurements) were right, and Christy and Spencer were simply error-prone (several times over) and had made a seriously flawed analysis. What's the relevance to OHC vs. TOA vs. models? Trenberth:We are well aware that there are well over a dozen estimates of ocean heat content and they are all different yet based on the same data. There are clearly problems in the analysis phase and I don’t believe any are correct. There is a nice analysis of ocean heat content down to 2000 m by von Schuckmann, K., F. Gaillard, and P.-Y. Le Traon 2009: Global hydrographic variability patterns during 2003–2008, /J. Geophys. Res.,/*114*, C09007, doi:10.1029/2008JC005237. but even those estimates are likely conservative. The deep ocean is not well monitored and nor is the Arctic below sea ice. That said, there is a paper in press (embargoed) that performs an error analysis of ocean heat content. Our article highlights the discrepancies that should be resolved with better data and analysis, and improved observations must play a key role.
Shorter form: current observational data and reconstructions of OHC built on said data pretty much suck at this point. This, BTW, is totally in line with his "travesty" e-mail touted by denialists as showing the Trenberth doesn't think there's been warming. Talk about misunderstanding the point ... Now, Josh Willis:I think that it is still premature to make claims about the Earth’s energy imbalance based on satellite observations and ocean heat content data over ANY period. As with the satellite observations, the ocean heat content data continue to undergo refinement and removal of systematic errors. Since the satellite data are insensitive to the absolute value of the imbalance, they rely on ocean heat content data to estimate it. However, I personally belive that there is not a long enough common period between the satellite observations and the RELIABLE ocean heat content record to make any strong claims about the energy budget. Many people are working on both data sets, however, and I hope that a more reliable comparison will become available soon.
You yourself said: "Well, net radiation balance at TOA (Top of Atmosphere) as measured by ERBE & CERES satellites is 2 ± 5 W m-2, that much we know. Unfortunately this outrageously inaccurate value is quite useless for checking OHC history reconstructions." Apparently you're unaware that there's something circular in the notion of using TOA satellite reconstructions to check OHC reconstructions (since Willis points out that the former depends on the latter ...)? Anyway, two experts in the field suggest that your faith in the observations is, at this point, misplaced, and that the quality of observational data available to date isn't good enough to warrant "throwing out the models". Just as the quality of Christy and Spencer's early satellite temperature reconstructions weren't of good enough quality to warrant "throwing out the models". -
Doug Bostrom at 02:10 AM on 20 April 2010Tracking the energy from global warming
Ken, I'm not sure why you'd need to get a instantly simultaneous reading from Argo buoys in order to derive a trend in total OHC from their collective data. If for instance you obtain a reading from each buoy over the course of 36 hours, wait for 6 months and then repeat the collection process, the 36 hour collection period should essentially vanishe from the OHC signal. There's a nice near-realtime map of Argo buoy distribution available: Current Argo distribution map -
Chris G at 02:02 AM on 20 April 2010Tracking the energy from global warming
The case for a change in circulation patterns might be getting stronger. Changes in salinity distributions are being found, and since it is a thermohaline cycle... Here is a summary of a paper by Durack and Wijffels. http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/04/100416094050.htm Regarding #34 and #39, also, if the warming were being caused by from-within, electromagnetic interactions between the sun and the earth, I'd expect that this would be detectable by measurements of deep mine temperatures. To my knowledge, there are several rather deep mines in the world, but I've never heard of a warming trend over time with them. Warming trend with depth; yes, but not over time. @ #32, Sorry, but I'm going to guess that what you are missing is an understanding of how statistics can be used to distinguish between sampling differences that are simply a result of random noise and those that are noisy, but are some measurable probability of being caused by real differences in the data sets. I took stable to mean that the standard deviation did not vary much over time; if that is right, then more sample data will lead to less probability that observed mean differences are merely noise, not greater. Yes, technically, any model which can not make 100% accurate predictions can be said to be incomplete. I don't know of any model, even most of the basic physics ones, that can do this. (For instance, we've all been taught in beginning science courses that projectiles follow the path of a parabola; that is a fundamentally flawed model, but it's still useful.) That does not mean that models are without use. The whole point of this discussion is a question of how might this model be better completed. -
Berényi Péter at 01:28 AM on 20 April 2010Tracking the energy from global warming
Well, net radiation balance at TOA (Top of Atmosphere) as measured by ERBE & CERES satellites is 2 ± 5 W m-2, that much we know. Unfortunately this outrageously inaccurate value is quite useless for checking OHC history reconstructions. Toward Optimal Closure of the Earth's Top-of-Atmosphere Radiation Budget Journal of Climate, Feb 1, 2009 by Loeb, Norman G, Wielicki, Bruce A, Doelling, David R, Smith, G Louis, Keyes, Dennis F, Kato, Seiji, Manalo-Smith, Natividad, Wong, Takmeng OHC measurements, at least for the upper 700 m are more accurate during the last couple of years. ARGO only accomplished its 3000 floats target in 2007, but coverage is reasonably good since 2005. So. The discrepancy is not between net radiation balance at TOA as measured by CERES and OHC as measured by ARGO, but between OHC measurements and computational model predictions. In cases like this the standard pre-postnormal science procedure is to abandon model and stick to measurement. -
Tom Dayton at 01:19 AM on 20 April 2010Tracking the energy from global warming
RSVP, the amount of heat leaking to the surface from the Earth's interior is not merely an assumption. It is known to be very small relative to the heating from greenhouse gases. See the references I linked in my comment of 9:28 a.m. and the following one, on the thread Volcanoes emit more CO2 than humans. -
VoxRat at 00:51 AM on 20 April 2010Tracking the energy from global warming
#36: "There still remains one way to balance the energy budget and that is to accept the observed red line in figure 1 is also the actual energy budget. But I guess that raises too many uncomfortable questions!" How is that "balancing the energy budget"? The red line represents a cumulative estimate of where all the incoming goes... If you choose to ignore the satellite data on incoming and outgoing radiation, how do you estimate the incoming energy to balance against it? -
HumanityRules at 23:48 PM on 19 April 2010Tracking the energy from global warming
The Pielke/Trenberth exchange continues here -
HumanityRules at 23:40 PM on 19 April 2010Tracking the energy from global warming
Here's a couple of reviews from Trenberth and Cazenave which focus on sea level rise. Trenberth remains skeptical about the most recent data while Cazenave seems to have a more faith in the numbers. I think Cazenave makes a plausible case for the numbers in Table 1 of her review (page 7). Marcel Bökstedt point about deep ocean expansion is raised by Trenberth but isn't quite the issue Marcel suggests it might be and can't explain away the lost energy. Trenberth still has to come back to faulty ocean data even though several lines of approach confirm the lack of thermal expansion in the most recent data. Just on the question of lag raised by thingadonta. I think this is only an issue when you are measuring either atmosperic or ocean parameters alone. If your measuring both simultaneously it doesn't really matter where energy is building up or whether there are shifts in the rate of transfer between the two systems. It has to be observable somewhere and at the moment it isn't. Piekle makes a good point that total energy is a better parameter for understanding whats going on compared to global mean temperature for this very reason. There still remains one way to balance the energy budget and that is to accept the observed red line in figure 1 is also the actual energy budget. But I guess that raises too many uncomfortable questions! -
Ken Lambert at 23:11 PM on 19 April 2010Tracking the energy from global warming
I have read some of the Willis and von Schukmann papers and it is not easy to understand their exact methodologies for correcting the temperature data from their 'tiling' the oceans and then measuring the heat content of each tile. A tile might be eg. 200m deep x 5nm x 5nm (nautical mile) or some such volume – but have made the point before that unless an instantaneous snapshot at Time1 was compared with a snapshot at Time2 of the whole volume of the oceans (all the tiles) then it would seem hard to measure an accurate difference between the OHC increase or decrease between Time1 and Time2. eg. for major currents like the Gulf Stream – running at 4-5 knots could move heat from one tile to another in minutes to hours. I would think that the Argo buoys would have to measure all at the same instant – eg. 12.00 noon GMT at Time1 and then at Time2 and a buoy would have to be in each 'tile' at the two reference points in time for that data to be useful. Since the Argo buoys are not tethered to a particular spot in the ocean, and move with the currents, would they tend to coagulate in warmer or cooler currents than calmer waters? and what happens to the data from a 'tile' location reporting temperatures at Time1 when it has no buoy in it to report at Time2? -
RSVP at 23:09 PM on 19 April 2010Tracking the energy from global warming
I never understood the explanation for why the Earth's inner mantle is so hot. Supposedly, all that pressure due simply to gravity makes for heat, but pressure in-and-of itself does no produce energy. Pressure on the increase in a fluid does, but if the pressure is static, it is not clear to me how this produces heat. I bring this up in the context of global warming as volcanic energy is assumed to not form a significant part of the radiate model as so far explained at this website, but in terms of something that could change over time, it seems suspect, perhaps accounting for "missing energy". With erupting volcanoes and earthquakes currently going on around the world, it seems this heat varies over time and is not constant. The fact that the Earth is a giant metal ball spinning in the magnetic field of the Sun should tell you something. A situation that should theoretically lead to electrical currents that in turn produce heat. And given that the Sun magnetic field changes with time, perhaps all this could explain the fluctuations we observe. -
thingadonta at 22:46 PM on 19 April 2010Tracking the energy from global warming
#19 "How you know global heat transfer is weakest and slowest between the deepest oceans and everything else"? Ever dived into a deep lake in the middle of summer?, it gets significantly colder as you go down because the surface warms much faster; warm water also rises and cold water sinks-creating long term stratification that isn't easily budged by further input of heat at surface. In fact with time the T divergence between the surface and deeper water can increase, until a point is reached whereby heat transfer can overcome this gravity-related stratification. The important factor is the time involved. The stratified water column resists heat transfer, and the time scales involved since 2005 are too short for the missing heat to be 'going into' deep oceans. Upwelling and downwelling currents are also much too slow to be transferring additional heat from surface to ocean depths in the matter of years. I suspect the explanation of the divergence in Figure 1 lies in some sort of time lag between net radiation and heat transfer,and that the figures are mostly accurate, and that net radiation might start to decline, as it does at the very end of the graph. -
thefrogstar at 21:21 PM on 19 April 2010Tracking the energy from global warming
The blog appears to faithfully reproduce the published article, but I think I'm missing something here. "....satellites which measure both the incoming sunlight and outgoing radiation. The absolute energy imbalance is too small to be measured directly." -So the simple calculation of Energy 'Out' subtracted from Energy 'In' can't be done because the errors of measuring the two are large, relative to the difference between them? "However, the satellite measurements are sufficiently stable from one year to the next so it's possible to track changes in the net radiation". -Isn't this the exact same calculation: "Net Radiation" is the difference between radiative energy 'In' and 'Out'? If the measurements are "stable" how does this make them better? ....Or are they just collecting data over a longer time period to get a better statistical grasp on the data? If this is the case, won't the signal-to-noise ratio only increase as the square-root of the time period? Separately, a third expanation: Might "a divergence problem, if you will" be due to a model which is incomplete, if you will? -
Marcel Bökstedt at 20:40 PM on 19 April 2010Tracking the energy from global warming
SNRatio> Yes, it seems that the expansion of water per added unit of heat is about twice at big at the surface as in the deep ocean, so if we (A) believe figure 1, (B) believe that all that missing energy went into the deep ocean, we would conclude from looking at figure 1, taking into account that the upper ocean is warming at a slower rate now, that the rise of sea level should have been approximately constant since 2005. This ignores the additional effect of melting glaciers. -
SNRatio at 20:20 PM on 19 April 2010Tracking the energy from global warming
27.Marcel Bökstedt at 18:37 PM on 19 April, 2010 Berenyi Peter> It seems that Trenberth does exactly this calculation, and gets that if the "missing energy" (0.9 W/m^ 3) were deposited in the ocean below 700 meters, it would rise the sea level by 1.3 mm/y. ---- May this be an explanation why we have had a continuing sea level rise in spite of very little surface temp increase 2000-2010, and only a fraction being explainable by ice caps/glaciers melting. -
Marcel Bökstedt at 20:06 PM on 19 April 2010Tracking the energy from global warming
thingadonta> I think that we don't really know the amount of heat transfer between the top of the sea (say the top 700 meters) and the rest of it. I'm not saying that there must be a significant transfer, but I can't see how we can rule it out - how do you know that "global heat transfer is weakest and slowest between the deepest oceans and everything else"? -
thingadonta at 19:35 PM on 19 April 2010Tracking the energy from global warming
There is insufficient heat transfer between the atmosphere, land and oceans on annual and interannual time scales for net radiation measurements and calculated heat contents to be in agreement, even if the calculated heat contents are correct. This means there will be a time lag between the two, which becomes most apparent after an inflexion in either trend. If the rate of warming has indeed slowed, and there is no 'missing heat' in the deep oceans, net radiation is lagging the decreased rate of warming and the two lines in Figure 1 diverge, and are correct as they stand. They should eventually re-align. Also, note that global heat transfer is weakest and slowest between the deepest oceans and everything else, so it is even more unlikely that this 'missing heat' is going into the deep oceans in the short time scales involved (ie years to several years). If this explanation is correct, it also contradicts at least some of the standard assumptions about climate sensitivity to greenhouse gases. Neither declining rates of warming, nor the divergence in satellite measurements of net radiation and modelled earth heat content should be happening if greenhouse gases are physically doing what the IPCC says they should be doing. -
Marcel Bökstedt at 18:37 PM on 19 April 2010Tracking the energy from global warming
Berenyi Peter> It seems that Trenberth does exactly this calculation, and gets that if the "missing energy" (0.9 W/m^ 3) were deposited in the ocean below 700 meters, it would rise the sea level by 1.3 mm/y. An imperative for climate change planning: tracking Earth's global energy . -
Marcel Bökstedt at 18:10 PM on 19 April 2010Tracking the energy from global warming
Berenyi Peter> That is a good point, maybe we can start quantifying? It seems you know this stuff, so perhaps you can offer an estimate on the sea level rise which would be caused if the "missing energy" was hiding in the deep sea? -
Berényi Péter at 16:58 PM on 19 April 2010Tracking the energy from global warming
#24 Marcel Bökstedt at 16:28 PM on 19 April, 2010 the temperature of the deep ocean is close to that minimum, so that its thermal expansion coefficient is close to zero A common misconception. Equation of state for sea water is rather tricky. At high pressure volumetric thermal expansion coefficient is positive even at 3 °C. -
Marcel Bökstedt at 16:28 PM on 19 April 2010Tracking the energy from global warming
Humanity Rules> The argument about sea level rise is nice, but has to be analysed a bit. The expansion of water under heating is not constant, it depends on the temperature you start with. The minimal volume and highest density is reached at 3.98 C. I understand that the temperature of the deep ocean is close to that minimum, so that its thermal expansion coefficient is close to zero, which means we cannot use sea level to restrain the temperature of the deep ocean. I think. -
James Wight at 16:13 PM on 19 April 2010Tracking the energy from global warming
This seems to be quite a mystery. I wonder if it could have anything to do with the Pacific Decadal Oscillation (which appears to have switched to a "cool" phase). -
yocta at 15:26 PM on 19 April 2010Tracking the energy from global warming
RE#21 garythompon. I think you may be looking at the wrong paper. The paper you have linked is titled "Global warming due to increasing absorbed solar radiation" K.E. Trenberth, J.T. Fasullo. Geophys. Res. Lett, 2009 Reference 5 in the paper discussed above is titled Earth's Global Energy Budget K. E. Trenberth, J. T. Fasullo, J. Kiehl, Bull. Am. Meteorol. Soc. 90, 311 (2009) . which can be found here -
garythompson at 14:29 PM on 19 April 2010Tracking the energy from global warming
the following statement in the trenberth paper says "Increasing concentrations of carbon dioxide (CO2) (see the figure) and other greenhouse gases have led to a post-2000 imbalance at the top of the atmosphere of 0.9 ± 0.5 W m–2 ( 5);" going to reference (5), i looked at that paper and couldn't find that in it. can someone point me in the right directions and let me know what i missed? and i apologize if the link doesn't show as embedded. i followed the style as listed on this website but for some reason it didn't show right in the preview. i'll keep working on that..... -
scaddenp at 14:08 PM on 19 April 2010Flowers blooming earlier now than any time in last 250 years
"weather has cycles". But the papers under discussions are talking about trends not cycles. -
HumanityRules at 14:02 PM on 19 April 2010Arctic Sea Ice (Part 1): Is the Arctic Sea Ice recovering? A reality check
53.Philippe Chantreau I don't think understated just stated. The mass balance has probably been in negative territory (with a few interruptions) since the 1750's. -
Tracking the energy from global warming
Very curious - that's quite a divergence, rather unprecedented from the previous data. I would certainly trust the sat. data; radiation measures are pretty straightforward compared with ocean temp. accounting. My own DK idea would be to posit a change in deep vs. shallow water circulation - a new(ish) vertical cycling of the water providing a new heat sink. But then, I would be suggesting a WAG, not even a SWAG (scientific wild a** guess). Are there any suggestions of changes in circulation that might be consistent with this theory? I look forward to better suggestions from people who actually know what they're doing on this topic. -
johnd at 12:52 PM on 19 April 2010Flowers blooming earlier now than any time in last 250 years
scaddenp at 12:40 PM, it depends on how the wetter and dryer periods cycle. Weather has it's cyclic patterns as well. Droughts in Australia being a good example. -
scaddenp at 12:40 PM on 19 April 2010Flowers blooming earlier now than any time in last 250 years
Wetter is climate change of course. -
yocta at 12:24 PM on 19 April 2010Trenberth can't account for the lack of warming
RE #6 hu? You say:Where in Ternberth 09 does it state that satellites indicate an energy gap? Trenberth 2009 states it is the difference between satellite measurements and ocean heat content measurements from ARGO ocean floats. And Trenberth says: ..."Their sum should amount to the sea level from altimetry estimates from satellites, but substantial discrepancies betweentrends of 2 mm/yr were found..." You say: Also, what do you think the author meant when he says 'or the warming is not really present?'. He is referring to perhaps the satellite observations are incorrect, which is discussed more in the paper on page 24. (See also John's post here too) You say: ...public computers...how can the author's have any expectation of privacy? And what is the basis of your claim that the emails were stolen? They are stolen because they were hacked and the Police are investigating. You can very certainly expect privacy. Even though one might be a public servant, nobody should have ther private correspondences delved into anyone who could misquote it. You may be dealing with sensitive information including defense, patents and communication with industry. Universities and staff have the right to protect their intellectual property. If an official inquiry demands the information stored on public computers then yes of course you would have to disclose the contents but only then. -
Leo G at 11:20 AM on 19 April 2010Flowers blooming earlier now than any time in last 250 years
Errr - weTTer, not weeter! LOL! -
Leo G at 11:20 AM on 19 April 2010Flowers blooming earlier now than any time in last 250 years
Hmmm, just discovered this - http://ukclimateprojections.defra.gov.uk/images/stories/Trends_images/T_300dpi/T_Fig2.46.png Seems that England has been getting weeter since the early 1960's. I would think that this would have a lot to do with the earlier bloom times of the last 25 years. -
HumanityRules at 10:43 AM on 19 April 2010Tracking the energy from global warming
Response #14 I thought there is an independent confirmation of energy in the ocean and that is sea level rise. Extra energy in the ocean would cause it to expand making the sea level rise. Sea level rises via two mechanisms thermal expansion and extra volume (from melting land ice). The most recent measurements of sea level, I think from 2003 onwards, suggest that sea level rise has slowed. And that nearly all that sea level rise has come from melting ice. This would suggest there is little thermal expansion, suggesting little extra energy in the ocean. We should measure temp in the deep ocean but sea level rise suggests it probably isn't there. -
HumanityRules at 10:33 AM on 19 April 2010Tracking the energy from global warming
Another important question is why did the energy budget balance for the first decade of figure 1? If we are looking for a nett transfer of energy to the deep oceans from 2005 onwards we have to assume that this wasn't happening before 2005 when things would have to have been in equilibrium. We need a machanism for the transfer and one that shows a fair amount of variation over time. Do we have anything like this? And evidence it went through some sort of phase switch in 2005? -
yocta at 10:29 AM on 19 April 2010Tracking the energy from global warming
Great posting John. I remember reading this posting by NASA on Balancing the Sea Level Budget in which Willis identified problems with the latest Argo floats which led to underestimating ocean warming. I am interested in what comes about from your correspondence with Susan Wijffels as she is quoted there saying "What we found was that ocean heating was larger than scientists previously thought, and so the contribution of thermal expansion to sea level rise was actually 50 percent larger than previous estimates.” Here is my DK moment but since Trenberth has used Argo data in his assessment of ocean heat content, could that not account for some of the divergence? My hunch is it is more likely an instrumentation problem than anything else. -
Rob Honeycutt at 10:23 AM on 19 April 2010Tracking the energy from global warming
John, I would hope that Trenberth knows of your site here and appreciates the valuable and gallant job you're doing to help people understand the complex science going on with climate change. (I imagine that's why you got such a prompt response from him.) -
Don Gisselbeck at 10:08 AM on 19 April 2010Arctic Sea Ice (Part 1): Is the Arctic Sea Ice recovering? A reality check
Peter Hogarth at 22:32 PM on 14 April, 2010 That was a pretty interesting paper. If you want to see the Stantan Glacier pictures, they are on my flikr page (dongisselbeck) and on my facebook page. It is striking how much change a small glacier can have in a few years. I expect to see the ice at 2007 levels or less this Sept. -
paulgrace at 09:37 AM on 19 April 2010Tracking the energy from global warming
RE: "Hopefully, Trenberth won't get bothered too much by nagging bloggers such as myself and he can get on with the important work of better tracking the flow of energy through our climate." Don't discount the importance of communicating the subtleties of the work. This is just the kind of data that would be taken out of context by deniers. It's good for lay individuals to be able to refute it right away. After all, researchers can't solve the problem and communication is a key part of the resolution. -
HumanityRules at 09:35 AM on 19 April 2010Tracking the energy from global warming
9.Glenn Tamblyn at 08:18 AM on 19 April, 2010 Is there a third possibility. This issue, like most others in climate science, is subject to assumptions, data processing, modelling and theorizing. The best test for all these is how things develop going forward. What we are seeing is that some aspects are poorly understood to the point that the expected and observed data diverge. When this happened with solar irradiance and temperature we were all ready to kill off a theory. Shouldn't we be loading the syringe with Nembutal again?Response: The comparison with sun/climate is not quite right. In that case, we're looking at a cause of climate change - if the sun is cooling while climate is warming, it's hard to see the sun is causing the warming.
In this case, we're looking at two different ways of measuring the same thing - the planet's energy imbalance. So if the two metrics diverge, we need to examine both metrics. As there is independent confirmation of the veracity of the satellite data, the more likely problem is with the accounting for heat content. And as our observation systems don't currently observe all of our climate, the natural next step is to look to extending our observations to cover more of our climate. A good first step would be to measure the deep ocean more comprehensively. -
HumanityRules at 09:24 AM on 19 April 2010Tracking the energy from global warming
I also found this paper on deep water heating which is in press. Can anybody to the mathes to see if this makes up the difference? http://oceans.pmel.noaa.gov/Pdf/gcj_3f.pdf Funnily I had also followed the Trenberth/Piekle email exchange and thought it was genuinely interesting. I don't know why you suggest Trenberth needs patience, Piekles seems a reasonably polite individual and it seems a genuine exchenge between two people who wish to get to the bottom of a problem. It's science. Anyway I also weighed in by sending this reference to Piekle, I guess we've both choosen our sides ;)Response: I was refering more to my bonehead questions - seeing Trenberth and Pielke discuss von Schuckmann in detail made me realise of course Trenberth had looked at von Schuckmann from the front, from the back, sideways and upside down. A Dunning Kruger moment on my part.
Funny you should mention that paper on bottom water heating - I was just talking to one of the authors, an Australian scientist Susan Wijffels (emailing her more of my bonehead blogger questions). -
Chemware at 09:21 AM on 19 April 2010Tracking the energy from global warming
A minor nitpicking point on Fig 1: rates (dQuantity / dTime) always have unit of reciprocal time: eg: Wm-2year-1.
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