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Comments 38501 to 38550:

38501. KR at 03:01 AM on 11 February 2014
       Unprecedented trade wind strength is shifting global warming to the oceans, but for how much longer?
       

       BojanD - See the discussion of spectral changes at the top of the atmosphere such as in Harries 2001 and other papers, direct evidence of reductions in Earth IR emissivity leading to an imbalance.

       This has been confirmed by the changes in ocean heat content (such as in Balmaseda et al 2013) provide direct evidence for the rate of longer term changes in climate heat content and the level of imbalance, putting more certain numbers to the imbalance, but the total radiation measures while less accurate do provide such evidence. 

38502. BojanD at 02:13 AM on 11 February 2014
       Unprecedented trade wind strength is shifting global warming to the oceans, but for how much longer?
       

       For example, by measuring incoming and outgoing total radiation (via sattelites) we know that there is currently an imbalance... more energy coming in then going out.

        

       Not sure that is true. Energy imbalance is measured indirectly via changes in heat content.

38503. One Planet Only Forever at 01:11 AM on 11 February 2014
       2013 was the second-hottest year on record without an El Niño
       

       Klapper @ 56,

       Your 'conclusion concerns me'.

       "In summary, you're not really answering the question of why a dataset which fills big holes is better than a dataset with actual data. Using the UAH v5.5 dataset I find at least the "hybrid" version of C&W appears to run hot for Antarctica."

       It is 'likely' that determining a trend from a sampling of the surface temperature that excludes a large percentage of the surface in some regions will be inaccurate. And I am using the term 'likely' in a colloquial manner, not in the 'defined manner' it is used in the IPCC Reports.

       Are you trying to find a way to say that human burning of fossil fuels is not a proven concern needing to be acted upon urgently to dramatically reduce such activity by the already fortunate?

       Fine-tuning aspects of the investigation into better understanding a larger issue like "the acceptability of continuing the fundamentally unsustainable and clearly damaging pursuit of benefit from the burning of fossil fuels", is important. But many appear to seek opportunity to claim 'uncertainty about that clearly certain matter' by finding a way to raise a question about the minutia to create the impressions of 'significant uncertainty about something there is no uncertainty about'.

       The extraction and burning of fossil fuels cannot be continued for very much longer, and humanity has billions of years to look forward to on this amazing planet. And there are many damaging impacts of the activity, including the impacts of the accumulation of excess CO2 (in the atmosphere and the oceans). There is also major harm cause by the conflict between powerful people fighting to get more of the potential benefit for themselves. Burning fossil fuels is an incredibly damaging activity ‘all things considered’.

       An acceptable use of an unsustainable and damaging activity would be to address an ‘emergency’. I would accept that ‘emerging’ economies should be allowed to use the burning of fossil fuels to more rapidly transition their entire population into sustainable economic activity. However, this would have to be a brief transient phase. After all, activity relying on burning fossil fuels is ultimately a dead end. Those economic activities simply cannot have sustained growth. And since the objective is to ‘lift the least fortunate into a sustainable better way of living’ the only ones benefiting from the burning of fossil fuels should be those who are the least fortunate. The same goes for any other unsustainable and damaging activity like the use of harmful chemicals or using up (consuming) other non-renewable resources. Everyone already ‘more fortunate’ should be ‘getting by with sustainable virtually damage free ways of living’. That is the only viable future for humanity. Anything else would be unsustainable and unacceptable.

       This ‘required development to sustainable activity model’ is challenged by the fact that sustainable activities will always be less profitable and less desired than the more damaging or less sustainable activities that ‘can be gotten away with because of popular support’. The ‘profit motive’ and ‘potential popularity’ clearly cannot be allowed to determine what is acceptable…because they clearly haven’t and won’t.

       So I hope you are ‘not of the opinion’ that fine-tuning the data on this small aspect of the larger issue of global warming and climate change alters any of the facts of the larger issue of the unacceptability of burning fossil fuels, or reduces the urgency to develop the most fortunate beyond the ‘popular and profitable in the moment’ unsustainable and damaging activity they have ‘grown fond of getting away with benefiting from’.

       The increased understanding among the global population of the unacceptable and significant impacts of excess CO2 is just one of the ways to help raise awareness of the fundamentally unsustainable and damaging ways that many among the most fortunate ‘strive to get away with for as long a they can get away with’. Discussing and debating details needs to be clearly understood to not reduce the urgency of ‘changing the minds, attitudes and actions’ of the population so that humanity actually develops a sustainable better future for all life on this amazing planet.

       That is my opinion.

38504. johncl at 00:48 AM on 11 February 2014
       2013 was the second-hottest year on record without an El Niño
       

       I sense a bit of trolling from topal, but I'll pretend he is sincere. A lot of people are thinking the way you are, that somehow the ENSO is creating the global warming - that the heat is coming from the planets core through underground vulcanism or something. But this is certainly not the case. As many have pointed to, the oceans absorb more than 90% of the incoming radiation including whatever is re-radiated from CO2 insulation. Oceans have an immense capacity to store heat and the best way to see this is by a simple experiment which you can find several youtube videos on where you put fire under a balloon with some water inside it. Many people still think they are watching a magic trick, while its just physics in action - physics that our brains often have difficulty grasping, just like climate science really.

       The planet acts just like any other physical body absorbing and re-radiating heat. If the heat escapes the body completely (into space) then its gone. As long as the body is receiving the same amount of heat as is radiated out, the system is at equilibrum. If you modify the composition of greenhouse gases around this body then some of that heat will be re-radiated into the body again and the temperature of the body will rise gradually until it radiates out the same amount that its getting from both the source (sun) and the greenhouse gas re-radiation. This simple fact is really all you need to know in order to understand where the heat is coming from, where its stored and where it disappears. Any variations on top of this is just noise really. One mecanism of earths ability to expel heat is through Equatorial currents that gives us El Ninõ's. This is often referred as the energy imbalance, and considering that the atmosphere contains some 40% more CO2 compared to pre industrial times there will be an energy imbalance for a very long time and we can expect continued warming no matter what the ENSO does as the CO2 persists and will keep on doing "its job" according to the laws of physics. If anything we have managed to mask out some of the warming by adding aerosols through increased use of coal this past decade, which reflects some of the incoming radiation in the atmosphere. The past decade has certainly seen a lot of the heat going into the Arctic region as we can see from rapid sea ice decline (even in the middle of winter, its now close to its lowest according to Cryosphere) and massive temperature anomalies. C&W study certainly shows that its wrong to ignore this when looking at global temperatures and that the warming is still stronger than ever perfectly following the trend that we know to be true from the physical facts I just talked about.

38505. CBDunkerson at 23:14 PM on 10 February 2014
       Unprecedented trade wind strength is shifting global warming to the oceans, but for how much longer?
       

       Klapper, the primary problem is that you're only looking at one line of evidence. Your idea that the models assume too much warming is only possible if you don't consider other known facts. For example, by measuring incoming and outgoing total radiation (via sattelites) we know that there is currently an imbalance... more energy coming in then going out. Ergo, we know that extra energy is accumulating in the climate system... rather than a fixed amount of energy just moving around (i.e from oceans to atmosphere as you suggest). Similarly, if we calculate the amount of energy that the measured increase in greenhouse gases should cause to be retained we get results in line with the sattelite measurements.

       Could decreased accumulation of heat in the oceans have been part of the 80s atmospheric warming? It likely was. However, that doesn't mean the models are showing too much warming... again, we know how much the climate is warming. The tricky part is figuring out where all the extra heat is going to be at any given time. Overall, the flux of heat between the atmosphere and oceans only seems sufficient to drive the warming rate slightly higher (e.g. the 80s and 90s) or slightly lower (the 00s) than the projected trend... averaging out to no change at all.

38506. Yvan Dutil at 22:53 PM on 10 February 2014
       Unprecedented trade wind strength is shifting global warming to the oceans, but for how much longer?
       

       Since climate is cahotic, it is pretty obvious that such slowdown is expected.

38507. Yvan Dutil at 22:51 PM on 10 February 2014
       Unprecedented trade wind strength is shifting global warming to the oceans, but for how much longer?
       

       #2 IPO was much smaller in the past. Hence, you do not expect that it explain previous slowdown.

38508. Bob Lacatena at 22:44 PM on 10 February 2014
       Unprecedented trade wind strength is shifting global warming to the oceans, but for how much longer?
       

       Klapper, 

       Your hypothethesis lacks physical support.  Heat does not just rise out of the oceans, coming from nowhere (or undersea volcanos, or hidden heat sinks beneath the waves).  It has to get there somehow to begin with.

       You seem to be standing reality on its head.  The oceans do not periodically warm the earth, as the IPO cycle shifts.  Instead, other (physically explicable) mechanisms warm the earth as a whole, and the IPO either "helps" to bury that heat in the oceans, or it doesn't.

       The warming you see is entirely anthropogenic.  All other physical mechanisms have been negative.  The only thing that is natural is the tendency of the system to temporarily obscure heat build up by burying heat in unexpected places (the Arctic, the deep oceans) where it is difficult to observe.

       Mind you, to, the models are not in any way "tuned," as you suggest.  They replicate physical processes and so generate physically comparable results.  In this case, the study points to a detail in the models that may not be well implemented in the physics, and so is not well reflected in the results.  The solution is not to "tune" the models colder, but simply to improve / amend the logic which handles this situation in the models -- that is, to make the physics in the models more accurate.

38509. Esop at 21:53 PM on 10 February 2014
       2013 was the second-hottest year on record without an El Niño
       

       # (57 Klapper):

       Looks like I was wrong: the 2013 anomaly for Antarctica wasn't 1.2C as I wrote above, it was actually more than 1.4C.

       The 2013 Antarctic temp info comes straight from Dr. Spencer:
       ”The warmest areas during the year
       were over the North Pacific and the Antarctic, where
       temperatures for the year averaged more than 1.4 C (more
       than 2.5 degrees Fahenheit) warmer than normal.”
       http://nsstc.uah.edu/climate/2013/december/dec2013GTR.pdf

38510. Klapper at 21:26 PM on 10 February 2014
       Unprecedented trade wind strength is shifting global warming to the oceans, but for how much longer?
       

       This same effect could be part of the reason for the rapid warming post 1975. If you run a 30 year rolling linear regression trend on the Church & White tide gauge sea level dataset you find sea level rise peaked ending in about 1965 at a sea level rise rate actually above the trend ending at 2010 (end of the dataset). Yet SAT was stagnent from 1945 to 1975.

       You have very sparse data coverage for heat content down to 2000 m during this period (actually pretty much every period up to ARGO), maybe a handfull of measurements per year in the south Pacific during the 60's so you're left with sea level as your best guess at possible heat gain in the deep ocean.

       The implication of that possible heat gain in the -IPO between '45 and '65 is that it's subsequent release in the 80's and 90's is some part of the warming of that period, which would mean the warming of this period was certainly not all anthropogenic.

       I'm one of those skeptics who believes in an anthropogenic component to warming, but that the projections of future temperature rise have been exaggerated by the models. The information in this post points to a possible reason the models are "tuned" too hot; they have failed to account for the heat "burp" from the ocean in the '80's, and have based the warming in this period solely on radiative forcing and feedbacks to radiative forcing.

38511. michael sweet at 21:19 PM on 10 February 2014
       Warming oceans consistent with rising sea level & global energy imbalance
       

       Elmwood,

       You got the sign wrong.  The Bearing Sea is recording record warm temperatures this year.  The past couple of years were slightly cold, but that changed this year.  Perhaps it is due to natural variation.  See this graph (unfortunately it is only a one day graph, the NOAA web site was having some problem today with the longer term graphs).  This Canada Sea Ice graph (one week old), shows Barrow as 13C above average for a week (that is 23F for the whole week).  Can you provide data to support your wild claim of record cold?  It is record warm in all of Alaska.

38512. Kevin C at 20:19 PM on 10 February 2014
       Unprecedented trade wind strength is shifting global warming to the oceans, but for how much longer?
       

       As a protonope I find the second figure almost impossible to read. Here's a version with just the CGCM lines:

       

38513. scaddenp at 19:05 PM on 10 February 2014
       Warming oceans consistent with rising sea level & global energy imbalance
       

       Even if PDO stayed negative (highly unlikely given our understanding of ENSO), how does it create a negative feedback? If you draw a trendline through only the La Nina years, then you get trend pretty much same as average long term trend.

       The deep ocean can only absorb more heat if you can dream up a mechanism that will transport heat from surface to the deep somewhat faster than mechanisms at work today - and that would only be temporary. This would still result in sealevel rise (from expansion of water as it warms) and hasten the point at which oceans reach limit for absorbing CO2 and outgas CO2 (currently probably hundreds of years away).

38514. Elmwood at 18:51 PM on 10 February 2014
       Warming oceans consistent with rising sea level & global energy imbalance
       

       How do we know how long this negative PDO phase will last or what causes it? Maybe global warming has messed up the PDO cycles and has shifted them permanently negative, effectively creating a negative feedback to increasing global surface temperatures. The Bering Sea is experiencing unprecedented record cold temperatures. Couldn't the deep oceans absorb all the increased heating from future AGW?

38515. barry1487 at 18:20 PM on 10 February 2014
       Australia’s hottest year was no freak event: humans caused it
       

       Yes, I'm still monitoring. You've changed the subject.

       The page you directed me to sorts mean minimum, mean maximum, and others highs and lows for monthly/annual, but not mean temperatures.

       First place I looked was my home town, Sydney, at Observatory Hill, where I know temp records extend back to the mid 19th century.

       
       I checked mean minimum annual data. The last few decades are definitely the hottest.

       Then I checked mean maximum annual. Same story.

       So I checked the town where I was born, but made it a rural site to avoid any UHI contamination - Mt Barker weather station, which is remote from urban build up. Mean min and mean max - Mean max temps have increased very slightly (0.2C from 23-year periods earliest and latest in the record), but the minimum temps have increased by 1C.

       Those were the first two I looked at. I fully expect to find some locations where temperatures are hotter in the late 19th century than present. This will be true for many individual locations around the world. However, for the Australian record, data is too sparse back then to determine a national average. I would be curious about, though not convinced by, any attempts you know of that have simply averaged out the data available prior to the 20th century. While it wouldn't give much insight, it would be a step up from selecting a couple of stations.

       Why the change of topic?

38516. sidd at 14:50 PM on 10 February 2014
       2014 SkS Weekly News Roundup #6
       Re;Sea WallsThat is one race they will lose. Don't get me wrong, they will try very hard ... but they will lose.
38517. Klapper at 13:45 PM on 10 February 2014
       2013 was the second-hottest year on record without an El Niño
       

       @Kevin C #54:

       To further check my trend calculations, I found a link to UAH TLT data v5.6 at Roy Spencers site. However, that only allows me to analyze what Roy has prepackaged in the ascii file which is a column called SoPol, which is -60S not -70. However, comparing 5.6 to 5.5 versions of TLT I get no significant difference. So I don't think there is a big difference between my use of 5.5 and your use of 5.6.

       I think maybe a better test comparison for these noisy S70 data is a longer period than 16 years and close the latitude to -75S to capture the place where I think the TLT correlates with SAT the best, over the high plateau. I think you're going to find that the C&W dataset is still running too hot, at least the hybrid version. I know it already runs hot compared to the 30 year global trend for UAH, and I suspect it runs really hot in the places it purports to fill in SAT data holes.

38518. Klapper at 12:12 PM on 10 February 2014
       2013 was the second-hottest year on record without an El Niño
       

       @ Esop #55:

       What baseline are you using? The UAH v5.5 TLT only shows an anomaly of 0.53 against a baseline of the compete record.

38519. Klapper at 11:59 AM on 10 February 2014
       2013 was the second-hottest year on record without an El Niño
       

       @ #54 Kevin C:

       I can see I've been trumped on the Antarctic. I did I rolling 10, 15 and 20 year trends, which is a way to either optimize cherry picking or avoid it depending on how you use the results but didn't get your number of .58C/decade from UAH. Nor did using your exact time frame give the same number. However since I'm extracting data using the KNMI data explorer I have to use v5.5 not v5.6.

       Using v5.5, the numbers are not so close. UAH TLT 70S v5.5 gives only a warming rate of 0.45C/decade 1998 to 2012 inclusive which is below both your C&W trends, and significantly below the "hybrid" version. The rolling 15 year does give some high warming rates in the range of 0.6C/decade, but that was trends ending in 2007 and the warming rate south of 70 has been declining since.

       Without access to either C&W datasets (hopefully this will show up on KNMI data explorer) I can't comment on shorter or longer trends comparing TLT to C&W surface, however I certainly can comment on how sensitive 15 year trends are for this area. If I had picked a 15 year trend ending in September 2012 not December, the trend would be 0.27C/decade so I think 15 years for these kind of data are probably not enough.

       Which brings up the question of why you chose a 16 year period? Looking at your graph it appears the C&W data have been smoothed but the inflection point appears to be around 2000 for Antarctica for very steep warming

       As for your comment on the contamination of the TLT data by the surface, Roy Spencer recently did a post re: the record low Antarctica temperature and noted that actually the microwave emissivity is pretty constant from the surface in Antarctica (and much less of a challenge then areas with sea ice like the Arctic.

       In summary, you're not really answering the question of why a dataset which fills big holes is better than a dataset with actual data. Using the UAH v5.5 dataset I find at least the "hybrid" version of C&W appears to run hot for Antarctica.

38520. Esop at 10:18 AM on 10 February 2014
       2013 was the second-hottest year on record without an El Niño
       

       Klapper (#52):

       You might be right that the 0.6C figure for Antarctica is wrong.                           According to UAH, Antarctica was on average 1.2C warmer than normal during 2013, so 0.6C for the past 10 years could thus be too low. Good observation.

38521. Kevin C at 10:07 AM on 10 February 2014
       2013 was the second-hottest year on record without an El Niño
       

       Kapper@52: That assumes temporal homogeneity in the AMSU data, an assumption we are unwilling to make on the basis of the divergenece between UAH, RSS and STAR (also RSS doesn't cover Antarctica). Also you cannot assume that TLT temperatures reflect SATs at altitude because of surface contamination issues.

       So I have grave doubts about the validity of your test. However, for what it is worth, here are the trends on 1997/01-2012/12 for 90S-70S:

       •  UAH v5.6 0.581C/decade
       •  CW v2 krig 0.467C/decade
       •  CW v2 hybrid 0.699C/decade

       UAH falls almost exactly between these two reconstructions.

       Validation against independent data sources provides a far more challenging and informative test of the reconstructions - this is one of the things we are working on at the moment. I'm afraid the backlog of results to write up is rather long though.

38522. Ken in Oz at 08:53 AM on 10 February 2014
       Establishing consensus is vital for climate action
       

       Widespread agreement that the problem is serious and deserves community wide effort is a kind of prerequisite. I think we have seen a kind of 'commerce and business grass roots' opposition to action on climate because businesses weigh things up in terms of cost, competitiveness and profitability, not on the validity of the science.

        Because commerce and industry is the part of society that does stuff, it quite rightly deserves to have it's concerns taken seriously and , however PR, lobbying and tankthink are considered stock in trade means to influence public opinion as well as government policy, and these do not come with an innate ethical requirement for truth or balance; on the contrary they are about changing opinions in ways that are most beneficial in terms of costs, competitiveness and profitability.

       The problem is not necessarily the innate amorality of commerce and industry when it comes to promoting it's/their interests - that should be taken as given; minimising costs in order to maximise profits is normal and necessary. They will - even if reluctantly - operate within the regulatory framework that goverments set, even as they use the tools they have to influence the formulation of that framework. It's at governement level, in that formulation process, where the broader ethical decisions reach the branching decision point. It breaks down with those elected and appointed to positions of trust and responsibility to the community/polity as a whole, who duck and dodge that responsibility and give precedence to the obligations and agreements to those who support and vote for them over things like science based information and advice.

       To what extent political parties successfully 'frame' the climate issue and become part of the PR, tankthink process that changes public opinion, and to what extent they simply reflect the opinion that exists is always a question, but in this case I think we are seeing too much willingness within the political system to put those obligations to their 'partners' and backers and the stance they find most advantageous ahead of the greater obligation to be well informed, cognizant of the bigger picture for the broader constituency they act on behalf of.

38523. scaddenp at 07:26 AM on 10 February 2014
       2013 was the second-hottest year on record without an El Niño
       

       I haven't followed this closely, but I thought Loeb 2012 showed slight increase in cloudiness with increased TOA (and hence increased albedo), but that doesnt necessarily mean negative feedback. Dessler and Loeb 2013 show slight positive feedback from cloudiness. Either way, effect appears to be small.

38524. Klapper at 07:22 AM on 10 February 2014
       2013 was the second-hottest year on record without an El Niño
       

       @Kevin C #49:

       I studied Kriging in a 500 level geostatistics university course many years ago. It's a technique developed in South Africa to interpolate gold grades. It's certainly more sophisticated than inverse distance squared. However you would be crazy as an investor to think because you have interpolated your grade using kriging you can drill your exploration holes 1 kilometre apart.

       You didn't need to show me the graph for me to guess the C&W warming trend for the arctic was pretty extreme. However, I am surprised at the steep trend in the Antarctic for the last 10 year or 12 years. It looks like by the dark blue line it was warmed about 0.6C in the last 10 years. That seems wrong.

       You do have a good cross-check against it however. Due to the elevation of the continent, the TLT trend should be very close to the SAT trend since the TLT sampling zone overlaps the SAT zone. If the C&W warming trend is substantially above the TLT trend for either or both datasets (RSS or UAH) then it is probably wrong. Which begs the question: Why would you use C&W as opposed to the TLT sets for the last 34 years?

       After all having actual data should trump filling in gaps with interpolation techniques every time.

        

        

38525. Klapper at 06:15 AM on 10 February 2014
       2013 was the second-hottest year on record without an El Niño
       

       @ Tom Curtis #36:

       "...Therefore any widespread net change in surface temperatures would be expected to result in further changes in the same direction globally as a result of feedbacks..."

       Loeb et al 2012 pretty clearly shows that changes to net TOA radiation act as negative feedbacks to ENSO events, not positive.

38526. scaddenp at 04:57 AM on 10 February 2014
       2013 was the second-hottest year on record without an El Niño
       

       Michael. Not true. For details on this I highly recommend the series at Science of Doom on "Does Back Radiation warm the ocean" and the follow up.

38527. Bob Lacatena at 03:33 AM on 10 February 2014
       Establishing consensus is vital for climate action
       

       ubrew12,

       Part of the issue is that (1) nobody has the title "Climatologist, and (2) scientists don't look at things in such oversimplified terms.

       Dr. Daniel Nepstad studies the Amazon, and the extreme droughts that have threatened that region in the past decade.

       Dr. Jennifer Francis studies Arctic sea ice and environs.

       Dr. Andrew Dessler studies atmospheric water vapor.

       The list goes on and on.  They're not, individually, "climatologists," but they variously study different facets of climate change.  The point is not that if they all get together, they'll all agree on statement X about climate change.  The point is that Dr. Nepstad says something like "whoa, look down here at the Amazon, this is unusual and bad," while Dr. Francis says something like "hey, hold it, look up here in the Arctic, this is really bad," and Dr. Dessler says "yikes, look here in the atmosphere, this looks like everything else is going to get even worse."

       The consensus is not some simplistic agreement with a simple statement of fact.  The consensus is a culmination of thousands of investigations into thousands of branches of science, from measurements and observations of impacts to attributions of cause to the physics that both explains what we see and tries to predict what we will see.

       In the end, the consensus is neither (IMO) served by nor able to be represented by some simple statement and a poll as to its veracity.  The consensus is far more nuanced, multidimensional and deeper than that.

       And that is what people really need to understand, and is perhaps the real value of The Consensus Project.  Dismissives want to express everything as an either/or, and whittle it down to numbers they can argue about.  What TCP really shows is that the consensus permeates every field of modern science which even tangentially crosses into climate science.

       The consensus is so pervasive and complete that it is, at this point, irrefutable.

       As the original post says, we shouldn't even be discussing it.  It's there.  Arguing about how to clarify its existence is of tantamount importance in getting the debate to move from "if" to "what's next" and "what to do," but I don't think there's a much better way to do it than the methods which have already been tried.

       The results are in.  There are just a lot of people who refuse to accept them, and that's what needs to be changed.

38528. Kevin C at 03:11 AM on 10 February 2014
       2013 was the second-hottest year on record without an El Niño
       

       Klapper:

       The fact that the CW datasets (all versions, i.e. UAH, kriging or a new hybrid to be released this week) produce trends which diverge from HadCRUT4 from about 1998 is both expected, and in fact inevitable for any global temperature series. Take a look at this figure from GISS and you will see why:

       

       (Hint: Look at the Arctic and the Antarctic lines, the main regions missing from HadCRUT4.)

       You get the same result if you look at GISTEMP, UAH, NCEP/NCAR, ERA-i, or MERRA.

       The much more intriguing question is why our trends are higher than GISTEMP. We will be addressing that question in a month or two, and the answers are looking very interesting indeed.

38529. One Planet Only Forever at 02:30 AM on 10 February 2014
       2013 was the second-hottest year on record without an El Niño
       

       Klapper,

       I am aware that a warmer global surface generally means a higher rate of radiation emissions (but all feedbacks including added capture of energy due to more water vapour need to be considered). That is why the norm of the global average is trending up. It needs to reach a new balance norm with the higher rate of energy capture due to added greenhouse gases and feedback effects resulting from the added CO2 like added water vapour.

       As you note, and I am aware, when an El Nino is occurring the bump in the global average can send more heat out than is coming in, but it is only noise in the trend line of global average surface temperature. When the La Nina occurs, more heat energy gets captured into the oceans as the planet stores up more heat energy because the surface is not as warm, not emitting as much.

       As for the satellite data values of the troposphere, those are a completely different way of tracking the changes of energy of the planet. The NASA/GISS data set also show 2013 to be 'as warm as 1998'. The satellite values are not 'comparable to the global average surface temperature data set'. They are just another measure of things that is 'trending up' as expected. It is improper to claim that a difference between the satellite and surface data sets proves that one or the other is inaccurate. However, the clear difference of the HadCRUT4 with other surface data sets did ‘beg an explanation’.

       Which brings us to C&W. They pointed out the 'siginificant gap' in the method of determining global averages in the HadCRUT4 data (large areas of the planet are not accounted for leading to a presumption that the areas not accounted for are trending just like the areas that are accounted for...which they aren't). Their algorithm filled the gap in a rigorous manner that resulted in 'correcting' the 'global average' in the data set (producing what you refer to as ‘magic’), resulting in trends that were more in line with the other surface data sets. This shows how ‘using HadCRUT4 exclusively as the basis for the IPCC AR5 report statements about warming since the late 1990s' was not necessarily producing an accurate representation of the changes. This is not ‘magic’ it is science.

       These are indeed complicated issues to develop a clear understanding of, but it can be harder to develop the understanding if you are tempted to not want to ‘change your mind’ as you strive to better understand things. And on this issue there is a very powerful motivation for many people to ‘not want to change their mind’. Their desire to benefit more in their moment from the unsustainable and damaging burning fossil fuels becomes less acceptable as they better understand this issue.

38530. jsam at 02:26 AM on 10 February 2014
       The History of Climate Science
       

       Typo alert, "climatologist Hubert Lamb among others, that the uncertainties included a failure to explain previous temperture fluctuations". Temperture?

       Moderator Response:

       [DB] Fixed; thanks!

38531. mgardner at 01:41 AM on 10 February 2014
       2013 was the second-hottest year on record without an El Niño
       

       @46 Tom Curtis

       Tom,

       This may be more on topic on one of the strategy/tactics threads, but...

       I don't agree that a significant numbers of readers may become misinformed or confused by my leaving out details. I'm trying to demonstrate an approach to teaching-- one which requires that we listen more than we lecture. My 'target audience' is people who do know some of the details but may not be good at communicating basic concepts to those who are less educated. I thought that was a major thrust of the effort at SkS?

       Someone like topal may be sincere and willing to learn, or may be ideologically biased and just trolling, I don't know. But you have to engage in an actual dialogue to figure that out, and to figure out where to begin his education if the former. It is almost universally the case that performing a data dump of all you know is not where to begin.

       As for 'rebuttal' by deniers, I think their greatest weapon is exploiting the honesty of scientists, by conflating what is well established with the areas under exploration and debate--simply because long explanations appear equivocal even when they are not.

       So, with all due respect, I will continue to do my best when I feel I can contribute, and suffer any subsequent academic purity humiliation with good grace.

38532. Tom Curtis at 00:36 AM on 10 February 2014
       2013 was the second-hottest year on record without an El Niño
       

       mgardner @45, in public forums on the internet, you are never just talking to the person you directly address.  Rather, you are being read (in a popular and widely accessed blog like SkS) by a large number of other observers.  The little detail you left out may well be irrelevant to your discussion with Topal, but as you stated it was inaccurate.  Without correction the potential consequence is that a significant number of readers may become misinformed, or confused.

       For that reason, while I recognize the need for simplicity in language in communicating the gist of complex ideas, we should err on the side of accuracy rather than simplicity.  Also for the same reason, when we encounter an unfortunate turn of phrase or mistatement, we should correct it.  I also understand that that can be inconvenient, and even irritating at times.  Better that, however, than for a casual reader peaking up a false idea from SkS, only to have it rebutted by a denier, who thereby gains false credence.

38533. mgardner at 00:15 AM on 10 February 2014
       2013 was the second-hottest year on record without an El Niño
       

       tom curtis @36,

       Sorry, I missed your comment before I replied to klapper. You say:

       "However, for ENSO to work as a ratchet that elevates tempertures in the long term (rather than simply results in oscillations around the mean), the feedback response to temperature would need to be greater than 1, and would need to be higher for rises in temperature than for falls in temperature. Both are known not to be the case from past climates."
       
       As I pointed out to klapper, how is this information relevant to my interaction with topal? It seems clear that topal does believe that (it is being claimed that) ENSO somehow increases the long-term energy gain for the entire climate system.

       I don't mean to be argumentative or critical-- well, a little critical-- but the obsessive need to avoid correction from one's peers can interfere with providing information that matches the educational level of the person we are trying to educate.

       I'm not a specialist in this area, but I am well aware that ENSO has knock-on effects, and, exactly as you explain in what I quoted, that it doesn't matter much at all, in terms of the public debate. I enjoy reading and learning from interchanges by the real experts, but I don't think those are much use to people like topal. Sometimes, less is more.

38534. Michael Whittemore at 23:50 PM on 9 February 2014
       2013 was the second-hottest year on record without an El Niño
       

       Just a question regarding ocean warning. I read that due to the warning affect of extra greenhouse gases, the oceans don't release as much heat because of the thin water layer on the surface of the ocean. Does this mean that greenhouse gases can't warm the earth up very fast because ocean can only rise from short wave radiation? Also with increasing greenhouse gases will this mean that El Nino's will not release as much heat due to it being warmer in the atmosphere then in the ocean?

38535. mgardner at 22:43 PM on 9 February 2014
       2013 was the second-hottest year on record without an El Niño
       

       klapper@39

       I'm not convinced that your conclusion from Loeb is probative or even correct, but for the purpose here it isn't really relevant. My interest is in educating people who are getting the basic physics wrong, whether due to their own misconception or the efforts of denialists.

       Clearly, topal is far from the point of being able to formulate simple questions properly, so a debate at the margins of significance is hardly useful pedagogy, don't you think?

        

38536. Klapper at 14:42 PM on 9 February 2014
       2013 was the second-hottest year on record without an El Niño
       

       @#41 scanddenp:

       I know how C&W use the UAH dataset. Re-read the 1st sentence in the 2nd paragraph of my post.

       Over the long term the C&W dataset produces a warmer trend than either the source or target datasets it creates it's adjustment from. From 1979, the beginning of the satellite record, the C&W-adjusted HadCRUT4 is .17C/decade vs. .15C/decade for unadjusted HadCRUT4 and 0.14C/decade for UAH TLT (global trends).

       A little analysis shows where the magic of C&W comes from. In the early half of the satellite record (1979 to 1996, C&W mimics the trend of HadCRUT4 while UAH lags (.11 C&W vs. .11 HadCRUT4 vs. .03C/decade UAH). Then in the last half of the satellite record period, 1997 to 2013 it follows UAH which in this period is warming faster than HadCRUT4 (C&W = .11C/decade vs .05 HadCRUT4 vs .09 UAH).

       The C&W algorithm creates an opportunistic result. That doesn't mean it's wrong. However, we should investigate further why there is some kind of mode change 1/2 way through the record with the adjustment.

38537. ubrew12 at 14:10 PM on 9 February 2014
       Establishing consensus is vital for climate action
       

       Consensus has been proven in so many ways, but if its so important perhaps one more demonstration is needed (but it'll be expensive).  Go to every Climatologist, employed AS a Climatologist, in a particular nation (say, the U.S.), and ask them.  

       Ask three questions

       1) Do you think Global Warming is happening, leading to Climate Change?

       2) Do you think humans are primarily responsible for warming in the last century?

       3) Do you think humans are solely responsible for warming in the last century?

       Get everybody on record, no ifs, ands, or buts.

38538. Markoh at 13:28 PM on 9 February 2014
       Ocean Acidification Is Fatal To Fish
       

       Vonnegut.

       i have posted on 'How global warming is driving mass coral bleaching' which is where this thread should be moved to. I posted about www.sustainableoceans.com.au a company that has developed technology for relocating coral. It is an exciting technology that has already proven successful.

       Perhaps their technology could be used to relocate some Palau coral that has the low ph capability into areas where the coral is currently suffering from OA?

       Moderator Response:

       [JH] Vonnegut has recused himself from posting on SkS.

38539. blnelsonusa at 13:18 PM on 9 February 2014
       Newcomers, Start Here
       

       My go-to resource. Thanks guys. Y'all rock.

38540. Michael Whittemore at 11:49 AM on 9 February 2014
       Google Earth: how much has global warming raised temperatures near you?
       

       @scaddenp, I have to admit there is a lot to consider when looking at temperature records. Yes I want to find specific temperature graphs, in key areas, but I also just wanted a quick answer to these google earth temperature records. I have not looked into it and have finally got my laptop out of storage to actually use google earth, but I wanted to know if the graphs are reduced to show no warming from urban heat? I wonder because when considering your local regions climate, I don't think urban heat should be taken out, or at least have an option to see the difference.
       

       Moderator Response:

       [DB] Global bold usage removed.

38541. scaddenp at 11:27 AM on 9 February 2014
       2013 was the second-hottest year on record without an El Niño
       

       I dont think you are understanding how C&W use UAH. What is obvious when you overlay the surface temperature record with the satellite lower troposphere, is that UAH has much stronger response to ENSO that than any surface record. Therefore you do not expect neutral 2013 to top an extemely strong El Nino in 1998 in UAH. However C&W do not use UAH measurement to replace missing data, but instead use the relationship between UAH and surface records to infill the surface record.

38542. Klapper at 11:14 AM on 9 February 2014
       2013 was the second-hottest year on record without an El Niño
       

       "...What's also interesting is that despite being a Neutral year, 2013 was hotter than 1998.."

       Only in the Cowtan and Way dataset. This is not true in any of the other atmospheric datasets. It is definitely not true in the datasets with the best spatial coverage, RSS and UAH TLT. The satellite data shows 2013 is 2/10's off of 1998 in the UAH TLT dataset and 3/10's lower in the RSS dataset.
       

       This is significant in that Cowtan and Way use the relationship between surface air temperature and the lower troposphere to help fill the big spatial holes in the instrument network, especially in the Arctic. However, while the adjusted version of HadCRUT4 shows 2013 to be warmer than 1998, UAH, the source of the adjustments clearly does not.
       

       
       

       
       

38543. Klapper at 10:48 AM on 9 February 2014
       2013 was the second-hottest year on record without an El Niño
       

       @ #35 mgardner:

       @ #38 One Planet:

       "...However, El Nino doesn't add any energy to the climate system as a whole ('the planet')...."

       "...As others have pointed out an ENSO or El Nino event does not 'add energy to the global system'...."

       ENSO can change global heat content. Read Loeb et al 2012. Net global TOA radiative imbalance on a monthly basis can spike +/- 2Wm2 based on the state of ENSO, and can average +/- 0.5 W/m2 over the period of a year. However the imbalance is the opposite of what you might think. The planet is losing heat during an El Nino and gaining it during a La Nina (which I'm sure shows in in the ocean).
       

       Since the posters here like the metric "Hiroshimas per second", I'll convert the La Nina between the start of 2008 and early 2009 from Loeb Figure 2, which shows a global TOA measured energy imbalance of about 0.4W/m2 (heat gain). Convert global to ocean and you have a heat gain of about 3 hiroshimas per second thanks to La Nina over the 1 and 1/2 year period or so.
       

       
       

38544. One Planet Only Forever at 09:31 AM on 9 February 2014
       2013 was the second-hottest year on record without an El Niño
       

       Topal,

       As others have pointed out an ENSO or El Nino event does not 'add energy to the global system'. It only ceates a short term global average surface temperature that is higher than the 'norm' (the norm being the average trend line of global average surface temperature - or the line created by a long average of temperatures like 20 or 30 year averages which can be created for each new month of new data).

       So the period since the extremely strong ENSO event of 1997/98 has 'appeared to indicate a slower rate of warming in the global average surface temperarure record. There have been El Nino events since 1997/98 but they have not produced the magnitude of bump of global average that the 1997/98 event produced.

       If you are wondering about recent reports that 'strong El Ninos are expected to be more frequent', that would be the expectation of a more energetic global climate system and the pattern  of global warming that is occurring (more polar warming). The strong El Nino events in the NOAA ONI history (linked to in my earlier post), occurred in 1972/73, 1982/83, 1997/98. These stronger events would be expected to occur more frequently in a warmed planet (our planet with more energy in the surface climate system).

       However, it is not just the strength of the ONI (or El Nino), that matters. The Southern Oscillation occurring with the El NIno (the ENSO), and the relative timing and magnitudes of the combined conditions will affect the magnitude of the temporary bump of global average surface temperature warming.

       The main point remains. Human activity is leading to more energy in the global climate system. This can be seen in many things like the global average surface warming to rebalance the rate of its energy emissions with the higher captured/trapped incoming energy (the higher capture being due to increased greenhouse gases in the atmosphere which are mainly due to human activity and additive feedback responses to that human activity - such as less surface ice reflecting incoming solar radiation). The continued increase of global average surface temperature since the very significant ENSO event of 1997/98 (combined with very little volcanic dimming in the same time period), will clearly become more difficult to claim isn't occurring when the next significant ENSO event occurs. The current ENSO conditions are on the La Nina side of neutral (the cooling from the norm side) and yet the global average for 2013 nearly matches the significantly ENSO bumped 1998.

38545. HK at 08:15 AM on 9 February 2014
       2013 was the second-hottest year on record without an El Niño
       

       Esop #2, 26, 28

       I agree completely!
       If the surface temperature trend between 1975 and 2000 had continued for the last 14 years we might have seen at least some action in stead of just talk, talk and more talk from the politicians. It’s bad enough that we now have a climate denier party in the Norwegian government, but the effort from the last government led by the Labour party wasn’t particularly impressive either.

       BTW, the average temperature in Longyearbyen, Svalbard, for the last 30 days is now 13.6^oC above normal, though the forecast predicts somewhat colder weather towards the end of next week. In fact, February will very likely become the 39^th consecutive month that is warmer than normal in Longyearbyen!

38546. Tom Curtis at 07:49 AM on 9 February 2014
       2013 was the second-hottest year on record without an El Niño
       

       mgardner @35, ENSO warms (or cools with La Ninas) the planet more than would be expected just by adding the warming or cooling of the tropical Pacific to the global average.  Further, the maximum warming (or cooling) of the planet from ENSO is experienced approximately 6 months after the maximum warming (or cooling) of the tropical Pacific associated with ENSO fluctuations.

       In a way that is unsurprising.  Temperature feedbacks are feedbacks on changes in surface temperatures.  Therefore any widespread net change in surface temperatures would be expected to result in further changes in the same direction globally as a result of feedbacks.  If that were not the case, climate sensitivity would be very low.  As it happens, it is not low, and the ENSO effect on global temperatures is one of the pieces of evidence that that is the case.  However, for ENSO to work as a ratchet that elevates tempertures in the long term (rather than simply results in oscillations around the mean), the feedback response to temperature would need to be greater than 1, and would need to be higher for rises in temperature than for falls in temperature.  Both are known not to be the case from past climates.  

38547. scaddenp at 05:57 AM on 9 February 2014
       Google Earth: how much has global warming raised temperatures near you?
       

       Michael, the data you need will depend very much on what your purpose is. These datasets are for assessing climate change. To be useful for that purpose, you have to have data that is comparable with past records and comparable with other stations. To do this, you have to make adjustments to account for change of instruments, screens, site location, time of observation, change in environment (urban heat effect), etc etc. The procedures and papers relating to these adjustments is very well documented at each data sets source. You might like to at USHCN or GISS for details. The data sets usually have the unadjusted data as well so you can compare.

       Of course the BEST project assumed they had done it all wrong and with fossil fuel money set out to do different. Funnily enough they got same answer. They also provide their data and methods - see here. There are other useful links on the page I linked to above.  Tamino and Realclimate both have links to the major data sources on their home page. Be sure to read the associated documentation to see whether it is fit for your purpose.

38548. william5331 at 05:34 AM on 9 February 2014
       Establishing consensus is vital for climate action
       

       The only way we are going to get consensus is if we are bludgeoned into it by a series of events that make Sandy and Katrina look like summer breezes.  A failure of Northern Hemisphere crops for a year might do it.

38549. mgardner at 05:14 AM on 9 February 2014
       2013 was the second-hottest year on record without an El Niño
       

       topal@32

       You appear to be ignoring my comment @19, so I refer you to it again.

       When you say "Agreed. And it [El Nino] will inevitably warm the planet.", you are incorrect.

       ENSO will not "warm the planet". El Nino will cause the MST to be higher, because it will increase SST (sea surface temp) where it occurs, and that will be part of the computation of average temperature for the entire surface of the planet.

       However, El Nino doesn't add any energy to the climate system as a whole ('the planet').

       If you are serious about learning how this works, you have to distinguish between:

       1) An increase in *one* temperature measurement

       and

       2) An increase in the total energy of the system.

       Why don't you try asking your questions without that ambiguous use of the term "warm"; it will make things clearer.

38550. Composer99 at 04:54 AM on 9 February 2014
       2014 SkS Weekly News Roundup #6
       

       The hyperlink for "How to convince your friends to believe in climate change" is broken.

       Moderator Response:

       [DB] Fixed, thanks!

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